Hollywood Crows

NINE

THE CROWS HAD a recurring problem and it had to do with the Nightclub Committee’s complaints about hot dog vendors. The prior evening, the vice unit, working in concert with the Crows and night-watch patrol, initiated Operation Hot Dog.

The night-watch and midwatch patrol officers had been too busy and too short staffed to deal with the vendors, and things had gotten out of hand. On Hollywood and Sunset Boulevards, where so many nightclubs were springing up-clubs whose purported ownership changed nearly as often as the tablecloths-Latino hot dog vendors were setting up carts to catch nightclub customers coming and going during the wee hours. On the night of Operation Hot Dog, there had been more than fifty vendors cited for illegal sidewalk sales, and their carts had been impounded. Now the station parking lot was jammed with carts and rotting hot dogs, and everyone was wondering if the “wienie sweep” had been a bit overzealous.

Ronnie got relieved of any responsibilities for Operation Hot Dog when she and Bix Ramstead were asked to meet 6-A-97 in Southeast Hollywood. The Crow who usually took care of calls in that neighborhood was on a short leave due to a death in his wife’s family. There were not many black residents living in Hollywood Division, and the absent Crow, a black officer, had established rapport with some of them.

Six-A-97 had responded to a complaint regarding shopping carts, five of them, that were lying around a wood-frame cottage rented to a Somalian couple. When Ronnie and Bix arrived, the older of the two waiting cops nodded to Bix Ramstead.

“We’re not trying to kiss this one off,” he said, “but you Crows deal with chronic-noise complaints and quality-of-life shit, right?”

“And ‘-quality-of-life’ covers a lot of territory,” Bix said wearily. “What’s the deal?”

The cop said, “The woman who called us says the people who live in that little house are from Somalia and the husband doesn’t like black people, so she can’t talk to them.”

“Somalians are black people,” Bix said.

“Yeah, but he doesn’t like American black people. So she wants us to talk to the guy and tell him that in this country, you can’t just walk off the market parking lot with shopping carts. In fact, she says the Somalian even jacked a cart from her teenage son when he tried to take it back to the market. She says the guy just doesn’t get it about shopping carts.”

“So did you try talking to the guy?” Ronnie asked.

“He won’t answer,” the cop said, “but the woman swears he’s in there. Can you take over? We got some real crime to crush.”

There it was, Ronnie thought. They were real cops, the Crows were something other.

“Okay,” Bix said. “What’s her name?”

“Mrs. Farnsworth.” The cop was obviously happy to dump this one on the Crows, since patrol officers believed that Crows never did a day’s work anyway.

Mrs. Farnsworth was a stout woman with straightened gray hair combed in a Condi Rice flip. Her bungalow, across the street from the Somalians’, had a geranium garden in front and was freshly painted. She invited the cops in and asked if they’d like a cold drink, but they declined.

“I’d like to handle this my own self,” she told them, “but that Somali man is mean. He has a big scar down the side of his face and he never smiles. His wife is very sweet. I talk to her when she passes on the way to the market. She’s about twenty years younger than him, maybe more. And she left him once. I didn’t see her for maybe three weeks and I don’t know where she went. Then a week ago she came back.”

“We’ll have the shopping carts picked up,” Bix said. “Any idea why he keeps taking different ones?”

“I think he’s plain crazy,” she said. “I tried to ask him to turn down his music one night and he screamed at me. Called me a nigger. I said, ‘Whadda you think you are?’ He didn’t answer.”

“Anything else you can tell us about him? Something that makes you think he’s crazy?”

“I talked to his wife a couple times when he had a big party with some Somali friends on New Year’s. She said they just chew something called kaat and eat their spicy food and gamble all the time. Every one of them has their birthday on New Year’s, that’s why their party lasted for three days.”

“Why New Year’s?” Ronnie asked.

“They’re so damn backwards, they don’t know when they were born. They just pick any year they want for the immigration papers, and make the birthday fall on New Year’s so it’s easy to remember. That’s what she told me. They’re that ignorant. And he has the gall to call me a nigger.”

“What’s his name?” Ronnie asked.

“Omar,” Mrs. Farnsworth said. “I found out they’re all named Omar, or Muhammad. I don’t know his last name.”

“Are you sure he’s home now?” Bix asked.

“He sure is,” she said. “And she is too. That damn music was blaring an hour ago and then it went off and he ain’t left the house. I been watching it. He just don’t wanna talk to the police, is all.”

“We’ll knock and see if he’ll open the door,” Bix said. “And we’ll call the store and get the carts picked up.”

“I can tell you this,” Mrs. Farnsworth said. “His wife is scared of him. You can see that. I’m surprised she come back to him, but maybe she just didn’t have no money and nowhere else to go.”

They crossed the street and Ronnie knocked at the door of the cottage while Bix stood to the side, trying to peek into the window through a rip in what looked to be muslin curtains. No answer.

She knocked louder and said, “Police officers. Open the door, please.”

They could clearly hear some movement inside and then an accented voice said, “What do you want?”

“We just need to speak to you for a minute,” Ronnie said.

The door opened, and a tall, very dark man with the chiseled facial structure often seen in the Horn of Africa stood in the doorway. He wore only black trousers and tennis shoes, and he was unmistakable by virtue of the pale scar running from his hairline down the right side of his jaw to his throat. His irises were gunmetal blue.

Ronnie said, “We’ve received complaints about loud music and about the shopping carts in your yard. Do you know it’s against the law to take shopping carts home from the market? That’s theft.”

“I will take them back,” he said with a rumbling voice from deep inside him.

“What’s your name?” Ronnie asked.

“Omar,” he said.

“And your last name?”

“Omar Hasan Benawi,” he said.

“Why do you take so many carts, Mr. Benawi?” Bix asked.

The man stared at both cops for a moment and said, “If they steal one cart I have more.”

“If who steals one cart?” Bix asked.

“Them,” he said.

“Who?” Ronnie asked. “Neighbors?”

“Them,” he said without elaborating but looking off vaguely in the distance with those gunmetal eyes.

“Is your wife home?” Bix asked.

“Yes,” he said.

Ronnie said, “Let us see her. Now, please.”

The Somalian turned and mumbled something, and a bony young woman wearing a maroon head scarf, pink cotton dress, and sandals came to the door. She wasn’t as dark as her husband, but like him, she had sharply defined features, and large, velvety eyes.

“Do you speak English?” Ronnie asked.

She nodded, glancing up at her scowling husband.

“Did you hear what we said to your husband?”

“Yes,” she said. “I hear.”

“Do you understand that you cannot play loud music at night and that you cannot take shopping carts home from the market?”

“Yes,” she said, looking at her husband again.

“Are you all right?” Bix Ramstead asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“I’d like to talk to you about the shopping carts. Can you step outside, please?” Ronnie said.

The young woman looked at her husband, who hesitated and then nodded. His wife walked onto the porch and followed Ronnie to the front yard, where Ronnie put an overturned cart upright.

Then in a quiet voice, while Bix kept the husband busy by getting names, phone number, and other information, Ronnie said, “Is there something wrong with your husband?” Ronnie pointed to her head and said, “Here?”

The young woman glanced back at the house and said, “No.”

“What is your name?” Ronnie asked.

“Safia,” the young woman said.

“Don’t be afraid to tell me the truth, Safia,” Ronnie said. “Has he hurt you in any way? If he has, we can take you to a shelter, where you’ll be safe.”

“No, I am fine,” Safia said.

“And your husband,” Ronnie said. “Is he fine? Up here?” And she pointed to her head again.

“He is fine,” Safia said, eyes downcast.

“Does he have a job?” Ronnie asked.

“No, not now,” Safia said. “He look for job. I look for job also. I clean houses.”

“How old are you?” Ronnie asked.

“Twenty-one,” she said. “I think.”

“Do you really want to stay with your husband?” Ronnie asked. “Is he kind to you?”

“I stay,” the young woman said, looking at Ronnie now. “My father give me to Omar. I stay.”

Bix left the Somalian on the porch and approached Ronnie and Safia then, saying quietly, “You do not have to stay with him.”

Speaking slowly and articulating carefully, Ronnie said, “This is America and you are a free woman. Would you like to get your clothes and leave with us? There are people who can help you.”

“No, no!” the young woman said emphatically. “I stay.”

Ronnie pressed a business card into the young woman’s hand and said, “Call if you need help. Okay?”

The young woman hid the card in her sleeve and nodded.

Bix Ramstead went back to see Mrs. Farnsworth and gave her one of his business cards, writing his personal cell-phone number on the back of it. “If you suspect anything really bad is going on over there, I want you to call me. I can be reached at this number anytime.”

And that’s how it was left. Bix and Ronnie stopped by the market two blocks away and notified the kid who picked up shopping carts abandoned in the neighborhood that there was a jackpot in Omar’s yard. They went about their business, hoping it was the last they’d hear of Omar Hasan Benawi.

Half an hour later, while driving to Hollywood South, Bix Ramstead said, “I have a very bad feeling about that Somali couple.”

“So do I,” Ronnie said.

Los Angeles experienced a rare summertime thunderstorm at twilight. The rain came down hard for twenty minutes and then it stopped, and a gigantic rainbow appeared over the Hollywood Hills. It was a magic moment, residents said. And the rain led to an incredible moment that would be remembered in LAPD folklore for years to come. It occurred moments after the midwatch hit the streets, and the surfer cops were there to see it.

The Gang Impact Team, called GIT, had made arrangements with the watch commander to use two of the midwatch cars and two from the night watch on a surprise sweep of the 18th Street gang. GIT had the highest felony filing rate at Hollywood Detectives and loved to jam the street gangsters, but morale had been suffering ever since the U.S. district judge overseeing the federal consent decree wanted all six hundred LAPD officers assigned to gang and narcotics units to disclose their personal financial records as part of the anti-corruption crusade. However, since that information could be subpoenaed, a cop’s bank account information, Social Security number, and much else could end up in the hands of lawyers for street gangsters. Cops were threatening to quit their present assignments rather than let that happen, and their union, the L.A. Police Protective League, was waging a battle on their behalf. It was another of many oppressive, paper-intensive skirmishes during the dreary years of the federal consent decree.

The information that GIT had was that the 18th Street crew were going to cruise south in their lowriders into Southeast L.A. to help other Hispanic gang members mete out street justice to some black gangsters who were suspected of shooting a Latino. More than half of the Los Angeles homicides in the prior calendar year were gang related. The informant indicated that the 18th Street homeboys would be waiting by a chain-link fence next to an apartment house in Southeast Hollywood, where most of them lived. When the cops arrived, eleven of the cruisers were perched on the top of the fence or leaning on the portion that was pulled from the posts and rolled in a tangle of steel wire. At a prearranged signal on the police tactical frequency, the patrol units swooped in, led by two teams of Hollywood gang cops.

None of the homies had seemed particularly disturbed and nobody ran. Several who were smoking cigarettes continued smoking. Nobody tried to toss any crystal or crack. They kept chatting among themselves as though the cops were putting on a good show for their benefit. The crew were not proned out on the ground due to the deep rain puddles that had formed under and around the fence, so the usual commands were modified:

“Turn and face the fence!”

“Interlock your fingers behind your head!”

“Do not move or talk!”

Then the cops began patting down each homie and pulling them aside to write FI cards. The gang cops took various members of the crew to their cars for more private conversations, but all in all it was a disappointment. The consensus was that the information had somehow leaked and the crew were expecting to be jacked up. The gang cops were mad and embarrassed.

During the first twenty minutes of the episode, when a few of the crew were copping attitudes, a cruiser dressed homie-hip in a baggy tee and khakis-with the usual face tatts consisting of spiderwebs and teardrops-turned to his crew and grinned, proudly displaying two gold caps. Like several of the others, he wore a red-and-white bandana around his shaved head.

He said, “Yo, this ain’t right,” to one of the Hispanic gang cops who’d arrested him in the past.

“What ain’t right, ese?” the gang cop said.

“We’re just hangin’, man. Ain’t no law being broke around here.”

“Homes, I would never accuse you of law breaking,” the gang cop said.

The cruisers were all grinning at one another, and the gang cops became more certain that somehow they had anticipated this sweep.

Flotsam wasn’t the least bit surprised and said to Jetsam, “Dude, have you ever heard of a cop keeping a secret?”

“Might as well give it to Access Hollywood,” Jetsam agreed. “You want it out there? Telephone, telegram, tell-a-cop.”

The surfer cops were waiting for the gang unit to give them the okay to clear, when a motor cop pulled up. He wasn’t just any motor cop. He was Officer Francis Xavier Mulroney, a hulking, craggy, old-school veteran who still wore reflector aviator sunglasses and black leather gloves. He had thirty-seven years on the LAPD, thirty of it riding a motorcycle. He was usually assigned to the Hollywood beat, where his nickname “F.X.” seemed wildly appropriate. He stepped off his bike and walked through the standing puddles, boots splashing any cops who didn’t get out of his way.

With his helmet and those boots and his paunch and those glasses, he looked to Jetsam like the guy that played General Patton in that old World War II movie. In fact, he even sounded like the guy, kind of gravelly.

What’s this cluster fuck all about?” he said to the nearest of the two Hispanic gang cops.

The gang cop shrugged and said, “Nothin’ much, looks like.”

Then the motor cop said, “Why ain’t these vatos facedown in the fucking water instead of standing around giggling like girls? What, you don’t prone out these hanky heads when it’s rained?”

The gang cop smiled agreeably and said, “Roger that message, F.X. I wish we could still do things like back in the day.”

Referring to the May 1 immigration rally in MacArthur Park, which got negative national attention when the LAPD used force on demonstrators and reporters, F.X. Mulroney sneered and said, “This is May Day all over again. Like, oh, dear me, let’s not rough people up. Shit! Sister Mary Ignatius tuned us up worse than that when I was in the third fucking grade!”

“Roger that,” the gang cop said patiently.

The motor cop said, “When I came on the Job, we were taught, ‘When in doubt, choke ’em out.’ This is why when I retire next year, I’m driving my bike onto the freight elevator at Parker Center and I’m running it right up to the sixth floor and leaving it in front of the door to the chief’s office. With a sign addressed to all LAPD brass, the police commission, and the mayor. A sign that says, ‘Put this crotch rocket between your legs. You got nothing else there.’ That’s what I’m gonna do.”

Clearly, nobody doubted him. Then one of the cops from the night watch turned toward his car to stow his beanbag shotgun.

The old motor cop snorted and said, “Beanbags. When I came on the Job, beanbags were used by little kids to throw at cutout clowns. That’s what they’ve turned LAPD into, a bunch of clowns!”

“Roger that too,” the gang cop said with a sigh. “We hear you, F.X. Loud and clear.”

Now the other cops were even more eager to get away from there, what with F.X. Mulroney on the scene. But the homeboys perched on the fence or leaning against it were giving the old motor cop the stink eye. A few of them actually laughed at him. And then a big mistake was made.

The homie with the gold teeth said in a stage whisper to one of his crew, loud enough for F.X. to hear, “He’s so old they should have training wheels on his baby hog.”

All of the 18th Street cruisers chortled at that one.

The motor cop took three big strides in those black, shiny boots toward the night-watch cop standing by the open trunk of his shop, where he was putting away his beanbag gun.

“Lemme borrow this for a minute,” F.X. said, and he pulled the cop’s Taser from his Sam Browne.

“Hey!” the cop said. “Whadda you think you’re doing?”

“We only got those bulky old piece-of-shit Tasers in our saddlebags. This is the new one, ain’t it?”

“What’re you doing?” the cop repeated.

The old motor cop showed the young night-watch cop what he was doing.

“Homes,” the motor cop said to the banger with the gold teeth, and to all the other food-stamp homeboys in their $200 Adidas, “don’t ever keep an electric appliance around your bathtub. And don’t ever stand in a rain puddle and lean on a chain-link fence. A bolt from heaven could strike.”

And he fired a dart that was attached to the gun by a twenty-one-foot copper wire, right into the tangle of fencing.

When the prongs bit and hooked onto the wet steel, fifty thousand volts made a crackling sound and arced a blue dagger like in Frankenstein’s lab. And the cops watched in astonishment as the homies started doing the Taser dance.

Two dropped off the fence and three fence leaners fell ass-first in the rain puddles. The rest leaped clear after experiencing shocks, mostly imagined, and everyone began screaming and cursing.

“He fucking electrocuted me!”

“I’m suing!”

“All you cops are witnesses!”

“I got a burn on my ass!”

And F.X. Mulroney joined in the chorus, crying out, “But I was only doing a spark check! Shit happens!”

“Pinchi cop!” Gold Tooth yelled. “He shocked us! You saw it!”

“My lawyer!” a homie yelled. “I’m calling my lawyer!”

Flotsam and Jetsam stared as Officer Francis X. Mulroney spread his arms wide, looked up at the darkening sky, and cried, “God knows I’m innocent! Even Bill Clinton had a premature discharge!”

“I’m fucking suing!” Gold Tooth yelled.

F.X. Mulroney bowed his head then and murmured, “Oh, the horror. The horror!”

Flotsam whispered to Jetsam, “F.X. always goes over the top. He’s, like, way dramatic.”

Jetsam whispered back, “In Hollywood everybody’s an actor.”

All the drama caused Flotsam and Jetsam to walk quietly to their shop, start the engine, and drive away before anyone noticed they were gone.

Most of the other bluesuits were doing the same, and the gang cop pulled Gold Tooth aside and said, “Homes, I think you better forget all about this…accident.”

“Accident, my ass!” the homie said.

The gang cop said, “Can you imagine what’ll happen if this story gets out? That crazy old motor cop can retire anytime. You can’t hurt him. But everybody’ll be laughing like hyenas. At you, dude. At your whole posse. MS Thirteen will laugh. White Fence will laugh. El Eme will laugh. All the Crips and Bloods from Southeast L.A. that done your people wrong, they’ll laugh the loudest. You’ll hear fucking laughter in your sleep!”

Gold Tooth thought it over and huddled with his crew for a minute or two. When he returned, he said, “Okay, but we don’t want nobody to know about this, right? All your cops gotta keep their mouths shut.”

“If there’s one thing cops can do, it’s keep a secret,” the gang cop said.

When they were two blocks from the scene, Flotsam said, “Dude, do you realize we were a witness to Hollywood history being made? That old copper just brought down a whole crew with one fucking shot!”

“We didn’t see nothing, bro,” Jetsam said. “We were already gone when history was being made.” After a pause, he said, “When he’s ready to pull the pin, do you think that loony old motor cop will really, like, drive his bike up to the chief’s office and leave it there with a sign on it?”

“What motor cop?” Flotsam replied.