While the neighborhood, led by King Benny, Fat Mancho and Carol, worked their end, I received and relayed the information I got from Michael back down the line. In turn, I fed Michael all that he needed to know.
We had set up a simple method of communication.
If Michael was sending, messages were left at work for me to call my nonexistent girlfriend, Gloria. Once I received the signal, I would send one of King Benny's men to pick up an envelope no later than noon of the next day at one of three designated drop spots.
If I needed to get word to Michael, I would have someone from the neighborhood pick up an early edition of the New York Times, script the word Edmund on the upper-right-hand corner of the Metro section and drop it in front of his apartment door. Later that day, Michael would pick up his envelope at an upper East Side P.O. box.
We spent our early weeks going beyond Michael's files, digging up information that could be used either in a courtroom or on the street against the three remaining guards. We also were working the witnesses, gathering their backgrounds, finding their weak spots. A full folder was also being developed on the Wilkinson Home for Boys, finding former guards, employees and inmates willing to speak out, hunting down wardens and assistants, locating the names of juveniles who died during their stay there and checking on the given cause of death.
Michael supplied us with a list of questions for O'Connor to ask in court. He also gave us the questions he intended to ask and the answers he expected to receive. Any additional information on the guards or on Wilkinson that he came across was also passed along.
All written messages, once delivered, were destroyed. Phone conversations were permitted only through the use of coded numbers on clear third party lines. There was never any personal contact between the main participants.
Our margin of error was zero.
Hell's Kitchen, a neighborhood that came to the aid of its allies as quickly as it rushed to bury its enemies, thrived under Michael's plan. The verbal shots at Michael continued, cries of traitor and gutter rat heard up and down the avenue, but those were bellowed for the sole benefit of strangers. The underground word, the only one that mattered, had spread through the streets with the speed of a late-night bullet – King Benny's 'sleepers' were making their play. 'Sleepers' was a street name for anyone who spent time in a juvenile facility. It was also a mob phrase attached to a hit man who stayed overnight after finishing a job. There were many 'sleepers' in Hell's Kitchen, but my friends and I were the only four King Benny considered his crew.
'You want a Rolls Royce, you go to England or wherever the fuck they make it,' Fat Mancho said. 'You want champagne, you go see the French. You want money, find a Jew. But you want dirt, scum buried under a rock, a secret nobody wants anybody to know, you want that and you want that fast, there's only one place to go – Hell's Kitchen. It's the lost and found of shit. They lose it and we find, it.'
EIGHT
King Benny sat on a park bench in De Witt Clinton feeding pumpkin seeds to a circle of pigeons, the late fall sun scanning his back. It was one week past Thanksgiving and three weeks into our work. The weather had begun its turn to New York cold.
He wore the same black outfit he usually wore in his club, ignoring the frigid air much as he ignored everything else. He had a coffee cup resting next to his right leg along with a small bottle of Sambuca Romana.
'I didn't know you liked pigeons,' I said, sitting down next to him.
'I like anything that don't talk,' King Benny said.
'I heard from Mikey today,' I said. 'The case goes to trial first Monday in the new year. It'll be a small story in the papers tomorrow.'
'You only got two witnesses who are gonna testify,' King Benny said. 'Two others changed their minds. That won't be in the papers tomorrow.'
'Which two?'
'The suits at the bar,' King Benny said. 'They said they had too many drinks to know for sure who they saw walk in.'
'That leaves the couple in the booth,' I said.
'For now,' King Benny said.
'Everything else is falling into place?' I asked, blowing breath into my hands.
'Except for your witness,' King Benny said. 'That pocket's still empty.'
'I've got somebody in mind,' I said. 'I'll talk to him when the time's right.'
'He good?'
'He will be,' I said. 'If he does it.'
'Make sure then,' King Benny said, tossing more seeds at the pigeons, 'that he does it.'
'None of this would work without you,' I said.
'You'd find a way,' King Benny said. 'With me or without.'
'Maybe,' I said. 'But I'm glad you're with us on this.'
'I don't know if I coulda been any help to you back in that place,' King Benny said. 'But I shoulda tried.' It was the only time he ever alluded to the fact that he knew what had gone on when we were at Wilkinson.
'Things happen when they're supposed to,' I said. 'It's what you always said to me.'
'Good things and bad,' King Benny said. 'Goin' in, you never know which one you're gonna find. Always be prepared for both.'
'And most of the time,' I said, 'bet on the bad.'
'You better go now,' King Benny said. 'You don't wanna be late for your appointment.'
'What appointment?'
'With Danny O'Connor,' King Benny said. 'He's waitin' for you in Red Applegate's bar. Should be on his second scotch by now. Get to him before he has a third.'
'Is he ready to go along?' I asked.
'He'll go,' King Benny said. 'He's too young to have his friends drive their cars with their lights on.'
Winter 1980
The court officers led John Reilly and Thomas Marcano into the crowded court room, both defendants walking with their heads down and their hands at their sides. They were wearing blue blazers, blue polo shirts, gray slacks and brown loafers. They nodded at their attorney, Danny O'Connor, and sat down in the two wooden chairs by his side.
The court stenographer, a curly-haired blonde in a short black skirt, sat across from them, directly in front of the Judge's bench, her face vacant.
The chairs of the jury box were filled by the twelve chosen for the trial.
Michael Sullivan sat at the prosecutor's table, his open briefcase, two yellow legal folders and three sharp pencils laid out before him, his eyes on the stenographer's legs. He was in a dark wool suit, his dark tie crisply knotted over his white shirt.
I sat in the middle of the third row. Two young men, both of whom I knew to be part of the West Side Boys, sat to my left. Carol Martinez, eyes staring straight ahead, was to my right. She held my hand.
Judge Eliot Weisman took his place behind the bench. He was a tall, middle-aged man with a square face topped by a cleanly shaved head. He appeared trim and fit, muscular beneath his dark robes. He was known to run a stern courtroom and allowed scant time for theatrics and stall tactics. Criminal attorneys claimed his scale of justice almost always tipped toward the prosecutor. The assistant district attorneys themselves called him fair, but by no means an easy touch.
Michael knew that Judge Weisman's initial take on John and Tommy would be one of disdain, a response that would be further fueled by the facts of the case. Michael also knew that the evidence against the two defendants would be so heavy that, combined with their history of violence, it would prod Weisman to try to avoid a trial. He expected Weisman to pressure both sides to work out a plea-bargain agreement.
Three times the Judge privately asked both counsels for such an agreement and three times they refused. John and Tommy stuck to their not-guilty plea and the Judge stuck to holding them without bail. Michael insisted that the people, as represented by his office, would want these men prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. As the case entered the jury selection phase, Judge Weisman did not appear pleased.