Bloodville (3 page)

Dr. Basil Wang, the coroner from Grants, declared Bud Rice and Blanche Brown officially dead at 10:20 p.m.
State Police Criminal Agent Jim Bob ―Doc‖ Spurlock arrived from Gallup in time to see the bodies loaded into the back of a undertaker's hearse. Doc walked over to Captain Mat Torrez, his boss, as the black Cadillac drove away.
―Evenin‘, Cap. I hope them bodies is on the way to the morgue and not some embalmin‘ parlor,‖ Spurlock said.
Torrez liked Spurlock and well knew the agent‘s record as a firstrate criminal investigator. ―They are. Indian Hospital in Albuquerque. We couldn't get an ambulance to come all the way out here just for two dead bodies.‖
―Figures,‖ Doc said. ―IDs?‖
Torrez looked at his clipboard. ―Rice, Howard Neil, AKA Bud, white male American, born January 17, 1913, age 54. Brown, Blanche, white female American, born December 22, 1885, age 82. Both shot. Motive appears to be robbery.‖
―What's the drill, Cap?‖
―You're case agent. Virgil Vee will help you with the crime scene as soon as he gets here, and I‘ll keep him on the case with you as long as I can.‖
―Suits me. Who already went inside there and screwed up the evidence?‖ Doc rubbed his hands to warm them against the cold which had dropped to near freezing.
―Let me see,‖ the captain said as he flipped over several pages on his clipboard, ―McGee, Gutierrez and Posey were here first. Colonel Scarberry. Sergeant Al North. D. A. investigator Jim Mitchell. Basil Wang. Hearse driver and his helper. Me. Flossie Rice. The housekeeper. Maybe a half-dozen other uniforms. Fifteen. Maybe twenty.‖
―Mighty well protected crime scene, ain't it?‖
The captain rolled his eyes toward heaven. ―You know how it goes, Doc. Everybody wanted a look. Do the best you can. Colonel Scarberry‘s here. He‘s being a real
cabróne
. He‘s running around here somewhere with tears in his eyes and ranting like
un loco
. You‘d think Bud Rice was his first born son.‖

Charles Scarberry, at age forty-four, had more than twenty years behind him in a New Mexico State Police uniform. He'd played the politics and done department dirty tricks necessary to move up through the ranks at a steady pace. Mat Torrez well remembered the deal Scarberry worked with former Chief John Bradford five years before to get himself transferred to headquarters and promoted to captain over several lieutenants with more seniority and better training. The deal was simple: as a captain in Santa Fe, Scarberry'd be in a position to pressure several subordinate officers Bradford considered enemies—Lieutenants Mat Torrez and Mo Candelaria among them— into leaving the department, without Bradford soiling his hands. Bradford also knew that if he didn't promote Scarberry, he‘d create a formidable political enemy, one who seemed to move well in both major parties. As a captain, Scarberry made the professional lives of Torrez and Candelaria miserable. He couldn't make them quit but a half dozen other officers found new employment. As a reward, Bradford, just before he retired, promoted Scarberry to deputy chief.

Scarberry‘d hoped for the chief's slot when the new governor, Dave Cargo, took his oath of office in January of 1967. His personal support for the Republican candidate was obvious to all. The deputy chief openly handled special errands for Cargo during the campaign and no high-ranking State Police commander minded that he used state owned cars and police personnel to do it. But Captain Sam Black, a bespectacled, cigar-smoking veteran of twenty-five years service, got the job instead and Scarberry got the consolation prize: he kept his position as deputy chief. It was better, Scarberry reasoned, than a bullet in the ass, but not much, especially since Black's new organization plan included the promotion of Mateo Torrez to captain.

One year older than Scarberry, Mat Torrez looked ten years younger. No gray streaked the captain‘s ample head of jet-black hair. His well-cut conservative suits fit his lean body comfortably and the captain carried about him an air of quiet authority and confidence. Consistently fair and even-handed, his subordinates in the Criminal Division liked and respected him. Scarberry would have put Torrez in uniform and sent him to the Tucumcari District but Sam Black wouldn‘t allow it and Scarberry knew better than to take on the chief—and the governor by extension—over a personnel matter.

Lt. Morris Candelaria and Criminal Agent Doc Spurlock weren't so lucky. Scarberry assigned them to Gallup, considered by many officers the Siberia of the New Mexico State Police. In Candelaria's case, Scarberry considered the transfer a matter of self-preservation. The ambitious young lieutenant had a large family and good political connections in Santa Fe and Albuquerque and the deputy chief wanted him out of sight and out of mind.

With Doc Spurlock it was a matter of personalities. Scarberry didn't like Doc, didn't like the way the agent dressed in western attire, high-heeled boots and Stetson hat. It annoyed the deputy chief that he couldn't find a regulation that forbade such clothing. ―Phony-baloney cowboy shit,‖ Scarberry called it one day in conversation with Chief Sam Black. ―He wants to dress like that, he should get in the movies.‖

―It ain't phony with Doc,‖ Black said. ―The boy‘s for real. Born and raised on a ranch down by Roswell. Rodeo bull rider.‖

―Bull rider. Bullshit. There ain‘t no real cowboys left.‖ Scarberry, born and raised in New York City, believed what he said. He tried to put Spurlock, a ten-year veteran back into uniform in Gallup but Captain Mat Torrez, by way of Chief Sam Black, was able to keep Spurlock assigned to the Criminal Division. It still amounted to half a victory for Scarberry. Spurlock—and his wife Patsy—very much craved assignment to a duty station closer to home: Roswell, Hobbs or Carlsbad. Gallup was about as far away from home as the deputy chief could assign him. The three-hundred and fifty odd road miles between Gallup and Roswell were enough to require that Doc take annual leave when he visited his parents or in-laws. Department rules forbade officers being more than two-hundred miles from duty stations on days off.

At about ten-thirty on the night of the murders, Scarberry stepped out the front door of the Budville Trading Post and looked around the parking lot as he pulled on his gray trimmed black uniform coat. All conversation stopped as police officers of all kinds waited to hear what he‘d say. The deputy chief's eyes fell on the captain in charge of the Criminal Division.

―Torrez! Front and center!‖

Captain Torrez clapped Spurlock on the shoulder and took ten steps to face the deputy chief. ―Yes, Chief.‖
―Roadblocks up?‖ Scarberry demanded.
―Roadblocks backing up roadblocks.‖

―Where are they?‖ At six feet two inches tall, two hundred twenty pounds and uniformed with gold braid on his cap‘s black visor and silver oak leaves on both his gray shirt collars and coat epaulets, Scarberry made an imposing figure. His puffy cheeks and eyes were noticeable even in the shadow cast over his face by the visored cap he wore in the military manner: two fingers off the nose. The cap covered a mostly bald head. His coat remained open because he couldn't close and button it over his ample belly and holstered gun.

The captain looked at his clipboard and ticked off roadblock locations as if reading a laundry list:

―Route 66 west at the Chief Rancho Motel; I-40 a mile east of Grants;
I-40 a mile east of Gallup at Rehoboth; I-40 at Nine Mile Hill west of Albuquerque;
U. S. 85 just north of Socorro at Escondido;
State Road 6 between Wild Horse Mesa and Los Lunas; State Road 117 at Paso Angostura;

The Zuñi tribal cops are set up on Route 53 at the Fence Lake Road turnoff. If we got them up in time, the killer can‘t get out of the area in an automobile.‖

―Tribal cops,‖ Scarberry said scornfully. ―It's a damn good thing the killer‘d have to get past a couple of our roadblocks first. Tribal cops'd never grab the guy. What about up north?‖ Scarberry had served nearly seven years on patrol in the Budville area. He knew the answer to the question before he asked it.

Torrez spread a map on the hood of a police car. ―There is no road north that goes anywhere except up on Mt. Taylor or into Indian land. None of them runs through to anywhere except for the old dirt road to Moquino northeast from the Seboyetta-Laguna Road and it‘s in bad shape, washed out in a couple of places. Jack Elkins said so. The sheriff has a car up there at Bibo watching anyway. We have notified District Ten in Farmington and the San Juan County Sheriff's office. Rio Arriba and McKinley County sheriffs have been notified, too.‖

―Sheriffs!‖ Scarberry nearly shouted and then looked around until he spotted Jack Elkins talking to the DA‘s investigator, Jim Mitchell. The deputy chief turned his back toward Sheriff Elkins and took Torrez by the arm and led him in the opposite direction. ―What the hell‘s the matter with you? I don't want no beer-guzzlin', dumb-ass deputy like Lupe Soto watchin‘ that Moquino Road. We ain't countin' on sheriffs or Indians for nothin‘. You understand me? You get one of our units up there to watch the Moquino Road and one down to Zuñi, too. I want this guy caught.‖

―Yes sir.‖

 

―What about south? What about that road from Acoma down to Pie Town?‖

Torrez looked through some notes on the clipboard. ―That's a Forest Service road but it‘s maintained by the Acoma Tribe. It's washed out between the Brushy Mountain fire tower and Little Cibolla Springs, right at the bottom of the escarpment.‖

―How do you know?‖
―Indian cops said so.‖
―How the hell do they know?‖
―Damn, Chief. It‘s their territory. They should know.‖ ―Don't get smart with me, Captain. They‘re Indians. Get one of our

cars down there. You got anyone canvassing the bars up and down the Old Road yet?‖
―I'm waiting for more criminal agents.‖
―Hell with that. You get these uniformed guys movin‘. They ain't doin‘ nobody no good standing around scratching their balls, fartin‘ and suckin‘ on cigarettes. I want a license plate number off every car in every bar parking lot between Albuquerque and Gallup. I want a statement from every drunk in every bar, and every bartender, too. What about airplanes?‖
―Troy McGee‘s got a couple of buddies in Grants with planes. They‘ll be up at first light.‖
―Who's gonna handle the case?‖

―Spurlock will be case agent. Virgil Vee will help him out.‖ ―You handle it. Personally.‖
―Chief, there is still the matter of Reyes López Tijerina and the

Tierra Amarillo raid. I have my hands full. We‘ve got witnesses to locate and interview. The DA in Santa Fe wants a better case than we‘ve built so far.‖

Chief Black had personally assigned Torrez to investigate the Tierra Amarillo courthouse raid, an incident in which State Police officer Nick Saiz and jailer Eulogio Salazar were shot and wounded when twenty members of the so-called
Alianza Federal de los Mercedes
, led by Reyes Tijerina, attempted to take over the Rio Arriba County court house the previous June. No one was killed but hundreds of shots were fired and a newsman kidnapped. Governor Dave Cargo had activated the National Guard. The governor and the press would both love to hear that the courthouse raid investigation had been dropped in favor of the Bud Rice killing.

―I think Doc can handle this ok, Chief.‖

Scarberry ignored what Torrez said. ―You handle this case personally and I want you to get ahold of Chief Paul Shaver at Albuquerque PD. You tell him I want a couple of his crime scene people out here. Photographer too.‖

―I‘m not sure we need....‖
―Don't you by-god argue with me, Captain. Just fuckin‘ do it. A goddamn cowboy like Spurlock don't know a crime scene from Shea Stadium and I ain't got a hell of a lot of faith in your brown ass either, but you're all I got.‖ Scarberry turned away from Torrez and walked back toward the store. He stopped beneath a floodlight affixed to the wall above the front door and he turned back with fresh tears in his eyes. ―Torrez,‖ he said loudly enough for all to hear, ―you get this thing moving. No one sleeps, no one rests, ‗til this son-of-a-bitch is in custody. Or dead. That clear?! I want an arrest in twenty-four hours.‖ He went inside and unnecessarily slammed the door shut behind him.

Neither Bobby Gutierrez nor Juan Posey had a police car. They stood together in the parking lot, apart from other officers. No one talked to them, the traditional treatment for rookies. They listened to Colonel Scarberry yell at Captain Torrez and they watched as the captain assigned officers to various jobs sending them off in different directions. Soon only three police cars remained parked in the driveway of the Budville Trading Post. Two officers, other than Gutierrez and Posey, were inside one of them and out of sight. Captain Torrez went around the corner into the dark to relieve himself. Scarberry stepped out of the store and into the dim light of the parking lot. His eyes fell upon the two rookies.

―What the hell you two doin‘?‖ He faced them with his feet planted wide apart, fists on his hips.

―Nothing, Chief, we....‖ Gutierrez stood at attention as he addressed the deputy chief.
―Where the hell is Torrez?‖
―Around the corner, sir.‖

―Torrez! Get your ass out here!‖

 

The captain emerged from the darkness, zipping his fly. ―Yes,

Chief?‖ Angry, Torrez spoke in a strong, even voice.
―What the hell these two doin'?‖
―They‘re rookies.‖
―Sorry ass lookin‘ rookies, too. Get 'em busy.‖
―They don't have a car.‖
Scarberry looked around the parking lot. ―Whose car is that?‖ ―Officer McGee's unit, sir.‖ Gutierrez said.
―Where's McGee?‖
―Al North took him to Grants to arrange for the airplanes,‖ the

captain said.
―Give his car to these guys.‖
―Damn, Chief,‖ Torrez said. ―That is not the way....‖
―Don't argue with me, Torrez.‖
―We don't have the keys for it....‖
―Then hot-wire it, damnit!‖
―No need, sir,‖ Gutierrez said. ―Officer McGee gave us each a key

in case we had to get in the car in a hurry, or something.‖ ―Get busy!‖ The deputy chief went back into the store and
slammed the door behind him again.
―I didn't mean to get you in no trouble, Captain,‖ Gutierrez said. ―Don't worry about it.‖ Torrez felt pain behind his eyes as if his
sinus cavities contained molten lead. With two years more service on
the State Police than Scarberry, he didn't appreciate being treated like
a
pendejo
by the deputy chief, especially in front of a couple of
novatos
.
―There's a bar down the road about a mile, give or take. On the south
side. I don't know the name of it. You two go check it out then come
right back here.‖
Captain Torrez went into the store and closed the door quietly behind him. The conversation that followed between the Captain and
the Lieutenant Colonel is lost to posterity but many of those most
closely involved in the Rice/Brown murder investigation noted that
the relationship between the two senior officers became quite formal
for a time and the deputy chief did not soon again raise his voice to
the commander of the Criminal Investigations Bureau, at least not
where anyone else could hear it.