Chapter Sixteen #2
Within moments, they had stormed the house.
It had little in the way of furnishings—mostly traditional—with hardwood flooring.
The citrusy scent of marijuana permeated the air as they were confronted by a Rottweiler guard dog.
The K-9 unit was able to effectively deal with the threat by subduing the animal and safely removing it from the premises.
They detained, without further resistance, the sole occupant—a medium built, short male with textured brown hair in a mullet cut, a scruffy beard and dark eyes—who identified himself as Luther Valdez.
After presenting him with the warrant, the search of the residence ensued. Confiscated were illegal narcotics—including fentanyl pills in multiple colors, fentanyl powder and liquid, methamphetamine, heroin, and cocaine—and oxycodone, a painkiller. Also seized were illegal firearms and ammunition.
Valdez was taken into custody to face charges.
* * *
IN AN INTERROGATION ROOM, Campbell got the first crack at the suspect, before the Feds would ultimately take possession of him, seeing that a number of suspected serious drug-related violations of federal law had been made by Luther Valdez.
Sitting in a wooden chair across a metal table from the suspect, Campbell glanced at the video camera that was recording the interview, then back at Valdez, and said to him in a deep tone of voice, “It looks like you had quite an operation going there.” And obviously had not learned any lessons from his previous stint behind bars.
Valdez scratched his beard and muttered, “Yeah, I guess.”
“Uh, this means you’re in a lot of trouble,” Campbell told him mockingly, in case he didn’t get that. “Drug trafficking happens to be a serious crime in this state—and the country.”
Valdez rolled his eyes. “So why am I here?”
“You’re here because I’d like to help you, if you’ll help me—” Campbell said, watching his reaction.
“How’s that?” he asked suspiciously.
Campbell dodged the question. He pushed two pictures in front of his face and said solemnly, “Since Founder’s Day, these two women have OD’d on fentanyl mixed with carfentanil…
I have good reason to believe that the drugs came from you.
The question is, did you sell or give it to them directly?
Or did you sell it to someone else?” He considered that it was a leap of faith that they had zeroed in on the right drug trafficker.
Now he only needed him to bite the bait.
Valdez studied the two faces of the dead women, taken after the fact for maximum effect on the results of drug overdoses. He jutted his chin and said tonelessly, “I’ve never seen either of them before.”
Campbell wasn’t sure he bought that, and pressed him. “Your drugs killed them,” he said flatly. “If you didn’t hand them a death sentence directly, then someone else did. Who did you sell the fentanyl powder laced with carfentanil to on or around Founder’s Day?”
Valdez set his jaw. “What’s in it for me?”
I was afraid he’d ask that, Campbell told himself.
He responded straightforwardly, “If you’re legit, I can put in a good word for you when your case moves forward.
Could make the difference in how you fare at the end of the day.
Now, I need a name.” He wondered if Kenneth Braison’s name would pop out of his mouth.
After a moment or two of contemplation, Valdez leaned toward him and said, “I sold the fentanyl to Juan Barrientos—”
“Barrientos?” Campbell hoisted a brow, glancing at the video camera.
“Yeah. We go back a ways. Juan said he needed it to help keep some people in line with that cult he belongs to…” Valdez rubbed his nose. “I only sold him the drug. How he chose to use it wasn’t my call.”
“You can’t get off that easily,” Campbell told him unsympathetically, as Valdez was just as culpable in knowing that fentanyl could be deadly.
But right now, the onus was on Barrientos.
Had he taken it upon himself to drug the women for one reason or another?
Or had he acted on behalf of Kenneth Braison as a means to control his followers—whatever the costs?
“When exactly did this drug transaction take place?” Campbell demanded of the drug trafficker.
“A day before Founder’s Day,” Valdez answered without runup. “Said he needed some of the stuff in a hurry.”
Campbell sighed thoughtfully. If this was the real deal, Barrientos would be held accountable for his decision to perpetrate drug-induced homicides on Mia and Jasmine. As would the man who sold him the deadly drug. “We’ll check out your story,” he told him keenly. “And go from there…”
Valdez seemed content to let this play out, undoubtedly hoping it would work in his favor to one degree or another when he was handed over to federal authorities.
Fifteen minutes later, Campbell was at his desk, going over the claims by Valdez with Georgina, who was at her own desk.
“If Valdez is telling the truth about Barrientos, there’s our smoking gun,” Campbell said matter-of-factly, “with respect to linking Mia O’Dell and Jasmine Roxburgh’s fatal ODs. The big question is what does Kenneth Braison know and how long has he known it?”
“Yeah, both need to be answered, sooner rather than later,” Georgina said, staring at her laptop. “Valdez, the creep that he is, has basically pointed the finger at the Braison Family itself and their involvement through Barrientos in Roxburgh and O’Dell’s deaths.”
Campbell lowered his chin. “Now we need to make the case for this.”
“I think I found something that backs Valdez up on his claim of selling the fentanyl to Barrientos—if only by connotation in Mia’s fatal OD…” Georgina said. “Come take a look…”
Campbell got up and walked over to her desk. “What are we looking at?” he asked, watching the video over her shoulder.
“It’s surveillance video we obtained from a security camera not far from where Mia O’Dell was last seen alive,” she responded. “There’s Mia…”
“I see her.” Campbell stared at the small screen, waiting for more.
“Watch as the blue Volvo XC60 SUV pulls up alongside Mia,” Georgina said anxiously. “She looks inside, says something, then gets into the passenger seat before the SUV drives off—toward the direction of Reston Hills Park.”
Since he couldn’t make out the driver of the vehicle, Campbell said, “Can you back that up and zoom in on the license plate?”
Georgina did so for his benefit while saying excitedly, “I’m already two steps ahead. I checked out the plate.” She drew a breath. “The SUV’s registered to Juan Barrientos—”
“We’ve got him,” Campbell told her, feeling that the pieces had fallen into place that Barrientos had, in fact, lured Mia into his vehicle and gotten her to ingest the powdered fentanyl—before or after he took her to the park to leave her to die.
The pattern fits as well in the death of Jasmine Roxburgh.
Now they only needed to get him into custody and see just how far up the Braison Family chain this went.