Frank Tracey, deputy commissioner of real property at City Hall, was one of those guys. In 1981, he was convicted of tax evasion and sentenced to an unusually harsh 18 months. He did his time in Kentucky, enduring long, uncomfortable bus rides to Boston to appear before grand juries. He never gave anyone up, insisting there was no one to give up.
Some 20 years later, a private eye named Ted McDonough was sitting in his downtown office when a frail, elderly man shuffled in. “Before I die,’’ Frank Tracey told him, “I want to find the guy who put me in jail.’’
Tracey told a story of being used to get at White, of overzealous prosecutors using a witness of dubious character to get at him. He wanted to confront that witness, Francis Green, and tell Green he had lied.
“You’re not gonna whack him, are you, Frank?’’ McDonough asked. “No,’’ replied Tracey, who at the time was pushing 80, “but I might punch him in the nose.’’
After Tracey promised he wouldn’t do anything physical, McDonough agreed to take the case. “Here, kid,’’ Tracey said, pulling five crisp $100 bills from his pocket, “take this.’’
“Frank,’’ McDonough replied, “put that back in your pocket. You can buy me a beer if I find him.’’
The problem with finding Green was that he had been officially disappeared, relocated by the government. McDonough traced Green to Seattle, where he had run a clothing business. Green had been convicted of theft connected to that business and sentenced to nine months in the county jail in Seattle. By the time McDonough tracked him down, he had returned to Massachusetts and was working at a strip club in Peabody.
McDonough walked into the club at 10 one morning and found Green sitting at the bar, reading a newspaper. Green wasn’t happy to see him.
“Leave,’’ Green said coldly, “or I’m calling the cops.’’ McDonough left and called Tracey’s house on Cape Cod. “I found him, Frank,’’ he said.
“I’ll take the bus up,’’ Tracey replied.
McDonough picked him up at South Station, and they drove north toward Frank Tracey’s destiny.
