The collected musings of Ryan Elder

Basically my story is a thriller where in third act, the MC's revenge plan is to frame the villains, and manipulate the police into going after them, for him. Sort of like the classic playing one side against the other plans.

However, the police who becomes part of his plan to manipulate them, don't really have a role to play hardly, before the third act. They are not really part of the story, and don't really have much to do, before then, since it's the MC doing things by himself.

In fact it is essential that the police do not have a role to play prior, because if they did, they would have known too much, and therefore, wouldn't have been able to be manipulated into such a plan, cause they would already know what is really going on, if they had been part of the plot prior.

So I was wondering, how can I introduce a group of police that are part of the MC's plan in the beginning of the third act, without it coming off as out of nowhere, or a possible deux ex machina if you will, since their is not much for them to do in the story prior, plotwise?

 

I don't think there is anything necessarily wrong with introducing them later but if you wanted to introduce them earlier perhaps have the police sniffing the trail of the MC at an earlier stage. Maybe the heat gets too heavy where he NEEDS to manipulate evidence or whatever to get them not only off his trail but to frame the villains as well.

If you don't want the police investigating anything prior to the end, perhaps the MC knows a cop in his personal life? Brother in law, neighbor, old high school buddy or something, you could introduce the police in that manner.

 

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Sorry my post, posted three times for some reason and I deleted the other two.

 

In my story, the MC who is a cop, is tailing the suspected leader of a gang, on his own time, cause he has a reason to believe that he and the gang of other mystery characters, are behind all the crimes, he is investigating but he has no evidence that is legally solid to do any further investigating. So he is surveying the suspect on his own time.

As he is doing this he learns that another cop who he works with in the same department, is corrupt and has been working with the gang leader all along, feeding him information and what not. The gang leader finds out that he is being surveyed by someone who has found out his identity, which is the MC. The leader calls his gang members for help. They try to box in the cop to find out who is onto the leader, and kill him, if need be.

The corrupt cop finds out that the gang is up to something and observes. He sees that the MC is in danger and tries to stop it. The MC, thinking that the corrupt cop is there to kill him, since the gang has him trapped, shoots the corrupt cop who has his gun out, thinking the corrupt cop was likely going to kill him. The corrupt cop dies.

I want to write it so that the MC pins the death of the corrupt cop on the gang at this point in the story. This results in other cops, who are friends of the corrupt cop, taking revenge on the gang, not knowing that their friend was in collusion with the gang.

However, this is where I hit a road block. I mean if let's say the MC gets rid of the physical evidence at on the body, linking him to the corrupt cop's homicide. All he has to do is call in after, that he saw the gang leader kill the corrupt cop. And then the police would be all over it, probably with the MC's word being enough to get search warrants, and maybe even a wire tap order.

So if the MC's word is enough to get an investigation going, then the other cops will not feel the need to take revenge, cause the system is working instead.

Or maybe the MC does not call it in, cause he takes too much time getting rid of the physical evidence, and it will look too suspicious calling in late, after the time of death? But not sure if a few minutes later would matter.

Or maybe the MC wants to get rid of the evidence and just get the heck out of there and not report it, but link the homicide to the gang leader, without having to report it himself for some reason?

I keep hitting road blocks on this one, cause I want the revenge to happen for the ending I want, but I keep finding the justice system likely working and the motive of revenge, on the other cops' part therefore, not being needed. So what I mean by my question is, how can the villain get away with a murder, that is pinned on him, so that the revenge can happen? What do you think?

 

Gangs sometimes have 'tags' maybe they mark the bodies of their victims in some way. Your cop could emulate this.

 

Yeah the cop actually does do something like that. The gang has been sending in emails to the media and on the net, bragging about their past crimes, but without giving away their identities, since none of the suspects are known to police. Kind of like what the killer in the movie M (1931) did.

So the MC does emulate an anonymous email and he could emulate a tag as well. However, wouldn't he logically still say he saw it though, in which case, that would be enough to get search warrants, and the revenge is therefore not motivated in the other officers?

 

He just needs to let some other cop find the body, maybe he could engineer that.

 

Okay thanks. But after re-reading the story over, a new development has to come mind. Why doesn't the MC just say he the villain do it, to his superiors? Before I wrote it so that he plants evidence, and all that stuff, but now that I read it again, it feels like a plot hole, that he doesn't just say he saw how, and identify him, no?

 

Perhaps he worries about keeping his story straight. Little inconsistencies could unravel his entire lie, with nasty repercussions.

 

For my story, a woman is subpoenaed to testify against a gang member who is arrested and being prosecuted. The rest of the gang, do not want her to be a witness, and she has a cop watch her house at night. I want the cop to be knocked out, or incapacitated somehow.

So for the rest of the night, she is forced to defend herself and her home on her own, with more available cops to watch her, since the police cannot send anymore, or at least have any more stay the whole night, after investigating an attack on her house.

But how can I write it so that the cop will be incapacitated for the rest of the night, but be okay the next day pretty much, so he can fit back into the story later, when I want to use him again? Is there any type of injury that would work for this effect?

 

Few minutes. Beyond that there might be a full recovery but it would be a serious injury.

But you can have the cop be groggy for the night after 10-15 minutes being unconscious. By the next day they might still be a bit foggy headed but could function normally.

You have a problem though in that, why can't the cop just call for more help? Maybe he needs to get locked in his trunk or something.

 

He calls for more help, and they arrive. They investigate the scene, and tell her to go stay at a friend's house, and then leave. At least when I asked real cops how the scene would go down, that's what they told me would happen, and it's quite common that they don't have the budget to assign an officer to watch one person's house, for a whole night.

But I do want the main character cop to still respond though, in which case, he and others that respond with him, can get the cop out of the trunk nevertheless. But after they investigate, and the intruders are gone, and they tell her to go someone else's house for the night, I want her to be alone without the police after that. So I want the one officer watching her to be groggy or unfit to carry on protecting her for the rest of the night in the plot.

 

Alright, I got a question on this topic.

So were I to go from what little I have written for the intro then transition quickly with literally something like "And then the mercenary company responded to Joe's application with a helicopter which landed right in front of him and took him to the island" that would be a good idea? Do other authors struggle with this same issue and get through it this way, do you think?

 

I couldn't answer that without knowing what's in the intro. Does the sentence above flow logically from what came before? Is it believable in the context of the world you're creating or is it a cloud of smoke to allow you to figure out where you're going? The cloud of smoke can work to get you moving, I suppose, but it may create more headaches for you later on.

I rarely struggle with getting from the very beginning to deeper into the story. My ideas about what I want to do are usually pretty firm for the early parts, fuzzier for the later parts. And that makes sense, because both stories and characters evolve as we get to know them better.

 

To be honest if I were you I would worry about the beginning later. Like one poster said beginnings are prone to change a lot. This has happened to me many times where I had to tweak my beginning.

 

For my story, basically the villain plans to get off for his crimes in court, but he waits until the preliminary hearing before introducing evidence that will exonerate him. Then I wanted him to be a free man, for the time being in the story.

But I was told that this is implausible by a reader because if he waits to introduce evidence, he would be charged with obstruction of justice, for wasting the courts time, when he had evidence that could get him off. So if that's the case, how can I write it so that the reader will believe it, or how could I sell it better, than he does not go to jail on obstruction of justice crimes after?

 

You could have someone else introduce the evidence like henchman or a family member. That way he wouldn't be accused of withholding evidence and would walk free

 

Okay thanks. This is what actually happens, he has a witness introduce it for him. But I was told it would be the same thing, and that him and the friend would be held in contempt and charged with obstruction of justice for taking so long and dragging it out, when they knew he was innocent all along. I don't want him and the friend to be charged though and want them to walk free, if that's possible.

 

Basically for my story, which is a thriller set in modern times, a gang of villains are recruiting a new member, and they give him a 'blood in', which is a term used for when a gang tests a new recruit, by having him/her spill the blood of another person, or at least see if they will do it.

The gang in my story, wants to make sure that the new recruit is not be an undercover cop. So they put him through the blood in, but they do not want to put the man in a situation where he has to harm a real hostage. The reason is, is because if he is an undercover cop, and there could be other cops nearby, they would be up on kidnapping related charges, if they had a real hostage for the new recruit to harm.

So the gang decides to use one of it's own members, posing as a hostage, for the new recruit to pull the trigger on. But the gun will not be loaded. It will be loaded with a dummy round, that won't fire, in case the new recruit is an undercover cop. That way, if he is, and he tries to bust the gang, the hostage, will not testify against them, if she is rescued.

During the blood in test though, a real cop is patrolling the streets, and he gets a glimpse of two of the gang members search the new recruit for weapons and a wire. He sees that the new recruits are hiding their faces with sunglasses and hats, as well, to hide their faces from the new recruit.

After seeing that the new recruit is clean, the gang takes him to the place where they are holding one of their own members, who is posing as a hostage for the new recruit.

The cop follows them, sneaks around to see what is going on, and spots the blood in, in progress. He stops it and manages to arrest one of the gang members, and rescue the fake hostage, thinking she is real. The other gang members as well as the new recruit, escape as the cop rescues her and arrests the one.

I wrote it out before that she doesn't know what the cops know, and therefore she does not want to get caught in any lies. So she chooses to remain silent, and not say anything. This causes the police to want her to cooperate so the prosecution subpoenas her to appear at a preliminary hearing, to testify against the arrested defendant.

This causes the gang to worry that she will be caught in a lie, even though she is willing to, when being forced to testify, and they plan on killing her.

However, after going over the plot with fresh eyes, and asking some others' opinions, the defendant being arrested causes complications in the plot that I don't want.

So I was thinking of changing it to that maybe the entire gang gets away, and all the cops have is her, but she will not cooperate, in telling anything about the others. So I was thinking of writing it, so that the prosecution subpoenas her to appear before a grand jury instead of a preliminary hearing, and she will testify at the grand jury with no defendant to prosecute. She just testifies as to what happens.

However, is this enough of a reason for the gang to come after her and kill her? Especially if no defendant has been arrested? They don't have to try to kill her necessarily, but I would like them to physically come after her, even if it's just for threats or another reason. In order for the story to go where I want it to go, I would like a physical attack on her of some sort, for it to work.

Or would the gang have to actually have one of their members in custody in order to be pushed far enough to kill one of their own?

Thank you anyone for your opinions. I really appreciate it.

 

Can't answer about how the American legal system works but I'll try to share some thoughts and see if they can help you.

I think its hard to say what the gang will do without knowing about personal relations. As a principle, yes, any gang member who cooperate with the police will be killed by their gang if possible. But thing is also that to my knowledge getting to prison from time to time is part of the criminal life, and so if the member who got caught shuts up, or the gang is confident in that she won't say anything, then they will probably just wait for her to come out again and get back into the gang.

So as I see it, the gang member you want to be attacked could perhaps have either some sort of action in the past that makes the gang think she'll rat on them, or if they are pretty trigger happy her really just cooperating with the system could absolutely make the gang, in my mind, think thatthis chick will keep talking and start spilling stuff and so she needs to be silenced.

One scenario I thought of is this: The gang killed a trio of drug dealders who wouldn't pay for operating on their territory and the "hostage" was part of that operation but showed some kind of hesitation over it, even if she went through with it. Now when she's caught they are afraid she will spill all the beans and so need to be silenced, or if you want the gang to be more of assholes, she rejected advances by a friend of the gang's leader and now he's used his friendship with the leader to get back at her by having her killed. I absolutely think you could build up a backstory of the gang and its members' relations to explain why the story plays out.

 

I'm a little confused. If the cops believe they have a victim, but she is unwilling to testify and the cops have no perpetrator of a crime, what good is the subpeona? To go to trial, you need a defendant, whereas in the situation you described, you don't have one. I may be reading this completely wrong or be more clueless than I think about the legal system, but I don't see how she would be a threat to the gang. Plus, I don't see how the cops could hold her or anyone could force her to testify.

A bigger threat would be if the cops/lawyers knew she was a gang member and arrested her on actual charges. They could then offer her a deal in return for testifying against the other gang members. In this case, yes, I could see the gang trying to kill her.