Its stated purpose was security training and private property risk assessment.
Police officers sometimes performed approved outside employment in private security, training, or consulting. Such work was not automatically prohibited.
But Redbrook required employees to disclose outside business interests and obtain approval when those interests might conflict with official duties.
The relevant disclosure file contained no current authorization for Mallory's work with Sterling Crest.
Hannah Foster examined the payment records.
Sentinel Field Services had received a series of transfers from a contractor associated with Alan Pierce.
Several payments were labeled Community Safety Coordination.
Others were described as Priority Response Consulting.
The amounts were not enormous.
A few thousand dollars here.
Another payment a month later.
But the timing was significant.
Certain payments occurred near clusters of police contacts involving properties Sterling Crest hoped to acquire.
Hannah didn't assume the payments proved bribery.
The company might have provided legitimate consulting services.
The investigators needed contracts, communications, and evidence explaining what work had actually been performed.
Then they found a draft invoice.
It contained a line item that made Hannah stop reading.
Targeted Residential Compliance Support β Hawthorne Avenue.
She stared.
The words weren't necessarily a crime.
But they sounded less like ordinary security training and more like a program intended to pressure particular households.
She looked toward her partner, Detective James Walker.
βFind the supporting agreement.β
James nodded.
He examined the contractor records.
Then opened an attachment.
The document described a plan for increasing official contacts near selected properties.
It recommended maintaining pressure through nuisance complaints, property inspections, and coordinated communication with neighborhood representatives.
At the bottom was Alan Pierce's name.
Beside it appeared a distribution list.
Among the recipients was Derek Mallory.
Hannah felt a cold heaviness.
For months, Alan had described his efforts as protecting property values.
Mallory described his responses as ordinary police work.
But the documents suggested an organized effort to use complaints and official attention as pressure against homeowners who resisted the redevelopment.
The investigators continued.
They obtained relevant communications through the applicable legal process.
Some messages had been deleted from Alan's laptop.
But deletion did not necessarily erase them from every server, account, or recipient.
Copies remained in business email systems.