ridiculous.
The search wrapped up with trace amounts of cocaine being recovered from the toilet bowl. Before imitating Superman by flying out the bathroom window, Clark Kent had apparently flushed some of his kryptonite down the commode. Three suspects were booked on various charges. Two were transported to the hospital before being taken to the county jail.
While the rest of his squad guarded prisoners in hospitals and tackled the hours of paperwork, Thorpe excused himself under the guise of completing administrative chores for The Walrus.
Monday
February 5
Late evening
MIDNIGHT NEARED AS THORPE WALKED through SID’s web of desks to a separate section that housed the equipment officer’s space and most of the division’s toys. There, he retrieved night-vision goggles and a handheld thermal imaging device much like the FLIR on the helicopter. Thorpe didn’t bother signing out either item; he planned on having both returned before the equipment officer arrived in the morning.
Leaving the building and walking into the parking lot, he took a plastic bag from his assigned truck before borrowing one of the extra undercover vehicles. He chose a red Chevy short bed confiscated from a local drug dealer. Like all the other cars in SID’s fleet, the license plate was not registered with DPS. Because the plates came back as “Not on file,” SID’s undercover investigators were routinely pulled over by patrol officers. These encounters could be a real problem when the UCs had a bad guy in the passenger seat and a uniformed officer walked up and said something like, “Shit, Sergeant Thorpe, I didn’t know it was you,” marking the end of an operation. The Training Academy taught recruits not to show recognition when they crossed paths with an undercover, but those instructions were sometimes forgotten.
Having detached himself from the rest of the unit, Thorpe’s first objective was to scout the residence of Dwayne Foster, aka “L.A,” a drug dealer from New Orleans who had been displaced by Hurricane Katrina. How Foster got the nickname “L.A.” was a mystery; as far as OGU could figure L.A. had never lived in California, let alone Los Angeles. Whatever , it didn’t really matter.
Despite the fact that both men were Hoover Crips, L.A. and Marcel Newman were sworn enemies. They had purportedly fired rounds at each other on several occasions, not once hitting their intended target. Thank God bangers held their weapons sideways in an attempt to look cool . They never acquired a site picture and rarely hit what they were aiming at.
When Thorpe instructed Marcel to write L.A.’s initials in the dirt of the barn, Marcel smiled. He’d figured out what Thorpe was planning: L.A. was going to take the fall for Marcel’s murder.
On the floorboard of Thorpe’s borrowed Chevy sat the plastic bag. The bag contained a pair of boots. The boot’s distinctive soles would match imprints left in the dirt around Marcel’s abandoned carcass. The dirt on the soles would match the barn’s floor. The blood splatter on the boots would be linked through DNA to Marcel Newman. The hair Thorpe had placed on the duct tape binding Marcel Newman would be matched through DNA to L.A. Thorpe had retrieved the hair from a comb during an earlier search warrant they had served at L.A.’s residence. This physical evidence would be discovered during search warrants served after Marcel’s body was found with the initials “L.A.” written in the dirt by the victim’s own finger.
The discovery of the boots wasn’t a necessity, and if Marcel’s body had already been discovered, Thorpe wouldn’t risk planting them. But if he could get the footwear in place, the evidence would be insurmountable. It didn’t matter how many witnesses L.A. could come up with who would place him elsewhere at the time of the murders. Today, when juries think CSI Miami is the real deal, physical evidence—especially DNA—is king.
L.A. lived near 5 th
The search wrapped up with trace amounts of cocaine being recovered from the toilet bowl. Before imitating Superman by flying out the bathroom window, Clark Kent had apparently flushed some of his kryptonite down the commode. Three suspects were booked on various charges. Two were transported to the hospital before being taken to the county jail.
While the rest of his squad guarded prisoners in hospitals and tackled the hours of paperwork, Thorpe excused himself under the guise of completing administrative chores for The Walrus.
Monday
February 5
Late evening
MIDNIGHT NEARED AS THORPE WALKED through SID’s web of desks to a separate section that housed the equipment officer’s space and most of the division’s toys. There, he retrieved night-vision goggles and a handheld thermal imaging device much like the FLIR on the helicopter. Thorpe didn’t bother signing out either item; he planned on having both returned before the equipment officer arrived in the morning.
Leaving the building and walking into the parking lot, he took a plastic bag from his assigned truck before borrowing one of the extra undercover vehicles. He chose a red Chevy short bed confiscated from a local drug dealer. Like all the other cars in SID’s fleet, the license plate was not registered with DPS. Because the plates came back as “Not on file,” SID’s undercover investigators were routinely pulled over by patrol officers. These encounters could be a real problem when the UCs had a bad guy in the passenger seat and a uniformed officer walked up and said something like, “Shit, Sergeant Thorpe, I didn’t know it was you,” marking the end of an operation. The Training Academy taught recruits not to show recognition when they crossed paths with an undercover, but those instructions were sometimes forgotten.
Having detached himself from the rest of the unit, Thorpe’s first objective was to scout the residence of Dwayne Foster, aka “L.A,” a drug dealer from New Orleans who had been displaced by Hurricane Katrina. How Foster got the nickname “L.A.” was a mystery; as far as OGU could figure L.A. had never lived in California, let alone Los Angeles. Whatever , it didn’t really matter.
Despite the fact that both men were Hoover Crips, L.A. and Marcel Newman were sworn enemies. They had purportedly fired rounds at each other on several occasions, not once hitting their intended target. Thank God bangers held their weapons sideways in an attempt to look cool . They never acquired a site picture and rarely hit what they were aiming at.
When Thorpe instructed Marcel to write L.A.’s initials in the dirt of the barn, Marcel smiled. He’d figured out what Thorpe was planning: L.A. was going to take the fall for Marcel’s murder.
On the floorboard of Thorpe’s borrowed Chevy sat the plastic bag. The bag contained a pair of boots. The boot’s distinctive soles would match imprints left in the dirt around Marcel’s abandoned carcass. The dirt on the soles would match the barn’s floor. The blood splatter on the boots would be linked through DNA to Marcel Newman. The hair Thorpe had placed on the duct tape binding Marcel Newman would be matched through DNA to L.A. Thorpe had retrieved the hair from a comb during an earlier search warrant they had served at L.A.’s residence. This physical evidence would be discovered during search warrants served after Marcel’s body was found with the initials “L.A.” written in the dirt by the victim’s own finger.
The discovery of the boots wasn’t a necessity, and if Marcel’s body had already been discovered, Thorpe wouldn’t risk planting them. But if he could get the footwear in place, the evidence would be insurmountable. It didn’t matter how many witnesses L.A. could come up with who would place him elsewhere at the time of the murders. Today, when juries think CSI Miami is the real deal, physical evidence—especially DNA—is king.
L.A. lived near 5 th
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