“Hey!” I yelled angrily as I circled the vehicle and made my way to them. “Get your shit together. Both of you.”
“He’s accusing me of being a traitor and leaking information to Steve!” Diden spouted.
“Steve?” Jennings shot back. “You call him by his first name like you’re friends. What the hell, Diden? Why are you trying to help this psychopath?”
“How does calling him by his first name mean I’m helping him?” she snapped. “You’re the one who nearly assaulted him.”
Great. Just what I needed—an assault charge against one of my staff.
“I didn’t assault him!” Jennings spat. “I cuffed him after he lied about you and the boss giving him permission to be here.”
That got my attention and had me attempting to break into their heated conversation. “He told you I gave him permission?” I asked, wondering how that conversation went.
“No, he said you and I told him the closed-off area would be re-opening soon, and he thought that meant he could be there,” she countered.
“Why the fuck are you defending this guy?” Jennings barked. “You said he mentioned in his podcast that thekiller possibly murdered nine other women! How does he know that? He could be the murderer!”
“Enough!” I yelled. “Both of you, take five minutes and walk it off. Now!”
They needed it, but I also needed them to not be around while I asked a few questions of our suspect.
Once they cleared the area, I walked over to the SUV with him inside. Either Jennings or Diden had left the vehicle running with the AC on, but I was about to ruin that. I opened the back door.
“I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said right out of the gate. “You said it would be open to the public soon after the dive that day. I waited two weeks just to make sure. You can’t arrest me for being on public property.”
He ended by jutting his chin out in defiance with a level of confidence that was way too high.
“Mr. Stanton, you’re not being arrested for trespassing, technically speaking,” I informed him. “You’re being arrested for digging on federal property without permits.”
“I…uh…have them, just not with me,” he replied, his confidence breaking just a little. “They’re at home.”
“You know you are supposed to have them on you, or the permit access is invalid, but…” I held up my hand because I could see he wanted to argue with me. “I’m willing to let that go, but you need to tell me specifically what your conditions and oversight were listed for on your SRCP.”
I knew he wouldn’t be able to answer that because he didn’t have a permit. SRCP stood for Scientific Researchand Collecting Permit, but again, most people didn’t pay attention to all these details…unless they actually had a permit.
“Look, man, you said the other day while I was here that I couldn’t go into these areas while it was an active investigation area, but now it’s not, which makes it public access,” he argued.
“Public access and public domain are not the same thing,” I explained. “This is federal property that weallowyou to visit. It’s like the library. You can go in, read some books, use the space, but you don’t get to rip out certain pages of the books and take them home and keep them.”
“Okay, but a library also lets you take the books home as long as you bring them back,” he argued. “So why can’t I just take some samples as long as I agree to bring them back?”
Jeez. Jennings might be right. This guy was a few fries short of a Happy Meal.
“Why does a podcaster need dirt and sand samples?” I asked, getting to the point of the matter.
“For research,” he said, sticking his chin out again.
“What kind of research?”
“The criminal justice kind,” he shot back, his confidence stretching into arrogance.
We had teams of professionals for that, and he knew that, but I needed him to give me more, so I ignored the fact that he was not a trained professional and moved on.
“What’s your specialty?” I inquired. “What do you look for in these circumstances?”
His head jerked back slightly, almost shocked that I’d asked.
“Am I being arrested?” His mood now changed entirely. He was no longer confident but angry. “I want to speak to a lawyer.”
