AI Era: I Smell Trouble

Sally and I looked at each other, and her face crumpled. I pulled her into my arms and we both began crying. I felt overwhelming relief, closely followed by a small amount of joy and an intense need to comfort my wife. Wilma pushed over a box of tissues, and gave us some time to react to the news.

After several minutes, Sally gave me one last hug, and sat back. She took a deep breath, and said, "That worthless motherfucker! That sorry sack of shit! That pus-licking abscess on a mandrill's ass! That scrotum-faced, tiny-dicked puddle of ass-ooze! That pimple-dicked, anus-munching, syphilitic chancre on a colostomy site!"

I should point out here that my sweetheart learned wordplay as the child of two former Marine drill sergeants. They viewed creative profanity as an art form, and Sally was an avid student. Her years of medical training further enriched her vocabulary of the vulgar and the profane. After a few more sailor-blanching obscenities, she calmed down, and in a quiet and deadly voice, said, "Carthago delenda est."

I nodded. "I agree, sweetie. But remember, noli ire ad carcerem."

Seeing Wilma's puzzled look I said, "Sorry — two high school Latin club nerds mouthing off. She said, 'Carthage must be destroyed', referring to Rome razing Carthage and enslaving its population."

Wilma raised her eyebrows. "What did you say to her?"

"I said, 'Yes, but don't go to prison.' I agree that Dick Snot needs to be punished, but we need to do it without breaking the law."

Wilma promised to forward the lab work to Mark, and we returned home.

Mark came by our house that evening to talk about the case. He was glad to hear the preliminary results of the rape kit, but was not optimistic about proving a charge of rape against Tom.

"The problem is that most rapes occur with only two people in the room. In court, it often comes down to a matter of 'he said - she said', and it's difficult to predict who a jury will find more credible. It would help a lot if we could gather further evidence against him."

I said, "How would we go about that?"

Mark said, "Catching him in the act in front of witnesses would be definitive. But waiting for him to do it again could take months, and we can't keep Sally under police surveillance for that long."

Sally said, "But couldn't we set up a sting operation, and get him to confess? What if I wore a wire?"

Mark shook his head. "That's too much to ask of you, Sally. It will be rough enough for you to get through what Wilson has already done to you. I won't ask you to go through it all again."

"But what if I want to? What if I can prevent this from happening to some other poor woman?"

"OK Sally, but all we can do is to wait until Tom makes the first move. I can set up a few things in advance. If Tom tries to get together with you again, let me know immediately. I can get an emergency warrant that will allow us to record any encounter with him, and we can have some officers waiting nearby when it goes down."

***

One of Sally's colleagues referred her to a therapist to help her deal with her anger, shame and depression following the rape. I started seeing a therapist of my own, and joined a support group for spouses of rape victims. The following week, Sally also starting doing half days back at her work.

For the next two weeks, life proceeded at a routine pace. Then Sally phoned me on Wednesday afternoon. "John, Tom just called. He wants to get together with me at the same motel this Friday, at 7 pm. He threatened me with those videos again." I called Mark immediately, and he is applying for a warrant.

Mark called me Friday morning to tell me that he had the warrant for the sting operation, and had several officers assigned to assist him in the arrest. Sally had taken the day off, and wandered around the house, trying to keep herself occupied on mundane things such as laundry, vacuuming, and gardening. She also spent a few hours on the treadmill and exercise bike in our home gym, burning off some of her nervous energy.

At 5 pm, Mark came by. "Sally, I want to give you another chance to bow out on this sting. This sort of operation can be dangerous enough with a trained officer, and is even more so for you. We can find some other way of nailing this bastard. What do you say?"

"Thanks for the offer, but I'm still in. I really want to bring him down."

Mark sighed. "OK then. We'll do everything we can to ensure your safety. We don't have any records suggesting that Tom owns a gun. However, we have to act as if he has a weapon with him. We will be monitoring you on video and audio very closely. If you feel like you are in danger or want to pull the plug at anytime, you need to say a safe word and we'll be through the door in seconds. What would you like to use as a safe word?"

"Hmm... I'll say the word 'disgusting' if I'm concerned."

"Great. We'll put a video and audio recorder in your purse and we will also try to get some installed in the motel room. We'll be listening to everything you guys say. Once we have enough information for a conviction, we'll come in the door unannounced. When we do, drop to the floor and stay down until we have him subdued. Is that clear?"

"Yes, drop to the floor and stay down."

"Good. Now remember, our goal here is to get him to incriminate himself. We'd like you to string him along as long as you can, and get him to give as many details as possible about what he wants you to do and what he'll do to you if you don't comply. Also, don't eat or drink anything he tries to give you."

I faced Mark. "I'd like to be part of the sting operation."

Mark shook his head. "I'm sorry, but no way. Stings can be extremely dangerous. It's bad enough putting Sally at risk, but we don't have anyone else we can use as bait. You, on the other hand, are not essential to the operation. Please trust me on this, John. I and several other officers will be in a surveillance van parked about 20 feet from Wilson's room."

I grimaced, and he said, "However, you can ride along in one of our unmarked police cars. You'll be waiting about a minute away, and we'll have you on site just as soon as we have Wilson in custody."

I nodded, and turned to Sally. "Sweetie, you are so brave. I'm not strong enough to do what you are about to do. I love you and will be there just as soon as Mark lets me."

She gave me a fierce hug. "I love you too. Thank you for believing in me, even after I did such a terrible thing."

I shook my head. "No, the only terrible thing is what Wilson did to you. You are a wonderful woman, and I love you. I am so proud of what you are doing tonight."

Tom introduced me to the two detectives who would be waiting off site with me. We shook hands, and they led me to their car. They drove us to a small lot a few blocks away from the motel and parked the car.

Then we waited. The two officers with me spent the time on their phones, calmly reading email. I tried to do that, but was way too antsy to read more than a few lines of text. I kept checking my watch every few minutes. As 7 pm finally approached, all three of us put our phones down and sat up straighter in our seats.

The screen flashed on one detective's phone. He held it to his ear for a second, and said, "Sally just arrived."

He paused for about 30 seconds. "She's out of her car and knocking on Wilson's door."

Another pause. "She's inside."

The next 5 minutes felt like 50. "They're still just talking."

Another 5 minutes passed even more slowly. "Just talking."

Another 5 interminable minutes, and suddenly our driver dropped the phone and started the car. "She said the word! We're going in!"

I'm glad I had my seat belt on. Police cars have a remarkable amount of torque. We were hauling ass in no time, with lights flashing. We reached the motel in seconds, and swerved to a halt a few feet from Room 127.

The two detectives ordered me to wait in the car, and ran to the room. I ignored them and tried to open the car door. It was locked. Fuck! All I could see through the open room door was several policemen with weapons drawn. I was about to shit. However, as I watched, some of them holstered their weapons.

Finally, I saw Mark coming to the door. He saw me in the back of the car and came over and opened my door. I tried to run into the room, but he grabbed my shoulders and said, "She's fine, John! She's fine! She'll be out in just a minute."

He pulled me into a hug. "Sally was magnificent. She helped us get everything we need to nail him."

"Thanks, Mark. I was so fucking scared. Did he hurt her?"

"Not a bit." He laughed. "Actually, there was some hurting going on, but it was the other way around."

"What do you mean?"

"Right before the balloon went up, Wilson tried to grab her. She proceeded to drop kick his balls into the next zip code. When we all came bursting through the door, Wilson was lying on the floor shrieking. She was heading for him with the most terrifying look I've ever seen on a woman. She got in another good stomp or two before we could pull her away. I'll show you the video later. We got the whole thing in 4K video from multiple angles."

We turned toward to room, just in time to see Sally coming out of the room, eyes blazing like an angry Valkyrie. As she stepped outside, the police cheered. When she saw me, her fierce expression softened, and she came running over into my arms. "Oh, John! I'm so glad that's over."

I held her tightly while she sobbed, and I told her how great she was. I'm pretty sure that I cried a bit myself.

The EMTs rolled a gurney into the motel room. After about 10 minutes, they rolled it back out with a moaning Wilson strapped into it. Sally stiffened, and for a moment I saw Kali the Destroyer peering out of my gentle wife's eyes. She yelled, "Eat shit and die, motherfucker!" Then she relaxed, and said, "Kicking ass is thirsty work. Do you think they'd let us stop for a milkshake on the way to the station?"

"I'll bet that can be arranged, sweetie."

There was no objection to us stopping for a milkshake. In fact, Mark joined us at Dick's Drive-In up on Lake City Way. It turns out that kicking ass is also hungry work. After a Dick's Deluxe, an order of fries and a milkshake, we were ready to move on to the taking names part of the evening. However, just as we were leaving for the police station, Mark got a call. He talked for a few minutes, and then hung up and turned to us. "Looks like we won't be needing you tonight, Sally. That was one of my men over at Harborview Medical Center. The EMTs took him there to have his injuries checked out. It seems that they whisked him to the operating room right away to see if they can salvage what you left of his testicles."

I gave Sally an arch look. "So, once again you were his tallywhacker attacker?"

She smiled at me. "Yes, sweetie, I got mad and did something rad and bad to his sad little 'nads."

Mark raised his eyebrows at this exchange and shook his head. I said, "What?"

"I'm just not used to seeing this degree of levity in rape cases."

Sally said, "I'm sorry to give you that impression. I assure you that neither John nor I are being cavalier about this. Being raped is a giant, oppressive shit sandwich. Therapy sessions have helped me deal with it, but some days it's two steps backwards for each step forward. When I do have one of those steps forward, I embrace it as hard as I can."

I said, "This is not me and Sally doing standup comedy about the sunny side of rape. It's us trying to restore the core of our relationship. A lot of our emotional intimacy has always revolved about puns, wordplay and our wacky senses of humor. When Sally came back from Chicago, that was gone. It was like the canary in our personal coal mine had keeled over. So now, if a few bad puns make my canary's eyes light up again, I'm all for it."

Mark paused for a moment, and then nodded to us and said, "OK, fair points." Then, with a twinkle in his eyes, he said, "No need to come down to the station tonight. As a result of Sally's pecker wrecker and 'nad jihad, Wilson will be in the hospital for a week. After that we'll bring him in for interrogation and booking. So, get a good night's sleep and I'll see you tomorrow for the rest of your statement."

Sally and I went home and went to bed, but were too wired to fall asleep. We tried to talk about other things, but kept coming back to Tom Wilson. Sally said, "Mark said that Tom will be charged not only with second degree rape, but also with extortion for his attempts to blackmail me. Besides prison time, he'll lose his medical license and get placed on a sex offender's list. He'll lose his job and probably never be able to work in medicine again."

"That sounds like a good start to me." I said.

"Yeah, me too. However, I worry about his clinic partners. I know most of them, and they are good people. The stigma could devastate their practice for years."

"Yeah, I remember that case in Sacramento years ago where an anesthesiologist was sexually assaulting his patients once they were unconscious"

"Oh, dear god yes. The press gave him the catch-phrase: 'While you were out, I was in!' That put a real damper on elective surgery at that hospital for years."

"At times like that I'm really glad I'm not in medicine. Say, is Tom married?"

"I think so. I met his wife at a local internal medicine society function. Nora, I think. I believe they have a son, probably around 13 years old."

"Oh, geeze. I'm all for publicly eviscerating that motherfucker. But the thought of the collateral damage to his family just depresses the shit out of me. It's hard enough being a teenager even if your dad isn't a rapist. Going to a school where everyone knows that about your dad? That is a special kind of hell."

Sally cuddled up to me and sighed. I asked, "What's the matter?"

"My therapist is concerned that sex with you will trigger memories of my assault by Fuckface. But I'm more optimistic. The warm, loving, awesome sex I've always had with you is way different from what that asshole did to me."

"I'm glad, sweetie. I've had similar concerns."

"Pish, tosh!"

"Pish? Tosh? Is that some medical term I don't know?"

"No, asshole. Let me translate for your feeble male brain. "Pish, tosh!' is just a more refined and genteel way of saying 'No fucking way!' Let me be clear, bubba. If you ever hear me fart during sex, that's the only time I'll be thinking of Fuckface. But any other noises I make are all going to be about you."

"Your refinement and gentility astonish me. That is why I fucking love your ass."

"I fucking love your ass too, John." She sighed and snuggled a bit closer to me. Sometime after that we drifted off into a peaceful and fart-free slumber.

***

Sally and I slept late, followed by a leisurely breakfast. We then met Mark down at the Seattle North Precinct police station. Mark took us into a viewing suite, where we could watch the video from the sting. He said, "Once we knew which room Tom had booked at the motel, our tech team went down there with the warrant for the operation. They got into the room a few hours before Tom showed up. That gave them plenty of time to install three different cameras and a variety of mikes around the room. We took the regular desk clerk out to dinner, and left one of our undercover officers to manage the front desk. Bottom line is that we got great video of the entire operation from three different angles in 4K resolution."

Mark started the video showing Tom entering Room 127. "Tom arrived at the room about 6 and started setting up one of his own cameras on a tripod. We think he wanted to record some additional blackmail material to use against Sally." Mark hit the fast-forward button, which showed Tom bouncing about the room Ike a gerbil on speed.

"We got our first big break right here." He slowed down the playback to about half speed. "The video here clearly shows Tom typing in the passcode to his phone. This is huge, because we can now use that passcode to change the system passwords on all of his devices. This will prevent him or an accomplice from deleting evidence from these devices. It also allows us to look at all of the media on his phone, his iPad and his Mac."

"Did you find any of the blackmail videos he took of Sally?"

"Yes, we did. We found several of her, and a few video files of other women. However, we suspect that he has a lot of other files stashed elsewhere. Now that we control his devices, we can sift through his password files, looking for cloud accounts on external servers. He could also have copies stashed in some physical location, but we didn't find any at his house."

Mark sped up the playback speed again until Sally entered the room. The next 20 minutes showed Tom trying and failing to get Sally to take her clothes off. Sally played him like a trout, and got him to repeat his threats to disseminate the videos he made of them in Chicago. When Sally continued to be reluctant, he offered her a drink to 'help relax her'. Sally took the glass from him and started to put it to her lips. At the last minute, she wrinkled her nose, put the drink down on the bedside table away from Tom and said the words that launched the takedown, "This smells disgusting!"

At that point, Tom tried to push Sally aside and grab the drink back from her. Sally was magnificent, and refused to step aside. Instead, she swung her leg up in a beautiful punt to Tom's crotch that actually lifted him off the ground an inch. A second later, the police kicked the door in. Before they could reach Tom to subdue him, Sally got in a few more foot strikes to his chest and face. The police pulled her away from Tom, and quickly got a set of handcuffs on a shrieking Tom.

Mark said, "We got some preliminary results on that cocktail Tom was trying to get Sally to drink. It was a nasty mixture of alcohol, a few different benzodiazepines, and a splash of ecstasy. When we searched his gear at the motel, we found some of the same drugs in his possession. This fresh attempt to drug you may add a few years to any sentence he gets."

I raised my hand. "You mentioned videos of other women. Does that mean that Sally is not his first victim?"

Mark nodded. "Yep, that's what we think. He was practiced enough with his video prep for Sally that we suspect that he has done this before — perhaps with multiple women. We're still sifting through all of his computer devices for additional video and still images. Based on information from our sting, we were able to get another warrant to search his house. We impounded some additional computer gear there. A preliminary search through hard drives and memory sticks is underway there. So far, we haven't found much more. He could have his files backed up elsewhere, but we haven't found anything yet. We're trying to compile a list of all of his email accounts, cloud services, DropBox, GoogleDrive and OneDrive accounts. We've searched his clinic office. We're working with his wife to compile a list of all bank accounts, and checking whether he has any safety deposit boxes associated with them."

I rubbed my face. "So what happens next to Wilson?"

"He'll remain under guard at the hospital until he is discharged. His doctor suggests that he'll still be in house another week or so. After that, he'll be arraigned in court sometime within a week following his discharge. That's where bail will be set. Once he pays that, he'll be out pending his trial."

Sally said, "Wait, they are going to let him out on bail?"

"Yep, the 8th Amendment prohibits imposing excessive bail. Based on the current charges, his bail might be set at between fifty thousand to several hundred thousand dollars. If Wilson can lay his hands on ten percent of that, a bail bondsman will loan him the rest."