Patriots Versus Bureaucrats

by Thomas Temple

  Thursday, September 18, 2014

  The Coastal Highway just south of Galway, Ireland

  9:32am

  Michael Shaunessy had just checked out of the delightful bed and breakfast where he had stayed the previous night near Galway. With a good breakfast under his belt Shaunessy decided that today’s trip would take him south along the Coastal Highway. The view of the Irish Sea was spectacular and he drove quietly along in his rented Jaguar F-Type red convertible. His trip had been better than he had ever imagined as he wandered about Ireland at his own pace, often staying at little out of the way hotels and bed and breakfast inns. The nightly visits to the pubs were always a delight and the Irish people were friendly and good humored. They were especially helpful and friendly to the American with the Irish name of Shaunessy who was making a pilgrimage of sorts to the land of his ancestors.

  The red convertible began a long descent down the highway along a huge cliff looking down into the cobalt blue waters of the sea. It was a sunny and clear day along the coast and Shaunessy began looking for a safe place to stop so that he might capture the view on his camera. The trouble was that the highway was narrow and winding and did not offer much in the way of off road parking. He geared down as a switchback approached and reduced his speed to less than the recommended eighty kilometers displayed on the roadway sign. Suddenly the Jaguar began to shake as he approached the upcoming switchback turn. Both the brakes and the steering failed and Shaunessy crashed through the guardrail and plunged two hundred feet onto the boulder strewn beach below. The car burst into flames upon impact leaving little doubt as to the fate of the lone occupant. Two men drove past the burning wreckage, nodded at each other and drove quickly away. The Collective had accomplished another routine task.

  Friday, September 19, 2014

  10:45am

  EPA Headquarters, Washington DC

  Administrator Rassmusen was in her usual foul mood during the morning staff meeting when she was interrupted by an urgent call from the head of the Criminal Investigations Division, known as the CID. “I hope that you have some real news for a change Vinson,” Rassmusen growled into the telephone. “I certainly do, Madam Administrator, the boys at US-Cert has found the origination point of the hack and it is a private residence in McLean that belongs to Michael Shaunessy.”

  Rassmusen felt like she had been hit with a cattle prod. Michael Shaunessy had been with the EPA for over thirty years and had just retired as the Assistant Director of Information Technology, He would have possessed the technical expertise to execute an attack on the EPA systems, but why would he. Before she could verbalize these thoughts Vinson advised her that the CID and the US-CERT teams were in route to Shaunessy’s residence with the appropriate search warrants. “Great, just let me know as soon as you have the bastard in custody,” instructed the EPA head as she rang off and returned to haranguing her staff.

  Four vehicles carrying eight EPA CID agents and eight members of the US-CERT team converged on the quiet suburban residence of Michael Shaunessy. Guns were drawn and agents moved into position to cover all exits from the house. Getting no response from within, armed agents kicked in the door and entered the home as if the Jesse James Gang was making a last stand there. Nobody was home and judging by the amount unopened mail, nobody had been there for several weeks. Satisfied that a sixty year old retired bureaucrat was not going to attack them with multiple automatic weapons the agents began executing the search warrant. They seized computers, files, papers, books, financial records, and anything that looked like it would yield some information to aid their investigation. They were about to conclude their raid when one of the agents opened the chest freezer located in the basement and discovered the frozen body of Milton Jernigan. Suddenly things became more complicated.

  Charles Vinson, the EPA’s head of CID, was determined to keep jurisdiction of the case even though neither he nor anyone else in his division had any experience with homicide investigations. Bella Rassmusen totally agreed since Jernigan was an EPA official who had been missing for several weeks and presumed to be a victim of some sort of accident while he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. The EPA had been the target of a computer attack that apparently was instigated by a recently retired and disgruntled employee of the EPA. Rasmussen was determined to keep the investigation and, most importantly, control of the information within her agency. The first task was to locate and apprehend Michael Shaunessy. Unknown to Vinson or Rassmusen was the fact that the charred body of their suspect had been transported to the US Embassy in Dublin and was being flown back to the United States for burial by the next of kin. The Irish police, known as the Gardai, had completed their investigation and determined that Shaunessy had died in a tragic accident while driving near Galway in the western part of Ireland. Superintendent Colin Mahoney of the Gardai had officially closed the file on the investigation and forwarded a copy of his findings to the US Ambassador. It would take Vinson and his investigators over a week to discover these facts.

  The CID had asked virtually every law enforcement agency within the Federal Government to help locate and arrest Michael Shaunessy, to no avail. Finally the sleuths at the CID caught a break when a secretary in the CID noticed Shaunessy’s obituary in the Washington Post. The story leaked out and the EPA’s CID became the laughing stock of every Federal and local law enforcement agency in the metropolitan area.

  Despite the humiliation of finding the whereabouts of their suspect from the obituary pages in the newspaper, the CID had discovered some very troubling information about Shaunessy. His computer revealed a number of wire transfers that involved several million dollars. These transfers were routed through several countries and ended in the Principality of Andorra on the French and Spanish border. Then the money simply vanished. Several travel guides on Andorra, France, and Spain were found at Shaunessy’s home. There was also a language tape that taught one to understand and speak Catalan, the native language of Andorra. The plane reservations that Shaunessy had made for a Dublin to Barcelona flight virtually confirmed the theory that Shaunessy had decided to escape to Andorra, a country without an extradition treaty with the United States, and never return. Jernigan’s autopsy revealed that he had been tortured extensively. The theory concluded by the CID was that Shaunessy had kidnapped and tortured Jernigan to obtain sensitive information to facilitate the attack on the EPA’s computers. Although no one at CID could explain the how and why of the wire transfers of millions of dollars on Shaunessy’s behalf, it was assumed that he had been paid by some third party who had an interest in disabling the EPA’s operations. Naturally, since he died in the traffic accident, the people who paid him simply retrieved their money. Such were the conclusions of a totally amateur law enforcement agency that was no match for the expertise and resources of the Collective.

  Bella Rasmussen was more than happy for the conclusion of the investigation into the attack on the EPA’s computer systems. The culprit had been found and had garnered his just deserts in an accidental and brutal death.

  There was some small satisfaction in knowing that Shaunessy would not be able to enjoy the fruits of his crime. The disappearance and murder of a senior EPA official, Milton Jernigan, had been solved. Now Bella could devote her sole attention to the problems that resulted from the computer attack.

  Rassmusen took stock of the current situation at the EPA and was not at all pleased. The computer people reported that it would be at least six months before files and reports could be sorted out and returned to the proper regional offices. In the meantime personnel from the various regional offices would have to effectively change places with each other to accomplish a minimum of important tasks. This was wreaking havoc on the budget and the personal life of many of the key employees. Morale was low and getting worse since bureaucrats can’t resist sticking their noses into other people’s business, even those within their own agency. People in one regional office looked into the personal emails of the personnel of the regional office whose
files they had received in the attack and vice versa. Everybody was playing one-upmanship and resentments were growing every day. Accusations of poaching were especially vicious among the CID agents of different regional offices. Making arrests and collecting fines were the currency of promotions and career advancement.

  Bella decided that it would be impractical to attempt to write the many new regulations that were scheduled in the coming months. The regulations dealing with WOTUS, known as Water Of The United States, were some of the most important and far reaching regulations to be effected in years. She decided that it would be best to delay the final writing of these regulations until the agency was back at full strength. What could be addressed immediately was the current poor state of morale within the senior ranks of the EPA. She needed to get her staff and all of the heads of the regional offices together for an executive session and retreat. In the next several days her staff came up with a proposal for a meeting in late October at the Blackwater Canyon Resort in West Virginia, just a two hour drive from Washington, DC. Administrator Rassmusen approved the plan immediately and directed all of her staff and the regional directors to clear their calendars for the event.

  Sitting in the most secure area at the “farm” near St. Louis, Hawkins had a newfound respect for the Vulcan. He was receiving the emails from the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency at the same time that her staff and regional directors were receiving them. After reviewing the plans for the executive session and retreat in October, Hawkins thought to himself, “just like shooting fish in a barrel.”

  CHAPTER 11 - OPPORTUNITY KNOCKS

  Monday, September 28, 2014

  7:42 pm

  34,000 feet above northwestern Nebraska

  Pete Wallis poured himself another shot of Macallan and lit up a cigar. One nice thing about owning your own jet is not having somebody tell you that smoking is prohibited.

  Wallis was eager to get back to the ranch and chill out for a few days. He had been running almost non-stop since last Friday.

  First there was the trip to St. Louis to meet with Snyder and Hawkins at the “Farm” on Friday. Final plans were made for the transport of materials from the Mole Works to the Farm. Then it was off to the Mole Works in Kansas to implement the transportation plans for the “recycled geothermal pipe” from Kansas to Missouri. While at the Mole Works Pete also gathered up sixteen guidance modules for the MAIMS and documented the scrapping and cannibalization of the guidance module components. The return trip from the Mole Works to Wyoming featured a side trip to St. Louis to deposit the guidance modules and another five million in cash. During this second trip to St. Louis in three days, Pete briefed Hawkins’ operatives on the use of the TAMES and MAIMS. The programming of these systems had already been implemented by Pete during his two days at the Mole Works. Hawkins would obtain the solid rocket fuel and the high explosive and incendiary payloads from several of the “Chemists” within the Collective.

  Pete was pleased to hear about the EPA intelligence that Hawkins was obtaining in real time and he immediately approved the suggestion to extend Operation Indigestion to include the EPA meeting in October. It was simply an opportunity that might not present itself again and the price tag of an additional five million dollars was well within Peter Wallis’ budget. Pete was thankful for his decision to convert fifty million of his fortune to actual cash and another twenty million into gold coins and bullion. This was done in early 2008 soon after Wallis had sold all of his plants except the Mole Works and really was unsure of what he wanted to do then with the bulk of his fortune.

  Pete deployed a good bit of his wealth in 2009 and 2010 into significant shares of good quality companies and as a result had increased his net worth to almost four billion dollars. There was no need to convert the cash and gold into investments so he just kept them in the high security vaults built by Snyder Security Services. One of the vaults was located beneath his house at the ranch and the other vault was placed on Level 9 in the Mole Works.

  Thursday, October 16, 2014

  1:45pm

  EPA Headquarters, Washington, DC

  Bella Rasmussen was very pleased with the plans for the weekend executive retreat for her staff and all of the Regional Administrators. Her executive assistant had suggested two weeks ago that the retreat should include all of the Chief Technology Officers from the ten EPA regions in order to get their insights into the progress that was being made in sorting out the problems that Michael Shaunessy had created. Their inclusion would also allow them to meet their counterparts from the other regions and share ideas about solving the mutual problems of reconstructing files and programs. The attendance would include Administrator Rasmussen, her executive assistant, her Deputy Administrator, four Associate Administrators, twelve Assistant Administrators, ten Regional Administrators, and ten regional Chief Technology Officers, for a total of thirty-nine people. There would be a welcoming cocktail party on Friday at the Marriott near Dulles Airport. Saturday morning everyone would be transported by vans to the Blackwater Canyon Resort for a series of meetings.

  The Blackwater Canyon Resort was in the Allegheny Mountains of West Virginia, only one hundred and twenty-five miles from Washington, DC. Bella Rasmussen thought the resort was perfect for the EPA executive retreat due to its proximity to Washington and its commitment to “green” operations. The resort consisted of a luxury hotel of two hundred and thirty rooms and a separate observatory that provided spectacular views of the Blackwater River Canyon. The hotel was proud of its solar heating, menus of organic foods, bio-degradable consumables, and electric vehicles.

  The resort was opened in 2010 upon a special approval of the US Park Service to build a “green” resort on land that had been closed to any other type of commercial enterprise. The Blackwater Canyon Resort was the meeting place of choice for environmental organizations and lobbyists who were not put off by the six hundred dollar nightly room rate. Since the EPA budget was generous in its authorization for training and travel, cost was not an issue. The taxpayers should be happy that the Federal Government employed such dedicated and qualified public servants within the EPA. Of the thirty-nine attendees who were convinced that they were saving the world, not one had felt any obligation to defend the United States by donning a military uniform in his or her career. With the exception of the Chief Technology Officers, no one in attendance possessed a scientific degree or had ever worked in an industry they were regulating. The academic degrees of choice were law and public administration. The EPA was proud of its record for diversity and its top management reflected that commitment. In attendance would be twenty-one women, ten of whom were African-American, eight African-American men, six Asian men (all Chief Technology Officers), and four Caucasian men. To some this demographic proved that the EPA was hiring the best and brightest; to others, not so much.

  Friday, October 17, 2014

  11:10pm

  Blackwater Canyon Resort Observatory

  A small man dressed in black emerged from the darkness and walked briskly to the service entrance for the elevator that rose sixty feet from the ground level to the circular room that served as the gathering place for the Observatory. Within seconds he had picked the lock and entered the service room, carrying a large duffle bag. Five minutes later he emerged, locked the door behind him, and melted away into the forest.

  Saturday, October 18, 2014

  9:30am

  Marriott Hotel near Dulles Airport

  Washington, DC

  Bella Rasmussen looked on approvingly as all of the participants loaded onto the six passenger vans that would transport them on their two hour trip to the Blackwater Canyon Resort. A seventh van brought everyone’s luggage. The cocktail party last night achieved Bella’s purpose of having the guests mingle with one another and provide at least the beginnings of personal relationships that hopefully would reduce some of the hard feelings that had developed between the Regional Administrators during the last six weeks. The atmosphe
re at this morning’s breakfast was enthusiastic and friendly. Tonight Bella would deliver a carefully rehearsed speech that she hoped would promote unity and a sense of increased dedication to their noble purpose at the EPA.

  The vans arrived at the resort on schedule at 11:48 am. The staff was waiting and well prepared for their arrival. Within thirty minutes all of the guests had been checked in and shown to their rooms. A small ballroom had been reserved as a hospitality suite and guests were encouraged to drop by for refreshments and conversation with their colleagues. There was to be an early dinner at 4:00 pm to accommodate the planned meeting at the Observatory at 5:30 pm. Today was a perfect autumn day, sunny and a comfortable sixty degrees. The fall colors of the native hardwoods were in full glory. The view of the sunset at 6:25 pm from the Observatory should be breathtaking and inspirational. The vans headed back to Washington and would return Sunday at noon.

  The Observatory was located a half of mile due west of the hotel. It was accessible by vehicle via a small gravel road that wound around a heavily wooded hill that blocked direct vision from the hotel. There was also a footpath along the gravel road for those who chose to walk. The Observatory rose sixty feet from a limestone slab on the edge of a thousand foot cliff overlooking the Blackwater Canyon and the sparkling waters of Blackwater River. The view was to the southwest and was unobstructed as far as the naked eye could see.