by phuc
Victor and Midget traded a glance. The back of Rachael's neck tensed, as if expecting a blow. The other gang members shifted visibly, as if expecting Daryl and the officers to rush them in a swarm. Daryl nodded at Victor, emphasizing that it was okay to speak freely. Victor caught the gesture and relaxed and Rachael felt the weight lift off her shoulders. Be cool, she thought. Everybody just be cool.
“It's possible,” Victor said, looking and speaking to Rachael directly now. Of the six gang members here, Victor was clearly the leader of this particular set and the most articulate. “I mean, you should see the kind of people that come down here looking for junk or crack. Businessmen, celebrities—all kinds of people, man. Rock stars, movie stars, people like that. Even lawyers, man.” Victor looked more disgusted at the professional level of his clients than his role in the drug trade. “It's not just other ‘bangers that come down here buying shit from us."
“But if you want to buy from us,” Rascal piped in from the rear of the circle, “you got to have somebody who knows us introduce you.” He stepped forward, his wild shock of hair bobbing in the slight breeze. “Like, say you and me know each other, and I'm tight with Victor here. And say you want to score some Black Tar or something. Some real good stuff. You might ask me where you could get some primo stuff, in a place where the cops don't hardly go and where it's pretty safe. And since I know Victor and his crew hang here, and that the cops don't come here, I say, ‘yeah, I know the perfect dealer for you. I'll set you up'. Then I call Victor, arrange a buy, and I take you down here. You make your deal and if he likes you he gives you the okay that it's cool for you to come down. And he tells the other homeboys that you're cool, y'know what I'm sayin'?"
Rachael knew what he was saying and she got it loud and clear. She glanced around the area, noting the multi-colored graffiti staining the concrete columns that supported the bridge, the abandoned sofa resting against a graffiti stained wall, the trash that littered the ground, and the six gang members who stood grouped around them. She pictured what this place must be like at night, when the lights of the city barely penetrated the area, leaving it dark, ominous, the only sound the constant hum of traffic from the bridge. The only lights would come from the gang members who either brought flashlights to the scene, or the occasional bonfires that were built by homeless people on cold winter nights. No wonder the cops stayed away from this area.
Speaking of the homeless: “What about the homeless people?” Rachael asked.
“Do they come around here?"
Midget shrugged. “Sometimes. They don't bother us, though. They're cool."
Gordo was shaking his head. “Not many of them come down here.” He slammed his meaty fist into his palm again. “It gets boring down here sometimes."
The other gang members laughed at this and Rachael got the message loud and clear. She supposed the scariest thing about being homeless would be trying to seek shelter from the rain under this particular bridge and then having the daylights stomped out of you and whatever spare change you might have stolen, all just to amuse the local hoods.
“So I guess we can safely rule a homeless person out as being the murderer.”
Rachael meant the comment to be taken as a joke. Half of the gang members—Victor included—got it; the other half stared at her dumbfoundedly.
“Let's get back to what goes on down here on an average day,” she coaxed them back down that track and, with some encouraging and prodding, got them to paint a picture of what a typical day under the Eight-first Street bridge was like. Admittingly, nobody actually showed up at the spot until around ten in the morning. The first four hours of the day were spent shooting the shit, playing craps, gossiping, drinking beer, getting high. Occasionally a customer would cruise down in search of drugs. As the afternoon drew to a close the older gang members would stop by for a beer, a toot, a toke.
There was always much laughter and festivities. By the early evening most of the gang members were tanked and ready to go for a night on the town. Some of them hit the streets in search of cheap thrills-a car to jack, an enemy to kill, a girl to fuck. But their places under the bridge were always filled with other homies. As the night wore on, young gang members who hadn't been initiated into the gang life, and who were ready to take the plunge were jumped in. More drug deals went down. And as the night wore into the early morning, the area began to thin out as gang members began to go home or head off to brighter pastures.
All six of the Los Compadres gang members took turns telling her varying versions of this narrative, often from many different perspectives of the day. But she got the gist of it. And the bottom line was that between two and eight a.m., this area was largely uninhabited.
Which was roughly around the same time frame it was estimated that Rick Perez's decapitated body was left under the bridge.
She glanced at Daryl Garcia who returned her look. She was sure Daryl was thinking the same thing: whoever dumped Rick's body was either damned lucky that he had gotten into this area undetected, or he knew the area and the people who inhabited it very well. And if that was the case, he would have known that between the hours of two and eight a.m. would have been the best times to dump a body.
No wonder they think a rival gang member was responsible, she thought. While the idea was tantalizing, theoretically it was impossible. After all, with one exception, all the victims were from different gangs. She brought this up to Victor.
The gang member appeared to think this over. “Yeah, but that doesn't mean anything. Whoever killed Rick wasn't the same dude that killed those other hotos."
“But the murders are all the work of the same person,” Rachael said, reading from her list of notes. “The FBI determined that they're not separate random acts. One person is responsible for them all."
“So?” Victor eyed her, full of macho bravado.
“So what that means is that it's impossible that another gang killed Rick,” Rachael said.
“Why couldn't it be somebody from like Boyle Heights or Tortilla Flats if one of theirs was killed?” Midget asked, defiantly. “Maybe they killed Rick because they thought we killed one of their hotos. Since Rick was from Eighteenth Street, maybe Tortilla Flats killed him and dumped him here on our turf to make it look bad on us. Shit, we wouldn't kill a hoto from another gang and leave him in somebody else's turf."
“You wouldn't?” The question was out of her mouth before she could stop it.
Victor glowered at her menacingly. The other gang members took a step forward.
Rachael felt herself taking two big steps back as Victor bore down on her. “You accusing us of killing the putos from those other gangs that way? Cutting them up and shit?"
Rachael searched for a quick solution to the misunderstanding. “No, I'm not. I'm just trying to make you see a point. You see, if you didn't kill one of their homeboys in that manner-which I know nobody from Los Compadres is responsible for-than how could one of them have taken Rick out that way?"
This seemed to calm them down. They relaxed. Victor backed down, his face still darkened with the anger that any of his homies could have killed rivals in that fashion.
She smiled at them, hoping that would break the ice, trying to make eye contact with them. Only Joker, who seemed to see himself as the gangster Don Juan, would return her glance and smile.
“The bottom line to all this I suppose is that shit goes down here all the time, right?” Rachael asked.
Gordo nodded. “Shit goes down here all the time. Rick ain't the first dude to die down here."
“And he won't be the last,” Midget said, his scowl still etched on his little face.
Rachael glanced at Daryl, who nodded twice. Time to go. She turned back to Victor and held out her hand. “Thank you for your help. All of you. I really appreciate it."
She shook hands with all of them as they asked if she was going to use their names in the newspaper. She said that she would if they wanted her to. They laughed about their new-found fame, who
oping it up. Lance stepped up, his cue to begin his work.
Rachael took the lead. “Now if we could maybe get some pictures of you guys just sort of hanging out."
The gang members were only too happy to comply. They pulled red and blue bandanas over their noses and mouths like bandits of the old west, squatted on their haunches, flashed gang signs amid the backdrop of graffiti covered walls and columns while Lance snapped away. During the quick photo session she managed a few words with Daryl. “That went over better than I thought it would,” she whispered.
“Yes, it did,” he said softly, looking on as Lance directed Victor, Gordo, Joker, and Midget for another shot. “Thank God for Danny Hernandez. He was really instrumental in pulling this off."
“I'll have to meet him sometime to thank him personally,” Rachael said.
“I'll introduce you,” Daryl said.
“He's involved at the church, right?” Rachael asked, watching as Lance seemed to ease into the quick photo session. The laughter of the gang members echoed in the dusty hangout. “The gang counselor?"
“That's right,” Daryl turned to her and smiled. “He's a good guy. He's in tight with these kids here in the streets. Used to be one of them. He runs a youth ministry at Our Lady of Guadalupe Catholic Church in East Los Angeles."
“Maybe I can talk to him next,” Rachael said. She put her notes in her jacket pocket. Lance was finishing up the shoot.
“I'll give him a call,” Daryl said.
They bade the gang members goodbye, climbed in their cars, and turned around, heading out from under the bridge. As they drove down the dusty road out of the squalid neighborhood, Rachael couldn't help but ask Lance how he felt.
“Better now that we're out of there,” he said. He looked at her from the rearview mirror, his brown eyes showing relief. She smiled at him, then turned her attention back to Daryl.
“Thank you,” she said. “For everything."
“Don't mention it,” Daryl said, watching the road ahead. “You just write yourself one hell of an article. If you need to talk to Danny Hernandez, let me know."
“I'll call you tonight,” she said. He nodded, a little smile on his face. She smiled back. I can't string him along anymore, she thought. I think he's hooked a little too deep.
Maybe we can do lunch or something. That might ease the pressure.
She settled in the front seat, thinking about the article she was going to write as Daryl and Lance talked about the Dodgers.
Chapter 7
Daryl Garcia finished the evening edition of the Los Angeles Times with Rachael Pearce's two-part retrospective story of the Eastside Butcher and folded it up, placing it on the coffee table. He leaned back on the worn sofa in his living room. It was a damn good piece of investigative journalism. He had been worried that her exposé on the murder series and how the LAPD was handling it would be a blow to the department and hinder the investigation somehow. If anything, the article had helped them. Since publication of Part One yesterday, the department had been flooded with calls by people with tips. By this afternoon Parker Center had received almost four hundred tips from citizens ranging from people voicing suspicion of a neighbor or loved one, to people calling to voice concern over strange goings-on in their neighborhood. A few crackpots even called to confess to the murders but were quickly eliminated when they couldn't provide intimate details of the emasculations and post mortem sexual abuse performed on the corpses. They would probably be getting more false confessions in the weeks and months to come. Daryl reached for a glass of beer he had poured for himself upon returning home and drained the glass dry. He sighed again. It had been a long day and he was very tired.
He heard the click of toenails on the linoleum floor and looked up. A white and tan pit bull terrier was standing in the doorway, wagging its tail so hard that the animal's hindquarters were swishing back and forth. Daryl broke into a grin. “How ya doin', Petey?
Have a nice nap?"
The dog barked happily and trotted over to Daryl. He set the paper aside as the dog practically leaped into his lap and began smothering his face in dog kisses, wagging his tail harder. Daryl laughed, patting and rubbing the dog's back. “Yes, I love you too, you big mutt. Boy, are you happy today."
Petey grabbed Daryl's right hand gently in its jaws and tugged slightly. Daryl knew what the dog wanted. “Okay, but just for a little while. I've still got the paper to read, okay?"
He got to his feet and followed the happily bouncing dog through the living room and out to the back patio. He grinned. The few people he'd had over at the house were always amazed at how he allowed the pit bull to clamp those bone-crunching jaws over his wrist like that. Once most people spent a few minutes with Petey they realized he shattered all stereotypes of the breed.
Once they hit the back patio, Petey took off running. Daryl reached down for a tennis ball that had been sewn to an old rag. He threw the ball and Petey jumped up and caught it. The dog eyed Daryl, tail wagging, backing up towards the fence. Come get me, his eyes seemed to say. Daryl laughed and lunged for Petey, who feinted to his right and ran around him. “You little snot!” Petey veered closer, on purpose it always seemed, and Daryl grabbed the rag and pulled. Petey growled and shook his head and the two of them spent the next thirty minutes playing like this. It was Petey's favorite game: the human throws the ball, the dog runs after it, gets it, and runs away with the ball. Oh, but he has to let the human get the ball to make the human feel good about himself. Once the human got the ball, though, the dog had to pretend to be big and tough and engage the human in another game—tug of war. What dog didn't enjoy a game of tug of war with a human over some object?
As Daryl played with Petey, his mind tracked on how the pit bull came into his possession. He had obtained Petey when the dog had been only six weeks old. While performing a raid on a gang house in South Central Los Angeles, they had discovered a make-shift kennel in the backyard and a circular area of the yard that had been used for pit fighting. Three adult female dogs and one male were confiscated, along with twelve younger dogs and puppies. Most of the dogs were in bad shape with obvious wounds from fights. It had sickened Daryl and he remembered being tempted to kick holy hell out of the homeowner, a fifty-one-year-old long-time gang member who freely admitted to breeding the dogs for pit fighting. If it had been up to him, he would have forced a pit fight between the homeowner and one of his loser gang buddies—one to the death the way they forced it on these poor animals.
Among the twelve younger pit bull dogs and puppies was a six week old quivering puppy that Daryl had fallen in love with the minute he laid eyes on the critter.
Animal Control Officers were already on the scene doing their best to round up the animals, and Daryl had picked up the quivering puppy and looked him in the face.
Looking at that little puppy had reminded him of one of his favorite childhood shows The Little Rascals. The dog on that show was a pit bull and its name had been Petey. This puppy looked exactly like a miniature version of the dog that he had grown up with on that childhood show. He had stroked the dog's fur and the puppy licked his fingers, making friends. Daryl had smiled at the dog. “Nobody's ever going to hurt you ever again, little guy. Never."
He had taken Petey home with him that day, gotten him neutered, and invested in a professional dog trainer. And unlike those who breed pit bulls to fight, he had left the Petey's ears uncropped and his tail intact. He had just gotten divorced a few months before from his second wife and he felt that he needed a companion. Petey had become that companion, and as the dog grew up they had become quite close. Petey grew to be a loyal, obedient, gentle, and very intelligent animal. So intelligent, in fact, that Daryl had to spell certain words in the dog's presence lest the animal go into a frenzy if he uttered the words car or ride. Petey loved riding in the car.
“That's it, boy. I'm beat.” Daryl held the ball up and Petey leaped around the yard, as if begging one more, just one more time. Pleeeaaassseeee!
&n
bsp; “No more, guy. Really, I'm tired okay?” Daryl put the saliva soaked ball in the basket he had set by the patio and opened the sliding glass door. Petey stopped leaping in the air and trotted over, content that he had still gotten a good game out of his master.
Daryl let them back in the house, closed and locked the patio door. Petey padded into the kitchen and Daryl heard the animal slurp water out of his bowl. Daryl sat back down on the sofa, feeling tired. Not much else on the agenda tonight except read the paper and kick back. He picked up the paper, found his place, and continued reading.
Rachael Pearce's two part story had started with a detailed history of the murder series, beginning with the discovery of Lorenzo Cardena and Louis “Goofy” Hernandez in September of last year. She delved into all the theories of both murders and drew a strong parallel that they were related to the murder of an unidentified woman washed ashore in Newport Beach a year previously, which Daryl had told her privately was no doubt the work of the same killer. Then she quickly went through the rest of the murders, to Gloria Aldrete, Rick Perez, the unidentified man found in the San Gabriel Mountains, and the most recent victim found in the LA River. She also drew a strong correlation to a lone African American victim killed in 1989 and an unidentified victim, whose nude decapitated body was found in a railroad boxcar in Riverside County this past June. Nine bodies all together. In addition, she also interviewed the parents and loved ones of the murder victims, getting their reaction to the murders, their feelings about losing a loved one to such a heinous crime. As usual, many of them expressed the same sentiments against the Los Angeles Police Department: “The police don't do enough to protect us,”
or “the police don't care about the people who live in these neighborhoods.” She noted all their reactions, positive and negative, then continued on. And as part one of the article wound down, she was able to get the investigators reaction to the murder series. One of the detectives, a guy named Tony Butler, who was assisting in the investigation, was quoted as saying: “Serial killers are the worst because you never know when they will strike, much less who they could be. Thankfully the FBI is able to profile them, which gives us some help. But for the most part they're very difficult to catch."
