Chapter 17

Day 17 (24 October 2018) Notes for Taxi Driver Task Force initiated on 8 October 2018

(Detective Trish Cavanaugh Badge 3446 SFPD)

I knew that the Task Force commander, Special Agent in Charge FBI chief Rocky Nelson was not at all happy with my inclusion on the Task Force.

He was not at all pleased with my questioning of the killer ID as a “Taxi Driver” when all the clues pointed to the fact that he was not a traditional Taxi Driver like one working for a company like Yellow Cab of San Francisco. In fact, it was most likely that he was either an independent contractor working for one of the internet pick-up services like “Uber” or “Lyft” or the more probable chance he was simply a “drive by night” gypsy cab driver just picking up a few bucks under the table where it couldn’t be taxed.

In addition to that shortcoming, he was particularly incensed that I had the temerity to question the FBI “profiler” team of not doing due diligence in labeling the killer as being “white” or “middle-aged”. In fact, my data collection was pointing to a man about the age of 28 to 30 with a possibility he was a minority mixed race or Asian with a connection to either a community church or a part-time volunteer at one of the health care facilities located in the killer’s hunting grounds. My gut feeling was the “white” and “middle-aged” labeling was done strictly by some sort of nationally based software program that constantly shuffled the deck to see what the most probable solution was.

I was quickly coming to the conclusion that the so-called “Task Force” was as much a misleading term as the “Taxi Driver” label. I had been on a lot of these things before and this was the first time I had seen such a counter-productive atmosphere of confrontation and downright sabotage inside that unit. I wanted to blame it all on the Feds but in all honesty the local cops had a lot to answer for as well. I knew I was not making new friends with my question when we were asked the insincere question,

“Are there any questions?”

I was beginning to learn with this bunch that was the signal to “keep your mouth shut and don’t waste my time because I have it all under control” coming straight from the highest ranking Fed in the group.

Josh was sympathetic but I noticed he seldom asked any questions and would only say what he really thought when we were alone together.

I decided as much as I enjoyed the privacy of a team of two, it was time to expand my team within a team effort and try something else to solve this case or the city of San Francisco might become more famous for its Serial Killers, than for the fires and the earthquakes.

Jill Chen was a new FBI investigator with an impressive law degree and we hit it off over a latte at the nearby coffee bar. She agreed to join Josh and I in trying to sort out some other ways to analyze the data we had already collected because it was obvious to me at least that the FBI standard approach was not really working all that well.

Jill agreed with me and she promised to show up later that evening for a think tank session on the killer’s changing MO.

I explained it to Josh and he was a little upset because he knew with the addition of another task force member, he wouldn’t be getting any pussy at the session or immediately after because it would be too risky. I hoped that the three of us would be able to work together and not get caught up in the undercurrent of sexual tension that seemed to be gripping all of the task force members as the case dragged on and on and more women were murdered by the rapist fiend in our midst.

Of course, crime in San Francisco was not ebbing in any sense of the word.

The murder rate was going up at an accelerating pace.

The lack of meaningful executions and long lists of inmates on death row meant that the hard core violent criminals considered the justice system a joke and treated it with complete disrespect on all levels. As bad as it was in San Francisco, the rates in our sister city across the Bay over in Oakland was even worse. In a horrific way, the city of Oakland was becoming more of a chaotic scenario for minorities than the slaughter house of Chicago that was setting new records every year for homicides and suicides.

The death rates in all three cities were in a shambles and it was the same story in most of other urban areas as well.

The politics of the area with the “Sanctuary City” designation and the fact that city hall was in open warfare with the Federal government in matters of illegal immigration and other areas of contention was chaotic at best. The entire State of California had become a “Tale of Two Cities” with the urban sprawl along the coast and the mostly agricultural and rural remainder of the state. Law enforcement was a dirty word in the inner city and the violent attacks on the police had risen drastically in recent years.