Kill For Me (26 page)

Considering it was a week before Christmas, Thursday, December 18, 2003, the temperature was seasonably warm that morning. Somewhere near 61 degrees. At 7:30
A.M
., Ski and his law enforcement colleagues attended an arrest briefing. Every agency needed to be on the same page. The get-together was designed to map out the morning, step-by-step, and make sure everyone had his or her detail straight. Now was not the time to be stumbling over one another.

This was, Ski later said, “the big takedown.” They had been waiting for this since the moment the PPPD had found Sandee Rozzo’s lifeless body inside her garage; Ski, perhaps more so, after he left Sandee’s daughter’s house after making a promise.

As the meeting carried on, Ski recalled, it was the first time he truly realized that Tracey Humphrey had been living several different lives. It was the licenses. The team had put Humphrey’s various license photos from all over the country up on a board with some other materials. Ski looked at the different photos of Humphrey throughout the years.

“Who’s this guy over here?” Ski wondered while looking at one photo. Humphrey had a buzz cut. The top of his red hair was frosted blond—the tip of a dipped paintbrush.

“The photo was from back in the early 1990s,” Ski recalled. “It hit me right there. Looking at all of these photos lined up—he was gay. To me, Humphrey had an identity crisis. He probably wanted to be with women, but he had this hidden homosexual tendency…and whether he’s so torn between being the big muscle-headed guy, he doesn’t want anyone to find out he’s gay. He struggled with it his whole life, in my opinion, and that’s where the violence comes into play.”

After the short debriefing, heads nodded and “let’s get this done” echoed as the team walked out the door.

Ski’s job was to wait by the main intersection near Terrell Therapies until he heard that the arrests had been made. From there, he was going to head straight for the Athletic Club in Brandon, where Humphrey used to work, and speak with Humphrey’s roommate Wade Hamilton. There had always been an indication that Hamilton knew a hell of a lot more than he had volunteered. As Humphrey’s boss when Humphrey was at the Athletic Club, and now his and Ashley’s roommate, perhaps the reality that Humphrey and his pretty little green-eyed wife were in jail awaiting arraignment on murder and gun possession charges was going to be enough to jolt Hamilton into maybe talking about all he knew.

In total, twenty-eight law enforcement personnel from the ATF, FDLE, PPPD, HCSO, and SAO were involved in the arrests. The team wasn’t taking any chances with Tracey Humphrey. They knew the possibility was there for him to be armed. He was definitely dangerous—the “loose cannon” cliché almost went without saying. In addition, Humphrey had run from the law in the past. Was there anything stopping him from doing it again?

Not long after the meeting, the team headed over to Terrell Therapies and descended upon the building. It was as though a tip had come in that Osama bin Laden was holed up inside.

To everyone’s surprise and, notably, great relief, both Ashley and Tracey Humphrey were taken into custody without incident.

The ATF took Humphrey, charging him with felonious possession of, and handling, a firearm. Humphrey laughed as he was taken away. He could have been thinking,
You have nothing on me…. I’ll be out in a few hours.

The ATF charges were legit. But the main purpose of the arrest, of course, was to get Humphrey into custody so the PPPD, which had arrested Ashley on murder charges, could get to work on speaking with her. If she fingered Humphrey, he was going to be rearrested on murder charges.

Ski and Detective Mike Lynch soon located Wade Hamilton. He seemed to have a different outlook on things, now that the Humphreys were behind bars, facing serious charges.

Hamilton said he had known Humphrey for four years and had lived with him for the past two. “Look,” he added after being asked, “I know Tracey has done some bad stuff. I looked up his background on the Internet. He has some problems with violence.”

“Have you ever seen him get violent?” Lynch asked. Mike Lynch had built a rapport with Hamilton, so he did most of the questioning.

“No. I don’t have any firsthand knowledge of him beating on anyone.”

“Did he say anything about Sandee Rozzo?”

“Just that the charges she was pressing were bullshit. He had never done any of that, he told me.”

“You ever meet her, Sandee Rozzo, I mean?”

Hamilton didn’t appreciate where the questioning was heading. It was clear in the tone he started to use with both detectives.

“Yeah…I had seen [her] once when she was working at the Green Iguana one night. We had a brief, friendly conversation. She never said
anything
about the pending court case. I liked Sandee. She seemed like a nice person.”

Lynch brought Hamilton back to that July Fourth weekend when Sandee Rozzo was murdered and asked him if he could recall anything pertaining to the Humphreys that seemed peculiar and stood out to him on that particular weekend.

“The marriage…it was, like, during their lunch break that weekend, while they were working. I thought it was weird. Just strange that they could be working one moment, then head out to lunch on break, and when they came back, they said they had gotten married. I never understood that.”

Hamilton said he wasn’t around on July 5, 2003. He could prove it. But the next morning, he and Ashley drove a friend of theirs somewhere to pick up a car. During the ride, Hamilton said, “she did not seem all that unusual in her behavior.”

Lynch asked about Humphrey’s reaction when he heard that Sandee Rozzo had been murdered.

“They live in the same apartment with me, but we maintain separate living areas and separate schedules. I rarely see them.”

“So you didn’t see them near that time?”

“Look,” Hamilton said, “if you want me to say a certain thing about Tracey and Ashley, just tell me what to say, and I’ll say it.”

Lynch looked at Ski. “We just want the
truth,
” Lynch said. “We want to find the people responsible for this murder.”

“What about Tobe White, you know her?”

“Tobe’s strange,” Hamilton said. “She was always at the apartment. I know she told them that you guys talked to her about the murder.”

“Did Ashley ever mention that she was being stalked or followed?”

“No. Never. She did tell me that Tobe was attacked, and that Tobe was looking to buy a gun because she was so afraid.”

Hamilton went on to talk about how much Ashley disliked her mother and David Abernathy. He called Ashley a “quiet, odd girl. Tracey was controlling and overly protective of Ashley, but I never saw him physically abuse her.”

As the conversation continued, Hamilton became agitated. He said, “Look, I’m losing money by not working. You’re taking up too much of my time. And I
don’t
like the aggressive nature of your questions—trying to make me feel like I did something wrong.”

“We just want the truth.”

“You must be some sort of psychologist,” Hamilton said smartly to a female agent standing nearby. “You have those kind of eyes. You want to hear about my life, is that it?” He laughed.

“We need to find out what you know about a homicide,” Lynch said, sounding like a cop. “That’s all.”

“If you have no other questions, I need to get my ass back to work.”

Lynch handed Hamilton one of his business cards. “If you think of something, give me a call.”

Hamilton walked away.

Ski called to him; he had one more request.

Hamilton turned.

“Hey,” Ski said, “we’re going to need a key to get into your apartment.”

At 12:45
P.M
. on December 18, 2003, Special Agent Steve Davenport escorted Ashley Humphrey into an interview room at the FDLE office in Tampa. Ski was inside the room already, along with several other FDLE agents.

“Sit over there,” Davenport told Ashley.

She sat without speaking.

“Okay,” Ski began. “Ashley, I believe I mentioned one time, okay, just to refresh your memory, I am Detective Scott Golczewski with the [PPPD]….”

Ashley looked defiant. She gave Ski a bitter growl.

“You all right, Ashley?” Ski said. “And do you understand what you are being arrested for?”

“Um, yeah…they said the murder of a woman I don’t even know!”

“Okay.”

“This is just a little threatening to me that I am being arrested for it.”

“Okay, well,” Ski said with a professional twist to his voice.

“So I want my attorney.”

Ashley was getting a little ahead of herself. Ski, then, read Ashley her Miranda rights, slowly, word for word. Then he handed her a Miranda form and asked if she would kindly read it. As she did, Ski explained why she had been arrested by the PPPD, ending with, “You’ll have to answer to the charge of murder in the first degree.”

Ashley signed the document. Put the pen down. Looked up. “Get my attorney!”

“What do you mean, ‘get him’?” Ski asked.

“I mean bring him here!”

“For what reason?”

“Because I am
not
speaking. I didn’t do this! I am not speaking without my attorney.”

“Okay,” Ski said.

Davenport spoke up. “Listen, I understand that, and I don’t want you to speak at all. But what I want to tell you is…to me, it’s hard to understand how someone so young as you could get involved in such a serious crime. I mean, you remind—you really remind me of my son’s girlfriend…. I want to tell you also that we are interested in speaking with you…. I don’t believe you are entirely responsible for this. I think someone else, a master manipulator, orchestrated this whole scenario. There is a whole group of women who have been manipulated by Tracey Humphrey, and none of those women are better for their relationship [with him]. You, Tobe, you are
all
going to jail! Tracey is going to jail. I suggest [that] what you do when you take, meet with your attorney, is that you tell him the absolute truth. You tell him about your involvement, because there is no way in my mind that somebody like you would commit that type of crime unless someone was pushing, manipulating. Sandee Rozzo was a beautiful woman. She didn’t have to die. She never harmed anyone. All she did was speak the truth about a matter. And I think you know in your heart,
right now,
you
know
what type of individual Tracey is!” Davenport paused. Held up his hands. “Don’t say anything.”

“We don’t want you to say
anything,
” Ski added. “We want you to listen to us.” And then Ski broke into a long talk about all of Humphrey’s women. Ashley sat and seemed to listen, although she had a “this is not impressing me” look about her.

“And what is going to happen here,” Davenport piped in, “is that Tobe is going to cooperate and Tracey is going to tell us the truth—and you are going to be left holding the bag on this homicide.”

“And you know why?” Ski said as Ashley began to cry softly, her shoulders and chest hiccupping. “Because that is the way that Tracey wanted it from the beginning. That’s why you are the one who looked up Sandee’s info on the computer. It was billed to your debit credit card. Two websites! That’s why you are the one that did the credit check on Sandee….” He then went through and explained much of the circumstantial and ballistic evidence they had on Ashley, noting how the shell casings matched Abernathy’s gun—a guy who had told them, Ski said, that Ashley had asked for the gun and never returned it. Ski went on for five minutes, running through everything he could mention without giving the entire case away.

When he was done, Davenport took over, talking for another ten minutes about how Humphrey had manipulated Ashley into murder. How Humphrey had two-timed her with other women. Beat other women. How he had tried to get other women to kill for him, but he was unsuccessful. Davenport warned Ashley that she would be “cast aside” like garbage by Humphrey once he was finished using her—and that day was coming soon enough.

Ski said, “Yeah!” echoing the case Davenport was making.

Ashley sounded broken and shaky. She asked for a glass of water.

Ski said, “Do you know what puzzles me most?…If somebody told me that I was under arrest for a homicide that I didn’t commit, I wouldn’t be sitting here as calmly as you are. That is what I find
real
strange about this whole thing. I mean, you said you were throwing up the first time I talked to you.”

“I want my attorney!”

“I know, and understand it’s just like another day in the neighborhood.”

“Get my attorney.”

Another agent in the room spoke up. “Steve, she wants some water.”

“Ashley, would you like some water? I was going to get something myself. You gonna have a Coke or something?”

“No!” she snapped back smartly.

They talked about getting sodas for a few minutes. One of the agents said something about “the abuse…and mental anguish” Ashley must have endured under Humphrey’s spell, before asking Ashley how long she and Humphrey had been together.

They all looked at her.

“I am not talking without my attorney.”

Ski tried again, talking about how Humphrey was an expert at finding “young girls down on their luck,” whom he could twist and mold into anything he wanted—this time, obviously, a murderer.

For the next several minutes, they asked Ashley where she lived, her date of birth, and was she able to read English.

Ashley was cordial and answered all of the questions.

Ski talked for a few moments; then he reached into a file and took out a photograph of a young girl. Slapped it down on the table. Slid it over toward Ashley. “See that,” he said. “The lady you shot—that’s her daughter.” He pointed his forefinger down on top of the photo. “When I call her up today and tell her that the person who killed her mother was arrested, I guarantee for the first time in about six months, she’ll have a smile on her face that will probably be bigger than that (the smile in the photo)…. And I want you to look at the picture there, so every night when you go to sleep in your jail cell,
that
is the face you see. Because you
ruined
her life!” He kicked his voice up a notch: “You
understand
me!”

Ashley looked down for a moment. Head up: “Get my attorney!”

After a few more inconsequential questions by other agents, Davenport said, “Ashley, just one more quick question. We wanted to ask if you would consent, give us consent to search your—your vehicle?”

“Just get my attorney.”

“Okay,” Davenport said. “What about your house?”

“Get. Me. My. Attorney.”

“Okay. And will you provide us with a DNA sample?”

“Get me my attorney!”

“Listen,” Davenport said after some discussion over Ashley using the bathroom, “we found a large amount of cash”—$6,044.94, to be exact—“in your purse.” He handed her a receipt for the money.

Ashley looked at it. Then she initialed where the amount was on the form, but she refused to sign it.

“How much do you weigh now?” Ski tossed out.

“One hundred and twenty-eight.”

“Yeah, what kind of tattoos do you have?”

“Let me speak to my attorney.”

Ski asked a few questions about work and then broke into one more speech regarding bank records and cell phone records, letting Ashley know—in general terms—she was screwed. They wanted to give her every opportunity they could to admit guilt, so they could move on.

But she wasn’t going to budge.

They talked about the handcuffs, which were bothering Ashley. So Ski cuffed her in front with plastic flex cuffs.

She said that felt better on her back and neck.

Several agents then led Ashley out of the room toward a waiting van.

By 3:20
P.M
., Ashley Humphrey was transported to Pinellas County Jail and booked on charges of first-degree murder.

Interesting interview, Ski thought. It wouldn’t be the last time they tried talking to Ashley. It was clear that she was still under Humphrey’s magical charm. A few days or weeks behind bars and away from him would change things, Ski considered.

Time, the ultimate healer—or, in this case, arm twister.

There was one phone call Ski needed to make. Not to Tobe. Or anybody else involved in the investigation. All those calls could wait.

“Sandra, that you?” Ski asked when Sandee Rozzo’s mother picked up the phone.

“Yes…” She knew who it was.

“We made an arrest,” Ski said, telling Sandra Pool as much as he could.

She cried. “Thank you. Thank you, Detective.”

As Ski left, two FDLE forensic analyst technicians walked into the room where they had interviewed Ashley. Although she had refused to consent in giving them any DNA, Ashley had sipped from two separate Dasani water bottles. The techs labeled them Exhibits 3 and 4 (the tape from the interviews being 1 and 2) and placed them into a plastic evidence bag as FDLE special agent Scott Peterka witnessed the chain of evidence in action.

The team now had a perfectly good DNA sample from Ashley Humphrey.