Suspects

by William Caunitz

  “Negative. Stay with our lady friend in case she takes off on us. Harris could be a decoy.”

  “Ten-four, Lou,” Higgins radioed.

  “He’s out of the Jeep standing on the curb, watching everything and everybody around him,” one of the mobile units radioed.

  “He’s running across the boulevard,” someone shouted over the air. “He’s jumped the divider and hailed a taxi.”

  “Get the plate number,” Scanlon radioed, a rising urgency in his voice.

  “Subject got in yellow cab, license T276598. Heading north on Five-eight Street.”

  “Base to Renegades One and Two. Are you eastbound yet?”

  “Negative. We haven’t even reached a turn lane yet.”

  “Can any unit follow subject?” Scanlon radioed.

  “That’s a negative. We’re all facing the wrong direction and are unable to make U-turns because of the divider.” Herman the German was frantic. “We’re going to lose him.”

  “Like hell we are. He’s going for the guns and the tools. They have to be stashed someplace nearby. Someplace where he can get at them quickly. Someplace he has access to.” Scanlon looked at the inspector. “We need a helicopter to search for that taxi. It takes an MOF above the rank of captain to order a chopper up.”

  Herman the German rushed over to the nearest desk and seized the telephone. Dialing, he said, “I hope Colon is enjoying his goddamn party. He certainly got dolled up for it.”

  As the inspector was telling the operations officer at the Aviation Unit what he wanted, Scanlon bolted from the squad room.

  “Where are you going?”

  Scanlon hollered over his shoulder, “Harris has a splash locker at the One-fourteen.”

  Scanlon ran from the station house and over to the radio car that had just slid into the curb. He jerked open the rear door and said to the startled crew, “Take me to the One-fourteen. Tell Central you’ll be out of service—ten-sixty-one.”

  The driver of the radio car, a short man with the torso of a body builder, turned to look at the lieutenant. “You want the scenic route or are you in a hurry?”

  “I want you to shag ass,” Scanlon snapped.

  “You got it, Lou,” said the driver. “We’ll take Manhattan Avenue up to Vernon Boulevard and Vernon all the way up into Astoria. Have you there in no time.”

  The car’s recorder, a willowy man in his early twenties, switched on the turret lights and snatched the radio out of its cradle. “Nine-three Adam to Central, K.”

  “Go, Adam.”

  “Nine-three Adam will be ten-sixty-one to the One-fourteen on a precinct assignment, K.”

  “Ten-four, Adam. Advise Central when you’re ninety-eight.”

  As Nine-three Adam pulled away from the curb, Scanlon caught sight of Herman the German running from the station house. The squealing police car sped under the massive span of the Queensboro Bridge, passed the drab towers of the Queensbridge Housing Project, and raced past the Con Ed generating plant on Vernon Boulevard.

  Scanlon felt the bitter tug of frustration in his chest. He should have thought of a splash locker long before he thought about Colon’s leaving the squad room to change into his partying clothes. Most cops have extra lockers in the precinct where they stash clothes and things from their secret lives. He blamed himself again and again for not seeing the possibility that Harris might have an extra locker in the One-fourteen. What safer place could there be to hide evidence of a murder than in a station-house locker that had another man’s name and shield number on it, a member of the force long since retired or transferred? A perfect hiding place, a place open seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day. It had the right feel.

  Scanlon asked the recorder to pass him the radio handset. The cop stretched the black spiraled cord into the rear seat.

  “Switch your set to channel three,” Scanlon ordered.

  When the recorder complied, Scanlon radioed, “Renegade base to Renegades One, Two, Three, and Four. Base has reason to believe subject heading for the One-fourteen. Ten-eighty-five this unit at that location, forthwith.”

  A spate of hurried acknowledgments came over the channel.

  The One-fourteen Precinct was a block away. A taxi was double-parked in front of the building. A swarm of cars gridlocked Astoria Boulevard, blocking the police car. “Turn off your lights and siren,” Scanlon ordered. “Go around them.”

  “Lou, what’s going on?” the driver asked, concern seeping into his young voice.

  The radio car sped up onto the sidewalk, scattering pedestrians, and bounced back into the roadway.

  Harris came running from the station house clutching a brown duffel bag.

  The police car came to an abrupt stop behind the taxi. Scanlon leaped out into the roadway. “Harris!”

  The sergeant was bending to get into the taxi when Scanlon’s voice stopped him. He backed slowly out and stood looking at the man standing in the roadway. The two men remained motionless, as though frozen in time, glaring at each other. The crew of Nine-three Adam got out of their radio car and stood by the open doors watching the confusing scene unfold. Harris glanced down at the duffel bag. He moved around the front of the taxi and stood in the roadway facing Scanlon. He bolted for the Triboro Plaza underpass.

  Scanlon yelled for him to stop and took off at a run.

  Harris ran up the embankment and tossed the duffel bag over the wall. He wheeled away from the embankment and ran toward Steinway Street. Scanlon rushed up to the embankment wall and peered down onto the highway. A blue car ran over the duffel bag, and then another and another, tossing the cloth satchel across the highway.

  Jabbing a finger down at the traffic feeding off the Triboro Bridge, Scanlon called out to the cops who had driven him, “Shut off the traffic.” He took off after Harris.

  Policemen stood on the steps of the station house scratching their heads and other parts of their anatomies and asking each other what the fuck was going on. Harris dodged his way along the teeming sidewalk. He bumped into a boy on a bicycle and stumbled. The boy and bike fell to the sidewalk. Regaining his footing, Harris ran to Forty-first Street and darted around the corner.

  Scanlon careened around the corner in pursuit and came to a stop when he saw Harris leaning against the building wall, lighting up a clipper.

  “Whaddaya doin’ in this neck of the woods, Lou?”

  Scanlon grabbed him by the shoulders and turned him to the wall. “You’re under arrest, Sergeant. You have the right to remain silent …” He informed the prisoner of his constitutional rights as he frisked him and removed his police credentials and revolver.

  The One-fourteen’s interrogation room was a stale cubicle, the walls of which were covered by acoustical tiles and a one-way mirror.

  Scanlon and Harris faced each other across a small table. Herman the German and Jack Fable watched and listened in the viewing room, a narrow space that also contained the One-fourteen Squad’s refrigerator. Harris’s cowboy boots had been taken from him and invoiced as evidence. The prisoner was wearing cloth hospital slippers.

  “Was it worth it, George?” Scanlon asked, toying with a De Nobili box.

  “I want my boots back.”

  “In time. First tell me about Gallagher and the Zimmermans.”

  “I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about. I got nothing to say to you or the other assholes on the other side of that mirror. I want a lawyer and I want to see my SBA delegate.”

  “You’ll feel better if you tell me about it, George.”

  Harris laughed in his face. “You really got the balls to try one of those Mickey Mouse interrogative techniques on me? I’ll feel better, shit.”

  “Mrs. Gallagher is talking to us,” Scanlon lied. “She’s giving the whole thing up. She’s agreed to testify against you.”

  “That’s nice. I hope you two have a long talk. Now get me my lawyer.”

  “About a dozen people saw you throw the duffel bag over the embankment. And
we’ve recovered its contents.”

  Harris’s eyes narrowed to slits. “What duffel bag?”

  Herman the German stuck his head into the room. “May I see you a moment, Lieutenant?”

  Scanlon pushed his chair back and went outside. Brodie and Christopher were waiting in the viewing room.

  “The rifle and shotgun weren’t in the duffel bag,” Brodie said. “We’ve recovered the makeup, including the walrus mustache, and the tools, a crowbar, screwdriver, and a blacksmith’s hammer.”

  Scanlon cursed in Italian.

  “We had the southbound traffic shut off,” Christopher said. “The men from the Bronx had already done that before we arrived. There were also two highway units on the scene. All the traffic was funneled through the chokepoint and every motorist questioned. We came up with four witnesses who saw the driver of a dark green Chevrolet swerve to avoid hitting the duffel bag. The driver stopped his car, got out, and, according to the witnesses, ran over to the bag and removed an attaché case and what appeared to be some sort of a firearm that had been broken down. He jumped back into his car and took off for parts unknown.”

  “He must have gotten through the chokepoint before the traffic was shut off,” Brodie said.

  Scanlon kicked the wall in anger. “Did anyone get a description of the car and its driver?” Scanlon asked, idly opening the refrigerator door and looking into the freezer. It was a solid block of ice.

  “A thin male Hispanic with a pencil mustache, wearing a gold earring in his right ear. He had effeminate mannerisms and drove a Chevrolet that had chartreuse venetian blinds across the rear window and a pink animal with a bobbing head,” Christopher said.

  “No one thought to get the plate number?” Scanlon asked.

  “No,” Christopher said mournfully.

  “Where are Higgins and Biafra Baby?” Scanlon asked.

  Herman the German said, “They’re still sitting on Mrs. Gallagher’s apartment. I told them to remain there on the off chance that she has some evidence stashed in her apartment and might try to get rid of it. I also took the statements of the anticrime men you got on a steal and sent them back to the Bronx. I asked them to drop off the cowboy boots at the lab on their way back.”

  “What about your detectives, Jack?” Scanlon asked the CO of the Nineteenth Detective Squad.

  “Back to command, no meal,” Fable said. “No sense cluttering things up around here.”

  Scanlon nodded.

  “Tom McCormick, the president of the Sergeants’ Benevolent Association, and one of the SBA attorneys are waiting in the administrative lieutenant’s office to see Harris,” the inspector said.

  “Where are the two cops I commandeered to drive me here?” Scanlon asked.

  “They’re waiting downstairs in the captain’s office with their PBA delegate and one of the PBA attorneys,” Herman the German said.

  Scanlon looked at the inspector. “We made the lawyers’ day for them. Were the PC and the CofD notified?”

  “Both of them were,” Fable said. “And they’re both not responding to the scene. The borough commander and the duty captain were also notified. The duty captain will be here later. He’s tied up in the One-oh-three on a shooting.”

  Scanlon said bitterly, “They’re all distancing themselves from the arrest, waiting to see which way it’s going to go. Which means, of course, that they think we messed it up.” He opened the door to the interrogation room and motioned Harris outside.

  The administrative lieutenant’s office was on the same floor as the detectives’ interrogation room but at the other end of the building. Walking down the corridor, with Harris in the center of the group, they passed cops who either looked away or cast their eyes downward. Policemen do not like to see one of their own under arrest.

  The SBA attorney’s name was Berke. He had a scabrous complexion, a red beard, and hard, cunning eyes. He was waiting in the corridor with Tom McCormick, the SBA president. Harris went into the administrative lieutenant’s office with his representation. Herman the German and Jack Fable stood guard outside the door while Scanlon rushed downstairs to the captain’s office.

  Disgruntled policemen loitered in the muster room. The grapevine had it that the Whip of the Nine-three Squad had arrested a sergeant from Queens Narcotics. It had something to do with Lieutenant Gallagher’s wife, so the word was. Hurrying down the staircase, Scanlon saw the faces of the cops looking up at him. Many of them glared their contempt up at him; some turned their backs to him and shuffled off into the sitting room.

  The PBA delegate’s name was Frank Fortunado. He was waiting for Scanlon outside the captain’s office. “Looks like you grabbed yourself a wolverine by the balls, Lou,” Fortunado said.

  “Where are the two cops?” Scanlon said, noticing the delegate’s iron-gray hair.

  Fortunado motioned to the door. “Inside with our lawyer. Their names are Rod and Eichhorn, and they both most definitely do not want to get involved in the arrest of a member of the force.”

  “Your MOF is a cop killer.”

  “That’s what you say, Lou. But we both know that that ain’t gospel until a jury says it’s so too, and until the Court of Appeals says it’s so.”

  “Is the captain in his office?”

  “He’s on his RDO. His next scheduled tour is eight to four, tomorrow,” the delegate said, chucking open the door and following Scanlon inside.

  Scanlon recognized Police Officer Rod as the driver of the radio car. Eichhorn had been the recorder. The lawyer’s name was Eble. Medium-tall, with wavy black hair, and an obvious penchant for expensive clothes.

  The lawyer was sitting behind the captain’s regulation flat-top desk. The two cops were sitting next to each other on the captain’s green regulation leather couch. They appeared nervous and self-conscious.

  “I have to take their statements, Counselor,” Scanlon said.

  “I have no problem with that, Lieutenant,” the lawyer said. “Officers Rod and Eichhorn will be more than happy to answer any question put to them that is specifically directed and narrowly related to their performance of duty.”

  Scanlon bridled at the lawyer’s use of the restrictive phrase used in the Patrol Guide’s procedure concerning the interrogation of members of the service.

  “Counselor, your clients are not the subjects of an official investigation. So spare me that specifically directed and narrowly related bullshit. I commandeered them to drive me here. All I need from them now is a statement as to what they saw and heard when we got here.”

  “My clients saw and heard nothing, Lieutenant.”

  Scanlon hurled a withering look at the two cops, who shifted uneasily on the couch. “You didn’t see Sergeant Harris run up to the embankment and toss a duffel bag over the wall?”

  “I didn’t see nothing, Lou,” Rod said.

  “Me either,” followed Eichhorn.

  “I suppose the other cops who were standing on the precinct steps didn’t see or hear anything either,” Scanlon said.

  “That would be my guess,” the lawyer said.

  Rancor showing clearly on his face, Scanlon whirled and left the office. Policemen were still milling about the muster room. Ignoring their searching stares, Scanlon made for the staircase. He heard a rushing footfall behind him and turned. Police Officer Rod was shamefaced. “Lou, I’m sorry for what happened inside. But I had no other way to go.”

  “I’d like to hear why,” Scanlon said.

  “I’ve got fourteen more years to do in the Job,” Rod said. “Six months from now the Gallagher case is going to be yesterday’s news. But I’d be the cop who helped convict a police sergeant. No one would remember that the sergeant was tried for murder, they’d only remember that I was the scumbag who testified against him.”

  “Look, kid, it don’t have to be that way.”

  “Bullshit, Lou,” Rod said, sweeping his hand at the policemen in the muster room. “Look at the way they’re looking at you. They don’t even know
why Harris was arrested. And they could care less. What matters to them is that a street cop arrested another street cop. Not some bastard from IAD whose job it is to arrest cops, but one of their own, from the trenches. No, Lou. That’s a head trip I don’t need. I just ain’t that dedicated.”

  Scanlon stood by the staircase and watched Rod walk back into the captain’s office. That was one of the major differences between guys who worked in the bag and guys who worked in soft clothes, Scanlon reflected. Detectives and plainclothesmen see many different sides to life. They have to understand a person’s motivation and try to figure out what makes that person tick, act the way he or she does. Detectives learn early that there are no black-and-white issues in life, only different shades of gray.

  Scanlon glared back at the cops, turned, and hurried back upstairs. Harris was still closeted in the administrative lieutenant’s office with his lawyer and the SBA president. Herman the German and Jack Fable were still on guard duty outside the door.

  “What did the two cops have to say?” Fable asked Scanlon.

  “They said that they saw nothing, heard nothing, smelled nothing, and sensed nothing,” Scanlon said. “There are going to be some unpleasant reverberations over this arrest. And I don’t see any reason for you two to be hit by any of the shrapnel. So why don’t you both sort of disappear into the woodwork?”

  Jack Fable made an ugly face. “Tony, my man, I’ve been a detective squad commander for the better part of fifteen years. And during that time I’ve developed my own philosophy for dealing with these delicate situations. Simply put, I fuck ’em where they breathe.”

  Scanlon smiled. Fable was from the old, old school. There weren’t many of his kind left in the Job. The new breed of squad commander wore a somber suit and carried an attaché case to work that contained two apples, one banana, and a Thermos of decaffeinated tea. And they wore big college rings, but still said “between you and I,” and they loved to go on about how the quality of evidence was determined by the statistical concept of probability.

  Herman the German bit his lips. “Gallagher was no bargain, but he was my bargain.”