Corruption

Corruption

Charles Freeman was a stout middle aged man who lived for two things. Power and money. Charles had money, always did. His grandfather opened his own restaurant; his father took over and made the restaurant a franchise. His father was a successful business man that had restaurants in every state from New York to California. Charles’s mother was a doctor, not much is known about her parents, she was an orphan. Charles himself was a successful business owner, he owned the local bar. With the money his father and grandfather made Charles lived a nice life, the only thing he wanted was power.

Temperance, California was a nice small town of about 1500 residents. A town where everyone knew everyone, and if you weren’t known, it was for the sole reason of not growing up there. Charles didn’t grow up there, but the people of Temperance knew of him…knew of his money. Five years ago the Mayor of Temperance passed away, the coroner’s office said he had a heart attack. In need of a new mayor, Temperance held an election, if you could call it that. Charles was the only candid that decided to run for mayor. He didn’t run for mayor because he cared about the people, he ran for the power. Since he ran unopposed, Charles was named the new mayor and has been for the last five years.

Charles wanted to test his power, the first year as mayor he was pulled over for drunk driving. His blood alcohol limit was 0.16, way above the legal limit. He was arrested but never served more than the night in jail, and never had any charges brought against him. He never received any points against his driving record, and local news was never informed of the crime. Aside from Charles and the arresting police, no one knew about this incident.

The second year as mayor, Charles was accused of assaulting his girlfriend. His girlfriend claims that Charles was drunk after returning from the bar. He picked a fight with her because she did not want to make him a midnight snack. Things escalade and before she knew it, he was on top of her throwing punches like Muhammad Ali. She was able to break away and call the police for help. Again, Charles was arrested, but nothing more came from it. The third and fourth year as mayor was quiet, aside from some parking tickets and minor traffic violations.

Charles is now ten months into his fifth year as mayor. He loves the power that he has and now has the urge to try it out again. Yesterday Charles was at his bar. He wasn’t there looking to relax and have a drink after work, no, he was there on a mission. The mission was to test the power, and he had a plan. A homeless looking man walks into his bar, Charles felt the tingle start in his toes and rise to chest, and this is it.

Charles asks the man “what are you doing here?”

“Looking for a drink after work is all.”

Charles laughs at the homeless man, “after work? Don’t lie to me.”

Charles walks over to the man and punches him with everything he has. The homeless man falls to the ground knocked out, but Charles doesn’t stop. He delivers punch after punch, kick after kick. When Charles decides he has had enough he calls the police.

* * * * *

Police Officer Dawson is the first to arrive at the scene. Charles has never met this policemen, he must be new. What better way to test his power than on a new police officer.

“Hello, I’m Mayor Charles, this is my bar,” Charles starts.

Officer Dawson takes a look around the room before replying, “Mayor, it is nice to meet you. Could you tell me what happened here?”

Charles begins to tell Officer Dawson a fabricated story about the homeless man. After getting the details officer Dawson asks to see the security footage so he can confirm the mayor’s story.

* * * * *

Twenty four hours have passed since the bar fight, but Officer Dawson is confused. The “homeless man” isn’t homeless at all. He is a construction worker named Timothy Gee; he has a wife and three children. The video shows that he just came into the bar, some words were exchanged and then the mayor attacked him and now he is dead. Something was not right with the Mayor’s story.

Charles heard the knock at the door and was not surprised to see Officer Dawson.

“Hello mayor, I have some questions that need to be answered.”

“Please, call me Charles. What can I do for you…I’m sorry what was your name again.”

“John Dawson. Mr. Freeman, I reviewed the video from your bar and the video does not match your story. It seems as if the homeless man was not homeless at all, and it seems that you attacked him for no reason. Can you explain this?”

“John, before we get down to business, we will be working closely together, with me being the mayor and all. Tell me about yourself, are you a family man, do you have children?” Charles asked.

Officer Dawson saw no harm in the question, “Yes I have a daughter, no wife she passed away while giving birth to Lucy.”

“I’m sorry about your wife. Lucy, such a beautiful name, is she in school here?”

“No. Lucy is at the hospital she has been battling cancer.”

Charles saw his opening. “Cancer, what a horrible disease, how is her treatment? I heard cancer treatments can be expensive.”

Officer Dawson looked at his shoes, “Treatment is expensive and the one treatment that could really work, is not covered by insurance.”

“John, I think I have a solution for your problem” Charles started, “I could pay for little Lucy’s treatment, if you can make this whole homeless, not homeless man mess disappear. What do you say?”

In a shocked tone John asks, “How am I supposed to make this go away, there is video evidence of you beating this man. The news knows something happen and I have to give them an answer.”

Charles responds, “That is for you to figure out. If you make my problem go away, I can help with your daughter. You have three hours to figure it out.”

* * * * *

Three hours later Charles turns on the news. “A man was a victim of a vicious beating at Mayor Freeman’s bar. The suspect is a convicted drug dealer with the street name Snake Eyes. Here is video showing the fight, as a warning there are graphic images.”

Officer Dawson did it. The video editing was amazing, never would have known that he was there, Charles thought. Money and power, the two things Charles wanted, and they worked. They always worked. The weakness of the Temperance police department was the family members of the officers. Each officer needed help with their family for something. Medical bills, college, and everyday bills, if you could figure out which one they needed help with you could have the power over the police department.

* * * * *

“The drug dealer that went to jail for killing Timothy Gee was found in his jail cell deceased. The cause of death is not known at this time. Stay tuned for further developments in the case. On a side note Mayor Freeman has announced that he will be running for his sixth year as mayor.”