An Unladylike Murder, page 27
part #1 of Jessica Sloan Mystery Series
“How is that even possible?”
“Let me ask Logan. I’ll text him.”
JESSICA: Logan, can you please go to iPoirot. What can you tell me about an email account set up by David Coyne? Address is JohnWayne1234. iPoirot says that Ben Lopez has accessed it. How?
Thirty minutes later Jessica’s phone rang. She looked at the screen.
It’s Logan.
“What have you got for me, Logan?”
“David Coyne’s a naughty boy. The email account you sent me is bogus. It’s what we call a drop account.”
“I’ve never heard of that. What is it?”
“It appears that Coyne shared the password for the email account with both Juan and Ben Lopez. Coyne would write secret messages but would never send them to anyone. He saved them as drafts only. Because Ben and Juan had the password they could get into the account, open the draft, read it, then delete the message as if it never existed.”
“Can you recover the email drafts that were deleted?”
“Maybe, but that’ll take a warrant and then I’ll need some time.”
“How long are we talking?”
“With luck a few days to a week.”
“Sit tight and I’ll work on getting the warrant.”
Jessica found John. “You won’t believe what Logan found.”
After Sloan had finished, Cutter raised his eyebrows. “Now that is very interesting. I’m going to phone to get the warrant, then I’ll interview Ben.”
Chapter 83
Sloan watched Cutter walk into the room where he’d earlier interviewed Carloz Lopez.
She crossed her fingers.
Cutter clicked his camera to on. “For the record I’m Detective John Cutter and I’m interviewing Benedicto Lopez, aka Ben Lopez. Is that correct?”
Ben was looking at his hands and remained silent.
John’s using his soft, soothing voice, so he appears non-threatening.
“I’m afraid you need to answer. Is Benedicto Lopez your name?”
“Yes.”
Sloan watched as Ben’s eyes moved to the right.
He just told the truth.
“Good. Now Ben, we first talked the night that you were supposedly protecting Jill Gillberry and you were the one who supposedly found her dead in a stall in the Ladies Restroom at the Orpheum theatre. Is that correct?”
Ben was silent.
“You claimed to be standing guard outside the restroom with your brother, right?”
Ben continued to ignore Cutter.
“Ben if you stay silent this will go very badly for you. I’m only in here trying to help you out. Now once again, is that correct?”
“Yes.”
“Good.”
“Ben, I now know that you were involved in Jill Gillberry’s murder.”
Sloan watched as Ben’s eyes moved to the left.
He’s trying to make up an alibi. He’s going to lie.
“I didn’t… ”
“Stop right there, Ben. If you lie to me, things will go very poorly for you. It'll be your turn to talk in a moment, but right now, you just need to listen.”
That’s classic. Interrupting the suspect keeps their confidence low and doesn’t give them a chance to ask for a lawyer.
“Ben, we know for a fact that your cousin Renata Rodrìguez died using the device Jill Gillberry’s company provided to her and that her mother Sonia blamed Jill for her death and then threatened Jill’s life.”
Ben hunched his shoulders.
Cutter leaned across the table to get physically closer to Ben. “I need you to look at me, Ben. That was your motive for killing her. It was revenge. I can understand that and I don’t blame you for protecting your family’s honor.”
Ben squirmed then finally raised his eyes to Cutter’s face.
“Good. Now you’ve already told us that you were the only person who entered the empty Ladies Restroom. That means that only you had the opportunity to kill her.”
Ben appeared to be off-kilter; his eyes were searching the top of the table as he tried to come up with an argument.
“We have your fingerprints on the restroom stall and we even found your footprints on the restroom floor. So we know you went into the stall to inject her with air from the 200cc syringe.”
Ben was fidgeting with his fingers.
“I’ve sent your handgun off to our forensic lab to be tested. I’m sure they’ll find DNA on it where you whacked Jill on the side of her head to knock her out so you could inject her with the syringe.”
Ben’s probably feeling doomed.
As Ben licked his lips, Cutter paused before he lowered the hammer. “I’m afraid that since we can prove that you alone had the motive, means and opportunity to kill her, that is more than enough for a jury to convict you.”
Sloan watched as Ben moved his hands up to his face.
He knows he’s trapped.
“Look Ben, I believe that you killed her because it was a crime of passion. You and your entire family are grieving for the loss of your cousin Renata. Am I right?... Or did you kill her because someone paid you? If they did and you roll on them, we can cut you a deal.”
Ben’s voice cracked. “Renata was my cousin. She was familia.”
“You’ve already admitted that David Coyne hired you and Carl to escort and protect Jill Gillberry for that evening. Did he ask you to do more?”
John Cutter glanced at the camera because he felt Ben was about to confess and he knew Jessica Sloan was watching.
“If you don’t talk, we’ll assume that you and your brother Carl worked and conspired to commit the murder together. You’ll both get the death penalty or life in prison. If it was just you, spare his life and confess.”
Cutter felt the butterfly of anticipation in his stomach.
Ben will confess on videotape. Then I’ll have him write out his confession. Once it’s written, I’ll have Ben say that the confession was voluntary and not coerced. Then Ben will sign it.
Ben sat up straight and rubbed his eyes. “I want a lawyer.”
Cutter was shocked by Ben’s request. “If you want a lawyer, I won’t be able to help you Ben.”
“Lawyer.”
Cutter stood up to leave. “Last chance, Ben… Fine, do you want a court appointed lawyer?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t worry, you’ll be getting three cold meals and a lumpy cot soon enough.”
Feeling deflated, Cutter opened the door and stepped out into the hallway.
Sloan met him there. “What just happened in there?”
“I don’t know. Everything was going perfectly, until he asked for a damned lawyer.”
Chapter 84
Jessica wasn’t sure what she could say to pick up her partner’s mood. “At least we’ve taken the bad guys off the street.”
Cutter grimaced on one side of his face.
She faked a smile. “We already have hard evidence against Juan for hacking your phone and against Carloz for attacking me. I’m guessing we just need to keep at it until we can figure out if it was in fact only Ben that killed Jill. I thought you had him until you told him that you could prove that he alone had the motive, means and opportunity to kill her.”
“It’s been my experience that half the time whoever finds the victim is the murderer. If that’s the case, we need to figure out if it was just Carloz standing guard for him. We also need to prove Sonia encouraged him and that Coyne hired him knowing Ben was going to kill Jill.”
“Perhaps once we get the warrant for Coyne’s phony email account it’ll all come together.”
Cutter tried to wipe away his frustration by running his hand over his face. “It would have been better if Ben had just confessed. Now we still have a lot of questions to answer.”
“But we know that Ben, Carl and Juan must have plotted with Sonia to kill Jill Gillberry. We just need to figure out which one used the syringe to inject her.”
“We need to get the prosecutor to cut one of them a deal, so they’ll turn on the others. Then we need to keep finding all the answers until the prosecutor’s convinced he can get convictions. Don’t forget that it’s the prosecutor’s job to be skeptical of the story we put together. The prosecutor wants an air tight case so he’ll be telling us where the holes in our case are and what more we need to find for him.”
“Do you think it’ll be a long trial?”
“If we’re lucky this case won’t even go to trial. Ninety percent are resolved with plea deals. Once we show their lawyer the evidence we have, instead of murder one, they’ll plea to lesser charges, or they’ll plead guilty of the charge but will receive sentences less than the maximum.”
Jessica was disappointed. “I don’t think that’s fair. But you know, you were right when you told me that Jill’s murder might have happened because of an associated crime.”
“It happens a lot. This time it was because Jill’s product killed someone and her relatives wanted revenge.”
“I’ll remember that.”
“Every detective starts to get their wisdom teeth when they get a case like this one. It’s not about fairness. It’s about expediency. Going to court takes a lot of time, manpower and money. We need to update Brown so she can call the prosecutor to secure a certificate of determination for probable cause and ask that the entire family be held in jail pending criminal charges.”
“Don’t forget the warrant for Coyne’s email.”
“I won’t.”
Chapter 85
Ben Lopez was still in Interrogation Room One.
Sloan touched Cutter on the arm. “Look, you need to get answers as to why they were trying to kill the both of us.”
“I agree. But my guess is that they were just trying to scare us into stopping the investigation of their family.”
“Is that unusual?”
Please say yes.
“Let me put it this way. It’s not the first time, nor will it be the last.”
As they were discussing how to deal with Ben, Garcia walked in. “I’m afraid that the Lopez brother’s lawyer has arrived.”
Simon Ratner strode down the hallway towards them. “Detectives Cutter and Sloan, how very nice to see that you are continuing to be the intrusive arm of the law.”
Sloan snarled. “What are you doing here, Ratner?”
“I’m here to shield Sonia Rodrìguez, Ben and Carl Lopez and Juan Gonzalez from the power of big brother. And who am I talking to? A rookie detective on her first ever homicide case who’s been partnered with the oldest detective in Homicide, who is past his put out to pasture date.”
Cutter and Sloan wanted to arrest the blowhard. Instead, they let him talk. “You think you can barge in and interrogate anyone you want, making up accusations and then arresting them in order to start a fishing expedition. It’s my duty as a lawyer to shield them from you. Now then, where are my clients?”
“Sloan will you please get Carl and put him into interview room one with his brother.”
Cutter turned to Ratner. “Sonia and Juan are in their cells.”
“Please bring them all out here.”
“We don’t take orders from you.”
Ratner addressed Cutter. “I’d like you and Sloan to hear what I tell them, so I suggest you should bring Ben and Carl out here…”
“That’s not going to happen.”
Cutter was upset and Sloan could tell.
“What’s seems to be the problem here?” Lieutenant Brown appeared with her hands on her hips.
Ratner gave her a grin as he offered his hand. “I’m Simon Ratner, Attorney at Law, and who might you be?”
She shook his hand. “I’m Lieutenant Susan Brown and you’re in my squad room. So please tell me what you are doing here.”
“I’m glad you asked. It should go without saying that experimenting with predictive artificial intelligence in real-world law enforcement demands thorough testing and public oversight.”
“Would you please stop posturing and get to the point, Mister Ratner.”
“As I was about to say, I checked with the San Francisco Department of Technology and they told me that iPoirot was never approved to be used. Plus, it was never approved to be connected to the other software systems it requires. Since those things didn’t happen, I am here to advise you that the experiment you have been conducting is nothing but a beta-test and as such, is illegal.”
Brown, Cutter and Sloan all looked at each other in disbelief.
Other officers began to gather.
Ratner puffed out his chest. “As soon as I leave here, I will be filing a lawsuit on behalf of Ben and Carl Lopez, as well as Sonia Rodrìguez and their cousin Juan Gonzalez, against the City of San Francisco, the SFPD, the software’s developers, as well as Detectives John Cutter and Detective Jessica Sloan, personally.”
Ratner looked at Cutter, then Sloan. “I’ll be suing everyone for harassment, wrongful arrest, emotional distress and using an unproven, and therefore illegal system against my clients.”
Enjoying the confusion on everyone’s face, Ratner stood a little taller. “I’d now like to talk to my clients Ben and Carl in private.”
Lieutenant Brown snapped. “Detective Garcia, please escort Mister Ratner into the interview room to see his clients.”
“Yes, Lieutenant.”
Ratner stopped in the doorway. “If I find out that anyone listens in or tapes me, I’ll be suing them as well.”
Garcia walked away.
Cutter and Sloan stood and watched.
Hearing that they were about to be sued, they both felt like they had been blindsided and gut punched.
Cutter muttered. “I wish I could give our boy Ratner an old fashioned attitude adjustment. He’s a real Alpha Hotel.”
“What do we do now Cutter?”
“Let’s go get some coffee.”
Chapter 86
Sloan and Cutter sat in a corner and kept their voices low.
Leaning across the table, Sloan said, “Is what Ratner said real?”
“Probably, but we’ll have to wait and see.”
Sloan half whispered. “Given what we know, the killer must have been Ben.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Ben is the older brother and Carl does
what Ben says.”
“That makes sense.”
“Whether any women actually came out of the restroom doesn’t matter. Ben probably said there were three as a red herring.”
“Okay.”
“So Ben went in, killed Jill while Carl stood guard making sure a last minute female didn’t wander in.”
Cutter nodded. “And the motive?”
“Ben’s belief that his cousin Renata was killed by Jill’s product.”
“So, it was just revenge by the family?”
“No, I think Coyne helped them set it up.”
“What was his motive?”
“Embarrassment over his backing Jill and how she pulled the wool over his eyes. I also think Coyne figured we were closing in on him so he ordered the Lopez brothers to try and scare us off.”
Cutter raised his eyebrows. “If we can use
iPoirot, hopefully it’ll help us find enough evidence to prove your gut.”
“Nothing else makes sense to me.”
“I can’t argue with your logic, but going forward depends on what happens with Ratner’s claim that iPoirot isn’t legal.” Cutter stood up. “Should we head back to see what’s happening?”
Chapter 87
As they entered the squad room, they heard Lieutenant Brown’s voice. “Cutter. Sloan. My office. Now.”
For once, Susan Brown motioned for them to sit.
Cutter said what was on his mind. “What did Simon Ratner mean that iPoirot wasn’t approved?”
Brown held up her palms. “It’s too late. That’s why I called both of you in here. I was just notified by the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office that the iPoirot system has been shut down until our lawyers and politicians sort out the lawsuit that Ratner’s threatening against the Department and the city.”
“You forgot to mention that Ratner threatened to include both Sloan and myself in it as well.”
“You both need to focus on your jobs.”
Sloan was bewildered by what she was hearing. “Will the Police Department provide lawyers for us?”
Brown pouted her lips and looked down, but didn’t reply.
Cutter said, “No, Sloan. We’re on our own even though we were just following orders.”
Lieutenant Brown said, “Since the key to information connecting the Lopez brothers came from iPoirot, the information may turn out to be considered as fruit of the poisoned tree. I have been ordered to release the four of them.”
Sloan said, “But what about the fact Carl assaulted me?”
Brown shook her head. “They’ll argue his arrest was part of the poisonous tree.”
There was a knock on the door.
“Come in.”
Garcia cracked the door open. “Juan González and Sonia Rodriguez have been brought up from lockup. Along with Ben and Carl Lopez, they’re being released.”
John Cutter and Jessica Sloan stood up and watched out Brown’s window.
They sagged as they saw Simon Ratner strut by with the four people they knew had been involved in Jill Gillberry’s murder.
They were all swaggering.
Sloan was upset and confused.
They’re all wearing smug grins.
Cutter muttered under his breath. “We’ll see if Ratner’s right, once we get to court.”
Sloan’s voice was emotional. “We can’t let them get away with this.”
“Who said they’ll get away with it? You and I just need to start over by not using anything we found because of iPoirot.”
“You’ve got to be joking.” Sloan looked for hope on her partner’s face. “You’re joking right?”
“No, I’m not. You’ve got to get a hold of your emotions.”
“I’m not being emotional, I’m pissed.”
“I’m sure I’m not the first cop to warn you that you have to overcome emotions. They can kill you.”
