On the way to work one Monday morning, my cell phone sounded off. I didn’t expect to hear Horace Colwell on the other end. Not many police chiefs give out their personal phone numbers, but Horace was an old friend and . . . I really should reassess my practices.

“Sam, we’ve got a problem.”

“Whattaya mean ‘we,’ big man?”

“I mean me and Dwight.”

Dwight was Horace’s brother and manager of Prospect Marine, a business they owned jointly.

“How can I help?” I asked.

“You kin git yer butt down here and look at the body we got behind the boat yard.” He sounded exasperated.

There are two things I hate in my professional life—catching a major case first thing on a Monday morning and not having a second cup of coffee before starting work. After one phone call, I was two for two.

“Have you called 9-1-1 yet?” I asked.

“Called you first.” Horace spoke with a classic east Tennessee accent and a deep voice that would make Sam Elliot jealous.

I sighed. “I’ll be right there.”

For a day job, Horace Colwell worked as a building contractor. But he had lots of spare cash and invested in the side business because he loved boats and his younger brother needed a job.

It only took me five minutes before I pulled my unmarked Ford into the parking lot in front of a small showroom building. A mechanic named Butch Sexton met me and pointed toward the repair shop at the back of a large and orderly boat yard where Horace and Dwight stood.

The weather couldn’t have been better: clear sky, perfect temperature, birds singing—a day to sell real-estate or fall in love.

“What’s up, gentlemen?” I said. “You’ve got a body?”

“Back here,” Horace said. “Look fer yerself.”

He began walking and I followed, Dwight at my heels. Behind the cement block building, Horace pointed to a male body lying face down on the ground. Blood covered the back of his head, dried and caked in the matted dark hair. In front of the corpse, a section of tall chain link fence had been snipped, leaving a four-foot opening.

“One of you two catch him breaking in here?”

“We did not.” Horace sounded vehement, probably thinking I’d be accusing them of murder.

Several flies buzzed around the blood, but I checked for life signs anyway. Finding none, I looked from Horace to Dwight for a reaction when I shook my head.

“We’re not supposed to have dead bodies in Prospect,” I said. “This is not some sleazy urban crime center.”

Neither man commented, but shot looks at each other.

“I think I know this guy,” Dwight said.

“Think?”

Some people say, when a person completes a stretch in a Tennessee correctional facility, they’ve paid their debt to society. They don’t know Noyd LeQuire.

After his release from Brushy Mountain State Prison and a bus ride to Knoxville, a taxi delivered him to the town square in Prospect.

As soon as he rented a single-wide on Doc Beasley Road, it became known as a bad neighborhood and property values dropped drastically.

All that happened just before Thanksgiving.

Four weeks later, I sat double-parked in my unmarked police car outside Prospect Bait & Tackle waiting for Sergeant Bettye Lambert to purchase a Christmas gift for her son.

The city’s Department of Buildings and Grounds had once again overdone the holiday decorations with illuminated wreaths on every utility pole, millions of twinkling lights in the bare branches of trees on the town square, and a Christmas tree to rival the monster at Rockefeller Center in front of the municipal building. If the citizens of Prospect didn’t know the city’s kilowatt-hour meter was spinning at warp speed, they should have.

I looked in the rearview mirror and watched a GMC suburban vacate a spot three car lengths behind me. As the big SUV drove past, I tapped the gear shift into reverse and parallel parked in the vacant spot.

Two minutes later, a twenty-year-old Chevy Caprice slid into a parking spot near the Prospect Citizen’s Bank & Trust.

As I looked away from the yellow Caprice, Bettye startled me by opening the back door of the Crown Victoria and tossing in a disassembled fishing rod. Then she jumped into the passenger’s seat, next to me.

“Hey,” I said. “That was quick.”

“I sure hope you’re right about what rod and reel to buy for Li’l Donnie.”

“Of course I’m right. My friend Richie is a fisherman and he says a Penn reel and Ugly Stik rod is the way to go.”

To my left, three car doors slammed. I looked across the street just as a trio of men wearing night-watch caps and rain coats exited the Caprice and headed toward the bank.

“Damn it,” I said. “This does not look good. Get on the radio and tell all units we’ve got a 10-15 in progress at the bank.”

Angela Valle explained that she and her estranged husband, Howie Wetzel, had separated nine months earlier. Because of irreconcilable differences, she had no intention of reuniting. Howie, on the other hand, wanted her back – badly.

In the last six months Angie had gone out with several other men; each of them visited by Howie and warned to stay away from his wife – two of them were spoken to at gun point. Some cops believe they can stretch the rules of good behavior to solve a personal problem.

Wetzel currently remained on disability leave after an on-duty traffic accident, claiming he suffered incurable whip-lash. He’d hired an attorney to get him classified as officially disabled and entitled to a line-of-duty disability pension.

I learned that Howie was originally from Cincinnati. He had taken the job with Knoxville PD seven years earlier when he left the Army after serving three years in the Military Police Corps.

Howie lived in the Foot O’ the Mountains Mobile Home Park on the outskirts of my city, beautiful downtown Prospect. Fool that I am, I agreed to talk some sense into him.

After taking care of a few of the necessities needed to run a small police department, I had lunch and then drove to the trailer park, hoping to speak with Officer Wetzel. A late model Nissan Z-350 was parked at the foot of a relatively new single-wide on Song Bird Lane. I knocked at the door and met a man in his early thirties. If Howie hadn’t been a cop he could have gotten a job modeling in a police supply catalog. He looked to be about five-foot-ten and could have worn a perfect size forty-regular. His short, dark hair and startling blue eyes would no doubt attract the ladies – until they got to know him.

After a few minutes of chatting with Howie I started to have serious doubts about Knoxville’s psychological screening process. Howie struck me as an unleashed shit-house rat.

“Are you here to charge me with a crime?” he asked, bristling with attitude.

“I’m here as a favor to your wife and as a courtesy to you; as one cop to another. I’m an impartial observer. From experience, I can tell you that putting the arm on your ex-wife’s new friends will get you jammed up with your job, and possibly tossed into the Knox County court system. If you think about this for a while, you’d see that.”

“Oh, you’re saying I don’t see things clearly?” His attitude went from bad to worse.

“I’m telling you nothing more than what you heard. I have no vested interest here. My friend works with your ex-wife. Your ex-wife is on the verge of taking legal action against you. You’re looking for a disability pension worth big bucks. I’m suggesting you put your efforts into getting your tax-free pension rather than into tracking down her boyfriends and breaking their balls.

“Hey, do whatever you want. If you break the law in Prospect I’ll lock your ass up – cop or not. Other than that fend for yourself. Thanks for your time.” I turned and left.

Before I got into my car I looked at Howie standing in his doorway and heard him saying, “Yeah, thanks for stopping by. Tell my ex thanks a bunch for sending one of the farm-cops to see me. Have a nice day, asshole.”

At 11:30 Saturday night six of the twelve cops employed by Prospect PD and I waited outside the Iron Skillet on Sevierville Road. Five of us had driven our personally-owned pick-up trucks to haul away the furniture, file cabinets, and other accouterments used by the owner to promote gambling and sell untaxed alcoholic beverages.

I keyed the portable radio I held. “Prospect-one to all units, do it.”

Officers Bobby John Crockett and Vernon Hobbs slammed on the front door. Harlan Flatt, Leonard Alcock, and Junior Huskey covered the back door and the windows at the rear of the restaurant. Stanley [Rose]and I moseyed up to the front.

A man looking like a bartender answered the door. The two cops pushed their way in. Stan and I followed.

“Police department, we have a search warrant. Nobody move!” Bobby called out. No one moved.

“Where’s Audie Blevins?” I asked, waving a copy of the [search] warrant in my left hand.

“That would be me,” said a short, well dressed man of about sixty. I handed him the paper.

“This is a warrant to search your premises for evidence of illegal gambling and untaxed liquor,” I said. “I see two card games, care to explain anything?”

“Jest some friendly games, officer. We get t’gether ever once’t in a while t’ play cards, nothin’ more.”

“Have a seat, Mr. Blevins, and don’t touch anything.”

I told Bobby Crockett to open the back door and let the three other cops in. While Stan and I took names and capped the drinks on the tables with Glad-Wrap, the boys searched the restaurant, the adjacent office, and the storerooms.

The quickest way to put pressure on a restaurant owner is to threaten to take away their liquor license. I demanded a copy of his from Audie Blevins. As I recorded all that information, Junior Huskey got my attention.

“Sam, look-it here.” He gave me two folders and a well stuffed, padded manila envelope. One folder was marked players, the other was unmarked; the envelope was full of cash. I looked over the two page list of players. There were over thirty names with telephone numbers. The unmarked folder had several loose-leaf pages showing dates and dollar figures. The dates went back more than two years to March of 2005.

Crockett and Harley Flatt carried in four plastic gallon milk jugs all full of clear liquid.

“They’s about six or seven more jest like these in the back,” Harley said. “Take a whiff, boss.”

He popped the cap off one jug and lifted it to my nose.

“Yahoo.” I took a half step backwards. “Smells like pure alcohol; must be 190 proof or better,” I said, and turned to the closest table of players. “Any of you guys feel like you’re going blind?” No one seemed to enjoy my attempt at humor. “Confiscate everything and box up all these glasses we’ve put tops on. We’ll let the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms people analyze this for us,” I told Harley.

Then Vern Hobbs walked up, extended his hand and showed me a large revolver.

“Got this in the office, boss. Nice lookin’ gun.”

It was an old Smith and Wesson model 1917, .45 caliber revolver; a revolver that fired .45 automatic ammunition.

“Bag it and tag it, Vern. I’ll send it off to be checked.”

#

“Hey, can you buy the luck you always seem to have?” [FBI Special Agent] Ralph Oliveri asked, several days later.

“What luck? I’d prefer to think of it as superior police ability. What are you talking about anyway?”

“The gun you gave me [to check out]. Give yourself a gold star. You got a jackpot.”

“Keep talking, Ralphie, I’m starting to get excited.”

“The gun was used in a homicide near your neck-of-the-woods. In September of ‘06 a guy named Harvey-Dean Mullins was shot to death in his Maryville home. The Blount County Sheriff has the open case. Two distinct sets of prints on the gun. One matches to your defendant. The other is an unidentified partial. The gun’s on its way back to us as we speak. Pretty good stuff from your little jerk-water PD.”

She had a black and blue mouse under her left eye and the beginnings of a cauliflower ear—not things you expect to see on a fifty-year-old woman with plenty of money.

She sat on the exam table, a doctor to her left and a nurse on her right. Sergeant Stan Rose stood next to me, ten feet from that small corner of the emergency room.

“I doubt you have a concussion,” the doctor said, “but it would be best if you stayed the night.”

The patient shook her head gingerly.

“Okay, but you should see your family doctor tomorrow.”

The woman said nothing. The doctor understood.

“Or if you have problems, come back and see us,” he offered. “Sign the papers for Teresa and you’re free to go.” He smiled and walked away.

The nurse began her explanation as if it had been recorded. I thought of the dolls my sister had years ago—pull the ring on their neck and listen to a recorded message. Maybe graduates had rings installed as they left nursing school.

Ella Mae Swope slowly slid off the exam table, grimaced at a stabbing pain in her side, and took a moment to steady herself. She turned around and signed three hospital forms while resting the clipboard on the table’s surface. The nurse swept the privacy curtain back against the wall. Ella Mae started her walk to the lobby.

“Ella, we need to talk,” I said.

“I’m really not in the mood, Chief.”

“I won’t keep you long, and I have to insist.”

She nodded.

I looked at my watch—quarter-to-midnight. I looked at Stanley. “Go ahead and close up shop. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

He nodded and left.

“The waiting room is crowded,” I said, “Let’s walk down the hall to the coffee shop.”

Mrs. Swope followed me, declined my offer to buy her coffee, and chose a table away from the half-dozen other patrons scattered around the room.

I assumed Ella had once been an attractive woman. Actually, she still was, until you saw the pain and hopelessness behind her outward appearance. Too many years of getting tuned up, and the stress of living with a violent man had hardened a once pretty face. The extra few pounds she wore probably came from no longer caring or from a few too many alcoholic calories each day. Her medium-length brown hair needed a combing as we sat at a small, round table in the hospital coffee shop.

“Are you going to sign the assault complaint this time?” I asked.

“What’s the use? Nothing will happen to him, nothing will change. You won’t do a damn thing yourself.”

“Ella, I could jump up and down on this table telling you that’s not true, and you wouldn’t believe me. I’ll just say this once, I will do something, but you have to sign the complaint and follow through by going to court.”

“What’s the use?”

“What’s the sense of being used as a punching bag every time Danny has a bad day?”

“He’s not a bad guy. It’s only when he has trouble at the yard or when he’s been drinking.”

“How many times has he smacked the crap out of you? How many black eyes, bruised ribs, or other physical damage do you have to suffer before it sinks in that getting beaten is not part of a good marriage?”

“I know you’re right, it’s just . . .”

“Stop.” I held up a hand to squelch her rationalization. “Your excuses may work on you, but not on me. Bottom line, Ella, come into the PD tomorrow and we’ll do the paperwork, or not—your choice.”

“All right, I’ll sign. But are you really going to lock up a member of the city council?”

“I haven’t had to before, but sure, why not? Danny needs some quality time with a good shrink. If a court order is the only way to get him there, so be it.”

“You’re a city employee, Sam; they’ll make your life miserable.”

“I’m the cop; it’s my job to make people miserable. Politicians are pussycats. Besides, that’s my problem

“Now for tonight,’ I said, “where can I take you, mother, daughter, or sister’s?”

“My sister’s, please.”

* * *

The chief assistant district attorney told me I was nuts. I often annoy her. Moira Menzies lectured me on the trouble I might encounter in prosecuting a local politician for domestic violence. An accurate assessment, of course, only I didn’t much care.

Later that morning I picked up my assault warrant at the Blount County Justice Center. I received a few more bits of similar advice from the judge, designed to make my professional life easier, but ever since I was a kid I had this thing about seeing justice done. It’s just what cowboys do.

Ella Mae’s husband, Danny, owned Swope Lumber and Supply in Prospect, Tennessee, a pretty little town in the foothills of the Great Smoky Mountains.

In no way a self-made man, Danny inherited the business from his father, who in turn inherited it from his father, who founded the business in 1930-something.

For the several years I’ve known Danny Swope, I recognized him as a spoiled fifty-three-year-old child who drove a big Cadillac Escalade and constantly spoke of his hunting adventures. Danny had never bothered me personally, but I still didn’t like his act.

“You believe that whoaman, Sam?” Danny asked. “You believe I hit her? I thought you knew your job. I’m disappointed in you, Sam. She had too much ta drink and tripped on the cellar stairs, is all.”

Danny thought his clever ploy of making me doubt myself would work.

“I know the difference between bruises from a fall and the marks of a good beating, Dan, and I don’t much give a rat’s ass what your opinion of me is.”

“You callin’ me a liar?

I guess he wanted to play chicken.

“If you persist in telling me you haven’t beaten your wife, then you’re a lying sack of shit. Clear enough?”

“Well, I’ll tell you this, Mister Sam, Po-leece Chief, Jenkins, you ain’t lockin’ me up, nosir.”

“Danny, keep your mouth shut and listen carefully. I came in here as a courtesy to you in deference to your position in the community. I could have sent two cops and had them drag your ass out in cuffs. But no, I told you to get with your lawyer and come into my office this afternoon or tomorrow morning and surrender yourself. I’ll make you that offer once more, but if you piss me off again, I’ll cuff you myself and arrest you right now—in front of all your employees. Understand?” I stood up and glared at him.

He came around from behind his desk. I didn’t like how fast he moved and I poised to hit him. But he stopped, about three feet from me, and he began to percolate.

Danny was not a tall man, only about five-foot-seven or eight, but he was built like a fire-plug. He had broad shoulders and thick arms. His wide, ruddy face had turned even redder with anger.

“Careful, Danny, looks like your blood pressure is on the rise.”

“Careful yerse’f, Jenkins. Last time I looked I’s one o’ your bosses. Push me an’ I’ll make life miserable fer ya.”

I laughed, not because I found what he said humorous, but because I thought it would anger him more. If he had a stroke right there in his office, my troubles might have been over.

“I’m my own boss, Danny, but I might admit to working in the best interest of the people.”

He snorted and put his hands defiantly on his hips.

“Last time I looked. I’m the cop and I can take away your freedom. You own a lumber yard. The best you can do is sell me a two-by-four. Don’t act tough with me.”

I think that one got to him. He stood there seething, his jaw muscles working overtime.

“Alright, y’all will hear from my lawyer.”

“Thank you, sir. Nice doing business with you.”

That was how my Monday ended.