Isabel's Run

by M. D. Grayson

  He took notes. “Basement?”

  “Yeah. Like I said, I didn’t even know about it when I was there. But apparently, there’s a basement with an entry in the office down here on the main floor.” I pointed to it.

  Nancy looked at me for a moment, then she looked down at her notes for a few seconds. “The judge talked to our witness—a juvenile female—last night,” she said. “Our witness told her that the gang keeps marijuana in the kitchen pantry and that they keep cocaine, methamphetamine, and weapons downstairs in the basement. Also—and this is very important—she said there are two bedrooms in the basement that lock from the outside; they’re essentially jail cells. We have reason to believe that a missing juvenile—Isabel Delgado—may be held in one of these basement bedrooms. Although the judge gave us our warrant specifically for illegal drugs, the warrant allows us to search those bedrooms—for drugs—and to make sure our officers are safe. If you happen to discover a young girl being held against her will while you’re in there, well, let’s just go ahead and bring her out, too.”

  Radovich nodded. “Agreed,” he said.

  “Any idea what we’re talking about in terms of dope?” Bryant asked.

  “I think there’s at least ten kilos in the kitchen pantry,” I said, pointing to the closet I’d sketched in the back of the kitchen. “I think it’s in one-kilo bricks. I don’t know anything about the blow or the crystal.”

  He stared at me for a minute. I didn’t know what to make of his dark, beady eyes. Maybe he just didn’t like me. “You seem to have pretty good information,” he said.

  I smiled. “I do,” I said. I didn’t elaborate.

  “How about the guns?” Radovich asked. “Do we know anything about their weapons?”

  Nancy turned to me. “Well?” she asked.

  I shook my head. “No, sorry. I don’t know anything about their weapons.”

  “How about lookouts?” Radovich asked.

  “The couple times we’ve driven past, we haven’t seen any,” I said.

  “So,” Radovich said, “if we’re going to the trouble of searching the house for drugs, and if we happen to find some, we’re going to want to arrest someone. Preferably the ringleader—this Donnie Martin character. How do we know he’ll even be at this house? As I understand it, he and his girlfriend—,” he referred to his notes before continuing, “Patricia Denise ‘Crystal’ Wallace—don’t even live there.”

  “True,” I said, nodding. “But every day we’ve watched, Martin and Crystal Wallace leave their house about a mile away and drive over to this house at noon or a little after. We think they hold some sort of staff meeting—maybe to divvy up the previous night’s earnings. But we’ll know for sure whether he’s there or not by whether we see his car—a white BMW.”

  “And we don’t need to worry about these other two houses?” He pointed to photos of the big house and the girls’ house.

  I shook my head. “Lucky for us, they have their daily staff meeting at our target house. There probably won’t be anyone at all at the big house, and most likely it will be just the girls at the other house.”

  “We’re going to watch both of them while we’re raiding the house on Brooklyn, anyway,” Nancy said. “Or actually, Danny’s going to have a man watching each house so that we can concentrate all our guys on the raid. Our warrant includes them, as well—just without the no-knock part. We’ll hit them after we’re all done with the target.”

  Radovich nodded. “Makes sense. So here’s our basic plan, then. He spent the next twenty minutes going through a simple but very detailed assault plan that seemed to me to leave nothing to chance.

  “Anything else anyone wants to add?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” Mickey said. “Remember to be careful with Martin. He’s dangerous.”

  Radovich nodded. “So are we.” He looked up at the clock in the back of the room. “It’s eleven o’clock now. We’ll meet at the rally point at noon. I’ll need a couple of minutes there to go over the plan with all the men. At 12:15 p.m. we’ll move to our assault positions. Then, when everyone’s ready, we’ll go. Questions?”

  There were none. The meeting broke up, and we started to leave.

  “Hey, Logan.”

  I turned around.

  Gary Radovich approached. “I just wanted to say, I appreciate you coming clean in there. My main goal is to make sure that I go home with the same number of guys I started with.”

  I nodded. “Been there, Captain. I get it. Just remember: these guys are going to be either in the back of the house—the family room—or the basement. The living room’s not set up for more than four people.”

  “Got it,” he said. “Thanks.”

  Nancy walked up and said, “I appreciate it, too. Still, when this is all over, we need to have a little talk,” she said. “Seriously.”

  I nodded. You bet. Right after we pull Isabel and Kelli out, I’m all yours.

  * * * *

  Since I often drive the Jeep with its hard top removed, I’d had a locking steel box welded into the floor of the cargo compartment for security purposes. Both Toni and I are almost always armed. For me, it’s a carryover from my military days. Toni learned from me. On the few occasions when I needed to take my weapon off—like when I visit police headquarters, for example—I lock it up in the steel box. But today, the moment we were out of there—even as we stood there in the police garage—we “gunned” up. To not have done so would have been unthinkable. Imagine. “Excuse me, Mr. Armed Bad Guy. Would you hold up a second while I run to my car and get my sidearm?”

  Although we were dressed plainclothes-style in blue jeans and shirts, we’d chosen to wear our tactical belts and holsters today—the kind that strap down around the thigh. In the unlikely event that we found ourselves in a gunfight during the raid, I wanted to be ready. Along those lines, I also went ahead and pulled out the two dark blue bulletproof vests we’d brought along. These, I tossed into the backseat of the Jeep for easy access later.

  “You ready?” I asked Toni.

  She nodded.

  “You nervous?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Mostly because of Kelli.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “We’ll have her out of there before lunchtime’s over.”

  Chapter 25

  OUR RALLY POINT was the parking lot on the north side of the football field at Roosevelt High School, about three-fourths of a mile north of the boys’ house on Brooklyn. Because we had a little extra time, we went to a drive-through at a Starbucks on the way. Toni ordered a latte, and I ordered my usual trenta-size green tea. We jumped back on the road, and we were still fifteen minutes early to the parking lot. By 11:55 a.m., though, the lot was crowded with police vehicles including a SWAT truck, no fewer than twelve patrol cars, a half-dozen unmarked cars—even an ambulance with EMTs. Altogether, there were almost fifty police officers present. Clearly, taking down a gang headquarters where the occupants were known to be armed and dangerous was something SPD was taking seriously. This was probably a good thing. Also, it made the thought of having to go in and rescue the girls on our own seem a little overwhelming. I’m glad we were able to get SPD to do the heavy lifting.

  At noon, everyone assembled around an easel near the steps at the side of the SWAT truck. Nancy started us off by pointing to a map on a flip chart mounted on the easel. “Here’s how things are laying out,” she said. “We’ve got search warrants for three houses including our primary target, which is this house here at 6147 Brooklyn Avenue. The target house warrant is a no-knock. At this time, we’ve got people watching all three houses, just so we can keep tabs on everything. Just for your background, these places have been identified as houses used by the North Side Street Boyz gang—the subject of our raid. Our intel tells us there’s a daily meeting about this time at the target house on Brooklyn where the gang members get together. In fact, right now as we speak, Donnie Martin, leader of the gang, is at the target house for the meeting. Nancy paused and flipped
a chart to a page with blowups of the surveillance photographs we’d taken. “He’s a BMA, aged twenty-two. Approximately six feet and weighing a hundred and sixty-five. He drives a white BMW 750i, with Washington tags: 375-WAK. Our surveillance team says it’s parked in front of the house right now.”

  “Martin rarely travels without his two lieutenants—DeMichael Hollins and Crystal Wallace.” She flipped the chart and showed photos of the two. She read off their descriptions as well.

  “Now, we will continue surveillance on the other two NSSB houses while we raid the target. After we hit the target house, we’ll release SWAT, and then we’ll raid the other two, starting with the house on Nineteenth. We don’t believe that there are gang members at either of the other two houses at the present time. If that changes, our surveillance people will let us know.” She looked at me, and I nodded. The surveillance people she referred to consisted of Doc at the big house and Kenny at the girls’ house. She continued, “At the target house, we’re going to detain everyone inside and, if the narcotics guys locate the drugs we expect to find, we’ll go ahead and arrest them all.” She looked around. “Questions so far?”

  There were none.

  She smiled and continued. “You may have noticed all the guys in the black tactical clothes,” she said, sweeping her arm toward the SWAT truck. “Because of the gang presence and the nature of the men we’re after, the actual entry and clearing of the target house will be handled by SWAT. Let me introduce Captain Gary Radovich.”

  “Thanks, Nancy,” Radovich said. “Okay, we have a pretty simple plan.” Radovich gave a detailed description of his plan to the assembled police officers. I glanced around and noticed everyone taking notes.

  “Now listen up, because this is important. We have word that these are potentially very bad guys—potentially heavily armed. The word is that Donnie Martin’s said he won’t go back to prison—he intends to shoot it out. We need to shock and awe these guys so fast and hard that they don’t have the chance to limber up any heavy firepower they might possess. After we’re safely in and secure, I want Team Two to quickly clear the main floor. While this is happening, I want you three guys from Team Three in the office to secure the entry to the basement. No one goes in—no one goes out. Including you. Don’t go downstairs. Just secure the door. After we’re clear on the main floor, then I want six guys to clear upstairs. When that’s done, we’ll clear the basement.”

  He went quickly through the rest of the briefing. When he finished, he asked for questions—again there were none.

  “Okay then, let’s get everyone in position. On my command, we’ll close the streets and move everyone into final assault position. Then, again on my command, we’ll execute. Everyone be safe. Let’s go.”

  * * * *

  Radovich planned to park the SWAT command vehicle on the corner of Sixty-Second and Brooklyn. He’d have an oblique view of the front of the house from there but, unless an occupant came out the front door and walked to the sidewalk and looked north, he’d be reasonably hidden from their view. “You guys can just follow us in,” Nancy said. “We’ll be at the CP. As long as you stay with us up on Sixty-Second, you’ll be good.” She looked us over. “Nice stuff,” she added. “I like your vests.”

  “Thanks. I hope we won’t need them today.”

  “Absolutely,” she said.

  Because of the one-way streets, we had to drive west on Sixty-Sixth for a block to Roosevelt and then south until we hit Sixty-Fifth. Then we turned north for a block back to Brooklyn before turning south again. The area around Ravenna Park is a nice suburban neighborhood. The streets are a little skinny and lined with large shady trees. The homes themselves are quite grand, built in the first half of the last century. Most feature large porches with several steps leading up to wide entryways. Hell, the homes are so nice that the porches might even be called verandas. I’m sure no one around suspected that their neighbors in the tan two-story were running a large prostitution ring right in the middle of the neighborhood. Oh well. They were about to find out.

  * * * *

  We parked right behind Nancy and Tyrone on Sixty-Second and joined them at the CP in front of the SWAT truck.

  When everyone was assembled, Radovich reached for the microphone on his radio and said, “Okay, folks, the CP is up. Let’s have the entry teams into pre-position,” he ordered. I watched as a large unmarked van rolled past us from the north and stopped in the road two houses above the target. Ten heavily armed SWAT team members in full black tactical gear, including Kevlar helmets, hopped out. At the same time, another van did the same thing but coming from the opposite direction. Three men emerged from that one. From our briefing, I knew that a third van was also being positioned in the alley with four more men.

  “One’s ready,” Gary’s radio crackled to life.

  “Three’s ready.” That was the team in back.

  “Two’s ready.” That was the north team.

  “Surveillance one?” Radovich said. He had a plainclothes officer in the park with binoculars on the front of the house.

  “The front of the house is clear,” the voice on the radio said. “There’s no one outside and no one appearing even to be looking outside.”

  “Surveillance two?” He had another man in the alley behind the house.

  “There’s no one in the backyard. The drapes are drawn—should be able to walk right up.”

  “Excellent,” Radovich said to himself. He keyed his microphone. “Close the roads,” he ordered.

  Seconds later, I saw a patrol car block Brooklyn about a quarter mile south. Although I couldn’t see, I knew that Brooklyn was also being closed on the north, along with Sixty-First Street to the west. All vehicle access points were now sealed off.

  “Okay. Entry teams, into assault position.” The ten-man team on the north moved single file down the street while, at the same time, the three-man team from the south came forward in similar fashion. When they reached their respective edges of the property, all three members of the south team went to the side yard south of the home. The north team split—three men going into the side yard on the north side.

  The remaining seven men on the north team ducked down past the living room windows and silently approached the front door on the porch. Once there, they moved quickly into their pre-assigned assault positions—two men holding shotguns aimed directly at the door locks, one man between them holding a heavy steel battering ram. The four men who would enter first crouched single file behind the man with the battering ram.

  When Radovich saw that the entry team was in position, he said, “Time is now 12:17. Entry team commander—you have the command.”

  The man in the front of the entry line immediately started a count we heard over the radio—“one, two, three,” and then he pointed at the door at the same time he said, “Go!” into his radio microphone.

  The two shotguns exploded simultaneously, sending breaching slugs into the locks and leaving gaping holes where a split second before a deadbolt and a door handle had been. Almost immediately afterward, the man wielding the battering ram swung it with such force that the front door was blown back on its hinges. The next man in line tossed a flashbang grenade into the home that exploded with a brilliant flash of light and a loud bang!

  The noise hadn’t even quieted when the first SWAT members charged through the door yelling, “Police!” and “Hands up!”

  * * * *

  “Move in!” Radovich said to the officers in the squad cars. “Go! Go! Go!” He waved them forward as the cars shot past him one by one before screeching to a halt a couple of seconds later in front of the house. The patrol officers immediately jumped out of their vehicles, weapons drawn, and took up defensive positions behind their cars.

  The CP was nearly forty yards from the front door, and we obviously couldn’t see what was happening, but we were still able to hear the men yelling inside the house, “Hands up! Don’t move!” A neighbor in an adjoining house opened his front door a
nd stepped out onto the porch to see what the commotion was about.

  “Go back in your house, sir!” one of the patrol officers barked. The man looked around, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. Then he scurried back inside and shut the door.

  Shortly afterward, a voice I recognized as belonging to the entry commander said over the radio, “Main floor’s clear! Starting upstairs.” Then he said, “We’ve got eight in custody. We’re going to start bringing them out now. You guys ready?”

  “Ready,” Radovich said. He ordered the patrol officers to move forward out of their defensive positions and prepare to start handling suspects.

  We watched as the SWAT team began marching out the gang members who’d been captured in the raid. The young men walked outside, hands held high, squinting against the bright daylight. I couldn’t see from this distance, but if they’d been acting true to form, most were undoubtedly stoned. Once outside, they were immediately lined up against a planter wall by the patrol officers, frisked, handcuffed, and made to sit down.

  Three minutes later, the entry commander again spoke over the radio. “Upstairs is clear!”

  “Good,” Radovich said. “Two down, one to go.”

  Less than three minutes afterward, the radio sprang to life. “House is clear! We’re Code 4. Bring up the medics and the ambulance. We’ve got a girl in bad shape down in the basement.”

  Uh-oh. Radovich called the EMTs and the ambulance and sent them in. Then he turned to us. “That’s our cue. Let’s go,” he said. We hustled over to the house just as the EMTs were entering. They carried a collapsible gurney with them.

  I looked at the gang members seated against the planter wall, and then I turned to Toni. She was staring at the front door, obviously worried about the girl inside. My skin went cold when I realized that I hadn’t stopped to consider that it might possibly be Kelli who was injured. Obviously, Toni had already thought of that.