“Which basically does nothing.”
“Exactly. But my guy can still dip into the licensing records and the database.”
“And?”
“And basically these DNA labs have to be licensed, but as you know there is no oversight or enforcement after that. However, the FDA does have to accept complaints, and my guy told me there was a flag on Orton.”
“Is that on the record?”
“On the record but not for attribution.”
“Where did the flag come from?”
“He could not get that, but my guess is that it was from UCI and what happened there.”
That seemed most likely to me.
“All right,” I said. “Anything else?”
“One other thing,” Emily said. “Orange Nano’s license has an amendment allowing it to share anonymized data with other licensed research facilities. So the data it gets from GT23 can pass through the lab and Orange Nano and go somewhere else.”
“Is any approval required of such transactions?”
“Not at this time. It’s apparently going to be part of the rules and regs the FDA is taking its sweet time with.”
“We need to find out who they give DNA to,” I said. “We can ask Orton when we see him, but I kind of doubt that will go anywhere.”
“We’ll see soon enough. What about Jason Hwang, disgruntled ex-employee of the mothership? Maybe he knows something and will share.”
“Maybe. But he would be a transaction removed. He sent DNA to Orange Nano. He would have no control and probably no knowledge of where it went afterward. What about your FTC guy?”
“I’ll try him, but the FTC washed its hands of the DNA industry when the FDA took over. Whatever he can get will be at least two years old or more.”
“Well, it’s worth a shot.”
“I’ll call him later. What did you get from the cop on the UCI case?” she asked.
“I talked to him in court and then I called the lawyer who represented the UCI victim.”
“Jane Doe.”
“Actually, it’s Jessica Kelley.”
“Who gave you that?”
“I think Gaspar, the lawyer.”
I explained the text I had gotten.
“Good stuff,” Emily said. “If she’s still around we can find her.”
“She signed an NDA, so that may be a dead end. But having the name will help us with Orton, if the case comes up.”
“Oh, I think it’s going to come up. Are we ready?”
“We are.”
21
Orange Nano was in a clean industrial park off MacArthur and not far from UCI. It was a single-level precast concrete building with no windows and no sign out front identifying it. The front door led to a small reception area where we found Edna Fortunato, the woman I had been told by Rexford PR would get us to William Orton.
She escorted us into an office where two men sat waiting, one directly behind a large desk and the other to his left side. The office was basic: a desk cluttered with files and paperwork, diplomas framed on one wall, shelves of medical-research books on another, and finally a six-foot-tall sculpture in a corner that was an abstract double helix made of polished brass.
The man behind the desk was obviously Orton. He was about fifty with a tall and slim build. He stood up and easily reached across the wide desk to shake our hands. Though ostensibly looking for the cure to baldness, he had a full head of brown hair slicked back and held in place with heavy product. His bushy, unkempt eyebrows gave him the inquisitive look of a researcher. He wore the requisite white lab coat—his name stitched above the breast pocket—and pale green scrubs.
The other man was the mystery. Dressed in a crisp suit, he remained seated. Orton quickly solved the mystery.
“I am Dr. Orton,” he said. “And this is my attorney, Giles Barnett.”
“Are we interrupting something you two need to finish?” I asked.
“No, I asked Giles to join us,” Orton said.
“Why is that?” I asked. “This is just a general interview.”
There was a nervousness about Orton that I had seen before in people unaccustomed to dealing directly with the media. And he had the added burden of worrying about his secret discharge from UCI. It seemed that he had brought his lawyer to make sure the interview didn’t stray into an area Emily and I surely intended to take it.
“I need to tell you at the outset that I don’t want this intrusion,” Orton said. “I rely on Rexford Corporation to sponsor my work and so I cooperate with their demands. This is one of them. But as I say, I don’t like it, and I am more comfortable with my attorney present.”
I looked over at Emily. It was clear our planning for the interview had been for naught. The scheme to slowly lead Orton down a path toward a discussion of his past troubles would now clearly be stopped by Giles Barnett. The attorney had a tight collar and the thick body of an offensive lineman. In my glance at Emily I tried to get a read on whether she thought we should abandon ship or press on. She spoke before I could make a determination.
“Could we start in the lab?” she said to Orton. “We wanted some photos of you in your element. We could get that out of the way and then do the interview.”
She was proceeding with the plan: get photos first because the interview was going to lead to a confrontation. It’s hard to get photos after you’ve been ordered to leave the premises.
“You can’t go into the lab,” Orton said. “There are contamination concerns and a strict protocol. There are, however, viewing windows in the hallway. You can take your photos from there.”
“That’ll work,” Emily said.
“Which lab?” Orton said.
“Uh, you tell us,” I said. “What labs are there?”
“We have an extraction lab,” he said. “We have a PCR lab, and we have an analysis lab.”
“PCR?” I asked.
“Polymerase Chain Reaction,” Orton said. “It is where samples are amplified. We can make millions of copies of a single DNA molecule in a matter of hours.”
“I like that,” Emily said. “Maybe some shots with you involved in that process.”
“Very well,” Orton said.
He stood up and signaled us through the door into a hallway that led to the far reaches of the building. Emily hung back so that Orton was several feet ahead of us, his lab coat flowing behind him like a cape. She took photos as we walked.
I walked next to Barnett and asked him for a card. He reached behind the pocket square in the breast pocket of his suit coat and handed me an embossed business card. I glanced at it before putting it in my pocket.
“I know what you’re going to ask,” Barnett said. “Why does he need a criminal defense attorney? The answer is that it’s only one of my specialties. I handle all Dr. Orton’s legal work. That’s why I’m here.”
“Got it,” I said.
We turned down a forty-foot hallway with several large windows running along both sides. Orton stopped at the first set of windows.
“Over here to my left is PCR,” he said. “To the right is the STR analysis lab.”
“STR?” I asked.
“Short Tandem Repeat analysis is the evaluation of specific loci,” he said. “This is where we hunt. Where we look for the commonalities in identity, behavior, hereditary attributes.”
“Like balding?” I asked.
“That is certainly one of them,” Orton said. “And one of our main points of study.”
He pointed through the window at a device that looked like a countertop dishwasher with a rack containing dozens of test tubes. Emily snapped another photo.
“Where does the DNA for your studies come from?” I asked.
“We buy it, of course,” Orton said.
“From who?” I asked. “You must need a lot.”
“Our primary source is a company called GT23. I’m sure you’ve heard of it.”
Nodding, I pulled a notebook out of my back pocket and wrote down his di
rect quote. While I was doing so, Emily continued her role as photographer.
“Dr. Orton, I know we can’t go into the lab,” she said. “But could you go in and sort of interact with what you see in there so I can take a few shots?”
Orton looked at Barnett for approval and the attorney nodded.
“I can do that,” Orton said.
“And I don’t see anybody in the labs,” Emily added. “Don’t you have staff that helps with your research?”
“Of course I do,” Orton said, an irritated tone in his voice. “They preferred not to be photographed, so they have the hour off.”
“Forty minutes now,” Barnett added helpfully.
Orton used a key to unlock the STR-lab door. He stepped into a mantrap where an exhaust fan roared to life and then died. He used the key to open the next door and enter the lab.
Emily walked up to the glass and tracked Orton through the lens of her camera. Barnett took the moment to move next to me.
“What are you doing here?” he asked.
“Excuse me?” I responded.
“I want to know what is behind this charade.”
“I’m doing a story. It’s about DNA and how it gets used and protected and who’s out there on the frontier of the science.”
“That’s bullshit. What are you really here for?”
“Look, I didn’t come here to talk to you. If Dr. Orton wants to accuse me of something, let him do it. Call him out here and we’ll all talk about it.”
“Not until I know—”
Before he could finish, he was interrupted by the roar of the fan in the mantrap. We both turned to see Orton stepping out. Concern was written on his face, as he had either heard the confrontation or seen the pointed discussion through the lab’s window.
“Is there a problem?” he asked.
“Yes,” I said before Barnett could respond. “Your lawyer doesn’t want me to interview you.”
“Not until I know what the interview is really about,” Barnett said.
All at once I knew the plan for a subtle lead-up was out the window. It was now or never.
“I want to know about Jessica Kelley,” I said. “I want to know how you fixed the DNA.”
Orton stared hard at me.
“Who gave you that name?” Barnett demanded.
“A source I won’t give up,” I said.
“I want you both out of here,” Orton said. “Right now.”
Emily turned the camera on Orton and me and started firing off shots.
“No pictures!” Barnett yelled. “Put that away right now!”
His voice was so tight with anger that I thought he might lunge at Emily. I slid into the space between them and tried to salvage an unrecoverable situation. Over Barnett’s shoulder I saw Orton pointing toward the door we had come through from the office.
“Get out of here,” he said, his voice rising with each word. “Get out!”
I knew my questions were not going to be answered by Orton or his lawyer, but I wanted them on the record.
“How’d you do it?” I asked. “Whose DNA was it?”
Orton didn’t answer. He kept his hand raised and pointing toward the door. Barnett started pushing me that way.
“What’s really going on here?” I yelled. “Tell me about dirty four, Dr. Orton.”
Barnett shoved me harder then, and I hit the door with my back. But I saw that the impact of my words hit Orton harder. Dirty four had registered with him and for a moment I saw the facade of anger slip. Behind it was … trepidation? Dread? Fear? There was something there.
Barnett shoved me into the hallway and I had to turn to keep my balance.
“Jack!” Emily cried.
“Don’t fucking touch me, Barnett,” I said.
“Then get the hell out of here,” the lawyer said.
I felt Emily’s hand on my arm as she walked by me.
“Jack, come on,” she said. “We have to go.”
“You heard her,” Barnett said. “Time to go.”
I followed Emily down the hall in the direction we had come from. The lawyer followed to make sure we kept going.
“And I can tell you something right now,” he said. “If you print one word about Dr. Orton or one photograph, we will sue you and your website into bankruptcy. You understand that? We will own you.”
Twenty seconds later we were getting into Emily’s car and slamming the doors. Barnett stood in the main entrance of the building and watched. I saw him looking down at the front license plate of Emily’s car. Once we were in, he turned and disappeared inside.
“Jesus Christ, Jack!” Emily yelled.
Her hands were shaking as she pushed the button to start the engine.
“I know, I know,” I said. “I blew it.”
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” she said. “You didn’t blow anything, because they fucking knew why we were coming. We were never going to get anything. They cleared everybody out of there, then started the phony dog-and-pony show. They were trying to extract information, not give it.”
“Well, we got something. Did you see his face when I said dirty four?”
“No, I was too busy trying to not get thrown into a wall.”
“Well, it hit him. I think it scared him that we know about it.”
“But what do we actually know?”
I shook my head. It was a good question. I had another.
“How’d they know what we were there for? I had it set up through corporate PR.”
“Somebody we talked to.”
Emily pulled out of the industrial park and headed back toward my Jeep.
“No,” I said. “No way. The two guys I talked to today, the detective and the lawyer, they hate Orton’s guts. And one of them gave me the name. You don’t do that and then turn around and warn Orton about why we’re coming.”
“Well, they knew,” Emily insisted.
“What about your FTC guy?”
“I don’t know. I don’t see it. I didn’t say anything about us coming down here.”
“Maybe he just tipped them off, said a reporter was sniffing around. Then Orton gets word from corporate in Indianapolis to let me in. He calls his lawyer guard dog and is waiting for us.”
“If it was him, I’ll find out. Then I’ll burn his ass at the stake.”
The tension from the confrontation turned to relief now that we were in the car and away from Orange Nano. I involuntarily started to laugh.
“That was crazy,” I said. “I thought for a moment the lawyer was going to go after you.”
Emily started shaking her head and smiling, casting off tension herself.
“I thought he was too,” she said. “But that was nice of you, Jack, to step in there between us.”
“It would have been pretty bad if something I said got you attacked,” I said.
A City of Irvine patrol car went streaking past us, its lights flashing but no siren engaged.
“You think that’s for us?” Emily asked.
“Who knows?” I said. “Maybe.”
22
Myron Levin frowned and told us that he needed to pull us off the story.
“What?” I said. “Why?”
We were sitting in the conference room—Emily, Myron, and me—after Emily’s and my long, separate rides back to L.A. We had just spent thirty minutes reviewing the events in Orange County.
“Because it actually isn’t a story,” Myron said. “And I can’t afford to have you chasing after something for this long with no results.”
“We’ll get results,” I promised.
“Not with what happened today,” Myron said. “Orton and his lawyer were ready for you and they shut that whole avenue down. Where do you go from there?”
“We keep pushing,” I said. “The four deaths are connected. I know they are. You should have seen Orton’s face when I said dirty four. There is something there. We just need a little more time to pull it all together.”
“Lo
ok,” Myron said. “I know there’s smoke, and where there is smoke there’s fire. But right now, we can’t see through the smoke and we’re hitting dead ends. I let you two run with this but I need you back on your beats producing stories. I was never convinced this was a FairWarning story in the first place.”
“Of course it is,” I insisted. “That guy down there has something to do with these deaths. I know it. I feel it. And we are obligated to—”
“We are obligated to our readers and our mission—consumer-watchdog reporting,” Myron said. “You can always take your suspicions and what you’ve found so far to the police, and that would take care of any other obligation you think you have.”
“They won’t believe me,” I said. “They think I did it.”
“Not once your DNA comes back,” Myron said. “Talk to them then. Meantime, go back to your stations, refresh your story lists, and let’s meet individually in the morning to sequence.”
“Damn it,” I said. “What about if Emily goes back to her beat and I stay on Orton? Then you don’t have half the staff on this.”
“Way to throw me under the bus, asshole,” Emily said.
I spread my hands.
“It’s my story,” I said. “What’s the alternative? You stay on it and I go back to the beat? That’s not happening.”
“And neither is your scenario,” Myron said. “You’re both back on the beats. Story lists in the morning. I have to go make calls.”
Myron stood up and exited the conference room, leaving Emily and me staring at each other across the table.
“That was really uncool,” she said.
“I know,” I said. “I think we were getting close.”
“No, I’m talking about you throwing me under. I’m the one keeping the story going and you were the one who fucked it up with that lawyer.”
“Look, I admit I messed up with the lawyer and Orton, but you said yourself it wasn’t going to go anywhere. And it was probably your FTC contact who tipped him off. But this thing about you being the one keeping the story going, that’s bullshit. We both had moves in play and were pushing it forward.”
“Whatever. I guess it doesn’t matter now.”
She got up and left the room.
“Shit,” I said.
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