Shakedown

by Gerald Petievich

  As Lopez squirmed with his handcuffs, Novak leaned back in the seat. Outside, the sidewalks were crowded with the beach town's eclectic population, rich west-siders in khaki pants and designer polo shirts, college kids wearing overalls and other pseudo-farm gear, garishly dressed blacks, punk rockers, and the modestly attired elderly who all seemed to be walking dogs.

  "Actually, we're interested in someone you did time with."

  "I ain't no fucking stool pigeon, man."

  Two hours later, in a carpeted interview room in the Los Angeles Strike Force office, Novak sat across a small table from Pepper Lopez, who, probably because he needed a fix, was squirming in his seat. Haynes leaned against the wall.

  "Why are you so worried about answering a few questions about Eddie Sands?" Novak asked, for probably the fiftieth time.

  "Fuck all this, man. If you're gonna put me back in jail, why don't you just go ahead and do it?"

  "I'll tell you why," Novak said. "Because I feel bad about locking up a man who just got out. It's not something I want to do. You can ask my partner here. He'll tell you that if there's one thing in the world I hate to do, it's lock up a man who's just hit daylight."

  Pepper Lopez started to rub his scarred forearm. He stopped himself and wiped his wet palms on his trousers. He formed a wry smile. "My parole officer can't bust me just for having marks. This ain't like the old days."

  Novak took out the sugar-filled glass vial and palmed it. He moved close to Lopez, reached into Lopez's shirt pocket, and feigned finding the vial. He held it up for Lopez to see. "But he will for possession."

  Lopez clutched his shirt pocket, came to his feet. "There wasn't nothing in my pocket! You put that there!"

  Novak handed the vial to Haynes. "Tag this and list it on an evidence receipt, Red. We'll turn it over to Federal Parole."

  "You salted me!" Lopez said with his hand still clutching his shirt pocket. "I'm gonna tell my parole officer you salted me!"

  Novak shrugged. He sat down at the table. "He won't believe you. All hypes lie."

  FOURTEEN

  Lopez's eyes blinked rapidly as Haynes opened a folder, tugged out a narcotics evidence form, and began writing Lopez's name on the top line.

  "This ain't right, man," he whined.

  Novak stared at Lopez as Haynes continued with the form. "Sit down," he said.

  Lopez continued to stand. "You people are playing head games with me."

  Suddenly Novak sprang across the table and with both hands grabbed Lopez by the collar, yanked his face close. "No, it proves that we aren't playing games," he hissed. "It means that unless you start talking, your ass is headed back down to Terminal Island."

  "I don't know nothing about him."

  "We heard that you were his right-hand man in the joint," Haynes said. Novak shoved Lopez away.

  "I got a habit, man," Lopez said. "In the joint I did things for the people who kept me supplied."

  "That's understandable," Novak said in a calm voice.

  "When Sands first came in, some people asked me to take care of him ... to make sure he was protected."

  'Which people asked you?" Novak said. He sat down again.

  "Some people who are connected."

  "Tony Parisi's people?"

  "I ain't naming no names."

  Red Haynes interlocked his fingers. With a sharp outward motion, he cracked his knuckles. Lopez turned to see what the sound was.

  "What kind of guy is Sands?" Novak said.

  "He's not like most cops."

  "How do you mean?"

  "He can talk, man," Lopez said. "He can talk real smooth like a lawyer. Better than a lawyer. And he's always thinking ahead. Like if that happens then this will happen. That kind of shit. That's how he ended up in the joint. He was fixing cases for the big boys in Las Vegas. He was a detective."

  "Did he tell you what he was gonna do when he got out?" Haynes asked.

  "He said he was going to be a private eye and make a lot of money."

  "Who is Monica Brown?" Novak said.

  "His main squeeze. He had her picture up in his cell."

  "May I ask you a question?" Novak said.

  Pepper Lopez formed his eyes into slits.

  "Is there anything you can give us on Sands? Because if there isn't, we're all wasting our time. I mean, like if you really don't know anything about the man, we've got the wrong guy, and you're going back to the slammer.

  Lopez's eyes opened. "That's what I been telling you all along. I don't know nothing about the motherfucker."

  Novak and Haynes exchanged shrugs. Slowly, Haynes lumbered off his chair. He reached behind his back and unsnapped handcuffs from the keeper on his belt. He motioned for Lopez to stand.

  "What happens now?"

  "We take you to your parole officer."

  "He'll send me back to the joint for sure."

  "Talk to us, Pepper."

  Lopez sighed deeply. "There was talk he was going to get early release because his people were paying off somebody at the Federal Parole Board," Lopez said after a while. "There was talk about it on the yard."

  Novak stared at Pepper Lopez for a moment. "And that's all you know about him?"

  "I swear on the name of my mother."

  After another half hour or so which netted them no further information, Novak and Haynes led Lopez to the front door of the office and allowed him to leave.

  On the way back from Los Angeles, Novak and Haynes stopped in Barstow, a sweltering desert town of service stations and coffee shops, which existed for no other reason than that it was halfway between L.A. and Las Vegas. Having filled the tank at a crowded service station, Novak steered the G-car into the parking lot of a coffee shop that looked reasonably clean.

  Inside, a beefy waitress wearing a starched, sweat-ringed beige uniform that was a size too small set menus and glasses of water on their table.

  "How much bribe money do you think it would take to get somebody out of the federal joint?" Novak said.

  "A lot. The guys on the Federal Parole Board aren't gonna risk their asses for a dollar and a quarter. And a bag- man had to be paid. There's always a bag-man. Probably some rotten, greedy lawyer."

  The waitress returned to the table with a coffeepot. Haynes covered his empty cup. "I hate coffee." She drew the pot back, filled Novak's cup. They ordered hamburgers.

  "If you were the king hood in Las Vegas, what would make you go to the trouble of getting someone out of jail?" Novak ruminated.

  "Money."

  "Where is an ex-cop gonna come up with a load of money?" Novak said as he stared out the window at a tour bus that was unloading elderly passengers returning from Las Vegas.

  "Maybe he's gonna work it off."

  "Could be."

  After finishing the hamburgers, Novak and Haynes got back on the road. Haynes took the wheel. They drove about twenty miles without speaking.

  "How did you ever find your way into the Bureau?" Haynes said.

  "I was in Army Intelligence. When I got back from Nam the Bureau was hiring."

  "What did you do in Army Intelligence?"

  "Interrogated prisoners of war, wrote reports." Novak lit a cigarette, dropped the match into the ashtray.

  "Torture 'em for information?"

  "Some guys did. But it doesn't go very well. People get pissed off when you torture them."

  "Ever ask yourself why?" Haynes said. "Like why did you become an FBI agent instead of delivering mail or selling insurance?"

  "We're in it because we get a charge out of it," Novak said. "We get a charge out of catching the bad guys."

  "Why didn't you ever remarry?"

  "I almost did, was even engaged," Novak said. "I was stationed in Mississippi. She was a schoolteacher."

  "What happened?"

  "A civil-rights case. I interviewed a female prisoner in the local jail. She tells me the sheriff has been raping her in her cell. I get a written statement, the U.S. attorney files a case on the sheriff.
The sheriff counters by accusing me of raping the woman I interviewed while I was in her cell and gets the local district attorney to file a complaint against me. Instead of backing me up, the Bureau transfers me. To New York."

  "And your fiancée refused to make the trip?"

  "She didn't want to leave her teaching job to live in New York," Novak said.

  "I bet you thought about quitting the Bureau," Haynes said.

  "The thought crossed my mind. But it's not really the Bureau that's to blame ... just the people in it."

  Red Haynes gave him a puzzled look.

  The only sound for some time was the humming of wheels against scorching desert highway. His eyes on the white line in the road that seemed to stretch forever before him, Novak considered what he knew about the case.

  "Somehow or another Parisi found out what we were up to with Bruno," he said finally.

  "Maybe Bruno was killed for some other reason. Maybe he owed someone money. Maybe..."

  "Parisi is cautious. He would never have authorized the hit if he didn't know for sure."

  "Where do you think the leak is?" Haynes said as he upwrapped a stick of gum, offered the package to Novak. Novak declined.

  "It could be a member of the federal grand jury. It could be a clerk in the mail room who happened to read one of our reports. Who the hell knows?"

  "It might be Frank Tyde."

  "Tyde is too lazy to be a crook."

  Haynes thought about it. "Good point."

  In the Strike Force office early the next morning, John Novak thumbed through a file drawer until he found a file on Eddie Sands. He removed the file from the drawer and took it to his desk. In it was a case report which recounted, in summary form, the details of Sands's indictment, arrest, and conviction. Witnesses had testified that while a member of the Las Vegas Police Organized Crime Intelligence Squad he was funneling information to Parisi concerning investigations directed against him.

  Also in the file was a one-page Las Vegas police form, entitled "Intelligence Contact Report," which read as follows:

  CONTACT: Aug. 29

  REPORTING OFFICER: Fisher, J. Serial #94429

  DETAILS OF CONTACT WHILE ON ROUTINE TRAFFIC PATROL.

  I stopped a vehicle bearing California license plate 547 MEM. The car was driven by Edward Sands, whom I knew as a former fellow Metro officer before his arrest and conviction. I issued a verbal traffic warning in lieu of citation. Sands said he was working as a private investigator. No further information. This contact report prepared because Sands is listed in Field Interview computer as an organized crime associate of Parisi, Anthony.

  On a page titled "Personal History of Intelligence Subject," someone had filled in blanks to show date of birth, fingerprint classification, and other details. In the right-hand corner of the sheet was a section marked "Associates." There was only one name listed: Raymond K. Beadle.

  Novak left his desk, searched through a card file in the corner of the room. There was only one card bearing Beadle's name. It was marked "Possible assoc. Sands, Edward, per CI #98634.

  In a numbered file which was kept in the office safe, he recovered an informant card on Confidential Informant #98634. It was a woman named Florence Bradshaw. The last entry on the card had been made by Frank Tyde. It read: "Negative Contact with CI" – a federal-law-enforcement euphemism which meant that Tyde had not taken the trouble either to contact the informant or to remove her name from the active files. He copied the woman's address on a three-by-five card, shoved the card in his pocket.

  Later, Novak wandered down the hall and found Frank Tyde standing in front of the sink in the tiny coffee room holding a foot-high plastic statuette of an immodest cherub boy under a running faucet. "Remember an informant named Florence Bradshaw?" Novak said.

  Tyde finished filling the statuette with water. "Watch this," he said as he set the statuette on the counter. He pressed a button and the plastic cherub boy pissed a curved stream of water into the sink. "It's for my bar at home. The wife loves these."

  "Florence Bradshaw. Does the name ring a bell?"

  "Florence Bradshaw ... Florence Bradshaw," he said. "A cocktail waitress at the Plush Pony?"

  "That's the one."

  "She was a witness." Tyde pressed the button a second time. He grinned proudly as the cherub boy functioned again.

  "To what?"

  "There was some muscle work that took place outside the Plush Pony. She was there but refused to sign a statement." He pressed the button on the statuette again. There was another stream of water. "Some guy got his leg broken by some collectors for a bookie. He owed three grand or something, so the collectors waited until he left the bar. One guy held his arms and the other one whacked his right leg with a Louisville Slugger. She saw everything. Elliot wanted me to handle it as an organized-crime case, but I kissed it off. just because somebody gets their leg broken doesn't mean it's organized crime." He turned the statuette upside down, emptied the water into the sink.

  "How about the name Ray Beadle?"

  "I think that was the name of the guy who was supposed to have swung the bat. An ex-cop.

  "What did she say about him?"

  "She claimed she couldn't identify anybody because she was drunk. Even the victim wouldn't give a statement. The whole thing was a bag of worms. I kissed it off." He set the statuette in a box. "I can't decide whether to fill this thing with scotch or bourbon."

  Later, Elliot came into the squad room to arrange red thumbtacks on an outdated Organized Crime graph he had pinned to the bulletin board.

  "Someone coming from D.C.?" Novak said as he lifted his suit jacket from the coat rack.

  "Head of OC Section from justice will be in tomorrow morning. The quarterly inspection."

  Novak nodded, shrugged on his jacket.

  "Briefings for the brass bore you, right?" Elliot said.

  Novak shrugged. "I guess you could say that."

  "This is a mistake," Elliot said. "Because in reality there is nothing else. I realized it as soon as I was sworn in as a U.S. attorney."

  "I don't think I follow you."

  "This is a job, a way to earn a living. And graphs, boards, bullshitting the people from D.C., this is what it's all about. You can make big cases, convict a hundred organized-crime figures, but no one really cares. The way to get promoted is by show and tell."

  "I guess that's one way to look at it."

  "When D.C. has a promotion to hand out, they don't check arrest statistics. They're looking for someone who can present himself, make a good show at Congressional budget hearings. Someone who looks the part. Sure, I'm interested in making cases, but looking the part is where it's at. Am I boring you?"

  Novak smiled, shrugged.

  "You've got a lot of leadership ability, Novak. If you'd play the game you could get promoted, become an agent-in-charge somewhere."

  "I'll think about it," Novak said, though the idea disgusted him. In fact, Elliot disgusted him.

  "During the inspection I'm going to be asked about the Bruno Santoro murder. What's the status?"

  "Red and I are working on it, but as of right now there's nothing," Novak said.

  Elliot stabbed another tack into the board. "We need to solve this one. Parisi meant this as a message. If we can't solve it, other witnesses will never come forward against him. He knows that."

  "It'd be nice to know how Parisi found out about Bruno," Novak said.

  "My guess is Parisi was using Bruno until things got too hot," Elliot said. "Parisi gives Bruno some info on one of his competitors, Bruno tells us. We were arresting people Parisi wanted to be arrested. How's that for a scenario?"

  "If that was happening, Bruno would have realized it."

  "I'm afraid I have little faith in informants," Elliot said.

  Novak noticed that some of the names listed on the chart on the bulletin board were those of Las Vegas organized-crime figures who were dead. He wondered if the OC section chief would notice this when Elliot gav
e his quarterly enthusiastic briefing on the current Nevada organized-crime picture. He guessed not.

  "Faith has nothing to do with it," Novak said. "It's just that I've been doing this for a long time and I think I would have been able to tell if an informant was taking me for a ride."

  "I hope you don't take what I've said in any derogatory sense."

  "I'll make the case," Novak said. "It might take a while, but I'll make the case."

  "Love that spirit," Elliot said. "I'm behind you one hundred and fifty percent."

  FIFTEEN

  John Novak steered his G-car down a narrow street which was only a block or two from the casinos. It was lined with recently built two- and three-story apartment houses-the stucco prefab variety that, like the plethora of casinos that had sprung up around town in the past few years, were designed for speed of construction. Flaking stucco was everywhere and cracks at window joints were clearly visible.

  Novak pulled to the curb and turned off the engine. He found the name Florence Bradshaw on a mailbox at the entrance to the place, climbed a flight of stairs, knocked on the door of Apartment 7. The door was opened by a barefooted woman wearing shorts and a soiled T-shirt which clearly showed her nipples. Her lipstick was purple and her head was wrapped in a dye-stained white towel.

  "Florence Bradshaw?"

  She nodded.

  Novak showed his FBI badge and identification card. "May I come in?"

  "Do you have a search warrant?"

  "No. I just wanted to ask a couple of questions."

  "Questions about what?"

  "About what happened outside the Plush Pony the night the man had his leg broken."

  "You can ask your questions right here at the door."

  Novak glanced both ways in the hall. "I think it might be better if we could talk where we can't be overheard," he said in his best disarming manner. Florence Bradshaw stared at him for a moment. He gave her a little smile. Hesitantly, she stepped back and allowed him inside. He closed the door softly as she moved to a cluttered end table, grabbed a pack of cigarettes, and lit up. "You can sit down if you want," she said with a mouth full of cigarette smoke.