by Ivan Bering
JUSTICE REBORN
By Ivan Bering
Copyright 2014 Ivan Bering
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the author.
ISBN 978-0-9937100-0-1
SPECIAL THANKS
Thanks to my daughter Cathy for starting me
on this path and reading many versions of this novel.
Other Charlie Taylor novels:
A Disconnected Mind: second in the series: projected publication late 2015
Kill All of Them: third in the series: projected publication 2016
tABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents
JUSTICE REBORN
SPECIAL THANKS
AUTHOR’S NOTE
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1: WHERE was CHARLIE?
CHAPTER 2: WHITE ROCK PRISON
CHAPTER 3: sTEPHEN’S BOARD
CHAPTER 4: CHARLIE’S LOG: The Tipping Point
CHAPTER 5: the five star couple
CHAPTER 6: charlie’s log: the basketball game
CHAPTER 7: CHARLIE’S LOG: The REST
CHAPTER 8: THE BLACK ANGEL ARRIVEs
CHAPTER 9: Charlie’s LOG: The Spring Dance
CHAPTER 10: Binary Search
CHAPTER 11: Charlie’s Log: Karen
CHAPTER 12: Stephen AT HOME
CHAPTER 13: Charlie’s Log: At the Hotel
CHAPTER 14: waiting at Fort Green
CHAPTER 15: Charlie’s Log: Chinese Supper
CHAPTER 16: A PRISON VISIT
CHAPTER 17: First Brainstorming Session
CHAPTER 18: condition Confidential
cHAPTER 19: Charlie’s Log: At the Abbey
CHAPTER 20: Forensic Division Problem
CHAPTER 21: Brainstorming Concludes
CHAPTER 22: Charlie’s Log: concern
CHAPTER 23: Charlie’s Log: first Meeting
CHAPTER 24: Dr. Grovernor
CHAPTER 25: HARRY and the HOTEL COUPLE
CHAPTER 26: Charlie’s Log: the Assistant
CHAPTER 27: statutory rape
CHAPTER 28: uncle willie wanders
CHAPTER 29: Charlie’s Log: Sam and Ron
CHAPTER 30: Another Look at Harry
CHAPTER 31: Dr. Max’s Interrogation
CHAPTER 32: the schemer
CHAPTER 33: The Judge, Kate and Janice
CHAPTER 34: Charlie’s Log: The Blowup
CHAPTER 35: Random Selection
CHAPTER 36: Another Special Board Meeting
CHAPTER 37: An Ultimatum
CHAPTER 38: Charlie’s Log: Analysis
CHAPTER 39: An Amazing Video
CHAPTER 40: the Judge’s Chambers
CHAPTER 41: the Last Meeting
CHAPTER 42: At the Hotel
CHAPTER 43: Charlie’s Log: a Watcher
CHAPTER 44: Charlie’s Log: the Parking Lot
AUTHOR’S NOTE
My therapy demanded I start writing, the mantra: write what is important to you. For some time, this meant bugger all. But my analyst persisted, and I began with what I knew best: my work.
I tried to capture the turmoil and tension which existed when we reinstated the death penalty, and executions were an acceptable part of our ethos. Of course, with Prison Reform everything escalated and the body count mounted.
It was not to be that easy; the writing had to be personal. Hence, this book includes personal logs of my struggles. These private records have been edited, and there are a few omissions; some events are too embarrassing to provide a full confession, vanity trumping accuracy. I’m sure you will be able to fill in the gaps; if you can’t, by the last chapter you will know how much I care.
Charlie
Charles (Charlie) W. Taylor
Detective First Class Homicide Division
PROLOGUE
They stayed here: albeit underground, nevertheless at the Abbey.
The irony: the place was built around 400 years ago to serve the needs of a cluster of monks, and evolved into a commercial success. The revenue from business conferences, meditation weekends, and individual retreats provided a healthy profit and allowed the Abbey to prosper. A central core consisted of a variety of buildings, all surrounded by a waist-high stone wall, with exits at various intervals. One of the exits led directly into an adjacent woodland where the walking and jogging paths continued for miles.
He tried to control the frequency and timing of his visits. It was best to blend with a crowd, best not to be conspicuous and get recognized.
The pathways offered a diversity of surfaces: some concrete, some paved, some crushed rock, and where the paths enter the woodland some type of reddish earth mix prevailed. He walked the forest for hours; on these tracks he found serenity, at last, able to recharge and relax.
He buried them here, months ago.
CHAPTER 1: WHERE was CHARLIE?
“When we first arrived, she was creeping on the sidewalk, like an injured cockroach.”
Jean Hardin delivered each word in a strained cadence; at irregular intervals she lost all control. The convulsions and tears transformed the attractive woman into a sobbing five-year-old, knees tight against her chest as she rocked in the big chair.
Dr. Sam Taylor, her psychologist, decided it was best to allow her to vent without any interruptions, no questions, and no clarification. He would wait until her hysterical energy depleted. She was an EMT, emergency medical technician. Her prior visits centered on a horrendous traffic accident involving young teenagers. This was different. Today’s session went beyond depression.
“The patient screamed every time she heard a male voice. Any time a man spoke she let loose with a desperate howl. The only reason we managed to get her into the ambulance is because Detective Zubik was there and she helped me. Karen, that’s the detective, even stayed in the ambulance and tried to calm the woman. The poor lady. Oh god, she kept screeching, tossing her head and spattering blood over me and the inside of the ambulance.
I’m still not fully qualified to connect her to all the sensors of the new patient monitoring gear, but the senior EMT couldn’t get close, so I wrestled my way through the setup.
No one could understand her. Jesus, her entire face was swollen and bruised, almost shattered, most of her front teeth were missing…”
Jean stopped for a moment the memory overwhelming her. Great sobs wracked her body. Sam touched her shoulder and encouraged her to continue.
“I’m not sure if it was the mild sedative in the IV or if she just passed out but eventually she stopped. Bill, our senior EMT, decided to sit up front with the driver, and I stayed in the back with Karen.
She’s the latest victim of that mad man…rapist…..you know he typically kills them but I think she’ll live….her face will never be the same…
I can’t sleep. Every time I close my eyes I see her. And I’m scared to go outside. When night comes, I lock all the doors and turn off the lights. I’m going to buy a gun even though I hate them. They’ve given me time off, but it isn’t helping. I’ve got to resign. I couldn’t stand the sight of another one ……….oh shit..”
She lost all control again and the crying intensified. Sam was prepared and decided it was time. He was stepping over the line; as a psychologist he was not licensed to inject medication, but it was a line he crossed before when facing a hysterical patient.
“Jean, let me roll up your sleeve and give you a shot….…just enough to allow you to relax. Now sit back in that big chair and close your eyes. I want you to re
st for about 15 minutes. Then we’ll talk.”
Jean wiped her face dry, closed her eyes and put her head back; soon her breathing became closer to normal but Sam knew she needed more time. His official recording would start in a few minutes; in preparation, he logged the date into his recorder: Friday, March 26th, 2021.
As he waited, he thought about the serial rapist/killer who was terrorizing the city. Some his new clients were woman traumatized by this high profile criminal and his bragging rants which all the news agencies appeared anxious to report. Even his ridiculous name was established by the press; the damn rapist got tagged as Horny Harry, which implied, even if he was raping and killing, he was just a few degrees beyond normal.
Harry was a brutal killer, only two of his six victims survived his frenzied attacks. If Detective Karen Zubik was at the site, then Sam’s brother should have been. At one time his brother, Charlie Taylor, was the senior homicide detective in the Division and acknowledged as the best man in the squad.
Sam knew all the detectives in the homicide section. When Charlie’s wife and daughter were still alive, his brother’s backyard became the gathering place for summer barbecues; the detectives were a small elite group, all men except for Karen. She was older than the men but able to sustain their pace and match their humor; the men, Wes, Terry, and Manuel, were all under 35 years old.
Sam compared the summer evenings to being with a bottle of fireflies: constantly in motion, at times one would light up with a joke or a story and all would erupt, an explosion of laughter.
Sam and Monk, Charlie’s best friend, were the only outsiders invited. But Sam’s wife found the humor too black, and she often found an excuse not to attend.
Was the Chief of Police still trying to keep Charlie buried in the Records department? The entire situation was becoming hopeless; his brother would explode if those restraints weren’t lifted.
But the Chief believed ‘law and order’ also applied to internal procedures and codes of behavior; Charlie, an impatient detective, struggled with the forms and office procedures which he viewed as secondary priorities. So the two good men had their relationship defined by the proverbial lament: not on the same page.
Two days ago one of the detectives, Wes, phoned Sam; it was too tentative to tell Charlie but the latest rumor in circulation: the Chief planned to reinstate and promote the senior detective.
So, where was Charlie?
CHAPTER 2: WHITE ROCK PRISON
Most of the cells on death row stood empty, but the execution rate never faltered.
As another convicted was wheeled into the execution chamber, the head guard neared a panic state and screamed into his phone. “Peter, get the hell back up here. We need the gurneys and more body bags. I’ve got bodies stacked in the hall.”
“I’m coming. I’m coming. The first two ambulances collided, then a tailgate door stuck, and we couldn’t load the corpses. A goddamn mess.”
“I don’t care. Try running. If the Warden gets here before you do, we’ll all be back in the shit.”
“I hate this. It’s all happening too fast. We’ve executed over half of death row in a couple of weeks.”
Currently, White Rock prison functioned as two extreme zones. Inside the closed doors of the Interrogation and Execution rooms, the atmosphere was all business, logic, and control. Outside these rooms, in the hallways and corridors, chaos and confusion prevailed, as prison staff hustled to deal with the logistics of executed convicts, their relatives, and the crematorium staff. In the yard, the temperature was over 100 degrees, and a traffic jam of ambulances competed for the next corpse. The mass executions at White Rock prison were the result of one man’s brilliance: Dr. Max Armstrong.
Unfortunately, peer jealous frequently accompanies individual brilliance. His detractors complained he was too fast, skipped steps, jumped to conclusions and was reckless. Harsh criticism for any scientist.
However, when the history of science is updated, three will be named as the giants of all time: Newton, Einstein, and Armstrong. Before he was 30 he had a Nobel Peace Prize, and the world had new insight into the operation of the brain.
Dr. Max Armstrong’s research resulted in three interrogation techniques. Techniques so powerful they allowed a complete upheaval of the system of justice, including universal acceptance of the death penalty. The procedures soon lost their sophisticated laboratory labels and simply became known as S1, S2, and S3.
S1 is the first level of interrogation and the most frequently used. The cocktail of drugs is a general relaxant. Euphoria develops which makes the recipient interested in talking. This means not only talking about the crime in question but also exposing his complete portfolio; it appears confessing is good for the soul. There are very few people who can stand up to the drug’s seductive power, and most interrogations were completed at this level.
S2 uses the same drugs but at almost double the dosage. Since, at times, side reactions can be severe, this interrogation requires medical staff to be present and monitor the recipient.
S3 is reserved for capital crimes and entails an intense probing or scanning of the suspect’s brain. This interrogation step allows the legal system to access, retrieve and display streams of memory from any individual. This inquiry is mandatory before a death sentence can be carried out. The suspect’s own mind reveals his role in the crime.
Dr. Max developed the chemical mix which enhanced the scanning and retrieval process and at the same time provided the brain with protection from the severe probing process. Without this protection, it was impossible to conduct a complete scan without killing the participant. The probing action is like an irritant which cause the cells to release feeble signals, a stream of electronic consciousness. It was Dr. Max who integrated and modulated these fragile signals into an electronic stream which could be processed by the software he developed. The results are fed to regular computer monitors for all to see and hear. The net outcome of an S3 interrogation: guilt or innocence is no longer in doubt.
Dr. Max Armstrong’s IQ exploded off any measurable scale; not as loudly proclaimed: his emotional IQ was that of a young teenager. His appearance surprised those who met him for the first time, his extraordinary good looks and physique the picture of a Hollywood stud. Mother Nature, for a few seconds, relaxed the rules and allowed all her gifts to be packaged together in one man. Female companionship was not a problem, his indulgence a legend.
To the chagrin of his employers, a minor genetic idiosyncrasy persisted: he was attracted to the younger segment of the female sex, a character flaw neither humorous nor harmless.
CHAPTER 3: sTEPHEN’S BOARD
Would the executions be allowed to proceed? At the conclusion of the meeting, Judge Stephen Miller’s Board would make one of the most notable decisions of its brief existence.
A few of the Judge’s staff had witnessed the inaugural set of executions which took place at White Rock prison, in Sector 13. Next up: the prison under Stephen’s jurisdiction, Fort Green.
At today’s meeting, the Board would review any logistical or procedural issues which had been encountered at the historical undertaking at White Rock. There were no legal barriers; the new legislation, Justice Reborn, demanded the decommissioning of all prisons and the processing of all death row convicts, execute or release the directive.
However, at the moment Kate’s early morning voice mail message concerned him. He played her message again:
“Stephen, I’m sorry to interrupt your meeting preparations, but this is critical. I’m driving in from White Rock prison; Emma is with me. We’ve been working all night, but the results are too sensitive to discuss over the phone. Please ensure I’m last on the agenda and only Board members are in attendance when I report; last, it is best if this story is not recorded. Again, I apologize for the mystery, but I know you’ll agree when you hear my conclusions. Emma is the only other person who is aware of the situation. It’s not good. Bye.”
He trusted her and would do wh
at she asked. But now he had to regain his equilibrium and ensure he was ready for the Board; his nervous energy force him to pace around the office in a brisk fashion, looking a bit ridiculous, he thought. Eventually he tired, relaxed, stopped and gazed down at the park.
It was a sunny morning and the spring wind vigorously tossed about loose debris; leaves, empty containers, and discarded paper wrappers rose, twirled and fell back to the ground with each gust of wind. His corner office, via two large glass panels, provided an unobstructed view of one of the city’s most extensive green spaces. Bookcases and walnut paneling covered the remaining walls in an office larger than he required but bureaucratically-sized to match his position.
He reminisced about that April, years ago, and his passionate affair with Kate. At the time, both of them married but not to each other, and both in the final year of different work programs at the University. The work programs, associated with advanced degrees, had been fortunate appointments, and a successful completion would see them assigned to prominent positions. The end of the affair had been swift, with no turning back for either of them. His feelings periodically flared, watching her with others, hearing her voice, at times a challenge to his self-control. Had he made a mistake in appointing her to the Board?
He turned from the window, walked out of his office and into the boardroom, a large room with more wood paneling on the walls, dark hardwood floors and heavy burgundy drapes to shield the room from the warm spring weather. The room accommodated a series of small tables arranged in a U-shape with Stephen and Ann, his assistant, at the top and the various Board members along the legs of the U.
Stephen Miller, Judge for Sector 14, was the chair and in control. Although not avuncular by nature, the Judge knew how to keep the meetings loose and still maintain the pace and focus. His four Division Heads, three of them selected by him, were already seated, waiting, material organized and ready to report, the exception being Dr. Kate, a late arrival.