Richard Legree, Save our Farm and the “Too Big to Fail” Chester County Drug business.

When Richard Legree allegedly “ran” Coatesville the alleged threats were more subtle or maybe more Machiavellian and definitely very well backed up.

A prominent Chester County attorney once told me that allegedly Richard Legree was in the room when 4 separate murders happened.

He played very well in the darkened Machiavellian corridors of Chester County politics and I believe he played the bottom feeder public officials of Chester County very well.  Richard allegedly made himself comfortable in any West Chester Courthouse address, including the Chester County Clerk of Courts, that would let him in. As a State Constable he could transport a prisoner of his choosing on sometimes hour’s long rides.  He had clout in the CCRC as the Chairperson of Area 14 of the Chester County Republican Committee. And in Chester County the CCRC has most elected and appointed positions in Chester County locked in. He could also legitimately travel almost anywhere in the USA as “Administrator of the Laborers’-Employers Cooperation and Education Trust.”

Such a charming man with good salesmanship; only I believe that the “closing” was not the end but the beginning.

From my view it was kind of “stick and carrot” approach with the carrot coming first. The stick was somehow cleverly built into the carrot and unsuspecting people only realized the stick was in there after they ate too deeply into the carrot to turn back, and he had you.

And he might have a sort of flanking maneuver lurking as a backup that could make you irrelevant, not needed by him anymore.

Altogether I think they were “smart threats”.

No dead dogs on Richard’s watch.

I believe the new guys that are trying to replace Richard Legree are just not capable of subtlety, as in dead dogs and possible arson. And I think Richie is down there just shaking his head.

It’s a little like the murder of Philly Mob Boss Angelo Bruno and later the others who murdered Philip Testa. They believed they could just step in and take over.

 Just a few years before, the century old Republican control over Philadelphia ended with Mayor Joe Clark. Before then it was bad for your health to vote the wrong way (Democratic) in South Philly.

The most obvious change as a result of Bruno’s death was that you could buy a ricotta cheese besides “Maggio’s” and maybe the supermarket hamburger wouldn’t kill you if you cooked it medium rare.

The very public shootings and the breakdown of mob corporate structure was the beginning of the end for the Philly mob. In the end the FBI and US Attorneys moved in and decimated organized crime in the Philadelphia area.

The cheese and everything else in the supermarkets is much better now.

I can remember being in the “Radio 437 Store” in Philly. A guy was shouting for everyone to hear that he wanted the best stereo they had for his girlfriend and he would pay cash. He never got the stereo. When he went to pay his briefcase was gone and he turned white as a sheet. The Daily Number Pennsylvania Lottery killed the numbers racket. But Viet Nam brought high quality smack and grass into Philly and later the guns came in. So maybe Bruno was the lesser evil.

It’s not a perfect analogy to Coatesville. Organized crime is still in Philly.

But what is happening in Coatesville really is different than Philly. Philly has “badlands” but they are several miles away from a very well policed and vibrant downtown, so both can exist in the same City. You can’t hear the gunshots coming from North Philly in downtown Philly.

But Vietnam veterans in Coatesville recognized the sound of an AK-47 from the other end of town.

Violent organized crime here in Coatesville affects the entire City and a vibrant downtown Coatesville cannot coexist with a vibrant drug dealing business. The city is too small for that.

The Revitalization of Coatesville that everyone was talking about in 2004 would have meant the end of the drug business in Coatesville and would have destroyed the easy in and out supply depot that Coatesville is in Chester County. The trickledown effect from the loss of drug business would affect hairdressers, car dealers, furniture stores, churches, restaurants and other local business; but most importantly it would affect the pay off income of corrupt public officials.

Organized crime could feel their drug business in Chester County ending.  And the USDoJ was pushing as hard as it could for Revitalization.

When Paul Janssen said the first thing we have to do is make the streets safe he hit a bull’s eye. Paul Janssen’s problem was that the drug dealers and their corrupt public official enablers put that bull’s eye on his back and began a multifaceted program to get him out and stop the revitalization.

There were others but I think Richard Legree was a leader or maybe a facilitator in bringing Drug Mecca status back to Coatesville in the “Too Big To Fail” Chester County drug business. I believe the calls of “Save our Farm” ringing across Coatesville and even in the Daily Local News masked the real game plan.

For 10 years Coatesville teetered on the brink of becoming a really good place to live. 

Because of what I believe was a cooperative marriage of drug dealers, corrupt public officials and judges and extreme right wing politicos Coatesville fell back into place as the Drug Mecca for Chester County. In the end the reform City Council was quashed. The drug dealers in effect won the election and  a 4 year long nightmare of shootings, violence and murder began, ending in fiery conflagration.

The murder of Angelo Bruno may have brought an end to the Philly Mob. 

I think the extreme violence, multiple bullet holes in homes, shootings, murders and finally a fiery conflagration of arson fires woke up Chester County and could end the “Coatesville Mob”.

Now the more than a century old Order of the Legree, Suber and Trowrey family may be coming to an end. 

Talk about revitalization and the best real estate bargain in Chester County added new Coatesville residents that don’t have scores of relatives known to the organized crime families here. See “Little Sicily”

We have a new progressive City Council and the old crime family order is dying off or very sick and either in or on their way to prison. I believe there are more that have not been arrested yet.

The new hotel and the Velodrome and the new people, restaurants and jobs they will bring are bad for business, the drug business.

When he was a Federal Prosecutor Tom Hogan said to me, “Coatesville was ready to turn over and then these new guys came in.” I think Coatesville could really do a complete turn over this time.

More coming in another post