actively on the prowl for a love interest. His wife had been dead for seven years, and he longed for a stable relationship. Ron did not. Women were for sex and nothing else. Ron, though, proved difficult to shake that night, and when Dennis went to visit his lady friend, Ron went with him. When he finally realized he wasn't welcome, he got mad and left, but not on foot. He stole Dennis's car and drove to Bruce Leba's house. Fritz stayed with the woman, and when he got up the next morning, he realized his car was gone. He called the police, filed a report, then called Bruce Leba and asked if he'd seen Ron. Bruce agreed to drive Ron and the stolen car back to Ada, and when they arrived, both were stopped by the police. The charges were dropped, but Dennis and Ron did not speak for months.
Fritz was at home in Ada when he received a phone call from Detective Dennis Smith. The police wanted him to come down to the station and answer some questions. What kinds of questions? Fritz asked. We'll tell you when you get here, Smith replied. Fritz reluctantly went to the station. He had nothing to hide, but any such encounter with the police was unnerving. Smith and Gary Rogers asked him about his relationship with Ron Williamson, an old friend he hadn't seen in months. The questions were businesslike at first, but slowly became accusatory. "Where were you on the night of December 7?" Dennis wasn't sure at that moment; he'd need some time to think about it. "Did you know Debbie Carter?" No. And so on. After an hour, Fritz left the station, mildly concerned that he was even involved in the investigation.
Dennis Smith called again and asked Fritz if he would take a polygraph. With his science background, Fritz knew that polygraphs are wildly unreliable, and he wanted no part of an exam. At the same time, he'd never met Debbie Carter, and he wanted to prove this to Smith and Rogers. He reluctantly agreed, and a test was scheduled at the OSBI offices in Oklahoma City. As the day approached, Fritz became more and more nervous, and to calm his nerves, he took a Valium right before the exam.
The test was administered by OSBI agent Rusty Featherstone, with Dennis Smith and Gary Rogers lurking nearby. When it was over, the cops huddled over the graphs, grimly shaking their heads at the bad news.
Fritz was informed that he had "severely flunked" the exam.
"Impossible" was his first response.
You're hiding something, they said. Fritz admitted to being nervous and finally confessed that he'd taken a Valium. This upset the cops, and they insisted that he take another polygraph. He felt as though he had no choice.
A week later Featherstone brought his machine to Ada and set it up in the basement of the police department. Fritz was even more nervous than before, but answered the questions truthfully and easily.
He "severely flunked" it again, only this time even worse, according to Featherstone, Smith, and Rogers. The post-polygraph interrogation began with a fury. Rogers, playing the bad cop, began cursing and threatening and saying, "You're hiding something, Fritz," over and over. Smith tried to play the role of Fritz's true friend, but it was a juvenile act and an old one at that.
Rogers was dressed like a cowboy, boots and all, and his style was to strut around the room, fuming, cursing, threatening, talking about death row and lethal injections, then suddenly he would lunge at Fritz, jab him in the chest, and tell him that he was going to confess. The routine was frightening enough, but not very effective. Fritz said over and over, "Get out of my face."
Rogers finally accused him of the rape and murder. He got angry, and his language became even more abusive as he described how Fritz and his sidekick, Williamson, broke in on the girl, raped her and killed her, and now he, Rogers, was demanding a confession. With no evidence, only a confession could've solved the case, and the cops were desperate to squeeze one out of Fritz. But he didn't budge. He had nothing to confess, but after two hours of verbal abuse he wanted to give them something. He told the story of a road trip he and Ron had made to Norman the previous summer, a rowdy night in bars looking for girls, one of whom hopped in the backseat of