by John L. Work
“Which airport are you calling from, sir? O’Hare or Midway?”
“O’Hare. I’m in lot sixteen. I’m driving a red Ford pickup truck and I hit a green Buick Le Sabre.”
“Hold on sir, the airport police are on their way to your location.”
“Okay, thanks.” He disconnected the call. He might have to pay for a ticket, but at least he’d have a clear conscience.
Chicago Police Officer Fred Clancy, who’d been working the airport unit duty for two years, arrived about five minutes later. He spoke with Frederickson, took down his information and thanked him for having the honesty to make the collision report. After making a few preliminary notes, verifying the proof of insurance, driver’s license and vehicle registration, he sat down in his marked car and keyed the radio microphone.
“Two Ocean fifteen, list a plate.”
“Two Ocean fifteen, go ahead.”
“Two Ocean fifteen, the plate is six John Henry Frank six nine nine on a Colorado passenger car.”
“Two Ocean fifteen, copy, stand by.”
Clancy turned to his left to speak with Frederickson, who had walked over to the open car door.
“I’m just checking the registration on the plate to see who owns this thing. Looks like it’s been parked here for awhile. It’s pretty dusty.”
“How much longer will you need me here? I’m in a little bit of a hurry to get home.”
Clancy looked at his notes, extended a business card in his right hand and answered, “You can go. Here’s the case number. I’ll get in touch with you later on because I’m probably gonna have to issue a citation. I don’t want to, because you went out of your way to be a good citizen and report this. I’ll talk to my sergeant.”
“Thanks, Officer. You have all my information there, so if it’s okay, I’ll be on my way.”
“Go ahead, sir. And thank you again for your cooperation.”
Frederickson turned to walk away, got into his truck, started the engine and drove toward the airport exit lanes to pay his two weeks parking fee. Clancy waited about two more minutes, wondering where he should eat his lunch. He started thinking about a double bacon cheeseburger.
“Two Ocean fifteen, prepare to copy.”
“Two Ocean fifteen, go ahead.”
“Two Ocean fifteen, your plate comes back on a 2000 Buick Le Sabre, green over green, wanted in connection with a Chicago homicide. We’re notifying the case detective right now.”
“Two Ocean fifteen copy. Standing by.” He whistled softly through his lips. You just never knew what was going to turn up next, even on a little fender-bender.
Fifty minutes later lot number sixteen at O’Hare Airport was abuzz with police activity. A team of crime scene investigators arrived and criminalists’ cameras began taking color photos of Samantha Newsom’s car from all angles. The police impound lot sent a roll back tow truck to haul it in for processing as evidence. Bill Frederickson got a call from the Chicago Police dispatch center and was asked to respond to Detective Frank Stanley’s precinct for a taped interview. He made an appointment for the following day.
Stanley made a call directly from the scene of the recovery to Welch’s office.
“Hey, it’s Stanley in Chicago. We just recovered Samantha Newsom’s car in one of the parking lots at O’Hare. Some guy backed into it and called the cops. I’m having it towed in to be dusted for prints and combed through for trace evidence by our forensics team. We got the trunk open and found the dress, the coat and the shoes she wore during the killing. There’s no weapon.”
“Hot damn, you hit the jackpot. How long will it take your team to go through it?”
“Well, I’ll see if my Lieutenant can put some pressure on the division chief in the crime lab section. He’ll ask for a rush job. I’m hoping we can have the preliminary work done by tomorrow morning. I’ll call you first thing right after I have the report on my desk.”
“I’ll be waiting for your call. Hell, I may just sleep right here in my office.”
“No, hell, no, don’t do that. We’ll find what we’re gonna find soon enough.”
“Great. Talk to you tomorrow.”
“Okay. Goodbye.”
Welch’s heart was racing. He was disappointed that the gun wasn’t there, but the clothing would be a huge factor as physical evidence. The cops finally got the break he’d been looking for.
As soon as it was logged in at the impound lot, Chicago Police Department Criminalist Ron Kowalski and his team went to work on the exterior and interior of Sammie Newsom’s Buick. They dusted the surfaces for latent impressions. They lifted her prints from all over the steering wheel and the interior rear-view mirror. She was already in the NCIC data base, because of her job as a loan officer with the First Colonial American Bank.
A twenty-one year old honors student intern from the Harold Washington College, named Julie Holmes, was working with Kowalski’s team. She had aspirations to be an FBI lab agent and she was fascinated by all of it, thrilled that she was finally watching some real cops do some genuine detective work at her very first day on her assignment. She looked on as they vacuumed the entire passenger compartment for hairs and fibers. When they did the same inside the trunk and bagged up the residue to be sent to the lab for microscopic examination of the ball of lint, she was pleased to see them doing all of the procedures that she’d only studied in her forensics classes at the college. At the end of the trunk search they pulled up the Velcro fixed carpeting strip and looked to see what lay beneath it. There were only the spare tire, the frame jack and a tire iron.
As Kowalski reached upward to grab and close the trunk lid, Julie Holmes took her first bold step into police work. She said, “Excuse me, Mr. Kowalski, but, shouldn’t you look under that spare tire?”
The twenty-year veteran detective turned toward her slowly, his hand still on the trunk lid, and regarded her for a moment as if she were a small child who’d just told him not to pick his nose in public. Her face whitened, she lost her courage and said, “I’m sorry.”
Kowalski smiled and said, “You know what, young lady? You’re absolutely right. Be my guest, but first put on a pair of gloves.”
The intern returned his smile, the color returned to her face, and she pulled a pair of latex gloves from the open box that was on the car roof. She began to unscrew the wing-nut, removed it and the frame jack. Then she very carefully lifted the tire – revealing a man’s brown leather wallet.
Kowalski picked up his camera.
50
“Welch speaking.”
“Guess whose wallet was in Sammie Newsom’s car.”
“Jim McCowell’s?”
“Precisely. And there was gunshot residue all over the right sleeve of that dress coat and all over the right glove.”
“You gonna do an arrest warrant now?”
“Yeah. And a U-FAP, too. She’s skipped the State of Illinois or I’ll eat your shorts.”
U-FAP is a law enforcement acronym for the federal statute that defines Unlawful Flight to Avoid Prosecution, making it a felony to commit a crime in one state and flee across the border into another, or to a foreign country, in order to escape the long arm of the law. So, now Sammie Newsom was a fugitive from justice. Hiding. But, who knew where?
51
Under a darkening cloud of depression, Marnie McCowell watched her stepdaughters crying at their father’s funeral. She couldn’t bear to see them in this pain. His parents wouldn’t look at her. They thought they knew, although neither could prove, what had really been going on. After her return to Denver from the funeral, it came to her what she would have to do. She’d have to confess to all of it. But before she could call the Roberts County Sheriff’s Office and ask to speak with Welch, the phone rang. It was a homicide Detective from Chicago. He was flying to Denver and wanted to meet her in Colorado Springs. He and two other police officers from Colorado needed to talk with her about Jim’s murder. She agreed to meet with Frank Stanley and the others, but
told him she wanted to contact her attorney first. The appointment was made.
She knew it was over, not only because she could no longer live with what she was doing but she intuitively figured that the police must have known much more than she thought they ever would, or all three of them wouldn’t have wanted to speak with her. The next day she sat down with her lawyer and told him everything. It was time for the reckoning. Her attorney, David Talidge, recommended she not talk with the police. When she insisted that she was going to tell the cops the entire story, with or without him, he told her that he thought he could find good legal counsel to defend her in Chicago. He suggested that perhaps they might be able to negotiate a deal with the Illinois prosecution team. He would deal with the Colorado District Attorney’s Offices.
It took a few days for all of the logistics to be set up. The Colorado Springs Police made an interview room and video taping equipment available. Frank Stanley had to make travel and lodging arrangements from Chicago to Denver, where Welch would pick him up and drive them south. Steve Reilly cleared his calendar in Park County to make the trip to Colorado Springs.
52
They waited for the tap on the glass mirror before beginning, letting them know the video tape was rolling. Welch spoke first.
“Marnie, this is Detective Stanley with the Chicago Police Department, and this is Detective Reilly from the Park County Sheriff’s Office. Just so you know, we’re going to be video taping the interview. Are you okay with that?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Talidge, do we have your consent to tape the interview?”
“Of course.”
They were in an over-sized interview room at the Colorado Springs Police Department. She’d requested that Talidge be present before she talked with the police about her husband’s death.
Stanley began the interview.
“Let me tell you where we are in this investigation. We’re looking into three murders that we believe are related. Thank you for your cooperation in agreeing to sit down with us. You’re not under arrest at this point, so we’re not going to read you your Miranda Rights. Your lawyer is here to look out for your best interests. Either you or he can stop the interview at any time you want to stop talking to us. We’re going to begin with your husband’s murder.
“We know that a woman named Samantha Newsom drove her car from Denver to Chicago, where your husband was attending a business conference. We know he went out to dinner on Friday night. She took a seat on a bench right outside his hotel lobby, waiting for him to come back. When he arrived she walked up to him and shot him three times. We recovered the projectiles. We found Samantha’s Buick in the O’Hare Airport parking lot and we found the clothing she was wearing during the murder. She left them inside the trunk of her car. There was gunshot residue on the coat, the gloves and the dress she had on when she killed your husband. She used a forty-five caliber handgun. We think she probably got on a plane from O’Hare Airport to run away somewhere, but we don’t know that for sure. We’re hoping you can clear some things up and tell us where we can locate her.”
Reilly was next.
“I’m investigating the murder of a young man named Jimmie Slaikovitch. He was shot with a forty-five caliber hand gun and buried up in the Park County mountains. I have good reason to believe that Samantha Newsom is the person who killed him.”
It was Welch’s turn.
“Marnie, as I told you a long time ago when all of this began, I’m investigating Sheila McCowell’s murder. She was either lured or kidnapped from her home in Roberts County and taken up into the foothills to a picnic area. I know that Jimmie Slaikovitch was the man who beat her to death with a rock, probably with someone else’s help. I know that Sheila’s car was dropped off at a coffee shop parking lot up in that area on the Friday before her body was found – probably right after she was killed. I suspect that Samantha Newsom was present during the murder, and that she drove Sheila’s car right after the murder. I believe she had Slaikovitch with her when she swapped out the cars. I know for certain there were telephone calls made from her cell phone to your home phone and to your cell phone on the weekend that Sheila was murdered. I’m going to be asking you to give us whatever details you may have about Sheila’s murder, how it was arranged, who planned it and how it was carried out.”
Stanley said, “I know that you and your husband talked by phone on the Friday evening right before he went to dinner in Chicago. Then you called Samantha’s cell number. We have all the phone records. Your husband called you again about an hour and a half later, and you immediately called Samantha one more time. A few minutes later he was dead.”
Welch continued, “We know that you worked as a personal trainer at the Condition Plus fitness center for a few years. We interviewed the owner and the manager. They gave us your client list from the company’s computer records. We know that Jim and Samantha were on your client list. We’ve connected Jimmie Slaikovitch directly to Sheila’s murder. We’ve tied Samantha directly to Slaikovitch. Now we’ve connected you and Samantha at the gym. So, today the three of us are here to listen to you tell us from the beginning what happened and how all of this came to pass, if you’re willing to do that. I understand that Mr. Talidge has been in contact with the Roberts County District Attorney’s Office. I have no knowledge of any of the details or subject matter he may have discussed with any Deputy District Attorney. I don’t have the authority to enter into any negotiations either with Mr. Talidge or with you. The District Attorney’s Offices in Cook County, Illinois, Park County, Colorado and Roberts County, Colorado have all been notified that we’re talking with you today about the three murder cases. None of us can make any promises to you or agreements with you in exchange for whatever you tell us. Any deals like that have to be arranged between Mr. Talidge and the various prosecutors who may become involved in the cases at a later time. Do you understand all of that?”
“Yes, I do.”
“Has anyone threatened you or promised you anything to induce you to talk with us today?”
“No.”
“So, it’s of your own free will that you’re going to speak with us about these three murder cases and tell us whatever you may know about them?”
“Yes.”
“And you understand that at this moment you’re not under arrest, that you can stop talking whenever you want to stop talking, and you’re free to leave right now?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s begin with Samantha Newsom. Tell us how you met her and what your relationship is with her.”
Marnie cleared her voice, rubbed the palms of her hands on her jeans, looked at her attorney, then down at the tabletop. She rested her elbows on the table, put her forehead down into her hands and began to speak.
“Sammie came into the gym about a year and a half ago. She’d just moved up here from Texas. She’d worked in real estate down there and she’d been through a divorce. She was looking for a personal trainer and we talked a couple of times before she asked me to take her on as a client. She wasn’t interested in the usual stuff that women do to stay in shape – aerobics, Pilates, bicycle, or step training. She only used weights, so that fit perfectly with my function in the company. I was a free weights trainer.
“I was very attracted to her physically and, after awhile, emotionally. She was so strong in so many ways. She hated men after her divorce. She told me her ex drank a lot and controlled every aspect of her life. I’ve always been bi-sexual – I had boyfriends and girlfriends, beginning in my college days. I never told my parents about my women – I only introduced them to my boyfriends. They never would’ve understood me being with a woman, so I kept those relationships a secret. Anyway, Sammie and I became lovers. After awhile I was in love with her. At the time I was already seeing Jim.
“Yes, Jim was cheating on his wife, but I was the one who really did the pursuing. When I first talked with Detective Welch, I lied about who initiated our affair. I opened the door for that and start
ed everything. I could tell his marriage was in trouble when he first talked with me. I was his personal trainer, and he confided in me. He was looking for something – for someone.