Ewing introduced us to Denise and explained the reason for our visit.
“Financial problems?” Denise said. “Harry Waltham comes to mind. He had to file bankruptcy after his wife had a prolonged illness. He missed a lot of work. Some of the other drivers complained about having to cover for him. Harry seems like a decent guy, though. Despite his money issues I can’t see him robbing a bank.”
The detective and I exchanged discreet glances. Desperate people sometimes took desperate measures. The police constantly arrested thieves, embezzlers, and con artists whom others had seen as upstanding citizens. Still, if one of the thieves was Harry Waltham, who were the others? Friends of his? Family members? Other bus drivers?
Despite Denise’s sense that Waltham wasn’t our guy, Jackson made a note of his name on her pad, adding his address and phone number after Ewing pulled it up on her computer. Ewing also showed us a photograph of Waltham. The guy was a light-skinned African American with short black hair, a longish face, and a strong chin. He appeared to be in his forties. He fit the general description of the man who’d brandished the rifle on the bus.
Turning back to the HR director, Jackson asked, “What about drug or gambling problems? Any drivers you know of with those types of problems?”
Denise’s face contorted as she appeared to be thinking things over. “We had a driver named Ronnie Butler who used to go to Vegas every time he took vacation. He eventually quit working here when he got a job driving a tour bus to the casinos in Oklahoma. I remember when he turned in his resignation he joked about finally getting his dream job, that he’d be able to gamble on the clock.”
“How long ago was this?” Jackson asked.
Denise sucked her lip in thought. “Two, maybe three months ago.”
Jackson jotted down his name and contact information, too. “What about disgruntled drivers? Anybody get reprimanded or fired and not take it well?”
Denise chuckled. “Does anyone take getting fired well?”
Jackson merely raised an impatient brow in return.
Denise sat up straighter in her chair. “We had to let one of our more senior drivers go recently when we discovered he’d been carrying a handgun on the job. He drove a late shift in east Fort Worth and said he didn’t feel safe without it. I felt bad for the guy, but carrying a weapon is against policy. We also terminated another driver last month. Three women accused him of groping them as he pretended to help them onto the bus. He claimed there was no truth behind their accusations, but when we searched his bus we also found a small video camera taped to the ceiling over the doorway. He said he didn’t put it there, but who else would put a camera on a city bus? Our guess was that he was using it to get a peek down women’s shirts. He’s been a real pain since we fired him. He’s written to the mayor, the city council, even his congressman.”
Jackson held her pen at the ready over her pad. “Their names and contact information?”
Denise provided the details. The man who’d been fired over the gun was Lewis Blakemore. The alleged groper/virtual peeping Tom was Phillip Gunderbaugh.
The detective thanked the women for the information and stood. “Soon as we figure this out, we’ll be in touch.”
We exchanged parting handshakes and walked back outside to my cruiser. I loaded Brigit back into her enclosure and climbed into my seat.
Jackson slid into the passenger seat, gestured to my laptop, and held up the list of names she’d compiled inside. “Let’s do a little triage. See which of these men look the most promising.”
I set about pulling up information on the men Denise had mentioned.
The web offered little on Harry Waltham, the one with the sick wife and the pending bankruptcy. He had no Facebook page. No Twitter account.
Jackson waved a hand. “Next.”
I ran a search on our next potential subject. Ronnie Butler, the gambler, had a Facebook page replete with posts about his gambling escapades. A post from last week stated: Lost my shirt at the blackjack table! Evidently, his luck had changed. An entry from earlier today read: Won $300 on a Double Diamond machine at the Flamingo!
I pointed at the post, which showed it had been entered only four hours ago. “Looks like he’s in Vegas.” Of course the entries could be faked, posted to throw us off his trail. For all we knew, he was right here in town.
Jackson pulled out her pen and wrote “Vegas?” next to Butler’s name on her list. “That brings us to Lewis Blakemore, the guy with the gun. See if he’s got a record.”
I ran his name through the criminal database. “Nope. He’s c-clean.”
I googled his name next. Like Waltham, he’d kept a low profile online, only a few items popping up. I clicked on the first one, which led me to an amateur website someone had put together for the Blakemore family’s 2014 reunion. Lewis Blakemore appeared in a wide-angle photo with approximately three dozen extended relatives, all of whom resembled each other to some degree. Being one of the taller people, he stood at the back, visible only from the shoulders up. He wore a wide smile and a blue-and-white striped cap. He also appeared in a second photo, a close-up shot of him holding a toddler, both of them wearing the striped hats this time, as well as sunny smiles. A third photograph featured him sitting in the shade on the bank of a river flanked by two adolescent boys. While Blakemore wore no hat in this photograph, he held a fishing rod, as did the boys on either side of him. The final photograph of Blakemore showed him shooting skeet with the same two boys he’d been fishing with.
Hmm … If a picture is worth a thousand words, some of those words would be “family man” and “doting grandpa.” He appeared to be nothing more than a normal middle-age man with a possible gun fetish. Not unusual in Texas.
Jackson glanced at the page, her gaze roaming over the photos. “Not sure I’m feeling it.”
“Should I open the other links?” I asked.
“First let’s take a look at that last guy. The groper.”
When I typed Phillip Gunderbaugh’s named into my browser and hit the enter key it was a wonder my computer didn’t explode. The search returned over a thousand results.
“Whoa.”
Gunderbaugh had posted what appeared to be hourly rants on his Facebook page, complaining about his termination on the baseless accusations of a few stupid whores! to the sons of bitches who’d refused to give him a fair hearing! He encouraged the citizens of Fort Worth to boycott the Transportation Authority via a three-stanza rhyme: They all lied! Support driver pride! Don’t take a ride!
A look at the man’s Twitter account showed he’d sent over three hundred tweets, ranging from a relatively benign Fort Worth bus system unfair to drivers! to a more insidious Fired unfairly! Ft Worth Transportation Authority fucked me over! and If FWTA thinks I’ll go down without a fight they’ve got another thing coming!
Jackson pursed her lips. “He doesn’t seem to have moved on.”
“That could explain the bus-jacking,” I noted. Stealing a bus, disrupting service, and making the department look incompetent would be a fitting revenge. “But what about the bank robbery? How would that play into his scheme? And who would be willing to go along with him?” After all, the guy seemed certifiable.
Before we could speculate further my shoulder-mounted radio went off. “We’ve got a report of a fire and robbery at a convenience store. Three male suspects. Two Caucasian, one African American.”
As the dispatcher gave the address, my eyes met the detective’s. Three men, two white, one black? Another fire and robbery? It had to be the same suspects we’d been tracking.
Jackson strapped her seatbelt into place. “Let’s go!”