PART III Chapter Twenty-seven

PART III Chapter Twenty-seven
Kate was careful not to ask too many questions that incriminated Alan before she actually charged him. She wanted to make sure she read him his “Miranda rights” before they got too deep in the questioning. She didn’t want the case tossed out on a technicality. 

Kate stood up before seemingly ending the interview. Alan stood up and offered a handshake to Kate but before she excused Alan she had a question for him.

Kate asked, “By the way, Alan, Do you own any weapons?”

Kate knew the answer before she asked, that was the best question to ask; the ones you knew the answers to. She already had the weapons and Alan’s prints were all over them. She had also ran the serial numbers on the guns and found that Alan was a registered owner to both pistols.

Alan replied, “I am sure you already know the answer to that question, yes I have two registered pistols in my name.”

After a short pause Alan asked, “Am I a suspect in the crimes?”

Kate replied, “I guess the answer to that is yes. I need to advise you of your rights.”

Kate recited the Miranda rights from memory. She had told them to criminals hundreds of times. As Kate figured, once Alan was officially charged, he stopped talking and asked for a lawyer.

Kate immediately stopped asking questions and had Alan taken into custody and she put in the request for a public defender. Kate thought to herself that Alan would need more than a public defender to get out of the mess he had gotten into. 

Kate knew they had gathered a lot of physical evidence, she didn’t need a confession and was sure there wouldn’t be one. She would try to talk again with Christine but chances were that she had already found a lawyer. She had a lot of hubby’s money that would pay for both of them. 

When Kate called Christine later her suspicions were realized. Christine had hired a lawyer and Kate was referred to his number for any questions she might have. Kate knew that was the end of getting any questions answered. She knew they had plenty of physical evidence and it would have to be enough. 

Kate wondered if Tim would still be willing to talk to them. He wasn’t being charged with anything although his wife might be implicated. Kate was sure Christine knew about Alan’s activities and might even be involved in the actual murders. Kate had hopes that she might be able to get Christine to flip and testify against her brother once she found out how much evidence they had against him. 

Kate asked Tim to come in and talk with her. She was going to try to figure out how much Tim knew about what Alan and his wife had done. Tim agreed to come in and had not hired a lawyer like his wife and brother-in-law had done. Kate wouldn’t have long to wait, Tim showed up at the station less than a half hour later. She led him to an interview room as soon as he showed up on her security camera. 

She took a seat right across the table from where Tim had sat. She took things slow before her questions began to center around the murders and the involvement of Tim’s wife and brother-in-law. Her questions were created to explore what Tim may have known about the activities his wife and brother-in-law were involved with. 

During questioning, Tim told Kate he was surprised to find out his brother-in-law was a suspect in the murders of the two women who were found dead. Tim seemed believable when Kate questioned him about what he knew and she didn’t think she would get any additional information from him.

Kate didn’t see any reason to keep Tim in the interview room under present conditions. She let him leave and decided they would have to depend on physical evidence to prosecute their case. Kate thought they had a good case, she would have preferred to have a confession to go with it but that would not be happening. 

After a few days had passed and the defense had a chance to review the evidence, Kate received a phone call from the district attorney’s office. Dan Patterson was the attorney inside the office assigned to the case and he had received a call from Christine’s defense attorney. John Hughes told the DA that his client might be willing to testify against her brother if the right deal was offered. 

Kate told Dan they didn’t need much else in terms of evidence, but if he wanted to make a deal that would be okay with her if they could trust the information that she gave them. Dan told Kate he would meet with the accused to see what she would tell them and told her she could come along if she wanted to. 

Kate accompanied Dan when he met with Christine and her lawyer. They all met in an interview room. Christine had been released with bail pending her trial but Alan hadn’t been able to raise enough money to make bail. 

Kate and Dan sat on one side of the table and Christine and Dan sat on the other. Dan made the offer to Christine to reduce her charge to manslaughter from second degree murder. The main stipulation from Kate was she wanted the full story in exchange for the reduced sentence. 

Christine began telling Kate and Dan her story. She started with finding out her husband had mistresses on the side. She told Kate that she suspected Tim and when she told Alan about her suspicions he volunteered to follow Tim and try to determine if her suspicions were true. They discovered the bank had an apartment for clients that Tim had access to and Alan followed Tim to discover where some of the women lived.

Christine said, “Alan told me he would take care of everything. He told me he found out where the women lived and he thought it best to get rid of them in their own home.”

Christine kept telling them about the conversations she had with her brother while maintaining that she was always unaware of his full plans. She admitted she thought she knew what he had in mind but thought it best if she never asked him about the plans.

Kate asked, “You never asked what he was going to do?”

Christine replied, “He always just said it was best if I didn’t know. He said he would take care of everything.”

Kate showed Christine crime scene photos of the two murdered women. 

She asked, “You never thought about something going down like this.”

Kate pointed to the photos as she made her statement.

Christine replied, “I guess I never thought about any details, I just thought about it being over.”

Kate asked, “Did you ever see Alan come home with blood on his clothes or see any actual evidence of what he did?”

Christine replied, “He called me both times and said Tim wouldn’t see that woman anymore.”

Kate asked, “Tim was seen with several women. Were there any other murders that you are aware of?”

Christine replied, “No more bodies that I know about. We decided after the first two, we couldn’t kill everybody.”

Kate asked, “Did Alan ever give any specifics about how the murders took place?”

Christine replied, “He wanted me to not know many details but he just said the women were executed. A clean shot with no fuss. Nothing special. He was surprised the first one was able to call 911. He said he was sure she should have died right away; I guess she was tougher than he thought.”

Christine was excused after about an hour since they figured she didn’t have anything else that would help them. Kate knew she had physical evidence and Christine would implicate her brother on the stand, there wasn’t much else that was needed outside a confession from Alan and a guilty plea.

Kate was about done with her case, she was like a quarterback and she was about to hand the ball off to the DA. It would be up to their team now to cross into the end zone. There were no plays left to run and she didn’t have a Hail Mary. It was up to the DA not to fumble the ball going forward.