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Wiretappers, don’t forget to hit me up on Venmo. In this second of a two-episode series with retired East Providence RI Police Captain Joe Broadmeadow, we discuss his second book about members of Raymond L.S. Patriarca’s crime family. In Broadmeadow’s book, Unmade: Honor, Loyalty, Redemption he tells about the unusual crime career of Bobby Walason.
Bobby Walason’s father threw him out of the house and he was left to fend for himself on the mean streets of Providence RI at age 12. Walason learned to survive and even thrive on the streets and inside juvenile detention centers until a court sentenced him to adult prison at age 16. He gravitates to the toughest men inside because he is a very tough kid and a skilled street fighter. in an unusual situation, young Bobby comes to the aid of Patriarca crew leader Gerard Ouimette and another prisoner named
Raymond Patriarca takes notice. Walason is invited into the “gangster side” of this Rhode Island prison and the older mobsters groom him as a new crew member. Upon release, he gravitates to Ouimette’s tavern called the Bronx Tap Room and becomes a feared enforcer for the Patriarca crime family.
Bobby Waalson finds that he has life skills that will serve him better as a legitimate businessman and the story of how he extracts himself from a mafia family who believes death is the only way out, is one of the most gripping stories I have ever heard. Once again Joe Broadmeadow uses his skilled writing style and police officer’s insight into this life to tell a compelling story of, as the title states, “Honor, Loyalty, Redemption.”
Joe Broadmeadow is a skilled writer who uses his insights as a cop who investigated Organized Crime to tell compelling stories about life in the New England mob. He has a new book being released on October 8, 2019, It’s Just the Way it Was: Inside the War on the New England Crime Family and other Stories. He writes this with Brendan Doherty, a retired Rhode Island State Police Officer who worked the mob for the majority of his long career.
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