Growing up in a family of eight in an Irish neighborhood ghetto in Boston, Massachusetts, is not an easy life. Cody realizes early on that a kid from this neighborhood can only become a priest, a cop, or a criminal. Cody chooses the latter. He quickly adapts to living on the streets. He desires the life of a criminal and is mentored by some of the most reputable gangsters known around Boston. A career criminal, Cody pleads guilty to murder in the second degree and enters one of the harshest maximum correctional institutions in the country. But incarceration doesn't stop Cody; he adjusts easily to prison life. During his sentence, he escapes twice and commits several murders. With assistance from other inmates, he's accused of forming execution squads to maintain power. He helps organize a prison takeover while plotting to commit more murders. Death has been his best friend all of his life. Cody has other friends in some strategic positions within the Massachusetts justice system. He's not the average man nor is he the average criminal. Although Cody never had a problem escaping prison, he realizes that he can never escape his past.

A Big House for Little Men

By Michael W. McKay

iUniverse, Inc.

Copyright © 2009 Michael W. McKay
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4401-5540-6

Chapter One

Back in the day, Boston was known as the city of corruption and the birthplace of gangsters. Some of the very best gangsters came out of Boston, from the famous names of mobsters who ran South Boston (Southie) and had most of the authorities in their pockets, to the other Irish guys called the Winter Hill Gang who ran Somerville and Cambridge, and then over to the North End with the Italians running the north side of town.

It was never a secret who ran what and which section. It was all about who you knew and what you had on that person. All of the tough guys and big gangsters always had something on someone or someone in their pocket, but 95 percent of all gangsters where rats (informants). They would give up somebody or feed something to the cops or the Feds just to keep everyone happy and just to have that favor owed to them in the future. But if someone informed on any of them, they would have had that person killed and his or body would have been dumped into the Charles River.

Cody used to watch these guys very closely. He studied their actions and how they worked. They were smart in a lot of ways. They had nothing to do each day except plan shit and think of how to get away with it. They used everybody and everything they could to gain control and power. Cody thought it was great and so easy to do because everybody wanted fast money. They set up scores and sent people out to steal for them and bring the items back, and then they would pay the people shit. They took no risk. They were like the pimps and everyone else were their whores.

Cody used to laugh every time the cops showed up for their money, but then he thought about the times those same cops arrested people he knew. That was when he understood how all of those guys worked. The gangsters watched the kids in their own backyards (the neighborhoods they ran). Any kid who was trouble, they wanted to recruit. To Cody's luck, he was the most wanted kid around by the gangsters from an early age.

Cody stole anything he could put in his pocket, carry off, or drive away with and sell. The gangsters had one rule: Never play in your own backyard. If you pulled any crime, it had to be out of the neighborhood you lived in. Cody had his own friends from when he was arrested and placed in Department of Youth Services (DYS) and from meeting other kids from Charlestown (the townies), Mission Hill, Hyde Park, and Southie. He grew young with Johnny, his partner. They were like brothers. Nothing kept them apart.

Cody and Johnny knew a lot of kids over in Southie who got tattoos-a dot between their thumb and index fingers-that represented a large gang over there call the Saints. Cody and Johnny were offered the chance to join but turned it down because they didn't want to be used by the gangsters or told what to do. The gangs over there exist to this day, and they are followed by other generations of families.

Cody and his young associates never respected gangsters and mob figures. Those kids didn't give two shits about any of those guys. But at the same time, everyone knew they had to accept the way life is and not get killed by those bastards. So when Cody stole cars and striped them down, he went to Roxbury to sell the parts, for cheap money. Most people in the ghetto paid using their welfare checks and liked driving fine cars. He was taught how to hate and grew up never trusting anyone from a different race, like all his friends did. However, when it came to making money race wasn't a factor. He sold all his stolen items around Boston just to establish and set up his own connections. Cody and his friends would then drive out to the Boston suburbs and break into houses and fence the shit to the gangsters just to keep them happy.

Cody went to the DYS many times as a juvenile. It was like a second home to him. He never minded it. It was like a meeting house for him and all of his friends to gather and get a break from the streets. They got three meals a day and a bed, and they were released within one to three months. It was like a vacation, and the best part was that each time Cody got released; he had the same probation officer, Dave. They became very good friends. Cody found out Dave had a cocaine habit and started supplying to him. They formed a close relationship and stayed that way for a long time.

One day, Cody had to go to Dorchester Court from the DYS for stolen car charges, and they-the DYS-did not want to transport him or his partner Johnny. Johnny was a runner, and when he ran, people had a hard time catching him. So they sent two state troopers to get both of them. Troopers Chase and Callahan showed up and took them both outside. Chase opened his trunk, took Johnny, and put him in the fucking trunk.

"You're not running on me you little fucker!" he told Johnny.

He then put Cody in the back seat of the car. Johnny was pissed all the way to the courthouse because he had been planning to run that day and being free. It was a good laugh for years to come.

Everyone knew Trooper Mark Chase had been a rookie cop back in the '70s. He grew up in Dorchester, but people on the streets knew he was fair and that he never forgot where he came from. Cody had come to know Trooper Chase one night when he was working the Mass Pike with three other kids. Trooper Chase pulled their car over.

After pulling each of them out of the car and starting his search, Trooper Chase found a starter pistol on Cody and about eighteen keys on his key ring. He could not figure out why Cody had so many keys, but Cody knew the keys belonged to stores throughout the inner city of Boston. He had friends that worked in the stores, and they made copies of keys to the front or back doors so Cody and his friends could just unlock the door, take anything they wanted, and lockup when they were done.

Trooper Chase refused to give Cody back his starter pistol, which only fired blanks. Anyone could buy those pistols at a lot of stores in Boston for fewer than twenty bucks, and they looked like real guns. Cody used the pistol just for show and because he knew he never could be arrested for having it.

"If you want this, pick it up at the state police barracks," Trooper Chase told Cody. He then tossed Cody the keys and told them to move on and to have a great night.

Cody was happy about getting the keys back, but he was pissed off that Trooper Chase took his starter pistol. After he pondered it over for a few hours, Cody woke his partner Johnny up around 2:00 am and asked him for a ride up to the police barracks to get his pistol back. His other friends started laughing and thought Cody was crazy. They told him to go buy another one in the morning.

Cody looked at them and yelled, "Trooper Chase had no right to take it." It was the principle of the matter, and he wanted it back right then.

"Okay, let's get this out of your system so I can get some sleep tonight," Johnny yelled back.

Later, while driving up to the barracks, Johnny said to Cody, "Sometimes I don't understood how you think. Do you really think these cops are going to give you back your starter pistol?"

When they arrived at the police barracks, Cody walked in and saw a big fucking trooper sitting behind the desk. Cody approached the desk, as boldly as could be.

"Are you in charge here?" he shouted. He looked at the trooper's name tag, which read "Sgt Stone."

Before Sergeant Stone could say anything, Cody demanded the starter...