Bringing Adam Home - Les Standiford [122]
Matthews briefly contemplated the fact that even insects seemed to have conspired against him in his pursuit of the investigation, but it was not in his nature to dwell upon disappointment. He simply shook his head and moved on, intent upon building a body of evidence that would compel any law enforcement agency to conclude that a certain individual had committed this crime and that a successful prosecution could be carried out.
Still, events around him were a constant reminder that time had its own way of imposing a statute of limitations on a case. In July 2007, former Hollywood police chief Dick Witt, who had ordered Matthews off the cold case investigation back in 1996, died in Ormand Beach, where he had retired. And in early November, current Hollywood chief James Scarberry, the man who had authorized opening his department’s files to Matthews, retired, hounded by accusations that he had tipped off his command staff that several corrupt Hollywood detectives had been targeted by an FBI sting operation.
Scarberry’s departure was no great disappointment to Matthews, for while the chief had posed no impediment to his investigation, he was clearly not greatly interested in the matter either. In fact, as Matthews reviewed the files that had been turned over to him, it became clear that even though every tip that had come to America’s Most Wanted over the years since the airing of the Adam episode in 1996 had been passed along—leads that Matthews had pursued all the way from Florida to Colorado and points in between—not one had ever been pursued by Hollywood PD.
Still, he reminded himself, that was all water under the bridge. The more pressing issue now was the inclination of Scarberry’s successor, Chad Wagner, who’d risen through the ranks at Hollywood PD, beginning as a patrolman in 1983 to become assistant chief under Scarberry.
Would Wagner prove to be another in a long line of administrators who would rather the matter were simply buried once and for all, or would he throw the roadblocks up once again? The answer was not long in coming.
In December, Mark Smith of the Hollywood PD, now a captain of detectives at Hollywood PD, called Matthews. By this time Matthews had come across the “ulterior motives” memo Smith had written years before, but Matthews said nothing. Smith was either going to be a help or a hindrance, and bringing up the matter would accomplish nothing.
Smith explained that he was calling on behalf of the newly appointed Chief Wagner, who wondered whether or not Matthews might be able to provide him with an address for John Walsh. Wagner wanted to introduce himself, Smith said, and he also wanted to extend his personal condolences to the Walsh family. Matthews held the phone away from his ear to stare at it for a moment, not sure he had heard correctly.
He gave Smith the address, then went back to work, wondering if he might have imagined the incident. A few days later, however, he got a call from John Walsh, who began by saying, “You’re not going to believe this letter I just received . . .” Matthews said nothing, just listened quietly as John Walsh described the contents of the first unsolicited communication that had ever passed from the Hollywood PD to him and his family in more than twenty-six years. Matthews could hear it in Walsh’s voice—how much that gesture meant to a still-grieving family.
Then, in late January of the following year, at a reception following a Broward County Police Academy graduation, Dick Brickman, the president of the Broward County Police Benevolent Association, took Matthews by the arm and introduced him to Chief Wagner. Matthews let Wagner know how much his letter meant to the Walsh family, surprising the chief when he mentioned the fact that it was the first such gesture they had ever received from his agency.
Matthews also told Wagner that he was well along on a cold case investigation of the murder of Adam Walsh that had been authorized by Chief Scarberry. Matthews explained that his progress had been delayed by the fact that his ninety-four-year-old mother was