Surviving the Mob - Dennis Griffin [65]
“I listened to Charlie closely and completely understood where Regina’s father was coming from. And then out of the corner of my eye I saw a woman sitting on the bench twenty feet away holding a handgun in her lap. It was my mother. If I could see the gun, so would Charlie if he looked in that direction. And if Charlie made any moves my mother thought posed a danger to me, she might come after him. If that happened, he’d probably try to defend himself and I’d have had no choice but to kill him. I quickly assured Charlie he could tell Regina’s father I wouldn’t see her again. I kept talking so his eyes stayed focused on me as I walked him to his car.
“When he was gone, I returned to the bench where my mother was sitting. I was angry. What the fuck did she think she was doing? But as I got closer, the anger turned to sadness as I saw her trembling and crying. We hugged and she literally collapsed in my arms.
“When she was able to talk, she admitted that she’d eavesdropped on my phone conversation with Charlie. She was afraid that I was being set up. She knew that I kept guns stashed around the various places I frequented. So as soon as I left my sister’s, she took one of the guns and followed me to the meet.
“My life had just reached an all-time low. It really hit home that the way I’d been living all these years was devastating my family. Here was my mother out on the street carrying a gun—ready to do murder to protect me. I think it was that moment that ultimately opened my eyes that being a part of this cancer called the Gambino crime family could never have a happy ending for anybody.”
While Andrew realized his chosen lifestyle was having a devastating effect on his mother, there didn’t seem to be a great deal he could do about it. He couldn’t simply throw away his guns and become a legitimate working man. He was facing as-yet unknown legal issues and his criminal colleagues weren’t exactly the let-bygones-be-bygones types. If he wanted to stay free and alive, it required a good and steady income. And in Andrew’s shoes, that meant he had to continue his criminal activities. It didn’t take him long to figure out a new angle that would greatly improve his financial position.
“A couple weeks after the incident with my mother on Ocean Parkway, I met up with an old friend I hadn’t seen in a while. He said he knew a guy who had a solid connection with a marijuana supplier from California. This guy could get five or ten pounds of marijuana shipped in at a time and it would provide a steady income. He gave me the guy’s phone number. I made contact with him and we opened up a business.
“Here’s how we set it up. The weed was mailed from California to New York. We got the tracking number of the package and gave it to an accomplice working in a management position at the post office. He intercepted it and turned it over to us. We did a trial run with five pounds of marijuana. It worked perfectly and we started receiving regular shipments.
“With a steady income, I didn’t have to rely on my friends as much. I used some of the money to rent an apartment in Manhattan Beach in Brooklyn. Although Regina and me had stopped seeing each other, she put the apartment in her name. Nobody else knew I was living there and I never invited anybody over. It was my safe house.
“I continued to get word that Wild Bill Cutolo wasn’t happy with me. And Danny Cutaia and his crew were still pointing fingers at Mike Yannotti and me for Robert Arena’s murder. This stuff was causing a lot of stress, so I reached out to Nicky Corozzo. I asked him what I should do if I ran into one of those guys. First, he said no decision had been made about how to handle the Cutaia faction—whether to eliminate the whole crew,