Mob Princess - Tess DiRosa's Story
Copyright© 2025 by Argon
Chapter 27: Closing Cases and Deals
The next morning found Tess, Agent Clare and Shona Andrews on the road to Hershey, PA, armed with a copy of the lab report and a federal search warrant for Eric Walker’s lab bench and desk. Gorman had notified Penn State’s campus cops of the planned interrogation and search, and they had offered their facilities and assistance.
They arrived a little after eight-thirty and went straight up to Keller’s laboratory, where they found the good doctor quite agitated and dismayed. Tess shook than man’s hand and then showed him the official forensic report. He shook his head.
“I should have thought of that myself, really.”
“Well, Doctor, you’re not a cheater, so you didn’t think of it. To my understanding, that speaks in your favor.”
“Yes, maybe, but it’ll be difficult to explain to the rest of my students and to regain their trust.”
“I can imagine, but it’s not your fault. Let’s wait for Mister Walker to arrive, and then we’ll execute the search and apprehend him.”
They had to wait until 9:45 before Walker arrived at the lab, and before he could even take off his jacket, Tess and Agent Clare faced him.
“United State Secret Service. Are you Eric Walker, Sir?” Tess asked, showing her badge.
“Y-yes...”
“I am Special Agent DiRosa, and this is Special Agent Clare. We must ask you to accompany us the campus police station.”
“Why?”
“You are under suspicion of the crime of defrauding the United States by falsifying scientific data in a federally funded research project, to wit NIH Grant Nº NCI2014-77-3857. We have a federal search warrant for your work place and your personal effects. I must advise you that anything you say may be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you have no attorney, a defender will be provided free of cost by the federal court system. Please, come!”
Walker cast a telltale, desperate look at a freezer.
“Doctor Keller, kindly assist Special Agent Clare and Ms. Andrews in searching and sorting the items in that freezer. You know what we are looking for,” Tess added, steering a shell-shocked Walker out of the lab. Outside, two campus policemen took over, taking the suspect away to their station where Tess would interrogate him.
In the meantime, Tess joined Clare and Andrews sorting through freezers and refrigerators with Keller watching. It was Keller who pointed at a carton box bearing a hand-written label with “C21H26O5, 1 mM”.
“That’s prednisone, Agent.”
Andrews took the box and opened it. There were around 30 snap-cap reaction vials, with the caps bearing the “P’sone 1mM” inscription in sloppy handwriting.
“Let’s take them to the lab for analysis and fingerprinting, Ms. Andrews,” Tess ordered the tech, who produced a larger evidence bag and bagged the entire box, storing it in an insulated dry-ice container.
“Doctor, can you find out if this compound was purchased with NIH grant money?” Tess asked Keller, who shook his head.
“I went over our purchase orders for the last six years, ever since I started out here. Nothing. I also went over all the papers published by the colleagues here in Hershey. Also, nothing.”
“Could he have obtained it from the hospital?”
“They have a pharmacy and should be able to find out, Agent.”
“Agent Clare, find the pharmacy and ask them about prescriptions of prednisone, or whether it’s something they stockpiled on the stations or in emergency rooms.”
Clare nodded and took off, leaving Andrews to complete the search and to keep custody over the evidence box.
“Let’s talk to Mister Walker now,” Tess concluded.
The campus police station was only a short walk away, and Tess arrived there only five minutes later. A campus police officer showed her to the interrogation room where she found Walker, his hands shackled to the table. The campus police shift leader sat in with her and Tess looked her suspect over silently.
“What’s this about?” Walker demanded in a shaky voice.
Tess activated the small digital recorder she carried and spoke into it.
“April 7, 20xx. This is Special Agent Teresa DiRosa, United States Secret Service, interviewing Mister Eric Walker, currently pursuing a doctorate at the Cancer Research Center of Pennsylvania State University, Hershey Campus. Present, too, is Sergeant Emile Lovejoy, of the Pennsylvania State University Police Department.
“Mister Walker, pursuant to a complaint raised by Doctor Emanuel Keller, your supervisor, we investigated you for misuse of federal research funding. Last week on Wednesday, we took samples from your cell cultures and found the relevant samples contaminated with an immune modulatory substance, prednisone to be specific. Would you care to explain why you spiked your test cultures with such a substance?”
“Those were my samples!” Walker protested.
“Not so. Ownership rests with PennState and its authorized representatives. You’re only a student, I’m afraid. Now, why did you add an immune modulatory substance to your test samples without recording the fact in your documentation?”
“I didn’t!”
“We found a box of prednisone-filled vials in the freezer you use. We’ll have our forensic lab analyze the contents for a controlled substance, for fingerprints and for your handwriting. Why don’t come clean now and save the tax payers all that work?”
“Will I get fired?”
“That’s for PennState to decide. I believe that you should be more worried about a criminal charge in a federal court of law. Defrauding the United States is a felony.”
For a few more minutes, Walker tried to talk his way out of the mess, but Tess kept asking him questions with an air of complete self-assurance, and ten minutes after she had entered the interrogation room, Walker folded. He confessed to manipulating the experiments to get ‘more exciting’ results, but also to get back at Dr. Keller, who was ‘against him’ and always criticized him. He also admitted to taking a vial of the substance from an emergency cart in the ER when he was treated for a cut he had suffered from a broken glass beaker. Further questioned, he admitted to cutting himself on purpose to gain access.
“I believe you should make use of your right to an attorney now,” Tess concluded, after recalling Clare from her wild goose chase.
The sergeant of the campus police nodded vigorously to that and offered to have the recording of Walker transcribed into written form by his sole detective, an offer Tess accepted, understanding that campus police had their own designs on Walker. Stealing a controlled substance from the ER was certainly frowned upon by the university.
Campus police would also have Walker arraigned before a local judge for the theft charges. An arraignment in Federal Court would follow if the US Attorney deemed it appropriate. In the meantime, Tess and her team collected the evidence and drove back to Philadelphia.
Back in her office, Gorman stuck his face in, telling her that the US Attorney would prosecute Dennis McGhee for threatening the President, adding to federal and state weapons charges.
“It’s a slam dunk for him,” Gorman shrugged. “One more conviction for his resume.”
Tess spent the rest of the day writing reports, both about the Walker case and about the travel and other expenses. The analysis of the evidence found in the laboratory would take a week and more, and then, Tess would be able to present the case to the federal prosecutor.
She also received a call from Piero Santucci, who told her that he estimated the costs of rebuilding the Morton property at between $120,000 and $178,000, depending on the extras Tess and Ted would pick, such as a basement spa and laundry room, but also the finishing of the attic. $120,000 would get them a house fully compliant with current building codes and with an up-to-date heating system. Tess knew immediately that a family rebate was already worked into the estimate, but getting the house fixed seemed doable for Ted and her.
She thanked Santucci and called her uncle Roberto Salieri, who held the lofty position of real estate manager for DiRosa Enterprises, asking him for advice on how to proceed. Laughing softly, he let Tess know that he had already been told to chaperone Tess through the purchase.
“Not much Uncle Vince and Felix miss, is there?” she asked wryly.
“More like nothing,” Roberto chuckled. “I drove by the place yesterday and talked to Petey. Three-hundred K seems a bit stiff given the shape of the place. We should be able to shave off at least $20,000. You want me to handle this? You know Vince. He’s looking out for you and Joey.”
“Lemme talk to my man about that. He wants to chip in, so I gotta ask him before I can give you the go-ahead.”
“I take it you won’t need a mortgage?”
“I won’t, but Ted might. He wants to pay half. It’s important for him.”
“Sounds like a solid guy.”
“He is. I could just buy the house and be done with it, but you know, happy boy gives you joy.”
Roberto guffawed. “Well, let me know. In the meantime, I’ll do a full appraisal based on Petey’s cost estimates.”
“Much appreciated, Uncle Bobby,” Tess laughed. “I’ll call you soon. Thanks for your help!”
“No problem. We’re family, right?”
“Right!”
Two days later, Ted returned to Philadelphia — driving a rental truck and towing a trailer with his car, an older model Toyota, which saw little use as Tess knew. He had vacated the rented duplex, and his landlord had potential successors already lined up. Ted was optimistic that he would get out of the lease soon.
Joey and Tess had organized a storage unit for Ted’s belongings in West Philadelphia, and that was where Ted was rerouted upon arrival. The three of them then shlepped Ted’s furnishings into the compartment, after which Ted returned truck and trailer to the local rental office. They only took some of his clothes, his laptop and some personal items back to Powelton, where he moved into Tess’s room for the time being.
They had at first planned to rent an apartment, but Joey and Deirdre had nixed that, claiming — convincingly — that they loved to have them. They would live with Joey’s family until their own house would be finished. Uncle Roberto already had the go-ahead to negotiate the sale with Mr. Morton, and they hoped to close on it soon, leaving them some time to organize the financing. Joey and Tess arranged for dipping into their former trust funds, now managed by a brokerage firm controlled by Vincent DiRosa, and Ted was arranging a loan with his parents. Things would soon firm up.
Ted had been a busy beaver, and had already lined up job interviews with the school authority, but also with three private schools. The haste with which those places made appointments with him made Ted optimistic.
Therefore, for the rest of the week, Ted wrote formal applications, updated his CV, and Xeroxed his Army service documentations in preparation for those interviews. His old school had given him a glowing reference, in an obvious attempt to mollify him, and Ted Xeroxed that, too, shrugging it off as a piece of his past.
Unbeknownst to Ted, Tess had also phoned with Mrs. Harlow, her old principal, who still remembered her. After some schmoozing and letting Harlow know about her new, senior position in law enforcement and about Joey’s meteoric rise in the life sciences, she had then greased the skids in Ted’s favor, waxing about his willingness to follow his bride, Tess, to her new station, thus showing what a modern, enlightened man he was. Mrs. Harlow agreed that such behavior was certainly a stellar example. Hence, Ted’s interview with Harlow was already set for the next Monday, giving her first dibs on Ted, so to speak. Tess thought that Ted and Benjamin Franklin Preparatory Academy would both profit from hiring him.
Saturday night, Eileen volunteered to babysit Gianni, giving the rest of the household a chance to eat at La Grotta Azzurra, for Ted to meet one of Tess’s future bridesmaids. They had a lovely evening, with Anita Minetti spending some time at their table, leaving Ted with having a new favorite eatery, too. Of course, Tony Minetti chimed in, treating Ted as a make-believe suitor for Anita, and making Joey warn Ted that Tony was not to be trusted to come up with a big enough dowry. The guys had a lot of fun, with Anita protesting in vain against her father’s antics.
“Your lover, he’s just as bad as your brother,” she complained to Tess.
On Sunday, they joined Vincent DiRosa for a lunch at the old man’s favorite restaurant, Branzino. Their host was genial, already treating Ted like a family member, and assuring him of his support in his search for new employment. Of course, he already knew of their housing plans, and he applauded their decision to find a place close to Joey’s family.
Over the course of the lunch, quite a few people dropped by to talk to the old man, and noticed that each of them was discreetly checked by two alert-looking men in expensive black suits, who stood a bit to the side of their principal. Noticing Ted’s look, the old man smiled sadly.
“It is the sorry state of our world that forces me to be cautious.”
“I cannot claim to have insight into the lives of the wealthy,” Ted shrugged. “Although, working as a high school teacher, I sometimes wish to have better workplace security.”
“Should your interview with Missus Harlow go well, you too will be protected by DiRosa Security Services. We provide the security for the academy.”
“Since when? When I went there, we only had retired ex-cops past the use-by date,” Tess asked.
“We use former police officers, too, but we are a little picky about whom we employ. We would love to win the public schools as clients, too, but they have entrenched firms handling their security.”