Thrill Kill (18 page)

Sinclair wasn’t surprised to encounter locked doors at the entrance to Caldecott Academy. Although private schools were not as frequent targets of school violence as public ones, they were not immune, and even though the school was nestled in the redwoods not far from Montclair Village, the crime and violence that plagued the Oakland flatlands were only a ten-minute car ride away. He and Braddock stood in a covered alcove facing two reinforced glass doors. To their left was a thick glass window similar to what many inner-city banks place between their tellers and the customers. A tall, thin woman wearing large, black-framed glasses smiled at them. “May I help you?”

Sinclair pulled his badge from his belt, held it up to the window, and said, “Sergeants Sinclair and Braddock. I called about seeing Lisa Harper.”

Sinclair pulled open the door when it buzzed and made an immediate left into the office. A waist-high counter separated a waiting area with six chairs from an open office area with three desks, behind which were two closed doors, labeled
Headmaster
and
School Counselor
. “Mrs. Harper’s expecting you. Make a left out the door, take your first right, and follow the hallway to room fourteen.”

The hallway was empty but filled with a steady din of laughing and screaming kids coming from the direction they headed. “Tell me again why we’re talking to Harper?” Braddock asked.

“To verify Whitt’s story.”

“Tell me again why we’re focusing on Whitt?”

Her questions caused him pause. They had originally interviewed Whitt not because they thought he was the killer, although Sinclair couldn’t rule him out, but because they thought he knew Dawn better than her other clients and could provide useful background. Although they hadn’t talked about it, Sinclair figured Braddock shared his suspicions. After they were stonewalled at NorCal, Sinclair grew more suspicious of Kozlov, and once Fred explained how Whitt, Yates, and Kozlov were intertwined, his suspicions grew. Now he wondered if he had gone off on a tangent when the real trail to the killer was elsewhere.

“Can you just bear with me while we talk to her?” Sinclair asked. “When we’re done, we’ll head back to the office and figure out what direction we want to head in.”

“It’s your case, but if you shared with me what you were thinking occasionally, maybe I could help.”

She was pissed off. He’d worry about it later. Sinclair pushed open the door to room fourteen. Four rows of desks took up the center of the room. Windows on one wall. A wall of whiteboards filled another. Bulletin boards covered with bright artwork, posters, letters, and other stuff covered the other two walls. A trim woman with long, blonde hair, deep-blue eyes, and a wide smile sat behind a desk in the front of the room.

“Hi, I’m Lisa Harper. Pull up a desk. They’re a bit small, but it’s all I have.” Harper described her affair with Whitt much as Whitt and the court documents had. When she finished, she said, “There’s no excuse for what I did. Getting involved with a parent is bad enough, but what was worse was the impact it had on Travis and my other students. In my profession, it’s all about the children, and I had forgotten that. Once the shock of what I
had done wore off, I entered therapy. It turned my life around. I married a solid man twelve years ago and have two wonderful children.” She paused and smiled. “In addition to twenty-three wonderful fourth graders.”

“I understand Mr. Whitt subsidized your salary after the incident,” Sinclair said.

Harper brushed a strand of hair behind her ear. “He gave me two thousand dollars a month to make up for the lower pay. It was a nice gesture and much needed for a while, but I was responsible for my choices. A few years ago, I mailed a check back to him and told him to stop sending them. My husband does very well, and quite honestly, I don’t teach for the money.”

“Have you had much contact with him?”

“After the divorce hearings were finished, I never saw him or spoke to him again. At the suggestion of my therapist, I wrote him a letter as a sort of closure and apologized for my part in the affair. He wrote something back. Except for a short note when I returned his check, that’s the last contact I had with him.”

Sinclair pulled a photo of Dawn from his folio. “Do you know her? Her name’s Dawn Gustafson.”

Harper shook her head.

Sinclair pried himself out of the student desk and walked toward the door with Braddock. Harper followed and said, “The girl you showed me—is that who was killed?”

“Yeah,” Sinclair said.

“Do you think William was involved?”

“Do you think he’s capable of it?”

“I don’t know. I try not to psychoanalyze others, but William was never violent and never even exhibited a temper.”

On a bulletin board by the door were a series of black-and-white photos of a young woman in various ballet moves. In one, the ballerina’s right leg was stretched high and her head was turned to the side and looking upward. The similarity to how Dawn’s body was posed in the park was uncanny. Below were color photos of Harper, wearing leotards and surrounded
by grade-school-age girls in dance clothing. “Is that you in the black-and-white photos?” Sinclair asked.

“Yes.” Harper smiled. “In my teens, I dreamed of being a professional ballerina, but I wasn’t good enough. Instead, today I share that dream with young girls by teaching them the joy of dance.”

Harper continued as Sinclair grabbed the doorknob: “My biggest regret is the damage we caused to Travis. His father’s affair and his mother’s suicide were hard on him. Like many kids, he blamed himself.”

“Who told you it was a suicide?” Sinclair asked.

“Travis thought for the longest time it was an accident, but he recently found out she intentionally killed herself.”

“You’re in contact with Travis?” Sinclair asked.

“My therapist suggested I write a letter to Travis as well. When he turned eighteen, I did. He wrote back, and we corresponded for a year or so, and about a year ago, he called me—just to let me know he was doing well. I keep in touch with many of my students. Travis and I have since talked on the phone several times. He’s a computer engineer and doing well professionally. He’s had therapy himself, and he told me he’s in a nice, healthy relationship with a girl his age and has reconciled with his father.”

When Travis Whitt’s cell phone went straight to voicemail, Sinclair sent him a text requesting he call him back. He threw a sandwich wrapper in the trashcan next to his desk, ripped open a small bag of chips, and looked at his partner. “What are you so pissed about, Braddock?”

She forked a cube of melon and popped it in her mouth. “Men like William Whitt and Yates use women as sex toys with no repercussions. Their money gives them a free pass to do as they wish. Meanwhile women’s lives are destroyed, some permanently.”

“We’re working to hold them accountable.”

“For murder,” she said. “Assuming one of them’s involved. But what about for the ruined lives?”

“Cathy, we can’t fix the world. We can’t even fix this tiny piece called Oakland. All we can do is solve the murders we’re assigned and bring those responsible to justice.”

“I started getting frustrated when it became clear that Whitt and Yates had nothing to do with the murders and would get away with what they did to those women.”

“You’re sure they’re innocent?”

“Come on, Matt, there’s not a bit of evidence that points to them. You’re trying to concoct a motive out of thin air, but it’s
all conjecture. We’ve been speeding down the wrong road and need to turn around and find the right path.”

“Did you see the photo of Lisa Harper in her classroom?”

“Yeah.”

“Just like how Dawn was posed in the tree,” Sinclair said.

“Matt, hanging a woman by her neck and tying up one leg is not a ballet pose.”

“What about Travis telling Harper his mother’s death was a suicide? Doesn’t that make you wonder why his father lied to us?”

“Aren’t you the one who told me that everybody lies?”

Just because someone lied, it didn’t make him a killer. Whitt had obviously figured out his wife had committed suicide just as the traffic investigator had, and at some point told his son.

Sinclair’s desk phone rang. It was John Johnson, the
Oakland Tribune
reporter. “Have you seen the video of your murder?”

“What video?” Sinclair asked.

“On YouTube.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I just sent you the link,” Johnson said. “Check your e-mail. This thing’s going viral. Call me back after you see it. I need a quote.”

The video was dark, but he immediately recognized the tree at Burckhalter Park. The camera zoomed in, showing a tall, slender person in a black mask lifting an inert, naked female body.

Sinclair turned on the speakers. Braddock stopped what she was doing and wheeled her chair alongside his. The video shifted to another man, shorter and stockier, also wearing a black mask. He was pulling a rope downward as if he were hefting a weight on a pulley. The video shifted back to the tall man and showed the rope around Dawn’s neck. The tall man lifted her a few feet and let go. The rope suspended Dawn’s body as the tall man grabbed her at the waist and lifted again. The video jumped forward. The person shooting the video had
either stopped filming or edited out parts. The tall man was now standing next to Dawn’s body, which was hanging from the tree exactly as Sinclair saw her a week ago. A long piece of cloth dangled from her groin area.

A young, excited male voice, which probably belonged to the videographer since it was loud and clear, said, “Watch here as we barbecue a hooker just like on GTA.” The tall man lit a disposable lighter and held it next to a can of hairspray. The videographer said, “Flame on!” followed by a childish laugh. Flame shot two or three feet from the hairspray can. The tall man directed the flame toward Dawn, and the cloth that had been inserted into her vagina burst into flames. The fireball illuminated Dawn’s face for a few seconds. Then the video stopped.

Sinclair yelled for the lieutenant and played the video again as Maloney and five other investigators crowded around his computer. When it finished, Maloney asked, “Is there any way to trace this?”

Sinclair shrugged his shoulders.

Behind him, Sergeant Lou Sanchez, the unit’s resident computer guru, said, “Lemme see.”

Sinclair got up, and Sanchez took his seat. After a few clicks of the mouse, Sanchez said, “It was posted an hour ago by someone with a username of G-G-four-thirty-eight. It has over three thousand views already. The profile was created today. The only information listed on the profile is gender—male. This is the only video or any other content the user’s posted.”

“Is there any way to identify him?” Maloney asked.

“YouTube is part of Google, and anyone can create an account with Google,” Sanchez said. “You can use any name you want. Some people have dozens of profiles and use different ones for different things. I could create one right now under the name of Donald Duck if I wanted to. But I’m sure someone already has that name.”

“So there’s no way to trace him?” Maloney asked.

“Google won’t just release information,” Sanchez said. “If we did a search warrant, they’d be compelled to give us what we ask for. But unless this guy’s an idiot, he didn’t use his real name or personal info. In theory, they should have a record of the IP address of the computer the person used when he created his account and the IP address when he posted this video.”

“That could tell us where he lives or works,” Maloney said.

“Only if he used an Internet connection there. He could’ve sat outside a Burger King that had a Wi-Fi connection.”

“Can we get this taken down?” Maloney asked.

Sanchez chuckled. “YouTube is into freedom of speech in a big way. But if we tell them this is an actual murder someone posted, they might.”

“Do it,” Sinclair said. “Our victims and their families don’t need this shit blasted to the world.”

“I’ll get on it, but it could take a while.” Sanchez returned to his desk and went to work at his computer.

Even though it would take more than a week to get anything back, and the chances of the results leading anywhere was a longshot, the video was still their best lead to the identity of the killers, so Braddock volunteered to start the search warrant paperwork.

In the blink of an eye, the video changed everything Sinclair had assumed about the murder. The voice sounded young, early twenties or so. Not the profile of someone who would normally employ an escort. The reference to GTA was about the video game Grand Theft Auto, the five versions of which were some of the most violent games ever marketed. In one, there was a scene where gamers could kill a prostitute with a flamethrower. Opponents of these games, claiming there was a connection between violent video games and real-world violence, frequently cited that scene as an example. Sinclair had never gotten into video games, not even in Iraq, where many of his fellow soldiers spent hours of their off time mesmerized by them.

The video, as disturbing as it was, gave Sinclair hope. It showed three people involved in the murder. One man could keep a secret, but three couldn’t. They sounded proud of what they’d done and might brag more about it.

His phone rang. “Well?” asked John Johnson.

“Well, what?”

“Is that the way you figured the murder went down?”

“I guess it doesn’t matter what I thought before,” Sinclair said. “The video pretty much shows it.”

“You believe this is real?”

Sinclair chose his words carefully. “What I saw in the video is not inconsistent with what the crime scene and autopsy showed.”

“Do you have a suspect?”

“All I know is what you saw on the video.”

“Can’t you ID them from that?” Johnson asked.

“We just had that discussion in the office, but the short answer is you can’t trace a YouTube video unless the person posting it uses his real name. The video isn’t very clear, and I don’t imagine anyone could recognize masked men.”

“Any thoughts on the motive?”

“Come on, John, you saw the video the same as me.”

“I can’t write an article about what I think the motive is.”

“I don’t want to speculate.”

“Looks to me like people killing a prostitute for the fun of it.”

“I need to know a lot more before I’m willing to say these killers fit into the thrill-killer mold,” Sinclair said.

“But it is a possibility?”

“Sure, but the victim’s background opens all kinds of motives.”

“Okay. I’ll check back later.”

Sinclair hung up and walked into the lieutenant’s office. “The
Trib
already called,” he said. “The rest of the media will be on it before long.”

“Any benefit to you talking with them?”

“Just a distraction.”

Maloney picked up his phone and pushed four buttons. “I’ll tell the PIO this is his to handle. Tell Connie the same,” he said, referring to the unit admin.

Sinclair’s phone rang again as soon as he sat down. “Homicide, Sinclair,” he barked.

“Matt, it’s Phil.”

“Did you call to apologize?”

“Not exactly,” said Roberts. “A source of one of my guys just called and told him to look at one of the websites set up by a fringe Occupy Oakland group. It has a video of your homicide posted on it.”

“I just saw the same thing on YouTube.”

“This includes some comments about who the people might be. Let me give you the URL. Look at it and call me back. I might be able to help you identify these people.”

Sinclair punched the web address into his computer and brought up a blog. The top banner read,
Black Lives Matter. So do brown, red, yellow, and white lives. All lives matter except blue ones and 1%ers.

The top entry showed a photo of a line of OPD officers in riot gear in front of a police car with all its windows shattered, probably from one of the most recent demonstrations. Under the photo was a long tirade about how cops work for the one-percenters to oppress the working class. The video was attached to a comment posted by GG438 that read,
A slave to the elite meets her maker
.

Other comments followed:

Sinclair called Roberts. “Do you think suspects in my murder are occupiers?”

“What do you know about the Occupy movement?” Roberts asked.

“Probably as much as most cops. I’ve stood in many a skirmish line and had rocks and bottles thrown at me.”

“Most of the people in those protests are normal people. They believe in the cause and attend what they consider to be rallies. Then there’s the professional demonstrators, who come to yell and scream. It doesn’t matter whether it’s for animal rights, gay rights, police brutality, or the environment. Some of them are the hard-core anarchists. Those are the ones that cause most of the trouble. They burn cars, break business’s windows, and toss Molotov cocktails at us.”

“Under what category do my murder suspects fall?”

“It’s not like these groups have lists of members. They might just be hangers-on. There’s no real hierarchy, and the leadership is vague and fluid. But we’ve heard of Gothic Geek and Anarchist Soldier. Their names first surfaced during the protests in Oakland over Ferguson.”

Sinclair, like every able-bodied cop in Oakland, had been assigned to work uniform after the Ferguson grand jury decided not to charge an officer for the death of Michael Brown. OPD stopped a crowd of thousands from marching onto the freeway and shutting down traffic. Later that night, they arrested dozens of demonstrators when the crowd began breaking storefront
windows in downtown Oakland. The protest moved to Berkeley the next night. The protesters were hoping for a kinder, gentler police force, but when the crowd blocked the entrance to the freeway and started fires, Berkley PD called for mutual aid. OPD was one of many departments that responded.

“Are they anarchists?” Sinclair asked.

“Their names pop up in anarchist circles and are also associated with the By Any Means Necessary group.”

Sinclair remembered one of the anonymous leaders of that group being quoted in a newspaper as saying, “You can never replace the lives of Michael Brown and Eric Garner, but you can always replace broken windows.” The group’s website said aggressive actions were justified whenever police killed a black man with impunity.

“You didn’t get this from me,” Roberts continued, “but for the last few years, one of my guys has been working these groups nearly full-time. They’ve cost the city millions of dollars, not including the millions in lost business revenue when they shut down streets and businesses. They blocked access to the Port of Oakland last year because two Israeli flagged ships were supposed to dock. The cost estimate from that disruption to the supply chain was over fifty million. We’re working on the identity of Anarchist Soldier and Gothic Geek, and I’ll let you know the second we get something.”

As soon as Sinclair hung up, Braddock picked up her phone and dialed an inside number. She summarized the video and the information Roberts had told them, and then she listened and wrote notes on a legal pad for a few minutes. After she hung up, she said, “That was the investigator for the protest task force.”

“I didn’t know we had a protest task force,” Sinclair said.

“Last summer the department decided to assign an officer full-time to handle all the offenses stemming from the protests since the same players’ names were coming up over and over. She noticed a trend beginning last summer with some fringe
troublemakers showing up at protests that identified themselves with gamer screennames.”

“Gamer?” Sinclair asked.

“Yeah, young people who play online video games. She has a felony vandalism warrant for the arrest of Sean Garvin, who goes by Evil Tildor, for firebombing a police car and a downtown store during the Occupy Oakland protest in October.”

“Is Garvin associated with Gothic Geek or Anarchist Soldier?”

“She’s never heard of them,” Braddock said. “But it sounds like they’re gamers, so Garvin might know them.”