It was the first Friday in May and in Oceanside, Virginia, since the early 1970s, that had been “May Day.” While May Day was celebrated in many other cultures, especially in Europe, as the beginning of spring, Oceanside’s Director of Tourism had come up with celebrating it in the city to kick off the summer tourist season a few weeks earlier than the other seaside cities; Oceanside’s competition. So, on the first Friday of each May, all city offices were closed, the beaches were officially open and a grand parade was held down Coastal Highway ending in the huge carnival-like celebration in the city’s inlet parking area. All of the seasonal shops along the boardwalk opened and the city came alive for another summer season.
The police and fire departments had lots of extra manpower on duty and the beaches were staffed to maximum capacity. There were lifeguards and police officers galore out patrolling the sand and making sure those in the water stayed safe. ATVs were commonly seen during the off-season, but not as many of them drove the sand during the summer season. The liability-conscious lawyers advised against having too many out. On May Day, though, every ATV in the city’s fleet was out and about, either with a lifeguard team on it or with a police beach patrol officer on it. JP was on one such ATV wearing her comfortable beach patrol uniform (shorts and polo shirts), her body armor making her sweat and her ball cap keeping the sun out of her eyes.
On the boardwalk there were officers patrolling in teams on foot and bicycle. On the streets there were officer teams in patrol cars and, just in case, the city’s SWAT team was on stand-by in the gymnasium of Southern High School.
JP tried to keep her mind focused as she patrolled – and she surely had to focus so that she didn’t run over any of the tourists who seemed to have simply oozed up out of the sand – but she kept thinking about Max and wasn’t bothered by it a bit. She was still confused about her fear and hesitation as far as being involved with a police officer, but she didn’t doubt her love for him, nor his for her, for a second and couldn’t bear the thought of living without him day to day. The fact was that she had crawled out of his bed that morning, showered with him before work, and enjoyed breakfast with him before she came out to this zoo and he went to his temporary light duty assignment in homicide investigations.
She knew that the light duty assignment was driving Max a bit stir crazy. He was itching to get back to the streets… but the doctor had told him it would be at least two more weeks before he could return to full duty.
- - - - - - - - - -
Back in the homicide section of investigations – the homicide bull pen, as it was commonly referred to - Max wasn’t quite ready to beat his head on his desk… but he was close. Detective Coleman had him reviewing the case file and comparing the victim’s information to that of the other reported victim. So far the only similarity that Max had been able to find was that both victims were poisoned and then put into the ocean near enough to the coast that they’d wash up on shore. JP had found the first victim on the beach and he’d been identified as being from Baltimore. The immediate assumption was that he’d been on a boat that left Baltimore harbor and he went overboard after being poisoned when the boat was near or passing Oceanside. Then Coleman got a call from the Coast Guard’s Criminal Investigative Service (CGCIS), and was informed about a body that washed up on the outer banks of North Carolina. Cause of death was the same: at first it appeared to be drowning but the medical examiner’s toxicology report and autopsy showed that the victim was poisoned, not drowned.
Lieutenant Griggs of the CGCIS had been kind enough to email a copy of the coroner’s report for the North Carolina victim. He’d also not taken over the investigation of the homicide case Oceanside was working. For now the two deaths were being treated as unrelated but information was being shared in the interest of professional cooperation.
Like most detectives, Coleman wasn’t fond of examining and reexamining the information looking for clues or similarities. He’d dumped that unenviable task on Max and Max was going cross-eyed doing it. His mind kept going back to that morning when he’d been woken up by JP throwing a bare leg across him, draping an arm across his chest and nuzzling her nose against his shoulder. Even now he smiled to himself: how could she be so hot all over and still have a cold nose? It was a pleasant way to wake up and he’d missed it. He was glad they were back together and he reminded himself of his promise to her: that he would do all he could to maintain a risk management outlook where work was concerned. He understood her fear because he had the same fear about her getting hurt at work; he just managed the emotions attached a little bit better.
The phone ringing brought him back to his desk and the open folders in front of him. Coleman was out of the office – Max didn’t know why – so Max answered the phone. “Oceanside Homicide, Breaklin. Can I help you?”
“Breaklin?” asked the voice at the other end. “I was trying to get Coleman. Is he around?”
“No, sir,” replied Max to the male voice on the other end. “He’s not available at the moment. Can I help you?”
There was a pause before he got a response. “This is Griggs from the Coast Guard in reference to the poisoning case that washed up on your beach.”
“Yes, sir,” said Max. “I’ve got the files in front of me.”
“I thought Coleman was working the case?” Griggs asked/stated.
“He is, sir,” said Max. “I’m temporarily assigned to assist.”
“Oh, okay,” said Griggs. “Well, you got something to write with? I’ve got something for you.”
Max grabbed a pen and pulled over his notepad, flipping the paper to a blank page. “Go,” he said into the phone.
“We’ve got another victim; this one off the Florida coast,” said Griggs. Max wrote as Griggs gave him the particulars: another poisoned victim found in the ocean, this time by a deep sea fishing boat off the coast of Fort Lauderdale instead of washed up on the beach. “The difference this time,” Griggs said, “is that it’s a female victim. Jeneanne Louise LaMont, white female, date of birth March fourteenth, nineteen-seventy-two.”
Max looked at the information as he wrote it down and compared it to what the files had for the other two victims:
Victim one had been identified Donald Gerald Densky, a white (#2 in police parlance) male with a date of birth of August fourteenth, nineteen-sixty-nine. He’d washed up on the Oceanside beach in the first week of April.
Victim two was Raymond no-middle-name Samson, a #2 male with a date of birth of November fourteenth, nineteen-seventy-four. He’d washed up on the beach in Kill Devil Hills, North Carolina.
Now they had victim number three and Max saw it. It was the only connection he could find between the first two and now the third: they were all born on the fourteenth day of the given month: 8/14/69, 11/14/74 and now 3/14/72.
Max would share that observation with Coleman when he came back into the office. Should he tell Lieutenant Griggs now? If the lieutenant hadn’t already realized it, he soon would. How would it make Max look?
“Lieutenant,” Max said, “have you noticed that all three share the fourteenth as their birthday?”
There was a pause on the other end before Griggs answered. “No, I hadn’t,” he said. “Good catch – but if that’s the only thing they have in common it’s going to take us a long time to find whoever is killing them and why.”
“Well,” replied Max, “I know it’s probably not worth much, if anything at all, but is it a safe assumption that they’re all being dumped off the same boat?”
“Yeah,” said Griggs.
“Is there any way to track a boat from Baltimore to Florida?” asked Max.
“Only if we know the name of the boat ahead of time or have reason for multiple encounters,” said Griggs.
At that moment Detective Dick Coleman walked into the bull pen and saw Max on the phone. His only question was expressed in a raised eyebrow. Max knew what it meant: “Who’re you talking to? Is it anything important?”
Max answered by saying, “Hey, Lieutenant Griggs, hold on a second. Detective Coleman just walked back in.” He pushed the button to put Griggs on hold and before Coleman picked up, said, “Griggs. Another body was found off the Florida coast. Female this time – but the three victims share the same day of birth.” Coleman made a surprised face and then picked up the phone. Max hung up his handset and dove back into the files. There had to be some other link. Whoever had killed them hadn’t just happened upon three total strangers who all shared the same day of birth and befriended them enough to get them on his (or her) boat, poisoned them and dumped them.
- - - - - - - - - -
On the beach it was starting to get warm. JP wasn’t bored or complaining though. The number of people lying in the sand, wading in the surf and swimming just outside the break line was vast. The lifeguards were certainly earning their pay and she felt like she was as well. It wasn’t lunch time yet and her pedometer said she’d already walked over five miles. So far she’d had to have a few people dump out (or finish downing) their beers. No drinking alcohol on the beach was allowed. Normally, pets weren’t allowed on the beach in season either, but for May Day the city suspended that ordinance. There was an assortment of dogs – all shapes and sizes – running around, chasing Frisbees and in general making a nuisance of themselves. But they were a fun nuisance and the owners appeared to all be picking up behind them.
The parade had come to an end and a part of it had been about three or four dozen jeeps from the local club. The city had marked off a piece of beach for them so that when the parade ended they could pull onto the beach from the inlet parking lot and set up their own little beach space. Because of the way it was set up, the jeeps could come and go as their time and schedule permitted. Some left and others that hadn’t been in the parade showed up. The city didn’t care as long as the total number on the beach never exceeded fifty. There were a number of police officers and firefighters in the club so the jeeps never caused a problem; usually they were pretty helpful if an emergency situation arose. JP knew that several of them had complete trauma kits in them and she’d seen one with a rifle lock – but the rifle wasn’t in it.
Idly she thought about Max and his jeep. She knew he had a pretty complete trauma kit in the back of his and, for longer trips, he’d mounted a handgun holster to the passenger side of the center console. It was easy for him to access while driving and kept the gun from digging into his right hip and kidney. Thinking about Max took her back to that morning when she’d woken up next to him. It had become one of her favorite things to do and she reminded herself to never take it for granted. She’d woken him up by throwing a leg and arm across him and then rubbing her nose against his shoulder. Interestingly, it wasn’t her warm limbs that woke him. He’d gotten quite comfortable sleeping with her. It was her cold nose - her “doggy nose” as he’d started calling it – against his shoulder that made him jump awake.
“Geez that’s cold!” he’d said with a chuckle. “If I ever touch your nose and it’s not cold I’m going to wonder if you’re sick and need to see the vet.”
“So now you’re calling me a dog?” she’d asked with mock indignation.
“Not at all,” Max had said with a big smile and as he pulled her in close against him. “I’m just making an honest comparison with a well-known fact: If your nose isn’t cold and wet then you must be sick.”
“I’ll give you cold and wet,” JP had joked back. “Stay here while I go get some ice cubes.” She’d started to pull away but he held her close.
“Oh, no,” he said with a big smile. “Now that I’ve got you here I’m not going to let you go.”
Their conversation had melted into a kiss and…
JP was brought out of the pleasant memory by the shout of a woman about a hundred yards down the beach. “Stop him!! He’s got my purse!” Looking in the direction of the shout, JP saw a man running on the beach, toward her, and the woman pointing behind him as she looked around for anyone of authority. The woman was JUST outside the cordoned off area for the jeeps and JP saw that a number of them had heard the shout as well.
JP turned her ATV in that direction and gunned it to the best speed she could safely manage as she weaved in and out of the tourists, some of whom just HAD to see what was going on and inadvertently jumped into her path of travel. It made for an interesting if somewhat nerve wracking dynamic obstacle course.
The perpetrator had heard her ATV’s engine gun and saw that a police officer was coming toward him. He didn’t turn and run back toward the victim who was still shouting and pointing, but he did veer off so that he was running more toward the surf than down the beach. Past him, JP saw a couple of the jeeps move down toward the surf line. She smiled as she added a little more speed to her ATV. She was confident that this perp would be caught in short order. He had nowhere to go but out into the surf and not many criminals ran INTO the water.
Sure enough, within the next minute or so, the perpetrator was standing knee deep in the small waves of the ocean, two jeeps on one side of him, and JP’s ATV along with another jeep on the other side. All four vehicles were angled and the perpetrator had nowhere to go unless he wanted to go swimming. He stood, looking defeated as he held the woman’s purse that he’d stolen.
JP looked at the various vehicles and selected a jeep as her anchor point. She directed the criminal over to it, had him put the purse on the hood and then his own hands spread out on the same hood. She directed him to put his feet back and spread them out. The good news, she thought, was that he was only wearing a bathing suit and a t-shirt; he’d be easy to search. The bad news was that if he WAS hiding a weapon it was going to be disgusting to find. With several jeepers (jeep owners) as her backup, she handcuffed the criminal suspect and got on her radio to call in some foot patrol units who would take him up to the street and hand him off to a patrol squad.
Less than an hour later JP was back on her ATV enjoying her fond memories of that morning while the criminal suspect was in the hands of the central processing team.
Discuss Episode 5:5 (this episode) on our forums
Editor’s Notes & Officer Survival Concerns
Officer Survival & other comments on Episode 5:5:
We often don’t pay attention but uniform comfort can play a big role in how efficiently we do our jobs. Elbeco makes a wide variety of uniform designs to fit every need.
Officer Survival & other comments on Episode 5:4:
We’d like to thank our sponsor, Elbeco, for supporting this on-going fiction crime-drama. Check out their full line of uniforms and apparel on their website.
Officer Survival & other comments on Episode 5:3:
With the end of spring and launch of summer there are usually a lot of bar openings, special events on beaches, etc. They all bring with them particular risks and threats that we can only avoid or minimize so much. Temptation grows to play hero, lone gunman, whatever. Remember the Ten Deadly Errors and stay on your guard. The imperative is going home whole and healthy at the end of your shift.
Officer Survival & other comments on Episode 5:2:
No officer survival comments on this one except this: We ALL have emotional turmoil that enters our life. It IS very distracting. We can’t safely work distracted like that. Talk to someone if that’s where you are in your head. Get it sorted out. DO NOT go to work that distracted and unfocused. It can get you killed.
Officer Survival & other comments on Episode 5:1:
Few outside our profession can relate to the fears and complications associated with any shooting situation. They’re not usually aware of how politics can impact police work in all the wrong ways. As we can see in this story, the significant other (JP) of an injured officer (Max) is having her doubts about the relationship due to her own fears of lost stability. We also get to listen in on the conversation between the Mayor and the Chief and see how their concerns are different. Be that as it may, the Mayor’s concerns WILL impact how the Chief acts or reacts because ultimately he answers to the Mayor. Please remember to visit our supporter for this episode: Elbeco Uniforms. Great products to cover you in all your uniform needs.
