Even in death, Katlyn Lundquist looked exquisite. Blonde, svelte, and with sculpted facial features, she was the quintessential Swedish beauty, the type men lusted after on the street if not in the many adult magazines devoted to the worship of the female anatomy. Lundquist, who would have been 25 in December, had emigrated at age five from Stockholm to Pennsylvania with her parents, who died, tragically, in an automobile accident in 2009. Now she lay on NYPD Deputy Coroner Michael Antonetti's autopsy table, a single bullet hole in the back of her head.
"So, Michael, what can you tell me about Jane Doe?" asked Detective-Investigator Louis Martelli of Manhattan's First Precinct as he thumbed through the victim's file. It was 9:30 AM on a Wednesday morning in late August.
"Not much, I'm afraid," responded the deputy coroner as he finished sewing up the deep Y-shaped incision in Lundquist's chest-shoulder-to-shoulder meeting at the breast bone and extending down to the pubic bone-he had used to remove her internal organs. "As you see from the police report, she was found in Thomas Paine Park, within spitting distance of 26 Federal Plaza-well after midnight-without any identification. Her clothes, which my assistant tells me could have been purchased at any of a hundred stores in the five boroughs, weren't disturbed, and my preliminary examination shows she wasn't sexually assaulted."
Martelli turned to Antonelli's assistant, Latonya Williams, who nodded, confirming what Antonetti had just said.
"No signs of a struggle, Michael? Perhaps something under her fingernails?"
"Nothing there. But there were cotton fibers around the entrance to her nostrils. I took samples and sent them to the lab. Overall, given the condition of the body, I'm inclined to say she either knew her killer or killers, or was taken by surprise."
Martelli looked at Lundquist's naked body. "What about her breasts? Any implants. Those certainly would give us leads as to her identity, given they carry lot and serial numbers."
"Sorry, Michael, they're the real McCoy. This lady had everything going for her in the looks department, which makes looking at her in this state all the more difficult. It's like looking at a beautiful feathered creature that's been shot out of the sky and now is lying on the ground, dead and bloodied, no longer able to sing in morning's first light."
"And her teeth?"
"Perfect. Oh, a small filled cavity here and there-the dental work was good-but other than that, her teeth look perfect. I took impressions in the event we may need them later for identification."
The room went silent as Martelli looked down and shook his head at the thought of another senseless death, a death he and his partner, Detective-Investigator Sean O'Keeffe, were going to have to investigate.
"There is one thing, however, you should see, Michael. Latonya, would you please help me roll the body over."
Working together, Antonetti and Williams rolled the victim on her stomach, revealing the woman's back, which was covered with a large tattoo.
Martelli let out a low whistle. "Well, if that isn't a thing of beauty," he remarked, taking out his cell phone and snapping a picture of the tattoo. "What do you make of it, Michael?"
"It's the Wheel of Fortune," interjected Williams.