In this gripping episode of Gangland Wire, host Gary Jenkins sits down with Robert “Bob” Cooley, the Chicago lawyer whose extraordinary journey took him from deep inside the Outfit’s criminal operations to becoming one of the federal government’s most valuable witnesses against organized crime.

Cooley pulls back the curtain on the hidden machinery of Chicago’s underworld, describing how corruption, bribery, and violence shaped the Chicago Outfit’s power in the 1970s and beyond. As a lawyer, gambler, and trusted insider, Cooley saw firsthand how mob influence tilted the scales of justice—often in open daylight. Inside the “Chicago Method” of Courtroom

Corruption
Cooley explains the notorious system of judicial bribery he once helped facilitate—what he calls the “Chicago Method.” He walks listeners through: How defense attorneys worked directly with Outfit associates to buy favorable rulings. The process of approaching and bribing judges. Why weak forensic standards of the era made witness discrediting the key mob strategy. His personal involvement in the infamous Harry Aleman murder case, where clear guilt was erased by corruption.

Life in the Outfit: Gambling, Debt, and Mob Justice
Cooley recounts his early days gambling with Chicago Outfit associates, including Marco D’Amico, Jackie Cerrone, and John DeFranzo. Notable stories include: The violent implications of unpaid gambling debts in mob circles. Tense interactions with bookmaker Hal Smith and the chaotic fallout of a bounced check involving mobster Eddie Corrado. How D’Amico often stepped in—sometimes with intimidation—to shield Cooley from harm. These stories reflect the daily volatility of life inside the Outfit, where money, fear, and loyalty intersect constantly.

Bob Cooley has a great book titled When Corruption Was King where he goes into even greater detail and has many more stories from his life inside the Chicago Mob.

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0:06 Introduction to Bob Cooley
1:32 Life as an Outfit Gambler
2:00 My Relationship with Marco D’Amico
10:40 The Story of Hal Smith
11:05 A Dangerous Encounter
20:21 Meeting Sally D
22:23 A Contract on My Life
22:37 The Harry Alleman Case
34:47 Inside the Courtroom
51:08 The Verdict
52:26 Warning the Judge
53:49 The Case Against the Policewoman
58:36 Navigating the Legal Maze
1:08:14 The Outcome and Its Consequences
1:11:39 The Decision to Flip
1:24:38 A Father’s Influence
1:33:57 The Corruption Revealed
1:50:12 Political Connections
2:02:07 The Setup for Robbery
2:20:29 Consequences of Loyalty

transcript
[0:00] Hey, guys, my guest today is a former Chicago outfit associate named Robert Bob Cooley. He has a book out there titled When Corruption Was King. I highly recommend you get it if you want to look inside the Chicago outfit of the 1970s. Now, Bob’s going to tell us about his life as an outfit gambler, lawyer, and I use payoff to judges to get many, many not guilty verdicts. Now, I always call this the Chicago method. This happened for, I know, for Harry Ailman, a case we’re going to talk about, Tony Spolatro got one of these not-guilties. Now, the outfit member associate who is blessed to get this fix put in for him may be charged with a crime, even up to murder. And he gets a lawyer, a connected lawyer, and they’ll demand a bench trial. That means that only a judge makes the decision. A lawyer, like my guest, who worked with a political fixer named Pat Marcy.

[0:53] They’ll work together and they’ll get a friendly judge assigned to that case and then they’ll bribe the judge. And all that judge needs is some kind of alibi witnesses and any kind of information to discredit any prosecution witnesses. Now, this is back in the olden days before you had all this DNA and all that kind of thing. So physical evidence was not really a part of it. Mainly, it was from witnesses. And they just have to discredit any prosecution witness. Then the judge can say, well, state hadn’t really proven their case beyond a reasonable doubt and issue a not guilty verdict and walk away. Now, our guest, Bob Cooley, is going to take us inside this world.

[1:29] And it’s a world of beatings, murders, bribes, and other kinds of plots. He was a member of the Elmwood Park crew. He was a big gambler. He was a big loan shark. And he worked for a guy named Marco D’Amico, who was their gambling boss and loan shark in that crew. Among other bosses in this powerful crew were Jackie Cerrone, who will go on and become the underboss and eventually the boss for a short

[1:55] period of time. and John no-nose DeFranzo, who will also go on to become the boss eventually. What was your relationship with Marco D’Amico? I talked about when I first came into the 18th district, when I came into work there, and they put me back in uniform, the first person I met was Rick Borelli. Rick Borelli, he was Marco’s cousin.

[2:23] When I started gambling right away with Rick, within a couple of days, I’m being his face, and I’m calling and making bets. There was a restaurant across the street where every Wednesday and sometimes a couple days a week, I would meet with Ricky. And one of the first people he brought in there was Marco. Was Marco. And Marco would usually be with a person or two. And I thought they were just bookmakers.

[2:55] And I started being friendly with him, meeting him there. Then I started having card games Up in my apartment And, Because now I’m making, in the very beginning, I’m making first $100 extra a week. And within a couple of weeks, I’m making $500, $600 extra a week. And within about a month, I’m making $1,000, sometimes more than that. So now I’m having card games, relatively big card games, because I’ve got a bankroll. I’ve got probably about $5,000, $6,000, which seemed like a lot of money to me. Initially uh and after a while that was a daily that was a daily deal but uh so we we started having card games up there and then we started socializing we started now he’d be at these nightclubs all the time when when i’d go to make my payoffs he was part of the main group there he was one of the call he was right he was right under jack right under at that time originally Jackie Cerrone, and then he was right under Johnny DeFranco.

[4:07] But he was… And we became real good friends. We would double date and we spent a lot of time together. And we had these big card games. And that’s when I realized how powerful these people were. Because after one of the card games, there was somebody that was brought in, a guy named Corrado. I’m pretty sure his name was I can’t think of his first name, but Corrado was this person that somebody brought into the game. And after we finished playing cards, and I won all the time. I mean, I was a real good card player, and I wouldn’t drink. I’d supply liquor and food and everything, but I wouldn’t drink. And as the others drank, they were the same as at my office. After we finish up, this guy says, you want to play some? We can play maybe some gin. just human being. And he was there with another friend of his who just sat there and watched. So we played, not gin, but blackjack. We played and passed cards back and forth when you win. Then you’re the dealer and back and forth. And I lost, I think I lost about $4,000 or $13,000 to him.

[5:26] I lost the cash that I had. I had cash about $5,000 or $6,000. And I gave him a check for the rest. You know, but everything I was doing was wrong, you know. Yeah, one of those nights. It’s in there. And it’s funny because you asked about Marco.

[5:47] And I thought, you know, oh, well, and whatever. And I gave him a check. I said, no, it’s a good check. And it was. It was for my office. It was an office check that I gave him. And that next morning, I’m meeting with Ricky and with Marco at this restaurant across from the station before I go in and to work. And I said, son of a B. I said, you know, they had a bad night first ever. Marco wasn’t at that game, at that particular game. And what happened? I said, I blew about 12,000. Okay, but you? Wow. And I said, yeah, I said, one of the guys at the game played some, I played some blackjack with somebody. What was his name? Eddie, Eddie Corrado. Eddie Corrado. He said, that mother, he said, stop payment on the check. He said, stop payment on the check. He said, because it wasn’t nine o’clock. It was only like, you know, seven, you know, seven 30 or whatever. He said, and when he gets ahold of you, arrange to have him come to your house. Tell him you’ll have the money for him at your house. So that’s what I, that’s what I do. So I stopped payment on it probably about five after nine. I get a call from, from Mr. Corrado. You mother fucker.

[7:17] I said, no, no. I said, there wasn’t enough money in the account. I said, I’m sorry. I said, all right, then I’ll be over. I said, no, no, no. I said, I’m in court right now. I said, I’m in court. I said, I’m going to be tied up all day. I’ll meet you at my place. I’ll meet you back there. Well, I’ll be there. You better have that. I want cash and you better have it. Okay. Oh, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m at home. Marco comes in. And he was there with Tony and Tony was there and Ricky was there. And Ricky was there. And they come over a little ahead of time and he comes in. I live on the 27th floor. The doorbell rings. Up he comes with some big mustache.

[8:00] I open the door. You better have the fucking money and whatever. And I try to look nervous. I try to look real nervous. and when you walk into my apartment you walk in and you see the kitchen right in front of you and to the left to the left you’ve got an area away and you’ve got the the kitchen wall blocking what’s behind it over there and these three guys are standing marco and you are standing right there alongside of it and and when he walks in behind me, He sees Marco and all but shit in his pants. When he sees Marco, he goes, and Marco, you motherfucker. And, you know, oh, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t know he was with you. He says, how much money you got me right now? And, you know, he says, pull your pockets out. He had about, he had about three or 4,000 with him.

[9:02] And he says, you give him that. He says, you, he says, you, and he says, you give him that right now. And you apologize to him. Oh, and he says, he says, and I may give you a number. I want you to call. He says, we can put you to work. Apparently this guy had done the same thing to them a few years before and got the beating of his life somebody brought him into one of their card games, did he have a technique a cheating technique or had some marked cards no it was a card mechanic he could play games with cards they call him a mechanic and, in fact the guy was great at it because he had his own plane and everything else. But again, he had moved from Chicago and had just come back in the area. And they mounted. And so anyhow, he leaves. And he leaves then, and Marco took the money. Marco took the money. Marco took the money. Typical Bob guy, man.

[10:19] And I says, what about the cash I lost to him? He says, well, you lost that. He says, you lost that. That’s when I realized how powerful. That’s when I realized how powerful that

[10:35] he was part of the mob, not only a part of it, but one of the operational. Yeah, important part of it. That brings to mind another unbelievable situation that occurred.

[10:49] The, uh, this is probably the, we’ll know the year by when it happened. There was a bookmaker named Hal Smith. Oh yeah. I remember that name. He got, tell us about Hal Smith.

[11:05] Well, Hal Smith was a, he was a big guy too. A real, a real big guy. I met him on Rush street. He knew I was a gambler. He knew that I was a big gambler and I started gambling with him. Thank you. And I was with him probably for about maybe five or six months. And I’d win with him. I’d lose with him. And he would take big places. He would take $5,000 a game for me. And as they say, so the numbers were big. At the end of the week, we were sometimes $60,000, $70,000.

[11:42] They were big numbers back and forth. And he was always good for the money. I was always good for the money. And one particular week, it was about $30,000. And I was waiting for money. Somebody else was supposed to give me even more than that. And the person put me off. And it was a good friend of mine. And I knew the money would be there. But a lot of times, these guys are going to collect it at a certain time. And then they’re expecting to give it to somebody else. Well, he was short. So I said, look, I don’t have it right now, but I’ll have it tomorrow, I said, because I’m meeting somebody. Well, okay, it better be there.

[12:31] And look, it’ll be there, okay? Not a problem. So the next day, the person I’m supposed to get it from says, I’ll have it in a couple of hours. I don’t have it right now, but I’ll have it by late this afternoon. And I’m in my office when Hale Smith calls me and I said, I’ll have it a little bit later. And he slams the phone bell. I’m downstairs in Counselor’s Row. In fact, I’m meeting with Butchie and Harry. We’re in a booth talking about something. They had just sent me some business or whatever, but I’m talking about something. And George, the owner of the restaurant, comes over and he says, somebody is asking who you are and they want to talk to you. And they point out this guy. It was a guy I had seen before, because a lot of times at two in the morning, I would go down on West Street, and they had entertainment upstairs. And there was this big English guy. He was an English guy, as you could tell by his accent, a real loud guy. And when I walk up to talk to him, and he’s talking loud enough so people can hear him, and he says, you better have that. I’m here for it. You better have that. You better have that money.

[13:51] Bob Hellsmith sent me, you get the money and you better have that money or there’s going to be a problem or whatever. And I said, well, the money will be there, but people can hear what this guy, this guy talking that shit. And he leaves. And he leaves. He’s going to call me back. And he leaves. I said, I’m busy right now. I says, give me a call back when I’m in the office and I’ll meet with you. So Butch, he goes, what was that all about? And I said, you know, it’s somebody I owe some money to. Well, who is he? Who is he with? I said, Harold Smith. And he said, who’s Harold Smith? You don’t pay him anything. He said, you don’t pay him anything. And he calls, when he calls back, he says, you will arrange to meet him. And I said, you know, I said, well, where?

[14:44] And they knew where I lived. They’d been to my place at that time. I’m living in Newberry Plaza and they said, there’s a, there’s a Walgreens drugstore in Chicago Avenue. Tell him you’ll meet him there at Walgreens, and we’ll take it. And he says, and we’ll take it from there. When he does call me, I said, look, I said, I’ll meet you tomorrow morning for sure at Walgreens. I’ll have the cash. I said, I’ll have the cash, and I’ll have all of it. I said, but, you know, I’m tied up on some things. I said, I’ll go to my own bank when I’m finished here and whatever, and I’ll see you tomorrow morning for sure at 9 o’clock tomorrow morning. Okay. I sit down with them and they just said, I said, they said, go there and go meet them. And we’ll take care of it. The Walgreens is a store right in the corner of Michigan Avenue and Chicago Avenue, south side of the street. And it’s all windows. Huge windows here. Huge windows here. And a bus stop, a bus stop over here. When I get there, I park in the bus stop and I’m looking to my right and here he is sitting in a booth by himself, right by the window. And I look around and I don’t see anybody. I mean, with a lot of people, I don’t see Butchie.

[16:06] Uh or red or anybody around but i i go in there anyhow and uh sit down and i uh sit down in the booth across from him and he’s eating breakfast he’s got some food in front of him and uh the girl comes by right away the girl comes by and i says you know just get me a coke and and he says have you got the money and i said yes and why i got i got a lot i got a lot of money in my pocket but not the, whatever it was he wanted, not the 27 or 28,000. There’s nobody there. And, uh, so we’re talking for no more than about two or three minutes. They had a telephone on the counter. I hear the phone ring and the waitress, the waitress is on the phone. And then she comes walking over and she says, it’s a call for you. And, and when I go get in the phone, I woke up and there’s a phone booth there. And here’s Butchie in the phone booth. And he’s there with a couple of other people. I hang the phone up. I walk over and I had my appointment booked. And I walk over and I just pick up the book. And as I’m walking out there, walking in, we pass each other. And so now when I get in my car and he’s looking at me in my car and right next to him is Butchie. And across from him was a red old male and Fat Herbie.

[17:34] Herbie Blitzstein? Herbie Blitzstein? No, it wasn’t Herbie. This is another one. That’s one thing of Herbie. We called Herbie Fat. It was Fat Herbie. And the third guy is like sitting facing him. This is like, that weighs about 300 pounds. Oh, Sarno. Make Mike Sarno. Mike Sarno. That was it. And that’s, that’s, that’s who it was. You know, and I, I drive off, go to my office and go about my business. I get a call later that day from, uh, Hale Smith. Where’s my money? Where’s my money? I said, I gave it to your guy. You what? I gave it to him. I met him at nine o’clock this morning and I gave him the money. You did. And I said, yeah. Um, okay. And he hangs, and he hangs up. I don’t hear anything for a while. I never saw him again. I saw Hale a couple of times because he was always in one of the other restaurants. I lived in Newberry right across from there, but he never talked to me. I never talked to him, never said anything. It was about maybe it had to be a good couple of months later, When I read about Hale, Hale’s no longer with us.

[18:52] That’s obviously how they found out about him. I never saw the other guy again. I’m hoping they didn’t kill him, but I’m assuming that’s what probably happened to him. In a public place like that, they probably just scared him off. He probably said, you know, I’m way over my head. I’m out of here.

[19:15] They didn’t kill him in the public place he wouldn’t have been in the newspapers my little thought is like with the three guys they took him for a ride, I don’t know they just told him to leave town and he realized what it was and he did Hal didn’t get a chance to leave town Hal had other problems if I remember right I’d have to look it back up but he had other problems with the outfit what I found out later what they had done, was they had gotten one of their guys connected with him to find out who his customers were. In other words, one of the other people that he didn’t realize, that Hale didn’t realize was with them, they got him connected with them where he’s the one who’s doing his collecting and finding out who the customers were because they wanted to get all his customers as well as his money. It turns out he was He was a huge bookmaker for years. That’s what happened to him. And they just took his book. Yeah, I remember something about that story because I killed him in his house, I believe. Yeah, Sally D.

[20:22] Sally D, yeah. Sally D was one. When I first met Sally D, he was with Marco’s Fruit, too.

[20:30] He owned a pizza place up on the north side, north shore, and I broke him. I was betting with him and beating him week after week. And one of the last times I played with him, he couldn’t come up with the money. It took him an extra couple of weeks to get the cash to pay me. But we were real close friends with him. He’s a bizarre character because he was a totally low level at that time. Yeah. When he then connected up with the Cicero crew, with Rocky and Felice, with Rocky and those people, he became a boss with them. It turns out it was after they killed Al Smith. He was part of all that. That’s Salih De Laurentiis. He’s supposed to be a boss. He moved on up after the Family Secrets trial. He didn’t go down with that, I believe, and he kind of moved on up after that. I don’t know what happened to him. What was so funny about that, when he would come into the club, Marco’s club, Bobby Abinati.

[21:42] Who was strictly a very low-level player, although we indicted him with the Gambia star. He’s the one who set up the robbery. Would that have been great if that would have gone through? He’s the one who set up that robbery in Wisconsin. He’d be making fun of Salihide all the time.

[22:03] When Salihide would come in, he would make fun of him and joke about him and talk about what a loser he was. This is when he’s a boss of that crew. I mean, just a strange, I mean, nobody talked to bosses like that, especially when, when you’re, when you’re what they call Bobby, you know, what was Marco’s nickname for Bobby Knucklehead?

[22:23] That was his nickname, Knucklehead. Pat Marcy, uh, contacted me about, you know, handling me in the only own case.

[22:32] I couldn’t have been happier because that was a short time after they put a contract on me. So now i realized if they’re going to be making money you know they finally stopped because for good six seven months when i when i came back to chicago uh i was checking under my car every day in case there was a bomb i moved i moved from uh from a place that i own in the suburbs into an apartment complex so i wouldn’t be living on the first floor yeah it’d be impossible to somebody to break into my, you know, took them thrashing into my place. I changed my whole life around in that sense.

[23:10] And when I drove everywhere I went, you know, I would go on the highway and then jump over. I would do all, I wanted to make absolutes. Even though nobody came around, I wasn’t taking any chances for a long period of time. And that was too when it cost me a fortune because that’s when I stopped dealing with the bookmakers because I wasn’t going to be in a position where I had to go meet somebody at any time to collect my money and whatever.

[23:39] So what had happened, though, was somebody came to see me. And when I was practicing, there’s a lot of things I wouldn’t do. I set my own rules. I would not get involved. After the Harry Alleman case, I never got involved anymore myself fixing certain cases. But even prior to that, I wouldn’t fix certain cases. I wouldn’t get involved in certain cases, especially involving the police, because my father was such a terrific policeman, and I felt I was too in a lot of sentences. I loved the police. I disliked some of the crooked cops that I knew, but on the surface, I’d be friendly with them, etc. Harry Ailman was a prolific hitman for the Elmwood Park crew. He killed a teamster who wouldn’t help set up trucks for the outfit, a guy named Billy Logan. He was just a regular guy. He’s going to take us right into the meeting with the judge. He’ll take us into a counselor’s row restaurant where these cases were fixed. Now, Bob will give us a seat right at Pat Marcy’s table. Now, Pat Marcy was the first ward fixture, and he’s going to take us into the hallway with Pat Marcy where they made the payoffs.

[24:57] Now, Bob, can you take us inside the famous Harry Aileman murder case? I know you fixed it. And tell us, you know, and I know there was a human toll that this took on that corrupt judge, Frank Wilson. Okay. The Harry Aileman case was, it was not long after I became partners with Johnny DeArco. I get a call from, I’m in Counselor’s Row at the restaurant. Whenever I was in there now, my spot was the first ward table. Nobody was allowed to sit there day or night. That was reserved for first ward connected people and only the top group of people.

[25:40] I’m sitting there at the table and Johnny DeArco Sr. Tells me, you know, Pat wants to talk to you. About something. And I said, you know, sure. Not long afterwards, Pat comes downstairs. We go out. We go out in the hall because we never talk at the table. And he tells me, have you got somebody that can handle the Harry Alleman case? I had seen in the news, he was front page news. He was one of the main mob hitmen. He was partners with Butchie Petrucelli. But it was common knowledge that he was a hitman. He looked like one. He dressed like one. He acted like one. And whatever. And he was one. In fact, he was the one that used to go to New York. And I know he also went to Arizona to do some hits and whatever. He traveled around the country. I said to Pat, they thought the case was a mob hit on a team street. a teamster. I assumed that it was just that. It was people doing what they do. But I said to Pat, I said, well, get me the file. Get me the file. Let me see what the case looks like. Because I would never put a judge in a bad spot. That was my nature.

[27:06] When I had cases, a lot of these judges were personal friends of mine. What I would do, if I wanted to have a case, if I wanted to fix a case to save all the time of having to go to a damn long trial, I would make sure that it was a case that was winnable, easily winnable. When I got the file, when I got the file from Pat, he got me the file the next day. The next morning, when he came in, he gave me the file. I looked at the file. It was a throw-out case. When I say throw-out case, absolutely a nothing case.

[27:46] The records in the file showed that a car drove up down the street. Suddenly somebody with a shotgun blasted a guy named Billy Logan in front of his house and drove away. They were contacted by a neighbor, this guy, Bobby Lowe. Was it Bobby Lowe? Yeah, I’m pretty sure Bobby Lowe. Who indicated that he opened the door and let his dog run out. And when he looked, he saw somebody. He saw a car, and he gave a description of the car. And he saw somebody pull up, and he saw him shoot with a shotgun. And then he saw the person get out of the car and shoot him with a .45, and shoot him with a .45. And then the car sped away. That was pretty much the case. Some other people heard some noise, looked out, and saw a car driving away. A period of time after that, it had to be about a year or so after that, somebody was arrested driving to Pennsylvania to kill somebody. There was a guy who stopped.

[29:16] Louie Almeida was his name. Louie Almeida was stopped in his car. He was on the way to Pennsylvania. And in front of his car, he had shotguns. And he winds up, when he gets arrested, he winds up telling the authorities that he can tell them about a mob murder back in Chicago and winds up cooperating with them. He indicates what happened. He indicated that, you know, he was asked to, you know, or he got involved in it. He got the car and whatever. They did this. They did that. And he pulled up alongside Billy and wound up shooting the victim as he came out of the house.

[30:09] Now, I look at some other reports in there, some reports that were made out, new reports. They talk about the Louis Almeida. They talk about the witness that gave the first statement. and they said that they found, or he’s giving us a new statement now where he says he’s walking his dog. He hears a shotgun. His dog runs towards the car where the shooting was coming from. He saw Harry get out of the car and walk over and shoot him, walk over and shoot the victim, and he was looking at him, And then he jumped in the bushes and the car drove away. A complete new story. Yeah. A complete new story. And. I looked at the reports, and this is an easy winner. And so I told Pat, you know, I’ll take it. You know, I’m sure I can handle it. I said, I’m sure I can handle it, but, you know, I’ll let you know.

[31:21] That’s when I contacted, I met my restaurant, Greco’s, and I had Frank Wilson there a lot. Well, I called Frank Wilson, invited him and his wife to come to the restaurant. I had done that many times before. When he gets there, I tell him, I have the case. You know, I told him I was contacted on this case, I said. And I said, it’s an easy winner, I said. And I explained to him what it was. I told him, you know, it’s the driver of the car who’s doing this to help himself. And this other guy, Bobby Lowe, that gave a complete new story from the original story that he gave. And I indicated, you know, can you handle the case? And he tells me, I can’t handle the case, he said, because I was SOJ’d. In Chicago, Illinois, they have a rule that makes it easy for people to fool around because for no reason at all you can ask to have a judge moved off the case. And you can name a second judge that you don’t want to handle the case.

[32:34] Frank Wilson’s reputation was as such that the lawyer that turned out to be a judge later on, Tom Maloney, who had the case, named him in the SOJ. It was assigned to somebody else, and he indicated he wanted any other judge except Frank Wilson. Frank Wilson on the case. And this was Harry Aileman’s lawyer. Yeah. Okay. And who Tom Maloney, who then ends up being the judge years later. But yeah. Well, because we knew he was going to be a judge. Yeah. We knew ahead of time. I knew at that time. That’s what makes the story so unbelievably interesting. Yeah. Anyhow, he says, I can’t do it because… In Chicago, in Chicago, it’s supposed to keep it honest. I love this. To keep it honest. Yeah. To keep it honest, each judge is supposed to be picked by computer.

[33:33] Same thing they’re doing to this day. Trump wondered why the same judge kept getting all his cases. Because they’re doing the same thing we did, some of us could do in Chicago. He was the chief judge in the area. he said to me, I don’t think I can get the case. I don’t think I can’t get the case. I said, I’ll get the case to you. I said, I’ll get, because I already, I, in fact, through Pat Marcy, anytime I wanted a case to go anywhere, I would contact Pat and I’d give him a thousand dollars and he would get me any judge I wanted. Uh, I said, well, I think I can. I said, I said, And I gave him $1,000.

[34:16] I said, here, this is yours. And if I can’t get the case to you, you keep it. If I can’t get, I never said to him, will you fix it? Will you this or that? I mean, he understood what it was. I didn’t know how he would react to it. When I asked him, would you handle it? Were the words I used. I had never fixed anything with him before.

[34:43] In case he was, you know, he would want to report it to somebody. I wasn’t worried because Frank had a reputation as being a big drinker. After I got the Harry Elliman file, Pat tells me, I’m going to have somebody come and talk to you. Who comes? And we meet in the first ward office, and then we go downstairs into the special room they had for conversations. It’s Mike Ficarro. He’s the head of the organized crime section. He’s the one who prosecutes all the criminals. He’s one of the many prosecutors in Chicago. That’s why there were over 1,000 mob murders and never a conviction from the time of Al Capone. Not a single conviction with over 1,000 mob murders because they controlled absolutely everything. He’s the boss.

[35:35] I knew him. I didn’t like him. He had an attitude about him. You know, when I would see him at parties and when I’d see him at other places, and I’d walk by and say, hi, he just seemed coldish.

[35:47] I found out later why. He was jealous of the relationship I had with all these people.

[35:54] He says, I’ll help you any way I can, anything you need, whatever. So the prosecutors on the Harry Olliman case were our people. That’s who’s prosecuting the case anyhow. But they couldn’t get one of their judges apparently who would handle the case. So, but anyhow, uh, so, uh, when we, um, when we go, when we, when we go to trial, um.

[36:25] Before to help me out, I told Pat, I’ll get somebody else to handle the case. I’ll have somebody else. I said, I won’t go in there. I won’t go in there because everybody knows I’m close to Frank, very close to Frank. I said, so I won’t go in there. I’ll get somebody. He says, no, no. He said, I’ll get somebody. And so he gets a guy named Frank Whalen, who I didn’t know at the time. He was a retired lawyer from Chicago. He was one of the mob lawyers.

[37:00] He was one of the mob lawyers. And he lived in Florida. He lived in Miami. I think it was, no, Lauderdale. He lived in the Lauderdale area. He was practicing there. So I fly out. I fly out to meet him. I i do all the investigating in the case the i’m using an investigator that harry alleman got from me in fact he was the same investigator that got in trouble in in uh in in hollywood for what for a lot of stuff i can’t think of his name right now but he’s the one who got indicted in hollywood eventually for you know wiretapping people and whatever it was the same one. And he got me information on Bobby on this Bobby Lowe. He found out Bobby Lowe, Bobby Lowe was a drug addict.

[37:59] When the FBI got a hold of him, Bobby Lowe was living out in the street because he had been fired from his first job. He had a job in some kind of an ice cream company where they made ice cream, and he got fired there for stealing. And then he had a job after that in a gas station, and he faked a robbery there. Apparently, what he did was he called the police and said he had been robbed. This is before they had cameras and all the rest of that stuff. He said he had been robbed. And somebody happened to have been in the gas station getting gas. It was a big place, apparently.

[38:45] And when the police talked to him, he said, I didn’t see anything strange. He said, I saw the attendant walk out to the back about 10, 15 minutes ago. I saw him walk out to the back of the place and then come back in. And so they go out, and he had his car parked behind it, and they found the money that was supposed to have been stolen in the car. So not the best witness, in other words. Well, that’s an understatement, because that was why… That was why now he suddenly shows up, and they know all this. The FBI agents that obviously know all this, that’s their witness. That’s their case. To me, it’s an airtight, you know. Yeah. Anyhow, I developed the defense. I went back to see Frank a second time. I flew out to Florida a second time, gave him all this information.

[39:48] I had talked to some other people to a number of people that were going to indicate that Harry played golf with them that day see how they remembered not golf but he was at a driving range with them with about five people they remember what they were three or four years three or four years before that what I also found out now, and I didn’t know and it changed my whole attitude on that this wasn’t a mob killing you, This guy that he killed was married to his, I think it was his cousin or some relation was married. I’m pretty sure it was to his cousin. She had told Harry, I got this from Butchie, Butchie Petrosselli, who had become a close friend of mine after I got involved with Harry’s case, his partner. And that was why he killed them, because apparently the sister, his sister-in-law, whatever she was, had told him, you know, when he was beating her up, she had said, well, my Harry Alameda won’t be happy about this. And he said, supposedly, he said, fuck that, Kenny.

[41:02] And that’s why the shooting took place. Wow. This changed me. You know, I’m in the middle of it. There’s no getting out of it now. Yeah, they’ll turn it back. And by now, I’m running around all the time with Butch and Mary at night. I’m meeting them at dinner. They’re coming to one of my places where I have dinners all the time. You know, I’m becoming like close friends, close friends with both of them. Yeah. So anyhow, but anyhow, the lawyer that he got, Frank Whalen, who was supposed to be sharp, turned out like he was not in his, let’s just say he was not in his prime.

[41:46] Charitable. And when he went in, you know, while the trial was going on, you know, while the trial was going on, I get a call from Frank. From Frank Wilson, because I told him, you don’t come back into the restaurant now. You don’t come back into the restaurant. I used his office as my office all the time, along with a bunch of other judges. I had a phone, but it cost about a dollar a minute to talk on my phone. I had to talk on my phone. So when I’d be at 26th Street in the courthouse, even though no lawyers are allowed back there in the chamber, so I’m back there sitting at his desk using the phone taking care of my own other business. I stopped going in there while the trial was going on.

[42:35] So, anyhow, he calls me, and he wants to meet me at a restaurant over on Western Avenue. And, okay, he called me from one of the pay phones out there in front of the courthouse, and I go to meet him. What did he want? Was he complaining about the lawyer, Waylon? What was he complaining about, Waylon? and I was screwing it up.

[42:59] When I meet him, I said, you know, he’s like, you know, he said, you know, we go into the bathroom and he and he said he’s all shooken up. He says, this is going to cost me my job. He said, he said, you know, they’re burying him. You’re burying him. You know, because I had given this information on the two witnesses. And he says, Frank Whalen, he said, isn’t doing a thing and cross-examining these people and whatever.

[43:32] And he says, and he’s all upset. And I said, Frank, no, I’m shook up one of the few times in my life where it’s something I can’t handle. He had never told me, you know, I’ll fix the case, never. And I said to him, and I said, Frank, I said, if something goes wrong, I said, I’m sure they’re going to kill me, is what I said to him. Yeah. I said, if something goes wrong, I’m sure they’re going to kill me. And I left. I left the bathroom. Now, I have no idea what’s going on in his mind and whatever. Yeah. I see Pat the next day. And by something goes wrong in this case, you mean if he gets found guilty, that’d be what would go wrong and you would get killed. Is that that’s what you mean? Well, no question, because when I met, I didn’t go into that. I met with Harry Alleman. I get a call after I got involved in the case. A couple days later, I get a call from Markle. Meet me at one of the nightclubs where I was all the time at night with these people.

[44:47] Above it, you’ve got a motel, a bunch of hotel rooms. I get a call from Markle. The reason everybody loved me and the mob, I never discussed what I was doing with anybody or any of the other dozens of mobsters I run with that I was involved in Harry’s case. Never said a word to anybody about any of this. That was my nature, and that’s why all these people love me. I never talked about one thing with anybody else or whatever. He says, I want to meet you. When I get over there, he says, let’s go upstairs. Somebody wants to talk to you. And we go upstairs, and there’s Harry Alleman. And Harry, how you doing? How are you?

[45:27] And he says, listen, you’re sure about this? And I said, yeah. I said, I’m sure. And he said, well, if something goes wrong, you’re going to have a problem. Those were his words to me. You’re going to have a problem. And I said, you know, he says, because this judge, he says, this judge is a straight judge. And he said, Tom, you mean Tom Maloney. He says, and Tom wants to handle my case. And he tells me he’s going to be named a judge by the Supreme Court real soon. And he wants to handle and he wants to handle my case before he… Uh, you know, before he becomes a Supreme court, before he becomes a judge, I knew the moment he told me that I knew for sure that was the case because we control everything, including the Supreme court. I said, you know, I said, don’t, you know, don’t worry about it. I lied to him. And I said, uh, I said, yeah, the judge is going to, I said, yeah, he’s going to throw it out. He knows, I said, he knows what’ll happen if he doesn’t. That’s what I told Harry. I want to keep him happy.

[46:34] I’m going to keep him happy probably for a few hours I’m a little nervous and then that’s all behind me like so many other problems I got in the middle of oh my god talking about walking a tightrope so now the lawyer came into Chicago he was in Chicago I met him when he came in he was staying at the Bismarck was at the Bismarck Hotel right around the corner from you know where Counselor’s Row was that’s where he was staying in the in the hotel right there by the first board office and there was a way to go in there without being seen and there was a, You go through another restaurant and you go through the alley and go up there. And I wouldn’t, I didn’t want to be seen walking into there because I know the FBI are probably, are probably watching and whatever. When he comes into town, they handle the case. So I go upstairs to see him. You know, I said, what the hell’s going on in court? He says, I’m going, it’s going great. It’s going great. I said, it’s going great. I just, you know, I just got a call last night. I had to go meet the judge. And he said, you’re not doing any cross-examining. Oh, I’m doing a great job. You know, I’m doing a great job. So after a few minutes of, I leave. Yeah.

[47:52] That’s when I saw Pat Marcy, too. And I said, Pat, I said, the judge is upset about whatever’s going on. I said, maybe we should give him some more because I agreed to give him $10,000. And he said, you know, what a piece of work he is. You know, he said $10,000, and that’s all he’s going to get, not a nickel more or whatever. So now to say I’m nervous again is an ultra statement. The case, I walked over, and I wouldn’t go in the room, but I wanted to just be around that room for some reason. FBI agents all over the place.

[48:30] FBI agents all over the place. And so now I’m at home and I’m packed. I’ve got my bags packed because if he finds it, I don’t know what he’s going to do. I’m worried he might find him guilty because of all that had happened. He, when the trial ended a given night, and the next day he was going to give the result. In fact, I didn’t go out and play that night. I was a little nervous, and I stayed home, and I packed up my bags. I packed up my bags, and about 9 o’clock, I got in the car, and I started driving. And by the time he gave the ruling, I was probably about 100, maybe 150 miles away. And I hear on the radio, you know, found him not guilty, found him not guilty. So I turn around. Hit the next exit, turn around and come back. I turn around. Northbound on I-55.

[49:27] Probably a couple hours later, here I am parked in my parking spot. My parking spot was in front of my office, right across from City Hall. And I parked in the mayor’s spot when she wasn’t there. And drove probably to drive her crazy. But that was where I parked. That was my parking spot. We’d see my big car with the RJC license plates parked in the bus stop. And so here I am. I parked the car and I go in. I go in.

[50:01] And I’m sure Pat told some people, probably not, but I’m sure they told all the mobsters, all the top mobsters, because these guys all wanted to meet me afterwards and get the restaurant. I go in to see them. We walked into the janitor’s closet. You walk out of Counselor’s Row. You go to the left. It goes into the 100 North Building. Now, you’ve got the elevators to the right. And behind that, you’ve got a closet where the janitors keep all their stuff. And you’ve got some stairs leading up to the, there was a, what do you call it? There was an office there where the commodities, big commodity exchange was right there. that there was a stairway leading up to where the offices were with some doors with bars and everything on it. And Pat is standing on those stairs, about two or three stairs. You know, I said, wow. I said, you know, everybody’s going nuts. And he goes, well, you know, you did a good job. And he gives me an envelope. He gives me an envelope. And, you know, I put the money in my pocket.

[51:09] We said we had some more. We said a couple other words about, you know, this and that. And then I just go in there. I go back in the counselor’s.

[51:21] Now, after the feds started getting indictments, did you try and warn the Aleman case judge, Frank Wilson? Why did you do that? And when I went to see Frank Wilson, I went to help him. I said, Frank, I said, look, I said, I was contacted by, I said, I was contacted by the, by the, by the FBI. They were investigating the Harry Aleman case. I said to him, I said, they, they feel the case was fixed. I said, when they come to see me, I said, you know, I said, I’m not going to talk to them. I said, I’m not going to talk to them. I’m going to take the fifth. And in your case, you can do the same thing. When they, if they come to talk to you, you just take the fifth amendment. If they give you immunity, I said, you know, then you, then you testify, but you tell them the truth. I said, don’t worry about me. Tell them the truth. This is how I talk to him. When I’m talking to him like that, it’s almost like he’s trying to run away from me.

[52:27] We’re at a restaurant in a big complex. It was in one of those resorts in Arizona. He’s all but running away from me. I was trying to help him. What I said to him was, Frank, I said, the statute of limitations ran on all this. It’s been more than five years. There’s nothing they can do to you or to me, I said, because the statute ran. I said, so don’t lie to them. What the feds were concerned about, and I don’t know why, that he would deny ever fixing the case when it went through. I don’t know why they’re worried about that, but they were, and I didn’t want to see him get in trouble.

[53:13] That’s why I went there to protect him. Hey, Bob, you were asked to represent an outfit associate or an outfit associate’s son who was accused of breaking the jaw of a Chicago policewoman. And you know, when a cop is injured in a fight with somebody, the cops follow that case. And I do not want to see any shenanigans going on. So, so tell us about how you walked that line. And I bet those cops were, were not happy with you in the end. Some people think this is a reason you flipped. Take us inside that case, will you?

[53:45] And the reason I mentioned that it had a lot to do with what I eventually did. Now we’ll get back to what made me do what I was going to do. When I was practicing law now, and now I have been away from all this for years, I was out of town a lot because I’m representing the Chinese all around the country. I’m their main lawyer right now.

[54:10] And I get a call from Lenny Colella. And he says, my son, he said, my son is in trouble. I want to come in and I want to talk to you about handling his case. This was a heater case, too. This was a front page case because he was charged with aggravated battery and attempted murder. Supposedly, he had beat up a policewoman and it was all over the place. He was a drug addict and whatever, supposedly he did all this. And when he came into the office with his dad, he was high. When I talked to him, he’s got his kid with him. And the kid is a smart aleck. As we’re talking, the kid, and I asked the kid, well, whatever. The kid was a smart aleck. And I just said to him, I said, Len, I can’t help you. I said, get him out of here. I want nothing to do with him. I said, I can’t help you. You didn’t take cases that were involved with cops anyhow, for the most part. No. I didn’t know what had happened in this case. I know what I saw in the paper. I didn’t know what the facts or anything were or whatever. I mean, if it turned out that if I felt when I talked to him that he had done it, whatever, I would not have taken the case anyhow.

[55:26] I mean, I would not have. That’s why I say, too, that may be, too, why I was as quick and as rude as I was when he came in there and was acting and was a little bit high. I just wanted nothing to do with him, period. I said to his dad, his father said, you know, if I get him cleaned up, you know, I said, well, if you get him cleaned up, then we’ll talk again. I said, but I can’t help him, and I can’t help him.

[55:54] And off he goes. the father re-contacted me about a week later. And he said, I had him in rehab and he straightened out and whatever. And he brought him back in and it was a new person. And when he told me the facts of the case, when he told me what happened, because he was a big, tough kid. He was a big, you know, he was a weightlifter, but he was a big, tough looking kid.

[56:19] And it’s a little police woman. When he told me what happened, I believed him. Because I’ve been out in the street and whatever. And he says, you know, he told me what happened, that he had gotten stopped. He was out there talking to her. And when she said, you’re under arrest for DUI, he just walked. He says, I walked. I was going to get in my car and drive away. And she grabbed me and was pulling me or whatever. And I hear all these sirens coming. And within a few minutes, there’s all kinds of police. There’s about half a dozen police there. He says, and then they started jumping on me. He said, she was under me. He was all beaten up. He was all bloody and whatever. And she apparently had her jaw broken. And there’s no doubt in my mind when he’s telling me that, you know, when they were hit with his clubs or with this thing that they claimed he had without his fingerprints, it was a metal bar. Right, a slapper. A chunk of lead covered by leather. Everybody used to carry a slapper. How about you carry a slapper? They claimed, but there was no cloth on this. It was just the metal itself. Yeah, oh really?

[57:45] Anyhow, that makes it interesting during the trial when they flat out lied. No, he had no blood. I got the hospital reports. They wouldn’t take him in the station because he was too badly beaten up. But anyhow, he also had two other charges. He had been involved in a fight in a bar. And he had been involved in another situation with the police. And he was charged with resisting arrest and battery on a policeman out in Cicero. So he had these three cases. So I gave the father a fee on handling, you know, the one, I was going to, I gave him a fee one case at a time. I said, you know, first thing we’ll do, I want to get rid of those other two cases. I’ll take them to juries, I said.

[58:36] I’ll take them to juries because I wasn’t going to put them. I knew both the judges on those cases, but I wasn’t going to put them in a position on a case like that. I take the first case to trial. And I get him a not guilty. That was the fight in the bar.

[58:54] That was out in one of the suburbs. That was out in, I’m not sure which suburb, in the northwest side. After we get that case over with, before that case, I get a call from Pat Marcy. Pat Marcy, I hadn’t seen him probably even for a couple months, but I hadn’t talked to him for quite a long period of time. And he says to me, you got a case that just came in. He said, we’re going to handle it. And I said, there’s no need, Pat. I said, I can win these cases. I said, there’s no need. I can win these cases. And he said, we’re going to handle this. The case is going to go to Judge Passarella, he said, and we’ll take care of it. I said, Pat, there’s no need to. I said, I can win these cases. I said, they’re all jury trials, but I know I can win them all. And he says, you do as you’re told. Pat had never talked to me like that before.

[59:54] Powerful as he was and crazy as I am, And he never, you know, you never demand that I do anything or whatever. We had a different type relationship. And although I hadn’t broken away from them by now, it’s been years. I had broken away from them for about, you know, two, three years. And he says, you know, take the case to trial. I said, well, he’s got some other cases, too, and I’m going to take the one. And she says, I’ll take it to a jury, and I’ll win it. You’ll see how I win it. I take her to trial, and I get her not guilty. The second case was set for trial about a month after that. Not even, yeah, about a month or so after that. And during that time, a couple of times I’m in counselors, and Pat says, when are you going to take the case to trial? I said, well, Pat, you know, I won the one case. I got the other case on trial, and it was before Judge Stillo. He was a judge that we eventually indicted.

[1:00:51] Stillo was very, very well connected to the first ward. He’s one of the old-time judges out in Maywood. And I told him, you know, when I came in there, he assumed I’d take it to trial and he’d throw it out. And I said, no, no, no, there’s no need to. I says, I’m going to take the jury on this one. Number one, I had stopped fixing things long before this. And, but he was, to make money, he was willing that he would have thrown the case out. It was a battery with a Cicero policeman. And I says, no, no, I’ll take it. I’ll take it to, you know, I’ll take the jury. I said, I don’t want to put you in that pursuit. Oh, don’t worry about me. I take that one to trial and I win that one too. Now Pat calls me, when the hell are you going to take the case to trial? And that’s the original case with the police woman. That’s the main one. The main one. Okay, go ahead.

[1:01:44] When are you going to take it to trial? And I don’t want to take it to trial. In fact. I had talked to the prosecutor, and I said, look, I said, because he was charged with, he was charged with, you know, attempted murder and arrest. I said, if you’ll reduce it, the prosecutor was an idiot. He knew me, should have realized that, you know, that I never lose cases. Yeah. You know, but I want to work out something. He was a special prosecutor on it. He said, we’re not going to reduce it. We said, you know, if you want to work out a plea, we went five years, we went five to ten or whatever in the penitentiary. And I said, well, that’s not going to happen. I said, well, then we’ll just have to go to trial. So now, while I’m at Counselor’s Row, on one of my many occasions, because I was still having some card games over there at somebody else’s other lawyer’s office, because I had had big card games going on there for years. I’m sitting at the counselor’s row table, and Judge Passarella comes in. There’s just him and me there, and when he comes in, I say, Oh, you’re here to see Pat?

[1:02:56] And he goes, Pat, who? No more conversation. Who the fuck? No more. The guy’s treating me like I’m some kind of a fool or whatever. And I developed an instant disliking to him. I had never seen him around that much or whatever before that. So now, after the second case, you’re going to go to, you know. So I talked to Lenny. When Lenny came in, Lenny came in with him when we were starting to get prepared for the case. And, oh, this is before this is before I talked to the prosecutor. And I said, Lenny, I said, I says, if I can get it reduced to a misdemeanor, to a misdemeanor. I said, you know, can we work with, you know, and work out a plea, let’s say, for maybe a month or two, you know, a month or two. Is that OK with you? Oh, sure. He says, oh, sure.

[1:03:57] Now, this Lenny, this was the kid’s dad, your client’s dad. This is his dad. Now, explain who he was, who Lenny was. His dad was. What’s his last name? Yeah, Karela. Karela, okay. Lenny Karela, I’m pretty sure was his name. He owned a big bakery out there in Elmwood Park area. Okay. And he was friendly with all the mobsters. Okay, all right. I got you. For all I knew, he may have been a mobster himself, but I mean, he may have been because we had thousands of people that were connected. He was a connected guy. All right, go ahead. I’m sorry. And he said, oh, yeah, sure, no, not a problem because the papers are meant, they’re still, after a year, they’re still mentioning that case will be going to trial soon and every so often.

[1:04:43] What I had also done, I tried to make contact with the policewoman, not with her, but I put the word out and I knew a lot of police and I got a hold of somebody that did know her. And I said, look, I said, no, the case is fixed if I want it. Yeah. But I don’t want it. Even though I know that, you know, that it’s all BS, you know, I said, look, I said, get a hold of her and get a hold of her lawyer and tell them if they want to file a lawsuit, you know, you know, we can, they can get themselves some money on it. Uh, you know, he’ll indicate, you know, he’ll, he’ll, he’ll indicate that, you know, he, he was guilty or whatever, but I wanted to get her some money. The word I get back is tell him that piece of shit, meaning me to drop dead, to drop dead. You know, we’re going to put this guy in prison and that’s where he should be too. When the case now, now when the case goes to trial.

[1:05:48] The coppers lied like hell and talk about stupid. I’ve got the police reports there. When they took him into the police station, they wouldn’t take him. The station said take him to a hospital. He goes to the hospital and the reports, you know, bleeding here, bleeding there, and, you know, marks here, marks there. They beat the hell out of him.

[1:06:10] You know, nobody touched him. You know, nobody touched him. Nobody touched him. Was he bleeding? No, no, he wasn’t. He wasn’t bleeding. Didn’t have any, you know, along with, you know, along with everything else. Flat out lied. How many policemen were there? There were two or three. There were about 10 by the time it’s over. But it’s an absolute throwout. Any fingerprints on that metal? Well, we had some fingerprints, but not his. And on and on it went. It’s a throwout case to start with. The courtroom now where the case was, was very interesting. You walk in there, and when you walk in there, there’s about 20 people that can sit. And then there’s, it’s the only courtroom in the building where you have a wall, a glass wall, all the way up, all the way up. Covering in the door, opens up and goes in there. You go in there. It’s a big courtroom. A bunch of benches now in there. You go to the left, and here’s the judge’s chambers. You come out of the chambers, and you walk up about four steps. And here the desk is on like a podium. And it’s not where all the others are, you know, where you look straight forward. It’s over on the side. It’s over, you know, to the left as you walk out of his chambers.

[1:07:40] When the judge listens to the case he goes in there I’ll come up back with my ruling he comes out about 10 minutes later he walks up the steps, And now he turns off the microphone. Somebody turns off the microphone so the people in the back can’t hear anything. The ones inside there can, you know, can hear. The one back there can’t hear anything because it’s all enclosed.

[1:08:11] That’s why they got the microphone back there. Somebody shut it off. He says, basically, I’m not guilty in a real strange voice. And all but runs off the all but run and don’t ask me why this is what he did all but runs off all but runs off into the into his chambers, you know he’s afraid all those cops out in the audience were going to come and charge the stand I guess and put a whack on him.

[1:08:43] But think about it this is Chicago he’s with the bad guys but I’m just saying I don’t know why he did all that, but that’s what he did. And so now, as I come walking out with Mike, and they’re all in uniform, and most of them are in uniform, and then you’ve got the press and all kinds of cameras and whatever there. And as I come walking out along with him, some of these guys I know, and these jerk-offs are like calling me names and whatever. I go, I go see Pat.

[1:09:23] And when I go back into Counselor’s Row now, he’s there at the table. And when I come in, it’s a repeat of the Harry Allerman thing. He walks out. He walks directly. And I’m following him, and he walks in. He goes back into the same janitor’s closet and stands on the same steps just above me, you know, talking to me. And I said to him I said this judge is going to have a problem, I said, he’s going to have a problem. I said, what if he says something? And he said to me, nobody would dare. He said, nobody would dare cooperate against us. They know what would happen. Or words to that effect. And don’t ask me why. So many other things had happened before this. But now I’m looking at him and I’m thinking, you know, somebody’s got to stop this craziness. All this stuff. I’m thinking that at the moment, but then I’m worried for some reason, I think he can read my mind.

[1:10:34] Stupid as all of this seems, I’m afraid to think that anymore. I’m almost, you know, cause Pat’s such a powerful person and every sense I know, I know his power, but anyhow, so I leave. And like I say, 10, 15 minutes later, that’s all forgotten about. He paid me the rest of the money I was supposed to get from them.

[1:10:56] Obviously, he wanted to do it because he was probably charging a lot of money. That’s why he didn’t want me to take things. He wanted to collect the money because while the case was going on too, he puts me in touch with the head of the probation department because he was able to help in some way. He knew some of the, you know, some of the, some of the policemen involved in the thing had been contacted too. Yeah. But they were contacted and they messed up by, you know, they messed up by lying about all that. Yeah. When there’s police reports saying, oh, no, but anyhow, that was that particular case. Tell us why you decided to flip.

[1:11:38] These had been your friends. You knew you had explosive information. You knew as a lawyer, you knew what you had to say would send these people to prison for many, many years. if not life. It had to be hard. As other things happened, why did I commit the, Probably two or three other times things happened. But the most important thing was to think when my dad was dying, and I was very close to my dad. When my dad was dying, he was in the Olympia Fields Hospital.

[1:12:13] He had what they called it something else, but it was Alzheimer’s is what it was. Because my dad was a very easygoing person. A big guy. He was a real big guy, but he was not the tough guy. He was just a real easygoing person. He started getting mean with my mother, which he had never been.

[1:12:40] One time she comes home from church, and he had been going to Mass and communion every day of his adult life because he was almost a priest. That was my parents. Every morning went to church, went to mass and communion every morning. He had stopped going because, you know, he was acting up and giving her a hard time and didn’t recognize her, started not even recognizing her. She comes home one day and he’s out in the street naked. This is in the wintertime. He’s walking. He came out of the house and he’s naked, I guess maybe in his underpants or whatever. But, you know, when she calls and tells me that, you know, he’s got to go into the hospital.

[1:13:23] We want to get him into a nursing home, but they wouldn’t take him until he was in the hospital for, you know, to get some other attacks and whatever. When he’s in the hospital, when I go to see him the very first time, he’s all strapped in there. They’ve got him all strapped in a bed and his bed is all wet. He’s laying in his own urine he’s laying in his urine and whatever and and i kind of exploded you know what the hell is going on here and whatever and, The nurse comes in, she said, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, she said, nobody could control him, she said. Went to ask the nurse something and when she bent down to ask what they want, he punched her in the face. Uh, you know, so we, so we, we strapped him in now when I walked in, son, you know, look what they’re doing to me. And that’s what he always called me. Son. He didn’t call me Robert all my adult life. Son, son, son.

[1:14:25] And he recognized, obviously he recognized me. He hadn’t recognized anybody else for weeks. Didn’t know who anybody else was.

[1:14:34] So anyhow, I get him. I get him. cleaned up. I take him into the bathroom, get him cleaned up and whatever. And when we come back and when he’s laying in bed and he said to me, he said, you know, son, he said, you know, I, what, why are you, why are you, what were his words? Why are you wasting your God-given talents with these people? He said, they’re the ones who killed your grandfather. And then they fixed his case, and I had never known anything about that before. I knew he was killed and whatever in the line of duty. As I mentioned before, I was delivering groceries to his mother, who lived over on South Park, which became Martin Luther King Drive when I was younger. So I was bringing her groceries every two or three days when she ordered them from Verimus, a grocery store where when I was about 14, 13, 14 years old. I never knew that before. These are the same people that fixed your father’s case or your grandfather’s case or whatever. And it wasn’t long after that when he died. That part stuck with me. There were a couple of times, there were a number of times when I saw certain things. And like I mentioned before, all these people that had been killed around me.

[1:15:57] These people had destroyed. The one other thing that really got me angry with these people was always wanting to make more money and destroying people doing it. What they were doing in the civil courts. Really got me angry because they would go in there and they would just steal people’s businesses and cheat them out of everything and smile and laugh when they’re doing it. Not that they needed the money, but just so many things about the system had to be cleaned up.

[1:16:29] And I thought about doing something, but then I thought, no, that’s crazy. You know, I give up the life that I have because I’m living an unbelievable life. It just so happened, I’m playing cards upstairs, I’m playing gin with Alan Ackerman and a couple of others on a Saturday. I’d been doing that, driving back down, because I had moved out to the suburbs, too. And I want to go get a corned beef sandwich. I think it was called the Dill Pickle or something. There was a place under the L tracks, not far from there. And you walk by the federal building to go there. As I’m walking by the building, I have no idea. I just got the urge. It happened to be, it was either a Saturday or a holiday because I got the urge. When I thought about doing it too, I would not go to the, I would not go to the U.S. Attorney because I knew they were crooked. We were paying the U.S. Ah, yeah. The regular U.S. attorney. There’s, there’s, and the U.S. Attorney’s office, they’ll be the strike force or the organized crime division or whatever. than the regular U.S. attorney, just so guys will. Go ahead, Bob.

[1:17:39] I’m talking about when I was with Pat, there was a period of time when I’d go on the limousine rides with these people. After I fixed Harry Alleman’s case, we would go on these limousine rides. It would be on a Thursday night. The limousine, it was Ben Stein, who was the head of the janitor’s union. It was his limousine that would come.

[1:18:04] When I first got involved, initially, they would have dinners. They would have dinners there at counselors. They’d cook all kinds of special stuff for the group. And the group would consist of different major people, like the head of the Teamsters, a bunch of other people, a bunch of other mobsters from out of town, celebrities. They would go with us on these different rides, and we would go to different restaurants each week, different famous restaurants around the city. This went on for about three years when I was with them. During one of the rides, the U.S. attorney at the time, Pat was, no, Tom, Tom Sullivan, Tom Sullivan was the U.S. attorney in Chicago. One of the mobsters had a friend who, I don’t know who the, if it was somebody from Detroit or somebody from Cleveland, but one of the bosses came in and one of his good friends had been sentenced in Chicago. He had been convicted and sentenced to a number of years. I think it was like 20 years. He had been sentenced to like 20 years in prison. And Pat Marcy told him, not a problem. He said, what we can do, he said, we can have him ask for a new trial.

[1:19:27] We can hope that we can get the sentence reduced. There’s no way. And now the U.S. Attorney during this time when I came in is Anton Veloukis. Anton Veloukis had come from Jenner and Black.

[1:19:44] Uh, so I knew he was, he was corrupt. General and Block was getting millions of dollars from the mob. And the mob had control of all the money in the city, uh, and, and everything else. The, the, the mob and General and Block were the ones that they were paying. General and Block represented them. Uh, the U.S. Attorneys that were working on these, on these cases, including mine, the U.S. Attorneys that were working on these cases would retire and they either either with their own firm or otherwise would be representing these people and a lot of them would never get indicted that’s what happened in my stuff too there were nine people main people that never got indicted including johnny de franzo the head of the mob the head of the mob street crews there’s no way i was going to go to him, Gary Shapiro was the head of the organized crime section. So when I went upstairs that day, it was just, I didn’t, I got up that morning. I wasn’t planning on doing this. Really? An hour before I was not planning on doing this. Something as I’m walking by made me go up there. And the reason I did too much because the place was always full of people.

[1:21:06] Before there’d be all kinds of people around there you know i walked in there because at the time.

[1:21:14] There’s nobody in the building other than a couple of security people and i’ll check and see if anybody’s up in the organized crime section i thought it was a separate section, so when i go upstairs when i go upstairs i there was a woman back there in the office.

[1:21:33] There’s a window there you look in. And I come in and I said, you know, I’d like to see, I looked it up, I’d like to see Gary Shapiro. And, you know, what’s this about? And I said, you know, it’s something personal. You know, what’s your name? You know, Robert Foley. And she goes back to wherever. He comes walking back out of your office and, you know, what can I do for you? And I said, I’d like to talk to you. I’d like to talk to you. and he said you know okay so I go into the office and I said I’d like to help you put an end to the corruption the corruption in the court system I said, I said and he said he he was like shocked and you know said well why he said why do you have a problem, I said, no, I don’t have any problems. I said, I would like to help you. I said, I can help you clean up the whole system. I was talking not just about the court system too, about the whole state. And I told him, I said, I was involved in some things a while back in the statute, maybe to run on my stuff, because I hadn’t been doing anything wrong for a long time. And in Grey Lord, nobody cooperated against me. I knew nobody would dare. Nobody would dare cooperate against me or other people in the upper echelon.

[1:22:58] And nobody did. With all the people invited, I dealt with most of them, and none of them gave my name up as being involved. And so anyhow, he said, well, what do you want in return? I said, all I want is use immunity. I said, I don’t even need an immunity. I said, just use immunity where you can’t use my words against me. I said, then I can help you. And I said, but before I do that, I want you to check and make sure I don’t have any investigations or problems.

[1:23:29] And he said, what do you mean? If there are any investigations, I can’t help you. I said, because a lot of things I tell you, the statute is run and whatever, and it’s strictly me saying it, it wouldn’t help you and it could possibly get me in trouble. I said, I want to do what I want to do. I want to make sure I’m successful if I do it because I’m giving up a fantastic life. Should I put to Chicago, too? Should I put to Chicago authorities and make sure there’s no cases pending? And if they’re not? If they’re not? And he said, okay. And then he said to me, but I’m going to have to talk to Anton Veloukis. And as soon as he said that, and I said, to Veloukis, why? He said, well, he’s my boss. And I thought to myself, what the hell have I done? I thought I just committed suicide. Okay. That’s what I thought as I’m sitting there looking at him. Now, I want out. I couldn’t tell him he’s a crook or I think he’s a crook or whatever. So I just said, well, check on everything and then let me know if I don’t have anything.

[1:24:38] And now I said, I’ll decide if I want to do something. But I have to think about it. As I left that building, I’m a nervous wreck because I had no idea that, you know, that he would, I thought this was something out of Washington. So now it’s about a good week later. I had one of the worst probably gambling days of my life that week. Everything I did was wrong.

[1:25:08] Now the people I’m betting with too, none of them are the main bookmakers there. In Chicago. I had stopped dealing with all them. I had developed some other people myself, including somebody from out of town, including a major bookmaker in New Orleans. And there were a couple of people that I have known for years now in Las Vegas. And these are the people I’m dealing with. Now, this is a sports book. You’re betting on games. You’ve started betting big on a bunch of games that were going on at the time. Oh, yeah. I’m still probably close to the biggest veteran town. Yeah. You know, then that’s why they knew it too ahead of time because they named an Operation Gambit for gambling attorney. Gambling attorney, yeah. I mean, they knew this. Everybody knew this. About a week later, it’s about a week later, when I come into my office on our trip, another secretary now, it wasn’t Kathy anymore, it was Judy. And when I came into the office, Judy said to me, there’s some people here to see you, and they think they’re FBI agents.

[1:26:14] I have no idea how she got that idea they didn’t say we’re agents you know and because she had them sitting in my office nobody sat in my office they sat in the outer offices and whatever yeah when i come in there to see them there’s these three agents and one of them says to me you know are you sick have you got any maybe you got some problems you know they think i’m nobody can believe when i come in nobody can believe that i’m from i’m legit and i’m coming in for the right reasons, They thought maybe I was sick and I’m dying and whatever. Because he said, are you sick? Are you okay? And I said, no. And I said, we agreed to have me meet with the U.S. Attorneys and some other people in the motel a couple days later. When I go to meet with these people, prior to going in there, what I did, I owed something like about $260,000, $270,000. In cash, I had more than that. I had more than that in cash in my boxes. But I wanted to get everything cleaned up, cleaned up as best I could. So before I did, because I was worried, too, that they might tell me I got to stop gambling. I’m making a lot of money in my practice, but I’m making a lot of money gambling.

[1:27:38] So I go to see Marco D’Amico. There was one of the people that I owed the money to, a guy named Bob Johnson, a big, he was a big Xbox or whatever. I wasn’t afraid of him physically. He was giving me a hard time that week. I didn’t want to make those payments to those people, use up my money right now until I saw where exactly I could go and make sure I could keep gambling or whatever. I had put him up. I was supposed to give him, I think it was only like $30,000 or whatever. I was supposed to give him some money, and I called up, and I said, look, I’m tied up right now. I’ll see you in a day or two. He called back, and he was screaming and yelling. The next day, somebody shot a bullet through my window at the office. I come in, and there’s a bullet hole through the office window, a big play class window, right on the street there where I was with Lemke. So I go to see Marco.

[1:28:38] And I said, Marco, I said, he was playing cards. And I said, Marco, you know, can I talk to you? I hadn’t been there probably in two years, three years into the office. And he says, I’m kind of busy right now, you know. And so I just left and I went to see the boss. Johnny DeFranco was the guy in charge of everything. He’s the street guy. He was right on to Jackie Sharon. I passed away. He was the boss. He’s the one who set up the Tony’s Black Show killing and didn’t get arrested, because he was on the payroll with the U.S. attorneys. No, because he was paying big, big money to the Jenner and Black. That’s why he never got… He set the whole thing up. They knew it. I told him… In fact, I told him years ago that he was the one who did it. I knew the whole story on that. I went to see Johnny. Johnny owned a car dealership, a Chrysler dealership.

[1:29:35] And, uh, I went in to see him and I said, and I said, hi, John, how are you? And, uh, what’s up? You know? And I said, John, look, I said, I got a problem with some people. Uh, who’s that? And I said, you know, I owe some money. I said, I’ll get it together in a little bit. I said, but I need a little time. And he said, well, who are these people you owe money to? He says, get me a list of the people you owe money to, and you don’t have to pay anybody.

[1:30:06] Okay, he said, Bob, he said, look, he says, don’t get yourself in trouble. He said, you know, meaning like that. He said, don’t get yourself in trouble. You know, ease up. You know, ease up. He says, you’re a super sharp guy and this and that. He said, you don’t have to pay anybody. Give me a list of the names of the people in the world. The only names I gave him were a couple of local people. And I gave him Bob Johnson and a couple of the others. And he said to me, oh, he said, who’s Bob Johnson with? And I said, you know, I don’t know if he’s with anybody. He said, oh, okay. And I left. Now, when I went and met with the FBI agents in the motel, there were about five people there, U.S. Attorney.

[1:30:56] I’m pretty sure it was Tom Durkin, who’s the judge now. So anyhow, when I went to see them, well, I said, all I want is use, immunity, and the rest of it. And I told them about a couple of the things I was involved in, a couple of the cases I was involved in from a while back, just a few of them. I said, you’ve got a guy right now who’s your liaison, who’s with us, meaning with the mob, who’s with us. And he said, who’s that? And he said, Amanda. Oh, the cop, the, uh, uh, the high school, William Hanhart, you, you told him that William Hanhart was, uh, was with you guys. So go ahead, start over a couple of days ago.

[1:31:43] Anyhow, I said, I said, Hanhart is your liaison and he’s been with us for years. In fact, I said, he’s the one who had some of the people that he’s the one that helped kill some of the people. And the agent looks at me and the agent said, you don’t like him, do you? And I said, no, I don’t like him. Is that why you’re making up these things about him? And I had a few choice words with him. How bad. That agent didn’t realize that William Hanhart was running the biggest jewelry theft ring going to Chicago at the time and had done tons of things for the outfit, tons of things, helped set people up and all kinds of stuff. It came out eventually. They got all that information from me. He was the liaison between the FBI and Chicago. Whenever they were going to do anything, he’s the one that they contact and they, quote, unquote, work together with. And was obviously a good friend of this FBI agent. Obviously. He said, who I never saw again. They never brought him around me again. Anyhow, and that’s how the whole jury thing got. That’s how the whole investigation with him got started. Because I told them also.

[1:32:58] But he was the one, there were a couple of those burglars that robbed, was it? I was at Iubo’s house. Oh, Icarus. Tony Icarus. Joe Batters. The ones that robbed him that were killed, he’s the one who had people go pick him up and deliver him to these people. Yeah. Butchie told me that. I met with Butchie on something else one time when somebody else got killed. And I thought, how could these guys be so stupid? But, you know, when those two guys that tried to kill Ido, the gambler, and he said, well, what do you do if the police come in? If the police come in and say you’re under arrest, what can you do? He said, Hanhart took care of that. And I used to see Hanhart all the time there with Pat Marcy. He’d openly meet with Pat Marcy at Council’s Road Table. He’d have the car sitting out in front. He’d have the car sitting out in front. He’d be in an openly meeting with them.

[1:33:58] Just obviously blatant and he’s the FBI’s liaison and they didn’t know it yeah right they were all corrupt at that time, that was why too only very few people knew what I was doing for the first period of time very few because they knew a lot of the others there were corrupt because they were getting millions of dollars, With all the city business that would go, and I was there when these guys are cutting all the money up, the way they’re splitting it all up, and that’s going on to the present day. Well, you’ve got to quit gambling and this and that. And I said, look, I said, I don’t have to pay any of these people. They’ll say, how much do you owe? And I said, I don’t have to pay anybody. Why not? I was told not to pay them. By who? By Johnny DeFranco. It wasn’t the one I had words with. It was another FBI agent. You can’t talk to. You can’t talk to Johnny DeFranco. Johnny DeFranco was one of my closer friends for years. And I said, in fact, I went to see him and he told me not to, oh, you want me to go see him again and get that on tape?

[1:35:10] And that’s what I did. And the next day, I got the okay to go to wear a tape. I went to see Johnny. We played the tape in court. And I went to see him. Hey, Bob, how are you? Everything okay? You got everything straightened out? And I said, I said, yeah, thanks. I said, yeah. I said, thanks. I said, John, I said, I want to pay this. I want to pay this one guy. Who’s that? I want to pay Bob Johnson.

[1:35:41] And he said, why? He said, you’re not afraid of him, are you? These are his words on the tape. Because they know I wasn’t afraid of anybody. He says, you’re not afraid of him, are you? And I said, Johnny, I said, somebody put a bullet.

[1:35:57] Somebody shot a bullet hole. I said, the guy’s a lunatic. Can somebody shot a bullet hole through my window and so forth? And he said, well, if you want to, if you want to, so be it. This leads to an even better story. I called Barbro. That’s his name. I called Barbro. He was a bookmaker in the Western suburbs. He had been on TV a couple months before when he got arrested. He was a major bookmaker, but he was out in one of the Western suburbs. I called him and I said, I want to give you some of the money.

[1:36:30] I owed him about, I think about, it was only about maybe 20,000, 25,000. I said, I want to, meet you and get you some of the money. And he said, you don’t have to. That’s okay. You don’t have to. And I said, look, I said, you know, you’re a nice guy. I want to. And I could have gotten myself really in trouble by insisting on paying people if they realized what the hell, why would somebody was told they didn’t have to. They want to make cases on these people. That’s why they want me to pay them. They want me to make cases on them. So I meet them at my office when i’m gonna meet him when i meet him at my office and this is all on tape i said i got a couple thousand here for you he says look he said i didn’t threaten you did i they’re gonna kill bob johnson he said because they’re gonna kill bob johnson this is all on tape because he’s not paying anybody.

[1:37:30] And he said, and I want to make it real clear, I’m not threatening you with anything. I said, no, no, no, you’re a good guy and you’re a good guy and whatever. And so now they notify Bob Johnson. They said, well, we have to let him know that they’re going to kill him and whatever. Bob Johnson, no more than a couple months after that, gets indicted by the feds when he was a major bookmaker. He got caught coming off the plane from Vegas with a couple hundred thousand in cash or whatever, and they put him in the MCC. I didn’t know this until later. He’s in the MCC and they put him in the same, on the same floor with Rocky and police and a number of the Cicero people. This is all information I gave them led to their arrest. Like I say, all those people involved in that family secrets, they were arrested based on my information and my introductions to those people, the agents that I brought into the racetrack to meet with, to meet with Joe Nagal.

[1:38:52] A short time later, he’s found dead. They claim he committed suicide holding a bag over his head. No question. These people put him in the MCC on the same floor when they knew that these people were going to kill him. And he was the second one. another good friend of mine about a year before that was cooperating and I met him in an interesting way he was a hit man but I had met him in an interesting way and he had become a good friend all these guys loved hanging with me after they met me but uh he wound up he wound up supposedly on the same floor with the same people killing himself with a bag over the head, And the end of case, that’s how corrupt the system was, even when I was there. But let’s get back now. Was that Jerry Scarpelli by any chance? A guy named Jerry Scarpelli. I’m pretty sure it was. He was the one that. Was going to inform him and then he came, then he decided not to. Yeah. Okay. I’m pretty sure it was Jerry because he was also a good friend. I’m pretty sure he was the one that was in there.

[1:40:13] And they put him on the same floor when you had about half a dozen of the other top mobsters, the most vicious ones in there. But frank swiss did you ever run into frank swiss the german he was a bad dude, yeah he was he was up there in fact he was with the north side yeah i knew him real well yeah uh along with uh he was up there his area was the old town area right yeah he was he was he was a porn store owners and that guy redwood met was uh was uh running the red o’malley wire was a guy named Redwood Met that had his office bugged and he was taping Frank for a couple of years, really. It was a hell of a case. Well, I wasn’t real close to him, but I knew him. I saw him a lot because I lived right there in Newbury Plaza, and I spent a lot of time. A couple of the girls I was fooling around with were there and were waitresses there in Old Town. Old Town, yeah. He was connected with DeVarco, with Caesar. He was with Caesar’s crew.

[1:41:22] It’s funny how I met, jump in real quick to that. And the way I met Cesar, I was dealing with a new bookmaker who I went to collect. I was supposed to go collect money from the first time, and he wanted to meet me at a restaurant up on the north side, up on the north shore. And when I went to meet him, I go in there, and I go into a small— it’s a small little restaurant, a little restaurant with a couple tables and with a little bar in the corner. And when I come in there and I sit down, there’s only one person there at the bar. And I sat a couple seats down from him. And there were about three or four other people at one of the tables close by that look like mobsters. They just had that look about them. And I’m looking for my bookmaker. I don’t see him. And this person, this old timer, moves his chair over a little bit. And he looks at me and he says, do you know me? Do I know you? I don’t think so.

[1:42:28] You don’t know me? No. Then why are you saying you’re connected with me? I said, what are you talking about? What are you talking about? And he said, and then Woody O’Clock comes out of the back room, the bookmaker comes out of the back room. And he said, you told him that you were connected with me. I said, I told him I was connected with Johnny Diarco. And I meant this, and I was talking about this. When I had met with him at the restaurant or whatever, where people are talking about me being partners with Johnny DeArco. And he’s thinking Johnny DeArco, the mobster. And I said, no. I said, you know, I’m an attorney. I said, I’m a blog partners with Johnny DeArco Jr. His name was DeVarco. No, DeVarco. Yeah, Cesar DeVarco. I got you.

[1:43:22] He says, it was a short time after I had become partners. It was probably only maybe a couple weeks or whatever afterwards. He became a great source of business after that. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. In fact, I’ve seen the counselors once in a while when they come in there. And by now, I’m meeting all these other people. But see, the way I got to be so familiar with everybody, I bought Postals, the health club. That’s where the mobsters were all going. I bought that place. What was the name of that? Post TLS, Postals Health Club. Postals Health Club. Where was that? Downtown? We’ll read about that in the books. They talk about Postals Health Club. Charlie Postal was a world-renowned wrestler, not like we wrestled, but from the old times. But when I was a policeman in 18…

[1:44:20] One day at roll call, they tell us, don’t anybody go to Mama DeLuca’s anymore. It’s a mob joint, and nobody’s supposed to go in there.

[1:44:32] That’s why I went for lunch that day. And I meet Pat Marcy for the first time in his schmock and the rest of it. And he says, oh, you’ll see a lot of your friends here? And I says, no, I won’t. And he said, what do you mean you won’t? We were all told not to come in here. Oh, really? And why are you here? Because I was told not to come in here. I became unbelievably close friends with him. He was an old-time mobster who had connections. He had connections in traffic court and a lot of places. And I started having, when I was a policeman, I started having dinners there all the time. And inviting all these mobsters. And when I would have a dinner, we would take up just about the whole restaurant. He’d have a leg of veal. He’d make a leg of veal. He’d send his kid out to Lake Michigan to catch lake perch and make all kinds of dishes. And we would take just about most of the restaurant. All these different mobsters wanted to come with me to these dinners. Butchie and Tony and all kinds of others. This is when I’m still a placement. And I’m meeting some of these people because I’m involved in the gambling and I’m over in those places all the time. And when I first started going, that’s when everybody challenged me. Oh, you’re a copper. They hated coppers. And after all my activities, everybody wants to be my friend.

[1:46:00] But now when I became partners with Johnny, Johnny flew me down to Springfield. The state plane went from Meigsfield down to Springfield. And it was just for the senators and the congressmen and, you know, and the political people. I would go, I went with Johnny the first day, you know, the next day when he’s going, when he’s going down there. He’s telling everybody that this is my partner. This is my partner now. And all these people are coming into his office, you know, tell your dad I said hi and the rest of it. That’s how I initially met with these people.

[1:46:45] And now when we had the elections back in Chicago, all these people would come there at the first ward office. Just about everybody was anybody. Anybody running for office, anybody wanting to be a judge. You had judges, you had all the politicians. and there were no Republicans. They were just rivals. Everybody there, in fact, as I got to know and meet with these people, all these people were, initially they were Democrats, and they would call themselves Republicans when they were running in a Republican area. All of them, including the governor, including Thompson, and I wrote about him in my book, and he never denied it.

[1:47:31] He’s the one that was meeting with Johnny in the steam room that one day and as I said before when Harry when Harry Alleman’s case was going on Tom Tom Maloney, Knew he was going to be named a judge, even though he had a reputation, even though he had been under investigation for killing a couple of people. And I found out later about that from Butchie. That was the reason he wanted to represent Harry was because Harry had killed a few people for him years before. He was involved with all kinds of narcotics people. Uh he was his hangout was a restaurant over there on west 26th street uh his girlfriend who became his wife was a dope dealer who came to me who came to me for representation at one time uh and uh when i’m wearing a wire i build up my own reputation and my own business by doing that a lot of these mobsters.

[1:48:36] Whenever they got in trouble, I would help them out. A lot of them were gamblers themselves. And when I would go to these dice games and these other games with girls I’d pick up to impress them. There’s a casino right down the hill, a casino. And when I would walk in there, everybody could see I was the star when I’d walk in. Everybody wants to shake my hand. But a lot of these guys, Bob, have you got 100 or two? They never gave it back to me. I didn’t mind doing it. I didn’t mind doing it for a lot of reasons. They were out getting me business. In fact, the one who warned me about was one of these people. He was somebody I had loaned money to a couple of times and done things for. But the senators, too, they would call me when their family got in trouble, when their kids got arrested. That’s why I’m Leroy.

[1:49:30] Frank Savickas was one of the uttermost powerful senators. I was with Frank probably two, three times a week for a couple of years. In my restaurant, I would meet all these people. They all wanted to be my friend for a lot of reasons. They could talk to me. A lot of them that couldn’t talk to Pat Marcy would have to go through me. Even Marco, Marco couldn’t talk to Pat Marcy. If he needed something or wanted to get a message, I’m the one who carried it because I could see Pat five days a week. That we’re talking about not just the senators, the congressmen, judges, these other people.

[1:50:09] I’m talking after being with them for a few years. What I would do, too, when we had every election… They were run out of the office. They were run out of the first ward office. And what I would do was I would sit in Johnny’s office, you know, behind his desk when he’s not there. So when these people come in, you know, come in to say hello and whatever, who do they see there but yours truly? And people began to realize this is the person that can get a lot of things done. So now tell us about the robbery he set up in Wisconsin. That was a story all on its own. Now remind us who this guy is, Bobby. Tell us a little bit about him. Bobby Abinati.

[1:50:58] He had a no-show job as a tow truck driver for the streets of sand. That was his job. And he used it as, and I mentioned in the book, that was where he did his booking from. That was his office. Okay. But I knew dozens of people that had no-show jobs. They got a paycheck. And they had a job with Streets and Sand or with the city or with the county or whatever. They never went to work. And what they did, the deal was with them, they gave half the money they got after taxes to the mob. They gave half of it. That’s why they got all these people, these different jobs, the no-show jobs. The ones who got other jobs paid 10%. That’s what it costs you if you want to go in there and get a job. And we’re talking with everything in the city and the county. They had control of all of that. Crazy. So what was this robbery set up up in Wisconsin? What must have gone wrong? When it’s time for me to go, these are the people who are going to kill me. I want to make sure I get them. What I did was I had been told, well, Veloukis, when Veloukis was the U.S. Attorney running everything, he would not give me the okay to wear a wire on a number of people, any of the mobsters.

[1:52:21] I was told I couldn’t wear a wire on them because he said it was too dangerous for me. He was trying to, I knew why, he was trying to protect them because they’re making millions of dollars off them. He told me I couldn’t represent any of these people, so I had to try to find a way to do it. Uh, so what I did, uh, Johnny DeFranco, the boss, you state, we used to go to Maywood racetrack every Friday and he’d sit there with being sheriff. With Dvorak, who was the sheriff. They’d sit there at the table every Wednesday night. And I’d be going there a lot with Jimmy Andreacci, Joe Andreacci, one of the top bosses, a younger brother. Oh, yeah, Joe the trucker, I think they called him. Yeah, but his brother, he had a brother, Jimmy Andreacci. And Jimmy was a real close friend of mine.

[1:53:26] And Jimmy would have the table. He was the one who gave all the juice loans out to all the people involved in the racetracks. He was the one that handled the juice for the drivers, for the owners, for the trainers. They all went through Jimmy. And he had a table right by the window in the clubhouse.

[1:53:48] And Johnny and Dvorak would be about five rows up at a table, always the same one every Friday. And Tony Doty would be there and different mobsters would be there, but I would be there every, I’d be there four or five nights a week. I had nothing else to do. And that’s where I would take a lot of girls I’d be meeting. I’d be on, I’d be to the newspaper. I’d be meeting all kinds of girls because I no longer went to Guacolos or those places. I had stopped going, you know, for quite a while. By this time, I’m collecting at the window, and as I’m coming down, Tony Doty stops me. Hey, Bob, what’s up? I said, and he says, gee, you haven’t been with us for a long, you haven’t been betting with us for a long, long time. And I says, I got my own operation going. Oh you do and he said uh i said yeah i said it’s not real big i said i’ve only got about half a dozen people i won’t i won’t let them bet more than a thousand which was big big money at that time and i went back and i sat down when i went when i went to when i went to the office on monday i get a call from marco and he says you know can you stop by the can you stop by the club.

[1:55:04] And uh yeah sure i knew why i knew by telling don’t telling dodie this that i’d get whistled in.

[1:55:13] So i called tom and i said you got to get the okay for me to wear a wire i said i just got a call from marco and i told him what i did he said what he said what are you crazy you know what are you nuts i says look you gotta get the okay because i told him i’m going over there and i’m going over there so i got the okay to wear wire uh i had been told clearly i couldn’t against pat marcy and i could not against eddie burke and i could not against certain other people and so i get the wire and i go to see him and and he said what’s this about about whatever and about you having an operation yeah yeah mark i said that it’s not a real big he said look he says bobby this is all on a wire now. He says, Bobby, you got to pay.

[1:56:03] Even you, I can’t help you. You’ve got to pay. You’ve got to be with somebody. And if you’re not and you get caught, something’s going to happen. You can’t mention any names unless you’re already lined up. Now, I was with them when all this, this whole thing began right about the time I got with these people.

[1:56:25] They were meeting over at the club, at the club. There was a separate little room for Mirko in the club when you went in there. And that’s where, at the time, initially, it was Jackie Cerrone. It was Johnny DeFranco. It was other top mob bosses. People from all around were coming in there. That’s when they were setting up the whole scam with everybody has to pay. And that’s when everybody now had to pay street tax. If anybody messes with you, you give them by name, say you’re with me, and that’ll be the end of it. You’ll have no problems. They won’t mess with you. That was the deal. In fact, it became like a business in the courts. The clerks, The police working in there, you know, the policemen all around the city, other people, anybody who found out somebody was doing anything, not just gambling. We’re talking about with the bookmaking, with chop shops, with stealing cars, with even being involved in insurance scams, anybody, burglars, burglars had to use mob.

[1:57:52] And all of them paid a street tax. In other words, if you were a major burglar, you had to use one of their offenses. So you paid a portion. They got a portion of what it was. Everybody, even the one you dealt with, would all pay. We’re talking millions of dollars a month, not just in Chicago, but in all the suburban areas out there, all the way into Indiana and Wisconsin. Listen, this was the new thing now. They would come in there all the time and they would exchange. In other words, I’ve got this customer, I’ve got that customer, I’ve got another customer.

[1:58:31] And the person doing it would get a piece of the action. With bookmakers, it was 25,000 in front. I know this because one of them that got caught came to me for help, a jeweler upstairs. He got grabbed and knew that I knew these people and came to me terrified, wanting to pay. He wanted out of the business, but he was still going to pay them. And he wanted to make sure he wasn’t killed when he went to go pay them. I had to go with him. That’s another story. But anyhow, Marco tells me the whole thing. and you’ve got to pay. It depends on how much you’re doing and how many plays. So we arranged where I would pay, I forget the exact, I don’t know if it was $5,000 or $10,000. I was getting a discount because, you know, I had known those people. But where I would pay, and he told me, if you get more customers too, or if we find out you’re lying, you know, you’ll be paying more, but you can’t be lying to us because then something might happen to you. This is all on tape. But they did give you the friends and family discount. Yeah.

[1:59:42] Then what I do, I was able to make a new law in Springfield. I talked about that in the book. I’m paying John $50,000. In Diarco, I’m paying him $50,000, and we’re going to pass a law in Springfield. It’s all set to be done. I tell Marco, and I’m paying Johnny $5,000 at a time, But I tell John, I tell Marco, after I made a couple payments, I tell Marco, I tell him, I need $50,000. I got to pay Johnny $50,000 because, you know, we’re fixing a matter. We’re fixing something and we’re getting a law passed at Springfield. I don’t want to go into my box and take a lot of money. You know, can I get $50,000? Yeah, sure. And what will that cost? I got a discount, too, because I’m family. Even though they were going to kill me a few years before.

[2:00:37] But, and this is all on tape. And he gave me the 50,000. And now, and I made a few payments on that. So we got all that information. And we got all that information on the street tax that goes on to this day. None of the U.S. attorneys ever indicted anybody on any of that. So, yeah, we’re going to get the robbery. We’re going to get the robbery set up. I mean, they wouldn’t let me gamble to the last two weeks when I was there. And when I was, and when I was finally allowed to gamble, I only had like four or five bookmakers. and I won close to $200,000. I won close to $200,000.

[2:01:18] No, I’m sorry. It was actually three weeks, only two weeks and a couple of days. But I told these people, I’m going to be betting and I’ve got other places I’m playing. I said, so this week, no matter what, we’ll carry it over until next week. We’ll carry it over until next week. We won’t be, there’ll be no straightening out for this week. It’ll be, it’ll start next week where we straighten it out, but I want to play with you guys. Okay, no problem. So, uh, I lost about four or 5,000 in those two days. It was a Saturday and Sunday. So we start playing the next week. It’s going to be straightened out, you know, on the following Tuesday or Wednesday or whatever. So the next week I went a little over 200,000.

[2:02:08] And I’m betting with Bobby, which kind of brings up, begs the question and have to bring this up is there’s going to be people that say, well, the only reason he came in was because he had huge gambling debts and this was a way to get out of paying them. What would you say to those guys? Well, because the facts of the case, I’ll get into this. The facts of the case are in terms of that, I had given him big money in the past and never got paid back. He never did. He didn’t have the money.

[2:02:40] And like there were a few others like him, I had loaned him like maybe the first time $1,500. Then I loaned him like $4,000, a couple times $5,000 when he had to pay off money that he owed and whatever. And the last time I did it was, I got him a $10,000 Judas loan. I did it with a friend of mine who had the parking lot over there in Halsted with George. And I said, George, I said, you know, I’m going to bring in Bobby Ebenati. He’s one of Marco’s guys. I said, because he’ll maybe pay, I’m sure he’ll pay you back. I’m sure he’ll pay you back. I said, because I keep loaning him big money. I never get it back. And he’s a good friend. But, uh, so I figured I’ll get the money back that way. And, uh, so, okay. So I set up a juice loan with, uh, with George, Bobby made one payment and then stopped and then just stopped. He figured he could because he’s with, with whatever. And so I paid George the rest of the money. I mean, it sounds bizarre, but I began that at that time I was making unbelievable money, you know, because of the way I was able to gamble with all those people. So anyhow, when I win the $200,000, when I win that, I tell Bobby, I want to set up this bullshit card game.

[2:04:05] Hey, Bob, tell us about your last operation working with the feds. I know you wanted to lock something in where they’d go to jail for a long time because you didn’t want them out there. You didn’t want to have a bunch of not-guilties. And you know anything can happen when you go to trial. But when you catch somebody in the act, it’s a different story. So tell us about that. It’s a pretty exciting case, guys. And I said, oh, Bobby, I said, Bobby, I said, when I collect this money, I’ll give you 25% of it.

[2:04:35] His was like 40-some thousand. I said, when I collect it, I’ll give you 25%. I’m having a real good thing. I’m never going to. I know now the robbery’s going to take place probably in the next week or so where you get it lined up. Beforehand, I had seen Marco, and I told him, you know, I got a card game. When I made one of my payoffs, I think I made my second payment on the juice loan. And I said, you know, I play cards with these people. And I told them, I says, I play cards up in the, what was that building there? It’s a hundred stories on Michigan Avenue. Dave, John Hancock. I said, the person who has the game, we play up in the Hancock. We play up there. I said, it’s a big game. What kind of money? I said, oh, there’s probably a hundred, 200,000 in the money. I said, we’ve got some dope dealers coming in. He said, okay, we can hit the game. And if we do, he said, you get 25%. And I’m wearing a wire at this time. And he said, don’t worry about it. We’ve done it there before. We got somebody over there and we’ve done it there before. We can do it. And then when I talked to my people, Steve Bowen. Steve Bowen was the agent I worked with from day one.

[2:05:58] Steve said they said it would have been too dangerous to to go when they’re, you know, with people, other people being around, obviously hundreds of people being around, they, they decide to arrange to set it up in Wisconsin and they set it up right there, in Lake Geneva where people are not there in the winter time. This is in November where there’s not a lot of people. So it’s set up to go there in Lake Geneva. I’m talking with, talking with, I talked with Marco and Bobby gets a hold of me. You’re going to, you’re going to have a card game that they’re going to rob. Yeah. He says, well, he says, tell Marco that I want to do it, that they’re going to have somebody that’s not my group. That’s not my, that’s not everybody’s. They’ve got crews to do certain things. Certain crews that go out to do the killings, certain crews that go out for robberies, certain crews that go out for burglaries. He’s with the burglary crew. He says, I’m with the, I’m with the, uh, the burglary guys and whatever. He says, tell Marco. So, you know, I meet Marco and I said, Bobby wants to fuck him. The knucklehead. No, he’s not going to, he’s not going to do it. We got somebody else. And so now I’m hanging around those people again. Now, now that I’m paying, obviously something won’t happen to me. I got their money. You’re paying street tax. You got some of their money.

[2:07:26] Now I’m back in the clubs all the time. And setting up other people uh you know the bad guys i mean the real bad guys a lot of the bad guys a lot of the guys we’re friends about and i never turned in any of them i’m telling now as i’m talking to bobby they were talking about there’s another game i said i want to get into, this game up there in lake geneva he says that’s my area he said he says i got you know i got a place up there. And Marco has a place up there. They’ve got places up there. They’re up there all the time, you know, and whatever. So it’s going to be in Lake Geneva. Oh, that’d be great. And I’m telling Bobby now that, you know, there may be close to a million dollars in the game because we got some other major dope dealers that play and whatever. I says, and whatever, he’s pressuring me, pressuring me, pressuring me. And Marco keeps saying knucklehead. No, not the knucklehead.

[2:08:26] Then a couple of days before it’s set to go, it’s all lined up to go on a certain day. Marco calls me. He says, we’re going to let Bobby do it. We’re going to let his crew do it. The other guy, the one who was supposed to do it, and the one that was supposed to do it is one of my closest friends i just saw him a couple days ago he the one who would the one who they wanted to do it didn’t want to do it it turns out he didn’t want to do a cowboy thing like that yeah i don’t uh and that’s that’s why bob that’s how bobby got involved in it on the day it was supposed to happen i was supposed to collect that 40 some thousand from bobby because that was it was like that was collection day. Bobby only gave me, or maybe it was even like 60. Bobby only gave me about half of the money he owed me and said, I’ll give you the rest of the money later. I’ll give you the rest of the money later. I obviously told these people that he had delivered the money to me when he did that. Because it turns out they were going to kill me. I found out from Lantini, from Rick, they were going to kill me at the card game. Rather than give me my percentage and whatever, Rick told me, yeah, he said, I was supposed to do it. He said, but I turned them down and they kept pressing and I kept saying no. That’s when they gave it to knucklehead, to knucklehead.

[2:09:56] So now when we get it all lined up, it was around maybe three o’clock when I met Bobby. He gave me the money and he told me everything is all set to go. We’ll see you later on. What they’re supposed to do, it’s a house that they’ve got. And it’s probably about a good distance away from where the dirt road is. There’s a circular dark road, or a semi-circle. It goes from the street here and goes around in those houses. There’s houses around there, big houses, and comes out back a little distance away on the other side. And what they had done was they had set up flash grenades in there. So when the guys come in, they have to come this big distance, and that’s when they announce that you’re under arrest or whatever because these guys were trying to fence. Tactically, they could, like, trap them in with something blocking the street on both sides on that circular driveway and then set off the flashbangs.

[2:11:03] Trying to think tactically, and then have agents hiding in the woods and then come in on them. So, yeah, that was pretty good. They had them all over the place. They had them all set up. It was a long distance down there, and across the way they had some bushes, issues and but but again you know getting well getting into that uh itself bobby you know bobby paid me only a portion of the money uh a portion of the money and uh and i talked with him and he said yeah he said you know we’ll be there we’ll see you and the deal was i was supposed to call them uh i was going to be staying in the lodge there and i was supposed to call them uh call him after I got in there and I’m ready to go to the game. And so when I get there, there had to be, in that room, there had to be 30, 40 people. It turns out they had two whole SWAT teams. The Wisconsin SWAT team and Chicago SWAT team. And the Wisconsin guy was in charge of it. When we finally get to the hotel room, I call Bobby.

[2:12:14] Uh, and I said, I said, he said, I said, yeah, I’m here now and I’ll be going over to the, oh yeah. He said, we saw the place. It’s going to be perfect. He said, you know, I can see, I can, you know, I can see the, I can see the, uh, smoke coming out of the windows and whatever. Uh, it’s going to be ideal. It’s a secluded place. Uh, he says, and he says, and he says to me, and I’m here, we got the shotguns, we got the shotguns and whatever. cover and we’re all the time he’s setting you up to kill be killed.

[2:12:49] He said and and and uh and he says and uh you know we’re ready to go i said okay i said uh, so when i hang up i said the gym jim wagner was there with me from chicago he was the head of the strike force there in chicago uh and i said to jimmy okay let’s go and he and and now the Wisconsin guy running the show says, you’re not going in there. No, you’re not going. I said, I got to go. No, no, no. It’s too dangerous. He said, he said, you’re not, you’re not going. And I said, I have to go or it’s not going to happen. I said, you know, and, and, uh, Jimmy says, I’ll put on your coat. And that’s Jimmy. Yeah. Yeah.

[2:13:32] You’re not. If I don’t walk in there, nothing happens. I have to go. So the other guy gives in and agrees to let me go. They were worried I might get killed. It turns out they were right.

[2:13:46] But I was going anyhow. I mean, my life is, I knew my life is over at this stage. Anyhow, we go in there, And, uh, when I get in there, there had to be 30, 40 people in there. And when I get in there, they tell me, you got to go upstairs and it’s a two level and you got to go in the bathroom and you got to go stay in the bathroom. No, they’ve got it. They’ve got it wired and they’ve got a plane up above. They’ve got a plane, a silent plane up above. And I’m listening to all this. It’s all being, you know, it’s all loud as hell in there. All these guys are with shotguns and with vests. And they’ve got, I don’t know how many people outside, outside, across the way and whatever. And in about maybe half an hour, not even that, half an hour later, I hear, here they come. Here they come, that must be them, because there’s no traffic at all around there and in there. And yeah, oh, the car stopped. The car stopped in front. It stopped in front. and somebody got out. Somebody got out and they went in the bushes across the way. Oh, fuck, we got some guys over in that area. We got some guys in that area.

[2:15:07] Okay, and then the car moves around and I never saw the area. It goes all the way around and comes back to the street and the car goes around and the car comes back, it comes back about maybe, About 10, 15 minutes later, here it comes again. It’s slowed down. It’s moving now. They’re still driving. They’re driving around. They disappeared. Nothing for a little bit. And then after a while, here it comes again. This time, Gorbos in the bushes comes out and talks to them And then goes back into the bushes, and the car leaves. Oh, man. Cautious, cautious. And the car leaves. And it’s gone. It’s gone for a while. This time, probably maybe like a half an hour. Here it comes again, and the guy gets into the car, and the car leaves. in nothing. We’re in there for an hour, hour and a half, and nothing. That said something must have happened. We leave. Now, I’m leaving town the next morning. I don’t know where I’m going.

[2:16:37] But I made it clear I was not going to witness protection. I told them there’s no way. I said we own protection. We own that. That’s a death sentence in there. And as we’re going, we drive in and we go to the north side FBI station. Let me call Bobby and let me see what happened. Maybe we can still do something. Maybe we can do this another time, but let me talk to Bobby. So I call Bobby. I call this house and his wife tells me he’s not home yet. So I know where he’ll be at this particular bar, nightclub that’s owned by Rick Lantini, my buddy, the guy that I’m dealing with to this day.

[2:17:27] Rick Lantini owns the club, and he’s one of his top guys. This guy’s got a 30-piece crew of his own.

[2:17:37] And he answers the phone. What’s up? Is Bobby there? Oh, yeah. He says, Bobby’s here. He says, what the fuck is going on? I says, what do you mean? He said, he’s here, and so many people are here, and they’re yelling about something happened. And he says, what the fuck? He said, did something go wrong on that robbery? Or words to that effect. Rick was the one they wanted to have do it, and he wouldn’t do it. But they come back, and they’re there. holy shit, what happened was, When they went around, there was a copper undercover police were there.

[2:18:19] When they called the local police department and they told them there’s going to be something happening. They wouldn’t tell them where. Don’t go at all excited if you hear some noise and commotion or whatever. So this is some goofy copper who wants to be around the action. And that’s the place he picked the park. yeah and these guys come by and they see him and they figure to top or screwing somebody, and that’s why when they went by the first time they saw him when they went by when they went by the the uh when they went by the second time and they saw him they figured you know he’s sleeping that son of a bitch must be sleeping there yeah and they’re in but and they’re going to do it But anyhow, because it’s like a block away on the other side, air holes or something breaks in the car.

[2:19:14] When they leave there to go, The car, the car, but it’s their work car. They never, it’s a stolen car. Yeah. They never, you know, they never, so they’ve got another car that they came down there in and all. So they, they went over to, in town to see if they could find somebody in town. Apparently some people sometimes, you know, we’re late in those places. They couldn’t get the car fixed. So the guy running the show called it off. He says we’re not gonna we’re not gonna do it oh man he says he says we’re not gonna do it we indicted them and convicted him anyhow because i’ve got i’ve got bobby on tape saying when i was there i’m here i’ve got the shotguns yeah uh they’ve got they’ve got all it off because they wanted to. They called it off because they couldn’t do it. We wound up convicting all of them. But Bobby wouldn’t give up his crewmates. He wouldn’t give them up. Bobby did 10 years rather than do that. Wow.

[2:20:30] Crazy, crazy, crazy. God. Bob Cooley. Guys, there’s many more stories like this in When Corruption Was King. I’ll have links in under the show notes.

Retired Kansas City, Missouri, Police Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins tells the story of the unsolved murder of James Ragen.

Gary Jenkins digs into an old-school Chicago Outfit story pulled from a vintage newspaper clip by legendary columnist Drew Pearson. The article centers on James M. Ragen,” a key figure in the Continental Press and Racing Wire—and what happened when the Outfit decided it wanted total control of the race wire business.
This is a gritty snapshot of how Chicago’s underworld allegedly dominated legitimate businesses in the 1940s—bars, taverns, suppliers, and especially gambling infrastructure—then used violence and influence to keep it that way.
Gary returned to Chicago Outfit history after spotting an old Drew Pearson column: “A Songbird Who Sang, Murdered.”
Who James Ragen was: a major player in distributing horse racing results nationwide
How race wire services powered mob-controlled bookmaking across U.S. cities
The Outfit’s push to muscle in with a competing racing wire—and the warning: don’t compete with Chicago
Mob-linked figure Mo Annenberg and the money behind race wire “tolls” and kickbacks.  Outfit names mentioned in the takeover fight, including “Greasy Thumb” Jake Guzik and others from the era.
Pearson claimed that Ragen gave information about mob domination in Chicago to the U.S. Attorney General Tom Clark, and that resulted in his murder.

The broad daylight attack: a fruit truck pulls alongside, and a machine gun ambush erupts at a stoplight, and James Ragen goes down in a hail of .45 bullets. The “stranger-than-fiction” twist: Ragen later dies, and an autopsy allegedly finds a tube of mercury in his stomach. Why the case remained murky: the coroner allegedly refused to pin it cleanly as murder (per Pearson’s reporting)
Gary frames it as a reminder of how deep the Outfit’s influence ran in city systems and politics.
Memorable Moments

Ragen/Reagan’s fatalistic line (as told by Pearson): “If they want you, they’re gonna get you.”

The bizarre mercury detail and Gary asking listeners if they’ve ever heard anything like it

Why This Story Matters

This bonus episode connects the dots between information networks (race results), organized gambling, and the Outfit’s approach to business: control the pipeline, control the profit—and crush anyone who won’t move aside.

Gary invites listeners to share any other “old but gold” Chicago Outfit stories or clippings worth covering in future bonus episodes—and reminds everyone to check out his books and films (search Gary Jenkins on Amazon or visit his website).

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

Subscribe to the website for weekly notifications about updates and other Mob information.

To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

To rent ‘Brothers against Brothers’ or ‘Gangland Wire,’ the documentaries click here. 

To purchase one of my books, click here.

Transcript
James Ragen race wire story
Speaker: [00:00:00] Well, hey, all you wire tappers. Good to be back here in the studio. Gangland wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City, Missouri Police Detective, formerly of the Intelligence Unit. I spent 14 years there investigating organized crime in Kansas City. Best 14 years of my life.
Speaker: I think sometimes you know, I’ve got this True Crime podcast and we focus on the mob and I haven’t. Been to Chicago for a little bit, it seemed like. And I was, I was looking through some stuff from the Chicago outfit Facebook page, and there’s a newspaper clip on the, the, the group that has newspaper clips on it that had an article by a man named Drew Pearson.
Speaker: Now, drew Pearson was a real famous columnist back in the forties and fifties, and the title of it is A Songbird Who, mur, who Sang, murdered. Now he starts off talking about the singing of Joe Vce. I guess he, he wrote this article about the time Joe Vce had all the newspapers, Andre, and talked about the New York mob.
Speaker: But he had [00:01:00] a guy who talked about the Chicago outfit. He said that, he feels, he said that he felt responsible for the death of this informant outta Chicago. So he dropped in, he said he dropped into the morgue of Chicago’s American newspaper to refresh his memory just about this guy and, and what he said. This guy was a man named James M. Reagan, who was a of the continental press and racing wire. He was machine gunned down from a fruit truck. In August 14th, 1946,
Speaker: Reagan, before he died, had told him many things in, in 1946 four years before the Koff Commission and just before he got killed. Reagan told Drew Pearson about the Chicago Mob rule and gave him permission to take it to the Attorney General of the United States, Tom Clark. Now, Tom Clark is the same guy who [00:02:00] commuted the sentences of.
Speaker: The four Chicago outfit bosses who were given tenure prison sentences for the Hollywood scandal for, for trying to extort money from Hollywood unions and Hollywood film companies. Now this story that he told was about hotels and taverns and nightclubs and restaurants, and he said they’re all dominated by the mob in Chicago.
Speaker: He said to hire a bartender, to buy ice cubes or to launder. Roller towels. Those are the old towels that you used to pull down in the bathrooms. I don’t think they have ’em anymore.
Speaker: And they take those towels out and send them off and they’d launder ’em and give you a freshman to buy any beer. To replenish your alcohol supply in a bar, you had to do business with the mob. The mob ruled a very large part of Chicago. He took this story back to Attorney General Clark, who authorized a dozen or so FBI men to check on Reagan’s facts.
Speaker: Couple weeks later, they reported back and he said, this is all [00:03:00] true. They also reported that the control of the underworld reached in a very high places in Chicago and political places, and then Illinois too, also to Tom Clark, although nobody really knew that at the time and, and only indirectly. Some of these rules of the underworld in Chicago were on the surface, respected businessmen and, and politicians whose names were household words in Chicago.
Speaker: Some of them had reformed, but they still controlled the mob. They, which means that they maybe didn’t go out and do mob stuff anymore, but they still were, had some control in the mob. In some respects, Reagan’s information was much more important than that at Joe Bachi, especially when it came to Chicago.
Speaker: Achi didn’t know anything about Chicago, didn’t talk about Chicago, but the Justice Department in Washington had no jurisdiction at the time, which is kind of interesting. They had to pass a lot of special laws in order to bring the feds in or catch these guys on a, some kind of a interstate. Violation [00:04:00] now, they just didn’t wanna do it because they had interstate theft at that time.
Speaker: There’s a lot of things they could do. Transportation, women across state lines for immoral purposes. They could use the interstate transportation of stolen autos. There was all kinds of stuff they could use, but, but they wouldn’t use it. Claim the state’s rights city of Chicago and state of Illinois responsible, not the FBI or the Justice Department now, ain’t, that’s something they claim they had no responsibility for all this crime going on in Chicago.
Speaker: Lot different than it is today. The feds are trying to, to send the national Guard in and, and all the new federal police, a newly hired federal police , into Chicago to. Clean up Chicago. So back then they didn’t want anything to do with Chicago. Called drew Pearson back a little later, shortly after, and there was a leaky place up there in Washington.
Speaker: He said the mob. Was wise to him. They were out to get him and he asked for FBI protection, the FBI did give him a bodyguard for a short period of time. But you know, it, that didn’t last. And Reagan [00:05:00] himself was not exactly a saint. He was, he was the the bar boss of the continental racing wire. And he, you know, he distributed raising results.
Speaker: And there’s a huge amount of gambling in all the different cities that was ran by the mob. And the results came over this continental racing wire. Immediately you could have a race in, in upstate in Saratoga. And when that, that race was done, the results were sent back to Chicago and Kansas City and Baltimore, and, and Cleveland and all those states.
Speaker: And he was involved with a mob associate named Mo Annenberg and distributing this news to RS all over the country. He actually had some minor altercations with this Mo Annenberg, who was definitely a mob associate when Annenberg wanted to increase the race wire tolls to some certain publications that that weren’t kicking back to the mob.
Speaker: He wanted almost, he wanted to almost triple him from $200 a week to $500 a week. And his troubles really began because [00:06:00] Chicago Mob had started their own racing wire that was gonna compete with them. And, you know, you just don’t compete with the Chicago outfit on a business level. You just don’t compete with them.
Speaker: A couple of names he said, Jaime Levin and greasy th. And greasy thumb, Jake Guzzi directed that battle to take over the race wire. The former Illinois State Senator involved Pat Burns. He was working for the mob acquired property over over, over the tracks where men with binoculars could flash the odds and the race results to offices, which then in turn sent ’em out over the wire to bookmakers all over the country.
Speaker: And Reagan’s continental wire was already doing the same thing. And the take on this was fabulous for the mob and the mob demanded Reagan move over and let them have it all. You know, the mob, you just don’t, if they wanna move in, they’re gonna take it all. They’re always gonna take it all. Probably that’s what induced Reagan to talk to him.
Speaker: Do Drew Pearson [00:07:00] opines and ’cause he had threats on his life even before this. And, and I think he thought maybe he could bring a lot of federal heat onto the mob in Chicago. That then would back them off from trying to take over the race wire business. You know, it’s you know, it’s a way to use the FBI or the police to take out competition really, is probably what it really comes down to, what it really was.
Speaker: You know, drew Pearson says, you know, when a man calls you on the phone and tells you in detail about one time he found two gunmen laying outside his home, waiting for him to come out, and he tries to do something about it. And that’s when he called the FBI you know, and they said, manpower short, we got other problems to handle.
Speaker: And. And Reagan kept calling Drew Pearson and kept calling saying, you know, my life’s in danger. And, and Drew Pearson, he was telling the truth. Reagan finally hired two bodyguards, what he should have done all on his own before a retired policeman named Walter Peltier and a truck driver named Marty Waltz.
Speaker: The retired policeman might be okay, although that [00:08:00] would be suspect with a mob in Chicago. He just as soon turned him over for a little more money as guard him. I got a feeling. Two months after. Reagan talked to Drew Pearson. He was driving home about five 30 in the afternoon. A gray sedan with Indiana plates stopped in front of him in per Pershing Road and State Street.
Speaker: The traffic light turned and the two bodyguards were following him in a close behind. They expected trouble, but not till they got home. And not in broad daylight on the streets of Chicago and downtown Chicago with all the traffic around. Well, a fruit truck, a light delivery truck with crates of fruit on it, and a tarponing across the top.
Speaker: Pulled up alongside Reagan at this light. All of a sudden the Taron was pulled aside. This just like TV folks, machine gun stressed out and bam, bam, bam. I mean, they, they fired off round after round into Reagan’s car, light changed in the fruit truck, and the gray sedan moved on out. [00:09:00] Reagan was taken immediate to a hospital, and he was still alive, and he was kind of philosophical.
Speaker: According to Drew Pearson. He says, well, I guess if they want you, they’re gonna get you. This was not the end of the story though. Re Reagan began to recover from the mods bullets. Three Chicago cops had sat in shifts outside his hospital room, one on each shift, and, and so, you know, they couldn’t finish the job in the hospital room, and Reagan got better and better.
Speaker: But then finally on August 14th, this is about what, two months later, he dies. The autopsy showed that there was a tube of mercury had been placed inside his stomach enough to kill three men. Now, go figure. Have you ever heard of that? They placed it, I somehow they placed a tube of. Mercury in his stomach.
Speaker: I guess he threw some of the wounds he had or something. They must have had a doctor involved. I’m not sure how that happened. That’s a, that’s a weird one there folks. That is something else. Any of you guys ever heard [00:10:00] anything more strange than that? Let me know. But put his tube of mercury in his stomach.
Speaker: Crazy. The coroner ruled that he could not charge murder since he couldn’t say whether Reagan had died of gunshot wounds or of mercury poison. I think he’d charge murder either way. Well it sounded like the coroner was on the take too. You know, the outfit had Chicago wired in most of the political offices in 19 46, 47, 48.
Speaker: Clear up to really up to the seventies, and the operation Graylord started knocking some of that out. They don’t know. They just don’t know whether some mobster came in there and or they bribed somebody. But more than likely, they bribed somebody to get that tube of mercury in his stomach. Death of James N.
Speaker: Reagan remains one of Chicago’s 974 unsolved Gangland Slain since 1919, and that this was back in the fifties or so when this article was written. So that’s the end of James Reagan and the end of [00:11:00] his. Wire service, a continental press and racing wire in the total domination of Chicago, of the wire services, especially west of New York.
Speaker: I mean Chicago. They wanted to rule everything west of New York and they did so. Anyhow. If you got any other old stories like that that are kind of interesting, let me know. I’m putting this up as a little bonus episode, and I really appreciate y’all tuning in. Don’t forget, I got books and movies out there to sell and go to my website or go to Amazon, just search for Gary Jenkins.
Speaker: You might wanna take a look at the VA website. If you’re in, been in the service and you think you have a problem with PTSD or alcoholism or anything like that, if you have a problem with gambling via 8 1 800. Bets off or whatever. Your state has all the gambling casinos in the United States.
Speaker: Whenever they get awarded a gambling license, they have to kick in so much money to provide services for people with problems with [00:12:00] gambling. They have problems with alcoholism straight you know, our friend Anthony Ruano, he’s got a website out there. Just go to his website and he’s, there’s a way to contact him on that.
Speaker: I used, I sometimes say a number. I’m not sure if that number’s still any good. And I guess that’s all I got. Thanks a lot guys.

In this explosive episode of Gangland Wire, host Gary Jenkins sits down with actor, entrepreneur, and mob insider Gianni “Johnny” Russo, best known for his unforgettable role as Carlo Rizzi in The Godfather.
Russo pulls back the curtain on a lifetime of stories that stretch from Frank Costello and Joe Colombo to Las Vegas skimming, the Vatican Bank, Marilyn Monroe, Jimmy Hoffa, and even Pablo Escobar.
Russo discusses his new book, Mafia Secrets: Untold Tales from the Hollywood Godfather, co-written with Michael Benson—an unfiltered account of power, violence, politics, and survival inside the criminal underworld and Hollywood royalty. This is not recycled mythology—this is Gianni Russo’s personal version of history from the inside. Whether you believe every word or not, the stories are raw, violent, and utterly fascinating.
This episode discusses:
The Godfather, The Kennedy assassinations, Vegas skimming, Marilyn Monroe, Jimmy Hoffa, the Chicago Outfit, Pablo Escobar

🔥 Episode Highlights
🎬 How Gianni Russo REALLY Got Cast in The Godfather. Russo reveals that Joe Colombo personally helped secure his role. Paramount Studios negotiated directly with Colombo to avoid trouble. The real-life mob influence behind Carlo Rizzi’s casting. Initially, James Caan was slated to play Michael Corleone
🏛️ Growing Up Under Frank Costello Russo describes how Costello became his protector. Living for decades in a Manhattan apartment, Costello employed him as an errand runner and messenger for influential mob figures
💰 Vegas Skimming & Vatican Money Laundering Russo details moving hundreds of millions of dollars through the Vatican Bank. How casino cash from Las Vegas was “cleaned” overseas, and how Chicago Outfit figures like Jackie Cerone were tied to the financial pipeline.
🎭 Marilyn Monroe, the Kennedys & a Dark Secret Russo claims Marilyn was pregnant with Bobby Kennedy’s child. The explosive fallout and her alleged assassination. Why her body would never reveal the truth, according to Russo. The mysterious death of journalist Dorothy Kilgallen
🚬 Jimmy Hoffa’s Fate Russo shares what he says is the real story about Hoffa’s murder, the crushing and disappearance of the body. Why Hoffa was marked for death after returning to union power
🔫 Pablo Escobar & the Vegas Casino Shooting Russo describes killing Pablo Escobar’s underboss in a self-defense shooting. The terrifying private meeting that followed—with Escobar himself, how respect between two men prevented a bloodbath
⚰️ Tony & Michael Spilotro: What Casino Got Wrong Russo disputes Scorsese’s version of the murders. First-hand account of seeing the brothers after their brutal beating. The real setup and why Tony Spilotro sealed his own fate

Mafia Secrets: Untold Tales from the Hollywood Godfather by Gianni Russo & Michael Benson

A memoir covering: The Mob, Hollywood, Politics Vatican corruption, Murder, betrayal, and survival 👉 Available now wherever books are sold

🎯 Why You Should Listen
Few guests in the history of Gangland Wire have touched so many legendary crime stories in one lifetime.

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

Subscribe to the website for weekly notifications about updates and other Mob information.

To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

To rent ‘Brothers against Brothers’ or ‘Gangland Wire,’ the documentaries click here. 

To purchase one of my books, click here.

Transcript
Speaker: Well, hey, are you wire tapper? It’s good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire.
I have a guest today, which is, as you can see, if you’re looking, it’s, Johnny Russo. And I know a lot of you guys know Johnny. , He is, been a, a character, a mover in the shaker in this mob entertainment business for a long time. Starting with The Godfather, I think the first time we heard of him.
He, , somehow got selected for the part to get beat up by James Conn and earned the, the reputation of being a wifebeater. Now that was all fiction. You guys realize that was all fictionalized for the story. But anyhow, welcome Johnny. It’s great to have you on the show.
Speaker 2: Always my man. So much fun.
Always. And I, the fact you’re still doing it and you know, the intrigue of the mob is never going away.
Speaker: Never going away is it’s just, it’s gotten more in the last, I’ve been doing this for five, six years and it’s gotten more and more each year. It’s crazy.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah. The funniest thing you say that, most people don’t know I own all the IP of the Godfather.[00:01:00]
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: All the intellectual property.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Like if all your listeners go on right now to quarterly own fine Italian foods.
Speaker: Uh,
Speaker 2: my, all my food. I’m in 83 countries, Gary.
Speaker: That’s right. You got in the food business, didn’t you? Crazy,
Speaker 2: crazy food business. I got in the liquor business. I, I mean, clothing. My, I mean, it’s crazy.
My clothing line is called the mia. By Gianna. I try to keep everything in the mod mob feeling.
Speaker: Well now you got a new book out called Mafia Secrets, untold Tales from the Hollywood Godfather. And we’re gonna talk a little bit about those mafia secrets, which that’s what, you know, that’s what we all wanna know.
We wanna know the secrets of mafia. That’s think that’s part of the, that’s part of the, uh, j quo, the, uh. A little bit of something different. What we, what’s, intriguing about the mafia is this code of erta and the secrets that they had tried to keep over the
Speaker 2: years. Well, you know, the situation with this, which book here that you’re talking about, that this [00:02:00] book.
On, on the, one of the cove notes is Chei had it wrong in Casino.
Speaker: Interesting.
Speaker 2: Because I was, I one of the highlights, one of the big chapters in here. It’s pretty gory. I mean, we were just talking about Michael Benson Pryer going on. This guy is really a great graphic. Uh, writer and I mean, when he, when he’s talking about killing somebody, you could smell the blood.
Speaker: Cool. That’s what we like. Well, let’s, let’s talk just a little bit about your history, your background. You go clear back to Frank Costello when you were a kid in, in New York City. You grew up in New York. Right. Tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 2: In, in 73 when he died, he left it to me. I’ve been in this apartment 70, I’ve been in this apartment 71 years.
Speaker: On the Upper East Side, I guess. [00:03:00]
Speaker 2: Oh yeah,
Speaker: yeah. Oh yeah.
Speaker 2: Like sit 16. I mean, it’s ridiculous. People come and say, how did you, how could you afford it? I said, I can’t. It was given to me.
Speaker: Really? Especially these days.
Speaker 2: Oh my
Speaker: God. Now you still living in New York City?
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah. That’s my base. Yeah. I, I, I, I have a house in Sicily.
I’ve had for a while now. I bought different properties in different, where I like going.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And then. I kept them all by made, I’m the only guy, even, even when I bought my boat, they said, that’s gonna be a money pit that’s gonna eat all your money up.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I, I bought a boat when I was 21. I bought a Riva 148 foot Riva
Speaker 4: Damn.
Speaker 2: And I was good friends with Grace Kelly. ’cause Grace was going to the Baran school right around the corner on 62nd Street.
Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: Well, I got to know all of these young actresses when they were just coming out. [00:04:00] That’s how I got invited to her wedding. Sinatra couldn’t believe I got invited to the wedding.
What happened? I, I got the boat and the boat had a slip in Monaco.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I used to go there April, stay on my boat for a couple of months, and then I gave it to the Carlton Hotel to lease out. I made money from that boat every year.
Speaker: I bet. And so it wasn’t holding the water. You stuck money in, as we say,
that’s what you always hear about a boat. So, uh, speaking of of money and money, you talked about money laundering for the Vatican. Now I heard a story here in Kansas City, bear with me. This guy gave, he wanted to buy a church. He gave like a million dollar. Donation and the only way they’d take it if he had it converted to gold, actual gold and he took it over to the Vatican.
Does that sound right to you?
Speaker 2: [00:05:00] Uh, that we do Well, I used to do that myself, so I mean, I know that, but they, gold got too heavy. And then when they put all these restrictions after nine 11, yeah, you would never get on the plane.
Speaker: Oh.
Speaker 2: So, so I did something new. I’ll reveal it to your audience. I started buying diamonds.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: Which they don’t even reflect going through the machine. So I have a solid gold Davidoff cigar holder.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I put a hundred karats of diamonds. I put it in my suit jacket. I don’t smoke. It goes right through the machine.
Speaker: Huh, interesting.
Speaker 2: I guess every drug dealer in the world is doing because
Speaker: it probably smell no problem.
Smell that cocaine going through the machine. Be all over that cocaine. Try that.
Speaker 2: I mean, I never took a drug. Thank God.
Speaker: Yeah, me neither. So I see in the background you got the Godfather. I mean this is, I [00:06:00] know it’s been told before, but, so we got some guys out here that that may not know that story. You’re you, how did you get that part anyhow?
You were the son-in-law of the Godfather and the brother-in-law to Son Corleone James. James Conn James Conn’s character. How’d you get that part?
Speaker 2: I, I, I left the country for about three or four years after the Kennedy assassination. ’cause I, I mean, I was a messenger. I knew nothing about who, what and where.
Yeah. But they wanted to question me. So Costello sent me on a nice trip and while I was out the book of the Godfather that came out. I’m an illiterate. I had somebody read it to me because I never went to school. ’cause when I got outta Bellevue from polio, I was 12 years old already. And then I was selling ballpoint pens on the street corners, and that’s how I met Costello.
And the rest was history. But so what happened to me was that I had to read the book. And then I, [00:07:00] I was in la. I landed in LA ’cause nobody knew my name because Costello named me the kid. They couldn’t even get a subpoena on me. Who’s the kid? What’s his last name? What’s his first name? People got to know my name.
Once The Godfather to come out.
Speaker 5: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: That was it, which was great. I mean, the guy was a genius, but long story short, I read that, you know, Joe Colombo. Created the Italian Anti-Defamation League in New York and he had a big rally in, in 71 and a hundred thousand people came and there were cops got stabbed and everything else.
The only good thing he did do was hire Barry Sch Slotnik, a great Jewish attorney, and in fact, his son now is still my attorney.
Speaker 5: Oh,
Speaker 2: really? So it, but uh, a long story short. I came to see Castella, I mean, uh, Colombo. I was in LA. I said, Joe, you’re gonna be in the [00:08:00] club on 86th Street tomorrow morning. I’m gonna fly in from la.
He said, yeah, come up, come on over. I don’t even wanna see you. I haven’t seen you in a while. So I get there and there’s a car outside. He’s, come on, we’re gonna go to the new headquarters on Madison Avenue. And I, that day I met Barry Sch Slotnik. And they were telling me what they were doing. I said, well, you know, whatever you don’t like in the book, now that you got this great attorney, why don’t we have a meeting?
Paramount and whatever you don’t like in the, in the film that you think is detrimental to the Italian image, if they take it out, we can make a lot of money. You So we i’s why? I got the idea. What do you mean this ain’t a gift. I’m on a red suit and a white beard on we, I don’t see a mouse in my pocket who says what’s his?
We so that, with that said, I told him what my idea was. He said. Could you get it on? I said, gimme permission to [00:09:00] go talk to you. So unbeknownst to me, when I shot that screen test for in, in la, I shot it on 18 millimeter Mag Stripe film.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And unbeknownst to me, Francis Ford Coppola was trying to convince them to do it in a C tone.
Don’t shoot it in color or black or white. Give it a SIA tone. So it has that old tinge to it.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And, and I happen to buy 18 millimeter film that was old. It came out Sia. So I, I’ve always had my life has always got opportunities and obstacles. Thank God I got more opportunities. Well, this was an opportunity ’cause they passed my test to everybody.
Bobby Evans, Stanley Jaffy, everybody saw the test. They didn’t know me. They didn’t even care about, that was the tone. So when I walked in the Gulf of Western building, the next morning, they’re all looking at me and they know me and I’m saying how they all know me, [00:10:00] but I only knew Bobby Evans because he was going out with Ali McGraw at that time.
I walked right over to ’em. I said, you know, you have a big problem in New York. I think I could strain. I, he said, oh no, we got no problem here. Yeah. I said, I just left Joe Colombo. You got a problem.
Speaker: You do have a
Speaker 2: problem. You just left Joe Colombo. I said, yeah. I said, he wants to meet, he will he come here? I said, I’ll bring him anywhere you want.
So they said, bring him here tomorrow, 10 o’clock. So I go back down Madison Avenue, I down, 59th Street in Madison Avenue. I said, Joe, we gotta go tomorrow. He said, great, let’s do it. I said, but do me a favor. They know the book In and Out, obviously. They bought the script. They got Mario Zo and the director Coppola writing it.
Speaker: Coppola. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Let, let us just go with two of your heavies. So we, we took a butter Dec Chico. Who was a butcher deco was a [00:11:00] tough guy collecting for them. And the other guy was Lenny Montana who got the part of Lenny, uh, Lu Razzi in the movie
Speaker: Razzi. Yeah, that’s right. They probably saw him say, I want him for heavy.
And
Speaker 2: yeah, so we go with these two guys, Barry Sch, Slotnick, Joe and I, the five of us only go, we go up to the 33rd floor. Everybody’s there. Even the Charlie Blue Dawn who just bought Paramount. And they’re all talking and Barry addressed all the things and said, you know, we’ll go through the script.
If you agree to make the changes, I think we can work out a deal. We’ll guarantee you all the locations you want. All the neighborhoods get the cooperation. And they’re getting up there shaking hands. So I’m still sitting. I said, Joe, I pull on his sleeve. I said, Joe, what about me? He goes to them, what about my boy here?
Oh, we’ll give him a part. I said, excuse me, Joe. Tell him to sit [00:12:00] down. He didn’t tell him to sit down. He went like this, like gorged. They all sat. So I got out. I said, listen, I brought this guy here. This is gonna work now I want a big part. I said, who’s playing Michael? So. They all looked at each other, and this may shock your audience.
James Karn was playing Michael originally.
Speaker: I think I read that somewhere. Originally.
Speaker 2: Yeah, originally. And then I said, well, who’s playing Sonny? They said, Carmine edi. He’s in a play called the Manful LA mantra. They thought he should be a big brawly guy.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So I said, who’s playing Carlo? Says, we didn’t get there yet.
So I said to, to Costello, I said, I wanna play Carlo. So he looked at them. Stanley, Jeff, everybody was there. He says he’s playing Carlo. They all looked at each other. So Ruddy starts to say, well, are you in the union? I said, excuse me, I did my [00:13:00] homework. New York is a taf Hartley Acts, state. Yeah, you gimme a little bit a part.
I’ll go get in the union.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: That’s how I got the part. Joe Colombo cast me in the movie, nobody Else.
Speaker: Interesting, interesting.
Speaker 2: It changed my life 55 years later. Here we are.
Speaker: Oh yeah. Here we are. You know, I, I, you talked about JFK and I’ve already been. Done a couple other shows here recently. That’s kind of a hot topic right now.
It seems like with the release of all these, uh, documents and, and everything, uh, you had some, uh, dealings with Joe Kennedy maybe and, and as well as
Speaker 2: how I met Joe Kennedy. Joe Kennedy and Frank Costello during prohibition.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: They made $30 million each. That’s like 3 billion today In the thirties.
Speaker: Yeah.
Damn.
Speaker 2: And he went to Costello early on. He wanted his son to become president and the deal he made with the mob and nobody realized it. [00:14:00] He said, if my son becomes president, the first thing he will do that week was to evade Cuba and give you all your casinos back. So it was a win-win deal. The great deal everybody.
Now, obviously we know he wins. The mistake they made was put Bobby Kennedy and his attorney general, he hated all these guys. He hated all his father’s friends. And he started going after them. Marcelos, all of them. Yeah. So one year goes by, two years go by. I’m at Cal nva. He says, go to Cal Niva. I want you to be up there.
Be my eyes and ears. I did that a lot. Now for your audience, Cal NVA is a casino. Built in Nevada on the California border.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: So if you in the black book or a mob guy and can’t go at the casinos, you stood in the bungalows on the California side.
Speaker: Ah,
Speaker 2: when you wanna go to the casino, you walked across the pool, you were in there.
Speaker: Yeah. Didn’t Frank Sinatra have a piece of that? Wouldn’t [00:15:00] that his
Speaker 2: for Oh yeah. Sinatra had a, in fact, I was there with Sinatra when I got there. Sinatra was there, Marilyn Monroe was there and a couple of and, uh, Sam Jean Con. From Chicago.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And he was running the whole thing. And what they wanted Marilyn to do was to sleep with Bob because when John became president, he convinced Marilyn, I can’t see you anymore for a year or two.
Speaker 3: Yeah,
Speaker 2: because I’m a Catholic boy, but in a year or two I’ll divorce Jackie and marry you. That’s how naive she was.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: We know that didn’t happen.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 2: So Bobby was supposed to keep an eye on her. Well, he kept a couple of hands and everything else on her too. That night we found out she just had an abortion six weeks with Bobby’s kid.
Speaker: Hmm. Man,
Speaker 2: and she was hysterical. She, I’m going to the press, these [00:16:00] Kennedys are phony, and we all looked at each other. I flew right back to New York. He said, how’d that meeting go? I said, it didn’t go. She ain’t doing it. I said, what are you talking about? He said, she’s having an abortion with Bobby’s kid, and she’s going to the press.
This was a Monday morning, Gary, you won’t believe this. I said to him, they can’t kill her. She’s a big movie star.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: He says they’ll kill her. Believe me, on Thursday, she was dead.
Speaker 5: Mm.
Speaker 2: And it’s funny you bring where you brought this up this past Saturday on the eighth, I dedicated a street on Bark Avenue in 68th Street to Dorothy Kga.
Speaker: Yeah,
Speaker 2: I just heard about that when the investigation on the Kennedy assassination.
Speaker: Yeah. See
Speaker 2: it was, and the Marilyn Monroe assassination.
Speaker: Yeah. She had a mysterious death herself after she had really dug into that big time.
Speaker 2: The same guy I know, the same [00:17:00] anesthesiologist that killed Marlin. All they did. All he did was inject it with oxygen in her fallopian organ in her groin.
You’re not gonna see it through the pubic hairs. Yeah. And when every time they wanted to exhume her body, there’s, what are you gonna exhume? It’s oxygen. There’s nothing there. I mean, Marilyn always had barbiturates in her system. She lived on them.
Speaker: Now there’s a guy in from Chicago that claims that the guy named called the German.
Frank SW was going around Chicago, claiming he was the one that that off Marilyn Monroe. Have you ever heard that story?
Speaker 2: Unless he’s an anesthesiologist, he’s full of
Speaker: shit. Okay.
Speaker 2: English.
Speaker: All right. A lot of stories about Marilyn Monroe’s death isn’t there. And JFK’s. And RFKs. There’s a lot of stuff out there about that that, that you don’t know what to believe
Speaker 2: anymore, never come out, and it’s so, it, I, wait, you know what’s so interesting to me?
I got to know. Marilyn Monroe and Dorothy Kga [00:18:00] because I got caught on the streets of New York. I was 15 and a half by a true officer and says, you gotta go to school till you’re 16. This was in August. So I give Costello the ticket. He says, I’ll handle it. So he says to me, when you come out. Of De Dempsey’s upstairs.
There’s Wilford Academy. I said, I’m no fan. I don’t want to pick become a hairdresser. You’re crazy. He said, no, just check in and leave. You’re gonna meet me at 11, go there at nine o’clock and don’t stay. So I got there, carry the first day and it was just like you said, the girls had just signed the book.
’cause they’ll come and check and then leave. So I look over her shoulder, there’s 30 young girls there. 30 young girls. We gonna find 30 young girls in New York City at nine o’clock in the morning.
Speaker: There you go.
Speaker 2: I was there every day for a couple hours before I had to meet him
Speaker: working that Russo charm. No doubt.[00:19:00]
Speaker 2: That was, so that’s how I got to meet Marilyn because Kenneth. Marks and Claire, they were lovers when they said they were partners. I didn’t know what they meant. I thought they were partners of the business. They were hairdressers for Lilly Dasher. They came there looking for shampoo boys, and again, a great opportunity.
They hired me. So now I didn’t have to go to the school. I get the credits, I’m making tips over in Lilly Dashay. She was on 56th of Park. Mm-hmm. And the fourth head of hair. I’m, I’m washing Marilyn Monroe. I couldn’t believe it.
Speaker: You’re 15.
Speaker 2: I was 15 and a half.
Speaker: Wow.
Speaker 2: That was August in December. I, I could walk out.
So now, and, and it’s not like I want your audience to know, it’s not like a salon where we have all the shampoo basements lined up. These were rooms, these ladies changed. They got that there [00:20:00] cashmere that put a robe on. So she’s laying back in the sink. ’cause the maid put her in the sink already. I walk in, read the card, and I don’t even know how long I was staring at her.
Because I went to see something like it hot. I saw something like it hot 10 times already every night. I was upstairs masturbating in the, in the in the balcony.
Crazy times.
Speaker: Really? Yeah. I’ve been talking about all these mysteries with a lot of stories around about ’em. What about Jimmy Hoffa? I see that you’ve got a little, something about Jimmy Hoffa in there and his body, that that seems to be a much discussed topic.
Speaker 2: There was no big mystery about what happened to Jimmy because, you know, Jimmy came out, found God and Frankford Simmons, including myself, borrowed a lot of money already from, I mean, Vegas was built on the chief’s pension fund.
Every dime was down there.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Now this guy’s gonna [00:21:00] come out and they had, they got rid of him. You know, was everybody’s gonna dig him up every time the FBI. Once a raise some money off, get some, they’d say someplace else and they go dig something else. They’re never gonna find this guy, this guy was crushing a car presser on Staten Island.
By, by, by the Dreezy brothers.
Speaker: Yeah. Interesting. So, you know, it’s always a point of contention about that. Did they did they take him? Do him right there in Detroit, in the Detroit area and get rid of him. That was always my contention. ’cause he wouldn’t wanna haul a body that far. There’s another guy that said that took him to New Jersey and buried him.
Speaker 2: No, this is what happened on the highway. They had it set up in the Buick. He was in on the highway, a big one of those big like bust. Tow trucks came behind his car.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And they pushed him right up in a ramp, into, into, uh, a semi. They closed the doors and they [00:22:00] asphyxiated themselves by the exhaust of, of the tractor trailer.
’cause they tapped it through the floors. By the time they got to stand Island, both of them were dead.
Speaker: Ah, both of them. Who was the other guy? Well, who was now Chucky O’Brien wasn’t had gone by then. Who else was with him?
Speaker 2: No. Some guy he knew.
Speaker: Oh, okay. That
Speaker 2: He put a bunch of new people together when they got out.
Speaker: Okay. Who is his new driver? Is that that’s what you’re saying? Yeah. Okay. Interesting. I hadn’t heard that, uh, that theory or that story. A lot of ’em out there. He got some stuff in there about Pablo Escobar. Now, how could you. A little nice little Italian boy from New York City who admittedly had a big part at a very young age and met a lot of important people.
How could you end up with Pablo Escobar?
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, it’s funny because I, we spoke earlier, one of the forwards on my new book is Steve Shepa. And [00:23:00] she ripped, you know, was from Baccala from the Sopranos and now Blue Bloods, and he was going to the University of Nevada and I used to hire all these guys to work my club, Johnny Russo State Street, and that club was 10,000 square foot with a casino and everything else that was in the eighties.
One night a guy came in, we used to have all kinds of people come. We operated 12 hours a day, six at night to six in the morning. I served gourmet food until six in the morning. That’s where I got my biggest clientele. ’cause in Nevada, with the unions, they only had coffee shops after midnight.
Speaker: Ah,
Speaker 2: they would send me all the high rollers.
And this guy came in one night with a girl, and we was comped. They brought him out to the comped area. So I called Steve, I said, Steve, who was the guy? He said, I don’t know who he is. I said, who comped him? They said, Caesars said, all right. The next thing I know, the. We send over a bottle of [00:24:00] a Kristal bottle of Luda 13.
We whw whacked him right up because Caesar’s paying $1,800 Bill he opened up with, he ain’t paying. He gets the Kristal bottle, breaks it on the table and sticks it in the girl’s face.
Speaker: Oh my God.
Speaker 2: So now I call Steve, I said, get to seven. Look what happened. He said, I ain’t going over that guy’s nuts. So I get involved.
I gotta go over there. Yeah. And thank God I, I was wearing, I was wearing Ralph Lauren, the three piece suit I had a vest on and, and Jack Weinstein of tower jewels made me two five shot solid gold derringers. And I had one in each pocket in my vest. So I go over there and I said, sir, you hear these sirens.
They’re coming for you. Why don’t you just get outta here? I don’t need any problems. He said, no, man. I said, no, man. Where the hell are you from? He said, you don’t wanna know. I didn’t know he had the neck, a bottle in his hand. The neck. He [00:25:00] went for me. I went back. I got 81 stitches along my jaw boat. My chin is hanging down and I’m saying, how am I gonna diffuse this guy?
So now I said, look what you did to my shirt. I waited six months for this, the sea island cotton. He’s looking at me like I got two heads. Blood is all over. I just wanted to get my hand on the gun. Soon I got my hand on the gun and I put a righteous fight. I put three right between his eyes. A hundred people at my casino watched me do it.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Guy was Lorenzo Morales. Pablo Escobar’s. Under boss.
Speaker 3: Under Boss.
Speaker 2: That’s how I met Pablo. Wasn’t a meeting I wanted to go to, but Rieger called for me. I said, you sure I’ll get out? And he said, I’ll call. Go. And I went. So I’m in Pablo Escobar’s house that he just built a prison in. Remember? He built a prison.
They made a deal. Yeah. [00:26:00] So I’m there. I’m having dinner with him. He’s got people all around him and it’s just him and I on a long table. He said, I know we meet, we have mutual friends. They said, you wanted to explain what went on? I said, yeah. I said, I didn’t know who your guy was.
I said, I did my homework. You have a daughter, Pablo Gina. She’s the same order, same age as my daughter, GIA. I said, I know what you know my alitos do. They’re gonna kill my kids, my family and all that. And I don’t think it’s justified. That’s why I wanted to come and talk to you. So he is looking at me because I didn’t, you know, if I’m gonna go, fuck it, I was already there.
Yeah, I’ve been shot. Run over, take me out, but don’t touch my kids. He gets up, Gary and he walks towards me and I don’t know if that guy’s gonna put a knife in me. He says, stand up. I stood up. He gave me a kiss. He says, there’s very few men like us. He [00:27:00] says, what happened? I said, the girl, he came in with a girl.
He broke the bottle, stuck it in the face, had nothing to do with it. I went over looking, I still had this, you know, he still had bandage stitches. I said, guy slit my throat. I said, I don’t know who he was. If I knew he was shook guy, I would’ve never killed him. Had we stayed French from that point on. So crazy.
Yeah.
Speaker: Interesting. That’s a crazy story there, man.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. Tell me. I didn think I was coming back. In fact, I bought a one way chicken.
Speaker: Yeah, figured you’d come back from that one. Oh yeah. So Las Vegas, you, you spent a lot of time in Vegas, didn’t you? After New York,
Speaker 2: I went down and realized, I went down in the thirties.
I mean, I went down thirties. I went down in 1959 for 30 years. They were watching the transition that Howard Hughes was [00:28:00] making, taking over their casinos.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: And as long as they had the count room, they didn’t care who owned them.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And that’s what I was doing. ’cause as you know, in my last book, I, I moved Nick Nady, Frank NA’s kid at a Chicago.
He and I moved $600 million to the Vatican. From Vegas legal quarries. We were quarries bound by the Lloyds of London, and our employee was the Vatican. When they stopped us at the airports, we had showed ’em the letter tell we here, we, we locked, we legal man. They said,
Speaker: how come the money, why was the money going to the Vatican from Las Vegas?
I don’t quite follow that.
Speaker 2: They were cleaning it for him and red depositing it. We were bringing three or 4 million, just Vatican. They’d take their piece and then they’d deposit it wherever they wanted.
Speaker: Oh, they were watching it. Somebody over there was watching it for somebody in Vegas.
Speaker 2: Oh, well who was, who was watching over there [00:29:00] was, hello?
He was a bishop from Chicago. Okay. Tony Ocado had that wired man.
Speaker: I see. What they didn’t take right back to Chicago. Why they sent over to, out to Las Vegas. ’cause there was some money coming back to Chicago. I’m pretty sure they needed some walking around money divide up for the guys.
’cause Angelo LaPierre and all those guys were getting a piece of it. Or they should have been
Speaker 2: everybody when it came back, they deposit where you wanted it. The Vatican Bank or drop out? Any, any give the account number.
Speaker: What’s, oh, supposed the Vatican would deposit it for those guys. The Jackie Cerone and Angela Lap.
Piera and
Speaker 2: Jackie. I love Jackie Senior too.
Speaker: Who? Ja.
Speaker 2: Jackie. I, I was in Chicago when Jackie first got outta jail.
Speaker: Oh really? You knew him? He was a bad dude, man. His
Speaker 2: son became a lawyer, you know.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah, I know he was, he went to law school with an FBI agent. I know. And they called each other C You know how you guys [00:30:00] are, you call each other C but if they’re joking around, calling each other C.
So this F FBI agent tells me he’s in the courtroom when and here in Kansas City when Jackie Cone’s being charged with the skimming in a trial. And he comes out and he said, he said something about. A hi cousin and then some, one of those other guys from Chicago went up to him and he said, what’s wrong with, you’re like a traitor.
He said, here you are a cousin to Theones and, and you do this to us. He said, no, no, no, no. He said, I just know his son and we jokingly called each other C Oh, okay. Right.
Speaker 2: Yeah. He was his character. Even I love the S
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: God.
Speaker: Cork was a character. Nick was not much of a character. He was Mr. All business. Oh,
Speaker 2: no.
He was just, no, he was all business.
Speaker: He never saw him out in the joints. Cork was all out in the joints all the time, man. You probably knew him well. Were you,
Speaker 2: were you from Ohio originally?
Speaker: Who me?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker: No, [00:31:00] I, I grew up right here.
Speaker 2: Where’s right here? I dunno where you are?
Speaker: Kansas City. Kansas City. Where I am now.
Speaker 2: Okay, well there you go.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Well you’re close enough. Kansas City. Hello?
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. Cork was out in the joints all the time. Did you know their nephew, Butch, who ended up out there in Las Vegas and, and
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. He came out, he came to my club a lot. I liked Butchy.
Speaker: Did he? Yeah.
Speaker 2: I dunno if he’s alive anymore.
Speaker: No, I understand. He is in a nursing home now.
Speaker 2: What shame
Speaker: and, and I think he’s back Kansas. He’d be a little older than
Speaker 2: me.
Speaker: Yeah. Yeah. He’s gotta be closer to 90. He was several years older than me. I remember him. He was never really part of it. The the,
Speaker 2: oh no. They kept him clean.
Speaker: Yeah. He ran joints for him.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker: Here’s, here’s a good story about him. The IRS wanted to get him so bad. That they took a, a, an undercovered him up, put him in as a bouncer and a doorman, and he. Let him in one night and they got all the records [00:32:00] ’cause they wanted to make his IRS case on him. And the only thing they found was that he was not declaring the cash money that they were handing to the doorman.
He was charging like a $2. $2, cover charge or something like that. Just some modicum of, you know, a little bit of money cover charge to keep some of the riffraff out. And he didn’t declare that’s the only thing they could get. So they ended up filing a case on him and of course it got kicked out pretty quick.
So he was, he was clean. He, they kept him out of it.
Speaker 2: What a gentleman too. Very
Speaker: nice guy. Yeah, nice guy. People seem to like him. So what else would you want people to know outta this book? When they get it?
Speaker 2: The book the interesting thing, one of the catchy things that we did on the cover note is that Scorsese got it wrong with Tony and Michael Spilotro.
Because as you know, in the movie, they got beat to death in Indiana in a court field. Yeah, well, on the Sunday [00:33:00] night before they got killed, Tony Scho hated me. He, they Chicago sent him to watch the Stardust and all that in Vegas. And I never got along with the guy. He’s a little short guy. That’s why they call him the an, I had all kinds of broads.
I had 86 girls working for him in my club and I wouldn’t let him in ’cause he was in the black book. I said, I can’t let you in here.
Speaker: Yeah,
Speaker 2: you were in the black book. For your audience that don’t know, if you’re in a black book, you can’t go into a gaming decision. I could lose my
Speaker: license. You can’t even walk inside.
Can’t even go into the coffee shop. Right.
Speaker 2: Right. So he always had me at the end of his nose. So the night before on a Saturday night, he comes to my club about four in the morning and he wanted to come in. He was drunk. I said, you can’t come in. He says, right, there’s nobody in here. I says, I can’t let you in.
I, and I locked the door on him.
Speaker: Hmm.
Speaker 2: That Sunday night, he machine gunned my house.
Speaker: Oh really?
Speaker 2: My house on La Paloma Avenue. Yeah. He [00:34:00] got some guys to come up from San Diego and they cut my house in half because he knew I had my Sunday dinners. Thank God my house was built on a little knoll, so they were shooting up.
Speaker: Uh,
Speaker 2: but what he didn’t realize, Rex Bell, who was the district attorney in Nevada, was my neighbor. They didn’t get off the block. They gave him up in two minutes.
Speaker: Yeah,
Speaker 2: so I call, I called Chicago. I said to I, I never talked to, I never talked to any anybody, but you know the old man. And I said, Tony, the guy’s getting crazy now you shot up my house.
He said, I heard about it. He said, come in on Wednesday. So I get to the airport O’Hare and who picks me up is Frank Colada.
Speaker: Oh
Speaker 2: really? Who I knew was with him.
Speaker: Yeah.
Speaker 2: He part of that Vulner war gang. And I’m saying as well, wait a minute, maybe they’re doing the [00:35:00] switch here. Maybe I’m gonna get whacked. Really?
Well you see him, but the only good grace that they had, another guy, Frankie b Frankie, be that I knew. So we, you know, I, I get and. We walked to the car, they opened the door, they put me in the back. I said, well, they’re not gonna choke me. I thought I was, you know, gonna do another collar with which, you know,
Speaker: the old
Speaker 2: Frank next day,
Speaker: and they
Speaker 2: near the Leiden Motel.
We get to a residential house. There’s a couple of cars out it, it’s maybe midnight now. We go down, we get into the house, we go downstairs, and I could smell the stench. They had the tarps up Michael, who had nothing to do with his brother at all.
Speaker 4: Yeah,
Speaker 2: a nice kid, Michael Citro, how they lured Tony to Chicago.
They said, Michael’s gonna be made, you’re getting too much attention and you’re gonna be [00:36:00] his underboss and we want you to sponsor him. So he came. They were stripped nude, shackled to chairs and Joe Batters, I don’t know if you know, that’s how he got the name. He liked beating up bodyguard for Capone. He used baseball bats.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: So all they were doing, not all they were doing, they broke every bone in their bodies. And Tony wanted me to see this, and I’m saying, I don’t wanna see this
Speaker 4: really,
Speaker 2: you know, and just to smell alone. I don’t want to get vulgar, but just imagine
Speaker 4: who,
Speaker 2: but anyway, then Tony calls me out of a whisper ’cause he catch me at, at the corner of his eye and I go over close enough and Colorado’s stopping me.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And he said, tell him to kill my brother. He didn’t do nothing. And I said, I can’t say anything. And I walked back and then I laughed. And then [00:37:00] that’s when they brought him to Indiana and buried him. But it was terrible.
Speaker: Yeah. It was, it was a hard, tough way to go.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker: I know the, I know the autopsy said that they’d really been beaten bad.
I didn’t know the extent of it, but the autopsy for sure said they’d been beaten bad. No,
Speaker 2: there, I don’t think it was a, a bone that wasn’t broken.
Speaker: Crazy, crazy, crazy. All right, Johnny Russo. The book is Untold Tales from the Hollywood Godfather Mafia Secrets, with, Michael Benson. I really appreciate you coming on the show, Johnny.
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you man. Always. Anytime. All my, my and great pleasure. I’ll send you a book. I wanna sign it and send
Speaker: it. I got one. I got one. I don’t have a signed one though.
Speaker 2: Alright.
Speaker: I got one, but I don’t have a signed one. Soll send, feel free to send me a signed one. Send. All right.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, everybody out there.
God bless you all.
Speaker: All right. All right, Johnny. Thanks for coming on. Alright, I’ll see [00:38:00] you.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, Gary Jenkins interviews bestselling author Mark Shaw about his explosive new research into the JFK and RFK assassinations — and the hidden role of New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. Shaw breaks down newly uncovered FBI documents, including Marcello’s alleged 1985 prison confession claiming involvement in JFK’s murder. We explore Marcello’s long-running war with Robert Kennedy, the suspicious death of journalist Dorothy Kilgallen, and significant inconsistencies in the official story of RFK’s assassination. This conversation challenges the lone-gunman narrative and exposes how organized crime, politics, and government investigations may have collided to shape American history.

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0:10 The Kennedy Connection
21:37 Sirhan’s Background Uncovered
31:56 The Role of Marcello in Assassinations
44:54 The Quest for Justice
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Transcript
[0:00] Aaron Cohen began to expose a goings-on in Louisiana, which eventually came to the attention of Robert Kennedy and a Senate committee investigating corruption.

[0:11] Through Robert Kennedy’s efforts in the Justice Department, our organized crime and racketeering section really was established. That was a Robert Kennedy brainchild. To concentrate a group of prosecutors, who were specially trained to engage in traditional organized crime investigations. Marcello and other mobsters who appeared before the committee refused to acknowledge the existence of the mafia. Even FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover seemed to concur. For the reason for Marcello’s absence, he was still subpoenaed to appear before the McClellan Committee. Marcello defiantly pleaded the Fifth Amendment to 66 questions that Robert Kennedy directed toward him. His arrogance and contempt for the proceedings provided even more incentive for Robert Kennedy to attack the mafia.

[1:02] Marcello even refused to answer the question of where he was born. This very withholding of information became the weapon that Robert Kennedy would use to go after Marcello. Hey, all you wiretappers, good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective with a special guest today. Man, you know, recently, guys, I had always just gone along with the fact Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone. Sirhan Sirhan acted alone. And those investigations were all legit and they were accurate.

[1:36] And, you know, over the last year, there’s been a lot of stuff come out and I’ve started looking into this and I’m beginning to wonder myself. And so I was able to find Mark Shaw, who we have sitting here, who has done more work than maybe anybody on this whole thing. And he’s come up with some really compelling evidence on a mob connection on Carlos Mosello. So welcome, Mark. I’m really glad to have you on the show. Thank you, sir. So Mark, God, I was looking over your credentials here. You’ve been doing this for 30 years or so, or your whole life, I guess. And, and you’ve got him. Oh, you got 30. I know where I got the number 30. You got 30 books out there. You’ve done, and you’ve really, you’ve done a bunch of them on the JFK investigation and murder. So, guys, I’m going to put up his website, put a link on his website, and you’ll see what all those books are. So, if you want to really take some more deep dives into the JFK thing.

[2:32] Go to that and get some of his books. And this book is a little more about the RFK. See, I just really always assumed Sirhan Sirhan did it, Mark. I don’t know what to say. It’s just that’s the only information I ever heard was Sirhan Sirhan did it. And they got the video of him doing it. So there’s no doubt, I guess, I don’t know if he did it or not now. So let’s, uh, uh, and Carlos Marcello was so involved in all this. Let’s start unpacking this a little bit, if we will, if we could like, okay, let’s talk a little bit about Carlos Marcello. How does he figure into both of them? Well, I felt like you did. You know, I grew up when I was real young, when JFK was assassinated, I just took what J Edgar Hoover said about Oswald alone. You know, I’d never even thought about it for years and years and years. And then I practiced law with Melvin Belli, who, you know, that name, the famous lawyer in San Francisco. Yeah. And I wrote a biography of him and I started to learn about his mafia connections.

[3:32] And his main client, for instance, was Mickey Cohen, who you I’m sure you know that name. Yeah. Oh, yeah. West Coast racketeer, killer, all of that. And I started to wonder about Belli’s representation of Jack Ruby. So I looked into that and that led me to the 1960 election. and some of the mafia, Joe Kennedy, bringing them in to win Chicago so they could get JFK elected. So that made me wonder about all that. I wrote a book called The Poison Patriarch about that. And then I found out about this Dorothy Kilgallen that was the most credible reporter to have ever covered the JFK assassination. So that got me into writing these different books. The Reporter Who Knew Too Much was the first one, and it did well, and so I kept going and going. But today we want to talk about the Marcello effect, I would call it, on both the JFK assassination and now the new evidence that I have in the book Abuse of Power coming out December 2nd, indicating that Marcello was not only responsible, in my opinion, for JFK’s assassination, but also Robert Kennedy’s. And I think the most amazing news to your listeners, as it was to me when I found out about it earlier this year, when the JFK assassination records were released, finally, after all these years, I came across a FBI file.

[4:58] And basically, the long and short of it is a confession by Carlos Marcello. And it happened on March 4th, 1985. I’ve got it in front of me. When Jack Ronald Van Landingham, an inmate at the Seagalville Federal Institution, Pareto Institution in Texas, said the following. He was in the company of Carlos Marcello and another inmate at the Federal Corrections Institute yard in Texarkana, Texas, in the courtyard, engaged in conversation. Carlos Marcello discussed his intense dislike of former president John Kennedy, as he often did. Unlike other such tirades against Kennedy, however, on this occasion, Carlos Marcello said, referring to President Kennedy, yeah, I had the son of a bitch killed. I’m glad I did. I’m sorry I couldn’t have done it myself. Now, you have to pause and really think about those words.

[5:53] Would Marcello have done that? Because, as you know, most mafia were supposed to keep their mouth shut. Was he just bragging? What was he doing this? or, you know, what was his motive for saying that to this Van Leningham, who actually was a government’s plant who they had put in there to set up Marcello, trying to get information about him regarding the JFK assassination. So I was a little bit dubious of it. And I went, though, back into some research and everything. And I found out more about why this happened. And it seemed to be more credible to me all the time. And then I found out that there was actually an auto recording.

[6:35] And I think you know that what they had done is give this snitch a transistor radio with a microphone in there. And so the confession was audio taped. Now, the location now of that audio tape, which has never been released, I want to talk about a little bit later. But this changes everything because I feel like, in fact, that it validates a lot of my research and that of Dorothy Kilgallen in my first four books. Because we always pointed the finger at Marcello, And Kilgallen, who was the only reporter to have interviewed Jack Ruby, and Jack Ruby sent her to New Orleans, the home of Carlos Marcello. And things go on from there to where Dorothy, finally in 1965, 60 years ago, is mysteriously killed right as she’s writing a book for Random House implicating Marcello. So Marcello is in the middle of all of that. And if you know if you’re if you and your listeners know his history it was frank costello in new york who set up marcello in new orleans now i’ve interviewed several people down there who knew him and he was not somebody that you want to mess around with that’s for sure and it’s it’s very i always look at motive like you did when you were a detective and marcello obviously and now shut up for a minute uh marcello had obviously the strongest motive to have eliminated uh jfk.

[8:02] When Bobby Kennedy became attorney general, the first thing that he did was go after they swore that they would never go after the media or go after the mafia if they’d help him elect JFK president. First thing he did was was deport Marcello to Central America, where he almost died. Marcello spent two agonizing months in exile. After making his way through the rugged Central American jungle, Marcello somehow got back to Louisiana. How exactly Marcello was able to re-enter the U.S. is uncertain. Investigator Ed Becker believes Marcello used his connections to sneak back into the country. When he got back in the United States, Robert Kennedy charged him with racketeering.

[8:43] And Marcello knew that Bobby Kennedy was going to keep going after him. So what did he think? Smart man that he was.

[8:52] If I kill Bobby Kennedy, which I want to have happen, then Jack Kennedy will come after me with everything the government has. But if I eliminate JFK, Bobby Kennedy will be powerless. And that’s exactly what happened. Now, we’re going to tie that in a little bit, if I may, to what happens five years later when Robert Kennedy is running for president of the United States. And he’s in California at the Ambassador Hotel. He’s just won the California primary. And if you’re Marcello, you’re smart enough to say, wait a minute, I can’t let that guy become president because I know he knows that I set up his brother for the assassination. He’s going to come after me. And we’ll talk about how I have then connected that into his involvement in the Robert Kennedy assassination. Richard, was it Richard Van Leningham? He was a white collar criminal that was already in prison with. So he had credibility within the prison. And I know these guys sit around on those tables outside and in a communal area many times and talk, I’ve got a buddy that used to talk to a guy, all the mob bosses down in Springfield, down at the hospital prison. So all that, all that really, really rings true. And now you tell me they’ve got a, the actual, the actual audio tape is there. So that’s, uh, as most interesting, I had, I’d seen that clip before, uh.

[10:16] Where it’s, you know, it claimed, but I didn’t know, you know, in this day and age, who knows if anything’s true or not, but there’s an actual audio tape that that’s dated and signed and gone into evidence. So that’s, uh, that is the most interesting little thing. And, and, you know, for our, our list, there’s a lot of them a little bit younger. Dorothy Kilgallen was a pretty well known reporter in New York city. And I think she was on a TV show for a while. And, and she was like i’m trying to compare her to somebody in modern time she was uh she was like almost too big to kill in many ways too big reporter to kill yeah her her career uh overwhelms diane sawyer, oprah uh you know all of those barbara walters and all of that wrote a newspaper column uh read by 200 000 people every day for the hearse corporation was on what’s my line the uh The famous quiz show that was on for 15 years. She covered the Dr. Sam Shepard case and the Lindbergh baby kidnapping case and all of that. Very close friend of JFK’s. She was the real thing. And the New York Post called her the most powerful female voice in America. And as I mentioned to you before, I was in New York City this past weekend where they renamed the street at East 68th Street and Park Avenue, Dorothy Kilgallen Way in honor of her.

[11:38] The biggest thing, though, that we need to know there is that she was at the Jack Ruby trial. A lot of these experts like me, supposedly, weren’t in Dallas. Dorothy was there right away. She interviewed Jesse Curry. He told her the shots came from the overpass.

[11:52] She did experiments to see whether Oswald could shoot Kennedy from the sixth floor depository. She was really on this, but interviewing Jack Ruby made all the difference because basically, I think he told her his involvement in the JFK assassination. And where did he send her? Where did he send her? He sent her to New Orleans. And she went ahead and investigated Marcello down there, connected him to Jack Ruby, connected him to Lee Harvey Oswald. And then as the fall of 1965 came along, she made a big mistake. She let the wrong people, who I believe included Marcello, know she was writing a book for Random House, a tell-all book that would expose him for his involvement in the JFK assassination and J. Edgar Hoover for covering the whole thing up. And a few, very few days later, she was found dead in her townhouse in New York City in Manhattan, in a bed she never slept in, wearing her eyelashes, makeup, everything. It just didn’t make any sense. She was found dead there. And I have proven through my books, especially the reporter who knew too much and collateral damage and others, that she was poisoned because the autopsy only showed one, and there was a cover-up, only showed one barbiturate in her system, and the new autopsy showed there were three.

[13:12] I interviewed Dr. Michael Bodden this past summer, and he admitted to me they didn’t know what happened to Dorothy Kilgallen, but unfortunately, they let the media know that she had overdosed on drugs and so on and so forth, which ruined her reputation at the time.

[13:27] Yeah, that’s a no-brainer. Just slip that out, and it just takes over everything. The myth is much more powerful than the truth, and the lie of running around the world before the truth gets out of bed. So that was really smart. And I always thought about this, and you just explained something to me. Why kill JFK?

[13:50] Because RFK is the one that personally, he attacked Sam Giancana. You know, he said things like, what are you going to giggle like a little girl? He personally attacked Hoffa. He was personally, you know, going after Marcello. I mean, he made it personal. Why not go after him? Well, now you explained it, that go after him, you know, kill one brother. You better kill them all and go after him. You take out, you know, the president. Then the next, uh, and Lyndon Johnson’s not going to do anything. He’s not going to really allow too much to, to go on there. Plus he got rid of, uh, RFK pretty quick and RFK immediately, you know, went head to head with Johnson. So that was, that was brilliant on their part. So he really explained something to me.

[14:35] This whole thing started with this book, I think, The Enemy Within, which is Bobby Kennedy’s book. And if you go in there and look at what he says about the mafioso, their slick back hair, they’re giggling. I mean, you talk about hatred coming towards him with that. You know, Bill Alexander, who was one of the prosecutors of Jack Ruby, when I interviewed him, he said, you know, Bobby Kennedy had a lot more enemies than JFK. I thought Bobby would get killed. Yeah. And, and, uh, you know, finally in 1968 he was, but, uh, yeah, Bobby, Bobby brought all that on the Kennedy family and, and everything with regard to his hatred for the mafia and for sure. Yeah. Really? I tell you, there’s a, there’s a trail of dead women behind these Kennedys and mob guys. It seems like, can I tell you just a quick story? Sure. When I was a correspondent for good morning America, I covered trials for them and everything like that. So they sent me to Atlantic City to interview Angelo Bruno.

[15:36] That’s probably a name people know, the big mafia boss in Philadelphia, about them getting into the gambling in Atlantic City. So I went to his, I couldn’t get him, but I got his lawyer. I went to their office and I interviewed the lawyer. And he told me things we couldn’t believe. It was on Good Morning America the next morning. Huge audience for it. The producer sent me, said, stay there and see if you can interview him again. Then I went, I called his office, secretary came on. I said, is such and such there in a silence and said, wait a minute, are you okay? Are you crying? She said, yes, Mark. I guess you don’t know. When my boss started his car this morning, you can’t mess around with those guys. You know that. No, no, you can’t. You can’t. Oh, you can’t. So Marcello especially was, I’ve done an awful lot of research on him and that’s one guy you couldn’t mess around with. Yeah, really. He was, he was scary.

[16:28] So uh let’s talk a little more about the uh just a little bit more about the jfk thing i think that ruby it’s really interesting that ruby spilled a lot to dorothy kilgallen now was that part of what she was writing in her book or how much of that had already gotten out that was going to be a part of the book for sure i think she was going to nail marcello and hoover but also she’s the one who exposed the Jack Ruby Warren Commission testimony, before it was supposed to be released. So she was making enemies all the way along in terms of, and she wrote all these columns, the Oswald file must not close and everything else. But, you know, yes, that would have been in the book for Random House. And unfortunately, I will tell you, all of her notes about the JFK assassination and the manuscript for the book, Right after she died, there was a raid on her apartment, and those papers have never been found. I’ve tried to find them everywhere. I still hope they’re out there, and someday we will. But they were confiscated and probably burned. Wow. That was my next question. What happened to her manuscript and her notes and everything? Now, let’s switch a little bit over to RFK. How is Sirhan Sirhan? It was so interesting. I thought he was.

[17:45] In my mind, I think a lot of people felt like I did. And he was like a busboy or some low-level employee there in the hotel, which gave him access. And, you know, he just was able to stumble into RFK walking off the stage and kill him and get close enough to shoot him like that. But this started, he was talking about this whole deal with the Santa Ana racetrack and Mickey Cohen and Los Angeles hoodlums and all that. That’s so fascinating. The Ambassador Hotel Los Angeles, on June 5th, 1968, headquarters for the Robert Kennedy for President campaign. Victorious in the crucial California primary, Kennedy addresses an enthusiastic crowd in one of the hotel’s ballrooms. My thanks to all of you, and now it’s on to Chicago and let’s win there.

[18:31] As he turned and went by me, he turned to the right toward the kitchen. When he did come through, lots of television cameras and stuff, and we were going into a press conference. He was shaking hands with the two busboys, talking with him, and it was at that time that the shots started. We’ve made sure they recorded that Senator Kennedy has been shot. He’s been shot? That’s right. I just heard this crackling noise, and was shaking violently, and I thought it was being electrocuted. That was my impression. Senator Kennedy has been shot. Is that possible? Is that possible? I saw him laying on the ground. I knew he wasn’t going to live. Everybody else, just please stay back. 25 1⁄2 hours after he is shot, at 1.44 a.m. on June 6, Robert Kennedy dies.

[19:27] Immediately following the shooting, there was little doubt in anyone’s mind the 24-year-old Sirhan B. Sirhan, using an eight-shot, .22-caliber revolver, was the one who killed Kennedy and wounded five others. There were 77 people in the pantry that night, witnesses. He was tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. An open-and-shut case. Or was it? Greg Stone has spent over a decade looking into the Kennedy assassination. He is one of a number calling for a reinvestigation of the case, a call based on seeming inconsistencies in the physical evidence, and on a belief that the original investigation is flawed, a belief that is remarkably shared by former LAPD Sergeant Paul Chiraga, the first police officer on the scene the night of the shooting. When asked if he thinks there has been a cover-up inside the LAPD, I would have to come to that conclusion. If there is a cover-up, the question is why? To hide a conspiracy or to conceal slipshod police work? Who really shot Bobby? A much simpler question 20 years ago. I don’t think we have to accept the idea that the stain of bloodshed is going to be ever across our country. Well, every time I finish a book, I tell my wife, that’s it. I’m done. But I’d always been quizzical about the Robert Kennedy assassination. It just didn’t make sense to me, especially with regard to Sir Han.

[20:44] So it’s amazing, really, in many ways, where I find my material. People all around the world send me tips and things like this. And so about a year ago, somebody said, look into Sirhan Sirhan, his job in California at Santa Anita Racetrack. So I did. And I found this account, which is in the book. And the link is to it on YouTube and also other parts of it. Internet. It’s been out there for years. But it’s an account by John Shear, who was a paddock captain at Santa Anita Racetrack. My grandparents, my mom would stroll me out to the track of the paddock area. A hot walker would come by and greet my family, greet me. And that man’s name was Sir Han Sir Han.

[21:38] This young man comes right at the bar and he says, I’m looking for work. Do you need anybody. So I looked at me, the guy not much taller than me. I said, the only job we have is a hot walker. A hot walker is a man or a person that walks the horses after they’ve exercised. They’re washed off and they walk them around in a ring until they’re cooled out. And I said, well, that’s the only job I have and it pays 200 a month. I said, if you’re interested, I need a hot walker. He said, I’ll take it. We call him Saul. Very quiet and he was like subservient in a way. Not only would he walk the horses, he’d clean all our racing tack, he’d sweep out our little office, he’d sweep the shed row, he’d do all this work for nothing, because he liked to work. We were in the tack room one day. A friend of mine and I, we were sitting in the office there, and he was reading the Los Angeles Times.

[22:28] And on the front page, I think it was, he said, oh, he shouted out, like, hey, Bobby Kennedy is arming Israel, or something like that, he said there. As soon as he said that, at Sirhan Sirhan, he went into a rage. He roared and shouted and he screamed, and how wicked of a man he is, a man should be dead, he’s killing my people, because he is Palestinian. My friend and I were looking at him with our mouths wide open, because he’d been from a mouse to a lion in a matter of seconds. And finally I said, so calm down, calm down. I said, what do you know about politics? He rattled every senator and congressman in the United States and what state they was from. He knew everything about politics.

[23:10] So he calmed down, eventually calmed down. We’re over at Hollywood Park. I saw him going up the steps with these people, and I said, it’s funny, I saw my wife later on that evening, I said, you know, I saw a soul at the racetrack. We all dressed up, we had money, and he doesn’t seem to be working yet. He had a couple of hoodlums with him. I can’t remember who they were. I’ve seen these people before. I think they’d been thrown off the track once. The day that Kennedy was shot, I was working the racetrack, and they flashed his picture on the TV. They said, do you know this man? So my wife saw it and she saw who it was. Called Hollywood Park, and they said, I’d like to talk to my husband. It’s very, very important. So they got me to the phone, and she said, guess what? Bobby Kennedy’s just been shot, and guess who shot him? Saul. You have to tell somebody. So I put the phone down in a hurry. I ran down to the security office, and I told him, I said, I know the man who shot Kennedy. Bobby Kennedy. I told him who he was, said he worked for me.

[24:07] Actually, he was a hero, because one day a horse in the paddock area got loose. And went after a little six-year-old girl. And John Shear put himself between the horse and the little girl and saved her life. All of his bones were broken and everything else, but he was a real hero. So I started reading this account, and it said that he was at Santa Anita Racetrack. And one day, this man, kind of a subservient-type man, quiet and everything, came in there and said, I need a job. And and john sheer said well the only thing i have is a hot walker and it pays two hundred dollars a month he said i’ll take it so sir han sir han then was a stable boy like or whatever you want to call it hot walker for several uh for several years he talked about how um he was subservient how he was shy how he was easily manipulated um things like that about his behavior and everything but But they really liked this guy. The only thing that happened was at times when Robert Kennedy’s name would be, and people read about this in the book, when Robert Kennedy’s name came up, he kind of went into a little bit of a rage. I think John Shearer’s word, he went from a mouse to a lion.

[25:29] And John Shearer didn’t understand that exactly. So he did have that ill feeling to Robert Kennedy. So now we move towards the day that Robert Kennedy is killed.

[25:40] John Shearer is at Hollywood Park and he’s watching and he sees Sir Han in the accompaniment of two men, one on each side, hefty guys, kind of looking like they are controlling where he’s going. He has on a brand new suit even though he’s unemployed and it just looks like to to uh um to uh john sheer what’s going on here it looks like you know he’s in in control of a couple guys and plus i i believe they’re ones that had been thrown out of santa nita racetrack so rfk is killed on the screen on the la uh television is do you know this man with a photograph of Sirhan? Well, of course, John Shearer knows. And this is where, again, a little chill when I read this and watched this video.

[26:34] He said, I called, my wife had me call Hollywood Park and I told the authorities, whoever it was there, probably the security people, that I knew who he was. And I knew him because I knew him at Santa Anita Park and so on and so forth and everything. And I expected then that they would give that information to the LAPD or the FBI, and I’m pretty much sure they did, and they would get back to me. They never did. They never followed up. And the kicker there then is that he says in his videotape, you know, what was most interesting, though, is for the next year, my wife and I would pick up the phone and hear a click.

[27:11] And we knew that somebody was watching what we were doing. So if you go on and take that on through, okay, what I did was I started to figure out if Marcello could be connected to Sirhan.

[27:25] And I started to think, how could that happen? Because Marcello’s in New Orleans. This is happening in L.A. But the kicker was Mickey Cohen, who was the close associate of Carlos Marcello, ran the racketeering business on the West Coast, and that included Santa Anita Racetrack and Hollywood Park. So I tried to put two and two together there, that how could that connection have occurred? And what really triggered my more interest on that was the fact that one of the hotels that Mickey Cohen controlled with racketeering was the Ambassador Hotel. And he knew all the workings of the Ambassador Hotel.

[28:09] So we go on forward, and then Sirhan is arrested. He’s there when Robert Kennedy is killed. He’s arrested for murder. And one of the most amazing things to me, and I think you will find it true as well, because you were a superb detective and you would look into every element of a crime. When Sirhan was arrested, he had four $100 bills in his pocket, even though he was unemployed. Floyd. That had never been explained until I believe I have with all the corroborative evidence in abuse of power. Because obviously, who paid that kind of money at that particular point? Now, John H. Davis, who I think is one of the best researchers of Carlos Marcello, Mafia Kingfish and everything, people should read that book too. Because he sets up the whole thing also with regard to Sir Han, Marcelo, Mickey Cohen, everything, but nobody paid any attention to him back in the day. So then Sir Han is, there’s another interesting aspect of Sir Han. When he’s arrested, one of the detectives says they were amazed at how cool he was, how calm he was. All right. Well, who does that go back to? It goes back to Lee Harvey Oswald, And it certainly goes back to Jack Ruby, because I had shown that when when he found he was really excited and smoking, even though he didn’t smoke and everything. But when he found out Oswald was dead, he relaxed completely.

[29:39] So there’s some connections in there that I’ve been able to put together. Sirhan then is given counsel, terrible representation. And I have listed in the new book about 25 different reasons why I believe Sirhan Sirhan should be either given a new trial, paroled, whatever it is, because he’s been in prison too long. And as RFK Jr. Says, he doesn’t believe that he was accountable, Sirhan was, for his father’s death. Now, over the years, RFK Jr. Has changed his story a lot. At first, he said it was the mafia and Marcello, as his dad did when JFK died. Then he switched to the CIA. And so I agree with some of what RFK Jr. Says with regard to Sirhan not being accountable and needing a new trial and being paroled or whatever. On the other hand, I can’t go along with what he believes happened because I believe Marcello, again, he could not let Robert Kennedy become president. No question about that.

[30:41] Really? It’s kind of interesting here as you compare the two murders. In both of them, the alleged trigger man were the same, almost the same personality type. They were meek, humble, unassuming, uh, even had the same kind of a, a hang dog look, kind of a down, downcast look. Good point. And just the same kind of person. And, and then you take Jack Ruby that gets into it. He’s the kind of guy that’s, that’s, uh, you know, he’s a follower. He’s not a.

[31:13] We’ll do what somebody else gets him to do. I mean, all these guys are like that. They’re not people that go out and act on their own. It doesn’t seem just, that’s just my, you know, armchair analysis of these guys. I understand maybe how Oswald came to the attention of Marcello because he was down there. He was down in New Orleans. He was on that free Cuba committee. He was on the streets of New Orleans. I understand. And it was down in Dallas. I understand how they may find that guy. How did they find Sirhan Sirhan? And how did they choose him and develop him on out to do this? Because obviously it appears to me that maybe somebody groomed him on out. How did was Mickey Cohen involved in that?

[31:51] Well, one of the things Cohen controlled were the racketeering part of L.A. And that’s been proven through the years. But, you know, when you’re looking at a patsy, and I believe there’s a patsy involved in Dorothy’s death, as we could talk about maybe another time, a patsy in JFKs and RFKs, okay? You look for somebody that can be easily controlled and there has to be something, maybe there’s a couple of things that, that connect you to believing, okay, we could compromise this guy. First of all, Sirhan is poor. Second of all, he he has a hatred for RFK. OK. And the other thing is, and it’s been proven that he had gambling debts. All right. So he’s vulnerable.

[32:37] Oswald was vulnerable. You can. And I think I’ve discovered that the real modus operandi by Marcella, who was a smart guy, was to use patsies with these three deaths, including Dorothy Kilgalland’s using her one of her best friends to set her up. You pick these guys out and and then you use muscle to convince them that it’s in their best interest to go ahead and go forward, because there isn’t a reason in the world why Sirhan would have gone ahead to the Ambassador Hotel that Cohen controlled.

[33:12] And then he’s, you know, it’s always been the question of the ballistics. He’s standing in front of Robert Kennedy and Robert Kennedy is shot from the back. I have new ballistics tests in the new book, In Abuse of Power, showing that that almost is impossible for. Now, Sirhan had a gun. Sirhan shot the gun. There’s all kinds of questions about the bullets, just like there was with Oswald and so on and so forth. But I think there’s enough evidence there for, you know, there to be an investigation of, again, of Sirhan’s accountability. And I’m hoping Bobby Kennedy, I’d like to provide closure for Bobby Kennedy Jr. Here if he wants it, because I think this is the most compelling evidence that will tell him, yeah, you’re right about Robert. You’re right about Sirhan Sirhan. Now, let’s get this guy out of prison after 60 some years. Interesting. You know, you, you talk about Carlos Marcello and using these patsies, uh, a friend of mine, Ron Rosson is a kind of an expert on, uh, Carlos Marcello has never written anything, but believe me, this guy, he knows a lot of stuff about New Orleans mob, but going way back to the turn of the century and everything. And, and Ron told me that, and I believe I found that somewhere else that, uh, one of the first known crimes of Carlos Marcello when he was young was not something he did. He got two other young guys to go rob a grocery store. He set it up and then I gave him the guns and everything and then met him afterwards.

[34:38] So, uh, this guy started out using people early, didn’t he?

[34:43] Well, and he, you know, that’s why, you know, I look to see what his financial situation was with his empire in 1963, and he was pretty much a millionaire. But by 1968, I mean, he was almost a billionaire. All this property owned everything that he did. I mean, he’s not going to let Bobby Kennedy become president and tear all that down. He just think about, you know, common sense here and logic with regard to the motive that he had. That’s why it’s so disturbing. And I mentioned, I think, a little bit earlier, this task force on government secrets and so on and so forth. Boy, when I found out they were going to look into the assassinations, I was euphoric. And so I wrote several letters to Congressman Luna telling her of my research and said, I want to contribute to your investigation. And here’s the material I have about JFK and the confession. Here’s the material I have about Bobby Kennedy and so on and so forth. I sent several letters. I even had a short conversation with her about perhaps inviting me to one of the hearings and all of that. And then all at once, bang, that just stopped.

[35:48] And they will not look into that kind of research. They don’t want anything to do with Marcello, even though I gave her the confession and all of that. And now worse is that a couple colleagues of mine and myself, we’ve tried to get her with all the power she has to go into that Texas court and get the audio tape, and she refuses to do so. In fact, I don’t know if you know one of her comments recently.

[36:14] I want to be clear, the Task Force on Declassification of Federal Secrets is not here to provide the definitive account of what happened on November 22nd.

[36:27] 1963. Well, why in the world are you there? Sounds like the Warren commission all over again. Yeah, it does. You know, you, uh, you said something, something that kind of caught my attention there. And I want to follow up on, uh, the, uh, ballistics test out of the gun at the ambassador hotel. Now, did it, did it show there was more than one gun fired for sure. More than one gun was fired in that because, you know, I miss a hotel. There shouldn’t be, but one gun fire because no law enforcement shot anybody shot at anybody.

[36:58] Well, uh, I’m going to say the same thing I’ve said about, uh, what happened with the, the rifle and the shots in daily Plaza and all of that. I know expert on that. As far as the shots being fired at the Ambassador Hotel, that has been a question for many, many years as to what happened. Now, Sirhan had a gun and he supposedly shot. And these new ballistics tests that I put in the new book show that they were scattered all over the place. But you’ve got you’ve got, you know, you’ve got Noguchi, the autopsy guy, Cyril Weck. I don’t know if you ever interviewed Cyril Weck, the foremost forensic guy in the world.

[37:40] You’ve got a new ballistics test and everything saying that Sirhan was standing in front of Bobby Kennedy. And the shots came from behind the shoulder and the neck and killed Bobby Kennedy. Well, there’s no way he could have, you know, shot Bobby Kennedy unless he turned all the way around and put his gun up that way or Bobby Kennedy shifted. But those are speculation and i don’t deal with speculation so i think when you put everything else together i think uh sir han was set up as a patsy uh and marcello is so smart i’m not going to forget you said that because i think it’s important that early on he wanted a grocery store rob and so he got two other guys to do it yeah that’s mafia at its best isn’t it oh yeah yeah that’s how it works man that is how it works we sit here and watch it in kansas city or i did back in the day when when they were something you know i mean they had you know the boss had his underboss tuffy the luna take care of all the street business you know you could see it i mean we got tapes you know listen to him telling talking to people and taking care of all the street business say well i’ll carry this back to unk or zeo as he called him so that’s you know that’s mafia at its best and and marcello was a master at it sounds to me like and he learned from Frank Costello, but he learned from somebody who helped form the mobs. Right. Exactly. Exactly. For sure. If, if Sirhan were to have a trial, if they were to have a retrial.

[39:07] Was there, is there some kind of particular smoking gun kind of evidence that might come out that would, you know, have ever like people on the jury go, Oh, wow.

[39:17] Well, I think the John Shearer account for sure is very, very important. Uh, and then I think, uh, you would, you would look into motive again, you’d look into motive of Marcello. How am I going to get rid of Bobby Kennedy Jr. And in the book, I say that when Bobby Kennedy completed that speech in the ambassador hotel and just won the California primary, looked like he was going to be president and said, it’s on to Chicago and everything. I’ve put in there, and I guess this is some of my better writing, the long arm of Carlos Marcello reached into that ambassador hotel and changed the smile on his face into one of death. Because, you know, I believe that’s what happened. Marcello, motive wise, everything else. I think that would be the kicker, the smoking gun. And you could, You know, you’re a former detective. I lay out in my books, like I try to have the reader read it by I lay out the evidence like a prosecutor would. Yeah. OK. And that’s what you did as a detective when you went into when you into the courtroom, you know, the evidence against the accused. And so I think that’s what what would happen here. I think a first year prosecutor or defensive attorney, I’m sorry, first year defense attorney could present all of this evidence and all of these things happening. with some other interviews and so on and so forth. And I think Sirhan would be released the next day.

[40:38] Yeah, interesting. Now, you are an attorney yourself, and you’ve been in the courtroom, and you’ve reported on a lot. Did you get the trial transcript from Sirhan’s trial?

[40:49] I’ve partially looked at it. It’s so lengthy, but I will tell you this as well. His legal representation, you know, go back to Oswald just a second. Who did they get for him? A lawyer.

[41:04] Mafia connected Melvin Belli. Melvin Belli. He was a cream of the crop back then. Absolutely. But he’s connected to the mafia, and I think he had orders. He wouldn’t let Oswald testify. Made him look crazy and everything. Now we go to Sirhan. they get in a lawyer that’s connected to johnny roselli oh really okay yeah and so you know the the representation was terrible they finally uh i think uh unfortunately uh he he confessed to what had happened but it didn’t really make any sense as to what occurred so he never had a chance and again i’m all about justice just as you are you know fighting for justice with these uh with these people that I’ve, you know, written about in my books. In fact, I was on a radio show not too long ago, and I was asked, why do you keep doing this, fighting for justice? And I said, well, they’re just like my clients when I was a criminal defense lawyer and a public defender.

[41:58] You know, Oswald and Sirhan and Dorothy Kilgallen and JFK, they deserve justice. And unfortunately, And as I said, when we first talked, we needed detectives like you that would go after the evidence and not do what you called it, cherry pick, because all of these people have written these books about JFK assassination and Dorothy and RFK. What they do is they pick a sensational headline and then they fit the evidence to that. That’s not how you do it. You go out and grind out the evidence and everything like that. And then you come up with some sort of conclusion or how you’re going to prove what happened. And that’s one of the problems that we have today. I think that there aren’t more detectives like you on the job. Interesting. It’s, um.

[42:45] I don’t know, you know, and J. Edgar Hoover, you think about that, he was such a politician that wanted to hang on to his power and his position that I could see where he would be motivated to if powers, political powers, powerful people wanted him to sit on that and finish it, that he would do that. Did you find any much more about that? I mean, it really, he’s so, he was so secretive. It’d be hard to find any kind of smoking gun there.

[43:16] First of all, he and Frank Costello used to meet in the, in Central Park in New York City and talk about J. Edgar Hoover’s gambling debts. So, but as far as Hoover, what does he have to do when JFK dies? He cannot possibly let anybody believe there’s a, I hate to use the word because I don’t like a conspiracy. It’s got to be one person. And so right away, he’s yelling out, Oswald alone, Oswald alone. And he doesn’t want anybody, even though he knows about Marcelo and his connections and so on and so forth, and how the Kennedys betrayed him and the other mafioso when the 60th election happened, he can’t let that happen. So he just covers all that up. What happens when you get to Robert Kennedy? He doesn’t want anybody going back into a full investigation of Robert Kennedy’s death. And especially with Sirhan. So what is it again? It’s Sirhan alone. Yeah. And that’s and same thing happens with Dorothy Kilgallen’s death. So he was a very smart man. You mentioned the word. He was more of a politician than he was. Yeah. And then the police enforcement officer. Yeah. He was always watching his back. Don’t they say that Hoover had this black book with all of the dirty, you know, information about everybody? And that saved his, his job all the way through the, those years, that guy. Help him get those big, uh, appropriations from Congress and build the FBI.

[44:43] And it’s the first, it was like a personal power, which a lot of people that rise to that position, they want to hang on to that personal power.

[44:50] And that’s, you know, that’s what, that’s a good way to do it is having to hang on to those secrets. And he was a master. Well, Mark Shaw, this is a most interesting, uh, abusive powers, a book guys, uh, I’d highly recommend you get this. You’re going to learn more than you ever want to know about the, these two murders. There’s been a lot of books about JFK, but there’s a lot of different angles and everything. And I had a guy on here not too long ago that said that his father worked with the CIA and that he was part of a team who went to Dallas the weekend that JFK was killed. So there’s just a lot of stuff out there. And I’m not sure what to think sometimes, but this has definitely been well researched. I can tell you that I got the book and it’s definitely well researched and footnoted.

[45:40] And, uh, you know, the, the evidence is out there and some of it’s hidden, uh, some of it, you, you find out from a couple of different places and you can’t get that tape to support that FBI transcript. And that was a FBI document that you got that had that statement by Marcello in it. You just can’t get the tape. You need to tape to really support that, make sure That wasn’t just that guy making, you know, how prisoners are, they’ll make shit up in order to get a break. And, and he got the tape with Marcello’s voice and his voice on it. You know, that would, that would make that irrefutable. So it’s, there’s a lot of stuff in this book, guys.

[46:17] Mark, you got any last words here? You got any last words here? Well, thank you very much. And I want people to know my email is mshaw, I-N, at Yahoo. I answer every email because I’ve gotten tips over the years and so on and so forth that way. I don’t expect everybody to agree with my evidence and conclusions. But I’ll tell you, I think what’s different here is nobody has ever really looked at the connection between JFK’s death and Robert Kennedy’s death five years later and looked at both of those in the context of the other. Because when you do that, you get a different perspective of what happened and why and why Marcello is the most logical person to have decided those Kennedy brothers could not live. Yeah. If you do a thing we call a Venn diagram, you know what a Venn diagram? That’s where people have these different connections and you draw a circle around all the ones that have been connected to each other. Well, you’ll put circles around Sirhan Sirhan and JFK and RFK and Oswald and Marcello and you start drawing those circles. You see Marcello’s in all those circles.

[47:26] I am not smart enough to know what that was called, but when we’re done, if you open up the book and go back to about the last 20 pages, there’s a circle there with Marcello and all of them in there. I just didn’t know what it was called. I did it at three o’clock in the morning, so you’ll see it there. All right. I’ll do that. Yeah, we learned that in an intelligence school I went to back in like 1978, 77, something like that. What’s it called again? V-E-N-N. V-E-N-N, V-Vector, E-N-N, Venn Diagram. I’ll tell my wife, she’ll think I’m really smart.

[48:05] Yeah, that’s what we got going here. Hey, thanks so much. It’s a Venn Diagram. All right, Mark, thanks so much for coming on the show. Thank you, sir. Don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles, so when you’re out on the streets there and you’re a big F-150, watch out for those little motorcycles when you’re out. If you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to the VA website. They’ll help with your drugs and alcohol problem if you’ve got that problem or gambling. If not, you can go to Anthony Ruggiano. He’s a counselor down in Florida. He’s got a hotline on his website. If you’ve got a problem with gambling, if you have gambling, most states will have a hotline number to call. You just have to search around for it. I’ve always got stuff to sell. I got my books. I got my movies. They’re all on Amazon. I got links down below in the show notes and just go to my Amazon sales page and you can figure out what to do. I really appreciate y’all tuning in and we’ll keep coming back and doing this. Thanks guys.

In this powerful episode of Gangland Wire, retired Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins sits down with Tegan Broadwater, a former Fort Worth Police officer, musician, and undercover operative whose story reads like a movie script.

Broadwater takes listeners on a riveting journey from his early years as a professional musician to his dramatic turn infiltrating one of America’s most dangerous street gangs—the Crips. Drawing from his book Life in the Fishbowl, he details how music, culture, and human connection became unexpected tools for survival and success inside the underworld.
Listeners will hear:

How Tegan Broadwater transitioned from touring musician to undercover police officer, bringing creativity and adaptability to the streets.

The story of his two-year infiltration into the Crips—posing as a South Texas drug dealer with the help of a trusted informant. His insights into gang hierarchy, loyalty, and manipulation, and how understanding culture was key to earning trust. The moral challenges of living undercover—forming friendships with men he would eventually arrest. The emotional impact of a major gang raid that ended with over 50 arrests, and how it changed his outlook on justice and humanity.

His decision to donate proceeds from his book to the children of incarcerated parents aims to break the cycle of violence. He continues to share lessons on leadership, empathy, and cultural understanding through his private security firm and new podcast projects.   Broadwater’s story isn’t just about crime and undercover operations—it’s about identity, compassion, and the human cost of violence. This episode offers a rare look at what it means to live behind a mask while still holding onto one’s purpose.

🎧 Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

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To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

To rent ‘Brothers against Brothers’ or ‘Gangland Wire,’ the documentaries click here. 

To purchase one of my books, click here.

1:08 Life in the Fishbowl
4:54 The Dangerous Fishbowl
11:09 Going Undercover with the Crips
14:14 The Kingpin and His Operations
26:54 Encountering the Mob
34:27 Comparing Gangs and Organized Crime
44:30 Tegan’s Current Projects and Future Goals

Transcript
[0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers. Good to be back here in studio of Gangland Wire. I have a guest today that is another former cop, just like me, worked for the Fort Worth PD. I’m talking with Tegan Broadwater. Now, Tegan has an unusual background. He was a professional musician at one time who ended up going deep undercover to infiltrate the Crips. Now, you know that the Crips is a black gang, don’t you? I know you guys do. The Crips and the Bloods. If you know anything at all about inner city crime, the Crips and the Bloods or the gangs, well, here’s this white dude goes undercover with the Crips. Now, we’re going to find out how he did that. I’m dying to know myself. So welcome, Teagan.

[0:42] Thank you. I appreciate you having me. All right. Now, let’s tell us a little bit about yourself. You just told me kind of nomadic growing up. You went to high school in Houston. You ended up in Fort Worth working for the PD. But you also have been a professional musician and you have a podcast today, written a book, Life in the Fishbowl. You have a company called the Tactical Systems Network. So tell us a little bit about yourself.

[1:08] Yeah, I mean, music was my original passion, and from fourth grade on until my late 20s, that was all I wanted to do. So I went to college for music, went to a prestigious jazz program, and was touring on the road and got signed by a label at one of the early South by Southwest conferences back in the 90s, and just grew a little weary of the music industry itself. I love music, and I still consider myself a creative for the book and the music and stuff that I still do today. I still love to express myself. I think it also played a great role in leveraging it in cop work. So ultimately what happened was as I grew tired of the industry and sharing two beds with five dudes at a day’s end in Oklahoma City on the road, I also had a kid.

[1:57] In 95 I had a kid and I thought, man, I do not want to be gone. So I decided to, at the behest of a few cops that used to come see us play when we were in town they talked me into doing that which was crazy because i just never imagined anything else so i cut eight inches of locks off and retook my driver’s license picture so the guys wouldn’t criticize me when i applied yeah and got into the pd i applied actually at houston pd and for pd and whoever was going to take me first and fort worth was quick to the draw and and although i had absolutely no experience in police work or firearms or anything like that i feel like I really had the type of personality that they needed. I don’t know if they realized that or not, but from the jump, I really wanted to work undercover because I felt like, you know, here I am. I’ve been touring with multicultural bands. I’m the only white guy in this group and that group and whatever. And I’m going to a music school, a bunch of artists and stuff. And so I feel like even in high school, I’d hang out with the jocks, I’d hang out with the smokers, hang out with the whoever. We’re just kind of a pliable personality, just like good people. So I felt like I could really excel at that. And it turns out that I really could. So I got into the police work and ended up being really.

[3:14] Really proficient with a firearm because, again, they teach you how to use it. And I had no bad habits to unlearn. So, you know, I took to all that stuff really well. Yeah. And so, most of us do somewhere. But, you know, I ended up just politicking to try to go to the worst part of town, so to speak, with the highest crime areas so that I could gain more experience. I was super ambitious, learned a lot about the neighborhoods. And at one point, you know, I was trying to.

[3:44] Get into a narcotics unit and as a six foot one white stiff nerd a little more difficult to do so, i started creating my own resume i politicked some of the captains to try to re-implement some of the old weed and seed programs and and learned how to write search warrants and procured some old used expired gear from swat and after just a few years i was i was spending my shift, making covered buys and learning how to do a few undercover buys. And then at the end of every shift, we would earn overtime and go crack doors down some old dilapidated crack houses and, you know, make some cases that way. And so by the time I applied to narcotics for my fourth time, they couldn’t deny me because I had a bunch of informants. I had, you know, several hundred, pardon me, several hundred dynamic search warrants under my belt and all that kind of stuff. So, ultimately, I was accepted there, and what ironically turned out to be a place that I used to work a lot in, there’s an area of town where it was a gang-ridden part of town where you had the Bloods and the Crips divided by one single street.

[4:54] But in terms of the turf, there was a six-square block area with one way in and one way out that was particularly dangerous and particularly problematic.

[5:03] We always rode down there too deep and the cops deemed it the fishbowl because every time you went down there people were radioing in everybody got a warning ahead of time and it made it really difficult for for us to do work down there tons of violence i remember answering calls down there you know bloody females and kids screaming and you know having domestic disturbance calls and displacing these kids and just a real crazy situation but fortunately for me having done those warrants for the few years preceding narcotics when the problems finally arose where the finally they had a killing down there that that drew the attention of the city council.

[5:41] They got together with the chief of police and said, what can we do? We need to pull all stops to get this little segment of town cleaned up. Because obviously there are good people that are down there being held hostage by these jerks that are just shooting each other and making it impossible for anyone to live a normal life. And these people that are innocents are too poor to just stop and move. It’s not as easy as that. So they started doing all the typical things. Of course, they’re not consulting me. I’m just a grunt. And they’re doing jump outs with unmarked bans and writing search warrants and pulling over everybody that moves and trying to get people to flip and obviously to no avail or else that would have worked prior. So, yeah. My whole idea, me being the genius that I am, I went to an informant and said, hey, what do you think of this idea? I said, you pose as somebody that I’m trying to fund. I’m going to pose as T. I’m a big-time dope dealer from South Texas and just had my source busted by the feds. I’m coming up to North Texas, and I’m trying to get my game restarted.

[6:43] But you are the poor crack dude that’s trying to do his little hustle. Because if I’m some kind of big timer and I’m trying to infiltrate Crips here via the dope trade, I certainly can’t go start down at the corners and start buying $25 rack rocks. But I could roll down there with you and tell them that I’m just buying for you. And that was the premise that we went with. He laughed his ass off at first, obviously, too, because obviously the fitting in, I fit in by fitting out, by standing out, right? I wasn’t going to try to fit into that mold. And I even played ignorant along the way by wearing, you know, 49ers, Falcons jerseys and stuff down there in the blue territories.

[7:28] And they’d pull me aside and say, fool, what are you doing? You fool, what are you wearing in this red shirt? And I was like, what? What? You know, I don’t know. You know, give me the evidence. So it was tons of questions, but I feel like I leveraged my own personality and, way more than most would. And between not having an elaborate story to memorize and by knowing that I was going to take this on as a long-term deal, it was easy for me to tell people no. So when they start giving me all these 20 questions, where do you live? Where are you from? I’ve never seen me all of this. I’m like, hey, I’m way higher than you in this game. You don’t even know who you’re talking to. And I’m damn sure not going to tell you where I live. And I’m not going to ask you where you live, you’re obviously an amateur, so I’m going to move on. I got to do my business somewhere else. And then they would think, oh, well, no, I kind of want some money. So they would, you know, ultimately would end up talking me into doing deals. And slowly but surely, I would spend time down there on a little PD budget that we had for our team.

[8:31] And so on days where I knew that guys, key players there were not around, I would pull down to the blocks and ask for them knowing that they’re not there on purpose because I couldn’t afford to spend tons of money every day. So I would go down there and ask for somebody that wasn’t there and then end up hanging out and, you know, share 40 ounce Magnums or playing video games or whatever and getting to know these fools on a different level. And it was just as much learning about their way of life and earning street cred without having to buy bricks yet. So, and that was just on that, you know, skimpy PD budget.

[9:08] So I promised my wife. Now, how did you, how did you like show cash even? Did you, did you borrow some cash from the feds to show cash? The PD gets real nervous. If you want to sit some show money, you know, you’re saying, okay, I’m going to bring this back. This is just for show, but to generate, you know, 10, $15,000 in show cash is hard to do.

[9:31] You’re right. And because you put yourself at risk of being jacked. And you’d be robbed, too, yeah. Yeah. So that was the biggest concern that I had. And what I was actually doing at the time, by facilitating other people.

[9:45] Eventually they would see me come and go, and they would see me doing these deals for my partner and say, man, no, don’t talk to me, just give it to him. And they would see me pull out the swads of cash and give it to him so he could make these buys, and nobody was getting busted. So they knew I was a somebody, but I was literally taking our monthly budget from our NARC crew and cashing in a couple hundred ones and then putting a stack of 20s on the top so that when I pulled out this massive wad. So that was my flash. But after about eight months, I promised my wife it was going to take three months and we’d be done. But I was climbing this ladder rapidly and bad guys introduced me to other bad guys. And it was just turning into a giant operation. I went to my sergeant, who was the only reason I was able to do this deep cover thing and work off the books so often. And just said, look, I’m running out of resources because these dudes are going to start calling bulls on this. Because, you know, I keep telling them I’m this big player. and i go down there and all i’m doing is buying samples or letting guys talk me into trying some of their crack instead of you know the powder because i’m i always tell them it’s like i don’t do no crack i mean i’m i’m looking for bricks and powder because i i move the big stuff so yeah you know i’d buy samples of the favor i said but i can only get away with that for so long so we decided to purposely go shop the feds and.

[11:10] Started with DEA and I presented all this thing. I have this hierarchy. These are the guys. This is where they rank. This is how they’re working together.

[11:21] And ultimately they said, hey, we love this case. This looks like a great deal for us. We’d love to take it from you and we’ll let you know how it goes. And I was like, no. I mean, this isn’t just my ego talking, but by the time I’d been doing this eight months and down there seven days a week and building this massive case, There’s no way I’m handing it off to somebody, even if they are DEA. There’s no logical reason to bring in a new undercover when I already have this kind of momentum going. So then we went to the ATF. They didn’t really have the resources of the people. And somebody mentioned that the FBI had an agent assigned to our gang unit that was there for the gang and violent crimes task force.

[12:04] And she was currently working on another case, but sat down with her, and she was a hustler. She’s fantastic, perfect fit. She loved the idea.

[12:13] She was going to obviously let me continue the undercover work, and she spent a few months finishing up her other case. So for those few months, the advantage slash disadvantage I had was, since I’d been working off the books anyway, now my sergeant thought, well, you’re working for the FBI. And the FBI thought, well, you still have a sergeant. and I was just saying, hey, could I get the 17K? I need to buy a bird. And by the way, could I get a different car? And then, you know, in two days, I’ve got cash money and a Range Rover. So now I’m balling, you know? So now I’m showing up and really able to play the part. And, you know, after a solid year, this thing, I’ve stayed undercover for almost two years. And, you know, after that first year, I started having people come to me trying to do deals. And I had gotten to the point where I was telling people I couldn’t do deals because in my mind I’m thinking, well, this cat is actually too small for me or this cat is not actually a crit because it wasn’t a dope case. And that’s the whole misnomer about the case that we had in the first place. The whole point was to eradicate the violent gangsters that were in this part of the neighborhood, and it ended up spreading into other parts of the neighborhood and a larger area of town, obviously, as ultimately what happened is when the U.S. Attorney said, it’s time to wrap this up. You have your top gun guy.

[13:36] My top, my kingpin, so to speak, in Fort Worth was moving $250,000 of product a week. Wow. Then it was time to wrap it up. So after that long, I probably would have just kept going because I got so into it and just so bought into, you know, the relationship building and the momentum of the case that I, who knows when I would have stopped, but I would have certainly burned out at some point. But it turned out that we ended up arresting 51 people. Crips and 41 went federal and 10 went state.

[14:11] And it was, you know, one of the more successful gang cases a lot. They got tons of time too. Yeah. Interesting. Now you’re a kingpin. How did you work up to him? How was he set up? How did he instantly, can you tell us a little bit about their procedures and how they had that set up?

[14:29] Sure. And the most difficult part was the kingpin was obviously you’re smarter, even though if you’re in a gang, there’s some level of intelligence that must stop at a certain point. But this cat had, he had car lots, he had a real estate license, he had storage units and things like this. So he was sophisticated in terms of a street thug because, you know, typically Crips are, you know, violent dudes that will, you know, take what they need in order to achieve what they need to achieve. But he was smart also. So, you know, he’s a dangerous cat to deal with. And ultimately it was really ironic because it was really what happened is they had what they call the four tray day. And now a four tray crip is a crip that originated on 43rd Street in Compton, you know, Southern Cal. But they carry those five deuce and four tray, they call them. Those sets were heavily populated in Fort Worth and so they had a four tray day and they had everybody in the park behind this fishbowl area all coming together to glorify cryptum i guess and and they’re all there together yeah i know they even got a city permit that’s how smart this oh my god oh my god.

[15:54] So it’s doing so of course i’m you know i’m t from south texas and i go rolling into the barbecue i’m still standing out like a sore thumb oh my god Who’s that white dude? Hey, who’s that white dude? So for every person that would question me and say, what the hell are you doing here? I had just as many people saying, hey, wait, that’s T. Are you kidding me? He’s okay. And they would start introducing me around. Yeah. Well, it turns out that my kingpin, I almost thought I was going to have to wrap it up early because my kingpin had left for California to lay low because he was feeling heat. I don’t know that it was necessarily for me because I hadn’t started wrapping up this case or anything, but for whatever reason, he laid low for a couple of months. And when he came back amidst all this, there was a basketball game that I got caught up in and met up with a few people around this basketball cart in an apartment complex right outside the park. It was just, you know, hundreds of people out there. And turns out he was in one of these games and went to smoke a cigarette outside of one of these apartments. and I met one of my informants out there and I was like, man, I got to go in and see if he’s got a little something.

[17:05] It was a stab in the dark, but at this point, the AUSA had said, hey, you got to wrap this up. So I’m thinking, I got to get this kingpin somehow. And as goofy as my informants have been over the years, this one statement rang true and it ended up being really profound. And he said, T, you know you’re way too big to be asking him for something small and the chance that he has anything on him is already low and you know being so presumptuous to walk up and ask for something small since I only had you know so much money to spend that particular day he said let me let me do it let’s go back to our first little premise and so we ran it the same way and say you know I’m hooking this cat up or whatever I know we haven’t seen you for a bit I know you’re back in town man we’re just trying to get a little something something and just kind of made it really casual if you don’t got it it’s all cool and he’s like man i got you and he reached into his pocket and pulled out this little bit for my partner uh you know i spent a few hundred bucks and you know and then wrapped it up so ultimately we were able to wrap him up in the conspiracy also by the time you debrief all these people they’re all connecting the dots that you haven’t connected for yourself and you know he ended up getting 25 years, we had a 60-year sentence, a life sentence, and then most of the others ranged between 17 and 30 years.

[18:27] Convicted so it was really really traumatic for me honestly because i i didn’t play emotions at all when you’re working undercover you’re you’re highly goal-based you know i’m trying to accomplish certain things and i’m always keeping in mind what i’m trying to do yeah if you get emotional well you would know i mean you know as well or better than i you get emotional in any level of cop work you’re asking for trouble yeah it needs to be a it’s it’s all business and you’re doing your job and that’s the way it needs to be so but we start wrapping these people up many of whom i thought please go away forever but also many of whom who i i really adored as people because i thought man if this kid weren’t a sociopath all we did was play video games and he’d talk about the chicks on the west side of town and we’d share beers and talk about if the cowboys were going to get their ass kicked or whatever and just and i felt like these dudes are just dudes i mean And, you know, it has nothing to do with race. I think most of us would agree that most people don’t have anything in common with criminals that make a living selling dope and moving prostitutes and selling and buying guns. I mean, that’s just not the type of people that we associate with. But I found profoundly that there was so much more in common with some of these guys. And it was at that point that I really felt like emotionally overwhelmed and drained. I’d been put in all these extraordinary hours.

[19:53] And so it really, it wiped me out and during that roundup time. And a lot of people don’t know, just, just actually the act of being out there on the street, hanging out with these guys.

[20:04] Man, in that, what he’s talking about, the fish bowl and these projects and, and these apartments he’s been in and at any time something can jump off, but it might not have anything to do with you. Something else would jump off and the bullets start flying, man. And it’s always that edge of danger and fear going on all the time.

[20:25] And you can’t show that. No, and I think part of it was my natural personality is kind of calm and analytical when it comes to that, which is why, again, I think my creative brain being engaged was part of my advantage. Sometimes I get too creative for my own good, but other times, you know, when guys pulled guns on me, which happened more than once, you know, I would just, I would act like, man, why are you, you’re going to do this? You don’t even know what you’re doing or who you’re dealing with yet. Why don’t we have the conversation and then we’ll figure out if you still want to pull that out. You know, that kind of thing. At the same time, I’m still moving 100 miles an hour in my mind about what I’m going to do. Do I need to drill them a new eye socket or can I talk my way out of this, you know? Really, it’s kind of like the story about the duck you see going across the pond. On the surface, the duck just looked like it’s calm and serene just kind of going across the pond. But underneath the surface, those little feeders going, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That’s exactly right. That’s a great analogy. It’s exactly right. My brain’s going, holy…

[21:26] Okay do this do this okay do this okay say that okay all right all right yeah dude what’s up, yeah but you just stay in character and just like this this isn’t how this isn’t how we do business man you know i’m if you want to learn from people that have been there before you need to put that down and hear what i’m going to tell you because i’ve been at so many levels beyond what you’re talking about i’d be willing to share it if you put that shit down and stop playing around because This is not how we do it. So I would just, I would play it calmly, not even yelling at them. They would yell and whatever, but, you know, I wasn’t intimidated. I think I probably got slightly complacent to a certain point. Yeah, I can see that, yeah, I bet. Yeah, about 12 months in, I can’t remember the exact date. I could look it up, but ended up in a little shotgun house with, you know, trying to do a deal with this kid who was, again, he begged me to do the deal. I confirmed it was a crip I’m like okay and I go to his house and there’s, A couch, a coffee table with a gun and a scale and some dope and then a big screen TV and practically nothing else in there. I’m sure as a cop, you would know. There’s probably a Bible in there somewhere. Probably.

[22:41] Probably. Maybe some porn, but otherwise that’s it, right? So as I’m talking to these cats, I’m hearing an eerily familiar voice. And you got to realize this is about 2006. So, you know, we had three main TV channels. We had, you know, Fox, ABC, NBC, or four, because CBS, I think Fox was there by that time. And Fox was running cops like a mother. I mean, if you hadn’t heard of Fort Worth, yeah, if you hadn’t heard of Fort Worth before cops, you knew who Fort Worth PD was after cops because those suckers followed us all day for years.

[23:21] And we used to have these guys that loved to go out with those crews. It was not me, but when they were off, my sergeant would always assign them to me because me and my partner were hustlers and we would go out and find stuff. So I ended up on a couple episodes of Cops. And so as I’m standing there negotiating this deal with my back to the TV, I hear a familiar voice. I’m thinking, no way. But yes, it was one of the episodes of Cops with me arresting a kid for a bunch of eggs that he had in his pants. And I’m just filibustering and talking loud and everything. And you know how it is too. You could be best friends with somebody that you know is a cop that you see on their off-duty all the time. And then you see them in the grocery store in plain clothes and all of a sudden you don’t recognize them. Well, that was the only advantage that I had because nobody noticed it the entire time. Even when I wrote the book later on, there was no way I could pull a quote from that experience because the only time I truly panicked was then.

[24:18] And then it caused me to really come back to reality. Once I got out of that alive, I thought, Every other deal I did after that, I thought, man, has somebody else seen this? And I’m not aware that they’ve seen it. Yeah. So it really kind of put me back on my toes and made me really regret doing that TV show too. Even though I was ready to do it. Because, you know, there’s some people that are really good with faces and they remember a face. I’m not very good with faces. I know that, but they’re really good with faces and are your voice, you’re hearing your voice. They’re really good with that. mm-hmm so I could see that and I you know.

[24:55] I was a dork in both cases, undercover and in uniform, but I was more of a dork in uniform. So I think it helped that I had, you know, the next to shaved head and all that kind of stuff and then a little bushier hair or whatever. But, you know, in my mind, just the consequences that came to bear were incredible. And so I was just fortunate to get out of that situation. What about chasing down the money? Did you have much luck chasing down any money? Did you end up getting any – did you have a civil forfeiture unit by then? I don’t remember when those started.

[25:27] Yeah, we did. And we were doing our own forfeitures. We seized cash, but it wasn’t anything outrageous. And we got a few hundred thousand bucks in cash. But I know that the Kingpin had cash somewhere. And so my goal immediately after was to, his girlfriend actually took over the operation, which was already sort of a mistake. I don’t know how much he had to do with that. So I started following her around, and within a week, she was executed. So I never did figure out where his money was. He’s since gotten out and probably has it. Yeah. No, I did not find it. You know, we checked a few of his storage units and tried everything we could to make connections there and just never could. There’s always one step ahead. I don’t know if he buried it or what, but, you know, he’s got plenty of people on the outside, even when he went in that would have done his bidding to hide that stuff. So I’m certain it was there, but no, I never got to seize that, unfortunately. Never got the big cash hoard. The big briefcase full of money that everybody says, I ain’t mine, that ain’t mine. I know. Oh, it must be mine.

[26:41] Well, they all got off the street. That was ultimately the idea was, let’s lower the violent crime by getting active gang members off the street. You know, it was kind of the original intent anyway, so…

[26:54] Well, interesting. Now, what about, you talked about having some brush with Gotti. What’s the story with that? Yeah, so the transition time between being a musician and being a cop, while I was in music school, I had this longing to try to get an experience with being on the road and ended up auditioning for this. It was, I guess, pop music, rock music, and some show music, along with a comedian and all this craziness that I auditioned for. And they were out of Pennsylvania in the Poconos. And out of Jersey. And so obviously I didn’t know anything about the mob at the time. I’m just a long-haired drummer who’s trying to get experience on the road. So I auditioned for this outfit, make the audition, go up and they have a spot in the Poconos at the Caesars Palace Resorts in the Pocono Mountains, which is where all of the Goombas hung out. I mean, that was their spot, you know, and it was kind of accepted. I was just learning the ropes. I literally, on day one, was going to the cafeteria line at one of these resorts.

[28:08] And literally looked over at the girl that was serving the whatever it was. I don’t remember what it said. I don’t even know what I said. It was something innocent enough, but yes, she was pretty. And my boss immediately looks down at me and says, you can’t talk to her. That’s, you know, Tony, whoever’s daughter. And I’m thinking, I don’t know who that is, but, you know, but he’s given me an order. I’m just thinking that’s that’s strange so we’re what we would do is typically as the band guys we wouldn’t intermingle with a lot of the resort guests and stuff so we would go off in these little booths and stuff or go to the nightclubs where we they had these big nightclubs and we would tour between each of the nightclubs and play do comedy and all that open for tony bennett types and all that yeah so we’re over eating the sandwich one day and my boss.

[28:55] Whose name was Terry Moretti. And he was, man, he wanted to be connected. He could just tell. But he, and you got to realize, I’m still a musician, no cop experience, no, I’m the most nonviolent, hippie kid, whatever, I just want to play music kind of guy, right? I’m on this gig. And he answers the phone in this club area. They bring a phone over. It’s an actual landline phone.

[29:23] And he takes this call. Yeah, and I don’t know how much I can quote him because it was filthy mouth stuff, but he’s screaming, he’s spitting into the phone. He’s screaming, you mother, you blah, blah, blah, you never talked to me. He starts screaming, and I’m just looking across the table just flabbergasted, like, what is going on with this guy? He’s nuts, and he’s just going off. He slams the phone down and says, come on, we’re going back to the cabin. I said, yes, sir, I’ve got all my food. I’m just leaving all my food because I’m just freaking out. So I go up there and we jump in his Honda and he drives me up as he’s pulling up to my cabin where I stayed. This big Lincoln pulls up behind us and slides sideways in front of us. And my boss reached down to the console and pulls a gun and says, run. Oh, shit. All these guys start bailing out of this Lincoln in front of me. I’m like, am I in a movie? What’s going on here? But no sooner did I think, am I in a movie? I also hauled ass. To my cabin, because I’m not sticking around to find out what’s going on. So all these guys are bailing out this Lincoln, and you could tell this had to be the people that he just cursed out. I don’t know. They had some big standoff. And so they had all this, and nothing ended up happening. I didn’t even watch the end of it, because I went as far away from potential bullet flying as I could.

[30:45] But the next day I go to a payphone and I’m calling my roommates and I’m saying, man, I’ve had some experiences here and I’m really kind of concerned that I think like the mob is everywhere here. And I thought the mob was just in the movies. I said, but I told him about this story and I recounted that and recounted all these orders about these people’s daughters and everybody that works there and can’t talk to anybody. And I said, this is the weirdest experience I’ve ever had. And the very next day before our show, my boss walked into the dressing room and said, don’t you ever mention the word mob again. None of this is your business. You know what you’ve been told and just do what you’ve been told and you don’t understand what you’re getting into. And I’m thinking, I called my friends from a pay phone at a 7-Eleven. And this guy is getting onto me for those types of things. So I was, honestly, it scared the crap out of me at that point. I was like, okay, well, I’m not doing anything. I’m not supposed to. I’m not looking for trouble. But I thought, I didn’t think the mob even existed in the 90s. Like, you know, this is passe. Well, you know, to whatever extent. I mean, obviously, Gotti’s a rock star. And that’s what happened, you know, within the next couple of months is my boss was heard that Gotti’s wife had fell ill, which she had. She was in the hospital. So, he went and visited her.

[32:10] Gotti came out to the show that night. And this was another perspective for me is, you know, he walks up to me and he literally puts his hands around my neck. This is nothing that would happen to me today, I assure you. But as a hippie kid, just like trying to learn life, he puts his hand up and pushes me against the wall. He said, this is how you were going to greet Mr. Gotti. You don’t look up. You only reach out your hand if he reaches out his hand and don’t say a damn thing unless you’ve spoken to. And I’m thinking, okay, okay. But then I thought, wait, did he say Mr. Gotti? And then I’m freaking out. Like, what? So that night during the show, we go out on the stage and we play. And, you know, after the third number where we’re telling a few jokes, he said, I’d like to introduce a dear friend of mine. And, you know, his wife is ill, but, you know, Mr. John Gotti’s in the audience today. And this is an arena with 4,000 people in it. Every single person stands up, standing ovation, clapping, cheering loudly. And Mr. Gotti stands up from the middle of the crowd and just kind of waves at everybody. I thought, oh, my gosh, this dude’s a rock star.

[33:19] He’s a rock star here. So then I’m super confused. Because, again, this is like the Pablo Escobar thing. Well, the poor people swear he gives them free things and helps the community. And it’s the same thing. Robin Hood, Jesse James, same thing. Wow. That’s the most confusing experience of my life. And he comes backstage, shakes everybody’s hand. Of course, I’m staring at the floor when he walks in, sticking my hand out when I see a hand. So the experience was not that notable because I didn’t even hardly speak to the guy. But the fact that he was there and I got that type of impression amidst that kind of environment really woke me up to the fact that, wow, organized crime is no fallacy. These guys are alive and well, and they have the public’s support. And, you know, it was an absolute eye-opening experience for me to be able to meet that guy. Really. You know, talk about the mafia. And, you know, the mafia is organized with a boss, an underboss. Capos are like capo regimes. They have so many guys working under them.

[34:26] Then you’ve got soldiers. Maybe you’ve got a consigliere. Now, can you compare and contrast that with a crypt street gang? Do they have any kind of organization at all?

[34:35] They do, but they are not nearly as organized as they should be. I think if they were more organized, we’d all be in a lot of trouble, honestly. They have guys that they’ll call themselves OGs. There are not that many OGs. There was an OG in this case, but he wasn’t even really the kingpin. He was a guy that was in his 40s who shouldn’t have been playing around anymore, but just got out of prison and ended up kind of back in the game a little bit. But he was an OG because he actually was out with running the parks with Tukey Williams, who started the Crips in L.A. And he was displaced here into Texas and was running around with these guys, but wasn’t playing a significant role, didn’t really play that. But they called him OG.

[35:18] Most of it, I found, was predicated on the level in which you ran business, whether they’re selling guns or running prostitutes or selling dope. So it was almost like that kind of hierarchy. I didn’t hear the mention of lieutenants and things like that much, but I knew exactly who was on different tiers. But it turned out that it coincided directly with, all right, well, if you want to start buying multiple keys, you need to go see this guy. If you want to buy street level whatever or get a whore, you go talk to this guy. And so there were still social levels of people there. And pretty much the guys at the top were recognized as guys at the top. Everybody else was kind of fighting to be known, but they did so in their work. I think a lot of that does align with the way the families or, you know, in terms of.

[36:13] Not necessarily in terms of a formal title, but in terms of how you earned your keep. You know, that’s how you moved up in those families, too. You were a real hustler, and you started bringing in big business. You earned opportunities to move up. It was the same thing, which is less formalized in this case. Yeah, like in a mob, there’ll be a guy who was a little more, he’d be a soldier, even an associate, but he’d be a little more of a natural leader. And then guys will gravitate to him because he has this certain skill or these connections and certain skills that set up jobs that are lucrative for everybody. And so what I hear you’re saying is within these crypts, did they call them sets down there? I remember we used to have different sets, which would be a smaller group within the larger group. And so a certain set will then have a pretty lucrative, have a good connection for dope. And so that, you know, they may be higher in the hierarchy, but these sets are all totally separate from each other. Right. It seems like they’re not, whereas the mob, they really have a real pyramidal thing, but it doesn’t sound like they really are so pyramidal.

[37:21] There aren’t as pyramidal. They are in concept, but they aren’t really as in formality. And when you think of sets, you can just think of it as the different families. Because you couldn’t just volunteer to be a mob family. I mean, the mob families were the mob families. But you also didn’t encroach on other people’s business. There were rules about encroaching into other territory and things like that. That’s exactly how the Crips work. And unfortunately, and probably the same for Mobland, I mean, if any of those guys decided we’re going to become one entity.

[38:00] It would have been a huge nightmare for society and law enforcement and everybody because then you would multiply the amount of weight that they pulled. And it’s the same thing within gangs. I think the best thing you can do is just lean on the fact that they’re not smart enough to all come together as one and remain organized and civil enough to do that for a bigger purpose, which is fortunate for all of us law-abiding citizens. Yeah, really. If you think about the mob, the mafia brought this organization that I described, you know, the boss, the capos, and they brought that from Sicily. That’s been going on for several hundred years in Sicily. They brought that here. Now, the Crips, this is a homegrown thing that just started in like the 1960s. More highly organized as gangs. We ran into a deal when they first came out here from L.A. We started the L.A. Boys Task Force, and I was part of that with my TAC team. We started figuring out that a lot of these taggers, everybody is freaking out about taggers. We got all these different gangs. Sometimes we’d learn that the 31st Street Crips were nothing but three kids running around with spray cans. And, you know, it was, you had to look at the narcotics angle to figure out who was who. And that it’s the same down there. It sounds like.

[39:23] Yeah, for sure. Yeah, because you have wannabes, but it’s similar. You know, like I compare it now to a lot of the terrorist organizations that we’re combating. When it seems like you have a terrorist occurrence, something happens, and then someone like the FBI would say, well, you know, they weren’t on our radar. They’re not claiming to be a part of a whatever group or whatever. Some cases, that’s more dangerous than being a part of a bigger organization because you can’t keep track of rogue actors. So you get three kids that are taggers. You’re right. Most of the time, they’re just artists trying to be relational with other people that are lost. They have people that are in common. They take them into the group, but they’re kind of harmless. But you also get some of those smaller sets with people with very little to lose and you get the right sociopathic combination and then they’ll just walk up and murder you like it’s nothing because they don’t care if they get caught. And in that case, same with, you know, a Gambino family. I mean, they decide you’re going to be offed. Even the guys within the family would figure out, well, it’s, you know, time for me to do my Sonny Black. I need to turn in my stuff and, you know, prepare myself because it’s, yeah, it’s about to happen. And so, you know, it’s, it’s kind of that, that it’s a lot of parallels in that criminal world. Really interesting. Did you ever watch the wire? Did you get into watching the wire?

[40:52] Man, I started to. I need to go back and watch it. I don’t know if it still stands up. That gives PTSD, man. That puts you right back on them streets.

[41:00] So I was still working. I was still working when I came out. And that’s literally the only thing that I hated was I felt like I was just extending my already long work day. But it wasn’t bad. You would.

[41:16] Ultimately, the one thing about the wire that I appreciate the most, and is the way I approached my book too is that I appreciated that as an audience.

[41:27] You’re kind of rooting for some of the bad guys and some of the good guys. And you kind of pick and choose based on some of the characters you’ve grown an affinity toward. And I felt the same way in my case. Like when I wrote the book, I thought I’m not making enemies out of all these people. Some of these guys are really, have endeared themselves to me and are really kind of good dudes otherwise. And so when I present it, I present it like, man, you know, I know some people are going to read this and kind of hope that guy makes it out because you know what? I hoped that he would make it out. I hoped that at the end he would go ahead and cooperate and get a downward departure and I would testify as to his character and the dude would get a minimum sentence and be out and contributing to his society. And that’s the beautiful thing about the way the story was set up and in the wire too. So that’s, because that’s real life. You know, it’s not, everything’s not black and white. No pun intended.

[42:21] That’s for sure. Yeah, really. And in this case, for sure. But yeah, things are not all one way or all another way. And that’s the thing. When you work close to people on the streets, undercover like you did, you have a lot of informants. You really, when I was a patrol officer, I would get out of the car and I would go talk to people and talk to them a lot, trying to develop informants. And you find out. That is, it’s not, you’re not like a soldier in a war zone. You know, there’s a lot of really good people out there and there’s a lot of kids that are just lost and they just need a direction, try to get some kind of direction. And it’s, you know, it’s emotionally harder when you really get close to people. But I think the bank cops are the ones that will get close to people.

[43:01] I totally agree with you. And I appreciate that you did that because there’s not enough of that going on still. I think there’s, there’s a lot to be said, even, even if you’re not gathering information and you’re just trying to. Gain some kind of rapport and have a relationship with the people in your city and, you know, some of the, you know, gang parts of town or whatever. I think it’s admirable what you did. And I think that there’s a lot of people back in your day, my day, and on forward that need to take those lessons forward and just, you know, try to be humans, man. Come on. I had guys tell me we had a big sector. Half of it was more in the white neighborhood and nicer businesses. And then half of it was, was, was all black. And, and these guys used to say, well, Jenkins, you just go over there in the east side and never come out. You know, it’s boring over there where you are sitting around at 7-Eleven talking to each other. Come on over here, it’s not so boring.

[43:59] Being productive here. Yeah. And that’s a beautiful thing. That’s a beautiful thing to that. I mean, they’ve talked about segregating cops to where you can put black officers in black neighborhoods and Hispanic officers in Hispanic neighborhoods so that there’s that cultural relationship. And I think that also tends to be a problem because I think we just need to acknowledge that we have a lot to learn about other cultures and make a concerted effort to learn about other people. That’s really all it takes is a little effort. Yeah.

[44:30] Because it’s interesting. It’s interesting as hell. And I tell you, I made a friend over there, and I went into a barbershop. I came back off duty, and we went to a barbershop they always like to go to. You know, in the black community, the barbershop is a center. And sit there and play checkers with guys and talk with them. And, you know, you just find all these really fun people that, you know, you just have this stuff with. They worked at different places. Some of them were criminals. A couple of them were, all of a sudden, one of them says, quit talking to me about that bank robbery. He says, that’s a cop sitting over there.

[45:00] You know, they had everything in there, you know, most of them worked at the Ford plant or Chevy plant or, or, you know, for the post office and things like that. It’s really nice people. That’s beautiful. And there’s, you know, there’s other dudes that would be scared to go in one. So again, you can really experience it and you can’t judge, you know. Really? All right. Deegan Broadwater, tell us a little more about what you’re up to now. Let’s sell your book. You’ve got companies and you’ve got a podcast. You’ve got all kinds of stuff. Yeah, I’ll whip through it. But after this case became public and after a while I was outed as the undercover, people were encouraging me to write a book. And ultimately, during the debriefs of these guys and getting their backgrounds, we discovered there were 104 children left fatherless after rounding out these 51 people. And it made me really think about whether or not this was solving any of the problem or not. And I acknowledged that, yes, these dudes have to go to prison. But no, it’s not solving the problem. This is step one of many steps that have to happen. And so what really inspired me to write the book was when I discovered that, I thought, okay, well, I’m going to write the book. Will tell the story in a realistic manner and then we’ll donate all the profits of the book to charities that mentor children of incarcerated parents.

[46:26] So, and I’m thousands of dollars in the hole having written this book, but I’m proud to say, you know, we donate all of what would have been money in my pocket to those organizations because ultimately you’ve got to keep their kids from becoming part of that cycle of violence, you know, because everybody knows what a poor fatherless home for a kid is going to serve him. And the stats are too high that they’re just going to be susceptible to gang life and everything all over again. And you got to do a whole nother Operation Fishbowl in 20 years. And we don’t want to have to keep doing that. So I wrote that book and have been promoting the book for some time. You can get it on Amazon. It’s called Life in the Fishbowl. And I have a copy right here. You know, if you find that on Amazon, that’s the copy. All right. And again, it’s for a good cause. Other than the show notes too, guys.

[47:19] Appreciate that. And I left, I got so burnt out doing this. I mean, I’d never made more money in my police career because the feds are paying all my overtime and I literally have been overtime doing this thing. But I left and decided to do something with no risk, like leave with no retirement and start a company from the ground up. And so I say that facetiously, of course, but I started a private armed security firm and we do protection and armed security.

[47:47] Been doing that for 18 years and after covet i got back into the creative biz started writing music again because we were i was being courted to do a movie based on the book and so i told him i was a musician started getting all the stuff and i started writing music that was going to be placements in my own movie which i thought was a cool idea covet hits and you know spoils everybody’s plans but by then i’d kind of started i had the book out and i was writing music again and decided to do a podcast try to get just a little ip and now the podcast has turned into something of a passion project for me also because as you certainly well know we’ve been doing it a lot longer than i have it’s a fabulous experience to be able to to background and learn about all these different people and and in my case i i try to find commonalities and very unique people with extraordinary stories and we just try to find that through line that is so common between people and I just I feel like it’s a it’s a constant learning experience so.

[48:50] I’m doing that. I write a column for SoFRAP based on, you know, military, police, and music. And so I’m writing every week. And I just, you know, I fill my time is what I try to do. So I’ve got people helping me run the company right now that are doing a fantastic job. And so it’s been a rewarding life. I feel very blessed. I’m just trying to aim for things that will help impact positive change ultimately with all the projects that I’m doing. Okay. Tegan Broadwater, I really appreciate you coming on the show. And it’s been really fun for me, us sharing our little stories and our experiences because they’re not December. For sure. That’s for sure. Yeah. I’m very honored. I’m honored that you have me on. And I appreciate your service as well, sir. Well, thanks so much for coming on the show, Tegan. Thank you. You have a great one.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, host Gary Jenkins sits down with former FBI agent Séamus McElearney, author of Flipping Capo, for a deep dive into one of the most remarkable Mafia investigations and how he took down the DeCavalcante Family.

McElearney recounts his unlikely path from the world of banking to the FBI, driven by a lifelong fascination with law enforcement. Despite being told he didn’t have the “right background,” he pushed forward—eventually landing in New York’s Organized Crime Squad C-10, where he investigated both the Bonanno and DeCavalcante crime families. He describes the rare and demanding experience of working two Mafia families at once, and the teamwork required to dismantle them from the inside out.

As the conversation turns to his book, Flipping Capo, McElearney explains the years-long process of writing it and the rigorous FBI review needed to ensure no sensitive investigative techniques were revealed. He shares early memories of notorious boss Joe Massino, and the high-stakes surveillance and arrests that defined his career.

A major focus of the episode is the arrest and flipping of Anthony Capo, a feared DeCavalcante soldier—and the first made member of that family ever to cooperate with the government. McElearney walks listeners through the tension of that operation, his calculated approach to treating Capo with respect, and the psychological tightrope that ultimately persuaded Capo to talk. That single decision triggered a domino effect of cooperation that helped bring down the New Jersey mob family many believe inspired The Sopranos.

Gary and Séamus dive into the proffer process, cooperation agreements, and the behind-the-scenes strategies used to turn high-level mobsters. McElearney also draws comparisons between real mob figures and the fictional world of The Sopranos, revealing how much of the hit series was grounded in the actual cases he worked.

The interview closes with McElearney’s reflections on how organized crime continues to evolve. While today’s mob may look different from the one he battled in the ’90s, he stresses that the methods—and the money—still flow. His candid insights offer a rare look into the changing face of the American Mafia and the ongoing fight to contain it.

Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.
2:26 Seamus’ FBI Journey
6:26 Inside the DeCavalcante Family
9:05 The Process of Flipping
10:27 Comparing Families
12:30 The First Cooperation
17:43 The Proffer Process
25:03 Protecting Cooperators
27:44 The Murder of Joseph Canigliaro
29:42 Life on Trial
30:28 The Real Sopranos
39:43 Leading the Columbo Squad
44:15 Major Arrests and Cases
50:57 Final Thoughts and Stories

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Transcript
[0:00]Well, hey, welcome all you wiretappers. Good to be back here in studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective.
[0:07]Welcome to Gangland Wire
[0:07]I have a former FBI agent as my guest today. And, you know, I love having these FBI agents on. I’ve had a lot of them on and I worked with a lot of the guys and they’re really good guy. Everyone I ever met and worked with was a really good guy. Now they got their deadhead just like we did. But these aggressive guys are the ones that write books and I’ve got one on today. Seamus McElherney. Welcome, Seamus. Thank you. It’s great to be here. All right. Well, an Irish name now working on the Italian mob, huh? How come you weren’t working on the Westie? So they were maybe gone by the time you came around. There’s no such thing.
[0:47]Oh, yeah. You got your code. You Irish guys got your code, too. All right, Seamus, you got a book, Killing, or Killing, Flipping Capo. I want to see it back up over your shoulder there. Really interesting book, guys. He flipped a guy named Anthony Capo. And he really took down the real Sopranos, if you will. So Seamus, tell us a little about how you got started with the FBI, your early career. Okay. When I got out of school, I really didn’t know what to do. And I got into banking and I just decided that was really not for me. And I got lucky where I got to meet an FBI agent. and I was just so fascinated by the work. It seemed like every day was different. You know, one day you could meet a CEO and another day you could be doing surveillance. It just, the job just seemed really interesting.
[1:38]Like fascinating to me. So I decided to try to become an agent. And I was constantly told, Shane, you should never become an agent. You didn’t have the background for it. And one, one, a motto in life to me is persistence beats resistance. And I was just determined to become an agent. And back then in the late 1990s, it was a long process and it took me close to two years to actually become an agent. And I was selected to go down to training and I was very fortunate to be selected to go down to training. Now it was your first office back up in New York and the, one of the organized crime squads, or did you go out into boonies and then come back? I actually was born and raised in New York, and I was fortunate to be selected to be sent back to New York. So my first squad, I was sent back to the city, back to 26 Federal Plaza,
[2:26]Seamus’ FBI Journey
[2:24]and I was assigned to a squad called C-10. And C-10 was an organized crime squad, which was responsible for the Bonanno family, and then later became the DeCavocanti family as well, which I can explain to you yeah yeah we’ll get we’ll get deep into that now now let’s let me ask you a little bit about the book tell the guys a little bit about the process of writing a book from your fbi experiences.
[2:47]It’s a long process. First of all, I was contacted by someone who was interested
[2:55]Writing a Book
[2:53]in writing a book based upon my career. People had encouraged me to write a book because I had a very successful career. And when you work organized crime, it’s never just about you. It’s about the people that you work with, right? It’s definitely a team. It’s never just one person. I had great supervisors. I had great teammates. I had a great partner. And so I was approached to write a book. So then I had no idea. So there was an agent, a famous agent, an undercover agent named Jack Garcia. So I kind of really leaned on him to kind of learn how to write a book. And it’s a long process. You have to get an agent, the publisher, a co-author I had. And then when you finally have all that, and you do have the manuscript ready to be written, you have to send it down to the FBI. And that is a long process. The FBI, in this instance, probably took over a year for them to review the book because what they want to make sure is you’re not revealing any investigative techniques. Fortunately for me, a lot of the information that is in the book is public information because of all the trials that I did. Interesting. Yeah, it is. It is quite a I know it was quite a process.
[4:00]Now, the banana squad, you work in a banana squad. You know, we know a little bit about the banana squad.
[4:07]Was Joe Pacino the boss when you first came in? Yes, he was. And I actually had the pleasure of arresting Joe as well. Ah, interesting. I did a show on Joe. He’s a really interesting guy. I know my friend, who was at the banana squad, I think just before you were, and he talked a lot of, to me personally, he won’t go on the show, but he talked a lot about Joe Massino. He said, actually, saw him in the courtroom one time later on, he hadn’t seen him in several years. And, and Joe looked across the courtroom. He said, Doug, how are you doing? He said, Joe was that kind of guy. He was real personal. He was.
[4:44]Yeah, so when I first got to the squad, the supervisor at the time was a gentleman named Jack Steubing, and he had the thought process to go after Joe and his money. So there was two accountants that were assigned to a squad at that time. It was Kimberly McCaffrey and Jeff Solette, and they were targeted to go after Joe and his money. And it was a very successful case. And when we arrested Joe, I think it was in January of 2003, I believe it was, I was assigned to be part of that arrest team. Interesting. You know, McCaffrey and Sled are going to be talking about that case out at the Mob Museum sometime in the near future. I can’t remember exactly when it is. And it was a hell of a case. I think it just happened, actually. Oh, did it? Okay. I actually just spoke to Jeff, so I think it just happened about a week or two ago. Okay. Yeah, I tried to get him to come on the show, and I think maybe he was committed to doing something else, and I didn’t keep after him. And I don’t like to pester people, you know.
[5:44]And Fensell was the one that said, you got to get Jeff Sillett. You got to get Jeff Sillett. When I looked into that money angle of it, that was pretty interesting about how they were laundering their money through the parking lots and just millions. And when he gave up, like $10 million or something? I mean, it’s unbelievable. Yes. And that’s that’s one of the reasons why I wrote the book is because I don’t think the public or the press really put this together where that squad, C-10, is a very unique squad where we were dismantling the two families at the same time. Half the family was working the Bonanno family and half the family was working the Cavalcanti family. So it’s a very unique squad during that six or seven year time period where we were dismantling two families at the same time.
[6:26]Inside the DeCavalcanti Family
[6:26]Interesting and and that gets us into the dekavocante family i could always struggle with that name for some reason but that’s all right guys know i butcher these names all the time.
[6:37]Forgive me guys anyhow so you ended up working on the dekavocante family down in new jersey now that you know that’s unusual how did that come about we got we got a new jersey branch of the fbi down there too, Yes, we do. So what happened was I went to training in February of 1998. The case actually starts in January of 1998, where an individual named Ralph Guarino was the mastermind behind this, but he had the idea of robbing the World Trade Center. So he had three people that actually tried to execute that plan. They did rob the World Trade Center, but when they came out, they took their mask off and they were identified by the cameras that were actually there. So those individuals were actually arrested pretty quickly. I think two were arrested that day. The third person, I think, fled to New Mexico and was found pretty quickly. Ralph was smart enough to know that he was going to be apprehended pretty quickly. So he reached out to an agent named George Hanna, a legendary agent within the office, and George was able to convince him to become a proactive witness, meaning he would make consensual recordings. That was in January of 1998. I think it was January 14th.
[7:51]Approximately nine days later, there was a murder of an individual named Joseph Canigliaro. Who was a ruthless DeKalocanti associate assigned to a wheelchair. How he got in a wheelchair was back in the 70s, a DeKalocanti soldier and him went to go collect money from a loan shark victim. And the story goes that Jim Gallo, James Gallo, actually shot Joseph Canigliaro by accident and paralyzed him. No hard feelings. It was just the course of doing their business back then. But he was paralyzed from the 70s to the 90s. He was a ruthless individual. though. And the reason that they killed him is his crew around him had him killed. They actually killed him because he was such a ruthless person and who would extort people and just really was a bad person. There were stories that he would call people over to him in his wheelchair and shoot them. So a ruthless guy. And he was killed in, I think, January 23rd of 1998.
[8:50]So that’s how this case starts. Ralph Guarino, as I said, became a proactive witness. When you have a proactive witness. You just don’t know where they’re going to go. What I mean by that is you would direct him through mob associates and many guys, and you’re trying to gather evidence on tape.
[9:05]The Process of Flipping
[9:06]Where Ralph Guarino led us was the Brooklyn faction of the DeCavalcanti family, namely Anthony Capo, Anthony Rotondo, Vincent Palermo.
[9:17]Joseph Scalfani, a whole host of DeCavalcanti people that were located in Brooklyn. And that’s how we start to build this case. Now, granted, I was just in training at that time in February of 1998. I don’t get sent back to New York until May of 1998. And from May of 1998 until December of 1998, they put you through a rotation, meaning I go through the operations center, I go through surveillance, and then I finally get assigned to C-10 in December of 1998. At that point in time, Jeff and Kim are already on the squad, so they’re operating the case against Messino. I come to the squad, and the Decalvo Canty case has now started. So I’m assigned to the Decalvo Canty portion of the squad to work them. And as I said, that’s why we’re working two parallel cases at the time. One is against the Bananos, the other is against the Jersey family. And we operate, Ralph, proactively from January 1998 up until the first set of indictments, which was in December of 1999. So compare and contrast the Banano family structure and how they operated in
[10:27]Comparing Families
[10:24]a DeCavocante family structure and how they operate. Were they exactly the same or were there some differences?
[10:31]They’re into the same types of the rackets that the Waldemar people are into, but I would say related to the Decalvo Canty family, since they’re based in Jersey, they really had a control of the unions out there. There was two unions that they basically controlled, Local 394, which was the labor union, and they also started their own union, which was the asbestos union, which was Local 1030.
[10:53]And those were controlled by the Decalvo Canty family, so that was the bread and butter of the Decalvo Canty family. So, as I said, the first set, you know, we operated Ralph proactively for almost close to two years. And then in December of 1999, we executed our first set of arrests because there was whispers that Ralph, why wasn’t he arrested yet? Where he was the mastermind behind the World Trade Center being robbed, but he hasn’t been picked up yet. So there was whispers that he might be cooperating with the government. And for his safety, that’s why we took him off off the street and we executed our first round of arrest in December of 1999.
[11:33]I’m a relatively new agent. I’d only been on the squad now for a year and we arrested 39 people that day. I get assigned to arrest Anthony Capo, who’s a soldier within the Decavacanti family based out of Staten Island. And I was really surprised by that because, as I said, I was just an agent for about a year. Usually when you’re a new agent, you’re assigned to the back, you know, like we are security. I was even surprised that I was going to be on a team. And I was fortunate enough to be the team leader, which is very surprising to me. And the case was out of the Southern District of New York. And in New York, just for the public, there is two districts. There’s a Southern District of New York and the Eastern District of New York. And the Eastern District of New York also had charges on Anthony Capo as well. So for my arrest team, I had members from the Eastern District of New York as well. There was a separate squad that was looking into Anthony Capo there.
[12:30]The First Cooperation
[12:27]So I got the ticket to arrest Anthony Capo in December of 1999. And that’s how this case starts.
[12:33]Interesting. Now, nobody’s ever flipped out of the DeCavocante family before, I believe. It’s been a pretty tight family, really rigidly controlled by this Richie the Boot. I mean, he’s a fearsome, fearsome guy. I mean, you did not want to get crossways with him. And a smaller, tighter family, it seems to me like, than the New York families. That was right. Well, like up and up until that point, up until that point and unbeknownst to me that no made member in the DeKalbacanti family had ever cooperated with the government before.
[13:08]So I had watched George Hanna, how he operated Ralph Guarino for those two years, and he always treated him with respect. And prior to going to arrest Anthony Capo, Anthony Capo had had a reputation of being an extremely violent person, hated by law enforcement and even hated by a lot of people within the mob. But I was going I wasn’t going to let that, you know, use that against him. I was going to treat him with respect regardless. Right. I didn’t know I didn’t know him. I never dealt with him before. And I would basically before I went to go arrest him, I was going to study everything about him, learn everything about him. And I was going to use the approach of treating him with respect and using some mind chess when I was going to arrest him. What I mean by that is I was going to learn everything charges about him, everything about his family. I wanted him to know that I knew him like the back of my hand from head to toe, the start of the book to the end of the book.
[14:02]And when I went to arrest him, I remember when we went to his house, he wasn’t there. So all the planning that you do related to going into an arrest, the checks that you do, he’s at the house, you knock on his door, and guess what? He’s not there. So his wife basically tells us that he’s at his mom’s house. So then that throws all the planning out the window, and now we go to his mom’s house. And when I met him, you know, I saw that he had a relationship with his parents, which, you know, it gives me a different perspective from what I heard from him. Interesting. And that says something about him, that’s for sure. So everything that I heard of this violent person and hated person, the way he treated law enforcement, he wasn’t that way with me.
[14:49]So when I get him in the car and I start to read him his rights and start to ask him questions, every question that I would ask him, I already had the answer to, like, your date of birth, social security number. And then he would invoke his right to counsel, and then you’re not allowed to ask him any more questions. So what I would do is I would let the mind game start then. And I would ask him, you know, tell him about the charges that he had at that point in time. He was only charged with a conspiracy to murder Charlie Maggiore, who was an acting panel boss of the Decalvo Canty family. At that time, that point in time, they had three panel bosses. It was Charlie Maggiore, Jimmy Palermo and Vincent Palermo. Vincent Palermo was known as the stronger personality and really known as the acting boss. And they wanted to kill Charlie Maggiore. So he was charged with that. conspiracy to murder. And he was also charged with, I believe, stock fraud or it was mail fraud that would lead to stock fraud. So when I would question him, I would tell him, since he already invoked his right to counsel, don’t say anything, just listen to me. For an example, I would say your plan was to murder Charles Majuri. Your plan was to ring his doorbell and shoot him right there with James Gallo, Joe Macella. But you guys didn’t do that because there was a cop on the block. So instead of just doing a ring and run, you guys were going to ring and shoot him, right?
[16:17]And now you’ve got to think, I told him, don’t say anything. Just listen to what I just said, right? Because I can’t have him answer any questions. And this wasn’t a question. This was a statement. Yeah. So that gives him food for thought, because you got to think, how would I know that? He doesn’t know at that point in time, this is an indictment. How do I know that? He doesn’t know who the cooperator is. He doesn’t know who made a recording. So I’m just throwing this at him. And this is the first time he’s hearing this. So it’s got to make him think, like, what else does this agent know? And I did this with the other charges as well. And then I would just throw these little tidbits at him. And then I would speak to the driver. How are you doing this? just give him food for thought. And then we just developed a bond that day, just talking sports back and forth. He actually was a cowboy fan. I’m a Steeler fan. So we have that little intensity going back and forth about that. And then we just developed a bond that day. I think that was the first time that he had an interaction with law enforcement, where it was more of a respect thing, as opposed to someone yelling at him or being contentious with him. I don’t think he’s ever or experienced that before.
[17:27]Also because of his delivery as well, right? You know, it works both ways where you can, he can have his delivery really angry and that could, you know, provoke law enforcement to be angry towards him too.
[17:43]The Proffer Process
[17:40]So I think that helped it that way that day. And then just throughout the whole day. And I think one of the things that I do talk about within the book is just explaining processes to people, which is generally, I haven’t seen that done in a book before about how pretrial works. So what is pretrial? How cooperation works? How trial works? So I think there’s a lot of tidbits within the book that kind of explain things like that. Even some crimes, too. Like everyone hears what loan sharking is. I go into detail as to what loan sharking is and how it really works, because it’s a very profitable way to make money. So we have our day together. And, you know, then I had to meet his stepfather. I think he had heard that I treated his stepfather with respect. And then approximately a week later, I get a call from his lawyer and I basically almost fell out of my chair when his lawyer said he wanted to cooperate.
[18:37]I bet. And then, yeah. And, you know, keep in mind, I’ve only been on the job for a year and I immediately call the assistant who is a seasoned assistant. Maria Barton, what was her name? And she’s really concerned, like, what did I say? Right. So I told her in these situations, less is more. I just told her I was going to call you. That’s all I said. I didn’t say anything else. Didn’t promise anything at all. I said I was going to call you. So, you know, that started with the process and then you go through a proffer. So I explained what the proffer is and how that process works. Interesting. Yeah. A proffer, guys is is like a kind of agreement you know and you you have to be totally open and admit to every crime you ever did and and we’ll cover you but to a certain point the basis you’ll lie down the basics.
[19:31]Right. So what, you know, what we kind of like call it is queen for a day, right? Where you come in, we can’t use your words against you unless you lie to us, right? If you were, if you were to lie to us and then go, go to trial and, you know, we could, if you were to take the stand, we could, we could use it against you. But as long as you come in and you tell us the truth and you tell us everything, all the crimes that you’ve done. And the beauty of the mob is when they do a crime, they never do a crime alone, right? They involve a lot of people within a crime. So that’s the beauty of that. So when we have our first proffer, you know, in time, you only have a short amount of time to actually speak about this because you can only be away from jail for a certain amount of time right before the bad guys start to realize that something might be up. Right. So he comes in. And even even before that, on his on his way back, when we’re taking him back to 26 Federal Plaza, one of the things that he tells us is and it makes sense when we went to his house, he wasn’t there. He was at his mom’s house in the car ride back. He throws a little shot at me and he goes, we knew you were coming.
[20:33]Meaning that there was a leak. They got a leak. Yeah. Right. So then when we have the first proffer, he explains the leak to us. And it appears allegedly there was a court reporter within the Southern District that was feeding them information. So that’s not good. And then in the proffer, he tells us about two murders. So, and there might be the bodies, a body might be buried up in Phil Lamella, who was a DeCalvo County soldier, up in Marlboro, New York. So that’s the first thing that he tells us. So these are jewels to us, right? He tells us about a leak. He tells us about two murders. Bodies might be buried. So we have to huddle and we have to decide, is he telling us the truth or not? We all decide that he’s telling us the truth. The proper takes place with George Hanna, as I mentioned him before. Kenny McCabe, a legendary Southern District investigator, and me. And in these situations, again, I’m a new agent. Less is more. I don’t want to say something stupid. So I kind of keep my mouth shut, right? And just listen. So that went really well. And that kind of started this whole process. So now, as we said before, you have… No one cooperated in 100 plus years of this family. And now we have the first
[21:49]A Spiral of Cooperation
[21:48]made member to cooperate. And basically, Anthony starts a spiral effect of cooperation.
[21:56]After he where he reported to in the family at that particular time, since he was such a violent person and hard to control within the family himself. Well, he reported to Vincent Palermo, who was the acting panel boss out of that panel that I talked about, but viewed as the acting boss because of his strong personality. So you have Anthony cooperating. He reports to the acting boss. So from our perspective, our perspective, that’s golden, right? Because now Vinny is going to have to make a decision. Is he going to cooperate or not? And then about three months later, guess what? Vinny decides to cooperate. So now we have a soldier and we have the acting boss who’s going to cooperate. So we go from no one in a hundred years to basically two people in three months.
[22:45]Then we have an associate, Victor DiChiro, decides to cooperate. So we go and we arrest him. So now we have three people in four months. So we take all their information, and they have to plead guilty, and they get a cooperation agreement. I explain all that. And when you have a cooperation agreement, as I mentioned before, Anthony was initially arrested for conspiracy to murder, and I believe it was stock fraud. When he pleads guilty, he has to plead guilty to all his crimes that he committed throughout his entire life. Off the top of my head, I remember he pled guilty to two murders.
[23:23]11 murder conspiracies, boatload of extortions, and basically every other crime you could think of. And then the same thing with Vinny and Victor. We take all their information, and then we have our next series of indictments. So the first series was 39 indictments. And then the second series of indictments is in October of 2000, October 19th, which we just we just passed the 25th anniversary of that. And that was known as the hierarchy arrest, where we arrested the official boss, John Riggi. We arrested the two other panel bosses, Charlie Maggiore and Jimmy Palermo. We arrested the consigliere, Steve Vitabli, a bunch of captains and soldiers. So that’s a significant arrest, right? So now, as you know, when you have an arrest, there’s trials, there’s plea negotiations. So now we arrested 39 people plus another 13. We’re already up to like 50 something like something people out of that arrest. We get a little shockwave in the sense is that there’s an associate named Frank Scarabino. Frank Scarabino comes forward one day and tells us that there’s a contract on Anthony Capo’s family and Anthony Capo.
[24:43]And also, there’s a contract on law enforcement. They want to go back to the old Sicilian ways and basically send a message. So, you know, that’s basically a little bit of a jolt where now we have to try to move Capo’s family.
[25:03]Protecting Cooperators
[24:59]And Capo’s in prison. He’s defenseless. And I explain all that. People have this sense of you go into the witness security program, you get a whole new life and you’re off and having a great time. They don’t realize that there are prisons within the United States that you have to go to prison. So I can’t say where the prisons are, but I kind of explain that process of how the WITSEC program works, which is run by the marshals. So that’s in that’s in the book as well. Yeah, they have a whole prisons that are just for people in WITSEC. I heard about a guy that said he was in one out west somewhere. Yeah. So and, you know, for those prisons, it’s not like you have to prove yourself. They’re all doing the same time. So they’re basically just trying to do their time and try to get out and get into the next phase of the WoodSec program. So that was kind of a jolt, right? So now we have Frank Scarabino cooperate. So now we have another person. So it’s the list is just getting more and more now. You got to stop taking cooperators and start putting people in jail for the rest of their life, man.
[26:03]So it got to after that, we had like two more people cooperate. So we went from having nobody to having seven people cooperate in this period. And it’s interesting. And I know we’re going to go back and forth, but we went from 100 years of having no one to having seven people during this three year period. And since that time period, no other members have cooperated since. So we’ve started the clock again. I think we’re at 25 years plus again since no one cooperated during that period. And I mentioned the murder that we started this case, Joseph Canigliaro. So he was the guy that was in the wheelchair. So as I said, they wanted to kill him because he just tortured his crew. We were able, one of the guys who was initially arrested as part of the December 1999 arrest, he sees everybody’s, he is deciding to cooperate with the government. So he decides to cooperate. His name is Tommy DeTora. So Tommy DeTora decides to cooperate. He’s out on bail. So since he’s out on bail, we decide, let’s make him make a consensual recording. And he makes one of the best consensual recordings the Bureau has ever made. He gets everyone involved in that murder together.
[27:28]And they talk about the murder from A to Z. It’s a priceless consensual recording that we used at trial. And it just, you know, one of the things that does stick in my mind is the shooter was Marty Lewis, who got a life sentence.
[27:44]The Murder of Joseph Canigliaro
[27:45]Marty Lewis is describing when he shot him. And he’s like, I shot him like five or six times in his car. Right. And then Marty Lewis gets out of the car. Joseph Canigliaro drives away, gets to the top of the block in Brooklyn, puts a signal on, put a signal on. And drove the traffic laws, drives to Joseph Wrightson’s house. A guy who was part of the murder conspiracy honks his horn for Joseph Wrightson to come downstairs. So can you imagine Joseph Wrightson looking down the window seeing the guy that’s supposed to be dead right now and telling him to get in the car to go to the hospital with him?
[28:32]Unfortunately, when they go to the hospital one of the things that does happen is joseph brightson has uh unfortunately an nyp detective cop who’s a cousin and involves him in this as well and the cop takes shells from the car and he becomes he gets locked up by us as well they all go to trial they get convicted and.
[28:55]You know, we also arrested a Genevieve’s captain related to the leak. So in total, I think the numbers were 71 defendants were convicted, 11 murders were solved, seven trials transpired. You know, as everyone knows, you have the arrest, but then you have the trials, right? And I know that from December 2002 up until November of 2003 was the year that I was on trial. There was three trials that I had, and then there was another trial. There was two trials that one was a mistrial. Then we had another trial. So during that one year, we had a year of trials, and the biggest trial I had went on for two months.
[29:42]Life on Trial
[29:38]So I basically had a year of no life where it was just trials. And as you know yourself, when you have trial, it’s not just you just show up at trial. You have trial prep beforehand. And then when you’re actually on trial every day, it’s 20, it’s 24, seven, you have a trial, you have trial, then at night you have to prep a witness. So there’s just constant stuff throughout the day. Yeah, really? It’s a, it’s a long, boring process for you guys.
[30:05]You know, these are like what we would say the real Sopranos, you know, the Sopranos, Tom Soprano, and that’s kind of based on this New Jersey family. I tell you, that Soprano, so much of it was ripped from real life. I don’t know. They interviewed you for details. They interviewed some agents and looked some court cases in order to write those scripts. I know that. And in particular, I think of the gay member that was killed.
[30:28]The Real Sopranos
[30:27]You know, you guys had that down there. So there’s a lot of references in your book or things in the book that the guys will say, oh, yeah, they did that in the Sopranos. Can you tell us about some of them?
[30:37]Well, the thing that was great, especially for trial, is in March of 1999, the show starts in January of 1999. And we have a consensual recording in March where we have DeCavocanti members talking about the show and them saying, saying, this is you, this is you, and this is you, which was priceless for trial. Right. It’s like a jury’s going to hear that. And even during the trial, the judge had to give the jury instructions about the show to make sure that it wouldn’t sway their decision. Then if you watch the show, the first season, the official boss in the show dies of stomach cancer. In real life, that’s happened in real life. In June of 1997, Jake Amari was the acting boss of the Decaval Canty family. He dies of stomach cancer. So that’s a…
[31:40]It’s a part of the show right there. Then I know everyone sees the strip club, right? Well, the acting boss, as I told you at the time, Vincent Palermo, he had a strip club in Queens, Wiggles.
[31:53]So there’s a similarity there. Then they have the meat market that they go to, right, back and forth in the show. That’s a real meat market. I don’t want to say the name of the real meat market here, but there is a real type of meat market there. We discussed the union angle, the two unions that they have. So there’s so many scams related to the unions. There’s the no show job, right, where you don’t have to show up to work. There’s the no work job where you come, but you don’t have to do any work at all.
[32:26]Back then, what it was called was they had union halls, right, where you actually had to show up early in the morning. There’d be a line of people, and you would show up. It was called the shape up. and you would wait online and hopefully that you would get work that day. Well, the DeCable Cante members, they wouldn’t show up early and wait online. They would show up whenever they want and they would cut the line and they would get work. So these were their types of unions that they had. Then, as you mentioned, there was the gay angle too. So on the DeCable Cante real side, there was a guy named John D’Amato. And John D’Amato basically made himself the acting boss when John Riggie went to jail in the early 1990s. John D’Amato was part, was very close to John Gotti. There was a murder. It’s probably the most indictable murder in mob history called the murder of Fred Weiss. John Gotti wanted Fred Weiss killed because John Gotti thought that Fred Weiss was cooperating with the government. all because Fred Weiss switched lawyers.
[33:35]He was paranoid that Fred Weiss was cooperating. So it became a race to kill Fred Weiss. So you had two mob families trying to kill him, the Decalvo Canty family and the Gambino family. So in total, I think either 15 people at least have either pled guilty or have been convicted of that murder. That murder happened on 9-11-1989, a horrible day, right? So, where I’m going is that happened in 89. In 1990, 1991, John D’Amato becomes the acting boss of the family. So, now he’s the acting boss of the DeKalb Alcanti family. John D’Amato had a girlfriend. His girlfriend starts to tell Anthony Capo that John D’Amato is going to sex clubs with her and they’re having sex with men. So this is this is brought to Anthony Capo’s attention. And he has to tell his superiors that we have a gay acting boss representing our family. And in his eyes, this cannot happen. Right. So he brings it to Vincent Palermo, brings it to Rudy Ferron, and the superiors that this is what’s happening. And they decide that he has to be killed. Now, also what he was doing was, and you speak to Anthony Rotondo, who also cooperated with the government.
[34:58]John DeMotta was also stealing money from the family. He was borrowing money from the other families, telling him that it was for the DeCalbacanti family, but it was really to cover his game of the gambling losses that he was incurring. So those are two things that he was doing. Right. He was he was if you ask Anthony Rotondo, he says he was killed because of the gambling that he was incurring the losses. And if he asks Anthony Capo, he was killed because it was looking bad for our family, for their family, that he was a gay acting boss. And at that time, it wasn’t acceptable. Times have changed. But back then, it wasn’t an acceptable thing. And that’s similar to the show. There’s a gay angle within the show as well.
[35:41]The Gay Angle in the Mob
[35:42]Interesting. It’s the real Sopranos. I remember I watched that show, even going back and watch some of them every once in a while. And I just think, wow, that’s real. So, so even though the director says no one was speaking to them, it’s kind of ironic that there are a lot of like similarities between the show and real life. Yeah. And especially down there in New Jersey and, and, and their connection to the Bonanno family or to a New York, the New York families. And then also, and then also within the show is, is, is the stock stood. There’s also stocks. Oh yeah, the stock fraud. Yeah. They did a boiler room or something. And they were pumping and dumping stocks and Tony was making money out of that. So, yeah, that’s I’d forget. And then from and in real life, Bill Abrama was like the wizard of Wall Street.
[36:37]So interesting. Well, you’ve had quite, quite a career. What do you think about New York organized crime now that today, you know, we just had quack, quack, Ruggiero, Ruggiero’s son and some other guys that were connected to families indicted for gambling. He’s got my gambling fraud. I haven’t really studied it yet. It is like they had some rig gambling games, which is common. Like in Kansas city, when I was working this, they would have, they would bring in guys who would love to gamble and had money businessmen. And then they’d, they’d play them for sure. They would cheat them and take a bunch of money from them. This was much more sophisticated, but that’s a, that’s a story that’s been going on a long time. You think that Bob is on a comeback from that? Ha, ha, ha, ha.
[37:24]The mob has been around for 125 years. They’re not going to go away. Okay. They get smarter and they adapt. And it’s like, I haven’t read the indictment from head to toe, but they’ve used some, you know, sophisticated investigative techniques just to kind of con people. So they’re getting better, right? So some of the techniques that they use when you hear, it’s like some of the things that I saw where the poker tables that they use, the tables that they use were able to see the card. So they use some pretty, you know, slick techniques, you know, and then like some of the glasses or the contact lenses. So, you know, they’re not going to go away. They’re just going to keep on trying to rebuild. That’s why you have to continue to put resources towards them. Yeah. I think what people don’t understand for these mob guys, it’s if they don’t get out and go into legitimate business selling real estate or something like that. It’s it’s a constant scam a constant hustle every day to figure out another way to make money because they don’t have a paycheck coming in and so they got to figure out a way to make money and they got to make it fast and they got to make it big and in a short period of time it’s just constant every day every time they walk by knew a drug addict one time as a professional burglar and he said every time he’s in recovery he said every time i’ll buy a pharmacy he said in my mind I’m figuring out how to take that pharmacy off. So that’s the way these mob guys are.
[38:52]And sports betting has been a staple of theirs forever. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. And the apps are getting into them a little bit, but I see what’s going on now. Also, we had these players, Trailblazers coach and a couple, three players, are now helping people rig the bets. And you go to the apps, and you bet a bunch of money on some guy who’s going to have a bad day. And then he just doesn’t show up to work. You end up being the supervisor of the Columbo squad, I see. Same as after that DeCavoconte case, and you spent all that time, you ended up getting promoted to a supervisor and you must’ve been good because they kept you right there in New York and gave you another mob squad. I know one agent here in Kansas City that was promoted and he kept the one squad here, as they called it.
[39:43]Leading the Columbo Squad
[39:40]And that was really unusual. Usually it’d be somebody in from out of town. So that says something about you. So tell us about your experiences doing that.
[39:48]Well, after we did this case, which was about six years, I was requested to go down to run the Columbo squad. And at that time, I think the Columbo squad had eight supervisors in eight years. I really thought I was too young to be a supervisor because I only had six years on. So I was basically voluntold, I would say, to go down there. And guys, that is young. I want to tell you something. I’ve seen a lot of different Bob squad supervisors come through here in Kansas City. And and they were all you know like 20 year agents 15 18 year agents that came from somewhere else so yeah so you know again I thought I was just way too young to be a supervisor as I said I was just on the job for about six years and I was voluntold to go down there yeah and I said if I’m going to go down there there’s a couple of things just based upon what I saw a I’m not a yes man and two the squad needs some sort of stability so I went down there and I was able to stay there I was there from actually December of 2004 all the way up until June of 2013.
[40:51]So we at that time when I first got there we really didn’t have a lot of cases going trying to go on so I was able to change the tactics right because I think juries had changed at that point in time where instead of having a historical witness just go on to stand and tell things, now we had shows out there, right? You had NCIS where the whole DNA-type stuff came in, so I had to change our approach, and proactive witnesses making consensual recordings were the way to go. And I think during a seven-year time period, our squad.
[41:24]Did an amazing job. Now it went from C10. I went, the squad went down to, it became C38. And we made probably 1,800 recordings in a seven and a half year time period. So, which is an amazing amount of recordings. So, a lot of transcriptions too. A lot of transcriptions. And I, you know, a three-hour tape could take you a day to listen to because you’re just trying to find that little piece of information. Yeah. Because a lot of it is just talk, right? Yeah. So I think our first big case was in June of 2008. And we took down the acting boss, a bunch of captains. And that’s when things really started to take off. We had a violent soldier cooperate named Joseph Compatiello. And, you know, we talk about proffers. His first proffer, he comes in and he basically tells us that there are three bodies buried right next to each other. So the layman would think, OK, they’re right next to each other. They weren’t right next to each other they were about 1.1 miles apart from each other.
[42:28]And you could be in your your room there and we’re trying to find a body it’s really hard to find so we were actually able to find two of the bodies one of the bodies was a guy named while Bill Cattullo he was the under boss of the Colombo family we found him in Formingdale Long Island he was behind a berm we were out there for about eight days and each day you know I’m getting pressure from my superiors. We’re going to find something because there’s a lot of press out there. There was another victim named Cormone Gargano who was buried. He was killed in 1994 and buried out there. Unfortunately, there was a new building built.
[43:06]And we could not find him there, but he was initially killed at a body shop in Brooklyn, and they buried him in Brooklyn, and then they decided to dig him up and bring him out to Long Island. So we went back to the body shop. What the Colombo family used to do, though, is they used to kill you, bury you, and put lime on top of the body. What lime does is it kills the smell, but preserves the body. Oh, I didn’t realize that. I thought it was supposed to deteriorate the body too. I think most people bought that. So good information. So, so when we found wall of bill, basically from his, from his hips up were intact. Oh, And when related to Cormier Gargano, because they had killed him in the body shop and then dug him up and brought him out to Long Island. We went back to the shop and figuring, let’s see if we can actually see if there’s any parts of him there. And there actually were. And we’re able to get DNA and tie it back and confirm it was him.
[44:15]Major Arrests and Cases
[44:12]So that’s how that dismantling of the Colombo family started. And then just to fast forward a little bit in January 2011, we have I spearhead the largest FBI mob arrest where we arrested 127 people that day across the states and also went to Italy, too, to take down people.
[44:32]And after that, the Bureau decides to reduce the resources dedicated to organized crime. And I then get the Bonanno family back. So C-10 merges back into my squad. And then I have the Bananos, the Columbos, and the Decafacanthes as well. So now I have all three families back. And I basically run that for another two years. And I guess my last official act as a supervisor is related to Goodfellas, where Jimmy Burke had buried a body in his basement. We saw a 43-year-old cold case murder where he killed an individual named Paul Katz, buried him in his basement. And when he went away for the point shaving, the Boston College point shaving case, well, he killed him in 1969, buried him in his basement. Then he goes to jail in the 80s. He gets fearful that the cops that he had on his payroll back in the 60s were going to talk. So he decides to have our witness at the time, Gaspar Valenti, who came forward back in the 80s, moved the body with Vincent S. Our son so they move the body but again they’re not professional so pieces are going to be back there so in 2013 we go back and we dig and we actually find pieces of paul cats and we tie that to dna to his son to his son and we confirm that it was him.
[45:57]So that was my last official act as a supervisor. Talk about art, art, imitating life again, you know, in the Goodfellas, they dug up a body. In the Sopranos, they dug up a body. I think I saw another show where they dug up a body. One of them, they were like, man, this smells.
[46:13]I mean, can you imagine that going back and having to dig up a body? And then, you know, and, you know, they’re just wearing t-shirts and jeans and maybe leather gloves. And they’d have to deal with all that stuff and put it in some kind of a bag can take it somewhere else oh my god you know i have a question while bill cutello that this guy was part of the the hit team that took him out do you remember anything about right i’m trying to remember i’ve read this story once he was kind of like more of a peacemaker and and if i remember right you remember what the deal was with him well back like what happens is in the early 1990s there’s a colombo war right you have the persicos versus the arena faction and one thing about the Colombos and the Persicos, they never forget. So in the early 1990s, while Bill Cotullo was on the arena side, and as I said, there was a war where approximately 13 people were killed. In the late 1990s, Ali Persico was going to be going to jail, and while Bill Cotullo thought that Ali was going to go to jail and that he would take over the family, Ali didn’t want that to happen. So basically while Vilcunzulo thought he was getting the keys to the kingdom and they were going to kill him.
[47:28]And what they did is they lured him to Dino Saraceno’s house in Brooklyn and Dino Calabro lured him into the basement and shot him in the back of the head. And we had all these guys then decide to cooperate. As I said, Joe Caves was the first person to cooperate. Dino Calabro cooperated.
[47:48]Sebi Saraceno cooperated. So we had a whole host of people cooperate and we were able to dismantle the Colombo family. And I’ve been extremely blessed to be part of teams that have dismantled three families, Bananos, the Columbos, and the D. Calacanti family. So, you know, as I said, and it’s never just one person. It’s always teammates, partners, and also other supervisors that I’ve had. Yeah, interesting. Yeah, it does take a lot of people to take those down. When you’re writing books, you try to make sure everybody gets a little bit of credit. Yeah. And, you know, I think, you know, the thing that was that was, you know, crazy when related to the recovery of Wild Bill is we had our evidence response team out there. And, you know, the witness takes us out there to show us where he thinks the bodies are buried. And related to Wild Bill, it was in the back of a field. And he kept on saying it was behind a berm. So we took him back there and he showed us where he thought it was. So we had our evidence response team dig. And they basically dug us an Olympic-sized pool.
[48:57]We could not find him. So there was two other sites that we were trying to look at because Richie Greaves was supposed to be next to the train tracks. And as I mentioned, Cormac Gargano was next to a building that had been replaced. So my squad, actually our squad, C-38, decides, Seamus, do you mind if we get some shovels? So I was like, sure. So there was, because we were just looking at each other at the time. So my team, Vincent D’Agostino, they’re pretty close by. He got some shovels and came back. And there was like six of us. And we just started digging ourselves. So we dug in one area, nothing. Then another agent basically said, let’s dig over here.
[49:38]And sure enough, like talk about, you know, I always say hard work leads to good luck. We started digging and then we found the white stuff. We found the line and jackpot. It was while Bill, he was hogtied face down with his feet up. And as soon as I saw the white stuff and then I saw, you know, like his foot, then we stopped and I said, let me go get the professionals. I ran over, I drove over, and I got the team leader from ERT. She got in the car. And, you know, of course, she’s very excited. I was like, you know, we F.M. got him, you know. And so I drove her back over there. And that’s when you kind of contain the crime scene. And we were able to find him. But, you know, it was our squad that found him. And then, as I said before, then, you know, our squad decides to go back to the body shop. And we found remnants of Carmine Gargano there. So the squad just did an amazing job but really we basically found two bodies ourselves you know and i think in my career i’ve been extremely blessed to find five you know which is just crazy well that’s not something those accountants and lawyers and stuff were trained for you need to get those former cops out there on those shovels and digging for bodies.
[50:57]Final Thoughts and Stories
[50:57]Well interesting this this has really been fun seamus any any other stories you can think of You want to you want to just want to tell just busting to make sure people know that’s in this book. I tell you what, guys, this is an interesting book. It’s it’s, you know, as I said, those kinds of stories and the procedures and how FBI works. There’s there’s a lot of stories in there. I don’t want to give to give the book away. You know, there’s a lot of stories even. Yeah. You know, there’s an even during that year of trials. There’s plenty of stories there. There was a blackout that that year, too. So there’s a lot of stories related to that. You know, even even the trials, there’s a lot of things that came up at trial. So I don’t want to give to give those stories away. But I think it’s a good read. As I said, I think it’s one of the few books that actually explains things because, you know, I think the public hears these words, but they don’t know what these words mean. And I just think it’s important that they do know what it means, because there’s a lot of things that go on behind the scenes, especially with the jury. Right. You know, the jury only sees what they see. There’s a lot of things that go on when the jury leaves the room between the government, the judge and also the defense attorney. So I try to bring to shed some light related to that as well.
[52:13]Interesting. Well, Seamus McElherney. And the book is Flipping Capo. That’s Anthony Capo. The first guy to be flipped in the Cavalcante family ever, which led to a cascade of other mob guys flipping, didn’t it?
[52:32]Sure did. Just like in a Bonanno family, you know, they start flipping there. And it just, I didn’t know where it was ever going to end. Finally, it ended.
[52:41]It sure did. Well, I have to say, it’s been great to meet you. I wish you continued success. And this has been a lot of fun. All right. Yeah, it’s been great to have you on Seamus. Thanks a lot. Don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. So when you’re out on the streets there and you’re a big F-150, watch out for those little motorcycles when you’re out. If you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to the VA website. They’ll help with your drugs and alcohol problem if you’ve got that problem or gambling. If not, you can go to Anthony Ruggiano. He’s a counselor down in Florida. He’s got a hotline on his website. If you’ve got a problem with gambling, most states will have, if you have gambling, most states will have a hotline number to call. Just have to search around for it. You know, I’ve always got stuff to sell. I got my books. I got my movies. They’re all on Amazon. I got links down below in the show notes and just go to my Amazon sales page and you can figure out what to do. I really appreciate y’all tuning in and we’ll keep coming back and doing this. Thanks guys.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins sits down with author Jay Baer to explore the hidden, human side of organized crime’s biggest names — Al Capone, Meyer Lansky, John Gotti, and Paul Castellano.

Jay’s book, Mob Life: The Private World of Capone, Lansky, Gotti, and Castellano, takes a unique look beyond the murders, rackets, and headlines to reveal how these mobsters actually lived — what they ate, how they dressed, their relationships with religion, and how they handled immense power and wealth.

Listeners will hear:
How Al Capone’s family sold his spaghetti sauce recipe to Ragu — their first commercial product.

Why Meyer Lansky, the most devout of the four, was denied the right to die in Israel by Prime Minister Golda Meir.

The lavish lifestyle and fatal missteps of Paul Castellano, the “Howard Hughes of the Mafia.”   The contrast between Gotti’s flamboyance and Lansky’s low profile — and how each approach shaped their downfall.

The staggering fortunes these men built — and how, in the end, they all lost it.

Jay also shares his own lifelong fascination with organized crime, his career outside writing, and his upcoming project, How to Live Like a Gangster — No Prison Required, a look at mob values like loyalty, respect, and power through a modern lens.

Gary and Jay swap mob history from New York to Kansas City, including a discussion of the real story behind scenes from Casino and Kansas City’s own underworld power struggles.

ON AMAZON Wayne said

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Facts on the Mob
Reviewed in the United States on October 3, 2021Format: Kindle
If your looking for a good fast interesting read on the Mafia, this is the book for you. Full of information on mob types that most have no clue about.
You can’t lose with this book I believe.

🎧 Listen now to uncover the side of the mob you’ve never heard before.

📘 Get the book: Mob Life: The Private World of Capone, Lansky, Gotti, and Castellano by Jay Robert Baer on Amazon

00:00 – Intro: Gary Jenkins welcomes Jay Baer 01:00 – Why Jay wrote Mob Life and his lifelong fascination with gangsters
03:30 – From detailing cars to writing true crime books
05:30 – Gary and Jay’s early mob reading influences
07:00 – Researching Al Capone’s private life
08:00 – Capone’s secret spaghetti sauce recipe sold to Ragu
09:00 – John Gotti’s love for Cracker Barrel and biscuits & gravy
10:00 – Meyer Lansky’s religious life and denied burial in Israel
12:00 – Castellano’s wealth, arrogance, and fall 14:00 – Jay’s next book: How to Live Like a Gangster — No Prison Required
15:00 – Loyalty and respect in the mob vs. business life
16:00 – How Castellano’s aloofness led to his murder
18:00 – The real Joe Watts story — the German who made millions
20:00 – Gary shares Kansas City mob stories and Casino connections
23:00 – The failed car bombing of underboss Tuffy DeLuna
25:00 – The Mob Museum and modern mob myths
26:00 – Jay shows his book Mob Life and shares fun mob trivia 28:00 – How much money mob bosses really made — and lost
30:00 – Why law enforcement didn’t chase mob money before the drug era
31:00 – Joe Massino’s $10 million cash and gold surrender
32:00 – Final thoughts: The mob’s empire always ends the same way

Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

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Transcript
Gary Jenkins: Well, hey, all you wire tappers. Good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins. You know, I’m a retired Kansas City police intelligence unit detective and I am now a mob historian and with the podcast and a few other things, some books and stuff out there.
Gary Jenkins: And I interview other mob authors as well as research stories. And today I have an author named Jay Bear. He has written a book about the mob, a really good, solid, historical, factually true book as kind of a basis for a novel he wants to write. So Jay, welcome.
Jay Baer: Oh, thank you. I’m, I’m happy to be here.
Jay Baer: This is really great. So I’m looking forward to this interview.
Gary Jenkins: All right, Jay. Well, you know, we, we like the mob here and we like the the facts about the mob. When I read about your book, that’s, that’s when I got hold of you. I thought, well, this is so interesting. It is Mob life, the private world of [00:01:00] Capone, Lansky, Gotti, and Castellano.
Gary Jenkins: And what did Al Capone wear? How much did it cost? Where did he buy it? You know, what, what kind of Italian, right? What kind of, what kind of food did Gotti like besides Italian and, and that kind of a thing. So I, that, that was really interesting, those esoteric little details that we don’t really know usually.
Jay Baer: What I wanted to do is I wanted to tell a different story. Everybody writes books about their crimes and law enforcement’s effort to put them away. We’ve heard all that. So this was like something I wanted to do for years. Let me just tell a different story. And I did, and the book is filled with, you know what?
Jay Baer: How much money they made, what they, how they dressed religious views really. Which there wasn’t very much in religious views except for May Lansky. The rest of them were, even, even Paul Castellano, the the bishop did not wanna bury him in a Catholic, in, in a Catholic cemetery. And they fought him on it and they got him to do it.
Jay Baer: [00:02:00] But yeah, none of ’em had really any religious views except for, may Lansky.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: He went to synagogue on a regular basis. He belonged, he did a lot of stuff, you know, during the war to help you know, catch the Nazis.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: In fact, there’s a book out there, an older book with called Luciano’s Luck and it’s about their, what they did and how they got involved in the, you know, world War ii.
Gary Jenkins: Interesting. Yeah, I had heard that. I’ve never really, I talked to one guy, an author that had a book really about the, more about the Navy guy that approached Luciano in prison and then worked with this guy named Sox Sox Lanza, who had the Fulton Street Fish market in, in trying to gather information about any possible Nazi saboteurs.
Gary Jenkins: But I’ve never really got into that. Mayor Lansky area. So Jay, tell us a little bit about where you come from. You’re not, you’re not a career author. Sometimes I have guys that that’s all they ever done. They’ve been newspaper reporters and written books and stuff. Tell us a little [00:03:00] bit about yourself.
Jay Baer: Well, I’m from New York based, you know, originally you can probably tell with my voice, you know, forget about it and all that stuff. I knew you were from north of me. Where are you? Kansas, Missouri. Oh, okay. So. My father moved us down here to Florida, like, oh my God. 1972, and I’ve been here ever since. So, but I, I de, I started detailing cars when I was 28, and I’ve been doing that ever since and it’s, you know, brought me, right now I’m kind of like, I only work in the mornings, you know, I’m almost 70, so I’m kind of like maybe semi-retired.
Jay Baer: Yeah. But I’m never gonna retire because, I gotta find something to do all the time. So I write, and right now, you know, I wrote this book, mob Life and I wrote a book before that called Angels of Death. It’s about two girls who are on the run for murder and they become killers for hire and realize they’re in love with each other.
Jay Baer: And I also wrote a nonfiction book about public speaking ’cause I [00:04:00] used to teach public speaking. I’m a distinguished Toastmaster. I did a lot of speaking over the years. I taught hundreds of people how to overcome their fear of speaking. So I wrote, I, I took my course and I put it into a book.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: It was only a very short book.
Jay Baer: ’cause you know, people don’t need a lot. I don’t think people need a lot of information to be successful, but I’ve always been interested in gangsters ever since I was a kid. You know, my, my friends were listening to The Beatles. I was reading books about. Capone and May Lansky. So there’s something about them that always intrigued me, their power, the women, the way that they just controlled so much, you know, they’re very powerful men.
Jay Baer: And it’s just something I’ve kept, kept on for, oh my God, since 35 years. No, 55 years. Ever since I was a kid, 15 years old, I’ve been interested in gangsters. So, and I decided, hey, it’s time to write about ’em. [00:05:00]
Gary Jenkins: Interesting. You know what just outta teens in my teens, I first read my first. True Crime book, which was in Cold Blood by Truman Capote.
Gary Jenkins: And man, that book, I was hooked then in that true crime. And so I was, I was in junior college right outta high school and, and I found green was it Greenfeld Jungle? By Ova DeMars. It was all about the mob in Las Vegas. It was. Thick, real dense book, but, but I bought into it, man, I, I love that book. I devoured that book.
Gary Jenkins: I, I read one by a guy named Ken, a New York City detective named I think it was Joe Erno or Tony Tony Erno, I can’t remember his erno and read that. And he really. You know, made these gangsters come alive in that book back then. And I remember even, even back then, I thought, boy, that veto genovese, that was a bad, that’s a bad dude.
Gary Jenkins: So they I understand. I got hooked on it early myself.
Jay Baer: Oh, that was a nonfiction book.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Right. Oh, okay.
Jay Baer: Yeah. You know, there’s a, there’s a lot of stuff [00:06:00] out there like that. I mean, fiction, like, I’m, I’m, I’m rereading The Godfather ’cause I like the way Mario Puzo writes.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: And I also listen to it, you know, so I’m learning, I’m learning from that.
Jay Baer: And I also I, I like to read Elmore Leonard.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Jay Baer: You ever read any of his stuff? He’s got, yeah, he’s a good one. I started, I started reading him because that’s what Quentin Tarantino learned how to write by reading his books.
Gary Jenkins: Mm-hmm.
Gary Jenkins: Interesting. So this book about private World of Capone, Lansky, Gotti, and Castellanos now, like Al Capo, where, where did you go?
Gary Jenkins: How did, how did you start researching. Information on Al Capone. And what are some of the interesting things? You know, we all know a lot of the public things and the myths. We know more myths than the real life things. I think like the old myth about him beating two guys to death with a baseball bat and some different things like that.
Gary Jenkins: So how’d you go about working on Al Capone and what are some of the interesting things you learned about Al?
Jay Baer: What I, [00:07:00] what I did was is I had about 11 different, I think the, I think I have 11 different chapters. I’m pretty sure that’s it. And I focus on one thing at a time, and I researched all of them. So like when I was doing food, ah, I mean now we have ai, but when I wrote that there was no ai, so I’d put in John Gotti food, hashtag whatever, you know, I, I did, there’s a lot of ways to.
Jay Baer: To research on Google. Mm-hmm. And so I would look it up and I’d find stuff about them. And I, I went on encyclopedia that’s online. There’s a lot of good stuff in there. And I just researched and I spent months doing it.
Jay Baer: You know, I do it at night after working and it’s, it was a lot of work, but I, you know, I enjoyed it. And what I found out about Capone was different thing, well, I’ll give you something really unique about him. He, he had a walnut spaghetti sauce. It was his recipe.
Speaker 4: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: And when [00:08:00] he died, his sister Mafi sold it to Ragu and it was their first sauce they ever made.
Jay Baer: Interesting. And he, he was a, he was a heck of a dresser. He he had like lime suits and purple suits and he had Oh, really? Stuff made for him for down here when he lived here. And I found out all these things about him. What he, you know, I, I don’t remember much about what he liked to eat. It was usually Italian, you know.
Jay Baer: And the thing about John Gotti that I always about the food that I always find interesting is he was in a cracker Barrel one time with a friend. And a reporter came over to him and said, what are you guys doing here? You’re Italian. And his friend said, how much Italian food can a guy eat? And and Gotti liked to eat biscuits and gravy with a country fried steak, but his favorite Italian food was eggplant tini.[00:09:00]
Jay Baer: These little things you find out. Yeah. And that’s why I wrote the book. ’cause I, you know, something different, something unique so people could s see a different side of them. Instead of, you know, looking at all the murders they created, all the people that they had whacked, I figured it was, you know, time to find something else for them to know about.
Gary Jenkins: So talking, you, you mentioned something about when we were talking about their spiritual life and their relationship with the church and, and I know in, in Kansas City when our mob boss died, Nick Novella, there was a big hubbub among the Catholic church if he could be buried in the church and if what priest was gonna conduct the ceremony.
Gary Jenkins: And, and in the end he was buried in the church. And, and, and they I know actually know the young priest. He was a real young priest that. You know, he wasn’t he, he wasn’t even old enough I think maybe when the mob was really rocking and rolling in Kansas City to, to be that affected by it. And, and so he conducted the ceremony.
Gary Jenkins: So what did you learn about that? You, me, something about Lansky’s pretty connected to a synagogue and, [00:10:00] and that kind of thing?
Jay Baer: Well, you know, Lansky was probably the most religious out of these four men, but he did belong to a synagogue and that’s where he met. No, he met. Arnold Rothstein at a bar mitzvah.
Speaker 3: Hmm.
Jay Baer: And that’s when Rothstein took him under his wing. They met at like the Park Avenue Hotel and they just talked for us like six hours. And then he bankrolled Lansky and Luciano during prohibition. See Rothstein. You ever read a book about him? No, I haven’t. Haven’t. Very interesting. You should check him out.
Jay Baer: ’cause they call him the father of the mafia Uhhuh because he was the one that started bankrolling these guys so they could you know, sell booze. And he had the booze brought in from England and when it got here they would cut it with cheaper stuff. They made millions, millions and millions. But he always kept himself out of everything.
Jay Baer: He ran it. No connection. [00:11:00] He just made sure that he was never involved with what he had going on. Other people had to take the fall. So and your question, so, well, you know, Lansky wanted to die in Israel and Goda Maier, who was the Prime Minister then said no. And she basically kicked him out of the country.
Jay Baer: She didn’t want him there. And his, his life, that was his, that’s what was his dream to die in Israel. But she made sure it never happened.
Gary Jenkins: Wow. Seemed like the TRO brothers up in Chicago when they found their bodies that I believe with with Tony, I don’t think they could get a, a, a church to to approve of that one.
Gary Jenkins: His, his brother Michael. They may have, but that’s, that’s been a constant ongoing kind of a theme. Between the church, especially the Catholic church and the Italian mafia, somebody is, is so prominent that it’s like then Lansky and gold. My ear is so prominent, she even [00:12:00] stopped his right of return because every Jew has a right of return to Israel and she denied that based on, really, based on myth and headlines and stuff.
Gary Jenkins: She didn’t, you know, there he’d never really taken a conviction. Come on.
Jay Baer: Well, from what I read about him, the only time he was in prison was in upstate New York, and it was just a gambling charge. He went to jail for two months. He was too smart to get put away.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: He wasn’t flamboyant like Gotti. He didn’t want anybody seeing him.
Jay Baer: Even when he walked his dog, he just did it and then he went home. He didn’t want pe, he didn’t wanna make a a, a scene where, you know, got, Gotti would go into. Restaurants and throw kisses at people, you know? So he didn’t keep a low profile and that was one of the things that led to his downfall, I think.
Gary Jenkins: Oh, got, he’s, yeah. Oh yeah. No doubt about it. And law enforcement can only take so much when a guy keeps throwing it up your face, he’s get there. I tell you what, I used to watch these guys, and I think [00:13:00] if you only knew. The array of forces that were written ready to come down on you, you wouldn’t be doing this stuff.
Gary Jenkins: But somehow they don’t care. They’re different.
Jay Baer: They, they, you know, I’ve been writing in my new book that they just didn’t care. They knew what the life was like. They knew the consequences and they did it anyway. And they all did the same thing. I mean, all of ’em were either put in prison or they died.
Jay Baer: Some of ’em died of natural causes like Banana and Lansky. There wasn’t many. Oh, and Gambino Carlo, he died of natural causes. I know he went to prison, but that’s the fate and they know it, and they, like I said, they actually don’t care. They just lived a life.
Speaker 3: Hmm. And,
Jay Baer: and some of ’em got out like, you know, banana.
Jay Baer: Like I said, he got out, he lived, he moved to Arizona and he lived the rest of his life there. So, but not many of ’em have done that.
Gary Jenkins: No, not many of ’em. Such a strong way of [00:14:00] life. And you mentioned, you mentioned your next book that you’re working on is gonna be how to live like a mobster. And so what did you , glean from these guys here?
Gary Jenkins: How they live like a mobster that was success, made them successful or work for them. .
Jay Baer: How to live like a gangster.
Jay Baer: No prison required. Yeah. I’ve got some things about these guys, but it’s gonna go deeper than that. I’m gonna use other gangsters. There’s a lot of information out there, especially now with ai. You can just pick stuff up in seconds. I mean, I could, you could even have write the whole thing if you want, but I don’t do that.
Jay Baer: Yeah, don’t do that. I like to put my own stuff. Yeah, no, and it doesn’t, you know, it doesn’t come out well anyway. No, but you know, one of the things I’m looking at in that book is loyalty and respect. You know, loyalty was a big thing, but you know what, that’s, that’s the same in regular business. You have to be loyal.
Jay Baer: You have to show respect to your boss, and if you’re the boss, you know, you have to show respect to your employees. But the, you know, the difference is [00:15:00] in the mob, if you screw up, you get dead. In regular life, you just get fired. So you know, it’s a big difference. Yeah. But you know, everybody, even the soldiers, they know it.
Jay Baer: They going in, they know I can screw up. Bam, you’re gone. So that’s just, you know, and if you don’t want that kind of life, that’s fine, then stay out of it. But you know what they say, once you’re in, you’re in. That’s it. You’re not getting out.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. And, and that brings to mind Paul Castellano. That was one that was a mistake he made.
Gary Jenkins: He, he stayed so aloof from the street guys and even the, the capos that they became jealous of him. And, and so the way he lived his life, he lived in this huge mansion that he would have him come in once in a while, but he, he didn’t come down to the club anymore and he had this different life and his clothes and everything.
Gary Jenkins: What did you learn about Paul Castellano’s life?
Jay Baer: Well, you know, he was just like you said, [00:16:00] he, there’s a, there’s a big part in the book about how he had friends, like the guy that started the grocery store what’s it called? IRA Wall Baum Wall Baum Wall Baum G groceries. He was good friends with him.
Jay Baer: He was friends with Frank Purdue. He helped Frank Purdue get his chickens in the grocery. Of course, probably not for free, but he did. He was friends with a, a woman who owned a it was like a, a lumber company. So he hung around with them instead of hanging around with his own men. And people got tired of it, especially Gaia.
Jay Baer: And what I heard, I don’t know but Castellano found out that. Gotti’s brother was selling drugs and he was gonna whack him, but Gotti got to him first. See, that was the thing. If he would’ve acted on it right away, that would’ve been it. That would’ve been the end of it. And he, I mean, he might be in prison now, but he may still be alive, [00:17:00] but he screwed up and he didn’t, I guess he didn’t fear Gotti as much as he should have.
Jay Baer: Mm-hmm. You know, let’s face it, a lot of these guys get to the point where they think they’re invincible.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: And. Well, you know what happened to him? Yeah. You wanna hear a funny, you wanna hear a funny story about that?
Jay Baer: Joe Watts went one day, went to Castellano’s house and said, I am cooking on a really big re real estate deal. You want in. So I. Castano says, yeah, you know, I’ll give you like 6 million. So he is walking to the door with Thomas bti and BTI says to him, Hey, the boss has plenty of money.
Jay Baer: Why don’t you count me in? He goes, yeah, no problem. So a couple days later he goes, he picks up $8 million or 7 million total. I think it was 7 million total. Five from Castellano, two from Bella. And you know, you know who Joe Watts was? He was on the backup team to kill Castellano. Yeah. [00:18:00] He wasn’t one of the, the, the four, he was backup.
Jay Baer: So he knew they gonna get whacked. Guy made himself $7 million like that, like that. And then, and then Gotti gave him Pilate’s, black book. He made, made millions and more dollars. And the guy’s still alive. He’s like in
Gary Jenkins: his eighties. Yeah. I think he, maybe he just got outta jail or maybe he’s still in prison.
Gary Jenkins: I can’t remember they call him. No, no, you’re right. He, he got out a while back. That’s what I thought. Yeah, that’s
Jay Baer: it. That’s
Gary Jenkins: him. It’d be a great interview the German to get him on. Joe. Anybody out there know Joe, the German? Give him a call. Tell him I wanna have him on the show.
Jay Baer: Smart guy. That takes though.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. You know, think
Jay Baer: about it. If Castellano would’ve found out,
Gary Jenkins: yeah,
Jay Baer: he would’ve made it. He would’ve made it down the street.
Gary Jenkins: Well, let’s breed man. I’ve heard of that before where they know somebody’s gonna get hit and then they Joe Macino did this and then he went to the guy and got him to a bunch [00:19:00] of money out of him that he was gonna, you know, have to pay him back.
Gary Jenkins: And then, but they know they’re gonna get hit, so that’s yeah. Yeah. Bob Life. Huh? Bob Life. Yeah. How to, how to live like a mobster a gangster. Don’t don’t be loaning anybody any money. ’cause anybody that’s dangerous.
Jay Baer: Yeah. But you know what’s kind of funny about that is people should know when they’ve screwed up and they’re gonna come after them.
Jay Baer: I don’t know how they always get like whacked. They just don’t believe it. I don’t, I don’t get it. I mean, me, if I knew my life was in danger, I’d pack my crop and go, man. Exactly. I
Gary Jenkins: would not be hanging out on those same streets. I would not be holding, keeping that same pattern that I usually keep. I, I, I don’t get it.
Gary Jenkins: I don’t get it at all. And we’ve seen it here in Kansas City, never big city. You know, they know that somebody’s after ’em, but yet they continue to do the same things. They keep the same patterns. [00:20:00] Over and over and over and really take very little precautions. I, I don’t know.
Jay Baer: So Kansas, Kansas City, was the, they filmed a part of casino with those guys that
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: In the market is was that real?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Well, they didn’t actually. Yeah. And they did actually film that in Kansas City, that that sequence of events happened. But it was in a bar and, and there was a bug there. But, and, and they didn’t pick up exactly everything that, what they used, but it was, it is somewhat along those lines, but yeah, it was, it was just, wasn’t in a market.
Gary Jenkins: Everybody thinks that was a, everybody’s in Kansas City was trying to, oh, that was Jamaica’s, or that was Orlando’s, or it was this market or that market. But I know for a fact it was in a, a pizza joint called the Villa Capri, which is more of a neighborhood tavern.
Jay Baer: Was there a guy like Remo out there?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Oh yeah. That was, I think that was the toughie doing that was our underboss and, and he handled for Arc family, he handled. All that Las Vegas business. He made the contacts with people. He talked to him on [00:21:00] the phone, you know, and he would carry the information to our boss, Nick, and say, okay, what, here’s what they’re telling me.
Gary Jenkins: What do you want to do? If there’s a decision to be made, you know, what do you want me to do? And then he’d get back with a guy in Las Vegas. They’re, they’re kind of their mole out in Las Vegas. And, and so he was, he did his underboss job there. He insulated the boss. From these people that were on the streets in LA in the casino in Las Vegas to do that.
Gary Jenkins: So yeah, that, that’s all true. And they did have a big meeting with Chicago to decide how to cut up things. And there’s a lot of Nicholas pledging in that movie. I’m getting off on my own story in a way, but Nicholas pledging that movie. He came to Kansas City and he spent about three days with a case agent on that, who also took a lot of documents and things home.
Gary Jenkins: And, and so he went through all that and, and really gathered. The background information from primary sources to put into his book and the, and the screenplay. They just for the screenplay, you know. Okay. They gotta they gotta change things around.
Jay Baer: Yeah. Yeah. ’cause they, [00:22:00] they have to cut 500 page, book four.
Jay Baer: Oh, page book.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: They gotta put it into 120 page screenplay.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. Yeah, that’s for sure. It’s tough. But,
Jay Baer: One of the things I like that Remo said, and I use it all the time, why take a chance? Yeah. That’s how he said when they, when they were whacking everybody. Yeah. And they were saying, you know, this guy’s a good guy and he’s a good guy.
Jay Baer: And Rema was like, well, I take a chance. That’s how I look at it.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Gary Jenkins: I got killed. Yeah. Well, he ended up dying in prison a after that. Really. I’ve just been working on a book myself and, and part of it is about the time that they tried to plant a bomb underneath his car. He is so lucky. Jay’s so lucky that they had a remote control.
Gary Jenkins: Ated bomb. They put it underneath his car. They watched him come out and get in it, and then as soon as he got in, they started hitting the, the switch and it wouldn’t go [00:23:00] off because the antenna wasn’t quite long enough to make the connection to the receiving unit on the bomb. And they had to run up and get the bomb and the plastic air paper back and go back and experiment with it.
Gary Jenkins: Were they
Jay Baer: trying, who were they trying to kill? Remo?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, the Remo character. Tuffy de Luna. That was in real, I was in real life here in Kansas City. Yeah. Okay. That wasn’t, and none of that was in the movie casino at all. There was a mob war going on while all that stuff was going on in Las Vegas, we had a inner family conflict in Kansas City that they were killing each other off right and left for a while.
Jay Baer: Oh, really? I don’t know. Well, I, I’ve always focused mainly on New York.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: Yeah. There’s, there’s, I mean, there’s a lot of mob, you know? Have you ever been to the, the Mob Museum in Las Vegas. I have,
Gary Jenkins: yeah, twice actually. It’s really good. It’s, it is worth the trip. It is, it’s worth the 35, 40.
Jay Baer: There’s like a hundred pictures of gang gangsters, people you never even heard of.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: Yeah. I, I really enjoyed that. I spent, I went downstairs to [00:24:00] the still. Did you do that?
Gary Jenkins: No, I didn’t. I don’t, I don’t know if it was there yet or something. I can’t remember, but no, I didn’t, I didn’t go down to the, the bar. They have a bar or something downstairs?
Jay Baer: Well, they, they have a bar and they have their own, they make moonshine, but it’s a modern steel and they, they sell the booth to all the restaurants.
Jay Baer: So I went down there, you know, you pay the lecture and you get these little cups. These little tiny cups Yeah. Of booze. And so he asked a question. The guy that was talking, he said, does anybody know who the Flamingo was named after? So I raised my hand and he goes, who is it? I said, it was Virginia Hill.
Jay Baer: He goes, oh wow, we have a gangster in the room here. People at my table got a extra drink of Peach Moonshot. What? What was the, lemme do that
Gary Jenkins: again. What was the question again?
Jay Baer: Who was the flamingo named after?
Gary Jenkins: Oh, okay. Yeah, I, yeah, Virginia Hill. I couldn’t have called that one up off the top of my head, but I had heard that before.
Gary Jenkins: That’s a [00:25:00] good, he got a gangster among us here. Somebody knows his gangster history.
Jay Baer: You wanna, do you want, you want me to show the book?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, yeah, go ahead. Yeah, let’s see it. Book, its Folks Mob Life, the private world of Capone, Lansky, Gotti, and Castellano by Jay Bear, actually Jay, Robert Bear. . I’ll have a link in the show notes to the Amazon link if you want to get that book. Okay. And I’ll have Cool, I’ll have a link to Jay’s Facebook page too. So our Facebook group, if you wanna get onto that, it’s
Jay Baer: also it’s also on, it’s on audio and it’s, and it’s ebook, it’s all three.
Jay Baer: Yeah. You can get all three of it. So and it’s, it is, it’s a short audio, like an hour and a half, you know. Mm-hmm. I found a guy on five who did a really nice job.
Gary Jenkins: What’s one last thing that you found the most interesting in their kind of private personal lives that people might not know?
Gary Jenkins: What, what, what would you want to tell us about there?
Jay Baer: [00:26:00] Well, I thought the food thing was pretty interesting, but what really became interesting was the money they made, the millions. I mean, John Al Capone was worth over a hundred million dollars when he was 23 years old. Hmm. That was in the twenties. You know what that’s worth today? Yeah. Oh my God. I couldn’t even imagine that meeting today.
Jay Baer: He, he had, he owned a building where they cut out the second store story. So they could put a gigantic vat of beer.
Speaker 4: Hmm.
Jay Baer: That’s how smart this guy was. And they, you know, he owned brothels also, which to me, there’s nothing wrong with that. You know, it’s like you are, you are giving a service. He owned brothels and he did that, and actually he took all that over from Johnny Torrio because they tried to kill him.
Jay Baer: So he handed everything over to Capone and he retired. Then I think like four or five years later, he died of a heart attack.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: But I found that what they made the kind of money when when Sammy the Bull wrote that book, my [00:27:00] boss
Gary Jenkins: mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: The Underboss, it was called Under Boss. Underboss.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah, underboss.
Jay Baer: He was on an interview with Diane Sawyer and she said, what did you guys, what happened to all your money? And he said, nothing. We still have our money.
Jay Baer: They didn’t want our money. They wanted us, and they found out, I said, how, well, how much did you make? He goes, I think he said he made like five or 6 million a year where Gotti was making like 10 or 20, $30 million a year. It was cash. It was all cash. They had duffle bags full of cash in their basements.
Jay Baer: So that’s the thing I found out that I found, you know, interesting. And they, they had, they were persistent men. They weren’t just guys that were like you know, we’ll just go to work today. They weren to work. They worked the streets. They were street men. They knew how to handle things. They knew how to make money.
Jay Baer: Especially Castellano, you know, he was called the Howard Hughes of the mafia. He was so smart. But they all, I think all of ’em were like that. Lansky made millions. [00:28:00] They all made millions and millions of dollars. But you know what, in the end it was all gone.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: Every one of ’em lost everything.
Gary Jenkins: I’ve noticed, I’ve noticed that.
Gary Jenkins: I have people ask me about that and I say, you know, I, I don’t know. I, I don’t know whatever happened to their money. I know a lot. Nicks of El made a lot of money. They were bringing 40 grand a month just out of the Tropicana. That was not even out of part of the Stardust, hacienda Frontier, and there was another one in there.
Gary Jenkins: And, and that was just for him. And then he split, he split a lot of it up among his men, and that’s what these mob bosses do. Some of ’em, the good ones will split it up among their their maid guys that they can depend on have depended on for a long time. But back in those days, Jay, the law enforcement before drugs, before cocaine hit and all that money hit, the government didn’t really go.
Gary Jenkins: Tooth and nail after the money. They, if they got the guy, like you said, if they got the guy, then they [00:29:00] just moved on. That was enough. They didn’t really go try to run down the money and, and trace it down after cocaine hit and all that drug money hit, then they, the government started going after money and then we developed whole units, you know, the, the civil forfeiture unit and had civil for forfeiture laws, state and federal that were not really in place before.
Gary Jenkins: So, so that’s why government, they just didn’t care about the money.
Jay Baer: What did you say earlier? What did you, you were a police officer?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. A
Jay Baer: detective,
Gary Jenkins: yeah. Here in Kansas City.
Jay Baer: My son just my son was with a city called Margate in Fort Lauderdale, and he just retired, not retired. He went to work for Monroe County, the Keys, and he became a he’s head of emergency management.
Gary Jenkins: No, that’d be a good job.
Jay Baer: Well, it’s better than he’s, he does not have a bullseye on his back anymore. But he was the detective for what, for like the last two years and what I was, you know, they, I was Do you ever listen to that podcast? It’s called Law and [00:30:00] Order.
Gary Jenkins: I don’t think so. Who does it
Jay Baer: check that out?
Jay Baer: Because they they would, they, one of the last ones I listened to, this is their second year Law and order. It’s a podcast and, i, I listened to one where they, they were getting Joe Massino, I think that’s his name.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah.
Jay Baer: And they, Joe was a
Gary Jenkins: bonno. They,
Jay Baer: they stopped using Rico. They said Rico was not working anymore.
Jay Baer: So you know what they did? They hired like a dozen accountants. Yeah. And they went after me. Yeah. And you know how they got ’em? They found a guy in New York that owned a bunch of parking lots, right?
Gary Jenkins: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: And you know the story.
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. I, I did a whole two or three parts series on Joe Macino in that parking lot guy.
Gary Jenkins: And he, he was like kicking money to their wives and, and they started tracing through their wives and all that. Joe Macino gave up. This is solid numbers. This is not meth. He gave up like $10 million in cash and Gold Bull in when he made his [00:31:00] deal in the end to save himself for life in prison or the death penalty.
Jay Baer: Oh, he did?
Gary Jenkins: Yeah. That
Jay Baer: I didn’t, that I didn’t say.
Gary Jenkins: That’s, that’s the one case I know of where. Factually, law enforcement or anybody actually saw the money that these guys claim to have, and, and he had it. So it’s out there. I don’t know what they do with it.
Jay Baer: Did you ever hear of the, this guy, his name was Slu, C-E-F-A-L-U.
Jay Baer: He was a Gambino boss.
Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.
Jay Baer: And I don’t think he’s ever gone to prison. Now, there was another guy after him called Marino, but you should check this guy ou because, he was there for a while and but you know, again, in the end,
Speaker 4: yeah, yeah.
Jay Baer: We get it all. Just like they said in casino, in the end we get it all.
Speaker 4: Yeah. Juniors,
Jay Baer: juniors college fund, the house payment, we get everything. Yeah. Interesting. [00:32:00] Alright, well this has been great. I really appreciate the opportunity
Gary Jenkins: Jay Bear, I really appreciate you coming on the show, Jay.
Gary Jenkins: All right, thank you. All right.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins sits down with Burt Gonzalez, a veteran officer from the Miami-Dade Police Department, for an unfiltered look inside one of the most violent and chaotic eras in American law enforcement history. Bert has published his story title The Real Greatest Show on Earth.

With decades of experience spanning multiple divisions, Burt recounts the transformation of Dade County’s police force—from Metro-Dade to Miami-Dade—and now back to an elected sheriff. He walks us through the gritty evolution of policing in South Florida, where the drug trade fueled daily violence and cartel wars left bodies in the streets. Burt shares firsthand stories from Miami’s cocaine-crazed years, including a shocking drug bust that netted 208 kilos of cocaine and over a million dollars in cash, offering a vivid glimpse into the unpredictable and dangerous life of a street cop.

Beyond the shootouts and seizures, we explore the human side of policing—the growing mental health crisis in Miami-Dade, the deadly unpredictability of domestic violence calls, and the emotional toll that constant exposure to trauma takes on officers. Burt emphasizes the importance of training, de-escalation, and support systems for those on the front lines.

The conversation also previews Burt’s upcoming show, Sergeant Maverick, a podcast where he’ll tackle everything from police work and politics to financial advice for first responders—and even the decline of customer service in America. Join us for this candid, eye-opening conversation as Burt Gonzalez pulls back the curtain on the realities, dangers, and hard-earned lessons of Miami policing during the height of America’s drug war.
Click here to get the book, The Real Greatest Show on Earth
Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

To rent ‘Brothers against Brothers’ or ‘Gangland Wire,’ the documentaries click here. 

To purchase one of my books, click here.

Transcript
[0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers, welcome to the studio of Gangland Wire. I’m back here, and I have a fellow copper from down in Miami-Dade County, Florida, Burt Gonzalez. And, you know, I worked all the jobs on the police department, mainly spent my time in intelligence, so that’s why I focus on organized crime. But I worked all the rest of the jobs, almost all of them. I never was a wheel man. But other than that, I think I did everything. And Burt’s done a lot of things, too. So welcome, Bert. Thank you, Gary. Appreciate it. Glad to be here. And guys, you need to know, and we’ll talk about this later, Bert has a book out there about his career and some great stories called The Real Greatest Show on Earth. And believe me, Bert, it is the real greatest show on Earth, isn’t it? Well, that’s why I named the book that.

[0:49] I was thinking about what is it that we do and what do we call it out there ourselves, in the street, in the homes of our citizens and everything. And really, it’s a circus. So that’s where I came up with that. True circus. All right, now tell the guys a little bit about your department that you spent your time in and how you ended up going on that department and a little bit about the history of it and what it was like as you went over the years. So go ahead. So I was with Miami-Dade Police, formerly known as Metro-Dade Police, when I joined in 1983. And in the areas where my family moved here from New York and I followed a year later, the area was unincorporated Dade County at the time. It wasn’t called Miami-Dade County yet.

[1:40] And so the police of the jurisdiction was Metro Dade police. And our neighbor behind our house, Bob Johns, was a sergeant with Metro. So then all of my interactions, I’ve seen Metro everywhere. And then as I got to know Bob and I got to know more about the department,

[2:00] Metro Dade is the largest department in the Southeast United States. Now is Miami Dade. It still is. And it’s the sheriff’s office, even though we didn’t call ourselves that. We just called ourselves Metro-Dade and now Miami-Dade Police. It is a sheriff’s office as of a few weeks ago again. First time in 60 years we’ve elected a sheriff. And that involves all the politics about the county governing itself away from the capital, Tallahassee. And then the voters here a couple of years ago said, we want to have an elected sheriff again, as opposed to an appointed director by the mayor and the county commission. And you know, as well as I do, that if you have an appointed chief or an appointed director, the mayor has control over them. So the director is not answerable to the citizens or the chief of police isn’t really answerable to the citizens. They’re answerable to the mayor.

[3:04] And it caused a lot of problems. And finally, the citizens down here said, we want an elected sheriff again. In November, we elected a sheriff. One of my colleagues, Rosie Cordero-Stutz, who highly qualified, she was an assistant director with us. So now we’re the sheriff’s office again.

[3:22] So the more I learned of what department I wanted to apply to, it was going to be Metro-Dade and only Metro-Dade. I didn’t think about the city of Miami, which is another, the second largest department in South Florida.

[3:37] But it was going to be Metro all the way. And there’s going to be folks that may be here, listen to this, and going to say, well, that sounds pretty arrogant. Well, it is the best department down here for sure. And it is a leading agency around the country. And we’re very proud of that reputation. So I joined Metro, like I said, in 83.

[4:00] And two years later my brother got out of the army and he came on as well and I gotta tell you at that time it was the height of the cocaine cowboy wars when we came on.

[4:13] This is what I was thinking, Miami Vice. You say Miami area in 1983. I’m thinking Miami Vice, maybe. You couldn’t throw a rock without hitting a kilo of cocaine anywhere. I mean, it was everywhere. And the district that I work, Southwest District, we had a lot of dopers that lived there. They built these big houses. And of course, oh, that’s not a doper there. Of course not, right?

[4:41] Cameras outside. You know, and the thing about the cowboy wars at that time, besides the fact that cocaine was everywhere, we had a lot of dead bodies dropping all the time. And there was a time literally every day we were finding bodies all over the county, all our different districts. And the homicide rate was so high that our department had to create a specialized narcotics-focused homicide squad to handle it. So when you say Miami Vice, and also, I’m sure you’ve seen it and many of your viewers and our fellow colleagues, Scarface. Yeah. The movie Scarface. And that scene, I’m always reminded of that scene where Tony Montana and his crew are walking into the banks with duffel bags full of cash. Yeah. Well, I’ve got one story about that. And I was working, I worked mostly uniform in my career. I did a lot of training as well, but I also did plainclothes work.

[5:58] And we did a lot of street-level narcotics. So I was on this crime suppression team playing clothes, and we were getting hit with a lot of driveway robbers. We have an affluent area in the district I was working. And from the expensive department stores.

[6:19] Macy’s, Bloomingdale, Neiman Marcus, the people would get followed home and get robbed in their driveway. And they’re driving an expensive car, You know, so we got assigned to do surveillances and try to catch these bad guys. And, uh, like I wrote in the book, I always describe a bad guy as an asshole bad guy. Yeah. Cause that’s what they are. Right. So what we were doing these surveillances and we hired extra officers, uh, to increase our numbers. Cause we were a small plainclothes squad. Mark, Sylvia and I, uh, went down this one street one night about eight o’clock at night. And it was dark, and as we drove by this one house, we see two guys looking in the picture window next to the front door. Look really suspicious. We drove down the street. We didn’t see a car in the driveway. We came around. They were gone. Okay, we got something here. Go down, park in somebody’s driveway. I got out, told the owner who we were. Can we park in your driveway? We’re going to watch this house. We called the rest of the squad in. we surveilled for a while.

[7:30] No movement so we went to the house Mark and I went to the back of the house, and what we in the backs of a lot of Florida houses they have what’s called the Florida room it’s like a second living room that’s in the back of the house next to the yard or the pool, generally screened in or something like that when the other guys went to the front door and knocked on the door and a relatively of a young woman came to the door and Joe on our squad who had the gift of gab, she, he started, uh, interviewing her and said, well, there’s two guys that were just here and they’re gone. And she goes, there’s nobody here.

[8:13] So they relayed that to Mark and I, and we’re staring at the two guys in the floor room with the kids in the, in the back of the house. Uh-oh. Okay. Right. So, you know, the, the plot thickens, right? Yes. Joe talked his way into the house and got the lady to sign a consent to search. We secured it. He did have a gift to gab, man. Big time. Big time. We secured the two.

[8:40] Asshole bad guys, because that’s what they turned out to be. And we searched the house. In one of the rooms, we found Mac 11 machine guns. We found a table with a ledger book on it that was a code book that we sent to the DEA.

[8:59] We found suitcases with coffee grounds. Because at that time, the dopers were running the drugs or coffee grounds to throw the dogs off, as many people know. And then, you know, the acetylene torch tanks, their steel, well, those were used to drop from the airplanes into the Everglades. And they had a couple of those in the room. And then we found a garbage bag full of cash. Okay. Later on, when we counted it, it was $1.3 million in cash. Oh, my God. And then when the guys got up into the attic to check there, 208 keys of Coke. Ooh, 200? 208 keys, yeah. Oh, my God. So at that time, it was the biggest seizure in Dade history, Dade County history. Since then, it’s been eclipsed by tons. Yeah. Oh, yeah. But the ledger book, when the DEA broke the code, came back to a real estate office in Miami, Columbia, and a place in Milan, Italy. So it was a triangle and the lady was in the house with her husband and her three kids living as a family. They were from Columbia, no drug dealers from Columbia, right?

[10:17] So they were there set up to funnel the drugs and cash in and out of the house. Was it great police work? Okay, something suspicious. We jumped on it. It was dumb luck. Yes. It was just dumb luck. That’s how it works, man. I know. I got my own stories like that. Just dumb luck. You just stumbled into it. And then when everybody hears about it, oh, you guys did a great job. All right, we’ll take it.

[10:48] But I’ll tell you what, that day you guys were running around the station high-fiving each other as you put that coke in the property room it would counted that money out today everybody come and look look at all this freaking money they’re counting absolutely oh yeah oh yeah you know you take the win and then you move on to the next yeah yeah yeah well you know it works that way it’s just how it works you know then you put 100 hours in something else and nothing happens you know then all of a sudden something little something falls and it and it starts happening it for you i’ll tell you what that is how it works and and that’s one reason it’s fun it’s uh you know those guys like that or uh that would that’s just something i mean the most most marijuana or most cocaine we ever discovered during my short time i spent about two years in this business was five kilos that came in from california so that that tells you the difference in miami and dade and and kansas city we just you know we get that was the most

[11:46] you know that was the most anybody found for a long time. Finally, they found more. It was crazy everywhere. The same squad I was on, we were in uniform first and we transitioned to plain clothes.

[12:00] So what we used to do, we did something called working the pay foams. So in our marked cars, green and whites, as we called them, those were the colors. We would watch a bank of telephones, pay phones with binoculars. And the thing is that our cars are visible everywhere. So the bad guys were used to seeing our green and whites around. And they’d go to the pay phone with their roll of quarters and they’d be throwing quarters in there, calling Colombia or Bolivia, wherever it was. And we would watch them and then we would follow them afterwards. We’d stop them and then we’d get them to let us search the car, half a key, guns, you know, whatever it is. It was almost like shooting fish in a barrel. So then what we would do is we’d call Border Patrol because these guys are probably here illegally. And then Border Patrol didn’t need a warrant to go into their residence. Oh, really? Yeah, because they were here illegally. So they would get an entry. We would follow them in and back them up, and then we would find the rest of the narcotics or whatever it was. And we’d take all that. We would drop arrest forms on them, and then Border Patrol would take them away also and put an immigration charge on them. So as you know, paperwork is tedious. Yeah.

[13:20] Tedious. But it was fun. And that was just a brief moment in time during my career. Um i worked uniform most of the time i was a field training officer i was a field training sergeant um i did a lot of training over the years in different things different disciplines, but i really uh spent most of my time in uniform and you know i i liked it that way because that’s where the action is yeah and i like the craziness of the street the crazier it is on the street the more I was enjoying it, you know, everybody just lose their collective minds. We’d have, you know, big scenes or whatever, burglars running, perimeters, fires, hazmat situation, whatever it was, the crazier it was, the better I liked it. And I also, also had colleagues that were like that. You know, we liked the act. Yeah.

[14:14] Yeah. I know what you mean. I was the same way. You go, you go to the, uh, you go to the area, the district, you volunteer for the districts that they’re the highest crime. And that’s where the most action is. You could easily, you know, we had two kinds of policemen. We had the guys that were frantically trying to get out to the suburbs where there wasn’t anything to do. And then you had the rest of us that were frantically trying to get into the hot districts and, and get, if you had a beat car, get that hot car. So you could, uh, or get up maybe a, uh, a wild car. And once in a while they, they have programs where you’d have a wild car and you could just cruise around and just get into whatever you could get in.

[14:52] So that’s, that’s what we, that’s what we like to do here. I know that I had, uh, you know, and, and I remember one night I’m like.

[15:01] We’re on this kind of a burglary deal where we’re wild cars and there’s about four or five of us. And there was a high dollar district in which they were burglarizing in the evening while people were out to dinner. And then they come back over toward the ghetto. So all of a sudden, you know, we have, they jump one up. There’s been a burglary. Somebody’s came home. They caught them on the inside. They jumped in their car and they lost them. Then they found them. We lost them. And then they jumped out of their car. And I jump out of mine and we’re all one person cars. and I’m like chasing this guy through the backyards. Then I lose him, of course. And I’m running pell-mell and all of a sudden I thought, you know, I better slow down just a little bit. This son of a bitch will be waiting around the corner for me.

[15:45] And sure enough, they found him, you know, after I ran by him, he got underneath a bush. And another guy came along behind me and said, oh, he’s down here underneath the bush right here. I tell you what, it’s crazy out there. It could be really dangerous too. One bad guy means two bad guys. One gun means two guns. And you’ve always got to think that way.

[16:08] In our profession, while we like the action, when you leave the house in the morning, and here, we didn’t go to the district, like let’s say a precinct in New York at NYPD or some other places where you change at the station, right? You’re in civilian clothes when you’re commuting, and then you change. Well, we don’t do that. We just put our uniform out at home, and we go. Yeah, that’s what we did. And then in 92, one of our districts did a pilot program. Actually, it ended in 92, five years, to see if having assigned cars that you can take home was cheaper for the department because they didn’t get abused 24 hours a day. Yeah. And our union did that, the PBA, and the department agreed, the county agreed. So in 93, I got my first take-home green and white. And it was like, I was a little kid driving, you know, like when I was 16 years old and got my license for the first time. And now I’m driving without my parents or, you know, whatever. And I remember driving home from the station when it came to my car. I go, you know, remember Flounder and Animal House? Oh boy, is this great.

[17:22] And then we had the benefit of you’re allowed to drive it off duty anywhere in Date County because part of the package was that the visibility of the car being everywhere. So we did a lot of us did that. And I would say that, uh, until 2012, when I bought my 2008 Corvette convertible. I drove my green and white to tennis for decades.

[17:54] And then when I got the Corvette, of course, I needed to drive that with the top down and go play. Right. Yeah. And then when I got rid of the Corvette, it was back to driving the green and white to play tennis again. So it was a great benefit for us. It was good having it. You didn’t have to pay a dime for it. You didn’t have to put anything into it if you didn’t want to. The gas was paid for. The insurance was the county self-insured.

[18:16] And it was a great thing. Now, the other side of that coin, when you’re off duty and you come across a crash, you come across somebody broken down or something, stop and render aid. And I always did. That could be at the time, my mother who was broken down or somebody needed help. I’m in a patrol car. I don’t care. I’m off duty. I’m going to stop and I’m going to help. So unfortunately, a lot of our young, uh, Jedi Knights, as I refer to them now, they’re more involved with their phone and they just want to get where they’re going and they don’t want to be bothered if they’re off duty. And I, I can’t stand that. Um, I taught my son how to do it and he’s very good about it. We’re here to serve. So that’s what you have to think. Well, they still have take home cars like that. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. They talked about that here, but they never, I don’t think that, not when I was in patrol that they ever did it. You know, you got to be ready. Like you said, if you’re going to take it home, you got to be ready. If you see a wreck, you got to stop and do something. If somebody’s going to be flagging you down, you got to stop and do something. So I bet a lot of guys drove them home and didn’t go back out again.

[19:31] I’ve come across a bunch of stuff driving around in that car off duty. Yeah. Or on my way home from work or to work, something happens and i can take action you know i helped find a child with autism at one of our local parts here near our house when i was on my way home from the airport it is near the end of my career 20 in 2019 uh the call went out i’m on my way home i’m five minutes from home and the call went out over all the frequencies uh you know four-year-old with autism walked away okay.

[20:07] Why did he walk away? Well, that’s unanswerable. You know, the parents weren’t paying attention. And from my training that I had with autism, and I also trained a lot of officers in dealing with the mentally ill. So I did a lot of that. I was well-versed in that. But with autism, children are drawn to the water. And there’s a lake in the park over here. So when I told the dispatcher, I’m off duty, coming home, but I’m going to go to the park. And I went straight to the lake in that park. It’s a park near my house, a mile away that I’m very familiar with. Walking, cycling, playing tennis there, played softball there, played soccer there. I went to the park. Somebody was walking that kid back towards me.

[20:54] He fell in the water. Oh, wow. He didn’t drown. Thankfully. but and I said I’m glad that I went you know I didn’t have to go in the water or find a drowned child yeah, but like I said it comes with the territory you know you gotta take action you just can’t hide your you know bury your head and go home you know you’re listening to the radio even if you’re off duty which you have to do, in case let’s say in the case you worked you know for my department I’m on my way to play tennis and you’re in the jackpot screaming for emergency backup. And I happen to be the closest unit. Am I going to go to the tennis court or am I going to stop and help you?

[21:44] That’s a no brainer. Yeah. Fortunately, a lot of the young guys are like that. Yeah. Yeah. You got to do it. If you’re going to take, you’re going to take that advantage. You audit it. If you got to stop, if you see another policeman, I mean, I drive down the highway and I see some policeman got somebody stopped. I kind of slow down and watch and make sure everything looks copacetic and before I keep on going. So you got to, cause you’re out there when you’re out there by yourself, man, you’re, you’re alone and they’re not super bad and you’re not bulletproof. And I don’t know about you. You may have your own stories, but you ever tie into somebody who was crazy and, and was so strong that you couldn’t, one man couldn’t even hardly hold one arm down. Let alone take three or four of you, even just to hold this person down and get them under some kind of control. I mean, there’s a lot of people out there like that, and you run into them by yourself. You know, you better hope help gets there pretty fast. And so since we’re talking about my book, I have a chapter dedicated to mental illness.

[22:46] And here in Florida, the law that allows us to take somebody into protective custody for a mental disability when they’re acting out self-neglect, harmful to themselves, harmful to somebody else, is called the Baker Act law.

[23:06] Which was instituted in 1971 in Florida. And it’s a great law. So the title of my chapter, I used the code for our Baker Act calls, 43. And then I said, 43 mental illness, what batshit crazy is really like. I give it a little bit of a comical twist, but it’s a very serious chapter. And you know as well as I do, when someone has mental illness or they’re on drugs, they are so strong. And no matter what you do, they don’t feel the pain and you’re trying to take them into custody and you’re trying not to hurt them. But it gets to the point every once in a while where you’ve got to hurt them bad just to get them into custody. You know, we don’t want to do that, but they’re not going to give up. And I’ve run into that so many times. In Miami-Dade County, the national average for mental illness in the United States is about 3% of the population.

[24:14] In Miami-Dade County, it’s 9%. It’s three times higher than anywhere else in the country. So we’re Baker acting, as we call it, people every single day. Almost every police agency here in Miami-Dade County, and there’s 36 of them. Uh miami-dade mine and city of miami the next largest department, baker acting people all day long every shift every district or sector um it is just amazing how many people have it and then act out or something happens they get off their meds the police get called they’re tearing up the place a lot of uh um assisted living facilities These ALFs have people with mental illness and they end up throwing the things around and 911 gets called and we got to go fix the problem and you got to take them into custody. And as you know, getting him into custody sometimes just is not easy. And then after the four of you fought this guy or gal, shoehorned him into the backseat of the car or put him in a rescue truck or ambulance to take him on a gurney. You get to the crisis receiving facility They’re calm now, And then the doctor gets them. And then the doctor disagrees with your assessment.

[25:37] Where your uniform’s all disheveled, your name tag, the pen came out, you know, and the doctor’s in this clinical environment saying, oh, they’re fine. They’re fine. No, they’re not fine, doc. You know, so we’ve run into that a lot as well. I didn’t have like that. I mean, this guy, we just couldn’t even hardly control him and get him down to what we used to have. what they call a PRC psychiatric receiving center. And we get him down there. And all of a sudden this is like Mr. Meek, Mr. Mild. Those tenants are looking at us like, well, what’s wrong with you guys? You know, there’s nothing wrong with this guy. I said, okay, whatever you think we’re leaving him with you. He’s yours. We’re gone. Exactly. Exactly. And then unfortunately within an hour or two hours, they’re just walking out the door because the doctor, you know, he’s calm. Now the doctor doesn’t see anything that he might be harmful to himself or others and doesn’t hold them, uh, for a more thorough examination. So, but that’s the nature of our job. It’s things we have to deal with. And then we go on, go to the next one. Really?

[26:44] We had a guy at an intersection. He had a big truck and, and I don’t remember if we got a call or somebody noticed him. And then I think this other guy noticed him and called me over. I was nearby. And so we get out of service and we walk up this guy and he’s just like steering straight ahead and he’s just like pushing the clutch and then letting it out pushing in letting it out and this big truck is rocking back and forth and and we can’t get his attention so i reach up in there and i turn it off and it’s it’s in gear and then he and then they like start pulling him out well he’s resisting us the whole time and he’s a big dude so we pull him out we wrestle him around and they a bunch of other guys come in. We rough him all up a little bit, just trying to get him under control and, you know, finally get rid of him. And I remember this other guy, he was bad. And so he went back to the station. He wrote a whole bunch of tickets on this guy. And then the next day, they tell me, I said, oh, well, he was in insulin shock. Oh my God. I mean, you know, what are you supposed to do? I mean, you know, what the hell are you supposed to do? You just got to do something. And then we, you know, we had to call a tow truck and get that truck out of there. It was just, it was a nightmare. And all he needed was a piece of candy. I came as a young officer. I came across one evening and by the way, afternoon shift was always my favorite. The transition from day into night.

[28:09] Didn’t have to wake up at the crack of dawn and, you know, and on mid nights, I had a hard time functioning. But one afternoon I got a call. There’s this guy in the parking lot of an apartment complex on his knees. He’s incoherent. Fortunately, we get really good training and we get updates all the time. And I remembered, okay, something wrong. His door was open to his apartment. I went in and I found an address book where we had address books. Remember? Yeah. For our phone numbers. For our phones. Yeah. And I thought it was family. So I called him and they said, he’s diabetic. He’s an insulin shock. I grabbed orange juice from the refrigerator and I put it in his mouth, woke right up. I mean, came out of it just like that. Yeah. I heard that. Damnedest thing. But, you know, yes, sometimes these things, they don’t look right. You know, something’s wrong, but you’re not really sure what it is. You know, later on, now this is going to sound sarcastic and maybe it is because sarcasm is one of our superpowers as cops. We know that, right? Yeah. So in the last 20 years, many more children have been diagnosed with autism.

[29:30] Back when we started, you know, it was rare. Yeah, I’ve read that. That there’s, I don’t know what the story is. Now, there’s HDD and a whole bunch of things, right? So, and autism is one of the big ones. And now, you know, dealing with some child, especially a child that has severe autism, it’s very difficult. And you have to learn some techniques. And we went through the, all of us went through the training to try to learn these things. Because not only do we have the highest mental illness rate in the country,

[30:03] but it seems like we’ve got a lot of kids with autism. And as a side note, my oldest daughter, Christina, is going to our local college, Miami Dade College. Uh, she just got her associates in education and now she’s working on her bachelor’s and she’s going to be specializing teaching kids with autism. She has a knack for it. You know, she gets them to do what the other teachers can’t get to get the kids to do. It’s pretty cool. And, uh, when she told me this the other day that she had this class as a substitute and the T the main teacher said, how do you get the kids to follow you? They don’t listen to me. Christina has a knack for it. So I asked her, do you have a whistle? She goes, no. I go, well, let’s start calling you a kindergarten cop, like Arnold Schwarzenegger.

[30:48] Then I’m marching around the classroom. But she seems to have the knack. So for us, you come across somebody with autism. Hopefully you went through the train to try to deal with that because it’s super difficult. It’s not a mental illness, so you don’t bankrupt them. You don’t take them to a crisis center. It’s a different protocol. And one of the techniques that we learned was, especially with children, and let’s say that the child’s name was Gary. I’m going to use yours as an example.

[31:19] The child’s acting out, having an episode. Gary, 10, 9, 8. Gary, how are you feeling? And the kids are taught that way to de-escalate. So when you start counting backwards, they start counting. It doesn’t always work, but it is one of the techniques where someone with mental illness, they say, and you know the magic words, well I think I want to kill myself, you’re gone we’re taking you right there is no debate anymore but the autistic thing is different, it’s more difficult for cops, interesting yeah to get them to focus on those numbers I can see where that might work that is really interesting you bring your attention back they’re all over the place.

[32:13] Our neighbor last week The son, 37 years old, autistic, went running down the street and took off. Didn’t find him to the next day. 37 years old. So I can only imagine what that family’s gone through for 37 years. Oh yeah. Yeah. That’d be a tough one. So tell me something, Bert, did you ever like drive around the corner and just find yourself in a real jackpot? In a real mess and you’re all by yourself you had to jump out and start doing something, um crashes come to mind yeah because that seems to be the most prevalent you know for a patrol officer uh come around the corner and there’s you know three or four or five cars in a crash and you got people bleeding and all that all over the place and uh funny story about that when you know,

[33:11] the enormity of a scene, right. That can overwhelm a young officer. So I was a field training officer on midnights in our Midwest district. And I had George with me. He was on his first month writing assignment out of the academy.

[33:26] And at this big intersection that we have, it was a crash. Two U.S. Marshals were transporting a prisoner northbound on 87th Avenue. And a guy in his little work pickup truck blew the red light, whatever it was, three o’clock in the morning, and T-boned him. Everybody’s hurt. A lot of fire rescue response. Several engines a couple of rescue trucks so we get to the scene and it’s everywhere this this is a huge intersection and we got fire lights everywhere we got six police cars there and i tell the officer who got the call um we’re going to handle it for training because i was teaching George. So I go, George, get your clipboard. We’re taking this. And he literally looked at the scene and did this.

[34:30] He froze for a second, right? Oh, it’s overwhelming. I know it’s overwhelming. Exactly. One month, you know, it was first month on the road. So we got it. We started handling it, got all the information from all the parties involved and rescues doing their thing and transporting. And now we’re finally sitting in the car and we’re starting to report. And I said, you seem a little overwhelmed. He goes, I was in shock looking at all of this, right? And I said, okay, let’s break it down to its most basic component. What do you have? And he had to think about it for a second, and then I had to lead him. I said, George, you got one car going northbound. You got one car going westbound that blew the light, T-Bone. I want you to remove all the fire rescue trucks and all the police cars. All you have is a T-bone accident. That’s it. We have injuries. Yes. But that’s all it is. It’s only two cars. And he looked at me and it’s like I gave him a secret to the Holy Grail or something. Yeah. So. Yeah.

[35:36] Breathe, take a look at what you have and calmly start to assess, right? So to your point, you come around the corner and you see something. And then after a while, like I said, I like the chaos and the craziness, but after a while you come across and you see all this happening and you just go into that mode and you know what to do, right? When we’re young, not so much, But as time goes on, you just get better and better and better at it, no matter the enormity of the thing.

[36:12] Fortunately, one day, I was driving down one of our streets, and one of our officers that worked the Midwest District, which is around Miami International Airport, he came on the radio in a panic, and he said, a jetliner just went down. Oh, wow. It was fine air. It was a cargo plane. It took off and they didn’t secure the cargo. And as it was going up this, the cargo came loose and went toward the tail and put that plane down. It was a 757, which is a large jetliner. I’m into aviation. So when he said that, I could feel in my heart, It kind of stopped for a second because at first we didn’t know it was a cargo and not a passenger.

[37:10] And I talked to him later on about that. And he said he was so scared shitless because he witnessed it. Right. And you don’t ever want to witness something like that.

[37:24] Uh the the two crew or three crew that were on board were killed and one guy on the ground that just picked up his wendy’s lunch and was parked in his car near a business got killed, it just happened to be parked there yeah and you know i think back to that and i go wow it just to this day you know thinking what that officer saw or anybody else that saw it.

[37:53] Um and i’m glad i never had to witness something like that really you come around the corner you got bad guys running and it’s like okay what do i do all right i’m not going to run after them, i’m going to set up a perimeter and then get everybody in there because you know as well as i do the foot chase can end up in something real bad oh yeah you can get hurt in the foot chase Mainly you bust your, blow your knees out, things like that. But you can also get behind those houses and, and you can really get hurt bad. Yeah. And, and you don’t know where the bad guy’s waiting for you, you know, an ambush or there’s more than one bad guy. Yeah. You know, so I’m glad to say, you know, it experiences the best teacher. And as we go along in our careers and then you, you get to see things and assess it immediately. Right. This is what I got. This is what I have to do. I need help. I can’t do this alone. And you just kind of go into that automatic mode and start calling out stuff. You know, I need a box set up. I need a unit on this corner. I need a unit on this corner. I need aviation. I need canine.

[39:04] When I was an officer, start a supervisor. When I was a sergeant, I hear that. Time for me to go. Right? My officers are handling it. Time for me to go to the scene. Yeah. So it’s just. While it’s crazy, it’s serious, it’s dangerous, to me, it was fun. I had a blast. I really did.

[39:26] What about domestic violence calls? Those can be awfully dangerous. So I have a chapter in the book on domestic violence.

[39:38] You probably would agree that early on, especially in the early 80s, domestic violence calls were handled more like a personal matter, like between his houses, right?

[39:51] And we weren’t properly trained to handle them. Depending how serious the injury was, we make an arrest or not make an arrest. Usually the husband into leaving for the night, you know, it’s always a husband, ain’t it? Right. So in the wake of the OJ Simpson event, I think it’s either, I think it’s Netflix or prime or the other. There’s a new four-part documentary on the entire OJ case with behind-the-scenes stuff that we didn’t know about before. Oh, really? That’d be interesting. And the infighting in LAPD between Mark Furman and Lange and Van Adder. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. And how the crime scene technician screwed up the scene. I mean, it was a whole bunch of stuff that I highly recommend cops watching it. You’re going to learn a lot of stuff. So in the wake of the OJ disaster, our department with one of the universities did a study on domestic violence calls. Officers would respond to a domestic violence call, remove the felony. If it was a felony battery or something like that, you’re going to jail. There’s no ifs, ands, or buts, you’re going to jail.

[41:10] If it’s a misdemeanor battery on, you know, the husband slapped the wife, the wife slapped the husband, or pushed or shoved or grabbed, you know, something like that. The dispatcher on her console, and I say her because it was almost all female dispatchers at the time. We got a lot of male dispatchers now.

[41:30] You would tell her that the call is eligible for the study. She’d hit a button on her console, and we called it the roulette wheel. It would come up A or come up B, you know, like come on red, right? When you, when you throw the ball, if it’s an A, we make the arrest. If it’s a B, we don’t make the arrest. And the idea was when all the stats were compiled after six months, when we made the arrest, did it reduce the recidivism rate on those calls for us going back to that same household? Either reduce it or eliminate it completely. Or when we didn’t make the arrest, did we have to go back to the house? And after a six-month study, it showed absolutely if we made the arrest, it almost eradicated domestic violence in that particular household or reduced it greatly because we didn’t want, as you know.

[42:33] Women die the most by abusive spouses in this country. We made a lot of arrests and after the study was over we didn’t take any chances she’s got a red mark on her or something you’re going to jail okay you know if you can you can assess, that they’re telling the truth yeah the guy’s full of shit or she’s full of shit or whatever the case is but because of that study and the amount of domestic violence in a very busy county like Miami-Dade.

[43:06] We developed our, or formed our own domestic violence bureau detectives that just handle only that because it was so, you know, prevalent. So the, and, and you know that that is besides the traffic stop, the most dangerous thing cops do, the domestic violence calls, the most dangerous call cops go to. And I’ve been a lot of fights in domestics, um, where, uh, You’re going to go arrest the husband or the boyfriend or whatever it is. Yeah. Now she is, oh, don’t arrest him. And she jumps on you or the family attacks you. Right. And now everybody’s going to jail. Yeah. You’re asking for emergency backup. The world is coming. You’re just throwing bodies around and getting in a fight. I mean, yes, it’s crazy. And to a civilian, when they hear you and I and the other cops talk about those things, they go, oh, my God. You know, to me, it was great. I had a blast. No, you know, so, but domestic violence is that one call. And I chapter on that by itself. And I talk about.

[44:20] The walking up to the front door of a house, which is no man’s land for a cop. How many guys have gotten shot just walking up to the house? Because that asshole bad guy is waiting back there with a shotgun or a rifle or a handgun, and he’s not going to let you get to the front. And I’m sure, you know, you watch TV. And Gary, I would love to be a technical advisor on a police drama. Yeah, they kill me. They kill me. I know. They kill me. Why are you standing in front of the door, knocking on the door? I mean, you don’t do that. Yeah. You know, you just don’t do that. And especially when I was training rookies, right, this is the way we’re going to walk up. If it’s a hot call, we’re parked about two houses down. If it’s a single family house, not an apartment complex. and then we walk to the house, keeping an eye on things and trying to stay away from that funnel, the fatal funnel of the front door. And how many times if you were training young guys yourself, you’ve had to grab them and go, get over here, you know, like a puppy. So.

[45:36] The domestic, yes. Is it fun to handle? Well, it depends on your definition of fun, but I found it at times you know, and then walking into the house, separating the warring factions, as I call it. And the thing I learned from some senior officers when I was a rookie, when you walk in, scan everything and see if there’s any potential weapons laying around, kitchen knife, a pair of scissors, a screwdriver, you know, and if someone is going to go sit on a couch, get them off the couch. Yeah. Yeah. They’d be hiding a firearm, you know, so. The shit you and I didn’t know when we came out and we’re learning and everything, right? And we got our heads up our asses like every rookie does. And then later on you learn it. And then you can just, you can scan and see exactly what the threat environment is like.

[46:29] Make the arrest, not make the arrest. You know, on the hot calls when I was a sergeant, uh, that 22 of my 37 years was as a sergeant. So I did a lot of teaching, a lot of training.

[46:41] And I would go to the hot calls with my officers because it was my obligation to go with them. And especially when I had young squads to teach them and go in there and just keep an eye on things. You guys are going to handle this, but I am here. Don’t think of me as just your sergeant. Think of me as your backup. If the shit goes crazy, right? This, you know, you asked about any stories. So this leads me to this.

[47:10] July 20th, 1998 at 1045 p.m. at 2288 Northwest 46th Street in our Northside District. Northside District, for our department, everybody around the country might remember the 1980 riots. Northside District for us is where part of those riots took place. Overtown was in the city of Miami, and that was the other part of the riots. It’s late. Two of my rookies are handling a domestic call, domestic violence call. I don’t hear from them for a little while. So I go by the scene and it’s a duplex with a wall between the duplexes, a wall in the front with a gate. I get there and I’m listening to my two rookies debate with the subject boyfriend who apparently struck his pregnant girlfriend. So if you’re pregnant and you get hit, it’s an automatic felony, right? Somebody’s going to jail tonight. Yeah, in Florida, it’s an automatic felony.

[48:07] So I’m watching this and I, and then I say to the guys, what are you doing? Right. The subject’s sitting on the front stoop. I go, stop. You open this gate. He gets up and he walks inside the temp, the, the, the apartment, right. The duplex. I said, okay. So the gate’s locked, but I’m looking at the duplex next to it. It has no gate and it’s got a three foot wall between them. And I don’t guys, what are you? Doing? Come here. Follow me. We go to the next one. We jump over the little wall and now we’re at the front door. Okay. These guys couldn’t figure that out, but you know, they’re, they’re young. The subject battered his pregnant girlfriend. All right. He’s going to jail today. I said, come on out. And he says, I’m not coming out. I’m going to shoot the baby. You got a 20 month old son in there. No. Soon as I heard that I go move. And I start kicking in the door. It took about three shots. I kicked in the door. He picked up his 20 month old son and had him in a bear hug like this. And he was squeeze, trying to squeeze into death, literally squeeze the life out of him. So he had, he was like this and I jumped on top of him and pushed him on his back. My two rookies were with me. We got on top of him. We could not get him to let go of the baby. Gary, I am pounding this guy.

[49:36] I did boxing and martial arts, and I’m hitting him with everything I got, the right way of hitting somebody. He wouldn’t let go. I thought about shooting him in the head, but I was afraid that the round would come out and hit the baby. I put my hand between his head and the baby’s head. The baby’s head was right here with him.

[49:56] And I tried to squeeze it in so I can grab him and pull away while my thumb was exposed. Next thing I know, he’s biting down on my thumb. Oh, this is 1998. I still have the scar. It’s down to the bone and I’m yelling or he’s biting my thumb. So I’m pounding him in the side of the head as hard as I can. He won’t let go. So I remembered a pressure point right under the nose. So I reached under and I yanked as hard as I could. And he opened his mouth, right? Got my thumb out. So now I grabbed him. The guys were able to pull the, uh, his arms apart to get the baby away. We beat the dog shit out of this guy. That’s what I’m thinking. Right. So then my guys got him in custody. We’re going to go put him in the car. I come walking out and I asked the girlfriend, does he have any diseases? And she said he has AIDS. Oh, good. Oh, boy. I remember when that AIDS first started, that was a huge deal, man. Every once in a while, somebody gets stuck with a needle or somebody gets spit on or they get bit. Yeah, that was huge. A little bit of time. So I got on a radio. I requested fire rescue. The dispatcher asked me, who’s it for? I go, it’s for me. The subject bit me.

[51:14] My lieutenant heard that, and he goes, haul an ass out of the station. Rescue arrives, and it’s a truck company. And they send one of my rookies to the store for a bottle of Clorox.

[51:25] I’m not paying any attention to it, right? So he gets back, and you know how the fire trucks have that five-gallon water jug on the side of them for the firefighters? Yeah. Well, they didn’t let me see it. They took one of the Dixie cups. They put half water, half Clorox in it, and they go, Sarge, come here. Oh God Three firefighters Grabbed my hand and put it in a Dixie cup Oh God When the Clorox hit the wound Of course I started to pull out And the three of them were holding They go.

[51:59] Fight it, take it Because we’re trying to kill any chance Of the AIDS virus being transferred I gotta go to the hospital now I had to take one of those horse pills That kind of covers all the communicable diseases Yeah And the next day, they sent me to a satellite center for the hospital to meet Dr. Ross. And when I walked in there, he was on the phone with this disease specialist out of Coral Gables near the University of Miami. And I heard him say, yeah, the best time to be on the drugs is before it happens. And I went, what the fuck is he talking about? I was sent to the specialist, and he put me on the AIDS cocktail, AZT, Epivir, and Crixivan, to try to stop it before it did anything to me. Now, this is not the end of the story. You would think, I’m taking the medication, and I’ll be fine. Well, this is the first time this has ever happened to a Metro-Dade cop, right, or a Miami-Dade cop. Risk management for the county did not want me to see the specialist and didn’t want to pay for the drugs.

[53:10] Which costs $3,020 for the month. You would think this is a workman’s comp thing, but since it’s never happened before, they didn’t want to do it. So now I’m fighting with risk management. I’m on the phone yelling with these people over there. They wanted to have me written up for insubordination. And I’m telling them, you can go fuck yourselves. You have no idea what I’m going through right now. The drugs themselves were so potent. I lost a week from work. I could not leave the house and I had to keep running the bathroom every 30 minutes. Right. It was that bad. So since the county didn’t want to pay for it, it was time to play hardball. So my lieutenant sent faxes to all the local TV stations saying one of our sergeants rescued a 20-month-old that the father was trying to kill and he bit the sergeant and he’s got AIDS and the county doesn’t want to pay for it. And then my wife at the time did two television interviews till finally the county capitulated and they paid for the medication.

[54:05] After that, the proper policy was written for anybody that had this happen to them after me. Some months later, one of my officers got hit with a knife. This guy was trying to kill himself, and Sharky went after him. And when he went to grab the knife, the guy pulled back, and it hit Sharky in the hand. This guy was scraping the knife across his belly. It was a domestic, male-in-male domestic. And the guy broke up with him and he’s losing his mind and now he wants to commit suicide and Sharky got cut. The guy had AIDS. Now Sharky’s got to go through the same protocol that I did. So me being the asshole that I am.

[54:46] I called the director of risk management. She answered the phone. I got lucky. And I said, this is Sergeant Norberto Gonzalez. Norberto’s my formal mate. I said, do you remember my case where I got bitten by the guy with AIDS and you guys didn’t want to pay for it and everything? And finally you did. Well, Officer Benavides is one of my officers. And now he just got exposed to AIDS with a knife cut. I said, I hope that we’re not going to have to go through the same thing that you did to me. And then she said, no, no, no, no. He’s going to be covered. She turned around when we hung up and called my director and said, who the fuck does this sergeant think he is? Oh yeah. Oh yeah.

[55:29] The director called my major at the district. Oh yeah. It starts rolling downhill. Yeah. But he was, he was really cool about it. He goes, just tell Bert to back off. Calm down, Bert. It’s going to be okay. Calm down. But this guy that bit me, we got a warrant that night to draw his blood in the jail and have it analyzed. Yeah. You know what the infectious disease doctor told me? He said, this guy was so polluted with AIDS that had he hit you with a syringe of his blood, you’d have been in big trouble. Right. Now, for two years, I had to get checked every six months. When we went to the hearing for him, now, he was already a multi-time loser, 48 years old, alcoholic. That’s why he didn’t feel any of the punches. When we went to court for his sentencing, the jail doctor had to give a medical report on the guy. He suffered a brain aneurysm while he was in jail. The neurosurgeons at Jackson Memorial Hospital, the county hospital, and the Rattler Trauma Center, saved this guy’s life. The judge asked the doctor, how much does that surgery cost? It goes about $110,000. And the judge said, this guy’s got better healthcare than I do.

[56:44] So he got, he’s dead now. He died in prison. The county was paying for his AIDS medication when he got out of jail. And here I am, the officer’s son, and they didn’t want to pay for mind.

[57:00] Bureaucracy at its finest. Yes. Exactly. Bureaucracy at its finest. All right. Burt Gonzalez. Burt, this has been great,

[57:10] but we got a few things to talk about and you’re going to start a podcast. So tell me about that before we hang up here. I came up with the idea, of course, after the book to help promote the book, but also to be able to talk about those things that affect this all as cops. So my podcast, which is going to launch in about a month, and my son, Burt Jr. is the engineer.

[57:34] So he’ll be doing all the stuff that you do yourself that I don’t want to learn about. I do it all myself. Yeah, he’s going to do all that for me. So the podcast is going to be called Sergeant Maverick, the podcast, all things police work, politics, and life. I developed a guest questionnaire that I’ll email to my potential guests to give me more background information on them so that I can formulate questions. And then we’ll do the podcast, ask them questions, but talk about their careers, how, you know, for all of us, what was your decision to become a cop? You know, what was your background before that? Do you have a family? Where have you worked? And then we’ll transition, maybe, depending on the way the podcast is going, into the political topics of the day.

[58:20] I love presidential politics. I’m a political animal, so I’m into it a lot. So we may talk about the things that are happening that week, you know, or the president, the Congress, you know, what’s going on around the world. Some of the insanity that we see on a nightly basis. And then the life part of that, I’ll get into topics that affect all of us, not just cops, but that affect us all as citizens. And I think one of the first things I’m going to talk about is customer service and how piss poor it is, you know, that we all have to deal with almost on a daily basis when you go to the store. Or how about when you need to call one of your credit card companies or a cable company and all that nonsense, right? But it’s not just going to be cop-centric. Yeah, okay. I’m going to have firefighter friends on to talk about their profession, the similarities and differences between the two of us. And also, I’m going to get into financial and tax issues. So we all invest.

[59:31] Well, how do you invest? How do you know about money? How do you learn about money? So my financial advisor at Wells Fargo will be coming on and we’ll be doing a segment with him to talk about your pension and your deferred compensation and other funds that you have going into retirement. You know, how do you invest those things? Because we really don’t know how to do that. Unless you’re trained in money, you don’t know how. And then the other side of that coin, I’ll have my accountant Tom on.

[59:58] To talk about the tax implications for all that money that you now have set aside in an IRA or other funds so you don’t get yourself into tax troll. Officers and firefighters will have these funds and then they’ll take them out and they won’t pay the taxes on them. When they deferred all these years, right? Tax deferred and now you get yourself into a big tax jackpot. So I want to cover issues like that, as well as I’ll be doing family segments.

[1:00:29] So the first family segment will be my wife, Rosie. I’m back to the book. Of course, I talk about cops and relationships. And one of the sub chapters in there is called marriage, divorce, marriage again and again. So I’ve been married three times. Me too. My wife’s been married three times, you know, third time’s the charm, right? So then I’m going to bring her on first family segment completely expose myself and say go for it you know we’ve been together 21 years, and you know you want to call me an asshole call me an asshole I mean I’m not a box of candy to live with all the time like most of us.

[1:01:10] And then children’s segments I’ll have all my kids on what’s it like having a parent as a cop you know and let them go for it and go at it my nieces is Megan and Alina, my brother, both parents were cops. In the back of the book, the last chapter is war stories from a bunch of my colleagues. And the reason I included war stories by other cops, my colleagues, my brother, my niece, my son, and a whole bunch of others, you know, the thing, big, big things that happened to them or funny, crazy things that happen to them is that throughout the book, I have my war stories, depending on what the chapter is, right? The topic in the chapter, I wanted to add legitimacy to my stories by telling other cops stories because the crux of the book is that I’m writing not about me,

[1:02:06] but about us cops everywhere because we’re all the same. I ended with one last war story of mine. My wife told me, you need to put this one story in there because it was such a big factor in my career. January 7th, 1987, my son’s godfather, Gary, and I were heading back to the barn for the end of the shift. It was 9.30 p.m. A call goes out, man at the door with a gun.

[1:02:36] And Gary and I were going to be passing the new crew coming out of the station, uh, heading to the call. And we were close by. So we said, all right, let’s go. You know, that sixth sense that we have, right? I call it Spidey sense, like Spider-Man, you know, it’s tingling back here. I pull up a little way from the house, not in front of the house. Gary goes straight down. He’s the passenger. He goes out that way. And I worked my way around the house, the front of the house and to the back. And as I start working my way to the back, I’m looking into windows and I get to this big picture window in the back of the house.

[1:03:17] I look in. There’s a guy standing at the front door looking out the peephole, with a 30 caliber carbine in his hand. And there’s a 12 gauge on the couch. Asshole bad guy with gun. This is not good. I work my way. I get on the radio. Of course, I advise. got bad guys with guns inside the house send the world i get to the sliding glass door for the kitchen and as i come up like this the 18 year old of the three subjects meets me right at the sliding glass door he’s holding a semi-auto in his hand at that time i have a revolver we hadn’t transitioned to semi-autos yet that was this was 87 and we didn’t transition till 89 so i got a six-shot Ruger, whole 18 rounds on me. We meet eye-to-eye, and Gary literally, he goes, and I went, oh shit, right? Yeah.

[1:04:12] He runs inside and there’s a big pit like they use for a smoking mead or something like that. Concrete about a foot and a half tall. It’s the only cover I got. I get behind it. I’m pointing at the sliding glass door and I tell the dispatcher so the world knows what we got in there. I said, now we got two asshole bad guys in there with guns. A third guy, the 32-year-old in the suit, the 56-year-old was the guy at the front door. The 32-year-old in a blue suit comes out, and he’s at the glass door, and he’s going, everything’s okay, everything’s okay. And I’m yelling at him. I got my gun pointed at him. The family comes out behind him. They’re in their pajamas. Oh, man. Husband, the father, the kids, and grandma. It was a home invasion. So I’m yelling at him to open the door. It’s okay, it’s okay. One of the family members reaches underneath, unlocks the door, slides the door open, and pushes him out to me. So I jump up, I grab him, I put my gun to his head, I grab him around the throat, and I’m dragging him to the side of the house, and I yell at the family, go this way. Gary was waiting for him at the corner of the house. So we rescued the family. I drag his ass to the side, we handcuff him, the world is arriving, they put him in a car, I take cover again. The other two guys are not coming out. So we called for our special response team, SRT, right?

[1:05:42] And one of the guys who would become a very close friend later on was on that team. They negotiated for about two hours, and Frank told me later on, yeah, we told them basically, you come out or we’re going to come in here and kill you. We found the cut zip ties that they used to tie up the family in the kitchen, a little bit of cocaine, another pistol, a couple things, along with the shotgun. As it turned out, they hit the wrong house. The house, the doper house they were looking for was the next one over with all the cameras. Now we go to court. We have the bond hearing. Each guy has his own attorney. So the state attorney has me tell the judge what happened. And I give him the same story I just gave you. This guy did this. He had the gun at the front door. This guy had the gun at the glass door. This guy seemed to be the head guy calling the shots that we pulled out and we rescued the family. The judge holds him without bond. The background investigation the state attorney’s office did, the 56-year-old with the carbine, He was part of a truck hijacking gang that when the troopers stopped the truck after it was hijacked, his job was to drive by and kill the trooper out on the highway. Said, okay.

[1:06:55] Not a nice guy. The 32-year-old in the blue suit escaped from our jail. Don’t ask me how that happened. Right? Okay? How do you escape?

[1:07:07] Somebody- Good one. I never heard of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. There was a corrections officer that was paid off. I have no doubt. So this guy fled to Costa Rica. And this took a few months. And the Costa Rican police found him. He was sent back with his arm in a cast like this. a cast down to here and a cast over one of the legs. Well, when the pull the Costa Rican police found him as a fugitive and coast there, it was a five story apartment building. He was on the fifth floor. I don’t know how it happened, Gary, but he flew out that window five stories down. He was trying to escape again. I guess, I guess. Yeah. We’ll have to go with that. Yeah. And then he was extradited back here and they all went to prison for, you know, 25 years or whatever the case was. But the reason I said that that and my wife said it should be in the book was a very important case is because had Gary and I walked to that front door straight to that front door yeah yeah exactly yeah you just don’t know those home invasion crews that are drug ripoff artists those guys those are the worst most dangerous criminals out there and you just stumbled into it that’s a man. Dumb luck again, right? Just dumb luck. During the cocaine cowboy times, we had guys impersonating cops doing these home riffs. It was a bad time.

[1:08:36] Then, I’m sure you’ve probably heard of the Miami River cops. Yes, I have. At that time, where it was real cops killing bad guys. Those guys jump in the river and took their cocaine and they couldn’t swim. I know I shouldn’t laugh about this, but there or something funny about it.

[1:08:53] Well, you know, I’ve done a couple of television interviews and the host of one, the Channel 4 here in Miami, near the end of the interview, he wanted to talk about corruption. You know, okay, I was ready for it, but I didn’t want to talk about corruption. I want to talk about my book, right? And our experiences. But he wanted to talk about corruption. Okay. And I said, yes, we had corruption. the temptation was so strong for some guys it was cash everywhere yeah like i can imagine what i told you about with the bag right yeah and i said it happens but then that’s why we have internal affairs yeah and they investigate these guys and we don’t want them either they get rid of them, i play tennis with this lieutenant.

[1:09:37] Quite a few times. He ended up getting popped by the DEA because someone ratted him out. He was helping drug dealers transport and guarding stuff. And of course I didn’t know it, but I know full well that the DEA looked into me because they were probably following him to the teleport. Oh yeah. He played. Yeah. And then they’re catching, they’re catching the number on my patrol car. Yeah. And then investigated to me to see what my finances were like to see if I was in cahoots with them. And then when he was arrested, it was like, we were all shocked. You know, the nice guy, I never knew that type of thing. But, you know, when you have that kind of money floating around, there’s going to be some bad cops. Yeah. Oh, yeah. We need to get rid of them. We don’t want to read. If you don’t have that big money around, there’s going to always going to be some bad cops. It’s just, that’s part of it. You know, that’s part of it. As I used to say, you know, if you didn’t have a little corruption, it wouldn’t be a big city. You know, all big cities got a little corruption. Come on some more than others some more than others yes some more than others we had our share then i was never i i was never brave enough to do anything like that i was like oh no.

[1:10:48] One of our guys uh was going through a a protocol and he went to the uh staff psychologist or psych services and he was asked you know would you stop a guy and the guy says you know don’t arrest me with the cocaine in the back seat or whatever you know and he offered you money, and he goes you know would you would you ever consider taking it and the officer’s response was well i’ll tell the guy you got 10 million dollars in your pocket right now right being sarcastic of of course, that it would take, you know, and he wasn’t serious, but no one’s going to carry $10 million with them because you’re going to lose your job. At least the 10 million, you can flee, right? At least.

[1:11:38] All right. Well, Bert Gonzalez, guys, there’s that story and many more in the real greatest show on earth. And also he’s got the podcast. What’s the name of your podcast i don’t think you said the uh the title of it sergeant maverick the podcast okay sergeant maverick the podcast and and i’ll put this show up about the time your podcast starts so be sure and send me a link to uh early show and let me know that it’s up and then i’ll work you in right after that all right absolutely absolutely i appreciate it i appreciate your time today bird it’s it’s been a pleasure talking to you as a brother and in many ways as as you know and we have a lot of similar experiences. I can tell you that right now. Like I said, like I wrote in the book, we’re all the same. All these things happen to us. We’re all the same. Okay. Thanks a lot for coming on the show, Bert. Thank you, Gary. I appreciate it.

[1:12:33] Hey guys, that’s, uh, that’s why my brothers, I’ll tell you what, those stories, I got a ton of them like that myself. I don’t know. I’m, I’m working on a book guys, a memoir. It’s hard. It’s really hard to write about myself.

[1:12:46] And I like to remain humble at least to as much as I can. I don’t know. It’s hard to do. Uh, you know, we all got ego. So it’s, uh, and, and, you know, and I don’t want to put it out there. If I look like, you know, I’m not just a regular guy and humble, but I have had some fun experiences that I think people would be interested in and, and some, I want to make some points out of my memoir and I’m sure a bird has done that with his. So I’m going to be working on that over the next year. Uh, don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. So if you’re out there in your big SUV, as I’m saying now, or your big F one 50, watch out for motorcycles or your little Volkswagen bug. If you have a bug and I don’t know if you’ve had bugs anymore or your little car, uh your little miata you know watch out for motorcycles out there because it’s uh you know there’s no protection on the motorcycle you get hit by a car and you’re going to be injured there’s just no doubt about it and you’re probably going to be killed if you’re out on the interstate some way uh if you got a problem with ptsd or drugs or alcohol go to the va and get their uh website get their uh hotline number and if you’ve been the service you’ve not been the service and you got a problem with drugs or alcohol, why be sure and look up our friend Angelo Reggiano, former Gambino prospect, son of a Gambino soldier. He’s down there in Florida running there working at a drug and alcohol treatment center, I understand.

[1:14:13] I hope he’s still doing it. If he is, let me know. If anybody has experience with him, why let me know. I’m curious about it. It’s like Burke talked about. He’s got some going to have public service announcements at the end of his podcast. I feel like we should all be giving back. I’ve been blessed with a, you know, a good job and a lot of opportunities over the years and have a lot of fun with this podcast. And so I give back as much as I can. I’ve got things for sale. I got my own books. Just, uh, I’ll put a link to my author page on Amazon and go check my books out. If you do, especially that New York book, give me a, give me a review. I’ve only got one review. I got a bunch of reviews on my Chicago book, but if you’ve got my New York book if you’re a verified purchaser, which looks a lot better, give me a review on that. I really appreciate all you guys out there. Subscribe and like and watch my YouTube channel if you’re not on the audio podcast and share it with your friends. Helps. Everything a little bit you do helps the podcast and I’ll keep putting stuff out as long as I can. I’m getting old. Sometimes I think I should cut back. I just had a discussion with somebody about that the other day, and it’s hard to do. I need a mission in life. I need something to do, so I’m going to keep doing this for a while. Thanks a lot, guys.

In this explosive episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins dives deep into one of the most complex and mysterious figures of the Cold War era—Ricardo “Monkey” Morales, a Cuban exile whose life intersected with the CIA, the anti-Castro underground, Las Vegas mobsters, and even the JFK assassination.
Gary welcomes Rick Morales Jr., son of Monkey Morales, and author Sean Oliver, co-writer of the new book Monkey Morales: The True Story of a Mythic Cuban Exile Assassin, CIA Operative, FBI Informant, Smuggler, and Dad. Together, they unravel the incredible life of a man who was at once a patriot, a spy, and a killer.
Rick recounts growing up in Miami’s Little Havana, where his father’s shadow loomed large—rumored to have ties to the JFK assassination and known for his secret missions across the world. From escaping Cuba as a disillusioned Castro loyalist to training as part of the CIA’s Operation 40 assassination unit, Monkey Morales lived a life that reads like a spy thriller.
Sean Oliver walks listeners through Monkey’s covert missions in Africa’s Congo, his deep ties to other operatives like Frank Sturgis and Barry Seal, and the secret wars that connected Cuban exiles, the CIA, and organized crime. The conversation also explores how Monkey became entangled with Lefty Rosenthal, the Chicago Outfit’s Las Vegas gambling mastermind, and how his bomb-making skills were used in mob turf wars across Florida.
The discussion culminates with Morales Jr.’s chilling memory of his father confessing he was in Dallas on the day President Kennedy was shot—and that he had seen Lee Harvey Oswald in a CIA training camp. Whether you believe Morales was a hero, a villain, or both, his story weaves through some of the darkest and most intriguing chapters of 20th-century American history.
📘 Get the book: Monkey Morales: The True Story of a Mythic Cuban Exile Assassin, CIA Operative, FBI Informant, Smuggler, and Dad
🎙️ Highlights include:
• How Monkey Morales went from a Cuban intelligence officer to a CIA-trained operative
• The secretive Operation 40 and its links to the Bay of Pigs, the Congo, Watergate, and Dallas
• Morales’s work for the FBI and the CIA—and his dangerous double life in Miami
• His connection to mob figure Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal and the Outfit’s Florida operations
• A firsthand account from Morales Jr. about his father’s claim to have seen Oswald in CIA training
• The moral code of Miami’s Cuban bombers—and how it vanished when Colombian cartels arrived

Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.

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Transcript
Speaker: [00:00:00] All right, well, hey, all you wire tappers out there. It’s good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. Uh. Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence unit detective turned podcaster now, and I have another story and we’re gonna talk a little bit about the JFK murder and a connection to it, and a little bit about Lefty Rosenthal.
Speaker: And you guys know that I know a lot about ref lefty Rosenthal because he was calling back to Kansas City every once in a while to our mob guys and, and so, so I’m really anxious to talk about this story, but first, let me introduce my guest today and I’m really excited to have these guys on here.
Speaker: I have Rick Morales, Rick Morales, Jr, actually, and Sean Oliver. Welcome guys. Well, thanks Gary. Love the show. So, uh, you know, I, I looked at the two chapters you sent me and, and learned about the book and, and a little bit about your lives and especially yours, Rick, and it’s, it’s just fascinating as hell.
Speaker: Rick and I were talking a little bit before you [00:01:00] came on here. We, I didn’t tape it or anything, Sean, and about I had, you know, I was a policeman and I had kids growing up and, and Rick, his dad wasn’t a policeman, but his dad was, was in that. Kind of a violent, kind of a uh, occupation, if you will, about bringing that edge of violence home to your family.
Speaker: And there’s no way to, you don’t, you know, you know, let it loose on them, but you’ve been in some violent circumstance. All day long, or Rick’s case, maybe his dad’s case, maybe for the last several weeks. And then he comes home and, and so it’s, it’s just an interesting, uh, family dynamic I always think. But, let’s start with you, Sean.
Speaker: Tell us a little bit about where you came from. I know you’re an author and you’ve been into wrestling.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Um, I’m from a planet called New Jersey. No, no. Strange. I think you’ve covered a lot of my residents in the past. I, neighbor, just a couple of weeks ago ago, I heard you doing Bobby Manna, who was very much a, a local of mine.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And my neighbor, Chuck Webner, who you may or may not know, not a mobster, [00:02:00] but I was a, I was a film and television actor for a long time. I, um, I directed television commercials. I, I was in entertainment and then I fell into covering professional wrestling. I wasn’t a wrestler myself. I know the physique has you fooled.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so I had a pro wrestling production company, and then through that, kind of fell into that world. And so my first few books when I started writing were covering that world. And then, um, wrote some novels and then, uh, my first foray into true Crime, certainly not reading it, but writing it came when I met a man.
Speaker 2: Beside me known as, uh, Rick Morales Jr. When I found out who his father was. And I went on a hunt for someone alive who could talk to me about Ricardo Monkey Morales. And that’s how I met Rick, I guess six years ago now, Rick. Yeah.
Speaker 3: Six years.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And we began [00:03:00] developing the story initially for television, um, as it’s, uh, really lends itself to an episodic.
Speaker 2: It’s, yeah, it’s so vast to the story, but COVID hit production shut down. We, it was impossible for anyone to produce anything of this scope. So about two years ago, I said to Rick, we had been past our last. Pass was, uh, Rob Reiner, I guess. And I said, Rick, I, let’s do this as a book. You know, I have an inn in the publishing world.
Speaker 2: I have, you know, multiple books out. Let’s tell your dad, we gotta get the story out. So that’s when we started doing this for publication.
Speaker: Interesting, interesting. And it is interesting story. We go from, uh, JFK assassination to Las Vegas, like I said, and, and a whole bunch of stuff down in South America. Rick, you gotta tell us about yourself.
Speaker: You know, Richard Morales. Yeah, Ricardo Mon Monkey Jr. I guess her dad was called Monkey Morales. So tell us a little bit about [00:04:00] your childhood. It had to be a little bit different than a lot of other childhood.
Speaker 3: Yeah,
Speaker: yeah. A little
Speaker 3: bit different than Sean’s, I would say. Yeah. I was, uh, born in Miami. I got older brother, younger brother, and a sister.
Speaker 3: I was born in 63 in Miami the same year. JFK gets second vaccinated. So I was there, but I wasn’t able to. To watch my dad do much ’cause I was only a couple of months old. So grew up in Miami. My dad and my mom left Cuba. My dad was a G two government agent for the Castro government when it took over.
Speaker 3: And then during the two years between 58, 59 or 59 and 60. Disillusioned as much as many were. He was trying to figure out which way the direction of the country was going, and eventually they, uh, tried to kill him. They, they put him on a hit list because his father was a judge for Batista’s regime and [00:05:00] had, his father was a judge in the Batista regime, so they were eliminating anybody that had to do anything with the Batist regime.
Speaker 3: So eventually he escapes through the Brazilian embassy. He spends like 82 days there with a bunch of other people. And, uh, eventually they’re taken out and he moves to Miami where he immediately goes to work for Cuban revolutionary groups. Because he’s, he is got the abilities. He’s a bomb maker. He is a master bomb maker.
Speaker 3: He is a sniper, so he’s been trained in the government and all those things. So he joins Cuban power groups in Miami trying to fight. Against the castor regime and, and the power. And that’s where he starts making his name for himself and then that leads to further jobs with government agencies. CIA what All this time we’re kids.
Speaker 3: We’re not aware in the early ages, like when I’m young, I’m not aware of what my father is [00:06:00] doing, but eventually there comes times when I see news stories on tv, they try to hide it from us, but they can’t. We hear stories from friends. I would go to friend’s house when I was young and they would one day be my friend, and then the next day they weren’t allowed.
Speaker 3: And when I would ask them at school, what happened is, your dad’s Monkey Morales, he was involved in the JF Kennedy assassination. That’s what everybody in Little Havana was saying. And so they weren’t allowed to come to my house anymore for fear of anything happening at my house that they would become, uh.
Speaker 3: Involved and heard or something. So I grew up with that stigma, you know, uh, as a child. Wow.
Speaker: Crazy. Well, like, do you guys, uh, Sean, did you did you get into investigating any of these pro anti-Castro groups down in Southern Miami? They were, it was Southern Florida. They were all kinds of little groups down there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so you’ve got Cuban exiles coming here [00:07:00] landing in the waiting arms of the CIA who are able to train arm, and with the intention of sending them back into Cuba to take care of Castro all the while keeping the US’ name. Off any documents. These, the, the brigade 2, 5, 0 6, uh, who were sent down for what became known as the, the Bay of Pigs failure, um, were, were, were shielded and, and, uh, masks as having been a part of, of any US operation.
Speaker 2: Right. So, uh, I mean, we didn’t even. Provide the air cover for them. That’s a whole other ball of wax. But, so here are these guys well-trained. 1500 Cuban exiles, well-trained demolition experts, snipers, intelligence counterintelligence in one city, in a very concentrated area in one city, all with a [00:08:00] common mission.
Speaker 2: And throughout this book, something that really differentiated. Those, the Cuban exiles and the crime that came with it, bombings, et cetera, was, and it differentiated from like typical Cosa Nostra or, or a lot of the other organized crime was that it was all mission based. This overarching mission for these guys in Miami was the anti-communism, anti-Castro movement.
Speaker 2: Even something like. Ratting, which if you’ve watched Scorsese movies, you know that, you know, that’s the, that’s a death penalty in this community. These guys freely gave information to authorities. Because they could go get that guy and the mission kept moving and you weren’t marked for death. When you gave somebody up, it was seen as one [00:09:00] mission.
Speaker 2: You fed some crumbs to the authorities, who by the way, were well behind the eight ball with trying to to learn the Cuban culture as it descended on South Florida, which was largely Jewish and Irish. Even the police officers, all the reports I have from those years. There’s no Spanish names of any kind until the seventies or right the turn of the sixties.
Speaker 2: So, yeah, it, it was, you had such a concentrated area and, and a, and a law enforcement that was not prepared to deal.
Speaker: Really? Now, Rick, that’s, uh, that’s Little Havana I think we’re talking about now. You grew up in what the, what’s known as Little Havana. That’s correct. Right. So, so your neighbors, I mean, how, how is it, you were all unified, I’d say, by this hatred of Castro and, and wanting to get back to Cuba.
Speaker: Is that did that continue out throughout your whole life? How did that play out in your life?
Speaker 3: Yeah, for the, for the people [00:10:00] that had come over from Puba, it was a singular objective. That’s why there were so many groups running around. The problem was the, the way some of the groups wanted to approach as versus others.
Speaker 3: Uh, you had some groups that wanted to be extremely violent towards any international company that was doing business with Cuba, but they were, they were bombing places. They were wanting to bomb places with people on it, like ships. They were trying to bomb ships that were in the harbors of Cuba and in Miami.
Speaker 3: My father was working with the FBI to make sure that that didn’t happen because then it’s an international problem. It’s no longer the US ’cause you’re allowing Cubans to use US soil to bomb international, uh, companies and, uh, and vessels and whatnot. So he was trying to stop the other factions from doing those things by supplying them with fake bombs.[00:11:00]
Speaker 3: Bombs that didn’t work. If he liked the target, he would allow it to be a bomb that worked. So he would then report back to his police handlers, there’s a bomb here. There’s a bomb there. This one’s good, this one’s bad. You gotta find this one, you gotta take that one out. And all those things were going on while he was playing every every side.
Speaker 3: Oh my God. So, yeah,
Speaker: man. Talk about walking at tight wire. And
Speaker 3: they, and my uncle, who is in the book Hector Corner, a lot, he ended up replacing bombs at businesses. They would always do it at night when there was nobody there in the office. The offices were closed. It was always make sure nobody gets injured.
Speaker 3: The groups that were trying to injure people were the groups that my father was trying to infiltrate and, and give info on and give bad munitions. There’s one time where they’re trying to fire a bazooka at a Polish freighter, and my dad provides them the rounds. But they’re dummy rounds that they’ve painted green because the dummy rounds are blue and they’ve painted them green to look like [00:12:00] good rounds.
Speaker 3: They fire it, it hits the ship, but it doesn’t explode. They can’t figure out why it didn’t explode. Oh, a dud, that’s too bad. Let’s get outta here. So they never sink the freighter and he knew it was a dud. And so he is, you know, if they find out he is the one that’s doing it, he’s, he is a dead man. You know?
Speaker 3: He’s a dead man. It, it, it didn’t matter. He, he got by that so
Speaker: well, maybe he was
Speaker 3: trying to help and fight at the same time, not create a national incident, but still be able to do things against Castro. But he wanted to do it with the backing of the US as opposed to some other Cubans that wanted just to freelance it and do whatever they wanted really.
Speaker: Which kind of, you know, gets us onto into the question of. CIA and training people, training the Bay of Pigs people and, and training other people. And, and your father monkey. And did he become known as Monkey Morales? By this point in time,
Speaker 3: he becomes the Congo and the Congo in Africa. Um, what happens is the CIA creates a team called OP [00:13:00] 40, which is a specialized unit of assassins pilots, bomb makers, fighters, you know, specialized.
Speaker 3: Certain things. And that Op 40 team is then used Inc. Conde Incandescent, and they’re sent to the Congo to fight against the Cubans that Castro has sent to the Congo to fight against the forces there. So they go to the Congo to fight, and there’s a very famous mission that Sean could tell you really better than I can.
Speaker 3: He’s done the, a beautiful telling of the story, but there’s a, there’s a rescue mission that they go on. Fighting against the local and the Cubans that are there to rescue missionaries in the Congo.
Speaker: Alright, yeah, Sean, tell us a little bit about that. Now, let’s, let’s set the scene. Castro sent soldiers over there to bring communism, correct?
Speaker: Correct.
Speaker 2: Yes.
Speaker: Africa, with the support of the Russians. Is that the
Speaker 2: Russians? Yeah, a hundred percent. Yeah. So this at the Belgian Congo, uh, and the United, the
Speaker: United [00:14:00] States, the CIA now has got. Some anti-Castro Cubans put together into this team and sending them against the Cubans over in, uh, who are working for the Russians.
Speaker: I tell you what guys this book is, is, yeah, is you gotta get it. This book has got some stories. Go ahead.
Speaker 2: You could see why there are 675 footnotes at the end of this book, taking up a fair number of pages. So, yeah, so what you’ve got is the, the Belgian Congo, right? You, you’re, we’re trying to, uh, we send an interest, we have an interest in this, obviously ’cause of the spread of communism at the time.
Speaker 2: And, uh, US boots on the ground is a, is a problem anywhere. You know, it needs sufficient justification so. Who can we go to? Well, our friends, the Cubans were tried to use them with Cuba and Castro. So this specialized OP 40 group is sent over to the Belgian Congo. Ricardo’s father, uh, [00:15:00] monkey is one of them.
Speaker 2: And, um. He’s, he’s put there and they discover on their own. They’re not told much about this. The windows are blacked out, takes a couple of days to get over there. They don’t know where they’re going until the wheels hit the ground. And rip Robertson pulls open a map. And, and tells ’em this is where we are.
Speaker 2: These are the areas we need to go to. And, uh, we need to, uh, we need to rescue this city, which, which has been over stanleyville, which, which had been overtaken by the rebels. Simba Rebels, very different enemy, uh, voodoo. I mean, they, they watched some hostages, spoke about being ensconced in a bank, looking out the window and having.
Speaker 2: The, the Congolese army, the good guys, uh, lining the bank, keeping the people safe, who were inside, uh, missionaries politicians, business owners from Europe and the United States, [00:16:00] and a witch doctor is sent down the street by the rebels. Doing some spell and they watched their protectors, the Congolese army drop their weapons and abscond.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And, and they were taken a hostage, obviously, so very different tactics than, than anyone was used to in the training of traditional warfare. So he gets over there and the story about the moniker monkey, it’s usually attributed to him because of the chaos he created. Or every organization for which he worked, which is certainly true, but the name was actually given to him by another Cuban in the Operation 40 Outfit.
Speaker 2: One of the villages they happened upon, everyone had been slaughtered by the rebels and there was this little Congolese girl who was alone and they were kind of just marching through and Morales took her, threw her on his back. Whenever there wasn’t, whenever they weren’t going to encounter fire, [00:17:00] she stayed with them.
Speaker 2: She slept with them, and he was always running around the jungle with a girl on his back. So one of the other soldiers says, Elon. Here comes the monkey running around with a baby on his back. So that’s how silly it really was when he first got that nickname. But then when he comes to, he’s in the US and everything’s going on in Miami, his connections to Lefty Rosenthal, which we’ll touch on.
Speaker 2: The press falls in love with the moniker and they begin to splash monkey everywhere because of the chaotic, whimsical, wild actions of Ricardo Morales. But it was really just because he was running around with a baby on his back.
Speaker 3: Oh wow. Great. Let me add something real quick there. Toria, the OP 40 team that they created was created in 61.
Speaker 3: This is 68. We’re talking about the Congo. This is that OP 40 team that’s run by Sturgis. Which connects to Hunt, which connects to [00:18:00] JFK. So remember that when for later on, when we discuss JFFK guys, that the OP 40 team is created immediately upon the Cubans arriving in Miami 59. They’re in 60 and 61. So by 61 they’ve got this OP 40 team already created.
Speaker 3: Barry Seale was one of the pilots. The original pilots, he was a smuggler in that movie. American made that starred Tom Cruise. So they’re the team and they’re control Sturgis, which works for Hunt, which then you see the connection with the team that gets put together and sent to Dallas. Which we can touch on later on.
Speaker 3: That’s Frank.
Speaker: Frank Sturgis. Right? Frank Sturgis. Correct. He was CI. He didn’t end up in Watergate. Also wasn’t, he wanted the Watergate burger. Correct? All of them are. That’s the whole thing. There’s a seam. Yeah. There’s a seam that runs through this. A, a string that runs through this whole thing. That’s all the way up to Watergate.
Speaker: It’s a That is correct. It’s a half of this. All of that
Speaker 3: comes from Op 40. Yeah. Sturgis [00:19:00] Hunt and that whole team. Created is, is created from OP 40, and that’s how they use all those Cubans in their specialties, snipers and bombers. Remember? Yeah. For the words.
Speaker: Well, now, uh, El Mano, as we would say in Spanish.
Speaker: Yeah, right? If I get that right. Rick El Yeah. You got it right? Yeah. Is how, how’s it getting all this publicity at the time? I mean, is somebody uh, has it got a publicity, an agent out here feeding the, well, actually y.
Speaker 3: A story.
Speaker: Sean,
Speaker 3: go for
Speaker: it
Speaker 3: man. You want, you want me to say it? Which, which story? How he’s getting the news because he is got an uncle who runs that, that works at the Herald and his girlfriend.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he had family in
Speaker 2: in the Herald uncle.
Speaker 3: My uncle, my dad’s sister’s husband is an editor at the Miami Herald at the time, and he is the first editor in Spanish in Miami at the time. And his second wife was a reporter for. Harald also, which [00:20:00] he eventually marries her. So he had connections at the Miami Herald and a lot, knew a lot of Cubans in power.
Speaker 3: So the stories would get out in the news the way he wanted them, the way he wanted to get out into the news. There you go. So there’s always a connection. Yes.
Speaker: Yeah. Which, which gave uh, Sean a lot of fodder to go out and find Yes. Stories. I mean, that’s invaluable, that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2: The, the, the press, the, the old newspapers was definitely invaluable.
Speaker 2: But also it, this is a good time to write a book like this because of, because of the internet. My god, I sound like I’m 95 years old. The internet makes it all easy, but the access to documentation. Yeah, I know. CIA documentation, FBI, white House memos. We were talking earlier about the US trying to keep its fingerprints off anything.
Speaker 2: Clandestine like this, but still take action against Castro or in the Belgian Congo [00:21:00] and the lengths to which after the failure of the Bay of Pigs, the lengths to which they considered doing things to justify putting American boots on the soil in Cuba. I have a memo, a joint Chiefs of staff memo to Kennedy.
Speaker 2: Where they were considering sinking boatloads of incoming Cubans or setting off bombs in areas in Miami, basically killing Cubans that we’ve taken. Yeah. Assigning it to an agent from Cuba to justify going down there. Yeah. Red
Speaker 3: flying operation.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I, I recreate part of that memo in the book there. Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Wow. Crazy. One of the things, Gary, I, I, if, if I may, uh, that we touched on before where Rick was saying the Cubans were great at. Knocking out targets without a body count. Ships, offices, warehouses. [00:22:00] That was one of the things that attracted Lefty Rosenthal to monkey. He was first working with Louis Posada, uh, another OP 40 who was on his way to Venezuela placed there by the CIA to run intelligence.
Speaker 2: In a, a friendly country at the tip of South America, you know, also mi just miles from Cuba. Mm-hmm. So lefty would always say the orders from the outfit, no body count. We need this taken out. We need, when they were trying to, you know, Florida was kind of an open. Flea market for organized crime. You had a genuflect at the bench of Santo, but then you could work Florida.
Speaker 2: So, um, when Lefty was down there to kind of get a stranglehold on the, the bookies for the outfit, Giana, one of the things that Morales, that attracted Morales to him was his ability to get very difficult jobs, done a boat in the water [00:23:00] a house the wall of a gambling parlor, just the wall, nobody else taken out.
Speaker 2: Those were the things that Lefty most respected about, uh, about Morales’s craftsmanship.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Adding to that, a lot of people don’t realize that they think that the drug wars and the Cuban wars and all that in Miami, but if you really look at it and you look at all those bookie wars and where they had a, they were, uh, tracking the bombings.
Speaker 3: They had a, the newspaper had a tracker on, and every day how many bombs have been placed and how many bomb had gone off, there was zero body count. Even Cubans killing Cubans, they didn’t kill anybody else. Like if you were going to kill somebody. There was, let’s say you were putting a bomb in a car and he brought his wife with him.
Speaker 3: The bombing was off. Mm-hmm. Child, children are off limits. Family members were off limits. Nobody, there was no, no, uh, collateral damage to say, so you, they had, it [00:24:00] was, they had this conscience about making sure that they didn’t kill innocent people. And you’ll see it, you can go back and Google. There’s no deaths.
Speaker 3: There’s nobody dead in most of these unless it’s a directed target that you’re trying to kill, which was what happened where it went wrong with the Orlando Let Air bombing. He was a Chilean diplomat working for the Chilean government at the United Nations, and they put a hit on him and the, there was a Cuban hit squad that went after him and his mistress was in the car with him.
Speaker 3: They blew up the car and killed them both. And my dad made a point of saying if I had been involved, that woman would be alive because we never kill women. We honor women. We don’t murder women. So yeah, there was code of ethics, code of conduct, but it still didn’t stop ’em from placing the bombs. But at least they had, uh, the code of ethics, the Cubans did in Miami at that time.
Speaker 3: That’s before, gotta have a [00:25:00] code. Man’s got even with a co code as they say. Yeah, there was a code. There was a code, yeah. Till the Colombians came in. Then when the Colombians came in, everything went out the window.
Speaker: I’ve read, I’ve read that, you know, and that no collateral damage of somebody was talking on some, somebody I was interviewing about, there’s very few bombings in New York City between mobsters like some other cities because New York is so.
Speaker: Congested and there’s so many people around all the time, and they do not like collateral damage. It, it brings down the heat like you can’t believe, right. So you’re talking about, uh, lefty Rosenthal. There’s a story in there I thought was kind of interesting when, uh, when El Mano first met, uh, lefty and then he, he had a friend, a guy named John Clarence Cook, who was a master jewel thief, kind of a, these mob guys, they move into another city and, and then they.
Speaker: They gather all the professional criminals around them. They’re just attract ’em like flies, I think. Yes. Because everybody knows that’s where the connections are to other cities and job big jobs and things like that. [00:26:00] So, can you guys tell us a little bit about that story that, that, uh, lefty and, and, uh, monkey Morales?
Speaker: I’m get started in
Speaker 3: Sean. Yeah. I’ll, I’ll get it started. I know there was, there was a robbery at the Museum of National History, I believe it was. Massachusetts, Boston, New York? No, the one in New York. New York. New York. Oh, sorry. New York. And, uh, they stole a bunch of diamonds and, and whatnot from, uh, from the museum.
Speaker 3: And they got away with it. The guy was nicknamed Murph to surf. Yeah. Who, uh, who did, uh, the theft and then, then my. Then Lefty becomes involved because he wants something
Speaker 2: so, well, John Clarence Cook was good friends with Murph, the Surf, and Alan Kuhn also, who is the other, uh, party responsible for the theft of the, the sapphire of India was the big jewel that was taken in that, in that theft.
Speaker 2: But the, the initial job that Lefty has Morales do is a cleanup of a [00:27:00] job that Louis Posada. Former CIA Operation 40 had blown, there was a newsstand, Alfie’s 24 hour newsstand, which was a haven for gamblers basically. And uh, and next to it was Epicure Food Market. Um, epicure is bombed one night, oddly.
Speaker 2: There’s no Cuban interest in this, so law enforcement that’s been tracking with the help of the Miami Herald’s bombing box score, which did appear in there, we just keep a count of all the bombs in the city. This was weird that and uh, dry cleaning, Jack Rands dry cleaning on Alton Road in Miami Beach.
Speaker 2: But what these two things had in common was. Chappy was a bookie. Mm-hmm. But also next to Epicure Food Mart was Alfie’s, which was a news stand where the bookies hung out. So now you have two. The proximity was, was interesting. Louis had goofed and bombed the wrong place. [00:28:00] So Lefty said, I need Alfie’s hit not epicure.
Speaker 2: So, uh, POS is headed to Venezuela to do his, uh, CIA work down there. So he introduces Morales to lefty. He says, I, there’s a glass partition in the back. I just need the partition taken out with a bomb. No body count. I need a reason for police to respond because they were all, there was already an agreement that once the police got there, they would go to the back and bust the bookie operation for Lefty and Company.
Speaker 2: So that’s the first job. Morales gets it done. And then the second one involves, uh, John Clarence Cook. Cook needs somebody bombed. They, uh, an, an address is provided. He just wants the property bombed front of the house. Lawn Landscaping Morales does it to his dismay. He [00:29:00] sees in the newspaper the following day.
Speaker 2: It was a policeman’s house that also violated a code. For him. And he was, he was pretty angry with Lefty. Um, lefty couldn’t share everything obviously with his, with the operatives he was hiring. So, um, he, Morales was initially told someone was bothering Clarence Cook’s son, but it happened to be a cop. So that, yeah, that, that’s the initial, that’s the initial introduction to John Clarence Cook into this fold, master Jewel Thief.
Speaker 2: And then, um. Eventually lefty hires morales to bomb Clarence Cook’s property, a boat in the, uh, in the, in the bay behind him, as well as a car in the, uh, in the, in the carport also.
Speaker: Yeah, he, and he was, uh, trying to line up the book. He’s kinda like Allah, Chicago. I remember I did a story once, a guy named Joe Ferry, Olin.
Speaker: He said, we need [00:30:00] to line up all these bookies, just like Capone had all the uh, uh, bootleggers lined up and Right, you know, kick up and so lefty. Then I guess he was probably sent down there with that idea to line up all the gambling that he could and kick back up to Chicago. So there was also. Go ahead.
Speaker: Mr. Morales along on one of those jobs, he doesn’t really know what he’s getting into, I don’t think. Right.
Speaker 3: That I, I don’t think my father knew why Rosie, why Rosenthal took ’em with him that day. But I’m pretty sure there a lefty knew that the guy was fencing the jewels from the occasion where they stole those, those diamonds, whatever were left over.
Speaker 3: So at some point. My father pulls out his gun and shoots him in the, and it goes through his eye, I believe. Hyman
Speaker 2: Gordon High. Gordon
Speaker 3: High Gordon was, it’s the fence. He’s the fence. And they shoot High Gordon. And, uh, there, I don’t know if they stole all the, I’m guessing there must have something from him.
Speaker 3: They wouldn’t have. [00:31:00] But we don’t, I don’t know what it was.
Speaker 2: This is also unique, uh, a unique time in his life Gary because. He’s for the first time and only time taking jobs outside of that overarching mission of the Cuban bombers. Yeah. This is organized crime now. It’s a contract job, right? It’s, it’s a, it’s a 10 99 yeah’s.
Speaker 2: It’s not. It’s not for the mission and when it ends. Something we had to talk about, Rick and I was well. Lefty, this is his stop before Las Vegas, as you know, Gary and, and his and his buddy Tony from, from Chicago head to Vegas. Why? Would an operative so effective as morales not have been asked to go, and the likely answer is whether he was asked or not to accompany him.
Speaker 2: He wouldn’t have because it was, [00:32:00] it was not mission-based. It was, it was a money thing and a job thing, and that was not really where he, and, and the, the violent Cuban exiles that, that had that overarching mission in. Mind. They didn’t do stuff like this, so he needed money. He was, he was back in Miami after the Con Belgian Congo.
Speaker 2: So he takes this job, he works for Lefty for the better part of a year, and then left Lefty moves on to Vegas and Morales stays there and works with the bombing roots there until he himself is placed as the one of the commandants in. Venezuelan Security Dsip, D-I-S-I-P, their agency. But you joined some other Cubans down there.
Speaker: Crazy. Yeah. Let’s, uh, let’s, let’s do one more story here. Let’s talk about, he saw Lee Harvey Oswald in a CIA camp. So, uh, yeah, let’s, let’s talk about that a little bit.
Speaker 3: Sure. When, uh, when, when I was about [00:33:00] 18, 19, this is about a year before my father was killed. So he had been in the Witness protection program for a little bit.
Speaker 3: They had put him up in New, in New York, somewhere in the city, in one of the boroughs. And he was unhappy. He didn’t wanna be there, he didn’t wanna live that life hiding and getting a job and whatnot. That wasn’t gonna work for him. So he gave up his witness protection program and he just went back to Miami on his own.
Speaker 3: And, uh, so. He, uh, used to show up. What he would do with us, with us and my brothers and whatnot would be, he would show up out of the blue. He would never call us and tell us I’m coming by or anything.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: We’d be playing basketball or something and take a shot, turn around, there’s the car parked, get in.
Speaker 3: There were a couple of times where we would go. He would take us out to the Everglades to teach us how to shoot, so we’d be out there shooting with him and there was a couple of occasions where we were shooting and stuff and whatnot. This last time that he took us. He, uh, [00:34:00] he was different ’cause he, he was worried that he had no protection.
Speaker 3: He had multiple contracts on him that were valid contracts of people that were trying to kill him in Miami. So I think, and he was also planning a book that he was writing, that was his exit strategy. He was gonna write a book about his life and he had already had been given new identity. He was gonna move to Spain with the royalties from the book and, uh, just disappear and, and go to Spain.
Speaker 3: That was his plan. So he was worried that he would never see us again and he could die. So he was talking about stuff that he had never talked to us about from his past, and he asked us to ask any question we wanted and I wasn’t asking a question ’cause I really wasn’t a fan. I grew up a little bit, miss, you know, oil and vinegar with my dad.
Speaker 3: Uh, but my brother asked if he was involved in the JFK shooting. He asked him straight up, did you kill JFK? And he said, no, I didn’t kill JFK, but [00:35:00] I was in Dallas that day. And we asked him, what were you doing in Dallas? He goes, well, I was sent to be a cleaning team. And that’s what we did. I took him to Dallas, waited for a phone call.
Speaker 3: The phone call we got was go home because obviously. The had been assassinated. So there was nothing for him to do. It was for after action if something had gone wrong, to eliminate people or whatnot. So that was the first thing he told us. And then the second thing he told us was like, we asked him, did, uh, do you think Oswald killed him?
Speaker 3: And he says, there’s no way that guy killed him. Because I saw that guy in a CIA training camp sometime before that assassination, and he couldn’t shoot. He could barely shoot. So he was a barely, you know, when they say a marksman in the Marine, that’s a guy sitting static shooting at a static target at a distance.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I’m a master sniper in the Marines, if you want to say that. [00:36:00] What we’re talking about is training people to shoot at moving targets. Mm-hmm. And at moving targets was what he was training on. He was not good. And my dad has a photo. Memory, you, his people from his pass will tell you he would drive through town and ride alongs with his cop friends and they would write down 40 tags and he would tell you the 40 tags later on.
Speaker 3: So one are they? If he saw you, he remembered you. Yeah. So I believe him when he says he saw him. Now, whether it was a year before, but. And it wasn’t at some camp where there’s thousands of people, it’s just five, six people that he’s helping to train. So he has that memory of seeing him at a camp training to shoot and maybe the CIA was just putting him out there so people would see him so that later on they would say, you know, I saw this guy training or whatever.
Speaker 3: Who knows? ’cause they, but they [00:37:00] were. That’s what he was doing. And he says At the static targets, yeah. Everybody that comes from the Marine Corps can hit a static target pretty good. But moving targets, that’s a different story. And also in real life, your heart’s racing, you know, it’s, it’s a, a sniper knows how to control the environment around them.
Speaker 3: And all the things that come into shooting. Oswald missed the easiest shot, the first shot. ’cause after that. You’re nervous, you’re reloading, you’re moving. The first one, you’re sitting there waiting, and so if you couldn’t hit the first one, which was closest and easiest. The next ones are impossible. So really he didn’t, that’s, and he told us there’s no way he would’ve hit ’em anyway if he was moving.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So
Speaker: now, Sean, did you, there’s been a lot of documents released from this JFK thing even more recently. Even more, and I know you probably spent hours and hours in these documents. What, what, what were you finding? Were you finding any of this in there? [00:38:00]
Speaker 2: The thing that the commonality in many of these documents.
Speaker 2: As of the, as of the publication or when we had to turn it in there were still 15,000 outstanding. I think after the last release there’s still about 5,000 outstanding in what has been declassified and we see what are the commonalities in all of them? Gary Cubans, they appear a ton in the declassified JFK documents, Cubans.
Speaker 2: Brigade 2 5 0 6 CIA, Tran Cubans and the Mob.
Speaker: Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2: And, um, you’ve probably seen read and covered a lot of, a lot of what I saw, like where they were again, white House memos about involving traffic ante Ana in, in, in, um, first in, um, uh, uh, in, in Cuba with [00:39:00] Castro. So there’s a relationship, there’s an off to the side relationship with our government and the mob.
Speaker 2: So their names appear the, the Cubans, it’s. It’s, there’s so much and so much has happened with blogs and vlogs and documentaries. You could just search JFK assassination on Amazon and you’ve got every Cucamonga theory in the world, and they all carry different weight. So it’s a story that continues to invite interpretation.
Speaker 2: Because there’s no real smoking gun, there are no real answers. The best you can do is use a little logic and extrapolate what would’ve been feasible and reasonable at the time. And, um, there’s never gonna be a smoke. You can release every document, Gary. There’s never gonna be anything on paper where a government implicates itself.
Speaker 2: Or someone working with [00:40:00] them.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Let me add something to that. There, there was some new releases on, uh, file, which is, that shows that the CIA, which is a Cuban file that they’ve been holding, the CIA’s been holding and now wanting to release, where it shows that the Ccia a had been monitoring Oswald for a period of time before and had been even going through his mail.
Speaker 3: So the CIA knew who he was. More than they let on, and that just came out. So there is, and there is a, the files that they’re holding onto the most are anything that has to do with the Cubans and that makes you wonder why those are the files that they hold onto the most because, and then the, what did they get rid of?
Speaker 3: You know, the burn bags must have been in, uh, you know, hundreds. Yeah. So, but there’s new files that show more CIA knowledge. Than they ever let on about what they knew about Oswald, how much [00:41:00] they followed Oswald, how much contact they had with Oswald. Were they working Oswald, were they just following him or were they directing him?
Speaker 3: Those are the papers that are all missing. The outer stuff is there showing contact and, and surveillance and, and all those things. You’re just never gonna find a document that says. We want you to go to Dallas and kill the president, you’re not gonna find it. It’s just not gonna exist. And everybody’s dead now.
Speaker 3: So they, they’ve achieved, they wait till everybody’s dead and they destroy the papers that connect. And now we’re left with. Speculation for the rest of our long lives.
Speaker: Very, very, very, very interesting guys. I would highly recommend you get this book if I know a lot of people out there are really interested in this, uh, JFK thing, but, but the whole story of Cubans and, and Castro and the CIA is just fascinating and I hope you get this [00:42:00] sold and made it into a miniseries for.
Speaker: Netflix because that’s, uh, your lips to God’s ears. It’d be a hell of a show if they do it right. You never know.
Speaker 2: An expensive show. Maybe you can finance it. Gary. I don’t know what, what? Yeah,
Speaker: I don’t know what your nest, your retirement,
Speaker 2: nest egg from. We’re always looking for
Speaker: help. Yeah, I know what you mean, man.
Speaker: All right, guys. Uh. Rick Morales Jr. And Sean Oliver, and the book is Monkey Morales, the true story of a Mythic Cuban exile Assassin, CIA operative FBI, informant smuggler, and Dad and dad. So it’s, it’s a hell of a story. Guys, I really appreciate y’all coming on. We appreciate you having
Speaker 3: us.
Speaker: All right. Bye.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins welcomes author Gregory Macalino, whose book “Little Pussy and Long Branch: Perfect Together” offers a deep dive into New Jersey’s underworld and the life of one of its most notorious figures—Anthony “Little Pussy” Russo.

Gregory begins by sharing his own story, growing up in Monmouth County amid the Italian-American enclaves where whispers of mob activity were part of daily life. His firsthand familiarity with the gambling, politics, and personalities that shaped the Jersey Shore inspired him to explore Russo’s remarkable and brutal reign.
Gary and Gregory trace Little Pussy Russo’s rise from a small-time Newark street thief to a powerful player in the Genovese crime family, detailing how he infiltrated Long Branch’s political and law enforcement circles to control the town for over twenty years. Gregory explains Russo’s business acumen, his use of gambling and real estate ventures to mask criminal operations, and the dangerous rivalries that emerged with independent drug dealers who threatened his dominance.

Listeners will hear how Little Pussy Russo’s empire ultimately unraveled amid violence, betrayal, and federal pressure. Gregory recounts dramatic gangland episodes, family connections, and the eventual collapse of a criminal fiefdom that had once seemed untouchable.

The conversation also touches on how Russo’s world parallels modern portrayals of mob life—especially The Sopranos—revealing just how much real New Jersey mobsters influenced America’s favorite mafia fiction. As the discussion closes, Gregory reflects on the lasting cultural footprint of men like Russo and what their stories teach us about power, corruption, and community identity.

This is a must-listen for true crime fans, Mafia historians, and anyone fascinated by how organized crime once ruled the Jersey Shore.
Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.

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Transcript

[0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers, good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. For those of you who don’t know me, most of you do, I think, sometimes, a lot of repeat listeners out there, and I really appreciate all you guys that always come back and make comments on my YouTube channel and comment on my Gangland Wire podcast group page, and so I really appreciate all you. And for you guys that don’t know me, I was with the Kansas City Police Department. I spent about 14 years in the intelligence unit. We worked the Sabella crime family here in Kansas city and a variety of other things like that, uh, retired and did a couple other things and find out my last retirement gig is I’m a podcaster. And then this has just been so much fun for me, guys. I really appreciate all your support. I’m getting to know all these authors all around the United States. There’s not a place. If you’re an intelligence, you like to have contacts where you can learn something or find out something or get something done. Well, there’s not any city, I don’t think, in the United States, I don’t know somebody that’s been on my podcast that I can call them up or email them and say, what about this or what about that?

 

[1:06] So it’s really broadened my life and this made my life much richer. So anyhow, today, without further ado, we have Gregory Macalino. Gregory, welcome.

 

[1:17] Thank you. Great to be here, really, truly. Yeah, well, I really, as I told you when we were talking before, I really am pleased about getting you on the show and about your book that you wrote, Little Pussy and Long Branch, Perfect Together. This is about New Jersey and not just like New Jersey, just across the river, but down into New Jersey. And there’s a lot of mafia activity that went on down there. And I’ve not really covered it very much, just a little bit. Years ago, Scott D.J. did a book. Uh, I can’t remember the name of it now that got up into New Jersey. Uh, gang state, or I’m sorry, garden state gangland, garden state gangland. Yeah. And that was a God, that was, I was one of my early interviews. I sometime maybe in the first year, like five or six years ago. So.

 

[2:04] Gregory has put together a book about Anthony Little Pussy and Long Branch, which is part of the Genovese family. And he has really studied this, but he grew up here. So, Gregory, tell us about your life. And you grew up in this area in Monmouth County and Long Branch. And what did you see that then stirred you to eventually write this book about it? Well you know um being in lawn branch you will find out that there is a huge italian community and someone everybody knew everybody that knew someone that was connected and somehow and not like heavy hitters or anything like that but more like you know there was tons and tons of bookies there was numbers runners uh the local the local mob dudes used to hire high school kids that I went to high school with to be the runners.

 

[2:56] And so everybody knew somebody that was connected. And you couldn’t help but know. And as you read the book, you will come to find out that Little Pussy completely infiltrated the whole municipality in terms of the local politicians, the city council.

 

[3:14] There’s accusations of the police chief. There’s also Monmouth County police higher-ups that he completely corrupted and he basically ran the town of long branch for 20 years and he was in headlines constantly making headlines for 20 years and you’ll be amazed that there used to be a local newspaper it was over 100 years old it was called um the the daily register i’m sorry the daily record it was out of long branch it was over 100 years old it stopped i think it started in the 1880s and it stopped in like the late 1970s so or just around just about 100 years old and And if you went a month without a blaring headline about the mob in Long Branch, you’d be completely surprised. Because I went through micro-spice and tons of records from the old newspapers. And every other week, there was some big major headline about Anthony Pussy Russo and his little gang of guys and what was going down.

 

[4:14] And it was prevalent. It was just a constant. It’s amazing. I believe it. I tell you a little side story. Uh, when my son was in high school, he had this friend from who actually spent all of his life up until they got to high school and his dad moved back here in Tom’s river, New Jersey, which is kind of down in that area. And so my son, what they had, he loves sports and this kid loves sports. And he had, I looked down what he had. He had a parlay card. I said, where did you get that? He said, oh, he said, Eddie gets them. His dad gets them at work. He gets them from some guy that has one of those, uh, tow main wagons that comes around those coffee wagons and he gets them. And so we’re making our picks. I said, what are you doing?

 

[5:02] And he said, well, you know, I don’t know. Big Ed got them, gave them to Eddie’s, you know, we’re just making our picks. We like put five bucks down or I think like put, I think only put a dollar, a dollar down on our picks. I just said, oh my God. I tell you what, we didn’t have anything like that growing up, but in Tom’s River, New Jersey and Long Branch in New Jersey, that was pretty prevalent. I got to say, you probably saw stuff like that yourself when you were in high school and on up since then. Yeah. That’s like, that’s like 40 minutes South of Long Branch. Also, Eddie Murphy, Eddie will be so proud of me to do this show. And I have to, I got to get ahold of him as soon as I get off of here.

 

[5:42] And I’ll probably give him this book after I get done with it. Cause he’ll be really excited to read it. Anyhow, let’s talk about Anthony big pussy Russo.

 

[5:54] And, and he was, he was little pussy. His brother was big pussy. Okay. All right. All right. All right. Yeah. I got a little pussy. I just, my, my, I was trying to do two things at once in my mind. So go ahead. You go ahead and start telling us about this guy. Okay. So Auntie Little Pussy is from the Newark area. They migrated up to Newark from Brazil, the family. They were from a lot of Italians. Half of the Italians went to America and half the other Italians went to South America. So his family went to Sao Paulo, Brazil, I believe, and then they migrated to Newark. And he was born 1916, I believe. He was one of 13 children. the father died early and so he was on the streets of newark and he had two older brothers one was called ralph and the other one was called john ralph and john started working for richie boyardo who was a big you know big time bootlegger in newark and this is before the mafia was formulated before you know there was five family all that this is during prohibition and and So Anthony was like the runt of the family, and he idolized his brother, John.

 

[7:05] Well, one thing led to another. They all started working for Richie Boyardo. The only reason Anthony Little Pussy rose to the heights he did is because of his brother, John. John was the opposite of him. Anthony was boisterous, a loudmouth. He loved to draw attention to himself and supposedly wasn’t the sharpest tool in the box. But his brother was the total opposite of him. And he was a heavy hitter. He ended up going to jail in the 20s for a prohibition murder in the service of Richie the Boot. But because Richie at this point had influence, the 30-year stint that John got was reduced to only 10 years he got out. Meanwhile, the older brother, Ralph, was an incorrigible, unbelievable, and he was being told constantly by Richie the Boot, cool it, cool it, cool it. He didn’t. And supposedly, with the two brothers knowing, a little pussy and big pussy, knowing that Richie was going to whack their older brother, Ralph… It was okay with them. That’s how incorrigible and a wild man the older brother was.

 

[8:12] Well, so they went from, and the way they got their nicknames, by the way. Yeah, I was just getting ready to ask that. They got to tell us about the nicknames. Yeah. So, and of course, this comes from the Sopranos as well. The Sopranos bought this. Yeah. You’re right. So with Ralph dead, the two brothers had been, before they joined Richie’s gang, they had been petty thieves. But they were renowned for being great cat burglars because they could climb up you know they were very athletic they could climb up the drainage pipes break into buildings second, story men b and e guys and they were renowned for doing that and when they when they became known throughout the streets of as because they were cat burglars as big pussy and little pussy so that’s where that’s where that comes all right okay so then they said right so And then they joined Richie the Boot’s organization full-time through Prohibition and then later into the 30s. And then, you know, Richie the Boot came under the auspices of the Genovese family through Lucky Luciano. Before it was even called the Genovese family, it was the Luciano family. And he had some problems in Newark with the Jewish gangsters, Longy Zwillman. And Longy Zwillman, you know, had some big associates. I mean, he was really good friends with Lucky Luciano. And he was very good friends with Al Capone, where Richie the Boot was not, regardless that he was Italian and he was Jewish. But they had a gang war. But after a while, it was settled. They became really good friends, as a matter of fact, Richie the Boot and Longy.

 

[9:41] And as he grew in all his endeavors, which after Prohibition, of course, included gambling, number one, try-locking, number two,

 

[9:50] and the numbers running policy racket. That’s where the Pussy Brothers went from being petty criminals to racketeers. And they just moved up and up and up. So now how did they end up down in Long Branch? We got Newark, but Long Branch, what you described for me is, what, an hour, a couple hours south of Newark, mid-state along the coast. It’s 50 minutes. Without traffic, it’s a 50-minute ride south from Newark to Long Branch. 50 minutes. Okay. And the way that happened was this. in, you know, I don’t know if you saw the movie The Alto Knights, the story of Costello and Vito Genovese. Those two were engaged in a, you know, for who was going to run the family. Right. The Luciano family. As we know, Vito Genovese’s chauffeur bodyguard, Vincent de Cingiganti, took a shot at Costello, wounded him, but he had to go on the lam because a doorman had witnessed and recognized him. While he was on the lam, Vito Genovese needed a new driver. So he asked Richie the Boot, give me one of your best guys to be my driving bodyguard.

 

[11:01] Well, everybody thought that big pussy, John, big pussy should get that gig, but Richie didn’t want to give him up because he was so valuable to him. He gave up his younger brother, little pussy, who at this point in the late 50s was annoying everybody in Newark.

 

[11:20] If it wasn’t for John… they would have not tolerated Anthony Little Pussy Russo. They would have probably killed him in the 50s. But he ended up getting the job as the chauffeur for Vito Genovese. As you know, that is a big-time position. That opens you up to—I mean, there’s been—Vincent Giganti was Vito’s chauffeur, and he ended up being the godfather. Other ones become—underbosses, other become powerful lieutenants and captains. So this was like a plum job to get. And he got it and the reason why he got it is as as loud mouth as he was and not as smart, he had two things going for him he was able to pull a pistol and shoot people yeah yeah which which you know when you’re doing bodyguard detail is a must but he could also make money he was he had he had a penchant for making money and and after at this point not so much i mean he was doing okay with his his what do you call it to the machines that they put in bars you know he had like Poker, slot machines, video poker. Back then it was slot machines. Now it’s video poker. Yeah, Joker. Joker, right. I know, pinball. So he had that going. And, you know, gambling and sports betting and even loan shark and all that. But so anyway, to answer your question was.

 

[12:37] Vito Genovese used to come to Jersey a lot. And when he came to Jersey a lot, he used to go to Long Branch a lot because there was a huge concentration of Italians there for about forever. And Vito ended up buying a lot of properties, a lot of businesses. Okay.

 

[12:53] And then his daughter ended up marrying a guy that lived in Long Branch by the name of Pat Simonetti. And Pat Simonetti was originally from Newark as well. A ton of people,

 

[13:03] everybody, all the Italians that were from Long Branch had migrated down from Newark. Okay okay it wasn’t only just a a summertime resort destination when it it also became home to a lot of these people that decided to leave newark so so next thing you know while little pussy is driving for veto he ended up spending a lot of time in lawn branch made a lot of friends, and veto used to school him you know buy property buy property you know it’s the best thing well Well, then that gig only lasted less than two years as his chauffeur because Vito ended up getting convicted and going to prison for narcotics trafficking. Okay. So at this point, everybody thought that Anthony Little Pussy Russo was going to be like, you know, disappear, you know, not ever be heard of again. But while in jail, Vito wanted Long Branch to open up Long Branch for the rackets. He saw real potential down there and he actually liked, a lot of people didn’t like Anthony Russo but Vito did, and he thought he was funny, that’s what I’ve been told, he thought he had a good sense of humor he was very voicey, so he instructed Richie the Boot.

 

[14:16] To put Anthony in charge of the Monmouth County Rackets with the mission control seat being in Long Branch. And next thing you know, Little Pussy started buying a lot of businesses in town, started making more money. And this is the point where he starts making a lot of money because now he learned the real estate business. He learned labor racketeering. And when you read the book, you’ll be amazed at how many legitimate businesses as he owned, including golf courses, hotels, mega restaurants, pharmacies, delis. He was all over the place.

 

[14:56] Wow. So now he’s got, he’s basically a crew now. Did he like become a capo or how did they refer to him as a capo down in New Jersey? Right. That’s funny how you became that because he was still just a soldier. But because Vito had picked him to be the, you know, to give him a territory to run. But I was told that there is sometimes they use for a cop, they use the word captain or they use lieutenant. Well, I’ve been told, I’ve been told that it’s sort of like a lieutenant was

 

[15:31] just under a captain, but over regular soldiers. Just like that’s our police department. Yeah. Right. Right. So exactly. So this is where he was. So technically, in a weird way, a little pussy, who had never been respected much within his best brethren, had actually risen to a higher position than his brother, who was very, very respected, technically.

 

[15:58] Oh, interesting. Because he was such a big moneymaker and had people under him and had a lot of power. I mean, you got a lot of people under you. He’s going to have political power down there. I assume he was instrumental in buying off the police and all the everybody in that county down there.

 

[16:15] Yeah. They owned that county politically, didn’t they? Correct. Absolutely. He did. And it wasn’t just that. And whenever Richie DeBoot needed him to go far and wide, he sent him down to the Caribbean to take over the casinos down there. He sent him to Las Vegas, where by the weirdest coincidences, they infiltrated a small mom and pop casino. Nothing, I mean, like almost like a joke of a casino. But it just so happened this casino happened to be owned by two guys from Long Branch over here. They own this outpost of the casino.

 

[16:51] The Jolly Trolley Casino, and Pussy Russo infiltrated it. And again, he was always seen as not too smart in making these absurd assumptions and all this. But there is a scene where, from the movie Casino, the character played by Joe Pesci, he was a real-life gangster by the name of Anthony Spilatro. They nicknamed him Ant. He was a very, very scary individual. well he happened to have a a jewelry store called the gold mind right behind the jolly trolley casino and he was extorting the casino okay and he said yeah well then pussy russo shows up there and there’s an encounter between the two and yeah and pussy russo didn’t know didn’t didn’t know when to shut up okay he always kind of made himself out the bigger he was and he gotten into Spolaccio’s face and threatened to kill him on the spot.

 

[17:53] You know, Spolaccio was someone you didn’t do that to, but Spolaccio then, figured out who he was and that he was hooked up with Richie the Boot. And if you know about anything about Richie the Boot, he was a very scary person himself. And you’ve probably heard of the famous, or maybe you haven’t, but I’ll tell you now, of the incinerator that he had way back in his… Did you ever hear that? No, I didn’t hear that one. Okay. There’s a great book called In the Godfather Garden. It’s all about Richie the Boot. and he was known to have he had 60 acres I think 30 acres up in Livingston and way way way back in the forest he had like a great like a big grill, giant, human sized grill where he was known to get rid of his yeah.

 

[18:46] It’s actually, they actually recorded them having this conversation on those books in the early 1960s, you know the Cavalicante family and pussy Russo’s on there talking about it so as as scary as Anthony Spilatro was he had heard rumors about the the newer crew and they were and he backed down and he backed down to Russo yeah that’s interesting that’s kind of like mob deal you know like if if somebody’s connected guy if you find out somebody’s a connected guy you got to hold that back and then go to the bosses and And then let them talk about it and then

 

[19:23] figure out what you’re going to do. And it’s Latro. He was a violent guy, but he knew the rules. He did know the rules. Right. No. And almost pussy Russo almost didn’t, you know, it’s like, he just, you know, acted. He was a reactionary, but in this one time it worked in his favor.

 

[19:42] Ah, interesting. That was, that’s crazy. And, and, and so they were, I believe that, did he just move in on these guys because they were from Long Branch and he was so intimidating that, that they just start giving him a piece of it. Is that how that worked? Cause you know, normally these casinos were controlled by mob because they arranged for loans from the Teamsters pension fund. But I don’t sense that was going on here. This is what happened. So the guys that owned the casino in, in Las Vegas that lived here in Long Branch. These three guys, two of them lived in Long Branch. There were three of them. These three guys owned about 10 restaurants in the Long Branch area. Well-to-do restaurants, classy restaurants. Okay. So two things are happening. One, these three guys are being extorted by Anthony Spolatro in Vegas and they didn’t like it. Okay. The other thing is when Pussy Russo found out that the guys that owned that casino were living in Long Branch, he sent his men to all the restaurants and said, look, you’re going to have labor problems here. You’re going to have picketing out front. We’re going to, we’re going to unionize all your, so they said, give us a piece of that casino or you’re going to have union problems. Okay. Well, they all heard about Pussy Russo. They knew who he was. They knew he was like as serious as any thing can be.

 

[20:58] And in a weird way, it was, they were happy to get Pussy Russo to get the aunt out of there, to get Spolaccio. who they didn’t like. So, by the way, those three guys ended up going to prison. Oh, really? Oh, yeah. They were like, you know, rich guys that owned, you know, well, they went, two of them went to prison. I think the third one didn’t for some reason. I can’t remember correctly, but it’s an interesting story.

 

[21:25] Yeah, that’s, Little Pussy, that’s a name that was real familiar in The Sopranos. And you mentioned when we were talking about how David Chase must have read that. Now, was there some of these stories that you remember that are really ripped from real life here in Long Branch? Okay, so this is going to blow your mind too, and you’re probably going to think it’s not true, but it is. Okay, about three years ago, I used to own a bar, a rock and roll bar. It was called the Brighton Bar, okay? And it’s one of the oldest rock and roll original, not cover bands, right? Not doing original rock and roll venues. you know they started doing original music in the mid 70s like 74 i ended up buying it in the 96 and i sold it in 2022 okay okay it’s the only rock and roll joint in long branch for mega years and again it’s original so i don’t know if you’re you know familiar with the sopranos there is a whole two years worth of a story where.

 

[22:36] The character Montessanti, Christopher Montessanti. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Girlfriend take over a live rock and roll bar in Long Branch, New Jersey. Yeah, I remember that, yeah. And being convinced by the FBI and the state police for illegal activities with drugs and all that, okay? That directly comes from my bar, Brighton Bar, okay? Everybody knew it. And as a matter of fact, on two different episodes, while in the bar they have two bands that play themselves on the show were actually play the brighton all the time and a guy that lived right around the corner from the bar ron haney he was the technical advisor for clothing on the soprano show he was he was one of those bands that played at the brighton all the time and i’ve he’s a friend of mine from way back and he lived right around the corner from the Brighton bar.

 

[23:32] So that’s, there’s that connection, you know, David Chase, I’m sure knew this. Okay. Yeah. Right. So, and just the word, just the nickname pussy as, as that comes from that. And then there’s the whole drug, the whole drug thing, because Vito Genovese, when he got busted in 59 for drugs, the Genovese family went in the opposite direction and had this moratorium totally against any kind of narcotic,

 

[23:57] any kind of narcotics. Okay. So there ended up being a gang war in Long Branch starting in 75, ended in 1980 between Pussy Russo and this loose knit of, of, of criminals of a drug ring. And he didn’t want any drugs in Long Branch and they were pushing for drugs. So they actually, what ends up happening, about eight people died. Eight people died. Yeah.

 

[24:23] So he had, he had guys under him, The Genovese family came down hard on no drugs, and he had guys that were already working under him that were making money off of drugs. Yes, but that’s not the other. He was battling a whole set of guys that weren’t even involved in the mob. They were just drug pushers. They were just drug pushers. Oh, okay, I got it. He was trying to get them out of town. They were trying to stay in town, and not just in town, you know, surrounding towns too, Asbury, Redback. Yeah. That’s interesting. Yeah. Yeah. A lot of history there. Yeah. And it’s all, it’s all in the book. You’re going to, you’re going to, you’re going to enjoy reading about the mob, the mob war between the two factions, you know, and see who’s who and all that. I think you’ll really like it. What is, you got a lot of stories in here. I’ve brushed through it. Haven’t been had time to do it. A lot, a lot of stories in here. Tell us another one that, you know, that, that you found particularly interesting.

 

[25:23] Well, to me, it was always, so here’s how, this is what happened. Because of all these weird connections, I was a kid, you know, we happened to like rent our house out to an individual who was one of the guys that ended up going to war with Pussy Russo over this drug thing. So, you know, we rented our house out to them and we found out soon after like, oh my God, what did we do? you know? And, and, you know, it’s, it’s just, it’s all this intercalculated like connections

 

[25:52] that just kept revisiting and revisiting, revisiting. And, you know, I, I was present one time, well, I met Pussy Russo one time and. What were the circumstances of that? Oh, so here’s what the circumstance was. It was my, it was my, my parents’ 25th year anniversary of marriage and we had gone over to dinner as it was like sort of like a family own only, pre-anniversary just a family my sister flew in from california and we went to the surf lounge now the surf lounge you know unbeknownst to me at the time i was i was only like 12 years old, is owned by pussy russo and his guys but it was known as the best italian restaurant around so we went there and this weird circumstances occur where there was these two men there. And my sister was staring at one of them, which I didn’t understand why, while the other one was staring at my father.

 

[26:46] And, and I was the only one to notice this, you know, that these two staring contests were going on.

 

[26:52] And then all of a sudden there’s some guy comes over to the table and he, in a not a nice way, he was like to my father, I know you, but it’s bothering me. Where are you from and my father my father who’s a complete legit guy completely just was very happy to tell him it’s it’s i used to do your floors my my uncle my father and all his brothers had a floor waxing business uh-huh and they used to do all the businesses around here and the guy that would said to my father who who are you was pussy russo and my father recognized him right away and said i used to do your floors and before i used to do your floors i used to do vito genovese’s floors And I know you from both times. So that came out. And then it turns out that my uncle, my father’s brother, who invented a floor wax, and that’s the basis for their business, made a ton of money off of selling it, ended up buying a million-dollar house in deal in the 60s. And he lived maybe five blocks away from Pussy Russo, who owned like an $11 million house, and they became friends. So meanwhile my sister’s staring at the other guy and the other guy was tony dale agolino who was one of pussy’s intimates my sister recognized him and you won’t believe from where from las vegas my sister moved to california and california she used to go to vegas.

 

[28:19] While in Vegas, some guy comes up to her, who’s this guy, Tony Dale, and offers her two free tickets to her and her girlfriend over there to go see Elvis at the Hilton. Oh, wow. So in 1971, 72, my sister got to see Elvis for free. Yeah. One of those half moon booths. Oh, yeah. She said it was one of the greatest concerts she’d ever seen. And she was treated like a queen, you know, free champion, all this. The guy who did this was the guy that was in that restaurant. I recognized him. The guy, plus he was recognizing my father. It was like all the weird, weird, weird stuff. Unbelievable. It’s all in the book.

 

[29:02] Crazy, crazy. You got a lot of great stories in this book. I know that. I don’t know if I’m doing it justice and you’re following if I’m giving too much detail. That’s exactly what I want. We don’t want to give it all away, but there’s no way as big as this, as thick as this book is, guys, there’s no way he’s going to tell all the stories. No matter how many stories you tell, Greg, there’s going to be a whole lot more in this book. Absolutely. Absolutely. And I’ll tell you, it’s just a taste.

 

[29:27] These are really great stories. Yeah. Now, little pussy in the end, what kind of an end did he come to?

 

[29:33] Well, okay. So it was during the time that he was having this gang war with this drug ring, independent drug ring. And everybody thought that the independent the drug ring had killed him but it wasn’t he was killed by his own people because his chauffeur was a guy by the name of patrick pazuto patrick pazuto now patrick pazuto he met in in jail they were they were bunkmates and he was a very tough guy patrick pazuto he was not a mob guy he was not a mob guy he was a he was a gunman you know a stick-up man yeah but but he was a tough guy and he used to do favors for Pussy in jail, you know, go get him his meals. Pussy Russo was illiterate, by the way. He couldn’t read or write. So Patrick Pizzuto, who happened to be very intelligent, by the way, very, very intelligent and a tough guy, would write all his letters, read all his letters. And at one time, Pussy Russo, who was in jail at the same time with his second in command, a guy by the name of Babe Miraglia, were stabbed by the black population.

 

[30:37] And who came to their, to their, to their rescue was Patrick Pizzuto. And throughout a couple of weeks, he stabbed a couple of black guys in jail and all that. Anyway, when they both got out of jail at the same time, and he immediately went to work for him as a chauffeur. Now, again, a chauffeur is always a stepping stone to a big… Oh, yeah. So…

 

[30:58] So now they’re battling this drug ring and they set up a guy to get killed. He gets killed. They forgot to wipe the fingerprints off the car. Patrick Pizzuto was one of the guys on the hit. Went back to the location at a rest stop after the murder and wiped it down. And then based on the fact that it took place in a murder and that he went and wiped down the thing and really put his life on a line twice in one day. Yeah pussy russo put him up for induction official right and then unfortunately.

 

[31:34] He got caught patrick brazuto with an old indictment from the 60s before he even met pussy russo he had he had robbed a grocer an 81 year old grocer up in posaic and then the guy, lunged at him he shot him and killed him and he had been able to stay you know stave off the the prosecution but now they had him dead to rights so he actually turned state’s evidence against the mob this is right towards the end of the of the of the warring faction over the drug ring so what ends up happening is the head of the genovese crime family from new york sent word down to richie the boot that pussy russo had to go no matter how much money he was able to generate and he was able to generate a lot of money for the family but the fact that he almost was you know a hair

 

[32:22] away from letting in a guy that just turned state’s evidence he had to go. So most people thought it was the drug ring that killed him, but it wasn’t. It was his own people. So his two very good friends came to Long Branch, and they whacked him out right in his great Long Branch here at his apartment. Yeah, that’s a great story. They found him surrounded by stuffed cats. Right, exactly.

 

[32:45] Crazy, crazy, crazy. Gregory Macalino. I’m looking forward to really getting into this book. And I know my little friend Eddie is going to be reading this too. We’ll be passing this around. Great. I really appreciate that you put all this together. Like I said, this is not covered that much. Five families up there are covered too much almost. And I cover them too much, but there’s so many great stories. But now I moved down into New Jersey. I’ll probably go through this and maybe come up with another show or two out of your book. I’ll give you credit. I’ll make sure I let them know that I got this out of there. I was thumbing through there. I see Bruce Springsteen’s name. You know, he was, did he ever play your club? I guess you didn’t have his club until after he got big tied, did he? Yeah. As a matter of fact, I was there now. Listen, this is, I was at the time I was actually underage. I didn’t know it then. I said, I’m a musician and I used to play at that club, the Brighton bar all the time. And I was always using my brother’s ID, but when he played there a couple of times, Bruce, and I was there one time. Yeah. So we have a wall of fame and it’s now in my basement. I took it because, you know, I sold the place because of a pandemic. I owned it for 26 years, but I sold, I sold, but I have, he’s on the wall, he’s there. And, you know, he, his wife.

 

[34:02] Was Next Door Neighbors with Pussy Russo. I mean, literally, her family lived right there. Really? That Patty Scaffo? Yeah. And as I say in the book, you know, Bruce sings about the pink Cadillac. There’s only one that had a pink Cadillac convertible, and that was Pussy Russo.

 

[34:20] Interesting. I know he has a pretty good one about Atlantic City. That’s a pretty good one. He’s got a pretty good mob song. And not a lot of songs about the mob, but that’s a good one. I agree. I agree. Yeah.

 

[34:33] And, and, and Pussy Russo was like, you know, was in with all those guys with Angelo Bruno and Nicky Scarfo. He did time. They became really good friends. So, you know. Yeah. That’s another little explored aspect is that connection with Philly. Yeah. Atlantic City. That’s right. New Jersey and New York. I mean, they were really all intertwined with each other. Exactly. And you, and you do know that the Philly mob also has an outpost in Newark. They have a little section of Newark as well. Oh, I didn’t realize. Oh, as a matter of fact, Angelo Bruno, who was killed, I’m sure you know that, he was killed by his own consigliere who was running Newark for him. Okay. A guy by the name of Tony Banan Cabanigro. Okay. Oh, yeah. Okay. I remember that name now. I’m trying to put that together. There’s so much sometimes runs through my head. I can’t remember it all, but I do remember that name, Cabanigro. So that’s why those names I probably have butchered in stories in the past. Right, right, right.

 

[35:39] All right, Gregory, I really appreciate you coming on the show and imparting some of these stories with us. And guys, you got to get out and get this book. It’s just if you want to know about Newark and New Jersey and on down the coast in New Jersey, it’s got it all in there. It’s got it all.

 

[35:57] And I want to, I want to thank you and I’m honored for being on your show. And by the way, I loved your Bobby Maddo section. That was good.

 

[36:04] Fantastic. Tons and tons of details that I never knew. Great stuff. Yeah. I worked like, I worked a lot on that one. I actually had a guy from New York help me. He gave me kind of the basis and I went in and, and learned a bunch more. So it was, it was a pretty fascinating story. Yes, definitely. Well, thank you. I enjoyed it. Thanks a lot for coming on this show. Thank you for having me, Gary. Appreciate it. Don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. So when you’re out on the streets there and you’re a big F-150, watch out for those little motorcycles when you’re out. If you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to the VA website. They’ll help with your drugs and alcohol problem if you’ve got that problem or gambling. If not, you can go to Anthony Ruggiano. He’s a counselor down in Florida. He’s got a hotline on his website. If you’ve got a problem with gambling, most states will have, if you have gambling, most states will have a hotline number to call. Just have to search around for it. You know, I’ve always got stuff to sell. I got my books. I got my movies. They’re all on Amazon. Just go. And I got links down below in the show notes and just go to my Amazon sales page and you can figure out what to do. I really appreciate y’all tuning in and we’ll keep coming back and doing this. Thanks, guys.

In this episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins sits down with Tim Richards, a former St. Louis intelligence officer and author of Crook’s Kill and Cops Lie. Tim brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge from his years investigating the mob and navigating the thin line between law enforcement and organized crime.
We dive deep into the history and dynamics of the St. Louis crime families and their ties—or lack thereof—to Kansas City and Chicago. Tim reveals how the St. Louis mob and the Syrian mob were into labor racketeering, ghost workers, and union control, profiting off federally funded projects.
Click here to buy Crooks Kill and Cops Lie and to see all of Tim’s books
• Listeners will hear gritty stories about:
• The interplay between Kansas City, St. Louis, and Chicago mob families.
• The “Syrian” mafia’s role in local unions, vengeance, and violence.
• St. Louis mob figures like Paul Leisure, Mike Trupiano, and Jesse Stoneking.
• An unforgettable encounter with Trupiano during a traffic stop.
• The challenges police faced without legal wiretaps, relying instead on FBI intelligence.
• The ripple effects of mob influence reach as far as Las Vegas gambling operations.

From bloody reprisals to uneasy alliances, Tim shares not just history but lived experience—vivid accounts of hit jobs, betrayals, and the complexities of policing organized crime. As he reflects on how law enforcement strategies and technology have evolved, Tim leaves us with a powerful reminder of the mob’s enduring mark on Midwestern history.
If you want an insider’s perspective on St. Louis mobsters and the Midwest underworld, you won’t want to miss this one.

Subscribe to get more stories every week.
This is a must-listen for true crime fans, Mafia historians, and anyone fascinated by how organized crime once ruled the Jersey Shore.
Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, or your favorite podcast app.

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To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here

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0:03 Welcome to Gangland Wire
1:02 Exploring Kansas City and St. Louis Mob Ties
4:19 The Influence of the Chicago Mafia
8:56 The Aladdin Hotel and Skimming Operations
11:41 A Deep Dive into Paul Leisure’s Fate
15:12 The Old Italian Mafia and Its Tactics
23:09 Changes in Policing and Mafia Control
24:54 Personal Stories from the Streets
27:43 The Rise and Fall of Jesse Stoneking
33:05 Reflections on Organized Crime and Histor

[0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers, good to be back here in the studio, Gangland Wire. I have another former intelligence unit detective, Tim Richards. Now, you know, and if you don’t, I didn’t introduce myself. I’m sorry, guys. Some of you all may be new listeners. I’m Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. Got this podcast, Gangland Wire. We deal with the mob. And I worked a mob in Kansas City, and Tim Richards worked in it in St. Louis, just across the state. So welcome, Tim. Thank you. Thank you, Gary. I’m really glad to have you. I was really glad to find this book. I’ve been working on a book myself. So I’m looking at your book, seeing how you did certain things and then going back to mine. And my story is a little bit different, I guess, but different, but the same. You know, we had very similar experiences, guys. When Tim and I first started talking on the phone, you know, it was like, oh, my God, that’s like I was talking to another guy in the same unit, you know, because we had the same kind of experiences.

[0:59] Some of them we’ll talk about, some of them we won’t talk about on here. But we’re going to talk about the mafia primarily. And Tim, what I always found interesting, even back then in the 70s, there seemed to be little to no relationship or connection between Kansas City and St. Louis crime families. Do you remember that like that? Yeah, I recall that. We knew that Nick Zabella was a powerful guy in the families. But we never really saw anything that he was insane. St louis the chicago mafia controlled st louis with some help from detroit the detroit mafia.

[1:37] They the chicago mafia came in here in the late 50s when they were rebuilding downtown st louis and they built the poplar street bridge which was called the tunnel project, they came through east st louis with a guy by the name of buster workman who controlled everything in East St. Louis, and they used ghost workers. It was a federal-funded bridge-building event, and they used ghost workers there, and these guys were getting rich. And in the meantime, they came over to St. Louis and infiltrated our two labor workers, 110 and 42. They also infiltrated 562, which is a five-fitters union, a very wealthy union, and they had them for decades. And they apparently Eventually controlled them 110 was controlled totally And 42 was controlled totally By the Chicago mob.

[2:34] 562 eventually went under It was controlled totally by the Chicago mob And The Chicago mob ran everything here, Allegedly Some dabbling by Detroit I don’t know how they worked that out But Detroit had some function here But um, Yeah, Tim, you go in your Crook’s Kill and Cops Lie book, guys, and I recommend you get this if you want an inside look at the St. Louis Police Intelligence Unit at Police Intelligence Everywhere, why this book will give it to you. And you have a second book before we get too far into this. Hold that one up. I couldn’t find my copy. It’s over across the room somewhere. This is actually the sequel to Crook’s Kill, Cops Lie. Okay. It’s just another St. Louis Intelligence book. The unit was referred to as Intel 210, which was the code name for the unit within the police department. And this is my second book pertaining to the St. Louis Organized Crime Advice. This goes deeply into the intelligence unit and what we actually did and the things that went on between cops and crooks and FBI agents. And we were whores for the FBI.

[3:48] We did all this shit. And the FBI would come over to our office and glean it all. But we didn’t care. We enjoyed what we were doing. And we got to know these FBI guys, and we didn’t mind helping them. The thing is that we couldn’t get legal wiretaps. They could. And so we gave them information, whatever they needed. But anyway, both of my books pertain to that, intelligence and how the unit cops and the FBI and the other feds worked together trying to get these guys together.

[4:20] It’s interesting. In St. Louis and Kansas City, from looking at your book, it was basically the same, different than in other cities, I think.

[4:30] We really worked closely with the FBI also. And like you said, we were their go boys. We went out and they said, hey, we got this going on. Why don’t you go check this out? Well, see the FBI, they have these high level sources because they’ve got all this power and all this money to spread around. And, you know, they can kick a damn grand jury indictment aside if they want in order to put pressure on somebody. We couldn’t do that. We didn’t have any local wiretaps. We finally got a law. We ran one here and it was, I tell you what, you never want to do a wiretap unless you got a huge, huge, huge budget, which we never do. So, you know, it’s the same way here. It’s really interesting, you know, the talk about the labor racketeering in particular. You go into that pretty in depth because there’s more than just Chicago and more than Italian mafias. And then you had the Syrian mob in St. Louis that got heavy into union racketeering. So it’s just a really interesting mix down there, Tim.

[5:32] Well, the Syrian mob, it was named, it was actually Lebanese. Oh, that’s right. The FBI named it the Syrian mob, and it stuck. The newspapers picked up on it. We picked up on it. It was referred to as the Syrian mob. But they were political people. They were all politicians and business people within St. Louis. And the Leisure, Paul Leisure, Anthony Leisure, Paul Leisure was a hitman for years for the Chicago mafia here in St. Louis. But Tony Giordano, they wanted to kill another Syrian guy by the name of Jimmy Michaels for control of a 110, local 110.

[6:11] Anthony Giordano told him to lay off of him because the Chicago mob told him, we don’t want him killed. He had worked with them, for them, for years over in East St. Louis for Buster Workman. So Anthony Giordano told the Leisure to lay off of him. The reason they hated him so much is because some Michael’s family killed a Leisure guy over in East St. Louis was back in the 50s shot him in a bar and got away with it and killed him and so there was there was a feud there between the two Syrian families the Lebanese families so the feud just festered and festered and festered and they wanted to kill jimmy michaels for two reasons revenge and control of local 110 jim uh anthony giordano died and that left jimmy michaels wide open so they blew him up in broad daylight with a car bomb on i-55 during rush hour and uh, But then this gang war broke out. Then the Michaels retaliated and blew up Paul Leisure in front of his mom. So I was at both of those scenes, certainly. They’re in my book. My picture’s in the book at the scene.

[7:21] But it was an interesting time there. And the politicians were scurrying because they’d been in bed with these people for the last 30 years. I bet, yeah. I mean, yeah, they were scurrying. And it was just really crazy. There was another Lebanese family by the name of Webby, Sarkis Webby Sr. Was a lawyer and a very influential guy. And he owned the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas. And they were skimming the money there. Somehow, this is how the Detroit Mafia comes into this. The Detroit Mafia, the New York Mafia, and the Chicago Mafia were skimming funds from Sarkis Webby’s casino. And they would meet up here in St. Louis and divvy up this cash money. And we had gangsters coming in and out of here, like you would not believe it, from New York City, big gangsters.

[8:11] But it was just crazy how they were going after the skim money. But Sargis Webby, they indicted him and Mike Trippiano, who was the head of the mafia here, and they had one local 110. And they indicted them. And they also indicted Sargis Webby Jr., the son of Sargis Webby. And the dad died. Sargas Lombi died before he could go to trial. But little Sarg did not, and he went to prison. He did a hard time for a lot of years down in Florida. He’s out now. He’s a big-timer, influential guy. And that was for skimming from Aladdin? No, it was a cable TV show.

[8:56] Oh, scam. Another scam. They were going to allow, okay, this is when cable TV just began. And they wanted to come into St. Louis. And then these two guys, these two gangsters said, yeah, you can come into St. Louis, but this is our town. And you’re going to have to pay us. So they had it all on tape. And they all went down. They did not convict Trupiano, Mike Trupiano.

[9:24] But everybody else got convicted on it. And, uh, well, of course, Sarkis will be seeing your diet before he could go to prison. Okay. Little Sarkis, little Sarkis will be went to prison, but, uh, that that’s what they went down on. Uh, it wasn’t the skimming and it wasn’t anything else that they had all the dastardly things they had done. It was for something stupid, like being greedy and one, one thing there, it were the cut of the cable TV money. And now that’s, that’s, that’s how they went down on it. So you really had three, uh, Lebanese blood, blood families, separate blood families. That were then connected with the Italian La Cosa Nostra Mafia in many ways, both in local schemes and national schemes. Yeah, back to the only two because Sarga’s way to senior was part of the leisure gang. Okay, I didn’t realize that. He was allegedly the guy that was keeping the peace. He was an attorney. He was a smooth guy. And little Sarga’s way to junior is a smooth guy. I mean, you know, he drives nice cars and he’s a wealthy guy now. And he always was a wealthy guy. He grew up in Las Vegas. He was a St. Louis kid who grew up in, his daddy owned a casino in Vegas. So you can imagine how he grew up. Yeah, yeah. Hell, he’s a scratch golfer.

[10:39] You know, he has women. I mean, he’s a guy that people would look up to. But he’s not a gangster anymore. In fact, I don’t think he ever was a gangster. He was just a kid that wanted to be tough. and he wasn’t something. He’s a small guy. But the reason they got him instead of the daddy, it wasn’t the daddy died. But the reason I got him is that they had his phone tab. They owned a hotel here in St. Louis called the Mayfair. And they were all afraid of Paul Leisure because he was a monster. He had killed 20 people for the Chicago mob. The Chicago mob would call telling Leisure, I don’t want this guy here. They’d go to Paul Leisure. We want this guy here. He killed 20 people for them. So they were all terrified of him And he was crazy Besides that he was nuts I wanted to stay on the good side of Paul Leisure, And so Paul Leisure called him on the phone At his Mayfair hotel And they had just a casual conversation And Paul Leisure said I quote He said give me two

[11:39] .45s And I’ll shoot it up with these damn St. Louis cops I’ll kill a man And Little Sark said bye bye birdie And all that stuff was taped So in the meantime All right.

[11:51] David Leisure, who actually pulled the pin to kill Jimmy Michaels on I-55, he’s the one that pulled the trigger on it. And everybody knew it. Well, he was hiding out because there was an arrest warrant for him. He was hiding out. So he went down to the Mayfair Hotel and Little Sargast, what, he hit him. He hit him in a, the police came in looking for him. And they hid him in a laundry, a big laundry, hotel laundry basket type thing, and put blankets and stuff on top of him. Well, everybody knew that. And so Lil Sark went to prison for all that, aiding and abetting, running his mouth. What they did, they said, listen, you can plead guilty, or if you want to go to court, you can go to trial. And he had a good lawyer. And they said, but we got this takeover. You’re talking to Paul Leisure about being a tough guy. You know, and Lil Sarg said, yeah, I’m a tough guy, man. I’ve killed people before. I’ve done this and I’ve done that. I’m a street. He wasn’t. He wasn’t. But he talked all that bravado on this tape. They were going to play it for the jury. And so I’ll plead. So he pled.

[12:57] And that Paul Leisure, didn’t he get his legs blown off also? Yeah, he got one of them blown off. I was there when he was still in the car. He was living with his mom. If you believe that, he lived with his mom. It was a nice beautiful day fall day in St. Louis and a call came out for an explosion I drove down there immediately and he was still in the car and his mom was standing outside the car he was a big, powerful, mean guy, man, talking to his mother. It was pitiful. It was just pitiful. She was standing by the car and she had heard the explosion. And as one of his legs was gone, his fingers were all mangled and gone. There were dogs in the neighborhood grabbing his fingers. Grabbing his fingers. Yeah, grabbing his fingers. We were trying to get the dogs out. Get out of here. Get out of here. Oh, my God. And the car was blowing the smithereens, man. And it was a nice neighborhood. Oh, yeah. But when everybody said, everybody said, get those dogs out here. He’s eating those fingers.

[13:53] And then it’s his mom standing there and he’s in the car going, mom, mom. It was pitiful, man. It’s like a friend of mine told me, he said, you got shot in Vietnam. He said, you know, when you get shot, he said, the first thing you do is call out for your mother. He had his right there. And I’ll tell you what, after all that crap that he had pulled before he got blown up, they didn’t even give him. Local 110. They gave him local 42, which is a lower local. And so he was, he was a, uh, uh, an organizer for local 42 and he had his brand new helmet on white helmet. He had it in the car and it said, Paul, these are organizer local 42. And, uh, so I grabbed it. I grabbed, I globbed onto it and I took it to the office and I put it on filing. And it was going to be in my memorial you know and uh i i came back to work one day and the damn thing was gone i said what happened to paul leisure’s helmet and they said oh the fbi came in and got it i think you liars man somebody took that home somebody took it home yeah yeah some captain or major, said i want that yeah i want you got it sir yeah yeah you know how it goes shit rolls downhill as.

[15:13] Well, let’s, let’s talk a little bit about then the Italian mob and it goes way back. Uh, to the thirties and, and, you know, Prohibition and all that ends up with Giordano was, uh, the boss for quite a while. And if I remember right, Giordano and Truppiano, what Mike Truppiano was the last, basically the last boss, I think Italian of La Cosa Nostra. Uh, and they have some connection with Detroit and he come, didn’t they send that kid down there from Detroit? Was he a nephew of Giordano? Yeah. Yeah. He was a nephew of Giordano and he came from Detroit. He still was controlled since Giordano died. And so they said Mike Truppiano. But he was still controlled by the Chicago mafia. How that worked out. I think I heard somewhere that Iupa had to approve of Truppiano then taking over. Yeah, yeah. And Truppiano was not known to be a really skillful mafia boss is my understanding. No, he was pretty inept. I had dealings with him personally.

[16:18] I got to the point where I got tired of following these guys around, so I’d pull them over and talk to them. And one time, the New York Mafia was in town. I can’t remember their names now, but they were high up on the Mafia scale. There were two guys in my unit that did a lot of undercover stuff, and they would stay out at the airport. So they saw them come in, and they followed them, and they went to a house. I don’t know whose house it was. It could have been Giordano’s house in South St. Louis County. And I’m pretty sure it wasn’t John Vitale’s. Anyway, they had a big meeting there. And Chupiano was chauffeuring them. And so these guys that had been surveilling them got me on the air and said, would you do a car check on Mike Chupiano? Fine, I’d do some car with him. I said, yeah.

[17:08] So I pulled him over on a busy St. Louis street. They were on the way back to the airport. And I made him get out of the car and Trippiano was furious these were high ranking, guys you know he was furious and I said who got in the car with you and he said they’re friends of mine I said get out of the car everybody get out well one big guy who was in the front seat got out I don’t remember his name, but then this big other big Monty guy just sat in the back seat they all had, real expensively dressed so I said give me your ID and he said I don’t have an ID And he went like this, and he had this black suit on with a red silk on the inside of it. I bet it cost $2,000. Anyway, his airline ticket was in his pocket. And I went, oh, you don’t need an idea. And I know who you are now. I said, what’s your name, man? So I just, I got their names and days of birth and everything. Well, it upset the FBI. I was, I got called into the office. He said, did you do a car check on Mike Trippiano? I said, yeah. He said, who do you have in the car? I was really at least hots from New York city in there. He’s big time house. And, uh.

[18:17] He said, well, there was a guy there. And I said, who’s this guy? He said, he’s an FBI agent. He didn’t introduce him to me, the FBI agent. He was furious. He was furious that I did this. I don’t know why. Apparently, one of them was probably a snitch, this young agitator. And they didn’t want anybody messing with him. But it was crazy, man. You could throw a rock around here and say, listen, hit some goddamn FBI guy or hit some organized crime guy.

[18:43] You mentioned John Batali. Tell us about John Batali. He was kind of the Italian mafia’s union guy, if I remember right. Well, you see, back in the day, the unions, they were a plum that they wanted to control. Oh, yeah. They were mostly controlling gambling and prostitution. And I’m sure back in the day, like in the 70s, when I first became a cop, the black people were all addicted to heroin, white heroin. I was in a mid-city area. They were all addicted to everybody you stopped, everybody you had dealings with, was having withdrawal from white heroin. Now, the white heroin was coming from Europe. And it wasn’t a situation like it was coming from Mexico or whatever. That’s brown. That’s brown heroin. And everybody said the mafia didn’t deal with white heroin. Well, I don’t believe that, man. I mean, all these guys were addicted to white heroin. And what they would do, they would buy this heroin from, I presume, a representative of the Chicago Mafia. And then they would cut it, and they’d have their own business. And they were killing each other left and right with machine guns, just like it is today. But they were killing each other left and right over, you know, the money had gotten screwed up. But everybody that we dealt with was screwed up with white heroin. And I’m sure that was part of John Vitale and Tony Giordano.

[20:07] You know, I met Tony Giordano one time. When I first became a cop in the 70s, we had a towing service. Most of those kind of places were run by the Chicago Mafia.

[20:18] And they were city organizations, and they had city employees, but the Chicago Mafia ran them. And one time, what they would do is they had a scam where they would tow your car, and they wouldn’t let you have it back. and if it kept it for a certain amount of time, they could apply for another title and it would be their car. And so they were doing this. And this was 1970. And Tony Giordano was one of the guys and he had another gangster with him whose name I can’t remember right now. And they ran this towing service called Metropolitan Towing for the city.

[20:55] And so they played this scam where they wouldn’t get people’s cars back for a certain amount of time. I don’t care what you brought in there. They would say, that’s not good enough, that’s not good enough. People were turned away. So a Catholic priest had his car towed, and they towed it to Metropolitan Towing in my district at Duncan and Van Aventer, is where the lot was, and he was, The Catholic priest didn’t have his priest outfit on. Dollar, yeah. Yeah, and he went in there to retrieve his car, and they wouldn’t give it to him. And he got upset about it. Tony Giordano pulled a sawdove shotgun on him. He said, either you get out of here, or I’m going to blow you in half. He didn’t know he was a Catholic priest. Well, the Catholic priest had influence. He had people that—anyway, he got his car back, obviously. But then they said, oh, my gosh, there’s a problem at Metropolitan Towing. I don’t know what it is, you know, these politicians. So they put a cop sitting in front of Metropolitan Towing 24 hours a day. And I only had like, I had like six months on the police department. I was one of the cops. I had to sit in front of this place for eight hours a day in a police car. So I said, Rose, downhill, man. Yeah. I said, what if I got, what if I have to use the restroom? He said, well, okay, we’ll let you go in there and use the restroom, but don’t you go in there for any other reason. And you come out of there. I said, all right, fine. So I went in there. I went in there. And hell, I hung out in there. And Tony Giordano and his other car thief, I can’t remember.

[22:22] Well, Tony Giordano was real talking to him. He was saying, like, yeah, when I was a kid, man, I got arrested. They didn’t have juvenile. They just put me in with the regular guys. And I grew up tough and blah, blah, blah. He was talking. He was all the time talking. And there was a room there. I can see. They had this full of golf clubs in bags. And he said, are you?

[22:43] Guns and clubs, officer? Yeah, I know. Oh, yeah. They had Phil for these clubs. He said, hey, you play golf? I said, sure, I play golf. You want to set a golf club? No, man, I don’t want any golf clubs. I mean, it was crazy, man. You know, they were so used to giving cops or whatever, anybody, whatever they wanted. Especially back in the sixties. He came on in the early seventies. That’s when things kind of started changing.

[23:07] And I know you went, saw those changes. The older guys that were like the generation before you, when you came on as a young troop, you know, you know, it was different and we changed things, you know, we quit doing a out of that stuff and things modernized real quick but there was always a rub between those older guys and us younger guys we started getting federal money for one thing for cars yeah guns and uniforms and and yeah then eventually we started getting some pay raises and pay raise pay yeah but the old guys that i when i came on they’re the old guys that were there they were crooks i mean they were they were as big of crooks as the gangsters yeah i heard one guy say you You know, we used to make $100 a month and all you could steal. Yep, yep. They were crooks, man. Yeah.

[23:55] Oh, well, that was the good old days, as they say. You know, I had this one intelligence guy who was one of the early members of the intelligence unit that was first, I think, the first one or first one of two selected because he was known as such a straight arrow guy. And he told me a story. When he came on, they assigned him with an older policeman. They didn’t, when they break in, you know, you just get, you know, dried. This guy tonight and he rode the west 12th street car where there’s a lot of joints and said that guy you know he drank all night and he took money all night and then the end of the shift he said he counted out the money on the on the bent seat and said and pushed part of it over said here this is yours and ray said i told him i said yeah i don’t need that man it got on out he said they’d never assigned me to ride with anybody again i’m a one-man car from then on so.

[24:44] Yeah, man, being a cop was wild back in the old days.

[24:50] It was crazy. It was a great life, though. I tell you, I had a great 25 years myself. It was interesting. Paid me to do some of that stuff. You got me nine books. You got nine books out there? I got nine books out, yeah. All right. Well, guys, I’ll make sure I put a link to his author page. That’s the easiest way to find Tim’s books is go to his author page on Amazon. Tim, tell me some other stories that you remember, those kind of little personal stories. Remember anything else about dealing with these guys?

[25:25] Yeah, there was a guy, another, he wasn’t a mafia guy. He was too smart to be a mafia guy. I’m talking about Donald Ray Wolbright. Have you ever heard that name? It sounds vaguely familiar. I may know it from your book. I get so much in my head. Donald Ray Wolbright was the guy that did the burglary on Howard Hughes’ warehouse in Long Beach, California, and stole a bunch of stuff, including a lot of money. He was a safe man. He was actually a car dealer, but he was a safe man. And he went to L.A. and was selling Cadillacs. And in the meantime, he was staking out. He had a long-range plan. It was to do Howard Hughes’ safe. in Long Beach, and he did it. He was a safe cracker. Anyway, he came back to say, well, he stole all this stuff, and he stole these CIA documents pertaining to a Russian submarine that had sunk.

[26:24] And the CIA paid Howard Hughes to try to retrieve the submarine or whatever. Anyway, he had all these documents. It was supposed to be top secret stuff. And Donald Ray Wilbright obtained him in a lot of money and a lot of jewelry, too. And he came back to St. Louis flush with money because the FBI was going to arrest him. And he said, I didn’t donate. I’m in possession of this stuff because a guy gave him to me. But I want to get rid of him, and I’ll sell him back to the government. And so he did. He sold all this stuff back to the federal government because the federal government didn’t want any publicity on it. So he sold all this top secret CIA stuff back to the government for a lot of money. And he came back to saying, oh, it’s flush. Well, the FBI here was furious, man, because they knew Donald Ray. He was a notorious murderer and burglar. He was notorious.

[27:19] And he was just a very successful crook. And so the FBI hated him. So they had to follow him around all the time. You know, whores for the FBI, man. They said, follow Donald Ray Wolbright. And so this is what we did. Like for a week, we followed him around, you know. And he knew he was being followed. And we would write his license plate number down from people he talked to. And then he’d stop and write our license plate number down. Oh, it was crazy. Yeah, I know.

[27:43] So Donald Ray Wobright, he was just notorious, man. And, you know, Jesse Stoneking, did you ever hear about Jesse Stoneking? Oh, yeah, you got a bunch of them in your book. Now I can’t remember, but… Well, Jesse Stoneking is the reason there isn’t any more mafia in St. Louis. He was a notorious murder thief.

[28:03] Professional crook. And he was also a car thief. And he had gone to prison over here in Illinois for some kind of a car theft. I don’t know what it was. And Tom Fox, an FBI agent here, who was really, really smart, and his partner, whose name I can’t remember, they went over and interviewed him. They tried to roll him over. And he said, it isn’t going to work, man. I’m not going to do that for you. But before he went to prison, And he had told Art Burney, who was in charge of, now in charge of the Eastside mob, he took a bus to Orton’s place. And he worked for Art Burney. He said, I’ll go ahead and take the ball on this. But he had two families. He said, you take care of my families. He actually had two sets of wives, kids, dogs, cats, houses. And he said, you take care of my families while I’m going. And I said, we’ll take care of them. We’ll take care of them. Well, they didn’t. And his wives would come to the prison to visit him and say, we’re destitute. Nobody’s taking care of us. Well, it pissed him off. So he got out and he called Tom Fox and he said, I’ll work for you. So they wired him and he went into all these people. He had the reputation that if he walked in a room, Crooks would flock to him, brag about what they’d done. And, uh, it was, it was just amazing.

[29:19] Even people that want Crooks would go up and say, I did a, I burned my car the other day, you know, because it was in the car I burned. I got the money for, I mean, it was all on tape. All these people went to prison. He even got some guys. I think Joey Ayupa may have gone to prison because of that. But all these dark and nice crime guys took falls. And he did it. Jesse Stumpkin did it. But he robbed a guy, a friend of mine, over in Brussels, Illinois, an old politician. He was really wealthy. And they were gambling together. And he beat him up and took his diamond ring. It was like a 15-karat diamond ring. And they sealed off. It was on an island. And they sealed the island off.

[30:00] And they started taking names to everybody that came out. Well, Jesse Stoneking’s best buddy was there. And they got his name. So the Illinois police came over to our office because they knew we had dossiers and all these people. They said, what do you think it went on? I said, what the hell does Jesse Stoneking? And they said, well, he’s in prison. I said, no, he’s not. I just saw him last week at a restaurant over in Belleville, Illinois. And we used to go over there. There’s this restaurant all the house used to eat at. We’d go over there and glare at them. They’d glare back. But he was over there anyway. Yeah. so jesse i i hated him for knocking that old man over he was a friend of mine so we did a car check he was he was with mike trippiano and they split up and they ran to their cars and took off and so i i told my partner stop jesse’s talking so we stopped him broad daylight, i was mad at him i made him get out of the car yeah and i i told him i said.

[30:52] I said, Jesse, you better carry yourself back to East St. Louis where you belong, man. You don’t belong over here. And I said, and you knocked over a buddy of mine over in Brussels, Illinois. I don’t appreciate that, man. I said, you probably don’t know how I know that, do you, Jesse? And he just looked at me. And I said, you’re going to get hurt real bad if you don’t carry yourself back to Illinois. And he said, well, maybe the FBI would like to know that. And I said, hey, man, I don’t get a damn about the FBI. Are you either? So he took off. I got back in the car. They called me in the office. Did you do a car check on Jesse Stone King? I said, yeah. I said, did you threaten to kill him? I said, no. They said, it’s on tape, man. You did. I said, oh, that’s Jesse Stone King. Yeah. Oh, shit. It was on tape. He was wired, Tim. Yeah. He was wired, man. Oh, shit, Tim. Oh, shit. Oh, yeah. I got all kinds of shit for that one, man. Oh, I can imagine. I was in big time trouble. And so Jesse Stone King Everybody wants to kill him For being a snitch He snitched on I don’t know 50 guys 50 guys Including you Yeah including me He got it all on tape He was all taped.

[32:00] In fact he even went to trial And testified it In federal court What he had done And, But he didn’t get Mike Trippiano He didn’t get He didn’t take But the jury wouldn’t go along with it Because I hated Jesse Stone King More than I hated Mike Trippiano Everything was over with And he didn’t want to go into witness protection. He had these two families. You know, he just wanted to live. So he bopped around hiding, and he’d come in and see his families, and he’d go hide somewhere else.

[32:30] Eventually, he ended up in, Arizona, somewhere in Arizona, and he had a car repossession company. And this is FBI information. It was in a newspaper. He was in a car, and a cop, a local cop, did a car check on him. And the guy driving the car got out to talk to the cop, and Jesse allegedly shot himself in the head, committed suicide. That’s a damn lie. And so they put that in the same newspaper. He’s still around here. I’m sure he is.

[33:01] Interesting. So then, yeah, he’s still kicking because he’d be 80 now. Tim, Timothy C. Richards, Cops Kill and Cops Lie and several other books, which, guys, if you want to learn a whole lot more about St. Louis and Eat St. Louis. And, you know, we talked a lot about, guys, if you’re not familiar with the geography of the area, it’s kind of like Kansas City, Missouri and Kansas City, Kansas. You got the Mississippi River over there, and then you talked about an island. And I assume that was an island out in the river where they did that robbery. It was way north. Way north up by Alton. And so that whole East St. Louis area is notorious for strip clubs and library racketeering and really more notorious for two-bit criminals. And you can get anything you want in East St. Louis. It’s kind of like KCK. Kind of like a third world country in a way. Definitely. It definitely is.

[33:55] All right, Tim. Thanks a lot. Thanks so much for coming on. Okay, Gary. Thanks for having me. Don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. So when you’re out on the streets there and you’re a big F-150, watch out for those little motorcycles when you’re out. If you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to the VA website. They’ll help with your drugs and alcohol problem if you’ve got that problem or gambling. If not, you can go to Anthony Ruggiano. He’s a counselor down in Florida. He’s got a hotline on his website. If you’ve got a problem with gambling, most states will have, If you have gambling, most states will have a hotline number to call. Just have to search around for it. You know, I’ve always got stuff to sell. I got my books. I got my movies. They’re all on Amazon just going. I got links down below in the show notes and just go to my Amazon sales page and you can figure out what to do. I really appreciate you all tuning in and we’ll keep coming back and doing this. Thanks, guys.