Dead of Night (4 page)

 

 

By this time, the detectives had worked up a composite drawing or sketch of the suspect, largely from the descriptions provided by Virgie Chin and by Amanda Collins, the alleged October 2007 parking garage victim, and released it to news media outlets. The sketch was also posted in strategic locations around town, including the UNR campus, with the hope that someone might recognize the man in the drawing and call in a tip. The composite sketch was completed by Detective Paul Villa, who worked in the fraud division of the Reno Police Department.

Villa had been doing the double duty for eleven years, sometimes providing as many as thirty sketches of suspects annually. He was the only police sketch artist in Washoe County at that time. As he interviewed a crime victim, Villa focused on the descriptions provided by the victim of the suspect’s eyes, nose, and mouth. These were features, he said, that were difficult to change without major reconstructive surgery. In this case, Villa had been helped in compiling the sketch by Amanda Collins, who had been able to see parts of the face of the man who had raped her.

Not long after the sketch was released and circulated throughout the community, Villa, who was also at times running the Brianna Denison tip line, received a call from a man who complained about the composite drawing.

“It’s awful,” the caller told Villa. “How dare you circulate that! I could do a better job.”

Villa told the man that he thought the sketch was a “pretty good” one. “Not the best,” he said. “But it’s the image the women saw.”

Villa thanked the caller and assured him that the tip would be forwarded through the proper channel. Some would later wonder whether the caller had been the person the cops sought.

Lieutenant McDonald said that he placed considerable value on Villa’s sketches, which he said were quite accurate.

“As we get more high tech and advancements are made in DNA, we still know there are no replacements for things like sketches,” McDonald said. “It’s how good the detective is who is interviewing victims and witnesses, and using that talent to put the images on paper.”

The description accompanying Villa’s sketch, which varied slightly from the earlier descriptions, now indicated that the suspect was a five-eight to five-ten white man in his twenties or thirties, with light brown or dirty blond hair. He had a slender to a medium build and was wearing a dark hooded pullover sweatshirt, athletic-type nylon sweatpants, with black stripes, and white tennis shoes. The victims of the other attacks had described their assailant’s age as twenty-eight to forty.

McDonald cautioned the public not to take Villa’s sketch of their suspect, or any other artist’s sketch, for that matter, as being carved in stone. Rather, they should use it as a guide, something that might spark a memory or remind them of someone they knew.

“Sketches are not a photograph,” McDonald said. “They usually have some sort of resemblance to a number of people. The danger in using sketches is that some people may use it as gospel and we may lose a suspect.... Detective Villa is very good. He’s an asset to the department.”

According to Villa, most victims do not forget what their assailant looked like, even when they wait for a considerable period to report the crime. It is often the questions from the person completing the sketch that draws out the details that result in the suspect’s image going down on paper. Detectives decide on a case-by-case basis whether to use a sketch artist based on how serious the crime is, whether or not a victim feels like providing the details needed to make the sketch, available lighting where the crime occurred, how close the victim was to a suspect and, perhaps most important, how close a look the victim got at the suspect. Problems can arise, however, when a victim or witness, who understandably has gone through a traumatic and stressful ordeal, focuses only on a specific aspect of the crime—as opposed to focusing on many details—and whether or not multiple witnesses and/or victims remember things differently.

Investigators also publicly revealed at that time that the suspect had flashed a silver-and-black handgun when he attacked the parking garage victim from behind. He had held the gun to her head as he sexually assaulted her between two parked cars. It was so far the only known instance in which their suspect had shown a weapon to a victim.

“It is hugely important to solve a case like this in the first twenty-four to thirty-six hours,” Commander Ron Holladay said, referring to Brianna’s disappearance. “Every bit after that reduces our chances of finding her alive.”

“Every day that goes by, it’s worse,” agreed McDonald.

But that was not all that was worse. The stains on the pillow and blanket that Brianna had used had been confirmed as being human blood—Brianna’s.

Chapter 5

When it was made public that DNA had linked Brianna Denison’s abductor to the same male offender who had kidnapped and sexually assaulted Virgie Chin just before Christmas, along with a description of the still-unknown suspect and the type of vehicle he was believed to have been driving, nothing short of fear combined with outrage could adequately describe the public’s reaction. The news even brought in volunteers from two well-known national missing children’s organizations: the Laura Recovery Center for Missing Children, out of Friendswood, Texas, and the Polly Klaas Foundation, which was based in Petaluma, California. The crews made plans not to search only in and around Reno—they would also search, on foot, several state parks, lakes, and reservoirs. Their plans also included walking along highways in the area, including U.S. 395 through Carson City and Interstate 80 to the east, all the way to Fernley. Although the assistance from the two groups was welcomed, their involvement caused it to become almost a certainty to the interested public, and to Brianna’s family, that the searchers were now very likely looking for a body.

“We are hopeful still that Brianna is alive and hope this new development will help facilitate her release if she is being held against her will,” Lieutenant Robert McDonald said about the DNA link between Brianna’s disappearance and the rape cases. “We have his DNA, and we are going to find him, if not today or next week or next year, then ten years from now. We will find him. We won’t ever give up. . . . There is no statute of limitation on this.”

It was also publicly revealed at that time that someone had attempted to break into Virgie Chin’s locked apartment only hours before Brianna went missing, a fact that they had only talked about among themselves until now. The police naturally suspected that the culprit was the same man they were already looking for, who they now believed might be someone who frequented, lived, or worked in the area. The attacks had occurred in close proximity to each other, during similar times of the day, with the assailant using similar attack methods. The unknown suspect’s DNA had already been entered into the CODIS database, but it had not matched any of the DNA profiles in the system at that time. It was said that there were very large backlogs, however, of DNA profiles waiting to be entered into the system—a possible explanation of why there was no match. Of course, it was also possible, even most likely, that the suspect had not yet been arrested for an offense of the type that would require his DNA to be entered into the system.

The authorities continued to regularly update the public about the details of the case, releasing as much information as they felt was safe to release without risking the integrity of their investigation. The detectives now said they believed that Brianna’s abductor had entered and exited through the house’s rear door after prowling the university area neighborhoods during the early-morning hours. He may or may not have seen Brianna through the windows as she slept on the couch, though it seemed very likely that he had. But the investigators had to also consider the possibility that he had simply stumbled upon her after entering the house. Detectives said that he was almost certainly looking for a victim when he found Brianna—regardless of how he had found her—and that he had very likely been fantasizing about attacking a woman beforehand.

While many volunteers searched the highways and other outdoor locations, Reno police officers returned to the area of the UNR campus, including the neighborhood surrounding MacKay Court, and posted updated flyers about Brianna’s abduction. Commander Ron Holladay also urged members of the public to come forward with any information they might have about the case, no matter how unimportant or trivial it might seem to them. He asked that people be alert about anyone who might have drastically changed his behavior or appearance, moved out of the area suddenly, or may have had items relating to a small child inside his vehicle.

Meanwhile, in the aftermath of Brianna’s disappearance, a Brianna Search Operations Center was set up inside Circus Circus Hotel and Casino, located near downtown, where volunteers were recruited and urged to join the search effort. Hundreds of volunteers showed up and registered for what would become daily searches. Flyers, along with blue ribbons that said,
Got Bri,
were distributed by the local and national support and search operations. The dedicated corps of volunteers braved the harsh, cold weather of the northwestern Nevada winter each day to conduct grid searches in designated areas.

 

 

It was at this time that Governor Jim Gibbons issued a statement praising the overwhelming community support in the search for Brianna. He urged fellow Nevadans to make themselves available for a large organized search that was set for Saturday, February 2, 2008, in which his wife, First Lady Dawn Gibbons, was planning to participate.

Gibbons’s statement read:

The search efforts were not only to look for Brianna, but also for any clues that might be found, such as clothing or other evidence. They were hunting for anything that might shed light on what had happened to her.

“As a mother of a child nearly the same age as Brianna,” Dawn Gibbons said, “my heart goes out to the entire Denison family. I continue to be impressed by the overwhelming community support and the many volunteers dedicated to the ongoing search efforts. This tragic case has touched the hearts of so many across the state.”

Gibbons’s son had attended Reno High School with Brianna.

“Every woman is in danger, every day,” as long as Brianna’s kidnapper remained at large, said Denison family friend Jennifer Bushman, responsible for spearheading the Bring Back Bri campaign.

 

 

Meanwhile, news that the UNR attacks had been linked with the disappearance of Brianna had another impact on the community. According to UNR police chief Adam Garcia, “Brianna has disappeared. She has fallen off the face of the earth.... From our perspective, we don’t have any credible leads in which to follow up at this point.” He said that Brianna’s vanishing without a trace appeared to have had an effect on the students’ awareness regarding their safety, particularly the female students.

“This young woman was of college age, hanging out with other college kids, and in the eyes of our students, they see a lot of themselves in this situation,” Garcia said. “But they really need to be concerned with their safety whether this happened today, last week, or tomorrow.”

According to Todd Renwick, associate director of police services at UNR, students had become fearful and were “losing sleep” because of their worry that anyone could become the attacker’s next victim.

“We have to try to calm down the campus,” Renwick said.

Renwick said his office was receiving more calls than usual from students concerned about their safety. He said that the increase in calls was an indication that the students were now being more aware of their safety, but it also indicated that they were clearly very frightened.

“When you look at the overall scheme,” he said, “you can still say the campus is safe. But we have thousands of people who are frightened to go from point A to point B.”

“It’s unnerving,” student Kristin McCarthy, a UNR senior, said. “The flyers serve as a reminder that it’s not safe to be alone at night because this is not something that’s happened once. It’s happened too much in Reno.”

Some students who never before had carried pepper spray were now buying it. In fact, area retailers began having difficulty keeping it stocked.

“Who’s to say that person [the offender] isn’t sitting by the business building right now, you know, just chilling at midnight, waiting to snatch someone up coming from the gym?” asked Sherleta Gambrell, twenty, a sophomore. “It’s ridiculous. It’s not cool.”

Other students chose to focus on self-defense classes.

“With all the events that have happened on campus, it’s a good skill to have,” said a female student.

DeWayne Manning, a UNR self-defense instructor who also taught boxing classes, was asked to offer a special session of his self-defense class after Brianna’s abduction. He explained that the classes were “packed” with students wanting to learn how to protect themselves. In addition to the regular class offering, he provided female students with a booklet called, “Through a Rapist’s Eyes,” which explained what rapists look for in a potential victim. He also provided the students with a list of “dos and don’ts” to follow if they were ever faced with being raped or otherwise sexually assaulted.

“The more information you have, the better off you’re going to be,” he told a class. “I want to make you guys aware so when you walk out on the street, you’re not going to be a victim or a target.”

In light of the fear and concern being expressed in the entire community, and particularly among the student population, Garcia began e-mailing students and university staff to keep everyone updated on the status of the case. UNR police also hosted a safety presentation on campus, and they included a community briefing with Reno police to help address the safety concerns being expressed.

“I find any crime of this nature despicable regardless if it is connected to the campus or not,” Garcia said. “In our mind, the close proximity of the events hit home when we first heard of the November assault, and we have followed it closely since then.... We are asking that people take their safety into account. I still feel the campus is safe. People should be concerned for their safety, but that should not be translated into being frightened. They should take appropriate actions to protect themselves.”

One student, Argituxu Camus, twenty-seven, from Europe, said that she had begun to wonder when the attacks against women in Reno were going to end.

“If someone really wanted to come into our house, they could,” Argituxu said. “I don’t feel safe here at all.... I’m just very scared and have decided with my friends to organize ourselves that if we need to be walking around after five
P.M.
, we coordinate our schedules and all walk together. If we can’t do that, we are definitely calling for a campus escort.”

Argituxu said that it was frustrating for the female students to have to worry on a daily basis about finding an escort. She said that she often walked to class from her apartment on College Drive, located just across the street from where Brianna had been abducted.

Another foreign student, Mariann Vaczi, thirty, from France, was concerned because she said that someone had attempted to break into the home she shared with Argituxu Camus. She said a man ran away after a resident of the house peered at him through the window blinds after he attempted to open their sliding glass door. She said the incident was not reported to the police.

“It’s just shocking,” Mariann said. “I’ve been to another college in America and there was nothing like this happening there.”

Yet another female student, Chelsea Utick, nineteen, said that she had been so affected by Brianna Denison’s abduction that she dropped an evening class and added one during the day so that she would not have to walk outside during nighttime hours.

“ ‘Scary’ is the right word,” Chelsea said. “When I heard that she was my age, I thought, ‘Oh, my goodness. ’ This is really terrifying.”

Chelsea said that she remained cautious and always locked her doors and windows.

“It’s silly to leave your door open,” she said.

As police patrolled UNR’s campus in early February, more than one hundred students assembled in the Joe Crowley Student Union building to hear Officer Eric James provide a safety presentation on how a person could help prevent herself from becoming a victim.

“Personal safety cannot be guaranteed, but good personal practices minimize the risks,” James told the crowd. “These little tips are what keep people alive.”

James explained that most criminals commit their acts from opportunity. He said that when opportunities are decreased by people being aware of their surroundings, keeping their property—such as home and vehicles—secure with doors and windows locked, and just generally being alert, especially when outdoors, people can effectively diminish their chances of becoming crime victims.

Among the tips James offered was to fight for your life if accosted, and to make a scene to try and attract attention from other people, such as screaming and fighting off the attacker. He also advised that wildly flailing one’s arms in a move he called “the windmill” can be effective in preventing an attacker from grabbing his potential victim’s arms.

“Your first response should be to flee,” James said. “Do the windmill and run. It’s going to work.”

He also advised that using a cell phone, as if taking a picture of a suspect with it, could be “very effective” in thwarting an attack. He also recommended calling the police immediately any time that any sort of suspicious activity was witnessed. To avoid becoming a victim, James said that it was unwise to hitchhike, to avoid taking shortcuts through darkened alleys or behind buildings, and if followed, to make every effort to get to a public place as quickly as possible. He advised that a person should use every means available to defend herself.