Caught Dead by Andrew Lanh Page B

targeted . Then I’d say, it needs a look-at, especially since the Hartford cops have written it off.”
    â€œDo you know Detective Ardolino?”
    â€œBy rep,” Jimmy answered. “Never met him. Heard he could be a hard-ass.”
    â€œHe’s written off Mary’s murder already.” I tapped my fingers on the table. “Or so I’m guessing.”
    Liz was opening her purse, pulling out a sheaf of folded sheets. “Does anybody here wonder why I was circling the neighborhood?”
    â€œI thought you were stalking Rick,” Jimmy smirked.
    â€œWell, there is that. But no, sorry to report, I called to say look at this.” She handed over the sheets, more printouts. “I’ll cut to the chase. Mary was killed by a bullet from a Glock 19, right in the head. One shot. Dead on. The gun of choice of street gangs. But I think you may be curious to learn that a kid was also shot. A known dealer, picked up a couple of times near that square and for some reason released over and over by a myopic judge, checked himself into the Hartford ER around six the next morning. Until then nobody knew there was a second victim. Gunshot—a slug extracted from a baggy-clad shin. Kid scared he was gonna lose a leg. Turns out it’s the same gun. Big surprise. Kid said he was ‘walking by’ on his way to see his baby’s mama when a car he didn’t see drove by and shot him. Oh yes, he saw the ‘old lady’ hit, but he was too busy ducking into an alley.”
    â€œShit,” Jimmy roared. “Sounds like maybe he was the target.”
    â€œPolice were slow to release news on him to the press, questioning him, but to no avail. You’ll read about it in tomorrow’s Courant .”
    â€œLots of priors?” From me.
    â€œLike a hundred. He claims he’s clean. No longer selling—has no beef with anybody.”
    â€œAnd the cops say?” I asked.
    â€œWhat do you think? Detective Ardolino is crowing like a rooster in a hen house. Proves his case. More gang-bang rivalry.”
    â€œBut,” I insisted, “it doesn’t explain why Mary was there. And out of her car. If you find yourself in the wrong neighborhood, you gun it, find your way back home.”
    Liz spoke, “Maybe she got disoriented?”
    â€œOver what?”
    â€œYou’re the detective.”
    Jimmy sighed, rubbed his belly, made gestures of leaving.
    â€œI’m curious,” I began. “Do we have specifics on the earlier shootings there? Besides the notorious one where the little girl died in her father’s lap.”
    Liz took back the sheaf of papers from me, found one in the middle. “Well, four deadly shootings in the past year alone, but there may have been more attempted murders, unreported. One kid was Julio Sanchez, another Marcus Lopez, a third Mario Lucia. All gang members. The Latin Kings. It’s their turf. And the sad little girl, member of no known gang. In the second one cops spotted a kid in a stolen Jeep, gave chase, lost him, but a cop knew him, a gangbanger from rival Los Solidos. Tracked him down an hour later at his sister’s, but he was clean. That is, the stolen gun in his pants was not the shooter, no residue on his hands.”
    â€œSo?”
    â€œSo police are convinced he’s the killer, and they suspect he did a quick gun exchange with a brother—everyone has more than one stolen gun these days—and then washed his hands in tomato juice. These kids are one step ahead. He knew they’d expect him to have a gun.”
    â€œAre they looking at him for this shooting?’
    â€œNo reason to. Someone shot him six months back. In the head. Dead at eighteen. Right in front of the State Legislative Building.”
    Jimmy snickered. “A loss for civilization.”
    â€œThat’s cruel,” I said.
    Jimmy got up to leave, mumbled good-bye, but Liz lingered, curling the edges of the