by Mike Lawson
“So what did you find?” Peyton asked.
Berman pointed at the ceiling, and Peyton could see a hole where a ventilation grille had been. The grille was leaning against a wall. Berman pulled over DeMarco’s visitor’s chair and said, “I noticed there were scratch marks on the grille near the screws, and they looked new, the metal all shiny and bright, so I removed the grille. Sir, if you wouldn’t mind, stand on the chair and look inside the duct, but don’t touch anything.”
Peyton did as Berman instructed, and inside the duct he saw what appeared to be the uniform of a U.S. Capitol cop. On top of the uniform was a cop’s equipment belt including a holstered Glock.
“Who the hell is this guy?” Peyton muttered.
The impressive machinery of the Federal Bureau of Investigation went into high gear.
Forensic specialists photographed the uniform and gun in place and then carefully removed them from the ventilation duct. The clothes—dark blue pants, a dark blue short-sleeved shirt, boots, a police equipment belt, and a dark blue ball cap—appeared to be identical to what the Capitol Police wore. The technicians immediately confirmed—no microscope required—that the Capitol Police insignia patch on the shirt matched the fake patch captured by the security cameras.
As for the Glock, it appeared to have been fired recently, and the magazine, which could hold seventeen bullets, contained only fifteen. The gun barrel was machined to accept a silencer, which was later found in one of the pockets of the uniform pants. Everything was placed into evidence bags—gently, so that fingerprints and potential DNA were not disturbed. One of the technicians noticed two longish dark hairs inside the ball cap, stuck in the sweatband, and she made sure the hairs were not dislodged when she bagged the cap.
The uniform and the weapon, DeMarco’s computer, everything in DeMarco’s desk, and even the ventilation grille were then whisked off to the FBI’s lab in Quantico, Virginia, for further examination.
For a case like this, Department of Justice lawyers and a friendly federal judge were always on standby, and it took less than half an hour to get the warrants needed to invade DeMarco’s life: warrants to search his home, computers, phone records, financial records, safe-deposit boxes. About the only thing the warrants didn’t permit was a body-cavity search, but that could be accomplished without a warrant after DeMarco was arrested.
It took one phone call to Verizon and less than ten minutes to find DeMarco based on his cell-phone location. He was at the Westfields Golf Club, a public course in Fairfax County, Virginia. Eight agents were dispatched to throw a net around him. At the golf course, two agents removed their suit jackets and ties, and rented clubs and a cart. The kid in the pro shop found it odd that two men in white shirts, nice pants, and dress shoes had decided to play golf but didn’t say anything. He figured it was a couple of guys on a business trip who’d decided to goof off instead of working. And anyway, all golfers were nuts.
The agents found DeMarco on the eleventh green. He was playing by himself. Through binoculars, an agent watched him miss a three-foot putt, then look skyward, as if asking God how that could have possibly happened. The agent notified Peyton they had DeMarco in sight, but Peyton dispatched a helicopter to hover over the golf course, and the pilot was directed to stick with DeMarco when he left the course. Peyton didn’t want his agents losing DeMarco thanks to a traffic jam or a badly timed light.
About the time DeMarco was teeing off on the thirteenth hole, Peyton was informed that the gun found in DeMarco’s office had been used to kill Canton. Marks on the shell casings found in Canton’s office confirmed this. The autopsy on Canton had not yet been completed, but Peyton was sure that after the pathologist removed the slugs from the body, there would be no doubt that the weapon used to kill Canton was the one found in DeMarco’s office.
By the time DeMarco reached the tee box for the sixteenth hole, FBI accountants had already taken a peek at his finances. DeMarco had a simple and unimpressive financial life. His latest tax return showed no stocks, no bonds, no income from any source other than his government job. He had no real estate other than his Georgetown home, and he was still paying the mortgage on that. His checking account balance was approximately $3,000 and rarely got higher than that amount. His savings account showed a balance of $121,000—but the day before Lyle Canton was killed, the balance had been only $21,000. A hundred thousand dollars had been wire-transferred into the account the day the congressman was killed.
The FBI accountants—men and women who spent most of their time tracking money going to terrorists—easily traced the wire transfer to an account in the Cayman Islands, but that’s where the trail ended. The Cayman bank refused to cooperate in identifying the account holder. So Peyton told the Treasury Department and the State Department to threaten the bank and the Cayman government with anything they could think of. He doubted they’d have much luck, but he had to try.
About the time DeMarco was searching for his ball in the rough near the seventeenth fairway, the lab at Quantico reported that the equipment and clothes worn by the killer were amazingly free of trace evidence. There was gunshot residue on the front of the shirt, but there were no fingerprints on anything: belt buckle, buttons, boots, and so forth. One might have concluded that the clothing had never been worn if not for two strands of dark hair found in the ball cap. A technician said that he would be able to make a DNA match off one of the hairs as soon as he had something or someone to match it to. DeMarco’s DNA was not in any federal or state database.
Peyton called the senior agent watching DeMarco and told him to look for an opportunity to get a DNA sample. The agent said, “I think I can do that right now. He’s in the clubhouse having a beer, bullshitting with a couple of old codgers. I’ll get in there and get the beer bottle when he finishes.”
Thirty minutes later the agent called Peyton back and said, “Okay. I got two beer bottles DeMarco drank from and half a hot dog he threw in the trash. One of my guys is on his way to Quantico with them.”
In the time it took for DeMarco to drive from the golf course to his home in Georgetown—followed by agents in four different cars and a helicopter in the sky overhead—the Quantico lab had reported that a preliminary DNA test showed that the hair found in the ball cap matched the DNA taken from DeMarco’s half-eaten hot dog. A more comprehensive DNA test would be performed later, but the odds right now were already about a billion to one that the hairs in the cap belonged to Joe DeMarco.
8
Peyton called FBI director Erby. He’d been keeping Erby informed ever since they found the uniform in the vent duct in DeMarco’s office. He assumed the director was keeping the president informed and hoped that there was nobody else in the loop. Peyton’s fourteen-year-old daughter could keep a secret better than the White House.
After Peyton told the director about all the evidence they’d accumulated, he said, “I’m going to arrest DeMarco in the next hour, and we’ll tear his house apart at that time.”
“But why did he do it?” the director asked.
“Well, one reason could be the hundred thousand someone wired into his savings account,” Peyton said.
“But why him?” the director said. “His old man may have been a professional killer, but he’s not. Or least it doesn’t sound like he is based on what you told me earlier.”
“Another reason could be he did it for John Mahoney. Mahoney might have even paid him the hundred grand,” Peyton said. “But that seems pretty far-fetched. It’s no secret that Mahoney hated Canton, but it’s hard to imagine him paying to have the guy killed.”
Anyone who watched the news was aware of the animosity between John Mahoney and Lyle Canton. The two men—usually standing in the hallways of the Capitol—would hurl sharp verbal spears at each other while the cameras rolled. Each accused the other of being a liar and a hypocrite; of twisting statistics and polling data to misrepresent the facts; of supporting economic policies that were destroying the economy and crushing the dreams of
the poor and the middle class. Canton delighted in saying that Mahoney, because of his age, was out of touch with reality and living in the past. Mahoney, a veteran, delighted in pointing out that Canton was a hawk who’d never had the guts to serve in the military but didn’t hesitate to send other people’s children off to war. After these exchanges, the Republican Speaker of the House would usually appear and say, basically, “Now, boys, let’s play nice and try to work together. Although I must say that I agree with Congressman Canton when it comes to—”
The war of words between Canton and Mahoney reached a new low point the Sunday before Canton was killed. Chuck Todd had invited both men to appear on Meet the Press to discuss the bill that Canton had been working on the night he died—a bill that the Democrats unanimously opposed. (The Republicans could have proposed a bill proclaiming that kittens were cute, and the Democrats would have been unanimously opposed.) Mahoney had shown up on the set after a breakfast meeting where he’d consumed several Bloody Marys and was even less careful choosing his words than he normally was—and normally he wasn’t all that careful. So at one point, after Canton accused Mahoney of deliberately misleading the American people on one aspect of the bill, Mahoney said he wasn’t misleading anyone, that the facts were clear. Which was when Canton said, “Congressman, how can you sit there and lie like that?” Mahoney leaped to his feet and said, “How dare you call me a liar, you little—”
The next word was bleeped out, and Chuck Todd refused to say later what the word had been, but lip-readers hired by Fox were pretty sure it had been cocksucker. Todd broke for a commercial so the staff could clip the microphone back onto Mahoney’s lapel; the mic had torn loose when he’d stood so abruptly. When the show resumed, Mahoney was still steaming but managed to make it through the remainder of the interview without any more swearing at Canton.
Director Erby said, “Or maybe Mahoney didn’t pay him, but what if someone who had a hundred grand to spare paid DeMarco to kill Canton to get Canton off Mahoney’s back?”
Growing weary of playing “what if” with his boss, Peyton said, “Sir, it doesn’t matter why DeMarco did it. We don’t need a motive to prove he killed Canton. We have all the evidence we need for a conviction. The fact that he became a hundred grand richer the day Canton was killed may not be proof that he was paid to kill him, but it will certainly give the jury another reason to conclude he’s guilty. Anyway, unless you object, I’m going to go arrest him.”
Peyton made a few phone calls, telling his people to saddle up. It was time to put Mr. DeMarco in handcuffs. Right now, according to the agents watching him, DeMarco was at home, standing in his kitchen, making dinner for himself. He was visible through the kitchen window. As Peyton was putting on a bulletproof vest, Berman walked into his office. She was still wearing the same blouse she’d soiled when she’d searched DeMarco’s office.
“I just learned something interesting,” Berman said. “When I asked DeMarco what he was doing in the Capitol at ten on a Friday night, he said he’d had a date with a woman, and when they finished dinner, he’d sent her home in a cab, like the date had been a bust. But I called his date to confirm his story, and she told me they were having a great time, when DeMarco suddenly gets a text message and says he has to leave immediately.”
“Okay,” Peyton said. “But I don’t understand what the big deal is.”
“Well, first DeMarco lied to me about why he went to his office, just like I suspected. But that’s not the big thing. I just finished looking at DeMarco’s phone records, and the text he received when he was at dinner came from John Mahoney’s cell phone. And that’s not all. At ten thirty, like fifteen minutes after Canton was killed, DeMarco called Mahoney’s cell phone, then he left the Capitol a few minutes later.”
“Do we know what the text message said?”
“No, not yet, but it just strikes me as odd that DeMarco and Mahoney were communicating with each other right before and after Canton was killed. I’d love to get my hands on DeMarco’s phone. The text message might still be on it.”
“Well, your wish might come true, Berman,” Peyton said. “I’m on my way to arrest DeMarco. You wanna come with me?”
“Hell, yes,” Berman said.
Peyton and Berman drove together from the Capitol to Georgetown, stopping a block from DeMarco’s house, where a dozen agents were waiting. The agents were dressed in full body armor, including helmets with face shields, and they were armed with a combination of M16s, semiautomatic pistols, shotguns, flash-bang grenades, and tear-gas grenade launchers. They were as pumped up as an NFL team about to play in the Super Bowl.
“Okay,” Peyton said to the group, “everybody take a deep breath and take it down a notch. We’re going to surround the house, and then I’m going to call him and tell him to come out with his hands up. If he doesn’t, or if he starts firing at us, then you can go all commando on him.”
9
DeMarco was preparing spaghetti and meatballs, and he was preparing enough to last him several days. Being a bachelor, he often did this when he cooked: made a batch of whatever he was cooking—fried chicken, beef stew, pot roast—so he wouldn’t have to cook again for two or three days. And he was making his spaghetti dinner the easy way.
His mother was an incredible cook, and although she was Irish, she specialized in Italian cuisine, mainly because she’d married an Italian, DeMarco’s late father. When his mom made spaghetti and meatballs, she bought handmade pasta from a place in Queens and made her sauce and meatballs from scratch. The sauce started out with a couple of cans of crushed tomatoes and a little tomato paste, then she started tossing things into the pot: eggplant, fresh herbs, a little onion, a little sugar, and so on. The meatballs were made by combining two pounds of hamburger with eggs, Parmesan cheese, bread crumbs, and spices she refused to divulge even to her own sister. She then formed the meatballs into perfect spheres, identical in size, seared them in a frying pan to seal in the juices, and then let them simmer in the sauce for three hours.
DeMarco’s way was much simpler. He bought a box of spaghetti, two jars of Newman’s Own marinara sauce, and a package of twenty-four frozen, already-cooked meatballs; dumped the meatballs into the sauce—and thirty minutes later he was ready to open a bottle of red wine and sit down to dinner. He had to admit that his mom’s pasta tasted better than his, but his was edible.
As he waited for the spaghetti water to boil, DeMarco watched the news on the small TV in his kitchen. The lead story was still the killing of Lyle Canton. It sounded as if the only thing the FBI knew—or was telling the public—was that it appeared as if a man dressed as a Capitol cop may have killed Canton. That had to have taken balls, DeMarco thought, to kill the man while real Capitol cops were roaming all over the building.
DeMarco had never met Canton personally nor had any dealings with him and didn’t really have a strong opinion about the man—other than that he was a typical, worthless politician. DeMarco sincerely believed that there was no institution in America more useless than Congress. The executive branch and the judicial branch at least functioned. Maybe they didn’t function well, but they did something. Taxes were collected, at least most of them; the mail was delivered, at least most of the time; federal cops and spies and soldiers did their jobs. And the Supreme Court at least decided cases, even if all the decisions were five to four. But Congress, made up of two political parties that couldn’t agree on the time of day and did nothing but throw stones at each other, never seemed to do anything truly meaningful about anything that truly mattered. Congress was Kabuki theater as far as DeMarco was concerned, and men like Lyle Canton and John Mahoney were no more than actors giving endless monologues about the evils of the other party—and the play just went on and on and on.
DeMarco had always gotten a kick out of Mahoney and Canton going at it, each accusing the other of being the reason the country was such a mess. And although Mahoney had hated Canton, DeMarco had never thought that Canton was really any different
from Mahoney when it came to doing his job. He couldn’t believe it when Mahoney, following Canton’s death, said to the press with a straight face, “It’s well known that Congressman Canton and I had our differences, but I always admired him for his patriotism and his dedication.” In private, Mahoney had always called Canton a scheming little motherfucker—pretty much what he’d said on Meet the Press.
DeMarco had been shocked to learn that he’d been in the Capitol at the time Canton was apparently killed. He was even more shocked when that good-looking female FBI agent had asked why he’d been there and whether he’d seen anything that might shed some light on Canton’s death. He was a little concerned that he’d lied to the agent—lying to the FBI is a crime called obstruction of justice—but he wasn’t too concerned. It wasn’t like he’d committed a real crime—he’d told a small fib—and he hadn’t seen anything that could help find Canton’s killer.
As he’d told the agent, he’d been having dinner at 701 with a woman named Carol Hansen. Carol was a lobbyist in a town that had about a hundred thousand lobbyists, and she was quite attractive: long dark hair, gray eyes, and a noteworthy figure. DeMarco had met her at Clyde’s, a Georgetown watering hole within walking distance of his house.
On the night Canton died—just as he and Carol were finishing dinner, DeMarco wondering whether she might invite him in for coffee when he dropped her off at her apartment—Mahoney sent him a text message. It said: Go to your office immediately. Be there in fifteen minutes. DeMarco had assumed that the text meant that Mahoney would be there in fifteen minutes. The odd thing about the text was that Mahoney never went to DeMarco’s office; he always ordered DeMarco to come to him. But the oddest thing was Mahoney sending him a text in the first place. In all the years he’d worked for Mahoney—even after Mahoney finally learned how to use a smartphone—Mahoney had never sent him a text. Not ever. Mahoney always called and bellowed at him over the phone, and the reason Mahoney didn’t text was the same reason he hardly ever used e-mail. As he’d told DeMarco several times, “They can’t subpoena air.”