Absent Friends

Sally Keegan refused to comment. Kevin Keegan would not answer a reporter's questions except to say, “Jimmy McCaffery was my godfather and my father's best friend. There's no way he was involved in anything dirty, with Eddie Spano or anyone else.”

Spano, reached at his office at Chapel Pointe, a luxury development going up on Staten Island, denied any knowledge of where or why the payments to the Keegan family originated. Asked about his relationship with McCaffery, Spano said, “I knew Jimmy when we were kids, that's all. Always admired the guy. A real hero.” Pressed about his motivation for contributing to the McCaffery Fund, Spano would only say, “I just wanted to help out.”

Spano called allegations of his own ties to organized crime “ridiculous.”

It is a matter of public record that Spano has been indicted twice, once on charges of extortion and once for racketeering under the state RICO law. He was paroled after serving 10 months of a 30-month sentence under a plea bargain on the extortion charge. The racketeering charge was dismissed for lack of evidence after a key witness disappeared.

Spano's role, if any, in the deception remains unclear, as does the exact role McCaffery played. Based on witness accounts, Constantine, who remained close to the Keegan family, had continuing contact with McCaffery over two decades, though the men claimed to dislike each other.

The Fund director, Marian Gallagher, also stayed close to the Keegan family, although she claims to have “lost touch” with McCaffery. Asked about McCaffery's actions at the time of Molloy's and Keegan's deaths, she would say only, “They were Jimmy's friends. He was devastated when they died.” On the question of McCaffery's relationships with Constantine and Spano, she refused to speculate. Asked about her own part in the deception, she vigorously denied any participation.

No criminal activity is alleged against any party at this point.

By rejecting Spano's contribution, Gallagher seems to have staved off a movement within the FDNY to shut down the McCaffery Fund, at least on a temporary basis.

“This is crap about Jimmy, that's all it is—the purest crap,” said retired firefighter Owen McCardle, who served with McCaffery at Staten Island's Engine 168. “Jimmy was one of the finest members of this Department it's ever been my privilege to work with.” Nevertheless, sources say elements of the FDNY leadership, under pressure from the Mayor's office, have suggested freezing the McCaffery Fund until an investigation into McCaffery's relationship to Spano is complete.

“You've got to understand, firefighters are big heroes now, not just here but all over the country,” FDNY Deputy Assistant Chief Gino Aiello told the Tribune. Aiello was promoted last week in the Fire Department's effort to replace high-ranking officers lost on September 11. “Schoolkids are sending us pennies. But that could turn around. You saw what happened last week.” This was a reference to the October 25 melee at Ground Zero, when firefighters, protesting the Mayor's order to cut the number searching for remains, clashed with police officers. Seventeen firefighters were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct.

“Look, no one believes every man or woman in this Department is pure as the driven snow,” said one Fire Department source, asking to remain anonymous. “But McCaffery was famous. Long before 9/11, people heard of him, he was a hero. Since they set up the Fund, he stands for the Department in a lot of people's minds. If it turns out he was mixed up in anything, that could hurt us. It could hurt a lot of the positive things going on.”

“September 11, we lost 343 guys,” Chief Aiello told the Tribune. “But also 92 vehicles. Equipment—radios, oxygen tanks, all sorts of things. Right now a lot of guys are putting in tremendous overtime in the search. That's all got to come out of the budget somewhere. The McCaffery Fund could be a big help, but not if it blows up in our faces.”

The investigation is continuing.

PHIL'S STORY

Chapter 2

How to Find the Floor

October 31, 2001

It was going to be a busy day.

Halloween. In his field, they used to joke it should be a national holiday. This year made-up horrors were redundant. Not a lot of Freddie or Jason masks around this year.

And all days were busy, now as before. Phone service still spotty, even the cell phones went in and out. Some offices, courtrooms, chambers still closed, judges and ADAs needing to be hunted down and mostly on foot because of the damn phones. The building where Phil had his office had reopened, but it was inside the perimeter, making many people vastly confused about whether they were allowed to go there, and if so, how.