COP

by Jim Magwood

  “You bet. Two o’clock. From the hospital, right?”

  “Doofus. Where else would I be?”

  “Yeah. Dumb, huh? So we’ll be there, okay? Don’t you worry. Do you need anything? Can we bring anything?” He was almost stumbling over his words with excitement, and Jake was shuffling behind the desk, almost dancing.

  “No. I’ve got these haut couture hospital gowns. What more could a girl want, huh? This one just wants a ride home. Besides, a girlfriend brought me a couple of things.”

  “Okay, we’ll be there. Don’t you go anywhere, hear?”

  “Right. Where would I go, doo…?”

  “I know. Doofus. Yeah, we’ll be there. Two o’clock. Yeah.”

  Both of the men checked their watches every minute for the next four hours, trying to make the time pass sooner. When two o’clock rolled around, they were standing at her hospital room door waiting for the nurses to pack her and get her cleared out.

  She got lots of hugs from the hospital staff and had to promise to call them at least weekly to keep them informed on her progress. Lunch and dinner dates were made. E-mail addresses and phone numbers were shared. It was obvious she had been a favorite.

  Finally, they let her out of her room. Jake demanded that he push the wheelchair, and nobody dared to say no. He pushed her down the halls like a proud father bringing his new baby home.

  They got her home and settled comfortably in a stuffed living room chair, tried to make her tea, soup, anything. Pleaded to be allowed to run out and get her hamburgers, tacos, milk shakes, anything. She let them know that a caregiver would be arriving shortly and would be staying for several days, which finally got them to relax.

  They sat and talked for a couple of hours. Neither man wanted to leave her alone, or even just to leave, but she eventually got them shooed out the door. Jake and Paul decided that the day was late enough and they should head home. With the excitement, they both felt more tired than Sylvia had looked, but they felt good. It had been a long couple of weeks.

  The men got to their respective homes and settled in for the night. Hopefully, no pagers would go off.

  Jake had a snack to keep him for the night and a quick drink, then locked up and went up to bed. He cleaned up and rolled in gratefully and turned off the light. The moon shone through the open window and a breeze fluttered the curtains and touched him lightly.

  The shooter watched as the man settled down for the night. No hurry now. Take time and make it a good shot. The moon was good and he had a clear line to the bed. With the scope, everything was as clear as daylight. It would be an easy shot. Just wait a bit for things to settle and neighborhood lights to go out.

  After twenty minutes and no movements on the street, the shooter carefully pushed the comfortable chair back and knelt on the floor. He only pushed about six inches of the rifle barrel out the cut in the screen. He rested the rifle on the windowsill and sighted in on the body across the street, then gave a bit of adjustment to the left so the deflection going through the screen into the room would be accounted for.

  He waited again, checked for any neighborhood sounds, then looked down the street at the homes for any movement. All quiet. He carefully sighted again, then slowly squeezed the trigger. The rifle bucked hard, but the sound suppressor deadened almost all the noise. The body at the other end jerked violently, then thrashed a bit. He considered firing again, but waited. The thrashing stopped. Everything became still. He watched for several minutes, then, satisfied, carefully packed all his equipment, walked out of the room, down the stairs and out the way he had come in.

  He pulled the wire lock over the gate as he left, then walked back down the alley and street to his car. The engine turned over smoothly and he drove away.

  Back at the house, ex-Washington, D.C. District Attorney John D’Marco never knew what had happened. He had closed his eyes and was almost asleep, then felt a tremendous blow to his chest for an instant. But before having any thought as to what it was, he simply died.

  The next morning, a reporter at the local paper received an e-mail that said, “Another one gone. They should have done something.”

  It wasn’t until three days later that John D’Marco’s body was found. He had been retired for four years and didn’t have anywhere to report to. His wife had died shortly after his retirement. It was only when he missed a golf appointment with some old buddies that anyone went looking for him.

  Investigators were able to easily compute the angle of the shooting. The window was the only way in after they had eliminated actual break-in possibilities. From the bed through the window gave a line of trajectory directly to the window at the vacant house. The break-in there was obvious, as was the scene at the actual sniper site. Marks on the window sill from the rifle; the comfortable chair still close to the window; scuff marks on the carpet from someone moving around there. They noted the shooter had kneeled, presumably to get a good line of site.

  But nothing else. No fingerprints. No blood from cuts at the break-in spots. No shoe marks for size. The realtor was checked but couldn’t provide any information as to people who might have been in the house. Other realtors had obviously been there and entered using the lockbox, but they were all checked and it was obvious none of them had been there the night of the shooting.

  The setup appeared to be far too organized and detailed to be someone from his past that had been put away and was now settling a score. Someone had been watching him carefully to even know about the vacant house and to use it as a shooting stand. The case had no links to anything important until the ballistics report came back with a match to the other shootings. Then things exploded.

  Paul and Jake had not initially caught the call for the shooting, but as soon as the match was made, it became theirs. In addition, the FBI was called in because of their work with the other cases. The shooting of an ex-DA didn’t exactly warrant the FBI being called, but the links to the other cases did.

  Jake had immediately added the case details to the search Sammie was doing for them, and Paul sent a message to Roger Evans in Canada to bring him current on the mess. Then they were stuck again with no leads. Nothing to direct them.

  They did all the normal neighborhood canvassing and the running down of possibilities as in any other murder case, but nothing came from the efforts. Again, a big blank. The wall behind their desk had become a huge diagram board, with pictures and notes and strings connecting items. The casebooks now weighed many pounds and took up most of their desk space. But there was still nothing to give them a direction. There was only frustration, and it was often hard holding in tempers.

  It was almost a week later that Paul got an e-mail from Roger Evans that said simply, “I may have something here. Call me ASAP.”

  “Paul. Glad you called. I’ve been running all this data

  and something new just popped up.”

  “Man, we could sure use a break. What do you have?” “Well, it was after we included the data on your latest

  shooting. By the way, I’ve got a friend here with me. We’ve worked together on things like this before and I can vouch for him. Anyway, we had these other things before, but it wasn’t until we added the DA to the picture that we red-flagged. Apparently, your DA was involved in a case from a few years back that also included the two senators and the councilman. And some news people. This latest item packed the database, I guess, and it said, ‘Whoa. What gives here?’ There were links before, but this one became so strong that we got a flag.”

  “So, where does it go, Roger?”

  “About six years back, there was an incident in downtown

  Washington that involved some school kids.”

  Paul immediately felt his hair stand on end.

  “They were from out of state, Missouri, and were visiting

  the Capitol on a trip because of an award they had won. Nothing out of the way except when they were leaving the Smithsonian one day, they got caught in a shooting between some rival gangs. Th
ey were in a school bus and I guess they drove right between the two gangs. Several shots hit the bus and twelve of the kids were seriously wounded. Four were killed outright.

  “That was basically the end of the incident. Some gang members were picked up but the evidence against them wasn’t strong enough and they were turned loose. The kids had gone home; funerals were held; the basic case petered out. But here’s where things start to get really interesting for your case with the schools.

  “Some of the parents apparently asked some people to put up a small marker at the site in memory of the injured and killed kids. It ultimately went up through some local D.C. people, then some congressmen and so on until everyone finally dropped it. The parents wrote some articles blistering the politicians and so on, but nothing ever came of it. But, guess who some of the people involved were?”

  “I’m guessing, Roger, and my nerves are tweaking, but tell me.”

  “Your councilman, Tom Jessen, your senator Marks, and that other congressman, Mildowney. On top of all that, your DA was the one who caught the case and eventually dropped it for lack of evidence. Put that together with schools being set on fire, news people getting shot, the news building fire, the Smithsonian bomb itself, and you’ve got some very interesting possibilities. I’ve got a news report here that one father started making some accusations and they turned into threats, but he was picked up back then, told to clean up his act and then released. Nothing else ever came from it.”

  “Wow, that does make for some wild scenarios. Did you get any other names or incidences? Anything on perpetrators?”

  “No. There were lots more items on the individuals separately since they got flagged in this main thing, but nothing that would raise flags by themselves. The DA got some threats for a few more years, but then I guess he retired. Same with the senator and so on. Regular stuff more or less related to their public jobs.

  “I did run a check on that father that caused a stir. He’s back with his family. Moved to Nevada a few years ago and has a good job. No news on him at all. You can check him, of course, but he looks pretty clean.”

  “Yeah, I’ll do that for sure. Any ideas, Roger? Anything that pops into your mind from seeing all this?”

  “Nothing specific, Paul, except for a wild thought. Maybe someone local took up the cause for the kids. You gave me the contents of the notes, and there are indications that that’s what the references were in the notes. “Somebody didn’t do this thing right, and now I’m going to take them all out.” That kind of thing. That could be local. I won’t make any guesses as to who it could be, but that’s a maybe.

  “Paul, I want to shoot all this data to your local data guy. He would have a lot of local knowledge—maybe names, news reports and so on in his own memory—that I don’t have from here. He might see something that rings a bell.”

  “Great idea, Roger. I’ve got his e-mail right here, and I’ll call and tell him to be expecting your dump. Wow. This might be the beginning for us.”

  “Okay. I’ll get this off to you right now and then my friend and I will get back on some more leads.”

  A few minutes later, Sammie got the download and quickly reviewed it. He called Paul right away.

  “Listen, this does ring some bells. I vaguely recall the case. A bus full of kids gets shot up, some squawks from parents for a monument and then it was all dropped. I pulled some quick files and I see the Smithsonian got at least one threat due to their being against putting a monument at their place. Can’t blame them since it didn’t happen there, but someone got upset at them anyway.

  “I pulled a news clip from Senator Marks and he was pretty blunt and cold when he announced there was no need and no budget funds to put up a marker. Then Mildowney came out a couple of weeks later with a denial of his own. Nicely spoken, but still a ‘Go away. We’ve got more important things to do.’

  “The parents appealed directly to the councilman but he didn’t even reply from the notes I’ve got here. Sent a letter from his staff saying he was sorry for their loss, but never addressed the monument. And it was in his district that the shooting happened.”

  “Do you have anyone else that ties into it, Sammie? Anyone that might have taken up the crusade personally?”

  “No. No sign of anything like that. But maybe someone waited this long and started crusading. Your stuff started all at once without any other reason for it, so maybe you’re on the right track with that thought.”

  “Yeah, it’s a maybe. But still nobody to hang anything on. Nothing to give us a start.”

  “Sorry I can’t help there. At least not yet. I do have some ideas as to maybe how to run some more checks though. Some local stuff that might give some ideas. I’ll let you know as soon as anything pops.”

  “Sammie, throw something else into the mix, will you?”

  “Sure, Paul. What?”

  “Search for anyone who made any threats or accusations or news reports, you know, anything at all against any of the majors in the case. Somebody who said ‘if you don’t do this…’ You know?”

  “Sure. Got it. I’ll do it right now. Let you know as soon as I can.”

  CHAPTER 80

  “Jacob, what do you make of these references Paul gave to ghosts and demons? He links them to some kind of death squads from back during Vietnam, and maybe even since. We spoke about them in that e-mail a bit back. Ring any bells for you?”

  Jacob’s nerves immediately tingled although his face didn’t register anything. “Yes, it did. Do you have more references to them? What brings that thought up now?”

  “Just a thought. You seemed to acknowledge them back then, as if you knew something. Anything you can share?”

  Jacob thought for a moment, then replied, “They are real, Roger. Whatever they are called at points of time, they were, and are, real. Do you know anything of the subject yourself?”

  “I looked up references on the ‘Net, but there’s nothing really but stories and rumors. Nothing that really purports to be factual. Secret government stuff. Conspiracies. Mystery novels. That sort of stuff. A lot from the Phoenix Program of the Vietnam times, but nothing that says it carried on after that.”

  Again, Jacob paused, then said, “They are real, Roger. And are real today. Throughout modern history, there have always been secretive groups, whether military, police or government, that have been tasked with using any means to find and neutralize the enemy. Many times those groups, while first supported by the governments and military, later were disbanded and turned loose to become rebels and vigilantes. Often they would band together after their official conflicts and work on their own or for the highest bidder.

  “While no modern, respectable, government would admit that ‘Yes, we used secret assassins,’ they have been a fact of life well known in the darker circles of intelligence. And, while some investigators know of them, and have even had occasion to search them out and confront them, they remain very secretive with supporters and owners, if you will, who know how to find them when needed and use them.”

  “Okay, I thought as much. But, do we know if they’re kept under any kind of control, or whether they just run wild? Could my neighbor be one of these ghosts or demons and I don’t know about it? Are they kept in a camp somewhere and brought out when a government needs them, or…?”

  “No, they are not controlled, for the most part. There are some who are still unofficially on the payrolls of certain agencies and who are still sent out on black operations. But many have now evolved to being available to the highest bidder— crime lords, gangsters, rogue government leaders and so forth.”“I gather that the Phoenix Program was done away with?”

  “The outward appearance of the program was finally done away with about 1975, after Saigon fell. However, it lived on secretly for many years. We saw signs of it in Panama and other places the United States operated for many years, and agencies from around the world conducted the same kind of operations basically in every small war we’ve had.”
r />   “Would it work today, Jacob, in a civilian setting?”

  “Someone wrote a report, Roger, that said, in essence, that in a peacetime setting, no, it would not be viable. He said that any program required to do the same tasks as Phoenix would injure innocents in its attempts to control any actual guilty parties, no matter how carefully conducted. The idea of having paid, uncontrolled, highly trained assassins turned loose among the civilian population is simply not able to be justified.”

  “But, they are there.”

  “Yes, they are.”

  “Could these activities Paul’s chasing in Washington be conducted by this kind of group? Or by individuals from that kind of background?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you think he knows about this, or does his government or the police force?”

  “First, it’s not likely he knows much about it. Unless he’s done a lot of research himself and has had some very knowledgeable friends, most of this kind of information is very deeply hidden. It surfaces every once in a while, but then is quickly buried and denied.

  “Second, yes, his government does likely know a lot, though who in the government is another story. Their CIA is widely reputed to have used contracted ghosts, though in the years since the power has been taken from them, that activity has been greatly decreased. Some branches of the military have used some of these people at times, but again, with the surveillance by the public in the last few years, the activity has almost stopped.

  “The government itself, though, that’s another story entirely. Nothing is provable, but it is reported in high circles, or dark ones, that certain powers have access to these people whenever they want them. And the secrets that a chief of staff or powerful senator or even a president could hide could be appalling. There are individuals in the political realm who have built power structures that are far beyond the belief of regular citizens. Many investigative agencies have insights into these power bases, but are totally hamstrung in trying to do anything about them. Something happens, someone dies, a few reports are written, the cases are buried.”