Today's blog brought to you by the letter "M" and the number "4."
Boy meets girl. They fall in love. They're still in high school, but they move in together with the girl's mom. Boy and girl decide Mom is a drag. Boy asks girl if he should "take care of her mother" for her. She says yes. Boy goes home while a friend drives girl around the block — she doesn't want to watch — and tries to suffocate Mom in her sleep, but fails. Grabs a knife instead and stabs her repeatedly in her mouth and neck.
Now boy and girl and friend with the car have a DB on their hands. Hate it when that happens.
They call another friend, say it was self-defense, ask for help burying Mom somewhere. The four of them drive Mom to a cemetery and bury her in a shallow grave. Then they decide the grave is too shallow and that, sooner or later, Mom will pop up or be found. So they dig Mom up, stuff her in the trunk of her car and drive her home. Now she's bloody and dirty.
Not sure what to do, they leave Mom in the trunk — and go back to normal life. They go to school. They do homework. They try to ignore the fact that Mom is dead in the trunk in the garage. But without Mom around to nag and be a pain in their asses, the music gets too loud. The neighbors call the cops. And suddenly everyone wants to know, "Where is Mom?"
Damned hard question to answer, that.
Arrests follow. The media — pain the ass media — has a field day. Matricide. Teens plot murder. Mom dead in car for a month. (Ew.)
Well, that's the headlines from here, folks. Now here's the kicker — that fourth kid is an acquaintance of my son's. And my son is really torn up about this. He had a lot of respect for that fourth kid. I'm betting the kid will get a fairly light sentence, though he's being charged as an adult with a major felony — accessory to murder after the fact. It sounds like he was deceived and intimidated. Frankly, if my friends confided in me about a dead body... well, I'd call the police.
In other news: A whistleblower story dropped into my lap this afternoon involving a very large sum of money transferred under questionable circumstances, possible fraud, and who knows what at this point. I've got about a zillion documents to go through, and then the real work begins. I think I'm about to make some men in suits very unhappy. Let's hope they're pleasant about it.
How do I crack this nut? How do I get bank records that aren't mine? How do I prove that the money was transferred before the board of directors approved it? How? How? How? These are the questions investigative journalists face. It's a matter of piecing the puzzle together, gaining access to the clues you can by whatever means you can, and proving that some deep, dark secret is the truth.
I always get excited when something like this plops into my lap, but this one presents some really interesting conundrums. I need to crack the nut by March 22. It's going to be a crazy month. Yeah, and there's the small matter of a novel due, too.
Also, I set up an appointment to meet with the good folks about the polluting cement plant north of town. They did a health study proving that the CKD (that's cement kiln dust for those of you who haven't read Extreme Exposure) is causing respiratory problems. Some 30 percent of people living near the plant have respiratory diseases.
So that was my day at work. What did you all do today?
Boy meets girl. They fall in love. They're still in high school, but they move in together with the girl's mom. Boy and girl decide Mom is a drag. Boy asks girl if he should "take care of her mother" for her. She says yes. Boy goes home while a friend drives girl around the block — she doesn't want to watch — and tries to suffocate Mom in her sleep, but fails. Grabs a knife instead and stabs her repeatedly in her mouth and neck.
Now boy and girl and friend with the car have a DB on their hands. Hate it when that happens.
They call another friend, say it was self-defense, ask for help burying Mom somewhere. The four of them drive Mom to a cemetery and bury her in a shallow grave. Then they decide the grave is too shallow and that, sooner or later, Mom will pop up or be found. So they dig Mom up, stuff her in the trunk of her car and drive her home. Now she's bloody and dirty.
Not sure what to do, they leave Mom in the trunk — and go back to normal life. They go to school. They do homework. They try to ignore the fact that Mom is dead in the trunk in the garage. But without Mom around to nag and be a pain in their asses, the music gets too loud. The neighbors call the cops. And suddenly everyone wants to know, "Where is Mom?"
Damned hard question to answer, that.
Arrests follow. The media — pain the ass media — has a field day. Matricide. Teens plot murder. Mom dead in car for a month. (Ew.)
Well, that's the headlines from here, folks. Now here's the kicker — that fourth kid is an acquaintance of my son's. And my son is really torn up about this. He had a lot of respect for that fourth kid. I'm betting the kid will get a fairly light sentence, though he's being charged as an adult with a major felony — accessory to murder after the fact. It sounds like he was deceived and intimidated. Frankly, if my friends confided in me about a dead body... well, I'd call the police.
In other news: A whistleblower story dropped into my lap this afternoon involving a very large sum of money transferred under questionable circumstances, possible fraud, and who knows what at this point. I've got about a zillion documents to go through, and then the real work begins. I think I'm about to make some men in suits very unhappy. Let's hope they're pleasant about it.
How do I crack this nut? How do I get bank records that aren't mine? How do I prove that the money was transferred before the board of directors approved it? How? How? How? These are the questions investigative journalists face. It's a matter of piecing the puzzle together, gaining access to the clues you can by whatever means you can, and proving that some deep, dark secret is the truth.
I always get excited when something like this plops into my lap, but this one presents some really interesting conundrums. I need to crack the nut by March 22. It's going to be a crazy month. Yeah, and there's the small matter of a novel due, too.
Also, I set up an appointment to meet with the good folks about the polluting cement plant north of town. They did a health study proving that the CKD (that's cement kiln dust for those of you who haven't read Extreme Exposure) is causing respiratory problems. Some 30 percent of people living near the plant have respiratory diseases.
So that was my day at work. What did you all do today?