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“She knows that you’ve visited Sergio Diaz twice and thinks you’re working for the defense.”
“I’m not,” I said.
I couldn’t tell if he believed me.
“I have a theory.” I put the perfectly built Guinness in front of him.
He sipped, smiled, said, “Give it to me.”
I told him about how Sophia said Henry had Sergio’s hoodie for nearly a week—including the night that Rodriguez was killed. From the videos, a taller, skinnier kid was wearing it—not Henry.
“I thought initially that Sergio confessed to protect his brother, but after talking to him and Sophia, I think he confessed to protect his sister. Maybe both of them. According to Sergio, Javier threatened Sophia and if Sergio didn’t remain silent about the robbery, Javier said that she’d get hurt.”
“Remaining silent about a crime and confessing to murder are two different things.”
“The confession was knee-jerk. He knew how deep his brother was in Javier’s crimes. That, coupled with Javier’s threats against his sister, had Sergio doing what he thought he needed to do to protect her.” I shrugged. “You and I both know that young men often make split-second decisions without thinking things through. But now, Sergio feels stuck. If he recants, Javier isn’t going to be arrested without evidence. Which puts a target on Sophia’s back.”
“They don’t trust us.”
Tomas took that personally.
“Maybe not,” I admitted, “but these are young people who have seen the worst of the system. They’re in foster care. The system has kept Sergio from gaining custody—at least in their eyes. Henry is angry and latched onto an older teen in his house, a surrogate for his brother. He is the key. We need to convince Henry to tell us everything he knows. He may even have physical evidence of the crimes. He was there,” I emphasized.
Tomas raised an eyebrow. “We?”
“He’s not going to talk to you,” I said. “He might talk to me—or his sister. Arizona is a one-party consent state. She can record the conversation.”
“They’re minors.”
“It doesn’t matter.” True, I didn’t know the exact law, but having Henry state what he knew might be the best way, at a minimum, to get Henry out of Javier’s house. “If we can get Henry and Sophia to another house, a safe place, Sergio will talk.”
Tomas didn’t say anything.
“Sergio is not a killer,” I said.
“You can’t know that.”
“I’m a good judge of character.”
He stared at me, sipped his Guinness, then leaned back on his stool. I was wearing him down, which made me happy.
I put the bag with the Coors Light, cigarettes, and change on the counter. “I don’t know if you can get prints off these, but if Greg Rodriguez’s prints don’t match the Paradise Valley burglaries, I think the man who handed me these will.”
I told him my theory about Don Cruz and Greg Rodriguez—friends in high school who reconnected last summer when Greg started working at the Cactus Shop. “Maybe Don got him the job, maybe not. If you go through their social media accounts—both of which are public—you’ll see there are several points where they match up, but for the most part they led separate lives until they started working together. This wouldn’t have made me suspicious, except that Don lied to me for no reason.”
“Maybe because you’re a PI?”
“He didn’t know that. I was a customer, I bought a six pack of Coors Light, he flirted with me. Told me that he barely knew Greg, except that they worked at the same place.”
I told him about the videos that showed Don was very familiar with the Phoenix Mountains Preserve and Piestewa Park specifically. I showed him the maps I’d created and how easy it would be to disappear into the mountains. “The burglaries are at night, between eight and midnight,” I said. “I’ll bet if you review the shift schedules for Don and Greg, they’ll both be off those nights.”
“It’s not enough.” He gestured to the bag. “I can’t run these prints.”
“Why? I can make a statement that they’re Don Cruz’s prints.”
“I need cause. I didn’t witness him touching these items. I can’t just take the word of a civilian that he might be a thief.”
“Well, shit,” I said. “What about Greg Rodriguez? Can you check his prints, since the morgue took them? They might match to the burglaries.”
