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

by William Barrons

  “The reason I didn’t spout out with an idea right away Chuck, is it sometimes takes a while to click with something. Okay, my cabbie friend said a man handed a little brown bag to McCoy and he paid in cash; we can suspect the bag had in it meth tablets or packets of coke. And none of us wants to forget that he carries death to the unwary in that shoulder bag.

  “Of the four men he killed and burgled their apartments, always well after bar-closing time, three of them were servers in Gaslamp restaurants or nightclubs. One was a cook there. So that’s where McCoy sells his drugs, I’d suppose.”

  “Hey! That’s it,” Lieutenant Dean barked. “By God, all of us, the whole damn Homicide detail, we’re gonna be circulating in the goddamned Gaslamp Quarter to find that sonofabitch McCoy. We’ll alert the uniformed officers there too, to look for him. He might be disguised of course, but a telltale thing about him is that damn shoulder bag he seems to always wear.

  “All of us must wear shirt-tails out; out over our pistol, badge, radio and hand cuffs on our belts,” Lieutenant Dean continued. “Don’t forget to push the record button on your radio if you’re talking to a suspect. Leslie of course does just fine disguised as a most distinguished man in town.

  “We’ll meet at oh, at 9 o’clock tonight at Fourth and Market and spread out from there,” Dean said. “There should be a good crowd down there tonight and of course, McCoy will hope to blend in with all those guys and tourists who’re looking for girls. We’ll figure to pack it in at 2 in the morning and we’ll do this until we get that prick or I say to knock off. Okay? You fellas should pick up a mug shot and then go home to rest until 9.”

  Detective Kevin Williams mentioned he hardly ever frequented the bars in the Gaslamp and but since it was only Tuesday, there wouldn’t be such large crowds as there were on holidays or weekends.

  “Fine Williams; I know there won’t be so many during the week nights but we’ve gotta get that murdering bastard. Just try to avoid those places where you’re known, especially if they know you’re a cop,” Dean told him. “I’ll assign each of us a stretch to wander through at 9 o’clock.”

  “One last thing about McCoy, Lieutenant,” Leslie put in. “From what Eric Jansen told me about him making love to Mary Annders, it wouldn’t appear the man is homosexual. I think he carries that shoulder bag because he’s always armed with that super-pricey revolver. Since his revolver is a whopping fifteen and a half inches long, the bag must be at least sixteen inches long to hold it.”

  “Good point, Jack,” Dean said, ending the meeting.

  ELEVEN

  Jack Leslie got to his condo about 2:30. His Ronica was about to leave to pick up her daughter from school.

  “While you’re picking her up sweetheart,” he said after their embrace, “I’ll nap awhile since I’ll be working tonight, from 9 until late; and maybe for many nights. When you bring her home, we’ll go to Costco and look for a computer for you and if you like, we can have pizza or a sandwich and ice cream right there. Okay?”

  By 5 o’clock they were at the Southeast San Diego Costco off Market Street and he insisted on getting her an “All-in-one” computer with the computer guts inside of the monitor. It would take less space although it was rather expensive. He added a printer as well, so Little Anne’s wouldn’t be bothered. Then they ate in the food court and went home.

  Leslie explained to them that they were quite certain McCoy was dealing drugs in the Gaslamp Quarter at night. Leslie was one of the many officers who would be looking for him there until he was caught.

  He reminded both Ronica and Little Anne that McCoy was two people in one body and that one of the two was unbelievably dangerous. He insisted they should stay with him until the fugitive was caught. Ronica got busy opening up her new “presents” with her computer-savvy daughter happily anxious to help her with them.

  After a relaxing two hour nap, Leslie walked the three blocks over to 4th Avenue and Market Street to meet with the rest of the Homicide Detail’s Team Three and their Lieutenant. He was the only one dressed in a splendid necktie and business suit. Even his black oxfords were “spit-shined” like his Marine Sergeant Major dad’s shoes always were.

  The Lieutenant assigned each a few blocks to patrol, on each side until 2 in the morning. Leslie had the stretch on 5th Avenue from Market south to the overhead “Gaslamp Quarter” sign. Others were told to patrol north from Market Street to Broadway.

  The Lieutenant had managed to get a special channel of the police radio spectrum assigned to Homicide so they could alert one another of a sighting without broadcasting to everyone in the world, hopefully.

  The thermometer had returned to the usual San Diego readings of the mid-seventies. There was no breeze and the sky all day was more or less blue what with streaky white clouds hanging loose here and there.

  As he slowly wandered down the street, Leslie saw that business had fallen off surprisingly little for those establishments although there were fewer young men and women walking along than he had seen in the past. Ah, it had to be the Great Recession, he figured, what with those who were employed more cautious about spending their hard-earned dough. Many people had lost their jobs and it was difficult to find any sort of work. Companies were also cutting back on lavish parties for their employees.

  Wedding receptions also booked up some of the establishments – but those would customarily be on Saturdays.

  The last of those drug users killed – the slow-to-pay-his-rent guy near 25th and C Streets - had worked at an exclusive club, he recalled, that had a great business going with company parties and wedding receptions. That club was on his “beat” for the night and he kept a particular eye on the men and women coming and going from that place.

  McCoy was certainly a daring criminal and Leslie thought he just might return there to pass out more drugs.

  Would McCoy recognize him, Leslie wondered? The only time the killer would most likely have seen him would have been when he was talking to Eric Jansen; when McCoy returned to see, from some unknown distance, the three Police cars flashing their lights up to Mrs. Annders’ house.

  No man on the Homicide Detail had ever seen McCoy in person; they only had the color photographs; height; weight; hair color; that he was fairly good looking; that he usually wore blue jeans – not unlike billions of other men and women.

  Of course, McCoy could also be disguised. A false mustache, a hastily grown beard and even a wig, would throw off recognition – especially from a mug shot. The big clue would be that shoulder bag he habitually carried. That was a rare thing for a man’s accessory.

  Men used their pants pockets to carry wallets, combs, keys, etc.; women and some gay men didn’t wish to disturb the lines of their figures and so wore tight-fitting pants and carried purses. But then, McCoy might change to some other mode.

  They needed a break, Leslie reckoned. Hopefully it would not be the sort of event that left another human being “real dead”, as Sergeant Robert Jackson had put it.

  Leslie noticed the young women strolling from place to place wore immodest dresses that often covered very little of their breasts and only just reached to the legs. Some of them wore old and ragged blue jeans that were so tight they seemed painted on. Such were the fashions of youth these days, he noted.

  The clothing stores must make huge profits on such garments, he assumed. They charged women big money for a few pennies worth of cloth.

  A portion of the so-called Gas Lamp Quarter – which had no gas lamps whatever and was never a quarter of anything – had been called the “Stingaree” years before with its whorehouses.

  Most of the women were quite lovely strolling the streets these days and were well “made up”. So, had the old time Stingaree with its bawdy houses and painted ladies changed so very much? Birth control pills had certainly made a big alteration in modern sexual attitudes.

  Although studying perhaps more than two hundred men and women from 9 to 2, Leslie only once saw a man carrying a shoulder bag. He wa
s about six feet two inches tall like himself but remarkably skinny – and wearing high heels, rouged cheeks and lipstick. He had looked Leslie up and down and said, “Oooh wow!” Sergeant Jack Leslie shuddered and walked on after noticing the dainty and pretty bag he carried was too small to hold much more than the guy’s cosmetics.

  The Homicide Detail met back at 4th Avenue and Market Street at a bit after 2 a.m.

  “Gentlemen, nobody didden see nothin’, as usual,” Lieutenant Patrick Dean said, “but we’re not quitters. We’ll be back to patrol the entire Gaslamp Quarter tomorrow night. And Goddamnit, we’ll do it every night until we find that crazy bastard McCoy. Now, get your butts home and rest because we’re gonna do this until we catch that sonofabitch.”

  Wednesday night and Thursday night were about the same as on Tuesday. There were occasional arrests for public drunkenness and traffic tickets given out, but always by uniformed officers. None of the Homicide Detail’s Team Three or the Lieutenant saw any sign of killer McCoy.

  When they met after another disappointing search Thursday – actually, Friday morning at 2 am, - the Lieutenant seemed as determined as ever to repeat the patrol the next night.

  “Lieutenant Dean,” Leslie put in as they were standing on the corner recounting their lack of success, “we are perhaps beginning our search too late. We should probably begin about 5 o’clock because we’ll recall, so far as we know, it wasn’t everyone he sold drugs to, but restaurant and bar workers. By much after 5, maybe most working folks would be too busy to deal with a drug peddler so we ought to begin about then or earlier, sir.”

  “Hey Jack Leslie, that’s a damn good idea!” Dean said.

  “Also, I can tell you - since I’ve eaten in some of these restaurants - that during week nights, as we’ve all seen,” Leslie went on, “there’s lots of customers and tourists down here in spite of the financial world going nuts. I’d guess they mostly live in apartments and condos downtown or close by. But on Friday and Saturday nights, it becomes almost a madhouse. Darn, you have to wonder sometimes where all those men and women come from on the weekends and holidays.

  “So what I’m getting at here, is not only should we start our search early Friday night, but also, since the streets will likely be crowded with people, we might as well search also for the car McCoy stole.

  “There are big and little parking lots all over and near the Gaslamp Quarter and it might be that McCoy will park in one of them and we can post somebody to watch the car for his return to it. What do you think, Lieutenant?”

  “Well I’ll be goddamned and go to hell. If you don’t come up with the damnedest ideas, Jack. You live near here so I’d have to say you know the district best. Okay Leslie, we’ll give your ideas a try. Tomorrow – rather, tonight - we meet right here at 5 and we’ll all look not only for that bastard McCoy but for that stolen old green Volvo wagon, too.”

  “You’ll notice fellows,” Leslie added, “that most of the cars in those parking lots on weekends are new and expensive. It seems to be the fashionable thing these days for men and women with good-paying jobs to buy exotic, pricey, foreign cars; I suppose for the imagined prestige of it. So I’d guess an old Swedish car might sort of stand out. That is, if he hasn’t stolen another car to replace it.”

  During Friday, Ronica and Little Anne went to the McCarty Apartments to do their laundry and bring fresh clothing back. They both explained to Winfred McCarty what was happening and he seemed understanding of the possible danger to them if they didn’t stay away.

  Another so-called “Santa Ana” was blowing hot air toward the ocean from the desserts. The air was particularly dry and caused anxiety about possible wildfires. The thermometer also showed high eighties; it was ten to fifteen degrees above the normal temperatures.

  Leslie dressed in a cooler, plain tan colored single-breasted suit, light blue shirt and red striped silk tie. For comfort, he wore his white Costco sneakers – these days, he reckoned, a guy could wear just about anything and not raise eyebrows. He had actually noticed grown men wearing Converse Chuck Taylors with business suits. Shockingly, some of them with no neckties!

  Ronica complained that “You look far too beautiful to be let loose where I know gorgeous women were searching for just such a handsome guy as you.”

  Countering that, Leslie told her, “I’m a one-girl guy and you, my darling, are that one and only girl.”

  The Homicide Detail met again on 4th Avenue and Market Street at 5 pm Friday, September 19th. Lieutenant Dean took the 4th Avenue-to-the-south stretch and Leslie was assigned the same area as before; 5th Avenue south to the “Gaslamp Quarter” over-the-street sign. Leslie noted to himself that Dean would be patrolling near the Chinese museum on 3rd Avenue.

  “I gotta tell you guys some things,” Lieutenant Dean said. “Chief Slumberjay’s no dummy and of course the politicians and other big boys in town as well as all the media, have been jabbering in her ears about these .22 caliber homicides. I know she’s gonna be dining down here someplace tonight. She didn’t say exactly, but she’s got some sort of party to attend.

  “Other brass too, will be around here someplace. They’ll all be out of uniform and incognito, more or less. There’s gonna be lots of parties this weekend in the Gaslamp, I hear; so be aware of that and if you see any of our police leaders, pretend you don’t notice them.

  “Just remember, the sonofabitch McCoy is extremely quick to act, so watch out for a guy with a sixteen inch long bag hanging from his goddamned shoulder!”

  “Or,” offered Leslie, “it might be sixteen inches deep or at an angle; it’s a substitute for a gun holster and probably holds money and other stuff.”

  “Yeah guys, McCoy’s sonsabitching bag might be sixteen inches in any direction,” Dean affirmed. “But please, don’t anyone take a tape up to him to measure it, okay?” he laughed. “Anyway, let’s get to hell moving.”

  As the Detail scattered to their assigned beats, Leslie walked over one block to 5th Avenue and turned right from Market Street, to the south. The sun still shone brightly and it was quite warm, giving the girls, he assumed, further rationale to wear as little as their enticing immodesty allowed.

  Already, the sidewalks were cluttered with males and females and the streets were clogged with cars in which their gawking drivers were in no big hurry. It seemed every establishment was busy, even at that early hour, barely after 5 o’clock. The noisy babble of society socializing sociably and of music wafted out to the street. Didn’t any of these people work, he wondered?

  Even though it wasn’t a Saturday, he saw wedding parties at two of the places between Island and J Streets, on the west side. Near the corner of 5th and J there was two Ford Explorers belonging to two of the television stations. So, he supposed, TV reporters must be there to cover the wedding or reception of some big celebrity.

  He passed Island Street, taking it easy, looking over everyone on both sides of the street and noticing the cars going slowly by. He had memorized the license number of the old Volvo, just as the others in the Detail had.

  Leslie hadn’t quite got to the “Gaslamp Quarter” sign beyond J Street when the little radio on his belt vibrated. He lifted it up out of its holster and listened.

  “Ha! Hey guys, Pat Dean here and I see ahead of me a goddamn green Volvo wagon! The license number is….sonofabitch! It’s the one McCoy stole! I don’t see anybody inside it….I’m looking around to the front of….POP!” There was a short pause; then he heard, “POP! POP! POP! POP!” Plain as could be! Five small caliber shots!

  “EVERYBODY!” Leslie shouted into his radio, “Converge on 4th below J! The Lieutenant should have been below J by now! Hurry! Chuck! Call for an ambulance there!”

  He kept the radio to his ear as he turned around and ran back up 5th Avenue. There was a great deal of confused jabbering on the radio, by seemingly many people. He heard a woman scream. Then another.

  As he ran past K Street, he spied an average size man walking fast. A bag was swinging
from his right shoulder. He turned off J Street, going north up 5th Avenue. Leslie couldn’t see what the man was wearing but he thought, it must be him!

  The man turned to look back – apparently right at Leslie running up the street – and then waved to him as he ducked to the left into a restaurant!

  “POLICE! POLICE!” Leslie hollered at the people on the street to get out of his way. His coat was open to show his badge and the stuff on his belt and his new pistol was in his hand held high.

  “MAKE WAY FOR THE POLICE!” he roared as men and women stared at him running and then scattered to clear the way.

  A car would have run him down as he crossed J Street if he hadn’t ducked out of the way!

  A little past J Street he looked left to where McCoy had run and saw it was a huge wedding affair. He ran into the place, searching with his eyes for McCoy.

  By Heaven! There he was! Plain as could be, with no attempt at disguise! McCoy was standing with his back against a mirrored wall, between tables, smiling from ear to ear! He had both hands clenched atop his head!

  The place was crowded of course and all the folks were dressed “to the nines”. It was absolutely blazing with lights for the occasion.

  “POLICE OFFICER HERE!” Leslie shouted. “MAKE WAY FOR THE POLICE HERE!”

  Holding his pistol high in the air, he forced his way forward to a spot opposite McCoy, who was about ten feet away and had his back up against the mirrored wall. Leslie noticed the flap to close the bag was folded back to McCoy’s side, making the bag open to grab the gun certainly inside, quick and easy.

  Meantime, McCoy held his hands on his head and still smiling, managed in a cheerful loud voice to say, “Yes, yes! Let’s make way for the nice Policeman! It’s Detective Tyrone Power also known as Jack Leslie, folks! Our Jack’s gonna murder me right now in cold blood! And I’m not armed! He’s gonna murder me! POLICE BRUTALITY!” he laughed. He actually laughed!