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The Lawyer Who Taught Police About Money Laundering, Then Ordered His Wife's Murder · FBI Files

0:03
Speaker 1: In 1992, a young mother was gunned down in front
0:06
Speaker 1: of her children. Police searched for answers but found nothing.
0:14
Speaker 1: Then family members offered a startling clue. It would take
0:20
Speaker 1: local and federal agents to untangle an intricate web of money, drugs,
0:24
Speaker 1: and murder to capture the architects of a heartbreaking crime.
1:01
Speaker 2: Two young boys were the only witnesses to their mother's murder.
1:05
Speaker 2: The horrible crime appeared unmotivated, senseless, and random. I'm Jim Kallstrom,
1:11
Speaker 2: former head of the FBI's New York office. The victim,
1:14
Speaker 2: the wife of a prominent Atlanta attorney, was also a
1:18
Speaker 2: woman burdened with a secret. The FBI believed that secret
1:22
Speaker 2: led to her death. They hoped its discovery would also
1:26
Speaker 2: lead to her killer.
1:34
Speaker 1: November 29th, 1992, Atlanta, Georgia. Travelers returned home at the
1:42
Speaker 1: end of the Thanksgiving holiday. 39-year-old Sarah Tokars and her
1:48
Speaker 1: two children had spent the long weekend with her parents
1:51
Speaker 1: in Florida. Her husband, a well-known lawyer and judge, was
1:57
Speaker 1: away on business. After a nine hour drive, they arrived
2:02
Speaker 1: safely in their suburban Atlanta neighborhood of Marietta. The house
2:12
Speaker 1: was dark as they pulled into the driveway. But it
2:26
Speaker 1: was not empty. Sarah did not see a man waiting
2:33
Speaker 1: in the shadows of the garage. He brandished a weapon.
2:40
Speaker 1: The gunman forced Sarah back into the SUV. The terrified
2:47
Speaker 1: woman had a six-year-old at her side and a four-year-old
2:50
Speaker 1: still asleep in the car. She had no choice. The
3:05
Speaker 1: man put his gun to Sarah's head and told her
3:07
Speaker 1: to drive towards the city. She followed instructions. As they
3:19
Speaker 1: reached an empty development, he told her to turn off.
3:24
Speaker 1: She refused. She pleaded with him to let her children go.
3:34
Speaker 1: He answered with a single gunshot to her head. As
3:38
Speaker 1: the gunman grabbed her purse and fled, the vehicle kept rolling.
3:44
Speaker 1: The children still inside. When it came to a stop,
3:50
Speaker 1: Sarah's six-year-old son had to reach across his mother's body
3:53
Speaker 1: to turn off the ignition. He unbuckled his groggy four-year-old
4:00
Speaker 1: brother from his car seat. then ran to the nearest house. There,
4:11
Speaker 1: a neighbor called 911. Officers responded to the report of
4:20
Speaker 1: a possible homicide in the vicinity of Powers Road. Cobb
4:26
Speaker 1: County Police were dispatched immediately. Homicide detectives arrived as officers
4:39
Speaker 1: fanned out to search for the gunman. Police briefed them
4:47
Speaker 1: on the spot. The two young boys who witnessed the
4:51
Speaker 1: shooting identified the victim as their mother, Sarah Tokars. Their father,
4:58
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars, was out of town. Police were already trying
5:02
Speaker 1: to contact him. Forensic technicians examined the vehicle where it
5:08
Speaker 1: had stopped. There might be trace evidence outside as well
5:14
Speaker 1: as inside the car. An analysis confirmed that the boys
5:19
Speaker 1: had told police. The gunman was sitting directly behind Sarah
5:23
Speaker 1: Tokars when he pulled the trigger. Blood spatter patterns suggested
5:30
Speaker 1: he had used a shotgun. Detectives knew it would be
5:40
Speaker 1: difficult to get detailed information from children so young, especially
5:45
Speaker 1: after such a traumatic experience. The oldest one, six years old,
5:52
Speaker 1: would try his best. He said the killer was a
6:00
Speaker 1: black male wearing jeans, a sweatshirt, and a cap. He
6:07
Speaker 1: could not be more specific. The boy didn't know which
6:12
Speaker 1: way the killer had run after he grabbed his mother's purse.
6:17
Speaker 1: But he said the weapon looked like a pirate's gun
6:19
Speaker 1: that you would see on TV. Detectives were not sure
6:26
Speaker 1: what he meant. Maybe the autopsy would tell them more.
6:35
Speaker 1: Detectives tracked down relatives living in the area to take
6:38
Speaker 1: custody of the boys until their father could be located.
6:41
Speaker 1: Police learned the family's address by running the plates on
6:50
Speaker 1: the vehicle. They continued the investigation at the Tokars' home
6:56
Speaker 1: where the abduction had occurred. In the living room, they
7:09
Speaker 1: found a security dowel lying next to a sliding glass door.
7:15
Speaker 1: The killer had likely entered the house here. The home
7:20
Speaker 1: security system had not been activated. No alarm sounded as
7:25
Speaker 1: the intruder entered. Perhaps a burglar had taken advantage of
7:31
Speaker 1: the lax security, and Sarah surprised him when she returned home.
7:37
Speaker 1: Whoever the burglar was, he hadn't left any trace evidence
7:41
Speaker 1: at the Tokars' home. There was little to go on,
7:45
Speaker 1: according to Cobb County Chief Detective Arthur Allred.
7:51
Speaker 3: At this point, we just really didn't know what happened.
7:53
Speaker 3: This was in an upper-middle-class neighborhood. This was a mother
8:02
Speaker 3: with her two children, and this type of crime just
8:06
Speaker 3: didn't occur in this area at all. The most serious
8:09
Speaker 3: crime we had probably vandalism. So initially, we were really
8:16
Speaker 3: baffled as to what had happened and why.
8:22
Speaker 1: Sarah's eldest son worked with a police sketch artist and
8:25
Speaker 1: described the man in the dark who had killed his mother.
8:29
Speaker 1: The drawing of a thin black man wearing a knit
8:31
Speaker 1: hat was released to the public. But the six-year-old's description
8:38
Speaker 1: was too vague to elicit any viable leads. The victim's husband,
8:46
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars, was contacted at his hotel in Montgomery, Alabama.
8:52
Speaker 1: He returned to Atlanta immediately. As a criminal defense attorney,
8:59
Speaker 1: Tokars was aware he would be considered an early suspect
9:02
Speaker 1: in his wife's murder. He had his own attorney present
9:07
Speaker 1: when he spoke to authorities. They quickly established his alibi
9:13
Speaker 1: so police could pursue more promising leads. Detectives confirmed that
9:19
Speaker 1: at the time of the murder, Fred Tokars was in Alabama.
9:25
Speaker 1: He had been visiting a client incarcerated in the Montgomery Jail.
9:31
Speaker 1: The grieving husband assured police that he and Sarah had
9:34
Speaker 1: a strong marriage. He would do anything he could to
9:40
Speaker 1: help find her killer. Tokars agreed to walk detectives through
9:49
Speaker 1: the house. As far as he knew, the doors were
9:56
Speaker 1: locked and the security rod was in place when he
9:58
Speaker 1: left for Montgomery. He explained that he had intentionally left
10:05
Speaker 1: the alarm off because a plumber was scheduled to fix
10:07
Speaker 1: the hot water heater over the weekend. Tokars led detectives
10:17
Speaker 1: to the basement where he kept his home office. He
10:22
Speaker 1: said he usually had about $ 1, 500 locked in the safe.
10:27
Speaker 1: Now it was open and empty. Its combination was hidden
10:33
Speaker 1: in a nearby file. Only he and his wife knew
10:37
Speaker 1: it was there. Perhaps Sarah had taken the money on
10:42
Speaker 1: her trip to Florida. It was also possible that the
10:48
Speaker 1: burglar had found the combination and taken the cash. Ultimately,
10:54
Speaker 1: Tokars couldn't specify how much money, if any, was missing.
10:57
Speaker 1: To police, nothing else in the house seemed disturbed, and
11:02
Speaker 1: no clues pointed to the killer's identity.
11:07
Speaker 3: A lot of people were frightened. A lot of people
11:11
Speaker 3: were I just couldn't believe that this would happen to
11:15
Speaker 3: a mother in front of her children, and especially in
11:18
Speaker 3: the neighborhood where it occurred. So there was a lot
11:24
Speaker 3: of pressure on the department to find who had killed her.
11:31
Speaker 1: Police hoped the coroner's report would give them more. Lab
11:37
Speaker 1: examiners confirmed that Sarah Tokers had been killed with a.
11:39
Speaker 1: 410 shotgun To a child, if that type of weapon
11:45
Speaker 1: had been sawed off, it might look like a 17th
11:48
Speaker 1: century flintlock pistol used by pirates on TV. Only the
11:54
Speaker 1: plastic wadding and buckshot were recovered from the SUV. Because
12:00
Speaker 1: no shell casing had been ejected, they would not be
12:03
Speaker 1: able to match anything to a specific weapon if one
12:06
Speaker 1: were later found. the examiner discovered no foreign hairs, fibers,
12:12
Speaker 1: or fingerprints on the body or clothing. The anonymous killer
12:18
Speaker 1: had left nothing that could lead investigators to his identity.
12:26
Speaker 1: Former Assistant United States Attorney Buddy Parker, like many members
12:29
Speaker 1: of the Atlanta community, was stunned by the news of
12:32
Speaker 1: the murder. We had a discussion.
12:36
Speaker 4: That morning about the notoriety of the homicide of it
12:40
Speaker 4: being the wife of Fred Tokars, who was known within
12:44
Speaker 4: the legal community, having been a former assistant district attorney
12:49
Speaker 4: for Fulton County. I was familiar with Fred Tokars in
12:53
Speaker 4: his role as a criminal defense lawyer in a matter
12:57
Speaker 4: that was then pending in our office, a matter regarding
13:02
Speaker 4: the investigation of a particular drug dealer.
13:07
Speaker 1: Fred Tokar's lucrative criminal defense practice brought him into contact
13:11
Speaker 1: with many men accused of federal drug charges. Rarely does
13:17
Speaker 1: such a murder have a simple motive. Solving the case
13:22
Speaker 1: would not be easy. The following day, two women came
13:29
Speaker 1: to the Cobb County Police Station. Sarah Tokar's sister and
13:34
Speaker 1: her cousin had a file they needed to show detectives.
13:40
Speaker 1: Sarah had entrusted her sister with the file three years earlier.
13:48
Speaker 1: At the time, Sarah made her promise to take it
13:50
Speaker 1: to police if anything ever happened to her. It contained
13:56
Speaker 1: what appeared to be lists of Fred Tokar's bank accounts
13:59
Speaker 1: and their balances. Women suggested that the papers might be
14:04
Speaker 1: related to Sarah's attempt to divorce Fred. Her sister's marriage
14:11
Speaker 1: was not as strong as Fred had led police to believe.
14:16
Speaker 1: Sarah wanted a divorce, but whenever she broached the subject,
14:20
Speaker 1: he threatened to use his legal connections to get sole
14:22
Speaker 1: custody of their children. Sarah was trapped. If she ever
14:31
Speaker 1: hoped to divorce Fred and keep her children, she needed leverage.
14:37
Speaker 1: After the incident, Sarah had secretly copied some of Fred's
14:40
Speaker 1: files and gave them to her sister for safekeeping. She
14:46
Speaker 1: suspected they outlined illegal activities he might be involved in.
14:53
Speaker 1: If that were so, they could be her only leverage
14:55
Speaker 1: against him in court. Investigators reviewed the files carefully. Perhaps
15:06
Speaker 1: they would help police determine whether Sarah Tokar's death was
15:09
Speaker 1: a botched robbery or a carefully planned conspiracy. Cobb County
15:17
Speaker 1: detectives called the FBI office in Atlanta for help. They
15:23
Speaker 1: hoped that Special Agent Michael Twible could determine if Fred
15:26
Speaker 1: Tokar's bank statements were somehow linked to the murder.
15:31
Speaker 5: We were contacted by the Cobb County authorities concerning the
15:36
Speaker 5: documents they had discovered, which were brought to them by
15:40
Speaker 5: Sarah Tokars' sister and cousin, which revealed that Mr. Tokars,
15:44
Speaker 5: her husband, had been involved in setting up offshore bank
15:48
Speaker 5: accounts and offshore corporations.
15:53
Speaker 1: It would take time for Agent Twible and his team
15:55
Speaker 1: to unravel the names and finances on those documents to
15:58
Speaker 1: see if they had something or nothing to do with
16:00
Speaker 1: the death of Sarah Tokars. On December 3rd, 1997, four
16:07
Speaker 1: days after the shooting, Sarah Tokars was laid to rest.
16:14
Speaker 1: Her two children were left motherless. Investigators still had no
16:22
Speaker 1: leads that pointed to the identity of her killer. Whoever
16:27
Speaker 1: had killed the young mother was still out on the streets.
16:36
Speaker 1: Just after Thanksgiving in 1997, the FBI and local investigators
16:41
Speaker 1: continued their search for the lone gunman who shot and
16:44
Speaker 1: killed Sarah Tokars, the wife of a prominent Atlanta attorney,
16:48
Speaker 1: in front of her two young children. Sarah's six-year-old child
16:56
Speaker 1: had given a vague description of the suspect to police
16:58
Speaker 1: in Cobb County, Georgia, but they still had no solid leads.
17:06
Speaker 1: Copies of her husband's bank statements was sent to the
17:08
Speaker 1: FBI field office in Atlanta for closer scrutiny. Special Agent
17:15
Speaker 1: Michael Twible hoped to provide insight as to whether the
17:18
Speaker 1: documents might somehow be connected to Sarah Tokar's murder.
17:25
Speaker 5: Once we reviewed these documents, it revealed that Mr. Tokars
17:29
Speaker 5: had set up offshore banks and corporations, not only in
17:33
Speaker 5: the Turk and Caicos, but in Montserrat and in the Bahamas.
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Speaker 5: These documents also showed that he had set up numerous
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Speaker 5: corporations in nominees' names in the Atlanta, Georgia area.
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Speaker 1: Nominees are people who in name only head dummy corporations
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Speaker 1: for purposes of money laundering. Although Fred Tokars had never
17:56
Speaker 1: been accused of money laundering himself, he was an expert
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Speaker 1: on the subject. Buddy Parker, a former assistant U.S. attorney,
18:06
Speaker 1: was aware that Tokars was not only a well-known lawyer,
18:09
Speaker 1: he was also a certified public accountant.
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Speaker 4: Fred Tokars was known within the Atlanta legal community as
18:18
Speaker 4: a person who held himself out to be an expert
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Speaker 4: in money laundering and in fact conducted lectures for law
18:29
Speaker 4: enforcement authorities at the state level on money laundering.
18:37
Speaker 1: Investigating the finances of a man like Fred Tokars would
18:40
Speaker 1: be a delicate business. He was well-liked and well-connected among
18:45
Speaker 1: Atlanta's power elite.
18:50
Speaker 5: He was well-known in Cobb County. He was also well-known
18:53
Speaker 5: in political circles inasmuch as he had been appointed as
18:56
Speaker 5: an assistant municipal court judge and he had been an
18:59
Speaker 5: assistant solicitor for Fulton County.
19:02
Speaker 1: He had.
19:05
Speaker 5: A lot of friends in high political places and helped
19:09
Speaker 5: on numerous campaigns of state and local politics.
19:13
Speaker 1: I'm wondering if you have any... Investigators again met with
19:18
Speaker 1: Tokars and his attorney. They told him they believed his
19:24
Speaker 1: business dealings could be connected to his wife's killing and
19:27
Speaker 1: asked him about his clients.
19:29
Speaker 5: Has your wife mentioned anything to you about anyone.
19:32
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars admitted several were violent drug dealers who operated
19:36
Speaker 1: in dangerous circles.
19:37
Speaker 4: In my office and really looked them out here in Atlanta.
19:40
Speaker 1: One in particular was reputed to have been a major
19:42
Speaker 1: cocaine supplier in the Atlanta area. The dealer had returned
19:51
Speaker 1: home to Detroit after another one of Tokar's clients had
19:54
Speaker 1: allegedly forced him out of the South. Not long after,
20:05
Speaker 1: he was gunned down in front of his mother's home.
20:09
Speaker 1: The murder weapon, a handgun found later in a nearby alley,
20:13
Speaker 1: had been traced back to a gun shop north of Atlanta.
20:20
Speaker 1: Tokars suggested that the dealer's remaining crew, or even those
20:23
Speaker 1: who murdered him, could have had Sarah killed to send
20:26
Speaker 1: a message to the lawyer. Detectives secured a warrant to
20:32
Speaker 1: search the attorney's office to see if they could find
20:34
Speaker 1: any link to the killer in his papers. That night,
20:44
Speaker 1: local investigators and IRS agents conducted a thorough search of
20:47
Speaker 1: the office. They confiscated files, date books, and business calendars
20:54
Speaker 1: dating back several years, but found no direct clues to
20:57
Speaker 1: the murder. In the margins of Tokar's date books, agents
21:04
Speaker 1: did find notations of offshore accounts The total deposited in
21:11
Speaker 1: these accounts far exceeded the amount Tokars claimed on his
21:15
Speaker 1: taxes each year. It looked as if Fred Tokars had
21:22
Speaker 1: used his expertise in money laundering to his own financial advantage.
21:28
Speaker 1: Local and federal officials met with representatives of the Atlanta
21:31
Speaker 1: United States Attorney's Office.
21:33
Speaker 5: So that's a good.
21:35
Speaker 6: Start for us.
21:36
Speaker 1: They suspected Fred Tokar's illegal activities went far beyond money laundering.
21:43
Speaker 4: Money laundering was already on our radar screen, if you will. Secondly,
21:48
Speaker 4: now we have evidence coming out of the Tokar's home
21:51
Speaker 4: of offshore bank accounts. With those two clear facts, we
21:57
Speaker 4: felt that there was a firm basis to open an
22:01
Speaker 4: investigation formally on Fred Tokar's.
22:06
Speaker 1: Parker learned that in August of 1992, the DEA had
22:10
Speaker 1: arrested one of Tokar's clients in a sting operation. His
22:15
Speaker 1: name was Anthony Brown. Brown had a reputation as a
22:20
Speaker 1: cocaine dealer in Atlanta. The day before, agents had intercepted
22:26
Speaker 1: one of his couriers in Texas and seized more than
22:28
Speaker 1: 100 kilos of cocaine. Inside the trunk of Brown's car,
22:36
Speaker 1: Agents found $ 50, 000 in cash. They also found documents revealing
22:44
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars was more than Brown's defense attorney. He had
22:50
Speaker 1: incorporated an Atlanta nightclub for the drug dealer.
22:56
Speaker 4: It was believed by law enforcement that the nightclub was
22:59
Speaker 4: a front to help launder the drug proceeds of the
23:02
Speaker 4: drug trafficking organization that Brown was a member of.
23:07
Speaker 1: DEA agent Jeff Dahlman had participated in the sting operation
23:11
Speaker 1: to arrest Brown. Parker hoped Dahlman's drug trafficking case would
23:16
Speaker 1: help with the murder investigation.
23:20
Speaker 6: What had happened as a result of the homicide of Mrs.
23:23
Speaker 6: Tokars was that the light got turned on Fred Tokars'
23:26
Speaker 6: past and what he had been doing for the past
23:29
Speaker 6: several years. And what was illuminated was that he'd been
23:33
Speaker 6: involved with several drug traffickers in the Atlanta area.
23:40
Speaker 1: Investigators wondered how deep that involvement went. Police re-interviewed Tokar's
23:46
Speaker 1: neighbors to see if they had missed anything. One close
23:51
Speaker 1: friend confirmed that Sarah wanted to divorce her husband, but
23:54
Speaker 1: she was afraid of him. Not long before she was murdered,
24:01
Speaker 1: Sarah confided that she had found some of her husband's
24:04
Speaker 1: documents that seemed suspicious. According to the neighbor... Sarah said
24:10
Speaker 1: these weren't simply lists of offshore accounts. They were stronger
24:14
Speaker 1: proof of criminal activities.
24:18
Speaker 4: About a week and a half before Sarah Tokars' murder,
24:23
Speaker 4: Sarah Tokars exclaimed to her that she now had the
24:28
Speaker 4: goods on Fred, that she had found documents or records
24:31
Speaker 4: that indicated he had engaged in or was engaging in
24:34
Speaker 4: tax evasion. and that she was going to go to
24:37
Speaker 4: the authorities with this information and she could then get
24:40
Speaker 4: a divorce.
24:43
Speaker 1: If Sarah had confronted her husband with the evidence, it
24:46
Speaker 1: might have motivated him to harm her. Investigators additionally found
24:53
Speaker 1: the name of a Tokars private investigator. The PI admitted
25:00
Speaker 1: to agents that Tokars had hired him to approach drug
25:03
Speaker 1: dealers about laundering their profits. He was listed as one
25:09
Speaker 1: of the owners, along with Fred Tokars, of another Atlanta nightclub,
25:13
Speaker 1: according to Special Agent Michael Twyball.
25:17
Speaker 5: We determined that he was an owner of a company,
25:21
Speaker 5: but through our further investigation, we realized that he was
25:26
Speaker 5: a nominee. And when I say the word nominee, I
25:29
Speaker 5: mean the fact that He was delegated to the person
25:33
Speaker 5: being legally responsible as being an owner of the club,
25:36
Speaker 5: but in actuality, he was not.
25:41
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars had constructed the entire scheme. According to the
25:47
Speaker 1: private eye, Tokars courted reputed drug dealers like Anthony Brown,
25:52
Speaker 1: men who had a lot of cash, but no place
25:54
Speaker 1: to invest it without raising suspicions of the IRS. Tokars,
26:00
Speaker 1: a money laundering expert, proposed depositing their drug profits in
26:05
Speaker 1: offshore accounts and in businesses like clubs that operated primarily
26:09
Speaker 1: on a cash basis. The money could then be filtered
26:13
Speaker 1: through legitimate financial institutions.
26:20
Speaker 5: The way you would launder the money is even though
26:22
Speaker 5: it's still in cash, you would pay entertainers on paper $ 15, 000
26:27
Speaker 5: when in actuality you paid them $ 5, 000 cash.
26:34
Speaker 1: Tokars would receive thousands for each transaction.
26:39
Speaker 6: He was actually involved knowing that these people were drug
26:42
Speaker 6: traffickers and what they were doing with their money.
26:44
Speaker 1: The object was to.
26:47
Speaker 6: Open corporations, mainly nightclubs, cash businesses where they could easily
26:52
Speaker 6: hide their assets, where they could easily run their drug
26:55
Speaker 6: proceeds through them.
26:58
Speaker 1: Authorities believe the connection between Fred Tokars and drug traffickers
27:02
Speaker 1: had somehow led to his wife's murder. But the details
27:09
Speaker 1: were elusive. Weeks after the murder of Sarah Tokars, a
27:15
Speaker 1: man capable of murdering an innocent mother in front of
27:18
Speaker 1: her children, remained at large. By December 1992, several weeks
27:30
Speaker 1: after Sarah Tokars was killed, federal and state authorities had
27:35
Speaker 1: still not found the lone gunman and still had no
27:38
Speaker 1: clues to his identity. Shortly before she was brutally murdered,
27:45
Speaker 1: Sarah believed she had discovered papers in her husband's law
27:48
Speaker 1: office that documented his illegal activities. Former U.S. prosecutor Buddy
27:55
Speaker 1: Parker believed that Sarah had likely threatened to expose Fred
27:58
Speaker 1: Tokars with those documents unless he agreed to a divorce.
28:04
Speaker 4: That began to give us a feeling that Sarah Tokars
28:08
Speaker 4: was murdered to keep her mouth shut about her knowledge
28:12
Speaker 4: or her beliefs. about her husband's role and involvement in
28:15
Speaker 4: laundering drug money for drug traffickers.
28:21
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars not only represented violent drug dealers, he had
28:24
Speaker 1: gone into business with them. Investigators now had evidence Tokars'
28:31
Speaker 1: clients were laundering money through several nightclubs. If his wife
28:37
Speaker 1: had threatened to expose him, Tokars, as well as his clients,
28:40
Speaker 1: had a lot to lose. the FBI took a hard
28:47
Speaker 1: look at the nightclubs the attorney had incorporated. Special Agent
28:52
Speaker 1: Michael Twible had to wade through piles of state records,
28:56
Speaker 1: searching for a name that could link Tokars directly to
28:58
Speaker 1: the murder.
29:01
Speaker 5: We started reviewing company and corporation records and liquor license
29:06
Speaker 5: and business license that Mr.
29:08
Speaker 1: Tokars had incorporated.
29:10
Speaker 5: We started looking at these different clubs to see actually
29:14
Speaker 5: who owned them.
29:16
Speaker 1: Major drug suppliers like Al Brown contributed the funds. A
29:21
Speaker 1: middleman purchased the clubs. And Tokars set up the entire deal,
29:27
Speaker 1: as DEA agent Jeff Dolman discovered.
29:31
Speaker 6: They didn't really trust Mr. Tokars to launder money in
29:34
Speaker 6: offshore bank accounts.
29:35
Speaker 1: It was too elaborate. They wanted their money.
29:37
Speaker 6: Where they could touch it, where they could feel it,
29:39
Speaker 6: where they could use it every day.
29:40
Speaker 1: Where they could buy cars with it.
29:41
Speaker 6: And so the laundering, in essence, in this investigation, turned
29:45
Speaker 6: towards the laundering of money through nightclubs, through incorporation of
29:49
Speaker 6: the nightclubs.
29:53
Speaker 1: FBI agents interviewed employees of the nightclubs. Over time, they
29:58
Speaker 1: were able to piece together the structure of the business,
30:01
Speaker 1: its owners, and its profits. To attorney Parker, it was
30:06
Speaker 1: like assembling a complex puzzle.
30:11
Speaker 4: The picture of how the nightclub money laundering was structured
30:15
Speaker 4: was really developed through insiders, through inside drug traffickers who
30:22
Speaker 4: ultimately decided to cut plea agreements with us and to
30:26
Speaker 4: cooperate and provide evidence.
30:31
Speaker 1: But nothing from the nightclubs pointed to Sarah Tokar's killer.
30:36
Speaker 1: After months of frustration, Cobb County police finally got a break.
30:43
Speaker 1: A detective working on the case got a tip from
30:45
Speaker 1: his brother, a deputy in nearby Fulton County. The deputy
30:51
Speaker 1: remembered seeing Fred Tokar's name in the file for a
30:54
Speaker 1: businessman who had an outstanding arrest warrant. The businessman's name
31:01
Speaker 1: was Eddie Lawrence, wanted for writing bad checks on one
31:04
Speaker 1: of Tokar's accounts. Of all Tokar's business associates and clients,
31:11
Speaker 1: Eddie Lawrence was a name he had never mentioned to police.
31:16
Speaker 1: Authorities quickly learned that Eddie Lawrence and Fred Tokars were
31:19
Speaker 1: involved in several businesses together. These included construction, renovation, and
31:25
Speaker 1: mortgage companies. Fred Tokars had also defended Lawrence in several
31:31
Speaker 1: minor brushes with the law. It was a long shot,
31:37
Speaker 1: but it was the only lead they had left.
31:43
Speaker 4: Eddie Lawrence had, through Fred Tokars, been granted access to
31:48
Speaker 4: some of the most prominent individuals within the city. Fred
31:54
Speaker 4: would take Eddie to some of the big political fundraising functions.
31:57
Speaker 4: And all of a sudden, Eddie was, like I said,
32:00
Speaker 4: he's very presentable. He could certainly mingle and not be
32:05
Speaker 4: embarrassed at cocktail functions and things and engage in conversations.
32:11
Speaker 4: And so he was living this wonderful life. And the
32:14
Speaker 4: way he got there was through Fred Tokars.
32:19
Speaker 1: A few days later. The young businessman agreed to questioning
32:22
Speaker 1: after police discovered records of calls between he and Tokars
32:25
Speaker 1: on the day of the murder. Eddie Lawrence said he
32:29
Speaker 1: had been in business with Fred Tokars for almost a year.
32:34
Speaker 1: He claimed the phone calls were all job related. He
32:39
Speaker 1: knew nothing about Sarah Tokars' murder. The detectives had Lawrence
32:44
Speaker 1: arrested on the bad check charge and then released him
32:47
Speaker 1: on bond. They wanted to see which one of Tokar's
32:53
Speaker 1: associates got nervous when they heard Lawrence was being investigated.
32:56
Speaker 1: The plan worked. The confidential informant contacted police. The word
33:15
Speaker 1: on the street was that Eddie Lawrence had been looking
33:17
Speaker 1: for a hitman prior to Sarah Tokar's murder. He had
33:24
Speaker 1: pressured one of his employees to help him find someone
33:27
Speaker 1: to kill a woman who he claimed stood in the
33:29
Speaker 1: way of a lot of money. The employee gave Lawrence
33:36
Speaker 1: a name, Curtis Rower. Rower was a drug addict with
33:42
Speaker 1: a long rap sheet including armed robbery. He needed money.
33:48
Speaker 1: Maybe he'd be interested. Although the informant didn't mention Fred
33:55
Speaker 1: Tokars by name, investigators finally had a potential link between
33:59
Speaker 1: the victim's husband, Eddie Lawrence, and a hitman. Detectives interviewed
34:07
Speaker 1: Eddie Lawrence. They questioned him about his relationship with Tokars.
34:19
Speaker 1: He claimed no involvement in the murder. Police felt he
34:24
Speaker 1: was lying. On December 16th, 1992, police detained Lawrence and
34:33
Speaker 1: revoked his bail because of the flight risk. They wanted
34:39
Speaker 1: him in custody when they went after Curtis Rohwer. Detectives
34:46
Speaker 1: immediately secured search and arrest warrants for a house in
34:49
Speaker 1: College Park where Rohwer was staying. They proceeded with caution.
34:58
Speaker 1: If Rohwer was capable of killing an innocent woman in
35:01
Speaker 1: cold blood, there was no telling what he might do
35:04
Speaker 1: when cornered. On December 22, 1992, three weeks after a
35:14
Speaker 1: mother of two was murdered... Cobb County Police circled a
35:20
Speaker 1: home in College Park to arrest suspected hitman Curtis Rohwer.
35:36
Speaker 1: The woman who answered the door said she wasn't sure
35:38
Speaker 1: if Rohwer was home. An initial sweep of the house
35:46
Speaker 1: produced nothing. Still, they kept up their guard. One officer
35:54
Speaker 1: thought he heard movement in a bedroom.
35:58
Speaker 7: Curtis, you're in the bed.
36:16
Speaker 1: It was Curtis Rower. He was unarmed. Rower was booked
36:27
Speaker 1: and charged with murder. He claimed that Eddie Lawrence, Fred
36:35
Speaker 1: Tokar's business partner, had offered him $ 5, 000 to kill Sarah Tokars,
36:40
Speaker 1: but Rower was too scared to go through with it.
36:45
Speaker 1: He said Lawrence was the one who had caused Sarah's death.
36:52
Speaker 1: Rower admitted that he had carjacked the family. But when
36:57
Speaker 1: Sarah Tokars stopped, he said that he couldn't pull the trigger.
37:03
Speaker 1: At that moment, Eddie Lawrence ran up to the car,
37:05
Speaker 1: screaming for Rower to shoot. Lawrence grabbed the shotgun and
37:10
Speaker 1: it went off, killing Sarah Tokars. Both men then fled
37:19
Speaker 1: in Lawrence's car. Though police believed Rohwer was downplaying his role,
37:31
Speaker 1: Sarah's six-year-old son was the only other witness they had
37:34
Speaker 1: to refute his claim. He remembered only one shooter. The
37:42
Speaker 1: boy would be forced to identify the man who terrorized
37:45
Speaker 1: his family from a lineup. unless Eddie Lawrence corroborated Rohrer's story.
37:53
Speaker 1: Authorities charged Eddie Lawrence with conspiracy to commit murder, but
37:57
Speaker 1: Lawrence refused to confirm or deny Rohrer's statement. Cobb County
38:05
Speaker 1: Police notified Fred Tokars that Eddie Lawrence and Curtis Rohrer
38:09
Speaker 1: had been formally charged with his wife's murder. He received
38:14
Speaker 1: the news at Sarah's parents' house in Florida where he
38:17
Speaker 1: was vacationing with his sons for the holidays.
38:21
Speaker 2: He was on the phone.
38:21
Speaker 4: It's the police. They've arrested someone for the murder.
38:27
Speaker 1: Thank God for that. His relatives later said that while
38:30
Speaker 1: the rest of the family expressed relief, Fred Tokars did not.
38:37
Speaker 1: He seemed despondent. The arrests of Lawrence and Rohwer had
38:44
Speaker 1: made national headlines. Tokars was caught in that same spotlight
38:50
Speaker 1: and refused to give any statements to the press. Because
38:56
Speaker 1: the suspected hitman's story conflicted with Tokars' son's version, the
39:00
Speaker 1: six-year-old was asked to view a suspect lineup. Police explained
39:06
Speaker 1: that though he would be able to see five men
39:08
Speaker 1: staring at him, they would not be able to see him.
39:13
Speaker 1: The one-way mirror would prevent that. When the child said
39:18
Speaker 1: he was ready, investigators called for the men. All of
39:25
Speaker 1: them resembled the boy's description of his mother's killer. Detectives
39:32
Speaker 1: reassured him that he could take as much time as
39:34
Speaker 1: he needed. But it was no use. The child was
39:42
Speaker 1: either too young or too frightened to remember the killer's face.
39:49
Speaker 1: When relatives tried to reach Fred Tokars in Florida to
39:52
Speaker 1: inform him, he was nowhere to be found.
39:57
Speaker 4: Fred left the company of his in-laws and returned to
40:02
Speaker 4: his hotel room where no one heard from him. And
40:07
Speaker 4: the following morning, they tried to raise him on the telephone.
40:11
Speaker 4: They tried to find him, and.
40:13
Speaker 1: There were no responses. Concerned, Sarah's father rushed to the
40:22
Speaker 1: hotel where Tokars was staying. Fred!
40:33
Speaker 3: Fred!
40:33
Speaker 7: Fred!
40:38
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars had swallowed a handful of sleeping pills and
40:41
Speaker 1: washed it down with beer. the manager of the hotel
40:49
Speaker 1: quickly called an ambulance.
40:52
Speaker 4: He had apparently attempted to take his life after hearing
40:56
Speaker 4: that Eddie Lawrence this business partner of his had been
41:02
Speaker 4: arrested for the murder of his wife.
41:08
Speaker 1: Sarah's father found a note written in Fred Tokar's handwriting
41:11
Speaker 1: on the table beside the bed. In the locked hotel
41:16
Speaker 1: room Fred Tokars wrote a long, rambling note, apologizing for
41:21
Speaker 1: the pain and suffering his lifestyle had inflicted upon his family.
41:27
Speaker 1: He wrote that Sarah was a great woman. Then, on
41:34
Speaker 1: the day before Christmas Eve, Fred Tokars swallowed a handful
41:38
Speaker 1: of sleeping pills. Enough to kill him. Fred Tokars lay
41:48
Speaker 1: on the bed, barely breathing. If he died, the truth
41:53
Speaker 1: about his wife's murder might die with him.
41:55
Speaker 2: Come on, Fred.
42:01
Speaker 1: In late December of 1992, Fred Tokars, the once prominent
42:05
Speaker 1: Atlanta attorney now suspected in his wife's murder, lay motionless
42:09
Speaker 1: in a Florida hotel room from an overdose of sleeping pills.
42:16
Speaker 1: He was rushed to a nearby hospital where they were
42:18
Speaker 1: able to revive him. After his release, he held a
42:24
Speaker 1: press conference. He told the public that he was very
42:30
Speaker 1: depressed and that the media was not making it easy.
42:34
Speaker 1: Tokars had gone to the extent of establishing residency in
42:37
Speaker 1: Florida to avoid the attention. But he believed that justice
42:43
Speaker 1: would soon be served. Mr.
42:46
Speaker 7: Tokars, may we have your comment on the silence?
42:49
Speaker 1: Arrest of Eddie Lawrence. The FBI believed justice would soon
42:55
Speaker 1: be served as well. Convinced that Fred Tokars had used
43:00
Speaker 1: his business associate, Eddie Lawrence, to hire a hitman to
43:03
Speaker 1: kill Fred's wife, Sarah, the team of federal and local
43:07
Speaker 1: investigators would use federal racketeering statutes known as RICO to
43:11
Speaker 1: prosecute Tokars.
43:12
Speaker 7: Mr.
43:14
Speaker 1: Tokars. Building a RICO case to prove Sarah Tokars had
43:18
Speaker 1: been killed to protect her husband's illegal activities meant outlining
43:21
Speaker 1: those activities in detail.
43:26
Speaker 4: The RICO statute, it attacks basically this conspiracy of individuals
43:31
Speaker 4: who are out committing all types of different crimes, not
43:34
Speaker 4: necessarily together, but they're all for the benefit of this
43:39
Speaker 4: criminal group to exist, to continue to exist, and to
43:42
Speaker 4: make money.
43:46
Speaker 1: A federal grand jury named Tokars as an unindicted co-conspirator
43:50
Speaker 1: in the homicide. Though Tokars' partner, Eddie Lawrence, had remained
43:56
Speaker 1: silent after seven months in prison, investigators hoped the public
44:00
Speaker 1: indictment might encourage Lawrence to testify against Tokars. Not long after,
44:07
Speaker 1: the Atlanta U.S. Attorney's Office received a phone call that
44:10
Speaker 1: Eddie Lawrence was ready to cooperate with in exchange for
44:13
Speaker 1: sentencing consideration. For Lawrence's long-awaited statement, investigators secured a remote
44:25
Speaker 1: location in Georgia that would be monitored by chopper surveillance.
44:31
Speaker 1: DEA agent Jeff Dahlman was part of the team that
44:34
Speaker 1: needed to make sure nothing went wrong.
44:39
Speaker 6: We were there before Mr. Lawrence was brought in. His
44:42
Speaker 6: location had been kept a secret from everybody involved. The
44:45
Speaker 6: only people that knew of where Mr. Lawrence was actually
44:48
Speaker 6: being held at that time were the Cobb County Police Department.
44:51
Speaker 1: Mr.
44:51
Speaker 6: Lawrence at that time was a key witness in this investigation,
44:55
Speaker 6: and his safety was paramount to everyone.
45:01
Speaker 1: Inside a fortified house, Eddie Lawrence told investigators that he
45:06
Speaker 1: and Tokars were not just partners in the construction business.
45:09
Speaker 1: They were also involved in laundering drug money. Lawrence told
45:22
Speaker 1: FBI Special Agent Michael Twible the details of the scheme. Mr.
45:29
Speaker 5: Tokars warned him to try to solicit drug clients in
45:33
Speaker 5: the various nightclubs and bring them to him so he
45:35
Speaker 5: could launder their money. I know you don't like the idea,
45:39
Speaker 5: and in turn also set up Eddie Lawrence into several businesses.
45:44
Speaker 1: Lawrence owed his success to Tokars. He also owed the
45:50
Speaker 1: attorney $ 70, 000 in business debts.
45:55
Speaker 4: Fred Tokars approached Eddie Lawrence indicating that, you know, that
45:58
Speaker 4: Sayward now was going to try to divorce him and
46:00
Speaker 4: take everything he had, and he wasn't going to let
46:02
Speaker 4: that happen, and he couldn't afford to allow her to
46:05
Speaker 4: do that to him, and he wanted her killed.
46:10
Speaker 1: Lawrence refused initially. Although he had been involved in drug dealing,
46:15
Speaker 1: he had never been involved in murder. Mr.
46:19
Speaker 5: Lawrence said, well, just let her have the house and
46:21
Speaker 5: the kids and the cars.
46:23
Speaker 1: And Mr.
46:23
Speaker 5: Tokars said, I've worked so hard, I'm not going to
46:26
Speaker 5: let her have it.
46:29
Speaker 1: Lawrence said that Tokars planned the murder for several months.
46:35
Speaker 1: His first idea was to have Sarah shot in his office,
46:38
Speaker 1: but decided the couple's home was a better location. Tokars
46:43
Speaker 1: was to pay Lawrence $ 25, 000 for the hit. Mr.
46:49
Speaker 5: Lawrence advised that Mr. Tokars wanted to be out of
46:52
Speaker 5: town and that for Mr. Lawrence to commit the murder
46:57
Speaker 5: as a burglary, basically in front of his children, which
47:02
Speaker 5: is very unusual.
47:04
Speaker 1: He told Mr.
47:05
Speaker 5: Lawrence, that the kids would get over it, that they're young,
47:10
Speaker 5: and it wouldn't bother them saying that their mother was murdered.
47:17
Speaker 1: Lawrence admitted he didn't have the nerve to kill an
47:19
Speaker 1: innocent woman, so he hired Curtis Rohrer. After Rohrer shot
47:28
Speaker 1: Sarah Tokars, Lawrence drove him away from the scene. Since
47:39
Speaker 1: he cooperated, Lawrence earned 12 1⁄2 years for his part
47:43
Speaker 1: in setting up the murder. The hitman he hired, Curtis Rohwer,
47:49
Speaker 1: was sentenced to life without parole. For the time being,
47:57
Speaker 1: Tokars was still a free man. Mr.
48:02
Speaker 6: Tokars had custody of his two children. Our concern... During
48:07
Speaker 6: this time and the arrest of Mr. Tokars was there
48:09
Speaker 6: could be some harm done to the children.
48:11
Speaker 1: And Mr. Tokars was aware that he'd been watched.
48:15
Speaker 6: The media was still down in Florida at the time.
48:18
Speaker 6: He knew that people were watching him daily. And we
48:21
Speaker 6: had to develop a plan to get Mr. Tokars out
48:23
Speaker 6: of the house where there'd be no harm done to
48:26
Speaker 6: the children or to himself and try to affect the arrest.
48:33
Speaker 1: The agents knew Tokars hated the press. They posed as reporters,
48:39
Speaker 1: lurking around the condo, hoping to elicit a response from
48:42
Speaker 1: the wanted man.
48:45
Speaker 6: The game plan at that time was to have Mr.
48:49
Speaker 6: Tokars come out and check us out, which he had
48:51
Speaker 6: done previously to other people that had been parked in
48:54
Speaker 6: the area. The plan worked well.
48:59
Speaker 1: He came downstairs.
49:00
Speaker 4: He called the police.
49:08
Speaker 1: Local officers arrived, aware of the ruse. Fred Tokars emerged
49:18
Speaker 1: from his condo to file a complaint. Instead, he was arrested.
49:29
Speaker 1: Fred Tokars pleaded not guilty to the charges against him.
49:35
Speaker 1: But separate state and federal juries found him guilty of racketeering,
49:38
Speaker 1: money laundering, murder for hire, and murder. He was sentenced
49:44
Speaker 1: to four life terms with no chance of parole. For
49:49
Speaker 1: elevating his greed beyond the life of his wife and children,
49:53
Speaker 1: he will never be free again. Bye.