Confessions of a Second Story Man

by Allen M. Hornblum

  “‘Jesus Christ, what the hell are you doing, you goddamn idiot?’ I scream at him. ‘Those guns are antiques. They’re worth money.’

  “Now the little that we did get is worth next to nothing, and I’m bummed out again. But one thing we did come out of there with that had some value was the Social Register..t had all the phone numbers and addresses of all the socially prominent people in America. I was going through a desk drawer at the Biddle place looking for money, checks, anything of value, and came upon it. Once I saw what it was, I took it.”

  Though the Biddle estate turned out to be a huge disappointment, “the little red book” Kripplebauer had discovered was a road map to some of the wealthiest families in the country. Some of the famous families and swanky properties in the Social Register,.ripplebauer reasoned, must have money, furs, expensive jewelry, and other items of value. His plan to use the book never materialized, however. Just a few weeks later, Philadelphia detectives raided the apartment of Mitchell Prinski in Northeast Philadelphia and arrested all four of the conspirators. At the time, the police were unaware of the crew’s involvement with the Biddle burglary. The discovery of the Social Register—.tuffed in an old cigar box inside a closet overflowing with stolen goods in Prinski’s less than regal apartment—supplied the link to the Biddle break-in. The cops had stumbled upon a mother lode of ill-gotten goods.

  “We had a lot of stuff stored at Mitchell’s place in the Jackson Court Apartments,” says Kripplebauer. “They had no idea what they found. At least a quarter-million went down with that raid. We were packing up. We were getting ready to leave the next morning for Canada. We were going up to Montreal, where the World’s Fair was being held, to unload over $200,000 in hot postal checks. Friends of mine, a crew of guys from Pittsburgh, had robbed the post office in Bryant, Alabama, and now wanted to sell the money orders they had walked off with. They had stolen the official stamping and validating machines as well. We were stamping the money orders when the detectives raided the place. We figured the Montreal authorities, with all the activity and international tourists in town, wouldn’t get too suspicious about a large number of U.S. postal money orders being cashed. We had set up new IDs and had letters sent to the Canadian hotel cashing the money orders for $300 and $400 apiece. It would have worked, too, and brought in a bundle.”

  Besides interfering with the stolen-money-order and Social Register.chemes, the police raid also helped uncover another creative moneymaking operation that had recently led to the collapse of a well-known Philadelphia automobile dealership.

  “When the cops went through the apartment, they found the stolen checks from the Shore Brothers Pontiac Agency. We cleaned the owner’s account out,” says Junior, almost proudly. “Every time he made a deposit, we made a withdrawal. We had a pretty good plan. Mitchell had the ID of guy named John Barton, and we had a girl inside the Shore Brothers Pontiac dealership that was helping us. Mitchell goes to the bank to cash an $8,000 check made out to Shore Brothers. The bank teller is suspicious, so she contacts the dealership and gets our girl on the phone. She informs the teller that John Barton is a salesman for the Shore dealership down South and he needs the money, since he was leaving that day to purchase cars. He got $8,000 in hundreds.

  “This happened five, six, seven times for a total of about $50,000. Every time Mitchell wanted to cash a check, we’d call to make sure there was enough money in the account. Finally, though, the owner stumbles over the scam himself. He writes a check and the bank notifies him he’s overdrawn. Overdrawn by about $30,000. The guy wrote a check for something like $275, and the bank tells him he’s overdrawn for 30 grand. The guy went right through the ceiling. They asked him if he knew John Barton. He didn’t know what they were talking about. The bank fired their own teller, thinking she was involved with the scam, and Shore went out of business. There was no money for inventory or salaries. The bank wouldn’t give him a nickel. No one figured it out until they found the stolen checks in Mitchell’s place.”

  The takedown put Kripplebauer in some serious trouble. If the Biddle job, the car dealership theft, and the stolen postal checks and equipment weren’t bad enough, he was also facing a charge of aggravated assault and battery with intent to murder. For the alcohol-sodden culture of the K&A crowd, it was par for the course. All too often the burglars’ lifestyle itself—whether armed or unarmed, working or not working—got K&A guys into trouble.

  In Junior’s case the trouble began one evening inside the Chew Tavern, a popular watering hole in the Germantown section of the city, when he got into a dispute with Nicky Lazzaro. Lazzaro was a short, powerful man who had 20-inch arms and could bench-press 500 pounds. He bullied many in the neighborhood and kept his hand in a number of illegal endeavors. Lazzaro claimed Junior owed him money. When Junior told him he owed him nothing, Lazzaro pulled a revolver and threatened to use it.

  “Lazzaro had a beef over a job me, Tommy Collins, and Petie Masone had done,” says Junior. “We did the house of a wealthy tax assessor on Ridge Avenue and walked off with a big score. I think we got something like $150,000 out of there. Nicky felt he deserved a cut based on the fact that he knew the guy was loaded and he planned on putting together a crew himself and doing the job. Well, he didn’t. We did. And now he wants a cut of our take.

  “Nicky was very strong. He was a little guy with a complex, and he used to bully people. When he got drunk he could get really angry. He was known to put his fist right through a wall. A lot of folks were afraid of him. It got so bad, some bar owners used to pay him to stay out of their establishments. Well, he starts givin’ me a lot of shit at the bar about what I owe him. He’s pretty drunk and I’m not much better, but he’s getting real loud and tellin’ everybody my business. He starts ranting and raving about what I supposedly owe him, and pretty soon the whole joint is listening. And the next thing I know he pulls out a revolver and flaunts it in my face. He’s waving it all over the place. I had my own gun on me, but I grabbed his when he turned his head. We struggled for it, and a few shots went off. The bar was crowded, and all of a sudden people are ducking and running for the door. Nicky and I are now locked in a death struggle.

  “Shots were going off in every direction, and I finally manage to get the gun out of my face and pointed at his chest. Nicky’s still ranting and raving, and that’s when I shot him. Bing, I just popped him one in the chest. I knew I wouldn’t have any more problems with him.

  “But now another guy, one of his friends, jumps in, grabs ahold of the gun, and starts sucker-punching me. He hits me four or five times in the head and manages to get the gun away from me. The guy starts yelling, ‘I got the gun. I got the gun.’ He’s feeling all proud of himself. That’s when I pulled my own gun and put it right in his face.

  “Fortunately for him, Fingers Hurst, a Kensington guy I did a lot of work with, was there, and he starts yelling, ‘C’mon, Junior, let’s go. Let’s get out of here. The cops are coming. Let’s go out the side door.’

  “We threw the guns down and got the hell out of there. We drove over to Petie Masone’s place, and I started to break out the guns. We always kept guns stashed at his place in case of an emergency. My mind was racing. I’m drunk. I figured I just killed a guy. The police will be coming after me, and maybe Nicky’s friends as well. I grabbed a sawed-off shotgun and stuffed two.45s inside my belt. ‘Let’s go back,’ I tell Fingers. ‘This time I’ll kill them all.’

  “Fingers calmed me down, and the cops eventually picked me up.”

  Steve LaCheen, Kripplebauer’s attorney—“legal magician” might be a more accurate description—was able to package a number of unrelated cases and cut a sweet deal for his client. It certainly helped that the shooting victim refused to testify. Every time the case was listed, Junior walked into the courtroom with Spider Haynes, a well-respected man in Germantown. Lazzaro, who required extensive surgery and had to have a lung removed, didn’t want Haynes, or anybody else for that matter, to see him rat Kripplebauer out. The
code of the streets—for standup men, at least—dictated that Lazzaro keep his mouth shut. He did, in fact; he never even showed up on scheduled court dates. Junior sat in the Philadelphia Detention Center for nearly two years while LaCheen tried to orchestrate a deal with the District Attorney’s Office. When sheriff’s deputies finally brought Lazzaro to court, he refused to testify, claiming he didn’t see who had shot him. The courtroom was filled with friends of both men; it would have been too embarrassing for one burglar and “standup guy” to testify against another.

  Eventually a deal was struck: two to four years for everything. In a few more months, Junior would be done with it. But not done with jail time: the State of New Jersey wanted a piece of him as well. They wanted him for a burglary in Cherry Hill and placed a detainer on him. Once he was freed from the Philadelphia Detention Center, Camden County authorities picked him up, shackled him, and took him across the river to face the Jersey charges.

  Kripplebauer was no stranger to prison; incarceration was part of his professional life. Serving a few months or a few years in the joint was an understood and accepted business expense. More than most, Junior possessed the mental and physical toughness needed to endure the primitive, oppressive conditions behind bars. From the endless periods of boredom in one’s cell to the periodic outbursts of violence and mayhem on the cellblocks or in the prison yard, Junior learned to survive, and in most cases to thrive. He knew how to navigate between competing prison gangs, gain the trust (or fear) of men, and always protect his own interests.

  At six-foot-three and 215 pounds, Junior was no shrinking violet. Strong, athletic, and self-assured, he carried himself in a way that few mistook for weakness. He would never instigate a confrontation with another inmate, but would stop at nothing to terminate anybody brazen enough to start something with him.

  Kripplebauer called on this survival instinct after New Jersey authorities took him out of Pennsylvania and placed him on ice in the Camden County Jail, a violent and overcrowded penal facility in a notoriously troubled city. The jail’s racial makeup was almost 90 percent African-American. White prisoners knew it was to their advantage to keep a low profile. Kripplebauer abided by the unwritten rule, but he somehow still caught the eye of a particularly fearsome opponent.

  “Hardrock got on my case big time,” says Kripplebauer. “For some reason, he took a dislike to me and wouldn’t let up. He was on another cellblock, but every time he saw me he’d yell, ‘Hey, white boy, I’m gonna make you my bitch. Yeah, you’ll be my bitch, you big honky bastard. I got something good for you to suck on.’

  “This went on for some time, but I just kept my mouth shut. After a while, though, I said fuck it and started to give it back to him. I told him, ‘I know you’re back there sucking those kids’ dicks. I read you right off, motherfucker. I know you’re having a suck fest over there.’

  “No one in the joint challenged him, certainly none of the white guys. He was a big guy, had done a lot of time, and was being held on a murder charge. Nobody wanted to take him, on including me, but I knew that sooner or later I’d have to do something about this asshole. Then one morning I’m sleeping in my cell, and Jack the Jew [inmate Jack Siggson, serving time for murder] wakes me up and says, ‘Hey, Junior, that nigger you were having trouble with is on the block.’

  “I jumped right out of bed. I didn’t want to be caught unprepared with Hardrock around. I looked down the corridor and there he was, standing on a stool with his back to me at the far end of the tier, cleaning the bars. He was part of a work detail cleaning the jail. I didn’t waste any time. I walked up behind him, circled just beneath him, and gave him a fuckin’ shot right in the chin. I hit him with such force it lifted him up and he smashed his face in the bars. Turns out he was wearing a dental plate, and the shot I gave him drove it right up into the roof of his mouth. His teeth, blood, and the plate flew everywhere. They had to take him to the hospital to get stitched up.

  “Things were a little different after that. The blacks were pretty pissed and made some noise, but kept their distance. On the other hand, the white guards were pretty pleased with me. When passing me in the corridor they’d say, ‘Hey, Kripplebauer, you really shut that motherfucker up.’ After seeing so many white guys get pushed around in the jail, they were tickled pink I stood up to the guy.

  “I knew he’d be coming back at me so I got my shit together. I got ahold of a pair of scissors, took the pin out so I’d only have one blade, and kept it on me at all times. Next time I saw Hardrock he was cursing me and saying, ‘I’m gonna fuck you up, you ugly honky devil. I’m gonna fuck you up bad. You’ll be sucking my black dick yet, motherfucker.’

  “I listened to him rant for a while and finally I told him, ‘Suck on this, you black motherfucker.’ I raised my shirt so he could see the shank I was carrying. I’d had enough of this asshole. I told him, ‘I’ll be in the visiting room at two o’clock. Be down there and I’ll plant this iron in your heart, you fuckin’ jerkoff.’

  “I would have stabbed him right then and there, I was so fed up, but he never showed up. Soon after that, I hit court, was given a four-year sentence and sent to Trenton State. Things were fine for a few months, but then I got the news. Once again, Jack the Jew, who’s now doing time with me in Trenton, comes up to me on the cellblock one morning and says, ‘Did you hear who just came in? Hardrock was just admitted. He’s down at A and O’ [admissions and orientation]. Right then and there, I knew what I had to do.”

  “The routine is the same for everybody. A new prisoner at Trenton State is placed on “A” Block, a quarantine block. I figured that would be a good place to take him out. I worked in the hospital and had the run of the joint. I knew Hardrock didn’t have anything on him yet, ’cause he just came in the joint, and I know I’m gonna have trouble with him. I told myself, let me do it now while I have the advantage.

  “I was hiding in a stairwell when he was coming back from chow. I grabbed him from behind. I had one arm around his neck and started to whack him in the chest with the other. I drove the shank in his chest and stomach pretty good. He tried to protect himself with his hand and arm, but I cut the hell out of him. I really got him good four or five times. Blood was everywhere. Guys on the block started yelling; bells were going off; guards came running. I thought I had killed the son-of-a-bitch, but he survived. I don’t know how, but he survived. They gave me an extra two to four for the shanking and threw me in the hole. I did most of the time in lockup. They said I was an incorrigible and put me in the Vroom Building, where they kept the nuts and the worst dudes in the joint.”

  The episode earned Kripplebauer two extra years on his sentence, but he no longer had to worry about Hardrock. In fact, he rarely had to worry about anybody. Such violent and decisive punitive strikes solidified Junior’s reputation as a tough motherfucker it didn’t pay to fool with. The prison subculture— always difficult to influence or impress—took notice. From county jails like Holmesburg in Philadelphia, to large state institutions like Pittsburgh and Hunt-ingdon, and on up to the close-security, level-five federal penitentiaries like Lewisburg and Atlanta, Junior was known as a standup guy, a wily con who knew how to maneuver, and someone definitely worth knowing. After a few more lengthy prison stints in places like Texas and North Carolina, the name of Junior Kripplebauer would become well known throughout a good portion of America’s burgeoning penal system. As one Pennsylvania lifer who never even met Kripplebauer declared, “Hell, Junior was a living, breathing legend.”

  His fearlessness well documented, Kripplebauer was repeatedly sought out by other desperate men to do “a piece of work” for them, but he never seriously entertained the notion. He wasn’t into contract killings. “I wasn’t opposed to killing somebody, but to do it for money, no way. It led to bad karma. If somebody does something to you, okay, kill him. But for money, no way.”

  On the street as well, Junior had earned a reputation as someone not to be trifled with. He was also seen as a “workhorse,”
a serious-minded criminal who was unaccustomed to downtime. Though he spent his share of time in gin mills and was often seen squiring beautiful, voluptuous women around town, he never let his social schedule interfere with his business activities. There weren’t enough hours in a day to satisfy Junior’s criminal appetite. He was open to just about anything and more than receptive to illegal escapades contrived by non-Irish crews—something that most K&A men generally refrained from. As one friend comments, “Junior would saddle up with an incredible assortment of people. There were so many different guys and teams. He was all over the place.” His openness to outsiders was considered ill-advised, and friends tried to caution him. “Jesus Christ, it was amazing,” recalls one colleague. “I told him more than once that some of these guys he was hooking up with aren’t standup guys. They’re not gonna step up when you need them.”

  Kripplebauer was even willing to freelance with one of the more active Jewish outfits wrecking havoc throughout the area at the time. Led by Sylvan Scolnick, a mountain of gelatinous flesh topped by a genius for convoluted get-rich-quick schemes, the gang included Kenny Paul, Allen Rosenberg, and Sid Brooks, a nightclub owner, burglar, and accomplished practitioner of the art of “Jewish lightning” (i.e., arson). Scolnick (“Cherry Hill Fats”), who periodically topped out at 750 pounds, was said to be a criminal mastermind of unrivaled proportions. One journalist called him “undoubtedly the fattest, probably the shrewdest, unquestionably the most deceptive, perhaps the evilest and likely the most driven criminal conspirator in modern history.” Superlatives aside, Scolnick had a big body and a big brain. He and his confederates did everything from loan sharking and fraudulent bankruptcies to arson and violent stickups, but there was one significant omission in the gang’s criminal portfolio: no one knew how to crack a safe.