by John Bateson
Holmes responded to that death, too, but had to wait to examine Schlette’s body until a bomb squad arrived. Schlette had taped a grenade to his throat and strapped what appeared to be dynamite to his waist (it turned out to be road flares).
Looking back on Weissich’s murder Holmes says, “It never ceased to amaze me how some cases were rewoven with the same people appearing multiple times and, on occasion, in different ways. That certainly was the case with Bill.”
CHAPTER 04
14K3, 10-49, 10-55
Shortly after the Olive murders, another investigator in the office, Bill Thomas, told Holmes that there was an investigators club. It was a select group that met in a special meeting place whose location was a secret.
“You have to earn your way into it,” Thomas said. “Once you do, you’ll receive a key to the clubhouse. Until then, though, neither Don nor I can even tell you where it is.”
Holmes had never been an investigator before and didn’t know that there were any perks to the job beyond his salary and county benefits. Dr. Jindrich hadn’t mentioned any to him when Holmes was hired.
“What do I have to do?” Holmes asked.
“From time to time I’ll give you a question,” Thomas said, “and you’ll need to give me a detailed, written response.”
Holmes knew that he had a lot to learn, and he was eager to prove himself to his peers, Thomas and Don Cornish. “Okay,” he said.
“The quality of your answers, the depth of thought behind them, will determine whether you get a clubhouse key or not,” Thomas said. His voice was grave and forboding. “Don and I earned our keys, and if you don’t earn yours, you won’t be able to go there with us.”
As a boy, Holmes had been active in Scouting and worked through the levels to Star Scout. Many of the life skills he had acquired, from surviving in the wilderness to tying knots, he learned in Scouts. Because of this experience, he appreciated the value of group membership.
“This will get you started,” Thomas said. “Which came first, the chicken or the egg? Support your answer with appropriate documentation.”
It never occurred to Holmes that Thomas was pulling his leg. Holmes didn’t know Thomas well yet, and he sounded so serious that even though it was an age-old question, Holmes accepted it as the first step in securing a clubhouse key. He wrote out an answer, stating that the chicken came first, and gave it to Thomas. Thomas looked it over, grunted without offering an opinion or betraying the slightest emotion, then said that Holmes would receive another question soon.
Every few weeks for the next several months, Thomas gave Holmes a question, which Holmes responded to in writing. All the while Thomas talked about the fabled benefits of this select group who shared a secret meeting place. At Thanksgiving, Thomas presented Holmes with a key on a metal ring that had a tag reading “Investigators Clubhouse.” He also gave him a specially made T-shirt that featured a large turkey with its tail feathers spread wide. Only then did Holmes realize that he was the turkey. There was no clubhouse and no group. Bill Thomas and Don Cornish had found an easy mark.
THE ACADEMY
Every successful coroner must have a good understanding of medicine and forensics, be compassionate in dealing with grieving family members, and be a skilled investigator. The first trait is acquired and takes years of study to learn. The second trait is largely innate; either you have a lot of compassion for people—including strangers—or you don’t. The last trait is developed, and in California it starts at a police academy.
Coroners in the Golden State don’t have to be physicians—and many aren’t—but they do have to complete the same twenty-two-week course that police officers take to qualify for work in the field of law enforcement. This might seem like an odd requirement for coroners, but it is at the heart of how their job is viewed. Coroners—even ones whose office is independent from the sheriff’s office—are seen as extensions of the police. Not only do their investigations often support police activities, but in emergencies they are expected to provide backup protection to officers. If there is a shoot-out, manhunt, or hostage situation in which the police are understaffed and an investigator from the coroner’s office is present, he or she is counted on to assist. This means that all death investigators must be armed while on duty, and test annually at a gun range to maintain their proficiency.
The academy covers all aspects of police work—basic powers of arrest, major sections of the Penal Code, motor vehicle law, community policing, conflict management, investigative procedures, and first aid. It also includes physical training, firearms training, and a week of pursuit driving and safe driving. One of the skills that is taught is how to lift latent fingerprints off various kinds of surfaces.
Patent prints are fingerprints left in blood, grease, ink, and sometimes dirt, which clearly are visible to the human eye. Latent prints are deposits of human oils left on an object that aren’t visible. An investigator brushes white, black, or bichromatic powder on the surface, then uses lifting tape to pull off a fingerprint. White powder is used on dark surfaces, dark powder is used on light-colored surfaces, and bichromatic powder, which is a combination of white and black powder, is used on either.
When Holmes began in 1975, investigators used a brush made from camel hair or squirrel hair. Later he transitioned to a fiberglass brush because it distributes the powder more evenly, which is critical. The two biggest mistakes that inexperienced people make when dusting something for fingerprints are using too much powder and brushing it on too thickly. A heavy stroke can wipe away latent print residue, so the key is to spread the powder gently with as few strokes as possible.
Holmes learned that smooth surfaces like glass, tile, porcelain, lacquered furniture, and shiny metal are the easiest to lift prints from. Paper, cardboard, drywall, leather, and most dashboards are harder. Organic surfaces—tree leaves, fruit peels, and feathers—are formidable. Most difficult are fabrics, human skin, and rough or textured surfaces such as checkered handgun grips.
Transparent adhesive tape is used to lift the print. It is unrolled a little at a time, and folded over slightly into a tab for handling so that the person doesn’t get his or her own fingerprints on the tape. Then it’s laid on the powder and rubbed to make sure that contact is complete and there are no bubbles underneath the tape. After the tape is firmly in place, it’s pulled up gently and evenly, and pressed onto the blank side of an eight-inch-by-eight-inch fingerprint card. The other side of the card is preprinted with fill-in boxes for the date, time, case number, and related information, which the investigator completes.
Another important skill, especially for coroner’s investigators, is how to manage people at a death scene. “You get a sergeant who is full of himself,” Holmes says, “and a patrol deputy who has been on the street only six or seven months and has never seen a dead body, and there is a widow or widower and three crying kids, all in the same room at the same time, and you’re in charge. The sergeant wants to be in charge, but can’t be, and the deputy doesn’t know what the hell to do but the sergeant is telling him what to do, and may be telling him the wrong things. The coroner’s investigator needs to take charge and manage the situation.”
When someone from the coroner’s office arrives at a death scene, he or she is the senior authority, outranking everyone, including police chiefs. More than once in Holmes’s career, a police chief didn’t want to leave a scene that Holmes was working. One time it was the chief’s first murder in his small town and he had a prurient interest. His captain took him aside.
“Come on, Chief,” he said. “The reporters are here and they’re listening to this, and there’s no reason for you to be inside because you’re not doing the investigation.”
The chief refused, and Holmes decided to let him stay, only because it would look bad if he cuffed him. Later, though, Holmes had a word with the mayor, who reminded the chief that at a death scene the coroner has jurisdiction over the police, not the other way around.
Us
ually, coroner’s investigators go to the academy first, before they start handling cases. It’s not a prerequisite, but some of the skills that are taught have particular relevance to new investigators in a coroner’s office. These include how to secure a scene, manage bystanders and reporters, collect evidence, interview witnesses, and write a report that summarizes the findings in a way that can be used in court if necessary.
The first course that was offered shortly after Holmes was hired was full, though. The next course was four months away, and Dr. Jindrich couldn’t wait that long; Holmes needed to start investigating cases immediately.
* * *
As a lifelong hunter, Holmes was familiar with many kinds of handguns and shotguns. He also was a World War II buff and knew a lot about machine guns, bazookas, and the like. At the academy he learned about other types of weapons, from small derringers to rapid-fire assault rifles. What he didn’t learn at the academy he learned on the job and in continuing education classes over the years. Of paramount importance was knowing how to unload a weapon so that it could be transported safely to the coroner’s office. Beyond that, he had to be able to identify the caliber and type of weapon found at a death scene, as well as calculate the number of shots that had been fired based on the gun’s bullet capacity and the number of empty casings in the chamber and on the ground.
From the start, Holmes made a point of learning about each new weapon he encountered. Later, when he became the assistant coroner, responsible for training others, he instructed his investigators on each weapon’s characteristics, noting differences between a pump-action shotgun and an automatic shotgun, for instance, or between a break-open pistol and a semiautomatic one.
COMM CENTER
Each of the three investigators worked a twenty-four-hour shift. They were on duty one full day, then off the next two days. Shifts started at 8 A.M., when they were expected to be in the office. At 5 P.M. they went home and were on call until the shift change at 8 A.M. the following day.
Most death notifications came from the county’s Communications Center. They were relayed by phone if the investigator was in the office or at home, and by radio if he was in the field.
If the call came by phone, the dispatcher said something like, “Hey, Ken. We just got a call from San Rafael PD. They responded to a house fire at 35 Canal Street and found a body in the back room. It’s an elderly woman and they think it’s the owner or the person who lived in the house. When you get there, contact Battalion Chief Smith.” Or the notification might be, “There’s a two-car accident on Highway 101 southbound near the Mill Valley exit. One person is dead at the scene and three others are being taken to Marin General with injuries. Talk to Officer Brown.”
Investigators would get as much information as possible from the dispatcher over the phone because it was a private conversation. Nobody was listening in. If the call came by radio, though, the notification was brief and codes were used.
“14K3, 10-49 Canal Street, 10-55, 904.” Or, “14K3, 10-49 to 101 south, 10-55, 11-80.”
14 was the code for the coroner’s office, K was the code for the investigator on duty, and 3 was Holmes’s number. Bill Thomas was K1 and Don Cornish was K2, while Dr. Jindrich was 14A (for administration) and Assistant Coroner Keith Craig was 14A2. 10-49 meant go to the following location. 10-55 was the code for a dead body, 904 the code for a fire, and 11-80 the code for a traffic accident with injuries. A confirmed suicide was 10-56 while an attempted suicide was 10-56A.
“That’s all I would get on the radio if I was mobile,” Holmes says. “Many people—mainly shut-ins and reporters—listen to police and fire calls all day long, and dispatchers don’t want to light up the air. When I got to the scene, it could be almost anything if the call came over the radio.”
Dispatchers knew how to reach him at any given moment. As soon as he started his shift, Holmes phoned the Communications Center and said, “10-88,” meaning he was now on duty. When he got in his car, he radioed in and said, “10-8,” meaning he was mobile. Every time he got out of the car, he used other codes—10-7 if he was stopping for a meal, which meant he was off the radio but could be reached on his pager, or 10-10 if he was home and on call, which meant he could be reached by phone.
“When you’re on duty, it’s like being umbilically tied to the center,” he says. “Dispatchers always know where you are.”
An electronic tote board at the center displayed up-to-the-second information for all key people in the county who were on duty—everyone in the sheriff’s office, fire department, public works, animal control, coroner’s office, and ambulance companies, public and private. All any dispatcher had to do was look at the board to see how to reach anyone. This also included how to reach individuals in the California Highway Patrol, FBI, state and national park services, and Coast Guard. The latter had its own dispatch system, but people in the Communications Center had radio access to the actual boats.
The 10 code—so named because most of the numbers start with 10—is common to most municipal police agencies. For a variety of reasons, San Francisco and the California Highway Patrol use different codes (9 code and 11 code, respectively). A dead body in Marin is 10-55, for instance, while in San Francisco it’s 9-80. The FBI has a different numbering system, which is classified. Everything should be uniform, but it’s not.
“It’s up to dispatchers at Comm Center to translate,” Holmes says, “and up to everyone who’s connected to know what the codes mean. It was another thing I had to learn.”
The Communications Center is the nerve center for all emergency services in Marin County. For most of Holmes’s tenure, it was in the basement of the Civic Center. It was sheltered with reinforced concrete, hardwired, and without windows because no one wanted to risk someone throwing a bomb inside. Eventually the center moved to the second floor of a three-story building across the highway from the Civic Center. The new space is huge, open, and has windows that are unbreakable. Whereas five to seven dispatchers used to work in the center at any given time, today it’s twice that number because of everything that is being managed there.
As one might expect, action inside the center is frenzied and intense, no matter the time of day. In all but two instances, dispatchers juggle multiple emergency calls simultaneously, coordinating people and equipment like air traffic controllers. The two exceptions are police pursuits and hostage situations. In these instances the dispatcher who answers the call when it comes in handles it exclusively and everyone else relieves him or her of other responsibilities. The Communications Center manages everything, including getting the hostage negotiator to the scene, because not every police department has one. The dispatcher tells the person next to him or her, “Get San Rafael’s hostage negotiator on my line,” and takes it from there. The same is true for police pursuits, although these tend to be short, usually lasting three to five minutes. The dispatcher talks to the lead car and the cars behind it, letting everyone know what’s going on.
“We have a car coming in two miles ahead, east off of Sir Francis Drake Boulevard.”
Communications Center dispatchers are 911 operators as well. “Is he breathing? Get him off that soft surface, get him down on the floor, and start compressions. I’ll help you count.” If a caller doesn’t know CPR, the dispatcher teaches the person on the phone, kids included. Dispatchers have to maintain their poise, be calm and reassuring, and also assert authority when necessary.
“Be quiet and listen to me. Stop asking questions; do your compressions.”
Sometimes, if Holmes was in the office at night and it was quiet, he would go down to the basement and hang out in the center. It was a way for him to get to know the system and the people, and for them to get to know him. In addition, the action was riveting.
“Sometimes I’d be there an hour and a half,” he says, “and just watch in awe. They handled so many things at once, and did it so well. Every single shift the people were balls to the wall.”
SHARING A CAR
“Ugliest cars on the planet,” Holmes says, “because the county always bought what was cheapest. It had amazing get-up-and-go, though.”
The cars were traded in between 75,000 and 100,000 miles because county administrators decided that the cost of maintaining and repairing them after that wasn’t worth it. The county would buy a fleet of cars, and the next time the investigators’ car was due for service, it would be replaced.
“The only question we were asked,” Holmes says, “was whether we wanted the blue one or the green one.”
Early on the car had a big-whip antenna for the sheriff’s radio system, but some police cars had the antenna wired inside the rear fender well, out of sight, and the investigators were able to get this, too. There was a siren inside the grille and an outside speaker that could be switched on if they were outside the car but nearby.
“The car didn’t have Christmas tree lights on top or anything like that,” Holmes says. “We just had a bulb with a red light that we would drop down from inside.”
It also didn’t have a decal with the county seal on it. Dr. Jindrich didn’t want families to be forewarned by the sight of a county car pulling up in front of their home.
During the early 1980s, the investigators had a Chevy Chevette that happened to be dark red. Mechanics at the county garage nicknamed it the Blood Clot.
“One time I had to go to a wreck in the middle of the night in west Marin,” Holmes says. “I’ve got this silly red bulb, and I’m trying to get people to move out of the way; wrecks invariably draw a crowd. They looked in the rearview mirror and saw this toy car behind them with a red light and a siren, and didn’t move. So I got on the loudspeaker—it was one of the few times I ever used it—and told them to pull over or be arrested. They did, but made sure to give me dirty looks as I passed.”