Practice to Deceive

  “I liked Patti—I was close to her,” Jackson recalled. “But I was involved in a new relationship and had too much on my plate at the time to take a week off to bring Patti home. I felt bad because she apparently got the idea that I was taking Jim’s side. I wasn’t—I avoided taking either side. I didn’t even know who Jim was having an affair with, really didn’t care to know. It could have been his next wife—Jean—or it could have been someone else.”

  Jean, who was born in Orange, New Jersey, was a tall, slender, rather plain woman. When his divorce from Patti was final, Jim Huden married Jean. They remained in Florida for a number of years. Jim continued to visit Whidbey Island occasionally, always drawn back to where he grew up and the memories he shared with his old friends. Sometimes he brought Jean with him.

  One of his old friends said that he liked Jean, she seemed “nice enough,” but that they’d all felt much closer to Patti. It was difficult to picture their longtime friend with anyone but his first wife.

  * * *

  THE JIM WHO HAD become a “high roller” after his financial bonanza from the software program he sold to Microsoft had changed. As far as any of his friends knew, he hadn’t cheated on Patti until near the end of the almost fifteen years they were married. By the time he married Jean, he was middle-aged, drank more—Crown Royal, in particular—and they were concerned that he might also be doing drugs. Jean Huden used drugs. Moreover, Jim had begun to notice women outside his second marriage, but he didn’t elaborate on that side of his life with his island buddies.

  Huden’s high life couldn’t last forever. Like all advances in the brave new world of technology, Jim’s software program had run its course and was rapidly becoming obsolete.

  Jim Huden was lean but muscular, and now he wore his hair pulled back in a ponytail. Not truly handsome, he was what most women would call “hot.” Jim resembled actor Mickey Rourke (before Rourke’s disastrous boxing injuries and bad plastic surgery). On the outside at least, Huden had become a “bad boy” type, a man who fascinated many women.

  And, after all, he was Buck Naked, the leader of the band. Female fans crowded around the stages in clubs where the X-hibitionists played.

  As in most relatively insulated communities, many of Whidbey Island’s residents were connected in one way or another. Two of Jim Huden’s oldest friends on the island were Sue and Neil Mahoney. Susan, a warmhearted woman the old gang called “Sweet Sue,” and Neil had both lived through unhappy first marriages. As it happens with many slightly older couples, Sue and Neil were very much in love and grateful to have found each other. Their home was a gathering place for both the old high school group and their families.

  Invariably, whenever Jim Huden returned to Washington, he would visit Sue and Neil Mahoney’s home and he could expect to find old and new friends there.

  Of the many people whom Jim Huden treasured, the Mahoneys were near the top. When the stress of his life grew too heavy, he knew he could always count on them.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  * * *

  AS SHERIFF’S COMMANDER MIKE BEECH and Detective Mark Plumberg prepared to fly to Florida in August 2004, they realized that they could not have chosen a worse time. They would be literally flying directly into a storm of horrific magnitude. Hurricane Charley, the strongest hurricane to hit the United States in a dozen years, was gathering strength in the Caribbean Sea and heading directly toward Punta Gorda. At its peak, Charley was expected to have winds measuring over 150 miles an hour.

  The weather warnings only made the Washington State investigators feel more urgency as they headed for Florida, hoping that they would get there in time to talk with Jim Huden. They didn’t have the luxury of waiting for calmer skies; Huden could be long gone by then.

  The plan was for Beech and Plumberg to go to Florida, and when they were finished there, Commander Beech would join Detectives Shawn Warwick and Ed Wallace and fly to Nevada to interview Peggy Sue Thomas again, if need be. Mark Plumberg would stay on Whidbey Island, organizing the case and seeking any further warrants they might need.

  Nevada in late August/early September would be extremely hot. But that was nothing compared to an encroaching hurricane.

  Beech and Plumberg arrived in Punta Gorda on August 3, beating the hurricane there. They did not, however, know if they could head back to Washington State before it hit.

  They immediately called Bill Hill and told him they would be staying at the Best Western Hotel and asked if he would meet them there. He was still conflicted and they could hear it in his voice. At first, he declined to meet them, but he called them back a short time later and said he had changed his mind; he said he was actually at the Best Western—waiting for them in the parking lot in his van.

  For the first time, Mike Beech and Mark Plumberg saw the man whom they had spoken to so many times on the phone.

  After they checked in, Hill accompanied the detectives to their room. They sensed his angst at once; he clearly hated the thought that he was betraying his best friend, but he felt compelled to help them solve a murder.

  Bill Hill confirmed everything he had told them in his series of phone conversations.

  “Would you be willing to wear a wire while you talked to Huden?” Plumberg asked.

  “No, no—I couldn’t do that,” Hill stammered immediately.

  Nor would he provide them with a written statement about what Jim had told him. He remained ambivalent, torn between loyalty and duty.

  “He’s just too good a friend,” Hill explained.

  Hill felt that Jim was going to try to get Peggy Sue back, explaining that Huden was very much in love with her, even though he still lived with his wife, Jean.

  “But I guess Peggy came to Florida last weekend, and she met with him and Jean,” he said. “Jim isn’t sure whether she will come back to him.”

  It was late and Beech and Plumberg had traveled all day. They agreed to meet with Bill Hill the next morning to continue their interview.

  Hurricane Charley stayed on top of the news, and all around them, those Floridians who realized the danger to come were nailing plywood sheets over plate-glass windows, bringing in outdoor furniture and plants, and generally battening down their hatches. Still, Mike Beech and Mark Plumberg were so focused on talking with Jim Huden that they barely noticed.

  At 3 P.M. on August 4, 2004, they met with Detective Tom Lewis of the Punta Gorda Police Department, who went with them to Jim and Jean Huden’s home on Yucca Street.

  There was a stillness in the air, an odd heaviness as Floridians waited for the storm to swoop in. Every once in a while, a ripple of wind caused the tropical vegetation to tremble and the jalousie windows to rattle. Still, the TV weathermen were assuring Punta Gordians that the storm was likely days away from landfall in Florida.

  As the Whidbey Island detectives neared the front door of what was reputed to be Jim Huden’s home, Plumberg could see a man sitting on a sofa and a woman standing nearby. He knocked on the door and Jean Huden opened it.

  “I identified myself, telling her in a loud enough voice for the man inside to hear me that I was from Whidbey Island, Washington. I asked if Jim Huden was home and if I could speak to him. She let us in.”

  The man stood up and held out his hand to Plumberg, saying: “I’m Jim Huden.”

  He didn’t seem at all surprised to see the detectives who had flown across America to speak with him.

  Mike Beech interviewed Jean Huden in one of the bedrooms, while Plumberg talked to Jim in the living room.

  “I assume you know why we’re here,” Plumberg said.

  “No—not yet,” Jim said.

  Twice more, the detective told Jim Huden that he and Beech were from Island County, Washington, but Huden still didn’t seem startled or ask why they had come to his door in Florida.

  “We’re here to investigate a crime that occurred in Island County.”

  Huden’s expression remained unreadable.

  Read his rights under Mirand
a, Huden said he understood and waived his rights verbally.

  Jim Huden didn’t ask what crime the investigators were asking about, but he didn’t seem shocked when Mark Plumberg started asking him about the murder of Russel Douglas almost eight months earlier.

  Only moments into the interview, Plumberg wanted to shake Jim Huden up. He told him that they were in Punta Gorda because they suspected him of taking part in the unsolved murder of Russel Douglas.

  “You’ve been implicated in his death,” Plumberg said bluntly. “I know that you’re the man who pulled the trigger.”

  “I don’t know why someone would say that,” Huden said softly. “I’ve never even owned a gun.”

  As Plumberg questioned Jim Huden in Punta Gorda, Florida, in the summer of 2004, he made sure that Huden knew he could leave at any time. He was not under arrest.

  Jim agreed readily that he and Peggy Sue Thomas had traveled from Las Vegas to Whidbey Island during the past Christmas holidays.

  “I drove Peggy’s Lexus up, and Peggy flew up with her two daughters.”

  Mark Plumberg reminded Huden once again that he was not under arrest, that he was free to go at any time. Huden nodded, but made no move to leave. The detective continued the interview by asking for more details about the trip Jim and Peggy had made just before Christmas 2003. Jim repeated that he had driven Peggy’s car, and she and her daughters had boarded a plane.

  “Can you describe Peggy Sue Thomas’s car?” Plumberg asked.

  “It’s a dark green 1992 four-door Lexus sedan, and the license plate says FIRYRED. That’s kind of Peggy’s image.”

  “So when did you get up to the Seattle area?”

  “A day later than I planned. But a day before Peggy was going to fly. I stayed that night at my friend Ron Young’s house.”

  “Do you recall which day that was?”

  “I’m not sure—I’d have to look at a calendar. I drove down to Sea-Tac to pick up Peggy and the girls the next day. We stayed together in a hotel north of Seattle in the Alder-wood/Mill Creek area. Then Peggy and I drove to Whidbey alone the next day.”

  “What about her daughters?”

  “I’m not sure how they got to their dad’s—Kelvin’s place—but I know they were with him.”

  Jim Huden said that he and Peggy Sue had stayed at his good friend Dick Deposit’s home from the Friday before Christmas, December 19, to Monday or Tuesday of the next week, either December 22 or 23.

  “Peggy was cutting hair at Just B’s from that Friday until the next week, and then we left the island. We stayed at a hotel by the airport next.”

  Suddenly, Jim Huden interrupted the interview, saying, “Can I ask you a question?”

  “Go ahead,” Plumberg said.

  “Is Peggy angry enough at me that she would implicate me in this crime?”

  At this point, Mark Plumberg hadn’t indicated that Peggy Sue Thomas was in any way connected to Russel Douglas’s murder.

  “Why would Peggy be angry with you?”

  “I guess because I hurt her and wasn’t truthful with her. Early this year, I led her to believe I was coming back to her but I never did. You know, I helped her move from Whidbey Island to Las Vegas in August 2003 and I stayed in Vegas with her until January of this year.”

  It was not easy for Plumberg to see where this was going or how the relationship troubles that Jim Huden and Peggy Sue were entangled in might possibly have any connection to the homicide probe.

  He tried another tack.

  “Have either Peggy or Brenna Douglas ever talked to you about Brenna’s having financial difficulties?”

  Jim shrugged. “I know Brenna was late with the rent for the house a few times. Peggy owns the place where Brenna and her kids live, and she really doesn’t like being a landlord.”

  “Brenna have any reason to be mad at you?”

  “Maybe she might be mad because I hurt Peggy.”

  Huden appeared to be fishing for what Peggy Sue and/or Brenna Douglas might have told investigators about him.

  Plumberg didn’t really answer him directly.

  The sheriff’s detective returned to more intense questioning about how Jim and Peggy Sue had spent their days on Whidbey Island around the previous Christmas. That chill wintertime seemed so far away now as the Washington detective sat in the oppressive Florida heat.

  “Did you two get together with Brenna Douglas while you were there?”

  “We meant to—and we tried, but it never happened.”

  “How did you pay for the hotel by the airport in Seattle?”

  “We put it on Peggy’s credit card.”

  Plumberg pulled out photos of Russ Douglas and of his yellow Chevy Tracker.

  Huden shook his head. “I don’t recognize him or the car.”

  “Did you by any chance interact with Russel Douglas while you were in Washington?”

  “On the night that Peggy and I left the island to go to the airport hotel—that’d be Monday or Tuesday before Christmas—I took a present for Brenna over to Russel’s apartment in Renton.”

  Although Plumberg’s expression didn’t change, a bell went off in Mark Plumberg’s head. Peggy Sue Thomas had given him a different scenario having to do with a present for Brenna. She had told him during one of their phone conversations that she was the one who took a present for Brenna to Russ’s apartment. Why would the couple tell him two different stories?

  “Where was Peggy at that time—when you took the present for Brenna to Russ?”

  “She was back at the hotel. She saw a lot of clients that day, and she was pretty tired from being on her feet all day at the salon.”

  “Why didn’t Peggy just give Brenna her present when they were both at Just B’s that day?”

  “Well, the two of them made a pact that they weren’t going to give each other anything for Christmas—but Peggy wanted to buy a present for Brenna. She just had to make sure all the stores were closed for the day so Brenna couldn’t run out and buy her something in return.”

  Huden said he hadn’t talked to Russ himself before he took the present to him; Russ had given the directions to his apartment to Peggy to pass on to him.

  (This was another small flaw in their scenario. Peggy later told the sheriff’s detectives that Jim had spoken directly to Russ to get directions.)

  “I parked directly in front of Russ’s building—but out in the street because there weren’t any parking spots left inside. I ran up the stairs and knocked on his door. When he opened it, I asked him if he was Brenna’s husband, gave him the present, said it was for Brenna—and then I left.”

  “That would have been on December 23?”

  “Yes.”

  “Had you ever met Russel before?”

  “No.”

  “Did Peggy tell him that you would be bringing a present?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did he know who you were—that you were Peggy’s boyfriend?”

  “I suppose he did because Brenna and Peggy talked about everything.”

  That answer made it seem even stranger that Peggy claimed she only learned of Russ’s murder belatedly—days after it happened. Why wouldn’t she have been one of the first people Brenna Douglas called when she learned that Russ was dead? But Peggy had been emphatic that it was Doris Matz, her mother, who notified her. And this was well after she and Jim were back in Las Vegas.

  “Did Peggy call Brenna when she heard?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” Jim Huden said. “I told Peggy that it would just be another phone call with everyone calling Brenna and that she would understand and know Peggy didn’t want to overwhelm her with more phone calls.”

  Mark Plumberg asked Jim if he would be willing to accompany them—voluntarily—to the Punta Gorda police station to provide a full statement on tape. The suspect agreed to that and immediately started putting on his shoes.

  “You do know that you’re not under arrest,” Plumberg reminded him one more time, “and you d
on’t have to go with us.”

  “I know,” Huden said. “I’ll go.”

  “Even though I told him many times that he wasn’t under arrest,” the Island County detective recalled, “it seemed to me that he thought he was in custody.”

  A Punta Gorda police officer drove Jim Huden to the precinct, and Mark Plumberg prepared to follow them.

  Before Plumberg left the house, however, he spoke with Jean Huden, telling her that Jim was willing to go with them.

  “Has Jim ever owned a gun?” he asked casually.

  “No! Jim hates guns. Is Jim under arrest?”

  “No, ma’am, he’s not. He’s voluntarily going to give us a statement.”

  Jean didn’t ask why Jim might be in trouble or why he would be arrested. Commander Mike Beech and Detective Mark Plumberg had never before encountered a homicide probe where the people they interviewed asked fewer questions or who reacted with such little emotion. Particularly Jim Huden. Was it because Jim and Jean were in shock?

  Or perhaps their demeanor was so flat because they already knew the answers.

  * * *

  AS THEY WAITED FOR audiotapes and a video camera to be set up in an air-conditioned interview room at the Punta Gorda police headquarters, Plumberg and Huden made small talk. The suspect was hard to read. He didn’t seem particularly nervous; his mien was more one of calm acceptance.

  When the tapes started to roll, the detective read Jim his Miranda rights once again.

  Jim began to answer questions, and he confirmed several major points on the record, knowing that one day his voice, image, and statements might indeed be used against him in a court of law.

  Plumberg jotted down the salient points, filling about ten pages of his yellow legal pad, and he watched Jim’s reactions to certain questions:

  1. During the Christmas holidays in 2003, Jim Huden had driven Peggy Sue Thomas’s Lexus from Las Vegas to Seattle. At the same time, Peggy flew from Vegas to Sea-Tac Airport.

  2. Jim and Peggy stayed at Dick Deposit’s home on Whidbey Island from Friday, December 19, until Monday or Tuesday, December 22 or 23.