Hair Of The Dog

A rainy morning in the city....A small area outside of an apartment complex on Ivy Hill in the Cedarbrook section of Philadelphia...A shapely and attractive African-American woman lay of to the side, clad only in bra and panties...Lifeless eyes staring at the sky....I waded through the police cars and uniformed officers...Showing them my ID...

Most knew who I was...Assistant District Attorney Keith Wallace.

Many had seen me at other crime scenes...

My wife, Detective Carlotta Rodriguez-Wallace and Lieutenant Sissy Van Buren Stood over the body as

Forensic Investigator, Dr. Hazel Baylor examined the body....

"She was strangled...Body temperature and Lividity states that she died about six hours ago around midnight." she said.

"It's been raining all night...The water has washed away all trace evidence ,anything that could help us identify her..."said Carlotta, frustrated...

"Anybody see anything? Hear anything?" asked Sissy...

"No...Jimmy and I interviewed everybody in that Apartment complex over there..Nobody saw or heard a thing."said Detective Tyriq Pile..

"It was raining and thundering so hard last night...that I can believe that...Some of the tenants told me that their cable and computers went out around one in the morning."said Detective Jimmy Barlow....

I was just driving up.....My wife, Detective Carlotta Rodriguez -Wallace walked over to me and kissed me softly in the lips..

One of the perks of my job...I'm Assistant District Attorney Keith Wallace, I prosecute Homicides and serious crimes...I often work with these Detectives..Of the Criminal Investigative Division-Homicide!

"Hi Honey Bunny...We got a who done it!" said Carlotta frustrated...

"I see, the rain water has washed any trace evidence away...and she's not exactly ,fully dressed...

"Hmmm, come on Jimmy, maybe we can find a purse or the rest of her clothes around here somewhere."said Detective Tyriq Pile..

"Okay...With any luck, maybe her prints will tell us something." said Jimmy... He looked at the body and looked at Carlotta...He took some tweezers and pulled what looked like a dog hair or an animal hair out of the waistband of her panties..

"Look...It looks like some type of dog hair." he said.

"Any type of Animal might have been wandering around here after the body was dropped..." said Carlotta.

"Yeah, but that's pretty up close and personal...It could belong to a husband or boyfriend's dog...I'm just saying...we got next to nothing...That's something to look into...It could be nothing."said Tyriq..

"No Rico, Jimmy...You both have a point...Bag that and tag that...Like you say...you never know."said Carlotta.

"If she had sex in the past 24 hours...Maybe there is still semen inside of her..This might not be  as dead end of a case as it looks..

"said Hazel...

"Are you the Primary Chica?" asked Lieutenant Sissy Van Buren...

"Yes..."said Carlotta...Wishing she had more to go on...

"You done with the body?" asked Sissy...

Carlotta looked on, The CSI people had taken photos of the body and the area.. Had taken plaster cast of all of the tire tracks ....There were no street cams within blocks or business cams or traffic cams...Just one ATM cam across the street...Carlotta had ordered some policemen to get footage from it... She sighed..

"Si..We are done here..." she said.

"Okay guys, wrap it up!" said Hazel...

The six of us watched as the body was put on a stretcher and carted away....

II-

The rain poured down something fierce....Some Hours later...While Carlotta,Tyriq and Jimmy were patiently awaiting an identification of their victim...Detectives Sirena Pile and Tony Hopkins got a call from the same area about the same thing...a body of a young woman had been found...

Once Again in a A small area outside of an apartment complex on Ivy Hill in the Cedarbrook section of Philadelphia...A shapely and attractive African-American woman lay of to the side, clad only in bra and panties...Lifeless eyes staring at the sky....

Detective Tony Hopkins had on Latex Gloves and was examining the body , clad only in bra and panties...Lifeless eyes staring at the sky....

''What do you make of this Doc?" asked Hop as we called him..

Doc Gibbons and some of his attendants examined the body....

"Pitekial hemmoraging in the eyes...She was manually strangled." he said dryly....Body temperature and Lividity states that she died about12 hours ago...Body is as stiff as a board...Rigor Mortis is settin in." he said.

Detective Hopkins saw his partner, Detective Sirena Pile and three uniformed police officers walking towards him...

"Hey partner...Anybody see anything?" he asked..

"Not a thing...These officers and I interviewed everybody in that Apartment complex over there..Nobody saw or heard a thing. In fact they told me that hours ago some other detectives were here asking about another body that was found"said Sirena..

"Really?" said Hop...

''And from the descriptions they gave ,It sounded like Rico,Jimmy and Carlotta." said Sirena.

''Wowww..For once I don't feel so bad...Looks like the Super Team has a who done it also." joked Hop..

There was a friendly rivalry between Carlotta,Tyriq Pile, who was Sirena's husband and Jimmy and Sirena and Hop....Both teams had an almost 100 percent clearence rate of cases and fought hard to keep it that way.

"On a serious note partner....The is constant down pour of rain doesn't help...The water has washed away all trace evidence ,anything that could help us identify her..."said Sirena...

"Well if she's had sexual intercourse in the past few hours ,we might be able to pull that from her and get a DNA sample...Maybe her prints will turn up an identification...."said Doc Gibbons..

"Hey what is that in the waistband of her panties..?" asked Hop..

"You would see that there wouldn't you?" laughed Sirena, giving him the side eye...

"It looks like an Animal Hair, a dog hair or something..."said Doc Gibbons, who passed it to an assistant...

"Bag this and Tag this." He said.

"You guys get enough photos of the area?" asked Hop..

"Yeah detective" said one of the CSI photographers...

"You get plaster cast of all of the tire tracks on this road?" asked Hop..

"We got it."said another man...

Sirena looked around...

'No Street Cams, No Business Cams and No Traffic cams for a few blocks.." she mused..

"Yeah,but there is an ATM cam across the street..We need to scrub that...Maybe our guy was here and we can catch him on film and match his vehicle to the tire treads."said Hop..

Sirena smiled..

"You are becoming quite a great detective young man.."she said laughing.

"You guys done here???...I'm gettin very wet."said Doc Gibbons..

"Yeah Doc...We done."said Hop...

III-

Rain continued to pour down that day and strangely enough....Some three hours later...Detectives Angie Belton-Barlow and Edwin "Duke " Baylor were called to the exact same scene where the body of an attractive and shapely Latina woman was found on the other side of the same apartment complex in a wooded area...Like the other two women, clad only in bra and panties...Lifeless eyes staring at the sky....

Sissy ,Hazel and I were at the scene of this crime...

 "I can't believe we are out here a second time today."said Sissy...

 "I know and Sirena and Hop brought me a body of a young woman from this same area ,earlier tonight also, same m.o. Strangled , clad only in her underwear and with some type of animal hair found on the body...

"WHAT?  Oh My God...A serial killer! " I said. I hated Serial Killer cases...Hard to find motive, the killer usually had no real ties to the victim...I could go on as to why they drove me nuts... Give me a good gangland slaying or a normal murder.

Angie examined the body with Hazel....

''Strangulation,I can look at the neck and tell that." she said.

''Yes and the killer has big hands.. but he or whoever dropped this one in the mud and the rain and everything has washed away most trace evidence..just like the other two."said Hazel..

"Other two?" asked Angie...

"Yes...We were here this morning...with Carlotta, Rico and your husband..we found a Black girl here, clad in her underwear, strangled...but it was across the road..."said Sissy.

Duke and three uniformed officers came walking up...

"Nobody saw or heard anything in that building and now people are worried.."he said.. Apparently Top,Rico and Jimmy found a body here this morning and Hop and Sirena found a body here this afternoon...This is the third body TODAY!"said Duke...

"Oh My...We have a very active killer...on our hands.."said Angie. She looked at the girl closely and kneeled down ...

"Look, it's some kind of animal hair in the waistband of her panties..."she said..

"That doesn't mean anything...Dogs , Cats ..all kind of stray animals run around here during the day...This is a rotting corpse...They might have been drawn to it."said Duke..

"Jimmy found the same thing on the body this morning." I said.

''And Sirena and Hop found an animal hair on their body..." said Hazel....

"That's more than a co-incidence...Bag and tag this and get plaster casts of the tire tracks..." said Duke..

"It would be nice if there was Street or Traffic Cams around here...No businesses either..."said Angie..

"Looks like our killer got smart too...There is an ATM camera across the road where Carlotta ,Tyriq and Jimmy's victim was found and Sirena and Hop's too...You got nothing here."said Sissy.

"I know right? We gotta compare notes with them....Looks like we are looking for the same killer.."said Angie..

Duke looked at his watch...

"It's getting late and we are all getting drenched...Let's get this body out of here.." he said.

"Okay guys move her out."said Hazel....

''A good night's sleep will do us all good...I'll see everybody ,first thing in the morning."said Sissy as we moved out..

Duke looked at me...

"I sure hope this guy doesn't drop anymore bodies up here...Damn...Three in one day!" he said..

I smiled..

"Yeah let's hope for a cooling off period.." I said.

IV-

 When I arrived at headquarters, mostly everybody had gone home...Only Carlotta, Hop and Sharon were still around...

"So Duke and Angie and Sirena and Hop all found a dead girl on Ivy Hill Road...today huh?" said Carlotta.

"Yeah, that's what it looks like...Never seen a serial killer case where the killer drops three bodies in one day at the same place..."I said.

"And nobody sees or hears anything."said Carlotta..

"It was a thunderstorm and everybody's power went out...It was very convenient..."said Hop...

"Yeah, too convenient...but I guess the killer was just opportunistic...I'm going through VICAP and Interpol files to see if there are any other murders like this...Maybe tomorrow I'll have something."Said our friend and Hop's wife..FBI Deputy Special Agent in Charge, Sharon Ferrell-Hopkins..

"Well...I'm out of here...See you guys in the morning."I said as I took Carlotta by the hand..

''We out of here too."said Hop.

"Shame we aren't using the safehouse...we could all just walk upstairs."said Sharon..

"I know right?" laughed Carlotta...

We headed home in the pouring rain....We had a new case... A serial killer case....I wondered to myself..What was it about that road that made the killer keep coming back and dumping bodies...And did anyone in that complex see anything?? Was the killer someone in there who we had interviewed already?

The thought sent a cold chill up my spine.

(TO BE CONTINUED)