The Circle Ch. 47

Chapter 47 – Investigative reporting

Things started to get strange around the town and house a couple of months later, and it was Willow's fault in a way.

Willow was the noon and evening news anchor for WWLX-TV. Between 12:30 and 5:00 p.m. she more or less had time on her hands, and during that down time she started to shift from perfecting her delivery (already very good), to investigative reporting.

She'd done several exposés on various problems citizens in the city and surrounding suburbs faced: scamming roofing contractors, credit card fraud, a charitable rip-off, the shameless condition of public housing, a disenfranchised veteran, and so on.

Her most recent focus had become the local State Senator, Douglas Clement. Clement had become one of the more powerful senators in the state legislature, and was highly visible in the surrounding community. Many people put him in the same category as a used car salesman, only a little slicker and more likely to sell you a lemon of a car.

He'd made a number of campaign promises to people in the senate district that included the city and even Dillonville, and Willow initially thought she'd just give an honest report card on him to his constituents. What she turned up, however, was far more than she bargained for.

Willow pulled Bob aside one evening after dinner. She appeared worried. "I have a growing problem at work, and I need some outside advice from someone I trust ... plus I have to share what I'm learning in case something happens to me."

Bob heard the serious nature of her words and pulled her aside. "Whoa. What's all that mean? You make it sound like your job is dangerous."

Willow voice cracked with anxiety, "It is, I think. I've been studying Senator Clement for one of my exposés, and in the process I developed a half-dozen confidential people who will to give me the scoop on him. I guess you could call them informants, but some of them have given me some really hard evidence.

Senator Clement is a bad man. The information I have collected will likely get him indicted for graft, corruption, racketeering, and ... murder. It'll blow-up state politics because he's so powerful, and even put a dent in national politics because his party was going to put him up for a gubernatorial run."

Bob looked suitably shocked, "And what's the issue? You don't want to report it? What?"

Willow said in a hushed tone, "One of my sources, a man named John Ayn, showed up dead yesterday. I have a friend at the morgue. I talked to him when I learned what had happened. He assured me it was murder made to look like suicide. The cops aren't pursuing the matter, which tells me something even more alarming."

"And you want to report on this?" Bob said in disbelief.

Willow sighed, "It gets worse. Today, I got an anonymous email with a video of Clement and a high level police officer dumping Ayn's body in the city park where he was found by a jogger the next morning.

"This is the tip of the iceberg. There's at least one other politician involved too – our state rep. It's a whole network of crooks ripping off the public, even misusing campaign funds. We're talking several million here – maybe more, but now the evidence points to murder."

Bob mumbled, "This is bad."

Willow said, "I just don't know what to do. Sooner or later the Senator will discover that I've been probing around in his underwear drawer looking for dirty linen. Because he's so soiled, he'll know I have a lot on him."

"What if he tries to buy you off ... or warn you off?"

"I'm not for sale, and while I'm scared, I'm not totally intimidated – yet. If anything I'm worried whether I'll have an untimely accident. If I do, I want you to be sure Ariana is cared for, and then try to tell everyone you can that I was murdered."

Bob asked, "Do you think he knows about your investigation now?"

"No, I'm pretty sure he doesn't, but if I start to air any of this he will."

"Hold off putting this on air, but make some tapes. Keep working on it, but don't broadcast. Let's think about this."

Willow said, "I've got a backlog of other stuff to report on, so that's no problem – small change stuff not even related to politics."

Bob thought and then said, "OK, first we have to arrange some protection that you can trust, and that's obviously not going to come from the police." He added, "We'll do this from the general fund. What about your sources? Do they need protection; it sure sounds like it?"

"I'll let you know, but thank you for this. I'll try to pay The Circle back for this trouble. I hope nothing spills over to anybody else."

Bob said, "We should keep Ariana under protection too, just in case. We should even get her out of the house. Now, what else do we need to do to help?"

"I've got so many leads on Clement's bad deeds, I don't know where to begin, or how to start laying it out in my news broadcasts. I also need someone that understands how to read someone's financials. I have access to the information, but I'm not smart enough in that area to understand it."

"Does anyone at the station know about this yet?"

"Errr, no. I don't know how to tell anybody."

"Who's the head man or the head of the news team? Can they be trusted?"

"Both the same man. Rod Minchen."

"Is he on anybody else's payroll, like the Senator?"

"I'm pretty sure the answer is no."

"Be sure, if you can. Check with your sources. If he looks clean then invite him here to meet with you and me, and maybe a couple of the others. I think we'll be able to get you some help too to track down leads, gather evidence, analyze information, and such."

"How?"

"Well Derek's company is closing, so he's about to be out of work; Don just took early retirement; and I am my own boss at this point, so I can screw around in any direction I want. We might be able to draw on some from the female side of aisle too."

"Thank you."

A week later, Willow hosted a meeting at the house on Sunday afternoon. "Bob, Jim, Derek, Don, Marlene, this is Rod Minchen, the owner of WWLX as well as the head of the news department. He's a hands-on manager."

The niceties of handshakes and name exchanges were made. Several mugs of coffee got passed around, and the group settled down for business in the large home's living room. Bob noted the large question mark over Rod's head wondering about why Willow had brought him to this meeting.

Willow said, "Thank you for coming and meeting with me – with us."

Rod said, "I'm a bit puzzled by why you wanted to meet here and on a Sunday. What's this is all about? You made it sound really important."

Willow said to him, "I have a tiger by the tail – a story so big it could blow the lid off of everything going on in the area, and maybe the state. In the newspaper trade you'd stop the presses or put out a special edition on this one."

Rod looked skeptical. "Go on."

"I've been investigating Senator Doug Clement. He's been a very naughty boy. I have verifiable evidence that he's been getting kickbacks on construction contracts in the area, that he's running a high level protection racket on a few leaders of local businesses, and most recently that he was involved in the murder of an aide named John Ayn about two weeks ago." She paused, "I have lots more, but this summarizes the more egregious and verifiable things on the list."

Willow gestured to her friends in The Circle, "Some of my housemates have helped me sift through the information I had or could download, so I now have even more than what I started with."

Rod sat back in his chair almost in shock, "Wow!" After a few seconds to digest and process this information, he said, "And you say this is verified? Be careful, Clement is the most powerful man in state government except for the governor, and my understanding is that he'd like that position next."

"Yes. I have multiple sources. I also got copies of his bank statements. I can match up where deposits were made as they came out of state coffers, or event the accounts of some of the people he was extorting. The amounts and dates line up for several hundred line items. I have audio recordings, illegal probably but not in all cases too. In one, he is explaining to the head of Paronne Construction how the 'game' will be played in this district if Paronne wants any work at all – private or government. In the case of the murder, I actually have a video showing Clement and another man dumping the body; he's clearly identifiable. The body was found by the police in exactly that location, and the video is time and date stamped."

Rod leaned forward, "Shouldn't we turn this over to the police?"

Willow grimaced, "The other man with Clement was a cop – Lieutenant Bruce Brennan."

"Jesus H. Fucking Christ." After cursing, Rod stood and started to pace. Everyone looked at him expecting some guidance. He said, "I'm thinking about what to do next. If we go live with it, we want something to happen, but what? Impeachment? Indictment? Arrest? Who needs to do what to make those results happen?"

Bob added, "And who can you trust?" He paused and added, "We made a big leap involving you in this. We sure hope you aren't on somebody else's payroll."

Rod looked horrified, "I went into this business, even kept my finger on the news area, because I wanted stuff like this to come out. Now that we've got it, I guess it's time to shit or get off the proverbial pot. I want this to come from WWLX. I want to help make this happen, whatever 'this' is."

Jim said, "We need an honest judge, an honest cop, and the governor's ear – unless he's tied into this in some way. I guess I should ask if we can trust the state attorney general too."

Rod thought, "I think I can get us all four. Mort Thomas, the Federal district judge is a personal friend, and someone I trust. My neighbor Robert Gerrity is a newly retired sheriff from Tucson, or rather Pima County; he was the head guy out there, but grew up around here and just moved back; he claims to know where the local skeletons are too or at least how to find them. He doesn't have any authority, but he knows the landscape and can help. I've met our governor Keith Hammer several times, and I am sure I can get access to him if we need it; I can't speak for his lack of involvement in anything, however. He went through some pretty major hurdles to get to the job and it was a dirty election, so if there's something there, I suspect his opponent would have found and used it to discredit him. Ergo, I suspect he's clean. The same with Joe Anderson, the attorney general; he's ex-military JAG, so I'm guessing he'll be clean too. He rode in on Hammer's coattails, as well as a law and order platform. I can get access to him through Hammer."

Jim nodded, "Keep those contacts handy."

Rod said, "We need to build more of a case, and on more of his dirty deeds. I won't begin to ask about your sources, but ... see what else you can dig up. Be careful."

The admonition to be careful and the arrangements for personal security were almost too late. On Tuesday afternoon, while Willow was inside the studio making a few telephone calls to 'sources,' the entire building rocked as though an earthquake hit the area.

Outside in the parking lot, Willow's car had been turned from a nice sedan into a hunk of burning carnage after a car bomb went off. The two cars on either side of hers in the lot were also destroyed. Pieces of the car were found a hundred yards away.

The city fire department acknowledged that the explosion had been caused by a bomb and guessed that it had been intended for Willow, but had for some reason gone off prematurely.

The TV station immediately added 24/7 security and beefed up their video surveillance. The little they had showed a man cutting through the parking lot; he entered the lot with a package and left on the other side empty handed after passing her car and pausing for a moment.

Willow's personal security started the afternoon of the car bombing. The security guard drove her home in a bulletproof SUV, and said they would hang around outside to deter any further threats. They'd have another guard in the morning to take her back into work.

Two nights later just after midnight, someone tossed a Molotov cocktail through Willow's bedroom window. Fortunately, the room was unoccupied. Also fortunate, was that the door to her room was closed and that the fire suppression system went off only seconds later extinguishing the fire before other parts of the house became badly affected. That said, there were several thousand dollars in damage.

The Circle took even more dramatic action to protect the house and the others. Four guards were required onsite at all times.

Willow's personal security was beefed up too. She now wore a bulletproof trench coat whenever she was outside, or between the house and the car, plus a scarf or something to hide her identity. She was escorted everywhere with two bodyguards, and areas were checked before she moved into them.

Lynn took Ariana, Willow's toddler daughter, and a bodyguard and headed to upstate Michigan to her summer cabin. The other children were moved to Don and Michelle's home with multiple guards around the place as well.

* * * * *

The investigative team sat around the living room on Sunday.

Rod asked Willow, "How long will it take to be ready to broadcast this?"

"I'm ready in some ways, and not in others. I've got about an hour's worth of stuff between me talking and playing the tapes and videos. I need help cutting it down. I think we do the situation a disservice by only doing a two or three minute spot."

Rod paced as he was prone to do. He spoke, "The peak day of the week for watching the news is Tuesday. I'm going to usurp using the network right after their national newscast, so at seven o'clock we'll have the maximum number of viewers, and we are going to do a one-hour News Special Report on the Senator."

Jim and Willow asked simultaneously, "How? By who? How much do you want to show?"

Rod smiled, "I want to show it all. I want to play every video clip; play every sound bite; show the bank statements, and so on. Lots of details. I want to try this man on the air. If we don't do it all at once, he'll come after us to squash any further broadcasts about him."

"What about protection for us? Are we really ready to piss this guy off."

"I have the station on lockdown now, and I've got a platoon of security guards around the place, including the transmitting tower even though most of our stuff goes out over cable."

Rod thought and spoke, "I'm going to get my ex-sheriff as one of the guest speakers. Willow, you'll interview him and ask what should happen to all this evidence, and how to proceed from there. We can do that tomorrow; only a couple of minutes worth. It'll show we're being careful about this bastard's legal rights, as well as teeing up everything for various indictments."

He went on, "I will also alert the governor and attorney general that they will want to be sure to watch. I'll tell them both that they will need to keep some staff around after hours, because they will be needing to make some immediate statements about our 'allegations.'" Rod used both hands to make air quotes as he said allegations.

Don said, "We've got a pretty tight package we can turn over to them. CDs and DVDs, as well as copies of everything we've got on paper. We should send multiple copies to the various keepers of the law."

Rod nodded and said, "For dramatic effect, keep a copy on the corner of the desk in the studio we broadcast from. It'll show that we have a compelling pile of evidence."

Bob said, "If this is as explosive as you say, I have another suggestion."

Rod motioned for him to speak.

"I'd record the show ahead of time, and keep Willow, you, and as many other people as you can away from the studio that day and the next. I assume you can broadcast remotely."

Rod nodded at that wise observation.

Two days later, Willow did the early evening news from a makeshift studio set up in the lounge of The Circle's home. Someone had gotten a large map as a backdrop. The various videos were still played by an engineer at the station. As she ended the six o'clock news, she alluded to a seven o'clock news special broadcast of some remarkable investigative reporting. She repeated this several times.

Rod arranged to run a circulating crawl or ticker at the bottom of the screen while the national news was on. The purpose was to beef up the audience for the special seven o'clock news hour.

As the network national news ended, WWLX-TV clicked back to local origin. A couple of commercials ran, and then the screen showed a flicker and the headline 'Special News Report – Corruption in Local Government.'

Willow immediately appeared, this time in the WWLX news studio since the episode had been recorded that morning.

Good Evening. I am Willow Mendez, the news anchor for WWLX-TV. The purpose of this special is to show the citizens of the city and the surrounding area the graft, corruption, and deadly danger residing with some of our local politicians, specifically State Senator Douglas Clement and State Representative Meyer Thornberg. I will tell you up front that on this show, in the next hour, we will show you some disturbing footage, play some revealing audio, and project for you some documents that prove these allegations.

This pile of documents and the CDs and DVDs have been sent to state and federal authorities to facilitate their own investigations. My starting position and that of this station is to have a clean and ethical government. We won't rest until justice has been served about these terrible situations.

Let me begin by talking about the recent death of John Ayn. John was an aide to Senator Clement, and he was a source of information to this reporter about some of the misdeeds of the Senator that I'll tell you about in a minute. He provided some of the information you will see later in this show. He died two weeks ago in what was listed as an apparent suicide. He told me he feared that he would be killed, and made a brief video recording that I will show you now.

The TV screen flickered and a video of a young man appeared facing the camera. He described several illegal situations in which the Senator was involved including some strong-arm tactics, and also indicted the State Rep. as a co-conspirator. The screen then switched back to Willow.

John Ayn was shot in the head. Here is a video shot by a hidden eyewitness of Senator Clement and City Police Lieutenant Carl Brennan dumping and arranging the body to make his death look like a suicide. This is a night shot, but we have enhanced it for viewing. You can see both men carry the body from the trunk of Clement's car, and then Officer Brennan placing the gun Mr. Ayn supposedly shot himself with into Ayn's hand while Clement stands by watching. We do not know where the actual shooting took place, but clearly the body was relocated to this part of the city park.

As Willow talked, explaining the video, the clip from an iPhone played on the TV.

The broadcast went on from there, building a case against the Senator and Representative, and suggesting that there was more of a 'machine' operating for these men than what had been shown. Future pathways for law enforcement to investigate were suggested.

Willow also showed her firebombed car, and the room at the house hit by the Molotov cocktail as the firemen trooped through the smoldering debris. The point that these men were dangerous couldn't be emphasized further. If you were a citizen, the broadcast left you shaking in your boots.

The evidence of the shakedowns appeared next, with one merchant talking in the shadows and with a disguised voice about how he was approached by Clement and told about the payments he would be making thereafter to protect his business and his family.