by Mark Johnson
“Yeah, I know Donte. In fact, I’m about a minute away from his mama’s place right now. Got a warrant for him? ’Cause he won’t come to the door when ya knock.”
“He won’t?”
“Nah. And both his mama and his sister’ll lie to your face, say he doesn’t live there, even though everybody who knows him tells me that’s where he’s staying.”
“Hmmm. Well, I don’t have enough for a warrant yet, that’s why I’m hoping to bring him in for questioning, or at least do a knock-and-talk there at the house.”
“Well good luck wi’dat, Bub. I’ll meet you there if you wanna try—maybe your people skills are better’n mine—but don’t get your hopes up.”
“Thanks. I’m about five minutes out now. See if you can get one of your patrol units to meet us there, just in case we get lucky and need a cage for transport.”
I call ol’ Frank Black, who (predictably) knows Donte Curtis from several of his own encounters with the lad. The three of us converge on Merle Street, near the dead end of Riverside Drive at Dog River. There are no vehicles in the driveway or the yard; it doesn’t look promising. Frank goes around to cover the back, I cover the west side where the bedrooms are, and Bailey knocks on the front door.
And knocks. And calls out, “Police! Mobile Police Department! Come to the door!”
I think I hear some movement in one of the bedrooms and pound on the window.
“We know you’re in there, Donte!” I yell. “Don’t make us kick in your mama’s door!”
Frank’s peering in through a narrow gap in the curtains of a sliding-glass door in back and calls out, “Just saw somebody scamper up the stairs from the kitchen!”
We all continue beating on windows and doors, telling Donte to come on out, make it easy on yourself, we just wanna talk—the usual combination of bullshit and borderline harassment. Neither of which is working on young Master Curtis.
A crackle of static comes over our radios. The dispatcher’s voice is taut with urgency and louder than usual. All of us stop our pounding and yelling for Donte.
“Hold traffic, all units hold your traffic to patch the channels.”
This usually means a multi-precinct or even multi-jurisdiction car chase is under way. It could be a stolen car, a bank robbery, or just some terrified jerk with warrants for unpaid traffic tickets who can’t bear the thought of going to jail for them. I wait impatiently for Dispatch to advise, and I know Bailey and Frank are doing the same, feeling the same anticipation for the signal as me, same as every other Mobile officer on duty. We listen intently to hear if we’re close enough to get in on it, or if it’s important enough that our distance doesn’t matter.
It turns out, both.
“Signal 17 just occurred at Metro Jail, involving an officer. Time elapsed, two minutes. Officer down, signal 17, officer down. Subject has signal 51’d the vehicle of the signal 17 officer, last seen southbound on St. Emanuel Street from Metro sally port, in a marked MPD unit.
“Repeat, officer down, an officer has been cut at Metro jail, subject fleeing southbound at high rate of speed on St. Emanuel Street in marked MPD unit. Hold your traffic, all units hold your traffic, attempting patch with County . . .”
The three of us race to our cars, hit our lights and sirens, and spray Donte’s mama’s house with a scattershot of gravel and a cloud of dust. Frank’s in the lead, Bailey’s riding his bumper, and I’m bringing up the rear as we make the block and stomp the pedal eastbound on Riverside to Gill, down the long straight shot to Dauphin Island Parkway, hoping the bad guy will take I-10 westbound so we can get in on it as he nears D.I.P.
If he goes east through the tunnel to the Bayway and Baldwin County, we might as well turn around and go back to Donte’s (although when he heard us peel out he no doubt skedaddled out the back to lay low with some nearby baby-mama for a few days).
“All units hold your traffic, County units in pursuit of Metro escapee, subject last seen southbound in a marked MPD unit on St. Ema . . . Correction, subject now westbound, Short Texas Street, hold traffic . . . Subject now southbound, Conception Street, County has lost visual.”
A new voice comes over the air, one of ours, in pursuit. He’s amped up, nearly shouting: “Three-twelve, I got visual on subject now southbound on Conception, crossing Texas . . . crossing Montgomery, I have two County units behind me . . .”
The shanker’s headed for the Virginia Street on-ramps to the interstate, I’m thinking. Which way will he go? I’m betting westbound; to go east would require a hard left onto a tight cloverleaf to the right, but westbound would be an easier left, then a straight shot up and onto I-10, with better options beyond, like I-65 north to Prichard or Eight Mile, or staying westbound on 10, maybe running for Mississippi.
“Three-twelve, subject now westbound on Virginia! He’s headed for the interstate! Do we have any units at either ramp? I’ve lost visual—”
A new voice, another one of ours, cuts in, shouting over the last one, “A unit runnin’ code just ’bout hit me cutting onto the westbound 10 ramp, is that him or—”
“That’s gotta be him!” 312 shouts.
The dispatcher tries valiantly to regain control of the airwaves. “Units crossing. All units hold traffic, 312 is in pursuit, 312, 10-9 your last?”
The second voice, ignoring the operator’s instructions, walks all over her, yelling, “Subject now westbound 10 from Virginia! Westbound 10 from Virginia! Speed’s approaching one hundred, I’m tryin’a get up behind him.”
Dispatch tries once more to restore order. “Units crossing. Which unit’s westbound I-10 from Virginia?”
“Three-seventeen, in pursuit of black male subject wearing light-colored shirt, in 51S City blue-and-white, westbound 10 from Virginia, speed’s a hundred! He’s weaving in and out of traffic! He’s activated lights and siren, westbound 10 approaching Broad Street . . . crossing over Broad Street, speed now 110, 115, westbound 10 approaching Michigan . . .”
Behind 317’s yelling, his siren and the roar of his Crown Vic can be heard, matching the roar and wail of my own as we zoom eastbound on Gill to the Parkway. I’m thinking, All right! He’s coming right to us! If we can just make it up to I-10 in time, we might have a chance to do a rolling blockade, or to force him to scrape up onto a barricade or off-road into the ditch. At the very least we’ll be in the chase.
Frank and Bailey are thinking the same: as soon as we hear he’s headed toward us, they punch it up to 75, screaming eastbound on two-lane Gill Road. The three of us moving as one, tight, bumper to bumper, like the Blue Angels streaking low and fast in close formation over the beach on the Fourth of July. Pedestrians are fleeing the road ahead, cars veering off into yards as we blaze past. I feel the adrenalin dump and begin tactical breathing.
“Three-seventeen, I’ve lost visual . . . I think he got off at southbound D.I.P. Advise any units behind me to continue westbound on 10, I’m getting off here . . .”
The dispatcher interjects: “Three-twelve, copy?”
“Read direct, continuing westbound 10,” 312 replies.
“All units hold traffic for further . . .”
“Three-seventeen! He’s southbound D.I.P.! Just blew the light at Old Military, southbound D.I.P., high speed, weaving, heading into the curve . . . I’ve lost visual.”
Holy shit, I’m thinking. We’ll be comin’ up on him in less than a minute! How we gonna stop him head-on? Now I’m glad Frank and Bailey are ahead of me. We slow slightly to negotiate the 90-degree turn from eastbound Gill across D.I.P.’s two southbound lanes onto the northbound Parkway (exactly the route I’d taken in my ill-fated pursuit of the hooker Heather a few months earlier, before being canceled by Lieutenant Andrews as I closed the gap).
In the turn onto the parkway, everything not strapped down or boxed up inside my car—loose change, coffee cups, map book, case files—flies to the right, bounces off the passenger side door, and scatters all over the place.
Just as we straighten out and
stomp it past BC Rain High School northbound, I see blue lights sweeping around the bottom half of the D.I.P. curve, coming toward us fast in the center turning lane. I hear Frank, in the lead, come across the radio. He’s the first calm voice so far, even calmer than Dispatch.
“Three-nineteen, myself, 862, and 163 are northbound D.I.P. approaching Cedar Crescent, we have visual of the subject . . .”
Before Dispatch can respond, Frank continues, “Three-nineteen, subject just blew the light at Cedar Crescent, now eastbound on Cedar Crescent, and [his deep register softening] . . . I’ve . . . lost visual . . . momentarily . . . ”
In an instant, all three of us have made the right-angle right from northbound D.I.P. onto Cedar Crescent. All the detritus from my preceding left turn now bounce back into my side of the cockpit and onto me. Cedar Crescent Drive is a long, gentle loop (hence the name Crescent) curving south through a residential neighborhood around the back side of BC Rain High School, with six roads shooting off toward Mobile Bay to the east, like spokes from a hub.
A new voice, even calmer than Frank’s, a voice of reason (though betraying more than a trace of exasperation), says, “Operator, the subject’s in 351’s vehicle. Is that unit’s automatic vehicle locator functional?”
“Ten-four.”
“Advise subject’s further locations from that unit’s AVL.”
I’m thinking, wow, why didn’t I (or anybody else) think of that? All our marked units have trackers mounted on the trunk lids. Duh! Visual contact isn’t even necessary to catch this guy as long as he’s driving one of our units.
After a pause, the dispatcher, no doubt having just smacked herself in the forehead with the heel of her hand, says, “Ten-four, AVL now shows subject southbound Cedar Crescent at North Drive . . . now at Shore Acres . . .”
I see Frank peel off to his left onto Shore Acres. Did I miss her saying he turned onto Shore Acres? That must be what Frank heard. Our bad guy clearly doesn’t know the parkway very well, I’m thinking, because Shore Acres dead-ends at Bay Front, which hugs the bay from there south. If he’s not careful, the guy will launch himself right off into Mobile Bay. I visualize a spectacular splash like something out of The Dukes of Hazzard.
In front of me, Bailey slows but then continues south on Cedar Crescent. As I pass Shore Acres a moment behind him, I look to my left and see neither Frank’s nor the bad guy’s car and wonder, where’d they go so quick? Then I remember that little one-block connector, McVoy Avenue, which links Shore Acres with the next road down.
Just then, the operator reports, “Now showing at South Drive,” and I see Bailey veer off to his left onto South Drive.
Am I missing something? I follow Bailey in a hard left onto South Drive but see nothing but Bailey zooming toward the bay. No bad guy, no Frank. I jam my foot on the brake pedal and all my interior debris, now including stuff for tonight’s parade duty from the backseat, flies forward. My riot helmet ricochets off my base radio in the center console, my snack sack and vest in a tangle close behind.
The operator intones, “Now passing Seapines Boulevard . . . now turning south onto Jacksonville Drive,” and I jerk the Crown Vic into a reverse whip back onto Cedar Crescent, then stomp the gas with tires squealing to Jacksonville Drive.
The operator says, “Turning west from Jacksonville onto Cedar Park,” and a moment later I roll up on 351’s idling cruiser, blue lights ablaze and siren still wailing, rutted in somebody’s once-manicured front lawn. The trunk’s popped up, obscuring my view of the interior; the driver door’s wide open. It’s a spooky-sick damn scene to behold.
Bad guy probably heard the chatter about his car’s AVL over the stolen cruiser’s police radio, heard his locations and maneuvers reported in real time, same as he performed them. Realizing his only chance was to put distance between himself and the GPS-tracked car, he musta bailed out and run. Or did he?
Wary of a trap, an ambush—he likely has the gun from the officer he cut—I approach the idling cruiser with my gun drawn. I crouch low to check for feet behind the open driver’s door, or anyone squatting on the opposite sides of cruiser. Nothing, but he could be hidden by the front tires. Neither am I able to see (with the trunk lid popped up) if the car’s occupied or not. Cautiously but quickly I “slice the pie” and get close enough to see, first into the trunk, then around the trunk lid all the way across the interior, next checking all the way down to the floor in the back, then down to the floor in front. Empty. I move back behind the trunk and circle around the far side, from rear to front.
Clear. I allow myself to exhale.
Dispatch comes over my shoulder mike. “Still showing Jacksonville at Cedar Park, subject may have bailed. Approach with extreme caution, subject may be armed.”
I scan my 360, aware that the fugitive may have eyes on me right now, may be lining me up in his sights. With an electric jolt, I lock eyes with a terrified, middle-aged female in a house robe I somehow hadn’t seen till now, standing wide eyed in the driveway next door, just beyond the abandoned cruiser I’d circled moments ago. She’s just yards away from me, and I hadn’t seen her! Tunnel vision, peripheral blindness, condition black: they told us about this in the academy . . . am I there? Is that happening to me?
She has one hand to her chin, her other holding a handful of envelopes. She musta just been walking back from her mailbox when the stolen cruiser jumped the curb and rutted to a stop in her neighbor’s front yard. She stares at me, motionless and mute, mouth agape, then thrusts her hand with the mail toward the house across the street. I look where she’s pointing, mimic her gesture; she nods vigorously, still waving her mail at the driveway across the street. I set out in that direction, as she finds her voice. Over the yowling sirens I hear her call out, “That way. . . . He dint look like no poe-leece, but he wa’ carryin’ a big ole gun he got from outta the trunk . . . He run up behine ’at house. . . . Wha’s goin’ on, Officer? Do I needs’a take cover?”
Without a word in reply, without putting out my location over the air, without grabbing my vest out of the car or my shotgun from my trunk, not thinking to check 351’s trunk for his shotgun, without waiting for backup, without a thought in my mind beyond “I gotta get him,” off I run in pursuit.
27
Shit Gets Real
Resist not evil: whosoever shall smite thy cheek, turn to him the other.
—Matthew 5:39
For it is written, Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.
—Romans 12:19
Later that evening and over the days and weeks that follow, I learn from television and newspaper stories, written police reports, digital surveillance footage, and the firsthand, eyewitness accounts of the officers and detectives involved, that twenty-year-old Lawrence Wallace Jr. walked into a west Mobile Dollar General store on the morning of Friday, February 3, at 1113 hours. He was about as far away as you can get (without leaving the city limits) from the sad and crumbling subsidized rental houses and boarded-up commercial strips of the lower Parkway, where I encountered him a little less than five hours later. It’s not a stretch to say that the North Schillinger Road Dollar store and its prosperous retail neighbors, as well as the comfortable middle-class subdivisions surrounding them, are a world apart from Dauphin Island Parkway south of the I-10 overpass.
Lawrence Wallace drove to the Dollar store that morning in his silver Toyota Camry. He entered the store wearing a black hooded jacket and blue pants. He walked around the store a few minutes, gathering seemingly random items, then approached the checkout counter and placed them (charcoal, lighter fluid, a longneck Bic lighter for barbecue grilling, and several knit caps) on the counter. As cashier Kayla Cunningham began ringing them up, Wallace exited the store, explaining he had to go get his money from the car.
When he returned moments later, he ordered the cashier to open her register and give him all the money. When Kayla Cunningham advised him politely that she couldn’t do that, he began removing the articles Kayla had rung up for him from
the plastic bag she’d put them in and demanded to speak to the store manager. Then he began squirting the lighter fluid all over the charcoal, the knit caps, and the counter.
Despite the old complaint about cops never being around when you need one, sometimes we are. Off-duty Mobile police officer Charles Wilson, shopping in the store at the time, had already noted Wallace with suspicion, even before he witnessed the confrontation at the checkout counter.
“He was walking around the store acting strangely, as if he was gonna commit some type of criminal act,” Wilson told me. “You know what I’m talkin’ about. You been on the job awhile. Sometimes we can just sense it with people, their vibe: something ain’t right.”
When the lighter fluid started to flow, Charlie Wilson ran out to his car for his gun.
Cashier Kayla Cunningham turned around and tapped her store manager on the shoulder. Tobias Smith was working the register next to her. “We have a problem here, Toby,” she said.
“I turn around to see a guy squirting lighter fluid all over the place, clicking his Bic with his other hand,” Smith said. “He says to me, ‘Give me everything in the cash drawers and the safe, or I’monna burn this bitch down.’ Then he walks around Kayla’s counter over to mine and stands right next to me. I thought he was gonna squirt me and set me on fire, but instead he squirts the cardboard display of potato chips next to my register and lights it.”
Charlie Wilson returned to the store just in time. He pointed his Glock at Lawrence Wallace Jr. and said, “Mobile PD. Get on the floor,” according to his written account in the Incident/Offense Report.
“You can tell me the truth, Charlie,” I said when he recounted the episode to me later. “I mean, how often do we get a chance like that, to hit a robbery in progress, catch the guy right in the act. You were psyched, I know you. What you really said, in your best Shaft voice, was ‘Git onna ground, now, muhfucka!’”