by phuc
never protects us, came the same old lament. When something bad happens to one of us, the LAPD doesn't care. When something bad happens to somebody white, or in a good part of the city, they do everything they can to solve the crime. But they don't care about us.
The simple fact of the matter was that with manpower stretched so thin, there weren't enough detectives to cover all the murders in the highest crime infested areas of the city. Most of those crimes were committed by gang members, who were tough to crack in confessions, and usually skipped town to safe houses when the going got rough.
One out of every five murders in LA goes unsolved every year, simply because murder had changed. No longer was murder the result of a lover's triangle, or a simple robbery, or between family members. Most of the murders committed in these rough neighborhoods were by young street thugs protecting streets they didn't even legally own, pronouncing their sentences as indiscriminately as the common cold. Eighty percent of the time the murderer didn't even know the victim.
The four murders Daryl and Steve were assigned to had all been committed between the hours of eleven p.m. and noon today. They decided to split them up between them. The first two involved members of two rival gangs, the Los Compadres Mafia and Eighteenth Street, while the other two involved Eighteenth Street and Boyle Heights Thirteen. There were also scattered shootings involving a fourth gang, the Tortilla Flats.
Daryl Garcia looked down at the files. It was all the same. Young Hispanic men gunning each other down for what? To claim a piece of pavement? Because of the misconception that another man had looked at him with “disrespect"? Because a man from a different neighborhood had strayed into the “wrong one"? For those trivial offences did a man have to lose his life?
And to make matters worse, all four of these killings were built on further misconceptions; that the victim had something to do with the murder of the young man found in the LA River the day before.
They hadn't even positively identified him yet.
Information had come from a pair of detectives from the East Side division that there were thirteen men missing who loosely resembled the scant description of the man found at the river. Six of those men were known gang members, all on parole. Daryl thought about this as he read the report. Most likely they were parole violators; one had served time for grand theft auto, another for rape, another for second degree murder. Four of them had no gang ties, and not much was known about the others. Daryl looked at the list of gang members on the list who were missing. None of them were members of any of the gangs involved in the latest skirmishes in the area.
If gang members could read it might behoove them to take a peak at the newspaper. Especially this morning's edition, which had a large article on the latest murder.
The article, starting on column one, page one of the Los Angeles Times, stated the basic facts of the discovery of the LA River victim, as well as a few tidbits of information the LAPD had released to the public. All one with reasonable intelligence had to glean from the way this latest victim was dismembered was that gang members lack the sophistication to dismember people. They might stab each other in fights, but they didn't decapitate their victims. They didn't sever their arms and legs cleanly at the shoulder and hip joints. And they didn't kill their victims in one place and transport them to another, as the murderer had done in this case.
What the papers didn't report, and what the LAPD didn't release to the press, was that all of the victims were sexually violated post mortem.
What macho homeboy fucked the corpse of his enemy in the ass after he had killed him?
Daryl Garcia opened a file drawer on his right, gathered the four files up and put them in the cabinet. To be truthful, he probably wasn't treating the gang bangers fairly. He was very biased against them, and for good reasons. When he was twenty-two he and his first wife, Shirley, had been driving home from a nice relaxing day at Griffith Park.
Shirley was seven months pregnant with their first child. Daryl had just graduated from Long Beach State with a degree in Psychology. As they sat in traffic on Normandie Avenue waiting to get to Los Feliz, which would take them to the 5 freeway and back towards home, the unthinkable happened.
A robbery in progress at a video store on Normandie spilled out onto the sidewalk as the robbers—members of an East Hollywood Street gang—ran out of the store, one of them shooting the merchant as he went for the phone to call the police. Daryl's car was in the right lane, closest to the action. He was blocked in on all sides by cars, and as the light changed green and traffic started crawling forward, two of the gang members lunged toward his car, tugging at the passenger side door and smashing the window on Shirley's side. “Get the fuck out of the car, motherfucker!” they shouted. Everything after that happened in slow motion.
Daryl had tried to speed off but there was still a car in front of him. In his excitement and fear, he crashed into it.
The gang member at the passenger side of the car smashed the window on Shirley's side, reached in and unlocked the door.
Shirley's screams ... ?
Daryl's screams for help and mad attempt to free himself from the seatbelt so he could get out and help her ... ?
...as the gang member opened the door, grabbed her arm, and tried to pull her out of the car ... ?
...as another gang member grabbed Daryl roughly by the neck and hauled him out, spilling him onto the pavement ... ?
Daryl didn't see what happened next but he didn't have to. Gunshots mean only one thing.
When it was over the gang members were speeding off in his car, leaving Daryl and Shirley bleeding on the street. He remembered crawling over to his wife.
He remembered the vast pool of blood that was gathering underneath her very pregnant body. He remembered her blue eyes as they stared up at him, still alive, knowing that what she had wanted most in her life, to be a mother, a devoted wife, had been cruelly taken away from her forever.
She died in Daryl's arms as the sirens of approaching help arrived.
He was never able to make love to another woman after that without thinking of Shirley. She had been his best friend, his companion, his lover. They had been high school sweethearts, and he had proposed marriage to her only a month before they graduated. They were married at the age of twenty and had shared a small apartment near his parents house in Gardena while they both attended school They had their whole lives ahead of them. When Shirley got pregnant, she dropped out of college and took a job as a secretary at a law firm while Daryl finished up his degree. He had been dedicated to Shirley with body, mind, and soul.
The day she and their baby had been taken away from him changed everything.
Daryl sat at the desk and straightened up the files. Thinking about Shirley was hard. He hadn't thought about her in a long time now, and every time he did it brought back painful memories. That horrible day occurred twelve years ago, but it still felt like it was only yesterday when she was alive and with him.
He had been with other women since Shirley was killed, was even serious with two of them. But the spark wasn't there in those other relationships. If there was such a thing as having a soul mate, one person with whom you shared your life with until death do you part, Shirley Watkins had been that person. And she had been taken away from him. Brutally.
He could feel a headache coming on and he pinched the bridge of his nose with his fingers, head bowed toward the desk, eyes closed. He always got bad headaches like this when the work was especially grim, or whenever Shirley came to his mind. Despite the fact that the police had caught the men who killed Shirley, and the killers were later convicted and sent to prison, all but one had been released within the last year-and-a-half.
One of them was later killed in a gang shooting, and the other one was currently out there somewhere, working within the criminal system. Not a day went by when Daryl didn't think about the men that did this as he drove his beat or investigated a crime. Not a day went by when he didn't think if it weren'
t for those scumbags who ruined my life I wouldn't feel like I need to be here trying to stop them and their kind.
He hated gang members. Loathed them. When they killed each other on the streets he was glad. He went about his work in a mindless fashion, going about the routine of asking the same questions, filling out the same paperwork, chasing down suspects. He tried hard to solve the crimes he worked on, but he secretly he applauded the vermin when they killed each other. If it was up to him, he'd put every gang member on a deserted island somewhere, give them an array of machine guns and say there you go, knock yourself out, kill each other, I'd be fucking glad to help you. What drove him to do his work was remembering what happened to him twelve years ago, as well as things that happened every day: children with their heads blown off in drive-by shootings, the elderly victimized in their own homes, the children of the neighborhood who were good kids in their hearts, beaten and intimidated, their dreams crushed. It was this that kept him going.
Thanks to those images, he felt no guilt when he got rough on the gang members.
He had beaten more than his share of gang members, and at one point was getting involved in too many officer-involved shootings (he always kept a spare handgun in his ankle holster that was unregistered; the handgun was later placed in the hand of the dead or dying gang member after they were shot). In the wake of the Rodney King beating and the LA riots, Daryl had to rein in his anger a bit. Luckily, he was never indicted or reprimanded for his handling of the gang members, and it was at this time that he made it to homicide. And it was in homicide that he started to make headway. He made contacts in the neighborhood and used them when needed. He relentlessly pursued leads, doggedly went after evidence, and worked on his temper through the martial arts training he began to study about three years ago and it helped. Now the only time he resorted to violence was in instances like five days ago when he and Steve had beaten the shit out of Rudy Montego and his little scumbag friend for killing that little kid. In cases like that, resorting to violence was a good thing: he got to relieve pent-up aggression on lower forms of life, and in doing so he gained valuable information that was needed to close cases.
All in a day's work.
Daryl gathered up the files and arranged them in a neat order. The office was starting to come alive again as the nightshift officers arrived. Daryl gathered his personal belongings, rose from his chair, and grabbed a leather satchel that was resting under the desk. He put the files in the satchel. He needed to chill out tonight, drink a few beers, clear his mind. He was already thinking about what he would do tomorrow, how he would approach the case. His main concern was the decapitation murder; he felt that if he could help identify the victim it might assure the homeboys that none of their kind had anything to do with it. He hoped it would. With all this crazy speculation fueling the fire, it was eventually bound to get an innocent person killed.
Daryl couldn't have that.
As he was heading out of the office Raymond Skipp, a friend of his from the days when he worked nights four years before, raised a hand in greeting. “How's it going, Daryl?"
“Same old, same old, Ray."
“You working tomorrow?"
“Yeah. You?” He stopped by Ray's desk on his way out the door. Ray was a short, wiry little guy who was nearly bald. He sported a frizzled beard and beady little eyes. He worked undercover narcotics.
“Nope. Catchin’ the last game of the season at Dodger Stadium."
“Well, good for you. What you workin’ on lately?"
“Same old crap,” Ray sighed. “I hear you're working on that latest Butcher case?"
A journalist from the Los Angeles Times had termed the killer the East Side Butcher. Daryl's supervisor, Hank Wilkson, and some of the other guys in the office were calling him LA's Jack the Ripper. Daryl nodded. “Yeah, and the fallout that is happening because of it. I've got four gang murders to handle in addition to it."
Ray shook his head. “I heard about that shit. Nasty."
Daryl felt the smooth taste of Miller Lites calling him at his apartment. “Well, listen, Ray, I gotta—"
“Oh, wait a minute,” Ray said, holding his hand up. “Now I remember why I called you over. I've got something that might help you on this Butcher thing."
“Yeah?” Daryl stopped, looking at Ray curiously.
“One of the drug counselors I work with on the East Side, guy by the name of Danny Hernandez, seems to think he knows who this latest victim is."
“He does, huh?"
“Yeah.” Ray plucked a pad of paper from the clutter on his desk and wrote an address on it. He tore the page off and handed it to Daryl. “Give him a visit tomorrow."
“What does he say?"
Ray shrugged. “He said judging from the description in the paper it sounds like a guy he used to hang out with when he was using. Guy named Javier Perez, member of the Eighteenth Street gang."
Daryl nodded. That was a nice lead. So far Eighteenth Street hadn't been implicated in the crime, and none of the supposed missing persons were from that gang.
“Okay, I'll pay him a visit tomorrow. Thanks for the lead."
“No problem, man,” Ray said. “Oh, listen, one more thing."
“Yeah?"
“This Danny Hernandez guy is a former gang banger. Used to be a heroin addict and a dealer, but he's been clean and sober now for almost ten years. He does a lot of gang and drug interdictions with the kids and works well with the community there. He's very tapped into the community on the East Side. If there's anybody who is clearly from the streets that knows what these people think, and who can communicate with them and work with us, Danny is the man."
Daryl nodded. “He sounds like a good resource. I'll make double sure I see him tomorrow then."
“Good. See you later, man."
Daryl left the office and took a look at the address Ray had scrawled. It was in Boyle Heights, only ten miles out of his way. It was only seven o'clock, still relatively early. Perhaps it wouldn't be a bad idea to look up this Danny Hernandez character on his way home.
He did precisely that. He detoured east on Interstate 10 heading for East Los Angeles.
The confessional booth he was seated in at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic church was growing hot and stifling in the lateness of the day. Father John Glowacz was just about to get up and leave for the day when he heard the outer door of the confessional booth open. A figure stepped in and closed the door. He settled in his seat behind the screen and crossed himself, waiting for the person to sit down and begin the liturgy.
“Forgive me Father, for I have sinned.” The voice that came from behind the screen was spoken in a hoarse whisper. The priest detected an eerie familiarness to it but couldn't quite place it. “It has been one week since my last confession."
“I'm listening, my Son,” Father Glowacz murmured.
There was silence for a moment. It had been unbearably hot all day and at the latter part of the afternoon and early evening the confessional booth had been stuffy and hot. The priest loosened his clerical color, wiping sweat from his neck. He hoped this one would hurry it up.
The silence dragged on for a moment. The priest was just about to urge the poor soul on when there was a strangled gasp from the other side of the screen. “I..."
“Yes, my son?” Father Glowacz urged. It sounded like the poor soul was really struggling with something bad. Andthere was something familiar about that voice. Had he heard this penitent's confessions before?
The whisper was choked and garbled. “I've done some ... bad things, Father."
“God forgives all those who confess their sins, my son,” he said, his stomach suddenly growing leaden.
“Does He?” The whispered voice held a hint of doubt.
“Yes, He does."
“Thank ... Jesus...” the whispered voice cracked.
There was silence for a moment. Father John Glowacz took a deep breath, licked his lips, and urged him on. “Go on, my son."
; The figure behind the screen cleared his throat. “Nothing I tell you goes outside of these walls, right Father? It's all between you, me, and God, right?"
“That's right, my son."
“Good.” More clearing of his throat. No matter how much he cleared his throat, the penitent's voice still sounded hoarse and whispery. “Because I've done some bad things."
“Well, let's hear what they are before we decide how bad they are, eh?” Father Glowacz's heart was beating hard. His hands were shaking. It couldn't be, it just couldn't be who he was thinking it was.
“Okay.” The penitent paused again, as if trying to decide which sin to confess first. “I did it again."
“Did what again, my son?” Oh God, no!
“I told myself I wasn't going to do it anymore,” the whispered voice went on, becoming slightly falsetto. “Especially since the one I got over a month ago is still with me. But.... I just couldn't help myself.” His voice squeaked slightly, cracking in its hoarse, deep tone.
“What did you do, my son?” Father Glowacz's stomach felt leaden with dread. It's him, he thought. It's him, oh why God why—
There was a shuffling from behind the screen, as if the person sitting on the other side of the confessional was shifting in his seat. There was a squeak of the bench as if the person was leaning forward.
And then he confessed. And Father John Glowazcz sat on his side of the confessional booth, his mouth gaping open in horror, his hands trembling, his heart racing with fright as the madman confessed his sins once again to him.
Chapter 3
The apartment complex Danny Hernandez lived in was the best looking building on the block. In a neighborhood consisting largely of small, clapboard style houses badly in need of paint, and small apartment complexes looking worse for the wear, the building Danny lived in was a sight for sore eyes. The paint on the building was fairly recent, at least five years old. It was a seven unit complex with a long narrow driveway that wound to the rear of the building where the carport was housed. Danny lived in apartment number seven, at the top of the stairs. Daryl climbed the stairs, noting that in spite of the rambunctious shouts of children from houses and apartment complexes in the neighborhood, the tenants of this building were fairly quiet.
