9.
As Calleigh began the painstaking process of recording and collecting all the evidence at the spot where Cletus Parnell died, Eric maneuvered his way carefully across the backyard to the open mouth of the culvert. He was growing more dismayed as he went. The backyard was literally covered with spent bullets, broken glass shards and peppered aluminum cans.
"Calleigh," he called out, setting his kit down, "I'm gonna let H know we need more help on this one, I think it would be a good case for letting the new recruits get practice at collecting." He snapped off a few quick photos.
"That bad, huh?" Calleigh called back. "And how can you be so cruel to a batch of newbies?"
"It looks like a copper mine back here." Eric retorted, pulling out his phone. As he made his call, he looked at the emptied gas can, the charred rim of the culvert, which still let out wisps of smoke. Shaking his head, he studied several spent books of matches, then frowned as he noticed dozens of casings around the hole, followed by a pair of vice-grips and a pair of needle nosed pliers. 'There shouldn't be any casings at the far end of a target range', he thought to himself. He knelt as he talked with Horatio, requesting a teaching session in the field, explaining the huge amount of ammunition that had been spent. As he did, he noticed a handful of unspent bullets. Twisting around, he fished his tweezers out and gently picked up one of the unspent rounds not attached to a casing and examined it.
It didn't take a genius to see that the bullet had been removed from its casing and that the gunpowder had been used to… Eric stared at the culvert. Gasoline and gunpowder. No wonder the guy launched like a human cannonball. Concluding his call, he called back to Calleigh.
"Hey Cal? Guess what?"
"I'm listening…" She replied, carefully going over the impact spot against the house, collecting hair, flesh, etc.
"He used gunpowder from several unspent bullets as well as gasoline."
"Oh, goodie!" She chortled back. " I get to confiscate all the weapons!"
"You are entirely too happy about that," Eric joked back as he dug up an envelope and put his evidence inside.
"I just love relieving good ol' boys of their toys!" She replied, laughing.
Eric chuckled with her, setting envelope and tweezers aside as he prepared to take pictures of the culvert. The smell of gas and charred vegetation still lingered in the air, causing him to wrinkle his nose as he studied the angled down chute. Pausing a moment, with the camera in one hand, he pulled up his mag light and shone it down the mouth. The three foot wide culvert angled downwards a good ten or so feet and Eric could see it angled again, leading out somewhere down the bank into the dense scrubby trees. The culvert was dirty, covered in char and soot marks indicating a large projectile, ie Cletus, had recently been propelled outward, by the vertical striations of the marks inside the culvert.
Along with all the spent matches, spent bullets, the eight or nine broken up bullets used for their gunpowder -- along with a pair of pliers found later-- Eric noticed, and took pictures of, fresh raccoon tracks. He shook his head, and stood up, wondering where the culvert let out in the scrub beyond. Shouldering his camera, he decided to follow a hunch. Moving cautiously , he half slid-half stepped down the steep embankment that the culvert was buried in and began hunting for the exit.
It didn't take him long to find it. The smell of burnt soil and vegetation led him to the mouth where more wisps of smoke were drifting about. He began photographing. There was a neatly burned path from the culvert exit indicating it was the exhaust from the initial blast. He was smirking, still unable to believe what he was seeing, when a noise caused him to jerk his head up.
Something was moving in the trees above his head and seconds later he spied it moving away from him to a more convenient spot. Looking highly ruffled and indignant, was a soot-covered raccoon, even its fur was looking somewhat singed. It swung around, shooting an angry black beady-eyed glare at Eric as if in accusation that he had been responsible for his present state, then it began to clean itself up.
Eric stared in disbelief before he had the presence of mind to swing the camera up. As he snapped away, he murmured, "Calleigh is never gonna believe this!"
Calleigh, in the meantime, finished the task at hand, then went and joined the policemen who were keeping an eye on their four charges. She set her kit down on the back of a nearby patrol car and turned around to look at the four men.
"Morning ya'll!" she said cheerily, secretly enjoying the reaction of a happy person on several hungover men. "My name is Calleigh Duquesne and I am a crime scene investigator." She indicated her badge and ID on her hip. "Who wants to start telling me about what happened here?"
Sullen, slightly pained glances were cast her way, and three heads hung, while another looked away and sighed.
"We were just target practicing…" he said.
"And you would be?"
"Tyrell Johnson." he said, glancing glumly at Calleigh. "Everyone calls me Tye."
"All right, Tye, tell me what happened here." Calleigh asked again, a more somber expression settling onto her.
"We were just target practicing. You know, get together, have a few beers, pop off a few rounds."
"Popped off a little more then a few rounds…" Calleigh remarked, to which all four men squirmed. "Not to mention a few too many beers. What led your friend to dumping gasoline down that culvert, then trying to light it?"
"Coon…" Another man replied sourly. "Stinkin', wily-assed, 'coon."
"Why do you say that?" Calleigh promptly asked.
"Cause none of us could get it." A third one replied indignantly. "Ol' Clete, that just sorta pissed him off, 'specially when that damn 'coon dove into the culvert."
"He kinda went nuts then, went chargin' downstairs and grabbed up the gas can, dumped it down the culvert and started lighting matches." Tye said.
The fourth man sniggered, "Funny though, none of the matches lit the gas!"
"So he started yelling for bullets and a pair of pliers, thought maybe the gas needed a little help."
The fourth man giggled, then hung his head in shame and pain from the roaring headache he was getting. "Damn culvert still wouldn't ignite. That's when he started hollerin' for all our matches."
"So he added gunpowder to the gas already in the culvert. How many bullets would he have pried apart to get any results?" Calleigh asked. All four men looked at her like a parcel of owls. She sighed. "Never mind, we'll figure that one out. All right, so what led to Cletus climbing down inside the culvert?" she asked.
"Kept saying that no raccoon was gonna get the better of him," The giggler replied.
"Did he have any help?" Calleigh asked.
"No, Ma'am…" Tye replied shaking his head, thumbs snagging into the belt loops of his jeans. "Clete, he just slid down that culvert on his own, determined to get that raccoon."
"Oh, come on boys!" Calleigh replied, smiling her dazzling best. "I'm a southern gal, I've been to hundreds of backyard target practices, fish frys and cook outs. When you get a bunch of drunk buddies together and they are trying to see who's the biggest and baddest of them all, they always encourage one another. So what were ya'll doing to encourage ol' Clete?"
The giggler snickered. "Clete was getting that pissed off that he couldn't shoot that 'coon."
"We were telling him to keep trying that he had to be better than that raccoon." One of the others said.
"You had to have been egging him on…" Calleigh replied.
"Well, somewhat, I mean, Clete is always going on about what a good hunter he is. And he can't even hit a raccoon at the back of his property." One of the other men protested feebly.
"Billy here was the one who suggested he slide down into that chute."
"Hey!" the giggler protested. "You were the one who said he needed to go down in there and light the match!"
A general squabbling amongst the four men suddenly erupted as Calleigh rolled her eyes and folded her arms. Honour among thieves suddenly evaporated in the back of a bayou. She glanced over at one of the policemen standing nearby. Very loudly, he let out a piercing whistle.
"Listen up, boys!" he hollered, causing four hang-over induced winces. "The lady ain't done talkin' with ya'll!"
"Which one of ya'll suggested Cletus go into the culvert and which one of ya'll told him to light the match?" Calleigh asked.
Four fingers pointed in four different directions, all at each other. Calleigh hung her head a moment, her mouth skewing to one side before she sighed and looked back at them.
"Well ya'll, here's the problem. Your urging him on makes you accomplices to manslaughter. So ya'll know where that is going to go." Calleigh drawled.
"But we was just target practicing!" One of the men protested as the policemen attending made ready.
"Regardless, your suggestions to Cletus to go down inside a gasoline and gunpowder laced culvert and, lighting a match, led to the man's death. And because of that, I am confiscating every weapon in and around this house."
"Now, you can't just go an do that!" Tye protested, as all four men looked at her indignantly, "We got constitutional rights to…"
"I have every right, Mr. Johnson, despite your misguided conception that ya'll were just havin' a little bit o' fun out here; a man died. And gunpowder was used as an ingredient to help in his death. So I, as a law enforcement officer and a ballistics expert, can confiscate all your weapons and determine which gun the bullets came from to help fuel Cletus's demise."
One of the patrolmen barely caught himself from snickering out loud at her last comment and Calleigh suddenly realized what she had said as the other officers exerted a mighty effort not to crack a smile by biting the insides of their cheeks.
"So ya'll are getting a ride downtown, where we'll sort things out from there and then let the State's Attorney's office decide to press charges. Gentlemen." Calleigh looked at the police officer nearest her and nodded.
As the four men were being formally arrested, she indicated that they hold back Tyrell Johnson. He looked at her sullenly.
"Can you tell me who all lived here besides Cletus?"
"Just Cletus, well sometimes Owen comes around, but we hardly ever see him."
"And who is Owen?"
"Clete's brother. Thinks he's too big for us, only comes around when he wants something from Clete, or to use his boat."
"What do you mean he thinks he's too big for you?" Calleigh pressed.
"Went and joined the Marines about ten years ago, saw the world and all that crap, now he thinks we're just a bunch of dumb ol' rednecks." Tye muttered.
"All right, thank you Mr. Johnson, we'll talk more, later." Calleigh said, and let the officer lead him away. With a sigh she turned and looked at the house. Slowly a smile spread across her face, now the real fun was about to begin…