Gray had actually shown up at the station just as the original call came in that morning reporting the child missing, though this was inconsistent with what Gray had said. McQuinn was instructed not to take Grayâs shirt.
Detective Bacon was astonished. He knew of the Chris Shipley and Jackie Poling descriptions, but with extensive experience in child abuse cases, questioned whether it made sense to place so much emphasis on descriptions given by seven- and ten-year-old boys. And no one knew for sure whether the man seen walking with Dawn into the woods was, in fact, her murderer. Bacon believed there was probable cause to arrest Richard Gray. The fact that Gray was at the Fullerton station when the call came in didnât rule him out as suspect. The call, he knew, didnât come in until nearly noon,and the girl may have been killed as early as eleven. Bacon wanted hair samples taken and fingernail scrapings secured from Richard Gray. Bacon wondered why his newspapers were undelivered. Why had there been a pair of childâs underpants in Grayâs car? Why were his hands clean? Why was there blood on his shirt? Why the agitation, the vomiting? He pressed McQuinn to detain Gray. Again, Detective McQuinn contacted his supervisors and discussed whether to arrest Richard Gray. Again, he was told not to do so. Richard Gray was released. Neither his person nor his automobile was ever subjected to a forensic search.
Detective Bacon left the station that night upset. Afterward, he was ordered back to the Child Abuse Division and told to have nothing more to do with the Dawn Hamilton murder investigation. Within a few months he started staying home from work. He sought counseling, took psychiatric leave, and later retired on medical disability. The murder of Dawn Hamilton had affected him deeply.
Two weeks or so after the crime, Richard Gray was given a lie detector test by Detective Darden of the county police department and failed it. By then, however, Detectives Ramsey and Capel had honed in on another suspect, one who fit the FBI psychological profile to a tee, and they believed they had their man. They were on to their prey, like hounds with the scent of the fox in their nostrils, building their case, closing the net. Richard Gray was forgotten. His file was marked cleared. W. F. Johnson was forgotten as well. The Fells Point rapist lead was dropped. Other leads were abandoned. This new suspect had many characteristics similar to the description given by the two boys and looked very much like the composite sketch. Chris Shipley had picked him out of a photo spread. And he had blood in his very name.
NINE
T HE BOOK
O UTLAW G UNNER
, by Harry M. Walsh, tells the story of wildfowl hunters, guides, market shooters, and hunting outlaws from earlier days in and around the Chesapeake region. Kirk Bloodsworth keeps a copy in his home and is proud to display the page depicting a photograph of his great-grandfather, John Bloodsworth, standing on a sunken river blind with a large pump gun resting in the crook of his arm. Kirk has a romantic fancy for the old days. In addition to being some of the earliest settlers of Marylandâs Eastern Shore, his ancestors, he believes, had also been sailors, pirates, rum runners, as well as fishermanâfor the most part seafaring people whoâd stayed close to and lived off the water. As his father, Noble Curtis Bloodsworth, would say, âKirk was born and bred with salt in his veins.â
Family history has the Bloodsworths first emigrating from Scotland, Ireland, and England in the mid-1600s. They landed on a small island off the western edge of the Chesapeake Bay, low-lying, marshy, but teeming with lifeâducks, geese, oysters, crabs, clams for the scooping. They built houses on stilts and laid claim to what became Bloodsworth Island in Dorchester County, Maryland. AsKirk remembers from visiting as a boy, âThe tide goes up there and you go with it . . . Water
Detective Bacon was astonished. He knew of the Chris Shipley and Jackie Poling descriptions, but with extensive experience in child abuse cases, questioned whether it made sense to place so much emphasis on descriptions given by seven- and ten-year-old boys. And no one knew for sure whether the man seen walking with Dawn into the woods was, in fact, her murderer. Bacon believed there was probable cause to arrest Richard Gray. The fact that Gray was at the Fullerton station when the call came in didnât rule him out as suspect. The call, he knew, didnât come in until nearly noon,and the girl may have been killed as early as eleven. Bacon wanted hair samples taken and fingernail scrapings secured from Richard Gray. Bacon wondered why his newspapers were undelivered. Why had there been a pair of childâs underpants in Grayâs car? Why were his hands clean? Why was there blood on his shirt? Why the agitation, the vomiting? He pressed McQuinn to detain Gray. Again, Detective McQuinn contacted his supervisors and discussed whether to arrest Richard Gray. Again, he was told not to do so. Richard Gray was released. Neither his person nor his automobile was ever subjected to a forensic search.
Detective Bacon left the station that night upset. Afterward, he was ordered back to the Child Abuse Division and told to have nothing more to do with the Dawn Hamilton murder investigation. Within a few months he started staying home from work. He sought counseling, took psychiatric leave, and later retired on medical disability. The murder of Dawn Hamilton had affected him deeply.
Two weeks or so after the crime, Richard Gray was given a lie detector test by Detective Darden of the county police department and failed it. By then, however, Detectives Ramsey and Capel had honed in on another suspect, one who fit the FBI psychological profile to a tee, and they believed they had their man. They were on to their prey, like hounds with the scent of the fox in their nostrils, building their case, closing the net. Richard Gray was forgotten. His file was marked cleared. W. F. Johnson was forgotten as well. The Fells Point rapist lead was dropped. Other leads were abandoned. This new suspect had many characteristics similar to the description given by the two boys and looked very much like the composite sketch. Chris Shipley had picked him out of a photo spread. And he had blood in his very name.
NINE
T HE BOOK
O UTLAW G UNNER
, by Harry M. Walsh, tells the story of wildfowl hunters, guides, market shooters, and hunting outlaws from earlier days in and around the Chesapeake region. Kirk Bloodsworth keeps a copy in his home and is proud to display the page depicting a photograph of his great-grandfather, John Bloodsworth, standing on a sunken river blind with a large pump gun resting in the crook of his arm. Kirk has a romantic fancy for the old days. In addition to being some of the earliest settlers of Marylandâs Eastern Shore, his ancestors, he believes, had also been sailors, pirates, rum runners, as well as fishermanâfor the most part seafaring people whoâd stayed close to and lived off the water. As his father, Noble Curtis Bloodsworth, would say, âKirk was born and bred with salt in his veins.â
Family history has the Bloodsworths first emigrating from Scotland, Ireland, and England in the mid-1600s. They landed on a small island off the western edge of the Chesapeake Bay, low-lying, marshy, but teeming with lifeâducks, geese, oysters, crabs, clams for the scooping. They built houses on stilts and laid claim to what became Bloodsworth Island in Dorchester County, Maryland. AsKirk remembers from visiting as a boy, âThe tide goes up there and you go with it . . . Water
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