The Last Undercover (5 page)

It was mid-December when we first met Heather. The fact she even agreed to meet with us boded well. Many subjects “lawyer up,” preventing law enforcement officials from even making a pitch. She met us at an outdoor café on Ventura Boulevard in Studio City. Over coffee and Cokes, we explained in detail the accumulated evidence and told her that, just as an associate of hers had been arrested, she would be taken into custody unless she agreed to cooperate. Our strategy was nothing novel, nor was it something most people couldn’t observe by watching crime dramas on TV. She seemed receptive and asked for a chance to think over our offer. Since we were unprepared to arrest her right then anyway, we gave her the opportunity to reflect. We agreed to meet a week later.

On December 23, my partner and I went to Heather’s North Hollywood apartment. When we arrived, prepared to welcome our newest informant into a stable of very productive sources, we were shocked to see a packed bag sitting by the door. She arranged a babysitter for her eight-year-old son and was prepared to have us take her to jail. She decided she was unwilling to cooperate and was instead willing to face whatever consequences awaited her. The problem was, we had no authority to arrest her: the U.S. Attorney’s office was unwilling to indict her based upon the evidence we had, and typically the FBI will not make an arrest without the prior authorization of the prosecutor. Heather didn’t realize it, but she had our backs to the wall. With our stock of options dwindling fast, I asked if we could sit at her tiny dining room table and talk through her decision.

My partner and I started off slowly, using all our persuasive skills to convince her that jail was not an appropriate place for a mother, especially one who had an alternative avenue before her. Although we could see she was softening, she was unwilling to commit. Finally, in one last effort, I asked her to look me in the eye.

Heather was in her mid-thirties, a recovering heroin addict, a prostitute, a convicted felon, and a victim of parental and spousal abuse. Throughout her lifetime, she saw the damage drug abuse wreaked in peoples’ lives; her own life was in shambles. With complete sincerity and—okay, I admit it—a bit of dramatic flair, I looked into her eyes and said, “Today, Heather, you can prevent another girl from going through the same hell you’ve seen. By agreeing to cooperate with us and targeting those people selling heroin to our children, you can help us save another Heather somewhere from the mess you’ve been through. Will you do it?”

She bowed her head, almost as if in prayer. When she looked up, tears were streaming down her cheeks. She choked as she spoke. “I’ll help you.”

My partner and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Once Heather regained her composure, she asked us if we were Christians. I laughed when my partner said, “No, I’m Catholic,” but I acknowledged that I was a Christian. She said she believed in God and believed He sent us. She said that while using heroin, she often prayed to God, seeking a vein in which to plunge the needle, and He always provided. I must admit, I was never convinced God was in the business of providing veins for junkies, but I was glad she saw us as God’s messengers. I was pretty sure she’d fare better, over the long haul, with the choice she was making now, rather than the other less-favorable alternatives she’d already tried.

My partner and I wished her a Merry Christmas, told her we’d be in touch after the holidays, and began to think about how we could best utilize Heather’s insider knowledge. Not long after the New Year, she would begin meeting—and exceeding—all our expectations.

4

THE WELCOMING COMMITTEE

A
fter the first of the year, my partner and I received even more intel from the Mounties about Darrel, including details of his operation and several of his associates. Heather was unfamiliar with Darrel, as it turned out, but she did know several of the associates the Mounties identified. She was also familiar with a popular bar he used to frequent in Vancouver. We learned from Heather that one of Darrel’s associates was a heroin dealer named John. His estranged wife, Kristi (not her real name), was living in L.A. and was a close friend of Heather. Both attended the same methadone maintenance treatment center, and like Heather, Kristi worked as a prostitute. Later in the year, Kristi and Heather moved in together, sharing the same North Hollywood apartment with their children. Eventually, my partner and I approached Kristi. She, too, agreed to cooperate. Neither woman knew the other was providing information to the FBI, but it was an excellent way of crosschecking the information each of them was giving us.

The information we were obtaining convinced us beyond any doubt that Darrel was a worthy target. Though a Canadian citizen, he’d been living in the U.S. since the 1960s. He was smart, evasive, and tough. Years earlier, we learned, he’d outmaneuvered a Drug Enforcement Agency team trying to nail him. In one situation, he’d agreed to a meeting with an undercover DEA agent only on the condition that they talk in the steam bath at a health club, where both men would be naked. Pretty hard to wear a wire into a situation like that. Eventually, Darrel wore out the DEA’s patience and they moved on to other targets.

As I continued to talk with Heather about Darrel, she suggested that maybe she and Kristi could connect with him and pretend to know him from Vancouver. I realized we’d have to bring Kristi and Heather together in the operation, so I arranged a meeting in which the two women agreed to convince the other to work together as FBI informants.

In the summer of 1983, I received a call from my RCMP counterpart. He provided the flight itinerary for Darrel, who was returning from Canada later in the week. I hatched a plan to take both women to the Los Angeles International Airport, and, as Darrel got off the plane, we would orchestrate a “chance” encounter.

The scene that day, August 24, 1983, was like something you might view on the big screen. Both ladies showed up at LAX, dressed like they were working Hollywood Boulevard during convention season. One was in black and the other in red. As Kristi told me, “Black and red are the two sexiest colors.” I don’t know anybody—any man, at least—who would have disagreed. Actually, I was embarrassed just directing them to the gate. To say they turned heads is an understatement: chiropractors probably noticed a spike in business from men getting off planes that afternoon.

As part of their play, they pretended to be stranded and were engaged in a mock argument as Darrel exited the plane. They were so engrossed in their act they missed him as he walked past. He was well down the walkway when I approached them. “He’s heading toward the baggage area,” I whispered.

Heather and Kristi spun and started running—no small thing in spike heels—down the walkway, clomping like cloggers in a speed competition. Had it not been so nerve-wracking and potentially dangerous, I would have laughed. Just as the two passed Darrel, they abruptly stopped and turned toward him. “You’re Darrel from Vancouver, aren’t you?” He bit and the game was on.

Over the next several months, Heather and Darrel occasionally dated. I continually warned Heather about getting sexually involved and she assured me he “wasn’t sexual”—an interesting notion, given Heather’s highly attractive qualities. My reason behind the admonition was twofold: morally, I had problems putting Heather in a compromising position; legally, I feared sex might torpedo the investigation, setting up an entrapment plea as an out for Darrel. However, as they continued to date, the fifty-eight-year-old heroin trafficker said all the right things, bragging of his overseas connections and eventually offering to sell Heather heroin for her out-of-town buyer. I intended to be that buyer.

For some reason, Heather decided to tell Darrel I was from Denver, even though that wasn’t what we discussed and I’d never even been there. However, I figured I could do enough research to at least familiarize myself with the major landmarks. Later, at a critical point, my Denver “residency” would pose a temporary logistical problem, but for now, Darrel was going along with the story Heather was giving him: I was interested in purchasing large amounts of heroin.

As an initial transaction, we arranged a ten-ounce buy with Heather as my intermediary. The deal went smoothly, paving the way for my introduction. Once I was introduced, Heather’s involvement was phased out. Darrel made few, if any, efforts to maintain contact with her, which pleased us all. For her part, Heather had no desire to maintain any relationship with him, and apparently Darrel’s interest in her was also waning. Maybe she was right: maybe he wasn’t “sexual.”

At this time, the FBI was fairly new in the world of big-time drug traffickers, and Headquarters was dipping into the newly created Superfund for drug-buy money. The money in the fund was the result of the seizure and sale of forfeited items from various drug investigations throughout the country. It was an excellent idea: essentially, drug traffickers financed our narcotics investigations without the need of tapping into tax dollars.

As I began to have more face time with Darrel, I came to realize his ego was almost boundless. I have a fairly robust self-esteem—some of my detractors might even suggest it borders on cockiness—but believe me, I paled in comparison to Darrel. I must have listened to a couple dozen sermons about his skill and acumen as a drug dealer. “I’ve been moving this stuff for twenty-three years and I’ve never been busted,” he said. He based his operation in L.A. because the justice system in the U.S. was easier to beat, he told me. I just let him talk. I called him “Dr. D, the Doctor of Drugs,” and he ate it up. Every time we met, the case against him got stronger.

One time, I decided to see how long he would talk without my saying anything. He started, and I just sat there, nodding my head at strategic moments, letting the tape roll. When it was transcribed, his soliloquy ran for over three pages, single-spaced. I don’t think even Hamlet spoke that long in a single stretch.

Meanwhile, I was keeping up the Denver story line. The Bureau set up a cold phone in the Denver office and had the calls forwarded to my L.A. bad-guy phone. Darrel would call me from his Brentwood residence and I’d pick up the receiver in L.A., talking about the snow on the ground, or whatever the weather report from Denver said. To further the ruse, once I arranged to meet him at LAX long before 9/11 security rules went into effect. I waited for the plane from Denver to land and boarded through the rear doors, outside the terminal. I walked through the plane, grabbed a Denver paper from an empty seat, and walked out into the terminal, greeted by Darrel, who was standing at the gate. Subsequently, we had a very incriminating conversation at the airport.

Darrel talked of plans to travel to Australia and Thailand to solidify another heroin transaction. As I inquired about a future purchase, he said he still had thirty-two ounces available and once those ounces were sold he would travel. The FBI dipped into the Superfund a second time and we arranged the purchase.

Until this time, I had only discussed drug trafficking with him. Our previous buy was through Heather, working as my cutout. This was to be my first purchase. It was important that the transaction be recorded, but I was mindful of the DEA cohort who was forced to strip in order to discuss business. I decided to take the offensive with this purchase.

In November, prior to his December trip to Australia and Thailand, I negotiated for the purchase of his remaining thirty-two ounces of China White. The day the deal was supposed to happen, Denver had a huge snow storm, closing Stapleton International Airport. Keeping with the ruse, I had to postpone the deal one day. When I called him that evening to delay the deal, he commented on how clear our phone connection was. He said it sounded as if I were across the street. Little did he know.

New York NAMBLA Conference

As I walked toward Times Square with Peter Herman and the rest of our tour group, I thought about all the things that could go wrong with the investigation, even if I were successful at obtaining ironclad evidence of criminal activity and executing a textbook arrest. Would some defense attorney successfully argue that I somehow intruded on a NAMBLA member’s constitutional rights of free speech or freedom of assembly? How overt did a violation have to be to meet the standard of the courts? At the time, I had no idea I would be pursuing this investigation for two more years, nor how difficult it would prove to secure actionable grounds for arrest and indictment. But I was determined: these guys were sexual predators, and they had to be stopped, somehow.

Because this was my first in-person encounter with members of the organization, I chose not to wear a wire. I wasn’t sure what was going to happen and wasn’t completely confident they wouldn’t make me strip or at least pat me down, looking for such devices. Several times during undercover assignments I have experienced the pat down or a subtle search or even a full-fledged frisk, but tonight there was a lapse in security—no pat down, no search, no apparent concern.

The members came in all shapes and sizes; their ages ranged from the mid-twenties to the late sixties. They had only two things in common: they were all boy lovers, and they were all white.

Peter showed concern at first; he looked at my arm crutch and questioned whether I would be able to make the lengthy walk to Times Square. I assured him I could. Floyd, who joined us on the walk, had a harder time getting around than I did; he actually had a medical problem that contributed to his hobbled gait. My “osteogenetic osteomyelitis that resulted in spondylolisthesis” was more a condition of my imagination and a way to give fits to anyone who transcribed my recorded conversations. It worked, though; the condition’s ominous sound never required further explanation. The $350 titanium crutch provided by one of my friends added authenticity to my claim of failing health.

As one member approached, my first impression was that he was a priest. I assumed there would be several at the conference, but I was wrong; there were none. Still, I wasn’t too far off in my initial assessment: Jeff Devore was a chiropractor and an ordained minister from Orange County, California. As we began the walk, I struck up a conversation with Jeff. He was outgoing, easy to talk to, a fellow Californian, and it was his first conference as well. We had so much in common—except I carried a badge.