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Speaker 4: You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking
Speaker 4: killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 4: written about them. Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Night Stalker DTK.
Speaker 4: Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking
Speaker 4: and infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with
Speaker 4: your host, journalist and author.
Speaker 5: Dan Zufanski, Good Evening. In October of nineteen seventy seven,
Speaker 5: David Bowman moved to Las Vegas as a sixteen year
Speaker 5: old kid with his parents and older brother. Bowman chronicles
Speaker 5: his journey through the streets of Las Vegas for the
Speaker 5: next three years. Bringing down Kolada. Bowman tells us how
Speaker 5: he worked his way into the most elite criminal organization
Speaker 5: in Las Vegas. He recounts how he became the point
Speaker 5: man in the Las Vegas organized Crime Strike Forces investigation
Speaker 5: of the Chicago outfit and Tony Spilatro in his right
Speaker 5: hand man Frank Klota, the leader of the Hole in
Speaker 5: the Wall Gang. The book that we're featuring this evening
Speaker 5: is bringing Down Colata, the story Casino couldn't tell you
Speaker 5: with my special guests off the David Bowman, Welcome to
Speaker 5: the program, and thank you for this interview. David Bowman, Thank.
Speaker 6: You, Dan. I'm glad to be here, looking forward to it.
Speaker 5: Thanks, thank you so much. This is a very personal story,
Speaker 5: and let's get right to that. I won't ask how
Speaker 5: you got involved. That will be revealed as we go
Speaker 5: through this story. Why don't you take us back, as
Speaker 5: you do in the book, to nineteen seventy seven, your
Speaker 5: dad was forced into retirement and you got sick in
Speaker 5: the eighth grade. Tell us what happened in the eighth
Speaker 5: grade and who you were at that time and how
Speaker 5: things changed after that. Give us a little bit about
Speaker 5: your background, your family life, and as you do in
Speaker 5: the book, and what happened in that pivotal time just
Speaker 5: entering high school.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I got sick with Sam and Ella initially and
Speaker 6: we couldn't where I got it from. But it ended
Speaker 6: up it was our cat, our family cat, and but
Speaker 6: that developed into colidus and I had to you know,
Speaker 6: I was in really bad shape. I lost a lot
Speaker 6: of blood. I had to have six pints of blood
Speaker 6: transfused over the course of a couple of weeks, and
Speaker 6: so I ended up having to have emergency surgery, uh colostity,
Speaker 6: temporary colostomy, and that was really, you know, devastating to
Speaker 6: me at the time. I mean, being a in the
Speaker 6: eighth grade. You know, it was February is when I
Speaker 6: got sick. So I was into the school year, and
Speaker 6: you know, I was very you know, popular athletic. Uh
Speaker 6: you know, I was an editor of our little paper
Speaker 6: and school paper and whatnot. So I was just a healthy,
Speaker 6: normal kid. I was into racing dirt bikes too. My
Speaker 6: friend was a we were into that and so yeah,
Speaker 6: I got very sick. And but once I had the surgery,
Speaker 6: you know, I recovered and pretty well bounced back to normal.
Speaker 6: But at that time, my dad had worked for the
Speaker 6: Colorado Few and Iron and CFNI Steel Plant and Pueblo
Speaker 6: and at that time, in the late seventies, the Daphening
Speaker 6: Steel was beginning to flood the cars, and so he
Speaker 6: was They were scaling the mill back, and he was
Speaker 6: pretty much forced into retirement and either had to go
Speaker 6: back in the ranks, take a pay cut, or or
Speaker 6: retire early and get his pension. And so that's what
Speaker 6: he did, and that was devastating to him. You know,
Speaker 6: he'd worked there for thirty two years, and it was
Speaker 6: you know, I really didn't understand it at the time,
Speaker 6: but as I got older, I realized, you know, how
Speaker 6: how devastating that was to him, because he was still
Speaker 6: pretty much a young man. But anyway, we had gone
Speaker 6: out to Vegas in March seventy seven and went out
Speaker 6: just on a vacation with me and my brother Larry
Speaker 6: and my folks, and we had a great time. We
Speaker 6: liked it, and we started talking about moving out there.
Speaker 6: And because Peblo was really it was kind of a
Speaker 6: dead end place. There really wasn't a lot of opportunity,
Speaker 6: and my dad knew that, and so he thought, well,
Speaker 6: let's go out to Las Vegas. And so that's really
Speaker 6: how it happened. We left and went out there in
Speaker 6: October seventy seven.
Speaker 5: Now you talk about that your parents don't hang around
Speaker 5: so long, and you decided to hang around with your
Speaker 5: brother and you get an apartment. They think that they're
Speaker 5: going to give you a little bit of money, you're
Speaker 5: going to get a job, and you're going to get
Speaker 5: this apartment, and that's what you're going to do. But
Speaker 5: you had other ideas, didn't you.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Well, you know, I'd met some people. They the
Speaker 6: reason they moved back was because my mother's my granddad
Speaker 6: was at the end of his life and he needed
Speaker 6: a lot of you know, attention and care and he
Speaker 6: was living with my mother's younger sister, so she wanted
Speaker 6: to go back, and you know, that was the big
Speaker 6: driving force of them leaving. My dad wanted to stay,
Speaker 6: but you know, because of my mother, he went back
Speaker 6: and it was just me and my brother. We had
Speaker 6: already had an apartment and it was the same apartment,
Speaker 6: but you know, when they left and my brother and
Speaker 6: I just took it over and he got a job,
Speaker 6: and you know, they left me a little bit of
Speaker 6: money when they left, and I had met some people
Speaker 6: in the apartment complex that we lived in and down
Speaker 6: at the pool, and that's how it began. I they
Speaker 6: were selling cocaine. And I had never even done cocaine
Speaker 6: until I had got you know, at that point in time, Uh,
Speaker 6: you know, I had already started smoking pot and that
Speaker 6: was about it, really And and I started doing that
Speaker 6: after I was kind of rehabbing after the surgery and recovering.
Speaker 6: You know, I couldn't ride my motorcycle, and so you know,
Speaker 6: I started experimenting with the league. But yeah, so I
Speaker 6: started selling blow with some guys I met in an
Speaker 6: apartment complex and was making a lot of money, especially
Speaker 6: for a seventeen year old guy that I was.
Speaker 5: You met a guy named Joey Posson and it was
Speaker 5: Petcha chef and he became fast friends. Your friend Larry
Speaker 5: got strung out, you said, And that led to another
Speaker 5: guy named Craig, and then he started doing speedball. So
Speaker 5: a lot of these people, you know, they did they
Speaker 5: and parted too much. Yeah, that part of it. They
Speaker 5: spent too much on new product business.
Speaker 6: I'm part sorry.
Speaker 5: Go ahead, So you talked about Joey introducing you to
Speaker 5: Jerry Costanza in late nineteen seventy eight. Who else did
Speaker 5: you meet at that time? And tell us about that
Speaker 5: meeting with Jerry costantin who he was.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Jerry was you know, Joey had talked about him
Speaker 6: quite a bit before I actually met him. And the
Speaker 6: whole Costanza family that he you know, got involved with,
Speaker 6: nick being the father and Elaine was his daughter, and
Speaker 6: Jerry and Michelle and Nicky Junior and that was the
Speaker 6: Costanzas family. And I met all of them. Uh and
Speaker 6: you know they kind of became, uh you know, sort
Speaker 6: of my Las Vegas family, uh so to speak. And
Speaker 6: uh but I didn't I hadn't met Jerry. I actually
Speaker 6: met uh Elaine prior, you know, before I met Jerry.
Speaker 6: And Jerry was a pimp. He was a coke dealer.
Speaker 6: Uh he'd been out there for a long time. Uh
Speaker 6: so he was a street guy. And but he was
Speaker 6: a pimp and a drug dealer and he was, you know,
Speaker 6: pretty well connected and in the street. And I met
Speaker 6: him because my connection had kind of dried up, like I,
Speaker 6: Like you said, he was he got strung out doing
Speaker 6: speedballs and mixing the heroin and the cocaine. And and
Speaker 6: that's something I never did. I never put an needle
Speaker 6: in my arm. That was where I drew the line.
Speaker 6: Back in my day, there was a stigma attacked to
Speaker 6: that and and that was someplace I never wanted to go.
Speaker 6: And so anyway, that's what I was looking to get
Speaker 6: a new connect. And Jerry had warned me, or Joey
Speaker 6: had warned me about Jerry saying that he had gotten
Speaker 6: you know, he gets good stuff. But he was just, uh,
Speaker 6: you know, he'd burn you. I mean he would burn
Speaker 6: you if he could, you know, he'd feel you out
Speaker 6: and if he would see how much you knew and
Speaker 6: if he if he determined that you didn't know anything,
Speaker 6: then that's when he would put the screws to you.
Speaker 6: But I showed him that I wasn't. I showed him
Speaker 6: I kind of impressed him with my knowledge. You know,
Speaker 6: I tested it in front of him. I did a
Speaker 6: bleach test in front of him. And yeah, I was
Speaker 6: very respectful. I mean I was kind of intimidated by
Speaker 6: him initially because I'd heard so much about him from
Speaker 6: Joey and uh, but him and I kind of had
Speaker 6: a chemistry and we you know, he was very funny guy.
Speaker 6: He could be. He was just a character and he
Speaker 6: was very funny and we had you know, we just
Speaker 6: kind of hit it off and formed a business relationship.
Speaker 5: You talked about you write about dealing weed and and
Speaker 5: but you also were lining up jobs or scores as
Speaker 5: just as you write about Laura at the bank, what
Speaker 5: did you ask of Laura and tell us a little
Speaker 5: bit more about this sideline that you had other than
Speaker 5: dealing drugs.
Speaker 6: Well, that was prior to that was in Colorado. Was
Speaker 6: whereab that all took place in my hometown, and we
Speaker 6: were coming back. We were going back and forth, you know,
Speaker 6: to Colorado. I would go back and you know, move
Speaker 6: some product back there. But at that time, prior to
Speaker 6: us going on out or coming back to Vegas in
Speaker 6: June of eighty when I met Frank in the Hole
Speaker 6: in the Wall game, and we'll get to that. But
Speaker 6: the deal with the girl at the bank was just
Speaker 6: kind of a fluke. Actually, we had met her at
Speaker 6: a I'd met her at a friend's house and we
Speaker 6: just started partying and you know, talking, and she mentioned
Speaker 6: the guy at the bank, and we just kind of
Speaker 6: ran with it. So it wasn't anything that we were
Speaker 6: really doing, you know, it was just we saw it
Speaker 6: as an opportunity and like I said, we just ran
Speaker 6: with it. There was something we weren't doing regularly. I
Speaker 6: just wanted to say that.
Speaker 5: Right. You write about the state of Las Vegas in
Speaker 5: terms of for the mobsters and for law enforcement in
Speaker 5: the seventies in Las Vegas, and you'r co author of
Speaker 5: this book Dennis Epans book of the Battle for Las
Speaker 5: Vegas Chronicles, and he had written extensively about the Hole
Speaker 5: in the Wall game. Tell us a little bit about
Speaker 5: that state of where both parties were at that time
Speaker 5: in Vegas.
Speaker 6: When I met them in the summer of nineteen eighty
Speaker 6: was the first week in June. It was after the
Speaker 6: failed attempted heist in Pueblo, and we went straight to Vegas.
Speaker 6: I mean right after that happened. We hit the highway
Speaker 6: and we were in Vegas the next day. And at
Speaker 6: that time Jeene Smith, who was a sergeant, Eugene Smith
Speaker 6: of the Las Vegas Metro Intelligence Division, had shot one
Speaker 6: of the mobsters Chicago mobsters, a guy by the name
Speaker 6: of Frankie Bluestein in front of his in front of
Speaker 6: Sunrise Villas, had tailed him. They were they were constantly
Speaker 6: surveilling the Bupper crust and anytime a new car which
Speaker 6: out of state place would would pull in that parking lot,
Speaker 6: they knew about it and so Gruver and Geene Smith
Speaker 6: followed him one night after he left the restaurant and
Speaker 6: they were and as Jeane Smith tells me later, they
Speaker 6: weren't even going to pull him over. They were just
Speaker 6: running his plate. But he takes off down Flamingo, I believe,
Speaker 6: going like eighty ninety miles an hour, and so they
Speaker 6: had to pull him over, and that's what happened. They
Speaker 6: pulled him over in front of Sunrise Villas and he
Speaker 6: pulled a gun on him. I know it's in the
Speaker 6: movie Casino. They say it was a hero sandwich, but
Speaker 6: that wasn't the case.
Speaker 7: It was.
Speaker 6: In fact, the gun was registered to his brother. And anyway,
Speaker 6: he pulls the gun on Smiths and Gruber and they
Speaker 6: shot him fifteen times and killed him. And so those
Speaker 6: guys when I pulled up to the restaurant in June
Speaker 6: of the first week in June, they were all a
Speaker 6: buzz about that because it had just happened. I don't
Speaker 6: know whether it was the day before or a couple
Speaker 6: of days, but it was very you know, fresh, and
Speaker 6: so yeah, they were a buzz about that as well
Speaker 6: as they pumped me and Joe about Nix Castanza's youngest
Speaker 6: son being killed a few months prior. They found him
Speaker 6: in the trunk of his car in the desert, shot
Speaker 6: in the back of the head, and so Nick and
Speaker 6: Jerry were beside themselves over it. I mean, they were
Speaker 6: a very clit, close knit Italian family, and so they
Speaker 6: wanted to pump me and Joe and got real serious
Speaker 6: with us, pretty scared, very actually, and I mean we
Speaker 6: didn't know anything. I mean, we were good friends with
Speaker 6: Niki and in fact, we had gone horseback riding with
Speaker 6: him just after we'd left to go to Colorado. We're
Speaker 6: right prior to that. But it was pretty, uh, it
Speaker 6: was pretty intense. But that was how the first meeting
Speaker 6: went with with the with the whole newall gang guys.
Speaker 5: Now, let's explain for audience that for those that seen
Speaker 5: I have seen casino, which is everybody, probably Frank Rosenthal,
Speaker 5: Frank Lefty Rosenthal as partners with Tony Spilatro, how does
Speaker 5: Frank Klata come to be who? How's he connected to
Speaker 5: Spilatro and and tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 6: As you've explained, Yeah, it was a completely different relationship.
Speaker 6: The relationship that Spilactro and Rosenthal had was a secret
Speaker 6: relationship everyone knew they had it, but they tried to
Speaker 6: you know, not be seen in public together. And when
Speaker 6: they met, it was very clandestine because they didn't want
Speaker 6: that association to be you know proven actually. But anyway,
Speaker 6: Kalada was his street lieutenant. He was his muscle, and
Speaker 6: that's what he brought Frank out there for and assembled
Speaker 6: these guys who later became known as the Hole in
Speaker 6: the Wall Gang, the Larry Newman, the Ernie Divino, Leo Guardino,
Speaker 6: Wayne Mtechi. But mainly the two hole in the real
Speaker 6: Hole in the Wall Gang was Ernie Divino and Leo Guardino.
Speaker 6: Anybody else like the picture that they everybody sees of
Speaker 6: when they were arrested at Bertha's, they associ that's the
Speaker 6: Hole in the Wall gang, But there was three guys
Speaker 6: involved in that that weren't you know, involved in That
Speaker 6: was probably the only job they were involved in. So, yeah,
Speaker 6: that's Alk was the leader of the Whole in the
Speaker 6: Wall Gang, which was a burglary crew. They were professionals,
Speaker 6: Ernie and Leo, and they would get tips and information
Speaker 6: from people all over Las Vegas and they would pound
Speaker 6: holes in the side of the wall in certain jobs.
Speaker 6: Sometimes they did things differently, but h and that's who
Speaker 6: they were, and they weren't even supposed to be. The
Speaker 6: bosses of Chicago would have never okayed that because it
Speaker 6: creates heat and they didn't want anything disturbing the skin
Speaker 6: or or you know, bringing heat down on people.
Speaker 5: You talk about Elaine working at this upper crust restaurant
Speaker 5: and it's owned by Frank Colada, and I store the
Speaker 5: restaurants a bar called my Place, a hangout for spiatro. Yes,
Speaker 5: you're the person that you knew in the Hole in
Speaker 5: the Wall gang was Ernie. You didn't know anyone other
Speaker 5: than Ernie, and Ernie was instrumental in you tell us
Speaker 5: how you become involved with the Hole in the Wall
Speaker 5: gang and in what capacity.
Speaker 6: Well, right after we arrived into town, as I talked
Speaker 6: about earlier, my friend Joe Tsni began. He took over
Speaker 6: Jerry Costanza's spot as the chef at the Upper Cross
Speaker 6: almost immediately. So I was spending a lot of time
Speaker 6: down there. I mean I did know, Like I said,
Speaker 6: I saw Frank all the time. I talked to Frank,
Speaker 6: but it was never you know, about crime or pulling jobs.
Speaker 6: As you said, Ernie was my guy in that group
Speaker 6: and uh, and that was mainly because him and Jerry
Speaker 6: had become tired. Him and Jerry could stand it, and
Speaker 6: so through Jerry and you know, Ernie and I became tight.
Speaker 6: But yeah, Ernie, I gave them a couple of score.
Speaker 6: The first one they almost got arrested by the police.
Speaker 6: I mean, it wasn't nothing that I had done. I
Speaker 6: had not at that time, you know, was not working
Speaker 6: with the police. I was, you know, totally legit straight
Speaker 6: with the Holan Wall. But I gave him the score
Speaker 6: and they posed as police officers, Ernie and Leo, and
Speaker 6: we had we had hit this guy like two years before.
Speaker 6: We'd broken into his house because I was selling blow
Speaker 6: to him and he was a dealer at the MGM
Speaker 6: Grant and we discovered that he had a safe in
Speaker 6: his place. So you know, there was we weren't that sophisticated,
Speaker 6: and so we did to let it go. But then
Speaker 6: you know, a couple of years down the road, this
Speaker 6: is when I met the home Wall. This is the
Speaker 6: first score that I gave him. And so they went
Speaker 6: in and they knocked on the door and the guy
Speaker 6: answered the door and they flashed badges and as soon
Speaker 6: as you know, he opened the door, they you know,
Speaker 6: bum rushed him and were tying him up in a
Speaker 6: chair and you know, we're going to get the safe
Speaker 6: combination out of him. But the neighbors saw what was
Speaker 6: going on the next to the neighbor across the street
Speaker 6: and called nine to one one. Well, Frank was driving
Speaker 6: around with the police scanner. He heard the call come
Speaker 6: across and so he radioed Ernie Leo to get out
Speaker 6: of there that the Cocks had been called. And they
Speaker 6: ended up running up the street and hiding in somebody's
Speaker 6: house that they knew up there until Frank could get
Speaker 6: up there and get him. And I was pretty worried
Speaker 6: about that because I found out about it by I
Speaker 6: was sitting with Jerry and Joe and we had the
Speaker 6: TV on and the news came on and it came
Speaker 6: over the news as a potential hostage situation at this address,
Speaker 6: and I'm like, we just looked at each other, and
Speaker 6: I was and immediately my pulse went out because I thought,
Speaker 6: you know, they would blame me for some reason, you know,
Speaker 6: even though you know, there really wasn't anything that I
Speaker 6: told them exactly what the deal was. But nevertheless, I
Speaker 6: mean I knew these guys were killers, and you know,
Speaker 6: I didn't want to be on the wrong side, so
Speaker 6: finding out if I was still cool with them was
Speaker 6: important to me, which which I was. And they kind
Speaker 6: of laughed about it actually, and and then we went
Speaker 6: on to the next one.
Speaker 5: Tell us about this score. When you meet Nicky's cousin,
Speaker 5: Tommy Amato, as you say, this quelude freak here. But
Speaker 5: you had asked him about if he knew any tell
Speaker 5: us what you asked him and what he turned you
Speaker 5: on to.
Speaker 6: Yeah, we were just you know, I'd run into Tommy
Speaker 6: every once in a while, and you know, I just
Speaker 6: threw out there, you know, if he knew anybody, you know,
Speaker 6: any dealers that you know that we could you know,
Speaker 6: throw to the hole in the wall game. And he
Speaker 6: mentioned this Cuban that he got his kuaylude from and
Speaker 6: the guy's name was Ernesto, and so we basically set
Speaker 6: him up. Joe and I sat on him one night
Speaker 6: and he went to this restaurant in Las Vegas and we,
Speaker 6: just like I said, sat in the parking lot and
Speaker 6: sat on him while Ernie and Leo went over and
Speaker 6: hit his apart. And initially we were told by Franks
Speaker 6: that they got like an ounce of blow and a
Speaker 6: thousand woods, and as we found out a little bit
Speaker 6: later from Earnie telling Jerry, they got a whole lot
Speaker 6: more than that. So that's that's where the rub began
Speaker 6: right there.
Speaker 5: Now, when you realize and you find out that you've
Speaker 5: been ripped off, what is your plan? And who goes
Speaker 5: along with this plan with you?
Speaker 6: Well, I mean, honestly, when I found out, initially it
Speaker 6: was like, well, what am I gonna do? That was
Speaker 6: my initial reaction. I mean, what am I going to do?
Speaker 8: It?
Speaker 3: Over?
Speaker 6: And you know, strong on these guys and then and
Speaker 6: honestly that's how it was. But then Jerry came over
Speaker 6: and he started kind of priming me and you know,
Speaker 6: getting me fired up about it, and you know, saying, hey, Dave,
Speaker 6: you know it was your score. You know, it's up
Speaker 6: to you. You do what you want. But I know
Speaker 6: where the stuff is at, and if you want to
Speaker 6: go get it, you know, let's let's go get it.
Speaker 6: He said, I'll drive you over there. I can tell
Speaker 6: you exactly where it's at, and he did. And it
Speaker 6: was a lane. It was a house that Frank had
Speaker 6: rented for a lane and her kid and it was
Speaker 6: over off of the Durante Street, which was over by
Speaker 6: where Liberachi used to live. It's only Liberachi's house was
Speaker 6: only a couple of blocks away. It's a it's a
Speaker 6: total bad neighborhood now because I'm actually out in Vegas
Speaker 6: right now, but I went by there about a year
Speaker 6: or so ago, and it's it's downgraded quite a bit,
Speaker 6: but that's where we went. We drove over there and
Speaker 6: his other sister, his sister, Michelle Camaro, and I got
Speaker 6: to you know, he lets me out and it was
Speaker 6: a bathroom window that I was to go through, and
Speaker 6: it was a bunch. It was some louver glass pane
Speaker 6: and I pushed one of them to break it, and
Speaker 6: it broke, but it left the jagged edge and I
Speaker 6: caught the bottom of my arm on my bottom of
Speaker 6: my forearm, by my elbow actually, and I gashed it
Speaker 6: pretty good. But I mean, I just, you know, it
Speaker 6: didn't even FaZe me at the time, because you know,
Speaker 6: I'm breaking into some killer's house, and you know, that's
Speaker 6: what's on my mind. So I managed to get into
Speaker 6: the bathroom and I keep and I hear this drip drip,
Speaker 6: and I'm over the sink and I think it's the
Speaker 6: sink dripping, but and it's pitch black. I couldn't see
Speaker 6: a damn thing. And so as soon as I rolled
Speaker 6: into the bathroom, I flipped on the light and there
Speaker 6: was just my blood was everyone and I just kind
Speaker 6: of freaked me out, and I looked down in my
Speaker 6: arm was just you know, gush what and it's you know.
Speaker 6: So I was like Jesse Ventura and Fredat I was like,
Speaker 6: I ain't got time to bleed, and so I just
Speaker 6: kind of boom went right to where he told me
Speaker 6: it was, which is in a under a dresser drawer
Speaker 6: in a pillowcase. And he also said if there's anything
Speaker 6: else there, day leave it behind. He said, don't if
Speaker 6: there's anything else, just just just takes a dope. Now,
Speaker 6: I mean I really didn't think it's a time, but
Speaker 6: that don't make a lot of sense, you know, But
Speaker 6: I really didn't care. It was like we were we
Speaker 6: were driving over there to do it, so it's like whatever.
Speaker 6: And but there was there was a bag of jewelry
Speaker 6: with probably you know, who knows how much money worth
Speaker 6: a jewelry in there, with watches and necklaces and rings
Speaker 6: and a lot of items to think gallons zimp blocked
Speaker 6: bag and I picked it up. If I hadn't to
Speaker 6: cut my arm, I probably would have stucked it down
Speaker 6: my pants and take it. But like I said, cutting
Speaker 6: my arm was was the wild card and the whole thing,
Speaker 6: and that's what happened. I opened the door, went outside,
Speaker 6: and Jerry was sitting out there waiting, and I jumped
Speaker 6: in the car and we took off.
Speaker 5: Now what do you guys go do? Even though you
Speaker 5: know Frank is likely gonna suspect Jerry and yourself number one?
Speaker 5: So what do you guys do? Play safe?
Speaker 6: Well, you know, to be honest with you, Dan, I
Speaker 6: think the biggest reason Jerry, you know, got me to
Speaker 6: go do that was he just wanted to get high.
Speaker 6: That's really It sounds crazy or stupid, but that's what
Speaker 6: it was. And so we immediately started free. We went
Speaker 6: and hid the car my car, and got a hotel
Speaker 6: room done at the end of the strip. We called
Speaker 6: our girlfriends up, who were both waitresses at the Pepper Melt,
Speaker 6: and that the party was on, and and we went
Speaker 6: on this long two weeks as I described in the
Speaker 6: book Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas trip where Jerry
Speaker 6: just got completely strung out, you know, with all that blow,
Speaker 6: and he was, you know, drinking to take the edge
Speaker 6: off the blow, and he just you know, fell apart, basically.
Speaker 6: And that combined with his dad calling him every day,
Speaker 6: you know, we were on the road, but Jerry would
Speaker 6: call in his dad and then Nick would bust his
Speaker 6: balls about you know, what we did and telling him
Speaker 6: that we got to give it back, you know. So
Speaker 6: this was what was going on, and Jerry ended up
Speaker 6: giving something back to him. He ended up we ended
Speaker 6: up giving him back what they said, they what he
Speaker 6: Frank had told him they initially got, which was against
Speaker 6: my advice, and I thought it was the dumbest thing
Speaker 6: in the world, but it was you know, I called Jerry,
Speaker 6: you know, you go ahead, but I'm sure if hell
Speaker 6: ain't going to that meeting. So he went there with Nick,
Speaker 6: and I guess Frank slapped him around a little bit
Speaker 6: and that was that.
Speaker 5: So this idea of giving the money back, and I
Speaker 5: was giving back and you guys had done most of it,
Speaker 5: or a lot of it, anyway, incredible amount of it
Speaker 5: and sent money like like you like you were rich
Speaker 5: and wealthy. Right, what's the conversation that turns the tide
Speaker 5: and you have a radical reversal in your decision making.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Well we uh after that it happened, and Jerry
Speaker 6: had been planning to go to Houston, Texas to manage
Speaker 6: a strip club down there called the Bunny Club, which
Speaker 6: was on Vicinette Street in Houston. And he had a
Speaker 6: good friend. This guy's name was Bob Bernie, and Bob
Speaker 6: would fly into Vegas, you know, periodically, and you know,
Speaker 6: him and Jerry would party and whatnot. That Bob was
Speaker 6: doing some pretty good serious smuggling out of Mexico. And
Speaker 6: so Jerry had told me and Joe that, well, we'll
Speaker 6: go down to Houston and I'll hook you up with
Speaker 6: Bob and then you guys can run blowback to Colorado.
Speaker 6: Well that never happened. Okay, after all of the dope
Speaker 6: from the score was gone and the money was gone,
Speaker 6: Jerry Owedine probably about ten thousand dollars because he had
Speaker 6: bought a new car, you know, borrowed money from me
Speaker 6: for that from the down payment of Mazda seven Limited Edition.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 6: It was a black and golden, nice brand new car,
Speaker 6: which is what he drove to Houston in and then
Speaker 6: it plus, you know, and he was spending this quaylud money,
Speaker 6: the money that we were getting from our guy moving
Speaker 6: the louds while we were on our road trip. You know,
Speaker 6: we'd leave, we left him a few thousand, and then
Speaker 6: we'd come back into town and then he would give
Speaker 6: us the money, and we kept the quailouts in a
Speaker 6: safe deposit box at one of Jerry's friends, Bob, my
Speaker 6: next bank, and so we'd go to the bank and
Speaker 6: pick him up, and I'd take him over to my
Speaker 6: friend George, and then George would move him. But so anyway,
Speaker 6: Jerry owed me a bunch of money. He and you
Speaker 6: just started acting weird and kind of distant. His attitude
Speaker 6: completely changed when we got down to Texas and I
Speaker 6: noticed a big time so to jump, so we actually
Speaker 6: thought maybe he was setting us up to get whack.
Speaker 6: And I felt very vulnerable down there. When I would
Speaker 6: go over across the street to the bar in the
Speaker 6: dark strip club, I could envision somebody walking in and
Speaker 6: blowing me away, and so I just felt uneasy. And
Speaker 6: the fact that he owed me all that money, it
Speaker 6: was just everything came to a head down there, and
Speaker 6: I ended up having to sell my car, and it
Speaker 6: was just I was over it all, and I was
Speaker 6: over all the people, the Costanzas and the Colattas and
Speaker 6: the whole bunch of them. And after you know, being
Speaker 6: around them for that entire summer and into the fall,
Speaker 6: you know, I got a good glimpse at who they
Speaker 6: all were, and it was it wasn't the type of
Speaker 6: people that I wanted to. You know, they lie, they
Speaker 6: tell you that, you know, they borrow money, they don't
Speaker 6: pay it back, you know, put you in bad situations.
Speaker 6: It's just it as the decisions. I just said, I'm
Speaker 6: going to the police and I'm going to squash all
Speaker 6: of them. That's what I told Joe, and we flew
Speaker 6: back into Vegas, and that's how it began.
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Speaker 5: you said you made the very difficult decision, but you
Speaker 5: were very determined. So you mentioned earlier in the book
Speaker 5: that the FBI had their Vegas office and there were
Speaker 5: certain people there, certain detectives and agents pardon me, that
Speaker 5: were there who did you contact, Who did you speak
Speaker 5: to and what did you tell them?
Speaker 6: Well, the first contact was with Las Vegas Metro Police
Speaker 6: Secret Witness Line, which was their anonymous tip line. I
Speaker 6: figured that would be a good way to just break
Speaker 6: the ice and you know, feel them out. I had
Speaker 6: made the decision to go to Metro over the FBI
Speaker 6: because I really didn't didn't trust the FED, I'll be honest,
Speaker 6: and that's was my decision. I felt more comfortable going
Speaker 6: to the locals, and so I contacted. The first person
Speaker 6: I spoke to was a detectiven Age Palmer, and he
Speaker 6: ran the Secret Witness program and I basically and the
Speaker 6: first thing I said to him was today's your lucky
Speaker 6: day and he kind of laughed and said, yeah, well,
Speaker 6: well why And I went on to tell him that
Speaker 6: I had spent the entire summer with Frank Colotta and
Speaker 6: Ernie Devino and Leo Gardino and the Home Wall gang
Speaker 6: and had enough information to take them all down. And
Speaker 6: so you know, at that time, the Metro Police and
Speaker 6: FBI had absolutely nothing, no cases, nothing on Frank Colotta
Speaker 6: or Tony Spillantro either one. And it wasn't for lack
Speaker 6: of trying. They were spending millions of dollars and had
Speaker 6: constant twenty four hour, twenty four to seven surveillance wire
Speaker 6: taps the whole nine yards, but they didn't have anything
Speaker 6: on him, and so I kind of just ran him through,
Speaker 6: you know, the first score that I gave him that
Speaker 6: I described earlier about where they closed as police officers.
Speaker 5: Right.
Speaker 6: I told him that I had ripped off Colotta, and
Speaker 6: that was one of the reasons why I was coming
Speaker 6: forward because rather than kill him, because I'm not a
Speaker 6: killer and I don't I respect human life, but I
Speaker 6: knew I had to get rid of him for what
Speaker 6: I had done if I ever wanted to, you know,
Speaker 6: sleep soundly and not have to worry, you know, down
Speaker 6: the road. And I took it very seriously, and I
Speaker 6: pretty much said, you know, I'm going to do whatever
Speaker 6: I have to do for however long I have to
Speaker 6: do it, until I put this dude away. And so
Speaker 6: after about a week or so, I talked to my
Speaker 6: friend and so I called up one day and this
Speaker 6: was probably a week after I initially contacted him, and
Speaker 6: Palmer told me that I would now be calling and
Speaker 6: speaking to Jeene Smith. Right when I spoke the one
Speaker 6: who shot Frankie Bluestein. Well, that kind of made me
Speaker 6: feel at ease because I knew from being around those
Speaker 6: guys that Jeane wasn't dirty, okay, And at that point
Speaker 6: in time, that was my number one concern coming forward,
Speaker 6: because you know, I knew about Joe Blasco, and I
Speaker 6: didn't know if they had anybody else that was still
Speaker 6: in the department that they that Spilatro had in his
Speaker 6: back pocket. And so that was a major concern of
Speaker 6: mine that I wasn't walking into, you know, getting whacked out.
Speaker 6: But when he when he told me Jeene Smith, I
Speaker 6: kind of felt at ease because I knew for a
Speaker 6: fact that Gene wasn't dirty from the way they the
Speaker 6: mobsters talked about him when I was around him. So
Speaker 6: that's who I started to call. So as soon as
Speaker 6: I called him, he gave me his number and we
Speaker 6: set up a meet and I ended up meeting him
Speaker 6: at a Denny's. The Denny's right by the cop shop
Speaker 6: back then, which was close to downtown, and I met
Speaker 6: a Jean pulled up and he had a white bottleville
Speaker 6: and I jumped in and he saw me, and I remember,
Speaker 6: I'm only nineteen and I shook his hand. I says,
Speaker 6: I'm not what you expected, was it. He kind of
Speaker 6: looked at me and smiled and laughed. He said, no,
Speaker 6: not really. And we had an epic drive where, you know,
Speaker 6: I told him what I had, and I told him
Speaker 6: that Frank had a house full of stolen shit furniture
Speaker 6: that was still there that they had done from a
Speaker 6: burglary that summer. And I was new for a fact
Speaker 6: that it was there because Tommy Yamatto told me and
Speaker 6: he helped move it in. So I told him that.
Speaker 6: So a couple of weeks passed and they still hadn't
Speaker 6: moved on it, and so I met him again and
Speaker 6: I really pressed him, and I, you know, I told him, look, man,
Speaker 6: I said, I don't have time. You guys gotta you're
Speaker 6: gonna blow this. You got to move on it. And yes,
Speaker 6: when he told me, he says, well kid, he says,
Speaker 6: here's the deal. He says, I got to get a search,
Speaker 6: prepare a search, warn Affi, David. And I've never used
Speaker 6: you before as an informant. He says, I believe you.
Speaker 6: But he says, I'm going to have the fudge this
Speaker 6: warn a little bit and say that you were you
Speaker 6: know that you were a confidential, reliable informant in order
Speaker 6: to get Judge Mcroorty to sign this. So and that's
Speaker 6: what they did. I flew back to Colorado and I
Speaker 6: told him that because it was around Thanksgiving. It was
Speaker 6: just a few days before Thanksgiving, and I told him
Speaker 6: that I was flying back to be with my family.
Speaker 6: And I said, but Joe will be out here, and
Speaker 6: I said, he's, you know, out here to take care
Speaker 6: of anything if you know, whatever happens, or you need
Speaker 6: to pass on any messages. And sure enough, since I
Speaker 6: got back to Colorado, they hit Colotta. They broke They
Speaker 6: came in with a search warrant and the furniture that
Speaker 6: I had told them was there was there, and they
Speaker 6: were real happy. That was the turning point right there.
Speaker 6: That bust was the beginning of the end for the
Speaker 6: Chicago outfit in Las Vegas.
Speaker 5: Now let's talk about to well, I'll mention it. What
Speaker 5: you told the authorities was that the stolen furniture would
Speaker 5: be a good pressure for Colada because he was this
Speaker 5: would likely be his three strikes and considered life in
Speaker 5: prison for this furniture. And as a result, you also
Speaker 5: told them are these authorities that that would pressure him
Speaker 5: into even Tony Spilatro thinking that he might rat out
Speaker 5: putting a price on his head. Tell us the predictions
Speaker 5: that you make, that that you're vindicated later on when
Speaker 5: you find out, But tell us the predictions you made
Speaker 5: to the authorities.
Speaker 6: Yeah. I told Jeane Smith that Halloween night as we
Speaker 6: drove around, and he showed me he had been ava
Speaker 6: BlackBook with him, which I thought was pretty interesting. I
Speaker 6: got trying kind of strange actually, and he handed me
Speaker 6: that black book and he said, all, show me who
Speaker 6: you know in here. But anyway, I go through it
Speaker 6: and h and at the end of the conversation, I
Speaker 6: told you and I told you, look, this is a
Speaker 6: slam dunk case. The furniture's there. He's a two time
Speaker 6: convicted felon. He's like you just said, he's looking at
Speaker 6: three confelony convictions. Not only that, but he's under constant
Speaker 6: twenty four hours surveillance. They're looking to nailing you know,
Speaker 6: he's public enemy number two behind Tony's Bilotro. So you know,
Speaker 6: I told him all that, and I and you know
Speaker 6: the cops were being cops. He's he knew it too,
Speaker 6: but he didn't want to let me knew, you know,
Speaker 6: know that how important it was, you know, or how
Speaker 6: important I was. And I told him that I had
Speaker 6: sized up Colatta and because of the drugs that he
Speaker 6: was doing with the coke, he was had it lane.
Speaker 6: He started dating the Lane Costanzo. In fact, he was
Speaker 6: day her, you know, when we got into town, and
Speaker 6: he eventually ended up marrying her. But anyway, that was
Speaker 6: the deal. I said, if if if he's looking at
Speaker 6: life in prison, he'll flip. And when I told Jane
Speaker 6: Smith that, initially he kind of laughed. He basically laughed
Speaker 6: at me, and you know, looked at me like, well kid,
Speaker 6: he says, I don't know. He says, these outfit guys
Speaker 6: are pretty hardcore. I mean, I still remember, that's exactly
Speaker 6: what he said. And I says, well that that's true.
Speaker 6: But I said, I'm telling you, when they're looking at
Speaker 6: life in prison, living the life that they're living now,
Speaker 6: we'll see. And I said, he's not going to flip
Speaker 6: right away, mind you. I said, it's but when when
Speaker 6: he runs out of rope and he runs out of road,
Speaker 6: and when it gets down to you know, he has
Speaker 6: to make a decision, that's when it'll happen, and he
Speaker 6: kind of just blew it off, like, well, well you know,
Speaker 6: we'll see. But yeah, that's exactly what I told you.
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Speaker 5: Now you talk about the the idea that you were
Speaker 5: going to make this deal, But what were you expecting
Speaker 5: in terms of compensation and and what was your idea
Speaker 5: initially that you wanted to get out of this out
Speaker 5: of this deal? What what was your idea and what
Speaker 5: was their idea?
Speaker 6: Well, see that was what was like a fluid situation.
Speaker 6: I mean what I wanted was very simple. I wanted
Speaker 6: I didn't necessarily want to go into the witness protection program.
Speaker 6: I wanted enough money to relocate myself to another city
Speaker 6: in return for were giving them Collotter. And I don't
Speaker 6: think that that was asking for much. You know, just
Speaker 6: what I had down the road is we get further
Speaker 6: down into the book after I you know, they fly
Speaker 6: me out and I testified where that's really where the
Speaker 6: negotiations took place between me and Don Campbell. After I
Speaker 6: testified on made the fifth on Jerry Costanz, on the
Speaker 6: drug cases that I built. But that and that's when
Speaker 6: Campbell asked me. He says, well, do you want to
Speaker 6: go into witness protection. See, the thing that people have
Speaker 6: to remember what makes my situation pretty unique is that, see,
Speaker 6: they had nothing on me. I didn't get busted for anything.
Speaker 6: I had no charges at all initially when I came
Speaker 6: in and you know, gave him an I busted Kata.
Speaker 6: I mean I had no felony record, I had no priors,
Speaker 6: and I wasn't charged with anything. So they couldn't control me. Now,
Speaker 6: your your average mafia inform and or witness is somebody
Speaker 6: that they busted and you know he's wrapping on his
Speaker 6: friends and it's that type of thing. But this that
Speaker 6: wasn't the case, and it caused the problem with them
Speaker 6: from the from the get go. And for the simple
Speaker 6: fact that they couldn't control me. You know, if I
Speaker 6: got pissed at him, I'd take off and they wouldn't
Speaker 6: hear from me for two or three weeks. You know,
Speaker 6: as you will find mebody's reading the book. I go
Speaker 6: up the cannon. But that when it all came down
Speaker 6: to it, that was the deal. And I told Campbell, no,
Speaker 6: I don't want witness protection because it meant you can't
Speaker 6: talk to your family or anything else. Wasn't going to
Speaker 6: do that. I'm twenty years old for crying out left
Speaker 6: And I told him all I need is money and
Speaker 6: all and a contact number in case I needed them
Speaker 6: for something. But I wanted to you know, all I
Speaker 6: wanted was enough money to move and get you know,
Speaker 6: have enough money to get started on someplace else. And
Speaker 6: that was that. And I told him, if you need
Speaker 6: me to testify, I'll be more than happy to testify
Speaker 6: for you.
Speaker 5: Were you allowed to still conduct criminal activity.
Speaker 6: When I was working with him?
Speaker 5: Yes?
Speaker 6: Yeah, well I mean I wasn't, you know, in their
Speaker 6: face with it. But I had a rentel car that
Speaker 6: I'd rented in Colorado that you know that I never
Speaker 6: took back, and I drove around in that it was
Speaker 6: a black LTD all summer long. And I would meet
Speaker 6: with Gene Smith when we would go as we later,
Speaker 6: you know, they wanted me to get back into Jerry
Speaker 6: because Jerry came back from Houston. And so during the summer,
Speaker 6: spring and summer of nineteen eighty one, that's what I did.
Speaker 6: I met Jerry in May, and you know, they wanted
Speaker 6: me to hang in some drug buys on so we
Speaker 6: could lever, you know, leverage klata. I didn't want to
Speaker 6: do it. I told him, you know what had happened,
Speaker 6: how I took taken his pawn tickets to his jewelry.
Speaker 6: Before I'd left, we had the altercation with his dad,
Speaker 6: as you'll read about in the book, which was one
Speaker 6: of the most craziest nights of my life. And I've
Speaker 6: had a few of them, but that was probably in
Speaker 6: the top five for sure. And it was, you know,
Speaker 6: I didn't want to do it, but it was to me,
Speaker 6: if it meant okay, I'll get back into Jerry and
Speaker 6: do some control but drug buys on him, if it'll
Speaker 6: end this thing, you know, if you'll, if we can,
Speaker 6: you can pull the plug on me and I can
Speaker 6: get out of this. And so that's what I did.
Speaker 6: And we had told them, you know that, you know
Speaker 6: that since Jerry and Elaine were so tight and the
Speaker 6: Costandra family was so tight that especially now remember he's
Speaker 6: already got the possession of stolen property charge on him
Speaker 6: and Bruce's hadn't happened yet on July the fourth of
Speaker 6: eighty one. So hanging drug cases on his brother in law,
Speaker 6: with all the other things that I had done to
Speaker 6: and was going to put him pretty much in checkmate,
Speaker 6: and so that's why that was done.
Speaker 5: What happens in terms of your prediction about the contract
Speaker 5: on Frank Klada from Tony Spillatro.
Speaker 6: Well, I mean I knew that all along. You know,
Speaker 6: that was just something, you know, that was a bonus
Speaker 6: that the more heat that I put on him, that
Speaker 6: even if he didn't flip, they probably ended up, you know,
Speaker 6: whacking one or the other. He'd get whacked out once
Speaker 6: Tony thought he was, you know, a liability, and so yeah,
Speaker 6: it was.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 6: The story that they've told Kalata and the FBI is
Speaker 6: that he was played a tape of some outfit guy
Speaker 6: telling Tony Spilantro to clean his dirty laundry. Well, I
Speaker 6: don't know if that is true or not. I seriously
Speaker 6: doubt it. The reason Kalada flipped was because on May
Speaker 6: the four and I had gone back to Colorado because again,
Speaker 6: they were just dragging their feet. I had done those
Speaker 6: controlled drug buys on Costanza and they were just sitting
Speaker 6: on the table and I kept getting bullshitted by Arnoldy
Speaker 6: when I would call him and Jean Smith, well, Campbell's
Speaker 6: tied up one another case or you know, blah blah blah.
Speaker 6: It was always something you know, just to string me along.
Speaker 6: So finally after what happened was was Kolota got convicted
Speaker 6: on April twenty fourth of nineteen eighty two on my
Speaker 6: possession of stolen property chart. So he had gotten out.
Speaker 6: This is something else that most people don't know because
Speaker 6: they lied about it. Klota was out on one hundred
Speaker 6: thousand dollars bond on my case on the possession of
Speaker 6: stolen property case. Okay, that happened in November of nineteen
Speaker 6: eighty Now Birth's doesn't happen until July fourth of eighty one.
Speaker 6: So he's already out on one hundred thousand dollars bond
Speaker 6: when he gets cracked because of sal Romano and Burthas
Speaker 6: sal Ramono setting him up on the birthas thing, all
Speaker 6: of them, and so the judge revokes his one hundred
Speaker 6: thousand dollars bond and combines the two cases and sets
Speaker 6: his bond at a million dollars. Well, he didn't get
Speaker 6: out right away, and Tony didn't come up with any money.
Speaker 6: He sat in jail from probably the July fourth until
Speaker 6: it was it was in the fall. He did a
Speaker 6: couple of months down in jail, and then he bonded
Speaker 6: out because and I write about this in my book.
Speaker 6: Gene Smith calls me and he says, do you know
Speaker 6: anybody that Colada knows up in Mountain Arrelson? And I thought,
Speaker 6: and I said no. I said, oh, alask Joe. But
Speaker 6: I don't think so. I've never heard any mentioned things.
Speaker 6: But it was this woman that he knew, and he
Speaker 6: put up her house and from cash, I guess. And
Speaker 6: he got out in late fall of eighty one. Most
Speaker 6: people don't know that, they think, because like I said,
Speaker 6: they lied about it, the FBI and Colada lied about it,
Speaker 6: basically saying that he was in jail when they played
Speaker 6: in this tape. Now he might have been in jail
Speaker 6: because they might have revoked his bond on April twenty
Speaker 6: four when he got convicted of finally got convicted on
Speaker 6: the possession stolen property. But so anyway, he was in
Speaker 6: a bad spot. And so they bring me in on
Speaker 6: May the fourth. And remember he hadn't it hadn't been
Speaker 6: announced that he had flipped and become a government witness, Okay,
Speaker 6: And when I was flown out there on May the fourth,
Speaker 6: nobody was acting like Frank Klouda had become a gummental witness.
Speaker 6: In fact, they knew exactly what I was being brought
Speaker 6: out there for, and that was to testify before the
Speaker 6: Federal Strike Force grand jury along with Detective Cordel Pearson,
Speaker 6: who I did the control bys on Costanzo with. That
Speaker 6: were all filmed and I had a wire on and
Speaker 6: the whole nine, and that's what I did. They guarded
Speaker 6: me twenty four to seven. I was guarded like the president.
Speaker 6: I was taken to the Federal building in the back
Speaker 6: door and then I testified to what I did. And
Speaker 6: that's after that, that's when I had the meeting with
Speaker 6: Campbell about the witness protection and getting paid and all that.
Speaker 6: But what ended up happening was they sent me back
Speaker 6: to Colorado because Campbell told me, he says, you know,
Speaker 6: otherwise we got to I got to tie up a
Speaker 6: whole unit of guys to you know, sit on you
Speaker 6: and guard you. And I don't think you want that,
Speaker 6: So he says, why don't you. We'll fly you back
Speaker 6: to Colorado. As soon as we going around these guys up,
Speaker 6: we'll fly you back and then we'll get your money
Speaker 6: and get you you know, you disappear. Well. As soon
Speaker 6: as I flew back to Colorado the next day. I mean,
Speaker 6: I'm on pins and needles, which you can imagine, right,
Speaker 6: my whole life's getting ready to change. I mean it's
Speaker 6: I'm twenty one years old at this point, just turned
Speaker 6: twenty one actually, and this and I don't get a
Speaker 6: phone call from Ayot and they start clicking by and
Speaker 6: still nothing about Colada flipping. Then all of a sudden,
Speaker 6: I get the phone call. I don't know if it
Speaker 6: was a few days or a week later. Meanwhile, I'm
Speaker 6: calling arnold Y Campbell, Jeene Smith. I'm blowing their phones
Speaker 6: up out in Las Vegas, Okay, and I and none
Speaker 6: of them are returning my calls. So you imagine what
Speaker 6: I'm thinking. So here's the next thing. Joe Tsoni calls
Speaker 6: me up in Las Vegas. He said, Hey, guess what.
Speaker 6: It's all over the news. They just announced Frank Klatta
Speaker 6: has become a government witness and now this this happened.
Speaker 6: Uh gee, I got the newspaper article. I think it's
Speaker 6: May the ninths, and okay is when they announced it.
Speaker 6: I'm sure he flipped before. You know, they waited a
Speaker 6: few days after he flipped before they announced it. So
Speaker 6: just to give you the timelines, because I contend that
Speaker 6: it was everything that I did on Frank Klatta that
Speaker 6: caused him to flip, and especially the final testifying against
Speaker 6: Jerry and also his cousin Lewis. And there was three
Speaker 6: about three or four of the people who went along
Speaker 6: with Jerry on those buys, and so there was like
Speaker 6: five people on the indictment. And I mean, Cherry knew
Speaker 6: a lot himself. So uh, what happened was was they
Speaker 6: took those indictments over to Frank and Elaine and said
Speaker 6: it's all over, Frank. And that's pretty much what happened, right,
Speaker 6: and now to flip.
Speaker 5: Yes, let's stop for a commercial break.
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Speaker 5: Now we have to talk about how you were dissatisfied
Speaker 5: with the deal with the US State Attorney for Nevada,
Speaker 5: Don Campbell, and eventually you realize you're getting screwed over
Speaker 5: and you weren't going to get your money, You weren't
Speaker 5: going to get your credit. There was a story, there
Speaker 5: was something in the media. It was a four part
Speaker 5: series that was produced, but at the end of it,
Speaker 5: you were you were still disappointed that the story wasn't
Speaker 5: really told. Your story really wasn't told. And then you
Speaker 5: saw again all the books that came out again that
Speaker 5: you weren't even mentioned, So it was like you never
Speaker 5: really existed. And the work that you did, this crucial,
Speaker 5: important work to bring down Spiatra and Hole in the
Speaker 5: Wall gang. Without you, they wouldn't have done this whatsoever?
Speaker 5: You wanted credit? So how do you meet Dennis Griffin
Speaker 5: and tell us about this journey to get your story told?
Speaker 6: Well, going back right after they burned me is when
Speaker 6: after Joey had told me that on the phone, I
Speaker 6: told my father this, and you know, joe and I
Speaker 6: talked about it, and Vince and I talked about it,
Speaker 6: and so I flew out there and on my own dime,
Speaker 6: you know, not protected, and basically just barged into the
Speaker 6: US Attorney's office and told Doron Campbell, you know, wtf,
Speaker 6: you know what? You know, what what's going on? I
Speaker 6: know Frank flipped, and I know why he flipped, and
Speaker 6: now why haven't I heard from the Well it was
Speaker 6: the most surreal experience I've ever experienced in my life.
Speaker 6: And it's it I'll never forget it because here are
Speaker 6: these people who had, you know, fallen all over me
Speaker 6: and treated me, you know, and realized how important I
Speaker 6: was and the work that I was doing for and
Speaker 6: then all of a sudden, as soon as they got
Speaker 6: colloed because of me, when I flew back out there,
Speaker 6: it was like one hundred and eighty degrees turnaround in
Speaker 6: their attitude. I mean, they basically just treated me like
Speaker 6: a like a piece of dirt, and it's like kick rocks, kid,
Speaker 6: get lost. You know, we got what we wanted out
Speaker 6: of you, and so just go get killed. And I
Speaker 6: mean I had people on you know, remember those indictments,
Speaker 6: and well, first thing I asked him was what happened
Speaker 6: to the indictments on Cassandra?
Speaker 3: What?
Speaker 6: I just came out here and testified. Remember the guys
Speaker 6: guarded me twenty four to seven, and you know, and
Speaker 6: then you don't answer my calls. And then I find
Speaker 6: out from Joe that the Colada flips and here I am,
Speaker 6: and it's well, he gives me this BS story. Well,
Speaker 6: the grand jury wouldn't return the indictments, and I just
Speaker 6: looked at him like, dude, I'm only twenty one, but
Speaker 6: I'm not that dumb, okay, And part of the deal
Speaker 6: was was for them that Frank would cooperate and become
Speaker 6: a government witness if those indictments that I had just
Speaker 6: gotten on Jerry and Lewis and the rest of them
Speaker 6: were dismissed. That was part of the deal from the
Speaker 6: get go. And the second part part of the deal
Speaker 6: was that David Bowman would never be mentioned from this
Speaker 6: point further. So I'm telling you it was a surrealist thing.
Speaker 6: I've never seen people act the way Campbell acted. And
Speaker 6: then I went over and had a big confrontation with
Speaker 6: June Smith in Kent Clifford of Intelligence. After Campbell had
Speaker 6: threatened to have me arrested by federal agents. I called
Speaker 6: him on the phone and asked him something after the
Speaker 6: initial meeting, and he jumped in my ass and he's
Speaker 6: telling me, oh, I'm going to have you arrested by
Speaker 6: federal agents for a pain because he gave me like
Speaker 6: four hundred basically enough money to buy a plane ticket
Speaker 6: back to Colorado, and he was going to have me
Speaker 6: arrested by federal agents because for obtaining federal funds under
Speaker 6: false pretens. Well you can imagine what I told him.
Speaker 6: You'll read about it in the book when he told
Speaker 6: me on the phone. And so I go to the
Speaker 6: media and I went to all the television stations. I
Speaker 6: met with Glen Costaldi and her producer with count of
Speaker 6: the NBC affiliate. I spoke to Ned Day, who had
Speaker 6: written a lot of stuff on Spilatro with CBS and
Speaker 6: he also wrote for the RJ. But I ended up
Speaker 6: doing the story with Jeff German and the Las Vegas Sun.
Speaker 6: And it was almost immediately after they burned me. I
Speaker 6: went to the media, right and I told the FEDS that,
Speaker 6: and the police said that I was going to the
Speaker 6: media and I was going to blow the whole thing up,
Speaker 6: and I didn't care, and that's what I did. The
Speaker 6: story never came out Dan until September. I believe it
Speaker 6: was September nineteenth of eighty two. Now, remember I got
Speaker 6: burned in May, so it took them months to scrub
Speaker 6: this story because the Costanzas weren't under indictment for anything
Speaker 6: at that point, so they couldn't use their name, so
Speaker 6: they had to change their names in the story. And
Speaker 6: that's why I was disappointed in the final product that
Speaker 6: came out, the four part series. I mean, it was
Speaker 6: a huge story. But here's something that's very relevant that
Speaker 6: people need to know that as soon as my story
Speaker 6: was released, which was a Sunday, was when the first
Speaker 6: part broke front page of the Las Vegas Sun the
Speaker 6: very next day, that following Monday. Guess what happened. The
Speaker 6: Las Vegas FBI and Frank Kolotta collaborate on a story
Speaker 6: to a front page story and the RJ, the competing newspaper, saying, here,
Speaker 6: all of a sudden, Kla he's a federal witness, right,
Speaker 6: and here, all of a sudden, he's doing a front
Speaker 6: page news story with the fbis blessing, which it's pretty
Speaker 6: weird to begin with, but it was. It was all
Speaker 6: done to deflect attention away from my story, because they
Speaker 6: ran that story the following Monday, and I never forget.
Speaker 6: I called Jeff German and he told me that. He said, Dave,
Speaker 6: you're never going to believe this. He says. They ran
Speaker 6: a story with Klatta saying that he paid off the
Speaker 6: sheriff elect at the time, John Moran, because the elections
Speaker 6: were coming up in November for sheriff and John McCarthy
Speaker 6: was running against John Moran. McCarthy was the incumbent. They
Speaker 6: were the bunch that I worked with, Jeene Smith, Kent Clifford,
Speaker 6: and John McCary. That was McCarthy's regime. And Moran was
Speaker 6: his opposition. So Klotta come up with a story that
Speaker 6: he bribed Moran forty thousand dollars so he would stay
Speaker 6: off of Tony and him, which John Moran later took
Speaker 6: a polygraph. There was a whole a bunch of stories
Speaker 6: that followed that because it set off a a shit
Speaker 6: storm basically in the media that just went on and
Speaker 6: on and on for weeks after that. Moran called him
Speaker 6: a pathological liar, and I mean it was, It got
Speaker 6: really ugly. But Moran did take a polygraph. Bottom line
Speaker 6: is then the whole story was completely fabricated by Colada,
Speaker 6: by the FBI to not only smeer Moran, but mainly
Speaker 6: to deflect attention away from my story and how they
Speaker 6: burned me.
Speaker 5: Right now, let's get to Colorado Springs. Your brother has
Speaker 5: a business and you start working a regular, regular job,
Speaker 5: and you rent the house with your old friend, Vince
Speaker 5: Spoto and along with his wife who's the dancer, And
Speaker 5: you meet a dancer named Melinda molly Derwigger. Tell us
Speaker 5: about her okay, sorry, tell us about her personal situation
Speaker 5: and relationship and how you got involved.
Speaker 6: Well, like I said, I'd gone back to Colorado after
Speaker 6: all the Las Vegas stuff, I started working for my
Speaker 6: brother's company. I'm in Colorado Springs. Actually, I'd moved in
Speaker 6: to the house on web Drive and Colorado Springs was
Speaker 6: actually a childhood friend and then and his girlfriend, and
Speaker 6: then Vince and his wife. Well, Vince came out initially,
Speaker 6: and then his wife came out a couple of weeks later.
Speaker 6: He brought her out well with his son who was
Speaker 6: just born, and excuse me, and so yeah, he moved
Speaker 6: in with me because I after I moved back to Colorado,
Speaker 6: I hadn't I quit doing blow. I know, wasn't partying.
Speaker 6: I was just working all the time, and I was
Speaker 6: actually just kind of bored and lonely. And you know,
Speaker 6: Vince was having you know issues out in Las Vegas,
Speaker 6: and he was involved with the coke and was dealing
Speaker 6: out there, and his life was kind of coming unraveled,
Speaker 6: and he kind of wanted to be around his friend,
Speaker 6: you know, and he wanted, you know, some just to
Speaker 6: get out of Vegas for a while and hang out
Speaker 6: with me for a while. So he flew back and
Speaker 6: we started frequenting this script club and it was kind
Speaker 6: of a real, you know, light script club. Light Okay.
Speaker 6: It wasn't a real hardcore bar because the girl that
Speaker 6: was that I met this, Melinda was was nineteen at
Speaker 6: a time. So it was kind of like a go
Speaker 6: go dance club called the Candle Light in up on
Speaker 6: North Nevada and Colorado Spring, and it was just innocent,
Speaker 6: you know. We came in and we'd go back to
Speaker 6: shoot pool and and uh watch the girls, and and
Speaker 6: we had the coke. Vince had some blow with them,
Speaker 6: and so we kind of used that to uh break
Speaker 6: the ice with the with the dancers. And uh, that's
Speaker 6: how I met her and we started partying. She came
Speaker 6: over and to the house and spent the night with
Speaker 6: me a couple of times, and we would just begin
Speaker 6: getting involved in a relationship.
Speaker 5: Tell us about the night in question that again once
Speaker 5: again changed your life drastically and dramatically.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it was. Uh, it was very unfortunate. I had
Speaker 6: met gone down to the club with Vince and Shira
Speaker 6: because Hero was going to get a job dancing there
Speaker 6: because he had just got into town. And since it
Speaker 6: was like a little go go club, you know, Vince
Speaker 6: was cool with it. So he's like, okay, and we
Speaker 6: brought her down there and she talked to Mollie and
Speaker 6: she was going to start working there. And then Mollie
Speaker 6: and I spent a little time together, and she told
Speaker 6: me just go to her apartment and her roommates would
Speaker 6: let me in. She'd see me after when she got
Speaker 6: off work. And I said cool. I said, I'm gonna
Speaker 6: take Vince and shere a home and then I'll get
Speaker 6: my work clothes and head over. And that's what I did.
Speaker 6: And so it's like it's very early in the morning,
Speaker 6: and I get over to her apartment and she hadn't
Speaker 6: got home yet, and like she said, her roommates were there,
Speaker 6: Tracy and Mary, and there was a couple more actually,
Speaker 6: but I didn't really know them. And so the two
Speaker 6: girls I knew let me in, and I went into
Speaker 6: her bedroom and started getting undressed, and I had my
Speaker 6: work uniform and things so I could get up go
Speaker 6: to work the next day. Well, it wasn't long. All
Speaker 6: of a sudden, she opens her bedroom door and walks in,
Speaker 6: and immediately I knew could read her face that something
Speaker 6: was up. I mean almost immediately I could tell something.
Speaker 6: She was upset. And she just looks at me and
Speaker 6: she kind of and she's I could tell she was embarrassed,
Speaker 6: and you know, and she looks at me. He says, Dave,
Speaker 6: I feel like such an asshole. Please don't hate me.
Speaker 6: Roger's downstairs and he says, we have to talk. And
Speaker 6: now I'm super tired. I've been doing coke. I've worked
Speaker 6: all day, okay, and then I've been up partying. I
Speaker 6: had a couple of dreams, but I'm totally exhausted. And
Speaker 6: I didn't say any I just looked at her, and
Speaker 6: before I could say anything, her roommate, Tracy, grabs me
Speaker 6: by my hand and says, Dave, come with me, and
Speaker 6: grabs me by the hand and takes me out of
Speaker 6: the bedroom and we go into the bathroom. Well, this
Speaker 6: girl was shooting coke and that was really what she wanted.
Speaker 6: She wanted to she wanted to shot, so I obliged her.
Speaker 6: I loaded her up a spoon booth powder and watched
Speaker 6: her do her thing. And while she's doing that, I'm
Speaker 6: asking her. I'm like, all right, Tracy, what's going on here?
Speaker 6: And she says, oh, Molly, really dig your day. But
Speaker 6: this Roger, he's an asshole. He won't take no for
Speaker 6: an answer. But just let Mollie handle it. She wants
Speaker 6: to be with you and just but let her deal
Speaker 6: with this jerk. Okay, that's basically what she told me. Well,
Speaker 6: while we were in the bathroom, this guy, this ex
Speaker 6: boyfriend of hers who was a DJ down at the club. Okay,
Speaker 6: he was the DJ at the Candlelight and Mollie had
Speaker 6: told me that she had dated him and it was
Speaker 6: over and blah blah. So anyway, well, I'm I come
Speaker 6: out of the bathroom with Tracy. He has has come
Speaker 6: into the apartment and gone into the bedroom and closed
Speaker 6: the door. I still got all my clothes and coat
Speaker 6: and keys and you know, and and I'm thinking to myself, boy,
Speaker 6: this guy has got a lot of balls to do
Speaker 6: something like this, you know. I mean, but I remember,
Speaker 6: I've been through all this in Las Vegas. I've worked
Speaker 6: with the FBI, you know, and the police. I'm upset,
Speaker 6: but I'm very much under control. And I realized, you know,
Speaker 6: what this guy's pulling. And I say to Tracy, I said, look,
Speaker 6: I said, somebody better go in there and get my
Speaker 6: coat and my stuff and my keys. I said, because
Speaker 6: if I go in there, I think, you know, it's
Speaker 6: going to be some problems. And so boy, she she
Speaker 6: was right on with Johnny on the squat. She went
Speaker 6: into the bedroom, she knocked on the door, she slid in.
Speaker 6: She came out with my coat and my keys, but
Speaker 6: she left my work uniform because I left it in
Speaker 6: this little wedge between the wall and the bed, which
Speaker 6: is key down the road. That I just wanted to
Speaker 6: interject that. And so I get my stuff, and I
Speaker 6: didn't leave immediately. I just sat out there in the
Speaker 6: living room because I'm hoping maybe he'd walk out or something.
Speaker 6: And all the while I'm processing in my head, what
Speaker 6: should I do? Should I go confront this guy? And
Speaker 6: I said to myself, Dave, he's got a gun, or
Speaker 6: he would have never did what he did because he
Speaker 6: wasn't a big guy. Okay, he wasn't big at all,
Speaker 6: so and he knew that. That's why I figured he
Speaker 6: had a gun as boldly as he was acting. And
Speaker 6: it wouldn't do me any good to go in there
Speaker 6: because he would just pull the gun on me and
Speaker 6: the whole situation would then escalate. So I decided to leave.
Speaker 6: I get in my work truck and I drive all
Speaker 6: the way back to the house. Well, on the drive
Speaker 6: back to the house. I got more pissed, you know.
Speaker 6: I just thought, well, balls of this guy, and well,
Speaker 6: who did this guy think he is right? And so
Speaker 6: I get back to the house and it's much I'm
Speaker 6: kind of surprised. When I walked in, Vince had gotten
Speaker 6: up and he was getting something out of the refrigerator.
Speaker 6: When I walked in, it was like four o'clock in
Speaker 6: the morning, early I was about thirty three point thirty
Speaker 6: something like that, and he was getting a drink or
Speaker 6: something and he looked at me, like, what are you
Speaker 6: doing here? And I went on to tell him what
Speaker 6: had happened. And I told him. I says, give me,
Speaker 6: give me your gun. I said, I want to go
Speaker 6: back over there and confront this this idiot. And he
Speaker 6: says no, he says, I'll go with you. I said, no,
Speaker 6: I don't want you to go with me. I said,
Speaker 6: it's none of your business. I said, oh, I just
Speaker 6: let me use the gun. And he said no, he said,
Speaker 6: he said I want to come with you. I said,
Speaker 6: all right, dude, I said, but you know I'm telling you,
Speaker 6: don't you know I don't want you to pulling the
Speaker 6: gun on this guy. I'm telling you just watch my back.
Speaker 6: I'm going to confront him, and I said, you know,
Speaker 6: if we get into a fight, I said, just make
Speaker 6: sure I don't, you know, get carried away on this guy.
Speaker 6: That's what I told him. But I said, you gotta
Speaker 6: promise and he won't pull that gun. And he said,
Speaker 6: I promise you do. I said, I'm good. I said,
Speaker 6: we don't need this bullshit. I said, I just want
Speaker 6: to find out, you know, if she wants to be
Speaker 6: with him, fine, but that's not what Tracy told me.
Speaker 6: I said, I'll throw his ass out of there. I said,
Speaker 6: but just watch my back. That's all I want you
Speaker 6: to do. So we go back to the apartment. Vance
Speaker 6: has the gun. He's stuck. He's got it stuff down
Speaker 6: his waistband. He's got my winter jacket on, which is
Speaker 6: a heavy winter kind of a leather jacket, which he
Speaker 6: couldn't tell that he had a gun, a three fifty seven,
Speaker 6: and his waistband. So we knock on the door. The
Speaker 6: girls let us in, but immediately they saw me at
Speaker 6: Vince and the roommate knew. I could see it in
Speaker 6: her eyes that she knew. You can see the fear
Speaker 6: in her eyes, say, oh shit, this is going to
Speaker 6: be this don't look good. So Vince and I go
Speaker 6: to the bedroom door. I knock on the door and
Speaker 6: almost simultaneously open the door flip on the light. There,
Speaker 6: Molly and him are in bed. She's laying on the
Speaker 6: left side, he's laying on the right side. And I
Speaker 6: go to the corner of Molly's into the bed and
Speaker 6: Vince walks around my back and he stands directly in
Speaker 6: front of Bird who's laying in bed, and he's got
Speaker 6: his arms fold and he just doesn't say a word.
Speaker 6: He just stands there, and I'm the one that talks.
Speaker 6: As soon as I slipped on the light, he lifted
Speaker 6: his head off the pillow, and I looked at him
Speaker 6: and says, hey, you and I got something to discuss.
Speaker 6: And he looks at me and he says, f you
Speaker 6: pick a better time, and he lately puts his head
Speaker 6: back down the pill I say, I kind of laughed,
Speaker 6: and I said, hey, I says, you got thirty seconds
Speaker 6: to get up out of that bed and put your
Speaker 6: pants on, or I'll put him.
Speaker 5: On for you.
Speaker 6: And he sits up in bed real fast and says,
Speaker 6: oh yeah, and he reaches up on the headboard where
Speaker 6: he has his twenty five semi automatic, with his cliff
Speaker 6: laying right next to it. He grabs him with one hand.
Speaker 6: He transferred. He pops the cliff in as soon as
Speaker 6: Vince saw and reached back there he says, He says, David,
Speaker 6: he's got a gun. And out of the corner of
Speaker 6: my eye, I saw Vince pirouette and turn his back
Speaker 6: and unzi up his jacket, and I knew he was
Speaker 6: pulling the gun. And so he pulls the gun out
Speaker 6: of his waist bend and he comes around the corner
Speaker 6: of the bed, and by then Berg had already leveled
Speaker 6: the gun on me. He grabs his wrist, was a
Speaker 6: gun in it and jerks it straight up in the
Speaker 6: air so if he squeezed the shot it wouldn't shoot me.
Speaker 6: And going the ceiling, and he takes the three fifty
Speaker 6: seven and he jams it to Bird's temple and tells
Speaker 6: him and I mean he jammed it to his head
Speaker 6: and says, chill out, asshole. And he had him. Okay,
Speaker 6: he had his wrist, he had the three fifty seven
Speaker 6: pressed to his hat. The guy, if he would have
Speaker 6: just dropped the gun this, my whole life would be different, Okay.
Speaker 6: But he was drunk. The autopsy showed he had all
Speaker 6: kinds of drugs and he was heavily intoxicated, and he
Speaker 6: tried to rasp struggle with Vince, turn his gun on Vince.
Speaker 6: And as soon as they locked into the struggle, I
Speaker 6: leaned down because Mollie was starting to, you know, get
Speaker 6: it active, and she said like no, guys, no, or
Speaker 6: something like that. I leaned down to grab her foot
Speaker 6: because I was going to pull her, you know, out
Speaker 6: of the bed. Once those two locked up on each
Speaker 6: other and they both had guns, I just wanted to
Speaker 6: the first thing I thought was to get her out
Speaker 6: of harms way. But as soon as I reached down
Speaker 6: to grab her ankle, the Vincu's done went off and
Speaker 6: I could see, you know, you know, it killed him instantly.
Speaker 6: It was a pretty gross thing to see. And immediately
Speaker 6: Molly flew out of bed, just screaming, you know, hysterically.
Speaker 6: And I mean, if you have a if you're human
Speaker 6: at all, I mean, a hysterical screaming woman is something
Speaker 6: that I think gets to most people. And I understood why,
Speaker 6: you know, because we certainly didn't intend not to happen.
Speaker 6: So it was just a shock is what it was
Speaker 6: to me, because everything just happened so fast, within a
Speaker 6: matter of seconds, and it was just a situation. I
Speaker 6: never should have went back over there. I mean I
Speaker 6: sat in prison for I did an eight I ended
Speaker 6: up doing eight year sentence over that. Vince ended up
Speaker 6: going got convicted of first every murder. I wasn't able
Speaker 6: to testify at his trial because they severed us. We
Speaker 6: were induided by a grand jury. So you know, there
Speaker 6: was a lot of legal maneuver and involved. But I
Speaker 6: gave the thirty two page statements to the Colorado Springs
Speaker 6: Police after I flew back and turned myself in. Sergeant
Speaker 6: Joe Kenda was actually the guy homicide on her Canada,
Speaker 6: and I gave They asked me if I wanted a lawyer.
Speaker 6: I wanted to say, Hell, I am a lawyer. I
Speaker 6: don't need a lawyer. You know, guys don't know what
Speaker 6: I've just been through in Las Vegas. But I didn't
Speaker 6: say that. I just basically told the truth. I told
Speaker 6: him exactly what I just told you and your audience
Speaker 6: as to what happened. And I'll stand on that state
Speaker 6: to this day. Is what I always tell people. The
Speaker 6: truth never changes and so that's pretty much what it is.
Speaker 6: What happened down the road was the case was overturned
Speaker 6: by the Colorado Court of Appeals. The state appealed the
Speaker 6: appellate Court's reversal and to the Colorado Supreme Court, and
Speaker 6: the Colorado Supreme Court took the case and we won
Speaker 6: that four to three Colorado Supreme Court case. It's a
Speaker 6: precedent case. It's people versus photos, a precedent case on
Speaker 6: similar transaction evidence.
Speaker 5: Ye use as an opportunity for to stop for a
Speaker 5: commercial break. Now, you talked about after prison, after this
Speaker 5: whole thing was all sorted out, and then you decided
Speaker 5: that you needed to tell the story, and you discovered
Speaker 5: that Frank Kolotta was having tours of the spots in
Speaker 5: Las Vegas where Casino where some of the scenes in
Speaker 5: Casino were actually shot. So tell us what your plan
Speaker 5: was and your meeting with Frank Kolotta before I.
Speaker 6: Let you go. Yeah, I had tried to reach him,
Speaker 6: actually several times prior to this, years, prior to the
Speaker 6: time when I finally did in August of twenty nineteen.
Speaker 6: I just wanted to throw that out there and he
Speaker 6: would ignore me. So I thought about it and I
Speaker 6: thought of how I could confirm without him giving him
Speaker 6: a back door to run through. And like you mentioned,
Speaker 6: I found out he was doing his Frank Colada casino tour,
Speaker 6: and so I booked a a tour with him. And
Speaker 6: of course I didn't tell him I was David Bowman,
Speaker 6: and I knew after all these years, after forty years,
Speaker 6: he probably wouldn't recognize me with the gray hair and all.
Speaker 6: But anyway, that's what I did, and I went out
Speaker 6: there for the sole purpose of telling him I wanted
Speaker 6: to write a book. And I told everybody when I
Speaker 6: went out there. The people that I were working with
Speaker 6: said I'm going out there to get a book deal,
Speaker 6: but I didn't know, but I just I was going
Speaker 6: to get it done. And so I booked the casino tour,
Speaker 6: and I got to admit it was pretty It was
Speaker 6: pretty nerve wracking when I stepped into that vehicle with
Speaker 6: him and his driver. I wasn't so much worried about
Speaker 6: Frank as I was his driver, because I didn't know
Speaker 6: who this guy was, and I knew Frank was eighty
Speaker 6: years old. That much I was worried about with him,
Speaker 6: But the first minute was pretty intense. He started talking
Speaker 6: about his saying and I said, yeah, Frank, I know
Speaker 6: all about it. I says, I'm David Bowman, secret witness
Speaker 6: for ninety one. As soon as I said that, he says, oh,
Speaker 6: you're that son of a bitch, and and then pretty
Speaker 6: much right after that he says, you're persistent, and I thought, yeah, Frank,
Speaker 6: I am. But he knew when as soon as I
Speaker 6: told him that I was David Bowman, he knew that
Speaker 6: I was the guy that got him way back, Like
Speaker 6: I said, when they brought the indictments to him on
Speaker 6: on Jerry, they told him that I was the one
Speaker 6: that got him on the furniture and that I was
Speaker 6: the one that got Jerry and basically got him carried.
Speaker 6: So he and that was he actually did. Frank also
Speaker 6: did an eight year sentence even though he was in
Speaker 6: witness protection on my possession of stolen property case. It
Speaker 6: wasn't birth as it was the possession of stolen property
Speaker 6: that he did is three and a half years of right.
Speaker 6: But it was a very tense, like I said, for
Speaker 6: the first minute or so, and then we had a
Speaker 6: great conversation. We've talked about things that only him and
Speaker 6: I could discuss. Because you know, he knew what I knew,
Speaker 6: which was everything, and we talked about who murdered NICKI,
Speaker 6: we talked about Elaine. You know, he called Elaina while
Speaker 6: we were still driving around because he knew that I
Speaker 6: was close to Elaine. I had met Elaine two years
Speaker 6: before he did. I mean, I was Elaine was kind
Speaker 6: of like a big sister to me, and so he
Speaker 6: called her up. And then but it was after or
Speaker 6: he called a lane up, after he called Danny Griffin.
Speaker 6: He called Danny Griffin up immediately because I told Frank,
Speaker 6: I said, look, I want to do a book and
Speaker 6: I want to tell my story, and Frank knew it
Speaker 6: and he wasn't going to object to it. I think
Speaker 6: I actually kind of scared him a little bit. I
Speaker 6: really do. We were both nervous in our own for
Speaker 6: our own reasons. But like I said, he even told
Speaker 6: me that doing those casino tours, he worried about one
Speaker 6: of his victims family members coming in and lacking them
Speaker 6: because one of the things that he just to show
Speaker 6: you how what I think, is how crazy our society
Speaker 6: has become part of this casino tour. He would drive
Speaker 6: around or he would go to the house of the
Speaker 6: guy he murdered this Jerry listener, and he would describe, indeed,
Speaker 6: tail how he killed this man. And he did it
Speaker 6: to me. He told me how he did it, how
Speaker 6: he used half loads in the twenty two and he
Speaker 6: shot him in the you know, we got in the
Speaker 6: house and shot him in the head, and the guy
Speaker 6: wouldn't go down, so and he used half loads because
Speaker 6: they couldn't get a silencer at the time, so they
Speaker 6: had to use half loads, but they weren't enough powder
Speaker 6: to you know, penetrate his skull, I guess. So he
Speaker 6: ends up having to strangle the guy with the water
Speaker 6: cooler electrical core. And then Wayne Mattechi came in because
Speaker 6: Frank didn't come out right away when he was supposed to.
Speaker 6: So Wayne came in and had another gun, and he
Speaker 6: put a pillow in his face and shot him in
Speaker 6: the face five or six times, and then they threw
Speaker 6: him in the pool, is how he describes it. They
Speaker 6: took him out back and threw him in the pool
Speaker 6: to wash off the forensic evidence, and that's where they
Speaker 6: found the guy floating in a swimming pool. Jerry Wisner, which,
Speaker 6: by the way, your listeners should know that he was
Speaker 6: given immunity of course for that killing, along with three others,
Speaker 6: so he was basically given immunity on four murders to
Speaker 6: become a government witness.
Speaker 5: Now in the end, Dennis Griffin was the author that
Speaker 5: Frank Klotta told you about and had written and helped
Speaker 5: Frank Colotta write his story and also had done covered
Speaker 5: extensively the Hole in the Wall gang in books such
Speaker 5: as Battle for Las Vegas. Tell us about Dennis Griffin.
Speaker 5: We talked about this earlier. He passed away this August.
Speaker 5: Tell us just a little bit about bringing this book
Speaker 5: and getting this book done with and as Griffin.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Denny, like I said, Frank called him that very
Speaker 6: as we were driving around on this casino tour, which
Speaker 6: surprised me by the way as quickly as he called him,
Speaker 6: and how quickly it all happened, And that's how it happened.
Speaker 6: It was just like that. And he gave me Denny's number,
Speaker 6: And after we got done with the tour, I called Denny,
Speaker 6: or he gave Denny my number. I forget what it was,
Speaker 6: and we just immediately started talking on the phone, and
Speaker 6: he contacted a publisher who he had done other books with.
Speaker 6: I believe of Frank's books and said they were very
Speaker 6: interested and that's what when we were going to do it,
Speaker 6: and so. But Denny was a very it was a
Speaker 6: total gentleman. I never met him personally. We did all
Speaker 6: everything over the phone, and I wrote my manuscript and
Speaker 6: he pretty much just edited it and put it together
Speaker 6: very nicely. But from my impression of Danny, he was
Speaker 6: a very what I knew of him, he was a
Speaker 6: very good man and an honest man, and a very
Speaker 6: talented writer. And he did a great job with like
Speaker 6: I said, editing my manuscript and putting it in book form.
Speaker 6: And I thought he did a great job. And it
Speaker 6: was a shock when he passed a few months ago.
Speaker 5: I want to thank you David Bowman for coming on
Speaker 5: and talking about your book bringing Down Colotta, the story
Speaker 5: Casino couldn't tell you. Is there a website, the Facebook
Speaker 5: page somewhere where they might take a look at this.
Speaker 5: I know it's on Amazon, but tell us about that.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I've got a Facebook page and it's bringing down
Speaker 6: Klata and as well as a Twitter account same thing,
Speaker 6: bringing down Colata. It's c U L l O Tta.
Speaker 6: It's kind of a sometimes that people get the spelling wrong,
Speaker 6: and I will have my website up in a few days.
Speaker 6: In fact, I'm working on it, or was working on
Speaker 6: it before the interview, so I would say within a
Speaker 6: week I'll have my bringingdown Klota dot com up and
Speaker 6: you'll be able to buy the book from that as
Speaker 6: well as from my publisher, Coastal West, which is a
Speaker 6: Canadian publisher. You can get the book through Coastalwest dot CA.
Speaker 5: A great Thank you so much, David Bowman. It's been
Speaker 5: a pleasure bringing down Klota the story Casino couldn't tell you.
Speaker 5: You have a great evening, and thank you so much
Speaker 5: for this interview. David Bowman, goodnight.
Speaker 6: Thank you, Dan, appreciate it.