Innocence

by David Hosp

  Except that a theory was all that it had been, and reality beats theory every time. What the overeducated criminologists had failed to take into account was a dearth of options for the residents. It was all well and good to assume that a more visible police presence would reduce the frequency with which people committeed crime, but that assumed the availability of an alternative, or at least the perception of one. If the criminals had perceived the option of moving to another area or pursuing legitimate work instead of committing crime, the theory might have panned out. As it was, those options seemed like little more than illusions to the people in question, and both the cops and the criminals realized quickly that little was going to change. As a result, putting police headquarters in the area had done nothing more than shine a flashlight in the fog. Eventually, the notion of redevelopment on a larger scale had been abandoned.

  Finn brought Kozlowski along with him—it never hurt to have an ex-cop with you when you wanted to get some cooperation from the police. They left Lissa at the office. She was in charge of digging into the Salazar case: coordinating with the DNA lab, contacting Dobson’s secretary to have all of his files forwarded, getting a line on fingerprint experts, and clearing the administrative hurdles to get them all the information they would need. There was a mountain of work to climb, and the sooner they laced up their hiking boots, the sooner they’d reach the top.

  Finn and Kozlowski walked into the building and up to the reception desk in the lobby. A young female officer looked over the desk at them with a bored expression. “Can I help you?”

  “I hope so,” Finn said. He always felt that the first strategy in dealing with any bureaucracy was to be polite. Most people behind government desks had a far greater ability, if not actual authority, to solve problems than they let on. “We’re here to see the detective in charge of investigating the murder of Mark Dobson.”

  She frowned. “What is your connection to the investigation? Do you have any information that might help?”

  Finn said, “I don’t know. Probably not, but I was working with Mr. Dobson. The newspaper reports didn’t have much information, but depending on where the investigation is headed, it’s possible that we may be able to help.”

  “Do you have a card?”

  Finn produced one, and she inspected it. Then she rummaged through a stack of forms until she found one in triplicate and made a few notes on it. She stapled Finn’s card to the sheets and handed them back to him. “If you fill these out with a brief statement of any information you have and then give them back to me, someone will call you to follow up.” After a pause, she added, “If they think it’s necessary.”

  Kozlowski stepped up to the counter, taking out his wallet and flipping it open. Behind clear plastic in the top interior fold was a card with a picture of Kozlowski and the official seal of the commonwealth of Massachusetts, identifying him as a retired detective. “Officer,” he said, “we wouldn’t have come down if we didn’t think we could at least be of some help. Is there any chance that you could see whether the detective in charge is available? It might save both us and the detective squad some valuable time.”

  She looked at the identification, taking note of Kozlowski’s name, and gave a shrug that indicated it was no skin off her nose one way or another. She picked up the phone behind her and turned so that they couldn’t hear what she was saying. After another minute, she hung up and turned back to them. “He’ll be down shortly, if you’d like to wait,” she said.

  “Thank you,” Finn replied. “That would be fine.”

  z

  Kozlowski had a bad feeling about this. His stomach was churning, and he felt light-headed. It was probable that Dobson’s murder had nothing to do with the lawyer’s involvement with Salazar; the paper gave no details, so it could just as easily have been a random killing. People were murdered all the time. There didn’t need to be a reason. There was a better than even chance it was nothing but bad luck and timing. Kozlowski didn’t like those odds.

  It was strange being back at headquarters. It had been over a year since he’d been drummed off the force. He’d taken a bullet in the knee in the line of duty, and the brass had pushed him into retirement. He was past his twenty, a full pensioner with disability to boot, and yet he’d wanted to keep doing his job. It was the job he’d been born to do. It was a job he was good at. But he was a pain in the ass to his superiors, and they’d used his injury to push him out.

  It wasn’t nearly as bad as he’d thought it would be, though. Finn kept him fairly busy, and there were a number of other law firms that recognized his competence, which led to some additional jobs from time to time. It was a second salary, what with his pension. Still, he missed being a cop, and he’d consciously avoided coming down to headquarters since he’d become a civilian. He still kept in touch with his friends on the force, and he used them to get information other investigators generally couldn’t. But he hadn’t been back in person. It felt strange, like being in your own house as a guest after you’ve sold it. Everything’s pretty much the same, but now you have to ask permission to take a crap.

  Kozlowski was over at the honor wall—the space reserved for the pictures of the men and women who’d given their lives in the line of duty. He’d never understood why it was called the honor wall. When he’d been a cop, he’d bled with every police officer who went down in the line. Respected their sacrifice. Contributed to the college funds for their kids. But honored their deaths? No. There was no honor in death, as far as he was concerned. The job was to catch the bad guys. The job was to kill them, if necessary, before they killed you or anyone else. You couldn’t do that when you were dead, could you?

  “Mr. Finn.”

  Kozlowski heard the voice and recognized it before he turned around.

  “Detective Macintyre, right?” he heard Finn reply from a few feet away. “You’re in charge of the Dobson investigation?”

  “I am.”

  Kozlowski turned. “Mac,” he said. He kept his voice even. No trace of friendship. No animosity, either.

  “Kozlowski,” Mac said. “You in for a visit?” His voice was even as well. He clearly hadn’t grasped that Kozlowski and Finn were together.

  Kozlowski nodded. “I guess so. You know we were working with Dobson on a case.”

  Macintyre said, “Salazar. I tried to warn him off the case. Looks like it didn’t work. I had no idea you were involved too.”

  “You think this was related to what he was doing for Salazar?” Finn asked.

  Macintyre looked around as though worried that someone might be listening. “Let’s go somewhere we can talk,” he said, ushering them toward a door. “We can use one of the interrogation rooms.”

  Finn fell into step next to the detective. Kozlowski followed. He knew the way. He’d never been in an interrogation room as anything but a cop. He wasn’t looking forward to the experience, but it made sense, and he didn’t have much of a choice.

  Macintyre looked back at Kozlowski. “How’s retirement?” he asked.

  Kozlowski thought he heard a note of derision. He shrugged. “Could be worse.”

  “You were in, what? Twenty-three, twenty-four years?”

  “Twenty-seven.”

  Macintyre shook his head. “Can’t imagine being a civilian after all that time. Gotta suck, huh? Like having your balls cut off?”

  Kozlowski considered his answer. “I don’t know, Mac; I’ve never had my balls cut off. What’s that like?”

  Macintyre looked behind him again, this time with an exaggerated smile. Kozlowski had never seen anything more unnatural. The man’s great hog jowls were pushed up to the sides of his face to make way for a display of dark, crooked teeth. “Good one. We need more guys like you still in the department. It’s like no one has a sense of humor anymore. Shit, you can get written up these days for the slightest little comment. If the sensitivity squad even heard that ‘no balls’ comment, they’d probably have me up on sexism charges. It sucks.”

/>   “Tragic,” Kozlowski deadpanned.

  Finn cast a look over his shoulder now, but Kozlowski waved him off. Like it or not, this was no longer his territory. It was Macintyre’s house now; he was just a visitor.

  z

  “I’m glad you came in, Mr. Finn. You were on our list of people to talk to, so you saved me a trip,” Macintyre said.

  They were settled in an interrogation room on the second floor of the building. It was like thousands of other interrogation rooms in police stations around the country, only newer and cleaner. There was a sturdy, nondescript table in the center of the room, with four chairs pulled up around it. The walls were white and unadorned. On one wall was a large picture-sized mirror, the two-way kind. Finn was familiar with the setup.

  “What can you tell me about Vincente Salazar’s role in Mr. Dobson’s murder?”

  The question surprised Finn. That was probably the goal. There are several well-developed approaches to examining a potential witness. One is to draw information out slowly, to start the interrogation as a discussion, friendly and nonthreatening, and pull out bits and pieces of information like so many lengths of string from a poorly knit sweater. Sometimes the person being interrogated doesn’t know what is happening until he’s naked. Another method is to attack the witness head-on—ask the brutal questions right off the bat to put the person off balance. Off balance is a bad place for anyone to be when answering questions from the police.

  Finn took a deep breath before answering. “I should probably make a few things clear, Detective,” he started. He kept his voice genial but firm. “I represent Mr. Salazar, for good or for bad. I would like to be of whatever assistance I can be without violating my ethical obligations to my client. All that said, I have no reason to believe that Mr. Salazar had anything to do with Mr. Dobson’s murder.”

  “That’s bullshit, Counselor, and we both know it.” Macintyre smiled for the second time that afternoon. Finn didn’t like it when the man smiled. “If you have no reason to believe that Salazar has anything to do with this, then why are you here?”

  It was a good question, and Finn didn’t have a good answer. “As I said, I met with Dobson a number of times last week. Now he’s dead. If there’s any way I can help without compromising myself as an attorney, I want to do it.” Macintyre looked at him. He was silent. He was waiting for Finn to give him more; sweating him out. It was another good technique. Finn continued. “You seem certain that Dobson’s murder had something to do with Salazar. Maybe if you tell me why Salazar would have his own attorney killed, I’ll have a better idea of what information might be useful.”

  Macintyre leaned back in his chair, considering it. “It was the way he was killed,” he said.

  Finn looked back at the detective. It was his turn to be silent; his turn to get more information. It worked.

  Macintyre got up and walked out of the room, closing the door behind him. Finn looked at Kozlowski, who shrugged. A minute later, Macintyre returned carrying two manila folders. He laid one on the table in front of him, looked at Finn for a long moment, then pushed it over toward him.

  Finn looked down at the folder and flipped it open. The image on top shocked him, almost made him puke. He wrenched his gaze away and looked at the floor. “Shit,” he said quietly, holding his hand to his mouth, willing the nausea down.

  Kozlowski leaned over and took a long look. He let a low whistle escape his lips.

  Finn took a deep breath, like a diver getting ready to go under the surface. Then he pulled his head up and looked at the picture again.

  It was Dobson, that was pretty clear, but only from the circumstances. The body in the picture was unrecognizable. It had been hacked to pieces. The head was barely hanging on to the body, and at least one arm was missing. The torso had been sliced and diced like nothing Finn had ever seen before. Several ribs, slashed and broken, jutted up from a mess of red-gray flesh, and Finn couldn’t even tell whether it was the back of the body or the front he was looking at.

  “Hell of a thing, isn’t it?” Macintyre said. The words were sympathetic, but it seemed as though he was enjoying the difficulty with which Finn was flipping through the pictures. They were taken from different angles, but they showed the same pile of mutilated corpse.

  “I don’t understand,” Finn said, his voice little more than a whisper. “Why?”

  “Because that’s what they do,” Macintyre replied.

  “Who?”

  “VDS.” Macintyre leaned back in his chair again, sucking the air through his teeth as though trying to free a piece of food from his last meal. “There was a similar incident a couple of years ago north of D.C. The gang’s pretty strong down there, too. The feds had a line on an informant, and it looked like they were going to get enough to bring them down—the top guys, at least. Then the informant disappeared, along with his FBI handler. They were found a couple of days later in a tidal basin in Maryland. Same condition as Dobson. Worse, maybe, because the fish had had a couple of days to go at ’em.” Macintyre leaned forward and picked up the top picture. “See these long gashes? The way the force of it not only cut through the skin and muscle but went clear through the ribs?”

  Finn looked, but only for a moment before he had to turn away. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Macintyre smirk.

  “And here,” the detective continued. “In this one, the blade split open the man’s face. Three or four swipes there, tops, and yet most of the bone and skin’s gone.”

  Finn didn’t bother looking. “So what?”

  “Machete,” Kozlowski answered for Macintyre.

  The detective gave a look like Kozlowski had spoiled his party.

  “That’s right. Machete.” He glared at Kozlowski. “I keep forgetting, you used to be a cop.”

  “Yeah, well, you got a lot on your mind, I’m sure,” Kozlowski replied.

  The staring match continued until Macintyre broke it off and turned back to Finn. “You see, the machete is VDS’s weapon of choice, particularly for something like this. They’ll use guns when they’re running drugs or conducting everyday business, but when they’re taking someone out specifically, to make a point, they like to use a machete.”

  “Why?” Finn croaked out.

  Macintyre shrugged. “It’s some sort of macho South American thing. Scares people. Maybe it’s tradition. Maybe they’re just sick, psychotic bastards. Who the fuck knows? What we do know is that your boy Dobson, here, was targeted by them.”

  Finn took a deep breath, still trying to recover from the shock of the photographs. He had to think. None of this was making any sense. “Fine,” he said at last. “Let’s assume you’re right. Let’s assume that Dobson was killed by this gang. How does that tie it all to Salazar?”

  “Like I tried to tell you the other day—like I tried to convince Dobson the other day—Salazar’s one of them. Maybe very high up. We know he was the doctor they used whenever they got shot or stabbed when he was on the outside. Plus, he had the connections in El Salvador when he was there. That’s why he fled.”

  “How do you know that?” Finn asked.

  Macintyre pulled out the second folder and opened it, holding up a set of pictures showing Salazar in deep conversation with several heavily tattooed men. “Look at the markings,” he said. “VDS, all the way. There’s no doubt he’s tied in. We never could have made a case based solely on these, but there’s no question who he was with.”

  Finn looked closely at the pictures and thought about it. “That it?”

  Macintyre laughed like he knew he was being hustled, but he played along. “That it?” he mimicked Finn. He laughed again. “No, that’s not it, but it would be enough. This Dobson guy kept very careful track of his hours. Entered them into his firm computer every day, even remotely from his home when he needed to. Turns out, over the last week, the Salazar case was all he was working on. Looks like day and night—up to eighteen, nineteen hours a day a couple of times. Right up to the time he got killed.”r />
  Finn thought about that. Then he shook his head. “It doesn’t make sense. What’s your theory? Dobson was trying to get Salazar out of prison. If Salazar is VDS, why would they kill him? Why would Salazar order a hit?”

  “Oh, I’m not saying for sure that Salazar ordered the hit. Maybe some of his homies did it because they don’t want him out. Maybe they don’t want him reasserting himself on the outside. Or maybe Dobson learned something Salazar and his boys didn’t want him to know. Maybe he found out the truth and they had to waste him. Who knows? All I’m sure of is that Salazar is mixed up in this somehow.” Macintyre leaned forward. “Now, Mr. Finn, I’d like some answers from you.”

  Finn shook his head.

  “No?”

  Finn shook his head again.

  Macintyre folded his arms. “Seems like there’s been a lot of information flowing here, but it’s all been in one direction. Seems like that’s not right.”

  “I’ve got to talk to my client,” Finn replied. “I’m sorry.”

  Macintyre scratched his ear. “Funny, that’s what Dobson said, too. I laid out Salazar’s connections to VDS, and he said he was sorry, too.” He picked up the photographs and waved them in Finn’s face. “How sorry do you think he is now? You want some friendly advice? Stay away from this. Tell me everything you know, and then get as far away from Salazar as you can. He’s bad news.” He waved the pictures of Dobson’s mutilated remains at Finn again. “How much more proof than this do you need?”

  Finn shook his head a third time.

  “So that’s the way it’s gonna be?” There was a thin, evil smile on Macintyre’s lips. Finn still didn’t like it when the man smiled.

  “That’s the way it has to be,” Finn replied.

  Chapter Fifteen