So let’s get back to the main story… on September 23, 1974, Catuara called upon his two top guys, Gushi and DiFonzo, and they met at Oak Lawn motel to finally discuss their next “master piece”. They told Catuara that they made the final plans for robbing the Purolator Security Inc. vault at 127 West Huron Street. In fact the idea came from Marzano but the problem was he was a low level criminal and wasn’t allowed to contact directly with Catuara so he had to go through Gushi. The idea was developed from Marzano’s cousin Ralph Marrera who managed to obtain a security job at the Purolator Company as a night guard. Marrera told his cousin that the Purolator armoured trucks picked up the receipts from all of the local race tracks, in the form of plenty of small bills that couldn’t be traced. The thing was that they knew the building was rigged with a silent alarm, which sounded to another security company, located just one block down the street. So this is the part where Marrera came in and played the main role.


For several weeks prior to the crime, Marrera made a very smart move by acting polite and suggesting to the security staff, almost on daily basis, that they should leave early, only if they wanted to, so they can be with their families. Like any other ordinary people, every time the guards accepted his offer. Marrera even managed to obtain the combination to the main vault which was not very difficult to obtain since many of the guards already knew it. But the problem was that the vault cannot be opened without setting off the alarm on the switchboard at the Wells Fargo Alarm Service, which was a firm hired by the Purolator Company. So the trick was once a week, Marrera opened the vault door and than closed it. In a matter of few seconds, the people from the alarm service called to check out if everything was ok. Then Marrera assured them that everything was “ok” but even with that, the service usually sent someone to check things out anyway. When the security patrol arrived, they usually checked the premises, and obviously they found that there was nothing wrong and than left. So the plan was for Marrera to trip the alarm at 8 PM every Saturday night until the alarm company would think that the Purolator alarm system had a glitch in the system, which it caused a malfunction every Saturday night exactly at 8 o’clock. It turned out that it was quite a good plan because after a while, nobody came to double check.


So the whole thing was a huge deal for the boys and so they received Catuara’s blessing for the job and in the end he also reminded them about the Outfit’s cut or 20 percent from the stolen loot. Marzano asked for 45% from the planned loot because he had to give a part from his share to his cousin, Maniatis and Marrera and so the boys fairly agreed. On September 27, Gushi gave Pollakov a call and told him to come by down to his house, collect $4,000 and to purchase a van. Gushi did not inform Pollakov on what was the purpose of the van but instead he told him to get Maniatis with him. So Pollakov, together with Maniatis, went to the Hawkison Ford and purchased a mint green Ford Econoline van. During the purchase Maniatis recited the information on his driver’s licence and refused to show it to the salesman. The next day, Marzano came to inspect the van by checking the engine oil and the interior and also scratched the identifying mark under the front wheel. When Gushi came to the scene, he allegedly told Pollakov that “This van is gonna bring us more than two million”. On October 8, 1974, Marzano sent Pollakov again to the Hawkison Ford to pick up licence plates for the van. On his way back, Pollakov was also instructed to buy black clothes, gloves, boots and ski masks for the crew. Also, on his way home, Pollakov informed the feds that something big was about to happened but the problem was that he was mostly kept in the dark.


On Sunday, October 20, 1974, Marrera again played the “old trick” on his fellow Purolator employee named Angela by telling her to leave early so she can be together with her family. Angela left somewhere around 7:30 P.M. and by 8:00 PM, Gushi and the Marzanos, Patsy and William, walked into the garage through the overhead door way, which Marrera previously left it unlocked, while DiFonzo remained outside in the van. The thieves took “used” money stacks that were dropped off that day from the Hawthorne Park Race Track and after that they tried to burn the rest of the millions in the vault with gasoline bombs. Clearly, the robbers hoped if the police found only ashes in the vault they would have no way of knowing that a robbery occurred or they would’ve think an accident occurred. Or at least the cops would have no idea how much money were missing. But the problem was that the burglars made one mistake, meaning they forgot that after the vault door was closed the fired died from lack of oxygen and the millions of dollars were barely damaged. In the end, they took everything that they could carry and walked away clean with tons of cash.


When the smoke from the fire hit the alarm, the security company immediately notified the Chicago Fire Department which quickly sent one of their units to the location. The responding firemen arrived in front of the building, in a matter of few minutes, where they were met at the door by Marrera, who was armed with a shotgun. At first Marerra initially refused them entrance, insisting he had no indication of trouble and he was not authorized to admit anyone to the building, but the problem was quickly resolved with the arrival of the Purolator executive. When they opened the vault, the firemen saw the smoke and quickly sprayed with their fire-fighting foam. The sight of thousands of shiny coins scattered on the floor outside the vault, as the fireman slogged ankle-deep in piles of cash left behind by the thieves, was astonishing. When they entered inside, they witnessed a disaster. Quite large part of the money were gone, one third was destroyed from the unsuccessful attempt by the burglars to burn the rest, and the remaining cash was all wet and damaged from the fire-fighting foam. According to some reports, more than 30 million dollars were recovered.



Purolator truck blocks drive while the police process the crime scene


Now, the burglars planned on getting a large part of the money out of the country but first Gushi and his friends had to pay tribute to Catuara and the Chicago Outfit. He received a phone call and the individual on the other side demanded “Put the money in a suitcase and leave it behind your house. We will pick it up.” No questions asked, Gushi packed $500,000 (some reports say $300,000 or $400,000) in a black bag and left it in an alley behind his house for a pick up, and that was that. Then he returned to his house and watched as the suitcase was whisked away by two dark and menacing figures in two black sedans. But Gushi and the boys had one “small problem” and that was the amount of cash, meaning the weight of the untraceable money. At the time, some banking officials estimated that $4.3 million would weigh about 800 pounds, measured roughly at two pounds for each $1,000 in bills and so the boys had a quite difficult time in transporting the loot. So Gushi decided to phone Catuara, his friend and neighbour, to intervene and help in transporting the money, but in a very “friendly” style, Catuara refused to help by simply telling Gushi "You are on your own, bud." Later, he called two other so-called “Outfit friends” and asked them for a boat so he can tae it to Florida and transfer the cash to the British West Indies. But again he botched both because the boat of one skipper Gushi contacted was in dry dock and other refused to put out in rough seas.


So with no other choice, the Marzanos, Gushi and DiFonzo had to bury a part from the cash at none other than Marrera’s grandmother’s home. Marzano explained to the boys that this was a house from a relative of his and it’s the safest place that they can find. The boys dug about 10 feet in the ground, packed the loot and buried it under a layer of concrete. From there they took their van and drove straight to Columbus, Ohio and over there they rented a small airplane and took a flight to Miami, Florida. In Miami they were wining and dining extravagantly, while paying for everything with $100 bills and also gave quite large tips to the strippers. The other day, DiFonzo took a plane to the Grand Cayman Island in the British West Indies, where banking transactions are kept in secret. On the arrival, DiFonzo allegedly tipped the pilot $300 and on his way out of the airport, he was carrying three big bags full of U.S. currency which were so heavy that DiFonzo needed four porters to help him carry them. And so, DiFonzo successfully deposited somewhere between $1,400,000 and $2,000,000 in five of the Grand Cayman Island’s 178 banks.


Like the speed of light, the crime became a sensational news story all around the country. The first reports had put the robbery at only $1,000,000 and after few days it became $2,000,000, then $3,000,000 and every new day the public awakened to see new and higher estimate bannered across the morning headlines but in the end, the vault loss was set at $4,300,000. Every newsman around the country was looking for answers and so did the lawmen. The story was quite big because this was one of the greatest heists committed on American soil at the time, meaning this was 4 years before the infamous Lufthansa heist which occurred in New York.


Because of the popularity of the case, there was a lot of pressure over the law enforcement agencies and so they needed to start from somewhere. Three FBI agents who were assigned on the case, decided to investigate the guards from that night and when they realized that the female guard was asked by Marrera to leave early, they felt suspicious. So the feds decided to give Marrera a polygraph test and during the testing, the needle of the polygraph machine jumped up and down because Marrera was quite nervous, obviously because he was guilty. Since he failed the test, the next day he was arrested at his mother-in-law’s home in Oak Park both by Chicago PD and the FBI. During the arrest, Marrera allegedly told the cops “What are you trying to do, get me killed?” Obviously he was in panic and during hard times, people are able to do almost everything just to save their own skin. Marrera knew that somebody was going to post his bond and before you know, he might end up six feet deep under the ground. So his paranoia forced him to make one fatal mistake by trying to kill himself. So in no time, the guy started to talk but the problem was that he didn’t know too much but at least he mentioned four names, including Gushi, DiFonzo and the two Marzanos. He told the feds that some of the suspects fled the country so they can transfer the cash to foreign banks and in the end he added that all of the suspects were “connected guys”. From this point on, Marrera was considered to be at large risk and would be a prime target for people who would want to silence him as well as those who might want to squeeze him for information on the location of the loot. Immediately the feds spread the word that Marrera was placed under heavy security at a military installation near Chicago, but in reality Marrera was being held at the Winnebago County Jail in Rockford.


The first guy on which the feds laid their hands on was Jimmy Maniatis, who was arrested on October 19, 1974, for purchasing the van which was used during the heist and later in transporting the cash. He was taken for questioning but the problem was that Maniatis was a stand up guy and plus, he knew almost nothing about the heist. The next day, without knowing on what was going on, Gushi made a wrong move by appearing at the police station with a bag of cash for Maniatis’ bond and that’s when the cops arrested Gushi and placed him in custody. Now, both suspects were confused regarding the situation since they knew that everybody was safe, including the stolen loot. But they were wrong because they were not informed about all of the individuals that were involved in the heist. The problem was that Patsy Marzano previously did not reveal Marrera or his so-called “inside guy” to Gushi and the rest of the crew, which explains all of the confusion. But Marzano’s main mistake was that he informed Marrera about the rest of the guys, which in this situation made them “sitting ducks”.


So on October 30, 1974, Luigi DiFonzo, Patsy and William Marzano were arrested by British authorities at the airport on the Grand Cayman Island. During the arrest, the suspects were at the Holiday Inn where they ate steaks, while swilling a red wine known as St. Emilion and wearing silk pyjamas. Also both DiFonzo and Marzano were carrying $26,000 in $100 bills; a lot less than custom officials said DiFonzo had when he checked on the island. While the suspects were escorted by the local police, Marzano made all kinds of hysterical “parade” before getting in the police van. By early November all of the suspects had been apprehended and that same month an indictment was returned against Pasquale Marzano, William Marzano, Ralph Marrera, Luigi DiFonzo, Peter Gushi, and James Maniatis. The indictment charged these persons with conspiracy to commit theft of money from Purolator Security, Inc., including other various offences, and on top of that, all of the charged were held on very high bonds.


Now, the government was ready to attack with three key witnesses including undercover agents Martin Pollakov and Eddie Doyle and of course their “inside guy” Ralph Marrera. As the trial was closing up, so did the paranoia in Marrera’s head and that’s when he decided to inform the feds also about the hidden cash at his grandmother’s house. At first he was threatened by the feds for holding back such valuable information from them but in no time, the investigators managed to recover $1.5 million from under the basement at a house which was located at 2045 N. Natchez Av. But even with that, Marrera was still in big trouble because from this point on, the feds felt that Marrera wasn’t telling them everything and so they cancelled their deal and increased the pressure over their prime witness. The problem was that the pressure already deeply penetrated Marrera’s mind and so on November 29, 1974, Marerra attempted a suicide by hanging in his prison cell at the Winnebago County jail. He was quickly saved by the prison guards and although he was not seriously injured in the attempt, he was still transferred to the Cermak Memorial Hospital at the Cook County jail. When he recovered from the suicidal attempt, Marrera again tried to kill himself by drowning himself in the pool at the medical facility. He was saved again, but this time he was strapped to his bed. Now this is the point where more than few strange things occurred regarding Marrera’s situation.


Two days later, Marerra has been relocated at the intensive care unit at the Cook County Hospital, because suddenly out of nowhere, he was in a coma and in a very critical condition. Everybody was confused and many stories started circulating around Chicago. For example, some speculated that Marrera was in fact poisoned, but by who? The Outfit couldn’t reach him because he was under very strong protection by the feds and was relocated more than several times. So my point is that the only individuals who had the access to Marrera were strictly government people. Story goes that 29-year old Marerra was being medicated with large doses of Thorazine, a tranquilizer with a sedating effect but what was the point of all of that and who and why would do this? If somebody wanted to poison Marrera, he could’ve done it in various other ways. Rumours were that some people from the government wanted to know on where was the rest of the hidden cash, and they thought that Marrera was still lying and so they shot him up with the tranquilizer so they can extract the needed information. But it looked like that those so-called government people were more interested in finding the money not for publicity but instead, to take the cash for themselves. It was a lot of cash and so it is not very strange to attract the likes of some of the more “dirty” government people. So maybe the first doze of the tranquilizer wasn’t quite working and so they decided to give him another one thus making him a “human vegetable” or in other words, they paralyzed him. So this became a huge problem for the government, because first they almost killed a human being and second, they lost their prime witness.


But in the “last minute”, the government was saved by another suspect who also decided to “spill the beans” and that was Pete Gushi. I believe that he also decided to talk in order to save his skin from Catuara and the Outfit and obviously because to avoid any long prison term such as life sentence. Gushi told the agents that two weeks before he got arrested, he received a mysterious note which was scribbled on a matchbook cover with a telephone number to call. He said he made the call and was told by an unknown individual to turn over whatever money he was holding, or, the voice at the other end said, "There is going to be a lot of blood shed yours, too." In the end Gushi added that the individual refused to identify himself but said enough to convince him that he was in fact an Outfit guy. So in June, 1975, Pollakov and Gushi were called to testify against their former partners in crime, or should I say in the Purolator heist. But before the trial started, the prosecution gave a psychiatric report that Marrera was unfit to stand trial. The report said that all intellectual functions were grossly impaired, and that the patient couldn’t read, nor recite the alphabet and he also couldn’t walk or do any physical function on his own. I believe that the report was true and that Marrera was really damaged, but somebody didn’t want for him to testify in front of the public because there were small, but still real chances that he might’ve reveal something.



1975 press photo of Ralph Marrera getting seated into a wheelchair before getting into the courtroom


Marrera


Anyway, during the trial government informant Martin Pollakov testified and explained in details all of the conversations that he overheard at Gushi’s store or attended on and also he informed about the purchase of the van. Next, Peter Gushi became the “special guest star of the show” against Maniatis, the Marzanos and DiFonzo. He reportedly has publicly confessed his part in the bizarre theft and has said he received a lot of money for his role in the heist. He gave details about the whole operation and about the members who was involved with. Most of the defendants pleaded guilty and refused to testify or otherwise cooperate with the government. Here’s the point where another so-called strange situation occurred and that was no one really implicated Lou DiFonzo in the case. During Gushi’s testimony, he confirmed that DiFonzo was actually one of the individuals directly involved in the heist and that he was one of the alleged masterminds behind the whole operation but the problem was the rest of the government witnesses such as Pollakov and agent Doyle, couldn’t confirm that DiFonzo was directly involved since they only heard his name. In his own defence, DiFonzo claimed that he was only hired to deposit a large sum of cash in the Grand Cayman banks and he also claimed that he never new that the cash was stolen and who really were the people with whom he was involved with. Miraculously in the end, he was found innocent by the jury, got acquitted and walked free to continue with his skills to prey on society.


As for the rest of the gang, Jimmy Maniatis pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice and for possession of stolen property and was sentenced to 3 years in prison but served only one. William Marzano refused to cooperate with the government and received maximum sentence of 7 years in prison but served only 28 months. When he got out, he collaborated on a book and made the talk-show rounds, talking freely about the whole affair. Patsy Marzano pleaded innocent, was found guilty and was sentenced to maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. When the judge asked him if he had something add regarding his sentencing, Marzano just mutely shook his head. Six years later, Marzano sued his jailers because a female guard allegedly attacked him. Ralph Marrera, who was found “mysteriously” unstable to stand trial, was declared mentally unfit and was taken to protective custody. Government “rat” Peter Gushi was sentenced to 4 years in prison but was put in custody of the U.S. Marshal. In jail, he was placed in a special department under a constant guard where he was segregated from other prisoners. After serving his sentence, Gushi , together with his family, was taken to the Witness Protection Program in which he was given a whole new identity. Martin Pollakov was also given a protective custody and a whole new identity and was also rewarded $40,000 for his undercover cooperation. Except for DiFonzo, the other guy who got away completely clean was Jimmy Catuara. Even with Guhsi’s testimony Catuara was never arrested nor charged regarding the case but three years later, on July 28, 1978, he was gunned down by Outfit assassins.


The poor Ralph Marrera, later recovered from his medical ordeal but was left with permanent disabilities both to his speech and his ability to walk. He was still placed in a nursing home but the problem was that his psychiatrist started to fell that Marrera was ready or in other words, mentally stable to stand in front of a judge. When Marrera got wind of the situation, he suddenly disappeared from the nursing home without a trace. But one day, January 29, 1982, Police officers James McNally and James Mandock, midway through their overnight shift in west suburban Forest Park, to a respond to a burglar alarm that has been triggered at the Blough-Miner Television Co. on West Madison Street. Little do they know that the investigation of this seemingly routine burglary attempt will set in motion a final, determined attempt by the FBI to close the book on the biggest cash theft in U.S. history at the time. Inside of the store, the cops found several so-called "alligator clips" and other devices which can be used to bypass burglar alarms, and they also found one walkie-talkie radio, and a radio scanner tuned to police calls. At the parking lot behind the store sat a 1982 brown Ford van and a 1974 brown Ford station wagon. No one was in the van, but as McNally and Mandock poke the beams of their flashlights into the station wagon, they discover a man, dressed entirely in black, cowering on the floor next to the front seat. When the police officers pulled him out of the car and frisked him, the individual protested by saying "Hey! I just fell asleep!" On the floor of the auto, where the suspect has been huddled, the cops found one walkie-talkie. It was a mate to the one inside the store at the burglary scene and was tuned to the same frequency.


After a 14-month search, which started somewhere around the end of 1980, one of the police officers suddenly recognized Marrera but he was not quite positive regarding the individual’s identity. So the suspect was placed under arrest and was taken to the Forest Park police station. When they saw his identity card, the name was different which read “Albert Santangeli” but still the agents felt suspicious and decided to fingerprint the individual. They also found for the individual to be carrying four sets of identification papers and some in the name of Santangeli and others in the name of Anthony DeMore. The papers also listed four separate addresses, all fictitious, such as one in Cicero or Stone Park, Melrose Park, and Northlake. The cops knew that something just wasn’t right because they had a guy who obviously has been around, but his police record only went back several months. He was just too cool, too calm and too professional and is why the cops did not buy his story that he just happened to fall asleep next to a burglary scene. So when the results from the fingerprint-check returned, it was positive that the individual was in fact Ralph Marrera.


So in March of 1983, he was the last of the group to be convicted for his part in the Purolator heist. The agents testified that when arrested in Forest Park, Marrera allegedly conversed freely and openly with them and that he was quite lucid and didn’t show any signs of serious brain damage. Later, when he realized that he was uncovered, Marrera allegedly began babbling and claimed to be unaware of what was going on. So no matter if he did or did not played the crazy act, in the end Marrera still managed to delay his sentencing by being again hospitalized because of a drug overdose. According to some reports, it was the fourth time since his arrest. Now the really awkward situation was that every time he suffered from an overdose of Valium and one unidentified drug. How the hell did he managed to get his hands on those drugs…no one knew. In the end, Marrera sat motionless with his hands folded as the verdict was read thus sentencing him to 20 years in federal prison. Minutes later after his sentencing, Marrera attacked a television crew in the lobby of the Dirksen Federal Building as dozens watched, slack-jawed in horrified surprise. The TV crew ignored his pleas to leave him alone, but still the crew advanced on him and so Marrera grabbed a metal sign and threw it, narrowly missing a cameraman and a technician. In a matter of seconds, in all of the confusion, Marrera somehow managed to disappear. So with credit for the time which he previously spent in custody, Marrera was later paroled in 1989. In December, 1990, in connection with the so-called “brain damage” incident, Marrera was awarded with $650,000 in a medical malpractice suit against Cook County.