"I Heard You Paint Houses": Frank "The Irishman" Sheeran & Closing the Case on Jimmy Hoffa Read Free Page A

talks. They were very smart from head to toe. They had mental toughness and physical toughness. But in one important way they were different. Russ was very low-key and quiet, soft-spoken even when he got mad. Jimmy exploded every day just to keep his temper in shape, and he loved publicity.
    The night before my testimonial dinner, Russ and I had a sit-down with Jimmy. We sat at a table at Broadway Eddie’s, and Russell Bufalino told Jimmy Hoffa flat-out he should stop running for union president. He told him certain people were very happy with Frank Fitzsimmons, who replaced Jimmy when he went to jail. Nobody at the table said so, but we all knew these certain people were very happy with the big and easy loans they could get out of the Teamsters Pension Fund under the weak-minded Fitz. They got loans under Jimmy when he was in, and Jimmy got his points under the table, but the loans were always on Jimmy’s terms. Fitz bent over for these certain people. All Fitz cared about was drinking and golfing. I don’t have to tell you how much juice comes out of a billion-dollar pension fund.
    Russell said, “What are you running for? You don’t need the money.”
    Jimmy said, “It’s not about the money. I’m not letting Fitz have the union.”
    After the sit-down, when I was getting ready to take Jimmy back to the Warwick Hotel, Russ took me aside and said: “Talk to your friend. Tell him what it is.” In our way of speaking, even though it doesn’t sound like much, that was as good as a death threat.
    At the Warwick Hotel I told Jimmy if he didn’t change his mind about taking back the union he had better keep some bodies around him for protection.
    “I’m not going that route or they’ll go after my family.”
    “Still in all, you don’t want to be out on the street by yourself.”
    “Nobody scares Hoffa. I’m going after Fitz, and I’m going to win this election.”
    “You know what this means,” I said. “Russ himself told me to tell you what it is.”
    “They wouldn’t dare,” Jimmy Hoffa growled, his eyes glaring at mine.
    All Jimmy did the rest of the night and at breakfast the next morning was talk a lot of distorted talk. Looking back it could have been nervous talk, but I never knew Jimmy to show fear. Although one of the items on the agenda that Russell had spoken to Jimmy about at the table at Broadway Eddie’s the night before my testimonial dinner was more than enough to make the bravest man show fear.
    And there I was in my kitchen in Philadelphia nine months after Frank Sheeran Appreciation Night with the phone in my hand and Jimmy on the other end of the line at his cottage in Lake Orion, and me hoping this time Jimmy would reconsider taking back the union while he still had the time.
    “My friend and I are driving out for the wedding,” I said.
    “I figured you and your friend would attend the wedding,” Jimmy said.
    Jimmy knew “my friend” was Russell and that you didn’t use his name over the phone. The wedding was Bill Bufalino’s daughter’s wedding in Detroit. Bill was no relation to Russell, but Russell gave him permission to say they were cousins. It helped Bill’s career. He was the Teamsters lawyer in Detroit.
    Bill Bufalino had a mansion in Grosse Pointe that had a waterfall in the basement. There was a little bridge you walked over that separated one side of the basement from the other. The men had their own side so they could talk. The women stayed on their side of the waterfall. Evidently, these were not women who paid attention to the words when they heard Helen Reddy sing her popular song of the day, “I Am Woman, Hear Me Roar.”
    “I guess you’re not going to the wedding,” I said.
    “Jo doesn’t want people staring,” he said. Jimmy didn’t have to explain. There was talk about an FBI wiretap that was coming out. Certain parties were on the tape talking about extramarital relations his wife, Josephine, allegedly had years ago with Tony Cimini, a soldier