serves me correctly, some of the worst perps we ever tracked down led
lives on the surface that looked like something out of Leave It to
Beaver.”
Sawyer did not look convinced. “How much?”
“Archer could’re gotten several million easy for the information.”
“That sounds like a lot, but you think a guy will kill a couple hundred
people to cover his tracks for that? No way!”
“There’s another wrinkle to all this. A wrinkle that makes me think
Jason Archer was some kind of mastermind despite appearances, or maybe
that he was working for such an organization.”
“So what’s the wrinkle?”
Hardy suddenly looked embarrassed. “There’s some money missing from one
of Triton’s accounts.”
“Money? How much money?”
Hardy eyed Sawyer squarely. “How does a quarter of a billion dollars
grab you?”
Sawyer almost spit his coffee across the table. “What?”
“It looks like Archer wasn’t just interested in selling secrets. He was
also into raiding bank accounts.”
“How? I mean, a company that big, it had to have controls in place.”
“Triton did, only those controls were premised on it receiving correct
information from the bank where the money was on deposit.”
“I’m not following you,” Sawyer said impatiently.
Hardy sighed and put his elbows on the table. “In this day and age,
moving money from point A to point B involves the use of a computer. The
banking and financial worlds are wholly dependent upon them, but that
dependence comes with risks.”
“Like there might be some glitch, the computers go down, stuff like
that?” Sawyer ventured.
“Or that the bank’s computers might be penetrated and manipulated for
illegal purposes. It’s nothing new. Hell, you know the bureau created
a whole new section to deal with computer crimes.”
“Is that what you think happened here?”
Hardy sat down and reopened his file, rustling through some pages until
he found what he wanted. “An operating account for Triton Global
Investments, Corporation, was maintained at Consolidated BankTrust’s
branch here in northern Virginia. Triton Global Investments is Triton’s
Wall Street investment company subsidiary.
The account was funded over time until the total bank balance reached
two hundred and fifty million.”
Sawyer interrupted. “Was Archer involved in setting up the account?”
“No. He had no access to it, in fact.”
“Was there a lot of activity in the account?”
“At first, yes. However, as time went on, Triton didn’t require the
funds. They were sort of kept as a reserve in case Triton or its
affiliated companies were in need of funding.”
“What happened next?”
“Turns out a couple of months ago a new account was set up at the same
bank in the name of Triton Global Investments, Limited.”
“So Triton set up another account?”
Hardy was already shaking his head. “No, that’s the catch. It was
totally unrelated to Triton. Turns out the company is fictitious, no
address, no directors or officers, no nothing.”
“Do you know who set the bank account up?”
“There was only one signatory to the account. The name given to the
bank was Alfred Rhone, chief financial officer. Our investigation
turned up zilch on Rhone. But we did find one interesting piece of
information.”
“What’s that?” Sawyer hunched forward in his chair.
“A number of transactions took place from the phony account.
Wire transfers, deposits, things like that. The signature of Alfred
Rhone appeared on each of these documents. We checked those signatures
against those of all of Triton’s employees. We found a match.
Care to guess who?”
Sawyer’s reply was immediate. “Jason Archer.”
Hardy nodded.
“So what happened to the money?”
“Someone infiltrated BankTrust’s computer system and did some very
careful rearranging of accounts. Turns out that the legit Triton
account and the phony account were assigned the same account number.”
“Christ! You could drive a semi through a hole like that.”
“Right. One day before Archer disappeared, a wire transfer
authorization was made moving the two hundred and fifty million from the
Triton account to an account set up by the phony company at another
major money center bank in New York. BankTrust’s wire department
already had a standing authorization from our friend Alfred Rhone. The
account was fully funded, all the i’s and t’s dotted and crossed. The