Borderline Insanity

by Jeff Miller

  “Can’t we go in?” he asked.

  “We need a warrant.”

  “But the house is abandoned.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” she said. “It belongs to someone.”

  “I thought the courts said you could search abandoned property without a warrant.”

  “The Supreme Court said you could search abandoned trash at the curbside. They never said anything about entering an actual house without a warrant.”

  “But you went in last night?”

  “Those were exigent circumstances—that’s an exception to the Fourth Amendment.” This was her story, anyway. Whether the circumstances were actually exigent wasn’t clear. Although they later heard a voice calling for help from the silo, this was after she had already searched the home. If it became an issue, it could bar the admission of any evidence concerning the cigarette stub she had collected during her search. Up until now, she’d been breaking all the rules. From this point on, they’d need to do things by the book.

  “John, you’ve got to swear out an affidavit for a search warrant. I would do it, but I have to stay here and greet the troops when they arrive.”

  “Troops?”

  Her phone buzzed. “Looks like they’re here. I’ll walk you out on my way to meet them. See if you can get the warrant within the hour.”

  “The judges won’t be at the courthouse for another two hours.”

  She knew he’d never worked on anything with such high stakes, and that it would take some time for him to realize the measures the stakes demanded. “Catch a judge at home.”

  “Okay.”

  When they got to the edge of the farm, twelve Bureau technicians and crime-scene specialists were waiting—the first batch of what she hoped was much more. She gave them an overview of the circumstances that awaited them and e-mailed each a copy of the case summary she had drafted. Every inch of the property had to be inspected, and every piece of evidence documented and bagged before any bodies could be removed. Extraction of the bodies would likely require some demolition of the silo, which would be performed by construction crews acting under Bureau supervision. Once removed, the bodies would be loaded into bags and placed in the refrigerated trucks for transport to a team of medical examiners and forensic technicians who would attempt to identify each body and capture any evidence associated with them. To the extent that bodies had been torn apart, efforts would be made to reunite the parts. Fingerprints would be identified, where possible, and matched to prints on phones, which would allow them to associate names with the bodies. Fingernails would be scraped in case a scuffle had captured the unsub’s skin fragments.

  The group dispersed to begin collecting evidence. Dagny watched them for a while to assess their technique and offered suggestions where necessary. Her meddling seemed to irritate only a couple of men in the bunch, to her relief. Once she had confidence in their competence, she called Diego.

  “Hello?” he answered in the haze of sleep.

  “I need your help.”

  “For what?”

  “Driving in daylight.”

  “I don’t understand, but I’ll be there in twenty.”

  “Great.”

  The driving was to get some orientation. What surrounded the Hoover farm? They would have to interview any neighbors. Were there cameras in the vicinity? If so, there would be footage to review. The Caltech software program had identified the location of each abduction, and each of those areas would have to be investigated for eyewitnesses or security feed. The amount of work that awaited them seemed overwhelming. She pulled out her phone and dictated a list of items that had to be accomplished. There were ninety-seven entries on the list when Diego arrived, and she wasn’t close to done.

  “You look terrible,” he said, hopping out of the car.

  “Thanks,” she said, grabbing the keys.

  “I’m serious. You’re banged up, and your clothes are ripped and wet, and your eyes—”

  “I get it.”

  “—are bloodshot, Dagny.”

  “It’s been a busy night.” She slid into the driver’s seat.

  “You need some sleep. A shower. Some bandages,” he said, pointing to the scrapes on her arm.

  “No time.”

  He climbed into the passenger seat. “Breakfast, at least?”

  “If we see a drive-through.” She turned the key, hit the gas, and they were off.

  She drove loops, turning right at each intersection, increasing the radius of the circle each time around. It was obvious why the unsub had picked the farm—the silo was in the center of a hundred acres of land, and each edge of the property was abutted by farms of similar size, which were each in turn abutted by more farms of similar size.

  As they drifted farther away from the Hoover farm, a television news van sped by so quickly that Dagny barely caught the Channel 7 News Dayton logo on the side. Someone had already contacted the press. She dialed the police chief and instructed him to block off all streets within two miles of the Hoover farm.

  After she hung up, Diego asked, “Is that legal? With the First Amendment and all.”

  “Everything’s legal until a court says otherwise.” Another news van sped past. “We can’t have them trampling on evidence and recording everything we’re doing. Press coverage is exactly what the unsub wants. It will make him feel like he matters, and it will give him a window into our investigation.” She looked at her watch. “It’s not even nine thirty in the morning, and the circus has begun. Reporters are going to start talking to neighbors, pushing cameras in their faces, before we’ve even had a chance to talk to them. They’ll start all-day coverage, repeating the same two or three supposed facts they think they know.” Her phone chirped with a text message from Victor: Landed Dayton, in car, on our way.

  They needed to meet somewhere away from the chaos. She texted back: Meet at Beamer’s.

  And then she texted Beamer: Still need your basement for a little while. Meet there in one hour. Bring the warrant.

  He sent back a frowny face and the word okay.

  CHAPTER 28

  Dagny had arranged six chairs in a circle in Beamer’s basement, but no one dared to select one until the Professor chose his. The slight, bald man stroked his pointed white beard while he pondered the selection. After too much deliberation, he chose the one that sat the highest. Victor slumped into a seat to the right of the Professor, who studied his droopy gaze and shook his head. “No reason for you to be so tired, Walton. Wake up. You’ve got a lot to learn in a little time.”

  Victor bore this better than anyone in his place should have. “Of course.”

  Dagny began the introductions. “John and Diego, this is Timothy McDougal, but we affectionately call him the Professor.” The Professor grimaced at the word affectionately. “He’s been with the Bureau since the days of Hoover in various capacities, infiltrating domestic terrorist cells, overseeing investigations of multistate serial killers, profiling and lecturing at the Behavioral Science Unit in Quantico. He is widely regarded as the leading intellectual thinker in the FBI.” It was a bold proclamation, and one that he himself had drafted, insisting that the Bureau feature it in all of his biographical summaries. “He’s the head of our little group, which operates largely outside of the organizational chart of the FBI. The Professor reports directly to the Director, who has issued a blanket order that the resources of the Bureau’s other divisions accede to any of our requests.

  “Brent Davis,” she continued, “is the consummate special agent. He’s spent time working in California, Colorado, and Texas, and is very good with working with people. I am not.”

  Beamer and Diego already knew Victor, but the Professor didn’t know that, so she introduced him. “Victor Walton Jr. was previously an accountant for Deloitte & Touche. He joined the Bureau when he realized that he was an accountant for Deloitte & Touche. His capacity for tedium is his biggest strength.”

  “Hi,” Victor said. “Nice to meet you guys.”


  Beamer and Diego looked confused as to why he was introducing himself as though they’d never met, but thankfully didn’t say anything about it.

  “John Beamer is our host,” Dagny continued. “He’s graciously given us his basement until we find new quarters, and—”

  “I like it here,” the Professor said. “It’s discreet.”

  Beamer spoke. “Our station has a room three times this size—”

  “Too much traffic and attention. Let’s keep this,” the Professor replied.

  Dagny continued. “John is Ron Beamer’s nephew. He’s an officer with the Bilford Police Department. Unlike most police officers, he’s competent.”

  He bristled at that. “I think—”

  “It’s a compliment, John.” Dagny turned to the Professor. “John’s been instrumental in assisting our efforts.”

  “A big help,” Victor added.

  “How would you know?” the Professor said.

  Victor opened his mouth, but it took a few seconds for words to come out. “Because they found the bodies, right? So, I can only assume he was a big help.”

  The Professor shook his head.

  “And this,” Dagny said, gesturing to Diego, “is Father Diego Vega. His congregation came to him when members of their families went missing. He conducted his own investigation, and then came to me—”

  “Enough of this, really,” the Professor said, waving his hands. “Father Vega, Officer Beamer, we appreciate your assistance on the effort. We can take it from here. You’re free to go.”

  Diego and Beamer looked at Dagny and started to stand. She held up her hand to stop them. “Professor, I highly recommend keeping both of them as part of our team. I trust them completely. John has been designated as our liaison to the Bilford Police Department, which is currently supporting the investigation by protecting the crime scene and can serve additional functions throughout the investigation. And Diego, apart from his own deep investment in the case, is our ambassador to the local immigrant populace. They trust him, and they don’t necessarily trust us. He gives our investigation legitimacy in their eyes.”

  The Professor studied them for a few seconds. “Very well. But this is it. Just the six of us.”

  She nodded and began an overview of everything that had occurred, summarizing her interviews of the families and the discovery of the phones, demonstrating the database generated by their metadata and the chronological mapping of their movements, and describing the discovery of the bodies and the ongoing efforts to document and analyze evidence from the Hoover farm. She reviewed the ninety-seven entries on her to-do list, and the Professor added another twenty of his own.

  He asked about the billboards at the entrance to the county, and Beamer and Diego explained about Sheriff Don and the politics of the region. “Has there been a record of violence against the immigrant population?” the Professor asked.

  “No,” Diego said. “Not until this.”

  The Professor stroked his beard. “A man or men? One or a gang?”

  Brent said, “Eighty-one people is a lot for one man to kill.”

  “No,” the Professor replied. “Not over time. Not with an immigrant population afraid to go to the police. Not with the way this labor market works. You show up with a truck and leave with a dozen of them. Take them to the farm. Maybe even have them climb into the silo itself under the pretext of work, and then you never let them out. Easy. One man keeps a secret better than any group can. Cults recruit. They splinter. They fight internally and, therefore, accomplish less. A cult might kill a dozen. Only one man can kill upward of a hundred.”

  Dagny immediately thought of counterexamples, like 9/11 or the Holocaust, but stayed silent.

  “Now, as for motive,” the Professor continued, leaning forward and putting his head in his hands. “Three possibilities, at least. One, he hates immigrants. Two, he loves immigrants, and he wants the world to sympathize with them. Three, he doesn’t care about immigrants. He’s killing them because they are easy people to kill, since their families won’t contact authorities and their employment is undocumented and irregular.”

  “Perhaps the bigger issue is his mental state?” Dagny asked. “You don’t kill this many people unless there’s something severely wrong with you.”

  “He’s insane,” Victor said.

  “Borderline insane,” the Professor barked. “Never use the word insane, and if it tumbles out, it better have the word borderline with it.”

  Victor seemed confused, so she explained. “When an investigation starts to use the word insane, it seeps into documents and reports, and a defense lawyer can use that to build an insanity defense.”

  “And they get the Hinckley treatment instead of the death penalty they deserve,” the Professor said. “In any event, the unsub here is not insane. To kill for this long without being noticed requires meticulous and careful planning, extraordinary patience, and focus and dedication. The truly insane are not capable of any of those things. He’s disturbed but not insane.”

  Brent joined in. “In terms of a profile, I think it’s safe to say we’re looking for a white man once again.”

  Victor whispered to Diego, “It’s always a white male.”

  “But as for age . . .” Brent shrugged.

  “You can guess, or I can just tell you,” the Professor said. “Middle-aged.”

  “Because?”

  “Because that’s who can hire these men,” Diego answered, surprising everyone. “They would trust him enough to hop in his truck. A younger man wouldn’t have the responsibility for a job big enough to warrant hiring them.”

  “Very good, Father,” the Professor said. “You’ve jumped ahead of Victor on the organizational chart. Now, let’s talk assignments. Brent, I want you talking to any- and everyone who lives or works near the Hoover farm.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Dagny, oversee the evidence collection at the farm and the transport of the bodies. Frankly, I don’t like that there is work proceeding without our supervision this very moment. Victor, I want you to oversee the makeshift morgue. Link up the phone data to as many bodies as you can. Work with the Disaster Squad to set up systems to process the information. I want seamless flow. When a fingerprint analysis comes back, I want it to be automatically incorporated into our master database. We’re building something from scratch here, and you need to make sure they do it right.”

  “No problem,” Victor said.

  “What can I do?” Beamer asked.

  “Assist Dagny with the forensic inspection of the farmhouse, if you’re competent enough for her to trust you.”

  “He is.”

  “After that, get everything related to the Hoover farm you can. We need the story of the property. Deeds, clients, permits, mortgages, foreclosure documents. Subpoena every document from every bank that ever had an interest in the place.”

  “Sure.”

  The Professor looked at Father Vega. “We have a long list of names. Meet with your congregation and go through them. See how many of these families are known. Keep track of anyone who can help us with them. Explain that we’ll need their cooperation. Tell them God wants them to cooperate, if that will help.”

  Diego nodded. “I will.”

  With all of the others dispatched to their tasks, Dagny stayed back to talk to the Professor. “Nice meeting. But what are you going to do?” she asked.

  “I’m going to play.” He walked over to the computer setup, sat down, and opened the cell phone database. “What a wonderful toy. It’s the key to everything. The data shows where he abducted his victims. You see the importance of this, right? The NSA has GPS data for nearly every cell phone in the country. If we could find a cell phone that traveled with these dots to the silos, we’d have the unsub.”

  “So, if our data shows twelve phones at Fowler Road—”

  “The NSA data might show a thirteenth phone joining them, which would belong to the unsub.”

  “To get NSA data, you’r
e going to need approval from the FISA court,” she said.

  “It won’t be a problem.”

  “The F in FISA stands for foreign. The court is only supposed to permit data mining when there is a suspected foreign terrorist threat.”

  “A man has killed close to a hundred illegal immigrants. Sounds like terrorism to me.”

  “But most likely domestic.”

  “That hasn’t been proven. Don’t be naive, Dagny. Do you know how many data-mining requests the FISA court has ever rejected?”

  “No.”

  “The answer is point zero three percent. They will approve the request.”

  He was probably right. “NSA said they stopped collecting domestic location data in 2011.”

  “And since then, there has been only incidental bulk collection of bulk data. Which means they have almost everything.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because there’s no oversight of NSA. Their decisions are scrutinized by a secret court that is subject to no judicial review or public scrutiny. They have dirt on every politician who might be inclined to check their power. They do whatever they want.” He sighed wistfully. “They’re like we used to be.”

  Dagny didn’t pine as hard for the days of Hoover. “What if he doesn’t carry a cell phone? When he called the radio station, he used a victim’s phone.” She reached into her backpack and pulled out the disc from The Hank Frank Show.

  He inserted it into the computer and waited. The drive spun, and the disc popped back out.

  “The words need to face up,” she said.

  He flipped it over. As audio of the killer’s phone call played, he smiled.

  “Why are you smiling?”

  He looked up at her with wide eyes and a grin. “Because he’s real, and we’re going to catch him.”

  CHAPTER 29

  When Dagny parked Diego’s Corvette at the edge of the Hoover farm, Sheriff Don was standing at the border of the property with a dozen deputies and a tank. The tank had track wheels, an armored skirt, a large main gun, and the words SHERIFF DON’S SWAT TANK painted sloppily on the side. The fat, balding sheriff was screaming at John Beamer, and a television crew was filming the confrontation.