by Brian Thiem
Gorman cut into the neck tissue along the line where the rope had rested. “As I suspected, there’s no underlying tissue damage, which means the victim was dead when the constriction around the neck by the rope occurred.” He cut into two purplish bruises on the front of her neck and slowly dissected the windpipe, closely examining the throat and neck region. “Someone strangled her with their hands. Most likely from the front, with the thumbs pressing into the larynx and thyroid cartilage, which fractured the hyoid bone. That injury may have eventually led to her death if the muscles and tissue swelled and cut off her air supply, but it appears the bullet ended her life before that occurred.”
He looked at the bullet wound with a magnifying glass and snapped a half dozen photographs with a digital camera equipped with a macro lens. “There’s no indication of fouling in the tissue of the wound, nor any on the skin around the wound. I do, however, see signs of stippling on the skin.”
No experienced pathologist would estimate the range of a gunshot based on his examination of the body alone, but Sinclair could tell from the wound that it was not a press contact, where the gun muzzle was touching the victim. Likewise, the absence of fouling—soot or residue from burned gunpowder—indicated that the gun was probably at least six inches away, assuming the weapon was a medium-powered handgun. Stippling, also called tattooing, resulted from unburned gunpowder embedding in the skin around the wound and seldom occurred beyond two feet. But without knowing what kind of gun and ammo was used, he could only estimate the distance from which it had been shot as somewhere beyond a few inches and less than two feet.
Gorman took a scalpel and made several deep incisions through the scalp, pealed the back of the scalp over the corpse’s face, and stepped back as his assistant cut through the skull with a high-speed electric rotary saw. Gorman carefully removed the skullcap, set it in a stainless-steel pan, and made a few cuts through the membrane to remove the brain. He probed the soft brain tissue with a finger, plucked out a copper-jacketed lead slug, and placed it in a plastic container. “Your firearms examiner can tell you for sure, but it appears to be a nominal thirty-eight caliber jacketed hollow point.”
Sinclair knew that could mean a 9mm, .38, .357 magnum, or .380, all very common calibers for handguns. Gorman took a stainless-steel probe and slowly worked it through the wound track in the brain until it came out the back. He held the brain up, shifted it until it was level, and looked at Sinclair. “From the location of the entrance wound, the bullet track, and where it came to rest at the back of the skull, I’d say the victim’s face was perpendicular to the barrel of the gun as well as close to ninety degrees laterally.”
Sinclair liked the manner in which Gorman explained his findings. Doctors with less experience would try to conclude how tall a shooter was based on the wounds or the direction the person was facing, but there were too many variables to come to quick conclusions. A shot that went directly into a victim’s forehead could result from both the victim and shooter facing each other or the victim being on her knees and the shooter standing and shooting from the hip, or it could just as easily result from the victim lying on the ground and the shooter standing directly over her and shooting downward.
“So, she was looking right at the gun, and it was up close and personal,” said Sinclair.
“That’s about all there is for you to see. If I discover anything else significant, I’ll give you a call. Good luck, Matt.”
*
Braddock was sitting at her desk typing on her computer when Sinclair walked into the homicide office. The office consisted of a large room containing eighteen small metal desks that had been purchased by the city when the Police Administration Building, or PAB, was opened more than fifty years ago. Walls were lined with metal file cabinets. A few windows overlooked Washington Street and the county court building across the street. On the opposite side of the room were two glass-walled offices, one of which belonged to the homicide lieutenant. The other had been converted into a soft interview room, a casual place to talk with family and cooperative witnesses. A table with chairs, a green vinyl-covered sofa, and a small end table with a cheap table lamp that had not worked in years filled the room. Toward the back of the main office were two metal doors that led to the other interview rooms—small six-by-eight rooms where Sinclair had spent countless hours trying to convince witnesses and killers to tell the truth.
“Was she alive when the killer lit her on fire?” Braddock asked.
Sinclair hung up his raincoat and suitcoat and poured himself a cup of coffee. “She died from the gunshot to the head and was hung and torched sometime later.”
“Thank God for that.”
“Before the gunshot, she was manually strangled hard enough to fracture the hyoid,” Sinclair said. “The gunshot was within a few feet.”
“Sounds like it was personal.”
Sinclair had come to the same conclusion. Other strangulation murders he had investigated were normally crimes of passion—committed during a sudden rage—rather than premeditated. But the firing of a bullet into Dawn’s head didn’t necessarily fit unless the killer just happened to have a gun on him and his anger totally engulfed him. Sinclair began running other possibilities and motives through his mind and finally realized how futile it was with the limited information he had so far.
Sinclair wrote the number ninety-two on a piece of paper from a memo pad, added today’s date and his and Braddock’s initials, and pinned it to the bulletin board. With only a few weeks left until the end of the year, it looked like the city would tally under a hundred murders for the year, something that had only occurred a few times in the last four decades. “I’m guessing the shooting took place somewhere else, and she was transported there and posed,” he said.
“I was thinking the same thing,” Braddock said. “The way she was arranged seemed symbolic.”
“Is the RO gone?” Sinclair asked.
“Yeah, I reviewed his report and approved it. With only one witness, there wasn’t much to it. I ran out our victim. Her history begins with her juvenile arrest for the B case you put on her ten years ago. She was counseled and released to her parents by juvenile hall two days after the arrest. It appears they flew to Oakland and signed for her. I have their address in Minnesota, but I don’t know if it’s any good after all these years.”
“I’ll let the coroner’s office contact them. I doubt the parents will be able to shed any light on her recent activities.”
“You just hate talking to family.”
“You blame me? All they do is babble and blow snot and tears. And for what? If Dawn was close enough to her parents for them to know what she was up to, she probably wouldn’t have been involved in whatever it was that killed her.” Sinclair was angry. Angry not only because she was dead, but angry with her for not staying out of Oakland when she had the chance.
Braddock continued, “She had one other arrest for soliciting six years ago. The report says it was an operation run by the PSA due to citizen complaints of overt prostitution activity on Market and West Mac. Case was dismissed in the interest of justice.”
In one of many departmental reorganizations over the last ten years, the vice unit was disbanded, and the responsibility for street prostitution enforcement fell on the police service areas, which were responsible for all general police services in their sector of the city. At times, the special victims section, the investigative unit that handled sexual assaults and child abuse, conducted prostitution enforcement. But with all their other responsibilities, these units didn’t have the time or resources to do many undercover prostitution operations. As a result, the numbers of street prostitutes and the brazenness with which they flaunted their wares in public had increased dramatically over the last few years.
“Anything in LRMS?” Sinclair asked, referring to the law records management system.
“Only two field contacts for looking like a hooker in a high-hooker area. The last one was a stop by the beat officer two
years ago at Brockhurst and San Pablo. She gave the officer the Tennyson Road address. She never did a change of address with DMV from that one.”
“Vehicles?”
“A two-year-old Chevy Camaro is registered in her name. No leaseholder or bank is listed, so she bought it outright.”
“You don’t often see a girl working the stroll with a brand new car.”
“She’s only had one traffic ticket. That was five years ago. She was driving a BMW three series, which was registered to her back then. I don’t know of many street prostitutes who own cars like that.”
“Maybe she was primarily doing outcalls and only hit the streets when her phone didn’t ring,” Sinclair said. “That would explain how she stayed below the radar most of the time.”
“I wonder if she worked the circuit. That could explain her limited contact with the police in the Bay Area.”
“Is that still going on?”
“When I worked the special victims unit, we investigated a ring that rotated girls between Salt Lake City, Tucson, Reno, Sacramento, and Oakland. Some worked the street, some had in-calls arranged for them in apartments provided by the managers of the operation. The girls liked it. They got to spend summers in Salt Lake City, winters in Tucson, and a week here and there in Reno for conventions.”
“They were living the dream,” Sinclair said.
“The rental office of the Tennyson Road apartments called when you were at the coroner. She moved there four years ago. No mention of her reason for leaving and no forwarding address. They did a credit check on her and she looked good. Her rental application said she did public relations for an entertainment company, made five grand a month, and provided the name of her supervisor, a Helena Decker, and a phone number. They made a note on her application that they spoke to Ms. Decker, who gave Dawn a positive reference. I checked the number and it comes back to a Verizon cell phone.”
Sinclair called the number and got a voicemail message: “Hello, this is Helena. Leave a message and I’ll return your call.” Sinclair left his name and number and said he was inquiring about Dawn Gustafson, but didn’t mention that she was dead.
Sinclair and Braddock spent the next two hours driving the whore strolls from the San Pablo area in West Oakland to MacArthur Boulevard in East Oakland. The rain fell steadily, punctuated by several five-minute-long pounding torrents that emptied the streets. When it finally transitioned to lighter rain, they saw a few hookers and showed them Dawn’s driver’s license photo. None admitted to knowing her. Sinclair couldn’t tell if they were lying or not. Not many johns cruised for prostitutes on normal Sunday afternoons, and with the cold and rain, only the desperate girls or those with demanding pimps were out looking for business.
They returned to the office, and Sinclair drafted a press release—a requirement on every homicide call-out.
NEWS FROM THE OAKLAND POLICE DEPARTMENT
On December 4, at 0548 hours (5:48 AM), Oakland police officers and emergency medical personnel were dispatched to a report of an unresponsive person in Burckhalter Park on Edwards Avenue near the 580 Freeway. Upon arrival, they discovered an adult female with a single gunshot wound. Paramedics pronounced her dead at the scene. The victim, whose name is being withheld pending notification of next of kin, has been identified as a twenty-seven-year-old woman whose last known address was in Hayward. Anyone with any information is urged to call Sergeants Sinclair or Braddock of the Oakland Homicide Unit at (510) 238-3821.
Sinclair e-mailed the release to the twenty people on the distribution list and put a hardcopy on the lieutenant’s desk and another on the desk of Connie, the unit admin. He returned to his computer and started typing his investigative log while Braddock began combing the Internet and other public systems the department subscribed to in an attempt to learn more about Dawn.
A half hour later, the door to the office clicked, and John Johnson walked in. He’d worked the crime beat for the Oakland Tribune for forty years and was the only reporter who had free access to the PAB. Johnson poured a half cup of coffee into a Styrofoam cup and pulled a desk chair alongside Sinclair. He studied his BlackBerry for a few seconds and then said, “You kept the press release pretty vague.”
“We don’t know much yet.”
Johnson showed Sinclair a photo from his phone of Dawn hanging from the tree. “The editor wants to put this on the front page of tomorrow’s paper.”
“She’s no one famous, John. All that picture’s going to do is invite a lot more attention to this case than it probably deserves.”
“Won’t that help? Maybe get people to come forward?”
“It’ll cause the mayor and the chief to get involved in one of my cases again.”
“Not if I mention that she was a prostitute. Then the pressure will be off because everyone assumes her chosen occupation led to her demise.”
“Who said she was a prostitute?”
Johnson smiled.
“I sure wish other cops would stop blabbing about my cases,” Sinclair said.
“I’d find it out tomorrow anyway when I check court records and see the prostitution conviction.”
Sinclair grinned. “Nice bluff, but your sources are wrong. It was a juvenile arrest, so it’s sealed and you couldn’t get it. Besides, your editor knows better than to print a juvenile arrest record.”
Johnson pulled his spiral reporter notebook from his pocket, flipped it open, and studied a page. “I’ll bet if I scoured the jail logs, I’d find another arrest and get someone to confirm she was working the streets.”
“When the media says my victim’s involved in criminal activity, it infers she got what she deserved and that her life is less important than someone else’s. I need cooperation from friends and family to solve this, but when they read your paper, all they see is the cops badmouthing her.”
“It won’t be you saying it. Besides, if I run it by the PIO, you know he’ll say that it’s important for the public to think average citizens are safe so long as they’re not running the streets.”
The department public information officer’s purpose was to portray the department and crime in the best light possible. It looked better to City Hall when murder victims weren’t righteous citizens. “It probably won’t make much difference,” Sinclair conceded.
“The hanging’s obvious from the photo,” Johnson said. “What should we say about the burning?”
“I’d like to withhold that.”
“Okay. Do you mind if I talk to Dawn’s parents?”
“You’re going to print her name?”
“The coroner’s office already notified the parents, Eugene and Cynthia Gustafson of Mankato, Minnesota. Eugene manages a John Deere dealership there.”
“Go ahead.”
“What about an occupation I can attribute to her?”
“You mean other than ‘lady of the evening’?” Sinclair said. “I talked to a friend in Hayward who said she was an accountant. I haven’t verified that through an employer or anything.”
“I’ll put it down. No one will complain if it’s not true. Is there anything you can tell me—any great quote about how you’re going to catch her killer?”
“I met Dawn about ten years ago when she was seventeen and had just moved to Oakland. She was a sweet kid, mature for her age, very pretty, and optimistic. She didn’t deserve what happened to her.”
Johnson wrote feverously in his notebook. “You worked vice-narcotics back then, so I imagine you don’t want to say under what circumstances you met her.”
“You know we seldom meet people in Oakland when their lives are going well.”
Chapter 4
By the time Sinclair finished his report, it was dark outside. The rain had turned into a light mist, so the sidewalks along San Pablo Avenue were full of working girls trying to make up their lost income. Sinclair pulled up to a street corner. Upon seeing his unmarked car, three girls scurried down a side street. One remained in her spot and waved. Tanya had been working
that corner longer than Sinclair had been a cop. She was about five-foot-six, dark skinned, and had shoulder-length straight hair that was undoubtedly a wig. Tanya was known for her large butt, which she swore was natural and more perfectly formed than Kim Kardashian’s.
Braddock lowered her window, and Tanya looked past her and smiled at Sinclair. “How ya doin’, honey?”
“I’m good, Tanya.” He pulled a photocopy of Dawn’s DMV photo from his portfolio. “You know this girl?”
“That’s Blondie. She okay?”
“No, she’s not. What can you tell us about her?”
“Business is slow out here. Buy a girl dinner and I’ll talk with you.”
Sinclair bought Tanya a bacon cheeseburger, fries, and a chocolate shake, and coffee for him and Braddock, at the Carl’s Jr. drive-through on Telegraph Avenue. He parked in the BART lot across the street. Sinclair looked at his watch: 7:00 PM. On weekdays, trains rumbled overhead every five minutes and deposited late commuters from San Francisco and other parts of the Bay Area who were lucky enough to get a parking spot at this station. But on Sundays, trains only ran every thirty minutes, and the lot was nearly empty. Sinclair pulled a Macanudo Robusto cigar from his breast pocket and held it up. “Do you mind?” he asked Tanya.
“Baby, a man buys me dinner, he can smoke crack while I eat if he wants.”
Sinclair lowered the front windows, turned the heat up a notch, and lit the cigar with the old Zippo lighter he’d bought at the Army PX in Baghdad five years ago. “When did you last see Blondie?”
“Maybe last summer. On this side of the street between Thirty-Third and Thirty-Fourth.”