Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - Inside The Mind Of A NYPD Gangster Cop | Mike Dowd

Episode Date: January 1, 2024

Inside The Mind Of A NYPD Gangster Cop | Mike Dowd

If I think photos, it's a different approach. I'm going to get mine. Yeah. I'm going to get my, whatever it is. If it's an extra sweater, you know, if it's a fucking Nike hat, whatever the fuck it is, I'm going to get something for me out of this because it appears that there's more to this than just driving to work and keeping the peace. Hey, Matt Cox, and I'm going to be interviewing Mike Dowd, and Mike Dowd is a former New York City police officer.

75th precinct. I just watched a documentary on them. It's great documentary. We're going to put the link for the documentary. It's on YouTube so we can do a little thing right here, that little thing, and they can watch the documentary, and we're going to go over Mike's story, and that's it. Appreciate it. So, yeah, so I'm happy to be here. My name is Mike Dowd. If you've seen the 75 documentary, you'll know a little bit about the story. And if you don't, check out the documentary. It's an interesting story about the 1980s, basically, in the New York City Police Department, the corruption during the crack epidemic. that hit New York City. Right. Yeah. It was a great documentary. It's a great story.

But anyway, so let's just start. So I'm just going to go with what struck me about the whole story in general is that you were what? Like, like, 19 or 20 or something? Well, I was 21 in like a week when I became a New York City cop. Right. But you went, what did you do? You went to the why?

Police Academy. Yeah, but why did you always want to be a police officer? No. No, it's just. So I come from a long line of civil servants. My father was a New York City firefighter. My grandfather was a New York City bus driver. My great-grandfather was a New York City cop for a week.

So back in the day when he said, men sleep at night. So he refused to do a midnight shift. So yeah, but so anyway, so the Irish civil servant underbelly of New York City, that was New York City in the probably from the 40s on up until now. You know, so I wouldn't say currently because it's more like Hispanic and African American, but so every, every ethnic group works their way through. And usually it's the city jobs that the politicians control and they end up being in whatever ethnicity is in the city at the time. Right. It becomes politically in charge and then politically in charge.

Some patronage takes place. And then for the years, the Irish ran the police department in New York City. Right. Which had nothing to do with the civil service hiring exams. It's just that it was the place to go for work. Right. And so you, so you, so we went to the police academy in your 20s and then you're 21 years old. Right.

You get hired right away. Right. You ended up in one of the worst dangerous. So I ended up in the police academy. And so I took the job because I needed to, I wanted to get laid. I wanted to get married. Of course. I needed to have a job.

Your priorities right. Yeah. So, yeah. my penis was my priority, pretty much still is. And so I needed to get a job. And in order to get married back then, you needed to get a job. I don't know about today,

but back then you needed to have a job. And so having a police job was a career that would at least give you some stability if you, of course, if you treated it that way. And so I took the job. And then, of course, immediately after I took the job, the girl I was dating and engaged to said, I'm not marrying a police officer.

That's crazy. So I found myself basically after the police academy, semi-broken up single, crying and bitching and moaned that why don't you want to be with me type of thing. Right. Which in the end, she was probably right the whole time. She made the right call. She made the right call,

but I refused to accept that. Right. Because of my hardheaded 20% stud muffin and 80% muffin of something going through me. So then you ended up, So you met your wife at the time or a few years later? No, so I was dating her, went through the academy, we broke up, we got back together, broke up, she got pregnant, we got back together, and got married. So you started at the police at the police academy.

Right, but I mean, then you were, you went to the 75th precinct, which is one of the most dangerous. So I ended up in Queens first as a rookie. So I cut my teeth as a rookie in Queens, walking their streets under, if anyone's familiar with Roosevelt Avenue, under the L, Junction Boulevard. It was back then it was called Little Columbia because that was where the Colombians settled in and did all their cocaine distributions from. It was Elmhurst, Jackson Heights, Corona, Queens. And that's when all the airports in New York

were used as the main transport hubs for the cocaine from Columbia. So it was insane. Right. But that was high end because the Colombians were high end. They weren't street dealers. There were major, massive movers of cocaine. So I worked in a really pretty nice precinct,

which is the 110 in Corona, Jackson Heights, Elmhurst, as a rookie. And then I learned a little bit about what was going on, but you didn't see street-level activity because it was the guys that were moving tonnage. Right, right, right. And then after about a year or so, that time, I ended up getting transferred to the 7-5, and I thought I went to fucking hell.

I was like, oh, my God, what the fuck is this? Well, I saw that at that time, New York City was like the, what was it, like 35, 3,600? people were being murdered every single year so so everybody gets that number confused but it was about 2,000 people were murdered a year but probably on the on the upward side of 20 000 a shot for about every one person that dies eight to 10 get shot so you can imagine yeah so you can you got shot a little yeah yeah it's just no big deal just get shot i was in the guy somebody got stabbed in the yard and i said somebody got killed in the yard and he goes now he just got stabbed up a little bit yeah that's how life that's

That was life. So anybody, so here it was, I was a Long Island kid, right? I was born in Brooklyn, but raised on Long Island, where it was pretty much peachy keen, you know, everything was okay. I mean, I grew up in a mixed neighborhood, so it was no like black, white animosity or hatred, or, you know, we played sports, so we interacted well. But when you get into the ghetto and you really see what life's about, like, for those people in the ghetto, not ethnic, but the people in the ghetto.

I mean, my best friends were Hispanic and black when I was a kid. But when you see how they're in, they live in. the ghetto life it's like oh my god this is a fucking different world right like those people that are ethnic in my neighborhood wouldn't fucking survive in this they'd be like that's why that's why they're there out by me you know right so it was just insane and but but i guess the insanity was the um complete you know you just said um you got stand up in the yard yeah so they just shrug it off like yeah he got shot he said all right you know he took eight shots but he's good he's yeah i mean i i i i came across people

and it's insane like this one guy was shot like nine times and so I put the 95 tag on his toe yeah I put the 95 tag on his toe and a week later I'm talking to his wife at the precinct because the precinct was a good place to use the phone what is the 95 but what does that mean? I'll get to it

okay so I put this 95 so the guy I'm talking to this woman I said I'm really sorry to hear about your husband you know what else am I going to say I passed her she noticed me I noticed her, you know, and a little Coochie mama, on the phone, we're here for belly hanging out, you know, it's the summer, you know. Figures she's looking to get laid at the precinct, whatever, you know,

that's a good place to get laid, right? There's 450 cops as fucking 425 men, you know? Anyway, so she's at the phone, making a pay phone of the precinct, making a phone call, and so we passed glances, and I am really sorry to hear about your husband, and she goes, what do you mean? I go, well, he got shot nine fucking times. I put the 95 did.

The DOA, I put the DOA tag on his toe in the hospital. And I've never done that before, by the way. I was not always, I wasn't there, like, at the cease time to put, but I put the 95 tag on his toe because I was busy. I had some things to do. And I figured by the time this is over, I don't want to come back and have to do it. Turned out. He says he's over there on the phone and making a phone call.

Here's a guy who was shot nine times. He looked this, here, see, I put this nice white t-shirt on, maybe for effect today, because he looked like this shirt. That's how white this man was, like going into the O-R. I put the 95 tag on his fucking toe and turned out he wasn't dead. He was standing. He was on the outside phone. She was on the inside phone in the precinct.

He was on the outside phone at the precinct. So, yeah, that's, I mean, that was like, all right, so that's not normal, but that's normal. You know what I mean? There's no big deal. Oh, okay, he made it. Sorry. Next. Yeah, so, but it was, it was thrilling.

It was exciting to go to work. Yeah. So you think about it. Like, you know, we're adrenaline junkies in some way or another, right? We seek the bizarre or we just want to see crazy stuff in life. And so when you're in New York City cop back in that day, like every day was like a surprise, but fun. Right, right, right. It's exciting, you know, what's going to happen today?

Like, you never really worried about yourself. Right. In the beginning, you know. Right, right. Well, I, the first, the first realization that this is real and nothing really matters. Right. Well, you had said it felt like, oh, no, no, that was your partner's. It felt surreal.

And everybody kept saying throughout the whole documentary, they keep saying, you know, that you never seemed, they were like, Mike never seemed scared. Like he was never worried about any of this stuff. Like, to him it was not a big deal. Like, and even, you know, you had mentioned like, you know, well, just the whole thing. Like you, like nobody was out to get you except for that one time.

Right. You didn't feel like you were in danger. Like you were. No. No. It's, yeah. Like Teflon Don, right? John Gotti went to trial. and you just go, he'd be smoking a cigar

at the end of the afternoon. And it just became, you know, I was one of seven kids. I was a survivor in that realm. You know what I mean? I learned how to survive. I learned how to get my food and how to work my way through that.

So it always seemed like I'd always find a way. No matter what problem I was in, you know, some of the stories that you shared with me about your stuff, you always found a way to make it work or to come out okay. Like, no matter how bad things are, it's going to be okay.

Yeah, this is just an obstacle. I have to get around. Right. Most people, I just find that most people in life, they hit an obstacle. Right. That's it. That's it. Right. They surrender and they turn around. Right. And it's like, this is just something. I wish I did. Right. Because the first obstacle, I mean, I had signs and I had warnings and I had, you know, people confront me at times. And I mean, from my mother who was like the most dangerous confrontation. Right. Your mother confronts you. You know, your wife or, you know, or a family member. I even remember before I got arrested, my father said to me, you know, one of my friends in the Suffolk County Police. department, a family friend, a close family friend, like cousinish, said that your name was dropped around a little bit and wanted to make sure that you were on the, you know, that you were on the up and up, you know, of course, what am I said to my dad? Yeah, of course, dad, you're right, I have

a severe problem facing them. You know, you're going to tell your father, yeah, you're right that, I'm robbing everybody in Brooklyn, I'm selling cocaine on Long Island. I mean, just, I have a hard time transitioning from being the charm. the son with the four homes, the condominium on the ocean, the brand new Corvette, the beautiful wife, the ex-girlfriend, you know, it's just, it's hard to go, yeah, I am doing something wrong. You mean you figure it out? You're not even a detective and you figured this out. Well, I, I, so when was, just to, when was the first time you actually did something that you knew you were crossing the line? You know, you know, I always talk about this time when I took money,

when I basically told a kid that I didn't want to I didn't want to give him summonses because I don't give a fuck about summons I don't I don't gain on a summons right right so and it's not that I mean I'm not supposed to gain

it's a police job it's a civil service position you're supposed to serve the public but there comes a point where you begin to get frustrated in any job you can get frustrated but as a police officer you're supposed to maintain your decorum and continue on like a Drew Blue Trooper. But I guess sometimes when the humanity comes in,

you go, you know, I'm fucking, I could use a good meal. You know, I'm not that I'm starving. Yeah, I never starve. But you're living off a 600 bucks a week. No, 600 every two weeks. Every two weeks. Yeah, but he's misled by that. I was claiming 300 a week.

In fact, in the Academy, I was clearing $205 a week. And then, you know, you get a little bit of raise, you get a little bit of raise. I was clearing 300, like at one point, $303 a week in the 75, you know. But this was, this was, this was, 83, 84. Yeah, this is like 40 years ago, but even then, that's just, that's no money.

It was poultry. You're trying to, it's like, yeah. I would have, I would have at the end of, at the end, and I didn't have any bills, by the way. I live with my parents, right? So you're young, you couldn't, you can't live by yourself. You're a young rookie cop. You're living with your parents. I'm talking about that debt, in the early part.

Right. And, you know, so maybe I'm banking, I'm giving them 50 bucks a week and I'm banking 200. Right, because I want to save her from, get a house so I can get married. That's why I took this. job, right? And you see that it's really not going to, it's not going that well. You know, the savings is not really mounting up pretty quickly for a guy who's living home and having reduced bills, which, you know, I was very financially very responsible throughout my whole life. Anyway, so a county major in college, yeah. So, yeah, so very good. And they're pretty good

at it. So I realized that the money was just not adding up. And so when you pull somebody, over and they're like fucking let's say they're 17 right and first of all and they don't even have a license they don't even have a registration they don't have license plates on the fucking car right and yet when you pull them over they got a stack of hundreds in there back then it was fanny packs yeah you know those fanny packs the leather pouches the pouches and shit did you have one no i didn't have one i i knew people i knew people yeah so i mean it's the stacked with hundreds you know I'm like, what the fuck? You know, I got six bucks, you know, and it's got to last me, it's Tuesday,

it's got to last me to Thursday at 4 o'clock when the checks roll in, you know? So, I mean, you don't have to feel bad for a guy, but that's what, it is what it is. So I'm like, fuck, where are you from? Puerto Rico. The guy's not even a fucking, like, of course, he's a citizen, but he's not, he just got him in Puerto Rico last week. He bought a car, you know, a Corvette. Yeah, he bought himself a Corvette, and he's got a stack of hundreds.

in his wallet and it's in his pouch. So I could use a fucking nice meal. You know, I'm going to tell him, I want your money. I didn't know how to, I didn't know how to make that transition. So, you know, you got $1,800 worth of summons this year. Plus, I've got to take your car. So who knows when you're going to get it back and whatever, you know, toll, pay for a toll, pay for storage.

You know, but if you got me a good fucking lunch, you know, and a good one, I mean, like a lobster lunch, you know, then we can, this will go away. Right. So that's like the main, that was the first time that I did it with intention. Right. There are other moments where I let things go or saw things I didn't, I didn't care about. You know, like maybe it was some drugs somewhere, you know, never to my benefit. Right, right.

Never to my benefit, you know, just like maybe it was laziness or I didn't give a fuck, you know, whatever. I've witnessed things. But in this case, it was like, I took an aggressive approach to try and get something. Yeah. And like we discussed previously, it felt like, I was nervous. I thought it was being set up. Right. You know? Because like, it was just perfect.

I think I had no papers, no license, the plates, they're nonexistent. And then after we got the money and we drove around like for a while, like no one pulled us over or anything like, whoop, whoop, internal affairs, what are you doing? It was like, yeah, I can do this. Like, I can do that. Yeah. And that was on the back. And I always forgot to tell the story.

That was on the back. of an incident with me and two other police officers. So I'll just make the short of it. I make a car stop. Some guy blows a stop sign. I pull them over. I'm up on Jamaica Avenue by Highland Park in the borderline between Brooklyn and Queens.

And I got this car stop and all of a sudden I look behind me, this fucking flashing red lights from a fucking police car. And I'm going, Oh, this must be so-and-so coming to join us like. Right. Check on us. Yeah.

Back up. Yeah. For no reason, but still. Back-up. Yeah, whatever. That's cool. What are you doing? My, excuse me.

My job. McGregor, whatever fuck his name was. Terry McGregor was a guy's name. The other guy ended up losing his job. Anyway, he goes, what are you doing? What do you mean? What am I doing? Why do you ask me, what am I doing?

He goes, I go, I made a car stop. he goes, in my sector? So I go, well, so I knew that was a little touchy thing, and I'm like, well, we pulled them over here, but we followed him from my sector, let's say. You know, he followed him three blocks and pulled him over. This is the best place we could pull the guy over. Yeah, well, don't be making any car stops in our sector.

He said, all right, he goes, and make sure you stay away from our, our day. and our fucking spots. Right. I mean, obviously that's something's odd about that. Their territory when all of it falls within the precinct. Yeah, it's in the precinct. I can drive by here all day long,

but he don't want me doing anything in his sector. Right. So he's what, charging, he's charging protection money to people? You're not positive, but something's ain't right. Something's not right. So, you know, later we talked about it, my partner and I at the time, Sal was a different partner and Kenny and I said something like like I get that you don't want me eating at some of your

spots because you get eat on the if you're eating on the arm you don't want to hurt right right right right the other guy coming in saying listen I can't give 15 guys free meals in a day right right so you that that I'm aware of you know but to make a car stop like is this something am I missing something here so like the next day or two I see this car I pull it over and I said you know maybe this is what it's about. I gave it a shot. I got paid. And it was a different approach.

From that day forward, it was all like, I wasn't, I was on about two years. From that day forward, it was just a different approach. I'm going to get mine. Yeah. I'm going to get mine. Whatever it is. If it's an extra sweater, you know,

if it's a fucking Nike hat, whatever the fuck it is, I'm going to get something for me out of this because it appears that there's more to this than just driving to work. and keeping the peace and going home and getting the paycheck. But you're still conducting police business. It's just that if something comes across,

you're not out at that point, I know later, but at that point, it seemed to me like you weren't seeking it out. Like if it, you're an opportunity. You're an opportunist. If I come in on a bus and this and that, and there's a stack sitting here. So that's the next thing that ends up happening. Right.

And the homicide scene with this guy, Sal, and we were still, and so I go on this homicides. side, we first response, I can't even open the door because the body's, body's blocking the door. The guy was hitting the head and he was fucking laying by the, I can't even open the door. Finally I opened the door. I get inside and I see it's a marijuana. Back then they had tray bag stores. I don't know if you guys are familiar with Brooklyn's setup. It was a bunch of dummy candy stores and they were all selling nickel bags. Like today, they're starting to sell

pot everywhere, whatever. They've already got the setup, you know, 40 years ago in Brooklyn. Right. They had these paper plates in the window with, you know, candy signs. Candy, you know, whatever. It was a fucking dope spot for marijuana. Pushed the door open. We had to move the body. The guy was basically dead on the floor and the block of the door.

The guy got shot in his spot. So the door was held closed by the body. We couldn't even get inside. So eventually we push our way in. And so it's a funny scene of where inside there's a bunch. It's a, yeah, it was funny. Yeah, it was funny. It was funny.

What's so funny is I have a six sense of humor. Like, to me, that is funny. Yeah, but people are like... Yeah, but you take it in because the guy's blot, he's blocked. Oh, I hate that. Yeah, he's blocking the door. Can you get up? So anyway, in there's bags of marijuana.

Like, like, clearly a huge amount of marijuana, like pounds. And come to find it later on, there was over four or five pounds, which is quite, you know, it's a substantial amount. Yeah. And it looks large, you know. Pound of marijuana is a fucking a lot, you know. And so, anyway, so he has this, and he's got his nickel trade bags set up, and he's got cash. and lots of cash so I'm like

well this is a little I'm excited and then out comes this guy from nowhere and he's oh my God he starts blowing on his friends giving him CPR mouth to mouth the guy's dead and then so

the odd thing is I'm trying to put this together like what's going on here because you don't want to stop someone from giving someone CPR what the fuck let him do it and then he takes looks at his hands and he starts wiping the blood off his fucking hands, right?

I mean, to me, that disturbed me. Like, this is your friend who's dead. It's your best friend in the world, and you're worried about the blood on your hands. Whatever. So, then I see the money and the marijuana, and so long story short, I see a sliver of a stack of hundreds.

It's not a lot. I think the number was 600. So I put a little 600 in my pocket, and now we have to call for the emergency service, the search teams, all this fucking the sergeants, the EMS, everybody, to show up. We got a real shooting. We got a possible DOA on the scene.

Send an ambulance, send the sergeant, send the morgue, you know? Anyway, so we set it all up, and in comes the sergeant about five, ten minutes into it, and he says, so we got this bags of marijuana, we got a stack of cash, I don't know how much cash was there at the time, and he turns around, he looks at me, he says,

so is that it? Right. So I look at him and I go, well, I take the fucking 600 out of my pocket, and I go, like, you know, if you can't fucking see it, I go, here, this was this goes is that it and I go that's it I go that's it I go he goes I didn't want to I said I didn't want to get all lost I don't know what to say like I gave you a stack of fucking 20s but I got a sliver of hundreds in my pocket they didn't want it to get lost

anyway so someone else takes the takes the perp oh this I think the squad showed up I don't remember who showed up but I didn't process the arrest right I was because it was a homicide usually the homicide detectives take over right away and they were there quick enough so They took over the case. So the homicide detective says to me, what do you think? I said he did it. The guy with the hands.

And he says, he asks me why you say that. I said, because just the way he acted. I said, plus he wasn't there. He came running out of somewhere. We did a little quick search. We saw handprints all up the fucking upstairs. There's handprints going upstairs.

I didn't see him go upstairs. And with the handprints of blood. Yeah. And he made, I'm CSI now. Yeah. And he made such a scene about wiping off the blood and making sure he touches the guy to get blood out. That's why the blood on my hands because I touched him.

Exactly. He made a big scene. So from that, I said he did it. And one of the statements the kid made was a funny story. He says, I told him to stop fucking with those women. What do you care if he's, what he meant was stop fucking with my woman. Oh, okay. As it turned out.

So the squad has this two, two, three pieces of information with them. They turn the guy in five minutes against themselves. You know, I didn't mean. Because they told me he was alive. He's alive and he's talking. They're like, he's like, oh, shit. They lucked. The guy's obviously dead.

He's got his brains all over the place. Right. Anyway, so, so yeah, so at that scene, when I put the 100, 600 and I gave it back. So that night we went out for choir practice, you know, drinking with the boys. And the sergeant happened to come with us. We're out in Huntington on Route 110. I think the place was, I can't remember that. I think it's like Farrell's.

It wasn't Farrell's, but something like that. It was a common name, one of those Irish books. a Fulton Street, Fulton Street Pub. If anyone knows Huntington, Long Island's Fulton Street Pub. And I like to throw that a contestant. A lot of people love that, you know. And so I was at Fulton Street pub, there's 1.30 in the morning

and I say, I go over to a sardion, and I said, which is odd, because the sergeant usually don't go out with the fellas, you know, because they're bosses, you know, let the boys do their thing. I said, listen, you know, I gave he, he says, I said, what do you think? I gave you a couple hundred, he goes,

if you get there before me it's all yours he says if I show up I can't condone you fucking taking it right he says because I don't want the problem I'm a boss he says but you show up in a fucking murder scene and there's cash fly like the NYP does not murder people right

to set you up yeah they're just not going to go that far they'll do a lot of things but they're not going to kill people to set you up so he says if you get there you see body and you see stacks of cash or whatever. It's yours, but make sure I get mine. And he says to me, because if I find out later on it, that you clip, you clip 25, 30 grand, then I got nothing. He says, I'm going to be pissed. I said, so, so like, so for effect, you know, later on I thought about it. And I'm like, he just gave me a fucking license. Yeah. To do whatever the fuck I want. And now I'm like at 23 years old or something like

that. And I'm saying, I can fucking do anything I want out here. You know, especially since the witnesses are mostly dead or running from the scene. It's their word against yours anyway. And I'm a cop. And honestly, like when we talk about the drug dealer stuff, like the other guy's like, what are they going to say? Their drug dealers are. Hey, I lost 10 keys and 50,000 in cash. Who's going to say that?

You're going to walk to the precinct. Excuse me, a detective or investigator. Yeah. One of your police officers robbed me for 35 kilos and a million dollars in cash. Okay, good. Sit down. Have a seat. Just not what happens.

But more and more it happens today, believe it or not. It wasn't back then, though. Your sergeant, you said, it's funny because, like, I actually had a owner of a bank tell me, basically, it was almost the same, a similar site. I mean, he had caught us. Right. And then sold the loan, caught us, said, hey, we caught you. And said, I don't know nothing about it. And he said, and then he sold the loans, knowing they were all fraudulent loans, bad loans selling them.

Knew it. Because he thought they might perform. Right. And then later he came down and we were talking. And he was just, he had a couple drinks in him. We were talking about fraud. And he said, listen, man, I don't care about fraud. He was nobody in the industry cares about fraud.

He said, if you, if it goes through us and we can get rid of it, he said, I could care less. Right. He has, I just don't want to get stuck with it. Right. And to me, that was just like, so he was basically saying nobody's going on the FBI. Like the worst that happens is we blacklist you and you can't do any loans with us. And it was just like, to me, I was like, oh my God. And then, I mean, let's go.

Let's go. Yeah. Turn to, I punched it. Yeah, yeah. Overdrive. Yeah, oh, absolutely. Yeah. So, yeah, so that moment is a defining moment for me because I became less cautious about scenes.

I didn't, so I actively looked for scenes, but I didn't, I wouldn't roused up a scene to make it happen. Right. So then, like, I'd rush to a homicide. Right. I mean, no one really wants to be on a homicide because then you got to stay with it and do all the, the dirty work right but if you rush to a homicide scene see people die for a couple reasons usually because of a bad relationship issue money or drugs right and the ghetto it's usually money and drugs because everybody's got a bad relationship you know babies daddy's mom is in a

you know thanksgiving is a tough day because you know they all get you know six babies daddy show up nine babies mom is you know it just it gets confusing it really does you know but i'll tell you One funny story, I had a park footpost one day because I was on punishment post. I used to get punishment post because they didn't want to have to keep an eye on me. So it was easy to put me on a footpost because you only have like a block square area

but in the car you can go fucking 40 miles from one direction to the other. And when I was under a lot of investigation, they'd put me on a footpost. And so one of the young girls comes up to me, a young kid, like eight, nine years, cute kid, beautiful little child says to me something about Thanksgiving or Christmas

And she says, well, I have five stepdaddies. And I said, oh, I felt bad for the child. You know, you have five stepdaddies. I got seven brothers and sisters and five stepdaddies. I said, oh, that's, you know, she goes, it's great. Because Christmas, each one of the stepdaddies buys us a gift. Right. So that's guaranteed five or six gifts there.

And then your own daddy, he really gives you lots of gifts. so I mean like there was a silver lining there was a silver lining to everything you know so like they do stab each other every once or one that's that's you yeah usually because mom is not you know yeah putting she's not holding up our end of the bargain I guess I don't know whatever but yeah so it I mean what an education for a for a guy who grew up there was dad was a fireman and he came home you know once every three days would smelling like smoke you know

and hockey player baseballs I love athletic you know Long Island kids going to play sports and you're out in the ghetto now and putting out fires every day like what the fuck I don't mean not fires but you know putting fires personal fires out every day putting your finger in the in the dike

of the dam and the crack arrow was just insane it was insane well and there wasn't a big budget for police for law enforcement at the time it was I mean it was just so you hit a point there to budget so part of the reason why things get the way to do

you can actually hawking back to today what's going on in today's environment, like it's dangerous today in a lot of these major cities because of the, you say budget, whatever, defund the police story. But back then, we had budget crunches because the volume of arrests was insane. Like, so, like, people don't get this. Like, there's a million arrests in New York City every year. Just make sure you're called your late, there's a million arrests in New York City every year. That's insane. That's what it was, let's say. And so 250,000 were arrested in Brooklyn, maybe more. It's a lot of process, right?

We talked about process before. There's always a process, right? So processing an arrest is guaranteed 17 hours overtime, maybe more. Right. So you're paying somebody to process an arrest for 17 hours overtime. then you're having to pay for legal aid for the perpetrator, court costs, bailiff court. You can go down the list on what it costs just to process an arrest without the overtime. So the city began to sort of discourage arrests for drugs.

Now, perfect storm, right? Because if you're telling a police officer don't make an arrest for drugs because it's not going to go well for you. why we're going to put you on footposts we're going to put you in less desirable assignments because you're killing us with the overtime costs so some guys didn't give it damn they'd make an arrest in the station house like and that happens all that happens by the way every day you know people walk in and ask a question guy runs the name oh you could you're under arrest and the guy like we took you off patrol so you wouldn't make overtime he goes too bad I got an arrest right now and you can't stop me right see they can't stop you from making a lawful arrest right what's the

Supervisor to say, unarrest that person. Let them go. Yeah, you can't. But today, I think you can for Christ, because it seems that way, which is another story, right? So think about that. 250,000 arrests. Everyone is 17 hours overtime, let's just, for argument's sake,

and the numbers just are astronomical. Yeah, it's outrageous. So they discourage it. So now you're telling me, here's what you make me, you make me the armed security force for the drug dealers. Right. You're just trying to get people to stop shooting each other at this point. So I'm not arresting. I'm just trying to get you guys to stop killing us, stop killing each other. So it's the profile. So you have a higher visibility. Because if I make an arrest, I'm taking a patrol car and my partner pretty much off the street unless there's somebody else to jump in with him.

Because we don't do solo patrols in Brooklyn. You're not allowed. It's dangerous. So I'm taking you off the street and me off the street and I'm processing an arrest. So that cars down for the day. So really the numbers wise It doesn't pay to make the arrest So we become the armed security force For the drug dealers I mean when it's January 17th And it's 18 below zero with the windshield

And it's 2 o'clock in the morning And there's four guys on the corner On Picking Avenue and Pine What the fuck do you think they're doing? Right I mean can anybody out here tell me What do you think they're doing? I mean, they're selling fucking something

You know, they got the Eskimo So they get to go about their business while you hang out and make sure nobody comes drives by and shoots at them because they're on their corner or so. Yeah, so you could fill in the fucking dots from there. And that's what happened was the public began to be outraged that we were not making arrests. But they're not announcing to the public. We're discouraging arrests. And this is a fact.

These are all facts as I lived it. You know, we're discouraging drug arrests because blah, blah, blah, blah, we're saving money. meantime it's making your neighborhood horrible to live in the broken window theory fixed the window in the house so it looks better and people won't try to break in steel and burn it down right so that was the Giuliani theory fix the broken window get the squeegey guy from off your windshield because once he's off your windshield he has to be someplace else you're not intimidated and you go forward and have a better day so so that's the approach they had back then and and we we were the epicenter of you know the

The police are always the conflict, no matter what. No matter if you do, it's damned. Damned if you do, damn if you don't. You know, so there was a long line of what you're seeing today happened back then, but in a different way. Because back then, but you can still beat the fuck out of you. Right. Straight up.

Back then you can still. There's too many. Back then you can still give a good beating and everybody went home. It's funny. And everybody went home. Dan and us. The Rodney King thing, I remember all these guys were like. I got arrested three days after the Rodney King riots.

Everybody, when that came out, I remember guys were saying, you know, well, that's an isolated event. I was like, yeah, it was. The isolated event was that there was a guy with a camera. It happens all the time. It was just isolated. There was a guy with a camera. And yes, and that's true. And to defend the police always, that's not what, that's not all they do.

No, no, no, no, I know. And it's usually, let's just say earned. It's usually earned. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's usually earned. And I'm not saying they deserve that, but it's usually earned. You know what's funny is like, guys talk to me about prison. They're like, you know, well, there are a lot of stabbings and people, were you scared?

Were you like, whoa, whoa, whoa. I'm like, you understand. If you get stabbed in prison or beaten up in prison, you had it coming. It doesn't sound good, but you did something. They're not randomly running up and smashing dudes. You owed money. Right. They told you to pay it.

Then they, you said, fuck you. Then they told you check in. You get yourself shipped. You said, I'm not going to. They, you know, they brought, they went to your, they went to the shot collar, explained to the shot collar. Finally, the shot caller talked to you. He, you then told him, I'm not paying.

Then the shot collar said, beat his ass. And you got your ass beat or you get stabbed. I mean, you had a chance. Yeah, yeah. You know. Punks, money, drugs. Absolutely. One of the worst beatings I saw was over a punk.

Yeah. And it's so funny to say punk out here. Like the first time I said it, like everybody like, I was like, I mean, a gay guy. Yeah. And it's like, oh, now it's even more. worse. Yeah, just called, now you, now you just, I just said I called a punk or a gay guy a punk. Yeah, right. And that's prison. Yeah, right. So, yeah. But, um, okay, so back to, um, what I was going to say is, I mean, at some point, the guy cello came to you. Oh, yeah. I forgot his

name. I forgot his name. I forgot the fucking guy's name. And the guy interview and he forgot. Well, it was funny because, too, like, he was the low man that told him pole. His boss, then his, his, His boss was actually a really good interview. You know what I'm saying? Okay. So you got it confused. Huh? You got it confused.

Chella was the boss. Oh, I thought Chello was the guy in the, in the, um, Chello was the guy in the, uh, the Porsche. Yeah. Well, yeah. So, oh, he was the boss. I thought he was under the, the other guy. No, cella was a, so Diaz.

Right. Says chela was a little nothing to him. Right. That's what he says. Because Diaz, you know, he, he started at two, 300 kilos. a week. Chello might do 50 kilos a week, but he was selling grams,

half grams, fucking dime bag, whatever the fuck he was selling. So he was selling retail, and Diaz sold wholesale. So to him, he was a nobody, but Chello had his own organization, top to the bottom. He was in charge of his own organization.

La Campania. La Campania. And they had 28 murders, fucking La Campania. And Chello was responsible in some way or another for the hits that they order. Right. So, yeah, so he

so they were two, let's say two equals this way, but Diaz, you know, sold a million dollars in tonnage. This guy sold a million dollars in half grams. Right. So, so that's the thing. But cello put a hit on me because

I put pressure on his shop, put pressure on his store because he didn't pay me to $700. He's supposed to pay me $8,000. He shorted me $700. Why would he do that? Did you ever find out like when he's just trying you right out of the gate he just tried you? See, I wasn't sure.

So that's why I was pissed, you know, like why would you do that, you know? So I think what it is, and I think that somebody... But he came up with the exact amount that he was short. Yeah. Okay. So, I mean, he knew. It's not like somebody miscounted. Well, I think that he didn't.

do it. Okay, so there was an intermediary. Yeah, I think that a guy, see, when they, when they pay a drug money, it comes in thousands. Right. So a thousand bundles, right? And if it's 20s, it's 50, 50, 20s is a thousand bucks, right? Yeah, right? So, so instead of, there's 45, 45, 45, 45, 45, and it was like, like, we're counting out. It's like, are they doing it's on purpose? Right. So someone's taken, taking $100 out of each bundle. That's what I got from it. So by telling them that they were short 700, I thought he would go, be pissed at his people.

Not pissed at me. Why would I tell you you short $700? I mean, that's penny. That's picky, I'm telling you you short $700 because, one, if it's your people that are robbing it, straighten them out, and two, make it right. So to clarify, you basically, you had gone to them and said, look, it's $8,000, give me $8,000 a week, and I'm going to give you the heads up on any

investigations, on anything that's coming down, any raids, anything into you. He then pays you the money, short somehow or another, you get shorted. And then you don't say anything that's not like you can complain. What you did was you went and you basically parked your police car in front of. No, so I went to Barron, the head of the Autosound City shop. You told him. I was in black in the thing. And who set this whole meeting up. I said, Baron was short 700. He goes, yeah, I know. I said, well, tell him we're short 700, make it right. I didn't think much of it. And then after about a week, he comes back and tells him, go fuck yourselves, we're not paying you. We're done and I'm not paying you. I said,

that's not the way this is going to go. Right. So I started putting pressure on the store. I had myself and my partner would park in front of his store. Like just sit there, well, fucking chase cars that pulled up and, you know, just made it clear that you're not going to do. You're not going to do this right so and then I even went one step further and I paid another crew of cops a thousand dollars just to sit on the store when I wasn't working so he had like 24 hours a day almost coverage on the store I mean up until midnight you know so all day up until midnight he couldn't sell a fucking graham a coach because no one would go to the store because the cops were there you know they want to get caught moving out with the drugs on him

anyway so he sends a message over to baron I put a hit on him so I don't and I get my 9-1-1-1 page, Baron doesn't page me, 911, 911, page goes off, and I end up going in to see Baron, he goes, they put it on you. I said, okay. And the funny thing is that I heard, which I think was accurate, that the precinct knew about it and told me nothing. They, yeah, they knew about it and didn't fucking say anything. At that point, they were already, they were like, they were like, they were like good, kill his motherfucker. They didn't know what to do, but I heard that they knew. So they had informants. Right. In the fuck of La Campania. And if you Remember them in that van?

In the movie scene, in the van, Joe Ball, they're running back to the precinct. Well, in that van was one of the companies' informants, telling them who's who. Oh, that's when they ran from them. When they came out, they start shooting at them, and they take off. Correct. So to my point.

But it made it sound like there was only a couple guys there. They didn't mention that. Oh, yeah, no. Yeah, to my point was that. So the precinct and the DEA, they worked together. Yeah. Had informants in the company, and they knew that. they put a hit on me because the informants told them they put a hit on this cop yeah so so so so so now when

i get the word i went i and it's funny because my recollection gets a little foggy here and and i was i was called to task on some common uh i did it i did um audy lang podcast but with Kenny came on the i did a audio lang lang podcast and Kenny fucking cried and begged i want to do what i want to do want to. So Artie Lang said, I put you on. He says, Mike, can you join us in the middle of the fucking podcast? And I don't want to do it because I don't want to give Kenny any fucking credibility. But for Artie Lang's sake, I said, let me, I'll jump on. And we argue back and forth about, he says, and you didn't do, he says, I don't remember this $700 and you, and you confront them and this, this Mexican standoff in the fucking street. I said, really?

I said, that you weren't there because it happened. I got the 700. He said, well, I didn't get my half. I said, well, if you didn't get your half, I said, well, if you didn't get your because you didn't do anything. What'd you do for it? I ended up fucking chasing a guy down, getting a death threat put on me, pulling him over. I mean, I wouldn't short Kenny 350,

so I don't know that I didn't give it to him, but I'll take his word for it that I didn't. But then he wasn't there, because I think I was working with the Internal Affairs chick, Lisa Breland, she was like, they'd have set me up, but she didn't. She just couldn't do it. She wasn't trying really hard, you know?

But so anyway, so after the threat was made, I found the guy that day on the first fucking day that he put a hit on me I never met the guy in my life I just know he paid us but I knew the description of his car so I went up on Fulton Street

by Norwood under the L and sure enough there's a fucking car I pulled him over and I licensed registration insurance card he turned as wet as his shirt no that's not accurate

he's like oh okay office I get your license registration insurance card and he goes like this and I take the license registration I throw it right back on bang because it was down below me so I throw it right back in his fucking lap I go you fucking fucking put a hit on me

motherfucker he's like now he's like fucking now he doesn't know what to do I just was yeah it's funny because like you're so like you're in it right yeah yeah so I go I was praying he had a fucking gun on him

like I was just like when he opened the glove box to get the like let the gun for an excuse let the gun fall out you know I mean because at this point you put a fucking hit on me I mean I got a win I can't lose otherwise it's over right so well and these guys are

killing people. Yeah, and there's murders all the time. And that's what they do. And that's what they do. So I'm just, I might as well just, you know, if you got a gun on you, I can kill you. And then, you know, we just make a little 95 tag. Put it on your toe and say goodbye. I mean, that's how I, right. That's what you have to. That's what you become. You know, you become it now. You know, it's no longer like you're there, you're there for you. Right. To survive. No, I was the, um, when they did the, what was it, the commission and they're questioning you during the commission. Yeah. The one commissioner asks, you know, were you, did you, did you, At that by this point, so when you start protecting the actual, that organization, she says,

do you feel like you were a police officer or were you a, you know, a drug traffic? Right, right, right. And you were kind of like, hmm. I didn't know what to say. I don't know. I look at my lawyer. I go, what am I tell them the truth? I said, both.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, how does that work? I don't know, but it felt like both. And it was like, that's like, everyone like, only fuck. Can you imagine you ever that? You know, look, they don't get the, they don't understand the mindset of continually getting away with committing crime, what it does to you, like mentally, you, you just, look, when you go to work and you drive a truck and you deliver Coca-Cola every day, and you're going to the same routine and same routine and same routine, and you're, you're underneath the umbrella of the law. Right.

And you're following all the rules, you don't understand what it's like to work or to behave. outside of that and get away with things consistently. Most people, they drive a little bit over the speed limit, boom, they get caught. They're like, I can't believe this. You know, and, you know, but when you are existing outside of that, and you continually get away with it forever. And then when you do get caught periodically, you get out of it over and over again. You get this, the rules just don't apply to it.

Yeah, the gray line. That's what you start believing it. It was a silver, it was a gray line. You started out here, right? And the gray line just kept getting further and further. further away. So like I would start like most people start their day

tie their shoes and go to work and drive down the fucking highway you know stop at the light. Right. I mean I started my day over here. So like stopping at the red light was way over here.

Like that wasn't even an option. Like it you know when you normal people start here and when you start here and this is normal you can't that's harder to do.

It's harder to do normal than you're already over here. here. We can rationalize and justify anything, but that's how it is. Yeah. No, look, look, it's, you know, and this is a horrible example. It's like, it's like when I'm driving on legitimate driver's licenses and other people's names, you know, some homeless guy I interviewed in Idaho, and I've got a driver's license, and I'm driving, the rules don't apply. Right. So I'm getting, am I, you know, are you scared of getting pulled over? No. No. The car's in his name,

the registration. I mean, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, And if I get it, I'll get three tickets into his name and run up all the points. Go to traffic schools. Like, it doesn't apply. It doesn't matter to me. I have tons of money to pay for the extra insurance. I'm driving 95 miles an hour in a 50 because it just doesn't apply. And if I get pulled over, I'll pay the ticket.

Like I'm not, the cop would come to the window and be like, you know, do you know how fast I was going? I was like, it depends on how far long you been behind me. Yeah, when did you start laughing and they just look at you and I go, they'd go, well, why were you going so fast? And I'd go, stupidity? Yeah. And he would look at it and he goes, never heard that one before. And they'd go, well,

alright, I'll be back. Like, they don't know what to do. You know, because like everything I had, like, you're not going to go check at the car and find a warrant. Right. I got that covered. Right.

Like, I'm, you know, so it's just, it's just insane. Like, your thought, and you don't realize until you're sitting in that jail cell and I started looking at myself going, I was a fucking maniac, bro. Like, what am I thinking? Yeah.

Like, how did I? People start telling me things. I did and said and behaved like and I was like I know you're right like and I'm like now I look at it and I think how was I not terrified right yeah I'm driving I'm driving home from work in my corvette going 140 miles an hour down Robert Moses cause Robert Moses nothing causeway uh Jones Beach Parkway and I got a half a kilo in the back of the vet and I don't even have my badge anymore because now I'm on modified assignment. I've got myself to wear I'm on modified assignment, which means that I've gone to the farm. You're almost not a cop anymore,

but I'm still going 140 down the Jones Beach Causeway because, no traffic, and the police vehicle that I've passed, it's plain clothes, so he's got to be a detective, and detectives don't chase speeders but turns out this guy's in the the New York State escaped fugitives program and he just happens to be driving along Jones Beach State Parkway the day I'm blowing by in my fucking 140 mile an hour in my red corvette with a white convertible top you're not noticeable at all you can't you won't see this practically blends in the one that I But the one that I parked in the lieutenant's spot, you know, because he pissed me off because he thought he can bang my girlfriend, and that wasn't going to happen, you know, the biggest

cock, you know, bigger red fucking corvette in the lieutenant spot, you know. So it's just, it never ends. Like, like, put a flag on your back and call yourself, asshole, idiot, or king, whatever you, either way, someone's coming for you. Right. You know, the bright red light shining all the time, you know. Well, so, I mean, look, at some point. point at at some point you guys started like I mean you started you were full time basically giving these guys the drug dealers you're you're giving them escorts right you're like that one time when the they were about to raid the guy's fucking the grocery store where they're selling kilos that made that made me worth my weight in gold oh I'm sure if you

if Diaz said and the Mike was worth his weight in gold so so they're the the cops are about to raid this grocery store where they're selling keys out of the back of the grocery store and you go... You can get pampas and sugars. So he finds out about it. Whips around, comes in, goes into the store to get a couple of beers, goes up to the

counter and you tell... You tell Diaz, right? No. Oh, is that just some cash... When you say that in the thing, I was wondering, like, Diaz is running the cash register? No, this is just... This is just his cash register. You just lean in and say, cut it, cut it, cut it.

And he looks at me, I go, shut it, because I didn't know if he knew what this man died. Right. Or if he knew that I was the mark, you know, because I never met these people. Right. Well, do you even know, you don't probably, do you even know that he knows what's really happening in the back or you know he knows? Oh, he knows. Okay. He got him know.

There's no way. Okay. The guys are walking with bags of money and shit, you know. And he might tell him, go to the back, you know, if someone's new or unaware of what to do, you know. You know, they're coming in with, back then it was shoe boxes filled with money. That's, when you're buying a kilo or two, you know, you're coming in with stacks of thousands like this, you know.

So, and I would be, I'd be like, I can't believe these guys are standing in front of the store with boxes. Like they're standing in front of the store with boxes, shoe boxes. I mean, am I that stupid? You got brand new Nike size 12, and this is a size 8. They must also feel invincible, though. I mean, I've written in stories where the drug dealers were paying FBI agents to, and so they, he was like, oh, I was bulletproof.

Yeah. I felt untouchable. He's like, I'm paying a, I'm paying an FBI agent. He said, he's calling me. He's like, if I meet somebody, I call him up and say, hey, this is the guy's name, run him. He is in, he comes back like an hour later and says, uh-uh, he was arrested two weeks ago. He's currently this. He's current.

Don't work with him. Or they go, he's good. Never heard of that guy. And so, I mean, they feel, not just that. they would have guys get arrested, call the FBI. And the FBI, he's like, and like two hours later, the cops come to him and say, okay, we're releasing you. Yeah.

They just called and say, look, he's a CI. Let him go right now. Yeah. They just, he's like, I've been walked right out. Yeah, it was all the time. So, yeah. But yeah, so I can imagine they felt invincible. But, you know, so walking around with them walking, being pretty obvious.

Yeah. Probably not that big of a deal today. At that point, they think, well, we got Mike. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, well, but I was like the one who told. And listen, you got to tamp that shit down because it's one, it's over the top. You know, I'm trying to, see, because what I'm trying to do is to keep them from getting

on the radar for narcotics. Right. Because if they're on narcotics radar, I don't work for narcotics. I'm a patrolman, right? So I'm trying to keep them off the radar for narcotics. I make a phone call to narcotics on its competition. And the guy on the narcotics says, oh, you mean 522 New Jersey on the corner of Vermont and Newlats? I go, no, it's 521 across the street.

Right. He goes, oh, we're not aware of that one. I go, yeah, well, that's the one. That's the one that's really doing bad stuff right now. I'm like a tell the guy. This is my guy's story. He just gave me the address to. He says, we're in that.

We got that. We're on that one. I'm like, I can't believe. Because my guy complained, my Adam, complained to me. He says, the guy across his street is lower in his breath. So, I mean, I sent cops in there on duty, off duty. We shook the place down, on duty, off duty. We threatened this guy to shut him down, right? And then we'd sit in front of his store and chase

people, so he had no business going on for about a week. Meanwhile, we go around the barque over on Blake and Dumont Avenue and right by Vermont. And there's this is this fucking Jeep, Wrangler sitting there with two guys with beards, you know. So I go, hey, what's going? on guys yeah we're doing a stakeout around the block I don't know where because there's six spots around the block but I know one is mine right so I go around the block and I walked in the store and I fucking picked up two Heinekins they opened up the I don't know if they opened them all they probably did open up the Heinekins put them in a brown paper bag walked out shut it down now walked out the store got in the car

called the beeper because the beeper thing I had to call got no answer I ain't got time for this but this is not good I just saw on the cover around the block I don't know when this is going down they didn't give me the inside

loop on this so that's why I went in by the way so I told it in reverse so I hit the pageer I waited like 30 seconds they didn't call the pay phone back I said I can't do this went inside shut them down left

about a half an hour later we circled back and they got the fucking lights dogs a team of 40 fucking guys going in through in and out of the place so if they didn't find anything they found nothing yeah they couldn't even find salt in the place so yeah so you know I laugh but you know it's it's you laugh you know I mean I shouldn't laugh but it is what you know what I'm saying I I hate when I do podcast and then guys come back and they they he's not even sorry right bragging what you didn't

see me come on the podcast right right and apologize I'm not here for that I'm here tell you the story I didn't try that day no one got hurt right no one got hurt which was the key thing which I always had said to Diaz is if somebody gets hurt if a cop gets hurt I don't mean like he's tripped and broke a fucking right if a cop gets injured doing one of your fucking operations or shot at you know or injured severely I said I'll turn myself in I said I'm not gonna live with that on my conscience right and and if you if you spoke to Diaz if you saw him in the Yeah, he's just a nice guy.

He's just, I mean, he'll kill people if you ask you. Oh, absolutely. Don't get me wrong. Why just survive back to school when you can thrive by creating a space that does it all for you, no matter the size. Whether you're taking over your parents' basement or moving to campus, IKEA has hundreds of design ideas and affordable options to complement any budget. After all, you're in your small space era. It's time to own it. Shop now at IKEA.ca.

I've met that are the nicest murderers I've met and they're just super nice guys you know Johnny A light you know Larry Mazza you know I had dinner with Larry yesterday I know Johnny

I mean I've been out with Johnny a dozen times you know and I mean those guys between the two of them that killed 40 50 people but then the nicest guys you ever want to meet in your life you know I was going to tell you you know the police officer that was it did he take his

his baton or a plunder or something? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just read Volpe. Huh? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. He was in Coleman. Yeah. Was he in Coleman? It was in Minnesota, wasn't he? No, he was in Coleman for a couple of years. I'm sure he'd have been many places. So there was a police officer who had arrested some guy, guys mouthing off, and... They knew this guy. He was a pain in the prick. Yeah, and he was a setup. This guy was a setup. He was constantly baiting the

police. Right. And so he's mouthing off. He's this. I forget, what, would you remember what Volpe's first name is? Anyway, he, fucking cop gets frustrated, basically takes his fucking baton in the police department, right? Right in the bathroom, in the bathroom. Right in the guy's ass. Now, I, you know, and when, so I had met. Yeah, you like that?

I don't think it went that smooth, but, uh, he, uh, but, oh, guys, this is horrible. see this is and so anyway perforated the guy yeah yeah he so yeah so there was there was definitely you know he didn't light candles there was no soft music so um anyway so it was a bad situation right so he ends up of course he gets mad he's fired they bring up charges everything he goes 30 years yeah they yeah they gave him 30 he played guilty in the middle of the trial he's like i i just pled guilty like it was obvious i was going to get it was just going so wrong and when so when we were talking that colman That's how he was going to get 35.

Right. He pleads guilty. In the middle of the trial, he played guilty. Oh, I didn't know that. Oh, he said I was, it was so over the top bad that he said, listening to it, I just. Right. Oh, yeah. Couldn't, you know.

You hate yourself when you listen to what they say. Yeah. Oh, yeah. And he's like, I just, this is so, this is so going so wrong. He's like, I could look at the jury and I could tell. It's over. It's over. And, of course, this is the thing, like, the jury doesn't know what you're facing.

Right. So the jury's like, did he do it? Yeah, he did. Do you believe he did? Yes, I believe it. Okay, they go home and they think, he's probably going to get probation or he's probably going to get five or ten years or 20 years. Yeah, yeah, that's what they think. And then boom, you get 30, you get 35 or 40 years. And they go, what? Now, granted what he did was fucked up. But still, you typically don't give a rapist that kind of sentence. So the point is, is that he ended up in prison, nicest guy. He wasn't, Justin. Justin. Justin. Thank you. Yes. And when we talk one time, I remember I looked at him and I went, I go, bro, I mean, honestly, what the fuck? He's like, I don't know. He's like, I was, you know, you have to understand. You have to be there. You have to be there. And just feel invincible and this was what I was doing and this.

Steroids and all this shit. Yeah, he's telling me all this. And I'm just going, I go, still. And he's like, ah, come on. What are you doing? I said, I'm not trying to make you feel bad. I mean, we're two guys in the library laughing. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

And it's not laughable. It's not laughable. But it's comical for some to actually, you mean you shoved your fucking broomstick or someone's ass? I mean, what the fuck were you thinking? Where did that even, what did that come from? You know the PSI, right? You're pre-sentence.

He said the PSI, the, the, the, um, he said when he, so when you, when you get in trouble. The guy got $7 million and he lived. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, there's no death or anything. I mean, which is not, it's horrific, too. There's no way to justify it, whatever. It is what it is. Deal with it.

So the point is, is when he's doing his PSI, which it means the probation officer comes and they interview you for a pre-sentence report that goes to the judge. So the judge can try and determine what your sentence should be. Well, you are. Yeah, and try and if there any mitigating circumstances, you know, to give you the high end of the guidelines or even the low end, you know. And so they come to him. And so while he's being interviewed, he told me, he goes, while he was being. interviewed by the by the probation officer well I think it was a male

permit he said well he's being the guy starts asking he was like is there any anything in your past like any abuse anything and he said he's looking at him and Justin goes he goes no no no there were there were no funny pony rides in my in my childhood if that's what you asked and I mean it's like a funny pony rides and And he said, I know, my dad fucking was there. My dad was like, funny pony, right? That's like, that's like even strange, dude, are you okay? What is you funny pony, right?

He's like, God, I don't know. It was, listen, obviously, the, the conversations in prison are not like the conversations you have with your buddy that works at Walmart. Clearly, you're dealing with a different. Everybody's done something. Yeah. Or heard of something. Yeah.

Yeah. So he was a little off. Nice guy, though. But I heard. It seemed like I was, of course, I had never been arrested, but now when I think a pony ride, but now when I think of a pony, you know. Yeah, that'll definitely come up. Yeah. Yeah.

I can't see a miniature pony now. So I was the face of corruption. Oh, yeah, yeah. All right. In 92, I get arrested. So I got sentenced to 94. He perforates this guy in 97, right? So the city's just starting to heal.

You got lucky then. Well, I never. I never got lucky. This is the city, yeah, no. The city is just starting to heal from the, from the. from the trauma that I put it through, they changed the whole fucking patrol guide. They had a whole new division,

no, bureau, they call it bureau. They went from Internal Affairs Division to Internal Affairs Bureau, which means it's now, it's, so what that means is they've now created another layer? So it's now it's over. It's over, it's like, so you have the detective bureau and the

Internal Affairs Bureau because it used to be IAD which was a division Right Now it's a bureau So there's nothing above that except But Bureau basically You kind of govern yourself

You self govern right? Correct So before they were division They could be told back off Correct Okay Now they're their own bureau Yeah so anyway

So that I created Thank you And so there's some chiefs That I gave jobs Because they were I'm sure that's how they look at it, too. Probably everybody wants to thank you. One of them I heard, because I hear stories throughout the years.

And one of them says, I finally got a out case. Like, really? Like, like, I got one. Like a Charles Ponzi. A Manson, a Manson. A Manson. A Manson. I got me a Manson. Now you've got a whole thing named after you. It's like Ponzi.

Like, like, Ponzi. Before Charles Ponzi, it was the Peter Paul scam. Now we renamed. We named, renamed corruption after you. Yeah, right, right. They got a Michael Dowd kicks. Something. Yeah, internal affairs. No, why got me and Michael Dow?

Look at the other words, it's going to be a career maker. Right. And that guy ended up getting arrested. The guy that publicly said it got arrested, he got arrested for taking money or, I should even say taking money. I think he got arrested for doing favors on summonses, like cutting people, like, don't worry about it. We'll get rid of the summons.

Like, how small? How small is the fuck? You're really a big shot. got a doubt case. The smallest of cases that they got rid of you for something shit like that. Well, it's like, you know, what's fun. Well, I was going to say, look, sometimes some guys, some guys do insane shit, probably their entire career and never have it come back on them. Some guys do something minor and get caught immediately. Because I was going to say, you went years and years and years doing, not that it's minor. Well, it is minor in comparison.

Well, in comparison. Yeah, a couple thousand here, a thousand here, 500 here. But when you leapt to, hey, give me $8,000 a month, I'm going to watch out for you, I'm going to do this, I'm going to give you the heads up. If I come across it, I'm going to this, I'm going to that, I'm going to escort your guys, I'm going to do this. So you have a whole litany of things that you're doing for this money. Right. You know, that really just, like, that's actually what your partner, what was your partner's name? Kenny, when he was like, he's, he went like within a month from taking like $100 to, boom, we're making $8,000 a week doing this. Yeah, yeah, you think thousand a week yeah

I mean he went from being a normal cop him slipping him like a hundred bucks and then like a month later boom okay here's what we're doing now we get 8,000 what? Yeah. How did it just go from me getting 100 bucks which I didn't even spend? Yeah yeah yeah yeah. I kept it in my locker to eight that but he was a cheap cock sucker I mean he didn't he didn't say nothing

he loved listen so so in hindsight and even at the time I recognized at the time that he could say no right now. Oh yeah yeah and and then everything would be okay like I was not like a serpico situation yeah you know say it's not like I never put him in a situation where he had to do this right because I made a determination that that I was going to be a

police officer for until I get arrested right or quit or or get injured and get three-quarters disability which is what my goal was and so but what happened my goal you get injured because I yeah that's your goal if you get a best case scenario yeah I twist my nose knee. Yeah, no, yeah, bad knee. A slight limp. Yeah, good. Three quarters.

Disability for the rest of the life, tax free. So, yeah, I mean, that's the goal. So that was my goal, and I had it. At any minute, I could have done it because I needed surgery on either knee because both meniscuses were torn from playing ice hockey. So I started out with a, I started out with a pension if I, but the money was so good and I just liked it. Yeah.

I just liked it. I liked going to work. and just being important? Oh, yeah, does that make sense? No doubt, absolutely. I mean, I know, I know, like, I never retired, right? I didn't get a chance. But when I talk to guys, I had retired, like, they're like impotent.

It sucks. They're like, I'm not important anymore. Like, you know, they think they are, but they know they're not, you know. And even their wives hate them, and they get half their pension and they leave them. You know, so, yeah, so I get it now. But at the time, I was faced with choices. You know, if Kenny had told me, I'm not doing it, you know, I'll have a beer with you at Joe's Moldega, but I'm not going to do this. I would have said, okay, and I would have just probably, and I don't want to say this for sure, I would have just went on and did my thing, probably got a pension and left.

But instead I had a- But I got a partner in crime. I had a willing partner in crime, and I said, this is great. Because now I got a guy who's all in, and he was, who's all in. So what happens in the It doesn't really show up in the movie What happens is Doesn't at all show up in the movie

Is Kenny Yerell I know he's a little soft in the underbelly Right And so I end up going away to a fucking rehab You know Because I was in I'm into the You can't have a drug problem In the police department

Because you get terminated So I told him I had an alcohol problem Which all right, whatever And I go up to the rehab And while I was away to rehab I told Kenny, you know, Kenny, I found out a little bit more information. By going into rehab, they came to,

like the counselors, which are cops, said, listen, you're in a lot of fucking hot water from what we know. And you just need to stop whatever you're doing, do your rehab time, and then pray and go to church. This is what the guy said, and go to church every Sunday. I said, okay, young, 26, 25, whatever fuck I was.

Yeah, okay, sure. But I knew a problem could arise from a weak link. So in the meantime, three of my friends get arrested for shaking down a bodega, for doing an armed robbery. So they're out, I put a bail for one and put one in my house. Because his family kicks him out, he's got nowhere to go. And his name is Walter, that big Walter in the fucking,

Big Walter with the big fucking hands. I end up putting them in my house. In the meantime, I tell Kenny, you got to get hurt. It's Fourth of July weekend. It's 4th of July weekend. I'm in a rehab. We just came home from rehab. And Kenny's not getting any patrol assignments

because if you go on patrol, you're going to get hurt, right? Because it's arrest. Every day there's an arrest. But it's 4th of July weekend that everybody's out on details like in Manhattan doing parade duties, all this shit.

So they shoot at manpower. So Kenny hasn't been on patrol in four months, not one day. What's he doing? He's in the station house. Okay. Do paperwork. Yeah.

Paul, answering, clerical shit because they don't want him out there. Fourth of July weekend, they're short. They put him in a car for his first day. He makes an arrest. Some kind of fence was involved, whatever. He grabs the mooch, brings him in, and goes into the bathroom and breaks his hand.

Oh. On the sink. And he already broke it once before. So now he goes, bang! He fucking slams it on the porcelain sink. He breaks his left-handed. He breaks his fucking hand.

He goes in and tells the fucking boss. He says, ah, making the arrest. I got hurt. Grabbing this guy over the fence, whatever. No one gives a fuck. They're not thinking he's under investigation. He needs to get the fuck off the job. He breaks his hand.

He never goes. One day on patrol breaks his wrist and never goes back to work. He gets a three-quarters disability pension. I get it for him because my uncle runs the pension section. Right? He gets medically approved because you can't have a cop with a bad risk that has broken now twice in the last, say, six years. Right. Because now he's going to be shooting a gun.

What if his wrist goes bad in the middle of shooting a gun and kills the kid instead of the old man? You're right. So they approve him medically. Now it's supposed to take a year to two to get released through the pension system. I call my uncle. I say unc.

Kenny was just approved yesterday. He goes, okay, it's going to take 30 days. He goes from the bottom of the pile to the top of the pile, and he's fucking walking out the door and who's walking in? Because you go before the pension board. The pendulum board, boom, approved.

You're done. He's walking out the door. In comes Trimbole, the guy that was following me for fucking years. He even pasted dinner in front of my house, his wife kicking him out the door. He's walking in to interview him. And Trimbole goes, you're out. He goes, I wasn't there, but I was told. He goes, he says to him, what are you doing here?

He says, I'm sorry, Sarge, I got nothing to say to you. He goes, what do you mean? He goes, I'm off the job. I'm retired, three-quarters disability. He goes, I wanted to ask you about doubt. He goes, I'd love to tell you. He says, but I'm not required to talk to you right now. I'm done.

Got to go. And the love to tell you thing was in there, you know? He wanted to tell him. So he leaves. He gets us to recruit his disability. Now he's sitting at home bored. He likes the action. That's right.

He likes the action. He likes the action. So I'm running around now. I've made it through the rehab two years. I went to two years of rehabs. work and then Kenny is calling me up I need fucking some I need some work I need some bricks I need something I didn't know he was involved in fucking drugs right I had no idea was he before or just this is just something he decided to do so what happened was this people

this story is so fucking yeah his cousin was a copy of 7-3 was bringing home shit they were stealing from the drug dealers right it's giving it to Kenny and Kenny was selling it I have no idea so one day he says to me Mike can you help me get a piece of fucking you know big eight you know whatever whatever they want a half a key I go of course I can't so he goes okay anyway I go to his house

to pick up the money and they're there the cops are everywhere like clean clothes so he doesn't know it I go Kenny your fucking house is hot as fucking the pistol he goes what do you mean I go there's cops all over the place here he goes I just left your house and two cops will follow me he goes

how do you know there were cops I said okay I left you house I circled the block they fucking two cops cars was the plane closed follow me twisting going different directions he says Mike they've been following you for five fucking years what's he says this probably still following you I go I don't know Kenny this seemed a little different P.S he hangs up I leave his house I get a car to go to work pick up tequila whatever he gets on the phone I don't know this I'm not there it comes up later on and he's on the phone his phone's tapped he's calling the 17

three precinct to have his cousin run a license plate. The license plate comes back to Suffolk County Police Department. You think he'd fucking tell me. Right. For the next month and a half while they're investigating us, he already knew that Suffolk County PD was following us. He never told me. He didn't change his act either.

He ends up getting arrested. I mean, the things that took place were insane. I get arrested. I get arrested eventually. it was May 6th, 1992. Now, that was the fourth day after the fucking, they burnt L.A. down. Three or four days after Rodney King,

I guess, they're not guilty trial. Yeah, yeah, not guilty. Not guilty, verdict. Yeah, and they were burning the city down, they burned New York City down, they burned, breaking everything up. This whole thing, this is sometime in, let's say, March. He was actually under investigation from January,

which I didn't know. I come into the picture sometime in March. I go away to the Cayman Islands I come back from the Cayman Islands and I want to set up a little bit of an organization where I don't have to do any more work just put my money up let my Dominican friends sell cocaine

and I'm just a part of the business we end up pulling our money together but you're still a police officer Of course. Well I'm sorry that was a given I was like I told you I'm not going to I'm getting out one of three ways

arrested injured or retired one of the three So, so I set up this organization where I don't have to do, just put the money up. So, and it was a difficult time, it was around Easter, and the price of cocaine doubled. It went from 17,5 to 35,000 a kilo. So our numbers kept moving. And so at this point, I didn't want to lay out all of the money, so I encouraged Kenny to come. Kenny goes ahead and he calls up three of the guys from the 73rd precinct and tells them to meet him to put the money.

So now there's three cops from the 73rd precinct, his cousin and two of his... Are putting up money to invest in cocaine. In cocaine business, yeah, of course, yeah, of course. And then you have Kenny, so you have three cops in the 73, Kenny, myself and my partner. I couldn't leave my partner out. I didn't need him, but, you know, he's my partner. If I'm going to be making moves, he's got to get a piece of something, right? So now does five of us involve in this fucking kilo distribution ring, right?

And some other cop gets arrested for steroids. Anyway, so we had this whole thing set up and it's working like a clock. The first week we put 54,000 back in our pockets, which each? No, so 35 is the investment. Okay. We got back 54,000.

Okay. So the next week, it would be 35 and get something similar. But I was a little annoyed. I wanted to be more. I wanted to double the fucking money. I want 70,000. So the next week it's going to be 70,000,

not 54. That's bullshit. So, I mean, you're fucking selling 20 kilos a fucking day. I got to, you know, I want two. Yeah. So you're flipping yours. I want mine flipped along. This is the truth.

This is the way it is, right? Why should I get double my money? I give you 35. I want 70. Can we do this? The answer was yes. So don't give me 54. So next week, anyway, next week doesn't come, by the way.

So in the interim, Kenny's got to pick up a piece for himself to sell. so now he's got this machine going that I set up and he's got to pick up a piece so I got to pick up a I don't know half a kilo or something from somebody in Brooklyn and in the patrol car and I meet him at work the guy jumps in the back of patrol car

and now they got me on film and I'm knowing it I'm knowing something's wrong and like something I'm looking up there's an apartment building upstairs and there's a building over here a rectory church rectory

and I see like it looks Like there's cameras in these windows? Is this possible? You know, like when you know, but you say, no, it's not really happening. No, you feel, you still feel untouchable. It's no way. It's not the camera on me.

The camera's on somebody else right now. Two cameras, one there, one there. And it's funny because in the Model Commission hearings that was where I testified, they show it. Right. They show those angles from cameras of me getting in and out of patrol car and the guy jumping in the back of the patrol cars I drive off and the funny thing was he normally just hand me

the shit I go keep it low like here I am saying keep it whoa because I know like you know and you know and there's nothing you can do like you handle the fucking paperwork in for your fucking fraud and this could be the last

one and you're knowing it like like I'm knowing something wrong and it's like keep that thing low so he plans it Like the seats break in the middle. He hands it through me in the seat. And I was so careful to keep it low that the cameras couldn't see it.

And of course, we're driving, so the cameras are not, they're stationary. Right. I mean, think about what I'm telling you. I know I'm being filmed. In uniform, receiving kilos from a guy that's a Colombian in the... And I just pick it, and I...

It's good stuff. It sucked, but it was better than nothing. And that's... And the price... is a premium. I get the shit. I drive around the block. I meet Kenny. I give it to Kenny and there's a car parked behind Kenny.

And I see the car. Kenny doesn't see it. I see it. He goes home with the fucking package. I do patrol. And I don't get called. Like the whole time there's no radio runs.

me for two days now there's been no radio runs for me so I've been like I'm on patrol and there's no calls for my sector for two days does that ever happen before now never have not even a day no no and I'm isn't by the way I'm in a less busy place now right I've gone to rehab and now instead of going back to the seven five I'm now in the nine four precinct which is heaven anyway heaven for patrol work right oh my god the cat and the fucking tree type thing you know well the drunk polish guy but in the wrong house they go to the wrong house and it's the same house but it's on the wrong block you know they were block off and that's

my night you know so and I'm getting and no calls and then all of a sudden we get a call so what are mine 9 4 Henry 9 4 Henry 10 2 I was like hmm 10 2 why would why would they call us back to the precinct and I look at my partner and we've done nothing wrong here today we've nothing wrong here today. You know, I maybe dropped the care of a kilo. What? No one's business, you know? You didn't tell anybody. I didn't tell anybody.

We're good. So I drive back to the precinct, but I go the wrong way on a one-way street to the precinct, which is the first time I ever did this. I just... But it's just by accident? No, something's not right. I'm driving to my maker right now and I'm like, something's not right. And I see this car

to my... I'm pulling up. to the precinct. Now, the car's facing the tracks. It's one way. The car's facing this way, and I'm pulling up this way. And I look, and there's two guys sitting in the front seat of the car, plain clothes. I'm like, that's a little odd, huh? So I pull in, and I just had gotten two big gulps filled with vodka and seven up. Absolute. Big ones like this. Took a big head off of one. I did a couple of bumps. I was doing good. Right. Get out of the car, I walk into the precinct, and I hear footsteps behind me. And I'm like, I'm like, don't turn around.

This can't be good. This just can't be good news. So it's like, I know I'm walking in to the end. But you, but you know, there's nothing you can do. There's nothing you can do. If it's over, it's over. It's happening. There's no, there's no move you can make during this process that changes anything.

No, except get back in the patrol car and drive to Pennsylvania, Maine, or Canada. Yeah. One of the two. So I'm like, okay. So I woke up to the desk and I go, what's up? So I just said 10-2. And the guy, the sergeant at the desk is like mortified. He goes, go to the captain. He wants to speak to you.

It's set up. This is a setup. He knows he's setting me up. He just doesn't know what to do. No, there's nothing. There's nothing. He's following orders. So he points, we turn around to go to the captain's office.

And up comes these two detectives from internal affairs with their trench coats on and their fucking badges. This is the lieutenant so on. we're taking you for a department ordered drug test I'm like that's all this is perfect my career ends here right it's over I'm gonna go downstairs and change put my shit on my my civilian clothes go take the piss test fail I can go home didn't work out it didn't work out that way but so I'm getting dressed downstairs now that they've ordered this downstairs this is insane

I'm downstairs trying to get dressed and the cop playing close detective is almost humping me he's so close I can't move I'm trying to I go can I am I under arrest I know something's wrong here and I under arrest he goes no why would you say that I said because you're so close to me I can't even I couldn't bend my knee to take my pants off to put my civilian clothes on. He goes, no. So I go, well, would you back up? And now I'm getting pissed.

Would you back up? So he goes like this. So he went from here to here. He gave me an inch more room. Holy fuck, this is serious. Because he's on my shit. So now in my pants is the cocaine. That, you know, because on the right home.

Some cocaine. Yeah, five grams. Not the kilo. No, no, that's gone to Kevin to Kenny. He's got that on. Long Island. I'm trying to get dressed. Can't get dressed.

Now I go to him. Now, you know something's wrong. When I know, I go to him, you think I should take my off-duty revolve? My off-duty revolver? Or leave it? He goes, you can leave it there. You can come back and get it later.

He says to me, he says to me, he's on, wow. You might be all right. I'll be back. Yeah, I'll be back. Get outside, get in the patrol, back in the plane clothes car. And I'm saying, I got to get rid of this cocaine. on me. So I'm like, how am I going to do this? So I go, I look at, there's no handles.

There's no handles and no windows on the fucking door. So I can't even, I can't open a window and I can't open the door. So I go, and I turn around and I look at them. I go, I don't know what this is about, but one thing I want you guys to know is my partner has nothing to do with it. Whatever this is, my partner has nothing to do with it. I want to exploit this kid because I feel bad. I was, he followed me, you know. And I love the guy. And he's my god's, he's the godfather of my kid.

And if I go down, at least someone can survive this, right? Not, but anyway, don't you worry about him. He's got his own things. Now, he's already been arrested for murder and beat the charge. Okay, so that's why we're together. Because no one will work with him and no one will work with me. So this is so much I skipped to get to this point. Yeah.

So now, we're not back of, so how am I going to get rid of this fucking cold? Because God forbid I did get pissed. I might get pinched here, right? So, but God forbid. So you're gonna fail the piss test anyway for cocaine. Yeah, it's gonna fucking light up the fucking... It's gonna line it up. I just took a bump a couple minutes ago, so it's good.

And yesterday, it was good. So I go, I'm gonna smoke a cigarette. They go, okay, yeah, no problem. I smoked that cigarette, and then I smoked another one right behind it. You couldn't, there was a layer of fog inside the fucking car. You guys, can you open a, I want them to open the fucking window.

I mean, it's just like a 15-minute drive from there to Jamaica where we're going to go take the piss test. They didn't open the fucking window once. So I said, okay, no problem. When I get out in Jamaica, Jackson Heights is where the left-wrack city. I'm going over the left-rack city

where the police has their medical office. I mean, you got to understand. Police medical office, okay? Like, they have their own medical division, okay? It's like fucking, because there's 35,000 cops. They have a medical division. They have two floors of a,

of an awful four floors of an office building with like 700 offices in it this it's just it's it's it's massive massive it's a massive bureaucracy and um so i i get out of the car and right there like and i turn around and there's a phalanx a phalanx of brass if you know what brass the guys with the brass on their fucking hats and lieutenants the cur yeah yeah all the all the bosses phalanx of them all the way from the street and it's about 40 50 feet from the street to the entranceway door then there's the entranceway phalanx there's the hallway phalanx and the fucking button opens up on the elevator and there's a look up there's a guy with more scrambled legs on his fucking hat than i've ever seen in my career because he was a chief the chief was standing in front of me

and a deputy inspector both of them like this and they just i just got on the elevator and i turned around and I was standing between them. I don't know who they are. And then the guys that brought me in went up with the sort of was four of us in the elevator. Open up the elevator on the 16th floor, I think it was. And sure enough, another half a dozen scrambled eggs on each side, freelancing me into this.

Did you realize at this point this is for you or you're still thinking this is just coincidences? Is it overwhelmingly obvious? This is here for me. This is, they're doing this. I don't want to, I don't, I don't, I don't, I don't, I, I don't, I, I, I don't, I, I, It hasn't hit me yet. Oh, okay.

Yeah. You just think this is weird. This is weird. Yeah. Because I don't know. I don't know that there's six cops getting arrested. Right. And there's been an ongoing investigate.

Well, you knew there was an investigation. Yeah, but you didn't realize. They were investigating me for five years. You didn't realize it was this massive. How long were they investigating you, right? Forever. Right. Right.

So for five years, I've been dealing with this shit. It's no big deal. Right. This is fake. This is fake. This 147 cops from internal affairs. Right. from internal affairs are on my case.

And I think I'm seeing shadows. I think it's paranoia. But it's not. It's real. But I'm thinking I'm crazy. So now they're all in uniform, phalanx in this place. They open up the door and there's this lieutenant

who's been after me for fucking four years. Because he tried to fucking piss test me out four years ago or five years ago, whatever the fuck it was. And he stared at there with this grit on his face. And he goes, okay, Dad, I got you here. with an H, I forget his fucking name on a fucking smack him. Anyway, because he's a prick. He yelled at me one time, get in here now.

I said, what do you mean get in here now? I'm sick. He was on sick leave. He goes, I'm lieutenant so-and-so in charge of health services. And I, and then he goes like this. And I'm ordering this officer, like he pulls the phone away. And I'm ordering this officer to get in here today by noon. And he's saying he's sick.

I know you're sick officer. I'm telling you to get, like he could. tell it I'm telling you to get in here now he's like could you imagine like he's the can you imagine this guy's to dude all right I'm on my fucking way I get there and they bring me into psych services and I ended up going away to the farm for two years but anyway so he's there now and he's got me he's got to get me to piss because they tried to do it to me before but I fucking beat them see so I beat them and I can't beat this so I'm about to piss I'm I think I'm gonna piss and go home so I take the piss I'm drunk now because they're fucking drunk

Now the drink is hitting me, right? And I'm realizing, ah, it's just going to be over. It's good. I can go home. I can go home and just convilch with the family and say, what am I going to do now with the rest of my life? So here I am.

The guy's finally got me to take the piss test. I piss in his cup. I'm like, I'm happy it's over. You know, we'll see you tomorrow. You know, have a nice night. And I turn around and then goes, and walks these two other guys into this small cubicle area, and he goes, Suffolk County detectives.

And I go, oh, I do a guy. What's up? You're on the rest. for conspiracy to distribute narcotics. I go, oh, okay. I mean, I just say, the nerve of you. I mean, so one of the things is, you know, the newspaper accounts is,

and he just, you know, turn around matter-factly. I'm what if I do a kick and scream and say, go fuck yourselves? I mean, you know, I said, put my hands be on my back. They put the cuffs on me. So now they go to search my pockets. Right. And I got that cocaine in my pockets

that I couldn't get rid of. at fucking the 14 times I tried to move it out and the guy goes oh look at this we got here and I go yeah I got a little problem what I go I got a little of a problem what what you know what else you know so uh so so that's that to that so back of the patrol car now to take me out to Suffolk County because that's where they're booking me see the whole thing here is the city's pissed off right because they didn't get their guy the out of jurisdiction got the guy right you're not because you're not you're not you're in the city

you're not at Suffolk County. I'm not a Suffolk County police officer or anything and they they've had me on their investigation for five years and they couldn't put a pinch on me but Suffolk County has an investigation for three months and they got me you know because they got me because of the Kenney. Well because of the wires Kenny didn't give me up

it was wires that got me and then Kenny on bail puts a wire on and then he gets me. People don't know people don't know how the story actually breaks out but that's how it breaks out. So anyway so telling the story is is exhausting, you know. And how much should we skip

when we tell these stories, right? Like 80% or more of it, right? In fact, I'm working on getting a screenplay done now because they can't get it down. They've been working on it for five years of screenplay to do a movie, a remake movie of the 75 documentary,

and they just can't get it. So I've been through the mill with all kinds of involvement with different people in Hollywood. Right. Frank Scott, who did Get Shorty, I never saw it. You never saw it get shorty?

No, I never saw it. John Travolta, it's a great movie. Yeah, the guy who wrote that was supposed to do it. Then it was Scott Gillespie, a guy named Gillespie who did I-Tanya. I don't know, I-Tanya movie with the Ice Gator girl. The ice skater. Oh, like Tanya for Tanya Harding. Tanya Harding, yeah.

Well, wait, real quick, how much time did you get? I got 14, well, so I ended up getting a 14, 168 month sentence. Okay. You have 14 years. And then you went to, you went to, prison, obviously. Yeah, I went to prison. I started out in, well, I did MCC for two years waiting to be sentenced. When you got grabbed, did you ever get out on bond? No. From Suffolk County, I did. Right. But then when I was out and they set me up to the feds, no bond. I mean, I could have

tried to get bond, but my lawyer's like, dude, you're going to do some time so you might as well start now. Yeah. That's exactly what he said. Yeah. That's sure. Right. Yeah. Unless you're mounting, there's no reason to be out unless you're mounting a defense like you're trying to go to trial. Well, so to be fair, I was going to go to trial because the first plea offer was 24 to 30 years and you know what that's like, you know? I'm like, who the fuck did I kill? Right. You know, so knowing that I was going to do sometime, I, you know, I was shocked to see their first plea they don't call them offers, they call them agreements. Like the first plea agreement was for 30 years. I said, I'm not fucking doing, I'm going to trial.

Might as well go to try and might as well try. So that's what was my approach for the first six months or so. And then they knocked it down to like 24 and then they knocked it down to 17. And I still said, you know what, I ain't doing 17 years without going to trial for it. Fuck it. So I pushed it and pushed it and probably lasted a little over a year. And then the Malin Commission people came to me and said, we'll write a letter to your judge for you if you help us.

and so I turned them down twice and the third time they came to me was shortly after they said I did nine murders in the ghetto and I'm like okay well this is the newspaper you know and

just bullshit I mean I know it's bullshit but I'm saying what where did they come up with that somebody said something they're looking for there's nine murders that they can't figure out

around this period of time when I had a brand new nine millimeter gun and they were all nine millimeter murders I mean at the ghetto everybody gets killed with a nine millimeter but anyway

so they were investigating me and my partner for nine murders specifically me I guess because Kenny's like a good guy and um so it was all the news I'm like listen I didn't do any fucking murders and oh by the way my own commission called again today and and ask it if you could please you know cooperate with them and what were they investigating that what was that commission that task was to investigate corruption in the city and basically just a systematic like mine was whatever and um so I drew them a roadman I showed them how to do it.

They arrested the whole 30th precincty. They called it the dirty 30. They arrested the whole night shift, which is 30 guys on the 30th precinct. We're all in the cahoots. I don't know anybody. I didn't know anybody. But I showed them how to catch me.

Something like you might have done to show what which company. Ethics and fraud thing. Same thing. So I showed them how to catch me. I said, you don't put a sign. Look over here for cash. You know, dude, you got to make it.

The cop's got to be a little more. like surprised or industrious. Don't make it, don't put a sign, check on their fucking ice cubes for cash. They're gonna check. You don't need to tell them, you know? Don't make it so obvious. So anyway, so I gave him a few points like that

and I told them how and how I would do, how I would see a scene and how I would assess it and how I would know I wasn't being set up. So they did what I told them. And they got the whole 30th precinct, they got a couple of the bunch of guys. So now when I went to get sentenced, They wrote a letter to the judge saying that I was honest and helpful.

That's all they would say. Was this sentence in the state or the feds? I didn't have got sentenced in the state because they subsumed the superseding indictment. They made it all one. Right. So make it a RICO case. So I was, yeah. Okay.

So I got the RICO. Yeah. So, uh, so I got a RICO indictment. And I pled guilty to it. So I faced zero to life, based 10th of life. Right. at my sentencing and... Did the U.S. Attorney recommend that you get the low end of the guidelines or anything?

No, no, no, no, no. He was against everything. He was sort of like what you had to deal with when you were through. Like, there was no friend in that courtroom except for the letter. And the judge witnessed my testimony. And even partly to my dismay is some of my sentence, like some of the testimony wasn't very good, you know. Like I stole money from some girl like 300 bucks under the Bible.

The money, the mother hid the money. under the Bible I estimated is there any hidden money in the house that they might have right and she goes well she's on the phone mom you have she goes check onto the Bible so I found it yeah yes yeah it looks like the burglars got it yeah they got it so you know that's a real shitty thing to do you know right but part of my justification well we all do shitty thing yeah part of the justification was listen you don't explain to me I know but but you know people that they hear that like how the fuck can you do that well you know

I got a partner next to me that's that's that's threatening me right now. He's like, you fucking set me up. The last job, there was $11,000 in cash. You fucking missed it. You had it in your hand. I said, take it easy, dude. I'm not looking for someone's fucking savings. I'm looking for bags of cash like this. I'm not looking for a fucking, yeah. I'm not looking for a knot of $11,000 that someone saved. That's a lot of fucking money. I said, no one isn't. Not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for 30, 40, 50 grand in 20s. Not someone's little life savings stack. Right. So anyway, so long story short I ended up the next chance I could to get some money I did you know it was a couple three

four hundred dollars whatever we took from under the girl's Bible which was horrible and and for what I'm saying is when I got sentenced to judge said you know mr. down you know all the things you were very helpful but you know but you know taking that three hundred dollars from the fucking Bible with the girl you know was not a very I said I'm gonna say right she was she was letting it know that she was aware of that you know yeah yeah that being said they said you were very very helpful. I was going to give you a sentence to the top end of your guidelines, which were in 15 and a half years. She said, instead, I'm not going to give you, I'm going to give you right in the middle, which was 168 months. So, so essentially,

she says the Malin Commission helped me. I'll take her at a word. She could have given me more because they wanted to give me more. Right. You know, I'm sure they, they probably would have given me more if I didn't testify with the Malin Commission. But I gave there a hard time in being because I said, I said, you don't give a fuck about me or anybody else. I said, You're going to have a bunch of cops kill themselves. If I testify for a Mallon Commission, a bunch of cops are going to, sure enough, 17 cops, I think. 12 cops killed himself right after I testified

for the Mallon Commission. So she gave me 168 months, right in the middle of the guidelines, she said, because of, she felt that I was instrumental in helping the New York City Police Department create the changes that they needed to make the improvements that they desired. So it was positive in the end, you know. But it wasn't something that came easy

because I was not too, because I was concerned that they didn't give a fuck about people killing themselves, you know, and they didn't. And they plan out said to me, we don't care. I said, what about their families? Their wives, their children. And the response was, that's too bad. Like, that's, it doesn't enter into the, it's, you know. Yeah, it's just, it's, no, no, nobody leaves.

They're expendable to. Listen, the, the U.S. attorneys, and I've seen these guys left and right, like you got some low-level crack dealer who gets 15 or 20. 20 or 25 years or 30 years. I knew a kid that was 19 years old, home sitting on his couch, his brother comes in, you know, the reverse thing is, comes in and says, bro, I need you. We had a guy that was going to drive the car. He's not going to drive the car.

The kid's never been in trouble before. Says, we need you to drive the car. And he goes, for what? And he's like, we know a stash house. There's money in the stash house. We're going to go, money and drugs. We're going to rob the stash house. Right.

And he's like, all you can do is drive the car. We're going to run out. We're going to come back in. It's here. And he's like, it's nothing. You're not even involved. Right. And he's like, come on, man.

I need you. He's like, okay. So he goes, we're going to give you a couple hundred bucks. So he jumps in the car. He drives. The two guys, the brother and the other guy, jump out of the car to go in. They don't even get in the stash house. The cars pull up.

Run out. You know, get on the ground. Get on the ground. Get on the ground. he doesn't even realize the kid is so scared he doesn't even realize he goes i don't even know it's dea right he said i think we're being robbed he said they start shooting i ducked down i hit the fucking gas he drives forward um hits another car then he they start shooting at the car he jumps out and runs from the car his brother has already been shot shot and killed by the way so they killed

his brother of course pulled out they pulled out guns they got shot yeah they got shot the kid starts running they shoot the kid the 19 year old kid blow his from his knee from his leg from the knee clean off that's gone wow he hits the fucking ground um well he loses the leg or half the leg he ends up getting sentenced

for his brother's murder right because you know how it works doesn't matter that someone dies you're trying you charge of three of us were you know he's like I was just driving the car no you were your conspiracy to break in it was a reverse thing. There was never any money in the drug house. It was just setting up the brother. Brother brings him. Kids never been in trouble. He pled guilty. He got 30 years.

Because he was going to get life because of the murder. Because the murder. Murder that I didn't get. You killed him. It doesn't matter. You knew they had guns. You knew what was going on. He gets 30 years. And I guarantee that that kid probably had they not presented him with that he would have never probably ever done anything. He did, he was just driving. And I'm telling you right now, that U.S. attorney slept like a baby that night. Like, you could given that kid five or ten years. I'm not saying you shouldn't have gone to prison. You can make you point. Right, right. But that's it. It's over.

Yeah, these guys are. Now the taxpayers have to pay for this. These are. They're heartless. They're heartless people. They really are. But I mean, and that's just, you know, that it's over and over and over again. And they don't. Listen, I want, you know, I hate to be political because my politics, you may not, I mean, they go after this guy, Roger Stone because he, because they don't like him. I mean, they're after him again.

Yeah, yeah. They're after him again. Yeah, I saw that documentary too. They were after him again. He's great. He's, I love him because he's crazy. Yeah, he's odd. He's an odd ball. Yeah. That's what makes this work around.

People like him. Yeah. Now, I'm not saying you can agree with him or disagree with him, but there's no they got 28 fucking guys going after a guy because he fucking, he signed his name rule on a form? Yeah. I mean, they're all over him. I was, you know, I also wanted to mention that it's funny because whenever I say anything about the U.S. attorney, look, let's face it, 99% of the inmates that,

They're guilty. They're guilty. You know, the sentences are just dracony. They're outrageous. They're insane fucking long sentences. Well, they're designed to make people cooperate. Right, of course. That's the reason.

But if you're the last guy on the totem pole, you're just done. You're done. You got nothing. Yeah. Well, you know, the thing, you know, and look, let's face it, mostly you've been to prison. You don't want, I don't want to live in the neighborhood with these guys. No. Like these are not nice guys.

No, no. Most, yeah. Yeah. But you see, I mean, the murders are the nicest guys in the joint. Yeah. Normally. They are. Yeah.

And they have the load of recidivism rate. That's as, and recidivism as far as once they get out, like, they never kill anybody. Very seldomly does somebody get out and kill somebody again. No, no. No. No, Stone called killers. Yeah, but that's a far and few in between. Most guys, it's an accident or they did kill somebody. Right. But they're not, you know.

Yeah, but most of the guys involved in the drug. It's so horrible. The drug trade brings violence. Of course. He's a great guy. But, you know, yesterday he killed three people. I mean, but meanwhile, he's making love to. And he's raising kids.

He's loving this woman, or three of them. And he's raising kids. I mean, it all is a perspective, you know. He has a great daddy. Yeah. Just not a good business guy. So right now there's a documentary. You refer to it as a movie a few times,

but it's a documentary that you're hoping gets turned into a movie. Right. So right now, Ben Stiller has been added on to be the, the director so it's it's this is now five years in the making okay right so it's gone through several it's gone through several like Gillespie who directed it ton i tanya i think anyway and another two or three directors have had it and now ben stiller is has it uh him and and and a few people it's it's they can't get they can't get the story right right for film i got the story for film because i know i mean just picture the scene of all these fucking scrambled eggs

He's like fucking blind a day I got arrested. And that's, you can start in the beginning or the end of the middle. That could be the middle of the movie because the beginning of my movie is when I come home from prison. That's fucking heavy. Right.

I mean, think about the day you got released. Now, I don't know about you, but I'm going to give you a scenario and we'll end on this because there's so much we can talk about. Coming home from prison, right? So we'll end on this. I come home from prison

with much to do, by the way. Newspapers, all this other shit, You know, bullshit. What year? 1990, no, 2004. April, I think, 2004. You think I'd remember the date, but I don't. I think it was April 13th, but I'm not sure.

Right. So, because that was the only day I slept. That was the, that was a, I shouldn't say only, I slept every day, but the first day I overslept in my entire prison fucking time was the last day. They had to wake me up. Like they knocked up, they want your shit. Yeah. the guys are waiting for your shit

you want your sweatpants your snaking your cups you fucking not you know you give away your stuff because I don't need my prison sweatpants and my sandals yeah you need that you take you get it out on the way out

so yeah so they have to wake me up so so it's like a fucking log I guess and so when I when I get home after a couple days at the halfway house

you get a pass to go see your family so I had a four hour pass to go see my family so the scene is fucking unreal I'm going to my parents Now, I'm a man who had four homes

and a condominium on the ocean in Myrtle Beach. I had money out of every pocket and you know it's led to live life and here I am I got nothing and I look I'm going to take a shower

I just want to take a shower I want to take a shower where no one's standing out the door you know when no one's waiting for me to get out you know I just I want to get my own little fucking thing so I look out the window and there's my brother's two kids

who I don't even know their fucking names I don't even know their names but and it hit me that the world has passed me by oh yeah it's passed me by i don't think i belong here so i go to get in the shower this is fucking you know 12 years in prison i get in the shower and it lets go i don't know if the fucking tears or the water is wetting me i'm so fucking just everything's coming out i'm crying so hard that I'm saying to myself, you are crying so fucking hard right now. And it just didn't stop.

I mean, I don't take, three minutes shower. I'm a three minute in, out, fine, got to go, things to do. 20 minutes in the shower with this fucking water hitting me and tears hitting me, and I'm not sure if it's the tears or the water. And I'm thinking the whole world has changed. And I'm not really ready for this. I don't know what to do. I don't know where to begin.

I went to prison. I was picking up $54,000 the day before I went in, you know, Was I going to Myrtle Beach Or the Bahamas this week Or Vegas that week And here I am I don't even have money for a sandwich If I walked out the door

And I didn't want to be I wanted to go back to prison Oh absolutely I wanted to go back Because I didn't even know how to walk across the street I didn't have to cross the street It was fucking

I was like And then the fucking press following me I didn't want to fucking Like when the hand goes up To walk across the street street you stop go walk I didn't want to break the fucking rules but not because I could give a fuck about walking across the street illegally but these motherfuckers take a picture down breaking the rules already I mean this is yeah this is anyway

so that's how I lived it but come a long way right now I'm still working on my book which is forever I've probably written four times now different people had writers come on legit writers guys that have four or five books I don't know what happened they had treatments together then they say oh that story's been told. Really? You told my fucking story? Who told my story? They don't, you know, so I don't know what's going on. And then, so, yeah,

a lot of stops and starts. And, you know, you know, it takes forever. It takes a long time and there's no one really reaching out. You know, no one's like looking to help you. Yeah. I lost a job making $100,000 a year because this documentary came out about my life. So it's been a lot of stops and starts, but the good thing about it is, overall

I'm okay. I'm okay. Life is good, you know? Yeah. And you heard me say that? Like I hear people complain all the time. And I'm like, it's fucking amazing out here. All I have to do is remember laying in my bed,

my bunk in prison. Anytime I start to feel stressed out or upset about something, and I immediately just go, what are you doing, bro? You live out of a three foot by 18 inch by 20 foot or 20 inch locker. With a tuna you were fucking big dog.

Right, right. Exactly. Like, this is good. And the worst day out here It's better than the best day in person. It's all good. Yeah. It's okay.

I lived in someone's spare room for over a year. An ex-girlfriend. An ex-girlfriend's spare room with her two kids and her husband. I live in my ex-girlfriend's house right now. And she don't want to get rid of me. Yeah. Because I'm good to her. Yeah.

There's nothing intimate. Yeah, yeah. You know, my girlfriend and her are friends. My girlfriend comes from Canada. She flies in, she stays at my girlfriend's house with me. Yeah. And right now we're in clear. would have staying in a condo.

My new girl, my chick, Jess would stay in the spare room with me at my ex-girlfriend's house, not that there's anything there, but yeah, she, Stacey loves me. I help take out the garbage, I put up shelves, I change light bulbs, I do whatever. She's got a guy around, she trusts. And her husband loves me because I put up the light bulbs, I change his shelves, like, oh, the groceries, where's Matt? Yeah, yeah, right. Ask I'm watching this, you know.

Yeah, yeah, so. It works. Yeah, but it's, it's so good out here. Keep my bill small now. And it's funny, like, dead broke now, like most of the time I barely making my bills every month, never been happier. Didn't realize how unhappy I was with money. Chasing it. Until I had no money.

Exactly. And realizing. This is good. This is a good life. I keep my shit small. I stay within my means, you know? I don't need to go to the Bahamas this weekend. I'd like to.

If someone wants to send me a fucking ticket, go right ahead. Yeah. Otherwise, I'm not going. People are like, oh, you don't care about money. Let's not get crazy here. I'm not an idiot. No, no, no. I want to make money.

Oh, yeah. But I know that it doesn't really mean that much. If I never, if I never do better than I'm doing right now, I'm good. I'm okay. Yeah. I have nothing to complain about. Right. Right.

Yeah. I'd like more, but I don't really want more or need more. Right. I'm not willing to do anything to do everything over the line to get it. It's not necessary. Right. It's not necessary. It's just too, it's too good out here.

But thanks for having me in. I really appreciate it. Yeah. I appreciate to meet you. Your story's interesting as well. Yeah. Sorry. Yeah.

but I did finish my book Shark in the housing pool you can buy it on Amazon yeah is it okay yeah bro you gotta you should throw me a copy for coming here I actually will I'll grab one all right so that's it

so if you like the interview if you like the channel subscribe hit the like button share the video leave a comment for the algorithm and I'll see you the Mike Dowd Instagram Twitter

and Mike Dowd to Michael Dowd on Facebook. So say hello, leave a message, follow. Actually, yeah, and I'll put all the, if you send me the links, we'll put all the links in the description too. Good. And that's it. And good luck with getting the movie made. We're going to talk about it. We're going to talk about Larry and the whole thing. All right. See you.