Name of the Devil Read Online Free PDF

Their vehicles were parked outside of the church. Some of them show burns and other postmortem trauma indicating proximity to the blast. It’s still unclear if they were inside or outside the church when it happened.
    â€œPreliminary cause of death for all the victims seem to be the explosion, although there are anomalous signs of trauma that make this suspect. We’re awaiting autopsy results.
    â€œWhile it’s too early to say whether this was accidental or intentional, much less infer a motive, the presence of Sheriff Jessup’s vehicle nearby does suggest there might be something to look into. In the last eighteen months there have been two explosive-related attacks on local law enforcement nationwide. We’re looking into the possibility that Jessup may have been the intended target here. WVBI is going through court records and cross-referencing them with possible suspects.
    â€œAgain, let me emphasize this could still be an accidental explosion. We expect more information tomorrow when we get the preliminary autopsy report. I’ve emailed you a document detailing all of the evidence we’ve accumulated so far.”
    As Mitchum takes a question from a WVBI agent about jurisdiction, I pull up the evidence log on my laptop. For expediency’s sake, she’s indexed inclusions by agent name.
    I find mine and see my photograph of the symbol on McKnight’s chest. There’s no mention of the other tree and its broken branch.I pull up Knoll’s notes. There’s nothing there either, but I give her the benefit of the doubt. The information is still very recent and there hasn’t been a chance to catalog everything.
    However, on the crime-scene map where numbers cross-reference specific locations with what was found there, McKnight’s tree is clearly annotated—but not the other tree. She left it out intentionally.
    The tree with the broken branch could be crucial. We have no idea what happened, let alone what’s important and what isn’t. Leaving it out as an oversight is sloppiness. Leaving it out to spite me is incompetence.
    I wait for Mitchum to call the briefing to a close, then approach her at the lectern. She’s going through a binder with a local case supervisor.
    â€œAgent Mitchum?”
    â€œYes, Blackwood,” she replies without looking up.
    â€œThe damaged branch Knoll and I found. I don’t see that in the evidence log.”
    â€œIt’s a large forest, Blackwood. We don’t have the ability to cover every fallen leaf or disturbed bird’s nest.”
    I ignore her tone. “I understand that. But everyone in this room knows this wasn’t an accident. The body placement rules that out.”
    â€œWe can’t assume anything.”
    â€œThere could be something else critical there, like fibers.”
    â€œThe tree isn’t going away,” she replies.
    It feels pointless to mention to her that any evidence could deteriorate, or get carried away by wildlife. The potential for crime-scene contamination alone already makes admissibility a challenge.
    She gives me another of her forced smiles. “I included your devil theory.”
    There’s something behind her statement that I don’t trust. According to this entire preliminary report, my one contribution was saying the bloody smears on McKnight’s chest kind of, sort of , look like the name of a demon in Hebrew. No mention of my pushing to extend the search parameter. No mention of that possible first tree and what it might mean.
    Vonda Mitchum is writing me off as a crackpot. In the final report, I’ll literally be chasing ghosts.
    I walk away before I say something that will get me in trouble. Field FBI agents take their jobs seriously and don’t like interlopers telling them how to do things, any more than anyone else would. And I get it. Being from FBI headquarters doesn’t necessarily make you more of an expert than someone who