Diana picked up the materials, "OK, first is the artist Rachel. She only came to New York to hold an art exhibition, and doesn't have a network here. She's only familiar with three people by name, one of whom is the gallery owner, Parker Denley."
According to Rachel, Parker was someone she met in Paris. After getting to know each other, he mentioned he had a small gallery and could organize a solo exhibition for her. After much consideration, Rachel and Parker came to New York together. It took them a month to prepare before the exhibition officially opened."
The projector displayed a photo of Parker Denley, of course, it was an ID-type picture because Parker wasn't in New York and they hadn't seen him in person.
Diana continued, "After receiving a call from the gallery, Parker will return to New York, expected tomorrow. I'll contact him then."
Diana operated the computer to change the photo to a graduation picture, which had two people circled on it.
Diana: "The two acquaintances of Rachel in New York are these two people, Anthony Gonzalez and Peter Collins. They were Rachel's classmates. Currently, they're both in Queens and not engaged in any artistic work. Anthony Gonzalez is a stockbroker, and Peter Collins works for a construction company. They don't have any particularly close contact with Rachel. Relationally, these two shouldn't have anything to do with the theft.
I will arrange for someone to follow up on their whereabouts from the past couple of days to confirm."
Jones moved over the computer and played several photos, "These are the four employees of the gallery. Since it's a small gallery, they don't have full-time security. Usually, during exhibitions, one or two people would cycle through shifts. However, for this exhibition, they didn't schedule any staff for the evenings, which raises some questions.
I asked the employees, and they said that the exhibit was a friend of the boss and not a famous artist, so they didn't schedule any duty personnel. Also, there had been very few visitors in the preceding days and nothing unusual happened.
I suspect it might be related to Parker Denley's absence. With the boss away, they slacked off. The alibis of the four employees for the night before last have all been recorded. According to their statements, they all have alibis that need to be verified."
Peter: "OK, for now, each of you verify the testimonies of Rachel's friends and the gallery staff according to the current clues."
After Peter made the arrangements, they began to pack up their things to leave the meeting room.
Jimmy: "Peter, what should I do?"
Peter: "You follow Jones to investigate the whereabouts of the four employees. Go."
Jimmy: "OK."
Jimmy and Jones set off together, with Jones driving. Of course, this was a car assigned by the FBI. Jimmy was still a probationary agent, needing to act in concert with other agents, so he wasn't given anything, not even an account to access the database on the computer.
There were four people on the list, luckily all living in the Chelsea District, and two of the women were renting together. For Jones and Jimmy, this was good news, as it could save a bit of work.
Jimmy and Jones first aimed at the two of them. They were on the third floor of an apartment building. Jones led Jimmy to check the surveillance near the apartment entrance, then they went upstairs to have a look, while Jimmy conveniently activated Heart Eye and scanned their apartment. The place was a mess; it showed that neither person was particularly fond of cleanliness and order.
However, Jimmy didn't scan anything unusual in the apartment, especially not any neatly-shaped objects like picture frames.
Since the gallery was now closed by NYPD, all employees had gone home to wait for news. Jones knocked on the door, re-verified their schedule for that day with them, and with permission, Jimmy and Jones entered for a basic inspection.
After both were cleared of suspicion, Jones and Jimmy went downstairs, preparing to leave.
Jones: "These two should be fine. Let's go."
Jimmy: "Yeah, but it's best to check the surveillance anyway. This apartment has only this entrance here. The traffic surveillance at the nearby intersection should capture the entrance."
Jones drove off to find the third person, Seyman Meis, who also rented an apartment. Jones checked the surrounding surveillance again before entering the apartment building to knock on the door.
Seyman Meis answered the door, and as usual, Jones re-confirmed his whereabouts. This time, however, they didn't enter all the rooms, just glanced at Seyman's bedroom since Seyman said the apartment was rented jointly with another person, and without his roommate's permission, he couldn't let them enter the other bedroom.
Frustrated, Jones could only take Jimmy downstairs, ready to leave.
Jimmy: "This person might be problematic."
Jimmy reached this conclusion first and then thought of reasons because he had already seen some rectangular objects leaning against the wall in the bedroom via his Heart Eye scan, about the size of picture frames. Unless Seyman's roommate happened to be a painter, those paintings were very likely from Rachel's exhibition.
Coincidentally, that room was the one Seyman mentioned belonged to his other roommate.
Now the problem was, without a search warrant, they couldn't inspect the room, and to apply for one, they needed a good reason. It was time to think of a reason to secure a search warrant.
Jones: "How do you know? What's your reasoning?"
Jimmy: "Uh, intuition. I feel like he was lying. Let's still check the nearby surveillance first."
Jones didn't know about Jimmy's capabilities and wasn't ready to abandon the fourth person based on Jimmy's gut feeling alone.
Jones: "You thoroughly check around for surveillance first, I'll go see the last person."
Jimmy: "Alright."
Jimmy got out of the car, and Jones drove away. Walking along the pavement, Jimmy now had a target in mind. How could he nail them? Evidence and reason were very important.
After walking around a couple of times, Jimmy confirmed there were no external cameras nearby to capture the street vehicles. That made things complicated.
Jimmy took out his phone and called Jones: "Jones, how's it going your end?"
Jones: "No problems here. The person lives in a basement, and there's nothing unusual in the room."
Jimmy: "Yeah, do you have a camera in the car? I couldn't find any surveillance that captures Seyman's apartment here. I can only try to keep watch."
Jones: "Wait for me to come back."
After a few minutes, Jones drove back. He didn't stop outside Seyman's apartment but twenty or thirty meters away from it.
Jones: "Jimmy, any discoveries?"
Jimmy: "No, Seyman hasn't come out. I'm trying to capture anyone entering or leaving on camera, so we can check that later. My gut says Seyman definitely has issues. He seemed very nervous during our conversation."
Jimmy didn't know how else to phrase it, so had to make up some nonsense to bide his time.