by Rick Acker
Brandon was willing. After going to church with his mother, he drove out to the nursing home. It was a forlorn-looking old building in a run-down area on the outskirts of Stockton, but it was set in a large and well-landscaped lot that was vibrant green after the fall rains. As he parked, Brandon saw splashes of color, which marked beds of flowers planted along a winding path that led from the home’s side door.
Father Vicente met him in the lobby. “I’m glad you’re here, Brandon,” he said as they walked into the home’s common room. A row of elderly ladies in faded dresses looked up and smiled expectantly as they entered. “I’ll be with you in a moment, ladies,” he said to them.
As they exited through another door, the priest leaned closed to Brandon and winked. “The line for confession is long today,” he said in a low, conspiratorial voice. “They must have gotten in a lot of trouble last week.”
They walked down a hallway lined with numbered doors, many of which had been personalized with handmade nameplates, artwork, and pictures. It felt a little like a college dorm.
“There’s someone I’d like you to meet,” Father Vicente said as they reached an unadorned door near the end of the hall. “I think you may know him.”
The priest knocked, then opened the door without waiting for a response. The room was poorly lit and had few decorations on the wall. A man sat in a wheelchair, facing the door. He was a big man in his midforties. He had been muscular once, but now his body was slack and soft. The heavily tattooed skin hung from his atrophied arms, and his hands were bony fists that bent down at the wrists. An ugly scar creased his right cheek. Another scar marred the left side of his bald head.
Brandon knew him. “Omar Sanchez,” he said.
Omar’s eyes seemed to focus. His mouth moved, but only an inarticulate grunt came out.
“Yes,” Father Vicente said. “Omar, remember I said you were going to have a visitor?”
Omar nodded.
“This is Brandon Ames,” the priest said. “He’s the son of Tim Ames, the man who owned Ames Construction.”
Omar’s eyes widened and his lips moved again, but nothing came out.
Brandon had been angry at this man for a long time. More than once, he had thought out eloquent, accusatory speeches he would give Omar. But now that Brandon was here and actually saw him, he discovered that he didn’t want to give a speech. Instead, he had a question. “Is that a dropout scar, Omar?” he asked, meaning the scar on Omar’s cheek.
Omar nodded again.
Omar must have wanted to go straight, wanted it badly. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have taken the risk of dropping out. When members of prison gangs quit, other gang members often attacked them—slashing the defectors’ faces to brand them as dropouts. Dropouts were marked men for the rest of their lives, subject to attack on sight by members of their former gangs.
“Omar and I have talked about your dad,” Father Vicente said. “About how he gave Omar a second chance. About the accident. Omar knows it was his fault. He wishes he could go back in time and make that day different, but he can’t. He asks for your forgiveness.”
When Brandon last saw Omar, four years ago, he had seen a threatening thug with an evil-looking scar. Now he saw a man who tried to do the right thing, but made mistakes—including mistakes with alcohol. A man who had spent time behind bars and resolved never to go back. A man with guilty blood in his veins. A man like him.
Brandon’s throat felt thick. “I forgive him,” he said.
Omar’s face became blotchy and he looked down. He sniffed, and tears dropped into his lap.
Brandon took a deep breath to steady himself. He noticed a familiar smell in the room. It was a stale, human scent—not precisely sweat or body odor, but the smell of a place where men have spent too much time in one room. The smell of prison.
“Would you like to go outside and get some fresh air, Omar?” Brandon asked.
Omar nodded.
Brandon walked into the shadowy room and pushed Omar’s chair out the door, down the hall, and to the door that led to the garden path. Father Vicente opened the door for them, and they went out into the bright, fresh sunlight.
AFTERWORD
As with all my books, I’ve kept the fiction to a minimum when it comes to the background facts in Guilty Blood. The OPM database really was hacked, Wente really does serve marvelous champagne in their winery tasting room, and your smart TV really could be used to spy on you.
Here are the facts behind some of the central plot elements in Guilty Blood:
Chinese hacking. One of the most successful cyberattacks in history came to light in 2015, when US authorities disclosed that the Office of Personnel Management had been breached, and that the breach went undetected for at least a year. The perpetrators, most likely a Chinese military unit, made off with tens of millions of detailed data files on everyone who ever requested or received a security clearance from the US government. That covered every federal employee who worked in intelligence, security, or law enforcement. It also encompassed lots of state and local officials—including me, annoyingly—who had received federal clearances while working on joint state-federal projects. The Chinese government therefore likely has an enormous treasure trove of data that would allow for successful spear phishing of the type Kevin Fang describes.
Human trafficking. While Lan Long is fictional, there are numerous international crime organizations that profit from human trafficking. The methods Jade Li described are typical for sex traffickers—vulnerable young women are lured in with false promises of modeling or acting careers, then forced into prostitution once they reach America. Their passports are often taken to make it difficult for them to flee. And as Jade mentioned, many women—and men—are kept as domestic slaves, unable to leave the homes of their owners. While reliable statistics are very hard to come by, the number of victims in California alone is almost certainly well into the thousands. In fact, a 2012 San Diego State University study put the number of Mexican trafficking victims in California at nearly half a million.
Prisons and gangs. The specific correctional institutions and gangs in this book are fictional. However, the portrayal of gang behavior, prison culture, and the California correctional system is largely realistic. Each institution is unique and has its own dynamics, procedures, strengths, and flaws, but I tried to make the worlds of Tassajara and High Sierra as typical as possible.
DNA testing and statistics. I glossed over some details for the sake of simplicity, but the depiction of forensic DNA analysis in Guilty Blood is substantively accurate, with two exceptions. First and most important, the FBI recently dropped the thirteen-locus method described in the book in favor of a twenty-locus method, which should almost entirely eliminate spurious partial matches of the type that convicted Brandon. Second, I basically guessed at the statistics about the number of nine-locus matches Lan Long would find if it ran searches on its agents’ DNA profiles in CODIS. But it’s impossible to know whether my guesses are right or wrong because, as Dr. Weiss noted in the book, the FBI won’t let outsiders analyze the data in CODIS.
Monsieur X. This bizarre case actually happened, and it occupied most of my time between 2000 and 2005. If you read French and you’re interested in international business intrigue, try Googling “Executive Life” and “Francois Marland.” I thought about turning the events of the case into a novel, but the actual facts were too unrealistic to make good fiction.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Anette (wife): for long walks devoted to plotting, hundreds of hours spent editing, and boundless love and support.
Amy Hosford, Sheryl Zajechowski & the entire Waterfall/Grand Harbor team: for doing a fantastic job with this book and the four previous ones. It has been a great pleasure to work with you.
Peggy Hageman and Meredith Jacobson (editors): for perceptive comments, questions, and suggestions that brought out the best in this book.
Karen Bovarnick (criminal law expert): for answering a civil litigator’s many
questions about criminal courts in general and cold-hit DNA cases in particular.
Cindy and Fred Acker, Chris Ames, Gary Cantrell, Kathy Engel, Marcie Farano, Randy Ingermanson, Emily Kalanithi, Per Kjeldaas, Gail & Bubba Pettit, Charlotte Spink, Jody Wallem (test readers): for insightful feedback on the characters and plot—and for catching lots of little mistakes.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Photo © Anette Acker
Bestselling author Rick Acker is supervising deputy attorney general in the California Department of Justice. Most recently, he and his team won a string of unprecedented recoveries against the Wall Street players who triggered the Great Recession. Acker has authored several legal thrillers, including Death in the Mind’s Eye, an RT Book Reviews Top Pick. He spends most of his free time with his wife and children. You can learn more about Acker and his books at www.rickacker.com.