by Fred Galvin
I was devastated. Louie’s death was on me. My friend had taken the ultimate hit because of me. It wasn’t his fault. But that bastard Finacci got away with it no matter how hard you and I worked to hang his ass. I started thinking about Finacci as my personal O. J. Simpson and I was determined to somehow, someday, make it up to Louie.
Her guilt must have been overwhelming. I have been close to some of my CIs too and the few times one turned up dead I often wondered if his relationship with me may have been a contributing factor. Actually knowing must have been a terrible burden for Ronnie.
Dan, I don’t expect forgiveness from you. In fact I would never blame you if you totally disavowed me and washed your hands of me. What I do hope for is some level of understanding. I say this not for sympathy but to hopefully give you some understanding of the helplessness of an addict.
Gambling addiction is a sinister disease. Yes, a disease. You could say, “Why not just stop?” You could ask that question to an alcoholic or a heroin addict as well and you’d get one of two answers: either “I can stop if I want to and I just don’t want to,” or, “I just can’t stop. If I try, my anxiety and depression are debilitating.” The first is simply denial. Anyone who says that they can stop any time knows they are lying. The second is the honest answer and the saddest because it controls you, not the opposite. I view my addiction as a hungry demon that has to be fed but whose hunger is never satisfied.
Wow. That she carried on doing her job at such a high level while bearing such a burden was remarkable. How could I not have seen some sign?
That’s the short version. I could go on and on but it would serve no purpose. I can say with hope that this whole episode from Louie Calzone’s death through this present moment has set me on the right path.
Tragically, and with some degree of irony, Finacci killing Louie actually forgave my debt. Finacci had accounted for the amount due from me, via Louie, as a write-off. And I guiltily admit that I was the beneficiary.
From that moment onward I swore that Louie’s death would not be in vain. It would serve a purpose, that of my “sobriety.” I can’t say that I’m totally clean but I can say that I no longer compulsively gamble. A bet with you on a Yankees-Red Sox game is about as far as I’ll go now. At least I know I have a better than 50-50 chance of winning!
Actually, the Yankees hold about a 200-win advantage over the Red Sox in about 3,000 games all time. I will remind her of that someday, hopefully.
Enough of my tale of woe. Back to my activities with Finacci. This should give some meaningful context to the CCTV footage you’ve watched.
While staked out at the Delancey Club, I saw two men arrive in a Town Car about 8 a.m. We now know they were Papalini and Lucci, both big Made Men muck-a-mucks in the Mariucci Family. Lucci was a bit higher on the food chain than Papalini. A short time after Papalini and Lucci got there, Finacci arrived rather hurriedly. The Lexus you saw in the CCTV was his, as I’m sure you have surmised.
A while later I heard what I thought were two gunshots inside followed by Papalini and Lucci exiting shortly thereafter. It looked to me like Lucci was forcing Papalini along, perhaps with a gun jammed in his back. They made a hasty getaway in the Town Car. I had thought Finacci was probably the recipient of one or both of the gunshots. I believed my suspicions were confirmed when four men arrived and unloaded what looked like cleaning materials. I figured they were there to clean up Finacci’s remains but almost immediately after they went in, Finacci emerged, heading for his car.
Not having any accompanying sound with the CCTV leaves understanding the images’ actions to the imagination. I figured something had happened when I first viewed this portion and now I had the explanation.
I saw my opportunity and intercepted him. He was disgusting, spattered with blood and what looked like brains. I got out of him that Lucci had shot someone named Stump in the head inside the club. Finacci was scrambled and agitated. I managed to convince him that I could help him stay alive but only if he came with me. The idiot bought it and fell perfectly into my contingency plan. You know me, I always have Justin’s backup plan.
You may ask who Justin is. Well, Ronnie was one of the most thorough detectives in the precinct. Whenever we had a plan of action on a case it seemed she always had a contingency plan. She referred to it as Justin, as in “Justin Case.” Rim shot, we’ll be here all week. Take care of your server.
So he got in my car and off we went. I wanted to get him away from the club in case the goons came out looking for him.
I’m sure you’re baffled by the footage showing us going to the EATS 24-7 Diner. That was a spur of the moment decision. For my backup plan to work I needed some time alone with him and what better place? I was sure no Mariucci wiseguys ever set foot in there and Flo was not a problem. Finacci cleaned up a bit and I had a wedge of apple pie waiting for him. It calmed him down and he actually commented on the high quality of the pie.
This made me smile. I could picture Flo with her hands on her hips wondering both who this bloody character was with Ronnie and where I was, but then diverting her attention back to the TV.
My “Justin Case” plan? You’ll laugh at this. With Finacci sitting there I “made a call to WITSEC” to arrange to have him put in the protection program. Here’s the really great part. You remember I once mentioned my brother Roje? Well, he had come up to the city in his charter boat for some R&R and to visit me. I had arranged with him that I may be calling on him to pose as “WITSEC Agent Ortega” on a phone call. He agreed, thinking it would be fun. I briefed and coached him and made the call from the booth with Finacci. He played it beautifully and Finacci ate it all up with a spoon. He was scared shitless of what the mob was going to do to him.
Evidently he had been skimming money from his bookie operation for some time. Eventually, the mob, in the form of Lucci and Papalini, got suspicious and confronted him at the club that morning. Finacci was finally coerced, at the expense of poor Stump, to confess. He had to come up with 250K by 9 p.m. and he knew he couldn’t do it. I speculated that really he could and just didn’t want to and he didn’t exactly deny that. So the mob would be looking to turn out his lights.
This filled in many gaps. Now I understood. Frankie was greedy and it ended up costing him his life. With Roje and his boat now part of the picture, I now had some idea how that came about but I just kept reading.
So all I had to do was drive him to the meet with “WITSEC Agent Ortega.” The idea was to get him on Roje’s boat and head out to sea so he wouldn’t be able to have second thoughts and bolt.
At this point I had to take a break and think. My brain was racing. This was a great deal to take in. I went to the bathroom to make room for my next Bud Lite.
Chapter 38: “Dear DD” - Part 2
With a new cold Bud Lite in hand and bladder relief completed, I walked in circles around the apartment contemplating what I had read so far. I needed to process what I had read and make room in my brain for what was left. The blockbuster from the first half was Ronnie’s revelation that she had a gambling addiction and as a result, she was at least indirectly responsible for Louie Calzone’s death. The personal blockbuster was that I had had no clue about her condition.
I went out on my fire escape to take in some Brooklyn air. My place was on the eighth floor, just high enough to scrub away some of the city’s sounds and smells. The evening was cool with a slight breeze coming in from the harbor to the south, typical of early summer in New York. As I drank my beer I wondered what was in store on the remaining pages. I finally would learn what had happened to Fast Frankie Finacci and how he ended up on the shore of Garbage Cove in front of me and my goofy-foot surfer buddy Dante.
Back inside, I made a grilled cheese and bacon sandwich, grabbed a bag of Fritos to round out my dinner of champions, sat down with my beer, and picked up the letter again.
I must confess that I slipped a mickey into Finacci’s drink when he went into the bathroom at the diner. Nothing st
rong, just a little something to induce a nice nap in the car so he’d come quietly, all part of my Justin Case contingency plan.
He slept on the ride from the diner to the warehouse lot on the shore of the East River. I know that’s where the CCTV coverage ended so the rest of this you’ll just have to take at my word.
That was not a problem for me. Ronnie’s account so far synced perfectly with what I had viewed on the CCTV and I saw no reason for her to fabricate the rest of her story. It was becoming clear to me where this may be going.
When we arrived, Roje was already there with his boat. While his boat is very seaworthy, he was eager to go because he was monitoring a storm out in the Atlantic which could be a problem for us in the next twelve hours.
Finacci came around and was confused by the sight of Roje and the boat. Before he had napped I had told him I’d take him to a hotel for safekeeping. He wanted to pick up his secret stash of cash and I had agreed we’d do that at some point.
Now, for the record, and for whatever it’s worth, he offered me a considerable sum which I never intended to accept. These wiseguys think money can buy them out of anything.
We assured him that it would be best to let the heat die down before we went back for his money. “Agent Ortega” and I convinced him that this was all part of our WITSEC plan for him to survive the mob’s desire to eliminate him. My whole motivation was to use whatever intimidation and threats I could muster to get him to confess to Calzone’s murder. Add to that the possibility of having him flip so we could nail Lucci for the murder of a man named Stump that morning at the Delancey Social Club. At that time we also suspected Lucci may have later whacked Papalini as well. Then we might even have him turn witness against the whole Mariucci Family after which we’d give him to the real WITSEC.
Honestly Dan, those were my objectives. I figured I’d get his confession and hold enough leverage on him to achieve the other goals. Then we’d sail back to the city and I’d bring him in.
I truly believed her. This was Ronnie through and through. I was sure she had every intention of bringing him in as the confessed murderer of Louie Calzone and as a turned witness against Leonardo Lucci and the Mariucci Family.
But it all went a sideways out on the ocean. Finacci became suspicious for some reason. I think he remembered our interview with him about Louie’s murder two years ago and my venomous attitude toward him. He may also have become suspicious of Roje really being a WITSEC agent. When I think back on that, it was hard to believe that he had bought any of that part of the story in the first place.
Anyway, he began to question me and all that was happening on the boat. I had to crack down on him to maintain control. He did the usual mobster tough guy thing thinking it would intimidate me which, of course, it did not. Then he lunged at me trying to get my gun. We struggled in the cabin of the boat and my gun discharged twice while pointed up to the ceiling. I remember praying that neither bullet had gone through the ceiling and hit Roje up on the bridge directly above us.
When a swell rocked the deck I fell backward and he came down on top of me. My gun came loose from my hand and he picked it up and pointed it at me. His smile was maniacal. At that moment I really thought he was going to shoot me. Then Roje appeared at the cabin door behind Finacci. The gunshots had missed him. He came downstairs to see what was happening. He was armed with a small bat he used on his charter trips to club sharks and marlins that his clients pulled up on the deck.
The irony wasn’t lost on me when he used it this time to club a bookie loan shark who was about to shoot his sister. The sound it made when he hit Finacci’s head was unnerving but not as much as the certainty that the blow had most certainly killed him. His dead eyes stared up at us and I was dead sure, forgive the pun.
That last made me chuckle. I’m sure the trauma of the moment had horrified her but she now could see some dark humor in it even if it was merely to break the tension of her confession.
So there we were out in the Atlantic, the weather was deteriorating quickly, and now we had a dead body on our hands that not even Justin Case had planned for. We quickly had to decide what to do. It was pretty obvious that we couldn’t go back to New York with a corpse on deck. One thing I was certain of was that I needed to do whatever was necessary to protect Roje. Yes, he had swung the club that had killed Finacci but it was in defense of me. The sobering part of that was the fact that it was just the two of us and self-defense would be a questionable defense that we wouldn’t be able to have corroborated.
So the only logical option open to us was to dump him into the ocean. It was very difficult, not only emotionally (neither of us had ever done anything like that before) but also physically. Like I said, the sea was getting rougher by the minute and it was raining. The deck was slick and it was pitching considerably.
The only option readily available to us was to wrap him in a sheet and an old anchor chain to take him down. With great effort we hefted him over the side and he was gone.
We returned to the dock and Roje dropped me off at my car. I was exhausted. He had said he was still going to stick around for a while to make sure I was okay and to enjoy the city. He didn’t need to go home and resume his charter business quite yet.
You can probably piece together the rest. I guess we didn’t secure the anchor chain well enough because our friend ended up on the beach and greeted you and your surfer friends out on the Island. Of course, I didn’t know it was Finacci.
I was fine until Captain Smart assigned us the Finacci case. You could have blown me over with a feather when he told us the ID of your beach corpse. It was very difficult for me to keep calm and not start shaking on the spot. My mind was racing. How could he have floated back up? And what stars had to have been aligned for him to float in at the exact spot where you happened to be sitting on the beach? What’s up with that? Talk about someone pushing your buttons; mine were being pounded on.
Undoubtedly you can figure out the rest. Now you can understand my recent behavior. My paranoia was running rampant. I was so torn and racked with guilt, but not about Finacci (he had it coming). What bothered me the most was that you were conducting yourself with your usual thoroughness and professionalism trying to solve the case, which meant trying to catch me and my brother.
I knew I had to do one of two things: either come totally clean and confess all, or, and up until then this was unthinkable for me, cover up any evidence pointing my way.
I’d like to say I really didn’t consider the latter, but that would be a lie. I did. I tried to figure out how I could access and delete the CCTV but I knew I had to act quickly since you would be going down that path for sure. That quickly became an unfeasible choice. So I then tried to come up with some scenarios that would explain my presence outside the Delancey Social Club that morning and really couldn’t do that either. I was getting desperate.
Coming clean seemed to be the only choice but I just couldn’t pull the trigger on that one. I surely would be suspended until either Internal Affairs did a full investigation or I was put on trial. If not that, I would be outright terminated. If just suspended, I’d be sent to rehab for my addiction, also not a very attractive option, although I’m sure it would do me good to go.
Given all that, I actually dreaded one other consequence much more. I’d most likely lose your respect and friendship. That would hurt me the most.
So I took the day off to decide what to do.
And the survey said? A third option suddenly made itself clear to me.
As you read this I am on the Sea Nymph heading south with my beloved brother. Yes, I’ve “blown town” as our mob friends would put it. I’ve decided to go home with him and sign on as his unpaid crew in his charter business. I know over the years I’ve been pretty closed off about my personal life. Hell, I’m not sure you even know where “home” is beyond somewhere in the Caribbean.
But you’re a detective, right? Well, maybe not officially anymore since you’re “just a consultant�
� now. Anyway, I know you’d be able to find me in a heartbeat if you put your mind to it.
It pains me to say this, but please don’t put your mind to it. I hope very much that you can see to it to let me go. The reason it pains me so much is obvious. I will miss you until I die. We’ve been very close, both professionally and personally, and I dread the life ahead without our easy banter and comfortable camaraderie. Of course, you will do what you have to do and I will respect that.
One thing, you may bring the nice ladies of St. Augie’s to my apartment (you know where the key is). They are welcome to anything they feel they may want to keep or be able to sell for the benefit of the church. They may donate the rest.
You should be hearing from Captain Smart tomorrow morning as tonight I will be dropping off my shield, service weapon, and a brief letter of resignation addressed to him at the precinct house front desk. It will simply state that “compelling personal reasons” have come up which force me to immediately resign my position with the NYPD along with apologies for not being more specific and not giving any notice.
