Latest / FBI Files / The Acupuncturist the FBI Hunted for 4 Years After the Brink's Murders
Transcript
- 0:01Speaker 1: An hour north of New York City, a band of
- 0:04Speaker 1: deadly gunmen descended on a peaceful suburban community. They struck
- 0:10Speaker 1: quickly and savagely. Agents learned that the gang's leader had
- 0:16Speaker 1: been living underground.
- 0:17Speaker 2: For more than two decades.
- 0:21Speaker 1: The FBI's New York Anti-Terrorist Task Force hoped they could
- 0:25Speaker 1: find this most wanted fugitive before he killed the gang.
- 1:01Speaker 3: A series of armored car heists and bloody shootouts shocked
- 1:05Speaker 3: law enforcement. The brutal violence of the crimes suggested a
- 1:09Speaker 3: motive more complex than greed. When the robbers started targeting police,
- 1:15Speaker 3: the FBI took charge. I'm Jim Kallstrom, former head of
- 1:19Speaker 3: the FBI's New York office. Agents would expend thousands of
- 1:23Speaker 3: man hours to stop an armed gang that terrorized New York.
- 1:34Speaker 2: Rockland County, New York, 1981.
- 1:35Speaker 1: The burgeoning suburb just 20 miles north of New York
- 1:41Speaker 1: City had become a refuge of former city dwellers. Most
- 1:46Speaker 1: left their urban homes in pursuit of safer, more affordable
- 1:50Speaker 1: neighborhoods for their families. They enjoyed more open space and
- 1:55Speaker 1: lower crime rates. The town of Nanuet was typical and
- 2:00Speaker 1: drew many people to its new mall. At 340, October 20th, 1981,
- 2:08Speaker 1: a Brinks armored truck made its regularly scheduled pickup.
- 2:12Speaker 2: From a retailer. One guard remained in the truck while
- 2:19Speaker 2: another watched the doors. The third returned with cash and receipts.
- 2:37Speaker 1: With no warning, a gang of masked men burst out
- 2:40Speaker 1: of a red van. One guard was hit in the throat,
- 2:44Speaker 1: another was hit in the arm. The gunman then trained
- 2:48Speaker 1: his weapons on the driver. He shot back, but the
- 2:52Speaker 1: assailant's gunfire was overwhelming. One guard managed to climb into
- 3:00Speaker 1: the back of the truck for protection. Police Chief Alan
- 3:24Speaker 1: Colsey of the South Nyack Grandview Police Department was five
- 3:27Speaker 1: miles away when he received the call. Officers from other
- 3:32Speaker 1: nearby towns were also called, since Nanuet was too small
- 3:35Speaker 1: to support its.
- 3:35Speaker 2: Own police force.
- 3:38Speaker 4: In October of 1981, when the Brinks case occurred, it
- 3:41Speaker 4: was an extremely shocking event for the entire area of
- 3:46Speaker 4: Rockland County. For the NIA community, for the Clarkstown community,
- 3:50Speaker 4: this was something that they had never expected to ever see.
- 3:57Speaker 1: Clarkstown police and paramedics arrived first. They placed one guard
- 4:03Speaker 1: on life support, hoping he would survive the ride to
- 4:05Speaker 1: the hospital. Brink's guard, Peter Page, would never get that chance.
- 4:12Speaker 1: A gunshot had severed major arteries in his right shoulder
- 4:15Speaker 1: and neck.
- 4:17Speaker 2: He died before help arrived. The uninjured driver said though
- 4:24Speaker 2: the gunman had worn masks, he believed they were black males.
- 4:29Speaker 2: They sped off in a red van.
- 4:33Speaker 1: From a deposit log, police learned that $ 1. 6 million was missing.
- 4:41Speaker 5: $ 1.
- 4:41Speaker 1: 3 million remained in the trunk. Chief Colsey received updates
- 4:48Speaker 1: as he raced to the crime scene.
- 4:51Speaker 4: The first information coming in from the Nanuet scene was
- 4:54Speaker 4: that the suspects had been seen escaping in a red van.
- 4:58Speaker 4: They were eastbound on Route 59. This would take them
- 5:01Speaker 4: along a route adjacent to the New York State Thruway,
- 5:05Speaker 4: which leads directly into New York City over the Tappan
- 5:08Speaker 4: Zee Bridge.
- 5:13Speaker 1: Moments later, a local resident close to the mall reported
- 5:16Speaker 1: seeing masked gunmen in a parking lot transferring sacks and
- 5:19Speaker 1: weapons into a.
- 5:20Speaker 2: Small moving truck.
- 5:25Speaker 1: The witness told Clarkstown Police.
- 5:27Speaker 2: That the vehicles exited eastbound.
- 5:33Speaker 1: Detective Arthur Keenan and two other police cruisers were on
- 5:36Speaker 1: Route 59, close to the thruway entrance when they received
- 5:39Speaker 1: the update.
- 5:41Speaker 5: We proceeded on to Route 59 near the New York
- 5:44Speaker 5: State Thruway to see if we would see the getaway vehicle.
- 5:50Speaker 5: We went to that area figuring that would be a
- 5:53Speaker 5: getaway route.
- 5:57Speaker 1: When the officers arrived at the intersection of Mountain View
- 5:59Speaker 1: Road and Interstate 87, they noticed a moving truck. waiting
- 6:03Speaker 1: to turn left onto the thruway. Keenan ordered one patrol
- 6:08Speaker 1: unit to block the on-ramp. Then, Detective Keenan received a
- 6:13Speaker 1: call about a second moving truck.
- 6:16Speaker 5: At that time, there was a radio transmission from the
- 6:19Speaker 5: Orangetown police that they had a UOL truck heading southbound
- 6:23Speaker 5: on Route 304 near the New Jersey line, which was
- 6:28Speaker 5: approximately the same distance from the Nanuet Mall as we were.
- 6:33Speaker 1: Unsure if the truck on Route 59 was the suspect's,
- 6:37Speaker 1: Sergeant Edward O'Grady and Detective Keenan blocked the truck. Officers
- 6:43Speaker 1: Brian Lennon and Waverly Chip Brown approached the drivers.
- 6:51Speaker 5: Suspects were described as being black males. At the intersection,
- 6:56Speaker 5: we observed the driver and passenger as being white individuals.
- 7:07Speaker 2: The woman objected to the shotgun.
- 7:12Speaker 1: Sergeant O'Grady directed Lennon to return the gun to the
- 7:14Speaker 1: patrol car.
- 7:17Speaker 2: They believed they had stopped the wrong truck.
- 7:22Speaker 1: As Lennon secured the gun, the detective inspected the back
- 7:27Speaker 1: of the moving truck. Though it didn't appear locked, the
- 7:31Speaker 1: back door wouldn't open. He told the couple that he
- 7:36Speaker 1: wanted to see what was inside.
- 7:40Speaker 5: I couldn't understand why it wouldn't open. I wanted to
- 7:43Speaker 5: know what was in the back of the truck. And
- 7:45Speaker 5: then instantly, as I was sent out, a noise came
- 7:49Speaker 5: from the truck.
- 7:49Speaker 2: I turned and.
- 7:52Speaker 5: All the suspects were coming out of the back shooting.
- 7:57Speaker 1: The rounds from the officers' six-shot revolvers bounced off the
- 8:01Speaker 1: bulletproof vests worn by the armed gang. Officer Lennon rushed
- 8:10Speaker 1: back to his patrol car for his shotgun. Officer Brown
- 8:15Speaker 1: was shot in the neck and shoulder and fell to
- 8:17Speaker 1: the ground. Even if the officers were wearing their vests,
- 8:22Speaker 1: it wouldn't have helped.
- 8:24Speaker 5: We were at a disadvantage. In addition to which, the
- 8:28Speaker 5: ammunition that was being used in the M-16 was capable
- 8:32Speaker 5: of going through vests.
- 8:37Speaker 1: As the masked gunman approached, one executed Officer Brown at
- 8:40Speaker 1: point-blank range. Detective Keenan was hit in the leg and
- 8:45Speaker 1: ran for cover.
- 8:48Speaker 5: I was still being fired at. Even after I took cover,
- 8:50Speaker 5: I had shots go between my legs. The tree that
- 8:52Speaker 5: I was behind took a shot chest high.
- 8:57Speaker 1: Officer Lennon had unlocked his shotgun but was taking heavy fire.
- 9:05Speaker 1: The gunman rammed the police car, trying to clear it
- 9:07Speaker 1: for their escape.
- 9:11Speaker 2: It didn't work.
- 9:14Speaker 1: Then, two cars arrived at the scene. The suspects gathered
- 9:19Speaker 1: the money bags and piled into the cars. One suspect
- 9:25Speaker 1: never made it to a getaway car. A passing motorist
- 9:29Speaker 1: grabbed the woman who had been a passenger in the
- 9:31Speaker 1: truck and prevented her escape. He watched the white Oldsmobile
- 9:38Speaker 1: and tan Honda speed away. Officers Keenan and Lennon rushed
- 9:45Speaker 1: to help their injured colleagues.
- 9:48Speaker 5: As the suspects made their getaway, I went to both
- 9:52Speaker 5: Waverly Brown and Eddie O'Grady to see if there was
- 9:55Speaker 5: anything I could do for them. Waverly Brown ended were
- 10:00Speaker 5: both beyond any medical attention that I could administer.
- 10:06Speaker 1: Still en route, Chief Alan Colson's main focus now was
- 10:09Speaker 1: to find the fleeing vehicles, but reports were scattered and
- 10:12Speaker 1: hard to decipher.
- 10:16Speaker 4: It was very, very difficult at this particular time to
- 10:18Speaker 4: get a clear, open communication from anyone out in the
- 10:22Speaker 4: field back to a desk area because of the number
- 10:26Speaker 4: of communications that were literally stepping on one another.
- 10:30Speaker 1: As the chief approached the area, he determined that the
- 10:32Speaker 1: crime scene didn't need any more personnel or vehicles.
- 10:37Speaker 2: He set out to find those responsible.
- 10:40Speaker 4: I didn't want to interfere with the emergency response in
- 10:44Speaker 4: that area.
- 10:45Speaker 2: The road was completely blocked.
- 10:47Speaker 4: So knowing that this particular escape route would lead them
- 10:51Speaker 4: in a particular direction, I made a U-turn at Mountain
- 10:54Speaker 4: View and 59 and traced my steps back.
- 10:58Speaker 1: He figured the suspects would travel towards New York City,
- 11:01Speaker 1: where there was potential for a greater loss of life.
- 11:06Speaker 2: He believed their route would take them along Mountain View
- 11:08Speaker 2: Avenue to a T-intersection.
- 11:11Speaker 4: I figured there was a 50-50 shot that they were
- 11:14Speaker 4: either going to go east or west and that I
- 11:16Speaker 4: could cover at least one of those avenues of escape
- 11:20Speaker 4: and went immediately to that area as quickly as I could.
- 11:24Speaker 4: In fact, en route to that particular intersection, I observed
- 11:28Speaker 4: the suspect vehicles, two of them, at a high rate
- 11:31Speaker 4: of speed heading east on Christian Herald Road.
- 11:36Speaker 1: The chief followed the cars. He radioed in his position
- 11:40Speaker 1: and asked for backup.
- 11:43Speaker 4: It was clear to me, based upon the events that
- 11:46Speaker 4: had transpired up until that point, that these were extremely
- 11:50Speaker 4: dangerous individuals who had no compulsion or no regard for
- 11:54Speaker 4: human life and no hesitancy to take the utmost of
- 11:57Speaker 4: violent actions against anybody who would stand in their way.
- 12:03Speaker 2: Until units arrived, it would be up to him to
- 12:06Speaker 2: stop two vehicles that held six heavily armed cop-killers. After
- 12:12Speaker 2: following for a few minutes, the chief noticed that two
- 12:14Speaker 2: passengers in the Honda had ducked out of sight, perhaps
- 12:17Speaker 2: to load guns.
- 12:20Speaker 4: As we get to the corner of 6th and Broadway,
- 12:22Speaker 4: the Oldsmobile makes a right-hand turn onto Broadway going south
- 12:25Speaker 4: into the middle of town, and the tan Honda attempts
- 12:29Speaker 4: to do the same, but slides, skids across the road.
- 12:35Speaker 1: The chief positioned his car between himself and the fugitives.
- 12:41Speaker 1: He drew his gun and continued to call for backup,
- 12:44Speaker 1: hoping his voice could be heard.
- 12:45Speaker 2: Over the clamor of simultaneous calls.
- 12:49Speaker 4: I continually order the suspects out of the vehicle. There's
- 12:53Speaker 4: a period of a few seconds where nothing in fact happens.
- 12:58Speaker 4: And then the door opens up and I see a
- 13:01Speaker 4: female put her feet out onto the roadway and remain
- 13:05Speaker 4: seated in the front seat of the car.
- 13:10Speaker 1: The chief repeated his commands to exit the vehicle with
- 13:13Speaker 1: their hands in the air. The woman then began to
- 13:17Speaker 1: reach behind the seat, perhaps for a gun. Then a
- 13:22Speaker 1: second occupant walked towards the officer wearing a bulletproof vest.
- 13:28Speaker 4: Despite my repeated orders to the contrary, one of the
- 13:32Speaker 4: suspects came walking.
- 13:33Speaker 2: Up towards me.
- 13:35Speaker 4: The female was attempting to reach around and get something
- 13:38Speaker 4: which I immediately assumed to be a weapon.
- 13:42Speaker 1: The chief was outnumbered, and neither of the suspects obeyed
- 13:46Speaker 1: his orders.
- 13:47Speaker 2: He made one more desperate call for backup.
- 13:55Speaker 1: On October 20, 1981, the Nyack, New York police chief
- 13:59Speaker 1: had stopped one of two getaway cars filled with suspects
- 14:02Speaker 1: from an armored car robbery that had left three dead
- 14:05Speaker 1: and two wounded. As he continued to call for backup,
- 14:11Speaker 1: One suspect reached behind her seat, another.
- 14:14Speaker 2: Approached the chief wearing a bulletproof vest.
- 14:19Speaker 1: He was outnumbered, and neither of the suspects obeyed his orders.
- 14:25Speaker 1: As the chief made one last desperate radio call, backup arrived.
- 14:28Speaker 3: Get on the ground, face down, on the ground.
- 14:33Speaker 4: Get on the ground, face down.
- 14:39Speaker 1: They secured the scene and pulled a third suspect from
- 14:42Speaker 1: the back seat. Police believed that he had been an
- 14:46Speaker 1: armed lookout for the other two, but was injured and
- 14:50Speaker 1: dropped his weapon when their getaway car careened out of control.
- 14:56Speaker 1: Police searched the car. In the trunk, they recovered sacks
- 15:00Speaker 1: that held in excess.
- 15:01Speaker 2: Of $ 1 million.
- 15:04Speaker 1: Under the front seat, they found a loaded 9mm pistol
- 15:08Speaker 1: the weapon the woman had likely been reaching for. Thousands
- 15:15Speaker 1: attended the funeral for the officers slain at the October
- 15:18Speaker 1: 20th shootout. The entire community shared the grief felt by
- 15:24Speaker 1: Detective Arthur Keenan at the loss of his colleagues.
- 15:29Speaker 5: The death of my two friends, Chipper Brown and Eddie O'Grady,
- 15:33Speaker 5: definitely affected my life from that point forward. When you're
- 15:39Speaker 5: in a small community like that, in a small police
- 15:41Speaker 5: department like that, you go to each other's weddings and
- 15:46Speaker 5: christenings and barbecues and things of that nature, and it
- 15:50Speaker 5: becomes like a secondary family of sorts. So it was
- 15:55Speaker 5: very devastating to lose two of your good friends.
- 16:02Speaker 1: The four murder suspects, including the woman captured at the roadblock,
- 16:06Speaker 1: maintained their silence while arraigned at Nyack Village Hall. Police
- 16:13Speaker 1: had no way to know how many more were still
- 16:15Speaker 1: at large.
- 16:18Speaker 4: The law enforcement community in Rockland County was taken greatly
- 16:22Speaker 4: by surprise by the sequence and magnitude of the events.
- 16:25Speaker 4: This was really a small assault team that came to
- 16:29Speaker 4: Rockland County to rob this this Brinks truck, and it
- 16:33Speaker 4: was a magnitude and a seriousness and a firepower that
- 16:38Speaker 4: had never been seen anywhere in the law enforcement community here.
- 16:45Speaker 1: If Nyack police were not used to such violence, 30
- 16:48Speaker 1: miles south in New York City, the FBI and New
- 16:51Speaker 1: York City police certainly were. The New York Joint Terrorism
- 16:56Speaker 1: Task Force had already been investigating a series of armored
- 17:00Speaker 1: car heists throughout the region that had been executed in
- 17:03Speaker 1: a similar fashion. Now-retired Special Agent Lou Vesey was a
- 17:10Speaker 1: member of that team. He believed the Nyack robbery was
- 17:15Speaker 1: connected to the others.
- 17:19Speaker 6: The people who had done Nyack had to have some
- 17:21Speaker 6: involvement with all these other crimes. I mean, because the M.O.
- 17:24Speaker 6: was absolutely identical. The whites were driving the vehicles, the
- 17:29Speaker 6: blacks had done the robberies, the weapons that were used
- 17:33Speaker 6: were identical to the weapons that had been used in
- 17:35Speaker 6: the other robberies we were looking at. So there was
- 17:38Speaker 6: no doubt in anybody's mind that this was at least
- 17:41Speaker 6: some of the same group.
- 17:44Speaker 1: The suspects were processed at the Rockland County Jail. When
- 17:48Speaker 1: asked for their names, all gave aliases, except one.
- 17:53Speaker 2: Judy Clark.
- 17:54Speaker 1: Arrested in the getaway car was no stranger to the FBI.
- 18:00Speaker 1: To agents, she was known as a member of the
- 18:02Speaker 1: Weather Underground, a radical group involved in many violent robberies
- 18:07Speaker 1: and bombings in the 1960s and 70s. For the Brinks robbery,
- 18:14Speaker 1: she would be sentenced to 75 years in prison. Special
- 18:20Speaker 1: Agent Lou Vesey was an expert.
- 18:22Speaker 2: On the Weather Underground.
- 18:25Speaker 6: One female I recognized immediately as Judy Clark, who had
- 18:27Speaker 6: been someone who had been under investigation previously by us
- 18:31Speaker 6: as a possible terrorist. There was another female there who
- 18:36Speaker 6: I thought looked very familiar.
- 18:40Speaker 1: Agent Vesey suspected the woman arrested at the roadblock was
- 18:43Speaker 1: Kathy Boudin, another member of the Weather Underground. A fingerprint
- 18:49Speaker 1: check confirmed it. Boudin pled guilty and was sentenced to
- 18:53Speaker 1: 20 years in prison for acting as a decoy passenger
- 18:56Speaker 1: in the moving truck. They discovered one of the men
- 19:01Speaker 1: to be David Gilbert, Boudin's common-law husband who was also
- 19:04Speaker 1: a member of the Weather Underground. He received 75 years
- 19:09Speaker 1: for his role. Sam Brown, who had been injured in
- 19:14Speaker 1: the getaway car, was an associate of the Black Liberation Army,
- 19:18Speaker 1: another militant group. Like Gilbert and Clark, Brown was sentenced
- 19:24Speaker 1: to 75 years in prison. Four members of the gang
- 19:30Speaker 1: were behind bars. From survivors' statements, agents estimated at least
- 19:37Speaker 1: seven more were out on the streets. Special Agent Ken
- 19:43Speaker 1: Maxwell joined the investigation to help determine who and where
- 19:47Speaker 1: the remaining fugitives might be. One new lead held promise.
- 19:53Speaker 1: The second getaway car had been found a few miles away.
- 19:59Speaker 7: The Oldsmobile was found in Westchester County, dumped or abandoned. Inside,
- 20:04Speaker 7: there was a great deal of blood indicating that whoever
- 20:08Speaker 7: had abandoned the vehicle had been wounded during the shootout.
- 20:15Speaker 1: Agents checked local hospitals for gunshot victims. They found no
- 20:21Speaker 1: patients whose whereabouts were unaccounted for on the day of
- 20:24Speaker 1: the shootout. The Oldsmobile was registered to a woman at
- 20:30Speaker 1: an apartment on Prospect Street in East Orange, New Jersey.
- 20:38Speaker 1: They suspected that the armed fugitives had taken refuge there.
- 20:43Speaker 1: Agents obtained a search warrant. They found no one inside
- 20:50Speaker 1: and began to process the apartment.
- 20:55Speaker 7: The location in East Orange, New Jersey, was a treasure
- 20:59Speaker 7: trove of evidence. It's what we commonly refer to as
- 21:04Speaker 7: a safe house. Inside that safe house, the New Jersey
- 21:08Speaker 7: State Police and the FBI located a tremendous amount of
- 21:13Speaker 7: documentary evidence indicating other safe houses other vehicles used by
- 21:19Speaker 7: these subjects, and also photographs and other forms of identification
- 21:25Speaker 7: that began to unravel the mystery as.
- 21:29Speaker 2: To who was involved.
- 21:33Speaker 1: One key name investigators discovered on rent receipts was the
- 21:36Speaker 1: legal name of the tenant, Marilyn Jean Buck. The FBI
- 21:43Speaker 1: knew her name and history, She was a known operative
- 21:46Speaker 1: of the Black Liberation Army and its only white member.
- 21:51Speaker 7: Marilyn Buck had a long history of her involvement with
- 21:55Speaker 7: radical politics, if you will. At the time of the robbery,
- 21:59Speaker 7: she was a fugitive who had gone underground and was
- 22:02Speaker 7: wanted on weapons charges.
- 22:06Speaker 1: Agents also found a bomb-making manual, diagrams of six police precincts,
- 22:11Speaker 1: and a hit list naming civic and business leaders. They
- 22:18Speaker 1: turned up more false IDs, disguises, a shotgun, two 9mm pistols,
- 22:27Speaker 1: and ammunition. A ledger with detailed notes made in Marilyn
- 22:34Speaker 1: Buck's handwriting revealed.
- 22:36Speaker 2: The group's illicit activities.
- 22:40Speaker 1: It listed dates and expenditures for rental cars, guns, ammunition,
- 22:44Speaker 1: and illegal drugs. As investigators sifted through the evidence, they
- 22:50Speaker 1: began to encounter a problem that would plague them throughout
- 22:52Speaker 1: this complex case, according to Agent Lou Vesey.
- 22:57Speaker 6: I think the real difficulty is just the sheer bulk
- 23:00Speaker 6: of information and evidence. Numerous pieces of evidence from numerous
- 23:05Speaker 6: crime scenes. Individuals who constantly used aliases, false identification, had
- 23:11Speaker 6: safe houses. You had to figure out who was who.
- 23:14Speaker 6: Was that person identical to a person with a different
- 23:17Speaker 6: name but a same physical description in another safe house?
- 23:22Speaker 6: It was a gigantic jigsaw puzzle, and sometimes you didn't
- 23:26Speaker 6: think you had all the pieces.
- 23:29Speaker 1: Agents still didn't know who was involved, where they were,
- 23:33Speaker 1: and why they did it. To get answers, the FBI
- 23:38Speaker 1: needed to develop a cooperating witness. They turned to Sam
- 23:43Speaker 1: Brown in Otisville Prison, the gunman arrested after the car chase.
- 23:49Speaker 1: He was a low-level associate of the Black Liberation Army.
- 23:53Speaker 1: Brown cooperated in the hopes that his sentence would be lightened.
- 23:58Speaker 6: Sam Brown was the only one who decided to talk
- 24:01Speaker 6: to the investigators. He really got us started. He's the
- 24:05Speaker 6: one that named a few names, and with those few names,
- 24:08Speaker 6: that's where the investigation began widening out to the rest
- 24:11Speaker 6: of them. So he was very important.
- 24:17Speaker 1: The most valuable name Brown provided was that of the
- 24:20Speaker 1: mastermind behind the armed robbery.
- 24:24Speaker 2: Matulu Shakur.
- 24:26Speaker 1: Shakur was a known militant, the leader of the Black
- 24:30Speaker 1: Liberation Army, and one of the highest-ranking members of the
- 24:33Speaker 1: gang who called themselves The Family. The Family was a
- 24:38Speaker 1: group of about a dozen terrorists comprised primarily of members
- 24:42Speaker 1: of the Weather Underground and Black Liberation Army. Their formal
- 24:47Speaker 1: association was news to Agent Maxwell.
- 24:52Speaker 7: We had known from prior investigations in the past that
- 24:55Speaker 7: these groups had communicated, that they had some common goals
- 25:00Speaker 7: and objectives, but never before had that communication or association
- 25:07Speaker 7: evolved into this type of criminal activity.
- 25:13Speaker 1: Brown told agents that the family met on many occasions
- 25:16Speaker 1: to plan the Nyack robbery. Matulu Shakur assigned jobs to
- 25:22Speaker 1: each member.
- 25:23Speaker 2: Of the group.
- 25:29Speaker 1: Edward Joseph and Donald Weems were assigned as gunmen in
- 25:32Speaker 1: the armored car assault. The FBI knew Weems was a
- 25:37Speaker 1: member of the Black Panthers and the Black Liberation Army.
- 25:41Speaker 1: He had escaped from prison in 1978. Investigators knew little
- 25:47Speaker 1: about Joseph. Another man named Chewy Ferguson would handle the
- 25:53Speaker 1: M16 assault rifle. Samuel Lee Smith would be armed with
- 25:59Speaker 1: a shotgun.
- 26:02Speaker 2: Brown didn't know the names of the others, but provided
- 26:11Speaker 2: agents with physical descriptions.
- 26:15Speaker 1: Agents put out APBs for the five names given, which
- 26:18Speaker 1: included Samuel Lee Smith. In Queens, homicide detectives were on
- 26:28Speaker 1: their way to Smith's last known address. A license plate
- 26:33Speaker 1: registered to him had been found in a safe house.
- 26:38Speaker 1: As one detective drove down Smith's street He passed a
- 26:41Speaker 1: driver who fit the suspect's description. The detective called for
- 26:48Speaker 1: a marked unit to stop him. When the man saw
- 26:54Speaker 1: the lights, he took off.
- 27:01Speaker 2: Police followed him into an alley.
- 27:04Speaker 6: Get out.
- 27:08Speaker 4: Of the car!
- 27:09Speaker 6: Put your hands out of the window!
- 27:12Speaker 4: Use your left hand to open the door. Step out
- 27:14Speaker 4: of the vehicle. Step out of the car.
- 27:16Speaker 2: You step out of the car.
- 27:19Speaker 6: Keep out of the car. Step out of the car.
- 27:21Speaker 2: Keep your hands back.
- 27:22Speaker 1: For the third time in as many days, an armed
- 27:25Speaker 1: member of the family had opened fire on uniformed officers.
- 27:33Speaker 1: Samuel Lee Smith, a fugitive, wanted for his role in
- 27:36Speaker 1: the shooting deaths of two police officers and an armored cargo.
- 27:40Speaker 1: had opened fire on New York City police. His attack
- 27:45Speaker 1: did not last long. He was killed by the officers
- 27:50Speaker 1: returning fire. Smith was the fifth member of a terrorist
- 27:56Speaker 1: group called The Family to have been taken.
- 27:58Speaker 2: Off the streets.
- 28:00Speaker 1: Seven others remained at large, with almost a million dollars
- 28:04Speaker 1: in stolen cash still missing. On a tip from Sam Brown,
- 28:11Speaker 1: a gang member already in custody, police canvassed a Bronx
- 28:14Speaker 1: neighborhood for another.
- 28:15Speaker 2: Suspect named Donald Weems.
- 28:19Speaker 1: Special Agent Ken Maxwell recalls that Brown knew very little
- 28:23Speaker 1: about Weems.
- 28:25Speaker 7: Brown had given us a general description of a neighborhood
- 28:28Speaker 7: in the Bronx where he had met this individual who
- 28:32Speaker 7: fit the description of Weems. My partner and I, after
- 28:36Speaker 7: a process of elimination and a lot of legwork, pinpointed
- 28:40Speaker 7: a building that possibly could be the place Brown was
- 28:43Speaker 7: talking about.
- 28:47Speaker 1: Detectives canvassed the neighborhood, hoping someone would know Weems and
- 28:51Speaker 1: reveal his address.
- 28:56Speaker 2: They got lucky.
- 28:58Speaker 1: A neighbor directed police to his apartment. He told them
- 29:02Speaker 1: Weems was upstairs right now. Detectives called for backup. Since
- 29:09Speaker 1: every other encounter with these terrorists had resulted in gunfire.
- 29:13Speaker 2: They prepared for the worst.
- 29:18Speaker 1: In a short time, they entered the building with a
- 29:20Speaker 1: warrant and.
- 29:21Speaker 2: A SWAT team. They had no idea if Weems was
- 29:25Speaker 2: alone or if he was armed.
- 29:29Speaker 7: There were some anxious moments in terms of waiting. But
- 29:34Speaker 7: then he ultimately came out and surrendered in the hallway.
- 29:39Speaker 7: It is a part. however, we found several firearms, a
- 29:44Speaker 7: gas mask, a bulletproof vest, and enough ammunition to do
- 29:49Speaker 7: battle with.
- 29:49Speaker 4: A small army.
- 29:53Speaker 2: Weems was the only member of the family inside.
- 29:58Speaker 1: He was tried on federal charges and found guilty of
- 30:00Speaker 1: robbery and second-degree murder. He was sentenced to 75 years
- 30:07Speaker 1: in prison. Though six members of the family were now
- 30:11Speaker 1: in custody, group leader Matula Shakur remained on the streets.
- 30:19Speaker 1: Once again, cooperating informant Sam Brown provided agents with a lead.
- 30:25Speaker 1: He believed Matula Shakur could most likely be found in
- 30:28Speaker 1: Harlem at the acupuncture clinic Shakur had founded. The FBI
- 30:36Speaker 1: and NYPD set up 24-hour surveillance on the clinic.
- 30:43Speaker 7: We utilized agents and detectives of diverse ethnic backgrounds to
- 30:50Speaker 7: do our best to blend into certain neighborhoods. We knew from.
- 30:55Speaker 5: both.
- 30:55Speaker 7: Experience and also recognizing the intelligence and versatility of this
- 31:00Speaker 7: group that we had to be particularly discreet in surveilling
- 31:06Speaker 7: these individuals.
- 31:10Speaker 2: Agents watched and listened for months.
- 31:15Speaker 1: Though Shakur never showed, they noted several others who came
- 31:18Speaker 1: and went quite often. Agents hoped they would eventually lead
- 31:23Speaker 1: them to Shakur One night, agents followed a man from
- 31:37Speaker 1: the clinic to a house at 85 Barrow Street in
- 31:39Speaker 1: Greenwich Village. They learned the house was rented to Edward Joseph,
- 31:47Speaker 1: one of the suspects named by informant Sam Brown in
- 31:49Speaker 1: the Nyack robbery and shootout. They suspected Shakur was hiding there.
- 31:59Speaker 2: They were right.
- 32:02Speaker 1: Their months of perseverance had paid off. A federal judge
- 32:07Speaker 1: authorized a Title III. This permitted agents to set up
- 32:11Speaker 1: wiretaps and buttons. Shakur and Joseph must have suspected the
- 32:17Speaker 1: FBI's presence, since they often turned up the TV when
- 32:20Speaker 1: they talked. Despite this, agents were able to pick up
- 32:24Speaker 1: snippets of incriminating conversations, including a discussion of killing informant
- 32:29Speaker 1: Sam Brown. After several weeks, agents had enough evidence for
- 32:39Speaker 1: a warrant to raid the Greenwich Village hideout.
- 32:43Speaker 2: On the night of March 25th, 1982, six months since
- 32:46Speaker 2: the murders and robbery in Nyack.
- 32:49Speaker 1: Agents prepared for the assault They'd strike early the next morning,
- 32:55Speaker 1: hoping to catch.
- 32:56Speaker 2: The fugitives asleep and unaware.
- 32:59Speaker 1: As the agents watched and waited, they saw Shakur enter
- 33:02Speaker 1: the house. At dawn, two SWAT teams arrived. One team
- 33:20Speaker 1: entered through the front door, The other covered the fire
- 33:25Speaker 1: escape and back. They arrested two men, Chewy Ferguson and
- 33:35Speaker 1: Edward Joseph, both named as participants in the Niagara Heist.
- 33:41Speaker 1: Their leader, Matulu Shakur, was nowhere to be found. Somehow,
- 33:49Speaker 1: he'd escaped during the night, slipping past the surveillance. Ferguson
- 33:58Speaker 1: and Joseph were convicted on federal charges as accessories for
- 34:01Speaker 1: harboring a fugitive, though they were acquitted of murder charges
- 34:04Speaker 1: stemming from the Nyack shootings.
- 34:09Speaker 2: Both were sentenced to 12 years in prison.
- 34:16Speaker 1: On July 23, 1982, almost a year after two officers
- 34:20Speaker 1: and a guard had been killed in the Brinks robbery,
- 34:23Speaker 1: Mutulu Shakur was placed on the FBI's 10 most wanted list.
- 34:29Speaker 1: Finding the leader of the gang responsible for three cold-blooded
- 34:33Speaker 1: murders would now become a priority for every FBI office
- 34:37Speaker 1: across the country. Almost a year after Brink's robbery and
- 34:45Speaker 1: shootout with police, FBI agents around the country continued to
- 34:49Speaker 1: pursue the mastermind behind the million dollar heist. Matula Shakur,
- 34:56Speaker 1: a leader of the terrorist group called The Family, had
- 34:59Speaker 1: been placed on the FBI's ten most wanted fugitives list.
- 35:04Speaker 1: Shakur and at least three others remained at large. In
- 35:10Speaker 1: the summer of 1982, an agent from New York City
- 35:14Speaker 1: traveled to Georgia to interview a member of The Family
- 35:17Speaker 1: who had been arrested for a separate bank robbery. Tyrone
- 35:22Speaker 1: Rison offered his cooperation in the hopes of a lighter
- 35:24Speaker 1: sentence by the state of Georgia. Though he claimed that
- 35:29Speaker 1: he was not present when the armored car was robbed
- 35:32Speaker 1: in Nyack, New York, he confessed to having helped plan
- 35:35Speaker 1: the job that left a Brinks guard and two police
- 35:37Speaker 1: officers dead. Rison provided crucial information about other members of
- 35:44Speaker 1: the family.
- 35:48Speaker 6: Rison was not only a member of the family, he
- 35:50Speaker 6: was a very important member of the family and had
- 35:53Speaker 6: been involved in all the robberies. He knew who was
- 35:58Speaker 6: in the family, he knew the names, and he knew
- 36:01Speaker 6: how the family operated. So he was able to describe
- 36:03Speaker 6: the M.O., the robberies they did, the weapons they used,
- 36:06Speaker 6: who did what.
- 36:09Speaker 1: Rison told the agent how members of the group were
- 36:12Speaker 1: able to secure so many aliases. The prisoner explained that
- 36:18Speaker 1: a manager of a children's clothing store in Manhattan was
- 36:21Speaker 1: key to obtaining false IDs. The manager gathered license information
- 36:27Speaker 1: each time a customer paid by check. Since New York
- 36:32Speaker 1: State did not require a photo license in the early 80s,
- 36:35Speaker 1: an imposter would take the information to the Motor Vehicles Department,
- 36:39Speaker 1: claiming she'd lost her license. Then, the DMV would issue
- 36:43Speaker 1: a duplicate immediately, Rison also described to Special Agent Maxwell
- 36:49Speaker 1: the group's motives.
- 36:52Speaker 7: They term these robberies expropriations, almost acts of war. And
- 36:58Speaker 7: as one of their members eloquently, or not so eloquently,
- 37:03Speaker 7: commented one time, in war, people get hurt. So if
- 37:10Speaker 7: you can understand that philosophy, you can understand the mindset
- 37:15Speaker 7: or the motivations behind the gang.
- 37:20Speaker 1: Rison's information helped agents understand more about the inner workings
- 37:24Speaker 1: of the group. But by the fall of 1984, three
- 37:29Speaker 1: years after the Brinks heist and triple murder, three fugitives
- 37:32Speaker 1: still eluded the FBI, including gang leader Mutulu Shakur, Marilyn Buck.
- 37:37Speaker 2: And Susan Rosenberg.
- 37:42Speaker 1: Despite this, time was on the side of the FBI,
- 37:47Speaker 1: The longer the fugitives ran, the more likely it was they'd.
- 37:50Speaker 2: Make a mistake.
- 37:54Speaker 1: On November 29, 1984, local police received a call from
- 37:58Speaker 1: a manager at a storage facility in Cherry Hill, New Jersey.
- 38:03Speaker 1: He reported a customer on the premises who had been
- 38:05Speaker 1: paying her bill with a credit card that was determined
- 38:08Speaker 1: to be stolen. Officers arrived to find the woman about
- 38:15Speaker 1: to leave. Inside the back of the van, they noticed
- 38:20Speaker 1: containers that appeared to hold explosives. Police asked her for ID.
- 38:30Speaker 1: When she reached for her purse under the driver's seat,
- 38:33Speaker 1: the cautious officers stopped her. They wanted her hands to
- 38:37Speaker 1: stay in plain sight. Inside her purse, they found a weapon.
- 38:45Speaker 1: They placed her under arrest. When she was processed, police
- 38:50Speaker 1: learned that she was Susan Rosenberg, a member of the
- 38:53Speaker 1: family wanted in connection with the Brinks robbery and shootout.
- 39:00Speaker 1: Investigators secured a search warrant for the van. Inside the crates,
- 39:09Speaker 1: they found 640 pounds of explosives.
- 39:10Speaker 2: And 14 weapons.
- 39:16Speaker 1: The van was registered in New York State to a
- 39:19Speaker 1: woman named Louise Harmon. Agents discovered the name and her
- 39:23Speaker 1: address had been falsified. As forensic technicians processed Rosenberg's vehicle,
- 39:30Speaker 1: they noticed a sticker on the door from a.
- 39:32Speaker 2: Repair shop in Connecticut.
- 39:40Speaker 1: Agents located the New Haven repair shop where the vehicle
- 39:42Speaker 1: had been serviced. They hoped the owner would remember the
- 39:49Speaker 1: persons who had brought the van in. They showed the
- 39:55Speaker 1: owner several photographs of women who were known associates of
- 39:58Speaker 1: the family. The woman he identified was Marilyn Jean Buck,
- 40:04Speaker 1: one of two remaining fugitives in the Brinks robbery and shootout.
- 40:10Speaker 1: While Buck had not used her real name on the
- 40:12Speaker 1: vehicle's paperwork, she listed an address in Dobbs Ferry, New
- 40:16Speaker 1: York on the repair.
- 40:17Speaker 2: Bill Agents followed up on the lead.
- 40:26Speaker 1: They determined that Buck was in Dobbs Ferry and set
- 40:29Speaker 1: up surveillance, but she eluded them for months. Then on
- 40:36Speaker 1: May 11, 1985, they finally cornered her outside a diner
- 40:40Speaker 1: and arrested.
- 40:43Speaker 5: Her.
- 40:45Speaker 1: Buck denied knowing Matulu Shakur or having any connection to
- 40:48Speaker 1: the Brinks robbery and shootout four years before. But a
- 40:55Speaker 1: federal trial would prove differently. Buck was sentenced to 50
- 41:00Speaker 1: years in prison without the possibility of parole.
- 41:04Speaker 6: She was extremely important in the planning of the robberies
- 41:08Speaker 6: and in the procurement of the weapons, as it turns out.
- 41:10Speaker 6: A lot of the weapons that the family had, she
- 41:13Speaker 6: obtained in gun shows in Texas, buying them under phony names.
- 41:19Speaker 1: Now, only one known suspect in the Nyack robbery and
- 41:22Speaker 1: shootout remained, terrorist leader Mutulu Shakur. Agent searched a Baltimore
- 41:31Speaker 1: apartment rented by Buck, hoping for a lead to Shakur's whereabouts.
- 41:38Speaker 1: They discovered paraphernalia for making false identity papers, wigs likely
- 41:45Speaker 1: used in disguises, plans to bomb federal offices, and $ 10.
- 41:52Speaker 2: 000 in cash.
- 41:55Speaker 1: Searchers also found guns and ammunition stashed in various locations
- 41:59Speaker 1: throughout the apartment. Then, scrawled on a piece of paper,
- 42:05Speaker 1: agents came across what they'd been hoping for, evidence of
- 42:09Speaker 1: Mutulu Shakur's whereabouts.
- 42:12Speaker 2: It listed a phone number in Los Angeles.
- 42:18Speaker 1: Special Agent David Mitchell spearheaded the search for Shakur. He
- 42:23Speaker 1: contacted the FBI Los Angeles field office to have agents
- 42:27Speaker 1: follow up the lead.
- 42:30Speaker 8: Special Agent Dana Ingalls in the Los Angeles office advised
- 42:34Speaker 8: me that he had interviewed an individual that had established
- 42:40Speaker 8: that Shakur had in fact been residing in Los Angeles.
- 42:46Speaker 1: Shakur had eluded authorities in a nationwide manhunt for over
- 42:49Speaker 1: five years. Agents hoped that this time they could corner
- 42:54Speaker 1: him and bring down the leader of the terrorist gang
- 42:57Speaker 1: responsible for killing one armored car guard and two police officers.
- 43:06Speaker 1: The FBI and NYPD were closing in on Matulu Shakur,
- 43:10Speaker 1: the elusive criminal believed to have masterminded a deadly Brinks
- 43:14Speaker 1: robbery and shootout. Special Agent David Mitchell had tracked Shakur
- 43:20Speaker 1: to L.A., where the terrorist leader remained one step ahead.
- 43:25Speaker 2: There were a number of challenges.
- 43:28Speaker 8: Shakur was working with a group of individuals that were
- 43:32Speaker 8: closely aligned to each other. They had a support network.
- 43:37Speaker 8: The investigators all assigned to this investigation were having a
- 43:43Speaker 8: difficult time getting individuals to cooperate.
- 43:48Speaker 1: After many weeks, investigators were finally able to convince an
- 43:51Speaker 1: informant to tell what he knew about the fugitive's whereabouts.
- 43:57Speaker 1: He said he didn't know where Shakur was hiding, but
- 43:59Speaker 1: he identified a man by the name of Chapman, known
- 44:02Speaker 1: to be close to Shakur. For about six weeks, agents
- 44:12Speaker 1: conducted ground and air surveillance on Chapman and other Shakur associates.
- 44:16Speaker 1: but Shakur continued to elude authorities.
- 44:22Speaker 8: Shakur was leading a very low-profile life in Los Angeles,
- 44:26Speaker 8: at least as far as our investigation could determine. He
- 44:31Speaker 8: did not frequent any locations or areas where he could
- 44:38Speaker 8: be identified, and we virtually knew very little about his
- 44:43Speaker 8: activity at that time.
- 44:46Speaker 1: As the surveillance continued, Mitchell and the other investigators tried
- 44:50Speaker 1: to find a pattern to the moves Shakur's associates made
- 44:53Speaker 1: to hide him around the city. They pored over apartment
- 44:58Speaker 1: rental records and other documents, but learned little. Then on
- 45:03Speaker 1: February 11th, 1986, their confidential informant called.
- 45:07Speaker 4: Hey, thanks for being here.
- 45:11Speaker 1: He told them that Chapman would meet with Shakur that
- 45:13Speaker 1: night after Chapman left a Lakers basketball game. Investigators located
- 45:23Speaker 1: his car and waited for him to leave the forum.
- 45:33Speaker 1: Chapman attempted what agents called dry cleaning, counter surveillance.
- 45:36Speaker 2: Tactics designed to lose a tail.
- 45:41Speaker 1: He wove through the streets, turning, changing direction. Police stayed
- 45:49Speaker 1: with him, not knowing if Chapman had seen them. When
- 45:57Speaker 1: Chapman reached his destination, Mitchell's team pulled in nearby. Chapman
- 46:07Speaker 1: approached a man they believed was Shakur. Two officers headed to.
- 46:21Speaker 2: Where the men were talking, careful not to attract attention.
- 46:26Speaker 1: When Shakur saw them, he took off on foot.
- 46:35Speaker 2: They caught up with him in an alley.
- 46:41Speaker 1: The arrest of this violent revolutionary closed a five-year nationwide manhunt.
- 46:49Speaker 8: When Shakur was arrested, it was apparent to those officers
- 46:53Speaker 8: and agents involved in the arrest that he was tired
- 46:58Speaker 8: and it was late in the evening. He was transported
- 47:02Speaker 8: to the Los Angeles FBI office where Agent Ingles and I.
- 47:06Speaker 2: Attempted to interview him.
- 47:09Speaker 8: Shakur declined to furnish any statement to us during this interview.
- 47:17Speaker 8: and was subsequently removed back to New York City to
- 47:19Speaker 8: face the charges.
- 47:24Speaker 1: In the spring of 1986, Shakur was tried on federal
- 47:28Speaker 1: charges related to the Brinks robbery and shootout. He was
- 47:33Speaker 1: sentenced to 60 years in prison without the possibility of parole.
- 47:42Speaker 1: The police officers who survived that terrifying day in Nyack,
- 47:45Speaker 1: New York, were relieved that Shakur had been brought to justice.
- 47:50Speaker 1: But for South Nyack Police Chief Alan Colsey, the memory
- 47:54Speaker 1: of their loss would always be with them.
- 47:58Speaker 4: Eddie O'Grady and Officer Brown, Chip Brown as we called him,
- 48:03Speaker 4: were local Nyack community members. They'd gone through the Nyack
- 48:09Speaker 4: school district, They had been on the job before I was,
- 48:13Speaker 4: and in fact, more or less had sort of brought
- 48:15Speaker 4: me and broken me into the community. They were very,
- 48:19Speaker 4: very close to the community and to a lot of
- 48:23Speaker 4: us that were police officers here. They were excellent people,
- 48:29Speaker 4: they were excellent cops, and we miss them dearly to
- 48:32Speaker 4: this day.
- 48:32Speaker 1: To commemorate the slain officers, a monument was erected in Nyack,
- 48:38Speaker 1: New York. The surviving colleagues have found some comfort in
- 48:44Speaker 1: knowing that the lessons learned from the Nyack shootout have
- 48:47Speaker 1: made life safer for citizens as well as for the
- 48:50Speaker 1: officers on the street today.
- 48:55Speaker 7: Let it not be said that they died in vain,
- 48:58Speaker 7: but rather that their ultimate sacrifice led to the identification
- 49:04Speaker 7: of a national problem. I think Their ultimate sacrifice and
- 49:11Speaker 7: their tragic deaths of everyone involved certainly uncovered a nationwide
- 49:22Speaker 7: network of domestic terrorists heretofore unknown and in essence prevented
- 49:29Speaker 7: the loss of life to others.
- 49:58Speaker 1: Bye.