Pop Goes the Weasel

combination water fountain/toilet. Sneakers had been tossed in the hallways outside several of the cells. It’s what experienced prisoners do who won’t take the laces out of their sneaks. Laces aren’t allowed in the jail for safety reasons.
    A small-time drug runner and petty thief named Alfred “Sneak” Streek was seated like the Fresh Prince of D.C. in one of the holding cells. The street punk looked up at me as I entered his cell. A slicky-sick smirk crossed his face.
    Sneak was sporting wraparound sunglasses, dusty dreadlocks, and a bright-green and yellow crocheted hat. His white T-shirt had a drawing of Haile Selassie’s face and read H EAD H UNTER . R ASTAFARIAN .
    “You from the D.A.’s office? I don’t think so . No dealee, no talkee, my man,” he said to me. “So get lost.”
    Rakeem ignored him as he spoke to me. “Sneak claims to have some useful information about the Glover and Cardinal homicides. He would like us to extend him some courtesy in return for what he claims to know. He’s jammed up on a charge that he may have broken into an apartment in Shaw. He was caught coming out of a bedroom window with a Sony TV in his arms. Imagine that. Not very Sneaky of him.”
    “I didn’t rob no ticky-tacky apartment. I don’t even watch TV, my man. And I don’t see no assistant district attorney present with the au-tho-rity to make a deal.”
    “Take off your sunglasses,” I said to him.
    He wouldn’t look at me, so I took them off for him. As one well-known street saying goes, his eyes were like tombstones. I could tell at a glance that Sneak wasn’t just running drugs anymore; he was using.
    I stood across from Sneak in the jail cell and stared him down. He was probably in his early twenties, angry, cynical, lost in space and time. “If you didn’t rob the apartment, then why would you be interested in seeing a lawyer from the district attorney’s office? That doesn’t make too much sense to me, Alfred. Now here’s what I’ll do for you, and it’s a onetime offer, so listen carefully. If I walk out of here, I don’t come back.”
    Sneak half-listened to what I was saying.
    “If you give us information that directly helps solve the murders of those two young girls, then we will help you on the robbery charge. I’ll go to the mat myself. If you don’t give up the information, then I’m going to leave you in here with Detective Powell and Detective Thurman. You won’t get this generous, one-time offer again. That’s another promise, and as these detectives know, I always keep my word.”
    Sneak still didn’t say anything. A glaze was coming over his eyes. He tried to stare me down, but I’m usually better at it than the average TV booster.
    I finally shrugged a look at Rakeem Powell and Jerome Thurman. “Okay, fine. Gentlemen, we need to know what he knows about those murdered girls in Shaw. He gets nothing from us when you’re finished with him. It’s possible that he’s involved with the homicides himself. He could even be our killer, and we need to solve this thing fast. You treat him that way until we know differently.”
    I started to leave when suddenly Sneak spoke.
    “Back Door, man. He hang at Downing Park. He, Back Door, maybe see who done those girls. That’s how he say it at the park. Say he saw the killer. So how you gonna help me?”
    I walked out of the cell. “I told you the deal, Alfred. We solve the case, your information helps, I’ll help you.”

Chapter 34
    MAYBE WE WERE CLOSE TO SOMETHING. Two Metro cruisers and two unmarked sedans pulled up to the fenced-in entrance of tiny Downing playground in Shaw. Rakeem Powell and Sampson came with me to visit with Joe “Back Door” Booker, a well-known neighborhood menace.
    I knew Back Door by sight and spotted him right away. He was short, no more than five-seven, goateed, and so good with a basketball that he sometimes played in work boots just to show off. He had on dusty orange construction boots today. Also a faded black nylon jacket and black nylon pants that accordioned at the ankles.
    A full-court basketball game was in progress, a fast, highlevel game somewhere between college and pro in terms of athletic ability. The court couldn’t have been more basic — black macadam, faded white lines, metal backboards, and rims with chain nets.
    Players from two or three other teams sat around waiting their turn to play winners. Nylon shorts and pants and the Nike swoosh were everywhere. The court was