Tyranny of a Lover...Diary of the Wife of an Undercover informant

by Janet J. White

  The phone clicked in my ear.

  His calm, unemotional voice made his threat more believable. Brush it aside, I told myself, refilling the glass of wine to go with my meal. The salad and medium rare steak tasted amazing.

  It was the morning of the fourth day. Leaving the condo around noon for more make-believe errands, I wondered how long I could keep up the pace. Glancing in the rear view mirror from time to time, I watched for the Caddy or the Datsun. Had they switched to a third car? "Come on fellows, show yourselves," I said aloud.

  Three hours later, I returned to the condo without having seen the Caddy, the Datsun, or a different vehicle following me. The surveillance had ended; I could feel it in my bones. I could feel the big black cloud drifting away. Surely, the Mafia had listened to last night's conversation with Dick. Now, knowing the truth, they had decided to leave me alone.

  Coming in and closing the door, I could hardly believe my good luck that they had come and gone without so much as touching one of my long, polished fingernails. "Thank you Lord," I whispered repeatedly. Drawing the drapes, I lay down on the couch for a nap, not awakening until thirteen hours later.

  The next afternoon, I walked the beach and thought about the last unfinished item on my list of things to do. The divorce. I called my attorney, advising him that I had been followed for three days. "Looks like you weren't kidding, Jen," Tom replied. "Two men in a blue Cadillac, and another car tailed me for two or three days, as well."

  "Oh, Tom. I'm so sorry you had to go through that. I was scared half to death. How did you handle it?"

  "Not bad," the attorney said. "Maybe because I've been there before."

  "I'll be forever grateful no harm came to either of us," I said. "Good-bye for now, Tom."

  I had just put the receiver down when the phone rang. I picked it up to hear Dick's snarl, "I am...going to come back and kill you."

  "Why don't you come back to Bonita Beach and try," I said. "You can join the caravan that's been following me around town. One's a big expensive ride and the other is a go-fast car. Guess who, Dick?"

  "You're bull-shitting me!" he said, sounding uncertain.

  "There's one way to find out." I taunted.

  This time, he hung up with a gentle click.

  Now that my followers had vanished, I figured I might as well use the ploy to keep Dick at bay. The man might be willing to abuse my sixteen-year-old son, drive off my daughter, and smash a former wife's jaw, but tangle with the Mafia? No way. I also knew the diversion could not work forever. The clock ticked. Intending to find a way to put an end to Dick's threatening phone calls, I thought about moving, but the cost had to be considered and the rent had been prepaid for another six weeks. My phone number had to remain the same because the condo owner refused to change it. Even if he agreed, a new phone number would be listed in his name, which Dick knew. And lastly, I refused to be further intimidated and terrorized by my soon-to-be ex-husband. After what I had just gone through, I felt strong enough to fight him, and win.

  Each night before falling asleep, different plans came and went. One morning I awakened with an idea. I drank coffee and sat down with paper and pen.

  "Dear Dick," the letter began. Four pages later, with the task completed, I put the letter in an envelope addressed to his 'Mama'. Knowing she would read it first, before forwarding it to him, I outlined Dick's illegal activities, the FBI fiasco, the terrible danger, and his death threats. Recounted in detail were various statements he had made about his family members, such as:

  "My mother has always wanted to go to bed with me, I've always known that."

  "My sister Ruth, who I put through college, turned on me when I needed help."

  "You're a liar, Dick," I wrote. "You accused me of the unfaithfulness that you, yourself, were guilty of!"

  I ended the letter with, "Just know that I'll retaliate if you ever again threaten to kill me. I have access to a snowball that I'll kick down the hill. By the time it reaches you, it will have gathered enough weight to squash you and whatever happens to be on top of you at the time...be that female, rooftop, either or both!"

  During the next few days, while the letter winged it's way to his mother’s house in North Carolina, Dick continued with his death threat calls. Five days later, he stopped calling me. Blessed silence. Apparently, ‘Mama' had taken care of the problem.

  During the weeks that followed, I gloried in the blessed solitude, in the water and the wind and the beauty that surrounded me.

  In September of 1983, just before the condo lease expired, and within five weeks of the second divorce filing, my attorney called.

  "Are you sitting down?" Tom asked.

  I caught my breath. "Why, what's up?"

  "What I'm about to tell you is almost unheard of," he said in a hushed voice. "I've just received your Divorce Decree. Come in as soon as you can, you'll want to see this right away."

  I let out a little yelp of joy. In my mind, I heard a heavy, metal door crank open. "Oh, that's great, Tom. I'm half-way out the door already."

  I ran to my car, jumped in and sped off. On the forty-five minute drive to Tom's office, I had a terrible time resisting the urge to push the petal to the floor. "Slow down, gal," I said aloud. "You're driving a car, not flying a Lear jet."

  Arriving at Tom O'Grady's office, he motioned me to a chair and handed me the Final Judgment of Dissolution of Marriage. I couldn't stop smiling or shaking my head in wonder.

  "This is most unusual," he said again, with enthusiasm. "The judge granted you an immediate final divorce, without even attempting to serve the Instruments on Dick, which I believed to be almost impossible. On top of that, you asked for only what is yours and he turned around and gave you everything left in storage. In all my years of practicing law, I've never seen this happen before."

  I don't know whether you've ever laughed and cried at the same time. That day, I did.

  Tom came around his desk, handed me a Kleenex and patted me on the shoulder. "Well, Jen, all I can say is that you certainly must have someone in your corner."

  Overwhelmed with gratitude, I thanked him for all of his help and for being the kind of person he was. “I'm glad I found you, with a coupon no less. Such a deal!" We both laughed as he escorted me to the door. "And yes, Tom, I truly believe there's someone in my corner. So long for now, Thomas O'Grady, Esquire."

  "Good-bye, Jen," he said, holding the door open, "It's been good."

  "It has, Tom. Perhaps our paths will cross again one day. I hope so."

  I left Tom's office in a happy daze, smiling all the way back to Bonita Beach. My list had been completed, six out of six. Feeling lighter and safer than I had in years, at last I could begin a new life.

  I barely remembered driving to the spot where I drew my car to a stop. Like a slight smile, a half moon lit the seaweed-scattered path that led to the water's edge. Countless stars twinkled above. The ocean rolled gently, as I removed my sandals to feel the sand beneath my feet. Sitting down on the damp beach, I listened to the silence of the night and watched renegade sea birds gliding overhead. As bits of sea spray mixed with sand prickled at my face, I reached for a piece of white foam that ran over my feet and wondered what it was made of, thinking this must be what it feels like to be in paradise.

  Suddenly a shooting star soared through the heavens and, with tears flowing down my cheeks, I whispered, "Thank you, Lord."

  THE END

  EPILOGUE

  AFTERWARDS

  THE FBI: From October l981 to May l983, the FBI paid Dick $20,000 as a covert operator for services he performed during the twenty-month investigation of 'Operation Fuzzball'. Since he received odd amounts of $200, $650, and $1,125 during that period of time, it seemed curious that it totaled exactly $20,000—to the penny. I kept an accurate accounting. Later, while researching the workings of the FBI, the reasons became clear.

  As I understand it, FBI guidelines at that time were under a Criminal
Undercover Operations Review Committee that had to approve certain operations. The FBI criterion distinguishes between Group I and Group II investigations, based on the length of the operation and its cost. Group I covers the longer (over six months) and costlier (over $20,000) investigations and require approval by the local U.S. Attorney, FBI headquarters, the Criminal Undercover Operations Review Committee, and either the FBI director or a designated assistant director.

  Group II investigations require the approval only of the local supervisor. Low and behold. 'Operation Fuzzball' should have been designated a Group I investigation. Instead, it had been arbitrarily thrown into Group II.

  No wonder the FBI had refused to pay the $5,000 we incurred in out-of-pocket expenses during those twenty months, or reimburse the $1,700 in travel expenses from Killeen, Texas to Naples, Florida. Any expenditure above $20,000 would have triggered reviews at a higher level. The operation took twenty months to complete and ran close to $27,000. It appears that scrutiny at that higher level had been carefully sidestepped by the FBI office of Sarasota, Florida.

  Without the aid of a keen attorney at the inception of the case, who could have secured a written guarantees, the FBI had no need to keep their promises of relocation, identity changes or reward percentages, or even reimburse our costs of working for the FBI.

  The FBI, DEA, and IRS, in the first series of arrests in 'Operation Fuzzball', felled numerous individuals and corporations in this country. Dick opened the door so that the FBI could ascertain how illegally gained monies were laundered through gambling casinos and transferred to offshore banks in order to hide huge amounts of monies and avoid taxation. Soon, the door swung open wide. Other drug smuggling operations fell into the net of the Justice Department, in great part, because of Dick Lee. After 'Operation Fuzzball' ended, the FBI secured the indictments that they had sought for nine years. Eventually, light was shed on the involvement of Manuel Noriega, the Panamanian leader. Conservatively, the Justice Department's treasure chest grew fatter by hundreds of millions of dollars in seized bank accounts and confiscated properties. Some claim, and I agree, that the U.S. Justice Department is considerably more dedicated to exchanging huge sums of money for shorter prison terms than to dispensing true justice.

  After the divorce from Dick, with court order in hand, I retrieved my remaining household goods from Miller's Storage Company in Sarasota, leaving Dick's few possessions for him to collect, if he so choose. I wanted nothing to remind me of him.

  Then I thought long and hard about how I would make a living. I couldn't return to Sarasota and resume my career in real estate. I decided to enroll in a two-year court-reporting course in Tampa and moved into a small apartment near the school. Unfortunately, I soon fell behind my younger and more nimble-fingered classmates and eventually had to drop out of the course. The strain of the past two years had taken its toll. I couldn't seem to concentrate. And being a stranger in Tampa, without family or friends, made the task more than I could handle. I needed a little help. I decided to write to our former FBI contact, Sonny Knight, to ask him to keep his promise to "put in for a reward for you personally, Jen...and having nothing to do with Dick."

  A week before Christmas, I sent the letter.

  Three days after Christmas, I received a response.

  I suppose the ultimate stripping away of all pretensions to high purpose and sense of fair play by the FBI should not have come as a surprise. However, their refusal to at least reimburse the thousands of dollars it cost me personally to help finance 'Operation Fuzzball', or the cost of storing my household furniture, smacked as the supreme shame of the FBI.

  As for some of the others, I've learned the following:

  Melvin Pome, Dick's crooked gambling partner, committed murder/suicide in 1986. Distraught over his live-in lover's intentions to leave him for another, Melvin shot her in the head in the parking lot of Sarasota's Memorial Hospital before turning the gun on himself.

  CLARK RAINIER, JR.: The FBI implemented their original plan of using Clark to snare the drug kingpin to the letter. At Clark's arrest, his bail was set at $1.5 million and charged under RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act). Many believe that RICO touches on unconstitutionality since the defendant's funds and assets can, and usually are, frozen before the case is brought to trial. The Government's premise has been that the accused should not be able to access monies that may have been gained from racketeering activities to defend himself. Thus, unable to make bail, Clark occupied a jail cell while awaiting his trial and asked only for his mother's Bible. That wish was denied. The smuggling and laundry trials of international proportions took place in Florida and California in 1983 and 1984. Clark plea-bargained and gained liberal immunity by testifying against the Kingpin and others, in exchange for serving little or no prison time. In 1986, he was arrested for boarding an airplane with a gun.

  JACKSON DEATON: Clark's attorney and associate, Jackson, was arrested and charged under RICO, his bail also set at $1.5 million. Like Clark, Jackson was also unable to make bail, eventually rolling over and testifying against others in exchange for a minimal sentence. Jackson's wife divorced him after his arrest.

  REED REYNOLDS: The Florida attorney who introduced Dick to Clark and Jackson was not arrested, according to the disclosure of court records at the conclusion of the sting. He and his wife subsequently moved from Sarasota and disappeared into the fog.

  JACOB DAVIS: Owner of the Royal Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada, Davis spent little time behind bars. His people quickly carted in suitcases of cash to meet his bail of $500,000. In l988, the Nevada Gaming Commission denied the renewal of his casino gaming license. A Las Vegas source informed me that his application had been rejected, not for his illicit money laundering operations, but for sloppy bookkeeping systems.

  An incidental note on casino gambling: It's reported that slot machines pay the bills, with casino owners looking to a consistent 19 percent profit. A big shake-up occurred at the Royal Casino when the slot machine profit dipped to a low 13 per cent and management looked for a thief among the employees.

  BRUCE SOLOMAN: The Kingpin and main target of 'Operation Fuzzball’, Solomon also pleaded guilty and turned over his home and other assets to the government. He received a fifteen-year prison sentence for drug smuggling plus an additional five years for conspiring to avoid income taxes. The two sentences ran concurrently for a maximum of fifteen years, with his prison term beginning in January of 1984.

  DICK LEE’S MOTHER: She sold her home of thirty-five years in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, as well as her flower shop, then disappeared. I recall her terse comment to me during a visit: "Dick likes to live like a millionaire, as long as it's on somebody else's money." Ruth, her daughter and Dick's sister, along with her family, also moved from North Carolina and left no trace of their whereabouts.

  My brother DENNY, his wife and family: Six months after I had been followed by the Mafia in Bonita Beach, Florida, and more than a thousand miles away, a black limousine parked in front of their home and videotaped their comings and goings for close to a week. My brother and sister-in-law gave serious thought to packing up their family, selling their home and moving their business to another state. Fortunately, nothing further transpired to disrupt their productive lives. They remained in their hometown and prospered, as the Mafia's search for Dick continued elsewhere.

  GREGG: My handsome and gentle son married and has a daughter. Gregg now has a stable life and works in the manufacturing industry. Although states separate us, we remain close in spirit and supportive love. And every now and again, we manage a visit and I'm able to see my redheaded granddaughter.

  SUZIE: My daughter divorced Simon in 1986. In 1996, she earned a bachelor's degree with a 4.0 grade point average. My beautiful Suzie remains in a western state and earns her living in the hotel management industry. We talk on the phone and fax one another two or three times a week. Best of all, Suzie and I meet once a year at various locations aro
und the country for shared vacations.

  As for ME: I've remained single. I'm healthy, happy and grateful that my children and I have survived the Dick Lee era, and been given the opportunity to build new lives.

  I sincerely hope this true account will encourage even one person to heed the sight and sound of red flags and warning bells of unacceptable behavior in that 'special someone'. Listen to your instincts, that little voice that says, "Hold on a minute, there's something very wrong here." My brother, a wholesome and just person, has this to say: "When you want to determine a person's true character, don't ask a former spouse. Don't ask a former lover. Don't ask their friends or family. Do ask a former employer. Now, there's a person who has no ulterior motives, is impartial and can usually offer an accurate character assessment."

  In our desire to believe the best of a loved one, it's too easy to confuse the difference between what we want that person to be with what that person truly is. We should not kid ourselves that he will lie to others, but he won't lie to me. He will cheat on others, but he won't cheat on me. Guard your mind against impractical thoughts and imaginary hopes that the leopard will change his spots. He won't. He will, however, devour you if he can, because that's his nature to do so. Then he will stalk his next victim as he continues his journey through the jungles of his mind. Be wiser than I was.

  DICK LEE: On June 1, 1983, he drove away from the condo in Bonita Beach, Florida, his head thrown back in maniacal laughter, leaving me with his last words ringing in my ears, "If someone kills you or not...it's all the same to me.

  Three years later, in 1986, he was arrested for spousal abuse of his fourth wife in Pompano Beach, Florida. In 1988, while packing boxes to move from Asheville, North Carolina, I heard a Crime-stoppers radio bulletin asking for information about a motorcycle gang of five men who tortured and raped a sixteen-year old female hitchhiker. As the newscaster described the main perpetrator, that little prickling sensation coursed through me. It sounded like Dick Lee. I picked up the telephone and described Dick to the detective handling the case. "What