by Rich Curtin
His fundamental assumption was that the two cases were linked in a way he could not now see. Both men were rockhounds and belonged to the same club, but that was only a loose, superficial connection. He needed to determine if there was a stronger, personal link between the two men. He’d pursued the Webb case as far as he could without making much real progress. Now it made sense to start at the other end of the presumed linkage and see if he could work backwards from the Upton case to the Webb case. If the linkage theory was correct, he figured, investigating the Upton case might suggest useful ideas in breaking the Webb case.
The first thing he noticed in the Upton case file was that Deputy Sheriff Dave Tibbetts had assisted the sheriff in her investigation. Rivera was glad to see that. He could pick Tibbetts’s brain about what had taken place during the investigation without bothering the sheriff. Rivera had worked with Tibbetts on several cases over the past five years. He was young and had limited investigative experience, but he was smart and diligent.
Rivera extracted a photograph of Frank Upton from the file. It had been taken a few years before his death. He was tan and bald with a trim, dark beard and sharp features. His black eyebrows slanted down toward the bridge of his nose, and his dark eyes looked back at Rivera with a baleful stare. The corners of his mouth were turned downward in what Rivera surmised was a perpetual frown. It looked like an unhappy, almost threatening face, the kind one would tend to steer clear of.
Rivera read the bio the sheriff had assembled during her investigation. The information was compiled from public records, employment files, and an interview with Upton’s neighbor, a lady who had found the body and called it in. Upton was fifty-two years old and had spent his entire life in Moab. He graduated from Grand County High School and dropped out of Utah State University in his freshman year. He held various jobs during his lifetime but didn’t seem to stick with any particular career path. For twelve years, he was a truck driver making local deliveries for United Parcel Service. Later, he became a heavy equipment operator for a road building contractor. After that, he worked for the Steadman Company, an environmental outfit with contracts from the Bureau of Land Management for collecting and analyzing water and soil samples from select sites on the Colorado Plateau.
Upton had a reputation as a loner, according to his former employers. He tended to avoid social contact and spent most of his time alone. He’d never been married. When he was forty-five, he’d inherited from an uncle a little over two hundred thousand dollars and a modest house in the LaSal Mountains. The house was on a gravel road in a small community of homes just off the Castleton-Gateway Road. Upton moved into the house, quit working, and spent much of his time protesting the proposed expansion of subdivisions in Spanish Valley and the construction of new motels in town. Some described him as an environmentalist in the tradition of Edward Abbey; others described him as a nuisance. His efforts to raise public awareness of the environmental impact of further expansion in Spanish Valley seemed directed solely at Arthur Atkinson, a real estate developer who had built several successful subdivisions in the Moab area. Atkinson’s new subdivision was called Whisper Breeze and it was awaiting approval by the county authorities. Upton’s activities had represented a significant impediment to that approval.
Rivera scanned the Medical Examiner’s preliminary report prepared by Devlin. The cause of death was two shots in the back of the head from a 9-millimeter handgun. Ballistics testing showed that the bullets had been fired from a Glock 17 owned by Arthur Atkinson. The gun was found in the center console of Atkinson’s Jeep with his fingerprints on it. Upton’s body had been shipped to Salt Lake City so the State Medical Examiner could perform a final autopsy as required by Utah law.
Rivera pulled a set of crime scene photographs from an envelope in the file. Several showed the body slumped in an armchair, and others showed various shots of the interior of the house. The armchair backed up against a living room window which was open at the time of the shooting. This allowed the shooter to stand outside the house directly behind his target. The bullets were fired at close range as powder burns were found on the back of the chair and the back of Upton’s head. The photos included shots of two 9-millimeter shell casings lying on the stone patio just outside the window.
In the evidence container were the victim’s clothing, shoes, and clear evidence bags containing the items removed from his pockets. Rivera examined them and saw nothing unusual. Four small bags contained the two 9-millimeter bullets which had been removed from the victim’s skull during the autopsy and the two shell casings found on the patio. In another bag was a small book with light-blue padded covers. He put on a pair of latex gloves and removed the book from the bag. It was a diary for the current year, one page for each day. Rivera riffled through it. It had an entry for January first and each day thereafter up until the day before Upton’s murder.
Rivera sat back, hoisted his feet onto his desk, and began reading. Each entry was succinct and highlighted Upton’s activities for that day. In some entries, he wrote about his feelings, but most were simply a chronology of his activities for the day. Many entries related to his activities opposing further real estate development in the Moab area.
Rivera read each page. In late January, Upton had recorded an event he described as frightening. Arthur Atkinson had encountered him on Spanish Valley Drive one morning. Upton was stapling onto a telephone pole a handbill opposing the approval of Atkinson’s Whisper Breeze subdivision. Atkinson pulled to a stop in his Jeep and began threatening Upton. He reached into the center console, pulled out a handgun, and pointed it at Upton. He warned him not to obstruct his business ever again or there would be dire consequences. Then he drove off.
The day after that, Upton noted in his diary a redoubling of his efforts to save Moab from the kind of growth that would kill the things that everyone loved about Moab—its small town feeling, its mining town history, the old buildings in the downtown area, and its locally-owned businesses. He spent the next day marching up and down Main Street with a placard that read Stop Killing Moab with an enlarged photo of a traffic jam on it. A few days later, he wrote about how disgusted he was about the influx of businesses owned by national chains, especially motels. He was horrified that there was even talk about the city constructing a parking garage downtown.
On one day in February and another in March, two more direct encounters with Atkinson were recorded. In the first, Atkinson used threatening words; in the second, he again pointed his handgun at Upton. On two different days in April, Atkinson had come upon Upton tacking up protest notices. He’d stopped, lowered the window of his vehicle, displayed an angry face, and pointed his handgun at Upton. On one of those occasions, he pointed the gun at Upton for nearly thirty seconds and mouthed the word Bang repeatedly. In early May, someone had driven past Upton’s cabin in the mountains and fired a shot at his house. Upton again mentioned that he feared for his life but stated that he was undaunted and had no intention of backing off. He noted in the diary that he didn’t report the incident because Atkinson was a popular and powerful man in Grand County and was politically well-connected. Upton wrote that he was sure no one important would have taken his word for it.
Rivera finished reading the diary and put it back in the evidence bag. The sheriff was right—the Upton murder looked like an open and shut case. Maybe the rockhounding connection between Iggy Webb and Frank Upton was just a coincidence. If that were the case, no doubt the sheriff would be relieved.
The case file also contained a two-year-old feature article about Arthur Atkinson which had appeared in The Times-Independent, Moab’s local newspaper. Atkinson was a local boy who had made good. He’d graduated from Grand County High School at the top of his class, was class president and valedictorian, and was captain of the football team. He was voted most likely to succeed. After high school, he attended Stanford University where he earned a degree in business. There was a formal promotional photo of Atkinson in the file. He was blond with a ha
ndsome face, a strong jaw, and a winning smile. The file noted that he was divorced and had no children.
Rivera closed the case file and the evidence container and returned them to the evidence locker. It seemed almost certain that Atkinson was the guilty party, but Rivera couldn’t get the rockhound connection out of his mind.
14
RIVERA DECIDED TO pay Dave Tibbetts a visit to get his perspective on the investigation. He walked down the hall to Tibbetts’s office and closed the door behind him. Tibbetts was reading through a thick sheaf of documents and looked bored. He was in his late twenties with thinning blond hair and blue-gray eyes. On the walls of his office hung several photographs of the deputies’ baseball team. Tibbetts had been elected team captain since he had played ball in college. A single tournament trophy sat on top of his bookshelves, a tribute to the time four years ago when the team had managed to win the finals for Grand County.
“Dave, I’ve been reviewing the Frank Upton case file and saw that you assisted Sheriff Anderson with the investigation.”
“That’s right. There wasn’t a whole lot of investigating to do. Atkinson’s gun was the murder weapon, and he had a strong motive. Upton was trying to ruin his business.”
“Could you fill me in on the investigation?”
“Sure. The lady that lives across the road from Upton heard a couple of shots late one night. She figured Upton was shooting at the raccoons that had been trying to chew through his roof and build a home in his attic. The next morning, she went to Upton’s place to inquire if he’d gotten rid of the pests and saw Upton’s body through the window. She called it in. The sheriff and I went out to investigate. While searching the premises, we found Upton’s diary on his desk and read through it. Based on several of the entries regarding Atkinson’s threats, we secured a search warrant for Atkinson’s home and vehicles. We found the handgun he kept in his Jeep. Ballistics testing proved it to be a match for the bullets that killed Upton. His prints and no one else’s were on the gun. And Atkinson had a motive. Upton was trying to stop his real estate deal. Case closed. It only took three days.”
“No chance of an error?”
Tibbetts hesitated before answering. “Well, just between you and me, I did think the sheriff moved pretty fast on this one. She probably should have waited for you to return. Or called you back from leave.” He glanced toward the open doorway and lowered his voice to a whisper. “Maybe she wanted a feather in her cap before election day.”
“Did you verify that the handwriting in the diary was Upton’s?”
“Yes, we had an expert compare it to samples of his writing on job application forms on file at the Steadman Company.”
“Did you know that Upton was a rockhound?”
“Huh? No, I didn’t. Why is that important?”
“Iggy Webb was also a rockhound.”
“There were some beautiful rock specimens in Upton’s house, but I didn’t know he was a rockhound. In any case, the rocks didn’t seem particularly relevant to our investigation. I just assumed he’d bought them somewhere.”
Rivera sat down in the visitor’s chair. “Dave, you know how I am about coincidences. Two rockhounds belonging to the same club are murdered in a small town just days apart. Makes me think there’s a connection.”
“Right, but remember, when we performed our investigation, there was only one murder. There was no reason to place any importance on the rocks in Upton’s house.”
“That’s true. But now that we know about the connection, I think it needs to be investigated further.”
“You think we might have made a mistake?”
“Probably not, but I need to dig into this a little more. If it turns out there’s a connection, understanding the connection might help me solve the Webb case.”
“I don’t see how Upton’s murder could be anything but vengeance delivered by a frustrated, infuriated Atkinson. I mean, we have the murder weapon with his prints all over it. What else do you need?”
“I know, but the rockhound business is a loose end I need to learn more about.”
A smile slowly appeared on Tibbetts’s face. “C’mon Manny, can you think of another possible explanation of why Upton was murdered?”
“Not offhand, Dave, but that’s not the way I work. Just because I can’t think of another reason why he was killed isn’t sufficient to make me accept the prevailing theory.”
“Jeez, Manny, sometimes I wonder how your brain works. The evidence is staring you right in the face.”
“Doesn’t the coincidence of time and place of the two murders make you wonder about a connection?”
“Well, sure, there may be a connection, but the Upton case is clear. Atkinson killed Upton.”
“Look Dave, just humor me. How about coming with me to the Upton place and let’s take a fresh look at everything.”
Tibbetts laughed. “Sure, Manny, let’s go. I wouldn’t mind leaving all this paperwork and getting some fresh air.”
15
RIVERA DROVE INTO the LaSal Mountains with Tibbetts riding in the passenger seat. The young deputy was describing in detail how the investigation had been conducted, the layout of the house, where the body was found, and the diary they found on the desk. They wound their way up the gravel Castleton-Gateway Road, passing through pinyon pines and junipers at the lower altitudes, then scrub oaks and aspens higher up, and finally the beginnings of the spruce forest. Just past the Fisher Valley overlook, Rivera turned right onto a nameless gravel road. It led to a section of private land where years ago a dozen widely separated houses and cabins had been built.
A quarter mile later, Tibbetts pointed to the right. “There it is. That’s the Upton place.”
Rivera pulled to a stop in front of a small house with walls constructed of spruce logs and a roof covered with green asphalt shingles. A pair of weathered elk antlers was mounted over the front door which was now draped with yellow crime scene tape. A rock chimney rose on one side of the structure, and an old Toyota 4Runner was parked in the gravel driveway. The house sat in the shade of towering spruce trees covering the entire lot. The structure looked like it had been built a century ago, perhaps by someone who lived in Moab and wanted a place in the mountains to escape the summer heat. Across the road, set back in the woods, was a large rock house with a metal roof.
Tibbetts pointed to the rock house. “That’s where Annette Benson lives. She’s the neighbor who found Upton’s body and called it in. Her husband is a forest ranger. They have a young son who has some mental challenges, and she’s expecting a second child.”
Rivera pointed to the 4Runner in Upton’s driveway. “Is that Upton’s vehicle?”
“Yeah. I searched through it. Just the usual stuff. I didn’t see anything relevant to the case except a few Save Spanish Valley posters.”
“Well, let’s take a look inside the house.”
They ducked under the crime scene tape, unlocked the front door, and entered. Upton’s home consisted of a living room, a kitchen, a bathroom, and two small bedrooms. The living room was furnished with a couch, a coffee table, two stuffed chairs with side tables, two straight-back chairs, a television, a desk, and a set of shelves containing books and a collection of colorful rocks. The wooden floor was covered with a faded, well-worn rug. One of the stuffed chairs was stained with blood, now blackened with the passage of time.
“We found the body slumped over in that chair,” said Tibbetts, pointing. “The shots were fired through the open window directly behind the chair. I closed the window to keep the weather out.”
On a table next to the chair were a lamp, a framed photograph of a pretty girl, a CD player, a drinking glass, and a half-empty bottle of Jim Beam bourbon. The photo was faded and appeared to be a high-school graduation picture from many years ago. Rivera wondered who she was.
He studied the scene. “Was the television on when you found him?”
“No. He was listening to some music on that CD player. It was set on repea
t mode, so it kept playing the same thing over and over.”
“What was the CD?”
“It was some kind of opera music. I shut it off.”
Rivera lifted the lid on the CD player and read the label on the disk. The music Upton was listening to during his final hours was Kiri Te Kanawa singing Strauss’s Four Last Songs. Rivera owned a copy of that same CD and listened to it often. He enjoyed playing it loud while driving across the high desert with the windows open. He thought it ironic that Upton was listening to that particular German opera when he was killed as the libretto was about confronting death.
He walked through the house, trying to get an overall impression of Upton’s life. On a bedside table in the main bedroom was another framed photograph of the same girl. “Who’s the girl in the photographs?”
Tibbetts shrugged. “No idea.”
Rivera opened the dresser drawers, inspected the contents, and found nothing unusual. He looked through the clothes closet. It contained work shirts, jeans, and jackets hung on wire hangers. Several pairs of shoes and boots rested on the floor.
He walked into the second bedroom and found a couple of card tables but no bedroom furniture. On the tables were a collection of printed posters decrying the growth of Moab and the Spanish Valley. They had titles like No More Condos, Save Spanish Valley, No More Subdivisions, Stop the Whisper Breeze Subdivision, Stop Arthur Atkinson and His County Council Cronies. Some pretty hard-hitting stuff, thought Rivera. Stacked against the walls were placards containing similar messages. Upton was clearly on a mission to stop the growth of Moab, but it seemed an inordinate amount of his effort was directed at Atkinson. Rivera wondered about that. There were other developers building condos and homes in the Moab area, but only Atkinson and his proposed new subdivision had been called out by name. It was clear why Atkinson, the area’s premier real estate developer, would detest Upton’s activities.
