38 Years a Fugitive

By Eugene Paull

A memoir that reads like a novel, this is a story of E. D. Paull's mind-blowing life journey, and it's nothing short of amazing. Paull lived as a federal fugitive for thirty-eight years, "beating the system" for half his life. He used his skills, luck, and talents to navigate the twist and turns of an adventurous life that most people can only dream about. This is Paull's remarkable story-a story of a smuggler by trade, sprinkled with sex, drugs, rock 'n' roll, and reggae. In the middle of it all, he coached amateur boxing from 1988 to 2001, formed and served on the board of the Caribbean Boxing Federation, and held the Jamaica National Boxing Forum in December of 1999. On the run, he lived life to the fullest while his travels took him from New Jersey to Philly, California to Vietnam, Canada to Jamaica. Though he lived an unconventional life, his contributions to society included serving in the Army during the Vietnam War, working on programs to help Vietnam vets, and various writings that have appeared in Connecticut Cruise News, Born to Ride magazine, and Go For a Ride magazine.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Mar 6, 2018
• ISBN: 9781641388863

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38 Years a Fugitive

Eugene Paull

Copyright © 2018 Eugene Paull

All rights reserved

First Edition

Page Publishing, Inc

New York, NY

First originally published by Page Publishing, Inc 2018

ISBN 978-1-64138-885-6 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-64138-886-3 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

I dedicate this book to my mom and dad—

long gone, but never forgotten.

To my son, Roger, the movie producer and filmmaker.

To Therissa Ann Donna, my wife and soul mate.

To all who shared a moment in time with me,

who took away my pain and loneliness,

those moments were special.

To all who believed in me, not all the shit in the media.

To all those who wish me well, care about me, love me.

Thank you from the heart.

(I love you too!)

Foreword

Destiny

Iwas a biker, boxer, outlaw, smuggler, and fugitive for almost forty years. I lived off the grid and on the run but always found a way to survive and thrive. Through it all, one lesson is bigger than every other: The law only had to be right once. I had to be right all the time, every time. For thirty-eight years I was—too often by the skin of my teeth, what more than once can only be explained as miracles. Somehow, I found a way to beat the system .

It’s been a hell of a life.

Destiny is what we get by playing the hand we’re dealt—along with a lot of luck, good or bad. I had no say in my mother and father, the place of my birth, the name I was given, or whether I was born into riches or poverty. Heredity and environment were chosen for me as they are chosen for all of us.

Born on an overcast, cold day with a dark cloud over my head but guardian angels smiling down on me because, somewhere beyond the clouds, my lucky star shone brightly and always has.

I would have had an older brother if he hadn’t died at birth. The doctors told my mother she’d never have another child, so she considered me a miracle. Little did she know the trials and the trouble her little Genie Boy would bring.

I’d arrived, ready or not, and was not your normal offspring. Had my mother known, she’d have named me Extreme Trouble instead of Eugene David—born on a magical cloud carried by a turbulent wind, with amazing adventures ahead.

Born a rebel, stubborn and mostly acting on impulse, with little thought of the pros and cons, cause and effect, or the consequences of my actions. Like a cat, with nine lives giving me second chances; it turned out I’d need ’em all.

I wasn’t stupid; I just did stupid things.

I thrived on excitement. I’d act first and face the consequences later. Suited me; I got bored easily. Dad used to say I had ants in my pants. Maybe that explains why I couldn’t sit still; my high energy had me jumping in head-on into life. A miracle I’m around to write my memoirs.

Turned seventy today, January 28, 2015. Time to start writing my story. If I don’t, I won’t live long enough. The miles are showing. My health isn’t what it used to be: high cholesterol and worn-out knees, bronchitis, shortness of breath, and restless legs syndrome. I don’t sleep well at night, sometimes not much at all.

Dad died of a heart attack at age seventy, but Mom lived to ninety-one, so I’m giving myself to eighty-one, all things being equal, which they never are—which is the point why the story needs to be told.

I won’t be complaining, just stating the facts as I see them. Know that my priority is for context more than exact chronology and insight into experiences, not just facts, figures, and details.

I made my money doing what others didn’t have the balls to do and ventured where others feared to go. I was a pickup artist and a lady’s man, picking up whom I wanted and loving the one I was with. Made love to many—more than most men have even dreamed of—with enough miracles thrown to get to seventy alive and free.

I love women, maybe too much, but also respect them. In telling my story, the language I use is true to the times, very different times. It’s authentic, if not politically correct, by today’s standard.

Never read Shakespeare, but I always knew life was a stage and everyone on it an actor or player. I played my part well and enjoyed the role, thriving in the spotlight.

Life flashes by in the blink of an eye, and the older I get, the faster the years rush past. Seventy today, maybe ten or twenty years left, but who knows? In the end, we’re all just a heartbeat away.

All my life, I would take a dream and turn it into a goal then turn that goal into reality. Once it was reached, I set another goal to strive for. Without that, I knew I’d stagnate and die.

So this is my final goal—to write the story of my life, running through all my lives.

Then in a perfect world that never is, for it to become a best seller and give the money from the book sales to my son, Roger, to turn into a movie. Then I’ll sit back and watch the movie, smiling, knowing I truly did beat the system and the whole world gets to see how crazy it was.

No one can make this shit up. The fact is I’ve lived one hell of a life, one adventure after another and enough miracles thrown allowing me to get to seventy alive and free. A maverick, a restless soul, a wayward wind, and a rolling stone living recklessly to the lyrics of whatever song happened to be favored in the personal soundtrack of the times of my life. I’ll share lyrics from time to time.

Earning a master’s degree in life, courtesy of street education, Army education, war education, jail education, and book education, I lived as a street punk, soldier, paratrooper, rebel, smuggler, romantic, pickup artist, sexaholic , felon, convict, and fugitive. I have been shot and shot at and returned fire. I’m here because I really did know when to walk away—and when to run.

Somehow lucky throughout it all and I still am. Someone up there likes me.

I may have had dark clouds following me through my life, but behind them was my lucky star. Always making it to the edge of the cliff but somehow not falling over, to the brink of disaster without being consumed by it, spending over half my life on the run as a federal fugitive hiding in plain sight, living just below the radar, surviving against the odds. If I had to spend time in prison for all the laws I’ve broken and the numerous crimes I’ve committed in my life, I would have used up the lives of nine cats and would still owe them many more. Only God can judge me; no human was ever sent from heaven to occupy that bench.

Everyone has a story and this is mine: sex, drugs, rock ’n’ roll, and reggae. Some of the names have been changed to protect the guilty still living. So with a wink, we’ll call this book a fiction. Any resemblance to any person or real-life event is simply coincidental.

Thought you’d be interested—there were many candidates for what to call this story.

PART ONE

Growing Up Badass

I loved playing cowboys and Indians, especially drawn to

Zorro and Robin Hood, who wore green and took from

the rich and gave to the poor. He was my hero.

What a noble thing to do.

CHAPTER 1

Childhood

I’m the product of nine months in the womb after my dad’s shore leave during World War II in April of ’44, a few days away from the aircraft carrier that he and mom made count. The world greeted me on January 28, unleashing that day a powerful winter storm on Torrington, Connecticut. The wind howled; so did my mom in delivery, and I’m told I didn’t cooperate much. My style, even at the beginning.

Speaking of style, I won’t be wasting your time with silly, résumé-type bullshit. As an example, who really cares where I went to junior high school? Better to focus on the madness that was junior high school. So I’m giving you snapshots of people, events through my personal lens of times long gone and how they challenged me, tested me, and defined me.

You Can Call Me

Eugene David Paull read the birth certificate. That would forever be Genie Boy to my mom and relatives, Gino to my Italian and MC brothers, and Gene to mostly everyone else.

At least in the beginning.

First Brush with Death

One of my earliest childhood memories is one I barely understand. Might have been a dream. To me, my mom was the best mom ever. I was thrilled silly whenever she took me with her when she left the house. To this day, I hear her asking, Do you want to come with me, Genie Boy?

She’d put on her long brown winter jacket, the one with the big collar, and then help me into my cozy jacket and boots. Then it was out the door. The outdoors were an adventure and a world of wonder to me. I remember trying to absorb as much as I could wherever I went out. One day, the trees were void of leaves, making it easier to see the few birds remaining during the harsh winter.

Studying them distracted me, but out of the corner of my eye, I caught a figure walking on the opposite side of the street. Panic overwhelmed me, but I didn’t freeze up. I made mad dash across the busy street, oblivious to the cars bearing down on me from both directions, eyes glued to the lady in the long brown winter coat with a big collar. I never heard the screeching tires of alert drivers or felt the breeze of cars passing a whisper from my vulnerable three-year-old body.

Why had she left me? Why was I being abandoned? Sobbing, I managed to call out.

Reaching the other side of the road in a flash felt like an eternity, and I tripped on the curb, but by some miracle, didn’t fall and reached my mom. Mommy! I said, grabbing on to her long brown winter coat with the big collar, pulling myself closer with all the might.

Only to stare into a startled face I had never seen before. Then I was grabbed from behind. My feet left the cold concrete sidewalk as I was lifted high into the air, confused and in shock, but fear was quickly replaced by a warm and familiar bear hug from the lady in the long brown winter coat with a big collar. Now it was my mom’s face, and I felt safe. The nightmare I’d experienced faded quickly, but the memory of it never quite left me.

While that harrowing experience didn’t teach me to look both ways before crossing, it taught me what was most important to my three-year-old mind: my mom loved me. That was all that mattered.

A Sister and TV

Nina Louise was born on October 13, 1947. From that day forward, my life was forever changed. At first, I was excited to have a sister to play with, but I soon found myself competing for Mom’s attention. Before my sister came along, I had it all to myself. In the early years, I didn’t notice so much as my sister and I played together, acting out our favorite television shows—a puppet show called Kukla, Fran and Ollie; Flash Gordon and the Clay People; Buffalo Bill, Peter Pan and Tinker Bell.

Cowboy shows like Hopalong Cassidy (who wore black but rode a white horse) exposed us to fighting, shooting, and violence at an early age. We were taught to associate white with good and black with bad from these TV shows. Lash LaRue was an exception. He was a good guy with a whip who wore black. Others included the Cisco Kid and Pancho, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, and the Lone Ranger and Tonto. The Lone Ranger wore white and rode a white horse. Tonto, an American Indian, was his best friend. I remember a joke where the Lone Ranger and Tonto are surrounded by hostile Indians.

Looks like we’ve had it this time, Tonto, the Lone Ranger says.

What do you mean ‘we,’ white man? Tonto replies.

I loved playing cowboys and Indians, especially drawn to Zorro and Robin Hood, who wore green and took from the rich and gave to the poor. He was my hero. What a noble thing to do.

These were some of the best years of my life. I loved when my dad took off work for a family vacation. I learned to fish using hellgrammites as bait and met Bonnie, the second love of my life, on one such vacation.

During the weekends of summer, we’d drive the short distance to Ocean City, New Jersey. I loved the ocean, and swam like a fish. My parents met as lifeguards, so I was taught lifesaving skills and all the strokes: breast, back, side, and so on. I’ve always felt very comfortable in the water. Maybe being an Aquarius also had something to do with that.

First Love

Early in grade school, Patsy Turner and I had a true puppy love thing going. We’d ask the teacher of our one-room class if we could go to the bathroom and then meet in the coat room and kiss. She was the first girl in my life; funny how we remember the first.

Hello, Johnny Law

The same year I discovered the wonders of love, I also learned about the long arm of the law. I was five years old and just made my first slingshot. Eager to try it out, I keyed in on the neighbor’s chicken farm, which had glass windows close to ground level. Window by window, with perfect aim, I took them out. By the time I got to the last window, I considered myself an expert shot. The next day, a state trooper visited our house and spoke with my mom. A neighbor had seen me shooting out the windows and told the owner of the chicken pens, who called the police. Instead of pressing charges, the man wanted to teach me a different lesson. I had to pay for the cost of replacing the windows I’d broken—which led to my first job.

On the Job at Five

I got a night job catching free-range chickens. The chickens would roost high in the trees at night, and I’d climb up, grab the chickens by their legs, and hand them down to the people on the ground, who put them in crates. I worked many a night at one dollar an hour until my debt for the windows I’d broken was repaid. As you might guess, this ended my days of breaking windows with my slingshot. Besides, I was already an expert and had nothing left to prove.

Enterprising at Nine

When I was nine, Jimmy Murdock and I followed the smoke to the forest fires. Once the volunteer fire company put out the fire, they hired us for one dollar an hour to strap water tanks on our backs and walk around in the smoldering aftermath of the fire to squirt water on the hot spots. Wherever there was smoke, we’d pump water onto its source until the smoke disappeared. Doing this kept the smoldering spots from flaming back up. Despite the hard work in less-than-favorable conditions, we felt like real firemen doing an important job—and we got paid for it!

Cheating Death—Again

I’ll never forget the time Frankie and I were busy gathering fallen leaves. We carried armfuls and made a giant pile of leaves under the garage roof. Then we climbed a big tree near the garage and jumped onto the roof. Frankie jumped first. I didn’t see Frankie as I made my way to the end of the garage roof just above that huge pile. Peering over the edge, I saw Frankie’s head poking out of the leaves.

I did a belly flop! shouted Frankie in his boastful five-year-old voice. Actually, he’d jumped, landing on his feet. Not to be outdone, I shouted back in my most boastful five-year-old voice, That’s nothing! I yelled and, with more balls than brains, leaped off the garage roof headfirst. Bad move. I hit the ground like a ton of bricks, landing on my head, and the leaves couldn’t break my fall. I saw stars and couldn’t breathe. My chest cavity holding my ribs together had popped out of place. I jumped up and began running, my face turning blue, gasping for air until my lungs functioned as they were meant to, taking in big gulps of air until the color of my face returned to normal and my heart, which was trying to beat its way out of my chest, did the same. My chest cavity popped back into place when I jumped up and began to run around looking for air. I felt like a cat using up one of the nine. The doctor told me I was one lucky kid because, if my chest cavity hadn’t popped back into place, I would have died.

Another Close Call

It’s the events that impact us early in life that are so vividly recalled in our memories decades later. At seven, I was way too young to even hold a BB gun, but when the big kids said Peter and I could tag along with them into the woods to shoot their new .22 rifles, I was excited. After all, as an adventurer always looking for a new one, I followed the big kids until we reached a thicket of trees with thick underbrush. The bushes up ahead made a rustling sound. My heart started to beat rapidly. Was it a bear that made that sound? My imagination ran wild.

Stay here, said Pete’s big brother Vince as he and his friend moved into the thick underbrush and disappeared. We waited patiently for what seemed like forever when two shots rang out. Our hearts beat wildly. Two more shots rang out. One of the bullets missed me by a hair, slamming into the tree I was leaning on and splintering a small spot of bark right in front of my eyes. I didn’t realize until later how close I’d come to death. The other bullet brought my friend Pete even closer to death, entering his left cheek, taking out a tooth, and exiting out the right side of his jaw. For a moment, time stood still. Pete put his hand to his face. Blood covered his palm and ran down his cheeks. His eyes widened, and he took off like a bat out of hell. I followed.

Oh shit, I said to myself. Pete’s been shot. Those words seemed to echo in my mind, running along the trail leading to Pete’s house. I ran as fast as I could. I was a faster runner, but not that day. Pete left me in the dust. By the time I reached his house, all I could see was the screen door swinging shut. When the dust cleared, I saw the screen door fly open and Pete’s mom run out, towing Pete behind her. In a flash, they were in the car. She floored it in reverse, the tires screeched to a stop as the car was slammed into first gear, the gas pedal touched the metal, and the clutch popped as the tires turned in opposite directions at such speed that the car stood still while the tires spun on the pavement, screaming as if in pain and billowing smoke before they gained traction, and the car headed off in the direction of the hospital at warp speed. I sat down on the steps of Pete’s house and tried to take stock of what had just happened. My seven-year-old brain got a hell of a workout, and new beads of sweat formed on my face.

My mind was full of what-ifs. That could have been me.

I could have been shot, even killed. What would my mother think? What happened to Pete? Was he going to die? Shock set in and my kidneys opened up, urine flowing down my legs. At seven, I had no idea about death, but I knew I wanted to live. There are so many things I couldn’t do if I were dead. I wanted Pete to live too. Who would I play with if my best friend died? As it turned out, Pete’s time wasn’t up yet. We would both live to see another day, but the cost was another one of our cat lives.

Farmers’ Union Camp

I wasn’t always cheating death as a child. As a Cub Scout and a Boy Scout, I learned wilderness-survival skills. I remember going to Farmers Union Camp and living in a tent, sitting around the campfire, singing songs.

I thought I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you and me.

I said, Hey, Joe, you’re ten years dead.

I never died, said he. And on his shirt, he wore a union button; he wore it in the daytime and the evening, so they say. And when you asked him why he wore that button, he said I’m in the union, and I’m in to stay. My father and my uncle Joe Chandler were active in the union movements and even went off to Kentucky to fight for the rights of the coal miners to form a union and have bargaining rights, a safer work environment, and decent wages. If they saw what has become of labor unions today, they’d surely roll over in their graves.

Confessions of a Bully

A little painful here, but what better time than your memoir to make amends and apologize for the wrongdoings of your youth? I’m sorry to admit it, but in grade school, I picked on kids. I remember getting off the school bus at Joey Z’s stop one day. His father was on the scene to encourage his son to fight me, to no avail.

There was also this overweight kid, Clarence. I was on his case constantly until one day he couldn’t take it any longer, and he hauled off and punched me in the eye, bringing an abrupt end to my bullying ways. Now I apologize for being such an asshole to all those to whom I did bad things that made their lives miserable, especially Joseph and Clarence. I am sorry.

Cars

Being a curious kid, I learned about cars around 1954, back in the days when the engines were flat heads, by watching and asking mechanics questions. Some guys a block from my house had a stock car they worked on during the week and raced on the weekends. They’d let me sit in the number three Coop while it was towed to and from the track. I learned about burning petroleum ether to make them go faster despite it being against the rules. Everyone burned it; you could smell it in the air. I remember when the first six cylinder raced on the track, beating all the V8s because of the gearing that was perfect for the small track. Watching them work on their car, I learned about milling down the head to boost compression, port, and relieving—which polished the inside of the intake port to let fuel and air flow smoother and faster—oversized pistons, and reseating the valves. All this would come in handy in the next millennium, when I worked on my single cylinder Wizard motorbike engine. My Schwinn bicycle averaged sixty miles per hour instead of thirty.

Guns: One Shot, One Kill

Guns became a part of my life when my dad gave me a BB gun at nine. Making me promise not to shoot any windows, he presented me with the gun. I quickly became an expert shot, shooting birds: one shot, one kill. To make amends for this later in life, I put out birdhouses and feeders.

I am sorry, birds. Please forgive me for being such an asshole.

My Second Gun: Honing My Skills

At age ten, I was given a single-shot .22 rifle by