Rock & Roll Homicide

by R J McDonnell

  “Are we talking obvious mistakes or nit-picky stuff?” I asked.

  “I have a pretty good ear and half the time I couldn’t hear anything that sounded remotely off. It was clear that the guys in the band weren’t hearing it either. They were pissed,” he said.

  At this point I launched into what I knew of the contract with Cerise Records. “I was hoping you could take a look at it and see if you could spot anything that might give the record company a motive to kill him.”

  “Do you have it with you?” he asked.

  “No,” I said. “Jeannine was supposed to get a copy from Chelsea Tucker today, but after my near death experience, I forgot to call to see if it came in.”

  Bernie said, “Why don’t you call her from my office. If it’s there she can fax it over.”

  It was almost 6:30 PM and Jeannine had surely left for the day, but who knows how many times her OCD compels her to check the lights now that she lives within walking distance of the office.

  I tried calling her at the office and didn’t get lucky. I called her house and connected. “Hi, Jeannine. Have you settled in for the evening?”

  “Uh-huh,” she replied in a quivering voice.

  “Are you OK” I asked in a panicked voice, fearing the Russians had come looking for me.

  “No. I’m not OK,” she replied with a sob.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked.

  “Lassie’s dead!” she cried. “One minute she was standing next to the river and the next minute she’s going down the rapids. Now she’s dead.” Jeannine began to wail. She was letting it all out, like I’d never heard her cut loose before. It could have been the basis for a very therapeutic session. But, since I’m no longer her therapist I did what any other self-respecting detective would have done. I ruined the movie by telling her how it ends and got her to walk over to the office and fax the contracts. About twenty minutes later thirty-one pages of legal bullshit came steaming out of Bernie’s fax machine.

  While we waited, Bernie reminded me of a night at the club shortly after I started carrying a gun. At the time, a stick-up man was ripping off local bands. We were usually paid in cash after our gig and would frequently find ourselves in a dark alley behind a club at 2:30 AM. Since my dad was a cop and I handled the money, I got elected for security detail.

  One night, after collecting our pay and hanging with Bernie until the band had time to load the equipment into our truck, I walked into the alley behind the club. I immediately heard a voice screaming about money. As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, I saw a crazed junkie holding a hypodermic needle less than an inch from our bass player’s neck. “I’ve got AIDS!” he screamed. “Give me the money or this guy’s as good as dead!”

  The rest of the band was frozen in front of the junkie, saying the money guy hasn’t come out yet. I had the gun on a belt holster in the small of my back. I quietly pulled it out, took careful aim and yelled, “Put the needle down or I’ll blow your fuckin’ head off!” As the junkie turned to look at me I screamed, “RIGHT NOW!”

  It was very clear to me, the band and especially the junkie, that I wasn’t bluffing. He carefully laid his spike on the ground, raised his hands and said, “I crashing man. I wouldn’t have stuck him.” Then he sprinted down the alley. My first instinct was to chase him, but Kyle, the bass player, started hyperventilating and I thought he was having a heart attack. I stopped to help and the junkie was long gone.

  “That was a life or death situation and you handled yourself very well, as I recall,” Bernie said.

  “I thought of that scene many times when I was weighing my decision to become a detective. Until today, I thought I’d be a lot cooler under fire,” I said.

  “Actually, you are,” Bernie said. “I’m sure you’ve replayed that scene in your head a thousand times, but you probably forgot that we sat here in this office and talked until 10:00 the next morning. You were on an adrenaline high that the junkie would have died for. Tonight you’re not even a quarter as amped as you were that night.”

  “Really?” I asked. “I forgot all about what happened afterwards.”

  “The last thing San Diego needs is a detective who thinks shooting people is part of the job description.” As he was finishing his point, the fax machine stopped printing.

  He got me set up with pen and a notebook and began analyzing the content. When he read a section he thought could have a bearing on the case he gave his expert opinion and answered all of my questions.

  “Bernie, what do you think? What stands out the most?” I asked.

  He replied, “As you know, I worked as an agent for 17 years. Since I became a club owner a lot of bands, managers and agents have asked my opinion on record contracts. The thing that screams at me is that the owner or ownership group has business experience, but not recording industry experience.”

  “How so?” I asked.

  “The contract has a couple of giant loopholes that could easily be exploited by somebody who knows the established legal precedents in recording industry contract law,” he said.

  I asked, “What would be the record company’s motive?”

  “There was no way of telling if the Internet piracy issue would be resolved quickly when the contract was written. You had a talented new band with some name recognition and some terrific new material, jumping into a bad contract market. Along comes a new record company, anxious to attract talent. I know from personal experience that Terry got involved in contract negotiations and knew how to mix charm with a knack for getting his way. I’d guess it didn’t take long for him to figure out he was dealing with amateurs and he managed to plant a hidden time bomb in the contract that would enable him to call the shots if the first two CD’s performed well,” he said.

  “Was Terry the kind of guy who’d screw the recording company and piss them off enough to get himself killed” I inquired.

  Bernie replied, “Most of the recording industry executives I know have ego’s that wouldn’t fit in this room. If their meal ticket had ‘em by the balls the way Terry had Cerise Records, I wouldn’t put anything past them.”

  “Wouldn’t that be like killing the goose that laid the golden eggs?” I asked.

  “It would if the whole band died in the explosion. There’s a lot of talent in that group and, if memory serves me, Terry wrote only half of the songs,” he said.

  “Can the band survive without Terry?” I asked.

  “I’d give them a listen,” Bernie said.

  Chapter 3

  I rarely work on Saturday mornings. So far, most of my clients have been either spouses who suspect infidelity or rich parents looking to bail their kids out of scrapes with the law. Business booms on Friday night. Saturday morning is for sleeping.

  My first task was to call each of the band members to schedule a time to meet on Monday. I reached the bass player, Jack Pascal, who was quite cooperative. I left messages for drummer, Ian Davis, and lead guitarist, Nigel Choate.

  Over the next two hours I reviewed the Internet research that Jeannine dug up yesterday. I immediately went to the material on Cerise Records and John Koflanovich. She tracked the business through two dummy corporations to a business called Yuliya, Inc. This is an electronic parts manufacturing operation based out of Tecate, California, which is a border town southeast of San Diego. Most of Yuliya’s officers share the sir name, Chofsky. Yuliya is a small, publicly held corporation on an over-the-counter exchange. Jeannine found it listed in the local stocks section of the San Diego Union-Tribune newspaper. In the paper’s archives she found a two-page feature on the company from 1990. It appears Yuliya has been essentially the same size since the early 1900’s. It was a privately held company based out of San Francisco until 1979, when it went public to finance the move to Tecate in 1980. Before doing so, Yuliya was known as Rasputin Enterprises. In the early days, Rasputin traded in machine parts and slowly transitioned to electronics as technology developed.

  The phone rang. “Duffy Investigations,”
I said.

  “Is this Jason Duffy?” asked the caller with a heavy British accent.

  “It is.” I said.

  “Nigel Choate. Your message said you were hired by Chelsea Tucker,” he stated.

  “I appreciate your time and I’m sorry for the loss of your friend,” I said.

  “Friend? Terry wasn’t a friend. I don’t think Terry had any friends. I don’t usually speak ill of the dead, but if you’re conducting an investigation you’re going to find this out sooner or later,” he said and paused. “What do you want from me Mr. Duffy?”

  “I’d like to get together and talk about what the recording sessions had been like; if you noticed anything unusual. Those types of things,” I said.

  “I went through all of that with the police. Does Chelsea think one of us did it?” he asked with stress becoming apparent.

  I replied, “Nothing like that. Actually she thinks Cerise Records may have been involved because of what was happening with the contract. I’d really like to get your take on it, as well as your thoughts on the record company rep who was at all of the sessions.”

  Nigel started to relax, “I think she may be onto something. The cops didn’t really ask many questions about that Neanderthal from Cerise. I don’t like him; I don’t think any of the lads do.” Nigel agreed to meet me on Monday to go into details.

  As soon as I hung up, the phone rang again. After answering with my usual salutation, I heard my girlfriend, Kelly Kennedy, say, “When did you start going to the office on Saturday?”

  “Since I started working a high-profile murder case earlier this week,” I replied with some enthusiasm.

  “Are we still on for the Padres game tonight or will you be holding a press conference?” she asked.

  “Let me call my people and I’ll get back to you,” I replied.

  “Your people are probably all in group therapy at this hour. You’re just going to have to decide all by yourself,” she said, enjoying the exchange.

  I replied, “Well, we can’t disappoint all of those fans. I’m sure they’re expecting us.”

  “What about dinner?” she asked.

  “I thought we’d go with the cylindrically shaped, all beef, non-kosher specialty of the house,” I retorted.

  “If I have to eat another hotdog I’m not going to want to come within ten feet of anything that even remotely resembles a wiener for a long time,” she said.

  “As a former therapist I feel duty-bound to help prevent wiener aversion. How does the buffet at the park restaurant grab you?” I asked.

  “I’ll be ready by 6:00. See you then,” she said and hung up.

  After a lunch break at the local deli, I was back at my desk by 2:00 PM. I decided to try Ian one more time. After six rings and a brief silence, a smoker’s grunt told me a semi-conscious human was attempting to communicate. “Is this Ian Davis?” I asked.

  “Who’s this?” was the phlegmy reply.

  I started by telling him I work for Chelsea and briefly explained what I wanted. He agreed to a meet on Monday, though I got the impression he wouldn’t remember the conversation, since it was apparent he was still drunk from the night before. I managed to find out where he would be on Monday afternoon to help avoid getting stood up.

  As 3:30 PM approached I was getting ready to call it a day. I had just finished outlining another To Do list for Jeannine when I heard the front door open. I was sure it was Jeannine, since I definitely locked the door behind me when I returned from lunch. Fortunately, I had a convex mirror installed in the upper corner of my office when I first moved in, primarily to avoid old mental health clients who couldn’t let go of me as their therapist. But that was no familiar face walking through the door. I quietly rolled the middle drawer of my desk open and withdrew my snub-nosed .38 revolver. I then inched my way to a spot behind the door and wondered if he could hear the pounding in my chest. He rustled a few papers on Jeannine’s desk, then made his way for my office.

  As he walked through the door I stepped behind him and put the .38 against the nape of his neck. “Freeze,” I said, knowing I sounded exactly like one of my Dad’s favorite cop shows.

  The intruder was in his mid-thirties and built like a professional wrestler. I ordered him up against the wall and frisked him while maintaining the gun’s contact with his spinal column. He was carrying a large pistol and two extra clips. After lightening his load, I walked him back out to the reception area, where I could move him out of lunging distance before turning him around. “What are you doing here?” I asked loudly. He didn’t reply. “You can either talk to me right now or you can talk to the cops in ten minutes.”

  He replied with a thick Russian accent, “You call cops anyway if you don’t kill me.”

  “That depends on what you have to say,” I offered, hoping to get some answers before arranging his accommodations at our county lock-up. “Did Koflanovich send you over here?”

  “Like you visit Koflanovich yesterday?” he responded.

  “I went over there to ask him a few questions. I didn’t break in,” I said.

  “You trick girl and knock Nicky unconscious. Not quite friendly visit,” he said.

  “Tell me about Koflanovich. Why all the strong-arm security?” I asked.

  “Your boss no tell? American Mafia keep many secrets,” he stated.

  “Koflanovich is in the Mafia?” I asked.

  “Not him, you!” was his reply.

  “I’m not in the Mafia and I’m not the one who needs to start answering some questions.” I walked over to the phone on Jeannine’s desk, picked up the receiver and said in a forceful way, “Tell me about Koflanovich or you’re off to the gulag right now!”

  “Ivan is legitimate businessman. He move to US after daughter, Ivana, kidnapped in Ukraine. After your pig comrades cut off finger,” he said with disgust.

  “I have no pig comrades,” I said. As I was about to ask my next question Jeannine walked through the front door. When I turned to look at her, the Russian sprinted toward the balcony, smashed through the screen door and dove over the rail. I ran to the edge of the balcony in time to see the Russian dislodge himself from a couple of oleander branches, two stories below, and run down the street.

  When I walked back into the office Jeannine looked to be in shock. “Are you OK?” I asked.

  “I told the salesgirl I couldn’t wear this perfume. She said it would drive men wild. Is he dead?” she asked.

  “He just ran down the street, and it wasn’t your perfume. He broke in and just escaped to avoid going to jail,” I said.

  “I’m going to wash it off anyway. I’ll be in the girl’s room,” she said and walked out.

  Chapter 4

  Kelly loves going to baseball games, though she doesn’t seem particularly attuned to what’s happening on the field. She grew up in a dysfunctional family with two alcoholic parents and two older brothers who followed their parents lead down the same road. Kelly got out at 18 to attend school on the East Coast, primarily to get away from the family. I think she likes engaging in what she perceives to be normal family activities. While I’m watching the game she does a lot of people watching, which is OK until she feels compelled to share. A little sharing is fine. Getting nudged in the bottom of the ninth with the game on the line is not.

  We’re both constantly amazed that we are dating someone of Irish heritage. Kelly associates the Irish with alcoholism and her bad childhood. On the other hand, I think of how Mom had to spend so many lonely nights while Dad was hanging out with his Irish buddies. As a teenager I would feel guilty leaving her alone while I went out with friends or played gigs with the band. I grew up not far from San Diego’s Little Italy section and dated girls of Italian heritage almost exclusively, until I met Kelly just over a year ago.

  As is our routine, I slept over at Kelly’s house Saturday night, and we planned to have brunch after reading the Sunday papers, then go our separate ways. However, about once every month or two the Kennedy clan
goes on the warpath and calls Kelly to be the arbitrator of who’s right and who’s wrong. They used to call at all hours, sometimes from jail. About the time we started dating, Kelly laid down the law and told them if they called before 9:00 AM she would change her phone number and make sure none of them ever got it again. At 9:01 AM Sunday her phone rang and she talked with them for over an hour. When she finished she asked if we could spend the afternoon at the mall and take in a movie. I managed to negotiate a no chick flick codicil to the agreement, and we had a fun day.

  On the drive home I cruised the neighborhood surrounding Cerise Records and got lucky on two counts. First, the building offers underground parking for employees, requiring a keycard for entrance. There are two, labeled visitor parking spots per tenant around the perimeter of the building. Second, there is a park directly across the alley from Cerise’s parking spots. Cory, my stakeout photographer, could easily sit at one of the picnic tables with a book and his trusty Nikon to keep tabs on the comings and goings of Cerise’s visitors. I called Cory and set up a meeting at the office for first thing tomorrow.

  At 8:00 AM on Monday morning I met with Cory Pafford, who suffers from Tourette’s Syndrome. This is a very unusual psychological disorder that results in many victims uncontrollably uttering the foulest language you can imagine. Cory is forty years old and has been unable to hold a job for any length of time. He’s a truly gifted photographer who had a few of his photos printed in major magazines. Unfortunately, most of the steady jobs in photography involve working with journalists, babies, mommies and numerous others who are immediately incensed by the symptoms of Cory’s affliction. When I worked with him at the mental health center, I helped him get a job with a National Geographic journalist I had dated briefly. To make a long story short, apparently there is a lot more English fluency in Ecuador than you might imagine. When they got unofficially deported Cory got officially sacked.

  Since most of the obscenities Cory spews are not germane to the conversation, I’ll spare you as much of it as I can. I laid out his assignment and sent him on his way.