Animal (39 page)

Partington feared that his unpredictable prisoner would not get on the plane without a fight. He had deputies guard Barboza’s hotel room so that he would not escape. The next morning, Partington went to retrieve the Animal for the ride to the airport. Before entering the hotel room, he told one of his deputies that if he clicked twice on his walkie-talkie, it meant that he should run to the room and shoot Barboza if he had to. The deputy was coiled to attack, but there would be no need. Partington preached to the better angels of Barboza’s beastly nature.

“We’ve gone through too much together. I’ll tell you what we’re going to do. We’re going out the way we came in, just you and me.”
¹⁷⁸

Barboza was taken aback. “No handcuffs? No leg irons? Just you and me?”

Partington nodded, and the two walked out of the hotel like old friends. When they arrived at the airport, Barboza pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pocket and lit one as he climbed into the Coast Guard seaplane. He smiled back at Partington. It was a nod to their first meeting at the airport on Cape Cod, when the marshal had ordered him to put out his cigarette before boarding the plane. Barboza took a deep drag from the smoke and blew it back in the marshal’s direction. It was a small act of defiance as the curtain closed on their relationship. As the plane lifted off, Partington remembered that he had one more duty to perform on behalf of Joe Barboza. His wife, Claire, was now contemplating her next move. Should she join her husband in Kentucky? Or should she run and never look back? She had been on a roller-coaster ride as Mrs. Joe Barboza, which at first had been dangerous and exciting. The danger remained, but the excitement had been replaced long ago by humiliation and despair. She had stayed with him during the trials because she had convinced herself that Joe was doing something both courageous and noble. However, letters written by her husband to his girlfriends and presented at trial had extinguished her love for the man. She had stood by him only to learn that he had returned her faith with deceit. Claire had plenty of reasons to leave her husband, but none more important than their daughter and their infant son, Richard, who had been born in late summer. The children would never have a chance at a normal life with a father as deadly
and erratic as Joe. John Partington drove to the small Boston hotel where Claire was staying and found her sobbing in her room. She had been running through her options in her mind, and she could not make a decision. Claire once again leaned on her protector and confidant, John Partington, for advice. The marshal’s guidance on the matter was not what she had expected. Instead of backing Claire’s decision to run, Partington urged her to remain with Joe.

“Do it for Stacy’s sake,” he pleaded. “She needs her father.”
¹⁷⁹

The marshal could sense the trouble ahead if Claire decided to walk out now. Barboza would revert to the wild animal he was, and that would pose a serious danger for those who had been ordered to guard him during the remainder of his sentence. After a long and emotional conversation, Partington finally persuaded Claire to reunite with her husband in Kentucky. He visited the couple a few months later at Fort Knox and found them relatively happy, despite the fact that Joe was still under guard. Barboza found security at the Fort Knox facility extremely lax and accused some marshals of being drunk on the job and stealing from his room. With no more Mafia trials on the horizon, the federal government decided that it was too costly to guard Barboza with a myriad of U.S. marshals any longer. They could not place him in a regular prison, because he would surely become a target for other inmates looking to score points with the
La Cosa Nostra
. The feds had no other choice but to grant him an early release in late March 1969.

The question that remained—where could Barboza go without the Mafia finding him? The U.S. government had been developing a new program that called for the lifetime protection of high-level witnesses and was now in the process of trying to relocate a Buffalo, New York, gangster named Pascal “Paddy” Calabrese, who like Barboza had recently testified against
LCN
. The federal Witness Security Program (
WITSEC
) would provide new identities and new lives for men like Barboza and Calabrese and their families. Calabrese was given a new last name, Angelo, and was packed off to Jackson, Michigan, where he was granted work at a manufacturing plant. For Barboza, remaining in the United States was seen as too much of a risk. At first authorities petitioned
FBI
director J. Edgar Hoover to allow Barboza to relocate to Australia. Hoover approved the plan, but the idea was later nixed in favor of northern California. No
doubt, Claire Barboza expressed her concerns that Australia was simply too far away. Joe also shot down the plan when he was told that the Australian government would not allow his two dogs into the country. Santa Rosa, California, was as good an alternative as any. The city, just fiftyfive miles north of San Francisco, serves as a gateway to California’s wine country. Santa Rosa was considered a quiet place to live, despite blemishes in the city’s past that included the murder of its police chief in 1935. It was also the city made famous by director Alfred Hitchcock in his 1943 thriller
Shadow of a Doubt
. In the classic film, a killer had come to town unbeknownst to members of the community.

With a new name, Joe Bentley, the Animal was given a small place to live and worked with the
FBI
to choose a new occupation. Agents sat down with Joe and thumbed through the yellow pages of the local phone directory looking for a business that might trigger his interest. He had always prided himself on his cooking ability and had served up a number of tasty Portuguese dishes for his security detail over the past year. Barboza enrolled in cooking school, and the feds found him a job in the galley of the
SS
President Wilson
, a merchant ship that made frequent voyages to China. The meager pay was a fraction of what he had made during his days as a gangster, and Joe complained about money constantly. Claire was also having a difficult time transitioning to her new life as Mrs. Joe Bentley. Neighbors had asked her questions about her thick Boston accent, and she and little Stacy had to be tutored regularly about their personal legends, which had been created by the Justice Department. Claire Cohen did not exist any longer. She had vanished into thin air. The Justice Department had told newspaper reporters that Barboza and his family had been flown to Europe courtesy of the U.S. government. The Animal thought he was safe, at least for now.

The
FBI
received a scare shortly after the relocation when agents received an anonymous tip that the mob knew where Barboza was hiding. Agents kept a close eye on Santa Rosa, but no threat materialized. Soon Joe shipped out on his first and last voyage on the
SS
President Wilson
. He did not take well to following orders and found assembly-line cooking tedious. Always looking at all available angles, Joe staged a slip and fall job onboard the ship and was awarded $18,500 as compensation for the work-related injury. He returned to California and his old ways. Through
an intermediary, Barboza got word to the Office that he would be willing to recant his testimony in the cases of both Deegan and Patriarca for $500,000. The Mafia expressed interest, so Barboza began traveling back and forth to Massachusetts in an effort to secure a deal. What the
FBI
had failed to realize was that the allegiance of men like Joe Barboza could be rented but never bought. The Animal had asked the government to give his family more money but had been turned away by the feds. He now decided once again to offer his story to the highest bidder. Barboza kept H. Paul Rico and Dennis Condon in the dark about his bid for a double deal.

The agents’ arrogance had grown since the Deegan verdict, and they were now casting a wide net for any disgruntled mobster looking to secure the “Barboza Treatment” in exchange for damaging information and testimony against
LCN
. Rico and Condon paid a visit to Stevie Flemmi shortly after the convictions of Peter Limone, Joe Salvati, and company. It was Flemmi who had convinced Barboza to flip and who later tried to kill attorney John Fitzgerald, presumably at Rico’s urging. They met at a Roxbury auto shop owned by Flemmi’s partner, Frank Salemme. “Cadillac Frank” was an old-school gangster who did not mind meeting with cops when it suited his interest. However, he could not fathom the possibility of forging a partnership with the
FBI
. Flemmi had kept his friend in the dark about his dealings with Rico and Condon, and Salemme had no idea that his partner had become a Top Echelon informant. Salemme attended the little get-together and offered the agents donuts and coffee as they recounted the Deegan case.

“I wonder how Louis [Grieco] likes it on death row,” Condon said gleefully. “He went from Florida to death row and he wasn’t even there.”
¹⁸⁰

Salemme did not know Grieco personally but took offense at the comment.

“How can you talk about that?” he asked Condon. “You know they weren’t there.”

Salemme’s father was a member of the Knights of Columbus, and he knew that Condon was also a member of the Catholic fraternal organization.

“You’re a fourth-degree knight,” he reminded Condon. “One of the commandments is Thou Shall Not Bear False Witness. How do you expect
to get through the pearly gates with Saint Peter, putting that slob [Barboza] up there to put four guys away on death row?”

Condon, who was normally cool, exploded when Salemme had the gall to bring up his religion.

“You’re so smart, why don’t you take the stand?” Condon shouted.

“I will, let’s go up, you and I. We’ll take the stand and we’ll testify. Who’s gonna believe me?”

As the cop and crook continued their argument, Rico shared a concerned look with Stevie Flemmi.

A few months later, both Flemmi and Salemme were indicted for the bombing that almost killed attorney John Fitzgerald. H. Paul Rico tipped off Flemmi, who was already on the run in California for murdering Wimpy Bennett’s brother William, to the charges. Flemmi remained in hiding for nearly five years, first making his way to Manhattan and then to Montreal. “Cadillac Frank” went underground in New York City and stayed there until he was arrested in 1972 by a young
FBI
agent from South Boston named John Connolly. Connolly, a protege of Condon and Rico, had acted on information supplied by Salemme’s partner and friend, Stevie Flemmi.

While Rico and Condon had their time tied up with Flemmi and Salemme, there was little supervision or interest in Joe Barboza. The Animal made several trips to Boston and Providence and always in disguise. If the feds got a whiff that he was back in town, they would lock him up for the seventy-plus years he had remaining on his suspended sentence for being a habitual criminal.

If the Mafia found him, he was as good as dead. Barboza created elaborate disguises for himself, including a hippie disguise complete with long-haired wig, fake beard, and love beads. He would also pass himself off as a longshoreman in petticoat and cap. Barboza called for a private meeting with Frank Davis, a Patriarca emissary, in a wooded area in Freetown, just outside of New Bedford. Joe tapped a few childhood friends to provide security for the meeting and also asked newspaper reporter James Southwood to attend. Southwood had remained close to Barboza since the two had worked on a story for the
Boston Herald
together, outlining his reasons for testifying against the mob. Southwood was contemplating a book project with Joe to chronicle his life story. Barboza felt the reporter
should get as close as he could to the action. Southwood grabbed an old army gas mask out of a trunk to shield his identity and accompanied Barboza to the meeting. Joe told the Patriarca emissary that he would refute his testimony against the imprisoned Mafia boss and others for half a million dollars plus $1,000 per month while the deal was getting finalized. Barboza said he could also get his hands on $300,000 in stolen securities that he would sell the Office for a commission. Patriarca’s man countered with a deal of $100,000 plus all the money still owed to Joe by his shylock customers. No decision was made that day in the woods. Instead, Joe returned to Santa Rosa in pursuit of the stolen stocks and bonds.

He began frequenting the Mirror Man Lounge, a seedy bar in Santa Rosa where he befriended a small-time drug dealer and junkie named Ricky Clay Wilson, who was the current owner of the stolen securities. One night after a meeting with Wilson and others, Barboza mistakenly left his address book behind at the bar. The book was filled with contact numbers for the
FBI
, U.S. marshals, and the Justice Department. The address book was picked up by a friend of Wilson’s who demanded to know why their new associate from the East Coast was friendly with “the pigs.” Barboza concocted an elaborate story when he retrieved the address book the next day and hoped the discussion would end there. A few days later, Wilson asked Barboza if he would help retrieve some guns that he had buried outside of town. Joe agreed, as he was looking for a new weapon. Wilson’s wife and another female hippie accompanied them as they drove to a wooded area near Glen Ellen, California, just fifteen miles outside Santa Rosa. They pulled down a wagon path about fifty feet into the woods and got out of the car. The men walked ahead of the girls, and, at one point, Wilson turned around to confront Barboza.

“Listen, you’re a fucking snitch,” Wilson said. “I heard about those guys you put on death row back East. You can get me for conspiracy because of those stocks.”
¹⁸¹

The Animal remained calm despite the fact that his cover had now been blown. “If you believe that, you deserve anything that happens to you.”

Wilson reached for a gun in his waistband. Barboza wrestled him to the ground as the gun went off, the shot echoing through the quiet California night. The Animal snatched the weapon out of Wilson’s hand and jammed it against his skull. Wilson then made another move for a smaller
gun he had hidden in his boot. Seeing this, Barboza fired twice—one bullet tore through Wilson’s eye, the other traveled through his temple. Joe ran to the girls and told them to flee the scene. He dragged Wilson’s body deep into the bushes and left it there. He wiped the murder weapon clean and threw it as far as he could. When he rendezvoused later with Wilson’s wife and the other girl, they were high on drugs and nonchalantly offered to help bury Wilson’s body. The trio spent the rest of the evening moving the body from the murder scene to another wooded area where they had dug a shallow grave. Barboza dumped the body in and tried to forget about it. His killer instincts had served him well during his bloody confrontation with Wilson, but they had failed him now. It may have been a simple oversight, or it may have been the fact that he had never hurt a woman. Either way, Joe let the hippie girls live to tell their tale.