A stolen list of safes

becomes a map

to high life and tragedy

This story is from The Journal archives

The resulting spree of burglaries by a R.I trio ends with them running afoul of the law - and, for one, the mob.

By W. ZACHARY MALINOWSKI
Journal-Bulletin Staff Writer
Sunday, 7/10/1994

Under dreary overcast skies, Philip H. Barber parked his unmarked van outside The Golden Nugget, a pawn shop off Olneyville Square in Providence whose name belies the urban blight that surrounds it.

Barber, then 62, sold and installed safes for a living and arrived to make a sales pitch to the pawn shop's owner.

The conversation, on Jan. 9, 1992, was overheard by Michael L. Raposa, a frequent visitor to the shop who had an arrest record for stealing a safe.

Slipping outside, Raposa approached a passing youth and offered him $5 0to break into Barber's van and grab any receipts he could find, according to court records.

Raposa hit the jackpot: The boy returned with a scrawled list containing about 40 names, addresses and telephone numbers of people who had had safes installed by Barber, along with the combination that would open each safe.

Police reports contained in court records offer a detailed picture of what happened next.

Beginning that spring and continuing through the fall, Raposa and two buddies, Raymond A. Luca and Barry R. Kourmpates, used Barber's list as a roadmap to break into dozens of houses and businesses and steal jewelry, guns and hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash.

"They hit the lottery when they found that list," said state police Detective Lt. Steven Reynolds. "One day they had nothing. The next day they had all this money."

Police say the three men, all in their 20s, used the stolen money to lead a lavish lifestyle, dropping thousands of dollars a night in local strip joints and buying luxury cars and motorcycles.

The only problem, police say, was that Raposa, Luca and Kourmpates, probably inadvertently, emptied several safes belonging to friends and relatives of organized crime figures.

It was a mistake that police investigators suspect cost Kourmpates dearly.

On May 8, Kourmpates's badly charred body was found on a footpath at Beavertail State Park in Jamestown. He had been shot repeatedly before his body was set on fire. He was 23 years old.

His two friends had their own troubles even before Kourmpates was murdered.

Raposa, 26, was arrested in late 1992 in connection with the burglary ring and is serving a five-year sentence in the Adult Correctional Institutions.

Luca, 26, also has been arrested and is awaiting trial on six felony charges stemming from the breaks.

The story of the trio's alleged crime spree - and ultimate demise - bears a striking, but entirely coincidental, similarity to the story line of the movie Federal Hill. The independently made film premiered here in May and chronicles the lives of five larcenous buddies who run afoul - fatally - of the mob in Rhode Island.

Roots in suburbia

Raposa, Luca and Kourmpates grew up in apparent comfort in the suburbs of Providence. Raposa and Luca were friends and high school classmates, both the sons of contractors in the West Warwick area; Kourmpates was raised in a tidy, two-family apartment house in Cranston's Eden Park neighborhood.

Luca was born Orren W. Houle, a name he kept for the first 23 years of his life.

For most of that time, there was little indication that he would eventually come to the notice of law-enforcement officials.

He made the honor roll at Bishop Hendricken High School several times, graduated in 1986 and pursued an interest in law enforcement. In February 1989, the West Warwick police appointed him to the force - providing he made it through the Rhode Island Municipal Police Academy.

But three months after he entered the academy, he was dropped. West Warwick Police Chief Edmund J. Izzi said that Houle, a bodybuilder, was deemed "undesirable for police work."

"There were consistent infractions of department rules and regulations," said Izzi, declining to elaborate. Izzi never heard from Houle again.

But other police departments soon heard from him. Less than a year later, in February 1990, Warwick police charged Houle with assaulting three people. Two of the charges were dismissed, but he pleaded no contest to one count of simple assault, a misdemeanor.

That got him six months of probation. Soon after, in November 1990, Houle moved to North Providence and filed a petition in Probate Court seeking to have his name changed to Raymond Anthony Luca. The petition was granted.

According to the petition, Houle, who listed his occupation as carpenter, sought the change because he wanted to open an Italian restaurant and needed a name that was cosmetically correct.

State police investigators have a different interpretation. They say that Houle wanted to emulate a gangster by the name of Ray Luca in the television police drama, Crime Story, which aired in the late 1980s.

Shifting paths

Raposa, also a 1986 graduate of Bishop Hendricken, had his first brush with the law in December 1989, when he was 21.

Providence police arrested him and three other men after a break-in at LaCroix Catering Co., in West Warwick, in which a safe containing several thousand dollars was stolen.

In January 1990, a grand jury refused to indict Raposa and the charge was dropped.

Raposa, who told police he was a professional gambler when he was arrested, split his time between Rhode Island and Orlando, Fla..

Sometime in late 1991, state police say, Raposa and Luca struck up a friendship with Kourmpates and the trio formed a burglary ring.

Kourmpates's parents and brother declined to be interviewed for this story, as did half a dozen of his friends and former neighbors.

But court records show that his parents divorced in March 1980, leaving his mother to raise Barry, then 10, and a younger brother. Kourmpates earned his high school diploma from Cranston East High School in 1988. Apparently he left no lasting mark there. His class yearbook lists only his name and address.

After high school, Kourmpates's father got him a job as a laborer at the Port Edgewood Marina in Cranston. He earned about $210 a week cleaning and painting boats, cutting grass and running errands.

"Basically, he was a nice kid," said Ray Mooney, the marina's general manager. "I trusted him."

But the relationship soured.

On May 15, 1990, Kourmpates got into an accident in a company truck. The truck was not damaged, but Kourmpates claimed he suffered neck, lower back and shoulder injuries.

Three days later, Kourmpates, then 20, was fired by Mooney for failing to return to work. Kourmpates filed a claim against his employer and wound up getting about $4,500 in workers' compensation payments.

Around that time, police say, Kourmpates turned to crime.

In May 1991, Cranston police charged him and four other men with breaking into businesses and houses in Cranston, Johnston, Smithfield, Warwick and Foster. Kourmpates pleaded no contest to four felony burglary charges and was placed on three years of probation.

Barber hit again

In the winter of 1992, no one, including the Providence police, was looking for the list of safes stolen from Barber's van. That's because he never reported it missing.

When police later asked Barber why he kept silent about the break-in, he told them he figured "some kids took it," and it wasn't a big deal.

Skeptical, police asked Barber to take a lie detector test, which he did. The test determined that Barber was "not deceptive." (Barber, 65, died of natural causes on April 28, 1994.)

Meantime, the list was in the hands of opportunistic criminals.

On May 24, 1992, the East Greenwich police investigated the theft of a safe. Thieves had forced open a kitchen window of a home off Post Road, entered and got away with $20,000 in cash and jewelry.

A few days later, during Memorial Day weekend, Barber himself was the victim. Thieves cut the phone wires at his home on Manolla Avenue in Warwick, deactivated an alarm and climbed through a back window.

Barber's safe was smashed open. The thieves grabbed $100 and a pile of receipts that included more names, addresses and combination numbers.

This time Barber reported the theft. As soon as he returned home from a vacation in Lake Tahoe, Nev., he called Warwick police.

Warwick detectives braced themselves for a rash of safe breaks.

The first came in Cranston, in August 1992 at the home of a Cranston businessman. Thieves opened the safe at his home and stole $30,000 in cash, as well as checkbooks and personal papers.

Meanwhile, Johnston police were investigating three other breaks involving safes, including one that contained two handguns.

In North Kingstown, police, puzzled by two safe breaks, called Detective William Higgins in neighboring East Greenwich and asked him whether he was looking at any similar crimes.

Higgins said yes. Three.

North Kingstown and East Greenwich police quickly learned that all five victims had bought their safes from Phil Barber.

Higgins then checked with Warwick police, and the pieces of the puzzle fell into place. Soon, police learned that every person in Cranston, Warwick, East Greenwich, North Kingstown and Johnston who had recently reported a safe break had purchased their safe from Phil Barber.

Police believe there were other safe breaks that were never reported because the victims were criminals themselves and didn't want their own activities probed.

'Life in the fast lane'

Raposa, Luca and Kourmpates lived it up.

As spring wore into summer and then to fall, they shopped for gold jewelry, carried beepers and bought natty $1,000 suits at Montecello's, a clothing store on Mineral Spring Avenue in North Providence that was favored by organized crime figures. It was not uncommon for the trio to drop $3,000 to $4,000 a night at strip joints, police say, and they took frequent trips to Florida and Atlantic City.

According to court records, a female friend of Raposa told police that he had money invested in time share condominiums in Orlando, Fla., and Cancun, Mexico.

Kourmpates also bought himself a red 1991 BMW, a black Jeep and a motorcycle.

"He really enjoyed that life in the fast lane," said state police Detective Lt. James P. Mullen. "He wanted to be a wiseguy."

But the three men grew careless. Some of their victims - police declined to say which ones - had ties to organized crime or to other illegal activities.

Paying 'tribute'

Sometime in 1992, state police say Raposa was summoned to The Golden Nugget, the pawn shop where Raposa's life seemed to have taken a lucky turn when he happened to overhear Barber months earlier. A couple of reputed mobsters wanted to talk business.

According to court records, the mobsters were Anthony "The Saint" St. Laurent and Vito DeLuca, two convicted felons and soldiers in the Patriarca crime family.

St. Laurent and DeLuca had a problem to discuss. Word had gotten back to them that Raposa and Kourmpates had broken into the homes of people "who were friendly or connected to organized crime," a state police affidavit says.

DeLuca told them to return the goods. It's unclear whether they were able to comply.

According to a court affidavit, a state police investigation determined that Kourmpates, Raposa and Luca also were forced to "pay tribute" - cash extortion payments - to St. Laurent and an associate.

State police also say the two were forced to hand over $5,000 for a theft they were not involved in.

A roadside bonanza

Though the mob knew who was responsible for the string of safe breaks, the police were still in the dark.

Then on Dec. 3, 1992, investigators got the break they had been waiting for.

Around 11:30 p.m., Warwick Patrolman Samuel Maldonado stopped a silver 1985 Mercedes-Benz traveling north on Route 95. The car had temporary Florida plates that appeared to have been tampered with.

The driver was Raposa.

Maldonado ran a check on Raposa and discovered that his driver's license had been suspended. Then he searched the car.

It was a bonanza. Inside the car were burglary tools, two-way portable radios, police scanners and a ski mask. It also contained Phil Barber's books of receipts from his safe business, and a computer organizer containing the names, addresses and phone numbers of two of the homes robbed in East Greenwich.

Detectives from Warwick, Cranston, East Greenwich, Johnston, Pawtucket and Smithfield converged on Raposa and questioned him for about 24 hours about the breaks in their communities.

Police say Raposa named Luca and Kourmpates as his partners. He gave police details about more than a dozen break-ins. He gave a statement saying that he had bought the Mercedes, two Porsches and a 35-inch television "from my criminal breaking and entering in the state of Rhode Island."

He told investigators that he had cash, guns and other stolen goods stored at his parents' house at 1 Potter Court in Coventry.

Warwick police later obtained warrants to search the Raposas' home and a shed on their property. Police seized $44,000 in cash, $740 in counterfeit $2 3bills, three loaded semiautomatic handguns, and a needle and syringe.

Raposa's parents, Louis and Barbara Raposa, signed a statement saying they "had no idea of our son, Michael's, activities," nor did they lay claim to any of the cash or goods.

Raposa went still further in his statement to police. Mullen, the state police lieutenant, said Raposa seemed "relieved to get this all off his chest."

According to court records, Raposa told police that he, Kourmpates and Luca had fenced stolen goods through The Golden Nugget.

Police raided the pawn shop a few days after Raposa was arrested and seized guns and jewelry, but no charges were ever brought against the owners.

Laundering cash

Raposa also told police that he and Kourmpates laundered their illegal money in various businesses.

According to an affidavit filed last month in District Court by State Police Cpl. Steven Pare, Raposa told them one such business was K.B. Motors, on Hunt Street in Central Falls.

The business is operated by Artin K. "Harry" Bedrosian, 33, of Warwick. According to Pare's affidavit, Raposa said he gave Bedrosian $130,000 in cash. Raposa said Kourmpates also "had invested large sums of money into K.B. Motors."

Another business, according to the affidavit, was Hair Graphics, on Mineral Spring Avenue in North Providence, which is owned and operated by Deborah Muccino Bedrosian, Bedrosian's wife. Raposa told police he provided $20,000 in start-up money in return for a monthly payment of $200 from the hair salon.

Pare's request for a search warrant was granted, and last month police raided K.B. Motors, Hair Graphics and two houses belonging to the Bedrosian family, one in Warwick and one in Smithfield.

State police seized boxes of financial and computer records that they say linked Barry Kourmpates with the car dealership and hair salon.

Bedrosian was charged with 11 felony counts, mostly relating to auto theft. But none of the charges directly relate to Bedrosian's alleged relationship to Kourmpates, Raposa and Luca.

On June 16, Bedrosian was sent to the ACI to serve two months in prison for violating his probation on a 1990 conviction for possession of a motor vehicle with altered identification numbers.

The indictments

After Raposa's arrest in December 1992, it was just a matter of time until police tracked down Kourmpates. He set out to cover his tracks.

In court records, police say Kourmpates instructed his father, Charles R. Kourmpates, to stash money at the elder Kourmpates's house on Blackmore Street in East Greenwich.

The elder Kourmpates buried about $125,000 in cash in his yard, according to a police affidavit.

State police say the money has never been recovered. No charges have been filed against him. The elder Kourmpates, a charter pilot, declined comment when reached by telephone at his new home in West Palm Beach, Fla.

On Dec. 9, 1992, Cranston police arrested the younger Kourmpates and charged him with burglary.

Two months later they picked up Luca.

On April 16, 1993, a grand jury indicted all three men on a litany of burglary and conspiracy charges in Smithfield and Cranston. Raposa also was charged with robberies in East Greenwich, Johnston and South County.

Kourmpates had avoided prison after his conviction for burglary in 1991, but this time would be different. On Oct. 5, 1993, Kourmpates pleaded no contest to six counts of burglary and conspiracy. He was sentenced to 8 years in prison, and ordered to serve 30 months of it. The rest was suspended.

Mullen and Reynolds, of the state police, said Kourmpates boasted to other ACI inmates about his life as a gangster on the outside. He talked about his mob connections and all the money he had managed to tuck away.

"At the prison, he was running with anybody who was somebody," Mullen said. "He thought he was street smart."

A state police affidavit says that Kourmpates kept in contact with his friends on the outside. Police say, for example, that Kourmpates called Harry Bedrosian, owner of K.B. Motors, two or three times a week.

A grisly message

On March 23, 1993, Kourmpates was paroled from the ACI after 14 months. He moved in with his mother and brother in a cottage on Arnold's Neck Drive in the Apponaug section of Warwick.

Raposa remained in the ACI serving his sentence. Luca, meanwhile, was free on bail awaiting trial.

According to the state Parole Board, Kourmpates had a job lined up at Hughie's Service Center on Oakland Beach Avenue in Warwick.

Chris Faulkner, an attendant at the service center, said that Kourmpates had worked there for about two months before he was paroled. His employment was part of the prison's work-release program - designed to ease an inmate's reintroduction into society.

"He was friendly and upbeat," she said. "He never bothered anybody."

But shortly after Kourmpates was paroled, he took a leave of absence from his job.

State police say he had other business to tend to. Kourmpates was making daily visits to Bedrosian's car dealership in Central Falls.

Kourmpates was last seen alive on Saturday, May 7. State police said he spent the day visiting friends in Warwick, Central Falls and Providence. He never returned home that night.

There was no word from him on Sunday, May 8 - Mother's Day. His mother grew concerned, Mullen said, because Kourmpates "always called her on Mother's Day."

Later that day, a charred body was discovered in Jamestown, and newspapers and TV stations publicized the gruesome murder.

On Tuesday morning, Mrs. Kourmpates called state police to say she suspected the dead man might be her son. She was right.

Investigators concluded that the murder was a mob hit intended to send a warning to anyone who crosses them.

"There was a message sent that (Kourmpates) was dealing with the wrong people," Lt. Reynolds said. "They were saying, 'This is something that could happen to you.' "