Phoenix Confidential: OCB

The Organized Crime Bureau of the Phoenix Police Department was created in the 1974 when Chief Larry Wetzel sent Detective Sgt, Oscar Long to clean up the old Intelligence Bureau, full of place-holders and shady types compromised by the mob. His goal: Replace the old "subversive surveillance squad" with top investigating officers to dig into organized and white collar crime for prosecution purposes. The old squad just gathered names to put in the intelligence files. The new one intended to put made men and corrupt pols on the defensive in one of America's gangland playgrounds. Lt. Glenn Sparks requested a federal grant to fund the OCB and it was approved in a very short time.

OCB attracted some of the most gifted detectives and supervisors in the department, indeed in the nation, including Long, Sparks, Lonzo McCracken, Jim Kidd, Cal Lash and A.J. Edmondson. I leave out some names at the request of the detectives — safety is still an issue. Over the next several decades, the OCB was involved in the most important investigations in the state, from the murder of Arizona Republic reporter Don Bolles to corruption of high city officials and the depredations of the New Mexican Mafia (New Eme). Lash went on to serve as Administrative Sergeant for two police chiefs.

In a city where, as the blurb for my new novel goes, "gangsters rubbed elbows with the city’s elite amid crosscurrents of corrupt cops, political payoffs, gambling, prostitution, and murder cloaked by the sunshine of a resort city," the Organized Crime Bureau was Phoenix's Untouchables. And this was real, not fiction.

Kidd was a good, quiet investigator who developed, along with McCracken, cases that resulted in the arrest and conviction of land-fraud king Ned Warren, as well as a case that was leveraged into the information that lead to the arrest and conviction of all of the killers of Don Bolles. As to the latter, investigators felt they were stalled by prosecutors and above from going up to the top of the conspiracy. Lash saw suspected corruption in the local Fraternal Order of Police (FOP). He formed a group of officers that ran for, and were unanimously elected to the FOP leadership. The corruption was found and the people were all tossed out of office. Before they could be moved out, one shot himself to death with a pistol that had been bought by the lodge for auction but had disappeared instead.

It was dangerous work, and not only in the paranoid months after Bolles' 1976 assassination, when some wondered if the Mafia had changed its predisposition against whacking reporters or cops. Arizona was a laboratory of white-collar crime, and the suspects included leading businessmen, politicians and city officials. These powerful bad apples kept trying to plant information that Wetzel or the OCB detectives were dirty. The political pushback against the investigators was enormous.

Wetzel warned the detectives, Long said, that "if anything went wrong in any of (the investigations) that he would surely be fired. He always said if we suspect criminal activity, we have to investigate it. He said that if he gets in trouble or gets fired, he would much rather it be for trying to investigate sensitive matters instead of knowing about them and not investigating them." OCB took down several corrupt bureaucrats, including a City Manager, City Attorney, and finance director. Some went to prison.

They also faced headwinds within law enforcement. For example, Mo Berger, the County Attorney, kept sandbagging cases against Ned Warren. He admitted to McCracken that Harry Rosenzweig, the merchant prince and GOP boss, had something on him (some speculate Berger had been caught on film at a whorehouse). McCracken played the tape for Rosenzweig and Berger was out within days. Prosecution of Warren went forward. In another instance, a detective-analyst from the old Intel Squad was suspected of hiding files pertaining to the Bolles investigation, including the infamous 851 file.

As the Chicago Outfit withered and land fraud went legit, new forms of organized crime took hold. One was the New Mexican Mafia, or New Eme. Edmondson took part in the war against New Eme when he came on board in 1999 and it was tearing the state apart. "I think they were suspected of 27 homicides in an approximate 30 month period and they were absolutely vicious," he recalled. "They'd be drinking beer with you on Monday night and then having you whacked on Wednesday morning. During our investigations at times, it was hard to keep up with who was killing who."

After the gang threatened the head of the state Corrections Department, OCB launched a huge investigation, along with the FBI Violent Street Gang Task Force Squad. Two wires were tapped. Detectives worked 12-hour shifts. Among the criminals they pursued were two who ran an auto theft and narcotics ring and were suspected of murdering two confidential police informants. The investigation culminated into a huge round up.

OCB was a victim of its own success. The political heat never abated. New chiefs were not as supportive as Wetzel. An investigation into drug use in pro sports brought down pressure from top businessmen. And 9/11 sent the department into a "flavor of the day" mode in fighting terrorism. A hiring freeze left the department with hundreds of vacancies, hard pressed to perform its basic duties. Not surprisingly, without focus on organized crime and white-collar offenses, Phoenix is again an underworld capital.

 

Comments

[Gary Jenkins]

I am retired from the Kansas City OCB and I have a true crime podcast. Can you pass along my invitation to do a phone interview about their experiences. My Podcast and contact is at www.ganglandwire.com

[Ramjet]

For some real investigating reporting read: "Down By the River" by Charles Bowden.
Learn why the so-called "War on Drugs" is truly unwinnable.

[Cal Lash]

Yep, i worked the BNDD (DEA) task force when Phil Jordan was the Agent in Charge.
Thats how i eventually established a friendship with Chuck Bowden.

[fmurray]

This is absolute drivel. Ned Warren was not convicted of anything by PPD. Ever. Chuck Hyder's Maricopa County Attorney's office sent Warren to the Arizona State Prison by specifically AVOIDING the Phoenix Police Department because of the internal corruption of its Organized Crime Bureau. They convicted Warren of underlying land fraud and the subsequent attempt he made to bribe a County Attorney investigator to destroy the files of the land fraud case. Because of the subsequent charges of bribery, Warren was non-bondable and had to make a deal. When he lied to prosecutors at the County, he was sentenced to 54-60 years in state prison. That was the end of Ned Warren, who died in prison. The Department of Public Safety (DPS) worked these cases along with County Attorney Investigators, because PPD's Organized Crime Bureau was considered unreliable. In fact it was later shown that three officers on that unit were corrupted by organized crime. By 1984 they were gone from that unit.

[Cal Lash]

Police departments dont convict!
The prosecution by Chuck Hyder(currently a federal prosecutor)was a good thing. However the Maricopa County attorneys office investigation at the instruction of interim county attorney Don Harris(who advised he ordered Frank Murray to prosecute the case after Harris took over on the hasty departure of County Attorney Moise Burger, allegedly upon the instruction of Harry Rosenzweig) and subsquent conviction by Chuck Hyder's staff, including Frank, of Ned Warren was also aided by information previously gathered by non corrupt officers of the Federally Funded White Collar Crime Unit that that was attached to the PPD OCB.
Frank has pointed out some accurate things but that does not make the entire column "absolute drivel."
It is a fact that PPD White Collar Crime Sgt. Oscar Long told Warren in an interview, that he would die in prison!
Thanks Frank for your input.

[Cal Lash]

In May of 1979 as a Sergeant in Internal affairs, I/A, I was transferred to the Administrative Sergeants position in the Organized Crime Bureau, OCB. Neither my Lieutenant in I/A or the Captain in OCB at the time knew why. I was instructed to see the police chief.

The chief advised he “had been told by the FBI that a member of the OCB staff had been identified as a Mafia associate.” The Chief also told me there were “files all over the OCB he wanted some order” brought to that problem.

Shortly after I transferred to OCB, the detective file clerk in the OCB Analyst section came into my office and said “you aren’t fucking getting me, I am retiring.” I said “what?” and he repeated himself. Shortly thereafter I discovered the “851” file and the index cards used to find them were not in the file room but in OCB detectives' possession.

I spent the next few months working on the Chiefs orders. Eventually the pressure of investigating my fellow officers (I had already been in I/A and also the pressure previously investigating corruption in the police union in 1975) I asked for a transfer.

I was transferred to the Administrative Sergeant's position in the Chief's office where I served two police Chiefs before going back to Uniform Street Patrol and eventually SAU (SWAT) and I/A again before retiring in 1991 as the Sergeant in Charge of the Narcotics Intervention Unit at Sky harbor Airport.

After my police career I took five years off and then in 1995/96 I “Urban” backedpacked and walked (not hitchhiking but occasionally accepting a ride when offered) across America arriving in Washington DC on Earth Day.

In 1996 I became a Private Investigator and owned a High end Security guard company and a diamond transport business. At almost 78, I continue to work and still believe there is no such thing as a “free cup of coffee.”

Note: For many years I have asked many reporters I know to write that the Don Bolles Murder was not a onetime singular event but a continuation of events that I believe started when Al Capone went to prison for TAX evasion. And this activity continues to this day.

[Nancy Smith]

My name is Nancy (Nealis) Smith. My father was Lt. Seymour Nealis. He was a police officer for Phoenix, AZ for 25 years retiring in 1979. He then went on to be Chief of Police in Goodyear for 14 years. Do any of your books mention him? I would love to know if you have heard stories about him. He died in July of 17. I have lots of memorabilia from his time in law enforcement.

[Rogue Columnist]

Unfortunately, my books don't mention him.

[Cal Lash]

Jon and Nancy,
I worked for Lt. Nealis three times, Once in Narcotics, once in Night Detectives along with Sgt. Wild Bill and once in Internal Affairs prior to Chief Wetzel transferring me to Organized Crime. Nealis was a great guy and a great supervisor.

[Jack Nock]

Nancy, I knew your father. In 1964 and '65, I was a young cub reporter for The Phoenix Gazette. I was assigned to the police beat to work with a seasoned reporter, Thurman L. "Johnny" Johns. The entire Police Department was housed in the brown stone building that's between Washington and Jefferson streets and between First and Second avenues. The Detectives Bureau where your dad worked was on the elevated first floor (most people would call it the second floor). Across the hall was the I Bureau (or Information Bureau) where massive machines held 4 x 5 cards on rotating shelves. The Detectives Bureau was divided into units, such as Burglary and Robbery. Your dad headed another unit, "Crimes Against Persons," that investigated assaults, murders and suicides. At that time, Phoenix was a relatively small town, just beginning to experience explosive growth. It was several years later that the city had grown large enough to warrant a homicide unit. As I recall, your dad didn't care much for his given name, Seymour, so went by the name of Steve. Your father was a good guy, willingly helping a young reporter learn his way around. Every morning, we would have to read the stack of DRs (Detectives Reports) from the night before. Your dad would help me understand them and would point me in a direction that he thought would make a good story. I'm 76 now and my memory is not what it once was. But I recall your dad being rather tall. I think Jon Sellers was assigned to Crimes Against Persons. If I remember right, so was a detective named Gilliland, and maybe Ron Gailard and Eloy Ysasi. In 1965 I left the Gazette and joined UPI and I had only occasional contact with your father. After your dad retired and became chief of police in Goodyear, I heard that while doing yard work at home, he injured himself with a chainsaw while trimming a tree. Is that true? How serious was the injury? I heard he had a nasty injury to his leg.

[Frank Murray]

I have just gotten back on this site and seen the misleading comments of Cal Lash last year. PPD had almost nothing to do with my convicting of Ned Warren of land fraud, and later, of bribery. I worked these cases quite independently in the 70's: not with any "second chair". Chuck Hyder, who also deserves a lot of credit, stayed out of my way, facilitated my efforts, and even came to Judge Thompson's Court to support me when the defense attorneys (predictably) conjured up every way they could to get me on the stand. This was their standard "trick" at the time.
We worked with a small unit at DPS under Lt. Norm Beasley, and the U. S. Attorneys' Office's former strike force attorneys and their expert CPA's, along with the FBI. It was the U. S. Attys - Joe Keilp, Joel Sachs and Paul Corradini - who first showed me the 302 Reports on the corrupt PPD OCB unit. They made excellent witnesses for me at the Hearings in from of Judge Thompson.
We already knew something was very, very wrong with PPD, because, despite there being a few good men in this unit, something always went wrong when you tried to do a case with them. Still, there was also a long line of wonderful guys in OCB.
It was my County Attorney investigator that Ned Warren tried to bribe "to burn the files in Frank Murray's office" (not that that would have stopped the case). His attempted bribery while on release from my fraud case, made him non-bondable, and he was done - when he agreed to "cooperate," we knew he wouldn't. When he lied instead of cooperating, we revoked the agreement and a few weeks later he was in Florence - permanently.
The people nominated for praise by the police (such as Cal Lash) should be received with a thick grain of salt. Don Harris had something to do with the case against Ned Warren? Laughable. Harris was County Attorney for 5 months. I had spent months working up the Ned Warren case before Harris got there in August of 1976. He visited me twice, total. First time he met me, he said something rather odd (not unusual for him). "You're doing the Ned Warren case. You're probably untouchable." Bizarre. I said nothing. I charged Ned Warren of 20 counts of land fraud in East II Justice Court on September 22, 1976. The only other time Harris talked to me was towards the end of his tenure, in the winter of that year. By then he had apparently bothered to read the charges and found out that the Mesa car dealer Jack Ross was involved in the land transactions. "we're going to charge Jack Ross and Aquanetta with those counts" he declared to me as he saw me in the hallway. I quickly responded: "no, we aren't going to charge Jack Ross and Aquanetta!" I allowed myself a faintly sarcastic tone. No one in that office paid any attention to Don Harris, the five month county attorney. Bill Schaefer and I shared many observations at his expense. He didn't have the long-run interest in mind of anyone, except himself.
I never sought publicity - to me that got in the way. But I was the Bureau Chief of Special Operations, and, before that, a trial group supervisor. I carried the number 3 badge in the office. I liked to try cases, did so often, and tried them by myself.
Just as I did Warren.

[Roy Warden]

I am revisiting the Don Bolles' murder and the basic facts set forth by Dave Wagner in "The Politics of Murder: Organized Crime in Barry Goldwater’s Arizona” as background for my work in progress: “The Battle For Armory Park.”

Wagner continually refers to "The Phoenix Network" and public officials who violated their oaths of office to “keep the lid on” and protect the “vested interests” of the pioneer families: the Goldwaters, Marleys Rosenzweigs, Brophys, etc., as well as the “vested interests” of the professions in which they were employed.

Posted here are many comments made by those who have knowledge of, or who participated in, many of the events documented by Wagner.

I would GREATLY APPRECIATE any additional commentary, supportive or in conflict with Wagner, regarding Arizona’s history, based in crime and corruption, which continues on today.

[Rogue Columnist]

Mr. Warden,

Wagner is solid. And I'll be on the lookout for crime/corruption today. Mostly the old-fashioned land fraud has gone away or is legitimized by sprawl without adequate water that is green-lighted by regulators anyway.

[Roy Warden]

To Cal Lash and Rogue Columnist:

Can ANYONE share personal recollections regarding Lonzo McCracken, whom Wagner features prominently as the guy who "pried the lid off Phoenix based Organized Crime?"

Was he a "stand up" kind of guy (like Frank Serpico) who refused to "go along to get along?"

Was he a gregarious, story telling backslapping kind of guy or was he a loner, a brooder, who kept to himself?

Wagner says he had an ulcer. Can that be a result of the frustration McCracken must have felt with PPD "higher ups", and getting anything done regarding high profile criminals (like Warren) and establishment figures, (like Prosecutor Moise Berger), who seemed to protect them?

Did McCracken die as a result of his stomach issues?

Did he smoke or drink, swear or pop Di-Gel or other medications to deal with his ulcer?

Any personal insight would be appreciated!!

[Cal Lash]

Which Wagner are we talking about.
My email is [email protected]

[Roy Warden]

Mr. Lash:

Dave Wagner who wrote "The Politics of Murder." Thanks for your email address. I will respond in a day or two.

You are RIGHT about "all this activity continues to today."

You (MIGHT) be SURPRISED that, as Dave Wagner wrote, "Mob" related activity was (and still is) the LEAST important component of the corruption of Arizona institutions, including Arizona's criminal justice apparatus (lawyers and judges) who thrive upon processing cases related to illegal entry, and don't want the flow of illegal entrants to stop.

[Cal Lash]

Talton. I'm not sure, "land fraud" went away. Like prostitution it's still with us.
It just has a different appearance.
Hiding behind political manufacturing to give "Developers,"cover.
The Sajuaros of the The Great Sonoran Desert keep being replaced by buildings and asphalt.
That said, eventually like those "who are gone" before us, the desert will win and grass will grow thru the cracking man made roadways.

[Roy]

RECAP:

Don Bolles murder, I Squad member Lonzo McCracken, Cal Lash who worked with McCracken and reports that corruption continues in Arizona today:
https://www.scribd.com/document/485279203/6-THE-PHOENIX-NETWORK-PROTECTS-CRIME

[Roy Warden]

NEXT CHAPTER:

Bolles Murder: Lonzo McCracken, Cal Lash and other I Squad members stood UP and tried to protect the public interest, while "higher ups", including superior court judges and the Maricopa County County Attorney, continued to "lie, cheat and steal" and otherwise break the law to protect The Phoenix Forty, the Arizona Establishment and ongoing institutional supported crime, which today includes "Open Border Policy" and the source of Arizona's cheap Mexican labor force.

https://www.scribd.com/document/491045991/7-Judges-Protect-the-Arizona-Open-Borders-Establishment

[George Kolber]

Looking to contact Nancy (Nealis) Smith or any of Seymour Nealis friends or family to discuss a story that includes him. Please send a your contact information to [email protected]