by C. M. Sutter
I discreetly showed her my badge and leaned in closer. “We need to speak to the person in charge.”
Near panic took over her face. It was apparent she’d never dealt with a police situation before.
“Oh, um, I don’t know what to tell you, Officer.”
I didn’t correct her but instead asked in a different way. “Who unlocked the door this morning?”
She grimaced. “I did.”
“Then I guess you’re in charge.” I looked at her name tag—it read Carol.
“But—”
I didn’t have time to spoon-feed her the reason we were there. “How far back does your camera save recordings?”
“I have no idea, sir. I don’t even know how it works.”
I smiled. “Who does, Carol?”
“Probably Dennis Everly, the store manager.”
“And where can we find Dennis?”
“He works a split shift, so he doesn’t come in until two o’clock.”
“How about calling him for us? Like I said, we need to view your camera footage.”
Carol’s eyes darted to my left. I turned that way, and three people were lined up to pay for their food.
“This is a police matter, folks, and it won’t take long. We’d appreciate your patience for just a minute or two.” I nodded at Carol. “How about making that call now?”
“Okay, I guess.” She addressed her coworkers. “Take over for a minute. I’ll be right back.”
Frank and I followed her to a room that served as both an office and storage area. A desk, chair, computer, phone, and file cabinet filled most of the space, and a shelf with cleaning products, a mop bucket, mop, and a closet with the words Supplies on the door took up the rest of the room. I imagined that behind the door were shelves filled with napkins, plastic utensils, cups of various sizes, straws, and condiments.
Carol walked to the desk and lifted the receiver from the base. Taped to the wall in front of her was the employee phone number list and the monthly schedule. She called the top number on the sheet.
“Dennis? It’s Carol. There are two officers here who need to see our camera footage. Uh-huh, they showed me their badges. I guess they looked real.”
I reached out and asked for the phone.
“Hang on. One of the cops wants to speak to you.” She placed the receiver in my hand. “His name is Dennis.”
I nodded. “Yeah, I figured as much.”
I took a seat in the office chair, introduced myself as Detective McCord from the homicide division of the Chicago PD, and explained why we needed to see the footage as soon as humanly possible. Dennis told me the system saved only a week of footage then recorded over what had been saved. That meant we would see Sunday’s recordings but nothing from Alvina’s drop.
“It’ll have to be good enough, and we’d appreciate you coming down here and setting that up for us as soon as possible.” I thanked him and hung up. “He said he’d be here in ten minutes.” I tipped my head toward the door. “Thanks for your help, Carol. You can get back to your job now, and we’ll wait here for Dennis.”
My phone buzzed in my pocket and I assumed it was one of the officers checking in. “McCord here.”
“Detective, it’s Foxworthy. Simpson and I just pulled over a black car with a scratch down the side and rust above the wheel wells.”
“You’re kidding me!”
“Nope. We’re checking the plate number on the DMV website right now.”
“Have you approached the occupants yet?”
“Not yet, sir. Seeing if there’s any outstanding warrants first. Might have to go in cautiously.”
“I’ll hang on the line.”
“Sure thing.”
We waited on pins and needles for Foxworthy to review the information on the car’s owner.
He read us what the database showed. “No warrants. Says the car belongs to a Marie Donaldson. Wait a second. Damn it.”
“What’s wrong?”
“The car is described as a coupe not a sedan. Let me go take a look. Another car was blocking the rear of the black one while they were at a stoplight.”
I rubbed my left temple while we waited. A headache was creeping up on me.
“Sorry, sir. It is a coupe. I’ll apologize to the driver, send her on her way, and we’ll keep looking.”
“Yep, keep us posted.” I ended the call just as the door opened. The manager, Dennis, had arrived.
I rose from the chair. Frank had already extended his hand and made the introductions.
“So you need to see our footage from Sunday?”
“That’s correct since you can’t give me two to three weeks ago, right?”
He shook his head. “Unfortunately not. Our sub shop doesn’t attract a lot of criminals, so we’ve never had a reason to store surveillance for more than a week. Honestly, nobody has ever asked to review our footage, so our security costs are lower by letting it record over itself.”
“Understood.” I tipped my head toward the computer. “Can you get Sunday rolling for us now? We have a busy day ahead of us.”
“Yep, sure thing.” Dennis took a seat at the desk, wiggled the mouse, and double-clicked the thumbnail that was titled Security Camera. “We only have that one camera, so it’s just a matter of choosing the day and time and then watching it. The camera does cover a wide area since it’s on the corner. It catches a half block to our left and the same to the right.”
“We’re interested in the bus stop shelter across the street.”
“It catches that and several hundred feet to either side of it too.” He glanced up at us. “So should I start it at noon?”
Frank spoke up. “How about eleven thirty? We can take it from there.”
With the footage set up, Frank pulled the guest chair to my side of the desk, and we settled in. We should see somebody approach the bench, take a seat, then leave seconds later. Hopefully, they would arrive close to noon. I hit Play, and the footage rolled.
Cars buzzed through the four-way intersection then stopped at red lights while pedestrians took to the crosswalks. Our eyes searched every angle as we looked for that particular car or a scrawny guy or guys. Since it was a Sunday, and a nice one at that, people were out and about on foot and in their vehicles. The major grocery chain nearby was jam-packed, and cars zoomed in and out of the parking lot. I squinted at the screen and watched every person who walked to the bus stop. From the sub shop’s camera location, it was impossible to make out ages and features. The best we could tell with seventy-five percent certainty was the difference between male and female and if they were heavy or slim. Our chances of determining the clothing were fifty-fifty at best. Light colors, dark colors, skirts or pants, and that was it.
Frank took charge of writing down everything we saw that could be a possibility while I handled forwarding and reversing the recording. I stopped on every person who entered the shelter, sized them up the best I could, then moved on if they weren’t a candidate for one of our burglars. Every so often, I checked the time on the lower right of the screen as the minutes inched closer to noon, then I paused the footage.
“What’s wrong?” Frank asked.
“Nothing.” I balled up my fist and gave my eyes a thorough rub. “I just needed to freshen my focus. Staring that hard is tough on the eyes.” I started the recording again and propped my chin up with my hand. “Wait!” I backed up the recording by a few seconds. “I swear I saw the black car pass by.”
Frank scooted even closer. “Inch it back slowly.”
I moved the scrubber bar gradually to the left until the vehicle came back into view. When the car was centered on the screen in front of us, I paused the footage. Luckily, it was heading west, so the driver’s side faced us.
“It is a sedan, and there is damage to the driver’s side.”
Frank’s vision was better than mine, and I hadn’t brought my reading glasses with me. “Can you tell if there’s rust along the bottom of the car? Without my r
eaders on, it all blends together.”
He pressed the plus sign to increase the zoom.
“Yeah, that’s better. Don’t you think that’s corrosion along the lower door panel?”
Frank moved closer to the screen. “I’d definitely say that’s corrosion. I can’t get a good bead on the driver, though. His elbow is resting on the sill and hiding part of his face, plus with him sitting inside a car, it doesn’t show us if he’s scrawny or not.”
“True. So that means we need to somehow catch the license plate.”
I advanced the recording, and we continued watching. I hoped the car would turn at the intersection so we could see the rear plates, but it didn’t. “Damn it.”
The car made the green light at the intersection then disappeared from view.
“Maybe they’re doing laps around the block to see if Paul shows up,” Frank said. “There’s still ten minutes left before he’s supposed to arrive.”
We continued watching the screen for another sighting of the car.
“What do you think of the guy walking east on the opposite side of the street? They could have parked the car down the block and one of them walked back so he could watch for Paul up close and personal. If it’s our guy and Paul is a no-show—like we already know—he’ll probably alert his partner with a phone call. Let’s see what he does.” It was 11:55.
We stared at the screen for another ten minutes as the guy stood about twenty feet to the right of the shelter.
My shoulders slumped. “Maybe it isn’t him.”
“It has to be him. The guy isn’t in the shelter waiting for the bus like those two women are. Why else would he be hanging around?”
I glanced at the time again—12:09.
“Check it out. It looks like he pulled out his phone and is talking on it,” Frank said.
Seconds later, the black car came around the corner, pulled to the curb, and picked up the man who was standing there.
“That’s them! We have them dead to rights.” I noted the time and wrote it down. “We have to get this recording to Todd and see if he can enhance it. We need something to work with and damn quick.”
Chapter 26
With a copy of the recording in hand, I thanked Dennis, then Frank and I headed back to the jewelry store. Tony and Kip were still watching the street footage.
“Any possibilities?” I asked when we entered the security office.
“Yeah, several. How about you guys?”
“We might have one of the guys and the car but no plate numbers.” I pointed at the computer. “Get that footage put on a drive and bring it back to the station. Tell the patrol units to keep searching this neighborhood for the car and make sure they all know it’s a sedan, not a coupe. We’re heading back now, so wrap it up here. I want Tech to compare the guy or guys who are possibilities on your footage to what we have, so make sure you give him the time stamps where the men appeared on screen.”
“Got it. We’ll be ten minutes behind you.”
I called Lutz on our way back. It was the first time I felt we were getting somewhere, and Deidra’s life depended on the apprehension of the killers before they attempted to break into the pharmacy. If they were successful, she would be of no use to them anymore.
I dropped off the zip drive before we headed upstairs and told Todd and Billy that the guy and the black car showed up on the screen at 12:11. We needed a still shot of that image and enhanced as good as they could possibly get it. Todd promised to call me as soon as they had something. We thanked them and continued to Lutz’s office.
I gave the commander’s door a rap and Lutz said to come in.
“Have a seat, guys, and tell me what was on the tape.” Bob removed his glasses, pinched the bridge of his nose, and gave us his full attention.
Frank took that round of explanations while I sat back and added my two cents when it was needed.
“The sub shop we were at only stores footage for a week before it’s taped over. We decided to watch Sunday’s recording since that’s when Paul was supposed to make the drop. Tony and Kip were at a jewelry store a few buildings farther east, and they were watching the footage for the day Alvina taped the envelope under the bench.”
Lutz nodded. “Go on.”
“We were pretty sure we saw the black sedan pass in front of us, but because we only saw a side image, we couldn’t get a plate number. We hoped it would turn on a side street, but it didn’t. A few minutes later, we caught the image of a guy walking to the bus stop, but instead of sitting in the structure with the other riders, he just milled around the perimeter.”
Lutz scratched his chin. “Did he fit the scrawny-guy profile?”
“Yeah, for as much as we could tell from that distance. Anyway, noon came and went, and then right around ten minutes after the hour, he called someone. Sure as shit, it was that black sedan. He picked up the guy at the bus stop, and they took off on East Seventy-Fifth going west.”
“So same as before, no way to get a plate number?”
Frank blew out what sounded like a puff of discouragement. “Exactly.”
I continued. “We have a copy of that recording and have already dropped it off with Todd. Tony and Kip have their recording, too, with possible suspects. They’ll have Tech compare the men to see if they’re one and the same.”
“Good work, but that isn’t going to find Deidra. Unfortunately, we need names and addresses.”
I tapped the desk. We were up the creek without a paddle unless we found that car. “And if we air the description of the car and the man at the bus stop, and the burglars see the news, they’ll kill Deidra just to make a point.”
“They have the codes, so unless that car is found today, we’ll have to watch the pharmacy and hope they go for it tonight.”
Frank spoke up. “I don’t know, Boss. Those guys have gotten away with a half dozen burglaries. They may drive a piece of shit and look like scrawny lowlifes, but they aren’t stupid. I’m sure they’d be watching for anyone who might be hanging around the pharmacy.”
“We’ll station officers in the area, wearing street clothes and driving their personal cars,” Lutz said. “It’s all we have. When was the last time you spoke to the officers making rounds in their cars?”
I tipped my wrist. “Twenty minutes ago, give or take.”
“And no sightings of the sedan?”
“Nope. They thought they had something, but it turned out to be a coupe, and the owner was a female with no outstanding warrants.”
“Okay. I’ll see if Abrams can spare a few more patrol units. We have to find that vehicle.”
Seconds later, my cell phone buzzed, and I pulled it from my jacket pocket. “It’s Todd.” I slid the green phone icon to the right and answered. “Tell me something good, buddy. I’m putting you on Speakerphone. Frank and I are with Lutz.”
“We enhanced both videos, took screen shots of each man in question from Tony’s recording, and then ran a match analysis with your guy. We have a positive match.”
I fist-pumped the air. “Yes!”
“How about the car?”
“There’s no way to see the plates from the camera’s angle, but I do have an idea that’ll probably give you exactly what you need.”
Lutz perked up. “We’re all ears.”
Chapter 27
Todd’s news was encouraging as he pointed out the bus that had just stopped at the shelter when the black car pulled away from the curb. We had joined him in the tech department as he ran the recording for us.
“Here’s where you may get lucky. All city buses are equipped with cameras, and as far as I know, they have several angles, including straight ahead out the windshield.”
“You’re a genius, Todd! That bus had to have caught the plate number of the sedan as it pulled away from the curb.”
“Exactly. Getting that recording might be a challenge, and I have no idea how long they keep recordings, but I’d definitely check with the transit authority that
covers that neighborhood and find out as soon as possible. The bus number is right there.” He pointed at the front driver’s side below the window. “It’s number sixty-three. Tell them the time and date in question and the bus number.”
I pulled my notepad from my pocket. “Bus sixty-three.” I checked the time stamp when it pulled to the shelter. “At twelve minutes after twelve on Sunday, and bus route number nine twenty-two. Got it.”
Lutz patted Todd’s back. “Nice work, guys. I’m sure I’ll need a warrant for that recording if they still have it.” He headed to the door. “I’ll get on that immediately.”
We thanked Todd and Billy, headed upstairs with Lutz, and listened to his instructions. “I’ll call the judge for the warrant. Meanwhile, you contact the transit authority and try to reach the right department. Hopefully, we won’t get strangled with red tape. There isn’t time for that shit.”
“Good enough,” Frank said. “I’ll get on that right away.”
I stopped in the hallway, waffling about what to do next.
Lutz turned. “What’s wrong?”
“I need to run downstairs and have another talk with Paul. According to him, the cars were damn near nose to nose. He had at least thirty seconds of dead time before those guys got out and approached his car. He has to remember something about the plate number—at least a number or two.”
Lutz jerked his head. “Go on and see what he says. It’s worth a shot, and you don’t have to deal with the attorney since Paul is already talking.”
I took off and headed downstairs with my phone pressed to my ear. I needed Bill to move Paul to a box immediately.
Minutes later, I signed in and placed my sidearm in a locker. Bill escorted me to interview room two, unlocked the door, and left. I walked in and took a seat across from Paul. His appearance had changed dramatically since yesterday. He looked haggard and unkempt with heavy bags beneath his bloodshot eyes.