By Jeff Coen | Tribune staff reporter
9:39 PM CDT, July 25, 2007
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E-mail Print Single page view Reprints text size: His burglar pals had been disappearing one by one, so career thief Robert "Bobby the Beak" Siegel didn't exactly jump at the opportunity when a mobster offered him a score involving gold coins.
Burglars John Mendell and Buddy Ryan heard the same pitch in early 1978, Siegel said in a deep and scratchy voice, and he had never heard from either one again.
"I didn't have to be too bright to figure out what that was," Siegel testified Wednesday at the Family Secrets trial.
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The Chicago Outfit, it turned out, was taking a scorched-earth approach to rooting out the crooks who had burglarized the River Forest home of mob boss Tony Accardo, so Siegel said he went so far as to take a lie-detector test to prove he wasn't involved.
Later, Siegel approached mobster Gerald Scarpelli to ask why his friends had been eliminated and why he had been put on the same list, he told jurors. It had been a warning from the Outfit to burglars, whether they were involved in Accardo's break-in or not, Siegel said he was told.
"They were trying to make it one guy of every nationality," Siegel said he was told by Scarpelli of the hit list. "He said, 'You just happened to be the Jew.' "
Siegel, a tall man with swept-back gray hair and a prominent nose, sat on the witness stand in a light-colored T-shirt with a pair of eyeglasses stuffed in his front pocket. He often gestured with his hands to make a point and offered jurors a bit of a history lesson on Chicago's crime scene from the 1950s through the 1980s.
Now 71 and in the Witness Protection Program, Siegel said he fell into a life of crime on Chicago's West Side after dropping out of school in the 5th or 6th grade. He was 13 or 14, tagging along with friends and stealing "anything we could make a buck with," he said.
By 16, he had graduated to armed robberies, Siegel testified, and he had become aware of the neighborhood's Outfit toughs.
"They made the money, and they didn't go to jail," testified Siegel, chuckling at the memory. "Most of the police were on the [Outfit] payroll at that time."
Over the years, Siegel estimated, he burglarized as many as 100 stores, robbed three or four banks and took part in three murders as an Outfit enforcer and collector of high-interest "juice" loans.
His first link to the mob came from Frank "the Calico Kid" Teutonico, who earned his Wild West nickname by firing a gun into the ceiling before a card game as a warning to would-be cheaters that things would be "on the square," Siegel said. Siegel emphasized the point to jurors by forming his hand into the shape of a gun and raising it above his head.
Siegel told jurors he was a collector for Teutonico, making $400 a week. "If a guy didn't pay the money, I would go out and get a hold of him," he said.
By the late 1960s, Siegel was working for mobster Angelo Volpe, who ran a numbers racket on the South Side, he said. Siegel said he once watched Volpe bribe a Chicago cop who was a boss in the vice unit.
"He gave him a bag of money," Siegel said. The cop then revealed a gambling site that police were about to raid. "[Volpe] told him that was OK, it wasn't one of ours," Siegel testified.
Siegel also alleged that William Hanhardt, a Chicago police officer then in a police intelligence unit, was also on the take. Hanhardt and his partner received $1,000 each month from the mob as well as a new car every two years, Siegel said.
In the mid-1990s, Siegel cooperated against Hanhardt, now serving a 12-year prison term after pleading guilty to running a mob-connected theft ring that stole jewels from traveling salesmen.
Siegel said he met Mendell, the burglar, in 1973 while in federal prison in Minnesota. After both had been released, they teamed up on a few crimes together in Chicago, he said. According to Siegel, Mendell knew "a little bit" about alarms.
Siegel testified he got a call from Mendell in early 1978.
"He called me on the phone and told me he got a call from 'the Little Guy,' " reputed mob hit man Ronnie Jarrett's nickname. Jarrett had told Mendell he had something good for him, Siegel testified, and Mendell had promised to bring Siegel in.
But Siegel never saw him again. Mendell's body turned up in the trunk of his car.
That account would corroborate Nicholas Calabrese, the key government witness in the Family Secrets trial who told jurors last week that Jarrett brought Mendell to a garage where he was killed. Calabrese said his brother, Frank Calabrese Sr., one of five defendants on trial, strangled Mendell. Nick Calabrese said he cut his throat.
Siegel told jurors that burglar Buddy Ryan contacted him just after Mendell disappeared and told him Johnny "Bananas" DiFronzo had called him about a job involving gold coins. Ryan called Siegel about joining in, he testified.
"I never heard from him no more neither," Siegel said.
In all, six suspected burglars were killed for burglarizing Accardo's home. But Siegel was spared after he passed a polygraph in which he denied any involvement.
According to a government filing in the case, a witness has told authorities that Mendell admitted to him taking part in the Accardo break-in in order to reclaim gems Mendell had earlier stolen from a jewelry store.
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