She looked around them to see if anyone was close enough to listen. “Some folks are dirty as hell in this city, Mr. Richmond, and my father tried to clean up one corner of it. I know who killed him, and they know who killed him.”
7
Bob stared at the diner menu. It was nearly eight o’clock in the evening and his stomach was grumbling. Sharmila hadn’t eaten and had a lot to say, so she’d suggested a place a few blocks from the station.
But his expression spoke confused volumes. “Eighteen dollars for a hamburger!?” He shook his head. “Greed is driving this entire country into the ground.” Then he realized how bad his timing was. The woman was grieving. “Sorry. You don’t need my whining right now.”
She frowned and shook her head slightly. “It’s okay. I mean… I guess life just has to go on, right?” She sniffed a little. “Bakersfield is a tough city. There’s so much money in the valley that to folks making hundreds of thousands a year in the oil industry or agribusiness, these prices don’t mean much. But this whole city is just about evenly divided: about half are struggling, and about half are doing real good. And more than ten percent of the population is undocumented, so they get treated quite poorly much of the time.”
“Ten percent? You have 40,000 illegals in Bakersfield? That seems… That’s incredibly high, right?”
“I believe it’s more like 60,000, right around thirteen percent. Something like that. When people have few legal rights… well, that isn’t a situation that lends itself to fairness. If it was, people like my father would have had an easier time protecting the health of the average citizen. If it was… he probably wouldn’t be dead right now.”
She pursed her lips again, holding it together.
“Outside the station you said you know who killed him.”
She looked around again to make sure no one was eavesdropping, before lowering her voice. “A drug dealer named Merry Michelsen. He controls a big piece of the meth trade. My father had made combatting that trade a political issue.”
“How so?”
“He ran an HMO for years and had to treat kids from meth families, kids living in extreme poverty.”
“He was a physician?”
“And a surgeon.
“Intense.”
She nodded curtly. “Which is why I became a GP.”
“And… he was taking on the drug trade?”
“He’d had enough. He heard they were planning to massively expand the trailer parks on the edge of Oildale, where much of the meth is cooked.”
“And he opposed that?”
“Initially, it was sold as more affordable housing. But the more he looked into it, the more the plan seemed to shift from what he thought would be apartment blocks to another trailer park, a massive one. It bothered him. Dad was going to run for Sheriff of Kern County. He might’ve won, too. Everyone loved him.”
Bob ignored the irony of the statement. “Bakersfield has its own police…”
“Yeah, but the trailer parks aren’t in Bakersfield. They’re in the county. They’ve got shared policing arrangements and all, but technically, the county sheriff gets a big say in everything, enforcement-wise.”
“And someone didn’t want him running.”
“That’s my guess, yeah. He hadn’t even made it widely public yet, just let a few key people in the business community know. He filed last Wednesday, had a meeting with business types on Thursday, and Friday…”
“Someone killed him.”
“My father… you have to understand, he wasn’t around much for his kids. But he was really popular in Bakersfield. He treated generations of school kids, often on his own dime.”
“And this Michelsen guy?”
“Expanding the trailer parks, adding new ones… that would mean thousands of new residents… which would mean potentially hundreds of new customers for the dealer who controls them. But… beyond that, I don’t know how he’s involved. Maybe he’s got money in it somehow.”
“I’m guessing he’s not Oildale’s only meth slinger.”
“Not by a long shot. It’s a real problem. But he’s the biggest.”
“Tough guy, then?”
“He frightens people. He’s also hard to miss. He’s a big man with dirty platinum blond hair, sunglasses. Always has an entourage of his thug friends. He showed up at a community meeting and intimidated people. That was three months ago, and the first time he threatened my father. That was when Dad started to see the affordable housing angle as maybe something untoward.”
“And it continued?”
“Three weeks ago, Dad was driving home from business in San Jose and a truck tailgated him, bumped him at high speed. They basically tried to run him off the road. If a cop car hadn’t passed and given him a chance to pull over, I don’t know if…” She paused. “I guess it doesn’t matter now.”
“And you told the cops this?”
“Uh huh. Have you met the investigating officer in his shooting? Jeb Fowler? Lots of good cops in this town…but a lot of pretty dirty ones, too. Most folks who know him figure he’s one of the latter.”
“We talked briefly. He exudes jagoff energy.”
“Jagoff?” She looked puzzled.
“Eastern thing. He’s an asshole, basically.”
“Yeah, that fits. I went to high school with him and he was a piece of work even then. His partner’s okay, but not the brightest bulb at the bulb store, if you catch my drift.”
