As Harrison walked away, James picked up Perry's heavy gold badge from the booking desk where Miller had placed it. He weighed it in his palm, feeling the cold metal before slipping it into his coat pocket next to his own. "Go sit in the interrogation room, " Mr. Perry, James said, intentionally dropping the title of officer. "Your night is just beginning. By 4:15 a. m., the fourth precinct had been transformed from a sleepy graveyard shift into a high octane command center.
Captain Richard Donovan, the head of internal affairs, a notoriously ruthless investigator who had built his career on hunting corrupt cops, arrived with three of his best detectives. They moved with a clinical efficiency, taking over the precinct commander's office and turning it into a makeshift war room. Donovan, a lean man with prematurely silver hair and sharp analytical eyes, immediately plugged the confiscated axon body cameras into his encrypted laptop. Chief James sat silently in the corner of the office, his arms crossed, watching the monitors. Maya sat beside him, wrapped in a dry police blanket. someone had miraculously found sipping a cup of hot tea.
"All right, let's see what we have, " Donovan muttered, clicking the play button on Perry's footage. The high-definition video filled the screen. The sound of the freezing rain was instantly audible. The camera showed Perry aggressive approach, the blinding flashlight shoved directly into Maya's face, and his immediately hostile tone. Maya watched herself on the screen.
She heard her own calm, measured voice. She heard Perry escalating agitation, the fabricated claim about the yellow line on Fourth and Elm, and the unmistakable sound of his hand slapping his holster for intimidation. He's trying to provoke a 148, Donovan noted quietly, referencing the penal code for resisting an officer. Textbook escalation. He wants her to snap so he has a legitimate reason to put hands on her.
The video showed Maya stepping out of the car. Then the footage jerked violently as Perry grabbed her. The audio picked up the sickening thud of her chest, hitting the wet roof of the Honda. Dimitar James' jaw clenched so tightly the muscles looked like they might snap. He stared at the screen, watching a man assault his daughter under the color of authority.
It took every ounce of his 30 years of discipline not to walk down the hall to the interrogation room and handle things the old-fashioned way. Stop the video, James ordered quietly. Donovan hit the space bar. The image froze on a frame of Maya's face pressed against the car roof. Her expression one of pained endurance.
"We have excessive force, false arrest, and a clear violation of the Fourth Amendment, " Donovan stated, typing furiously on a separate notepad. "But Perry is a rat. He's going to claim he smelled marijuana or that he perceived a furtive movement. He's going to try and muddy the waters. " His union rep, Thomas O'Grady, is in the lobby right now, and O'Grady is a bulldog.
James shook his head slightly. Perry is arrogant, Richard. Arrogant men get sloppy when they panic. When I first walked in, he was at the break table. I want to see the precinct security footage from 3:10 a. m. to 3:30 a. m.
I want to know exactly what he was doing before I walked through those doors. Donovan nodded to one of his detectives who immediately pulled up the CCTV feed from the booking room. They fast forwarded to the moment Perry brought Maya in. They watched the booking process and then they watched Perry retreat to the break area with his two buddies. "Zoom in on Perry, " James instructed.