“Not all the evidence,” Kins said. “There’s still the problem of the lack of fingerprints on the sculpture, and the kid’s prints on his father’s shoe, which doesn’t fit with either story.” He looked to Cerrabone. “Can we charge them both and see if one of them blinks?”
“Not with what we currently have. Not without risking having the charges against both of them dismissed.” Cerrabone massaged the back of his neck, a habit when he got frustrated. “Besides, Berkshire would see through it and use one against the other to raise reasonable doubt as to both. This seems calculated to me.”
“Could be the reason Berkshire let Angela tell us her story,” Kins said, “So we’d have two competing stories and not be able to prove which one is the truth.”
Tracy pressed her temples, feeling the beginning twinge of a headache. “Berkshire’s a scumbag, but that’s his daughter and his grandson.”
“I know, but if it’s the only way to get his daughter off . . .” Kins said, letting the thought linger.
Cerrabone leaned against the edge of the table. “This was already going to be a difficult case with the domestic violence allegation. Now . . .” He let out a breath and shook his head. “I’m not sure where it leaves us.”
“This is why we should have GSR kits at every homicide,” Kins said, referring to gunshot-residue kits. Detectives could use them to take swabs of a person’s hand to detect primer and gunpowder residue. SPD didn’t use the kits because they weren’t conclusive. They could prove only that a person had been near a discharged weapon, not that he necessarily fired it.
“But we don’t,” Cerrabone said. “And it’s too late now.”
“He’s declined an attorney,” Kins said. “Why not go back in and confront him with the discrepancies in the evidence.”
“If we do and this is a ruse, we’d be educating him and his mother and Berkshire,” Tracy said. “That just gives them time to come up with something to explain the discrepancies. I say we keep that to ourselves for now.”
“Couple other problems,” Cerrabone said. “One, he might technically be an adult, but he looks fourteen. Berkshire, or whoever they get to defend him, will say he was scared and intimidated, and a jury will buy it. Two, unless they both recant and tell the same story, we have reasonable doubt up the wazoo, whoever we charge. Berkshire would, without a doubt, refuse to waive a speedy trial, and we could lose any chance of ever convicting either of them. I’m going to talk this over with Dunleavy,” he said, referring to the King County prosecutor, Kevin Dunleavy. “I’m going to recommend that we let them both go for now. Meanwhile, we’ll continue to work this and see if something shakes free. It always does.”
“Yeah, but in the interim, this isn’t going to play well in the media, especially if the brother raises hell,” Kins said.
“So talk to him,” Cerrabone said. “Explain the situation. Tell him we’re not giving up, but we need time to work the evidence.”
Tracy and Kins looked through the one-way glass. Connor Collins sat with his legs extended, head tilted back. Their would-be grounder had not just taken a bad hop; it had become a fly ball into the sun, against a bright-blue sky, and neither Tracy nor Kins were wearing sunglasses.
CHAPTER 11
The following morning, Tracy and Kins called Cerrabone, who’d spent a late night talking with Dunleavy. He had agreed with Cerrabone’s assessment not to charge either Angela or Connor Collins, but to wait until they’d developed more evidence.
“And nothing yet from Berkshire?” Kins asked, still puzzled by Berkshire’s silence.
“Not a word,” Cerrabone said.
They all had expected the Berkshire they knew to be raising holy hell that they’d taken a statement from Connor without an attorney present. “Could be further evidence he’s orchestrating all of this,” Kins said.
“You get a hold of Mark Collins?” Cerrabone asked.
“Faz and I are heading out that way now,” Kins said.
With a seeming stall in the Collins case and Kins and Faz working the evidence, Tracy turned her attention to Kimi Kanasket. She ran the names Earl and élan Kanasket through Accurint, a database that provided access to public records, which meant it provided last known addresses. Going back forty years, Tracy suspected she was testing the limits of the system, but she was relieved to find a matching address in Yakima for both men. A quick Google search confirmed the address was on the Yakama Reservation. On a hunch, she also ran Tommy Moore’s name through the same database and determined that Moore also lived on the reservation.
Next, she ran all three men through a Triple I criminal background check. Moore had been arrested in 1978, 1979, and 1981, each time for drunk and disorderly conduct. On one of those occasions, he’d also been charged with assault and battery. In 1981 he’d been charged with breaking and entering, and in 1982 he’d spent time in jail for possession of a controlled substance. After that, his record was clear. The lack of any further arrests was ordinarily a strong indication the criminal had died, but the recent utility records said otherwise. Tracy wondered if Moore was one of the lucky few who had managed to somehow turn his life around.
Neither élan nor Earl Kanasket had criminal records.
Tracy also ran the men’s names through the Department of Licensing database and obtained current and available prior driver’s licenses. DOL’s policy was to purge older license photos, but Tracy had found she could often go back three to four license cycles—ten to twelve years. She needed the current photos for herself. She would need the older photos if she tried to refresh someone’s recollection about any of the three men. It helped to have a photo as close in appearance to the time of the event being discussed, like Kimi Kanasket’s senior photo. That thought made her scribble a note to also go to the Stoneridge Library to browse through high school yearbooks and old newspapers from that period to get a pulse of the school Kimi attended and of Stoneridge during that time.
When she’d finished, Tracy called Jenny and told her she would be coming back to Stoneridge.
“Your captain approved you working the case?”
Jenny knew of Tracy’s relationship with Nolasco, since she’d been at the Academy when Tracy kneed him in the groin and broke his nose after he’d groped them both during an arrest scenario. “Not exactly. I’m using some personal time.”
“I hate to see you do that,” Jenny said. “I could make some calls.”
“Don’t worry about it. I lose the time if I don’t use it by the end of the year.” She told Jenny what she intended to do and said she’d call her when she’d checked into a hotel.
“No sense doing that,” Jenny said, “especially if you’re the one footing the bill. You can stay at my mom’s. We sent her off on the cruise today with her sister. You’d have the whole house to yourself.”