Whistler's Angel

by John R. Maxim

  As he waited for the six o’clock broadcasts to come on, he was struck by the utter tranquility all around him. Every home on shore was dark. Few cars were moving. A soft breeze had risen out of the West. The events of last night almost seemed like a dream. They were not the sort of thing that ever happened in such places. He feared that the story, for that very reason, would attract much wider attention.

  The news came on and, as he’d expected, the shooting was the opening lead. Whistler reached to turn the volume down low.

  The local newscaster was a good-old-boy type, named Billy something or other. He began by announcing a “wild west-type shootout” in a popular Hilton Head restaurant. As he spoke, film came on. It was all of the aftermath. Flashing lights, jerky cameras, police cordoning the area.

  The newscaster gave the names of the three shooting victims. Two had been pronounced dead at the scene. The older man outside who’d been shot through the glass was a tourist from Ridgewood, New Jersey. The woman inside who’d got up to run was a real estate broker on the island. A photo of Ragland came on the screen. The newscaster said he was in “guarded” condition and that he was recovering from surgery. He said, “More about Philip Ragland later.”

  The “alleged assailants” got only three sentences. The shooter wasn’t dead yet; he was on life support. He was given little chance of recovering. His “suspected accomplice” was still being sought. Neither man had been identified, no hint as to motive. Whistler, however, felt reasonably sure that Sergeant Moore had been right. Ragland’s broadcasts had probably offended some wacko. It was certainly not a professional hit. A pro might still have done it in a crowded bar because a pro would know the value of confusion and panic. A pro, however, would have gone for a head shot. A pro would not have bellowed, “God is not mocked.” He would have said nothing at all.

  The newscaster, having glossed over the assailants, took a breath and launched into an excited account of how the “enraged local patrons” reacted. While some inside the restaurant attacked the first gunman, others outside tried to stop his accomplice, heroically risking their lives. But Whistler wasn’t mentioned, not even as Wismer. The account made no reference to Claudia whatsoever. It mentioned the knife with which someone “stabbed” the gunman “during the ensuing melee.” It said another patron then picked up the gunman’s pistol and fired at the getaway driver outside. “That patron has not been identified.”

  Another video segment came on that had been shot by an on-the-scene reporter. It was shot from a distance through the shattered front door. It focused mostly on the EMS crew that was wheeling Ragland out on a gurney. Whistler saw himself and Claudia; they were still at the bar, but her head was down and his own was turned toward her. The camera caught them only in passing.

  Whistler could hardly believe his good luck. He was one of the “enraged local patrons” at most. Just one of the crowd. So was Claudia.

  The photo of Ragland reappeared on the screen. The photo had been posed, a publicity glossy. The newscaster’s voice-over personality.” described Philip Ragland as a “tabloid TV host. Its tone struck Whistler as borderline contemptuous. Ragland, he said, had espoused such causes as “abortion on demand and gay rights.” The phrase, “gay rights,” was said drippingly. He said that Ragland was also a leading proponent of “making the use of drugs legal.” The newscaster noted that Ragland’s positions ran counter to traditional values, and, “are not those of this station or its management.” He stopped short of suggesting that whoever shot Ragland might have done a community service.

  Whistler switched channels, looking for a network station. He had almost forgotten that except for resorts and the larger cities, this was still Bible Belt country. And this was a State that still had laws on the books forbidding oral sex of any kind, gay or straight. He was nonetheless pleased that Ragland’s views were the story and that his own role was totally ignored. He found CNN’s Headline News.

  Whistler was dismayed, though not entirely surprised, to see that CNN had named the shooting as one of the morning’s top stories. But again, its emphasis was primarily on Ragland and its treatment was considerably more generous. Ragland’s program was far from a tabloid TV show according to this network anchor. It was known for supporting libertarian causes and had won any number of Emmys. Ragland and his wife had shared a Pulitzer Prize in the field of investigative reporting. He had also testified at congressional hearings looking into…

  “Good morning,” said Claudia.

  She’d awakened after all. She was standing below, looking up through the hatch while slipping into her robe. He looked for that big good-morning smile that he’d grown used to. She tried, but she couldn’t quite manage it.

  He said, “Hi, there. How are you feeling this morning?”

  “A little better, I think.”

  “I heard you up here last night. I heard you talking to yourself. I would have come up, but…”

  “It’s better you didn’t. I had things to work out.” She waved off the subject. She gestured toward the screen. “I didn’t hear us mentioned. How are we?”

  “So far, so good. We just might slip through the cracks. So far, we’re not even a footnote.”

  “And the man…Philip Ragland?”

  “He’ll recover, thanks to you. Come on up and watch. I’ll fill you in.”

  “In a minute. Let me put on some coffee.”

  Whistler turned up the volume so that she could hear. The phrase, “libertarian causes” was repeated.

  “Libertarian causes?” she asked from the galley. “What does that mean? Did they say?”

  “Well, to me it means leaving people alone. Staying out of their personal lives.”

  “Adam, I know that. I meant in this case. Which cause was he for that got him shot?”

  Whistler shrugged. “I guess we’ll know when they’ve ID’d the shooter. If they have, they’re not saying so as yet.”

  “Or what he’s against. Is he anti-religious?”

  “Why? Because of what the shooter yelled out? That couldn’t be it. His program would have dumped him at the first sign of that. But who knows what people get into their heads? Some nut might have thought he was the anti-Christ.”

  He changed channels again to another network station. This one, a Fox affiliate, was doing a piece about Ragland’s opposition to the drug laws. The Raglands had been awarded their Pulitzer, it said, for a series on the “more enlightened drug measures underway in certain European countries.” He’d also won an Emmy for a feature he’d done that condemned the asset forfeiture laws.

  Uh-oh, thought Whistler. This was getting close to home.

  The Fox commentator summarized that legislation. It had been enacted as a weapon against major drug kingpins, but had led to a number of outrageous abuses against people with no drug involvement. The commentator was citing examples. A California man owned several hundred acres of undeveloped land outside Malibu. Marijuana plants were found on the property. The owner lived elsewhere, had no criminal record, had no provable knowledge that the plants were on his land. Even so, the property was forfeit. Although the matter was still in the courts, some of that acreage had already been sold and the proceeds used to hire more police. Ragland charged that the seizure was a land-grab, pure and simple. The county had tried to buy some of that land, then they’d tried to condemn it without success. In the end, they decided to just take it.

  In Massachusetts there was even a ship-grab. The Wood’s Hole Oceanographic Institute had an 80 million dollar research ship. It was seized because a single half-smoked reefer had been found in the kit of a single crewmember. The seizure made headlines. The press ridiculed it. Because of the publicity and the Institute’s prestige, that seizure was soon overturned.

  If the Institute had that kind of influence, however, most victims of seizures did not. Thousands of people had their cars and cash seized because the cash in their pockets had drug residue on it and those people were presumed to be dealers. Drug-sniffing dog
s had reacted to the cash and that became probable cause for the seizure. The fact is, however, that trace amounts of drugs can be found on nearly any bill that’s changed hands enough times. Especially cocaine and marijuana. Those two drugs cling more than most.

  Almost none of those people who were stopped were ever charged. Their money was taken; they were sent on their way. Such victims could sue, but they almost never did. Some were guilty, surely. Perhaps most of them were. Some were carrying large sums in order to buy drugs and some to buy handguns for resale up North. Some were merely loading up on cartons of cigarettes at half the price that they’d pay in, say, Connecticut.

  They’d accept the loss as a cost of doing business. But some, many hundreds, had no criminal intent. Some were merely on vacation. Some had won the money gambling. Some merely liked to carry a few thousand in cash for any number of reasons. Perhaps they had no credit, or they didn’t trust banks, or perhaps they simply enjoyed flashing rolls. Their money would be seized and they would soon learn that the legal costs of getting it back would be greater than what they had lost in the first place. They would also be reminded that they still could be charged, and would be if they didn’t go away.

  Claudia was listening. “Like those articles Mom faxed us. But this makes it sound even worse.”

  Whistler nodded. “It’s worse than you know. Your mother was not the first person to be framed and it isn’t all just the police. Any vengeful ex-wife or ex-husband can do it. Any business competitor, any rival, and it’s easy.”

  She handed him his coffee. “How easy?”

  Whistler pointed to a house on the shore. A luxury home; it had its own private dock. “See that house. Let’s say that my ex-wife owns it. No, wait, we’ll rule out vengeance. We’ll stick to simple greed. Say I don’t know the owner. Never met him.”

  “Okay.”

  “One way or another, I get into that house. I stash a sellable quantity of cocaine in something that’s likely to have the owner’s prints on it. I tell the cops that I’ve heard he’s been dealing. I say that someone told me where he keeps it, that he sells it from the house. My word is all they need in terms of probable cause to go to some judge for a warrant. Next they’ll call in the DEA to make the actual raid. That’s because when the Feds are involved in a seizure, 80% of the proceeds, by law, revert to the local jurisdiction. If the locality should do it on its own, that amount would usually go to the state. The locality would rather keep the money.”

  “So, they find the drugs you’ve stashed…”

  “The Feds, by the way, will have first asked the owner whether he has any drugs on his property. He’ll say no, and now there’s another charge against him. It’s a felony to lie to any federal official. When the drugs are found, that house is instantly seized. When the house is later sold by the U.S. Marshal’s Service, I get 10% of the take.”

  “That’s unless he’s found innocent. He probably would be.”

  “He might; he might not, but that wouldn’t really matter. Guilt or innocence has very little to do with how the seizure laws work.”

  She said, “Adam, I find that hard to believe.”

  “You do? Why is that? Because this is America?”

  “And because there’s such a thing as constitutional protection.”

  “The constitution means what the courts say it means. It protects individuals from unreasonable search and seizure…or at least it protects them in principle. But the courts have said that property isn’t a person and does not rate the same protection.”

  She had closed one eye. “Then who does this man go to?”

  “For what? To get his house back? He can bid on it himself. He might want to because that would be cheaper and quicker than trying to get it back through the courts. Either way, the man’s reputation is ruined. If this happened, he must have been guilty.”

  “That’s outrageous, Adam.”

  “Yeah, but it’s the law. It’s extortion, but it’s legal. And it won’t stop anytime soon. It’s easy money.”

  “Laws can be changed. No one’s trying to change it?”

  “Ragland is, for one. And look what happened to him.”

  “Are you…saying you think that’s why someone wants him dead?”

  Whistler shrugged, then shook his head. “No, not really. I’ve no reason to think so. Actually it’s more that I’m hoping it isn’t. I’m hoping that the motive will be some grudge that has nothing to do with you or me.”

  Whistler supposed that he had drugs on the brain. Oddly, however, if drugs had been the motive…or rather Philip Ragland’s position on drugs…it’s the traffickers who probably would have wanted him silenced as much as the anti-drug side. Traffickers don’t want the drug laws reformed. Take away prohibition and their business dries up. Whistler knew, however, that no trafficker had done this. They would not have been that sloppy or stupid.

  If Ragland won his Pulitzer for a series of reports in favor of the “more enlightened European model,” Whistler knew what Ragland’s position must have been. It must have been much like his father’s. Start by accepting the world as it is, not as you’d like it to be. There has never been a drug-free society. Scrap all the drug laws as they’re now on the books. Adopt the successful Dutch and Swiss systems that emphasize treatment and containment. Let doctors treat addicts under strict controls instead of not letting doctors treat them at all. Recognize that addiction is an illness, not a crime, much the same as alcoholism. Decriminalize, therefore, all private use and put all your effort into choking off the source. Keep coming down hard on the traffickers.

  Whistler reached to switch back to the CNN channel. It was still on Ragland. And a similar topic. This one mentioned that Ragland had personally funded a number of drug treatment centers.

  Claudia asked, “But does drug treatment work?”

  “Sure it does. What there is of it,” he answered.

  “I sure wouldn’t think so from all that I’ve read. Doesn’t only a tiny percentage stay clean?”

  “Yes, but that’s true of diets and of trying to quit smoking. Most people who try are going to fall off the wagon. However, while they’re trying, and even if they fail, their consumption is down and that’s something at least. Most will try again until it finally takes. But the government does not want to pay for treatment centers. They’d rather spend the money, up to ten times the money, to put drug users in jail.”

  An excerpt from one of Ragland’s programs came on. No, it wasn’t a program. It was Ragland at some hearing. He was testifying before congress. His words startled Whistler because it almost seemed as if he’d picked up on Whistler’s train of thought.

  “Above all,” he was saying, “start telling the truth. Admit that the drug war has been a disaster. Admit that most of what you’ve been saying about drug use is at best misleading and at worst an outright lie. Admit that the Dutch and Swiss have been right and that what they are doing is working. Admit that addiction has gone down, not increased, wherever common sense laws have been enacted. Admit what every honest clinician has long known – that cannabis has never been a dangerous drug. If it’s harmful, it’s far less harmful than alcohol and only slightly more toxic than coffee. Admit what’s been known for more than three thousand years. Admit that it’s a medicine that can ease more human suffering than almost any legitimate drug. Chemotherapy patients

  and those suffering from AIDs are able to eat food and keep it down. People wracked by migraines can get instant relief. Give a little cannabis to a patient with Glaucoma and the pressure…that can blind them… is eased in two minutes. Will you give it? No. Will you consider it? No. So you force these sufferers, those who can afford it, to fly off to one of the more civilized countries, one whose leaders have listened to its doctors. One whose leaders, I might add, are not gutless.”

  A gavel came down. “That will do, Mr. Ragland.” The hearing room had erupted into laughter and cheers.

  Claudia asked, “It that all true?”

  “P
retty much.”

  “Do those congressmen know that?”

  “Some do. Most don’t want to. That’s why he said, ‘gutless.’ Any congressman rash enough to agree, at least in public, knows he won’t be in office very long.”

  Ragland, once again, was saying much the same thing. “Some of you know what I’m talking about. But admit it? You won’t. You’d be called soft on crime.

  And as most of you know, the stakes are too high to let a little thing like truth get in the way. The war on drugs has become a big business. Twenty billion a year and that’s just law enforcement. Add in all the prisons built to lock up drug offenders, most of whom are there for personal use or for selling a miniscule amount. Add in the lost income of lives that have been ruined by mandatory sentencing guidelines. Five years for possessing five grams of crack, an atrocity against urban blacks.”

  Ragland paused to study their faces. He said, “You’re sitting there thinking, ‘What makes that an atrocity? These animals are guilty, are they not?’ The fact is that blacks use far less crack than whites. But they’re there; they’re available, you can pick them off the street and they usually can’t afford a decent lawyer. The result? As we speak, there are more blacks in prison for simple possession of just marijuana than for all crimes of violence put together.”

  He said, “Add in police corruption – cops stealing and dealing. Add in more human cost; the muggings, the burglaries. Add in tens of thousands of women turning tricks in order to finance a need they can’t control and despising themselves for what they’ve become.”

  The camera, tight on Ragland, pulled back a few feet to show some people nodding in agreement. Whistler recognized one of them. It was Ragland’s wife. Same intelligent face. And she was, of course, a good deal more composed than she had been the last time he saw her. Her husband was still speaking. This was more than a film clip. The news show that was running it was letting it go on well beyond the sort of sound bites that were usual. Whistler guessed that this network agreed with Ragland’s views, and was probably the network that carried his show. Ragland seemed to be just warming up.