While she waited, she stared straight ahead, preparing to do battle with the kind of evil she’d faced down once before with Stahl.They thought they could intimidate her.After Stahl wrapped her in razor wire and threatened to set her on fire, it took a lot more to scare her than it used to.Although the use of the crosshairs on Nick’s forehead had been highly effective in scaring the living shit out of her.But she wouldn’t ever let them see that.
“Vernon?”
“One more minute, ma’am.”
“Are you sure you want to go out there alone, Sam?”the chief asked.
“I’m one hundred percent sure.”
She vibrated with tension as she waited for the go-ahead from Vernon.His two minutes were long up by the time he said they were ready for her.
Sam pushed through the double doors and was briefly taken aback by the massive gathering of media—one of the largest she’d ever seen.
As usual, they shouted questions at her from the second they saw her come through the doors.
“Have you seen the video?”
“Are you going to resign?”
“Are you endangering your coworkers?”
“Have you spoken to the president?”
“Why do your coworkers hate you?”
Sam waited until they got them all out before she began to speak.“Earlier today, in a meeting with my team, we began to zero in on the two officers who released the video as being potentially responsible for the recent murders of four innocent people and for the attack on a beautiful young woman who’d begun to date one of my colleagues.We were looking at them for the thwarted drone attack on the Easter Egg Roll at the White House, as well as the shooting of Secret Service Agent McFarland in Adams Morgan this week.
“Before the video was published, questions were raised about how all those seemingly random things could be tied to two disgruntled officers.I reflected on my career within the MPD and how, from the start, I’ve encountered two different types of men on the job.The first kind, which includes the men on my team and many others I interact with on a daily basis, are supportive of their female colleagues.They don’t treat us as less qualified to be there or as if we’re taking a spot on the force that should’ve gone to a more qualified man.”
As she spoke, she heard the door behind her open and glanced back to see Jeannie McBride and Lindsey McNamara come out to stand behind her.
The gesture filled her heart to overflowing with love for her friends.
“The other kind of man is the one who’s threatened by our very presence in this building, mostly because they know they’ll never be as good at the job as we are.They’ll never achieve the level of success we’ve known or the rank I and others have earned.They’ll blame my success on the fact that my last name is the same as the department’s former deputy chief.They’ll claim that every win I’ve ever had on the job is because I’m related to him, because the chief was my father’s best friend.They’ll go so far as to infer that I slept with the chief, a man who was a treasured uncle to me growing up, to achieve my rank.As if that’s all it takes to hunt down murderers, to get justice for victims and to protect the people who live here and those who visit each year.”
The door behind her opened again, and she glanced back to see Erica Lucas, Neveah Charles, Gigi Dominguez and Dani Carlucci come out.
Their show of support threatened to derail her as a huge lump formed in her throat that she cleared away so she could continue.
“Ramsey has been frustrated by his failure to be promoted beyond the rank of sergeant, which happened because he cut corners on the job.He did the bare minimum.He came at me because for every win I achieved, he seemed to notch another loss.He blamed me and others for the death of his son, who’d assaulted and brutalized numerous women and had taken another hostage in Rock Creek Park.When a department sniper took out Shane Ramsey and saved the life of his hostage, somehow his father determined that it was my fault his murdering, raping son had been killed.I understand needing someone to blame when you’ve raised a monster, but Shane Ramsey’s sins were his and his alone.
“Ramsey told me I’d gotten what I deserved when Stahl wrapped me in razor wire and threatened to set me on fire.We got into an altercation, and he fell backward down a flight of stairs, suffering several injuries.He was outraged when the now-late U.S.Attorney Tom Forrester took the case to a grand jury, which declined to prosecute me for assault.He chalked that up to another favor being done for me because of my pedigree or my higher-than-average profile or my husband or whatever else he came up with, looking for someone to blame.He went on to threaten me numerous other times, witnessed by others, and to ransack my office.He ramped up his attacks, crashing his car into my Secret Service vehicle and interrupting Tom Forrester’s funeral with his vitriol.He was out on bail, awaiting trial on numerous charges, when he apparently partnered up with Dylan Offenbach—ironically the same sharpshooter who killed Ramsey’s son—to embark on a retribution tour.
“Offenbach is another case study in misogyny gone wild.A talented sharpshooting sergeant on his way to a big career in the department, he checked out of work last year to attend a law enforcement conference in Philadelphia at the same time that a series of sniper shootings terrified District residents and visitors.As we worked our way through the list of people qualified to perpetrate these heinous crimes, we looked inside our own house at the team of officers who’d been trained to shoot with devastating accuracy.That’s when we discovered Offenbach was not at a conference as his boss believed.He was having a rendezvous with his mistress in Atlantic City as his wife was about to give birth to their sixth child.He was busted down to Patrol officer.His wife filed for divorce as well as full custody of their children.Offenbach was outraged that we’d investigate a fellow officer and promised to make me pay for the consequences of his actions.Another man looking for someone to blame.
“At this juncture, I want to note that despite these high-profile cases and the ones involving Stahl, Conklin and Hernandez, ninety-nine percent of the people who work in this building are dedicated public servants who have the best interests of this city and its citizens at heart when they come to work every day.They put their lives on the line by wearing the uniform and the badge, and they do so willingly in service to the public.They should not be lumped in with this band of losers who screwed up their own lives and careers and then went looking for people to blame.
“My heart is broken over the innocent loss of life associated with their reign of terror and for the woman who was kidnapped and brutally assaulted, simply because her friend aided in the investigation that determined Offenbach wasn’t where he was supposed to be.These men are depraved criminals and should be treated as such.The FBI, the Secret Service and other federal organizations are leading the investigation.They’ll find these pathetic cowards and ensure they spend the rest of their miserable lives in prison.”
After a beat to catch her breath, she said, “I’ll take a few questions.”
“Lieutenant, you’re saying that four people were murdered by these men as part of their revenge against you?”
“We suspect they conducted a series of seemingly random murders knowing I’d do exactly what I did the second I returned to work from my family’s Easter break.I went to each victim’s home, I met with their families, I investigated the places where the murders took place and dug into their lives, looking for commonalities that didn’t exist because these victims were chosen randomly.They were murdered because they were walking at night in poorly lit places where our cameras wouldn’t catch the perpetrators red-handed.
“We have a witness to the second homicide who was able to identify the vehicle that was used in the crime, the same make and model as the vehicle owned by someone in Ramsey’s family.They even capitalized on a terrible mistake I made two years ago when I let my emotions get the best of me while interrogating a suspect after my partner was shot.I don’t deny that I stepped out of line with Hector Reese.I vehemently deny that the incident was in any way racially motivated.I desperately wanted information from Reese, and that was the only motivation for my behavior that night.
“As for the drones sent to the White House...Federal law enforcement has been stymied by the lack of elements that could be traced to a manufacturer or source.”
