From: pez@manhattan.com (Gizmo) Subject: The Adventures Of Smacks Past (Part 20) Drug Deals, Views Of The Hudson & "The Son Of Sam" Date: 1996/10/01 newsgroups: alt.drugs.hard THE ADVENTURES OF SMACKS PAST (PART 20) DRUG DEALS, VIEWS OF THE HUDSON & "THE SON OF SAM" As I related in adventure nineteen, after my house burned down it was time to regroup. What to do? At least I wasn't strung out at the time. But I did have this growing pot business and I was determined to continue doing business, since I just lost virtually all my possessions in the fire. And no, I did not have any homeowners insurance. I moved into a friends house and tried to recover from the disaster of a failed relationship, a burned out house, the loss of my possessions. All I had going for me really was that I was not hooked on hard drugs and this marijuana business that I'd developed over the past two years. Was this a prescription for success? Hrmmph. Anyway it wasn't long before I got my head together and continued to ply my trade as a local pot distributor. Business was good. 1973 and 1974 saw me making ever increasing amounts of $$$. And not blowing it on Heroin or Cocaine, I saved a bunch. It wasn't long before the obligatory new car and pad were to be had. I bought a condo in Yonkers and moved in sometime in early 1974. This was a great pad overlooking the Hudson River. Big rooms, vaulted ceilings, plush carpeting, terrace, health spa etc. I was starting to feel like I had "arrived." I started filling my head with dreams of becoming a really big pot dealer. Hell, the connection I was getting the stuff from had graduated from one ounce deals some years earlier to pushing a hundred or more kilos at a time! I figured if they could do it, I could also. Plus everything was on consignment! An added plus. Oh yea, a little aside that I should cover in a separate story but probably won't. The building I moved into, was the very same building that David Berkowitz was living in at the time. David Berkowitz, some of you may recall was the infamous "44 Caliber Killer" that terrorized the New York area during 1974, 75 & 76. "Son Of Sam" as he tagged himself in his communiqués with the New York police departments, was shooting woman at point blank range with a 44 caliber pistol. He chose the name "Son Of Sam" because he claimed to be getting orders from a dog that was owned by a man named Sam Carr who lived just around the corner from us on Glenwood Avenue. All total I think he killed over 12 people and wounded a few others during those years. New York was living in fear while this maniac was on the loose. These were "psychosexually dysfunctional" murders. He went after woman with long black hair that he found with their boyfriends in parked cars, in Queens, The Bronx and Brooklyn. Mind you, he was doing all this while I was living exactly three floors below him in the same apartment line as mine! I even remember seeing him in the lobby a couple of times, usually late at night, staring off into space. Who would have known? This postal employee looked like a very benign fellow. Who would have known? I didn't. I was wheeling and dealing. Rolling in $$$ and enjoying it quite a bit. Then in the middle of 1974 I offered a "friend of mine," the chance to go into a limited partnership with me. He needed a place to stay, so I let him move in with me. He was an old dope fiend buddy of mine that was "trying to stay clean," was down on his luck, and I thought, "what the fuck," let me see if I can help. This was a mistake. Not only was he not staying off dope, but we started to rub each other the wrong way. Sure I was helping him make money, but all he did was get more and more greedy and abusive. Plus he was using more and more dope. It wasn't long before I gave into the temptation. After my fucking connection turned me on to some pure dope from Thailand one night, I was all in once again. Me and my roommate started coping together. In a few weeks I had a habit. I tried to keep it under control, with the business and all, but it was gradually wearing me down. Plus with all the marijuana I was carrying and stashing I started to get paranoid. Finally by the summer of 1975 I was a mess again. Strung out, couldn't stop, dealing pot, paranoid like a mother fucker. Plus me and my drug dealing partner/friend/roomate had a knock down brawl in the my living room one night. We almost killed one another. I threw him the fuck out, but I was worried. I was worrying all the time now. I was just sensing something was not quite right in dope land. A week after this big fight, I was driving North on the Hutchinson River Parkway to deliver a couple of pounds of grass and this car pulls up along side of me and honks it's horn. I thought it might have been a couple of babes wanting to wave to me in my convertible but it was two guys! And the passenger lifted a camera, took a picture of me and sped off! That should have been the tip off. Why would a guy want my picture? I knew it had to be "the man." But I was too sucked into my current lifestyle to stop now. I told myself I would be more cautious from now on. Right. Well, the hammer fell about two months later. By this time I was starting to sell some Cocaine along with the grass. Plus I had an apartment full of all kinds of dope. Heroin, Coke, Pot, Methadone, you name it. One night in late October, I was waiting for some customers to come and buy some grass and coke. About 7 PM the doorbell rang. I turned on channel six for the lobby intercom and saw that both sets of customers had arrived at the same time. Two guys were here to by pot and the other two were there to by the half ounce of coke I was holding for them. Convinced they were alone and all right, I buzzed them in. When they got to the door, I opened it to let them in. "Hey, how you doing. C'mon in." I motioned them into my home. One, two, three, four, five!! Wait a minute. I thought I saw four people in the lobby! But I figured it was okay. Once everyone was in, the fifth guy, pulls out a gun and tells everyone to freeze. Fear took over completely now. A voice went through my head that said, "Holy shit. I'm being robbed." I quickly thought, "Fuck, we could all get killed if this is a rip off." I starting praying that it was a cop! And sure as I thought it, this undercover narc pulls out a badge and says, "Okay, you've seen it in the movies, now everyone get the fuck down on the floor. Now." In a few minutes we're all handcuffed and my apartment is crawling with about 20 police officers. They're tearing the place apart. They find the coke, the pot, everything. One of them comes over to me and says, "Gizmo, we're going to put you so fucking far away, they're going to have to mail you sunshine in an envelope." I never forgot these words. I came to find out that I was being faced with a possible 25 year sentence! This was like dying. You're whole life flashes before your eyes. You realize that your life, as you knew it, may be over. On the way down to the station house, I made the ultimate mistake of incriminating myself about my dealings! Doom & Gloom were on the horizon. Doom, to the tune of four felony's and a class A misdemeanor. Gloom, to the tune of no more drug dealing business, plus a heroin habit, plus the prospect of a long jail sentence... New York was under the grip of the worst drug laws in years. These were the dreaded "Rockefeller Laws," that were approved in 1972 or so. These laws were so draconian, that possession of even a joint could get you jail time, or being sent to the "Rockefeller Rehab program." Plus, the new laws did not allow for any plea bargaining. I got out on a low bail because I "agreed" to "work with the authorities." I had no intention of cooperating with the police, but it was the only way to get out of jail the next day. I also found out at the booking that someone dimmed on me. Could it have been my roommate? I never found out. Later that week, I was introduced to a top criminal mob lawyer who literally looked like Kojac. He had the shaved head and was a dead ringer for Telly Sevalas. After reviewing my case he told me that he would have a better chance of getting me off, if I had committed murder! That's how solid the states case was. I found out they had my phone legally tapped for the past month. They had photos of me through the window of my apartment. It turned out that they had rented a condo diagonally adjacent to me so they could take pictures through my window! Plus they had some of my own testimony on the way down to the precinct. Checkmate! Well, not exactly. CODA My lawyer made a series of motions to postpone the trial date into the future. In the meantime I got back on methadone, got clean again, and led a sort of straight albeit semi boring life the next two years. The cops who I "agreered" to work with continued to ask me to rat out people I knew in the drug trade. They were willing to give me "flash cash," drugs, whatever I wanted, as long as I helped them get some arrests. They insisted that under the existing laws, it was the only way to get probabtion. I continued to string them along. There was no fucking way I was going to work with these guys. I knew enough to know that once you start doing that, then it's never enough and they own your ass forever. So I very skillfully continued to string them along. I met with them once or twice and told them I just didn't know anyone who was big enough for their purposes! They even tried to get me to make buys from folks I didn't know. I found one excuse after another to get out of it. In the meantime almost two years passed. Toward the end of this time, the government decided to get rid of the hated Rockerfeller Laws and go back to the older, slightly more humane statutes. This was the break my attorney was looking for. Proving to the DA. that I had given up the old life, and that I was "doing well," married etc., we got the break we were waiting for. After shadow boxing with the DA. all night, my lawyer finally told me that I was going to cop a plea under one of the felony charges and get 5 years probabtion with 1 day spent in the County Jail! I couldn't believe it. For a long time, my lawyer told me that I should be expecting more like one to life, with a possible stretch of about 18 months with lifetime parole!!! I walked into the courtroom that day, after taking 90 mgs. of methadone, thinking I mind as well be stoned for the one day in jail. The case was put off to the next day, as they had a big murder trial going that day. The next day I went before the judge. After chewing me out and telling me that if he ever saw me in his courtroom again in the next ten years, I was going down, he gave me the agreed upon sentence. This case, and trying to live the straight life eat up all my money. I was broke by the time it was over. But it was worth it. The real bonus though, came later. Years later, when I had reason to check my rap sheet, mysteriously or so it seemed, all records of that bust "disappeared." Was it an accident? Was it the skill of this very adept criminal mob lawyer? I'll never know. I just know that now it makes a great story. Hope you enjoyed it. Copyright 1996 Gizmo P.S. "Son Of Sam" was busted a about a year after my bust. I wasn't living there at the time, but it was that he was just three floors above me while all this stuff was going on. Coincidences? How's this for another one. My wife knew one of the first woman that David Berkowitz shot. They were close friends in high school and they knew each other for about three years.