Circle of Six (24 page)

He and Al hit me with some more barbs about my jump shot. As they led me from the room, we didn't talk about anything else.

I found myself moving quickly through the lobby. I tried desperately not to look at it, but there it was, that unmistakable iconic symbol in a field of blue:
Department of Justice, Federal Bureau of Investigation
. Underneath it read,
“Fidelity, Bravery, Integrity.”

The betrayal I felt wasn't going away. I'd been done dirty by the job, the New York City Police Department, but now it was my turn at infidelity. I'd turned a corner that only brought me closer to my own demise. I wasn't the NYPD's devoted little foot soldier anymore. I was a rogue operator, with no handlers and no support.

The turnover on the info was quick. While at my
Hollywood
office on Fifty-fourth Street, the receptionist buzzed me, “There's a Joe Murphy on line two, Mr. Jurgensen.”

I had to look around the room to see if my father had snuck in.
Mr. Jurgensen?
I had no idea who Joe Murphy was. “This is Jurgensen.” I heard street life in the background.

“Randy, I got those prices on the jerseys. Do you know where the Saint George Hotel is?”

“In Brooklyn?”

“Yeah, why not meet me there.”

“Now?”

“Is good'a time as any,” Pistone said dryly.

I'd been to the Saint George Hotel as a kid on field trips with my grammar school, Corpus Christi. My class would take the train, and within forty minutes we were whisked back in time to old New York. The Saint George was located in historic Brooklyn Heights. They were truly inspirational field trips for a bunch of rough and tumble Harlemites. After picnic lunches on the esplanade, we'd walk two short blocks to the Saint George Hotel for a swim in its indoor saltwater pool, which at the time was the largest in the country. Now, twenty-five years later, riding that same train, I was propelled back to the innocence of my childhood. I got lost in warm reminiscence, how as a kid everything seemed so possible, filled with such promise and certainty. Suddenly I was surged forward, and the train's screeching wheels brought me back to the miserable uncertainty of what my life had become. I began to question myself. Would all this deceit be justified in the end? Would it be the end of the case or the end of my career? Was my disloyal
behavior getting me anywhere? Was it just pride pushing me? Was the vengeance I wanted for Phil's murder worth this disconnection from all the protocol I had ever known?

But then the train stopped and I didn't have time to ponder all these questions. Though it had been two and a half decades since I'd been in the building, I had no trouble finding the pool.

I noticed Joe lounging on a deck chair, wearing a pair of sunglasses and a thick white terrycloth robe. In hindsight, I assume that Joe was boning up for the part of his lifetime, but from where I stood, he resembled less an FBI agent than Al Capone. I chuckled as I made my way to him.
Only thing missing are the cucumber slices for his eyes,
I thought.

“You guys really know how to live, Joe.”

“So I've heard, Randy. So I've heard.”

He seemed preoccupied, slid the sunglasses half-way down his nose, watching everyone in the huge quad, never looking into my eyes. “I'm gonna get up. Take the seat. Underneath the pad is what you asked for. It's all there.”

He stood and began to walk away. I asked, “Is this a one-time thing, Joe?”

He stopped with his back to me, pulling off his glasses to clean them. “Up to you, Randy.” He walked away.

As Pistone walked past the pool, Al Genkinger emerged from the water with two other men. They followed Pistone through double doors, toward the locker rooms.

I didn't open the manila envelope until the train pulled out of the station. My hands were shaking. Each picture was numbered one through twenty. I unfolded a legal-size paper. On it were the numbers corresponding with the photos. Next to each number was a name, date of birth, and address. Some even had Social Security numbers. At the bottom of the paper, a type written message read: “please destroy.”

I slid the pictures back into the envelope. I was giddy. I now had real names and addresses to go with the faces.

The thoughts I had had on the way there suddenly gave way to an intense feeling of euphoria. I wasn't betraying the job, not the way the job had betrayed Phil. I was working it, rolling with it; and in doing so, I was damn close to avenging the senseless death of a New York City cop, my friend, Phil Cardillo. At that moment, I knew I was exactly where I was supposed to be in life, and it felt good to be alive.

Once the pedigrees were transferred to the pictures, I did as requested, destroyed the paper. Handwriting analysis and fingerprints were infallible pieces of evidence. I was sure they had wiped or
dry-cleaned
the pictures. The information could never be doubled back to the FBI.

I called Sam DeMilia again, requesting the truck and camera. I wanted to fill my corkboard with as many faces as I could. The more pictures I had, the better my chances were that one of them would turn out to be a witness, and maybe just maybe, the shooter.

I went back to work. Day after day, the same trap was set for the mosque and its members. The second they noticed the RMP across 116th Street, the doors would open and the FOI men would file out onto the sidewalk. Some days, I had duplicate photos, other days I'd have all new faces. After collecting about twenty new faces, I called
Joe Murphy
, who met me at the Saint George, and then again a week later to switch envelopes. I gave him the new photos; he passed me the dry-cleaned envelope filled with pedigrees.

In all I had sixty identified Muslims. Now was the hard part, placing them at the scene. It was time to call The Bull, John Van Lindt.

Van Lindt's office was on Baxter Street, which was located in the rear of 100 Centre Street, Manhattan's Supreme Court. He was the number one gun in the homicide division. He was the protégé of famed Bureau Chief John Keenan, who had convicted more murderers than any other ADA in the Manhattan DA's office, including the two cop killers I'd arrested, Victory and Bornholdt. Van Lindt was a serious-minded attorney who lived by the letter of the law. He was an introvert with a keen ear for listening and an eye on the smallest detail of any case. His sleeves were rolled up, tie loosened over a crisp snow-white shirt when I walked in. He sat back and listened intently as I broke the case down for him. What I didn't give him was the fact that a Hollywood film editor and agents from the FBI had inadvertently become my cornermen on the case. John Van Lindt and every other ADA in the entire tristate area knew all the scummy details of this case. I didn't feel the need to add any more negativity, especially with the man who was going to work this case.

After hearing my account of the ID'd Fruit of Islam soldiers, he was emphatic that not one of the Muslims be interviewed unless I was absolutely positive that the man was at the scene and he in fact saw the shooter. “You only have one chance at this, Randy. You grab the wrong man, he gives you a total lie. Then we have to start disproving the lies. It just makes it that much harder to make the case.”

I knew what he was saying all too well. I also knew that if I started detaining Muslims, two things were going to happen: the Muslims would coordinate their stories into one big gelatinous lie, and the real shooter would be in the wind.

We agreed, the only way to get any decent statements would be to turn one of the witnesses at the scene. That would mean one of them had to get himself arrested, I'd have to be informed of the collar, and then I'd have to turn him. My biggest problem was that out of the sixty ID's I had that at that moment, I couldn't place any one of them in that lobby.

It was time to go back to the cops.

My plan was to conduct photo arrays with all the cops I'd originally designated in tier one at the mosque. I'd been worried about doing this before, because once they'd ID'd the men, the cops would be howling for arrests. But I couldn't make an arrest until I knew who the shooter was. I didn't have a choice, so I hoped I could keep a handle on things.

I then had another idea. I would type up a UF49, which would simply state, that if an arrest was made of any Muslim, man or woman, I was to be notified immediately at the 2-5 Precinct so I could debrief and question the person or persons. The forty-nine would also state that a deal could be bartered if the information given was truthful and led to an arrest. I could circulate the forty-nine to all seventy-five precincts through the department mail.

I typed the forty-nine and brought it to Lieutenant Muldoon, where I was immediately denied the request. I didn't argue or imply a threat. I did what I was told to do. I put all my requests on paper. That paper trail was growing, and cutting a wide swath from the 2-5 directly to the twelfth floor of the puzzle palace, One PP.

I wasn't deterred. Muldoon wasn't running the case; I was. I typed and printed the forty-nines anyway. This was before Xerox machines. They had to be duplicated by hand, not an easy task. Once I was done, I set sail for Brooklyn, my first of many stops.

I was lost in the borough of pizzerias, churches, and funeral parlors. My first stop was the 8-4 Precinct, which was located about 2,000 feet south of the Manhattan Bridge. After that, there were twenty-three more.

I delivered the forty-nine to the 8-4 squad, where all of the detectives knew me and my story. I was told the forty-nine would be placed at the fingerprint board. Anyone collared would have to look directly at the report while being printed. I was given directions to the next nearest precinct, the 7-6 in Carroll Gardens.

It took me almost an hour to find the 7-6; this wasn't going to work. I needed help. I made my way up to the squad, handed the forty-nine to the DTs, and explained my dilemma. A uniformed cop heard my story. I saw him bolt from the squad room. When he returned, I was surrounded by ten uniforms. I thought the fervor for the case had subsided, but I was wrong. After updating half of the precinct's patrol force on the progress of the case, the PBA delegate offered to deliver the forty-nines to the closest three precincts. He'd have those cops deliver it to their neighboring three precincts, and this would continue until all the forty-nines had been passed out through Brooklyn. It worked.

I got the same help from the Manhattan precincts. I split the work, delivering half myself.

Within one day, Vito received three calls, two in Brooklyn, and one in lower Manhattan. Whether these collars turned out to be relevant to my investigation didn't matter. What was important was the fact that the plan had worked. It was just a matter of time before some arrestee would have some information to trade. I hit the lower Manhattan precinct first. The perp wasn't even a Muslim. It took me almost two hours to find each precinct in Brooklyn. Both of those perps were Muslim, but they turned out to be
fruitless. I went back to Manhattan to continue papering the remaining precincts.

This went on for weeks. I'd deliver the forty-nines, then I'd call in to the 2-5 where I'd be given more precincts with arrested “Muslims,” wanting to talk. Most of the time, the arrested individuals weren't Muslim, but they all claimed to know someone, who knew someone, who knew a Muslim. And of course, I'd get a call from the ass-end of Brooklyn, which would turn negative results, and then I'd get another call from the Bronx, then another across two boroughs into Staten Island. This started to wear me down, but it was my only plan of action.

I worried that eventually this paper drive was going to find its way to the Farrakhan mosque, and then I'd be fucked. My instinct told me they weren't aware that we were even investigating the murder, which gave me room to maneuver. It also gave me the element of surprise, if and when someone was collared with legit information to trade. I couldn't help it. The plan went on for weeks with no results.

Then I was called into Van Lindt's office and got terrible news. He'd accepted a job with the Attorney General's office. He'd be gone in a matter of months. This was devastating to me because Van Lindt knew every aspect of the case, and we worked well together. He assured me the bureau chief—John Keenan—was watching this case closely, and the replacement would be as thorough. In the back of my mind I knew the longer it took to develop this case, the harder it was going to be to keep continuity from within. Van Lindt, the quarterback of this case, was the first casualty of the NYPD's campaign to never solve this murder.

While at Van Lindt's office, I got a call from
Joe Murphy
. He wanted a meet at the Saint George Hotel. This was odd. I hadn't given him any new pictures recently. He didn't elaborate. We agreed to meet in half an hour. Van Lindt knew I was way off the NYPD grid on this case, which is why he never asked questions. He understood that I was savvy enough to give him only what he could use in court, anything else was excess fat for defense attorneys. The less we gave them, the stronger our case would be.

I stepped out of the office to find my personal car had been tagged with a ticket by a meter maid. It was the first of a truckload I'd receive while at the DA's office. I wasn't granted an NYPD parking permit from Muldoon.

Our meetings at the Saint George varied; sometimes it was at the pool, other times in the coffee shop, restaurant, or bar. Today we met in room 906. I assumed the FBI used the hotel for clandestine meetings with foreigners or
other CIs. As directed, I didn't announce myself at the desk. I went straight to the rear elevators. I had begun to use my undercover tradecraft whenever I took these meetings with the bureau. I felt safer that way.

I knocked three times on the door. The peephole slid and closed quickly. Joe was alone. The room was standard, a pair of double beds, bathroom, and small kitchenette. The kitchen area was stocked with food. A table was set up as a bar, lined with top-shelf liquor, and the closet contained business suits, leisure clothes, bathing suits, even neatly pressed pajamas and an assortment of slippers. I figured the room was used as a safe house for visiting agents, rogues, even spies. This only added to my paranoia. I wondered if cameras went along with the bugs I was sure were planted in the room. I wondered how far up the federal chain my betrayal was known.