by J. A. Jance
“Finding anything important?” Joanna asked as she joined the two clipboard-carrying officers who were conferring earnestly just to the left of the Suburban’s smashed driver’s-side fender.
“This is Sheriff Brady,” Dave said, seeing her for the first time. ‘And this is Sergeant Steve Little of the DPS.”
“Glad to meet you, Sheriff Brady,” Sergeant Little said. “The biggest question in my mind is why this old crate was still on the road in the first place. No way it should have been doing ninety miles an hour. The brakes are shot. The shock absorbers are rusted out, and, with as many people as he had in there, the vehicle was grossly overloaded.”
“Who’s it registered to?” Joanna asked.
‘A guy in Tucson who says he sold it last week to a Hispanic guy who paid him a thousand bucks in cash and said he needed it for his landscaping business. He used it for landscaping, all right. Turned it into a bulldozer.”
“Do we have any idea who ‘he’ is?” Joanna asked.
Dave Hollicker shook his head. “No idea. The driver was carrying a fake ID and a fake driver’s license. He won’t answer
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any questions, but he’s asking for a court-appointed lawyer. Says he wants to be deported back to Mexico.”
Joanna thought for a moment of the dead and bloodied baby she had cradled in her arms. “That driver’s not going home anytime soon,” she declared determinedly. “Not if I can help it.”
Leaving the impound lot in her Ciwie, Joanna was surprised at the number of vehicles pulling into the Justice Center parking lot. On Saturdays, when court wasn’t in session, the public parking area at the front of the complex was usually deserted. Last in the line of arriving vehicles was a battered Camry. A magnetic sign bearing the Bisbee Bee’s distinctive logo was plastered on the driver’s door.
As passengers began spilling out onto the hot pavement, Joanna assumed they had nothing to do with her and headed for her reserved and shaded parking place behind the building.
Inside her office, she used her phone to call Lupe Alvarez at the reception desk in the public office.
“What’s going on out front, Lupe?” Joanna asked. “Did someone schedule some kind of tour or activity that I don’t know about?”
“Beats me,” Lupe replied. “From here all I can see is a bunch of people milling around in the parking lot, lots of them waving signs. It must be some kind of demonstration.”
“What do the signs say?” Joanna asked.
“One of them said A-W-E,” Lupe returned. ‘Any idea what that means?”
‘AWE? Not the slightest,” Joanna answered. “What about the people? Do any of them look familiar?”
“No, but most of their backs are to me right now. They seem to be posing for photos in front of the door. Right, I just saw a flash, so someone did take a picture.”
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“Why don’t you give Chief Deputy Montoya a call,” Joanna suggested. “Maybe he knows something about this.”
“Right away, Sheriff Brady.”
Joanna put down her phone. While she waited for Lupe to call back, she turned on her computer to check her e-mail inbox. She had twenty-seven new messages, most of them offering her ways to earn money by working at home, or quick fixes for the latest computer virus. One by one she deleted those without even opening them. She was down to the last eleven seemingly real messages when her phone rang again.
“Chief Deputy Montoya is on his way in,” Lupe reported. “It’ll take him about twenty minutes to get here. He’s scheduled a ten o’clock press briefing, so maybe some of the vehicles are reporters coming for that, but he doesn’t have a clue about a demonstration.”
“Great,” Joanna said. “Well, then, since he’s not here and I am, I’d better go out and see what’s happening.”
Since it was Saturday and Joanna had planned on spending the entire day in the office, she had come to work wearing jeans and a wrinkled but comfy linen blazer. If a newspaper photographer was outside snapping pictures, it was likely that a less-than-wonderful photo of Sheriff Brady would end up appearing in print.
Eleanor Lathrop was nowhere around, but Joanna had a fair idea of how their next conversation would go. “How could you possibly go to work dressed like that,” her mother would ask, “looking like something the cat dragged in? What about that nice uniform you wore in the Fourth of July parade?”
Walking toward the door, Joanna smiled grimly to herself, imagining the reaction if she came right out and told Eleanor
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that the uniform was out of commission due to an encounter with puppy pee. An answer like that wouldn’t be well received.
Opening the front door, Joanna stepped out onto the shaded veranda where a shorts-clad blonde with short-cropped hair was speaking earnestly to Kevin Dawson. Kevin, the Bisbee Bee’s ace reporter and photographer, was also, by some strange coincidence, the son of the newspaper’s publisher and editor in chief.
As the door closed behind Joanna, one of the nearest sign-wielding demonstrators spotted her. “There she is,” he shouted to the others, pointing in her direction.
“That’s Sheriff Brady.”
Interviewer and interviewee turned to face Joanna while a series of boos and catcalls erupted from the group of demonstrators gradually coalescing at the foot of the stairs.
As they moved closer, Joanna managed to catch a glimpse of some of the Signs. SHAME ON SHERIFF BRADY, Said One. CCSD UNFAIR TO
animals, announced several others.
Animals? Joanna wondered in confusion. What animals?
Considering the events of the night before, she more than half expected the demonstrators outside to be human rights activists protesting the maze of conflicting international policies that had resulted in the terrible human carnage at Silver Creek. In fact, considering the dead boy whose bloodied body Joanna had held in her arms, Sheriff Brady herself might have been sorely tempted to join such a protest.
Then she saw another sign that clinched it. seventeen too MANY.
That’s when Joanna tumbled. The people in the parking lot weren’t the least bit concerned about dead and injured illegal immigrants. Callous about human casualties, the jeering group of protesters on the doorstep of the Cochise Justice Center had 184
come to express their outrage over the heat-related deaths of Carol Mossman’s dogs.
Joanna stifled an inward groan. “Who’s in charge here?” she asked.
The woman with the short-cropped blond hair who looked to be about Joanna’s age gave Sheriff Brady a scathing look. “I am,” she announced crisply.
A man with a video camera on his shoulder shoved his way through the crowd and pushed a microphone in Joanna’s face.
“And you are?” Joanna asked, ignoring the cameraman.
“Tamara Haynes,” the woman replied. “That’s H-A-Y, not H-A-I,” she added for the reporter’s benefit as he dutifully took notes.
“May I help you?” Joanna asked.
Her question was drowned out by a new series of jeering catcalls. Despite her best intentions, Joanna felt her temper revving up.
Her second question was far less welcoming. “Who exactly are you?” she demanded.
‘And what are you doing here?”
“I already told you,” the woman replied. “My name is Tamara Haynes.” A diamond tongue-stud glittered as she spoke. Her ears were pierced a dozen times over. Her belly button, visible on a bare midriff, sported its own set of piercings, and her upper arms and shoulders were covered with a series of tattoos.
“I’m the local chapter president for AWE.”
“Which is?” Joanna prodded.
‘A-W-E,” Tamara said. When Joanna exhibited no sign of recognition, the woman added, ‘Animal Welfare Experience.”
‘And you’re here because … ?”
“You’re in charge of Cochise Animal Control, are you not?” Tamara Haynes asked.
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“Yes,” Joanna said, “I am at
the moment. Why?”
“Well,” Tamara returned, her voice dripping contempt, “we’re here to serve notice that the members of AWE hold you personally responsible for the deaths of all those poor animals out by the San Pedro. If you and your department had simply responded to the situation in a more efficient and timely fashion, none of those unfortunate dogs would have died.”
With great effort Joanna kept her response reasonably civil. “Those dogs died in their owner’s overheated mobile home-a home with no electricity and no air-conditioning,”
she added. “They died after their owner was murdered, shot to death by an unknown assailant through a locked back door. If anyone is responsible for the deaths of those animals, it’s Carol Mossman’s killer. And that’s what my department is doing right now-searching for her murderer.”
But Tamara Haynes wasn’t someone whose opinion could be easily swayed by the presentation of mere facts. She grew shriller, making sure her voice carried beyond the front line of demonstrators. “If you and your people in Animal Control had been doing the job properly, Sheriff Brady, Carol Mossman never would have had the opportunity to amass that many animals in the first place.”
“That’s right,” one of the men shouted, waving his hand-lettered sign in the air.
“Way to go, Tammy. You tell her!”
Joanna’s temper edged up another notch. Her voice, unlike Tamara Haynes’s, actually decreased in volume. “Ms. Haynes, I’m in charge of a department that handles public safety for an area eighty miles wide and eighty miles long. A total of one hundred thirty people report to me. Four of them are in Animal Control.
‘As I’m sure you know, Animal Control officers enforce 186
ordinances having to do with animal licensing. They collect stray and injured animals.
They supervise animal adoptions and attend to the ones they’ve impounded. They respond to calls involving wildlife, which sometimes include marauding javelinas as well as human encounters with rabid skunks and coyotes. When Game and Fish officers aren’t available, my people are responsible for trapping and relocating rattlesnakes and other wildlife that pose threats to public safety.
“In other words, Ms. Haynes, Animal Control has its hands full. My Animal Control officers are doing an excellent job despite limited resources and severe budget cuts.
If you really care about animal welfare, Ms. Haynes, you and your sign-wielding friends here should be out at the pound volunteering your time shoveling doggie-doodoo and arranging adoptions instead of staging a protest on my doorstep. Now, if you’ll excuse me-“
“So that’s it?” Tammy Haynes objected before Joanna could step back inside the building.
“You’re just going to give us a line of excuses and that’s the end of it?”
“I’m not giving you excuses,” Joanna said tightly. “I’m giving you a dose of reality.
In case you’ve been too busy being an animal activist to notice, seven human beings have died in Cochise County in the past several days, including a two-year-old boy who died in a senseless automobile accident, to say nothing of the owner of those seventeen dogs who was murdered in the sanctity of her own home. You’re going to have to pardon me, Ms. Haynes, if I put those dead dogs on a back burner in favor of attending to my other duties.
“It’s Saturday morning. You’re here because you want to be, and so are my people.
Paid or not, I expect most of my investigators will be on duty today, working hard to solve the cases I just
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mentioned to you. Protest all you like, but we have a job to do here. If you’ll excuse me now, I’ll go to work.”
“What about us?”
Tamara Haynes sounded like a petulant child. “What about you?” Joanna returned. “You’re welcome to stay here as long as you wish and as long as there’s no disruption of traffic in or out of the building.”
“We have every right to be here,” Tammy Haynes whined. “I’ll have you know this is a peaceful protest.”
“Good,” Joanna returned, “I’m glad to hear it. And if you know what’s good for you, you’ll keep it that way.”
With that, Joanna turned away. Most of her part of the discussion had been conducted in a voice so low that only the nearest of the protesters had heard what she said.
As she let herself back into the building, a new outburst of jeering rose up from the crowd. Frank Montoya was waiting just inside the door.
“They don’t sound happy,” he observed as the closing door stifled the noise. “What the hell is that all about?”
“They’re pissed about Carol Mossman’s dead dogs.”
“They’re that upset about the dogs?”
“Right,” Joanna said. “I don’t think any of them noticed that Carol Mossman also died. For some reason, that’s beside the point.”
“How long are they going to be here?” Frank asked.
“Most likely until hell freezes over. Why?”
“Because what happened last night at Silver Creek has happened three other times in the past year and a half,” Montoya returned. “Each incident has resulted in up to a quarter of a million dollars’ worth of unreimbursed medical costs to nearby hospitals, putting a further burden on overtaxed trauma care all over the state.”
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“So you’re telling me there’s a lot of statewide interest in this case.”
Frank nodded grimly. “I’ve scheduled a press briefing for later this morning. In a little over an hour the place will be crawling with reporters and photographers.”
“Great,” Joanna said. “The press will get their money’s worth this morning-a twofer-a press briefing and an animal rights protest.” She turned from Frank Montoya to the receptionist’s desk. “Lupe,” she said, “do you still have that Out of Order sign we had to put up on the rest room door two weeks ago?”
Lupe frowned. “Yes, ma’am,” she said. “But as far as I know, Sheriff Brady, the rest room’s fine now-“
“No,” Joanna said, “I don’t believe it is. I believe someone mentioned to me that they heard a strange gurgling sound in one of the drains, so until we can get a plumber in here to check it out on Monday, I’m declaring the public rest room off limits.
If the reporters or anyone else with legitimate business here needs to use the facilities, direct them to employee rest rooms. Everyone else, especially the demonstrators outside, are out of luck.”
A smile of comprehension passed over Lupe’s face as she went searching for the sign.
Meanwhile Joanna walked over to the Coke machine in the rest room alcove and calmly pulled the plug on the soda machine. “Oops,” she said. “I think this is on the blink, too.”
Following her, Frank shook his head. ‘Are you sure antagonizing them is a good idea?”
“Probably not, but ask me if I’m enjoying it.”
“But, Joanna …” Frank began.
“Look,” she said, “those people have their noses out of joint because of the -way Animal Control handled the Mossman case,
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but as far as I’m concerned, Officers Ruiz and Phillips went by the book on that one. True, they’re shorthanded at the moment. We all are, and budget constraints keep me from adding any more officers-not to Animal Control and not to Patrol, either.
Should I beef up Animal Control by sidelining regular deputies into Animal Control?
Not on your life, not when we’re inundated with everything else. And if those people in the parking lot think coming out here and waving signs and yelling at me is going to change my mind on that, they’re nuts.”
Joanna and Frank had walked into Joanna’s office. Closing the door behind them, Frank tried to reason with her. “But is locking them out of the rest rooms a good idea?”
It wasn’t lost on Joanna that the public-contact section of her police academy training was where she had earned some of her lowest marks. Years into the job, she realized that anger management was still one of her biggest challenges.
“If their only choice is to go pee behind a bush, maybe they’ll pack it in and go home,” she said. “If they were out there protesting the death of that two-year-old, I might feel differently about it. In fact, I’d probably be out in the parking lot waving my own sign. But those yahoos don’t have the foggiest idea about what we do here, and the sooner they leave, the better.”
“This is an election year,” Frank reminded her.
“I’m well aware of that,” Joanna returned. “But I’m not going to change my mind.”
“So be it,” Frank said, giving up. “I guess I’ll go get ready for that briefing.”
Frank left then, and Joanna turned to her desk. With everything on her plate, it would have been easy for her to feel totally overwhelmed that morning, but she didn’t.
Somehow the
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confrontation with the protesters had cleared Joanna’s head and renewed her sense of purpose. She had a job to do, and she set about doing it.
As reports and information came across her desk, she sorted them into three separate piles. One stack was for the Richard Osmond case. Another was for Carol Mossman and the two murdered women in New Mexico. The third stack was for the vehicular homicide incident at Silver Creek.
Osmond and Mossman, Joanna thought. Sitting side by side, the two names were spookily similar, and yet there was real irony in how the two people had died. Osmond, a jail inmate who could easily have been the victim of jailhouse violence, had actually died peacefully and of natural causes in his sleep, while Carol Mossman had been gunned down in the privacy-and presumed safety-of her own home.
How come nobody’s protesting that? Joanna wondered.
Jaime Carbajal came in a few minutes after Frank’s departure and handed Joanna a computer-generated printout. “What’s this?” she asked.
“It’s a tentative list of last night’s victims,” he said. “The ones with hospital notations are still hospitalized, or were the last time we heard. Several of the less seriously wounded have already been released.”