Digital Extras

10.19.2001 00:05

The biggest score yet

For years, Bobby Buehne lived a double life -- as a player in the Providence underworld and as a police informant. Now he has a new identity and a new life, which the government gave him after he helped lock up a ruthless figure in the Rhode Island mob.

BY W. ZACHARY MALINOWSKI
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

Paula Coppola didn't grieve for long.

Just weeks after her husband, Ronnie Coppola, was gunned down at the Hockey Fans Social Club, she took up with Bobby Buehne.

The courtship hardly came as a surprise. Buehne had spent a lot of time with the Coppolas and their young son. Buehne and Paula Coppola were both in their 20s, while Ronnie Coppola was about 30 years older.

In the winter of 1993, Paula Coppola had flirted with Buehne. He walked away from the conversation, telling her, "You're crazy."

Ronnie Coppola had told a friend that he suspected something was going on between his wife and Buehne -- but there wasn't. Buehne had heard of Ronnie Coppola's suspicions and felt bad.

On March 31, 1994, Ronnie Coppola was murdered. The relationship between his widow and Buehne changed.

By the summer, Paula Coppola and Buehne were an item -- seen together in Providence restaurants. That August, he moved into the Coppola townhouse, near the Cranston police station.

The mob frowned at their relationship.

Buehne (pronounced Bee-nee) said he had heard that Edward "Mulligan" Romano, a capo in the Patriarca crime family, thought Buehne deserved "a bullet in the head."

Buehne knew that he was playing with fire.

He also knew that he had another potential problem: the imminent release from prison of mobster Gerard T. Ouimette.

OUIMETTE WAS A feared and ruthless figure in the Providence underworld whose criminal résumé dated to the 1950s.

He gained notoriety in the '70s for running a vicious gang that used to hang out in the neighborhood bars, diners and markets along Broad Street and Elmwood Avenue, in Providence near the Cranston city line.

In 1972, Ouimette was convicted of conspiracy to murder in the killing of a former associate, and he received a 10-year prison sentence. His reputation was enhanced during his incarceration: he was convicted of assault and of threatening to break a state trooper's jaw.

While he was in prison in Rhode Island, Ouimette had free run of the state Adult Correctional Institutions. His meals were catered from local restaurants. His 5-year-old son was smuggled into the prison for a sleepover. For a while, he had a phone installed in his maximum-security cell.

During his 11 years in federal prison beginning in the 1980s, Ouimette forged strong ties to soldiers of the Gambino crime family headed in New York by John Gotti.

Raymond L.S. Patriarca, the late mob kingpin who for decades ran the New England rackets from a Providence storefront, often relied on Ouimette and his crew for their extortionate skills.

The mere mention of "Gerard" sent fear into potential victims and criminals.

As Ouimette's time in federal prison wound down, he began to make big plans with Ronnie Coppola, regularly calling him collect from the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pa.

Once Coppola was killed, Ouimette continued calling the mobster's widow.

He promised to come and see her when he got out.

OUIMETTE WAS A man of his word.

During his stay in a halfway house in Boston, Ouimette and Paula Coppola began a relationship. Eventually, they slept together.

The infidelity upset Buehne.

One day, Buehne and Paula Coppola argued and the issue came to a head.

She admitted an affair with Ouimette. "I like him," she said.

Buehne told her to choose: Ouimette or him.

"It's up to you to decide what you want to do with your life," Buehne said.

She chose Buehne.

But the betrayal stuck with him. Buehne alerted Providence Detectives Steve Cross and Bobby Lauro, his longtime police handlers, about Ouimette's return.

The possibilities intrigued Cross and Lauro. They urged Buehne to cultivate a relationship with Ouimette. They also warned him to be careful: the mobster was one of the most dangerous outlaws to ever walk the streets of Rhode Island.

THE FALL OF 1994 turned out to be a busy one for Bobby Buehne. Ouimette was living in Southeastern Massachusetts and renewing his old ties with hoodlums in Rhode Island.

At the time, Buehne was working as an informant in a major gun case for the Providence police and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms.

The authorities monitored Buehne's contact with the suspected gun dealer, and his fledgling relationship with Ouimette.

Ouimette's downfall would prove to be one of Buehne's pals: Paulie Calenda, the millionaire businessman and mob associate.

During Ouimette's romance with Paula Coppola, he had told her that Calenda owed the mob $125,000. Ouimette also told her that he planned to collect.

Buehne saw his opening.

He sent a message to Ouimette's sister seeking a meeting with the mobster.

They agreed to talk at the townhouse Buehne shared with Paula Coppola.

Ouimette arrived at the townhouse in an SUV driven by James "Slugger" Gellerman, a violent felon and the son of a former driver for John Gotti.

Ouimette, a small, trim man with steely dark eyes, wore a suit.

"So, what do you want to see me about?" he asked Buehne.

Buehne laid out a fictitious story about his plan to collect a debt from Calenda. Before making a move, Buehne said, he wanted to talk to Ouimette because he knew he had an interest in Calenda, too.

Ouimette liked what he was hearing. He agreed to work with Buehne.

"This kid owes a lot of money," Ouimette told Buehne.

Buehne had his foot in the door. He continued talking to Ouimette over the next few weeks.

One night, Buehne met Ouimette at the bar of St. Rocco's Social Club, off Elmwood Avenue in Cranston. They spoke of Buehne's interest in pulling off a few home invasions. Buehne mentioned Calenda as a potential target.

Buehne said that Ouimette hugged him and kissed him on the cheek.

"We're going to make a lot of money," Ouimette said.

Buehne reported back to Cross and Lauro, the Providence police detectives.

The detectives arranged for Buehne to meet with James H. Leavey, a federal prosecutor, at a hotel in Massachusetts. Leavey OK'd a plan to plant a recording bug in Calenda's condominium.

Buehne told Calenda of the government's plan, and Calenda reluctantly agreed to go along.

The meeting was set for March 6, 1995. The authorities had planted a hidden camera with a recording device in a lamp in Calenda's living room.

Buehne and Calenda sat in chairs at the ends of a sofa, forcing Ouimette to sit on the sofa and face the rigged lamp.

Next door, in Buehne and Coppola's townhouse, federal agents and the Providence police monitored the meeting.

Within minutes, Ouimette made it clear that he was close to John Gotti, and enjoyed a good relationship with the other New York crime families.

"I got some nice friends in New York, you know what I mean?" he said. "You know I was around John [Gotti] for about 10 years. His brothers are dear friends of mine. John writes to me. His brother writes to me from the can. And I got a good relationship with every crew in New York."

Calenda and Ouimette worked out an arrangement: Calenda agreed to pay $50,000 in $5,000 weekly payments. Calenda would give the money to Buehne, who would then deliver it to Ouimette.

THE AUTHORITIES WANTED to gauge Ouimette's reaction to getting shortchanged.

They told Buehne to deliver a $1,500 payment -- instead of the $5,000 agreed upon -- to Ouimette.

The meeting was set for March 11, 1995, at Camille's Roman Garden, a classic old-time Italian restaurant on Federal Hill.

Buehne arrived with Paula Coppola. She wore a hidden microphone in her bra.

Ouimette ordered a glass of Chardonnay.

Buehne and Coppola told Ouimette that Calenda was acting tough, refusing to pay the full $5,000.

Ouimette told Buehne to deliver a message: pay up or get your garage blown up with a howitzer.

"Tell him, 'If you don't come up with the $3,500 it's open season on him,' " Ouimette said.

Ouimette picked up the tab for Buehne and Coppola's dinners.

MEANWHILE, BUEHNE'S OTHER work as an informant for the police in a gun-trafficking investigation was coming together nicely.

A gun dealer, Billy Rivelli, happened to run a plating business in the same building that housed Calenda's jewelry company.

In the fall of 1994, Buehne went to Rivelli's office and bought a machine gun from him for $1,500. Buehne then drove to the oil tanks off Allens Avenue and delivered the gun to a federal Drug Enforcement Administration agent and Providence Detective Lauro.

Buehne told Rivelli he wanted to buy more guns.

On Nov. 27, 1994, Buehne went to Rivelli's house in Cranston to look at guns. At one point, Rivelli's 8-year-old son went to his father's bedroom to get a mini M-16 rifle from under the bed. As Buehne checked out the rifle, Rivelli told him "it was his pride and joy" and not for sale.

A few months later, Rivelli had a change of heart. He agreed to sell Buehne the rifle for $2,000.

The deal was set to go down.

ON MARCH 18, 1995, in the early-morning hours, federal agents and the Providence police gathered in an office in Buehne's newly remodeled ranch house near T.F. Green Airport, in Warwick.

The office featured a fish tank with piranhas.

The cops, armed with warrants, left to take down Rivelli in Cranston and Ouimette in Fall River, Mass.

The police raided Rivelli's house on Azalea Court, arrested him, and seized two dozen machine guns, rifles, handguns and ammunition.

Rivelli later pleaded guilty to four federal charges and was sent to prison for 27 months.

About 5 a.m., as darkness turned to light, a team of officers climbed the stairs to Ouimette's second-floor apartment on Pleasant Street, in Fall River.

Cross and Lauro, the two Providence detectives, were there. Cross led the charge, smashing down the door with a battering ram.

Ouimette, wearing boxer shorts, ran down the hallway toward the pack of police officers. They had their guns drawn and yelled, "Freeze! Freeze!"

Ouimette stopped just inches from Cross.

"Whew!" the mobster said. "I thought it was a hit. Thank God it was you guys."

Those were Ouimette's final moments of freedom.

BUEHNE WAS REWARDED for his work the next day. The DEA gave him several thousand dollars to get out of town. He took Coppola and her son, as well as Calenda and his wife, Gail-Ann Calenda, to Disney World.

The friends spent two weeks in a hotel in Orlando, Fla., touring Disney and dining at restaurants.

Upon their return to Rhode Island, Buehne and Paula Coppola and her son were taken to a resort on a New Hampshire lake.

They spent the next five months in New Hampshire, living off a monthly stipend from the government and waiting to get accepted into the federal Witness Protection Program. The police checked in on them every other day.

In August 1995, word came that they could enter the program.

One morning at 5, Buehne, Paula Coppola and her son were brought to DEA headquarters, on Westminster Street in Providence. They were hustled to a basement garage, where they said their good-byes to Detectives Cross and Lauro, and DEA agent Ray Mansolillo.

Suddenly, two black SUVs with tinted windows pulled up, carrying armed federal marshals. The couple and child climbed into one of the vehicles. The SUVs headed onto Route 95.

Their lives in Rhode Island were over.

They were given new identities and taken to a new place to start new lives.

Ouimette's life in Rhode Island was over, too.

He was convicted of extortion charges and ordered to spend the rest of his life in a federal penitentiary.

Epilogue

In 1998, Bobby Buehne left the federal Witness Protection Program for about five months. He quietly visited Rhode Island and met with a reporter and photographer from The Providence Journal. He walked into the newsroom wearing a dark double-breasted suit and about $18,000 in gold jewelry, much of it encrusted with diamonds and his initials. In his pants pocket was a roll of $5,000 secured with rubber bands. Over many hours, he told his story. He repeatedly credited the U.S. Attorney's office, especially prosecutor James H. Leavey, Providence Detectives Steve Cross and Bobby Lauro, DEA agent Ray Mansolillo and the ATF office for saving his life.

That summer, Calenda, who had been arrested on a federal weapons charge for possessing an Uzi machine gun, was sentenced to 22 months in prison. He lost about 75 pounds in a federal prison in Loretto, Pa., and has since returned to Rhode Island.

Meanwhile, Buehne, who had ended his relationship with Paula Coppola, got word from the marshals that the Rhode Island mob may have learned where he was living. Buehne entered the Witness Protection Program again, got another identity and moved to another location, where he runs a successful business.

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