The Body at Midgley Bridge

by Charles Williamson

  “Was the entry hole consistent with a .338 cal. round?” Mike asked.

  “Ah, I think you know more than you put in your written report. To answer your question, yes, but only if it was still moving at an extraordinary velocity after traveling a thousand meters.”

  Dr. Sumter continued with the report. “Ms. Riley was in good physical health at the time of her death. There was no evidence of coronary artery disease or other chronic health problems. She had a partial mastectomy at least a decade earlier and reconstructive surgery sometime after that. There were no current signs of cancer. She would have died without realizing she’d been shot when her brain matter and forehead exploded outward. Over half of her brain is simply missing. You can tell the family that I said she experienced no pain or suffering.”

  There might have been a tear in her eye as she finished by saying, “Mike, I understand that she went to that secret location where she’d scattered her father’s ashes fifteen years earlier. She must have had a fine father to still honor him in that way. I envy her that. I flushed my child-abusing asshole of a father’s ashes down the toilet.”

  Mike was shocked. Kay Sumter had never before mentioned any personal history in his presence. “I’m sorry Kay.” Mike was the only person in the department who ever used her first name.

  She cleared her throat and said, “Well gentlemen, I have other duties. I’ll call you when I hear back from my army friend about the wound.”

  When they returned to Mike’s vehicle, Mike commented, “Sean, please never mention Dr. Sumter’s comment about her father, especially to your brother.” One of Sean’s brothers worked with Kay’s husband.”

  “I swear. I think she forgot I was even there, but I guess we understand her gruff manner a little better.”

  At 2:00, Mike went to discuss the case with Sheriff Taylor before they both attended the press conference. The sheriff was OK with Mike explaining the autopsy results, but the main point would be to ask the public to help find anyone who saw a vehicle at Midgley Bridge near the time of the murder. Sheriff Taylor said that he wanted Mike to do most of the talking.

  Mike had briefed the press many times from the same auditorium. That afternoon the room seemed almost empty with about fifteen reporters present. One network had set up a pool TV camera to record the presentation and share it with any network that wanted footage for the evening news. A single death in Sedona would probably not make the evening news in Phoenix because there were several local murders to report almost every evening. In this case, the victim was a political activist and had a charitable reputation, but that would not attract much attention. Nearly everyone in Flagstaff knew about the Riley family because their name was on so many local businesses, but to most of the rest of the state, she was an unknown middle-aged woman. Most of the press assumed Mike would be reporting a suicide because of the body being found near Midgley Bridge.

  Sheriff Taylor began by welcoming the press and pointing out that Captain Mike Damson was in charge of the homicide case and would be briefing the press. He mentioned Ms. Riley’s support for many local charities and her family’s long history as pioneering nineteenth century ranchers and early businesspeople. They had helped settle Coconino County, and they had contributed to building the city of Flagstaff.

  Mike began his presentation with a slide of Ms. Riley’s remains taken from a distance that also showed Midgley Bridge. He switched to a slide of the ridge from which she had tumbled after being shot.

  “We have established that Ms. Riley was honoring the fifteenth anniversary of her father’s death, by camping in a location accessible from Schnebly Hill Road. We believe it was a spot she had camped with her father when she was a young girl and where she had spread his ashes after his death.”

  Mike switched to a slide of the Midgley Bridge parking lot. “Evidence supports that conclusion that the shot that killed Mildred Riley was fired from this parking lot next to the Midgley Bridge. She was a shot with a high-powered and probably scoped rifle from over a kilometer away. The shot penetrated the back of her skull and passed out through her forehead. Dr. Sumter, the county medical examiner, said she died instantly without any pain or suffering. Because of the trajectory, we have no hope of recovering the actual round. There was no brass left at the Midgley Bridge parking lot.”

  Now cell phones were out taking photos of Mike. There was a buzz in the small audience. Mike continued, “We are looking for anyone who traveled past Midgley Bridge on Arizona Highway 89A yesterday morning between five and six thirty. We hope they might have seen a vehicle parked there, or maybe even heard a shot. If you would ask anyone with information to contact the Coconino County Sheriff’s Department at 808 555 0071, I would appreciate it. Now I will take questions.”

  Nearly everyone raised their hand to ask questions, but Mike called on a local reporter for the Sedona Red Rock News. “Ms. Riley was listed as one of the forty wealthiest Arizonans in the Phoenix New Times last year. Are you investigating a financial motive for her assassination?”

  “Janet, we’ve looked into that possibility. We learned that over the past five years, Ms. Riley had transferred almost all of her assets to her four sons. The balance of her estate goes to various local charities and NAU. So far we’ve found no financial motive.”

  James Duncan of the Flagstaff Daily News asked, “Is her husband a suspect? He is only half her age and spends a lot of time in bars near the university.”

  “Her husband, Peter Barbour, is not a suspect. He has an alibi and no financial motive because of a prenuptial agreement.”

  The reporter from the FOX station in Phoenix asked, “Ms. Riley’s Wikipedia page shows she was chair of the Democrat Party in Coconino County. She was also known as left-wing blogger with twenty-two thousand twitter followers. Could there have been a political motive based on her radical liberal activism and abortion advocacy.

  “Ms. Coffee, I have been reviewing the many threats Ms. Riley received, including death threats. After hours of reading her posts, I think you are mistaken about her abortion advocacy. However, she was strongly opposed to the current administration’s environmental and immigration polices. She was adamantly opposed to uranium mining on the Colorado Plateau because of the damage previously abandoned uranium mines have done to the water sources on the Riley Ranch northwest of Flagstaff and also to the water supplies on the Navajo Reservation. She was also a strong supporter of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. As chairperson of the Democratic Party of Coconino County, she may have made some political enemies, but that is the normal give and take of local politics. It was her twitter and Facebook accounts that seemed to have outraged many people. So far, we’ve found no credible suspects, but there are death threats we’re investigating. Many of the threats are from anonymous sources that will take time to trace.”

  Howard Snyder of the Arizona Republic of Phoenix asked, “Was the victim an opponent of the Second Amendment? There are a lot of gun nuts and militia groups that hate any attempt to restrict gun ownership.”

  “No, Howard. Her posts never mention gun control. She and her sons are hunters and ranchers as well as business owners. Everyone in her family would have learned gun safety and marksmanship as small children. I don’t know her exact position because she never mentioned it in her blog, but you won’t find many gun control advocates among rural Arizona ranch families.”

  The questions went on focusing on potential political motives. Mike was relieved because he didn’t need to answer the most alarming question. During the whole press conference, no reporter asked a question about serial killers. As he walked off the stage, Sheriff Taylor gave him the thumbs up indicating he approved of Mike’s performance.

  Chapter 7

  Once Mike was back in his office reviewing travel reimbursement requests that needed his signature, Deputy Sean Mark came in with a big grin on his face and a handful of papers in his hand.

  “Mike, that June Rosetta is really sharp about all things Internet
related. There is a volunteer organization in San Jose that traces Internet trolls, especially ones that made threats. This organization Troll Researchers United, or TRU, put June’s request first in their queue because it involved a homicide.”

  Sean handed the papers to Mike and continued. “They traced all eight threats that we were not able to identify, five originated from the same address in St. Petersburg, Russia, a troll factory that works for the Russian Cyber Command. Two posts originated in a small town in Albania famous for paid hackers and paid online trolls. Only the last two are connected to Arizona.”

  “Russia and Albania, do they have something to do with Ms. Riley? Is it about her opposition to uranium mining?”

  “Mike, where have you been for the past eighteen months? Don’t you know about the hacking of the last election? The trolls merely want to sow discord in every way possible. It wasn’t specifically Ms. Riley who was targeted. They post thousands of comments a day and often take either side of any issue merely to increase the stress on American free speech and degrade our civil discourse.”

  It sounded like something Sean had read and was repeating. “Civil discourse” didn’t sound like something the young deputy would come up with on his own. Mike was surprised at Sean’s certainty, but he merely said, “I don’t use twitter and seldom look at my Facebook account, but I have read about it. What about the two threats from Arizona?”

  “One is from another member of that Sovereign Citizen bunch that Colin Curran talked about. The man is a dentist in Cottonwood and lives near Camp Verde. I checked with his office. He’s been gone for almost three weeks doing free dental work in Zimbabwe as part of a volunteer organization. He’ll be back next Sunday. I called the New York headquarters of the organization. They confirmed he is currently a volunteer and that he was at the free clinic in rural Zimbabwe.”

  In Mike’s long career he had often reflected on the bundle of contradictions that make up all humans. This dentist could threaten to kill a grandmother in a horribly gruesome manner involving fire ants because of her immigration stance, but he could still donate three weeks of his time to helping the less fortunate in Africa. “He can’t have been our sniper. How sure are they that this threat was actually posted by this Cottonwood dentist?”

  “TRU traced his most recent posts to an iPhone X in Zimbabwe. Almost all of them concern immigration issues, and several include threats.”

  “What of the last threat on the list?”

  “It was from a local minister by the name of Reverend Doctor Paul John McIntyre of the Pentecostal Flame Mission of the All-knowing God. The Flagstaff police have a file on him. There is a local attorney who does pro bono work for immigrants who has an order of protection against McIntyre because he threatened to burn his office and home. There are six complaints about family members being forced into a cult and extorted out of their assets, but none of those resulted in police intervention. The cult members denied being forced to give up their assets to Reverend Doctor McIntyre. They said it was an act of penance for their sins against the All-Knowing Father. The local cops think it’s some kind of scam, but no one is following up on that. Arson investigators are looking into a fire at one of his ex parishioner’s house, but they found no evidence of accelerant. Embers from a Franklin stove that had the firebox door open started the house fire. The resident swore that she didn’t leave it open, but the case was closed anyway. McIntyre’s ministry is conducted from a storefront in an almost empty strip shopping center in east Flagstaff.”

  Mike was skeptical that this minister was a sniper, but he decided that they should go see him anyway. Before they left they met June Rosetta in the hall. “Mike, I’m glad I caught you. I have some more information on McIntyre.”

  She handed him a copy of a photo from the Flagstaff Daily Sun. It was four years old, but it showed that McIntyre had bagged the champion bull elk in the Coconino National Forest that year. In the photo, the minister was holding a rifle with a scope.

  She continued, “He goes by the title doctor, but I found the source of his doctorate of divinity is an online diploma mill. You get the doctorate by writing a five-hundred-word essay about your relationship to God. It costs a hundred dollars, but they send you a fine graduation diploma suitable for framing from the Columbia University of Divinity. Their website has the country code for Serbia.”

  “Thanks June. That’s good information to know. We’re on our way to speak with him now. Keep up the excellent work.” Mike was pleased to see her big grin. She’d been important to many of his cases.

  Twenty minutes later, Mike and Sean pulled up to a strip shopping center on Old Highway 66 that had seen better days. It looked like it might have dated from before Interstate 40 bypassed this part of Flagstaff. In addition to the mission, there were only two other occupied sections, a hair salon and a consignment store. The only vehicle in front of the mission was a new looking Mercedes G-Class SUV. When they entered, they saw a tall man with a receding hairline and an erect posture who Mike estimated at about thirty-five. He was dressed casually and smiled as they entered.

  “Come my children and hear the good news. You can be baptized in the Holy Spirit, as were the apostles after the resurrection. Come now under the protection of the All-Knowing.”

  Mike withdrew his badge and said, “Mr. McIntyre, I’m Captain Mike Damson and this it Deputy Sean Mark. We’re here to talk about a threat you made to the late Ms. Mildred Riley.”

  He handed McIntyre a copy of the threating post he’d made a few days prior to her murder. In it, Reverend McIntyre threated to immolate her in the fires of righteousness until she renounced the support for the blasphemy of allowing Papists from Latin America and Muslims from heathen countries to infest the sacred lands given to white Protestants by the Holy Spirit in the momentous year 1776. Mike thought the speech had been repeated so often that it was a mantra.

  The minister continued, “It’s Doctor McIntyre to you deputy. Get thee both from my presence blasphemous infidels and agnostics. I merely do the work of the Holy Spirit. I tried to save that fallen woman’s soul. Now, she’s burning in the everlasting fires of hell, and a well-deserved fate if you ask me. I get my instructions directly from the All-Knowing One, and He dictated those words for my fingers to type through the intervention of the Holy Spirit.”

  “You maintain that God made you threaten to burn this woman alive. Do you remember the commandment ‘Thou shall not kill?’ Did they not teach you that at the Columbia diploma mill of Serbia.”

  Now the Reverend McIntyre’s face was scarlet and his chest was heaving as if preparing to attack. His bare hands were balled into fists. Mike pulled his sports coat back revealing his weapons. He put his right hand on his pistol and his left hand on his stun gun. Sean took two steps back and did the same. The standoff lasted fifteen seconds.

  McIntyre spoke as if possessed, but not by the Holy Spirit. “Goddamn you both to the everlasting fire. Atheists like you might not know that the fire of the Holy Spirit burns but does not consume. It bestows wisdom and a closer connection to the All-Knowing. That post is not a threat of physical harm you fools. The fire I referred to is the blessing of the Holy Spirit. Unless you have a warrant get the hell out of my church!”

  Mike and Sean turned and left the tiny mission church in the storefront. As they walked to the car Mike said, “I don’t like the man, but he seems to be a religious zealot without the guts to actually kill anyone. I’d still like to get a warrant to see what sort of firearms he owns, but since we didn’t find the brass or the bullet, no judge is likely to OK a warrant on that religiously ambiguous threat alone.”

  Sean said, “He’s the sort of minister that gives organized religion a bad name. My family members were Methodists, but I wasn’t very good at Sunday school attendance after I was about thirteen. What is this Holy Spirit fire he’s talking about?”

  “I went to Catholic schools until college so I had more than my share of religion classes. To Catholics, the Pentecost is
the celebration of the descent of the Holy Spirit on the disciples of Jesus after his ascension up to heaven. A flame appeared above each person’s head, which represented the Holy Spirit. It bestowed the disciples the wisdom to teach the gospel to the people of the world. Of course it didn’t actually burn them or set their hair on fire, so the Reverend Doctor McIntyre was correct about the Pentecostal fire not actually burning people. He’s probably not our shooter, but he’s the only local suspect left. I wish we could bring him to an interrogation room and ask more about his whereabouts yesterday morning.” Mike had not shared his knowledge of the Park Sniper with anyone except Sheriff Taylor, but he was very afraid that Ms. Riley was a random target in a long string of homicides. He would only know when another death occurred.

  When he returned to his office, Mike found a folder on his desk from the research department. He’d asked them to obtain bank records for the accounts of Ms. Riley and her husband Peter Barbour. As he’d expected there was a five hundred dollar transfer from Ms. Riley’s large account into the small account in Mr. Barbour’s name. It occurred each Wednesday. There was nothing else unusual in Ms. Riley’s account. Just the normal credit card and utility bills. There were also substantial checks to her church and to many local charities. However, when he looked at Mr. Barbour’s bank account he got a surprise. There was only one check written each week, the rest were all cash withdrawals at ATM’s. The single check he wrote each week was $50 to the Pentecostal Flame Mission, a tithe of one tenth of his weekly allowance.

  Mike knew that Mr. Barbour was a Southerner where the Pentecostal congregations were common. Although Peter Barbour knew he stood to inherit almost nothing from his wife, Mike doubted that he shared the information with anyone. Reverend McIntyre probably thought Peter was in line to inherit a substantial part of a hundred million dollars, one tenth of which might be tithed to his small church. There was a financial motive. Maybe it was enough for a warrant to search his property, but since they had no way of identifying the weapon, he decided to take no action yet. He would ask Reverend McIntyre to come to the Sheriff’s Department tomorrow for an in person interview.