“On the strength of that, we had them interviewed by their parole officers. They were asked to account for their movements in detail, and then we had their stories checked out. As far as we can tell, they’re clean.”
“Who did the checking? Us or Corrections?” Brandt asked, slightly confused by Ron’s syntax.
“I did,” Dennis DeFlorio answered. “I talked to family members in Gilchrist’s case-Sorvin lives alone-and friends and neighbors of both of them. Harriet’s transcribing my report. Maybe I’m wrong, but I kind of think we’d be wasting our time with them. Just my opinion, of course.”
No one challenged him, much to his apparent relief, so Ron plowed on. “We finished going through the list of people Gail submitted, and except for Harry Murchison, we came up empty. But since those were the people she suggested herself, we gave them a second going-over. The only iffy pair were Philip Duncan and Mark Sumner, who were at a party together until two-thirty-after the rape began. Since each had spoken for the other concerning that time, and their friends could’ve been covering for them, we looked for other witnesses for corroboration. Unfortunately-or fortunately, I suppose-we found them. Both a waitress and a bartender confirmed the time.”
“This place was still open at two-thirty?” Billy Manierre asked.
“It was a special party at the Redtop Inn-the dining room was reserved for the whole night. Ethan Allen Realty’s just been bought out by some businessman from Boston, and I guess he wanted to show his new employees what a great guy he is.”
“So what about Murchison?” Brandt interrupted, impatient with Ron’s methodical approach.
“I’ve been checking him out,” Sammie answered. “And he’s still a good candidate. I went to Krystal Kleer pretending I wanted a mirror cut to size, and I got into a conversation with the woman at the desk. According to her, Murchison is a grade-A sexual harasser, making comments, copping feels, and generally being a pain in the ass. She said even some of the customers complained, and the boss had to stop sending him out on the road.
“I looked into the two sexual priors against him-an aggravated-assault conviction and a dropped simple-assault charge. The first involved a woman he was seeing and who’d broken off the relationship; he waited for her one night when she got back from work, forced her inside, threatened her with a hammer, and then raped her, apparently hoping the ecstasy of the experience would make her see the error of her ways.”
Everyone but Kunkle remained studiously silent at the bitterness in Sammie’s voice. Kunkle laughed.
“Murchison did three years for that and got out almost three years ago. The simple-assault charge was eight years ago and didn’t stick because the girl he had sex with was too flaky-she only came forward because her parents forced her to, and she kept changing her story. The state wasn’t all that sure who to believe.”
“What was the background on that case?” Todd Lefevre asked.
“Backseat groping at a lover’s lane. The girl was a well-experienced minor. He claimed he didn’t know how old she was. There was no violence, but her first story-the one she came in with accompanied by her parents-was that he’d forced the situation. There don’t seem to be any parallels with our case, unlike the rape he was convicted for. Willy did the legwork on his whereabouts the night before last.”
We all looked expectantly at Kunkle, who took his time finishing off a Coke. I filled the gap by asking Sammie, “Did you run a picture of Murchison by Gail, just to make sure we’re talking about the same window installer?”
She hesitated. “I wasn’t sure I should-not this soon after.”
“You better get me a mug shot or something. She said the guy had almost electric blue eyes.”
Sammie was already nodding, “That’s him-the receptionist even said it was too bad they belonged to such a creep.”
Willy put his can down and wiped his mouth against his sleeve. “Okay: Harry Murchison is a definite maybe-the truck fits the old man’s description, and we know from his neighbor he spent at least part of the night away from home. Turns out he had a fight with his girlfriend-something about her drinking too much beer at a party they were both at-and she had to catch a ride home with a friend. Murchison lit out for parts unknown.
“I put together a list of his drinking buddies-most of it from his ex-parole officer-and tried to see if I could trace his movements that night. Up to about the time of the rape, I got him drinking at a guy’s house near West Dummerston, but then he disappears. They ran out of booze and Murchison took off, either in search of another watering hole or someplace to pass out besides home. With more time, I might be able to pin down which one. One interesting thing, though-the quickest way to get back into town from the place in West Dummerston is Meadowbrook Road.”
“So the truck the old guy saw was Murchison’s,” Dennis said.
But I saw the problem with that. “Maybe-Willy said Murchison left his buddy’s around the time the rape began-that’s 2:13-and the witness didn’t see the truck ‘til… ” I glanced over my shoulder at the board, “4:15-over half an hour after Gail got loose, and twenty minutes after her own car was seen leaving for the hospital.”
“He could’ve waited, to watch her leave,” Ron suggested.
I didn’t argue the point. “I’m not ruling him out-it’s just a discrepancy we need to remember. Keep digging, okay, Willy?”
He nodded once without looking up, his eyes on a distant pickle.
Ron hesitated and then resumed running the meeting. “Robert Vogel is next. I assume you’ve all read the updates, so you know basically who he is. I made some phone calls after Joe gave me Vogel’s file, and talked to an assistant DA in Massachusetts who knew a little about his case. From what he told me, it does look like we should put Vogel at the top of our list.”
Ron shuffled a few pages in front of him and extracted a single sheet of notes he’d presumably written to himself during his phone conversation. “Bob Vogel is twenty-eight years old-and a dark-haired Caucasian, which fits the samples J.P. recovered from Gail Zigman’s bed. As far as law enforcement in Massachusetts knows, he’s committed three rapes, the last of which landed him in jail for a fully served four-year sentence. As your updates make clear, he’s now out on a burglary probation, being monitored by our own Department of Corrections.
“The interesting thing about this man is that his record shows a learning curve, as if each rape taught him how to improve on the next. In the first attack in North Adams, he held his victim down by the neck and got scratched for his efforts. The next time, he used tape on her wrists and ankles; and on the third outing, he used the slipknots. Same thing with the blindfold: first time, nothing; second time, he ordered her to keep her eyes shut; third time, he used her nightgown.”
“And now he’s into pillowcases,” Sammie muttered.
Ron continued speaking. “In all three instances, the women were single, lived alone, and didn’t know Vogel personally, although they may have seen him around town. Also, all the attacks were made in the middle of the night, all of them involved a knife-although he actually used it the third time only-and all of them lasted several hours.”
“Were the second and third rapes committed in North Adams?” Lefevre asked, taking notes of his own.
“No. After the first one landed him in court, and ended with a hung jury and a dismissal from the judge, Vogel moved to Greenfield. That was about eight years ago, when he was twenty. The second one occurred a couple of years after that, but it never got to court. The prosecutor couldn’t run with it because the investigation was botched-illegal searches, a broken chain of evidence, a few other things. The officer in charge turned out to have a drinking problem and was let go right after, but the case was a wash. The ADA I talked to was pretty bitter-even though they nailed him good and proper the third time, the court had to sentence him as a first-time offender. That’s why he got off so light.”