Silverfish Ch. 01

Allgood continued: "Okay, Don, here's the situation. I think you're right about the data people, they're there to help the Detectives, and as such they are part of the Detective branch. But the I.T. people, the ones who install the equipment and manage the servers, and all that... they're definitely part of the Properties group."

Allgood paused, and I knew what was coming. He then said "And you know this has been coming since before Chief Griswold retired, Don: you definitely were in charge of I.T., but you have too much else to do. So we're going to be making a change there."

Brownlee was grinning at what he thought was a victory, but Allgood's next statement wiped the smile from his face. "I've already talked to members of the Council about the situation, even before you raised a stink about it, Robert. They want to consolidate some of the I.T. operations, which will allow the Police and Court systems to be more integrated and work together. They also want the branches of the Public Safety Department, which is the Police, Fire, EMS and Public Health Departments, to be more integrated. And seeing what's happening here, I think that's a good idea... take I.T. completely out of the Police Department's Properties Group's hands, and thus out of your direct control."

Brownlee was frowning, but maybe it was me wincing that caused the Sheriff to end the meeting. "Okay Robert, I need to talk to the Commander here. For now, I'm leaving Milton in charge of the SuperUser and SuperAdmin assignments, as well as overall I.T. security, and he'll continue to report to Commander Troy for the time being."

"But Sheriff," said Brownlee, not giving it up, "we've discussed this, and the Union agrees: Commander Troy should not be I.T. Supervisor any longer, nor have control over I.T. operations--"

"And he won't." replied Allgood, cutting Brownlee off. "But I'm not going to change everything on a dime, especially where computer security is concerned. You are not a computer nor I.T. expert, Robert, and neither am I. Now go; let me talk to the Commander." Brownlee was angry, but seeing me about to get up with my crowbar in my hand, he decided leaving was his wisest course of action, and he took it.

"Thanks for staying cool, Don." Daniel said.

"I'm just waiting for the full story." I said.

"What do you mean?" Sheriff Allgood asked, a gleam in his eye.

"Only that I talked to the Council about this months ago." I said. "The Council agreed that the Police Department, Sheriff Department and Justice Department, i.e. the Courts, have to have separate systems, and that's for security reasons. But we also installed a system and servers for joint operations and secure transfer of information and digital evidence, and the like. So it's a done deal, though Paper Pusher there doesn't know it."

"You're right." said Allgood. "The full story is that Brownlee has been raising a lot of crap about who is in charge of what. Instead of being cooperative, he runs to his Union buddies, who then run to certain Council members. But the Council is trying mighty hard to infuse me, your friendly neighborhood Sheriff, into my role of leading the Public Safety Department, and they are not happy that Brownlee is going about things the way he is."

"Remove him, then." I said. "Before we start losing good people. Captain Harlow has already told me that some of her people are starting to look for other jobs, and I suspect she is, also."

"I hear you, but we're stuck with him." Allgood said. "The Council made him Deputy Chief to keep him from being put in the Chief's chair altogether. And he is a good manager of the overhead operations, even if everyone does think he's the biggest asshole since Steven Ikea left."

"Yeah." I said. "Chief Griswold warned me something like this would happen. I don't have his political skills, either, so I'm not good at these games. I'm trying to solve crimes here like the Police are supposed to do. Now I've got this jackass, who couldn't solve a case of missing toilet paper in an outhouse, trying as hard as he can to keep me from doing my job. You say he does a good job in administrative things, but now that he's been promoted, will he keep that up? Or will he start trying to fuck with me more than doing his job?"

"I've already told him he's overstepped on a few things." Allgood said. "But what I want to ask you is this: how do we resolve this situation of I.T.? Brownlee explicitly wants control of SuperUser and SuperAdmin statuses, and he does not want you having any. He's pushing that especially hard. That's no big deal: the Council wants you to have access due to your position as Commander, and I want that also. So you'll have it. But one thing is for sure: you have to give up I.T., it can't be yours, and basically Brownlee will be over it. He'll also push for control of data information, especially Milton and Mahoney. Just to fuck with you."

"Man, that sucks." I said, more to myself than to Daniel. "I don't mind giving I.T. away; I did the same thing with the Campus Police. But they brought in competent people to run I.T. on Campus; we've got this idiot."

"So..." Allgood said, "what's your solution to the whole mess? And it has to be something I can take to the Council, not any backdoor tricks." Wow, Daniel was giving me an opportunity here, I realized.

"First," I said, "I am not giving up Myron, Mary, Sonali or Lainie, no matter what. I'm suggesting a Data Squad, led by Myron, that will be part of the Detectives branch under Cindy's control. Someone will have to think of a cool name for it, but you get the idea."

"That's an excellent idea." said Allgood. "But System Maintenance, physical computers, and the servers are going to be under I.T. And ultimately, under Deputy Chief Robert Brownlee." I don't know if Daniel was needling me or trying to make me think of a better solution... and then one came to me.

"Yeah." I said, then brightened up as I had an idea. "Yeah, let's do let Brownlee have what he wants, except I'm not giving up SuperAdmin for either myself or Myron. Yeah, let's let him have what he wants... oh, by the way, Sheriff, who are you putting into the Captain's slot for Physical Properties?"

"Ah, now you're thinking like Chief Griswold told me you'd be thinking." said Sheriff Daniel Allgood, grinning.

"I'm thinking of one more thing that needs to happen, and it's an admin thing." I said. "So I want you to help me make it happen before Brownlee tries to stop it..."

Part 5 - Back To Basics (of the Case)

"So, what did you guys do while I was taking care of the lightwork?" I asked Cindy as she and Tanya came into my office.

"Myron and Mary are going to see what they can get, but they think you'll have better luck going through the FBI." Cindy replied. "Julie Newton says she'll try to trace the money and any laundering operations, but she needs to be pointed in the right direction to search, meaning some names, locations, and such."

"I was hoping she'd have ideas to start looking at now." I said. "Oh well, what about Teddy and Joanne?"

Tanya answered "I have them going to Second National Bank and interview the Assistant Manager there. He was a loan officer there when the Silverfish bank heist was committed. Teddy will tell him they're seeing if there's a connection between that one and the more recent one, the one where the Corrigan Cell mercenaries robbed them and took Luisa Gomez."

Having decided official business was done and wanting to satisfy her enormous curiosity, Tanya then asked "So, Don, what's going on with 'Brown Nose' Brownlee?"

"He's demanding to take over I.T.," I said, "and regarding the systems and maintenance and such, he's right that it falls under his pervue as Deputy Chief, which is essentially the 'XO' job. But I'm keeping the data people; they'll formally be assigned to the Detectives. Cindy, you now have MCD, Vice, and Data to watch over."

"And now it's going to be slow computers, losing our access, and waiting forever to get things back?" Cindy asked. She knew how things were going to be.

"We'll see." I said. "The Sheriff did take my advice, and he is going to put Captain Marc Aaron into the Physical Properties slot. Oh yes, we'll have to promote him from Lieutenant first, but he'll be brevetted to Captain and immediately assigned to the post. Brownlee wanted Douglas Forsyth there, but the Sheriff is going to tell 'Brown Nose' to pound sand on that. Aaron isn't exactly our best buddy, but he's no friend of Brownlee and he does good work, so he won't tolerate too much crap if I.T. tries to fuck with us on computer access and equipment and such."

"Damn, I wish you'd taken the Chief job, Don." Cindy said wistfully.

"You're just angling for my Commander slot, arentcha?" I asked her with a grin and a wink. Tanya laughed, and Cindy rolled her eyes.

"Oh well, that's spilt milk now." I said, not really sorry. "They're already going through the final rounds on selection on that. And the good news is that the new Chief will be able to keep Brownlee on a leash, since the Chief traditionally watches over administration as much if not more than operations."

"And speaking of Brownlee, don't worry about him, Cindy. If he starts fucking with us, he'll regret it. By the way... here's a place you can tell Julie Newton to start looking..." I told her where Julie could start looking.

"I'll bet you already have this thing solved." said Cindy.

"Nope." I said. "But with good people like you guys helping me, it won't be long."

"Don, can I ask you a question?" Tanya asked, her use of my first name suggesting that this would be an 'inside baseball' type of question. I nodded and she said "This Silverfish case... I can understand using it for training purposes, and we might even get a break and solve it and Paulina or the FBI can use the information... but you seem to really be into it. What do you think we're going to find that's going to be so helpful?"

"I'm not sure." I said. "But I have this feeling that there is going to be something there that will become important to us in the future... and that's it's going to be worth the effort to investigate this old case..."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Thank you for seeing us today." said Detective Joanne Cummings, flashing a bright smile at the Assistant Manager of Second National Bank, one Mr. Harkins. She was wearing a Police uniform with light blue shirt and dark blue skirt and high heel black pumps, showing off her shapely calves. Detective Teddy Parker was there also, dressed in a Police light blue shirt, blue pants with light blue piping down the side, and a black light trenchcoat/raincoat, trying to emulate the Iron Crowbar in his outerwear as well as brain power.

Mr. Harkins was a short man, putting on weight, his hair graying and thinning on top. He wore glasses on his pudgy face, and his white shirt and red-and-black striped necktie looked like they were trying to choke him. "Certainly. What can I do for you, Officers?" he asked.

Teddy Parker spoke. "We're following up on the bank robbery that occurred here a few months ago, and we're investigating to see if there are any common links to the bank heist that occurred some eight years ago. Were you employed here at that time?"

"Oh yes." said Mr. Harkins, his voice soft. "I was a loan officer back then. We came into work one morning and the safe was wide open. Nearly $400,000 was taken."

"Sir, why did the bank have that much money on hand?" Joanne Cummings asked.

"If I recall, we had some big deposits and also a special payroll." said Harkins. "Crown Chemicals had been having trouble with that environmentalist group, and they thought they were about to get another attack some months after the first one that killed all those people. They asked us to secure cash for paying their employees and also paying extra security people."

Harkins continued: "We got the money in Monday, it was going to be picked up by Crown on Wednesday. But on Monday night, the thieves broke in and took the money. We were able to get some cash from other banks, including J.P. Goldman Bank and the County Regional Bank branch in Hillside, in Nextdoor County. Our insurance and the FDIC replaced the money over time, of course."

"Who knew that shipment of money was coming in?" asked Teddy Parker.

"Well, there was our bank officers, of course." said Harkins. "I didn't even know about it until after the robbery. The Crown Chemicals people, at least some of them, had to know. The Police, which were not merged at that time, knew about the threat to Crown, but I don't know if they knew about the special payroll. J.P. Goldman Bank had also gotten in some cash for Crown, so their officers at the time must've known. But they weren't robbed, and we were."

"Sir," said Joanne Cummings, "the more recent bank robbery netted about $85,000, if I recall correctly. Did you have extra money on hand for that, as well?"

"Yes." said Harkins. "That was mid-November. Many businesses start acquiring extra cash on hand for the Holiday season, and we were starting to accumulate cash for their needs. Certainly not a huge amount, but still above normal. Today we only have about $50,000 in cash on hand."

"And who knew you had extra money in the recent attack?" asked Joanne.

"Everyone and no one." said Harkins. "By that, I mean that it was routine for us to begin accumulating money, but we did not bring in a huge load of cash at one time. We generally just kept more than normal, rather than send it to the Federal Reserve Bank, starting the first of November. After the Holidays, we'd send back a little more than normal to the Federal Reserve Bank. The businesses generally knew we did this, but wouldn't know any specifics. Our own bank staff would know to some degree, as well. And of course... the other banks in the area were doing the same thing, including J.P. Goldman Bank. They'd know the routine."

"So the first bank robbery," said Teddy Parker, "we understand that there was a marking left?"

"Oh yes." said Harkins. A fish sign, drawn in silver ink, was left on the wall near the entrance. The FBI was very interested in it at the time, and they really investigated thoroughly. But if they ever succeeded in getting the money back, I never heard about it. The FDIC probably would've claimed it back, anyway, after they made us whole."

"But there was no marking during the more recent robbery?" asked Parker.

"No, not that anyone found. The burglary several years ago was done at night. The alarm was turned off, they had plenty of time to work, apparently. In the recent robbery, the criminals held us up at gunpoint, then took Luisa Gomez with them. She's still undergoing therapy from what I understand, poor girl."

"Yes, very sad." said Joanne Cummings.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Okay," said Jack Muscone as Cindy and I met with him later that afternoon at the FBI offices off Courthouse Square, "you've had me on pins and needles all weekend. Why did the Director give you these cases to look at?"

"Pins and needles, eh?" I said, then grinned as I stated my observation of Jack out loud: "And that after obviously getting laid?"

Cindy broke out laughing at Jack's laser-beam stare at me.

I stifled my own laugh and decided to change the subject by saying: "First, what did he say when you talked to him? I'm sure you asked."

Muscone replied "First, he said that there is no classified report on this that he knows about. He's in a position where there is literally nothing that can be hidden from him if he wants to find out about it, so I'm sure he speaks from knowledge there. Then, when I asked him about why he gave you the case and you telling me to guess, he just laughed, then said 'Follow the money.'. I'm not sure what he meant by that." I just smiled.

"Want to borrow a crowbar, Jack?" Cindy offered politely, well aware of the game I was playing.

"I might just." said Jack. "Or some firewood and a stake."

"Okay, okay, I'll tell you." I said, pretending to be 'persuaded'. "What he meant was the amount of the money stolen is in itself a clue. Well over $300,000 per hit is a huge amount. It means that each bank was hit and burgled at a time when they had a very large amount of cash on hand. Now it's not normal for banks to even have that much in cash every day, and they don't keep such money on hand very long even if they did have reason to have it for a little bit of time. So that means that the timing of each crime was prodigious... 28 times over. So what does that tell you?"

Muscone thought about it. "They had inside knowledge?"

"Something like that." I replied. "They definitely had knowledge. The question is: from where did they obtain that knowledge?"

"Like I said, they'd have to get information from the inside."

"But from 28 different places, developing that many contacts, and at banks that carried that much money... and then on top of that, they hit right at the time the money was there... every time?" I said.

"I would guess it means they have some kind of scout team that got the information ahead of time, maybe cased the joints as well?" Muscone offered, surprising me at how he was flailing mentally over this.

"Silverfish is likely only one person, probably a gang of no more than three or four." I said. "He or they would not want to trust too many people, and how would those scouts know where to look and which joints to case?"

"Okay, I admit it, I'm stumped." Jack said. I think he just didn't want to play the game any longer.

"Cindy?" I asked, offering her a chance to get the answer.

"I'm not a Troy," she said, "but just as a wild-ass guess: from what I've been reading of the case, they had to have inside information each time." Cindy said. "So they're either part of a network of some sort, or they had contacts-- oh, good grief, of course: Moriarty."

"Very good, Crowbar 2." I said, and I was indeed extremely impressed with her. "Yes, if I were Silverfish, I'd contact a... Consultant of Crime." I said. "Someone who has a large web, many contacts, and could get the information at each of those locations at the correct times... for a fee or percentage, of course."

"Ohhhh..." said Jack, his eyes lighting up. "The 'real Moriarty', as you've been calling him. So you think Silverfish got his information from your Moriarty."

"Yes." I said. "And if our Moriarty is involved, I suspect the Director thought I might get some kind of clue to him by reviewing all these cases. Yes, the Director thinks he's Wargrave, and that is his and your target, but that's okay... we're still working on the same goal."

"Have you found anything in any of this?" Muscone asked. "I went through everything this weekend also, just so that we could talk about it and maybe I'd see something. But there's no real pattern that I can find."

"Nor did the FBI's best analysts and codebreakers." I said. "And there may simply not be a pattern for us to find. But I will say this: even though Silverfish really zigged and zagged over the landscape, he still eventually went from Northwest to Southeast in the United States. So maybe there's a pattern of the way the money was distributed, and then the criminals hit the banks. I've got my computer and money people searching for that."

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"So that's all we got from him." said Joanne Cummings in my office. Teddy was in the chair next to her, while Cindy sat on the sofa behind them, quietly listening in.

"Okay, guys, good work." I said. "So did anything stand out to either of you during your interview with Mr. Harkins?"

"No sir." said Joanne. "He seemed sincere, answered the questions readily. He... he did mention J.P. Goldman Bank several times, and wondered why his bank was robbed and Goldman's wasn't."