If Jo Annie was conscious of this, she moved among them without rancor, beautifully composed and self-possessed. Goodman had represented Chagra in a previous drug case, which was undone by his client testifying. Standing in front of the mirror, he would snap the pearl buttons of his red cowboy shirt, then climb into the black Western-cut leisure suit. An inextricable connection, whether emotional or physical or both, would continue between Lee and Vivian long after Vivian and Jimmy were married, Catherine would later learn. The agents thought so little of the information gleaned in the interview with Johnson that they didnt even bother to place him under oath. It's going to be a very interesting night Jan. 18 at the Mob Museum in Las Vegas. Only a few select friends and celebrities like Rosey Grier or Gabe Kaplan were allowed in. The perfect vehicle for the imperfect time. After about an hour Lee had lost $90,000. Two overstuffed easy chairs were pushed together against the front of Lees desk, blocking the path across the room. While it was being renovated, he occupied an office in a building on Montana owned by another lawyer friend, Mickey Esper, who was related to Jo Annie. Much later, Lee Chagra learned that the single piece of evidence against him was a statement made by Tom Pitts, claiming that he and another drug dealer had once used Lees office to cut a deal. A short time later there was a knock, and Lee admitted two hookers to the room. Lees limit was $3000, and he would have played for $10,000 had Caesars Palace allowed it. In the first minutes of Lees run, a little old lady burst through the crowd just as Lee released the dice. He died from injuries resulting from an automobile accident that occurred on December 6, 1996. If Stricklin cooperated, they would work for his early release. Then he expanded the pointer, an inch at a time. 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 Kerr preferred playing Bach fugues in the dim light of the First Presbyterian Church and going to the symphony. He inherited the whole El Paso docket in 1974 when Judge Ernest Guinn died suddenly of a heart attack. When Lee hit a losing streak, he could fly into a snit, blaming anyone handy, especially Jo Annie, who more than once hurried off the casino floor in tears. Gambling and women, said Lees old friend and fellow lawyer Clark Hughes. And that wasnt all. 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.. Whatever Jo Annie was thinking, she wouldnt say anything. For years there had been a rivalry between the two brothers, a fierce and unyielding competition that only the two of them completely understood. Until now the media had treated the charges against Stricklin as routine news, but Woods ruling added a bizarre new twist. He decided on James Kerr, one of the assistant U.S. attorneys he had inherited from the Republican regime. A judge cant associate socially with a prosecutor the way Wood did with Kerr and still call em correctly, John Pinckney, the first U.S. attorney, had said. What Lee didnt know at the time was that Johnson had, as they say, gone over. Hed become a government snitch, albeit not a very reliable one. He wanted to dress the way Lee dressed, in fine clothes and jewelry, and he wanted to hear whispers of respect when he walked into a room and silence when he told a story. In fact, many aspects of the case were never investigated. By early autumn 1976 Lee was back in El Paso, pumping money. There was no bitterness or rancor, but by the end of August Joe Chagra realized that he had had all he could take. If youre not careful, your friends become crooks, too. Lee first had the dangers of his association with criminals brought home to him in 1973. Chagra's third wife, Elizabeth, was found guilty of delivering $250,000 to Charles Harrelson to kill Wood. Dad had been gone for eight years. I undermined their entire case of how the bullet got to the judge.. In a secret interview with a group of DEA agents and prosecutors, Johnson had implicated at least sixty El Paso citizens as major drug traffickers. And when it came to squandering the profits, Lee was at the head of the line. 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. Hadnt I already proven that wrong?. Further complicating the relationship between the two brothers was that Lee, who was married, had an affair with a woman who worked the switchboard at the Sheraton Hotel in El Paso and, after cutting off the relationship, or at least attempting to, introduced her to Jimmy in order to keep her close. He discussed with the CIA the possibility of liquidating all major drug traffickers in the Middle East; it was estimated that 150 key assassinations would do the job. 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. Many a night, the Chagra brothers would play all six spots on a blackjack table, for anywhere from $10,000 to $25,000 a hand. It was as if their friendship had come to a fork in the road, and Lee had wandered off in another direction. He bragged that he never once granted probation in a heroin case. Offers may be subject to change without notice. The greatest job of bullshit advocacy Ive ever seen, Clark Hughes said of Lees performance. Esper had also observed Lee making large cash payoffs to various collectors. Back in El Paso things werent going much better. The documents revealed that hardly a week passed without some agents making inquiries into Lee Chagras private life. [2][22][6] He was the first federal judge to die by assassination in over a century. It was Stricklin who was on trial, not Chagra. I knew he was dying, Catherine Chagra said. Lee was already there. By mid-November the feds had just about made their case against Jimmy Chagra, and rumors of his imminent indictment were rampant. Hed never cried about it before. Yet he could risk the familys last penny on a roll of the dice. And it was killing Lee. For the time being, the Jerry Johnson episode played itself out in obscurity, but the Chagra name burst into the headlines in the opening days of 1977. Jamie Boyd was the consummate politician. Marriage license #D875871, Marriage License Records, Las Vegas. From time to time agents provocateurs posing as clients came to his office to discuss a phony case, then ended up trying to score some drugs from him. He would never go back to Vegas. Two of Chagras daughters, Christa and Catherine, now live in Smithville. The family was worried about Lee. All rights reserved. Then Kerr observed that the request for reportsis an overt act on the part of the defense attorneyto obtain government reports and documents concerning him. That is, concerning Lee Chagra. The deal made guys sweating over a ton of weed loaded onto a plane and flown across the border look like chumps. Well, I didnt know about it, Lee said, dumbstruck. He said he would meet her at home in a couple of hours. The Indian brushed a strand of limp hair over his bald spot as he walked toward Lees car. Its going to be a very interesting night Jan. 18 at the Mob Museum in Las Vegas. 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. A known gambler and hit man, Harrelson had apparently been cleared in the Wood murder. A shake-up of the entire federal drug enforcement apparatus was under way, ramrodded by Nixons ranking authority on drugs, G. Gordon Liddy. When you live that way, chances are youll die that way too. By maintaining close ties to Democratic Party kingmaker Travis Johnson, Boyd had run the gamut of offices: assistant county attorney, assistant U.S. attorney, district attorney, U.S. magistrate. All three believe he would never have gotten into the dope business without the contacts of Lee, a lawyer who seemed drawn to shady characters along the border, where smuggling was the economy. Lee was lying face up on the floor, blood trickling from his mouth. In the seven years or so that it had been in on the books, few had bothered to read that section of the drug law. After the phone calls, Lee would take a long timemaybe two hours, maybe moreto bathe, groom, and dress himself in the wardrobe that he reserved for these occasions. That old watch-me-carry-the-world smile was back on his face. I decided to disappear over to the Hilton for a while. When Clark Hughes returned to Caesars about nine that evening, Lee had almost exhausted his credit limit. The next morning FBI agents called on Lee Chagra, confiscated his gun collection, and asked him to take a lie detector test. Lee Chagras funeral was a microcosm of all the extremes in his life. All the drawers were open and papers were scattered on the floor. You help us and well help you, the agents told Stricklin. With the gambling and the ostentatious living, the money never lasted long. Any craps! she shouted, throwing a $5 chip on the table. Security guards kept the riffraff away. Hughes never knew whom he called or whyLees life was like hornets nest, with thousands of isolated cells, and no one person, however close, ever saw more than a single cell. Something about a will, about some large estate in California? His cowboy hat was pushed forward until the brim almost touched his nose, and shaggy locks of graying hair spilled over his collar. He had no information incriminating Lee, except that he confirmed that Lee had set up some dummy corporations to launder money, but he was willing to finger Jimmy as the kingpin. And co-conspirators in others. 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. Lees vial of cocaine was open on the corner of his desk. On the plane from Tucson, Lee must have reflected on the paradox of his life. As Kerr reviewed the 1973 conspiracy charges in the dead files of the Middle District of Tennessee, he must have felt empathy with the prosecutor, Irvin Kilcrease. The family had a late dinner. The madness seemed to peak in November, when two men in a van sprayed Kerrs car with buckshot and .30-caliber bullets. In 1995, he appeared as himself in the movie, Casino.. He always got excited the moment he felt the clamor and hysteria of Caesars but this time he was practically dancing on the walls. Now they eat three meals a day and imported cheese. 2023 www.statesman.com. In the summer of 1977, sensing the heat but also attracted by the opportunities being suggested by his new partner, a wily, borderwise ex-con named Henry Wallace, Jimmy told Lee he was moving his base of operations to Florida. [40][3], He had seven children, including a daughter named Catherine, who wrote a memoir about the family. Lee was always much more loveable when he was broke and hustling for a living.. Kerr had the advantage of interviews with a number of dealers who had been arrested since 1973one informant claimed he had personally paid Stricklin $500,000. Ill drive you home, he said in a low voice. He once sentenced a dope dealer to 35 years for contempt of court. It was his most important victory in monthsand his most profitable. How come when Im winning you let me do anything I goddam please, but when I lose you wont let me out of the trap? he shouted in a voice that could be heard in the coffee shop on the opposite side of the casino. El Pasos legions of smugglersdrug smugglers in particularmanage to get themselves arrested often enough to keep law practices like Lee Chagras busy and profitable. When Lou Esper learned that Lee was a cocaine user, he found a good supply and usually delivered the goods in person. During his tenure as magistrate, Boyd and Lee Chagra became friends, and when there was an opening for the job of U.S. attorney after Jimmy Carters election in 1976, Lee, Sib Abraham, and others supported Boyds appointment. When they called Jimmy he chartered a jet and arrived about two hours later. Jimmy was known to win or lose $1 million a night, according to Catherine. Lee told her he still had a pile of work on his desk. Oh, yes. Gentlemen, he told the other players, this table is now reserved for a private game. Chagra's son, Joseph, 19, and daughter, Samantha, 17, kept a bedside vigil urging him, despite his coma, not to give up. The feds reasoned that Lee was the mastermind because Lee was so smart, and they became so preoccupied with this scenario that they failed to see the obvious irony: Lee was too smart to play that role. A book signing of In secret interviews Wallace as singing like a drunken angel. 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