Depraved Indifference

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Karavitch took the poster, put on a pair of thick reading glasses, and looked at it. “So?” he said. “The communists wanted me after the war. They wanted thousands. What of it?”

  “That is you, then?”

  “Of course, it is me. It looks like me, it has my name on it. Of course it is me. What nonsense are you talking?”

  “Bear with me a moment, Mr. Karavitch. Would you sign your name on this paper?” Karp pushed a yellow pad and a pen across the table.

  The old man smiled and signed his “Djordje Karavitch” with a flourish. “You know, Mr. Karp, in case you have any other old papers you wish to compare with this, sometimes signatures change over the years.”

  “I’m aware of that. But some things never change. I notice you signed with your left hand and took the poster I gave you with your left hand. You are left-handed, are you not?”

  “Of course.”

  “Of course, but you know it’s amazing about handedness. It pervades our own lives, but it’s one of the last things we remember about others. I bet you couldn’t recall the handedness of a single one of your friends or acquaintances. It’s not something that ever comes up, except on athletic teams. Now in this poster here, for example, you’re writing, and of course, you’re using your left hand.”

  “Of course. What are you driving at, Mr. Karp?”

  “Wait, I’m almost there. That’s what I thought too. Then I began studying this poster. It’s very interesting because it’s really a poster within a poster. The subject is photographed in his office, and there’s a poster on the wall behind him. Are you familiar with that poster?”

  The old man peered at the paper. “Yes, it’s a propaganda poster, against the communists.”

  “Uh-huh. Can you read the writing on it?”

  “No, I cannot. It is too blurred. What is the point of this? It’s just an old poster.”

  Karp reached into his briefcase again and took out a hemispherical glass paperweight, a common object on nearly every desk in the building. They made fairly good magnifiers.

  “My eyes are better than yours, but I can’t read it, either, because it’s in Cyrillic script, or so I thought. It looks that way at first glance. But just now I thought to myself, why would a poster on the wall of a Croat nationalist be in Cyrillic script? The Croats use Latin script, don’t they?”

  The old man did not answer. Karp slammed the paperweight down on the poster. The sound echoed in the room, startling the stenographer. “Now you can read it and so can I. I don’t know what it says, but I can read it, because it’s not Cyrillic script at all. Those are Latin letters, but they’re reversed. The negative was reversed when it was printed. It must have been a rush job during the war. Djordje Karavitch is writing with his right hand, isn’t he, Hauptsturmfuehrer Josef Karl Dreb?”

  The old man waved his hand weakly in front of his face, as if waving away flies. “I don’t know what you are talking about. I am Djordje Karavitch.”

  “No, you’re not. This photograph proves you’re not. And it would be child’s play to get the records, school records, dental records, medical records, to demonstrate it beyond a shadow of a doubt. The Yugoslavs would love to help and so would the Israelis. Especially the Israelis. No, your scam is based on nobody looking very closely, on the fact that you fixed it so that everyone thought that Dreb was dead, on the acceptance of the man who knew Karavitch best, Pavle Macek.”

  “I am Karavitch,” the old man intoned.

  “Yes. And you’re going to Attica for life as Karavitch. Because, you Nazi fucker, you are going to plead guilty to the top count of the indictment, and you’re going to rat out your friends too, because if you don’t, this—who you really are, Dreb—will be all over town. The Croatians will spit on you. The Church will wash its hands. Your wife will know she married a goddamn fake. You’ll stand in a glass cage in Jerusalem and whine that you vas only following orderz, and the Jews will hang your filthy ass.”

  “I am Karavitch. I am Karavitch!” screamed the old man. His face was turning red and flecks of spittle flew through the air and fell to the tabletop.

  “Calm down your client, counselor,” said Karp to the white-faced Evans. “He needs some legal advice.”

  As Karp left the room, the old man began to shout once again his identity to the world, his voice high and cracking.

  “My hero,” said Marlene.

  “Yeah, who was that masked man? Christ, Marlene, I’m dead. When was the last time I got a night’s sleep?”

  “I think a week after this past Shevuos. I might even give up my chance to possess your fine young body for eight straight.”

  “I’m not that tired.”

  “Oh, you thing! So, that’s it. One down, only six hundred and twelve homicides to go. It all worked out.”

  “Yeah. Except for one detail. Your compensation. I don’t trust Bloom worth a shit to muscle the state. In fact, he could fuck it up so bad that we’d never see daylight and never prove that it was him that screwed us.”

  “Oh, that. Well, you did your best—”

  “Bullshit. I haven’t started. Here, sit on my lap so your ear’s next to the phone. I want you to hear this.”

  She did so, squirming nicely, while Karp dialed a long-distance number. “This is his private number. I screwed it out of Evans. Only presidents and above get this one.”

  The phone rang for two rings and someone picked it up.

  “Hello?” said the golden voice of Arthur Bingham Roberts.

  “Roberts? Karp here, of the New York DA.”

  The voice lost forty degrees of warmth. “Yes? What do you want?”

  “Well, Roberts, I want a favor.”

  “A favor?”

  “Yeah, a legal favor. I want to retain you as counsel in a compensation case. I want you to sue the State of New York for a friend of mine.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “Oh, I’m dead serious, Roberts. It won’t be hard to win, because justice is on our side, and justice is something I know you dote on. You and our fine district attorney. Come on, say you’ll take the case. For me.” A pause.

  “Very well. One of my associates will contact you.”

  “Uh-uh, Roberts, no associates. I want you up there in Albany personally. After all, it is the most important case of your career, because if you lose it, I guarantee you won’t have a career.” A longer pause.

  “I see. I should warn you that my fees are quite high in cases like this.”

  “Oh, get real, Roberts. Your fee is zero on this one. Nada. We get all the money, and it better be a whole shitload of it. Am I making myself clear?” The longest pause of all.

  “Perfectly clear. Is that all?”

  Marlene put her soft lips to Karp’s ear and whispered, “Ask him if he does divorce work.”

  A Biography of Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Robert K. Tanenbaum is the New York Times bestselling author of twenty-five legal thrillers and has an accomplished legal career of his own. Before his first book was published, Tanenbaum had already been the Bureau Chief of the Criminal Courts, had run the Homicide Bureau, and had been in charge of the training program for the legal staff for the New York County District Attorney’s Office. He also served as Deputy Chief Counsel to the Congressional Committee investigations into the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. In his professional career, Tanenbaum has never lost a felony case. His courtroom experiences bring his books to life, especially in his bestselling series featuring prosecutor Roger “Butch” Karp and his wife, Marlene Ciampi.

  Tanenbaum was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. He attended the University of California at Berkeley on a basketball scholarship, and remained at Cal, where he earned his law degree from the prestigious Boalt Hall School of Law. After graduating from Berkeley Law, Tanenbaum moved back to New York to work as an assistant district attorney under the legendary New York County DA Frank Hogan. Tanenbaum then served as Deputy Chief Counsel in
charge of the Congressional investigations into the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr.

  The blockbuster novel Corruption of Blood (1994), is a fictionalized account of his experience in Washington, D.C.

  Tanenbaum returned to the West Coast and began to serve in public office. He was elected to the Beverly Hills City Council in 1986 and twice served as the mayor of Beverly Hills. It was during this time that Tanenbaum began his career as a novelist, drawing from the many fascinating stories of his time as a New York ADA. His successful debut novel, No Lesser Plea (1987), introduces Butch Karp, an assistant district attorney who is battling for justice, and Marlene Ciampi, his associate and love interest. Tanenbaum’s subsequent twenty-two novels portrayed Karp and his crime fighting family and eclectic colleagues facing off against drug lords, corrupt politicians, international assassins, the mafia, and hard-core violent felons.

  He has had published eight recent novels as part of the series, as well as two nonfiction titles: The Piano Teacher (1987), exploring his investigation and prosecution of a recidivist psychosexual killer, and Badge of the Assassin (1979), about his prosecution of cop killers, which was made into a movie starring James Woods as Tanenbaum.

  Tanenbaum and his wife of forty-three years have three children. He currently resides in California where he has taught Advanced Criminal Procedure at the Boalt Hall School of Law and maintains a private law practice.

  Tanenbaum as a toddler in the early 1940s. He was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York.

  A five-year-old Tanenbaum in Brooklyn, near Ocean Parkway.

  Tanenbaum’s family in the early 1950s. From left to right: Bob; his mother, Ruth (a teacher and homemaker); his father, Julius (businessman and lawyer); and his older brother, Bill.

  Tanenbaum’s high school varsity basketball photo from the ’59–’60 season. He played shooting guard, center, and forward, and earned an athletic scholarship to the University of California, Berkeley, where he continued to play.

  Tanenbaum shooting during a basketball game his junior year of high school. He wore the number 14 throughout high school and college.

  Tanenbaum’s senior portrait. In addition to basketball, he also played first base for his school’s baseball team.

  Standing outside a courthouse in downtown Manhattan are Tanenbaum, James Woods, NYPD detective Cliff Fenton, and Yaphet Kotto. Woods and Kotto played Tanenbaum and Fenton in the 1985 movie Badge of the Assassin, based on Tanenbaum’s book of the same name about a real-life murder mystery in 1971 Harlem.

  Seen here in the late 1980s, Mayor Tanenbaum poses with Ed Koch, then mayor of New York City, while Tanenbaum’s son Billy stands in front wearing a hat given to him by Koch. The two mayors were meeting to discuss a tourist exchange program between Beverly Hills and New York City.

  While mayor of Beverly Hills, Tanenbaum awarded Jimmy Stewart, seen here, with this proclamation of Outstanding Citizen of Beverly Hills in the late 1980s.

  Tanenbaum and his wife, Patti.

  Tanenbaum with Patti and their children Roger, Rachael, and Billy at home in California.

  Tanenbaum’s author photo, which has graced the covers of many of his books.

  Gallery Books

  Proudly Presents

  BAD FAITH

  Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Coming soon in hardcover

  from Gallery Books

  Turn the page for a preview of Bad Faith . . .

  PROLOGUE

  THE HANDSOME YOUNG FDNY PARAMEDIC JUMPED from the back of the ambulance with his gear bag and looked up at the old four-story walk-up on the Upper West Side. Once a haven for junkies, including the infamous Needle Park, much of the neighborhood had been gentrified and cleaned up. However, the West 88th Street building, located between Amsterdam and Columbus Avenues, had fallen into disrepair. The steps leading up to the building’s entrance, like the sidewalks along the narrow, tree-lined street, were cracked and uneven; a rusted fire escape climbed the faded red bricks of the façade; what paint remained around the windows was peeling away.

  There was certainly nothing charming about the bitter November evening air, nor the three large white men standing in front of the stoop who moved to block the paramedic. “False alarm,” said the man on the left, the words coming out from his bearded lips in puffs of condensation that hung briefly in the chill breeze before dissipating.

  “Sorry, but we got a 911 call about a child in medical distress, and I have to check it out,” the paramedic replied. He tried to step past, but the man in the middle—the tallest of the three and ruggedly handsome with long, wavy gray hair swept back from his tan face—placed a hand on the young man’s shoulder and stopped him.

  “Sorry, brother, but as Brother Frank just told you, your services are not needed here,” the man said, fixing the paramedic with his intense blue eyes. He was smiling wide, his big, white teeth flashing in the dusk, but there was nothing friendly about his demeanor.

  The paramedic scowled and brushed the larger man’s hand off of his shoulder. “I’m not your brother, Mac, so keep your mitts to yourself.”

  “What’s the problem, Raskov?”

  Justin Raskov turned at the sound of his partner’s voice. “Yo, Bails, these jokers won’t let me in the building,” the young man replied to the other paramedic coming up behind him.

  “Well, it ain’t up to them,” Donald “Bails” Bailey Sr. growled as he moved ahead of his partner to glare at the big men confronting them. “We got an emergency call for this address and we legally have to check it out. And you, my friend,” he added, thrusting his jaw at his opponent’s face, “are breaking the law and I’m maybe two seconds from sic-ing New York’s finest on your ass.”

  In his experience, Raskov was used to seeing even the most recalcitrant people move out of the way when stared down by his pugnacious partner, a muscular middle-aged black man who’d been a staff sergeant in the army and still carried himself like one. But the three other men closed ranks, two behind the third, who was obviously the leader and who now raised his hand, palm outward, and thundered, “‘YOU SHALL NOT PASS THROUGH, LEST I COME OUT WITH THE SWORD AGAINST YOU!’”

  At the unexpected outburst, Raskov took a step back but Bailey stood his ground and rolled his eyes. “Frickin’ great,” he sighed. “We got us a Bible thumper. Numbers 20:18, right? Yeah, I know the Good Book, too, and I’ll take that as a threat.” He looked back at the ambulance whose driver had his head out of the window listening to the exchange.

  “Hey, Dougy, call the cops and tell them we got three morons preventing us from responding to a 911 medical emergency, and one of them just said he was going to attack us with a sword.”

  When he finished, Bailey looked back at the three men and tilted his head with a slight smile on his face.

  “Tell you what, asshole. If there’s somebody in that building who needs our help and doesn’t get it on time because of your cute little antics, it’ll be on your head.”

  Disconcertingly, the big man smiled back. “The true believers of this household are under the protection of the Lord.”

  “Yeah, we’ll see how that works when the cops show up,” Raskov said.

  As if on cue, a patrol car swung around the corner and pulled over to the curb behind the ambulance. Two officers got out and hurried up to the knot of men. “What seems to be the problem here?” the older officer asked.

  “Hey, Sergeant Sadler, how ya doin’?” Raskov said to the cop. “We got a 911 call that a child has a medical emergency in Apartment 3C. But these jokers won’t let us check it out.”

  Sadler nodded at the paramedics. “Evening, Justin, Don,” he said before frowning and turning to the three men on the stoop. “One of you want to explain?” he asked.

  The man who’d shouted the Biblical verse stepped forward. “I am the Reverend C. G. Westlund and God’s emissary at the End of Days Reformation Church of Jesus Christ Resurrected. I speak for the family in Apartment 3C. The call was
in error and any intervention by these gentlemen would be against the family’s religious beliefs.”

  “Well . . . Reverend . . . is it true there’s a sick kid in there?” the sergeant asked, his voice indicating that his patience was not going to last long.

  “The child’s infirmities of the body are being healed by the power of prayer,” Westlund answered. “God’s will and compassion are the only medicine the child needs.”

  “Then with all due respect . . . get your ass out of the way, and let the paramedics do their job,” Sadler barked. “That or you, me, and your pals here are all going to take a little ride down to the precinct house where I’ll toss your butts in the pokey for obstructing these fine officers of the FDNY in the performance of their lawful duties.”

  Westlund turned his head slightly to his right, and the man he’d identified earlier as “Brother Frank” suddenly rushed forward with a growl as though to attack the sergeant. But Trent Sadler, a grizzled old veteran who’d been dealing with street thugs and violent criminals for more than twenty-five years, was ready. He stepped neatly to the side, and in one swift motion pulled a Taser stun device from the holster on his belt and applied it to the neck of the would-be assailant.

  Brother Frank yelped and fell to the sidewalk in a twitching heap. Keeping his eyes on the other two, Taser at the ready, the sergeant spoke to his partner.

  “O’Leary, handcuff this quivering mass of idiot and hand him over to the backup when they get here,” he said just as another patrol car wheeled around the corner with its lights flashing. “Speak of the devil. Now reverend, I didn’t like the little nod to your ‘brother’ here, so I wouldn’t mind lighting you up too. Having said that, you need to answer this question: Do you want to find out what a Manhattan sidewalk tastes like, or will you get the hell out of my way?”