Chaingang

16

MEMPHIS

“Mark, I think we're about ready,” the daddy rabbit said in his command voice. The agent named Mark hit the lights.

“Okay.” The conversations in the room subsided. “Ladies and gentlemen, as you know only too well, the so-called war on drugs was never a war at all. It was a holding action. Not even that, really. It was a series of dog-and-pony shows.” Like this one, he thought.

“The Medellin, Cali, Bogota, North Coast—” his pointer flicked across the background display “—and various other Colombian organizations have operated for years without fear of serious reprisal by law enforcement agencies. It's only in the past year we've been able to mount a real campaign against the active drug cartels.

“As we're all aware, painfully aware, the U.S. government has done what it could to make the smuggling of drugs easy. We tell these Third World countries to give us their tired, their poor, their huddled masses. Give us your dope mules, in other words.” There was a murmur of agreement in the conference room.

“From the blue-collar immigrant who loads it, to the ones who mule it in, to the street kids who act as lookout for the peddlers and pushers, our open society and open borders have made it impossible to control the flow—especially in states like Florida and Texas. And—let's give the rats credit: they've been very smart.

“We've known for years there was little point in trying to stop the traffic once it hit the street. Our only hope in staving in the Colombian cartels’ machine has been to try to hit the second-level guys. The big boys have been all but untouchable, and the little guys are too numerous to do anything about. It has always been the secondary level where the Colombians have been their most vulnerable.

“The cartels’ traffic managers, the bagmen, the bankers, the intermediary distributors, the money launderers—that's where the weaknesses could be found.

“Purchases, transfer of funds, the actual shipment and so forth, these second-level activities—these were the primary areas where we've put our manpower, and it's really paid off.

“Because of limitless funding, they were always able to provide their secondary-level personnel with the best security money could buy. But they made a big mistake. When the state-of-the-art electronics gave them access to DISA codes and such, they couldn't resist the temptation to use it as a communications mode. We were waiting for them.

“How have the Colombian traffic managers communicated with their distribution links? Traditionally it has been by phone. Pay telephones or black boxes. Sometimes, in the more sophisticated operations, they've employed bounce systems and elaborate telephone-relay blinds.

“But when the computer hackers learned how to obtain the security passwords for Direct Inward System Access on private branch exchange numbers, it was a new ball game. They had a way to set up blind two-way phone security, with the added benefit of beating the telephone companies out of the charges.

“They bought the access codes from dumpster divers, or black and blue boxers, or from pirated voice mail bulletin boards, or pay phone taps—a dozen ways. Or used the second dial tone after accessing call-processing features. They'd get in—make their blind call—and get out free. The call would show on some corporate bill—uncheckable at either end and, in theory, as secure as an unscrambled land line could get.

“What our job was here at ELINT was to monitor all the DISA heavyweights in markets with abnormally high rates of DLD fraud. We'd had a ‘watch’ on the Romero family for a long time, for example. Papa Romero—” his pointer tapped an ugly face “—Midwestern traffic manager for the Medellin.

“His MO has been to set up call pads with his distributors. Then initiate the calls at prearranged times to untraceable units, using DISA passwords. Even if you tapped the line, the calls were so structured that Papa Romero would never be implicated. The distributors used codes, and everything was by the numbers. Romero did not personally touch either end of transport or delivery—only the money itself—keeping him insulated from the narcotics.

“We used an informant to begin a series of larger and larger buys. Establish his dealer credibility with the distributor. When we knew Romero had just muled in over four hundred keys of cocaine, we had our snitch set up a buy for real weight. Then—when the deal was down—go shy on the deal. It put the distributor, who works out of a small town called Waterton, Missouri, in one helluva bind. He then had to initiate a call for help to Papa Romero.

“We kept tight surveillance on the distributor and put together a package to show sufficient PC for a Romero wiretap. It was a can't-lose deal, you see: Even if he ultimately beat the coke thing, we could go for complicity in a federal telephone scam. Bada bing, bada boom—we had him set to fall two ways. Any questions?"

A DEA man spoke up.

“How did you keep the snitch from getting whacked?"

“Well...” the daddy rabbit said, “you know how it is. You got a user who's dealing to support his habit, you don't worry too much about taking him down, you concentrate on turning him. Putting him back to work for our side. And you hate to lose a good informant, but this operation had to look totally kosher every step of the way. We had to leave it up to him to survive.

“Both the distributor and the dealer are still in place, by the way. If our man can stay alive until we get the other guy taken down, then fine. If he gets whacked—” he turned his palms up and shrugged “—then we'll take the distributor down on a homicide as well as a narcotics bust.

“As I said, it's a can't-lose deal."