The .22 Caliber Homicides: Book 1 of the San Diego Police Homicide Detail featuring Jack Leslie

by William Barrons

  “I checked to see Little Anne was still asleep and I phoned 9-1-1. That’s it, Sergeant Leslie. That’s all there was to it.”

  “Thanks. You forgot the wine in the first place at your bar. Why do you suppose you forgot it?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe because Saturday night was my fifth night working and I was tired? Maybe that’s it. Now then, if you imagine it was because I was all worked up and excited to bring a man home with me, well, I can tell you I’d hardly think so. Jay was nice and I suppose attractive, but I wasn’t all gaga over him. He was a good man but there was something about him; well, I don’t know what. Okay?”

  The two crime scene people came into the kitchen and the man shrugged his shoulders to Leslie; they’d seen nothing at all suspicious, said the signal.

  Leslie stood up and turned to the redhead.

  “Miss, please let me know if you think of anything that might help us. Here’s my card. You said, ‘There was something about him’ and I know there’s such a thing as ‘woman’s intuition’, so let me know if you think of something. Okay? Meantime, I’ll let you know how the investigation goes. Goodbye for now.”

  As Leslie climbed into the PT Cruiser, he reminded himself what a small world it was.

  The McCarty woman had been a client of his wife’s “Donna Elsie Hair Salon” and the McCarty woman felt she already knew him.

  But the Salon had changed the name of course since his Mrs. Donna Elsie Leslie existed no more.

  Leslie drove only a little ways west for a breakfast omelet, toast and home fries at the Hob Nob Hill restaurant. Perry’s was his other favorite breakfast place because they served many Mexican breakfasts. But most mornings, he merely fixed a bowl of cereal at home.

  THREE

  By eight forty five that same Sunday morning, he was in San Diego Police Headquarters, at 14th Street and Broadway.

  From his small cubicle office he called the Medical Examiner’s office, knowing the first thing they would do would be to open up the victim to determine a first assessment of the cause of death.

  “Sergeant Leslie,” he was told, “he might’ve already been on the floor when he was shot. God, he was all muscles. If someone knocked him down first, they must’ve been damn awful strong; or maybe it was easier because he was drunk, I think; he smelled like it.

  “We’ll check his blood alcohol level. We’re certain it was a single, tiny .22 caliber bullet that killed him almost instantly. It nicked a front rib bone and that made it tumble. Then it flipped over and over as it ripped a big hole through the heart; right through the center of his heart. The bullet was stopped by a back rib where it was smashed into tiny pieces.

  “Damn, his bones are like iron. It’s going to be hard to gather all the bits of that smashed bullet; it’ll be worthless to ballistics, it’s in such tiny pieces. Sergeant Leslie, believe me, he had to have died real quick the way his heart was chewed up. That’s why there was such a little bleeding as his blood pressure dropped instantly, I’d say.”

  “Well, well. Thanks. There was no shell casing to be found. The crime lab must be certain to save those bullet fragments and test them for content,” he surmised.

  “Yes Sergeant Leslie, of course.”

  “I mention that although I know how thorough you folks are. The reason is, the victim in this case, Jay Williams, was a vice president of a Los Angeles insurance company and they’ll be on Lieutenant Dean’s back, demanding answers. So thanks much.”

  Leslie knew that although such bullet fragments would be useless to determine if they were fired from a particular gun, each manufacturer made them a little differently.

  Bullets were never of pure lead and the companies made them with their own formula of alloys and additives to make them more workable or to hold up better in gun mechanisms. They might add phosphorus, sulfur, copper or any combination of various elements, to the lead body or the covering full metal jacket or both. The composition might even vary slightly from one batch to another.

  Homicide Detail Lieutenant Pat Dean was an eager fellow, coming in to review the latest strange killing even on a Sunday, the other Homicide Detail Lieutenant being out of town.

  It was the Lieutenant’s duty to deal with the media, his detectives remaining as “anonymous” as possible. He was waiting in his office at nine sharp when Leslie walked in.

  “Hi there Jack. Got you up a little early for this one, eh? I was left a voice mail how he died. What’d you find out?” the Lieutenant asked.

  “Sir, I doubt this one’s connected to the other three .22 caliber homicides, from the way he was shot. The victim’s a Los Angeles area fellow. I’ll get further I.D. on him, but it seems he’s an insurance company executive who comes down here monthly to service an insurance account; at least one account, at the Cecilia Hotel. Picture in his wallet shows a woman and three teen-agers with him. Looks like his family although the bar maid who had him up to her apartment supposed he was single. It doesn’t seem like drugs would be involved as looks certain in the other three .22 caliber homicides,” Leslie allowed.

  “Goddamn drugs; they cause so much violence,” Dean said. “Those two in Hillcrest – well, those two you say looks like they didn’t pay their dealer and therefore they paid a bigger price. And the one in Golden Hill, that’s also plainly an execution. Jesus Christ! Shooting out both eyes and even their teeth!” Dean said.

  “So far, we know it’s a .22 caliber gun that’s done those in because of the beatings with the barrel of the thing and we got out the bullets. But the latest slug’s in tiny bits. Useless except for testing ingredients. However Lieutenant,” Leslie put in, “we at least have a .22 rifle. It belongs to the bar maid’s ex-husband and he could have a motive and certainly I could see he’d have the opportunity to knock off a guy he possibly supposed was a lover of hers. However, he gave the rifle up quite freely for us to run through a bunch of tests.

  “Conveniently though, he claims to have used his .22 auto for target practice yesterday and cleaned it afterwards. If it was his Mossberg, it would’ve flung out a shell casing; but he’d have been stupid not to have picked it up.

  “And he doesn’t seem at all stupid except for giving up a beautiful, very nice wife for a bit of sex with a young girl. We will of course check with the India Street firing range for their records,” Leslie said.

  “So what’s what with the .22 caliber killings up there in Hillcrest and Golden Hill? Any leads so far, Jack?” the Homicide Detail’s co-commander asked.

  “Nothing’s turned up beyond what we found out after that first look. I’m going to talk to that bar maid’s boss about this latest one. He owns the Cecilia Hotel,” Leslie said.

  “Hey, I know that guy,” the Lieutenant said. “He’s a goddamned work-a-holic. Damn near never sleeps. Really smart; decent, too. I doubt he’s taken a day off since he bought that building twenty or so years ago. I like him. He’s Greek but you’d never guess it by that name Stevens.”

  “Well, he might not like somebody messing with his bar maid. I’ve heard things,” Leslie said.

  “Heard things? Like what?” Dean asked.

  “Dale Hayden – remember him? He was a detective for a short time. Anyway, he told me an unlikely story that a dishwasher there found out that once a week, the bar maid unfastens her dress in front of him in his office; she stands there only in her panties and bra. Then the Greek masturbates. Takes him only a couple minutes before he’s done because he’s so excited about her. Then he pays her something; dishwasher didn’t know how much.”

  “That sounds to me like plain old bullshit,” Dean said. “Good God, that’s just so damned impossible, Jack. That damnable Hayden just dreamed that scene up. He was such a liar on many other things; that’s why he’s gone. I fired him for lying and he actually thanked me for pointing out his faults. He actually thanked me! But he hated me for being honest, believe me. Oh no, I can’t think anything so unlikely could….Okay, what’s she like? I mean, is she so damn sexy that she’d
be such a real turn-on?”

  “Lieutenant Dean, I’ve got to tell you something. She is one very impressive woman. She’s a little over thirty. I’ve met a thousand women in my time and I’ve got to tell you, she’s special. She’s not simply gorgeous, she’s….well, she is really very special.”

  “My oh my, is our vaunted hot-shot detective Jack Leslie finally going nuts over a woman?”

  “Come on; I was only explaining that – well, for a bar maid, she’s most certainly different. With all the talking this morning with her, I don’t think she used a bad word even once. That’s something for someone who just has to hear dirty words with regularity but doesn’t adopt them in her own conversation. Really, she gives me the impression of being rather special.”

  “Well, you’re a most unusual man yourself since you’re not at all a cusser. I know, it’s part of your ‘act’, as you call it, to present yourself in our business as though you’re a distinguished gentleman. Even the way you dress; like you own a string of banks, for God’s sake. For a plain-clothes officer, you’re never very plain! Well, I’ll just have to drop into that bar to see how’s come she’s registered so good with my top man.”

  “She works six p.m. to two a.m., Tuesdays through Saturdays. You see her and you’ll know what I mean. She’s something else. She’s not at all what you’d expect to find behind a bar, even in a ritzy, pricey boutique hotel like the Cecilia.”

  “Well damn; you’ve got me anxious for Tuesday night to come along! Maybe I’d best take my wife to dinner there to be on the safe side, eh? Meantime, what’re you going to talk about with my friend Larry Stevens?” Lieutenant Dean asked.

  “Don’t have anything thought out yet about him. I’ve not met him so I’ll maybe just see what he has to say; take it from there like I usually do. Oh yes Lieutenant, there’s another possible guy; he’s an ex-friend of Miss McCarty and I want to get a search warrant before I go see him although I’ve yet to find out where he lives. He owns a .22 rifle also. And by the way, you may be my Lieutenant but I’m telling you, you’d best stick to the lovely gal you’ve been so very lucky to rope in. How pretty Carol fell for a blue-eyed devil like you is way beyond me.”

  “Doggone you Jack, you old ‘Okie-Mex’, when I look in the mirror” he smiled, “I have to wonder the same goddamn thing. Leave me a memo with the information on the ex-friend and I’ll make sure we have a search warrant real quick. Anyway, it’s my day off and I’m gonna be outta here!”

  Back in his own little cubicle office, Leslie whipped out his Blackberry and called the Cecilia Hotel. A friendly voice answered and asked to whom the call might be directed.

  “I’d like an interview with Mr. Stevens, please. This is Sergeant Jack Leslie of the San Diego Police. Is he available now?”

  “Yes sir he certainly is, Sergeant. Hold on, please.”

  In seconds another voice was on the line.

  “This is Larry Stevens, Sergeant Leslie. Our Bar Manager Miss McCarty called to tell me the shocking news. It’s so dreadful and surprising. When would you like to come by?”

  “As soon as possible sir.”

  “Come right over, Sergeant. I’ll be happy to talk to you. Just stop at the front desk and they’ll be glad to direct you to my office. Okay?”

  Other officers would be looking at Williams’ car, parked at the Cecilia Hotel garage and having it inspected and towed to the impound lot. They’d check his hotel room as well. Then the rough part – notifying his next of kin.

  Leslie made it from his 14th and Broadway office to the Gaslamp hotel in mere minutes.

  Beside the hotel front desk was an eight foot tall polished brass statue of a well-formed, beautiful woman. Although of brass, she appeared to be solid gold. She was polished yellow brass right to her modest gown of many folds. Interestingly, her curly hair was gathered atop her head and held there with a brass bow. After polishing, it had been finished with lacquer or something.

  The statue was set back in an arched, grotto-like alcove. Lights shone inside the grotto so you could read on the base, “CECILIA, GODDESS OF HOSPITALITY”.

  The body was nicely tilted as Cecilia was holding a large bottle with her left hand and was pouring “wine” with a gurgling sound from it into a big glass goblet in her right hand. Of course, it was dark red water circulated through the Goddess’s fingers and body continuously by an electric pump back of it somewhere.

  In the restaurant, all the dinnerware and glasses were decorated with a beautiful picture of the statue and they actually sold single sets of the dishes and up to twelve place settings, “below our actual cost”. Obviously, those pieces would advertise the place wherever they were used.

  Leslie was pointed to the owner’s office, just off the lobby and the door was opened by the tiny man who called himself Larry Stevens.

  “Sergeant Leslie! So glad to meet the kind of man I’ve admired for a long time! Such a job you have sir, constantly fighting those bad guys! Please have a seat.”

  The fifty or sixtyish Stevens was not just very short but quite skinny. He weighed one hundred ten pounds, tops, Leslie thought. He wore a pleasant look on his swarthy face. His extremely curly black hair was cut short. He was well known as being a successful businessman.

  Leslie sat on the red leather chair he’d been waved to while Stevens retreated to the seat behind his desk.

  “I won’t keep you long, Mr. Stevens. I wonder first, how well did you know Jay Williams?” Leslie asked.

  “Hardly at all except from the insurance business. I’m sorry to admit I didn’t like him very much since he seems to be a bully type. But his company has given me the best deal I’ve found so far for insurance. That’s a big part of our expenses here so it matters. I suppose his company thinks of my account as being a little shaky so they’ve sent him down here pretty regularly to collect the checks but I’ve wondered if it was Williams’ way of getting away from home with his expenses paid. I don’t know exactly why, but I didn’t like the man. I could save money I know, if I paid the premiums quarterly or annually with most companies, but not his.

  “Lately he’s been staying here overnight before going back to Los Angeles. He’s told me he’s married and I think he has children and that makes me surprised that Miss McCarty would have him over to her place. If I’d known she intended to do that, I’d have strongly advised her not to. When she came back for the wine she’d bought, she didn’t say anything to me about him being a guest of hers.”

  “She told me she understood him to be single,” Leslie told him. “Did you know they had become friends at the bar?”

  “They’d become friends? Well, her friends are her own business, naturally. No, I didn’t know that. I hardly stick my nose into what happens at that bar. For one thing, she’s by far the best Bar Manager in the business. She keeps them always coming back; partly I suppose because she obviously likes people and never, ever forgets their names. She’s absolutely the perfect beauty, as anyone with eyes can see but you know that.”

  “You said she’s a Bar Manager?”

  “Oh yes indeed; and the best. I give all employees some sort of dignified title. Not ‘bar-keep’ or ‘bar-maid’, for heaven’s sake but what she actually does is manage that bar; and she manages the customers too, for if you’ve had enough alcohol, she’ll let you know in the nicest way.

  “The ladies who care for our guest rooms are called Room Managers because that’s exactly what they do. Those are highly responsible positions. We have no ‘bus boys’ or ‘dishwashers’; they’re Dish Managers, for that is what they in fact do, day in and day out.”

  “I see; that’s interesting Mr. Stevens.”

  “Now getting back to your business, Sergeant Leslie, do you have any suspects or motives so far to this awful killing?”

  “Not yet. Tell me sir, do have any weapons?”

  “You’d think a skinny Greek runt like me would want to protect himself with a whole arsenal of guns. But no, I’ve never owned a gun or so much as
shot one.

  “I have an armored truck take our receipts to the bank so that neither any employee nor I will be in danger from robbers; I fondly hope not, anyway. What was he killed with?”

  “It seems he was shot with a .22 caliber pistol or rifle. That’s a target or varmint gun. You know, it’s for boys or men sometimes, for squirrel shooting or maybe for target practice. The ammunition is cheap and is in three sizes; .22 Shorts, .22 Longs and the most powerful, .22 Long Rifles.”

  “Well no, I’m quite certain nobody has ever said anything to me about owning such a gun. I’m sure not,” Stevens said.

  “Surprisingly, you’d hardly think of so small a gun as a murder weapon but he’s the fourth victim this summer in San Diego of that caliber of weapon,” Leslie informed him. “It’s quite puzzling but the murderer or murderers I suppose only have that particular gun available and use it with exactness for it’ll make but a small hole in a man.”

  “I’ve heard of a .45 caliber gun,” Stevens said.

  “Yes, that’s far more powerful and the bullets are more than twice the diameter of the .22 caliber. A .45 will put a big hole in a man and usually knock him right on over and that takes the fight out of him. Do you know of anyone who might be jealous that Mr. Williams was becoming friendly with Miss McCarty?”

  “No. No, I’m not one to delve into the personal lives of my employees. We’re sort of like the family I can never have but I like to think of us as a family business.”

  Stevens paused and looked at the ceiling thoughtfully and then back to Leslie.

  “You must know Miss McCarty is divorced. That was simply terrible – really, really terrible - and it’s difficult to understand how a husband of such a truly wonderful woman could do what he did. I’ve never liked that man since and you and I must think, he’s as good a prospect as any for suspicion. Wouldn’t you agree, sir?”