by Chris Culver
“Good luck.”
Ash took the elevator to the lobby and walked to his car. He didn’t get in and drive off right away; instead, he opened the two front doors to air it out and hopefully cool it down. Since the seats felt too hot to sit on, Ash stayed outside and called the phone number of the individual who had been so intent on getting in touch with Spencer. The phone didn’t even ring; it simply went to an electronic message telling him that he had just called a number that didn’t receive incoming calls. The message repeated, thanking him again for calling the Pendleton Correctional Facility. Spencer had been getting calls from someone in prison.
21
Pendleton contained both maximum- and minimum-security units and famously housed John Dillinger for several years in the midtwenties. As far as prisons went, it had a surprising number of rehabilitative amenities. Inmates could learn a trade, earn a GED, or even receive college credit through a local university. Politicians derided the programs as an unnecessary waste of taxpayer dollars, but they rarely mentioned that those opportunities lowered the rate of recidivism for many crimes and kept a lot of men from going back to prison later in life, saving the state massive amounts of money. The courts around Indianapolis sent a lot of convicts out there, so Ash knew the facility fairly well. He also knew that its warden wouldn’t allow an inmate to make that many phone calls that quickly. If a prisoner made them, he had a deal with somebody.
Ash called the facility’s main operator, who, after he introduced himself, transferred Ash’s call to the assistant warden’s office. The assistant warden, a man named Tyler Addison, listened politely as Ash laid out the basics of the case and the timing of the phone calls. Addison promised to find out what he could as quickly as he could. Ash wouldn’t have put much faith in that, but for one fact: Cameras filmed every exchange between guards and prisoners, every phone call, and every patrol on the floor. If someone had made calls on behalf of a prisoner, Addison would find out quickly.
Ash drove to his office. By the time he got there, Addison had already finished reviewing surveillance video that had been shot at the time of the last phone call. A female corrections officer had given a prisoner access to a phone in a restricted area. Unfortunately, that inmate never turned toward the camera, so no one at the prison could identify him yet. They would as soon as they went through enough film, but that would take a while. In the meantime, Addison had placed her in custody pending an arrest for official misconduct, a felony under Indiana law.
The drive would take at least forty minutes, but without much else going on with the case, Ash had time. As the liaison officer, he could even make a decent case that he should be the one to go. He told Addison that he’d be over as quickly as he could before hopping in his car and driving off.
Pendleton and its surrounding buildings occupied a five-hundred-acre tract of what could have been extremely productive farmland. A thirty-foot-high razor-wire and chain-link fence surrounded the maximum-security buildings, but a minimum-security dormitory sat just outside. In the distance, he could even see a juvenile facility. A good number of men spent most of their lives on those five hundred acres, going to the juvenile facility as teenagers and then graduating to the adult facility years later. Sad and frustrating didn’t begin to describe it.
Ash parked in front of the administrative building of the main prison and stepped out of his car. Heat radiated from the asphalt so strongly that he felt it through the soles of his shoes. The administrative building had been built well before the rest of the jail, and it showed. It had large picture windows, ornate stone molding on the roof, and impressive ornamentation in the brickwork. Someone had been proud to build that place. Had Ash not known better, he could have mistaken it for a school. Before going inside, he pulled his jacket back, exposing the badge on his belt.
Warden Addison met Ash in the lobby and then led him to a booth where he could check his firearm for the duration of his stay at the prison. After that, they walked to an unadorned room normally used by inmates to speak with their attorneys. Ash couldn’t see cameras anywhere, but he could see a red panic button beside the door. The suspected guard walked in by herself a few moments later. She had smooth, evenly tanned skin, brown hair pulled back from her face, and smile lines beside her eyes. When Ash showed her his badge, she dropped her gaze and looked at the table.
“What agency are you with?” she asked, her voice soft. Before answering, Ash gestured at the seat across from him at the table and she sat down, being careful not to sit on the baton still at her hip. Corrections officers had significant law enforcement and crowd control training, but they didn’t go to the police academy. She probably didn’t know the rather nuanced rules that guided an interrogation. Ash could use that.
“I’m Ash Rashid, and I’m a detective sergeant with the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. Just so I know what to call you, what’s your name?”
“Rita Morehouse,” she said. She started to say something else but then looked away. “Why do you want to talk to me?”
She looked at him again, her lower lip trembling. Had Rita been a regular witness, Ash would have averted his eyes and given her a moment to herself. He refused with her, though; she put on a uniform every morning, and she knew the sort of men housed in a maximum-security facility. Few of them had joined the local church choir when young, and few would have scruples about ordering a murder over the phone. Ash held her gaze and watched as the tremble passed from her lips to her shoulders.
“I think you have a pretty good idea,” said Ash. “I know that you allowed an inmate to place unauthorized calls to a man named Marvin Spencer. I want to know the inmate’s name.”
Her hand moved from the table to her upper chest and throat. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t need to make this hard on yourself. It’s on video. You’re not doing yourself any favors by holding back on me.”
She wiped a tear from her cheek. “I’ve got kids,” she said. “I could lose my job.”
“You think I drove from Indianapolis because I’m interested in having you fired? You allowed an inmate to call a man suspected of human trafficking. You facilitated criminal acts and can therefore be prosecuted for those criminal acts. Conspiracy to commit murder, rape, promotion of prostitution, human trafficking. Take your pick. Any of those will put you in jail for the rest of your life. Cooperate with me and the prosecutor might go easier on you.”
Rita started sobbing before he even finished speaking. Ash couldn’t make deals with anyone, nor did he think the local prosecutor would actually charge her with anything beyond official misconduct. That would get her fired and it could even send her to prison for a year, but more than likely, she’d plea it down or receive a suspended sentence. She had done something stupid, but she hadn’t ruined her life no matter what he said. He didn’t want her to know that, though.
“I need a name. Who was he?” Ash waited for fifteen or so seconds, but she didn’t respond. “We’re going to find out anyway once we look at the film. Time matters in the case I’m working, though, so I need a name now.” He waited again, but she didn’t say anything. Ash decided to use a different tactic. “You said you had kids. Do you have family around who’d be willing to take care of them?”
“Why?”
“Because I don’t think you’ll be seeing them anytime soon. Tell me what I want to know, and make this right. I bet you’re a good mom. Do the right thing here so you can see your children grow up.”
She looked away, pursed her lips, and squeezed her eyes tight. Ash thought he had her, so he gave her some time to think. Eventually, she wiped tears off her cheeks with the back of one hand.
“He told me he was trying to set up a birthday party for his daughter,” she said. “I didn’t know what he was really doing.”
“Unfortunately, he lied to you. What was his name?”
She took a deep breath and looked at the table. “Nathan Ross. He’s a nonviolent offe
nder on my block. I didn’t think he’d do anything like this. He told me I was helping out his kids.”
“Thank you for your honesty. You’ve done the right thing,” said Ash, already planning his next move. He stood up and walked to the door, but stopped before opening it. “Before I go, tell me one thing. Why did you really help this guy?”
She looked at the table. “He said I was pretty. No one has told me that in a long time.”
“I’ll tell the local prosecutor that you helped me. In the meantime, you should call a defense lawyer because you’re going to need some help.”
* * *
Rita stayed in the interview room while the guard who had been outside escorted Ash to Warden Addison’s corner office. The warden shared a receptionist and waiting room with the prison’s chief counsel, but the guard escorting him must have been under orders to let him through quickly. He nodded to the receptionist and then knocked on his boss’s door before Ash even had time to take in his surroundings. Two men greeted him inside: Addison, whom Ash had met earlier, and a major from the Department of Corrections’ Internal Affairs division. The major must have been stationed nearby for him to get out there so quickly.
Ash sat on one of two brown leather chairs in front of the warden’s gargantuan oak desk, while the major took the chair beside him. Addison’s office had wood-framed windows on two walls, one set of which overlooked a concrete exercise yard inside the prison, while the other overlooked a field of soybean plants beyond the prison’s fence. A picture of Addison shaking the previous governor’s hand occupied a place of honor on the wall behind the warden’s chair.
“First off, your officer admitted to me that she allowed a prisoner to place some phone calls,” said Ash. “I don’t know what damage, if any, her actions have caused, but she is cooperating.”
Addison nodded, but his face remained impassive and unreadable. “Very good,” he said. “Did she give you the prisoner’s name?”
“Guy named Nathan Ross. She said he was a nonviolent offender on her block.”
Addison nodded and began typing on his computer. While he did that, the major looked at Ash.
“She sleeping with him, too?”
“I didn’t ask.”
“She probably is,” he said. “She’d be the third one this year. The last two were nurses. You think with their college degree they’d be smart enough to keep their pants on. No such luck. If I had my way, we wouldn’t hire them.”
Ash presumed he meant he wouldn’t hire women rather than nurses. He didn’t ask him to correct that minor ambiguity, though.
“You find Ross’s records?” asked Ash, directing the question to Addison.
“Yeah,” he said, glancing from the computer to Ash and then back. “He’s in the third year of an eight-year rip for forgery and identity deception. He’s up for parole in a couple of months. He’s been written up for having cigarettes in his cell, but he hasn’t ever gotten violent with anyone.”
“You have any of his trial records?”
The warden shook his head. “We don’t have those, but you’re in luck. Marion County prosecuted him, lady named Susan Mercer. You know her?”
Ash grunted. He did know her and had even got along with her for several years. Their relationship became strained after he testified for the defense in the middle of the largest murder trial she ever prosecuted. He had done the right thing, but he couldn’t help but regret the collateral damage it caused.
“I wouldn’t say that makes me lucky,” said Ash, standing and removing his cell phone from his jacket. “If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to make a call.”
The warden nodded and Ash slipped through the door and into the lobby. Susan answered quickly, and while her tone remained civil, she spoke mostly in one- or two-word answers, almost as if she were a witness under hostile examination in court. She had a nearly encyclopedic recall of cases she tried, though, so she recognized Ross’s name.
A clerk caught him trying to buy booze with a stolen credit card at a liquor store almost five years ago and called the police. The first officer on the scene suspected Ross had a weapon, so he patted him down and found eight fake IDs for eight young women of various ethnicities as well as a revolver in his pockets. The IDs appeared genuine and even had many of the same security features a real, state-issued ID would have. None of the young women on them could be found in the system, though. Thinking Ross made them for illegal immigrants, detectives secured a search warrant for his home and found printmaking equipment and stacks of fraudulent birth certificates and Social Security cards. Despite being offered a generous plea deal, Ross never cooperated and he never identified the eight young women he had made documents for. If he had made those IDs for human traffickers, Ash understood his silence.
He thanked Susan for the information before going back to the warden’s office, catching the tail end of a conversation about a problematic inmate in one of the blocks. Addison and the major quieted almost as soon as Ash came in.
“Did you get what you needed?” asked the warden.
“Mostly,” said Ash. “Ross was arrested for making fake IDs for young women, and he’s trying to get in touch with a man who traffics in young women. I need to talk to him.”
“Rita Morehouse,” said the major, shaking his head. “Never should have hired her.”
“You’ve made your opinion known, Terrance,” said the warden. “She’s not going to be working here anymore if it makes you feel better.”
Terrance held up his hands defensively. “Didn’t mean any offense. I know you don’t make the policy.”
“I appreciate that,” said the warden. “Find Mr. Ross and bring him here.” He looked at Ash. “Thank you for bringing this to our attention. We will work with the Madison County prosecutor’s office and your own office to ensure that Mr. Ross and Ms. Morehouse are punished appropriately.”
“Does Ross have a cellmate?”
“We’re at over a hundred percent capacity right now. Everybody’s got a cellmate.”
“Then get him, too,” said Ash. “I’ve got an idea.”
The warden looked at Terrance again. “Do it.”
He left without saying another word. Ash excused himself as well and went to the prison chapel for afternoon prayers. Even just a few minutes away from the case cleared his head and made the world a little easier to take. Ross may not have been as bad as Palmer or Spencer, but he played a pivotal role in the trafficker’s organization. Even the thought of being in the same room as him caused an almost primal, instinctual anger to form in Ash’s gut.
By the time he got back to the assistant warden’s office, Terrance had returned with sweat beading on his brow and dark patches on his uniform. Ross and his cellmate had been in the exercise yard outside, so it took several guards to find them amid the other prisoners. With that many bodies on that much concrete, the temperature must have been off the charts. Ash didn’t plan to use anything the cellmate said, so he almost felt guilty for asking the guards to bring him. On the other hand, Terrance’s comments about women had proven him to be an asshole, and Ash didn’t have a lot of sympathy for assholes.
He asked the guards to put both men in separate interview rooms but he didn’t go immediately to either one. Instead, he let them stew and wait alone for about twenty minutes. When he went into the room with the cellmate, the guy had his head on the table and looked to be asleep. Like a lot of prisoners, he had several visible tattoos, one of which was a crude drawing of a red bird sitting atop a baseball bat; the lines were blotchy and the ink looked faded, but Ash recognized the logo. Ross’s cellmate liked the St. Louis Cardinals. Ash gently woke him up and introduced himself. He didn’t have to say much to get the prisoner talking. As soon as Ash asked if the prisoner had seen the Cardinals and Astros game, he opened his mouth and only stopped talking to take a breath.
Unbeknownst to the prisoner, Ash wasn’t the only person watching him talk. If Terrance had gotten the timing right, he would have “acciden
tly” led Ross to the wrong room, thereby allowing him to see through the one-way mirror built into the door. To him, it would have looked like a detective and his cellmate were having an animated discussion. The technique may have been old and clichéd, but turning people against each other and playing them for information worked well. Ross probably didn’t tell his cellmate everything, but everybody talks in prison and that creates opportunities.
About five minutes after starting his baseball discussion, Ash ended the conversation and pounded on the door for the guard to let him out. He then crossed the hallway to peer through the one-way mirror on the door of the other interview room. Ross had thin shoulders and a scar on an otherwise unadorned chin. Unlike the other men Ash had run into on the case, no tattoos covered his arms and little malice glinted in his eye. He paced the room, his arms at his side. He never stopped moving his fingers. Had he been on the outside, Ross could have passed for an accountant who had just blown a meeting with his most important client. Ash let him pace for another moment, letting his nervousness build before walking inside.
“Hey,” said Ross, taking a seat and leaning against the table. “I wondered when someone would come to talk to me.”
Ash sat across from him at the table and rested his elbows on top. Ross crossed his arms and put his hands on top of his biceps. He tried to keep his nervousness under wraps, but his hands trembled and his breath came shallow and quick.
“Sorry about the delay. I was in the bathroom.”
Ross’s eyes darted to the door and then back to Ash.
“Fine, sure. Who are you and what do you want?”
Ash pulled back his jacket so Ross could see his badge.
“I’m Sergeant Ashraf Rashid with the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. I’m here to give you an opportunity to come clean and maybe stay out of trouble.”
He looked at Ash’s badge and then at his face. “What trouble could I get into in Indianapolis? I’ve been in prison if you didn’t know.”
