When you think of the Mafia you think of The Godfather, Goodfellas, The Sopranos, and you think of people like Al Capone, John Gotti, Sammy “The Bull” Gravano. There is one man, who was the epitome of all that and then some! His name…Richard Leonard Kuklinski.
Richard was born in Jersey City, New Jersey on Thursday, April 11, 1935 to Anna and Stanley Kuklinski. His mother was a devoute Catholic and his father an abusive alcoholic. Anna worked at a meat packing plant and Stanley worked as a brakeman for the railroad.
Richard was born second to his brother Florian. When Richard and Florian were growing up Stanley would often beat the 2 boys, sometimes so bad that he would literally knock them out cold. They would also witness Stanley’s abuse towards Anna on several occasions! One day in 1940 Stanley was beating Florian when he hit him too hard and killed him unintentionally.
He forced Anna to tell family and police that Florian had fallen down the stairs and died that way!
Richard hated his father. Even when he was sitting in jail being interviewed many years later he would attest how he regretted never killing his father for the pain he caused in his life.
Richard grew up in the projects with his sister Roberta (who was born premature) and his other brother Joseph, both of which were his younger siblings. His favourite thing in the whole world were true crime magazines. Richard all to often was beat up by local bullies. By the age of 10 Richard was taking his anger out by torturing animals. He would tie dogs to the bumpers of buses, and throw dogs off of rooftops. He would even go as far as throwing animals into the incinerator in his building.
Richard had taken enough beatings and was fed up. Thoughts of going to the police went through his head but he kept telling himself “I’m no rat..” and would take matters into his own hands! It was a cold Friday night in January when Richard yanked a two-foot-long wooden pole out of the hall closet and went into the alley by his building. He waited in the shadows for what felt like hours, hoping and knowing that Charley Lane (leader of the gang of boys that used to beat on Richard) would walk by the alley on his way home. Just as he was ready to head inside he saw Charley in the distance...his nerves trembled with both fear and hatred to very strong feelings to feel all at once. He confronted his tormentor only to have Charley threaten him with violence if he didn’t get out of his way to which Richard replied “Yeah, try.” Charley went to attack Richard but Richard replied with a smack in the head, just above the ear, with the pole he swiped from his house…Charley stepped back now filled with anger he went to attack again…and again Richard attacked Charley with the pole this time knocking him down to the ground where Richard kept hitting him until he didn’t move anymore. He just wanted to lay a scare into the boy, not wanting to kill him. When Richard realized Charley was dead he grabbed a car that he had stolen for a joyride and stuffed the body in the trunk…drove around for a while till he came to a bridge with a pond under it near a forest in South Jersey. Richard grabbed a hammer and broke out Charley’s teeth and cut the tips of his fingers off, knowing that they were ways to identify a body from reading his true crime magazines. Richard then dumped the lifeless body over the bridge and as it broke through the ice he knew that he had to have the upper hand, he tasted what it was to be powerful and have someone’s life taken away because of his own hands and it felt good. Richard Kuklinski had experienced murder first hand at the age of 14.
After he killed Charley Lane, he got his revenge on the other boys who used to beat him!
Richard began hanging around pool halls beginning to pick the game of pool up like a pro. Because he had a thick frame and tall exterior there weren’t’ too many people that wanted to go toe-to-toe with Richard Kuklinski. Those who did were sorely mistaken.
Richard ended up starting a crew and took leadership. Calling themselves ‘the Coming Up Roses’ they were involved in many bar brawls and were soon known as a fearless and unbeatable crew.
One day Carmine Genovese of the De Cavalcante called upon Richard to take car of a mark with his crew. He had heard good things about Richards crew and wanted to see just how fearless and vicious they could be! The man lived near Lincoln Park and the hit had to be done quick, he “need to go” as Carmine so blatantly put it! One of the members of the gang offered to be the shooter as long as Richard drove, and Richard agreed…John Wheeler a big tough as nails kinda guy froze once he saw his target getting into his car…Richard saw this and said not to worry they could pull up to marks car and take him out through the window at the next traffic light. Wheeler froze up again at the next opportunity to take this easy target out. So with Richard now pissed that the job still wasn’t done they tailed him to this bar in Hoboken where Richard spoke up and said that he’d take the guy out. They waited for the guy to leave the bar. He finally left the bar and Richard got out of the car walked over to the mark and just as he was getting into his car *BOOM* Richard shot him in the head just above the ear. Killing him instantly. Richard calmly walked back to his own car and sped off. As they left the crime scene
Wheeler looked at Richard and said “Man, Rich, you’re cold like ice!” They returned to Carmine and the crew earned $500 each and the doors to the underworld were now open to big possibilities for them!
The gang was given enough work to last them a while, they were making money hand over fist and Richard would gamble most of his winnings away, which would become a big problem for him in his future.
One day two of the members, John Wheeler and Jack Dubrowski thought they were invincible and held up a card game held by a made man in the De Cavalcante family. This was a bad idea because one of the members of the game recognized Wheeler even though they had there faces hidden. Word hit a soldier in the De Cavalcante family and he had a sit down with Richard.
He told Richard about the card game being hit and that everyone knew that Richard had nothing to do with the robbery otherwise he’d be dead! Richard offered to tell Wheeler and Dubrowski to leave town and never come back, but that wasn’t good enough for the soldier! He wanted them taken out! See in the Mafia world you don’t mess with a made man! Ray Liotta told us this in Goodfellas. So with that said Richard sealed their fates and gunned them down! Left them where they lay so that it would be known that the job was done. Much like Richards previous murders before these he was never identified as a suspect! He finally put the Coming Up Roses behind him and was looking forward to moving on with his new found fame as an extremely dangerous street tough and hit man for hire!
His first time having to torture someone was when Carmine Genovese, freshly released from jail, asked Richard to make this guy disappear. He disrespected one of his friends wives. Carmine made it clear he had to suffer! So Richard went to the marks work and scouted the place where the he worked and then set the trap up! The mark worked at a used car lot so Richard set it up to happen on a test drive. They went out on the drive and parked…Richard pointed at something and then *BAM*, hit the mark in the head knocking him out cold. Richard hog tied him, duct taped his mouth and shoved him in the trunk of his car. Richard drove out to a wooded area in the Jersey Pine Barrens, pulled the mark out of his trunk and placed him against a tree and made him realize that he was gonna suffer! He pulled out a hatchet and proceeded to break his knees. He cut his fingers off one-by-one and was gonna use them as proof the mark had suffered but got a better idea…by this time the mark had soiled himself. Richard finally killed the guy and buried what was left of him in a hole out in the woods.
Richard soon left with the proof he needed for Carmine…his head!
One thing that not many people at all knew about Richard was that he was married once before Barbara. Her name was Linda.
She had taken a liking to Richard when he was sixteen and she was twenty-five-years old. She would go on to let him live with her and they would have sex numerous times a day, everyday. Richard would at times be violent with Linda (as he grew up witnessing his mom being beaten by his father), and other times he would bring her stuffed toys, fresh flowers, fancy candy, and clothing. After finding out that Linda was pregnant he ended up marrying her for the sake of the baby.
At 20, Richard was a father for the first time naming the child Richard Jr. He had no real feeling of love or emotion for the child…he felt the child was just an extension of lust and nothing else. Linda became pregnant again and nine months later gave birth to his second child they called David. Richard still had no emotional feelings of love towards his children but he did feel the need to protect them on occasion. One such instance was when the super-intendant slapped both Richards kids for allegedly being too loud. Linda called Richard at a local bar and told him and he lost it! He got in his car and drove to find the super at a bar he usually drinks at. Long story short the super was hospitalized for weeks, and Richard had to pay $3000 for knocking a cop (who was working as a bar tender at the bar this happened in) out. Richard and Linda’s relationship was going sour and they had stopped having sex to barely any at all.
One fateful evening Richard’s younger brother Joe, now all grown up, told Richard he had seen a guy, Sammy James, and his wife Linda go into a room at the Hudson Hotel. Room 16 his brother told him…ground level right near the Coke machine.
So Richard in a fury left his brother and sped of for the hotel. He showed up at the hotel and booted the door in with all his might. Linda’s eyes popped out of her head in shock and fear. Richard looked at James started to beat the crap out of him and told him he was gonna break every bone in his body but one…and that if he ever heard he was around Linda again he would find him and break that bone he did not break and went on to break ever bone but one. He then turned to Linda and said “If you weren’t the mother of my son’s” and pulled out a knife. He went to grab her left breast and she tried to put up a fight so he hit her and knocked her unconscious and proceeded to cut her nipples off. He never had any real contact with her after that and only saw his sons on occasion.
Roy DeMeo would turn out to be an important role in Richards up and coming life as well as big a thorn in his side as his own father!
Roy DeMeo was a well known tough like Kuklinski but Richard could never be made as he was of Polish decent. Roy looked up to people like Lucky Luciano, and Al Capone so he was really striving to become famous in the Mafia world. He was not liked by many but respected by all as a good earner in the underworld. He was not liked because of his explosive temper, which a lot of people said would be his downfall.
Richards first meeting with DeMeo would not be a good one. Richard at the time was distributing and directing porn, he never got into the porn, just saw it as a cash crop for him and ended up being the porn king of New York at one time!
Richard was behind on a payment he owed to an investor. The investor happened to be friends with Roy and he got Roy involved. Richard went to see his investor but was met by Roy asking for the money. Roy knew that Richard was well over 6 feet and 300 pounds but he did not care as Roy was a hot tempered, loud mouth. They exchanged words Roy saw that he was not putting enough fear into Richard and Roy knew he didn’t want to go toe-to-toe with this mammoth of a man so he left to get his crew. When Roy left Richards investor told him who Roy was and that he was connected…he didn’t want to see Richard get hurt so Richard turned around to get on the elevator. He was met by DeMeo’s men who had their guns pointed on Richard.
DeMeo stared Richard down and said “So tough guy, You want to die, you want to fucking die?” and right after that he hit Richard across the side of the head with the butt of his gun. DeMeo didn’t know that Richard was carrying a gun just like he always did…a .38 derringer. Richard knew that if he said anything or tried to go for the gun he would surly be shot!
Soon all of DeMeo’s men were beating on Richard only enraging him, but doing his best to keep it cool so he did not get shot on the spot. They kept beating him but got tired when they couldn’t knock him out. DeMeo told him to get the money or he was dead! Richard got up, angry as could be, and went to the washroom. Looked at himself in the mirror he was mad at the mess they made of him. He had to go to the hospital and got thirty-eight stitches on three different wounds on his head.
Richard made arrangements to pay his investor. He then went and found DeMeo at a club he owned called the Gemini Lounge.
He walked in to the club and asked for DeMeo. DeMeo told him he was glad that he was making payment arrangements and said that he had balls for coming to the bar. He told DeMeo he wanted to talk and they talked. Richard told him that the two investors that had Roy confront Richard were stealing from each other and that he didn’t owe as much as they had made it seem! Roy said that maybe they got off on the wrong foot and proceeded to tell him that he had asked around about him and found out that Richard was actually a stand up guy, and also told him that he knew Richard had a gun on him and it took balls not to go for it. They talked about the money they could make together in the future all the while Richard was scheming a plan to kill DeMeo…he would wait for the right opportunity, but he wanted to make some money first.
First piece of business was to pretty much rule the porn industry in New York. With DeMeo’s help Richard was pushing massive amounts of pirated porn and Disney movies in the underworld.
Probably the biggest downfall in Richard’s life. Although throughout the relationship together Richard loved Barbara more than anyone he had ever loved before.
Barbara is first introduced into Richard’s life at a soda machine at Swiftline Trucking Company where Richard worked.
They walked by each other at the machine, said hi to each other and went about there way. They kept running into each other around the workplace, Barbara worked in the office and Richard worked in the loading bay and where ever else his boss could take advantage of his massive frame. One day while Richard and Barbara stopped to talk to each other…their boss, Sol Goldfarb, saw this and got upset. Sol had a crush of sorts on Barbara and didn’t like that she was talking to someone as bad as Richard was. This was something that would haunt Barbara for the rest of her life…people telling her to watch out for Richard that he was in with bad people, that he had a bad reputation for being extremely violent. She couldn’t see this as Richard had two sides to him…Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
Throughout their lives together they had 3 children. Their names are Merrick, Christin, and Dwayne. Because there was so much physical abuse towards Barbara, she would tend to shield Dwayne from seeing it because she did not want to see him grow up to become like Richard the way Richard saw his dad beat his mom growing up. Richard actually was jealous of Dwayne because he was a new male introduced into the environment and Richard being the alpha male that he was didn’t like that Barbara gave Dwayne so much attention. Richard never layed a hand on his kids, not even the kids he previously fathered as Barbara told him that if he ever did that she would kill him where he stood!
Regardless of what people thought of Richard Kuklinski, he was always a family man. He kept his personal life (meaning the Mafia, and the fact that he was the biggest distributor of Porn in New York) away from his family because he didn’t want to hurt them in anyway. Near the end of his career as a hit man and professional killer he even thought of quitting the business and taking off with his family to a place where no one knew who or what he was.
Roy DeMeo had many of the NYPD cops on his side, and payed them handsomely for looking the other way at certain times or giving up info on cases against him and his crew. One of these cops was Peter Calabro. Peter wanted his wife killed so Roy did it for him. It would be this killing that made DeMeo a fully informed man when it came to busts, and info on anything that DeMeo needed.
Sammy “The Bull” Gravano was a well known man in the Mafia world. He was not a man to mess with being John Gotti’s right hand man. When Gravano needed a cop killed he contacted DeMeo and he referred Richard. DeMeo had a feeling it was gonna be Peter Calabro that was going to be the hit, and he wanted nothing to do with it…that and the fact that he was a cop.
Gravano contacted Richard and set up the hit…supplied him with the proper tools and gave him all the info that he needed to know…when and where he was going to be where he was to be hit! The biggest piece of info that Gravano and DeMeo forgot to mention was that he was a cop.
March 14, 1980 it was cold and snowing. Richard had followed Calabro for a while and learned his routes and followed him that day and finally went ahead of him and parked on the side of the road with his emergency lights on. He knew it would force Peter Calabro to slow down as he was driving by. He waited until Calabro drove directly by his window…with a shotgun ready at window level he fired and killed his mark instantly.
Richard found out the next day that the man he had killed was a cop and that made him more livid than any moment he had ever experienced. He knew that it was then that he had been too careless with his killings.
Richard first met him at a hotel in Queens where he was hunting for his next mark on contract. He thought the guy was there after him so he played it cool. Richard walked into a bathroom, stepped up to a urinal and then the guy walked in and stepped up to the urinal directly next to the one the Richard was using…Richard was about ready to battle it out with this guy, he was not taking going to let this make him a victim. It wasn’t till they both went to the sinks to wash their hands that Richard talked to him. He asked him if his business was with him and the other guy asked if Richard had business with him, they both said no and that was that. They both knew they were hit men, and only another hit man can see a hit man a mile away.
A few days later Richard sat there in his car with a tranquilizer gun, which was a new weapon that he had introduced into his arsenal of death, when he heard a Mister Softee truck coming around the corner. He flagged the truck down and walked over to get some ice cream. When he got to the window he was in shock to see the ice cream man was the same hit man he ran into at the hotel while Richard was on surveillance. They introduced themselves to each other and this is where we first meet Robert Pronge. They talked shop and Robert told Richard that he used the Mister Softee truck to do surveillance, Richard was impressed. Robert Pronge used to be a Special Forces soldier and had extensive training in Explosives and killing. It was here that Richard would first be introduced to a weapon he loved to use more than any gun or rat cave he had…POISON. They exchanged methods of offing their marks and became friends then and there. It would prove to be fatal for Robert Pronge.
Richard and Robert would carry their friendship on for a while before Richard thought that Robert was truly crazy. Now I remember writing this earlier but Richard would never kill a woman or child…ever! So what befell Robert Pronge was that he asked Richard to kill his wife and eight-year old son. He told Pronge that he didn’t do that kind of thing and that he thought it morally wrong and wouldn’t do it. Another issue that upset Richard was that Robert wanted to poison a reservoir that serviced an upstate community with drinking water. He was only doing it because a guy was gonna pay him several thousand dollars to poison a certain family, but Richard though it unnecessary to poison so many people for no reason…all Richard could think about was all the young kids that would die for no reason.
Richard went to see Robert and put an end to his psychopathic tendencies. It was mid-august when Richard crept into Roberts garage where he kept his truck and his killing tools. Richard was always known for having a cat-like walk when he was hunting for his prey. He wanted them to be surprised when they saw him (if they ever did) at the last second of their lives. So Richard walked up on Robert, pulled out his .22 pistol stocked with a silencer and put 5 bullets into Robert Pronge’s body. Richard felt sad as he did genuinely like Robert, but didn’t trust his psychopathic ways.
Richard wasn’t killing as much as eh was laying low from the Peter Calabro killing. He was into a bunch of things…Money Laundering in Zurich and the states, Porn distribution, the odd contract, and he went back to doing breaking and entering.
He was working with a B&E crew that consisted of Al Rinke, Gary Smith, Danny Deppner and Percy House. They scored from houses all over New Jersey. Richard had experience doing B&E’s because that is what he did before he started doing big time hits for the Mafia.
One day while robbing a house, Al Rinke was caught and arrested. He tried to make a deal with the police in order for him giving up the rest of his crew. Detective Pat Kane (who had at the time been investigating a string of house robberies) had been questioning him for two-days when he gave up the names: Danny Deppner, Gary Smith, Percy House and the head of the crew…a guy he only knew as “Big Rich”, a name that Pat Kane would have come across him from now on!
Percy House was the first to be arrested, and he wouldn’t say anything (he knew the reputation of Big Rich). The other guys were no where to be found. Danny Deppner’s wife went to the police with details about what they were looking for. She told the police that Danny and Gary were afraid to come out of hiding because they didn’t want Richard to kill them. They considered Richard the Devil. She told them of how Richard helped them and put them up somewhere safe away from the cops and told them to stay put till he told them it was okay to come out of hiding.
Richard helped Gary and Danny out by putting them up in a hotel for the time being and helped them with food if they needed it. Richard told them to stay put so they did not get seen. Gary got it into his head to leave for a couple hours to see his daughter. Richard found out about this and decided it was his time to go.
Richard went to a diner near by and bought three hamburgers for each of them to eat. He sprinkled poison on just Gary’s burger and took it too them. Richard put on a front to make the guys feel east about him being there and he really wanted to watch the life leave Gary Smith’s body. They sat down to eat the burgers and almost instantly the poison worked on Gary.
Richard made Danny strangle Gary to finalize his death and make sure there was no coming back for Gary! Richard then had Danny dispose of Gary’s body by putting it underneath the bed of the hotel room they were in (this would be a big mistake on Richard’s part). Deppner was next. He would eat a roast beef sandwich that was laced with cyanide. You’d think he would have learned not to eat anything Richard brought with him. After Danny ate the sandwich he was almost dead when Richard shot him in the head with a silenced .22.
Richard was also involved with another one of his close personal friends Phil Solimene. Richard never trusted anyone but Barbara, and Phil was the only other person he trusted. Phil was the owner of a pharmacy. Richard knew Phil for many years, and committed many crimes with him including murder.
Phil had gotten himself in some trouble and Pat Kane had approached him to get him to set Richard up. It was either that or serve jail time. So Phil agreed to set up the only man that ever trusted him with his life. An undercover agent was set up as a fake Mafia hit man who’s background was a fresh jail releasee that was looking to get back into the game.
Phil would try and get Richard to the store to have coffee and meet his “friend” that he knew would get along well with Richard. Richard was reluctant at first and many times after that. By this time Richard was flying all over the world and laundering money for different big time people.
Finally Richard agreed to come to the store and hang out. Phil had been trying for so long now to get Richard to come to the store and he finally had his chance. Richard for a long time now had wanted to kill Pat Kane because he had been investigating Richard for some time (I am talking a couple years have passed since the Deppner-Smith killings). It started when Pat came to Richards house and stirred up the pot by bringing his personal life to his house, something he had been desperately trying to keep away from his family for so long. Pat was investigating the murders of Danny Deppner and Gary Smith.
When Phil first tried to sell Richard on his new “friend” he told him that he was a big timer with connections to anything Richard needed, drugs, guns, hit men, anything really. So Richard called up Phil and asked to meet with Dominick, the undercover cop. Richard was looking for cyanide. Cyanide specifically because he used it in a spray bottle mixed with a certain amount of cyanide and water. This acted as a deadly spray that when sprayed in someone’s face (provided only a little cyanide, just enough to kill a grown man, was used) is would cause them to die instantly and make it look as if they suffered a heart attack.
Richard and Dominick’s first encounter was where Richard was looking for some silencers and cyanide. Dom said he would look into getting what Richard needed…knowing that he can’t really supply him with any killing agents, he would string him along saying he knew a female DEA officer that could get him the silencers and he knew a guy that could get the cyanide. Richard became impatient about having to wait so long to get what he needed, and he started to become distant with Dom because of having to wait. Richard was asking all over for cyanide to kill this cop that was a thorn in his side. So finally one day Dom got a hold of Richard and they talked about getting the cyanide for the last time as Dom threw him a curve ball and stated that he was looking for a hit man to do in a loud mouth customer of his that was Rich and he wanted to rob and kill him. Richard said he would be up for it. To keep him strung along Dom asked about ways he could do it and that is what sealed his fate. Richard had been talking to Dom on a bugged phone, all the while Richard was not even suspicious of this.
A man that all his life had never said much to people about who he was or what he did told the most unlikely of people that he would take a contract, while being recorded.
It was almost like a scene right out of Goodfellas. Richard and his family were getting ready for another Kuklinski Christmas when he was contacted by Dom with info on when and where they were gonna rob Dom’s customer.
It was set up for early in the morning on a Wednesday. They would meet the buyer and deal business with him in the back of a van. Dom mentioned that every time they meet at this place he orders an egg sandwich. Dom said that he would supply the sandwich and the vial of cyanide, again Richard never thought in his mind that this guy was trying to set him up. All Richard was thinking about was putting a bullet in both Dom and the buyers head. Richard wanted to save the cyanide that was gonna be used in the buyers sandwich for Pat Kane.
December 17, 1986 Richard was off to meet Dom for what was going to be a big day for the Jersey police and the Anti Mafia Justice League.
They met on time that morning and said there hellos. Dom mentioned that eh was going to meet the buyer and bring him to Richard’s van where he would test the coke out before he would buy it from Dom. Dom handed Richard the cyanide and the egg sandwich making sure to say everything clearly so the wire he was wearing would pick it up. Richard was feeling now that he was possibly being set up and said that he was going to go and pick his van up, that he’d be back with the van. Dom kept trying to get Richard to put the cyanide on the egg sandwich there so that they could bust him on the spot, but he didn’t.
They let him go. Richards plan was he was going to drive off and come back in a different car to see if the buyer really was going to show up…all he would have said was his van wouldn’t start so he got a bigger car.
Barbara had been feeling ill for a while now, and Richard went to find a pay phone to call her to see how she was doing.
They talked for a few minutes and asked if she wanted to go for breakfast, she said yes, and he was on his way home to pick up his wife…the love of his life and the only woman he ever felt true love for. By this time Richard said screw Dom and would call Phil and tell him he thought that Dom was full of it and ask why he would talk so highly of someone so full of it.
By now the cops knew that Plan A was out of the question and they felt they had enough on Richard Kuklinski that they could just go and pick him up on what they had, which was Richard on tape talking about ways he had killed people and various other murder and mob related incidents. Off they went to arrest the mammoth murderer of a man that his neighbours knew as just Rich they family man, not The Iceman worlds greatest hit man.
Richard and Barbara were just getting set in the car to go to breakfast. They were gonna go for breakfast and Richard wanted to take Barbara to the doctors to get looked at because she was still not feeling to well. Richard had no idea what was about to happen next. There were a pile of undercover cars parked up the road monitoring the Kuklinski home. The local cops had no idea what was going on and a neighbour called the local police and they almost ruined the whole operation.
Richard and Barbara were in the car and Richard started it and they were off up the street. No sooner did they get up the road when they were surrounded by cops and agents. Richard wanted to grab the gun he had under his seat but was afraid with all the bullets that might be flying around one might hit Barbara.
Richard was ripped from the car, and about to be put to the ground when Barbara was ripped from the car too. This infuriated Richard, he kept shouting to them that she had nothing to do with this and they should leave her alone. But they threw her to the ground and this upset him to the point of no return. It took eight strike force officers to get the hulking man to the ground and handcuffed, all the while thinking about how they had hurt his only true love. He would kill Pat Kane if he died trying.
Barbara was let out but charged with possession of a gun that was found under the seat of the car they were busted in, but the charges were later dropped when they convicted Richard. Richard was charged with nineteen felony offences and 4+ murder charges were added to his list of charges. He was sentenced to 2 life sentences as they could only prove that he killed Smith-Deppner, and Louis Masgay.
More can be learned about Richards trial and the actual numbers of charges he ended up with by reading the book “The Iceman: Confessions Of A Mafia Contract Killer” by Philip Carlo, or by searching for his name on the internet.
Richard Kuklinski has said in later interviews that he killed 200+ people. Some for fun, some for money, some were hobos he was trying new weapons out on, some where heads of Mafia families. He was claimed to have been part of the Jimmy Hoffa killing, which to this day had been unconfirmed.
Right before Richards death on Sunday, March 5, 2006 of unknown causes, he tried to bring down Sammy “The Bull” Gravano (as he was the one who had Richard unknowingly kill a cop) for the killing of Peter Calabro. When Richard died all charges were dropped against Gravano and the secret of the Hoffa killing would be voided, and never brought up again. Richard just before he died was paranoid that someone was poisoning him and that was the reason he was getting sick. He could never get anyone to believe his complaints and no evidence of what he died of has yet to be given to the public.
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