Tuesday, March 2, 1999

Nobody's Child - 78

An unknown girl was beaten to death on naval property being turned over to DC. Although not a student she stowed away on a school bus touring the base but sneaked away and was chased down by a naval Master Chief. Chegwidden (C)assigned Harm (H) and Mac (M) to see to it that the ball wasn't dropped. Agent Holland was investigating for NCIS and they found a Master Chief insignia in the girls hand. While there H seemed contemplative and saw the girl in sort of a vision. He sent M on back and he stayed with the body while the autopsy was performed. He asked C to be assigned to the case and was allowed. Eventually he brought in Doctor Coulter to perform another, more thorough, autopsy and she found that the child had died from severe abuse including being locked away and needing to eat paper to survive. No one reported a child missing and H and Coulter held a burial service and read from the bible. M could tell that H had the "same look in his eye" as when he was chasing his father and defending the "king of fleas" but H kept shutting her out. Bud (B) found records of a convicted child abuser living in the area with his brother who was a master chief. He and H tailed the man, William Hawkins, and harassed him until he told them where he had seen the child and that he had worried she was being abused but was afraid to report that he knew. H took a drawing around to the neighborhood and found a woman who would tell him where she had seen the girl if H would track down her deadbeat navy husband. The girl lived with her aunt Marjorie Lewis who had moved out with "Charlie" one week prior, in a hurry without notice. She said that the girl never spoke and didn't even say thanks when she had been given one of her husbands insignias. A social worker told H and Coulter that the girls name was Annie Lewis and her mother had died 3 years previously. She had been given to her maternal grandmother to raise, but she had died 6 months previously and Annie had been lost to the records. She said she couldn't legally give H the address but left the chart out where he could see it. They went to the abandoned house and had "feelings" that the child had been there then found the closet where she had been locked. H saw the girl, that he had seen twice in vision, and followed her to a hiding place. She was the dead girls twin sister, Dar Lin. She said that "they grabbed Annie but I got away" and Charlie had locked them in the closet. He had told them that he would stomp their head if they weren't good. H promised her he would find Charlie and make him pay. Then he was shown making the same promise to a headstone engraved with Annie's name.

C gave B the newspaper to read that he had passed the Bar exam. Ht was helping with the case and clumsily dropped the folder of photographs onto the floor. She freaked out when she saw then and chastised H for taking the case when he didn't have to and getting B involved. She slugged H then came to C the next day resigning her commission. He tried to downplay the incident but she said she "struck an officer." He said that all he had seen was her making an exaggerated gesture which by chance struck H. He tore up her resignation and muttered "I can't count the number of times I thought about hitting Rabb."

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