by Edward Izzi
“Yes, I just flew in from Midway, and rented a car to come here to your precinct. Chicago is such a lovely city,” she mentioned. “I had both GPS systems going on my cell phone and in the car, but I still managed to get lost.”
“Chicago is an easy city to travel in, as long as you don’t get caught up in all the traffic,” I replied, as my schoolboy jitters were starting to settle down.
“Yes, I did catch quite a bit of it going downtown to my hotel.”
“Where are you staying?” as if it was any of my business.
“The Sheridan on Wacker Drive,” she replied. “What a beautiful hotel. Chicago is such a gorgeous city. Every time I come here, I always notice a new skyscraper.”
“Indeed,” I responded, still trying very hard not to stare.
She then reached into her large purse, pulled out a manila folder, and began fumbling through some papers and reviewing some of her notes.
“I understand there has been another homicide of an ex-priest in your city,” she casually mentioned.
“Yes, there has. We’ve been racking our brains, trying to find some new leads in these two murders, but so far, it has been very frustrating,” I retorted.
Even though she was from the life insurance company, I didn’t want to come across too forthcoming on the details of these investigations.
“There are rumors floating around that there may be a serial killer responsible for both of these murders,” she mentioned. I wasn’t sure how much information she really had, or how much homework she had done on the facts of both murder cases.
“We really don’t know what we have right now, Ms. Laurent.”
“Please, call me Olivia.”
“Ok, Olivia…and you can call me Phil,” I replied. I didn’t know any more if this was really was a business conference or a ‘meet-and-greet’ encounter, compliments of Match.com.
“We’re just not sure what we have right now, Olivia. Even though both murders are very similar, we’re not sure what the motive is or who might be involved,” I continued.
“Well, judging by the quick life insurance claims that were just made by the Chicago Archdiocese I have a difficult time believing that they’re not involved,” Olivia responded.
“We can’t assume that. We really just don’t know.”
Olivia gazed at me, with a rather puzzled look on her face. “I am hoping we can solve these cases soon, Detective. There is pressure on our company from everyone to settle these claims, one way or the other,” she mentioned, giving me the impression that our investigation into these murders was not progressing to her satisfaction.
“Nobody wants to solve these cases more than I do,” I curtly replied.
We both sat there rather nervously, as there were several moments of uncomfortable silence. I was nervously glancing at my computer screen several times during our conversation, just to keep myself from staring at her.
“Are you busy this evening, Detective? Perhaps we could meet for dinner and drinks after work downtown later,” she suggested, “We could discuss the details of this investigation when you’re not as preoccupied,” she smiled.
I was thrown off balance again, not remembering the last time a women asked me out for a date, even if it was only for business.
“I will check my schedule, but I’m sure there won’t be a problem,” as I didn’t want to sound too eager.
“That sounds great, Olivia,” I responded.
“My cell phone is on my business card. Please call me later and confirm, and we can decide where to meet and what time,” she suggested.
It had been several years since my divorce, and I forgot what going on a ‘date’ was really like. I hadn’t done a lot of dating or ‘bar-hopping’ since my breakup and messy divorce. Up until now, I wasn’t too motivated to go out there and get my heart mutilated and stepped on again.
“I look forward to seeing you later, Detective,” as she rose up and grasped my hand again, “It was a pleasure meeting you.”
“The pleasure was mine, “as I stood up and returned the pleasantry, hoping I didn’t sound or look too nervous or uneasy.
At that moment, she gracefully opened my door and left my office. I could see her from my office glass window, strolling past the other detective’s desks. They were all too eager to take notice, as she quickly exited out of the front precinct door.
I was both apprehensive and excited to meet up with Olivia later that evening, hoping that our business dinner date would end up being “more pleasure” and “less business.”
Although she had walked out of my office at that moment, I had no idea that Ms. Olivia Laurent was walking into my life.
Chapter Eighteen
Little Tony’s DUI
A black Maserati was speeding south bound on the Dan Ryan expressway on that sunny, Tuesday afternoon. Little Tony DiMatteo had just finished a lunch meeting with some business associates at Gene and Georgetti’s Steakhouse on North Franklin Street and was in a hurry to get back to his warehouse on South Ashland Avenue. The afternoon traffic was light in the left lane, as DiMatteo was struggling to keep his eyes on the road. With his daily, 5:00 am workout routines, and after three of his ‘Crown Royal on the Rocks’ cocktails, DiMatteo was a more than a little tired. He was drowsy and was struggling to keep his car under control. But he needed to quickly return to his office, attend to some business, and to take one of his usual ‘power naps’ in the late afternoon.
As he was driving, he wasn’t paying much attention to his speedometer. The needle was climbing past ninety-five miles an hour, as he was taking the expressway curve a little too fast past the South Archer Avenue exit. He didn’t notice the Chicago Police squad car, parked on the far left side of the Dan Ryan expressway, whom he had driven past. The patrolman clocked his speed, then put on his sirens and began to follow the speeding, black Maserati. His radar gun recorded the car’s rate of speed going faster than 97 miles an hour.
Little Tony was struggling to stay awake, and loudly turned on his radio. There was a Four Seasons song playing on a Sirius XM oldies station as he was turning up the volume. He didn’t notice the police squad car that was chasing after him until the cop car pulled up right next to him on the I-94 expressway and, blowing his sirens loudly, ordered him to pull over.
“Good Afternoon Officer, nice weather we’re having,” Little Tony politely said as he rolled down his window.
“Driver’s License, Registration and Proof of Insurance, please,” the unamused patrolman answered, shining a flashlight on Little Tony’s eyes and around the front and back seats of the sports car. Tony’s eyes were dilated, and the distinct smell of alcohol was more than evident as he was fumbling with his wallet and the papers in his car’s glovebox. He finally, after some delayed searching, retrieved the requested identification.
“Have you been drinking, sir?”
“I had a cocktail, but I’m fine. Why are you asking?”
“Sir, step out of the car, please.”
“No, officer, I am not going to step out of my car,” Tony loudly replied, always remembering his attorney’s advice when getting pulled over after having too many drinks.
DiMatteo knew that he shouldn’t cooperate with the officer, knowing he was going to get asked to blow into a breathalyzer machine. The patrolman angrily took the driver’s identification and typed in the information into his squad car computer, along with the driver’s license plate number. It was then that the Chicago police officer suddenly realized whom he had just pulled over.
Tony DiMatteo was then forcibly arrested and brought to the Seventh District.
___________________________________________
It was almost 4:00 in the afternoon, and I was looking at my clock, counting out the minutes until I got off from my shift at 6:00pm. I had just received a return text from Olivia, and we had made some plans to get together at 7:30pm at the Dover’s Catch, an upscale restaurant on West Wacker Drive near her hotel.
“Detective Doria
n,” as I answered my ringing desk phone.
“Phil, it’s Commander Robertson over at the Seventh District. We’re holding someone here at the station that you may want to talk to. Are you still working on those ‘Pedophile Priest Murder’ cases?”
“Yeah, why?” I curiously asked.
“We’ve got Little Tony down here on a DUI,” the Commander replied. “He was pretending to be Mario Andretti and was racing his Maserati down the Dan Ryan when he got pulled over. We’ve heard through the grapevine that our little buddy here may know something about what’s going on. We thought you might want to come down here and have a little ‘chit-chat’ with him.”
“Tony DiMatteo?” I verified, making sure they had the right Tony.
“Yep, that’s the one. We’ve got him in a holding room.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. “Has he ‘lawyered up’ yet?”
“No, not yet. He’s too busy entertaining everyone in the precinct with his smart-ass comments. If he wasn’t who he was, we would have already thrown him in the shithouse by now,” the Commander replied, tongue in cheek.
I wasn’t surprised that the ‘Capo’ of all the crime families in Chicagoland was getting the royal treatment at the Seventh District.
“Thanks Commander, I’ll be right down.”
I couldn’t believe it. Little Tony and his buddy Kilbane, were both getting bad habits of drinking and driving after one too many cocktails.
I had the pleasure of picking up and holding DiMatteo a few years ago on a suspected homicide charge. We had found a dead body in the trunk of a car in Jefferson Park, and it was more than evident by the victim’s identification that it was a mob hit. He had three bullet holes in his head, a gun, and over five grand in his coat pocket. The victim had several currency exchanges in the city and had gotten behind on some juice payments that he was into Little Tony and his boys for. DiMatteo wasn’t a pleasant ‘boy scout’ on that day either, and he ‘alibied’ his way out of getting pinched. In that homicide case, we had uncooperative witnesses, couldn’t tie out any of the DNA evidence, and ballistics traced the bullets to an unregistered gun. I had spent several months trying to get a collar on that case, and it was never solved.
But the “Capo dei Capi” was way too smart to be speeding down the Dan Ryan ‘all juiced up’. I just didn’t understand it, and I couldn’t put my head around all this sudden stupidity. I jumped into my Crown Vic, turned on my sirens, and raced down to the Seventh District on West 63rd Street. That afternoon, I certainly wasn’t about to look this ‘gift horse in the mouth’.
“Thanks for coming down, Detective,” Sergeant Charles Anderson said, as he guided me to the holding room where they were keeping DiMatteo. He was an older, overweight police officer who had probably made more than his share of social visits to the donut shop. I could tell he was having a hard time walking and getting around, as he was painfully, escorting me around the precinct office.
“This son-of-a-bitch is one, cocky bastard,” he commented. “I’m hoping this won’t be a waste of time for you, Detective. Maybe you can get some information out of him. We’re all surprised he hasn’t called one of his high-priced lawyers yet.”
“Don’t worry, Sergeant…that’s coming. I’m sure he’s on his way over. Let’s hear what he has to say before his lawyer shuts him up,” I advised. I opened the door to the holding room with the desk sergeant behind me, expecting to make a formal introduction.
Little Tony DiMatteo was comfortably sitting on a chair at the table, and his face seemed to light up when I walked into the room.
“Well, well. If it isn’t Detective Philip ‘Fucking’ Dorian,” he arrogantly said, broadly smiling from ear to ear.
“It’s always a pleasure to see you too, Tony. I heard you were doing a ‘stand-up routine’ here at the Seventh and I didn’t want to miss the show,” I amusingly replied.
I already knew from experience who I was dealing with, and I had to make sure that I brought along my ‘A-Game’ for this visit. Little Tony was a cocky, arrogant, mega-rich Mafioso who knew criminal law better than most law school professors. I knew before this meeting that he was probably going to ‘toy’ with me and the other officers, until he got tired and bored. At that point, he’ll probably call one of his ‘over-priced’ attorneys to come over to the police station and ‘fish him out’.
“I heard you were racing in the Daytona 500 down the Dan Ryan this afternoon,” I quickly said, hoping he would give me a straight answer.
“Yeah, I was drag racing some little old lady down on the expressway in a ’59 Edsel,” he sarcastically replied.
“What I can’t figure out, Tony, is where this new habit is coming from?” I asked him point blank. “You guys are way too smart for this kind of shit. You and your priest pally seem to be juicing and driving an awful lot these days. We picked up your buddy Kilbane last week on a DUI as well.”
“What? I’ve got nothing to do with Kilbane, so go fuck yourself, Dorian.”
“Is that why you had dinner with him at your favorite little ‘trattoria’ there on North Halsted last Thursday night?”
Little Tony became deep in thought, trying to remember his activities from the prior week.
“Last Thursday night? Last Thursday night? What the fuck was I doing last Thursday night?” as Tony was scratching his head.
“How in the hell am I supposed to remember what I did last Thursday night, Dorian? I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning.”
“Judging from your girlish figure, Tony, it was probably a grapefruit and a granola bar,” I answered.
From what I remembered in the past, this Chicago mobster was always in shape, and ‘dressed to the nines’. He was wearing a grey sport coat and black collared shirt, sporting several diamond rings and an oversized, gold Rolex watch. For a sixty-something, grey-haired hood, DiMatteo always looked impeccable and was very fit and trim.
“I see you’re still having your half-a-dozen jelly donuts in the morning, Dorian. How’s that working for you?”
“Just fine, Tony, not that it’s any of your damn business,” I replied.
Little Tony just started shaking his head. “My arteries start to harden every time I stare at that huge ‘panza’ of yours, Dorian,” he answered. “My trainer comes to my gym at 5:00 am every morning. Why don’t you get your fat ass out of bed and come over and start working out?”
Little Tony DiMatteo felt qualified to pass out health and fitness information, as he was puffing out his chest, sucking in his stomach, and doing his best ‘Jack LaLane’ imitation.
“Thanks for the invite, Tony. But we don’t want the neighborhood donut shop to go out of business,” I bantered back, as I didn’t need to hear him taking any more shots at my size forty-four waist.
“So, where were you last Thursday night?” I asked him again.
“Hmmm….,”he answered. “Let me see….” as he silently thought for a moment.
“Oh yeah, I remember now, Dorian,” as he was blurting out another cocky answer at my expense.
“I was fucking your wife.”
I angrily looked at him silently for about ten seconds, knowing that I couldn’t get away with taking a hard swing at that this little son-of-a-bitch and get away with it.
“Wrong answer, Tony. The waiters and the valet at the ‘Pagliacci’ remember you having dinner with Monsignor Kilbane last Thursday night. We pulled him over with a suitcase full of cash,” as I continued to interrogate him.
“And just for the record, Tony, I’m divorced.”
Little Tony just rolled his eyes in the air, looking like he was starting to get bored with this whole conversation.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he quickly replied.
“The waiter remembered Kilbane walking in and out of the restaurant with the same black briefcase, and he saw the two of you passing the briefcase back and forth at the table,” I said, as Tony was still struggling to remember.
/>
“Again, Dorian, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he repeated.
“You’re well recognized at that restaurant, Tony. They said you’ve been there many times, and that you even have your own private booth and meeting room,” as I was trying hard to squeeze it out of him.
“That has nothing to do with me, Dorian. What Kilbane does and how much money he carries around isn’t my fucking problem.”
“Well, he obviously thought he owed you some dough, Tony. So, he brought along some retainer money that night, to the tune of fifty large in cash, to tide you and your boys over until the insurance company settled the claim on the murder of those two ex-priests, am I right?” I started to push it, hoping I could get a reaction out of him.
Little Tony started to look nervous, as the sweat was starting to bead on his forehead in the precinct office’s warm, somewhat uncomfortable, interrogation room.
“I don’t know anything about any old priest murders,” he angrily replied.
“They were mob hits, Tony. Both victims were sliced up and filleted like porterhouse steaks. Only you guys have that kind of culinary talent.”
“Then maybe you should call the Butchers Local 1546, Dorian. I hear they have a lot of unemployed butchers walking around,” he arrogantly countered back.
“Go fuck yourself. You can’t put those murders on us. We had nothing to do with them.”
“Hmmm, I don’t know, Tony. The Archdiocese is the beneficiary of both of those life insurance policies, and there are rumors swirling around town about the Cardinal being broke. Seeing that you and the Monsignor are so tight, he probably enlisted you for your services,” I said.
Little Tony started to laugh. “If Kilbane was hiring us for our services, he would need a lot more than fifty large,” he jokingly replied.
“Exactly. That’s why he was trying to bring you a deposit, Tony. My theory is, for whatever reason, you refused to accept his money. Maybe he didn’t bring enough cash, or maybe…”
“We had nothing to do with those murders, Dorian. I want my lawyer!”