One Night In Bangkok Ch. 01

"But not his gun?" I asked as I perused the photos, showing the deceased's oft-perforated body lying on the concrete floor.

"No sir." Wilson said. "We have not found any guns at all."

"I'm sure you did this already," I said, "but check again under everything, even a distance away. His gun might've slid or been kicked under something. I really need to know what happened to it."

"Yes sir." said Officer Wilson.

"Okay, any cameras in the area?" I asked, again looking all around.

"None in the building or inside the fences, sir." said Wilson. "The street cameras have all been put out of commission, and not replaced."

Shane O'Brady said "This is not the best area in the county. Every time we install any cameras, they get taken out pretty quickly, no matter how well we hide them."

"Sounds like you have a leak." said Cecil Mason. "Someone on the inside telling the perps where the cameras are being installed."

"I wouldn't be a bit surprised." said O'Brady.

"Any other areas like that?" I asked. "Where the cameras are taken out? Or is it all over?"

"Pretty much just a few areas." said O'Brady. "This area, which we call the Industrial District. Then there's the Red Light District, such as it is. Can't keep any kind of surveillance cameras there, and there's a lot more traffic accidents from running red lights there than anywhere else. Most of the residential areas and the streets leading to the Interstate are left alone. Those are the areas where cash is generated from tickets."

"Have you found Cash's car yet?" I asked.

"No sir." said Wilson. "Lt. Cash owns a gray Toyota Camry, and we're canvassing the area looking for it, but no results yet."

I nodded thoughtfully at that. "Anything else, Wilson?" I asked.

"No sir, nothing immediate." said Wilson. "We're also trying to find out who owns this place, but our SRIC friends have found nothing, so far. It's Sunday, sir."

SRIC stood for 'State Regional Intelligence Center'. Just like the State DOJ had regions for Crime Labs, they'd also set up data and intelligence analysis centers. The City, my Town & County, and Southport had refused to participate in the SRICs, nor share data with them, knowing well that like the SBI-NTF, they were badly compromised. Wilson Hammonds had forced Pottsville to participate, and many jurisdictions that could not afford their own data gurus had to use the SRICs. I once again felt hugely grateful to be part of the Town & County Police Force, and have good friends in the FBI as well.

"So," said O'Brady, "either he was lured here and ambushed, or he was undercover and was found out. I doubt that if he were captured elsewhere and brought here, he would have had his hands free and been able to walk out like he apparently did."

"Good point." I said. "Officer Wilson, what do you think?"

"I think he was undercover, sir." said Wilson. "As Detective O'Brady said, it's likely he came here of his own accord, but if he was lured here, wouldn't they have shot him when he came in one of the doors to the outside?"

"Good thinking, Wilson." I said, praising the young but promising Officer. "But we should not theorize without solid data, and there is one piece of data that flies in the face of that theory. By the way, we need to know who owns this property, who uses this property for legitimate as well as illegitimate purposes."

"Let that be your first order of business, Wilson." said O'Brady. "Commander, based on the data you are seeing, any ideas?"

"Just a couple of things." I said. "I think it's likely that the shooters were doing something, whether chopping cars, moving boxes of stuff around, or something like that. I don't think Cash walked into an empty building, or he'd have been a lot more wary, if not had his gun drawn."

I continued: "So he's in the back office area, here. I don't think he was meeting anyone in an undercover sort of way. Someone brought him to this location. Then he was made to walk out here, and into the ambush."

"How do you know that?" asked Detective Marvin Chester.

"Because someone forced him to take off his body armor under his shirt." I replied. "That's why he was found with only a t-shirt on. His shirt, jacket, and holster were removed in that office room, then brought in and left on the floor behind his body after the killing. Unless it's found, I think his gun left the scene with one of the perps, probably whoever brought him to the location. So I'm seeing that he came out of the office area, probably at gunpoint, then a lot of armed men proceeded to use him as target practice, and mowed him down in a hail of bullets."

"So he was undercover, and they found him out?" asked Cecil Mason.

"Could be. Or he could've been dirty, and was betrayed." I replied. "But it looks to me like a stakeout, and he was discovered." Everyone nodded as they looked around, seeing my thesis in their own eyes and minds... but not truly observing, I realized. You can lead a horse to water, I thought to myself...

We all exchanged our professional cards and then we made our goodbyes, as did the Westphalia Officers. O'Brady and I got into my car and drove out.

"So," said O'Brady, "did the Internal Affairs guy give you anything?"

"Ah, so you spotted him too, did you now?" I said, beginning to be impressed with O'Brady.

"I was wondering why you wanted to talk to him alone." said O'Brady. "Then it slapped me in the face when he started talking about the knocked-out cameras being an inside job. He's right, and we're already sure of it, but it struck me that that's how an Internal Affairs guy would think. So how did you spot him, and so quickly."

"Observation, deduction, and knowledge." I said. "Detective Chester not introducing him by rank nor position was one clue. Another is that I was in a unique position to know the name of Cecil Mason: we just hired an Internal Affairs guy after Goodwin took the SBI Director job. Mason's name was on my semi-short list, though we didn't interview him."

"Well, hell's bells!" exclaimed O'Brady. "No wonder you get all the results."

I chuckled. "Yep, just a magic trick. Anyway, he's one of the good guys, near as I can tell. Tomorrow we should go to Westphalia, see if they'll let us look around in Cash's files and stuff."

"Maybe you should do that." said O'Brady. "I'd be out of jurisdiction."

"Let's go back to your Headquarters." I said.

"You have a solution for that, I would guess?" asked O'Brady.

"I sure do."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

We went to Chief Rogers's office. "You guys find out anything?" asked the Chief as he had us sit down. We related what we had found at the scene.

"So maybe he was brought here, or lured here?" asked Rogers. "I guess my question is why here? Why not just bump him off in Westphalia?"

"Why not, indeed?" I replied. "He'd have Police backup up there. By that I mean your Police Force is fine, but he'd know his own guys much better. So something brought him down here."

"So you guys need to go to Westphalia, see what he was working on." said the Chief.

"We were talking about that, Chief." said O'Brady. "I don't have jurisdiction, but SBI Inspector Troy does." He saw the Chief and me exchange a glance. "What?" he asked.

"I got a call from Lieutenant Governor Marshall." said the Chief. "She made me an offer I couldn't refuse."

I stood up. "Detective O'Brady, If you will stand up, please, raise your right hand, and repeat after me." When O'Brady did, I had him repeat after me the SBI Reserve Oath. Once done, I said "Congratulations, you are now an SBI Reserve Detective in addition to your duties with the Pottsville Police." I handed him his SBI Reserve badge and I.D. card.

"Already pre-printed." observed O'Brady. "You've had this in mind before coming down here." The Chief grinned at that.

"Indeed I did." I said, smiling.

"How does this work?" asked O'Brady as we sat back down and I handed him the inevitable paperwork.

"The SBI Reserve Program was done away with," I said, "but there still is an SBI Reserve. I can swear in local LEOs so that they can act in a State capacity temporarily. Once you're sworn in, as you have just been, you're in. But use the power sparingly, only when you need to."

"My God, what will Wilson Hammonds say?" O'Brady asked, and I could not tell if he was worried about that or maliciously happy about it, as I was.

"The rules of the Game," I said, "are that one Lieutenant Governor, who may be our next Governor, beats a minority-Party Legislator any day."

"Yeah, don't worry about Hammonds." said the Chief. "I've got your back on this. Needless to say, I'm not unhappy about this at all. I just don't know how the Iron Crowbar pulled it off."

"Very easy." I said. "In the greatest Corleone tradition, I do a favor for Lt. Governor Marshall, she does a favor for me. She wants me to help solve this; I told her I needed that O'Brady guy as an SBI Reservist to help me..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

After arranging to meet O'Brady the next morning in Westphalia, I drove up to the City and to the Federal Building. I found Jack Muscone in his office within the FBI's suite. I knocked on the glass door and he waved me in.

"Wow, still here on a Sunday afternoon?" I asked as I came into his office.

"Yeah. Have a seat." said Muscone. Then he looked at me and said "Over here on a Sunday afternoon?" I smiled and nodded.

"I was in Pottsville." I said. "A Westphalia Police Lieutenant, Paul Cash, was found dead in Pottsville, and I was asked to assist them with their inquiries."

"Cash." said Jack, trying to remember. "Homicide Detective? I think I remember meeting him once or twice. I've certainly never heard of him in a bad way."

"Neither had I, but Westphalia I.A. turned up at the scene." I said. "Guy named Cecil Mason. He said it was routine when a WPD Officer turns up dead outside their jurisdiction..."

"But it didn't quite ring true, eh?" Muscone said as he peered at me.

"Well..." I said, "if I or another TCPD Officer was found dead outside the County, the TCPD would send Officers to see about it, probably including me personally if I wasn't the victim. But we'd likely not send I.A. Officers, at least not immediately. And Mason said that they'd opened a file on Cash, that he was investigating something but they didn't know what it was."

"Sounds like Cash was trying to play Iron Crowbar." grunted Muscone. "He should've left that to the Originals. So how did he die?"

"He was obliterated by a large volume of gunfire." I said. "He walked into an ambush. He may have been undercover and was 'made', or he may have been dirty and was betrayed. Shane O'Brady and I are going to visit Westphalia tomorrow morning and see if he left behind any case notes on whatever he was working on." Muscone nodded. "So..." I asked, "what are you working on?"

"Aftermath of that nuke incident." said Muscone. "You had the easy part; you just found the nuke, got handcuffed to it, then stopped the threat and walked away. Me, I've got all the paperwork to do on it, plus the ongoing search for the perps." I'd laughed at Muscone saying I'd had the easy part, but lost the sense of humor at the mention of the perps."

Muscone said "We've had no luck finding Dick Granger of SPS, and Edward Blassingame has pretended to be helpful, but has not been. Blassingame says he'll have Granger talk to us if and when Granger shows up, but of course he wants Granger to have a lawyer with him to protect his rights. Of course, Blassingame is the CEO of BigAgraFoods now, but the SPS people aren't being helpful, either. So, we put out a nationwide APB on Granger yesterday."

"Hell, if I remember correctly, Granger himself was very much a stickler for his rights." I said, remembering Granger's actions and lack of cooperation in the 'Delivery In The Rear' case. "He also went to prison over that case. So nothing on Barsbane, Shimono, Trent and Quint?"

"No, not yet." said Muscone. "We're hoping Barsbane does a dumb thing and goes to Southport. We're watching for him, and I even contacted State Senators Jimmy Cerone and Moe Molinari and said the FBI would be 'grateful' if they gave us any information leading to Barsbane's arrest. And we heard from backchannels that Cerone did put out the word in both Midtown and Southport to cooperate with the authorities if Barsbane showed up, and Molinari did the same for the metro City area."

"As to Shimono," Muscone said, "she's been a ghost for years, and trained by the Intelligence Services of three nations (USA, Japan, Red China) to be that ghost. Trent and Quint have also had very good training, but our sources nationwide have not heard anything on them, such as if they put themselves on the dark markets for hire, stuff like that."

"What does the vaunted BAU say about them?" I asked. Muscone's eyes cut over to me.

"You've really got a bee in your bonnet about them." he said. "Whassup wit' dat?"

"Well," I said, "I never understood why they were called in to the nuke incident, and by that I mean actually being on site. Their analysis of the perps was exceptionally poor. And most of all, I don't like either brother named 'Rovers'."

"Gotcha." said Muscone. "Well, Bob Rovers's team went back to Washington with their tails between their legs. My understanding is that General McFarland's comments to the FBI Director about them were 'not positive'. So they're not working on that case anymore. There's plenty of work for them with all the nutjobs in this nation that bear watching, like the 'Antifa' wackos."

I nodded. "I'm glad General McFarland ripped them."

"Okay, I'm about done here." said Muscone as he packed up his stuff. "You headed back home, too?"

"No." I said. "In fact, would you mind if I plugged into your secure net to do some research on this Pottsville case?"

"Sure, just plug into my connection there." said Jack, pointing it out.

"How about we hit the City Diner for dinner tonight, my treat?" I asked.

"Ah, thanks, but Tanya's ordering takeout for the family." Jack said. "And that reminds me..." He straightened up in his chair and said "We're going to set the date for the wedding in late July or early August. Tanya wants to ask you to walk her down the aisle, and I was going to ask you to be my Best Man."

"Darn, I hate being the subject of your first argument." I said.

Muscone said "I'm being fair in telling you both sides, and I am asking you to be my Best Man and do all those Best Man things. Don't answer now, though. We'll talk about it some more with Tanya in the room."

"Most very wise." I said. "Okay, you have a good night."

As Muscone left, I hooked up my FBI laptop to the connection and began working. First I looked up Paul Cash's 12-year record with the Westphalia Police. It was spotless. More, it was heroic: two equivalent medals of the TCPDs Star of Gallantry, one Police Medal equivalent, one Purple Order equivalent, and a ton of Achievement Citations that were the equivalent of our Achievement Medal.

Cash's rise to Lieutenant had indeed been fast: from Patrolman to Sergeant, equivalent of our Detective Sergeant, in four years, then to Lieutenant in four more. Then he'd left the WPD for six years before coming back and spending the last four years in WPD Homicide Division.

I was able to get into his personnel digital file, showing his evaluations and commendation write-ups. Everything looked great. Constantly commended. Appeared to be respected if not loved by his subordinates. But I was wondering what that six-year hiatus was about. Military reserve call up? Something else? Had to be something else, I thought as I looked up another record... Cash was never in the military, any branch, active or reserve.

Then I looked up Sharon Marshall, her entire career as a local- and State-level politician from Westphalia. After all, the person who calls it in must be checked out, and Marshall had called me into this.

Though nothing explicit was said, Marshall had several times written letters to the WPD Police Chief, commending Detective Cash for various things, and one did not need to have a crowbar to know that Cash was one of Marshall's 'marked cards', a supporter in the WPD that she could rely upon for information and possibly Police action where needed. Could that be a reason for Cash's death?

I did cross-connections between him and Pottsville. There was no record of his computer looking up anything in Pottsville, nor any particular connection between Westphalia and Pottsville Police Departments. Whatever he was doing, he didn't do it in any official capacity.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

As I continued to do my data work, my personal cellphone rang. It was Laura, asking if I was coming home.

"No, honey, I won't be home tonight." I said. "I'm going to stay here in the City." I explained about the case, my research, and going to Westphalia in the morning.

"Then we're going to stay at The Cabin tonight." said Laura. "Molly and her boys are there, and will stay with us, also. And Bowser is worried about you; Carole pointed out to me that he keeps watching the front door, waiting for you to walk through it. So if he's getting a vibe, maybe you should stay in safehouse 34a instead of a hotel tonight."

"Uh, sure." I said, knowing that Bowser was not the only one concerned about my safety. And 'safehouse 34a' was just that, a house in the City's middle-class southwestern suburbs, with a bed, bathroom amenities, a few pieces of kitchen and den furniture, and a wi-fi hookup.

It was almost 1:30am when I was finished with my data research. I packed my laptop away in its carrying pouch, then went down to the garage. I looked my vehicle over to make sure no bombs had been attached, then got in and drove through the City streets towards the safehouse, making sure I was not followed by any vehicles.

Arriving at the safe house, I used the app Laura had installed on my personal iPhone that acted as a garage door opener. A CIA-type gadget... oh wait, my wife once was the CIA, as Mycroft Holmes was the British Government...

The door to the kitchen inside the garage was unlocked. I cleared the house, then ate the late-night Chinese takeout I'd picked up along the way. After checking the TCPD duty logs on my Police iPhone, I headed to bed.

But sleep would not come. There were too many questions in my mind. I was not trying to answer them, just get them docketed in my head. The answers would have to come later. But one thing I did realize... this case was a lot bigger than it appeared on the surface. A lot bigger...

Part 3 - Beginning The Investigation

"This is Bettina Wurtzburg, KXTC Channel Two News!" said the redheaded MILF reporterette at 7:00am, Monday, March 18th, from the KXTC studios anchor desk. "With me is reporter Amber Harris. Channel Two News has learned that local Police Officer Donald Troy was called into SBI service to investigate the death of Westphalia Police Lieutenant Paul Cash, who was found dead in Pottsville over the weekend!"

"Lieutenant Cash was a decorated Westphalia Police Officer," said Bettina, "and sources tell Channel Two News that Commander Troy was asked to assist in the investigation by Lieutenant Governor Sharon Marshall, who was the State Representative for Westphalia before winning the Lt. Governor election last November. Neither Commander Troy nor the TCPD have responded to repeated requests by Channel Two News for comment."

Amber took it up: "In other news, State House Judiciary Committee Chairman Justin Madoff said that he hopes Commander Donald Troy will answer questions before his Committee sometime this week, but he will definitely be required to do so before the Legislative session ends on March 29th. Our reporter Keith Madden is with Dr. Adam S. Keller of the City University Rodham Foundation for Political and Social Change. Keith!"