Free Good Day to Die by Stephen Solomita Page A

listed as a single shot to the back of the head from a .22-caliber pistol.
    Toxicology reports showed the presence of various intoxicating substances in the victims’ bodies. Most of them had had some alcohol in their systems, but not all. Four had tested positive for cocaine, two for heroin, two for barbiturates. One of the things that interested me (as it had the other six hundred cops who’d investigated the case) was how the killer controlled his victims until he was ready to kill them. He’d taken them off crowded streets and, therefore, was not likely to have dispatched them immediately, not with a gun.
    Of course, he might have used a silenced automatic or soundproofed his van, but several other factors indicated that he’d controlled each victim for some time before administering the coup de grace. For instance, the .22 had been only three inches from the back of the skull when Thong pulled the trigger. (The carefully photographed scalps were severely charred by the resulting powder burns.) Plus, all the entry wounds would easily fit into a two-inch circle. And not one of the victims, as far as forensics could tell, had resisted his attacker. There was no tissue under the fingernails. No evidence of defensive wounds.
    I found myself absorbed in the material despite my carefully professed cynicism. Getting the victim away from the pickup area would have been fairly easy. Most street whores, male or female, prefer car tricks to hotel tricks because there’s enough risk of exposure in a car to keep the johns from lingering over their purchases. Anal and vaginal sex are equally difficult in a car (less so, admittedly, in a van), making quick, neat blow-jobs the order of the day. In and out; one, two, three; take the money and run.
    But getting the victim away from the stroll was only the beginning for the killer. In each case, he had to find a quiet place to park, convince his victim to turn away from him, then pull the trigger before his victim could react. I don’t deny that it’s possible to intimidate someone into dying passively, but when you’re talking about seven victims, it seems unlikely that one or two wouldn’t fight back. Or at least move his head enough to change the position of the entry wound.
    Drugs could have been the answer, if there had been any evidence of recent drug use. Johns commonly offer cocaine (along with money, of course) as an inducement to especially adventuresome sex. The killer might have concocted his own mixture of heroin and cocaine, worked his target into a stupor, then fired the fatal bullet. That hadn’t happened. The stomachs and nostrils of each victim had been carefully examined for drug residue. The skin had been inspected for any sign of recent puncture marks. All with negative results.
    If Thong hadn’t controlled his victims with drugs, how had he controlled them? For some reason, the answer didn’t leap, full-blown, into my consciousness. But it was another thing I could use on Bouton, another angle to pursue. Wasn’t it possible, for instance, that King Thong was two little monkeys instead of one giant ape? Perhaps the trigger man snuck up behind his working (i.e., kneeling) target and pulled the trigger just at the moment of orgasm?
    Or maybe each victim had been offered a cash inducement to wear a blindfold and play the passive partner in a round of anal sex. The killer had approached his naked, prone victim from the rear, but instead of slamming his penis into the proffered butt, he’d slammed a .22-caliber bullet into his playmate’s skull. Blindfolds are not uncommon in the sewer of New York prostitution. Not for boys—or for girls, either. I noted that wood fibers had been found all over the bodies. The fibers had come from a sheet of unstained, unpainted plywood, and the prevailing theory was that it had been used to line the bottom of a commercial van. I had to presume the area surrounding the eyes had also been examined for fibers of material or for