Animal (32 page)

Barboza told John Doyle that he had been approached by Peter Limone to take care of Teddy Deegan.

“He [Limone] came outta the Dog House [Angiulo’s North End headquarters] and said he wanted to talk to me. Limone said that a lot of people had been complaining about Deegan killing the Sacramone kid,” Barboza claimed. “He also said that Deegan had robbed a bookie in Everett and grabbed $82,000 in action money that belongs to the Office.”
¹¹⁴

Continuing the story, Joe said that Limone offered to pay him $7,500 to “handle the Deegan problem,” and that later, Henry Tameleo himself approved the hit.

“Henry told me, yes it’s okay. He [Deegan] has to go.”

With both Limone and Tameleo now implicated by Barboza for the Deegan murder, the feds still faced a problem with the actual hit squad
itself. They wanted to save both Nicky Femia and Jimmy Flemmi, and that meant replacing them in the getaway car on the night of the murder. Through an informant, Chelsea police believed it had strong information about Femia’s involvement. Barboza would have to swap out his friend Nicky with someone else. The question was who? This proved to be a great opportunity for the Animal to settle some old scores. He would simply replace Femia with Louis Grieco. After all, Grieco had tried to ambush Barboza crew member Patsy Fabiano several months back and had also served as Raymond Patriarca’s errand boy during botched negotiations with Joe’s lawyer, John Fitzgerald.

“How did Grieco become involved in the Deegan murder?” Detective Doyle asked Barboza.

Joe explained that Louis Grieco had reached out to him and complained that his wife was cheating on him and asked Joe to kill her for him.

“Louis told me that he’d return the favor any way I wanted it,” Barboza added.
¹¹⁵

Joe said that he’d recruited Grieco as a triggerman and another associate from the North End to serve as one of the getaway drivers. The biggest challenge facing Barboza and the feds was explaining away the description of a heavyset, bald man given by a key witness—Chelsea police captain Joe Kozlowski. This was the most damning evidence against the Bear, and it could give him a one-way ticket to the electric chair. Was there someone else whom Joe knew that might fit this description? The first man who came to mind was Joe “the Horse” Salvati, a Mafia wannabe from the North End who had been given his nickname because of his ample appetite. Salvati was a part-time fishmonger who also made money unloading trucks and working the door at various neighborhood social clubs. Salvati had three strikes against him in Joe’s mind. First, he had witnessed Barboza draw a knife and stab another gangster named Jackie Civetti inside Romeo Martin’s North End apartment in 1965. Salvati had pulled Barboza off Civetti, who ran out of the apartment and onto the street, leaving behind a trail of blood. Barboza then grabbed Salvati and pointed the knife to his throat. “You keep your mouth shut or you get worse.”
¹¹⁶

Salvati did keep his mouth shut but made an equally egregious mistake by taking a $400 loan from a Barboza associate and not paying it back.
When the Animal went to collect while Salvati was working the door at a Mafia-owned bar, the Horse told him to go fuck himself. Barboza was tempted to kill Salvati where he stood but thought better of it, only because he was in the North End at the time—enemy territory.

Fuck Salvati
, Joe thought. Although the Horse and the Bear shared a similar physical build, Jimmy Flemmi was bald, while Salvati maintained a thick head of hair. Condon and Rico had no solution for this major dilemma. Their plan had hit a wall, and that would mean bad news for Jimmy Flemmi. It would be easy to refute testimony brought forth by a regular citizen, but it would be nearly impossible to contradict statements made by a trained investigator like Chelsea police captain Joe Kozlowski. Suddenly Barboza had an idea. He told Condon and Rico about the elaborate disguises he had used on a number of jobs, including the hit on Teddy Deegan. Joe had worn a fake mustache and glasses to alter his appearance on the night he shot Deegan.

“I’ll testify that Salvati was wearing a bald wig,” Barboza announced.

It wasn’t airtight, but it certainly was the most plausible explanation they had heard thus far. The key now would be Barboza’s ability to sell it to a grand jury and later at trial.

Barboza testified before a twenty-one-man secret grand jury in late September 1967 and was then transferred from the Barnstable House of Corrections into the custody of the U.S. Marshal Service. He was removed from his jail cell under the cover of darkness and driven to the airport in Hyannis, where he was to meet his new protector—John Partington. The marshal had flown to the Cape in a
PBY
seaplane donated for the occasion by the Coast Guard. As he stood on the tarmac waiting for the man they called the Animal, Partington assessed his surroundings. Although the small airport lacked the security of a larger facility, Partington was somewhat relieved to find that a heavy fog brought on by cold, damp weather had decreased the visibility for any potential sniper hiding under the pine trees just beyond the runway. The marshal then returned his thoughts to Barboza. Given all that had been said and written about Barboza, it was crucially important for Partington to establish control over the prisoner right away. The Animal arrived at the airport at midnight and was escorted onto the tarmac surrounded by more than thirty state troopers and local cops armed with rifles. Wearing a porkpie hat and a long trench
coat ill suited to his stocky frame, Barboza shuffled forward bouncing on the balls of his feet like the boxer he once was. His appearance reminded Partington of the Raging Bull himself—Jake Lamotta. He also wore his signature wrap-around sunglasses and sported a three-day beard that covered his pronounced jaw.

“Get on the plane,” Partington ordered.
¹¹⁷

“Jesus Christ, where’s the rest of the guards?” Barboza asked as he took a deep drag on a cigarette.

Partington motioned to his partner, Deputy Marshal Jack Brophy, who would later protect Patty Hearst among others. “I’m it along with him,” Partington explained. “Put out your cigarette and put on your seatbelt.”

Barboza mimicked the order. “What’re you, a goddamned warden or something?”

Partington laid down the ground rules so that there could be no misinterpretation. He told Barboza that he was to follow orders or they’d sit on that fucking plane until morning.

The Animal stood his ground and asked Partington to offer his name, which the marshal did.

“Oh, you’re the prick on the beach every day with my wife. The other marshals come and go. What’s your angle?”

Partington ignored the poke. Instead he reiterated the order for Barboza to get on the plane. The
PBY
took off in the early morning hours, headed for Boston’s Logan Airport. After landing a short time later, Partington placed his prisoner in a car and continued on to the Federal Building.

As they entered the Sumner Tunnel, taking them from East Boston into the city, Barboza noticed a car following them. He alerted Partington, who had the car pulled over. The vehicle was carrying a small flock of reporters who had been tipped off that the Animal turned stool pigeon was being brought back to Boston. The media had its airport spies, and so did the Mafia. Partington knew that he had dodged a bullet, and his goal now was to get his prisoner in and out of the city of Boston as quickly as possible.

After a brief meeting at the Federal Building, Barboza was told that he would be reunited with his family on a secure island in Boston Harbor. The idea sounded very tranquil to Joe, who figured it would be a major improvement over his jailhouse accommodations on Olde Cape Cod.

His mood changed quickly when he landed on Thacher Island. This was no resort; instead it appeared to be Barboza’s own personal Alcatraz. There were a couple of weather-beaten cottages that appeared to shake in the harsh winds. Snakes slithered about in search of seagull eggs while the protective birds squawked incessantly, trying to keep the reptiles at bay.

“My wife’s gotta live in this shit place? My baby, living here? What the hell are they gonna do? You’re bringing my baby out to this goddamned place?”
¹¹⁸

“It’s either here or a ten-by-twelve-foot cell,” Partington replied.

Barboza didn’t respond. Instead, he stepped down from the landing pad and walked a few yards toward one of the many rocky hills that dotted the island. He stared down at the waves crashing below and thought how easy it would be for little Stacy to slip and fall to her death. He would have to watch her as closely as the guards watched him. Lost in thought, he gazed out at the horizon back toward Boston. It was at this moment more than any other that he realized that he was taking down New England’s Mafia Empire and that his enemies would try to destroy him no matter what the cost.

Seeing Barboza exposed as he was on the rocks, Partington rushed over and ordered him down. The Animal didn’t respond, so the marshal grabbed his leg. Barboza reacted on instinct and lunged at the marshal, connecting with a left hook to Partington’s mouth. He started bleeding from the lip and was momentarily unaware that Dennis Condon and Paul Rico had arrived and wanted a word.

“How’s it going?” Condon asked.
¹¹⁹

Partington wiped the blood from his lip and bit down hard. He told them that everything was just fine.

As they walked toward Barboza’s cottage, he whispered into Partington’s ear.

“Thanks for not ratting me out back there.”

Barboza knew that he had just struck a federal officer and that he could spend an additional ten years in prison for the assault.

“I’m not a rat,” Partington replied.

“Yes you are,” Barboza pointed out. “But you’re a good rat.”

There had been little activity on Thacher Island in recent years, and suddenly the rocky atoll was alive again with people coming and going
with supplies. The residents living onshore in Rockport and Gloucester buzzed with speculation about what was happening there. Most townsfolk thought the Coast Guard was involved in some new type of training on the island. Yet some people had seen a woman and little girl being escorted by small boat to the mainland in Rockport for a few hours of shopping from time to time. No one could have imagined that they were the wife and daughter of a notorious mob killer who himself was under twenty-four-hour guard on the island once known as Thacher’s Woe.

17

Baron’s Isle

Well I run to the rock, please hide me

NINA SIMONE

Barboza had spent the past several months in solitary confinement, and now he was having a tough time transitioning back to life as a husband and father. This certainly wasn’t an Ozzie and Harriet type of arrangement, but it had never been. Barboza was no domesticated animal. Previously, when the boredom of married life became too big a burden, Joe would simply vanish for days on end, shacking up with mistresses here and there. He had proved to be more like his father than he would care to admit in that respect. But there were no avenues of escape on Thacher Island, so Barboza had nothing to do but commit himself to being a better family man.

This was no easy task with more than a dozen U.S. marshals constantly hovering around.

Little Stacy Barboza had brought her cat Oby to the island, but there was no swing set and there were very few toys for her to play with. Her mother had allowed her to bring her tricycle onto the island, unaware of just how dangerous it could be. The only thing that her father truly feared in life was that something terrible could happen to his little girl. On Thacher Island there seemed to be a deadly hazard around every corner, and Joe had peace of mind only when Stacy was in the cottage and out of harm’s way. On one occasion she asked her father if she could ride her tricycle, and Joe said no. Like most children, little Stacy sought a second opinion, but she didn’t go ask her mother. Instead she asked her new friend, John Partington, who told her that it was okay. The marshal was unaware that he had overruled Barboza, and when the Animal saw Stacy riding her tricycle, he yanked her off and ordered her back to the cottage.

“I hate you,” she told him with tears streaming down her cheeks. “I want John.”
¹²⁰

Barboza gave Partington a menacing look. First the marshal had tried
to win over his wife, and now he was attempting to take his daughter away from him, at least in Joe’s mind.

To Partington’s credit, he understood the threat he had posed in Joe’s eyes. The marshal tried to make peace by setting up a makeshift boxing gym and allowing Barboza to sit in on the protection detail’s nightly card games. But even this had its challenges. Joe sparred with another young marshal who had doubted his argument that a great slugger could defeat a great boxer. The two men met on the landing pad and tapped gloves. The young marshal showed a few flashes of skill as he caught Joe with a straight jab to the face. Barboza seemed to relish the pain. His senses were suddenly alive again. It was the first time in a long while that he’d had the chance to physically dominate someone. The predator pounced and returned fire with a powerful hook to the body. The young marshal keeled over and the match was called. X-rays later revealed that Barboza had broken three of the man’s ribs. During a card game, Barboza and Partington had to be physically separated after an angry Joe told the marshal to fuck his mother in the ass.