Andersen THE SNIPER

Hunting A Serial Killer - A True Story
1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-1-0983-0383-9
Verlag: BookBaby
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)

E-Book, Englisch, 560 Seiten

The gripping true story of an undercover police tactical unit, utilizing advanced surveillance techniques, who are tasked with dismantling violent commercial business robbery crews, who suddenly find themselves deeply immersed in a high risk surveillance of a group of serial killers who use a sniper hidden in a specially modified vehicle to shoot and kill armored truck couriers. After killing the courier, they would then steal the contents of the armored truck. In an around the clock surveillance, which lasted over three months with many twists and turns, this elite team of undercover officers and their federal partners (ATF/FBI) were able to either arrest or kill these criminals when they were just moments away from trying to kill another innocent armored truck courier.

Autoren/Hrsg.

Andersen, Chris

Leseproben

PROLOGUE I was born in 1960 on Long Island, just outside of New York City. After I was born and after the birth of my brother John and sister Karen, my parents moved the family to the end of Long Island (the North Fork) to the “country” and as far away from New York City as possible—in Southold, NY. In the 1970s, the area was rural, covered by potato farms attended to almost exclusively by Polish-descended farmers whose last names I could not pronounce. The area was interspersed with sections of heavily wooded areas. More significantly, the North Fork was surrounded by water. On one side was the Long Island Sound (on a clear day you could see Connecticut), on the other side the great Peconic Bay. My mother insisted that every year I attend swimming lessons. Swimming lessons in that era was more of a swim camp held for a few weeks each year in June. As you got older and as your proficiency grew, you would progress to a higher level of “swim class” until, at the completion of the course(s) over the years, you would emerge as an efficient swimmer. Of much greater interest to me was the woods and the great outdoors. My friends and I spent most of the time outside, where we acted out our favorite scenes from the popular movie Jeremiah Johnson, a fictional account of a loner mountain man in the 1800s, living in the wilderness, who fights hostile Indians and eventually earns their respect. As I got older, playing Jeremiah Johnson gave way to hunting. My father was an enthusiastic bow hunter (archery) and a disciple of Howard Hill, Fred Bear, and Saxon Pope— well-known archers/bow hunters from earlier in the twenty-first century famous for their shooting exploits. I became a bow hunting enthusiast—so much so, that we kept a few hay bales in the backyard, where I would practice nearly every day in anticipation of the upcoming deer or small game season. Later in life, I would lose all interest in hunting (although I don’t fault those who do) and now hold the view that there should be a more valid reason to kill animals other than the “thrill of the hunt” or for a “trophy.” I hated school. I found high school in particular to be confining and boring—and for the life of me could not understand the relevancy of algebra in relationship to my dream of being a New York State Conservation Fish and Game Officer. This job was where I could fulfill my life’s destiny of always being outside, in the wilderness, and engaged with the activities I enjoyed. To say I was a marginal student was an understatement and I did just enough to get by. Throughout high school and into college, I worked various part-time jobs. The first was as a farm hand, at $1.83 an hour. Later, I was a carpenter’s helper (for slightly more an hour), which was hard physical labor, particularly when trying to navigate large sheets of ¾ inch plywood onto construction sites and then hand nailing them into position (there were no pneumatic nail guns then). I have to admit that I relished neither job’s hard physical labor, particularly in the heat of the summers or in the bone-numbing cold of those windy Long Island winters. But there was a much better job available to me—LIFEGUARD! The North Fork of Long Island was a summer mecca for tourists from New York City. The reason the life guarding gig appealed to me: GIRLS. Now, usurping my desire to be a modern reincarnation of Jeremiah Johnson and live a hermit’s life in the wilderness, I discovered that I found the company of attractive women much more interesting. A lifeguard’s job would surely provide many opportunities to meet those attractive, cosmopolitan, young, Greek, Jewish, and Italian girls from New York City. But first I had to pass the dreaded Open Water Life Guard Test—a series of tests of various swimming proficiency skills. You had to pass each test to get your Life Guard certification, which would be your pathway to a “better tomorrow.” I passed. I received my Life Guard certification and soon after the town hired me as an open water lifeguard. One high school program I was involved in was Navy Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (NJROTC). This program taught leadership and good citizenship, as well as stressing United States Navy history, tradition, and indoctrination. I entered the program on the off chance that if I couldn’t be a conservation officer, then maybe I could serve on a submarine. The United States Navy’s primary East Coast submarine base was across Long Island Sound in New London, Connecticut. The Brooklyn Navy Yard, farther up Long Island Sound in New York City, was where, in the 1970s, navy ships were still being repaired. My father recalled during World War II, as a kid, he’d seen heavily damaged ships being towed into the navy yard after having been torpedoed by German U-boats (submarines). As a NJROTC cadet, I could take tours of both bases as well as the major surface combatants moored there. I graduated high school in 1978, majored in gym, study hall, and skipping school. My only extracurricular activities were on the wrestling and the small bore (.22) rifle team. I can remember bringing my rifle and ammunition and storing it in my school locker. I am sure this would never pass muster in this day and age. After graduating from high school, I applied and was accepted (I think everyone who applied was accepted) to Suffolk County Community College, where I would pursue an associate’s degree in criminal justice, this being somewhat related to my intentions of becoming a conservation officer. I did well in community college (it was interesting and relevant to my career goal). Surprisingly, I made the dean’s list and received my associate’s degree in criminal justice in 1980. While in community college, a harsh reality began to emerge. Two factors were conspiring to derail my conservation officer ambitions: during the presidency of Jimmy Carter, there was an oil embargo, and the Northeast was in a deep economic recession. There were few jobs available and the State of New York had no immediate plans to hire many conservation officers in the near future. In addition, this was also the era of affirmative action and there was a great overabundance of white males seeking these types of jobs. I realized I would have to reframe my career path to something more readily available: a position in a municipal or state law enforcement agency. As soon as I was able, I began taking the Civil Service Exams for the Suffolk County Police and New York City Police Departments, as well as the New York and Connecticut State Police. Back then, most of the departments used a “three list” civil service system: one list for white males, one for females, and one for blacks. Then, depending on how you scored on the testing (primarily the written test), you were on one of three lists, according to your gender and/or ethnicity in rank order. During the hiring process, if the department wanted a black male, they would go to that list and hire the top name on the list, and so on. I learned that because of the fierce competition among white males, I would most likely have to get a perfect written score besides having the maximum number of veterans credit points added to my raw score (military veterans received a certain number of points depending on their length of military service) and high school NJROTC did not count. But a black male only had to pass the civil service test to be hired. It was a dawning reality that, as a white male, living in the Northeast during the late 70s, getting a law enforcement civil service job would be difficult. Although I did well on the various civil service exams, there would not be any job offers forthcoming. During the fall of 1980, upon receiving my associate’s degree, I then entered the State University of New York at Brockport, a college in Upstate New York, near Buffalo and the Canadian border. It was here I was to work on my bachelor’s degree in criminal justice. I lacked motivation. There were no jobs to be found and I was going into heavy debt. My family was not wealthy and I had to fund my college education by taking out government college loans and supplementing that money with part-time jobs. I could not see a path forward and again had to redefine my career path. The answer appeared to be the Army ROTC program that my college offered. By joining this program, the Army would pay for the lion’s share of my tuition and, in return, I would be committed to several years of active duty service upon the completion of my four-year degree. Of great interest to me was the program they were pushing forward—a bit of a bait and switch— in which I could, if qualified, become a warrant officer/helicopter pilot. I talked to my father about this and he discouraged me from this career path: “You would be an idiot.” My family does not have a military or law enforcement service tradition. My father was drafted during the Korean War and served as a forward artillery observer in post-World War II Germany; he did not see the military as a good career path for his son. Remember, this was not too long after the Vietnam War and the United States military was perceived by many to be in disarray and disrepute. One day, my college roommate told me that a recruiter from the Houston Police Department was on campus and that Houston was actively recruiting “us” (white college boys). I headed to the Criminal Justice Department where the recruiter had been, but missed him. Fortunately, he left several thick recruiting packets, which consisted of a multi-paged application and a thorough questionnaire about one’s personal life—including questions such as “list below everything that you have ever...