The Detective’s DeskHARD · CASE FILE
Hard · A private editorial meeting at a gallery
A signed departure entry appears to remove the editor from the murder interval. An assistant had a motive, and a caretaker admits a different offence. Test the departure entry against independent timing and movements, then identify the roles the evidence actually supports.
Read the case file below, or open the interactive desk to examine records, keep notes and submit your reasoning. These are the case materials, without the solution.
Rowan is found in his private office. The doctor’s supplied interval is civil time. Every person-sized office entrance is covered by the checked civil-time access record; there is no remote device or unrecorded visitor.
Research assistant
I was in the public lecture from civil 21:00 until the alarm. I had argued with the victim over credit.
The lecture stream gives its live civil timestamp, not the hall clock time.
Duty doctor
The examination places Rowan’s deliberate close-range assault at civil 21:05–21:12.
The appointment message was copied to the front desk before the incident.
Visiting editor
I left the building when the hall clock showed 20:55. The signed departure book confirms it.
The clock in the hall has a maintenance offset from civil time.
Front-desk attendant
I wrote the departure-book time by copying the hall clock. I did not independently verify that Mara had left then.
I preserved the clock’s checked correction card and the complete entrance record.
Gallery caretaker
I removed petty cash earlier and lied that I had not entered the office all day. I did not harm the victim.
My disputed office visit was recorded before the later private appointment.
Read each record on its own terms. A claim made by a person is different from a fact established by an independent record.
Physical record · Front desk
The entry copies the displayed hall-clock time beside Mara’s declared departure. Omar expressly marks it “declaration received; exit not sighted”. It is not an independent physical sighting.
Physical record · Private office
Rowan dies from a deliberate close-range assault at civil 21:05–21:12. The earlier petty-cash removal does not fall in that interval.
Physical record · Private office
Mara enters the office at civil 21:05 and leaves at 21:12. Her face is clear. No other person enters between those times, and the office has no other usable entrance.
Physical record · Private office
Tomas removes petty cash at civil 19:40. The complete sequence then shows him at the front-desk inventory with Omar during the fatal interval. His initial all-day denial conceals an earlier theft.
Physical record · Front desk
Mara asks Omar to enter the displayed hall time before she collects her documents. He agrees to record the declaration but not to certify an exit. There is no request disclosing or agreeing to an assault.
Physical record · Lecture room
Celia stays on the live lecture stream at civil 21:00–21:20. The disputed research credit is real, but the stream locates her away from the office during the assault.
Physical record · Front desk
Rowan asks Mara to bring the source documents to the private office at civil 21:05. He intends to report that her published edition used forged source material. Her reply acknowledges the meeting.
Physical record · Front desk
The hall clock is ten minutes slow. Its displayed 20:55 corresponds to civil 21:05. It was checked and recorded before the appointment, not adjusted after the incident.
Use the interactive case desk to select your finding and cite the records that support it. The answer is checked there, and your progress stays in your browser.
Compare the records with each account. Work out what the evidence establishes, then separate that finding from anything it does not prove.