Diagnosis Murder 3 - The Shooting Script by Lee Goldberg Read Free Book Online Page A

it came to solving difficult cases. In the chief's opinion, the more successful the doctor was, the more incompetent it made the LAPD appear.
    That opinion didn't change even after Mark Sloan foiled a plot by a corrupt city councilman to implicate the chief in the murder of a police officer, if anything, the experience only strengthened the chief's belief that Mark Sloan undermined public confidence in the LAPD.
    His one attempt to co-opt Mark Sloan, by appointing him as a member of a special civilian task force examining cold cases long abandoned by the LAPD, had backfired badly. Mark Sloan discovered there was a killer who'd masked his murders by making them appear to be the work of other serial killers. As a result, scores of convicted serial killers were appealing their convictions, forcing dozens of complex cases to be retried, taxing the already overburdened resources of the LAPD and the district attorney's office.
    And now Mark Sloan was inextricably involved in a high-profile celebrity murder case. Even without his involvement, the case was a ticking bomb for the LAPD. There was no question the bomb would explode; the question was how to contain the damage to the department when it did.
    He muted the sound on the TVs and turned to look at the city from his window. It's what he always did in times of crisis. It centered him, like a needle in a compass pointing true north.
    The ex-football player and former Marine reminded himself he was the chief of police of the city of Los Angeles. This was the city he was sworn to protect. To do that, the people had to respect him and his officers. So it was essential to maintain the authority and prestige of the LAPD.
    The last major celebrity case, involving statutory-rape charges against actor Abel Marsh, who played the lovable and wise inner-city priest on the hit TV series Heaven Sent , put the LAPD on trial, too. The department was accused of entrapment, sloppy evidence-handling and coercing false statements from witnesses. There was just enough truth to the accusations to topple the previous LAPD regime and bring Masters to power. He didn't relish the idea of history repeating itself, but he knew that to some degree it was unavoidable.
    Celebrity murder cases always became scandals.
    And, more often than not, he knew that the detectives who got stuck with the case were probably working the last investigation of their careers. The white-hot intensity of the media was too much. Every blemish on their records would be exposed, every personal failing revealed, every weakness exploited. Most cops in that situation retired immediately after the trial, leaving humiliated, disgraced, and disgusted. A few lucky ones got book deals, or ended up being portrayed by Greg Harrison, Greg Evigan, or some other has-been Greg in a low-budget TV movie.
    All of a sudden, Mark Sloan's involvement in the Lacey McClure case didn't seem bad at all.
    It was fortuitous, in fact.
    Masters allowed himself a smile. If he played things right, when all of this was over, it wasn't the department that would face the scrutiny of the press and the wrath of the public.
    It would be Dr. Mark Sloan.
    Chief Masters wasn't the only man at that moment who, after watching the local evening news, stood at his office window, contemplating the inevitable ramifications of what was already becoming known as "The Lacey McClure Case."
    The law firm of Tyrell, Dinino & Barer occupied three floors of a building at the corner of Beverly Drive and Wilshire Boulevard, at the geographical epicenter of wealth and power of Hollywood.
    Arthur Tyrell was a large man, affectionately described as "big-boned" by his mother and "double-wide" by his father. He wasn't fat, but he was large, and he liked to live large, too.
    When Tyrell looked out the window of his mahogany- paneled corner office, he saw the exclusive stores and restaurants of Rodeo Drive, a street devoted to thriving on the outrageous excesses of the rich and self-absorbed.