CSI09 - In Extremis Page 5

  and where they ended up at the actual time of the shooting. ‘A’ cone set for Shooter Number One, ‘B’ cones for Shooter Number Two, etc; the ‘dash-one’ cones for the truck-arrival locations, and ‘dash-two’ cones for the shooting locations.” “And I assume you’d like those locations based on an individual interrogation of each shooter— one that takes place out of hearing range of all of the others— and includes their general sense of where all the other shooters were located?” “That would be ideal,” Grissom replied. “And while you’re asking questions, we’re going to need to know how tall each of these shooters are, and if they were standing, kneeling, or prone when they fired their weapons.” “And if they shot right-or left-handed,” Catherine added. Brass made the appropriate entries in his field notebook. “Okay,” he said, looking up from the notebook, “so, while you guys are poking around the truck, we’ll handle those interrogations. After that, I’ll have a little heart-to-heart with Miss Jane Smith while the rest of you do your thing.” “Sounds like a fair division of labor to me,” Grissom said, then turned to Catherine. “What do you think?” “Give me a difficult crime scene and a shredded corpse over a bunch of arrogant and pissed-off undercovers anytime,” she replied with a glacial-eyed shrug. “Deal,” Brass said with a satisfied smile as he turned and headed back to the parked Denalis, where the four CSIs were still engaged in their initial collection of evidence. “Nice to know that our good captain still remembers the basic protocols,” Grissom commented as he and Catherine turned their attention back to the shattered truck. “You think he’s been one of those closet forensic types all this time?” “I doubt it,” Catherine said, shaking her head as she put her notebook back into her vest pocket. “I think he just likes to confront the bad guys, whoever and whatever they might be; and he doesn’t seem to mind if he has to get a little dirty in the process.”

  During the next twenty minutes, which Grissom and Catherine spent carefully working their way around the perimeter of the scene in opposite directions— each taking a series of inward-facing overall scene photos and placing some of their locator flags next to potential evidence items or areas of interest as they progressed— Viktor Mialkovsky sat crouched beneath his protective canopy, carefully dividing his gear into two piles for what would probably end up being a strategic retreat down the western slope of the Sheep Range. It was not a task that pleased him, but it had to be done. The issue was weight and volume versus speed. Mialkovsky was very much aware— because he’d reconnoitered the area a few days earlier— that a withdrawal down the back side of the Sheep Range, in the middle of the night, would involve two difficult elements: first, a strenuous climb over and around slick rocks and loose gravel; and then a hazardous descent through narrow, slippery, and often plunging gaps in the mountain’s massive granite ledges, crags, and boulders, where a careless move could easily result in a hundred-foot drop and a potentially crippling— or even fatal— accident. He’d included the route in his plans as a last resort, in spite of these obvious difficulties, because the detailed map he’d obtained from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service’s Refuge Office had highlighted it as one of several paths on the high mountain range used by generations of mule deer and Desert Bighorns to escape their human and nonhuman predators. And the physically demanding aspects of the trail— those close-knit ledges, crags, and boulders— appealed to him in terms of concealment and egress from searching helicopters. And that was the crucial thing— to successfully escape what was rapidly becoming a potential trap, Mialkovsky simply could not allow himself to be seen. But in selecting this path as his emergency escape route, he’d been careful to account for the fact that a large, muscular human, encased in thick winter clothing, with a nightscoped and silenced rifle in one hand, a folded thermal canopy in the other, night-vision goggles strapped to his head, and eighty pounds of equipment and supplies slung on his back would be a far different creature among those narrow rocky gaps than a slender mule deer or agile Bighorn. From the first moment he’d stood at the summit of the Sheep Range and stared down into the pathway marked on his map, Mialkovsky knew it would be impossible to descend the route quickly and evasively with all the equipment and supplies he’d be taking on the mission. And that didn’t even count the added problem of avoiding the night-vision and thermal sights of two helicopters conducting random search patterns overhead. The only solution was to bury all of his nonessential equipment and supplies under some nearby boulders— and then abandon the dune buggy where it was now hidden, knowing that the night-camouflaged vehicle would be easily discovered by a daytime search team. This was not how he had wanted to leave his carefully rigged scene. But the unexpected arrival of the young Hispanic, the subsequent shooting at the campsite, and the rapid response of the Metro backup units had forced him to progressively alter his initial withdrawal plans. And now, the ever-expanding sweeps of the circling helicopters were forcing him to resort to an emergency escape route that he’d never intended to use unless his life was actually in danger, a possibility that had seemed so unlikely, that he’d actually chuckled to himself as he’d finalized his plans. He wasn’t laughing now. It wasn’t because he minded caching the equipment items and supplies at the scene. The likelihood of their discovery was remote, at best, even if the CSIs made a determined search of the area. He knew he could always retrieve the more expensive and difficult-to-replace items at a later date. Nor was he concerned about abandoning the dune buggy at the kill site. He’d hot-wired and stolen the titanium-tube vehicle for this mission from a local auto mechanic— who’d been foolish enough to use a cheap and thus easily picked lock to secure his back storage lot— with the expectation that it would be found. In fact, his initial plans specifically assumed the Las Vegas PD would eventually locate and track the stolen dune buggy back to the auto shop. And when they did so, they would find a blue tarp protecting a carefully arranged pile of empty boxes from the sun, instead of a twenty-thousand-dollar ATV, but nothing whatsoever to link him to the theft. The black recon clothing, hairnet, hood, and gloves he’d worn that night were very effective in retaining hair, fiber, and latent print evidence; and he’d had plenty of time to make sure that all of the prints left in the dirt by his soon-to-be-disposed-of boots were thoroughly eradicated. The problem Mialkovsky was now deeply concerned about, as he began to transfer the small pile of essential equipment to his backpack, had little to do with abandoned items of evidence, and very much to do with the rapid passage of time. Right now, time was his true nemesis. Mialkovsky had counted on being back in Las Vegas— carefully and methodically cleansing his hotel room of any latent or genetic evidence of his presence— long before the body of his target was discovered and the CSI teams arrived at the scene. But that initial plan, long since abandoned, hadn’t accounted for an unexpected third party arriving on the scene in a noisy red truck. Withdrawal Plan Bravo had died in a blaze of gunfire, along with the driver of that truck. And his alternate Withdrawal Plan Charlie had quickly evaporated in the rotor-wash of the Black Hawk helicopter as it came roaring overhead in a wide loop across the eastern face of the Sheep Range. So that left Mialkovsky with the one remaining emergency escape plan he’d never really expected to use: an estimated one-hour climb and two-hour descent in complete— albeit night-vision-enhanced— darkness, followed by another half-hour trek across mostly open desert to reach a small motorcycle he’d prudently concealed as a backup for just such a situation. Three and a half hours would still give him plenty of time to sanitize his hotel room and be well on his way to Los Angeles before the Las Vegas PD picked up the scent of a professional assassination. But he knew all too well that his earlier estimate had been based on “reasonably expected” conditions that had certainly not included helicopters that might happen upon him at any moment. If the searching pilots did come this way, and he was forced to take a more circuitous route down the mountain and out to the hidden motorcycle, Mialkovsky knew he could easily find himself on foot— and openly exposed to anyone who happened to glance in his direction— wh
en the sun began to rise in the eastern sky. That would be a terribly bad situation, one almost certain to result in his surrender, or a fight to the death that he would inevitably lose if the responding Metro officers recognized the non-civilian-like tactics of their adversary and possibly called for military backup. The rules of posse comitatus supposedly forbade the military from ever interceding in civilian law enforcement affairs; but Mialkovsky knew from experience that a clever police scene commander could always get an extremely competent and heavily armed response if he claimed the suspect was operating in military uniform and with military equipment. He’d been a member of one of those special response teams on three separate occasions.Nothing I can do it about that until it happens, he shrugged to himself as he hoisted the now much smaller and lighter pack over his shoulders, and then leaned down to pick up his nightscoped rifle and folded canopy, vaguely aware as he did so that his survival instincts were responding to some unseen and unheard stimulus, and beginning to demand attention. Five minutes later, he understood why. Tightly encased in a mountain-camouflaged winter survival parka that effectively retained his body heat, but necessarily limited his hearing, Mialkovsky was carefully working his way around the clearing where his target and the hapless mule deer lay crumpled and still on the ice-cold dirt and rocks, when the suddenly echoing roar of an approaching helicopter sent him scrambling for the shelter of another nearby juniper.5

  AFTER SEPARATELY AND METHODICALLY working their way around the circumference of the perimeter tape in opposite directions, Grissom and Catherine finally met back where they had started and briefly compared notes. Then they entered the scene at the point where the patrol car illuminating the right side of the devastated truck was parked. They did so carefully, one at a time, gently holding the tape up for each other, and then started toward the truck; hesitating before each step to scan the ground with their flashlights, making sure they didn’t step in or on any potential evidence. Fifteen minutes later, the two CSIs finally stood at the passenger-side door of the bullet-pocked truck, having taken a total of sixty-three medium-ranged and close-up photos to document their progress. In their wake, a scattered field of bright-colored flags— sticking up out of the sand on long wire stems— marked the location of numerous expended pistol, rifle, and shotgun casings, and the few boot prints in the soft sand and dirt that offered some promise of a match back to one of the UCs or Jane Smith. Around their boots, the light from the two flashlight beams reflected off thousands of glass shards— both slivered and cubic— scattered across the hood of the truck and the surrounding sand, dirt, and rocks out to a radius of approximately ten feet. As Grissom and Catherine slowly swept the flashlight beams up the side panel of the truck

  over the crackled surface of the mostly broken-out side window

  and then finally into the truck cab, the waves of intense white light reflected colorfully off a similar collection of laminated and tempered glass fragments and widely splattered patterns of coagulating blood, splintered bone, and brain tissue that covered the seat and the entire rear window. The body of the suspect lay twisted across the seat with the right arm extended toward the passenger door and the left dangling over the floor-mounted shift, as if he was looking under the dash for something he’d misplaced. “Pretty obvious why Jane Smith couldn’t positively ID this guy,” Catherine commented as she swept the beam of her flashlight across the suspect’s shattered skull, barely recognizable as human. “Not much to go on visually,” Grissom agreed as he turned on a small tape recorder attached to his vest, and then began to talk his way through the cab interior. “Subject is sprawled sideways across the single front seat of a red Ford pickup truck of undetermined age. He appears to be a muscular Hispanic male of uncertain age— possibly in his late twenties or early thirties— wearing what appears to be black nylon ski clothes and cheap work boots with broken leather laces. His facial features appear to have been destroyed by multiple high-velocity projectile impacts. His exposed wrists and neck are bare; no watch, no jewelry, no visible tattoos