Without Fear or Favor

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Ciampi smiled and held up her cell phone. “Excuse me for a moment. I need to make a call.” She walked around the corner of a bookcase.

  When she reappeared, she said, “We’re good. I’ve called a cab to take us to the East Village Women’s Shelter. It’s a high-security shelter that offers drug rehabilitation as well as life skills that you need to get back out there. You’ll be safe and you’ll be surrounded by a lot of people who are going through, or have already gone through, what you are.”

  Pardo smiled. “It sounds nice.”

  “Good, it’s settled, then,” Ciampi said. “Just one more thing. I want to stop by my apartment. I want you to meet my husband.”

  “That’s kind of you, but why?”

  “Because he’s the district attorney of New York County and he’s the man you need to tell your story to.” Marlene looked the other woman in the eye. “If you’re not ready, that’s okay, but we’re only a couple of blocks away. And there’s no time like the present, right?”

  Pardo bit her lip, then nodded her head. “If you say so, but there’s something else I didn’t tell you. Something important.”

  “And what’s that?”

  “I used to be a cop.”

  14

  “WHAT DO WE WANT?”

  “Justice!”

  “When do we want it?”

  “Now!”

  Karp could hear the chanting from the park across the street rising up to his office on the eighth floor of the Criminal Courts Building. A sea of humanity ebbed and flowed, snarling traffic, swirling around the makeshift stand in the park where Reverend Mufti shouted into his bullhorn. The crowd pressed against a cordon of police officers in riot gear who stood in front of the entrance.

  The crowd and its ringmasters had been gathering since noon, waiting for the press conference. They were expecting to hear that Karp was going forward with an indictment against Officer Bryce Kim for the shooting death of Ricky Watts. But they were going to be disappointed, and that would mean trouble.

  “I don’t like this,” Fulton said, coming over to stand next to Karp as he peered down. “There’s a lot of anger out there, and you’re going to be exposed in a way we can’t protect you. We don’t even know where this Anthony Johnson, aka Nat X, is, or any of his followers. But it’s not just about them, either; all it takes is one lone nut who thinks he’s striking a blow for the cause.”

  Karp looked at his friend. “I don’t think we have to worry about Johnson today. Ambushing an unsuspecting cop is one thing. Even talking some kid into trying to shoot an officer or, if what we’re hearing out of Oakland is right, raping and strangling old women in their beds at night is more his style. But showing up here, trying to do something in front of a few hundred police officers who are ready for him and would like nothing better than to take him down? Nah, he doesn’t have the cojones for that.”

  The chanting outside grew louder. Across the office, where he was standing next to the massive bookcase, Gilbert Murrow shook his head. “I can’t believe that Mufti is leading the protest. You’d think after Clay and Vince Cippio saved his butt, he’d be a little grateful.”

  After Eddie Evans called and said he wanted to talk about the death of Imani Sefu, he’d met with Karp and Fulton and told them about the meeting at Farrell’s Bar in Brooklyn. “I don’t think it was an accident that Sefu got left alone in the exercise yard or that Adkins had a weapon,” he said. “I think it was a setup, and I think they’ve got plans to go after others, maybe Mufti.”

  After giving it some thought, Karp asked Evans if he’d be willing to wear a wire and meet with the three officers again. “I would,” Evans said, “but I don’t think they’d trust me after the way I left it, at least not enough to say anything. But I thought you’d ask, and I do have an idea.”

  The plan was to ask Vince Cippio Sr. “That’s a lot to ask a man who just lost his second son in the line of duty,” Karp said.

  “That’s why I think he’d do it,” Evans said. “Tony was a great cop. In addition to that he had a lot of integrity, wouldn’t so much as accept a free cup of coffee on a cold day. The reason why he was playing basketball with a bunch of kids on the day he got shot was to show them what a police officer is supposed to be. And that apple definitely did not fall far from the tree. He talked a lot about his dad’s influence on him as an officer and a man. I don’t think Vince is going to be too happy with a bunch of vigilante cops using his son’s death as an excuse to commit murder.”

  So Evans and Fulton had gone to see Cippio who, they later told Karp, had grown more visibly angry the more he heard. He insisted that he be wired.

  As it turned out, Cippio had almost waited too long before stopping the hanging. “I have to admit,” he’d said later when they all met back in Karp’s office, “I wanted to see Mufti sweat. He has no idea how his words hurt those of us who have lost people we love to murderers who are encouraged by inference, if not calls to action, to attack police officers.”

  Fulton laughed. “Well, he did more than sweat. He needed a change of underwear before he came down to the office to give a statement.”

  Whatever Mufti felt after the attempt on his life was foiled, it wasn’t gratitude. He immediately went to the press with a full account, including a dramatic reenactment for Vansand’s program. He said the plot was “proof that something evil lived in the heart of the New York Police Department, as well as police departments across the land.” The only mention of his saviors was to note that “if not for the actions of a black officer, I would have been martyred.”

  Nor had he let up after Karp indicted Gilliam, Delgado, Satars, and Adkins for the murder of Imani Sefu, and the three officers for the attempted murder of Mufti. “What else could the district attorney do with the eyes of this city and the world upon him?” the reverend pontificated on one of the national Sunday-morning news shows. “Let us see how he proceeds not only with these cases, but the murder of an unarmed black teenager, Ricky Watts, by a police officer.”

  Now with Mufti inciting the crowd gathering in front of the Criminal Courts Building, Karp was going to have to appeal to a mob for patience. “Grateful?” he responded rhetorically. “His brush with ‘martyrdom’ has only increased his platform and standing. This attempt on his life by the thin blue line, or whatever they were calling themselves, had the opposite effect of what they intended. If police officers would commit murder to silence Mufti, that must mean he’s speaking the truth: cops are running amok, killing innocent black men. And now they want blood—not just those three idiots, but Bryce Kim’s as well. Mufti’s eating this up.”

  “Maybe you should say that there’s evidence supporting Kim’s story,” Murrow said. “And that it’s tied to the murder of Tony Cippio.”

  Karp shook his head. “We’ve been over this. We don’t know where Anthony Johnson is, but wherever he is, I don’t want him to think we’re on to him, or know his real identity. And until we can find him and bring him to trial, everything else will just be interpreted as stalling and play into the hands of Mufti and the media.”

  Turning away from the window, Karp looked at the half dozen yellow legal pads on his desk. They represented his notes on the Cippio and Watts cases: what he had, what he didn’t have and needed. Every day it seemed that a new piece of the puzzle was added. First Jaxon had come through with a DNA match to Anthony Johnson. Then it was Maurice Greene and DeShawn Lakes. Then the other evening when Marlene returned from “going to see another man about a dog” with Judy Pardo in tow.

  Each piece alone didn’t amount to much, yet together they were creating a solid case. He was still missing the two most important pieces, however: the killer and a silver, mother-of-pearl-handled .45 revolver. But as of that morning, he believed they were so close he could practically write his opening statement for the trial.

  Earlier that morning, he’d barely walked in the office when Fulton had appeared at the door. The detective held up a file folder and grinned.

&n
bsp; “What’s that?” Karp had asked.

  “The Holy Grail,” Fulton replied. “Actually, it’s the police report on that beef Johnson did in Oakland that Jaxon told you about. Only it wasn’t just a sex assault. He murdered an old woman, but the DA let him off with the lesser pleas. I told you I have a friend with Oakland PD, and he just sent a copy of the case file. Pretty grim stuff—what he did to the victim—but the most interesting information to us at the moment is the list of items stolen from her apartment, put together by her son.”

  Karp smiled. Fulton loved telling detective stories and Karp knew he was building to the climactic moment. “And on that list was . . . ?” he asked, playing along.

  “Drumroll, please,” Fulton said, stretching out the moment. “A stainless steel, forty-five-caliber Smith & Wesson Model 460 with an after-market mother-of-pearl grip. Apparently, her husband was a small-town police chief and it was given to him when he retired. It was registered, so we have the serial number.”

  “We need that gun,” Karp said.

  “Working on it,” Fulton replied. “It’s an unusual piece. Expensive, too. There’s a chance he’ll try to get rid of it and sell it to one of his cronies, and it will turn up in some other crime. Or maybe he’ll try to pawn it, and we’ll get lucky. NYPD has a notice out to all the pawnshops in the city, and all the Bay Area PDs are doing the same there in case he returns. Jaxon said he’d get it into the national crime computer. So let’s hope we get lucky.”

  “We just need to buy a little more time,” Karp said, as much to himself as the others. He looked at his watch and sighed. “Okay, let’s go get this over with.”

  “I’m with Fulton on this,” Murrow said. “I wish you’d reconsider. I can just go give a statement on your behalf. Nobody wants to shoot me.”

  Karp shook his head. “That just plays into their narrative—that I’m hiding out, stalling for time, hoping it will all pass over. I’ve got to go show my face, even if it’s just to say nothing much is new.”

  “You know how I feel,” Fulton said. “But if you’re going to do this, it’s simply to deliver the message and get the hell out of there. No questions and answers.”

  “Okay, okay.” Karp held up his hands in mock surrender. “I already gave in to your rules of the game. We’ll play it your way, but we’re going to play it.”

  Seeing the look on Fulton’s face, Karp added, “Look, guys, nothing I’d like more than to take the private elevator down, avoid the crowd, walk home while the sun is out, kiss my pretty wife, and relax for a few hours. But I got a job to do, and part of that is trying to reassure the people of this city that we’re out there trying to protect them, not hiding.”

  Fulton nodded. “I hear you, Butch. I know where you’re coming from. I’ve spent my whole life trying to do just that. I’m just worried about a friend.”

  Holding out his hand, Karp said, “I’ve never had a better friend, Clay, or met a man I trusted as much. You’re more than a friend, you’re my brother, and you always will be.”

  The big man’s eyes welled up as he shook Karp’s hand. “Feeling’s likewise, but all this talk is giving me the heebie-jeebies.”

  The moment was interrupted by a large sniffle. They both looked over to where Gilbert Murrow was wiping his nose. His face flushed when he saw them watching.

  “Murrow, are you crying?” Fulton asked with a smile.

  “Absolutely not,” Murrow denied, pushing his glasses back up his nose. “I was just interrupting this love fest or we’re going to be late.”

  The three men took the elevator down to the lobby, which had been cleared of most of the public. However, Marlene was waiting near the elevator bank.

  “You didn’t need to come,” Karp said. “This is going to last all of five minutes.”

  “I wanted to show my support.” Marlene nodded toward the doors. “It’s getting pretty wild out there.”

  Karp looked beyond the door. He could see the bank of microphones waiting for him, and beyond them, the assembled press, and beyond them, the black-uniformed riot police and the sea of angry faces.

  “Then the sooner we do this, the better,” he said, and led the way out of the door.

  “There’s Karp,” someone yelled from beyond the wall of police. “Quit protecting racist cops, Karp!”

  “WHAT DO WE WANT?” Reverend Mufti’s voice boomed from across the street.

  “JUSTICE!” the crowd responded.

  “WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

  “NOW!”

  Karp looked up, above the crowd at the bright blue sky beyond the roofs of the city. He closed his eyes for a moment and thought about his family. His sons. His daughter. The woman at his side, his wife, Marlene. About their sometimes crazy, always exciting lives together. I’d do it all again, he reflected, then wondered as he heard Murrow introduce him, Why the morose thoughts?

  Karp took a deep breath and let it out as he stepped up to the podium next to Fulton, who stood glaring out at the crowd. “Good afternoon,” he said. “Due to the lawlessness that has swept the streets of our city since the officer-involved shooting of a young man, Ricky Watts—”

  “Murder, you mean!” someone in the crowd yelled. This was met with shouts of agreement, but Karp pressed on.

  “Since the incident, the New York Police Department has conducted its investigation with its usual professionalism and thoroughness. The detectives involved in that investigation have now passed on their report to my office. I, personally, have tasked the NYPD detective squad attached to the District Attorney’s Office to continue that investigation so that a determination can be made as to whether charges are warranted against the officer. That investigation has not yet concluded and therefore no decision has been made. When . . .”

  As the words sank in, an angry murmur rose from the crowd. “He’s going to let the pig off!” a woman screamed.

  “No justice!” a large black man bellowed and pressed against the wall of riot officers.

  “When that decision is made,” Karp continued, “it will be according to the rule of law, and without fear or favor to either party, which every citizen has the right to expect from the County of New York District Attorney’s Office. That includes police officers.”

  “Everybody except an unarmed black boy!” a protester yelled.

  “Although this investigation will continue as long as necessary to establish the facts, I’m told by Detective Clay Fulton, the chief of the DAO squad”—Karp nodded toward Fulton—“that he expects it to come to a conclusion soon. I ask that the good citizens of our city exercise patience and restraint and allow the system to work.”

  “You’re stalling, Karp!”

  Across the street in the park, Mufti began bellowing into the bullhorn again. “WHAT DO WE WANT?”

  “JUSTICE!”

  “WHEN DO WE WANT IT?”

  “NOW!”

  Karp looked at the media cameras. “Thank you. That is all.”

  As the angry crowd pressed up to the cordon of police, Mufti changed his chant. “NO GUN, NO EXCUSE!”

  “NO GUN, NO EXCUSE!” the crowd responded.

  Just as he was beginning to turn away from the media and the crowd, Karp heard someone shout his name from down the steps. He thought it was someone in the media and though he’d said he wasn’t going to answer any questions, he hesitated. That’s when he saw him: a thin, young, well-dressed black man who separated himself from the rest of the media and stood pointing something at him.

  “Gun! He’s got a gun!” someone yelled.

  Karp frowned. He sensed, more than saw, Fulton start to react. Then there was a flash, and something struck him in the chest harder than he’d ever been hit before. I’ve been shot, he thought as he began to fall back. Then there was a second blow.

  As he lost consciousness, he heard another shot, closer than the first two. Marlene screamed his name. There was an intense pain in his chest and then nothing. His heart stopped beating.

  15

&
nbsp; Moto Juku jumped when the cell phone on the coffee table started buzzing. He looked at caller ID and frowned. “It’s Georgi from the pawnshop,” he said to the young black man sitting next to him on the couch.

  “Answer it on speakerphone,” his companion said, taking another puff on the joint they’d been smoking before passing it to the teenage woman next to him. “But I’m not here.”

  Juku nodded and answered. “ ’Sup?” he asked.

  “What’s up? What’s up? You tell me what’s up,” the agitated voice of the pawnshop owner boomed into the tiny apartment.

  “What do you mean?” Juku replied.

  “I’ll tell you what I mean. Cops are visiting every pawnshop in the Bay Area, including mine, looking for a certain gun.”

  “What gun?” Juku asked, though he knew what the caller was referring to—a stainless steel .45 caliber revolver with a mother-of-pearl handle.

  Anthony Johnson had shown the man the gun two weeks earlier when he’d come to his apartment in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco. The implication was that he was a thoroughly dangerous man.

  “Don’t play stupid with me, Juku,” the pawnshop owner, Georgi Gregorian, snarled. “The gun your pal, Nkama, or whatever the hell his real name is, talked me into taking under the table and delaying sending the serial number in like a law-abiding establishment. Now I know why. It’s hot, and by that I mean hot enough that they’re going shop to shop. They got the serial number, make, and model. And they’re making it clear that if we don’t say anything—and get caught—they are going to make life a living hell.”

  Johnson tugged on Juku’s arm and whispered, “Ask him if they were looking for anybody in particular.”

  “They mention anybody by name?”

  “No. What? You think they’re going to tell a pawnshop owner why they want this gun? Now I got a hot gun in my safe, and my ass is grass if they catch me with it, but I can’t sell it to anybody legit with this kind of heat. And if I sell it to some creep who uses it for a crime, and he gets caught and rats on me, I’m doubly screwed. So where is he?”