penetrates her vaginally and an ally with a foreign object, she can't
tell what. The doctors say it was probably some kind of stick they
found splinters. Anyway, they left the parking lot and got onto 1-84
going east. She remembers passing signs to the airport. After they
stopped we're guessing they were out by Multnomah Falls at this point
Suspect One tells Suspect Two to take a turn at her. She thinks he
penetrated her vaginally and remembers Suspect One telling him to
finish off in her mouth. Her memory of what happened toward the end
was pretty hazy. She also thinks they must've taken her purse, because
she had it with her when they pulled her in the car."
I felt sick. It's bad enough that people like these men walk on the
same planet as the rest of us. The fact that they manage to find one
another and work together is utterly terrifying.
"Could she describe the suspects?"
Ray Johnson nodded. "Nothing helpful, just that she'd know them if she
saw them again. We figure it's a long shot but go ahead and pull some
mug shots off X-Imaging of guys on supervision for child sods and
stranger-to-stranger rapes."
One of PPB's newest toys, X-Imaging is a computerized data system that
stores all booking photos taken in the state.
By using the computer to select booking photos corresponding to certain
MOs, an officer is more likely to get a successful identification from
a witness than by dumping several hundred booking photos in front of
her. I could tell from Johnson's voice that in this case, the strategy
had hit pay dirt.
"She's flipping through the printouts and hones right in on one guy,
Frank Derringer. I swear, it was one of the best mug-shot IDs I've
ever seen. I mean, you've seen how it goes; with that many pictures,
most wits start to get confused. This girl is just flipping through
'em left and right and then barn! she nails it. One hundred percent
certain. "That's him," she said. Pointed right at Derringer's mug."
Johnson was getting excited now. "We get even more worked up when we
see that Derringer's the guy we pulled who was just paroled last summer
on an attempted sod of a fifteen-year-old girl. Unfortunately for
Derringer, this girl had just started a kick boxing class. As he was
pushing her down, she popped up and landed a roundhouse kick straight
to his Adam's apple and got away. He only served a year because it was
an attempt, but it shows the guy's got it in him.
"We called O'Donnell at that point and told him what we had. He gives
us the OK to pick up Derringer. We picked him up last night around
seven. His parole officer, Dave Renshaw, went out there with us. The
plan was to arrest Derringer on a parole violation for having
unsupervised contact with a minor child, then write paper to search the
apartment."
I interrupted. "Does Derringer have any cars registered to him?"
Johnson nodded. "That would've been too easy. We ran him. Only car
registered to him is an 'eighty-two Ford Escort.
It was his associated vehicle until a couple years ago, probably when
he went to the pen. Since then, it comes up as associated with one of
Derringer's pals. Guy's gotten three DUIs in two years in that same
car."
"You know how these guys are," Walker said. "They sell their pieces of
junk to each other and never bother notifying DMV."
"So, is that all you had when you went out to the house? The
victim's
ID?"
Walker appeared to share my frustration. "Yeah, that's about it, but I
don't know what more we could've gotten before we went out. They did a
rape kit at the hospital, but, according to the victim's version,
there's probably no semen to get a sample from. Derringer never did
her. Even if the other guy left behind some pre-ejaculatory liquid or
they get something from the oral swab, it can take about a week for a
PCR analysis."
"What about blood?" If the victim drew any blood fighting, the
hospital could identify the blood type in a matter of minutes.
Johnson shook his head. "Nah. The vie was too doped up to put up a
fight, so she didn't have any evidence under her fingernails or draw
any blood from them. We did have a couple things to corroborate her
story. As luck would have it, Calabrese found the victim's purse in a
trash can by the road about a half mile from where they dropped her. He
and Forbes were thinking the bad guys maybe dumped the stick on the way
out. Good thinking, but no luck. But finding the purse showed that
Martin was remembering at least some details accurately."
My face must have revealed my skepticism. "I don't want to sound like
I've made up my mind, but that's pretty weak corroboration, Detective.
It just shows Kendra was robbed; it doesn't say anything about who did
this to her. Were there any prints on the purse?"
"We don't know yet. We've got it down at the lab being looked at with
the rest of the girl's clothes."
"OK, so what you guys are telling me is that, at least so far, this
case turns entirely on Kendra Martin's identification of Derringer. Do
we all agree on that?"
They all nodded.
"So when you went out to Derringer's apartment with his PO, did this
case manage to get any better?"
The second the words came out, I regretted them. Seasoned cops like
Jack Walker and Raymond Johnson no doubt were well aware of the
differences between their approach and a district attorney's. Cops
just need to make the arrest. The DA is the one who has to prove the
case to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt afterward, who has to deal
with a defense attorney gnawing at every argument and challenging every
piece of evidence. Trying a weak case can feel like getting poked in
the eye for two weeks.
Cops learn to live with the difference in perspective. But they don't
like being talked down to. And I was pretty sure I had done just
that.
"No confession, if that's what you're looking for. Damn it, Garcia, I
thought you said this girl was willing to try a close case. We're not
even done giving her the facts, and she's already shutting us down."
Jack Walker was clearly pissed off.
I chalked up the "girl" comment to generational differences and
swallowed my pride. No use alienating these guys over a careless
comment, even one that irritated the hell out of me.
"Detective, I'm sorry if my tone suggested that I was criticizing your
investigation, but to be honest I'm a little frustrated by what I am
beginning to perceive as an attempt to portray the evidence as stronger
than it really is. Look, if the case is a real dog, I'll figure that
out, whether or not you lead it to me barking. If it's a gimme, I'll
notice that too. But I want to decide on my own. With that said, I
apologize for my smart-ass comment. I should have said exactly what I
was thinking, and now I have. I hope you haven't made up your mind
about me, just as I haven't formed a final decision about your case."
The table was quiet as Garcia and Johnson waited t
o see if I had
managed to make things worse. Then Jack Walker shook his head and
smiled. "Well, that was definitely direct. And you're right. I guess
we were kind of hyping the case up a little." He glanced over at
Johnson, not so much with a look of blame as like a child who peeks
over at his partner-in-mischief when he realizes the teacher has
figured them out but good.
Walker then looked directly at me, and I could tell we'd entered a
spin-free zone. "Look, the truth is, the biggest thing we've got right
now is the girl's ID of Derringer. Derringer denied everything. He
says he was over at his brother's watching a basketball game and then
stayed for Saturday Night Live and some beers. The brother's name is
Derrick Derringer, if you can believe it. Anyway, so far Derrick's
corroborating his brother, but he's got three felony convictions, so
there you go."
"So did you arrest Derringer at his house?" I asked.
Walker shook his head. "Not us. Renshaw hooked Derringer up on a
parole violation based on Kendra's ID and took him down to the Justice
Center for booking. We figured the parole detainer would at least hold
him overnight, when O'Donnell could decide what charges to file." "And
what did O'Donnell make of all this?" Detective Walker slumped back in
his chair, the excitement draining from his face. "That's where this
whole thing fell apart on us. After we had Derringer hooked up, we
went back to central to meet Chuck and Mike. They had finished
processing the scene and were working on the warrant. Just as we're
finishing up, O'Donnell shows up in a fucking suit to review the
warrant. He's reading it, just nodding the whole time, not saying
squat. Then he says, "What about this girl?" So Ray and I explain how
she started out like a pill but then was a complete ten on the ID.
O'Donnell didn't like it; said the case rested entirely on the girl.
Then he asks whether we've run her."
"You'd finished the warrant and still hadn't run her?" Walker pursed
his lips and shook his head. "I know, we fucked up. We'd been up all
night, running around. We assumed she was straight up when she picked
a sick fuck like Derringer. We forgot about running her. It was a
rookie mistake."
Johnson continued with the bad news. When they ran the victim, they
found a few runaway reports and an arrest for loitering to solicit.
Worse, the cop who made the loitering pop found a syringe in the girl's
purse with heroin residue on it. Furious that the detectives had
miscalculated their victim, O'Donnell had tried to bully her into
coming clean, but his tough approach only made her dig her heels in
deeper.
Walker had to smooth things over with her, and she eventually admitted
to a nine-month heroin habit that she worked the streets to support.
"So it's basically a trick gone bad?" I asked.
"No," Walker said. "At least we don't think so. She admits she was
walking Old Town, looking for a trick. She'd just finished one up and
had scored some horse on the street. She figured she'd keep working
while she was high. Anyway, these two guys pull up and offer her fifty
bucks if they can high-five her."
"OK, I've been working vice a few years now, but I still don't know
what a high five is."
I knew it had to be bad when Walker and Johnson looked to Garcia for
help and raised their eyebrows. Garcia averted his eyes while he told
me. "It's when a girl gets on all fours and one guy does her from
behind while she blows the other one." I was about to ask why the hell
it was called a high five until I got a mental image of two naked guys
on their knees giving each other a high five.
I rolled my eyes in disgust. "So they ask her to work for both of
them, basically, and she goes with them?"
Walker eagerly accepted the invitation to change the subject. "Not
according to her. She says she told them to meet her in the parking
lot of the motel at Third and Alder. She rents a room there when she
works. She assumes they've got a deal and starts walking to the hotel.
That's when Derringer pulls her into the backseat.
"The rest of it happened pretty much like she said originally. When
the car was stopped and Derringer was undoing his pants, she tried
getting out but the guy in front pushed her back in. They told her she
wasn't going anywhere and she may as well shoot up what was left in her
purse, so she did. Thing is, she says it never dawned on her they were
gonna kill her until Derringer started to choke her out. But, my
thinking is, she knew it at some level when they pulled her back into
the car. She was just trying to get it over with. She said she
injected so much horse, the assault didn't hurt that bad, and this guy
really worked her over."
Ray Johnson shook his head. "Man, you should've seen O'Donnell. I
don't know if you guys are tight, but he can be one tight-sphinctered
obligation to be 'cautious wielding the stern hand of the law." "
Johnson's nerdy white guy impersonation pretty much nailed Tim
O'Donnell.
"Anyway, it was bullshit," he continued. "O'Donnell had us clean up
the warrant to include the new information and then signed off on it,
saying he was gonna kick it out of major crimes territory if we didn't
find anything that changed his mind. We found some porn, but nothing
damning. So, he's planning on filing it today as an Assault Three and
assigning it to precinct detectives for general follow-up before grand
jury."
I couldn't believe it. All you had to prove for assault in the third
degree was that two or more defendants acted together to injure another
person. It didn't begin to portray the savage acts that had been
committed against Kendra Martin.
"Assault Three? That's it?" I said.
Johnson nodded. "I know, ridiculous. He says the ID's weak, plus the
defense can say the whole thing was a consensual trick, that the girl
cried rape so her mom wouldn't find out she was turning tricks for
smack. Said he was only issuing the assault because of Derringer's
prior. He basically called the girl a piece of trash."
"And you guys don't think she is. You think she's telling the
truth?"
Walker looked at me and tilted his head slightly. "Ms. Kincaid, I
really do. It's almost in her favor that she lied to us at first.
Shows she still knows that working's shameful, not just a
matter-of-fact thing to her. Maybe that logic doesn't make any sense
to you, but I think she's basically still a pretty good kid. We pissed
O'Donnell off by not reading the case right, but he's taking it out on
the case, and this Derringer dirtbag is going to get the benefit."
"I agree that Derringer needs to be done, but I'm not sure how I can
help you."
I wasn't surprised that Sergeant Garcia had a suggestion. He had the
respect of his fellow officers because he was a smart cop and a good
guy. In a bureau where most black and Latino officers stall out at
the
front line of street-level enforcement, administrative staff promoted
him because he had a political savvy so smooth that its targets never
even knew they'd been had.
"The way I see it, this girl could be a good link for Vice. She's
young and probably knows a circle of working girls we don't have access
to. If we can earn her trust, she might be able to lead us to some of
the pimps we haven't been able to latch on to, the guys who are turning
out the real young ones.
"I'll call O'Donnell like I don't know much about the case but think it
might have potential with Vice, then ask if he minds me getting MCT's
OK to approach the vie as a potential informant. At that point I can
sell him on letting a DVD attorney take the case, so they have a head
start if the vie winds up developing other contacts for us. And then
I'll seal the deal. "Unless," I'll say, 'you want to keep the case
yourself and help me flip any vice contacts I work." "
Johnson was impressed. "Tommy, my man, you oughta run for president.
That is slick. You in, Kincaid?"
"I don't mind taking the case, but here's the problem: it still needs
major help. The rape kit's not back, the victim's clothes are still at
the lab, Derringer's alibi needs work, and we still don't have the
driver. If this case is filed as an Assault Three, it's outside MCT
jurisdiction. You know the precinct detectives aren't going to do the
follow-up that's needed."
Garcia was a step ahead of me. "I'll make another call to O'Donnell,
telling him that you want to file the case as a major crime so MCT can
keep working on it, but that MCT understands it might get bumped back