Needle Work: Battery Acid, Heroin, and Double Murder(52)

The landlord and his son followed her inside and Carol called 911. The three of them tried to lay Jessie on his back.

“He’s so cold,” Carol told the operator. “I think he’s, you know, I think he’s already dead. He’s cold.”

“Well, just lay him on his back the best you can,” the operator repeated for the third, or was it the fourth, time.

Finally they were able to get Jessie, all 468 pounds of him, on his back. The operator told her to start CPR. Carol held his nose, opened his mouth, and almost threw up.

There was something really gross in his throat. She couldn’t be sure what it was, maybe some sort of puke.

Carol heard sirens. Squealing brakes. Heavy feet pounding on pavement. The cop seemed to be by her side not more than a few seconds later.

“My name’s Officer Barch,” he said.

“Carol Giles. That’s my husband,” she said, and Barch knelt down next to “a large black male lying on his back on the bedroom floor.”

Carol stopped the CPR and told the operator that the police were there. A moment later, the paramedics ran in, put their equipment down, tore Jessie’s pajama top open, and attached EKG leads. While checking the digital readout, a medic asked Carol the last time she saw him conscious.

Carol told them that the last time she’d seen Jessie alive was eleven o’clock. She had gone out shopping, and when she returned, she had found him unconscious and propped up on one elbow beside the bed.

Bending down, the paramedics checked Jessie’s vital signs, quickly noting the lack of blood pressure and heartbeat. His body was extremely cold to the touch.

Carol appeared to be in shock as Officer Barch led her out to the living room. He pulled out his notebook and pen and prepared to take notes.

“Did your husband have health problems?” Barch asked.

Quickly, Carol filled Barch in on Jessie’s poor health history.

“He had been under the care of Dr. Richard Cohen, out of POH.”

“When was the last time you saw your husband alive?”

“I left at eleven to go shopping,” Carol related, watching Barch carefully to make sure he wrote it all down as she said it. After all, what he was writing was her alibi.

“Jessie told me to go shopping,” she continued. “I had errands to do. And Jessie, he planned to watch football,” which made sense since it was a Sunday right in the middle of the football season.

Barch looked around and found an open package of crackers on the bed and a package of luncheon meat. It looked like the victim was snacking.

“Anyway, I got home at two o’clock and found him on the floor in a sitting position with his back against the bed. I called 911 and then tried to start CPR.”

On further reflection, it seemed to Carol that Jessie seemed like he was going to have a heart attack and he wanted her to leave the house. He wanted to be alone. The implication was he knew the end was near and wanted to die alone, with dignity.

A medic came out of the bedroom. He explained that Jessie had no vitals. They didn’t even try the defibrillator to shock his heart. It was clear to the paramedics that Jessie had been dead for quite a while and that any CPR at that point was absolutely useless. The guy looked down at Carol and said sympathetically, “Looks like he’s been dead for a while.”

The medic called North Oakland Medical Center and relayed Jessie’s health information to a doctor on duty, who declared Jessie officially dead.

“Was there anything out of the ordinary in your relationship recently?” Barch asked Carol, who looked him straight in the eye, like Tim advised, and answered with an unequivocal no.

Barch looked around again. There was certainly no evidence to indicate that foul play had occurred. It looked like what it was—a sick man who had succumbed to his illnesses.

Barch gathered up all Jessie’s medications to list in his report, then called the medical examiner, which was standard procedure in Michigan whenever a police officer arrived at the scene of a death. It didn’t mean an autopsy, of course.

“Nothing found to indicate that a crime was involved. Death appears to be by natural causes,” Barch wrote in his report.

Carol watched as the death professionals shared the information about Jessie’s health history and medications. An hour later, the man from the medical examiner’s arrived. He was the ME on duty. He did an examination of Jessie’s body, still on the floor where he had fallen. He announced that, coupled with what they knew about his medical conditions, Jessie had died from a heart attack.

The state released the body. Carol had to call to have the body picked up. That was a detail she hadn’t thought of, not to mention how she was going to break the news to her kids.

She looked through the phone book and found the name of a nearby funeral home, Sparks-Griffin. They said they’d be right by to pick him up.

“The best way to get rid of your pain was to get rid of your problem,” Tim had said.

It was dark by the time the guys from the funeral home arrived. They were big, strong men and were able to pick Jessie up and transfer him to a rolling table, the kind with legs that collapsed as soon as you pushed it into an ambulance. Or a hearse.

Since the house was a ranch, they didn’t have to worry about steps. If they had, they didn’t know what they would have done. They wheeled Jessie out and down the driveway to their black van. They opened the door and lifted him up; the legs collapsed and they pushed him in. With a satisfying snap, they closed the door and got into the cab.