14th Deadly Sin

CHAPTER 4

I FELT SICKENED at what I had just seen on the footage. Like Jacobi, I hoped we were looking at holdup guys with a bad sense of humor, not actual police officers pulling off an armed robbery.

I asked Jacobi, “Were there any fatalities?”

“One,” he said. “The owner wouldn’t give up the combination to the safe until he was shot to pieces. He managed a few words with the EMTs before he bled out on the floor. He said cops did it. The kid who worked for him was interviewed on scene. He said there had been about sixty grand in the floor safe.”

Conklin whistled.

Jacobi went on, “This is the second one like this. A few days ago, three men in SFPD caps and Windbreakers robbed a Spanish market. A mercado. No one died, but it was another big score. It goes without saying, these guys have to be stopped or every man and woman in uniform is going to take shit for this whether we deserve it or not.”

Conklin and I nodded, and Jacobi kept going.

“Robbery squad is already working the case, but I told Brady I want the two of you to work with them now that we’ve got a homicide.

“Boxer. You know Philip Pikelny, who heads up Robbery? Call him. You and Conklin work with his guys. This is the most important case in the house.”

“We’ve got it, Chief.”

Muttering to himself, Jacobi stumped out of the bullpen.

About now, Robbery would be canvassing Ellis Street and Forensics would be taking apart a check-cashing shop called Payday Loans. Checks Cashed. All we could hope for was a snitch or that this professional crew had left evidence behind.

I called Phil Pikelny and repeated Jacobi’s instructions. The sergeant told me what he knew about the case so far.

“The scene is still off-limits,” Phil said. “CSU has barred the doors until they’re done, which could be later today.”

Phil told me he would get us the footage of the first “Windbreaker heist,” the armed robbery of a mercado.

“It’s with the DA’s Office, but I’ll put in a request to get a copy to you ASAP.”

I called Administration and asked for time sheets for every cop at every rank in the Southern Station, thinking maybe we could at least make a list of cops who were off duty when those heists went down.

And for me, question number one was: Were these robbers really cops? Or just crooks in cops’ clothing? Either way, wearing police Windbreakers probably gave the robbers a few seconds’ grace before the victims knew they were being hit.

My good-doin’ partner made a breakfast burrito run and I put up a fresh pot of coffee in the break room. Then we settled into our facing desks, ready for a roll-up-your-sleeves desktop investigation.