The Mammoth Book of Hard Bastards (Mammoth Books)

by Robin Barratt

At 2 a.m., Detective Richard Best found the weapon. Eighteen inches below the surface of a three-foot-tall purple sage bush, tucked down inside the cylinder shape of the plant, the gun was suspended in the darkness. He reported from the way it was positioned, it had to have been placed deliberately inside the shrub, not thrown. The purple sage bush was far out in the parking lot, just as Will had suggested.

  The gun was a Smith and Wesson .44 revolver. It would have sounded like a cannon when fired at such close range, as Will screwed on the bottle cap at his truck six parking spaces north. Three cartridges were spent. Three bullets were still in the chamber.

  Lockerby says without Will Coss’s icy calm under fire, they most likely would have ended up with a very difficult, even unsolvable, case. “I mean, how often do you have an actual eyewitness that was completely uninvolved with the murder? If he wouldn’t have done what he did, first of all officers wouldn’t have been able to get there as quickly which would have given the defendant time to get away. The two Modesto men were friends, too, so without the witness, it might have been impossible to figure out the role of the suspect or who the suspect was. Even if we had figured it out, it would have been a lot harder to prove.”

  Without Coss’s quick manoeuvring, Scottsdale Police Department may have been presented days later with two separate missing persons reports, with no connection to each other: an Eco Pest Control employee and the unemployed Modesto man with the Mesa address. They may have found two bodies in the parking lot and had to assume some kind of confrontation or relationship between them. Or they may have found one body but not the other. If Coss had not been there at all, Rami’s murder may have been pinned on a mythical third party such as an armed robber who got away. In fact, Ramsen did try to sell a story of a mysterious black Tahoe with tinted windows.

  But William Coss kept himself alive, got police to the correct scene and told them just who shot who, all while the body was still warm.

  Detective Lockerby asked his colleague, Scottsdale Homicide Detective Pete Salazar, to fly to Modesto to find out what he could about the two men in the Honda. It was here that Scottsdale PD found themselves immersed in the ancient culture with its tiny transplant offshoot still thriving and, in some ways, festering in California. Salazar heard tales of love affairs, vendettas, even “hits”. There was gossip that someone who was connected to a cousin of Ramsen wanted Rami taken out. A recent threat had been made that Rami would be “taken on from the back”. Here the personalities of the senior Dadesho brothers and the fiery Assyrian exile political scene came to life against the backdrop of known assassins and the Saddam Hussein regime.

  Salazar finally came to interview Sharokena Koshaba, who proved elusive in his first attempts to contact her. But when he did catch up to her, she was talkative with the detective. That is, she was talkative until she received a collect call from an Arizona jail during their interview. Salazar knew it was Ramsen who was phoning her. She immediately terminated her interview with the detective.

  Subpoenaed phone records showed she had been in constant contact with Ramsen during the time of the murder and had been the one on the phone to him when he walked up to Will and stared him down at his Eco truck. A text message to Ramsen showed she was still his “girl”, “no matter what you did”. Another text told him she was arranging a flight for him to flee Arizona immediately. She did not know that the phone was already in possession of the Scottsdale police, thanks to Will, at the time she was texting.

  As the investigation progressed, many people in the Assyrian community spoke of Ramsen’s increasingly paranoid and erratic behaviour in the weeks leading up to the slaying. His ex-wife found out he had left their small daughter with his mother while he went to Arizona with his victim. It seemed like an odd action after a hard-fought custody battle.

  Did Ramsen Dadesho have a specific purpose in travelling to Arizona on what was supposed to be a daddy weekend? Or did he just snap? Was there a remark about the shared girlfriend, Sharokena? Did two young men suddenly flare over insults about a lover or the loyalties of a woman?

  Sharokena’s last name is the same as that of the man, also from Modesto, serving time in a federal prison for plotting with Saddam Hussein to assassinate Ramsen’s uncle.

  Had William Coss, with his canisters of bug spray, walked into an Assyrian-Iraqi execution in progress?

  Why the two Modesto men drove to the deserted parking lot, with Rami at the wheel, and why Rami calmly sat there when Ramsen abruptly killed him may be locked forever in Ramsen’s own head. Ramsen’s bail was set so high even the powerful Dadesho brothers from the senior generation have not been able to raise it.

  Be it political assassination, love triangle, drugged rampage, soured partnership or quarrel over cash, in the United States, Ramsen is presumed innocent when he enters a courtroom. But William Coss’s voice recorded on the nine-minute 911 call giving the details of the murder while it was in progress speaks for itself.

  The sounds of the gunshots on the recording preserve forever the actions that ended one life, and narrowly saved another.

  “Previously being around something like that,” Will says, recalling his paratrooper training, “it’s kind of like you’re more calm. If you’ve never been in that position the stress overtakes you and people who’ve never been in that situation panic and they freeze. If you panic and freeze, you’re dead at that time.”

  Detective Lockerby couldn’t agree more: anyone who panicked would have been dead that night. “His background and his nature saved his life. He had that edge, of knowing how to play the situation when it’s bad guy versus good guy, where he was outmatched and had to escape. Most people, if they thought at all, would have hid in one place and not moved. And then when he was chasing them, they would not have known what he was up to. This situation was not just rare – it was unreal.”

  William Coss still seems to have no idea of the magnitude of the night’s proceedings. When asked about his thoughts during those lethal minutes, he says, “I just wanted to finish my work and get done with this situation.”

  He’s not quite aware of the awe in his interviewer’s voice at this revelation. “I was sitting there [after the police came] for at least a couple hours before it dawned on me. After a couple hours, then I knew my night was shot.”

  Coss is impatient to end the interview. He’s got drywall to hang. Mom and Dad are expecting him. He’s got a bunch of new accounts to service for Eco. He is very busy.

  “I just try to take care of my customers,” he says, “Just do the job that needs to be done.”

  Author’s Note: Sources for this story are Scottsdale Police Department Case Number 0908001, 911 transcripts, author’s interviews with William Coss, Detective Hugh Lockerby, Detective Pete Salazar, MaryAnn Carbone of Eco Pest Management, Arizona State Pest Control Board and other sources. All quotes are factual as transcribed.

  VLADIMIR BOGOMOLOV (RUSSIA)

  Soviet Leader’s Personal Bodyguard

  Introducing … Vladimir Bogomolov

  ALTHOUGH I NEVER visited the Russian Federation prior to 1992 – when it was the USSR – I have been to Russia a great many times since and lived permanently in the capital Moscow for almost all of 2003 and again in 2005. Over the years I have worked and trained with a great many Russian bodyguards and I can say, unequivocally, that they are some of the hardest, toughest and most ruthless bodyguards on the planet. The training they need to go through and the conditions of getting a bodyguard licence in Russia means that Russian bodyguards have a particular set of skills and a unique mindset that very few other people have on this planet. I remember attending a close protection course run by the Russian bodyguard company Grant-Vymple in Moscow in the late 1990s and their close-quarter unarmed combat was like nothing I had seen previously. I was in complete awe of these bodyguards.

  Prior to 1992, the Cold War left the world trembling. Russia and the West – particularly the USA – were arch enemies; spying was prevalent, and distrust and suspi
cion were normal. Although much is written about modern bodyguarding in Russia, it is still extremely rare to hear about the everyday lives of Soviet-era bodyguards, mainly because many have now died and the last few remaining still keep their life and their work a secret.

  And so this fascinating chapter, specially written for this book by Russian bodyguard Aleksey Fonarev (in a typically Russian style of stating facts with little emotion), gives us a brief but unique insight into the life of Vladimir Bogomolov, one of the government’s top bodyguards during the Soviet era.

  SOVIET BODYGUARD

  By Aleksey Fonarev

  Translated from Russian by Inna Zabrodskaya

  Vladimir Bogomolov was a second-generation bodyguard and for many years his father Viktor had also been working in the Soviet State Security Service.

  Viktor Bogomolov was a man of great physical strength; he was tall and powerful, an excellent marksman and could easily overpower three or four people in traditional wrestling (imagine a man whose shirt collar size is forty-eight!). Among fellow security officers, Viktor was known as “The Rottweiler” and was one of those rare characters who were sought after and chosen to be in the personal security detail of state leaders. During and after the Second World War, Viktor served in Joseph Stalin’s private security service and was awarded the Red Star Order for his work during Stalin’s trip to the front in August 1941. Afterwards he served as private security officer to General Georgy Zhukov and often went to the front to protect other high-profile Soviet Army generals, as well as on secret missions throughout the USSR.

  Once, when Viktor who was only twenty-six years old and was standing behind the doors leading to Stalin’s office in Moscow, the head of Stalin’s security came out and asked whether Viktor could play chess, as Stalin wanted to take a break from his work. As luck would have it, Viktor was a confident chess player, so he and Stalin ended up playing a few games of chess together.

  When telling his son Vladimir about the secrets and tricks of being a good personal security officer, Viktor would often recall many interesting stories about his time in his service with Stalin. For example, even during heavy bombings in Moscow, Stalin liked to go outside and walk in the fresh air, much to the concern of a very nervous protection team. And once in the very beginning of the war in 1941, he turned to Viktor and said reassuringly: “Don’t worry, everything is going to be all right. We will have Victory Day celebrations one day!”

  During Stalin’s funeral a proud and dignified Viktor Bogomolov stood beside his coffin as an honoured member of Stalin’s personal security team.

  From very early days it was known that Viktor’s son Vladimir Bogomolov would follow in his father’s footsteps as a high-ranking security officer, and would one day serve in the KGB. Indeed, Vladimir graduated from the KGB school in St Petersburg (then Leningrad) and then to a position in the department providing route surveillance and security for VIP mobile units. It took Vladimir just two years working diligently within this department to achieve the necessary experience and knowledge of the job. He developed a good reputation and proved himself to his more experienced colleagues and superiors. In December 1971 Vladimir was instructed to join the illustrious legendary KGB 9th Department; Leonid Brezhnev’s personal security team tasked to look after the Soviet leader, visiting heads of state and other VIPs. Branch 18 consisted of eighteen officers, plus security for Brezhnev’s city apartment and country residence. At first the team that accompanied Brezhnev on his trips around the country consisted of just three protection officers on a rotation basis, with others tasked to other protection duties as required (but in 1975 two more officers joined Brezhnev’s personal team).

  Vladimir had all the necessary skills and training for the position; he was an excellent runner, wrestler, swimmer and marksman, and his employment references, as well as his experience, expertise, morale and professionalism, were impeccable.

  Vladimir, along with his other team members, provided security during the visit of Willy Brandt, Chancellor of West Germany (1969–74), and accompanied him all over the country, and also successfully completed an assignment to accompany the vice president of an Arab country. He was then asked to provide security to Comrade Ryabenko, which meant that Vladimir was about to start his security career as part of the personal security detail to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party. This was one of the highest honours a KGB security officer could be granted in the USSR at the time.

  In the mid 1970s Brezhnev started using a new Russian ZIL115 car with drivers who were not part of Branch 18, but the security team maintained a good personal and professional relationship with them, making sure the vehicles were always manned by a driver and at least two security officers, and in the winter time the engines were continually kept running in case the car was urgently required.

  Up until 1977, police vehicles were not used to escort Brezhnev’s vehicle until one evening, after a Communist Party reception, Brezhnev and his entourage were on their way to his country residence when suddenly a huge truck with a drunk driver at the wheel came hurtling towards them. It was only the professionalism of the driver that prevented what could have been a tragic accident. Following that incident the Ministry of Internal Affairs issued an official order decreeing that a police car should always precede the state leader’s vehicle during all of his trips, and along the route policemen should be tasked to prevent vehicles crossing or entering the path of the motorcade (although years later this didn’t stop a Jeep, part of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s motorcade, smashing into a car that had mistakenly entered the route). Also, up to the 1970s the personal security officer accompanying Brezhnev never actually opened the car door for him; the security officer’s task was solely to monitor the surroundings, looking out for any dangers, while a senior duty police officer opened the state leader’s door. This was also changed.

  In December 1978 Vladimir Bogomolov was involved in a terrible car accident that almost ended his life and career as one of the USSR’s finest bodyguards. That year Moscow was experiencing an unusually cold winter and Bogomolov’s team were heading quickly back home after completing their shift. The car’s speed was around 100 mph and at a crossroads collided with a truck that had failed to stop because of the icy roads. The officer sitting in the back seat was thrown out of the car and was killed, and another other security officer was seriously wounded. Vladimir himself was unconscious for nine hours and spent two-and-a-half months recovering in hospital. Later, when Vladimir saw what was left of the car, he could not believe how he had survived the impact or how he was taken out from the squashed metallic remains; the car looked like an accordion. The only thing he said he could recollect was a white light at the end of a corridor and then darkness.

  His progress was personally monitored by the head of the KGB and after Vladimir recovered he was offered a number of positions in different departments, but he refused, asking once again to be included in Brezhnev’s personal security team.

  In 1977–8 Brezhnev’s security officers received new state-of-the-art Soviet weapons including a PSM pistol designed at the request of the KGB for their plain-clothes operatives, which is still one of the flattest pistols ever made. At close range, when the bullet goes through the body it leaves small entry wound, but the exit wound can be up to 16 cm in diameter. However, at long range they are not particularly effective. Brezhnev’s personal detail was also the first in the country to receive new compact machine guns which could be hidden in briefcases and, with the help of specially made equipment, deployed very quickly. Vladimir became the quickest marksman in the entire unit.

  Brezhnev loved cars and his favourite car was a black Eldorado Cadillac that US President Richard Nixon gave to the Soviet leader in 1972. Brezhnev also liked to drive his own Rolls-Royce, with his personal security officer in the passenger seat. One time, when Vladimir was accompanying Brezhnev in the Crimea, the Soviet leader almost fell asleep at the wheel after taking some sleeping pills,
with Vladimir reaching over to steer the car to safety.

  Another tragic accident happened during Brezhnev’s visit to Uzbekistan. The delegation headed to a building plant in Uzbekistan’s capital, Tashkent, where Brezhnev was going to award the Soviet Republic with the Order of Lenin. The premises were not checked and prepared in advance properly, as the visit was unexpected. All the workers gathered on the building’s balconies in order to have a glimpse of the state leader when one of the balconies crashed under the weight of so many people, directly where Brezhnev and his entourage were standing. The accident created panic, with Brezhnev’s security team shooting in the air as they tried to clear a path for him. Brezhnev broke his collarbone during this incident but was well enough to give a speech and present the Order of Lenin to the Republic the next day.

  According to Vladimir, Brezhnev took special care of all of his personal security team and once, when the KGB decided to remove one of his team for lapses in discipline, Brezhnev insisted on his return. Following Brezhnev’s orders, Vladimir himself got three new apartments during his time serving the leader, which meant a great deal during Soviet times. It is said that no other Soviet state leader was so attentive to the needs of his security team than Brezhnev.

  During the summer, Vladimir would always accompany Brezhnev to Yalta, in the Crimea, where Brezhnev took his vacations. Brezhnev loved to swim and would frequently swim for over two hours in the sea along the coast. He was guarded by at least two other swimmers and other bodyguards positioned in a security motorboat. Once, in 1976, when the current was quite strong, the swimmers were pushed away from their usual swimming area, so when they finally made it on to shore they took other holidaymakers by surprise – nobody expected to see the leader of the USSR surrounded by his security team with no other protection apart from their swimming trunks! Some people immediately recognized Brezhnev, others did not. The security services had already located Brezhnev and his protection team and were waiting on the shore with towels and his vehicle. When long swimming sessions in summer became the norm for Brezhnev, it was decided to create a special team of nautical security guards. The training sessions were held according to specially designed programmes run by the best diving instructors in the Navy. Bogomolov was one of the first to pass all the tests and training, and he became one of Brezhnev’s special submerged security detail with the additional benefit that he was already completely trusted by Brezhnev.