Early that morning Cindy was in her office, checking the East Coast news feeds, when her cell phone rang.
It was Lori Hines an old friend. They’d gone to Michigan together, and Lori had recently moved from Chicago to San Francisco for a high-profile job with KRON4.
“Cin, I’ve just heard that one of the snipers has issued a memo to the press,” she said. “Check your mail.”
With Lori on hold, Cindy scanned her mailbox and opened an email headed For Immediate Release.
Every word contained in its four paragraphs was a stunner.
She read it out loud to Lori, who said, “Get ready to break news, girlfriend. I’m in a satellite van less than ten minutes from the Chronicle’s front door.”
Cindy said, “I’ll call you right back.”
She read the email again.
It shook her as much on the second read and appeared to be every bit a blockbuster—raw, bloody, and ready to be splashed across TV screens everywhere. If it had been widely disseminated, the clock was ticking and the deadline was now.
She printed out the email and phoned Tyler to bring him into the loop, but at 7 a.m. her call went to voice mail.
What to do?
It was risky to go on the record with a story based on a totally blind lead, but it was done often enough. Unconfirmed at this time. Confidential sources say. And then there were the breathtaking Deep Throat leaks during Nixon’s last days.
Cindy thought over her options: take a moon shot, or go by a more cautious route. If she broke the news, she owned the scoop. If she waited…
She called Lori. “Give me ten minutes.”
Opening a new email file, Cindy wrote to Tyler, saying that a news bomb was about to drop, that she had judged the lead as authentic, and that she had moments to go live with the story before the competition broke it.
Cindy roughed out the story, and it was ready for edit in nothing flat. She gave it a headline, attached the unverified email, and, marking the package Urgent, fired it off to the publisher and editor in chief’s inbox.
Then she stuffed a copy of the email into her coat pocket, darted into a closing elevator, and rode it down to the street.
Lori was waiting for her on Mission, already set up for the interview.
The two friends and colleagues talked over the upside-downside ramifications while standing in the shadow of the Chronicle’s clock tower and agreed—the risk was worth taking. The business they were in, it was either go big or go home.
They took their seats in the tall director’s chairs facing the camera, their backs to the Chronicle Building, an umbrella shading their faces, the morning breeze messing with their hair.
The sound man tested the level. The cameraman counted off five seconds to go with his fingers, and then tape rolled. Lori introduced Cindy as the star reporter and head of the crime desk at the San Francisco Chronicle.
She said, “You have big news this morning, Cindy. A bombshell email that you’ve just posted on your crime blog, from someone claiming to have inside knowledge about the recent sniper attacks that have terrified people in five cities.”
“That’s exactly right, Lori. I received an email just minutes ago giving reasons for the sniper attacks and warning of future executions,” Cindy said. “I find the email credible. But viewers must understand that, like the Zodiac Killer’s letters to the Chronicle decades ago, the email is unsigned.
“I’ve weighed both sides of the argument carefully and have decided that it’s better to release this email than keep it quiet.”
“Cindy, is there a time stamp on that?”
“It landed in my inbox early this morning. The heading was ‘For Immediate Release.’”
“Can you read it for our viewers now?”
Cindy raised the sheet of paper from her lap and began to read the highlights.
“Quoting now: ‘This is a warning to all drug slingers, the pushers who sell grass, coke, meth, and Molly, the sickos who sell oxy, heroin, fentanyl, unprescribed pharmaceuticals, and designer drugs, or name your poison. Deaths from overdoses have risen to seventy thousand Americans per year, nearly half of those from opioids like fentanyl. It’s not okay. It’s not stopping. It’s getting worse.
‘A coalition of citizens across the country has had enough of ineffectual ad campaigns and political slogans. We’ve launched a new war on drugs. A real war. Nine scum dealers are dead so far and we’re just getting started. We have a list. If you’re part of the problem and value your life, stop selling drugs now, whatever it costs you. Destroy your product and get straight.
‘Or spin the wheel. You’ll never know when your number comes up.’”
Lori said, “Cindy, correct me if I’m wrong, but until right now we have not known the motive for the shootings that have taken place here and in Chicago, LA, and, as of yesterday, Houston and San Antonio. Is that right?”
Cindy said, “There have been theories that there was a drug connection, but to my knowledge, this email is the first public communication from someone asserting a connection with the shooter or shooters and that their mission is to rub out drugs.
“We have to take it seriously.”