{"id":9686,"date":"2019-09-19T13:30:24","date_gmt":"2019-09-19T13:30:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/?p=9686"},"modified":"2019-09-19T19:49:09","modified_gmt":"2019-09-19T19:49:09","slug":"john-peel-interrogation-bellingham-police-dept","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lelandhale.com\/wordpress\/john-peel-interrogation-bellingham-police-dept\/","title":{"rendered":"John Peel Interrogation: Bellingham Police Dept."},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bellingham, Washington. Saturday, March 24, 1984<\/strong>. John Peel arrived at the Bellingham police station a little bit after three in the afternoon. The game plan had him going up against Sergeant’s Flothe and Galyan. Sergeant Stogsdill was sitting on the other side of the one-way glass, manning the tape recorder. Next to him in the recording booth was Ketchikan prosecuting attorney Mary Anne Henry. If John Peel confessed, she was ready.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sergeant Galyan led their subject to the interview room in the detective division. A cramped, L-shaped room, it was barely six feet wide and ten feet long. The biggest thing in it was a rugged table, on which were perched a microphone and several newspaper clippings. Galyan instructed John Peel to take a seat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"police\"\/
John Peel, Bellingham Police Dept., March 24, 1984 (courtesy Alaska State Archives)
Note Sgt. Galyan’s red hair, lower left.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

But they didn’t start the interview. They let him sit. The purpose wasn’t so much to make him stew as to make sure he saw the news clippings. “We know all about you,’ the Bellingham Herald<\/em> articles seemed to say. ”We’re the police. We know what you did.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the interview rambled to life, Sgt. Galyan provided a narrative designed to let their subject know precisely what<\/em> the police knew. For his part, John Peel stayed noncommittal, politely acknowledging what the trooper was saying without agreeing to any of it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Galyan was single-mindedly determined to keep the pressure on despite Peel’s rebuffs. At one point, he played himself off against Stogsdill, in a classic good cop-bad cop routine. Stogsdill, Galyan declared, thought the murders had occurred during the course of a robbery, which made the Investor<\/em> crime particularly “heinous.” Galyan, playing the good cop, said he disagreed. “I think it was a cover-up,” he announced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Things started to break right about then, when John Peel asserted himself. ”What do you think the motive was?” he asked. The troopers — and Mary Anne Henry — would think it an odd question, as if Peel was probing the deeper waters of their knowledge, trying to gauge what they did — and did not — know. But anyone who’d followed the case knew there were about a million motives thrashing through the rumor mill. That<\/em> question was already in the air.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

”What do I think the motive was? Do you want me to lay it out for you? My theory,” Galyan replied, “based on everything that the investigation has shown, on eyewitness testimony and this sort of thing, is that I know that you have worked for Mark in the past. I know Mark was — how should you describe him? Very difficult at times. And probably in the fishing terms around the dock, he was probably an asshole as a skipper.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Galyan was just getting warmed up. Soon enough, he took them to a darker place. That place centered on the barest possibility of a motive, a theme the police were increasingly building toward: There was an underlying animosity between the two men that ultimately led to murder. Galyan was quick with an example. It was almost straight out of the police interrogation manual.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“You ask Mark just for a lousy ride from Ketchikan to Craig, and what does he tell you? Hey, he can’t be bothered with you. ‘I’m not even going that way.’ The guy lies to you.” ED. NOTE: One of the first things Peel saw when he finally got to Craig was the <\/em>Investor, tied up at North Cove.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Yeah,” Peel said, still listening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Okay. Somebody he’s known, that’s worked for him, and you’ve done turns for him and everything else — right? He lies to you, won’t even give you a crummy ride. John, I know you had to hock your watch simply to get [to Craig] so that you could get a job to take care of your family. I don’t know about you, but that would probably irritate me. In fact, it would make me mad if somebody was lying to me and wouldn’t even give me a crummy ride. All right? I had to spend my last buck so I could get a job and feed my family.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

‘”Then the end of the fishing season comes along,” Galyan continued. “I mean, you’ve had a beer or two with — oh, with the guys off the Investor<\/em>, whatever. You’ve partied a little bit.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Yeah,” Peel said, but nothing more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"police\"\/
Investor crew, fishing in SE Alaska, 1982 (courtesy Alaksa State Archives)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

”You toked a joint. It’s Mark’s birthday. He goes out to the restaurant with his wife and kids and the family and whatever. All right? I think — my theory, John — is that you bought maybe a bottle with your last few bucks before you got paid. You might have gone over to the Investor<\/em> with the guys, had a couple of drinks. You might have smoked a little bit. What did you want to do? I think you probably wanted to wish Mark maybe a happy birthday. All right? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

“All you wanted to do is be nice to the guy because, let’s face it, you lived in the same town with him, this sort of thing. All right? What happened? You maybe spent your last three of four bucks to buy a bottle and go over and wish him a happy birthday. He ain’t there. Dean and Jerome and the rest of them are. You guys are all buddies. You have a drink. You have maybe a little grass or whatever. I don’t know. It doesn’t make any difference. All right?”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Galyan paused for emphasis, but he was far from finished. He was just getting warmed up. He was working his way toward the final act. The cops-being-cops at the police station moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The hours drag by,” Galyan continued. ‘The first thing you know it’s 10:30, 11:00 o’clock at night. Finally — you know, you guys have been drinking and talking and having a good time, and kind of wasted. Finally, around 10:30, 11:00 o’clock, here comes Mark, you know. You’re happy to see him. You like the guy, you know. You worked for him. All right.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Yeah,” John Peel said, staying noncommittal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“He’s done you good — he’s done you dirty — but he’s done you good in the past, so bygones are bygones. All right? You’re going to wish him a birthday drink, and what happens? He comes aboard the boat. He berates you in front of your friends. Maybe he orders you off the boat or whatever. I don’t know, you know — theory, right? The next thing I know, John, is all of a sudden the gun is there, things go bad. Didn’t mean to do it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Okay? All you meant to do is — is to defend your own honor so you don’t look like a wimp in front of your friends. Then something goes bad. It goes wrong. All right? After that I mean, it happens, bang<\/em>, too late to change anything. All right? It doesn’t make you a bad guy. It doesn’t mean that you meant to hurt anybody, but it happened.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There was more — details mostly — and the trooper methodically built his case. When he finished, John Peel had only one thing to say.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I think you’re nuts, man,” Peel blurted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I am not nuts, John,” Galyan answered.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I think you’re nuts,” he repeated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“No. Let me tell you something,” Galyan demanded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I don’t — geez, I just can’t believe this.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Let me tell you something here, John,” Galyan said, using his most authoritative voice. “This is all going to come down around your neck. I want you to listen very closely. You’re a young man. You’ve got your whole life in front of you.”<\/p>\n\n\n

\n

Excerpts from the unpublished original manuscript, “Sailor Take Warning,” by Leland E. Hale. That manuscript, started in 1992 and based on court records from the Alaska State Archive, served as the basis for “What Happened in Craig.”<\/em><\/p>\n

Copyright Leland E. Hale <\/em>(2019). All rights reserved.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

\"Craig\"<\/p>\n

Order “What Happened In Craig<\/strong>,” HERE<\/strong><\/a> and HERE<\/strong><\/a>. True crime from Epicenter Press about Alaska’s Worst Unsolved Mass Murder<\/em>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bellingham, Washington. Saturday, March 24, 1984. John Peel arrived at the Bellingham police station a little bit after three in the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,11,98,12,13,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-alaskas-worst-unsolved-mass-murder","category-glenn-flothe","category-jim-stogsdill","category-john-peel","category-mark-coulthurst","category-what-happened-in-craig"],"yoast_head":"\nJohn Peel Interrogation: Bellingham Police Dept. - Leland E. Hale<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"When the cops bring you to the police department, it takes you out of your comfort zone. 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