Gambling bored him. A few hours later, the 38-year-old attorney, stunned and bewildered, found himself being transferred to the county jail, handcuffed to Georgie Taylor, who was a legend in local drug circles (he had made a million before he was eighteen) and who happened to be Jo Annies nephew. [30] Jimmy Chagra was acquitted of the murder of Judge Wood in front of Judge William S. Sessions, future director of the FBI, although he was found guilty of obstructing justice and conspiring to smuggle drugs. The consensus had always been that Jimmy Chagra would never amount to much. Lee had always been our strength., Lee couldnt shake the feeling that something or someone was stalking him. Fold this five ways and stick it where the elves dont play, he said. He had an affinity for cards and dice, for dope dealers and shady politicians, for cripples and nightclub singers, for dabblers in the black market and exponents of the quick buck. Clark assumed that he would go straight back to Caesars and claim some of his markers, but that wasnt Lees plan. While it was being renovated, he occupied an office in a building on Montana owned by another lawyer friend, Mickey Esper, who was related to Jo Annie. Instead of flying in the customary small planeload of 2000 pounds from Mexico, they imported 54,000 pounds from Colombia. Jo Annies own family, the Abrahams, had considerable wealth, and she continued to collect antiques and preserve an extravagant lifestyle. He left his hat and keys on the couch and walked down the hall to Lees office. Dirty Darlings. He went to the big guys at Caesars and told them that, by God, the next time his brother walked in that joint he wanted him treated like a goddam celebrity! Looking on, Joe marveled. In a secret interview with a group of DEA agents and prosecutors, Johnson had implicated at least sixty El Paso citizens as major drug traffickers. In Judge John Woods courtroom Kerr found the perfect forum for his crusade. And hes this huge drug kingpin. If she realized how pressed he had been for money in recent months, she didnt show it. Vivian did her best to smile. Jimmy wanted to be Lee. Jimmy couldnt stop talking about it.. They were married in Las Vegas. The Chagras were fiercely proud people, a handsome, hardy, beguiling line of Lebanese merchants and vendors who migrated near the turn of the century to Mexico and then to El Paso. He could betray a trust as casually as tipping a dealer a chip worth more than the dealer made in a month. Later, a superseding indictment added the charge of continuing criminal enterprise. By the time Lee finished dressing, Jo Annie had breakfast readyfreshly baked Syrian bread, butter, and a variety of fruit preserves. Catherine published a book about her life in 2015 titled Chagra: The King of Dope Drugs, Deceit and Dirty Darlings. She will be signing copies after the panel discussion. Some of them deposited large sums in the lawyers safe, against the inevitable. He was really happy that all the money was gone and he had to work again. He and Clark went back to the suite for a while. November 2022 Reader Quiz: What Did You Learn? He got 30 years. His sister, Patsy, recalled, It scared me to hear Lee talk like that. He earned a lot of money and became a high roller in Las Vegas, known for his very generous tipping. Everyone had assumed theyd made loveLee made a point of keeping her in his office long enough, then he flushed the toilet and gave her the money. It was in his blood. Lee was preoccupied this morning. Lee didnt seem at all depressed, said Donna Johnson, the law firms bookkeeper. In 1979, a federal grand jury in Midland, Texas, indicted Chagra on drug smuggling charges. Boyd, Kerr, and the DEA had worked so hard selling the media on the contention that El Paso was the hub of dope trafficking in the Southwest that everyone took it as gospel. Sometimes Jimmy pretended he was Lee, signing his name Lee Chagra and repeating Lees stories as though they had happened to him. Kerr thought Chagra was vulgar and common, and Chagra enjoyed enhancing this image by slipping up behind Kerr and whispering things that made the prosecutor blush. Its like Teddy Roosevelt always said, Lee told him, and now his smile was back in place. Since he was a stranger to El Paso, Pitts asked a local smuggler named Jack Stricklin for the name of a good lawyer. Chagra was also a heavy gambler in Las Vegas, Nevada, and attracted attention with his flamboyant ways. Goodman insisted that Chagra not testify. It is hard for me to go back into my cell and think of myself as the man the newspapers have made me out to be. It was four years before most people recognized Jimmys achievement, but the operation was a landmark in marijuana trafficking. Pitts fancied himself a big-timer and concluded that Chagra must be pretty big himself if he was demanding thirty grand. Yosephs gazed moved around the room. When Lee was murdered sixteen years later, Charles Alan Wright, one of the countrys leading authorities on constitutional law, called him one of the few students who stand out in my memory., There was never any doubt that when Lee passed the state bar exam he would join Jo Annies brother, Sib Abraham, who had finished law school the previous year and had already set up his practice in El Paso. They were like a sickness with him., Lee also loved El Paso and had never thought of living anywhere else. Woods first big drug case came in May 1971. It was a shocking verdict after the FBI conducted its most extensive investigation since the Kennedy assassination. He discussed with the CIA the possibility of liquidating all major drug traffickers in the Middle East; it was estimated that 150 key assassinations would do the job. Catherine figures she was 10 when her dad went to prison. The case had been dead for two years, but Kerr had a plan. Lee Chagras funeral was a microcosm of all the extremes in his life. It wasnt the cocaine so much as the lifestyle it symbolized. [6] In fact, he is described as having been "no less than the biggest marijuana smuggler in the country" during that time. SOLD OUT: Against All Odds: Oscar Goodman and the 40th Anniversary of the Jimmy Chagra Murder Trial. A block from the cathedral, on North Mesa at the edge of the downtown business district, Lee Chagras new office building was closed for good. It was the first time anyone from El Paso had thought of using a tramp steamer. Lee had never discussed with any of the staff the purpose of the apartment at the rear of the complex, but they knew he was having a regular evening affair with a stripper from the Lamplighter Club. On the monitor he saw a tall, muscular black man in his early twenties. With the help of their principled mother before her tragic death, and haunted by the shadow of their father, Dirty Darlings is a portrait of courage as three women attempt to re-assemble the shattered pieces of their lives. Wood was finally convinced that it was his duty. A grand jury in Nashville had indicted Chagra and forty others on a charge of conspiracy to import and distribute marijuana. They say Jimmy lacked ambition. I never know if we have fifty thousand dollars in our account or fifty cents. Hed fought a lot of tough battles at Lees side, and he loved them because they were something that he and Lee did together. Vivian died of cancer in July 1986. When Joe and Lee had drawn up their partnership, the arrangement was that they would share all revenues and losses, but Joe hadnt counted on sharing Lees gambling losses. He was later tried and acquitted in the assassination but received an additional sentence for obstruction of justice. Two of Chagras daughters, Christa and Catherine, now live in Smithville. The perfect vehicle for the imperfect time. Kerr claimed that money didnt matter, that his mission in life was vigorously and, I hope, successfully prosecuting all offenders that his clients could provide, but the mere fact that his adversary put such emphasis on money and the trappings of wealth must have touched some deep reserve of resentment in him. Donna had never seen him before, but Lee said that he was expecting the man and pressed the electronic button to admit him. The fifty-page text of the interview was used as supplemental material by a grand jury investigating a tax fraud, but it was never given the slightest weight as courtroom evidence. He was a mamas boy, always pouting and complaining. On the night before he was murdered, Lee Chagra returned home to El Paso flushed with the euphoria a gambler feels when he believes his luck is changing. It was becoming an obsession. For the time being, the Jerry Johnson episode played itself out in obscurity, but the Chagra name burst into the headlines in the opening days of 1977. Lees limit was $3000, and he would have played for $10,000 had Caesars Palace allowed it. Kerrs just working the tailings, he said. She remembers being elated when he got out, and the heartbreak that he was largely unchanged, as was her love for him: He was always looking for the next million and used a credit card a friend had given him strictly for essentials to rack up tens of thousands of dollars in gambling debts. While federal agents snapped photographs from the parking lot across the street, hundreds of mourners jammed St. Patricks. By early autumn 1976 Lee was back in El Paso, pumping money. Defendants convicted on a kingpin rap were not eligible for parole, period. All things considered, 1978 has probably been the worst year of Lee Chagras life. Catherine remembers the prison visits as the best times she ever had with her father. If Jo Annie was conscious of this, she moved among them without rancor, beautifully composed and self-possessed. A major law firm that always invited the top six UT law graduates to a spring gala invited only five in 1962. A short time later there was a knock, and Lee admitted two hookers to the room. The government seemed to know it didnt have a case, but it was determined to see how far it could travel. He may or may not have locked it. Christa remembers the family being on food stamps after her dad went to jail. Clark was dog tired and went straight to bed. He always got excited the moment he felt the clamor and hysteria of Caesars but this time he was practically dancing on the walls. The news that a task force of federal and state agents had seized a DC-4 with 17,000 pounds of top-grade Colombian marijuana in Ardmore, Oklahoma, on December 30 hit El Paso like a sonic boom. He was not very good at suffering alone, and friends and family visited him almost constantly. If it was a crime to love the fast lane, Lee Chagra was guilty. There was a ritual that he always observed before going downstairs to the casino. Every time the local papers wrote anything about Lee, the story started with Indicted drug trafficker Lee Chagra. Lee didnt appear to like Lou Esper, but he was one of the few people in town who tolerated him. I blocked the door with my body, Donna recalled, but he opened it enough to see the money.. Jimmy preferred the Sinatra penthouse with its white baby grand piano and spiral staircase. [39], Chagra married his third wife, Lynda Ray, while living under the name James Madrid on November 22, 2005. That was the year Lee and Jo Annie started building their new home on Frontera Road in the Upper Valley. On the cartoon, Clark had written Wood below the eagle and Chagra below the mouse. Wood was apparently confusing the fifty-page transcript of the secret interview with actual grand jury testimony. The sisters made mistakes, too, some by failing, in their youth, to realize that a substantial portion of their larger-than-life family history was a cautionary tale, an admonition that for some, life is best lived smaller and more quietly, away from big money and bright lights and celebrities with teeth so white and so impossibly perfect. As Lee reached for the dice, he recited a spiel that was also part of his ritual. And it was killing Lee. Please feel free to use any other table in the casino. Like so many sheep, the nickel-and-dime players started backing away. Jimmy was born four years later, and they soon nicknamed him Little Mischief. Lees morning coffee was perfect, and the cocaine was first-rate. Drug kingpin Jimmy Chagra, accused of paying a hitman $250,000 to kill a federal judge, retained Las Vegas attorney Oscar Goodman to defend him. The scam brought in more money than Lee had ever thought of making in his law practice. On May 29, 1979, the day that Jimmy was originally supposed to go on trial in Judge Woods court, John Wood was assassinated in the driveway outside his apartment. By New Years Day it was the top story in town, and the defendants were being called the El Paso Ten. He couldnt have flushed it down the toilet faster than the way he gambled it and lost it, she said. In a short time the bust was being described as the biggest one in El Paso history. His dislike for narcotic cops, particularly agents provocateurs, had been stoked to a white-hot hatred that nearly consumed both his private and his professional life. Almost every one of Chagras clients who had been sent to prison reported visits from DEA agents who pumped them for information about Chagra and offered deals if they would incriminate him. The verdict in the Tucson trial had been sublime: in a highly publicized, multicount bank fraud indictment, Lee had walked his man on every count. No man could have been prouder of his heritage than Wood; he was a confirmed, unapologetic elitist, a descendant of hardy pioneer-stock aristocrats. WebDrug kingpin who was charged with the murder of the US district court judge who would have presided at his drug trial. On August 31, 1977, Lee Chagra appeared in Judge Woods court to file a motion of discovery, asking that the judge turn over DEA reports, customs reports, grand jury probes, any material that would reveal when Stricklin was supposed to have engaged in continuing criminal activity. With Redd Fox. In fact, the charges were dismissed because there was no evidence to bring charges in the first place. The shotgun murder of an Oklahoma gambler in El Paso some years earlier had convinced him that the Dixie Mafia was making a power play in El Paso, and he had instigated a controversial grand jury investigation. David Long? Lee said. Most afternoons as Donna and Sandy were crossing the parking lot after work, they saw her, and sometimes two or three other strippers from the Lamplighter, hurrying toward Lees office. Wallace confessed that he had taken part in the burglary attempt on Mickey Espers office and also the attempt to rob the poker game at Jimmy Salomes house. When Clark arrived downstairs with his luggage, he saw Lee at one of the blackjack tables, arguing with a Teamster guy who was apparently in charge of credit for the casino. While Lee ate, Jo Annie puttered with the Christmas decorations. Its better to bust your ass trying and get kicked all over tomorrow than live all your life like those little gray bastards out there., A few weeks after the Vegas trip, Lee was hospitalized for a long overdue hemorrhoidectomy. Kerr escaped with only minor glass cuts. Uncle Lou, who had recently been paroled in California, had a drug habit of long standing. The greatest job of bullshit advocacy Ive ever seen, Clark Hughes said of Lees performance. Lee and Joe began to consider filing a harassment suit against Wood, Kerr, and various federal agents. Despite the differences in background and age (Stricklin was almost ten years younger), Chagra and Stricklin became more than lawyer and client; they became close friends. The position of federal authorities was that even though Joe Chagra was a lawyer, he was also suspected in conspiracy to conceal the crime; therefore, their conversations were not covered by attorney-client privilege. In the winter. The hitman, Charles Harrelson, was the father of actor Woody Harrelson. In the summer of 1975, Jimmy finally hit the big time. Jimmys Florida operation, far from being an immediate disaster, disbanded after successfully offloading fifty tons of grass from a Colombian freighter in March. No, you got it backwards, Lee said when he saw it. Jimmy had given her a couple of kids and a lasting pain in the ass. When he read copies of Kerrs motion and Woods reply, Chagra was flabbergasted and then outraged. It looked as though he was set for the night. Its David Long, the first man said. A man named David Long phoned before you woke up, she told him. Part of it was paranoia, his gut instinct that some malevolent authority was watching and waiting, and part of it was the sort of perverse obstinacy that makes some men walk through a wall rather than open a door. It was as if their friendship had come to a fork in the road, and Lee had wandered off in another direction. Lee had always lived his life on the edge of respectability, goading the El Paso establishment by defending hardened criminals, consorting with known drug smugglers, and cultivating his image as the Black Striker. [12] Their family name was historically "Bushaada", but Jimmy's grandfather changed it. Wood pressed on, however, announcing that the grand jury investigation concerned not only Lee Chagra and Stricklin; it also involved Sib Abraham and others. Visions of the 1973 fiasco in Nashville that had almost ruined his law career danced through his mind. [38] A fictitious name reference to the Judge John Wood assassination also appeared in an The FBI Files episode "Dangerous Company" as the show regularly changed names of real-life people to protect privacy. This friendship, the fact that the prosecutor and the judge were seen socializing so often, caused some lawyers to question Woods impartiality. [4][11] Jimmy Chagra also had a sister named Patsy. Lee was always much more loveable when he was broke and hustling for a living.. Eventually, Jimmys limit was $10,000 a hand and his credit almost unlimited. Technically Lee had won the battle, but there was little doubt that Wood had landed a crippling, perhaps fatal blow to the attorneys already battered reputation. Later, Jo Annie gave him an ebony cane with a gold satyrs-head handle. To mark the 40th anniversary of the trial of drug kingpin Jimmy Chagra, who was accused of paying a hitman $250,000 to kill a federal judge John Wood, Oscar Goodman, former mayor and at the time Chagras defense attorney, will join the late mobsters daughter, Catherine, to revisit But, speaking to his ex-wife, Vivian, in a federal prison more than 30 years ago, he said he was not a killer. It took three days for an ingenious pulley apparatus to hoist the 100-pound bales to the top of the cliffs. I dont know how much longer I can do this, he confided. And Im going to charge you ten thousand dollars.. What a strange, twisted love. [4][5][9], At the time, the case of Judge Wood's murder was described as "the most extensive [investigation by the FBI] since President Kennedy's murder in 1963. Chagra: The King of Dope Drugs, Deceit and Dirty Darlings, WATCH: Indiana father arrested on live TV after toddler is seen with gun. [21] His drug case went to trial and Chagra was found guilty in August 1979 and sentenced to 30 years. He was a fanatic about his family: he lavished gifts on his wife, his children, his mother, his sister. I have never found anything, he said pleasantly, in any of these grand jury investigations. Sib remembered: Candidly, we were very, very successful. [9][13] Reportedly, he used gambling as a method of laundering money he received through trafficking drugs. [10][4], Jimmy got into drug smuggling in 1969 and became one of the largest smugglers in the United States, trafficking drugs from Mexico and Colombia by plane and boat. His dream was to stash away $20 million, all taxes paid. After about an hour Lee had lost $90,000. A rigorous and lengthy investigation into the murder brought Jimmy Chagra front and center. A third, Cynthia Jones Chagra, lives in Austin. Two of their five children were with her. They didnt count all the bundles of cash in the tennis bag, but there was more money than either of them had ever seen in one place, something like $450,000. With the gambling and the ostentatious living, the money never lasted long. Jamie Boyd was the consummate politician. They knew about the safe in the floor of the bathroom, but there were othersone beneath the carpet near the fireplace in the living room of the private suite and another in the master bedroom. In a few years Abraham and Chagra had the leading anti-establishment law firm in the city. He died from injuries resulting from an automobile accident that occurred on December 6, 1996. Except for a few faithful clients like Jack Stricklin, Lees practice was at rock bottom. Thats the reason Im going to release it to you.Thats what Ive been trying to tell you. The family was breaking apart. [31][32], In a deal with the federal government, Jimmy Chagra admitted to his role in the murder of Judge Wood and the attempted murder of Assistant United States Attorney James Kerr. Lee was down and Jimmy was up. She had worn a pair of panty hose under the suit and as they were cruising out in the middle of a lake in Joes speedboat, Jimmy called everyones attention to her bizarre outfit and ripped her panty hose in one thigh. There were at least twenty lawyers for the defense, but apparently the entire burden of prosecution fell on poor Kilcrease. A shake-up of the entire federal drug enforcement apparatus was under way, ramrodded by Nixons ranking authority on drugs, G. Gordon Liddy. Catherine moved to Phoenix about three years later to be near the federal lockup where her father did time, visiting every Sunday for 20 years. Chagra, 39, a licensed professional gambler, was accused of paying Charles V. Harrelson $250,000 to kill the judge. The judge said he had spent eight or ten hours reading Jerry Edwin Johnsons 1976 grand jury testimony and the transcript of the IRS investigation. Lee Chagra by some of his fans was murdered in his office and robbed of some $450,000 that might have been intended for a mob boss. As he pulled off the exit ramp above a truck stop on IH 10, Lee could see the Indians car parked in the shadows behind some eighteen-wheelers that idled in the predawn chill. A case in point was that of an unsuspecting El Paso cafe owner who was conned by two agents into conspiring to buy stolen government weapons. Lee drew a crowd simply by walking through the front door at Caesars Palace, passing out money, and asking how much they loved him. It became his trademark. Though Jimmy Chagras name was never officially mentioned, almost everyone assumed that he had masterminded the scheme. In the early summer of 1973 Lee experienced for the first time in his life how it felt to be on the other side. After two days the jury reported itself hopelessly deadlocked, eight to four for acquittal. He needs you to look it over before he mails it back.. Jimmy and the crew of the chartered jet were arrested by Colombian authorities. With the agent providing invaluable assistance at every stage, Renteria and several others were drawn into the government trap. Lee meant $10,000 for all three defendants, but Pitts didnt understand that. He was already doing time on the fraud charge at La Tuna federal correctional institution, which was on the New Mexico state line not far from El Paso. Part of the reason was his honest conviction that even the lowest, meanest, rottenest scum on the face of the earth deserved, and in fact were guaranteed, a right to a fair trial. I knew he was dying, Catherine Chagra said. The silence was monumental. Lee cried a lot in those days. Before, they ate beans and a little meat. He just picked up the money and tossed it in a drawer. Many a night, the Chagra brothers would play all six spots on a blackjack table, for anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000 a hand. But the mere act of talking on the telephone seemed to boost his confidence. Those words, that adamant denial, were lost until this years Halloween floods in Central Texas displaced them from the attic of Jim McCullochs home on Bluff Springs Road in Southeast Austin, where for decades the transcribed words of Chagras ex-wife and the federal prisoner had been stored, then forgotten. 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