Read Online JJ08 - Blood Money by Michael Lister - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Michael Lister
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whoever left between the time Carla Jean let her in and when she was found at the prison. That was Don Stockton, Andrew Sullivan, Ronald Potter, and Felix Maxwell. I mean, everyone left the table throughout the night, but they’re the only ones that left the house. Sullivan was gone the longest. Then Stockton. But I think they were all gone long enough to do it.”
“That’s good thinking,” I said. “We need to go over everybody’s exact movements. Can you––”
My phone vibrated and I answered it.
“Chaplain Jordan?” the deep voice with the thick Southern accent said.
“Yeah?”
“I was asked by the OIC to call you in to the institution. An inmate in A-dorm’s dead. Looks like he committed suicide.”
When I ended the call, Jake said, “What’s up?”
“Emergency at the prison,” I said. “I have to go in.
Will you write down everybody’s movements through the night as best you can remember?”
“Will do.”
“Oh, and did I notice a cold-case deck on the poker table?”
“Dad asked me about that,” he said. “Got me thinkin’. There was a deck shuffled in by the end of the night but it wasn’t there when we started. I have no idea how it got in and who brought it. Is it important?”
Chapter Fifteen
A -dorm at Potter Correctional Institution is an open-bay, military barrack–style inmate housing unit that serves as the orientation and honor dorm. In the shape of airplane wings, A-1 houses new inmates during their initial week of orientation, and A-2 houses inmates with the best adjustment to prison, the ones who act honorably.
To be selected for the sixty-four coveted positions in the honor dorm, an inmate can have no disciplinary reports, or DRs, and must have achieved above satisfactory on his gain time evaluations in his work and housing areas.
Suicide did not seem likely for the honor dorm.
All the inmates from A-2 had been moved into other dorms, the yard was closed, and only a handful of officers and officials were near the crime scene. The still and quiet dorm with its rows and rows of empty bunks looked like an abandoned post-Cold War military base that had not survived down-sizing.
Buzzed into the dorm near the raised and enclosed officers’ station, I walked in between the row of double bunks against the wall to my right and the single bunks in the center of the dorm to my left, toward the back corner, which was the least visible in the dorm, especially at night.
When I arrived, a few of the officers milling around gestured toward me. Nearly all encouraged me to “have a look.”
I did.
On the back side of the last bunk—the point in the dorm that was furthermost from the officers’ station—an inmate was hanging on a small piece of rope, probably the kind used to crank the lawnmowers by the outside grounds crews. The small rope had been looped around the post at the top of the bed.
The body of the inmate fell forward against the rope, his pale face puffy, his dry, swollen tongue protruding. His head hung loosely, his arms dangling down toward the ground. The tops of his feet and bottoms of his shins lay against the cold tile floor.
He was wearing a pair of white boxers and a white T-shirt, both of which had his name and DC number stamped on them. Danny Jacobs. One of the most faithful members of the inmate chapel choir.
Beginning just beneath his thighs and culminating in plum-colored feet, his legs were a gradient of lighter to darker purple.
One of the officers standing nearby said, “They found him when they turned the lights on this morning.”
I wondered if the dorm officers had made rounds after lights out last night.
“He leave a note?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “Everything’s just like we found it.”
“ Is someone assigned to the top bunk?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Phillips.”
“Lance Phillips?”
“Uh huh.”
“Jacobs has been sleeping in the top bunk since Phillips went to Medical,” another officer offered.
It was at
“That’s good thinking,” I said. “We need to go over everybody’s exact movements. Can you––”
My phone vibrated and I answered it.
“Chaplain Jordan?” the deep voice with the thick Southern accent said.
“Yeah?”
“I was asked by the OIC to call you in to the institution. An inmate in A-dorm’s dead. Looks like he committed suicide.”
When I ended the call, Jake said, “What’s up?”
“Emergency at the prison,” I said. “I have to go in.
Will you write down everybody’s movements through the night as best you can remember?”
“Will do.”
“Oh, and did I notice a cold-case deck on the poker table?”
“Dad asked me about that,” he said. “Got me thinkin’. There was a deck shuffled in by the end of the night but it wasn’t there when we started. I have no idea how it got in and who brought it. Is it important?”
Chapter Fifteen
A -dorm at Potter Correctional Institution is an open-bay, military barrack–style inmate housing unit that serves as the orientation and honor dorm. In the shape of airplane wings, A-1 houses new inmates during their initial week of orientation, and A-2 houses inmates with the best adjustment to prison, the ones who act honorably.
To be selected for the sixty-four coveted positions in the honor dorm, an inmate can have no disciplinary reports, or DRs, and must have achieved above satisfactory on his gain time evaluations in his work and housing areas.
Suicide did not seem likely for the honor dorm.
All the inmates from A-2 had been moved into other dorms, the yard was closed, and only a handful of officers and officials were near the crime scene. The still and quiet dorm with its rows and rows of empty bunks looked like an abandoned post-Cold War military base that had not survived down-sizing.
Buzzed into the dorm near the raised and enclosed officers’ station, I walked in between the row of double bunks against the wall to my right and the single bunks in the center of the dorm to my left, toward the back corner, which was the least visible in the dorm, especially at night.
When I arrived, a few of the officers milling around gestured toward me. Nearly all encouraged me to “have a look.”
I did.
On the back side of the last bunk—the point in the dorm that was furthermost from the officers’ station—an inmate was hanging on a small piece of rope, probably the kind used to crank the lawnmowers by the outside grounds crews. The small rope had been looped around the post at the top of the bed.
The body of the inmate fell forward against the rope, his pale face puffy, his dry, swollen tongue protruding. His head hung loosely, his arms dangling down toward the ground. The tops of his feet and bottoms of his shins lay against the cold tile floor.
He was wearing a pair of white boxers and a white T-shirt, both of which had his name and DC number stamped on them. Danny Jacobs. One of the most faithful members of the inmate chapel choir.
Beginning just beneath his thighs and culminating in plum-colored feet, his legs were a gradient of lighter to darker purple.
One of the officers standing nearby said, “They found him when they turned the lights on this morning.”
I wondered if the dorm officers had made rounds after lights out last night.
“He leave a note?” I asked.
“No,” he said. “Everything’s just like we found it.”
“ Is someone assigned to the top bunk?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Phillips.”
“Lance Phillips?”
“Uh huh.”
“Jacobs has been sleeping in the top bunk since Phillips went to Medical,” another officer offered.
It was at
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