Chapter 88: Direction of Investigation

Upon returning to the office area of Investigation Team Five, Roan made a decisive… choice—to clock out and go home. After all, Verinice had just informed him that the mandated week would start tomorrow. Besides, today had been more than full: Roan had joined Ryder in the morning for the gang raid, spent midday assisting Organized Crime with Robert’s interrogation, and in the afternoon investigated the truth behind the laundromat owner. After a day like that, with no overtime pay on the horizon, Roan had no qualms about heading home.

But his plan to scrounge dinner at Mona’s apartment fell through this time. After a moment’s thought, Roan accepted Lacey’s invitation and accompanied her to the hospital to visit Ryder. Once they confirmed Ryder was in no serious danger—that he’d be discharged tomorrow and back at work the day after—Lacey wanted Roan to join her in exploring the sights and sounds of New York. Roan declined. The renovation company responsible for his apartment had sent over another set of design plans, hoping he’d come review them.

“Ha—”
The next morning, Roan sat at his workstation, stretched, and yawned deeply.

“Good morning, agents!”
Augustus, belly prominent, pushed open the door to Investigation Team Five’s office, Mona in tow, and announced loudly, “A new day begins! We’ve got a fresh case on our hands! Everybody, get your spirits up!”
He slapped the desk at Lacey’s station, jolting her awake, then turned to William and called out, “William, give us a rundown on this series of bank robberies!”

“Yes, sir.”
William stood amid a mountain of paperwork, grabbed the top folder, and began reading aloud:
“From the start of last month to the previous week, banks in Queens, the Bronx, and Brooklyn were hit six times by robbers…”

After summarizing the case for the team, William began distributing the heap of documents among the group:
“These are surveillance tapes from the banks, testimonies from staff and witnesses, and footage from the surrounding areas.”

Roman raised an eyebrow at the materials—clearly sourced from Investigation Team Fourteen.

“Good.”
Augustus nodded approvingly, flipping through a witness statement before tilting his head toward Roan:
“Roan, any thoughts?”

As the rest of Team Five turned their attention to him, Roan sighed, picked up a whiteboard marker, and walked to the front of the room.

“First, the primary difficulty—we don’t know where the robbers vanished after leaving the banks.”
The team nodded; the files made clear that surveillance in the bank’s vicinity was severely lacking. Once the robbers escaped, they disappeared completely. Only once had a camera on a street corner east of the bank caught a glimpse of the fleeing gang.

“The second challenge, and the most crucial,” Roan continued, writing as he spoke.
“The moment the robbers entered, they sprayed black paint over the cameras. Apart from the third robbery, where a hidden camera recorded the full incident, in the other five cases we rely solely on witness statements to reconstruct the events.”

“Exactly.”
The team nodded in agreement. Augustus, seeming to grasp something, asked in a low voice,
“Is there a problem?”

“There is.”
Roan pointed to the words on the board.
“The actual robbery lasted only two and a half minutes. In that time, the robbers ordered everyone to lie on the floor and not look up. So most witness statements only describe the robbers’ attire and actions, without any real interaction.”

“No, Roan.”
Lacey raised her folder.
“Of the six robberies, in four—excepting the first and sixth—the robbers pulled a female hostage in front of them, using her to threaten the security guards into dropping their weapons. These four women actually had contact with the robbers.”

“You’re right, Lacey,” Roan nodded, then shook his head.
“But you’ve misunderstood something. In reality, it was the robbers who initiated contact; the hostages didn’t approach them.”

The group frowned, failing to grasp his meaning. Roan explained in a low voice:
“When the robbers forcibly grabbed these four women as hostages, they were terrified—their focus was entirely on the security guards, not on the robbers themselves. Plus, with their backs turned, none saw the robbers’ faces. The robbers merely pointed their guns at the women’s heads, without touching them directly. All they could tell was that the robbers were men, strong, and through the mask’s eye holes, could see they were white. But these details aren’t enough to identify them.”

Once we catch the robbers, these facts may be useful in court.

“Well… alright.”
After pondering Roan’s words and finding no issue, Lacey hesitantly nodded. Mona looked up and asked,
“So, Roan, what’s your point?”

“My point is simple.”
Roan stepped forward, set aside the witness statements, then separated the surveillance tapes, speaking gravely,
“Team Fourteen’s investigation relied on large-scale screening—checking for tattoos, scouring area footage, interviewing witnesses. Except for the hidden camera from the third robbery, the other tapes are low-quality and brief, so they didn’t analyze them closely.
We need to do the opposite—focus our efforts on those five tapes. The witness statements can wait.”

“What?”
Mona furrowed her brow, pointing at her screen.
“You know these surveillance videos are poor quality, and the robbers painted over the cameras in less than ten seconds—how could we possibly catch them using such clips?”

Augustus, Lacey, William, and the others frowned as well, unable to understand Roan’s reasoning.

“Two reasons.”
Roan didn’t waste words, his expression severe.
“First, large-scale screening requires immense manpower and resources. Team Fourteen wasn’t big, but Broson leveraged his connections to launch a massive sweep for this case. We, Team Five, have only ten people and none of us have networks like that.”

Augustus frowned; his own connections were limited to the Justice Department, offering no help here.
After Roan’s explanation, Mona and Lacey exchanged a glance and asked,
“And the second?”
(End of chapter)