There
are certain stories you don’t forget, and one of those for me was a long
article from the Los Angeles Times in the early 1970s. Having no names or
specifics to Google, I’ll have to tell it from memory, where I’ve retained the
gist of it.
A
woman was driving alone through the Southern California desert, on one of the
major roads, when she was pulled over by a law-enforcement officer. He ordered
her into his patrol car and drove her up a dirt road to a remote deserted area
where he shot her to death with his service pistol.
She
was reported missing, and her car was by a major roadway, so a search ensued.
Eventually the body was found, somewhat the worse for the wear after days in
the wild, but more importantly, the fatal bullet was recovered and could be
linked to a gun of the type the officer carried.
The Murder Weapon Disappeared
At
some point in the investigation, the officer became a person of interest, and
once detectives began to follow that path, a picture of a rogue, killer cop
began to emerge. They were able to establish that he had been on duty and in
the vicinity the night the woman was last seen; that he had been out of touch
with communications for a couple of hours at the right time; and that he had
the right gun for the crime.
The
problem was that he didn’t have the gun any more. A day or two after the woman
went missing, he reported his gun lost or stolen, and all the legwork the
detectives could do wasn’t enough to find it. The prosecutor decided to try the
case, murder weapon or no, and charged the officer with murder in the first
degree.
‘He Couldn’t Possibly Have Done It’
In
the community where the trial took place, it was big news. Prosecutors mounted
a strong circumstantial case, but were hampered by the lack of a murder weapon.
The defense hammered the gaps in the evidence and called a parade of character
witnesses on behalf of the defendant.
Among
the witnesses were the officer’s pastor, members of his church, longtime
friends, and colleagues. All of them said basically the same thing: They had
known him for years; he was a good and decent man; and he couldn’t possibly
have committed such a horrifying, shocking, random crime.
It
was enough to create at least some degree of reasonable doubt with the jury,
which acquitted. The officer left court surrounded by cheering family and
friends.
The Witness Was Too Late
The
acquittal was big news far beyond the officer’s community, and among the people
who saw a story, and an image of the freed officer, was a pawnbroker who lived
at some distance from where the crime had occurred. He recognized the man who
had brought in a gun some time ago, and checked the pawn ticket for the weapon,
which was still in the shop. He called the police. Sure enough, it was the
murder weapon.
Double
jeopardy prevented the officer for being retried for murder, but federal
prosecutors came in and charged him with violating the woman’s civil rights.
There was no acquittal this time, and he got the maximum sentence — not enough,
but the best that could be done under the circumstances.
What
the story didn’t say, and what I’ve always wondered, was how the people who
testified on the officer’s behalf at the trial felt when the truth came out. We
all like to believe that we’re good judges of character and really know our
friends, but do we? The terrifying answer is no.
