Surveillance
During my training at the FBI Academy, my favorite operational training activity was our surveillance exercises. A team of FBI agents in different cars with radios followed people who were trying to elude us, and worked in tandem with unexpected participants that seemed straight out of a spy novel or movie. Fanning out on the local highways in towns in Northern Virginia was a true joy and a great learning experience. Unfortunately, our packed training schedule only allowed for a few surveillance practicals. However, much to my delight, I found out shortly after arriving in San Diego that surveillance would be one of the major activities that I would spend my time on in the field. This lived up to my expectation as being the most pleasurable activity I participated in while serving as an agent in the field. But surveillance is far from being enjoyable every minute. It can be tedious and boring, especially if an agent gets the feeling that he or she is wasting time and that the efforts will not yield fruitful results.
One of my earliest surveillance experiences in San Diego was observing an apartment of a woman believed to be associated with a violent fugitive who was wanted in Minnesota. I was alone in my car during several days and evenings, keeping an eye on the property, without a hint of the subject showing up. It did not take long for me to realize how much I stuck out like a sore thumb in the area, which was in the working class suburb of Santee. While I was dressed casually, my clothing was obviously something that would be more likely to be worn by an off-duty cop rather than a “boy from the hood.” Making things worse, I had no other options than to use my FBI issued four-door Buick, which could only have been more blatant if the plates had said “US GVT.” There was even an occasion on which a group of several children started riding their bicycles in circles around my car, until one worked up the bravery to approach my window and ask what I was doing. If I could have been filmed, the result would be a perfect instructional video on how to not conduct surveillance; this also would have made for an appropriate YouTube “fail” video. After a few days, I was pulled to other priorities and assignments, and other agents and I decided to play our hand and interview the former girlfriend of the fugitive. We followed her to her job, which was at casino located at a nearby Indian reservation. She was genuinely horrified that we would think she would still associate with her ex-boyfriend, and assured us she had not seen him for years. We thanked her for her time, and did not let her know that her apartment had been watched for several days. The fugitive was later captured in another state.
Another surveillance operation that I participated in was one that involved going to a hospital where the subject had a doctor’s appointment. We decided that this was an excellent arrest scenario since the subject, a female from Thailand, would most likely be unarmed for her visit. Also, she would be presumably out of her element, which would be to our advantage when arresting her.
A team of several agents were told through an informant about the subject and the doctor’s appointment. We set up surveillance on her house and followed her for about ten miles along the California freeways to her appointment. We had contacted other agents to assist with the arrest at the hospital, and by the time we reached her destination, the hospital parking lot was already crawling with agents. Our biggest worry was that she would spot agents and realize she was about to be arrested, but our agents successfully blended right in with the normal flow of patients at the busy facility.
We allowed her to go to her appointment, and decided to simply wait for her to come out and arrest her as she walked back to her vehicle. As the minutes passed, anticipation of the arrest built. I had “the eye” and was watching the hospital entrance, waiting for the subject. I saw her, identified her, and notified all agents that the subject had exited the building and was heading back to her car. As she reached her car, swarms of agents surprised her both on foot and by pulling up in vehicles with lights blazing. The reaction of the people in the parking lot was priceless; I am certain that most of them probably will never forget the day that they were simply going to doctor’s appointment and then saw a multitude of FBI agents making an arrest. This particular scenario was fun since the action moved fast and the odds of a safe arrest were in our favor.
On another occasion, the FBI received information from an informant on the location of a suspected bank robber. The location was in a rough area near central San Diego, right off an I-15 exit. The informant turned out to be a former spouse of the subject, one who was engaged in a custody battle. The FBI frequently would obtain information from unhappy or disgruntled girlfriends, spouses, or friends of suspects.
I took up a position outside of the subject’s house and waited. After a couple of hours, I saw movement through my binoculars, and I could see that it was indeed the subject we were looking for. The man finally walked to his car, got in, and drove away. He drove right past me, and I radioed back to all San Diego PD and FBI units that the subject was “rolling,” which initiated the ensuing arrest.
The model typically used for a joint operation between the FBI and San Diego police was for the San Diego PD to do what officers call a “hot stop.” This means that a normal black and white patrol unit would pull an arrest subject over in a low-key manner that would suggest a routine traffic stop. This helped to keep the arrest scenario from escalating and resulted in safer arrests. Although uniformed officers did the heavy lifting, they were usually more than anxious to participate and have the opportunity to arrest wanted criminals. And despite the tough talk that comes from many agents, the FBI is more than happy to pass along the risk and danger of arresting criminals to the local authorities when possible. Vehicle arrests in particular are considered to be extremely dangerous by the law enforcement community. Most shootouts and violent encounters tend to occur with vehicle arrest scenarios since the subjects often feel they have a chance to escape.
So for this particular arrest, a San Diego PD unit pulled over the subject. I was only about a half block away and could see that the arrest was going smoothly and without incident. Once the subject was secured, I drove up to assist. The subject was still wearing the shirt with a business logo reflecting where he worked. This did make me feel some sympathy for the subject, because the bank robbery had occurred a couple of years ago, and obviously the robber was working at a legitimate job and trying to make an honest living. He had made a poor choice at the age of eighteen, and now at the age of twenty would be facing a felony conviction with prison time for what was probably a one-time event.
This was a good lesson for anyone who thought he could get away with a bank robbery. The statute of limitations for bank robberies is only five years, which I found fascinating. Anyone could rob a bank and five years later write a book about his or her experience and not be subject to arrest. However, the government can seize the robber’s assets for an indefinite period of time, so even fifty years after a bank robbery, the offender could become broke, even if his or her money was not directly “earned” from bank robberies. Still, I could not help but hypothesize about a scenario of robbing banks, setting up accounts overseas, and then returning to the United States five years after the last robbery to do interviews, book deals, and movie deals. I would not be surprised to see someone perform this dangerous form of a stunt in society’s current reality show era.
On another bank robbery occasion, I took part in another arrest of a subject who was arrested while driving his vehicle. This particular arrest occurred on a road alongside harbor that is adjacent to the San Diego airport. I was doing surveillance on the subject and radioing out information to San Diego PD. I identified the vehicle and watched the black and whites move in. Several units surrounded the subject, and I hopped out of my car with gun drawn. Once again I was appreciative of the police officers who were assuming almost all of the risk and danger associated with the arrest. If there was a problem, I would be safely tucked away behind my car door while they were exposed
.
While watching the action of the arrest unfold, I suddenly noticed an elderly man standing upright directly next to me. He had decided to get out of his car and stroll up to me, even though I was crouched behind a car door with my gun drawn. He started to say something along the lines of “What’s going on?” but I abruptly interrupted him mid-sentence and ordered him to get back in his car. I was lucky that no violence broke out, because he easily could have been hurt or killed. I learned that agents can never assume that people will exercise common sense. Apparently a scene with law enforcement officials with guns drawn while hiding behind their car doors is not enough of a signal for some people to clear the area. With a typical arrest scenario, there will be one or more law enforcement people who control the crowd and prevent unwanted access to crime or arrest scenes. Aside from the public safety dangers, this also helps keep agents and police officers safe from an ambush while their attention is focused on only one direction. But with many fast-developing arrest scenes, agents do not have the luxury of having dedicated traffic control personnel, and this was one of those situations.
A few weeks later, I encountered a similar arrest scenario. A bank robber had been identified by a witness as possibly living in an inexpensive hotel near Balboa Park in San Diego. The FBI and San Diego PD set up our surveillance, identified the subject, and watched him catch a cab. Typically, surveillance takes hours or even days to be productive, but we were fortunate enough to spot him within minutes of setting up our positions. The subject hailed a cab, and our radios erupted with communications on how the arrest should be performed. Following our usual protocol, the FBI deferred to the San Diego PD, who elected to pull over the taxi using marked units to perform the arrest. We had a caravan of various surveillance units following the cab on parallel streets, and my pulse quickened as I listed to the radio chatter with the marked SDPD units. Although the PD had two units for the arrest, both would pull the cab over from behind on a one-way street. Help was needed to block off the end of the street in case the subject fled, so a squad mate and I frantically raced ahead on side streets to get one block ahead of the spot where we anticipated the arrest would occur. The street was empty, and we could see the cab followed by the PD units with lights and sirens blazing, heading our direction. We knew this was a dangerous scenario because the robber had been armed during his bank robberies, and we did not want to jeopardize the life of a cab driver. However, he was likely heading to Mexico; this was a common practice for criminals in the San Diego vicinity. If he made it to Mexico, we might not ever locate him again, and we knew the Mexican government would do nothing to help arrest him. We did not want to risk his escaping and potentially doing more robberies, each with an elevated possibility of injury or death, since he was known to carry a weapon.
The cab driver pulled over, and the SDPD officers quickly swarmed in with guns drawn. The suspect did not put up a fight and was arrested without incident. My partner and I were able to watch from a safe distance, and felt lucky that the subject had not attempted to flee on foot. If he had done that with his gun drawn, we easily could have been in a shooting situation, and as much as I would have hated to shoot him, I certainly would have taken any actions necessary to ensure I would go home safely that night.
CHAPTER 41
Murder-for-Hire
Another unusual investigation that I was involved in was a murder-for-hire case in which there was a young man who was attempting to locate an assassin whom he could pay to kill his ex-girlfriend. The FBI learned about the plot from an informant, and we sent in an undercover agent who could participate in this plot and pretend to be a contract killer. We planned to build the case using acceptance of payments through the mail and using phone calls. In addition to attempted murder charges, prosecutors would then be able to pursue wire fraud charges. Accumulating evidence pertaining to this scheme was another example of how a case that ensures a criminal will go to jail is built. It is not just a simple matter of knowing about a wrongdoing and arresting somebody. Law enforcement has a terribly difficult burden of proof beyond a reasonable doubt, and by building cases with multiple charges, agents can increase the odds of having a successful prosecution. If a clever defense attorney figures out a technicality to evade one charge, then it is a luxury to have additional charges to fall back on that will help make sure justice is served.
This particular case called for many hours of surveillance. I was an able photographer and had previously shown my ability to take high quality photos with no setup or preparation time. I was relied upon to be able to get photos in high pressure surveillance situations, which could be later used as evidence in court. For this case we arranged a meeting on a Saturday afternoon between the subject and our undercover guy in a park in the town of Coronado near San Diego. The subject, who was in the military, was familiar with the park in Coronado since he had previously served nearby on this military-friendly island. I parked my car along the street where I could view our undercover agent as he met with the subject. I grabbed my Nikon D100 camera, clicked in a telephoto lens, and climbed into the back seat. I left a front window slightly cracked and positioned myself at an angle whereby I could zoom in on the meeting from the back seat with no distortion from window glass. However, despite the slighted opened front window, the interior of my vehicle’s back seat quickly reached stifling triple-digit temperatures; although the outside summer air temperature was in the 80s, the sunbaked car interior was easily thirty degrees warmer. But there was little choice. I could not leave the car running or roll the windows down further or I would risk being spotted. Although I turned my FBI radio volume down so that it was barely audible inside my car, I still needed to communicate with the rest of the surveillance team and could not afford to have radio traffic drifting from wide open windows in the car.
I waited for the meet to occur. Despite the heat and my racing heart, I really enjoyed my position because it was exactly the work I had envisioned doing in the FBI. I was getting paid to take photos, so in a sense I was getting to be a professional photographer. These pictures would be used as evidence documenting criminal activity; this evidence would be used to take a potential killer off the street. The location on Coronado Island was a nice change from the usual seedy streets and rough areas where criminals typically hang out in the San Diego vicinity.
After about half an hour, the subject showed up with cash in hand. The fact hit me that he was actually attempting to pay somebody to murder another human being. I was thrilled to be part of the team that was putting a stop to this person’s evil intent. I shot a number of photos; many were mediocre, but there were plenty that clearly showed the subject passing a cash payment to our undercover operative. After the meeting, we arrested the subject, and the case wound up being successfully prosecuted. I was proud to have contributed to this effort, and I knew that I had successfully taken surveillance photos that were one of the pieces of evidence that helped put this person behind bars.
CHAPTER 42
Things Change
One of the more popular sayings that I heard repeatedly in the FBI was: “If you aren’t happy, just wait. And if you are happy, just wait.” Things do change quickly in the FBI, from the cars agents are assigned to drive, to fellow squad members, to who the supervisor is. A change in supervisor can signal a significant change for everyone who reports to that supervisor. The FBI’s operating structure follows a rigid model that is similar to that of a military organization. A supervisor position has great power and importance, since all activities that agents perform must be approved by a supervisor. All documents and papers must be reviewed by a supervisor. Short of going to the bathroom, anything an agent does has to be discussed with a supervisor.
I have always been self-motivated and worked well without close supervision. In fact, I have felt myself shut down creative thinking when closely watched, since I want to avoid criticism for “n
ot doing it the supervisor’s way.” The FBI is very much a by-the-book organization, which combined with a strict supervisor can make an agent feel like a military member on a good day, and on a bad day feel like he or she is in a prison. I viewed micromanagement as a barrier, but I could see that close supervision keeps new agents from making mistakes and is an effective mechanism to keep a supervisor informed of the details for investigations that their agents perform.
During my time in San Diego I had four different supervisors, each with different management styles, but all fine agents in their own way. They had to manage a tricky balance between being too tough and too easygoing. My first two supervisors gave me free reign and allowed all of the agents on my squad to work on their own with as much autonomy as possible. These supervisors only tried to meet the minimum administrative requirements that all supervisors are responsible for, such as periodic case file reviews with the agents and authorization for specific types of investigative activities that are strictly governed by the FBI’s rules. This approach resulted in the least amount of pressure and the most fun for agents. The feeling was not unlike having a substitute teacher when the usual teacher is out. After living through months of absolute military style regimentation at the FBI Academy, my day-to-day functions with my first two supervisors felt free and unrestricted. This made the job tolerable and encouraged me to work hard and follow the type of creativity that FBI agents are known for.
However, about six months into my stay in San Diego, my squad got a new supervisor, making this my third in six months (and counting my supervisor at the FBI Academy, this would be my fourth). This particular person was older and mature, but was used to operating on white collar squads that were much more regimented, with the complexity and details of long-term proactive investigations. He did not initially appreciate the dynamic nature of the reactive violent crime investigations that my squad performed. He demanded perfection, and was much more hands-on than my previous two supervisors. As a result, I felt that my work was administratively constrained; I no longer wanted to run out and chase bad guys or follow up on leads, since every action suddenly required another step in convincing our supervisor on actions we wanted to take. This same supervisor angered agents with his careful review and almost automatic rejection of the first draft of their written reports. He privately complimented my writing skills and always accepted my reports as-is; this made me happy to have his approval, but I did dread my encounters with him because it seemed that it was just a matter of time until he would anger me for being critical of a minor technical error.
[2014] Eyes Pried Open: Rookie FBI Agent Page 21