Phoenix Burning

by Isabella Maldonado

  She kept pushing forward, stopping short when a middle-aged woman clutching an oversized shopping bag jabbed an accusatory finger at her. “She’s got a gun!” the woman shrieked.

  More screams erupted as shoppers changed directions like a school of fish, now rushing away from her team.

  A whistle’s shrill blast cut through the cacophony.

  “Sam … Sam Stark!” A man with sparse gray hair wearing a mall security uniform elbowed his way toward them. A silver whistle dangling from a lanyard attached to an epaulette on his shirt.

  Sam did a double take then addressed the security officer. “Leo, any sightings of the active shooter?”

  Leo pointed to a brick-sized radio clipped to his thick leather belt. “Last report I got was a Hispanic male subject with a rifle in the east food court area.” He surveyed the rapidly emptying space. “Thought you’d need help. Got here as fast as I could.”

  The blond patrol officer to Veranda’s left quirked a brow at the mall cop, skepticism tingeing his words. “We’ve got this, sir.”

  The security officer’s jaw tightened. “I’ve had the same training as you, only more of it.”

  When the young officer opened his mouth to retort, Sam intervened. “This is Leo Garland. He’s retired from the job..”

  The blond officer addressed his comments to Sam. “I appreciate that he’s had the same training and all, but we need to clear this floor. We’ve wasted too much time already. The shooter went down that corridor.”

  Leo straightened. “And I know where that corridor leads, how to access shortcuts behind the stores to intercept him, the location of every exit, and where the best hidey holes are in this mall.” He leaned forward. “Do you?”

  Out of patience, Veranda cut in. “Point taken.” She shot a quelling look at the blond officer before turning back to the guard. “You don’t have a gun, so we’ll put you in the middle of the diamond formation. Is that a ballistic vest under your shirt?”

  “Never without it.” He raised his chin. “Ready when you are.”

  The mall seemed eerily empty as the group scuttled past storefront windows featuring sparkling jewels on plush velvet cushions and mannequins adorned in the latest styles.

  “We’ve lost him,” Sam muttered.

  “Turn into that alcove to your right,” Leo said from his position behind Veranda. “There’s an access point to the corridors behind the stores.”

  She opened the service door and led the team through. In stark contrast to the gleaming polished tile in the main area, the network of passageways connecting the delivery doors and employee entrances to the back of the stores had a grimy cement floor. The walls were bare cinder block and industrial fans hung from the ceiling between the exposed ductwork. Intermittently spaced bare bulbs provided the only light in the gloom as they moved ahead.

  The blond officer sounded annoyed when he asked, “What are we doing back here?”

  Leo gave him a terse response. “We’re taking a shortcut to the security office. I can pull up video and we’ll see where the shooter went in about two minutes. A lot quicker than going on foot through two hundred thousand square feet of retail space.”

  Veranda analyzed their situation. Leo’s plan made sense. “The shooter ghosted on us,” she said. “This is our best chance.”

  After another six turns through the labyrinth of hallways, they stepped through a glass partition to a foyer with a clean blue industrial-grade carpet and a metal reinforced door equipped with a Cypher lock.

  Leo punched in a code and pushed open the security office door.

  “Where is everyone?” Sam asked.

  “We were instructed to evacuate the customers and leave the premises.” He frowned. “Screw that. Unlike the rest of the security staff here, I was on the force. Knew I could help.”

  Veranda kept them on task. “Where’s the video monitoring station?”

  “Over here.” Leo led them to an elaborate array of thirty-two video screens, each flicking between different angles inside the mall and parking lot. Flashing emergency lights caught Veranda’s eye and she grimaced at the cluster of police and rescue vehicles in the far corner of the east parking lot.

  Leo plopped down in a worn swivel chair. “I’ll pull up the food court cameras and reverse them. Stop me when you see the shooter.”

  He typed commands on a keyboard, isolating footage from the food court on a large screen directly in front of them. Veranda watched as the images began to move in reverse.

  She held her breath as people ran backward, mouths open in silent screams.

  “Stop!” She pointed at the screen. “There he is. Back up a bit more, then go forward.”

  With growing dread, Veranda watched Roberto shoot his rifle in the air twice and duck behind the palm trees lining the food court. Another camera picked up his movement as he whipped down an adjacent corridor, looked over his shoulder, and shoved the rifle into a trash can. After a furtive glance around, he joined the throng bolting toward the nearest exit. A final switch of cameras confirmed her worst fear. Roberto had blended in with the terrified shoppers and surged outside with the crowd.

  3

  Two hours later, Veranda stood at the back of the raised stage in the police headquarters media briefing room. She checked her watch. The news conference would begin any moment. She cast her eyes around at the sea of reporters jockeying for position as they waited to sink their teeth into the PPD chief. Her attention locked on a petite redhead, Kiki Lowell, the local television reporter famous for her fluff pieces. Dressed in a clingy canary yellow skirt and teetering on five-inch stilettos, Kiki looked out of place next to her less colorful colleagues.

  Kiki raised a microphone to her collagen-enhanced lips, peered at the camera perched on a tripod in front of her and said, “Phoenix in fear.” After these words, she furrowed her brows in a grim expression and continued in a dramatic voice. “It’s now day seven of a brutal new crime wave. Warring cartels from south of the border have brought a new level of violence to the nation’s fifth-largest city. The death toll now stands at three, with thirty-nine injured.”

  Veranda did a mental body count. The past week had seen escalating violence between the SSS gang and the Villalobos cartel, resulting in bloodshed on both sides. The first murder had drawn her into the investigation, and she’d been chasing her tail ever since.

  This afternoon, the mayor had called a news conference to address public fear after the fiasco at the city’s largest shopping mall. The general public mostly ignored crime on the south side, but this new spate of violence had now spilled into the downtown area. And on a scale Phoenix had never seen.

  The unprecedented street war drew coverage from national and international news outlets. Veranda caught snippets of commentary as reporters faced their cameras. One network correspondent intoned, “Phoenix is under siege,” while another announced, “The savage and bloody cartel war has reached the US.”

  She clenched her jaw. The public’s reaction was worse than she’d expected. People were scared and angry. And, not surprisingly, the media hype wasn’t helping.

  She stood silently next to Sam, shoulder-to-shoulder, along with ranking officials from the department. The line of police personnel stretched across the back of the wide platform to provide a backdrop for the mayor and police chief to speak at a lectern bristling with microphones near the front of the dais.

  She stifled the urge to fidget. The conference should have started five minutes ago. Every second they delayed, she overheard reporters trading rumors and circulating theories.

  Feet shuffled behind her and she inched closer to Sam to make way for the chief, Steven Tobias, and the mayor, Umberto “Bertie” Benitez, to pass.

  The jostling gaggle of reporters quieted as Chief Tobias stepped to the bank of microphones. “Today’s incident at the Arcadia Fashion Center represents a deplo
rable situation I will not tolerate in our city.” He glanced down at his notes. “Detectives from our Homicide Unit were attempting to meet with a person of interest when the subject of the interview was killed in front of them in a drive-by shooting. The detectives were unable to stop the fleeing suspects, who drove an armored vehicle. Unfortunately, this led to a pursuit through downtown Phoenix in which shots were exchanged. The situation ended with the suspect driver deceased and a gunman evading capture by fleeing into the Arcadia Fashion Mall and blending in with shoppers as they dispersed before perimeter containment was established.”

  When the chief paused to take a breath, a tall, lean man with dazzling white teeth, perfectly windswept hair, and pancake makeup shouted a question. “Can you confirm that the escaped shooter is from a Mexican drug cartel?” Veranda recognized the correspondent from the nightly evening news out of New York.

  Chief Tobias looked up from his prepared statement. “The suspect has been identified as Roberto Bernal, who has ties to the Villalobos organization. We’ve secured arrest warrants, and we are hopeful he will be taken into custody without incident. A full description and photograph of Bernal are in your press kits.”

  When several reporters called out at once, Tobias pointed at various individuals, forcing them to take turns.

  A dark-haired man in a pinstripe suit got first dibs, his accent bearing the distinctive tones of Guatemala. “Mario Duarte from Noticias Centroamericana. What are you doing to find Roberto Bernal?”

  “In order to prevent further evasion on the part of the suspect, we cannot disclose our methods. The public should rest assured, however, that we are utilizing all available resources to capture him.”

  A local print reporter spoke up next. “Why wasn’t the initial pursuit called off once it reached the downtown business district?” His eyes moved down as he flicked back a page of his notepad. “Last estimate was thirty-nine injured, mostly in minor vehicle crashes and running away from automatic gunfire. No figures yet on property damage … Is this in compliance with your pursuit policy, Chief?”

  Tobias answered in a measured tone, a slight twitch of his jaw muscles the only indication he didn’t appreciate the question. “In a word, yes. Every scenario is unique. In each case, officers are trained to assess the threat to public safety posed by pursuing a fleeing suspect versus the potential harm if we let him escape without an effort to make immediate apprehension. In this case, due to the extreme violence of the murder committed in the detectives’ presence in a public place, along with the use of a fully automatic assault rifle, my officers decided to pursue.” His knuckles whitened as he gripped the edges of the lectern. “And I support that decision.”

  “When the initial pursuit started, why didn’t you have a police helicopter take over?” the reporter followed up. “Don’t you have something like ten helicopters?”

  “The Phoenix Police Department has seven helicopters in our air fleet, but only one is usually up at any given time. The on-duty air unit was approximately six minutes away when the pursuit began. It did, however, reach the area and lend air support.” Apparently trying to shift the discussion, Tobias gestured to a different reporter.

  “Why did the police return fire in a crowded area? Why not just follow the vehicle at a safe distance?”

  “Responding officers had to use lethal force to stop the suspects each time they fired on pedestrians and other officers. Due to their efforts, no bystanders were shot downtown or in the mall. I am, however, very concerned that people were injured trying to avoid gunfire.”

  Kiki Lowell waved frantically. With an air of resignation, Tobias pointed at her. She smiled brightly. “Why didn’t they just shoot the tires out to stop the vehicle?”

  A pained expression flitted across the chief’s face before he suppressed it. “Shooting from inside a moving car while swerving to avoid traffic, and aiming at the tires of another moving automobile that is also going all over the road at varying speeds, is extremely difficult. We also had information that not only was the Escalade armor-plated, but there were bulletproof flaps shielding the tires.”

  Undeterred, Kiki followed up. “Then why didn’t they ram the car to end the pursuit?”

  “The vehicle involved was a full-sized, steel-plated Cadillac Escalade, which is much heavier than our squad cars. Additionally, with a gunman shooting an assault rifle at them, the officers couldn’t get close enough to make contact. Several police vehicles sustained multiple gunshots. Fortunately, no officers were injured or killed.”

  One of the older reporters standing next to her looked like he wanted to elbow Kiki when she blurted another question. “Why didn’t they shoot the suspect after he got out of the Escalade before he ran inside the mall?”

  Tobias tensed, his back ramrod straight. “As the shooter exited the vehicle, he continued to lay down suppression fire while he retreated into the mall. The math is simple. He had an assault rifle capable of firing six hundred rounds a minute and our officers had handguns and shotguns, which can only fire one round at a time.”

  The older reporter stepped in front of Kiki, preventing more follow-

  ups from her, as he posed his question. “Chief, are you saying you’re outgunned? Has Phoenix become like some cities south of the border where innocent citizens are victims of drug wars and cartel violence?”

  Mayor Benitez edged next to Tobias, who took the cue and stepped aside.

  Sam bent to whisper in Veranda’s ear, “I wouldn’t be the police chief for love or money.”

  The mayor centered himself in front of the cluster of microphones and a hush fell over the sea of reporters. “Let me reassure you that I will not let our city suffer at the hands of criminals. The police have all the necessary resources at their disposal to handle any situation. In this case the department’s investigation indicates the factions involved in the recent wave of violence over the past few days are a cartel and a local drug gang.”

  He let his words sink in a moment as he looked around the room. “Chief Tobias and I have developed a new strategy to deal with this situation.”

  Benitez paused before his next proclamation. “I am announcing the formation of a new temporary task force, consisting of local and federal agencies, which will be housed at a satellite location we will refer to as the Phoenix Fusion Center. The task force’s mission is to end the immediate threat posed by these two groups.”

  The mayor nodded to one of his staff, who slid a dark cloth from a display board at the front of the stage, revealing an organizational chart. “The name of the operation is Scorpion Sting, and the objective is to arrest and prosecute major players within each organization plaguing our city.”

  Sam leaned down to Veranda. “Is it written somewhere that any group of three or more people in law enforcement requires a code name and an org chart?”

  Veranda suppressed a grin.

  Benitez indicated the second tier of boxes on the chart. “The task force includes agents from the FBI, DEA, the US Marshal’s Office, and Homeland Security. In addition, two agents from the Ministerial Federal Police in Mexico are flying in to join our team and lend their expertise. As you can see, we are bringing pressure to bear on the criminals perpetrating these heinous acts, and we expect quick results.”

  A query bubbled up from the pool of reporters. “With the alphabet soup of agencies involved, who’s in charge of Operation Scorpion Sting?”

  The consummate politician, Benitez waited until every eye was on him. “I want to make it very clear,” his voice rumbled in a low, clear tone, “the task force will be under the direction of the Phoenix Police Department. This is our city, and we will take the necessary steps to ensure public safety. Other agencies are assisting, but this is a Phoenix-based operation and our police department is more than capable of leading it.”

  “How’s this going to work?” the network correspondent asked. “Don’t the Feds h
ave greater authority?”

  Benitez stepped back. “I’ll allow the chief to explain law enforcement protocol.”

  Tobias returned to the microphones. Camera lights glinted off his gold badge as he spoke. “All homicides committed in relation to this investigation occurred inside Phoenix boundaries by local residents who are not foreign nationals. In short, the Phoenix Police Department has jurisdiction.”

  As a cacophony of reporters began to fire questions, he held up his hand. “This is not a law enforcement turf war. We leave that sort of thing to the drug dealers.” A slight chuckle went around the room, breaking the tension. “Every federal agency listed on the org chart has made it clear they prefer a support role. They have access to the best intelligence and technology available, and can augment our investigation as they have done on many prior operations.”

  “If the PPD is running the operation, who have you put in charge?”

  Tobias swung an arm out to indicate the command staff on his left. “Responsibility for the overall operation will fall to Assistant Chief Alexander Delcore.”

  Veranda hadn’t seen Delcore since he had forced her out of her position as a narcotics detective. Not a happy memory.

  Tobias signaled the next person over. “Under Chief Delcore, Commander Nathan Webster, who runs the Violent Crimes Bureau, will receive twice-daily briefings and make regular visits to the facility.”

  Tobias continued down the line. “Day-to-day operations will be supervised onsite by our new Homicide lieutenant.” The chief’s expression darkened. “I have just filled a vacancy in that position.”

  The mood in the room shifted. A hush fell over media and law enforcement representatives alike as Tobias continued. “I am taking this opportunity to announce the selection for this critical assignment.”

  For over a month, rumors had swirled throughout the department about who might take the coveted slot. Veranda had watched a stream of lieutenants traipse through the second floor on their way to her commander’s office for interviews.