The Butcher (26 page)

DEA agents engrossed in the search for Pitera victims, bird sanctuary, Staten Island. Note the thick growth.
Courtesy of the DEA

 

Members of Group 33 that composed the Pitera task force.
Courtesy of the DEA

S
hlomo Mendelsohn, also known as Sammy, was your basic lowlife, drug-dealing, hustling wannabe gangster. He was hooked up with the Israeli drug cartel that operated, for the most part, out of a slew of different lofts they owned in the West Thirties in Manhattan in the flower district. He was tall with high cheekbones, a strong jawline, and a thick head of straight, black hair. He was so good-looking that he could have readily been a model or a leading man. He had stupidly gotten busted selling several ounces of cocaine to an undercover DEA agent and was now stewing in jail, pacing, mad at the world. Jail wasn't for him. He'd find a way to get out of this trouble. He'd be clever, not like all the other fools around him. Shlomo Mendelsohn would find a way to get out of this mess.

Shlomo was one of those people on the outside of the war on drugs, an on-again, off-again player who, apparently, never heard—if you can't do the time, don't do the crime.

WHAT, he racked his brain, could he give up? WHO could he give up to get out of jail? His mind kept going back to one person and one person only—the worst criminal he knew of. The Israelis he knew were drug dealers and weren't even in the same category as the person he was thinking of. He paced his cell like a caged rat. He knew if he
could get his freedom, he'd ultimately be able to leave the country, go back to Israel, and there he would be insulated and protected…he was a Jew. The Jews protected their own. In Israel, he would blend in, become one of many.

Having made up his mind that he would become an informer, he reached out to law enforcement. What Shlomo knew, what Shlomo had to say, was passed along and ended up on the desk of Jim Hunt. Hunt and federal prosecutor David Shapiro went to visit Shlomo in the Metropolitan Correction Center (MCC.) David Shapiro was a thin athletic man who stood about five nine, a magna cum laude graduate of the State University of New York at Buffalo. He was thorough, likable, and had a profound understanding of the law and all its intricate nuances and shadings. Shapiro was regarded by Hunt and Geisel and most other agents and prosecutors as the best trial attorney in the Eastern District of New York. Neither Jim nor David Shapiro was impressed with Shlomo. Often Jim came into contact with people who had gotten themselves into trouble and were now offering up information. Often, they were, in plain English, full of shit, so whenever Jim met a person in prison looking to give up something, he was wary, skeptical.

Doubtful, Jim Hunt listened to what Shlomo had to say: “I know a real important guy in the Mafia who kills people. He's also a big drug dealer. I'll tell you everything I know; I'll testify in court…but I want to go home. I want to go back to Israel. If you do that for me, I'll give you this guy.”

Jim stared at him and he stared back. Shlomo added conspiratorially, as though he knew where the Holy Grail was hidden, “He buries people. He kills them, cuts them up, and then buries them,” he said.

Alarms went off inside Jim's head. Red lights began spinning.

“What's his name?” Jim asked.

“You've got to first guarantee me—”

“Hold on a minute. Nobody can guarantee you anything. If what you say is true, if you help us from the beginning to the end, we can
recommend that you'll get a good deal. We can recommend that you be extradited to Israel. We don't make guarantees.”

Shlomo thought this over. He stared at the two government men. Resolutely, Jim stared back. He was not playing poker. What he said was true.

“His name is Tommy Pitera,” Shlomo said, and Jim felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. Jim knew cases were frequently broken by information coming from the most unlikely of places, suddenly falling from the sky. Just the fact that Shlomo knew Pitera's name was
very interesting.
Jim already knew that people in Pitera's crew, Pitera himself, were dealing with the Israeli Mafia, buying drugs from them. They, both the DEA and the U.S. Justice Department, were interested. They reached out to Shlomo's attorneys and a tentative deal was struck.

Shlomo was allowed out of MCC, placed in the Federal Witness Protection Program. During debriefings, he told members of Group 33, Jim Hunt, and Tommy Geisel what he knew about Tommy Pitera. He said he had been in the home of Moussa Aliyan when drug transactions went down during which Pitera bought big amounts of cocaine from Aliyan. He said, more importantly, more shockingly, that he was there when Tommy Pitera killed Talal Siksik. Pitera not only killed him, he said, but he then “put the body in the bathtub, got undressed, stepped into the bathtub naked, and methodically cut the body into pieces. Sick fucking stuff. I never saw a thing like it,” he said, shaking his head in sincere dismay.

These words fit together like the last pieces of an intricate puzzle. Not only did Jim believe what Shlomo had just said, but it so fit the modus operandi of Pitera that Jim suddenly realized he was sitting with a man who had actually seen Pitera cut a body into six pieces. This was not only shocking and eye-opening, but it might very well be the weak link, the Achilles' heel they'd been looking for. With his intelligent, icy blue-green eyes, Jim stared at Shlomo; he believed every word Shlomo said. Jim was an astute judge of character—especially
characters coming from the street. He was so perceptive and adept at reading people, informers, that he could tell the truth from bullshit as readily as a lie detector. Jim had heard through the jungle grapevine that ran throughout all of Brooklyn that Pitera was, in fact, cutting up people he killed.

“So, you were there?” Jim asked.

“I was there,” Shlomo confessed. “Most horrible fucking thing I've ever seen in my entire life. And he did it with such…ease. It didn't bother him at all. It was like he was just taking a…a shower.”

“Step-by-step, I want you to tell me everything you saw,” Jim said. And Shlomo ran down the whole evening he spent at Siksik's house.

When Shlomo finished, Jim said, “This place you went to bury the body…where…was it?”

“Staten Island,” Shlomo said, fear of Pitera creasing his brow, tightening the mini-muscles on his handsome face as he went on to explain how they wrapped Talal Siksik in plastic and put him in suitcases and brought him out to some desolate place in Staten Island. “Like in a forest,” Shlomo said.

“Do you think you could bring us to this place?” Jim asked.

“I could sure try,” Shlomo said.

I
t was a hot day in late July. The humidity was 90 percent. There were no clouds to offer any reprieve from the searing July sun. Jim Hunt, Tommy Geisel, and Shlomo Mendelsohn were on a field trip of the most macabre, morbid kind. They were in search of a body farm, a Mafia burial ground. Under the best of circumstances, had Shlomo known Staten Island, been reasonably familiar with it, he still would have had a hard time finding the William T. Davis Wildlife Refuge. When he had been there previously, it was nighttime. When he had been there before, adrenaline had been filling his body and he wasn't paying attention to exactly how they got there and where they went. He had disconcerting, horrible images seared into his brain, as though they had been branded, but they were a series of disjointed images that had neither rhyme nor reason.

That whole day, Jim and Tommy drove Shlomo all over Staten Island. They checked out most every forest, the places that would be good for burying a body. The more they looked, the more frustrated, anxious, and out of sorts Shlomo became. He had only seen Staten Island that one time. To him, it was a foreign and distant place. He had no point of reference, did not know east from west or south from north. Both Jim and Tommy were becoming restless, tired. Though
they didn't think Shlomo was lying, fabricating, looking to get himself out of trouble—they were disappointed by his lack of understanding of the area. At one point he said, “Maybe…maybe it was in New Jersey,” which really frustrated the two agents. It not only frustrated them but it pissed them off.

Be that as it may, all Shlomo did was lead them up one blind alley after another that whole day and night.

However, just because Shlomo couldn't find this burial ground didn't mean it wasn't there, both Jim and Tommy believed. Hearing about the burial ground and seeing the fear that lived inside Shlomo motivated and drove the two agents on. They would not rest until Pitera was nailed to the wall with long, sharp spikes.

Luck…it seemed that Tommy Pitera of Gravesend, Brooklyn, had an inordinate amount of luck. He had been getting away with all kinds of crimes, murder, dismemberment. Jim Hunt and Tom Geisel were going to make sure that Pitera's luck changed.

J
oe “Dish” Senatore was a career criminal. He had spent over thirty years of his life in jail, was an original tough guy. As a young man, he had been the head of the Persico gang in South Brooklyn known as the “South Brooklyn Boys.” He was also Genovese capo Joe Jinx's driver. He knew every mafioso in Brooklyn. People liked him. People respected him. He was old-school tough. Now Joe Dish was in the fall of life. He was graying, round-shouldered, not the energetic, tough dynamo he had once been, though Joe Dish still did what he was best at—impersonating a cop, a New York City detective. He had badges, he had guns, he had the walk, the talk. He began working with Pitera's gang in 1988. Several times over the years, he had managed to get Pitera's crew into the homes of drug dealers. He was so good that when they did one score, Pitera was so pleased that he gave him a gold Rolex watch, which had been stolen from the victim.

“This is for you from me. It's personal. It means something,” Pitera said, showing a rare, giving side.

“I appreciate it. Thank you, Tommy.”

“Don't ever sell it!”

“Of course not,” Joe Dish said.

Joe Dish did not like Pitera. He felt he threw his weight around,
bullylike. He knew that Pitera cut up people in tubs. He had heard that Pitera had killed a girl and cut her up. This flew against Mafia protocol. It was something a psychopath out of a B-horror movie would do, not a man of respect. The thought of doing something like that was anathema to him. Still, he'd keep his personal feelings to himself, inside. Over the years, in his life of crime, he had dealt with every type of unsavory character. He'd smile and nod when he saw Tommy, but inside he felt disdain, not warmth, not friendship, no kind of netherworld bond.

The beginning of the end came when Pitera went to Joe Dish to get him to help set up Willie Boy Johnson. Willie Boy Johnson and Joe Dish went back. They were good friends. There was a genuine bond between the two men. No way was he about to set up Johnson for the likes of Pitera. When Joe Dish refused to help Pitera, said no, there was a sea change between the two. Joe Dish believed it was just a matter of time before Pitera killed him. The fact that he said no to such an important hit involving Eddie Lino and John Gotti himself was a death sentence. Number one—he had insulted Pitera by saying no. Number two—he knew that when Willie Boy Johnson went down, it would be Pitera's doing.

As if that weren't enough, Joe had also refused to help in the rip-off of the cash stash house in Howard Beach, the murder of the two female counters. Perhaps, in days gone by, Joe Dish could have gone to somebody connected who would speak on his behalf, but the truly connected people Joe had known were either dead or in jail. He was now on the far fringes of organized crime, an old-timer who had outlived a culture that had fallen by the wayside.

As it turned out, Joe Dish was not the old-time tough guy people perceived him to be. He had actually been a police informer for quite a few years. He was one of those individuals who adroitly played both sides of the fence. He had been sharing information with ATF special agent Billy Fredericks periodically, giving him information about crimes he was involved in, about crimes he knew of. Essentially what
Joe Dish was doing was playing both ends against the middle. This was another reason why he decided to tell all, tell what he knew about not only Pitera's crew but Pitera himself.

He was the man Jim Hunt, Tom Geisel, and Group 33 had been looking for—the door that would open into the world of Tommy Karate Pitera. He'd become the crack in the Rock of Gibraltar that was the visage Tommy Pitera offered to the world.

In Joe Dish's mind, he was striking first. In Joe Dish's mind, he would prevail over Pitera because he had the sense to pull the trigger first. Joe Dish's idea, however, of pulling the trigger had nothing to do with a gun. There was no way in hell he would try to kill Pitera with a gun or knife or bomb. The only way he could get to Pitera, he knew, was through law enforcement, by turning the tables. Joe Dish called his contact and friend Billy Fredericks and asked for a meeting.

Billy Fredericks was a good friend of Jim Hunt's. They had worked together on several cases. He was a Vietnam vet, a robust man with black hair and a twitch in his right eye. He was the type of man who was naturally fearless. He didn't like people in the Mafia. He thought they were backstabbing punks. He had little respect for them. Fact is that all he had for them was animus.

When he heard what Joe Dish had to say, he immediately called Jim Hunt. He knew Jim Hunt had been working on the Pitera task force. When Jim Hunt received the call at DEA headquarters, he said he'd be happy to meet with Joe Dish. In fact, he had seen Joe Dish at the Just Us Bar and knew who he was. They met in the parking lot of a shopping center in Staten Island. Jim got into Billy Fredericks's car. Joe Dish was in the back. Introductions were made. They shook hands. Shoppers passed on the left and right. Joe Dish began to tell his story. It was an interesting tale that immediately drew Jim Hunt in, but there wasn't the kind of proof, solid and irrefutable, that would hold up in a court of law. The crimes Joe Dish described were, as such, minor. They wanted Pitera for more—for murder. They wanted him for heavy-duty drug dealing. What Joe Dish was offering up was
neither of those things. Joe Dish would, however, Jim Hunt knew, be a good witness, surely bolster the case against Pitera. When Jim asked Joe Dish what crimes he was convicted of, there was a long list involving all sorts of larcenies, forgeries, etc.

“You ever commit a murder?” Jim Hunt asked, and Joe Dish told him that he had been just recently involved in a killing. He said it was a long convoluted story, but it involved him and another guy named Jack McInerney going to rip off the partner of someone who owed them money. This individual's name was David Braun and he ended up resisting, escaping from his bindings, and running out of the door of his house. Joe's partner Jack McInerney shot him several times as he ran.

“I felt terrible about it. I didn't want the kid to die. It was just one of those things—one of those spur-of-the-moment things. I only went there to get what was due me. I swear I never thought about killing him,” Joe Dish said.

This, Jim Hunt knew, could put a damper on Joe Dish's viability as a witness, but he had seen far worse characters used successfully, quite brilliantly, to put mafiosi away. Immediately Jim Hunt asked Joe Dish if he'd wear a wire in order to get Tommy Pitera to start incriminating himself in different crimes. Joe Dish said Tommy was paranoid, suspicious of everyone.

“But,” he said, “I'll try.”

Over the coming days and weeks and months, Joe Dish tried to get Pitera on tape talking about crime to no avail. It got to the point where he didn't want to be around Pitera because he felt that at any moment he, Pitera, would pull a gun out and kill him. However, with the guidance of Jim and Tommy Geisel, Joe Dish was wired up and let loose on all the many players in Pitera's mob. Dish had the gift of gab, was a consummate actor—a born con man. He was completely above reproach. Without much effort at all, Joe Dish managed to get Lorenzo Modica, the man who killed the two Colombians, Manny
Maya, Frank Martini, Michael Cassesse, and Pitera associate Jimmy February, among others, talking freely and openly and incriminatingly about their crimes. More importantly, Joe Dish got them to talk about the role Pitera played in a laundry list of crimes—murders and rip-offs and drug dealing.