The Restless Sleep:

What Cold Case Work is Really Like

Spending a couple of years with the Cold Case detectives was in some ways a fantasy-killer. Yeah, it's no surprise that TV and movies romanticizes what they do, we know this, but still. We expect more excitement. It's weird to see how it's still a job, with all these office-y, 9 to 5 elements. It's guns and bad guys and crime scenes then, " ... wrangling for more money, steaming about someone else’s promotion, sitting on hold, reading, filling out forms, and every once in a while, arresting a bad guy, that’s what they do. That’s their job." (That was from my book.)

Nothing looks like what you think. DNA screens look like spreadsheets, it's not graphic, it's all numbers. The programs used to find fingerprints are messy-looking and slow. Here's what a homicide file really looks like.

Reality, in the end, is always more interesting, though. Maybe precisely because we only get rare glimpses of it. The living, breathing guy, the real detectives, with whatever combination of talent, quirks and flaws are better than the cowboys on TV.

The depressing part, of course, was how ordinary, everyday and mundane murder is. Murder isn't exciting. It's dull and ugly. And smells bad.

Cold Case Work in the UK

I talked to John Bearchell last year. Bearchell is an Acting Detective Chief Superintendent of the Metropolitan Police Service, and the Commander of Homicide Support, which includes the Murder Review Group. Formed in 1999, the Murder Review Group investigates serious crimes in London including unsolved murders. With a staff of about 75, it is the largest such group in the United Kingdom. The Murder Review Group utilizes the newer LCN testing for DNA analysis (low copy number - this enables them to test from smaller samples). LCN testing should be available in New York when the new lab at the OCME is complete (Office of the Chief Medical Examiner).

Like New York, the Murder Review Group generally looks at cases going back to 1985, but they will look at earlier murders on a case-by-case request. Their clearance, (they call it detection rate) is 90% or better, according to Bearchell. With roughly 200 murders a year in London, that’s 20 cold cases every year.

Homicide Total Update

We're up to 515 murders in New York as of December 15th. Still well below last years total of 572. It's weird (and sad) to think that since the last time I was sitting here, typing away in this very same place, seven more people who were just going along, living their lives, were murdered. Seven more people who won't see today. (And probably many more people spending Christmas day shell-shocked from the loss.)

Christmas 1996

I edited out the body in this photograph, but Estaban Martinez was laying in front of the Christmas tree to the right. On December 15, 1996, Linda Leon, 23 years old, and Estaban Martinez, 29 years old, were tortured then shot in the head while their three children listened from the next room.

This case was cleared by Det. Wendell Stradford and was one of the cases I covered in the book. Not that it's any less horrible to be killed any other month, but I do wonder about their children, and if they have ever had a happy Christmas since. The oldest was 6, so perhaps it's possible that the memories have faded enough for them to enjoy Christmas once again.

Murder is Up (But Not in NYC)

According to the FBI, murder is up 2.1% nationally.

The Best Competition

It's December, and every December the papers start tracking a competition the NYPD participates in every day of the year, the results of which are announced on January 1st: Getting the Yearly Homicide Totals Down.

As of December 11th, there were 508 murders in New York City. Last year, the total was 572. So far so good (relatively speaking, of course - not good for the 508).

In keeping with the topic of this blog, probably half of those 572 murders have been solved at this point. In two years, 35 - 40% will remain unsolved, and perhaps will be picked up by these guys (this is actually a very old photograph of the Cold Case Squad and a lot of these guys are retired).

Cold Case Squad in Scotland

I would like to eventually make this site more international. I was sent a pointer to an article here about a new cold case squad in Scotland. The Strathclyde Police have created the Unresolved Case Unit to reinvestigate their unsolved murders.

The 1945 Sodder Fire

I went to West Virginia last week to research a piece I'm doing for NPR about a fire in Fayetteville, WV on December 25, 1945. Five children were believed to have died in the fire, but there was enough weirdness that night and for years afterwards that the family never accepted it. They believed the children were either kidnapped or murdered that night.

This is the billboard the family put up starting in 1952.

The children who died or went missing that night.

Maurice Sodder, 14 years old on December 25, 1945.

Martha Lee Sodder, 12 years old on December 25, 1945.

Louis Sodder, 9 years old on December 25, 1945 (his birthday was in 5 days).

Jennie Sodder, 8 years old on December 25, 1945.

Betty Sodder, 5 years old on December 25, 1945.

The site today. The billboard sat at the top of the rise, by the pine trees. The house that burned was on the left side of the driveway you see today.

This is Fayetteville today.

The Fayetteville Courthouse.

NYPD Helps Santa Get to Hard to Reach Chimneys

This is from my collection from the Photo Unit at 1 Police Plaza. It's an old photograph, obviously. It's sad to see the WTC, but this remains one of my favorite shots. I would LOVE to know who the very daring Santa was!

Cadaver Dogs Two

A few months ago I posted about how the police train cadaver dogs. Recap: to train a dog to find dead bodies they construct something called a scent tube. It’s made from PVC and sealed at both ends after inserting a piece of gauze that’s been doused with one of the following perfumes: Pseudo Corpse I or II (II is a corpse further along), Pseudo Drowned Victim, or Cadaverine. They get the stuff from the Sigma Chemical Company in St. Louis.

I found a site for training dogs and saw that Sigma also makes "Distressed Body Scent," and for training dogs to find narcotics, they make marijhana, cocaine, LSD and heroin scents. I always figured they used the real thing to train the dogs. Sigma was careful to note that they don't use the real thing in any of their products.