Except mine. The FBI dispatched teams of agents to visit all the top Mafia bosses they could find and tell them face-to-face, Hands off this agent, he beat you, it’s finished. If they hurt me, all the resources of the Justice Department would be focused on going after them—I and the FBI were not going to be intimidated.

On August 14, seventeen days after the agents had told Sonny about me, the bosses called a meeting in New Jersey. Sonny went to the meeting. I was not surprised. His options were either to turn informant, or to run, or to go to the meeting. He went to the meeting and disappeared.

Once we found out that Sonny was missing, I told Jerry Loar, “When you see them start taking his pigeon coops down, you can close your case on Sonny Black, because then he’s history.” About a week later a couple guys were on that roof taking the pigeon coops down.

A month later Sonny’s girlfriend, Judy, called the New York office of the FBI, wanting to talk to me. When I got in touch with her, she said she was scared for Sonny and for herself, and she wanted very much to get together and talk to me about things. I said okay, and that agents would be in touch with her to arrange it.

We had to be careful, even with Judy, because of a possible setup. We needed a controlled situation. So we decided to have the meeting in Washington, D.C. Two agents picked her up, flew down with her, and brought her to the Marriott right by National Airport.

We went to the dining room to have dinner. The other agents sat at a table across the room.

She said she was frightened and worried, and she missed Sonny.

I said, “Judy, the chances are that Sonny is not coming back. My recommendation is that you not associate with any of those people anymore. They’re not really your friends. Get on with your life.”

“I know that now,” she said. “But I had a good time with Sonny. I really liked him.”

“So did I.”

She was very sad, and she cried a little. “Donnie, I always knew that you weren’t cut out for that world because you carried yourself different, you had an air of intelligence, you know? I knew that you were much more than just a thief. You were a good friend to Sonny and me. Sonny didn’t have any ill feelings toward you.”

“I’m glad to hear that.”

She said he had told her about the agents coming to talk to him, and he didn’t believe what they told him—there was no way I could be an agent, because of the things we had done together, the conversations we’d had, the feelings we’d had. “You know what he said? He told me, ‘I really loved that kid.’ He was really broken up when he found out that you were an agent, but he said that wouldn’t change the way he felt because of the type of guy you were. You did your job and you did it right.”

“I always liked Sonny,” I said. “That hasn’t changed with me, either.”

“He told me he had this meeting in New Jersey. But that was all. Later I found out that just before he left for the meeting, he gave Charlie, the bartender, all his jewelry and the keys to his apartment and everything. The only thing he took with him were his car keys.”

“He knew he wasn’t coming back,” I said.

“Yeah. Am I going to have any problems, you think?”

“No, I’m sure you won’t. Don’t worry about anything. Nobody’s going to bother you. Just get on with your life and stay away from those people.”

At the end, she said she felt better, was resigned to the fact that Sonny wasn’t coming back, was glad for our talk.

“Call me anytime,” I said.

We figured Sonny, Lefty, and Tony Mirra were the most obvious targets for mob hits because of me. Mirra, because he was the first guy to bring me into Little Italy, the first Bonanno guy I hung around with, and also because they thought he was a snitch. Our information was that they thought that his fight for me at the sitdowns was all a ploy, that he and I were actually working together for the FBI to advance my infiltration into the mob. Lefty and Sonny were obvious targets because of my association with them.

But the only definite contract we got word on was on Lefty. He was the only one we could protect from his own people. On August 30, a Sunday, agents snatched up Lefty just as he came out of his apartment building.

Mirra didn’t get hit until March 1982. His body was found in a car in a parking lot at the corner of North Moore and West Streets, outside the building where Bonanno consiglieri Steve Cannone lived. Somebody had shot him four times in the head. He had $6,700 in his pocket.

On August 2, 1982, I started testifying in Room 318 of the Southern District Federal Courthouse in the racketeering trial of U.S. vs. Dominick Napolitano, et al.

On August 12, 1982, a badly decomposed body was found in a hospital body bag in a creek near South Avenue in the Mariner’s Harbor section of Staten Island. The body had been buried. Recent heavy rains had uncovered it and washed it up. The person had been shot. The hands had been chopped off—an indication of a Mafia hit and a special signal that the victim had violated mob security.

On November 10, five days before Lefty, Nicky Santora, Mr. Fish Rabito, Boots Tomasulo and others were sentenced, the body was identified through dental records as being that of Sonny Black.

I was sorry it was Sonny. I was glad it wasn’t me.

EPILOGUE

When I emerged from undercover in 1981, there was no celebration, no homecoming, no resumption of normal life with my family. In fact, because of the death threats and the contract out on me, there was more fear in my family when I came out than when I was under. I began work immediately on preparation for the many trials, and I have testified in those trials all these six years.

Though I continue to testify when called upon, I resigned from the FBI in 1986, after seventeen years of service, to write this book. I am not in the federal Witness Protection Program. I and my family have moved our home once again to another part of the country. Except in matters relating to FBI activities or this book, I do not use the name Pistone. When I am with my family, I use the name they use. When I am traveling or engaged in anything other than testimony or family activities, I use any of several other names.

At forty-eight, I will begin a new life under a new name. Except for close friends and some government officials, no one will know that I am the man who lived this life as Joe Pistone and Donnie Brasco.

Looking back, would I do it again? Professionally, yes, there’s no doubt in my mind that I would do it. Personally, it’s a different matter. I missed ten years of a life with my family. I don’t know whether that loss is worth it. But I do know that if I was going to do the job, I had to do it the way I did it.

Here follows a partial list of what happened to the major figures in this book:

Baldassare “Baldo” Amato: Convicted, “Pizza Connection” Case, New York, awaiting sentence.

Frank Balistrieri: Convicted, Milwaukee, 13 years; convicted, Kansas City, 10 years.

John Balistrieri: Convicted, Milwaukee, 8 years.

Joseph Balistrieri: Convicted, Milwaukee, 8 years.

Caesar Bonventre: Murdered, 1984.

Stefano “Stevie Beef” Cannone: Died, 1985.

James “Fort Lee Jimmy” Capasso: Not charged in our cases.

Bobby Capazzio: Missing, reports from informants that he was murdered.

Paul “Big Paul” Castellano: Indicted, “Commission” Case, murdered, New York, 1985.

Salvatore Catalano: Convicted, “Pizza Connection” Case, New York, 45 years.

John “Boobie”Cerasani: Acquitted in New York, pled guilty in Tampa, 5 years.