Chapter 9
Three weeks went by before we were alerted again, during that time we made a two-night trip to evaluate security at two natural gas power plants near Platteville, Colorado. We flew to Denver and met with a group of other security consultants and went by tour bus to their town and toured the facilities from a security perspective. We recommended upgrades in their remote sensing systems since the perimeter was only marginally protected. One of the plants used to be a nuke facility but the reactor was decommissioned long ago, it had been the only nuclear power plant in Colorado, now the state was entirely natural gas. We've seen this before, the belief within the natural gas power industry that they'd never be the target of environmental terrorism, one employee told us their biggest security threat were bison in the employee parking lot during mating season.
One of the plants only had one line of eight foot chain link fence around the property, we suggested a second line and barbed wire on top of both, with ground sensing between them, we also suggested lighting the perimeter. One employee said he didn't want to work someplace that looked like a prison. His comment was a good example of local attitudes toward security: it will never happen here.
The town of Platteville was surrounded by miles and miles of flat farmland, they had a large grain elevator complex along the train tracks in the center of town. Outside of town sat two large natural gas power generating plants and a large liquid natural gas underground storage facility. The times have changed a lot in this town, you could see signs of decline and rebirth all across the town as they slowly left the 1940s.
Nineteen days after the trip to Colorado we got the call from the Pentagon office about a problem in Dallas, Texas that wasn't our traditional type of alert but was possibly something we could apply our technology to help solve. They advised we could get called away from Dallas if something more significant occurred.
Near downtown Dallas, Texas was a small gay commercial district, it's one block long and sat on the route once taken by the Kennedys on their way to Dealy Plaza. David was told that over the past four weeks five gay couples had been shot while walking down the sidewalk in the gay district.
`The District' was a one block area of downtown Dallas with traditional storefronts on both sides of the street, and lots of tiny rainbow flags flapped in the wind. They had hair dressers, clothing, toys, shoes, insurance, a financial advisor, one diner, a coffee shop, an old hotel, and two bars. I heard it could get a little rowdy at night, but it catered to an older crowd, not so much the college age gays because they're more interested in crowds and malls and live bands, at least that's the way they were in Dallas. If you watched the old news film of the Presidential motorcade going down Main Street in 1963 they drove through The District, a lot of the buildings were still the same today.
Five men were shot, four of them died. Police had few clues, and no eye witness reports. I wasn't sure what they wanted us to do but we got on a commercial flight, fifty five minutes later we landed at DFW and took a taxi to our hotel and called a supervising detective at the police department main office. That was one expensive taxi ride, it's nearly 34 miles from DFW to Dealy Plaza. On the ride to Dealy Plaza David expressed it best when he said this was a police matter and we were not cops, just ordinary super heroes.
The story was kept out of the media, we were shown the autopsy reports. All the shots came from the same general area, just outside The District, possibly from a second floor window. All the rounds had matching bore markings. All the victims were walking the sidewalk holding hands and window shopping the stores. None of the victims had arrest records or affiliations with any organizations, except one was a US Navy vet. All five were shot in the back causing an upper abdominal wound, cause of death was related to blood loss. Race did not seem to be a factor in the selection of the victim, the shooter probably could not see skin color on his victims.
All the victims were over the age of 45, none were registered voters, all of them were employed, and all had the appearance of having been randomly selected while walking in public holding hands. The scenario was similar to a shooting rampage in Phoenix in 2006 called the Serial Shooter, we reviewed those files for similarities.
The District was an older retail area built in the 1920s, mostly two and three story buildings. Because of the canyon effect the sound of a single rifle shot echoed, everyone that filed a police report said the sound came from a different direction.
The DPS had created a profile of the shooter. All the incidents took place on Main Street between South Ervay Street and South Saint Paul Street. There was a city park on Main Street one block east of The District, which could provide some cover for a shooter. The park was called the Main Street Garden Park and offered free Wi-Fi and a fenced dog park, it was like a small town square with lots of trees but was poorly lit at night.
Using our DOD access we collected a summary of all the cell phones that were in the area of the shooting for one hour prior to both incidents and worked with the state police to whittle down the list of possible suspects. We also accessed city police records for all arrests in the area, all paroled offenders in the area, and records for all gun and ammo sales in that caliber over the past six months. Over two days we reduced the size of our shopping list by day and stalked the park by night. We both carried concealed pistols, our equipment case was at our airport office but we had our glasses which operated in IR mode (without the case) and allowed us to see hidden people. Supposedly, city and state police were advised there was a plain clothes DOD team working The District all day and all night. We carried cell phones and pistols only.
We worked from 9am to 11pm every day we were on the case and watched our list of suspects slowly decrease in size, by day three we were down to fifteen suspects and had surveillance on them using their smart phones as tracking devices.
No good leads were developed, we spent a week in Dallas accomplishing very little. During the week we installed a camera on top of the UNT College of Law building, it overlooked the entire park and down the street over the entire one block long gay district, and operated in IR mode only. Next to the camera we installed a multiband cell sniffer, it monitored the airwaves for all cell signals and recorded: identity, location, and movement based on each GPS receiver. This would give us an after-the-fact record of nearly everyone in the area should another shooting occur while we were in town. David requested it from the DOD and had it flown-in. We had to take a taxi to Love Field to pick it up from the checked baggage claim area.
The device generated a map of the area with a dot for the location of every active smart phone within 2,000 feet. I could watch it on my cell display so we could compare those to people we could see, since it was obvious the shooter was in a hidden location. We were constantly comparing the display to what we could see. A problem with the sniffer was the display was flat but The District was a 3D space. A third story target appeared the same as a street level target, which made it difficult to use. The shooter may have fired from a rooftop, and could have used the very place I mounted the camera and the sniffer!
Stuff hit the fan on the 9th day, 9:04pm, we were standing outside the dog park leaning against the fence watching the dogs play when David heard a muffled pop, followed by distant screams, and he turned to me and said: "Silencer, military vet." We took off running towards Saint Paul Street and slipped on our glasses in IR mode which proved to be the breakthrough when we saw a heat plume in a maple tree above the bus stop bench on Main Street, the northwest corner of the park.
David reached out and pressed his arm against my chest to slow us down, then he pointed to the bus stop bench. We sat down and listened carefully above us, but there was too much commotion and sirens to hear anything above us in the tree branches. Lots of people around us were running in different directions.
David carefully pulled his small pistol from his pocket and chambered a round. I was nervous as hell with the thought that the shooter could be fifteen feet straight above us. We heard sirens as police and EMS arrived in the area, people running down the sidewalk said a man was shot way down the block on the other side of the street, all we heard was the commotion. I used my cell to text our police contact that we might have a suspect for this shooting and needed backup.
About seven minutes later a very scruffy looking young man staggered up to the bench and sat down then leaned forward as if he was tying his shoelaces. "What you got?" he mumbled to David.
"You a cop?"
"Yeah, city vice, they said you needed help, you ID a suspect?" He softly whispered while he fiddled with his shoes, I could barely hear what he was saying, but I heard him say `vice.'
"These are heat sensing glasses." He said tapping the corner of his glasses frame, "We were by the dog park and heard a muffled rifle shot. We saw heat in the tree," he carefully pointed straight up. "I think your sniper is directly above us." He said in a very soft whisper as he leaned toward the cop.
The undercover cop looked at him and was instantly angry for putting him in danger. "Why the fuck are you sitting here?" He said in an angry whisper to David. "Because he only shoots couples holding hands in The District." The undercover guy rolled his eyes at David and said, "Fuck you!"
The undercover cop pulled out his flip phone and spoke very softly, "This is 172 at the corner of Main and Saint Paul we may have a sniper suspect and need back-up around the northwest corner of the park at the bus stop. Three undercover cops are sitting on the transit bench directly below the armed suspect who might be above us in the tree." As he said `undercover' he looked at is as if he suddenly realized he had no idea who we were.
"How long will that take?" I whispered to him, but he just looked down at the sidewalk (like David) and nodded yes. We all watched a police car with lights on race down Main Street but it kept going, then he looked at us and said, "Who the fuck are you guys, vigilantes?" David told him we worked for the Pentagon but the cop just laughed and said, "That's a new one!"
Within a couple minutes we heard the roar of car engines as four police cars converged on the corner and aimed weapons at us and told us to lie on the sidewalk. "This is unconventional," David moaned. So we all got down on the sidewalk while even more officers surrounded the tree from the park side. The cops grabbed David by his arms and pulled him to his feet like he was being taken into custody. He whispered something to one of the cops then they let him go, David grabbed the tree and started to climb the back side, a uniform cop pushed him up so he could grab the lowest limb. Silently he climbed and pulled out his pistol and looked around up in the limbs.
"Don't move or I'll shoot you dead!" David angrily screamed. With the sound of branches breaking a man fell from the tree and landed on the grass behind the bus stop bench and screamed in pain, I thought he broke his arm. The guy landed six feet from me, one second after he landed a rifle fell from the tree and landed beside him. He was immediately swarmed by police and taken into custody. I thought I heard a physical struggle to handcuff him. But these days the cops all yell `STOP RESISTING' even when the suspect was dead and limp.
The pile of cops on top of the suspect reminded me of the last Cowboys game I watched with David after an interception and fumble.
The undercover cop stood up and helped me to my feet, then he held my upper arm and walked me to a police car and put me in the back seat, but he never patted me down.
My heart was pounding, especially after I heard my husband yell like when we were in Seal School. I saw him carefully climb down the tree and was escorted to the cramped car seat beside me.
We watched a huddle of cops examine the rifle with flashlights to read the stamped ID plate on the receiver and commented it was the same size (7.62mm) as all the previous shootings. The man was a younger Hispanic guy and appeared to be mentally ill from what we saw as he laid on the ground screaming that his arm was broken and something about God coming to Texas. The homeless looking vice cop stood by the open car door and reminded us not to move. An ambulance arrived and took the suspect to the hospital.
Eventually our primary contact with the Dallas Police arrived and cleared us, we'd been detained until they knew who we were. Nobody apologized, but they were all very happy that their serial sniper was in custody. We were allowed to climb out of the car and hung around in case anyone wanted to know how we solved their case, or maybe even say `thank you.'
I was a nervous wreck but David was pissed because of how we were treated, even though city cops shoved him up into the tree with his IR glasses on and his own pistol in pocket, only management knew we were there to help them but they didn't know for sure who we were. I watched David as they handed his cell and pistol back and he swiped the screen and glanced at me with a sour look on his face. The time was 9:51pm. I got the impression watching David use his phone that he felt this entire thing was messed up by lousy communications within Dallas PD.
I told him I was going to go retrieve our equipment and took off walking to the Law Building roof to retrieve our gear. I left the camera mount but shut off the cell tracker and the camera and returned to the park.
The night shift commander of the Dallas Police arrived and spoke to David while I was gone, he told me later what he said to the boss, "You called us to come from El Paso to do the impossible and solve your sniper case, then this is how we got treated? Next time you might want to call someone else." He said the commander stood there red faced but had nothing to say. David told me later he was mentally hoping for a tiny show of thanks or respect but they said nothing, we were just a tool to be used, which was probably how they treated their own people too. To him it sounded like a significant management problem.
David asked him to run us down the street to Dealy Plaza, we'd walk the three blocks to the hotel. By 10:50 we were back in our room, we texted the office that our mission was accomplished and we'd be home tomorrow. I called for plane tickets, first flight back to El Paso tomorrow morning.
David quietly called for room service, two half pound burgers and fries and a six pack of Coors Lite in bottles. It took an hour for our grub to arrive, but it was rolled to our room by a city police guy in a business suit. Of course we asked about the reward and got his business card. He said he was the police media spokesman and wanted to apologize for how our situation was handled, I told him it was a total clown show and was probably why the police department couldn't solve the case on their own. He explained the problem started in the Mayor's office and the election was four weeks away and change was in the air, then he apologized again and we sat there watching our food get cold while this asshole ran his mouth and said lots of stuff except sorry' or thank you.'
After he left we nuked our food and chowed down and listened to music videos on CMT. We checked the local TV stations and saw no mention of the shootings. David recalled being told the story had been suppressed by city government to avoid a panic and make it harder to catch the sniper.
While we ate David mocked the cop guy by imitating his accent and the dumb stuff he said, which was kind of funny, but I was trying to enjoy my food.
After eating we lay on the bed and kissed and snuggled together for half an hour then got in the tub and soaked until both of us had the yawns. I told David I was too tired to do anything.
I sat between his thighs with the back of my head resting on his right chest, my fingernails gently scratched his legs. He had his hands on my chest and his head leaned back against the tub enclosure, I think we both dozed off until the water got too cool.
David turned on the AC to full blast cold and we got under the blankets together, I slept in back and rubbed his body with one arm over his side, my nose pressed into his hair.
At five AM my cell alarmed and we got up and packed our stuff, the camera fit back inside our small carry-on and the data collecting box already looked like an aluminum briefcase (with five small antenna mounts on the outside), like a miniature version of our hard case back at the airport in El Paso. We discussed how the TSA would react to the sniffer box as a carry-on, we're not sure how well informed they were about DOD tech being carried on a passenger jet. Taking pistols on the plane was an old and well known procedure for us and the airlines, they just didn't want anyone to see us do it.
At DFW our two cases went through TSA screening easily, they were just looking for explosives and didn't care what the box was used for. Thank God for that poorly trained guy on the x-ray monitor.
We checked our pistols with the pilot and put the cases in the overhead bins, and at 9:55am we landed in El Paso, but the plane parked at the wrong side of the terminal so we had to walk all the way over to the west concourse and then use the door with the keypad lock to go downstairs and enter our office where we happily surrendered the camera and the DOD cell sniffer in exchange for our case. The officer at the desk said the cell sniffer was not secret technology, anyone could buy them, and lots of police departments owned them and used them during civil unrest.
We spent the next two hours in separate rooms recording our statements for each hour of each day we were in Dallas and didn't get home until nearly 2pm, exhausted. I took a shower and a nap, David went downstairs to run for half an hour.
After his therapeutic run he took a shower and got under the comforter with me, but he blew me before he fell asleep, I rolled on my back and let him do his thing. There were times when the only thing that satisfied David was a boner in his mouth. After I came he snuggled against me like another spoon in the drawer.
"I honestly thought we'd never make progress in Dallas, it amazes me how often just simple technology and basic police work can solve so many crimes. We never really used the data from that cell sniffer."
"Yep, I think it was our AR glasses that broke the case, and basic shoe leather police work." David replied. Then he said, "I'd like to see a report how well this guy fit their police profile and how he fit into the evidence from the other shootings." I commented, "Yes, me too. I'd love to see it."
David liked to press his face against my neck and wiggle himself into my back side, sort of like making a sandwich then squishing it before you cut it in half.
David whispered into my ear, "What did you think of that guy in the tree?"
"He's fucked-up on something, maybe meth, did he have scars?" I asked.
"It was too dark, after falling eighteen feet he'd have scars anyway."
"Poor guy, there's no way they could put him in the city jail like that."
"They probably took him to the ER first at Parkland."
"Parkland wow, there's a name." I commented.
"Isn't there a high school here by that name?" David asked.
"Yes, north of Transmountain and east of Dyer." I answered while yawning. I was asleep a few minutes later.
David's last words were, "Suppose they'll fire us for not killing him?" He sounded funny talking with his lips touching the back of my neck. I really loved to snuggle with my husband and our pillow talk too.
Note: contact the author: borischenaz gmail