Wrongful Convictions, page 24
They continued to drive into the Twin Cities, exiting on Central Ave and turning south. They drove until they reached 694 and entered onto the eastbound freeway. They barely got to speed before they exited almost immediately on Silver Lake Road. At the stoplight on top of the hill her driver took a right and traveled down Silver Lake Road through several stop lights until they got to 39th AVE and the Silver Lake Village. The car waited for the light to give a green arrow and it made a left, traveled down a block to the second of two blue duplexes. The garage door opened on the two car garage and the driver pulled the car in and closed the door behind them.
“Come on inside, hungry?” Eagle asked.
“Famished, jail food sucks. Ever had it?” she responded, trying to get more out of him.
He said nothing.
The door opened into a split level house. She followed the man up the stairs to an open floor plan. The living room area was above the stairs. Directly in front of the stairs was the kitchen, and to the left of the kitchen was a dining room separated from the kitchen with a breakfast bar. To the right of the kitchen was a stairwell that lead up to two closed doors. She figured they were most likely bedrooms, and a bathroom. To the right of the stairs was a room that looked out over the living room. Tess surveyed the entire floor plan for possible escape routes. She couldn’t be sure what was going to happen in the short term but she knew she needed to get out of there sooner rather than later.
“Have a seat.” The man pointed her to a sofa in the living room.
The decoration in the house was Spartan to say the least. There was nothing on the walls of any room. The living room had a sofa, an uncomfortable looking chair and a television on a stand. It was an old style tube television, that seemed small in comparison to the standard fifty inch TV’s most people had.
In the dining room, there was a table with two chairs. Nothing else. No clutter, no mail, no empty ice cream pails, nothing. The entire place gave her the creeps, just like Mr. Mustache.
He walked into the kitchen and opened the fridge.
66
Tavian pulled into the driveway across the street from the blue duplex. He certainly didn’t like the look of the place. He made a call to check the title owner of the house; it was a rental owned by the man who lived on the other side of the duplex. He got a number and dialed it on his cell phone. There was no answer. Tavian felt the man in the car was a serious player in all of this. He made another call, this one to the local police department to run a check on the license plate of the vehicle that pulled into the garage of the duplex. The registered owner’s name was Antonio Eagle. Eagle did have a criminal record, but most of it was petty stuff, drunken assaults and some theft, nothing suggesting drug trafficking. It was also the same Antonio Eagle who was the registered agent for Blaine Auto in Minnesota according to the Unitah Tribe in Utah.
Tavian weighed his options. He had enough probable cause for a warrant but something bad could happen in the time that it would take to run it through the proper channels. On the other hand, he probably could justify breaking down the door based on the totality of the circumstance and his reasonable fear Tess’ life might be in danger.
The duplex had a fence around the entire outside of the lawn. Behind the duplex was an apartment building that might provide him a better opportunity to see anything inside the house. That could shore up his suspicions. He didn’t want to blow this one. They were so close.
He got out of his rental and double timed it up to the apartment buildings about three blocks from where he parked. He surveyed the apartments and selected one with the correct vantage point. He then found the building manager who said that the particular apartment was occupied. The two of them went to the apartment and knocked on the door. The apartment was occupied by a young Somali woman who spoke no English. The apartment manager said something to her in Somali and she let them in. She was in the midst of cooking in the kitchen and paid them very little mind. There was a unique smell to the food that Tavian couldn’t place and instantly hated.
Tavian and the manager made their way to the balcony where he took out a pair of high powered binoculars and focused them on the duplex. The shades were drawn everywhere in the house with the exception of the sliding glass door that connected the deck to the interior of the building.
There was something disconcerting about what he saw. There was nothing in the house, no microwave, no dirty dishes in the sink, no clutter of any sort on the island. There was a table and two chairs in the dining room but other than that there was nothing. This house wasn’t a residence. It was also unlikely that the house was a mere safe house. No this house was for more sinister purposes; this was a sterile house used to disappear problems. Tavian knew he needed to get over their quickly or Tess’ life would be in serious peril.
He didn’t bother thanking the apartment manager or the occupant. He bailed out the front door and high tailed it to the fence. He made the fence with a single bound, something that reminded him of the old Superman cartoons, and skipped up the stairs of the deck. He made a quick call for backup, then he drew his .40 caliber glock. In full stealth mode he peeked through the window. He was just in time to see Tess being lead up the steps, most likely toward the bathroom where she would be executed in a soundproofed bathtub. Tavian checked the door and by some wild stroke of luck it was open. He slid it quietly and let himself in.
The girl was crying and pleading with the man to not hurt her. Her pleas were falling on deaf ears. Tavian moved with catlike grace up the steps to the bathroom door. It was closed, so he kicked it in with his gun ready to fire.
Eagle was startled and unable to take a good aim. This didn’t stop him from whirling to the door with his gun drawn. Tavian fired once, striking Eagle square in the chest and knocking him back to the wall in front of the toilet. Eagle’s gun went off. Tavian saw the muzzle flash and heard the bullet whiz past him. The crack of it breaking the sound barrier shattered Tavian’s eardrum as it buried itself into the wall.
“Drop the gun, DEA!” Tavian shouted, pure adrenaline pumping through his veins. There was no response from Eagle, who was lying unconscious on the floor and quite possibly dead. Tavian's bullet entered his chest very near his heart.
The woman in the tub had began screaming and was now completely hysterical. Tavian didn’t pay her any mind, walking past to check on Eagle and secure his body. He first pulled the gun from Eagle’s hand, then checked for a pulse. He couldn’t find one; Eagle was dead. He then turned to the hysterical woman in the bathtub and reached out a hand to her. She scurried into a little ball in the corner of the tub, panicked.
“Tess, Agent Springs, DEA.” He tried to calm her.
He reached for her again, this time with both hands. She was fighting him, her arms flailing wildly a blather of sobs and hysterical no’s coming from her mouth. He finally got both arms around her, but not without taking a couple solid shots to the face however. He hoisted her from the corner of the tub and held her for several seconds, running his fingers through her hair and trying to calm her.
“You’re okay, you’re okay,” he spoke, trying to reassure her.
It took several moments but the woman finally quit fighting him and just collapsed in his arms a sobbing puddle, thankful for his arrival.
67
Marcel sat across from Ken for the first time since they had faced each other in court more than a decade ago. Ken had aged considerably more than Marcel anticipated. Ken picked up the phone first.
“Marcel Wright, the man who put me behind bars.” Ken’s voice was cold.
“Ken.” Marcel nodded.
“I never killed your brother, you know?” Ken voice quivered slightly.
“I know that. I know it wasn’t you. I am sorry for what I did.”
“Are you sorry about what you did to Harold Stone too?” Now the quiver in Ken’s voice was gone and his words were a dagger to Marcel’s soul.
“What? How could you possibly know about that?”
“You and your idiot brother had no idea did you?” Ken shook his head.
“No idea of what?” Marcel was in shock.
“That Harold’s little brother saw everything. He saw your faces, he saw you pull the trigger.”
Marcel’s heart stopped and his stomach jumped up into his throat. He was speechless and didn’t know exactly what to do.
“Why did you do it?”
“For Henry.” The response was automatic and after he said it, he realized that he made a mistake.
“Because Harold knew that Henry was stealing pills from the factory and selling them, and Harold was going to tell Banks.”
Marcel sat in silence.
“That’s why Banks had Henry clipped,” Ken continued.
“Antonio Eagle did it,” Marcel said, making the connection after all these years.
“Tell me this, why me?”
Marcel said nothing.
“You owe me an answer, you owe me that much.”
“Buckley. He must have known about that beating you gave me. I was a kid; I wanted to make you pay.” Marcel dropped his head.
“Yeah, well, now I am going to make you pay.” Ken stood up and Marcel’s head snapped to follow. Ken turned to the guard and though he could no longer hear Ken he read his lips.
“I got it.”
Shit, it was a setup. I gotta get outta here.
68
Shannon and Joanne sat in a parking lot of some abandoned factory in Commerce City. A black Ford excursion pulled up and parked next to them. A sturdy man with a crew cut hopped out and approached the window.
“You that scumbag Northbird’s gal?” he asked Joanne with a gravely smoker’s voice.
“Yeah, you the dirty C.O. he told us so much about?”
The man smiled, revealing a hot mess of crooked teeth and plaque.
“I can show your girlfriend there just how dirty I am if she thinks she could handle it.” He leaned in the passenger window and winked at Shannon. His breath reeked of cheap whisky and gingivitis.
“How about you get your shit and just get out of here?” Joanne moved her hand toward his face to shove him out of the car.
“Take it easy, lady, I was just trying to be friendly.”
Joanne popped the trunk. The man walked behind the car and started digging in the trunk. Shannon watched him through the rearview mirror.
“Buddy!” The C.O. motioned to his crony driving the Excursion. A man with a shaved head and swastika tattoo on his forearm got out. Joanne shot Shannon a look. Shannon shook her head.
They carried two heavy boxes each from the back of the car to the Excursion. When the boxes were loaded the skin head went back to the drivers seat but the greasy C.O. turned to Joanne.
“You ladies wanna come back to Buddy’s place and party? ” He raised his eyebrows in anticipation.
“Fuck off…” That was all the C.O. could hear her say.
An explosive whomp whomp whomp of a helicopters rotors suddenly drowned out all the sound underneath it. Dust and trash started blowing and swirling all around them. The C.O. looked at the two women in the car a befuddled look on his face. He had no idea what was happening.
When the connections in his booze soaked brain finally fired correctly, the confused look was replaced with anger. He turned to run but there was nowhere for him to go. A helicopter came up over the building and an armada of Denver police and unmarked federal law enforcement vehicles raced into the lot to encircle both of the vehicles. Shannon’s phone rang.
“Hello,” she answered barely able to hear over the sirens.
“Shannon, get out it’s a setup.” Marcel was barely audible over the noise.
“Too late.”
69
Northbird had been a model inmate for his stay at Florence and was afforded more privileges than the general population. He had approached the FBI directly after his first conversation with Clifford Banks. He had written a letter to Banks about his plight and the chairman had responded. There was one caveat. Northbird had to do some work inside the pen for Banks. This was a risk that Ken was not going to take. He wanted out of this hell on earth and now had a potential bargaining chip, so he made a call to the FBI and was put in touch with Special Agent Buckley. That had been three years ago. Buckley had instructed Ken to go along with Banks to help him gather evidence. In the interim, Banks had played games with him and he got tangled up with that crooked son o -a bitch Davis. Then, out of nowhere, Harold Stone’s brother had shown up with a plan for how to get Marcel Wright and get out of prison. Buckley was dead and there was some new woman turning over old rocks on the reservation. All Ken needed to do was make the call. So he picked up the phone and called Special Agent Shannon McCarthy.
70
2007
Northbird was led in and took a seat across from Shannon. He looked at her for a considerable amount of time before picking up the phone. Shannon thought the look was of a man contemplating the entire existence of the world. There was an overwhelmed look in his eye, fear and gratitude, hatred and excitement all wrapped into the package that sat before her.
Northbird gave Shannon a nod of acknowledgment and began to speak.
“Thank you,” Northbird spoke, relieved.
“I need you to answer a few questions for me,” she spoke and set down her digital recorder.
“Anything.”
“Henry Wright.”
“Look, I swear, I didn’t have anything to do with that murder. I wasn’t anywhere around that night.”
“Okay, so what proof can you offer?” Shannon responded.
“I know who the real killer is. I know the motive, you guys will have to put it together.” Northbird looked at Shannon.
“Tell me the story,” she said, also not breaking eye contact.
“Antonio Eagle killed Henry Wright, he was working for Clifford Banks.” Shannon nodded.
“You know Banks?” Northbird asked Shannon.
“I am aware of Banks,” she said.
“Banks is the Chairman of the Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe. He is a powerful man, he gets what he wants and he wanted Henry dead.” Northbird spoke clearly and slowly.
“Why did the chairman want Henry Wright dead?” Shannon asked.
“Drugs. The Chairman was diversifying tribal business into prescription drugs. He had a factory that was manufacturing a synthetic opioid called Narcodone that was supposed to replace Oxycontin. It was a synthetic that was supposed to be way less addictive and cheaper. The problem was that FDA approval takes years and Banks didn’t have the capital to sustain the factory throughout the trial phase.”
“How do you know this?”
“Harold Stone had just started working as a shift manager at the factory. His brother told me about all of it. Henry Wright was also working for Banks, that’s where everything went to hell.”
“What do you mean?” Shannon prodded.
“Henry was skimming pills. Harold found out about it while he was in prison and used that info to leverage himself out of the pen and into a security job with Banks. Henry, his brother Marcel, and two other guys rolled up to a trailer house and killed Harold right in front of his brother. I am not sure if Banks knew about Henry skimming or if he was retaliating for killing one of his guys. My guess it was the skimming because Bank’s is a class A asshole.
“How do you know that Eagle was the trigger man?” Shannon continued.
“Travis Jackson was a witness. He was my cousin. He talked to that asshole Buckley about it and everything.”
“Agent Buckley?”
“Yeah, Agent Buckley. He worked with that shithead Carmody and was the guy I went to when I learned about Banks…Fuck…”
“What is it?” Shannon was taken aback.
“Fuckin Buckley was on the take wasn’t he?”
“So Travis Jackson saw the murder?” Shannon ignored his question.
“Yeah, so did that little shit Marcel Wright, who lied his ass off in court about me.” Northbird shook his head and looked up at the ceiling then back at Shannon.
“It was Buckley who turned Marcel, wasn’t it.”
Shannon affirmed.
“That son of a bitch.”
“Mr. Northbird, this is a lot of hearsay. None of it useable in court. We are going to need more,” Shannon said.
“I will get you whatever you need or a conviction. I just need two things,” Northbird responded.
“What is it that you need?” Shannon asked.
“I want you to take down that bastard Marcel Wright. I want to see him locked away where he belongs,”
“And the other?”
“I need you to get me out of here.”
“If what you say about being innocent is true, it is going to take at least a year and a half to make it through your appeal process if you can get someone to take the case. After that it is still a fifty-fifty proposition whether or not you are exonerated. On the other hand, if what you say about Banks and the whole conspiracy is true, then maybe we can work our way around the whole court process.”
“Okay, I am listening.”
Shannon walked out of the prison. Jefferson Buckley had been her partner out of Quantico. He had gotten cancer and died not long after her appointment with him. A letter had been delivered to her by his lawyer at his funeral service that confessed to a litany of major and minor corruption. The collusion with Marcel Wright to lock away an innocent man was probably the worst offense on the list. Ken Northbird corroborated everything that she had read from Buckley and added a whole lot more about Marcel Wright. She was determined to take them down. This was her first big break in the case. Looked like it was time for her to go undercover.
