Chapter 28: More Evidence

June 7, 2008, Saturday afternoon

Once we knew the crime had taken place, 49 security had to work fast, going backwards, to figure out what would happen next. The physical evidence - trash, clothing left behind, etc. - didn’t give us much beyond a very quick getaway. There was evidence that all the packing, plus grabbing the gold, took place during the 10 minutes Friday morning between when Abril left the apartment and when she was expected to sit down in front of her security monitors.

The team set up in Abril’s room and went to work like CSIs. She could stay in my apartment or with her mother. She alternated, I was supportive but as a cultural thing she naturally turned to family, especially since the money was earned mostly by her father and was intended to get him out of prison. She also spent a good deal of time with Cynthia, Pammie was at home so there was room plus a sympathetic ear and other body parts in the bed. I gather that listening turned to licking for mutual comfort.

Rex - the nerd Sam sent over - had a laptop full of special programs, plus he brought a new hard drive, top quality, that was listed as unused except for being checked into inventory by Sam. At every step I had the computer guys talk to me first. Abril had the sense enough not to start her computer after she discovered the theft. Step one was to mirror Abril’s computer drive to Rex’s external hard drive so everything stayed intact, as evidence would, including Abril’s private stuff. They worked with the mirror image.

Martha had put many files in the trash but never did an overwrite, so what she threw away was still there. Abril gave permission so they examined it all - she had nothing to hide except some R-rated naughty selfies, and they quarantined those until Tina, a female tech, could inspect them. The web history, including web searches, gave an open book that told the story clearly. Then the search moved to emails, the guys had to wheel in a printer to get it all organized. On the first pass our guys found hard evidence of what I dreamed up: searches and emails showing how the pair had planned, for over a year since they arrived, of going to Thailand for extensive surgery. (Well, given what they were looking at, surgery in Thailand was pretty logical.) Abril saw how Martha had known about the gold and been after it all the time they lived here.

This stuff was actually on Abril’s apartment computer. Sam had hidden similar fictional material on the external drive in a way Rex and my guys could not find without Sam’s help. But we didn’t need the fiction, the facts were much more compelling.

They did the exact crime I would have framed them for! Except they had more disgusting detail than I could imagine.

I agree it was not a novel or unique crime, and that once you factor in the gold along with their desires there were not that many ways to go. I gave myself props, but then took them back, because it meant I was on Martha’s level as a criminal genius. Clearly it was not something to brag about, so I could not take credit (to myself) for that bit of genius. But on the other hand, if I had not planned the frame, and been ready for it, they might have gotten away. So I was faster on the draw.

Was I lucky or smart? After going back and forth of the issue I decided that I won, and that is what counted. After all, I had the Jack of Ass and the Queen of Mean chained in my private hell, on ice until I lit the fires, so I didn’t need to mention my prescience to anybody but them.

The specific planning - doctors and routes - started right after Martha read an online article about the bank closing. Abril always read the paper’s printed edition so she missed the early online article, and Martha intercepted the bank mailings that followed each month. That meant Abril would face a time crunch when she learned her safe deposit was going away, forcing her to bring the gold into the apartment where the roomies could get at it.

Martha’s emails and search history showed that three months ago Martha had searched for, and identified, the top body sculpting and gender change surgeons in Thailand. She contacted several and soon settled on a Dr. Huhg who would listen to them and their frankly impossible demands. With the gold was coming to the apartment before June 15 the fat bitch started planning the theft, the escape and the surgery all at the same time, leaving all kinds of evidence in the electronic trash.

Martha wanted extensive body modification, including extreme liposuction, to take off at least 40 pounds. She also wanted her tits perky and her clit extended “more penis like” so she could penetrate a woman’s labials. She told Dr. Huhg that she aspired to be a B&D queen in Asia. Her desires were well beyond what the doc was willing to do, and were likely to kill her, plus there was a significant cost. But Martha was committed and she said she had the gold coming so Dr. Huhg played nice and kept listening, giving her hope about different procedures.

Kirkos asked about more radical desires, he wanted a sex change to a woman with a vagina constructed with penile tissue - that was routine. But he also wanted his ass to be turned into a second working vagina, using nerves and flesh from his scrotum. (Yes, this was hard for the guys to read. Hard gang members and heartless criminals get squeamish about some types of surgery.) His colon was to be closed off and disconnected. Other methods (too disgusting to mention) would be used for waste. Part of his plan was to set up a port in his torso so he could use an IV for most nourishment. His request was well beyond the outer bounds of medicine, but when 40+ pounds of gold was mentioned Doc Huhg replied saying it posed some interesting issues and kept the exchange going.