Chemical Cowboys

by Lisa Sweetingham

  “Your brother is the biggest pain in the ass I ever met,” Mann would tell Ron. “But he knows what he's talking about.”

  Gagne took an active role in every step of his brother's case and he brought his understanding of drug culture to the table. He analyzed the psychology of the relationships between Bouyea and Betancur, Ron and Betancur. He drew from his own experience as a drug investigator to intuit what the police were thinking during their investigation and what the prosecution's next steps would be. Gagne knew the world his brother had gotten mixed up in, and he knew the language and technical parameters of blood, drugs, and guns.

  The more Gagne dug into the facts, the angrier he became. There was no evidence—no murder weapon, no prints, no blood—linking Ron to Betancur's death. Bouyea's story seemed to change with each telling and it didn't add up. She said Ron and Betancur had been standing facing each other when Ron pulled the trigger. But the gunshot wounds, the blood spatter, and the ballistics indicated the gun was fired with a downward trajectory, as if Betancur was lying down or on his knees.

  Prosecutors were working on a theory that Ron was so enraged that Betancur wouldn't hand over the coke that he shot him. Gagne's theory was that the cops saw a dead body, saw Ron's name on some checks, and found their answer when a pretty girl who was sleeping with the victim for his drugs said she saw someone else do it.

  The checks on the kitchen table made out to cash were another story. Gagne was stunned to learn that his brother not only had had a personal drug dealer, but he had been paying for cocaine with personal checks. It had become that casual. Ron had figured it was just easier than making an ATM stop on the way. When the first check cleared, Betancur was happy to take them. The cops discovered Ron's checks had been cashed all over town.

  “Listen,” Gagne warned his brother during a jailhouse visit. “There's just as much drugs inside as out of this place. If you fail a drug test in here, you're done. You have to be squeaky-clean.”

  Ron understood. He was subjected to random urine tests almost weekly. He stayed clean and got a job cleaning tables and pouring coffee in the dining room. He worked out: push-ups and pull-ups on the stairs, lifting buckets of laundry detergent, playing basketball and running in the recreation yard. He got in trouble for swearing once. Another time he slipped up and called one of the guards—a guy he used to play football with—by his first name.

  The other inmates liked to watch Cops and play cards and Scrabble, but Ron often tired of it and would return to his cell to read or to work on his running list of all the jokes he had ever heard. He missed being able to walk out a door and look at the sky without his every move being studied. He missed his son.

  Ron constantly had visitors. His siblings and friends tried to lift his spirits. His mom and sisters helped to keep his personal matters in order and arranged a fund-raiser for his defense. Every three days his father would come to see him.

  Ron was the only Gagne child who kept a close relationship with René. The day Ron was sent to ACI, René called with one question: “Did you do it?”

  “No, I didn't do it,” Ron said.

  “All right. Then I'm going to help you.”

  René and his second wife loaned Ron more than $50,000, taking out a line of credit on their home; Ron pulled $27,000 out of his annuity; his mother and sisters helped him with the rest.

  His defense and expenses topped out at nearly $90,000. He waited sixteen months for his case to go to court.

  102 BOB AND RON

  GAGNE HAD SPENT THE last sixteen months visiting public schools, training drug counselors, and telling kids to stay straight and healthy. In the evenings, he'd fight traffic back to Long Island, have dinner with his wife and daughter, and then head to the basement to work on his brother's murder case. Kristen would head to bed alone. Gagne knew he had a small window of opportunity to help Ron, and he feared that he would pay in guilt for the rest of his life if he didn't give his brother's case his full attention. It was the most important casework he had ever done. He discussed it with no one at DEA, not even Germanowski, who was with him at Quantico when he got the news. If he were to try to explain his brother's case to any of the other agents, where would he even start? There would be whispers and gossip about his dysfunctional family. He didn't want to be treated differently.

  Sometimes, he'd be alone in the basement, reading through police reports, and he'd forget that it was his own brother he was reading about, the presumed bad guy. Ron had been his best friend and confidant growing up. The scar on Gagne's lip was an ever-present reminder of the time when, as little boys digging for earthworms in the yard, Ronnie tossed a shovelful of dirt over his shoulder and accidentally caught Bobby in the face. The blade gashed clean through Bob's lip and he screamed out in tears. Their father emerged from the garage and threw a pair of pliers at Ronnie. The only thing that hurt Bob more than the stinging gash on his face was the guilt he felt when his father attacked his little brother.

  Gagne could always blame his father—the original bad guy—for his brother's troubles, but deep down, he felt a measure of culpability. He'd been so busy chasing drug dealers and trying to create a healthy home for his own family that he hadn't even noticed his brother was in trouble.

  He decided to put his mind on problems that were fixable and clear-cut. He focused on his brother's trial, and eventually he mustered his courage and turned to Linda Lacewell as a discreet sounding board.

  Lacewell was sympathetic. In the four years she had spent working alongside Gagne she found that fairness characterized his work. It was imperative in their cases together that they were certain they were bringing the right person to trial, and she knew that he was vexed that the case against Ron seemed held together by a single, dubious eyewitness. Gagne searched for inconsistencies in her statements to police and obsessed over the grand jury testimony of the detective who was present when Bouyea identified Betancur's killer. It was a single word in the detective's testimony, a slip of the tongue that jolted Gagne. The officer said he had presented the photo spread to Bouyea and then “we” picked Ron as the person she saw.

  Gagne felt like championing the rights of every murder suspect who was ever railroaded into a false conviction. But that was one more obligation he didn't need. He was juggling so many responsibilities—Tuito's trial, Ron's trial, demand reduction coordinator, student mentor, husband, and father. A lot of people depended on him and letting any one of them down was not an option. Sometimes he felt like he was barely holding it together.

  In the summer of 2002, Gagne was sent back home to Long Island to work as a street agent again. Kristen was glad for it. She was pregnant with their second child.

  103 MURDER IN THE

  FIRST DEGREE

  RON GAGNE'S TRIAL BEGAN on a Monday in late January 2003. He was transported to the courthouse in shackles and a waist chain. He changed into a suit and tie in his holding cell.

  His case was heard in one of the smallest courtrooms in the state: one door to get in, the jury box immediately to the right, two or three tables for the lawyers, and three rows of benches in a gallery that seated twenty-five to thirty spectators.

  Ron's childhood friends, parents of friends, his siblings, and his parents all sat close in the aisles next to local reporters. Gagne watched the trial from the back row with a notepad and pen.

  The charges against him were first-degree murder and use of a firearm while committing a crime of violence. He faced two consecutive life sentences if convicted of both counts. Eight men and four women were seated as jurors. For the next nine days they heard from neighbors, detectives, ballistics experts, forensic investigators, the medical examiner, and the two opposing star witnesses—Terry Bouyea and Ron Gagne.

  In addition to the neighbor who had found Betancur's body, another neighbor testified that he had heard a man and a woman arguing the night of Betancur's death. He heard banging against a wall, as if someone was being roughed up, and then gunshots. He looked out his windows and saw a
dark-haired girl, Bouyea, leaving the front of the building, shoving something down her pants, and running down the street.

  Prosecutors theorized that Ron had escaped out a back window, cut through a field, and run home, a little over a mile away. They had even recovered a fingerprint on a window screen. To call it a possible statistical match required that at least eight points on the print were identical to Ron's prints. The forensic examiner admitted during cross-examination that because the window print had only six matching points, he couldn't say it was Ron's.

  Betancur had been paranoid and awake for days on a binge when Terry Bouyea came to see him. Bouyea told the jury that she wanted drugs and Betancur wanted sex, so she gave it to him. While they were in bed, she said, Ron came banging on the door. She begged Betancur not to let him in, but he didn't listen. She said she hid in a closet while they argued, and then she saw Ron shoot Betancur and leave without taking the drugs. Bouyea admitted that she stole a bag of coke from Betancur's shorts before she left the apartment. She spent the evening with a boyfriend and eventually called police. Bouyea had initially denied knowing Ron Gagne, and she explained to jurors that she had lied because she was scared he'd come after her.

  Now it was time for Ron to give his side. The prosecution had portrayed him as a drug-crazed murderer and he knew he would have to answer difficult questions on the stand. He testified candidly for about three hours over two days.

  Ron said he had been buying cocaine from Betancur for more than six months. He had been depressed about his girlfriend leaving with their son, so he spent more time partying with friends. In the beginning, he'd do a little coke on a Friday or Saturday night but never during the week. Pretty soon, his drug use was on a predictable cycle: go to work, come home, nothing on TV, call the dealer, spend $100, party, go to bed, get up, go to work, nothing to do, call Joe. Ron called Joe more than three dozen times in the month leading up to his death and bought coke from him at least once a week.

  Ron admitted to jurors that he had a drug problem, but he didn't have it in him to kill anyone.

  “I had nothing to do with his death,” he said.

  The trial would come down to a case of he said, she said—a battle of credibility.

  “At the end of the day you have to decide if you will convict Mr. Gagne based on [Bouyea's] testimony,” Mann told the jury in his closing arguments. He noted that, by Bouyea's own admission, Betancur was still breathing when she rifled through his pockets, stole his drugs, and called her boyfriend rather than calling 911. “She should be on trial,” Mann said.

  Prosecutor Russell Sollitto urged jurors to give Bouyea credit for telling the truth, “even when it was bad for her.”

  The jury began deliberating at about 1:00 p.m. on a Thursday. Ron was led back to a holding cell in the courtroom. He loosened his tie and sat down. He was emotionally exhausted. He'd had a lot of time to think about his life the last 498 days in prison. He heard that some of the detectives, guys he grew up playing sports with, were bragging about their strong case and how they were going to put a Gagne boy away. It felt personal to him. Yet he kept coming back to the same obvious conclusion: if he hadn't been doing drugs, the cops never would have seen his checks on Betancur's table, linked him to the murder, and forced him to recount every detail of his drug use to his family and the community. It was embarrassing, but not nearly as bad as murder. At thirty-five, he felt like he had come clean about everything. It was up to the jury now to decide if he was going home or going back to his cage for the rest of his life. He'd eased back to take a nap when a deputy walked in.

  The panel had reached a decision in about two hours. Ron was weak and shaky as the officer led him down the corridor and back into the tiny courtroom. Mann was nervous too. Despite his objections, the prosecutors had been allowed a jury instruction, which stated that if they could not agree on first-degree murder, they had the option of finding Ron guilty of second-degree murder. Mann warned Ron: When the first verdict is read, don't react. Wait for the next verdict—the second-degree charge.

  Ron looked into the gallery at his parents and siblings, braving smiles but clearly on tenterhooks. Bob, however, had left. After sitting through the entire trial, Gagne was confident that his brother had been his own best witness on the stand. He saw it on the jurors’

  faces. He was so certain his brother would be freed that he said his good-byes and started the long drive home before the reading of the verdict. Gagne figured there would be tears and celebrations afterward, and he wasn't a parade guy. He could get people dressed and ready for the parade and get them there on time, but he preferred to slip out before the cheering and flag waving. He needed to get back home to his pregnant wife and try to return to normalcy. He was tired.

  Defendant, please rise.

  The jury foreman announced that they had reached a unanimous decision. The judge reviewed the verdict form, handed it back to the deputy, and asked the foreman to read it aloud to the court.

  We the jury in the case of the State of Rhode Island versus Ronald Gagne, in the charge of murder in the first degree, find the defendant … not guilty.

  A gasping sigh shot through the gallery like a rumble of electricity. Ron stood stony as a statue, squeezing the defense table to keep from passing out.

  “Have you reached a verdict in count one?” the judge asked.

  Yes … We the jury find the defendant, Ronald Gagne, in the charge of murder in the second degree …

  Ron swore he saw the foreman turn and say those last words just to him: not guilty.

  He collapsed into his chair, put his face in his hands, and wept.

  104 THREE MONTHS LATER

  ODED TUITO WAS RETURNING to America. By the spring of 2003, after two years of fighting extradition, Tuito had exhausted his appeals and the Spanish authorities were ready to hand him over. Gagne got a call from a U.S. marshal, checking in to see what kind of suspect they'd be dealing with.

  “He's dangerous. Don't let your guard down and stay focused,” Gagne said.

  Around the same time, Linda Lacewell handed Gagne a laundry list of to-do items—preparations in their case against the Fat Man. It was time for him start dialing up cooperators. There were about a dozen names on his list, mostly couriers. Finding Yakov Ariel—the first Tuito courier he had arrested at JFK—was going to be tough. Ariel was in Israel, but no one knew where he was living. Gagne called Gadi Eshed for help.

  “All right,” Eshed said. “I will get back to you.”

  Eshed called back within forty-eight hours. Not only had he found Ariel, he had already called to prep him for Gagne. Ariel still sounded surprised to hear Gagne's voice on the line. It had been four years since his arrest. His cooperation agreement obligated him to testify, Gagne reminded him, and the U.S. government would pay for his flight to New York—if they needed him.

  When Gagne caught up with Jackie Suarez, she was typically cold to him, but he could hear a lightness in her voice. She was working for an Internet-based gourmet food company and had been traveling on business around the country. Things were good at home. She sounded clean and in control.

  “We may call you to testify when Tuito comes back,” Gagne told her. “It's possible he could plead out. But I'm just calling because I have to let you know.”

  “How is he?” she asked. The question threw Gagne. He had no answer.

  On April 15, 2003, U.S. marshals took custody of Oded Tuito in Spain and transported him on a commercial flight to JFK without incident. He was scheduled for arraignment in federal court in Brooklyn the next morning.

  “You're going to be there, right?” Lacewell asked. She seemed nervous and Gagne enjoyed antagonizing her.

  “Linda, you know my wife is super pregnant right now?” Gagne said. “Like, ready to give birth any minute?”

  “Okay, but you're going to be there, right?”

  On April 16, Lacewell stood at the prosecution table in the courtroom of U.S. magistrate judge Cheryl Pollak. A public defender
took the defense table. Gagne sat behind Lacewell in the front row of the gallery.

  Oded Tuito's name was called. He wore a khaki prison uniform and slip-on shoes. He was unshaven and jet-lagged. He glanced around the courtroom. It was the first time Gagne and Lacewell had seen him in the flesh. Gagne and his DEA partners across the country had been chasing Tuito and his underlings for more than five years. To finally see him in shackles and standing before an American judge was a tremendous relief. Gagne was surprised at how small Tuito looked—thinner than in the old photographs. He seemed worn down.

  The forty-one-year-old Ecstasy kingpin smirked as Judge Pollak summarized the counts against him: conducting a criminal enterprise, importation of Ecstasy, distribution of Ecstasy with the intent to import it, related drug conspiracies, money laundering.

  “Everything you told me I know,” Tuito interrupted. He pleaded not guilty and requested a kosher meal for Passover. He would receive chicken with horseradish and a box of matzos for Seder in federal prison.

  In classic cowboy parlance, SAC Anthony Placido of DEA New York announced that day that Oded Tuito's arrest and extradition “will not only serve to disrupt the flow of millions of dosage units of illegal drugs into our country, it also sends the unmistakable message to criminals that they can run, but they cannot hide.”

  Tuito faced twenty years to life in prison and $2 million in fines if convicted. He was ready for a fight—he wanted to go to trial. New York had the strongest case and would try Tuito first. Gagne and Lacewell had yet to locate his assets, but because of his kingpin status, if he wanted to hire a private attorney he'd have to prove he wasn't paying with drug proceeds.

  They'd finally gotten him. Still, Gagne had a vague feeling that Tuito had more tricks up his sleeve. He had masterfully manipulated the courts abroad for years. Gagne knew they would have to stay one step ahead, anticipating his next possible move.