by Brian Shea
He eyed the Crime Scene Response Unit van and saw Raymond Charles sitting on the back bumper, inhaling his morning cigarette. Kelly liked working with him. Charles never entered a scene until Homicide directed. Others weren’t as considerate to protocols and jumped the scene, trying to impress their bosses. Charles had been working crime scenes longer than Kelly had been alive; he didn’t need to impress anybody.
Charles noticed Kelly and raised his green thermos of coffee in mock cheers. Kelly smiled and went back to his sketch, adding a few bits of detail.
Before him stood a strip of small, rectangular warehouse buildings. Most of them were vacant and had signs on the windows for numbers to call if looking to lease. On the far right, nearest the crime scene, was Sheffield Electric, more of an extended double-wide trailer than a building. Extending out from the building was an eight-foot chain link fence. The yellow tape extended from the post closest to the building and out to a telephone pole on the other side of the dirt parking lot. Two patrolmen in thickly lined patrol parkas stood outside the tape. Kelly was glad to see they weren’t on his side, playing junior detective.
The fence extended along to an open gate. Located inside was a variety of construction equipment, some of which looked as though it hadn’t been serviced in quite some time. There were piles of gravel near stacks of PVC piping, tethered into a pyramid of sorts.
Rough sketch complete, Kelly approached the two patrolmen.
“Mornin’, boys,” Kelly said. “You guys first on scene?”
“Yup,” the stocky officer said. His nameplate, affixed across his broad chest, said his last name was Russo.
“Let me get your full name and badge number for my report.” With over two thousand cops working the city, Kelly often found himself asking this of more and more patrol guys, especially if they were new to the job.
“Antonio Russo, 2146.”
“Gabe Lancaster, 2163,” the tall, thin patrolman said. His voice had the squeaky shrillness of a prepubescent teen. The man’s Adam’s apple protruded outward as if he had a gobstopper lodged in his throat. The two made for a uniquely odd pair and, working the rough streets of Dorchester, were sure to catch some colorful comments from the more vocal citizenry.
“I assume you boys will be getting me a report before you go offline today?”
“Yes, sir. As soon as we get relieved, we’ll write up our initial,” Russo said.
“Sounds good. And don’t call me sir. Makes me feel old and useless. I’m Michael Kelly. Call me either.” Kelly liked to dissolve any barriers created by rank and title. He found them to be one of the great hinderances to investigation. “Give me a quick rundown on what you found when you got here.”
“We got a call about a body. Called in by that sloppy piece of work over there in our squad car.” Russo thumbed in the direction of their cruiser.
In the back seat sat a man. The morning’s gray light bounced off the car’s lightly tinted windows and Kelly was only able to make out the shape of a wild mess of long dark hair, as if he’d stuck his hand on a Van de Graaff generator.
“Name?”
“Robert Blevins. Homeless. Verified him through an old DMV photo. No warrants. Pretty long history. Mostly drunk and disorderly related. Bunch of larcenies. No violent crimes in his past.”
“Did he give any reason as to why he was over this way?”
“He said he was rummaging for trash, but we found some copper wiring in his cart. My guess is he was out here stripping copper. Said he saw the girl’s shoe. I guess he was surprised to find the girl was still attached to it. He called it in.”
“You guys got a statement from him already?”
“Yeah. Figured we’d help out.”
“I appreciate it. I’m flying solo this morning.” Kelly peeked over at the man bearing more than a passing resemblance to a feral cat. “So, why’s our good citizen in the back of the cruiser?”
“Pinched him on the stolen copper and trespassing.” Russo folded his arms as if satisfied he’d solved a major crime.
“We’re not pinching Mr. Blevins today, fellas. He’s done himself a good deed. Maybe work on getting him a warm meal and cup of coffee.” Kelly watched as the words deflated Russo’s ego.
“Talk to Massie. His call to make. He’s over there on the other side of the crime scene van.”
“Paul Massie? He’s the supervisor on this?” Kelly asked. He knew Massie from years ago. A small man with a Napoleonic complex. Massie was one class ahead of him in the academy and the two had butted heads on more than one occasion when out on the street. He hoped today would not be a repeat occurrence.
Kelly walked past the homeless man in Russo and Lancaster’s car. Blevins seemed not to notice. He was otherwise engaged in a rather intense conversation. One is never alone if you’ve got friends, imaginary or otherwise.
“Hey Ray. We’ll get started in a minute,” Kelly called to the senior crime scene tech.
“Your show, boss.” Raymond Charles sipped from his thermos.
“No Dunkin’ this morning?”
“Wife cut me off. Said I spend too much damn money on the stuff. Can you believe she made a dang spreadsheet to show me how much money I waste on coffee? A spreadsheet! What’s my life come to?”
Kelly shook his head and laughed. “I don’t know what I’d do without it. I’ll bring you one next time. It kills me to see you reduced to this.”
“I think she hates me.” Charles took a swig and winced. “She put some chicory crap in it. Told me she saw it on a cooking show. Supposed to be sophisticated. Personally, I think she’s trying to kill me.”
Sergeant Paul Massie’s Ford Explorer idled quietly, the exhaust visible in the cool March air. Kelly approached and rapped lightly on the window, startling the small man inside. He likened the man’s jerky movements to that of a squirrel. Massie exited, pulling on a black skull cap to protect his bald head from the cold.
“Hey Paul.”
“Where’s Mainelli and Anderson?” Massie asked.
“Good to see you, too. Sorry to disappoint, but it’s just me today.”
“Sucks to be you.” Massie rubbed his hands together. For somebody who worked in the Northeast, the BPD sergeant had little tolerance for the cold. Short, thin, and bald—a veritable hat trick of genetic disaster for the street cop.
“I just talked to your guys. Apparently, they pinched the caller on some minor trespass stuff.”
“What about it?”
Kelly’s assumption was immediately dashed by the curt response from the sergeant. He understood it had been Massie who’d made the call on arresting Mr. Blevins. “Paul, I’m cutting him loose on those charges.”
“Why’s that?”
The fact that he had to explain this to Massie spoke volumes of the street boss’s incompetence and irked Kelly to no end. He refrained from saying what was really on his mind. He had a long day ahead of him and the thought of engaging the man in a verbal duel was low on his priority list. Plus, the slight pulsing of his hangover weakened his energy for the fray. “It plays better if this thing ends up going to prosecution. It looks a lot cleaner if our first witness isn’t in jail or awaiting his own trial. Work with me here on this one.”
“Fine. Do whatever you want with the bum. It’s your case. Far be it for us lowly patrol guys to piss all over it.” Massie looked away. He huffed silently, but his warm breath fogged in the cold air. Kelly had pissed off the man. “Me and my guys have been on all night. I’ve already called for relief. When it arrives, I’ll let you know before we cut loose.”
“Sounds good.” Kelly shook hands with Massie. A forced gesture of camaraderie. The patrol sergeant turned to his vehicle. A blast of heat poured out when the door opened. The bald squirrel retreated to his nest.
Kelly walked over to Russo and Lancaster’s patrol car. He opened the back-passenger side door. The repugnant smell of the man inside caught Kelly off-guard. Robert Blevins smelled more like a Porta-John than a human bein
g. For that reason, Kelly wanted to do his best to treat him like the latter.
“Mr. Blevins?” He controlled the need to gag.
The homeless man turned. His eyes squinted and Kelly assumed the man was working hard to determine if the voice he’d just heard was real or one of his imaginary friends. Blevins wore a heavy brown trench coat, stained and torn in multiple spots. Kelly could see three additional layers visible at the neckline. There were probably a few more, unseen and saturated with the man’s stink.
It was tough being homeless. Tougher so in the cold of New England. Kelly guessed it had been several months, or longer, since the man had bathed. It was difficult to make out his ethnicity because of the grime. Blevins’s cheeks and nose were swollen to cartoonish proportions, an obvious testament to the man’s overindulgence in alcohol. Not the best first witness Kelly had in a case. Not the worst, either.
“Mr. Blevins?”
“Didn’t hurt her. Promise. Not me. No way. Found her is all. I didn’t do it.” His voice was pitchy, ranging from baritone to falsetto. His words released like an untuned accordion.
“I never thought you did. Most people don’t call the police after they kill someone.”
Blevins was cuffed in front and held up the stainless-steel bracelets. The silver looked brighter against his filth. “They arrested me. I’m no killer. I told them. They arrested me.” He started to growl.
“Mr. Blevins, I want to take those cuffs off, but you’re growling.”
“Guess I’m a pit bull.”
“Um—yeah. Just don’t bite or I’ll have to send you to the pound. Fair enough?”
The strange rumbling growl subsided, and Kelly pulled a handcuff key from his pocket. He bent deeper into the cloud of stink surrounding Blevins and unlocked the cuffs. “You’re not under arrest. We just had to check some things out.”
“I’m free to go?” Blevins rubbed his wrists.
“Yes. The officers said you’ve already given a statement.”
Blevins stepped out of the cruiser. Kelly gave the man a wide berth. Even in the open air of the lot, the funk still persisted, penetrating deep into Kelly’s nostrils. The homeless man gave a humble bow as if departing royalty.
“Did you see or hear anything you may have left out when talking to the other officers?”
“I told ’em everything.” He looked off to the side as if listening intently to someone else. “Yup. Everything.”
“Mind lifting up your shoes?” Kelly was well within his power to force the man to do so, but always found it better to ask.
Blevins leaned against the cruiser’s side panel near the gas tank, balancing himself, and raised his left foot unsteadily. Kelly took out a thin digital camera from his front pocket. He bent low, catching the toxic vapors as he lowered. He photographed the treading, or lack thereof, on the bottom of the man’s well-worn soles. Kelly then pulled a small, rolled measuring tape. He held it alongside. A notation next to Blevins’s name in his notebook read left size 11. Kelly repeated the process on the right. The shoe on the man’s right foot was a different make and size. Photographed and measured with the odd notation of right foot size 12. Mismatched shoes for a mismatched man.
“Where can I find you if I need to reach out to you at a later date?”
“Here and there. In the cold months you can find me over at the UMass stop. Warm grates. Not too crowded. Not like downtown.”
“Thank you, Mr. Blevins.” Kelly pulled out a twenty-dollar bill and handed it over. A dirty hand with black-encrusted fingernails swallowed up the money eagerly.
“Buddy.”
“What’d you say?”
“Buddy. My friends call me Buddy. Ask around; they’ll know how to find me.”
“All right, Buddy. I’ll be seeing you.”
Robert “Buddy” Blevins ambled away from Kelly. The shoe on his right foot was a size too big, held together by poorly adhered duct tape. Each step was accented by a flop and pop as his feet slipped in and out. Kelly watched the man take up the reins of his shopping cart and meander away from the scene he’d stumbled upon hours before.
“Ready to do this thing?” Kelly called over to the older crime scene tech.
“I thought you’d never ask. Get anything from our beleaguered drifter?”
“Nothing. Seems he stumbled upon her. He’s not playing with a full deck.”
“You don’t say?” Charles spent thirty-plus years working scenes of departed souls and developed a palpable level of cynicism. Life took on new meaning when surrounded by the dead. “At least it doesn’t look like dumb and dumber over there did too much damage to our scene.” Charles eyed the two patrolman as he put white Tyvek booties over his sneakers.
Kelly retrieved a pair of his own from a small box in the back of the crime scene van. He leaned against the back bumper and slipped them on. Some scenes required more precautions, others less. This appeared to be one that would require less. The area inside the tape had already been contaminated by Russo and Lancaster’s initial entry.
The rookie homicide detective had been on enough dead body scenes during his time on patrol to know they did nothing wrong. Every street cop’s first instinct is to render aid to a victim. After it’s determined life-saving measures are futile, the scene should be locked down. From Kelly’s initial assessment, this appeared to be the case. Both patrolmen would give a detailed accounting of their actions upon first arriving at the body. One of Kelly’s later responsibilities would be to fact check discrepancies, if any.
Kelly slipped on two pairs of latex gloves over each hand. After any contact with the body, or potential evidence, he’d remove the outer layer. It wasn’t a perfect system, but if done right, greatly improved the likelihood for minimal transfer to the scene.
The two walked toward the barrier of “do not cross” tape. Kelly dipped under. He stopped just inside the scene. Jotting the time in his pad, he took a minute to take in the moment. Kelly allowed his senses to absorb his surroundings before stepping in deeper.
4
A dead body, regardless of the circumstances surrounding it, carries with it a uniquely powerful quality. Life is never more defined than in those liminal spaces where the living and the dead connect.
Kelly studied a rust-covered trencher. It likely hadn’t been used in years. At the base of the construction vehicle’s flat left front tire was an area of disturbed earth and gravel. In a shallow depression lay the form of a girl. Her right foot was outstretched. Guessing from Blevins’s account for how he first located the girl, Kelly assumed this might’ve been the foot he’d seen when rummaging through the lot for copper.
“Let’s get some overalls before we start in.” Kelly knew Charles would do it without him needing to ask, but controlling a scene from beginning to end was a habit he couldn’t turn off. Plus, every detective and tech had their own way of processing things. He’d worked with Charles enough in his short time in Homicide to know they took on a scene with a similar methodical approach.
The click of the Nikon sounded as Charles captured several photographs from the line. If the scene was extremely large, Kelly would request a drone overflight. From the initial observations that wouldn’t be a necessary tool today. Kelly fanned out to the left, making a wide arc, skirting along the fence line toward the building’s east side, each step taken with care, ensuring that no evidence was disturbed. Charles followed his lead, stopping to snap a photo every ten steps. Kelly took a couple photographs as well with his personal camera. He knew Charles would send him the photo file later, but Detective Michael Kelly liked having immediate access. It wasn’t so much a matter of impatience, more of obsession.
Kelly stopped near a dumpster by the side exit door of the building. A trickle of water from the building’s sump pump spewed out from the structure. The stream saturated the ground, turning dirt to mud. The slurry around green metal bins captured several fresh footprints.
“Let’s get these. Not sure we’re going to need to cast
them, though.” Kelly knelt, hovering above the markings. He laid his tape measure down. A click from the senior tech’s Nikon. “Buddy.”
“Huh?”
“Our tipster. These are his prints. See the smoothed-out soles and different sizing?” Kelly stood up and looked over toward the body. “Can you get a shot from here and direct it toward our Jane Doe?”
“Sure can. What’re you thinking?”
Raymond Charles always liked to test the new detectives. Kelly was well aware the crime scene evidence expert already knew the correct answer. “I think this is the spot where our good Samaritan first saw our vic.”
Charles nodded his approval and snapped the picture.
“Ready to close in?” Kelly asked.
“You lead; I follow.”
Kelly made his slow and deliberate procession toward the body, careful not to step in Blevins’s tracks. About ten feet from the body they noticed several other footprints around the area of disturbed earth. The deep grooved treads were most likely those of Russo and Lancaster.
The girl’s right leg was the first feature Kelly could clearly discern. She wore a low-heeled shoe with black straps. Her exposed ankle was pale white and had a blueish tinge. As he stood a few feet from the makeshift grave, her sequined dress sparkled in weak morning light like a shattered disco ball.
The girl was face down, in a prone position, with hands down by her side. Her light brown hair was a tangled mess of dirt and rock. On his initial pass, Kelly didn’t see any apparent injuries. No bullet holes or stab wounds.