A Killing at the Creek (5 page)

Lisa didn't meet Elsie's eye. In a challenging voice, she said, “I can't believe you all are ganging up on him like this. What is the Prosecutor's Office even doing here?”

Flustered, Elsie said, “A dead woman was pulled out of a creek bed, Lisa. We're investigating a murder, for God's sake.”

“Since when does the prosecutor run the investigation? Tanner hasn't been charged, hasn't been certified. It just feels wrong to me.”

This time, Elsie didn't respond. She was beginning to believe the juvenile officer had a valid point.

Chuck spoke up. “The prosecutor has a legal right to all the information regarding a juvenile suspect. It's a sensitive case; that's why Madeleine wants us to keep a close eye.”

Lisa did a count with her fingers. “Three against one. Nice odds. Very subtle.”

Chuck said, “Hey, you're here for him.”

Lisa shook her head. “I have to tell him that I'm not here to be his advocate, or to stand in like an attorney. But I'm certainly going to ensure that he understands his rights. And to see that this big ole detective follows due process.”

Ashlock unfolded one of the chairs and sat in it, smiling at the group. “ ‘Due process' is my middle name,” he assured them.

Lisa Peters produced a set of keys and said, “I'm going to get him out of his detention quarters now. If you're ready.”

“Ready,” Elsie said, hoping they weren't making a huge procedural error.

Seeming reluctant to proceed, Lisa asked, “Do you need me to go get some rights forms? I could go upstairs and copy the ones we use.”

“The juvenile office faxed the forms to me yesterday. I've got them right here,” Ashlock said, flipping open a notebook and showing her the forms.

Lisa nodded, her mouth pressed in a thin line as she left the room.

“What's her problem?” Chuck Harris asked, shaking his head.

Ashlock ignored the question. He instructed Elsie and Chuck where to sit, so that he could set up the interrogation in the most effective way possible, considering the conditions. Elsie watched as he tinkered with the tape recorder, testing it and playing it back.

Before Lisa returned, Maureen Mason arrived, a stout woman with graying hair pulled into a tight knot. “It's a lucky thing for you that I came in to look through my mail, or you never would have dragged me in for this,” she said. “I figured the whole juvenile division was shut down today. Thought I'd have a little vacation day for myself. I guess there's no rest for the weary.”

The door to the detention hallway swung open, and all heads turned to get a look at the juvenile.

He'd had a chance to rest and clean up, and he looked nondescript, a typical teen of moderate height, with dark brown hair in need of a haircut, and a splash of acne on his forehead. If Elsie saw him in line at the convenience store, she wouldn't look twice.

Maureen patted the spot beside her on the couch. “Come sit by me, Tanner.”

Ashlock intervened, a commanding note in his voice. “Ms. Mason, I believe it would be best if Mr. Monroe sits in this folding chair right here, facing me.” Ashlock placed his hand on the metal seat of the empty chair. “I've set the recorder up already, and we need to make sure he comes through loud and clear.”

Maureen shrugged. “Whatever.” She tried to grasp Tanner's hand as he walked by. “How are you today, Tanner?”

The boy snatched his hand away from her. Turning to Lisa, he asked, “Will you stay by me, Lisa?”

Elsie's radar went off.
Sounds like Ferris Bueller playing
sick.

But Lisa was moved. “You bet, Tanner; I'll set my chair right by you, and I'll be here the whole time.” Lisa shot an inquiring glance at Maureen, but the older woman ignored her.

Ashlock walked the teen through the rights forms, first reading his Miranda rights. He and his guardian signed off on the form.

“Okay, shoot,” Tanner said.

“Not quite yet,” Ashlock said. Pulling out another form, he advised Tanner again of his right to remain silent and right to counsel. He then said, “The offense you're being questioned about would be a felony if committed by an adult. Do you understand?”

The boy nodded. Ashlock handed him a ballpoint pen, and he checked “Yes” on the form.

Ashlock continued, reading from the form, “ ‘If you are alleged, at any age, to have committed First Degree Murder, Second Degree Murder, First Degree Assault, Forcible Rape, Forcible Sodomy, First Degree Robbery, Distribution of Drugs, or if you have committed two or more prior unrelated offenses which would be felonies if committed by an adult, a hearing will be held to determine if you should be prosecuted as an adult.' ”

Ashlock paused. Monroe met his look without flinching.

“Do you understand?”

“You bet.” He marked “Yes.”

When Ashlock finished reading the form, he handed Tanner the pen again. Tanner took it in his right hand, but leaned over to Lisa and placed his other hand on her shoulder.

“What do you think I should do, Lisa?” he asked in a low voice.

She shook her head. “I can't advise you, Tanner. It's like that paper says, I'm your adversary, I'm not your advocate. I really wish your parents were here. But you've got a guardian, and she's a lawyer.”

He sighed and cast a scornful look at the guardian. “I'm definitely not taking advice from that fat bitch,” he said.

Maureen blinked, taken aback. “Mr. Monroe. You realize that the Juvenile Court appointed me to look after your interests in the absence of your parents.”

The teen tipped back in his folding chair, rocking it precariously with the toe of his left foot. “I know what you're interested in. Food.”

“Tanner!” Lisa said.

“She needs to go on
The Biggest Loser
,” Tanner said in an aside to the juvenile officer.

“Despite your insulting attitude,” said Maureen coldly, furrowing an angry brow over her reading glasses, “I'd advise you that it's in your best interest to shut up. Don't answer any questions. In fact, it would be wise if you refrain from speaking entirely.”

The boy gave the guardian a look of appraisal, then shot them all an ironic half grin.

“If Fatty thinks I should shut up, then I'm definitely talking. Abso-­fucking-­lutely. Ask me whatever you want.”

Lisa looked anxious. “Tanner, are you sure?”

“Yeah. Bring it.” He stretched his arms and folded his hands behind his head.

Lisa gestured toward Maureen. “What do you say?”

With irritation still etched in her face, she shrugged. “It's his decision.”

“Okay, then,” Ashlock said briskly. “Mr. Monroe, we'd like to know how you happened to be on that bus. Let's start at the beginning, with your name.”

The teen provided his name, age, and date of birth, and told Ashlock that he lived in St. Louis, Missouri, with his mother.

“We need your mother's information. Why didn't you provide it at check-­in?”

“Because I'm emancipated.”

“At fifteen?” Ashlock asked with a dubious expression.

“Oh hell yeah.”

“Do you mean there was a judicial determination? A judge declared that you were independent?”

“I don't know about judicial. But I'm totally independent.” The boy held up five fingers. “I. Do. What. I. Want,” he said, ticking off the words with the fingers of his right hand. “I crash at my mom's place if I feel like it. If not, I don't.”

“Then your mother is still your custodian? Your parent and legal guardian?”

“Man, I don't know. I guess.”

“What about your father?”

Tanner huffed a humorless breath. “Yeah, what about him?”

“What is his role in your life?”

“His role.” The young man shook his head, and tossed his hair back. “You tell me. Never met him.”

“Never? Does he pay support?”

“If he does, I don't know nothing about it.”

“Your mother would be entitled to support.”

“I don't think he's one of those support-­paying types.”

“What type is he, then? What information did your mother give you about your father?”

“We don't talk about him too much.”

Ashlock sat, waiting for Monroe to say more. After a moment's silence, the boy said, “Seems like she said he was doing time. That was a while back.”

“So you've been in your mother's sole custody all your life.”

“Yeah. Except for foster care. Does that mean not in her custody? Because they never terminated.”

Elsie made rapid notes as Ashlock leaned closer to Monroe. “By terminated—­you're talking about her parental rights. Is that correct?”

“Yeah. They didn't do that. She always got clean. Then I'd go back.”

“How many times did this happen?”

“Shit, man, who can remember? But this last time, since she left rehab, it's been all right. Now that I'm fifteen, we kind of go our own way. It works out okay. We can hang, but we both do what we want. Right now, I'm seeing the country.”

“How's that?”

“Hitchhiking. Going where the road takes me.”

Ashlock set his pen down and regarded the boy with a level look. “And where has it taken you?”

The boy snorted. “For a ride on that bus, I guess.”

“Tell us about that. Where did you first see the bus?”

“At the Diamonds truck stop. The one outside St. Louis. I figured I could get a ride from there. And there was this woman with a school bus. She was taking it to Arkansas.”

The boy paused. He said, “Can I have one of my cigarettes?”

“No,” said Ashlock. “Tell us about the woman.”

“Old. Ugly. Stupid.” The boy rolled his eyes at Ashlock's solemn expression. “Okay, not that old. Forty? Thirty? You all look alike to me, old ­people, I mean. She wasn't getting by on her looks, though. Tell you that much.”

“How did you get a ride with her?”

“I just asked. She said I could come along. Said I'd keep her company.”

“So you wanted to go to Arkansas?”

“Hell, no. Arkansas blows. But I thought I'd get off at Springfield, maybe go to Branson, go down to the lake. Camp out.”

“So what happened?”

“Everything was cool. With her and me. But she picked up another dude.”

“At the Diamonds?”

“No, at a gas station down the road.”

“Where?”

“I dunno. Maybe Rolla. Maybe somewhere else.”

“Why did you stop again so soon? Rolla's not even two hours from the Diamonds.”

“Hey, she was driving. Maybe she needed to take a piss.” Turning to Lisa, he said, “When's lunch? I'm starved.”

Before she could answer, Ashlock said, “Describe the gas station where she picked up the passenger.”

“Gas, man. I don't know. It was dark. I was kind of dozing in one of the bus seats. Laying down.”

“How did she meet up with the passenger?”

“He asked for a ride. I guess. I wasn't filming it.”

Elsie shifted on the vinyl couch, trying to hide her growing impatience, as Ashlock asked him to describe the passenger.

“Seems like he was big. Real big.”

“Height?”

“Dude, I don't know.”

“Approximately, roughly. Compared to you.”

The boy yawned. “I didn't go head to head with him, man. But he was big, I kid you not. Big and scary-­looking.”

“Weight, build?”

“Big. Not fat.”

“Race?”

“White guy.”

“Hair color?”

“Ummm. Black.”

“Eye color?”

“Shit, man, I don't know. Brown.”

“Distinguishing features?”

“What's that mean?”

“Tattoos, scars, marks, facial features.”

Monroe rubbed the back of his neck and exhaled audibly. He screwed his eyes shut, saying, “Thinking, thinking, thinking,” then fell silent.

After a pause, Ashlock prompted, “Well?”

His brown eyes popped open. “Scar on his cheek. Right there,” indicating his cheekbone.

The adults all made notations on paper. Elsie shifted in her seat on the couch, unhappily conscious that she was sticking to the vinyl.

“And tats,” the boy added. “Jailhouse tats.”

“Where?”

“On his fingers. Couldn't make them out, though. He turned to stare at Lisa Peters. “You know what?”

“What?” she responded.

“If you were mine, I'd protect you. I wouldn't let anybody near you. No fucking way.”

 

Chapter 9

E
LSI
E SHUFFLED SHEETS
of paper, still warm from the copy machine, which contained Tanner Monroe's handwritten statement.

At the conclusion of his interrogation that morning, the juvenile had asked for pen and paper.

“I want to make a written statement,” he told them. “In my own words.”

Ashlock advised him that it wasn't necessary, they had the tape recording of his answers, and if he wanted to add anything, he was free to speak up. But the boy shook his head.

“Somebody could fuck with a tape recording,” he said. “No offense, dude, but it's the truth. Erase something, add something, switch the questions up. I better put it down in handwriting, so I can be sure it's my own words.”

Ashlock nodded. “Okay, then.” He instructed Elsie to hand Tanner her legal pad and pen. The adults watched in silence as the boy wrote.

Elsie observed as the boy scratched on the paper with the ballpoint pen, crossing out words and frowning in concentration; then he wrote at a rapid pace, only to pause again. Studying his face, she observed a faint sprinkling of hair on his upper lip, and the scatter of adolescent acne on his brow. Recalling her mother's words, she pondered,
Cutting a woman's throat: how could he do it?
Then she shuddered as a chilling thought followed:
Did he do it?

Focusing on his hands as he wrote, she tried to envision them handling a knife rather than a pen. The hands were big enough; though the boy was normal height, he looked strong enough to overpower a middle-­aged woman. Certainly, holding a weapon would give him the advantage. But as she stared at the hairless backs of his young hands, she wondered how he could be cold enough, at the tender age of fifteen, to take a human life. Maybe her mother was right; she generally was, Elsie knew from long experience.

Had he confessed on those written pages, her job would be much easier. But the photostatic copy in Elsie's hands contained no confession, no admission of wrongdoing. She laid the statement before her on her desk, wishing she had a clearer barometer of the events on that school bus than the scrawled paragraphs provided. Still, Elsie thought it might hold a clue, a key to reveal the true events of the murder.

With a highlighter poised in her hand, she read:

I, Tanner Dylan Monroe, swear this is the truth.

Here is what happened with the bus. The true story.

I was hitchhiking from St. Louis like I said. A woman with a school bus gave me a ride at the Diamonds but there was another dude too she picked up later.

So I was asleep in the back but there was a lot of noise. And I saw them fighting and he had her pinned. Then he had a knife and he cut her throat when he held her down. I couldn't do nothing because I was in the back.

Anyway after she was dead he took me prisoner. He made me drive and go in the middle of nowhere so we dumped the body there.

Then he made me drive and if I didn't do what he said he would kill me, too. I couldn't run or get help cuz he never let me out of his sight. He finally got off somewhere. I don't know where it was at. I drove the bus but it ran out of gas and I stayed with the bus because I didn't have money for gas and nowhere to go. The dude ran off.

That's it except to say I am innocent and I just want to go back to St. Louis. And see my mom.

This is what happen.

Underneath those words, in a cursive scrawl, he signed his name: “Tanner Dylan Monroe.”

ODDI defense
, Elsie had immediately thought.
Other Dude Done It
. It was easy to anticipate what the jury would want the state to provide when the defendant raised that defense; on rebuttal, the prosecution needed to show that there was no second passenger. They needed to prove to the jury that the crime was Monroe's own act, and they must prove it beyond a reasonable doubt. That was the state's burden, the prosecutor's job.

But first, Elsie must prove it to herself. She did not believe in proceeding on any case where she was unsure of the defendant's guilt, and that was especially true in this instance, where the defendant was a boy of fifteen. Regardless of orders issued by Madeleine or Chuck, she could not present a case to a jury if she didn't believe in it.

If the juvenile had committed a murder, he would have to pay; Missouri followed the trend in recent years toward certifying minors to be tried as adults for criminal acts. The state legislature had made it clear that the criminal courts would handle serious crimes committed by juveniles. But Elsie needed to be absolutely certain that the crime was his; that the evidence pointed to Tanner Monroe, and no one else.

Elsie toyed with the highlighter, thinking,
Let's see what
you were up to when you were on the road, Tanner Monroe.

She tossed the marker on her desk and said, “Oklahoma needs a visit from a big ole Missouri gal.”