The Charlemagne Murders

by Douglass, Carl;

  “There must be something we can do to stave off this worldwide financial and social disaster, Chief Superintendent,” Camille said with an expectant look.

  “Perhaps not all of what I have outlined needs to take place. As the three of you were having your short talk, I considered how things might be hastened and made less onerous. This is what I decided, and it is a take-it-or-leave-it choice for you. The decision must be made now. If you fail to comply with my offer and elect to leave this meeting without an agreement, I will make three calls and set all I have threatened into motion. Do you understand, Mandataire von Steiger?”

  “I do. Please continue, Chief Superintendent.”

  “Good. This is the only offer you will ever receive. I can state that because all present are in agreement. We wish the names of all SS officers who have benefitted from your financial and émigré assistance since 1943. We wish every bit of information you possess regarding several specific officers.”

  He handed them a list of the known Gebirgsjägers.

  “We know that you have a rather large account for General Antoine Duvalier aka Laird Eagen, aka Don Pedro Altenhofen and for Brigadier Michaele Dupont, aka Randolph Bellwether, aka Dennis Cunningham Lord Downfort, who is deceased. Effective immediately, you will close the account, freeze the assets, and agree to management of the account by a team of law enforcement officers headed by my office here in Lyon. Secondly, you will refrain from any communication of any kind at any time with Duvalier/Eagen/Altenhofen in perpetuity. Thirdly, all assets will be placed at the disposal of the aforementioned team to be used in the fugitive manhunt for Altenhofen and his confederates. Anything left over after the arrest and conviction of Altenhofen will be tendered to the State of Israel to use to help the victims of the Holocaust. Fourthly, the bank will cease and desist forever to do business with the ODESSA or like-minded organizations or with any individual with a past history of Nazi activity or sympathy. We will supply a list for you to use as a preliminary set of information. The bank will actively surrender all artifacts, objets d’art, and the like, and ship them posthaste to the State of Israel.

  “Finally, each of you will resign from your bank and all other business interests and submit to regular parole-type visits. You will each be fined $100 million. That is not negotiable. You will never again do business in the financial sector. That will be monitored by the parole officer assigned to you.

  “In return, you will not go to prison. Your heinous activities will not be made public. The bank will resume business as usual, absent the presence of Nazis or their money. You will make yourself obscure, and you will engage in useful work—the kind of work where you pack a lunch pail, wear blue collar clothes, and work at least eight hours a day at manual labor. Do you understand and agree to these terms?”

  A pall had settled over Attorney von Steiger and her clients. They once again held a hurried and this time anguished consultation.

  With gloom on her face and in her voice, Camille said, “We do.”

  “INTERPOL officers will accompany you back to the bank where you will obtain and produce the records we demand, and you will present them to the officers before the close of business today.”

  Eugène picked up his telephone and had a brief conversation with his agents waiting in the UBS lobby in Geneva. He put down the receiver and with a backhand wave, he dismissed the three miscreants with prejudice. In Geneva, the INTERPOL and other officers served their warrants—the ones with the limited objectives. Eugène had never really expected that he would be able to pull off the grand attack that he truly wished he could. This would have to do.

  CHAPTER SIXTY-FOUR

  Department of Justice, Office of the Assistant Attorney General, Criminal Division, 950 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington, DC, September 23, 1963, afternoon

  AAG Spencer Reynolds was tired, and it was still early in the day. Perhaps it was because he, his staff, and several FBI agents had stayed up all night preparing for the encounter scheduled to take place in fifteen minutes. All of the people for his side of the encounter were present, accounted for, and prepared. They, too, all looked tired. DFBI Warren Brent Gaines, Special Agent Xavier Gonzales-Soto, INTERPOL superintendent for New York, Axel Baird, FBI Assistant Director Malcolm Albright, the head of the CID [Criminal Investigative Division], and three agents specializing in financial crimes were seated on the law enforcement side of the conference table. Cecil Prathers from the Transnational Criminal Enterprise Section was there because of links in the murders of the generals to organized crime had recently turned up in the investigation. SA Don Peterson and SA Cynthia Broderick-Carter from the Financial Crimes Section were there because they were the two best brains regarding banking, banking fraud, and linking to out of CONUS financial affairs, including money laundering.

  The security detail showed in a very unlikely set of bedfellows including highly successful bankers, even more successful Mafia dons, and two quite unsuccessful CIA agents. Bank of America vice president Creighton Wilberforce and Evert Williams, an American investment banker with the Negro Industrial Bank of Washington—the oldest and largest Negro-owned commercial bank in the metropolitan Washington, DC, region took seats near the head of the table. The two Mafiosos—Giuseppe “The Boss” D’Aquila and Gaetano “Numbers” Terranova—swaggered in demonstrating an almost theatrical blasé indifference—been-there-done-that, and “You ain’t gotten nuthin’ on us; so, whyah we heah?” attitude. They sat squarely in the middle of the conference table facing the government agents. Two of the special agents of the CIA were middle-aged and seasoned Financial Threat and Asymmetric Warfare Advisors who had agreed to come only because they knew they were impervious to any investigation the DOJ might want to open into their handling of financial affairs of the Farm. Two other special agents—Kenneth Lawson and Donald Martin Allenton—were older men. They had grim faces and were stolidly silent. Those two men had been ranking officials of Operation Paper Clip—and still supervised the Nazi war criminal scientists they had spirited out of Germany at the end of the war. The CIA agents all sat on the same side of the long table as the other government agents but as far away from the FBI and DOF officials as they could and still be in the same room.

  AAG Spencer Reynolds took a quick look around the table to ascertain if everyone was there.

  “Thank you for coming on such short notice. We all have busy schedules and our times are valuable to us; so, I will get right to it. The reason you are here is to help the US government, the UN, and INTERPOL in an investigation of Nazi war criminals who are now operating brazenly in Argentina. You all have other activities that you would prefer not to be made public, and we have no wish to venture into those areas…,” he paused for effect, “unless we absolutely have to do so. We are here to talk about money.

  “All of you are engaged in financing a real estate venture in Bariloche, Argentina. We have every intention to have you volunteer to stop doing so. The reason is that the prime movers of the project are murderous Nazi war criminals and fugitives who are living and working in Argentina illegally. We ask your help. Because our operation is so sensitive, we are going to ask you to volunteer to be sequestrated for a few days while our operation is carried out.”

  Everyone on the other side of the table began to argue that their rights would be violated, that there was no due process in what the government was requiring; and the government had no jurisdiction … etc., etc.

  Spencer waited until the furor subsided then said, “As simply as I can put it, gentlemen, we have both the legal right and the authority to do so. It is in the interest of national security, and we have a presidential order. Relax. This will pass quickly. We also require that you say nothing about this mission for the next thirty years. That is a requirement of the National Secrets Act.”

  “So, what exactly do you want from us?” Evert Williams, the only black man in the room, asked with authority in his voice.

  “I’ll answer that in a moment. First, I want you to kno
w why in some detail. That’s why Special Agents of the FBI Cecil Prathers from the Transnational Criminal Enterprise Section and SAs Don Peterson and Cynthia Broderick-Carter from the Financial Crimes Section are here. They will present a legal history of the case in question.”

  Prathers explained the links between the murders of the generals and organized crime, and Broderick-Carter presented a prosecutorial legal brief explaining why the financial involvement of anyone was considered part of a criminal conspiracy and was in violation of the treating-with-the-enemy clauses of the National Security Act. She pointedly directed her eyes towards CIA agents Kenneth Lawson and Donald Martin Allenton for her next explanation.

  “The CIA has a plan called Operation Paperclip which secretly—even to the Congress—brought Nazi war criminals to the United States and gave money to Italy, Germany, the UK, and Argentina to either extricate the Nazi SS scientists and bring them to the US or keep them in safe situations in England, Germany, and Argentina where they could continue their work with the United States being the recipient of the scientific knowledge harvest.”

  “So,” interrupted Spencer, “what we want and are prepared to enforce and to monitor is for each and all of you to cease and desist immediately from funding this one particular enterprise. That should bring down the elaborate and expensive assistance program which keeps the criminals we are after from being protected. We can tighten the noose around their necks and bring them to justice.”

  “This is racist!” exclaimed Evert. “I hate to play the race card, but we will never allow ourselves to be bullied.”

  “Our business is perfectly legit!” blurted out the two Mafiosos almost simultaneously.

  “Operation Paperclip is classified!” the two older CIA agents snarled.

  “These are the requests and the conditions for your release back into society: as soon as you leave this meeting, both banks will call their Argentine receiving banks and cancel all further payments. You Italian gentlemen will sever your financial connections with the Corsican Union Corse and all of their offshoot Gitans having to do with this Bariloche project. The same thing applies for you two bankers. It is time to recognize that you have gotten into business with dogs. You may be aware of the old Spanish saw that says, ‘Si usted se acuesta con perros te levantas con pulgas,’ which roughly translates to ‘If you lie down with dogs, you get up with fleas.’ It is in your best interests to cut these war criminals off immediately. The same goes for the CIA. You have been funding this project in order to reap profits which will allow you to maintain your Operation Paperclip well into the future. I am here to tell you that I—for one—do not in the least approve of what you are doing. In this instance I can do something about it. Cease and desist with your Argentine adventure.”

  There was a self-confident but reserved chorus from the attendees, “And if we don’t?”

  DFBI Gaines chose to answer. “Glad you asked. If you decide to persist, the first thing I will do is turn over all the information the bureau has to the IRS CI [Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation division]. They—along with the FBI and incidentally, the CIA offices on the right side of the law—will make everything you are doing public and with the full force of our investigative bodies. Heads will roll, and I think several of yours will be part of the rolling. Our agencies will see to it that you are bankrupt in the end. If I have anything to do with it, some or all of you will go to prison. Now, I ask you, are those Nazi war criminals worth it?”

  The accused men realized that the government’s options and power would destroy them in the end, but they hated being bullied and cornered. Evert Williams was the only one to raise a challenge, and it was halfhearted.

  “We will not be bullied, sir.”

  “Yes, Mr. Evert, you will.”

  “Is that a threat?”

  “Yes. Think for a moment what the tenacious and patient bulldogs of the IRS CI did to Al Capone. Do you think–even for a moment–that you can withstand their scrutiny and ill will?”

  “I suppose not, but you are overstepping your authority.”

  “Perhaps so, but should you resist, in the end, we will outlast you; and you will be nothing but a negative footnote in the history of finance and a hiss and a byword for the cause of Negro equality.”

  At the end of the meeting, there was general unhappiness on the part of the targeted financiers, but they all reluctantly agreed to accompany the DOJ security personnel to their new vacation homes in Fort Meade, Maryland. Most of them were aware that it was the ultimately secure and most comfortable prison or safe house in the world—whichever one warranted. They were allowed one call each, and that was to set the processes of cessation of funding into accelerated motion.

  §§§§§§

  Palais de Justice Boulevard du Palais in the Île de la Cité in central Paris, SDM [Service de Contrôle Budgétaire et Comptable Ministériel—Office of Accounting and Budget], Office of Philippe Jean Joseph de Douai, assistant minister, that same afternoon

  Assistant Minister de Douai and his accountants, Directeur Général de la Police Nationale—the Sûreté—and his two senior subordinates, and chief of police for Ajaccio, Corsica, Ange-Pierre Persie, faced Don Agapito, the ruthless chieftain of the Guérini clan—the ruling dynasty of the Unione Corse on Corsica and one of the driving forces which earned the French protectorate the title of “Murder Island”—and his three principal underchieftains—Benedettu Paganucci, Dominic Rizzuto, and Tony Lagomarsino. The men looked across a table laden with Corsican Brocciu, Pulenda, and Figatellu, and niulincu, balaninu, bastilicacciu, and sartinesu goat’s milk cheeses. The Corsican meats included generous slices of Corsican pork produced from pigs bred with wild boars and then castrated at an early age. The Corsican beverage was biera accumudata cu a castagna [chestnut beer], and for both the Corsicans and the Parisians, there was fresh sangria. For the tastes of the Frenchmen, de Douai set out a fine young red wine—Beaujolais Nouveau.

  The etiquette of France demanded that no business be conducted until after lunch, even high-level police communications with known criminals; this was Paris, after all. The men enjoyed Cuban cigars and an after-dinner digestif of Cointreau, a brand of triple sec—an orange-flavoured liqueur—produced in Saint-Barthélemy-d’Anjou. As a sign that the business for which Don Agapito and his men had been summoned to Paris could begin, the Corsican oligarch pushed back his chair and rested on its back two legs in an exaggeratedly relaxed position.

  Agapito was fat with a face so porcine and fleshy he could hardly keep his eyes open. He had ruddy streaks lined with spidery veins indicative of his advancing liver cirrhosis. Like many of his paisanos, the don had bad teeth—full of caries and gaps where teeth had been removed. His gums were swollen and enflamed from poor dental hygiene; they oozed a small amount of odoriferous purulent material which he constantly spat into a fine monogramed silk handkerchief. The lifelong failure to practice even a minimum of mouth care produced a neglect that gave his teeth a green color. He had halitosis powerful enough to keep all but the most obsequious at an arm’s length distance. He wore a dirty white shirt with sweat-stained armpits and a short tie that had once been red and black but was now a splotchy maroon and gray. His pants were held up by a pair of overwide leather braces. His clothing had not been cleaned in days, and the body odor he emitted increased the distance created between him and anyone with whom he talked.

  He scratched his proturant abdomen then asked, “Now, Minister de Douai, to what do we humble Corsicans owe the honor of sharing lunch and fine things to drink with the head of the SDM and our esteemed Ange-Pierre Persie? Your presence suggests matters related only to money, and Chief Persie’s presence makes one wonder about criminal matters.”

  “Some of both, Don Agapito. We report to you that we have a criminal and monetary interest in several former SS officers and fugitives currently living in Argentina. They are guilty of truly heinous crimes which have no statute of limitations under the United Nations Rule 160—the
non-applicability of statutory limitations to war crimes and crimes against humanity including retroactive reach to noncurrent wars. As part of an international fugitive manhunt, the interest of the Service de Contrôle Budgétaire et Comptable Ministériel is to interdict the flow of money to and from the fugitives in order to impede their defenses. We French shall do our part—which is to halt the commerce and bribery—while others attend to the more regular police actions.

  “What does that have to do with the Unione Corse, Minister?” asked Don Agapito.

  “You have invested in a development project in Bariloche, Argentina, which is known to be active in the establishment of the status of the war criminals into Argentine society and protection by the Argentine government. They have murdered senior military officers from around the world, and we cannot allow that to go uncorrected.”

  “I see. And what exactly can we do for you? I presume that we are not being accused of a financial crime?”

  “Not yet. If you were to cut off all funding and all business transactions of any kind with the men involved—and we know that you are fully aware of their names and crimes—all interest by the French and Corsican governments in your financial affairs would cease until or unless there should be new such crimes. We require that that divorcement from those people come from you today.”

  “Would that be a matter put into writing, Minister de Douai?”

  “I have a document already prepared, Don Agapito. All it lacks is your signature and that of Mssrs. Paganucci, Rizzuto, and Lagomarsino who are all signatories to the legal documents in Argentina which got the project there underway and which keep it afloat. We do not want that project to succeed. We are serious enough about that to make life … shall we say … greviously difficile … for individuals or organizations that thwart our intentions. We would be aggrieved to have to do that given our long-standing history of cordial cooperation.”