CTF Chapter 1 The Capanelli Bust

Inside a normal cluttered and dirty locker room full of people, all of which are getting ready for something big. Tarvis Jackson is seen putting his Kevlar vest over his typical white t-shirt. Nearby Billy “The Kid” Taylor sits on a bench and starts loading shotgun shells into his pump action shotgun while quietly humming to himself. Reggie Wilson is at the back of the room, laying out the plan of attack with his small group of uniformed officers, most of whom were borrowed from another station at the map of the compound. Detective Mike Rogers enters the cramped locker room, and immediately everyone takes notice. Not only is Mike already geared up and ready, but his uniform has changed drastically. In place of his typical suit and tie most detectives wear he is currently outfitted in a blue t-shirt under his kevlar vest with his badge shining brightly, showing it was freshly polished. Mike also has forgotten his loafers in favor of some worn hiking boots. Mike looks like a man ready for war, and that is his mission today. Today will hopefully be his last bust as a regular detective, and he expects it to go down flawlessly. Mike goes to his locker and opens it out of habit. He doesn’t need anything out of it but he is going over his attacks plan and the speech he must give to his troops before the raid today. Everything has to go down perfectly and it will if he has anything to do with it. Chief Cruz has a pet project called the Crime Task Force or CTF, which will handle all violent gang or drug related crime cases in the city. Now with Mike’s reputation as a cop tough on criminals, his mostly clean jacket, and his stellar arrest record he was guaranteed a spot on that team. A police committee would be voting tonight on which officer would head up this team. With his letter from his captain and an excellent bust today he was a shoe in for the lead spot. Once Mike got the lead spot he could bring most of his team now with him and really clean up this city. The only thing standing in his way was Nicolas Capenelli. Capenelli is the head of the local Italian mafia sect in the city and try as they might they could never bust him on charges that his lawyer could not get him out of. Mike and his team had tried taking Capenelli down twice before, but never could get enough on him to amount to any significant prison time. Mike closed his locker and moved to the front of the locker room to give everyone their marching orders.

“Ok everyone today we are going to take down Nicolas Capenelli head of the local mob element in our city. Now Capenelli has three houses in a square block area which is basically a compound on 32nd St., he has two sets of lookouts posts as far as two blocks away to give him advanced warning and countless other holes he can climb into if anything goes south.” Mike informed all the uniform officers. Of course his team had been planning this raid for the past week so they all knew the drill and just kept going with their own stuff, quietly while Mike gave his speech. “Our informant tells us Capenelli took possession of three bricks of heroin this morning and it will be moved out of his house within the next few hours so we have a small window we can bust him with some serious weight, which means serious jail time.” Mike smirked as he joked to his troops. “Here is how it is going down, all the uniform officers know to which of my team you’re assigned and each of my team will accomplish up specific tasks and we will complete this raid as a whole. Tarvis over here with the white t-shirt will be in charge of taking down the first set of lookouts on 34th St. and Cedar.  Reggie here will take out the second set and any ground troops loitering around near the three main houses.” Mike now indicated The Kid and Butch. “Butch and The Kid will be knocking down the doors to houses two and three, but number one is Capenelli’s main residence and it belongs to me and my team. House two is where Capenelli keeps his guns for his soldiers, and house three is where he keeps his girls he has turned out. Now this mission will be a successful one only if we catch Capenelli with the drugs, get his foot soldiers off the streets on anything we can bust them on, and each and every person in this room comes back unharmed.” Mike concluded. “Now group up and be ready, we roll in five minutes.

Mike exits the locker room, and thru the bullpen with all the other detectives working normal cases, and out of the station. Mike gets into his dark blue Pontiac G6 and followed the swat van to the rally point a few blocks out from the initial lookouts. Mike is one of the first to arrive and waits for everyone else to catch up since they are not running lights or sirens yet. Mike starts nervously drumming on the steering wheel while he reaches into the console for another candy bar, his third so far today. Once everyone is in position he radios on the private channel that the mission is a go and that Tarvis’s team goes in first to take out the first set of lookouts. Tarvis and his squad of six uniformed officers take out the first set of lookouts without incident. Mike kept going, advancing closer to his goal and deeper into the Capenelli compound. The thought of cuffing Capenelli and putting him in a holding cell was driving Mike and making his heart pound in his chest. Reggie and his team of five uniform officers took down the final set of lookouts quickly. Though one lookout did pull out a cell phone, he was quickly neutralized with the butt of the gun connecting to his temple before he could alert anyone. Butch and The Kid split up from behind Mike’s car with their groups behind them. Mike sped up to Capenelli’s main house; he slammed on his brakes and was out of the car seconds after he placed it into park. Mike ran up to the door and was busting it down before his team even had time to catch up. He ran straight for Capenelli’s bedroom which was the third door on the right at the top of the stairs. Mike drew his gun as he slowly opened the door and caught Capenelli asleep in his bed with two girls.

“Police! Nicolas wake up and get dressed.  It’s time to call that five hundred dollar an hour mouth piece you call a lawyer, we have warrants and are searching multi-properties you own as we speak, now pay the girls and send them home because you’re leaving with me” Mike said as he nudged Capenelli awake with the barrel of his gun.

“So, any idea what you think you will find in my houses Officer Rogers?” questioned Nicolas while he was dismissing the girls and heading towards his closet under Mike’s watchful eye.

“It’s Detective Rogers, but you knew that Nicolas. Our informants told us you have drugs, guns, and under aged girls in this compound you have created.  Care to just turn them over to us now or shall we go about the normal procedure of searching every cabinet and crawlspace?” Mike asked as he started going thru Nicolas’ dresser drawers.

“Do whatever you’d like officer, I am sure my lawyer will figure out some kind of suit to file against you, the other officers, and the city if any of my property is destroyed” Capenelli remarked as he came out of his closet dressed in a blue button down shirt and tan slacks with a smug grin on his face as Mike escorted him out of the bedroom.  As Mike leads Capenelli down the stairs and out the front door Officer Bobby Ortiz came up holding three small bundled packages.

“Sir, we found this under the counter in the bathroom, it appears to be heroin.” Ortiz said to Mike like a nervous schoolboy.

“Good work Officer” Mike said to Ortiz before turning his attention to Capenelli.

“Anything else of interest we should keep looking for or are you going to clam up and wait for your lawyer?”  Mike asked. 

“That is not mine! You cops planted that heroin here, this is all a setup and I am not saying anything else until I have talked to my lawyer” Capenelli said with a sense of defiance.

“See that camera over there that officer is holding?” Mike said while indicating an office across the house. “He’s recording everything so that it is documented what was here before we started looking. So I don’t think that line of defense will work this time Nicolas.” Mike said as the grin left Capenelli’s face. Mike snapped the cuffs on him and started reading him his miranda rights.

Mike led Capenelli out of the house and was putting him in the back of his car when Butch and The Kid came up to him. Butch had found some semi-automatic guns and other weaponry with serial numbers filed off. The Kid had found some ledgers with what looked like a sports gambling book and a few underage girls making videos. Tarvis and Reggie had found some pot and pills on the foot solders and few had concealed weapons. “It was a good bust everyone, very good work executing the plan to perfection.” Mike said to all the members who had gathered outside to watch him place Capenelli in his car. “Should be enough of a bump to get you the top job on the Chief’s new task force, just don’t forget all the little guys who executed your plan, did all the heavy lifting, and let you bag the big fish here today” Butch joke as everyone started congratulating Mike.

Back at the station everyone cheered as Mike lead Capenelli down to booking. Next stop was the payphone to call his lawyer and finally the holding cell. Mike had ordered the uniformed officers to keep Capenelli separate from the low level guys to keep them from talking until Mike had a chance to interrogate the low level guys and see what he could shake loose. Mike also did not want to risk Capenelli attempting to get one of the guys to take the rap for the heroin they busted him with. Mike went to his desk in the bullpen with the rest of the detectives and started the mountain of paperwork he had ahead of him. Mike noticed Chief Cruz coming out of Captain Martin’s office.

“This has to be a good sign. The Chief is here just minute after I return from the biggest bust of the year, a day before he is supposed to make an announcement about who heads up the new task force.” Mike thought to himself. Mike’s phone rang in the middle of his thoughts. Mike quickly grabbed it up and answered “Detective Rogers”. “Captain Martin would like to see you in his office immediately, Detective” Mandy the girl on the switchboard responded. “Thank you Mandy” replied Mike. “This is either really good news or really bad news” Mike thought as he got up from his desk and headed to the Captain’s office. Mike walked from his desk to the Captains office all the while going through all the possibilities in his head. He came to the conclusion he was either going to be fired or promoted as he knocked on the door to get permission before entering. “Come in Mike” he heard Captain Martin command from his seat in front of his desk, which the Chief was behind. “I wonder if it annoys the Captain on the other side of his desk for once” Mike thought to himself as he entered the room and took the scene in. It was not often Mike saw his Captain not behind his desk, but with the Chief in the office it did seem right that he should be the one enjoying the most comfortable chair.

“Sit down Mike we need to have a talk” Cruz said as he gestured Mike towards a seat beside his Captain.

“I will leave you gentlemen to it then, good work today Mike” Captain Martin said as he got up and left his own office. After Martin had closed the door Cruz stood up and reached out his hand for Mike to shake.

“I wanted to come down here and personally congratulate you on the great job you have done today. I also wanted to offer you the lead spot on my new city wide task force. I would like to hear your game plan on how you are going to run it. I am confident you will take the job as you have hounded most of my underlings for clues about who all I was considering.” Cruz stated as he shook Mikes hand.

Mike was a bit dumbstruck by all this information and realized the Chief had stopped talking several seconds before he replied. “Oh thank you sir, I am honored to accept this position sir.” Mike said respectfully.

“That’s good to hear son, now I know you will want to bring some of your guys with you onto this team and with how well your team worked out today I have no problem with that, but we need to add a few other members.” Cruz replied.

“Who all do you want to bring with you Mike?” Cruz asked.

“The whole team if I could, sir. Reggie, Billy the Kid, Tarvis, Butch, and maybe a few local uniformed officers from this precinct if you would permit it, sir.” Mike asked.

Cruz mulled over the information for a bit before he replied. “You know Captain Martin will be happy for all of you, but he will have a stroke and fight us tooth and nail for taking most of his best detectives. Do you know Martinez and Diaz from the Southern Precinct?  They are mainly Robbery Homicide, but have excellent intelligence on a few of the Latino gangs in the city.” Cruz said as he leaned back in the chair and propped his feet up on the desk.

“They are more than welcome on the team, sir. I was hoping, sir to still work out of this precinct. That should take some of the sting out for Captain Martin since we will still be in his house, sir. We will of course focus on any crimes city wide that deal with drugs or gangs, but we could use one of the unused conference rooms and maybe a few offices beside it as our base of operations here, sir. We can use the successful bust today as the first of your new taskforce, sir. Leak to the press that I will lead up the team and about the guys on it and how we have already gotten excellent results, sir.” Mike replied.
Cruz was taken back and at the same time admired Mike’s dedication. Not only had Mike planned out his successful raid today, and executed it perfectly. Mike had chased after this lead spot on the task force as well, but he had the foresight to plan who he wanted on the team, where the team would be based, and had a plan to grab some quick positive headlines for the team and police force in general.

“Mike, you keep up producing busts like you are and thinking like you do and you will be Captain of your own house in the next five years, I guarantee it. I must be going now Mike. I will let you pass the good news along to your new team as well as Captain Martin.” Cruz said as he got up from the desk and walked over and shook Mike’s hand again. “I want you to come down to HQ next week and we’ll go over some more specifics, for now just carry on with your plans. See you next week.” Cruz said as he left the office.  Mike was left alone in Captain Martin’s office to think about his plans for his team and his future.