‘Wow, the motherfucker’s got balls, I’ll give him that,’ a tall and muscular SWAT agent said.
‘What are you, a fucking fan now, Luke? The guy is a psycho,’ another SWAT agent shot back. This one was a little shorter but just as muscular.
New murmurs erupted.
‘OK,’ Hunter said loudly, quieting everyone down again. ‘Graham Fisher still lives in the same house he shared with his wife and son in Boyle Heights. The address and the house schematics are all inside the folders on your desks. And we already have a warrant for his arrest. So how about we go take this sonofabitch down?’
One Hundred and Two
The police convoy was made up of two black SWAT SUVs, three unmarked police cars and two black and white units. Four SWAT agents occupied each of the SUVs. Hunter, Garcia and Captain Blake were in the first unmarked car, heading the convoy. Michelle Kelly was in the vehicle just behind them, together with two LAPD SIS agents. Three more SIS agents occupied the third unmarked car. The two black and white units were there just as a backup precaution.
The LAPD Special Investigation Section (SIS) was an Elite Tactical Surveillance squad that has existed for more than forty years, despite efforts from various human-rights and political groups to shut it down. Their kill rate was higher than that of any other unit in the department, including SWAT. SIS teams were mainly used to stealthily watch apex predators – individuals suspected of violent crimes who would not cease until caught in the act. Masters of surveillance, SIS officers waited to observe a suspect committing new crimes before moving in to make arrests. Lethal force was often used, and they were all expert marksmen.
The address they had took them to a small hilly street in the west quadrant of Boyle Heights, a working-class neighborhood just east of downtown Los Angeles.
All the houses were set back from the street but without any foliage. The street was devoid of trees. It was an unusually uninviting place. In the summer the heat probably turned the street into a relentlessly dusty place, where tensions and angers multiplied with the same intensity that bacteria did.
Graham Fisher’s house, number 21, was tucked away right at the top of the hilly street. The house itself was much the same as all the others in that road, a medium-sized, two-story, three-bedroom home, with air conditioners hanging from a couple of windows. Three narrow steps led up to the concrete front porch. The house was painted a faded blue, with the number 21 hand-painted in white near the front door. All the windows were shut. All the curtains were drawn. All appeared quiet. The front yard had a neglected look to it, streaks of dirt sidling up against grass choked with weeds. A white, thigh-high steel fence circled the property. The back alleyway that serviced the entire street wasn’t wide enough for any of the vehicles to drive down. The convoy parked at the bottom of the road.
‘OK, listen up,’ the SWAT captain said in an authoritative voice as everyone gathered by the two SUVs. ‘Alpha team – Morris, Luke and myself – will blast in through the front door. We’ll clear the living room, the dining room and the downstairs washroom, here.’
As he spoke he indicated the locations on the house schematics that he had spread open over the hood of one of the cars.
‘Beta team – Johnson, Davis and Lewis – will come in through the back door that leads directly into the kitchen. They will clear that room first before moving on upstairs, where they will clear both bathrooms and all three bedrooms. Gamma team – Lopez and Turkowski – will follow Alpha team inside through the front door and then proceed to the basement.’ He paused and looked up at Captain Blake. ‘SIS agents and HSS detectives will only enter the house once we have radioed in that we’re all clear inside. Is that understood?’ He made harsh and determined eye contact with everyone who wasn’t part of the SWAT team, hammering his point through.
‘Roger that,’ Hunter, Garcia and the SIS agents replied back.
The SWAT captain turned and faced his team.
‘OK, badasses. We have everything in our favor this morning. This sick puppy doesn’t know we’re coming for him today. So let’s hit the house fast and hard and give him the surprise of his sorry-ass life. We all know he’s a psycho, but not the gun-slinging kind of psycho. So even though he might have a firearm in the house, chances are it won’t be close at hand. Nevertheless, watch your six. No mistakes. No hesitations. This guy is as clever as they come, full of fucking surprises, and you all know that the only surprises I like are the ones we spring up on them. As soon as a room is cleared, radio it on. If anyone spots the target, arrest the fucker. Lethal force only, and I repeat, only if called for. No happy triggering today. Are we all clear?’
‘Clear, Captain,’ all seven SWAT agents replied in unison.
‘OK, badasses, let’s lock and load. I want this whole thing wrapped up in sixty seconds or less. Take positions, and let’s bring Judgment Day to this piece of shit.’
Twenty seconds later the SWAT captain heard the first status update through his earpiece.
‘Beta team is in position. Ready to blast some doors, Cap.’
Beta team was the only team traveling down the back alley. Alpha and Gamma teams were coming in through the front door.
To reduce the chance of pre-warning the subject, a SWAT agent slowly drove one of the SUVs up the hilly street. The remaining agents, forming teams Alpha and Gamma, crouch-ran together with the vehicle, hiding on the other side of it.
‘Roger that,’ the SWAT captain replied via his helmet microphone. ‘We’ll be in position in less than ten.’
‘Roger that, Captain.’
‘OK, let’s move,’ the captain ordered teams Alpha and Gamma.
They moved fast and stealthily. The captain took point while the other agents assumed standard 2x2 cover formation. They all cleared the steel fence by jumping it instead of going for the gate with rusty hinges – no noise, no warning.
At the porch the captain updated the teams’ status.
‘Alpha and Gamma are in position.’
‘Roger that, Cap,’ Davis from Beta team replied.
Agent Morris, Captain Fallon’s second in command, quickly slid a small fiber-optic tube under the front door. The tube was a fiberscope, connected to a three-inch screen monitor.
Davis did the same at the back door.
There was no movement coming from anywhere inside.
‘Kitchen is dead,’ Davis transmitted. ‘No one here.’
‘Negative for movement at the front room too,’ Morris confirmed.
‘We’ve got a very sturdy lock back here, Captain,’ Davis reported. ‘We’ll need to blast the whole thing off with the breaching shotgun.’
The captain quickly checked the lock and the hinges on the front door. So did Morris, who nodded back at Captain Fallon, agreeing with Beta team’s assessment.
A breaching shotgun is nothing more than a regular shotgun loaded with breaching rounds, also called ‘TESAR’ or disintegrators. These are shotgun shells specially designed to destroy door deadbolts, locks and hinges without risking injury or lives by ricocheting or by flying on at lethal speed once they get through the door. The rounds are frangible, made of a dense, sintered material, most commonly metal powder, in a binder, such as wax. The round will destroy a lock or hinge and then immediately disperse. Jokingly, SWAT agents have nicknamed these rounds ‘master keys’ and their use is referred to as ‘Avon Calling’.
‘Roger that and agreed,’ the SWAT captain replied, signaling Luke, one of the agents, who was carrying a breaching shotgun.