Chapter 39: HUMAN TRAFFIC
BURLINGTON, MARCH 2, 2013
The brick monolith had been out of service
for decades. Various plans for the decommissioned coal plant came and went, most
recently the former mayor’s idea of transforming it into a city-owned recreation
and sailing center. But the future of the 90-foot high building on the
waterfront remained unclear. The overgrown site was surrounded by a chain link fence
to discourage vandalism and prevent injuries.
The new mayor, an energetic housing
developer, had convinced voters to finance a series of improvements for a
central section of the shoreline on Lake Champlain. However, he also announced
that the city would no longer try to re-purpose the hulky structure on its own.
Before it was shut down, mainly due to pollution, the Moran generating station
loomed over the shore for years providing 30-megawatts of power. In 1986, the same year it was shuttered,
voters backed a waterfront plan with new zoning, a public park and a bike path.
They also backed any legal actions that would be needed to extend public authority.
Tonio arrived inside the building, then
exited through a broken window and found a break in the fence. Except for a few
die-hard skateboarders who used a rundown park on the opposite side of the
building few people came to this part of the lakefront during the winter months.
But only blocks away, despite a lead-colored sky, thousands of people lined the
sidewalks along Main and the Church Street Marketplace to celebrate. Harry
would be nearby.
The
tradition, known as the Magic Hat Mardi Gras Parade, started after he left
school and had continued for almost two decades. The Vermont brewer had figured out how to win
local backing and bring thousands of people out in the cold. It was an annual winter
ritual with live performances, floats and good commercial cheer, as well as an
effective fundraiser.
The night before several bands
performed in the heart of town to heat up the mood and launch the festivities. Right
now they were cheering the new mayor, waving to the crowd in a gold lame
jacket, silver boots and a feathered hat as the floats rolled through town.
Tonio made his way across Waterfront
Park, passing a row of condos and Main Street Landing, the arts center where
he’d watched The Millennium a few
months ago. When he attended school at the top of the hill most of this area
was still undeveloped. But if Harry had come to town and was talking with Danny
at this moment he wouldn’t be doing it on the waterfront or along the parade
route. Most likely he would be in a spot where he felt at home.
Cutting across Battery Street he
walked up Pearl to South Winooski and checked the area that served as
unofficial gateway to the Old North End and meeting spot for the alternative
set. As he suspected, Harry was having coffee at the Radio Bean as he learned
the truth about the Jump Room and Tonio’s disappearance.
When
the call was over Tonio quickly entered the funky coffeehouse.
“Jeez,” Harry shouted, “He wasn’t
kidding.”
“No. ” He sat down on the opposite
side. “But things have gone even further south since you spoke with him.”
“In ten seconds? And where did you
come from?
“Next
Wednesday,” said Tonio, “and so far it’s a very bad day.” He rapidly retraced
recent events, as explained to him by Danny, including the fact that Angel had
gone to see Shelley and may have been drugged.
“Unwise,” Harry said, “given what we
know, which is also why I was looking for you.”
“Whatever it is, can we use it as a
bargaining chip?”
“Bargaining? I’m not so sure. He’s
your blood. But yes, there’s more than enough to nail him.” Tonio demanded
details. “Well, we began by digging into what we already knew and worked
backward. For example, we know Wolfe Enterprises builds projects around the
world, that it has a controlling stake in various casinos and is developing
Jefferson Spaceport. We also know they have E-Global and its satellites.
“Now,
the Feds could exercise what they call shutter control on the satellites with
anything they considered off limits or a national security matter. But we
haven’t seen any evidence of that, which suggests cooperation. What we know is that
Shelley’s buying up land, in the US and elsewhere. But it’s hard to see the
pattern; some of the parcels are in the middle of nowhere and have no apparent
development potential.”
There was more. Harry’s group also found
evidence suggesting that Wolfe ran a blackmail operation targeting high rollers
at the casinos and used Private Intelligence Associates (PIA), the security
company it had purchased, to conduct corporate espionage.
“I met two associates not long ago.”
Tonio meant the guys tied up in the warehouse.
“But the main thing,” Harry
continued, “is the link back to the old country. Your grandfather came over
from Croatia, right?” As Tonio recalled the family history, he had emigrated
sometime after the Second World War. “This is the key. It’s how Wolfe went from
being a construction front for prostitution and gambling to what it is today, a
transnational holding company. Do you know what’s happened in the homeland in
the last twenty years or so?”
Tonio had no idea. He usually didn’t
even keep up with the headlines, and when he visited Europe his destination was
normally a Mediterranean island or a beach on the Italian Riviera.
“After Yugoslavia collapsed,
Croatia’s president, Franjo Tudman, started selling off state enterprises in a
way that was, let’s just say, not legal. It was known over there as
‘Privatization Robbery.’ Basically, about 200 families got control over
everything, and yours was one of them. It was an ‘everything must go’ deal, and
it went at fire sale prices. Then the new owners sliced up the businesses and
sold off the pieces, which was lucrative for them. But as a result some
companies that were successful for years went bankrupt, and it also led to
massive unemployment. So, basically you could say the Don participated in a
post-Communist gang rape of his native land.”
Tonio wasn’t completely shocked. But
he was humbled and challenged by a growing realization that his education and
most of his life had been financed by human misery.
“We’ve also established his ties
with Ivo Sanader, the former prime minister, who was recently sentenced to ten
years for taking bribes. When Sanader was Deputy Foreign Minister – the fight
for Independence was winding down at the time – he received payments through an
Austrian bank. He called them fees. At least two foreign companies were
involved. One suspect was Hungary’s oil and gas company, MOL. They
categorically denied any involvement, which tends to suggest the opposite. The
other was a front for Wolfe Enterprises.
“The
judge called what Sanader did war profiteering. Until a few years ago this was
the most powerful man in the country. However, in 2009 he resigned suddenly and
designated his successor on the way out the door. But the new PM, Jadranka
Kosor, launched an anti-corruption campaign that eventually led back to him.”
“Why would Kosor turn on the man who
made him?”
“Kosor is a she, and we don’t know
that she really turned on him. But we know that the Croatian elite badly wants
into the European Union,” Harry explained, “and to do that they have to clean
up their act on corruption, or at least look like it. The HDZ, the ruling party,
is staking everything on EU entry. Unemployment is at least 20 percent, youth
unemployment is double that. The country’s per-capita
debt-to-GDP ratio is one of the highest in Europe.
“From what we
see, the EU agreement will mean disaster for the country’s remaining economic
independence. Also say goodbye to fishing and agriculture. Fiscal policy will
be decided by Euro-crats in Brussels. So will exploitation of oil and gas
reserves in the Adriatic. The country will basically become another Greece, a
dependent state. The US and EU have already provided a billion dollar bailout,
supposedly for anti-corruption reforms. It won’t be the last. But most of the
money has been misused or stolen.
“What the political class wants – and what Shelley wants – is
access to about four billion Euros that Brussels will provide after EU entry
this summer.
“There is an opposition, including a group called Croatia 21st Century with a female leader, Natasha Srdoc. She's one of the few politicians willing to take on corruption. She's pretty conservative on social issues -- she wants to make abortion illegal -- but wants to seize assets and prosecute any official who has amassed unexplained wealth while in office. This alone would smash organized crime in Croatia.
“However, the party’s supporters are
already being intimidated or framed. One candidate, an anti-corruption author,
documented the crimes of the Interior Minister, a thug who uses the cops as
henchmen. Result – the writer ends up in jail, a political prisoner.”
Tonio
interrupted. “Danny mentioned something about the Balkan Route.”
Harry hesitated and then warned, “This
is rough stuff. Of course, it’s been a smuggling route for a long time –
weapons, immigrants, heroin from Afghanistan. Originally, most of it went
through Pakistan and Iran, now it mostly uses Balkan states. Cigarettes, oil,
anything you don’t want seen or taxed. Almost 90 percent of the heroin in
Europe gets in that way.”
The smuggling route helped organize
crime get a foothold in the country, Harry explained. After Yugoslavia’s
collapse, social confusion made the whole region an easy mark. As the country
moved toward democracy ties between the elite and the underworld flourished.
Officials in the old regime saw a path to convert their waning political power
into economic gain. Black market smuggling was already common, even
encouraged. The traditional economy had
never matched consumer demands. But corrupt officials and security forces
helped the black market run like a well-oiled machine. Once communism was gone
and privatization began, ex-cops and other officials with connections in the
underground were positioned to take smuggling to the next level.
“The
Serbs claim that Croatian ports have become a primary conduit for cocaine
entering the region,” he said. “It’s also believed to be the source of about a
billion annually in illegal exports, everything from cars and trucks to ships,
medicines, sugar and electronics. But the worst is transporting humans.”
Tonio
stopped him. “You’re talking about human trafficking, basically slavery?”
“I’m
afraid so, and Shelley has a hand in that too. It’s largely Bosnian woman who
are brought in to service the tourist trade. The offer is usually a legitimate
job, but then they take away the documents and force them into sex slavery.
During the last decade underage Croatian girls have become part of the mix.”
It
was even worse than he suspected. After months tracking down just one serial
killer of women, he had been informed that his father was responsible for
crimes as heinous and created even greater misery. What Harry described sounded
like the “Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon,” William Stead’s expose on child
prostitution in 1880s London. Little had changed.
“I
need air,” he said, standing up.
Harry
followed him outside to the sidewalk. “Let’s walk and talk. I also want to know
what you’ve been doing. And we definitely need a plan.”
“Yeah,
the first thing is to call Angel and stop her from going to Shelley.”
“Sure,
she’ll listen to me.”
“Try
anyway. Next, get out of sight and assemble everything you have. If Truthsquad
wants to shake things up this ought to do it.”
Harry
stopped. “Wait. You want me to expose your family?”
“I
do. And you have to do it within two weeks, before the demo for Shelley. We
need to turn up the heat, startle the snake, force a reaction, get him to deny
some charges and then hit him with more. We need to escalate and isolate him,
and expose him for the lying scum and hypocrite he is.”
“Harsh,”
said Harry, “but doable.”
“Then
do it with my blessings. Afterward, we meet with him and show him that, as bad
as things are, they could get worse. We re-run his past. The only thing I’m not
sure about is which parts of this new information we should actually use.
What’s your call?”
“As
much as security allows,” replied Harry, “our security I mean. People first I
always say. We’re people too.”
They were on the top block of the
Marketplace, ducking between revelers in beaded necklaces, when Tonio noticed
two men on the corner who looked out of place. Wearing identical parkas and
matching sunglasses they were eyeballing the crowd while the taller of the two
conferred with someone on a smart phone. The shorter one occasionally glanced
down to check an image on his own device.
“I think they’re here,” he said.
“More associates.” He nodded across the street.
Harry
noticed and cursed, “Frigging satellites.”
“I’ll
draw them off. You get out of here. Now!”
Harry
stepped away and turned. “It’s on,” he yelled, drifting into the crowd. “A week
or less.”
The short guy spotted Tonio and they
moved to flanking positions. The order was clearly to wait for back up. Tonio
walked casually down the center of the street, not acknowledging them until he
reached the entrance to the underground mall that extended toward the lake. He
froze in the pedestrian flow, waiting for a moment when the doors were wide
open, then bolted inside and down the escalator, executing a quick U-turn to
hide beneath.
Seconds later the two men followed
him down the escalator, scattering people as they headed into the underground
structure. As soon as they rounded the first corner Tonio emerged, ran back up
and outside. He turned the first corner and headed west toward the lake.
Someone might be watching from above, but he had trump.
“If you’re up there, I’m on my way,”
he shouted to Danny, tracking his movements from four days ahead. At Battery
Street he crossed against the light and jogged toward the nearest connection
with Waterfront Park. The two who spotted him earlier were on the opposite side
after ending up inside the Hilton. Two more pairs were stationed at Main and
Pearl Streets with the intention of boxing him in. His only option was straight
ahead, down a steep embankment that emptied into a parking lot. He made it
halfway before tripping and tumbling to the bottom.
Ruffled
but uninjured, he shot across the lot and leapt a fence. From there it was a
long stretch of open land to another, higher fence around Moran. He could see
them coming, just reaching the first fence, and behind them two police cars
screeching along Lake Street, drawn by the complaints about men causing a
disturbance around the mall.
All
he needed was to get there. He ran faster, smashing into the fence, bounced off
and kept going. The break was on the other side. They were still coming. One
fired a warning shot, meant to get his attention. He ran until he was around
the corner and saw the opening. Ducking inside, he made for the building, found
the window, and crawled inside onto a catwalk.
Streams
of pale light illuminated the dank interior. Below him were several floors
submerged in murky water. He pulled out the pocket watch and checked. It had been
less than an hour, as agreed, and he was back in the right spot.
“Hey,”
he shouted. “You guys are ex-military, right? What’s it like? One day you’re
defending your country. The next, you’re mob muscle. Can you hear me now?” The
reply was several gunshots.
“Cold,”
he said, moving along the catwalk, sticking to the darkest spots.
By
now, he assumed, the cops outside had called for backup. These guys weren’t
going anywhere and their actions would be hard to explain. It was time to get
back to New Jersey and put things in motion.
He held his breath and pressed recall. This
time it worked.
