117 Days of James Patterson - Day 105

Day 105, Chapter 105

(District Attorney) Leonard Parisi looked particularly ragged the next morning when Yuki and I came to his office requesting a search warrant. Parisi, known as "Red Dog" for his dark-red hair and his tenacity, pawed through the pictures of approximately four million dollars' worth of stolen jewelry and a copy of the letter from Hello Kitty.

(He "pawed through the pictures," get it?  'Cause he's a dog!)  Really?  We're still on this Hello Kitty thing?  I've got news for you guys, you just accidentally sent the frickin' jewel thief off to start a new life on the tax payer's dime - it's time to move on.  But hey, Yuki's back!

Parisi's pissed because the video surveillance at the Hall of Justice failed to pick up a decent shot of Hello Kitty when she dropped off the case filled with stolen jewels the other day.  No prints on anything, all the stolen goods are accounted for, no real lead on anything other than the fact that Hello Kitty said she didn't kill Casey Dowling.

Like the rest of us, Parisi had taken vast quantities of crap for his department's low conviction record in the face of San Francisco's rising crime rate. That would be our fault - the police, who didn't bring the district attorney's office enough evidence for them to build airtight cases.

Was that just an admission of ineptitude on the part of the police department?  Even the characters in this book know that they suck at their jobs.  That's bad.

I feel kinda bad for Red Dog, taking those "vast quantities of crap...in the face."  Seems excessive, no?

It seems that the warrant Yuki and Lindsay are seeking is for Marcus Dowling's house - even though they admittedly have no evidence that he has done anything wrong.  Well, they think that since Casey had a large inheritance, that's motive enough for the movie star to kill her off.  That and his story has been a little inconsistent throughout, but hey, that's not a crime, right JPatt?

"What else?"

"His hair was wet when we interviewed him right after the shooting."

Seriously?  You're going with that?  Do you have proof that his hair was wet?  Even if you do, what does that prove, exactly?  I'm going to light this book on fire if they convict Marcus Dowling because his hair was wet.  Help me out here, Red Dog.

"A shower is not probable cause. Before you search the screen legend's house and the news media gets hold of it and that gets us sued for defamation, you'd better have something stronger than the burglar says she didn't do it and Dowling took a shower."

Finally a reasonable, relatively sane character.  "A shower is not probable cause" just might be the best line in this whole vast crap in the face of a book. 
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