by Kwei Quartey
“Of course. No problem.”
“I’ll call you and let you know the verdict after I’ve examined it,” Gideon said.
FIFTY-TWO
Twelve months after
A Metro TV reporter spoke with Cleo Laryea in an exclusive interview broadcast on the six o’clock evening news.
Reporter: Can you confirm that new evidence has surfaced regarding the murder of Lady Araba from about a year ago, sir?
Laryea: We have discovered evidence our investigators were not previously aware of, and it might—I repeat, might—throw new light on the case. What I can tell you is that it is an object from the crime scene at Lady Araba’s home.
Reporter: The murder weapon, perhaps?
Laryea: I can’t comment on that. What I would like, however, is to appeal to members of the public with any knowledge relating to the murder of Lady Araba to come forward to the authorities on a completely anonymous basis.
Reporter: We’ve put the number to call at the bottom of the screen.
Laryea: Thank you.
Reporter: You’re welcome, sir. One question I had, though: Why, in the initial days after the death of Lady Araba, did the press have access to updates from the CID, including from the director-general, Madam Tawiah, but not after even a few days? What exactly happened to the investigation, sir?
Laryea: Well, the case was considered closed on the arrest of Lady Araba’s driver. But now that new evidence has been introduced, thanks to the wisdom and steady hand of the director-general, we are now able to resume our investigation with full force. We value the backing of our leader tremendously, and I am confident that she wants to get to the bottom of this just as much as I do.
Reporter: With this new information you have unearthed, are you confident you will find the person who killed Lady Araba, sir?
Laryea: We are going to put every effort behind it, yes.
Reporter: Because, sir, as I don’t need to tell you, the CID’s record of solving major murder cases has been less than satisfactory.
Laryea: We want to change that, and I think I can safely say on the director-general’s behalf that she wants that as well.
Reporter: Deputy Commissioner Laryea, thank you very much.
After the interview was over, Laryea expected at least a couple of people to call. Director-General Tawiah, who was away in the Brong-Ahafo Region at the time, came first. “Laryea,” she said, “good evening. How are you?”
“Evening, madam. I’m well, thank you, and you?”
“I’m confused,” she said. “I haven’t seen this TV news segment everyone has been telling me about, but is it true there is new evidence in the Araba Tagoe case? What is going on, and why wasn’t I informed of it?”
“I apologize that I didn’t contact you earlier, madam,” Laryea said. “Had you not been away, I would have come directly to you in your office at CID Headquarters, but with you dealing with issues in B-A, I felt I should get things settled before troubling you.”
“Okay, okay,” Tawiah said impatiently, “but what is this new development?”
“On the day evidence was collected from the scene of Lady Araba’s murder, one item was accidentally sent to the CID property room instead of the FSL, and it has been there all this time—”
“How did that happen?” Tawiah interrupted.
“It’s a long story that I will not burden you with at the moment, madam, but the bottom line is that the item must be tested for DNA because it might give us an important lead.”
“Well, yes, of course,” Tawiah said, but Laryea sensed hesitancy in her voice. “Nevertheless, I don’t like that you went on TV and gave an unauthorized interview.”
“Actually, madam, it wasn’t quite that way. I didn’t go to them. They came to me. Someone must have leaked the news of this possible new piece of evidence to Metro TV. They got in touch with me, and at first, I was going to refuse any comment, but then I thought I could use the interview as an opportunity to appeal to the public for information about the murder and also send out a positive message about what we are doing at CID. As you know, madam, the public’s trust in us is spotty, which is one of the reasons I praised the support you have steadfastly given the investigation.”
Tawiah cleared her throat. “Yes, that is true—”
“And because of that support, madam—excuse me for interrupting—I would like to make a humble request of you, please.”
“What is that?”
“I request that you put me entirely in charge of this investigation from now on.”
“I think you already are,” Tawiah said dryly. “Clearly, you have established yourself as the new lead on this, Laryea. I leave it to you.”
“Thank you very much, madam.”
Laryea hung up with a smile. The next call, which hit six minutes later, was from his friend Bob Agyekum, the general manager of Metro TV.
“I think your interview went very well,” he said. “The way you built Madam Tawiah up was magnificent. You put her on a pedestal from which she cannot now climb down. Has she called you?”
“Yes,” Laryea replied. “She’s agreed to put me in charge of the case.”
“Well done, my friend. Even Adam Kyei, our station owner, called me to congratulate me on the scoop, since none of the competing news outlets have it. So, he’s happy.”
“Also, I would say,” Laryea added, “it puts a feather in your cap as the general manager.”
“Thank you. So, what is next?”
“DS Boateng and I will go to the FSL tomorrow with the evidence, and he’ll begin analysis on it. He will also be sending a second sample by courier to the forensics lab at Cape Coast University. That way, we’ll have an independent evaluation.”
“Did you tell Madam Tawiah that?”
“No, but she’ll soon find out.”
FIFTY-THREE
Twelve months after
As DCOP Laryea and DS Boateng walked into the FSL office, Thomas looked up in surprise.
“Good morning,” Laryea said.
Thomas leapt to his feet and stiffened briefly in salute. “Morning, sir.” He sent a questioning glance at Boateng. What was going on here?
The two visitors took their seats opposite Thomas’s desk.
“Let me explain why we’re here,” Laryea said. “It came to my notice a few days ago that a piece of evidence taken from the scene of Lady Araba’s murder was accidentally sent to the CID property room instead of to the FSL. It has been sitting there since then.”
“Oh?” Thomas said in apparent surprise.
“You weren’t aware of that, I don’t suppose?”
“No, sir. I didn’t know anything about it.”
“Madam Tawiah has authorized me to take over the Lady Araba case,” Laryea continued bluntly. “I have signed out the evidence from the property room, and I will now officially sign it over to DS Boateng here to maintain the chain of custody. DS Boateng will then begin to process the DNA here in the lab. Do you have any problems with that?”
“Not at all, sir.”
“We’ll also send samples to Prof. Kingsley’s lab at Cape Coast University. I will put you in charge of that.”
“No problem, sir,” Thomas said, still looking nervous.
“Now, the other pieces of evidence from the crime scene—do you still have those?”
“Yes, sir,” Thomas said. “One hair sample and two swabs of blood evidence, which are in the freezer. Should I get them for you?”
“Not yet,” Laryea replied. “Keep them safely under lock and key. Sergeant Boateng will let you know when he’s ready to proceed.” He stood up. “I think a tour of your fine facility is in order. I’ve never been here before, if you can believe that.”
In the rear of the electronics shop at which he had once worked, Gideon watched over the shoulder of his
friend and store owner, Jacob, who was carefully removing the lid from Trasacco’s security hard drive. Inside the device were two stacked, polished discs with a spindle in the middle. At the end of a two-pronged arm were tiny heads that wrote and read the data on the discs.
Jacob grunted. “Stuck head. The arm should be parked to the side in the off position, but it’s jammed in the middle of the disc.”
“Yeah,” Gideon agreed. “The platters look okay, though.”
“Yup. Spinning well, and I don’t see any obvious scratches.”
“So?” Gideon said. “What do you think? Try for me, eh?”
“If you really want me to, no problem. I’ll switch out the heads and then we’ll try our data recovery software. If I find anything, I’ll put it on a thumb drive for you. Only thing is I don’t have a donor hard drive right now, but I think I can get one in two or three days. I’ll let you know.”
“Thank you, my man,” Gideon said. He could barely wait to see the outcome, but he tempered his eagerness. It was quite possible that the hard drive would reveal nothing.
FIFTY-FOUR
Twelve and a half months after
“We have a lot to discuss,” Sowah said at the morning briefing. “Let’s first address the DNA reports from DS Boateng at the FSL and Prof. Kingsley’s CCU lab. Boateng’s analysis finds the DNA of the strand of hair consistent with Lady Araba’s, so that doesn’t add any useful information to the case.
“Now, Boateng also finds the DNA on the bloody metal clip and on the two blood swabs in Thomas’s freezer are consistent with Lady Araba’s. DS Boateng didn’t detect any other DNA on either the swab or the metal clip.
“On the other hand, Prof. Kingsley says he believes there’s DNA from at least two different sources on the metal clip. He studied more than one area of the clip, and he’s getting a DNA profile from the edge of the clip that is different from the body of it, where most of the blood was. But it’s a very small amount, and he says he will have to carry out further processes to amplify it. That’s going to take a few days. So, at the moment, we’re in holding position as far as the DNA is concerned. Next, we come to the DVR findings, and here I’ll let Gideon take over—”
Emma put up her hand. “Sorry, sir, before we go on—remember we were debating whether the metal clasp was engraved with some letters? Did either Boateng or Kingsley comment on that?”
Sowah shook his head. “No mention of that. Text him to ask—he could have missed it or forgotten to mention it. Go, Gideon.”
“I took the hard drive to Jacob, my friend who runs an electronics store,” Gideon began. “He had a tough time recovering the data, and only some of what he obtained was of good quality. Anyway, he and I took turns watching for hours looking for relevant footage. A lot of it was corrupted data, so we couldn’t see much or sometimes anything at all, but whenever there was something that looked significant, we made a screen recording and transferred it to a pen drive, which I have here.” He plugged it into the company laptop and then looked quizzically at his still-seated colleagues. “What, are you made of stone? Do you want to see this or are you just going to sit there, staring at my face?”
Laughing sheepishly, the rest of the team got to their feet and gathered around Gideon.
“Jojo and Emma, I’m hoping you can help us here,” he said. “We found this portion of the video where we see someone opening up the shed near the rear gate and taking out two large flowerpots. The image is not that clear, but take a look.”
After a few seconds, Jojo said, “That’s Ismael. He’s the only one who has the key to the shed, and I recognize his physique.”
“I agree,” Emma said. “That’s him, for sure.”
“Good,” Gideon said. “I was hoping you would say that, because the time stamp says Monday, third of July, at six fifty-five in the morning, and he said he took two planters like these to Lady Araba’s upstairs terrace around that time. So, we can assume the time stamp is fairly accurate.”
The others murmured agreement.
“Having settled that question,” Gideon said, “we looked at the footage of the night before, starting from about nine o’clock, because we know that’s when Kweku brought Lady Araba home from the event. One of the cameras at the front entrance briefly captured a man leaving at nine thirteen. The image cuts off, but that’s probably Kweku-Sam, who told us he left around that time after bringing Lady Araba home.
“Then, at nine fifty-six, we see someone dressed in black come into view and walking pretty quickly toward the rear gate, followed by a dark-colored car that appears from the lower right corner of the screen, and then the person in black gets in the front passenger seat.”
Everyone instinctively leaned forward for a better look.
“The car then moves toward the gate,” Gideon went on, “which takes a little while to open automatically by the sensor mechanism, and then the car leaves.”
“Was that a man or a woman who got in the car?” Sowah said. “The image is blurry.”
“Let me try freezing it for a better look,” Gideon said.
They all stared at the image, humming and hawing as they tried to make up their minds.
“I say a man,” Jojo said. “The way he moves seems more masculine.”
“Maybe,” Emma said, “but it could be a large woman too.”
“Who walks like a man?” Jojo asked with amusement.
“So?” Emma retorted. “It happens.”
“Well,” Walter came in, “what’s the significance of the footage, though? Two people are going out somewhere, one picks up the other, and off they go.”
“Why at the back gate?” Emma questioned. “If I lived at Trasacco and I was waiting for a friend to pick me up, the logical spot would be at the front gate, not the rear where the exit is. This looks as though the person didn’t want to be seen.”
Walter shrugged. “So, let’s say he or she is having an affair with whoever the driver of the vehicle is. What’s the big deal?”
“Perhaps,” Gideon said. “Still, I was curious about the vehicle. Had it been parked to the side of the gate somewhere? So, I went back earlier than nine o’clock and found this at eight thirty-six. Looks like that same car approaches the rear exit from inside the complex, the gate slides open, and the man or woman in black we saw in the previous footage walks into the complex and continues out of the camera field.”
“So, he or she was waiting for the driver to get the gate open,” Walter said.
“I’ve just noticed he’s wearing a backpack,” Jojo observed.
“But watch what happens,” Gideon said. “After this person in black comes in, the vehicle doesn’t exit the complex. Instead, it backs up out of the camera’s view.”
“So the driver,” Emma said, “whoever he or she is, waited there until the person in black came back out at nine fifty-six?”
“It appears so,” Gideon said.
“What about the vehicle?” Walter asked. “It looks like a nice car like a Benz, or something like that.”
“For sure, it’s no Daewoo Matiz,” Gideon said, referring to the matchbox-sized taxi-driver favorite because of its unbeatable gas mileage.
“Is there footage of the vehicle entering the complex from the front entrance?” Sowah asked.
“I’ve looked for it, sir,” Gideon said. “Can’t find it, and earlier than about eight o’clock the footage is practically nonexistent.”
“Okay,” Sowah said. “Then, Jojo, what you need to do today is take the video to Peter to see if he recognizes the vehicle or knows who was driving it.”
“I’ll do that, boss.”
“Was there anything else of significance on the hard drive recovery?” Sowah asked Gideon.
“That’s all I have, sir.”
“It’s a great job you’ve done,” Sowah said warmly. “Round of applause, everyone.”
They obliged as Gideon looked bashful but pleased.
Emma’s phone buzzed and she checked the notification. It was a reply from DS Boateng with an image of the metal clasp attached. Emma smiled. “Who said there was no writing on the metal clip? Walter, I seem to remember—”
“You’re saying there is?” Walter said, wrinkling his brow.
“Yes, sir,” Emma said. “It says ‘Prestige.’”
They all exchanged glances.
“What’s ‘Prestige?’” Jojo asked. “Is that whoever manufactured the metal thing?”
“Or maybe the object belongs to an Ewe person,” Emma said. “You know how they love those names—Grace, Charity, Faith, Wisdom. My Ewe boyfriend’s name is Courage.”
“Someone, please google ‘Prestige,’” Sowah said impatiently, “to see if it’s some kind of metal company, and if so, maybe it has a picture of this metal device and what it’s for. It’s driving me to distraction.”
Gideon was, of course, the fastest to reach the first results page. “There’s Prestige Metal Products. Their products are brackets, sheet metal containers, hooks . . .”
Jojo moved over to peek at Gideon’s screen. “Ah, but this looks like heavy-duty merchandise for the metal industry.”
“And besides,” Gideon observed, “this company doesn’t engrave the brand name into its products.”
“Keep searching,” Sowah urged. “If there’s a connection between this piece of metal and the murder of Lady Araba, we need to find it.”
FIFTY-FIVE
Twelve and a half months after
“Morning, my brother,” Jojo said as he approached Peter at the beginning of the morning shift at Trasacco.
“Hey, morning! How are you?”
“I’m good. I have something to show you.”
“Okay, I’m coming just now. You can go inside the security booth.” Peter gave some instructions to the junior guards and then returned to Jojo.
Jojo rested his laptop on the counter. “Gideon recovered some footage from the Sunday night of Lady Araba’s death, and I wanted you to see it.”
