Copp On Ice, A Joe Copp Thriller (Joe Copp Private Eye Series) (7 page)

      
"It was a pattern, then?"

      
"Oh yeah," McGuire replied quickly. "It was definitely a pattern. He owned a couple of joints in Helltown, I understand, on the quiet."

      
That lifted my eyebrows. "Was he a friend of Schwartz- man?"

      
"I wouldn't be surprised," said the captain.

      
I decided that neither would I. A pattern was forming, yeah. And I had to wonder if it was about to engulf Lila Turner—or if she was part of it herself.

      
I wondered, also, if it was engulfing me.

CHAPTER EIGHT

My friend Garcia, the City Administrator
, had likened me to a lightning rod, a device that is supposed to attract lightning and harmlessly ground it. I'd use a different metaphor for the present situation. Unless it was total coincidence, my presence in Brighton seemed to be having an opposite effect. Lightning was striking all around me, sure, but not harmlessly.

Just look at it. I'd been in charge for a matter of hours and already three people were dead. If it kept going at this rate, I could depopulate the town before the city council could can me.

I dropped by the newspaper office at four
a.m
. and went through their morgue of local news, thinking I'd better get a bit ahead of the game before it rolled over me. The guy at the night desk was very helpful, knew exactly where to go to bring the relevant past alive for me, and I learned a lot.

Learned, for example, when and how Mayor Katz had

lost control of his town. It was more or less as Pappy McGuire had told me, but with a couple of details left out of his account. The local police association, the cops' union, had been instrumental in the balancing of the city council, throwing their support to a couple of mavericks who'd never been in politics before but won office a year earlier on a reform platform. This in spite of the fact that the police management group, usually influential in local politics, had backed the incumbents.

The police association is not open to people in the management ranks, lieutenants and above, and the management group does not regard itself as a union, but usually the two organizations work hand in glove when it comes to political endorsements. The split during the last election had left some wounds which, according to a recent newspaper article, were still festering.

The overall result, of course, was that the Brighton City Council was now composed of two "reformers" and two of the old guard who the reform slate had hoped to unseat. In such a split, the mayor has the decisive vote. The mayor was old guard, and he had narrowly squeaked out a reelection.

Now, with the mayor dead, there was no decisive vote and the council was deadlocked on virtually every issue that came before it, neither side wishing to offer any sort of strength to the other. Katz had been dead for only six weeks but already the machinery of government was virtually frozen, and it would be another three months before a special election could be held to fill the mayoral vacancy.

That was one problem.

Another problem had to do with the firing of the police chief and city administrator, the resignation of the city attorney, and the chaos in the police department.

In a singular show of unity, the council had voted

unanimously to fire the police chief one week following the death of Mayor Katz. Apparently Murray had made enemies even among the old guard, and he no longer enjoyed the protection of his sponsor, the mayor. In a related issue, the city administrator was fired because of his opposition to Murray's firing, and the city attorney resigned a few days later in protest.

The editorial stance of the newspaper had been more or less neutral until very recently when it began castigating both sides for the sorry state of local affairs. Much had been made of the sudden jump in the crime rate, relating this to the "morale problem" at the police department. A number of candidates for the chief's job had been interviewed and rejected during the five weeks since Murray was fired, and there had been vociferous controversy over attempts to appoint an acting chief from management, probably because all those guys had campaigned actively for the old guard, and the reform slate could not forget that.

Meanwhile there was also no city administrator and no city attorney. The hopelessly split council had lurched along like a rudderless ship until Garcia arrived and took over, just a few days before he contacted me. The editors wished him well but feared the worst: "Mr. Garcia has impeccable credentials for the difficult job ahead. Let us hope that sanity can triumph over factionalism within our city council, that reason can prevail, and that our elected officials will give the new administrator the cooperation required to get our city back on track. It should be noted here that two members of the council have given only contingent approval of Garcia's contract. Our advice, Mr. Garcia, is that you do not fully unpack your suitcase until all contingencies have been removed."

So my pal Garcia had walked into a hot one, made hotter by a resentful element within the police department and, apparently, threats against his family if he stayed on the job. That last rang a bit close to the attempt to intimidate me even before I knew anything about the problem. I had to wonder about the stakes here. What exactly was everyone so lathered up about?

The man at the newspaper could not help me with that. Nor could he help me with information about Harold Schwartzman. "I've heard the name," he told me. "I think—isn't that the guy—came to town a few years ago and built the big mansion in the heights?"

That was the guy, yes, but my informant could add nothing to the identification. He even tried a computer search of the newspaper files but came up blank.

"I'd say the man avoids publicity," the editor declared.

I told him about the Helltown connection but even that failed to jog the memory, so I thanked him and went to work on the police file. It was really a mess, had been for several years, with charges of excessive force by arresting officers, repeated over and over, dereliction, corruption— name it, this paper had reported it—and a spate of lawsuits during the past year charging wrongful deaths and civil rights abuses.

I left the newspaper office with a troubled mind, but actually I hadn't gained a hell of a lot. I'd read a lot of the news articles before. It's not the kind of stuff that sticks in the mind if you have no personal interest. I'd known of the problems in Brighton, of course, but at a distance. Found myself wishing I was still at a distance.

The wish became sharply focused two steps outside the newspaper office. A car without lights lurched around the corner and climbed the curb trying to reach me, but the timing was bad. I jumped back into the doorway to the building and held my breath as the front end of the car scraped bricks on both sides of me. It careened back onto the street at full throttle and was half a block away before I could unholster my pistol, so I held my fire. Didn't get an ID on the license plate and I was not even sure about the make, model or color of the car. I did get a flash glimpse of the occupants, two dark looking guys of indeterminate age but probably fairly young and excited as hell with the game, and vaguely familiar. It was just a gut feeling, but a very strong one, that I'd seen those guys before—maybe at my midnight meeting at the PD.

If the gut was right, then the implications were ominous, to say the least. It was time to stop thinking in terms of resentments and intimidation, time to start believing in murderous intent directed at myself and a "game" of obviously high stakes. High enough to have produced three murders and an attempted murder—my own.

Time also, maybe, to re-think my own involvement in the mess. It was a game I could do without.

I just did not know how to quit it with my self-respect intact, however. So I headed back to Helltown, hopeful of finding a dark, four-door sedan with fresh scrape marks on the right front fender. If nothing turned up there, I'd roust the whole damned department again and search for familiar faces.

But I didn't make it back to Helltown that night. Neither did the dark sedan and, when I found it, mere scrapes on a fender had lost all significance.

I heard the report on my radio when I was only a few blocks removed from the newspaper office. A chase was in progress, two police units involved and a third closing on an intercept point. I could hear gunfire on the radio and feel the tension of the chase. So I took an intercept route also, missed the climax by about two ticks, arrived at the scene with the dark sedan rammed into the wall of an industrial building and ablaze. It blew just as I got there, and I could see the two men inside engulfed by the fireball, but they had not appeared to be struggling and I figured them already dead. The body of the car was riddled with bulletholes, most of the glass shot out. Six uniformed cops were standing nearby with weapons drawn, and I did not see a saddened face among them.

I saw elation, satisfaction.

It was the same car, yeah. But I felt no elation, no sense of satisfaction, and those two had just tried to kill me.

Something, yes, was very sour in the Brighton PD.

And now the death toll had risen to five. It would be revealed within hours that all five victims were, or had been, officers of the Brighton Police Department.

CHAPTER NINE
 

It is always difficult to ascertain
the true facts in a police shooting incident, even when all the evidence seems to point toward the use of excessive force—and then it's even more difficult. If you have an officer wounded in the fracas, then the scales automatically tip toward the cops. If not, then there is always the question of judgment and intent on the part of the officers involved in the shooting.

No reasonable person would expect a cop to shoot only when shot at; that is never the issue. An old maxim at police academies says that "he who shoots first, shoots last," and that is often the case in real situations. But an officer is supposed to be capable of exercising split-second judgment, to know in that split-second if his own life is or is not in danger, and to shoot only if it is. That is what all the training is about, and that is why we have shooting reviews every time an officer's gun is discharged. There are, unfortunately, some overly fearful cops who shoot reflexively in a confrontation which they perceive as dangerous, and sometimes it turns out that the victim was not even armed. More unfortunately—and much more rarely, I hope—there are still cops in this land who are willing and eager to shoot upon the slightest provocation, and who take the greatest satisfaction in doing so.

I offer all of this so it's clear that all of these thoughts were in my mind that morning in Brighton at the scene of the latest shooting. I knew it had been a "shooting chase" that produced the result because I had been running with my windows down and had heard the gunfire live as well as via the radio. I had also heard one officer report via radio during the chase that he was receiving gunfire, as a caution to the intercepting unit, and a variety of weapons were recovered from the burned-out vehicle.

But there was no damage to any of the police vehicles nor any other evidence that bullets had moved in both directions during the incident. By the time I had arrived within eyeball range it was all over. All I saw was the suspects seated upright in the crashed remains of the burning vehicle, neither resisting or struggling to get clear before the gas tank exploded, six gloating officers standing well clear with weapons still raised and ready—and I could not erase from my mind the feeling that those guys would have been giving one another victorious "high fives" if I had not been there.

The victims were burned beyond any attempt at recognition and it was some time before the wreckage had cooled enough for anything more than a cursory examination. The patrolmen involved were relieved on the spot and sent back to the PD to write their reports and prepare for a shooting review. The haggard looking homicide chief, Ramirez, took over at the scene. It had been quite a night for him. I hung around until the bodies were transported, then went to my office and crashed on the couch until eight o'clock, slept maybe two hours as my purchase on the oncoming day, showered and put on fresh clothing and had breakfast at a nearby McDonald's while going over a copy of the dispatcher's log for the night.

      
Saturdays are normally quiet at any PD, same as any other offices with a forty-hour work week. Brighton was no exception, even at such a strained time. I finished breakfast before nine and was going through the files in my office when a pleasingly attractive woman of about forty placed herself in my open doorway and greeted me. "Chief Copp?"

      
Dark hair cut close and curly, trim body, dressed casually in knee-length shorts and a clingy jersey blouse, sneakers—very pretty with intelligent eyes and expectant lips. "I'm Marilyn DiAngelo, your secretary."

      
I gave her a quick up and down, smiled, and replied,
 
"Even on Saturday?"

      
"Do you need me? I just stopped by to..."

      
"How'd you know?"

      
"Grapevine." She had a very nice smile. "You're the talk of the town."

      
"Already?"

      
"Sounds like you had a crazy night."

      
"You heard about that too."

      
She came on in. We shook hands. I felt a bit awkward. Obviously, she had been Murray's secretary. I couldn't read happy or sad in her face, just nice. She told me, "I'd be glad to stay awhile and help you get settled."

      
"I probably won't be here long enough to get settled," I replied soberly. "But maybe you could help me onto a fingerhold. You worked for Tim Murray?"

      
She nodded. "The past five years. And I've been doing the necessary paperwork since he, uh, left."

      
"Did Murray get shafted?" I asked bluntly.

      
She met my gaze for an embarrassed moment, then dropped her eyes to say, "I never felt that he was incompetent."

      
"Get along well with him?"

      
"Well enough. He allowed me... considerable freedom."

      
"Meaning that you ran this office for him."

      
She locked onto my gaze again as she replied, "That is what secretaries do."

      
I closed the file drawer and carried a stack of manila folders to the desk, deposited them there, told her, "From the looks of things here, you do it very well."

      
"Thank you."

      
"Thank you. Married?"

      
"Yes."

      
"Kids?"

      
"Two, a boy and a girl. They're in high school."

      
"Like your job?"

      
"I love my job."

      
"Do you live in Brighton?"

      
"Yes."

      
"What does your husband do?"

      
"He's a teacher."

      
"Treat you right?"

      
"When 1 treat him right, yes."

      
"So you've got it made."

      
She smiled, and it was nice—like the rest of her. "I guess so."

      
"You'd like to keep it that way."

      
"Of course."

      
"Do yourself a favor, then. You've been running this office for five years. That gives you a highly privileged view of this town and this department. Where is the garbage buried?"

The smile faded. "What?"

"Something stinks here. What stinks?"

She said, "I'm not sure I. .."

"You do, you know what I mean. You have a stake in this town. Work here, live here, your kids growing up here. Where is the garbage buried?"

She had come in so perky, so composed, so nice. Now she was confused, troubled, unnerved. "I'd heard that you were very direct."

"Have to be. I'm in a revolving door. I'll be gone next week. You won't be. You live here, your family lives here. Give it a shot. Help me find the garbage."

She took a deep breath and showed me a shaky smile, then marched over to the file cabinet I'd just vacated, pulled open a drawer, removed a file, brought it to me and placed it in my hands, told me, "Maybe it's buried here," and left without saying goodbye.

I looked at the file, noted the tabbed inscription. Task Force, removed a single sheet of paper. It was a copy of a letter signed by Tim Murray and addressed jointly to the sheriff of San Bernardino County and the head of the regional DEA office, a notification that Brighton was withdrawing from the joint drug enforcement task force. The letter was dated three years ago.

While I was pondering that, Jack Ralston came into the office with a long face to tell me, "Maybe we have an ID on our two John Does." He placed two blackened badges on my desk. "Evidence technicians dug these out of the burned rubble of the car. Belonged to two of our undercover narcotics officers, Hanson and Rodriguez. Both men are missing, haven't been seen since early last evening." He sighed heavily, almost painfully. "There may have been a terrible mistake here."

I picked up the badges and inspected them closely. It

was obvious that they had been subjected to intense heat. I said, "Maybe. But I need to tell you something about that car and its occupants. Minutes before the car crashed and burned, it tried to run me down on the sidewalk outside the newspaper building. Obviously I had been under surveillance and the intent was to take me out. Do you still think it was your narcs?"

He replied, "All I know is that those were their badges. Formal identification is still pending. But if you're asking me what I think—well, yes, I think it's them."

"What about the vehicle ID?"

"No help there. Car was reported stolen just a few minutes before the patrolmen spotted it and gave chase. Why would anyone want to run you down? You just got here."

"I'm the type who makes enemies fast," I replied. "Or hadn't you noticed?"

The daywatch captain almost smiled, but it didn't quite get to the eyes before he switched it off. "Haven't noticed you making any friends," he observed sourly. "Heard you had a run-in with Tim Murray last night."

"Where'd you hear that?"

"It's still a small town, after all," Ralston said with a smirk. He collected the badges, went to the door, turned back to say, "I scheduled the shooting review for Monday."

"Reschedule it," I said. "I may not be here Monday. Two o'clock this afternoon."

Captain Ralston stared at me silently for a moment then turned and walked away.

I read the three-year-old letter again, returned it to its folder, and went looking for other tidbits from the files.

Found some.

Marilyn DiAngelo might have just been guessing ... or she might have known much more than she wanted to know, was afraid of becoming involved in the politics that were tearing the town apart, and had genuinely tried to point the way for me toward the garbage. Whatever, it was more than a point, it was a shove—and I'd decided that Jack Ralston had been wrong about one thing, at least: I had found a friend in Brighton.

The tidbits I found in the files that morning were no more substantial than the lead the secretary had offered, but they gave me quivers and I've gone a long way on quivers many times.

I've said something already about the jumble of police jurisdictions in the area. That is always a problem, but local departments had joined with the counties years back to work out various reciprocal plans and programs leading to better law enforcement for all. One of those programs was a direct result of the all-out war against drugs. It involved the formation of a Drug Task Force composed of members of the various city and county police departments together with agents of the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, which allowed a regional and cooperative approach to the problem irrespective of individual police jurisdictions. The DTF for this area had been spectacularly successful.

So why had Brighton pulled out of it?

The tidbits supplied a possible explanation. They also supplied a tantalizing clue to where the garbage lay.

Have you ever heard that money stinks? In small piles it's hardly noticeable. But the odor from huge piles can become almost unbearable.

It can even carry the unmistakable smell of fermenting garbage when that is what it makes of men's lives. And sometimes it smells of death.