The Jordan Harbinger Show - 674: Ken Croke | Undercover in an Outlaw Biker Gang Part Two
Episode Date: May 26, 2022Ken Croke is a retired ATF agent who worked undercover for years to bust numerous criminal organizations, and is the co-author of Riding with Evil: Taking Down the Notorious Pagan Motorcycle ...Gang. [This is part two of a two-part episode. Make sure you've had a listen to part one here!] What We Discuss with Ken Croke: How did Ken (and his wife, who was also a federal agent) keep their undercover lives separate from their home lives without jeopardizing either? Working undercover over the course of two years, what were some of Ken's closest calls that almost compromised his cover -- and possibly his life? How is evidence gathered in a way that will hold up in court without blowing an undercover agent's cover? What signals that it's time for an undercover operation to end? Does Ken worry about what his former gang associates might do if their paths should ever cross again? And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: jordanharbinger.com/674 See Jordan (with Ryan Holiday) Live in L.A. June 13th!: Go to jordanharbinger.com/tickets for more info Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
This episode is sponsored in part by Conspiruality Podcast.
You know how I'm always talking about critical thinking and spotting manipulation?
Well, there's a podcast that's all about dismantling new age cults, wellness grifters, and
conspiracy med yogis, basically the wild overlap of spirituality and misinformation.
It's called the Conspiruality Podcast.
The hosts, a journalist, cult researcher, and a philosophical skeptic, dive deep into how
this stuff spreads, from Project 2025 and the Heritage Foundation's dystopian vision of the future
to how former leftists get pulled into far-right conspiracies.
An interesting episode to check out is called Speaking Truth to Goop,
where Jen Gunter breaks down the pseudoscience behind the wellness industry
in a way that is super entertaining and eye-opening.
It's sharp, funny, and makes you a lot harder to fool,
which, if you listen to this show, you know I'm all about that.
From exploring cults to analyzing our cultural and political landscape,
the Conspiratuality Podcast will help you stay informed
against misinformation and resist fear tactics.
Find Conspirality on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and wherever you do.
get your podcasts.
Coming up next on the Jordan Harbinger show.
You don't go into it known as two years.
It could be two minutes.
You know, listen, I didn't sign up for a two years on the cover deal.
That's just what it turned into.
And most of the, or a lot of these, as they're progressing along, get stopped for different
reasons.
One, something's going to happen where you have to come out of roll and stop it.
Number two year cover does get blown.
It happens regularly.
Like, there's so many things that can happen that would stop it.
The fact that very few of these run for two years, you're always always.
kind of just seeing how it's going to play out. And that's where, you know, some of this
dumb luck comes into it. And people always think I'm making light of it, but it is a fact.
Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories,
secrets and skills are the world's most fascinating people. We have in-depth conversations with
scientists, entrepreneurs, spies, psychologists, even the occasional drug trafficker, money laundering
experts, or astronaut. Each episode turns our guest's wisdom into practical advice that you can use
to build a deeper understanding of how the world works and become a better thinker.
If you're new to the show or you want to tell your friends about the show, and I always
appreciate it when you do, our starter packs are the best place to get started with that.
These are collections of our favorite episodes organized by topic that'll help new listeners
get a taste of everything that we do here on the show.
Topics like negotiation and communication, influence, activism, resistance, failure and resilience,
investing in financial crimes, and more.
Just visit Jordan Harbinger.com slash start or search for us in your Spotify app
get started. Hey, special announcement, by the way, I'm going to be doing a live show, like live,
in person, in real life. I'm going to be interviewing Ryan Holiday, author Ryan Holiday, that's going
to be in Los Angeles at the Venice West on June 13th. So tickets are available. I'd love to meet you
in person. Tickets are available at Jordan Harbinger.com slash tickets. Again, Jordan Harbinger.com
Slash tickets. June 13th at the Venice West in Los Angeles, I'll be interviewing Ryan Holiday,
and I hope to see you there.
Part two with Ken Croke, who went undercover in the Pagan's Motorcycle Club.
Crazy episode.
If you haven't heard part one, stop this one right now.
Go get part one.
You've got to start from the beginning.
Stories are absolutely bonkers.
Here we go.
Here's part two with Ken Croke.
Did she work on that case where it turned out to be a firefighter the whole time?
Burning buildings down for like 20 years?
Actually, that was me.
That was you.
Oh, okay.
Yeah.
My degree is in accounting.
So when I first started on the job, they put me in arson group because a lot of arson work is based on money.
Insurance fraud, right?
Yeah, so I was a brand new agent and myself and Glenn Lucera,
L.A. Fire Department arson investigator started that case,
and we initiated that case and worked it through.
I was going back forth to the academy, so others were involved as well.
But yeah, that guy was one sick individual.
You think of arsonists as weird solo crazies,
because you got to love burning something down that might hurt a lot of people,
does damage to people's stuff, ruins people's lives.
There's almost no kind of real obvious upside for it.
If you own the building, man, yeah, you do some insurance fraud.
You get it.
But if you're just burning down someone else's building, it's just pure crazy.
For most of them, it ties back to like a sexual deal.
It's, yeah.
Oh, it's even more weird.
Yeah, there's a lot of studies to it.
But this particular individual, he was probably the most prominent in California arson
investigators because he wasn't just a firefighter.
He was an arson investigator.
And I'd work scenes with him.
Oh, wow.
He's probably one of the top five in the country.
And he was starting these fires.
And, of course, we'd go out work scenes and work grids to look for devices.
and he was always the guy who found it.
So in retrospect, you're like, oh, I wonder why.
Now I know.
Yeah, look, it was under this chair the whole time.
How did you find that?
Well, definitely, yeah, if you put it there.
Right.
But, I mean, he was responsible for the deaths of more than one individual, you know,
through these fires and some, you know, horrible, yeah, grandmother and her granddaughter
both were killed.
So, yeah, he's right where it needs to be.
Yeah, it's horrible.
How do you manage the undercover work you were doing with kids?
Because on the one hand, you almost get blown up with a huge explosion when this bomb maker
in the book, right?
but how do you tell your kids, hey, I'm not going to be around for a while, but also I can't
tell you what I'm doing, especially when they're teenagers. Like, they kind of know, but then you got to have
rules, right, for explaining this sort of thing. You can't be kind of hot and cold with it or it won't
work. We always tried our best to keep a low profile with our neighbors about what we did. Not to say
that some didn't know. I mean, you're walking out of your house at 4 o'clock in the morning because
you're going to do warrants. People are going to figure things out. Yeah. But we kept a very low profile
when it came to that. And we also had raised our kids, like, don't talk about what my mom
and dad do. And if any conversation you hear, you know, keep it here because they're sensitive. And
they were pretty good about it. But this was a little bit different. This was like, hey, dad's gone.
When he comes home, you know, like my wife would be the first one to tell you, when you came home,
you weren't really home. In retrospect, thinking back, how could I possibly have been home? Because
sometimes it was more stressful being away from the gang because you didn't know what was happening.
And then you had to re-engage with them where it was easier when you were just with them day in a day
out and you could see how things would develop. And then they would hear, unbeknownst to my wife and I,
they would hear conversations that we would have as kids do. You know, you think they're asleep or they're,
and that came out when I was able to get home and I went to one of my daughters, my youngest daughter's
hockey games. And I saw, and I was supposed to be the head coach of the team, but, you know,
that was before I had agreed to do this case. And so I was over by the bench and one of the girls
that said, hey, you know, coach Ken, we haven't seen you in a while. I'm like, yeah, I'm sorry,
I've been working. She's like, oh yeah, we heard you were at a party with Roblock.
Oh, God.
And I was like, holy shit, this is a big deal.
Like, if that name gets out and gets, you know, somebody post something, whatever it is,
your whole identity is gone.
And so, like, simple things like that.
And so, you know, we talk to kids.
And my wife and I were also like, hey, we got to go to the garage when we talk.
We just cannot talk about this in here because they're hearing us.
Dang.
You must have had to have, like, a baseball or whatever, soccer meeting.
Like, hey, you can't tell your kids about this.
I know you know some stuff and you hear some stuff.
like this will get me killed or worse. Did you have to manage that somehow? The folks that,
I'm sure they speculated the parents of players or whatever, but I never told them anything.
Now, they could see, I look like a shitbag. And when I was at games, you could see parents from
like the other team looking like, who's the shitbag, you know, over there watching the game.
And it used to infuriate my wife because my wife would be like, I just want to scream out. He's a
federal agent because... And he's keeping you safe. And she's like, we go in the supermarket and
people look at you like you're a dirt bag. And at one point, I was in a
bank. I was in the bank and came out and I took a phone call staying out front. I got jacked up
and thrown the back of a cruiser just because I lay a learn there was a guy who did an armed robbery
and he was like five foot one. I'm like six three. Like he didn't look anything like me,
but I still ended up getting jacked up and thrown in the cruiser. So, you know, stuff happens
and you know, you just kind of reflect back. You're like, why am I doing this again? Yeah, you would
second guess it. I mean, the undercover life has to spill into your home life a little bit even in addition
to that. I would imagine you can't be with a bunch of guys talking about violence, drugs,
misogynist stuff, and disgusting activity, and then come home and be a model citizen at home.
I assume the language, at least, the foul language, is at the least of that has to spill over into
your home life. And then you're just like, wait a minute, wait a minute. I can't do that in front of my
kids. Now, my wife would say to me, she's like, hey, we can't lose you to the dark side.
So we were talking one night and I was describing somebody. And so I'm like,
you know, the dude who puts peanut butter on his balls and his dog licks him off. And she's like,
do you realize what you just said? She goes, you say that like you're describing something
with blonde hair. That was your description. You didn't even bat an eye, like, you didn't even
think that was weird. She's like, you cannot turn into one of them. And I'm like, I'm not.
She just said, that's the thing that pops in my head when I think of this idiot. Yeah.
That concerned her. And she always, like, was there to try to level set and be like,
hey, remember, keep a foot in reality. Right. Obviously, I did and it all worked out. But
To your point, it does give you a different view, for sure.
When you say get lost to the dark side, does that just mean it degrades the way you talk
and act as a person?
Or are there agents that are like, you know what, this criminal life, I'm making a lot
of money, screw this police thing, this is great.
I mean, does that ever happen?
I don't ever think it's for the money.
I think maybe the lifestyle.
So we've lost people to the dark side.
Like they quit law enforcement?
Is that what that means?
Not so much.
No, but they change.
And their personality changes.
Ultimately, they're not able to survive on the dark.
the job anymore because of choices that they make afterwards. And so ATF made a real concerted effort
to really monitor that. So like when I was in, I had to every six months go see a shrink.
So they level set before you go in and then every six months you get evaluated. Now, it's problematic
because you've got to come up with an excuse to disappear. But you go and they would evaluate you
and I assume if they saw something wrong, they'd be like, hey, you got to pull them out. I always joked.
And I'm like, okay, if I can fool 2,000 pagans, I'm pretty sure I can fool one shrink.
But my shrink friends say, no, they're smarter than that, and they'd be able to detect it.
So I don't know the real truth.
I didn't go to the dark side.
So I don't know.
But they do put a lot of effort into making sure that those who are doing this stay healthy
and stay entrenched in where they're at.
And when they come back out, they give you a transition period to get back into a normal life again.
I know you said that there's cover teams nearby where possible.
Obviously not when you're in the top of a 40-story building in the projects or whatever if you can't do that.
But a lot of this biker stuff, man, you're out in the middle of what sounds like, just like a, in the middle of the desert, in a campground at best, or in the woods somewhere.
I mean, you can't just have a police van with tinted windows parked on the side of the road anywhere near this thing, right?
No, no, you can't.
And so other than one exception in the entire two years, I never wore a wire because there were times.
So church is where they do all their secretive meetings and where they do their criminal planning
and things like that.
So they refer to as church.
When you go to church, and this is because they learned over the years on criminal prosecutions,
that there's ways through cell phones that you can monitor cell phone batteries, blah, blah, blah.
So there were no electronics allowed in church at all.
Most cases they had RF detectors, so RF picking up a frequency of a transmitter.
They would want you to make sure that you didn't have any transmitters on.
And there were times where we had to strip naked and we'd be sitting, these are some ugly people, man.
And I'm just sitting in church naked, you know, having our meetings so that they knew nobody could have had a wire on.
Wow.
And so even if a cover team was around the corner, then I'm going to know anything happens until way in.
Maybe they see your body getting dragged out.
I don't know.
Yeah, exactly.
But in most cases, they were way too far away anyways.
I mean, there's times miles, miles away.
So they always joked it was the body recover team, not really a cover team.
But these cover teams, if they get too aggressive and they're too close, they can actually burn you much more than you can burn yourself.
So you have to have trust in those folks that are out there and they know.
And I'd much rather, I'd rather work my way out of something than have somebody come gangbusting through thinking they're helping me when they're not.
Did your cover team ever get you in trouble or come close to it?
There was only, it's pretty amazing for a two-year investigation.
And I will caveat this.
So when you were at certain events, like if I went to a mandatory, which a mandatory is,
prospect, worst experience. We could talk about that. But there was law enforcement there. Everyone was
there. And they knew law enforcement was there. And so they'd be flipping them off, posing for
photographs, because they knew the cops were all watching it because it was known that these events
were happening. So like, anybody could be there. There's no problem. But there was a night when I was
buying a couple ounces of crack cocaine off a hog man in his... As one does. Yeah. Just a regular
Friday night. And his source came and delivered the crack cocaine. And so pay
him did, you know, I think we were done. And a not so bright supervisors in a crime
Vic and got way too close. The classic police card that every kid recognizes from age 15
through the rest of your life, yeah. Exactly. Like, if you're in that, just go to like the
local coffee shop and have a coffee because you're not going to help anyways. But anyways,
this clown got way too close. And this guy calls back to Inwas Hogman and what's by the
crack from. He calls back and he goes, hey, cops are all over me. Something's up. Your place
heated this up. You know, what's going on over there, blah, blah, blah. And so Hogman's saying this
to me. And I'm like, hey, fuck this guy. He's clearly got the cops on him. He brought him to him
tell him he better not bring his ass back anywhere near here. Just tell him to keep freaking driving
or they jack him up, bed and keep him all shut. And so just put it back on him. And we had
several transactions and we didn't need to deal with him again. But when I met the cover team,
yeah, I met him at me like three in the morning to give him that crack cocaine. I lit in,
hey, who was that? Who was in that car? They should never be out here again. And unfortunately,
it was the supervisor. So they kind of had to be out there. So yeah,
Oh, man, it sucks because it's the classic boss maybe doesn't really know what the guy in the
ground is dealing with, except for, instead of like, oh, you messed up a week of work, it's like,
oh, you got three people killed or you got me murdered in front of my colleagues and ruined,
or just ruined the whole case where I was undercover for years with these guys.
Right.
No, that's exactly it.
The amount of time, blood, sweat, and tears that go into this.
And listen, there's things that happen.
That's why people are always like, oh, whatever made you decide to do it, two years.
year under cover. You don't go into it known as two years. It could be two minutes. You know,
listen, I didn't sign up for a two year undercover deal. That's just what it turned into.
And most of the, or a lot of these, as they're progressing along, get stopped for different
reasons. One, something's going to happen where you have to come out of roll and stop it.
Number two year cover does get blown. It happens regularly. Like, there's so many things that can
happen that would stop it. The fact that very few of these run for two years, you're always kind
of just seeing how it's going to play out. And that's where, you know,
some of this dumb luck comes into it.
And people always think I'm making light of it, but it is a fact.
Yeah, I've heard, I've had other undercovers on before Jack Garcia, who infiltrated the
mob, he was with the FBI.
And he basically just abruptly had to stop because one of the guys he was with saw somebody
he hated at the mall and picked up like a glass centerpiece and hit him in the head
with it.
And he's like, well, if he hits him again, that guy's going to die.
And I'm standing right here and we're at a shopping mall.
And so he was like, what are you doing?
and he like basically, I think I can't remember the exact details, but I want to say he stopped the guy or he arrested the guy right there and was like,
got to pull the rip cord because this idiot is an impulsive dumbass and I can't let this guy get beat to death.
Another criminal actually, you know, it's unfortunate. Like you can't let this guy get beat to death in front of me because laws.
Yeah. And there was a couple times, there was one night that I was a sergeant arms and there was another sergeant arms and two presidents and we were heading over to see a president of a support club.
it got heated.
We were going back, and the two presidents were like, we're going to kill.
We're going to stab him.
And we were up on the rooftop of a motel.
And they wanted to toss them between these two buildings.
It was like a three-foot gap.
And they're like, we're going to stab them to throw them between these two buildings.
And so it's like 700 of their gang members in this hotel.
And I'm like, there's no way that I can let this happen for sure.
And I've got a gun with six rounds.
And that's not going to do me a whole lot of good.
And so I'm looking around on the rooftop, and I see some blue flashing.
lights way off in the distance. And I'm like, how do I get their attention? Anyways,
long story short was I was able to use their own rules back on them, you know, to kill a president
of another club. You've got to have Mother Club to bless off on that. And I'm like, hey, we got to
go back and get Mother Club. We were at a mandatory. So I was like, we got to go back and get
Mother Club to bless off on this. One of the president was like, fuck that. We're doing it anyways.
The other president was like, yeah, he's right. Let's go. We'll go. And by the time, we went,
got there. Everyone kind of cooled off, talking Mother Club. And they're like, no, there's other ways we could
handle it, some bottom lies we were able to avoid it. But like at that point, there's no choice I was
going to have to come out of Raw. Oh, man. Good thing you were such a good student and you memorized all
these little bylaws that they have, right? You had to pull, you could have been a lawyer.
Yeah. Sorry, subsection four says, we have to get sign off on this. Ah, you're right. He's right.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Man. Use their own stuff back against them. I know eventually they put a female
agent in as your girlfriend, which seems like a good idea because then at least you're not alone, right? So maybe
if they got a female agent coming in as your girlfriend, she's just like another set of eyes.
What other benefit is there aside from that?
You know, in a lot of these cases, they would do that.
When you cycle somebody in and out as a girlfriend, in this particular case, there was a couple
things.
One is you've got a lot of these women who, like, not the undercover, but a lot of other women
involved in the case, old ladies are hangarounds or what have you, and they're going to be
hitting on you all the time.
And so, like, at some point, you know, if you don't have a girlfriend or a boyfriend or a
wife or something out there, you're only going to be able to say no so many times before it's
going to start looking weird. It kind of goes back to like the, here's the new guy in, oh,
he's not interested in women, he's not doing drugs, he's not doing, you know, alcohol and all
a sudden. So it just doesn't look right. And so when you could have a female as part of that,
that would take that burden away. The problem is on a female, and I talk about it in the book,
is you could go alone. You can go and have a female who's, you know, there, but they can't be there
for a lot of the stuff, especially when you're prospecting.
They don't want girlfriends, wives, or anything around.
Yeah.
And even when you're a member, certain events they can't go to.
So that limits their involvement.
But they are less scrutinized.
Nobody's searching them.
Nobody's really paying attention on what they're doing.
There's also like an underground chatter between old ladies.
And you may get some intel because even though you're not supposed to talk to your
old ladies about anything, these guys do.
So you can get some intel.
The other option is to take another male, you know, aging.
And that's happened many times where you've had two, three, four people in a chapter.
Certainly, and somebody's of mine have done it that way.
And they're like, hey, the upside is you at least have a normal person to talk to when you're in there.
But the other side of it is like there's so many ways your story can get crossed up when you bring other people in because they start asking questions.
Like, what can think about this?
What did Ken do last?
And they start checking up on your story.
It's the quickest and easiest way for them to get you crossed up.
So for me, it was always like, hey, I'd rather just do this on my own.
And if I screw up, I screw up.
It's on me.
And it's, they're going to affect nobody but me.
You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Ken Croke.
We'll be right back.
Hey, folks, a lot of you've asked me about networking and how I build my network and find the
guest for the show.
I'm teaching you how to build your network for free over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course.
That course is about improving your networking connection skills, sure, but also inspiring
other people to develop a professional relationship with you, a personal relationship with you.
This course will make you a better networker, of course, and a better connector, but most importantly, it'll make you a better thinker. It's free, and it's at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. By the way, the guests you hear on the show, subscribe and contribute to that same course. Come join us. You'll be in smart company where you belong. Now, back to Ken Croke. Man, the guys are so violent. Many of them are rapists and murders. Like, you could have, I don't know, I guess old ladies are probably off limits, but maybe they don't care. Or maybe they're too high on methamphetamine, and they just go out.
after her and you're like, great, now she's with the guy who eats dead things with the blood
fetish alone in a room somewhere and she doesn't have a phone or they take it out on her if they
don't like you? I don't know. Does that happen? Well, that absolutely could happen. But when you're a
full patch, they also give you a property patch. And so if you're a member, you have a property
patch. It would say property a slam and that would go to my girlfriend, wife, or whatever it is.
They're protected, if you will. Now, it's not, I wouldn't take it to the bank, but it's better off
than not. But the bulk, you know, a good part of this investigation, you're not a patched.
So there is no property patch. There is no protection. And there was one meeting where some old
ladies have been doing some stuff and one of the mother club members is getting really pissed.
And they're like, hey, I'm sick and tie of these old ladies and their friends causing all these
problems. Remember this. Rape them, beat them, kill them. We don't care. But they are not going
to be talking. So they're like laying this out. And so it puts you at risk. And in the book,
I talk about something that happened that was, and it was 100% my fault, where,
I had my undercover girlfriend there.
And I was not a patch.
I had been kicked out of the club and I got kicked out for nothing that I did.
The national vice president who vouched for me had tried a coup and tried to become the national
president the night before.
Or actually, no, this goes back about a month or two before.
And he gets beaten out of the club severely.
And then everybody who had, that he had sponsored got kicked out of the club as well.
So I was out, nothing to do with me.
And quite honestly, I was done.
I just wanted to go home and go back to my normal life.
but some folks convinced me to just kind of hang around and see what would happen.
It was long story short, I ended up down at this mandatory as a civilian, not anything with the club.
We weren't allowed to go in the compound of where all the pagans were because I wasn't a pagan.
But some of the presidents had a motel nearby, and so we were over there and people were hanging out.
I had left her there with some old ladies in the room.
I was up front, and PETA had walked up to me with his sergeant arms.
He's like, hey, I want to talk to you.
He's like, let's take a walk.
which wasn't abnormal.
And so we start walking.
And before long, I realized, like, where are we going?
And, like, you know, I felt like, hey, these guys are leading me away.
So I got this pit in my stomach.
And I'm like, oh, shit.
And we've walked, like, a fair distance.
So I was like, hey, I just got me a quick call.
And so I called the female out of cover.
And she didn't answer her phone.
And as it turns out, she had the phone on vibrate, which is normal.
That's what we always did.
But it was sitting on a bed.
So she didn't know.
Right.
You didn't hear it.
So I'm sitting there.
multiple times and I'm like I cannot believe I let these guys lure me away. So I very awkwardly
was like hey I got to go back. I got to take care of something. And they're like, wait, wait, wait,
we're not done. Hold on. And I'm like, no, I got to go. And there was no stopping me. I was going.
Because again, this is one of those things. If you have to, you come out of roll. I didn't know what
the hell was happening to hurt back there. So I'm trying not to run, but I'm walking as fast as I
can. And get back and the doors, it was open when I left it. It was not all the way close.
It was a jar, but not by much. And so I went and pushed the door. I'm expecting.
to see the worst. It was a bunch of old ladies hanging in there and talking. And she was one of them.
You know, it's like you lose your kid in the mall and then you find them. And like the first thing
you do is yell at them. Mostly because you were just scared. You're just happy that they're there,
but it's not how it comes across. Right. And so I did. I'm like, what the hell are you answering your
phone? You know, blah, blah. And it was totally on me. I never should have walked out of that
run. I never should have left that area. But just kind of, you know, a mistake that I made and luckily,
you know, nobody got hurt because of it. Although it's in character for you to be kind of an asshole to your
girlfriend as a outlaw biker guy, right?
And yell her in front of her friends.
Totally.
And it was totally not even acting.
But again, it was mostly, I was yelling at myself.
Yeah.
Because I never, you know, I knew better.
I should have never let it happen.
How do you weigh keeping your cover versus someone else's well-being, right?
The grossest guy in the book later on or one of the, it's hard to even keep it straight.
They're all disgusting, right?
But he tells you, oh, there's this girl hanging out at the tattoo shop who's like a young
student, right?
And it's a biker-owned tattoo shop.
And he's like, I'm going to brutally rape and murder this woman because I want to.
And you're like, that could have torn you out of your role, right?
Because you have to make sure that this innocent girl doesn't have this happen to her.
A hundred percent.
And it would have.
You know, again, it comes back to you just kind of thinking real quickly, like, okay, what can I do?
And this one was kind of slow developing over a period of probably, I don't know, a couple weeks.
Because it started with the very attractive art major, comes by the chapter president's tattoo shop.
She really gifted artists, but she didn't know how to tattoo.
And there's a big difference between drawing it and then actually put it up.
somebody's skin. So she was there kind of as an apprentice. So he worked with it legitimately,
but there was a couple of pagans who were there and they're like trying to flirt with it. And it was
comical for me at the beginning because I'm sitting back. And there was like a big sofa
and tattoo shop. And I'm looking at and I'm like, you idiots, like go look at a mirror and then go
look at this girl. Like you really think you have a snowball's chance in hell of getting with her.
But then it went from being funny to like, oh, wait a minute, because Hogman started talking and he
started getting more aggressive than what he was saying, not towards her, but the way he was looking
at her, I'm like, man, this dude's, like, he's heading down a path. And then eventually he was like,
hey, I'm going to rape this girl. And I'm going to, you know, he was talking about what he was going
to do to her. And so I was like, well, obviously, I'm not going to, like, some people may talk to that
stuff, you know, but like with this guy, I would never put it past him. And so I wasn't going
to wait around to find out. So I had approached her. There's one of a couple things I could do is
come out of roll and take the whole thing down or I could try to get her to go away. So I approached
and I basically said, hey, listen, I could get myself in a world of trouble by even telling you this.
I said, but you need to leave. You're not safe here. Hogman's very focused on you, and this is not going to end well for you. You need to leave. And I didn't mean need to leave like in the next three minutes. But like when you leave tonight, don't come back. Because it was easy enough to just to be around her and make sure nothing was going to happen. And to her credit, she did leave, never saw her again.
Smart. She was gone. I'm sure she went to another tattoo parlor and got her training.
These guys are obvious creeps, right?
It's not like this guy was undercover, chewing on blood clots and all the stuff that he was doing.
So she probably already had a bad vibe from him.
And then you coming in being like, yeah, this guy isn't just a gross guy that we can sort of like wave off.
Right.
And she's like, yeah, I was already on the fence.
See it ever.
And you can see how people are looking at you, you know?
Yeah.
It's like looking at you like hopeful and there's looking at you like you're a piece of meat.
And that's what it turned into for him.
There's a war between the pagans and the Hells Angels among other gangs, right?
and they're dealing guns, these illegal guns as felons. The whole time you're making a huge list of
crimes, right? What's the most intense or severe felony you had a front row seat for? Was it some of these
bomb threats and things like that? The murder conspiracy was probably the biggest where they were
talking about how they were going to kill certain people in a large apartment with Health Angels.
And they had very specific ways they were going about it. And there's some recordings that really laid out
their intent and how they were going to do it. And some of it was with bombs. They had the bombs.
we ultimately ended up getting some of them, you know, before the case was over.
But it was gun trafficking, drug trafficking, Vicar, you know, beatings.
Like, there's a whole string of events, you know, eventually it became a RICO case and prosecutors such as.
It's like organized crime case.
Right.
Exactly.
And so, you know, to your point, like, there'd be some days that not a lot was going on.
Other days, it would be like five different things going on.
And as you get later in the case, it's like, okay, you have to share up these charges by getting this conversation.
So, like, if you had a bodyguard and statute where somebody's,
carrying a gun in defense of a felon who can't carry a gun. That's a federal offense. But you have to
show that they knew that person was a felon. So then you basically have to have a conversation with
them somehow getting them to say or acknowledge that they knew this person was a felon. So like some of
those things to kind of tie up the loose ends of the case, the closer you get to the end, and then
you have to freshen up the PC for the warrants. PC probable cause, right? Right, right. I appreciate
translating for me. No problem, man. Somebody's got to do it. But you would be, you know, like I'd be in
trucker's house, who's one of the brothers, Roblock, Hogman, and Trucker. And I saw our gun there,
but I'd seen it months before. So now I've got to figure out a way to go back to Trucker's
house to see if that gun's still in Trucker's House, you know, is the case that's getting
closer to coming down. And so like a lot of that kind of activity as you move it along and kind of
putting those, because that's the whole reason you're there to build the case. And listen,
there was plenty of people. Actually, there was some who could have been charged. You weren't
charged. But there's some there that didn't do anything illegal. So it's like, okay, that's
fine too. You're not going in with, oh, I'm going to get these 20 guys in this chapter.
No, I'm going to go in and get whoever's doing what they're doing and document and make sure
I put together a solid case. So for people who are maybe not American or their law background
is not up to snuff, probable cause is what police have when they say, hey, I see something
illegal or smell something illegal in your car. Now I'm going to search your car. You need that to
get a warrant. So what you're talking about is if you saw a gun in someone's house eight months ago
and it's illegal and maybe he had a bunch of drugs in a safe and some cash, you can't say,
hey, eight months ago, this guy had something in there. You have to find a reason to go back
in the house, look in there again when he's not looking, make sure that stuff is still in there.
Then you can go back to the prosecutor, the judge, whatever, and say, that stuff's still
in there. I just saw it a couple days ago. The warrant, if we go and we search it, you're
probably going to find it. And then that makes the warrant hold up in court when they're
prosecuting, because otherwise you could have this old thing. You could even find it.
And then they say, well, this probable cause is kind of nonsense. You saw something almost
almost a year ago on that, you got a warrant, you went in there. Yeah, you found it, but that's
called Fruit of the Poison Tree, and it's so that police don't overstep their bounds, and it can
really screw up a case as I'm sure you've seen and probably had happened before.
Sure. Yeah, and that's really what, so not a single one of these individuals went to trial.
The evidence was overwhelming, but the majority of filed motions, much to, like what you were just
describing, in hopes of being able to suppress some of the evidence.
Yeah.
In the end, you know, they weren't successful and they all played guilty.
You know, I was amazed at how cheap it is to have some of these crimes done. It really is dirty deeds done dirt cheap for some of these guys. There was one example in the book where I think you said you wanted to blow up someone's boat because they poured sugar in your gas tank. It's just kind of a nonsense story. And this guy's like, yeah, no problem. I've got a grenade or a homemade bomb or something. And he's like, yeah, I'll blow up this guy's boat with you with an explosive, which is like, you know, decades-long felony to have an explosive, use it to blow something up. And he wanted like 300 bucks to do it, right?
Yeah, so the whole story, though, is he wasn't really charging to blow up the boat.
What it was is we knew they had what they referred to as Christmas presents.
We knew they were bombs.
I hadn't seen him yet, and I didn't know where they were.
So I came up with this story.
Like, if I was in New York and I just said, hey, listen, I want to go blow up Jordan.
Okay, the problem is they're going to go blow up Jordan.
Like, I'm not even know about it.
And they're just going to go do it because they think they're doing me a favor.
So I had to have an environment where I could control it.
So part of my cover story was that I post lobsters.
It allowed me the few times that I could go and say, I'm going out poaching.
They couldn't track me because I was out of the water.
And that would allow me to go home or go see the shrink, whatever it is I had to do.
So part of the story was, hey, you know, these poachers, and it's true, you know, you get caught poaching lobsters.
Watch out for the lobsters coming along with a sawed off shotgun because he's going to blast you.
They take that stuff serious.
Poaching lobsters is what, you go up to somebody else's traps and you just empty them out and steal is his catch.
Yep, take their lobsters.
And so what I was saying is I was out there poaching.
I got into this battle with this other guy.
And anyways, long story short, is he poured sugar into the tanks of my boat and destroyed my engines.
And I wanted to blow up his boat. And so when I told that to Izzo, he's like, hey, I may be able to help you with that.
And so I'm like, all right, well, hey, that'd be great. We talked about it a little bit, but we didn't iron it out.
We didn't have any set plan to do this. But I knew that he wasn't going to be able to go and use it on somebody in New York or something that I couldn't control.
Long story short, again, another part of my backstory is that I did collections for my boss.
He was running some numbers and some things, and I would help do collections that I'd get a piece of that action.
So you're like collecting money from gamblers or something like that?
Right, exactly.
And it's just the more of like the small time criminal stuff, the more legitimate it makes you be.
And so part of that was we set this up where it was agents, but I had set it up that I was doing these collections
and that Izzo was going to come with me.
Oh, so it's fake collections to like boost your, it's like street theater stuff, right?
That's exactly what it's street theater.
And it builds my credibility.
And so he comes up to do this.
And it still has danger to it because if he goes and does something crazy,
and that's an agent that I've put in that risk.
So I told him, I said, hey, the last guy who did this with me,
he got too handsy, and I threw him out.
And he's never did it again.
You do one thing that I tell you not to do, then you're out.
And so he's like, I'll do whatever you want me to do.
You don't know, no worry.
I was just going to pay him a hundred bucks, you know, for doing it.
So anyways, he comes up, and so we meet at a 99 restaurant.
When I say, come up, it was up to the Boston area.
So we're in the 99 restaurant
I have a beer
We're eating something
And so we're just about done
And so I'm like I gotta go take a leak
So I go in the bathroom
He follows me in
I'm like this is a little weird
But then he's like kind of standing behind me
At the earral I'm like this is really
fucking weird so
You know I finish doing what I'm doing
And I turn around
He's got one of those
A long trench coats
You know the oil slick ones
And so as I turn he like
A flasher
Whips up in his jacket
And he's got a bomb
In the inner pocket of the jacket
I'm like holy shit
He's got this bomb inside
This restaurant
Like that's like can't happen
So I'm like hey bro
Let's let's get out of here man
We don't want to get caught with that thing
And I just want him the hell away from all these people
Got him I said hey go meet me by my truck
So I'll pay the bill so he went out
And anytime you say I'll pay the bill
They're going to run out the door anyways
So I go pay the bill real quick and we get out there
And I'm like hey we got work to do man
We can't be driving around this thing
And so I had one of those big star from Dunkin Donuts
Cup so gave me the bar
I put it into the cup
And I left it in my vehicle
I said we'll take your vehicle
So we did and I fake making it
phone calls, we went out to the street theater, and I said, hey, listen, the boats,
he's out at sea. He's like, oh, we'll just wait. And I'm like, no, you don't understand, man.
He could be out for days. We could be sitting on the dock for days waiting for him to come back.
He's like, oh, fuck. And I'm like, listen, I talked to my boss. He'll give you 300 bucks for it,
and then I'll just take care of it whenever it comes back in or he'll take care of it himself.
And he's like, all right, cool. He gets 300 bucks, right? So, yeah, I give him the 300 bucks.
He leaves me with the boss. Oh, so he sold it to you. Yeah, he sold it to me. So now,
at least we knew it was a high explosive of rap with steel, but it was a legit device.
But when we got back to New York and we had church, Roblock, who's, you know, one of the more
intelligent of the crew, he caught wind of what had happened. So in church, he's like, hey, where's
the bomb? And I'm like, you used it, something about it. And he's like, you know who leaves or takes
stuff like that? Cops. That's what cops do. Now I'm thinking, shit, he thinks I'm a cop.
But as it turned out, as a story, the conversation went for another minute, he thought my boss was a cop.
And so his whole thing was like, hey, how do you know that he used it in sunk the boat?
How do you know this?
How do you know that?
I'm like, listen, you guys know I dive.
I'll dive and get photos.
I'll tell me to tell me exactly where it was.
I'll get pictures of the boat.
And he goes, and if I end up in a jail cell, and he's pointing at me and I'm going to
sell anyone near me because I'm going to kill the boat he is.
He was hot.
that, you know, the device that got left behind.
So did you get the pictures?
I mean, how did you manage that?
I just kind of strung it along for a little bit.
And eventually, so then these guys, it's like, if it doesn't happen right away,
it's not going to happen.
So I think it's time, and we never talked about it.
So it wasn't like in 10 days, they felt good about it and nobody got arrested.
But as time went by, I just stopped bringing it up.
He brought up a couple times.
I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'm working on.
I'm going to make it happen next time I go up.
But then he just kind of dropped it.
And I think it was more because nobody went to jail for it.
So he's like, okay.
Yeah.
If they were going to arrest us, they'd have done it by now, right?
That kind of thing.
100%.
Yeah, 100%.
This is the Jordan Harbinger show with our guest, Ken Croke.
We'll be right back.
Thank you so much for supporting the show and for listening to the show.
It means the world to me.
Of course, I do got a shill a mattress from time to time.
That's how this works, folks.
All the advertisers you hear on the show, all those codes, all those special URLs.
They're all in one place.
Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals.
That page works on your phone.
It's got a search thing now.
that's brand new. You can search for the sponsors using the search box on the website at
Jordan Harbinger.com as well. So please do consider supporting those who support us. Now for the
rest of my conversation with Ken Croke. Man, you always mentioned during your interactions with these
guys that they might know you're a cop or they might have a suspicion and you're worried about them
obviously shooting or killing you. That's one example. There was another one where you're moving a dead body
in the woods and you're like, oh man, I've been making me dig this grave for myself. Do you think that
these guys were actually suspicious, or was this just your mind playing tricks on you because of the
pressure? Well, I think it's a combination, right? You know, and it's not even mind's pain. You always
have to have you guard up. You always have to be thinking, what if? Now, the moving the body,
without getting too far into that story, because I don't want to be a spoiler, but we learned from
post-arrest interviews that they had gotten suspicious. And it was never really clear what it was
that tripped them that they felt was suspicious. But I just bought some drugs off of Tracy.
Hey, he was at the undercover house. And I got back inside the house to actually put the drugs away.
And when I came out, there's a group of the pagans were in the driveway. And how you walk out
and you know everyone's talking about you because they all stop talking. And so that happened.
I was like, what the hell is going on? And we later learned that they had thought that something,
you know, had happened that I was a copper informant. And I'm not sure which is worse.
And, you know, on day one, if they figure you're a copper informant, big deal. They're just going to say,
hey cop, leave. Day 100, when you've got charges on three quarters of them, that's not going to
end as easily. And so, you know, as it went on, they felt, you know, more secure that I wasn't. And,
you know, hence, I got more and more involved in some of the heavy hitting things that were
going on in the gang, which then raises the stakes, which makes it more difficult to stay in.
What made you finally pull the trigger on this one and have everyone arrested? What was sort of
like the, all right, here's the flag, like, let's do this.
I mean, you have, so the investigation goes on.
You have all these different times.
Some of them are like things that they did that you put you in a bad spot.
Like, you know, I was talking about having to kill that guy and throwing them off.
Other stuff was just the dumb luck, like he dodged a bullet.
You know, I mentioned to you when I got kicked out of the club, I was supposed to be doing guard duty out in front of the clubhouse.
I got kicked out of the club, so I obviously wasn't going to be doing guard duty.
So the Sergeant Arms was out there.
And the Hells Angels rolled up in the clubhouse.
They surrounded the clubhouse.
And they beat the Sergeant Arms with ball peenhammers, fists.
feet, he got med-flighted out. And that should have been me. If I hadn't gotten kicked out,
like, dumb luck, I got kicked out. There's another incident right, not too long after that,
when I was the Sergeant Arms, we'd been on this big run. There was like 30 of us. The way it
works is the highest ranking rides front left, the next highest, and it works its way all the way back
to the back of the pack. And so we'd gotten back in the chapter president that said,
hey, Hogman, slam, I need you guys to go pick this up, something at Home Depot. So I got,
So I pull out, I'm the Sergeant Arms, he's the vice president.
As I mentioned before, doesn't have any status if the president's alive and out of prison.
And he was.
So I pull out front left.
I'm the highest rank.
I should be riding front left.
He pulls out like around me into the other lane of traffic to get over to my left.
And so I'm like, whatever, man.
I'm a make-believe biker.
I don't give a rat's ass if I'm riding front-left, front-right.
Whatever, man.
You want to ride front-left, go ahead.
We don't get a quarter mile down the road.
And a minivan splatters him on the road.
And it wasn't his fault.
It was the minivan's fault.
Splatters him.
He codes out.
They bring him back to life.
He ends up coding out like two or three times on the way to the hospital and at the hospital.
That should have been me.
If he hadn't done what he had done, it absolutely would have been the minivan hit me.
So it's almost like Russian roulette, you know, at some point.
But the real driver is the further you get into this and the more trusted you are, they assigned me to this hit squad inside the gang.
Most of the gang members don't even know that this group exists within.
And it's selected by mother club members of what they consider to be their heavy hitters,
you know, the ones that can do the real down and dirty work.
And so Hellboy, who's, you know, his pitches in the book, and he had approached me.
He's like, hey, they want you to be a part of this.
We were going to be targeting Hells Angels and we were going to be killing them.
So you had that and you have that lack of control.
And then I had gotten arrested during the case, legitimately got arrested with a gun by the local gang task force.
And so I spent some time in jail.
but that case was going through the courts and that in of itself. So it's like the fuse is burning.
At some point this had to come down. But at the same time, we had other elements of the crimes that we had to prove.
So it was like, you know, chicken and the egg were like scrambling as fast as we can. They had to get all the evidence together.
And like I was originally supposed to come out at Christmas. Then it went to June. And the June one was a real date. Like I actually thought I was going to be out at that point. And then it got continued until October. And that's somewhat demoralizing too. Because, you know, not only for me, but,
my family, my family's expect to know he's going to be home.
And now since I've seen him four months.
Yeah, cancel all the summer plans.
Yeah.
Yeah, exactly.
So after all these guys get busted, aren't you worried that then they're going to try
and kill you?
Because I would imagine it's unsettling knowing that like 1,300 scumbag bikers want to kill you
in the most painful way they can imagine.
And also their patron support clubs too, probably have your photo somewhere.
Yeah, no, there's plenty of photos that were out there.
But they, yeah, they did put two contracts out on me after the case came down.
one of them, they investigated.
I won't go into a lot of details on it,
but the recording of that hit did not come out,
but it was an active conversation.
They knew.
There was a lot of protection put into place.
There was agents at my house for months afterwards,
but there are a lot of other safeguards.
And also they monitor, listen,
there's informants, part of these gangs.
There's a lot of information that comes out to law enforcement.
It's constantly, to this day,
still monitor all that activity.
And anytime something comes out or there's a reference or anything,
I get notified and the agency looks into it and, you know, investigates it. So it's part of what you do.
And there's also, I will say, for some of them, yeah, you know, obviously they were mad enough to put a hit
out on me. For others, they're like, hey, that's the job. Like, better to be a cop than an informant,
I think, because at least with a cop, it's like your job. And they're like, hey, he's doing his
job like, we're doing our job. So it's a little bit of both. But yeah, you always, you're very
wary of your surroundings and you try to do what you can to minimize it. Are you worried about it at all now?
I mean, it's been like 10 years, but some of those guys are still probably in the gang doing
stuff and probably higher ranking now, right?
Yeah, and there's still some that are in jail that will get out.
I don't know that you ever totally relax about it, but I don't live my life looking
over my shoulder either.
I've gotten on with my life.
And, you know, like you said, a bunch of time has passed.
Some of them are dead.
Some are still, you know, active.
But you just, you live your life.
You know, you try to be smart about it and know that your agency's got your back.
And that's all you can really do.
Once you're a part of a big operation like this, I assume you can't.
do undercover work again, right? Because you've met like thousands of scumbags over the years.
Like someone could easily recognize you at this point after all that time in the game, right?
Well, I did undercover work after this. So yeah, that's not 100%. It depends on the case.
So like none of these guys went to trial. They all end up pleading guilty. So there wasn't any
big dramatic trial that had a lot of media coverage. And so you could have the simplest
of case that generates a whole lot of, you know, whether it be media attention or if there was
a shooting and that kind of coverage, you know, or you can kind of fly low. I mean, I did
out of cover for 20 years and was able to do that successfully. Now, writing this book,
and if I was still on a job, yeah, yeah, it was over anyways, but if it wasn't, it would be now.
But you're retired now, right? I am. You must still have that axe handle and those pagan
the cut, the leather, the jacket and the patches and stuff and the ring and all that stuff, right?
You still got that stuff? Yeah, it's all locked away in a bank vault. But yeah, I keep it more
for training purposes.
Because a lot of that stuff means this messaging behind a lot of the patches and a lot of
those other things.
So when I speak to law enforcement groups, I'll sometimes bring that out.
I always get people like, hey, do you mind if I take a picture?
Do you in your calls?
I'm like, never happened.
So the day I came out, I swore I never put them on again and I never have.
Yeah, I don't blame you.
I don't blame you at all.
It's not like you're dressing up as somebody you admire.
No, no, I hated wearing them when I had to wear them.
So why would I wear them if I don't?
And then there's other people would be like, hey, could I take a picture with the calls on?
I'm like, if that ever gets out, good luck, because it's not going to end well for you because
they take this stuff really serious.
But there is a training value behind those.
Yeah, not only them taking a picture with something they're not supposed to be wearing,
but your cut is definitely like, oh, so not only are you wearing something you're not supposed
to be wearing.
It's the one from the undercover cop that put away like a hovary dozen of our brethren.
Yeah, it's like the worst version you could find.
Yeah.
What do you miss about the biker world now that you're completely out of the game?
There's got to be something.
No?
No?
No, well, people ask me all the time, like, hey, do you still ride?
People ask, did you ride before?
I absolutely did.
And when I came out of this case, I sold my bike, and I didn't ride for a lot of period
time because it took away the fun of riding.
Riding at 110 miles an aisle, two feet off the person in front of you, one gear down,
it's not fun.
It's not relaxing by any stretch of the imagination.
And I got burnt out on it.
I've gotten back into riding again, so that's been a good thing.
I really don't, maybe a little bit of the chess match of, you know, how
you're strategically putting together your case and trying to stay one step ahead. But no, I've
moved on. I'm glad I did it. I wouldn't do it again. And I hope others do. And that's why I teach
and talk to law enforcement cruises, because I think it's one of the few ways that you can get to the
hierarchy, the shock callers, because without being a part of the group, you're not going to get there.
You don't even miss the barbecues? I will say they did have some good food, man. There's a couple of
them, particularly Roblock, who could cook. I mean, now he cooked with every of the worst ingredients.
So that's probably why it tastes it's so good.
But the dude could cook.
It's still to this day the best brisket I've ever had.
Yeah, I'm just imagining like, hey, you think this meth is good?
Got to try the brisket.
Try his brisket.
Yeah, and that was the one thing I could eat as much as I wanted.
So that was always a good thing.
I'll tell you, you wanted an embarrassing thing.
Don't ever go to a Chinese food buffet with these guys because he'll like animals.
I mean, it's just embarrassing.
There's food flying everywhere.
It's just it's ugly.
You're using their hands to get the chicken out.
Yeah, exactly.
Oh, my God.
Man, I've kept you for too long.
Thank you so much. This is fascinating stuff, really. And thank you for what you did as well. I'm sure
that we are safer not having some of these horrendous human beings out in society, even if they're
detached from society. I appreciate and I appreciate you having me on, you know, being able to tell
my story. I've got some thoughts on this episode, but before I get into that, I wanted to give you
a preview of one of my favorite stories from an earlier episode of the show with John Emendez.
She was the chief of disguise for the CIA in Moscow during the latter part of the Cold War.
We'd really get into the weeds on how they hid people and hid spy gear in one of the most hostile espionage environments anywhere in the world.
We invented technology that didn't even exist yet.
The small batteries, for instance, they're in our watches and our phones and all of that stuff today.
They're kind of like Q from James Bond, but it's the CIA.
We could create any kind of character over your face, masks that came out.
of Hollywood, and we'd say, great.
Go down to the cafeteria and have lunch.
This is at CIA headquarters,
where everybody knows everybody in the cafeteria.
And they would go and discover that no one paid any attention to them.
You go, wow, I'm hiding in plain sight.
They were following us just every minute.
The case officer would step out of the car.
The driver would hit a button.
This dummy would pop up, wearing the same clothes as the guy that had just left.
Trailing surveillance would come around the corner
and they follow that car all night.
They never knew.
And if they could get to those people, they would execute them.
They were feeding people into these crematoriums, feet first, alive.
Unbelievable.
A really valuable agent said, I'll work for you on one condition.
And that is that you give me the ability to take my own life.
Eventually, everybody got arrested.
So they arrested him.
And we had put that L pill we gave him in the cap of the Montblok pin.
It was cyanide.
And he knew where it was.
And they said, we want you to write him.
your confession. So they brought him as a boneblock pin.
For more with Johnna Mendes, including some incredible spy stories that will really perk your ears,
check out episode 344 of the Jordan Harbinger show.
Man, this episode was so good. A lot of rules for being undercover and staying alive or in the
book, but one that I remember is keep your first name, and then you make up an easy last
name to remember. Also, you have to be able to explain quirks. Like, in Ken's case, he grew up
on Boston, and when he gets drunk, the Boston accent comes out. So he had to be ready to explain
why he says certain things a certain way. You have to keep a lot of your life exactly the same as it
actually is so that if you get wasted or something happens where something comes out in an emergency,
you don't get made right away. You can explain it away. Ken was also telling me that there was
actually a full background check and application to become a pagan, which is kind of funny,
but it makes sense, right? It's just ironic that this outlaw,
liker gang that slings meth and murders people is like, well, we want to make sure that you have a
record. Actually, it's not a clean record. It's a dirty record, right? We want to make sure you have
been arrested, especially for violent crime. And ideally, you've been to prison before, maybe multiple
times, but you better have a good credit score. I'm just imagining how that process goes in practice.
While in the gang, he found that he could order explosives really easily from guys in the gang
who would then make bombs, which is really, really scary.
And it's a miracle.
We don't have more crazy explosions and wild violence in this country.
And I think it's because of guys like Ken Croke.
I always wondered, of course, how big these gangs actually are.
Turns out they're pretty huge.
1,300 people are in the pagans or were in the pagans, including prospects.
That is an enormous amount of guys.
And also, I don't think that includes all their little satellite clubs and feeder clubs.
and things like that that help them with some of their stuff.
1,300 guys in one gang, and I think there are six of these major, major motorcycle club
gang.
So there's no shortage of extremely violent nomadic criminals rolling around our highways.
I also just cannot imagine, I mentioned this on the show, balancing this type of undercover
operation with having a family life as well.
Having two kids of my own, I'm like, how do you do a meth drop and a firearm pickup to get a
couple grenades or whatever to blow up somebody's boat, and then you're on a three-day bender,
and then you've got to go to a PTA meeting in an under-15 soccer game the next day and look
somewhat normal and presentable? I mean, how on earth do you do that? Something's got to give.
Ken also told me that the longer and undercover operation goes on, the more dangerous it becomes.
I know we touched on this during the show. There's more chances to blow your cover,
but also, like he said during the interview, if they find out you're a cop on day one,
they just, they get rid of you. But if they find out you're a cop after a year, they're going to kill you and it's probably not going to be fast. Also, their bureaucracy inside law enforcement agencies gets to become more and more as cases go on and people try to micromanage things and new people come in, experience people go out and stuff like that, those changes, they can get you hurt or killed. So, man, really thankful that people like Ken Croke are out there working on our side, or we would really be at the mercy of these kinds of criminals, which,
is a really scary thought. Links to all things Ken Croke will be on the website and in the show notes
at Jordan Harbinger.com. Please use our website links if you buy books from Ken or from any guest on the show.
It does help support this show. Transcripts are also in the show notes. Videos are on YouTube.
Advertisers, deals, discount codes. Those are all at Jordan Harbinger.com slash deals.
Please, once again, consider supporting those who make this show possible. I'm at Jordan Harbinger
on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn. I always enjoy a good
conversation with a fan. Don't forget, I'm going to be interviewing author Ryan Holiday,
live in person in Los Angeles at the Venice West on June 13th. I'd love to see you there in person.
Tickets are available at Jordan Harbinger.com slash tickets. That's Jordan Harbinger.com
slash tickets. Again, June 13th, Los Angeles at the Venice West. That's me and Ryan
Holiday live on stage. Hope to see you there. Speaking of connecting, I'm teaching you how to do the same,
connecting with great people and managing your relationships. I use software systems and tiny habits
that I do every day. I put that all into a course. Jordan Harbinger.com slash course is where you can find it.
It's a free course. I don't want your billing info. None of that. I'm just trying to teach you
how to dig the well before you get thirsty. And hey, most of the guests you hear on the show,
speaking of interesting people, they subscribe and contribute to the course. Come join us. You'll be in
smart company where you belong. This show has created an association with Podcast 1.
My team is Jen Harbinger, Jace Sanderson, Robert Fogarty, Millie O'Campo, Ian Baird,
Josh Ballard, and Gabriel Mizrahi.
Remember, we rise by lifting others.
The fee for this show is you share it with friends
when you find something useful or interesting.
I thought this episode was fascinating.
If you know somebody else who'd feel the same way,
please share this episode with him.
The greatest compliment you can give us
is to share the show with those you care about.
In the meantime, do your best to apply what you hear on this show
so you can live what you listen,
and we'll see you next time.
This episode is sponsored in part by Something You Should Know podcast.
Finding a new great podcast shouldn't be this hard,
so let me save you some time.
If you like the Jordan Harbinger show,
you'll probably like something you should know
with Mike Carruthers.
It's one of those shows that makes you smarter
in a practical, useful way.
Same curiosity vibe we go for here,
just in a fast-focused format.
Mike brings on top experts
and asks the exact questions
that you'd want to ask,
and the topics are all over the place in the best way.
Recently, they've covered things
like why we care so much
what other people think,
the benefits of laughter,
why sports fans get so invested,
and what makes people like you or not.
The through line is always the same.
Same. Smart ideas you can actually use in real life. Something you should know has been featured in Apple's
shows we love, and it's got thousands of five-star reviews because it's consistently interesting.
So if you want another show that scratches that I want to understand how people in the world really work,
itch, search for something you should know wherever you get your podcasts. Look for the bright yellow
light bulb and start listening. You can thank me later.
