Several belonged to homeowners who had refused purchase offers.
Others were located beside properties Cedar Crest wanted to acquire.
The pattern wasn't conclusive.
A neighborhood experiencing construction and property changes might receive more service calls for legitimate reasons.
But the coincidence deserved examination.
Then a former Summit employee contacted investigators.
He had seen news coverage of Marcus's arrest.
His name was Kevin Brooks, a thirty-four-year-old security supervisor who had resigned from Summit six months earlier.
Kevin explained that the company sometimes received instructions to pay special attention to houses associated with difficult property negotiations.
He described those instructions as unusual.
Security personnel were supposed to report actual concerns.
But managers sometimes encouraged repeated calls about ordinary activity near particular addresses.
A delivery worker unloading packages.
A contractor repairing a fence.
A young man mowing a lawn.
Kevin remembered questioning the approach.
His supervisor told him that creating a visible security presence helped reassure residents and discourage unwanted activity.
Kevin wasn't convinced.
Then he saw a message from Aaron Vale referring to one homeowner as a problem who needed to understand the neighborhood was changing.
The message mentioned increased patrol attention.
Kevin preserved his own lawful employment records and later provided his account through the appropriate investigative process.
Laura listened carefully.
Then asked.
“Did anyone explicitly tell you to make false police reports?”
Kevin hesitated.
“Not in those words.”
“What did they say?”
He looked down.
“They told us to report anything that could be considered suspicious.”
Laura nodded.
“Did they define suspicious?”
Kevin gave a bitter laugh.
“Sometimes it seemed to mean anybody the developer didn't like seeing around a property.”
For several seconds, the room was quiet.
Then Thomas asked.
“Did Deputy Vale ever receive direct instructions from Summit?”
Kevin hesitated.
“I don't know.”
He looked toward the table.
“But his brother talked about him all the time.”
Laura leaned forward.
“What did he say?”
Kevin swallowed.
“That the deputy understood how to make people take neighborhood security seriously.”
The words were carefully recorded.
They weren't proof that Christopher Vale accepted money or knowingly participated in a real estate scheme.
But they justified examining communications and financial relationships more closely.
The investigators obtained appropriate legal authorizations for the records they needed.
Then they began tracing the connections.
And what they found transformed the case.
The decisive evidence came from a series of messages between Aaron Vale and a Cedar Crest property-acquisition manager.
The messages discussed neighborhood enforcement, resident complaints, and the value of making certain properties less attractive to people who opposed redevelopment.
Several were ambiguous.
Others appeared to encourage misuse of police resources.