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Stevens, who sometimes calls himself Abu Ben Mohammed, is one of eight suspects in the murder-robbery of Goldblatt’s Furniture earlier this week. It was the intention of Staff Inspector Peter Wohl, commanding the Special Operations Division, to arrest all eight suspects at once, and in the wee hours, to minimize risks to both the public and his officers.
Seven of the eight carefully orchestrated arrests went smoothly. But, as this reporter and Officer Matthew M. Payne, administrative assistant to Inspector Wohl, waited in a dark alley behind Stevens’s house in the 4700 block of Hawthorne Street for the meticulously planned arrest procedure to begin, Stevens suddenly appeared in the alley, a blazing .45 automatic in his hand.
As this reporter dove for cover, two of Stevens’s bullets struck Payne, who had been assigned to escort this reporter during Stevens’s arrest. Payne went down, but he was not out. Somehow, Payne managed to get his own pistol into action. When the shooting was over, Stevens was critically, possibly fatally, wounded, and the young cop he had tried to gun down without warning was standing over him, blood dripping from his own wounds.
This was not the first battle for his life fought by Payne, who is twenty-two and a bachelor. Three months ago, while attempting to arrest Warren K. Fletcher, the Northwest Philadelphia serial rapist, Fletcher, who had his latest victim in his van, tried to run over the young policeman. Moments later he was dead of a bullet in the brain fired by the then six-months-on-the-police-force rookie.
Payne, who collapsed moments after making sure Stevens posed no further threat, was taken to Frankford Hospital, where he underwent surgery for the removal of the bullet in his leg. His condition is described as “good.”
Stevens, who was also rushed to Frankford Hospital by police, is in intensive care, his condition described as “critical” by hospital authorities.
Chief Inspector Matt Lowenstein, who commands the Detective Division, under whose overall command the mass arrest took place, said that Stevens, if he lives, will have assault with a deadly weapon and resisting arrest added to the other charges, which include first-degree murder, already lodged against him.
“I regret that force was necessary,” Chief Lowenstein said. “Inspector Wohl and his men took every step they could think of to avoid it. But I cannot conceal my admiration for this young officer (Payne) who bravely stood up to this vicious criminal.”
* * *
By 6:45 A.M., the appropriate plates had been replaced on the presses, and with a deep growl, they began to roll again.
It was the opinion of the managing editor that they could probably sell an additional thirty-five or forty thousand copies of the paper. Blood and shooting always sold.
How that goddamn O’Hara manages to always be in on things like this is a mystery, but giving the sonofabitch his due, he always is, and he probably is worth all the money we have to pay him.
Hector Carlos Estivez was in the first of the vans carrying the prisoners to arrive at the Police Administration Building at 8th and Race Streets in downtown Philadelphia. The others arrived over the next fifteen minutes.
The van carrying Mr. Estivez entered the parking lot at the rear of the Roundhouse, and immediately backed up down the ramp leading to the Central Cell Room.
The driver and his partner got out and went to the rear of the van. They found Homicide detective Joe D’Amata, who had driven in his own car from Frankford, waiting for them. The driver opened the rear door of the van and Mr. Estivez, who had been handcuffed, was helped out of the van.
Detective D’Amata took one of Mr. Estivez’s arms, and one of the officers who had been in the back of the van with him took the other.
Mr. Estivez was then led through the Cell Room to an elevator, and taken in it to the Homicide Bureau on the third floor.
There were several people standing just outside the office of Captain Henry Q. Quaire, commanding officer of the Homicide Bureau. Mr. Estivez recognized only one of them, Sergeant Jason Washington. The others were Farnsworth Stillwell, an assistant district attorney of Philadelphia County; Staff Inspector Peter Wohl; and Captain Quaire himself.
Mr. Estivez was taken to a small room furnished with an Early American-style chair and a small table. There was a window with one-way glass in one wall of the room. The chair was made of steel and was bolted to the floor. One end of a pair of handcuffs was looped through a hole in the chair seat.
Mr. Estivez’s handcuffs were removed. Detective D’Amata told him to sit down and, when he had done so, put Mr. Estivez’s left wrist in the handcuff cuffed to the chair.
Mr. Estivez was then left alone.
He looked with a mixture of contempt and uneasiness at the one-way glass window. There was no way of telling if someone was on the other side, looking in at him.
A minute or so later the door to the room opened, and Detective D’Amata returned. On his heels came Sergeant Jason Washington, Staff Inspector Wohl, and Assistant District Attorney Stillwell.
“Which one is this one?” Sergeant Washington inquired.
“This is Mr. Hector Carlos Estivez,” Detective D’Amata replied.
Sergeant Washington, a carefully calculated (and in fact, once practiced before a mirror) look of contempt, scorn, and dislike on his face, then took two steps toward Mr. Estivez. Mr. Estivez, who was sitting, had to look up at him. There was no way that Mr. Estivez could not be aware of Washington’s considerable bulk.
Sergeant Washington then squatted down, so that his face was on a level with Mr. Estivez, and examined him carefully for twenty seconds or so.
He then grunted, stood erect, said, “Okay, Hector Carlos Estivez. Fine,” and scribbled something in his notebook.
This was a little psychological warfare, Jason Washington having long ago come to believe that the greatest fear is the fear of the unknown.
Washington knew he enjoyed a certain fame (perhaps notoriety) in the criminal community. There was a perhaps fifty-fifty chance that Estivez knew who he was. And even if he didn’t, Washington was sure that the sight of a very large, very well-dressed black man in an obvious position of police authority would be unnerving.
