Philip Carlo - The Ice Man

“I’m tellin’ you, there’s a ton a fuckin’ money in it,” Argrila repeated.

“Really?”

“Absofuckinlutely. No fuss, no-muss, and it’s perfectly legal. We’ll give you all the product you need. I know you’re a stand-up right guy. Just pay us for what you take when you get paid, and you’re in business.”

“I’ll think about it,” Richard said, ultimately warming to the idea because it was, in fact, perfectly legal. The more he thought about it, the more appealing the idea seemed, and he decided to try it, what the hell. But he knew if he did delve into this he had to make a go of it, not fuck up, because the money involved was mob money, and he had to pay it back in a timely fashion. He didn’t like owing mob people anything, but for such an enterprise, he also knew, there was nowhere else to turn: I couldn’t go to a bank and say I got three naked girls and two guys with hard-ons and I want to make movies, he recently explained.

So Richard began taking large shipments of porn on consignment from Argrila and Rothenberg and wholesaling it out all over the East Coast. Money began pouring in. Richard was surprised at how much in demand porn was, and the dirtier and kinkier it was, the better. Because he was selling most of the product he was getting from Argrila on consignment, the bill he had with Argrila quickly grew to seventy-five thousand dollars, since Richard was spending money he should have been giving Argrila.

Richard wasn’t even sure Argrila and his partner were really mob connected. Guys were always saying they were “mobbed up,” and Richard kept taking product and was slow in paying it back. He also got it in his head to make his own movies, to have his own line, and decided to use the money he owed Argrila to start his own business. This proved to be, as Richard would soon find out, a near-fatal mistake in judgment.

Richard quit working in the film lab and immersed himself in the porn business full-time. Argrila and Rothenberg kept asking for money, and Richard kept stalling them. From working in film labs over the years, Richard did know quite a few people who made porno movies—line producers, camera people, even directors. He began talking to some of these individuals and quickly realized that he could indeed make his own porno movies from scratch. Using Argrila’s money, that’s exactly what he did—he began producing porno films, hired directors he knew, made deals with them, and let them run the show. He was only interested in the finished product—making money.

Richard’s daughter Merrick’s health was not improving. She was frequently in pain and had raging fevers, sometimes up to 106 degrees. Her sickness and distress embittered Richard even more. Her suffering, any child’s suffering, was so unfair that surely, he thought, there was no God. How could any God allow a child to suffer? Richard had great empathy for children, though absolutely none for adults. He and Barbara did all they could for Merrick, but whatever they did didn’t work; at least he was making money now and had the funds needed for Merrick’s care.

Richard was thinking he’d deal in porn for a short while—a few years at the most—make some serious money, and get the hell out of the business. Maybe move to the West Coast, buy a house on the beach and relax. That was Richard’s dream: to have a first-class white house on a beach and enjoy the view, the glorious sunsets, watch the girls frolic in the surf.

Richard said nothing to Barbara about what he was doing or his plans for the future. He knew she wouldn’t like it. As much as Richard dominated and abused Barbara, he had much respect for her, valued her opinion, valued her judgment. She often explained things to him he read in the newspapers that he didn’t understand. An avid reader, Barbara told him about books she enjoyed. She was always reading a book, both popular novels and classics. Richard was, of course, still dyslexic and had comprehension problems when it came to the written word. The only thing he ever truly enjoyed reading were the true-crime magazines; those, for some reason, he never had any trouble understanding.

The movies Richard was producing were shot in dilapidated warehouses—no doubt now fashionable lofts—in SoHo. Richard never went to any of the shoots. He was not interested in seeing the films being made. He thought little of the people who did such things and didn’t want to be around them. For him this was a strictly moneymaking proposition. He had no prurient interests at all. He was, when it came to sexual matters, a bit of a prude. Because all the films Richard was distributing were given out on consignment and were paid for after the retailer sold them, there was a mandatory period of time that the producers had to wait to get paid. There was no getting around that.

When Richard was sober and not in a bad mood, he was relatively easy to get along with. People he did business with tended to like him. He had a keen sense of humor and would readily pay for drinks and meals. For the most part, he tried to keep his word. Because of that he expected people to keep their word, which all too often didn’t happen. One individual who let him down was named Bruno Latini. He was a short, balding, mobbed-up guy who owned a bar on Eighth Avenue. Richard had given him fifteen hundred dollars’ worth of films on consignment. Because the fifty-two-year-old Latini had mob connections (his brother was Gambino captain Eddie Lino, who would, it would later be alleged, be murdered by crooked cops Louis Eppolito and Steven Caracappa at the behest of Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso), he thought he could get away without paying. He kept stalling Richard, then stopped returning Richard’s calls. This incensed Richard, ate at him.

Christmas was still very much a big deal to Barbara and she went out of her way for the holidays to be special; she bought dozens of wonderful gifts, had a huge tree, decorated the house beautifully. That Christmas Eve Richard was quiet and morose. He was thinking of Latini, not his family. When everyone went to bed, Richard quietly got into his car and drove to the city looking for Latini, looking to kill him. It was snowing hard but that didn’t stop Richard. When he reached the bar, he learned that Latini just left. Richard went to the lot on the corner of Forty-ninth Street and Tenth Avenue and found Latini sitting in his car. Latini invited Richard into the car and gave him a song and dance about the fifteen hundred dollars. Richard pulled out a .38 and shot him twice in the head. For a minute or two he was blinded and couldn’t hear because of the report of the gun in the enclosed space. Richard found Latini’s wallet. There was several thousand dollars in it. Richard took his fifteen hundred and put the wallet back with the rest of the money still in it. Odd. He finally stepped from the car, went back to his Caddy, and returned to New Jersey.

In the morning on Christmas Day a parking attendant found Latini with his destroyed head, quite dead. Police discovered his wallet on him and there was sixteen hundred dollars in it. This murder was never linked to Richard by the police or by the mob.

I killed him, Richard explained, out of principle. He thought he could treat me like a piece of wood.

Though Barbara made a big deal of the holidays, they tended to depress Richard. They reminded him of his childhood, and that always made him… angry. He still thought about his father, about killing him.

Tony Argrila kept hounding Richard for the money he owed. Richard kept stalling, giving excuses, not money, to Argrila. Just when Argrila began getting hot under the collar, Richard would give him some money—but not what he said he would—to shut him up. Richard was planning to pay him and was doing his best, but his best wasn’t good enough. Finally, Argrila lost his patience and called his silent partner, Roy DeMeo, and suddenly everything took a serious turn for the worse.