by Bill Bernico
“Not as bad as those cops at the twelfth precinct,” Norm said, laughing.
Kevin rolled his eyes. “Yeah, what would you know about that?” Kevin shook his head in disbelief. “That was done by a bunch of amateurs who just got lucky.”
Another workman began loading the truck with a forklift. Several pallets were driven into the back of the truck when Norm flagged the driver down and told him to stop.
“What’s going on here?” Kevin said. “You told me a whole truck load.”
“First I want to get a closer look at that money,” Norm said. “I’ve been burned, too.”
Kevin and Matt exchanged knowing glances. Kevin laid the case on top of a fifty-five gallon barrel on the dock and stepped back to give Norm his space. “If those dumb-ass bombers had any class at all they’d have waited until the other two cops got in the car and took out all five.”
“What other two?” Norm said, grabbing one of the money bundles. By the time Norm had one of the packets of bills in his hand, Kevin and Matt both had their .38 revolvers out and aimed at Norm and the forklift driver.
“These two,” Kevin said, aiming his revolver at Norm. “Kevin pointed at the case with his gun. “Put it back.”
Norm looked at Kevin with dagger eyes and Kevin was sure that if Norm could have gotten to him, that he’d have killed him. Norm threw the worthless packet back into the case and stepped back, his hands raised. “Cops,” he said. “Shouldda known. This was too easy.”
Kevin turned to make eye contact with Matt. “Matt, how about if you take the other guy out of here? I need to have a little talk with Norm.”
Matt smiled and led the forklift driver away from Kevin and Norm.
“You’re not going to leave me alone with this guy, are you?” Norm complained to Matt.
“What are you afraid of?” Matt said. “You afraid he might stick your sorry ass in one of those cars out there and blow it up so you’ll know what our three friends went through during the last few seconds of their lives?” Matt began to walk away with his prisoner.
Kevin smiled maniacally and slipped his gun back into his underarm holster. He approached Norm with clenched fists just as Matt left the room with the forklift driver, a man named Pete Lindstrom.
From outside Matt could hear scuffling sounds coming from in the warehouse. A few minutes later Norm exited the warehouse, followed close behind by Kevin, who had his gun trained on Norm again. Norm’s nose was bleeding and both of his eyes were beginning to swell shut. Kevin looked at Matt and shrugged, gesturing with his gun at Norm. “The clumsy idiot tripped and fell. Must have hit his head when he fell.”
“Several times, from the look of it,” Matt said, laughing.
“Cover these two vermin,” Kevin said. “I’m going to call in for backup.” He pulled out his cell and called the twelfth precinct. He got the desk sergeant and gave him his location, requesting an additional unit and a supervisor. The sergeant said he’d get them dispatched immediately. “And call the Riverside Police Department as well,” Kevin said. “This is really their jurisdiction. Don’t want to upset the locals.”
The Riverside patrol cars arrived first and met with Kevin, who produced his shield and I.D. card. Matt couldn’t hear what they were saying from where he stood, but from the reactions on the Riverside Police officers’ faces, he was sure they were talking about the Hollywood car bombing from the previous week. Kevin summoned Matt to bring the prisoners over to where he stood talking to the local police.
“Matt,” Kevin said, “This is Sergeant Ballard. They’re going to take the prisoners to the Riverside precinct. We’ll have them extradited back to Hollywood by tomorrow.”
Matt holstered his .38 and turned the two men over to Sergeant Ballard. He and Kevin stood back as the black and white left the lot with the two men. Forty minute later two units from the Hollywood division pulled into the factory lot. Matt could see a patrolman driving and when the patrol car stopped, a man wearing captain’s bars on his shoulders stepped out of the passenger side and walked directly toward Kevin.
The captain took Kevin aside, out of ear shot of the other cops and Matt. Matt could only guess what the captain was saying to Kevin, but it didn’t look like either man was wearing his happy face. After a few conversational exchanges, it seemed like the captain’s face softened. He laid a hand on Kevin’s shoulder and nodded slowly. The captain extended his hand and Kevin shook it. The two of them walked back over to where Matt stood talking to the driver that had brought the captain to this explosives factory.
The captain stood nearly toe to toe with Matt and said, “Lieutenant Cole tells me you were a part of this arrest.”
“Well, I, uh,” Matt fumbled for the right words; sure he was in for a thrashing from this new captain. Matt caught Kevin’s gaze and Kevin nodded. “I guess I was, Captain, but most of the credit should go to Kevin, er, I mean, Lieutenant Cole. I was just along for the ride.”
“Either way, the captain said, “I’m glad we caught those responsible for Captain Burke’s death.”
“Excuse me, Captain,” Matt said. “I didn’t get your name. My name’s Matt Cooper.”
“Oh, yes, I suppose that would make it easier than calling the precinct and asking for the guy in the captain’s office, wouldn’t it? My name is Captain Sturgis.” He shook Matt’s hand and patted him on the side of his shoulder. “My office is always open to you, Matt.”
“Thank you, Captain,” Matt said. “If you ever get by my way, feel free to stop in at my office as well. It’s in the Cahuenga Building on Hollywood.”
“I know where it is,” Sturgis said. “In fact, I know your father and I was familiar with your grandfather, too. How is Elliott these days?”
“Dad retired recently,” Matt said. “I took over the business a few months earlier.”
“And Clay?”
“Grandpa passed away several years ago,” Matt said.
“I’m sorry to hear that. He was a fine man, Matt, but I don’t suppose I have to tell you that.”
“Captain,” Matt said, changing the subject, “What’s going to become of the task force that Captain Burke had envisioned? Will anyone else pursue anything like that?”
Captain Sturgis shook his head. “I’m afraid not, Matt. It’s just too risky and I wouldn’t want to be responsible for any more deaths in the department. We’ll just have to keep on doing things the way we have been and just hope we can do them better than before.”
Sturgis turned to Kevin. “Stop in my office when you get back to town, Lieutenant.”
“Yes, sir,” Kevin said as the captain got back in the patrol car. His driver, a patrolman named Knickert, slid behind the wheel and was gone in a flash.
Matt turned to Kevin. “From where I was standing it looked like the captain was chewing you new one. What was he so pissed about?”
Kevin raised both hands and twisted his body from side to side. “Because we’re out here in Riverside, out of our jurisdiction. But he calmed down when I told him that we’d taken down two of the men responsible for the car bombing.”
“Good thing he did,” Matt said. “You’re too young to retire and too old to start over at some other job.”
“Makes you think, don’t it?” Kevin said.
“About what?”
“About how fragile life is and how easy it could be to lose a job you love,” Kevin explained. “I just hope this new captain will turn out to be half the man Captain Burke was. Captain Burke made my job that much easier to bear. I’m really going to miss him.”
“I know what you mean,” Matt said. “What do you say we get back to Hollywood? I’m all in. I just want to collapse on the sofa in my office.”
“Let’s go, Matt,” Kevin said. “Do you mind if we stop on the way back for a bite to eat?”
“Do we have to?” Matt said. “I just want to get back.”
“Come on, Matt,” Kevin said, reaching for his wallet. “I’ll make it worth your while.”
&nb
sp; “Oh oh. Here comes the bribe.”
Kevin rolled his eyes. “I was just going to show you a ‘Buy one get one’ coupon that I got in the mail. We can split the cost of the one meal and the other one is free. In other words, we’ll both get to eat for half price. See, no bribe.”
“Oh, all right,” Matt said. “What’s the name of this place?”
Kevin looked at the coupon again. “It’s called Mama’s House of Braunschweiger.”
Matt nearly did a double-take and then saw Kevin laughing. “My dad had a saying that I heard a lot when he still worked with me.”
“Really? And what were his words of wisdom?”
“No one likes a smart ass.” Matt slapped Kevin on the shoulder. Come on; let’s go get some of that Braunschweiger.”
“Sorry, Matt. I hope you weren’t serious because it’s really called Mama’s House of Pancakes. Still want to go?”
“Sure, why not?” Matt said. “I haven’t had a good plate of half-priced pancakes since I don’t know when. You going to throw in a glass of chocolate milk?”
“You’re going to…” Kevin started to say but amended it to, “Why not?”
The two men drove off, satisfied that Captain Burke, Detective Sheldon and Lucy Bristol would be joining them—at least in spirit.
It was two days later when Captain Sturgis and another detective from the twelfth precinct were finally able to sort out the facts from the arrest at the Riverside explosives factory. Pete Lindstrom, the forklift driver from Riverside took the deal that the district attorney gave him and told all he knew about Norm and the plot to kill four police officers and one private investigator. For his part in this dance, Pete got a reduced sentence of only thirty-five years to life, instead of life with no parole.
According to Lindstrom, his boss, Norman Pratt had begun planning the assassination the day after he’d heard that police officials at the twelfth precinct were putting together an untouchable task force to come down on crime in the Los Angeles area. It was Pratt who placed the charge of explosives under the front seat of the black Suburban. It had been wired to the ignition switch and detonated as soon as Captain Burke turned the key. For his part in the conspiracy, Norman Pratt received the death sentence.
Captain Sturgis had a hard time understanding how such a secretive plan such as the task force that Captain Burke envisioned could have been known to anyone outside the circle of selected candidates. It wasn’t until he talked to the mother of Lucy Bristol that it became clear. No one else of the five people involved had told anyone of the proposed plan. Lucy, however, had inadvertently let it slip to her mother that she had been chosen to join the task force. As soon as the words left her mouth, Lucy realized she was in trouble. She made her mother promise to keep this to herself but Lucy’s mother had said something completely innocent to another woman in the grocery store. She hadn’t told this other woman anything of the task force, only that Lucy had been chosen for a special assignment. That slip of the tongue escalated exponentially when that woman told two others and they each told three others and on and on until it eventually got back to Sylvia Pratt, Norman Pratt’s wife. And that was all it took to set the wheels in motion.
Norman Pratt had a contact within the department who didn’t know anything directly about this new proposed task force, but he knew where to look to find out more. The contact put it all together and sold Pratt the information for a measly grand.
Pete Lindstrom was sent to the L.A. County jail to await trial, while Norman Pratt waited for his day in court in the Hollywood lockup. No one knows for sure how word got back to the inmates at the L.A. facility, but two days after his arrival there, Pete Lindstrom was found hanging in his cell from a bed sheet fashioned into a noose. No one, including the other prisoners, believed for a minute that this was a suicide, but officials couldn’t find any evidence to the contrary and it was never investigated further. Pete Lindstrom was buried at the taxpayer’s expense in Potter’s Field.
Facing the death sentence, Norman Pratt finally decided that it might be better to live out the rest of his life in confinement rather than take that lethal dose by needle. He reluctantly agreed to meet with the district attorney and name the names of the other people involved in the car bombing. In Norm’s case, it didn’t even take as long as it took for word to get back to the D.A. for Norm to find himself at the sharp end of a shiv in the prison yard. The D.A. never was able to find out the names of anyone else involved, but on the plus side of the ledger, the taxpayers had been spared the expense of a dozen years of room and board for Norman Pratt while he awaited execution. Or, if he had been able to make the deal with the D.A. and get a life sentence, the taxpayers didn’t have to pay for forty to fifty years of food, housing, medical, dental and all the other perks prisoners were entitled to. All things being equal, the D.A. thought that the county came out ahead on this deal. There were always other ways of finding out who else was involved and he was sure with the combined efforts of the police force, that it wouldn’t be long before one or more people would be hauled in and made to pay for their part in all this.
It was just a matter of time before some snitch could be bribed to spill what he knew.
143 - Man With A Plan
Under normal circumstances, he would speak his mind, but with a gun pressed up against his head Lieutenant Kevin Cole figured the best course of action would be to keep his mouth shut and find out what his assailant wanted from him.
More than an hour earlier, he’d driven to the location that he’d written on a slip of paper and had tucked into his shirt pocket. It was completely out of character for Kevin to have let his guard down on a night like this, especially since he wasn’t even supposed to be out here in the middle of the night without backup or even a partner. Curiosity had drawn him to this deserted side street south of downtown Hollywood. He’d gotten his information from a reliable source; the same source that had helped him earn his Lieutenant bars several years earlier. Kevin had no reason to doubt Jimmy Bronkowski. Jimmy had been one of Kevin’s most reliable snitches in the past.
The minutes crept by uneventfully and suddenly Kevin realized that he’d been sitting in this same spot for more than an hour. A shiver ran up his spine, settling on the base of his neck and making the hairs stand up. A stray cat meowed from the alley across the street and a trash can cover crashed to the pavement. Kevin quickly turned toward the sound and opened his car door, his .38 still hanging under his arm in a leather shoulder rig.
He’d taken only two steps toward the alley when a figured loomed up from a crouching position behind Kevin’s car. That’s when Kevin heard the sound of a hammer being clicked into place and he froze.
“Hands out,” the gruff voice said from somewhere behind him. “Hold ‘em out away from your body.”
Kevin did as he was told while a hand reached around and plucked Kevin’s service revolver out of the holster. Kevin could hear the gun being stuffed into someone’s waste band. The man’s other hand reached around the other side of Kevin’s body and patted him down, finally settling on Kevin’s wallet. He slid the leather case out of Kevin’s hip pocket and flipped it open. Kevin breathed a little easier when he heard the next sound; that of the hammer being eased back down.
The hand came back around in front of Kevin, still holding the wallet, while the voice said, “Sorry, Lieutenant. I didn’t recognize you from behind. I didn’t recognize your car, either.”
Cole turned around and was relieved to see Detective Adam Rankin standing there looking a bit embarrassed as he handed the lieutenant back his gun and holstered his own. “What are you doing out here this time of night, Lieutenant?” Rankin said.
“I got a tip from one of my informants that there’d be something big going down here tonight,” Kevin said. “He didn’t know exactly what or who, just the where. I think we probably scared them away, whoever they might have been.”
“Sorry I spoiled your stakeout, Lieutenant,” Rankin said. “My partner’s in
the car down the street. I suppose I’d better get back there and let him know what’s going on.”
“Why wasn’t he here backing you up?” Kevin said.
“When I got out of the car, I didn’t know there’d be anything that needed a backup,” Rankin explained. “I told Joey to sit tight while I ducked into the alley to take a leak. Then I heard a noise across the street. Turned out to be a cat or maybe a rat. That’s when I saw you sitting there nice and quiet like and thought I’d better have a look.”
“You talking about Joey Wilson?”
“You know him?” Rankin said.
“I knew his father. He was one hell of a cop himself. Well, I’m certainly lucky it was you and not someone else,” Kevin said. “I must be losing my touch. I never let myself be taken by surprise.”
“You gonna stick around here, Lieutenant?” Rankin said.
Kevin sighed. “No, this stakeout is a bust. I think I’ll head home. You should do the same.”
“If only I could,” Rankin said. “I’m working the ten till six shift today. I still got three and a half hours left before I can call it a day. Well, goodnight. I guess I’ll be seeing you around.” Detective Rankin returned to his own car, slid in and told his partner what he’d found. A moment later they pulled away from the curb and drove past Kevin’s position. Detective Rankin waved as they passed by.
Kevin waved back, started his car and pulled away. He’d have to have a talk with Jimmy when he caught up with him. Kevin hoped he could sleep after all this, and if he could, he hoped he wouldn’t toss and turn from nightmares.
He’d worried needlessly. He was asleep just a few minutes after he’d crawled beneath the covers. He awoke the next morning, realizing that he’d slept in until ten. He got up and immediately called his secretary to let her know when he’d be in.
Around the same time Kevin Cole was crawling out of bed, Matt Cooper was already on his way out of the office, on his way to meet with a potential client about a case. This case, from what Matt could gather over the phone, was one that would require him to stake out a residence in the foothills overlooking Hollywood. His client wanted to know what his neighbors were doing while he was at work. Someone had been vandalizing the man’s property at irregular intervals and he couldn’t very well stay home from work every day, hoping to catch the vandals in the act.