The Fence - Dick Lehr [61]
“We’re heading toward Blue!” Mike called out.
“Headed toward Blue,” the dispatcher relayed. “Be advised. That car is wanted for a shooting.”
Smut had twisted the Lexus like a pretzel in and around the streets surrounding Mattapan Square, and the car was now back on Blue Hill Avenue. Smut’s plan was for Tiny to shoot north a few blocks, cut east toward the Morton Village housing project, and barrel down to their final destination—Woodruff Way. Smut told the others they were going to a dead-end street encircled by a chain-link fence. He knew kids had cut a hole in the fence to make it easier to come and go. He wasn’t sure if the hole was still there or had been repaired by city workers. But the point was to get past the fence and into the woods. “I told them to run towards the fence,” Smut said.
It was the only way Smut could think of to shake the cops. Tiny and Marquis listened carefully. Marquis had no idea where they were at this point. Smut repeated the plan to help him out. Boogie-Down got it right away; he knew the Mattapan area. “Once we get there,” Boogie-Down said, “we’re all gonna get out of the car and try to get to the fence through an open—the fence is cut open. We was gonna make it through there, and cut through the woods and come out to the other side.”
The Lexus took a series of rights—a right onto Norfolk Street, a right onto Morton Street. They drove past the intersection of Smut’s West Selden Street and then took a right onto Woodmere Street. They’d entered the Morton Village housing project.
Every move the Lexus made, Mike radioed it in.
“Norfolk coming up to Morton,” he yelled.
“Right onto Morton!” he said seconds later.
The dispatcher passed along the locations.
The chase was past the fifteen-minute mark and had covered about ten miles. For all the police power brought to bear, the Lexus had outrun the police and was now honing in on its exit plan. The adrenaline was rushing for those several dozen officers directly involved in the pursuit as well for the officers throughout the city listening to it. Despite the intensity and shouting, however, the transmissions at this point were breaking up.
“Where are we?” the dispatcher yelled. “Where are we?”
Mike replied, but his words were lost in the static and wailing sound of police sirens. Only fragments of sentences made it through.
“Projects,” Mike yelled. “Woodmere.”
Mike and Craig knew where the Lexus was headed. They knew it the moment they’d turned into the housing project. They’d worked the area and knew the layout of the streets—that a couple of streets looped, one to the left and the other to the right, and then met at the entrance to the dead end of Woodruff Way. They even knew about the hole in the fence; they’d chased car thieves who’d escaped on foot through it. Knowing all this, Mike and Craig could sense the chase was coming to a climax.
The dispatcher yelled, “Where are we?”
Only two words from Mike were audible: “Woodruff Way.”
There was more static and a collision of voices.
“Just the lead car!” the dispatcher yelled.
Mike broke through. “Woodruff! Woodruff!”
Mike’s voice was gone, then back to add that Woodruff Way was a dead end.
Then Mike was screaming: “Getting ready to bail!”
They were his last words.
Mike and Craig followed the Lexus making a right turn onto Woodruff Way. The road went downhill about a thousand feet to a cul-de-sac enclosed by a chain-link fence. The circular dead end was about thirty yards in diameter. Marking the end were seven steel posts in the ground, beneath a single streetlight.
The Lexus was screeching to a stop beneath the streetlight in the middle of the circle. Mike and Craig were no more than a car’s length behind. Mike’s heart was pounding. “You know you’re about to run, and you just get prepared to do that. Gather up whatever you need to run, whatever you’re gonna have, whether it’s your flashlight or your radio or your firearm.” He had been involved in police chases before, but nothing like this. “It seemed like an eternity.