I instructed him to have the hits done with shot guns if possible and all at the same time. I would pay an extra ten thousand per man, and one hundred thousand for him if all goes well.
On the day it was to go down, seven were killed, including the boss, and my guy disposed of the guns at sea. Rest assured we thought it was over, and out of respect as well as fear, they would stay out of our territory.
A week later my top security guy was found with his head missing. By the look of the rest of his body, he had been tortured for some time before death took him; I had to assume he told them everything.
Most likely he had told them about the hits, about me, about my family. I moved my wife and kids to New York by private plane, which would be harder to trace. I wanted everyone I loved out of harm’s way.
I did not think anyone knew about Rihanna, but I wanted her safe, too, just in case. I deposited a million dollars in an off shore account I had set up for her a while back, and called her on a Track phone.
“Baby, you have to get out of town for a while. You have to go back to the Bahamas. Take the next plane out and leave everything behind except your passport.” I had her write down the bank name and account number I had set up for her in Nassau, Bahamas just for such a contingency.
“When will I see you again?” she asked.
“Probably never. Go now and make a new life for yourself. And thank you for the best times of my life, baby,” I said.
After a long pause, during which I heard her sniffle, she said, “I love you, Geraldo. I’ll never forget you.”
I hung up without another word.
During the next few days, the bodies of the men who had made the hits on the Mexican were discovered. All were headless with evidence of extreme torture.
One day a package came; it contained the head of the guy who had replaced my security chief. The note inside read, “Your time will come.”
Within the next two weeks, I received more heads in the mail with notes attached.
My men took out some of their vendors and blew up the car with the new boss inside, killing him. We were doing assassinations and drive-bys but no torture. My men were scared and starting to rip me off and leave so as not to be kidnapped and tortured to death.
The Mexicans were brutal and without mercy as they even started killing wives and children, and this put even more fear into my men. I knew I had to make a move soon before they got to me.
I had not left my compound in weeks out of fear. I called in a Miami cop and had a sit down with him. I told him part of the story and offered him one hundred thousand to take care of my problem.
“Geraldo, you don’t understand that every time you take out their head man, they just move someone into his place and pay them more money. It will never end unless we continue the fight for you.”
He gave me a hard look, and I nodded my head. I wanted to hear more.
“You will need to pay us one million up front and one hundred thousand per week forever or you will be kidnapped and tortured. You need to give me the money now, so we can get started before they get you.”
I agreed to all his terms and paid him. He also said he would not arrest the Mexican kingpin for dealing drugs, and we would have to get together and share Miami and the rest of the territory. We would share on a first come first served basis, but the first one that breaks that deal would go to jail or die.
We got together the next day and did the split, with the same rules to apply for each state except California which the Mexicans wanted for themselves because they had been there ten years or better. All the Mexican there distribute their goods.
To have a fight over California at this point would be suicide, so we started this uneasy truce about territories in Miami now and have lots of fights over who was first and was selling goods there with the most men, etc. etc. Somehow we managed to get along without killing each other for the time being.
If anybody from outside looked at this, they would say a gun fight would break out any minute, but day by day we got by without cutting each other’s throats.
When we went into Minneapolis, we encountered a problem. They had a presence there or felt they did, with one Mexican from L.A. that they had moved there over a year ago and they were operating out of a clothing store in New Hope, Minnesota, and with an old gangster who just wanted to be in the action for all the excitement, not the money, just the jazz.
From the get-go we had trouble with Miami. They wanted to claim it exclusively like California, but I wanted to have half of it.
At first, dealers on street corners started to disappear; then it went to all-out war with people being shot or killed in other ways.
I decided to hire and pay monthly for a motorcycle gang. This could be a problem because for years they had been known for selling crank (speed—crystal meth). I had the cop contact the president of the local chapter for a sit-down.
When the meeting took place I was amazed at how clean cut and business like the biker was. Don’t get me wrong, he was real big, and I could tell he could kill me in a heartbeat, if I crossed him.
But this was business. As the saying goes, “I against my brother, we against our neighbor and all against a stranger,” and the Mexicans were strangers to all of us. I had to give them a wholesale price on meth, cocaine and weed to get the deal done, and he agreed to our rules of security, with one exception: his men would be using the goods, too. I tried to tell him this was a mistake; if his men got high and busted, they would roll over on him.
Consequently this would be the only time we would talk. Someone would contact him alone.
We made the deal, and he left with the understanding that I would supply him with goods, and he would take care of the Mexicans.
In the meantime my man met with the cook, and we took over his lab and chemist for meth and bought him a farm in central Florida where he set his cooking facilities up big time with the understanding that he and his wife had to be super clean with a low, low profile. We would supply the chemicals and do all the pickups and give him fifty thousand per month as long as he kept his nose clean. He and his wife should end up with twenty million in cash.
The cartel got its people in Minneapolis and so there was all out war between the Mexican gang and us for control of Minneapolis and Wisconsin, Illinois and the Dakotas.
The Mexican cartel never put two and two together. They thought it was just the motorcycle gang, but never the less, my business was growing by leaps and bounds on all fronts; the death toll on both sides went through the roof but nobody cared because they were lowlifes, corner dealers, and the DEA lost a snitch once in a while or a C.I. as they like to call them. But the motorcycle gang members were hard core and never really cared. The more Mexicans they killed, the more bikers died. And soon the word was out: stay out of Minneapolis and St. Paul or you will die or be beaten like a piñata at the very least.
It was a constant fight in several states to keep the territories, as men kept showing up dead on both sides. The wars escalated except for Florida which stayed where it was until one day, the war spilled over to Florida, too.
I put in a call for the president of the motorcycle club and found out that he and about three dozen of his men had been blown up in a clubhouse bar in New York during a meeting. The cops thought they were killed by a Mexican gang because the outside of the club showed signs of being doused with gas and so did the line of bikes outside.
They knew that I was not behind it. But I knew they would retaliate, so to be safe, I moved the kids and my wife again with body guards to get them out of harm’s way. And I knew I had to kill the Mexicans to stand any kind of chance.
I had the cop come to my house for a meeting. “Come on in,” I said. “The Mexicans are breaking the truce everywhere which includes here. And I have to do something about it now or I will lose everything including my life and the money to pay you monthly. So I need your permission to move forward now. “
“You don’t have my permissio
n to break the truce,” the cop told me. “If you do, you can expect to go to jail.”
I opened the security right hand drawer in my desk and took out a nine millimeter and leveled it at him and said “It’s too bad you don’t see things my way.”
“Everybody knows where I am,” he said. “If I turn up with bullet holes in me, they will be here in a hurry.”
“Don’t worry,, I said “You won’t show up.” I shot him twice in the chest and got up from my desk and walked over to him and shot him again, this time in the top of his head.
I told the two guards in the room with us to put him in a bath tub and cut his throat to drain his blood. I would deal with him after dark.
Later that evening, I had two men put the body in the boat and move the cop’s car. Then the three of us went out to blue water where we tied the body to a cement block. My two men put the whole works overboard. The body went to the bottom some five thousand feet below.
When we got back to the house, six of my top men were waiting for us.
“I’m sure by now you’ve heard of the killings and loss of income in New York and many other states,” I said. “The Mexican cartel is trying to kill all of us and put us out of business so they can take over and put their own men in our place. Now is the time for all of us to make a decision. You can quit now and leave, or you can quit now and join them with no hard feelings on my end, or join us in a war against the cartel. I’ll step out of the room for a drink of water so you can be free to talk among yourselves. I’ll be back in five. By then, you are either with me or have left with no hard feelings.”
After being gone for five, I stepped back into the room; all my men were still there.
I looked around the room. “That was your only chance to leave. Next is all out war.”
When not a single man moved, I nodded and started to hand out instructions. Each man was given a specific part of town to rid the corners of the competition.
“Any questions?” I asked.
There were none. My team left to go about the business of wiping out the Mexican cartel.
Later that day I went out with a guard and was stopped by an unmarked cop car with the cop’s partners in it.
“What happened to my partner?” he asked.
“I paid him the monthly one hundred fifty and he left.” We looked at each other for a stared into one another’s eyes for a long moment.
“We’ll be in contact,” he said and drove off.
I knew the number of one hundred fifty would cause trouble. They would think he had been swindling fifty grand a month all this time.
We recruited some “cowboys,” another word for mercenaries who will do anything for enough money, and they especially like gun play like the wild, wild West “cowboys.” Killing comes easy for them, and they looked forward to it. We set things up with a pay deal to kill Mexicans selling drugs on any street corner, which would put a dead stop to the cartel’s cash flow.
By the time I got to my front gate, the war was on. I had moved eight more bodyguards to my house to guard against attacks. I had four hundred feet of sea wall to protect, a nine thousand square foot house, a guest house, three acres of lawn and a five car garage.
We had all seen “Scarface” and “The Godfather” to know what could happen in a drug war. That very night a drive by shooting took place at my front gate. No one was hurt but the cops were all over the neighborhood.
The next day I had the video camera people install more cameras front and back to pick up cars and boats coming and going.
I also sent my eighty-five footer to a marina to clear the back. When the captain started the boat to move to the marina, it blew up at the dock, killing all aboard, the captain and two crew members. The water patrol and the cops showed up again.
By this time they knew what I did for a living and what business I was in. My secret was out.
CHAPTER 4
I had my head of security buy two Cadillacs for cash and keep them elsewhere so I would have work cars that were not recognized.
At night I and a couple of cowboys would go out to find Mexicans selling drugs. We would go with shotguns and pistols and go to where they would be. At first we would take their money and drugs and try to convert them to our side. If that didn’t take we put them outside our car then shot them. Soon they all started to say they would convert but they lied to live so we started killing them all or taking them to my warehouse to be tortured and left alive to tell the story.
One man we took to the warehouse was both arrogant and mouthy, so I did the torturing myself. When we got to the warehouse and got him, a Cuban, tied to a special table I walked up to him with a machete in my hand and held it up to him.
“You’re Cuban, right?” I said. “Well you know what they call this in Cuba.”
“A machete.”
“Well, smartass, for being so smart, I’m going to take this and cut your feet off and throw them in that corner.” I pointed the machete to the far side of the room. “You see, you think this is a movie like “Night and Day” or “Carlito’s Way, that you will somehow win and get out of this spot you’re in because of your mouth and your arrogance. Well, this ain’t the movies. I’m going to cut your feet off and then kill you. All you are or all you will ever be ends here with me. Put something over his mouth because he is going to scream a lot when I start on his feet.”
One of my men moved to put a red rubber ball in his mouth.
“Hey,” he screamed, “I’m sorry! I really am! I’ll work for you from now on!”
“It’s too late for that,” I said. “I’m disrespected, and I have all these men here that work for me. What kind of boss would I be if I didn’t keep my word? Finish,” I said to the man with the red ball and leather strap.
The Cuban was shaking and crying now in between whimpers. I took the machete and cut off his left foot at the ankle and picked it up to show him before throwing it in the corner.
He pissed his pants as I cut the other foot off. Again I showed it to him before tossing it next to the other one.
“Well, I guess you’re two feet shorter now,” I said and left. Outside I told one of my men to put the body and feet back on his street corner tonight. After driving around and looking at their men on corners I went home. Once at home I decided that there’s no stopping now. I must drive the cartels out of the cities I want. I must kill them all. I made up my mind to go out every night and get it done, but I would stay out of California. Maybe it would be a losing battle or maybe it’s the Mexican’s gains there.
I took delivery of a new boat but not at my house, because I could not protect it from the ocean side. They could burn it at the slip again like the last one. Instead, I docked it at a friend’s house.
About midnight we went out looking for more Mexicans. At four in the morning we saw their new boss driving with a car full of cowboys looking for us. He didn’t recognize us in the work car, and I had everybody in my car get down so they couldn’t be seen.
With his car ahead of us I had my men roll the windows down on the right side of my car.
”When I pull next to him and toot my horn,” I instructed them, “empty all your guns into their car. When I toot the horn---not before.”
They went on for several blocks, then pulled over to talk to one of their corner men. I pulled up next to them, yelling at my men get ready.
“Get ready – get ready!” We were side by side, door to door, window to window when I blew the horn. The three men with me set free the dogs of war Nobody in the target car had looked in my direction until the horn sounded. They all turned just in time to see my men’s first shots which were the last thing they saw.
They never had a chance to bring their guns to the ready. Parts of faces, brains and teeth filled their car while smoke and sound filled mine. When we drove off they were all dead, even the street vendor, and we were out of ammo.
I drove back to change cars and give the guns to someone to take out to sea and deep six the
m.
That took care of their boss and three of his best men, but it didn’t last for more than a week before there was a new boss from L.A. The war was on, as ever.
Over the next two weeks, the press and TV stations got into the act as bodies were found daily, killings mostly blamed on the Mexican and California gangs. My name was never mentioned.
Our new plan was to take all bodies out to sea to keep the television and newspapers quiet. When our men showed up it was blamed on the Mexican cartels because they were found with no heads, or they were never found. New York and Chicago were used to five or six dead men per weekend so it was no big deal to them.
We were losing the Dakotas, Iowa and Washington and had already lost Arizona and Nevada. The two cops paid a visit to me and wanted their money for the month but now they wanted one hundred and fifty grand. I made a deal with them for one hundred grand per month now that there were two of them and business was off by a third. Reluctantly they took the one hundred and left. I knew this would be a problem down the line, and I was losing the wars in the outlying states, so I decided to do a new deal for all states except Florida. I would turn them over to one man each and just deliver the goods to him in bulk at wholesale, and it would be up to the boss of the state what to do in his territory. For this they would get a cheaper price and be their own boss and all would go well as long as they bought from me.
I had the men I picked come in and meet with me for a couple of days each. Some I had to front the first goods to and some had the money which they bank wired. Now I was down to Florida at retail and the rest wholesale at an even cheaper price. I was making more money than ever because my payroll went way down with the same volume.
Now the Mexicans had a war in each state with someone that was making millions per month and wanted to keep it coming in. Now they had twenty or thirty wars not just one, and I was putting the pressure on in Florida through the cops and Cuban cartel. The outlying states were working so well I thought I would divide Florida up into three areas. The west coast including the panhandle, Miami, including the Keys and Hialeah then Fort Lauderdale north, including all of the east coast north from Palm Bay to the state line. Now I had ten men to control instead of one hundred and fifty.
Smugglers 3 Accidental Kingpin Page 4