Chasing Deception Read online

  “It’s OK, sweetie. I’m here,” her mother cooed as she patted her on the back.

  “Dad, the cops just came in with their guns and asked if anyone had any weapons. It was so intense,” a boy blurted out to his father.

  “Sounds pretty intense. I’m just glad you’re alright.” His father wrapped his arm protectively around the child.

  Jim asked the principal a few more questions, gave him one of his Courier business cards and was ready to leave when he saw a familiar face. The man, a couple inches shorter than Jim, had a pair of Ray-Bans resting on top of his short-cropped, brown hair and wore a luau shirt, jeans and black Converse Lo-Tops. The goatee seemed different, and then the name finally flashed into his mind: Terry Gould. The last time he had seen Terry, Jim was an education reporter and Terry was teaching history at the high school in the southern part of town.

  “Terry, I thought you were still at Valle Verde.” Jim shook the teacher’s hand.

  “Actually, I transferred here four years ago. I’m teaching AP European History and government classes these days.”

  “How do you like it?”

  “Other than today, it’s a pretty good gig.” His smirk mimicked the defensive posture some of the students were employing.

  “When you heard the alarm, what went through your mind?” Jim flipped to a new page on his notepad and jotted down the teacher’s name.

  “I don’t think I’ll repeat my exact words. Let’s just say I was worried for our safety. I told everybody to sit on the floor along the back wall and I stood between them and the door.”

  “What?”

  “When I signed on for this, I realized it was my job to care for my students. I know it sounds crazy in this day and age, but they are my responsibility. I’m not reckless by any means, but I take that duty very seriously. My wife doesn’t like it, but I keep telling her I work at a safe school in a safe neighborhood. That used to be true, but I’m not so sure anymore.”

  “Did you know the kid?”

  The teacher nodded. “Yeah. I had him in class last year. He was dealing with a lot of issues, but his counselor was helping him work through all that.”

  “And what’s his name?”

  “Nice try. I am sure either Mr. Pierce or the police department would be the best source for that information. Sorry I can’t help you, but I make it a policy to watch out for my students. Even when they’re not my students anymore.”

  Jim thanked the teacher and called Dan with an update as he returned to his car.

  2

  When Jim walked into the bustling newsroom of the 100,000-circulation paper just before 10 a.m., he scanned the headlines from the Courier in his right hand as he strode to Dan’s desk.

  As he briefed his boss on what had happened at the high school, Jim had considered inserting an inappropriate joke about the situation, but thought better of it.

  Walking back to his desk, Jim uncharacteristically refrained from the gallows humor famous in his line of work. Over the years he had acclimated to the cynical nature of the newsroom. He and his colleagues regularly made snarky comments about the people in their stories. Whether it was a politician taking bribes or someone who was injured in a gruesome or unique way, he or she would be punch-line fodder for weeks or months to come. Even those just guilty by association fell victim to the daggers of humor thrown about the newsroom.

  He justified the acerbic jesting as a way to let off the steam that regularly built up in this stressful job. And, maybe, deep down inside, he had come to view many of his sources as characters in some great story and not as actual people with real lives and genuine feelings.

  Jim shook off the thoughts as he turned on his computer. He decided a long time ago not to spend too much time in self-introspection, but to focus on scrutinizing the lives of others. He considered it one of the things that made him a good reporter.

  As the computer was starting up, he checked his voicemail messages. Two people called to complain regarding his article about Emerald Valley City Councilman Thom Stanford’s affair with a paid escort. It had been the paper’s lead story that morning and he figured the original piece and its follow-up articles would probably take top honors at the next Golden State Reporters Association awards ceremony. It would be another framed certificate to hang on the fuzzy wall sectional that marked off the borders of his “office.”

  Jim knew it would only be a matter of time until columnist Charlie Stein moved to a larger paper. He would then, hopefully, have the columnist job, with all the fame and corresponding hate mail that came with it. Editorial cartoonist George Conway sat near Charlie and said he thought the columnist had an interview with the San Francisco Chronicle this weekend. Maybe the move would be sooner than expected.

  He missed covering Emerald Valley full-time. The city had been his beat for five years until being assigned in January to a new part-time “special investigations” reporting position. He still had his pick of Emerald Valley stories, but he spent half his week now doing research and lots of background interviews on long-range projects that affected several cities.

  Councilman Stanford wasn’t the first Emerald Valley official who had bent the rules. Two years ago Jim had caught the city manager with her hand in the city’s coffers. His articles helped to spur embezzlement charges by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office and a public protest that led to her dismissal from office. Next to his award for the story was a framed copy of the picture Courier photographer Robbie Garcia had taken of the dejected administrator practically fleeing her last council meeting.

  Jim’s thoughts returned to the story at hand. He typed up his notes and then formed the sections into a smoothly flowing article. He called the police department to fill in a few missing details. The police still were not releasing the boy’s name, so he walked over to the cubicle of the daytime cops reporter, Dale Henzie, who had become an institution at the Courier during his 22-year career at the paper’s crime desk. Dale’s father’s retired as a police lieutenant, and his grandfather had served as a chief in Northern California for the last decade of his career. At 15, Dale knew his poor eyesight would keep him from active police duty, so he picked writing for the high school paper over going into the family business.

  The plucky 19-year-old got an internship with the Courier covering high school sports while he attended community college. He began to share the night cops beat two years later and took over the job full-time a year after that. He worked the swing-shift schedule for 14 years because he knew criminals preferred the cover of darkness to engage in their acts. The night duty left Dale’s skin with an ashen pallor his doctors said was unhealthy. The switch to the daytime shift brought color back to his cheeks and a wealth of experience the other reporters had come to rely on.

  Dale was on the phone when Jim approached.

  “So you really think the department has a solid lead on Oliver Schroeder and might be able to bring him in?”

  Dale paused as he typed notes on his computer.

  “OK. And how much help is the FBI’s L.A. Field Office providing in this investigation?”

  Another pause.

  “Thanks a lot, chief. I’ll call back tomorrow to see if you have any more details,” Dale said as he hung up.

  “What was that all about?”

  “Schroeder has made the FBI’s Most Wanted list for an investment scam he has played on seniors in Pennsylvania, Kansas and New Mexico since 1995.” Dale spoke in the measured tones of a master storyteller. “Now Chief Shaw in Pomona has a tip that someone matching his description but with a different name has applied for a license to open up a home-based financial planning business. They hope to arrest him tomorrow morning, but said he will give me a heads up before they go in so we can be there.”

  “You get to cover all the fun stuff… Hey, can you do me a favor?”

  “Sure.”

  Jim explained what happened at Emerald Valley High and how the police refused to reveal the teen’s identit
y.

  “Give me five minutes and I will see what I can get for you.”

  Jim returned to his desk and wrote the opening paragraphs of the article.

  GUN SCARE CLOSES DOWN HIGH SCHOOL

  • Emerald Valley High lockdown ends without injury

  By James T. Mitchell

  Staff Writer

  An Emerald Valley High School student who brought his father’s handgun to campus Thursday morning prompted a lockdown and class-to-class search that ended without incident.

  Jim left a blank for the student’s name he hoped Dale would be able to provide in a few minutes.

  Students and teachers were locked in their classrooms as pairs of officers searched each classroom. Officers cornered the student in the boy’s locker room next to the gymnasium, where Officer Lesley Sandoval, 29, talked the teen into surrendering without a shot being fired.

  Jim filled in the rest of the details, ending with the quote from the history teacher he had spoken with at the scene.

  A California Distinguished School since 1999, Emerald Valley is best known for its high test scores, sports trophies and traveling science program.

  History teacher Terry Gould, who transferred from Valle Verde High School four years ago, had considered Emerald Valley a safe school until Thursday, “but I’m not so sure (about that) anymore,” he said.

  Dale Henzie walked up to Jim and handed him a piece of paper with the student’s name on it.

  “How’d you get that so quickly?”

  “When you’re nice to your sources, they tend to do things for you. Like the saying goes, ‘you attract more flies with honey than with vinegar’.”

  “I thought the only thing that attracted flies were dead bodies and horse manure.”

  The snide comment earned a rare laugh from the grizzled veteran.

  “Thanks, Henzie. I owe you one.”

  “How about courtside Lakers tickets?”

  “You’re funny. How about a beer the next time we go to Smitty’s Sports Bar.”

  “Not quite what I was hoping for, but it’ll do.”

  As Dale walked away, Jim added the student’s name and gave his colleague credit for the assistance.

  Courier reporter Dale Henzie contributed to this report.

  Jim noted he still had some holes to fill in the story when he looked at the digital clock on his computer, which said it was just a couple minutes before 11 a.m.

  Just as he saved what he had written so far, Dan approached his desk.

  “Time for the budget meeting.” Dan handed Jim a copy of the budget, which listed the stories he and his fellow reporters were working on for the next day’s issue. His story was already slotted for the front page. Since it was Thursday, there would be some discussion of stories running this weekend. The municipal elections were coming up in about a week and a half, and people were filing stories on the ballot measures and the various candidates. Jim had already written most of the copy for his story, and he just needed to get a couple of quotes to wrap things up.

  As he walked to the editorial conference room, Jim was going over his plans for the weekend. If he could wrap things up early tomorrow, he was headed to Crystal Cove. It was supposed to be reasonably warm, and he wanted to go to the small Orange County beach he had discovered years ago. He went there to read and relax or sometimes just to think things through. It was his own private sanctuary, and he enjoyed retreating to the spot at least once a month.

  He took a seat in the conference room and greeted a couple of fellow reporters with a nod. Glancing around the room, he noticed an out-of-place reporter. What’s Missy doing here?

  Melissa Jenkins was a no-nonsense reporter in her late 20s who split her time between lifestyles and religion reporting. She was a natural beauty who wore her strawberry-blond hair in a chin-length bob and accented her classic wardrobe with simple accessories. Jim respected the fact she didn’t use her feminine charms to get a story, but she was a Christian and that was a strike against her for some in the office. She wasn’t self-righteous, but when she explained one Friday afternoon why she didn’t want to join him, Dale, Katie and Dan that night for drinks at Smitty’s, she got a reputation for being “Miss Holy Roller” or “Missy” for short.

  Jim wondered if she knew what the other reporters said behind her back. Probably not. She seemed to be too nice a person to pay attention to it even if she did know what was being said. Too bad. She’ll never get ahead in journalism with that approach.

  Dan cleared his throat. “OK folks, let’s get this meeting going. As you know, elections are coming up next week and we are putting out a special section on Monday. Most of you already have your assignment for the section, so we’ll cover that after we deal with what’s going on in the rest of the world.”

  Dan went from reporter to reporter, asking them about the progress of their stories. With the pending elections dominating the reporters’ time and attention, there was room for a host of personality profiles and kids-done-good stories finished days or weeks ago that were just waiting for a slow news day to run. Jim summarized three such stories of his own.

  “Can you freshen up the Arellano piece?”

  Even though Dan’s inquiry sounded more like an order than a request, Jim knew before answering there was nothing much he could do to spice up the story.

  “Dan, the kid got his Eagle Scout award three weeks ago because he helped build some wildlife preserve at the nature center. It’s already a 15-inch story with two photos of the kid and his little building project. The only reason I wrote the story in the first place was because Macy was called out on that bomb scare at Ontario Airport and missed the awards ceremony. So, unless the owls are on the warpath, there isn’t much to ‘freshen’.”

  “My nephew is an Eagle Scout and it’s called a Court of Honor, not an ‘awards ceremony,’ by the way. Humor me and take another look at the Arellano piece, would you? And if there’s nothing else you can think to add, perhaps you can find something else significant taking place in one of the 14 fine cities we cover.”

  “OK.” Jim knew when he was beat.

  Dan then covered all of the assignments for the special election section. Jim had little to say during this segment since only two of the three council seats up for grabs were contested, and the three measures on the ballot were expected to pass by large margins. He had actually written the bulk of his two stories on Tuesday and expected to only put a little more work into them before they were ready to run. This election was going to be pretty boring as far as he was concerned.

  During the meeting Jim noticed that Missy never said a word. He again wondered why she was there at all. He made a mental note to ask her about it afterwards.

  The meeting ended and everyone filed out of the conference room. It always got a little stuffy in there toward the end of the meetings. Jim was planning to get a cup of coffee from the break room and some fresh air in the outdoor courtyard, just as soon as he talked to Missy. She was at the other end of the room, and he was waiting for her to make her way toward the exit, where he was standing. As she approached, Dan’s voice captured Jim’s attention.

  “Jim, Melissa, can you two stick around for a couple minutes?”

  He returned to his seat, and Melissa sat next to him. Dan waited until everyone filed out before starting to talk.

  “Now, Jim, I know you have probably already written most of your story on the ballot measures in Emerald Valley. But there is one measure Melissa has expressed interest in working on, and I think she has a great angle for a story.”

  Jim swiveled his chair to face Melissa as she spoke.

  “How familiar are you with Measure B?”

  “Very. Measure B will allow the Emerald Valley planning commission and city council to restrict the leasing of shopping center units to commercial businesses only. The Chamber of Commerce and 90 percent of the businesses in town are behind the measure. I have no doubt it will pass with at least a 50-point margin. It was worth 10 inches an
d I gave it 14, so I think I have that base covered.”

  —

  Jim’s arrogant tone grated on Melissa’s nerves, so she paused before responding in measured tones.

  “I agree that Measure B looks like a benign proposal almost anybody would like, but did you also know that it seems to be aimed almost directly at one organization?”

  Noticing the look of confusion on Jim’s face, she continued. “The Chamber of Commerce and their friends on the council don’t seem to like the folks at New Creation Fellowship. They meet in the Cottonwood Center and apparently some people don’t like the people who attend the fellowship’s Saturday and Wednesday night services.

  “You see: the members at New Creation are all former drug addicts or alcoholics. Even their pastor, Jeremiah Harmon, used to be an addict, but, from what I have heard, he straightened out his life and he’s trying to help other people do the same. All they can afford is leasing space at Cottonwood since the center is kind of run down and the cost is cheap. But the council comes in, calls the place an eyesore, and gets some local business leaders to write up a measure to get rid of them. As a result, some people who are trying to put their lives together by going to church will have no place to meet. We should be telling their story, too.”

  Dan entered the conversation to break the tension. “The problem is that no one at city council or the chamber will talk to Melissa. They’re always ‘in a meeting’ and never return her calls. Jim, I want you two to team up on this story. Lean on a few people in City Hall. Talk with Barney Colbert at the Chamber. Get someone to comment.

  “I also want you to go with Melissa on Saturday to one of their services. You can be a fresh pair of eyes and ears. See if these guys are on the level. You two can write the story Sunday and take Monday off. I think you guys will make a good pair, the skeptic and the true believer.” Dan finished his pitch with a slight smile.