Assault with Intent by William X. Kienzle

Author:William X. Kienzle [William Kienzle]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781449423612
Publisher: Andrews McMeel Publishing
Published: 2009-01-28T16:00:00+00:00

The students and staff of St. Joseph’s Seminary couldn’t help noticing the changes. Immediately after the attack on Father Gennardo, the halls of St. Joe’s began to be regularly patrolled by uniformed Detroit police officers. They had shortly been replaced by men from a private security firm.

Not only were all students, faculty, and staff required to wear an identifying tag on their outer clothing while on the premises, the front and rear main doors were guarded by uniformed security officers who monitored the parking areas as well as entrances to the building via closed circuit television.

Mere weeks ago, the seminary’s policy had been, for all practical purposes, open-doored. Now, security measures, while not foolproof—many windows and some doors were impossible to secure—were nonetheless impressive.

Also impressive were the three people standing and conversing in the seminary’s inner courtyard, the very place where Father Gennardo had been shot. The tallest, and by anyone’s measure the largest, of the three was Inspector Walter Koznicki, a stranger to virtually all students and staff. A few recognized him from his infrequent appearances on TV newscasts or from his photo in the papers. During formidable or bizarre homicide investigations, the local media eventually gravitated to the Inspector.

The other two, Sergeants Patrick and Morris, were no longer strangers to the seminary population. Almost all of them had been interrogated by one or the other of the officers. And everyone, student and staff alike, was amazed that the two detectives knew each of them by name.

“Yes, Inspector,” Patrick was replying to a Koznicki query, “we’ve run a check on both Conrad Nap and Roman Kirkus. Kirkus is clean as far as felony charges. A few traffic tickets. He appears to be quite an aggressive driver. Nap, on the other hand, has several disorderly conduct convictions, usually causing a disturbance during a religious or social rally or parade or the like. Once he pushed a priest down the steps of an east side church. He has a permit to own a gun. A .22 caliber automatic. We wanted to check it against the slugs we found in this courtyard, but Nap claims the gun was stolen recently and hasn’t been recovered.”

Koznicki nodded. “Then they remain our likeliest candidates?”

Patrick and Morris nodded.

“Are you satisfied with security?”

Morris shrugged. “I guess you’d have to say it’s the best the seminary seems able to afford.”

“Which company?” Koznicki feared the worst.

“Woods Security.”

Fears confirmed, Koznicki shook his head.

“Mostly rejects from police academies,” Patrick commented. “A few pros, but not enough.”

“The equipment is not bad though,” said Morris. “The closed circuit TV surveillance is pretty sophisticated.”

“If they stay awake to watch it,” said Koznicki cynically.

“One thing we’ve got going for us is that Marge and I now know everyone here—students, faculty, and staff.” Patrick was understandably pleased that they had accomplished so much in so short a time.

“Yes.” Morris turned to look at some students crossing the courtyard. Classes were changing. “There, for example, is Eileen Schaaf, probably enroute to ascetical theology class.”

“So,” Koznicki smiled as

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