A Killing in China Basin

by Kirk Russell

  ‘I heard.’

  ‘It grazed me, my skull.’

  She closed her eyes again. She’d been unable to get to her feet afterwards. She felt blood streaming from her head, heard a man talking to her and faraway sirens as she lay on the sidewalk. She knew the man with her was trying to help, but she couldn’t quite understand what he was saying. She remembered the ride here and the doctor telling her how lucky she was as he stitched her up. She opened her eyes again, stared at Raveneau.

  ‘What do we do now?’ she asked.

  The coverage had gone national. Raveneau listened to local radio on the way here. KCBS reported, ‘Police are looking for a male assailant who shot and wounded a San Francisco homicide inspector tonight. The suspect is believed to have fled in a blue Volvo station wagon with license plates beginning with the letters T and F. He is armed and dangerous and anyone spotting the vehicle should keep their distance and call this number . . .’

  ‘Elizabeth?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  ‘I want to ask you a couple of questions.’

  ‘OK, sure, let’s go.’

  Her face was very pale. She needed to just rest here in the dark. He knew that.

  ‘Are you sure the shooter was male?’

  ‘Ninety percent.’ She mustered. She opened her eyes and said, ‘Wearing a dark-colored mask, like one of those they have now for extreme cold. It covered his head down to his collar bone. Bulky coat.’

  ‘How do you know he was male?’

  ‘I think he started to say something as he shot me. His arm, size of his head.’

  ‘Stoltz?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘Heilbron.’

  She didn’t answer. She faded on him, then said, ‘Maybe Heilbron. Something about his build.’

  ‘Or neither?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  She closed her eyes again. Raveneau waited several minutes.

  ‘Ben?’

  ‘I’m here.’

  Her eyes still closed, she said, ‘He roared up and hit the brakes hard.’

  Which was probably why he missed.

  ‘What about the gun?’

  ‘You’re telling me we haven’t caught him.’

  ‘That’s right. It’s gone statewide.’ It went statewide and became a bad night locally for Volvo drivers. ‘Remember anything more about the car? Cracked windshield, faded paint, a rack on top, anything.’

  She kept her eyes closed but spoke more clearly.

  ‘Definitely Volvo, wagon type I rode in as a kid, kind of square looking, a black bumper, chrome wheels.’

  Raveneau booted up his laptop to find images of older model Volvo wagons. As the screen came up, la Rosa opened her eyes.

  ‘Put the laptop on my stomach when you find something.’

  He rested it on her and held it steady as she scrolled between two photos and then said, ‘That’s it, that’s the car, a Volvo 240 with the bumper wrapping around in back.’

  ‘One idea floating is that it’s Stoltz and he went after you because you’re the spokesperson for the task force. But that seems unlikely to me because the task force just happened and you’ve only had one press conference. How often do you run that same route?’

  Slower answering again and closing her eyes, saying, ‘Vary the runs, but generally the same direction.’

  ‘At about the same time of night?’

  ‘Erratic since I started at homicide, but, yeah, I like that route.’ She smiled with her eyes closed, adding, ‘Or used to.’

  She was religious about her exercise. Raveneau’s guess was she ran the route often enough for someone to get a sense of her pattern. He didn’t go there now. He didn’t push her on it, except to ask, ‘Have you run it since joining this cobbled together task force?’

  ‘Excuse me,’ a woman said from behind Raveneau. He turned. He’d missed Deputy-chief Grainer walking in.

  ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘We’re talking about the shooter,’ he said, but Grainer ignored him now. She took la Rosa’s hand and said, ‘I’m so relieved you’re OK.’

  Then she turned to Raveneau and asked, ‘Is that your laptop, Inspector?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Please take it off Elizabeth.’

  She touched la Rosa’s face, withdrew her hand, and stood looking down at her as Raveneau turned the computer off.

  ‘Have you got your phone, Elizabeth?’ Raveneau asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’ll call you.’

  In the hallway he ran into Captain Ramirez.

  ‘How is she?’

  ‘She’s OK. I talked to the doctor who stitched her up and he said the bullet grazed her. It tapped the back of her skull as it passed by. He told me it made the faintest groove on the bone right here.’

  Raveneau touched his skull where the stitches were.

  ‘Did you learn any more from her?’

  ‘Not really. She believes he was male and of fairly sturdy build.’

  ‘Which fits Stoltz.’

  ‘It could. Or someone else we’ve been questioning. Carl Heilbron.’

  ‘I’m guessing it wasn’t coincidence.’

  Raveneau didn’t respond to that. It was an inane statement. He left Ramirez and rode the elevator down. Several reporters hustled toward him as he walked out.

  ‘Can you confirm the shooter was Cody Stoltz?’

  Someone in TV who ought to know once told him that national news was purely an entertainment business driven by constant market research polling, and to complain about endless nights of repetitive coverage of whatever current story they were selling was just naïve. He’d bragged that most of the time his national network decided what was news. Celebrities with brand names were easy to market, so significant lasting stories got built around them. Raveneau knew there was a higher plane of cynicism he had only glimpsed at, but he was pretty sure how the media would play this one.

  It would be a more immediately saleable story if the wounded homicide inspector had died here in the hospital with her last words being, find my killer. But that’s the breaks of the story-making business. You’ve got to work with what you have. Still, the story-makers were hard at work shaping the expectation – SFPD homicide detail and family versus unknown but driven and capable assailant.

  So now it was a chase and a hunt, a reality-based action show where more might get killed and the stakes and the ratings were driven higher. Who doesn’t love a good task-force sized hunt? Talk about turning the tables on a stalker, the media would compete to join the hunt, and you know what, Raveneau was OK with that. They needed the media’s help.

  He saw some familiar faces among the reporters, but ignored their calls on the way to his car. But as he drove away he did take a call from a reporter he knew and answered the questions as honestly as he could.

  ‘Is there any true evidence that points toward Cody Stoltz?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘Then why hasn’t he come in with a lawyer and challenged this?’

  ‘You’ll have to ask him.’

  ‘OK, all right, but you’re looking for him.’

  ‘Yeah, we are.’

  ‘And he’s trying not to get found?’

  Raveneau didn’t see any need to answer that one. His mind drifted back to la Rosa, how close a call it was.

  ‘Was Inspector la Rosa able to give a clear description?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Will she recover more memory, more of a description?’

  ‘Maybe, but I doubt it. The assailant had a mask on and it happened fast.’

  ‘Does that mean that, other than it was a Volvo he was driving, you have little to go on?’

  ‘Right now, that’s accurate.’

  ‘OK, one last question, if you were Stoltz and you hadn’t killed anybody and didn’t plan to, what would you do now?’

  ‘I’d call a lawyer and have him arrange a surrender.’

  ‘Does that mean you’d arrest and charge him?’


  ‘I can’t answer that.’

  ‘Perfect. Thanks, Ben, talk to you later.’

  FORTY-TWO

  San Francisco homicide inspectors are expected to clock in, work an eight hour day, and get approval for any overtime. If approved, you filled out one of the little salmon-pink cards, but Raveneau often ignored that. He worked whatever it took.

  He was standing at the windows drinking coffee and watching the dawn when he heard the office door open. A few minutes later Lieutenant Becker walked back.

  ‘I’m not in today,’ Becker said, voice flat, eyes bloodshot as Raveneau turned and looked at him. ‘I was at the hospital all night. My brother isn’t doing well.’

  Raveneau put an arm around Becker’s shoulders, knowing there was little he could say. He washed two mugs and brought Becker coffee. Then they stood at the windows as the sky turned pink with sunrise.

  ‘My brother’s daughter, my niece, Jolie, just turned seventeen. She and her dad are close but she’s a troubled kid, problems with drugs, a new tattoo or piercing every three weeks, and a knack for hanging out with all the wrong people. In any group she’ll figure out the one who’s going to get arrested and gravitate toward them unconsciously. But underneath it, she’s a good kid. It’s looking like they’re going to charge her former boyfriend and I don’t know how Jolie’s going to handle it. I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘Where’s her mom?’

  ‘In Minnesota with two young kids and a new family. She remarried after the divorce. She knows Alan was shot but we haven’t heard a word from her about Jolie.’

  ‘Can she live with you?’

  ‘My wife doesn’t like her and we don’t really have enough room but she’s going to have to move in with us, at least for the moment. Right now, she’s staying with her best friend. I’ve got to keep her in high school. That’s job one right now. Somehow I’ve got to keep her on track, but all I can think about is her ex-boyfriend.’

  ‘Is there new evidence?’

  ‘They’re waiting for DNA results.’

  ‘When are those?’

  ‘Today. There was blood at the scene that wasn’t Alan’s. The ex-boyfriend had a cut on his right forearm he claims happened when he fell off his bike. He also told the investigators he hasn’t been at the house in months. If they get a match today they’ll charge him.’

  Becker gripped the coffee cup with both hands. He hadn’t touched any of it. His eyes were bloodshot as he turned and said, ‘Oakland is moving forward with a case against Bates. They’ve got a signed statement from the girlfriend.’

  Raveneau nodded. He was aware. He had talked to Stalos for half an hour yesterday. Oakland wanted them to agree before they charged Bates. They didn’t want any blowback from SF Homicide.

  ‘Where are we at with Cody Stoltz?’ Becker asked.

  ‘I’ve asked the FBI to get a UFAP warrant on him.’

  ‘How are they going to do that if we don’t really have anything on him?’

  ‘They can get a warrant on anybody they want nowadays. They’ll get the warrant.’

  ‘We’d still need a way to hold him.’

  ‘Yeah, but we also need help finding him.’

  Raveneau told him about the private investigator following Stoltz north after Stoltz left the hotel late at night, but Becker seemed to already know about that. The Feds would get the UFAP and then they’d be all over Stoltz’s phone pen register. With phones, the FBI could track real time and that might be their best chance of locating him. But Becker was right, unlawful flight to avoid prosecution was a probable cause apprehension. If apprehended, they’d need evidence to hold him.

  ‘There was a phone call made from LA last night,’ Raveneau said. ‘That phone seems to belong to a non-existent person but it may have been him calling here.’

  ‘Made to where?’

  ‘Here. Want to hear it?’

  Raveneau put the message on speaker phone.

  ‘I’m ready to go again. Are you?’

  He pushed the volume up. With just Becker and him in the office he replayed it several times, then said, ‘The call came from LA. It’s similar to another one I got a day or two after we caught the China Basin killing. That’s something I can’t put together.’

  ‘What was that message?’

  ‘Also short, one line with some vehicle noise in the background, a man saying, “So you found her.” That call was made from one of these PCS one month phones where you try out the unlimited local service for forty bucks or whatever it is. The phone owner gave a false ID.’

  ‘This recent call was from Los Angeles?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Could be somebody playing with us.’

  ‘Sure.’

  Becker set the coffee down, still untouched. He squinted up at Raveneau.

  ‘And la Rosa is fine?’

  ‘A mild concussion and stitches where the bullet plowed a groove in her scalp, and that’ll be tender this morning, but it wouldn’t surprise me if she showed up here. She wants to strap her gun on and go Volvo hunting.’

  ‘What does she remember?’

  ‘Not enough. It happened fast, shooter wore a mask, and she didn’t see much.’

  Becker didn’t respond to that, no doubt had heard that already. Raveneau watched him go back into his grief. Becker left the homicide office soon after and returned to the hospital where his brother died just before noon.

  FORTY-THREE

  That same morning Stoltz walked into a car dealership and test drove a BMW, an older 330i with a sport package, relatively low mileage, and new Michelins. The body was as clean as they had claimed. He handed over a Visa with the name Steven Pullman on it, telling the salesman, ‘This way I get the airline mileage.’

  Then he sensed that one of the women working on the paperwork behind a glass barrier was watching him. He turned his back to her, moved out into the showroom, and waited nervously outside on a bench with the feeling that everything was closing in around him. Time was compressing. He needed to move carefully but faster. Twenty minutes later, he signed the papers and the salesman handed him the keys, smiling as he asked, ‘Where are you headed in that beautiful car?’

  ‘Vegas.’

  ‘Man, I wish that was me. How long are you going to be there?’

  ‘Ten days. I just got a bonus that was a long time coming.’

  ‘Have a great drive. This baby should really run for you.’

  Instead of heading toward Vegas, Stoltz went north on I-5, making the same drive he’d made last Sunday morning. For the next three hours he sat in a fast group of cars running at speeds way over the limit, as if somehow a pack mentality protected them from the highway patrol. After three hours he left the freeway to gas up. When he got back on he made a bad mistake, accelerating to catch a car in front of him and touching one hundred and five miles per hour as he passed it.

  Seconds later he hit the brakes, but too late. A black and white CHP cruiser was getting off a ramp up ahead and immediately came for him, closing fast, and as he did Stoltz moved his gun into his lap. But rather than pull him over the officer hovered alongside him for several seconds then sped off. What he might have done left him shaken.

  He drove another forty minutes under the white sky and flat land of the valley, before pulling the clip from the gun and calling his lawyer. North of the valley town of Patterson he merged into heavier traffic. He crossed over the brown hills past the slow-winding windmills of Altamont Pass, and headed for the warehouse in San Jose. There he showered and changed, and tried to calm down.

  But he didn’t feel like the director of the movie any more. He felt like an actor. He felt lightheaded. He switched cars and a mile from his mother’s house he called SF Homicide and asked for Raveneau.

  Raveneau asked, ‘Are you coming in?’

  ‘My lawyer has advised me not to talk to you, but I’m willing to meet with you. I don’t want to deal with the media.’

  ‘We’ll bring you in through the ba
ck, but I have to warn you that as of a few hours ago there’s a warrant out for your—’

  ‘I want to talk to you alone first. Then I’ll give myself up.’

  ‘OK, we’ll do it that way.’

  ‘But I’m not who you’re looking for.’

  ‘That’s why we need to talk.’

  ‘I didn’t kill the lawyer in Walnut Creek. I don’t even know who he is. I didn’t shoot your partner.’

  ‘We’ve got a lot to talk about. Where are you now?’

  ‘Almost home.’

  ‘Los Altos?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He was still talking to Raveneau when a SWAT team closed around him. Raveneau must have heard the squealing tires, the yelling, the order to get out of the vehicle, and Stoltz breathed into the phone as he looked at a gun aimed at his head, ‘If they kill me, it’s on you.’

  ‘I don’t know how they found you, but do exactly what they tell you.’

  They batted the phone out of his hand and jerked him out of the car. Then he was face down on the asphalt. He felt pebbles grind into his cheek, heard the handcuffs click, and let his body go limp.

  FORTY-FOUR

  Stoltz’s lawyer adjusted her glasses and made a prediction. ‘They’ll release him within two days and my client will sue and win.’

  It took Raveneau an hour to string together how the SID team knew Stoltz was on his way to his mother’s house. Turned out the FBI tracked him real-time through his cell phone, and Raveneau didn’t say it to anyone except la Rosa, but he regretted the takedown. He believed Stoltz would have come in, whereas now he was refusing to talk. He sat and talked strategy with la Rosa and then called Jurika’s cousin, Julie Candiff. Candiff’s fingers clicked over a keyboard as she talked with him. She was flaky but cooperating, flying in from Phoenix tomorrow morning just before noon.

  ‘We’ll pick you up at the airport.’

  ‘I rented a car.’

  ‘OK, it’ll take you about thirty-five minutes to get here. Do you want directions?’

  ‘No, I have my phone.’

  ‘We’ll see you tomorrow.’

  She didn’t answer and a moment later hung up.

  ‘Is she going to show?’ la Rosa asked, and Raveneau shook his head, no.