jimmy chagra daughters

In the 24 hours since their arrival, he had signed markers totaling $240,000. He was the black sheep, the all-star goof-up. Now the feds had a yard of hot real estate on their hands; they desperately needed someone to buy it. Jimmy was known to win or lose $1 million a night, according to Catherine. This didnt seem to disturb Wood any more than it had Guinn, who used to cackle, I can sentence them a lot faster than they can reverse them. Nor did Wood protest when they started calling him Maximum John. It took Lee less that half a day to discover that the search warrant used to bust the Tennessee smugglers was faulty. The casino was almost deserted. Lee told her he still had a pile of work on his desk. Lee had never let his name be linked to an illegal enterprise before the fact. Youve got it wrong, Lee replied. All things considered, 1978 has probably been the worst year of Lee Chagras life. As he pulled off the exit ramp above a truck stop on IH 10, Lee could see the Indians car parked in the shadows behind some eighteen-wheelers that idled in the predawn chill. He certainly knew about it before the feds did. Her mom and sisters left witness protection and moved to Buda to be near Bastrop, where her father was being held. Paradoxically, though, Lee was secretly jealous of Jimmy. [18] He was scheduled to appear before United States District Judge John Wood, a judge nicknamed "Maximum John" who had a reputation for giving out the maximum sentence allowed for drug-related crimes. His grandfather was imprisoned before Jimmy was born, and the family immigrated to El Paso from Mexico. He swore he did not put out a hit on Maximum John H. Wood Jr., the federal judge in San Antonio presiding over a case that could have sent Jamiel Jimmy Chagra to prison for life. Lee left the money spread across the bed and closed the bedroom door behind him. Two of their five children were with her. Yoseph let himself in the front entrance with the key that Lee had given him that morning. But Vegas had never seen anything that surpassed the performance of Lee and Jimmy Chagra. Lee loved being at the middle of the table, flanked by armed guards and at least one beautiful broad who would act as his lucky piece. Chagras idea of a good time was slapping a Willie Nelson album on the stereo, snorting cocaine, and getting naked in a pile of aromatic bodies. I waited around to wish you and the kids a merry Christmas, the gambler told her. Lee couldnt stop talking about Tucson. Narcotics and gambling were crimes that grew from a common stem composed of the worst elements in society. With the pointer fully retracted, Lee approached the jury box, smiling. If it was a crime to love the fast lane, Lee Chagra was guilty. A big blob of fat came pouring out, she remembered. If Stricklin cooperated, they would work for his early release. When the items are small, such as bottles of American perfume or jewelry, the fayuqueros hire old women called chiveras (shepherds), who actually carry the merchandise across the bridge and as far as Chihuahua City, 236 miles into the interior. The indictment was so vague as to make it impossible to respond or even to contemplate a defense. Jo Annies own family, the Abrahams, had considerable wealth, and she continued to collect antiques and preserve an extravagant lifestyle. Jimmy had given her a couple of kids and a lasting pain in the ass. Marble floors. Gentlemen, he told the other players, this table is now reserved for a private game. Boyd believed that one way or another Jimmy would take him to Lee. Goodman On the cartoon, Clark had written Wood below the eagle and Chagra below the mouse. Lee gave Jack Stricklin, now out of prison, $1000 and passed out lesser amounts to other old friends. Patsy Chagras husband, Rick De La Torre, faced four charges in the same conspiracy. She dismissed the greeting as a typical Sailor Roberts lie: she didnt believe for a second that hed gone out of his way to wish her anything. To mark the 40th anniversary of the trial of drug kingpin Jimmy Chagra, who was accused of paying a hitman $250,000 to kill a federal judge John Wood, Oscar It was a partial victory for Leethe jury found De La Torre guilty of only one charge and he got the maximum, 5 years. Lee despised Kerr, and Kerr had every reason to despise Lee. He gambled in Vegas and wrote bad checks and was constantly calling Lee to bail him out. That was a fact. He once sentenced a dope dealer to 35 years for contempt of court. Donna helped Sandy count the $20,000. Borrowing heavily from Kerrs own wording, Wood totally agreed: This request appears to be primarily an effort by the defense attorney to obtain reports of an investigation pertaining to him. By the time Lee finished dressing, Jo Annie had breakfast readyfreshly baked Syrian bread, butter, and a variety of fruit preserves. To mark the 40th anniversary of the trial of drug kingpin Jimmy Chagra, who was accused of paying a hitman $250,000 to kill a federal judge John Wood, Oscar Lee had never discussed with any of the staff the purpose of the apartment at the rear of the complex, but they knew he was having a regular evening affair with a stripper from the Lamplighter Club. I feel that it has all been terribly twisted. His cowboy hat was pushed forward until the brim almost touched his nose, and shaggy locks of graying hair spilled over his collar. But everyone said Lee was the best. Pitts arrived at Lees office looking like a hippie who had just crawled out of a Goodwill box but acting like the owner of a seat on the New York Stock Exchange. In these pictures shes 9 or thereabouts. One time she wrote about sports. He just picked up the money and tossed it in a drawer. Lee grabbed an old musket, the only gun in the house, and several of the poker players chased two black men across a field before losing them along the river. Copyright 2023 Knewz Media Group LLC. In short order, Wood surpassed Guinns unenviable reputation as the most reversed judge in the district. [21] Facing life for smuggling, Jimmy Chagra allegedly decided to have the judge killed. Chagra used one of his trademarks, a solid-gold retractable pointer, to demonstrate his case. His dislike for narcotic cops, particularly agents provocateurs, had been stoked to a white-hot hatred that nearly consumed both his private and his professional life. He imported more high-grade ganja than anyone, tons at a time, planeload after planeload. It was his most important victory in monthsand his most profitable. They showed him a Xerox copy of the section of the law dealing with continuing criminal enterprise. Mom would be returning from mass just about now, walking toward Lees office, unaware that anything had happened. The case had been dead for two years, but Kerr had a plan. She had put the same question to herself. Worse than 1973, the year the federal government indicted him on a trumped-up marijuana trafficking charge in Nashville and nearly destroyed his law practice. Kerr was an empire builder, Boyd said. Vivian remembered the previous Saturday at his office; shes heard murmurs from the staff as she followed him upstairs. He had known that the DEA was watching him, but a grand jury? Jamiel Chagra, known as Jimmy, was born in El Paso, Texas on December 7, 1944. Jimmy was born the middle son of a Lebanese rug merchant family. His mother was named Josephine, and his father Abdou Chagra. He had two brothers, Lee and Joseph, who were both attorneys involved with the legal defense of drug smugglers. El Pasos legions of smugglersdrug smugglers in particularmanage to get themselves arrested often enough to keep law practices like Lee Chagras busy and profitable. In the winter. Some of them deposited large sums in the lawyers safe, against the inevitable. It was four years before we lost a case.. Sometimes Jimmy pretended he was Lee, signing his name Lee Chagra and repeating Lees stories as though they had happened to him. The Museum is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization with a mission to advance the public understanding of organized crime's history and impact on American society. He was 50. Lee concurred and told other members of the family that Jimmy was dead broke and needed their help. When Patsy, who at one time weighed 180 pounds, finally worked up the courage to wear a swimsuit in public, Jimmy humiliated her mercilessly. [4][11] Jimmy Chagra also had a sister named Patsy. As Boyd must have realized, Kerr and Lee Chagra were natural enemies. [23] The authorities did not immediately suspect Chagra of involvement in the assassination, and it took thousands of man-hours to identify them as suspects in the case. Whats it all for? he said out loud, and Vivian could see the tears in his eyes and hear the catch in his voice. If she realized how pressed he had been for money in recent months, she didnt show it. Ill drive you home, he said in a low voice. Lee continued to object. There is no way to calculate how all the damning publicity affected the careers of Sib Abraham and the others. But the real bite of the law, the element that made it harsher than any other federal law on the booksharsher even than penalties for rape, murder, or kidnappingwas its inordinate range of sentences. They learned later that Jimmy left town with about $50,000. The real show was on the casino floor in special sections roped off for the Chagras. The office was a maelstrom of activity, none of it having anything to do with the practice of law. Jimmy was just talking. But the feds real ace in the hole was Jimmy and his partner, Henry Wallace. The lawyer mentioned that he sometimes looked down at the office complex that Lee was remodeling and experienced pangs of envy. The media reported that the charges were dropped for lack of a speedy trial. Whether or not he knew the details, Lee surely sensed the magnitude of the disaster that was bearing down on him. To combat what he perceived as the inroads of organized crime, Boyd needed someone tough and relentless to take over the El Paso docket as federal prosecutor. [12] Their family name was historically "Bushaada", but Jimmy's grandfather changed it. After a while Clark said, You must have dropped close to half a million back there. Almost every one of Chagras clients who had been sent to prison reported visits from DEA agents who pumped them for information about Chagra and offered deals if they would incriminate him. For some unexplained reason, the three assailants (apparently there was a third behind the wheel) raced from the scene without bothering to walk five or six feet and make sure that Kerr was dead. Visions of the 1973 fiasco in Nashville that had almost ruined his law career danced through his mind. In fact, the charges were dismissed because there was no evidence to bring charges in the first place. People may receive compensation for some links to products and services. Everyone had assumed theyd made loveLee made a point of keeping her in his office long enough, then he flushed the toilet and gave her the money. The Most Reverend Sidney Metzger, bishop emeritus of El Paso, came out of retirement to say mass. Lee always suffered shamelessly when he was down and Jimmy was up, but this was different. The charges against all the defendants were eventually dropped, but not for two years. On August 31, 1977, Lee Chagra appeared in Judge Woods court to file a motion of discovery, asking that the judge turn over DEA reports, customs reports, grand jury probes, any material that would reveal when Stricklin was supposed to have engaged in continuing criminal activity. On the morning of the day Lee was murdered, his bookkeeper, Donna Johnson, arrived at the office about ten oclock. 196 Before the case could be brought to trial, however, Jimmy eclipsed his brother in the headlines with a new and even more spectacular exploit. Vivian died of cancer in July 1986. It would be lost until the October flood, after which widower Jim McCulloch, after going through belongings hed moved into a storage unit, would place a call beginning, Cathy, youre not going to believe what I found., Going through things hed moved into the unit, McCulloch happened upon a box labeled Chagra.. It was during this period that Lee was introduced to Mickeys black sheep uncle, Lou Esper, a pale, seedy, rat-faced Syrian hoodlum who had spent about half his fifty years in prisons. On the night before he was murdered, Lee Chagra returned home to El Paso flushed with the euphoria a gambler feels when he believes his luck is changing. Just barely making it. In fact, many aspects of the case were never investigated. Chagra had little use for public servants, especially prosecutors, and Kerr was a classic bureaucrat, squeaking with authority and wedded to the book. The boys had been caught red-handed with 17,000 pounds if marijuana. Part of it was his steadily increasing need for money. The district attorney, several district judges, and a former mayor stood elbow to elbow with Sailor Roberts, gambler Amarillo Slim, and at least a dozen convicted dope dealers. Lee was a baffling tangle of contradictions. He referred to all of his male friends as brother, and yet there was a time when he couldnt keep his hands off his real brothers wives and girlfriends. In less than fifteen minutes, he won $90,000. Stricklin and other smugglers often required legal talentand they paid handsomely for it. I knew he was dying, Catherine Chagra said. No force on earth could stop him. He was really happy that all the money was gone and he had to work again. It was three days before Christmas, 1978. Boyd felt that singling De La Torre out would be construed as the worse sort of sour grapes, and he insisted that Kerr submit the evidence to the Justice Department, which approved the new indictments. Two of Chagras daughters, Christa and Catherine, now live in Smithville. By law, the interview was to remain a secret, known only to a handful of agents and prosecutors who read the transcript as part of their official duties. Stricklin was an enterprising and likable young man who had grown up in one of El Pasos better neighborhoods. A third, Cynthia Jones Chagra, lives in Austin. Which for Jimmy was almost the same as being broke, Patty said. A further indignation: The witness protection program first exiled them to Omaha, Neb. Although Jo Annie appeared at the federal courthouse with $50,000 in bail money, Lee was obliged to spend the night with Georgie Taylor, Jack Stricklin, and virtually the entire hierarchy of El Paso drug trafficking. A man named David Long phoned before you woke up, she told him. He needs you to look it over before he mails it back.. He said he would meet her at home in a couple of hours. He ran a floating blackjack game and started peddling dope. Wood was apparently confusing the fifty-page transcript of the secret interview with actual grand jury testimony. His plan was to reindict Stricklin, and maybe Chagra too, under an almost unknown section of the 1970 Drug Control Act that spelled out the crime of continuing criminal enterprise, popularly known as the kingpin act. Jimmy became involved in marijuana trafficking, with ties to a New England crime organization. When Lou Esper learned that Lee was a cocaine user, he found a good supply and usually delivered the goods in person. Theres a client buzzing at the door. Jo Annie tried to picture the man who had called that morning waiting outside. He was bubbling over with tales of the previous days Tucson victory. He earned a lot of money and became a high roller in Las Vegas, known for his very generous tipping. Its riddled with ethnic stereotyping of Lebanese men as reckless womanizers and Lebanese women as subservient slaves to their men. At the same time a swell of excitement seemed to rumble from the floor, and people pushed to get a look at the action. He got 30 years. He looked smaller than life as he stood there, facing the dresser, looking at the picture of his father and seeing his own reflection. These people used to steal, a Mexican policeman told the Associated Press recently, but there is more money in contraband. He inherited the whole El Paso docket in 1974 when Judge Ernest Guinn died suddenly of a heart attack. Since he was not technically involved in the murder, Esper escaped with a relatively light sentence of fifteen years. Lee stared out the limo window at the blur of cold neon. Patsy ran out the back entrance and toward the cathedral. A block from the cathedral, on North Mesa at the edge of the downtown business district, Lee Chagras new office building was closed for good. There's no way a bullet could have gone through there. State senator Tati Santiesteban, who had known Lee Chagra most of his life, led the procession of pallbearers. A third, Cynthia Jones Chagra, lives in Austin. He bragged that he never once granted probation in a heroin case. Whatever Jo Annie was thinking, she wouldnt say anything. Donna had never seen him before, but Lee said that he was expecting the man and pressed the electronic button to admit him. But lately Lee was taking new directions. Lee fought like hell for everything he had, but things came easy for Jimmy. It is estimated that one out of every five households in these two communities of one million is supported by some type of illegal activity. In secret interviews Wallace as singing like a drunken angel. The weapons existed only in the agents imagination, but at one point the trap got so bizarre that the poor cafe owner believed he was negotiating for a used submarine. Lee Chagra was special, and he went out of his way to prove it: student court, law review, Order of the Coif. 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