Aztec Treasure

Chairman Colletta Nygaard’s POV

Naval Station Guantanamo Bay, Cuba

The one thing we couldn’t do with our prisoner, former CIA Station Chief Henry Consuellar, was to bring him into the United States and turn him over to the FBI. Luna only knew how deep this thing went and how soon it might cause trouble for the Pack.

General Curtis and the Attorney General put together a small group of people they had absolute trust in and put them to work. The Attorney General put four US Attorneys and trusted staff members in the group. Knowing the FBI, DEA, CIA, and Customs were all potentially compromised, the investigators came from Homeland Security’s Office of the Inspector General, Secret Service, US Marshal Service, Internal Revenue Service, and the Department of Defense Criminal Investigation Service.

Frank and I were waiting at Gitmo when the plane arrived from Mexico City. “Peter Graves” and his team, all werewolves from the Donner Pack, were all smiles as they marched the prisoner over to us. Henry Consuellar couldn’t figure out what was going on, but he knew enough to know that Gitmo wasn’t a good place to end up.

The Homeland Security agents that flew down with us arrested Henry. When he realized that no one had Mirandized him until now, his face turned white as a sheet. “What is going on here?”

Frank had a big smile on his face. “Some private citizens just handed you over to actual Federal Agents, Henry. You should be more careful who you talk to.”

“You can’t do this! I have a deal!”

Peter held up the piece of paper. “I printed this off the Internet this morning. I’m sure the Feds will appreciate your confession, plus the people you implicated.” He handed over a voice recorder to the agents to Frank, who put it in his pocket.

Frank let that settle for a few seconds. “We did place your family in protective custody because you are now the Sinaloa Cartel’s number one target. Take him away.” He was struggling against the agents as they walked him towards the prison. General Graves wanted to keep him there for a few days until they completed the sweep of the conspirators.

Frank and I headed for our plane, which was already warming up. One of the agents would transcribe the confession as we flew to Washington to hand it over to the team. Meanwhile, the Donner Pack warriors would continue to Denver, where a Pack driver would bring them home. It was one more layer of deception to keep suspicion away from the Packs.

I could feel Frank’s anger rising through the bond as we listened to the confession on the way home. The sad part was that Henry had zero remorse. In his mind, they were all patriots, doing anything necessary to protect America from threats. Politicians and beancounters controlled the classified budgets. The CIA didn’t have time to go begging “idiots and politicians, which is redundant” for required money that never came without strings. Daniel French, the late Deputy Director-Covert Operations, set up the Cartel money laundering in exchange for a cut of the profits. It gave them a slush fund with no oversight.

The account allowed the conspirators another means to supplement their inadequate government pay. When cooperation was needed, they would find like-minded people and bring them in. Offshore accounts grew fat as the drug money rolled in.

I shook my head, knowing Henry didn’t realize how bad the data breach was. Every payment coming out of that account would prove the conspiracy he just described. Even if everyone else lawyered up, they would all go down.

You see, there’s a loophole in the Fourth Amendment’s protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. If the IRS wanted the Banco Mexico account records, they would need a warrant and the cooperation of a foreign bank. Spider Monkey just hacked into their computers and took it. Since she was not employed or acting as an agent of the government, even though hacking is illegal, it is still admissible. That is why Frank built a barrier between the legal and unlawful portions of the investigation. When Spider Monkey comes forward, she can truthfully say that she hacked the accounts to find out who tried to kill her friends.

The fact that she was allowed to keep the money and got a pardon later on? It doesn’t change the admissibility of the data because she provided the data to Frank before she got her pardon. The hacks into the accounts and the stolen money are all crimes, but the pardons covered them as well. Since she stole the money from a Washington, DC branch, and the bank is in Mexico, no state can touch her. She’ll never visit a Mexican beach, though.

We finished the transcription, encrypted it, then sent it to the Attorney General.

I was exhausted after that, and I sat back with a juice to rest. I turned on the news; the networks didn’t know everything going on, but Frank filled in the gaps.

As we flew, IRS investigators were chasing down every trail in the account records Spider Monkey had provided to them. The veteran investigators knew all the tricks used to hide income, and they were on the conspirators like a duck on a June bug. They froze dozens of accounts the first day, with more coming as they unraveled the web.

Meanwhile, the Federal Prosecutors were cranking out arrest warrants by the stack. Teams of agents swarmed over CIA Headquarters in Langley, the FBI building, and other agencies. Arrests and rumors were all over the news, and at least four people reportedly committed suicide before agents arrived to get them.

The White House was under intense pressure to make a statement, given the number of arrests and the people involved. It was reminiscent of the scandal following the takedown of the Sons of Tezcatlipoca. In that case, agents in Customs and Border Patrol, the DEA, and local law enforcement helped secure smuggling routes on the West Coast. This wave of arrests was at the highest levels in the agencies.

We’d landed at Joint Base Andrews and were in the limo to the White House when President Kettering entered the White House Press Room. “Ladies and gentlemen, fellow Americans, today is a sad day in the history of our country. A wide-ranging investigation into the attack on Air Force One exposed a conspiracy inside the highest levels of government. These men and women sought to operate outside the law and without the oversight of Congress. After the destruction of the CIA black site prison on a Gulf oil rig and the subsequent removal of senior CIA members, their attention turned to me. They sought to stop the investigation into the CIA by removing me from office.”

She let that sink in. “The conspirators planned to lay the blame for my death on a dangerous criminal. The assassination attempt failed only because of the courage of a fighter pilot and the skill of the Air Force One crew. The missiles they used came from the Sinaloa drug cartel. The conspirators planned another attempt by Julio Salazar, using anti-tank missiles the CIA falsely reported as destroyed. An alert citizen spotted them, and law enforcement recovered the missiles and ended the threat.”

The reporters started asking questions, but the President held up her hand. “Our investigators tracked down the offshore banking account used to fund the conspiracy and pay its members. The CIA conspirators used shell corporations to launder billions in Cartel money. They took a cut of the drug profits in exchange for protection against law enforcement. Our investigators are freezing accounts and seizing the balances since the funds are from drug trafficking. A lot has happened today, but we are nowhere near the end. The Attorney General will prosecute the conspirators to the full extent of the law, including the death penalty where warranted.”

She then stared into the camera. “An assassination attempt against a sitting United States President is an act of war. The Sinaloa Cartel is not a country, but today, we are in a state of war with it. I have signed a Presidential Decision Directive, pledging all United States assets towards the destruction of the Sinaloa Cartel. International warrants have been issued and will be honored for any Cartel leader who surrenders to United States law enforcement. Sinaloa Cartel leadership is now the priority target of law enforcement, intelligence agencies, and the United States military. We intend to work closely with Mexican and Central American countries to rid the region of their existence when allowed, but we will take them out wherever we find them. We will not stop until their leadership is dead or in prison, their organization in ruins, and their money is gone.”

There were murmurs at this; cooperation in Mexico wasn’t always welcome or effective. It didn’t sound like Laura Kettering cared what they thought. “The names of those people charged with conspiracy will be available on the Justice Department website. We will not waver, and we will not fail. Thank you, and may God continue to bless the United States of America.”

With that, she walked out. The press was going wild, and it was only beginning.