Cop Without a Badge (Chapter 11)

Chapter 11

Although Maher tried to shake it off, he was deeply hurt by his experience in the Ciasullo case. The truth was, he had not been treated like a real cop, and it forced him to face the fact that he wasn’t a real cop. Disillusioned by what he considered shoddy treatment at the hands of suspicious NYPD chief of detectives, Maher had second thoughts about his undercover exploits. May I should just forget it, Maher told himself. Besides, there was something else that was troubling him even more than his future as a quasi-cop. His marriage.

Maher could no longer deny that something had changed between him and Beth. If could be written of as the inevitable fading of passion that often occurs when two people have been together for a long time. But Maher’s gut told him it was something more than that. At first Maher thought it was his undercover work. Beth had never really been comfortable with what he was doing. Then Maher wondered if it might be Beth’s career, which was on a rapid rise. In 1978 she had left New York magazine for a job as a circulation manager of Esquire. In 1980 she had helped launch a new magazine called Prime Time. When that folded after a year, Beth had joined The Economist as circulation director. Maybe, Maher speculated, Beth’s increasing responsibilities in her ever higher positions were sapping her energy. But he knew that wasn’t it either. While the distancing between them seemed to have begun at about the time Beth went to The Economist, there was another factor. A coworker named Richard O’Rourke.

After her first day at The Economist, Beth had returned home late. She was drunk.

“Where were you?” Maher had asked.

“Ohm” Beth had said with a giggle, “an accountant at the office took me out for a drink.”

“Who?” Maher demanded.

“Richard O’Rourke.”

Maher had felt a twinge. Not of anger. Not of jealousy. But of sudden loss. His intuition told him Beth was enamored with someone else. As the weeks passed, Maher became convinced she was having an affair. It wasn’t that Beth mentioned the name Richard often, which she did, it was the way she said the name Richard, the inflection she used, dragging it out: R-i-c-h-a-r-d. It drove Maher crazy, yet made him physically ill. Yet, when he finally confronted her, she denied it. But Maher knew.

Seeking a way to shut off his mind, to stop the images of Beth with another man, Maher turned his attention to drag racing. On most weekends he could be found at the “strip” on Connecting Highway. He once again set about modifying his Corvette, making the undisputed fastest car even faster. And he went back to his old mechanic, Larry Birnholz. Why not? Maher told himself. Larry doesn’t know I was an FBI informant.

As Maher and Birnholz worked on Maher’s Vette, Maher decided to tell Birnholz a variation of the Ciasullo story. I want this fucker indebted to me, Maher reasoned.

“I am an FBI informant,” Maher said one day.

Birnholz dropped the wrench he was holding.

“Look, Larry,” Maher said with a laugh, “I was never going to lock you up. Grand theft auto? You’d get ninety days, maybe less.”

BIrnholz, a look of terror in his eyes, was speechless.

Maher continued: “But when you took off that fucking cop, they wanted me to testify against you. I had no choice. They were going to subpoena me.”

Birnholz stared at Maher, his mouth gaping.

“But I refused to testify, Larry. I told them I wasn’t going to turn on my friend. Other wise you’d be locked up right now. And you know that as well as I do.”

“So that’s what happened,” Birnholz squeaked. Then: “Thanks, Kevin.”

“Forget about it Larry,” Maher said.

They returned to the job at hand.

Maher and Birnholz removed the LT1 engine they had dropped into the Vette two years earlier and replaced it with a 427-cubic inch L88 Big Block motor, which packed more than 550 horsepower. Total cost: $8,000.

Besides the automotive changes, Maher added creature comforts not often found in a race car. He tweaked the engine to idle at a thousand revolutions per minute instead of the standard twelve hundred rpms, which enabled him to run the air conditioning without the car overheating. And he installed a $4,000 sound system consisting of twelve-hundred-watt Blaupunkt radio and speaker array that included ten-inch woofers. The resulting sound was so big that when Maher sat in the Corvette and cranked up the volume, the hair on the back of his would part.

After having sunk $12,000 into the Vette, Maher not only had the fastest vehicle in the area, he also had the most expensively appointed. Now he had to pay for all these modifications. So every weekend he would had up to Connecting Highway and wait for one of two types of drivers: someone who didn’t know him or his Vette, or someone who had gone off to modify his own car and had returned to the strip believing his could finally beat Maher. Maher didn’t care who showed up. He would bet $4,000, blast through a quarter of a mile, and pick up the money.

On one Friday night in the fall of 1982, a hotshot in a Camaro appeared. The driver was so certain his Camaro could take Maher’s Corvette that he spotted Maher a full car length.

When the Corvette and the Camaro were positioned at the starting line, the driver of the Camaro arrogantly motioned for Maher to move ahead a car length. With $4,000 at stake, Maher didn’t mind. He edged in front of the Camaro. A moment later, the signal was given and both cars revved up.

The torque of the Big Block motor in Maher’s Corvette (torque is the force an engine produces as turns) generated so much momentum that the car’s fiberglass body contorted to the right while the left wheel rose off the ground. For an instant, as the Vette wound up to sixty-five hundred rpms, it seemed frozen in time. Then, in an explosion of raw power, the car shot forward. Seconds later, it was over. Maher had won by ten car lengths, an incredible margin of victory in a quarter mile dash.

Maher screeched to a stop, climbed out of the car, and popped the hood. Dozens of people crowded around Maher’s Vette, pushing and shoving to get a better view. Among the mesmerized onlookers was a twenty-two-year-old Colombian named John Uribe.

Maher had met Uribe a year earlier when Uribe arrived at Connecting Highway in a stock 1978 Silver Anniversary Corvette/ At only 160 horsepower, Uribe’s care rarely won. Uribe regarded Maher’s Corvette – which by now had been featured in three national car magazines and a book about Corvettes – as the ultimate machine.

“Hey, Kevin!” Uribe shouted as he squirmed through the masses. “You put another engine in your Vette!”

Uribe finally made his way to the side of Maher’s car. He glanced at the Big Block, then looked up at Maher.

“What’d you do with the other motor?”

“I still got it,” Maher responded.

“Can I buy it from you?” Uribe asked, his eyes pleading.

Mahe smiled. John Uribe was a nice kid. It wasn’t his fault he was born into a family-run drug cartel.

Over the past year, Maher had often asked Uribe what he did for a living. At first Uribe would say, “Nothing.” Ultimately, after he felt he could trust Maher, Uribe had acknowledged that he was laundering money for the family.

“I take leaf bags full of cash out of the house,” Uribe had explained, “and I get the small bills changed into large denominations and money orders.”

“Doesn’t anyone at the bank get suspicious?” Maher had wondered aloud.

“No,” Uribe had said with a laugh, “I don’t do it myself. I’ve got a bunch of guys who go to banks all over the city.”

Then Uribe had offered Maher a job. “I’ll pay you five hundred dollars for every bag of money you change.”

Maher had declined.

Now young John Uribe, standing there by Maher’s new, improved Corvette and looking very much younger than his twenty-two years, was angling for an opportunity to have the second-fastest car at Connection Highway.

“I want you old motor,” Uribe pressed. “I want the LT1.”

“Sure, John. You can have it.”

Maher told Uribe he wanted $6,000 for the motor. Maher would not only install it, he would also throw in a myriad of extras, including a 400-turbo three-speed transmission, headers, and a heavy-duty radiator.

Maher contracted the job to Frank’s Sunoco Station in Lyndhurst, New Jersey. Every day Uribe would call Maher and check on the progress.

“Now this guy is going to make me the fastest guy at Connecting Highway?”  Uribe would ask over and over.

“Second, fastest,” Maher always would correct him. “I’m the fastest.”

One day, as Uribe rattled on about what was being installed in his Vette, Maher mentioned that it might be a good to have an engine oil cooler.

“Yeah,” Uribe agreed. “I need that.”

“And what about a transmission oil cooler?”

“I need that too, don’t I, Kevin?”

“It wouldn’t hurt.”

Mulitple spark discharge, special shield spark plug wires, water injection, special motor mounts, you name it, Maher sold it Uribe. At a profit, of course. The original $6,000 quote quickly ballooned to $10,000. But Maher didn’t feel guilty. Everything he was putting in Uribe’s Vette did in fact improve the performance. And besides, Maher thought, he’s a drug dealer with bags of cash. I’m going to bang him.

When the modifications were complete, Uribe showed up at Connecting Highway and blew every other car away. Except for Maher’s, of course. Even so, second fastest was a lot better than being the slowest.

Besides his new status at Connecting Highway, Uribe underwent another transformation. He no longer had the demeanor of a shy kid. He was flashing a lot of money. And he was showing up with a different leggy bimbo every weekend.  At first Maher attributed this to Uribe’s sudden popularity as a winner at the races. Maher knew that winning not only built confidence, it also generated cash. Then, Maher realized that Uribe wasn’t just carrying thousands he was carrying tens of thousands. And he begun carrying something else.

Cocaine.

One night – a humid summer night in 1983 – Maher noticed a pretty brunette standing by the side of Connecting Highway. Uribe watched Maher watching the girl.

“That’s Julianne,” Uribe said. “I fucked her.”

Maher jolted back from some fantasy and looked at Uribe. Sure, he was a good-looking kid, but Maher didn’t think of himself as any less appealing. Still, Uribe was the one getting all the action.

Uribe pointed across the highway at a blonde.

“Fucked her, too,” Uribe stated without any real emotion.

Maher found himself wondering: How does he do it?

“You know how I get all these bitches?” Uribe said, reading Maher’s mind.

Maher raised an eyebrow. “How, John?”

Uribe slowly reached into his pocket and pulled out a plastic sandwich bag filled with white powder.

“I give these dopey bitches some of this and they’ll do anything I want them to,” Uribe said with a smile.

Uribe offered Maher the bag of cocaine. “A present for you, my friend.”

Maher hesitated. He had never done coke.

“Go ahead,” Uribe urdged. “Take it. Try it. You’ll see.”

Maher tentatively took the coke from Uribe and stuffed it in his pocket.

“There are two ounces in there,” Uribe noted. “That should last you for a while.”

Uribe handed Maher a tiny spoon. “Here. You’ll need this.”

Maher took the spoon and then slowly ambled over to Julianne. She looked even better than she did from a distance. High-helled boots. Black leather miniskirt. And a tiny white feather dangling from one earlobe. Julianne glanced up as Maher approached her.

“Wanna hang out?” Maher said.

Julianne shrugged. “You got any hits?”

Maher showed her the two ounces of coke Uribe had given him. Julianne’s eyes widened and she reached for the bag. As she held out her right hand, Maher noticed something. The fingernail on her pinkie was about a half inch longer than he other nails. And she had a tiny diamond embedded in it.

“This cost me five hundred dollars,” Julianne pointed out, holding up her diamond-studded fingernail.

The utility fingernail became apparent when the two of them climbed in Maher’s Corvette. Julianne dug into the bag and used her fingernail to scoop a small about of coke, which she quickly snorted. Maher, using the coke spoon, followed suit. He waited for something to happen. Nothing did. Cake ain’t so amazing, Maher concluded. What the fuck is everybody talking about? But a few minutes later, Maher took a second hit. And then a third. Now I see what everyone’s talking about. He was overcome with euphoria. Everything is wonderful. The world is fantastic. Suddenly his mind was firing like the multiple spark discharge under the hood of the Vette. And his thoughts mimicked his driving technique. Fast. Dangerous. Out of Control.

For the next hour, Maher and Julianne cruised Queens, snorting coke and listening to the radio with the volume cranked. Maher was giddy and felt totally uninhibited. Julianne seemed in the mood for anything. So when Maher found himself in front of the Kew Motor Inn on Queens Boulevard he whipped the car into the parking lot.

Once in the room, Julianne pulled off her miniskirt and blouse, then fell across the bed. Maher shivered slightly as he let his eyes caress her long, slender legs, which were now open and inviting. Those legs go from here to New Jersey, Maher mused. A momentary flicker of confusion hit him. Until that night, he had never snorted coke. And he had never cheated on Beth. Never even thought about it. Now he was high and about to screw a gril with a feather earring and one long fingernail. It seemed bizarre, surreal. Maher dug another spoonful of coke out of the plastic bag and snorted it up his right nostril. The curtain of confusion parted. And there was Julianne, waiting on the bed.

Maher undressed and slip on top of her. The world disappeared in a blaze of lust, and Maher’s emotions churned inside him like his mind was a blender. In the midst of it all it struck him that the last time he felt this kind of unbridled thrill was when he took the cops on a chase to the Catskills. What never seemed to occur to him were the consequences. Not then. And certainly not now.

Maher entered the house quietly and,  as he usually did after a night at Connecting Highway, tiptoed to the bedroom. He looked at Beth, who was sleeping, and she seemed so angelic. How could I do this to her? Maher tortured himself. How could I fuck some dopey bitch? Then he undressed and slipped into bed. Beth stirred and wrapped her arms around his wrist.

“Did you win?” Beth whispered.

“Yeah,” Maher said. “I won.”

“That’s good,” Beth said with a yawn, then cuddled against him.

Maher felt waves of guilt. He ached for his mind to stop, longed for sleep. But Maher was about to learn a lesson about cocaine. The drug-induced euphoria dissolves long before the pharmacological effect of the stimulant wears off. And so he lay awake, wondering if he would ever be the same. Toward dawn, rationalization set it. What am I feeling guilty about? Beth’s fucking some guy at the office. Fuck Beth. Fuck her.

The following morning, as Beth made a pot of coffee, Maher brooded.

“What’s wrong, Kevin?” Beth asked.

“I tried cocaine last night,” Maher blurted out.

“You did?” Beth seemed only half surprised.

“It’s weird stuff,” Maher said with a sigh. “I couldn’t sleep.”

“Of course you couldn’t sleep,” Beth noted. “Cocaine is a stimulant. Stimulants keep you awake.”

And that was the extent of the conversation. This was 1983. Cocaine was no big deal. Even doctors were shrugging off its potential for abuse and addiction.

Throughout the day, Maher found it difficult to concentrate. The effect of his first taste of coke. The remorse over his encounter with Julianne, whch even the possibility of Beth having an affair would not quell.

Later that night, Uribe stopped by the house.

“A present for you my friend.” Uribe smiled as he offered Maher a hit of coke.

Mahe shook his head no.

“Kevin,” Uribe said, “when a Columbian offers you a present, you must not refuse. It’s an insult.”

Maher accepted the plastic bag of coke and the tiny silver coke spoon from Uribe, then took a hit in both nostrils. He felt better immediately. Maher was learning lesion number two about cocaine: The more you use, the more you wanted.

Maher returned the bag of coke to Uribe, but Uribe handed it back to him. “This is for you, my friend. My present.”

The simple exchange would set the tone for their entire relationship. Maher would teach Uribe all he knew about Corvettes. And, in return, Uribe would offer “presents.”

“The reason I stopped by to see you,” Uribe explained, “is that I want you to put an LS-seven four-fifty-four in my Corvette.”

Maher’s eyebrows raised. An LS7 was even more powerful than the Big Block engine in Maher’s Vette.

“John,” Maher pointed out, “that’s a twelve-thousand-dollar conversion.”

“I’ve got the money,” Uribe countered.

“You’ll need to change a lot of trash bags to pay for it,” Maher said with a laugh.

Uribe did not laugh. The solemn expression on Uribe’s face confirmed what Maher always suspected – that Uribe had long since graduated from laundering cash to dealing.

Maher ordered LS7 engine and had a mechanic at Frank’s Sunoco drop it in Uribe’s Corvette. Then Maher transferred the Vette to his garage, where he performed additional modifications. Uribe would stop by every day to see how the conversion was coming. On afternoon, Uribe arrived to find Bobby working next to Maher. Bobby was now twelve years old and he loved learning from Maher, watching his “father”, the automotive alchemist.

“How’s everything going?” Uribe asked.

“Getting there,” Maher replied.

Bobby was busy cutting and splicing heavy-duty spark plug wires. In the process, the stiff cables had cut his fingers. His hands were bloody.

“You’re fingers are bleeding,” Uribe reacted.

“It’s the wires,” Bobby said with a shrug.

The following day, Uribe showed up with a $1,500 Kawasaki dirt bike, a helmet, and knee pads.

“A present for you Bobby,” Uribe said.

Maher was so touched by Uribe’s display of concern for Bobby that he gave only a passing thought to the source of Uribe’s funds. John’s all right, Maher convinced himself as he watched Bobby test out the new motorcycle.

For the next week, while Maher worked on Uribe’s Corvette, Uribe over and over asked the same question: “When you finish, I’ll have the fastest car at Connecting Highway, right?”

“Right,” Maher responded each time. “But like I told you, with this configuration, you won’t be able to go Porsche hunting  on Long Island.”

Porsche hunting on Long Island was a pastime of an elite group of Corvette owners who had designed their cars for both speed and distance. Stock Corvettes would always win a quarter-mile dash against a stock Porsche, while a stock Porsche would consistently beat a stock Corvette over distance. On the open highway, Porsche drivers would sneer at Corvette drivers, then kick their car into high gear and spend the next few minutes watching the Vette fade away in the rearview mirror. Those Corvette owners who had built hybrid vehicles like Maher had, loved to cruise the Long Island Expressway, pull up next to the Porsche, then watch the shocked expression of the Porsche driver as the Vette roared away. But Uribe didn’t have dreams of Porsche hunting. He only wanted to be king of the universe he knew: Connecting Highway.

Whe the modifications on Uribe’s Corvette were done, Uribe tested his new machine at the Connecting Highway strip. As Maher had promised, nothing could touch the “Silver Bullet.” It seemed Uribe had gotten what he asked for: Supremacy in the quarter mile at Connecting Highway. Of course, he had yet to race Maher.

One Friday night, the inevitable contest was set up: Maher versus Uribe. Uribe – with the greater horsepower – had the edge. But driving experience triumphed over horsepower, and the student was unable to beat the master. Maher won by half a car length. Uribe was miffed. He had paid all that money for an LS7 – the most powerful engine you could put in a Vette – and still finished second place. Uribe stared at Maher. The look in Uribe’s eyes said: Maybe you didn’t do everything you were supposed to.

“Hey, John,” Maher offered. “Let’s go again.”

This time Uribe won.

“Congratulations,” Maher said when it was over.

“A present for you,” Uribe said with a smile, holding out a bag of cocaine.

Over the next several weekends, Uribe racked up victory after victory. But the glory was costly. One night, he blew a transmission. Another night Uribe burned out a torque converter. Still another race cost Uribe a rear end. Uribe was just beginning to understand how expensive a hobby drag racing could be. And Maher had begun to realize that Uribe’s drug dealing was not fueling the hobby, the hobby was fueling the drug dealing. Uribe was dealing more and more drugs to keep pace with the repair bills and the constant upgrades that would allow his Corvette to maintain an edge. While Maher didn’t believe he had been the cause of Uribe’s change of occupation by introducing Uribe to the bottomless pit of vehicular modification, he did feel that he had hastened the transition.

Once, in an attempt to justify his dealing, Uribe told Maher, “Did you know that if one drug dealer in the United States gets busted, two hundred and fifty Columbian farmers don’t eat?”

The bit of clever propaganda provided a raison d’ etre for a legion of Columbians who were perhaps only months removed from staring poverty right in the face.

In mid-1983 the house at 83 Jefferson street in Wood-Ridge that Maher had been renting was sold, and the new landlord declined to renew the lease. So Maher and Beth found a place in Waldwick, a town about ten miles away. But almost immediately upon moving in, there were problems. Bobby missed his friends in Wood-Ridge. Beth missed her neighbors. Maher missed his local gas stations and auto parts stores. Even Samantha the German shepherd seemed depressed. So Maher and Beth decided to look for a house to buy in Wood-Ridge. They were doing well financially, and it seemed time they owned a home. But they had to save enough for a down payment. Maher stopped pouring money into his Corvette. And, with the prospect of a real home in the future, he started spending less time at Connecting Highway and more time with Beth, Bobby and Samantha. The only thing still threatening his future was his cocaine habit.

One evening in December 1983, Maher returned home from work. Before getting out of his car, he took a hit of white powder. He was bolstered by the rush and strode into the house. Suddenly he felt excruciating chest pains and staggered to the sofa. Falling onto it. Beth rushed to him.

“Kevin! Kevin! What is it?”

As Beth ran to the phone to call an ambulance. Maher stopped her.

“Beth. I’m all right. I’m feeling better.”

Maher recovered enough to get to the dinning room table.

“Tomorrow,” Beth insisted, “you’re going to see a doctor.”

Maher took the next morning off and stopped by to see a doctor in Waldwick. A few days later the tests came back.

“As far as I can tell,” the doctor said, “there’s nothing wrong with you. It could have been an anxiety attack. If I were you, I’d take some time off.”

“Would you write a note to my job?” Maher asked.

“Of course,” the doctor agreed.

That afternoon, Maher walked into the office of the New Jersey Transit (formerly known as Con Rail) and informed them he needed to take an extended sick leave, doctor’s orders.

A month later, Maher’s allotted sick pay expired and he was put on full disability, which was not full pay. So when Uribe stopped by one evening and renewed an offer Maher had previously declined, this time it seemed more appealing.

“Why don’t you change a little money for me,” Uribe asked. “Life I told you before, I’ll give you five hundred dollars for each bag of small bills you change into large denominations.”

When Maher didn’t answer immediately. Uribe pressed: “It’s easy. You drive around to different banks and change two, three hundred at each bank. That way no one gets suspicious.”

Mahe still didn’t respond. He glanced out the window at Bobby, who was tossing a stick to Samantha. The money would help, Maher thought.

“Sure,” Maher said finally. “Why not?”

Among the people Maher met at various Corvette gatherings at Astoria Park, where care owners would congregate and show off their cars, was a cop named Vincent Caldera. Caldrea drove a 1983 Monte Carlo Super Sport, and since Maher was the man when it came to automotive modifications, Caldera would often ask him questions about improving performance. As they got to know each other better, Maher told Caldera about his work as a confidential informant. Caldera then confided in Maher about something he normally didn’t discuss.

“I’m on a modified assignment,” Caldera told Maher one day.

The term “modified assignment” was euphemism. Those on “modified assignment” were being disciplined in some way. Caldera’s case, he was assigned to traffic detail.

“What the fuck do you do,” Maher asked.

Caldera explained that a year before, he was of-duty and driving along in Queens when a taxi cut in front of him and almost hit his car. Caldera pulled his car up beside the cab and flashed his shield, but the cabdriver pressed the accelerator and raced away. Caldera pursued the cab until it got stuck in traffic.

“So,” Caldera said, “I jumped out of the car and, with a shield in one hand, drew my gun. I approached the cab and pointed the gun at the fucking driver.”

Maher was loving every minute of the story.

Caldera continued: “A passenger in the back of the cabe screamed at me: ‘Hey! You can’t pull your gun on him!’ So I pointed the gun in the backseat and said: ‘Shut the fuck up!’”

Maher laughed. “That’s great, Vinny.”

Caldera was stone-faced. “The guy in the back was a former U.S. Congressman.”

“Fuck!” Maher reacted.

“The bastard filed a complaint and I got modified assignment. Now I hear they’re thinking of firing me.”

Maher shook his head. “Look, Vinny, I know people at the district attorney’s office. Let me talk to them.”

The following day, Maher spoke with Harkins. Unfortunately, there was nothing Harkins could do. When Maher told Caldera, he shrugged.

“Thanks for trying,” Caldera said. “But I think I have it solved.”

“How?”

“I know this lawyer,” Caldera said, “who represents somebody big in the department. He says he can guarantee me my job back.” (Caldera’s lawyer represented a high-ranking law enforcement official who cannot be named.)

“That’s great,” Maher observed.

“Problem is,” Caldera added, “he wants twenty thousand. In cash.”

Maher knew what that meant. Bribery.

“Promise me you won’t say anything about this, Kevin,” Caldera said. “I just want my job back, that’s all.”

“Okay,” Maher assented.

Since Caldera didn’t have the money himself, he called his father. Then Maher, Caldera, and Caldera’s father drove to a bank and withdrew twenty thousand in cash. Next stop was the lawyer’s office, where Caldera delivered the bundle of currency.

A short time later, Caldera was reinstated.

Maher had promised Caldera he wouldn’t do anything or say anything about the payoff. He would keep that promise. Even so, Maher deposited that information in his memory. A former U.S. Congressman. A high-ranking law enforcement official. And twenty grand. No a bad deposit.

In January 1984 Maher was feeling well enough to return to work. However, when he reported for duty, he was told by the assistant supervisor, Moe Sykes, that he had been taken “out of service.”

Maher was furious. He had done everything he was supposed to do, filed every bit of paperwork.

“William French’s orders,” Sykes said.

French was Sykes’s supervisor.

“But here are the test reports from my doctor,” Maher said. “And the forms I filled out.”

Sykes was unsympathetic. Maher would have to go to hearing if he wanted to be reinstated.

“Show the paperwork to the hearing officer,” Sykes said.

Maher started to say something. Sykes cut him off.

“William French’s orders,” Sykes said.

On January 24, Maher appeared at a New Jersey Transit hearing.

“I hear you’ve been taking off a lot of work,” Maher responded. “I’ve been sick.”

Maher handed the hearing officer a stack of various letters, test results, and forms. Sykes enter the room as the hearing officer was reading Maher’s documentation.

“There is no case here,” the hearing officer said. “Why didn’t you give these notes to your supervisor?”

“When I tried to give them to him,” Maher said, pointing at Sykes, “he said give them to you.”

The hearing officer looked at Sykes. “Is that true?”

“Yes,” Sykes replied. “Bill French already took him out of service.”

After chiding Sykes, the hearing officer reinstated Maher, ruling that Maher would be paid for the days he was prevented from working.

“I want you to go to a company doctor,” the hearing officer said, “to maker sure you’re able to return to work.”

On February 9, Maher was examined by a New Jersey Transit doctor, and it was discovered that Maher couldn’t see out of his right eye.

“I was shot with a BB gun when I was kid,” Maher explained.

Maher reported to work on February 16, and Sykes handed Maher a pair of goggles. Sykes explained that there was a regulation that required anyone with impaired vision to wear protective eyegear. The pertinent regulation, Rule 15, read as follows: “An employee blind or practically blind in one eye must wear protective goggles at all times while on Company property.”

“Let me guess,” Maher said with a sigh. “William French’s orders.”

Sykes nodded.

Over the years Maher had adapted to his impaired sight by making use of his peripheral vison. The side shields that were part of the goggles prevented him from doing that.

“I can’t wear these things,” Maher told Sykes. “I’ll get hit by a train and get killed.”

“You have to wear them,” Sykes insisted. “William French’s orders.”

Mahe was getting sick of hearing those words: “William French’s orders.” It was beginning to feel like harassment.

Maher left work and went to his eye doctor, David A. Kaplan, who agreed that it was more dangerous for Maher to wear the goggles than not to wear them.

Presented with a letter from Maher’s doctor, Sykes said: “Go to our doctor, and if he concurs, we’ll exempt you from the rule.”

On February 27, Dr. Bernard Sarn, a New Jersey Transit physician, concurred.

Maher was allowed to resume work without goggles. Word around the lot was that the supervisor was definitely not pleased. Neither was Maher. And from that moment on, Maher decided he would watch William French very, very closely.

Cop Without a Badge (Chapter 10)

Chapter 10

Maher grabbed the stick shift and jammed the car into first gear, the slammed his foot on the accelerator. The Camaro catapulted from the curb. Summoning all the bravado he could muster, Maher looked over his should into the backseat and stared directly into Blasso’s eyes.

“Marconi’s going to pay us five grand a week and you want to stick up some fucking jeweler? Fuck you, man! Fuck you.”

Blasso was not amused. “Hey, you don’t want to do it? Then fuck you!”

Maher drove like a maniac until he reached the spot where the stolen Pontiac Trans Am was parked. Blassom Anderwkavich, Birnholz, and Torre climbed out of Maher’s Camaro and piled into the Trans Am. A moment later, the Trans Am pulled away, disappearing into the night.

Maher’s heart was pounding as loudly as the pistons in the Camaro. He drove home and fell into bed. Beth looked at him and sensed something was wrong.

“Kevin.? What is it?”

“I took another assignment with the FBI,” Maher said.

“Beth winced silently. A betrayal. A broken promise.

“I thought we agreed you wouldn’t do that anymore,” Beth said with a sigh,

“Beth…” Maher didn’t know what to say.

“Fine,” Beth said with emphasis.

Maher tried to explain. “It was going to be a big payday.”

“Fine,” Beth said again. This time her voice was barely a whisper.

Maher continued. “But then these guys set me up. They wanted to do a jewel heist. Before I knew it, I was in front of this jeweler’s house. I backed out, and here I am.”

Maher shrugged. Beth gave Maher a little half smile.

“Fine,” Beth said once again, then rolled over, turning away both physically and emotionally.

Maher stared at the ceiling. Fine. That’s what she always says when she’s upset. Fine. Maher hated that word. It twisted him up inside. Maybe he didn’t want to admit to himself, or perhaps he didn’t fully realize it, but there was a good reason why the word “fine” ravaged his emotions so completely. Somewhere, deep within his subconscious, he could hear Beth slipping away with each utterance of that word. He was losing her.

Maybe he had already.

The following morning, Maher was about to slap his hand down on the clock radio’s snooze alarm when the all-news station WINS broadcast the following report:

“In Flushing, Queens, four armed men wearing ski masks ambushed an off-duty policeman in his driveway in a botched holdup attempt. The office shot and killed one man. Three other suspects fled the scene.”

Maher shot straight up. Flushing? Four suspects?

Maher turned up the volume. Details of the attempted robbery were sketchy, according to the report, since the police had just begun their investigation.

Maher looked toward the door to the bathroom, where Beth was taking a shower. He realized, after hearing the newscast, that the case he thought was over might just be beginning. Do I tell Beth? Maher decided he wouldn’t say anything to Beth. He couldn’t bear to hear her say “fine” again.

Twenty minutes after the first bulletin, an update identified the off-duty police officer as Frank Ciasullo from the 13^th Precidnct. Another twenty minutes later, as the headlines rolled around again, Maher heard the name of the suspect who was killed: Randolph Anderwkavich.

Maher jolted. The dumb bastards went to the wrong house and tried to jump a cop!

The newscast also identified Richard Blasso, who had been wounded during the attempted robbery. Blasso had been arrested at the nearby hospital where he went to seek treatment. In addition, the newscast gave Officer Ciasullo’s account of the incident. According to police sources, Ciasullo’s report stated that when he returned home from his four-to-midnight shift, tow armed men approached him from the direction of the rear yard. At the same moment, Ciasullo said he was grabbed from behind by two additional males and that a shopping bag he was carrying in his left hand had been ripped free. Although one of the armed men hit him in the face with a gun, Ciasullo said he was able to draw his off-duty revolver and fired three shots. One shot struck and killed one man, and another shot wounded a second man. The report added that “no guns were recovered at the scene.”

 Maher knew how that might work against Ciasullo. Blasso would swear he was unarmed. And it would be Blasso’s word against Ciasullo’s.

The report concluded on an ominous note, at least as far as Maher was concerned.

“Police believe the suspects escaped in a car driven by a fifth man.”

Maher frowned. A fifth man? What fifth man?

And then the realization slowly washed over him. DeBellis is going to think I was the fifth man.

Maher rushed to the phone and called DeBellis, explaining every detail of what happened the previous night.

“I left them in Queens,” Maher insisted. “I got the fuck out of there, I sear I did.”

“I believe you, Kevin,” DeBellis assured him, then explained that because the case was now a homicide it was out of the FBI’s jurisdiction. “I’ll call this detective at NYPD I know and –“

“No,” Maher interrupted. “I’ll call someone I know.”

Maher called Doherty at the Defense Department. After hearing Maher’s story, Doherty might have suggested that Maher call a detective from the 109^th Precinct, which was the precinct covering the area in Queens where the shooting had occurred. However, Doherty felt that, under the circumstances, he should recommend someone he knew very well, someone who had met Maher before, someone who understood that Maher was not your usual one-step-ahead-of-the-law informant.

“Give Tom Harkins a call,” Doherty suggested.

Tom Harkins was one of the few remaining detectives from Doherty’s stint at the Manhattan DA’s office.

Born in Brooklyn in 1838, Harkins found his way out of the neighborhood by joining the Marines when he was twenty years old. He wound up stationed in Oahu, where he attended classes at the University of Hawaii. Harkins was discharged from the Marines in 1966. After his discharge, he received a master’s degree in clinical and counseling psychology from the New York Institute of Technology.

In April 1966 Harkins married Ann Collier. And in September he became a uniformed officer out of Manhattan’s 25^th Precinct, whose headquarters was on 126^th Street between Second and Third avenues; while in the precinct he id a tour of duty on foot patrol. He graduated to the radio and motor patrol, cruising the drug-ravaged uptown streets in a squad car.

In 1969 Harkins was assigned to the Manhattan South Narcotics Squad, and was stationed out of the 1^st Precinct, which was referred to as Old Slip because of its location. The 1^st Precinct was near the entrances to the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel and the Brooklyn Bridge, looking out over New York Harbor.

In those days, the path to detective was simple: Put in the time and ultimately be rewarded with a gold shield. Harkins spent two years in plainclothes and was closing in on a shield when the findings of the Knapp Commission sent the NYPD into a state of near chaos.

The Knapp Commission – named after prosecutor Whitman Knapp – convened in early 1970 after cops Frank Serpico and David Dirk made allegations about widespread corruption within the New York City Police Department. (Both became famous when a series of books and movies was done about the commission, particularly the 1973 film titled Serpico, which starred Al Pacino.)

Due to what was termed “the Blue Wall of Silence,” two years of investigation and public hearings failed to net much more than a handful of low-level officers. But the long, drawn-out process – during which rumors that hundreds of cops were about to be charged with various crimes – rattled the department. To prevent the wholesale devastation of any particular precinct, top police brass began reassigning many of the roughly eight hundred officers in the Narcotics Squad. Narcotics cops were allowed to select a precinct, and Harkins chose the 7^th Precinct, headquartered on Delancey Street at the foot of the Williamsburg Bridge.

Following two years in the Anticrime Unit, Harkins returned home one evening to find a message from a police lieutenant. The telephone number was 232-7300 – the courthouse. Harkins knew that the department was putting together a “Court Division,” and he wanted no part of it. Everyone knew that officers assigned to the Court Division would be nothing more than clerks monitoring the flow of paperwork. Consequently, Harkins ignored the call. But the lieutenant called back again the next day.

“You better call that guy,” Harkin’s wife, Ann, said when he returned home. “He was really upset.”

Harkins returned the call.

Instead of being given an assignment in the Court Division, Harkins was invited to interview with the prestigious Manhattan District Attorney Squad under the direction of DA Frank Hogan. With only seven years on the job, Harkins merely was biding his time and hoping for a promotion to detective. But to become a detective in the DA’s office was beyond anything he had hoped for.

A year after the interview, Harkins was notified of his promotion to detective and appeared at headquarters to receive his gold shield. Police Commissioner Michael Codd addressed the new detectives by telling them that, in the wake of the Knapp Commission, “they put us through the ringer.” Codd explained that each of those who were gathered to receive a shield had undergone such intense scrutiny that all their previous arrests had been carefully examined. Codd concluded: “Anyone here getting a shield, deserves it.”

Following Codd’s remarks, name after name was called and the orders were read, assigning the freshman detectives to various precincts. Harkins was assigned to the DA Squad.

A year after Harkins joined the DA’s office, Dick Condon – who had been a Knapp Commission investigator – took over the squad. The following year, Condon’s partner, Sergeant Jack Vobis, joined Condon as a squad supervisor. Since Vobis and Doherty had worked together on the French Connection heroin theft, Vobis brought Doherty in. And, of course, a few months later, Doherty introduced his new informant to Harkins – Kevin Maher.

Over the next five years, Harkins saw quite a bit of Maher. But when Doherty retired in 1980, Maher had stopped coming in. So, on a cool September morning in 1982, there was no reason for Harkins to expect a phone all from Maher.

Harkins had just settled in a this desk and was working on his first cup of coffee when his intercom buzzed.

“There’s a Kevin Maher on line two. He asked for you.”

Harkins stared at the blinking telephone light for a moment. I wonder what he wants? Harkins pressed line two. Instead of hearing “hello” or some other greeting, Harkins was hit with a sudden barrage.

“Okay. So you got two of the guys, right? One guy in the hospital and the other guy dead at the scene. Well, let me tell you, I know the whole story and – “

“Kevin?”

“Yeah?”

“Kevin, what the hell are you talking about?”

“Ciasullo.”

“Who?”

“The off duty cop from last night. He shot and killed Anderwkavich and wounded Blasso.”

“Anderwkavich? Blasso?”

Maher sighed. “Don’t you listen to the news?”

Harkins took a deep breath. “Kevin, I just got in. I haven’t seen a newspaper, and no, I haven’t listened to the news. So why don’t you start from the beginning.”

Maher explained the situation to Harkins. Since Maher was jumping all over the place without regard for chronology, it took Harkins half an hour to get the details.

“I could see big trouble here,” Maher said. “And I didn’t do anything.”

“Calm down,” Harkins said. “I’ll call you back.”

Harkins hung up the receiver and rubbed his forehead. This wasn’t his case. The shooting had occurred within the 109^th Precinct. It was their case. And the attempted robbery was a matter for the Queens Central Robbery Squad. But now Harkins was involved whether he like it or not.

From a procedural standpoint, Harkins was required to pass along the information he had just received from Maher. But it wasn’t just the procedural hook that was into Harkins, it was also an emotional one. Kevin Maher wasn’t just a faceless informant, he was a person. A kid who used to hang out at 1 Hogan Place. Harkins felt he had to do something to help him. Harkins felt he had to do something to help him. Or at least make sure Maher had an opportunity to be heard.

Harkins spoke with Captain Eddie Baccaglini, who then spoke with Chief of Detectives Joseph Borelli. Borelli told Baccaglini to send Harkins to the 109^th Precinct to provide assistance on the case.

After stopping by the 109^th Precinct and meeting with Detective Robert Kiselewsky, Harkins spoke with a detective from the Queens Central Robbery Squad, Patrick Mockler. Since Maher was Harkins’s informant, it was decided that Harkins, Mockler, and Kiselewsky would work together in a kind of joint task force born out of necessity.

Harkins and Mockler headed across the George Washington Bridge to Maher’s home in Wood-Ridge. For more than two hours, Maher and the two detectives went over the incident minute by minute, word by word. Clearly the suspects were unaware that Ciasullo was not merely a jeweler, rather was a cop who moonlighted as a jeweler.

“So they said someone named Beamen told them to rob Ciasullo?” Harkins pressed.

“Yes!” Maher answered, growing exasperated. He wondered: Why are they so obsessed with Beamen?

The conversation turned to each of the individual suspects and what Maher knew about them. Maher explained that he had only come in contact with the four men because of the FBI stolen car sting.

“Anderwkavich is dead,” Maher noted, “and you’ve got Blasso cold.”

Harkins smiled. “Not really. He denies knowing anything about Ciasullo or Beamen.”

“Of course he’s going to deny it.” Maher grew animated. “But he got shot with a bullet from Ciasullo’s gun, right?”

Harkins nodded.

“Okay,” Maher went on, “so maybe the bullet’s still in him.”

“It is,” Harkins confirmed, explaining that someone fitted suspect Birnholz’s description had dropped Blasso off at a Queens hospital. When doctors discovered Blasso had been shot, they immediately called police.

Maher held his arms open. “Okay. You got Blasso. And he’s got a bullet in him. You take the bullet and run a ballistics test, which placed him at the scene.” Maher shook his head. “I’ve got to tell you everything?” Maher laughed.

Then Harkins said: “Blasso refused to allow doctor’s to remove the bullet.”

Maher stopped laughing.

“My guess,” Harkins suggested, “is that Blasso doesn’t want the bullet used for evidence.”

For a moment, no one spoke. A man who would conceal evidence in his bleeding gut was scary.

Ultimately the question of a possible “fifth man” arose. Harkins made it clear that if there was indeed a “fifth man,” he didn’t believe it was Maher. Rather, Harkins told Maher he wanted his help.

“We may need you to wear a wire,” Harkins said.

Since it was Friday evening and nothing much could be accomplished over the weekend, the next meeting was scheduled for Monday morning.

The moment Harkins and Mockler left, Beth emerged from the kitchen. She and Maher stared at each other for a long time.

“Are you going to help them with the case?” Beth finally asked.

“Look, Beth, this cop is in trouble and – “

“Fine.”Beth spun on her heels and walked back into the kitchen.

The following morning, Maher flipped through the pages of The Daily News and came across a story with this headline:

Masked Man Is Slain at Policeman’s Home

The story recounted the attempted robbery by Blasso and company and then continued:

Details of the shooting were disclosed yesterday in Queens Supreme Court, where two brothers – Richard Beamen, 22, and Marc, 18, o Murray St. Queens – were on trial. They are charged as two of the four armed robbers – all wearing ski or Halloween masks – who invaded the Ciasullo home last August, terrorizing Ciasullo’s wife, her sister and her children and made off with $60,000 in jewelry.

Maher frowned. That’s right! Blasso said Beamen had robber Ciasullo before.

The article went on to sat that when the Beamens’ defense lawyers asked for mistrial, Justice Groh consented.

Maher’s mind began to reel. Is there some kind of connection between the mistrial and the robbery? What if Beamen told Blasso to whack Ciasullo and make it look like a robbery?

Maher felt nauseous as the realization hit him. Blasso wasn’t asking me to go on a robbery. He was inviting me to a contract killing.

The weekend passed slowly. Finally after a sleepless Sunday night, Maher jumped into his Camaro and raced into Manhattan. When he entered 1 Hogan Place, he found a somber-looking Tom Harkins.

“We have a problem,” Harkins said.

“You’re damn right we do,” Maher said. “This Beamen mistrial might be connected to –“

Harkins cut him off. “Kevin! Queens chief of detectives Michael Willis thinks you were involved in the robbery.”

Maher wasn’t shocked. He had a sick feeling all along that this could happen.

But why shouldn’t a chief of detectives question an informant’s veracity? After all, any seasoned cop had dealt with hundreds of informants an, in most cases, the informant would up being a sociopathic liar. Perhaps Willis was weary of the tenuous cop/informant alliance. Besides, Willis had never met Maher and did not know his history and did not know his history with Doherty and then Manhattan district attorney’s office.

As Maher fumed, Harkins added, “The bosses want you to take a polygraph test.”

“I’ve got nothing to hide,” Maher retorted.

“You can have a lawyer present if you like, “ Harkins added.

Maher was stung by the question. “I don’t need no fucking lawyer.”

Harkins escorted Maher to police lab, where a polygraph test was administered. The results were conclusive: Maher was not involved in the robbery.

Following the polygraph, Harkins and Maher discussed the possible relationship between the Beamen trial and the attempted robbery. They both agreed that Blasso, Anderwkavich, Birnholz, and Torre had not made an error in going to Ciasullo’s house in Flushing. Officer Ciasullo was in the jewelry business. However, as they explored the facts, the case seemed to fold back on itself. Ciasullo was set to testify against the Beamen brothers the next day. Several threatening calls had been placed to Ciasullo’s phone warning him not to testify against the Beamen brothers. There certainly seemed to be a connection. Where Maher and Harkins disagreed was whether a tie did or did not exist between the two incidents.

“Beamen told Blasso and Anderwkavich to kill Ciasullo and make it look like a robbery,” Maher speculated.

Harkins, less willing to make leaps of logic without a thorough investigation, disagreed.

“All we know is that Beamen gave one or more of the suspects information about Ciasullo,” Harkins countered. “We do not know that Beamen encouraged the robbery in order to affect his trial. Nor do we know that Beamen asked anyone to kill Ciasullo.”

If the second robbery had been designed to prevent Ciasullo from testifying in court about the first robbery, the plan had not only accomplished the goal of preventing Ciasullo’s testimony, it also resulted in a mistrial. The point could have been argued forever. There was only on way of finding out for sure.

“Kevin,” Harkins said, “we’d kike to wire you up and send you to talk to Birnholz and Torre.”

Maher would be compensated. Harkins had already spoken with the Policeman’s Benevolent Association, which has agreed to $2,500 for the assignment. Two hundred dollars would be advanced in cash as expenses, and the remaining $2,300 would be paid by check on the date of the grand jury hearing pertaining to the case against Blass, Anderwkavich, Birnholz, and Torre.

“We need to know every detail about how they escaped,” Harkins emphasized, “and it is critical we know where they discarded their weapons.”

“without the guns,” Maher noted, “Ciasullo’s in trouble, isn’t he?”

“Not necessarily,” Harkins countered.

“Come on,” Maher protested. “He was getting threats at his house. He was robbed once before. Blasso, Anderwkavich, Birnholz, and Torre could all swear they had no guns. And some lawyer could say that Ciasullo was paranoid and trigger-happy, then put Ciasullo on the stand and hammer him. You say they a gun? Okay where’s the fucking gun, officer?”

Harkins didn’t agree or disagree with Maher’s appraisal. He simply restated the objective. “Ciasullo reported seeing a sawed-off single-barreled shotgun and a nickel-plated .32-caliber snub-nose Smith & Wesson handgun. We would like to recover those weapons.”

Maher nodded and stood to leave.

“One more thing,” Harkins said. “Emphasize in your conversations with Birnholz and Torre that you told them not to do it.”

That evening, Maher, wired up both electronically and emotionally, drove across the George Washington and Bronx-Whitestone bridges and into Queens. He found Birnholz pacing his living room.

“I told you not to do it,” Maher bellowed, “but you fucking idiots did it anyway.”

“They got Blasso in the hospital under arrest,” Birnholz whined. “We’re fucked.”

Maher was unsympathetic. “Didn’t I tell you not to fucking knock off this guy?”

“Yeah,” Binholz said with a sigh. “You told us.”

Although the conversation had lasted only a few seconds, Maher was well on his way to accomplishing one thing: clearing himself.

“All right, you dumb fuck,” Maher said, sighing, “tell me what happened.”

Birnholz rattled off the events of the previous Thursday night, often jumping back and forth in the chronology. But Maher didn’t stop him. It was all being recorded.

“Blasso was bleeding bad,” Birnholz said at one point. “We were running, and the more he ran the more he was bleeding.”

Maher shook his head, Of course he was bleeding worse the more he ran. That’s what happens when you run. Your heart pumps faster.

“I took Blasso to his father’s house,” Birnholz continued. “The father looked at Blasso and said ‘Get the fuck out of here’ and slammed the door. Can you believe that? His son is bleeding to death and he slams the fucking door?”

Birnholz then told Maher that he pounded on the door again. This time he asked Blasso’s father to call an ambulance. According to Birnholz, Blasso’s father responded by saying “I ain’t calling no fucking ambulance.”

“So, I said, look, your fucking son is bleeding to death and I asked him if I could borrow his truck to go to the hospital. See, there was this plumbing truck in the driveway – Blasso Plumbing and Heating. The old man gave me the keys to the truck and I took Blasso to the hospital.”

Maher almost laughed. Birnholz takes Blasso – who is obviously a fugitive – to the hospital in a truck emblazoned with the name Blasso?

“I’m in trouble man,” Birnholz said with a moan. “I took Blasso to the fucking hospital.”

“Don’t worry,” Maher said. “They don’t know it was you. It could’ve been anybody off the street who brought him.”

As Birnholz relaxed a little, Maher came back with a question.

“Why’d you do it Larry?” Maher asked, shaking his head. “First I tell you guys not to do it, then I drive away from the fucking house.”

“You’re right, Kevin. You’re right.”

Maher was going to make absolutely certain that there was no doubt as to his lack of involvement.

“Okay, Larry. So why’d you go back?”

“I didn’t want to, Kevin. But Blasso kept saying, ‘We gotta rob this guy tonight, it’s gotta be tonight.”

“Why that night, Larry? Why not another night?”

“I don’t know,” Birnholz replied, sighing.

But Maher did. In Maher’s mind, it all had to do with the Beamen trial. Indeed, Maher was more convinced than ever that Beamen ordered a hit on Ciasullo.

“Did you ever talk to Beamen yourself?” Maher asked.

“No,” Birnholz replied.

Maher studied Birnholz for a long moment. He was telling the truth. He had never spoken with Beamen.

“So you go back to the house,” Maher prodded. “Then what happened?”

Birnholz explained how he and Torre waited in the front while Blasso and Anderwkavich hid in the backyard.

“The guy comes home carrying a shopping bag and Blasso and Anderwkavich run out of the backyard.”

“Armed?”

“Yeah, Blasso had a shotgun and Anderwkavich had a thirty-two.”

So far, so good. Maher had cleared himself of any ivolvement and had established there were weapons.

Birnholz continued: “Anderwkavich gets him around the neck with his arm and twists his right arm up behind his bck. Blasso says, “Give me the bag or I’m going to fucking kill you.’ Then me and Torre run up.”

Maher envisioned the scene as Birnholz was describing it. Blasso holding Ciasullo at gunpoint. Anderwkavich, his arm around Ciasullo’s neck in what thugs call a “dope fiend yoke.”

“Sounds like you had him,” Maher observed. “What the fuck happened?”

Birnholz shook his head, disbelieving his own recollection.

“The fucking guy reaches in his jacket and comes out with a fucking gun! He shoots over his shoulder and hits Randy. Kills Randy, man. Fucking shoots Randy dead. The he fires at Blasso.”

Maher felt a twinge of awe for Ciasullo. The guy is facing two guns and locked in a dope fiend yoke and he has the balls to go for his gun.

(Actually, there had been more than courage at play, there had been a fatal error by Anderwkavich. Although Anderwkavich had done exactly what he surely had done in previous armed robberies – approached from the back, locked his left arm around the mark’s throat, then twisted the mark’s right hand behind his back – there was a simple reason why this otherwise effective “dope fiend yoke” didn’t hinder Ciasullo. Ciasullo was left-handed, not right-handed, and his left hand was free.)

Birnholz then described how he and Blasso headed off in one direction and Torre went in the other direction. Ciasullo followed Birnholz and Blasso.

“But we managed to lose him,” Birnholz said.

Maher took aim at the burning question. “What happened to the guns, man? Where are the fucking guns?”

“I don’t know, Kevin. I swear.”

“Then who does know?”

Birnholz didn’t respond.

“Look,” Maher said. “You want me to help you or not?”

Birnholz looked away. “Maybe Torre knows.”

It took two days to track down Torre and set up a meeting in the interim, Maher turned over the Birnholz tape to Harkins. Harkins was pleased on two accounts. Maher, as Harkins had always believed, was not involved in the robbery; and the presence of guns had been established.

“Now we need to find the weapons,” Harkins said.

“Don’t worry,” Maher said. “I’ll find them.”

Maher once again wearing a wire, drove to Torre’s apartment in Queens. Torre, as Birnholz had been, was extremely nervous. After all, it had been a week since the robbery, and neither Birnholz or Torre had been arrested.

“I think I better get out of town,” Torre told Maher.

“If they haven’t nailed you yet,” Maher said matter-of-factly, “they probably never will.”

Maher began his conversation in the same manner as he began the conversation with Birnholz.

“I told you fucking guys not to do it,” Maher chastised Torre. “And you fucking jerk-offs did it anyway.”

As Birnholz had done, Torre agreed that Maher had warned them against the robbery.

“So I drop you guys off at the car,” Maher said slowly and with emphasis. “Then what fucking happened?”

Torre’s story essentially was the same as Birnholz’s story, including the fact that Blasso insisted the robbery be done that night. And, like Birnholz, Torre claimed never to have spoken with Beaman. The two were identical up to the point at which the shots were fired.

“The guy chased Blasso and Birnholz,” Torre recounted, “so I circle back to the driveway. Anderwkavich is lying there hurt bad. He says, ‘I’m dying. Help me.’ So I roll him under the car and tell him, I’ll get help.”

“He had a gun right?” Maher asked. “And Blasso had a gun. What happened with the guns?”

“I picked up the shotgun – it was there on the driveway – and I took the pistol from Anderwkavich.”

“And what did you do with them?” Maher wanted to know.

“I hid the shotgun in a driveway,” Torre finally said.

Again Torre hesitated. This time Maher pressed.

“It’s only a matter of time, man. They’re going to find the gun. Tell me where it is so I can take care of it.”

Torre explained exactly which driveway contained the shotgun. “I threw it under some bushes on the right side.”

“What about the other gun? Anderwkavich’s gun?”

Torre laughed.

“What’s so funny?”

“I’m running through the neighborhood and this fucking squad car comes out of nowhere and hits me with a light. I hear “Freeze!’ So I dropped the gun between to parked cars and walked out in the street. This fucking woman cop comes up to me and starts looking at the arm of my shirt. It was splattered with red. And for a minute I think oh, fuck! Blood! But the I realized it’s red paint.”

Both Maher and Torre started laughing. The fact was, Torre was a painter by occupation, and most of his clothes were dotted in some kind of paint.

Torre continued, “So this broad sees that it’s paint and I tell her I’m a painter and she says “Sorry but there was a robbery in the area and it looked like blood.’ And then she lets me go.”

After all these years, Maher had become familiar with police procedure. If an officer encounters someone suspicious in the area in which a shooting occurred, procedure dictates a “stop and frisk,” if for no other reason than the officer’s own safety. Additionally, procedure dictates that a person stopped be positively identified.

“Did she ID you?” Maher asked.

“Yeah,” Torre said with a laugh. “Then the broad let’s me go.”

Maher smiled. Torre could now be placed in the neighborhood at the time of the shooting.

“Okay,” Maher said, “she lets you go. Then what?”

“I go back and pick up the gun.”

“Where’s the gun now?”

“I hid it somewhere else.”

“Where?”

“I can’t remember.”

Maher leaned close to Torre. “Look, you fuckhead, tell me where you hid the pistol and let me get rid of it.”

“I told you I don’t remember.”

No matter how hard Maher hammered, Torre couldn’t seem to recall where he hid the Smith & Wesson .32. Maher gave up and headed into Manhattan to rendezvous with Harkins.

“Impossible,” Harkins said when he heard Torre’s taped account of where he hid the shotgun. “There were two hundred cops and Emergency Services Unit guys out there searching a ten-block radius.”

“Well, I guess they missed it, then,” Maher said with a shrug.

Maher and two detectives from the 109^th Precinct left for Queens immediately. They pulled up to the driveway Torre had specified and walked to the shrubbery under which Torre had said he hid the shotgun. One of the detectives pulled back a branch. A single-barrel sawed-off shotgun was lying on the ground.

Despite repeated phone calls and visits to both Torre and Birnholz, Maher never recovered the .32. But Harkins had three things he didn’t have before Maher called him. The suspects implicating themselves on tape; the shotgun; and the logbook report of the officer who stopped Torre for having red paint on his shirt, this placing Torre in the vicinity at the time of the shooting. Birnholz and Torre were arrested and charged with armed robbery.

On a crisp morning in October 1982, Maher dressed for an appointment at Kew Gardens, where the Queens grand jury was set to convene in the matter of Blasso, BIrnholz, and Torre. The hearing was scheduled for 9:30 A.M.

At 8:00 A.M., Harkins called Maher and announced: “I have a check for you, and I’m on the way to the grand jury. See you at nine-thirty.”

Maher was proud of himself. He had acted as a cop, saved a cop, and felt very much back in the game. Even better, he was on his way to pick up a check for $2,300. But it wasn’t the money, it was the self-esteem the money evoked. I am cop, Maher told himself. I’m being paid as a cop.

Ten minutes later, the phone rang again. It was Harkins.

“Queens chief of detectives Willis still believes you had something to do with the robbery,” Harkins stated flatly. “He refused to sign off on the payment.”

Maher went from shock to anger.

“And he still expects me to testify at the grand jury?”

Without Maher’s testimony, there was no way to tell how the jury would react to the tape of Birnholz and Torre talking about the crime. While reason might dictate that such definitive recorded evidence certainly would ensure an indictment, Harkins had seen how the absence of a flesh-and-blood witness could create doubt in the mind of a jury. Harkins desperately needed Maher to take the witness stand in Kew Gardens. Yet there was only one response from Harkins knew Maher would respect.

“Whatever you decided to do I’ll stand by you,” Harkins said quietly.

“Fuck him! I’m not testifying.”

Harkins understood Maher’s reaction and didn’t blame him. But, as a cop, Harkins had to make every effort to change his mind.

“Look, Kevin, I know how you feel. But we need your testimony.”

“What? This guy wants to make a complete fool of me. Hey, I risked my life several times, took three vicious criminals off the street, recovered a gun, saved a cop.”

Harkins had known Maher long enough to know there was no way he was going to turn him around.

Maher did not testify.

Even without Maher taking the witness stand, Blasso was indicted “by reason of belief,” a legal term that was perhaps one of the more logical statues contained in the code of law. Simply stated, if there was every reason to believe that a suspect was guilty, then the suspect can be indicted based on that “reason of belief.” In Blasso’s case, the bullet in his stomach seemed to indicate someone shot him and didn’t have any other plausible explanation as to why he was carrying around a slug in his body. (Blasso ultimately was convicted of armed robbery in the first degree and sentenced to three to six years in prison.”

However, in the absence of Maher’s testimony, the prosecutor elected not to introduce the tape. The grand jury refused to indict Birnholz and Torre. The case against them was dismissed.

Maher was happy about the grand jury decision. I proved a fucking point to Willis, Maher chuckled when he heard that Birnholz and Torre would walk. And besides, Birnholz is a helluva mechanic. If he’s in jail, who the fuck would I get to fix my car?