Jack Rausch: From the Cartel to Christ (Part II)

Cocaine was flooding into the United States at an unbelievable rate by 1985. The Medellín Cartel was responsible for almost 90% of the cocaine that was smuggled into the country.  They were grossing around $80 million a day from the cocaine.

Cocaine prices were dropping in the US by 1987, not because less people were buying but because of the large amounts the Cartel was bringing into the country.  In 1985 a kilo of cocaine was worth $32,000 in Newport Beach CA.  In 1987 that same kilo would be worth only $18,500.  The Colombians, like Jack Rausch, had left Miami for SoCal.  The traditional route for the Cartel was through the Caribbean and by 1983 Carlos Lehder (the Cartel’s head of transportation) was finished in the Bahamas.  Carlos was reduced to hiding in the jungles of Colombia.  

Jack Rausch was having big success in SoCal. He moved load after load of cocaine until he felt the heat from law enforcement.  He had been in a restaurant waiting to exchange car keys with his contact when a woman walked by and flirted with him.  He noticed that she was sitting with another woman and neither of them had touched their food.  When the contact arrived, Jack left with the keys.  He saw that he had a tail. He ditched the cars following him, but he saw the woman drive by as he was parked.  The heat was on, so he dropped off the contact’s car in a parking lot and let him know where the empty car was parked.  He quickly dumped his pager and emptied his stash house.  He called his office in Colombia and gave them his new pager number.  That was how the game was played back then.  If the heat was on you just dumped everything and waited it out.  The law only had so many resources that they could spend on a guy doing nothing.  

José Gonzalo Rodríguez Gacha, one of the members of the Cartel had developed smuggling routes through Mexico.  He helped flood the SoCal market with cocaine in the 1980’s. People who were not in SoCal at the time cannot imagine the amount of cocaine that was going around.  It was every bar, night club, restaurant and party.  So many people were buying it or dealing it.  It was not uncommon to see multiple people in restroom stalls sniffing cocaine when you walked in to use a restroom.

Looking back on his life, Jack Rausch figured out that he moved enough cocaine to supply 40 million doses (or hits) to people.  Jack knew what he was doing was wrong but things like right and wrong get lost in all the money coming your way.  In the 1980’s all of us thought the party would never stop.  We never thought that we would see the year 2000.  It is funny because we not only saw the year 2000 but saw our 30s and are now in our 40’s.  In those days Jack and I would pull up in front of our favorite sushi place in Aliso Viejo in our Corvettes.  The last time we met, much older, we were both driving regular Toyota trucks.

Jack had to make a trip to Medellín to see the bosses around this time.  It was a really bad time in Colombia because the Cartel was at war with the Government of Colombia but it was really the United States that was behind it.  The US was the world's biggest consumer of cocaine and by the mid-1980’s over 500 tons were being used a year. The politicians were under fire from everyone to do something about the cocaine epidemic. The cause of the problem was not the Cartel shipping hundreds of tons of cocaine to the US it was the people in the US using it.  America never likes to take responsibility for its actions.  The US Government  pressured the Colombian Government to let them extradite drug traffickers to the US to face trial.  The Cartel members knew that nobody ever beats the US Government in a trail so they fought to stay in Colombia.  

The biggest criminal in the world was Pablo Escobar at this time.  He was pulling down more cash than any criminal before him or since.  The Cartel offered to pay the Colombian National debt if they would not extradite them.  The Government passed on his offer, so Pablo started a war.  Pablo and Carlos Lehder were both heavy into politics but they both had to go underground.  They both started working with paramilitary groups in the jungles.  They brought in Israeli mercenaries to train their private groups and assassins also know as sicarios.  The Cartel sicarios like to drive up on a motorcycle and blast a target with a pistol.  This is how my friend was murdered in Newport Beach California in 1987.  I helped the Deadliest Warrior reenact this hit on an episode in season two.   “Plata o plomo” which translates to “silver or lead” was Pablo Escobar's motto.  You would either take a cash bribe, or be shot full of holes.  Pablo also offered up a million peso reward to anyone who killed a police officer.  

This was the Medellín that Jack left Orange County for in the 1980’s.  He was able to secure a big job for Pablo to move an 800 kilo load. When he got back to the US, Jack was happy at the time because he was moving serious weight for the big boss.  He never thought that he was selling his soul for a little plata. He was invited to Kevin’s disco which was in the mountains overlooking Medellín.  When he arrived the parking lot full of bodyguards with machine guns and the first thing he thought was it was a trap. Jack was not going to be killed, Pablo was inside.

Jack left after a few minutes, not wanting El Doctor to notice him.  A few days later he was at another Cartel dinner spot when a waiter came over and told them that DAS, the Colombian FBI, was going to raid the place.  Jack and his buddy took their pistols and went up to the roof through a secret passage.  DAS came and went but before they left the roof another two car loads of heavily armed men pulled up.  When Jack was leaving the restaurant one of the men came up and shook his hand and said you did a great job El Mono.  El Mono was his nickname.  The guy who shook his hand was Pablo’s top sicario.

We are not selling to addicts or kids.  That is what Jack and the rest of us told ourselves and each other in the 1980’s.  I mean technically, we did not, but what we did sell made it to the little dealers, which made it to addicts and kids.  I know Jack has thought about the damage he did and he knows there is no upside to drug use.  It is not glamorous or fun in anyway.  Pablo Escobar was a murderer who had people attack the Palace of Justice in Colombia and murder the judges.  He had Avianca Flight 203 blown out of the air. I have searched online for a passenger list of those 107 people that were killed and you cannot find it.  Pablo Escobar is a subject of movies and books.  This year I saw a Pablo Escobar Halloween costume.  These drug groups never last long because once the leader is gone that is the end of the group.  Pablo gave up Carlos Lehder to be extradited to the US.  He gave up a number of traffickers. There is no honor among thieves.  

Jack Rausch was enjoying success, or what he thought was success.  Life was materially good but inside he was lost.  It was the Mid-1990s and he was still in the game.  He had stopped using drugs and drinking, but his life was dark.  All the money came and went but happiness eluded him. The cocaine game had changed from the 1980’s.  The prices were down and it was not as socially accepted. The cheap drugs Meth and Ice had taken over as the high of the day.  Colombian traffickers no longer wanted to take a chance of being locked up forever in a concrete box in the United States.  Mexico had been a shipping point since the eighties and the groups inside the country had become powerful from the influx of cash.  They had the people in the US because of the non existent border.  They had their own built in distribution network that was easy to staff.  The treaties made bringing truckloads across the border easy.  Jack was now being directed by the office in Medellín to meet with Mexicans who smuggled the cocaine into the country.  Mexico as a country is even worse than Colombia when it comes to corruption.  The former President's brother had a bank account with over 60 million that he got from drug traffickers.  In the border towns law enforcement either are corrupt or dead.  Mexico is really a Narco State like the shows like to portray Colombia in the 1980’s. Our Government just won't admit it.  Jack began a 10,000 kilo load that the office in Colombia put together with some Mexican traffickers.

Jack had a used car lot and life looked good.  He figured that this would be his final job for Medellín. He met the Mexicans when the load was in SoCal and he received the first 550 kilos.  He dropped off 300 and then was getting ready to drop off another 200 when he noticed the helicopter.  He was soon surrounded by flashing red lights right there on the street in Aliso Viejo.  Jack's time on the street was over.  

He was defiant when locked up and he told law enforcement that he worked alone.  True to form for the criminals of today he was basically alone.  Days turned to months and so on as he waited for a court date.  He was given a Bible, which is the one thing they cannot take from you even when you are in the hole. One day when he came out he saw some men seated around a table praying.  He decided to join them.  Many years later he began his ministry after a lot of school and worship.  People can change, but only if they are willing.  Once they embrace God anything is possible.  There are not many people from that time period left. Many of the people we knew are no longer with us.  Those that stayed in the life are locked away forever.  Time for all of us to do some good.  Please read From the Cartel to Christ for the full story.

Narcos and Colombia - Jack Rausch

I thought I would switch things up this week.  The show Narcos on Netflix is a hit.  It has brought back the 1980’s cocaine world with a sterilized Hollywood view. The show tells the story of Pablo Escobar, the Medellín Cartel (which included Jose Gonzalo Rodriguez Gacha, Jorge Ochoa and his brothers Juan David, Fabio, the DEA Agent who pursued them). The movie Blow told the same story from the view of an American pilot. I thought some of you would want to know what it was really like inside the Cartel on a day to day basis. They all show the drug lords sending off tons of cocaine and then bringing home bags of cash.  How was the cocaine distributed and the money picked up? I urge you to read From the Cartel to Christ: How God restores stolen dreams. This book will take you into the dark world that was the cocaine trade of the 1980’s.

Why would I write about this book?  I will tell you the story.

In 2005 when I was writing Breakshot I started reaching out to people from my past. I ended up speaking to someone who I've known since high school.  She dated a man named Jack Rausch, who I became good friends with in the 1980’s.  I liked Jack and had not planned on writing about him.  I also figured he was either dead or locked up forever.  If Jack was not locked up, I figured he might be living in Medellín, Colombia where he grew up.  The way they deal with people in that city is not good and I did not want to cause him any problems.  So I did not include him by name in my book.  Jack had been a player with the Medellín Cartel for years in the 1980’s and the early 1990’s.

In 2009 I was put in touch with Jack and we decided to meet for lunch.  I left my office and went to El Polo Loco in Lake Forest.  This was a long way from our old days of Sushi and nightclubbing.  I was a little nervous because I rarely saw anyone from my past and I was not sure how he would receive me. When he walked inside I knew I made the right choice.  He greeted me with a strong handshake and a smile.  The years had been good to Jack, or so I thought.

We sat down to lunch and he told me the story that was his life since I last saw him. He continued doing the same thing that he always had in the 1980’s.  He had been arrested for his part in moving a 10,000 kilo load of cocaine.  He was charged with delivering 500 kilos of that load himself. For your information that is 1102.31 pounds of cocaine. He had been locked up since the mid 1990’s but according to him, his life was good.  He told me he had found Christ and that is when I rolled my eyes inside my mind.  I thought, “Oh great, another criminal who found God when he was in trouble.” I figured some kind of pitch was coming in a minute. It never came. The more I spoke to Jack, the more I realized that he was speaking the truth.  He was not in trouble, he was no longer a criminal and he was everything he said he was. He was a working guy who also worked at a ministry.  He never pushed it on me and now I know he knew I was not ready for it yet. He was happy and that was the thing I first picked up on.  In the 1980’s neither of us were ever happy, even with large amounts of cash coming in daily. Then he brought up that he was writing a book.  I thought that it would be great for him to get it out.  From the Cartel to Christ came out last year and it is a must read for anyone interested in the 1980’s Southern California drug world.  

I read it and it made me feel a little sick to my stomach.  It brought me back to a place and time that I was not sure I wanted to go back to at this time in my life.  

Jack’s story begins in Medellín where Jack grew up after his father left his mother.  Jack's father had started a couple of profitable banana plantations in the jungle regions of the country.  Jack however had no interest in school or bananas.  He wanted to be a mafioso.  A mafioso in Colombia is not the same as we know it.  Colombians had historically been known as smugglers in South America but as tastes changed, they moved into cocaine and they became known as mafioso.  Jack was in the right place at the right time if you consider that life good. Times were changing in the way they smuggled cocaine to America. It went from the mom and pop use of mules (aka people who carry the cocaine into the country) to airplanes filled with kilos in the 1980’s.

Jack begins when the Cartel was born and he is one of the few who made it out alive.

Jack’s first job had him waiting in the jungles of northern Colombia when a small Cessna plane made a quick landing on a makeshift runway carved out of the jungle.  Jack waited for a tractor loaded with canvas sacks full of kilos to pull up.  Another crew quickly refueled the plane as Jack and another man threw the sacks into the seatless plane.  The plane quickly accelerated and took off just barely clearing the trees.

Jack was paid 100,000 pesos or about 300 dollars in the early 1980’s. That was not bad money for his age or the times, but that is not what he wanted.  He was a newly licensed pilot and he wanted in on the transportation money.  Pilots could net 5,000 a kilo for transporting it to the US and they could carry about 400 kilos on a small plane.  They made a lot but they lived short lives.  The planes would run out of fuel and drop into the ocean or crash in the jungle never to be seen again.  Jack made a couple of runs but life as a pilot did not work out.  He was instead sent by the traffickers to the US to oversee the loads that came into the country from Colombia. They had started working together to put together huge loads that would serve to spread out the risk.  The system worked because before if a 500 kilo load was sent by one group and it was lost it was a huge hit.  The new way the load was split between five groups and that softened the hit if it was busted. The Cartel itself was not just the men whose names we know but a lot of small traffickers and later Traqueteroros, drug traffickers from good families that wanted to dabble.  They would pool investors cash and daddys money to put together loads. He started working in Miami until things changed there and the Colombians started migrating to Southern California. He was told that the office handling distribution in California had become available.  What that really meant was the guy who ran it before was dead or under arrest.  So Jack was soon on a plane to SoCal but just before he boarded the flight in Miami some DEA Agents grabbed him and had his baggage brought to them. It was bad to be a Colombian flying from Miami to Los Angeles in the 1980’s.  Once Jack landed at LAX he was picked up by another DEA team and searched again.  Once freed Jack made his way to a cheap airport hotel where he rested and watched TV.  A few days later he went to a payphone and made a call to the Miami office.  The next day his contract picked him up at the hotel and he disappeared into urban sprawl that is SoCal.  The Colombians had set up a system of offices to handle the importation, distribution and the handling of the cash.  

People have to remember that that cellphones were a few years away.  Pagers just beeped and you had to call into a service who gave you a message.  I paid 800 dollars for a pager and it was not even a display pager it just beeped.  Payphone calls were dime then and they all took incoming calls.  They set up a number of offices in Colombia that were a kind of logistical support.  Guys like Jack had the numbers memorized and they would call in with their code names.  They would be given contact names and numbers. They also set up other offices here in the US to serve the same purpose.  These offices never came into contact with the product aka cocaine so they didn't have the heat.  Jack and others would get here and chill in hotels until they felt there was no heat.  They would then get fake papers and IDs then move to a nice middle class neighborhood.  They would rent houses or condos buy cars and live normal lives until they got the call.  They would then go someplace and be handed a set of keys for a truck.  They would then drive the truck to a house they rented and unload the kilos of cocaine.  They would unpack it to protect the shipping method and separate the kilos for different groups here in the US.  Then they would drop off the truck and somebody would pick it up.  A week would be spent dropping off the load and then it was time to close down the house and find another. They would also get calls to pick up cash.  Rule number one was the cash and the drugs were never in the same place at the same time. That is why the way it is portrayed in the movies with guys standing around with machine guns when a deal goes down is stupid and wrong.  What do a bunch of Harvard guys know about the drug world but what they imagine?   Waiting for a load was a time for many like Jack to relax and have fun.  

Jack rented a home in Orange County and started going to school.  Life was normal until he had to pick up a load.  Then it was unpacking the Kilos marking down the symbols or stamps.  They would be wrapped blocks stamped with a penny or a queen with numbers and each one of these would be recorded into a ledger book.  Then they would divide them up according to deliveries.  They would drop off hundreds and then even lower amounts like 20 kilos which were closer to the street level dealer. Jack had to make a number of trips back to Medellín because the business was very much hands on and what happens there affects what went down in SoCal.

Next week I will write about what was going on in Colombia when El Doctor was running the business. I suggest buying the book if this topic interests you and you want a more detailed account.

From the Cartel to Christ on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/From-Cartel-Christ-Restores-Stolen/dp/0991380703

http://fromthecarteltochrist.com

"Gus" Farace

I had TV on in the background and an old movie starring Tony Danza came on.  It was called “Dead Or Alive: The race for Gus Farace.”  I had watched it many years ago, but it reminded me of the story.  

Constabile "Gus" Farace was a bad seed from an early age. Gus grew up in Tottenville, Staten Island, where his Mob connected father had a small store.  He was a large boy who loved to throw his weight around.  He joined a gang called the Bay Boys that used to brawl and destroy things in Tottenville.  Gus was pulled over by police in January 1977 and they found a pistol.  Not even a month later he was arrested for forgery.

Gus moved on to much worse crimes, and by December of 1979 he pleaded guilty to first degree manslaughter.  Gus, the stellar person that he was, kidnapped two boys from Greenwich Village because he claimed they propositioned him.  So Gus and his three friends beat one to death with driftwood and their hands.  The other was lucky because he was able to dive into the water near where they took them, and he escaped.  He later identified Gus in a lineup, and after the plea deal Gus was given 7 to 21 years.  

It was while locked up that he met and became friendly with long time Bonanno member Jerry Chili.  Jerry liked Gus and they stayed in contact when Gus was released in 1985.  Gus started dealing weed right away and soon moved into cocaine.  He partnered up with Greg Scarpa Jr. in 1988 in a drug business.

On the night of February 28, 1989, Gus did the unthinkable.  He murdered an undercover DEA Agent on Staten Island. The Agent, Everett Hatcher, was the first DEA Agent murdered in New York.  Hatcher had made some small buys from Gus and he had set up a deal with him that night. Gus directed him to a deserted section of Staten Island where he drove up next to him in a van and shot him through his open window as they spoke.  Gus shot him 3 times in the head and got away because Hatcher’s back up had lost him.  

Gus had broken a rule that had gone back to the time of Lucky Luciano by murdering a DEA Agent.  The heat was immediate and the Feds poured into New York.  They began to grab and roust mobsters all over New York. They let them know that they would not be able to breath until Gus was taken off the street.  The Mafia decided Gus had to go.  The Lucchese family had a member Johnny Petrucelli hiding Gus in an upstate cabin.  Petrucelli had met Gus in prison, where Gus saved his life. They soon gave Petrucelli the contract to murder Gus and they told him either kill him or yourself.  They told him to leave the body in the streets so the Feds would know he was dead.  Petrucelli never carried out the hit and a few months later he was shot to death.  

On November 17, 1989, just before midnight on a Brooklyn Street, Gus was gunned down by three men.  James Galione, Mario Gallo and Louis Tuzzio caught him in his car on a Brooklyn street and blasted away.  They also hit his friend, another associate, who lived.  They really did the State of New York a favor because Gus was just a bad seed.

Ndrangheta

There is another organized group from Sicily that has gone virtually unnoticed for years because of the rural area that spawned them.  They are the Ndrangheta or Honor Society and they are made up of approximately 100 families in and around Calabria.  They are now the largest organized crime group in the world with around 5,000 members worldwide.  Their structure is very close to the Cosa Nostra but most members of the families are related by blood and in some villages all the men belong to the Ndrangheta.  They are huge money makers by any standards because they pull in around 44 billion Euros a year or roughly 3% of Italy's GDP.  Over 60% of their cash comes from drugs.

Many years ago men from the Ndrangheta immigrated to far flung corners of the globe and with them they brought the Ndrangheta. They developed contacts in place like Columbia where they got close to the cocaine traffickers.  A lot of people think the Mexican cartels are in charge of cocaine trafficking but what they really are is the middle men.  The large Colombian traffickers from Medellin and California saw their empires and their freedom taken away because they imported cocaine into the US. So they found willing and able partners in Mexico.  The Ndrangheta formed a coalition with the Colombian traffickers and now they are the biggest cocaine importer to Europe.  They surpassed the American and Sicilian Mafia in that area.  They do work closely with the Mafia and in fact I’ve written about them before. They also move a lot of heroin.

They have operated for a long time in the US but have remained unknown.  They have been here for 100 years going way back to extortion plots in rural areas where Italians worked.  They had a long time member Vincenzo Coluccio in Los Angeles who was just deported on August 27 by Immigration and Customs. He was picked up by the DEA in 2010 for possession of methamphetamine, cocaine and a pistol. The Italian government wanted him back where he is wanted for drug trafficking.  They claim he is a high ranking member of Mazzaferro Crime Family based in Calabria. He was in charge of exporting the cocaine from Los Angeles using a courier system as well other methods to move large amounts overseas. They would have couriers pick up small carry on bags with compartments to carry the cocaine and they would book their travel from Los Angeles to all over the Mediterranean.  All these trips were book through Mirage Travel Agency which was owned by a Greek Italian.  Rocco Coluccio, an Italian American, was the long time head of the clan in Los Angeles until he was killed in a car accident and that is what brought Vincenzo Coluccio to the forefront. There was a coffee distributor in Inglewood, California that never really sold coffee but a few known Italian drug traffickers would stop by and then leave.  There was a similar one in Brooklyn near Henry and Union Streets. I am sure the Feds are keeping an eye on them.

The Ndrangheta controls Organized Crime on the East Coast of Australia since the 1920's.  They had a war in the 1960's over the Victoria Market in Melbourne which moves tens of millions in fruit every year.  They also imported more than 14 million ecstasy pills hidden inside tomato cans from Calabria.  This was the largest bust of pills in 2008.

They are very big in Canada because Canadian banking laws make it easy to launder cash profits.  They are in Spain which they use as a distribution point for Europe.

The Ndrangheta will continue to grow and become a bigger criminal organization as long as there is a war on terror keeping law enforcement busy.

Alessandro Taloni & Vito Rizzuto

Charged with importing over 100,000 Kilograms of marijuana from Canada to New York and Philadelphia between 1998 and 2012, this drug trafficking organization reached from California to Montreal and took in over a Billion dollars.  They worked with the Hells Angeles, Mexican Cartels, Bonanno Family and the Rizzuto Family.

A large amount of the Marijuana was grown hydroponically in Canada and then smuggled across the border in the US via the Indian Reservations that straddle the US-Canadian border.  This was an easy way for them to bypass US Customs at other entry points on the border.

They would use profits from marijuana to purchase cocaine from the Sinaloa Cartel and distribute it across the East Coast and Canada. They would obtain sizable loads of cocaine from the Cartel. They would break them down to between five and ten kilo's to smuggle into Canada.

The indictment has so many counts of exporting in excess of 1,000 kilograms of marijuana that it is hard to follow.  Then they had the problem that was recently so well portrayed by Walter White on Breaking Bad. They had to do something with all the cash. The Feds posed as money launderers that could help move money and make it clean.

Alessandro Taloni is a name most people have never heard.  He was an important part of the Bonanno Family's drug connection.  Taloni was born in Italy but has lived in Montreal for many years.  It was here that he became friendly with Vito Rizzuto and his crime family.  Taloni was an unknown until the head of the Drug Trafficking asked a DEA informant to move 1 million dollars in cash for him.  The Informant and the DEA told them they would move 200,000 at a time for a 6% charge which means they would launder 188,000 for the organization. A man in Los Angeles met with the Informant and after that meeting he was followed back to the Beverly Hills Hotel where he met Taloni and gave him a large suitcase which he placed in his trunk.  Taloni then left and drove to a home in Woodland Hills where he took the suitcase from the trunk and brought it inside.  The DEA sat on them in the house until Taloni left.   The DEA later pulled him over and found $80,000 in cash, a couple prepaid cell phones and an encrypted Blackberry.  The big surprise came when they searched his person and found Taloni was carrying a business card for a man named “Vito Rizz” and another for his Café Consenza in Montreal that served as his branch of the Bonanno family’s headquarters.

Vito Rizzuto

This was an eye opener for the DEA because Vito was as big as you get in International Organized Crime.  The DEA then went to the house in Woodland Hills and searched it where they found 49 kilo's of cocaine and 1.7 million in cash, numerous prepaid cellphones and a encrypted Blackberry.  Taloni had dropped off the cash but this was not the first time he had been observed in the company of the drug dealers. A few months before the Anaheim Police were watching a local cocaine dealer who met a man named Marc Canel-Pierre.  They followed Marc to Beverly Hills where he met Taloni in a parking lot.  They spoke for a few minutes and then Taloni removed a large bag from his trunk and gave it to Marc.  They then followed Marc to his home where they got a search warrant and found 34 kilo's of Cocaine and 1.6 million in cash.

Taloni loved Ferrari cars and the Ferrari racing team.  Many of his support letters from friends and family speak about his love of the cars.  All the cocaine was stamped Ferrari so I wonder how much pull he had in the organization.  I’ve read all his letters of support and one of them is a blessing from the Pope! I guess it didn't help much because he was given 10 years just the other day.  The one thing I find interesting is the fact that Taloni, who had a hair product business that sold to hair salons kept doing business in Beverly Hills.  That city seems to be very popular with the Zips.

Joel Cacace aka Joe Waverly

Never kill a prosecutor or anyone in law enforcement. That is a pretty clear rule that mafia families have followed. Not because they care, but in self interest.  They know that all law enforcement, and even the public, will turn on them.   In New York there is one family that did not follow that rule, and that is the Colombo Family.

There have been a few other unintentional cases where law enforcement lost lives, but none of the other families directly targeted Law Enforcement.  Rudolph "Rudy" Santobello and his buddy where in the middle of a kidnapping when an off duty NYPD officer Alfred Loreto stumbled onto the scene and was murdered. Rudy initially received life, but he beat the case on appeal and went on to have a long run with the Genovese Family. 

Then you had Costabile "Gus" Farace who was the first man to murder a DEA Agent in New York.  Gus had a set up a deal with a DEA Agent named Everrett Hatcher who was undercover.  They arranged a meeting in a remote location on Staten Island but the surveillance team lost Everrett.  Gus drove by Everrett's car on the side of the road and opened fire from a van killing him. Law Enforcement turned up the pressure on the Mafia and they ended Gus's run in Bensonhurst.

Joel Cacace aka Joe Waverly

That brings us to Joel "Joe Waverly" Cacace, a real upstanding human who at 72 is locked up until at least 2020 and is now facing more time than he will ever be able to serve.

The Colombo Family has been led by Carmine "The Snake" Persico and the Persicos never follow the rules. Carmine had a brother named Alphonse or Allie Boy, who has since passed on to the big nothing.  Allie had been on the lam for 7 years until 1987 when he was caught and sentenced to 25 years in Federal Prison.  This is where the story gets murky, because William Aronwald was the head of the Southern District Organized Crime Strike Force, but he did not do much with Carmine.  He did help put Allie Boy away, but for some reason after Carmine was locked away forever in the commission case, he sent word to Joe Waverly that he wanted William Aronwald murdered because he disrespected the Colombo Family.  It is kind of strange if you look at Mr. Aronwald’s cases, he actually prosecuted Neil Dellacroce twice.  So it would seem that the Gambino's would be the ones with greater reason for the beef.

Joe Waverly is no ordinary mobster, back in the 1970's he had a florist shop in Sheepshead Bay and one day he was waylaid by 3 men trying to rob his shop.  He was shot in the chest but he wrestled the pistol away, killed the robber who shot him and shot at the others who ran away.  Joe then drove the dead robber to the local police precinct where he was quickly taken to the hospital for his wound.   

Joe survived that escapade and his legend continued to grow.  So when Carmine sent word that he wanted William Aronwald murdered, Joe took action.  He enlisted three Colombo Associates Vincent Carini, Eddie Carini and Frank Smith.  These guys were the real deal, shooters and good at hits.  He gave them a slip of paper with the name Aronwald and the address of the Brooklyn law firm he shared with his father George Aronwald.  They followed Aronwald from his Brooklyn Office and shot him in a laundromat near his home.  The only problem?  It was the elder George Aronwald, not the younger William Aronwald who was the former head of the Organized Strikeforce.  

The other four Mafia Families in New York were enraged that they killed the wrong man, and even more enraged that they had killed a judge.  They wanted those that took part in the murder gone.  So Joe had another set of killers grab the Carini brothers.  It was a brutal slaying because both brothers were found in cars but both had major defensive wounds on their hands and arms showing that they put up a fight.

I wonder why the Mafia Commission did not do more.  Why didn’t they make Carmine Persico step down?  Why did they do nothing to Joe Waverly who organized the hit?  Maybe there is more to this killing.  The Gambinos had more cause to act, but why bother?  Joe Waverly felt so bad for the Carini brothers that he married Eddie Carini's widow.  Joe also had the brothers killer’s killed in Brooklyn not long after the murder.

Joe's reputation soared after this and his crew was loyal to him.  He was close to Vic Arena and when Vic and Bill Cutolo revolted against the Persico rule, Joe joined them.  He saw Persico loyalist Capo Greg Scarpa driving down the street and he fired shots at him but missed.  Greg would catch up with Joe again in Brooklyn and they exchanged shots, this time with only Joe getting hit.  Joe drove himself to the hospital and was patched up.  Joe, being the good guy he is, later shifted sides back to the Persico side.  Joe would be upped to the Consigliare position in the family after the war.  

Joe's wife divorced him and soon she married a Police Officer named Ralph Dols, and they lived in Sheepshead Brooklyn.  Joe was insanely jealous. so he sent word that he wanted Ralph Dols dead.  The tale told by one of the shooters, Big Dino Calabro, is that Colombo Underboss Tommy "Shots" Gioli gave him the order, the address and slip of paper with Ralph Dols licence plate number on it.  They could not find Ralph Dols, so Joe called Dino in for a talk.  Dino then stepped up his efforts to get Ralph Dols.  They found out where he parked his car on the street, they had someone shoot out the street light with a BB Gun so it would be dark.  Ralph Dols came home from work, parked his car, got out of his car and was getting ready to shut his door when Big Dino Calabro, carrying a 44 Magnum, and his cousin, Little Dino Saracino, armed with a 45 Auto, walked toward him.  Ralph Dols asked what was up and they opened fire on him.  He fell on the hood of his car and they shot him a couple more times.  They took off, but Ralph Dols managed to get to his house before collapsing in his doorway.  

The hit squad had no idea Ralph Dols was NYPD and they had no idea it was a jealous lovers revenge, they thought it was dealing with Colombo Family business.  Today Joe Waverly aka Joel Cacace is on trial for the murder of Ralph Dols. Tommy Shots and Little Dino were found not guilty of the murder, but were found guilty of racketeering.  Maybe this time it will be the end of Joel Cacace aka Joe Waverly.

This is what the Mafia has become: honorless slayers of law enforcement, they are just like all other low level street gangs.