Gilcrest walked behind him. He knew she was intentionally trying to make him uncomfortable. And it was working.
She slid her hands over his shoulders and down toward his chest, leaning in close enough that he could smell her shampoo.
“Whose theory?” she asked.
“Acting Chief Rumsfeld.”
“Ah, Danny Rumsfeld, City Manager Perkins’s errand boy. The man who will do anything so long as it helps him make chief. He’s not called Rumpswab for nothing.”
Wisely, the commander remained silent.
“Rumor has it you’ve thrown your hat into the ring too,” she said.
“Yeah. Not like I’ll have much of a chance over Danny. I just want city hall to know I’m interested in the job. Maybe one day down the road I’ll be considered.”
Gilcrest stood, removing her hands from Jennings, and returned to her chair. “Down the road? Why not right now? Why wait?”
“I’m not sure I understand.”
“Oh, come off it. You’ve been around long enough to know how this game works. It’s never what you’ve done that matters. It’s what you can do.”
“What can I do?”
“You are aware of my plan to announce my candidacy for governor of this backward-ass state, aren’t you?”
“I may have caught wind of that,” he said.
She frowned. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“Not at all.”
“I figure the seat will be ripe for the picking as Mr. Incumbent terms out. I’ll be running with a capital D in front of my name. After these last eight years, the Republicans might just as well wave the white flag now and save their money.”
“You really think you can win?” he asked.
“Ha! I already have some major donors and political high rollers backing me. The test polls show that if the primaries were held today I would be the nominee. And the Democrat will be a shoe-in.”
“Why are you telling me any of this?” Jennings asked.
“Because I believe in planning ahead. I’m talking with the people I know I could work well with. And you are one of those people, Ed.”
“What could Governor Gilcrest possibly want with me?” he asked. Waiting for her answer filled him with equal parts excitement and dread.
“How about the commissioner of public safety?”
He was momentarily speechless.
“Think about it,” she said. “You’d be working for me, at the state level. No more dealing with this local shit. No more working for someone the likes of Danny Rumpswab.”
She had him and they both knew it. Jennings had secretly hated Danny Rumsfeld for as long as he’d known him. What Gilcrest was offering was beyond anything he could have imagined. It was not only a way up but a way out. But at what cost?
“What do you need me to do?” he asked before he could stop himself.
Gilcrest leaned forward in her chair, intentionally affording him a seductive glimpse of the creamy unblemished valley inside her blouse.
“How long were you the commander of internal affairs, Ed?”
He swallowed nervously, not liking the direction this conversation was taking. “About two and a half years. Why?”
Her grin returned. “Do you still have access?”
Chapter 6
Monday, 9:00 a.m.,
January 16, 2017
Byron sat across from Micky Cavallaro, owner and manager of the Bubble Up Laundromat, in CID Interview Room Two, a cramped eight-by-ten space with cream-colored foam acoustic panels attached to the top half of each wall. The room was outfitted with three mismatched chairs and a round pedestal table straight out of the 1970s. The badly worn table consisted of a heavy metal base attached to a wooden top; a plethora of chewing gum pieces hung like stalactites from its underside. Like most of the chopped-up spaces at police headquarters, CID’s three interview rooms were, depending upon the time of the year, either freezing cold or hot enough to raise dough. Today it was the latter. It was obvious that Cavallaro, still upset at having been robbed, didn’t quite seem to grasp the magnitude of what had occurred in Kennedy Park following the stickup at his laundromat. Byron took his time reading the man’s statement, intentionally trying to keep him off balance.
At first glance, Byron had placed the laundromat owner’s age at about sixty. The date of birth entered atop Cavallaro’s witness statement confirmed Byron’s guess within a year. The shop owner was a large man, sporting a full head of wavy black hair and pockmarked skin, both of which were greasy. Given Cavallaro’s size, Byron doubted anyone would have been foolhardy enough to rob the man without a gun. He had no criminal history and according to the PPD computer database his only contacts with the police department were complaints he had lodged against others, mostly bad checks written by dry cleaning customers.
Cavallaro’s statement, taken by Officer Amy Connolly, was quite good. Byron was impressed with Connolly’s thoroughness. After rereading the three-page statement Byron placed it facedown on the table in front of him.
“So, tell me again what happened last night, Mr. Cavallaro.”
“I was robbed,” he said with obvious exasperation.
“I think we’ve already established that,” Byron said. “But I need you to recount exactly what happened again, okay?”
“I told the officer already. I was trying to close for the night when these two punk kids came into my store and robbed me. They stuck a gun right in my face,” Cavallaro said, pantomiming the actions of the robber with his own hands.
“They?” Byron asked.
“Yes, they. There were two of them.”
“Both subjects had a gun?”
“I guess so.”
Byron wasn’t looking for assumptions, only facts. “Describe them for me.”
“The robbers? Hoods and ski masks, the ones that look like skulls.”
“I’m looking more for their physical characteristics. Tall, short, heavy, thin?”
“Tall. Young, like teenagers. The one wearing the black sweatshirt was as tall as me.”
“How do you know they were young?”
“I could tell by the voices.”
“They both spoke to you?”
“No, just the one, but the other one yelled at the customer. I think he surprised them.”
“Did you recognize the voices? Is it possible you knew either of them?”
“I don’t know. I see a lot of kids around.”
“You said they were wearing ski masks. Did you see any skin or hair around the openings?”
“No, but the one who made me empty the safe was white. He wasn’t wearing gloves.” Cavallaro thought for a moment. “And I think his eyes were blue.”
Byron scribbled another note. Plummer had blue eyes.
“What about the other one? The red hoodie. Did you get a look at skin color or eye color?”
“No.”
“What about his hands?”
“He was wearing gloves.”
“Did they both approach the counter?” Byron asked.
Cavallaro shook his head. “No, no. Only the one in the black sweatshirt.”
“And the one wearing the black sweatshirt pointed a gun at you?”
“That’s what I’ve been saying.”
“Was the dry cleaning customer already in the store when the robbery happened?”
“No. He came in in the middle of it.”
“And which one of you called the police?”
“He did. Right after they ran out.”
“Tell me again who opened the safe?”
“I did. He pointed the gun at me and told me to open it.”
“How did he know about the safe?”
Cavallaro paused to consider this. “I don’t know.”
“Is it possible that one of your employees told him about it?”
“I guess it is. I have two full-time employees and two part-time. They work the counter and do the dry cleaning.”
“Was there anythin
g else of value in the safe? Something besides money?”
“No, only cash. Nearly six hundred dollars.”
Byron studied Cavallaro’s face, looking for any sign of deception. Seeing none, he pressed on. “Did all of the people who worked for you know that the security camera was just for show?”
Cavallaro frowned. “Yeah. They all did.”
Byron slid a file folder across the table to Cavallaro. “I’m going to show you a photo array. There are six similar-looking males depicted here. The pictures are numbered one through six. Please take your time and look carefully at each of the photos. When you have finished I want you to tell me if you recognize any of the people depicted. Okay?”
“All right.” Cavallaro flipped open the folder and spun it to face him.
Byron waited as the shop owner studied the pictures that Detective Stevens had compiled. The lineup had been more difficult than usual to put together due to Plummer’s young age. Typically, they could assemble an array from jail booking photos or from the database at the Maine Bureau of Motor Vehicles. In this case, the detectives were limited to booking photos only as Plummer did not have a license, only a permit. Luckily, he had a juvenile record, affording them one semirecent picture.
“No,” Cavallaro said at last. “I don’t recognize any of them.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes, I’m sure,” Cavallaro said. “Did one of them rob me?”
“That is what we’re trying to establish.” Byron retrieved the folder and flipped it closed. “Thank you, Mr. Cavallaro.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, his tone indignant.
“Tell me again what the other suspect looked like?”
“I already told that lady cop.”
“I know you did,” Byron said. “But I’d like you to tell me.”
“He was tall, like the other one. Thinner, I guess.”
“You guess? Why do you guess he was thinner?”
“Because of his sweatshirt. It was baggy,” Cavallaro said. “Like it was too big for him.”
Byron made a note in his notebook. “Did the suspect in the red hoodie display a gun?”
“He didn’t point one at me, if that’s what you mean.”
“Then how do you know he possessed one?”
Cavallaro paused for a moment as if trying to decipher his own riddle, then shrugged. “I guess I don’t. I assume they both did. They came into my store to rob me. Why wouldn’t they both have guns?”
“But you didn’t actually see the second person with a gun?”
“No. I didn’t see it.”
Byron decided to switch gears for a second. “Tell me about the gun you did see. Describe it for me.”
“The one the guy stuck in my face?”
“Yeah,” Byron said. “That one.”
“It was a revolver, metal-colored. Silver.”
“Stainless steel? Or reflective like chrome?”
Cavallaro thought for a moment. “Stainless.”
“What else can you tell me about it?”
“Not much. It was just a gun.”
Byron handed Cavallaro a clean sheet of paper and a pen. “Would you mind drawing the gun you saw?”
“I’m not too good at drawing.”
“That’s all right. I just need a rough idea of what you saw. It doesn’t have to be perfect.”
“Okay.”
Cavallaro took the pen and began to draw. Byron made several quick entries in his notebook while he waited.
When Cavallaro had finished, he slid the pen and paper back across the table. “Here you go.”
“And you’re sure this is what the gun looked like that was pointed at you during the robbery?”
“Yes. The drawing is not very good, but that is like the gun I saw.”
While Byron was at 109 conducting the follow-up interview of Cavallaro, Detective Melissa Stevens sat across from Attorney Clifford Stebbins in one of the conference rooms on the second floor of the Cumberland County District Courthouse.
“I apologize for having to meet you here, Detective, but my schedule is a little crazy right now.”
“Not a problem. I just wanted to go over your statement concerning the robbery last night.”
“I still can’t believe it, you know? I mean, you read about these things happening in the papers but to actually walk in on one. It’s crazy.”
Stebbins had set his leather attaché case on the table in front of him and was leaning on it with his forearms. He repeatedly clicked the pen in his hand, a nervous tic apparently brought on by nerves as the attorney relived the previous evening’s encounter.
“In your statement you stated that you didn’t realize what was happening until you were fully inside the laundromat. What did you see?”
“I saw the person in the red sweatshirt first. The skull mask kind of threw me. Then he started yelling for me to get down on the floor.”
“Did you comply?”
“Not immediately. I don’t know if it was shock or if I just didn’t believe what was happening. But I looked up and saw the second robber, the one wearing the dark-colored hoodie, standing behind the counter pointing a gun at the owner of the business, Micky. That’s when I knew.”
“And that’s when you got down on the floor.”
“Yes.”
“Was the voice of the person in the red hoodie male or female?”
“Definitely male. Sounded young.”
“Anything else you can remember about the voice?”
“I guess that’s it.”
“Did Red Hoodie have a gun too?”
“I never saw one. Just the dark-hooded figure behind the counter.”
“Can you describe the gun you saw?”
“Sure. It was a semiauto, silver colored.”
“And you’re positive it was a semiauto and not a revolver?”
“Detective, I don’t mean to sound condescending, but I do know the difference. I have a membership to a gun club in Windham. I shoot once a month.”
“What kind of gun do you have?”
“A Glock 40.”
Byron and Detective Stevens drove back to Kennedy Park to check in on the evidence-gathering progress.
“How can their descriptions of the handgun be so different?” Stevens asked.
“I don’t know, Mel,” Byron said. “Cavallaro was positive it was a revolver. He even drew it for me.”
“Maybe both robbers had guns after all.”
Maybe, Byron thought.
Stevens was checking her phone.
“Shit,” she said.
“What’s up?” Byron asked.
“I missed a call from Hugh Plummer while I was interviewing Stebbins.”
“Did he leave a message?” Byron asked, hoping they could get back to check Tommy’s room sooner than four o’clock.
Stevens checked her voicemail as Byron waited impatiently.
“Dammit,” Stevens said.
“What?”
“He canceled our four o’clock.”
“Canceled or rescheduled?”
“Canceled.”
Shit, Byron thought. “Did he say why?”
“No.”
Byron was beating himself up now. He should never have allowed Hugh Plummer to talk him into coming back. The voluntary search of Tommy’s room was most likely off the table now, and he knew obtaining a search warrant wasn’t an option. Warrants by their very nature require the police to have probable cause. In this case the information they did have was shaky at best. They hadn’t recovered a gun from the scene of the shooting. Not even a shell casing. Hell, the only evidence to suggest that a gun had been fired were the bullets from Haggerty’s gun, evidence that was now lying in a cooler at the state medical examiner’s office in Augusta. Cavallaro had said that the person who’d pointed a gun at him during the robbery was wearing a black hoodie and had blue eyes, but that didn’t mean Tommy Plummer still possessed it when he was shot by Haggerty. Not to mention the fact
that the two witnesses to the crime couldn’t even agree on the type of handgun displayed. Pelligrosso had located drugs at the scene, but there was no way of knowing whose drugs they were. Had they come from Cavallaro’s safe? Was the laundromat just a front for a drug distribution network? Or had the drugs belonged to one of the robbers? Maybe the laundromat wasn’t the only robbery they had committed. He could speculate all he wanted but it made no difference. None of the information they had was likely to persuade a judge. Byron would have had an easier time getting a warrant to search Haggerty’s bedroom than Tommy Plummer’s.
Their only hope was that the aggrieved family was delaying access. Something was beginning to gnaw at him though. What if something else was going on? Had the Plummers located some evidence of their son’s guilt? If so, what would be their next move? Destroy the evidence? Contact an attorney? If they had, their cooperation was likely over.
Byron drove up Munjoy Hill, bypassing Kennedy Park.
“I thought we were going back to the scene?” Stevens asked.
“I want to check in personally with the Plummers first. Saying no is always harder in person.”
Davis Billingslea sat in his cubicle checking his social media accounts on the Herald desktop. He had just put the finishing touches on his police shooting update and forwarded it to his editor, Will Draper. The surreptitious photograph he’d taken earlier was already posted to Twitter on both his and the newspaper’s feeds. It was receiving a fair number of likes, but more important were the retweets. The word was spreading and that was good. He pulled up the webpages for several of the local news agencies, but none had posted any new information on the story. Most were still speculating on the incident and regurgitating what little Acting Chief Rumsfeld had provided at the predawn conference in the PD lobby. Billingslea’s page was the only one that depicted the police collecting evidence at the scene. He was wondering how quickly Byron’s team might be able to match up the footwear when his editor hollered to him.
“Davis!”
“Yeah, boss,” Billingslea said as he quickly closed out his internet page and headed over to Draper’s desk.
“Your piece looks good,” Draper said. “I’ll put it out.”
“Thanks.”
“Now, I need you to get your ass over to city hall.”
Beyond the Truth Page 6
