Jordan began to understand that Fairhaven's trouble did not fit neatly into a story about one unusually cruel officer. Voss's behavior appeared repeatedly in the accounts, but the more persistent problem was the ease with which certain residents could demand immediate attention while others struggled to have a basic complaint acknowledged. Some officers had participated. Others had looked away. A few had tried to intervene and learned that the safest path for their careers was silence.
On Wednesday, Officer Luke Avery asked for a private meeting. Jordan did not agree to discuss Saturday's investigation alone with a witness, and he explained that any testimony about the incident needed to go through independent investigators with proper documentation. Avery accepted that immediately. Then he said there were broader issues he wanted to report through the department's formal channels and that he was willing to make a signed statement.
They met in a conference room with Lorraine present to document the conversation. Avery looked exhausted. His eyes were red, and the neat uniform he wore seemed to fit less comfortably than it had on Saturday. He had joined the department three years earlier, proud to be serving the town where he grew up, and Voss had been assigned to train him during his first year.
"I thought he was a good officer," Avery began. "He knew the roads, he knew the repeat callers, and he could talk his way through situations that made me nervous. He told me people trusted him because he didn't back down."
"What changed?" Jordan asked.
"I started noticing who he backed down for."
Avery described calls that received unusually fast responses because the caller was considered influential. Karen Whitcomb's name came up frequently. She had organized fundraising dinners for a police support foundation, attended civic breakfasts, and given Voss the kind of public praise that sounded harmless until it became an expectation of personal service.
"She had his private number," Avery said. "She would call him about people parking near her street, contractors unloading equipment, teenagers using the basketball court. He treated those calls like instructions."
Lorraine looked up from her notes. "Are you saying he took official action without a dispatch record?"
"Sometimes. Or he'd tell dispatch afterward that he was following up on a neighborhood concern. The call would get entered as a patrol contact, and no one would see how it started."
Jordan said nothing for a moment. He had expected poor judgment and uneven supervision; private requests turning into official action were a more serious matter. But Avery still had not explained why he himself had fastened handcuffs on a cooperative homeowner in broad daylight.
"Tell me what you thought on Saturday," Jordan said. "Not what you think I want to hear."
Avery swallowed. "I thought the stop made no sense. We were called about runoff. When we arrived, the water wasn't blocking anyone."
He glanced down at his hands before continuing. "Then Mrs. Whitcomb started talking about your car, and Voss asked for the registration. I couldn't see why that was connected to the call."
"And when he grabbed me?"