Chapter 4: KARALUS-WIP
Meanwhile, the red siren’s lights flashed through the small window in the abandoned laundry building nearby, alerting State Detective George Karalus’s consciousness. George looked up from his long, yellow legal notepad; he was a middle-aged man with a belly. He dressed in a workingman’s suit and hunched over a table with his headphones half on and half off his head. George was a good cop – a fair man. Five New York State detectives worked inside the building 24/7, listening to countless hours of wiretaps they planted all over The Queen City in the mid-1960s.
Karalus quickly got to his feet and peered out the small window. He waited and watched as the first ambulance pulled up in front of the Ivanhoe. Next, several police cars and a second ambulance arrived at the scene.
Very few knew about this surveillance program inside the old laundry room, so keeping it undiscovered was paramount. George moved his balding head from shoulder to shoulder, grappling with whether to go out into the madness. “I’m going out there. Hey David, I’m gonna see what the ruckus is in front of the Ivanhoe.”
David nodded. “Don’t get made.” He continued to monitor the “live wires” planted at hangouts like The Roseland Grill and an antique shop on Allen Street, owned by someone they called the “Fat Lady.” The State Detectives identified themselves as the Forest Ave Boys, and their purpose was to gather information on organized crime and gangs in Western New York.
The first ambulance fled the scene, whirling by George while he crept onto the sidewalk from the decaying laundry building. He approached the dark and chaotic night while groups of people gawked from the sidewalks. Buffalo Detective Burvid crouched beside Paul, now conscious and in shock. “Okay, you two, you are going to follow your friends to Columbus Hospital so we can get you checked out. Do you remember any details? Did you notice the make and model of the car that fled, maybe the color?”
“NO,” answered Paul with his head toward the ground. Blood dripped down his face. He held his hand over the laceration. The paramedics loaded Paul onto a gurney, helping the couple into the ambulance. Just before the swinging doors shut, Paul’s wife interjected, “Wait, it was a fancy gold car, and the headlights were two on top of one another in a column.” She stretched her hand out and pointed her index and middle fingers, illuminated by the street lamp.
George waited. The doors closed, and the ambulance raced to Columbus Hospital.
“Hey, Burvid,” George interjected.
Detective Anthony Burvid turned around, surprised to see George standing there. “Hey, George, where did you come from?”
“Just checking in on those protesters at the campus. What’s going on here?”
“Same story; nobody knows who the other couples were. The two men and their wives left the Ivanhoe and found their car blocked by another car.” He turned towards Paul’s car, still parked. “The other guy went back to find out whose car it was when another two couples came out of the Ivanhoe. The men started yelling, and one punched the other—a real Haymaker. Umm, his name was ” Officer Burvid. ” He looked at his notepad. “Thomas Trent. Tom got knocked to the ground right over there.” He pointed to a dark pool of blood on the ground. “He must have fallen in a bad way. He was unconscious when I got here, face bloodied, but no one is saying anything. The wife of the not-so-hurt one said it was a gold car with column headlights.”
George turned his head to the side in question. “Was it a Cadillac?”
“She didn’t know.” Officer Burvid replied.
Investigator Karalus’s gaze fell on a dark stain on the sidewalk. He knelt beside it, his trained eye recognizing the telltale signs of blood spatter. This was one hell of a punch.
George stood up and scanned the crowd for familiar faces. He noticed Eddie by the door. He remembered Eddie, the doorman, from his younger days on the beat.
“Hey, Eddie, how the hell are you?”
Eddie looked at George, and he shook his head back and forth.
“What happened?”
Eddie shrugged his shoulders.
“Well, aren’t you supposed to be watching the door?” egged on Karalus.
“No, no. We weren’t outside when it happened.” Eddie said with his eyes closed.
“Huh,” George walked closer to the two. You’re still hanging out with Gino, the great safecracker.
Eddie’s stature began to inflate just before he froze from the question. He turned his head towards George, compressed his lips, and filled the silence with, “I don’t know who you’re talking about.”
“Does Gino still have that beautiful gold Cadillac? Yeah, the concrete business must be lucrative. I heard his car got scratched, and he was mad as hell about it.” George, knowing his enemies’ secrets, could not resist poking them when they were already choleric. “Hey, is that Scrappy Speaker? How the hell are you? Officer Tuttlemondo is still pissed at you.”
This comment angered the two, and Eddie stood up from his stool. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Detective Burvid sidled up to George. “I’ll take it from here.”
George nodded his head and narrowed his eyes. “See ya later, boys,” he said before returning to his rotting headquarters in the abandoned laundry building. George and State Detective David continued their surveillance until they zeroed in on one tap installed in the kitchen of the new organized crime Boss, Sam Johns. They heard his garbled voice in the early hours of the morning, discussing plans “when we” Sam coughed “when we go up to ohio, I’m gonna have gino drive me and marine.”
Yay yay, it’s gonna be at the place next to that other spot we love the pizza at.” He had to do it on a Friday for scheduling purposes.”
“Gino will be driving me, so make a spot for him, and don’t forget when you make the arrangement for Tampa, make sure he gets a seat too.”
You letting that kid get close to you?”
George Karalus was the official glue that held the group of New York State Detectives together. The group was formed in 1966 to investigate organized crime in the Western New York Region.
The Forest Ave Boys knew Sam Johns. They followed the unfolding saga over the years, recognizing the key players and being aware of the overthrow that took place this year. They connected the names and places, understanding the hierarchy and settings involved. The old regime of Niagara Falls had collapsed, and the aging boss, who had never set foot in a jail cell, lost the trust of the Buffalo crew—the faction that held the soldiers’ strength. It was a mutiny. The rebels bypassed the Old Man and went directly to the commission in New York to elect a new Capo of Buffalo, and that was Sam Johns Pieri.
The detectives listened until dawn stretched her rosy finger across the horizon, and the horrible night ended with the light of day appearing.
