AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Don’t add insolence to everything else, Peter,” the mayor said.
“I didn’t use Highway because I thought using Special Operations officers was a more efficient utilization of manpower. And because I didn’t want a Highway car parked there all night, every night.”
“But you do now admit that was faulty judgment?” Czernich said.
“No, sir. I do not. I would do the same thing again. And I don’t think it would have made a bit of difference if a Highway car had been given the job. The same thing would have happened.”
“Now, that’s bullsh—”
“He answered your question, Tad,” the mayor interrupted. “Now let me ask one: What, if it was still your responsibility, would you do to the cops who took off before they were properly relieved?”
The question took Wohl by surprise. He tried to shift mental gears to consider it.
“They took off without checking to see that the cops who were relieving them were really cops. That got Monahan killed, and makes the entire Department look ridiculous,” the mayor said.
“I don’t think I’d do anything to them, sir. I hope you don’t. If I had been in that car and saw another car with uniformed cops in it show up when I expected a car with uniformed cops in it to show up, I would have presumed I had been relieved.”
“And you would have been wrong.”
“Malone’s plan was pretty thorough. I reviewed it. There was nothing in it about having the cops on the job check the IDs of the cops relieving them. That’s my fault. Not Malone’s and certainly not theirs.”
The mayor shrugged, but said nothing. He made another “come on” gesture with his hands.
“We believe,” Wohl continued, “that as soon as the RPC, the one going off the job, turned the corner, an individual wearing a police uniform rang Mr. Monahan’s doorbell, and when Mr. Monahan answered the doorbell, he shot him, if that’s the correct word, with a stun gun.”
“What?” Chief Lowenstein asked incredulously. “What did you say, ‘stun gun’?”
“What the hell is a stun gun?” the mayor asked.
“What it is, Jerry,” Chief Coughlin said, “is a thing that throws little darts at you. There’s wires, and when it hits you, you get shocked. It’s supposed to be nonlethal.”
“You know what this thing is?” Carlucci asked him incredulously.
“They had a booth at the IACP (International Association of Chiefs of Police) Convention,” Chief Coughlin said. “They demonstrated them. They’re supposed to be used places where you don’t want to fire a gun.”
“And Monahan was shot with one of these things?” the mayor asked.
“That’s what the medical examiner believes, sir,” Wohl said. “Mr. Monahan died of a heart attack. The ME thinks it was caused by getting hit with a stun gun. There are two small bruises on his chest.”
“How come the ME knows about these things?” the mayor asked.
“They’ve been trying to sell them to us,” Coughlin said.
“We buy any of these things, Tad?” the mayor asked.
“I would have to check, Mr. Mayor.”
“There are three at the range at the Academy,” Wohl said. “On loan from the dealer, or the manufacturer, I’m not sure which.”
“Let me get this straight: You’re telling me Monahan was shot by a cop with a Mickey Mouse Buck Rogers stun gun we borrowed from somebody?”
“No, sir. I checked with the Academy. The ones out there are inoperative; they’re waiting for the manufacturer, or the dealer, to come fix them.”
“So where did the one who shot Monahan come from?” the mayor asked, and then, before Wohl could frame a reply, thought of something else: “I thought Coughlin just said they’re nonlethal?”
“They’re supposed to be, Jerry,” Coughlin replied. “That’s what they said at the convention. They’re supposed to knock you on your ass for a couple of minutes, but they’re not supposed to kill you.”
“Monahan’s dead,” the mayor said.
