The Porno Set Mystery Ch. 03

The chronological order of my stories is as follows:

Todd & Melina series, Interludes 1-5, Sperm Wars series, Russian Roulette series, Case of the Murdered Lovers series, Case of the Murdered Chessplayer series, The Swap series, Interludes 6-10, The Murdered Football Player Series, Case of the Black Widow series, Teresa's Christmas Story, The Case of the Black Badge series, A Case of Revenge series, Teresa's Summer Race, The Trilogy series, Dark Side Of The Force series, Caught In The Act series, Case of the Murdered Bride series, The Credit Card Caper series, The Hot Wives Investment Club series, Seriously Inconvenienced, Ch. 1-5, Case of the Paper Trail, Ch. 1-4, Christmas Mystery Theater.

The Porno Set Mystery, Ch. 1-3.

Feedback and constructive criticism is very much appreciated, and I encourage feedback for ideas.

This story contains graphic scenes, extreme language, and actions that might be extremely offensive to some people. These scenes, words and actions are used only for the literary purposes of this story. The author does not condone murder, racial or racist language, violence, rape or violence against women, and any depictions of any of these in this story should not be construed as acceptance of the above.

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Part 9 - Moving Forward

The lawyer H.J. Lynch, Esq., senior partner of the Chase, Lynch & Berry Law firm, did not like it at all that I was calling him up at 6:00am on a Sunday morning, but I told him that I was about to interrogate Jay and that it was in his best interest to get there within ten minutes, and that I wasn't waiting much longer to make an arrest. He made it in fifteen minutes, pleasantly surprising me.

I also told the Duty Desk to send a vehicle and officers to escort Lisa, Betsy and Connie to Headquarters. While we waited, I asked Lt. Tanya Perlman, who had come in already, who she thought had done it, which she correctly surmised meant that I'd solved the case.

"I'm not sure who it is, Don." Tanya said, as Cindy watched us. "I don't think I've seen all the evidence you have."

"True." I said. "But let me help you: we have three suspects. Who are they?"

"Let's see..." said Tanya. "Lisa, who found the body; Jay, who was seen by no one and admitted he was with no one else; and... well, I'm not sure. Oh, wait! Connie Chang was last into the lunch line, and not really noticed by anyone beforehand."

"Excellent!" I said. "You've definitely named the only three that might have done it. Everyone else was in the company of others during the very narrow time frame. So, any ideas who it might be?"

"For the lack of information," Tanya said, "I'd have to go with Jay."

"This might change your suppositions." I said. First, I showed her the video of me examining the black belt. "This belt was the one found on the floor by Steve West. We assumed it was his, and that was my very bad mistake, I'll admit. As you can see, there are two secret pouches inside the belt, either could have concealed the knife that was the murder weapon."

"So West brought in that weapon himself?" Tanya asked. "And the killer got the knife from him somehow?"

"No, I don't think so." I said. "I think the killer was wearing this particular black belt when he or she came to the set that day. The killer got the opportunity to use the knife on West, then left that belt on the floor and put Steve's belt on and wore it out of the room. So one of the belts we examined was actually Steve's, and we found no pouches, but we didn't look at the belt found next to Steve. Very bad of me, folks, very bad."

"But you did get to it, eventually." Cindy said.

"Yes." I said. "And it shows we have a tremendously smart killer to deal with... who was smart enough to switch belts with Steve. So I have the raw footage of that day, and we can look to see if someone is wearing a belt that is not quite exactly like the belt we confiscated during the changes of clothes during processing. Otherwise we have an exact belt match, which will be a strangeness in and of itself."

"That doesn't really eliminate nor point to any of our suspects." Tanya said.

"True, but this does." I said, showing her the the raw footage of the gang-rape video.

"Jesus Christ..." Tanya said softly as she watched. Even the policewoman who ate popsicles while watching autopsies in progress was disturbed by what she was viewing...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Okay, Jay," I said in Interrogation-1 as he settled into his chair, the lawyer next to him, Lt. Perlman next to me on our side of the table, "the same conditions apply as before: you can re-invoke your Fifth Amendment rights at any time, but that's up to you. I just have one question for you: you did not kill Steve West... but you saw who did do it, didn't you?"

Jay's eyes practically came out of his skull. "No, I didn't." he finally said.

"Jay, Jay, Jay." I said. "Look dude, you only had to pee, not take a dump. You came back into the room and Steve West was lying on the bed, dead, and you saw the killer leaving... didn't you? You saw her take certain actions that if you described them, would help me prove who the killer is... and that it's not you."

Jay's eyes widened again. "What, were you there?" The lawyer groaned, burying his face in his hands as I looked triumphantly at him.

"I need a moment with my client." he said. We gave them five minutes before returning. It is possible that I did some victorious fist-pumping in the anteroom as we waited, while Cindy and Tanya grinned and tried not to laugh out loud.

Back inside, the lawyer said "We need a deal, here."

"I don't see why." I said. "Jay's innocent, and with his statement I can prove the perp's guilt. What does Jay have to fear?"

"C'mon, Commander," Lynch said, "any good defense lawyer will say Jay is making this up just to save his own skin. I want him to have immunity from prosecution before he gives his statement. If you really think he's innocent, you should have no problem with that."

"I need more." said Jay. "I need witness protection. If I give my story and I testify, the Mob will kill me just for being a snitch. That's why nobody is saying anything to you, Officer. Anyone talks, they die, even if it is to take a murderer off the streets. That's the way it is in this business."

"I believe you." I said. "And when our ADA gets here, I think he will accommodate you."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

ADA Franklin Washington had come in at my request, and he did indeed give Jay immunity as well as an agreement to put him into Witness Protection. Jay gave his story, which was that he saw the killer stab the knife into the dead Steve West's groin, then pull off West's belt from his pants and wear it out of the room.

"Yep." I said to Washington after Jay was taken out of the room. "He knew of the belt being exchanged. He didn't realize how strongly that exonerated him." Franklin smiled at my strong chain of reasoning, the links holding up well.

The other people that I had asked for had been brought to the Station, and were in Interrogation-A on the other side of the building. I instructed them to put one of the people in a holding cell until I was ready, then to bring Lisa to Interrogation-1.

"Lisa," I said when she arrived, H.J. Lynch watching as her attorney, "you found the body. You were alone with Steve West when you went to serve the food, weren't you? So why couldn't it have been you that did it?"

"Are you kidding?" Lisa said. "You think I'm The Flash or something?... how could I have had time to cut him up that many times? Ask anyone, I screamed when I saw him lying there... it could only have been a second or two..."

"I agree." I said. "And I don't think you murdered him. I just want to confirm what you told me earlier: you never saw Jay, and you did see Connie putting down the bowl of goop."

"Yeah, that's right." Lisa said. "Then Callie and I went into the front room and got in line for lunch."

"And how long was it before Connie got to the line?"

"Uhhh, she was just getting in line when I made the plates for Steve and Jay... couple of minutes, I dunno."

"Lisa, you said you've done some of the BDSM films for West. Did you do any gangbang or simulated rape films for him?"

"A couple." Lisa said.

"Did West have sex with you himself during any of those shoots?"

"No." Lisa said, her eyes growing wary. "I only made love with Steve off-camera, never on camera or 'professionally'."

"During these what I'll call 'rough' films..." I asked, "did anyone ever hit you, and by that I mean did someone deliver a closed-fist punch to your face or body, or slap you so hard that it injured you?"

"Not really." Lisa replied. "They slapped me, and it stung, but it wasn't hard enough to really hurt me."

"Not even to leave a bruise?"

"Not to my face, though one of the guys really squeezed and slapped my tits, and I got some bruising there. Nothing serious."

"So it would be abnormal, even in these rape films, to hit a woman hard enough to seriously injure her?"

"I can only say it never happened to me." said Lisa.

"Ah, so it did happen to someone else?" I said, giving her a 'gotcha' look.

"That's not what I mean." Lisa said, somewhat defiantly. "What I mean is that I don't know for sure if anything else happened to any other women, and I'm not going to say definitively that it never happened and then have you say I'm lying to police because you found a case where it did happen. Some women got fucked in the ass, and that can cause damage if they're not careful. Some women liked it rough, and may have been slapped around harder. Steve went as far as he could without overstepping. He asked me for my limits before we started, and he generally honored them, though he went to the edge at times."

"Well, I'm not trying to trick you into any 'lying to police' issues, Lisa." I said, as reassuringly as I could. "But I want you to watch this video, and tell me if this is the norm." I had Tanya show the video. Lisa watched, her face increasingly becoming a mask of horror as she watched.

"Oh God," she said, "I never... oh God, I never saw anything that bad." Then I saw the light hit her eyes as she realized who the killer of Steve West was...

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I had Cindy come in for the next interview, but said I'd be giving more instructions later.

"Thank you for coming in, Connie." I said, having her sit down next to the lawyer Lynch, who was becoming something between nervous and exasperated as I worked up to the final announcement of who the killer was. The pretty Asian woman looked at me impassively.

"Connie, my partner Lt. Ross here has two black belts in various martial arts." I said. Connie's eyes lit up and she smiled just a bit, as she looked at Cindy. "Are you a black belt in anything, Connie?"

"No sir, I'm a brown belt in-" Connie said, naming one of the martial arts forms. I then asked Cindy to explain the basics of that form of the martial arts, which she did. Free-flowing movements were a big part of it.

"I see." I said. "Lt. Ross, would you please step outside and ask Detective Washington and ADA Washington to come in, please? You and Lt. Perlman can grab some breakfast if you don't want to watch the interrogation." Cindy seemed surprised, but did as I asked. A few moments later the Washington brothers came in, and I could barely tell them apart though they were not twins.

"I need to show you some video, Miss Chang." I said. The raw footage of the rape scene came on. Connie quickly turned her head from it, refusing to watch.

"That is you, isn't it, Miss Chang?" I asked. Indeed, the woman being violated and abused on the film was indeed Connie Chang.

"I have nothing more to say." Connie said. "I am invoking my rights to remain silent."

"And well you should." I said. "But allow me to tell everyone what happened, and you'll just correct me if I go astray, okay?" I leaned forward slightly and began my tale.

Part 10 - The Solution

"Miss Chang, Steve West hated you. He hated your guts. He called you a 'Chink' every chance he could, he berated you, he could not understand why you kept getting hired for his films, but there you were. You filmed several romantic scenes, which were very good- my wife likes them very much- but then West rather suddenly decided to use you in one of his rape films, totally to your surprise."

"He had you assigned as an extra, but then had Bobby Steed grab you and begin forcing sex upon you. You scratched at him as you tried to get away, and that earned you being thrown to the floor. West was furious with you, expecting you to go along with the filming, and he hit you very very hard several times, injuring you."

"He then had Bobby Steed continue to rape you, and he was so worked up that he raped you himself after Bobby finished, hitting you as he violated you." I said. A tear was forming on Connie's face as I talked, but I went on relentlessly.

"The rape went on several minutes, as this film shows." I said. "You were in pretty bad shape afterward. You had to take time off; you certainly could not be seen on film with those injuries to your face."

"Once you healed, though, you began asking Betsy for work... because you secretly wanted revenge on West for what he did to you. Betsy hired you as an extra twice, but you never had a chance to be alone with West to kill him... with the knife secreted in your belt. Your purse might be searched for weapons, but you did not expect your belt to be examined, and I must admit it was a brilliant way to bring a weapon to the set."

"This time, you came on as an extra even though West was telling Betsy to not hire you any more. Even after raping you, he was insulting you, calling you names and racial epithets again, and he really had hoped the rape and the bad treatment would make you go away."

"So this time, you had a chance... after everyone went to lunch, Jay went to the bathroom, and there you were, alone with him. You had your knife out in a flash, and you ran up to him and got him in the neck where he could not scream out. He tried to hit back, but your martial arts skills allowed you to move very fluidly as you continued to stab him... I've been recently studying methods of samurai sword combat in ancient Japan, and your pattern was familiar to me as well as to Lt. Ross... and he finally fell onto the bed. You slit his throat fatally, you stabbed him in the heart to make sure, then you opened his pants and left the knife in his groin, cleaning it off with the sheets."

"Opening his pants wasn't just to stab the knife there; you needed his belt. You left your belt with the knife pouch there, and took his belt and put it on, wearing it. That was a very smart trick, but we think the DNA we've recovered on both belts will prove the swap." Connie's eyes fell as I said that.

"You then hurried to the front room and got in line to get food, and just in time: only seconds later Lisa began making plates for Steve and Jay. She went into the other room, screamed, and you rushed with everyone else into the room and saw the body."

"It's going to be hard to prove this, Commander." said the lawyer, though his face showed he knew his client was defeated.

"Not really, Counselor." I said. "Connie, we have a witness, someone who did see you commit the crime. Who it is will come out in the discovery phase for your trial, but along with the other evidence we're rapidly acquiring, we'll have a death penalty case. I'd suggest you and your lawyer begin conferring with ADA Washington about a plea deal before the arraignments on Tuesday morning."

"Commander," said the lawyer Lynch, "I need to see you and the ADA privately for a few moments. Miss Chang, don't say a word to them until I advise you to."

I called Cindy and Tanya back into the room; of course they'd watched from the anteroom. "Take Miss Chang back to her holding cell." I said. "Counselor, why don't we go to the Conference Room?" After Connie was escorted out, we went through the anteroom and the hallways of Headquarters to the main conference room.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"As I told you before, Commander," said the lawyer Lynch, "the other guy's statement is just a 'he said, she said' situation. That's reasonable doubt. And do you really think a jury is going to coldly convict this woman after we show the tape of what was done to her? Death penalty case? Really? I'm expecting an acquittal. You may be lucky to get a hung jury."

"Aggravating circumstances." I said. "She came here with a knife secreted in her belt with the premeditated intent to kill Steve West. She stalked him, hunted him down, and butchered him."

"And then there's 'guilty but insane'." said Lynch, and I began wondering why he was working this hard... it wasn't just a lawyer doing a conscientious job for his client. "After what's shown on that video, we could make that case, too."

"And have her sent to the Asylum?" I asked. "You know what happens to women there."

"Which you have effectively stopped, Commander." the lawyer shot back. That one, I had to concede.

"We need to talk about this one." said Franklin Washington, to me.

"Don't waste too much more of my time." sneered the lawyer. "I'm going to go back and confer with my client." I had a Uniformed officer escort the lawyer back to Interrogation-1."

"He may be right." said Franklin. "If he gets even one woman on the jury, I don't know if we can get a unanimous conviction."

"I'm even more worried about witnesses." I replied. "We have Jay in Witness Protection, and therefore we can get him back to the stand. But the minute we let the rest of them go, we will never get them back here."

"So what do you want to do, Commander?" Franklin asked.

"Put her on trial, for malice murder with aggravating circumstances." I said. "Go for the death penalty, make these bastard lawyers work their asses off. I suspect they don't want to work that hard pro bono, and she might just see reason and take a plea. What are you prepared to offer her?"

"The best I can do in any situation is 25-to-life with possibility of parole." said Washington. "By the way, why am I in here instead of Paulina Patterson?"

I just smiled. "For the same reason I sent Ross and Perlman out while questioning Ms. Chang. All right, I have one more person waiting in Interrogation-A. I want you to watch."

Part 11 - Wait! There's More!

I informed Lynch that I was going to talk to Betsy, and he demanded I wait until another of his lawyers arrived. A woman arrived at 9:00am, claiming to be the Chase, Lynch & Berry counsel for Betsy. Sheesh.

"Okay, Betsy." I said as Cindy Ross and I took our seats on our side of the table. "Let's watch some TV." I showed the video of Connie being brutalized. Both Betsy and the lawyer turned their heads, unable to watch for more than a few seconds.

"Betsy," I said, "would you mind telling me why, after that happened, you would even consider hiring Connie to be on a set anywhere near Steve West again?"

"As bad as that looked, Commander," Betsy replied, her eyes becoming shrewd and cunning, "it's what the porn industry is. Connie knew it, and when she came back, obviously for money, I didn't think about it. But to answer your question: I felt sorry for her, and I wanted to get her some work to get her some money."

"Yeah, right." I said. "I'll tell you what I do think, Betsy. I think Steve West was hopelessly in love with you. I think you used his feelings for you to wrap him around your little finger. You had him make a will leaving his personal assets to you, but that was only the beginning of it: you got him to give you a stake in his company. Now that he's dead, you get his company, you get a free inroad into making films. You've got Jay as your cameraman; all you need to do is make promises and string him along. Above all else, you don't have to start from scratch."