Storefronts: No Room For A Snitch!

The sky is cloudless, while tropical scents of Orange Blossoms are penetrating the air. Mocking birds are singing from atop the Southern Pine trees that border my property. Stretched out on a pool side lounge chair, clad in my bathing suit, I allow the sun rays to penetrate my chalky, almost milk-like, skin. I am home, eleven hundred miles from the streets of Detroit; a difference that at times leaves me fidgeting, feeling almost deficient, and longing for the view of tall buildings and chatter of the city. Home is now Florida. The pool waves caused by the filtration system reflect glistening patterns dancing on the walls and ceilings of my enclosed lanai.

The phone is ringing, causing me to sit up and retrieve it from the umbrella table nearby. Hello! I say, expecting a member from my family to be calling, as I've barely been moved in a week and few friends have my new number.

Hey! a voice loudly erupts. You piece of shit stoolie! We know who you are and where you are, and we knew who you were when you were playing your little F’n games. Watch your ass, you prick!

The line goes dead. I pause and again say Hello! but no one is there. Removing my sunglasses, I replay in my head the words spoken to me on the phone. Raising my beer bottle to my lips, I effortlessly swallow the remaining contents.

The doorbell is now ringing. What timing! Looking through the door peephole, I can clearly see the smiling face of an older woman who is holding a wicker basket filled with various papers, and what looks like samples of household items. Yes, it's the Welcome Lady promoting various businesses in the area.

Hi Boss, it’s Fuzzy! Lieutenant Berry replies.

Fuzzy! What the hell do you want? I thought I got rid of you. His typical way of trying to be humorous. I’m calling to tell you about a call I just received.

After hearing my story, he says he will take care of it. He didn’t say what he plans on doing, just that he will take care of it – Period!

At the County Courthouse, after signing my name and being sworn in by the Clerk’s Office, I receive a concealed weapons permit. The local newspaper feels that a short story is needed on how effortlessly a former law enforcement officer can obtain his permit, while the stack of citizens' formal requests go unanswered.

Not surprised by their anger, I wonder what their reaction would have been had they ever been exposed to the filth, greed, corruption, and low-life’s who were part of my covert life in the Motor City? Florida temperatures are decreasing, and low 70’s are the norm for the fall season, so I'm told.

After weekly telephone conference calls with Assistant Federal Attorneys, I will soon be called upon as a witness in the trials consisting of multiple defendants.

After being sworn in at the Federal Courthouse, the designated attorney says, Why don’t you start from the beginning and tell us how this assignment developed. And so it began!

CHAPTER ONE

Twenty-one damp degrees, flurries falling like paper airplanes from heaven, a round bright moon, and here I lie on my stomach as though glued in place to the third level of a train’s empty automobile carrier. This railway yard is gargantuan! More acreage is consumed here by cold steel tracks than many other towns. Staying alert translates to staying alive. It’s incredible how a single boxcar, being switched a quarter of a mile away by a powerful engine, can quietly glide down the tracks to its new destination in an almost eerie silence. Constantly, you must be aware of these rolling assassins. If not, your life can be snuffed out in seconds.

The radio surveillance channel crackles in my ear piece, breaking the night silence. Slugg-o to Fuzzy! The target is coming toward you. The target is a cop, a railroad cop, a suspected dirty railroad cop.

Informants have told of cases of liquor, television sets, and scores of tires all filling this ranking railroad officer’s residential garage. Besides being a thief, he is rumored to have shot a lone subordinate who surprised him months earlier during a break-in of a loaded boxcar. It’s our turn, the Cargo Theft Unit (CTU), to take down this scumbag!

Crunching of the ice and snow under his boots is a sound that taunts my nerves, like screams piercing the humid air, or someone running their fingernails down a chalkboard. My vision is hindered by nature’s barrier of snow flurries. Suddenly, his face appears in the light of the moon, unmistakably it's him! As with all criminals, you believe they can be armed. This guy is armed not only with his 9mm Smith & Wesson, but also with a pry bar swinging like a pendulum in his right hand.

Riveting his flashlight on the door of the boxcar, which is merely 100 feet away, he reads the seal, It's Showtime! As he breaks the seal, I’m lying on my stomach, pulse racing, and not moving a muscle. The crispness of the air provides an incredible stage for sound. Using the pry bar enables him to budge the hefty door. Pushing and grunting, he opens the door wide enough for his 6’2, 230-pound frame. After laying the pry bar down at the open door, he stretches out his lanky arms, grabs the door frame, and like a Grizzly searching for food, he pulls himself into the boxcar. Fuzzy to Slugg-o, Bear, Tricks, and Fish! He’s hitting now," I whisper over the surveillance radio channel. The plan is to take him down as he attempts to make his hit, but he exits without anything, and our case is weak, at best.

As he walks back in the direction he came from, I'm able to communicate with the other members of the surveillance team. It's agreed that we have to wait. He needs to come back and remove whatever contents are in the boxcar. Although I’m wearing gloves, the acute temperature is causing my fingers to become stiff.

An hour and twenty minutes has ticked off since anyone of us has seen him. Ice is forming on my beard and mustache with every exhale. My ears are struggling to cling to the surveillance radio ear-piece. My partners, Slugg-o and Fish, have maneuvered to a position where they can observe the target’s private vehicle. They announce that the target is entering his private vehicle. Headlights are on, motor is running, and he’s heading toward you, Fuzzy! Slugg-o broadcasts. Softly, I confirm knowledge of his transmission. It couldn’t have been any better. This scumbag of a police officer is driving down the service road adjacent to the track housing the boxcar that he already hit.

His Chrysler comes to a stop just south of my location. He exits and, like a kid at Christmas, he's whistling. He climbs up and makes his way over a line of rail cars stopped on the tracks. Walking up to the open door of his treasure chest, he enters. Heads up, he’s inside, I say when updating the surveillance team on the progress. It’s now looking as though his life is about to change from certified police officer to certified criminal. Large white boxes are giving him a struggle as he tries to place them at the door's opening. From my vantage point, I can’t see exactly what they are, but they appear to be heavy, as he stacks three of them in the doorway.

My heart is pounding and my adrenaline is building. You have to wonder if by chance this guy is hearing your radio or your body movements, and will he shoot, as he’s been suspected of doing in the past? Up until now, my weapon has remained holstered. But I now have it in my ungloved right hand, ready for the next scenario. The radio volume is down and I can hear Bear instructing the others on the radio as to the layout of the yard, and where the road leading to that the Chrysler is parked on. I am to tell them if he loads anything into the Chrysler. By now, this thief has taken one of the boxes off the train and is carrying it in the direction of his vehicle. Unbelievable! I’m thinking, as he sets the box down and under the stationary boxcar. Slowly, he lowers himself to the frozen turf and pushes the box under the stopped train, and then follows by crawling underneath. He has to know that this train isn’t going anywhere, because only a fool would risk the chance of becoming mincemeat by the train’s steel wheels.

This stupid bastard is still whistling. He's no longer visible to me, but I can hear what I believe to be his car door opening. Now I can hear him talking on the railroad's police radio. Again, I whisper an update over the radio. It’s decided that it’s too risky to take him down here. Looking like a turtle that is frolicking in the snow, he is on all fours as he comes back underneath the same box car. His amusing whistle has stopped, only to be replaced with him humming a rendition of the Christmas song, Santa Claus is Coming to Town. Once again, he boosts himself up into the boxcar and prepares another white box for departure. The plan now is to wait for him to load and drive away, and a roller will take him down on a traffic stop. A roller is a marked police vehicle in language spoken by surveillance officers. Roller is one of many strange definitions that come about automatically after years of operating incognito.

Again, he carries a second white box while leaving his trail in the snow. And just as he did the first time, he leaves with another box. This soon-to-be former police officer pushes the box under the boxcar, but this time he sits down in the accumulating snow and uses his feet to direct the box under the boxcar. Now he's assuming the position on all fours and is crawling out of my view. I’m feeling excited about the thought of this man, who wears a badge, soon being arrested. Again, I can hear him as he's loading the boxes into the Chrysler. Removing a third box from the doorway, he's using the pry bar to budge the door shut. This is his third trip and third time of lowering his body and crawling under the massive boxcar. I can hear the Chrysler start up, and am listening as he and the unknown contents of the white boxes depart.

Now that my frozen body is finally able to move, I immediately inform the team of his departure. Tricks already has a roller standing by in the area to make the traffic stop. Feeling rather comfortable, I'm able to turn up the radio and hear Tricks radioing the rollers that the target is a police officer and is armed. All caution is exercised. The rollers are in the area being assisted by a four-man occupied major crime cruiser. The thief drives his vehicle onto the street and approaches the red traffic signal when coming to a stop. The marked units and the unmarked cruiser quickly approach the Chrysler and activate their blue police lights.

The intensity of the blue lights is compounded by the glistening snow. The thief momentarily starts to proceed through the now green light, but the rollers immediately box him in. Like a corralled bull in a pen, he has nowhere to escape. The officers exit their vehicles and assume protected positions with their weapons drawn. A sergeant from the four-man cruiser breaks the night silence by using the PA System. Hold up your hands so we can see them! The thief is rushed by six officers as his driver’s door is swung open. He is grabbed by these officers like starving dogs discovering a bowl of food.

Without incident, the arrest is made. He proceeds to tell the uniformed officers that he has just recovered the merchandise. The merchandise, now known to be 19-inch Panasonic televisions, was allegedly found on the ground, according to this useless supervisory rank of a captain cop. It wasn’t long before the now defendant knew he had been under surveillance. He had previously heard of the reputation of our unit and happens to know Bear and Fish. They are railroad detectives temporarily assigned to the Cargo Theft Unit (CTU) of this major metropolitan Police Department.

After our high-fives, slaps on each other’s backs, and obligatory mounds of reports, we drive back to our Cargo Theft Office. Slugg-o checks for messages and discovers an Agent Vaskins of the United States Secret Service wants us to meet with him. The following day our career is about to change.

CHAPTER TWO

A call is placed to Agent Vaskins down at the Federal Building. He isn't available; seems he's at lunch or at the gym, but no one knows for sure. After leaving a message that we returned his call and that he could get a hold of us through Dispatch, we too head for lunch.

After being partners with Slugg-o all these years, we've become very accustomed to each other’s likes and dislikes. Actually, that’s an understatement. I am a master at reading his eyes and body movements, and know where his line of questioning is heading. Both of us can pick up on each other’s bullshit conversation and flow with it until our heads are spinning, while listening to our skill of adlibbing. We are not members of the Actors Guild, but our acting skills, nonetheless, keep us out of harm's way. We are both married, but the reality is that we spend more time with each other than with our respective spouses. When his children were born, I was nearby, as we were bonded, without a doubt.

After consuming lunch in the Greek Isles section of the city, a call comes in from Dispatch that Agent Vaskins is in his office and wishes to hear from us. We drive the Rat over to the Federal Building. Rat is a legend in that it is our assigned old four-door Chevrolet, which the city refuses to repair due to the age of the vehicle. Fleet management warned us that, if we brought the Rat in for repair, they will surely confiscate it. No problem, we thought. That was over two years ago, and in that time-frame, we had a series of repairs all completed by the graciousness of kind soles we had arrested.

I pull the Rat into the entrance of the Federal Building garage, and identify myself to the attendant by showing him my badge and I.D., asking if he has a spot to park the Rat. His eyes never look at the identification; rather, he keeps looking in amazement at the Rat. He then stares at us. His eyebrows are raised and his eyes shift back and forth from me to Slugg-o. Slugg-o resembles a cartoon character with a barrel chest that protrudes out of his black leather jacket. His long blonde hair is on his shoulders, and his beard is second to Grizzly Adams. I am being accused of looking like Charlie Manson’s twin, and am affectionately and professionally referred to as Fuzzy. The bewildered attendant turns his head sideways, spits