Authors: Patrick Abbruzzi
My eyes must have looked like two oceans about to open the flood gates. Fran
k
immediately offered me a cigarette, which I took willingly.
“The baby is dead. It was probably dead while I was giving it mouth t
o
mouth. The doctors said it was about six to eight weeks old. It sure looked younger to me but they’re the doctors. Two months old an
d
it’s on its fucking journey to dust. Where’s the prisoner?” I asked angrily.
“He’s in the squad’s car with Bobby Rizzo,” Frank answered.
“Any bosses show up yet?
”
“Yeah, Sergeant
Knobbe came and left,” replied Frank.
“Thank Christ,” I said.
We smoked our cigarettes in silence while we waited for Bobby to finish with Hartmill. He must have spent at least forty five minutes with him. We saw Bobby pass cigarettes to the prisoner, probably in a
n
attempt to butter him up so he would talk.
“Jesus Christ, Frank. He’s had him for almost a God damned hour! He must have found out something by now,” I said impatiently.
“It takes time, partner. Bobby is a good detective but you have to approach people in a certain way. First, he has to get to know who he i
s
and where his head is at. If Hartmillis an out and out lunatic, it jus
t
makes Bobby’s job all the harder,” Frank said in response to my question.
After a few more minutes, Bobby Rizzo finally exited from the car. He slammed the door and threw his cigarettes down to the pavement as if in disgust then made his way over to where Frank and I were waiting. We didn’t really know what to expect judging by hi
s
actions. I was the first to speak.
“What did you find out, Bobby?”
“Not a fucking thing! The guy’s mouth is tighter than an aardvark’s asshole! I’ll tell you what though; this guy’s been around the judicia
l
system before. He knows his rights and wants his lawyer, and I mean now.
“I have enough to hold him on, so I’ll take him back to the precinct and pu
t
him in a cell for a while. Later I’ll let him make his phone call. How is the baby doing?
”
“The baby is DOA,” I said quietly.
“Did the doctors give you a cause of death or time yet?
”
he asked.
“Not yet, but we’ll hang around and get it. As soon as we do, we’ll call you,” said Frank.
“Okay, talk to you later then. I’ll get busy putting out an all-points bulletin on the baby. All the radio divisions in all the boroughs wil
l
get the APB,” Bobby said.
“See you later, Bobby,” I said.
Frank and I waited outside the emergency room for someone to let us know the cause of death. The case was now a homicide an
d
as such, warranted top priority.
We both knew that the rest of the day would now be filled wit
h
police work dealing with finding the parents of the dead baby. Once we did that, we knew we would be faced with the hardest job any patrol officer could encounter – notifying the loved ones of their terrible loss. After a short time, a young man dressed in green scrubs exited through the emergency entrance and lit a cigarette as he approached Frank and I.
“Are you the officers who brought the baby in?
”
“Yes, Doctor,” Frank quickly answered.
The man in the scrubs nodded then said, “The baby died of blunt trauma to the head and sternum. The trauma coul
d
have come from either dropping the child or slamming its head against a hard object. The trauma to the chest was the result of a thrust of stron
g
force to the area.”
“In other words, the baby was either punched in the chest or an object was used,” said Frank inquisitively.
“In my opinion, the baby was punched. I can see what appears to be the outline of knuckles in the rib cage area. The ribs are broken and pierced the lungs but death preceded the lungs being pierced.”
“Thanks, Doctor. Do you have a time of death?” asked Frank.
The young man nodded. “I saw the report that stated you arrived at 8:00 A.M. I would say that death occurred at approximately 7:00 A.M.
”
“Thank you for all you’ve done,” said Frank.
The doctor returned back to his emergency room as Frank and I remaine
d
silent. Eventually we got back into the RMP and rode to the station house
,
also in silence.
Here was a baby, barely two months old, whose life had been snuffed out without a thought. Here was a child who would never say the words mama or dada. Here was an infant who would never know who its parents were. It was a tiny life whose eyes would never gaz
e
upon the blue sky of daylight or a dark sea above filled with glittering stars. Its tiny hands an
d
fingers would never feel the texture of its mother’s hair or icy, cold snow on a wintry morning.
I soon realized that I didn’t even know the sex of the baby and, somehow, this made me feel even mor
e
horrible. What if we couldn’t locate the parents? Would the baby hav
e
to be buried in Potter’s Field on Randall’s Island? I swore to myself the
n
that, if the parents were not located, I would petition to have the righ
t
to give the baby a proper Christian burial and purchase the tombston
e
myself.
All I could think of were my own two kids at home. I would be getting off at 4:00 P.M. and would be able to catch the latter part of the Easter Sunday dinner with my family. My son, Richard, was in second grade while my daughter, Diana, was in first grade, both at St. Anne’s Parochial School in Donga
n
Hills. They were good kids and I wanted nothing more than to se
e
them right at that very moment. Thinking of that innocent child, I thanked God for what I had.
I was a decent guy, but if
Hartmillwould have been before me right then, I would hav
e
killed him without any hesitation. I didn’t just think it; I knew it, and the very thought scared me.
Frank was quiet, too, but in his silence he did not think of kids. H
e
had a habit of hiding his emotions and did not easily express sorrow or anger. If he ever did, it was done in solitude.
When we arrived at the precinct, Frank double parked the car in front of the station house and remained in the vehicle while I ran inside. I saluted the desk then ran up the stairs to the detective’
s
offices. A sign on the door read knock before entering so I did so and opened the door. Upon entering I saw several detectives sitting a
t
typewriters, each of them busy poking away at the keys with two fingers. The lone cell in the room containe
d
Hartmill, who was sitting silently on the narrow bench.
Across the room I saw Bobb
y
Rizzo speaking with Lieutenant Mcshane, the Commanding Officer of the 120
th
Precinct squad. Captains usually commanded precincts but lieutenants commanded the detective squads. Lt
.
McShane had over twenty-five years on the job with twenty of those spent in the detective division. With a name like Mike McShane, he wa
s
destined to become a cop or detective.
I stood silently by the detention cel
l
housing Hartmill. The interior of his enclosure was painted green which was typical of all the cells found in squad rooms throughout the city. It had a single open toilet and a wooden bench but there were no pillows or blankets. His space was roughly 12' by 8', not a holding cell for overnight prisoners.
The precinct cells were the smallest types of cells and built for single occupants, used to hold prisoners while the detectives did their paperwork or further investigative work. When a detective finished his paperwork on a prisoner, he would transport him or her to court fo
r
pre-arraignment. If court was not in session, he would lodge his prisoner downstairs in the precinct’s detention facility.
Holding cells had blankets. If the prisoner was lodged before super or breakfast, the precinct would provide a sandwich and drink, free of charge. If the prisoner had his own money, he would be allowed to purchase something mor
e
substantial. It was a common sight throughout the city to see multiple prisoners walking out of station houses in the morning, shackled together and steppin
g
into paddy wagons.
Of course, not too many new cops refer to the patro
l
wagons as paddy wagons anymore. The term ‘paddy wagon’ was a reference to the tur
n
of the century when the majority of immigrants were Irish and therefor
e
the majority of arrests were Irish people. Soon thereafter the police force consisted of mostly Irish and the term stuck.
Hartmillwas sitting on the hardwood bench. His eyes were closed but
I
did not know if he was just dozing or faking it. Lt. McShanefinished talking with Bobby and returned to his office in the rear of the squa
d
room where he closed the door behind him. The words
Commanding Officer
were painted in green at eye level across the opaque glass section of the door.
This squa
d
room was illustrative of all NYPD squad rooms throughout the city. There were six to eight desks spaced evenly apart with a typewriter in the middle of each desk. Just a few inches away from each typewriter was an in and out basket, of which the in rack was always more full than the out one.
Some of these baskets contained
DD 5's
,
open cases, pending interviews
and
to be filed
. There were large metal fil
e
cabinets all around the circumference of the room and bulletin boards hung everywhere. There were clipboards with papers hanging on a nai
l
anywhere a nail could safely be hammered into the wall. Some held labels, such as Legal Division bulletins, Operations Orders and precinct memos.
One section of one wall housed a slim, enclosed glass cabinet which measured roughly 10' b
y
2". It contained photos of criminals filed b
y
crime and modus operandi. The way a criminal committed his crime wa
s
also important and thus the study of his method of operation also important. The photos within were hidden by a large green shade which was torn and tattered. A speaker on the wall next to the cabinet, precariously hangin
g
from yet another nail, was tuned in to the Richmond Radio dispatcher as well as the RMP’s in the field.
Some detectives wer
e
seated at their desks, others were speaking on the phone, and still others eithe
r
had victims or potential prisoners seated beside them in heavy, metal chairs.
The scene was reminiscent of an old movie called Detective Story I had seen on TV, starring Kirk Douglas and directed by William Wyler. It was a realistic account of detective polic
e
work in any major city and was even more realistic than Barney Miller o
r
Kojack.
After Lt.
McShane’s door closed I walked over to where Bobby was standing.
“What did you find out at the hospital?
”
he asked.
“The baby died around 7:00 A.M. or thereabouts. The doctor said it was blunt trauma to the head and chest area,” I answered with a frown. “How about you? Anything?
”
“
Hartmillcalled a few numbers but no answers on any of his calls. He didn’t even ask for a God damned phone book. I took an inventory search o
n
him. All he has are traffic tickets from all over the country; some are issued in the name of Hartmillwhile others are in name
s
he gave to the police who stopped him. It looks like the ticket
s
were issued without any verification by the cops who wrote them. I have some from New Mexico, Texas, the Carolinas, and even a few fro
m
Florida,” said Bobby disgustedly.
“Okay, so he’s a drifter. If that’s the case then where the hell is his car? Don’t forget tha
t
when Frank and I first spotted him, he was on foot,” I said.