Once, at a murder scene in Margate, they found a note from the killer hidden under a rock on the lawn. BSO's has always been high. Of course, law enforcement officials are quick to stress that solving murders isn't about numbers. It's about putting killers behind bars, bringing closure to families of victims, keeping predators off the streets. But privately they track the figures.
Clearance rates are the yardstick by which an agency is measured.
It's noon on Monday. Bukata and Kaminsky cruise down Interstate 95 in Bukata's county-issue Chevy Lumina on their way to the autopsies. They've been going for nearly 24 hours now. Detective Glen Bukata checks a van parked near where the bodies were found. Fioritto's personal items sit on a desk while the suspect is being questioned.