He looked over his shoulder as the three came into the room.
“ ’Evening, gentlemen,” Dr. Mitchell said.
“Thanks for calling, Doc,” Tony Harris said. “Doc, this is Sergeant Jim Byrth of the Texas Rangers. Jim, Dr. Howard Mitchell, our distinguished ME.”
“Good to meet you, Doctor,” Byrth said.
“Same,” Dr. Mitchell replied. “I’d offer my hand, but…”
“I appreciate that,” Byrth said.
“Jim’s here in Philly hunting a guy who likes to lop off heads.”
Dr. Mitchell nodded as he kept stitching. “What a coincidence, eh?”
“Good to see you, Doc,” Payne said.
Dr. Mitchell didn’t take his eyes off his stitching. “Likewise, Matt.”
Payne had seen the crude sewing of other doctors on post-autopsy bodies. He knew that Dr. Mitchell’s neat suturing was done as a gesture of respect for the deceased, as well as for their families, who may or may not have to view the body for a positive identification.
Payne glanced at the female victim’s hands and feet.
He said, “Looks like the usual washerwoman effect.”
Now Dr. Mitchell did turn his head toward him. He had a look of mock surprise.
He said, “So you do pay attention to what I say! My day is now complete!”
Payne smiled and shook his head.
Dr. Mitchell and his eight full-time investigators held weekly meetings with police detectives. They updated the policemen on cases, reviewing new information and reminding them which bodies remained unidentified and held at the morgue. One such recent case had been the bullet-riddled body of a black male. The victim had been pulled from the Delaware River at the foot of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge that connected Philly to Camden, New Jersey.
Dr. Mitchell had explained to Payne the “washerwoman effect”-the term in modern society of course being the complete opposite of politically correct. But “washerperson” just didn’t seem to carry the same descriptive impact.
The ME had said that the wrinkles on the body were caused by its having been immersed in water for an extended period of time. They were particularly pronounced on the flesh of the feet and, of course, of the hands. The condition was consistent with that of a woman who spent a lot of time washing with her hands. Thus, its name.
Harris then said, “Anything unusual jump out at you, Doc?”
Mitchell shook his head. “You mean, except for not being able to do a cranial exam? Not that I’m complaining; that saved me a good half hour off the usual two-hour process.”
“Yeah.”
“Define ‘unusual’ in this business, Detective,” he said dryly. He then added, “Nothing beyond the grass particles embedded in the bone of the spinal column.”
“Tell us about that,” Payne said.
“Well, it’s clear that whatever was used to cut through the flesh and bone had previously been used in someone’s yard.”
Kerry Rapier told us in the command center that Javier Iglesia had mentioned he’d seen the grass embedded on the body.
“Like a pair of those long-handled shears?” Payne said.
Mitchell shook his head. “No, these weren’t leaf particles. These were fibers of grass. I could show you in the microscope, but that’s not necessary. It’s pretty clear to the naked eye. Here, look.”
He waved them over to the end of the table where the neck wound remained open. He pointed.
“Jesus!” Payne said when he saw the hacked bone and flesh. “She was whacked at-look at all those chunks taken out. Shears would have made a cleaner cut. I mean, cuts. From two sides.”
“Are those also metal fragments?” Byrth said.
“Good eyes,” Mitchell said. “Blade fragments, I’d say. I believe the severing was caused by either a very sharp blade from, say, a lawn mower or, more likely, a more brittle blade, such as a machete.”
“Well, now, that’s good news!” Payne said, the sarcasm evident in his tone. “There can only be-what?-ten, twenty thousand machetes out there? Or one particular one rusting on the bottom of the Schuylkill.”
Byrth raised his eyebrows. “Yeah, but it’s consistent with what happened to the two in Texas.”
Payne and Harris turned and looked at Byrth.
“They used machetes?” Payne said.
Byrth nodded. “It’s a common tool used by the Latino lawn-mowing crews in Texas. You’ll see them pruning bushes and tree limbs with them. Apparently they use them on tall grass, too. If you think about it, it’s a pretty efficient bush tool. By ‘bush’ I mean jungle. They used it wherever they came from in Central America; why not here?”
The three stood in a shocked silence as they watched the ME go back to suturing the body of the young Hispanic female.
Payne had a mental image of some Latino towering over young girls and flailing with the long-bladed machete, just hacking away at their necks.
What sort of animal does that? he thought.
Certainly a godless one…
Harris finally broke their silence.
“What happens next, Doc?” he said. “We got nothing back from the FBI on her fingerprints. No records, nothing.”
“The examiners will make the usual calls, trying to see if she’s a runaway or similar. But unless someone comes forward, I guess she’ll just go on the list with the other two.”
He nodded at a clipboard hanging on a hook by the door.
Dr. Mitchell explained: “We went ahead and wrote up the two Hispanic males from the motel explosion.”
The ME’s office had a Forensic Investigative Unit. Among other tasks, the FIU worked to identify human remains. Then, if successful, it contacted the next of kin.
Most unidentified bodies brought to the ME were identified within a matter of hours. This was accomplished by matching fingerprints to FBI database records. Folks who died violent deaths of a suspicious nature tended to have an arrest record, which of course included a full set of fingerprints. For those who didn’t have a rap sheet the size of a phone book, the identification sometimes was made using dental records or DNA matching, both of which tended to be more difficult than matches by prints. But, like the prints, these matches were indisputable.
There were those victims, however, who just could not be so matched. Decomposition and charring of the body topped the list of reasons why no records could be found on a John or Jane Doe. And so the ME’s office published a list of these non-name victims available for public review.
Payne walked over and collected the clipboard. He read the top sheet:
City of Philadelphia
Medical Examiner’s Office
Forensic Investigative Unit
Howard H. Mitchell, MD
Medical Examiner To date, using current methods, the Forensic Investigative Unit of the Medical Examiner?s Office has been unable to identify the following persons. It is hoped that this listing of unknown individuals and their description being made public will aid in our identifying them.
Anyone having any information that may help the FIU identify these person or persons is asked to contract the Forensic Services Manager at 215-685-7445.
CASE NUMBER: 09-4087
RACE: Hispanic
GENDER: Male
ESTIMATE AGE: 25-30 years ESTIMATE HEIGHT AND WEIGHT: 5?4”, 140 pounds DATE BODY FOUND: 09 September LOCATION OF BODY: Philly Inn, 7004 Frankford Avenue, Philadelphia DISTINGUISHING MARKS: tattoo of a tear drop at corner of right eye; tear drop incomplete, only bottom inked in PERSONAL EFFECTS: gold earring stud right lobe.
CLOTHING: LUCKY brand jeans size 34x32, [unknown] brand T-shirt size medium, NIKE athletic shoes size 10 BRIEF DESCRIPTION: Charred remains. The decedent was killed in the explosion of a meth lab. Clothing mostly burned. The decedent can be identified by dental record or DNA.