No Witness But the Moon

by Suzanne Chazin

  “C’mon, man,” Vega urged Dolan. “Cut me a break and give me what you got on the suspect. It’s eating me alive.”

  Dolan cursed under his breath. “He had a social security card in his wallet under the name Antonio Fernandez,” Dolan said finally. “He had a pristine-looking Atlanta, Georgia, public library card under the same name, too.”

  “You think the ID’s real?”

  “His wallet didn’t contain a driver’s license. My guess? The social security card is a forgery. He got the library card with it to establish another form of ID so he’s probably here illegally. He broke into Ricardo Luis’s house so I’m guessing he’s probably got a criminal record. We won’t know until we lift his prints and send them through the computer, however. That could take a few hours.”

  “Is that everything you found?”

  Silence. Holiday lights on the passing houses flashed and faded in the glass. Vega had almost forgotten that Christmas was less than three weeks away. A few days ago, he and Dolan were bemoaning the glacial pace of promotions off the sergeant’s list. Now they were on opposite sides of a divide that could never be breached. Vega wondered if he’d ever feel normal again.

  “I didn’t do anything wrong,” Vega insisted.

  “Nobody said you did.”

  “Then stop freezing me out of the loop here.”

  “Jimmy, you’re not in the loop. You’re sidelined. Nobody removes their own appendix, comprende?”

  “I feel less like a patient at a hospital and more like the stiff at a funeral.”

  “There’s not much to tell, okay? We found a paycheck in one of his jacket pockets. From Chez Martine.”

  “The French restaurant in Wickford?”

  “Yeah, but it was made out to someone with an entirely different name at a Bronx address.”

  “You think he stole the paycheck?”

  “That, or he was using multiple aliases from multiple states.”

  Vega nodded. They’d both experienced the frustration of arresting an undocumented suspect who used different parts of their name to confuse the police and make it harder to track identity or past arrests.

  “Anything else to suggest a Bronx connection?”

  “He had a New York City Metro card and ten Lotto tickets from a Bronx bodega in the same inside pocket as the pay stub. He had a small rosary with a crucifix in there, too.”

  “Great.” Vega massaged his forehead. “So the suspect I shot just went from being a gangbanger who raped little girls to some religious busboy who just wanted to show me a picture of his family. Our department’s storing the evidence, right?”

  “Yeah. We’re handling the homicide and Wickford’s handling the robbery.”

  “So you can get access.”

  “And your point is?”

  “I want to see the photo he had in his hands,” said Vega. “I want to take a look at the contents of his pockets.”

  Dolan pulled a face. “No can do, Jimmy.”

  “A few quick shots on your iPhone. Come on, Teddy. What’s the harm in texting them to me? I want to try to understand.”

  “You may never understand.” Dolan shook his head. “In the Marines, we didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about whether our enemies tucked their kids in at night. Nothing good can come of that. You’ve got to let it go.”

  “I will. I promise. Once I see that photo and the other stuff.”

  “Aw, for crying out loud—” Dolan went to rail at Vega but pulled back at the last moment. Vega read something awkward in his eyes. Pity? God, he hoped not. That was the last thing he wanted from anyone.

  “I can’t be your inside man, Jimmy. No promises. But let me see what I can do.”

  Captain Waring was expecting Vega and Dolan at the station house. Dolan ushered Vega through the back doors. Under the best of circumstances, their boss, Frank Waring, inspired a certain trepidation among the detectives in the homicide division. He wasn’t a big man. He had the lean, angular look of a Depression-era dustbowl farmer and a voice that rarely rose above the decibel level of a librarian. But he was an ex-Navy SEAL and considered cops like Vega who hadn’t served in the military inferior to those like Dolan who had. Vega and Waring’s relationship had never been warm and fuzzy since Vega moved from narcotics to homicide two years ago. This latest incident wasn’t likely to improve the situation.

  “How are you holding up, Detective?” asked Waring. The captain’s gray-blue eyes registered no genuine concern except perhaps for what this incident might do to his own career.

  “Fine, sir,” said Vega. You don’t say “okay” to Captain Waring.

  Waring turned to a uniformed sergeant named Lasky. “Sergeant? Please get the detective a glass of water.” The water had nothing to do with any worry over whether Vega was properly hydrated. “Sergeant Lasky will take you down the hall for a urine sample.”

  “Yes, Captain.”

  Lasky, an old-timer nearing retirement, looked embarrassed by the request but Vega understood the procedure: everyone needed to be certain he wasn’t under the influence of anything. Vega had nothing to hide. He wasn’t even taking cold medicine. He sipped the water and then walked down the hall and whizzed in a cup while Lasky waited on the other side of the door. After that, the sergeant sat him in one of their interrogation rooms, a windowless space with a one-way mirror, a scuffed table, and a few folding chairs. That was it. No sound or light save the buzzing fluorescents overhead. Vega felt like a criminal—which he supposed he was in a way. He’d taken the life of an unarmed man. How much worse a crime can you commit?

  “Can I get you anything, Vega? A sandwich? Some coffee?” asked Lasky.

  Food was about as appealing right now as choking down carpet padding. Vega took the coffee but then watched it grow cold before his eyes. Several times cops mistakenly opened the door to the room, thinking it was available. As soon as they saw who was sitting there, they got wide-eyed and panicky, apologized profusely, and left. Everyone knew what had happened. They probably knew more than he did at the moment. When the door was open, Vega heard snatches of conversation.

  “. . . No weapon. Just some old photo . . .”

  “. . . This Latin pop star’s house . . .”

  “. . . Three Hispanics in all of Wickford and they gotta rob and shoot each other . . .”

  Vega had the attention span of a goldfish. He couldn’t keep a thought in his head for more than two seconds. He typed stuff into his phone’s search engine just to see what popped up. Already, the news had hit the Internet: Police shoot and kill robbery suspect in Wickford . . . Robbery suspect breaks into Latin pop star’s house. Okay. Those were the facts. He could live with them. He typed in Ricardo Luis and came back with a dimple-faced Mexican man in his late thirties from the cover of his latest CD—the same man Vega had seen on that driveway in Wickford. Luis had recently published an autobiography too, called Song of My Heart. The cover showed Luis in a beefcake shot with his shirt undone to his navel.

  There was a knock on the door.

  “Yeah?”

  A short, stout black woman with close-cropped white hair entered the room. She wore big gold hoop earrings and round bright red glasses attached to a chain around her neck. Her feet were encased in orthopedic loafers and her navy blue pants suit and white shirt looked starchy enough to be a uniform. She closed the door behind her and stretched out a hand.

  “Isadora Jenkins.” She spoke with a throaty tremor. “I’ve been hired by your union to represent you in these proceedings.”

  She wasn’t at all what Vega was expecting. He’d assumed his union would hire some jailhouse lawyer type with a paunch and a comb-over. Isadora Jenkins looked like a retired schoolteacher. A long-retired schoolteacher. All except for her choice in jewelry. On her bony hands, she sported several clunky costume-jewelry rings that seemed totally at odds with her drab attire. She looked like a Jehovah’s Witness who’d gotten lost in a dollar store.

  Vega rose from the table and shook her hand.
“Pleased to meet you,” he said woodenly.

  “No, you’re not. You’re deep in the doo-doo, facing the worst day of your life and you’re wondering what genius in your union decided to send somebody’s grandma to represent you.”

  Vega bit back a smile. “I would never say that.”

  “Good. Then you’ve got enough brains not to say everything you’re thinking. I like that in a cop.” She grinned. “Hell, I like that in a man.”

  Jenkins plunked her briefcase on the table. It looked scuffed enough to suggest she’d had the same one since she graduated law school. Vega sat back down and waited for her to take a seat across from him. Instead, Jenkins folded her arms across her prow of a chest and began walking the room, staring at him from every angle. He flushed at the wattage of her scrutiny. He settled his eyes in his lap.

  “Look at me, please.”

  “Huh?”

  “I am walking around this room and keeping my eyes on you. Please do the same.”

  Vega forced himself to comply. He felt acutely uncomfortable. He began jiggling one of his legs nervously under the table. He started to sweat.

  “I don’t understand,” he said after a minute.

  “People are going to judge you from this moment forward. Like I am now. Keep looking at me. Don’t back down.”

  Vega held her gaze and did as she requested.

  “Good.” She nodded, finally taking a seat. “You look away; people think you’ve got something to hide. You can feel sorrow. Sorrow is normal. No decent human being can be happy about what happened this evening. But if you act ashamed, then you’re telling the world that you did something wrong—something that deserves punishment. You see what I’m driving at?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “ ‘Ma’am.’ That’s good.” Jenkins nodded approvingly. “Lots of respect. Lots of deference. But no shame. You have to see yourself as you want a jury to see you.”

  “A jury?” Panic fluttered in Vega’s chest. His stomach went into freefall. Jenkins dropped the possibility of Vega going before a jury like they were discussing whether or not it would rain tomorrow. “Am I going to go on trial?”

  Jenkins shrugged. “Five years ago, I’d have said this could be cleared in-house. But police shootings are a political hot button these days. The moment the press hears the words unarmed suspect and that suspect is black or Hispanic, they’re on it like vultures on carrion. I’m sure you know that. That’s why we have to proceed as if anything could happen and be prepared for it.”

  Jenkins slid a business card across the table to Vega. Some law firm with many names, none of them hers. His union obviously didn’t think him worthy of a partner.

  “So,” said Jenkins, “I’ve got two absolutes.” She held up a hand with a large blue-green sparkly ring on it. Her veins stuck out like IV tubes and her joints looked like marbles. “My first rule is that you always tell me the complete, unvarnished truth. My second is that you never discuss the shooting with anyone. And by anyone I mean your significant other. Your family. Fellow cops. Your closest friends. You can’t say anything. Nada. Zip. Not even to justify your actions or deny some false allegation. The last thing we need is for some attorney to bring your family and friends up on a witness stand. You don’t want that. And I don’t want that. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, ma’am.” She had the hurricane force of Sister Margarita, the nun who ran Vega’s old Bronx elementary school.

  Jenkins pulled out a yellow pad and pen and set it down before her on the table. Vega took a deep breath and tried to gather his thoughts. His head was pounding. All evening, he’d been replaying the events on a continuous loop reel inside his brain. And now that he finally had someone to listen to him, he didn’t know where to begin.

  “You do know that you’re legally allowed to ask for a delay in giving your statement if you feel you’re under too much emotional distress—”

  “No! I mean uh—no. I’m okay.” That was all Vega needed: to cite “emotional distress.” Captain Waring would have him stamped “unfit for duty” and laterally transferred out of homicide and over to the pistol licensing unit where he’d spend the rest of his career doing background checks on firearms permits. No, thank you. “I can give a statement.”

  “Good.”

  “You know that the suspect had a photograph in his hand, right?” Vega’s voice sounded tight and weirdly out of tune, like guitar strings that had been pulled up to pitch too quickly.

  “Yes. I’m aware of that,” said Jenkins evenly.

  “I don’t know if he had any priors.”

  “Right now, I’m more interested in your actions, Detective. You are the sole living witness to what happened during the shooting.”

  “That’s what everyone keeps telling me,” said Vega. “But I feel like somebody else was in those woods.”

  “You were experiencing a common phenomenon that happens during a shooting,” said Jenkins. “Tunnel vision. Your senses are so focused on the danger that they shut down or distort everything else.”

  Vega massaged his forehead. “I didn’t see the cruisers at the bottom of the hill. Maybe if I had, I wouldn’t have . . .” His voice dropped away. He couldn’t bring himself to say the words shot or killed. It was too painful to contemplate what he’d done, let alone that it might have been averted had he paid more attention to his surroundings.

  “So far, no officer has come forward to say he witnessed the shooting,” said Jenkins. “Which is too bad, really. A fellow officer’s testimony could have greatly bolstered the case that you were in fear for your life.”

  “ ‘Bolstered’?” The word irked Vega. Did she think he had to invent excuses for what he’d done? “I don’t need to bolster anything!”

  “You have to understand,” said Jenkins calmly. “Most civilians have no idea about the stresses and strains of being in law enforcement. They’ve never been in any sort of violent confrontation, let alone a shooting. They just see an armed and highly trained police officer against an unarmed civilian. We want to consider every possibility that would tip the scales in your favor. We don’t have audio. We don’t have video. A favorable eyewitness would have been a plus.”

  “I’ll try to remember to send out invitations the next time dispatch tells me an armed suspect is on the loose.”

  Jenkins blinked at him behind the frames of her large red glasses. “Sarcasm is a bad tone to take here, Detective. And it’s absolutely suicidal with a grand jury.”

  “Sorry.”

  Vega placed his sweaty palms on the table and tried to figure out where to begin. It was like swinging blindfolded at a piñata. There was something weighty and ponderous hovering just out of his reach, something he needed to split open. But his words kept glancing off the essence of his actions, never quite opening the core. He recalled the dense, claustrophobic darkness of the woods, the sudden brightness of that spotlight, those two seconds when the suspect dug his hand into his jeans and Vega’s whole life flashed before him. He was blank on so much else.

  He identified himself as a police officer—that much he was sure of. But he couldn’t recall squeezing the trigger. He had no memory of firing off four shots. It had all seemed so clear in those moonlit woods, his actions so steeped in procedure, his choices so unavoidable. But now, under the bright damning fluorescents of this small interrogation room, he felt weak and ashamed of what he’d done. He wondered if Isadora Jenkins hated him yet. He certainly hated himself.

  “Whenever I used to hear about cops shooting unarmed civilians, I always figured them for cowboys, you know?” said Vega. “Especially when the civilians were black or Hispanic. I figured probably the cops were profiling. Definitely they were undertrained and letting their emotions get in the way.” Vega shook his head. “I never thought I’d end up right alongside them, being the kind of cop people hate—the kind of cop I hate. I don’t want to end up on Ruben Tate-Rivera’s Wall of Shame.”

  Jenkins nodded. Everyone knew about the form
er college professor who’d made a national reputation by spotlighting controversial police shootings, particularly of blacks and Hispanics. When he put a cop’s photo on his Internet Wall of Shame, it was a virtual guarantee that that cop would go on trial, maybe even land in prison.

  Jenkins rummaged through her briefcase and pulled out some unlined sheets of paper and a pencil. She pushed them across the table to Vega.

  “Perhaps if you drew what happened?”

  The paper helped. It took the onus off Vega’s words and allowed him to concentrate on the three-dimensional rendering of events on the page. He spoke and drew and tried to give approximate distances. Jenkins asked questions.

  She took notes. She helped him string together a coherent sequence of events. Gradually, Vega’s stick-figure memories got a semblance of flesh and blood. But one thing kept bothering him.

  “Do you know if the police found the suspect’s car?” asked Vega.

  “Car?”

  “Wickford is very rural. Luis’s house is in the middle of nowhere. It seems sort of strange that this guy just walked there. Plus, he must have planned to get away afterward.”

  “I don’t believe the police found a car, but I’ll check.”

  They went through Vega’s actions until he felt comfortable explaining them. Then Jenkins excused herself to let Captain Lorenzo of internal affairs know that Vega was ready to make a statement to him and Captain Waring.

  Vega had no illusions that Lorenzo and Waring were concerned about the dead man or even Vega, for that matter. All they were really worried about was negative publicity and lawsuits. Win or lose, a lawsuit would cost the county money. Which meant county officials would pass their displeasure on to the police brass who would in turn make Vega’s life a living hell. Vega wondered why departments even bothered to give cops guns. They seemed to get you into far more trouble than they ever got you out of.