by Matt Lincoln
“If we were in Miami, it’d be less than an hour. Diane has federal and local judges she can call at any time of the day.” I angled vents in the middle of the dashboard toward Tessa. “She has Tampa contacts, but they aren’t as familiar with us. Miami is a bigger port city, so we get most of the action there.”
“Too bad she couldn’t have called my dad,” Holm told us. “Some of his friends are sitting benches.”
“Yeah, but we’re supposed to be keeping this quiet.”
“Which is why it’s too bad.” Holm laughed. “Mom would just yell at me for not stopping in to say hi.”
My phone chimed at the same time as Holm’s. I opened the message.
“Warrant’s in,” Holm announced. “Search and seizure, questioning, the whole potluck.”
“It’s ‘shebang,’” Tessa said with a grin.
“Nah, ‘potluck.’ You haven’t seen the size of my family.”
I glanced at Holm. He seemed tired, and the way he’d been hunkering down with his laptop at any given chance was unlike him. I’d been thinking he was talking to a girl online, but I started to wonder if something else was going on. He usually told me everything. I decided I’d ask about it later when Tessa wasn’t right there.
“Vests are in the trunk,” I told Tessa as we got out of the car. “You get that on and your camera ready. Stay back until we clear the building.”
“We’ve gone over this a hundred times, Ethan,” she said in a testy tone. “I’m being careful.”
Holm touched Tessa’s shoulder and then pulled his hand back. “We’ll go over it a hundred and one times if needed.” He managed a grin. “If anything happens to you, Farr will have our hides.”
Tessa rolled her eyes. “Thanks for worrying about me.”
“Any time,” Holm said.
We geared up and joined the MBLIS, CGIS, and Tampa police who crowded around the sizzling hood of a marked car half a block down. Locals were predictably assembling on the sidewalks to see what the big deal was. I hated that. Even though we didn’t expect anything violent in this situation, there were no guarantees. Hence the vests.
I assigned a contingent to cover the back and side doors in case anyone tried to run. If the raid went the way I figured, the response was overkill, but I had to work with it.
Tessa photographed our short meeting to go over all the units’ assignments. She received a few side-eyes, but her presence was largely ignored as she hung back out of the way.
I pulled up the warrant copy on my phone, and Holm and I led the way in. Nobody pulled weapons, but we remained alert as we entered the door between the Christmas palms. The small reception area had six seats in the waiting area, and the reception counter had a sliding window in a wall. A door to the left of the window was locked when I tried it.
A young woman sat on the other side of the window. She played a game on her phone and didn’t look up as Holm and I approached the window. I tapped on the glass, and she jumped. She looked up, and her eyes went wide. The name badge on her company polo shirt read, “Hello, my name is CHARITY, and I’m here to help.”
“How can I… help?” Her voice was muffled through the window.
“We have a warrant to search the premises and interview employees of Sedin Disposal in the matter of a criminal case.” I held up the phone to the glass so she could see. “Are Tim Sedin and Marci Anderson here today?”
“Y-yes,” Charity stammered. “I… Let me go get them.”
She stood and started walking toward the back. I rapped on the window with my knuckle as Tessa joined the squad in the waiting area. Her camera clicks became part of the background of radio traffic and officers and agents speaking to each other.
“I’m getting them for you,” Charity told me.
“You’re taking me to them. Unlock the door.”
The flustered receptionist came to the door and allowed us into a long corridor with several doors.
“I might get in trouble,” she said in a small voice. “You have to have special clearance to go in the back because of what we do. I’m not even allowed in some areas, but we can go to their offices.”
“I understand that, miss,” I told her with a gentle smile. “Trust me that my partner and I have clearance. We’re federal agents.”
Charity’s hands shook, but she kept her chin up and took us down the corridor. She kept looking back as agents tried locked doors. Our warrant was to go through everything in the building, and yeah, we had people with clearance to investigate the secure areas. We even brought specialists to examine the direct handling of radioactive waste.
Marci Anderson’s office was second to last on the right side of the hall. Tim Sedin’s was the last. There were only two doors on the left, both metal, with heavy bolts and keycard access.
Charity led us into Anderson’s office. The co-owner jumped as we entered. She wore a knee-length summer dress and sat at a white computer desk along the side wall, and a traditional hardwood desk sat to the right of the center of the room. A sofa and recliner took the near-wall on either side of the door.
“Oh my gosh!” She took off her glasses and set them next to her keyboard. “What’s going on?”
Charity ran up to her. “They want to search us, Mom. I don’t know why.”
I glanced at Holm. The relationship was interesting, but nepotism was not uncommon. I walked up to Anderson and showed her the warrant on my phone.
“I’m Special Agent Marston with MBLIS, and this is Special Agent Holm,” I told her. “This is a warrant to search your building for evidence of illegal dumping in the Caribbean Sea. A paper copy is on the way.”
Anderson’s jaw dropped, and she put her hands over her mouth. Her daughter stared at us.
“What’s ‘embliss’?” the elder Anderson asked in a shaking voice.
“Military Border Liaison Investigative Services,” Holm said. “We investigate criminal activity that involves open water across international boundaries.”
Anderson blinked. “I’ve never heard of that.”
“Are we being pranked? Please tell us we’re being pranked,” Charity begged. “Mom would never, ever do something like that.”
“You’re not being pranked,” Holm told them in an even tone. “And we’re here to find out if your mom’s company would do something like that.”
“I certainly would not,” Anderson promised. “Where’s Tim?”
“Here!” A tall, lanky man with shaggy black hair and a slightly pointed nose strode into the room. He wore a casual suit with the top two buttons undone and tie loose. “Where’s this warrant, and why are people flooding my office?”
I showed him the warrant. “Your company is being investigated for illegal dumping of radioactive medical waste in open water.” He stumbled backward and recovered himself. “Mr. Sedin, we need to question you two and everyone who works here.”
“And we need access to the rest of the building,” Holm added.
“Oh, wow.” Sedin looked around and found a seat. He dropped down with shocked etched all over his face. “We run a clean business and will cooperate in every way you need.”
“With a lawyer’s advice,” Anderson interjected. “Nobody speaks without our attorney present.”
“Call him,” I told her. “How many employees do you have?”
“Besides Charity, eleven,” Sedin answered. “One is off today, but everyone else is here.”
“You only have eleven employees?” I imagined more than that. “How do you process all the waste you take in?”
“The waste is already sealed when we pick it up,” Sedin explained. He rubbed his palms on his thighs. “We bring it here to ensure it’s up to code for drop off at the landfill we use.”
Anderson walked over to him and touched his arm. “Tim, we need to wait for Tony. We know we didn’t do anything wrong, but they don’t. Don’t answer any more questions.”
A Tampa officer walked into the office and got my attention. “No weapons of any kin
d. The building’s secure.”
We settled Anderson and Sedin in separate rooms as we began going through their offices. The employees in the back were taken to the break room to be interviewed one by one by other MBLIS agents. Tessa followed as Holm and I checked in with agents in other rooms and offices.
“Are we going into the area where they get the waste ready?” Tessa wanted to know.
I turned to her. “You aren’t cleared, but you wouldn’t want to take your camera even if you did get to go in.”
“The waste is sealed, so it’s perfectly safe.” Sedin walked up to us. “I’ll answer questions about how our business works. Your photographer’s equipment will be fine. Is she with your agency?”
“Hi, my name is Tessa Bleu.” She introduced herself before I had a chance. “I’m an observer documenting the investigation.”
“There are some areas we don’t allow photography,” he told her, but then he turned to me. “Warrant aside, we’ll have to discuss with our lawyer before your techs take photos of those areas. It’s a security issue.”
“So you take security seriously,” Holm said. “Why did some of the materials you handled end up in the ocean?”
Sedin shook his head. “That shouldn’t ever happen. We monitor the process from beginning to end. Come on, I’ll show you the steps we take in here.”
He escorted us to the second door on the left side of the hall. His keycard tripped the massive bolt with a clank. Sedin took the three of us plus the two nuclear technicians who were brought in by CGIS. He addressed the technicians.
“Sorry, but I need to see your credentials before you go into the hot room,” he told them. “We have suits in the next room.” He then turned to us. “You can enter the storage and main floor. The direct waste handle happens in a shielded area, but there are leaded windows so you can see what your techs are looking at.”
One of Sedin’s employees was escorted in by a MBLIS agent.
“This is Kent. He’s one of my techs and can take your guys down to the hot room.” He smiled. “I’ll show you the rest of the facility.”
We started toward the door opposite of where the techs had gone, but Tessa didn’t move. The color had drained from her face.
“Tessa?”
“I… I don’t know if I can go in there.” Her knuckles were white where she clenched the sides of her camera. “It’s so close to the radiation.”
“Hey, you don’t have to,” I told her, “but it’d be a loss to your project.”
“Excuse me,” Sedin said. “I have something that should help.” He took three small blue devices from a counter and handed them to each of us. “These will squawk if we encounter loose radiation. They clip onto belts or bag straps, so you don’t even need to hold them.” He held one out to Tessa. “I promise it’s safe.”
She accepted the device and clipped it to the camera strap she wore about her neck. Some of the color returned to her cheeks, but her eyes stayed wide. Her fear of radiation was worse than I thought, not that panicking underwater was a mild fear.
“If any of the detectors make so much as a squeak, we’ll beat it back here to the control room,” Sedin said mostly to Tessa.
For being a suspect, he was awfully cooperative. I wondered what Holm thought, but he was too busy looking at the closed-circuit camera monitors for me to catch his eye.
We followed Sedin onto the floor. The roof was about three stories high, and we were at the end of a space that was maybe the length of a football field. Massive shelving units held yellow and black thirty-gallon drums. A forklift was parked by the stacks with a pallet full of half-size yellow drums plastic wrapped together.
“Each drum is labeled with numbers and barcodes to identify where they came from, who handled them, and final intended destination.” Sedin gestured behind us. “And there’s the hot room. This is where I ask you not to photograph anything.”
We walked over to the thick windows. I unclipped my little detector and held it close to the window. This was as much for my own peace of mind as Tessa’s.
“As you can see, it’s quite safe,” Sedin promised. He pointed to one end of the hot room. “Small shielded containers go in through there. The techs open the containers and use those machine arms to dump the contents into larger drums. Once the drums are sealed, they go through decontamination at the other end and then to the stacks. The smaller containers go through decontamination and can be reused.”
“What happens after they go to the stacks?” Holm asked as we watched a small container opened and then grasped by an operator running the machine that dumped the materials into a fifty-five-gallon drum. “There seems to be a lot of waste over there.”
Sedin nodded. “There is. Nobody likes to think about it, but this stuff has to go somewhere. We send it to a landfill that handles the material. The drums are buried, and that’s that.”
“And everything is tracked from start to finish,” I mused. “So the chain is broken somewhere, and nobody’s noticed.” Or someone was paid not to notice, or to fudge records. The question was at what point in the chain did that occur?
“Let’s get back to the office,” I told everyone. “If your attorney is here, we’ll have more questions.”
Sedin looked to the ground. “There’s something you should know before we do that.”
“What’s that?” I studied his furrowed brow and only sensed frustration.
“Look at MediWaste. We contract solely with them.” Sedin snorted. “All our eggs are in that basket, so they have us by the balls. I know I didn’t dump anything illegally. There’s no way Marci would. Please, look at MediWaste.”
“I’ll take that under advisement,” I promised.
We emerged from the storage area to a flurry of activity. The atmosphere was charged with the rush that followed the discovery of damning evidence against a suspect. A familiar face appeared in the mix.
“Parker, over here,” I called out.
CGIS Special Agent Will Parker was also based in Miami, but he traveled. I suspected he might show after my last phone call with Diane.
“Marston,” Parker said by way of acknowledgment. “Tim Sedin, you’re under arrest for illegal dumping and for the murder of Darrel Lemon.” He spun his finger. “Turn around.”
“Wait, what?” Sedin gasped. “I thought you were just questioning us to see if there was a link.”
“What’s going on, Parker?” I demanded. I wasn’t about to tell him that I’d been close to arresting Sedin myself. “We’re not done with him.”
“They found a box of papers next to a shredder in one of the storerooms,” Parker told me. “It was a list of times Sedin paid off a landfill worker to look the other way while he only paid to dispose of half the refuse.”
“That’s ridiculous,” Sedin exclaimed. “I never did any of that.”
Parker narrowed his eyes. “You better shut your pie hole until you talk to your attorney.”
Tessa’s camera clicked behind me as Parker handcuffed a shell-shocked Sedin. He looked over and saw the camera, and then Tessa.
“Hey, you’re the one who found that body in the cave.”
Tessa nodded. “I’m back for a project. Pretend I’m not here.”
“Oookay.” Parker shrugged. “We found a few other things to incriminate Mr. Sedin here. You’ll get the report.”
“This is my investigation.” I stepped closer to Parker. “Why are you arresting him?”
“Our holding facilities are better for a multi-agency case.” He raised a brow. “Unless you want to deal with the local and state charges that Sedin is also facing?”
“Belize may want to extradite,” I said in a mild tone. “I’ll give you that MBLIS holding isn’t as open as yours, but don’t you do anything without talking with us first.” I glanced at Sedin and felt that I was missing something, but I couldn’t put a finger on what it might be. “I want the transcription of your questioning ASAP.”
“Absolutely.” Parker narrowed
his eyes at Sedin. “There’s something else that came up about this guy.”
Sedin straightened and looked forward as if expecting what came next.
“What?” I asked.
“He was busted in college for dealing Ritalin and opiates.” Parker jiggled the handcuffs. “He spent five years in state prison for it.”
“Tim?” Anderson burst out of her office. “They said you’re being arrested!”
“I am, and I’m not speaking until Tony meets with me.”
Anderson’s mouth made a small “o” shape.
“That’s not possible,” she told us. “He’s a good man. Our company has flourished under his direction.”
“Tell that to the kid who overdosed on prescription drugs he dealt back in college,” Parker snapped. “Now he’s dumping poison into the sea. Yeah, it’s totally possible.”
“Tim?” Tears edged Anderson’s eyes. “Tell me—”
“The first part is true, and I paid for it,” Sedin told her, “but I never dumped anything in the ocean or sea or anywhere. I’ve put everything into this and have followed the rules to the letter.”
Parker handed Sedin over to another CGIS agent. “I’ll meet him at holding in a little while. Let me know if the lawyer gets there first.”
“Wow,” Holm said in a quiet voice. “He had everything going for him, and he threw it away, for what?”
I shook my head. “He served his time and made good. There might be something to his background check for the clearance, though. We’ll see.”
Tessa clicked a few more photos and then lowered her camera. “So that’s it? We have the suspect?”
“Maybe.”
“What are you thinking, Marston?” Parker asked. “I know that look, and it says you aren’t convinced.”
“That’s because I’m not so sure Sedin is our man. This case isn’t over.”
21
It was late by the time we got back to the villa in Belize City. Everyone was still up even though we had an early morning ahead. Muñoz and Birn would be hanging out with the lab team again while they did more testing on the materials we’d found. Holm, Tessa, and I were going to meet Header for the sub trip to the bottom of the Great Blue Hole.