Confessions of a Second Story Man

by Allen M. Hornblum

  Buried in a dozen different prisons and out of commission for almost 15 years, Junior still recognized that drugs had transformed the criminal landscape. Even before he went away, some of his friends were encouraging him to get into the game. They were all doing well. But he resisted. “I knew what was going on,” he says of the transition from burglary to drugs, “but I wasn’t aware of the incredible amount of money that was being made. I heard stories about Hughie Breslin, Maury McAdams, Jackie Kirby, and John Berkery, but I didn’t want any part of it. I didn’t see where I could make the money. Who was I gonna sell it to? The people I knew buying it already had a distribution network. I didn’t have anybody to sell it to. I knew guys who were selling meth to anybody and everybody. I wasn’t gonna do it. With my luck, I knew I’d get ratted out.

  “Burglary was dangerous, but drugs had the potential of being an even more violent world. A lot of people got hurt, but there was no real work to it. For older guys you no longer had to worry about running across lawns in freezing weather, carrying a 40-pound bag of burglary tools, or finding a buyer for what you stole. Drugs made you a hell of a lot of money. I’d say 90 percent of the K&A burglars got into drugs, and 50 percent of those got caught and did time. But the money was phenomenal.”

  Historically, K&A guys had very little interest in drugs; alcohol was their thing. Some guys in the fifties and early sixties had started taking diet pills and “eating bennies” because it gave them a little boost and could keep them awake for extended periods of time, a valuable commodity when you were driving across the country and then hitting a series of homes over successive nights. “You could drink for days on end without getting drunk,” says one appreciative burglar.

  Methamphetamine only increased their awareness, staying power, and sense of invulnerability. “Guys wanted meth,” recalls Kripplebauer of the powerful stimulant. “They’d be driving, stealing, and drinking for days. Along with the euphoria, you felt like you could do anything. You felt invincible.”

  Years later, the burglars realized that meth could do more than keep them awake for extended periods; it could make them millionaires. As Junior said of the drug’s “flood-like attraction” during the seventies, “I didn’t know anybody who didn’t want to get into the wholesale or retail end of it.”

  PHILLY COPS FIRST take notice of a new drug hitting the streets in the mid-sixties. In the beginning they’re perplexed; some are even dismissive of this unfamiliar substance that seems to be centered in the black community. Frank Wallace, a retired Philadelphia police inspector, recalls an African-American informant telling him and members of the Narcotics Squad about “monster” and its incredible “effect on people.” “It was 1966 and completely new,” says Wallace. “Nobody knew what the guy was talking about. We told our lieutenant what we were hearing, but he wasn’t interested. He told us, ‘We’re interested in heroin. That’s what we should be looking for.’”

  Within a year, however, Wallace and the Narcotics Squad would bust their first meth lab on Powelton Avenue (he recalls it as a “crude setup” that resembled something out of a “Dr. Frankenstein movie, with beakers, flasks, glass tubes, and wires all over the place”) and watch the drug cross over to the white community. Within a few years meth—or what former “Five Squad” Lieutenant John Wilson called “the poor man’s cocaine in the seventies”—was “moving quickly” through the city and developing quite a reputation. “There was a definite market for it on the street,” says Wilson. “People were quickly getting into meth. It cranked you up and gave you a greater kick than anything else out there.” Appropriately nicknamed “speed” in the white community, the drug could also be “produced easier” than most of its illicit competitors being manufactured and sold on the black market.

  Methamphetamine is an artificial stimulant that releases high levels of the neurotransmitter dopamine into the brain, producing euphoria and increased energy, often lasting over 12 hours. But meth can just as easily produce paranoia, delusions, and memory loss, as well as symptoms of physical degeneration such as rotting teeth. Meth users are known to addiction counselors as some of the hardest drug addicts to treat.

  Meth dealers—and the labs they needed to manufacture the product— cropped up first in South Philadelphia, then in Fishtown and Kensington. The labs were rudimentary and easily transportable; they gave off a distinctively foul odor that most people said smelled like “cat piss.” Soon dealers and labs alike could be found throughout the city, enabling the Drug Enforcement Agency to label Philadelphia “the meth capital of America” during hearings before the U.S. House Select Committee on Narcotics Abuse and Control.

  During those early years of the drug’s evolution, the prominent names associated with it were Stevie Vento, Victor DeLuca, Salvatore Soli, and Ronald Raiton. As meth grew in popularity in the seventies and eighties, however, the surnames associated with its production and sale took on a different ethnic flavor. Pennsylvania Crime Commission reports begin to identify Hugh and David Breslin, John Berkery, Edward Loney, Maurice McAdams, Carl Jackson, Edward MacEntee, and Roy Stocker as key players in the meth business.

  Though many drug gangs ultimately moved to cabins in the Poconos or other rural areas to do their “cooking,” any garage or basement would do. In fact, as one meth cooker said, “All you really needed was electricity” (for the fans necessary to expel the odor and the lingering combustible fumes). A batch of methamphetamine required phenyl-2-propanone (P2P), mercury, alcohol, aluminum foil, hydrochloric acid, and monomethaline (heavy water), along with a large vat and filter, pyrex dishes, electric hot plates, and a fan or two.

  P2P, or “P” or “oil,” as it was also known, was far and away the most difficult of the ingredients to acquire. Without it, the manufacture of methamphetamine was impossible. Banned in America, the liquid chemical was almost worth its weight in gold, and people went to great lengths to acquire it in Europe and smuggle it into the country.

  The manufacturing process began by mixing the alcohol, mercury, water, oil, and aluminum foil in a 15-gallon kettle and stirring until the foil dissolved, the temperature rose, and the chemical reaction got underway. The cooker had to stir constantly, take the temperature of the kettle’s contents every 10 minutes to ensure that it didn’t exceed 150 degrees, and add hydrochloric acid at the right stage. Explosions were not uncommon, and the 24-hour cooking process was physically demanding, necessitating the use of dependable personnel as neighborhood alchemists.

  After a filter had cleared off the residue and impurities, the desired pH was obtained by adjusting the alcohol and hydrochloric acid levels while the liquid was kept warm on electric hot plates. When removed from the heating elements, it would quickly crystallize into the illegal and highly profitable drug.

  In addition to the fear of explosions and lengthy prison terms if caught, freelance cookers had to contend with the nasty after-effects of the manufacturing process. “The stench was so strong,” says Donnie Johnstone, “you couldn’t stand yourself. The odor and chemicals seeped into all your pores and there was no way to get it out. I took five showers a day for four days and the odor was still there.” And cookers remained high for days. “You were literally speeding,” says Johnstone. “I couldn’t sleep for three days.”

  It wasn’t a fun job, but meth cookers were well paid. Johnstone says he once cooked a gallon and a half of oil over 26 hours, yielding 18 pounds of meth. At $6,000 per pound (wholesale), the final product was worth over $100,000. His share was approximately $15,000 for one day’s work. Some cookers made up to $2,000 per pound.

  The meth trade was extremely lucrative for everyone involved in the production and distribution of the drug. As the Pennsylvania Crime Commission reported in 1990, “vast profits” could be made. “The price of a gallon of P2P in France or West Germany in the early 1980s was $135 to $155. Once the drums reached Philadelphia, a gallon typically sold for between $2,500 to $7,500 at the wholesale level, a mark-up of between 1,800 and 4,800 percent. In the m
id-1980s, a gallon... was selling for as high as $28,000 in Philadelphia.” During the course of the decade as the price of the finished product climbed, “a gallon of P2P... could translate into gross profits of $60,000 to $120,000.”

  FOR THE KENSINGTON CROWD, the transition from burglary to drugs wasn’t an overnight phenomenon, but it wasn’t glacial either. It was more of a gradual, steady shift in product line spurred on by a panoply of societal, technological, and market forces. Improved policing, more sophisticated alarm systems, the greater use of personal credit cards, and the advancing age of the burglars all prompted the shift. For most, however, it just boiled down to dollars and cents. As any good businessman would tell you, go with the goods that will earn you the most money with the least amount of effort. And the K&A crowd did. Drugs had it all over second story work: you could make 10 times the money with 10 percent of the effort.

  It was almost impossible for the hard-working burglars not to notice. As Donnie Johnstone says, “There was such good money in drugs you couldn’t resist it. Just about everybody who wasn’t away [in prison] or dead got into in it. And compared to burglary, it was no effort at all.”

  “The money was phenomenal,” agrees Marty Bell. “Why should I take a shot breaking into places and the chance of getting caught for a couple grand when I can do a deal and make a quick hundred Gs?”

  “It was incredible,” says Jimmy Dolan of the rapid growth of the drug business. “The burglary business dried up in the seventies. There was nobody to work with any more. I made up my mind it was over. And for a lot of guys drugs were a million times easier and much more lucrative. It was tough to turn down a package of money when you’re hurting. They were living large and getting a new Cadillac every five months. My God, they had so much money.”

  Though the attraction was great, it wasn’t necessarily an easy progression for everyone. Some had reservations. For Jackie Johnson, who spent the seventies in prison, re-entering the underworld labor market in 1980 was quite a revelation. “No one was doing production work any more,” he says. “I couldn’t find a crew to work with, but guys like ‘One Eye’ [Maury McAdams] were constantly coming up to me and telling me all the fuckin’ money they were making. C’mon in, they’d say, there’s money enough for all of us.”

  Johnson, like many others of his milieu, resisted for a while. Drugs went against their ethic. True K&A burglars never wanted to hurt anybody and therefore never carried a weapon when they entered a private residence; they just wanted other people’s money. But the need for money, and the flash and glitz of their friends trading in drugs, were like the gravitational pull of the earth. Before long, Johnson would be like so many others, arguing that if he “didn’t do it somebody else would.” They’d also be hip deep in money. (When he was arrested in 1983, after being ratted out by the close friend who had gotten him into the business, Johnson had over $630,000 hidden in the ceiling of his home. The Feds got him and the money.)

  NOT ALL K&A MEN fell under the spell of drug dealing and the big money that came with it. Jimmy Dolan is probably the best example of a K&A burglar who resisted the temptation to make a quick fortune by peddling meth to a rapidly growing consumer market. Though he well understood the attraction of easy money, he couldn’t partake in the human damage it caused. Yes, he could ransack a home without thinking twice about it, but pushing drugs was over the top. It went against his nature.

  “The money was so overwhelming it was almost impossible to turn down,” says Dolan. “It was like a tidal wave, an irresistible force. The growth of the drug business was incredible. It was a million times easier and much more lucrative. I saw so many guys get into it. Guys specialized in P2P in order to produce meth. Meth was the fucking poison that ruined everything. About 70 percent of the guys got into it. But I couldn’t do it. I’m no fucking angel, but I just couldn’t do it. It’s just how I was raised. I watched neighborhoods disintegrate, turn into shit, because of drugs. They were ruining the lives of all these fucking kids. These kids are this country’s future, and they were being ruined. It was awful.

  “Yeah, I burgled homes, but we specialized in rich fucking people. Plus they were insured. So who were we robbing? The insurance companies. There were some stiff penalties if you got caught with drugs, but the real charge should have been treason. Cities lie in ruins today because of drugs. It’s a terrible thing. Nothing of any good comes out of that shit. You’re destroying our own people.

  “It was hard talking to guys who were wearing $1,500 suits and driving a $30,000 Mercedes. I told some of them they were in the wrong fucking business. I said they’d rue the day. Some of them nearly got violent with me. They didn’t want to hear that shit. Their attitude was drugs are already here and if I don’t do it somebody else will.

  “Drugs were the downfall of everything. I never robbed one of my partners and I never put any one in jail. Effie was drug-free. He never did a drug deal in his life. I was the same way. I couldn’t do it. Even though the burglary business was drying up in the 1970s due to better alarm technology, movement sensors, cameras, and all that other shit, I decided I wasn’t going the way of so many others. I wasn’t gonna get into the drug business. I made my mind up it [burglary] was over. There was nobody to work with. Yeah, the young kids were into drugs and you could make big money, but they were getting ruined from it. I decided it wasn’t for me. I wasn’t gonna be part of it.”

  JUNIOR KRIPPLEBAUER CHOSE to take a different course. “I needed the money,” he says. “The bottom line was, I was willing to move drugs even though it meant I’d catch hell if I got caught.”

  While still working on trailers during the day and beginning to do some part-time work as a limo driver between Philly and the Jersey shore, Junior fell into a position where he could make some quick and easy money moving P2P. It appeared simple and relatively safe; a trusted friend wanted to buy it, and another good friend wanted to sell it. As middleman in the transaction, he could bring in a good bit of cash.

  All he had to do was move a gallon of the oil a few blocks: literally from one side of Philadelphia’s Benjamin Franklin Parkway to the other. The eight-minute transaction would earn him an easy six grand, since he was buying the “P” for $34,000 and selling it for $40,000. Junior knew the hit he could take if caught with the oil, but he decided it would be “no problem.” As he succinctly says, “I knew who I was getting it from and who I was selling it to.”

  Kripplebauer admits to a certain amount of nervousness, especially during those early transactions. He’d meet his supplier in the parking lot of the Ben Franklin Motor Lodge, place the gallon container of P2P in his car, and then drive south across the flag-festooned Parkway to the Park Town Place Condominium, where he would transfer the oil to the buyer. To minimize exposure and thwart government surveillance, he’d get a room at the Motor Lodge near the parking lot, watch for the arrival of his contact, and just flick the remote on his car trunk to allow the oil to be placed in the vehicle without even being present for the transaction. The Park Town Place transfer would take place just a few minutes later in the high-rise structure’s underground garage, well out of sight of curious passersby. Money would be exchanged later, usually at the foot of Allegheny Avenue by the Delaware River on the deserted grounds of the old Cramp Shipyard. The delayed financial transactions—an oddity in the drug business—were possible because of Junior’s close relationship with both the supplier and the buyer. He orchestrated over two dozen such deals during the early to mid-nineties. Sometimes they were multi-unit transactions, with five gallons of oil going for $175,000.

  Junior was doing well. He was now driving limousines for a living during the day—mostly as a front—and bringing in the serious cash doing his periodic drug deals. He was back in business and no longer concerned about when the next dollar was coming in or where it was coming from. European vacations, new cars, expensive suits, and fancy restaurants were once again the order of the day. He was now involved with Hannah O’Brian, an attractive wom
an from his old Fairmount neighborhood, and the prospect of marriage was being seriously discussed. (Cheryl had died of a stroke in a Fort Lauderdale hospital on Labor Day, 1994.)

  His fortunes had definitely turned. “My biggest concern,” he says in all seriousness, “was where to hide all the money I was making.” Banks were out of the question, and he was always worried the Feds would come busting into his new home, a beautiful house by a lake in Collingswood, New Jersey, that he paid for in large part through drug deals. Stacks of money could be found in the strangest places in the Kripplebauer household: buried under trees in the backyard, stashed behind fake walls, or hidden in restaurant-size containers of mustard and mayonnaise in the pantry. Junior even began to put a good bit of money out on the street; he had it and friends needed it.

  The party came to an end, however, when his friend the oil supplier was scooped up in an FBI sting in 1995. His decision to deal only with trusted, standup friends paid off when his friend held up under pressure from prosecutors and refused to talk. It is unlikely that the authorities were ever aware of the legendary second story man’s involvement with P2P. Nevertheless, his days in the meth business were over.

  The loss of income did not go down well. “It was over $10,000 a month down the drain,” says Kripplebauer. “When they arrested my friend, it collapsed the whole fucking deal. I was told of some other contacts, particularly a guy in North Carolina who could supply all the oil I wanted, but I said no way. I wanted no part of it. If I didn’t know the people or think they were standup, I’d pass on it.”

  Surprisingly, Kripplebauer rebounded rather well, and in a most unexpected fashion. His next moneymaking venture was legitimate. Money attracts money, and the ever-resourceful entrepreneur stumbled into a deal with friends who were connected down at the Port of Philadelphia. He and his new partners procured a lucrative contract to pick up iron ore that had just arrived on cargo vessels from South America and move it to a nearby location. The logistics couldn’t be simpler: haul the ore, which belonged to U.S. and Bethlehem Steel, from Pier 19 on Delaware Avenue to a Conrail yard near the Philadelphia Navy Yard using a fleet of dump trucks. Contracted to do at least 10 ships per year, the partners earned $1 per ton, or $70,000 per ship.