Courts Building on 100 Centre Street in downtown Manhattan where Karp worked as the district attorney of New York County. The newsstand was owned by “Dirty Warren” Bennett, who now smiled mischievously and hooked a thumbover his shoulder at the front pages of the New York Times and the New York Post tacked to sides of his newsstand.
“Read ’em and . . . fuck piss . . . weep,” stuttered the little man, who suffered from Tourette’s syndrome, which, besides giving him facial tics and sudden muscle twitches, caused him to spout profanity.
Karp scanned the headlines: UNION BOSS CARLOTTA KILLED ON WATERFRONT; SUSPECTS FLEE, read the Times. MASKED BANDIT BLASTS CARLOTTA , the Post boldly advertised.
Karp nodded. He’d known what the headlines would be—or at least had a good idea—after he got a telephone call at one in the morning from Clay Fulton, the head of the NYPD detective squad who worked for his office.
• • •
“Thought you’d want to know,” his old friend had said. “Somebody shot and killed Vince Carlotta outside of Marlon’s. Looks like a robbery. I’m on my way over to the crime scene now. The press is going to be all over this, and I want to get there before the rumors start flying.”
Karp had swung his legs out of bed and turned on the nightstand light. It was no secret that Vince Carlotta’s supporters had been raising a stink about the last union election. The popular union boss had also been in the papers recently threatening to reopen the union investigation into a fatal accident involving dock cranes. The conspiracy theorists were bound to be out in droves. “I’ll get dressed and join you,” Karp said.
“Stay put. I think we’re okay,” Fulton replied. “Ray Guma heard about it from his Italian mob connections on the docks almost before we did. He called off the ADA who was catching cases on the homicide bureau night chart and is taking it himself. I want to talk to the detectives on the scene, maybe sniff around a little bit. But the initial report I got was pretty cut-and-dried. Carlotta got jumped and tried to pull a gun. Bingo, bango, he took one to thechest and one to the head. Gunman ran away. I’ll let you know if it looks like more than that; Ray and I will see you in the morning and get you up to speed.”
Karp thought about it for a moment. Special Assistant District Attorney Ray Guma was one of his oldest friends. They’d both come onto the DAO at the same time, fresh out of law school and as different as the law schools they’d attended. Karp at Cal-Berkeley and Guma at NYU. Karp was tall, long-limbed, with gold-flecked gray eyes; a highly recruited college basketball player who still worked at staying fit. Guma was built like an ape with a gargoyle’s face; he’d gone to Fordham on a baseball scholarship and played for a year in the minor leagues for the Yankee organization.
Karp was a straight arrow, the son of a Brooklyn businessman and an English teacher. A dedicated family man, he’d always preferred an evening in with his wife and kids to going out on the town with the boys.
Guma grew up in the rough section of Bath Beach in Brooklyn, one of six children of an Italian plumber and his stay-at-home wife. Through his extended family, Guma had connections to the Mafia, though he’d put plenty of mobsters away. Also, there was an understanding that “those” members of the family kept their business affairs out of Manhattan. Most of the time Karp had known Guma, his friend had used a hard-drinking, cigar-chomping, womanizing front to hide a heart of gold. He would lay his life on the line, and had, for his friends.
What they had in common—besides their Brooklyn roots and an obsession with Yankee baseball—was their love for the law and the work they did with the New York DAO. Under the guidance of the legendary District Attorney Francis Garrahy, they’d both discovered early in their friendship a mutual admiration for the beauty
“Read ’em and . . . fuck piss . . . weep,” stuttered the little man, who suffered from Tourette’s syndrome, which, besides giving him facial tics and sudden muscle twitches, caused him to spout profanity.
Karp scanned the headlines: UNION BOSS CARLOTTA KILLED ON WATERFRONT; SUSPECTS FLEE, read the Times. MASKED BANDIT BLASTS CARLOTTA , the Post boldly advertised.
Karp nodded. He’d known what the headlines would be—or at least had a good idea—after he got a telephone call at one in the morning from Clay Fulton, the head of the NYPD detective squad who worked for his office.
• • •
“Thought you’d want to know,” his old friend had said. “Somebody shot and killed Vince Carlotta outside of Marlon’s. Looks like a robbery. I’m on my way over to the crime scene now. The press is going to be all over this, and I want to get there before the rumors start flying.”
Karp had swung his legs out of bed and turned on the nightstand light. It was no secret that Vince Carlotta’s supporters had been raising a stink about the last union election. The popular union boss had also been in the papers recently threatening to reopen the union investigation into a fatal accident involving dock cranes. The conspiracy theorists were bound to be out in droves. “I’ll get dressed and join you,” Karp said.
“Stay put. I think we’re okay,” Fulton replied. “Ray Guma heard about it from his Italian mob connections on the docks almost before we did. He called off the ADA who was catching cases on the homicide bureau night chart and is taking it himself. I want to talk to the detectives on the scene, maybe sniff around a little bit. But the initial report I got was pretty cut-and-dried. Carlotta got jumped and tried to pull a gun. Bingo, bango, he took one to thechest and one to the head. Gunman ran away. I’ll let you know if it looks like more than that; Ray and I will see you in the morning and get you up to speed.”
Karp thought about it for a moment. Special Assistant District Attorney Ray Guma was one of his oldest friends. They’d both come onto the DAO at the same time, fresh out of law school and as different as the law schools they’d attended. Karp at Cal-Berkeley and Guma at NYU. Karp was tall, long-limbed, with gold-flecked gray eyes; a highly recruited college basketball player who still worked at staying fit. Guma was built like an ape with a gargoyle’s face; he’d gone to Fordham on a baseball scholarship and played for a year in the minor leagues for the Yankee organization.
Karp was a straight arrow, the son of a Brooklyn businessman and an English teacher. A dedicated family man, he’d always preferred an evening in with his wife and kids to going out on the town with the boys.
Guma grew up in the rough section of Bath Beach in Brooklyn, one of six children of an Italian plumber and his stay-at-home wife. Through his extended family, Guma had connections to the Mafia, though he’d put plenty of mobsters away. Also, there was an understanding that “those” members of the family kept their business affairs out of Manhattan. Most of the time Karp had known Guma, his friend had used a hard-drinking, cigar-chomping, womanizing front to hide a heart of gold. He would lay his life on the line, and had, for his friends.
What they had in common—besides their Brooklyn roots and an obsession with Yankee baseball—was their love for the law and the work they did with the New York DAO. Under the guidance of the legendary District Attorney Francis Garrahy, they’d both discovered early in their friendship a mutual admiration for the beauty
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