Devil's Harbor (6 page)

*   *   *

It was a beautiful fall day, cool and bright. Ruining it was Garrett Smith, loitering on the steps of the station. He thrust a micro-recorder into Finn's face.

“How do you feel ahead of today's hearing into the Perez shooting, Agent Finn?”

“What hearing?”

Garrett gave a lopsided smile. “Don't insult me, Finn. You're not the only one who can do his job.”

Finn brushed his way past the reporter and entered through the swing doors.

“How did he know?” he said.

“Because this place leaks like a sieve,” said Mona, “The system's—”

“Broken, I know.”

Diego was waiting for them in the lobby.

“I got an ID from our floater's prints,” he said. “Good news—he's got a state rap sheet. His name's Juan Miguel Espendoza, sixteen years old, and he's a U.S. citizen. His sheet gives an address in East L.A.”

Diego smiled. “You look surprised,” he said to Finn. “You were expecting him to be Mexican?”

“What's on his sheet?” said Mona.

“Always the lawyer, little sister,” said Diego. “Auto theft and possession of controlled substances, same instance, busted by LAPD last June. He pleaded guilty, but he was fifteen at the time, so it was a juvenile case and he didn't do any time.”

“Nothing since?” she said.

“Nope. But he's a gangbanger. Or was.”

“How do you know?” she said.

“The rap sheet.”

“Juvenile offenses. I'm surprised it wasn't sealed. Doesn't make him a gangbanger.”

“Ever the optimist. People don't change, Mona,” said Diego.

“Sure they do,” said Finn.

Now it was Diego's turn to look surprised. “Agent Finn, has my sister turned you into a bleeding-heart liberal?”

“Diego, you're a moron,” said Mona. She glanced at her watch.

Diego grinned. Then he lowered his voice and said to Finn, “We ought to go see the Irishman, see if he can give us anything on Perez.”

Finn nodded. The Irishman was an informant who ran a bar in San Pedro called Bonito's. “Sure,” he said. “Tomorrow night.”

Diego nodded.

The door to the conference room opened and Glenn's secretary beckoned them in.

“Ready?” said Mona.

*   *   *

A rectangular wood-veneer table stood in the center of the meeting room. There was a microphone plugged into a recording device on it, three empty chairs down one long side, the chair at the head occupied by DMO Glenn—meticulously dressed, as usual. Two men unknown to Finn were sitting on the other long side. The blinds were down on both windows and the overhead fluorescent lights were on. The room was airless and too warm.

The two men, whom Finn assumed were the IA agents, wore white shirts and ties, their jackets hanging on the backs of their chairs. Both men were sweating. One was tall and thin and carried his weapon in a shoulder holster. The other was heavy, had a shaved head and no neck, and wore his gun on his belt, cowboy-style.

Finn assumed they were the ones who'd closed the windows and turned off the air-conditioning. He turned it back on at the thermostat by the door, then sat down in the center chair, Mona to his right and Diego to his left.

The heavy IA man frowned, got up, and turned the air-conditioning back off.

DMO Glenn made the introductions. No one shook hands. Glenn seemed to Finn by far the most anxious person in the room.

“You guys like to sweat, huh,” said Finn, taking off his jacket. He knew that overheating a room was an interrogation technique designed to make the subject uncomfortable.

The one with the shoulder holster—the taller, thinner one whom Glenn had introduced as Agent Ruiz—tilted his head at Mona and said, “You brought your wife with you?”

“I'm here as Agent Finn's counsel,” said Mona.

“And as Agent Jimenez's sister, right?” said Ruiz, smiling in a way that Finn didn't like.

“It's a family affair,” said the thick-necked one, Agent Petchenko, who'd turned the air-conditioning back off.

“Why'd you bring a lawyer, Finn? This isn't an interrogation,” said Ruiz, his voice fake friendly.

Mona leaned forward and spoke into the microphone.

“For the record, my name is Ximena Finn of Holguin Associates, and I am present as counsel to Nicholas Peter Finn, marine interdiction agent with the Custom and Border Protection's Office of Air and Marine, Long Beach Station. Agent Finn is here of his own volition, as is his patrol partner, Diego Jimenez, who was present at the time of the incident. Today's date is Thursday, October twenty-second. The time is nine fifteen
A.M.
Also present are the OAM's director of Marine Operations, Scott Glenn, and Agents Anton Ruiz and Andrew Petchenko, from the Office of Internal Affairs in Washington, D.C., both in their shirtsleeves,” she said.

“Just seems mighty cozy to me, everyone being related,” said Petchenko, glaring at Mona. He had a deep, sodden, drinker's voice, and delivered his consonants lazily.

“I think we should get started,” said Mona.

Ruiz looked from Mona to Finn. “Why don't you start by telling us how you joined the CBP,” he said.

Finn was about to speak when Mona butted in.

“That question is irrelevant to the purpose of today's hearing. Agent Finn is here to talk about the events that led to the death of Rafael Aparici
ó
n Perez on the eighth of October. He will talk about that and only that. Let me repeat that this is an impartial hearing and
not
an interrogation. Agent Finn is
not
under arrest, has
not
been charged with any crime, and has
not
been read his Miranda rights. Agent Finn is here to help establish the truth of what happened during events that led to the death of Rafael Aparici
ó
n Perez. Ask any more irrelevant questions, Agent Ruiz, and I will counsel my client to cease cooperating immediately on the grounds that you are prejudicing this hearing.”

No one said anything for a moment. Both IA men looked unhappy.

“Fine,” said Ruiz. “Agent Finn, could you please relate to us the events that led to you shooting dead Rafael Aparici
ó
n Perez on the morning of the eighth of October, as you remember them.”

Finn glanced at Mona, who nodded.

“Like I wrote in the report, I was on patrol with Agent Jimenez,” said Finn, “Toward the end of our shift, at about six
A.M
., we come across this boat running with her lights out—”

“Is that illegal?” said Ruiz.

“At night, yes.”

“At night … what about at six
A.M.
?” said Petchenko, looking up from a printout of the report Finn had written.

Finn straightened his back. “It's October,” he said. “It's still dark at six
A.M.”

Petchenko shrugged.

“Go on,” said Ruiz with a reassuring smile.

“We're about a mile northeast of Catalina Island. We approach the vessel and discover that she's a big sport fisher. Her lights are out and she's not fishing. We see no one aboard. We turn on our wailer and blue lights, and I signal her with the spotlight.”

“You didn't try to contact her verbally?” said Ruiz.

“We didn't have time. She took off as soon as we switched on our lights.”

“Why didn't you have time? Did you sneak up on her in the dark?” said Petchenko.

“We approached the boat stealthily.”

“Why?”

“Because she was suspicious.”

“Why?”

Finn wondered whether Petchenko was really this stupid or this was some kind of brilliant circular-reasoning strategy internal affairs agents used to catch people out.

“Because she had her lights out.”

Petchenko looked stumped.

“Then what happened?” said Ruiz.

“Then we knew we had a twenty-two-thirty-seven.…”

Finn waited to see how well they knew their code. Neither agent said anything. He figured they didn't want to lose face by asking.

“That's Title Eighteen, Part One, Section 2237 of the Federal Code, namely, ‘failure to obey an order from a federal law-enforcement officer to heave to,'” Finn said helpfully. “So we set out after him. We signal him again with the spotlight. He still doesn't stop. So I fire a warning shot across his bow.”

“You opened fire?” said Ruiz.

“As I wrote in my report, I fired a flash-bang from our shotgun. I aimed it ten feet ahead of the fleeing vessel, so that there was no chance he couldn't see it.”

“So he thought he was being shot at.”

“Flash-bang shells have no projectile. They're harmless.”

“But he doesn't know that, does he? All he knows is a boat sneaks up on him in the dark, then he sees a big flash and hears gunfire. Easy to panic in a situation like that, when you're being fired upon. Sorry—
think
you're being fired upon,” said Ruiz.

Finn took a breath and wondered why these guys had such a hard-on for him. He glanced over at Mona, who had a stony look on her face.

“Okay. What happened next?” said Ruiz.

Finn knew the next bit was the tricky one. Firing a warning shot across a recalcitrant vessel's bow was standard procedure. It was perfectly legal, and they were trained to do it.

Setting a line to tangle around a vessel's propeller shaft, on the other hand, was Finn's own initiative.

“Normally, when a panga doesn't obey our order to heave to, we fire at its outboard and disable its means of propulsion. But this boat had an inboard engine, so we had to come up with another way to disable it. I used a rope.”

“A rope. Is that standard procedure, Agent Finn?” said Ruiz.

“Is it even legal?” said Petchenko.

Before Finn said anything, Mona stepped in. This was her area. She gave Petchenko a rundown of Title 19 of the U.S. Code, especially Chapter Four and the Enforcement Provisions of the Tariff Act contained therein. Then she gave him a dose of Chapter Five, the Anti-Smuggling Act. Finally, for good measure, she ran through myriad sections of Title 46, Shipping.

Mona said a lot and said it fast and with great conviction. Finn wasn't sure that any of it cleared up whether his trick with the rope had been legal or not, but the investigators looked bamboozled. He listened to his wife draw to a close and tried not to smile.

There was a moment when no one said anything, the dust settling. Both investigators looked a little deflated.

“Okay. So you've managed to lawfully stop
La Catrina,
” said Ruiz, gamely. “Walk us through what you did next.”

“Agent Jimenez took the wheel while I fetched the M4 from the locker and fixed it to its mount on the starboard rail.”

“Why you?” said Petchenko.

“I served eight years in the navy. I'm more comfortable with … with that kind of hardware,” said Finn.

Petchenko wrote something down and showed it to Ruiz. Ruiz gave a little nod and said, “Go on.”

“The suspect emerged from the cabin. There was something off about him. He didn't look like an angler. He was wearing the wrong clothes. A dark suit, a town suit. Not a spray jacket. Not something you'd go to sea in. We told him to put his hands up—”

“In what language?” interrupted Ruiz.

“I spoke to him in Spanish,” said Diego.

“Because you don't speak Spanish, do you, Finn?” said Ruiz.

“That question is irrelevant,” said Mona.

“I don't think so,” said Ruiz. “I thought it was a requirement for all CBP agents to be bilingual.”

“Today's hearing is about the Perez incident, not Agent Finn's linguistic abilities. Do you intend to follow this line much further, Agent Ruiz?” said Mona.

Finn felt a surge of gratitude for his wife.

“No, no. Please go on, Agent Finn,” said Ruiz.

“The guy's not responding. He doesn't put his hands up. I've got a bead on him. He starts making his way up the ladder to the flybridge—the platform at the top of the boat. A moment later, I see him come out with a gun—”

“This is at dawn, right?” interrupted Ruiz.

“Correct.”

“And he's in a position east of you?”

“That's right.”

“So the sun's behind him, right? I mean, you were looking directly into the sun?”

Finn paused. He had to be careful here. “I could see them clearly.”

“What about the smoke? On account of the engine being on fire? You sure you could see him right, through the smoke, holding a weapon?”

“I'm sure.”

Ruiz didn't look convinced.

“Can you describe the weapon?”

“Some kind of assault rifle. It sounded like an AK-47—”

“It
sounded
like an AK-47?”

Finn nodded. “I heard enough of them in Iraq to recognize one anywhere.”

“Even with the noise of the four engines on your boat? Even with the sound of your own weapon firing?”

Nice try,
thought Finn.

“Outboards are loud, but guns are louder, especially when they're being fired
at
you, and anyway we were idling. As for my own weapon, it was silent at that moment, as you know from my report.”

“I saw Perez open fire,” said Diego.

Ruiz frowned. “We'll stick with Agent Finn's account for the moment, Agent Jimenez. So what happened next?” he said, turning back to Finn.

“I shot him.”

“More precisely, Agent Finn.”

“I aimed at the individual's torso and fired one three-round burst.”

“You didn't think to evade his fire?”

“No, sir.”

No one said anything for a moment.

“How many rounds did you say he fired at you?”

“I didn't say. He fired for maybe five seconds. He got off maybe twenty rounds.”