The senior investigator asked whether she had been instructed to change any related entries.
She hesitated.
Then answered.
"Yesterday evening, I received a call."
"From whom?"
"The deputy chief."
The agent remained still.
The supervisor continued.
"He asked me to review the access logs and remove duplicate administrative entries."
The investigator leaned forward.
"What did he mean by duplicate?"
"At first, I thought he meant technical errors."
"And then?"
"He gave me specific record numbers."
She swallowed.
"I checked them. They weren't duplicates."
The investigator waited.
The supervisor looked down.
"So I didn't delete them."
The agent felt a small surge of relief.
"Did you preserve the instruction?"
The woman nodded.
"I wrote down the time and what he requested."
She reached into her folder.
Then produced a handwritten note.
The investigators documented it.
The note included the deputy chief's instruction, the relevant record identifiers, and the time of the call.
The supervisor's decision to keep the note would later prove extremely important.
It provided a contemporaneous record of an attempt to alter the administrative history surrounding the transfer.
But the investigation still needed a stronger link to the redevelopment money.
That link arrived unexpectedly from the community organizer.
The organizer had spent nearly a year fighting criminal accusations that damaged her reputation and consumed much of her savings.
She had originally challenged the redevelopment foundation after residents in her neighborhood reported that promised home repairs had never been completed.
She gathered photographs.
Organized meetings.
Requested public records.