$27,000 on that one car.
“On the downside, the second insurance claim within a year on that Caddy brought me to the attention of an organization I didn’t know existed until then. A couple of investigators from the National Auto Theft Bureau showed up at my house. They wanted to know about my car-restoration activities. Did I have receipts for the parts I supposedly bought to rebuild? And why did the cars I was involved with have a habit of having multiple insurance claims filed in short periods of time?”
Ironically, as they sat there talking, the second Caddy was in Andrew’s garage, all stripped down. He was doing the same thing with that car as his crewmate had done. He’d paid off the adjuster, filed a claim, and was waiting for the check.
“They finally left, but they made it clear that I was on their radar. Any future insurance claims I was connected to would get a real close going over. That forced me to change my methods. I had enough friends in the business I could work with on a percentage basis without having my nameappear on any of the paperwork. So I still made money on insurance fraud, just in a little different manner.”
CREDIT-CARD BONANZA
In late 1984, VISA credit-card companies began converting their cards to a hologram format for security purposes. In 1985 and 1986, the new cards were issued to new applicants or as renewals to existing customers. Although the idea behind the new format was to cut down on fraud, for Andrew and his associates, the issuance of the cards opened the door to vast financial rewards. Andrew explained it this way.
“We’d already been making a lot of money off credit cards. But when the companies issued these hologram cards, we made a real killing. I remember that a couple of guys from a Lucchese crew we were friendly with had a meeting with Nicky. I wasn’t there, but that same day Nicky told us we had access to thousands of new credit cards with all the related account information.
“Nicky never told us how this all came down. It seemed apparent, though, that the Luccheses had stolen the envelopes containing the new cards from a post office or mail truck. The envelopes contained the cards, personal identification information, and account information that included passwords, PINS, and credit limits.
“Through Nicky’s contacts we got stacks of blank New York State driver’s licenses. This was just prior to the state issuing photo licenses. We didn’t have enough blanks to make a license for every card, but we had a lot of them. That put whoever was using the card in good shape if a merchant requested identification.
“We sold most of the cards to customers for five hundred dollars each. We kept some of them for ourselves too. I knew a lot of merchants who weren’t exactly honest. Say I had acard with a three-thousand-dollar limit. I took it to one of them, banged it for twenty-five hundred, and split it with the merchant. The remaining five hundred I used to have fun with, like doing some nightclubbing.
“This scam lasted for several months and we made a killing during that time.”
HOSTILE-TAKEOVER ATTEMPT
Late in 1986, Andrew found his lucrative marijuana operation in Utica Park under threat. Another gang evicted Andrew’s dealer and claimed the location as its own. This was a challenge that required a swift and firm response.
The new gang was a large group of young Russians who hung around the park at Avenue N and Utica Avenue where Andrew had one of his marijuana dealers. Because he was the only game in town, he was doing $500-$700 a night from there.
“These newcomers didn’t know the rules. They didn’t know it was my spot and they had to keep their hands off. They told my dealer they were taking over and he had to get out. They even tuned him up a little bit to make their point. Like all things Mafia, this was more than just something between me and them. These kinds of things became known on the streets. People watched to see how the
“On the downside, the second insurance claim within a year on that Caddy brought me to the attention of an organization I didn’t know existed until then. A couple of investigators from the National Auto Theft Bureau showed up at my house. They wanted to know about my car-restoration activities. Did I have receipts for the parts I supposedly bought to rebuild? And why did the cars I was involved with have a habit of having multiple insurance claims filed in short periods of time?”
Ironically, as they sat there talking, the second Caddy was in Andrew’s garage, all stripped down. He was doing the same thing with that car as his crewmate had done. He’d paid off the adjuster, filed a claim, and was waiting for the check.
“They finally left, but they made it clear that I was on their radar. Any future insurance claims I was connected to would get a real close going over. That forced me to change my methods. I had enough friends in the business I could work with on a percentage basis without having my nameappear on any of the paperwork. So I still made money on insurance fraud, just in a little different manner.”
CREDIT-CARD BONANZA
In late 1984, VISA credit-card companies began converting their cards to a hologram format for security purposes. In 1985 and 1986, the new cards were issued to new applicants or as renewals to existing customers. Although the idea behind the new format was to cut down on fraud, for Andrew and his associates, the issuance of the cards opened the door to vast financial rewards. Andrew explained it this way.
“We’d already been making a lot of money off credit cards. But when the companies issued these hologram cards, we made a real killing. I remember that a couple of guys from a Lucchese crew we were friendly with had a meeting with Nicky. I wasn’t there, but that same day Nicky told us we had access to thousands of new credit cards with all the related account information.
“Nicky never told us how this all came down. It seemed apparent, though, that the Luccheses had stolen the envelopes containing the new cards from a post office or mail truck. The envelopes contained the cards, personal identification information, and account information that included passwords, PINS, and credit limits.
“Through Nicky’s contacts we got stacks of blank New York State driver’s licenses. This was just prior to the state issuing photo licenses. We didn’t have enough blanks to make a license for every card, but we had a lot of them. That put whoever was using the card in good shape if a merchant requested identification.
“We sold most of the cards to customers for five hundred dollars each. We kept some of them for ourselves too. I knew a lot of merchants who weren’t exactly honest. Say I had acard with a three-thousand-dollar limit. I took it to one of them, banged it for twenty-five hundred, and split it with the merchant. The remaining five hundred I used to have fun with, like doing some nightclubbing.
“This scam lasted for several months and we made a killing during that time.”
HOSTILE-TAKEOVER ATTEMPT
Late in 1986, Andrew found his lucrative marijuana operation in Utica Park under threat. Another gang evicted Andrew’s dealer and claimed the location as its own. This was a challenge that required a swift and firm response.
The new gang was a large group of young Russians who hung around the park at Avenue N and Utica Avenue where Andrew had one of his marijuana dealers. Because he was the only game in town, he was doing $500-$700 a night from there.
“These newcomers didn’t know the rules. They didn’t know it was my spot and they had to keep their hands off. They told my dealer they were taking over and he had to get out. They even tuned him up a little bit to make their point. Like all things Mafia, this was more than just something between me and them. These kinds of things became known on the streets. People watched to see how the
Similar Books
