There is no such thing as a real RatSnake code—at least not one you’ll ever be able to prove or show in writing. Snake code is an implied set of expectations for loyalty and dedication built on deep-rooted feelings for your fellow agents. The notion of coworker loyalty isn’t new, but if someone from another profession, let’s say an insurance agent, turns on a coworker or drops the ball, it’s unlikely that either of them will be killed as a result. Within specialized law enforcement and investigative units, the loyalty mentality is amplified. I won’t go all psychobabble on why this is. I think anybody reading this book recognizes the need for an unshakable devotion to your team. Snake code, and its close relation the “thin blue line,” is a real and vital part of the job.
Much about the UC world is unwritten. But if I were going to write a field guide, the section on Snake code would include some real-world examples, a.k.a. practical suggestions for how not to fuck it up when your and everybody else’s asses are on the line.
EXERCISE DISCRETION.
During my first day on the job at the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force (OCDETF) in San Francisco, most of the guys came over and welcomed me. Larry Williams did so from sitting behind his desk. He was one of the most senior agents in the OCDETF group and in San Francisco. All the new guys and even some of the old guys gave him a wide berth. He looked like the classic Marlboro man, had a reputation of being a badass, and had little use for new guys or management. He was also the first one to call me on my first day in ATF and welcome me aboard. He liked that I was an ex-cop and former Marine, so he took me under his wing. Even with that, I tried to stay out of his way.
Larry was a legendary investigator with a photographic memory. I literally have seen someone ask him for a specific report dating back six or eight years and watched him open a drawer filled with files and barely look down to pull out the report. On that first day, after shooting the breeze for a couple minutes, he asked if I was any relation to Bob Cefalu. He was asking about my father, and I didn’t know what to say. I actually was somewhat surprised that my dad’s questionable associations hadn’t hindered my background investigation as an ATF candidate. Growing up on the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, waterfront, my father held several bar-tending jobs for Frankie Ballistreri, a notorious Mafia boss. Frankie lined up my dad’s job in San Francisco when my parents decided to move to California. But that had been almost thirty years earlier. I didn’t think Larry was privy to that information since he hadn’t been the one to do my background investigation, but little did I know that Larry became aware of my dad by other means.
I answered Larry’s question in the affirmative and asked why. He got up and walked into a big storage room filled with old files and notes on past investigations. He moved a couple boxes and pulled out an over-sized poster board showing a link chart (a visual chart used to track groups of violators during ongoing investigations) and knocked the dust off of it. Right there in the middle of the chart was my dad’s name and picture. WTF?
When I saw that the chart was titled “The Finetti Murder,” I relaxed.
Ten years earlier, there had been a particularly heinous murder of one of my dad’s friends in front of his daughter. It all stemmed from some dispute between my dad’s bosses, who were local gangster types, and a man named Finetti, who apparently had a connection to the underworld. My dad’s employers brought in a hit man from Hawaii. They obviously didn’t say that was their purpose, just that the visitor was a friend. This “friend” asked to borrow my dad’s Cadillac to take a trip to Lake Tahoe with some of the bosses. Of course, my dad let them use the car. Sometime over the next couple days, this Hawaiian cat killed Finetti at his house and was driving my dad’s car. Since interstate crimes had been committed, ATF had gotten involved in the case, and my father’s name appeared on the link chart. The loan of the Cadillac to the so-called friend was proven to be the sole extent of my father’s knowledge of and involvement in this crime.
As a bartender over the years, my father had opportunities to boost his income. He would refer to himself as a sports analyst. I called him a bookie. A little-known fact about ATF is that in the early 1970s, the investigation and enforcement of gambling laws was delegated to ATF. It only lasted about six months, but my father again showed up on ATF’s radar.
The lesson for me was that Larry kept all of this under his hat. He was old-school and knew that we all have skeletons in our closets. This skeleton didn’t affect anyone else on the team or my ability to do my job. Over the years, I’ve kept in mind Larry’s example for how to behave when it was my turn to live out that part of the code.
DON’T ASK. DON’T TELL.
The way a UC sees it is that he or she knows things others do not, and we like it that way. We didn’t want the bosses knowing all of our shortcuts and ways to skirt policy. For example, it was against ATF regulations to use your own personal funds to pay an informant. However, when you were standing in a dark alley with your snitch, who was doing great work for you, and he asked for a hundred bucks to pay his rent, you had two options. You could tell him to call you later, after you had gone back to the office, filled out the proper paperwork, and had it approved. Or, you could take a hundred dollars outta your pocket, give it to him, and later replace it after ATF had approved the funds.
The only way bosses would find out about these measures was if they had been for-real, no-shit UC operators earlier in their careers. Or, if somebody told them. Bosses who had been no-shit UCs knew about these policy sidesteps and understood they were sometimes necessary to get the job done. They would turn a blind eye, preserving our code, or simply rely on the guideline of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” If we got caught, the consequences would fall upon us. To be very clear, sidestepping or loosely interpreting policy does not mean breaking the law, which is never tolerated by a RatSnake.
MANAGE UP.
An agent named Louis “Louie” Quinonez had been Bird’s local partner in Arizona for many years. As such, Louis and I had become friends. Louis was hyperintelligent, intellectual, and admittedly a quirky guy. He had a long family history of law enforcement. I always liked Louis—liked working with him and partying with him. I just didn’t ever want to work for him. We had such different personalities. Well, I must have jinxed myself, because while I was working in Georgia, that is exactly what happened. Louis was announced as my new group supervisor in Atlanta. I am, and always have been, crystal clear about my character flaws and personal shortcomings. Hell, I wouldn’t want to supervise me. It was an ongoing joke among the RatSnakes that Louie was being punished by being made my supervisor. I was actually fine with it. I trusted Louis implicitly. He had lived the Snake code.
His promotion came at a time when I was assigned to the drug task force run by the Athens PD, and we were extremely busy. He gave me his total support, and I did my best to keep it between the lines and keep him out of hot water. He was very nervous as a first-time supervisor, since he had a one-year probationary period, and his bosses were micromanaging control freaks. I told him many times, “Louis, whatever you do now will set the stage for the rest of your time here.” What I was trying to impart to him was that you couldn’t cower to the SAC and ASAC for a year, and then change and start standing up to them. It was best to set the tone early. For the most part, he did that, and also he and I navigated our new work relationship fairly well. Although our time together wasn’t without its trials. One Saturday morning, while I was at my son’s football game, Louie called me, and that call would test our friendship.
When I say Louie was quirky, it is not a criticism or a slam. The RatSnakes always had agreed that he would just think too hard and too much about stuff. The gist of his phone call was that he wanted me to consider leaving the group he supervised and transferring to another group in Atlanta. He felt that our being so personally close was not good for him or me. I was perplexed. I had worked in this group for years, and these were my people. And I was basically making Louie’s group the hardest-hitting one in Atlanta. I thought, “Why do I have to be the one to leave, why doesn’t Louis just move to another group?”
If Louie was anything, he was fair. We discussed, and he listened to my side. He ultimately agreed with me and dropped the matter. We remained friends and comrades throughout the whole time he remained in Atlanta. I think at the end of my pitch that day, I offered him a Midol.
BE STAND-UP.
Among our crew it often was said that ATF agents were the worst cock blocks ever. That is to say, the male agents and sometimes the female agents would disrupt a fellow agent’s progress at a romantic endeavor just for the fun of it. Kind of: “If I ain’t getting laid tonight, neither are you.” But we also would go to great strides to pump up one of our folks. In my personal experience, the best example of this aspect of the code in play occurred in Stockholm, Sweden.
Jay Dobyns and I had been tapped to teach in Budapest, Hungary. About forty-five days before the assignment came out, I was ordered to conduct some UC training for a group of Swedish federal police who were touring US law enforcement facilities. I fought it tooth and nail because I was up to my ass in ongoing investigations, but an order is an order. The relevant part of that story is that there were six male police officers and one six-foot-tall beautiful female officer in the group. After a week together, the female officer, Lotta, spent a couple extra weeks in the United States. At my house. When she left, we both thought that probably would be the last time we would see each other. Then the Budapest gig came up. I sent Lotta an email, and she invited me to come stay with her on the trip. My travel agent told me, “You have to fly right over Sweden to get to Budapest.” I asked the agent to book a stopover in Stockholm the week before I was due in Hungary.
Jay and I had planned to fly together. When I called to break the bad news that I would just meet him there, he asked why, and I told him of my plans. His response was, “Fuck you, I’m going with you.” Since he was my best friend, I said okay. Lotta said she would love to show the both of us around. So, we changed our flights, and we were off to Sweden. Having upheld my end of the code, Bird owed me one.
We landed in Stockholm about 7 AM and stepped off the plane into Minnesota-like winter weather. Lotta met us at the airport, and then we made the short drive to downtown Stockholm, where her apartment was located. Her place was situated amid cafés up and down the block, with old fixtures and flickering lights that gave it a charming European World War II–era ambience. And it was tiny. A very small, one-bedroom upstairs studio.
It was snowing outside and minus who-the-fuck-knows-how-many degrees. Like me, Jay was still dressed for California weather. He had on cowboy boots, ripped jeans, a wife-beater tank top, and a leather motorcycle jacket. Without any prompting, he said, “Hey, guys, I’m going to go find a cup of coffee and check out some of the area.” It was clear he wanted to give Lotta and me a little time to get reacquainted. We took full advantage of his generosity for the next hour or so. Then we heard a knock. I opened the door to see a visibly frozen Jay Bird. His lips were chattering, his knees were shaking, and there literally was a three-inch-long icicle hanging off his goatee. I busted out laughing, asked, “How’d ya like the architecture?” and invited him in. I guess we were even. Now that’s how a RatSnake does it.
BE LOYAL.
The basics:
• You don’t rat out a fellow operator unless said operator goes criminally rogue.
• You don’t fuck another operator’s spouse.
• You don’t ask a fellow RatSnake to break the law.
• What happens in our circle stays in our circle.
I’ll never forget walking into Pam’s #1 upon my arrival for the start of a new undercover school. As I approached a table where most of the crew had already assembled, Jimm Langley came up and kissed me square on the mouth. Before that very moment, my father and my sons were the only men I had ever kissed on the lips. I choked it down, hoping for a handshake from Box and the rest. Not so lucky. Next came a sloppy kiss from Box, then Bambi, then Carmen, who was Box’s wife, and then Bird, and so on. I’d say I was freaked out, but I really wasn’t. Shit, I had escaped from a medium-security juvenile detention facility at age fifteen; I could survive some slobber from my friends.
This also was the first time I was exposed to another tradition. Not one agent, old or young, can tell me how this came about or when. At the end of each of our gatherings, someone would put Don McLean’s “American Pie” on the jukebox. Every RatSnake present would sing—at the top of their voices—the song that never seems to end. This tradition among the RatSnake world continues to this day. I guess it was just some cool shit to do.
We began eating and drinking to excess, preparing for the long classroom days to come. I remember standing around listening to everyone’s stories, and one thing stood out. They weren’t bragging about their own accomplishments, they were bragging about each other’s. They were pumping each other up, and they even included me. Someone chimed in about a good case I’d made out in California. I liked this RatSnake shit.
WHILE I’M ON THE TOPIC, DON’T BE A SHOWBOAT.
That night at Pam’s #1, every time there was a break in the conversation, there was one guy who would say, “Let me tell you about this case I’m working now,” or “I did this undercover that nobody else could do.” He took any chance he could to interject how cool he was. That was my first exposure to this particular agent. Unfortunately, it wasn’t my last.
He was later involved in the OMO infiltration case of the Warlocks I told you about in the last chapter. The team of RatSnakes working the Warlocks case started out very close and tight-knit. That didn’t last long. As the infiltration got underway, the agent who thought he was God’s gift to ATF began to showboat, thinking he could do it better than the others.* He started railing against Tim’s drinking with the bikers, while doing the exact same thing. He set up buys or deals to garner his own fame without properly informing the other UCs. As the relationship was deteriorating between this agent and the other UCs, he became more critical of their performance. One such occasion brought things to near blows. The group of UCs was approaching an intersection on their bikes. Tim looked away, and then looked back just in time to slam into the rear of the self-serving agent’s bike. No one got hurt, no major damage. Shit like that happens when you are running hard. But this agent didn’t see it that way. He saw an opportunity to cut Tim out of the case. The others UCs had to talk him out of ratting Tim out. That event further built his reputation as a one-way son of a bitch not worthy of RatSnake status.
After all of his criticisms and perceived disloyalties during this investigation, karma caught up with his ass. The case was successfully executed and brought awesome prosecutions. But as news of the case was unsealed, so were this agent’s own misgivings. Apparently, he wasn’t the stout law enforcement loyalist he wanted everybody to think he was. After the arrests, he was overheard in US Marshals’ lockup apologizing to one of the defendants he had befriended. That was it for the other UCs on the case. The team spent over a year trying to put these assholes in prison, and this agent apologizes for doing his fucking job? Oh, it gets better. During the period preceding the massive takedowns, he was riding around with the sister of one of the outlaw gang members—a huge Operational Security (OPSEC) violation. It was said that Internal Affairs didn’t get involved until somebody made it public that this agent had personally purchased a motorcycle from a close associate of the Warlocks for well below market price. Somebody fairly high up the food chain must have stepped in and saved his ass, because the agent got minimal discipline for these infractions. His path, though, was clear. He was definitely heading for management, because none of the guys from the Warlocks case—nor most of the rest of us—would work with him ever again by choice.
TRUST AND HONOR.
In our day-to-day interactions, RatSnakes may have seemed nonchalant, as if not taking the job seriously. That couldn’t have been further from the truth. In fact, most of us were scared shitless most of the time when we were undercover. We took our jobs very seriously—sometimes to the point of paranoia. We simply had to be able to trust one another beyond normal levels. If you partnered up with another UC, you expected to be in agreement on how to proceed. You had to discuss options and agree on a response before it happened. For example, giving two different answers to a question from a violator could be fatal. Your reaction to an action should not come as a surprise to your partner.
In one case, Jimm and another agent were not full members of an OMO they were investigating. Therefore, they were not allowed to be involved in club business or attend “Church”—what bikers called their weekly or monthly club business meetings. Jimm and his partner were in the clubhouse but not in the room where the meeting was being held. But they could hear a heated debate. Jimm’s partner became convinced that the bikers were plotting their murder. Jimm heard nothing that led him to the same conclusion, but his partner started to come unglued. He tried to convince Jimm they should leave before the meeting let out. Jimm wanted to stay. When they heard the meeting start to break up, without warning, the agent pulled the wire he was carrying out of his pocket and handed it to Jimm. Moments before the door opened, Jimm had to stash the wire quickly so the bikers wouldn’t walk out to see him holding a recording device. Jimm never worked with that agent again. There were other events that caused concern about this agent’s ability to maintain his composure under pressure, and many besides Jimm also ended their contact with this agent.
PROTECT ALL LIVES.
On and off the job, we would constantly say and do things to desensitize ourselves to the danger we would be walking into. A non-UC might not get our sense of humor, but that was okay. We did. Jokes aside, no agent ever wanted to break his or her word. We tried to maintain the highest level of honor. This also applied to working with confidential informants. UCs probably took a slightly different view of CIs (confidential informants) than did the average field agent. We all were trained to keep a snitch down. Control their every action and never let them believe they were equal. But when you were working UC with an informant, if he died, you probably died too. So we tried to maintain some sort of working relationship with informants who were active. Sometimes we would become fond of and get closer to a CI than was prudent. But if you asked someone to betray their own, you often were the only friend they had left. A CI’s life during and even after the case often was your responsibility.
UCs lent themselves to a variety of details and services. We could get into areas other agents or cops couldn’t. We might be asked to do particularly tricky surveillance on foot in areas of high crime. We often were asked to get pre-raid eyes on areas that were too hard for our teams to recon because they wouldn’t blend into the type of environment. One such occasion required our UCs to secure and protect a high-level government witness, since UCs could come and go from safe houses without drawing attention. This female witness had ratted out her husband, Blair Guthrie, a very close associate and “meth cook” for the Hells Angels. She did so for domestic reasons, just so she could get away from him. We did our job, round the clock, 24/7 for weeks on end. Her husband was charged with manufacturing machine guns and silencers. He was ultimately convicted and sent to prison. We were directed to highly encourage her, in fact, to convince her that she needed to go into the US Marshals’ witness protection program. We were not to take no for an answer. But you can only help those who want to be helped. Just when I thought I had convinced her to go, she flip-flopped and decided not to. She came from a wealthy family and thought their money could protect her.
While protecting her, we agreed to let her call Sonny Barger—one of the founding members of the Oakland, California, chapter of the Hells Angels—and try to get a read on his attitude toward her for snitching on a close associate. The call was recorded, of course. She and Sonny had a brief conversation, during which she told him her actions were only directed at Blair and not the club. Sonny told her that was good enough.
When the detail was over, the FBI arranged for her safe travel back to her family’s home in Texas. They provided her a local contact agent should anything arise that might be suspicious. I understood why she didn’t want to go into hiding for the rest of her life, but I wish she had. Blair served about four years in prison. Within days of his release, there came a knock at the door of his ex-wife’s parents’ house in Texas. When she opened the door, the flower deliveryman opened fire and killed her in her parents’ foyer.*
Any loss of life is tragic, but this one hit home more than most. I was young and wanted to save the entire world from bullies. I always will remember that protection detail as a failure.
DON’T BREAK THE CODE.
A fitting example of what happens when the code is broken is a story that involved the infamous Jay Dobyns bikini episode, which basically went like this. During the training session known as the “class from hell,” a bunch of us were partying at the condo assigned to one of the female instructors for the class duration. Bird went to the bathroom and saw her bikini hanging in the shower and thought it would be funny if he came out wearing it, and, trust me, it was. It was funny as shit. Here’s this six-foot-two, former college wide receiver wearing a skimpy bikini, with—wait for it—a banana stuffed in the bottoms.
This female agent was liked and well trusted. She was a good operator and a loyal friend. At the time, she was dating a train wreck of a new agent back home. Speaking from personal experience, the guy was a tool. He also was the only probationary agent I ever recommended for termination. Professionally, I stand by my recommendation that he should have been fired. Lucky for him, our boss at the time, Lou Bristol, was old-school and asked me to tone down my recommendation. He said it was my job as his training agent to unfuck this kid. I respected Lou more than almost any boss I had ever had, so I tried.
When the female agent told her then boyfriend about the bathing suit incident, he apparently became infuriated (more likely, jealous) and insisted she report this horrible act to management. To be clear, the definition of sexual harassment or discrimination is predicated on unwanted behavior. For years, this female agent either had participated in or hung around us when our off-duty antics got out of hand. She was definitely in the inner circle and knew all of our secrets. And, she laughed her ass off when Bird walked out of the bathroom in that bikini.
Being a gambler, I would have bet my house that she would never file a complaint. Especially since most of the grief would fall on Box (he was in charge of the class and was present during the incident), who had welcomed her into his home many times.
She did report the incident, and the entire episode was devastating on both sides. Box took some time on the beach, slang for a suspension. The ensuing investigation that sucked many of us in quickly showed that she had repeatedly and regularly engaged in similar activity, and she withdrew her complaint. Unfortunately, she couldn’t take back the fact that she had intentionally broken the trust of her brothers and sisters. The other female UCs in our group took her actions particularly hard. They saw it as fucking up their hard-fought standing in this circle. After it all went down, a sign on the front door of a prominent local PD crime squad had this agent’s name printed inside a circle with a line through it. She would never recover with our collective crew.
In closing, let me break it down. You never heard the above stories. Snake code. You will never hear some other stories. Snake code. We all lived through this together, the good, the bad, and the ugly. Repeat after me. Snake code.
* To be somewhat clear, this agent’s name was not Jimm, Turbo, or Tim.
* I am not saying Blair’s release had anything to do with this young lady’s murder. I’m merely telling a story. You decide.