Appearing in #15, April 14, 2014

Title: The night shift

By Author: Adele Polomski

Tag line:   When the police arrived at the scene of the crime, they found one dead body and some unanswered questions…

Police characters:  Det. Holiday Price

The gist:   The story opened with Det. Price driving to the town’s industrial district to a brightly lit warehouse where police cruisers were already on scene.  A male, about 40 years old, dressed in jeans, a Hawaiian shirt and gray hoodie was under a blue tarp, the apparent victim of a single gunshot wound to the chest.  Det. Price raised the hole in his shirt to match the hole in his body. A shot straight to the heart.  Sonny and Nigel, the owners of the warehouse, arrived due to a call from their security guard, Archie.  The victim was identified as Rocco.   Nigel confessed that Rocco was an undercover investigator that he had hired because there had been some recurring thefts.  Nigel was sure it was an inside job but hadn’t been successful in catching the thief even with the company’s hi-tech security cameras.  Sonny was unaware that Nigel had hired this man.   Although the warehouse was insured, Sonny noted that reporting the thefts would have raised the premiums.  Nigel said, “This is clearly an accident.  Archie mistook, Rocco for a thief.”  Archie, who was neatly dressed and appeared to take pride in his appearance, said he had been with Alpha Security for over 30 years. He said in all his years he has never pulled his gun but tonight he said this man came at him and it looked like he was pulling a gun.  There was no weapon found on the victim.  Archie said he found this man coming out from behind the Dumpster. After the shooting, Archie called the owners and then called 911.   Det. Price asked Archie to open the trunk of his car, which he did.  Inside was a load of stolen merchandise. 

How did Det. Price know?

Crime scene:   A warehouse.

Clues:   The victim’s shirt.

Suspects:  None in the traditional sense. We know Archie shot this man.

Red herrings:  None.

Solution:  Because Det. Price had to lift the material of the shirt up to match it to the bullet hole in the man’s body, she knew the victim had had his hands up when he was shot.  Archie and the day guard were partners.  The day guard would store the goods behind the Dumpster and Archie would put them in his trunk when he came on his shift.

My two cents:    A private investigator carries a weapon.  Wonder what happened to it.  Must have been an interesting character.  He wore a Hawaiian shirt to work.  Way to fit in and not be noticed.  

Dumpster is a trade -marked named, like Kleenex, and is capped.

I can’t find anything majorly wrong with this story.  It was well written and it had a good clue, so it gets four stars.

Title: Checkmate

By Author:  John M. Floyd

Appearing in issue #41, October 14, 2013

Tag line:  Judging by the evidence, the sheriff concluded that Judge Moore had known his killer!

Police characters:  Sheriff Charles Jones and Deputy Fred Prewitt

The gist:  Judge Moore is found dead by his maid when she comes in in the morning and she immediately summoned the police.  He had been shot in the chest while sitting at his desk.  In front of him was a swivel chess board with only one chess piece sitting in the middle, a white knight.  The rest of the chess pieces were swept aside.  The sheriff felt this was a clue.  When asked why the judge wouldn’t have just written the killer’s name on piece of paper, Sheriff Jones felt that there must not have been enough time.  Although Ms. Potts is mentioned as being home with the flu, she is not a part of this story.  Only three people had keys to the house beside the maid; and they were the judge’s three grown children.  There was no sign of forced entry.  It was deduced that the judge must have seen his killer as he was sitting facing the door.  Sheriff Jones asked the deputy to go gather the three adult children but to only tell them that Judge Moore had been found dead.  When the trio arrived, son Clayton asked the sheriff, “Who could have killed him?”  This tipped off the sheriff, as the three were not told the Judge had been murdered.   When confronted Clayton pointed to his sister and blurted out, “It was all her idea.”  Both siblings were arrested.  Sheriff Jones told his deputy that the Judge DID leave a clue.    What was it?

Crime scene:  Judge Moore’s home office. 

Clues:  The white knight chess piece.

Suspects:   The judge’s three children. 

Red herrings:   None. 

Solution:   Clayton asked who killed his father when no one had told him his father had been murdered. Now for the white knight clue: The Lone Ranger had a white horse named Silver.  The Lone Ranger’s real name was Clayton Moore.  

My two cents:   Imagine the shock of seeing your son standing in the doorway with a gun pointed at you.  Imagine the horror of hearing that gun go off and feeling a bullet enter your chest.  Betrayed by your own child.  Dying.  What does he do?  Stay with me here.  He doesn’t try to write down a name.  He doesn’t try to dial 911 and utter his last word, the name of the killer, into the phone.  What he does is he sweeps the chess board clear of all the pieces except for the white knight which he places directly in the center of the board.  He had the presence of mind and enough breath and strength to connect a rook chess piece to a white horse to Silver to the Lone Ranger to the actor’s real first name that happens to be the same as his son’s.  Seriously?  (Is my mouth still hanging open?)

Unbelievable.  No, I really mean it.  It’s unbelievable. Never mind the tired old clue of having the killer ask who killed the guy, which has been used a kagillion times. This is more than a stretch.  This is an amazing illustration of just how wrong I am to think these stories need to be well written and entertaining and make sense to sell.  I throw my hands up in the air.  Just send in any old thing and see what catches their eye this week.   

Title: Station break

By Author:  Leslie Padgett

Appearing in issue #40, October 7, 2013

Tag line:  The detective had to get a new perspective on the crime scene before he could figure out who was guilty…

Police characters:  Detective Jason Holt

The gist: Someone murdered DJ Todd in his booth at the radio station.  He was found slumped over his console still wearing his headphones.  A sheet of paper with the writing 337 H was found near the body.  He was found by Hannah, the station’s secretary, who came in to work first at 6:00 a.m. and saw his car in the parking lot.  She figured he had stayed overnight to work on some promo material.  She brought him coffee and found him dead.  She had a love interest in DJ Todd, but it wasn’t returned.  Hannah had knocked over a stack of papers in her haste to back out of the booth.  She picked them up and put them back on the desk, then called the police.  She told the detective that DJ Todd’s death was going to be a disaster for the station.  The station manager, Hank Lee, arrived 20 minutes after Hannah.  The detective found Hank in his office.  Hank was on the phone ordering up an older show to fill the air time.   Hank told the detective that Todd had wanted a raise and when he was told no Todd threatened to take his show to a bigger station.  Another DJ, a competitor who resented Todd because he took over his prime time spot, told the detective that Todd was an insensitive jerk.   No one knew what 337 H meant.  Hannah suggested it was a page in Todd’s journal, a journal that Todd kept under lock and key because it contained inside info on everyone Todd has ever met.  

Everyone left the crime scene, but before they did Detective Holt took one last look and figured out who the killer was. 

Crime scene:  DJ booth at a radio station. 

Clues:   337 H

Suspects:  Besides everyone in the world in his journal?  Hank or the second DJ.

Red herrings:  The journal with dirt on everybody he had ever met in his entire life.   And Hannah, who had a crush on him that wasn’t returned. 

Solution:  After the DJ was shot he tried to ID his killer by writing down his name.  H Lee looks like 337 H upside down.  Hannah had dropped the papers and in her haste had gathered them up and put them on the desk backwards. 

My two cents:   Geez, didn’t anybody like this guy?  There are a lot of moving parts to this story.  You almost need a map.  Not only were there three people at the station who had a motive (Well, Hannah’s wasn’t really a motive.  I mean you don’t kill someone who doesn’t love you back. ) the author made sure there was a journal that had dirt on everyone the DJ had ever met.  Seems a bit over the top.  I’m not sure why Hannah surmised that the DJ had spent the night at the station because his car was in the lot before hers.  Maybe he came in early that day?  That seems more likely.  Her comment that the DJ’s death was going to be a disaster for the station seemed odd for someone who was in love with him.  She seemed to care more about the station.  If the DJ threatened to leave and take his show, which apparently was an important show for the station and it would be a disaster if he left, how would killing him solve that problem? 

I don’t recommend having the characters names as close as they are; Holt, Hannah, Hank.  It’s too confusing. 

Also if I was dying and I had a moment to scratch out the killer’s name, I would probably write Hank…not H Lee.   Just a thought.  This story was just so-so.

Title: A shot in the dark

By Author: Herschel Cozine

Appearing in issue #39, September 30, 2013

Tag line:  Was it a deadly accident or a deliberate murder?  Only time would tell…

Police characters:  Unnamed detective and his mother-in-law, Gladys, who likes to think of herself as an amateur sleuth.

Crime scene:   The victim’s home. 

The gist: Gladys and the detective are talking over the morning paper.  Gladys has recently moved in with her daughter and son-in-law, who works as a detective, and has taken an interest in his work.  She loves to ask him about his cases.  Today they are discussing what the police are calling an accidental shooting.  Gladys thinks it was murder.  The detective explained that the husband claimed his wife heard a noise downstairs at night and sent him down to investigate.  He told her to stay upstairs.  He went downstairs with his gun and proceeded into the kitchen. The lights suddenly went off.  He became a bit disoriented and waited quietly for a moment to let his eyes adjust. He was frightened.  He claims he felt a presence, heard a noise, and shot his gun in that direction.  Then he went to the fuse box and threw the switch.  When the lights came on he discovered he had shot and killed his wife.

Gladys doesn’t believe the story.  She questioned why the husband didn’t go first and turn the lights back on.  The detective said that was a consideration but the man did say he was frightened.  She questioned how a burglar would even know where the fuse box was to turn it off. The detective explained that the culprit might have been in the house before, or maybe even lived in a similar floor plan.   She questioned that the lights even went out at all.  The detective noted there was a digital clock on the table that was ten minutes off, just the amount of time the husband claimed this whole thing took.  

Clues:  The clock.

Suspects:  Is the husband guilty of killing his wife or was it an accident?

Red herrings:  None.

Solution:   When power goes off digital clocks revert to 12:00 o’clock and flash until they are reset.  The husband had manually set the clock back ten minutes to reflect a power outage that never happened. 

My two cents:  The story starts off with a joke about men.  So right there you’ve got to love it.  The interaction between mother-in-law and son-in-law is entertaining.  He tries not to roll his eyes.  She snorts at his explanations.  He tells her to let him talk and she presses her lips together and makes a zipping motion over her mouth.  When she smiles, he is reminded of the shark in Jaws.  I can almost see these two characters.  He has a logical explanation for everything and is trying to keep an open mind, but she isn’t buying any of it. 

This story was told in first person and pulled the reader into the scene.  It was presented in an interesting manner.  The reader is not taken to the usual crime scene, but instead learns the case details after the fact through dialogue between two people.  Although in the real world detectives are not supposed to discuss open cases with civilians, we know they really do.  In this scenario Gladys works details out of him and he gives in probably to keep peace in his house.  You have to feel for the guy.  

If the power really had gone off, other electronic devices would have also been blinking that the cops might have noticed.  Like the microwave maybe.  If this husband had only thought to really turn the power off for a few minutes he might have gotten away with it.  The title fits and the tag line doesn’t give too much away.  All in all this was a fun story that worked. 

Title: The truth stings

By Author:  John M. Floyd

Appearing in issue #24, June 17, 2013

For sale date:  June 5, 2013

Tag line: To Angela Potts, it was clear as day who the guilty party was…

Police characters:  Sheriff Jones and retired school teacher Angela Potts

The gist: Someone shot Justin through the driver’s side window of his car when he was pulling into his girlfriend’s driveway.  His girlfriend, Marge, got cut from the flying glass.  She jumped out of the passenger side of the car and took off through the woods, which she knows well.  It was pitch black, no moon, but the killer had a flashlight. Marge was trying to hide behind a tree but the killer had the flashlight trained on her and was approaching.  She took off her shoe and threw it at a wasp nest she knew was between her and the killer.  The wasps came out in a flurry and headed towards the light.  The killer took off screaming.  Marge told the police that the killer was her ex-husband, and she knew this because she had seen his face as he came towards her in the woods with that flashlight.  

Crime scene:  Marge’s driveway.

Clues:  The wasp nest and the flashlight.

Suspects:  Marge’s ex-husband and Alvin Hollis.  Who is Alvin Hollis you ask?  Someone Ms. Potts remembered had vowed to get revenge on the ex-husband because he testified against him.  Ms. Potts happened to know that Alvin was out of prison on parole because her cousin knows Alvin’s wife and the wife said he was out. 

Red herrings:  None. 

Solution:  If a flashlight it shining directly at you on an otherwise black night there is no way you can see who’s holding it.  Ms. Potts called Alvin’s wife and she confirmed that Alvin was full of wasp stings.  

My two cents:  Well, it seemed a bit coincidental that there just happened to be a wasp nest by the tree Marge was hiding behind.  And what a good arm she has, to be able to throw her shoe and hit the nest in the dark.  But as readers we are often asked to suspend disbelief a little bit.  My real gripe with this story is two-fold.  One is about the way the killer was introduced.  The story is 5 columns long but we don’t get to hear about this Alvin character until the 4^th column. It’s sort of like reading an entire book only to find out the killer was some character that they introduce in the last chapter. And of course Ms. Potts knew all about him but the sheriff didn’t.   My second gripe is about police procedures. The deputy went and arrested her ex-husband and put him in lock-up, yet he didn’t have a mark on him from any wasp stings.  Whatever happened to questioning a suspect?   Why did Marge wait until the next day to report a murder? (Or maybe the question should be Why is the sheriff waiting till the next day to question her?  Police get the skinny right away while it's fresh in the victim's mind. They don't let them sleep on it.)   Why did Marge want to frame her husband?  She actually told police she saw his face, when she didn’t.  I believe that’s obstruction of justice.  She’s the one who ought to be in lock-up.