CHAPTER ONE

"This is 911, " a female voice answered.  According to the clock on the wall of Central Control, the time was 9:33 p.m.  "What's the emergency?"

"A man near the east entrance of Carlyle Park.  He's dead," a deep raspy voice replied.

"Okay, what's your name and where are you calling from?" the 911 operator asked.  There was a click...and then a dial tone.....

"What have you got there?" An overweight uniformed sergeant in charge of the 4:00 p.m. to midnight shift sounded out.

"Some guy just reported a dead male in Carlyle Park. He hung up without giving me any more info. I'm dispatching the call to Central."

Within ten minutes, Patrolmen George Fowler and Ismael Ruiz of the Syracuse Police Department received the radio call while on a meal break at a near-by diner. They drove immediately toward the park, Fowler at the wheel.

Moments later, they reached Carlyle Park. Ruiz, a young rookie cop felt anxious.  He had been on the force for only five weeks.

What's there? he wondered.  What are we gonna find? he asked himself.
Fowler turned to Ruiz.

"Iz, get your gun ready.  This could be a set-up or it could be a legit call.  Anyway, be careful.  Y'hear?"

The patrol car moved slowly into the park, then turned right. It was October, no moon. The night was dark. The entire area was desolate. There was a time many years before, when people could go there at all hours, but that had changed.  Although it was only nine forty-five in the evening, the place was overtaken with an uneasy silence.

The car, with its bright lights on, started to inch slowly along the blacktop road. The grooved rubber tires crept slowly on top of loose chunks of hard broken road tar sending crackling sounds off into the night adding to its already mysterious and eerie atmosphere. Weathered and chipped concrete benches with their cracked and missing wooden slats lined the roadway every hundred feet.

"Im gettin' a little closer.  I just can't make out what it is,"Fowler said.  His tone was anxious.

And there it was, sprawled on its side: The body of a man in a dark blue suit, white shirt and maroon tie.

"Iz stay put, but cover me.  I'm goin' out.  I'm not sure what the hell's going on here."Fowler barked out to his partner.

Fowler exited the car, his back to Ruiz, gun drawn, as he walked cautiously toward the man on the ground.  Patrolman Ruiz was already holding his 9 mm semi-automatic weapon in his right hand as he radioed simultaneously to central headquarters, reporting in a hyperventilated voice what was happening.

As Fowler approached the man on the ground, he looked nervously around to make sure Ruiz was covering him.  The car lights with their high-powered full brights continued a steady focus on the man in the blue suit.

Slowly, still looking cautiously in all directions, Fowler walked toward the sprawled figure.

He could now see more clearly.  The man was on his back, his head pressed hard against the dirty pavement.  His right arm was extended over his should, left arm bent at the elbow, palm facing up.

The man's neck was cold to Fowler's touch.

"Dead," Fowler whispered to himself.

"What have we got?" Ruiz shouted from the car ten feet away.

"This guy's been shot.  Looks like he took a bullet in the head," Fowler yelled back.

Hearing what Fowler just reported, Ruiz got out of the car.  With the gun in his right hand and a flashlight in his left, he started to walk anxiously toward the motionless body.

"Any idea who he is?" Ruiz shouted out.  His voice shaky, fear shrouding it.

"Don't know," Fowler shot back.  "A guy dressed like him ain't out for a pleasure walk at night in this fuckin' place..."  He hesitated, then continued, "unless maybe he was out ta' kill himself."

Stark quiet continued to blanket the scene; one cop crouched over a dead man, another standing nervously next to the patrol car.

Fowler, a heavy-set fifteen year veteran of the force, and Ruiz, a young rookie cop, were in a deserted park on a dark night with a body on the ground.  The older cop had been in some similar situations before, but this was a first for Ruiz.  He had no special training for this kind of scene.  A strange feeling, not exactly sure what was happening.  Maybe it's because I'm a rookie and this is my first scary situation.  I'm sure it's a normal reaction, he kept reassuring himself.

Suddenly, as if struck by lightening, the figure on the ground moved.  He sat straight up.  His face, deathly ashen...eyes frozen by the penetrating high beams of the patrol car that focused on him like two giant stage lights.

"This fuckin' guy's alive," Fowler shrieked excitedly as he bolted up from his crouched position as he sprung back five feet.

Without hesitation, Ruiz moved in quickly.  His gaze fixed on the man sitting on the ground.  The weapon already in his hand was aimed steadily at the figure who remained in a spacey trance, staring at the car's full lights ten feet in front of him.

Within an instant, Fowler screamed, "Watch out Iz!  He's got a gun."

Reacting without thought, Ruiz pulled the trigger three times in rapid succession.  Three 9 mm bullets ripped through the man's chest.  He fell back with a thud, again sprawled out on the dirty pavement.  This time, he was really dead.

"Jesus Christ!  What the hell happened here?"  Ruiz cried out as he stared at the body that lay still in a pool of blood spilling out and mixing with the dark gravel around the lifeless form.

Fowler and Ruiz remained frozen as they stood over the motionless figure.  After a few seconds, the silence was broken.

"Where the hell's the gun?" Ruiz screamed out in panic.  "There's no goddamn gun.  You said he had a gun.  You said he had a gun."

"I thought I saw a gun in his hand," Fowler shot back.  "For Chrissakes, Iz, I thought I saw a gun."

"Shit.  There's no fucking gun.  Shit.  Shit!" Ruiz shouted back.  He had now lost all control.

"What do we do?" Ruiz cried out.  "How do I explain it?  I just killed an unarmed guy."

"We just tell it like it went down," Fowler said, trying to calm his sobbing partner.  "Look Iz, in a few minutes this place will be crawling with guys from the precinct.  We just gotta stay cool."  Trying to soothe the rookie, Fowler continued.  "Go sit in the car, Ruiz.  You gotta stay cool, man.  You just gotta stay cool."

"What the hell have I done?  How could I have fucked up this way?"  Agony was all over his voice.

Ruiz slunk into the passenger seat.  He held his bowed head in both hands, eyes staring blankly at his lap.  "Holy shit.  Goddamn shit.  Holy shit.  Goddamn shit," he kept repeating as he rocked back and forth.

The sound of a police siren shattered the silence, becoming louder as a patrol car approached Fowler's vehicle.  Stopping behind it, Sergeant Timothy Ryan and Patrolman John Mattis approached Fowler standing in the roadway in front of the vehicle that just entered the park.

"What the hell do we have here?" growled Sergeant Ryan.

All Ryan knew at this point was what dispatch had reported after it received the "911" call:  "There's a man on the ground in Carlyle Park and he's dead."

"Sarge, we have a problem.  A real bad situation.  Real bad," Fowler snapped.  The creases around his mouth began to tighten.

In measured tone, Fowler started to explain what happened, but was quickly interrupted.  "What the fuck are you tellin' me?  Are you sayin' that Ruiz took out an unarmed guy?  Is that the shit you're handin' me?  Are you guy's crazy, or what!"

Sergeant Ryan and Patrolman Mattis walked in rapid lockstep toward the body.

There he lay.  A man in a dark blue suit, wearing a white shirt saturated with blood, and a maroon tie.

Dead.

Ryan made an abrupt move toward Fowler's car.  The young rookie was in the passenger seat mumbling incoherently to himself.

"Ruiz.  Ruiz," Ryan shouted, poking the distraught cop's shoulder with his index finger as if he were trying to awaken someone fast asleep.

"For Chrissakes, what the fuck happened here?" Ryan screeched.  His tone was high-pitched, excited.

Ruiz gripped his face as tears welled up in his eyes.  "Fowler told me he had a gun.  He said he had a gun.  I shot three rounds.  It happened so fast.  It was instinct.  Oh, my God.  What have I done?"  He began to sob uncontrollably.

"Get a goddamn grip on yourself, Ruiz.  Come on, you're a cop.  Act like one.  Okay, you thought he had a gun."  This time, Ryan's voice was softer, with a consoling quality.  "Look Iz, you and Fowler will have to give a full statement to Internal Affairs and probably the D.A.  It was an accident.  That's it.  Full story," Ryan said flatly as he rubbed his hand gently around Ruiz' neck massaging it lightly.  "You'll be okay.  Listen to me.  You'll be okay."

Ryan turned to Mattis.

"Call headquarters.  Report what went down.  Tell 'em to send the lieutenant right away.  He's gotta get here before the press finds out what's happened.  Those asshole pimps will be on us like leeches."

Mattis returned to his car.  He called it in as Ryan directed.

"Who is this guy?" Ryan asked Fowler.

"I don't know, Sarge.  I didn't want to move him until the M.E. and forensics got here.  I still haven't gone through his pockets for I.D."

"Good.  The crime boys should be here soon..."  Ryan paused,"...then maybe we'll get some answers."

Within five minutes three more patrol cars arrived.  The lead car carried Deputy Inspector Roy Brown and Lieutenant Brian Goody.  Two other cars brought members of the crime scene unit with their cameras, chalk and tape.

By this time, everyone at the scene knew that Ruiz had killed an unarmed man.

The area was roped off as cops were posted to secure the scene while the crime unit went into action.  Camera flashes continued to pierce the darkness as photographers took shots from every angle.  In the end, a white chalk silhouette was drawn on the ground around the body spread-eagled on the roadway.

Sergeant Ryan searched the pockets of the dead man for any identification.  Looking up at Brown, he threw a surprised shrug.  "There's no wallet here, Inspector.  Nothing in his pockets at all.  He must 've been robbed first, then shot in the head."  Scratching his right temple, still perplexed, Ryan continued.  "What the hell was he doing in the park in the first place?" he rang out.

With eyebrows raised, Brown chimed in, "This whole thing is very bizarre."

Inspector Brown knew he would be the target of cynical questions fed by the media's hunger once it was learned that an unarmed man was gunned down by one of his cops.  No way did he look forward to this kind of barrage. Christ, one of my guys just shot an unarmed guy, he repeated to himself.  The press would chew up a department already under heavy mortar fire for past screw-ups.

News people began to arrive.  A reporter from WXRL-TV, another from the Syracuse Gazette, and a third from radio station WSYR were the first on the scene.

"Keep those fuckin' guys behind the goddamn tape," snapped Inspector Brown as reporters tried to swarm the crime area.

Within minutes, another patrol car arrived.  Chief of the Department Jack Thomas exited the passenger side.  He approached Brown.

"Do we know who the victim is?"

"Chief, there's no wallet and no I.D.," Brown responded blankly.

Chief Thomas walked toward the dead man.  He saw a body dressed in a dark blue suit, white shirt, maroon tie, surrounded by a pool of blood.  As he knelt over him, Inspector Brown, Lieutenant Goody, Sergeant Ryan and Patrolman Fowler crowded around.

"Throw a flashlight on his face," commanded the Chief as he bent down to get a closer look at the victim.

After seeing the dead man in the light, Chief Thomas got up slowly, rising to a full standing height.  There was a foreboding silence.  Breaking it, he shook his head from side to side, pursed his lips tightly, winced.  He started to speak in a deliberate, tremulous voice.

"Who's the bright cop that shot him?" he grimaced, a deeply pained look spreading over his face.

"It's Ruiz.  He's sitting in the first car," Brown fired back, unsure of what was coming next.

"Well, that's great!  Just great!  You can tell him the guy he just killed...," the Chief hesitated.  His voice suddenly dropped.

"Sweet mother of God..."   Chief Thomas moaned, its delivery, trembling, filled with emotion.  "One of our cops..." he paused, biting down hard on his lower lip as he continued slowly."  ...One of our cops just killed THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF THE UNITED STATES.

ARROWHEAD WARNING –
           Do not sneak a peek at the ending!