It was essential to explain to the court how, when, and where the body of the deceased had been found, and that her death was the result of a homicide. When I finished that paragraph, I looked up at Armando for help. “Now what?”
“You gotta throw in some background about me and Tego.”
I typed in his name and shield. “Your command?”
“NYPD Emergency Services, K- 9 Unit.” He told me how many years he’d been on the force and what his training had been to qualify him for this special duty. “Tego’s got four years on the job-specializing in cadaver duty.”
“What?” I knew German shepherds were used to great advantage in police work, trained to identify the scents of bomb materials and controlled substances. This one was new to me.
“True. He’s like Chapman-death is his specialty. Sniffs it out and loves it.”
“How do you train them for that?”
“There are a couple of chemicals that simulate cadaver odors-”
“Yeah, Coop, and Chanel doesn’t make ’em,” Mike cut in. “So don’t try and seduce me by dousing yourself in ’em.”
Armando continued. “They’re called Cadaverine and Pseudocorpse-both are artificial commercial scents. The dogs practice by smelling body parts, corpses, crime scene areas. Then we sprinkle some of the fake stuff on items like you’d find at a scene and let them go to work.”
“Tell her what you give them when they come up with a body.”
“Three treats and a rawhide pull toy, just like if he’d brought home your missing slipper.”
I improvised a few paragraphs about Tego’s training and the fact that he had completed more than sixty tests in the company of Detective Loquesto.
“What else do I need?”
“You gotta say what the dog did when he got to the target. The Chevy was parked in a row of nine cars. In training we call it a ‘marked reaction,’ which-”
“What’d he do, exactly?”
Chapman was impatient and anxious for me to complete the warrant. “He went ape, like you do when you see Alex Trebek. Drooling, panting-”
“Pretty close,” Loquesto said. “He sniffed next to the right rear passenger door, then ran around to the back of the wagon. He jumped up against it and began pawing at it, whining and scratching like it’d get him inside. I looked in- window was slightly tinted-and there’s a dark stain on a canvas-colored matting. Then I pulled Tego away and took him one at a time to the doors of each other car. No reaction at all.”
I finished the application with the routine language, respectfully asking the court for a warrant and order of seizure. “As soon as the lunch break is over, we’ll go down and get the judge who’s sitting in the arraignment part to sign it, okay? Anybody want me to call in something to eat?”
“Nah, we’ll grab a bite on our way to the Bronx.”
“Okay. I’ll open a grand jury investigation this afternoon so I can start some phone company subpoenas for muds and luds on the Caxton telephones-home and galleries.” Contrary to what most people thought, prosecutors have no power to subpoena people or evidence to their offices. It was only the authority of the grand jury in New York, not the district attorneys, that enabled the request for a witness to produce documentary evidence. “Who’s looking for Omar?”
“ My job,” Mercer said. “Since the gallery’s closed today, there’s no activity at all. The address on the Motor Vehicles Bureau records-for Omar’s residence-is in Brooklyn.”
“Before I came up to the courtroom,” Mike went on, “I called the boss at the Eighty-fourth Precinct and asked them to do a drive-by of that address. Desk sergeant beeped me back and said it’s a burned-out building. Mercer’ll be working on it this afternoon.”
My paralegal, Maxine, came into the room and greeted the trio of cops. “This looks like the wrong time to ask, but what do I do with a walk-in who just arrived now for her ten-thirty appointment?”
“Who is she?” I looked at my watch, noting that the woman was more than three hours late.
“Her name’s Unique Matthews. Says she’s here to see Janice-O’Riley, but Janice has to do a preliminary hearing all afternoon.”
“This one’s the prostitute who was raped at gunpoint by the trucker on Houston Street, right?”
“Yep.” Maxine smiled and motioned discreetly with her thumb for me to look out the doorway to Laura’s desk. A young woman was towering over my secretary, balancing on four-inch platform sandals with straps that wrapped up to her knees. The cheeks of her buttocks were hanging well below the bottom of her shorts, and her cleavage strained against the skimpy cut of her fuchsia cotton tank T-shirt, exposing a tattoo of Mickey Mouse on her inner left breast, outlined against her dark skin. Unique was chewing a wad of gum and sipping from a large bottle of Yoo-Hoo.
I called out to the witness, knowing that there would be no particularly good reason for her tardiness. “Unique, how come you’re so late today? You were supposed to testify this morning.”
She took the straw out of her mouth and sneered at me, certain that I could not understand how hard it had been to rouse herself for something as relatively unimportant as her court appearance. “I overslept.”
“Why don’t you take her across the street to Catherine’s office?” I said to Max. This was going to take more experience and a firmer hand than Janice had with these cases. “Let her work with Unique for a couple of hours.”
Chapman patted Max on the back. “Remind O’Riley of Cooper’s basic commands. Never make a morning appointment for a hooker. Like vampires, they don’t thrive in daylight. C’mon, blondie. Let Mercer get on his way. Me and Armando’ll come down to court with you to get the warrant signed.”
“Armando and I.”
“What else do you do in your spare time besides give grammar lessons? Wellesley meets the NYPD. Now that’s an exercise in futility.”
I stopped at Laura’s desk and asked her to check the docket assignment sheet. “Who’s sitting in arraignments this week?”
“You’ve got Roger Hayes in AR 1 and John Reick in AR 2.”
Mercer chided me. “Judge shopping, Alex? My money’s on AR 1. I’ll check in with both of you as soon as I get back from Brooklyn.”
Mike, Armando, and I took the circuitous route to the first-floor arraignment parts, down the interior stairway one flight and over to the elevator bank that serviced the courtrooms and stopped on only a single floor of the District Attorney’s Office, as a security measure. As usual the wait for a functioning elevator going in the right direction seemed interminable. And walking the hallways with Chapman was more of a social occasion than a business trip. He had worked with and partied with every senior assistant in the office at one time or another. He was a legendary storyteller, a great foil for people’s jokes, and the best investigator that most of us would ever encounter in the NYPD.
The double swinging doors of AR 1 pushed open as I entered behind Mike. Families and friends of prisoners arrested within the last twenty-four hours and awaiting their first appearances before the judge filled rows of benches on both sides of the room. Some mothers looked tearful and anxious, waiting for word from the Legal Aid attorneys that their sons would be coming home today, while other relatives slept soundly despite the noise and activity, clearly accustomed to the routine of this process.
We made our way down to the front row, saved for attorneys and police officers, and I scooted into the only available seat, between two uniformed cops who were dozing until their cases were called. Mike and Armando sat behind me, scrunched between an elderly Hasidic Jew dressed in his traditional black overcoat and an obese Latina woman who was whining some kind of prayer over and over again under her breath.
The air-conditioning wasn’t working and the windows were so tall in the two-story room that there was no way for the crew to open them for fresh air. Everyone in the well of the courtroom-lawyers, stenographer, officers, and clerks-was fanning with different files or sheaves of papers. The stench was unbearable.