THE TRAFFICKERS: A Badge of Honor Novel
W. E. B. Griffin and William E. Butterworth IV
Putnam Adult
Thriller
ISBN: 9780399155864
In less than a year, W. E. B. Griffin and William E. Butterworth IV have cranked out yet another Badge of Honor thriller with THE TRAFFICKERS. Homicide Sergeant Matthew Payne has been placed on leave from his street assignments following bizarre shootings, which have earned him the reputation of being the “Wyatt Earp” of the police department.
Matt’s natural father, a Philadelphia policeman, has been killed in the line of duty. His mother marries a prestigious attorney who soon adopts him. Raised in the lap of luxury, Matt is expected to follow the legal profession and enter his father’s firm. Instead, he passes with flying colors the exam to enter the city’s police academy, where he excels in all phases. It helps that his godfather is Chief Inspector Dennis V. Coughlin.
While Matt contemplates his future career possibilities, he’s drawn into a horrific situation involving an old prep school friend. “Soup King” Chad Nesbitt rings Matt’s number at 4:40 a.m. with an urgent request: “I need your help, Matt. This is bad.”
Matt agrees to meet Chad at an all-night diner across from a second-rate motel called the Philly Inn on Frankford. There, he witnesses the aftermath of a devastating explosion at the hotel site. Yellow crime-scene tape is being strung outside a portion of the building near where a burned-out Mercedes-Benz is worked by firefighters with “jaws-of-life” equipment. When he recognizes that the nearly destroyed car belongs to Becca Benjamin, another old friend, Matt is stunned. What could she have been doing outside such a sleazy address? She is the victim being frantically removed from the wreck for transport to a hospital.
The shock increases when they realize that a former friend and now business associate of Chad’s, Skipper Olde, has sustained life-threatening burns inside the unit where the fire erupted. He’s being taken to the Temple Hospital Burn Center, where Becca is. From across the street, Matt recognizes an early arrival, Homicide Detective Tony Harris, on the scene. Digesting the sketchy personal details of the business relationship from Chad, Matt walks over to the crime scene, flashes his badge and approaches Tony. A web slowly unfolds that stretches far beyond the legitimate ownership of a down-and-out hotel. His reluctant superiors allow Matt involvement only from a desk position. But he vows to work with Tony to answer questions about the fire. Illegal drugs become the focus of their investigation, and then it becomes apparent that the room in question housed a meth lab, one now blown sky high.
Trafficking in illegal drugs is but one aspect of the puzzle being solved. Illegal immigrants from Mexico, Honduras, Colombia and numerous South and Central American locations pay high dollars for “coyotes” to smuggle them into the United States. >From border states, they are transported to cities such as Philadelphia, where they are housed and fed in filthy conditions and expected to repay their benefactors for bed and board. Young women, mere girls, are drugged and turned into prostitutes, with severe physical consequences if they buck the system.
In Philly, the kingpin of the human traffickers, Juan Pablo Delgado (El Gato), raises the fear factor of those who dare to oppose him. He’ll maim and decapitate any girl who refuses to service the men he commands. One such victim, Rosario, escapes from him, seeking shelter with an upstanding Mexican family in the city. Her cousin Ana, in full view of the remaining cowering illegal girls, becomes the object of his wrath. El Gato beats her into lifelessness, binds her body and has it dumped into the river. But he delivers her severed head to the Paco Esteban family, who has given Rosario shelter.
A Texas ranger flown to Philly from Houston investigates similar beheadings in his district, following the destruction wreaked by illegal drug and body trafficking. Now working with Matt, they discover a trail that leads to events in Philadelphia. Evidence points to a much larger operation than an occasional meth lab and illegal prostitutes.
From two dead Hispanic males found in the charred Philly Inn room to Skipper’s possible connections with them, Matt’s team scrapes together numerous clues that imply a bigger scheme. When an armed intruder eludes both police and doctors, Skipper is murdered in his hospital bed. The action is intense, with chapters carrying many side stories forward but in effect conjoined, and the modern police investigation is drawn with pictorial pens. Griffin and Butterworth skillfully keep one’s attention riveted until the conclusion of THE TRAFFICKERS, which is sure to be another bestseller.
--- Reviewed by Judy Gigstad
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