As I stood there on the sidewalk I kept thinking to myself that I couldn’t believe this was the fourth Homicide in the last two weeks. Not that I was surprised that it happened, but they were all at Hispanic bars. The scary part about the situation was they were doing the murders right in front of everyone and with high caliber rifles and weapons. I knew that the people doing the murders weren’t local guys, so my only other thought was these guys were being sent here to commit these crimes. I stood by and watched as crimes scene, video taped, and collected evidence at the scene. The medical examiner arrived and conducted their investigation and removed the body for the autopsy.
A couple days later I was sitting at my desk working on a couple cases when Sgt. Ramano walked up to me and asked me to come into his office. Sgt. Ramano was a great guy he really took good care of me, so I tried to do everything I could to help him out. Ramano told me that they had an informant coming into the office that they were going to send into the same bar where we just had the Homicide the other night. He explained to me that they were going to wire him so they could listen to his conversation. Ramano told me that he wanted me to check out an unmarked car and head down to the bar and run some tags in the parking lot. I asked Ramano if there were any specific tags we were looking for and he said “no”. Looking back at it now I like to think that he just felt comfortable with me in the area of the bar. I asked Ramano if I needed to take my Swat gear with me, and he said he told me that I wouldn’t be there long.
As I was walking out of the office Detective Debbie Kirkland walked up to me and told me she was going with me. I was grabbing my take down duty vest and black t-shirt that said Sheriff on it. I got the undercover car out of the garage and drove around to where Debbie was waiting at her car. When Debbie got in the car and sat there and looked at her. She looked at me and said “what are you looking at?” I asked Debbie where her vest was at, or her gun, or her radio. Debbie said you got all of that, besides we won’t be there long let’s go. Now Debbie was in her late forties and had been a police officer for twenty years and was the most loving lady but didn’t take crap from anyone. So I just laughed and drove toward the bar. When we got to the bar we drove through the parking lot of the bar which was in a shopping plaza that also had a Circle K convenient store a hair salon and one or two small businesses. The bar was on the far left of the shopping plaza and there were around seven to eight cars in the parking lot area of the bar.
I was on the CID channel on the radio and I told Ramano that we had arrived and we were driving through the parking lot running tags. Ramano acknowledged on the radio and then beeped me on the Nextel and said that the informant had just arrived and they were setting everything up. Ramano told me that he would keep me updated over the Nextel what was going on and that after the informant left they were going to have a quick meeting and then they would be heading that way. Debbie and I found a used car lot across the street from the bar about 100 yards where we could just sit and watch what was going on at the bar and the whole shopping plaza. While we sat there Debbie and I did the usual laughing at each other and talking about whatever she brought up. I noticed a black truck pull up in the parking lot and three Hispanic males exit the truck. I looked at the tag through my binoculars and could see that the truck had Texas plates on it. When I saw the Texas plates on the truck it through up a huge red flag for me and I told Ramano over the radio. Ramano beeped me back on the Nextel and said that the informant had just left the office and was heading to the bar. I explained to Ramano that the fact that a truck from Texas with three males had just arrived at the bar and was a little unusual. Ramano said that they were listening to the informant in the office and they were walking into their meeting and would keep me updated.
After around fifteen minutes Ramano came across the radio telling me that the informant was pulling into the parking lot in a black car. I saw as the car pulled into the parking lot and watched as he parked and got out of his car. As the informant exited his car a bud light truck pulled up in the parking lot to deliver to the convenient store in the shopping plaza. Now to paint a better picture for you from where I was sitting the shopping plaza was shaped like the letter L. The long part of the plaza was facing us and she short side of the plaza was pointing towards us and the bar was at the end of the plaza. In between me and the entrance to the bar was 15th street east which was a very active roadway. Now with the Bud Light truck pulling into the parking lot it blocked half of the parking lot, but fortunately I could still see the part of the lot that I needed too.
The informant walked inside the bar and we just sat there and waited to hear from Ramano on what was going on or what he needed us to do. As we waited a big yellow truck pulled into the parking lot and it too also had Texas tags on it. Two Hispanic males exited the truck and walked into the bar. I just had this feeling in my gut that something wasn’t right with this situation. It was around twenty minutes when Ramano came across the radio and said that the informant had called them on his cell phone and said that he was nervous because there were some shady looking guys showing up inside the bar. Ramano beeped me on the Nextel and said something was going on because they had turned up the music in the bar so loud they couldn’t hear what the informant or any one else in the bar was saying.
Not even thirty seconds after Ramano said that the door to the bar flew open and the informant came running out of the bar holding his head. It happened so fast I didn’t even realize that it was the informant running from the bar. Suddenly Ramano was yelling over the radio “Fitz, Fitz, move in move in, they just tried to shoot the informant.” Little did I know as I sat there inside the bar they had just tried to execute the informant inside the bar? They asked him to play pool and when they started playing pool they turned the music up really loud. The informant walked away into the bathroom and that’s when he called Ramano on the phone and told him about the guys showing up at the bar and they were acting weird. The informant went back out and wanted to leave, but they wouldn’t let him they wanted him to play a game of pool. During the game the informant bent over the table to take his shot and felt someone move in behind him. The informant moved his head to the side to turn around and look and that’s when one of the guys that showed up in the trucks from Texas fired a round at the back of his head point blank.
The informant was hit but it was a graze wound on the side of his head and he pushed the guy and ran away out the front door. As I watched the informant run out the front door he ran across the parking lot. I lost him as he went behind the Bud Light truck and then I saw him run behind a dumpster and hide. I drove out of the car lot and flew across 15th street into the parking lot of the shopping plaza. As I was crossing the road I saw one of the Hispanic males that were in the trucks from Texas walk out the door holding what looked like a black bag in his hands. Now remember I have Debbie in the car with me with no gun, no vest, no radio, and an informant that I have no clue on how bad his injuries were. I wanted to jump out of the car and challenge the guy walking out of the bar, and what I mean when I say challenge is come out at gun point at him. Instead I drove to the corner of the lot where the informant was hiding behind the dumpster. When I got out of the car I ran to the informant who was on the phone talking to our detectives. Debbie was asking for my radio, but I told her to use her phone I could see the informant was fine as he was bleeding a little from the graze of the bullet.
I turned and saw the Hispanic male that had the black object in his hand was at the black truck driver’s side with the door open. I told Debbie to stay there and I ran around the car and started walking toward the truck which was only 30 yards at the most from me. When I started toward the truck the Hispanic male looked up and saw me and closed the door to the truck and took off running for the bar. I tried to keep as many cars in between me and the bar because the windows were dark and you couldn’t see inside. I knew that the suspects of the murders had been using high powered rifles and I needed to find cover and wait for back-up. Now I can’t begin to explain to you the chaos that was going on in this parking lot. It all happened so fast yet it was in slow motion. I made it to the black truck and there were no more cars between me and the bar. I looked into the passenger side window of the black truck and I saw three handguns that had been wrapped up in a black shirt. So that’s what the Hispanic male was carrying out of the bar and I was sure that one of the guns sitting there had been used to try to kill the informant.
I laid my arms across the hood of the truck and pointed my firearm at the bar in case I took any fire from the bar or anyone else walked out of the bar with a weapon. The hood of the truck was so hot that I burned my forearms. I wanted to try to make myself as small a target as possible so I laid down on the pavement of the parking lot behind the tire using it and the engine block as cover. It was around 95 degrees that day and lying on the pavement of a parking lot that was black top in a black shirt black vest and black pants isn’t recommended. I got up and just used the hood to hold my position. I could hear sirens coming and a lot of them. I kept telling the responding units that we needed to get people to the back door of the bar so they couldn’t run out the back. As I stood there for what seemed like for ever I watched as patrol unit after patrol unit parked on 15th street about 100 yard from the bar. No where near where they needed to go and not only did they park there but they gathered there and stayed.
I was telling dispatch that I needed units to come to the front of the shopping plaza to take positions next to me and secure the bar. We also had a victim and another detective behind me that needed to be treated. I couldn’t believe that I was sitting there watching every unit that arrived was parking 100 yards away on 15th street and not one person was coming to the front of the bar with me. For a good three minutes I called on the radio for units to come to the front. I saw an unmarked Crown Victoria gray in color pull in next to me and Sgt. Dale Couch (Yes LT. Dale Couch) get out of the car with his shot gun and took a position next to me. Other unmarked units started finally arriving in the front parking lot, and K-9 units.
Other Swat team members arrived relatively quickly and did a quick entrance on the bar taking the occupants in the bar out front and on the ground. K-9 began to track from the back door to a local apartment complex where the dog led the handler and other deputies to an apartment door that had been kicked in. They located the suspects inside the apartment in a bathroom. The detectives that were working the Homicides responded to the scene to conduct interviews and obtain search warrants for the trucks from Texas. They tried to get me to do the search warrants for them, but this was one time that I had done enough for the day and I went home when everyone else got there.
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