We looked at the issue prior to this back in May, so let's jump into part 2 of "The Storm"!
The issue opens on a funeral, and El Diablo being a little snippy with the pastor he visited last issue. The situation of the missing children has only gotten worse. It doesn't start that way, as Rafe describes the city's initial reaction to word of a serial killer as 'pulling together', but that doesn't last.
Rafe tries to organize a local neighborhood watch with local activist Olga Zamora, but it gets hung up in concerns about funding with the city government being on break through the holidays. So El Diablo turns to the "Los Diablos", a group of teenagers that helped him out before. He wants them to ask people in the neighborhoods if they've seen anything. Problem being, people in those neighborhoods don't like talking to cops, or anyone. The fact the Hispanic segment of the city's population doesn't trust the cops (who could have guessed) comes up more than once in the issue.
Rafe's cop buddy in charge of the investigation, Austin, is pushing himself to solve the case, while Zamora asks him to his face if there would be more progress if it was white kids being killed rather than brown. Which only makes Austin more determined, as he's already worried about his kids, who are mixed-race. Rafe tries to get funding for the neighborhood watch at a council meeting, but gets sideswiped by the corporate bagman, Councilman Thorn, and the matter is knocked down the agenda. The mayor's aide, Virginia, doesn't help by criticizing Rafe for getting adversarial with Thorn. Right, where's Rafe's bipartisan spirit? He should reach across the aisle so Thorn can really land a good punch on his nose.
Then one of the missing kids is found buried in an abandoned lot. The crime scene gets messed up by a bunch of people, Austin makes a dumb comment about it, the father of one of the victims takes a swing at him, the other cops respond with their typical restraint, everybody's angry. The neighborhood watch idea falls apart. Zamora tells Rafe families are moving back to Mexico where it's safer, theorizing this is all a plan to get these folks out so their low-income housing can be razed in favor of that commercial development. Boy, it'd almost be nice if that was the case. Then El Diablo could punch Thorn, and the Mayor, who is too busy meeting with developers to listen to Rafe's warning that this theory is gaining strength in parts of the city.
The Los Diablos are frustrated, too, but Artemio gets a lead on a guy. Lonnie March, the 'perfect suspect.' El Diablo convinces them to call it in as an anonymous tip, and March gets arrested. The crowd waits outside the police station for official word, getting angrier the longer they wait. But the victim had skin under their fingernails, and the DNA doesn't match. March even has good alibis, so Austin has to go out and explain that yep, they let the guy go.
The grieving father leads a mob back to March's place, including Artemio and another of Los Diablos. Zamora is outside the station, demanding answers and implying there's a cover-up, then is stunned when the crowd opts for mob violence. She even asks Austin if this is what he wanted, so I can't tell if she's disingenuous or a fucking idiot. I think Jones is just trying to write her as someone always seeing conspiracies, so we aren't supposed to take her seriously, but I don't know.
March tries to run and is seconds from getting beat to death when, first El Diablo and then the cops show up. A couple of the crowd get arrested, the killer is still unknown, and everybody is really pissed now. El Diablo's frustrated with himself for disappearing so the cops couldn't question him, and fears all that's been accomplished is make the situation worse. He's not wrong!
{4th longbox, 52nd comic, El Diablo #5, by Gerard Jones (writer), Mike Parobeck (penciler), John Nyberg (inker), Lovern Kindzierski (colorist), Tim Harkins (letterer)}
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