Routine Gone Wrong

"It was just routine," said St. Louis Police Lieut. Louis Shoulders a month ago as he modestly shrugged off the praise heaped on him for his arrest of Carl Austin Hall and Bonnie Brown Heady, the kidnapers and killers of little Bobby Greenlease (TIME, Oct. 19). But FBI agents began to suspect that something had gone wrong with routine as they searched for some $300,000 still unrecovered of the $600,000 Greenlease ransom.

Why, asked the agents, did nearly an hour elapse between Hall's arrest and the time he was booked at the police station? Why did Shoulders covertly bring two metal suitcases, containing part of the money, into the police station later? Where did he go in his car soon after the booking? The St. Louis police board ordered an inquiry; Shoulders did not appear at first because of a "nervous condition," but later showed up voluntarily and was questioned for seven hours.

Last week, after 27 years as a cop, Louis Shoulders resigned from the force "to save the department further embarrassment." Said he: "I got the kidnapers. I got the woman. I got the gun they used. What more did they want me to get? I did not get the money . . . I'm broke." Said the police commission coldly: "We regret that Lieut. Shoulders has seen fit to resign before this investigation has been completed." Shoulders' next date: a federal grand jury hearing this week in Kansas City, where he said he would refuse to testify.

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