by Mike Bogin
Inside The Bunker, Owen passed a photocopy of the index card across the desk to Dansk. Christiana Dansk had been brought in to help design the department’s new Intel Division immediately following 9/11. Intel’s budget made Dansk the most powerful woman in the Department. Between 2002 and 2005, money flowed to the Intel Division faster than it could be utilized. Following London’s lead, New York deployed surveillance hardware throughout Manhattan’s transportation framework. Intel installed three thousand cameras and tied them all to a central computer system built to screen visuals for thousands of key data points, ranging from color to weight to height and, potentially, even individual walking gaits and ticks or idiosyncrasies. A poker players’ dream, or nightmare, depending upon who controlled the technology.
I KILL RICH PEOPLE. Dansk studied it, shifted over to the name and mailing address.
“Sag Harbor?” she asked Owen, who agreed. That was what came to his mind, too.
“How did you come by this?”
“Directly from Emerson Elliot’s own hands.”
I KILL RICH PEOPLE. ABN. A big nutcase. But creepy, too short. Too matter-of-fact. No “if-then,” no “I’m going to,” no threat at all. ABN. “Strange stuff,” she conceded. “What did you do with the original?”
“Brought it straight to forensics. Nothing there.”
No terrorist groups since Baader-Meinhof and Brigada Rosa had focused on attacking the wealthy. From Mexico City to Bogota and across Africa, there were rational reasons for the rich to fear kidnapping and extortion. Economic crimes made sense. Utopian socialism was dead and gone. What was the rationale for attacking wealth, per se?
“Take it downtown to the Federal Building and get it in front of Bureau intelligence. Call on the NYPD Liaison Officer if you need to and make sure they pass it through their system. Could be they’ll have seen these before. Find out if they have this under cranksters or priors.”
“Can I give it to Tee?” Owen asked her. “I’ve got family stuff.”
Dansk stood nearly as tall as Owen, her high heels adding to her natural six feet. Every inch was intentional. Dansk accepted no camaraderie; she intimidated even her officers. “If I wanted your partner to take it,” she answered harshly, “I’d be talking to him, not you.”
Owen wasn’t sure whether Dansk was overcompensating or really could not absorb the concept that somebody in the division could have a life outside the job.
* * * * *
Intel Division wasn’t given to volunteering information to the Bureau. Taking evidence up to the Bureau cut against the grain for Owen Cullen. Intel Division had run at odds with the FBI from its inception. The NYPD Intelligence Division leaned toward Central Intelligence and treated the Bureau as a bunch of glory hounds quick to suck up everyone else’s gray matter without giving an ounce of bi-lateral cooperation and there was truth in that assessment. Owen Cullen wouldn’t have considered going to the Bureau on his own even though the Bureau owned the most comprehensive crimes database anywhere on the planet. Four or five dead billionaires and bullets flying past the mayor had sent a tremor reaching to the very top. Dansk must have been rattled, he thought, which may have contributed to her being especially fucked up that morning.
Officially speaking, each metro police department, county sheriff, and state police unit has mandatory rules for cooperation and evidence-sharing. But theory and practice never coincided. New York still had five dozen more living billionaires who had to have been burning up the phone lines with angry calls.
Owen strode over the blue and gold emblem emblazed on the floor of the FBI entrance, round like a shield and surrounded by gold edging, the balanced scales of justice; inside, Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity.
Two huge uniformed security officers oversaw Owen as he showed his gold lieutenant’s medallion and placed his service weapon and cuffs into the tray. He proceeded through the metal detectors. Once through, the closer officer nodded to Owen before giving him a numbered receipt for the gun. Owen glanced at the red chit, number 53, before putting it into his jacket pocket. He patted the empty place above his right hip then followed the line of the security officer’s arm, which pointed toward a bank of computer terminals. He was instructed on screen to register, then establish his logon and pin.
Owen scrolled through the options for Purpose of Visit, finally settling on Other. Afterward, he walked toward the elevators numbered for floors 21 and above.
The 23rd floor was entirely investigations. Owen walked through the double doors to the glass-enclosed reception cage where he displayed his identification and introduced himself as Detective-Lieutenant Owen Cullen.
The receptionist activated her speaker and asked him, “What is this regarding?” Owen looked into her eyes reflecting back at him blankly.
“I have potential evidence regarding the Sag Harbor sniper attacks.”
The young woman’s face showed no reaction whatsoever. She dialed an extension and spoke some words into her headset microphone. He could see her lips moving; her speaker was not activated.
“Have a seat and someone will come out to find you,” she told Owen. She gestured to the large foyer’s sofa and chairs that could have been in any dentist’s office, magazines and all.
Owen took a chair and leafed through a Sports Illustrated, reading a piece from a story about a deaf lacrosse player starting for St. John’s, then watched the young woman in her glass cage. She paid no attention to his stare. Two people were just murdered. He thought somebody ought to think this was a priority. Maybe the evidence he had was pretty thin, but the FBI didn’t know that.
The inner doors opened four times. He was on to a National Geographic, reading about geysers in Yellowstone National Park, when the doors opened a fifth time.
“Hello, I’m Al.” The speaker was an older man, sixties, straggly brown hair with abundant gray puffing along the sides of his head, bald on top. Al was reviewing papers in his left hand while he extended his right arm to offer a handshake without ever looking at Owen. Al’s handshake felt mealy and formless. He reversed through the double doorway, implicitly expecting Owen to follow.
Alvin Hurwitz, Data Analyst, “Al”; meaty face (poorly shaven), thick Clark Kent glasses, five-foot-seven or -eight, hair needing a wash, robin’s egg blue polyester short-sleeved shirt over wrinkled pants, the waistband rolled over by Al’s heavy gut. “Come on back.” He handed Owen back a business card and walked fast, surprisingly so for a man who appeared to be held together by his clothes.
Within the Bureau, a center bullpen with full-wall glass
windows floor to ceiling gave the space a freshness and vitality that made Intel Division’s “Bunker” appear industrial in comparison. A corporate workspace versus the edgy atmosphere of a police world where real work was getting done, Owen decided.
Half-wall cushioned dividers separated the cubicles; agents on laptop computers all appeared busily engaged with their screens or on their telephones. Nobody was sitting on the corners of desks or even standing up to speak with one another. Owen followed Al down the outside border. His eyes carried down to Al’s rounded black heels stepping onto frayed pants cuffs. After passing by the doors to both the men’s and women’s rooms, Al stopped toward the end of the passage, opened a door on his right, and held it open for Owen. When he turned back toward Owen, Al focused and seemed to see the lanky redhead for the first time.
“Owen Cullen,” Al said aloud as he walked. Owen was sixty pounds lighter, but his height and his red hair were like a younger Eamonn reborn. He smiled, displaying teeth stained amber from a lifetime of strong coffee.
They entered a break room, with a white refrigerator, a white microwave oven, white cabinets, stainless steel sink, coffeemaker, and two vending machines. Al gestured for Owen to grab one of the plastic chairs around a long folding table. The break room had none of the sleek, modern lin
es of the main office, feeling more like a throwback to a past generation.
“What do you take in your coffee, Owen?”
“No offense intended,” Owen responded, “But I’m supposed to be meeting the NYPD Liaison.”
Al looked Owen over from head to toe, smiled, and then went ahead to pour two cups of coffee, using hefty ceramic mugs he took from a cupboard rather than the Styrofoam cups from the stack. Reaching inside the refrigerator, he came out with a carton of Irish Cream flavored milk, poured some into his mug, and watched Owen from behind his glasses as if to suggest that he do the same. Al passed the mug across the table and flopped into a chair, telling Owen to “Sit.” He grinned. “I knew your father. You look like him.”
Owen wasn’t surprised. Running into people who had known Eamonn was routine. Half of New York knew Big Eamonn, or at least it seemed that way. Still, he didn’t expect that within the Bureau. He had no idea that Al Hurwitz had attended Eamonn Cullen’s funeral; three hundred people had been there, no way for Owen to know them all.
Owen wasn’t generally impolite, but he had not come to see the FBI to shoot the breeze with some old guy.
“Al, what’s the story? Can we get the liaison agent or what?” There was still a chance to make at least some of Liam’s ballgame.
“You can wait an hour for that big shot and get two minutes with him,” Al explained while testing the heat of the coffee, touching his lips to the rim, blowing, and returning for another test. “Or you can talk with me. You want a show horse or you want a work horse? I’m a work horse. You want to take pictures, you wait for Turner. I’m what you got, kid. You want a working noodle? That’s me.”
The old guy scanned Owen up and down, leaving him feeling like Al Hurwitz was paying more attention to his appearance than to the fact that Owen was a detective-lieutenant on NYPD business.
“You got an index card, right?” Al half-shouted. “I say, you got a card?” He opened his palms, and his neck seemed to disappear into his shoulders as he demanded Owen to get with the program. “So? Get it out. Let’s see what you got.”
Owen reached into his jacket, obediently taking the card out from his inside pocket. His parking slip came out with it, fluttering to the linoleum.
“THAT you don’t want to lose,” Al chimed in, seemingly more interested in the ticket from the parking garage than in whatever else Owen had with him. “Forty-five dollars they charge for a lost ticket, the pirates. Make sure you give me it when you’re leaving. DeShonnelle, the reception lady, she gives two minutes to get from here to your car and out the gate. Like she pays for the stamps herself. Here, give me the index card. Sit.”
Al reached his palm toward Owen, snapping his fingers for Owen to give it over. “Let me guess. Yiddee biddee bim bam. You are seeing this ‘I Kill Rich People’ and your mind goes to Morris Levy, to Sag Harbor. Am I right? I’m right. Sit. NYPD sends you to Mr. Important Special Agent, who is not so special, if you know what I mean, but eventually these things come to me so I can make some sense of this mishegas.”
Point by point, Al went through a tight, cogent analysis, laying it on perhaps too thickly, like he wanted to make an impression. The index cards themselves were common Boise Cascade stock available at thousands of office supply stores, drugstores, supermarkets. Right-handed writing, felt-tip pen, probably Sharpie. Again, millions. The Bureau already had six of them. How many more were sent out? Who knew?
“So, you may be wondering. Is this somebody tied to Sag Harbor?” Al paused, and then continued with a shrug. “Maybe. And maybe not.” Owen listened while Al went through a twenty-minute amassment of facts from internal FBI analysis. The shooter was probably in the woods along shore. Unlikely the shooter was on another boat: too unstable for a sure head shot and too many constraints to escape. The first shot, the one that killed Colin Merrill, came from a distance of 150 to 200 yards. From a prone position, there were at least fifteen million people who could make the shot with consistent reliability. The second shot was possibly longer, which gave the rationale for a torso shot like the one that killed Denning. Lower reliability. Higher distance. The heart rate rises, respiration is more rapid. Higher survival rate from torso penetrations, 8X as compared to rear-entry head shots, too.
“This is only a theory, of course, but the smart money goes on the Sag Harbor killing as specifically aimed at Merrill. First shot. Head shot. Second shot, more difficult and more survivable. Five dead uber-rich, and one more so-so rich. Could be that somebody contracted the shootings and tried to cover his tracks with a cockamamie boogieman ‘I Kill Rich People.’ You shoot one person and we zero right in; one shooting makes it easy to keep focus on one task. Each concurrent shooting exponentially increases the numbers of suspects, data volumes, and subsequent dilution of law enforcement resources. But unlikely. Sands Point was as dangerous as Sag Harbor was easy.”
Owen agreed, adding, “Nothing in the MO matches Islamist activity.”
“No,” Al agreed. “Certainly no suicide attack. This was surgical.
“Plus why would an Islamist radical have the mayor in his crosshairs and never take the shot?” Owen added.
Al liked the comment. It showed some nuance, a willingness to go beyond the obvious. Eamonn’s boy was a thinker.
Unless something was missing, which Al admitted was often the case, Stephen Denning would hardly make the register of rich people. A “lonely geek” with one lucky success, ten million dollars, lots of toys, and not a lot of friends to enjoy them with. He was even alone on his boat, a $500,000 model that tried to be everything at once and therefore succeeded little; part luxury fishing boat, not enough salon or deck area for entertaining, too small for long crossings, too big to be nimble. Colin Merrill, on the other hand, now he was somebody whom some people might well want dead. Al had at his fingertips full profiles of both
victims.
Between UCG and his other holdings, Colin Merrill had amassed 2.5 billion dollars and a long string of investors in funds that had fared far less successfully. The cell phone clipped
onto Hurwitz’s belt interrupted with the ringtone: Those were the days my friend, we thought they’d never end…
“A gift,” Al acknowledged as he glanced at the caller ID before answering. “I know, ma. I’ll pick up the shirts. On my way home. Yes, I have the coupon. No, I won’t forget. I can’t discuss Chris Christie right now. I know it’s an election year. Yes, these things are important. He’ll cut education. He won’t support a woman’s right to choose. Ma, we’ll discuss it later, I promise. That’s great, ma. Not much. A sandwich. I’ll be hungry. Ma, I have to go. At Boston, I know, Fenway. Burnett’s on the mound. Ma, I’ll…yes. Goodbye.”
He must have been used to those calls, Owen thought, because Hurwitz returned to his description without missing a beat.
“Me, I’m Jewish. Obvious. I know. So every Jew hears about Levy, Branderman, Perlman, Fleish, we’re thinking oy vey iz mir more crazy Jew-haters. But now maybe we’re not so sure. This Merrill, he’s a big macher, too. Flies the helicopter to his Hedge Fun yacht. Houses here, there. Sixty-four feet, this boat, and that’s not his main one.”
The 64’ Marquis, Al explained, was Merrill’s weekender, while his main yacht, Hegemony, a Lazzara 120, remained docked in the Mediterranean following the film festival in Cannes. Four-story townhouse facing the Park, an East Hampton waterfront estate, a timber lodge in the Yellowstone Club, a thirteenth-century castle in the Dordogne, France, and an equally lavish row house in the Knightsbridge neighborhood in London.
“He always reinvested ten percent of his earnings in political contributions to senators and congressmen. You know how Las Vegas rolls out the red carpet for the big gamblers. The casinos call them ‘whales.’ Congressmen have their whales, too, and they never say no to their whales,” Al said. “Vision Partners, a huge APA contributor. Merrill buys and trades Co
ngressmen like they’re AA infielders. The man never took a salary; he just vested in equity within his own hedge fund, $90 million dollars worth in a bad year, nearly a billion dollars this past year.”
Al nodded, tapping his index finger to his temple. “Good system, 15 percent maximum for cap-gains taxes, only he isn’t satisfied with 15 percent. When he wants money, he gets a loan from his own fund. One hundred million dollars each year. And you know what he pays in taxes? Zero. This sonofabitch even sends in lawyers to fight his property taxes!”
Al segued to walk Owen through Al’s own salary—$91,578 per year—and what he kept after social security taxes and income taxes—$4,584 take-home per month, after the nickels and the dimes.
“So how am I paying 33 percent and this one pays nothing? Nothing?! I could shoot this goniff myself.”
“But what if, let’s just say,” Owen said, picking at Al’s theory. “What if the shooter just saw rich people on boats and shot them indiscriminately?”
Al sighed. “Then, my friend, we have a worry.”
Al had run ‘I Kill Rich People’ past the Behavioral Analysis Unit. He had already passed the other index cards through NCB, the U.S. arm of INTERPOL, plus cross-referenced them against the Criminal History Record Search, and even went into CT Watch data. No records of any I Kill Rich People.
The highest probability of a violent event follows the concise factual statement when applied to a race or group (54 percent). The threateners, they don’t amount to much. ‘Touch me again and you’re dead.’ (4 percent, and almost always man-on-woman violence). Threat with specific means is a little higher. ‘I’m going to put a bullet in you.’ (15percent, generally acted upon by perpetrators with prior histories of violence.)
What did they have? Two shootings. No suspects. Motive? Hazy at best. But they could reason that this was not Islamist. The mayor was not the target, number one, and whoever did this was a professional. Efficient. In, out, gone. Nobody there was buying a quick trip to paradise and seventy-two virgins.
