“Yes, I do, he works for the insurance company. May I ask, did you have any luck?”
“No, we probably missed him by ten or fifteen minutes, but we’re going to process his room, and I already alerted all the area units for his car . . . the fool even used his own driver’s license and his own real, I mean his own friggin’ car when he checked in. All the units have his license plate . . . I don’t think he’ll get far,” she adds. “Give me a few minutes and I’ll give you two men an update,” she says as she turns around and heads back into the first floor hotel room.
“Ok, will you please bring me fully up to date and tell me what you know,” requests a bit aggravated Vince.
“Well, like I said earlier, this guy doesn’t match our hijacker. Once I looked over the original video at the bank, I was one hundred percent sure. I mean, he even put his hands all over the counter at the bank. We, I mean, Officer Martinez lifted a complete set of prints off the smooth counter top. I did call my FBI buddy Bob that I told you about before, and we had a hit in less than a minute. He’s a known crook, with a Federal rap sheet for moving drugs. He’s not going anywhere other than back to prison,” says Sal.
“You mean, if they catch him,” offers Vince.
“Oh, I wouldn’t worry about that; this is their second bank robbery this year, and they are going all in on this fool. He can’t get far . . . I mean damn, he used his own car, his own ID to check into the hotel, and is probably driving straight back to his home in Georgia. Some local detective simply needs to start here and draw a semi-straight line on a road map back to his neighborhood in Georgia, set up a few discreet look-see points along the way, and he’ll drive by within an hour or two,” says Sal.
“You said discreet points, do you mean road blocks,” asks Vince.
“No, basically what we learned over the years is, if you set up road blocks, the bad guys will simply figure out a way to get around them. However, if you leave all the streets open, the bad guys feel like or think they have been able to outsmart the local cops and will drive the major freeways and highways. Lay low, be discreet, and keep things under surveillance from the bushes . . . the fool will drive right by,” offers Senior Detective Sal. “I need a cup of coffee. Let’s go in the lobby and if no one is around we can steal a cup,” says Sal as he started in the direction of the main entrance.
“Yeah, coffee sounds good to me,” answers Vince as he walks along with Sal. “Boy, what a day. The weather turned out bad between Chicago and here, so we got to fly around in circles over southern Illinois . . . I thought for sure a private jet could bypass all the weather, but I don’t think I saved any time. How did your flight from Vegas go,” asks Vince.
“Oh, it was ok, thanks a lot for the ride . . . I’ve never ridden on a private Jet before, it was real fine,” is Sal’s answer.
Standing in the lobby sipping coffee, Sal detects Officer Martinez rounding the corner wearing a big smile. With a slight grin, he offers, “I think they just caught him.”
“Huh? What? How in the world could you possible know that,” asks a puzzled Vince.
As soon as the door opened, Officer Martinez gives Sal the thumbs up signal and fires off, “You were fuckin’ dead on, I couldn’t have done it without your help. One of our highway patrol units stopped him on I-10 about eighty miles from here. He was headed east bound toward Georgia just like you figured. The fool had all the cash in the front seat with him and gave the officer a full confession right there on the side of the highway. The Trooper is headed back here with the crook if you want to talk to him . . . should take about 30 to 40 minutes for him to get here.
“Yeah, that would be grand. Are you going to do a live ID at the bank?” asks Sal.
“That’s my plan; I’ll give you a shout when the trooper arrives—why don’t you two meet me back at the bank in about 30 minutes.”
“See you later, Detective Sal,” she says.
“Thanks again,” responds Sal.
“Why don’t we leave my rental car here, and I’ll ride with you to the Bank . . . I want to look this guy over myself,” says a determined Vince Kelleher.
A slight grin appears on Sal’s face as he turns to hide it from Vince. He doesn’t want to show any outward disrespect, especially on a crime scene. “Yea, sure, that will work and I can drop you back off when we head back to the airport. Uh, since we’re across the street, why don’t we go and tell the pilots our plan. What do you think?” asks Sal.
“Yea, that is a good idea and I want to use the head over at the FBO anyway,” is Vince’s response.
Five minutes later, the small Chevrolet Malibu rental car arrives at the Atlantic FBO. The walk into the lobby area allows Sal, Vince and their pilots, who are seated to the right of the entrance door, to wait, to be prepared for their fare. The four crew members stand to greet their approaching passengers.
Vince is the first to speak, “Not yet boys, we need a couple of hours, maybe three at the most.”
Scotty answers for the four men. “Yes sir, anytime is fine, but do you two know our destinations . . . so we can file our flight plans, check the weather, uh . . . and the like?”
“Oh, this one is easy, I’m headed back home to Chicago, Midway where ya’ll picked me up and Salvatore here needs to go back to Las Vegas,” answers Vince.
“Great, excellent, we’ll all be ready in two hours or whenever you get back,” says Scotty.
Right at a bit over 12 minutes later, Vince and Sal are headed back down Route 475 back toward the bank. Traffic is light as Sal makes his way along the four lane blacktop road south southeast bound. In an effort to break the silence, Sal asks, “Ok, now what do you think?”
“Well, damn. I was hoping this guy was one of our hijackers. When I heard they hit the same bank, I sort of figured they had at long last made a mistake, but I guess I was wrong. Uh . . . maybe I should have called you before I hired these two charter jets,” offers Vince.
“Hey, don’t be so hard on yourself; it was a good effort and with our help, we did catch at least one bank robber today. At bare minimum, solving this one has to make some of your bosses happy and keep them off of your ass,” says Sal.
“Yeah, I didn’t think about the case in a practical way,” says a grinning Vince. “Uh, I guess I need to head back to Chicago. Do you really want to go out to Vegas or you know these guys can drop you off in Houston.”
“Actually, I need to head back to Las Vegas to finish up out there,” is Sal’s reply. “Can I get an airline flight out of here today?”
A laughing Vince offers, “Now don’t get too spoiled I’m not sure if I can get us chartered jets after the way this one played out.”
“No problem, but these things sure beats the darn airlines,” says Sal. “Uh, what time does the flight leave?” is his next question.
“I guess you don’t quite comprehend the private jet concept . . . the plane leaves when you want to. The ship is totally on your schedule. That’s why corporations and executives love to use them. Hell, my company has three or four planes our VIPs use all the time. I’ve been out with our executives on an inspection tour, and we could visit five or six cities in an eight hour day and still be back at home in Chicago by six in the evening.”
“Wow, I never thought of . . . well . . . in the perspective of a business tool. The planes make good business sense if you can cover six cities in an eight hour day and still be back at your home base for supper,” offers Sal as he pulls into the bank parking lot. Turning off the motor in the parking space off to one side, he unbuckles his seatbelt and slides down in his seat. With his left hand, Sal removes his glasses and closes his eyes at the same time as he rubs his nose where the bridge has been digging in for the last six hours.
Without looking up, he asks, “How long . . . uh . . . much time has gone past?”
Looking at his time piece, V
ince answers, “Thirty-five minutes or so . . . and adds, “Here comes Officer Martinez. Look, look, behind her appears to be a state trooper car following her unit into the parking lot.”
Sal straightens up and looks outside to his right saying, “This is fantastic. I miss this kind of direct hands-on police work. Hell I loved chasing real bank robbers and hijackers.”
“I get the drift with what you mean, this is rather exciting! Are they going to bring the guy back into the bank or do the ID out here?” asks Vince.
“Well, at home in Houston, we learned a long time ago to always bring the bad-guy back into the store, bank, whatever. By doing this, in a way it can trigger any bit or memory the victims have to subconsciously supressed. Also, by doing this, we can help to take away one of the defense attorneys’ arguments about the ID was a tainted identification because the guy was in handcuffs, in custody, locked in the back seat of a patrol unit, and so on. Let’s stay over here out of the way and let them make the ID first, before I try to get us a couple of minutes with the crook,” finishes a reassuring Sal.
Leaning on the light blue Chevy, Sal’s Avis rent-a-car, he and Vince gaze about the area as the hijacker is escorted into the lobby of the bank. Moving closer to the Bank’s large picture windows, Sal and Vince peer into the tiny lobby. Within a minute, Officer Martinez has the two female bank employees walk up to their side of the banking counter to look eye to eye with the man who had robbed them a short time ago.
As soon as the two female employees spot the man again, just ten feet away from their counter top, they both start pointing and say almost in harmony, “That’s him, he’s the one—that’s son-of-a-bitch who robbed us with the damn fake bomb.”
“Are you sure, are you absolutely sure?” asks Officer Martinez. Performing already like a seasoned Detective, Officer Martinez waits for their answers.
“Yes and yes,” is their positive responses.
“Good, and thank you brave ladies for your help today,” she says as she, the crook, and the state trooper exit the bank.
“Now?” asks Vince.
“No, I’m sure the state copper wants to get the guy back in the security of his back seat cage before we can approach,” answers Sal.
Shutting the rear passenger door, Officer Martinez turns, smiles, and motions for Sal, with Vince in tow to approach the police car. “I can only give you a minute or two out here or I’ll get my butt in a sling. If you want to interrogate him, we’re going to have to run it by the Chief of Detectives . . . I’m sure you understand.”
“No, no, this won’t take but a second or two,” says a slightly grinning Detective Sal.
As Officer Linda Martinez opens the rear door of the police car, Sal asks only one simple question.
“Why did you hit this bank?”
“Uh, well I figured uh . . . since those guys on TV were robbing banks all over the country, I could pull off one or two and the other guys would get the blame. I don’t know what I did wrong; I wore a uniform and even grew a bread,” is the answer to Sal’s question.
“Thank you for being honest; I appreciate you telling the truth,” says Sal as he watches Officer Martinez close the right rear car door.
“Well, my friend, here we have it, just like I thought—a copy-cat hijacker. Some jerk trying to cash in on a job or two simply disappears into the abyss and let the real hijackers take the rap. A good plan . . . almost,” says Sal. With his right hand, Sal shakes Linda Martinez’s hand and thanks her again for doing a first-rate job as the two men walk back to the rental car. Vince follows his lead and does the same.
“OK, again, now what,” asks Vince. “Let’s get back to work on the real cases . . . me out in Las Vegas and you in Chicago.”
“Well, I guess today, now we go back to the airport and get back to work.”
The short drive back to the Jackson-Evers International airport is a quiet one. Sal wonders how Vince is going to spin the events of the day to his bosses back in Chicago, but he decides to not dig in or pick on Vince anymore.
Once the men retrieve Vince’s rental car at the hotel parking lot, Sal parks and gathers up his gear. After turning in his paperwork and keys to the front desk counter he looks around the lobby for the pilots. This time, the flight crews are not in sight.
“Uh, excuse me, Ma’am, but have you seen our pilots,” asks Sal.
“Oh, yes sir, they’re probably in the Pilot’s Lounge watching TV,” she says pointing past Sal’s left shoulder. With a turn to the left to look where she was pointing, Sal thanks her and heads in the proper direction. Twenty or so steps later, Sal peers in on the quaint little rest area set aside for the flight crews. Gazing in, he witnesses all four crew members kicked back in large recliners enjoying their down time.
“You boys ready to go flying?” he asks with a sheepish grin.
“Oh, yes sir, we didn’t hear you come in. We need about 10 to 15 minutes to warm up the avionics and get our flight clearance, but we’re basically ready,” says Captain Scott.”
Sal stands off to one side as he watches the four flight crew members load the bags in quick order and fires up the two airplanes’ APUs on the ramp as Vince walks into the lobby.
“Well, the fly boys said to give ’em ten minutes and they’ll be ready to launch,” offers Sal.
“Excellent, let me turn in my rental car, hit the head, and I’ll be ready to go,” is Vince’s reply.
“In that case, I’ll talk to you later boss,” says Sal as he heads out to the tarmac.
Sixteen minutes later, Sal is settled back into the Hawker 800 XP airplane as it taxies out for takeoff. Looking toward the cockpit, he follows as the Captain’s right hand pushs the thrust levers to the take-off position as he feels the big Hawker Jet jump as the plane reaches the liftoff speed. This time, the Hawker 800 XP is turning onto a west bound, heading back across Houston and El Paso Texas, then east, northeast toward Las Vegas, Nevada. Sal revels in the pitch angle as the bird climbs up to the ATC assigned flight levels. The crew has filed for a flight altitude of 36,000 feet for the three hours and fifty minute flight out to Vegas. Their filed true airspeed for today is at 442 knots—not too bad for a twenty year old airplane.
Sal closes his eyes and wants to rest for a moment. One hour and six minutes later, he wakes up. Peering out behind his eye lids it takes him a bit longer than a micro second to remember where he is. Later, in the flight, he sits up in his comfy leather chair and stretches out to look out the window to perhaps figure out what part of America they are currently flying over. Outside the window appears to be nothing, but clouds. Sal makes a quick head call before he strolls up to the cockpit.
“Hey guys, where are we?” asks Sal. Captain Scott has changed over to fly right-seat on the leg out to Vegas. He turns to his left and pushes a few keys on the FMS between the two pilots. “We’re about over Fort Hood, Texas,” he starts, “we’re headed directly to El Paso, and after that into Vegas. The winds have died down a bit,” he pushes another key and finishes, “only about forty or so knots on the nose. We should be in on the ground in Vegas in a bit over two hours.”
“Terrific,” says Sal as he returns to his seat, closes his eyes and dozes in his fine blue leather chair.
Chapter 12
Current Weather or current METAR: KIAS
2708KT CAVU, 28/19 A30.30 or in plain language:
Winds are 270 degrees at 8KTS, Ceiling and Visibility Unlimited (sky clear) temperature is 38C, dew point 19 and the area altimeter setting is 30.30; or in pilot speak, clear and a million miles.
Washington, DC
Some 1815 nautical miles away back in DC at the FBI Headquarters, the Agents are working hard on all their assigned bank robbery cases. The Senior Agent and the others Feds are all gathered in a regular conference room, seated around a long mahogany table. They once again are discussing and kicking
around the cases with the new information they received from Retired L. A. Police Lieutenant Vince Kelleher.
The Senior Agent in charge, Agent Smith starts off speaking. “Based upon this new info I gave to you from the Federal Aviation Administration files on each and every SouthEast pilot . . . what did your squads come up with?
Special Agent Bill Smith offers up, “Well, in a nutshell, nothing. All we can tell is that SouthEast Airlines employs approximately 23 white male pilots with Military backgrounds; 6 black guys, 2 Asian-Americans, and 9 females . . . in other words, far too many to do any real good. Be that as it may, we checked and re-checked all the photos, surveillance videos, and about everything else and still we come up with a big fat zero.”
“Furthermore and, uh . . . sir, I, I mean we checked every pilot’s photo against even the other surveillance photos from even some long-shot older robbery cases and still came up empty. Frankly sir, my team does not feel this theory suggests any merit.”
Agent Lynn adds to the conversation, “My squad arrived at the same decision too, sir.”
“We did some checking and the two retired cops, one from LA and one from Houston do not have anything to back up their accusations. The LAPD one is a full time insurance investigator trying to save his job and the other drinks like a fish—and let it be known he is only interested in getting his hands on the reward money.”
Senior Agent Smith, a moment later offers, “OK, well then, where does all this leave us?”
“Back where we started—probably a couple of white collar junkies.”
Agent Lynn agrees and then continues, “Yes sir, see . . . sir, look—every squad here thinks that we’re looking for a couple of professional bank robbers, not a drifter or a couple of renegade airline pilots.”
“Pretty wild story, if you ask me.”
“Their theory has no real merit here in the Washington DC office of the FBI.”
Grabbing a sip of black coffee, Agent Rivera continues on with, “I agree, my squad agrees and the computer and psycho analysis points to a couple of professional bank robbers—not pilots.
Con Trails/200 Sky Obscured Page 20