Cruel and Unusual ks-4

by Patricia Cornwell

  “Something like bite marks.”

  “Yes,” I said.

  The body was not yet fully rigorous and was still slightly warm as I began swabbing any area that a washcloth might have missed. I checked axillas, gluteal folds, behind ears and inside them, and inside the navel. I clipped fingernails into clean white envelopes and looked for fibers and other debris in hair.

  Susan continued to glance at me, and I sensed her tension. Finally she asked, “Anything special you're liking for?”

  “Dried seminal fluid, for one thing,” I said.

  “1n his axilla?”

  “There, in any crease in skin, any orifice, anywhere.”

  “You don't usually look in all those places.”

  “I don't usually look for zebras.”

  “For what?”

  “We used to have a saying in medical school. If you hear hoofbeats, look for horses. But in a case like this I know we're looking for zebras,” I said. I began going over every inch of the body with a lens.

  When I got to his wrists, I slowly turned his hands the way and that, studying them for such a long time that Susan stopped what she was doing. I referred to the diagrams on my clipboard, correlating each mark of therapy with the ones I had drawn “Where are his charts?” I glanced around.

  “Over here.”

  Susan fetched paperwork from a countertop. I began flipping through charts, concentrating particularly on emergency room records and the report filled in by the rescue squad. Nowhere did it indicate that Eddie Heath's hands had been bound. I tried to remember what Detective Trent had said to me when describing the scene where the boy's body had been found. Hadn't Trent said that Eddie's hands were by his sides? “You find something?”

  Susan finally asked.

  “You have to look through the lens to see. There. The undersides of his wrists and here on the left one, to the left of the wrist bone. You see the gummy residue? The traces of adhesive? It looks like smudges of grayish dirt.”

  “Just barely. And maybe some fibers sticking to it,” Susan marveled, her shoulder pressed against mine as slue stared through the lens.

  “And the skin's smooth,” I continued to point out. “Less hair in this area than here and here.”

  “Because when the tape was removed, hairs would have been pulled out.”

  “Exactly. We'll take wrist hairs for exemplars. The adhesive and fibers can be matched back to the tape, if the tape is ever recovered. And if the tape that bound him is recovered, it can be matched back to the roll.”

  “I don't understand.”

  She straightened up and looked at me. “His IV lines were held in place with adhesive tape. You sure that's not the explanation?”

  “There are no needle marks on these areas of his wrists that would indicate marks of therapy,” I said to her. “And you saw what was taped to him when he came in. Nothing to account for the adhesive here.”

  “True.”

  “Let's take photographs and then I'm going to collect this adhesive residue and let Trace see what they find.”

  “His body was outside next to a Dumpster. Seems like that would be a Trace nightmare.”

  “It depends on whether this residue on his wrists was in contact with the pavement.”

  I began gently scraping the residue off with a scalpel.

  “I don't guess they did a vacuuming out there.”

  “No, I'm sure they wouldn't have. But I think we can still get sweepings if we ask nicely. It can't hurt to try.”

  I continued examining Eddie Heath's thin forearms and wrists, looking for contusions or abrasions I might have missed. But I did not find any.

  “His ankles look okay,” Susan said from the far end of the table. “I don't see any adhesive or areas where the hair is gone. No injuries. It doesn't look like he was taped around his ankles. just his wrists.”

  I could recall only a few cases in which a victim's tight bindings had left no mark on skin. Clearly, the strapping tape, had been in direct contact with Eddies skin. He should have moved his hands, wriggled as his discomfort had grown and his circulation had been restricted. But he had not resisted. He had not tugged or squirmed or tried to get away.

  I thought of the blood drips on the shoulder of his jacket and the soot and stippling on the collar. I again checked around his mouth, looked at his tongue, and glanced over his charts. If he had been gagged, there was no evidence of it now, no abrasions or bruises, no traces of adhesive. I imagined him propped against the Dumpster, naked and in the bitter cold, his clothing piled by his side, not neatly, not sloppily, but casually from the way it had been described to me. When I tried to sense the emotion of the crime, I did not detect anger, panic, or fear.

  “He shot him first, didn't he?”

  Susan's eyes were alert like those of a wary stranger you pass on a desolate, dark street. “Whoever did this taped his wrist, together after he shot him.”

  “I'm thinking that.”

  “But that's so weird,” she said. “You don't need to bind someone you've just shot in the head.”

  “We don't know what this individual fantasizes about.”

  The sinus headache had arrived and I had fallen like a city under siege. My eyes were watering; my skull was two sizes too small.

  Susan pulled the thick electrical cord down from its reel and plugged in the Stryker saw. She snapped new blades in scalpels and checked the knives on the surgical cart. She disappeared into the X-ray room and returned with Eddies films, which she fixed to light boxes. She scurried about frenetically and then did something she had never done before. She bumped hard against the surgical cart she had been arranging and sent two quart jars of formalin crashing to the floor.

  I ran to her as she jumped back, gasping, waving fumes from her face and sending broken glass skittering across the floor as her feet almost went out from under her.

  “Did it get your face?”

  I grabbed her arm and hurried her toward the locker room.

  “I don't think so. No. Oh, God. It's on my feet and legs. I think on my arm, too.”

  “You're sure it's not in your eyes or mouth?”

  I helped her strip off her greens.

  “I'm sure.”

  I ducked inside the shower and turned on the water as she practically tore off the rest of her clothes.

  I made her stand beneath a blast of tepid water for a very long time as I donned mask, safety glasses, and thick rubber gloves. I soaked up the hazardous chemical with formalin pillows, supplied by the state for biochemical emergencies like this. I swept up glass and tied everything inside double plastic bags. Then I hosed down the floor, washed myself, and changed into fresh greens. Susan eventually emerged from the shower, bright pink and scared.

  “Dr. Scarpetta, I'm so sorry,” she said.

  “My only concern is you. Are you all right?”

  “I feel weak and a little dizzy. I can still smell the fumes.”

  “I'll finish up here,” I said. “Why don't you go home.”

  “I think I'll just rest for a while first. Maybe I'd better go upstairs.”

  My lab coat was draped over the back of a chair, and I reached inside a pocket and got out my keys. “Here,” I said, handing them to her. “You can lie down on the couch in my office. Get on the intercom immediately if the dizziness doesn't go away or you start feeling worse.”

  She reappeared about an hour later, her winter coat on and buttoned up to her chin.

  “How do you feel?” I asked as I sutured the Y incision.

  “A little shaky but okay.”

  She watched me in silence for a moment, then added, “I thought of something while I was upstairs. I don't think you should list me as a witness in this case.”

  I glanced up at her in surprise. It was routine for anyone present during an autopsy to be listed as a witness on the official report. Susan's request wasn't of great importance, but it was peculiar.

  “I didn't participate in the autopsy,” she went o
n. “I mean, I helped with the external exam but wasn't present when you did the post. And I know this is going to be a big case - if they ever catch anyone. If it ever goes to court. And I just think it's better if I'm not listed, since, like I said, I really wasn't present.”

  “Fine,” I said. “I have no problem with that.”

  She placed my keys on a counter and left.

  Marino was home when I tried him from my car phone as I slowed at a tollbooth about an hour later.

  “Do you know the warden at Spring Street?” I asked him.

  “Frank Donahue. Where are you?”

  “In my car.”

  “I thought so. Probably half the truckers in Virginia are listening to us on their CBs.”

  “They won't hear much.”

  “I heard about the kid,” he said. “You finished with him?”

  “Yes. I'll call you from home. There's something you can do for me in the meantime. I need to look over a few things at the pen right away.”

  “The problem with looking over the pen is it looks back.”

  “That's why you're going with me,” I said.

  If nothing else, after two miserable semesters of my former professor's tutelage I had learned to be prepared. So it was on Saturday afternoon that Marino and I were en route to the state penitentiary. Skies were leaden, wind thrashing trees along the roadsides, the universe in a state of cold agitation, as if reflecting my mood.

  “You want my private opinion,” Marino said to me as we drove, “I think you're letting Grueman jerk you around.”

  “Not at all.”

  “Then why is it every time there's an execution and he's involved, you act jerked around?”

  “And how would you handle the situation?”

  He pushed in the cigarette lighter. “Same way you are. I'd take a damn look at death row and the chair, document everything, and then tell him he's fall of shit. Or better yet, tell the press he's full of shit.”

  In this morning's paper Grueman was quoted as saying that Waddell had not been receiving proper nourishment and his body bore bruises I could not adequately explain.

  “What's the deal, anyway?” Marino went on. “Was he defending these squirrels when you was in law school?”

  “No. Several years ago he was asked to run Georgetown's Criminal Justice Clinic. That's when he began taking on death penalty cases pro bono.”

  “The guy must have a screw loose.”

  “He's very opposed to capital punishment and has managed to turn whoever he represents into a cause celebre. Waddell in particular.”

  “Yo. Saint Nick, the patron saint of dirtbags. Ain't that sweet,” Marino said. “Why don't you send him color photos of Eddie Heath and ask if he wants to talk to the boy's family? See how he feels about the pig who committed that crime.”

  “Nothing will change Grueman's opinions.”

  “He got kids? A wife? Anybody he cares about?”

  “It doesn't make any difference, Marino. I don't guess you've got anything new on Eddie.”

  “No, and neither does Henrico. We've got his clothes and a twenty-two bullet. Maybe the labs will get lucky with the stuff you turned in.”

  “What about VICAP?” I asked, referring to the FBI's Violent Criminal Apprehension Program, in which Marino and FBI profiler Benton Wesley were regional team partners.

  “Trent's working on the forms and will send them off in a couple days,” Marino said. “And I alerted Benton about the case last night.”

  “Was Eddie the type to get into a stranger's car?”

  “According to his parents, he wasn't. We're either dealing with a blitz attack or someone who earned the kid's confidence long enough to grab him.”

  “Does he have brothers and sisters?”

  “One of each, both more than ten years older than him. I think Eddie was an accident,” Marino said as the penitentiary came into view.

  Years of neglect had faded its stucco veneer to a dirty, diluted shade of Pepto Bismol pink. Windows were dark and covered in thick plastic, tugged and torn by the wind. We took the Belvedere exit, then turned left on Spring Street, a shabby strip of pavement connecting two entities that did not belong on the same map. It continued several blocks past the penitentiary, then simply quit at Gambles Hill, where Ethyl Corporation's white brick headquarters roosted on a rise of perfect lawn like a great white heron at the edge of a landfill.

  Drizzle had turned to sleet when we parked and got gut of the car. I followed Marino past a Dumpster, then ramp leading to a loading dock occupied by a number of cats, their insouciance flickering with the wariness of the wild. The main entrance was a single glass door, and stepping inside what purported to be the lobby, we found ourselves behind bars. There were no chairs; the air was frigid and stale. To our right the Communication Center was accessible by a small window, which a sturdy woman in a guard's uniforms took her time sliding open.

  “Can I help you?” Marino displayed his badge and laconically explained that we had an appointment with Frank Donahue, the warden. She told us to wait. The window shut again.

  “That's Helen the Hun,” Marino said to me. “I've been down here more times than I can count and she always acts like she don't know me. But then, I'm not her type. You'll get better acquainted with her in a minute.”

  Beyond barred gates were a dingy corridor of tan tile and cinder block, and small offices that looked like cages. The view ended with the first block of cells, tiers painted institutional green and spotted with rust. They were empty.

  “When will the rest of the inmates be relocated?” I asked.

  “By the end of the week.”

  “Who's left?”

  “Some real Virginia gentlemen, the squirrels with segregation status. They're all locked up tight and chained to their beds in C Cell, which is that way.”

  He pointed west. “We won't be walking through there, so don't get antsy. I wouldn't put you through that. Some of these assholes haven't seen a woman in years - and Helen the Hun don't count.”

  A powerfully built young man dressed in Department of Corrections blues appeared down the corridor and headed our way. He peered at as through bars, his face attractive but hard, with a strong jaw and cold gray eyes. A dark red mustache hid an upper lip that I suspected could turn cruel.

  Marino introduced us, adding, “We're here to see the chair.”

  “My name's Roberts and I'm here to give you the royal tour.” Keys jingled against iron as he opened the heavy gates. “Donahue's out sick today.”

  The clang of doors shutting behind us echoed off walls. “I'm afraid we got to search you first. If you'll step over there, ma'am.”

  He began running a scanner over Marino as another barred door opened and “Helen” emerged from the Communication Center. She was an unsmiling woman built like a Baptist church, her shiny Sam Browne belt the only indication she had a waist. Her close-cropped hair was mannishly styled and dyed shoe-polish black, her eyes intense when they briefly met mine. The name tag pinned on a formidable breast read “Grimes.”

  “Your bag,” she ordered.

  I handed over my medical bag. She rifled through it, then roughly turned me this way and that as she subjected me to a salvo of probes and pats with the scanner and her hands. In all, the search couldn't have lasted more than twenty seconds, but she managed to acquaint herself with every inch of my flesh, crushing me against her stiffly armored bosom like a wide-bodied spider as thick fingers lingered and she breathed loudly through her mouth. Then she brusquely nodded that I checked out okay as she returned to her lair of cinder block and Liron.

  Marino and I followed Roberts past bars and more bars, through a series of doors that he unlocked and relocked, the air cold and ringing with the dull chimes of unfriendly metal. He asked us nothing about ourselves and made no references that I would call remotely friendly. His preoccupation seemed to be his role, which this afternoon was tour guide or guard dog, I wasn't sure which.

  A right turn and we e
ntered the first cell block, a huge drafty space of green cinder block and broken windows, with four tiers of cells rising to a false roof topped by toils of barbed wire. Sloppily piled along the middle of the brown tile floor were dozens of narrow, plastic covered mattresses, and scattered about were brooms, mops, and ratty red barber chairs. Leather tennis shoes, blue jeans, and other odd personal effects littered high windowsills, and left inside many of the cells were televisions, books, and footlockers. It appeared that when the inmates had been evacuated they had not been allowed to take all of their possessions with them, perhaps explaining the obscenities scrawled in Magic Marker on the walls.

  More doors were unlocked, and we found ourselves outside in the yard, a square of browning grass surrounded by ugly cell blocks. There were no trees. Guard towers rose from each corner of the wall, the men inside wearing heavy coats and holding rifles. We moved quickly and in silence as sleet stung our cheeks. Down several steps, we turned into another opening leading to an iron door more massive than any of the others I had seen.

  “The east basement,” Roberts said, inserting a key in the lock. “This is the place where no one wants to be.”

  We stepped inside death row.

  Against the east wall were five cells, each furnished with an iron bed and a white porcelain sink and toilet. In the center of the room were a large desk and several chairs where guards sat around the clock when death row was occupied.

  “Waddell was in cell two.” Roberts pointed. “According to the laws of the Commonwealth, an inmate must be transferred here fifteen days prior to his execution.”

  “Who had access to him while he was here?” Marino asked.

  “Same people who always have access to death row. legal representatives, the clergy, and members of the death team.”

  “The death team?” I asked.

  “It's made up of Corrections officers and supervisors, the identities of which are confidential. The team becomes involved when an inmate is shipped here from Mecklenburg. They guard him, set up everything from beginning to end.”