“But if you have two conflicting statements, how would that be resolved in the investigation?”
“The police would attempt to confirm each statement. If they conflicted, then one person would be lying, or possibly remembering an event differently. That’s why witness testimony can be difficult. Take, for example, if I’m standing on one side of the street and you’re standing on the other, and we both see a fight. Maybe I see a weapon and report that information. You don’t see the weapon because you’re at a different angle. You are emphatic that there was no weapon. The police would then search for evidence, as well as dig deeper into the interviews to determine exactly where we were standing, what might have been obscured, even ask if we are visually impaired.”
Lizzy motioned that there was a caller. She sent him a text message, which he showed to Regan.
Male, no name, says he saw C Monday.
Lucas took the call. “Hello, sir, this is Lucas Vega and Regan Merritt. When did you see Candace?”
“I’m not one hundred percent positive,” he began, “but after thinking about the last caller, who saw Candace on Tuesday morning coming out of the library, I’m ninety percent sure that I saw her in the library on Monday. It might have been Wednesday, but I think it was Monday. Before closing.”
“How certain are you that it was during the week Candace was allegedly missing?”
“Well, I know it was a Monday or Wednesday, and it was in April—I was tutoring those two nights in one of the study rooms all month. Basically, from when I got back from spring break until finals in May, but she was already dead by then, right?”
“Yes. Her body was found April 19.”
“So I don’t hang out at the library, but it’s convenient for tutoring. I was leaving, so it was between nine and ten. The library closes at ten, and my tutoring was from eight until whenever my student understood the lesson. I was walking out and I remember thinking she looked lost. I mean, she was hot, so I noticed her. I probably shouldn’t say that.”
“All memories are valid,” Regan said. “Where exactly in the library did you see her?”
“The study rooms on the second floor. I was coming out, about to go down the stairs. She was coming up. She had this big, huge bag. Too big for a purse, but too small for a suitcase.”
“Do you remember the color?” Regan asked.
Lucas wanted to ask why that was important, but remembered earlier when Regan said that asking about specific details could yield better information.
“Not really. Not black or anything dark, I don’t think. Maybe gray or pink or blue or something. I really don’t remember. Just a big bag, over her shoulder.”
“Do you remember what she was wearing?”
“A Lumberjack sweatshirt, I’m almost positive. Just one of the standard gray sweatshirts, said Lumberjacks across the front. You see them everywhere on campus.”
“So how can you be sure she was wearing one?”
“I don’t know. Maybe I’m wrong. But she was cute, like I said, and I kinda knew her—she was a year older than me, but I was in a frat, and she and some of the sorority girls would come over when we had parties and stuff. So I did a double take, you know, because like I said, hot, and she was completely oblivious. Just walked by me, and I said something like, ‘Good to see you, too, Candy.’ She looked at me and gave me that You’re an asshole look, and I laughed.”
He remembered a lot. Was it a real memory? Or real...but the wrong time frame? Lucas wasn’t certain. “Did you go to the police,” he asked, “when you found out she had been killed?”
“No, but I remember telling my roommate that I’d thought I’d just seen her.”
Regan asked, “You said that she was walking up the stairs from the ground floor to the second floor, after nine on possibly Monday or Wednesday night. Do you remember where she went from there?”
“Yeah, she went up to the third floor.”
“How can you be so sure three years later?” Lucas asked.
“I didn’t really think about it until now, after listening to your caller, and then it just came back.”
“And the police never asked you anything?” Lucas was having a hard time buying this story, that this guy saw Candace and then talked to her and never said anything to the police. “Did you ever talk to them?”
“I never even heard about what happened, I mean I heard she was dead, but no details, and it wasn’t something that we really talked about. It happened off campus, and it was awful, but you know, finals were coming up and stuff.” He paused. “That sounds callous.”
Regan said, “I understand what you’re saying. Did the police issue any kind of blanket statement? Asking for anyone to come forward?”
“Maybe? I don’t know. I didn’t hear about it.”
Lucas said, “The university sent out a campus-wide email Monday after Candace’s body was found, notifying the students that she had been found dead and the police were investigating. It said if you had any information about Candace’s disappearance, to contact FPD. That was it.”
“I didn’t even see that,” the caller said. “But I don’t read most of the campus emails. There’s a lot of junk in there.”
Regan remembered that was true—she got dozens of emails a week from the university on her school email, and most of the time she ignored them.
The caller didn’t have any other information, so Lucas wrapped up the call and, because Lizzy was frantically indicating to him that they had gone over their time, said, “We’ve learned a lot about Candace Swain tonight. Please dig into your memories and think about where you were the week she was killed. Did you see her on campus? In the library or her sorority or somewhere else, like our caller who saw her in Kingman? No matter how small a detail, if you saw Candace Swain, please call in. I’ll be back Friday at seven.”
Forty-five minutes later, Lucas and Lizzy were done with the technical end of editing and uploading the audio. Lizzy asked, “Wanna grab some food?”