‘I understand.’
‘Good. I’m sure everything’ll work out just fine. Now, are you two ladies ready to go home?’
They headed toward the elevator that would take them down to the lobby.
At least a thousand times over the past six years, Laura had dreamed about the wonderful day when she would bring Melanie home. She had imagined that it would be the happiest day of her life. She’d never thought it would be like this.
13
At Central, Dan Haldane took two folders from the clerk in Records and carried them to one of the small writing tables along the wall.
The name on the first file was Ernest Andrew Cooper. By his fingerprints, he had been identified as the John Doe victim found the previous night with Dylan McCaffrey and Wilhelm Hoffritz in the Studio City house.
Cooper was thirty-seven years old, stood five-eleven, and weighed one hundred and sixty pounds. There were mug shots, related to a particularly serious DUI arrest, but they were of no use to Dan, because the victim’s face had been battered into featureless, bloody pulp. He would have to rely on the fingerprint match.
Cooper lived in Hancock Park, on a street of million-dollar and multimillion-dollar homes. He was chairman of the board and majority stockholder of Cooper Softech, a successful computer software firm. He’d been arrested three times within the city limits of Los Angeles, always for drunken driving, and on all three occasions, he had also been driving without a license. He had protested the arrests, had gone to trial in each case, had been convicted of each offense, had been fined, but had served no jail time. In every case, the arresting officers noted that Cooper insisted it was immoral — and a violation of his constitutional rights — for the government to require a man to carry any form of identification whatsoever, even a driver’s license. The second patrolman had also written: ‘…Mr. Cooper informed this officer that he (Mr. Cooper) was a member of an organization, Freedom Now, that would bring all governments to their knees, and that said organization would use his arrest as a test case to challenge certain laws, and that this officer was an unwitting tool of totalitarian forces. He then threw up and passed out.’
Smiling at that last line, Dan closed the folder. He looked at the name on the second file — Edward Philip Rink — and he was anxious to see what they had on this one.
First he carried both files to the nearest of three VDTs and sat down in front of the computer terminal. He switched it on, typed in his access code, and asked for a profile of Freedom Now.
After a brief pause, information began to appear on the screen:
Freedom Now
A political action committee registered with the Federal Elections Commission and the IRS.
Please note:
Freedom Now is a legitimate organization of private citizens exercising their constitutional rights. This organization is not the subject of any police intelligence division investigation, nor should it be the subject of any such investigation while it is engaged upon the activities for which it was formed and for which it has been cleared by the Federal Elections Commission. All information in this file was accumulated from public records. This file was created for the sole purpose of identifying legitimate political organizations and distinguishing them from subversive groups. The existence of this file in no way suggests special police interest in Freedom Now.
The LAPD had taken considerable heat from the American Civil Liberties Union and others for its secret surveillance of political groups that were suspected of involvement in dangerous subversive activities. The department was still fully empowered to conduct investigations of terrorist organizations, but it was enjoined from infiltrating properly registered political groups unless it obtained evidence sufficient to convince a judge that the organization in question had ties to other groups of individuals that were intent upon terrorist activities.
The disclaimer at the head of the file was familiar, and Dan didn’t bother to read it. He pressed the cursor key to roll up more data.
Freedom Now — current officers
President: Ernest Andrew Cooper, Hancock Park