The Late Show

30

Most people were trying to get out of L.A. Ballard was trying to get in. She steadily goosed her rented Ford Taurus through heavy rush-hour traffic on the 101 freeway toward downtown. The miles went by so slowly, she feared she would miss the eight-o’clock deadline at the Times. She had devised a plan that she believed might give her the upper hand against those working against her in the department.

She knew a couple things about how the murky lines between the media and law enforcement were negotiated. She knew there was little cooperation and even less trust. Those who chose to cross those murky lines guarded against risks. It was that practice she was going to use to her own purposes.

The PAB and the Times Building sat side by side on First Street, with only Spring Street separating them. The two giant bureaucracies cast jaundiced eyes at each other, yet at times they certainly needed each other. Ballard finally got to the area at 7:20 and parked in an overpriced pay lot behind the newspaper building. She took a shoulder bag containing some of her clean clothes with her and walked to a coffee shop on Spring Street that offered a clear view from its corner window of the block-long stretch of road that separated the newspaper and police buildings.

Once situated with a cup of coffee at the counter behind the corner window, Ballard pulled her phone and called Jerry Castor on his direct newsroom line.

“This is Renée Ballard.”

“Oh! Uh, hi, I’m glad you called. I wasn’t — there’s still time for me to get your comments into the story.”

“I’m not giving you any comments. This conversation is off the record.”

“Well, I was hoping to get some reaction to what I’m saying in my story, which is—”

“I’m not giving reaction, I’m not giving comments, and I don’t care what you say in your story. I’m hanging up now unless you agree that this conversation is off the record.”

There was a long silence.

“Uh, okay, we’re off the record,” Castor finally said. “For now, at least. I just don’t understand why you wouldn’t want to get your side of it into the story.”

“Are you recording this?” Ballard asked.

“No, I’m not recording.”

“Well, just so you know, I am. I’ve been recording since the start of the call. Are you okay with that?”

“I guess so. But I don’t see why you—”

“You’ll understand in a few minutes. So that is a yes on recording?”

“Uh, yes.”

“Okay, good. Mr. Castor, I’m calling to tell you that your information is wrong. That you are being manipulated by your LAPD sources to put out a story that is not only wrong but designed to inflict harm upon me and others.”

“Harm? How is that?”

“If you tell a lie in your paper, that harms me. You need to go back to your sources and take a look at their motives and then ask them for the truth.”

“Are you saying you didn’t stab Thomas Trent multiple times? That your statement wasn’t contradicted by another victim’s statement?”

That second part was new information and it would be helpful to Ballard.

“I’m saying you have been lied to and I have this conversation on tape,” Ballard said. “If you proceed with that story and its lies and out-of-context statements, then this recording with its direct warning will go to your editor and other media outlets so it will become clear to the community and in your workplace what kind of reporter you are and what kind of newspaper the Times is. Good night, Mr. Castor.”

“Wait!” Castor cried.

Ballard disconnected and waited, keeping her eyes on the Spring Street employee entrance of the Times.

She was working off of a fact, a supposition, and an assumption. The fact was that it was against the law and the policy of the LAPD to publicly disclose the details of a personnel investigation. Ballard had killed a man that morning in the line of duty. That was news and the department was duty bound to inform the public. That came in the form of a press release all parties had agreed upon. Ballard and Feltzer had written the three-paragraph statement while they had been in the command post that morning. But Ballard had not agreed to releasing any more details of the killing or the subsequent investigation. Castor obviously had details that went beyond the press release. It meant he had a source who was feeding him those details in violation of the law and department policy.

Ballard’s supposition was that Castor’s source would be smart and cagey and would be sure not to place himself in a position where he could be compromised. He would certainly not reveal the details of a personnel investigation in a phone call that could be recorded or heard by others without his knowledge. Whatever motivated a source to spill to the newspaper, the actual leaking would be clandestine and not take place on the phone, in the newspaper office, or at the LAPD.

That led to the assumption. Ballard had just thrown a fastball at Castor and she guessed that he would run, figuratively, in a panic to his source in order to salvage the story. He needed to tell his source what Ballard had just said. If there were ground rules about not talking on a phone, then Castor would be walking out of the Times Building at any moment to head to a meeting with his source.

Ballard’s only worry was that the reporter’s secret spot for meeting his source might be the very coffee shop where she was now sitting. It would be perfectly reasonable for a reporter from the Times Building and an LAPD employee from the PAB to cross paths in a coffee shop equidistant from both their work locations. Words and documents could be exchanged in the line to order, at the waiting counter after ordering, or at the sugar and cream stand.

Ballard visually tracked one man for half a block after he stepped through the Times door and headed north and away from her. After finally deciding he was a bogey, her eyes returned to the building’s doors just in time to see the real Jerry Castor emerge. He turned south, passing by the coffee shop from the other side of Spring Street. Ballard dumped the coffee she had bought but hadn’t even tasted. She stepped out onto the sidewalk and headed south, tracking Castor from the other side of the street.

There was a time when following someone on foot at night in downtown L.A. would have been impossible to pull off because of the scarcity of pedestrians after the nine-to-five workday ended. But the district had begun to thrive in recent years, with many young professionals deciding to avoid the angst of killer traffic and live in the area where they worked. Restaurants and nightlife soon followed. On this night near eight p.m. Ballard had no problem keeping other pedestrians between herself and Castor, though it did not appear that the reporter was thinking about the possibility of a tail. He never looked behind himself once. He never cleverly glanced into the reflection of a shop’s plate-glass window. He walked swiftly and with purpose, like a man on a mission, or a deadline.

Castor led Ballard south for four blocks, until he got to the corner of 5th Street, then took a right and disappeared through an open door. Ballard wondered if it was a move designed to lose a tail, but as she caught up, she saw a neon sign that announced the business as the last bookstore.

Ballard entered cautiously and found a giant bookstore in a space that appeared to have formerly been the grand lobby of a bank. There were rows of freestanding bookshelves angled between Corinthian columns rising two stories to an ornate coffered ceiling. On one wall hung a sculpture of books forming a wave. Balconies fronting small art- and used-record shops offered a view down onto the main floor, which was crowded with customers. Ballard had no idea of the place’s existence and the excitement of the find almost made her forget her quarry.

Using a set of shelves dedicated to the classics as a partial blind, Ballard scanned the lower level of the bookstore, looking for Castor. The reporter was nowhere to be seen, and it was impossible to cover every corner of the space because of the shelves, columns, and other obstacles to her vision.

Ballard saw a man with a name tag pinned to his shirt walking toward the checkout counter near the door.

“Excuse me,” she said. “How do I get upstairs?”

“I’ll show you real quick,” the man said.

He walked Ballard over to an alcove that had been hidden from her sight and pointed to a set of stairs. She thanked him and quickly started up.

The upper-level balconies afforded Ballard a fuller view of the bookstore below. There were several reading alcoves created by shelf stands positioned at right angles and complete with old leather chairs or couches in the privacy spots. It was the perfect place for a clandestine meeting.

Ballard scanned the whole place twice before finally spotting Castor in an alcove almost directly below her. He was sitting on the edge of a couch, leaning forward and in animated but quiet conversation with another man. It took a moment for the other man to turn his face so that Ballard could clearly see it.

It was Lieutenant Feltzer.

Ballard didn’t know whether to be more outraged by Feltzer’s treachery or jubilant that she now knew who the leak was and could do something about it.

She pulled her phone and surreptitiously took several photos of the meeting below. At one point she switched to video, when Castor stood up like he was in a hurry and looked down at Feltzer. He waved his hands in a dismissive way and then walked out of the alcove and crossed the main floor of the store. Ballard kept the camera going, tracking the reporter until he left the store through the door he had used to enter.

When Ballard brought the camera back across the floor to the alcove where Feltzer had been sitting, he was gone. She lowered the phone and scanned the store as best as she could. There was no sign of Feltzer.

Ballard suddenly became concerned that Feltzer had seen her and that he was on his way up to the second level. She turned to the steps but she saw nobody coming up. She was safe. Feltzer must have left the store, taking a different route through the maze of shelves and then out the door.

Ballard went down to the main floor, watching for Feltzer but catching no glimpse of him. She exited the store onto 5th and looked about. No sign of Feltzer.

Ballard guessed that Feltzer, like Castor, had walked to the meeting but that he had passed the same four blocks via Main Street instead of Spring. Main was more convenient from the PAB’s exit and it put space between the reporter and his source. She saw the light at the intersection change and crossed, then followed 5th to Main Street. At the intersection, she casually looked around the corner and north on Main. There, about two blocks away in the direction of the PAB, she saw a man walking with a fast pace that she recognized as Feltzer’s hard-charging gait.

Concerned that Feltzer would be more alert than Castor to the possibility of a tail, Ballard waited another ten minutes before heading up Main herself. When she got to First, she turned right and walked down into Little Tokyo.

At the Miyako Hotel she checked into a room after being assured by the desk clerk that there were several sushi choices on the room-service menu.

She got to the room and ordered dinner first thing. Then she opened her shoulder bag and laid out the clothes she planned to wear in the morning. The meeting with Feltzer was going to be pivotal.

While she waited for her food, she pulled out her phone and Googled the business number for defense attorney Dean Towson. She expected Towson wouldn’t be in his office this late but he would most likely get her message. Defense attorneys were used to getting late-night calls from clients. And judging by how fearful Towson had grown by the end of Ballard’s interview with him Sunday morning, he would return the call promptly.

The call went through to an answering service, and Ballard spoke to a live individual instead of a computer.

“My name is Detective Renée Ballard with the LAPD. I spoke to Mr. Towson Sunday morning about a murder investigation. Please get a message to Mr. Towson tonight. I need him to call me back as soon as possible, no matter how late. This is urgent.”

She disconnected and began the wait.

To pass the time, she put on the room’s television and was soon distracted by the political infighting and name-calling presented every night on cable TV.

Towson’s callback came faster than the sushi.