The Last Undercover (12 page)
Because the money was in my car, I thought quickly and decided to have Onofrio drive me to his house, leaving the car in the shopping center parking lot where I assumed agents could keep it under tight security. It also provided me another opportunity to have Onofrio or one of his associates drive me back to my car to get the money, allowing me to engage others in conspiratorial conversations. It also provided a chance for a surveillance team to follow me more than once, just in case they lost us going to the residence.
We arrived at Onofrio’s home, a large house in an upscale residential neighborhood that didn’t allow on-street parking. It was neat and well decorated, unlike the homes of the South Central gang members I’d been chasing recently. Onofrio had obviously been successful and now owned some valuable California real estate.
Onofrio and I were alone, as far as I could tell, which surprised me. He had me sit in his living room while he attended to business in the back of the house. He had yet to ask to see any money, so I assumed I was safe from being ripped, but still his actions differed from drug dealers I previously encountered.
Within a few minutes he returned from the back of the house and escorted me to the master bedroom. His house was much larger than mine. We walked down a long hallway. As we turned into his bedroom, I saw a cardboard box on the bed. In it were seven kilograms of cocaine wrapped in red cellophane. Peter told me earlier we could do seven, and then after that deal Onofrio would deliver the remaining ten I ordered. I pulled a switchblade knife from my back pocket, activated the spring-loaded blade, and slit open a corner of one of the kilos. I tested the product, using a standard field test kit I told Onofrio I purchased at a head shop in the Valley. Onofrio didn’t question the small hard plastic pouch, no bigger than a cigarette lighter, that contained three clear plastic vials. With the knife tip I took a small sample, placed it into the plastic container, and systematically broke the three vials, watching the substance change color with each broken vial. The small container lit up like a Christmas tree, indicating high-quality cocaine.
I announced my pleasure with his product and told him we needed to return to my car at the shopping center to retrieve the cash. He gave me an ear-to-ear smile and we both returned to his car. As he was backing out of the driveway and began to proceed toward the shopping center, we both spotted a lone male sitting in a four-door car that screamed “government vehicle.” It was the only car on the street in a neighborhood that prohibited on-street parking. The reason it looked like a government car was simple: it was.
Onofrio noticed the car immediately and commented on the driver, strongly suggesting he was a cop. Trying to defuse the situation, I said he was probably a real estate agent, and then, practically yelling into the transmitter I was wearing, I said, “The cops couldn’t be that stupid. No cop would sit in front of your house if he was watching you.” I was livid, and to make it worse, my efforts proved futile. Onofrio got on his cell phone and called someone in the house we just left—a person I had never seen or heard—and ordered him to take the drugs out the back. Onofrio called off the deal and drove me back to the shopping center, dropping me off near a phone booth.
By this time, the surveillance team lost me, and my transmitter was out of communication range. From the phone booth I called dispatch and told them where I was and what happened. I also called Peter, complaining that his supplier called off the deal because of a real estate agent. As hard as I tried and as hard as Peter tried, we were unable to complete the transaction that day. Three days, three attempts—all failures.
I returned to the “barn” and debriefed. I placed the show money in the safe and assumed that at some point we would indict Peter, but that Onofrio would walk. No-dope conspiracies weren’t real popular in federal court, and without the drugs Onofrio showed me, there was little chance the U.S. Attorney’s office would indict him. I began to worry that maybe my cavalier attitude about taking my son to a baseball game cost us a defendant and the seizure of seven kilos of cocaine. I had to prepare for court the next day. I was testifying in a trial stemming from a previous investigation we’d concluded. The courtroom and testimony meant a suit and tie, none of which were on my all-time-favorites list.
The next day, during my testimony, my pager vibrated; Peter was calling. During a court recess, I went to a pay phone down the hall from the courtroom.
The excitement in Peter’s voice came through the telephone. Onofrio had just delivered the seven kilos of cocaine to the restaurant, he told me, and he wanted me to come over right away and complete the deal. I knew there was no way I could walk off the witness stand in the middle of a trial. Peter thought I was a freelance screenwriter who supplemented his income with drug trafficking, a cover accounting for my unpredictable schedule. I told Peter he “jacked me around for three days,” his supplier saw cops masquerading as real estate agents, and I wasn’t about to walk out of a rewrite conference in Culver City for another no-show drug deal with him and his buddies. I would be at the restaurant sometime after seven, I told him. He bought my tirade and agreed to meet me in his office.
Following my testimony, I rushed back to the FBI offices, attempting for a fourth time in four days to secure the drugs and build a solid case against Peter and his supplier. My supervisor, however, was unmoved by my pleas to retrieve the cash from the safe. He was right when he said I had tied up the squad all week and he had little faith in Peter’s assurances that he would produce this time. I understood the supervisor’s reluctance but still I stormed out of his office, as I was prone to do, vowing to handle the situation “my way.”
Fortunately, two young agents were still in the squad bay, completing mounds of Bureau paperwork. Everyone else had left for the evening. Knowing that both these men, who eventually rose in the ranks and became two of the finest agents in the FBI, carried the same fire in the belly I did, I asked if they wanted to go make an arrest. They eagerly agreed and we left—without notifying the supervisor.
Once we got to Beverly Hills, I explained the situation. We briefed in the alley behind the restaurant. I changed into casual clothes as I explained the plan. Both knew this was somewhere far outside the volumes of regulations pounded into young agents at the Academy, but even before I assured them I would take full responsibility for any mishaps, they agreed to help. I really liked these guys.
I went into the restaurant using the alley entrance. My cover team remained in the alley several hundred feet from the door. Peter met me downstairs and we spoke briefly before he escorted me through a locked metal door and up the stairs to a locked storageroom. Once up there, he walked to a large floor safe and removed the same cardboard box I saw the day before in Onofrio’s bedroom. After opening the box, he allowed me to examine the contents. It was the same seven kilos of cocaine; the knife slits I made on one of the packages were clearly visible.
I told Peter I was satisfied and asked him to accompany me to my car where he could count the money and we could complete the transaction. He balked at that request, saying, “This is Onofrio’s stuff; God help me if anything happens.” He told me to bring the money to his office. His request made perfect sense from a drug dealer’s standpoint—except I had no money. But I headed for my car, anyway.
I had just left seven kilos of high-grade cocaine on the table in the upstairs storeroom and had no money to complete the buy-bust. I needed to find an acceptable means of payment—or to convince Peter I found one.
I returned to the car and my two young cover agents. As I began unpacking my gym bag I explained the plan. They thought I was kidding. I wasn’t.
For years, I had enjoyed boxing and worked out at a gym where many professional fighters trained for upcoming bouts. I regularly had my head beaten in by guys with world-class skills and some might say it knocked loose a few too many brain cells. However, I had a plan. I placed a pair of ten-ounce boxing gloves in a small gym bag, which would be my proxy for the cash I didn’t have for this evening’s transaction. I looked at my watch and told my confederates to come up to the storageroom in exactly five minutes.
I began walking down the alley, hoping I could pull this off. As I got to the back door, I noticed one of the cooks standing by the door, holding a meat cleaver—not a particularly auspicious symbol. I entered through the caged door and began to ascend the stairs. The door slammed behind me. Once I entered the storage area, I observed Peter sitting next to the cardboard box still on the table.
I walked toward the floor safe. I knew time was running out and I also knew the door to the storage area locked when it slammed shut. I looked at Peter and using my Marine Corps command voice told him, “I don’t like having the money and the dope together in one place. I just counted the cash; it’s all here. If I’m short, I’ll make it up next time.” I walked to the safe, shoved my gym bag inside, closed the doors, spun the tumbler, and did an about-face. I walked over to the table, picked up the cardboard box, and marched down the stairs before he could say a word.
My brazen attitude caught him so off guard he allowed me to walk away with the drugs. As I descended the stairs, my cover team awaited. I opened the door and walked out into the alley as they rushed up the steps and placed Peter under arrest.
The deal was completed. I had swapped a pair of ten-ounce boxing gloves for seven kilos of high-grade cocaine. Final tally: two arrests and two indictments; for the taxpayers, the seizure and forfeiture of the restaurant, Onofrio’s house, and the car he used to pick me up at the shopping center. Seeing a baseball game with my son from seats behind the dugout: priceless!
A NAMBLA HISTORY LESSON
New York NAMBLA Conference
S
unday marked a new day. I successfully sold my undercover persona during the first day of meetings and doubted I raised any suspicions. The Sunday session provided a chance to spend more time with the members in a somewhat smaller setting.
We broke into committees to help draft various pamphlets NAMBLA wanted to publish. We were encouraged to participate on one or more committees. I volunteered to be on the “Privacy” pamphlet committee with Joe P. from California and Rowan and Jim from New Jersey. Other committees included such topics as “Coming Out,” “Responding to the Media,” “How to Handle Arrests and Police Inquiries,” “Age-of-Consent Position,” “SVP (Sexual Violent Predator) Reporting,” “Treating Kids as Adults in the Court System,” “Power Differences,” “Families and Friends,” “Famous Boy Lover Figures,” “Legal Counseling,” “Religious Aspect of Boy Love,” “AIDS Advice,” “Are You a BL?,” and “Do You Love a BL?”
As I found out during my multiyear membership, the organization was poor on follow-through. To my knowledge, no pamphlet discussed at the conference was ever published. In my experience, the conferences had little to do with any organized political agenda. Instead, they were basically conclaves for boy lovers to gather, encourage each other in their “lifestyle,” and share criminal fantasies.
It was during our breakout session that Jim and I spoke at length. Jim, a former teacher from Bergen County, New Jersey, admitted to being arrested in 1982, but the charges were dismissed after three hung juries. The boy he was charged with seducing eventually testified that his psychiatrist coerced the admissions. Jim, however, never denied the seduction. He also discussed his hobby: photography. The conversation was enlightening—and infuriating—as he spoke of photographing students at an all-boys’ school, his hands gesturing to emphasize his points.
There’s a Catholic high school in the area of my neighborhood. . . . So I’m watching the soccer games . . . I mean, they’re out on the field . . . scratching, pushing their [genitals] down like they have [an erection], right on the field. One day this one kid, the most beautiful legs you’d ever want to see . . . he’s sitting there on the bench . . . like this [ Jim gestures as if playing with himself ], right out in the open.
When Paul interrupted our conversation I was somewhat irritated, but Paul elicited answers to questions I dared not ask. Paul introduced himself as being from Sussex County, New Jersey, and a friend of Tim B., the former membership chairman and Green Party member. He was clean-cut and looked to be in his early to mid-thirties. With his buttoned-down appearance, I would have suspected him of being an undercover FBI agent. His dialogue with Jim was enlightening.
Jim: We used to have chapter meetings in New York. . . . But it was so easy to infiltrate then. People show up you don’t know.
Paul: I think Peter tries to screen who comes here, hopefully.
Jim: Yeah, obviously the only reason I came here is because I knew how tight Peter was screening everyone.
Paul: He told me there were some people he decided not to invite. . . .
Jim: This is part of the problem with trying to spread the work out. . . . Someone seems to be all gung ho . . . then turns out to be a very skilled undercover operator.
Paul: Yeah . . . So we can all look at each other like that [with mistrust].
Jim: You know we do. . . . My only credential is I’ve survived twenty-three years in the organization.
Paul: Some people . . . have gotten out of it altogether. Won’t even show up to something like this.
Jim: Well, actually, I did quit; I guess it was back in eighty-three or something. I didn’t like the way they were going.
Paul: Politics?
Jim: Yeah . . . I was doing the publications, which got me well known to the FBI, I discovered later.
Paul: Yeah, well, it’s good maybe that you didn’t keep your name on the list there because you might be part of the lawsuit that’s going on now, the Massachusetts thing [the Jeffrey Curley wrongful death civil lawsuit].
Jim: I don’t know who’s on there, but I suspect it’s the executive . . .
Paul: Although I doubt if it will go anywhere.
Jim: Yeah, but it can be very expensive even if it does not go anywhere. That was my trouble.