If Eliza Blake were made aware of every letter that came from every crackpot obsessed with her, Joe Connelly was certain, the Evening Headlines anchor would never sleep again. As Director of KEY Corporate Security, Connelly maintained a policy of not telling her or any of the other on-air correspondents about letters unless there was actually something they should do to protect themselves. Part of his job was to insulate those he was responsible for protecting from unwarranted fear. Another part was weeding out the harmless letters from the ones that were truly threatening.
Eliza never even saw the crazy letters that came to her at the Broadcast Center. Her assistant opened all her mail and immediately sent on to security anything that seemed weird or menacing rather than just annoying. Over the years Eliza had anchored KEY to America, the morning news broadcast, Connelly had been concerned enough to send a few letters to the FBI. But now, in the short time Eliza had been anchoring the KEY Evening Headlines, her viewership had increased and so had the letters.
Connelly walked through the security command post buried in the basement of the Broadcast Center, scanning the dozens of video monitors along the wall. There were sixteen cameras on each chain, timed to record views of different locations. Cameras were trained on every entrance and exit of the building, outside each elevator, along each hallway. If Joe had his way, there would be cameras in the bathrooms, but, of course, that was against the law. The security monitors were not staffed at all times. That was impossible with the manpower situation as it was. But in the old days, all the camera tapes were recorded and saved for ten days—plenty of time to painstakingly replay and study each tape for any problems or signs of security lapses. Now the cameras were mostly digital, which made things much easier. Everything was saved on a disk and pinpointing time was more exact.
Still, during the hours when most of the on-air talent was in the Broadcast Center, Connelly liked to have a guard keeping an eye on the security screens.
“Everything okay?” he asked the guard now stationed in front of the monitors.
“I’m trying not to fall asleep, it’s so quiet.”
Unsmiling, Connelly nodded. “Good. Let’s keep it that way.”