Ridley Pearson: Probable Cause (USA 1991)

From the Publisher:
SHATTERED...
by a mindless act of violence that changed his life forever, James Dewitt decided to become a cop.

SHACKLED...
by a web of red tape and corruption, Dewitt now fights desperately to solve a string of murders cleverly staged to look like suicides.

SUBMERGED...
in the deranged world of the psychopathic mind, Dewitt struggles to outwit the killer-the man they call the "trapper"-before it's too late... and to use every fingerprint and every fiber -- and every last ounce of his strength-to escape the ultimate evil.

Ridley Pearson: Probable Cause. When one man's passion for justice becomes an obsession for revenge. St. Martin's Press, ISBN: 0312923856 (January, 1991), 401 p., $5.95.

Ridley Pearson: Probable Cause (USA 1990)

From the Publisher:
Ridley Pearson's last novel, Undercurrents, rocketed him onto the bestseller lists and earned him critical acclaim from coast to coast. Now, Probable Cause confirms Pearson's emergence as one of the finest crime novelists in America, a master of intricate procedural detail combined with taut, edge-of-the-seat plotting and acute psychological suspense.

The setting is Carmel, California - a scenic, peaceful tourist haven where James Dewitt is the police force's only detective. His usual caseload is stolen bicycles and an occasional burglary. But things change with frightening speed when a series of apparent suicides, which soon prove to be murders, shocks the community. Dewitt, a former forensic scientist, struggles with the minutest of clues in his quest for the killer, while departmental turf wars and local politics increase the pressures on his investigation. But his steps are dogged by renegade ex-cop Howard Lumbrowski, the man Dewitt blames for his wife's death. How is Lumbrowski connected to the killings? And why does he have information from Dewitt's confidential files?

Dewitt finds himself playing a dangerous game, breaking his own rules in his desperate search for answers. And as the case takes another murderous twist, the past comes back to haunt Dewitt. He will have to fight to save his reputation - and his life.

Ridley Pearson: Probable Cause. St. Martin's Press, ISBN: 031203914X (February, 1990), 288 p., $18.95.