i was third on scene, after roger and carl. it was … like walking into a horror movie. dispatch had told me that some teenagers had walked by 1305 chamber st thinking that the body parts strewn around were decorations left over from halloween. one of the kids dared another to steal the arm jutting out of the, eh, you know the end of the banister, there was a sort of decorative wooden spike-looking deal on the, ah, i don’t know what you call it. mcloughlin had skewered mr crawford’s left arm on the spike and one of the kids ran up and grabbed it, and it was, you know, just one of those moments where he took it and knew immediately that it was real. he dropped it and they all took off, they called the cops, and i just happened to be on i-5 north, just south of sutherlin. i raced over as fast as i could and as i did i radioed roger, and the way he described it just made my skin crawl.
once i got there roger and carl had managed to get police tape around the area and were keeping people at bay until the coroner and other investigators arrived. obviously everyone in springton knows everyone else, so there were several people who knew the deceased and were quite upset. carl spent most of the time talking to the gawkers and getting them to leave so we could start assessing the crime scene. it was … grisly. it was terrible. i’ve never seen anything like it before in my life, and i hope to never see anything like it again.
