A Long December

CHAPTER 20

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 21, 2001 23:03

It had been a long day. HESTER, GEORGE, and I got back to Iowa at about 9:15 P.M., and had been at the Nation County Sheriff’s Department, mostly wrapping up the reporting for the day.

George had held a briefing for the swarming media, along with Iowa and federal health officials who provided the technical details of what was becoming known on the networks as the “Kosher Killings” case.

Hester, Sally, and I had watched George’s briefing live from the safety of the dispatch center. We all groaned when the “Kosher Killings” headline was flashed on the screen. George, on camera, had no idea about the label until we told him afterward. We played the tape back for him. He’d been speechless.

We were still talking about that when Judy Mercer, KNUG’s bureau chief from Iowa City, buzzed the outside door and asked for admittance to the sheriff’s department. We could see her on the exterior camera. She was alone. That in itself was unusual. I couldn’t remember ever seeing her without a camera operator in tow.

When the duty dispatcher asked her the purpose of her visit, over the mike at the door, Judy replied, “I’d like to speak with the officers who’re working the meat poisoning case.” I think the fact that she hadn’t referred to “Kosher Killings” was the deciding factor in letting her in.

George, Hester, and I ushered her into the jail kitchen. I put on a pot of coffee, and we listened to what she had to say. To her offer, actually.

“I really want to be up front with all of you,” she said. “Let me start with the fact that this case could be the break I need to go to the network. Just so you know why I’m here.”

“Sure,” said George. “We understand that.”

“Good. Look, I’d like to be on air with something just a half hour ahead of the big boys out there. Something good that they’d die to get. All right?”

“We know what you want from us,” said Hester. “What do you have for us in exchange?”

“Okay, look. I don’t know just what this means, but I think it could be important.”

We waited.

“Okay, so you know where Coralville is?”

We all did. It was a town that shared a border with Iowa City.

“I’ve got a girlfriend who lives in an apartment in Coralville. She says that there’s been an Arabic student in the apartment next to hers, who comes and goes at odd hours and who has Hispanic and Caucasian men visit him on a regular basis.”

“Okay, and…? “said George. “I mean, in Iowa City, there must be thousands of foreign exchange students.”

“I know. But my friend called me about an hour ago and said that an Hispanic man had pounded on her door and asked to speak to a Mr. O’Day. She spoke to him through the closed door, but he was very insistent. She said that she was just about to call the cops when the door next to hers opened, and the Arabic man stuck his head out, and the Hispanic said, ‘Mr. O’Day!’ and they both went into his apartment. She thinks it’s strange that an Arab is using an Irish name.”

“Go on,” said George.

“Well, what she said was the really weird part is that the Hispanic man was the same man she saw on one of the interviews I did down at the plant today. She swears it.” Judy Mercer looked at each of us in turn. “I mean,” she said, “she tapes every segment I’m on. So she replayed tonight’s and double-checked. She says she’s certain. Now, I don’t pretend to know just what’s happening here, but it seems to me that that’s the sort of thing you might want to know.”

“Could be,” said George.

“Okay, she also says that, in the daytime, she can look out her bedroom window down to the parking lot, and this Arab’s car, when she can see it, has lots of maps in the seat. Regular ones, like you can get in gas stations.”

The three of us didn’t say a word.

“Well? I think you should check that out.”

“You might be right,” said George. “Who is this friend of yours, and where does she live?”

“Now,” said Judy Mercer, “we negotiate.” She had a dazzling smile. “Don’t you think?”

Within an hour, Coralville PD had gone to the apartment, interviewed Mercer’s friend, and staked out the apartment unit next door. The suspect was not at home. His vehicle, which they said was a red Dodge van with Michigan plates, was also gone. We talked to Barry Goodman, the Coralville chief and longtime LEIN member. He assured us that he would keep the place under very tight surveillance until we advised it was no longer necessary. He’d also see what he could find out about Mr. Odeh from other sources.

In exchange, we promised Judy Mercer that she would be the first told of an impending arrest. She bargained us up to include an exclusive interview with the first suspect we took into custody. Just in case, as she said, the impending arrest turned out to be made in Florida or California.

We got the best of that deal.

I finally got home at 01:30.1 let myself in as quietly as I could and found a note on the refrigerator. “Lasagna in white container. Tastes good! Watched TV and now I’m really worried. Wake me when you come up to bed, so I don’t worry. On the bright side, the weather report says we might get a white Christmas yet. Love, Sue.”

The lasagna was really good. I sat in the living room, eating it and watching our segment every fifteen minutes on Headline News. They changed the background footage twice, so I stayed up for another thirty minutes waiting to see if they’d change it again. They didn’t. Between times, I surfed through other news channels and got to hear some fascinating commentary about what was happening in New York City and Nation County, Iowa. Nobody seemed to have either the delivery method or the targeting anywhere near right. I learned a lot about ricin, and even got a five-minute segment regarding the “legitimate uses of castor oil.” This case was getting to be a real education.

So far, nobody had managed to link the poisoning to any specific terrorist network. Speculation was rife, though. Some poor bastard from the Israeli Embassy had been cornered, and was badgered about who he thought had done it, and if he thought it was an anti-Semitic hate crime, if he thought it would lead to a U.S. strike in the Middle East, and if he thought Israeli citizens felt safe in Tel Aviv. He did a very credible job of avoiding saying anything, and spent most of his time trying to reassure the reporter that “the U.S. authorities, I am sure, are handling this case with great expertise.” I thought that was nice of him. I also think he deserved a little credit for not calling the reporter an idiot.

I woke Sue and told her I was home. It must have been reassuring, because she was asleep again in two minutes. I think she only beat me by a minute or two.