Chapter 34 – Early Collections
Friday, April 5
T. WARREN MAGNAN WAS NEARLY FINISHED with the day’s bookkeeping when his cell phone vibrated on the desk next to him. There were only a few people who would call him on this line at this hour, and he was not shocked to see that it was Bruno at the front desk who was ringing him.
“What?” he barked into the phone, after tapping the speaker button so that he could keep working while he talked. Bruno was a decent security man, and he was as loyal as he was strong. But he was not a rocket scientist and could not be counted on to do any deep analysis or logical thinking.
“Mister M, sorry to bother you, but Ricky is here to see you.”
Magnan stifled a groan. He thought about sending the man away but decided that the headache of dealing with that was worse than just getting his visit over with. “OK, buzz him in and send him back to me.”
A moment later, Magnan heard the distant buzz of the security door at the front entrance, and shortly after that, a knock on the door to his room. He closed his ledger and stood, cursing his aging knees for popping and for the pain they inflicted every time he got up after sitting for a long time. He pushed down on the latch handle and pulled the door open, turning around and heading back inside the room without greeting his guest, who followed without a word.
“I’m here for the receipts,” Ricky said in the high-pitched and slightly scratchy voice that Magnan detested. Richard Eugene Spezio was in his mid-twenties. He was not particularly tall, but he was thin as a rail, which made him seem taller. His legs and arms seemed too long for his torso. He was a cocky kid who had no attention span and was always rocking back and forth like he was in a hurry to get somewhere. Magnan had heard the stories about how Ricky had been some kind of big athlete, and he had lean muscles and quick reflexes, but Magnan was never impressed. The kid did not respect his elders.
Ricky had a thin scar running along his jaw from his right ear to the corner of his mouth, which he wore with pride and the origins of which he told anyone who would listen. The knife fight was two years ago, but it was Ricky’s claim to fame, since the other guy ended up dead. Magnan was not sure how Ricky had obtained his position of favor in Fat Albert Gallata’s organization, but he detested the punk.
“Friday is tomorrow,” Magnan said as non-sarcastically as he could manage. “Are you drunk, or just confused?” Magnan had returned to the desk chair and his ledger and was trying to ignore the other man’s presence in the room.
Ricky took a step forward and let out a high-pitched laugh. “It’s after midnight, and I got plans t’morra, so I’m getting’ my rounds outta the way early. The boss don’t care as long as I get the cash in the bank, so let’s have it. Ya don’t wanna keep Fat Albert waitin’.”
It annoyed Magnan that Ricky always made a point of mentioning Fat Albert’s name in their conversations. Magnan suspected that Ricky was recording them in order to blackmail Magnan someday, or at least hold it over his head to keep him in line. Ricky, although not a well-educated kid, was savvy enough to know that this was his one and only point of leverage, so he used it frequently.
“Doesn’t it worry you, Ricky, that you’re talking to a police officer? How do you think Mr. Gallata would feel about you dropping his name and implicating him in a criminal enterprise? Hmmmm?”
Ricky snarled and opened his mouth to say something, but then couldn’t think quickly enough to figure out what to say. He just closed his mouth again like a fish trying to breathe on a beach. After a few moments of thought, during which Magnan ignored him, Ricky went back to his typical hard-ass approach. “Listen, wise guy, you just hand over the boss’s cut so I can get outta here.”
Magnan looked up and gave Ricky a bored expression, then removed a key from his belt, unlocked the bottom right drawer of the desk, and pulled it open. He extracted a metal box, which he unlocked with a different key, removed a thick envelope inscribed with the letters “AG” in cursive handwriting, and handed it to Ricky, who had taken three steps forward so that he was hovering directly above Magnan. Ricky shoved the envelope into the pocket of his coat and, without another word, turned and walked back toward the door. After he heard the door slam shut, he let out a sigh and mumbled to himself, “I can’t believe I have to put up with a putz like that.”
Chapter 35 – Closing the Noose
Monday, April 8
MIKE AND JASON SPENT THE NEXT SEVERAL DAYS working the Rosario murder, which was just what Sully wanted. They enlisted two rookie cops and one IT tech to review the finisher photos from the past several races staged by the NYC Runners. They had checked the names of the runners and determined that if Ricky Spezio had run any of them, he had done so under a different name. That did not surprise Mike or Jason, figuring that a career thug, who seemed to be living off the grid, would not make it that easy for the authorities to identify him. They figured he would have a fake driver’s license that would easily allow him to register for the races. Jason had run a few 5K races and knew that the security at bib pick-up was not exactly the airport TSA.
Without a name to look for, they enlisted face-recognition software to screen out women, children, and older men. Even narrowing it down with these parameters, there were still several thousand faces that had to be scrutinized, looking for a potential match for an artist’s sketch. It was slow work, but after a pile of overtime hours, they had identified eight possible matches.
By cross-referencing the bib numbers of the finisher photos against the roster of runners, they got names for their eight possibilities. The website listed each person’s city or country, but no address. The team was able to find seven of their eight faces at easily available addresses, only two of which were in New York City. All of the seven checked out clean and had solid alibis for the nights of the Rosario murder and the Webster Avenue chase.
That left one face, which corresponded to the name James Ryun, listed as New York, NY. Mike immediately got the joke – Jim Ryun was the first high-school runner to break the four-minute mile. That had to be their guy. They referenced prior races staged by the NYC Runners and found that James Ryun had run in several of them, including the NYC Half-Marathon the previous year. He finished in an impressive 1:15:53, placing him among the first 150 finishers. He was actually pretty fast, even over a long distance.
The NYC Runners club was happy to confirm that James Ryun of New York, NY was registered for the upcoming NYC Half-Marathon, and that he would be wearing bib number 10023. The bib had already been picked up, so it was not possible to catch him when he showed up to claim his entry credentials. They would have to get him on the day of the race. Jason wanted to send in a bunch of uniforms just before the start of the race to storm the mass of runners in the first wave and pluck their man out of the crowd. Mike, however, was not excited about trying to pick Ricky out of a tightly packed group of runners, and he was worried that their rabbit would run on them. With all the people at the Brooklyn starting line for the race, he might get away. Mike’s preference was to nab him as soon as he crossed the finish line. There, the runners would be spaced out, Ricky would be hemmed in by the barriers that surrounded the Central Park finish line, and he would be exhausted from running 13.1 miles. Sully liked Mike’s plan best, since it would require minimal uniforms and had the highest probability of success.
Ж Ж Ж
On Sunday morning, 24,000 runners left the starting line and began their journey from Brooklyn toward Central Park. Mike and Jason were sitting on cold metal bleachers just beyond the balloon arch that marked the finish line. The timer clock was clicking its way past forty-nine minutes. Two officers were staking out the point where the runners would turn north from the fountain near Columbus Circle and wind their way over the undulating road toward the finish line a half-mile away. They radioed to Mike and Jason that the lead runners would be coming past within the next ten minutes. They were tracking the progress of “James Ryun” on the NYC Runners app and he was still twenty-f
ive minutes away, in all likelihood. Two more beat cops were stationed on Fifth Avenue, where the runners first entered Central Park. The lead runners had passed their location, but they had not spotted their target.
Mike and Jason both got up and stretched. Mike pulled his wool hat down over his ears, while Jason adjusted the imitation fur ear muffs that matched his black pea coat. The warmth of the prior weekend was a distant memory. Jason had his service pistol in a holster at his side, under his coat, and two extra magazines of ammo in his pocket. Mike was still not cleared to have a gun, so he had an old-school Billy club in the inside pocket of his overcoat, just in case.
Mike checked in by radio with the two teams of uniformed officers who were assigned to assist with the arrest at the finish line. He thought it was overkill to have so many officers, but they wanted to be sure not to miss the guy. The area around the finish line was lined with metal crowd-control barriers on both sides of the park drive, keeping family members and friends from jumping onto the course to run the last few hundred yards with their loved ones. The barriers extended beyond the finish line for the next several hundred yards, where the runners were handed their finishing medals, water bottles, bananas, bagels, orange slices, and Mylar blankets. Inside the barriers, there was no place for Ricky the Runner to run, and the cops would be able to cuff him and lead him away to a waiting squad car. Jason suggested that they should let him get his medal before they busted him, since it would be one more thing the cops could grab onto if he tried to resist. Mike liked the idea of strangling the guy with his finisher medal.
Ж Ж Ж
While Mike and Jason moved one of the metal crowd barriers aside so that they could get inside the finisher area, a man wearing heavy gray sweatpants and a gray NYU sweatshirt exited a cab on Fifth Avenue and hurried into the park, carrying a small black pull-cord backpack. His given name was Horacio, but everyone called him Harry “the Spoon.” Harry liked his pasta, and he had an extra-large silver soup spoon that he carried with him to assist with his spaghetti spinning. Harry was no runner, although he was dressed today as if he were planning a jog in the park.
Harry approached the inner roadway, where a trickle of the leading runners whooshed past. This point was about three miles from the finish. There were no crowd barriers here, and a smattering of spectators lined the road, some with encouraging signs and some with bells or other noisemakers. They cheered and clapped as the fastest runners passed them. Harry the Spoon carefully scrutinized the runners. He chose a spot where there was a long flat stretch of road, followed by a curve and a slight incline. The runners would slow down slightly at that point. Harry reached into his black bag and extracted a dark red windbreaker, allowing the black bag to fall to the grass.
After waiting for five minutes, Harry stepped forward toward the roadway. He had spotted the runner he was looking for, wearing blue shorts, a thin white tank top, and bib number 10023. As the runner approached, Harry stepped out into the road and ran as fast as his thick legs would allow, glancing back over his shoulder. When the runner in the blue shorts came up on his left to pass him, Harry veered suddenly. He grabbed the man around the torso and pulled them both off the road and down onto the cold grass and mud next to the curb.
The runner cried out, “Hey, what the fuck?” Harry looked him in the eye and held one finger over his mouth in the universal signal to keep quiet.
“You been made,” Harry said quickly. “You just twisted your ankle. You’re comin’ with me. Try to limp.” Harry tossed the windbreaker at Ricky the Runner. “Put this on and let’s get out of here.” Harry got up and jogged back across the road, then started walking in the direction of Fifth Avenue.
Ricky panted out three long breaths, trying to slow his heart rate. He pulled on the windbreaker and then limped at a trot to catch up with Harry. He looked back over his shoulder longingly at the other runners, who were closing in on the finish line. “I was on a pace for a personal best,” Ricky lamented.
“Tough break, Kid,” was all Harry said before he hailed a cab and got inside, leaving the door open for Ricky.
Ж Ж Ж
As the race clock ticked past 1:35:00, Jason and Mike were pacing back and forth just beyond the finish line, watching the runners come through. The lead women had finished, and the line of runners was getting thicker, making it more difficult to pick out individual runners and their bib numbers. The two cops near Columbus Circle reported that they had not seen Ricky the Runner. Jason checked the app on his phone. It had been more than 45 minutes since their prey had crossed the last checkpoint. He picked out a random runner wearing a tank top emblazoned with a charity sponsor’s logo, “Team McGraw 45.” He noted the bib number and punched it into the app. The Team McGraw runner had crossed the last checkpoint fifteen minutes after bib number 10023.
“Where the fuck is he?” Mike asked nobody in particular.
“Maybe he got hurt – pulled a muscle or fell down?” Jason offered without enthusiasm.
Mike picked up his radio and instructed two of their backup units to move into the medical tents and to start reverse-walking the course from the finish line toward the last check-point. They spent the next hour looking for any sign of Ricky the Runner, while more and more runners flooded the roadway, making it difficult to see any individual person. The officers reported back that there was nobody lying injured on the side of the road, and nobody in the medical tents fitting Ricky’s description.
“You think somebody warned him to duck out before the finish line?” Mike asked Jason.
“The only people who knew this was happening were cops.”
“Yeah. I know.”
“Lucas is not going to like this,” Jason shook his head.
“I don’t like it either,” Mike responded.
After another half hour, they finally gave up and released the officers to go back to their normal shift duties. Mike and Jason walked west toward Mike’s apartment, trying to come up with a scenario where Ricky had not been tipped off by a dirty cop. They did not come up with any plausible alternate possibility.
Chapter 36 – An Unexpected Arrival
Monday, April 15
THAT MONDAY, MIKE AND JASON spent most of the day trying to figure out what had happened on Sunday. They had no idea how Ricky the Runner had figured out that he needed to leave the course somewhere in Central Park. The NYC Runners tracking system confirmed that James Ryun never crossed the finish line. They kept coming back to the same conclusion – he had been tipped off. Since the only people who knew about the operation were cops, that meant that either a cop had tipped him, or a cop had told someone else who tipped him. Agent Gomez felt the same way, and he was keen on tracking down the cop with the loose lips. But they had no leads. They interviewed all the officers who were part of the operation, and a few admitted telling other cops about the plans for Sunday. By the end, it was clear that the intra-departmental grapevine could have leaked the information to virtually any cop on the force. They had failed to make it a confidential operation, and it cost them.
On Tuesday, Mike got a call from Michelle in the middle of the day. She told him that she had received a call from Steph Barker. While that was surprising, the real shock was that Steph was calling from the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Manhattan. Michelle didn’t have any idea what Steph was doing in New York, but she had arranged to meet her. Michelle suggested that Mike should meet them. Mike agreed and said he’d meet her and Steph for lunch at the Nom Wa Tea Parlor in Chinatown. The little dim sum place was one of Mike’s favorites and one of the few places that they returned to often. He hopped a ride in a black and white downtown and arrived only a few minutes after the time he and Michelle had set.
He exited the squad car at the corner of Canal and Mott and walked to Doyer street, which curved around between Bowery and Mott for only a few hundred yards. The tiny street had a lot of history, its “Bloody Angle” having been the site of several high-profile crimes. The little tea house near the middle
of the curve was itself semi-famous, after a Kevin Bacon movie used it as the setting for a major shoot-em-up scene. But Mike had known the place since it was so obscure that the menu was available only in Chinese. Now it was more upscale, and even took credit cards. But it had good memories.
When Mike walked through the door, he was smiling and reminiscing about coming to the little place with his cousin Lou. He waved at the little Chinese woman at the counter in the front and scanned the expanse of small mis-matched tables and chairs for Michelle and Steph. He spotted them at a table near the back. The girl was dressed casually in jeans and a red off-the-shoulder top. She was staring at Mike and looked nervous. Mike tried to plant a neutral expression on his face and walked without hurry toward the table, trying to get a read on the situation from Michelle’s eyes, without success.
“Well, this is certainly a surprise,” Mike said with as much enthusiasm as he could muster, reaching out his hand to Steph. “Miss Barker, it’s good to see you. What brings you to our fair city?”
Before Steph could respond, their waiter appeared and asked for drink orders. Mike asked for tea, as did Michelle. Steph ordered a Diet Coke. When the waiter left, Mike prompted, “So, there’s a story?”
“Yes,” Michelle cut in, “it’s really interesting. You see, since we visited Port Angeles, Steph and I have been exchanging emails. She asked me how the investigation has been going so I told her about how you and Jason had tracked Christine’s movements to Brooklyn and you had a theory about how she might have been taken in by the prostitution ring, but that you were having trouble finding any additional information.”
“You told her all that?” Mike said. Mike had shared that information with Michelle because she was a government employee and because they worked together and spent so much time together. Sharing information with a civilian was a complete breach of regulations and could get both of them in a lot of trouble.
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