Minneapolis, late-March, 1975

 

After 16 days of intensive street work visiting 60 places selling cars and 43 covered parking garages, one of Yuri’s team members finally found a lead. After three visits to a large dealership on the south edge of the city, a part-time salesman recognized Kalin’s picture and remembered selling him a year-old station wagon. He remembered because it was the first cash sale of a nearly new car he had ever made. It wasn’t uncommon but it was his first.

The salesman said, “No, there was no trade-in. Are you cops? Because if you aren’t, I’m not telling you anymore.”

“No, we are not cops but we need to find this man and are willing to pay a $50 fee for any information.”

The salesman said, “We are finished here,” and walked into the show room.

Yuri’s team set up to watch for the salesman leaving after work so they could follow him home, but missed him in the traffic coming and going into the dealership.

At the meeting with Yuri that night, he wasn’t pleased they failed to find out where the salesman lived or his name. Yuri split the team to make two teams each with a member who could identify the salesman going or coming from the Ford dealership.

Yuri told them not to come back without the information and to do whatever it took. After three days of watching, a team saw the salesman leaving the car lot. They followed him to a diner and, when he came out alone, grabbed him just as he was getting in his car. The salesman, whose name was Gary Hoyle, recognized one of the team and said, “I told you I wasn’t going to give you any more information.”

“Look, we’re private detectives who are being paid to find a guy who ran out on his pregnant wife and two little kids. Her dad has retained us to find and serve him. We are authorized to pay you $500 for information about the false name he is now using and the VIN and description of the station wagon. Also we will not make trouble for your dealership selling a car for cash to a person using a false name and fictitious address. The court case over that could take months. Please cooperate. No one, including us, needs that kind of aggravation.”

“Let me see your licenses.”

“Okay,” and one of the team handed both licenses to him.

“Looks good to me. But I don’t have the file with me. I’ll have to get a copy of the sales contract.”

“Can you remember the name?”

“Only the last name and that was Kincaid.”

“Here’s $250. Bring the contract here tomorrow and we’ll give you the rest of the money.”

“Okay. See you here tomorrow at noon. Can I go now?”

“Yes and thank you. You have done a good thing.”

When they reported to Yuri, he left one team member to meet again with the salesman, while he and the other three went directly to Pittsburgh on separate flights.