The Hunting Dogs (8 page)

Wisting concentrated on the document dealing with the cigarette end found at the Gumserød
intersection and its analysis at the establishment, then called the Forensics Institute,
now renamed the Institute of Public Health, Forensics Division.

Chief Inspector Finn Haber had led the investigations at the discovery site. Wisting
had collaborated with him on several major cases before his retirement on full pension
eight years earlier. Responsibility for the inspection of a crime scene was a critical
task, involving an overview of all the material collected and the subsequent technical
examinations. It required a meticulous person with a particular aptitude for organisation,
exactly like Finn Haber.

The reports of the forensic tests were just as Wisting recalled Haber’s work: thorough
and precise. The cigarettes in question had been documented in a photograph of the
crossroads with a close up image of each of the three cigarette butts, all of them
rollups without filters. One of them had been trampled into the gravel, but the other
two appeared to have been extinguished by being pressed between the fingers. They
had been allocated individual numbers, A-1, A-2 and A-3. The folder included a sketch
showing where each had been found, all within a radius of two metres.

A separate document recorded details of a reconstruction when a hired Opel Rekord
had been parked at the intersection in accordance with the description given by the
witness on the tractor. Frank Robekk had acted the part of the man who had been standing
with a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. The cigarette ends on the gravel were
found just around his feet, as if the perpetrator had been waiting there for some
time.

The cigarette had been signed in for safe keeping with the initials
ESEK: Crime Lab
. A fortnight later, they had been signed out again and sent to the Forensics Institute.

The request for analysis had followed the standard formula: investigation of the enclosed
material with a view to identifying epithelial cells normally found in saliva traces.
The results had been reported three weeks later. On the samples tagged A-1 and A-2,
no human DNA had been detected. However, on the sample marked A-3, a DNA profile had
been established with the sex-typing marker determining male origin.

The next document was a report ascertaining that the trace sample A-3 was consistent
with the reference sample provided by the accused Rudolf Haglund, accompanied by expert
testimony in verification, and signed by the head of department.

All of this was according to normal procedures. If any objection could be made, it
would be that the cigarettes had been kept at Finn Haber’s laboratory for two weeks
before being sent for analysis, but even that was not out of the ordinary. He shut
the folder and replaced it in the box under his desk before crossing to the window
where he stood deep in thought, looking out at the downpour. An idea about what might
have happened with the DNA samples began to take shape, but he did not dare follow
through with that notion.

As he settled back in his chair, there was a knock at the door and the deputy chief
constable entered the room, dressed in a neatly pressed uniform. Closing the door
behind him, he sat in the visitor’s seat.

Audun Vetti had responsibility for prosecuting many of the cases Wisting had investigated,
including the Cecilia case. Their working relationship had been stressful. Vetti was
rarely open to the viewpoints and contributions of others, and made himself scarce
when difficult decisions had to be made. His efforts were directed towards promoting
himself. Solving crime had no significance for him beyond furthering his own career.
Two years earlier, his methods had paid off when he was appointed deputy chief constable
and moved to an office in Tønsberg. For the past few months, he had been acting chief
constable, and he had already added an extra star to his epaulettes. He loosened the
buttons on his uniform jacket and placed a folder on his lap.

Wisting leaned back in his chair. ‘The Cecilia case,’ he said.

Audun Vetti nodded.

‘Do you know something more than me?’ Wisting asked.

‘It was your case,’ Vetti replied, shaking his head. ‘Your responsibility. The irregularities
that occurred are matters you are better placed to know about than I.’

Wisting did not comment on this disclaimer of liability. ‘I meant, do you know anything
more about the background to this petition to the Criminal Cases Review Commission?’

Audun Vetti unzipped the document folder and produced a set of papers. ‘Sigurd Henden
and I studied together. He’s sent me a copy of the petition, obviously to give us
time to prepare a defence. Soon, we’ll receive it officially from the Commission seeking
a response.’

‘What are the grounds?’

‘He has had the cigarette ends analysed again,’ Vetti explained, leafing through to
one of the last pages before handing Wisting the papers.

‘And?’

‘They’ve been lying in the deep freeze for seventeen years. The material has deteriorated,
but analysis methods have improved. The result is the same.’

Wisting read the papers. The defence lawyer had arranged for the samples to be analysed
again by a neutral, independent laboratory in Stavanger. Two of them had not contained
cell material that could be used for a DNA analysis but, for the sample marked A-3,
they had established a satisfactory DNA profile with ten-out-of-ten markers.

‘I don’t understand?’ Wisting said though, in actual fact, he did.

‘Didn’t you consider it rather strange that in two of the samples they could not manage
to find human traces, while in the last example they had extraordinary success?’

‘A number of factors could account for that.’

‘Three cigarette ends,’ Vetti held up three fingers. ‘From the same man in the same
place at the same time, under exactly the same circumstances?’

‘We don’t know whether the other two belong to Haglund. They could be from someone
else, and may have lain there for weeks.’

Vetti shook his head. ‘You don’t really believe that yourself.’ Wisting silently agreed.
‘Sigurd Henden did what you ought to have done seventeen years ago, William. He had
the contents of the cigarette butts analysed.’ He waved a finger to indicate that
Wisting should leaf further through the papers.

Wisting skimmed the text. The three cigarette ends were examined at a Danish laboratory
specialising in analytic chemistry. For each of the samples, they had listed a percentage
composition of the contents. Tar and nicotine were two recognisable ingredients among
a variety of chemical compounds.

‘Modern cigarettes are hi-tech industrial products for which taste, nicotine content
and other factors are determined during production,’ Vetti said. ‘There are different
types of tobacco and various processing methods. Snuff, cigarettes and rolling tobacco
are all pure natural products to start with. Modern tobaccos have a wide range of
additives.’

Leaning forward, he pointed to the overview on the sheet of paper. ‘Some of the contents
here are the remnants of pesticides used in the cultivation of the tobacco plants.
Some of the additives are agents to retain moisture, while others are included to
adjust the taste.’

Wisting nodded. He had not read the conclusion of the investigation, but already had
a good idea of what it would be.

‘The point is …’ Vetti said, ‘that the two cigarette ends without DNA belong to a
different brand from the one with DNA. The folk at the lab have even conducted a comparison
analysis and can verify that the two cigarette ends that did not yield results are
Tiedemann’s Gold Mix number 3, while the decisive cigarette butt was Petterøe’s Blue
number 3.’

Wisting kept his own counsel, remembering that the initial interviews with Rudolf
Haglund had been interrupted every time he demanded a cigarette break. He had sat
with a pack of tobacco on his knee and rolled up before they climbed the stairs to
the roof terrace where he could light up. He still had the same pack of tobacco as
at the time of his arrest. When it was finished, he had been forced to scrounge from
police officers. In those days, there was no thought of banning cigarettes. There
had been nothing but goodwill on the part of the investigators. A cigarette was something
that could keep an interview going.

‘Someone,’ Vetti said, raising his forefinger and pointing at Wisting. ‘Someone here
at the station exchanged sample A-3 for a cigarette smoked during the interviews.’

Wisting could not argue. ‘What do we do now?’

‘I haven’t really any choice,’ Vetti replied. ‘You were the leader of the investigation.
I don’t know whether you were the one who did it, or if it was a collective initiative.
That’s something I have to leave to Internal Affairs to determine.’

‘Internal Affairs? Isn’t that premature? If anyone in the investigation team actually
did what you’re insinuating, then surely it’s too late to prosecute now?’

‘The inability to prosecute does not prevent us from finding out whether there has
been a miscarriage of justice.’ Vetti adjusted his tie and took back the papers. ‘I
hope you understand that I have no choice but to suspend you?’

Wisting opened his mouth but had to search for the right words. ‘You think it was
me?’

‘I don’t think anything, but you were in charge of the investigation.’

‘And you were responsible for the prosecution.’

Audun Vetti’s face flushed bright red. ‘My job was to use the evidence you obtained.
I trusted you to do that in an honest fashion.’ Standing up, he produced a fresh sheet
of paper from the folder and handed it across.

Wisting took it and read:
Temporary removal from
service in accordance with the Civil Servants
’
Act §16,
followed by his own name.

‘You have one hour to pack your personal belongings, and then you must leave the station.
I shall inform Police Prosecutor Thiis in the meantime. Hand your ID badge and keys
to her.’

He paused by the door, as though even he realised how brutal his instruction had been.
‘It has to be this way. Until we find out what actually happened seventeen years ago.’

Wisting watched his superior officer’s retreating back. This is not about what happened,
he thought. This is about what we did.

The press conference was held in a conference room on the second floor of the police
station at Gunnar Nilsens gate 25. The venue was no more than half full, and only
one TV team had turned up. Line nodded and smiled at her journalist colleagues as
she entered.

Erik Fjeld sat with his camera at the ready near the podium, but there was no time
to speak to him or the others. She found a chair by the window and sat carefully.
Her entire body felt tender. Outside, she looked down on a cemetery with old gravestones
and black, naked trees.

At ten o’clock a side door opened and three police officers entered, two uniformed
and one plainclothes, to take their places behind the table where handwritten placards
gave their names and titles. The two in uniform were the chief superintendent and
police prosecutor, while the man in civilian clothes was the leader of the investigation.

The chief superintendent opened the meeting by welcoming everyone and giving a quick
summation, before handing over to the prosecutor, who spread a bundle of papers across
the table and provided a more detailed account. Line sat with the tip of the pen between
her lips. None of what was said was new to the journalists.

‘Murder weapon?’ one of them asked, before the meeting had been opened for questions.

‘The murder weapon has not been found,’ the prosecutor answered, as though he had
just reached that point and not been interrupted.

‘Do you know what it was?’

‘It is also too early to say anything specific about the cause of death until we receive
the preliminary report from Forensics at the Public Health Institute. The crime scene
investigators describe a head injury inflicted by a blunt instrument.’

Erik Fjeld took position behind the speakers to snap the press representatives over
their shoulders. He directed his lens at Line who smiled and winked to confirm her
approval. He was doing exactly what she had told him to do when she phoned. He shifted
to a 125 mm lens and zoomed in to photograph the police documents on the table before
resuming his seat.

‘The deceased has not yet been identified,’ the prosecutor said, ‘but we have reason
to believe the person in question is a forty-eight-year-old man from here in Fredrikstad,
and we are linking the murder to a burglary that took place at a residence in W. Blakstads
gate yesterday evening at which a
VG
journalist was assaulted.’

Line’s cheeks burned.

‘Has any trace of the burglar been found?’ someone asked.

‘We are still working in the house. A dog patrol followed the scent to the industrial
area at Øra, where the trail went cold. We have reason to believe he left there in
a vehicle.’

The prosecutor now handed over to the detective, who related how many witnesses had
been interviewed and encouraged members of the public who might have seen or heard
something to get in touch. The meeting was opened for questions and a journalist asked
how a reporter from
VG
could discover the identity of the murder victim before the police.

The prosecutor replied: ‘I don’t know what sources
VG
has, but in general terms I would advise the media against getting in the way of
the police’s work.’

Laughter broke out.

Line busied herself with her laptop, opening the email from the girl at the petrol
station and clicking an attachment, a still photo from the CCTV camera at the service
station. It was the murder victim as he stood at the counter, the colour image sharp
and clear. The man’s greying, receding blond hair was neatly parted and rather futilely
combed over to camouflage his bald patch. He was fastidiously dressed, with small,
close-set eyes and a penetrating gaze.

Follow-up questions concerned details and clarification of what had already been said.
Most knew to keep the best questions until after the press conference. Only the least
experienced reporter questioned from his earlier notes, giving the others his information
free.

The next attachment was a picture of the man standing beside the dog tied to a pole
outside. It was sitting at his feet staring up at him as he rolled a cigarette from
his yellow tobacco pack.

One of the journalists conjured an arithmetical problem from the time of the death
at just before ten o’clock and Line’s attack just prior to midnight. ‘Does that mean
the perpetrator had been in the victim’s apartment for more than two hours?’

‘That’s speculation,’ the prosecutor responded.

An arm shot into the air. ‘Was anything stolen?’

‘It’s too soon to say.’

‘Do you know what he may have been looking for?’

An unequivocal answer: ‘No.’

Line opened a third image on her laptop. The man with a cigarette in the corner of
his mouth, and the dog on all fours.

‘Any further questions?’ the chief superintendent asked.

Line lifted her hand. ‘What happens to his dog?’

The chief superintendent glanced across at the detective. ‘It has been temporarily
installed at Falck’s stray dogs centre,’ he replied, getting to his feet. The press
conference was over.