The Man From Taured (2 page)

Transcript of Interview

Date: June 14, 2014

Time: 9:30 p.m. CST

Person interviewed: Chase Whitlock of TSA, O'Hare International Airport

Interviewer: Noble Randall of I.C.E. on behalf of Homeland Security

Subject: Strange occurrences on June 3, 2014, Chicago O'Hare Airport International Terminal.

Noble Randall (NR): Are you comfortable, Mr. Whitlock?

Chase Whitlock (CW): Yes, fine. It's rather late.

NR: I apologize for that, but we are trying to get through as many of these interviews as we can.                     

We can get started right away if you want.

CW: Please.

NR: We're interested in the case of Francis Duveen. The night of June 3?

CW: Yes.

NR: Can you tell me what happened that night?

CW: With me or with Mr. Duveen?

NR: Let's start with what you did that night and go from there.

CW: Well, I got to work. It was just the start of my damn shift, really. I went to the office, checked

voicemail and email and got coffee. I had just sat down to review some reports when the call came in that there was an incident at the line.

NR: That would be the arrival of Mr. Duveen, I assume?

CW: Yes. He was there with what looked like a legit passport and identification, but he was claiming

to be from a country that did not exist. I even checked.

NR: No Taured.

CW: Never existed from what I can tell. He was insisting that it was real and had been around for

millennia. I got him ushered over to an interview room as quickly as I could. I didn't want him causing a scene and he was holding up the line.

NR: Did you call anyone else?

CW: Not at first. I just thought I could ask a few questions and maybe get it sorted out right away.

NR: Was he receptive to questions?

CW: Yeah. I told him that we were having trouble finding his claim of orientation. He produced

more identification. He worked for the Gemini Corporation and we were able to determine that

such a company does exist. He produced other ID and all of it was from Taured. I asked him if

this was a new country, maybe one that had split off from Russia or something. He seemed confused about this and wondered why there would be countries splitting off from Russia.

NR: How long did this go on?

CW: Maybe an hour? I finally produced a map and asked him to point to where the country of

Taured was.

NR: Was he able to point it out?

CW: Sort of. He pointed to Spain. He pointed to what is listed on the map as the Principality of Andorra

in Spain.

NR: How did he react?

CW: Badly. He kept looking at the map and then at me. He accused me of trying to play a trick on

him. He got up from the table and began pacing and muttering in a language I didn't recognize. I told him to calm down and sit back down and relax. He wouldn't. He kept saying that he had no idea what Andorra was and that Taured was there. That was where it was. He wanted to know why we were playing such a cruel joke on him.

NR: Is that when you called your supervisor and security?

CW: Yes.

NR: Why didn't you notify Homeland Security? Why not call the police?

CW: If you had seen the man's face. The sheer look of absolute terror. He was certain of what he

was saying.

NR: Crazy people are often certain of their delusions.

CW: But you didn't see the passport and ID. It was flawless. It looked real. He wasn't making

threats or anything. He was just scared. I thought that I could calm him down and get him

talking again. Maybe something could be sorted out.

NR: And he did calm down again?

CW: Once my supervisor, Roy, got there he did.

NR: That would be Roy West?

CW: Yes.

NR: Did you and Mr. West continue to question Mr. Duveen?

CW: Yes, for quite a while. I don't even know how long we were in that room. Must have been

hours.

NR: Did you learn anything else?

CW: Not much more. He insisted that he was from Taured and that he was not part of any criminal

organization. He did not make any threats against the United States or even those of us in the

room. He just claimed to be a businessman from Gemini Corporation on a business trip to

Chicago. He said he was as confused as to why Taured was not on the map as we were. He

had no idea why that would be.

NR: It says in the initial report that his went on for almost eight hours. Is that true?

CW: If that is what the report says, that is what I believe.

NR: And you never thought to call Homeland?

CW: My supervisor was there and if he felt that Homeland needed to be called, I would have

listened. Both of us felt that we could just get to the bottom of this on our own.

NR: You are aware that this country was attacked on September 11, 2001?

CW: Of course.

NR: The Department of Homeland Security was created to prevent such things from happening in

the future. A man claiming to be from a fictional country with false papers should be the very

first thing at the top of the list of reasons to call us.

CW: I don't know how to respond to that.

NR: Whose idea was it to put him up in a hotel for the night?

CW: I think that was Roy's idea.

NR: That is one big jump in logic that I am just having a really hard time understanding. I

mean, with the increased security, the fact Homeland wasn't called and Mr. Duveen put into 

custody are some big, glaring errors here. Is this how you handle these kinds of

things?

CW: We've never had this kind of thing happen here before. We've had people here from countries

that fall into war and then their passports are no good. Like that movie? The one with Tom

Hanks? We've had to deal with that, but never anything quite like this. Roy said that the man

was tired. We'd get guards to watch the room and we'd talk to him with fresh eyes, ears and                minds the next morning.

NR: I see. So, you decide to put this guy up at a local hotel. That was the Hilton?

CW: Yes, the one located right there at the airport. It's in a busy area, where anyone trying to climb

out of a window would be seen. Lot of light. There are no ledges or balconies, just glass windows

and walls. There would be no way for the guy to get in and out except through the hotel room door.

We'd provide meal service for him and it would be checked out by the guards before being delivered

to Mr. Duveen. There was no adjoining room or door. It was as secure as a jail cell.

NR: Save for the telephone, king-sized bed, and cable TV.

CW: Yes.

NR: OK, so, let me see if I got this straight. A mysterious man shows up seemingly from nowhere. He

does not cause a disturbance at any point, until you start questioning him about his passport which seems to come from a fictional country. You interrogate him for nearly eight hours, getting nowhere, and then, instead of calling the authorities and notifying my office, you decide to put the guy up in a luxury hotel for the night. Did I miss anything?

CW: Well, it’s a nice hotel but hardly luxury. I mean my supervisor and I spent time making phone calls.

We called his place of employment. We found out that there is a Gemini office in the part of Spain

that he kept calling Taured. They had no record of the guy. They also denied that there was any area

of that part of the world called Taured. We called the office here in Chicago and confirmed they

were open and working, but that no one named Francis Duveen was scheduled for a meeting there.

With anyone.

NR: OK, well, that's something. So, when did you head home?

CW: I headed home when my shift was over in the morning. I told the guy who was taking over for me

about the incident and told him that Duveen was in the hotel room. I said that he should bring him over that morning and try questioning again. If he got the same answers, then it would be time to call you guys.

NR: Good to know that we finally entered the conversation at some point. So what happened then?

CW: I went home. I had just gotten home and was getting ready to eat my dinner and then get into bed for

the day when the phone rang.

NR: Was this the call from Collin Boynton?

CW: Yes, sir. He was my replacement for the morning. Anyway, he's in a panic. He says the guy is not in

the room. His clothes are gone. There's just no trace of him. The guards say they were there all night, never left, and never fell asleep. They heard nothing, not even the television, all night and when the
y
go in the next morning to bring him breakfast, they find Mr. Duveen is gone.

NR: Just like that?

CW: Just like that.

NR: Had the bed been used?

CW: It didn't appear to have been used, no.

NR: So the guy must have escaped not long after you put him in the room.

CW: We don't believe that he escaped.

NR: Oh no? Did he just vanish into thin air?

CW: Yes.

NR: What?

CW: That's what it looked like. There was no other door save for into the bathroom. None of the ceiling

tiles had been removed. We checked the ceiling spaces and there was no way for a grown man to crawl up there without falling through and most of the paths were blocked by vents. There was no damage to any of the air vents and it would have been impossible for a grown man of Mr. Duveen's height to crawl through them. Plus, even if he could somehow manage it, there was no way to get the vent screen back into place and the screws back in. There was no way to get under the floor. The windows were intact. The bed was made. There were no clothes. If he were escaping through vents or something else, he would have had to take his briefcase and his luggage with him, which would have been impossible. He was just gone.

NR: I see. You seem to be quite the detective here. Too bad you weren’t able to follow procedure.

CW: So, is there anything else?

NR: I have no further questions right now, but might have more later.

CW: What happens now?

NR: Well, Mr. Whitlock, I cannot stress enough the sheer amount of procedures that you violated doing

this. I am going to be launching a serious investigation into you and your supervisor. There will be an inquiry and disciplinary action is likely and, yes, you might lose your job. If you're lucky, that will be the only thing that happens. A man enters the country from nowhere, with false papers, and then gets away all on your watch. You had better hope Mr. Duveen is not a terrorist or involved in any terrorist organization, Mr. Whitlock. So, I will be in touch.

CW: What about the weird things that have been happening to me since this all went down?

NR: What weird things?

CW: Strange people lurking outside my house? Weird guys with wide-brimmed hats lurking behind trees.

Is that you guys? Are you going to end the harassment?

NR: Mr. Whitlock, we have no one stationed outside your home. I don’t know what you’re talking about.

CW: Yeah, right. No idea. Look, you’re freaking out my wife and kid. Just stop it. I told you everything I

know and I was following my supervisor’s orders. He just vanished.

NR: If you have people lurking outside your home, call the police. They are not from my department or

Homeland, as far as I know. As for the rest, you can tell that to the inquiry.

END OF INTERVIEW

***

Noble sat in the empty room for some time after Whitlock left. He rubbed his eyes and his temples. This story was just getting stranger and stranger. He checked the time and saw it was after ten o'clock. He had to inspect the room where Mr. Duveen had been placed and the idiots who had put him there had at least had the presence of mind to tape the interview in the interview room. Noble would have to review that as well.

Not tonight. He had already reported the incident to his supervisor. His supervisor was already calling for Whitlock's head and the head of Whitlock's immediate supervisor.

Hotel room.

Really.