Another part of the job

Another thing we occasionally do is process service. Most process service is done by Sheriff's deputies, civilian process servers working for the Sheriff's department, or full-time process servers working for or contracted by attorneys. None of them are investigators, though, and some people either evade service. That's when the client calls us. We charge more than any of those other people, but we do a lot more.

So I spent this morning watching a house for a woman who extorted a former boyfriend and shot up a store he owns. It's suspected she frequently goes armed. I never saw her, but we'll try again at a different time of day.

UPDATE: Got her. The client knew where she was hanging out, so we canvassed the area and found her hiding in her car in the dark on the street.

Crystal Meth Kid

Ronin dubbed this one the Crystal Meth Kid, 'cause that's what he uses and sells. And when I say "sells" I don't mean "hooks up his friends sometimes when they're getting low." He had a ton of it on him when we searched him. And probably plenty more in his car, but that's not our concern.

This guy's been a thorn in our side for almost two months. We spent a lot of surveillance time at his girlfriend's family's house waiting for her to show up, and she never did (while we were there). We talked to his family, her family, old friends, current friends, and got very little useful out of any of them. We canvassed hotels and liquor stores all over the area he was known to be, and that appeared about to bear fruit, when a liquor store owner on Colorado Boulevard told me he'd been seen outside "just hanging around" (waiting for his customers) several times in the past couple weeks. But a few days ago we also learned he'd told his family that he'd rather go out "suicide by cop" than go back to jail. So we let his girlfriend's family know that, and explained that that put her in danger just for being with him, and like magic, two days later an informant called and told us:

• where he was staying,
• who was with him (the girlfriend and two gangbangers),
• what he was driving, and
• what they were driving,

which intelligence we utilized immediately. There was another bounty hunter looking for him for a different bondsman, who met us there. We (Ronin, Fox, King, and I) were all tac'd out, so the other guy went into the hotel to see, if they'd used a real name, what room they were in. Before he got that information, our boy and his girlfriend walked out of the room and started to get into their car. We later learned that they were leaving that hotel for another one just to try to stay ahead of us. Too late!

After all his trash talk about "suicide by cop," he wasn't even armed. And his homies (if they were there), never came out.The rest is pretty standard stuff. Roll up, cuff 'im, stuff 'im, roll to IRC, wait, wait, wait....

This is the kind of file that really feels great to close. After so much work and so much time, it's a great relief to be done with it and not have to think about him any more. And one last thing that made it feel good: This was a different bondsman from our usual, and he paid, in cash, the agreed amount, before we even finished the surrender.

Some Vegas Pics

What Happens in Vegas... (goes on my blog)

It's been a busy few weeks. Fox and I went up to Vegas the night of March 17th and spent a couple days doing promo photos for Crusader Weaponry, Nightforce Optics, Viridian Green Laser, and Battle Comp. Then we headed to Front Sight for their Four Day Defensive Handgun course.

A good friend from Tennessee, Oleg Volk (a frickin' photographic genius), met us there and did all the photography, and attended the course with us. The pics came out great, as expected. Here's one of me:

Here's Fox:

And those rifles are Broadswords from Crusader Weaponry.

Oleg's been a friend of mine for a long time, but I'd never met him in person before, so that was cool. We also met two other people I'd only known online before, and a woman who's only been shooting for a few weeks who reminded us how cool it is when it's new. She was working all night and shooting all day, and loving it so much she never lost her sunny disposition. Yeah, you know who you are, 밝은 미소.

As for Front Sight, here's my review of it, copied and pasted from another site:

The course we took is called "Four-Day Defensive Handgun" and that's what it is. The emphasis is heavily on timed shots from a concealed holster. There's a lot packed into the course, and no breaks other than lunch.

The course is designed in such a way that beginning shooters and old hands can all get a lot of benefit out of it. Each technique is taught, then demonstrated, then practiced dry, then practiced live. Nothing tacticool here, just how to get the gun out and shoot it.

One of my favorite points about this school is what they don't do. As with any training, I have minor disagreements about a few small details of the things they teach. So where I have my own reasons for doing something a little different, I do it my way. At other training facilities I've been constantly "corrected" on this, to the point of harassment, and even belittled for having a different opinion. Here, they continued to correct me on things that actually mattered, but recognized the things I was doing my way on purpose and left me alone on those things.

The instructors were good-natured throughout, and never set themselves up to be anything more than competent instructors. This is another major contrast to other places, where every instructor is a super-duper-high-speed-low-drag-ninja-sniper-recon-blah-blah-frickin'-blah. Egos don't get in the way at Front Sight.

My nitpicks are few. For one, because they pack so much into the time, there's very little opportunity for more experienced shooters to help the less experienced (or less able for whatever reason). Not a big deal. There are a few others not even worth mentioning.

All in all, a very good course for any level of competence. (Just don't pay list price, which is $2000. There are plenty of people selling certificates.) I highly recommend it.

All in all, we had a great time and got some great training from it. I'll add a few more pics from the shoot.

Thanks, Mom!

Last week, the night after our hat trick, Third Echelon rolled again on three files. Jester and Sensei were working one file, Ronin, King and I another two.

It was really more of an informational type of night, as we didn't expect to actually arrest anyone, just put some information together and turn up a little heat in the right places. So we rolled around and kicked in doors and just generally sowed hate and discontent, and started building up the files. One guy we were looking for was "Magic," a gangbanger from the Florencia 13 gang. We hit his mom's apartment twice that night (and in between headed over to his other known hangout and cleared a condemned drug house), and got mostly the same old lies we get from everyone: "Oh, I haven't seen him, we don't talk to him much, don't know where he stays, blah blah blah." But we nonetheless put together enough info on enough files to call it a night. We headed home. I watched an episode of Justified on Hulu and then went to bed.

Forty-five minutes later, who calls me but Magic's own mother, to tell me he's sleeping downstairs in her truck, and can I please come to her apartment first so she can open the truck and I won't need to break a window. So I jump out of bed into my gear, and start making calls as I head out. No-one answers.

So, on my way south the main thought running through my head was that Hispanic gangs in L.A. very frequently are family affairs. One hardcase that skipped to Mexico was running with Lennox 13, and his Aunt owned the main gang hangout, and his father and little brother were slinging dope too. So all the way down to South Central I was wondering "What if she's just luring me in for him?"

But the opportunity was too good to let go, and I knew if I kept my SA up I'd be fine. I wanted this guy, but if something didn't look right I'd leave him for later.

Got to the apartment building and there was no way I was going up to that apartment by myself. I grabbed the building security guard (armed) for cover-man, and started searching the garage. In the second row was a Sierra with our boy in the back. No mistaking him with those neck tattoos. I got him out, cuffed him, and took him in. As we were leaving, his mom came down crying and told him "Será mejor así." (It will be better this way.) Being the wonderfully compassionate person that I am (don't laugh, it's rude), I never told him who called me. I even told the guard to tell his mom that he didn't know.

The rest is typical IRC stuff I've told before.

Hat Trick

We had a little training at the dojo last night, then rolled out at 2130. Attending were Ronin, Fox, King, Sensei, and myself, the always-lovable Redneck.

First we went to the bond-out address, and learned the bailee had moved a couple months before. But the current tenants knew he was living near a mortuary up the street, and in addition to the yellow Mustang we knew about, the family owned a red Mustang and a white Yukon.

So we located the mortuary and canvassed the area for the cars. It didn't take long to find a red one parked two cars behind a yellow one, and there in a driveway was the white Yukon. So we made entry there and got that guy. No sweat. Funny how his mother had "heart problems," like they all do.

Then we went for another. When we hit his house King and I were heading around the back when this massive pit bull rounded the corner and came running for us. King was quick with the bear spray, but it's a fog rather than a stream or foam, and there was no wind to clear it out, so when the dog ran and we continued towards the back we walked right into it. There we were, coughing and sneezing, eyes burning, trying to keep an eye on the back. His family told us the bar he was getting drunk at and we headed there and sho 'nuff, there he was.

Then we decided to try for a third. We hit his apartment and he'd moved. No surprise, but we had another address a mile and a half away. So we headed over there and it was a condemned drug house with bullet holes all over it. But in the back, at the granny flat, another pit bull, bigger than the first, on a heavy chain connected to a tiny little rope... Well, we were able to get close enough to the flat to see in other open windows and verify there was no-one there, so no need for the bear spray that time. Personally, I think it's just a matter of time before one of us has to shoot a dog due to lack of time to deploy pepper spray. An attacking pit bull can move pretty fast.

So we got those two to IRC and dealt with the usual shenanigans from the staff there. Not bad as these things go, just over two hours. But somehow, we just didn't have that warm fuzzy feeling! So, we decided to get another one.

We hit a drive-through for some sustenance and headed down to Koreatown for another one. This was, by far, the easiest arrest we ever made. The guy was leaving his apartment as we rolled up, so it was a simple matter to clip him up and haul him away. Being the nice guy that I am, I even took his backpack up to his apartment for him! (Real reason - they don't accept backpacks as property at IRC.) This guy claimed the name he gave the cops and the court was a fake name, and that that's why he didn't go back.

Final tally: Three arrests, 12 hours all told.

Names

Time to dispense with the names I've been using and go with what everyone will soon recognize. I'm Redneck. "The Boss" is Ronin. "Miss M" is Fox. "Master P" is Sensei. "Elvis" is King. And "Jester" is, well, Jester. Those are our call signs on the team, and that's how we'll be known on the upcoming show, and that's what I'm going to be using here.