The Legend of Joey Trucks: The Accidental Mobster

by Craig Daliessio

  I continued with my tale. “So Jimmy tells this guy that they had this poor slob whacked over the head with a blackjack right in front of his parents. Apparently he was unmarried, and still lived at home. They threw him in the trunk of a Town Car and took him to the old cement factory in Camden. They stuffed him in a bodybag and left him in there overnight, pondering his fate.” George played up this point perfectly. “Oh Maddonn! Cuz! They left this fajoot lying in there all night knowing what was coming? And Uncle Tony was in on this? Our uncle?” He said. I glanced at George and had to bite my cheek to stop myself from laughing. He sounded so sincere, like he was really shocked that our uncle could be a part of something like this. I pressed on.

  “Well somewhere along the way, the message got garbled. Nicky Bruno only wanted to scare this guy into giving the money back and promising never to do it again. So they took him to the jobsite at One Penn Center the next day, but the guy who had the order to not kill him wasn’t on the job. He was in Atlantic City, collecting on some debts. So since nobody wanted to disobey an order, and nobody wanted to cross Nicky Bruno and make a judgment call in the field, they just dumped him in the pit and poured two trucks of cement on him.” George whispered, “Get out!” “Yeah, Cuz.” I continued, “I heard that the next day, an envelope stuffed with about fifty grand shows up at this guy’s parent’s house with a note; “Don’t ask no questions” was all it said. That was the last anybody heard of that guy. George let out a low whistle and feigned a shudder. Phil started coughing and choking on his peppers and eggs.

  Fish on the line! I thought. I looked at George. We got him Cuz I said with my eyes. The truth about the story was this; My Uncle was in the pit the first day they poured concrete in One Penn Center, which was the first real skyscraper in Philly. There has always been a story that on the first day of the pour, before one pound of cement was dumped in the hole; they ordered every man out of the pit and off the jobsite. Once they were cleared out, two Lincoln Town Cars rolled in and about six goombahs got out and threw a still very-much-alive, wriggling body in a body bag into the pit and dumped twenty yards of concrete on him. My uncle would neither confirm nor deny that he was there that day and if it actually happened, thus perpetuating the aura of mystery that he enjoyed. Nobody knows how much of this tale was fact, but again, Phil Lowery didn’t know this. That’s what he gets for eavesdropping. And for making assumptions about me, simply because I’m Italian. Phil was quiet as a church mouse the rest of the trip to the docks. It’s not like he’s a talker to begin with, but he didn’t say a word until we rolled up to the boat and got out. “There she is, boys!” I said proudly. “The Emily-A. FiftyFour feet of fish-stalking beauty! Marlin have nightmares about the sound of her engines and Tuna run from her wake!” I said, sounding like a pirate bragging about his ship. We parked the trucks by the slip and off-loaded all the supplies. “She’ll sleep ten, so there is plenty of room. Make yourselves at home, boys!” I said, joyously. The guys were in awe of my boat. Hadn’t I told you? I thought. Didn’t I say she is a gem? I love this boat.

  At one point, Phil started wobbling and I thought he was going to pass out. I figured he was still feeling the beers from the night before. It happened when Tommy Fallone and I had backed my Tundra dockside next to my boat, so we could offload the three huge plastic zippered bags. Each was about six feet long and made of thick Kevlar. It took four of us to get it on them boat and down into the hold below decks.

  Phil went white and when I came up from below, Erickson was fanning him with a newspaper and giving him a bottle of water. “Take it easy Phil,” he said, “Just sit there until you come to your senses.” I was startled. “What happened? Phil, are you okay?” Phil was white as a sheet. He shook his head and insisted that he was fine. I was hesitant to go out with him feeling woozy but I chalked it up to remnants of his hangover from the night before. “You’re dehydrated, pal” I said, “Drink a couple of bottles of water right away and go lay down. We’ll be almost three hours getting out to the canyon. Take a little nap.” Phil agreed and Erickson helped him into the stateroom.

  We did a little walk-through with the guys. I explained where the emergency items were. We parked the trucks in the overnight lot at the marina and we shipped out. The big Detroit Diesels roared to life and I backed her out of her slip, spun her about, and pointed her toward the mouth of the harbor, and the Atlantic just beyond. We were off. Me, my new neighbors, my cousin, and one of my best friends from the old neighborhood. It was going to be a great couple of days.

  14

  Chumming

  For

  Seagulls

  We were heading out to open water. George sat up in the fly bridge with me and we talked for a long time about home, and our family, and how we had missed each other. Before long, Milledge joined us up on the fly bridge as well. “This is a beautiful boat, Joe. Really beautiful!” He said, against the noise of the wind. “How is Phil?” I yelled above the background noise. “Sound asleep.” Hank told me. We laughed at poor Phil’s misfortune and enjoyed the beautiful late morning sun.

  It was a gorgeous mid-summer day with a soft swell and zero clouds. The Gulf Stream was about seventy-five miles offshore by now and getting closer each week. I’d heard they were taking Tuna and Marlin in Baltimore Canyon and shark in the shallower water on the way out. Since we got a late start that first day, I figured we’d try for shark, to give the boys a taste of big game fish right away.

  It was about 2pm when I blasted the horn and called “All hands on deck!” The guys were excited as I told them the plan. “Listen boys,” I began. To get you guys in the spirit of the day, so to speak, we’re going to go for shark this afternoon. We can hit them on the way out to the canyon, and then we can go for big game fish in the morning. But first things first...we have to decide the pecking order here, so we’re going to do a little game of “Rock-Paper-Scissors” to decide who gets the chairs first and who does the job of first mate.

  The guys played for a few minutes until we had an order penciled in. My cousin was first in the fighting chairs, along with Milledge. Erickson and Phil Lowery had the lowest score, so they had deckhand duty. “Okay, Phil, Swede and Tommy come with me. George, you show Hank how to put together a shark rig.”

  I took Phil and Swede Erickson and Tommy down below decks to the lower storage hold. I started to position two of us at each end of one of the silver plastic bags we’d loaded before we left the dock. Phil reached for the wrong bag and I quickly told him, “No Phil! Not that one! You don’t wanna touch that bag! Grab this one.” Phil went white again and dropped to one knee. “You okay pal?” I asked him. Phil shook his head like he was shaking cobwebs. “Yeah...yeah I guess so.” He said meekly. “Okay, then let’s get this thing up on deck.” I said.

  We lugged the heavy bag up on the deck and dragged it to the transom. “Open it up for me, Phil.” I said, offhandedly. Phil went white again. I thought he was going to pass out. “Geez Phil,” I said, “You really are wiped out from those three beers. Are you going to be okay?” Phil was struggling to speak and staring at the big bag. I stepped past him and reached for the zipper. “Okay fellas...this is where it gets messy.” I said. Phil plopped down in the fighting chair on the left side. “Yeah, you just rest for a second, Phil. Put a hat on your head, the sun will beat you up.” I started to unzip the bag and thought for just a second I heard Phil whimper.

  “He was a fine specimen for his age.” I said. I didn’t see when Phil went to the railing but I heard him start to throw up. “Chumming for seagulls?” I asked him. I hate being such a smartass sometimes. “Okay boys, help me get this drag line tied to this guy.” I stepped back from the bag and Tommy and I pulled one of the two deer from inside. They were large, old bucks that I’d shot at my camp that past winter and kept in a deep freezer for this purpose. “Deer carcass will raise sharks in no time.” I said emphatically. We tied a long line –about a thousand feet- to the antlers of the first buck. Tommy wrapped the other buck ins
ide the bag and George helped him take him back below to the hold.

  I shifted the boat into neutral and had Erickson help me lift the deer out onto the transom platform. “One, two, THREE!” The deer carcass hit the water with a loud splash.

  I went back to the helm and slipped her back in gear and we pulled away from the floating deer. I noticed Phil looking at the carcass in amazement. “Just a deer?” he muttered to himself, barely loud enough for me to have heard. “Yeah Phil, we trail a deer carcass in the chum slick when going for shark. It drives them wild. What’d you think it was?” At first I said this in all seriousness, because I couldn’t imagine what else he could have thought we were dragging behind this boat. Then I remembered what Bransford told me about Phil’s suspicions, and then I realized how the deer were wrapped in what essentially looked like a body bag. Poor old Phil must have thought I was getting rid of evidence. I filed this away and thought about having some fun with it later.

  I looked back at Phil and Tommy and said “Okay boys, get that chum slick started.” The fun was about to begin. Phil was shoveling the chum like a pro. He still looked a little pale, but I have to say, he handled the fish guts quite well. Erickson was just as adept at slicking the waters. Before long, George spotted a few fins and within a few more minutes, we’d raised five big sharks.

  The deck became a madhouse of activity. They don’t call it a feeding frenzy for nothing. We had stirred up about a half dozen very large and very hungry Great Whites and a couple of Tiger sharks. I had hoped for a Hammerhead or two, because they are so rare and I wanted the fellas to see one up close, but it didn’t happen on this trip. We each took turns in the fighting chairs and by evening, we’d caught enough sharks that we were all pretty worn out from the battles. It was time for dinner.

  We cleaned up the gear and hosed off the deck and I went inside to the galley to get the food ready. It was a perfect evening, as far as the ocean was concerned. The swell was very gradual and the boat barely moved at all. We feasted and laughed and told bad jokes and even old Phil started to relax a bit. Now, any time a group of men gather on a boat, eventually they will start reciting lines from “Jaws.” The sun was just about set when we broke into the first lines of the unofficial contest.

  It got pretty raucous and then, miracle of miracles, old

  Phil Lowery absolutely nailed a Captain Quint impersonation. I mean nailed it. If I closed my eyes, I would have thought Robert Shaw had been on deck with us. We were all in amazement at Phil’s ability and ended the night singing “Show Me The Way To Go Home” and joking around about Phil’s “Gladys” tattoo actually saying “U.S.S. Indianapolis.” It was a lot of fun and we hated to see it end.

  “Okay boys,” I said, “I hate to break up the party, but we’re going to set up a five mile chum slick in the morning, before we drop even one teaser in the water. That means an early wake-up. Breakfast is at six. I’ll wake you. The guys had, by this point, already staked out their bunks. I decided to sleep on the deck, under the stars. On nice nights like this one was, there is nothing better than sitting under the stars, more stars than you can ever see in the city, and feeling the wonder of it all. The ocean is so big, and the sky is even bigger. George and I sat up for a long time, pointing out the shooting stars as we saw them, and talking about family, and old times.

  Sunrise is awe inspiring out at sea. I stood there, up on the fly bridge, (which is about fifteen feet in the air) taking it in for a few minutes before waking the guys. Most of them were stirring already anyway. We still had about an hour’s journey to get to the canyon. I didn’t take us all the way out there the previous evening, because once you hit the Continental Shelf, two things happen. One: You are too deep to anchor which presents a problem because, two: The Gulf Stream is a fairly well-moving current and you’ll end up a hundred miles off course by the time you wake up in the morning. We’d fished the sharks in relatively shallow water about twenty five miles from the rim of the shelf and the Washington Canyon. But the big game fish are in the deeper water, and they come up in the Gulf Stream, so we had to ride the last twenty five miles out to the deep, blue water.

  I fired up the engines while George made breakfast for us all. Cuz is a great cook and he did me proud. I like to eat light in the mornings, so I had a biscotti and a couple of cups of coffee. George makes the best coffee I have ever had. Other than Angie of course.

  We were about twenty minutes form the edge of the canyons and I let the GPS steer while I got the chum out from the holds. I buy it at the bait shop at the docks in fiftyfive gallon drums. It is basically the garbage fish that commercial fisherman can’t sell for food, plus the remnants from the processing plants. It stinks badly, but that’s the point, the smellier the stuff is, the better it works on attracting game fish. This batch we had on board was as fermented and ripe as I’d ever had. I felt bad for the guys who would be rotating the chum duties throughout the morning.

  Phil had done his turn the afternoon before, so he was first in the fighting chair, alongside Erickson. I took George and Tommy down below and we brought up the other silver Kevlar bag. The second deer carcass was inside and we tied the rope to his head and threw him over. He sat there bobbing, just off the transom, for a moment and it was a bit eerie. One eye was sticking up above the water and I turned to Phil and said, “He’s looking at you, Phil, which means you’ll catch the first fish!” Phil smiled weakly, but I could tell it unnerved him to see that lone deer-eye staring at him. Within minutes, the buck was a few hundred yards off our stern, but Phil kept watching him, like Tom Hanks watching Wilson, the Volleyball, drift away from his raft.

  About forty-five minutes into the chum slick, I called down from the fly bridge, “Two sails off the port stern!” George and Tommy jumped into action. We’d had teasers in the water in the middle of the chum. Teasers are lures with no hooks. The game fish will hit them and the job of the mate is to reel them fast enough the make the fish miss, but slow enough to make the fish keep trying to hit it. At the right time, the fish will find the rigged baitfish and hit it instead and then he’s hooked.

  George and Tommy really know how to work a teaser and in less than ten minutes after I spotted the first marlin, George called out “Fish on! Fish on Chair number one!” “I’ll be darned” I thought, “Phil did hook the first fish!” Phil was seated in chair number one. The Swede jumped out of chair number two, and did as Tommy told him, reeling his line out of the water as fast as he could. Only one man can fight a fish at a time. The teasers were out and the fun began. I slipped the boat into neutral and called down to my cousin, telling him to basically run the deck. I had to stay up on the bridge to drive the boat and watch for other fish.

  George took up position next to Phil and gave him instruction about when to set the hook and how to fight the fish. “Lower the rod, Phil...wait...wait...NOW! Pull back Phil!” Phil yanked back for all he was worth and if he hadn’t been strapped in, he might have pulled himself right out of the chair. The rod groaned under the force of the big blue marlin Phil had just hooked. The big fish was running about ten feet below the surface and I could see him shake his head wildly. He was about seven hundred feet off the stern. He shook and thrashed and then I saw him getting ready to run.

  George was yelling at Phil to keep the line tight. Phil did a pretty good job at first but he made the mistake of dropping the rod for just a second and that little bit of slack was all the big fish needed. He managed to turn his head and that was that. Now that he was facing away from the boat, he started to run...fast. He stripped away about five hundred feet of line in less than a minute. Phil was panicky but George calmed him down. “It’s okay, Phil, it’s just going to take longer to boat him now. He won’t turn his head back toward the boat until you wear him down.” Phil settled into the chair and George talked him through the next two hours. When to reel, when to relax. About two and a half hours after hooking the giant, the fish slowed down and turned his head back toward the boat. I knew what was coming next.


  “He’s turned Georgie!” I yelled. “He’s getting ready to sound!” Once a game fish has turned his head back toward his pursuer, he has one or two more tricks left. He knows this is a battle to the death now, (or so he thinks...we actually catch and release marlin) so he gets very feisty. His next trick is to sound; to dive deep and try to hide from his pursuer. The marlin was getting ready go deep. He turned and ran back at the boat, this took the pressure off his head and gave him a chance to relax and rest a bit. He was running with the strain of the line instead of against it. He covered about two hundred feet in just a few seconds and down he went. The big rod bent into a hard “C” and Phil’s eyes got big. “Let the drag tire him out, Phil!” George told him. Phil sat back and George tightened the drag a click or two and the fish was pulling against the reel.