Abuse of Power

by Nancy Taylor Rosenberg

  The day before, he had applied for a job as a security officer. The company had refused to accept his application on learning he had been terminated from the police department. He wiped his eyes with a comer of the bed sheet. His friends were gone. He would never be respected again, never feel he belonged again.

  The phone rang. He let the answering machine pick it up, fearing it was another reporter.

  “This is Lenny Schneider with Internal Affairs,” a man’s voice said. “We need to speak to Fred Ramone.”

  Ratso raced over and picked up the phone. They were going to give him his job back. “This is Ramone,” he said.

  “Good,” Schneider said briskly. “We were going over your personnel file and we came across something peculiar. We’d like to set up an appointment for you to come down and discuss it, say ten o’clock tomorrow morning.”

  “What’s peculiar?” Ratso said, his pulse pounding in his ears. Tomorrow was Sunday, and if Internal Affairs wanted him to come in over the weekend, he knew it had to be serious. “I don’t understand.”

  “Where did you go to school?”

  Ratso’s mind went blank. He couldn’t remember the name of the school his papers said he had attended. “Modesto,” he said finally.

  “That’s the town,” Schneider said. “I asked you the name of your high school.”

  Ratso didn’t answer. He gripped the phone with both hands.

  “On your application,” Schneider continued, “you listed the school as Freemont High.”

  “Yes,” Ratso said, “that’s right.” The carefully memorized details of his false identity were coming back to him. “I graduated in 1975, then I went on to community college.”

  “You didn’t graduate from Freemont High in 1975, friend,” Schneider said, staring at the data flashing on his computer screen. “Freemont High burned to the ground in 1973. The school district elected not to rebuild it, as the area in Modesto where the school was located was turning commercial and the property was too valuable. They sold the land, then later erected a new school a few blocks away on Coldwater Drive.”

  “Yes,” Ratso said. “I went to the new school.”

  “What was the name of the new school?”

  “Coldwater High,” Ratso said, improvising.

  “Then why does your high school diploma read Freemont High?”

  “They made a mistake.”

  Schneider looked over at his partner and smiled. “I don’t think so, Ramone,” he said, chuckling. “The new school was named Piedmont High, not Coldwater High. Your diploma is a forgery. First thing tomorrow morning—”

  Ratso let the receiver fall from his hands.

  They knew.

  It was over. They would deport him, send him back to Pakistan. He walked over and picked up a Remington 30.06 caliber rifle. He had bought it to go deer hunting with Jimmy Townsend and Grant Cummings the year before. Opening his bureau drawer, he pulled out a box of Black Talon ammo, loading four rounds into the chamber. Carrying it back to the bed with him, he placed the butt on the floor, then opened his mouth wide and lowered it onto the muzzle. His finger trembled on the trigger. He could not go back to Pakistan.

  For fifteen minutes he remained in the same position, his mouth sealed on the rifle. Finally he realized he could not do it. Letting the weapon tumble to the floor, he fell back onto the bed and stared at the ceiling. After a while, the water spots came to life, forming the image of a woman’s face. A sign from Allah, Ratso told himself, slipping off the edge of the bed and touching his forehead to the floor. He had been selfish, thinking only of himself instead of his friend. Now that he could no longer find a way to get the stolen money to his sisters, he would give it to Lindsey Townsend. He had seen his friend’s little girls on numerous occasions. This would be his final tribute to an honorable man.

  Picking the rifle up off the floor, he placed it beside him on the bed, stroking the barrel as if it were a lover. He had been given a new mission, a way to redeem himself. Once he completed his mission, he would be granted the courage to end his life.

  Lieutenant Lenny Schneider was an attractive man, with neatly trimmed blond hair and steely gray eyes. Generally he didn’t work on weekends, but since Internal Affairs was in the midst of a major corruption probe, he had been working around the clock. He was wearing a limp white dress shirt, dark slacks, and red suspenders, and his face was covered with several days’ growth of stubble. When Rachel and Carrie stepped through the door to his office, he asked his partner to leave and walked over to close the door.

  “Have a seat,” he said. “I’m pleased you’ve decided to cooperate with us. Things will move faster that way.”

  With Carrie’s prompting, Rachel talked for over an hour, painstakingly detailing the events she had witnessed inside the police department. She began with the Brentwood case, explaining how she suspected Townsend had planted the gun on the used car salesman. She told how she had awakened to find Grant Cummings on top of her at the watch party, then moved on to the riot at the Majestic Theater. She said she had seen Grant use the Hillmont boy as a human shield, and additionally witnessed Ratso using excessive force on another young man during the same incident. She described the pressure Sergeant Miller had applied to keep her from speaking out, along with the horror she had been subjected to inside the house on Maple Avenue when her fellow officers failed to respond for backup. She told of officers milking overtime, the use of sap gloves and steel-toed boots, blatant sexual harassment, evidence tampering, and filing false reports. She ended by telling the investigator about Grant’s vicious attack in the orange grove.

  Schneider reached over and hit the stop button on the tape recorder. “We’re investigating Fred Ramone from several angles,” he said. “Once the court issues a search warrant for his residence, we may be able to determine the extent of his involvement.”

  “What are you searching for?” Rachel asked, finding it hard to believe there would be evidence inside Ratso’s apartment from the shooting.

  “Oh,” Schneider said, “nothing much. Just fifty grand in drug money.”

  Rachel knew she had seen Ratso at the house on Maple Avenue, but only briefly. “What makes you think Ratso stole it?”

  “Ted Harriman saw Ramone carrying a package out of the back of the station the day after the money vanished from the crime scene,” he told her. “When Harriman quizzed him about what was inside the package, Ramone told him it was evidence. We looked over his activity sheet from the previous night and found no mention of any kind of evidence.”

  “Are you prepared to tell the DA what you’ve just told us?” Carrie said. “If you’re targeting Fred Ramone as the shooter, why isn’t he in custody?”

  “Talk to Bill Ringwald at the DA’s office,” Schneider said. “He doesn’t want us to arrest Ramone on probable cause. He wants the judge to issue an arrest warrant, and for that, we need more concrete evidence. With Cummings statement that Rachel was the shooter, Ringwald’s afraid the case might fall apart in the courtroom.”

  “What about Ratso’s fingerprints?” Carrie said. “The lab lifted them off the locker adjacent to Grant’s.”

  Schneider placed a hand inside one of his suspenders. “Ramone could easily explain the prints,” he said. “He could say his padlock got jammed one day, and in his rush to get out of the station, he simply shoved his gear into one of the vacant lockers.”

  “The prints weren’t found on the door handle,” Carrie told him, “they were lifted from the interior walls.”

  “So?” Schneider said, shrugging. “The floor in the men’s locker room is often wet. Ramone can say he lost his footing on a slippery tile, and had to brace himself by placing his hands against the interior walls of the locker.”

  Carrie shook her head. Rachel was right about the police department, she decided, wondering if her decision to cooperate with them had been a mistake. Schneider was slick. He seemed to have an explanation for everything.

  “Ringwald wants us to
dig up every piece of dirt we can find on Ramone, then use it to draw out a confession,” he said. “The longer we rattle his cage, the better chance we have that Ramone may crack during interrogation.” Schneider covered his mouth and yawned. “The only reason we came to suspect Ramone is the statement Ted Harriman gave us. He claims Rachel couldn’t have fled out the back of the station because he was parked right outside the rear door at the time of the shooting. She could have slipped past him, though, so I’m not sure how much weight we should attach to Harriman’s statement. The man was coming off a graveyard shift, and for all we know, he might have dozed off for a few moments around the time of the shooting.”

  “I want Rachel reinstated,” Carrie barked, her nerves frazzled. “Don’t you think you’ve put my sister through enough hell? She’s been locked up in a cell for the past two days for something she didn’t do.”

  “Just hang tight,” Schneider said calmly. “The preliminary hearing won’t be held until April fifth. I’m digging into Ramone’s past right now, and I’ve already discovered some major discrepancies. All the men who were involved in this have been either suspended or terminated, so you can’t accuse us of not taking action.”

  “You said men,” Rachel said. “Carol Hitchcock was involved. She provided Grant with an alibi during the time he attacked me in the orange grove.”

  “Right,” the investigator said. “That’s something else we’re working on. We think we might be able to charge Hitchcock with filing a false police report, maybe even breaking and entering. We replayed the tape recording of the caller who reported the hardware store burglary. We can’t be certain until the lab performs a voice analysis, but we’re fairly certain it’s Carol Hitchcock’s voice on the tape.”

  Rachel’s jaw dropped. She knew Carol had covered for Grant by saying he was at the hardware store, but from what she was hearing, the woman had taken it a step further. “Are you saying the burglary at the hardware store was a fraud?”

  Schneider took a sip of his coffee. “That’s the way it appears,” he said. “Hitchcock must have tossed a rock through the window, entered the store, then called in the report once she verified the owners were out of town. Since department policy states that the reporting officer must remain at the location until the building is secure, she provided Cummings with enough time to assault you in the orange grove.”

  “When will we know something?” Carrie asked, standing to leave. “My sister needs a paycheck so she can support her family. If she’s not reinstated by early next week, I’ll be forced to file a lawsuit.”

  Lenny Schneider snapped to attention. “On what grounds?”

  “Sexual harassment, false imprisonment, emotional trauma.” Carrie gave him a cold stare. “Do you have any idea what this story is worth? Look at her,” she said, glancing over her shoulder at Rachel. “The tabloids are camped on her lawn right now. She’s the perfect whistle-blower. Her appearance, her sincerity, the fact that she’s a young widow struggling to support her children. With the information Rachel just provided, she could turn this department inside out. Your officers will come across as the slimiest bastards on earth by the time we’re finished. Shit, Schneider, we might even make the cover of Time magazine.”

  “You’ve made your point,” Schneider said. “I’ll speak to Captain Madison and Chief Bates sometime this weekend. You’ll have your answer by Monday.”

  c h a p t e r

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Jimmy Townsend’s funeral was held at nine o’clock Monday morning. Rachel and Carrie were glued to the television set in the living room. Even though Town-send had been terminated prior to his death, the chief had decided that he should have an official police funeral. Ted Harriman, Nick Miller, and Carol Hitchcock were among the pallbearers. Rachel looked for Ratso’s face in the crowd. When she failed to find him, she wondered if he had already been arrested. Following on the heels of the corruption scandal, the media coverage was extensive.

  When the phone rang at one o’clock that afternoon, Carrie was unpacking some of her belongings in the kitchen. Once she had concluded the phone call, she stuck her head out the door and yelled at Rachel in the living room. “Get dressed,” she said. “Lenny Schneider just called. They want you to come down to the police station right away.”

  “Lucy isn’t home to watch Joe,” Rachel said, Stretched out on the floor coloring with her son. “She went to the doctor for her six-month checkup.”

  “I’ll stay with Joe until she gets back,” Carrie said. “I’ve already called Mike Atwater. He’s on the way to the police station with Bill Ringwald and Blake Reynolds. If Lucy doesn’t come back in the next hour, I’ll jump in a cab and bring Joe with me.”

  Ratso walked through the back door into Jimmy Townsend’s kitchen, carrying a tattered brown suitcase. An older woman was pulling a casserole out of the oven. “I’m Lindsey’s mother,” she said, eyeing the suitcase. Her daughter had told her one of Jimmy’s college buddies was flying in from Chicago. “You must be Sammy Cohen.”

  “Yes,” he said, hearing voices in the other room. “I’d like to speak to Lindsey privately.”

  “She’s resting, but I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if you popped in for a few moments,” the woman told him. “Her room is at the end of the hall.”

  After he had spoken to Lenny Schneider, Ratso had left his apartment and driven to a secluded spot high in the hills above Oak Grove. He had spent Saturday night locked inside his Chevy Nova. By Sunday morning, he had convinced himself that Internal Affairs would not arrest him on the basis of a few suspicious documents. He headed back to his apartment, thinking he could shower and catch a few hours sleep. As soon as he turned the comer onto his street, he saw a string of police cars parked in front of his complex. Sunday night he had locked himself in his car high in the foothills again, but he had been too distraught to sleep. Now that his worst fears had been confirmed, he knew he had to find a safe haven. If he tried to get out of town, the authorities would apprehend him. Reaching into his pocket, his fingers touched a metal object. Grant had given him the key to his townhouse so he could wash his car and clean his gun collection.

  The mourners had congregated in the living room. Knowing some of the officers he had worked with might be there, Ratso slipped out of the kitchen and darted down the hallway. When Lindsey Townsend saw the dark-skinned man in the doorway of her bedroom, she pulled the covers up over her chest.

  “I came to offer my condolences,” Ratso said. He was dressed in a white dress shirt and a crumpled tan suit. “Jimmy was my friend.”

  “Thank you,” she said. “The doctor wants me to stay in bed. There’s food in the kitchen. Please help yourself, Fred.”

  “I no longer need food,” Ratso said. “I have a gift for you and your daughters.”

  “What kind of gift?”

  “You must not tell anyone that I have given you this gift,” he continued. “If you do, they will ask many questions.”

  The look she saw in his eyes was alarming. Before her last two children had been born, Lindsey had worked as a nurse in a mental hospital. She wondered if the man was psychotic. His pupils were dilated, his movements stiff and mechanical. Psychotics sometimes believed they possessed supernatural qualities, that they no longer needed to eat, drink, or sleep. She watched anxiously as he placed the suitcase on the floor beside her bed, then turned and walked out of the room.

  The conference room at the police department was filling up with people. Rachel was waiting outside on a metal chair. She was an outsider now, not even allowed to be present during the meeting that might determine her future.

  Mike Atwater and Blake Reynolds stopped briefly by Rachel’s chair before rushing into the meeting. When Atwater realized several of the parties had not yet arrived, he came back outside to speak to Rachel. “Judge Sanders issued an arrest warrant for Ramone in the Cummings shooting,” he told her. “Ringwald met him for breakfast Sunday morning and finally got him to sign the paperwork.”

 
“Not yet,” Atwater said tensely. “Lenny Schneider called him on Saturday at his apartment after stumbling across some discrepancies in his background information. When the men tried to serve the warrant Sunday morning, the bastard had already skipped. They found some of his clothing, but there was no sign of the missing cash. Ramone probably used the stolen loot to buy an airline ticket.”

  Rachel’s chest rose and then fell. “Are you saying Schneider tipped him off intentionally?”

  “The man’s an idiot,” Atwater said in anger. “I worked with Schneider on several cases when he was assigned to Homicide. Back then, he had a pretty good head on his shoulders. Since he was transferred to IA, he gets his kicks making people squirm.”

  “He told me it was Ringwald who wanted to make Ratso sweat,” she said. “He said the longer they squeezed him, the greater chance there would be that he might confess.”

  “Bullshit,” Atwater said. He stuck his head inside the conference room. “Who are we waiting for?” he asked Blake Reynolds.

  “The attorneys from the AG’s office,” Reynolds told him.

  Atwater returned to his conversation with Rachel. “Chief Bates was behind this, not Ringwald,” he told her. “Since you were the person who went on TV and made the corruption accusations, Bates knew if he arrested the real shooter, the public would have no choice but to take your allegations seriously.”

  Two men in dark suits walked up behind Atwater. He directed the attorneys from the Attorney General’s office into the room, then followed behind them and took a seat at the long table.

  The atmosphere inside the room was along the lines of a wartime conference between opposing factions. The contingent of high-ranking police officers took seats on one side of the long oak table, next to Lenny Schneider from Internal Affairs. The district attorneys and the two men from the Attorney General’s office were seated at the opposite end of the table. Although Chief Bates generally dressed in a suit and tie, he had arrived in his dress uniform after attending Townsend’s funeral. With his service medals pinned to his chest, he resembled a general.