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Sotirios as "the serpent who first came into the garden and tempted
Kosta to eat the apple."
"But what could I do?" Kouracos says. "Call the police and tell them
my friend is passing counterfeit money?"
When Kosta got back from Milan in June and explained to his wife that
he was empty-handed, he had in fact acquired the hundred thousand
dollars in counterfeit money, which he would eventually bury in the
woods off John Anderson Drive.
The role of Peter Kouracos in all of this is difficult to discuss.
The federal jury that heard charges against Kouracos acquitted him.
Kouracos does, however, admit to a rather strange scenario in which he
went along while Kosta buried things in the woods at night and Kouracos
never asked Kosta what he was burying.
As Kouracos tells the story he drove Kosta three times to a deserted
area along John Anderson Drive on the west side of Daytona Beach. On
one occasion Kosta had a big vinyl bag. On the others, a metal
cannister.
"We would drive along in the dark and at some point Kosta would tell me
to stop. He didn't seem to be watching for any marker or counting
telephone poles or anything like that. Kosta would get out of the car
and tell me to come back in a half hour or forty-five minutes.
I would drive around for a while, and when I came back he would be
there waiting for me on the road."
While Kouracos's story does not go down easily, it is no less credible
than a good many other stories that would be told after the world
learned that Kosta Fotopoulos was a murderous sociopath.
Less mysterious than Kouracos's role in the counterfeiting scam is the
role played by Vasilios and Barbara Markantonakis, a couple that worked
for Lisa at Joyland.
Vasilios, who is known as "Bill," and Barbara Markantonakis, were hired
by Steno to work at Joyland in 1987.
Steno met the two at a restaurant where Kosta once worked, but Lisa and
Dina aren't sure who knew who first.
In any case, Steno liked to help out fellow countrymen who were down on
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their luck, so Barbara was put to work giving out prizes and making
change in the back of the arcade.
Bill, who did free-lance house renovations when he could, started out
doing carpentry and painting at Joyland, and when there was no such
work left, he was given an apron and a job making change.
"Barbara was one of the best workers I ever had," Lisa says, "but Bill
drove me nuts sometimes. He'd come down and tell me exactly how he was
going to fix something. I'm going to take off all this paint and I'm
going to put down a thin layer of this, and then I'm going to put down
tar and I'm going to take off this and put on that. And he would go on
and on, telling me every detail of what he was going to do.
But he wouldn't always do it. He was not the most reliable guy."
Bill was eventually relieved of his apron, but he still hung around
Joyland, where he did odd jobs. He also spent a lot of time going to
gun shows with Kosta. Bill, who was in his fifties and the father of a
small boy, thought Kosta was the greatest guy in the world.
He used to call him the Golden Child.
"Kosta and Bill went to a lot of gun shows," Lisa says.
"Tampa, Miami, Fort Lauderdale. They would buy and sell and trade guns
at these shows. He and Bill would usually stay overnight. When I
asked Kosta why he was going to so many gun shows he would say, "I'm
doing it for Bill.
The guns are Bill's. He needs the money, but he doesn't know a lot
about guns."" Lisa asked many times if everything was on the up and up,
and was assured just as often that everything was legal with the
guns.
However, she had her doubts when Bill Markantonakis came to her one day
and said, "Don't you worry, Lisa, I have a floorboard," and he told her
about a secret compartment under the floor of his car, where he could
carry twenty or thirty guns.
She went to Kosta.
"Kosta, I thought you told me everything was legal with these guns you
trade."
"It is," Kosta said.
"It is? Well then how come this guy has a floorboard?"
"Oh, Lisa," Kosta said.
""Oh, Lisa?" Never mind "oh, Lisa." If everything you're doing is
legal, then why do you have to hide guns under the floor?"
"Honey," Kosta said. He patted her cheek. "Think about it.
You've gone to gun shows with me, you know what I do there. But this
guy, Bill, he's trying to make a few extra bucks, you know, selling
guns. It's not against the law, but if you were a police officer and
you stopped someone for traffic ticket and you saw thirty guns, what
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would you think?"
Kosta's explanation, as usual, made sense. Lisa pushed the incident
from her mind, and had no further reason to Suspect Bill, and certainly
not Barbara, of being a criminal.
But Kosta knew otherwise. In the autumn of 1987 Kosta Sent Bill and
Barbara to Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, all over the South to pass
the funny money in convenience Stores, race tracks, supermarkets, and
restaurants. According to the Secret Service, Bill and Barbara were
allowed to keep half the profits on the money they passed.
The Secret Service also says that Peter Kouracos was brought into the
scheme and was paid a thousand dollars to help pass the counterfeit
bills. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]