Mind Switch

by Lorne L. Bentley

  “From what I have been able to determine, he took off right after he had shot up the room. I’m sorry, but that’s all I know so far.”

  Fred sent Steward to the projection booth area to find the light switch. Looking over the scene, he was shocked by the macabre commonality with the brutal shooting at the bank. A major difference was that, apparently, this time the shooter had immediately flown the scene.

  When Fred’s eyes fully adjusted to the bank of overhead lights, he realized for the first time that the horror he first observed in the darkened theater was much greater in the clarity of full light. At least ten bodies were slumped in their seats in all parts of the theater. Their lack of movement provided clear evidence that they would never enjoy another afternoon movie again. Fred guessed that another five were slightly injured; a scattered few traumatized victims seemed to be untouched. In the confined theater, the moans of the wounded seemed deafening.

  Fred was not sure what to make of the unreal scene in front of him. Paul had just arrived in the theater. Fred knew that Paul was sure to pass on his “expertise” at the first opportunity.

  Paul said, “It looks like you have a bit of a double problem on your hands. I just got back to town and went directly to the County Bank where I learned what had happened.”

  With characteristically limited information supported by even fewer facts, Paul immediately deduced that in the case of the bank, it had been a failed robbery attempt. He advised Fred that it was an open and shut case and that Fred should consider himself lucky to have been the first to arrive. Now Fred could take full credit for the assailant’s quick capture and the case’s imminent solution.

  Fred found it strange that Paul seemed totally oblivious to the macabre environment all around him. Fred said, in a forced neutral tone, “If it was an attempted robbery, why did this individual walk to the middle of the bank lobby and start firing randomly at customers as well as bank personnel? After all, at that point he was nowhere near the area where the cash was held. So what did he gain by killing bank patrons?”

  “Because this guy Slivers panicked, it’s as simple as that. C’mon, Fred, don’t try what you always do, make a case more complex than it really is!”

  Fred didn’t want to continue the discussion; but the pure idiocy of Paul’s comments forced him to respond in as rational a tone as he could muster, “Bank robbers might panic, especially ones that have had no prior experience, but they would logically panic in the middle of a robbery; this guy never even made it to the teller’s cage. He was at least 25 feet from the nearest teller when he started firing. In fact, according to witnesses, he started firing shortly after he entered the bank’s front door.”

  Paul did not verbally respond but his negative facial expression provided clear evidence that he thought Fred had no idea what the hell he was talking about.

  Now exasperated, Fred said, “If you will excuse me, I have another murder case here to solve.”

  At that moment emergency medical personnel entered the theater and started to work on the wounded. Fred approached a middle-aged male still seated in the second row. The man didn’t appear to have been hit by any of the flying bullets. Fred asked him to describe the gunman.

  “I had a chance to see him when he left the theater. He was a big guy, not heavy you understand, but very tall. He was wearing a suit—now who in this town would wear a suit to the movies?”

  Fred agreed with the guy’s take on the relaxed dress code of Floridians, but this was no time for that type of discussion. “Okay, wearing a suit – but did you get a look at the shooter’s face?”

  The man said, “Sorry, it was too dark. I didn’t really see his face.”

  Fred gained no additional information when he interviewed other patrons. He suspected that, in the darkened theater and with the heat of emotion, no one would be able to make any type of detailed and accurate identification. To complicate matters, no one realized that the man was actually shooting until patrons started to fall over in their seats.

  Apparently the gunman had been seated in the upper row, and from that perspective, he must have casually aimed his weapon directly at patrons seated below. The movie was a documentary based on the war in Iraq, so initially the audience likely believed the gunfire was simply a component of the movie. Too bad, Fred thought, had they realized what was happening, more of them might have escaped or at least ducked for cover.

  Witnesses’ names were taken, and for the second time in less than two hours, police photographers took extensive photographs of the crime scene. On his way out Fred asked Carl, the ticket taker, if he had noted any strange behavior from any of the patrons?

  “I sure did,” he responded eagerly, “But at the time I didn’t know what it was about. About twenty minutes ago, a tall thin man ran by me and then bumped straight into an usher. Both he and the usher fell over. But the man got up, he offered no apology, and continued running. I yelled at him but he ignored me and exited through the front doors. I thought about running after him but he was a lot taller than I am. And they don’t pay me enough to take that kind of chance.”

  “Did you see his face?”

  “Yes, I got a fairly good look as he passed by me.”

  Fred took the ticket taker’s full name and address. He directed him to stop over to the station and look at some photos and provide a description of the man’s features to the police artist.

  Chapter 15

  The marvel had watched from a distance of not more than fifty feet, witnessing Lieutenant Harris in the process of being almost crushed by two men frantically exiting the County Bank. Not part of my plan, the marvel thought, but at the same time certainly not an undesirable, unanticipated consequence. A broad smile accompanied the marvel’s realization of the massive physical damage being inflicted on this newly promoted cop.

  The marvel had not shot the little canine outside of the living room window two nights earlier. Not that morality had suddenly intervened; the gun simply had not been loaded yet, since its use was planned for sometime in the future if needed. Nevertheless, just the imagined vision of the little dog collapsing next to the shocked owner had brought an envisioned joy.

  Now, a short distance from the site of the bank robbery, the marvel, obscured by the crowd of movie patrons, was observing Lieutenant Harris entering the downtown movie theater.

  The marvel reflected, I am certain he will be overwhelmed by what he sees and will most likely start to question his ability to deal with unprecedented multiple homicides with no obvious cause. Harris is an emotional individual, his emotions may be submerged and temporarily under control; but under stress they will surface. Engaged emotion destroys logic; and in a short time Harris will find that his organized mind will start to gradually disintegrate, mired in self doubts. Perhaps with his insecurity, he will quit on the spot. That would be a very desirable and not unexpected outcome. Actually, I could most likely enter the theater and observe firsthand his emotions since I would easily blend into the environment.

  The marvel fully understood the complex dynamics going on in the police department and knew the chief would not tolerate any delay in the solution of this emerging, heinous crime wave. Some leaders attempt to guide and temper the actions of their subordinates, but the station’s chief tended to strangle them. Harris’s proclivity to fully understand all the components to a crime, and the inherent delay that process will take, will create a seething, gradual, defining conflict with the headstrong chief. The only problem, the marvel pondered, while simultaneously displaying a slight facial grimace, is that Harris is sharp—very sharp. Of course, not nearly as sharp as I, but nevertheless he could present a future problem if he does not shortly resign or be fired. I will have to consider that in the near future; but in the meantime I will immensely enjoy the disorder that I inflict on this town. It’s great theater, the marvel thought, and for the time being I don’t want to spoil it.

  Chapter 16

  Before he left the theater, Fred directed po
licemen on the scene to gather information from onlookers to determine if anyone had seen the killer. Outside the theater, in the bright sunlight, without the high emotion experienced by those exposed to the shooting, he hoped that potential descriptions from witnesses might be more accurate. At the same time, he recognized that eyewitness accounts are, under the very best of conditions, often difficult to come by and frequently wrong. Experience had taught him that people are consumed day to day, minute by minute, with their own personal problems; and either consciously or subconsciously, they block out events that do not include them or their self interest.

  Maureen had told him that, when people witness things, it is often through the prism of an episodic event in which details are recorded on a fleeting basis by the brain and remembered at best transitionally. If the perpetrator is of a different nationality than that of the witness, a personal bias may enter the picture and individuals would then appear much larger or smaller than they really are, depending on the nature of the filtering distortion. She felt that individual features are often blurred, consistent with our tendency to obliterate the details about other races with whom we do not identify nor share values. Fred felt that we have not advanced far from the savageness of the cave man. Over our primitive behavior is a very thin veneer of civilization and education. Scratch that veneer and out comes the primitive cave man that has been hiding for generation after generation just below our surface level.

  Fred then shifted his thoughts to the bank robbery. He wondered for a moment if he, like political test audiences, was somehow being manipulated. Perhaps he had been intentionally exposed to a selective slice of the truth, constructed to drive him in a pre-planned direction. No, he thought; that is much too complicated a possibility. The solution has to be much simpler than that.

  *

  Arriving back at the station, Fred learned that Slivers was still maintaining his innocence. His lawyer had arrived and was monitoring all interrogations. Fred suspected that his lawyer must be having a hard time developing a defense that would reconcile the clash between witness testimonies and Sliver’s unwavering declaration of innocence.

  Fred walked by the police artist’s room where the frustrated ticket taker was feebly trying to provide details of the facial makeup of the theater killer.

  “How’s it going?” Fred asked the artist.

  The artist didn’t look up from his sketch. “Not good, I’m afraid; we’re working on it, but I wouldn’t expect too much.”

  Officers returning from the theater reported they found no one who had seen where the assailant went after he left the theater. All in all, the news was pretty bad.

  Fred gathered the chief and Jim, and entered the conference room for the bank video viewing. The chief ordered that Paul be included in the viewing. Fred did not relish Paul’s presence, but determined that it was not worth his dwindling energy to battle with his chief. He knew that future conflicts would be unavoidable; but as the new kid on the block, Fred wanted to delay that day as long as humanly possible. Perhaps in the interim he would develop more credibility with his chief.

  The video was not at all clear, but they could see Slivers as he first entered though the bank doors. Fred thought, with all the high definition systems now available, why couldn’t bank security systems get up to speed? However, even from the blurry film, it was obvious that Slivers’ suit jacket was bulging on the right side. Slowly pacing himself, Slivers walked a few feet into the marbled lobby in the direction of the tellers’ cages. Suddenly, Slivers became highly animated. He had some sort of interaction with a woman who was on her way out of the bank. The video was silent, but it was obvious that she had responded with some type of comparable social amenity. In the next few frames, there was no hint of future blood letting.

  Suddenly Slivers pulled out a semi automatic weapon from his suit coat and immediately started firing. The video vividly displayed bright bursts of gunfire as multiple victims dropped simultaneously. Slivers started firing on the left side of the lobby, first killing the bank’s security guard and then proceeding to mow down bank customers in line at the tellers’ stations. Now he was slowly, and seemingly systematically, revolving his blasts around the room.

  To Slivers’ extreme right, just beyond Slivers’ peripheral vision, a large man started to exit the front door of the bank. A moment later, seizing the opportunity, a much smaller man left from the same door. Fred recognized the two as those that had run into him on the sidewalk. Since neither of the men had any interaction with Slivers, it was pretty clear that they had taken no part in the slaughter.

  Slivers appeared oblivious to the escape of the two and continued firing. When he had turned almost fully to his right, he stopped firing and froze for a second. At the next instant, he looked at the gun in his hand and threw it down hard on the marble floor. Chunks of large black marble fragments scattered from the impact. Inexplicably, Slivers immediately slumped to the floor. Several frames later, behind him, in the background, the camera picked up Fred entering the bank. The rest of the video displayed what Fred had already noted from his personal observation.

  To Paul and the chief, the video was great news. It was perfect, iron clad evidence for a future jury. Fred knew their mantra before either of them spoke. To a jury, visual aids are infinitely more effective than verbal arguments. To these two men, Slivers was already guilty beyond a reasonable doubt and the investigation was, for all practical purposes, over.

  “Pass the video tape and the written eyewitness accounts on to the DA, and let the legal system take over,” the chief ordered. “Meanwhile, let’s quickly arrange for a meeting with the press. They’re practically tearing down my office door.”

  Paul and the chief shook hands and were giddily slapping each other on the back as they exited the conference room. It seems more like a college football game victory than a bloody murder case, Fred thought.

  Jim and Fred remained stoically fixed in their chairs without uttering any comment. It was apparent that they both found something inconsistent in the video which had not been noticed by either Paul or the chief.

  Jim looked at Fred. “Something does not compute!”

  Fred nodded and said, “I agree. I’m not really sure what it is but something bothers me. Something is missing or inconsistent in Slivers’ actions. Something was not happening that should have been; but I can’t identify for the life of me what I am missing. I want to view that video again, perhaps more than once.” His secretary, Jan, had been assigned the job of controlling the video projection. Fred asked if it could be stopped at various points to freeze the frames.

  Jan said, “That’s not easily accomplished in its present form but I can have it made into a DVD which will do the job much more efficiently. Perhaps in the process we can also enhance the frames to provide better clarity.”

  Paul nodded approvingly and said, “Okay, but make sure we don’t lose the video tape. We have to keep the original copy; any defense lawyer would have a field day if we substituted a DVD copy for the original bank video and severed part of our evidence chain.”

  Jan said, “I understand. I’ll take good care of the video and will get the DVD for you by tomorrow.”

  Fred returned to his desk, propped his feet up, and looked into the distance at nothing in particular, unsure of his next step. He looked up, as if seeking divine intervention and guidance. Nothing! It was now evening, and dark clouds were starting to shut down the day’s residual sunshine.

  He ruminated over what had happened over the last few hours. He recognized that in the case of numerous murders, the victim’s body often is not found for several months if at all. Frequently a suspect cannot be identified and no weapon is found at or near the crime scene. Precious investigative time is often lost. This all contributes to make crime solving lengthy and difficult. In this case however, Fred thought, I have a suspect, a weapon, and an inconvertible record of the suspect committing the crime, all of which should make me feel positive about obtaining a
quick indictment.

  But Fred felt no sense of victory. The very nature of the two murder sprees were, on the surface, unique. However, Fred felt that somehow there were enough parallels to indicate a common link. But, for the life of him, he could not imagine what it was. He just could not accept the motive of a bank robbery in the first instance; but at the same time he could not find an alternative reason that made sense to him. He knew if he expounded on this theme to the chief, he would get a “who cares” response followed by the banal assertion that motives were solely for the district attorney to sort out, and Fred’s time should be spent on more relevant duties. “Our job,” the chief would say, “is simply to find the killers.” Fred could easily envision Paul seated somewhere in the background nodding his all encompassing agreement with the chief.

  Almost as an afterthought Fred decided to stop by Slivers’ insurance office, in the hope that someone would still be there, despite the lateness of the hour. If nothing else, perhaps they could shed some light on his activities prior to the shooting.

  *

  Slivers’ Insurance Agency was housed in a non-pretentious stucco building recently painted bright orange. The building fit the theme of numerous Florida establishments which portray to the public a bright, cheerful and airy image. The bold tangerine letters on the front window advertised insurance of all types.

  As Fred looked through the plate glass window, he noted that a secretary and at least one other employee were busily working at their desks. He walked in, displayed his badge and introduced himself to the office secretary. When he explained why he was there, she acknowledged that she had already heard about the bank robbery on the radio. She said, “I don’t know who you think you captured, but it couldn’t have been Mr. Slivers; he would never do anything like that.”

  Fred told her that he would like to talk to her, as well as any other employees still at work. He asked that the interviews be conducted in an available office to insure maximum privacy.