21st Precinct, Sergeant Waters. Well, who is this? Yeah. Oh, her daughter. Yeah, she was here. Yeah. No, we sent her on her way. What? Where is she supposed to go? Yeah. I see. You are in the muster room at the 21st Precinct, the nerve center. A call is coming through. You will follow the action taken pursuant to that call. From this minute until the final report is written in the 124 room at the 21st Precinct. Okay. If you don't hear from us soon, let me know. No, don't worry about that. We'll take care of it. Yeah. Okay. Right away. 21st Precinct. It's just lines on a map of the city of New York. Most of the 173 towns in the city are in the 21st Precinct. It's just lines on a map of the city of New York. Most of the 173,000 people wedged into the nine-tenths of a square mile between 5th Avenue and the East River wouldn't know if you asked them if they lived or worked in the 21st. Whether they know it or not, the security of their homes, their persons, and their property is the job of the men of the 21st Precinct. The 21st, 160 patrolmen, 11 sergeants, and four lieutenants of whom I'm the boss. My name is Kennelly, Frank Kennelly. I'm the conditioning command of the 21st. I was working my day tour, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. Immediately upon my arrival at the station house at 735, I signed the blotter and went into my office where I changed to uniform. Then I sat down at my desk and read reports and communications to bring myself up to date on the occurrences in the Precinct during the previous 24 hours while I was off duty. At 8, I went out into the muster room and behind the desk to turn out the platoon for the day tour. Then I returned to my office to finish reading and signing the reports in time for the Precinct messenger to take them to the 6th Division, which is located in the 17th Precinct station house at 163 East 51st Street. Sector car number two came by the house at 930, and I went out on patrol of the Precinct. It was 10 minutes after 11 when the car pulled up in front of the station house to let me out again. I crossed the sidewalk, walked up the three stone steps into the muster room where Lieutenant Gorman was desk officer and Sergeant Waters was on telephone switchboard duty. I headed around behind the desk to sign the blotter. Hello, Captain. Sergeant? Sergeant Waters. Hello, Red. Captain? What's going, Red? It's a quiet tour, Captain. Good. A teletype blotter came over. They shifted borough commanders and queens and the Bronx. Just traded jobs between them? Yes, sir. Effective 8 a.m. tomorrow. Why? I wonder if they like the new assignment. Well, there's no sense you worrying about it, Red. I know, sir. I guess they're hurting. I'll be in my office. Yes, sir. How's your wife, Sergeant? Better, Captain. How much longer does the doctor say she'll have to stay in the hospital? Well, we have to wait, that's all. That's good. Wait a minute. Just a second, lady. I don't understand you, lady. Doctor's talking, Miss Lady. Oh, what's the trouble, Sergeant? Got me, Sergeant. I came from Brooklyn, the house of my other daughter. Wait a minute. No comprendo. Sir, I asked a man and he said he'd come to see me. No comprendo either, lady. No comprendo. Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. All I want is to find my daughter. Sergeant, ring in and ask the Captain to step out here a minute. Yes, sir. That's all I want, my daughter. She's in some place in this neighborhood. I don't have her written here. Yeah, all right. Un momento. Un momento. Captain, can you step out to the desk for a minute? We've got an old lady who speaks nothing but Spanish. I think it was the real station on the train. No, un momento. Yes, sir. I'm so sorry. He says okay. He'll be right out. Good. The husband of my daughter works in the World of Astoria. Please, senora. Un momento. Oh, yes. Yes. What's the trouble, Lieutenant? We can't understand this lady, Captain. Que le sucede, senora? Oh, usted habla español. Sí, yo hablo español. Bueno, gracias a Dios. Gracias a Dios que alguien puede hablarlo. Me agradezco mucho. Estoy muy agradecida. Únicamente dígame que le sucede. Bueno, no puedo encontrar la casa de mi hija. You can't find a daughter's house. Oh. ¿Sabe usted la dirección? Mi otra hija lo escribió. Her other daughter wrote down the address. Aquí, aquí en este papel. It's on the west side. Senora, este es el east side. Está en el west side, al otro lado del parque. ¿En el otro lado del parque? Sí, el parque central. ¿Tiene dinero para llegar allá? Sí, tengo dinero. Mi hija me dio dinero para tomar un taxi del subway, pero me perdí. No sabía dónde estaba. Her other daughter gave her money to take a cab when she got out of the subway. Sergeant, get Fallon out here to put her in a cab. See that the cab driver gets the right address. She's got it written down. Le diré a un policía que le ponga en un taxi, senora. Qué bueno, qué bien. Estoy muy agradecida. Fallon, come out to the morgue for a moment. Estaba perdida, no sabía dónde estaba. Fallon, be right out, captain. OK. Senora, el policía estará con usted en un momento. Hey, mister, how are you heading for? For me? Yeah, where are you going? To the detectives. I'm going up to the detectives. Through the back room, up the stairs to the second floor. OK, thanks a lot. Siento mucho haberles causado tanta molestia. Gracias, senora. What's the trouble now, captain? Apologizing for bothering us. Fallon, did the guy in the brown sports jacket just come in here? Who are you? I'm Detective Ed Wise, my colleague squad. My partner and I were cruising by and spotted this pusher we know. I thought I saw him ducking. Oh, yeah, Fallon, the brown sports jacket asked for the detectives. Well, the detectives. I sent him upstairs. He's running for me and he runs right into the police station. I'm Captain Canelli Wise. You come upstairs with me. Sergeant, take care of her until Fallon comes out. Yes, sir. Come on, Wise. Yes, sir. Oh, Lieutenant, if he comes back this way, don't let him get out. We won't. That's the only way out, isn't it, Captain, past the desk? Yes, that's the only way. How did you happen to run in here? We were driving by on the corner, Captain. I spotted him. I told my partner to stop the car and he must have seen us at the same time. He started walking faster. Up the stairs. Yes, sir. I got out of the car and took after him on foot. It was a one-way street going the wrong way, so my partner drove the car around the next block in case I couldn't catch up with him. Why'd he come in here? I don't know, Captain. I guess he couldn't figure anyplace else to go. Why did he ask for the detectives? Well, he had to ask for something to get by the desk. Vitaly, did the fellow in the brown sports jacket just come in here? No, Captain. No one just came in here. Is Lieutenant King in his office? Yes, there is. Yes. Captain Cannelly. Come in, Captain. Matt, this is Detective Ed Weiss of the Narcotics Squad. Lieutenant Matt King, 21st Squad Commander. Lieutenant? He's got a suspect loose in the building, Matt. A suspect? Yes, sir. Where in the building? He stopped at the desk a minute ago and asked for the detectives. Desk officer, sending them upstairs. What do you want to come up here for? You got me, Lieutenant. Weiss was after him on the street. His partner drove the car around the block to the other end of the street to stop him there in case he got through. He just came into the station house. He didn't come into the squad room, did he? No, Vitaly and Howard are out there. They said he didn't. Did he come upstairs? Well, he went through the back room towards the stairs. Could have come up the stairs or he could have headed out and back to the cells. Or down to the locker room. Well, it's the first time I ever heard of a cop chasing a suspect into the station house. Well, it's got to be a first time for everything, Matt. There's no way out except the way he came in. Yes, that's the only way you can go. Let me talk to the desk officer for a minute. Go ahead, Captain. 21st briefing, Sergeant Waters. This is Captain Kennelly. You didn't see anything of that boy in the brown sports jacket, did you? No, sir. He said to come back this way. Who's the attendant on the job this tour? Bailey, Captain. Well, you better check Bailey and see if he didn't head back toward the cells instead of coming upstairs. Yes, sir, I will. And grab him if he tries to get out that way, will you? Yes, sir, I'll grab him. Well, we'll see if we can find him. He must have been carrying or else he would have stopped. Back through there are the beds for the detectives. Uh-huh. But he'd have had to come into the squad room to get through there. You follow Sticker on. I might need you. Yes, sir. The only other thing we've got on this door is old files from the detective squad. Go ahead. Yes, sir. That door is always locked though. Sit down that way. Hold it. It's not locked now. It sure isn't. It's half open. How'd he get in there? I don't know. Wife, you go down and take the far side of the door. I'm right here. Captain, you take this side, okay? Okay. I'll kick the door open the rest of the way. Uh, wife, how bad is this boy? He's got two felony convictions, Lieutenant. I don't think he'd be so happy about a third one. Is there a user as well as a pusher? Yes, sir, he's a user. I think he's armed. One of his convictions is on a gun charge. All right, let's get set. Okay. Okay. There, behind that car. All right, wait a minute. Take it easy, will you? What are you doing in here? You asked me yesterday to get out the records in that beach case, Lieutenant. Oh, yeah. Look, what's the matter? What's going on here? Detective Weiss, the narcotics squad, Detective Vitale. Oh, yeah. Hello, Vitale. Look, what's the trouble? Weiss chased a suspect into the station house. Into the station house? Yeah. What'd he come in here for? We don't know. He's got a record as long as you're armed. Might be the only place he feels at home. You are listening to 21st Precinct, a factual account of the way police work in the world's largest city. Now? Back to 21st Precinct and Captain Cannelli. We began an immediate search of the precinct house for the fugitive narcotics suspect. First we went to the top of the building, the fourth floor, where the old records of the precinct dating back to the 1880s were stored. We looked behind stacks of old blotters and arrest records, behind filing cabinets and cartons filled with reports made by long-forgotten police officers about long-forgotten crimes. When we were satisfied that the suspect was nowhere on the fourth floor, we came down the narrow winding stairway to the third floor, where the precinct youth patrolmen, the hack inspections, the safety officer, and the civil defense patrolmen have their offices. Only one of these men, Patrolman Jaffe, the hack inspector, was in his office at the time. His attention had been attracted by no one coming out of the floor during the last few minutes, but he said he'd been on the telephone talking to the license bureau and he may not have seen the suspect. We searched each of the offices thoroughly. We searched the washroom and all the storage closets. He was not in there, Captain. He crawled behind everything. I don't think he came up here. He's got to be someplace. But, Talley. Yes, sir? Come on. White? Yeah, here, Lieutenant. Let's go. There was nothing in there but air raid warden helmets. Well, the guy isn't up here. Not unless he crawled up in the back of a plaster. You're sure there's no place he could have gone on the second floor, Lieutenant? The only two doors are to the detective squad and the detective's old file room. He didn't come in the squad. He would have been seen. And he didn't come into the record room. Well, then he didn't come upstairs at all. When he walked into the back room, he went down instead of up. Let's go look for him. Yes, sir. Who was he kidding coming into the station house, White, sir? I guess it was the only place he could go. We knew if he went down to the end of the block that my partner would be around there with a car waiting for him. The station house is the biggest building in the block. We knew what he'd find in here. Didn't know what he'd run into in any of the stores. He might have thought that if you missed him and didn't see him come in here, you wouldn't figure it. Might have thought that, yeah. You sure did a lot of thinking. Just a second. I'm going downstairs. I'll be downstairs. Okay, Lieutenant. Yes, sir. Okay. You figure he was carrying when you're soon? Oh, yeah, he must have been. He didn't have anything on him. He just stopped and talked to us. He had nothing to worry about. He wasn't carrying any goods. These guys are full of conversation when they got no stuff on them. But when they're loaded, they make for the nearest exit. Well, we can take a look in the locker room. What's the layout down there, Captain? Well, there's the locker. Beyond that, the room with the beds. And there's the washroom with showers. Did anybody have been down there? There shouldn't have been. Not this time of day. Wait here a second. I want to go out and talk to the desk officer. Yes, sir. Did you see him, Captain? No, he wasn't upstairs. We're going to try down on the locker. Yeah, he might have gone down there, Captain. You keep your eyes open here. Yes, sir, Captain. No sign of him out there, eh, Captain? No, I haven't seen him. Let's go downstairs. Sorry to put you fellas through all this trouble. It's a novel experience for me, looking for a guy in a station house. Get the door open, Telly. Yes, sir. Okay. Let's go by the lockers first. There's a couple of empty ones there. All right, open them up. We might have dropped the stuff in there. No, nothing in here. Try the other one. Nothing. All right, I'll tell you what. You two go look in the washroom. The Captain and I will go in where the beds are. Okay? Okay, Lieutenant. Come on, White, this way. Okay, Captain. Yeah, man. This fella sure can crawl into a wallpaper, can't he? Yep. He's got to be down here someplace. I don't know where else he could be. Where's the light? It's a wall switch. On the left. Have to open the door. Well, we'd better stand back and reach in. If he's going to do any shooting, he'll have a good shot of us standing in the door. Yep. Okay? Okay. I'll get the light. All right, let's try it out. Okay. Well, let me get down and look under the bed. Nope. How about those two carpets? All right. This guy ought to get ten years. Yeah, twenty. Can't be too good for him. What's in this car? Bedroom and nothing. And blankets. Nope. How about the other one? Cleaning equipment. Blown smart. Get out of my way. Watch him. There he goes. Get out of my way. That's all he wants. Get him. There he goes. The locker room. Grab him. Get out of my way. There he comes. Oh, there he is. Get out of me now. All right. Let him go. Let him go. Let him go. All right. You okay with coming? Let him go. Come on, sit up there. Get out of the bed. Sit up there. Please, let me out of here. Sit up there, will you? Come on, Arthur. All right, I'll hold him. All right, all right. Now calm down, will you? I'm calm. I'm calm. Take it easy. Take it easy, boy. Now what do you want from me? I'm taking it easy. All right. Now get on your feet. Huh? Why? The man is talking to you, Arthur. Get on your feet. All right. Now lean against those lockers there. Go on. Hey, what are you looking for? I can't find anything. What do you think he's looking for? I'm not carrying it. I got nothing. Hey, you see? You see, I got nothing. You can't find a thing. Sit down on the bench, they're on. Go on. Sit down. Vitaly, go look in that broom closet there. See if he's dumped anything in there. What? What would I dump? I wasn't carrying anything. Go on, Vitaly. Okay, let's go. Now listen, you know me. I've been clean. I've been clean as a whistle. I don't mess around with that stuff anymore. Don't you? I don't want any more trouble. I don't mess around with that stuff. It cost me a good two and a half years last time. I don't want it anymore. I don't use it. I don't push it. It's no good. It stinks. It all stinks. Well, why did you run when we wanted to talk to you? I wasn't running. I was walking. Well, you walk awful fast. As a habit, I got a fast walk. Why don't you come into the station house and ask what the detective's for? I thought I might like to talk to a detective. Now, look, Arthur, we've got no time to waste with you. We've wasted enough already. Now, where'd you throw the stuff? You were carrying a load of it when you came in here. What'd you do with it? I didn't have nothing. I wasn't carrying. I told you I don't want no part of that kind of deal anymore. I'm through with it. Roll up your sleeves. Why? Go on. Roll it up. I got a right to know why. Look, are you going to roll it up or do you want me to roll it up for you? All right, all right. Take it easy. I'll roll it up myself. I don't know why you don't leave somebody alone. It leaves somebody being in peace. You've shocked the habitants. Didn't I tell you? What's that from? Well, I've been going to a doctor. He's been giving me penicillin shots. I got a bad throat. What doctor? Some doctor. What's his name? I don't know his name. It's a clinic-like. I go to a clinic. A different doctor every time. Where's the clinic? Near my house there. Where near your house? What's a clinic? Some hospital. I don't know. It's just around the corner from my house. What street is it on? I don't know. It's just near my house. Penicillin you've been taking, huh? Yeah. Yeah, penicillin. Something like that. Let me see that arm again. I've never heard of anybody getting penicillin shots in the veins. All right, maybe it wasn't penicillin. Maybe it was something else. I don't know. I don't know what they shoot into me. You go to a doctor, you don't ask questions. Or you want it to get well. Nothing in a clatter, Lieutenant. What'd you do with it, Arthur? What'd I do with what? The stuff you were carrying. I wasn't carrying anything. Now look, Arthur. You just made a buy right before we saw you. We stopped the car, I got out, and you took off. If you weren't carrying anything, you wouldn't have been in such a hurry. Now what did you do with it, Arthur? I wasn't carrying anything. Why did you take off? Because I wasn't in any mood for conversation. Where are you living now, Arthur? Well, I still live in the same place up there on 113th Street. You know where I live. No, you don't live in the same place. I was by there last week. I stopped in to see you. Super told me you'd moved. He did? He did. Where do you live now? I guess Super was lying. He knows I lived there. He was lying. Why would he want to lie? He likes to lie. He gets a kick out of it. He likes to get people in trouble with his lies. Where do you live now, Arthur? Where? All right, up in the Bronx. I moved to the Bronx. Where in the Bronx? 2142 Vernon Avenue. Are you sure of that? Sure, I'm sure. I wouldn't tell you if I wasn't sure. Between what street? Between Metzger and Naomi. Which house is it? It's on the corner there, right on the corner of Naomi. What kind of building is it? What do you mean, what kind of building is it? What kind of building is it? It's a house. How many stories? Four. Four floors. What floor do you live on? The second, the second in the rear. You live there by yourself? Yeah, all by myself. I got the room all by myself. Just a furnished room? It's two rooms. It's a living room and a small bedroom. You know the building, Captain? Yeah, I know it. Well, I got the key for the place. I got the key in my pocket. You saw the key when you searched me there, didn't you? Yeah, I saw the key. Well, that's the key to that place. What are we going to find there, Art? What do you mean, what are you going to find there? I mean, have you got any goods up there? I told you I was out of that business. And that, that's from Penicillin, huh? All right. It's not from Penicillin. It's not from Penicillin, and you're not out of the business. Yeah, I'm out of the business. Oh, look, I'm only using. See, I'm not, I'm not pushing. Not anymore. Are you working, Arthur? Yeah. Where? Well, here and there, odd jobs. For instance? Oh, I pick up a day's work here and there. How do you expect me to know specifics? Arthur, what did you do with the stuff? I didn't do nothing with it. Because I didn't have any. You came into this station house molded with age, Arthur. Now, where is it? What do you want from me? I didn't. What we want from you is what you did with it. Where'd you throw it? I didn't have any. Now, look, we're going to search this place from top to bottom, Arthur. We've been crawling around in dust behind old filing cabinets and under beds looking for you for half an hour now. If you make us crawl around some more, you're going to hold me in no suit. I'll crawl around if you want. What do I care? What are we going to find up in that flat, Arthur? I don't know. Dirty laundry. You've got the works up there, haven't you? You've got enough stuff to take care of yourself, haven't you? That's good enough for a conviction. Now, what did you do with what you had in your pockets? Yeah. Yeah, you guys are going to keep pestering me until you get an answer, aren't you? You want to know the truth? Yeah. All right. All right, I'll give you an answer. Of all the times I'm walking down the street loaded to the gills, then this time they make me. A car pulls up, I make them, and they make me. I see this here guy get out and he takes out after me. What am I going to do? Here I am, loaded to the gills, every pocket. Why did you come into the police station? Wait, wait. I saw one of them come after me and I saw the other one stay in the car. I knew what he was going to do. He was going to go around the block and come meet me the other way. So I didn't know any of those stores. The only thing in the block was heaven forbid a police station. Oh, I figured I'd take my chance. I'd go inside. Where else could I go? I figured the guy that was walking behind me might figure that was the last place in the world I would go. He might figure the last place. He might just pass it up and go on down the block. So I came inside the police station. Yeah, you were standing in there when I came in, huh? Yes, I was right there. Talking to some Spanish lady. Yeah, that's right. So I asked where the detectives were. That was the first thing that came into my mind, and you said upstairs. So I figured you said upstairs so I'd go downstairs. So I came down here and there wasn't anybody in the locker room, so... So this is where I came. What did you do with the stuff you had in your pocket? It was a shame what I did with it. A plain shame. What? I took it back there and I... I flushed it down the toilet. Did you? Every last nickel's worth of it. You know how much I had? I had $180 in that stuff I just made to buy this morning. $180? Good, cold, hard United States cash. Where'd it go? Down the drain. Down the drain. Every last nickel's worth. Oh, boy, the luck I got. The biggest buy I ever made. Five minutes later I get hooked. I'm on my way. Just when I was getting set up good and business. Oh, I don't know, it's just been worthwhile. Nothing's worthwhile. Nothing. You break your neck to work, you make a buck, and where do you wind up? You wind up making heroes out of four cocks. Big heroes. Arthur, if I had to depend upon you to be a hero, I'd quit tomorrow. Why are you first precinct, Sergeant Waters? Wait a minute, what's the address? Yeah. All right. Now what's the trouble there? Is gas leaking? And so it goes, around the clock, through the week, every day, every year. A police precinct in the city of New York is a flesh and blood miracle round. Anyone can catch the brass ring, or the brass ring can catch anyone. Twenty-first precinct, a factual account of the way the police work in the world's largest city, is presented with the official cooperation of the Patrolman's Benevolent Association, an organization of more than 20,000 members of the police department's city of New York. Everett Sloan on the role of Captain Cannelli, Ken Lynch as Lieutenant King, featured in tonight's cast were Bryna Rayburn, Billy Redfield, Harold Stone, Santos Ortega, John Larkin, and Frank Maas. Written and directed by Stanley Niss, produced for CBS Radio by John Eyes. Art Hanna speaking. Thank you.
