A Lead in a Haystack

Saturday June 20th. Turner and I took a bite out of the dusty combo meal of knowledge and eccentric vagrants that is the Boston Public Library. Little did we know that it would come with a super-sized portion of McInsight and a 32oz cup of divisiveness.

After some bumbling in the McKim building, we found the sparsely-occupied microfilm room. We would have been quicker in divining the microfilm machines, but our associate Books Mahoney was occupied with a serious heart wound. She's recovered, thankfully, and the mug behind it all is on his way to a few years in solitary (i.e. Maine).

I pored over frame after frame of local news coverage from 2005 while Turner took a leap into the Net. And though his web was world wide, the one I began to uncover was more tangled than last year's Christmas lights.

2005 saw the (supposedly accidental) burning of the First Baptist Church on Centre St, and in its wake a slew of real estate squabbles that threatened to cool the gooey warm sense of community JP basks in - or at least severely irritate a fat gaggle of residents and readers. Nearly every issue I scoped contained a letter to the editor concerning tenants' rights, land disputes, and snipes between community groups. Issues of race and class were embedded in these like a slug lodged in a stiff's brainbox.

That summer brought heat waves of all sorts. There was the natural phenomenon itself, which, as any reader of Romeo and Juliet knows, portends nothing good. Then there were the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council (JPNC) elections, which were fiercely contested. And, a week later, El Oriental de Cuba was firebombed. The more I read, the more I felt like a bachelor trying to figure out what had gone rotten in his fridge. My sniffer pointed at the fuzzy black mold gestating in last week's political leftovers.

Residents reported that El Oriental de Cuba was often the scene of debate over Cuban politics. They also mentioned that local suits in the public office held informal meetings there. While most denied that this could lead to such a despicable crime, there was further speculation on who the arsonist was actually trying to hit. Some said he was going for the tenants of the apartments above the shop - which is much more consistent with the pattern that would later emerge. Weeks later residents of a Paul Gore St apartment would submit a frustrated letter to the editor criticizing the JPNC. El Oriental is at the corner of Centre and Paul Gore; and JP Auto Body is just down the street. That has to mean something. The threads of a theory were there, but I didn't know how to crochet.

One thing I did know: though the M.O. was different, this was definitely the work of our bug. One man tried pursuing him after the fire at El Oriental started, and his description fits the surveillance from the Sigourney Street fires. But it was beginning to seem that he was just a puppet on a string held by a twisted group of puppeteers.

Further reading laid out yet more disputes over land and the elections. Reports of voter intimidation surfaced, coinciding with those from the '03 elections. There's not a clear connection (or else the case would be closed), but I was starting to think that somehow our shamuse was not operating solitarily on the revenge motive, and that there was some salt to the notion of this being the work of a gang of some sort. A gang potentially with friends in high places. And I'm not talking the Treefort Club, unless they own property or have their hands in electoral cookie jars.

Turner holds steadfast to the profile we've already developed - a solo flyer with a racial chip on his shoulder. I did read about a rash of arsons that occurred in the '70s and '80s, when our perp was still in his underoos. This follows the profile Turner researched, which suggests a prior influence from or fascination with fire setting. Still, I've got my hunches and he's got his. But perhaps it works better this way - with two different theories, we can keep each other sharp and steer clear of outright conspiracy over cold facts and observation.

We've got a lot of dots to connect and some sketches to color. Our time at the library also left us with a host of new contacts with whom we will be getting in touch. This thing's about as cold as a burning tire in July, so updates will be soon and maybe even regular.

Hotlanta - Oddly Not an Arsonist Hideout

Franklin here, back from a brief stint in Atlanta. Turner and I are still hot on the trail of our perp, and will be providing an update later this week. Before that, a few words on my travels. In Hotlanta I was shacked up in the new drug and sex-slave trade capital of the country, Gwinnett County. Unfortunately, the only drug I saw was aspirin, and the only slaves were consumers. But, I was witness to more than a few crimes. Here's the skinny:

Crime #1
Date: May 16th
Scene: House party
Some unscrupulous vandal tossed his cookies mid-conversation. My quick reflexes allowed me to dodge the spray, but the tile floor was not so lucky. I had a motive tagged to the guy before he even made it to the bathroom: Papa Stalin Vodka.

Crime #2
Date: May 22nd
Scene: A Room as Dark as the Night is Long
I was watching the new Star Trek flick. No complaints there. What's the crime? Zoe Saldana's getaway sticks glommed my ticker.

Crimes #3 & #4
Date: May 28th
Scene: G-Braves Stadium
Reports on the quality of a local baseball team were substantiated. But the establishment has a long way to go in theft prevention: $8.00 for a chili-cheese dog looks like highway robbery to me. Got to see Tom Glavine pitch holes through Cleveland's team before he was to move up to the major league Braves. Few days later an informant contacted me. Turns out he got sacked not long after the game. In a town of raw deals, Glavine was just handed a plate of sushi.

Crime #5
Date: May 30th
Scene: A Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy
Dames and eggs, such is the state of our tattered union: we Bay-staters enjoy reliable public transportation, clean politicians, and a uniform distribution of wealth, while in a secluded dump south of ATL, the conditions are simply medieval. I saw mugs and dolls alike carrying 36-inch shivs in broad daylight. Janes walking about advertising their wares like they were on eBay. Folks riding on horses instead of boilers. And the chow was barbaric: giant turkey gams and slabs of meat on sticks were hot items. The brew was alright. Most appalling of all was the state-sanctioned murder: At the end of the day, the mayor of the joint oversaw a duel. A duel that ended in the Big One. I was among the helpless onlookers encouraged to choose between the two contenders. Most of the crowd's support went to a regular roundheels; my guy definitely had the bulge on him. Or so I thought. Real quick-like he took a shiv across the throat, and that was that. Disgusted, I took a bunk and turned my better side to the Dirty Dirty forever.

Now that I'm back, expect updates to be more regular. Thanks to Turner for flying solo at the desk for a while.

The Night that Disappeared

Franklin here. More educated speculating (has a nice ring to it, right?) last night.

We were forced to use the back office again since the light's still out in the front. At least in the back the lighting was appropriately seedy. Fincher-esque, even. Armed with beers, we looked into a tip from Ninja Mahoney about the distance and chronological pattern of the fires. Noticed that there is somewhat of a counterclockwise motion - beginning at El Oriental de Cuba in July 2005, southward to the hair salon, then around and back to the autobody shop this past April. There are two anomalies, though - the perp hit the hair salon three times, and the Sigourney St. condos twice, once after lighting up a house on School St. The pattern is not linear, but the investigation provided us with a few insights and a few new questions:

1) There is likely a relationship between our firebug and the owner of the hair salon. Our hunch is that the perp is trying to punish them for some sort of continued behavior - also the case with the autobody shop. If the crimes are indeed racially motivated, he could simply be telling these people to close up, or else. This would explain why there were multiple attacks on the hair salon, which reopened each time. Same story with Sigourney St, a well-known site of a property dispute.

2) Assuming that these are all the work of one man and not any copycats, the firebug struck in '05, '06, '08 and '09. Where was he in '07? Cooling off in the hoosegow? Down and out in Paris and London?

3) The crime scenes make a radial pattern, suggesting that our man could be centrally located between them. The distance between sites indicates that a car had to have been used to transport the tires. We considered the possibility of his using a rental vehicle, but the specificity required by most rental organizations would be detrimental to one's alibi. This also brings up the question of a partner - does he have a wheelman?

We then thought about the hood himself, tried to stir up a profile of some sort. The one time he was caught on surveillance he appeared to fit the late 20s - mid 30s white male profile pretty well. We don't think he's striking at random. Specific motives means he's a JP resident, and has been since at least '05. Probably has his finger on the pulse of the community, but certainly isn't a good doctor. Not outspoken. Not interested in killing - or else he would've attacked the homes of the business owners. If you're going to go through the effort to bump someone off, you'd probably be willing to tail them home. As for the School and Sigourney St. sites, no one was injured in those fires. He just wants to get some sort of message across.

Towards the end of the conversation it started to get chilly in the office. We deduced that it was because the heat's broken. It'll probably stay that way. No one said this job has luxuries, and that no one was a dirty liar.

We share the office space with Dreads Mahoney and a shady figure named Tiny "Bling" Mahoney. While Turner and I made some more dead soldiers in the reception area, Dreads periodically contributed to our conversation, though she had some smut to write. All I can say is even our detecting skills can't figure out some of the choices Zack Snyder made in the Watchmen movie. Tiny lurked in late in the game and proffered up his maltese hookah. Knowing we might have to enlist his talents later, Turner and I kept on his good side and accepted. From there the evening vanished in a cloud of smoke.

I'm off to Atlanta to take care of some business (in the tune of a keg of beer and the Renaissance Festival). Turner has homework to do while I'm away, so keep your eyes peeled for the update. Then put some lotion on them so you can read it.

Enough of the Arson Holes

Guess this is where I come in. Franklin's the name. Turner and I did some work back in the English department at NU. Mostly Victorian in nature. He contacted me the other day about this arsonist burning up our neighborhood. Reward sounded pretty easy on the ears. Looking at my student loan statement could be deadly for the faint of heart - so I said what the hell. Someone's gotta stick up for the good people of Jamaica Plain. Besides, Centre Street Liquors could be hit next. And then there'd be real hell to pay.

Turner supplied the office space, I'm supplying the vice enablement. Case should be pretty open-shut - what else do you do with cases, after all? Half-shut them? We may be broke, but we ain't stupid.