Southside (9781608090563)

by Krikorian, Michael

  The guts of Six-Oh turf is Brynhurst Avenue, a place to be caught dead. The blocks along Brynhurst are lined with cramped two-story apartment buildings and courtyard bungalows. Many of the twelve-hundred-strong Rollin Sixties lived on Brynhurst, thugs with names like Tiny Creepy, Hammerhands, Felony Fred, Scatterbrain, Papa Loc, Peedee Wac, and Wild Cat.

  As Debra Sady drove her blue-green 2001 Nissan Sentra toward her Brynhurst rental, she was singing still, now to Marvin and Tammy’s “Ain’t Nothing Like the Real Thing.”

  The real thing would start tomorrow for Debra Sady: a bus driving job with real benefits and a 401K savings plan. Seconds after she turned off 63rd Street and onto Brynhurst, so did a carload of Hoover Criminals looking to avenge. As she exited her Sentra, carrying a plate of smothered pork chops from her cousin’s house, down rolled the window of a brown Ford Bronco driven by one Lyles Davis aka “Tiny Trouble.” Another Hoover screamed “Hoo-va” and speed triggered a Glock 19 at the suspected shooter of their homie. Near him were two other men, two women, and two boys, one of them doing circles in a blue on red Big Wheel. Before the “va” came out of his mouth, targets were running for cover. None of them, including the target, were hit. Not unusual. If gang members were good shots, L.A. would have one of the highest homicide rates in the world.

  But, as Debra Sady stepped from her Nissan, she heard the shots and a bullet struck her back, just piercing a kidney. The plate of pork chops went flying as she reeled for two spastic steps before tumbling to the concrete driveway of her apartment complex. The plate of food shattered near her head. Debra Sady lay oozing blood and dreams.

  CHAPTER 9

  The most mundane element of being a crime reporter is making the dreaded “cop calls.” Cop calls are when a reporter calls every police and sheriff’s station in the city and county to check if there is any fast-breaking news. Fire departments, too.

  It’s almost always an exercise in futility. Having made thousands of cop calls over the years, Michael had found that they generated a story—mostly briefs—at a ratio of maybe one in five hundred calls at best.

  Still, cop calls are required. Especially on night cops. Sometimes reporters get lazy—Michael was no exception—and they just call the main public-information numbers of the LAPD and the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s. The problem with that is that sometimes even the headquarters isn’t up on the latest breaking crimes. The sheriff’s are okay, but it is hit-and-miss with LAPD press relations. One of the LAPD public information officers, Sergeant Chris Feld-meier, always had the same report: “All quiet in the city tonight.” Always. No matter what. A dirty bomb could have been unleashed on the stadium during a Dodgers/Giants game, and Feldmeier would give his “All quiet” reply.

  Some of the LAPD PIOs, Public Information Officers, are engaging. Mike would often flirt with one of them, Lucy Sanchez, whose voice was sweet as butterscotch budino. About ten years ago, he even took Lucy out for drinks and oysters one lovely night.

  The proper way to do cop calls is to call every police station, every fire station in L.A. County. You might call the Redondo Beach watch command 755 times and get nothing. But, one of the cop reporter’s nightmares is that the night you don’t call, there’ll be a double homicide at the Redondo Pier.

  On that Sunday when Debra Sady was shot, Hector Salazar was the night cops reporter. When he called the 77th Street Station and asked what was going on, he was told there’d been a nonfatal shooting on Brynhurst near 64th Street. Salazar, raised in Boyle Heights, a graduate of Roosevelt High and Cal State-L.A., was not stunned by this, knowing the address was Rollin Sixties turf and shootings there are as rare as sunsets. He thanked the cops and told the night editor nothing was going on.

  About an hour later, the night editor, Marcy Duval, e-mailed him that they could use a brief or two to fill out the section. Hector e-mailed back quickly in the style of many reporters and even editors, not bothering to check the spelling. “got a shhooting on 64 street womanwounded”

  Marcy e-replied: “64 and what?”

  Hector: “Brynhurst”

  Marcy: “Thats not news”

  Monday morning, a week after he was shot, Michael was released from the hospital. His sister, Jeanine, all smiles and tears, picked him up. They drove by the Los Angeles County Coroner Building and Michael pointed it out to her.

  “I just thank God you didn’t end up there. I love you, Michael.”

  “I love you, too.”

  She drove him to her St. Andrews Place home in Gardena, aka G-Town, where they grew up and where she now lived with her two kids. Her husband, Ralph, having died unexpectedly four years ago from a stroke.

  Dr. Wang had told Michael he should not be alone the first few days and since Francesca was in San Francisco for a charity food event, he decided to stay with his sister for a night. He headed to his nephew’s room that used to be his and took to the bed. It felt good to be in this bed and he slept for seven hours.

  On his cell phone he had nine messages, eight from well-wishers and one of much interest. It was from a street source about a shooting on Brynhurst. Some saint got strayed. Sounded like a good story. He couldn’t do the story, so that evening he called Hector Salazar.

  After hearing from Michael Lyons, Salazar felt the rush, knowing he had a powerful story on his hands. All he had to do now was convince his editors the bus driver-to-be was indeed a great story. It would seem on the surface to be a natural. But, assistant city editors at the Times were, for the most part, a cautious group, the type whose main concern was to not make waves and to continue to get their $2,000-$2,500 a week.

  Salazar approached night editor, Marcy Duval, and pitched her the story of Debra Sady Griffen. The night before she had dismissed the story as just another nonfatal shooting in Rollin Sixties ‘hood. But, now Salazar was armed with a hard-luck, against-all-odds tragedy. Salazar’s worrying was for naught as Marcy said, “That’s a good story. Let’s get the background, interview folks, the cops, bus people. Get me a sked. Say twenty to twenty-two inches. We need art of her. Let’s shoot for Wednesday, even Thursday.”

  Hector nodded and headed back to his desk. Marcy sent Hector an e-mail: “Maybe we can tie it into the Mike shooting—another big shooting and they get away with it. Where’s the LAPD?”

  Hector, energized by visions of the front page, fired off a “sonds goood ill get onit.”

  Two days later, Michael got out of Francesca Golden’s bed. Francesca was already on her daily morning exercise walk, three miles, always the same route in her tree-lined neighborhood—Van Ness to Clinton to Wilcox to Rosewood, back to Van Ness. That course never varied.

  On the LATEXTRA front page he read Hector Salazar’s article entitled “SAINT OF OUR GUTTERS GUNNED DOWN.” Lyons muttered to himself, “Gunned down?” To him that meant dead.

  And on it went, extolling Debra Sady’s virtues and decrying the random gunfire. The local media had another field day. The LAPD looked bad again. So did the headline writer. Lyons thought Debra sounded like a good woman, but Mother Teresa?

  On most gang shootings, the chances that the cops will get any cooperation from residents are criminally slim. Witnesses fear for their lives. It’s that simple. But, Wednesday, one witness came forward for Debra Sady.

  As the gunfire that laid out Debra Sady briefly drowned out her television, seventeen-year-old Cardella Jackson calmly laid low in her bedroom.

  As the squeal of the tires was heard, she peeked out her bedroom window, got a good look at the Bronco and its rather easy-to-remember license plate, 069TDY. She laughed. The first—and last—time she ever tried 69ing was with a high school point guard named Teddy Jones who twisted and sprained his neck during the act and had to miss his Crenshaw High School basketball game vs. arch rival Dorsey. Dorsey won by four points. Anyway, she wrote it down, just in case.

  When Cardella heard that Debra Sady was the victim, she was torn. She liked Debra Sady a lot. Debra had on more than a few occasions brought over some �
�Sock It To Me” cake that was her specialty. She was quick with a sincere, kind word of encouragement. Debra had always treated Cardella with respect and when you don’t have anything and someone gives you respect, well, that’s one of the most precious gifts you can give in the ghetto, ranked not far behind giving up some of that cash.

  Consequently, Cardella was numbed by the shooting but scared to her core to go to the police, even with their promise of anonymity. Yeah, they say no names, but what about if and when the trial comes? They’ll pressure the shit out of you to testify in open court. She remembered her second cousin, Jermaine, who was set to testify against a gang leader a few years ago. From prison, the leader, Big Evil, ordered him dead, and dead he was in a week.

  Cardella prayed on it, then drove three miles to Gardena and punched 911 at a phone booth that had one window shot out and G-13 graffiti scrawled inside and out. Shit, she thought, you can’t go anywhere in this fucked-up city without some gang screwing things up. She asked to speak with a detective and she was trembling. She put her hand over her mouth and mumbled into the mouthpiece. The detective couldn’t understand her. She moved her hand away. “That shooting on Brynhurst. The one where Debra Sady got shot.”

  CHAPTER 10

  Two hours later, Tiny Trouble of Seven-Four Hoover was in an interview room at the notorious 77th Street Division police station drinking a Dr Pepper in the shadow of the intimidating Detective Mo Batts, six foot five, 275, and Sandra Core, a very attractive dirty blond deputy district attorney from the Hard-Core Gang unit.

  Batts pulled his chair close to Trouble. “Let’s get down to business. Brynhurst. You know Brynhurst?”

  “Never met the man.”

  Batts slapped the top of Trouble’s head. Deputy D.A. Core shot him a look that said, “Don’t overdo it.”

  Batts resumed. “Are you familiar with a street in the Hyde Park area of Los Angeles called Brynhurst?”

  “Yeah, that’s the street where the Rollin sissies hang out. Or so I heard. Towards myself, I ain’t never even been there. Too many faggots there for me. Me, I likes me some pussy. Some white sugar.” He leered at Sandra Core. She rolled her eyes.

  “Who you rollin’ your eyes at, bitch?”

  This time, Batts smacked Tiny Trouble upside the head. Hard. For Los Angeles gang members, rolling your eyes at them is a disrespect of the lowest order, a step from putting down your mother even if your mother was sprung and just a few steps away from putting down your saintly grandmother.

  “Look, here’s the situation,” said Batts. “We got several witnesses who saw you driving a Bronco on Brynhurst the night Debra Sady Griffen, the bus driver lady, was shot. They can point you out and identify the car as being the shooting vehicle. Do you think we just came up on you out of the blue?”

  “Fuck blue. This is Hoova. Hoova is orange.”

  “Enough with the colors bullshit,” said Core. “Didn’t that go out in the eighties? Wake up, boy.”

  “Who you callin’ boy, slut?”

  Batts slammed his fist into the wall. “Motherfucker. One thing I hate is for a lady to be disrespected in front of me. You know why, bitch? Because it’s disrespectful to me. Miss Core, can you let me alone with him for a few minutes? Wanna teach him some manners.”

  Core hesitated, but left. The hulking Mo Batts moved in close.

  “Get away from me,” Trouble said. “This ain’t Zero Dark Thirty. No torture. Back the fuck off.”

  “Too late for that. You dissed me. And now you’re going to be my punching bag.” He started throwing jabs that came close to Trouble. Trouble started to get up, but Batts, with one mighty paw, put a vise grip on his neck and ground him back down into the seat.

  “I’m gonna start yelling, you don’t back up.”

  “Go ahead. Yell. Scream like a bitch. Like the bitch you really are. You know what? I just came up with a better plan for you. Why bruise my hands? We need to give you a full-body cavity search.”

  At that, Batts pulled out his big nightstick. “Maybe I’ll get that pretty district attorney in here to watch to make sure I do this by the book.”

  “No! No!” It was like a sweat spigot opened over Trouble’s whole body. Then his bowels started to loosen. He was about to smear his shorts. Damn, he thought, why’d I go to Popeye’s? He tried to squeeze his insides together. That seemed to work. A foul smell emitted, but the brown tide scare receded. He took a deep breath. More sweat came off of him in rivulets. But nothing else. “Okay. Okay, I was there. I was on Brynhurst. I didn’t do no shooting. Leave me alone. I din’t even know there was a gun in the sled.”

  Batts stepped back, put his nightstick away, opened the door, and Sandra Core came back in and closed the door. She sniffed the polluted air. Batts said, “Our tough Hoover here just had a close encounter of the turd kind.” He laughed heartily. Core reopened the door and, with exaggerated, frantic hand movement, attempted to scoop fresh air into the room. She looked at Batts and started laughing too.

  Never had Trouble felt lower. He thought his life had bottomed out three years ago when he’d seen his mother sucking off one of his homies for a rock behind the Bethel A.M.E. Church on Fig, but, this bottomed that. Does life even have a bottom? How low does the basement go? How many floors down? Sad thing is for fellas to be in the basement, say on like negative level four and they be happy as shit ’cause they ain’t on basement level negative eleven. Ain’t even on the ground floor and they cool with the view. Damn, but to almost shit myself. And I know these exaggerating motherfuckers gonna tell everyone I did. Fuck, I’m gonna play my wild card today. Get me to the lobby and get out this building. A touch of his bravado came back. He’d play his ace.

  “Look,” said Trouble, “you wanna make me a deal? We can deal.”

  “Deal?” said Core. “You were in the car with people that shot an innocent lady. A saint, from what I hear. How the hell you going to deal?”

  “I know the Brynhurst shooting is big to y’all. But, the real big case is that reporter from the Times who got hit downtown. Am I right or am I right?”

  “What about it?” Batts said, trying to hide his interest. “You shoot him, too?”

  “Nah. But, I heard some very interesting information about that. That case been on like CNN and HBO and shit. Channel seven.”

  “Go on.”

  “I need to get a deal before I be sayin’ any goddamn thing.”

  “Say something interesting and maybe we can talk,” said Core. “But, you are not walking anywhere. You can give me the new pope from Argentina as the reporter’s shooter and you still gonna do something for the lady on Brynhurst. Maybe we can work something out, though. What do you have, Mr. Trouble?”

  “I like that. You calling me Mr. Trouble,” he said, eyes darting cautiously toward Batts. “Look, I ain’t actually heard it myself, but one of my g’s told me ’bout a tape floatin’ around that talks about the reporter’s shooting.”

  “A tape?” Core said. “Like a videotape of the shooting?”

  “Nah, nah. Not a video, a tape, you know just a sound tape.”

  “An audiotape?” said Core.

  “There you go. An audiotape.”

  “What’s on this tape?”

  “That reporter Lyons. He on the tape. Talking.”

  “So what’s so important on the tape?” asked Batts.

  “The reporter is on the tape planning his own shooting.”

  CHAPTER 11

  An hour later, LaBarbera and Hart walked into the 77th Street squad room and spent a minute bullshitting with detectives before getting serious with Batts. “Kuwahara told us what this guy said,” said LaBarbera. “It’s hard to believe. I’ve known Lyons for over ten years. I can’t see it.”

  “Well, let’s go talk to our boy here,” said Batts. “After he said that, we didn’t go too hard, though I gave him a good scare.”

  “You’d scare just about anybody, including me,” said Hart.

  “No. A stinky scare,” said Bat
ts who fanned his hand in front of his nose.

  “No shit?” said Hart.

  “Yes, shit. A trouser tragedy.”

  “You are one sick fuck, Mo,” said Hart. “But, I’m glad you’re on our team.”

  In the interview room with Sandra Core, LaBarbera sat near Tiny Trouble. Hart pinched his own nose and looked at Mo Batts who nodded proudly.

  “I’m Detective LaBarbera. This is Detective Hart. We hear you have information regarding the shooting of Michael Lyons. What’s the story with this audiotape?”

  “See, I ain’t like actually heard the actual tape. My dawg Mayhem from Seven-Fo’ heard it. He say the reporter is saying like ‘shoot me ’cause then I can be a hero.’ Some shit like that. Serious. He sounds serious.”

  “I thought you just said you didn’t hear the tape. So how can you say he sounds serious?” said Hart. “You better not be wasting our time. I’ll put your ass in the Rollin Sixties module at Men’s Central. Now, did you hear it or what?”

  “Nah, man, nah. I didn’t hear it. I’m just relaying what my boy told me. You want me to start every fuckin’ sentence with, ‘this is what my boy told me’? Or you want it more real? My boy said that reporter sounded like he meant it.”

  “How’d did your boy get the reporter’s tape?” asked Core. “And why would Lyons tape himself saying that? Doesn’t make sense.”

  “It wasn’t the reporter’s tape. It’s my uncle’s tape. My boy said my uncle was taping the reporter for like, backup. To play it safe, you feel me? Ya know, like if he makes up something we didn’t say, we got proof we didn’t say it. What they call being misquoted.”

  “Where’s your boy Mayhem with the tape? Call him,” Hart said.

  “He don’t have the tape. I told you. It ain’t his. He just heard it. My uncle, his shot caller, got the tape.”

  “The shot caller for Seven-Four Hoover?” asked Hart. “He’s your uncle?”