Infamous America - PIERRE HOTEL HEIST Ep. 3 | “The Robbery, Part 1”

Episode Date: February 1, 2023

 At 3:45 a.m. on January 2, 1972, eight men begin their plan to rob the Pierre Hotel, one of the most expensive hotels in New York. Before they even arrive, they experience their first nerve-racking problem. It will be a sign of things to come, but they press on despite the close call. While most of the guests and resident are asleep, the robbers will gain control of the hotel and begin their work in the vault. Check out Infamous America Executive Producer, Mandi Wimmer as the guest historian/expert commentator on the History Channel's "Greatest Heists" Ep. 2, The Pierre Hotel Robbery, hosted by Pierce Brosnan. See Chris Wimmer, Host of Infamous America, on "Greatest Heists Ep 7, The Dunbar Armored Depot Heist. Join Black Barrel+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons: blackbarrel.supportingcast.fm/join Apple users join Noiser+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Click the Noiser+ banner on Apple or go to noiser.com/subscriptions to get started with a 7-day free trial. On YouTube, subscribe to INFAMOUS+ for ad-free episodes and bingeable seasons. Hit “JOIN” on the Infamous America YouTube homepage.  https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCm4V_wVD7N1gEB045t7-V0w/featured For more details, please visit www.blackbarrelmedia.com. Our social media pages are: @blackbarrelmedia on Facebook and Instagram, and @bbarrelmedia on Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

New York City in the early 1970s was a dangerous place. There was a battle on two fronts. Let's call them the street level and the rarefied air. On the street level, Times Square was not the tourist attraction it is today. In the 70s, it was a cesspool of crime and vice, teeming with drugs and prostitution. Alphabet City, on the Lower East Side, was a drug haven. If you walked into that neighborhood at night, you could be risking your life, or at the very least your wallet.

The South Bronx was known as Fort Apache. The real Fort Apache was an army outpost in Arizona that became famous when it fell under siege from Apache Warriors in 1881. 90 years later, someone in the South Bronx must have known their history and thought the area looked like a war zone and the citizens and police were under siege. And parts of Brooklyn weren't much better. All of that and more was the street level. And then up in the rarified air, there were the high-end hotel robberies,

especially during a two-year period from 1970 to 1972. Thieves were breaking into the vaults and safe deposit boxes of the most exclusive and expensive hotels and stealing millions in cash and jewels. And sometimes, the robbers targeted specific people, like Hollywood stars Sophia Loren and Zha Jaja Gabor. So the New York Police Department was being run racked. They were battling street-level crime across the city's five boroughs, and they were running in circles trying to catch the thieves who were robbing the city's elite. At the insistence of the mayor's office and other elected officials, the NYPD had formed a task force to handle the hotel robberies, but they still didn't know the scope of the problem.

They didn't know if the robberies were the work of a bunch of separate criminals or one highly prolific gang. When it was all over, the NYPD would look back and make the educated guess that most, if not all, the robberies were the work of one group. At the core of that group were Bobby Comfort and Sammy Nalo. Bobby and Sammy never confessed to the crimes, but there was so much circumstantial evidence against them that it was hard to think of who it would have been if it wasn't them. They became a two-man crime wave, getting away with millions of dollars in cash and jewels over that two-year period. They were smart, and they planned their robberies with meticulous care. And at 4 a.m. on January 2nd, 1972, they began the mother of all hotel robberies. It would make history and land them in the Guinness Book of World Records,

even though they denied involvement until the day they died. From Black Barrel Media, this is Infamous America. I'm your host, Chris Wimmer. And this season we're telling the story of one of the boldest robberies in American history and the crazy cast of characters who brought it to life. This is episode three, The Robbery Part 1. Bobby and Sammy had spent two years planning the robbery of the Pierre Hotel, which sat on the corner of Fifth Avenue and East 61st Street in Manhattan.

Sammy had studied the floor plan of the hotel at the New York City Public Library. Bobby had spent countless hours inside the hotel learning the layout, the routines of the employees, and the security measures. They had chosen New Year's weekend because they hoped the hotel would be packed with rich people who would store their valuables in the safe deposit boxes in the hotel's vault. They scheduled the robbery to begin at 4 a.m. on Sunday morning, January 2nd. New Year's Eve was Friday night, and the robbers expected the guests to party late into the night. Then the next night, Saturday night, and into Sunday morning,

they expected the guests to catch up on all the sleep they missed Friday night. And because it was also a holiday weekend for the employees, the hotel staff would be at a minimum, especially on the night shift. Security personnel would be minimal, and because of that, Bobby had learned about an adjustment in the routine. His hours of recon paid off handsomely. The Pierre Hotel has two entrances. The main entrance is on Fifth Avenue, and the side entrance is on East 61st Street. Bobby learned that the main entrance would be closed at night during the holiday weekend. The side entrance was the only way in, and it would be locked between 1 a.m.

and 6 a.m. The night duty security guard at the side entrance was under strict orders to only allow people in if they had reservations. For the robbers, that problem was easily solved. Bobby booked a room for January 1st under the alias, Dr. Forster. And when making the reservation, the doctor had indicated he would be a very late check-in. Technically, he would arrive in the very early morning hours of Sunday, January 2nd. So, when the good doctor showed up at 4 a.m., no one would be suspicious. And now, it was time to go. At 3.45 a.m., eight robbers departed Sammy Nalo's apartment in Hell's kitchen.

They drove in a three-car caravan to the Pierre Hotel. Bobby, Sammy, and Nick Sacco rode in the back of a stolen Cadillac limousine. They were dressed in tuxedos. If a limo pulled up to the Pierre Hotel and three men in tuxedo stepped out, that wouldn't be unusual, even at 4 a.m. The limo driver was a Harlem crook named Al Green, and he was dressed as a chauffeur to keep the ruse going. The other two cars in the convoy were a green Ford Torino and a black Chevy Impala. They carried the four remaining robbers, and all three cars had been supplied by Christy Fernari, one of the top guys in the Lucchese crime family. The Lucchese family had sanctioned the robbery, and Fernari was supervising on their

behalf. The three cars would be deployed in a simple yet smart plan. Al Green would drive the limo right up to the East 61st Street entrance of the hotel. He would deposit Bobby, Sammy, and Nick, and then pull around the block to wait. He would act as a lookout during the robbery, and then as the first getaway driver when it was done. The other four guys in the crew, would park the Torino and the Impala a few blocks away on Madison Avenue and then walk to the pierre. When the heist was done, the seven men who had gone into the hotel would exit with the loot, pile into the limo, and then Al Green would drive them to the Torino and the Impala. The seven robbers would flee in the two getaway cars, and Green would take the limo to a scrapyard in Queens.

There it would be crushed into the size of a refrigerator, making it unidentifiable and impossible to trace. The crew had practiced the route several times, and they knew it took about seven minutes to get from Sammy's apartment to the Pierre Hotel. They left at 3.45 a.m., which gave them enough time to park the two getaway cars on Madison Avenue and for everyone to converge on the Pierre at exactly 4 a.m. The convoy drove up 8th Avenue from Hell's Kitchen and turned at Columbus Circle to head east on East 59th Street. They passed. the Hampshire House Hotel, where Bobby and Sammy had, allegedly, robbed Hollywood actress Sophia Loren two years earlier. They rolled through the heart of the most expensive hotels in the city,

many of which Bobby and Sammy had robbed. They turned left on Madison Avenue, and at that point they split up. Four robbers parked the Torino and the Impala on Madison Ave, and Al Green continued to drive the limo up to East 61st Street. He turned the corner onto East Sixty-first Street. He turned the corner onto East 61st and then paused. The side entrance of the Pierre Hotel was just ahead. The men in the limo were waiting until they saw the rest of the guys walk up the street after parking the getaway cars. Then they would converge on the hotel entrance and begin the robbery. And of course, that was when the first unexpected surprise happened, and it could have ruined everything. A little before 4 a.m., the weather was frigid. The streets were almost empty and steamed,

billowed up from the manhole covers. As opposed to the usual vibe of power and privilege in this part of Midtown Manhattan, it now looked eerie and almost menacing. Bobby, Sammy, Nick Sacco, and Al Green waited in the limo down the block from the hotel entrance. Behind them and around the corner, the four robbers had just parked the two getaway cars and should have been hustling up the street to meet the men in the limo. But as the men in the limo sat and waited, they grew increasingly anxious. The other four guys had not appeared, and the clock was ticking toward the start time of 4 a.m. The crew in the limo didn't know that the other guys had parked the cars just fine, but then they were greeted by the absolute last people they wanted to see. Don Franco's,

Ali Ben, Alvescanti, and Bobby Germain parked the two cars on Madison Avenue and then started walking up the street. They were a funny-looking for some a little before 4 a.m. Don Frank, aka the Greek, was a hit man who dabbled in high-end robbery. Ali Ben was an old friend of Sammies, and he was married to Al Green's sister. Al Visconti and Bobby Germain were the representatives of the Lucchese family. They had been forced into the crew to make sure the ringleaders, Bobby and Sammy, didn't try to short change the family. A little before 4 a.m., these four guys were walking up the street in tuxed with no overcoats,

despite the fact that it was freezing. They all wore bad wigs, and one of them had a fake beard and another had a fake mustache. Also on Madison Avenue was a police car. The two patrolmen sat in their car, staying warm against the cold outside, and watched the four guys walk up the street.

Even for New York, this was strange. The cops stepped out of their car and confronted the four men. Bobby Germain, who was generally regarded as a good-looking, smooth-talking criminal, jumped into action before any of the others could screw it up. He said the four men had just left a costume party around the block. They stepped out to get some fresh air, and that was why they were out here in the freezing cold in tuxedos with no coats and wearing stupid wigs.

The cops either believed the excuse or wanted to get back into their warm car because their shift was almost up, and it wasn't worth it to keep questioning these four guys. The cops let the robbers leave, and the four thieves continued up the block toward East 61st Street. Meanwhile, in the limo, things were getting tense. Bobby, Sammy, and Nick stared out the windows and wondered what had become of their four partners. Had they gotten cold feet and chickened out? That was doubtful. Had they somehow managed to get themselves arrested before the heist even began?

That was more plausible, but man, it would have been a crazy stroke of bad luck. or almost incomprehensible stupidity. Whatever the case, the guys in the limo knew something wasn't right. Bobby told Al Green to drive around the block to see if they could find the missing men. Green drove around the block, and when they made it back to East 61st Street, they spotted the four guys running up the block behind them. The guys in the limo breathed a sigh of relief. Their first potential crisis had been averted.

It was exactly 4 a.m., and they could still make this work. The day shift at the Pierre Hotel started at 7 a.m., but the employees would start trickling in at around 6.45. The robbers had two hours and 45 minutes to execute their plan. They were still on time, but just barely. They needed to work fast. Sammy Nalo and Nick Sacco jumped out of the back of the limo

and hurried toward the hotel entrance. They hid behind potted plants to stay out of sight, in a move that seemed like it was straight. out of a bad movie, but it worked. Then Al Green pulled the limo forward to the entrance. Bobby Comfort, posing as Dr. Forster, stepped out of the car with two Louis Vuitton suitcases. Al drove the limo around the block and parked, but left the engine running. He was now at his position for the duration of the robbery, and it was about to begin. Bobby, wearing his tuxedo in wig, walked up to the door of the hotel and smiled at the security guard who was

standing inside. Bobby yelled his name, Dr. Forster, through the locked door, and shouted that he had a reservation. The guard looked almost apologetic for having to leave the doctor out in the cold, but he had to follow the security protocol and verify the reservation with the front desk. The guard picked up his phone and dialed the extension. After verifying that Dr. Forster was expected, the guard smiled and unlocked the door. Bobby stepped inside, dropped one of the suitcases, and pulled out his revolver. He held it to the guard's chest, turned him around, and shoved him against the wall. Bobby instructed the man to take off his security guard coat. When the guard did, Bobby clapped handcuffs on the man's wrists. In previous robberies, he had used rope or wire

as restraints. But this time, the gang brought two dozen pairs of handcuffs, which, like the getaway cars, were supplied by the Lucchese family. And it was a good thing they brought so many cuffs. They would need almost all of them. Bobby pulled out a roll of duct tape, ripped off a piece, and slapped it over the guard's mouth. Then he pushed the frightened man into a nearby broom closet. That was one guard down, and there were three more somewhere in the hotel. The number was usually seven, but the security staff was scaled back for the holiday. Seconds later, the other six robbers were in the foyer with Bobby.

Bobby tossed the guard's coat to Don Franco's. His job now was to play the role of the security guard at the entrance and keep a lookout. Bobby led the other five men down the long marble corridor to the hotel's main lobby at the 5th Avenue entrance. Their next move was critical. By 1972, most high-end hotels had installed silent alarm buttons under their front desks, just like banks. If the front desk clerk thought something was wrong and was able to press the button, the robbers wouldn't even know it until the police arrived. As the six robbers in tuxedos approached the lobby,

Bobby and Sammy switched roles. Sammy became Dr. Forrester, while Bobby and the others hung back a bit. Sammy was the more aggressive of the two leaders, and he was better suited for what was going to happen next. In the lobby, Sammy approached the front desk with a smile, which was not something that came easy to him. His entourage held back,

but stayed close enough to jump in if there was any trouble. The front desk clerk, who was a slightly nervous young man, was standing alone behind the desk. He was smiling at who he assumed to be Dr. Forrester. And then Sammy pulled out his Smith and Wesson revolver and leapt over the desk like a lion pouncing on a wounded gazelle. Sammy wrestled the clerk to the floor before the young man could hit the alarm button. Sammy informed the clerk that this was a robbery and then said his version of the standard warning, something along the lines don't do anything stupid and you won't get hurt. The petrified clerk who was unable to speak

just shook his head to signal that he understood. While Sammy handled the clerk, Bobby hurried to the executive office behind the front desk and cut the telephone lines. A moment later, Sammy dragged the clerk into the office. The ringleaders had decided that this would be the holding pen for their hostages. Sammy deposited his prisoner,

who was now handcuffed and, muzzled like the security guard. With two critical employees out of the way, it was time for the other robbers to perform their designated assignments. Nick Sacko's assignment was to find and detain the overnight elevator attendant. Sacco was notable because he chose not to go with a wig and a fake mustache like Bobby Comfort and some of the others. Sacco sported a fedora, pulled down in a rakeish tilt. Bobby criticized Sacko and told him this was a robbery, not a fashion show. Sacco was quick to point out that his fedora looked a lot better than Bobby's cheap disguise. And Bobby couldn't really argue that point. He knew he looked ridiculous. So, Nick Sacco

and his fedora headed for the elevator. There was only one attendant on duty, and business was slow. The man had dozed off on a nearby bench. Nick walked over and gave the man a nudge with his gun. The attendant, who looked like he may have been working at the hotel since it opened, opened in 1930, woke up with a jolt. He immediately panicked and pleaded with Sacco not to shoot. Sacco said he had no plans to shoot the old man as long as the man cooperated. The attendant nodded, and Sacco handcuffed him and took him to the office to join the desk clerk. Three employees were now out of circulation, and Al Visconti was in charge of finding three more. Visconti's job was to locate the additional security guards. Best case scenario, they were all in the security office downstairs,

playing cards, or napping. Worst case, they were spread out all over the massive building. Visconti had memorized the floor plan, so he knew where to find the security office. The door was open when he appeared in his tuxedo, fake beard, and fake eyebrows. Two guards were in the office. One had his jacket off and his tie draped over his shoulder. He was sitting at a desk doing a crossword puzzle. The other guard was reclining on a sofa and casually leafing through a magazine. Both men looked up and noticed Visconti in the doorway and then sprang to attention. At first glance, they thought the man in the tuxedo might be a VIP who had just caught them slacking off. But when they saw the gun, they quickly understood what was happening. Visconti told

them to sit down and gave them the don't do anything stupid speech. moments later, Bobby ran downstairs to check on Visconti and was relieved to see that at least two of the guards were under control, but they still needed to find the other one. The two guards claimed they didn't know where their colleague was. He liked to wander around at this hour so he didn't fall asleep. Bobby instructed Visconti to handcuff the men and keep them downstairs until he gave him the okay to bring them up to the office. Visconti cuffed them as directed and sat the men down on the sofa. They now had five captives in total, but the hunt was on for the fourth security guard. When Bobby re-entered the lobby, he couldn't believe his luck. A man in an ill-fitting dark suit

was walking down the hallway toward him. The guy had security guard written all over him. Bobby approached with a smile, then pulled out his gun and stuck it in the guard's ribs. Bobby handcuffed the guard and marched him into their hostage holding tank. Then he ran down downstairs and instructed Visconti to bring the others upstairs. Now, with three guards in custody, Bobby suddenly remembered something he had forgotten, or some one. He ran back to the broom closet where he had stashed the first guard. The man was still standing there, frozen stiff with fear. Bobby took him by the arm and led him to the holding tank while calmly reassuring him he would not be killed. Bobby and his crew were about

20 minutes into the robbery, and they were doing extremely well. They had all four security guards in handcuffs, along with the front desk clerk and the elevator attendant. No alarms had been triggered. Don Franco's was guarding the only entrance, and now it was time for the real show to start. Over the past 20 minutes, while Bobby Comfort and the others captured the closest employees, Bobby Germain stood guard outside the door to the vault. As strange as it sounds, the exact location location of the vault is hard to pin down. More than likely, it was on the main floor, somewhere behind the front desk and the executive office where the hostages were being held. But it was also far enough away from those areas that the night auditor had not heard a thing.

Each night, an auditor checked the hotel receipts for the day and made sure they were in sync with the cash and checks that were on hand. And he needed to make sure that the slips for the deposits and withdrawals in the vault were accurate. When he was, went into the vault at around 3 a.m., he conveniently left the door open. Bobby Comfort had learned that valuable piece of information during his recon of the hotel, and it helped inform the time of the robbery. The night auditor usually left the door open until about 4.30 a.m., and it was quickly approaching 4.30.

Bobby Germain was standing near the vault, but out of sight, in case the auditor heard something and needed to be captured early. Otherwise, Bobby would wait until Sammy Nalo and Nick Sacco showed up with the tools. Sammy and Nick ran outside to the limo and grabbed two more Louis Vuitton suitcases and the bag of tools. In the car, everything was cool with Al Green, who continued to wait and watch. Sammy and Nick returned with the tools and the suitcases. They set everything down and gave Bobby Germain the nod to go inside and subdue the night auditor. Bobby pulled his gun and walked into the vault.

The auditor was a middle-aged man in glasses and a white button-down shirt. In his shirt pocket was a pocket protector filled with pens. He looked like an accountant who was sent straight from central casting. He was terrified when he saw Bobby Germain with a gun. As expected, the auditor had not locked the vault door behind him, which was a violation of the security protocol. Bobby slapped handcuffs on the auditor and walked him to the office with the other hostages. The auditor and the first six prisoners now had more company.

Ali Ben had been roaming the hotel looking for more employees. He found the bellman, a couple housekeepers, and a janitor. They were all handcuffed with their mouths and eyes duct taped shut. Alvescanti stood in the executive office and guarded the prisoners. There were now as many as 12 hostages. in the room that was quickly becoming cramped. Back at the vault, with the night auditor out of the way, Sammy and Nick were excited to go to work.

Sammy grabbed the bag of tools, Nick grabbed the suitcases, and they raced into the room. They had never been certain of exactly how many safe deposit boxes were there, but they were looking at an entire wall of them, numbered from zero one to 208. It was now sometime after 4.30 a.m. They had no more than two hours to crack open the boxes and steal whatever was inside. There was no way they could open all the boxes.

And again, Bobby's efforts saved the day. During his recon of the hotel, he had carried on a brief affair with a young woman who was an assistant bookkeeper. She told him that the front desk manager kept a set of index cards that listed all the valuables in all the boxes and who they belonged to. Lastly, she said the Knight Auditor had access to the cards. He needed them for his job. Sammy ran out of the vault and headed for the office with the hostages. On his way, he ran into Bobby Comfort, who was walking toward him with the index cards. Bobby had used his gun to persuade the auditor to give up the cards.

Bobby had already examined them and arranged them in the order in which they should be opened. Sammy hustled back to the vault, where Nick waited with the. tools. They were as happy as kids in a candy store. They had their targets, and now it was time to let the safe deposit box cracking begin. And if all this time you were picturing some high-tech super cool stuff you saw in a movie, this wasn't it. Nick grabbed a hammer. Sammy grabbed a crow bar, and they beat the holy hell out of those boxes. Next time on Infamous America, the crew in the vault are astonished at the stuff they're able to steal. It's beyond anything they dreamed. But out in the main part of the hotel, the problems begin.

There's one potential crisis after another, and the clock is ticking, and Bobby Comfort grows more worried by the minute. That's next week on Infamous America. Members of our Black Barrel Plus program don't have to wait week to week for new episodes. They receive the entire season to binge all at once with no commercials, and they also receive exclusive bonus episodes. Sign up now through the link in the show notes, or on our website blackbarrelmedia.com.

Memberships begin at just $5 per month. This series was researched and written by Michael Byrne, original music by Rob Ville. I'm your host and producer, Chris Wimmer. Find us at our website, blackbarrelmedia.com, or on our social media channels. We're Black Barrel Media on Facebook and Instagram and B-Barrell Media on Twitter. And you can stream all our episodes on YouTube.

Just search for Infamous America. podcast. Thanks for listening.