Back Alley Murder (Part 1)

"Don't fight me bitch," a man yelled.1

"No, please don't," a woman pleaded.2

The man punches her, over and over again. Blood sprays everywhere.3

Her face unrecognizable now, he rolls her over and grabs her wallet.4

He runs to his car and pulls out.5

6

"What do we have here?" I asked walking towards the crime scene.7

"Nice for you to join us Melissa," Detective Johnathan Mandrake said. "Jane Doe, early twenties, no cell. She was beaten to death. At least that's what it looks like."8

"Damn. What's time of death?" 9

"Coroner's sayin between 9:30 and 10:30 PM. Nobody saw or heard anything."10

"Who found her?"11

"The man who owns the garage. Opened it up this morning and found her."12

I look around. This is gonna be messy. Someone didn't like this girl and I wanna know why.13

My name is Melissa Felps. I'm a Crime Scene tech for the St. Louis Police Department. I've had too many cases like this and rarely do we catch the person who did it. It sucks but, there usually isn't enough evidence to get a solid case on someone. 14

"Okay," I say looking at the body and pulling out my cell phone, "I'm gonna need a little help on this one." 15

"Who you callin in? Matthews or Wilson?" Johnathan asked as I dialed.16

"Hello?" Michael Wilson answered the other line sleepily.17

"Hey Mike, you up?" I asked, knowing the answer to that.18

"I was sleeping, up till my phone started ringing." 19

"Well, I gotta call you in. We got a Jane Doe and I'm gonna need some help on this."20

"I'll help you if you feed me breakfast when we're done."21

"Yeah, I'll get you breakfast afterward."22

He was quite for a moment then said, "Fine, where are you?"23

"I'm at the South City Library at Broadway. Actually, in the ally behind it."24

"Yeah, I know where it is," he said through a yawn.25

"'Kay, get here soon, I'm gonna start processing the body so the coroner can take her."26

"Whatever, I'll be there in twenty," he said and hung up.27

Putting my cell away, I went over to the body and started going over everything. 28

First taking my camera and photographing her from every angle. As I took the pictures, I pulled fibers that looked misplaced. Then I scrapped under her finger nails. As I did, I noticed she was wearing a wedding band.29

"Fuck," I muttered. I called Johnathan over, "John, I need you to see this."30

"What?" he asked as he walked over.31

I pointed to the ring, "She's married. Someone's lookin for her, or will be when they realize she didn't come home last night."32

"Well, I guess we'll have an ID then, hopefully."33

Yeah, right. I thought. Shrugging, I continued with the body.34

I called the coroner over when I finished processing her. "I want her clothes and personal effects ASAP." I said as they moved her onto the gurney.35

"Yes ma'am," he said.36

"Okay, what do we got here?" Mike asked from behind me.37

"'Bout time. You said twenty minuets, it's now been," I looked at my watch, "Forty-five. You get fast food now for breakfast."38

Mike smiled, "Yeah, okay. So, where we at?" 39

"Just finished with the body. I want you to start looking in the dumpsters in the immediate area. Try to find a wallet or a weapon, probably something blunt like a bat."40

He looked at me with a blank stare, "You pulled me outta bed to go dumpster diving?"41

"Yeah, pretty much. Go."42

As Mike walked off, I started photographing the garage door. There was a massive amount of blood splatter on it. The crimson stood out on the dingy white of the garage door. I looked at the splatter, took a sample and moved on. There was a small trail leading towards the side street to my left.43

"Hey Mike!" I shouted, "You might wanna start in this direction.44

He walked over as I was putting down a ruler and taking photographs of the trail, then placing markers of where it's at. 45

"How kind, he left us a trail." Mike said and walked with me as I photographed.46

He took the markers out of my hands and started placing them as I finished with the spots.47

We got down the ally and the blood trail ended. Never going near any of the dumpsters.48

"Great, he got in a car." I said, squatting over the last of the blood.49

"Yep, and by the looks of it, didn't even leave a skid mark, the weapon or her wallet."50

"He didn't want any chance of us IDing her," I said shaking my head. Standing up, I started back to the garage. 51

Mike and I looked around for anything else that might be out of place but, other then the blood trail, we got nothing.52

"'Kay, I'm gonna get this back to HQ and pick up breakfast. Uh, John, go ahead and call in the clean up unit and Mike, stay here and look around and get more shots of anything unusual 'til they get here."53

They both nodded and I grabbed up my stuff and left.