The conference room at City Hall had a long, coffin shaped mahogany table with about twenty chairs. There were three exquisite crystal chandeliers, oriental carpets and walls covered with oil paintings of long dead city officials.
"Mr. Picker, I'm so glad that you could join us." I was shown into the room by a lovely Latina secretary with dark hair, a light brown complexion, an incredible figure and four inch spike heels. The man speaking introduced himself as the mayor's chief of staff.
"My name is Charles Barker. This is Assistant District Attorney Margaret Moore." Barker nodded to a mid-thirties woman with mousy brown hair cut shoulder length. She wore black rimmed glasses and a green skirt with a matching jacket.
They offered their hands. I just stood there. To my right was Laurence W. Finegold, both my friend and attorney. Larry is a junior partner with the prestigious Philadelphia law firm of Dewey, Cheethum and Howell.
CB: "Shall we sit down."
Everyone took a seat at the table except for me and a gentleman standing over by the window facing Broad Street. No one had bothered to make the introduction. Larry pulled a laptop from its case and set it up.
ADA MM spoke up. "Mr. Picker, I apologize for the manner in which you have been treated. When the FBI requested that we take you into custody we had no idea that you were harassed by rogue federal agents."
I stood there and said nothing.
Apparently, during my brief incarceration, TJ had recovered the security footage from the house. If either the police or any federal agency had searched the premises, they would have found the cameras but not the recordings. When activated, the cameras record nearly everything both inside and immediately outside my house. These recordings include rather clear audio. However, while the cameras are on the property, the actual devices that record the footage are located in a secure room up at the main house.
The powers that be had ample opportunity to view those tapes. What they witnessed were two men that came into my home, held Kelly and me at gunpoint and searched the property. Equally, if not more important, they failed to identify themselves as federal agents.
COS: "Of course, it goes without saying, that all charges against you are to be dropped."
I stood there and said nothing.
ADA: "Naturally, in return for dropping the charges we would appreciate it if no one spoke any further about this matter. Additionally, we want a statement in writing which indemnifies the government of any wrong doing. And, we would like to have procession of all of the recordings."
I stood there and said nothing. Larry, on the other hand, took this occasion to speak up. "First, and this is non-negotiable, we want all of the booking materials, including but not limited to photographs, finger prints and printed material to be handed over to us. All digital information erased and a written statement that no charges have been or will be filed against my client in regards to this matter. That includes federal, state and local authorities.
"In return, my client will not file a lawsuit. As for gagging my client, I'm afraid that it's too late."
Did I mention that TJ is rather handy with computers? During my brief stay with the local authorities TJ managed to accomplish the following:
He went online with a proxy server, this to elude detection. Set up a new Gmail account and in turn a new YouTube account.
I finally spoke up. "Those security recordings will go live on the internet in," I looked at my watch, "five, four, three, two, one. Now!"
Additionally, TJ ordered some Fiverr gigs. Fiverr is a web based service where you can hire people to perform various services for five bucks. In this instance, he arranged for the YouTube url to be tweeted to over a hundred thousand followers with the hash tag, 'Federal Agents Go Rogue'.
To add insult to injury, the names of the agents were annotated to the video thanks to the information provided by Detective McKee at the church.
Charles Parker shook his head and said, "Oh, shit." Miss Moore looked as though she was about to burst at the seams.
The unnamed man in the corner said, "You don't know the trouble that you've caused."
"Then you shouldn't have fucked with me." I turned and left the room.