Did a hot rod and a chopper disguise a murder?

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lazarat

Well-known member
Joined
Feb 7, 2018
Messages
657
This is a true story, the guilty have been named to protect the changes..or something like that.

The year was 1974. Back in my wild East Lauderdale days, in an apartment in the Las Olas neighborhood, about a mile from the beach and the Elbo Room bar, where Connie Francis belted out her hit in 1960, there was an argument.

A friend of mine, who was crippled from the knees down from a Corvair rollover accident when he was 16, was staying with me. He rode a custom built trike, hand shifted, Honda CB 750 with a Corbin Gentry rigid frame and rake, slicks on the back, girder front end and straight pipes. This argument coming from the apartment next door, went on until about 3am. It ended when a door slammed, and (lets call him) Tony, came out yelling, drunk as usual, at the woman saying don't you ever slam my 'expletive' door again you 'expletive' 'expletive' .

That was the last time I saw...or heard.. Tony alive.

The next evening, as the sun was setting, and me still being at work for a few more hours, a couple of friends of ours came up to meet and go to our favorite dive bar, where I was going to meet them later. This friend has a ratty but solid 56 Chevy 2 door post 210, with the 283, 4bbl, 3 on the tree and dual exhaust with glaspacks. As they are getting ready to leave, a guy and a gal walk up, the gal goes upstairs to Tony's apartment, the guy is admiring my friends trike.

Then, as the story goes, they fire everything up, both the Chev and the trike, and put on a bit of a show as they leave.

I get home a couple hours later, it is now after dark, and I am getting ready to go to the bar to meet the friends, when suddenly there is a frantic knocking on my door. Why, its the woman from the previous evening, the one that slammed the door! She is flustered, saying that something is wrong with Tony, then takes off, saying she has to tell somebody. Huh?

I go next door, Tony is laying on the floor, shirtless, and I check on him. He is dead. I notice these strange "circular" wounds on his chest, but my instinct was to go downstairs to the nearest phone booth and call the cops.

A few minutes later one cop shows up, quickly followed by a bunch, the first cop runs into the apartment, comes out and makes a shooting gesture with his fingers to the other cops. Oh.

So now I have half of Fort Laud PD in my apartment, questioning me, as I am nonchalantly moving things on a shelf hiding weed and other paraphernalia. Next thing I know, I am in the cop car, being brought downtown to the precinct, where I, the woman involved in the argument, and someone else was being questioned.

Until 4am, was I retelling over and over what happened, including my mention of the previous night argument. Finally I get home, I forgot to hide the key for my bud when I left, and he was sitting in my car waiting for me.

"Where the hell were you?" "
"Well you won't believe..."

Suddenly two detectives come out of the apartment with flashlights in our eyes, they recognize me, but my friend has a story to tell about the strangers that walked up to the apartment.

The gal, was a prostitute that had been looking for Tony, hanging around, as I had spoke to her a few days earlier. Apparently he owed her some money. The guy admiring the trike was her pimp. As I heard it later, she had come back to the scene, asked someone she didn't know was a detective if he was dead.

"How did you know it was a he?" Apparently that was the someone else that was being questioned at the precinct. The next day the item was in the local paper, "Hotel worker found dead in apartment".

The polices could not figure out why nobody in this area of close knit apartments and quiet narrow streets heard the shots, as many neighbors were questioned. The time of death was placed about 2-3 hours earlier about the time the sun was going down. Just go back and read the title to this story. It all makes sense, as my friends and I discussed it later. Just another mystery blank that the police were unaware of.

At the trial they split the cases, nobody could prove who shot, as it turns out both are acquitted.

Thats my story.... and officer, I'm sticking to it! :cool:

PS. I have a couple more similar stories, as I find writing an enjoyable change from my sketchings. I have another one involving crippled bro, stay tuned.
 
Last edited:
Well I seem to have several strange wrong place wrong time adventures, as we all do, not sure this is the venue. This story I thought fit, having cars involved.
 

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