Capital Crimes

by Peggy Blair

Inspector Ricardo Ramirez, the head of the Havana Major Crimes Unit, is haunted by the victims of his unsolved homicide cases, including an elderly woman whose dead body is discovered on New Year’s Eve. But before he can complete his investigation into her murder, he’s ordered to go to Canada and bring home Rey Callendes, a Catholic priest arrested by the RCMP for possessing child pornography on his laptop computer.

Soon after Ramirez arrives in Ottawa, women in Havana start dying from a mysterious food poisoning, one that could shut down the entire Cuban tourist industry and put others at risk if it’s not identified soon. Ramirez is powerless to do anything except hope that his friend, Hector Apiro, a brilliant forensic pathologist, can find the source of the toxin. But when it turns out that one of the poisoning victims,Hillary Ellis, is the wife of an Ottawa detective, Mike Ellis, who Ramirez was holding in custody in a Cuban jail when Hillary died, Ramirez is pulled into the investigation. Could Detective Ellis have poisoned his wife, and in doing so, killed others? And if he did, how did he get away with it?

With Apiro’s help, Ramirez not only uncovers a cold-blooded killer but untangles a web of depravity and deceit that extends from the corridors of power in the Vatican to Canada and Cuba.

This book is an update of THE POISONED PAWN with many changes from the original book. Available only from ReBound Press.

Mass Market Paperback

Published October 24, 2024

About the author

Peggy Blair was a lawyer for more than thirty years. A recognized expert in Indigenous law, she worked as both a criminal defence lawyer and Crown prosecutor before going into real estate. Blair is a Level 5 Boxer, an artist and a renovator. She is named in the Canadian Who's Who and is probably best known for her #DearestMartha tweets during the Freedom Convoy. She lives just outside Ottawa with a friendly cat and a TV watching dog.