Homicide files

Today I did some undercover work with the investigations unit of the local sheriff's office (sounds much cooler than it is). Things didn't work out exactly as planned so we're going to try again in a couple of weeks.

We (we being my Captain and I) went back to their headquarters to eat afterwards and an investigator gave us a bit of a tour. He showed us where they keep all of their major case files... most of them homicides. He had to return to his desk to work on some stuff but he told us we could look through the files for a little if we wanted.

These files are amazing. They are gigantic binders, often 2-3 for each case, filled to the brim with crime scene photos, autopsy photos, dialogs, test results, comprehensive personal histories of suspects and victims, and much more. They really capture and tell the story of a murder from many different angles.

There was the elderly woman who lived in the ghetto, but was a grandmother figure to many. She had no children but had lived with and taken under her wing an autistic adult for 10 years. She was willing to help anyone who came to her needing it.

One day a neighborhood crackhead came to her and asked for $20. She refused, and the crackhead got angry and bludgeoned the poor innocent old woman to death with a hammer. The autistic adult, who was basically this woman's child, was found sitting next to the old woman's battered body.

Yes, they did track down the crackhead, who confessed and is now serving a life sentence, thank God. I can't comprehend senseless violence, really. Some violence I can understand, but I guess this is the type of act only a crackhead could wrap his head around.

There was also the strange case of the husband, wife and daughter who entered a suicide pact together one day and all took a bunch of pills. The daughter died first, and then the husband and wife entered a semi-coma. When the husband came to and realized his wife was still alive, he shot and killed her.

Such a strange concept. Suicide pacts are nothing new... but with your own wife and daughter? So sad.

I wouldn't mind being a cop if I could put creeps like this behind bars on a regular basis.