The Voxlightner Scandal

by Don Travis

Wick contributed little more to our store of knowledge except he’d seen both Barron and Dr. Stabler the day they disappeared.

  “That would have been in March of ’04?” I asked.

  “The fifteenth to be exact. I’d kept my two-room office downtown at the Central New Mexico Bank Building and leased this entire building to them. The company was circling the drain, so I stopped by for a face-off with Barron. I couldn’t afford to have my name associated with a disaster.” He gave a mirthless laugh. “Fat chance. I was already up to my eyeballs. Anyway I bearded Voxlightner and Stabler in their own den. They were going over bank accounts and invoices in Barron’s office when I barged in. Barron admitted right on the spot he’d located a dozen phony accounts paid out of company funds. I lowered the boom. Told them I was calling in the FBI.”

  “Did you?” I asked.

  “Hell yes. But that night the two of them disappeared.”

  “What time did you see them?”

  “I left about one thirty in the afternoon. They were still going over the books. I spent the rest of the day fielding bitch calls. Voxlightner hit me right in the belly of my business, I can tell you.”

  The memories were apparently difficult to take because his features turned thunderous. “Called this FBI guy I know from Kiwanis but didn’t really tell him anything he didn’t already know. Went home about eight that night, and when I drove past this very building, I saw the lights on. No cars in the lot, but I checked anyway. As the landlord, I had keys. Nobody here. Papers scattered everywhere in Barron’s office, Stabler’s, and even Hightower’s.”

  Paul spoke up. “Hightower?”

  “John Hightower, the mining exec they hired to run the project.”

  “He was left to face the music,” I said.

  “Him… and me too. Spent hours… days… weeks talking to the feds, the bank examiners, and I don’t know who else.”

  “No evidence of foul play in the office?” Paul asked.

  “Nothing except everything was left out on desks, file drawers open. That kinda thing. No overturned chairs or blood on the floor. Nothing so gory. They got in their cars and hauled ass for somewhere unknown. Stands to reason they had a bolt hole prepared.”

  “So you think Barron and Stabler engineered the whole thing?”

  “Who else? Hard to swallow. I’d known Barron since we were both kids. Stabler, I didn’t know at all.”

  “Do you think the whole thing was a scam, or did someone get greedy and loot it before the company proved itself?” Paul asked.

  Wick shrugged, his bulldog face flushed. “We’ll never know. The mill never went into production. I know Everett Kent claimed he did assays showing the ore was worthless. How do you do dozens of assays showing gold and silver when there isn’t any? But then, I’m not a mining man.”

  “Did you think about raising some more money and going through with the project?” Paul asked.

  “Are you kidding? I’d have been run out of town.”

  I turned practical. “Who would have to cooperate in order to loot the corporate bank account?”

  Wick shrugged. “Barron and Stabler, I guess. Don’t really know.”

  AS WE returned to my downtown office Paul looked thoughtful. “Kinda cavalier, wasn’t he?”

  “Meaning…?”

  “Sorta nonchalant about something so significant to him.”

  “Wick’s never been one to sail close to the wind,” I said. “If he went all out for VPMR, he must have believed in it.”

  “Sounded to me like he was trying to delete himself.”

  “Pardon?”

  Paul fluttered a hand. “You know, fade into the shadows. If I got this straight, he’s the one who put this over the top. At least with the investing public.”

  “True. And like he said, he paid a price for it.”

  When we arrived at the office, I was pleased to learn Hazel had succeeded in pulling together the investigative reports from the FBI, Treasury, Security and Exchange, and the local police. A staggering amount of paper-shuffling stared us in the face. Paul headed for the Albuquerque Journal on North Jefferson to discuss the story he’d filed as I settled down with the FBI report.

  At the end of the day, we met and filled one another in on what we’d learned. Distilled down to the essence, while VPMR was heavy on technical know-how, there wasn’t anyone paying much attention to the minutiae of administration. We’d learned a simple signature stamp gained entry into the firm’s bank accounts. As often as not the stamp rested in someone’s unlocked desk drawer.

  Even so, the investigating authorities failed to come up with solid evidence of who was behind the looting of Voxlightner Precious Metals Recovery Corporation. They took the obvious—and easy—way out, concluding Barron Voxlightner and Walther Stabler were the perpetrators. They conducted a nationwide search for the two without finding either of the men. They simply vanished from the corporate headquarters of the company on Lomas Northeast on March 15, 2004. Not even their vehicles were located.

  Tired of dealing with the problem, I sat back and regarded Paul. This man, whom I loved above all else, was throwing unconscious signals that puzzled me. He’d returned from the newspaper claiming his article was accepted with minimal edits, yet his attitude was different. I’d worried drudgery work would discourage Paul, and perhaps that was happening. I mentally shook my head. No. He’d sopped up everything we’d learned with a growing excitement.

  That night despite Pedro’s and my interest, we didn’t manage to get anything started. While I lay on my side of the bed in disappointment, Paul snapped his fingers. “Just think. Somebody walked off with fifty mil. Just like that!”

  “Not the entire fifty,” I said. “They spent a few millions securing the tailing pile, leasing the mill, and the like.”

  “Okay,” he acknowledged. “So it was only forty. That’s a hell of a paycheck, even split two ways.”

  Chapter 7

  THE NEXT morning as the sun went about its job of heating up the atmosphere—the calendar had turned to August yesterday—Paul and I went to Belhaven’s place and found it a beehive of activity. The burned remains of a lawn mower and a few scorched panels from the attached garage lay on the driveway alongside a warped water heater. Carpenters bustled around repairing whatever the flames touched inside the garage. Spencer Spears stood in the middle of the activity without seeming to contribute to the effort. Observing and learning, I took it.

  Aside from that, the whole Belhaven clan was gathering, most likely for the reading of the will, although its contents were pretty well known. Harris Belhaven and his sister, Melanie Harper, greeted us at the door. Upon entering we were introduced to Melanie’s husband, Cagney, who shook hands with each of us with the short instruction to “call me Cag.” Without much digging we confirmed he worked for the Bureau of Land Management at the El Malpais Visitor Center at Exit 85 off I-40 in Grants. We also picked up that he and his late father-in-law weren’t on the best of terms. If I had to guess, I’d say it was because of Cagney’s untamed woolly beard and mustache. Like what was left of his curly brown hair, they were prematurely graying. I put him at around my age.

  No one voiced objections to our snooping in Pierce’s office, so we went back to find Sarah Thackerson running her nimble fingers over the keyboard of a new Dell desktop computer. She greeted us somberly and felt moved to explain she was helping the family tie up a few of Mr. Belhaven’s loose ends.

  After politely acknowledging her presence, Paul and I once again tore apart Belhaven’s inner sanctum. No piece of paper was too miniscule to escape scrutiny. Belhaven had a collection of old-fashioned tapes and cassettes, as well as some disks. When we went through all of them, at least superficially, the two halves of the dead man were clearly revealed. Many of the items were porn films, some heterosexual; others, gay. I vaguely wondered if somewhere there weren’t films depicting a ménage à trois? Nonetheless the items confirmed—at least to me—that Belhaven was engaged in sexual relationships
with both his secretary and his yard boy. A potentially messy arrangement.

  After spending most of the day at the Belhaven house, it wasn’t worth driving downtown to the office. I called Hazel for an update… which contributed nothing new to my store of knowledge. Thereafter Paul and I picked up an early dinner from a local restaurant and headed home. Paul was quiet during our meal. Jumpy. Drudge work does that to a man sometimes.

  This time there was a payoff. Tonight Paul apparently wasn’t so deeply entangled in the Voxlightner scandal and turned his attention to where Pedro and I both wanted.

  DET. ROY Guerra paid me a visit at the office the next morning. Paul had gone to the county clerk’s and assessor’s offices to check public records for anything of interest. I handed over the report on the Voxlightner case I’d dictated to Hazel earlier. He scanned it.

  “Interesting. But it doesn’t tell us much we didn’t already know.”

  “True. Nonetheless you’ve got to start somewhere.”

  “I’ve learned a little,” Roy said. “It didn’t take much effort to loot the company. Everyone concentrated on the fire assays, thinking if there was skullduggery, it would be there. The company’s financial and administrative practices and controls were virtually nonexistent. It wouldn’t be hard to slip in false invoices among the blizzard of expenses the firm was incurring. Things were moving so fast, management was scrambling to keep up with events.”

  “Nobody was looking out for the company’s dead presidents,” I suggested.

  “Huh?” He looked at me blankly for a moment. “Oh. I see. You’re hip to some old-timey jive. Money, you mean. At first the front office was doing what it was supposed to do. Paying for legitimate expenses. A gal by the name of Thelma Rider acted as office manager until she quit… before the scandal broke, I might add. From what I can gather, she was a good secretary but in over her head managing the entire office. She was just papering over cracks, especially when things were smoking.”

  I smiled at his payback for my slang. “Moving so fast, you mean. Do you have an address for her?”

  “According to someone who worked with her, she lived somewhere in the Northeast Heights. One of the streets named after states. You know, like Colorado or Florida. The feds interviewed Rider,” Roy went on. “Didn’t seem to be interested in her.”

  “I understand APD handled the investigation of Everett Kent’s murder.”

  “The lawyer who got whacked in his own office? Yeah. It went nowhere.”

  I demurred. “It went somewhere, all right. It ran right into the Voxlightner scandal and got twisted up in the mess. Easy to say Barron and Stabler were responsible, since they were tarred with all the other brushes.”

  Paul joined us at that point and dumped a pile of papers on the table. “Hi, Roy.”

  “Hey, man. Looks like you’ve been busy.”

  “Spent a fortune on photocopying and wore out my welcome in the clerk’s and assessor’s offices. From what I can see, it’s about as useless as a teapot made out of chocolate. Maybe you guys can find something.”

  “What’re you looking for?” Roy asked.

  “Anything of public record on the major players,” I answered. “And it looks like there’s plenty.”

  Paul waved a hand over the pile. “Most of it’s suits filed after the scandal blew up. Pissing in the wind for the most part. Someone even tried to sue old Marshall Voxlightner, and all he did was get taken like everyone else. I made duplicates for you, Roy.”

  “Thanks,” the detective said. “I checked the courts like I promised. Came across a jacket or two, but most of the people involved were as clean as can be.”

  “Any arrests or complaints at all?” I asked.

  “John Hightower had a jacket because he was suspected of being involved in the theft. Wick has a juvie record, but I didn’t break into it to see what the problem was.”

  “Nothing since he was emancipated?” I asked.

  “Nope. Kept his nose clean once he turned eighteen.”

  “But he was sued a lot after the company fell apart,” Paul said.

  “Successfully?” I asked.

  “Nope. He was Teflon. Claimed he was taken like everyone else. Lost his shirt.”

  “So nobody tapped his pocketbook in court?”

  Paul shook his handsome head. “Like I said. Teflon.”

  Roy pulled out notes from his attaché case. He was the only detective I’d ever seen lugging one around. “There was one person in the company with a record. The Thelma Rider I told you about.”

  “Who’s she?” Paul asked.

  “The so-called office manager. She had a record back in Chillicothe, Texas.”

  “For what?”

  “Prostitution and petty theft. Overnight stuff. No real jail time. Chillicothe sent me a copy of the file.”

  “I’d like to talk to her.”

  “Start with the Chillicothe PD,” Roy suggested.

  When I opened the woman’s file, a mousy, unattractive woman looked out of a police-blotter photo. To be fair most people were not particularly attractive in such circumstances.

  Paul frowned. “Wonder where they found her? Wonder who found her?”

  “Dunno,” I said. “But maybe John Hightower can tell us.”

  “Where is he?” Paul asked.

  “He left town as soon as the feds allowed him to go. But Hazel will find him for us.” I turned to Roy. “Ricardo Quintana, the accountant for VPMR, told Paul and me that Stabler was involved in a scam before. Did you find a jacket on him?”

  Roy shook his head. “Found some old newspaper articles about a Nevada scam. Lots smaller than VPMR. Peanuts really. Accusations got tossed around, but nothing came of it. So no jacket on Stabler.”

  HAZEL INDEED ran John Hightower to ground. He lived in the Tempe, Arizona, area, a bitter, premature old man at the age of fifty-three. Or that’s the way he sounded on the telephone. Reluctant to relive those bad old days, he acted as if each question was a potential trap to drag him back into the nightmare. It took virtually an hour on the speakerphone for Paul and me to confirm most of what we already knew from talking to others. His sole contribution was that Barron hired Thelma Rider, the office manager. The way he remembered the incident, she was recommended to Barron by someone, but Hightower didn’t know who.

  I next contacted the Special Agent in Charge of the FBI task force that originally investigated the crimes, who proved to be an amiable stone waller. He confirmed many of the facts we’d gleaned from our investigation so far, tried to pick my brain, and contributed nothing new. His attitude made it clear he considered the case solved with the disappearance of Voxlightner and Stabler. Roy later made available the information shared by the FBI with APD, and it amounted to bug dust.

  Friday afternoon after touching base with all the numerous jurisdictions that participated in the investigation of VPMR, I holed up in my office. Before tackling the investigation, I thought about Paul for a moment. Had his attitude changed, or was it just my imagination? Last night had been terrific, as wonderful as ever. Even so things were different between us.

  I got up and moved to the small mirror I used to make sure my tie was straight or my hair combed. A moderately good-looking man with apple-green eyes, what my mom called mocha hair—I considered it a peculiar color of brown—worn moderately long, and a sandalwood complexion stared back at me. I exercised and kept trim, but it was impossible for me to look through a younger man’s eyes and measure attractiveness. I fingered the small lentigo on my right cheek and considered forcing the issue with him. No, let Paul be Paul. When he was ready, he’d bring it out in the open… whatever it was.

  That out of the way, I sat back down, picked up my miniature Toledo blade letter opener, and began tapping the tip on my desk blotter. My typical mode of ruminating. My investigation—actually, Paul’s and mine—had not turned up anything of consequence. The only thing new was the note in Belhaven’s appointment book noting three separate electrical meter
readings. I glanced at the calendar. We’d talked to Watson Moore at New Mexico Power and Light eight days ago, and he hadn’t gotten back with us yet. I stifled the urge to dial his number. He was a reliable guy. As soon as he found the information, he’d call. Unless he’d taken a vacation or fallen ill or…. Rein in your imagination, Vinson. Watt was a responsible man. Give him time.

  Despite Paul’s and Roy’s tunnel-visioned concentration on the events of 2003 and 2004 as the genesis of Belhaven’s killing, I needed to keep an open mind. Even so I’d gone along with the decision to look at VPMR because of Mrs. Voxlightner’s—Dorothy’s—charge. I felt sort of like the old Roman god of household doorways who looked in both directions simultaneously, at the beginning and at the end. Janus was his name.

  I dropped my letter opener and reached for the growing file on the case. After riffling through the papers—it’s a good thing Hazel organized my files—I came up with the name of the defunct company’s office manager. According to my notes, Thelma Rider returned to Chillicothe, Texas sometime before the scandal really broke. I tried the number Hazel located for her and found it disconnected. I raised a sergeant in the Chillicothe Police Department who told me she died in an automobile accident in December 2010, about eight months ago.

  “Anything suspicious about it?” I asked.

  “Left a bar at midnight and took on an oak tree about fifteen minutes later.”

  The sergeant apparently knew Thelma—as he called her—and confirmed my impression of a rather quiet, timid woman. After she returned to the Texas town of her birth in late 2003, she lived on the family farm with her parents until they died. She continued living on the farm, although it went fallow after the parents passed on. She didn’t work, but everyone in town knew Thelma had been the office manager of a big company out in New Mexico and figured she’d put away some money. Her dead father was known as a tight-fisted old cuss, so the townsfolk figured there was enough mattress money to sustain “the girl” in her sedate lifestyle. Her only extravagance seemed to be a weekly trip to a local bar, which everyone figured proved her undoing.