The media made it official—Lieutenant Scott Noehring was a hero cop, shot in the back by an unknown assailant. I heard it on the radio while I was driving home Thursday morning. But the sun was rising and the turkeys were pecking at their corn in the backyard, and I didn’t really care about Noehring. I didn’t rush into the house and turn on the TV to hear what the local stations had to say about him, and I only skimmed the brief article that the St. Paul Pioneer Press managed to cobble together before it went to press. Seventeen-year veteran, three commendations early in his career, divorced, two kids, the governor asked that flags be flown at half-mast, yadda, yadda, yadda.
None of it pleased me; none of it made me angry. Truth was, Noehring probably had been a good cop, a very good cop to make lieutenant. He had been smart, he had been resourceful, and he had “protected with courage and served with compassion” like the motto says. Somehow that changed, maybe during his divorce. Maybe when he took that first free taco he spoke about. Before that he had been a real cop, so sing his praises, bury him with honor, why not? Shakespeare wrote, The evil that men do lives after them; the good is oft interred with their bones. Well, screw that. Bury the evil, too.
Let Noehring be a hero. The world needed heroes. The Minneapolis Police Department certainly needed heroes. In the recent past, an officer had been accused of planting a gun on a Hmong teenager who was shot and killed by mistake, a SWAT team member was arrested for robbing a Wells Fargo bank, members of the Metro Gang Strike Force were charged with stealing cars, cash, and jewelry from suspects, and a cop was indicted for providing confidential police records to a known gangster. A hero might help the remaining nine hundred very fine and ethical police out there get their due.
In the end, that’s what Lieutenant Rask wanted, I decided. Law enforcement is a tight fraternity because the members of that fraternity know that in a life-and-death situation, the only people they can depend on are each other. That’s why good cops often turn a blind eye to the bad conduct of their brothers and sisters—Rask knew Noehring was dirty long before he was shot. That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt, the criminal behavior. When a cop goes bad, good cops suffer, and not only in a loss of reputation and prestige in the neighborhood. It makes them sick at heart. That’s not just an ex-cop blowing smoke. I know it to be true personally.
So let’s pretend that Noehring was a hero. Build him a fucking statue, what did I care? The only thing that interested me that morning was a tiny story tucked in the newspaper’s “Daily Briefing” column.
MINNEAPOLIS MAN HIT BY CAR, KILLED DURING SCUFFLE
Thomas O’Brien, Minneapolis, was killed Wednesday night when he fell in front of a speeding car during a scuffle near Loring Park.
Authorities report that O’Brien, 24, had been fighting with an unidentified man on Willow Street on the east side of the park when he slipped on the ice and fell in front of a car driven by Irene Campbell, 29, of Pequot Lakes. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Officials said the investigation is ongoing, but the incident appears to be a case of self-defense and no arrests were made.
That was it. Apparently no one was going to build a statue for Tommy.
I had killed men before. Sometimes I felt sick and ashamed afterward, and sometimes I felt relieved if not downright exhilarated. With Tommy I felt—embarrassed. I had not meant to kill Tommy. It was an accident. I had not seen the car coming any more than he did. He had shoved the business end of a 9 mm into my face and threatened my life. Yet I didn’t know if he meant to use the gun or if he was merely bluffing. In any case, once I disarmed him, he was no longer a threat to me. If it hadn’t been for the car I would have sent him limping back to Heavenly.
I read the article until I had it memorized, then balled up the paper and tossed it into the recycling bin.
This should not have happened, my inner voice told me.
“Damn, Tommy,” I said aloud. “I’m sorry. I’m really sorry.”
I might have said more, maybe even uttered a prayer or two, but my phone rang. Mr. Donatucci wanted to know what went wrong last night. I reminded him that he was in the room when I made my final statement.
“Did you think I was lying to the cops?” I asked.
“No, it’s just—this should have been simple. What the hell happened?”
“Greed happened, Mr. Donatucci. Pure greed.”
Mr. Donatucci sighed deeply. Greed, yeah, that’s a story he knew very well.
“The question is, what happens next?” I asked.
“The police do not want us to pay a ransom for the Lily. If we decide to go ahead anyway, they want us to include them in the exchange so they can arrest the artnappers. However, we are under no obligation to follow their instructions.”
“Do you actually believe the thieves will try again?”