“This is just like before,” Tia Wetzel said. “I’m going to be smarter about it this time. It will end differently.” The way she scooted back her chair was a metaphor for her relative freedom.
I’d called her in for questioning, not only because she hadn’t answered a single question on the night of the murder, but because logic and proximity made her the prime suspect.
She was being much more savvy. Those who’d weathered the criminal justice system learned quickly. This time Wetzel had brought a lawyer. A famous one at that. Everyone in the state of Ohio within broadcast range of a radio or television knew of Vernon Dinwiddie. If there was a high-profile case in the black community, he was there front and center. I’d never seen him sitting alongside a white westsider, but there was a first time for everything.
“It’s your right to have an attorney,” I acknowledged. “It’s also my job to investigate homicides. So let’s get to it.”
Secretly I had to agree that Tia Wetzel was making a good choice. What I hadn’t said out loud was that she got on my radar after Cincinnati law students had poked around from the Ohio Innocence Project some months ago. That hadn’t gone anywhere, that I knew of, probably because she was free from confinement if not from a felony conviction record.
Now, here she was some eleven years after that first conviction, facing the same system she’d said had done her wrong. Wetzel couldn’t know that while I wasn’t on her side exactly, I was different than some cops I knew because I was on the side of truth. Not to pat myself on the back, but I’m not sure she’d have gotten fair treatment from Walsh or anyone else in the department.
I opened the murder book. Instead of my usual move of sliding the photos over to the suspect to spur feelings of guilt, I played it straight.
“Do you remember meeting me on the thirteenth of September?”
“I can’t see how I’d forget.” Wetzel’s tone was dry.
“Can you tell me, in your own words, what happened that night?”
“When do you want me to start?” She shrugged, resigned to reliving what had to be one of the most horrible moments in her life.
“Let’s go back before that night. How did you meet Malcom Pointer?”
Wetzel ducked her head in what looked like embarrassment. Then she lifted her head. Her eyes met mine, steady. “I met him in a bar a few weeks ago.”
I was a divorced man in Cleveland. I knew how it worked. If no one was willing to set you up, there were two choices, sketchy online dating via AOL personals or bars. This new assignment, and a certain squeamishness, had kept me too busy from either recently. The idea that I could run into a potential suspect might keep me celibate forever.
“What bar?” I asked.
“It’s this new place near the West Side Market—”
“Market Avenue Wine Bar?” I interrupted her answer with a question.
“You’ve been?”
“Once. Pretty good tapas.” I’d gone ostensibly to try the small plates. The reality was that I was interested in staying away from the same places and same people. The food and wine had been good, the female company, not so much.
“I went there after work with a couple of the agents to celebrate my birthday,” Wetzel continued. “It was a Monday. They left after one drink. I stayed. Malcolm came over, introduced himself, bought me a glass of Australian Shiraz and we got to talking.”
“What date was that?”
“August tenth.”
I made a note to add that to the timeline I was building.
“Did you see him again after that?”
“At the Cleveland Air Show on Labor Day weekend.”
“Any other times?”
“Not until I invited him over for dinner on the thirteenth.”
“What time did he come?”
“Around six thirty, I think. Maybe a little later. He was surprised at the address, had driven around a bit convinced there was some ‘other’ Detroit.”
“How’d you end up there?” At her confused glance toward Dinwiddie, I clarified that I meant her townhouse location.
“You mean a street that used to be an open market for prostitutes and drugs?”
I dipped my head.
“My office had the listing. It was an opportunity to buy something in good condition at a lower price than I’d get someplace else. Plus there was this whole ‘revitalize the neighborhood’ sales pitch from the developers. Malcolm had never been over this way because of the reputation, so I think he was a little thrown off. Plus he said in some cities there are some places that would always be no-go zones, even with gentrification.”
“Got it. When I first talked to you, you said that you’d gotten a call.”
There was silence for a long beat. I didn’t think I’d stepped on a trigger, so I looked between Wetzel and her attorney.
Finally Dinwiddie spoke. “There wasn’t a question there. I don’t want anyone to put words into her mouth.”
It was a good callout of police technique. I was getting pretty used to putting all levels of bait out there and seeing what got bit. From testifying, I knew that lawyers in court had far greater limitations for good reason. I decided, for the moment at least, to adhere to Dinwiddie’s rules.
“Did you receive a call after Malcolm arrived?”
“Yes.”
“How? Cell phone? Landline?”
“I didn’t get a landline after I moved. With all the taxes and fees, Ohio Bell costs nearly as much as a cell phone nowadays.”
“Who called your cell?”
“It came up unknown or maybe something else? But I answered before I thought about it.”
Wasn’t unreasonable. The only people I knew who paid attention to caller ID were my daughter when waiting for a boy to call, drug dealers, and women with stalkers.
“Who was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“What did they say?”
“That I’d left my credit card at a stall at the West Side Market.”
“Weren’t they closed?” The murder had been on a Sunday. Cleveland had loosened its blue laws up a bit. When I moved here, nothing was open on the same day when churches were. Times had changed, but many businesses were still open only half day or less.
“The guy said that he’d stayed after to clean up, but wouldn’t be there too much longer. I have some stuff on autopay now and didn’t want to have to cancel the card, get a new number, change out bills and all that.”
All three of us nodded. In the name of fraud, banks would change your card numbers in a heartbeat, but were no help with the economic carnage left behind.
“What did you do then?”
“I explained to Malcolm what happened. It’s like a ten-minute drive, so maybe twenty minutes tops? We didn’t want to end the date, so I said I’d go.”
“Is there a reason he didn’t go with you?” I’m not sure I’d trust a date in my place alone. But my job made me more suspicious than most.
“I had food in the oven. He wouldn’t be able to pick up my credit card because I might have to show ID, but he could get food out of the oven.”
I could practically recreate the frantic conversation in my own head. It all seemed plausible and reasonable, so far.
“What was dinner?”
“Baked ziti.”
“What happened when you got to the market?”
“It was closed. I was a little anxious, so I ran around the building, but I couldn’t find any open door.” Wetzel waved her arms. “Then I looked at my phone and realized it was an unknown number and I couldn’t call it back. Then I checked my wallet and realized my card was still there.”
“You didn’t think to check before?” I asked. This is where the story started to get hinky. Her brief statement to Parker on the night of the murder came out as if she’d been framed. I could see, though, how any jury would think it was creating a false alibi.
“I didn’t think. I panicked.”
“Did you drive back home right away?”
“Yeah. I was pissed that I might have messed up my date. I really liked the guy. Was trying to impress him. What if he forgot to take the food out? What if it was cold?”
“When you came back, what did you do?”
“I noticed that music was playing from my speakers. That was nice. Aimee Mann. I ran to the stove first. There wasn’t smoke or anything beeping, but I wanted to make sure. I’d gone to the West Side Market earlier that morning for the ingredients. I’d put a lot of work into it.”
“Where was Malcolm?”
“After I found the ziti with a towel over it, and knew dinner was safe, I started looking for him. I called his name a few times. My guess was that he was on the rooftop deck. I’d kind of mentioned having some after-dinner drinks up there to see the views. I ran up two flights, but he wasn’t there. Then I came down going from room to room…then I found him.”
“Where was he?” I was writing quickly now, trying to get every detail as she told it. Her attorney had objected to me making a recording. Unless I was willing to arrest and detain her, I wasn’t in control. And if I’d read her rights, no doubt she’d have exercised the right to remain silent. With only the information from the crime scene and her brief interview that night, I’d have had very little to go on. Me scribbling on a pad was the tradeoff.
“There was so much blood,” Wetzel whispered.
Dinwiddie covered her hand with his. Probably a signal they’d worked out to keep her from talking too much. Loose lips turned suspects into defendants.
“He was in my bedroom,” she said once she’d composed herself.
“Was he alive?”
“I don’t think so. It doesn’t seem like it was possible. I didn’t check. I couldn’t go in there. I ran out and dialed nine one one.”
“Did you kill Malcolm Pointer?”
“No.” Wetzel’s answer was firm, confident, oozing truth. “I wanted to date him, not end his life.”
“When you walked in here, you said it was just like last time. What did you mean?”
“This isn’t the first time I was framed.”