When Bosch came out of the trailer Edgar had already put Delacroix into the rear of the slickback. He saw a neighbor watching from the open front door of a nearby trailer. He turned and closed and locked Delacroix’s door.
36
BOSCH stuck his head into Lt. Billets’s office. She was turned sideways at her desk and working on a computer at a side table. Her desk had been cleared. She was about to go home for the day.
“Yes?” she said without looking to see who it was.
“Looks like we got lucky,” Bosch said.
She turned from the computer and saw it was Bosch.
“Let me guess. Delacroix invites you in and just sits down and confesses.”
Bosch nodded.
“Just about.”
Her eyes grew wide in surprise.
“You are fucking kidding me.”
“He says he did it. We had to shut him up so we could get him back here on tape. It was like he had been waiting for us to show up.”
Billets asked a few more questions and Bosch ended up recapping the entire visit to the trailer, including the problem they had in not having a working tape recorder with which to take Delacroix’s confession. Billets grew concerned and annoyed, equally with Bosch and Edgar for not being prepared and Bradley of IAD for not returning Bosch’s tape recorder.
“All I can say is that this better not put hair on the cake, Harry,” she said, referring to the possibility of a legal challenge to any confession because Delacroix’s initial words were not on tape. “If we lose this one because of a screwup on our part . . .”
She didn’t finish but didn’t need to.
“Look, I think we’ll be all right. Edgar got everything he said down verbatim. We stopped as soon as we got enough to hook him up and now we’ll lock it all down with sound and video.”
Billets seemed barely placated.
“And what about Miranda? You’re confident we will not have a Miranda situation,” she said, the last part not a question but an order.
“I don’t see it. He started spouting off before we had a chance to advise him. Then he kept talking afterward. Sometimes it goes like that. You’re ready to go with the battering ram and they just open the door for you. Whoever he gets as a lawyer might have a heart attack and start screaming about it but nothing’s going to come of it. We’re clean, Lieutenant.”
Billets nodded, a sign that Bosch was convincing her.
“I wish they were all this easy,” she said. “What about the DA’s office?”
“I’m calling them next.”
“Okay, which room if I want to take a look?”
“Three.”
“Okay, Harry, go wrap him up.”
She turned back to her computer. Bosch threw a salute at her and was about to duck out of the doorway when he stopped. She sensed he had not left and turned back to him.
“What is it?”
Bosch shrugged his shoulders.
“I don’t know. The whole way in I was thinking about what could have been avoided if we just went to him instead of dancing around him, gathering string.”
“Harry, I know what you’re thinking and there’s no way in the world you could have known that this guy—after twenty-some years—was just waiting for you to knock on his door. You handled it the right way and if you had it to do again you would still do it the same way. You circle the prey. What happened with Officer Brasher had nothing to do with how you ran this case.”
Bosch looked at her for a moment and then nodded. What she said would help ease his conscience.
Billets turned back to her computer.
“Like I said, go wrap him up.”
Bosch went back to the homicide table to call the District Attorney’s Office to advise that an arrest had been made in a murder case and that a confession was being taken. He talked to a supervisor named O’Brien and told her that either he or his partner would be coming in to file charges by the end of the day. O’Brien, who was familiar with the case only through media reports, said she wanted to send a prosecutor to the station to oversee the handling of the confession and the forward movement of the case at this stage.
Bosch knew that with rush hour traffic out of downtown it would still be a minimum of forty-five minutes before the prosecutor got to the station. He told O’Brien the prosecutor was welcome but that he wasn’t going to wait for anyone before taking the suspect’s confession. O’Brien suggested he should.
“Look, this guy wants to talk,” Bosch said. “In forty-five minutes or an hour it could be a different story. We can’t wait. Tell your guy to knock on the door at room three when he gets here. We’ll bring him into it as soon as we can.”
In a perfect world the prosecutor would be there for an interview but Bosch knew from years working cases that a guilty conscience doesn’t always stay guilty. When someone tells you they want to confess to a killing, you don’t wait. You turn on the tape recorder and say, “Tell me all about it.”
O’Brien reluctantly agreed, citing her own experiences, and they hung up. Bosch immediately picked the phone back up and called Internal Affairs and asked for Carol Bradley. He was transferred.
“This is Bosch, Hollywood Division, where’s my damn tape recorder?”
There was silence in response.
“Bradley? Hello? Are you—”
“I’m here. I have your recorder here.”
“Why did you take it? I told you to listen to the tape. I didn’t say take my machine, I don’t need it anymore.”
“I wanted to review it and have the tape checked, to make sure it was continuous.”
“Then open it up and take the tape. Don’t take the machine.”
“Detective, sometimes they need the original recorder to authenticate the tape.”
Bosch shook his head in frustration.
“Jesus, why are you doing this? You know who the leak is, why are you wasting time?”
Again there was a pause before she answered.
“I needed to cover all bases. Detective, I need to run my investigation the way I see fit.”
Now Bosch paused for a moment, wondering if he was missing something, if there was something else going on. He finally decided he couldn’t worry about it. He had to keep his eyes on the prize. His case.
“Cover the bases, that’s great,” he said. “Well, I almost lost a confession today because I didn’t have my machine. I would appreciate it if you would get it back to me.”
“I’m finished with it and am putting it in inter-office dispatch right now.”
“Thank you. Good-bye.”
He hung up, just as Edgar showed up at the table with three cups of coffee. It made Bosch think of something they should do.
“Who’s got the watch down there?” he asked.
“Mankiewicz was in there,” Edgar said. “So was Young.”
Bosch poured the coffee from the Styrofoam container into the mug he got out of his drawer. He then picked up the phone and dialed the watch office. Mankiewicz answered.
“You got anybody in the bat cave?”
“Bosch? I thought you might take some time off.”
“You thought wrong. What about the cave?”
“No, nobody till about eight today. What do you need?”
“I’m about to take a confession and don’t want any lawyer to be able to open the box once I wrap it. My guy smells like Ancient Age but I think he’s straight. I’d like to make a record of it, just the same.”
“This the bones case?”
“Yeah.”
“Bring him down and I’ll do it. I’m certified.”
“Thanks, Mank.”
He hung up and looked at Edgar.
“Let’s take him down to the cave and see what he blows. Just to be safe.”
“Good idea.”
They took their coffees into interview room 3, where they had earlier shackled Delacroix to the table’s center ring. They released him from the cuffs and let him take a few gulps of his c
offee before walking him down the back hallway to the station’s small jail facility. The jail essentially consisted of two large holding cells for drunks and prostitutes. Arrestees of a higher order were usually transported to the main city or county jail. There was a small third cell that was known as the bat cave, as in blood alcohol testing.
They met Mankiewicz in the hallway and followed him to the cave, where he turned on the Breathalyzer and instructed Delacroix to blow into a clear plastic tube attached to the machine. Bosch noticed that Mankiewicz had a black mourning ribbon across his badge for Brasher.
In a few minutes they had the result. Delacroix blew a .003, not even close to the legal limit for driving. There was no standard set for giving a confession to murder.
As they took Delacroix out of the tank Bosch felt Mankiewicz tap his arm from behind. He turned to face him while Edgar headed back up the hallway with Delacroix.
Mankiewicz nodded.
“Harry, I just wanted to say I’m sorry. You know, about what happened out there.”
Bosch knew he was talking about Brasher. He nodded back.
“Yeah, thanks. It’s a tough one.”
“I had to put her out there, you know. I knew she was green but—”
“Hey, Mank, you did the right thing. Don’t second-guess anything.”
Mankiewicz nodded.
“I gotta go,” Bosch said.
While Edgar returned Delacroix to his spot in the interview room Bosch went into the viewing room, focused the video camera through the one-way glass and put in a new cassette he took from the supply cabinet. He then turned on the camera as well as the backup sound recorder. Everything was set. He went back into the interview room to finish wrapping the package.
37
BOSCH identified the three occupants of the interview room and announced the date and time, even though both of these would be printed on the lower frame of the video being recorded of the session. He put a rights waiver form on the table and told Delacroix he wanted to advise him one more time of his rights. When he was finished he asked Delacroix to sign the form and then moved it to the side of the table. He took a gulp of coffee and started.
“Mr. Delacroix, earlier today you expressed to me a desire to talk about what happened to your son, Arthur, in nineteen eighty. Do you still wish to speak to us about that?”
“Yes.”
“Let’s start with the basic questions and then we can go back and cover everything else. Did you cause the death of your son, Arthur Delacroix?”
“Yes, I did.”
He said it without hesitation or emotion.
“Did you kill him?”
“Yes, I did. I didn’t mean to, but I did. Yes.”
“When did this occur?”
“It was in May, I think, of nineteen eighty. I think that’s when it was. You people probably know more about it than me.”
“Please don’t assume that. Please answer each question to the best of your ability and recollection.”
“I’ll try.”
“Where was your son killed?”
“In the house where we lived at the time. In his room.”
“How was he killed? Did you strike him?”
“Uh, yes. I . . .”
Delacroix’s businesslike approach to the interview suddenly eroded and his face seemed to close in on itself. He used the heels of his palms to wipe tears from the corners of his eyes.
“You struck him?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“All over, I guess.”
“Including the head?”
“Yes.”
“This was in his room, you said?”
“Yes, his room.”
“What did you hit him with?”
“What do you mean?”
“Did you use your fists or an object of some kind?”
“Yes, both. My hands and an object.”
“What was the object you struck your son with?”
“I really can’t remember. I’ll have to . . . it was just something he had there. In his room. I have to think.”
“We can come back to it, Mr. Delacroix. Why on that day did you—first of all, when did it happen? What time of day?”
“It was in the morning. After Sheila—she’s my daughter—had gone to school. That’s really all I remember, Sheila was gone.”
“What about your wife, the boy’s mother?”
“Oh, she was long gone. She’s the reason I started—”
He stopped. Bosch assumed he was going to lay blame for his drinking on his wife, which would conveniently blame her for everything that came out of the drinking, including murder.
“When was the last time you talked to your wife?”
“Ex-wife. I haven’t talked to her since the day she left. That was . . .”
He didn’t finish. He couldn’t remember how long.
“What about your daughter? When did you talk to her last?”
Delacroix looked away from Bosch and down at his hands on the table.
“Long time,” he said.
“How long?”
“I don’t remember. We don’t talk. She helped me buy the trailer. That was five or six years ago.”
“You didn’t talk to her this week?”
Delacroix looked up at him, a curious look on his face.
“This week? No. Why would—”
“Let me ask the questions. What about the news? Did you read any newspapers in the last couple weeks or watch the news on TV?”
Delacroix shook his head.
“I don’t like what’s on television now. I like to watch tapes.”
Bosch realized he had gotten off track. He decided to get back to the basic story. What was important for him to achieve here was a clear and simple confession to Arthur Delacroix’s death. It needed to be solid and detailed enough to stand up. Without a doubt Bosch knew that at some point after Delacroix got a lawyer, the confession would be withdrawn. They always were. It would be challenged on all fronts—from the procedures followed to the suspect’s state of mind—and Bosch’s duty was not only to take the confession but to make sure it survived and could eventually be delivered to twelve jurors.
“Let’s get back to your son, Arthur. Do you remember what the object was you struck him with on the day of his death?”
“I’m thinking it was this little bat he had. A miniature baseball bat that was like a souvenir from a Dodgers game.”
Bosch nodded. He knew what he was talking about. They sold bats at the souvenir stands that were like the old billy clubs cops carried until they went to metal batons. They could be lethal.
“Why did you hit him?”
Delacroix looked down at his hands. Bosch noticed his fingernails were gone. It looked painful.
“Um, I don’t remember. I was probably drunk. I . . .”
Again the tears came in a burst and he hid his face in his tortured hands. Bosch waited until he dropped his hands and continued.
“He . . . he should have been in school. And he wasn’t. I came in the room and there he was. I got mad. I paid good money—money I didn’t have—for that school. I started to yell. I started to hit and then . . . then I just picked up the little bat and I hit him. I hit him too hard, I guess. I didn’t mean to.”
Bosch waited again but Delacroix didn’t go on.
“He was dead then?”
Delacroix nodded.
“That means yes?”
“Yes. Yes.”
There was a soft knock on the door. Bosch nodded to Edgar, who got up and went out. Bosch assumed it was the prosecutor but he wasn’t going to interrupt things now to make introductions. He pressed on.
“What did you do next? After Arthur was dead.”
“I took him out the back and down the steps to the garage. Nobody saw me. I put him in the trunk of my car. I then went back to his room, I cleaned up and put some of his clothes in a bag.”
“What kind of bag?”
“It
was his school bag. His backpack.”