With no formal education in finance or banking, it was believed he owed his appointment to the bank position to his friendship with Michele Sindona, the man known as “God’s Banker.”
Sindona was an international financier who controlled more than 140 companies around the globe. For many years it was believed the Vatican bankers followed his lead very closely, pouring millions of dollars in Vatican funds into his ventures, not all of them eventually profitable. When the Sindona empire finally collapsed, the Italian press reported that the Vatican had lost more than $100 million.
Sindona, it appeared to some, used the Vatican Bank as his personal slush fund to transfer funds secretly (and illegally) out of Italy and to launder illegally obtained cash and counterfeit or stolen securities, sometimes at the behest of the Sicilian and American Mafias.
In 1972 all of this was speculation, however—the instinctive beliefs and hunches of law enforcement agencies and legitimate financial analysts and advisers. These groups generally agreed that Marcinkus, at first, was duped by Sindona, but eventually had to know what was going on. Then, instead of bringing the illegal dealings to a halt, he jumped in with both feet, probably to avoid major scandal.
But if Joe Coffey was to have his way, major scandal was about to come down on the Vatican anyway. He went to Hogan and to the strike force and demanded that Marcinkus be questioned with the aim of indicting him as a part of Rizzo’s scheme to counterfeit and steal $950 million in American corporate securities.
Joe was on a personal crusade to nail Marcinkus. He was offended by the archbishop’s alleged illegal activities not only because of his faith but because of the additional embarrassment of Marcinkus’s having been an American. Skeptical as he was about the clergy, Coffey still loved the church. But the best thing to do with dirty laundry, he believed, was to air it. He had long talks with Hogan about pursuing the Marcinkus lead and found his boss in agreement.
Ron Goldstock, the assistant district attorney in charge of the case, also agreed, as did Vitrano and Tamarro. They also had the support of Bill Aronwald, who was coordinating the investigation for the Justice Department’s strike force.
“We all saw it as our duty to follow any lead wherever it took us,” says Coffey.
As in May, when he learned of Pat’s miscarriage, Joe again returned home to some disturbing news after the Ledl trip. His son Steven had come in from playing one day over the Thanksgiving holiday and, as only a four-year-old would, decided to put his wet snowsuit in the oven to dry. When the suit caught fire, Steven pulled it out and, in panic, ran through the house dragging it behind him. Only quick action by his brother, Joseph III, who jumped on the suit and smothered the flames, saved the house from burning down.
The incident once again reminded Joe of the jeopardy cops often leave their families in for the sake of their jobs. “Here I was running around Europe trying to nail a Vatican official, who no one else seems interested in nailing, and my house almost burned down. I began to wonder if it was worth it.”
He expressed his concern to Pat, who once again found the right combination of words and emotions to convince her husband he was doing right by his family. He had a calling as strong and demanding as that of any priest, to do what he did best: catch crooks.
Meanwhile the clerks at the grand jury chambers were being kept busy typing subpoenas based on information Tony Grant was giving. In an effort to save himself, each new suspect would invariably give up someone else, so the list of suspects continued to grow. Cops and FBI agents all over the country were serving subpoenas and making arrests based on the information.
Coffey had the pleasure of handing Rizzo his subpoena personally. During the first week of December 1972 he walked into Jimmy’s Lounge and asked to see Rizzo. Coffey had been there before in his steamfitter’s disguise but never had made direct contact with Rizzo.
“I had been following him and listening in on his conversations for almost a year. I knew when he went to the bathroom, when he made love, and when he ordered his henchmen to get tough with a late payer, but we never actually met until that day in Jimmy’s Lounge,” Coffey remembers.
“And I knew Rizzo to be an animal. I knew how brutal he was to his wife and kids. He once almost beat a young Puerto Rican kid to death with a bar stool. I knew he had no conscience and deserved no place in a lawful society. He was garbage.”
On Rizzo’s part, by that December day he knew he was being hounded by Hogan’s man, Joe Coffey, and the feds. He was seeing his mob being rounded up, and he was getting reports from his own informants that his boys were singing like the cowards they were. But he had no idea that he had been under such intense surveillance for months. He had no idea that even the telephone in Jimmy’s Lounge was being tapped. He could not imagine that as he had sat in the Palace Hotel in Munich and talked about collecting $350,000 owed from the stolen securities job and heard Enze talk about a caper in the Vatican, Joe Coffey had been down the hall recording every word for the benefit of a future grand jury.
Inside Jimmy’s Lounge that day there was no doubt it was Joe Coffey who had come calling. Coffey fits the movie image of a cop. In his dark blue suit, a grin on his “map of Ireland” face and the subpoena clenched in his big fist, he asked the mob thug who stood in front of him, “Are you Vincent Rizzo?”
“That’s me. You must be Coffey,” Rizzo replied.
“I am Detective Joseph Coffey, and this is a subpoena ordering you to appear before a Manhattan grand jury.”
Rizzo, who had been handed such paperwork on previous occasions, took the paper from Coffey.
“Yeah, yeah, big deal,” he said. “Sit down for a minute. What do ya drink?”
“I wouldn’t drink with you,” Coffey growled as Rizzo pulled over an empty bar stool and snapped his fingers for the bartender to pour a shot of scotch.
“Come on, don’t be such a tough guy. Things can be worked out,” Rizzo countered, as he handed the shot to Coffey.
Joe took the glass, tipped it toward Rizzo as if offering a toast, and then turned it over and poured the scotch all over the bar. He turned and walked out the door.
Rizzo went berserk. He was not used to being treated that way. He had always been able to intimidate everyone. Even cops. As Coffey walked through the door Rizzo cursed after him. “You think you’re hot shit now, but I’ll get you! Count on it.”
Before Coffey was back at Leonard Street, Rizzo had contacted a local drug dealer known to be an informant for the FBI. He told the dealer that Coffey had tried to shake him down for $50,000.
It wasn’t until years later that Coffey learned that the FBI conducted a thorough investigation of the charge. Dick Tamarro was the agent assigned to look into every aspect of his friend’s life to see if the allegation could be true. Nothing remotely incriminating was ever turned up, but Joe Coffey never forgave his colleagues for not letting him know he was under investigation.
“It doesn’t matter that I was cleared. They were supposed to trust me over a low-life drug dealer. After a year of seeing what kind of cop I was, Dick Tamarro and the rest of them let me down. It hurts worse than if I’d been shot,” Coffey says.
But in 1972 Coffey had no knowledge of that part of the investigation. He was occupied with trying to get permission to go after Marcinkus.
Rizzo and twenty-four members of his ring were quickly indicted in Manhattan for operating an international drug smuggling and counterfeiting ring. Right before Christmas he surrendered to Coffey at the Manhattan district attorney’s office. With the city’s press corps following, Coffey led Rizzo in handcuffs to the First Precinct and booked him on the charges. Later that day he was released on $25,000 bail.
Early in January, on the advice of their highly paid attorneys, Rizzo and his key henchmen pleaded guilty. Rizzo was sentenced on extortion, counterfeiting, and drug charges to a total of twenty-five years in prison. Because many of the charges were to be served concurrently, he could be back on the streets in less than ten years. S
till being held over his head were the charges being presented to a federal grand jury by Aronwald and the strike force. It was during that case, Coffey hoped, that Barg, Ense, Ledl, and Marcinkus would also be brought to justice (the other Vatican official named by Ledl, Cardinal Tisserant, died in February 1972).
At first, in early 1973, Frank Hogan, trying to keep control of the case, appealed to Cardinal Terrance Cooke, head of the New York Archdiocese, to intercede with the Vatican and arrange for detectives to interview Marcinkus. Cooke did not take long to shoot the idea down. He told Hogan he saw no reason to believe any Vatican official was involved in a criminal act. He would not help.
As powerful as he was, Hogan was still a product of a political system. He could step on just so many toes before endangering his own position. Reluctantly, he realized he would have to count on Washington to investigate the Vatican connection.
The atmosphere in Washington at this time, however, was not conducive to chasing a big scandal. It was during the Watergate period, and Richard Nixon’s administration was fighting for its life. Michele Sindona, Marcinkus’s mentor, had been a supporter and adviser of Richard Nixon when Nixon was practicing law. It has been reported that Sindona offered a secret contribution of $1 million to Nixon’s campaign fund, which was wisely refused but indicated the level of interest Sindona had in Nixon’s success.
Aronwald’s request to the attorney general’s office for permission to travel to Rome to quiz Marcinkus was refused.
Hogan was furious. He considered the politics of his office a burden he had to bear in order to do the law enforcement work he savored. He was now ready to risk everything rather than see Marcinkus escape untouched by the investigation.
During his forty years in politics and law enforcement, Frank Hogan had developed an unequaled network of powerful connections from Capitol Hill to boardrooms of Wall Street. He began working his Rolodex as if he was a young lawyer running for office for the first time. He called in long-owed favors and put his personal reputation on the line with people who did not take such offers lightly.
And his efforts paid off. Washington finally agreed to send Aronwald, Tamarro, and Bill Lynch (head of the Organized Crime and Racketeering Section of the Department of Justice) to the Vatican. Joe Coffey was not allowed to go.
Hogan hit the roof: Coffey, he argued, was essential to the case. There would be no case without Joe Coffey. “You’re only keeping him out because you don’t want the tough questions asked!” Hogan screamed at anyone who would listen in Washington. But he was out of favors. This time, Mr. DA did not get his way. Joe Coffey, bursting with anger at the turn of fate, was left at home.
On April 23, 1973, Aronwald, Lynch, and Tamarro went to the Vatican City office of Archbishop Giovanni Benelli, the assistant secretary of state. Tamarro was forced to sit outside the office while Lynch and Aronwald spoke with Benelli and with Monsignor Martinez, an assessor in the secretary of state’s office. Later Joe Coffey was allowed to read the report of the Vatican visit.
This is what he learned from that report.
Lynch presented the case to Benelli and Martinez. He outlined the evidence, mostly provided by Ledl, that $14.5 million in counterfeit bonds, forged by Rizzo’s gang, had been delivered to Rome in July 1971.
Lynch told Benelli and Martinez that those bonds had been a sample to be shown to people in the Vatican, who eventually wanted $950 million in bonds. He said he was prepared to tell an American grand jury that Archbishop Marcinkus had been directly involved in the plot, as well as in other illegal dealings in association with Michele Sindona. In a veiled threat, Lynch indicated that no matter what transpired during his visit to Rome the information about the Vatican would make its way into indictments, against Barg, Ense, and the others. Eventually it would become public record. Lynch showed Benelli the letter Ledl had provided to the doubting Rizzo as proof of the Vatican request for the $950 million. It was agreed the letter appeared to be genuine.
But Martinez refused to accept the letter or the word of the swindler Ledl as proof of Vatican involvement in an illegal deal. According to Lynch, Martinez refused to check a list of stolen and counterfeit securities against the Vatican’s inventory on deposit in banks. He said such an investigation would be under the aegis of Archbishop Marcinkus.
The next day, with Tamarro once again forced to wait outside, Lynch and Aronwald met with Marcinkus.
According to Lynch’s report, Marcinkus listened patiently to the allegations against him and agreed to answer them.
He admitted a close relationship with Sindona, whom he considered a financial genius “well ahead of his time.” But he said he had few financial dealings with him. He said he considered the charges against him serious but not based enough on fact that he would violate the Vatican Bank’s confidentiality to defend himself. He implied that other Vatican officials jealous of his position of closeness to Pope Paul VI had conspired to implicate him.
He replied to all the specifics against him, falling back on the bank’s need for secrecy when he could not satisfy Lynch and Aronwald. And then after about two hours he bid the two Americans good day.
Back in the states it was agreed on the highest levels that the case against Marcinkus could not be pursued further.
Coffey was crushed. To him Barg, Ense, Ledl, Grant, and even Rizzo were habitual, dime-a-dozen criminals whose place in the roster of organized crime would be quickly filled after their imprisonment or death. But Marcinkus was a different story. He was a man who held the trust of millions of Catholics. To let him get away with violating that trust was unthinkable to Coffey. Yet that is what happened.
Life in the DA’s squad was becoming increasingly difficult for Joe Coffey. So, in May 1973, when the assignment came to join the 25th Precinct in East Harlem as a patrol sergeant, it was almost a relief.
Hogan was sorry to see his protégé go, but the department rule was a firm one. On his last day at Leonard Street, the DA called Joe into his office.
“I’m sorry the Vatican business ended the way it did,” Hogan said, shrugging his shoulders in resignation, “and I’m sorry I won’t be able to bring you back to my squad when your six months are up.” Hogan had no opening for a detective sergeant. “But I do have a going away present for you,” he said. He told Coffey he had arranged for him to join the Queens DA’s squad as soon as possible.
So Coffey left for East Harlem feeling better than he had since reading Lynch’s report. “In six months I’ll be back with a crack unit chasing big cases,” he thought.
Six weeks later he got a call from Vitrano saying the federal indictments were to be announced and he should be at the press conference.
On the morning of July 11, 1973, in the office of the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, a press conference was held to detail the breaking up of a ring accused of trying to dump more than $18 million in stolen and counterfeit securities throughout the world. Sixteen men, including Vincent Rizzo, Winfried Ense, Alfred Barg, and Leopold Ledl were indicted.
Just prior to the press conference Bill Aronwald took Coffey aside. Relations had been strained between the two men since Aronwald’s return from Rome. Coffey was convinced the prosecutor had engaged in a cover-up.
“I want you to stay away from the press. We do not want the Vatican mentioned,” Aronwald warned.
“You’re not my boss. I’ll do what I want,” Coffey replied.
Edwin M. Shaw, chief attorney of the federal Joint Organized Crime Strike Force, told the assembled press corps that the indicted persons had attempted to dispose of the fake securities in California, Panama, Italy, Belgium, and Switzerland. He said the forgeries were in the names of such companies as Pan American Airways, AT&T, and General Electric and that the ring dealt in securities stolen from Manufacturers Hanover Trust and Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith.
Shaw also graciously explained how the investigation had started in Hogan’s office, giving due credit to Coffey and to Assistant Distric
t Attorney Ron Goldstock.
And because mention was made of the Vatican in the indictments, mostly in reviews of conversations between the defendants, Shaw made sure to emphasize that the twenty-page indictment contained no criminal charges against anyone connected with the Vatican.
Following the official press conference Coffey fielded a question from a Wall Street Journal reporter who asked about the involvement of the Munich police. Coffey explained they had provided invaluable surveillance and logistical help.
The next day several newspaper accounts did focus on the meager mentions of the Vatican in the indictments. In the New York Daily News, reporter Ellen Fleysher wrote that “two of the defendants reportedly told other ring members that they could dispose of $14.5 million in fake blue-chip bonds through a source within the Vatican.”
The Wall Street Journal quoted a source as saying that “a man of the cloth was suspected of being the fence within the Vatican.”
“Aronwald thought I was the source of that quote and he was pissed off,” Coffey says. “I wasn’t. The reporter used my name with a quote about the Munich police involvement, and I stood by that.
“But Aronwald was fit to be tied. He threatened to ruin my career and make me sorry I ever spoke to the press. He said now he was going to have to subpoena the sixteen Munich cops I worked with.
“Of course it was nonsense. He didn’t need those cops for his case. But he stayed mad at me. I told him to take a hike. He didn’t run my life.”
So that was the end of it. Vinnie Rizzo got more jail time, eventually serving about twelve years. When he got out he was never able to return to his powerful position in the Genovese family because of suspicions that he had turned informant.
Ledl, thanks to the deal he made with Coffey and Tamarro, was never indicted. Barg and Ense got slaps on the wrist. Tony Grant, because of the help he provided in nailing Rizzo, was allowed to return to England, where he vanished into the underworld.
The Coffey Files Page 11
