by C. Soto
Once everyone was ready to begin the day, they all gathered around 7:30 a.m. in the conference room and waited on the chief so they could debrief him on the developments of the case.
Eric walked in around 7:45 a.m. “Good morning everyone. What’s the update that we have so far?”
John quickly replied, “Chief, last night as you know a lady, Sara Carson was abducted. We received an alert around 10:00 p.m. We went to her house and spoke to her roommate, Savannah, and she gave us a description of Sara’s day and what she was wearing.”
John paused for a second to take a drink of his coffee, “Savannah let us know she received a text from Sara stating that she was going to stop at the grocery store off N. Boulevard on her way home from work. She rode public transportation. Last night we went to the store and were able to get surveillance from inside the store and confirmed Sara was there.”
Eric replied, “That helps. This will give us a closer timeframe from when she was taken.”
John responded, “Yes, we canvassed the surrounding area identifying what other businesses had cameras. We have identified an ATM pointing directly at the grocery store, then we also saw a T-shirt store that had cameras and at an angle that pointed at the bus stop and part of the grocery store. Derrick called the bus garage last night and already requested the records from Sara’s routes, so hopefully we’ll have the surveillance from the buses today.”
“Great news. At least there are leads to follow up on. Keep me posted on what you find out. I’ll have another team work with the bank to get the video as that may require extra paperwork to get those. For now, focus on the surrounding businesses.”
John responded, “Thanks, we’ll keep you posted on what we find out. We will also visit the other areas prior victims were found, and interview family members of those victims.”
Eric responded, “Sounds good. I’ll leave you guys to it.” He then walked out and headed towards his office.
The team gathered up their materials and got ready to leave. It was 8:15 a.m. by then and they needed to get a move on.
James asked, “Do we all want to ride together, or should I drop you off now at Tammy’s to get your vehicle? I know we planned on visiting the prior scenes together, but with a new victim I think us splitting up and surveying the areas separately may be better since we are working against the clock here.”
John replied, “Let’s get the canvassing done around the grocery store then afterwards we can pick up our cars before we split up.”
James started the car, “Sounds good. I think we need to retrace her steps for the whole day. If she was taken last night, the killer might have been following her the whole day, waiting for his perfect opportunity.”
Tammy responded “Yes, I’ll call the IT branch and ask the agents to request those videos from the businesses around those stops. If we are lucky, the cameras will have caught the killer driving his car.”
James headed towards N. Boulevard where their canvass would begin for the day. It took them about twenty minutes to arrive. He parked in the parking lot of the T-shirt shop, and they got out and walked into the store.
John taking out his badge introduced himself and asked to speak to the manager. The clerk attending the store was also the manager. John introduced the rest of the team while they showed their badges to show him.
The manager wearily asked, “Is everything okay, how can I help you today?”
John calmly speaking, “We had a lady that was abducted last night, and we believe her to have been in the area last night. I noticed the camera outside of your store. Is it functional?”
“Yes, it is working. We had some disturbances in the past where people were spray painting graffiti on the windows, so I got a system installed to deter any more vandalism.”
“Wonderful, would you mind sending that footage to our email that way we can see if she was recorded on your feed?”
“Yes, of course. Let me go to the back and get that sent. I’ll be right back.”
The manager came back about ten minutes later with the confirmation that he sent the video link. John pulled out his phone and saw the email and forwarded it to the IT unit for them to review. He didn’t want any delays in reviewing the footage while they were canvassing.
John asked, “Do you remember seeing anything unusual yesterday across the street around 5:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m.?”
The manager replying, “No, nothing out of the ordinary. It was a usual day. We were busy, so I wouldn’t have paid attention since I had customers around that time. I’ve been hearing about those murderers recently on the news. Is this connected?”
John replied, “It’s an open investigation, so unfortunately I can’t comment on an ongoing case. Keep your eyes and ears open though. If you hear or see anything not right, please give us a call right away.”
“Yes, of course!” The manager said.
The team having the information they came for, left the store, and got in the SUV.
John told James, “Well it’s about 9:00 a.m. Why don’t we head back to Tammy’s house and grab our cars. Then we can split up and canvass the prior locations and then head to the interviews. We can meet up late this afternoon to go over everything and compile our notes and see where we are at.”
“Sounds good.” James replied. He pulled out of the lot and headed towards the direction of Tammy’s house.
James pulled into Tammy’s driveway around 9:30 a.m. and they all got out. Tammy noticed a small package left on her doorstop.
Tammy while walking up to her doorstep said over her shoulder, “James wait up for a minute, I got a delivery, let me go check it out. I don’t remember ordering anything.”
This put a red flag up for James. “Hold on Tammy, let’s first see what the box looks like. If you were not expecting a package, we need to be cautious about this.”
The whole team stood back from where the small package laid. John took out his phone ready to record them opening the package.
Tammy stating, “James do you have a kit in your trunk?”
He quickly jogged back to the SUV while yelling over his shoulder, “Yes, hold on for a minute.”
John started to record the inspection of the package, just in case.
James grabbed his kit and hurried back. In the kit, he had a laser that had explosive sensors and could determine if a package had any combustible components in it. He took it out and started scanning the package with the laser. When it did not pick up combustible material in the package, he told Tammy, “I think it’s safe to pick up, there is no detection of bomb material in the package.”
Tammy picked up the package and unlocked her door and entered in the security code to shut off the alarm. They all walked towards her kitchen table where she set the package down and John recorded the box with the label slapped on it from a courier service.
Tammy took out scissors to open the small package up. Once opened, she found a USB stick. She set it down and went and grabbed a laptop that was secure with no information on it.
She said to the team, “This is creepy guys. Do you think the killer sent this? Who else would send me a flash drive with no return address through a courier service? John, keep recording in case it is connected to the case.”
Tammy powered up the laptop and stuck in the USB drive. The video player loaded, and there was a naked picture of Tammy in the still screenshot where you hit the play button to start the video. She immediately slammed the laptop shut not even pressing the play button.
Her face turned red from hurt, anger, and embarrassment that her teammates saw her in an uncompromised position. She felt violated that the killer recorded her getting ready to shower and captured her nudity on video. Further evidence of him peering through her windows. He left her this video to show how close he had been to her. That he could have gotten to her, and she didn’t even know it at the time. That he knew where she lived.
James wrapped her up in his arms, holding her, trying to provide comfort to her. He
knew and saw from her face how devastating this moment was for her. “Don’t worry about it Tams, I would never let anyone get to you. We’re all here for you.”
“Thanks James. If you don’t mind, I’ll take this in the other room, to make sure there’s nothing further on it that involves our victim.”
He responded with compassion in his voice, “Of course not.”
Tammy took the laptop and walked back to her bedroom and closed the door behind her as she sat on the bed. She took a few deep breaths before she opened the laptop’s lid again then pressed the play button. The only thing on the three-minute video was her getting undressed, laying out her clothes, then walking towards the bathroom to get in the shower. The video ended there. She sat and allowed self-pity for a moment while she sat watching the still image from the end of the video, the closed bathroom door that connected to her bedroom. She sat while tears streamed down her face. She would only allow herself a few moments before she got up and faced her teammates. She would fight to find this bastard and bring justice to his victims. While she was not his normal victim, her privacy was violated by the killer and the safe cocoon she built around herself had been shattered. After a few minutes, she took out the flash drive, and powered down the laptop and removed the battery.
She knew she had to turn in the flash drive as well as the laptop to ensure no virus was attached. It was a secure laptop that was made for evidence such as this. Both would be turned in as a part of evidence.
She called the chief from her bedroom to let him know what she received and what was on it. She would need to drop it off at the office, so IT could examine the drive for any malware/virus left behind or if this were the only thing on the file.
Eric picked up on the third ring, “Hey Tammy, what’s going on? Did you guys find something already?”
“Hey boss, yes and no. Nothing helpful to finding the killer, yet anyways. However, we stopped by my house so we could split up, since everyone’s car was here. Once we got here we identified a small package left on my doorstep. It was delivered through a courier service. James and I will check out the business here shortly.”
She paused while taking a deep breath, still rattled by the morning’s events. “The package contained a flash drive, which is a video of me naked from the prior night getting ready to shower. I will drop this off on our way to do interviews so IT can scan it to see if they can gain any information from the file.”
Eric’s heart dropped hearing the killer had targeted Tammy once again. “Man, I’m so sorry Tammy. I know how upsetting this is, are you okay?”
“Yea boss, I’m fine. Troubled by the turn of events, however, I’m not in danger and I am safe and with the team. I can’t say the same for Sara, we need to get out there and get this guy.”
“Yes.” He didn’t want to drag out his sympathy if she didn’t want to talk about it. He knew the video was sensitive and was obviously very troubling to her. “Well drop off the equipment and I’ll have them put a rush on it and see what it tells us.”
“Will do, sir. Talk to you later.”
“Okay. Talk soon.”
She walked out of her room with the laptop, battery, and flash drive under her arms. She looked in James’ kit and grabbed an evidence bag that is used for electronics. She placed the laptop, battery, and flash drive in the bag and sealed it.
James stood next to her for support. Tammy turned towards him, “We need to get this dropped off first before the interviews. I spoke with the chief, and he’ll let IT know to rush the diagnostics. We need to see what else is hidden on that drive if anything. The only thing showing on the file was the video of me.”
James responded, “No problem. We’ll get him Tammy. Until then I am sticking with you, I won’t leave you by yourself.”
“Thanks James, that means a lot. I’m glad you’re here. All you guys, I know everyone here has my back, and I am thankful for that.”
John responded, “Of course, we’re a team and that’s what we do for one another.”
Once Tammy had everything recorded properly for evidence, the team walked out, and she reset her house alarm. The team then headed their separate ways to begin the day of tracking the killer’s steps of where prior bodies were discovered.
Tammy told James, “After we drop this off, we need to stop by the courier service to see if they have any cameras or any payment information from whoever sent me this package.”
“Yes, every bit of information helps. He’s bound to make a mistake, like he did with leaving his footprints.”
“Do you think he left me a package since he knows I know he was there? Which means he was there again watching the next morning. Otherwise, why give himself away by leaving me a video of him watching me?”
“Maybe he’s trying to get under the FBI’s skin via you. Toying with us, letting us know he’s close. It could all be mind games to him. You know serial killers leave packages for law enforcement and play games with us all the time. Unfortunately, this time he’s doing it through you.”
“Yea, maybe. I’m pulling up my video feed from this morning, maybe somethings on there.” Tammy pulled out her phone and started her home security’s feed and rewound it to 7:00 a.m. that morning. She saw the courier van driving up around 8:15 a.m. and parked in front of her house. The driver, who was clearly dressed in their company’s attire, walked to her house, and set the small package down. They then scanned what appeared to be the bar code on the package, confirming the delivery. She watched as he walked back to the van and drove away. There was nothing inconspicuous about his delivery. Which was why the killer was using the service instead of delivering it personally. He had to have saw when watching her, that she had cameras on her property and a security alarm. He was too smart to be caught on camera. He must have studied the angles she had to know it wasn’t angled on the side of her house or was it just luck on his side?
This left her feeling paranoid. She rewound the video again and started from the middle of the night and quickly went through the feed. Stopping anytime she saw a vehicle or person to see if it was someone unknown to her. She didn’t see anyone that was not belonging to the neighborhood, so she thought maybe the killer wasn’t near her house last night or at least that the video picked up. She knew better than to rely on the assumption that unseen meant not there.
Once she was done looking at the feed, she looked up and saw they were in the parking space back at the office. She turned toward James, “Why didn’t you tell me we arrived?”
“You were so focused, I didn’t want to interrupt you, especially if you were able to get him on camera. Any luck?”
“No. I don’t know if I should be thankful or disappointed. Obviously, I’m thankful I didn’t see proof that he was invading my privacy again, but disappointed that we didn’t get him on camera now that I added security to my house yesterday. It makes sense though he wouldn’t be there last night since Sara was abducted yesterday.”
“Yea, unfortunately I think your right. Don’t worry, we’ll get him, may take a little bit longer.”
They both exited the vehicle and headed towards the entrance to drop off the evidence from this morning left on her doorstep.
As they made their way inside, they headed to the IT department to drop the package off. Once they arrived, they spoke to Supervisory Agent, Kimberly Parker, and signed over the evidence to her to keep the chain of evidence intact.
She looked at Tammy, “I’ll make sure no one watches the video unless necessary, we’ll only look into the embedded file to see the coding. Hopefully, there is evidence of the user’s coding or something useful to it. I am really sorry this happened to you.”
Tammy replied, “Thank you Kimberly. I appreciate the discretion on watching the video, as obviously it was not recorded with consent. I don’t want the whole office to see a video of me like that.”
“Yes, of course.” Kimberly reached her hand to touch Tammy’s shoulder. “We’ll let you know as soon as we find anything f
rom all the video feeds. We have a couple specialist right now reviewing the ATM’s feed we received from the bank. Others are reviewing the T-shirt shop’s feed as well. Along with the buses’ cameras and a few of the stores along the buses’ routes.”
“That is excellent news. The team hopefully should be back around 2:00 p.m. at the latest. We can all meet in the conference room to find out what was discovered. I’ll text Eric and the team to let them know of the updated plans.”
“That sounds good. See you this afternoon. Good luck with the interviews.”
Tammy and James said their goodbyes and headed back towards the SUV to begin their day of interviews. Once in the car, Tammy shot a text out to everyone to let them know they would meet with the IT Unit that afternoon.
Chapter 23
Derrick, John, and Emily arrived where the first victim, Marley, was found. It was on a bench under a veranda in one of the parks. As they got out of the vehicle, they walked around the area, scoping out the location and seeing what was near the vicinity. The area wasn’t around shopping centers and there was no nearby traffic. There was a parking lot to the left of the veranda, where they had parked. It was near, so the killer would be able to quickly move the body and place it under the veranda and leave without anyone passing by seeing him, especially since the road wasn’t near the veranda.
John looked online to read about the park. He wanted to see if there was a significance to the park. Wanting to find the reason, if there was one, on why the killer chose this place.
The Internet came back with results of being a great place for special event pictures. People posted engagement, wedding, and family photos that were taken at this location. As he looked around, he could see why this park was used. There were Florida Maple Trees, Purple and Yellow Tabebuia Trees as well as Crape Myrtle Natchez Trees and Palm Trees. The different colors combined created a beautiful backdrop for pictures. Internally he made a note, if he ever had a special moment to capture, he would use this place, as he saw the beauty of the park.