The Brea File

by Louis Charbonneau

  “They meaning whom?”

  “Terrorists,” Magnuson answered bluntly. “We’ve all known it was going to come here, sooner rather than later. There’s no reason for us to go on thinking this country is off limits to the world’s terrorists. And if we’re going to be hit, then the FBI would have to be a high-priority target.”

  Other men agreed with Magnuson as Landers allowed the discussion to open up, encouraging reactions. “They didn’t use to hit us,” commented the ASAC of the St. Louis Field Office. He was the only black among the sixty men whose faces kept appearing on the monitor screens. “But I guess we can all remember when that punk walked in off the street in El Centro and wiped out our agents, and then it happened in Denver. And to Agent McWilliams right there in Washington. How long ago was that? Twenty months? This is just the next phase.”

  Landers allowed the speculation to continue only long enough to perceive that it was leading nowhere. “Is it the general feeling, then,” he asked, “that this bombing was directed at the FBI?”

  There was a general murmur of agreement from the men around the horseshoe-shaped conference table that faced the television console like a giant magnet. Waves of assent lapped over the first reaction as the key men of the Bureau reacted in the isolation of their communications rooms from Maine to California. No one seemed surprised. The day when the FBI would become a target for terrorism had long been expected. John L. Landers, observing the unanimity of agreement, the collective anger on the rotating televised faces, wondered if there might not be an aspect of collective paranoia involved. All through much of the 1970s the FBI had felt besieged, attacked by citizens and congressmen. None of those who were now top-level Bureau officials had forgotten.

  At that moment Russ Halbig, sitting next to the Director, said quietly, “I’m not sure that assumption is justified by today’s event. We can’t be sure that Callahan himself was not the specific target of that bomb.”

  There was a moment of startled silence. Then James Caughey spoke sharply. “Who the hell would want to hit Callahan? Hell, every one of those damned hijackers ends up thinking Callahan is his uncle. Was,” Caughey corrected himself.

  Halbig regarded him calmly. He was the only man in the conference room or in any of the field offices who had not shown emotional outrage, John Landers thought. The only one who seemed to regard the bombing at Quantico as just another problem to be solved. “It’s certainly possible that that bomb was intended as a blow directed against the FBI itself, not Callahan in particular. But I don’t think that is by any means certain. In fact, my own view is that Callahan himself was the real target. I can’t offer any direct evidence at this time, but there’s no evidence the other way either. What we do know is that Callahan was killed, no one else.”

  There were voices of agreement and disagreement, the beginnings of a fruitless debate, before John Landers intervened once more. “Let’s get back to specifics,” he said. “Szymanski, does the lab have anything yet on that bomb?”

  Szymanski, like Richard Nixon, showed at his worst in close-up on the television screen, his cheeks blue with a day’s growth of beard, his eyes a little watery and anxious, a nervous tongue probing his lower lip as if searching for a crack. “We have a preliminary report that indicates the explosive was U.S. Army plastic T-4. Unfortunately, a very common type.”

  “Commonly obtainable?” Landers said with irony.

  “I’m afraid so, Director.”

  “How was it detonated?”

  “We don’t know that yet. The trouble is, there was enough of that plastic to obliterate everything close to the point of detonation. We’re going over the plane and the ground, inch by inch. If there’s anything to be found, we’ll find it.”

  “Any guesses on the method of detonation?”

  Szymanski hesitated, the tip of his tongue searching for the elusive crack. “We don’t make guesses, Director.”

  Landers’ face darkened, but before he could respond James Caughey spoke up. Caughey, the Executive Assistant Director in charge of investigations for the Bureau, was to provide overall direction of the massive investigation into the Quantico bombing. “It was almost certainly a remotely activated device,” he suggested. “A timer would have been too uncertain of success.”

  “Why?” Landers demanded. “Everyone knew Callahan would be there giving his spiel at eleven o’clock with a whole class from the Academy there to hear him. The bomb, according to several witnesses, went off at exactly 11:03 A.M. That allows a three-minute margin if the killer or killers figured Callahan would start his demonstration at eleven o’clock.”

  Caughey didn’t back down. “No one could be sure how Callahan would set up his exercise. He might have started out explaining the Miami situation from ground level. On the other hand,” Caughey added grimly, “he might have had twenty or thirty people inside that plane right from the start.”

  “I might point out,” Russ Halbig cut in, “that whoever planted that bomb was familiar with the way in which Callahan conducted his exercises.”

  There was a shocked moment of total silence in the conference room, a shock reflected in the silent parade of faces succeeding each other in orderly rotation on the screens of the video console.

  “What the hell!” Frank Magnuson said. “You’re implying that someone on the inside planted that bomb—someone in the FBI!”

  One of the conference room cameras caught Halbig’s face in close-up on the large right-hand screen. His expression was imperturbable. A cold fish, John Landers thought, watching Halbig closely. “I am merely citing a possibility that must be considered,” Halbig said calmly. “Along with many others, of course.”

  “That’s one hell of a suggestion,” Magnuson retorted.

  The meeting continued for another fifteen minutes. At the end Caughey outlined the procedures already being put into action to investigate the bombing. Unlike the Brea file investigation, which was not discussed during the summit conference and was deliberately being carried out with low visibility and a minimum commitment of manpower, the Quantico bombing was to be a classic demonstration of the Bureau’s capability for swiftly organizing and carrying out an investigation on a massive scale, with hundreds of agents already committed and hundreds more to be thrown into the hunt as the scope of the investigation expanded. Everyone present at the time of the bombing, either near the plane or in the vicinity, was being interviewed. A search of the terrain had begun in the early afternoon and would continue through the next day in a widening circle, seeking to turn up anything unusual, anything out of place, any evidence of loitering. The area surrounding the plane had been sealed off and, as Szymanski had indicated, was being minutely combed by experts from the FBI Laboratory, specialists in unearthing and preserving the tiniest speck of physical evidence. The Internal Security Section of the Criminal Investigative Division was tracing and questioning known terrorists. The Anti-Terrorist Task Force, which had already assembled at the FBI Academy for specialized seminars and training at the time of the bombing, would be coordinating its intelligence on terrorist activities with the efforts of the Internal Security Section. Until some specific lead turned up, the main thrust of the investigation would be on developing links to individual terrorists and groups, especially those who had made threats against the FBI or the government.

  When Caughey sat down, John L. Landers addressed the men under his command. “You will all assign agents on standby to assist in this investigation if, as and when called upon. I am also ordering that priority security measures be in place within the hour in all FBI field offices. There will be no exceptions. At the moment we don’t know if this was a single, isolated incident, perhaps directed specifically at Agent Callahan, as Mr. Halbig has suggested, or the first shot in an attack against the Federal Bureau of Investigation itself. In any event, we must be prepared for anything—including an attack against any of our field offices.” Landers paused, allowing the physical force of his personality and rocklike image to dominate
the thoughts of the listening men. Then he concluded, “This much I want you all to know: We are going to hunt down Callahan’s murderers and bring them to justice.

  And if the FBI is to be the target for new attacks, we shall be ready to meet them-and, gentlemen, to defeat them!”

  * * * *

  In the FBI Director’s office, where Russell Halbig had followed Landers at the close of the summit conference, the burly chief of the Bureau sat heavily in his high-backed chair and waved Halbig toward a seat on the other side of the big desk. Landers appeared suddenly tired, his heavy features hanging in folds, as if he had let down after being so prominently on display for the past hour. Observing him, Halbig realized how intensely emotional an event the summit meeting had been for Landers. It was the first time he had directly faced the key men of FBI Headquarters and all sixty field offices at one time, acting as their Director in the midst of a crisis. He knew the men he had summoned for the conference had questions about him and would have been judging him by his performance tonight. Now, almost certainly, he was wondering how he had done—what the judgments had been.

  But when Landers finally spoke he said, “You had your reasons for sending Paul Macimer down to Quantico this morning, I’m sure.”

  “Yes, Director. He was to talk to Callahan about Brea.”

  Landers grunted noncommittally. He washed his cheeks with a broad palm, as if trying to massage life back into his features. The gesture also had the effect, Halbig noted, of covering any reaction. “What makes you think Callahan could tell him anything new?”

  “It just seemed like a good idea. After all, Callahan was your number two that summer—the operations man, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “You know damned well you’re not mistaken.” Landers frowned, then muttered as if to himself, “Maybe Callahan’s murderers didn’t want him to talk to Macimer.” He came to his next question with ponderous care, like a bear sniffing out a trap. “Do you still suspect Macimer of stealing or covering up the file Vern Lippert put together? From the reports coming in, I don’t see any foot dragging on Macimer’s part.”

  “I didn’t say I believed Macimer guilty—only that it was a possibility.”

  “You made a good case for it. Are you still planning on having Macimer and his old partner—Gordon Ruhle, is it?—out to your house Saturday?”

  “I see no reason not to. As a matter of fact, it gives me an opportunity to observe Macimer under… relaxed circumstances.”

  “Ummm.” The expression might have been approving or skeptical. Landers pushed up from his desk and prowled his office, an angry bear. He said, “I want detailed reports from Caughey on the Quantico investigation, not summaries. Also on the Brea case. That one stays quiet, but arrange press briefings on the bombing investigation.” He turned to glare at Halbig. “Is the bombing connected to the Brea file? Is that why you think Callahan was the target? Your personal opinion, Halbig.”

  Halbig was slow to answer. When he did his words were chosen with caution. “I’d like to reserve final judgment on that, Director. But I think a distinct possibility does exist that Callahan was murdered because of what he knew—or might have known—about the Brea file.”

  “Sticking your neck out, are you, Halbig?”

  “You asked me for my personal opinion, sir.”

  Landers nodded slowly. “So I did.”

  After Halbig left, Landers continued to stare after him, his eyes fixed on some point beyond the heavy paneling of the door. Halbig was a cold fish, Landers thought. Cautious and correct, looking under every stone, not letting his personal feelings get in the way. Still, it was hard to feel quite comfortable with anyone that emotionless, that cold.

  Not the kind of man John L. Landers would feel comfortable with as his second in command.

  * * * *

  Later that evening, at 10:30 P.M., the telephone rang in Paul Macimer’s study at home. The phone there was on a separate line from the other instruments in the house, the number unlisted. The caller was Pat Garvey. He was following Macimer’s instructions that anything important in the Brea investigation should not wait for teletype communications from Sacramento to the Washington Field Office.

  “We heard about the bombing at Quantico,” Garvey said soberly. “This is a black day for the FBI.”

  Macimer did not smile at the melodramatic comment. “I was there,” he said.

  “Why would anyone want to get Callahan?” Garvey demanded angrily. “Because he was working against hijackers and terrorists, is that it?”

  “It’s possible. Or the bomb might have been a message for the FBI, not for Callahan personally. Right now that’s guesswork. But whatever the motive, and whoever did it, we’ll find them. Now, what about our own investigation? What have you and Collins come up with? I take it you have something that couldn’t wait overnight.”

  “Yes, sir.” Garvey became crisply businesslike in response to Macimer’s abrupt change of subject. “Collins is over in Sacramento sending in the full reports. We’ve found where that screen came from, the one Agent Lippert sent in for a lab report. And it ties in.”

  Garvey had continued to canvass the neighborhood surrounding the 1310 Dover Street address. By late Thursday afternoon he had worked his way around to the houses on the adjoining street—Sussex Street—which backed up to the Dover Street site. By luck Garvey had struck pay dirt almost immediately—in the house directly behind the former PRC hideout, now an empty lot.

  “The man’s name is Lazzeri. He’s lived there eighteen years, so he was living there at the time of the People’s Revolutionary Committee blowup. He wasn’t home when it happened, though—he and his family were visiting relatives back in Minneapolis. They saw the whole thing on television. Lazzeri couldn’t believe what he was watching.”

  “Not many people could,” Macimer said. “Are you saying Lazzeri’s house was empty that day?”

  “That’s right, sir. And that’s what’s interesting. Lazzeri never noticed anything wrong, but I found out that Vernon Lippert canvassed the whole neighborhood this past winter. He learned that Lazzeri was away during the PRC period. He asked if he could look through the house, Lazzeri said, and when he came to one of the back bedrooms on the second floor, Lippert got very excited. The window in that room looks out directly over the lot where the PRC hideout was. Lippert asked to borrow the old rusty screen from that window. It had been there for years, Lazzeri says. Lippert promised to get Lazzeri a new screen but apparently he never got around to it. That happened back in February. Lazzeri can’t give an exact date, but the time frame corresponds to the date of Lippert’s lab request.”

  “The screen had a hole in it,” Macimer said. It was not a question.

  “Yes, sir. Lazzeri thought it was just a tear-but Agent Lippert guessed otherwise. And according to the lab’s analysis, he was right. There was gunpowder residue around that hole. It looks like Mr. Lippert figured someone was inside the Lazzeri house that day and fired a shot from the upstairs window.”

  “The shot that triggered the blowup.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Macimer was silent. Garvey’s discovery was no surprise, but it was important. It offered solid evidence to prove what Macimer had already surmised. He said, “Good work, Garvey. Tell Collins I said so. What else do you have?”

  “The telephone call the day before the blowup. Collins checked that out with Pacific Telephone Company records. They show a phone call coming from the pay phone at Sambo’s Restaurant—it’s inside, near the rest rooms—to the Sacramento number assigned to the FBI Task Force. The call was placed at 11:02 A.M. That’s the exact time the call for Brea was logged in Sacramento on August 27.”

  “So what do you make of all this?”

  “Well…” Possibly disconcerted by the sudden question, Garvey hesitated.

  “Walter Schumaker left the hideout that morning and made the call to Brea,” Macimer said. “According to your Wednesday reports, especially the interview with the Torgeson wom
an, Schumaker didn’t leave the house on the twenty-eighth. No one did.”

  “Yes, sir,” Garvey said quietly. “So he was inside that house when the shooting started—and his agent knew he was there.” There was a thread of controlled anger and disgust in the young agent’s tone.

  “Which leaves us with the big question. Who fired the shot from the Lazzeri house?”

  Pat Garvey didn’t answer. An answer was not really necessary, Paul Macimer thought. The pattern and focus of Vernon Lippert’s investigation were becoming clearer.

  After Garvey said good night, Macimer sat for a long time in the quiet of his den, the door closed, the sound of a television game show reaching him dimly from the family room, like those voices faintly heard on the long-distance telephone line.

  Blowup. That was the word Garvey kept using about the PRC affair. An explosion. Like the blowup of the C-54 used by the FBI for training exercises at Quantico.

  Macimer shook his head, almost violently. What he was thinking couldn’t be true—it wasn’t possible.

  But his heart kept beating heavily, loudly.

  You didn’t ignore a pattern in a series of crimes, even if the apparent pattern might prove to be nothing more than coincidence. On the contrary, you always looked for a pattern. Criminals tended to repeat themselves. Someone who would use a bomb to blow up the People’s Revolutionary Committee’s hideout might also use a bomb to get rid of someone dangerous to him.

  Like Callahan.

  And like Carey McWilliams, the former SAC of the Washington Field Office, blown to bits by a bomb explosion in his office at the WFO over eighteen months ago.

  Bombs in themselves were not rarities anymore. Ten or more bombs, on the average, exploded somewhere in the United States every day of the year. There was no reason normally to connect a bombing in California with another in Washington, D.C., and a third in Quantico, Virginia, occurring at eighteen-month intervals or more.