Jack Goes Bad - Part 2 - Words are Weapons

Lara:

Hi everyone! Thanks for listening today! We made it to the season one finale! Counting our two bonus episodes, we managed to churn out 49 in 47 weeks, and in those 11 months there have been over 27,000 downloads. 

Nina:

And that’s all thanks to you guys for sharing the podcast. Hopefully at the end of next season we’ll be reporting a hundred thousand downloads! 

Lara:

Who knows, maybe even more!

Truly it’s been a great adventure.

Nina: 

And a lot of work!

Lara:

I’ve written enough pages to fill three books, and you’ve done enough research for at least five!

Nina:

Well maybe there are other books on the horizon for us besides Double Deal.

Lara:

Are you trying to tease our listeners again?

Nina: 

I’d never do something like that.

Lara:

Nah, not you! You’re the innocent looking one, but people have no idea.

Back to all of you, our listeners, Nina and I have had the chance to get acquainted with folks that we otherwise might not have, and it’s been wonderful interacting with those of you out there who comment and write to us. Shout out to Charlie, Wanda, David and Mark! We love all of our listeners, so please don’t think otherwise. 

Nina:

Oh I hope so! And yes, hearing from our listeners makes my research, and Lara’s endless writing worth the effort! I too want to thank everyone who has spread the word about us. Other than a few tweets a week and a random Facebook or Instagram post, it’s all of you that helped  us gain more listeners.

Lara:

Indeed!

OK, a couple of other things before we get into the finale. Our next full episode, which will be the season two premier, will be up on September 12th at 9 am (EST), our usual schedule. Starting next Monday August 1st through September 5th, I’ll be posting some short clips atour usual time. For our YouTube peeps you’ll actually get to see me. Maybe I can persuade Nina to join me once or twice. We’ll also have a surprise guest who will share some first hand stories with us. If any of you have a specific question or something you want to hear more about, leave a comment on YouTube or email me at lara@doubledealpodcast.com by Thursday, July 28th. I’ll do my best.

Nina:

Maybe, just maybe you can twist my arm to join you once! We’ll see. I like being the behind the scenes girl. You’re the flashy one.

Lara:

At least you didn’t say the trashy one!

Nina: 

Hey, those are your words not mine!

Anyhow, in this episode, we’ll be having a few flashbacks, but primarily focusing on the events that unfolded after the Brink’s heist of December of 1968 which is where we left off last week. We’ll end today just prior to the arrests in August of 1969 with the infamous meeting in the parking lot of the Rib Room in Braintree.

Lara:

And what a cast of characters and what a subject was discussed at that meeting.

Nina: 

And I’ll have to wait another month and a half to tell the story about how Richie, Pro and Rico broke poor SA Gerard Comen! I still think your dad’s tale to Comen after Pro was arrested is what finally put him over the edge, but that’s going to have to wait until September 12th.

Lara:

I still think it was Pro in his undies!

Nina:

Now you’re teasing our listeners!

Lara:

Couldn’t let you have all the fun!

Nina:

Oh please, you have plenty of fun, but let’s not go down that path. Enough of the banter.

Last week, we talked a little bit about why Jack decided it was time to retire, and how he decided to take out a few of his nemesis in the process. You’ll recall that Sonny Diaferio and Mello Merlino had stolen $300,000 of the Plymouth loot that Jack had entrusted to them. They were supposed to launder it through the gas station and tire shop that the two men ran together. But instead they had the bright idea to fake its destruction by setting an apartment on fire that Sonny had rented to store the cash. Their plan was to tell Jack that the money had been destroyed in the accidental fire. While the building was burning not far from Sonny’s apartments which the postals and Feds had under surveillance, they moved it to Maine to a fellow car thief friend of Mello’s named Bobby Gentile. 

Wasn’t SA H Paul Rico watching them across the street when they set the fire? 

Lara:

Yes, that day Rico happened to be there watching!

Nina:

Well, Sonny and Mello successfully moved the money, but of course Jack knew in his gut they were lying. And this wouldn’t be the only nail they hammered into their own coffins. 

Lara:

We’ll get to that!

Between Sonny and Mello robbing from him, the theft of the Plymouth reward money, the years of surveillance by the authorities and decades of dealing with underworld characters, Jack had had enough and wanted out. But in Jack’s position you couldn’t just walk away. Two of the men in Jack’s world were CIs for the Feds at various times, dad was the one Jack knew about. And so they hatched a plan no less elaborate than one of their heists plotted out to the last detail. In true dad fashion it was the long game they focused on. 

Although nearly 20 years younger than Jack, dad wanted out too. Not out of his life of crime, but he desired a new way to rob. Rather than use a pistol, he decided to use his tongue. His skills of persuasion would net far bigger scores than his machine gun toting days. With a child on the way, me, he too plotted his escape.

Nina:

And they weren’t the only ones. SA H. Paul Rico wanted out of Boston. He had dreams of living in a warmer climate, and Jack and Richie presented him with an opportunity to not just get out of Boston, but to leave with a major bust unlike any other under his belt. Jack, the man described as a prolific thief, was his one way ticket to paradise on the sunny beaches of Florida. 

Lara:

Now that we’ve answered the why, let’s backtrack a bit to the how. You might remember from the last episode that Jack initiated the first part of his plan in the summer of 1968 when he made contact with Phil Cresta’s crew. The deal with Phil was that Jack would get a cut of the proceeds from the score. But Jack jinxed the job and cost Cresta and his crew over a million dollars by making them postpone the job until after the Christmas holiday. The jinx was necessary so that Jack could bow out without raising any suspicions on the part of the other men in the crew. Jack had also introduced Mello and Sonny into the job. Killing three birds with one stone!

Nina:

Jack always did love a bargain. 

Lara:

Filene’s basement shopper! Buying those rubber rain shoe covers…

Nina:

The odd man out was Steve Roukous and it’s still a little unclear who added him in and why. Maybe Jack had something against him too. I could only find two stories about Steve’s record. First, he’d unsuccessfully tried to rob a bank back in 1955. He threw his co-conspirator under the bus and testified that he didn’t know they were going to rob the bank until they got there. Sounds like Whitey Bulger’s version of events about his first bank robbery. Roukous’ partner was sentenced to 12-15 years in prison, and Steve walked away with a $50 fine for carrying a gun illegally.

Then in 1966, Roukous made the papers again, when he tried to sell someone’s stolen gun collection to a Boston lawyer. 

Lara:

Cresta and the other men went through with it, however, and the heist went off without a hitch, though the score was significantly less than what they’d anticipated. 

Jack still got his cut from the $500,000 Brinks score that Cresta and the others had taken down the Saturday after Christmas. The Brink’s guard, Andrew DeLeary, who had given them the route and the key for the truck had also been given a cut of about 10 percent of the proceeds from the score. Not too shabby. 

Nina:

Then Jack sat back and waited to implement the next phase of his plan. In March, Jack called Cresta on the phone, “We got trouble.”

Jack had been calling the Brinks guard every few days to check in on him and make sure he wasn’t drawing any attention to himself by spending too much in one place. But, he now confessed to Cresta that he hadn’t been able to get ahold of DeLeary for the past week, and hadn’t spoken to him for ten days.

“Listen, Red, if the feds got to him, we all go down, you understand? Find him before I do!” Phil threatened before hanging up.

Another three days went by before Domenico went to Cresta and told him that DeLeary had taken off on vacation to the Bahamas with his whole family, including his in-laws. 

When DeLeary returned, the Feds closed in on him as a suspect. The story Phil and Billy Cresta told was that the Brinks guard, DeLeary, was given the same treatment Tommy Richards was given by the Postal Inspectors. All his friends and neighbors were interviewed, he was stalked everywhere he went, and his phone was tapped. All in hopes that he would break down and confess everything. But unlike Tommy who endured the harassment campaign for years, DeLeary didn’t even last two months. 

In late April, Jack called Phil again. To add more drama to the scene, Jack whispered into the phone, “We got more trouble…. DeLeary called me and he’s about to crack.”

By now Phil was convinced that the Feds had everyone’s phones tapped, including Jack and DeLeary’s. 

“If he turns, Phil, we all go down.” Jack threatened.

Lara:

DeLeary had never met Cresta, but he had met Domenico, who the cops now picked up for questioning. But they couldn’t hold Domenico since there was still nothing to connect him to the robbery.

Phil tried to come up with a plan to kill DeLeary, even going so far as to scope out the police station, but by then it was already too late. The indictments came down on May 14th. Jack, Domenico, and DeLeary, were all arrested that day. But the first to be arrested was Billy Cresta! Phil was already on his way to Chicago.

While it was true that DeLeary had never met Cresta or the other men in the crew except for Domenico, there was one person who knew every participant and every detail of the job. And that was Jack.

Nina:

Jack was arrested at Lara’s family’s grocery store on Charles Street in Beacon Hill, Brendan’s Market. What Cresta and company and everyone but Richie and Rico didn’t realize is Jack had been plotting, scheming and planning his own demise for more than 11 months at this point.

Lara:

And not just his own demise, but everyone who crossed him. Jack would serve out his own justice. What the authorities didn’t realize or couldn’t realize was that they too were on Jack’s list. 

Nina:

Next season!

On May 23rd, Jack and company were arraigned. Paul Markham, the former assistant US Attorney who had helped prosecute Jack and his cohorts at the Plymouth Mail Robbery Trial, and who would later be tied to the death of Mary Jo Kopechne, represented DeLeary. Jack was represented by F. Lee Bailey’s then partner and future judge Gerald Alch. The papers said that Jack’s appearance in the courthouse caused quite a stir.

Lara:

Oh I bet!

DeLeary was freed on his own recognisance and placed in protective custody. Jack’s bail was set at $200,000 a few days later.

After the bail was set, dad arranged a meeting between the leaderless crew to discuss their current predicament. Pro Lerner, Roy Appleton, Sonny Diaferio, Mello Merlino and dad met in a small conference room that dad had secured at the Holiday Inn in Fall River. Each of them knew that Jack could put them in prison for the rest of their lives. The first to speak up was Roy. “We’ve got to get Jack out of there. Being locked up like that’s going to drive him fucking nuts,” Roy rambled on.

Mello put his two cents in, “You stand what ya gotta stand. Jack can put up the 200 large and be back on the street.”

White teeth flashing and gum snapping Sonny chimed in, “How the hell can he put up that kind of scratch? He can’t let anyone near his stash.”

Loyal to a fault, Pro weighed in, “We have to put up the money. We have to get him out of there.”

Dad asked, “Who’s got two hundred thousand? You? Me?”

“And what if we don’t come up with two hundred large and Jack goes bad?” Sonny asked with his gum snapping grin morphing into something much more maniacal. 

Dad stood up from the table and declared, “Jack don’t go bad.”

Mello snapped back, “Yeah but if he does we’re all going away.” Mello’s face took on a similar look to Sonny’s, “What if we can come up with a hundred grand between us. I’ve got a guy in Roxbury who’ll go for the other half. Think about what Jack knows, and if he goes bad…. So we bail him out and take him out. Jack goes away. El gonzo, and we don’t have to worry about him going bad. Maybe we could get him to pay my guy off for the 200 and we make him go away too. We can all eat good for a while.”

Nina:

No wonder Richie had it in for Mello all those years. And what a plan. Scrape, beg and borrow for the bail money, get Jack out, make him pay it back from his stash, kill Jack and rob and kill the loan shark. But Pro wasn’t having any of it. He slowly pushed his long lean frame up from the table and leaned across to Mello placing his hands a couple of inches from Mello. The color drained from Mello’s face. Pro’s steely eyes penetrated Mello’s soul as he hissed out, “I don’t want to hear anything about Jack going away. Everything this guy has done for us. If I have to go into fucking Charles Street and take out everyone who gets in my way and take Jack out of there myself, I’ll do it. One way or another he’s getting out of there.”

Pro looked around the table in an effort to determine which one of his compatriots was with him. Who besides him had Jack’s back? Shit eating grin Sonny leaned back in his chair and said, “He’s crazy enough to do it.”

Lara:

Mello still hadn’t bought it, “Just think about it for a little while. If Jack goes away, none of us has a headache.” And with that remark they each rose and left the conference room, staggering out in defeat to find their car and contemplate the next move. After 10 minutes or so they had all disappeared into the darkness except dad. He sat there in his car deep in thought, but he wasn’t there just to contemplate the events of the evening. The reason he was still parked there was to watch a lone Fed enter the hotel to retrieve the small tape recorder that was attached to the underside of the table of the conference room that dad was the last to leave, ensuring the door was left ajar. Dad always liked to hedge his bets. Rico wanted a sure thing and didn’t trust Jack not to  pull a fast one. The recording of the conversation was enough to lock-in Jack’s co-operation, but what Rico didn’t know is that when dad suggested it to him, he and Jack had planned it months in advance. Jack had his own agenda.

Nina:

Agent Comen made a beeline back to Boston. When he arrived at the Charles Street Jail a guard escorted him to Jack’s cell where Comen placed the tape recorder on a small table that was attached to the wall, pressed play and walked out. Comen had the tape cued up and ready to set Jack on fire. Jack listened to the familiar voices talking about killing him, cops, guards, the loan shark and so on. As cynical and ruthless as Jack was, he still had a hard time believing his ears. He knew what to expect and from whom, but it was still hard to swallow. These were his men. The men he trained, schooled, nurtured and kept on the street. The men he gave the opportunity to earn fantastic sums of money they never would otherwise. And what did he get in return? Roy and Richie saying he wouldn’t go bad and Pro ready to kill dozens of people. Jack was a thief like no other before or after him, and he may have been a killer but only when it was business. He had a code and didn’t deviate from it.

Lara:

And he stuck with the plan. Rico knew from the prior experience with Barboza that the jail guards would leak that the Feds were there for a visit, and they would definitely leak that Jack was moved at a later time. Jack called out to the guard and told him, “Tell them I want to talk.”

“Who?” asked the guard.

“The Feebees, the Feds.”

“What you want to tell them?”

“Almost everything.”

Nina:

The next morning Roy Appleton arrived at Charles Street to see Jack as he had planned with a multitude of Rolaids for him. As they sat across from each other Jack leaned in and said, “Don’t worry and tell Richie the same.”

“What about the others?” Roy asked.

“Sonny and Mello are going away for lying to me about the money and the apartment fire. Pro is going for other reasons.”

“Pro? He’s as loyal to you as a dog. He’d do anything for you.”

“That’s why. I created a monster, a Golem, and he has to be stopped. We have to think of our families, he has to be put away.”

“Jesus Christ,” Roy moaned.

Lara:

Later that morning, June 6th, Jack Kelley became a cooperating witness. The official line was that Jack’s wife convinced him to turn State's evidence. After all, the Feds couldn’t say that not only did they have one informant in Jack’s crew for 7 years, but a second one and that one of them along with Rico cooked up a scheme to help the country’s most successful thief retire.

Nina:

After making his “formal” deal with the Feds Jack was transferred from Charles Street Jail to the Barnstable County House of Correction where the first round of interviews began on June 6th with SA H. Paul Rico and SA Robert E. Sheehan. The first crime he gave a statement about was the murder of Rudy Marfeo and his driver Anthony Melei. If you haven’t listened to our episode about that, please check out Gaslit, episode 43. 

Jack began his tale by telling the Feds that six to seven weeks before Easter of 1968 he met Pro Lerner in Watertown, and they went to play pool in a parlor near the First National Bank in Kenmore Square. There Pro told Jack that “George” aka Raymond Patriarca was beside himself over Rudy Marfeo’s gambling operation on the Hill and how Marfeo was defying George every way possible. Pro told Jack that Marfeo was sending messages to George that he could go fuck himself and that he, Rudy Marfeo, was running everything and not George. 

Jack also claimed that Pro told him Louis “Baby Shanks” Manocchio had been shot and that Patriarca was all over Manocchio for not “taking out” Marfeo already. Supposedly that was when Sciarra and Manocchio cooked up the idea to bring Jack in to help with the planning and execution of Marfeo. They ran it by Patriarca and decided that Pannone’s Market was the best place to do it because a cruiser followed Marfeo everywhere except the market since the area was so crowded. They approached Pro to ask Jack for a meet and that he did.

Lara:

A few weeks later, Manocchio requested that Jack and Pro Lerner venture to Rhode Island to meet with him about a problem he had. Pro picked up Jack near his favorite night spot, The Scene in Brighton, MA. Jack and Pro drove to Rhode Island that day and had a meeting with Louis in a motel room. Later that evening he, Pro and Louis also met with Rudy Sciarra. Manocchio and Sciarra told Jack and Pro about the problem they had with Rudy Marfeo and recounted their failed attempts to take him out. Jack recalled how Louis was apprehensive to use Jack directly in the hit as he looked like a cop according to Louis.

Nina:

Why? Because he was Irish?

Several more trips were made to Rhode Island to meet and discuss the hit. On one occasion they supposedly met at an Italian Restaurant not in the Federal Hill section of Providence and sat down with Raymond Patriarca who Jack claimed he had met “casually” previously. 

At no time in Jack’s initial statements did he name the restaurant.

Lara:

Not once!

During that encounter, Manocchio and Sciarra told Raymond that they were “lining up Marfeo” and Raymond had little to say other than he didn’t want to hear any stories but wanted Marfeo dead. Manocchio assured Raymond that Jack would assist them in their mission. There was no mention of money or compensation of any type. Louis, Sciarra, Pro and Jack left together and headed to the Holiday Inn or the Gateway motel to discuss possible means of taking out Rudy Marfeo.

Jack who had the memory of an elephant right down to the most minute detail couldn’t remember the restaurant or hotel? Come on! He could remember the numbers of every license plate he passed in clumps of ten. Dad always said that Jack could remember stains on a table cloth or someone’s shirt, the color, size, location and possible composition. To think that he couldn’t recall important details is ridiculous.

Nina:

Shhhh! You’re ruining the Fed magic!

Lara:

You mean the Fed fiction!

Nina:

During that meeting it was agreed that Sciarra would not partake in the hit as he had too much heat on him. Rhode Island State Police Colonel Walter Stone was discussed as he was not adverse to stopping and searching Raymond’s guys whenever he or the other Troopers spotted them on the street. Manocchio gave Jack and Pro details about Rudy Marfeo’s schedule, in particular his Saturday morning routine that involved grocery shopping in the Silver Lake area of Providence. The store was described by Jack as a delicatessen, and upon investigation, Jack said the store was not a suitable place for a hit as there were “danger factors” including blind spots and a back room where Rudy could seek refuge and shoot it out with his would be assassins. But Louis had been planning it for a while and even had the red and black Buick already tucked away for the big day. Louis told Jack that the hit was to take place the Saturday before Easter and the hitters would stay in Louis’ house awaiting the call that Marfeo was en route.

But the week before the hit was planned, a young boy was killed at the home of Rudy Sciarra by another young boy. (PULL THE CLIPPING)

Lara:

The young boy who was killed was related to Bobby Fairbrothers and it was Sciarra’s son who shot him after finding a loaded .38 in a box in the backyard. I remember hearing that story over and over again when I was little. Awful. There was another story about one of those Rhode Island guys who killed his own daughter because of a guy she was dating. For the life of me I can’t remember who. Sorry back to Jack.

After the delay Jack suggested that the hot car be moved to the public golf course where Manocchio, Pro, Fairbrothers and Johnny whose last name Jack couldn’t remember would wait for Jack’s signal. Jack would have a second hot car parked on a parallel street to the store where the hit would take place to be used as a getaway car. Jack stated they met in Rhode Island one final time the night before the hit was to took place.

Nina:

“Johnny” was Johnny Rossi, “Alfredo the Blind’” Pig Rossi’s son. And his surname wasn’t the only one that Jack conveniently couldn’t recall. Jack continued on to describe how a man named Frank and he hung around the golf course with their binoculars watching the hot car. By 12:30 pm Frank was nervous and wanted to leave because the hit was supposed to have taken place by 11:00 am. Suddenly they saw Louis, Pro, Fairbrothers and Johnny jump into the red and black Buick with the carbine, a pump action shotgun and other equipment Jack said he provided them with. Jack and Frank hopped into their car and caught up with the foursome in the Buick. When Jack and Frank pulled alongside them Louis directed Frank to park their car near his which was already at the market. There was a third car parked about 60 feet from the market where Jack instructed Frank to drop him off before parking that vehicle. Jack told him that he would then pick him and the others up in the fresh getaway car. 

Lara:

But just as Jack was being dropped off Frank spotted Pro coming up the street at a fast pace in the getaway car that Jack was supposed to use. The hit had already gone down and Pro had to get the second vehicle on his own because Frank had taken a wrong turn and added two minutes to their journey. Jack, stranded, had to hail a taxi and make his way back to downtown Providence. There he used a payphone to call the Gateway motel and confirmed that Manocchio, Frank and Pro were there. When Jack arrived at their motel room, Pro told him that another “kid’ and Rudy Marfeo’s girlfriend were also in the store. He told Jack that they took out Marfeo first then the other kid, but didn’t touch the girlfriend.

As we mentioned in episode 43, every Saturday Rudy Marfeo purchased groceries for his girlfriend, Mary Baccari, who was living in the house of the late Tiger Billetto. 

Nina:

Back to the hit. Jack recalled that Pro might have told him that he had used a shotgun. Then he gave Jack the bad news that all of the equipment had been left in the hot car. Jack was livid. Manocchio reassured Jack that they would collect the weapons and clothing later that day, but that never happened as the police discovered the vehicle in a matter of hours. 

The Feds questioned Jack about the make and model of the weapons but said he couldn’t recall as they had been purchased years back and not for that job specifically. Jack continued on that he drove Pro back to the Brookline area and dropped Pro off in Brighton not far from his home. He reiterated that he did not receive payment for his involvement in the hit, but he believed Pro had. To wrap up his statement about the Marfeo/Melei hit he told Rico and Sheehan that Johnny was the driver of the hit car and that Johnny’s father was a tailor.

Lara:

Tailor? Johnny’s father was a fur thief and a bookie!

Nina:

Hey, Jack didn’t want to make disparaging remarks about the Blind Pig!

Lara:

Yeah ok. The Feds showed Jack a photo array, and he picked out John Rossi as his Johnny. Included in the photos was one of Louis “Baby Shanks” Manocchio, Rudy Sciarra, Pro Lerner and Raymond Patriarca. He identified them correctly and said he referred to Raymond as George which was what many in those circles referred to Raymond as. In a second photo array he identified Fred Chiampa, Benedict Oddo and Frank Vendituoli as the man he knew as Frank.

Nina:

The US Marshals took Jack into protective custody on July 3rd 1969. His whereabouts were kept secret and only the interviewing agents and the Marshals knew his location. John Partington would later describe his time guarding Jack in his book The Mob and Me.

Partington’s description of Jack was great:

“I’ll never forget the first time I met Red Kelley. His ruddy-complexioned face reminded me of a giant leprechaun’s. Shocks of gray ran through his thinning red mane. At six foot one, he was two inches taller than I and built like a cement block.” 

Jack buttered Partington up, calling him by first name, and flattering him by telling him that he’d tried to kill Joe Barboza and other government witnesses that Partington had been assigned to protect. “I couldn’t get near ‘em. That’s when I decided that if I ever needed to, I’d go into Witness Protection because you could protect me.”

Lara:

Oh that’s the story where Pro was out on Vinnie Teresa’s boat all done up in the scuba gear cruising around Gloucester looking for a chance to take out Barboza. Dad said they were always driving around with that damn scuba gear in case they had to shuttle Pro to the coast. Bunch of nuts. But as far as taking out anyone else in witness protection. Who the hell was in WP from the New England area between Barboza and Jack? Vinnie didn’t go in until after Jack.

Nina:

He was blowing smoke up his ass!

“Red Kelley was the most secretive man I ever met, “ said Partington.

Lara:

Dad was a close second I’m sure. He learned well from Jack.

Nina:

Partington shared an anecdote about Jack too, “Anyone who crossed paths with Red Kelley would say Kelley was tough, so they might have been surprised to hear two things: first, he loved his orange mongrel cat and constantly carried it around in his arms, petting it; and second, he was deathly afraid of flying.”

Lara:

I told you he used to feed his cats with a teaspoon. All of those guys with their pets!

The debriefings continued, and the stories always changed a little. New details being added each time.

Nina:

That’s what happens when the Feds are telling you what to say!

Lara: 

Fed magic.  The Marfeo/Melei hit wasn’t the only early topic of discussion. Of course the December Brink’s heist was priority number one. In the immortal words of Sonny Mercurio, “I advocate for taking it on the lam. Everyone should run”, Sonny Diafero, Mello Merlino, Rocco Novello, Phil Cresta and Stephen Roukus all took it on the lam. By June 10th they were on the wanted list. The VA robbery was also part of Jack’s agreement. And who did he give up? Ben Tilley, his and Raymond Patriarca’s old partner. He fingered Tilley and Charles Domenico for the heist and shooting. And now you get to tell us about Ben and the parking meters!

Nina:

Finally! I swear you just want to see me suffer!

Lara:

Hey don’t get all melodramatic here!

Nina:

Never!

In April of 1962, Ben Tilley was in the newspapers again. This time with Stanley Gusciora’s brother. Longtime listeners might remember from our third episode about the Great Brinks Robbery that Stanley Gusciora was a suspect in the heist and that the Feds harassed the Gusciora family for years as they tried to break the case. Stanley ended up dying in prison awaiting trial in the summer of ‘56. 

Anyway, Ben Tilley and Joseph Gusciora were arrested while robbing the dime parking meters in downtown Boston. Tilley had $1800 in cash on him and a little under $250 in coins in a bag in his car. Gusciora was in possession of $29 in dimes. And how were they raiding the parking meters? With a key that Tilley had hidden in the cuff of his pants.

Lara:

According to Billy Cresta, industrious Phil had stolen a few parking meters several months previously, and had taken them to Chicago where had keys made for them. When he returned to Boston, he promptly set to work using the keys to rob parking meters across the city. After several months the local cops started to get suspicious and began investigating. Eventually they figured out that it was not an inside job. At that point, Phil had multiple keys made and started selling them at $1500 a piece to other guys at a club in the North End. But the caveat was that they couldn’t tell anyone else that they had a key. One of his dozen or so victims was Ben Tilley. It was just a few weeks later that Ben and Joe were arrested.

Tilley was arraigned and pleaded not guilty in Municipal Court. He was tried and sentenced a few months later, but appealed the case, taking it all the way to the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court who denied his appeal. But Ben was out just in time for the VA robbery!

Nina:

As Jack continued to give statements and make Grand Jury appearances, the Mafia were beside themselves. Jack may have just seemed like some grumpy middle aged man to the average person on the street, but he was anything but. From the local guys all the way to Carlo Gambino, Jack had their ear, and they sought his counsel over the years. Everyone was concerned.

Lara:

And that brings us to the Rib Room. On the morning of August 8th dad received a phone call from Pro telling him that they had to meet. Dad drove to the parking lot of the Rib Room at the South Shore Plaza in Braintree. Pro motioned for dad to get in the passenger seat of his car. Before their conversation could begin Louis Manocchio, Rudy Sciarra and Frank Venditouli joined them.

Nina:

I have to interrupt you! Five grown men piled in a car in August! I can’t!

Lara:

I’ve been trying to visualize it for years. I don’t know about Vendituoli, but the other four were ALWAYS dapped out in those days! I just picture them all in their suits shvitzing away in the car. And they weren’t the only one’s at the meet. Billy Kenney showed up because he had a meeting with dad and Rudy, but Pro told him to wait in his own car.

Nina:

Well, it wasn’t like there was room in his car!

Lara:

I’m thinking it was more about the subject matter.

Pro began to question dad about his meetings with SA H. Paul Rico. The subject of dad being a former CI for the Boston Office and his being bounced after going on the radio declaring he was a double agent for the postal inspectors in connection to the mail robbery was briefly discussed. 

Nina:

That was one way of getting free of Rico’s clutches.

Lara:

Dad was industrious!

Pro wanted to know exactly where they met, if Rico was alone, in his own car, etc. Dad told Pro that another agent usually was present for the meets. Pro wanted details. Did Rico lock the doors of his car? Were the windows rolled up? Where did each of them sit in the vehicle? Dad went into detail about their meetings. Pro told dad that he believed Jack was providing information to the Feds about all of the men in the car, and they were all expecting to be arrested in the future. And they had a plan!

Nina:

Richie was to call SA Rico and tell him that it was urgent that they meet. Rico was to meet Richie at a pre-arranged location. When Rico and the other agent arrived, Richie was to get into their vehicle at which point Pro, Manocchio, Sciarra and Venditouli would approach the car, gain access and take control of the weapons of the two agents. Both agents would be driven to a remote location where SA Comen would be shot with a silencer equipped gun and his body left there. This would convince Rico they meant business. Thirty minutes later, Richie would call the FBI office and tell them that he had been waiting for thirty minutes and Rico was a no show. Pro and company would force Rico to take them to Jack’s location where he was being guarded by the Marshals. The Marshals would let down their guard upon seeing Rico at which point Pro, Manocchio, Sciara and Vendituoli would kill Rico, the Marshals and Jack.

Lara:

Pro stated that if he was to be wounded or killed, Manocchio was to take charge of the mission. Before the end of the meeting, Pro questioned dad about Rico’s home address. Dad said he only knew Rico lived in Belmont. Pro said he already knew that Rico lived in Belmont as they had been conducting their own surveillance of him in an effort to ascertain the exact location of his home, but were unable to with any certainty. Dad was to wait for Pro’s call, and with that the meeting at the Rib Room came to an end. August would turn out to be a very busy month!

Nina:

But our listeners have to wait until September 12th to hear what happened next!

Lara:

Hope all of you enjoy the rest of your summer. Stay tuned for our minis! We’ll be back next month!

Nina & Lara:

Bye!!!