End of watch is a term used to describe the end of an officer’s shift. It’s a time fraught with anxiety for families and loved ones, for they never know when a cop goes out the door whether he or she will return home whole and healthy, with his or her arm in a sling, or not at all.
Billie and I were the lucky ones. We spent the hours before our end of watch filling out reports and being interviewed downtown by the suits from Internal Affairs and then Press Relations, who split us up and went over our statements about Chip LeDoux’s confession and the exchange of gunfire between him, Perris, and me with a fine-tooth comb. And even then, there was a lingering sadness among our colleagues and a hint of something more troubling, as if they considered Billie and me more than just the messengers bearing exceedingly bad tidings.
The officer-needs-help call that Perris and Aubrey made en route to my house went out over the regular police frequency and brought cops from Wilshire Division, where my house was located, as well as South Bureau. It also sent Darren Wright, Chip LeDoux’s partner in crime, into hiding. Wright had last been seen at Brett Stewart’s house, peeking into the windows and telling the neighbors that Mr. Stewart called reporting trouble at the address. When he found out Stewart had left the country to meet his wife, the neighbors said Wright left in a hurry, cursing at the top of his lungs.
The detectives from Internal Affairs assumed Wright had heard the call on his way back to the station house because he never went back there, not even to try and pick up his car. He just drove the black-and-white to his slip in the Marina and took off. It would be a week before his boat was found by the Coast Guard off the coast of Catalina Island, Wright inside, the back of his head blown away, a nine-millimeter sandwich his last meal.
They tell me Wright’s casket was closed. Like his partner LeDoux, Darren Wright was buried quietly, without police honors, only a few family members and friends from the Southwest Division in attendance. Those were two funerals I was glad to miss.
Never judge a book by its cover. My grandmother’s saying should have been stenciled on those two cops’ headstones. It was fast becoming my personal mantra. It even applied to Sandra Douglass, the man-chasing, hard-as-nails attorney Perris had called from in front of my house. She was at my house fifteen minutes behind the black-and-whites to advise both Perris and Mrs. Franklin.
According to Perris, after they went downtown and she finished telling everyone from the Internal Affairs detectives on up of her plans to have Earnestine Moore call a press conference to expose the LAPD’s role in the proliferation of drugs in the black community, they were more than pleased to have her input on a press release that would keep her clients’ names out of the papers.
The first article that ran in the Times Metro section on Tuesday was short and sweet: “BIZARRE COP SHOOTOUT HAS AUTHORITIES BAFFLED.” The story, which bore Neil Hookstratten’s byline, was as close as anyone would get to the real truth of the matter for some time to come:
A twenty-seven-year LAPD veteran was killed Sunday as he held two LAPD female homicide detectives at gunpoint. Rudy “Chip” LeDoux, 49, had taken Detectives Billie Truesdale of South Bureau and Charlotte Justice of the Robbery-Homicide Division hostage in front of the latter’s home in Los Angeles, and was brandishing his weapon at the officers when he was shot by Detective Justice.
An LAPD spokesperson said Monday that LeDoux, who was stationed out of the Southwest Division, “had been under tremendous personal and professional strain over the past few months” and was distraught over the disappearance of his partner, Darren Wright. . . .
Wright’s suicide was also duly noted in a follow-up story that made the whole affair, to coin one of my father Matt’s phrases, as clear as mud.
While he dutifully reported what he was told at the press conferences, Hookstratten knew something was missing and had been dogging my heels for the real deal, even getting my unlisted number from some civilian snitch in the LAPD’s Human Resources Department.
“Come on, Charlotte, you know the line the Department is putting down is as phony as a three-dollar bill.”
“I got no comment, Hook.”
“There’s a rumor going around Parker Center that you were sleeping with both LeDoux and Wright, that the whole thing was some kind of romance gone sour.”
“Who told you that lie?”
“You know I can’t reveal a source, Detective.” There was an overly long silence on Hook’s end of the line. “We can help each other out, Charlotte,” he finally said. “If there’s something amiss in the Department, let me be the one to break the story. I will find out what’s going on, with or without your help. But if you help me, maybe I can help you. You never know when having a reporter from the Times on your side can come in handy.”
Hookstratten was only the first of a slew of calls, so many I eventually had to change my home phone number. Billie and I, Perris and Mrs. Franklin, even my parents were being dogged by reporters from the Times, the LA Weekly, and the tabloids, all hoping for an exclusive interview to follow up their lead stories: “JUSTICE SERVED BY FEMALE DETECTIVE IN COP KIDNAPPING,” and the one that had everybody buzzing, even in the midst of the rebuilding efforts, “FUGITIVE REVOLUTIONARY’S DEATH SPARKS LAPD INQUIRY.”
Once the press got hold of the story, things got real crazy. Raziya Bell retained Sandra Douglass, who stormed into a joint meeting with Tony Dreyfuss and Captain MIA with a list of quid pro quos a mile long for the information her client would give. But just when it looked like her lengthy negotiations with the Department were going to ruin our chances of learning the whole truth about Lewis’s life underground, I got a call from the Vegas prostheticist with a lead on our fugitive.
The man for whom the prosthetist fabricated the arm was listed as Rodney Langston in his records—the “friend” to whom Raziya and Mrs. Sparks had sent the money for Cinque’s surgery and new ID. Seems Rodney/Cinque had the surgery in Vegas, then left for a small Alabama resort town called Perdido Beach, about fifty miles downstream from Mrs. Spark’s hometown. There he’d built a new life for himself, complete with a wife and kids and a business manufacturing pickled okra and other condiments. According to the Perdido Beach Chamber of Commerce and the local sheriff, “Rodney Langston” had been a model citizen and a leader in the community.
Never judge a book by its cover. Whether for purposes of revenge or something else, Lewis had been in that warehouse with Big Dog Givens, and the LAPD and the Feds from the Drug Enforcement Administration wanted to know why. So Mike Cooperj and a DEA agent were planning a trip to Perdido Beach to get some background on Mr. Langston and his business ventures.
Lieutenant Stobaugh let me know I was welcome to tag along if I wanted to. “God knows, you’ve earned the right on this one,” he said.
Even Steve had to agree with that.
It was tempting but ultimately an invitation I declined. Cinque Lewis was dead, which was all I needed to know. It was time for me to get on with my life, to shed the blues I’d been living for a much happier color.
I decided to start with a vacation. I didn’t think I’d be missed. Captain MIA and Lieutenant Stobaugh were happy, at least on the surface. I had closed out five murders, so everybody’s statistics were looking good. But in the process the LAPD had another scandal to deal with, which only fanned the flames of the Department’s critics and made the incoming chief seem like more of a savior than he really was.
My sudden fame hadn’t won me any new friends in the Department, either. Sure, some of my colleagues would sidle up to me in the parking structure or the women’s room to say what a great job I’d done. But then these same people would avoid me when I walked through the offices or down a hallway. The whole thing made me a little sad. Sad, but not surprised.
But after a month of cold shoulders, I was getting so uncomfortable that I was considering leaving the Department for the first time in my career. I was sitting at my desk one Wednesday, completing yet another report on the Lewis case and feeling the chill in the air all around me, when I got a phone call from Uncle Henry.
“The Christopher Commission laid the groundwork in identifying the bad apples, and your work in exposing LeDoux and Wright is another important step,” he reminded me. “We got a new broom that a lot of people are hoping will sweep clean. So hang in there, Goddaughter. I’m not in a position to promise you anything, but you could be an important part of the new chief’s team.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence, Uncle Henry. I’m grateful.” But not convinced it was reason enough to stay in the Department. “Just give me some time to sort things out, see how I feel, okay?”
The following Saturday night, Aubrey and I went to a barbecue at the Nut House. My whole family was there, including Grandmama Cile and my sister Rhodesia, who were wearing identical T-shirts that proclaimed, “I’M TIRED. I’VE BEEN BLACK ALL DAY!” and talking about making a documentary on the rebuilding efforts.
Grandmama Cile presented a T-shirt to me and reached up to give me a big, Charlotte, Arkansas–style hug. “My grandbaby is out there kickin’ ass and takin’ names!” she crowed.
“Really, Mother Justice!” Joymarie scolded. “What your grandmother means is that we’re all so very proud of you.”
My grandmother harumphed by my side. “Said it the way I wanted to the first time.”
My Uncle Henry was there, chewing on his stogie, playing bid whist by the pool with my father Matt, Uncle Reggie, and girlfriend Katrina.
“Aubrey Scott!” my father Matt shouted. “Boy, git on over here!”
“Mr. Justice.” Aubrey hugged and slapped my father on the back for a long time. Katrina eyed him appreciatively and mouthed a silent “Go on, girl!” in my direction.
Aubrey sat down with my grandmother to play a hand. Louise and the twins were splashing in the shallow end of the pool, while Perris sat in one of the chaise lounges, drinking what looked suspiciously like a glass of champagne.
It was. I knew the LeDoux shooting had taken its toll on my brother, but he had been talking about it more than I’d ever seen him talk about anything in his life, and we had gotten much closer in the process. I thought things were moving forward, not backward.
“This is just to celebrate my little sister’s triumph,” he reassured me when I questioned him about his drinking. “Besides, I had a problem with hard liquor, not champagne.”
Louise heard him from the pool, her mouth set edgewise. My mother hovered, eyes wide with concern, and put more potato chips into an already-full bowl at his elbow.
“Just as long as you don’t start backsliding,” I warned.
“Don’t you worry about me,” he said. “You’ve got a vacation to think about. And while you’re gone, Mother and I thought we could start getting that old room packed up for you, if you’d like.”
“Thanks, but I’ll do it when I get back,” I smiled, took the glass out of his hand, and handed it to Joymarie. “I think it’s time.”
Perris took Aubrey and me to the airport on Sunday morning. On the way, I asked my brother to make a couple of stops. A few minutes later, I found myself not more than a hundred steps from the Eternal Peace Chapel, two mixed bouquets clutched in my sweating hand. I had never been able to bring myself to visit the gravesites after Keith and Erica’s funerals, so I was surprised to see how well maintained the graves were. A man on one of those John Deere lawnmowers passed between the flat markers, mowing the grass to a bristly green stubble that tickled my kneecaps through my linen pants as I knelt and made my nose itch.
The granite markers looked good, their blue-gray color still as peaceful and strong as the day I picked them out. “Keith Eric Roberts, August 19, 1943–May 10, 1978” and “Erica Justice Roberts, November 10, 1977–May 10, 1978,” I read, the stone beneath my tracing fingers cool and smooth to the touch.
I placed the flowers in a nearby holder, opened the bag I brought with me and pulled out a copy of the Metro article from the Times about Cinque Lewis’s death. I placed it on the grass and placed Keith’s broken eyeglasses on top. I pulled out the sweater next, and thought I could smell just the faintest trace of Keith’s cologne. The sweater would probably be picked up by one of the groundskeepers before the day was over, which would be okay.
I opened the gift that Katrina had given me for Erica the day she was killed. A pair of crocheted baby booties, the pink yarn still stiff and new-smelling. My heart caught in my chest, and I was overcome with the urge to stuff them into my pocket, but I ended up placing them on the pile, too.
I pulled out the old piece of paper from my wallet with the Twenty-eighth Psalm written on it in my grandmother’s perfect handwriting. Instead of reading the whole thing, I let the words flow through my heart, then murmured the last lines aloud—Save thy people, and bless thine inheritance: feed them also, and lift them up for ever—knowing they were a benediction for me and my family, living and gone, as well as for Raziya and Peyton, Billie and Turquoise, for the city I loved and the Department I had served for most of my adult life. I refolded the prayer and placed it in the pocket of Keith’s sweater. I hoped whoever got the sweater could use the blessing, too.
Aubrey was standing at the road, the car door open. When I walked up to him, he gave me a big, full-bodied hug, a hug that said no matter what, I had a friend, one who would stand by me.
“Are you ready to go?” he whispered and graced me with a gentle, understanding smile.
I looked back at the graves, felt a warm spring-turning-to-summer breeze on my cheek, smelled the grass-scented promise in the air.
Nodded, took his hand, and said, “I think it’s time.”