Delia reveals a secret

Okay, I have something to tell you guys that I’ve held inside for a while now. I might as well come clean, because I just admitted this stuff in a comment on another blog. It’s very relevant to recent news events, too. And you can file it under “sometimes Delia is just too naïve for words.”

Here it is:

I actually read Bernie Kerik’s autobiography, Lost Son: A Life in Pursuit of Justice, a couple of years ago, and I actually thought he was an okay guy.

There! I said it!

Now let me explain: First, I’m sure I’ve mentioned at least once that I’m going to school again to get a degree in Forensic Science. That's why I'm suffering through the calculus right now. Ever since I was a kid, I’ve been fascinated solving crimes. I never wanted to be a cop, though—I wanted to be a private detective or something cool like that, using my brain to solve crimes. I read Sherlock Holmes, Agatha Christie, and even Encyclopedia Brown (I thought Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew sucked). Cops were boring and mean and gave tickets and ate donuts; I wanted to solve crimes.

Later, when I started watching Bill Kurtis’ "Cold Case Files" (the first crime mystery type show ever—the one that started it all!), I knew I wanted to do that stuff—work in a crime lab and look at paint scrapings, or identify handwriting, or examine fingerprints. Something useful—something that would help find criminals and bring them to justice.

As a result of these interests, I have a rather odd library of books: beside all my general science and literature and birding and gardening books, I have titles like Whoever Fights Monsters, The Serial Killer Encyclopedia, MindHunter, Unnatural Death: Confessions of a Medical Examiner, and stuff like that. I absolutely love reading about what makes criminals do what they do, methods to catch criminals, etc. The Kat still gets a little freaked out when I come home with something like “Women Who Kill” or “Blood and Money” or “Helter Skelter” but she’s used it.

So I also love biographies—I’ve read books by cops, profilers, investigators, federal marshalls, and all sorts of people who investigate crimes. (I tend to stay away from the criminal bios, because I don’t want to support them like that; I try not to get dazzled by mafia types, killers, etc.) So when I saw Kerik’s book, and the fact that he was chief of police of NYC during 9/11, I figured what the heck? Might be interesting.

As I said, there were times when he’d drone on about his obviously right-wing beliefs and how big a threat terrorism is, blah blah blah--but I’ve found that many police officers are republicans because they mistakenly think that repubs are tough on crime, pro-police, etc – when all they really want is to make the cops enforce their fascist leanings (see GWBush).

But I digress. So anyway, the book was fairly interesting, and I thought he’d done a good job covering his life and his search for his mother’s killer (though the crime was never solved).

Then about a month after I'd read the book, I happened to catch a news story about Kerik's having possibly done some dirty stuff, using dirty money to redo his apartment, getting money from the Mob, etc. I was shocked, just shocked! Seriously—I just thought that he was an honest cop. At the time, I was taking an Intro to the Criminal Justice System class, and I even mentioned it to my teacher—a former Philly cop. He just shrugged and said there are good cops and dirty cops. I got the sense he didn’t want to talk about it, but it really bothered me. I mean, I knew there were dirty cops, of course. But I had read this guy’s book, and I kinda liked him! I was impressed with the good things he’d done while on the force. How could I have been so blind and so stupid!? And he sure didn’t mention anything about his Mob ties, his ass-kissing of Rudy, fudging his taxes, and all that in the book!

So he was indicted the other day on corruption charges; here’s a few details, from a story on Newsday.com:

_ Accepting $255,000 in renovations to his Bronx apartment -- including a marble entrance rotunda, marble bathrooms and a Jacuzzi -- from a construction firm, in exchange for helping the company get a business license. Kerik had complained to one company official that "he felt like he was on `welfare,"' the indictment says. The company was being investigated for alleged ties to organized crime.

_ Allowing an official of the same company to pay more than $236,000 in rent for another Kerik apartment. _ Failing to report those payments on his financial disclosure forms, on his tax returns and to a state grand jury that investigated him.

_ Getting witnesses to lie about the payments to investigators.

_ Falsely claiming $80,000 in charitable contributions and a home-office deduction on his income tax forms.

_ Not reporting the wages he paid to a nanny for his children and not paying her Social Security and Medicaid taxes.

_ Not reporting royalties from a forward he wrote for a book.

_ Falsifying a mortgage application by not disclosing that he had borrowed -- from a real estate agent doing business with the city -- the money he was using as a down payment.

_ Falsely answering written and oral questions from federal agencies as he applied for federal posts, including homeland security secretary. Kerik ultimately withdrew from consideration for the homeland security post because of tax issues involving his former nanny.

Wow. I’m never surprised anymore at these kinds of indictments. It seems like the higher-up people get, whether it be in law enforcement or politics or big business, the more likely they are to both get money illegally and then try to hide it. It’s like they start to make a little money, and that just makes them want more; then they find that their positions grant them audience with all sorts of people who are ready and willing to give them more money if they’ll just do this or that “small favor,” nothing big, of course! Just use your newfound connections to do a little favor, and I'll help you out with those home renovations you were trying to do, or I'll give your campaign a nice fat check.

I sometimes wonder how these things progress—how someone who originally went into a job to do good gets corrupted and ends up being just as bad a slimeball as the crooks they originally wanted to nail. I’m sure at first, they’re thinking, “well, it’s just this once, and everybody does it, and I’m sure it’s not illegal or they wouldn’t have asked me to do it!” Then before you know it, you’re taking money from crooks just to look the other way, and you’re getting a second apartment for your mistress, and you’re covering it all up nice and neat by just not telling anyone.

In his book, Kerik singled out a few detectives who worked with him when he was a police officer, still working on the streets. He talked about these guys like they were Starsky and Hutch and McGyver and Clint Eastwood, all rolled into one -- hell, that's kinda how he described himself, really. I wonder what those guys think of him now. Maybe they were in on his dealings all along; who knows? Or maybe they’re just as disgusted as I am.

When I was starting to write this post, I googled for the full title of his book, and I saw this--you can get a copy of that cook for a stinkin' penny:

I find it very satisfying that more and more stories are appearing in the national press about the effect this case could have on Rudy Giuliani. Of course, Rudy’s doing all he can to distance himself from Kerik (so much for loyalty and friendship!), but it’s obvious that the two have been pals for a long time to anyone in NYC, anyone who read Kerik’s book, and anyone who remembers the hilariously ironic fact that Rudy suggested to Chimpy Bush that Kerik would make a great head of the Dept of Homeland Security (hard to type those words without throwing up a little in my mouth). It’s going to be delicious if the media finally decide to turn on Giuliani and report this story as it should be reported, with all the juicy background connections between these two crooks. Imagine if Kerik does jail time!

So there—I’ve exposed my deep dark secret that’s been bugging me since all these Kerik stories started coming out. I’m clean now, and you may judge as you see fit.