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Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. This episode delves into the ongoing mob war in St. Louis, focusing on the power struggle between the Syrians and the Italians. Led by Paul Leisure, the Syrians aimed to gain control of the labor union racketeering and diminish the influence of the Italians, who were closely aligned with Jimmy Michaels. The murder of John Spica, appointed by Tony Giordano to push out the Syrians, still remains a mystery to law enforcement.
On the other hand, the Italians are facing internal disarray with a weak leader, Mike Trupiano, who has lost respect within the organization. Both factions heavily rely on the construction industry unions, which provide opportunities for corruption and control over job placements.
Pauly Leisure, a meticulous planner, had already devised a plan to kill John Spica. Now, he and his crew set their sights on Jimmy Michaels. Attempting to ambush Michaels at a diner and his home failed, leaving them frustrated. They eventually decided to use a bomb, meticulously practicing the installation process on a stolen car identical to Michaels’. They discovered that Michaels often attended a Wednesday luncheon at a church, where he mingled with politicians and business leaders.
On the day of the hit, the team arrived at the church undercover in a van, with one member keeping a watchful eye in a nearby tow truck. David Leisure successfully planted the bomb under Michaels’ car while Anthony Leisure had the remote control device. However, the bomb failed to detonate when they activated the transmitter. On high alert, they caught up with Michaels on the road, hoping to get close enough for the remote control to work.
To their surprise, the van bombed Michaels’ car, causing his death in a gruesome manner. The van managed to escape the scene and sought refuge in Illinois, utilizing connections within the criminal underworld to cover their tracks. Michaels’ death sent shockwaves through the St. Louis community, suspecting Pauly Leisure as the culprit. St. Louis mafia boss John Battaglia confronts Leisure, but Leisure refuses to acknowledge his involvement.
Leisure’s actions inadvertently benefit the Italian mafia, as Michaels’ ownership in a Las Vegas casino will transfer to remaining investors upon his death. Leisure takes over Local 110 and eliminates Michaels’ relatives from the union, further consolidating his power. This death raises concerns among mob bosses across the country, tarnishing their reputations.
The situation in St. Louis remains tense, with some believing the dispute has been resolved, while uncertainty lingers. Leisure gains more power through an alliance with Raymond Flynn in Laborers Union Local 42, promising extra money to his loyal soldiers. In response, the Michaels family seeks revenge and contributes to a war chest to eliminate those responsible for Michaels’ death, putting bounties on the heads of Polly and Anthony Leisure.
The host then transitions to a different segment, discussing the various tactics employed by the Leisures and their associates in seeking retribution. They assemble a hit squad, renting an apartment for secret planning. They collaborate with the Chief of Police in St. George for untraceable surveillance vehicles. They construct a bomb, leaving behind incriminating evidence and fingerprints. The hit squad manages to ambush Leisure, detonating a remote-control bomb under his car, severely injuring him. However, Leisure remains determined to seek revenge.
The feud escalates further, leading to kidnappings and torture, with brutal methods including red-hot pokers and a blowtorch being considered. The host informs listeners of the evolving story, detailing their attempted bombings and multiple clashes with associates and rivals. Ultimately, the FBI begins turning people, leading to convictions for all the Leisures, with Paul Leisure receiving a 55-year sentence.
In a side story, the host shares their experience working with a group of Syrian men connected to the St. Louis mob, who come to Kansas City to buy gold, particularly class rings. The host facilitates their transactions and provides security, as these men occasionally buy stolen items without thorough checks, causing some friction with the police property unit.
The episode concludes with a reminder to be cautious of motorcycles on the road and urging veterans with PTSD to seek help from the VA hotline. The host also recommends reaching out to Anthony Ruggiano, a former Gambino member turned counselor, for those struggling with drugs and alcohol. They encourage listeners to support the podcast by liking, subscribing, and sharing, emphasizing their dedication to delivering content based on listener demand.
I used information from articles in Crime Magazine by Ronald J. Lawrence and The St. Louis Post Dispatch for this podcast.
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Transcript
[0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City police intelligence detective.
I’m going to end up the third and final section of the St.
Louis Mafia story. We go all the way from the Cuckoo Gang and Egan’s Rats and Prohibition all the way up through the 50s and 60s with Tony Giordano and into the Leisure Wars, which was the Syrian Bob had this close connection to the Italian Mafia, and they shared in the labor union activities and labor union racketeering opportunities, especially the laborers’ local.
And there was a split in the Syrians between young upstart faction Paule Leisure and the old-time, old-school horseshoe Jimmy Michaels and the Michaels clan.
The Michaels were very close of the Italians, and this really started when Tony Giordano inserted a guy named John Spica into one of the laborers’ unions, and the Italians looked like they were starting to move to take a little bit more of the action out of the labor unions and push these leisures out.
He had an ambitious poly-leisure, and he had several cousins and brothers.
[1:15] And they got together and decided to strike back.
Now, they struck back by hitting Tony Giordano’s man, John Spica, who he had selected to move in and start pushing the Syrians out and take more action from the laborers local in St. Louis.
Retaliation and Murder of John Spica
[1:33] So we’re at that point in time where Poly Leisure has planted a bomb on John Spica and killed him.
He then has to go after horseshoe Jimmy Michaels, who was a close confederate of Giordano.
Giordano dies.
[1:49] He has appointed a man named John Vitale, who’s a really old guy, who’s really just a placekeeper because he wants his nephew from Detroit, Mike Trupiano, to come in and be the new St. Louis boss.
Trupiano will go to Chicago and get the nod from Joey Iuppa and be recognized as the boss.
The murder of John Spica is still a mystery to law enforcement and most people in law enforcement thought the Civella organization was responsible.
Mike Trupiano, to show you what kind of boss he’s going to be, he’s a weak guy.
He just did not have it. He had lost money running a sports gambling operation and that all came out and people didn’t really respect him.
He also lost respect of Joey Aiuppa even though he did give him the nod to be the new boss because it started coming out that Aiuppa had met with him and given him his stamp of approval, if you will, and Aiuppa heard about this and he accused Trupiano of releasing this to the news to make himself seem like he was bigger than what he was.
So, you never know in these deals, but that’s the scene.
We’ve started this mob war between the Syrians because they have killed John Spica and now they’re moving on Horseshoe Jimmy Michaels.
[3:04] Italians can’t really strike back exactly because they’re in disarray themselves with a weak sister new leader and Tony G is gone.
Now, the mafia, their principal power base, whether it be the Assyrian mob or the Italian mafia in St.
Louis, was the construction industry unions.
They gave them a facade of legitimacy.
They gave them incomes with salaries that they could report.
They had no-show jobs for people.
There were a lot of opportunities for graft, as there always is.
When you own a labor union, then you can shake down contractors for allowing them to use non-union workers, or you can shake down the union people.
You can use the welfare funds, take money out of that, create phony insurance claims.
They’re just all kickbacks on property purchased by the unions.
You’ll get your union to buy all new office equipment at a really highly inflated price, and then somebody will kick that back to you.
So there’s a lot of ways, there’s more ways you can shake a stick at to take money out of a labor union.
Also, the jobs on the construction projects were leveraged, which they get people to get that job.
They’re now indebted to the mob because the mob took care of getting it.
I saw a lot of that in the teamsters here in Kansas City. The people.
[4:19] Family members of the Spiro brothers, we had this war between the Spiros and the Civellas that was going on at the same time, and they were, they had influence in the team, sure as the Spiro brothers did, and people still love those guys today because they got them jobs on the docks or as truck drivers and everything.
So that’s a huge leverage to get people to help you out and be indebted to you if you control a labor union. Paul Leisure wanted all this for himself and his extended family.
His brothers, sisters, cousins, and a lot of other small-time criminals were thrown in with these guys, everybody they can influence, because they wanted to take over the Syrian Mafia and reduce the Italians’ influence over the labor racketeering.
And specifically, there’s three laborers union locals. Had a lot of similarities to the Civello-Spero War, as I said before.
[5:08] About a month after Tony G. dies, He hasn’t really, nobody’s really on the Italian side been able to make any moves to retaliate or even maybe find out really what happened to John Spica.
[5:21] And Tony G, Tony Giordano died in 1980, August 29th, 1980.
Paul Leisure waits about a month and then he starts moving on the Syrian patriarch of the Lebanese-Syrian crime family faction, and who was closely in line with the Italian’s horseshoe, Jimmy Michaels.
Horseshoe Jimmy Michaels was a kind of patrician sort of a guy with long, flowing white hair. He would really fit in with the community well.
He wasn’t a young up and comer on the joints and driving Cadillacs and dressing in the latest fashion.
[5:53] Pauly Leisure was that guy. Pauly Leisure was a planner. He had already, if you remember, he had a really meticulous plan to kill John Spica.
They like bought a car. They borrowed a car just like Spica’s and practiced putting the bomb on it. but they wired it to the brake lights, so if he had a remote control starter, it still would get him.
He was a perfectionist when it came to killing.
So Paul Leisure and his crew stopped Jimmy Michaels’ Brown Chrysler Cordova using a Dodge van they called the work car, and it was registered in the fictitious name.
So he took care of all the bases.
They learned he ate breakfast every morning at the same diner.
So the first plan was to ambush him there.
Michaels was sometimes accompanied by his brother, and an informant will later say that Pauly said, you know, we’re going to kill this old man and anybody that’s with him.
Pauly’s cousin, Anthony Leisure, and two others got ski masks and gloves and guns, went over there in the work van or the work car, went to the diner side door, and it was locked.
[6:53] Their plan was some of them would hold the customers at gunpoint while Anthony Leisure was going to go walk up to Jimmy Michaels and pull the trigger.
I tried this more than once and the door was always locked. So then they tried another time at Michael’s home, but any little thing that comes up, in this case it was a barking dog, frightened them away.
These guys, you’re trying to interrupt a mob hit. I’ve been there on this deal.
And if they just smell that anything’s not quite right, they’re gone.
They’re just gone immediately. Pauli decided he’d use a bomb.
[7:24] The bomb seemed to be working pretty well before. It was a little less hazardous if it can be detonated remotely and is a much stronger message in a way.
Once again, he meticulously planned this bombing, just like with Spica.
They stole a Chrysler Cordova. It was identical to Michael’s.
They practiced installing some kind of a case up underneath this Cordova and even timed themselves while they were doing it, because they needed to do it really quick. And they could do it in about a minute.
He had a remote control device rigged up to some dynamite to put into this attache case.
And what’s interesting is they used a model airplane controller that was going to detonate it. And that’s exactly what they used in Kansas City.
The Spiro brothers had one that we recovered, and they had a remote control detonating device that had been used to control a model airplane, and that was going to set it off.
This plan worked. Never did work in Kansas City. We didn’t get close enough. This plan worked.
The Leisure Hit team had noticed that Jimmy Michaels often attended a Wednesday luncheon of kind of movers and shakers in the Syrian community at the St.
Raymond’s Maronite Church on the south side of St. Louis.
And like I said before, he was an aristocratic-looking guy.
[8:38] He was more statesman than hoodlum, they said. He had this gentle disposition.
He knew a lot of people in business. He knew that knowing business people and appearing as just another businessman was important to make money and keep law enforcement off your butt.
Poly leisure, he wanted to be a hip and slit gangster is what he wanted to be.
Now this church luncheon was a really popular event and served some great Lebanese cuisine.
Jimmy Michaels gains political clout through connections
[9:01] Politicians, government officials, civic and business leaders would all be there.
Jimmy Michaels was friends with all of them, and he could use this to get political clout that other people in the organized crime factions lacked.
The Italians couldn’t get it because of that kind of reputation of if you’re Italian, you’re in the mafia, and Pauly Leisure certainly couldn’t get it because he hadn’t been around long enough, hadn’t developed relationships, he just wasn’t that kind of guy.
On the day of the hit, Jimmy Michaels arrives, the van with the darkened windows drives into the church parking lot, backs into a parking space.
A guy named John Ramo was driving, and Anthony Leisure, Pauly Leisure’s brother, sat next to him, and he had the remote control device, and in the back, a cousin, David Leisure, and another guy who were going to go plant the bomb.
A few minutes later, another guy, one of their confederates, parks a tow truck two blocks away from the church, and he turned on the two-way.
[9:56] Radio, was listening for any messages.
He also had a police scanner going. So he was hooked up by two-way radio in the van.
He had a police scanner on. He was watching for anything going on around there that didn’t look right.
If he heard any calls about something about a suspicious van in the parking lot or saw a radio car, a patrol car driving the neighborhood or coming in or maybe getting a call on something else in the neighborhood, he could call them and alert them that, hey, the cops are coming in, you know, back off.
About 10, 15 minutes later, David Leisure gets out of the van, carrying the attaché case, crawls up underneath the Chrysler Cordova and can attach his briefcase with a couple rubber straps and hooks in just about a minute because they’d practiced.
Jimmy Michaels will leave the church about an hour later, get into Cordova, and David Leisure wanted to go ahead and hit him there, but Anthony Leisure, who had the plunger, shall we say, said, let’s wait.
We don’t want to kill him at the church. That’s going to bring all kinds of heat, which he was right.
At least they were right on that. So they let Jimmy Michaels drive away from the lot, a few blocks away from the church.
Bombing successful, Michaels’ body severed, van escapes
[10:57] And the laser activates the remote control transmitter, nothing happens.
We had the same thing in Kansas.
They they act they punch the button on it or move this joystick or however that worked and it didn’t work and it didn’t work and they lost sight of Michael’s car and you know they’re in a panic in this van.
I can see them now like oh man we gotta you know maybe we’re not close enough gotta get up closer what’s wrong with this thing.
[11:23] So they catch him on I-55 which goes north and south and goes all the way from Chicago to New Orleans.
I know it goes through Memphis. I used to take it all the time from Kansas City to I sent me to Kansas City, to St.
Louis and then I-55 to Memphis. And they caught up with it on I-55.
[11:40] Michael’s didn’t even know this. His death was imminent. Didn’t know this van was coming up behind him. Got about four car lengths behind him. And it worked.
There was a huge boom and a plume of orange flame and black smoke goes out of Cordoba.
In the end, when the cops get there and they start pulling his body out, he’s severed in half at the waist, and he’d been hurled out like a ragdoll into the pavement.
[12:05] The van actually had to take evasive action to avoid hitting the recently bombed car.
I get to see this in a movie, just creams on through, smoke and debris coming down out of that explosion.
Everybody else is slamming on their brakes, and that van’s just moving right on through and getting out of there. They got debris and oil from the car all over the van.
So they drove it over to Illinois, where they had connections, as we all know.
There’s East St. Louis and St. Louis, and East St. Louis is in Illinois, and they’re really kind of down and dirty criminal connections, and a lot of strip clubs are over on the Illinois side.
They washed this thing down three times, replaced the windshield wipers because they’re afraid that residue from the explosion might be in the rubber on it.
They dabbed shaving lotion on their faces and all over the interior of the van. Smell of smoke.
[12:54] One of the guys said later, said even after we did all that, we could still smell the burned dynamite on us.
They had taken out the most respected underworld general in the Midwest, an above the ground organized crime boss that nobody really knew was an organized crime boss.
A lot of people liked Horseshoe Jimmy and he was well-respected in the community.
[13:16] And now, and that’s why the headlines were just huge, that whole St.
Louis community was just like up in arms about this, you know, what is going on here? Pauly Leisure has declared war.
[13:27] And the day after the bombing, John Vitale, who is the new mob boss and the interim boss after Giordano in St. Louis, meets with Pauly.
They met in a downtown hotel. Vitale is mad that Michaels was killed and he was pretty sure Pauly Leisure was responsible. He said he, the informant later said he asked Pauly, he said, what do you want, Local 110, take it.
Pauly told him, he said, John, whatever happens between the Syrians is none of your business. You take care of the Italian business, we’ll take care of the Syrian business.
The Italians mafia, the Italian mafia will have some benefit from Horseshoe Jimmy Michaels’ murder.
He had points in a Las Vegas casino with other Detroit and St.
Louis Italian mafia members. When he dies, his piece will just go to the remaining investors.
An interesting deal there. You know, there’s no way to like pass on to your heirs when you got points in a casino that’s kind of under the table, so to speak.
FBI agents will listen as leisure vents his anger at the mafia.
He says stuff like, F them, them stinking dagos. All my troubles and everybody’s troubles come from them dagos.
I ain’t going to take no backseat to them. That fucking Vitale ain’t never going to see the day he’ll dictate to me. I mean, that’s the end of their ballgame.
But he got, and Leisure got accomplished part of his goal. He was on his way.
[14:47] Hours after Michaels was bombed, he bragged, now top Syrian in town.
Jimmy Michaels’ wake presented kind of a dilemma for the Leisure outfit.
On the surface, they were all together.
They were all in business together. They were all in bed together with this labor’s union activity, this racketeering. and personally, family-wise.
[15:05] If they went, there might be a confrontation, but if they didn’t go, there’d be a lot of suspicion.
They decided that we’re all going to go and we’re all going to stand strong and have a show of strength there. Nothing happened.
Pauly immediately began to take over Local 110, forced out all Michael’s relatives, Anthony Leisure.
[15:27] Said, you know, just relax, you know, don’t move too fast.
But he didn’t do it. Five months later, the purging of all enemies from Local 110 began and ended pretty quick.
Jimmy Michael’s grandson was dismissed summarily from his union position, and his brother Francis will resign very shortly after that.
Now, Michael’s death was really considered a family matter within the Syrians, but it caused a lot of concern among mob bosses throughout the country.
There was a FBI recording of a St. Louis mob member said, bosses all over the country are really disturbed by this.
They said, you know, what a way for a man has been so respected for all his life to go. This is kind of low rent. Come on, his word was good.
The main thing in the family, if your word’s good, you’re reputable, you know, you’re good.
And it’s kind of an uneasy peace return to the St. Louis underworld for a while.
Some intelligence experts believed that the dispute had been settled.
Whatever it was that caused Jimmy Michaels’ bombing had been settled. but it wasn’t so sure.
[16:25] In May, Pauly Leisure was appointed an organizer and member of the Executive Board of Laborers Union Local 42 by Raymond Flynn, who they’d been in bed with, all the way back to the John Spica, who was a business manager.
In May, Pauly Leisure was appointed as an organizer and a member of the Executive Board of Laborers Union Local 42 by Raymond Flynn, who was the business manager, and you remember he was the guy that, you know, that John Spica was trying to get rid of when they got rid of John Spica.
The business manager was really the highest officer in that laborers’ union local.
It was the first alliance between Leisure and Ray Flynn on the surface after the Spica bombing.
Leisure will share any extra money he gets from Local 42 with all his loyal soldiers, relatives, and other soldiers that have taken him through this little mob war that’s gotten started. He’s consolidating his power.
[17:17] These are Syrians. The Michaels family is going to get some revenge, and they plot their own actions.
They weren’t any less fastidious than Polly Leisure in planning the murder.
Sadie Faheen, who is Jimmy Michaels’ sister, contributed $250,000 to a war chest to kill everybody responsible for her brother’s death.
Bounties were placed of $50,000 on Pauly and Anthony Leisure’s hits.
Assembling a Hit Squad
[17:45] They assembled a hit squad. A cousin in the Michaels family, a guy named called Beans Michaels, rented an apartment in suburban Jefferson County in a fictitious name.
This is going to be their war room where they could plan things without anybody knowing that they were even getting together who was involved in this.
They owned a chief of police in a small St. Louis community of St.
George, south side of St. Louis, and he provided them with two untraceable surveillance vehicles, and he insulated himself.
He had the police department’s mechanic purchase two used cars with cash that he, the chief, gave him personally and registered them under fictitious names and addresses. So they’ve got two hit cars registered under fictitious names and addresses.
They put together a bomb in this apartment, and in the end, investigators will find this apartment, they’ll find fingerprints of Michaels and this suburban chief of police, inside that apartment and on a magazine that was titled Law and Order.
It was a publication for chiefs of police.
This guy had a sharpest tool in the toolbox, wasn’t he? August 11th, 1981, Paul Leisure leaves his home in South St. Louis.
His mom walks out with him into the front yard.
He didn’t see George Sonny Faheen, who is Sadie’s son, and in the Michaels family, another guy named Jack Issa.
[19:08] Sitting in a car blocked down the street. They got identified by a witness later on.
Even before Poly Leisure inserted the key into the ignition, the car exploded, so they had a remote control detonated bomb up underneath the car.
Blast ripped apart the undercarriage of the car. He survives.
It was near death, but the surgeons brought him back. They amputated parts of both legs and repaired a lot of other serious injuries to him.
He once said, you know, I don’t care whether I can walk or not.
I just got to live until I kill these guys.
Here’s another instance where the remote starter didn’t work.
[19:44] Poly Leisure had a remote starter on that car, but you know, you just can’t, you can’t prevent that remote control detonated bomb and other types of bombs, like I said before.
It’d been a year since they killed Jimmy and I think he thought he was safe.
He didn’t even use the remote starter that morning.
[20:01] It might’ve curtailed his quest for control of the Mafia underworld, the labor unions and all that.
But now he has a vengeance back against Michaels and the Mafia and Batali because he thinks that the Michaels family, sure the Michaels family did this, and he thinks that Batali probably approved it and was involved in it, or some of the Italian Mafia was involved in it.
So now we’ve got him wanting to go after the Italians and the other Lebanese and any of the other Michaels family.
Pauli was a pretty bull guy. Another guy described him as high spirited and good spirits even after this.
He was motivated. He was motivated by revenge.
He said he once said, I pray to God let me walk to kill people.
I know that’s wrong. I’m motivated because I want to go out and kill 10 sticks of freaking dynamite.
I’m the only one I know of in the history of the whole country that ever walked away from a car bombing like that. And this guy was, he was a piece of work, wasn’t he?
He said in regards to the Michaels, I wish they’d come out here and let’s just get it over with. It’d do my heart good to blast it out with these fuckers.
Just give me two 45s. I feel like I could take a couple of slugs and drop them.
Six, five, four, I don’t care, you know, send them on. This guy was, he was a piece of work.
St. Louis mafia boss at the time, John Vitale, this is just before the heir apparent, Michael Trupiano.
[21:24] He seemed like he was a disinterested onlooker in this war between the Leisure and the Michaels family, but he was, like many mob guys, he was a master of treachery himself, and he will go on to help take some revenge on whoever killed his old friend, and it was his golfing buddy too, Jimmy Michaels, and really became an obsession with him, they say.
An informant will later say that John Vitale supposedly said, you No, they want Pauly and Anthony crack bad.
Jimmy Michael’s grandson wanted to give me $50,000 to crack Pauly Leisure while he’s in the hospital.
I said, you know, I don’t want to get involved because it’s none of my business.
I told him I don’t kill people for money, but in this case, I might.
And the bureau taped David Leisure saying, kill him, kill him so easy, make him die slow.
I knew the Michaels faction was responsible for the car bomb that took Pauly Leisure’s legs off.
David had a source in the St. Louis Police Department who identified the bombers for him. They identified these two guys by photo by this time.
Now they’re like stalking each other and searching around and they’re even kidnapping different family members and then torching them to learn about where others were.
Polly told David Leiser, he said, you know, if we catch one of these guys, we’ll work on him first.
You know, he had weird things. I mean, this guy, Polly Leiser was kind of weird.
He said, we’ll give them laxatives and then every time they take a shit, we’ll whop them with a baseball bat. Go figure that.
Maybe red hot pokers, right? There’s nothing wrong with a good blowtorch too.
Make them feel every bit of it.
Put their hands in the moving gear of a transmission. That’s a good option.
[22:53] I don’t know, man, this guy’s nuts. The Michaels family owned a farm about 100 miles south of St.
Louis, and the Leisure’s believed that family members might be hiding there.
Some of the Michaels family might be hiding there.
Couple three guys and Ray Flynn, the member of the union business manager, Pauli Leisure’s buddy in killing John Spica, drove down to the farm.
They were going to kill anybody that was there, but the house was empty.
So they decided, they thought they’d dangle a rope with some dynamite down the chimney, And if when the fireplace is lit, the whole cabin will blow up.
But one of the other guys said, you know, we better not do that.
There might be women and children inside and that would draw too much heat.
The Leisure’s learned about another guy who had been a conspirator in the bombing of Poly Leisure.
We learned where he worked and they tried to ambush him, but somebody scared him off on that.
One thing about these guys, they they are careful. I’ll say that they are careful.
And most organized crime guys are careful. That’s why you never solve these mob murders. start stalking, continuing to stalk each other.
Beans Michaels, and he has another brother, John Michaels, and they went to the Playboy Club in St. Louis County all the time, and they caught him there.
Some of the leaders, Anthony and David Leisure, followed him away from the club, but they realized they were being followed, so they took off and they got away, but then they found his car, their car, Beans’ car parked in front of his house, and they wanted to do a home invasion, but the other one said, And now, wait a minute, we don’t know who else is in there, wait.
[24:18] We might be running into a trap. He did, David Leisure did approach a friend who was a repairman for Southwestern Bell Telephone Company.
And they talked about installing wiretaps and voice activated recorders on the home telephone so they can learn, get a little intelligence on where these guys are.
These guys work just like the cops do, following people, stalking them, trying to catch them where they’re going, follow them away and see where they’re going next and putting wiretaps on them and home recorders on their home telephones.
Back in those days, you had these little voice-activated recorders.
[24:52] You could just tap on, put in somebody’s on the box right outside or where the wires came into the house, go hang it up there, and then each time somebody picked up the phone, it would activate the recorder.
It’s not a very good deal because there would be a drop in power on the line, and people would know that there’s something wrong with the telephone line.
The Leisure learned that one of the Michaels brothers, John Michaels always ate lunch at a restaurant close to the labor union office.
They thought they’d ambush him as he entered there, and there was an abandoned house right across the alley from the rear of the restaurant.
Finally, they stole a van and drove it to that house, got in that abandoned house right behind the rear of the restaurant.
As Michaels and a friend of his, a guy named Dennis Day, got out of Michaels’ car to go eat at this restaurant, Anthony jumps out opens fire at the shotgun.
John Michaels falls wounded.
Anthony Leisure shoots this Day guy and injured him. They took off in a stolen van.
That afternoon, somebody asked Anthony, why’d you shoot Day?
He didn’t have anything to do with this. He said, I don’t know why.
He was just standing there, so I shot him.
I mean, these guys, it was just out of hand. They were off the hook in St. Louis.
And Paul Leisure was really mad that they can’t seem to kill John Michaels. So they report back to Paul Leisure and they didn’t get these guys killed.
The Bombing of Fahim and the Stalking Begins
[26:12] He’s in a sense that they can’t seem to kill this John Michaels.
I don’t, at a long distance, I don’t, I never did that. You got to get up close to him.
David Leisure finally learns that one of the guys named Fahim, if you remember that name, Fahim, kind of more of a typical Syrian name, was one of the guys that planted the bomb on Poly Leisure and he lived at an apartment complex pretty close to Mississippi River.
He knew he drove a Volkswagen and he worked at the civil courts as a clerk.
So they started stalking him.
They saw him parking his car and walking several blocks to and from his office in the civil courts building.
They saw where he parked his cars on a multi-level garage adjacent to his own apartment building because he lived really close to the civil courts building so he could just walk to work every day.
That’s 1981, fall of 1981.
They drove to the parking garage, David Leisuren, another guy.
They checked out the Volkswagen and they left. They had to practice.
These guys always practice. David left, got a similar Volkswagen at a salvage yard and practiced putting a bomb in that car.
Later that next day, David Leisuren and his underling got a work car and watched Faheen as he went to the courthouse.
They had walkie-talkies, and one stayed over by the courthouse.
[27:26] And the other one had the walkie-talkie, went into the park garage where Faheen’s, car was parked, and put the bomb on there.
There was other people with Leisure that said, you know, you’re going to might kill some innocent people here in this enclosed area, but they didn’t care.
They got this bomb attached to Faheen’s Volkswagen, put it near the gas tank, which is up underneath the front hood, one of those Volkswagen bugs.
Later that day, Fahim gets off of work, comes back to his apartment, he gets behind the wheel in the car, puts the key in the ignition and turns it.
They wired this one to the ignition and it hit the gas.
The bomb went off, hit the gas. He’s incinerated almost instantly.
There’s another score finally settled by the leaders.
[28:11] Retribution for this and this area had been swift.
This was less than a year later after Pauly’s was bombed. He said that Pauly got a copy of the police report on the bombing of Faheyne, and he read through it and he said, look, burnt to death, both his legs gone, plus he burned up.
He was happy, you know, he got some revenge, got some paybacks.
The Leisures had a recent recruit into their gang. We had the same thing in the Spiro gang. They recruited a guy who was already an informant.
They recruited a guy, Michael Kornhardt, and he could not keep his mouth shut.
He was a thief, professional thief, but he was…
Just like in Kansas City and the Spiro gang, they recruited a guy that was way out of his league, did not really, wasn’t that guy to take part in murders.
Two days after Faheen was bombed, Kornhardt had been arrested and charged with the murder and he immediately broke.
The Arrest of Kornhardt and Plans for Revenge
[29:02] They didn’t really have that much on him. He fit the description of a man seen in a parking garage, but he knew about it and he started talking.
They released him on a bond pretty quick. The got him out on a bond.
At first, they weren’t concerned.
They thought the case against him was weak, and it really was, but they had sources in the police department that said, you know, this dude’s talking.
Well, they knew this Kornhardt was a weak sister. He might not be able to take a long stretch in the pen.
There’s police sources are saying that he’s cooperating. He could bring down a lot of people.
He’d been around long enough, and it was at enough of these scenes that he could bring down a lot of people.
Paul Leeser was pretty mad. He promised Kornhardt a job at Local 42 and paid $20,000 already of his legal expenses.
[29:49] It would be bad for the gang’s image, Pauly said, if we don’t go ahead and kill him, if he’s a snitch, we got to hit that kid.
You know, we’re gentle people. I want to tell you, bring him in here.
I’ll kill him right now. We’re gentle people.
[30:00] Pauly Leisure, he must’ve been a character. Pauly, now they start splitting apart.
He’s mad at David Leisure because he’s the one that brought this Kornhardt into the outfit.
David gave the contract to kill Kornhardt to some other newcomers to the outfit, and they were trying to impress Polly and make their bones.
Came up with a novel, less dangerous way to kill Kornhardt. They’d arrange a party and bring the victim there.
You know, hey, you know, we’re having a party, come on in, you’re our buddy.
He was a drug user and they just gave him an overdose.
That would be, but that scheme failed. This guy probably could take any kind of a dose you wanted.
Then they decided to shoot him. David had a clean pistol that was untraceable.
And a little bit later in 1982, July the 30th, actually 1982, a couple of leisure men took Kornhardt out on a job.
Well, anytime somebody invites you to go on a job, if it doesn’t feel quite right, don’t go, because that’s a way to get you isolated.
Said they had a house burglar in a rural area, rural St. Charles County, all lined up, gonna get a lot of money, it’s gonna be a big score.
They went back to his apartment with him because they said, oh, we need some gloves.
We got any gloves at their apartment. When they arrived at the burglary scene, Kornhardt got out of the car first.
One of the other guys shot him in the head from behind. When he fell, they shot him in the head again.
Then this is out in the country, so they just dragged his body into a nearby ditch and threw the gun in the cornfield. Of course, all this is gonna be found.
[31:24] Poly Leisure gives them two killers jobs in Local 42 and pays their initiation fee and all that.
Now this is gonna be the last murder of the Leisure War. FBI is starting to turn people and there’s a long racketeering and murder trial.
Comes up, they turn a lot of these guys, probably these last two that killed his corn heart.
They got convictions of all the leisures. Pauly Leisure gets 55 years in the penitentiary on a bunch of charges.
He told the judge, he said, the man that did this to me led lives of crime.
They’ve been murderers all their lives.
They attacked the FBI for failing to warn him that he was going to be bombed.
It’s a bad precedent, he said, when the FBI acts as judge, jury, and executioner.
I’ll and asked the court not to let this happen again.
And it was given a talk once here in Kansas City. And this woman obviously was connected to Sparrows.
And we spent a lot of time following this Carl Sparrow around trying to keep him from getting killed.
And finally, about three years later, they finally get him. Now we can’t follow this guy night and day. And he was in cooperative for three years.
So she keeps pressing me about how, you know, the FBI must’ve been paid off.
And, you know, they just let them kill the Sparrows.
And I said, you know, we can only do so much.
Finally, she gets done, and she said, well, you guys let him get killed.
You didn’t do a very good job, did you?
I said, well, I guess we didn’t. What are you going to do? Three years later, Pauli Leisure is going to be convicted in the state court.
This was all federal court before for racketeering.
[32:48] He’s going to take a conviction in state court for murder, the murder of Jimmy Michaels.
These Leisure’s don’t quit. Bomb threats received by an employee in the motel where the jurors are staying. They had to sequester the jurors.
No bomb was found. but he ends up being sentenced to life in prison without parole.
The prosecution had sought the death penalty. Anthony Leisure, like his brother, had no contrition in sentencing.
Said his words were kind of rambling, but he told the judge, I find it hard to show compassion for anybody who would blow up my brother, harm my mother, who I consider a saint.
I feel sorry for the community in which they are letting this Fred Prater go.
He was somehow involved with the Michaels.
He wears too many names. Sometimes he was a monster and he’s the one that ought to be locked up. Yeah, he’s on the loose.
Sentencing of Anthony and David Leisure
[33:33] I don’t feel I’m greedy or power hungry. Of course. Forty years.
Judge says 40 years, dude. Thank you.
That’s in federal court and state court. The jury convicts Anthony Leisure of manslaughter.
They had sought the death penalty on him, too. And he gets 10 years.
David Leisure, the final Leisure brother, he gets sentenced in federal court, he gets 55 years, and he said he had one request to the judge.
I would like to have my health checked.
It’s reported that the judge didn’t make any comments and said, that’ll be 55 years. I guess you can get 50, take 55 years to get your health checked.
They’ll check your health in the penitentiary at 55 years.
So that’s the end of the St. Louis mob story.
There’s not much going on there today. I don’t know whatever happened with the Assyrians, Lebanese, you know, kind of interesting little side story back when I was in the intelligence unit.
We got a call from the St. Louis Police Intelligence Unit and said, hey, there’s these guys coming to Kansas City, and they’re going to set up in different motels around the city, and they’re going to want to buy class rings.
This was a deal about buying gold.
[34:36] They put a big full-page article, they put a big full-page ad in the paper and say they’re buying class rings or other gold and people would show up and they’d weigh it and pay them for it.
And I don’t know as far as I could tell it was above board, but they were all Syrian and they were nice guys. They were really good guys. And I took the job.
I coordinated all their security at about three different locations.
So I would hire other off-duty policemen, tell them where to go and when to be there and then get the money.
They’d give me cash money and they gave me $30,000 one night just to hold because.
[35:11] They didn’t trust the, they didn’t have a safe in their hotel room and I don’t know, it was crazy. I didn’t have any idea what I was into at the time.
These guys, they were Syrian pawnbrokers and you know they were connected to the mob in St.
Louis, which said something about the guy that gave us the reference.
I didn’t have any idea about that kind of stuff then. They were buying some stolen stuff because they didn’t really check.
We had a little problem with the property unit sergeant that got mad because some stolen stuff went through their thing real quick, but, you know, I mean, you can’t check for that stuff.
And they’re just like, they were a pawn shop is what they were, and any pawn shop may buy some stolen stuff.
The bad thing about them is, see, they didn’t keep any local records and they were going back to St.
Louis, and so the pawn detail couldn’t come around and check all the stuff they bought.
I understand the property unit sergeant’s problem with them doing that, but they were within the bounds of the law and I don’t know, you just do what you do sometimes.
[36:10] So thanks a lot, guys. I really appreciate you listening. I know that you know
A plea for motorcycle safety and resources for PTSD
[36:14] I ride motorcycles and if you’re out there on the streets in your car, that it’s a 10,000 pound death trap for a motorcyclist, I’ll tell you that.
Look out for us, please look out for us. If you have a problem with PTSD and you have been in the service, please go to the VA website, get that hotline number and see what kind of help you can get.
And your drugs and alcohol, problem with that goes hand in hand with PTSD.
Whether you’ve been in the service or not, you can get help with our friend Anthony Ruggiano, a former Gambino guy who is now a drug and alcohol counselor down in Florida.
He’s got a hotline on his website at formedgangsters.com or his YouTube page.
Just start searching for Anthony Ruggiano Jr. You’re going to find him.
So like and subscribe. Tell your friends about the podcast.
Send it to your friends in St. Louis. Let’s put it up on your social media pages.
Let’s get as many listeners as we can.
It makes me feel better. The more listeners I got, the harder I’ll work.
I promise you that. So thanks a lot, guys.