The Iceman Page 18

  Late one night Kuklinski was by himself in the basement of the film labs, waiting for the elevator. He’d been running the loop machine all night, making copies, and he was dead tired. All he wanted was to get home and go to bed. But when the elevator arrived, he was surprised to see three men inside. They walked out with their hands in their pockets, forming a circle around him. He had no idea who these men were, but they knew him. They hustled him into a bathroom and locked the door.

  The biggest of the three stood right in his face. “So where the fuck is the money, Polack? Huh? C’mon, get it up.”

  “Who the f—”

  The man on his right side, the one with the dark, evil eyes, kicked Kuklinski’s knee out, and he fell to the cement floor. Then he was hit with something hard across the back of his head. Kuklinski linked his fingers behind his head and covered up. His ears were ringing.

  “It must be true what they say about you Polacks,” the big guy said. “Too fucking stupid to know what’s good for them. Now I’m gonna ask you again: Where’s the money, Polack?”

  Kuklinski kept blinking, but his eyes wouldn’t focus. “I—I don’t—”

  “No more fucking around, Polack. Get the money. Now.”

  The third guy booted him in the side and broke a rib. Kuklinski sucked in his breath and held it to stem the pain, but it didn’t help much.

  “So what’s it gonna be, Polack? You gonna pay or what?”

  “I—”

  Evil Eyes kicked him in the kidneys. Kuklinski threw his head back and squeezed his eyes shut.

  “No more fucking excuses, Polack. We want the fucking money.”

  Kuklinski could hardly breathe. “This week,” he grunted. “I’ll get it.”

  “When?”

  “Friday … I’ll pay up on Friday.”

  “How much?”

  Kuklinski couldn’t catch his breath. He couldn’t get enough air. “What I owe … up-to-date … everything.”

  “What the hell’s wrong with you, you dumb fuck? You think this is forgive and forget? No fucking way. The whole note. You pay the whole fucking note by Friday or you’re dead. You hear me, Polack?”

  Kuklinski’s vision cleared a little. He saw three guns pointed down at him. He started to nod. “All right … by Friday … the whole thing.” Anything to get rid of them.

  “Okay, by Friday. Now you’re not gonna forget again, are you?”

  Kuklinski winced and shook his head.

  “Yeah, well, I’d like to believe you, but you Polacks aren’t too smart. You people forget things. I’m gonna give you something so you don’t forget. Okay?” The big man raised his gun hand and bashed Kuklinski over the forehead with his pistol.

  Kuklinski fell back on his haunches and clutched his head. Blood streamed into his eyes. The three men had a good laugh as they filed out of the bathroom. The big man called back to him from the doorway, “Now don’t you forget, Polack.”

  Kuklinski later found out that the big man was Roy DeMeo. The other two were goons from DeMeo’s crew. That was Richard Kuklinski’s first encounter with the man who eventually became his rabbi in crime.

  Kuklinski came up with the money, and he let his anger simmer quietly inside him. But he soon found that dealing with the mob would be an occupational hazard he’d just have to live with if he intended to stay in the porno business, and as time passed, he came to learn how the Mafia operated. The beating DeMeo had given him was business, nothing personal, and since he’d come up with the money on time, all was forgiven. So much so that Kuklinski ended up becoming partners with the man who gave him the deep scar in his forehead, which he vowed to himself he would never forgive or forget.

  By the mid-seventies Kuklinski and DeMeo had an office at 225 Lafayette Street in lower Manhattan, just around the corner from the film labs. By then DeMeo had become a major player in the pornography business, operating a network of bookstores and sex clubs around the country, including the infamous Plato’s Retreat II in Brick Township, New Jersey. Kuklinski supervised a small staff of people who viewed, selected, and mass-produced porno films, while DeMeo took care of distribution through his bookstores.

  During this period DeMeo came to appreciate the “Polack’s” other abilities. Kuklinski was intimidating in size and demeanor, and he wasn’t afraid to do whatever was necessary, be it with his fists or with a gun. Eventually DeMeo started subcontracting “little jobs” to Kuklinski, collecting from deadbeat loan shark customers who had fallen behind in their payments. But there was one problem: Kuklinski’s temper. Kuklinski, who had already killed out of anger several times by this point in his life, had a hard time walking the line between physical intimidation and mortal violence, and a dead deadbeat isn’t any good to anyone.

  “Polack,” DeMeo said to him one day, “you just don’t have the temperament for this kind of work. A leg breaker needs to have a little restraint. But don’t worry about it. I got some jobs you’d be perfect for.” So under DeMeo’s tutelage Richard Kuklinski learned how to kill for profit and became a hit man for the mob.

  Their association was a very profitable one. At the time the minimum price for a professional hit was forty thousand dollars, but it didn’t take long before Kuklinski’s reputation brought his price up to twice that figure. Still, despite their success together, Kuklinski was never totally at ease around DeMeo. By the early eighties the mobster’s mood swings had become more sudden and irrational. DeMeo wanted to be respected as a traditional “man of honor,” but in fact, he was a loose cannon, and his erratic ways kept him from rising in the Gambino hierarchy. He was tolerated only because he brought in a lot of money for the family. But the crew he had assembled was not the typical band of proven earners. Instead he had put together a pack of obedient Doberman pinschers for himself. When Roy DeMeo said, “Kill,” they killed. No hesitation. And though Richard Kuklinski did a lot of “jobs” for DeMeo and earned a lot of money for the mobster, he was not an official member of DeMeo’s crew. To DeMeo he would always be “the Polack,” which meant an outsider.

  One night in Dracula’s apartment behind the Gemini Lounge, Kuklinski was having coffee with DeMeo and a few of his crew members, discussing Corvettes. DeMeo wanted Kuklinski to get as many as he could. There was a big demand for them in the Middle East, where he’d been shipping stolen luxury cars and selling them for a nice profit. Kuklinski said he had a few guys in north Jersey who could steal brand-new Corvettes right off the lot. Kuklinski was in the middle of assuring DeMeo that he could get him whatever car he wanted when he suddenly realized that everybody had moved to the other side of the room behind Roy, and they were all smiling these weird little smiles. DeMeo was holding an Uzi machine pistol fitted with a silencer. It was leveled at Kuklinski.

  “Hey, Polack, how would you like me to pull the trigger?”

  Kuklinski had no idea what he’d done to deserve this, but by this time in his life he’d been in DeMeo’s position many times. He knew the rush you felt holding a gun on someone, the adrenaline high of total control over another human being. Sitting there in Dracula’s House of Horrors, where they cut and packaged people like Italian sausage, Kuklinski did the only thing he thought he could do: take the joy out of it for Roy.

  He looked DeMeo straight in the eye. “It’s up to you, Roy. I have no control over the situation. Do what you want.” He made it sound as if he didn’t care one way or the other.

  DeMeo’s grin collapsed. He sneered and glared, then lowered the Uzi and tossed it on the table. He forced a laugh and looked around the room at all his men. “The Polack’s got some pair of balls on him,” he announced.

  The crew laughed with their leader and made like it was all a big joke.

  But Richard Kuklinski knew better. He’d ruined it for Roy. He’d stolen the moment. There was no thrill in killing someone who didn’t care.

  Dracula poured more coffee, and the men returned to their seats. DeMeo shook his finger at Kuklinski and warned him with a twisted grin: “One of th
ese days, Polack, one of these days. Either I’m gonna kill you or you’re gonna kill me. Believe it.”

  Kuklinski shrugged as he spooned sugar into his coffee. “Whatever you say, Roy.”

  On January 10, 1983, Roy DeMeo missed an appointment with his uncle. He also missed a birthday party for one of his children that evening, which worried his family. It wasn’t like Roy to miss a family event like that. A week and a half later his maroon Cadillac was discovered in the parking lot of a boat club in Brooklyn. When the police opened the trunk—four weeks after Gary Smith’s bloated body was found under the bed at the York Motel in New Jersey—they found Roy DeMeo’s body, frozen stiff from the winter cold. He’d been shot five times, encrusted wounds behind both ears. A chandelier was draped over his body. Law enforcement authorities are still trying to decipher the possible symbolism of this gesture.

  Years later Richard Kuklinski indicated that he killed Roy DeMeo, but he refused to comment on the significance of the chandelier. When asked whether or not he felt the rush of total control as he pulled the trigger, he remained silent.

  TWENTY ONE

  FRIDAY, OCTOBER 31, 1986—10:10 A.M.

  “So where the hell is he, Dom?” Investigator Paul Smith was sitting on a picnic table on the brown grass by the telephone booths at the Vince Lombardi Service Area, smiling and nodding as if he were saying something else. He could see his breath it was so chilly.

  Dominick Polifrone was sitting next to him, smiling and gesturing. “How the fuck do I know? Just keep smiling.”

  Dominick scanned the parking lot without making it obvious. It was a raw, cloudy day, and motorists were rushing from their cars to get in out of the cold. He’d talked to Kuklinski yesterday and told him that he was going to be meeting the “rich Jewish kid” here at ten o’clock. He said he was going to be giving the kid a sample of the cocaine he wanted to buy. Dominick had suggested to Kuklinski that he come by to “eyeball” the kid so he’d know who he was supposed to kill when the time came. Kuklinski had agreed to come and take a look. He’d said he’d meet Dom after the kid left, inside by the men’s room.

  “I’m freezing my ass off out here, Dom.” Paul Smith was still smiling. “He’d better fucking show up. I did a lot of research getting ready for this.”

  Dominick’s eyes narrowed. “What research?”

  “I asked Ronnie Donahue how I should play the rich kid, how I should act to be believable.”

  “Oh, yeah? What’d he say?”

  “He told me to act like a mutt.”

  “Oh … you mean he told you to ‘act natural.’ ”

  Smith pursed his lips and glared at Dominick. “That’s exactly what he said. How’d you know that?”

  “He told me.”

  They started laughing for real. Neither of them looked directly at the green sedan parked thirty feet away where Investigator Ron Donahue was sitting behind the wheel, pretending to be reading a newspaper. Donahue had an earplug in his ear that kept him in contact with the three other backups planted around the service area. A large wax paper soft drink cup sat on the dashboard in front of him. As soon as he heard that Kuklinski was spotted, he’d move the cup off the dashboard so Dominick and Paul would know the big guy was on his way.

  “Don’t make me laugh, Smith. I’m not supposed to like you that much.”

  “Why not? I’m the rich Jewish kid. I’m your best customer. I’m gonna buy two goddamn keys off you. I might even buy three. But I gotta tell you, Dom, your price isn’t that great. So don’t get wise.”

  Dominick gave him an evil look. “Smith, I should’ve killed you when I had the chance.”

  Paul Smith had to pinch his nose to keep from bursting out loud.

  “Hey, Dom, don’t you think it looks a little strange that two guys are hanging around out here in the cold, laughing like a couple of nuts? Maybe we’d better just do it in case Richie is out there somewhere in a different car looking at us.”

  Dominick scanned the lot. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.” He reached into the pocket of his leather jacket and pulled out an envelope. Inside was a plastic Baggie containing an ounce of powdered sugar, the rich kid’s “coke” sample. He handed it to Paul Smith.

  Smith peeked into the envelope and put it in his pocket. “Oh, thank you, sir, thank you.”

  “You know, Paul, I wouldn’t be surprised if Richie sent someone else to come take a look.”

  Smith rolled his eyes. “Get outta here.”

  “No, think about it. I wouldn’t put it past the son of a bitch.”

  “Get out. Who would he send?”

  “Maybe his buddy Tim, the guy from south Jersey.”

  “Why would he do that? If he brought somebody else into this, he’d have to give him a piece of the pie.”

  “Hey, I’m not a psychiatrist. I don’t know how his mind works. All I know is that any mutt who’d kill with fucking cyanide is liable to do anything.”

  “Hmm … maybe.” Paul Smith wasn’t smiling anymore.

  Dominick glanced over at Ron Donahue’s car. The cup was still on the dashboard.

  “Do you really think he’d send Tim?” Smith asked.

  Dominick shrugged. “Why not? We don’t know what he looks like. He’d be perfect. He could be out there right now taking pictures of us.”

  “Pictures! Shit, I never thought of that. What if Richie gets a picture of me? He could follow me to the mall or something. He could follow me home! What if he decides to do you a favor and kill me on his own?”

  “Calm down, Smith. Richie doesn’t give it away. He’ll wait for the big score.”

  “Yeah … I guess.” Paul Smith didn’t sound convinced.

  The soft drink cup hadn’t moved.

  “You know, Dom, I hate to say this, but I think Richie’s getting hinky.”

  “No, he’s not.”

  “Dom, he told you he’d be here just to take a look. I don’t think he’d send someone else. There’s no risk in just looking. He should be here. He’s definitely getting hinky, Dom. He is.”

  Dominick didn’t answer. The same thing had crossed his mind, but he didn’t want to believe it. He’d seen bad guys suddenly get suspicious and start acting strange before. It was pretty common actually. But that wasn’t the case with Kuklinski. He knew it; he could feel it with this guy. Kuklinski was cautious, very cautious, but he wasn’t hinky. At least not yet.

  “We’d better wrap this up in case he is looking,” Dominick finally said. “No sense hanging around.”

  “Right.”

  Dominick flashed his million-dollar smile and extended his hand to the “rich kid.” “Well, my friend, it’s been nice. I hope to be doing business with you soon. Next time I’ll bring my big friend with the nasal spray. He’ll give you a nice little nose job.”

  “Wonderful, wonderful. I can’t wait.” Paul shook Dominick’s hand and flashed his wise-ass grin. He started to turn away. “I’ll catch you back in Fairfield, Dom.”

  “Yup.”

  “Bye-bye now.”

  “So long.”

  They split up and walked back to their cars. As Dominick moved past Ron Donahue’s green sedan, he saw the paper cup on the dashboard. He hammered his fist against the driver’s door out of frustration as he passed.

  Ron Donahue didn’t flinch. He just turned the page of his newspaper.

  TWENTY TWO

  EARLY NOVEMBER 1986

  At the Organized Crime and Racketeering Bureau offices in Fairfield, the members of the Operation Iceman task force kept a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black. A photograph of Richard Kuklinski’s face had been taped over the label. When meetings ran late and tempers got short, they’d bring out the bottle and everyone would have a shot to soothe the tension. Tonight the bottle was running low.

  Deputy Attorney General Bob Carroll leaned back in his chair and linked his fingers behind his head. “So. What do we do now?”

  Dominick Polifrone rubbed his eyes. They’d been asking variations of the same que
stion all night, and it didn’t seem like anyone liked his answer because they kept going over and over the same territory. Dominick hadn’t heard from Kuklinski since the day before he had given the “rich Jewish kid” the “coke” sample at the Lombardi Service Area two weeks ago. His beeper had gotten so quiet he’d actually checked the batteries, thinking maybe they were dead. But that wasn’t the problem. Kuklinski just wasn’t calling. He seemed to have lost interest in “Dominick Provenzano” and dropped him like a hot potato.

  Sitting around the conference-room table, Bob Carroll, Paul Smith, Ron Donahue, and Deputy Chief Bobby Buccino had been casting around all night for new ways to get Kuklinski back on track, but Dominick thought they were starting to panic. They apparently didn’t think much of his advice: Just leave the guy alone for now. If the guy really was hinky, he reasoned, then they’ve lost him, and Michael Dominick Provenzano didn’t stand a chance anymore. But if Kuklinski wasn’t suspicious, then he was just doing his usual thing, disappearing for a while to make his mark a little crazy. That’s what Dominick thought was going on.

  Deputy Chief Buccino stared down into his plastic cup. “I understand why you didn’t want to call him before, Dominick. You had to establish your control over the relationship. But why don’t you want to call him now? What’ve you got to lose?”

  Dominick sighed. He was too tired to get mad. “Look, Pat Kane of the state police compiled six years’ worth of information on Kuklinski. Whatta we do, just forget about all that? This is how Kuklinski operates. He gets you interested in a deal, then he pulls back and disappears to make you so hungry you’ll do anything to get what you want. We know this. I’m telling you. This is nothing unusual for him.”

  Paul Smith leaned forward on the table. “But, Dominick, look at it from Richie’s point of view. He hasn’t made any money off you. Eleven hundred on the hit kit—big deal. You’ve been talking about this big arms deal with him, about the five to ten hit kits you need for the mob guys, about ripping off the rich kid, but so far he’s seen zilch. Maybe he’s saying to himself, ‘This Dominick guy is bullshit. He talks a good game, but it’s always wait and see with him. To hell with him.’ Maybe it’s time to throw him a bone, call him up and set up something definite.”