“I gotta ask you a few more questions, Chief,” Sal said as he straightened out his slumping shoulders. “Have you pissed off somebody’s husband or boyfriend that I need to know about?”
“No.”
Sal gave him an uncomfortable glance. “Were you ever intimately involved with Jack Potter or Dora Manning?”
Kerney put his arms on the desk, clasped his hands, and looked Molina in the eyes. “You mean sexually, don’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“No, I was not.”
“What about Norm Kaplan?”
“Same answer.”
“Did you ever have a confidential informant you either had to lean on hard or bust? A guy who might still be pissed off about it?”
“Two,” Kerney said, and gave Molina their names.
“Did you ever put somebody in the slam you knew didn’t belong there?”
“You’re asking if I falsified evidence or gave perjured testimony.”
“Yeah.”
“No, I haven’t done that.”
“How about any threats you might have made to a perp?” Molina asked.
Kerney thought about Bernardo Barela, a young man who’d raped, murdered, and mutilated a woman near Hermit’s Peak, and then killed his accomplice, a state police officer’s son, to keep him silent.
As far as Kerney knew, Barela was on death row awaiting execution. He’d personally promised Bernardo that he would hunt him down and kill him if he ever got released, and that vow still stood.
Kerney nodded and gave Sal a brief summary of Barela and his crimes.
“Anyone else?” Sal asked.
Kerney shook his head, unclasped his hands, and leaned back in his chair. “No.”
Sal closed his notebook. “That’s it, Chief.”
“What about the Patterson death investigation?”
“From all indications, it was a clear-cut suicide,” Molina replied. “Detective Pino is pretty shook up about it, and Cruz Tafoya is in the same boat about the Larsen shooting.”
Kerney responded with silence.
“They’re good detectives, Chief.”
“They’ll just have to sweat it out until Lieutenant Casados finishes his IA investigation.”
“When will that be?” Molina asked, as he got to his feet.
“I’ll let you know, Sal.”
Molina stood at the door and nodded. “Sorry about all those questions, Chief.”
“They were the right ones to ask,” Kerney replied.
Lieutenant Robert Casados had two pastimes: weightlifting and singing baritone in a barbershop quartet. At six-foot-two he was a bit taller than Kerney, and carried himself with the easy poise of a big man used to being treated with deference. His size and voice gave Casados a command presence, which usually made just about everybody, including cops, eager to cooperate with him. Along with his physical attributes, Casados had an analytical mind and a degree with honors in sociology.
Sitting with Casados at the conference table, Kerney listened while the lieutenant laid out his findings. The SWAT call-out had been premised solely on Detective Pino’s unconfirmed belief that Larsen was armed with a gun, followed by the supposition of both Pino and Sergeant Tafoya that Larsen was attempting to elude them.
“Pino had no actual knowledge that Larsen had a gun,” Casados said, as he referred to a note. “She based her premise on Patterson’s non-verbal reaction to the question. In fact, the counselor Pino spoke to, Joyce Barbero, made it clear that guns were not allowed at the independent living center.”
Casados set his note aside and reached for another slip of paper. “However, the presumption that Larsen ran to elude the police does have credibility. Patterson placed a call to Larsen’s cell phone minutes after Pino left the apartment. Why he ran is still in doubt, although it could very well be because he knew it was illegal for him to possess a handgun.”
“Why do you say that?” Kerney asked.
“Twice in Santa Fe and once in Albuquerque he tried to buy a pistol, and was turned down each time when the records check came back identifying him as mentally ill. He got red-flagged through an out-of-state arrest stemming from a road rage incident some years back where he’d brandished a weapon at a passing motorist who’d cut him off in traffic. He got a deferred sentence based on his military record, his previous psych history, and a court-ordered agreement to enter and successfully complete a treatment program, which he did. As far as I know, it was his first and only offense.”
“How did Larsen go from being an informant wanted for questioning to a murder suspect?” Kerney asked.
“According to everyone I’ve talked to and the tapes of the radio traffic, he didn’t,” Casados replied. “The orders were to proceed with caution and find and apprehend only. Sal Molina made it clear that Pino and Tafoya briefed him fully by phone before he bumped the request up to Deputy Chief Otero to call out SWAT.”
“Do you think Molina is covering for his people?”
“Only insofar as he’s willing to take the hit on this as their supervisor,” Casados replied. “Sal has nothing to lose, he can retire and go fishing. Tafoya and Pino still have most of their careers in front of them. He’d hate to see their chances for advancement get derailed.”
“So what went wrong?” Kerney asked.
“Since it wasn’t a hostage situation, nobody thought to put a negotiator on the team that went looking for Larsen. That might have made all the difference.”
“Nobody on the team tried to talk Larsen into surrendering?”
“After Larsen opened fire, the SWAT commander ordered Larsen to toss his weapon and give up peacefully. All four officers said he responded with more gunfire.”
“They had cover and concealment?” Kerney asked.
“Affirmative, although the evidence at the scene shows that Larsen came close to taking out the point man.”
“How many rounds did the team fire?” Kerney asked.
“In all, thirty-five,” Casados said, giving Kerney an uneasy look. The figure was exact; policy required every officer to account for all department-issued ammunition down to the last cartridge. But that wasn’t what bothered Casados.
“Did all the officers fire their weapons?” Kerney asked, reading Casados’s discomfort.
“Yes, sir.”
“That’s a hell of a lot of firepower to stop the action of one man with a handgun. How many shots did Larsen get off?”
“I checked his magazine. Larsen fired four times, and he wasn’t carrying any spare clips.”
Kerney’s expression turned sour. “What else, Lieutenant?”
“Larsen took three rounds in the back, Chief.”
“Shit,” Kerney said.
“According to the team, Larsen was belly crawling to safety and firing at the same time. The point man caught him with a burst when he rolled towards some rocks.”
Kerney pushed back his chair and stared out his office window. This wasn’t good. In fact, it sucked.
“Do you want me to write up my report and submit it?” Casados asked.
“Not yet. I want you to tack the Patterson suicide onto your investigation,” Kerney replied, as he got up and walked to the window. “Go over all that happened with Patterson and Detective Pino from first contact to the time she was hospitalized.”
“Yes, sir. Is that all for now?”
Kerney turned and nodded. “Thanks, Robert. You’ve done a good job.”
Casados assembled his paperwork and left quietly.
The DA wasn’t going to like what Kerney had to tell him, and he was due at Sid Larranaga’s office in fifteen minutes.
Kerney didn’t like it either. The problem was much bigger than the tragic mistakes that had been made by his people. Maybe Sid was right about the overeager-ness of cop shops to use special weapons and tactics in every apparent high-risk situation.
He thought about it a bit longer. No matter what kind of discipline had to be served up to individual officers, the overriding problem was officer training. Sworn personnel needed to deal effectively with mentally ill informants, suspects, witnesses, and victims, no matter what the situation. He would get the ball rolling on a mandatory in-service program. It wouldn’t stop the uproar from the community, but it was still the right thing to do.