Chapter 19: Crisis at Palin Correctional (Part 1)
[Author's Note: Sorry for the weirdness concerning the upload with my previous chapter. Thanks to that particular reader who gave me the heads up about the discrepancy. You know who you are! I have to upload my documents as a whole from now on, but so be it. Just so long as you guys can read the story!]
Palin Correctional Center
The Loop
45 Minutes Later
Now dressed in his black CPD identification vest, Harrison entered the front door of the new state-of-the-art Palin Correctional Center in The Loop. The facility was built a few years earlier with the purpose of taking the pressure off of the Cook County Jail, thus making housing and inmate capacity at the latter facility more available. The Palin Correctional Center had been freshly outfitted with all the perks afforded by Blume's newest advances in security technology, including networked locks and automated surveillance.
Harrison showed his badge and checked his weapon with the intake officer, after which point, he waved to Detective Tran, who was already seated in the facility's main lobby waiting for him. Like her partner, Tran was also clad in her black CPD identification vest.
"Hey Sunny", Harrison greeted, "Sorry I'm late. I got tied up talking with Lieutenant Broussard at Narcotics. What brings us here?"
"Monty Jones called the squad room looking for you and I was the one to answer the call", Tran explained, "he said he had heard from what he called a 'confidant' of his that there was someone who had information about the stadium murders. I tried to call Abby and loop her in, but her phone went straight to voicemail."
"She and Ernie are on an undercover case", Harrison replied as he sat down in the chair beside her, "They'll both be unavailable for a while. That's part of the reason I was meeting with the lieutenant earlier. Who's this guy we're here to see?"
"Raul Lionzo", Tran said, "he's a thirty-five-year-old Hispanic male and a known associate of both Maurice Vega and the Black Viceroys. According to his intake file, he's about five-eight, bald, has some very obvious tattoos on his face."
"What's he in for?" Harrison asked.
"The Thirty-First District detectives busted him for heroin possession two weeks ago", Tran replied, "He's fourteen days into a sixty-day sentence. The warden should be here shortly to escort us to the visitation area."
A few minutes later, Warden Peter Malich came into the lobby. Warden Malich was a lofty white man in his mid-fifties with a very noticeable combover in his salt and pepper hair, dressed in a very dapper three-piece taupe suit with a brown tie. He was accompanied by his younger brother, Correctional Officer Martin Malich. Martin Malich was a shorter man in his early forties who was dressed in a very basic-looking brown and gray CO uniform.
"Detectives Tran and Harrison, I presume?" Warden Malich inquired to the two detectives.
Both Harrison and Tran promptly stood up from their respective seats. "Yes sir", Tran replied as she gestured to her partner, "I'm Tran, he's Harrison."
The warden extended a hand to each of them. "I'm Peter Malich", he said, "I'm the Warden here at Palin Correctional Center." He motioned to his brother. "This is my brother, Martin", he continued, "He's one of our officers assigned to Inmate Lionzo's housing unit. I understand you wish to speak to Mister Lionzo regarding one of your investigations."
Sensing something could possibly be off with both Malichs' demeanor and intentions, Harrison tried to play things off as professionally and respectfully as he could. "That's correct, Warden", he said, "Unfortunately, we can't really divulge any specifics to you gentlemen. The investigation we're working on is of a very delicate nature. I'm sure you understand."
The respective senses of both Malich brothers were apparently just as sharp, as the warden started to detect Harrison's evasiveness, but he chose to pick his battles accordingly. "Fair enough", Warden Malich said after an uncomfortable beat before turning to his brother, "Martin, please get ahold of the unit supervisor and have Inmate Lionzo taken to the Contact Visitation Area."
Martin Malich momentarily stepped aside to act on his brother's instructions, keying his radio. Tran and Harrison watched as Martin quietly conversed with someone on the radio. All the while, a very unpleasant and palpably awkward tension lingered in the air between the two detectives and the seemingly shady warden.
Martin returned to the trio roughly two minutes later, at which point he addressed his brother first. "I'm sorry, Peter", he said with a regretful tone, "There's a problem. Lionzo is in transit to Solitary. He apparently picked a fight with some officers in the exercise yard a few minutes ago."
A loud siren alarm soon sounded throughout every speaker in the facility. "Attention please!" An excitedly nervous male voice said over the intercom, "Attention please! We have a Code Seventeen, basement laundry! Repeat, we have a Code Seventeen, basement laundry! All available hands, please respond immediately!"
"Code Seventeen", Warden Malich said with an equally fraught tone in his voice, "That code indicates a combative prisoner."
Harrison and Tran traded looks for a moment. "Okay", Harrison said, "We'll go help your officers. You guys should stay up here and hold things down as best as you can."
After Tran retrieved their guns from the intake officer, she and Harrison quickly headed down to the facility's basement-level laundry room via a back stairwell. As they did so, Harrison keyed his radio.
"Thirty-Four-Henry-Edward to Squad", he said into the radio, "Be advised, Thirty-Four-Henry-Bravo and myself are assisting CO's at Palin Correctional. Hold us down on a Code-Five-Eddie at that location, please. Will update further, over."
"Ten-Four, Thirty-Four-Henry-Edward", a female dispatcher replied through the radio, "All units in the vicinity of Palin Correctional Center, be advised, District Thirty-Four detectives are assisting correctional officers on a Code-Five-Edward at that location. Further information will be forthcoming."
They soon reached the full-sized yet still cramped laundry room. The heat emanating from the room's numerous steam pipes made the room seem three times as hotter as it probably would've been without them. As such, Harrison and Tran crouched down and removed their CPD identification vests, placing them in a corner by the open entrance door.
It appeared to the two detectives that four correctional officers were already present in the laundry room, having apparently already been there since before the "Code Seventeen" call was even put out. Harrison's gaze found its way to the corner of the room, where Raul Lionzo was pinned down. Two correctional officers were taking turns violently kicking him in the stomach.
"What are a couple of bottom feeders doing at the stadium?" one officer gruffly asked, "doing a deal without cutting us in? Think we don't have friends in high places? They expect a cut too!"
"No!" A weakened and desperate Raul said between coughs and grunts of pain, "I told you already. It wasn't a deal. We got called, man. Someone tricked a cut, too!"
"Fuck that, 'tricked'!" The bad-tempered officer said, "Stop lying. We've warned you before. Think we won't leave you for dead too?"
"I can't take no more", an increasingly distressed Raul replied, "I'm telling you what I know. I swear, please, man! I swear!"
"And your buddy?" The bad-tempered officer barked, "What happened to him? Where's he now?"
"Maurice?" a confused Raul asked, "I don't fucking know. They've got him. They must've killed him…"
Just as Harrison and Tran reached the point where they couldn't stand to watch anymore, the double doors of the laundry room's side entrance suddenly came open. Both Harrison and Tran were stunned to see Aiden Pearce enter the room. For some reason, he was wearing an inmate's orange scrub suit and holding a shotgun.
The room almost instantly erupted in gunfire from both Aiden and the apparently corrupt group of correctional officers. Harrison and Tran took the opportunity to come out of their crouched positions, apprehensively training their guns on the officers.
"Chicago PD!" Harrison shouted, "Hold your fire!"
No sooner did Harrison say that did a blast of shotgun fire hit his and Tran's position. Having no other choice, Harrison promptly gunned down the shotgun-toting officer with four shots to the chest and abdomen. The officer fell backwards onto the room's concrete floor, dead.
The detective found himself panting like a dog in the scorching summer heat as the adrenaline stirred within him. He lowered his gun and looked over his shoulder to his partner as the gun battle between Pearce and the other officers resumed. Tran was slumped against the wall, holding her right side, groaning in pain.
"Oh God!" Harrison said as he holstered his gun and dashed to his partner, "Sunny! You're hit!"
