Final justice - W.E.B. Griffin [88]
"I don't know about you two, but I'm going back to doing the scene," Slayberg said, and walked out of the kitchen.
"Emperors and people like that like to be welcomed when they go someplace," D'Amata said. "Matt, why don't you and I go outside and wait?"
They left the apartment by the rear door. There was a uniform standing at the foot of the stairway, and other uniforms were standing just inside the POLICE LINE DO NOT CROSS tape. On the other side of the tape there were not only more spectators than Matt expected--Cheryl Williamson's body had been taken away; the show was over--but more than a dozen representatives of the print, radio, and television press.
He didn't see Mickey O'Hara, and wondered where he was. Mickey was usually the first press guy at the scene of a murder.
The answer to that came when--ignoring questions several of the journalists called out--they walked around the end of the building to the front. There, behind the yellow-and -black POLICE LINE tape were even more spectators and representatives of the press, and Mickey O'Hara was among them. To make sure they didn't cross the tape, two uniforms stood directly in front of the press, one male, one female, both looking as if they had left the Academy as long as two weeks ago.
On the inside of the tape, there were a number of police officers, in uniform, and others with badges visible on their civilian clothing. Captain Alex Smith, the Thirty-fifth District commander, and Lieutenant Lew Sawyer were talking to a woman with a badge on her dress, whom Matt remembered after a moment to be Captain Helene Durwinsky, the commanding officer of the Special Victims Unit, and a man with a lieutenant's badge hanging on his suit jacket. He saw Detectives Domenico and Ellis, of Special Victims, standing a few feet from the white shirts, with several other detectives Matt didn't recognize.
"You got the word?" Captain Smith said.
There was no question what "the word" was, but Matt didn't know if Smith was speaking to him or Joe D'Amata.
"With no explanation, sir," D'Amata replied.
"It may have something to do with Phil's Philly," Captain Smith said dryly. "On which--according to my wife, one of Phil's most devoted listeners--about forty-five minutes ago, Mrs. McGrory spoke at some length about Miss Williamson being raped and tortured while the police stood not caring outside her door."
"Oh, shit!" D'Amata said.
"I just talked to her," Matt said. "I used her kitchen to talk to the brother. She didn't say anything about talking to that ass . . . Phil's Philly."
Phil's Philly was a very popular radio talk show. Philadelphians dissatisfied with something in the City of Brotherly Love could call the number, and be reasonably sure both of a sympathetic ear on the part of Phil Donaldson, and that Mr. Donaldson would then call--on the air--whoever had wronged the caller, to indignantly demand an explanation, an apology, and immediate corrective action.
"Well, she did," Captain Smith went on. "My wife said that Phil's first call was to Commissioner Mariani, and when Commissioner Mariani 'was not available' to take the call, Phil called the mayor. Who made the mistake of taking the call."
Three unmarked cars pulled up shortly thereafter, within moments of each other. Television and still cameras recorded Deputy Commissioner Dennis V. Coughlin and Captain F. X. Hollaran as they walked into the apartment complex, ducked under the POLICE LINE tape, and walked up to Captain Smith's group. Smith and Sawyer, who were in uniform, saluted.
The press then recorded the same out-of-the-car-and-under -the-tape movement of Captain Henry C. Quaire and Lieutenant Jason Washington, and then turned their attention to Chief Inspector of Detectives Matthew Lowenstein.
Lowenstein ducked under the tape and then spoke, while the cameras rolled, to the two young uniformed officers standing in front of the assembled press.
"Do you know who I am?" Lowenstein demanded,