The Boys from Biloxi: A Legal Thriller (38 page)

“I guess. You’re the expert.”

“Thank you. Now, about the money.”

Supply chain problems plague every rogue bomber, and phone calls can leave tracks.

On January 26, with the FBI in tow, though he had no inkling of it, Henry Taylor drove to a compound in the Ozark Mountains near the small town of Mountain Home. He had been there before and thought he had some clout. It was the heavily fortified supply base of a man considered by the Feds to be a domestic arms dealer. In a country with tepid gun laws riddled with loopholes, the man was doing nothing wrong and had never been convicted.

Henry couldn’t gain admittance and left the area. His followers assumed he was looking for explosives. He drove to Memphis and made calls from three public telephone booths, but the calls could not be traced in time.

On January 30, Gross called Henry at home and asked him to call the next day from a secure line. Henry did so, and Gross told him that the February 11 weekend trip by Mr. Getty and his wife was still on. Henry said he would be ready, but he did not tell Gross that he was having trouble finding explosives.

On February 1, Henry made his biggest mistake. There were six public pay phones within five miles of his home and office. The FBI guessed that he might use those for convenience and all six were tapped. The hunch paid off. Henry drove to a hot dog stand near downtown Union City and stepped into a red phone booth. His call went to a nightclub in Biloxi, a famous one known as Red Velvet. Five minutes later the pay phone rang and Henry grabbed it.

He told Nevin Noll that he was in a bind and needed some
supplies. Noll cursed him for calling the club and hung up. Minutes later he called from his own pay phone and was still angry. In cautious, even coded language, Henry said he needed five pounds. Noll said the cost would be a thousand dollars a pound, delivered.

Outrageous, said Henry, but he had no choice. They seemed to reach a deal and decided to work out the delivery details later.

Jackson Lewis and his team of FBI agents were beyond exhilarated. His scheme and patience had now led them to the Strip. The eighteen-hour days were about to pay off.

On February 8, Henry Taylor drove four hours to an interstate motel south of Nashville. He paid cash for one night and refused to provide any type of ID. He waited in the lobby for an hour and watched every vehicle and every person. At 4:30
p.m.
on the dot, J. W. Gross parked his Buick in the lot and walked toward the lobby carrying a briefcase. Inside, he made eye contact with Taylor and followed him to his room on the first floor.

Since they were a team now, Taylor didn’t bother with searching Gross for a wire. He wouldn’t have found one anyway. The bug was embedded in the belt buckle; its transmitter was hidden in the butt of the pistol. The trackers heard every word loud and clear:

They watched J.W. leave the motel, then waited two hours for Taylor to emerge with his small overnight bag. They followed him to the town of Pulaski, Tennessee, where Nevin Noll was waiting in the parking lot of a busy grocery store. He was smoking a cigarette, listening to the radio, watching the traffic, waiting for a blue Dodge pickup truck. In his trunk were five pounds of Semtex purchased on the black market near Keesler.

They were watching, and the sight of Noll casually smoking and flicking ashes on the pavement, with a bomb in his trunk, made them uneasy. They kept their distance.

The blue Dodge arrived and parked next to Noll. He got in the truck and the two talked for a few minutes. They got out and Noll opened his trunk. He handed a box to Taylor, who placed it in a metal container in the bed of his pickup. Noll closed the trunk, said something to Taylor, then started his engine and drove away.

Taylor’s plan was to drive all night and stay with a friend near Knoxville. His explosives were safely tucked away in an airtight, waterproof metal box, one he had built himself. It would take about an hour to assemble the bomb.

So much for plans. Five miles outside Pulaski, the highway was suddenly blocked with blue lights and there were even more racing toward them. He was arrested without a word, handcuffed, tossed in the rear of a Tennessee State Police car and driven to Nashville.

They waited patiently for Nevin Noll to amble back onto Mississippi soil. No need to mess with extradition if it could be avoided. When he crossed the state line near Corinth, some idiot ran up behind him with his lights on bright and wouldn’t go around. Then the lights turned blue.

Of course there was no Mr. Getty, no wayward wife, no lover, no love nest in need of detonation. J. W. Gross was a real character who played himself brilliantly and collected a nice fee from the FBI. He enjoyed the adventure and said he was available for the next one. The entire $50,000 in marked bills was recovered.

Jackson Lewis reveled in the success of his undercover operation and knew it would make his career, but there was little time to celebrate.

After a few hours of fitful sleep on a dirty mattress, bottom bunk because the top one was the territory of Big Duke, Henry Taylor was removed from the cell, handcuffed to a wheelchair, shrouded with a black hood, and rolled without a word to a windowless room in the basement of the jail. When he was situated at a table, the hood was removed but the cuffs were not.

Special Agents Jackson Lewis and Spence Whitehead faced him, both frowning.

To lighten an awful moment, Taylor began with “Well, boys, don’t know what’s going on but you got the wrong man.”

Neither smiled. Lewis said, “Is that the best you can do?”

“For now, yes.”

“We found five pounds of plastic explosives, military grade and highly illegal, in the bed of your truck. Where’d you get it?”

“News to me. Somebody must’ve put it there.”

“Of course. We picked up your pal Nevin Noll last night in Mississippi. He says you paid him ten grand for the stuff. Coincidentally, he had ten thousand cash in his pocket.”

Taylor absorbed the blow but couldn’t keep his lips together. His shoulders sagged and he dropped his gaze. When he spoke again his voice was hoarse. “Why’d you put that hood over my head?”

“Because we find your face offensive. Because we’re the FBI and we’ll do anything we want.”

“I suppose you’ll keep my money, maybe split it between the two of you.”

“The money is the last of your worries, Taylor. Conspiracy to commit murder by contract killing is a capital offense in Tennessee. They use the electric chair here. Down in Mississippi, killing someone for money will get you the gas chamber.”

“Decisions, decisions. Do I get a vote?”

“No. You’re going to Biloxi. Ever been there?”

“Nope.”

Whitehead handed something to Lewis, who laid it on the table. “Recognize this, Taylor?”

“Nope.”

“Didn’t think so. It’s the detonator you left behind at the Biloxi courthouse, the one used to set off the bomb that killed Jesse Rudy. Sloppy, sloppy. Your name was Lyle back then. We found your shirt too, in the same garbage can. There’s a partial fingerprint on the detonator that matches the prints taken from your hospital room. Sloppy. Coincidentally, those prints match at least a dozen we found in Room 19 at the Beach Bay Motel in Biloxi, including six taken from the two handguns you tried to hide under the mattress. Coincidentally, those prints match ones we lifted from your Dodge pickup truck, along with several dozen taken from your home, your little bomb lab out back, and your office in the warehouse in Union City. You’re a dumbass, Taylor. You left behind enough prints to bring down the entire Dixie Mafia.”

“I got nothing to say.”

“Well, you might want to reconsider that. Your pal Noll is talking, singing like a bird, trying to save his own skin since he doesn’t give a damn about yours.”

“I’d like to talk to a lawyer.”

“Okay, we’ll find one, eventually. We’ll keep you locked up here for a few days as we finish things. They’re gonna put you in a cell by yourself, no phones, no contact with anyone.”

“Don’t I get a phone call?”

“That’s for drunks and wife-beaters. You get nothing, Taylor, until we say so.”

“The food sucks.”

“Get used to it. In Mississippi, they keep you on death row in solitary for ten years before they gas you. Twice a day they give you the same meal, sawdust mixed with rat shit.”

Four hours later, Lewis and Whitehead arrived in Corinth and parked at the Alcorn County jail. The sheriff met them and they compared notes. He led them to a small room where they waited a few minutes while the jailer fetched their man.

Noll was handcuffed but not hooded. He sat in the chair across the table and sneered at the two agents as if they were interrupting something.

Lewis said, “You’re a long way from Biloxi.”

“So are you.”

“You had ten thousand bucks in your pocket last night. Where’d it come from?”

“I like to carry cash. It’s not illegal.”

“Of course not, but peddling stolen Semtex is. Where’d you get it? Keesler?”

“I have the right to a lawyer. His name is Joshua Burch. I ain’t saying anything else.”

A chartered King Air saved them six hours of driving time to the Coast. They arrived in Biloxi at 3:30 and went to the courthouse. Keith Rudy had been alerted and was waiting. Captain Moffett from the state police and two of his investigators joined them. They gathered in Keith’s new office and locked the door. Two uniformed troopers sat outside and dared anyone to come close.

Jackson Lewis was in charge and ran the show. He began with a dramatic “Keith, we have in custody the man who killed your father.”

Keith smiled and took a deep breath, but showed no emotion. Given the urgency in throwing together the meeting, he was expecting big news. But nothing could have prepared him for what he had just heard. He nodded and Lewis handed over an enlarged color photo. “Name’s Henry Taylor, from Union City, Tennessee. Cleans carpets for a living, builds bombs for a hobby. Ten years ago he was a member of the Klan and blew up a few black churches back in the day, got indicted at least twice but never convicted. Known in the trade as a hit man who favors explosives.”

“Where is he?”

“We threw him under the jail in Nashville. Interviewed him this morning up there, but he’s not very cooperative.”

Keith managed an even wider smile and said, “Okay, let’s hear it. How’d you find him?”

“It’s a long story.”

“I want every detail.”

As the briefing was underway, Hugh Malco left his apartment in West Biloxi and was driving to work in his latest sports car, a 1977 Corvette Sting Ray. Two blocks from home, he noticed a city
cop behind him in a patrol car. When its blue lights came on he began cursing. He wasn’t speeding. He’d broken no traffic laws. He stopped, jumped out of the car, and was storming toward the officer when he realized the street was being blocked by state troopers. One of them yelled, “Hands up! You’re under arrest!”

At least three handguns were aimed at him as they approached. He slowly raised his hands, got shoved onto the hood of his Corvette, spread-eagled, searched, handcuffed, roughed up a little.

“I swear I wasn’t speeding,” he said.

“Shut up,” a trooper barked.

They half-dragged him to a patrol car, tossed him inside, and left the area in a motorcade. Two hours later, he was taken to the county jail in Hattiesburg and placed in a cell by himself.