The Innocent Man

Chapter Four returns to the investigation of Debbie Carter and Ron's questioning by Detectives Dennis Smith and Mike Kieswetter three months after the killing. Ron's mother provides an alibi for Ron, having recorded in her journal that Ron was at home with her on the night of the murder. Ron states that while he does frequent the Coachlight, he doesn't recall having been there that night, and he only vaguely recognizes a photo of Debbie.

Around the same time, the police also interview Dennis Fritz, whom they have fingered as a possible accomplice due to his friendship with Ron. The two had previously enjoyed playing guitars and going to bars together, but had drifted apart, partly due to Ron's wild behavior. Fritz's own wife had been murdered a few years before that, leaving him the traumatized single parent of a young daughter. When the police call Fritz in for interviewing, they soon become accusatory, pressing Fritz to take a polygraph test, which they then inform him he has "severely flunked" (36). After three hours of interrogation and verbal abuse, during which Fritz insists he had nothing to do with the murder, the cops let Fritz go, but they continue to follow him around town and harass him.