Double Cross

by Sam Giancana

  “Good.” Chuck fell silent.

  “You aren’t convinced, are you? Jesus Christ, I’ve never seen you like this. Jack could be all mine. There’s a big difference between sharing a slice of the action with the other guys and having the President of the U.S. fuckin’ A. in my pocket.”

  “True,” Chuck said,

  “Granted, we’ve helped out the CIA now and then, and Nixon’s done me a favor, all right. Shit, he even helped my guy in Texas, Ruby, get out of testifying in front of Congress back in forty-seven.”

  “How’s that?”

  Mooney started to laugh. “By sayin’ Ruby worked for him.”

  “You’re kiddin’?”

  “No, but the funny thing is between Murray Humphreys greasin’ a few palms and Nixon sayin’ that, the fed bought it.”

  “That just proves my point,” Chuck said. “I still think your safe bet is Nixon.”

  “Jesus, Chuck, you sound like a fuckin’ broken record. Like I said, we’ll hedge our bets. Just like we did out in California when Nixon was runnin’ for senator.”

  “I’m still not sure,” Chuck insisted.

  “Hey, would you rather have the milk or the whole cow? Me, I’d prefer the cow.”

  “I hear you . . . but you don’t know what the hell Jack’ll do once he’s elected. With Nixon, you’ll know where you stand.”

  Mooney nodded. “That’s the safe way to play it all right. But the safe way isn’t gonna get me where I wanna go and it never has. That’s the problem with you, Chuck, you wanna always play it safe.”

  A sudden look of hurt crossed Chuck’s face and before he could hide his feelings, Mooney hastily added, “Hey, that’s okay, we’re just different. You like runnin’ a business. Me? I wanna run the country.”

  CHAPTER 19

  Not since 1916 had there been such a close election. On November 8, 1960, calls crisscrossed the country throughout the day and well into the night. To stay abreast of the returns personally, Mooney was kept posted on a line through a telephone link to his political fixer and Democratic National Committeeman, Jake Arvey, which was set up for election day. Reports were received on the Illinois election each half hour. The news had been good: up until eleven o’clock, it appeared Kennedy had the election sewn up. But by midnight, the tide had turned and NBC news anchor John Chancellor predicted a Nixon win.

  Chuck’s heart sank, as he imagined Mooney’s had as well, when he heard Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee, and the western farming states had swung to Nixon. Worse, the critical state of Illinois was faltering. Without Texas and Illinois, Kennedy would never make it. Chuck would later learn that, in a similar rush of concern, Jack Kennedy had called Mayor Daley of Chicago from Hyannis Port. Daley, in turn, contacted Mooney, who reassured his associates.

  Controlling Chicago’s powerful black wards and his own Mob wards—nine in all—Mooney had turned the screws with all the muscle he could muster. He confessed later that swinging the election was like taking a “stroll down memory lane”—all the old tricks from his youth in the Patch came into play when his soldiers were mobilized in the name of Jack Kennedy.

  To assure the election’s outcome, guys either trucked people from precinct to precinct and poll to poll so they could vote numerous times or stood menacingly alongside the voting booths, where they made it clear to prospective voters that all ballots were to be cast for Kennedy. Occasionally, some misguided citizen declared his independence from such tyranny and in so doing drew the wrath of Mooney’s zealots; more than a few arms and legs were broken before the polls were closed that day.

  Chuck awakened the following morning almost afraid to turn on the television. When he did, he was ecstatic. The results were in: Jack Kennedy would be the next President of the United States.

  In Mooney’s wards, Kennedy had received 80 percent of the votes, while the rest of Chicago registered a respectable 60 percent margin. When it was all said and done, Kennedy carried Illinois by a mere 9,000 votes and in Texas had squeaked by to victory with a lead of only 28,000 votes over Nixon.

  Nationwide, he’d won by a margin of only one-tenth of a percent.

  Outraged and correctly suspecting that the votes had been purposely falsified by certain Chicago precincts, the Republican party counted the Illinois vote and came up with a Nixon win of 4,500. At the call for an official recount, Daley balked as he’d been instructed and Nixon conceded defeat.

  Overnight, Mooney’s dream had become a reality: The man who would be king now shared the throne with the man who would be President.

  Chuck had never seen Mooney so happy; he was a changed man. The mood swings and their accompanying scowls, silent rages, and omnipresent hostilities all vanished overnight. In their place was a relaxed, jovial man who played practical jokes, took the time to enjoy a good story, and laughed readily with newfound heartiness. Chuck felt a certain joy at seeing his brother drop the mask, if only momentarily.

  Throughout Chuck’s life, his own stability had been closely tied to Mooney’s emotions, and now for the first time he thought he might be happy for more than a day or a week.

  “With Kennedy in office,” he declared to Anne Marie, “Mooney will be on top of the world. . . . We’ve got four of the happiest years of our lives ahead of us.”

  Like his brother, Chuck eagerly anticipated the inauguration; life would return to normal. Mooney had been busy getting his plans in order and his men in line. Immediately after the election, he sent Murray Humphreys to Washington to massage the political machine and mastermind the biggest pre-inaugural gala for Jack Kennedy the country had ever witnessed.

  In Mooney’s eyes, everyone connected to the underworld—from two-bit soldiers to brothers-in-taw—had to get what Outfit guys called “permission.”

  As his mob colleagues showed the proper degree of respect it was clear that Mooney was now one of Jack Kennedy’s biggest supporters and therefore would naturally look for the greatest names to support the gala. Once again he moved behind the scenes, invisibly pulling strings of innocent players unaware of manipulation.

  In the wake of the election, Mooney basked in glory throughout November—as did Daley, Marcello, and Lyndon Johnson. Each would claim the Kennedy victory as a personal triumph, if only privately. However, Mooney admitted to Chuck that the roles these men had played had been equally important and interdependent; it was their collective effort that had put Jack Kennedy in the White House.

  Another factor in Jack Kennedy’s success must indisputably have been the support of Sinatra whose celebrity status had served to mobilize hundreds of influential personalities, generating substantial campaign contributions. His star power had elevated the nation’s presidential campaign and election to new political heights—that of media event, a phenomenon critical to gaining publicity and the popular vote.

  Daley and Johnson were crucial to the political machine. Historians might argue which state—Texas or Illinois—actually turned the tide. But the bottom line was that alone, neither would have made Jack Kennedy President of the United States.

  As for Carlos Marcello—he rightfully believed his assistance was significant to the election’s outcome. But Marcello’s power and connections were largely limited to Louisiana and the relatively small electoral vote in the South.

  According to everyone Chuck talked to, Mooney was currently at the hub of most illegal affairs nationally—with the exception of those originating in New York. Guys such as Daley, Johnson or Marcello were simply spokes on a very big wheel.

  Mooney wasted no time cashing in on his new connection to the White House, telling Chuck he’d already begun expanding his underworld network to include dictators, presidents, and smuggling czars—from nations as diverse as Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Iran, Lebanon, Italy, France, Nicaragua, Guatemala, the Philippines, and Laos.

  Mooney also revealed he’d been in communication with his buddies from the CIA.

  “It’s beautiful,” Mooney said one day at the Thunderbolt, playfully stirr
ing his martini with a swizzle stick while the refrain of Bing Crosby’s “White Christmas” played in the background. “The Outfit even has the same enemies as the government.”

  He glanced around the empty lounge, decorated for the holidays with stylish silver ornaments and red satin ribbons, and lowered his voice slightly. “I’ve been meeting with the CIA guys since last August; we’re gonna hit Castro, Trujillo from the Dominican Republic, and some nigger in the Congo.”

  “So,” Chuck said, lighting a cigar. “Don’t leave me hanging’.”

  “Well, first things first,” Mooney said, smiling. “You know, if we’re successful, you might get that job in the Dominican Republic, after all.”

  “I won’t hold my breath,” Chuck commented. He’d practically given up hope of ever leaving the motel.

  “Well, the big hit is on Castro, anyway. At least, for the Outfit it will be. After Kennedy takes office and Castro gets hit . . . everybody in the country will have to come through me.” He smiled, lips curling around his cigar, obviously pleased at the prospect of being the undisputed “boss of bosses.” “I don’t care about fuckin’ titles. . . . I’m not a sap like Genovese. All I want is to know that I’m the boss. Titles don’t mean shit.”

  “Well, you really already have the bosses in line; I mean, they all practically kiss your ass now, as it is.”

  “Yeah, Marcello, Trafficante, the guys out west, they know who’s in control. Castro didn’t wipe me out. I’m all right, if I don’t look at what I’m losin’ every day he’s in power. But Trafficante, Marcello, Lansky, and all the rest of’em—shit, they lost a fortune. The mistake some of’em made was havin’ all their eggs in one basket.”

  “And you didn’t do that,” Chuck said tentatively.

  “Hell, no. I got deals all over. But those guys were in a box when Castro realized they were close to Batista. So, he fixed them real good. Hell, you can bet he knows Marcello and Trafficante are tight with the Cuban exiles, too.”

  He shook his head while puffing intently on his cigar. “We helped the CIA get guns to Castro, thinkin’ the guy would repay us by goin’ easy on our business down there. But Castro, the lousy bastard . . . I gotta hand it to him . . . he can’t be bought. He says Americans are all crooks and pimps. He’s a fuckin’ double-crosser if there ever was one.”

  “But he’s pretty accurate in his view of Americans, don’t you think?”

  “Yeah, Castro’s no dummy,” Mooney conceded. He sighed. “So, the CIA finally woke up to the fact that Castro’s closin’ down American business. The government doesn’t like that kind of shit. . . . After all, the CIA’s lost their cut of the take from the casinos, too. So they offered me one hundred fifty thousand bucks for the hit . . . chicken feed. I told ’em I couldn’t care less about the money. We’ll take care of Castro. One way or another.” He smiled triumphantly and raised his glass. “I think it’s my patriotic duty.”

  Chuck had learned by now that most politicians were crooks, but these stories of Mooney’s about the Outfit being paid by the government to hit other countries’ leaders seemed hard to believe. “If this stuff about the government killing guys is true,” he said, “why doesn’t anybody ever hear about it?”

  “Welcome to the real world, Chuck,” Mooney said, leaning over to slap him on the back.

  “The real world?” Chuck’s eyebrows shot up, half in anger, half in disbelief. Perhaps he was naive, as Mooney always said, but he couldn’t stand the idea that his country—one, he had to admit, he really did love—was so goddamned screwed up. The Outfit taking its piece of the action was one thing, but the government ordering hits on people—he found it all strangely depressing.

  Mooney studied him for a moment. Their eyes met and his brother began speaking in a tone that to Chuck seemed patronizing. “Yeah, Chuck, I’ve been tellin’ you for years this is how it’s played. You don’t hear about all this because it’s secret, top secret.” He paused and searched Chuck’s face. “These guys are secret agents; they aren’t supposed to get caught, and if they do, the government pretends they didn’t know a damn thing about it. That’s what secret means for Christ’s sake.”

  Mooney went on to say that CIA director Allen Dulles was the one who’d originally come up with the idea of taking out Castro. Two officials, Richard Bissell and Sheffield Edwards, were selected to put the scheme into action. For their liaison to the Outfit, Mooney said they called on Bob Maheu.

  “The guy from the FBI?”

  “The guy who used to be with the FBI. He has a cover, a detective agency. He’s workin’ for our Teamsters’ attorney friend, Williams. That’s how a lot of the guys work. Like Banister . . . shit, he’s got an agency down in New Orleans now and is workin’ on the Cuban exile thing with the CIA. Maheu and Banister work for the CIA all the time. They’re good, damned good. And they’ve made me a lot of money.”

  After Mooney’s initial meeting with Maheu, one arranged by his lieutenant Johnny Roselli, Mooney told Chuck he instructed Roselli to tell Santo Trafficante and Carlos Marcello he wanted them to provide the assistance necessary—their Cuban connections—to pull off the CIA assassination plan. Mooney made Roselli the go-between with Maheu and the CIA. Meanwhile, Mooney said he put Jack Ruby back in action supplying arms, aircraft, and munitions to exiles in Florida and Louisiana, while the former Castro Minister of Games, Frank Fiorini, joined Ruby in the smuggling venture along with a Banister CIA associate, David Ferrie.

  The virtual blanket of men surrounding both the director of the CIA, the President of the United States, and Sam Giancana served to insulate them from even a hint of suspicion. And if not from suspicion, certainly from any direct tie to the events that followed.

  As Chuck would conclude after their conversation that December, the Castro plot was only the tip of one iceberg, in a vast sea of icebergs, on a course charted by his brother and his undercover friends. It was a course that would result in the creation of a team of skilled men possessing the wherewithal to assassinate any world leader.

  News of Bobby Kennedy’s appointment as attorney general that December came to Mooney like a rabbit punch in the dark. The relaxed attitude he’d developed since the election vanished as suddenly as it had appeared. A seething anger simmered beneath his bitter disappointment.

  The immediate question from Hoffa, Marcello, and Trafficante was, “What the fuck is Jack Kennedy up to?”

  In an effort to get some answers, Mooney called Humphreys sidekick on the carpet. This was the guy he’d designated as one of his liaisons to the Kennedys, the man who’d assured him he had Jack under his thumb. “Eatin’ out of the palm of his hand,” Mooney yelled from behind his desk in his Oak Park basement one day. “. . . Jack’s eatin’ out of his hand. Bullshit, that’s what it is.” He slammed the phone down and threw it across the room.

  Up until now, Mooney had relied largely on this contact and Murray Humphreys to keep him abreast of the goings-on with the Kennedys, but after recent occurences, he told Chuck he planned to have Roselli keep a closer eye on things out west concerning the Kennedys. He said he was also sending his old Havana Tropicana pit boss, Lewis McWillie, to the Cal-Neva in Tahoe in an effort to beef up surveillance of the Kennedys’ frequent casino romps and to monitor the Sinatra/Kennedy friendship.

  The second person, after Harry Truman, to meet with Jack Kennedy in the Oval Office in 1961 was Chicago’s Mayor Daley. It was no coincidence; Mooney expected to see a change in policy toward organized crime and see it fast. Having Bobby Kennedy as attorney general was not what he had in mind. He wanted answers. But mostly, he wanted reassurance. What he got was, “These things take time.”

  Finding that message unacceptable, Mooney took matters into his own hands—personalty going to the White House for a private meeting with the President. Their meeting, and the assurances he said he received, did little to allay his concerns. He came back to Chicago dissatisfied and, Chuck thought, more suspicious than ever of Jack Kennedy’s motives.

 
It had occurred to Mooney that Joe Kennedy, “the wily old bastard,” had had a brainstorm. By putting Bobby in charge of the Justice Department, it could only be one of two things: Either Bobby would put the clamps on Hoover and tell him to lay off the Outfit as Jack and Joe had promised or Bobby would be utilized as henchman, with a virtual army of FBI agents at his disposal to destroy all those to whom the Kennedys owed favors. The former seemed hopeful but highly unlikely—it would be a behavior totally out of character for Robert Kennedy, the crimebuster of McClellan committee fame.

  Slowly, Mooney came to the conclusion that the man he’d envisioned slaving away behind a desk in some obscure legal office after the election was to be his nemesis. Bobby Kennedy, it appeared, had been placed in the position of attorney general to systematically erase all markers, and Mooney knew he’d be on top of the list.

  “It’s a brilliant move on Joe’s part,” he said ruefully. “He’ll have Bobby wipe us out to cover their own dirty tracks and it’ll all be done in the name of the Kennedy ‘war on organized crime.’ Brilliant. Just fuckin’ brilliant.”

  Just as he was coming to that conclusion, though, Mooney told Chuck that Jack Kennedy had done something completely baffling: Kennedy had started sending him copies of confidential FBI memos through Judy Campbell. Chuck would later learn from Mooney that the President used a young starlet and Marilyn Monroe as couriers between them, as well. What documents these other two women carried, Chuck never knew—although, two decades later, when he heard sensationalized claims of women carrying correspondence regarding the Castro assassination between his brother and the President, he dismissed them as preposterous and laughable. Mooney wasn’t one to correspond. Guys in the Outfit weren’t stupid enough to get their picture taken in compromising positions, nor did they write incriminating memorandums or keep damning tapes that proved their wrongdoing. Bureaucrats, they were not.