Tragic

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  “You bet. I was with Joey Barros and Vince Carlotta, neither one of them a shrinking violet, and then there’s me. Forget Jackie, but there’s not a lot of street punks who were going to look at the three of us other guys and want to fuck with us—pardon my French. In fact, the first thing I thought when the two guys jumped out of the alley was, Now, here’s a couple of idiots looking to get the shit kicked out of them. But then I saw the gun.”

  “What was your reaction to seeing the gun?”

  “Hell, I stuck my hands up in the air, like this,” Vitteli said, demonstrating. “I ain’t a fool to mess with a gun; for all I knew, the guy was some hyped-up junkie with an itchy finger and hair trigger.”

  “Is that why you grabbed Mr. Carlotta’s arm?”

  Vitteli nodded. “Yeah. I knew Vince was a hothead, and he’d had a bit much to drink. So I was kind of looking at him sideways to make sure he didn’t do nothing stupid and cause this yahoo to pull the trigger. But sure enough, Vince has to go for a gun. I didn’t even know he had one.”

  “So you grabbed his arm?”

  “I did. I thought he was going to get us all shot, and our wallets weren’t worth it,” Vitteli said.

  “What about the testimony that he called you a son of a bitch?”

  “He wasn’t talking to me,” Vitteli said. “You sort of had to be there to understand, but he’s saying it to the guy with the mask at the same time he’s pulling his own gun.”

  “But the witnesses thought he was addressing you?”

  “I guess it might have looked that way,” Vitteli conceded. He turned toward the jurors. “You have to understand that all this stuff was happening at once. Vince goes for his gun and starts to call the guy a son of a bitch just when I grabbed his arm, so sure he’s going to look at me, wondering what in the hell I’m doing.”

  “But all you were trying to do was prevent a shootout?”

  “That’s right,” Vitteli agreed. “I was just trying to keep the situation from getting worse.” He hung his head. “I’ve thought about that a lot. I wish now I’d just let Vince go for it. He might have got the guy. But I was honestly just doing what I thought was the smart thing. And, I don’t know, maybe I sort of panicked.”

  “What about the testimony that you shouted, ‘Do it!’ ”

  “I don’t know where they got that from,” Vitteli complained. “I know what I said, and what I said was ‘Don’t do it!’ ”

  “Who were you talking to, the gunman or Mr. Carlotta?”

  “You know, this may sound funny, but I can’t tell you,” Vitteli said. “I mean, two guys jump out of an alley, one of ’em’s got a gun pointed at us. Vince goes for his gun, I try to grab him to prevent a bloodbath at the same time he calls the gunman a son of a bitch, and that’s when I yelled, ‘Don’t do it,’ but ‘BOOM,’ Vince goes down. In the heat of all that, I couldn’t tell you whether I was yelling at Vince to stop or pleading with the gunman not to shoot.”

  “Mr. Vitteli, after Mr. Carlotta was shot, did you attempt to render aid?”

  “Yeah, I was trying to give him CPR to keep his heart going,” Vitteli said. Then his eyes narrowed. “And you know something that’s only dawned on me now. Barros and Jackie kept telling me he was gone and that I needed to stop. I never thought about it before, but it’s like they didn’t want me to help him.”

  Nodding as if it was now clear to him, too, Kowalski walked over to the prosecution table and picked up the front page of the Times with the photograph from the murder scene. “I know you saw this photograph,” he said, showing it to the jurors and the witness. “How would you describe what you were experiencing in this photograph?”

  “I was in shock,” Vitteli said. “Distraught. I mean, Vince and I sometimes fought, like brothers in any family will, and some of it wasn’t too pretty. I know he wasn’t happy about the election, and I know now he might have had a legitimate beef, but at the end of the day, we respected each other and were friends.”

  As Kowalski returned the front page to the prosecution table, he asked, “Oh, and Mr. Vitteli, do you recall saying anything about seeing any women near the alley entrance?”

  “I didn’t say nothin’ about seeing no women,” Vitteli scoffed. “That’s really out of left field.”

  “Could you explain then why Mr. Carlotta’s driver, Randy McMahon, said he saw three women on the way to pick up the car, and then Jackie Corcione claimed you made that statement?”

  “You tell me,” Vitteli replied, scowling at Karp. “It seems to me that maybe somebody got those two together so they could get their stories straight.”

  Kowalski and Vitteli both turned toward Karp as if expecting him to object again. But this time Karp simply looked at them like a predator sizing up his prey. Welcome to my web, said the spider to the fly, he thought.

  The defense attorney furrowed his brow and looked back at Vitteli, who shrugged. “No further questions.”

  36

  AS KARP STOOD AT THE end of the jury box closest to the witness stand, he and Vitteli locked eyes. Everyone present knew they were witnessing the last rounds of a fight between two men who loathed each other and in which no quarter would be offered.

  “Mr. Vitteli, why is this the first time anybody, outside of your lawyer, has heard of your version of the events leading up to and including the night Vince Carlotta was murdered?” Karp asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, did you tell the police detective who took your statement that night what you just told the jury?”

  “Maybe he didn’t ask me the right questions,” Vitteli countered. “And like I said, I was in shock.”

  “Were you in shock when you gave a statement two days later to Assistant District Attorney Ray Guma?”

  “I might have been. That whole time is sort of fuzzy to me.”

  “Did you tell the detective or Mr. Guma anything about grabbing Vince’s arm to prevent a shootout?”

  “No.”

  “Did you say anything about Vince calling the gunman a son of a bitch?”

  “No.”

  “Or that you yelled, ‘Don’t do it!’ ”

  “Like I said, I wasn’t thinking clearly.”

  “Yet you were thinking clearly enough,” Karp said as he held up a transcript he’d been holding in his hand, “and I’m reading from the Q and A statement you gave to Mr. Guma, ‘Two guys jumped out of the alley and demanded our wallets and watches’. . . . And, ‘I didn’t get a good look at them, they were dressed in black with ski masks’. . . . And, ‘Vince went for his gun, but the guy shot him.’ You recall telling that to Assistant DA Ray Guma?”

  “That sounds about right,” Vitteli replied.

  “Well, you were thinking clearly enough to recount those items, isn’t that right?”

  “Yeah, so? I remembered some of it,” Vitteli replied.

  “And were you still in shock,” Karp said, walking over to the prosecution table, where he put the transcript down and picked up another, “when you testified at the trial of Alexei Bebnev and Frank DiMarzo four months later?”

  “No. I might have been a little nervous, but I wasn’t in shock.”

  “Not so nervous that you didn’t joke about the gunman, Alexei Bebnev, a Russian immigrant, having a singsongy Puerto Rican or Mexican accent, isn’t that right?” Karp said, holding up the transcript.

  “Yeah, sure,” Vitteli responded. “Like I said, I was nervous and trying to break the ice a little. You were kind of in my face.”

  “Well, let’s look at some of your other testimony from the trial,” Karp said, ignoring the last comment. “Do you recall saying, ‘He reached into his pocket; I guess he had a gun. That’s when the fucker, excuse my French, shot him. Then shot him again.’ Does that ring a bell?”

  “I guess.”

  “You guess? Seems pretty definitive to me,” Karp replied. “Again no mention of grabbing Mr. Carlotta’s arm or any verbal exchanges, correct?”

  “That’s
right. Maybe I wasn’t asked the right question.”

  “Well, you were asked plenty of other questions,” Karp shot back. “Here’s your response when you were asked if you recognized either of the two defendants. You said no, and then followed up by adding, ‘Those two ain’t the guys who killed Vince.’ Then you were asked a question on page twenty-three: ‘Why not?’ Answer: ‘One thing is they ain’t big enough. And I don’t think either of the assholes had blue eyes like pumpkin-head over there.’ You were pretty clear about that, but those men—Alexei Bebnev and Frank DiMarzo were both convicted, and Mr. DiMarzo testified at this trial that he was indeed one of the assailants. So those two guys were the two assailants who murdered Vince Carlotta?”

  Vitteli pulled out his handkerchief and mopped at his brow. “It was dark. I was mistaken.”

  “Yes, you were,” Karp replied. “But again, there was no mention of any of this story you just told the jury, was there?”

  “It’s been a while,” Vitteli explained. “Some things came to me after that trial jogged my memory.”

  “So then you were also mistaken at the other trial when you testified that Jackie Corcione had no role in the union investigation into Vince Carlotta’s complaint about the elections except, and I’m quoting from the trial transcript page 3015, ‘He sort of sat in on it to give legal advice, but he didn’t vote.’ Am I correct?”

  “I might have misspoke there,” Vitteli said now reaching for a cup of water and taking a sip. “He was . . . uh . . . in charge of the investigation. He wasn’t supposed to vote though . . . but I’m not sure what happened. I stayed out of it.”

  “Because it would have been a conflict of interest, right?”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I have one more question related to your testimony at the other trial,” Karp said. “You were asked about the confrontation at Marlon’s Restaurant and you said, ‘My associate Joey Barros and Vince had some words,’ but there’s no mention of Jackie Corcione being involved in any confrontation with Mr. Carlotta. But yet that’s what you told this jury. Why is that?”

  “I forgot that Jackie kind of started it, and Joey came to his defense.”

  “Kind of hard to keep your stories straight when they’re made up out of thin air, isn’t it, Mr. Vitteli?”

  “I’m telling the truth now, that’s all I know,” Vitteli replied.

  Karp walked out in front of the witness box and stared up at Vitteli, who had no choice but to meet his look. “I just wanted to clear something up,” Karp said. “Is it your testimony that you only had the one contact with Mr. Bryant at the Labor Department and that he informed you that you had to exhaust your remedies through the union, is that correct?”

  “Uh, yeah,” Vitteli said.

  “But before you could initiate any such complaint, you were indicted on the charge for which you are now standing trial. Is that your testimony?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So there wasn’t time to go back to Mr. Bryant, or for him to assist you any further?”

  “That’s right,” Vitteli nodded. “You decided you needed a scapegoat, so you came after me.”

  Karp ignored Vitteli’s response. Instead, he walked over to the prosecution table and picked up the magazine photograph and held it up so that Vitteli could see it.

  “Mr. Vitteli, is it your testimony that this photograph was in your wallet that was taken by the killers the night of Mr. Carlotta’s murder?”

  Vitteli’s eyes narrowed and he licked his lips nervously, but he nodded. “Yeah, that’s right.”

  Karp handed the photograph to the jury foreman to look at and pass around to the other jurors. He then picked up the complete copy of the Dock and turned to the page containing the same photograph as he walked up toward the witness stand.

  “Mr. Vitteli, do you have a wallet with you today?”

  “Yeah, sure I do.”

  “Would you pull it out, please?”

  Vitteli looked at Kowalski, who shrugged and nodded. The witness reached into his back pocket and pulled out his wallet, which he held up.

  “Is that similar to the one taken from you the night of the murder?”

  “It’s close.”

  “Close in size and design?”

  “Yeah. Like I told you, it’s close.”

  Karp nodded and then tore out the page with the photograph from the magazine. “Your Honor, I’d like to hand the witness this page from the Dock magazine with a copy of the photograph in question for demonstration purposes.”

  “You may, please proceed.”

  Turning back to the witness stand, Karp handed the page to Vitteli. “Would you demonstrate how this photograph was folded in order to fit into your wallet?”

  “I don’t see the point of this crap,” Vitteli complained.

  The more agitated Vitteli became, the more restrained Karp appeared. “Just show us, please, how you folded the photograph so that it fit into your wallet, which was stolen by the killers, one of whom—according to your testimony—Frank DiMarzo, then removed and kept it in his Bible,” Karp insisted.

  Vitteli glanced over at the jurors, the last of whom finished looking at the photograph in evidence and handed it back to the jury foreman. They were all looking at him intently. “I don’t remember how it was folded,” he said.

  Walking over to the jury foreman, Karp retrieved the exhibit photograph. “Well, let’s start by folding it once and then tell us if that is what you did?”

  Looking at the page he held in his hand like it was a poisonous snake, Vitteli folded it in half. He shook his head. “No. It had to be smaller.”

  “Then go ahead and fold it in half again,” Karp replied. “And tell us if it fits.”

  Again, Vitteli did as he was told. He started to place it in his wallet, but it was obviously still too large. “No. Maybe one more time.”

  “Go ahead,” Karp encouraged. “A third time, please.”

  Vitteli folded the page again. This time he opened the wallet and stuck it in. “Like this,” he said.

  “Okay. The jury can see that there’s quite a bit of the photograph sticking out of the wallet,” Karp said. “But that’s how you contend you stuck it in your back pants pocket until you took it out and handed it to Mr. Carlotta’s killers, is that what you’re saying?”

  “Yeah,” Vitteli said. “I wasn’t real careful. It was just a photo to break the ice with Vince.”

  Karp glanced down at the photograph in his hand. “I’m looking at People’s Exhibit Twenty-Eight, the photograph in evidence, and it doesn’t appear that any of the edges of the page are folded or torn as might be expected if it was inserted into your wallet and pants pocket as you contend. Can you explain that?”

  Vitteli shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I folded it again,” he said. “I don’t remember.”

  “Well, why don’t you fold the demonstration photograph one more time and see how that fits?”

  Vitteli glowered for a moment at Karp but then did what he was told. He held up the wallet. “Yeah, I must have folded it again,” he said.

  “Four times?” Karp asked.

  “Three or four times.”

  Stepping forward, Karp handed the evidentiary photograph up to Vitteli. “Would you look at it, please, and then tell the jury how many times it’s been folded?”

  Vitteli reached forward and grabbed the plastic sleeve containing the photograph from Karp, his eyes boring into his antagonist until finally looking down at what he held. His hands began to shake as his face turned red. He reached for the cup of water but gave up as his hands weren’t steady enough to hold it.

  “Mr. Vitteli? Your answer please,” Karp asked mildly.

  The courtroom was absolutely still, waiting for an answer that Vitteli refused to give. “You tricked me,” he snarled instead, “you son of a bitch.”

  Unmoved, Karp turned to the judge. “Your Honor, I’d request that the witness answer my question.”

  Judge See leaned across his de
sk toward Vitteli. “Just answer the question, please.”

  Vitteli’s eyes, filled with hate, flicked from Karp to the judge to Karp again. “Once, it’s been folded once,” he said venomously and tossed the photograph in the direction of Karp, who calmly leaned over and picked it up.

  “So you were lying when you told this jury that the photograph was in your wallet that was taken by the killers?” Karp said.

  “Maybe it wasn’t in my wallet,” Vitteli retorted. “Maybe it was just in my coat pocket. I don’t remember. I’d been drinking.”

  “Well, do you remember reaching into your coat pocket and handing the gunman this photograph, Mr. Vitteli?”

  Vitteli crossed his arms. “I told you what happened, and that’s all I’m going to say about that.”

  “That’s okay, Mr. Vitteli,” Karp shot back. “You’ve said plenty.”

  Karp turned toward the prosecution table, and it appeared he was through questioning Vitteli, but then he pulled up as if he remembered one last thing. “Oh, by the way, whatever happened to that handkerchief you’re holding in your hand in that newspaper photograph?”

  Vitteli furrowed his brow. “It was ruined, covered with blood. Joey threw it away for me.”

  “Do you know where he threw it?”

  “Yeah, in a barrel by the alley that the bums use for fires.”

  “Do you know what happened to it from there?”

  Vitteli’s sneer disappeared, replaced by confusion. “I assume it got burned up.”

  Karp regarded his quarry for a moment, then smiled. “No further questions.”

  37

  THE FINAL SCENE IN THE last act of the people of the State of New York vs. Charles E. Vitteli began with Judge See turning to Karp, who sat at the prosecution table having just listened to Kowalski’s closing arguments. “Mr. Karp, would you care to deliver your summation at this time?” the judge asked.

  “Yes, thank you, Your Honor,” Karp replied as he rose and walked out in front of the jury. “As the district attorney in charge of presenting the evidence in this case on behalf of the People, the law gives me the opportunity to deliver a summation. At the outset, I’d first like to thank all of you for the patient and courteous attention you showed throughout this trial.”