“I’m glad you showed up,” Holman said. He latched the door and leaned against it. The subconscious action wasn’t lost on me…Marianna Perna was on the other side, and she was pissed.
“How long have you been holding the kid?” Schroeder asked. He hooked one of the straight chairs over and sat down, leaning it back against the wall.
“We took him into custody at about two minutes after five,” I said. “Glenn, as the deputy no doubt told you, Richard Staples was arrested in the basement storage room under the gymnasium.”
“The deputy didn’t tell me much,” Archer said. He rubbed a hand across his bald head.
“I’m telling you now,” I said as pleasantly as I could. Archer always reminded me of the mousey little guys who played accountants for the mob in grade B movies. He’d been principal for eleven years, something of an accomplishment in Posadas…and he’d proven himself a bright, innovative educator.
“It appeared that Staples was hiding in the basement for protection. He was uncooperative when we found him.”
“That place is locked in a dozen places,” Archer said. “How’d he get in?”
I looked across at Estelle. “Would you go ask Deputy Torrez if he has had time to conduct a personal inventory search of Staples, and if he has, would you bring the envelope?”
She slipped out, closing the door quietly behind herself. I continued, “There was no sign of forced entry. The way that building is put together, there’s only one answer that’s plausible. Now, the reason I needed to meet with all of you gentlemen is a little sticky.” I stopped as the door opened. Estelle had a manila envelope in hand.
I took it and walked around behind my desk. The contents were lean—one thin wallet, three dimes, a nickel, seven pennies, a Buck pocket knife, and a key ring with six keys. I picked up the key ring.
“Best?” I said, glancing up at Archer. “The school keys are Best?”
He fumbled in his pocket and pulled out a jangling wad. “Yes,” he said, “and key shops won’t duplicate them, either.”
I held out Staples’s key ring to Archer. He took it and grunted. “How the hell did he get his hands on a double A master?”
“Maybe he’ll tell us that. What will that key open?”
“Anything on the west end of the campus, from the gymnasium to the kitchen. Even the little storage building behind the kitchen.”
“Any of the office space?”
Archer shook his head. “That’s another key series. But Staples could walk into the gymnasium any time he wanted. Weight room, furnace room, anywhere except the concession storage. That’s a padlock. The Boosters’ Club and I have a key to that.”
“So he had himself his own private hangout after hours,” Holman said. “But he didn’t take anything?”
Archer looked pained. “Who knows what we’ll find out when we really start looking, sheriff. You know how it is. A teacher reports this or that missing and what can we do? We don’t strip search the entire school. We tell the teachers not to leave money lying around, and lock up equipment when it’s not in use. But, like I said…who knows what we’ll find.”
I held up a hand. “We don’t have a whole lot of time until the sheriff, the district attorney, and I have to deal with young mister Staples’s guardian, so let me lay the cards out for you.” I sat down behind my desk.
“Estelle and I have good cause to believe that Richard Staples is somehow involved with the murders of Todd Sloan and Stuart Torkelson. I’m sure you’ve heard by the grapevine what’s been going on this weekend.”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” Glenn Archer said.
“No, I’m not kidding. We don’t have any solid connection yet, but I have a couple reasons to believe there’s an association. First—” I hesitated and looked at Archer. He was listening carefully. “Glenn, you can appreciate the confidentiality of this. Nothing we talk about in here can leave this room.”
“Of course.” He looked pained that I had had to say it.
“Good. First, Estelle and I interviewed Todd Sloan’s mother and her live-in boyfriend, Kenny Trujillo, after she identified the boy’s remains. They both indicated that Todd had been hanging around with Richard Staples a lot recently.”
Archer frowned, but said nothing.
“They said that if Todd Sloan had been involved in any of the break-ins we’ve had recently, that it might be because of that association with Richard.” I shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. But that establishes some kind of connection between the two, however tenuous. In a community this small, it’s only logical to expect that Richard would know something about Todd’s murder, even if he had no hand in committing it. Everyone follow?” I looked around the room.
“And second?” Archer asked.
“Second is even less substantial,” I said. “It was clear to both Detective Reyes-Guzman and me that Richard Staples was hiding when we found him…he sure as hell wasn’t having much of a party down there in the dark with all those antique desks. But he wasn’t hiding from us. At least I don’t think so.”
“What makes you sure?” Holman asked.
“For one thing, he didn’t have any real warning that we were coming. We did pull into the apartment parking lot about fifteen minutes before, but we then left without going in. We returned, as I said, in about fifteen minutes, but Staples wouldn’t have known we were coming back.” I leaned back in my chair and took a deep breath.
“And even if he did know, he had no reason to hide. We were driving my civilian vehicle. When I went to his apartment to knock, there was nothing threatening in my bearing. I was in uniform, so he would have known who I was. Estelle remained in the vehicle. He could have just ignored us. He could have ignored my knock. Even an idiot would know that an old fat man isn’t going to break down the door.”
Ron Schroeder was the only one who smiled at that.
“I know it’s tenuous, but there are enough tidbits to warrant a good long talk with Mr. Staples. And that’s where I need some help.”
“Help?” Archer asked.
“Yes. No one throws a kid in jail for hiding in the basement of a school, especially if he used a key to gain entry and didn’t commit any vandalism or theft. He was just there, hiding like a scared rabbit.”
“I can understand that.”
“We need to establish what he knows, and that may take some time, it may take some threats, it may take some sweet talk. I don’t know this kid yet.”
“I can tell you a little about him,” Archer said. “He was suspended for truancy in November.”
“Suspended for truancy?” I said. “That’s an interesting concept.”
Archer was in no mood to discuss educational psychology. “He’s eighteen years old, and has enough credits to be a high school freshman.”
“You don’t need any credits to be a freshman, do you?” Holman asked.
“That’s the point,” the principal said. “Richard Staples attends school for the social and vocational benefits, not for anything else. And by vocational, I mean he’s a hell of a talented salesman. Whether the material he sells belongs to him is of little concern. But one thing surprises me in what you say, Mr. Gastner.” Archer rearranged himself on the chair.
“I’ve known both boys most of their lives. Todd Sloan was showing some signs, however small, of coming around. He’s in trouble a lot—I should say was in trouble a lot—for little things. But in the past semester he really showed some signs of trying. He was, what, fifteen? Maybe sixteen? That means he was two grade levels behind his age group. But this past semester he made the merit list. That doesn’t mean he had tremendous grades, necessarily. What it does mean is that at least three teachers singled him out as making commendable progress in some fashion.” Archer shrugged. “So, he was trying a little.”
“Did he hang around with Staples in school?” Schroeder asked.
“That’s what surprises me about all this. No, he didn’t. In fact, both boys were involved really early in the year in
a fight of some kind. Sloan was a scrappy little kid. He got into trouble at the middle school for fighting all the time.” Archer shook his head. “I never saw the two together, except that one incident. I think it was in September. It was a ruckus in phys ed class and involved three or four other youngsters as well.”
“So if they were working together after hours, they kept the fact well disguised,” I said.
“Right.”
“Here’s the problem, then. We have no real reason to keep Staples in custody. Yeah, technically, he committed a couple of crimes by being in the school. But he caused no damage that we’re aware of, and no harm to another person.”
Archer nodded. Ron Schroeder leaned forward. “What Bill needs, Glenn, is for you to sign a formal complaint against Richard Staples. That way, he’s got cause to hold the young man until a preliminary arraignment with the magistrate. Granted, that will only take a few hours, or even less…but it might give these folks enough time to make some connections.”
The idea clearly made Glenn Archer uncomfortable. “And if I don’t? I mean, as you say, there isn’t much cause.”
“Well, that’s not really true,” the district attorney said. “We can hold him for questioning, especially since we’re investigating two capital crimes, and there is some probable cause to believe Staples is involved, however tangentially. It’s just that with a formal, signed complaint from you, any problems down the road are ruled out.”
“And think of it this way, Glenn,” I said. “If we’re right, and Richard Staples was hiding from someone else, his being in our custody might well keep him alive.”
Archer nodded. “Let’s find out what’s going on.”
29
Marianna Perna was one cheerleader who wasn’t in our corner. As far as she was concerned, little Dicky Staples could do no wrong, which explained for me why the kid was in the fix he was.
“Now I want to know what you people think you’re doing,” she said, and her body English, massive in itself, told me she was going to block the hallway until she got an answer.
Sheriff Martin Holman started to hem and haw and I stepped forward to fix Mrs. Perna with my best Marine Corps gunnery sergeant’s glare. “We know exactly what we’re doing, Mrs. Perna. Let me explain something to you.” It wasn’t lost on either of us that Linda Rael was standing quietly in the corner behind Deputy Tony Abeyta, who was taking a turn at dispatch. Linda was holding a small tape recorder.
“We’re up to here,” and I tapped one of the wattles under my chin, “in a murder investigation…a double homicide. We have reliable information that Richard Staples may be aware of some evidence critical to this investigation. And I’ll repeat that for you…may be aware.”
She started to squawk and I held up a hand and frowned. “We also have information that Richard Staples may be involved in some way with at least one residential burglary.”
“Now I want to know—” Mrs. Perna began.
“First you need to listen, Mrs. Perna. Detective Reyes-Guzman and I visited your apartment today in order to talk with Richard Staples. Our intent was to seek information only. He could have opened the door, chatted with me for five minutes, and that might have been that. But he chose not to do that. For whatever reason, Richard Staples illegally entered the high school gymnasium, using a master key that he had in his possession.” Mrs. Perna looked more puzzled than brazen when she heard that.
“As an employee of the village, you know full well that a master key in the wrong hands is a problem indeed. Young Staples has no business with that key. The conclusion I would reach is one of two: Either he stole the key from someone, or the key was given to him by someone who in turn stole it. It really doesn’t matter at the moment. At any rate, Richard Staples entered the school and was observed by a law enforcement officer looking out of one of the windows.
“We apprehended him in the basement of the school and took him into custody. That, ma’am, is what is going on.”
Mrs. Perna counted to ten and switched targets from us to Richard Staples. “I want to talk with that young man. I’ll find out what he thinks he’s doing.”
She turned and looked down the hall as if that were the direction of the holding pen.
“No, ma’am, you may not talk with Mr. Staples. He is in our custody and will remain so until his preliminary arraignment this evening before Justice Emilio Gutierrez.”
“I have a right to talk with my nephew, and I want to talk with him right now.”
I looked at Mrs. Perna with considerable exasperation, tinged with just a little admiration.
“Sorry, Mrs. Perna. Number one, and you can check with the district attorney if you feel I’m wrong, you don’t have any right to see your nephew just now. He’s no longer a minor and he’s under arrest.” I glanced at my watch. “We’re due at arraignment at six-fifteen. That’s an hour and a half from now. If you would like to wait, you’ll have a chance to see Richard for a few moments while he’s being transported to Justice Gutierrez’s. Beyond that, you’ll just have to be patient. And now, if you’ll excuse me, we have a great deal to do.” I gestured at the two vinyl-covered chairs between the file cabinets. “You’re welcome to wait there if you like.”
Mrs. Perna looked at me and then at Sheriff Holman, who hadn’t said squat during the entire exchange.
Holman nodded and frowned. “You’re welcome to wait out here,” he said. “Excuse us.”
I turned and beckoned Deputy Torrez and Estelle Reyes-Guzman to follow.
The stairway up to the cells was steep, the wood deeply cupped in spots from decades of traffic. On one side of the upstairs hallway were six small, dismal jail cells. About all that could be said for them was that they were secure. In twenty-three years, I could remember no time when all six had been full.
Across the hall were a storage room, a photographic dark room, and the conference room. District Attorney Ron Schroeder, with other fish to fry who probably paid fifty bucks an hour, begged off.
“Lemme know what you need, Bill,” he said. “I’ll be in my office.”
“And miss all the fun?” I asked.
“Such fun,” he said. “I’ll pass.”
Deputy Torrez went down to cell six and after much clanking and door-slamming returned with a somber Richard Staples. I pointed to the straight ladder-backed chair on one side of the oak table.
“Sit there, Richard,” I said. Torrez escorted him to his seat and then joined Estelle and me opposite Staples. After considerable obvious indecision, Sheriff Holman sat at the end of the table, like father at dinner.
I gestured at the tape recorder in the center of the table.
“This interview is being recorded,” I said as I punched the two buttons down. “Has Deputy Torrez advised you of your rights?”
“Yes.”
“You’ll have to speak louder, Richard.”
“Yes, he advised me,” Staples said and I saw the VU meter on the recorder jump. His former bravado had evaporated. An hour in the dungeon had been the right medicine.
“Richard, I want to make sure you know all the people present.” I pointed at each person in turn. “On my left is Deputy Robert Torrez. This is Deputy Estelle Reyes-Guzman from the Isidro County sheriff’s department.” I saw a flicker in Staples’s expression. Maybe he was wondering what the hell he’d done up north to pull the cops down on him from there. Maybe he was too stupid to know where Isidro County was.
“And this is Sheriff Martin Holman. I’m Undersheriff William Gastner. Any questions?”
“No, sir.”
“Richard, do you know why you’re here?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Tell me.”
“For breakin’ into the gym.”
“Can you think of any other reason?”
“No.” His tone was sullen again, and I noticed I wasn’t “sir” any more.
“Why were you in the basement, Richard?” Estelle asked. Her voice was soft and silky, and the VU barely twitched.<
br />
We waited a full minute while Richard Staples examined the cuticle of his left index finger. A little sound that might have been a sniffle or just a noisy inhale told me that he hadn’t fallen asleep.
“You weren’t hiding from us, were you,” Estelle said. I half expected Staples to say, “Hell, who would?” but he didn’t. He raised his eyes from his cuticle to meet Estelle’s gaze.
“Richard, we need answers that the recorder can hear,” I prompted. Estelle had him locked in, but I wanted the kid to remember that there were other people in the room…and some of them nowhere near as kindly as the young lady.
“No, I wasn’t hidin’ from you,” he said finally.
“Who from, then?”
I saw his jaw tighten and he went back to his cuticle again.
“Has someone threatened you?” Estelle asked.
“I ain’t afraid of nobody,” Richard Staples said without hesitation.
“I wouldn’t think so,” Estelle said. “But you said you weren’t hiding from us. Will you tell us from whom, then?”
He lost interest in his finger and looked off toward the far corner of the ceiling. If he started counting ceiling tiles, we were going to be there all night.
“Richard, what can you tell us about the burglary at Wayne’s Farm Supply last week?” Deputy Torrez said. I tried hard not to grin. His timing was perfect, dropping another bomb in the kid’s lap just when he thought he could bore us more than we bored him.
Staples’s eyes shifted to the table in front of him and he blinked hard.
While he was waiting, Deputy Torrez reached down and lifted his briefcase to the table. He opened it and shuffled papers for a few seconds before selecting the one that had been on top all along. He read it over before laying it on the table in front of him.
“We have information that two male subjects entered the back of the Wayne Supply building sometime between six p.m. Tuesday night and eight a.m. Wednesday morning of last week.”
Torrez looked up and folded his large hands in front of him on the table like a priest about to say blessing for dinner. “We have evidence that tells us what size and brand of shoes one of the suspects wore. We have several sets of fingerprints lifted from the scene. We have a full inventory of goods taken from the scene. Several of the larger tools have not only serial numbers for identification but also the owner’s identification number.”
Twice Buried Page 17
