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Bernie Tavalerio asked bunches of questions.-
“What time did the shooting occur?”
“About two-thirty in the afternoon on February 28.”
“Who was present at that time?”
“My father-in-law, Ed Wroe, myself, Ramon Mendez, Gary Sarver, and Bart Young.-And Chrissy over at the trailer.-We were sitting under a shade tree out there near the lane drinking water and resting a few minutes.”
“Okay.-Who saw the black car first?”
“I guess Chrissy did.-She was at a higher elevation than we were.-The house we were building blocked our view.-I think all of us looked up at about the same time when we heard the engine noise.”
“What happened next?”
“The man on the passenger side opened his window, stuck out a gun and began shooting.”
They went on to tell the entire story ending with the car driving away and Ramon lying dead.-Tavalerio recorded the session on his tape player/recorder.-He told them he was pretty sure the license plates they described were indeed from Texas.-He also figured from their descriptions that the car was either a Cadillac or a Lincoln Town Car.-When he showed them pictures of both vehicles, they were convinced that it was indeed a black Lincoln.-Bernie immediately called Sheriff Lampton and told him to put out an all points bulletin to be on the look out for a black Lincoln Town Car with Texas license plates probably headed, at this point in time, toward Texas.
Johnny remembered the letter Ramon had received from his mother in Mexico.-They went into Ramon’s rooms to check it out.-It was laying on his bed and Bernie picked it up to read it and then discovered it was in Spanish which he couldn’t decipher.-He did know that the Spanish word “molestar” meant “trouble.” He’d need to find someone who could read it to him.-He went through the remainder of Ramon’s things but found nothing else of interest that might help them know what he had been up to prior to working for Johnny and Ed.
Bernie went back to Fordsville to talk things over with the sheriff.-One of the deputies spoke, read and wrote Spanish fluently so he read the letter to the detective and the sheriff and managed to decipher where the letter came from.-It was a little town just across the border from Laredo, Texas known as Nueva Laredo or New Laredo.-Bernie immediately booked a flight to the nearest airstrip to that town.-
Bernie spoke at length with Ramon’s family.-Expecting that the Mendez family would speak no English, he had ‘borrowed’ the Spanish-speaking deputy from Sheriff Lampton and taken him with him as interpreter.-No one had known how to contact them to tell them what had happened to their son.-So, Tavalerio had had to break the bad news of his death.-At first, they were afraid to tell him anything, but after they had talked for a while, they were convinced that this man was genuinely trying to learn who had killed their son and they gave him their complete cooperation.-The only thing they could think of that might help, though was to find a man in or near Laredo, Texas, named Pablo Alvarez.-They had both worked at one time for a man Senor Mendez hadn’t liked the looks of.-His name had been Jorge something or other and they were pretty sure his last name was Laquidera or something close to that.
“What kind of work were they doing for this Laquidera or whatever?”
“I’m not sure, Senor, but I’m afraid it was not legal what they were doing.-If you can find Alvarez, you should be getting all kinds of details.”
“Yes.-Okay.-Again, I appreciate your talking to me.-I’ll let you know what progress we make and, as I said before, my sincerest sympathy for the loss of your son.”
Meanwhile, in Fordsville, Pablo Alvarez was becoming truly worried.-Extremely worried, indeed.-His girlfriend, Shera Herndon, came home from getting groceries and told Pablo about the murder of Ramon Mendez.-
“They said it had obviously been an assassination-type murder.-Two guys in a big black car just drove up, shot him several times in the back and then sped away.”
“Madre Dios!-They will be after me next.-We must leave here at once.”
“But how can we leave without any money, Pablo?-You know how my folks feel about my being with a Mexican and your folks wouldn’t like it that you would want an African American.-And where on earth could we go if we had money?”
“Maybe we could get lost up north somewhere and maybe I can steal the money somehow.”
“Maybe, somewhere, somehow.-Those are such negative words.-We’ve got to make a plan; a positive plan.”-
“Honey, I love you, Shera, and I don’t care who likes it or who doesn’t.-Can you get your hands on a gun of some kind?-If I had a gun, I could hold up that convenient store down on Main Street and then get in your car and take off north toward Indianapolis or possibly on over into Illinois and maybe get lost in Chicago.-Just see if you can get us a gun and I’ll take it from there.-Maybe you should stay behind and I’ll send for you later when I find a place where we’ll be safe.”
“No, I love you, too, and I want to be with you.-Pablo, where you go, I go.-We’ll make it, Baby!”
It was two or three days before Shera could find a gun.-She had made discreet inquiries and when she mentioned it to her sister, Lonnsie, she had said her husband, Nerrill had a nine millimeter that he kept locked up in the glove box in his car.-
That night Pablo and Shera had put their clothes and toiletries and some food and drinks into Shera’s blue PT Cruiser and drove over to Nerrill’s house.-The night was rainy and miserable but it suited their purpose pretty well.-There should be fewer people out on a night like this, they thought.-They waited until there were no lights on in the house and then Pablo sneaked into the car and with the screw driver he had brought from Shera’s house, he pried open the glove box and took out the gun and a whole box of ammunition.-Putting it under his coat, he hurried back to where Shera was waiting in her car and they took off for the Seven Eleven on Main Street.-Once again Shera waited in the car as Pablo made a dash for the convenience store.-
Mindy Thompson was scared within an inch of her life.-She had always hated storms and then when she was thirteen, a tornado had followed on the heels of a particularly obnoxious lightning storm and had actually picked up the almost hysterical girl and set her down again, unharmed, but literally scared almost to death.-She didn't like working the night shift by herself anyway, but she needed the work and at twenty-four everybody expected her to have outgrown all her little-girl fears.-But she hadn't.-She was sticking it out, though, in spite of her chattering teeth and wobbly knees.
Pablo had waited until there didn’t seem to be any other customers and he went in with the gun drawn.-He showed the gun to the clerk.-She was already half crazy from the storm.-The lightning was flashing and the thunder was rolling and the rain was pouring and Mindy didn’t like any of it.-When Pablo told her to open the cash register, she complied without question.-There looked to be close to five hundred dollars in the cash drawer even though the sign said there was never more than a hundred dollars in the register at one time and Pablo took it all.-He left her lying on the floor, completely unhurt with orders to count to five hundred before she moved.-Mindy promised she wouldn’t move a muscle and Pablo hurried out to the car and Shera took off.-They headed for Dundee and from there they planned to go on up to Owensboro on the William H. Natcher Toll Road and cross the Ohio River there into Indiana and head on north to either Indianapolis or Chicago.-
But as Robert Burns put it:-The best laid plans of mice and men aft gang agley.-Their plans definitely ganged agley way out in left field somewhere.-They got lost in the rain much as Ed and Penny and their family did a couple of years earlier and before they could figure out just what went wrong, they were pulling up to the O’Reilly’s house site. Neither of them had any idea where they were nor how to get back to where they needed to be.
There were still lights on in the trailer behind the house so they knocked on the door and when Johnny opened it, he saw a young man who was obviously Mexican.-His first thought was that he might be a relative of Ramon’s.-At
any rate it was too nasty to let them stand out in the rain, so he invited them into the living room.-He was surprised that the young woman was a black girl.-Black and white couples were still fairly rare in the Kentucky backwoods; but you almost never saw a Latino and an African American together.
Pablo spoke up as Chrissy was entering the room.-“My name is Pablo and this is my girlfriend, Shera.-We were headed to Dundee and we somehow got lost in the rain.-Could you please give us directions so we can find our way back out of here?-Por favor.”
“We would be most grateful, if you can point us in the right direction. My sister is expecting us and she will be worried big-time if we don’t show up soon.”
“Of course, we’d be glad to help.-When I first saw you out there in the rain, I thought you might be a relative of Ramon Mendez.-He had been staying with us when he was shot and killed.-We’re still trying to find out why he was murdered.-He seemed like such a nice young man.”
“He was a nice man and a good amigo.-I’m not a family member but we had worked together for quite a while until recently.”-Pablo thought immediately that he probably shouldn’t have said that.-But these people seemed genuinely concerned about his death.-
“Do you think I could use your bathroom, Ma’am?”-All this rain coupled with the excitement and then the frustration of getting lost had made Shera need to go badly.
“Of course.-Right this way, Shera.-Did I say your name correctly?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“I’m Chrissy.-And I’m learning what it means to need to go a lot.-I’m about four months pregnant.”
“I’ll bet that is exciting.-Some day I want children, too.-When Pablo and I get settled, that is.”
In the living room, the phone was ringing and Johnny reached to answer it.-“Hello.-Yes, Bernie.-You just got back, I guess.-Yes.-What was that last name again?-Yes, Okay.-Alright then.-Thanks for calling.-I’ll see you tomorrow.-Bye.
“Now, Pablo.-You said you need directions to Dundee.-Okay.-What did you say your last name is?-Was it ‘Alvarez’?”
“I didn’t think I said my last name.-But it is ‘Alvarez.’”
“Pablo, I think I need your help more than you need mine.-When Ramon was killed I hired a detective to try to find out who killed him.-That was the detective who just called.-He had been down to Nueva Laredo to talk to Ramon’s family.-He said they told him to find a young man named Pablo Alvarez and he would know what kind of work Ramon had been doing and who he’d been working for and all that.-They told Bernie that you and Ramon had been good friends.-If that’s true, then you might be able to help me find the bastards who killed him.”
Ramon thought about that for a few moments and then sadly shook his head.-“I would like to help you, Senor, but that bastardo will be after me, too.-I am already probably a dead man and if I help you, there will be no doubt I will be muerto.”-Pablo was trembling pitifully now and Shera became quite troubled when she came back into the room.
“What’s wrong, Pablo?-You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”-Then she looked at Johnny.-“What have you done to him?”
“It’s okay, Shera.-But he knows that Ramon and I both used to work for Jorge Laquidera.- He wants me to help him identify the boss man; but I just explained that I can’t because he would kill me for sure if I did.”
“But, Honey, if they could find him and put him in jail, then we’d have nothing to fear from him.”
“It’s a big operation and they’d never be able to catch them all.-Whoever was left would still come after me.-And if you’re with me, they would hurt you, too.-It’s just too big a chance to take.-Drug dealers take it personally when someone snitches on them.”
Johnny spoke up.-“If we can catch up with most of them, even, the ones who we don’t catch are going to be so busy trying to save their own hides they won’t have time to worry about you, Pablo.-Let me tell you what we can do.-I’ll talk to the sheriff.-Sheriff Lampton is a good friend of mine.-If you put yourself in protective custody, you could help them apprehend the drug dealers.-Then they could put you in the witness protection program; give you new identities and relocate you to a place where they’d have no way to find you.-Would you consider doing that, Pablo?”
“I might except that I just robbed a convenience store in Fordsville.-I’d end up in jail with the same guys I’m trying to get away from.-Then I’d have no protection at all.”
“Pablo, will you let me call the sheriff and talk to him about all of it without giving him any names at all and see what kind of deal he could offer?”
“What do you think, Shera?-I don’t know what to do.”
“I think it sounds like our best chance of staying alive if they will make that kind of deal.-We still have the money we took and we could give it back if they would let us.-I say we go for it.”
“Okay, call and see if they will do as you said they might.-But don’t tell him we’re here.-Tell him you have a name and ‘if you can find him’ would he make that deal.”
Johnny called Sheriff Lampton and outlined the whole situation to him including the robbery.-The sheriff already knew about the robbery but he had absolutely no clues or leads.-The clerk had been too scared to even realize that it had been a Latino who robbed her.-After talking for several minutes, Johnny hung up and told Pablo and Shera that the sheriff had bought the whole deal.
“The sheriff said if you returned the money and helped them locate the guys who killed Mendez, they would totally forget the robbery.-Then after you testified against the killers, they would give you citizenship status and put you both into witness protection with relocation and the whole nine yards.-Will you do this for your friend, Ramon?”
Pablo and Shera looked at each other and nodded.-“Okay, we’ll do it.-Call him back and tell him to come and get us—if you will let us stay here until the sheriff comes.”
“Absolutely, Pablo.-I know Ramon would be so proud of you.-If I had only known, I might have been able to make the same deal for him and he might still be alive.-Anyway, I’ll call the sheriff right now.”-- When Johnny hung up, he told them Sheriff Lampton would be there in just a few minutes.--
“What can we do with Shera’s car?-We can’t take it with us—it would be too easy to spot.”
“We’ll see what the sheriff thinks when he gets here.-If he doesn’t have a good solution, there’s a shed up at my grandmother’s that we could store it in for a while at least.”
It was only about fifteen minutes before the sheriff got there and took them back to his office.-He questioned Pablo for most of the rest of the night and got the names of the people involved in the drug smuggling operation, the location of the main office, a layout of the office, the places where firearms were kept and what type they had and a lot of other good information.-By daybreak, he was ready to start planning the raid to put the heroin ring out of commission for good.-Before there was anyone on the streets, Sheriff Lampton just managed to sneak the two informants into an unmarked car and get them to Owensboro to a safe house where they could stay until they were needed for trial.
Also before daylight, Johnny took the PT Cruiser up to Lydia’s old barn they no longer used and pulled it inside and locked the doors.-Johnny and Chrissy were quite pleased that they had been able to help avenge their friend’s death but they sure were hopeful that there might be a little less excitement at their place for a while.
Two days later, though, it was time to visit the doctor again and, as planned, Penny took Chrissy for the appointment and had her appointment just before Chrissy’s.-Penny hadn’t come out yet when they called Chrissy in for her examination.-When they finished with Chrissy, Penny was sitting in the waiting room.
“Okay, Mom, what did they tell you?”-Chrissy asked as soon as they had gotten outside.
Penny rolled her eyes and got a long breath.-“I am pregnant.-The doctor told me he was setting my due date as August twelfth.-Isn’t that what he told you?-Good grief, Chrissy!-What if we give birth the same day?-I still can’t be
lieve it!-It just can’t be happening to me.-I’m too old to go through pregnancy and childbirth again.-I wish I knew how your father will feel about this.”-By this time, Penny was crying.-Her hormones were raging and she simply couldn’t help it.
Chrissy tried to comfort her mother; though, actually, she thought it would be sort of nice to both be going through the same thing at the same time.-Maybe her mother would feel better about it later.