We had plenty of time to take in our surroundings because the “one minute” the secretary promised it would take to produce Philos had dragged on past twenty.
“If that prick doesn’t show up in two minutes, we’re out of here.”
“Calm down, Deuce. Philos is on the firing line. Particularly today.” Just as Deuce turned away from me, the door opened at the far left of the space that functioned as reception room and bullpen. A man every bit as tall as Deuce, but at least fifty pounds lighter, entered smiling. He was polished and handsome, with a ring of fair hair going gray, a tanned bald scalp, and a good-sized black mustache. Every bit of sixty, more presidential than cop, and hardly what Panopolous’s term “Greek Mafia” brought to mind, other than an eye-snapping resemblance to the Greek president.
“Folks, please excuse me for keeping you waiting, I simply could not break free. This place is crazier than ever, which I hear is due to you. So thank you for that. I hope we do some good today. I’m Ted Philos.” He extended his hand and shook mine firmly. He greeted Deuce the same way, and then turned to Alison, took her hand, and stared into her eyes. She all but melted. Philos had won us over by being himself, or so it seemed. “We thought since you both know Dr. Tahani, and the doctor who was killed, you might come across a familiar face during deplaning and customs clearance. We have excellent CCTV coverage of everything that goes on out there. You will be able to watch it all in real time over there.” He pointed to the door he had come through earlier. “That’s why I was detained. I was reviewing the digital recordings of the late flights last night.”
“Reviewing as in viewing again?” I asked.
“No, reviewing the work done by my team. Extra eyeballs never hurt.”
“What were you looking for?” I asked.
“The usual. Suspicious behavior and individuals profiled in our brief. In this case, Asian men, Asian men dressed as women traveling alone, and generally, people from the Stans and the Middle East.”
“That covers a great deal of ground on flights from London, doesn’t it, Mr. Philos?” Alison asked. It was a rhetorical question, and the first time she had spoken without having been asked a question.
“Yes. This is a busy posting for that profile, but my team is good at it. The best, I hope. Everything at the JFK port of entry is first-team.” We were still standing where we had met, and Philos looked at us. “Why are you smiling?”
“The TSA people out front. What a joke,” Deuce said.
“Not every employee is a rocket scientist, I will give you that. But the agency is only ten years old, and it’s under Homeland now. All that will change.”
“Great. They’re still a bunch of idiots.”
Philos laughed dismissively. “I understand the frustration people feel interacting with them, but they are the first line of defense, and they do what they are instructed to do, and not always perfectly. But there are fifty thousand TSA employees. We at Homeland haven’t chosen the bulk of them, and it is not a high-paying or high-prestige job. These are the people who deal directly with the public. Our version of your traffic enforcement agents in the city. They represent the city, wear the insignias of the NYPD, and are the lowest common denominator among public employees. Lousy job, low pay, and the people attracted to the opportunity are not the best-educated people in the job pool. What do you expect?”
Apparently, Philos had had the discussion more than once.
Deuce said, “Yeah. We all have our problems.” And the subject was dropped. In the silence, I thought about Mrs. Black, my secretary. Mrs. Black, about as gentle and well-educated as her job allows, always contended that doctors, lawyers, and bankers had no idea how to run a business. They deal with the public, depend on public perception, and still have the least experienced, and often lowest paid, employees answering phones and dealing with the public. Why not be represented by people your clientele can relate to. People with good manners. People who make an effort to speak the language. People who make an effort to be nice. It’s not a big deal, just common sense. Philos would probably counter: “Civil service, unions, human resources.” All the excuses for poor performance, and generally I agreed. When you run across a pleasant, intelligent TSA employee or traffic agent, they are invariably supervisors. I rest Mrs. Black’s case.
“Now that we have settled that,” Philos said, “let me take you through the sterile area.” Alison and I shared a “huh” moment, but we followed him through the viewing room and out the other side into the vast immigration hall. We stood between the lines where the customs agents screened passports and the exit to the baggage claim and customs inspection.
“There are three points of contact between U.S. Customs agents and arriving passengers. Throughout the entire process, passengers are isolated from the outside. Cell phone use is forbidden, and reception is intentionally poor in the immigration hall. Since yesterday, we have been intercepting calls instead of jamming the circuits.
“The baggage claim area is isolated but not totally sterile. There are airline employees, baggage handlers, and porters milling around. They have all been screened, but I wouldn’t vouch for them. The only exit for passengers is through the customs funnel, where two agents clear customs declarations and either pass people to the exit or assign them to an alley where luggage is inspected and passengers are further interviewed.” Philos finished and was waiting for comments. Nothing he said was a great revelation if you did any foreign travel.
“What’s the weak link?” Deuce asked.
“There is none. Nothing obvious. It’s a pretty good system.”
That seemed a bit optimistic to me. Deuce beat me to the punch. “Any place where the environment is unsterile is suspect. How many doors in and out of the baggage claim area?”
“Offhand, I don’t know. But we watch everything.”
“Like what?” Deuce asked.
“Like I said, everything. In that area we look for items handed off to personnel. Things that wouldn’t get through inspection. It doesn’t happen often. A rich guy trying to avoid duty on jewelry isn’t going to entrust it to a hip-hop dude pushing a wagon. Profiling smugglers is about likely associates. Same goes for terrorists. Think ‘it takes one to know one’ and most of the time you will be right.”
“Too simple,” Deuce said. “Let’s watch.”
46
To say the day went slowly is to soft-sell boredom. There wasn’t a comfortable place to sit, and milling around the immigration hall and baggage area got old quickly. People-watching was why we were there. That part was interesting and new to me. The waiting between arrivals was torture.
“Welcome to your first stakeout, doc.”
“Fuck you too, lieutenant.”
“Boys,” said Alison, semi-seriously.
Trying to be unobtrusive in a huge, unadorned public space isn’t easy. What made it almost possible was the endless stream of new faces. Without the turnover we would be made in minutes. Alison and I strolled together, trying to look like a couple waiting for their luggage. Periodically, one or the other of us would look annoyed at the inept baggage delivery system. Deuce looked like a cop.
After an hour, we adjourned to the CCTV viewing area and found seats. The initial immediacy of purpose was gone, but it was strangely easier to stay alert.
“Look at how many people on the non-U.S. passport lines are from Asia, the Middle East, or the Raj,” Alison remarked. It was the first time I ever heard anyone use the term Raj in conversation. I thought it was one of those politically incorrect things people no longer said.
“You mean Indian and Pakistani?”
“Yes, of course. And their neighbors on the subcontinent, the other Stans.”
I didn’t want to sound bigoted, but I asked, “How can you tell the difference between people from all the Stans?”
Alison answered evenly, “Forget bias. Just profile the people you see. See if you can pigeonhole them. It’s a game. Male or female, skin color, features, size of nose, type
of hair, all the things you were taught to make believe you didn’t notice. Typical phenotypic characteristics. Eye color is all over the map, you know that, but some things hold true: 99 percent of ethnic Estonians have blue eyes . . . so if we ever go to war with Estonia keep that in mind. The point is it’s stupid not to use common sense. Look at how people dress. There are ethnic trends even when they think there aren’t. People from Eastern Europe look like people from Eastern Europe. Look at shoes, particularly men’s shoes. Shoes tell a lot about a man’s social class and origins. More than women. Affluent women buy shoes from a few big-name designers, and down the line the knock-offs follow. Men don’t see shoes as fashion. Pay attention to what they look like. Make snap decisions. You do it anyway, we all do, and now it can help us.” Alison waited for a comment.
“Don’t accuse me of being a bleeding heart—I’m not. But I’ve been on the job far too long not to see the abuses. Terry stops have been going on since the 1968 Supreme Court decision, I think.”
“What are Terry stops?” Alison asked.
“Terry stops refers to a Supreme Court case under Earl Warren, which allowed stop-and-search by police officers when they have reasonable suspicion of an illegal act, or believe they are in danger, but have no actual knowledge that anything illegal has been done. Since then it has been used to harass generations of black and Hispanic males but also to arrest a lot of bad-ass, weapon-carrying perps. Point is, it has been amazingly well used and seriously abused. But that’s ancient history. The Patriot Act makes Terry stops look like an ACLU invention.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“What, that profiling is abused? Definitely. If you were a nice black college kid driving through town after a party with a carload of friends, maybe playing the tunes a bit louder than necessary, what do you think the chances of being stopped and searched by the police would be versus the same stop-and-search probability for white kids? And would you feel alienated, or would you say, ‘Okay, most violent crime in cities is perpetrated by young black males, so thank you, officer, for the stop-and-search.’ I doubt it. But I also believe it is a necessary evil. A reflection of the facts of life. If all cops were thoughtful, well educated, and secure, there would be no issue. But, sadly, most of them are human, and some are bigots and bullies, and some suffer from mass mentality, which, combined with fear for either themselves or the country, puts civil rights in jeopardy. If anyone has the right to curtail civil rights, where does it end, and who will be the judge of that?”
“Wendell, I understand. I’m English; we pat traitors on the wrist and wish them well. I’ve grown up respecting civil rights and the right to dissent, to disagree. Now please, just keep an eye out for nice people who look like they might be terrorists.”
“Jesus, don’t you think that’s what I’m doing?” I asked.
“After that lecture, I had a moment of doubt.”
“Don’t.”
“Good. Our problem is not going to be individuals who fit the profile. They are too smart for that. We have a leg up knowing about the Asian male mules, but don’t count on it. Watch everything, everybody. Something won’t be right. A movement, a twitch, something won’t fit. That’s our sign,” Alison said.
“Don’t profile?”
“No, do profile, but don’t exclude anyone or anything. These people know what we look for. A young guy with a ratty beard and a bulky coat is going to be a red herring, but we have to react. If we don’t, one day one of them will be carrying a bomb. We have to spend resources even when our level of suspicion is low. In the long haul, that has been one of their most potent weapons. Security everywhere, lifestyle interruptions, crippling expense. The collateral damage is killing us, literally, and changing our lives. We’re only now learning how to play the game. Your drones have been a great help in taking guerrilla warfare to the guerrillas. Much more effective than in Pakistan. Nothing has been more disruptive to al-Qaeda, AQAP, and their allies. Al-Awlaki is a great example. Now, I think we are looking at their response.”
Six hours later there was nothing to report other than that we now knew our way around backroom security and the public areas. Things looked pretty much the way one would expect in the immigration and baggage areas. There was no unusual show of force inside isolation. Panopolous and Philos had made the hard decision that the courier was on the way whether or not we showed overwhelming force on site. The area was controlled, and no one could get out of isolation areas unless Customs and Homeland passed them. Outside baggage claim, it was an armed camp. The thinking was that once airborne, they couldn’t turn the mule back despite whatever panic message was issued. On arrival, the mule had to be apprehended and would be, but maintaining a business-as-usual appearance in sensitive areas would allow authorities to trap the cell operatives at the airport. There was nothing to lose so long as the mule didn’t get through.
Between arrivals, the hall was eerie. The plastic tape defining the immigration queues stood despite the absence of crowds. The occasional straggler still was made to drag hand luggage through the switchbacks to reach a bored employee in an ill-fitting uniform, assigning customs booths. The lack of consideration was both psychologically diminishing for the traveler and an unpleasant welcome to the United States. It also allowed the cameras more time to observe each and every movement.
Drifting toward four p.m., there was more activity at arrivals and definitely more behind the scenes. Customs inspectors, TSA, and airline employees made ready for the shift change. It all looked routine. The same number of uniforms came in as departed, but the demographics were decidedly different. Sharp-looking, fit, military-type personnel replaced the tired, stressed men and women unified by the chips on their shoulders and bad attitudes. Only the uniforms were the same. The new TSA inspectors were highly trained DHS antiterror operatives. The new shift of customs officers had the benefit of a detailed briefing from Philos, which didn’t happen often, and they were on high alert. Law enforcement officials began to talk about food.
47
Being inside the guts of an airport was like anything else. The wonder and magic were short-lived. Technical miracles like tracking aircraft in flight and passengers on the ground were briefly new, and then just another tool. The Homeland guys had listening devices, jammers, intelligence networks, and the finest weapons an unlimited budget could buy. They were federal special officers sworn to protect the country against its enemies, and then they were just another bunch of cops using different jargon.
Operation “Dust” was in its early stages, and an enthusiastic team spirit enlivened everything. The level of security employee skyrocketed noticeably as Homeland stood in for TSA. It was SOP under suspicion of imminent attack. Mostly, they were nice guys. A little intense for my style, but they worked from crisis to crisis, and the stakes were high. Right now, we were still getting to know one another. It was dinnertime, and hungry people were more alike than different. One of the feds, a thick redhead about thirty, wearing chinos and a fashionably wrinkled workshirt, was holding court at a nearly clear desktop at the periphery of the room. He was writing with his left hand, taking food orders on a lined legal pad with the Homeland Security logo at the top of the sheet. With the pile of cash in front of him and the steady stream of men and women dictating orders and dropping money, the place had the air of the ten-dollar window at Belmont.
“How about the finest. What do you guys want for dinner?” he asked.
“What’s on the menu, J. Edgar?” Deuce asked.
“Gourmet choices. We’re doing Subway. What’ll it be?”
“We pass,” Deuce said. “Thanks.” He waved away my objections with a glance. His eyes said, “Trust me.”
It was almost an hour and a half until VS009 arrived at 2010; 8:10 p.m. to us. Alison and I followed Deuce out the back of the Homeland office into the bowels of the terminal. He was doing double time, and his strides were longer than ours.
“Hold it, man. What’s the hurry?” Deuce just waved
us on and kept moving. How we managed to get from immigration to the departures area was a mystery, but Deuce halted in front of the Palm Bar and Grille, and gave us his best smile. “Ain’t I good to you?”
“The Palm. The real Palm, in the airport?” I asked.
“You bet. It’s the real thing. We deserve some decent chow.”
In fact, Deuce was right. An offspring of the famous steak house, the menu boasted mouthwatering slabs of pure cholesterol. We opted for the fabulous hamburgers and greedily stuffed our faces and drank Diet Coke, which was too bad, since an ice cold Heineken would have been perfect. I was disappointed that my companions wasted great beef on burgers cooked medium. Mine was very rare and very delicious. I ate it all and was spiraling toward a protein-induced coma. Two cups of thick, old coffee were necessary to banish the fuzz. I picked up the tab for dinner. It was an expensive hamburger.
We returned to the command center a lot less alert and edgy than we had been an hour ago. The science disputes that food in the stomach and intestines causes pooling of blood in the abdomen, depletes blood supply to the brain, and results in sleepiness. My father believed it and regularly fell asleep in his green leather chair immediately after leaving the table and filling his pipe. Lunch or dinner, it didn’t matter. He ate and he snored. Others indict elevated blood sugar and the release of insulin, though I’m not exactly sure how that makes you sleepy. Anyway, the edge was off, too far off. There were three more flights from LHR expected this evening, and we needed to be vigilant.
Wendell Black, MD Page 23