One Step Ahead

Unexpected Developments

February 9th, 10:20 AM

      "You wanted to see us, Chief?" Sanger questioned as he walked into Paul MacDevitt's office, closely followed by Eloise Han. 

      "Yes, I did. And close the door behind you, please," the supervisor replied, glancing up from his computer with a grim expression which caused the two detectives to glance uneasily at each other. Sanger allowed Eloise into the room and closed the door as requested, and only then did they notice that there were three other individuals in the room: Dean Bledsoe, and two others, only one of whom seemed even slightly familiar to either of them.

      Gesturing toward the chunky, bespectacled man sitting next to Bledsoe, MacDevitt said, "Garrett, Eloise, this is Captain Jonathan Manning, from Internal Affairs." Then, directing their attention to a tall, athletic-looking Latina standing near the office window, he continued, "And this is FBI Special Agent Yesenia Pruitt. She's with the Behavioral Science unit, and she's been working on a profile of our guy. Hopefully it'll help narrow down our suspect list."

      Captain Manning nodded his acknowledgement of the detectives, while Agent Pruitt stepped around the desk and extended her hand. "Nice to meet you both," she said, as she shook first Eloise's hand, and then Garrett's. "Your supervisors have had nothing but good things to say about you both, so I'm hoping that we can put our heads together and get this sleazebag off the streets."

     They returned the greetings and took the seats that MacDevitt indicated, waiting for him to reveal what had put him in such a somber mood. They weren't forced to wait for long, as he leaned forward in his seat, propping his elbows on the desk and steepling his forefingers beneath his chin. "I spoke with Officer Dietz this morning, when he informed me that the inventory of the property room had been completed. As we suspected, the gun that Marlena Whitman took from Ashley Purdy's home was indeed taken as evidence in a prior case, and should have still been in the locker. There was also another firearm missing, a Sig Sauer P227 Nitron that was taken in a drug bust in December of 2012."

      "But there's something else, isn't there?" Han inquired. "I mean, that's not good, but I don't think it's bad enough to make you both look so..."

      "Worried?" Bledsoe finished for her. "Or possibly queasy? Yes, Eloise, there's more, and this is even worse than missing firearms."

      She and Sanger turned their attention to him as MacDevitt nodded for him to continue. "Do either of you remember a group who called themselves the Defenders of Purity?"

      "I think so," Sanger replied. "Wasn't that the supremacist group that got taken down about a year ago after one of them was dumb enough to let somebody find out that they were planning to set off a bomb during the NAACP Awards?"

      "That was them," Bledsoe agreed. "Their leader was a guy named Stanley Norton, who was a research chemist before his oddball views cost him his job. When the forensics team searched his house, they found a fully equipped laboratory, and several vials of substances that he had manufactured by combining different chemicals or drugs to achieve the effects of both. These have been in the refrigeration unit downstairs since that time, waiting for his trial to take place, but now it seems that several vials are missing."

      "And we've finally received the toxicology reports from both Marlena and Elton Keel," MacDevitt interjected. "It seems that they were both injected shortly before death with a rather unique derivative of curare, which is a paralytic drug that was used in certain surgeries some years ago, but it's very uncommon now. The reason it was unique is that it was combined with certain other chemicals which negated the effect on the respiratory system, while still paralyzing the muscles. A dozen vials of this drug were taken from Norton's house, and three of them are now missing."