WEBVTT
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In conversation with Terry Shepard, award-winning broadcaster, narrator, and author.
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A deep dive into the writer's craft with the artists and support systems who create the stories we love.
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There are mob stories, and then there are the stories told by the men who actually put the mobsters in prison.
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During the 1980s, Edward McDonald led the Justice Department's organized crime strike force in Brooklyn, taking on some of the most powerful figures in the New York mafia.
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His prosecutions helped convict leaders from four of the city's five crime families, scores of mob captains and soldiers, corrupt union officials, and even members of Congress.
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But if Ed McDonald's face looks familiar, there's another reason.
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When Martin Scorsese made Goodfellas, the prosecutor who helped turn Henry Hill into a government witness didn't need an actor to play him.
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Ed McDonald played himself.
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Now, in his new memoir, Chasing Goodfellas, written with Jake Brown, McDonald takes us behind the headlines and into the investigations, courtrooms, and extraordinary personalities surrounding two legendary cases: the Lufthansa Heist and the Boston College point shaving scandal.
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Ed McDonald, welcome to the conversation.
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Well, thanks, Terry.
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I appreciate your inviting me.
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Take us through your journey to the courtroom.
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I saw myself as a lawyer, and when I decided what type of lore I wanted to do, I began to narrow it down.
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I decided I wanted to be a litigator and go to court, try cases, argue motions, write briefs, uh, rather than be a corporate lawyer and do deals and do people's wills and taxes and things of that nature.
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I wanted some action.
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And um, as I got into it, I decided that I wanted to be a prosecutor.
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I thought that's where the action was.
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And I kind of thought that you know you'd be on the right side.
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On the other hand, I've been in private practice as a criminal defense lawyer since 1989.
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So very often I'm wearing the white hatch when I'm a defense lawyer, I think.
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The big question that our listeners are gonna want me to ask, I'll ask right up front, and that is what was it like being on screen with Martin Scorsese directing?
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Well, it was certainly exciting.
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It was uh it was a real thrill.
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And the the crazy thing was that I I couldn't be in the movie if I was still working for the government.
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So by pure coincidence and good good fortune, the um the movie began to shoot in the summer of 1989.
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And I knew that I was going to be going into practice in May or June or July, sometime in that time frame after I had been in government service for 18 years.
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Um, so uh, I guess it was in April, uh Crusade and Nick Pellegi, who was the screenwriter, who I knew, he was a reporter for New York magazine, had written the book on which uh uh Goodfellas was based.
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Dick called me up and said, Marty would like a staff person to come down to your office and and take uh photographs because they want to replicate your office for the scene that uh in which Henry and his wife meet the prosecutor or discuss with the prosecutor the witness protection program and what they're ultimately going to do.
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So I said, sure.
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So this young woman came down and she was taking photographs, and she said, Could I take your diplomas and the pictures of your kids and all this?
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And I followed, you know, look, I'm spending all this time answering your questions, I'm giving you this stuff.
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Well, who's playing me?
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And and and it was there was talk that there was going to be some big name actors.
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The book, the prosecutor, had a bigger role.
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And uh she said, Well, they haven't cast your part yet.
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She said, I'll do it.
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And just kidding.
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Well, she went back to she didn't realize I was kidding, obviously.
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It's in because she went back to Scorsese and Pellegi, who were together that day.
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And Nick called me and said, Marty's here with me.
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He's he sees this as a uh sort of a situation where it could be cinema verite, which would be interested in having a screen test.
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And I says, No, you know, I just I've never acted, but never please.
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And he's come on, he says, You got the gift of Gab.
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Come on, just take the so I said, All right, all right.
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And I just it was sort of coerced me almost into doing it.
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And then, you know, I could have gotten out of it if I wanted to, but uh, you know, I I went home and discussed it with my wife, and she says, Look, you'll get to meet Martin Scorsese, you're not gonna get the role in a movie, but you know, it'll be fun, you know, it'll be just an experience.
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I says, you know, the you're right, all right, so I'll do it.
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So they sent me a script, and I went up to Warner Brothers' uh uh the offices where they were doing the uh the screen tests, and um, to make a long story short, I go into a room, Martin Scorsese is there with the casting director, and two people, two actors who were there to play a wife and a husband who were going into the witness protection program.
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And so they had the script, I had the script, and we started reading it.
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And Scorsese says, That's absolutely horrible.
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It didn't say absolutely horrible, he says, but that's pretty bad.
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Wrinkles it up, throws it in the ground, and says, Look, just be yourself.
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These two, you two, he points to the two of them and says, just act as if you're a wife and a and a gangster who's gonna cooperate with the government, you're going into the witness protection program, you're gonna give up your life in New York, and you're gonna be protected.
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And so we launched into this extemporaneous colloquy that went on for about 20 minutes or so.
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The woman is a professional actress, she's yelling at me and she's getting nasty with me, and I'm coming back and being nasty with her, and Scorsese would say, Well, try being you know quiet and meek and nice, and we do it that way.
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It was all ad lib.
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And after 20 minutes or so, he says, All right, this is great.
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You know, he says, Thank you.
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He says, We'll uh we'll get back to you.
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Perfectly charming.
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I mean, it was just that he was really trying to put me at ease, and he was he was really a terrif, you know, terrific guy.
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I really wasn't that nervous really during this process because I was more concerned about finding a job and going to the private practice.
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And so I got back to my office.
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Pellegi calls me and says, you know, Marty wants you to do it.
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You got the part.
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So about three or four weeks later, I was called and uh I had no script.
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Everything was going to be ad-lib for the scene.
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Actually, it's gonna be two scenes.
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It was a courtroom scene, and it was the scene in my office which preceded that.
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And um, I went out to Queens.
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There was a building that they had rented in Queens where they had a set.
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Um, you know, I sat down with Rayleigh Oder and Lorraine Bracco and Martin Scruszi was there and uh a whole staff of people.
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And that's when I started to get a little bit nervous because I said, What am I doing here?
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We don't even have a script.
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I got we don't have a script because I didn't have to memorize anything.
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But um, we did six takes, and each was about 20 minutes to a half an hour.
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And it was just a really, you know, a great experience.
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I mean it's something I've been you can imagine, I've been answering questions about the whole experience and what do you know what it was like to just like what your question was.
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I get asked that all the time.
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And it really was, it was yeah, it was, I think it was something that a reader would would find very entertaining.
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You know, the whole process of preparing for the screen test of what I encountered at the screen.
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When I showed up for the screen test, there must have been a hundred actors there.
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Not for my role.
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There were there was another actor there for my role who I actually knew.
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He was a he was a former cop, and I had some cases with him.
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And he called me before Polegie called me and said, You got the part.
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I says, Well, how do you know?
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He said, Because when I went in to do the screen test, Scurszy says, There's no need to do it.
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We got somebody.
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And he ended up becoming an arresting officer in one of the scenes.
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But in any case, it was it was a crazy experience.
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I'm walking in, and every waiter, gangster, gun mall, stripper, people with these small roles who were doing background stuff and it's very small parts in the movie, they were all auditioning that day.
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And uh, I was kind of saying, What am I doing here with these people?
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First of all, they look like hoods in gun malls, but they were professionals.
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And I um uh, yeah, I was a little unnerved.
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But but Marty put me at ease.
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Uh so I tell about that, and then I tell, you know, somewhat at length about my my experiences um on the day that I went out to shoot, and then on the sub on the following day, got to, you know, I both days I had a production assistant, or as they call it in the trade, PA.
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And lo and behold, my PA was Henry's daughter, Henry Hill's daughter.
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Henry Hill for the the listener or the viewers, the person about whom the the um uh the movie was made.
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He was the you know the subject of the movie.
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Uh so he I guess he pulled some strings and got his daughter, who was probably about 20, 21 at the time, she was my uh my production assistant, and she was supposed to take care of my whatever whatever needs.
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I had no needs.
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I wasn't gonna be presumptuous enough to start asking for things when I was on this on the set.
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But there's a you know, there's a lot of interesting, entertaining experiences that I had on the days when I when I shot the um even went out and found out, found I had a trailer.
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If you have a speaking part, you get a trailer for the day in your own room and and a cot.
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And uh I didn't spend much time there.
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I was too busy watching what was going on because I was so interested in in in what Scorsese was doing, what all the crew were doing.
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Uh but when I went out at the at the end of the day with the second day at the courthouse, was a uh a long, long session.
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I didn't finish until around uh uh 11 o'clock at night.
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And uh when I went out, I discovered that my change of clothes that they had asked me to bring had been stolen from my trailer.
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So I put a claim into Warner Brothers as I was told to do, and I never heard from them.
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But it was it was Ed McDonald is our special guest.
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The book he's written is called Chasing Goodfellas.
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Chasing Goodfellas Book.com is the website we hear about these crime families and these crime lords through myth, but you knew them in real life.
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What was the difference?
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Well, uh, I don't know.
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I I guess it depends on how they're portrayed uh on the screen.
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I mean, sometimes it's laughable when they have people sort of acting too tough, and then sometimes they uh like we say you have the the Don Corleone character, you know, sort of this classy man of refinement.
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I mean, you know, for the most part, these guys are thugs.
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And sometimes they put on a veneer when you know they're in public, when maybe they were in restaurants and and you know, out on the street or wherever they might be.
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And sometimes they have to come into contact with with business people.
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And again, they put on this air of refinement.
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But gace, these people are just gangsters.
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They're thugs.
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They they ever they resort to violence, and their power is derived from violence or the threat of violence.
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So there are no really no redeeming qualities that these people have, except, of course, when you for when you're fortunate enough to turn them and make them into witnesses, and they sort of join Team America, and then you find that the more significant they are, the more charming they are, and the funnier they are.
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People often ask me over the years, I've been asked, you know, what makes it, you know, what what what do you have to be?
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What do you have to do in order to get into the leadership of a family?
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Well, you have to be feared, you have to have you have to have used violence, be known for having used violence.
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But you know, most of these people spend a good deal of their day hanging around in social clubs and in restaurants.
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And just like in in normal life, the person who gets ahead is the person who's congenial.
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You know, the person who, while he is feared and while he has a reputation for using violence and being a threatening individual, the guy who's going to sit around with his cronies, with his fellow mob members and the associates of the family who can tell a good story and be self-deprecating at times, that guy tends to move up in the family.
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And of course, I guess the other more significant thing is is that guy an earner?
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You know, are they earning money?
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So that's what they look to.
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But uh for the most part, on the streets, these people don't have uh any type of refinement at all.
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So when you see that portrayed on the screen, it's uh it's the wise guys uh either in an inaccurate way or uh when they are sort of putting on a show for people that they're trying to impress.
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The Lufthansa story is one of the central pivots of Goodfellas.
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Take us back to that experience.
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Well, the odd thing is that it happened about 11 and a half months into my tenure in the strike force.
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Our mandate from the Justice Department, the strike forces were not part of the U.S.
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attorneys' offices that usually prosecute crimes or do prosecute crimes now in the districts in the United States.
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There are 93 districts throughout the country.
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Each has its own federal U.S.
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attorney.
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The strike forces were specialized prosecutors who were part of the organized crime and racketeering section, was supervised by attorneys in the organized crime section.
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We had our own boss and supervisor in in Brooklyn.
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There were 14 attorneys, and Tom Pucho was the supervisor.
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I was the deputy chief when I was hired in 1977 after the years in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office as a local prosecutor.
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But our mandate was to go after the leadership of the five families in New York, as and the other strike forces had the same mandate, and to go after labor racketeering and in those areas of the economy, in industries where organized crime had a significant impact on the economy.
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And so that's what we're looking at.
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So on uh the Sunday night in December, the uh robbery is committed.
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Uh actually, it's into Monday morning.
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It's about three o'clock in the morning.
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Everybody wakes up on hears on TV and on the radio and in some of the newspapers that caught it uh that the largest robbery in the history of the United States had been perpetrated.
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Uh, we came into work with with guys, the other people in my other prosecutors in my office.
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Boston, it's not for us.
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This is uh it's a glorified hijack.
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Uh uh, we'll leave this to the U.S.
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attorney's office or to the local DA's office.
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And all right, well, it is the biggest robbery in history.
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Well, needless to say, Justice Department sees all the publicity that's a feeding frenzy in the media.
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Um, Washington calls and says, Well, what's going on?
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Report, they said to my boss, what report on the case?
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He says, Well, we're not handling it.
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The U.S.
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attorney's gonna handle it.
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No, he's not.
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You got to do it.
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So they called the U.S.
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attorney and said the strike force was gonna handle it.
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And so I had some experience doing wiretapping in the DA's office, and when I was a federal district judge, uh judge's clerk, and but not, you know, getting getting papers together to get court orders in a matter of hours, and not monitoring the agents, you know, on a day-by-day, hour-by-hour basis to make sure they were in compliance with these really strict standards that you have for electronic surveillance.
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So I, but nonetheless, I was assigned to work with the FBI and with other agencies, you know, the New York City Police Department, the Port Authority, police had the they were the police officers for the airport, customs, a number of other agencies were involved, but it's mostly the FBI.
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And so we set out working with them.
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They were out in the field doing the surveillance, doing the electronic surveillance when we obtained that.
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We were only able to put a bug in a car of one of the individuals who actually committed the robbery.
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But the FBI knew within a matter of hours that the person responsible for organizing the crew was a man by the name of Jimmy Burke, Jimmy the Gent Burke, uh he was he was called.
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And he was sort of an infamous figure in in organized crime circles in in that part of Queens around the airport, and even in Manhattan, where he had all sorts of his tentacles uh in.
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He answered to a a major, major figure in the Lucchese family named Paul Vario.
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And uh so it was Vario's crew and Henry Hill, who was been hanging around with Vario since he was probably 10 years old, he was a part of the of the crew as well.
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So we were able to identify Jimmy Burke as the the person who was responsible, and we were able to get from FBI informants the uh the names of the people who had actually were um involved in committing the crime.
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The we also knew we also had a second, there were two FBI uh uh uh uh squads that were assigned.
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One of the squads was looking into who was the inside man.
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It was clear from the way the way the robbery was committed that there had to have been an inside man.
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We um uh they suspected who the inside man was, was a man by the name of Lou Werner.
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Turns out that he had actually stolen the plan from another Lufthansa employee, a German national, named Peter Grunewald.
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And Grunewald needed Werner because Werner worked at the cargo terminal and had knowledge not just of the layout of the terminal, but of the security system.
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And this is something that Grunewald didn't have.
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Well, Grunwald looked for a gang to commit the robbery.
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Me didn't have a clue as to how to find somebody to commit a big robbery like this.
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So Werner sat out on his own.
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And to make a long story short, he was able, through connections he had with his bookmaker, to get to Henry Hill.
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He didn't meet Henry Hill, but through these bookmakers, they contacted Henry Hill.
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Henry took it to Jimmy Burke, and Burke organized the crew.
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We could not penetrate Burke's crew.
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We couldn't think it was just a brick wall, primarily because the brick wall was filled with bodies, was killing everybody or every one of his accomplices who could put a finger on him, other than Henry Hill, who was close to him with a couple of other people.
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But we were making no headway.
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We decided to proceed against the inside man, hoping to turn him.
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And it was an incredible, it's actually a very interesting story.
00:16:56.930 --> 00:17:21.569
I think what I try to take the reader into is the ins and outs of criminal investigations in big cases, where there's a lot of pressure from you know, from headquarters, from Washington, from the people in, you know, from the bosses in the city, but the the Justice Department bosses in the city, the FBI bosses, and how we step by step, sort of meticulously went through hitting, you know, hit all the stops on what we should be doing in a criminal investigation.
00:17:21.650 --> 00:17:27.569
And I try to describe it in a layman's terms so that it's easy to read and enjoyable to read.
00:17:27.730 --> 00:17:32.609
And uh so we we we take it through the investigative stage on Burke, get nowhere.
00:17:32.769 --> 00:17:35.250
We take it through the investigative stage on Lou Werner.
00:17:35.329 --> 00:17:38.210
I go through step by step on how we flip witnesses.
00:17:38.369 --> 00:17:42.450
It wasn't so hard to flip the witnesses against Lou Werner because they were lay people.
00:17:42.690 --> 00:17:56.690
They were uh his fellow employee, a friend who he had been involved in a previous robbery with, who was actually having an affair with his wife, and he was trying to brag to his friend saying, Hey, you might be having an affair with my wife, but I'm the inside man on Lufthansa.
00:17:57.009 --> 00:18:05.410
I mean, you know, it's it was it was sometimes it was remarkable at how, you know, what was in people's heads, you know, the stupid things that some of the people involved in the case would do.
00:18:05.570 --> 00:18:07.890
So we turned to him and we turned to a number of other people.
00:18:08.049 --> 00:18:12.049
Um, you know, I take the reader step by step through that, and then we get into the trial.
00:18:12.130 --> 00:18:14.930
And that took place in in the spring of 1979.
00:18:15.170 --> 00:18:16.850
It's a it was a case for the ages.
00:18:16.930 --> 00:18:22.930
Uh it was really a remarkable case with colorful witnesses, colorful judge, a colorful defense lawyer.
00:18:23.090 --> 00:18:25.490
And it was about a you know, three and a half week trial.
00:18:25.570 --> 00:18:26.930
It was extremely stressful.
00:18:27.090 --> 00:18:28.289
The press was everywhere.
00:18:28.450 --> 00:18:31.170
There were crazy antics taking place during the trial.
00:18:31.490 --> 00:18:35.410
I was able to focus on Werner's girlfriend, and I put her in the grand jury.
00:18:35.490 --> 00:18:43.330
Not only was he he was still married, his wife was cheating on him, but he was he was having a relationship with a woman who turned out to be devoted to him.
00:18:43.490 --> 00:18:50.049
But uh, I was able to get her to admit in the grand jury, probably with a lot of tactics that some people might be looking askance at.
00:18:50.210 --> 00:18:56.850
But I was putting some pressure on her, and she said, Yes, he told me, he told me, and she broke down, cried, and said he admitted that he was the inside man.
00:18:57.009 --> 00:18:58.690
She re didn't want to testify.
00:18:58.769 --> 00:19:02.370
So she went through like three days of antics when she was fainting in the courtroom.
00:19:02.529 --> 00:19:04.610
She was taken out by in an ambulance.
00:19:04.769 --> 00:19:09.410
The judge was upset that she went, she left the attendants took her out in an ambulance.
00:19:09.570 --> 00:19:12.049
He ordered that she be arrested for the night in jail.
00:19:12.210 --> 00:19:15.650
I mean, it was just absolutely chaos in the courtroom.
00:19:15.730 --> 00:19:17.970
And it's a very, very entertaining story.
00:19:18.289 --> 00:19:20.289
So we convicted the inside man.
00:19:20.370 --> 00:19:26.850
He refused to cooperate because he was scared, didn't cooperate for another year and a half, and when he cooperated, his his testimony was useless.
00:19:26.930 --> 00:19:29.570
And he ended up, judge wouldn't reduce his sentence.
00:19:29.650 --> 00:19:34.289
And uh, despite my support, and uh, he served by nine years of a 15-year sentence.
00:19:34.450 --> 00:19:38.289
And so basically that was the end of it for us for a while, at least for me.
00:19:38.450 --> 00:19:39.570
I got on to other things.
00:19:39.730 --> 00:19:43.330
We had, if you might remember the ABSCAM case with the big political corruption case.
00:19:43.490 --> 00:19:46.769
Well, we had ABSCAM, so I was assigned to to work on ABSCAM.
00:19:46.930 --> 00:19:53.170
I ended up trying Harrison Williams, the senator from New Jersey, and was involved in prosecuting four congressmen here in in Brooklyn.
00:19:53.330 --> 00:19:57.809
And uh, they were from other parts of the country, one of them was from Brooklyn, but the others were from other parts of the country.
00:19:57.970 --> 00:20:03.170
And I tried the, at that time, I tried the acting boss of the Columbo family, so I really had a lot on my plates.
00:20:03.250 --> 00:20:13.490
And lo and behold, a year later, um the F uh Henry Hill was arrested by the Nassau County D uh District Attorney's Office on very, very serious narcotics charges.
00:20:13.730 --> 00:20:19.330
His wife was facing an indictment on narcotics charges as well, and we were able to use that that leverage.
00:20:19.490 --> 00:20:26.450
We more or less, we more or less stole Henry from the Nassau County EDA's office, although I never would have said that in those days.
00:20:26.529 --> 00:20:27.809
I wouldn't have phrased it that way.
00:20:27.970 --> 00:20:36.690
In hindsight, you know, I could see where they were very upset that we we took their witness for, we snatched him from them and turned him into a federal federal witness.
00:20:36.850 --> 00:20:44.210
And um, and that Henry gives us Jimmy Burke on a silver platter for Lufthansa, but it didn't do us any good because who's going to believe Henry Hill?
00:20:44.289 --> 00:20:48.210
It was a drug dealer, a career criminal, N'er duel, the drug addict himself.
00:20:48.289 --> 00:20:54.769
Uh we had no corroboration for anything Henry told us because about Burke and the and the the robbery because everybody was dead.
00:20:55.009 --> 00:20:56.529
Burke had killed everybody else.
00:20:56.690 --> 00:20:58.130
And he didn't have a chance to kill Burke.
00:20:58.289 --> 00:21:00.289
He was getting ready to kill Burke, but he didn't.
00:21:00.450 --> 00:21:02.210
We got him to we got him before he could.
00:21:02.289 --> 00:21:03.330
So what does he do?
00:21:03.410 --> 00:21:06.049
But sort of inadvertently tells us that.
00:21:06.210 --> 00:21:07.170
I said, What were you doing?
00:21:07.490 --> 00:21:08.529
What were we doing up in Boston?
00:21:08.610 --> 00:21:12.690
He said he was up in Boston in the days after the um after the robbery.
00:21:12.850 --> 00:21:15.730
He said, Oh, in them days we was fixing college basketball games.
00:21:15.890 --> 00:21:16.930
And I said, Well, where?
00:21:17.009 --> 00:21:17.970
And he says, uh BU.
00:21:18.049 --> 00:21:20.370
We had this little little All-American on BU.
00:21:20.610 --> 00:21:24.210
I said, Henry, there's no, there's no line on Boston University games.
00:21:24.370 --> 00:21:26.450
Yeah, they just didn't big enough basketball program.
00:21:26.529 --> 00:21:28.289
I said, could it have been Boston College?
00:21:28.450 --> 00:21:29.890
He goes, Yeah, yeah, you're right.
00:21:29.970 --> 00:21:31.490
Oh, it was Boston College.
00:21:31.730 --> 00:21:38.049
So I think the agents are joking because I went to Boston College and I played fresh from basketball for a while there.
00:21:38.130 --> 00:21:39.650
And so I thought it was a joke.
00:21:39.730 --> 00:21:43.090
I thought the agents were putting him up to it just to, you know, to pull my leg.
00:21:43.490 --> 00:21:45.730
Well, they looked at me like, what are you talking about?
00:21:45.809 --> 00:21:46.850
We're not wasting time here.
00:21:47.009 --> 00:21:50.450
You know, the with the Henry was being d interviewed by the marshals for the program.
00:21:50.610 --> 00:21:52.370
The FBI wanted to keep debriefing him.
00:21:52.450 --> 00:21:53.650
I wanted to be debriefing him.
00:21:53.809 --> 00:21:55.570
My assistants wanted to continue to debrief.
00:21:56.049 --> 00:21:59.009
He says, We're not wasting time, but of course I was doing, I'm telling you the truth.
00:21:59.250 --> 00:22:02.370
Well, we ended up following up the information he gave us.
00:22:02.690 --> 00:22:05.410
We were able to corroborate his his testimony.
00:22:05.570 --> 00:22:15.730
And we ended up in in uh indicting and convicting five individuals, three from Pittsburgh, where Henry was had a partner in the drug dealing business from Pittsburgh.
00:22:15.809 --> 00:22:21.090
And there were three gangsters from Pittsburgh, and Rick Hune was the BC player that we indicted and convicted.
00:22:21.170 --> 00:22:22.529
And he was from Pittsburgh.
00:22:22.610 --> 00:22:25.809
And and they felt that they needed heavyweight muscle.
00:22:25.970 --> 00:22:34.450
One of the one of the gangsters from Pittsburgh knew Henry, and he asked Henry if Henry could get some people from the Lucchese family to support them and get involved in the point shaping scheme.
00:22:34.850 --> 00:22:36.450
And that's how Henry got involved.
00:22:36.529 --> 00:22:37.730
And so everything was over.
00:22:37.809 --> 00:22:40.690
It was over the year before a year and a half early before Henry cooperated.
00:22:40.769 --> 00:22:43.890
Everybody went on their way and figured, well, if any, we're going to get any problems.
00:22:43.970 --> 00:22:45.490
We're, we're, we're in the clear now.
00:22:45.650 --> 00:22:49.250
Well, they weren't because we were able to follow up on Henry's information.
00:22:49.410 --> 00:22:52.769
And again, it's a it's a very interesting investigation.
00:22:53.009 --> 00:23:02.289
I take the reader step by step through interviewing witnesses and the manner in which the FBI went out and did it, bringing people into the grand jury, turning people.
00:23:02.450 --> 00:23:08.769
Again, we focused on the girlfriend of one of the one of the defendants, in this case, the girlfriend of the of the basketball player.
00:23:08.930 --> 00:23:11.970
She cooperated and became a very critical witness.
00:23:12.370 --> 00:23:18.610
The testimony at trial was was was really interesting and dramatic and somewhat really very sad.
00:23:18.769 --> 00:23:21.330
I mean, he she talked about how they were going to get married.
00:23:21.410 --> 00:23:26.610
And after they broke up, he put his hands around her neck and said, if you ever tell anyone about this, I'll kill you.
00:23:26.769 --> 00:23:36.210
And then I think one of the critical moments at trial was when the player's lawyer stood up to cross-examine her and he began to ask her about whether um about their relationship.
00:23:36.370 --> 00:23:44.049
Right at the outset of the testimony, the um uh the the young woman, you know, she he asked her whether to get married and said, Yes.
00:23:44.210 --> 00:23:46.210
And uh, but you didn't get married, no.
00:23:46.370 --> 00:23:49.250
But did you have abortions when you were having a relationship with him?
00:23:49.410 --> 00:23:51.570
And I didn't know that that would what the answer would be.
00:23:51.650 --> 00:23:53.490
And she said, uh, no.
00:23:53.970 --> 00:23:55.330
I'm sorry, she said yes, she had.
00:23:55.410 --> 00:23:57.890
She had two abortions, and uh he asked her why.
00:23:57.970 --> 00:23:59.809
And she's looking at me and she's crying.
00:23:59.890 --> 00:24:04.049
And I'm and I'm watching the jury as this guy's yelling at this all-American girl.
00:24:04.210 --> 00:24:06.370
You know, she was just like the perfect co-ed.
00:24:06.850 --> 00:24:09.330
And she was a nurse, and she just graduated from BC.
00:24:09.410 --> 00:24:13.970
And uh, she's crying, and I hear one of the jurors say to the lawyer, You shit.
00:24:14.049 --> 00:24:17.490
So I said, Well, I'm not gonna object, I'm just gonna let this guy sink himself.
00:24:17.730 --> 00:24:22.289
And so she says, Well, the reasons I didn't have the baby was because he gave me gonorrhea.
00:24:22.529 --> 00:24:30.049
Well, at that point, I stood off and objected, and it was like, Oh my, it was just, but there were so many crazy, crazy scenes.
00:24:30.370 --> 00:24:32.130
It's called Chasing Goodfellas.
00:24:32.370 --> 00:24:37.730
It's being released October 13th, and you know, I think it's uh it's an entertaining read.
00:24:37.890 --> 00:24:46.850
What the next part, the next two chapters or the next two parts of the book, I guess it's in about three or four chapters, it's about my relationship, my life with with Henry Hill.
00:24:46.930 --> 00:24:48.370
He just is crazy character.
00:24:48.529 --> 00:25:00.850
He I talk about the other cases in which he cooperated, I mean, somewhat briefly, um, and all of the hijinks in which he engaged and how he kept getting arrested throughout the country, what he was in the program, he kept getting kicked out of the program.
00:25:01.170 --> 00:25:03.730
I'm running to Washington to get him put back in.
00:25:03.809 --> 00:25:12.370
And then he gets he gets convicted on heavyweight narcotics trafficking in the Pacific Northwest in Seattle, and I come to his rescue again.
00:25:12.529 --> 00:25:13.730
He gets probation.
00:25:13.970 --> 00:25:15.009
And I stayed.
00:25:15.170 --> 00:25:19.570
I I don't I I'm not gonna say he was a friend, but he was somebody who I was really fond of.
00:25:19.730 --> 00:25:26.769
And I go into at length, I describe you know the nature of our relationship, and I got a big eye kick out of him, but he drove me completely crazy.
00:25:26.930 --> 00:25:28.769
And I thought he was a disreputable character.
00:25:28.850 --> 00:25:36.769
I mean, in some ways he was utterly despicable, but he was totally disarming and uh self-deprecating, had a great self-deprecating sense of humor.
00:25:36.930 --> 00:25:42.610
You know, I laugh, you know, now people were saying, oh, the guy was a must, you know, he was at the nobody on the street, but everybody liked him.
00:25:42.769 --> 00:25:48.130
Paul Vario liked him, Jimmy the Gent the Burke liked him, some of the most notorious gangsters in New York.
00:25:48.289 --> 00:25:50.690
He was a confidant of these guys because they liked him.
00:25:50.850 --> 00:25:54.769
They wouldn't trust him with doing anything important, but they always had him around.
00:25:54.850 --> 00:26:01.650
He brought these things to them because people liked him and they knew he had entree with these with these major league gangsters.
00:26:01.809 --> 00:26:04.769
So that's how he had information about these types of crimes.
00:26:04.930 --> 00:26:11.410
So and then that brings us to the last part of the book, which was the uh was the making of the movie of Goodfellas.
00:26:11.570 --> 00:26:19.009
And again, that was we started at the outset of the of the interview talking about that, and that's how I end the book with talking about how I was in in Goodfellas.
00:26:19.090 --> 00:26:23.170
And actually, I have a brief discussion of three other films that I was in.
00:26:23.410 --> 00:26:30.370
None of them are memorable, but there were certainly interesting experiences to go through the whole process with different directors and different actors.
00:26:30.690 --> 00:26:35.090
What do you hope that people will take away from reading Chasing Goodfellas?
00:26:35.809 --> 00:26:36.850
There's no message.
00:26:37.009 --> 00:26:39.170
I'm not trying to send a message to anyone.
00:26:39.330 --> 00:26:41.009
I'm trying to tell a story.
00:26:41.170 --> 00:26:43.890
I think, you know, I'm people have told me I'm just a natural-born storyteller.
00:26:44.130 --> 00:26:46.049
Maybe other people say you're just a win bag.
00:26:46.370 --> 00:26:49.890
But I I try to tell basically four entertaining stories.
00:27:01.250 --> 00:27:05.890
And I just hope to entertain the the reader and also to educate them a bit.
00:27:06.049 --> 00:27:13.170
The the reader who has some interest in the criminal justice process, in in trials, in landmark cases, in big time cases.
00:27:13.330 --> 00:27:26.769
I think that they could see, well, wait a minute, you know, this this guy has described what the FBI and the prosecutors go through in order to make the cases, what odds they have against them, what are the obstacles they face, and how they overcome them and how they can succeed.
00:27:26.930 --> 00:27:46.289
And I take them through the two trials, very you know, entertaining trials, but I take them through what was in my mind every step of the way, from preparation to jury selection to the examination of witnesses, my cross-examination of witnesses and summations, and and then the waiting, you know, the waiting that you go through, the stressful waiting, waiting for the jury to come in with their verdicts.
00:27:46.450 --> 00:27:49.410
So I just hope that people read it and enjoy it.
00:27:49.970 --> 00:28:14.210
The book is Chasing Good Fellas, and it's one of those rare books that is as fascinating and useful and entertaining and fun for any reader, but also for those of us who love to write stories like this because it takes you under a microscope into the deepest recesses of how the mechanics of the justice system actually work.
00:28:14.450 --> 00:28:21.170
The website is chasinggoodfellasbook.com, and the author has been our special guest this half hour, Ed McDonald.
00:28:21.330 --> 00:28:22.289
Ed, this is great.
00:28:22.370 --> 00:28:23.890
Thanks so much for doing this.
00:28:24.130 --> 00:28:25.090
All right, thanks, Terry.
00:28:25.170 --> 00:28:26.370
It was my pleasure.
00:28:26.769 --> 00:28:30.930
In Conversation with Terry Shepherd is a copyrighted presentation.
00:28:31.330 --> 00:28:32.690
All rights reserved.
00:28:32.850 --> 00:28:34.130
I'm Lisa Davis.
00:28:34.289 --> 00:28:37.570
Join Terry Shepherd next time in conversation.
00:00:35.169 --> 00:00:40.929
In conversation with Terry Shepard, award-winning broadcaster, narrator, and author.
00:00:41.089 --> 00:00:48.289
A deep dive into the writer's craft with the artists and support systems who create the stories we love.
00:00:48.609 --> 00:00:55.569
There are mob stories, and then there are the stories told by the men who actually put the mobsters in prison.
00:00:55.810 --> 00:01:07.090
During the 1980s, Edward McDonald led the Justice Department's organized crime strike force in Brooklyn, taking on some of the most powerful figures in the New York mafia.
00:01:07.329 --> 00:01:19.489
His prosecutions helped convict leaders from four of the city's five crime families, scores of mob captains and soldiers, corrupt union officials, and even members of Congress.
00:01:19.969 --> 00:01:24.849
But if Ed McDonald's face looks familiar, there's another reason.
00:01:25.090 --> 00:01:35.650
When Martin Scorsese made Goodfellas, the prosecutor who helped turn Henry Hill into a government witness didn't need an actor to play him.
00:01:35.969 --> 00:01:37.729
Ed McDonald played himself.
00:01:38.449 --> 00:01:58.209
Now, in his new memoir, Chasing Goodfellas, written with Jake Brown, McDonald takes us behind the headlines and into the investigations, courtrooms, and extraordinary personalities surrounding two legendary cases: the Lufthansa Heist and the Boston College point shaving scandal.
00:01:58.530 --> 00:02:00.769
Ed McDonald, welcome to the conversation.
00:02:01.090 --> 00:02:02.049
Well, thanks, Terry.
00:02:02.129 --> 00:02:03.810
I appreciate your inviting me.
00:02:04.049 --> 00:02:06.289
Take us through your journey to the courtroom.
00:02:06.530 --> 00:02:12.289
I saw myself as a lawyer, and when I decided what type of lore I wanted to do, I began to narrow it down.
00:02:12.449 --> 00:02:22.930
I decided I wanted to be a litigator and go to court, try cases, argue motions, write briefs, uh, rather than be a corporate lawyer and do deals and do people's wills and taxes and things of that nature.
00:02:23.090 --> 00:02:23.969
I wanted some action.
00:02:24.209 --> 00:02:28.129
And um, as I got into it, I decided that I wanted to be a prosecutor.
00:02:28.289 --> 00:02:29.969
I thought that's where the action was.
00:02:30.129 --> 00:02:32.689
And I kind of thought that you know you'd be on the right side.
00:02:32.849 --> 00:02:37.090
On the other hand, I've been in private practice as a criminal defense lawyer since 1989.
00:02:37.170 --> 00:02:41.329
So very often I'm wearing the white hatch when I'm a defense lawyer, I think.
00:02:41.969 --> 00:02:53.169
The big question that our listeners are gonna want me to ask, I'll ask right up front, and that is what was it like being on screen with Martin Scorsese directing?
00:02:53.569 --> 00:02:55.409
Well, it was certainly exciting.
00:02:55.569 --> 00:02:57.810
It was uh it was a real thrill.
00:02:57.969 --> 00:03:03.810
And the the crazy thing was that I I couldn't be in the movie if I was still working for the government.
00:03:03.969 --> 00:03:11.569
So by pure coincidence and good good fortune, the um the movie began to shoot in the summer of 1989.
00:03:11.729 --> 00:03:18.930
And I knew that I was going to be going into practice in May or June or July, sometime in that time frame after I had been in government service for 18 years.
00:03:19.090 --> 00:03:30.210
Um, so uh, I guess it was in April, uh Crusade and Nick Pellegi, who was the screenwriter, who I knew, he was a reporter for New York magazine, had written the book on which uh uh Goodfellas was based.
00:03:30.370 --> 00:03:45.409
Dick called me up and said, Marty would like a staff person to come down to your office and and take uh photographs because they want to replicate your office for the scene that uh in which Henry and his wife meet the prosecutor or discuss with the prosecutor the witness protection program and what they're ultimately going to do.
00:03:45.569 --> 00:03:46.289
So I said, sure.
00:03:46.370 --> 00:03:53.810
So this young woman came down and she was taking photographs, and she said, Could I take your diplomas and the pictures of your kids and all this?
00:03:53.969 --> 00:03:58.129
And I followed, you know, look, I'm spending all this time answering your questions, I'm giving you this stuff.
00:03:58.210 --> 00:03:59.329
Well, who's playing me?
00:03:59.490 --> 00:04:03.250
And and and it was there was talk that there was going to be some big name actors.
00:04:03.409 --> 00:04:05.409
The book, the prosecutor, had a bigger role.
00:04:05.490 --> 00:04:07.490
And uh she said, Well, they haven't cast your part yet.
00:04:07.569 --> 00:04:08.689
She said, I'll do it.
00:04:08.770 --> 00:04:09.810
And just kidding.
00:04:09.969 --> 00:04:12.930
Well, she went back to she didn't realize I was kidding, obviously.
00:04:13.009 --> 00:04:16.930
It's in because she went back to Scorsese and Pellegi, who were together that day.
00:04:17.009 --> 00:04:19.409
And Nick called me and said, Marty's here with me.
00:04:19.569 --> 00:04:25.329
He's he sees this as a uh sort of a situation where it could be cinema verite, which would be interested in having a screen test.
00:04:25.409 --> 00:04:28.529
And I says, No, you know, I just I've never acted, but never please.
00:04:28.769 --> 00:04:31.169
And he's come on, he says, You got the gift of Gab.
00:04:31.329 --> 00:04:33.490
Come on, just take the so I said, All right, all right.
00:04:33.569 --> 00:04:36.850
And I just it was sort of coerced me almost into doing it.
00:04:37.090 --> 00:04:49.730
And then, you know, I could have gotten out of it if I wanted to, but uh, you know, I I went home and discussed it with my wife, and she says, Look, you'll get to meet Martin Scorsese, you're not gonna get the role in a movie, but you know, it'll be fun, you know, it'll be just an experience.
00:04:49.889 --> 00:04:52.449
I says, you know, the you're right, all right, so I'll do it.
00:04:52.610 --> 00:05:11.170
So they sent me a script, and I went up to Warner Brothers' uh uh the offices where they were doing the uh the screen tests, and um, to make a long story short, I go into a room, Martin Scorsese is there with the casting director, and two people, two actors who were there to play a wife and a husband who were going into the witness protection program.
00:05:11.490 --> 00:05:14.129
And so they had the script, I had the script, and we started reading it.
00:05:14.209 --> 00:05:16.529
And Scorsese says, That's absolutely horrible.
00:05:16.689 --> 00:05:19.170
It didn't say absolutely horrible, he says, but that's pretty bad.
00:05:19.410 --> 00:05:23.250
Wrinkles it up, throws it in the ground, and says, Look, just be yourself.
00:05:23.410 --> 00:05:37.009
These two, you two, he points to the two of them and says, just act as if you're a wife and a and a gangster who's gonna cooperate with the government, you're going into the witness protection program, you're gonna give up your life in New York, and you're gonna be protected.
00:05:37.250 --> 00:05:43.730
And so we launched into this extemporaneous colloquy that went on for about 20 minutes or so.
00:05:43.969 --> 00:05:55.490
The woman is a professional actress, she's yelling at me and she's getting nasty with me, and I'm coming back and being nasty with her, and Scorsese would say, Well, try being you know quiet and meek and nice, and we do it that way.
00:05:55.810 --> 00:05:57.170
It was all ad lib.
00:05:57.329 --> 00:05:59.730
And after 20 minutes or so, he says, All right, this is great.
00:05:59.810 --> 00:06:00.689
You know, he says, Thank you.
00:06:00.850 --> 00:06:02.209
He says, We'll uh we'll get back to you.
00:06:02.449 --> 00:06:03.250
Perfectly charming.
00:06:03.329 --> 00:06:08.209
I mean, it was just that he was really trying to put me at ease, and he was he was really a terrif, you know, terrific guy.
00:06:08.370 --> 00:06:16.370
I really wasn't that nervous really during this process because I was more concerned about finding a job and going to the private practice.
00:06:16.610 --> 00:06:19.170
And so I got back to my office.
00:06:19.329 --> 00:06:22.930
Pellegi calls me and says, you know, Marty wants you to do it.
00:06:23.009 --> 00:06:24.050
You got the part.
00:06:24.370 --> 00:06:29.250
So about three or four weeks later, I was called and uh I had no script.
00:06:29.329 --> 00:06:31.089
Everything was going to be ad-lib for the scene.
00:06:31.410 --> 00:06:32.370
Actually, it's gonna be two scenes.
00:06:32.449 --> 00:06:36.129
It was a courtroom scene, and it was the scene in my office which preceded that.
00:06:36.290 --> 00:06:38.209
And um, I went out to Queens.
00:06:38.449 --> 00:06:41.490
There was a building that they had rented in Queens where they had a set.
00:06:41.569 --> 00:06:48.689
Um, you know, I sat down with Rayleigh Oder and Lorraine Bracco and Martin Scruszi was there and uh a whole staff of people.
00:06:48.850 --> 00:06:52.769
And that's when I started to get a little bit nervous because I said, What am I doing here?
00:06:52.930 --> 00:06:53.889
We don't even have a script.
00:06:53.969 --> 00:06:56.529
I got we don't have a script because I didn't have to memorize anything.
00:06:56.689 --> 00:07:01.009
But um, we did six takes, and each was about 20 minutes to a half an hour.
00:07:01.170 --> 00:07:04.850
And it was just a really, you know, a great experience.
00:07:04.930 --> 00:07:11.889
I mean it's something I've been you can imagine, I've been answering questions about the whole experience and what do you know what it was like to just like what your question was.
00:07:11.969 --> 00:07:13.170
I get asked that all the time.
00:07:13.329 --> 00:07:18.529
And it really was, it was yeah, it was, I think it was something that a reader would would find very entertaining.
00:07:18.610 --> 00:07:23.170
You know, the whole process of preparing for the screen test of what I encountered at the screen.
00:07:23.490 --> 00:07:26.370
When I showed up for the screen test, there must have been a hundred actors there.
00:07:26.529 --> 00:07:27.250
Not for my role.
00:07:27.410 --> 00:07:30.129
There were there was another actor there for my role who I actually knew.
00:07:30.290 --> 00:07:33.329
He was a he was a former cop, and I had some cases with him.
00:07:33.569 --> 00:07:36.529
And he called me before Polegie called me and said, You got the part.
00:07:36.610 --> 00:07:37.889
I says, Well, how do you know?
00:07:38.050 --> 00:07:42.930
He said, Because when I went in to do the screen test, Scurszy says, There's no need to do it.
00:07:43.009 --> 00:07:43.889
We got somebody.
00:07:44.050 --> 00:07:47.329
And he ended up becoming an arresting officer in one of the scenes.
00:07:47.490 --> 00:07:49.889
But in any case, it was it was a crazy experience.
00:07:49.969 --> 00:08:01.250
I'm walking in, and every waiter, gangster, gun mall, stripper, people with these small roles who were doing background stuff and it's very small parts in the movie, they were all auditioning that day.
00:08:01.329 --> 00:08:04.209
And uh, I was kind of saying, What am I doing here with these people?
00:08:04.449 --> 00:08:07.889
First of all, they look like hoods in gun malls, but they were professionals.
00:08:08.050 --> 00:08:11.329
And I um uh, yeah, I was a little unnerved.
00:08:11.410 --> 00:08:12.850
But but Marty put me at ease.
00:08:12.930 --> 00:08:27.089
Uh so I tell about that, and then I tell, you know, somewhat at length about my my experiences um on the day that I went out to shoot, and then on the sub on the following day, got to, you know, I both days I had a production assistant, or as they call it in the trade, PA.
00:08:27.170 --> 00:08:30.769
And lo and behold, my PA was Henry's daughter, Henry Hill's daughter.
00:08:30.930 --> 00:08:36.370
Henry Hill for the the listener or the viewers, the person about whom the the um uh the movie was made.
00:08:36.450 --> 00:08:38.049
He was the you know the subject of the movie.
00:08:38.129 --> 00:08:48.129
Uh so he I guess he pulled some strings and got his daughter, who was probably about 20, 21 at the time, she was my uh my production assistant, and she was supposed to take care of my whatever whatever needs.
00:08:48.210 --> 00:08:49.009
I had no needs.
00:08:49.089 --> 00:08:54.129
I wasn't gonna be presumptuous enough to start asking for things when I was on this on the set.
00:08:54.289 --> 00:09:03.089
But there's a you know, there's a lot of interesting, entertaining experiences that I had on the days when I when I shot the um even went out and found out, found I had a trailer.
00:09:03.170 --> 00:09:09.089
If you have a speaking part, you get a trailer for the day in your own room and and a cot.
00:09:09.170 --> 00:09:10.930
And uh I didn't spend much time there.
00:09:11.009 --> 00:09:16.769
I was too busy watching what was going on because I was so interested in in in what Scorsese was doing, what all the crew were doing.
00:09:16.849 --> 00:09:22.289
Uh but when I went out at the at the end of the day with the second day at the courthouse, was a uh a long, long session.
00:09:22.450 --> 00:09:25.329
I didn't finish until around uh uh 11 o'clock at night.
00:09:25.490 --> 00:09:31.569
And uh when I went out, I discovered that my change of clothes that they had asked me to bring had been stolen from my trailer.
00:09:31.730 --> 00:09:36.210
So I put a claim into Warner Brothers as I was told to do, and I never heard from them.
00:09:36.369 --> 00:09:39.329
But it was it was Ed McDonald is our special guest.
00:09:39.490 --> 00:09:41.730
The book he's written is called Chasing Goodfellas.
00:09:42.049 --> 00:09:54.529
Chasing Goodfellas Book.com is the website we hear about these crime families and these crime lords through myth, but you knew them in real life.
00:09:54.690 --> 00:09:55.650
What was the difference?
00:09:55.970 --> 00:09:57.170
Well, uh, I don't know.
00:09:57.329 --> 00:10:00.930
I I guess it depends on how they're portrayed uh on the screen.
00:10:01.009 --> 00:10:12.609
I mean, sometimes it's laughable when they have people sort of acting too tough, and then sometimes they uh like we say you have the the Don Corleone character, you know, sort of this classy man of refinement.
00:10:12.769 --> 00:10:15.170
I mean, you know, for the most part, these guys are thugs.
00:10:15.329 --> 00:10:22.690
And sometimes they put on a veneer when you know they're in public, when maybe they were in restaurants and and you know, out on the street or wherever they might be.
00:10:22.849 --> 00:10:26.289
And sometimes they have to come into contact with with business people.
00:10:26.450 --> 00:10:28.930
And again, they put on this air of refinement.
00:10:29.089 --> 00:10:31.410
But gace, these people are just gangsters.
00:10:31.490 --> 00:10:32.049
They're thugs.
00:10:32.130 --> 00:10:37.809
They they ever they resort to violence, and their power is derived from violence or the threat of violence.
00:10:37.970 --> 00:10:53.970
So there are no really no redeeming qualities that these people have, except, of course, when you for when you're fortunate enough to turn them and make them into witnesses, and they sort of join Team America, and then you find that the more significant they are, the more charming they are, and the funnier they are.
00:10:54.210 --> 00:10:58.849
People often ask me over the years, I've been asked, you know, what makes it, you know, what what what do you have to be?
00:10:59.009 --> 00:11:02.130
What do you have to do in order to get into the leadership of a family?
00:11:02.289 --> 00:11:07.170
Well, you have to be feared, you have to have you have to have used violence, be known for having used violence.
00:11:07.329 --> 00:11:13.890
But you know, most of these people spend a good deal of their day hanging around in social clubs and in restaurants.
00:11:14.130 --> 00:11:19.329
And just like in in normal life, the person who gets ahead is the person who's congenial.
00:11:19.410 --> 00:11:38.289
You know, the person who, while he is feared and while he has a reputation for using violence and being a threatening individual, the guy who's going to sit around with his cronies, with his fellow mob members and the associates of the family who can tell a good story and be self-deprecating at times, that guy tends to move up in the family.
00:11:38.450 --> 00:11:42.369
And of course, I guess the other more significant thing is is that guy an earner?
00:11:42.450 --> 00:11:43.569
You know, are they earning money?
00:11:43.730 --> 00:11:45.009
So that's what they look to.
00:11:45.250 --> 00:11:50.609
But uh for the most part, on the streets, these people don't have uh any type of refinement at all.
00:11:50.690 --> 00:12:01.890
So when you see that portrayed on the screen, it's uh it's the wise guys uh either in an inaccurate way or uh when they are sort of putting on a show for people that they're trying to impress.
00:12:02.210 --> 00:12:06.609
The Lufthansa story is one of the central pivots of Goodfellas.
00:12:07.009 --> 00:12:09.250
Take us back to that experience.
00:12:09.730 --> 00:12:15.250
Well, the odd thing is that it happened about 11 and a half months into my tenure in the strike force.
00:12:15.410 --> 00:12:19.410
Our mandate from the Justice Department, the strike forces were not part of the U.S.
00:12:19.490 --> 00:12:25.809
attorneys' offices that usually prosecute crimes or do prosecute crimes now in the districts in the United States.
00:12:25.970 --> 00:12:27.890
There are 93 districts throughout the country.
00:12:28.049 --> 00:12:29.410
Each has its own federal U.S.
00:12:29.490 --> 00:12:29.970
attorney.
00:12:30.130 --> 00:12:37.970
The strike forces were specialized prosecutors who were part of the organized crime and racketeering section, was supervised by attorneys in the organized crime section.
00:12:38.130 --> 00:12:40.769
We had our own boss and supervisor in in Brooklyn.
00:12:41.329 --> 00:12:44.529
There were 14 attorneys, and Tom Pucho was the supervisor.
00:12:44.609 --> 00:12:51.490
I was the deputy chief when I was hired in 1977 after the years in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office as a local prosecutor.
00:12:51.650 --> 00:13:07.569
But our mandate was to go after the leadership of the five families in New York, as and the other strike forces had the same mandate, and to go after labor racketeering and in those areas of the economy, in industries where organized crime had a significant impact on the economy.
00:13:07.730 --> 00:13:09.009
And so that's what we're looking at.
00:13:09.170 --> 00:13:13.730
So on uh the Sunday night in December, the uh robbery is committed.
00:13:13.809 --> 00:13:15.329
Uh actually, it's into Monday morning.
00:13:15.410 --> 00:13:16.690
It's about three o'clock in the morning.
00:13:16.769 --> 00:13:25.329
Everybody wakes up on hears on TV and on the radio and in some of the newspapers that caught it uh that the largest robbery in the history of the United States had been perpetrated.
00:13:25.490 --> 00:13:29.730
Uh, we came into work with with guys, the other people in my other prosecutors in my office.
00:13:30.450 --> 00:13:31.730
Boston, it's not for us.
00:13:31.809 --> 00:13:33.410
This is uh it's a glorified hijack.
00:13:33.809 --> 00:13:35.410
Uh uh, we'll leave this to the U.S.
00:13:35.490 --> 00:13:37.730
attorney's office or to the local DA's office.
00:13:37.890 --> 00:13:40.049
And all right, well, it is the biggest robbery in history.
00:13:40.130 --> 00:13:45.329
Well, needless to say, Justice Department sees all the publicity that's a feeding frenzy in the media.
00:13:45.410 --> 00:13:47.730
Um, Washington calls and says, Well, what's going on?
00:13:47.890 --> 00:13:50.289
Report, they said to my boss, what report on the case?
00:13:50.369 --> 00:13:51.410
He says, Well, we're not handling it.
00:13:51.490 --> 00:13:51.809
The U.S.
00:13:51.890 --> 00:13:53.170
attorney's gonna handle it.
00:13:53.410 --> 00:13:53.890
No, he's not.
00:13:53.970 --> 00:13:54.529
You got to do it.
00:13:54.609 --> 00:13:55.329
So they called the U.S.
00:13:55.410 --> 00:13:57.569
attorney and said the strike force was gonna handle it.
00:13:57.730 --> 00:14:19.730
And so I had some experience doing wiretapping in the DA's office, and when I was a federal district judge, uh judge's clerk, and but not, you know, getting getting papers together to get court orders in a matter of hours, and not monitoring the agents, you know, on a day-by-day, hour-by-hour basis to make sure they were in compliance with these really strict standards that you have for electronic surveillance.
00:14:19.970 --> 00:14:34.609
So I, but nonetheless, I was assigned to work with the FBI and with other agencies, you know, the New York City Police Department, the Port Authority, police had the they were the police officers for the airport, customs, a number of other agencies were involved, but it's mostly the FBI.
00:14:34.769 --> 00:14:36.690
And so we set out working with them.
00:14:36.849 --> 00:14:41.089
They were out in the field doing the surveillance, doing the electronic surveillance when we obtained that.
00:14:41.250 --> 00:14:46.369
We were only able to put a bug in a car of one of the individuals who actually committed the robbery.
00:14:46.609 --> 00:14:56.930
But the FBI knew within a matter of hours that the person responsible for organizing the crew was a man by the name of Jimmy Burke, Jimmy the Gent Burke, uh he was he was called.
00:14:57.089 --> 00:15:06.849
And he was sort of an infamous figure in in organized crime circles in in that part of Queens around the airport, and even in Manhattan, where he had all sorts of his tentacles uh in.
00:15:07.170 --> 00:15:11.890
He answered to a a major, major figure in the Lucchese family named Paul Vario.
00:15:12.450 --> 00:15:21.650
And uh so it was Vario's crew and Henry Hill, who was been hanging around with Vario since he was probably 10 years old, he was a part of the of the crew as well.
00:15:21.809 --> 00:15:33.170
So we were able to identify Jimmy Burke as the the person who was responsible, and we were able to get from FBI informants the uh the names of the people who had actually were um involved in committing the crime.
00:15:33.329 --> 00:15:40.210
The we also knew we also had a second, there were two FBI uh uh uh uh squads that were assigned.
00:15:40.369 --> 00:15:43.410
One of the squads was looking into who was the inside man.
00:15:43.569 --> 00:15:48.049
It was clear from the way the way the robbery was committed that there had to have been an inside man.
00:15:48.289 --> 00:15:53.410
We um uh they suspected who the inside man was, was a man by the name of Lou Werner.
00:15:53.650 --> 00:16:00.690
Turns out that he had actually stolen the plan from another Lufthansa employee, a German national, named Peter Grunewald.
00:16:00.849 --> 00:16:09.009
And Grunewald needed Werner because Werner worked at the cargo terminal and had knowledge not just of the layout of the terminal, but of the security system.
00:16:09.089 --> 00:16:11.170
And this is something that Grunewald didn't have.
00:16:11.250 --> 00:16:14.289
Well, Grunwald looked for a gang to commit the robbery.
00:16:14.450 --> 00:16:18.289
Me didn't have a clue as to how to find somebody to commit a big robbery like this.
00:16:18.450 --> 00:16:20.690
So Werner sat out on his own.
00:16:20.769 --> 00:16:26.450
And to make a long story short, he was able, through connections he had with his bookmaker, to get to Henry Hill.
00:16:26.529 --> 00:16:30.930
He didn't meet Henry Hill, but through these bookmakers, they contacted Henry Hill.
00:16:31.089 --> 00:16:33.970
Henry took it to Jimmy Burke, and Burke organized the crew.
00:16:34.130 --> 00:16:36.450
We could not penetrate Burke's crew.
00:16:36.529 --> 00:16:48.849
We couldn't think it was just a brick wall, primarily because the brick wall was filled with bodies, was killing everybody or every one of his accomplices who could put a finger on him, other than Henry Hill, who was close to him with a couple of other people.
00:16:49.089 --> 00:16:50.529
But we were making no headway.
00:16:50.609 --> 00:16:53.730
We decided to proceed against the inside man, hoping to turn him.
00:16:53.970 --> 00:16:56.849
And it was an incredible, it's actually a very interesting story.
00:16:56.930 --> 00:17:21.569
I think what I try to take the reader into is the ins and outs of criminal investigations in big cases, where there's a lot of pressure from you know, from headquarters, from Washington, from the people in, you know, from the bosses in the city, but the the Justice Department bosses in the city, the FBI bosses, and how we step by step, sort of meticulously went through hitting, you know, hit all the stops on what we should be doing in a criminal investigation.
00:17:21.650 --> 00:17:27.569
And I try to describe it in a layman's terms so that it's easy to read and enjoyable to read.
00:17:27.730 --> 00:17:32.609
And uh so we we we take it through the investigative stage on Burke, get nowhere.
00:17:32.769 --> 00:17:35.250
We take it through the investigative stage on Lou Werner.
00:17:35.329 --> 00:17:38.210
I go through step by step on how we flip witnesses.
00:17:38.369 --> 00:17:42.450
It wasn't so hard to flip the witnesses against Lou Werner because they were lay people.
00:17:42.690 --> 00:17:56.690
They were uh his fellow employee, a friend who he had been involved in a previous robbery with, who was actually having an affair with his wife, and he was trying to brag to his friend saying, Hey, you might be having an affair with my wife, but I'm the inside man on Lufthansa.
00:17:57.009 --> 00:18:05.410
I mean, you know, it's it was it was sometimes it was remarkable at how, you know, what was in people's heads, you know, the stupid things that some of the people involved in the case would do.
00:18:05.570 --> 00:18:07.890
So we turned to him and we turned to a number of other people.
00:18:08.049 --> 00:18:12.049
Um, you know, I take the reader step by step through that, and then we get into the trial.
00:18:12.130 --> 00:18:14.930
And that took place in in the spring of 1979.
00:18:15.170 --> 00:18:16.850
It's a it was a case for the ages.
00:18:16.930 --> 00:18:22.930
Uh it was really a remarkable case with colorful witnesses, colorful judge, a colorful defense lawyer.
00:18:23.090 --> 00:18:25.490
And it was about a you know, three and a half week trial.
00:18:25.570 --> 00:18:26.930
It was extremely stressful.
00:18:27.090 --> 00:18:28.289
The press was everywhere.
00:18:28.450 --> 00:18:31.170
There were crazy antics taking place during the trial.
00:18:31.490 --> 00:18:35.410
I was able to focus on Werner's girlfriend, and I put her in the grand jury.
00:18:35.490 --> 00:18:43.330
Not only was he he was still married, his wife was cheating on him, but he was he was having a relationship with a woman who turned out to be devoted to him.
00:18:43.490 --> 00:18:50.049
But uh, I was able to get her to admit in the grand jury, probably with a lot of tactics that some people might be looking askance at.
00:18:50.210 --> 00:18:56.850
But I was putting some pressure on her, and she said, Yes, he told me, he told me, and she broke down, cried, and said he admitted that he was the inside man.
00:18:57.009 --> 00:18:58.690
She re didn't want to testify.
00:18:58.769 --> 00:19:02.370
So she went through like three days of antics when she was fainting in the courtroom.
00:19:02.529 --> 00:19:04.610
She was taken out by in an ambulance.
00:19:04.769 --> 00:19:09.410
The judge was upset that she went, she left the attendants took her out in an ambulance.
00:19:09.570 --> 00:19:12.049
He ordered that she be arrested for the night in jail.
00:19:12.210 --> 00:19:15.650
I mean, it was just absolutely chaos in the courtroom.
00:19:15.730 --> 00:19:17.970
And it's a very, very entertaining story.
00:19:18.289 --> 00:19:20.289
So we convicted the inside man.
00:19:20.370 --> 00:19:26.850
He refused to cooperate because he was scared, didn't cooperate for another year and a half, and when he cooperated, his his testimony was useless.
00:19:26.930 --> 00:19:29.570
And he ended up, judge wouldn't reduce his sentence.
00:19:29.650 --> 00:19:34.289
And uh, despite my support, and uh, he served by nine years of a 15-year sentence.
00:19:34.450 --> 00:19:38.289
And so basically that was the end of it for us for a while, at least for me.
00:19:38.450 --> 00:19:39.570
I got on to other things.
00:19:39.730 --> 00:19:43.330
We had, if you might remember the ABSCAM case with the big political corruption case.
00:19:43.490 --> 00:19:46.769
Well, we had ABSCAM, so I was assigned to to work on ABSCAM.
00:19:46.930 --> 00:19:53.170
I ended up trying Harrison Williams, the senator from New Jersey, and was involved in prosecuting four congressmen here in in Brooklyn.
00:19:53.330 --> 00:19:57.809
And uh, they were from other parts of the country, one of them was from Brooklyn, but the others were from other parts of the country.
00:19:57.970 --> 00:20:03.170
And I tried the, at that time, I tried the acting boss of the Columbo family, so I really had a lot on my plates.
00:20:03.250 --> 00:20:13.490
And lo and behold, a year later, um the F uh Henry Hill was arrested by the Nassau County D uh District Attorney's Office on very, very serious narcotics charges.
00:20:13.730 --> 00:20:19.330
His wife was facing an indictment on narcotics charges as well, and we were able to use that that leverage.
00:20:19.490 --> 00:20:26.450
We more or less, we more or less stole Henry from the Nassau County EDA's office, although I never would have said that in those days.
00:20:26.529 --> 00:20:27.809
I wouldn't have phrased it that way.
00:20:27.970 --> 00:20:36.690
In hindsight, you know, I could see where they were very upset that we we took their witness for, we snatched him from them and turned him into a federal federal witness.
00:20:36.850 --> 00:20:44.210
And um, and that Henry gives us Jimmy Burke on a silver platter for Lufthansa, but it didn't do us any good because who's going to believe Henry Hill?
00:20:44.289 --> 00:20:48.210
It was a drug dealer, a career criminal, N'er duel, the drug addict himself.
00:20:48.289 --> 00:20:54.769
Uh we had no corroboration for anything Henry told us because about Burke and the and the the robbery because everybody was dead.
00:20:55.009 --> 00:20:56.529
Burke had killed everybody else.
00:20:56.690 --> 00:20:58.130
And he didn't have a chance to kill Burke.
00:20:58.289 --> 00:21:00.289
He was getting ready to kill Burke, but he didn't.
00:21:00.450 --> 00:21:02.210
We got him to we got him before he could.
00:21:02.289 --> 00:21:03.330
So what does he do?
00:21:03.410 --> 00:21:06.049
But sort of inadvertently tells us that.
00:21:06.210 --> 00:21:07.170
I said, What were you doing?
00:21:07.490 --> 00:21:08.529
What were we doing up in Boston?
00:21:08.610 --> 00:21:12.690
He said he was up in Boston in the days after the um after the robbery.
00:21:12.850 --> 00:21:15.730
He said, Oh, in them days we was fixing college basketball games.
00:21:15.890 --> 00:21:16.930
And I said, Well, where?
00:21:17.009 --> 00:21:17.970
And he says, uh BU.
00:21:18.049 --> 00:21:20.370
We had this little little All-American on BU.
00:21:20.610 --> 00:21:24.210
I said, Henry, there's no, there's no line on Boston University games.
00:21:24.370 --> 00:21:26.450
Yeah, they just didn't big enough basketball program.
00:21:26.529 --> 00:21:28.289
I said, could it have been Boston College?
00:21:28.450 --> 00:21:29.890
He goes, Yeah, yeah, you're right.
00:21:29.970 --> 00:21:31.490
Oh, it was Boston College.
00:21:31.730 --> 00:21:38.049
So I think the agents are joking because I went to Boston College and I played fresh from basketball for a while there.
00:21:38.130 --> 00:21:39.650
And so I thought it was a joke.
00:21:39.730 --> 00:21:43.090
I thought the agents were putting him up to it just to, you know, to pull my leg.
00:21:43.490 --> 00:21:45.730
Well, they looked at me like, what are you talking about?
00:21:45.809 --> 00:21:46.850
We're not wasting time here.
00:21:47.009 --> 00:21:50.450
You know, the with the Henry was being d interviewed by the marshals for the program.
00:21:50.610 --> 00:21:52.370
The FBI wanted to keep debriefing him.
00:21:52.450 --> 00:21:53.650
I wanted to be debriefing him.
00:21:53.809 --> 00:21:55.570
My assistants wanted to continue to debrief.
00:21:56.049 --> 00:21:59.009
He says, We're not wasting time, but of course I was doing, I'm telling you the truth.
00:21:59.250 --> 00:22:02.370
Well, we ended up following up the information he gave us.
00:22:02.690 --> 00:22:05.410
We were able to corroborate his his testimony.
00:22:05.570 --> 00:22:15.730
And we ended up in in uh indicting and convicting five individuals, three from Pittsburgh, where Henry was had a partner in the drug dealing business from Pittsburgh.
00:22:15.809 --> 00:22:21.090
And there were three gangsters from Pittsburgh, and Rick Hune was the BC player that we indicted and convicted.
00:22:21.170 --> 00:22:22.529
And he was from Pittsburgh.
00:22:22.610 --> 00:22:25.809
And and they felt that they needed heavyweight muscle.
00:22:25.970 --> 00:22:34.450
One of the one of the gangsters from Pittsburgh knew Henry, and he asked Henry if Henry could get some people from the Lucchese family to support them and get involved in the point shaping scheme.
00:22:34.850 --> 00:22:36.450
And that's how Henry got involved.
00:22:36.529 --> 00:22:37.730
And so everything was over.
00:22:37.809 --> 00:22:40.690
It was over the year before a year and a half early before Henry cooperated.
00:22:40.769 --> 00:22:43.890
Everybody went on their way and figured, well, if any, we're going to get any problems.
00:22:43.970 --> 00:22:45.490
We're, we're, we're in the clear now.
00:22:45.650 --> 00:22:49.250
Well, they weren't because we were able to follow up on Henry's information.
00:22:49.410 --> 00:22:52.769
And again, it's a it's a very interesting investigation.
00:22:53.009 --> 00:23:02.289
I take the reader step by step through interviewing witnesses and the manner in which the FBI went out and did it, bringing people into the grand jury, turning people.
00:23:02.450 --> 00:23:08.769
Again, we focused on the girlfriend of one of the one of the defendants, in this case, the girlfriend of the of the basketball player.
00:23:08.930 --> 00:23:11.970
She cooperated and became a very critical witness.
00:23:12.370 --> 00:23:18.610
The testimony at trial was was was really interesting and dramatic and somewhat really very sad.
00:23:18.769 --> 00:23:21.330
I mean, he she talked about how they were going to get married.
00:23:21.410 --> 00:23:26.610
And after they broke up, he put his hands around her neck and said, if you ever tell anyone about this, I'll kill you.
00:23:26.769 --> 00:23:36.210
And then I think one of the critical moments at trial was when the player's lawyer stood up to cross-examine her and he began to ask her about whether um about their relationship.
00:23:36.370 --> 00:23:44.049
Right at the outset of the testimony, the um uh the the young woman, you know, she he asked her whether to get married and said, Yes.
00:23:44.210 --> 00:23:46.210
And uh, but you didn't get married, no.
00:23:46.370 --> 00:23:49.250
But did you have abortions when you were having a relationship with him?
00:23:49.410 --> 00:23:51.570
And I didn't know that that would what the answer would be.
00:23:51.650 --> 00:23:53.490
And she said, uh, no.
00:23:53.970 --> 00:23:55.330
I'm sorry, she said yes, she had.
00:23:55.410 --> 00:23:57.890
She had two abortions, and uh he asked her why.
00:23:57.970 --> 00:23:59.809
And she's looking at me and she's crying.
00:23:59.890 --> 00:24:04.049
And I'm and I'm watching the jury as this guy's yelling at this all-American girl.
00:24:04.210 --> 00:24:06.370
You know, she was just like the perfect co-ed.
00:24:06.850 --> 00:24:09.330
And she was a nurse, and she just graduated from BC.
00:24:09.410 --> 00:24:13.970
And uh, she's crying, and I hear one of the jurors say to the lawyer, You shit.
00:24:14.049 --> 00:24:17.490
So I said, Well, I'm not gonna object, I'm just gonna let this guy sink himself.
00:24:17.730 --> 00:24:22.289
And so she says, Well, the reasons I didn't have the baby was because he gave me gonorrhea.
00:24:22.529 --> 00:24:30.049
Well, at that point, I stood off and objected, and it was like, Oh my, it was just, but there were so many crazy, crazy scenes.
00:24:30.370 --> 00:24:32.130
It's called Chasing Goodfellas.
00:24:32.370 --> 00:24:37.730
It's being released October 13th, and you know, I think it's uh it's an entertaining read.
00:24:37.890 --> 00:24:46.850
What the next part, the next two chapters or the next two parts of the book, I guess it's in about three or four chapters, it's about my relationship, my life with with Henry Hill.
00:24:46.930 --> 00:24:48.370
He just is crazy character.
00:24:48.529 --> 00:25:00.850
He I talk about the other cases in which he cooperated, I mean, somewhat briefly, um, and all of the hijinks in which he engaged and how he kept getting arrested throughout the country, what he was in the program, he kept getting kicked out of the program.
00:25:01.170 --> 00:25:03.730
I'm running to Washington to get him put back in.
00:25:03.809 --> 00:25:12.370
And then he gets he gets convicted on heavyweight narcotics trafficking in the Pacific Northwest in Seattle, and I come to his rescue again.
00:25:12.529 --> 00:25:13.730
He gets probation.
00:25:13.970 --> 00:25:15.009
And I stayed.
00:25:15.170 --> 00:25:19.570
I I don't I I'm not gonna say he was a friend, but he was somebody who I was really fond of.
00:25:19.730 --> 00:25:26.769
And I go into at length, I describe you know the nature of our relationship, and I got a big eye kick out of him, but he drove me completely crazy.
00:25:26.930 --> 00:25:28.769
And I thought he was a disreputable character.
00:25:28.850 --> 00:25:36.769
I mean, in some ways he was utterly despicable, but he was totally disarming and uh self-deprecating, had a great self-deprecating sense of humor.
00:25:36.930 --> 00:25:42.610
You know, I laugh, you know, now people were saying, oh, the guy was a must, you know, he was at the nobody on the street, but everybody liked him.
00:25:42.769 --> 00:25:48.130
Paul Vario liked him, Jimmy the Gent the Burke liked him, some of the most notorious gangsters in New York.
00:25:48.289 --> 00:25:50.690
He was a confidant of these guys because they liked him.
00:25:50.850 --> 00:25:54.769
They wouldn't trust him with doing anything important, but they always had him around.
00:25:54.850 --> 00:26:01.650
He brought these things to them because people liked him and they knew he had entree with these with these major league gangsters.
00:26:01.809 --> 00:26:04.769
So that's how he had information about these types of crimes.
00:26:04.930 --> 00:26:11.410
So and then that brings us to the last part of the book, which was the uh was the making of the movie of Goodfellas.
00:26:11.570 --> 00:26:19.009
And again, that was we started at the outset of the of the interview talking about that, and that's how I end the book with talking about how I was in in Goodfellas.
00:26:19.090 --> 00:26:23.170
And actually, I have a brief discussion of three other films that I was in.
00:26:23.410 --> 00:26:30.370
None of them are memorable, but there were certainly interesting experiences to go through the whole process with different directors and different actors.
00:26:30.690 --> 00:26:35.090
What do you hope that people will take away from reading Chasing Goodfellas?
00:26:35.809 --> 00:26:36.850
There's no message.
00:26:37.009 --> 00:26:39.170
I'm not trying to send a message to anyone.
00:26:39.330 --> 00:26:41.009
I'm trying to tell a story.
00:26:41.170 --> 00:26:43.890
I think, you know, I'm people have told me I'm just a natural-born storyteller.
00:26:44.130 --> 00:26:46.049
Maybe other people say you're just a win bag.
00:26:46.370 --> 00:26:49.890
But I I try to tell basically four entertaining stories.
00:27:01.250 --> 00:27:05.890
And I just hope to entertain the the reader and also to educate them a bit.
00:27:06.049 --> 00:27:13.170
The the reader who has some interest in the criminal justice process, in in trials, in landmark cases, in big time cases.
00:27:13.330 --> 00:27:26.769
I think that they could see, well, wait a minute, you know, this this guy has described what the FBI and the prosecutors go through in order to make the cases, what odds they have against them, what are the obstacles they face, and how they overcome them and how they can succeed.
00:27:26.930 --> 00:27:46.289
And I take them through the two trials, very you know, entertaining trials, but I take them through what was in my mind every step of the way, from preparation to jury selection to the examination of witnesses, my cross-examination of witnesses and summations, and and then the waiting, you know, the waiting that you go through, the stressful waiting, waiting for the jury to come in with their verdicts.
00:27:46.450 --> 00:27:49.410
So I just hope that people read it and enjoy it.
00:27:49.970 --> 00:28:14.210
The book is Chasing Good Fellas, and it's one of those rare books that is as fascinating and useful and entertaining and fun for any reader, but also for those of us who love to write stories like this because it takes you under a microscope into the deepest recesses of how the mechanics of the justice system actually work.
00:28:14.450 --> 00:28:21.170
The website is chasinggoodfellasbook.com, and the author has been our special guest this half hour, Ed McDonald.
00:28:21.330 --> 00:28:22.289
Ed, this is great.
00:28:22.370 --> 00:28:23.890
Thanks so much for doing this.
00:28:24.130 --> 00:28:25.090
All right, thanks, Terry.
00:28:25.170 --> 00:28:26.370
It was my pleasure.
00:28:26.769 --> 00:28:30.930
In Conversation with Terry Shepherd is a copyrighted presentation.
00:28:31.330 --> 00:28:32.690
All rights reserved.
00:28:32.850 --> 00:28:34.130
I'm Lisa Davis.
00:28:34.289 --> 00:28:37.570
Join Terry Shepherd next time in conversation.
