The Underworld Podcast - Meet The Chicago Outfit's Most Infamous Hitman

Episode Date: April 8, 2025

Kurt Calabrese grew up in the Chicago mafia known as The Outfit. His father, Frank Calabrese Sr, was the premier hitman, known for strangling his victims with his bare hands. But Frank didn't just leave the violence at work. He trained his sons Kurt and Frank Jr in the mob enforcer life since they were kids, through fear, intimidation and horrific abuse. When the entire Calabrese family got locked up for extortion, his other son, Frank Jr, who had battled a bad drug problem and stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars from his dad, wrote a letter to the feds and offered to wear a wire on his own father. Enter the infamous Family Secrets trial in Chicago. Kurt's father, who brutally abused him for years, is about to face numerous murder charges. His brother is about to become the most infamous rat in Chicago’s history. And Kurt is caught right in the middle of his family…and the biggest organized crime trial in Chicago’s history.  This is a special presentation of Season 3 of the Underbelly Podcast, Killing Kurt...produced by Underworld host Danny Gold. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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in Chicago. The day being done. indictments come down. 18 murders, loan sharking, extortion, all sorts of violence, racketeering, your typical mob or eco. But the 14 defendants are no ordinary group gangsters. They're the upper echelon of one of, if not the most powerful criminal organization in American history.

The Chicago outfit has ruled Chicago with an iron fist for generations at this point. You know, Al Capone, St. Poundine's Day Massacre, Tony's. Nieda Cardo, judges, cops, politicians, top-level businessmen, community leaders, they've got them all tied in or running scared. The entire city wrapped around their fingers. In fact, prior to these indictments, there's been an estimated 3,200 mob hits in Chicago over 100 years, and only 12 convictions. They are vicious, and they're untouchable.

Or are they? Frank Calabrese, Sr., is facing 13 of those murder charges. He's been with the outfit for decades, having become a man in 1983, along with his brother, Nick. In that time, he's become their go-to hitman, known for strangling people to death with his bare hands. And he's the guy, the heads of the most brutal organized crime outfit in America, called when they need someone taken care of, even if it's one of their own, which it usually is. And Frank Sr. does it, even if it's one of his close friends.

You don't say no to the outfit. And you also don't say no to Frank. That's a lesson two of his sons, Frank Jr. and Kurt can tell you. Frank's been training them for the mob enforcer life since they were barely teenagers. And let's just say it hasn't been pleasant. He does it through fear, intimidation, and horrific abuse, both physical and psychics. It gets so bad, Kirk goes to the hospital with an ulcer when he's only 15. And as they get older, their father only gets more vicious.

Kurt's careful, but Frank Jr. spins out, gets hooked on drugs and starts stealing money from Frank Sr. hundreds of thousands of dollars. Not something that Frank Sr. is going to take lightly. Before that gets resolved though, the entire family, Frank Sr., his brother Nick and his two sons, Frank Jr. and Kurt go down on an unrelated extortion bust. They get sent to prison in 1997. And up until then, the feds think Frank Sr. and his brother are just dollar store loan sharks, regular mobsters, nothing special.

But Frank Jr., fearing his dad might kill him and not wanting to own up to the stolen money, decides he's going to let them know a little bit more, quite a bit more. He writes a letter to the feds from prison, telling them his father is a sight of psychopathic killer that can't be released. Soon enough, Frank Jr. is still in prison, but he's wearing a wire, talking to his father and getting him to incriminate himself and a whole lot of others on murder charge after murder charge. Now, a few years later, with the indictment dropping, the word is out.

All the big outfit higher-ups are about to face a massive trial with ample evidence. And caught in the middle of this is Kurt, his father, who, who played in the middle of this, he was brutally abused him for years, is about to face numerous murder charges. His brother is about to become the most infamous rat in Chicago's history. And Kurt, who grew up with the code of the street and the life instilled in him from a young age, meaning you don't ever talk to the feds, is caught right in the middle of his family. And right in the middle of the biggest organized crime trial in Chicago's history. This is Kurt's story, and this is a special episode of the Under-Rour.

World Podcast. How are you guys doing? Welcome back to the Underworld Podcast. Your home for everything, gang, mafia, cartel, and everything else related to the world of international organized crime. A show hosted by two journalists, myself Danny Gold, and my colleague, Sean Williams, globe-trotting adventure and former Berlin Party Boy, who isn't here right now, who knows where he is, probably embedded with some rebels in Borneo or something.

I don't even know. Every week, we bring you the fascinating tales of drugs and violence and guys who just can't figure out how to pay their taxes. And this week is something a little different, something special. But first, as always, bonus episodes are available on patreon.com slash aneworld podcast or on Spotify or on iTunes. Sign up. You can also just give us monetary support there or elsewhere if you don't want to listen.

Underworldpod.com for shirts and other merch, the Underworldpodcast at gmail.com for any emails. Now, this episode. So in, in 2023, I spent most of the year. I mean, I was asked to, hired, to put together a limited series documentary-style podcast about the life of Kurt Calabrese and the Family Secrets Trial. You know, Frank, all his hits, the outfit, everything you heard in the cold open. Kurt had never really told his story before, unlike his brother, who's kind of talked to everyone,

and there are some differences there. And Kurt wanted to tell his side. So I produced this documentary series, you know, talked to the, found the feds, the lawyers, people from the neighborhood, Kurt's family, journalists and all others, and put this together. Spent a lot of time with Kurt, talking to Kurt and everything. And he's lived a crazy life. You know, he's done hard time. He's truly suffered the way he grew up.

And this story really gets to the heart of what being a member of an organized crime family and family, growing up on the inside of one is actually like, and it is not pretty. It is brutal. There's no glamour and glitz here. You know, even now, you know, I would spend time with Kurt. He never sits with his back to the door. He's always watching. He's always wary.

He's careful with what he says. He's as careful as anyone I've ever met. And his story is just completely, completely nuts. So you guys are going to want to hear it. You know, I wasn't able to be there for the post-production and putting everything together. But the interviews were amazing. It's super well produced. It's an insane story.

I've heard the first few episodes. They're amazing. And we're going to give you guys the first one right here. This is Killing Kurt. If you search for season three of the Underbelly podcast, just search for the Underbelly podcast, you can find it on any platform. So without further ado, whatever it is, have a listen. It was a very hard thing to decide to do.

Last time I'm going to see my father, maybe ever, maybe alive, I got things I want to get off my chest, and I don't want to do it this way, but I don't know if I'm going to ever have another way to do it. They put him under a measure. It was called the Sam's measure. It was like you were a terrorist. They locked him down. They took his rights away as a prisoner

and listed him as a terrorist. This is Kurt Calabrese. It's 2009, and one of the biggest trials in Chicago history was coming to an end. Walking to the courtroom was a big deal because all press was out in the hallway, and now they saw me,

and they were like, you know, what's he doing there? Why's he here? And they would all swarm me and try to talk to me. It was a fiasp, kind of a circus. The room was always full. I was in a row with victims' families that I didn't know that they were until I got there, which made me uncomfortable because it's like, well, they may be looking at me the same way to looking at my dad.

They may hate me because of what he did to their families. Kurt's father, Frank, is being sentenced. Kurt wasn't part of the trial, but he's insisting on reading a victim's statement. I had my paper in my hand, and I was getting nervous, and the FBI was sitting at the table over there, and they kept looking at me. And then my dad came out, shackled, he walked out, had these old glasses on, would tape in the middle. All an act to make himself look like an aging old man who is dying. That was his plan, and I bought it. At that point, I hated him.

I really hated him. But no matter how I feel about him, it's my dad. You know, when I saw him like that, I had tears of eyes, and the government saw it. I had tears of my eyes. I was like, I can't do this. I can't. Look at him. But he spotted me.

He became himself. When Kurt says he became himself, he means that for a split second, his dad dropped the weak old man act, and he gave Kurt the menacing glare that revealed the mind. monster inside was still there. And it reinforced to Kurt that he was doing the right thing. I wanted people to hear that this is what my life was about. This is what he did, this man did to me. We know he's a murderer.

We know he's not a good person. But now we want to hear what kind of father he was. And so I started talking. I was reading off the paper. And then I turned around and looked at my dad. He just, like a light switch, he just started. Cut me off, started yelling. You'd better apologize for the lies you tell me.

You have been treated like a kingdom. Of all the things I've done for you and your brothers. The judges got the smirk on his face like, ha, ha, here we go. This is what we were waiting for. For the courtroom to see him do that, the jury to see him do that. You certainly see those kind of moments maybe in TV or in a movie,

but I mean you don't usually see those in sort of the state courtrooms of federal court but this was truly one of the more dramatic moments you know I've seen in covering courts there for decades sitting there watching it and thinking how strange and surreal it is to be living through something like this they wrote about sounds legendary

whatever that means that's the words they use not me for decades Kurt's father Frank The Breeze Calabrese led one of the most notorious murder squads for the Chicago outfit, the Windy City's infamous mafia. He had been tried for over a dozen murders, and those are just the ones they could find proof of. It was called the Family Secrets Trial, and it put away not only Frank Calabry's

senior, but many other top outfit bosses, effectively putting an end to the reign of terror of one of the most ruthless criminal organizations in America. And it all started with the implosion of the Calabrese family. Versions of this story have been told in books and on the news, but Kurt says there's a lot that people still don't know. He's been approached by authors, movie producers, and documentary filmmakers to tell his story, but he's kept it all inside. And like a cancer, it's been eating away at him.

The only thing I look forward to every day besides my kids is being able to tell my story. and hopefully, hoping what comes out of it is it helps me, can help other people. This story needs to be told, and people need to know what really happened. I'm just setting the record straight with the truth. I'm your host, Anjain Agpaw, and this is Season 3 of Underbelly, killing Kurt. He could have attempted to strangle me at any time because he wanted to kill me. One of my father's favorite sayings were, where how many Kiki saw how'd you're going to walk funny. I'd cry myself to sleep at night.

I begged to die. I begged to not wake up. He shot my dad in the head with a shocker nine times. Murdered by the mob, beaten for information, later found dead in the trunk of a burning car. When you would first meet him, he was just a nice person. The way he was dressed, he looked like a Wisconsin cheese salesman. I mean, he was a very personable, likable person. to be honest with you.

My name is Joseph R. Lopez. They call me Joe the Shark. I'm an attorney in Chicago. I do criminal defense for the last 39 years. Joe the Shark Lopez is a legendary Chicago defense attorney who represented Frank Calabrese, Sr. during the Family Secrets trial. I can tell you, I tried to wiggle out of it, and I can still remember discussing the case and telling me that we need you in there because you're the only lawyer.

in Chicago can handle this guy because this guy's a mania. He was not educated, but he was street smart, very cunning, very organized. Frank was nearly 70 when Joe met him, and he'd been a criminal for most of those

years. He had that other side of him just described as vicious. His lips were tremble and I conceded in his eyes and we're stuck in this little room, five by five together. He could have attempted to strangle me at any time. Frank, his His parents and his six younger siblings grew up in Chicago.

Near poverty, sometimes they'd eat nothing but polenta for dinner. A bad case of scarlet fever sent him to the children's hospital at five years old. He did poorly in school and dropped out in just the fourth grade, later discovering he had dyslexia. In his teens, he became uncontrollable and was sent to a military institute. But he rebelled and he went AWOL just five days after finishing bootcule. camp. When he fled, he hid in his grandparents' pigeon coop, but he was caught. Then he went AWOL again, and this time he stole a car, which led to his first arrest in prison stint in

in 1954. Frank Calabry started out as a loan chart, putting money out on the street, then he rose through the ranks and became maybe one of the most prolific killers in the Chinatown crew. He would beat people, strangle them, and then slit their throats. That was sort of his calling car. This is Damon Sharonis, another prominent Chicago defense attorney. Daman represented one of Frank's co-defendants in this case. They were one of the most notorious hit squads in the Chicago outfit. You know, they were known as a rough bunch. You know, they also had big lone shark and crews. They had chop shops on the south side, things like that. But they, they were described as having sort of a specialty in committing mob-related murders. For instance, the murder of the

Dauber's, and they drove up next to him, they opened a van and shotgun them to death. Frank Sr. was talking about Billy Dauber's wife being present at the murder and said, you know, it's a shame she was there, but what we were going to do. Damon is describing a 1980 incident in which Chicago Mob Associate Billy Dauber was suspected by outfit leaders of being an informant. Frank got orders to execute Dauber. His wife was collateral damage. And that's the way it was. Over the years, the murders piled up, and the vast majority of them remained unsolved. That's one of the reasons the Family Secrets trial was such a big deal. Here's Damon again. I wasn't just a lawyer who sort of was on the Family Secrets trial,

who knew nothing about this. I mean, all of these names, with the exception of a few of them, including my own client, were people that I've heard of. You know, I've had friends who were family members of some of these people, especially in the Elmwood Park area where a lot of these guys lived, and it was a big Italian-American sort of enclave. Frank Calabrese, Sr. was one of the many who settled his family in Elmwood Park, joining a who's-who of the outfit. Homewood Park was known from Sam Giancano's grandkids lived there. Jackie DeLackie. Jackie Lackie Saron lived there. This is Ray Morelli and Frank Amante. They grew up with Kurt and his brother, Junior in Elmwood Park.

Tony Arcardo lived across the street in River Forest. You know, Joey Andriaki, John DeFranzo, they all moved out to Elmwood Park. That seemed like a nice place for them to go outside the city. But they were all nice guys, too. I mean, we grew up with all those guys. They were like uncles to us. I mean, and I think that was a lot why our neighbor was always safe. I got to tell you, there was never robberies, there was never headaches.

There was never burglaries. So it was just like Alma Park was like off limits to everything, which was a good thing for the neighbor, and that's why everybody wanted to live there. These guys were super nice, too. I mean, during the holidays, they'd give you their own homemade wine or Supersad. They would pass it out to the neighborhood. It was like an old-time movie.

I would go there once a year for Christmas Eve, and Mr. Calabrese would have us come up on that bonus room or whatever, right above the garage. It was a fireplace. Mr. Calabrese would give us a cappuccino, three of them, and three sniffers with brandy. And we're only like, you know, in eighth grade, we're like, I don't drink, I don't even know what the hell is in this thing.

But when you met him, I tell you what, I really enjoyed him. He just was like, I don't know if you guys know what Fred McMurray is from my three sons. That's the kind of guy he came across is when you met him. He was just generally a really nice guy, you know, asking about our families and how you guys doing. Hindsight is 2020, and today it's easy to see that Frank Calabry's Senior had two distinct sides to him. But for Ray and Frank, it took them getting a little older to realize what Frank Sr. really did for a living. Like, well, everywhere, I'm a car, Chicago, whatever, there's bookmakers, okay? The bookmakers don't get paid. They would get a guy like

Mr. Calabrese to get the money. That's what I used to always think it was. I just thought that he helped out like that to collect the money. And it wasn't a big deal because everybody was a bookmaker. So the conventional wisdom in the neighborhood was that Frank collected gambling bets, a relatively pedestrian job by outfit standards. But Kurt would start to learn that there was something more going on. Well, the front doorbell rang. I could see the policeman standing at our door.

And so I went down there and I opened up the door. And he's like, is your father home? And I said, and I always said, no. I said, and he's not home. And he said, well, just do me a favor. comes home, let him know. And he points right to the car, and he goes, that there's an FBI car sitting right there,

and they've been here for like four or five days, just let your father know. He did it blatantly. He wanted them to see him do it, I guess, because they could see. It was right there. The Elmwood Park police had tipped off Frank that the FBI was tailing him.

That's how tight-knit the neighborhood was, and that's the kind of respect Frank commanded. And he demanded even more respect from his kids. Kirk could be sitting on the picnic bench in front of the Civic Center in the circle. His brother Frank would walk up to the circle and he was only a year older than us, but he would give Kurt to like, come here, we got to go. And then Kurt would have this face on him and be like, just turned white.

And it was because his dad was home and he wanted him at the house. And that happened numerous times growing up with Kurt that he had to leave just unexpectedly because the brother or even the father would drive by just, stare at him and then that was it. But that's what I started noticing Kurt. He couldn't do the things that we were all doing. I really didn't have any clue with Kurt's dad. I mean, I knew he was involved and he was, you know, collecting money and this and that,

but I didn't know the, I didn't know all the details. I mean, you know, deep down inside, I know Kurt wish it could have been different, you know, for him, his brother and his dad. So, it's a shame. Like every other teenager, Kurt just wanted to hang out with his friends. But his life was different. During Kurt's formative years, Frank was gaining power within the outfit and was leaving a trail of bodies in his wake.

More and more, his rage would come with him when he walked through the front door of his home. When he came home, it was like, I had to be like, Hitler. Everybody would panic. You know, you panicked because you knew he was the boss and you knew he'd crack you around for times and he'd kick you out or he'd grab me by the hair and throw you down and then kick you out.

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See full terms at Mintmobile.com. The jurors sat in a dark room, hands resting on a Ouija board. They weren't guessing. They were asking the victim who killed them. Sounds unbelievable, right? But it happened. And that's just one of thousands of stories waiting for you on Morning Cup of Murder. Hi, I'm Karina B. Minas Durfer.

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Go listen to Morning Cup of Murder wherever you get your podcasts. And remember, stay safe. We were raised, and I say we, when I say we, I refer to my brother and I, because my older brother and I were 16 months apart. We were really, really close in age, and we were really, really close, you know, when we were kids. Kurt and his family lived in what is known in Chicago as a three-flat. On one floor, it was Kurt, his. siblings and his parents. The other two floors housed their grandparents and other family members.

And we lived in this room above a garage. It was a beautiful room and it was real big. It was like a huge family room. Back before family rooms and great rooms were, you know, big. We had this huge room and it was just beautiful. But the garage door, there was a heated garage downstairs, two-car garage, but you could feel the garage door open, you could feel the floor vibrate. when that garage door opened and he was the one who parked in the garage so whenever that door opened we'd feel that everybody would panic

no matter what you did or what you didn't do you know you panic if you run around what do I go what do I sit what should I do what should I did I forget to do something when that garage door went up everybody started canning it and he was just a nut

about chores and would check him as soon as he walked in the door and it was a trick because you didn't do it right. He'd say, you know, you'd go, oh, come here, come down here. You know, and you just, you froze because you didn't know what it was. He'd walk down the stairs and he'd say, come here. Did you vacuum the stairs? Well, yeah, dad. No, you didn't.

This was on the floor. I put this purposely on the floor. This was still on the floor. You didn't vacuum stairs. He would have vacuumed it. As an outfit, Lone Shark, and Hitman, Frank used intimidation, fear, and violence to keep his crew and his victims in line. Sadly, he used the same tactics as a father.

So Kurt and his brother, Jr., needed to stay on their toes, ready to run or duck at a moment's notice. One of my father's favorite sayings were, where, I'm going to kick you so hard you're going to walk funny. And he kicked me one time, and I actually walked funny for probably, at least a couple days. I remember kids at school saying you're walking funny.

I remember walking to school and hurting to walk. The punishing physical abuse was only part of the hell that Frank put his sons through. Because even when he wasn't around, the threat of his wrath haunted Kirk. I remember sitting watching TV with my mother. And having a really bad pain in my stomach. And I might have to take me in the hospital. We're in the hospital, and was there for a while, I'd make a week. All the stress led Kurt to being diagnosed with an ulcer at the age of 15.

What I remember most two things about that are coming home and my father telling me that he knew why I had the ulcer, that I do think wrong and then phrase him find out. My mom knew, you know, you could see the sadness in her face. I mean, she did everything she couldn't protect us. It was nothing she couldn't do. He'd hit her, he'd throw something at her. It was no different for him, ma'am. After years of abuse, Kurt's mom divorced Frank.

This was an extreme move given her strong, traditional Catholic roots. Frank then moved in with Diane, his longtime mistress. When my mother and father got divorced, the FBI came to the house. He made the door about him. talk to my mother, and my mother shut the door on him. I wouldn't talk to him. And I like to believe that I got that in me from my mother, that I don't want to talk about anybody else or tell on anybody or because my loyalty came from my mother and come from my father. Loyalty. It's what this story is all about. But the various members of the Calabrese family

had different ideas about what loyalty was. To Frank, it meant being loyal to him. But to Kurt, it meant looking out for everyone, even his older brother, Frank Jr. We were in the garage, and he started hitting Jr. And Jr. went down on the ground, and I actually jumped on top of him to try to protect him from my dad hitting him.

It wasn't something I thought out. It wasn't something that I ever did before. It was just a reaction to him doing that. Sticking together helped Kurt and his family whether Frank's abuse. But Frank knew this, so he often tried to drive a wedge between Kurt and his brother, Jr. Just the way he talked to each one of us when we were both standing there. My father would say, oh, yeah, you know, your brother is so much better than you. Why are you wasting your time?

You're no good. You're lazy. you're not in shape, you don't take care of yourself, you're useless, you're a piece of shit. Kurt describes life with his father as a living hell. And I would cry myself to sleep at night. I hope and praying to God, I begged to die. I begged to not wake up. And when I couldn't get that, when I asked for it and I couldn't get it,

made me feel like there wasn't a God. We'll be back with more after a short break. It's Jaredoff. I'm right here. Don't miss the return of Marvel Television's Daredevil Born Again. So what's next? I'm going to take this city back. In an all-new season, now streaming only on Disney Plus.

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Not today, sweatpants. somebody's wearing jeans that fit wow no photos please I'm just a regular dad who happens to have a stylist I really look my best when someone else makes the decisions hey we can all see you two-way mirrors

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beat and slashed after they allegedly killed three other underworld figures in Elmwood Park. He shot my dad in the head with a shocker nine times. Murdered by the mob, beaten for information, later found dead in the trunk of a burning car. He was stosed down. He went into one of the acid tanks. Took him into the basement and essentially beat them to death there. They tied her to a chair. They doused her in kerosene. They stabbed her a few dozen times and then lit her on fire while she was still alive. The sheer violence of the Chicago outfit dominated the nightly news in the 1980s.

It spoke not only to their brutality, but also their power. During the 1980s, the Chicago outfit really had tremendous power. Some would argue that the Chicago outfit had more power, more control, than any other organized crime group, certainly in U.S. history and maybe in world history. This is Marcus Funk. He's one of the federal prosecutors in the Family Secrets case. The Chicago mob had and has influence in corridors of power that you just don't normally see. They historically have been able to corrupt judges, prosecutors, law enforcement agents, obviously the civilian population.

Unlike defense attorneys Joe the Shark Lopez and Damon Sharonis, who we heard from earlier, funk didn't grow up in and around Chicago. He wasn't well-versed in the ways of the outfit, but he quickly got up to speed. Chicago, we call it the outfit. We don't call it the mafia. And in New York, you have five families that have a tremendous amount of control within New York. But they're structured entirely differently and frankly, more ineffectively. And I mean that in the following way. If you are a member of one of the five families, if you're the son of the mob boss of one of the five families,

you automatically sort of wear the crown. So the weaknesses of that structure are also you don't always get the best and brightest. if all you do is promote people who happen to be your children. In Chicago, outfit members generally did not bring their sons into the life, but Frank Calabry Sr. did, and that may have been the worst decision he made in a life full of terrible decisions. It wasn't 16 yet. We got to go something like late, late, night early morning,

because we had to go in the stores when there's nobody in the stores. To me, my brother, I never went alone. was always with my uncle. Not yet 16, Kurt's dad asks him and his older brother, Jr., to collect street tax from a local shop owner. Street tax is a form of extortion where the outfit would take a share of revenue from any business operating in their territory. I just remember how disgusting it was, and you go in and watch the moon and I was for him and jerk off. and all over the machine, and all over the floor, and all over the house, and he'd walk out. The floor was all full of shit, and quarters were all full of shit.

Tons of quarters, it was hundreds of dollars a quarter of thousands of dollars of quarters. Pretty fucking dirty. Kurt's first assignment was a string of seedy adult video stores. He would walk in past private booths that played X-rated films for customers during God-Nose-what for the price of a quarter a minute. We'd get brought to a garage and would have a wheel, you know, with the corn's on there. But the problem was the coins were wet. Guys peeing in there, jerking off in there. We had to do with clubs on it.

I mean, it was just a disgusting thing to do. Me hated it and, you know, but knew that we really had much of an option. Welcome to the outfit, kid. Kurt was learning that the life wasn't as glamorous as movies made it out to be, and that the outfit only cared about one thing, money. And whether it was juice loans, gambling, or extortion, someone had to collect that money, count it, and keep track of it. With Frank Sr. now in Mr. Miyagi mode,

he had another lesson ready for Kurt. A friend of mine, we were at a party and a fight broke out, My friend got hit with a crowbar in the mouth, split his lip open. I had a run-in with this guy's brother, and I planned on going to his house, and wanted to hurt him. With his friend badly beaten, Kurt wants revenge.

And after a run-in with the assailant's brother, he starts to hatch a plan. As I was at home getting some stuff together, my father came home and caught me. like I had a black on and I had a ski mask on my head and he said to me what are you doing and I got upset and I told him I said dad and this kid I want to kill him I'm going to his house and I'm waiting for him to come out he's like he's wanted me to show him where he lived my father came with me

to the kid's house and we were sitting on the street and he's telling me how are you going to do this and I said I don't know he says you're just going to you were just going to come here and what were you going to do think you're going to catch the guy and surprise him and I was like, Dad, honestly, I really didn't want to think about it. He goes, well, here, let me just show you something. He was pointing out things by the house where, see if you were going to do that, if you were to try to hide there,

you'd have to worry about somebody seeing you from over there. You'd want to try to get this light, the street light out because it's coming right down in the corner where, you know, he's got no bushes, so how are you going to approach him? And he showed me if you were going to do something that this is how you would do it. even if I was just mad and I wanted to go do something stupid, now I wouldn't because now I know what I can't do.

Now I know what I shouldn't do. Probably for the only time of my life, I actually felt we felt like there was something there that my father understood. You know, he was, I don't know what the word is. Normal. It says a lot about Frank as a father that when his son was seeking violent retribution, he treated it like teaching Kurt how to ride a bike. Gone was the belittling abuser, and in came the tactful and patient teacher.

Although Frank's temperament was impulsive at home, professionally, he committed violence with a cool and calculated demeanor. The lessons would keep on coming, and they would grow darker. He showed me how to stab someone, the way to grab him and bring him to you, and the look on his face was like he was actually stabbing somebody and killing him. Like he was like, you know, you can't stab it in or you just bring it up. Pull him to you and then in the stomach and then go up. Whether he likes it or not, Kurt's life in the outfit is just beginning.

And he has no idea where it will take him. What ultimately happens not only to Kurt, but his entire family, in the end, it was so much worse that he could have ever imagined. And his father turned him around and put a revolver in his, cheek and said, I would rather have you dead than disobey me. He knew out of all his three sons that Kurt was the one that he could target. There was times when I wanted to kill my father. There were times when I thought I had every right in the world to kill him.

You'd hear him laugh about some of these brutal murders. It was just a matter of just, you know, entertainment for him. What do you do when a mass murderer is coming home for Christmas dinner? That's Junior. That's the troublemaker, the trust caused all the problems, and he packed up and left everybody to deal with his mess. God knows how many different lies that Frank Jr. talked about to make Frank Jr. look good.

But I still have to look over my shoulder every day, and I still have to worry about my family. Because there are people out there and are still pissed off at what Jr. did. That's on this season of Underbelly, killing Kurt. So, yeah, that was the first episode. episode of a documentary series I produced called Killing Kurt. I mean, I imagine you guys want to hear more. That's a pretty crazy intro and it just gets crazier from there. Give it a listen.

Look up the Underbelly podcast. It's season three of that podcast. And yeah, I think the first two, probably three episodes are available now. Shout out to my man Vincent Shade, who really helped me put together and everything and is a great guy. And yeah, thanks for listening as always. and yeah, things are going to get interesting next week because we're starting to do video. But more about that in the next episode. Be well. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes.

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