“We’ve still got some time. Come on, there’s someone else I want to talk to.”
After leaving Scott Henderson in the care of one of the property detectives, Diane and Gardiner found Bethany Simpson right where they knew she’d be, at cheering practice. Simpson’s eyes widened at the sight of them.
“Hello again, Bethany,” Diane said. “There have been some developments and we need to talk. Let’s take a ride.”
“Where are we going?” Simpson asked.
“Down to the police station.”
Gardiner remained in the gym while Simpson and Diane headed to the locker room.
Diane stood by in silence as Simpson changed into her street clothes. She could see that the girl was becoming emotional.
“I’m sorry,” Simpson said as she slid into her coat.
“For?” Diane asked.
“For not telling you the truth.”
“About your Facebook post?”
Simpson nodded. Her eyes welled up.
“Did Mo ask you to keep a secret?” Diane asked. “A bad secret?”
Simpson nodded again wordlessly and started to cry.
Forty-five minutes later Diane and Gardiner walked into the lab carrying two brown paper evidence bags. They handed them to Gabe Pelligrosso.
“What are these?” Pelligrosso asked as he opened each one and looked inside.
“These are the sneakers and red hoodie that Mohammed Sayed asked his girlfriend to hide for him,” she said.
“Holy shit,” Pelligrosso said.
“We just recovered them from his girlfriend’s closet where they’ve been stashed since Davis Billingslea posted the picture of you casting the shoe impressions.”
Pelligrosso slipped a pair of rubber gloves on and lifted a pair of Nike LeBron Soldier X sneakers out of the bag, turning them over as he did so to examine the tread patterns.
“You think they’re a match?” Diane asked.
“They’re the right style. I guess we’ll know soon enough. What about the hoodie?”
“It’s ripped,” Diane said. “And there’s a piece of material missing.”
Chapter 31
Monday, 3:50 p.m.,
January 30, 2017
Diane felt like they were finally moving in the right direction but there were still too many pieces of the puzzle missing. Even if the tread from Sayed’s sneakers matched the prints that Pelligrosso had recovered from the scene of the shooting, it still didn’t put a gun in Plummer’s hand at the time he was shot by Haggerty. The shoe would only confirm Sayed’s presence at the time the shooting happened. The same was true of the ripped hoodie. They needed more.
Diane had nothing to do but wait for Pelligrosso’s call. She decided to take a drive to clear her head. She told herself she had no particular destination in mind, but she knew it was a lie. Twenty minutes later she was at John’s condo. The sight of his car in the driveway provided some relief. At least he wasn’t at the Gull drowning in booze. She realized that he could very well be inside self-medicating anyway, but maybe he wasn’t. Maybe, just maybe, Jim Ferguson had put a dent in that thick skull.
She drove past his driveway and was making the turn onto the adjoining street when her cell rang. It was Pelligrosso. She answered.
“Hey, Gabe. Tell me you’ve got good news.”
“Three things.”
“I’m all ears.”
“The first is that the sneakers you seized are the very same ones that made the prints I recovered from Kennedy Park.”
“You’re positive?”
“No doubt. The right sneaker has a staple imbedded in it near the toe. It was angled to match the tread pattern, so naturally I assumed it was part of the tread. It isn’t.”
She could feel her excitement building. “Great news, Gabe. What else?”
“The material I pulled off the cyclone fence definitely came from this sweatshirt.”
They were getting close; she could feel it. “And the third thing?”
“You know the hairs you gave me, the ones from the Khalid Mohammad?”
“Yeah. Abdi Ali’s hair. Please make this less complicated, she thought. “Tell me they don’t match the ones you found on the torn cloth.”
“They don’t,” Pelligrosso said. “The hair I pulled off the cloth aren’t Abdi’s. They are from a different person.”
“Like maybe Mohammed Sayed.”
“Let’s hope.”
Bethany Simpson’s statement along with the matching sneaker tread and torn sweatshirt were more than enough to obtain a warrant to search Mohammed Sayed’s room. Diane stood off to one side of the small bedroom watching as Pelligrosso and Murphy scoured through the boy’s belongings looking for any sign of a gun or ammo, or anything that might connect him with the robbery. Diane had assigned Nugent to watch the outside of the Sayed home and to give her the heads-up if Mohammed appeared. Stevens and a uniformed officer were keeping the Sayeds company in the next room.
Murphy had just replaced Mohammed’s mattress when Pelligrosso turned to Diane. “Think we may have a problem, Sarge.”
“What?”
Pelligrosso held up a pair of sneakers. “These are size ten and a half.”
“And?”
“And the ones I just matched to the shooting scene in Kennedy Park are only nine and a half.”
Diane scrambled to make sense of it. “Maybe the ones you’re holding run big?” she said, aware of how desperate it sounded. “Check the others.”
“I have. They’re all ten and a half. Whoever was fleeing the robbery with Tommy Plummer had feet smaller than Mohammed’s.”
Dammit.
Forced to release Henderson, the team decided to regroup. Diane, Stevens, Gardiner, and Nugent sat at the CID conference room table working on two large pizzas from Calluzzo’s Bistro. Diane had taken thirty dollars out of the petty cash box in LeRoyer’s office to pay for dinner. They were all tired and hungry.
“I don’t get it,” Stevens said. “Why would Mohammed Sayed ask his girlfriend to hide clothes used in the robbery if they weren’t his?”
After a moment of reflective chewing, Nugent spoke up, “Maybe they were his.”
Stevens rolled her eyes. “Here we go.”
“No, I’m serious,” Nugent said.
“What do you mean, Nuge?” Diane asked.
“Maybe the sneakers weren’t his but perhaps the sweatshirt was.”
“I’m listening,” Diane said.
“Well, I’ve been thinking how close in size Henderson, Sayed, Freeman, and Ali are. Hell, it’s like looking at a real estate comp sheet. What if Sayed really was sick the night the laundromat was robbed? Maybe he loaned his hoodie to someone with smaller feet.”
“Like Abdi Ali,” Gardiner said almost absently.
Stevens spoke up. “Playing devil’s advocate here, but why couldn’t it be Henderson? You said it yourself, Nuge. They’ve all got a similar build. Maybe Henderson changed into a red hoodie after he shoplifted the beer.”
“What size are Henderson’s sneakers?” Gardiner asked.
“Jesus, it sounds like we’re making the case for the defense,” Diane said.
“Something’s been nagging at me,” Nugent said.
“What’s that?” Diane said.
“Your wife?” Stevens asked.
“Ha, ha. No, I’m serious. The night of the shooting, when Mel and I first arrived, the Plummers were already there. At the scene. How did they know already?”
“The neighborhood grapevine?” Gardiner asked.
“Bullshit,” Nugent said. “We weren’t even sure who Hags had shot yet. So how did the Plummers know already?”
“Maybe the other robber told them,” Stevens said, thinking out loud.
“Or a relative,” Diane said.
“Nathan Freeman and Tommy are cousins, right?” Gardiner asked.
“They are,” Stevens said. “But Freeman’s mom alibied him as being home that night.”
“Rii
ight,” Nugent said. “And I’m sure she’d never lie to protect her little Nate.”
The room grew quiet for a few minutes as they worked on the pizzas and thought it through. Nugent spoke up first. “So if we assume for a moment that cousin Nate is the other robber, he knows that Tommy’s been shot. He grabs the gun and the backpack and gets out of Dodge.”
Stevens chimed in. “He runs home and tells Mom or Dad that he thinks something bad might have happened to Tommy, down in the park. Mom or Dad contact the Plummers, who race down to the project and find Junior dead.”
“Makes sense to me,” Nugent said.
Gardiner spoke up. “Maybe Nate Freeman supplied the gun?”
“Maybe,” Diane said. “But without some direct evidence that puts them together during the robbery, this is all just speculation.”
“I might be able to help with that,” a voice said from outside the room.
They all turned to see Dustin Tran standing in the doorway.
“What do you mean?” Diane asked.
“Hey, where’s my pizza?” Tran said as he entered the room. “I’m starving.”
“Help yourself, geek boy,” Nugent said, pulling out a chair.
Tran grabbed a slice and shoved half of it into his mouth.
“What are you talking about, Dustin?” Diane said.
Tran struggled to swallow the massive quantity of dough and cheese in his mouth before answering.
“I found something on the video you guys need to see.”
Nugent closed the lid on the remaining slices, then picked up the pizza box. “Here,” he said, pressing the cardboard carton into Tran’s stomach. “Take it to go.”
Several minutes later the pizza crowd had reassembled in the computer lab.
“What exactly did you find?” Diane asked again, knowing Tran would drag it out at novel length if she didn’t keep him on point.
“I started thinking that we might want to keep broadening our search parameters. So, I replayed the 7-Eleven video but this time I backed it up and began watching the outside monitors closely during the half hour before the shoplifting occurred.”
“Good thinking,” Stevens said.
“And?” Diane said.
“I think your shoplifting suspect—”
“Scott Henderson,” Nugent said, cutting him off.
“Yeah, Scott Henderson. One of the gas pump cameras caught Henderson getting out of a car about fifteen minutes before the beer theft. Here, look for yourselves.” Tran scrolled over the player with the mouse and clicked on one of the camera views, enlarging it.
“That’s Henderson in the dark hoodie climbing out of an older model two-door.” Tran continued. “I noticed that same car drive by on Washington Avenue several times before.”
“Are there any better angles?” Diane asked.
“Yeah,” Nugent said. “Maybe get a better look at the car. See who else was inside.”
“Or a reg,” Stevens said.
Tran grinned. “Ask and you shall receive. Remember I told you that I was checking to see who had a driver’s license? And Nuge made fun of me. I was toying with the idea that the robbers may have parked a getaway car nearby. Well, I think I found it.” Tran switched videos. “This is the dash cam video from Haggerty’s cruiser. I’ve cued it up to the point where Hags is going down Madison Street. See the two figures up ahead?”
“We see it,” Nugent said. “I’m begging you, get to the point.”
“As the suspects cut over onto Greenleaf, they passed in front of an oncoming car.” Tran let the video play on, freezing the image just before Haggerty passed by the other vehicle.
“Holy crap,” Gardiner said. “That’s Nate Freeman behind the wheel.”
Diane stared at the still, framed image. The alibi that Freeman’s parents had provided was now worthless.
“You want a still of this too?” Tran asked.
“You bet your ass we do,” Stevens said.
Diane turned to Nugent and Stevens. “Go find Nathan Freeman and drag him in here.”
Nugent, Tran, and Gardiner watched the interview from the monitor in the CID conference room, while Diane and Stevens worked Nathan Freeman for answers.
Defeated, Freeman let out a long sigh. “Yeah, I was out with Tommy and Scott. Mo was planning to go out with us, but he got sick.”
“What happened?” Diane asked.
“Tommy and I had talked about pulling a drug rip on the owner of the laundromat. That Micky guy. Said we could make a lot of money and no one would report it.”
“How did you know the owner of the laundromat had drugs?” Stevens asked.
“I don’t know. Tommy wouldn’t tell me how he knew, but he did.”
“Was Tommy dealing at the high school?” Diane asked.
Freeman nodded. “Yeah.”
“What about you?”
“No. I’m not a dealer. I just smoke a little weed. You’re welcome to search my stuff.”
“We know that Tommy fired a gun at Officer Haggerty,” Diane said.
“That wasn’t supposed to happen. I don’t know what the hell Tommy was thinking. I really liked Officer Haggerty.”
“Where did the gun come from?”
Freeman tilted his head back and sighed again. “The gun came from Abdi Ali.”
“Abdi was there that night too?” Stevens said.
“Yeah. He and Tommy did the robbery.”
“Why involve Abdi at all?” Diane asked. “Why didn’t you and Tommy do it?”
“This girl named Christine Souza died from a drug overdose a few months back. I guess she was, like, Abdi’s girlfriend or something. He was pretty upset about it. Tommy told Abdi that he might know where the drugs were coming from.”
“Did Abdi know that Tommy was dealing?”
Freeman shook his head. “No.”
“What did you tell Abdi?”
“Tommy told him that he might know a way to stop the drugs from coming into the school.”
“Why would Tommy want to keep drugs out of the school if he was dealing them?”
“He didn’t, but he needed Abdi to think that.”
“I still don’t get why either of you involved Abdi in the first place.”
Freeman fidgeted in his chair. It was obvious to both detectives that he didn’t want to go where he was headed.
“Tommy knew that the guy who ran the laundromat had a gun. We couldn’t go in there to rob him without a gun of our own. We all knew Abdi’s dad had a gun. He’d talked about seeing it before.”
“Where?”
“His dad’s store. Abdi said he kept one in the store for protection.”
“What kind of gun?”
“A semiautomatic handgun.”
“So, it was Abdi who brought the gun that night?”
Freeman nodded silently.
“We can’t hear you, Nate,” Stevens said.
“Yeah,” Freeman said. “Tommy told him that all he had to do was bring it. We would take care of the robbery. Abdi wouldn’t have to do anything.”
“But that isn’t what happened, is it?”
“No. Tommy took the gun and gave one of the skull masks to Abdi and told him that he and Abdi were going to do the robbery. We figured if Abdi helped he’d have to keep his mouth shut about it.”
“Tell us what happened?”
“We drove around in my car. We went past the laundromat to make sure that it was still open. Then we dropped Scott off at the 7-Eleven to steal some beer.”
“Why?”
“We figured the cop working the area would be busy taking the report and wouldn’t interrupt the robbery. We had no idea that Officer Haggerty was working.”
Diane and Stevens exchanged a knowing glance.
“Where were Tommy and Abdi while you were doing that?” Stevens asked.
“In the car with me.”
“What happened next?” Diane asked.
“After Scott grabbed the beer he ran behind the old J.J. Niss
en Building. We were waiting for him on Romasco Lane.”
“Did you drink it?”
“Yeah, we each had a couple.”
Liquid courage, Diane thought. “And then?” she asked, prompting Freeman to continue after a long silence.
“We drove down past the Bubble Up so we could see inside. The owner was still there, working alone just like Tommy said. We didn’t see any customers around, so I dropped the three of them off.”
“And you?” Diane asked.
“I drove down into Kennedy Park and waited.”
“Before dropping them off, did you discuss how it was supposed to happen?”
“Yeah. Tommy had the gun and the backpack. He gave a ski mask to Abdi and said he’d changed his mind. Abdi was gonna help him with the robbery. Said they were doing it for Abdi’s girlfriend, Christine. Scott was gonna be a lookout from across the street while Tommy and Abdi did it.”
“What happened next?”
“I started getting nervous. Seemed like it was taking too long. Finally, I decided to drive up to Washington Avenue and check on them.”
“Did you see them?”
“I never made it that far. Tommy and Abdi came running down Madison, right at me. And a police car with lights and siren was right behind them. I just about shit.”
“What did you do?” Stevens asked.
“Nothing I could do. They cut up Greenleaf and the police car followed them.”
“Where was Scott Henderson?”
“I had no idea. I found out later that he split. Ran home.”
“Where did you go?”
“I parked on Washington Avenue on the side of the road with my lights off. I waited for a while. I didn’t know what had happened.”
“How long did you wait?”
“A few minutes. Then I heard gunshots. A lot of them. It seemed like every cop in the city was coming. Sirens were approaching from everywhere. I drove home.”
“What did you tell your parents?” Diane said.
“I told my mom that I’d seen the police chasing Tommy in Kennedy Park.”
“Did you tell her why?”
“No way. She didn’t know I was out with him. She picked up the phone and called my aunt.” Freeman hung his head.
Beyond the Truth Page 31
