The Butcher (27 page)

I
t is amazingly difficult for the government to bug the car of a citizen. Even if that citizen is a notorious bad guy; even if that citizen is a mafioso killer; even if that citizen is a major drug dealer. Contrary to common belief, the government does not have unlimited power to eavesdrop on the American people. There are mandates, protocols, stringent rules and regulations that must be followed. Jim and Tom and Group 33 were intent upon adding to the growing amount of evidence piling up against Pitera—Shlomo Mendelsohn and Joe Dish Senatore. They wanted to get a bug in the car that he recently started driving, a black 1984 Oldsmobile. With the help of Justice Department attorney David Shapiro, papers were drawn up to get a listening device planted in the Oldsmobile. The affidavit was over an inch thick and laid out the reasons why the government wanted the bug. In this case, what Shlomo Mendelsohn and Joe Dish had told the government and what they had learned via other informants was reason enough to demand the right to install a listening device.

Using the VIN number of the Oldsmobile (which Pitera had dubbed “The Meatwagon,” and Group 33 had started calling it as a result), Jim went to the dealer who sold the car and was able to, with the help of court papers, get a duplicate of its key. Their plan was
to take the car to a place where a listening device could be cleverly installed and return it from where they had taken it. On the night they were going to pull this off, a half-dozen agents were involved. They were tracking Pitera from early evening to well after midnight, hoping he'd park the car and finally go to sleep. While he slept they would quickly do what needed to be done. Pitera was in his bar, the Just Us Bar, the agents patiently waiting outside in an unmarked van and in Jim's black Cadillac. Hour after hour passed, and Pitera did not come outside. Finally, near four o'clock in the morning, he exited with a couple of cronies in tow and they continued to talk outside.

Agent Dave Toracinta thought Pitera was so pale that he truly looked like a vampire. Toracinta was, in a sense, typical of DEA agents in that he had been in law enforcement in Dover, New Hampshire, but wanted more. He wanted to be part of the war on drugs, go up against the most cunning and dangerous criminals in the country. Like all the members of the Pitera task force, Dave was highly dedicated, highly motivated, would not rest until he knew the job was done and done well. It was Dave who was taking most of the clandestine photographs of Pitera and the Bonanno people.

Dave and the others watched Pitera grab the lower rungs of a fire escape and effortlessly do chins. He was obviously in good shape, they noted. Finally, near dawn, Pitera left Avenue S, parked his car near where he lived, and went upstairs as Brooklynites headed to work, went from one end of the borough to the other. Moving swiftly, the DEA agents absconded with the car, parking a government car in its place. They took it to the tech people nearby and a bug was installed. They returned the Oldsmobile to the spot where Pitera parked it. A job, they thought, well done.

Unfortunately, however, the bug malfunctioned and all their efforts were for naught. It seemed Pitera's luck was still, to a degree, intact.

B
oth Jim Hunt and Tommy Geisel knew that Manny Maya was a drug dealer, that he worked with Pitera. They were still looking for concrete proof, evidence—a way to turn Maya against Pitera. It was Joe Dish who revealed to Hunt and Geisel just how tight Manny and Pitera were—tight enough that Manny Maya and his garage could be used to undo Pitera. This was the garage where people from all the different crime families brought their cars to be detailed—cleaned up after a murder.

Manny was an average-size man with short hair, dark skin, and was muscular. He was friends with a very successful, active pot dealer named Michael Harrigan from Ozone Park, Queens. Harrigan had an excellent grass contact in Texas. He and his associates would actually fly down, buy suitcases, fill them up with hundreds of pounds of pot, and audaciously check the luggage on flights bound back to New York, according to Joe Dish.

In that this was many years before 9/11 and law enforcement were acting like wide-eyed innocents, it was an easy task to fly hundreds of pounds of marijuana from Texas to New York on domestic flights. Foreign flights, however, were another issue altogether. The luggage coming in from Italy, Turkey, Afghanistan, was as a matter of course checked for narcotics. Be that as it may, luggage on domestic flights
was not scrutinized as such. Like this, Mike Harrigan and his associates were able to bring large amounts of grass in from Texas as though it were something as innocent and innocuous as clothing. They were making a fortune—hundreds of thousands of dollars every month. Harrigan had been working under the umbrella of John Gotti Jr., the son of John Gotti Sr. People in the know say that John Gotti Jr. did not have the street acumen that his father did. In that this business between John Gotti Jr. and his associates was a narcotics operation, this was all off the books. It had to be.

Mike Harrigan did not like Gotti Jr. or any of his people; he felt they were all over-the-top, loud and vulgar, in-your-face “gangsters.” He felt that dealing with them, being associated with them, would eventually cause trouble. The trouble began when Michael Harrigan's ill feelings toward Gotti Jr. and company spilled over. He didn't want to be involved with them anymore. He vehemently complained to Manny Maya. Maya immediately suggested that they go to Tommy Pitera, that Pitera would welcome him with open arms, that Pitera would protect him, that Pitera wasn't afraid of anybody, least of all John Gotti Jr.

With that, Maya set up a sit-down between himself, Pitera, and Michael Harrigan. Pitera well knew the fortune that could be made with a good pot business. He knew, too, that because it involved drugs, he could freely co-opt the enterprise away from John Gotti Jr. with little problem. There would not be any kind of sit-down regarding this matter, particularly in light of the fact that John Gotti Sr. could not come to bat for his son over a matter that involved pot. Pitera played his cards with potent indifference to Gotti and company. Everyone knew, Pitera knew, that he was a killer. He was not just a man of respect, not just made, he was an ASSASSIN…he was the man who shot down Willie Boy Johnson; he was the man who cut up what was left of his enemies and adversaries and cleverly disposed of them somewhere out in the wilds of Staten Island and Long Island.

Now he'd be happy to be in a pissing contest with John Gotti Jr.

Michael Harrigan was between a rock and a hard place. He was
pleased to be away from Gotti and his associates, pleased to be working with Pitera now, but John Gotti Jr. was naturally irritated and angry. Gotti Jr. felt he was being disrespected, was losing a lot of money; he felt, too, that something he set up and nurtured was arbitrarily, unfairly, being taken away from him.

“Who the fuck does this Pitera think he is?!” were words heard frequently coming out of John Jr.'s mouth.

John Jr. could not go to his father about this, as Pitera knew. What he could do was “demand” a sit-down with Tommy Pitera. This sit-down would be like a quivering Chihuahua sitting down with a muscular Doberman pinscher—the Doberman was Pitera.

At the sit-down, John Gotti Jr. showed up with an Albanian associate named Johnny Alite. Pitera had Michael Harrigan with him. Harrigan was there because he had a vested interest in the outcome. Alite was an unknown guy who had no legitimate right to be there. Pitera immediately let his feelings be known—he didn't want Alite there. Offhandedly, somewhat facetiously, Gotti bragged that Alite had killed six people. Pitera disdainfully snorted that he had killed over sixty people, in a way of qualifying him, justifying his presence. Because both John Gotti Jr. and Pitera were made, Pitera had every right to demand that Alite leave, to throw Alite the fuck out the door, which is exactly what he did. Pitera knew that no matter how you cut it, he had the upper hand, provided that he stayed within the confines and dictates of Mafia protocol. He could not, as an example, slap John Jr. He could not curse at him. He had to treat him with respect. That certainly did not hold true for Johnny Alite.

When Pitera sat down and settled himself, calmed down somewhat, he told Gotti Jr. that Michael Harrigan now worked for him, that he was with him, and that John Jr. could go tell his father if he wanted. Pitera had outmaneuvered him with ease. Like this, the matter was resolved in favor of Pitera, and thus the pot business was wholly his. He came, he saw, he conquered.

 

Naturally enough, Pitera turned to Billy Bright to unload the pot. Bright had been selling weight of marijuana for many years. With Bright's connections, all the pot they brought up from Texas was quickly sold, turned into hard, cold cash. Pitera, Billy Bright, and Michael Harrigan made money hand over fist. Of course, no matter how you cut it, Pitera always got the lion's share.

Everything was going smoothly, with the precision of a fine Swiss watch, until Greg Reiter, a particularly loud and vulgar associate of Gotti Jr., came to Michael Harrigan and began making waves. Greg Reiter was a muscular tough guy who wore gold chains and drove a souped-up red Corvette. He felt that a good thing had been taken away from him unfairly, that something he developed with Michael and Gotti Jr. and Alite had been usurped, suddenly gone with the wind. He went and found Michael and said, “Look…what you're doing here is very unfair. I know you're with Pitera now. Everyone knows who Pitera is. Everyone is afraid of him, but there's a basic right and wrong and what you're doing here is wrong. This was our thing, man. We made it happen. Michael, we're friends…how could you do this?”

Reiter's words fell on deaf ears. No matter how you cut it, Harrigan could not go back to the way things were. Pitera had his sharp talons deep into their business and there would be no turning back. Harrigan well knew that if he betrayed Pitera, if he lied to him, he'd be dead. He, like everyone else, had heard about Pitera's burial ground, that he cut people up, that he got naked and got into tubs with people and cut off their arms and legs and heads.

NO—Michael Harrigan would not, in any shape, manner, or form, undermine Pitera's role in their pot business. Though Greg Reiter did not say anything overtly offensive to Michael Harrigan, he had opened a Pandora's box that would release something ugly and dreadful.

The following evening, Michael Harrigan sought out Tommy Pitera and found him at the Just Us. They went outside and walked along Avenue S. As they walked, DEA agents surreptitiously observed
them, took pictures of them. Michael explained to Pitera that Greg Reiter had come to see him, had said that what he was doing was “unfair.” With that, Pitera said, “Why don't you do this: set up a meeting with him and I'll come.”

“Okay,” Harrigan replied, unsure where this would go, apprehensive. After all, Greg Reiter had a right to be unhappy. Not believing Pitera would cause Greg any harm, that he was just going to “set him straight,” perhaps warn him, Michael reached out to Greg and said he would like to talk to him further. They agreed to meet in a parking lot in Nassau County, Long Island.

It was after eleven
P.M.
when they finally met. There were few people about. It was a cold night. Chilled winds with long, bony fingers tore through the wide-open expanse of the parking lot unchallenged, unbridled—mean. When Pitera arrived, he had Billy Bright with him. Bright was there as a backup gun for Pitera. In that Bright was a pot dealer, partners with Pitera in the pot business, he had a vested interest in what was about to occur. Pitera patiently, calmly, explained to Michael that Greg Reiter had to go; that sooner or later, he'd become a problem. That right now was the time to “nip it in the bud.” Considering the amount of money involved, that it was millions of dollars, Michael Harrigan knew Pitera was right. Greg could very well, as the next step, look to kill both Michael and Pitera. Pitera said, “When he pulls up, just act normal. Just act normal. Leave it all up to me.” And with that, Greg drove into the parking lot, ensconced in his red Corvette, comfortable and confident, and pulled up to where Mike Harrigan and Bright and Pitera were standing. Serious-faced, he pulled to a stop and began to get out of the car.

With shocking speed, Pitera moved toward him, raised a sawed-off shotgun that seemed to come out of nowhere, as if by magic, and fired. The shotgun sounded like a cannon, a thunderous roar. The double-O buck blew much of Reiter's face, neck, and collarbone into oblivion. What was left of his face was a sorrowful sight. With what was left of his countenance, he looked at Michael Harrigan and said in a weak
voice with blood bubbling from his mouth, most of his teeth missing, “I thought we were friends.”

“If we were friends,” Michael Harrigan said, “I wouldn't need him.” As he said this, he pointed to Pitera, as though he was kind of some robotic killing machine…not a human being.

 

Reiter's body was placed in the trunk of Harrigan's car. There were two shovels there already. Pitera, Bright, and Harrigan drove to a wildlife sanctuary in Nassau County—another location that Pitera used to get rid of bodies. By the time they arrived, it was close to one in the morning. A cold, frigid March wind tore through bramble and bush and trees. The branches looked like bare, arthritic fingers quivering and shaking in the winds hurrying off the nearby Atlantic. Because it was March, digging was hard and arduous, though with the three of them, each a strong, powerful man, the hole was done and the body was dumped inside of it. They covered the hole, patted the ground down carefully, and left.

Michael Harrigan would never forget how quickly and with what ease Pitera had taken Greg Reiter's life. He'd never seen anything like it. Not even in a movie had he seen the likes of Tommy Karate Pitera in action. Though he was clearly associated with Pitera, a business partner of Pitera's, he had come to loathe him. Over and over again, he had heard stories of how Pitera killed people who one day were his friends, one day were his partners, and the next day they were dead as a doornail…murdered, by Pitera. He well knew that Pitera had killed Phyllis Burdi, had cut her into six pieces and buried her. He also knew about Pitera's private cemetery on Staten Island. Slowly, Harrigan began to distance himself from Pitera. Whatever money he could earn via Pitera was not worth the creeps Pitera gave him, was not worth the nightmares. It didn't take long for Pitera to sense and realize that Harrigan was putting space between the two of them. Pitera sent out word that he wanted to meet with Harrigan to no avail.

Without notice, Pitera showed up at the Canarsie beauty parlor where Harrigan's wife, Anna, worked. She was an attractive brunette who knew nothing about the world of crime her husband was involved in. However, she knew Pitera, had met him in passing several times. Pitera asked Anna about her husband, why he stopped coming around, why he didn't return phone calls. He seemed…out of sorts, morose. Anna did not have the answers to Pitera's questions. Not knowing any better, not being a part of that world, she called up her husband, got him on the phone, and handed it over to Pitera. Pitera asked Harrigan where he'd been, why he'd stopped coming around. Harrigan said he'd been busy, that his mother hadn't been feeling well, that he'd come to Brooklyn to see him ASAP. With that, polite and smiling, Pitera thanked Anna and left the shop, Anna still on the phone with her husband.

“Why the hell did you do that—why'd you put me on the phone with him?”

“Why…did I do something wrong?”

“Yes, you did something wrong. I'm not returning the guy's calls because I don't want to talk to him.”

“He seems so…he seemed—lonely; like he has no friends.”

“Anna, he has no friends because he killed them all,” Harrigan said with an intensity and sincerity that unsettled his wife. Michael Harrigan did not like Pitera going around his wife. Fact is, he hated it. Pitera had no fucking right to bother Anna. But what…what could he do about it? Nothing, if he wanted to stay alive, he knew.

Though he didn't quite know it yet, Michael Harrigan's days were numbered.