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° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° ° Thacher island—September 1967 Joe Barboza found it hard to believe that his life might end here—in this place. New England Mafia boss Raymond L. S. Patriarca, known simply as the Man—a moniker that grew out of the respect he had built up among gangsters far and wide—was coming for him, and he would not give up the hunt until Barboza was dead. This Joe knew. Given the life he had led up to this point, Barboza had figured he’d take his last breath sooner or later on the streets of East Boston, seated at the bar at the cavernous Ebb Tide Lounge on nearby Revere Beach, or at any other number of places where mob killers like him plied their trade. But here, on this God-forsaken island? It was nearly impossible to imagine. Barboza had been holed up for the past month on Thacher Island, an unforgiving fifty-acre pile of jagged rock covered by sea grass and poison ivy about a mile off the coast of Rockport, Massachusetts. The island, under twenty-four-hour protection by the U.S. Marshal Service, was crawling with rats and snakes that had been cultivated to help ward off intruders . The only intruders thus far had been the seagulls that made routine dive-bombing runs to pick off unsuspecting vermin as they scurried out of their island holes. The deep, hollow wail of a foghorn, sounding twice every sixty seconds, rang incessantly in Barboza’s head. His enemies had vowed to send Barboza to Hell, but he felt as if he were already there. Joe’s only solace came in the companionship of his wife and their young daughter; both had been forced into hiding with him, and the marshals had sworn to give up their own lives to protect them. Would their protection be enough? It was a question Barboza asked himself again and again. He had never before had to depend on anyone else for his own safety. It was a foreign concept to him. He had always been the predator, an animal stalking its prey. But now he was the quarry—he was the kill. In the eyes of La Cosa Nostra, Joe Barboza had become the 1 Oh Sinnerman where you gonna run to?° nina simone 2° casey sherman most wanted man in America. His secrets and, more important, his lies had the potential to destroy the New England Mafia and damage crime families from coast to coast. For this, Joe Barboza had to be killed. The U.S. government had taken extraordinary measures to keep him safe. But the one thing Barboza knew was that if the Mafia wanted you dead—you were dead. The key was to strike first. Joe Barboza had fought his own battles on the streets with pistols, rifles, knives, ice-picks, and bare hands. Not that a weapon would do him any good now. Still, a killing tool in his murderous hands might make him feel more at ease, help to take the edge off. The only thing Joe Barboza could do now was hide. He had never hidden from anything in his life. Barboza’s secret location had been recently revealed in an article printed in a Boston newspaper under the headline “How to Hide a 250-lb Canary.” Barboza’s protector, U.S. marshal John Partington, had been notified that upon reading the piece, Raymond Patriarca had assembled an assassination squad to silence Joe once and for all. Patriarca had recently summoned mob associate Vincent Teresa to his headquarters inside the Coin-O-Matic Vending Company at 168 Atwell Avenue in the Italian section of Federal Hill in Providence, Rhode Island. The dingy mint-green building was hardly fit for a Mafia king like Patriarca—and that is exactly how he wanted it. Like most successful mob leaders, the Man worked to cultivate a low profile. The only hint of the power within was the fleet of polished Cadillacs parked curbside in front of the Coin-O-Matic’s dirty picture windows. When Teresa arrived he was led to a backroom, where the boss dictated his murder decree. “You take (Maurice) Pro Lerner up there and case the island,” Patriarca ordered. “See if you can get Barboza!”1 Teresa was an unlikely choice for such a mission. Known in mob circles as “Fat Vinnie,” Teresa was obese, weighing well over three hundred pounds, with beady eyes and black, slicked-back hair. Teresa was a swindler...

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