The Program

by James Swain

The door behind her opened. A large, balding Russian dressed in black came out, his left foot hobbled by a plaster cast.

  “Dimitri Tursenev?” Linderman asked.

  “That is me. What is this about?” the Russian asked timidly.

  “I’m conducting a criminal investigation. A suspect in a case made a phone call from one of your pay phones this morning. I want to know who he called.”

  “You want to see my phone logs?”

  “Yes, if you don’t mind.”

  Tursenev visibly relaxed. He opened his arms as if greeting an old friend.

  “Of course. Step into my office.”

  Linderman followed him through the door. The FBI had followed a wave of Russian mobsters who had swept into the United States during the past decade. With briefcases filled with cash, they’d bought homes and businesses and taken on the American dream, some succeeding, others failing miserably. Tursenev — bloated, poorly dressed, his face more confused than proud — appeared to be one of those failures.

  The office had cheap bamboo shades covering the windows and faded carpet. A coin-counting machine filled with quarters sat behind the desk. The article on Google had said that Tursenev’s strip clubs had made a hundred thousand a week before being shut down. The big Russian had fallen hard.

  “So how may I help the world’s greatest crime-fighting organization this morning?” Tursenev asked.

  Linderman produced a slip of paper containing the address of the pay phone which Mr. Clean had used. “I need to see a log of calls placed from this phone.”

  Tursenev studied the slip, then consulted a map of Broward County hanging on the wall. Finding the address, he dropped himself into a swivel chair, and let his pudgy fingers dance across his computer keyboard. “Each Sky Tell phone has a six-digit code. The code acts as a password, and will let me find the information you want in our computer system.”

  A short list of numbers filled the computer screen. Linderman came around the desk to have a better look. As he did, Tursenev stiffened.

  “Something wrong?”

  “It is nothing,” the big Russian said.

  Tursenev’s eyes darted to the canvas bag lying beneath the desk. Linderman felt tempted to pull the bag out, and have a look inside. Only that wasn’t why he was here. Instead, he pointed at the computer screen.

  “Are these the calls originating from that phone?”

  “Yes,” Tursenev said under his breath.

  Linderman stared at the list. Only one phone call had been made between seven and seven-fifteen that morning. The call had a nine-zero-four area code, which was the area code for Jacksonville, Florida. Mr. Clean had called someone in Jacksonville before he’d murdered the Harmony driver and abducted Wayne Ladd. If Linderman could track that person down, he’d be one step closer to learning Mr. Clean’s identity.

  “I need a copy of this page,” Linderman said.

  Tursenev hit a command on the keyboard. The printer on the desk purred like a kitten, and a sheet spit out. Linderman removed it from the tray, and placed it on the desk.

  “I want you to sign and date this, and authenticate that this phone number came from this pay phone,” Linderman said.

  Tursenev made a pen appear and signed his name with a flourish. Linderman signed and dated the page as well, just in case it needed to be later used as evidence in court. He folded the sheet and slipped it into his jacket pocket.

  “Are we done?” Tursenev asked.

  “Yes. Thank you for your help.”

  Tursenev pulled a metal flask and two shot glasses from his desk drawer. “I sense you have found something which is important to your investigation,” he said, filling the glasses with a clear liquid. “I believe a toast is in order.”

  “What are you pouring?” Linderman asked.

  “Vodka.”

  “No thanks.”

  “I will not tell, if that is what you are thinking.”

  Tursenev raised one of the shot glasses to his lips and waited. Linderman found himself being tempted. Maybe a quick jolt would lift him out of his dark mood. After all, it was his day off, and he could do whatever the hell he wanted.

  He picked up the shot glass.

  “To your health,” Tursenev said.

  “And to yours.”

  They clinked glasses. Tursenev smile broadly, his mouth filled with dark, crooked teeth. Linderman saw something in that smile that he hadn’t seen before. It was the look of a man who’d succumbed to temptation long ago, and who’d helped him solely because he was afraid Linderman might search his office, and discover all sorts of bad things. It was the face of the devil, hidden behind a pleasant Russian accent.

  He had known many men like Tursenev; they were the bane of his existence. To let Tursenev penetrate his defenses was a mistake, for it would taint his ability to do his job, and rub against his soul like a rough stone. Linderman had to stay clean. He had come to that conclusion long ago, for it was the only way to stay out of the abyss.

  He put the shot glass down and left the office.

  9/11 had changed many things in criminal investigations. Perhaps the most notable was the ability to track a phone number, be it a land line, or a cell phone. In the old days, the process took time and sometimes even court orders, and often brought investigations to a standstill. Today, the process was much faster, with the three major phone companies willing to give up the information to any government agency who requested it.

  With his car’s AC blasting in his face, Linderman sent out official FBI information requests on his laptop to AT&T, Verizon, and Sprint, asking them to supply him with the name of the owner of the 904 telephone number.

  Five minutes later, one of the companies replied.

  The company was Verizon. The 904 number which Mr. Clean had called belonged to cell phone owned by a Verizon customer named Eric Drake who lived at 387 Foxtrot Road in Jacksonville.

  It was a good start.

  Linderman called Verizon’s corporate office in lower Manhattan, and asked for their legal department. Soon he was speaking to a company lawyer, who informed him that Verizon would not produce logs of customer calls without court orders. Linderman told the lawyer the investigation involved the abduction of a minor. That changed things. “Promise me a subpoena signed by week’s end, and I’ll email you the information immediately,” the lawyer said.

  “You’ve got it,” Linderman said.

  “Give me your email address,” the lawyer said.

  An email from Verizon soon appeared on his laptop. Finding a McDonald’s, he ate lunch in his car while studying a spread sheet showing every call made and received on Eric Drake’s cell phone in the past twelve months.

  On average, Drake made seven outgoing calls a week on his cell phone, with all of the calls made late at night. Every outgoing call was made to a 954 or 754 area code, which was Broward County. The calls were to different numbers, with not a single duplication over a twelve-month period. Either Drake knew several hundred people in Broward — which was unlikely — or he calling pay phones so the calls couldn’t be traced.

  The incoming calls to Drake’s cell phone were the same, only less in volume. Drake received one or two incoming calls a week, all from Broward County, and all from different numbers. It was highly suspicious, and suggested that Drake was running some sort of criminal operation.

  Linderman decided to run a background check to see if Drake had a record. Using his laptop, he went to the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System, and typed in Drake’s name and address. The system was far from instant, and a Please Stand By message appeared on his screen.

  Then he had a thought. Regardless of what he found, either he or Vick would want to fly to Jacksonville, and interview Drake. At some point, the director of the FBI’s Jacksonville office would have to get involved. Better now than later, he decided.

  Vaughn Wood ran the FBI’s Jacksonville office, and had gone through the FBI academy with Linderman. Wood had made his chops
doing undercover work, and had brought down an outlaw motorcycle gang. Linderman was one of the few people who knew Wood’s nickname when he’d run with the gang. They’d called him Little Jesus.

  He called Wood’s office line, and heard his friend pick up.

  “Hey, Ken, I’m in the middle of lunch. How’s it going?”

  “I need a favor, LJ. Have you ever run across a guy named Eric Drake? He had a cell phone conversation with a serial killer this morning. I’m trying to find out why.”

  “He lives in Jax?”

  “According to phone records, yes.”

  “Name doesn’t ring any bells. Are you sure the name is real?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “A lot of criminals use aliases when they purchase cell phones. That way, we can’t run them down.”

  “I don’t know if the name is real, or not.”

  “Let me see what I can dig up,” Wood said. “Call you back on this number?”

  “I’ll be here.”

  Linderman sat in the McDonald’s parking lot and waited for a call back. He had spent most of his career toiling in an office at Quantico, protected from the outside world. Only since becoming a field agent had he experienced the bitter pill when a case broke bad, and all his hard work led to nothing.

  Wood called him back. He wanted the news to be good, and the dark clouds swirling around him to evaporate. He answered by saying, “That was fast.”

  “This is a beauty,” Wood said.

  “Let me guess. Drake has a criminal record a mile long.”

  “Actually, he’s clean as a whistle. Never committed a crime in his life, as far as we know.”

  “Then why is this a beauty?”

  “Eric Drake is a guard at Florida State Prison in Starke.”

  Chapter 7

  Linderman knew of Florida State Prison. Also known as Starke Prison, it was a brutal correctional facility in north/central Florida that housed some of the worst criminals in the country, many of whom sat on death row, awaiting the executioner’s call.

  Eric Drake had been a guard at Starke Prison for three and a half years, and presently worked the graveyard shift. Thirty-three years old, he was a highschool grad with four years in the Navy. He shared a house in nearby Jacksonville with his brother, Randy, a known crystal meth dealer. Outside of his brother’s lengthy rap sheet, there were no blemishes on Drake’s resume.

  Linderman was deeply concerned by this new twist in the investigation. Starke Prison housed a number of notorious serial killers, several of whom he’d profiled while at Quantico. Eric Drake came in contact with those offenders every day, and now he was linked with another serial killer, this one on the outside. Linderman’s gut told him there was a link, and he needed to find out what it was.

  “How badly do you want to talk to this guy?” Wood asked.

  “Badly,” Linderman replied. “A serial killer named Mr. Clean spoke with Drake this morning. I want to know why.”

  “Should I haul him in?”

  “I’d prefer if you put Drake under Special Ops, and watch him. I need to talk to the agent handling the case about our next step.”

  “Who’s in charge?”

  “Rachel Vick.”

  “You pick Vick in charge?”

  “She asked, so I said yes.”

  “Do you think she’s ready?”

  “She needed to get her feet wet. I’ll call you once I know something.”

  Linderman drove to the Broward County Sheriff’s Department headquarters on Andrews Avenue. Special Ops was a surveillance procedure used by the FBI to monitor people of interest, and employed wire-tapping, hidden tracking devices, and small planes and helicopters to follow a person’s movements twenty-four/seven. It was a real life Big Brother, and he hoped it turned up information that explained what Drake was doing.

  Sheriff’s headquarters was humming as he walked in, a mixture of uniformed cops, lawyers in expensive suits, and their clients in cheap threads. The food chain in law enforcement was strange that way; only the hired mouths seemed to prosper.

  He showed his ID to the receptionist, and asked for Vick. He was directed to the third floor, office at the end of the hall. Rachel was at a computer when he entered.

  “Good morning. How’s it going?” he asked.

  “I’m almost done,” Vick replied. “The web site devoted to catching Mr. Clean will be ready to go live this afternoon. Tell me what you think.”

  He pulled up a chair. You couldn’t be in the forensic business without being computer literate, and he recognized his own limitations. That was why he liked to work with young people. They’d grown up playing on computers, and were more comfortable with them than driving cars.

  The web site Vick had created to catch Mr. Clean was a static site, without any streaming audio or fancy computer graphics. In that regard, it was identical to other web sites run by the Broward Police, and used the same color schemes and typeface. A letter on the home page from Chief Moody contained his smiling photo.

  The site had three distinct areas. The first was devoted to information about the abductions and killings; the second, a physical profile of Mr. Clean along with an artist’s composite; the third, a blog where people could share tips or exchange ideas about the case.

  There was a certain clumsiness to the site that was immediately evident, including a number of misspelled words and an occasional grammatical mistake. He assumed that Vick had found similar mistakes on other web sites run by the Broward cops, and had decided to emulate them.

  Vick had also decided to play a psychological game with Mr. Clean. In the profile area, she’d referred to Mr. Clean as “a sloppy dresser,” when in fact they knew he was meticulous about his appearance. She had also stated that their suspect was “Hispanic, possibly of Mexican descent” when they knew he was Cuban. Vick had purposely included these mistakes on the site to target Mr. Clean’s vanity, and irritate him. Hopefully, he’d come onto the site, and post a correction on the blog.

  “I like it,” Linderman said. “What software did you use?”

  “Dream catcher,” Vick said.

  “How will you track viewers who come on the site?”

  “I’m going to place an alarmed visual traceroute program in front of the site. If anyone accesses the site, either by hacking or through authorized channels, a notice of the person’s ISP and physical location will be instantly sent to my BlackBerry. Using that information, I should be able to find out who that person is, and run a background check on them. If they’re someone of interest, I’ll proceed accordingly.”

  Vick made it sound like another day at the office. Only it seldom worked out that way; serial killers often understood computers and the Internet as well as they did. He said, “When do you plan to go live with this?”

  “By six o’clock. I want to make tonight’s local news broadcasts. Chief Moody has agreed to have one of his detectives hold a press conference, and trumpet the site. The publicity should generate a wave of viewers the first night. After that, traffic will thin out, and only family members and the morbidly curious will visit. And hopefully our killer.”

  “Which detective is going to the media?”

  “DuCharme.”

  Linderman frowned. “Why him?”

  “He was the first plainclothes detective at the crime scene, and spoke with a newspaper reporter. He also broke the news to Wayne Ladd’s mother yesterday. Chief Moody felt that for continuity’s sake, DuCharme should be the police’s face on the case.”

  “How do you feel about that?”

  Vick started to reply, then stopped. Rising from her chair, she went to the door, shut it, then sat back down. “DuCharme’s an asshole. He also thinks he’s God’s gift to women. Personally, I’d rather not work with him, but I think Moody has a valid point.”

  “You don’t want DuCharme jeopardizing your investigation. Get rid of him the moment he starts acting up. Understand?”

  Vick’s face reddened. She mumbled �
�Yes, sir.” and nodded stiffly. She acted flustered, and it made Linderman wonder if he’d made the right decision in turning the case over to her. There could be no hesitation or second-guessing when dealing with evil. He stared at the web site she’d created to catch their killer.

  “I tracked down the person Mr. Clean called from the pay phone this morning,” he said. “His name is Eric Drake. He lives in Jacksonville, and works as a guard at Florida State Prison in Starke.”

  “Mr. Clean called a prison guard?”

  “Yes. According to Drake’s phone records, he’s received several hundred phone calls from Broward County over the past twelve months, all from different numbers and no number twice. A rather odd pattern, don’t you think?”