Undercover FBI Agent Fact Checks Mob Movies & TV | Vanity Fair

this is Mike McGowan a retired FBI special agent who spent most of his 31 year career undercover I worked undercover against some of the more sophisticated complex criminal organizations such as La Cosa Nostra which is the mob Russian organized crime and also the Sinaloa cartel led by chapo guzman mike is going to tell us what movies have gotten right and wrong about organized crime and FBI procedures [Music] I want to be clear that I will not discuss nor disclose any undercover tradecraft or techniques that I believe will aid the criminal element nor jeopardize the safety of current law enforcement undercover personnel first up Reservoir Dogs scene man member at what look man undercover cops got to be Marlon Brando right to do this job you got to be a great actor you got to be naturalistic you got to be naturalistic as hell and undercover work there's a five-step training process it's preparation preparation preparation preparation and go do it it's part of our undercover training when I train young Undercovers I will send them into an actual bar I will point out an individual and tell him or her that they need to contact that individual and come back with that person's mother's maiden name you can't text them you can't email them you got to sit down look them in the eye and convince them that they want to do a deal with you it's the details to tell your story and this particular story takes place in a men's room so you got to know all the details about the men's room you got to know if they got paper towels or blower to dry your hands those details are critically important those are things that if someone has been there and you have not and you don't describe it accurately you've already screwed up the investigation I had a connection with this hippie chick in Santa Cruz all my friends knew it they give me a call honey say hey Freddie so what happens in real life is we have what's called the legend a legend as who you are as an undercover your identity your story your history etc and you have to create that yourself you can get help from senior agents or more experienced people but the story has to be realistic and things that you know so you have to develop your own legend so at the height of my undercover activity I had approximately six different identifications and people think how could you remember six different identifications but of all six the core elements the things that you understand all were the same I love golden retrievers you don't lie until you have to lie together ever so I had six identities and probably 80% of it was all the same so walking a man and who's standing there for Los Angeles County Sheriff's and a German Shepherd oh that's hard man that's a hard 62 pursuit you need to get the bad guys to like you before you can make a deal with them so when you tell a story like this young officer dead he's building rapport he's building trust he's acting natural he's just talking to a bunch of guys in a bar you can't be stiff you can't be rigid you got to tell some jokes tell a funny story and that's what he did he's barking me the only guarantee is nothing will go as planned one time that I was dealing with the mob and I had on a very expensive suit probably $1,500 suit and I also had on a pair of JCPenney socks which cost about eight bucks and the informant the person I was working with the introduced me to screw pointed out that they would recognize I was wearing a cheap pair of socks with a very expensive suit and they notice everything to do this job you got to be a great actor so the only thing I really didn't like in this scene is when the older cop tells him that he's acting you're not acting because you don't get take two if you make a mistake it literally can be fatal you could be killed or at a minimum you screw up the investigation next up the Department in this scene Jack Nicholson plays a mob boss selling micro processes to the Chinese while Leonardo DiCaprio serves as a young undercover police officer while the transaction is being monitored back at police headquarters we have a blind spot why do we have a blind spot we had two hours notice for two hours do you think this is NASA I never crossed my mind have you got a camera in the back what back what they got right for the most part was the interaction within the command center or the monitoring room it's chaos the technical equipment doesn't function properly those are very common occurrences that unfortunately is pretty much the main realistic part I want to tell you these two these gents have machine guns two dozen people show up for a major meeting that just doesn't happen every person in that room is a potential informant down the road if they're gonna hear and see everything you've done you have to be prepared that they're going to compromise you in this case here you had the mob boss and underlings well only he and the main negotiator for the Chinese should have been there you always see these meetings taking place in desolate warehouses or garages that's not very accurate if I have an important meeting I'll have it in the lobby of the Park Plaza Hotel you hide in plain sight did you put a camera in the back and I talked to you for a second please [Music] I've never seen a fight in a room but I've seen it get pretty close so I don't know if we want to go there but the frustration level is very accurate next up Donnie Brasco dude and ahjumma in this next clip you have Donnie Brasco posing as a jewel thief undercover in order to attend his first meeting with lefty Ruggiero played by Al Pacino this is the first time brass goes meeting rogério but what's done earlier is part of his legend building and his back stopping he spent time in this our room and became friends with the bartender who's led him to the mob guys he didn't go directly to the mob guys he let it be known that he was a jewel thief the mob ended up finding him when you have the legend the legend is who you are where you're from what you do etc backstopping is the filling of that it's filling in your story to appear real when Ruggiero first comes in and tries to talk to him Brasco looks at the bartender to get confirmation he's a real mobster so that was very effective and that part of the preparation process I've discussed yeah there's some beautiful thing don't you give it to your wife my wife how am I gonna give it to my wife I am married their girlfriend yeah I gotta go for it yeah some marry her because that's a Fugazi all right as a Fugazi how do you know what's a Fugazi who looked at it for two seconds rather than telling rogério what he wants to hear he tells him it's no good it's not worth anything to give it to his girlfriend yes if you're going to say you're a jewel thief you better know jewelry and in this case Brasco actually attended jewelry school he went out on his own and went to school to do that and I had one investigation where I was undercover as a state inspector and I had to go to dirt school to learn about dirt and believe me there's a lot to learn about dirt that I didn't know until I went to dirt school but once I went and it was also an organized crime case I was able to talk dirt to the bad guys and pass off as I was a state official in which they later bribed me for a state contract Boardwalk Empire dirty in the following scene a prohibition undercover agent is intensely questioned by Al Capone for fears that he's a rat when you moved to Cicero 1922 from where Minnesota Ortonville we owned a wheat farm it went belly-up how do you up a wheat farm brown rust it rots the leaf in this scene I thought the undercover agent did a phenomenal job of talking his way out of trouble if you're an undercover eventually you're going to be challenged it's inevitable so why not prepare and he obviously had prepared his legend in advance he was able to cite specific history with the bad guys so he did a excellent job under extreme pressure stock I worked for you for seven years I broke heads in Cicero I set up Dean O'Banion I make my number every week Wow there's a myth out there that if someone asks you if you're law enforcement while you're undercover you have to answer in the affirmative that's not true I've been challenged multiple times the first time I was challenged when somebody said you're an FBI agent I said yeah I'm Jed go and he immediately started laughing and we went off and finished what we were doing because I just disarmed them with the humor maybe I'm a federal agent maybe I'm a bigamist maybe I'm a murderer on the run believe what you want there's no way I can stop you but that's not what matters now it's not when you're faced with a life-or-death situation you probably want the bad guys to know that you are in fact law enforcement as opposed to a cooperator that's a very effective technique because the bad guys most criminals at least sane criminals don't want to kill law enforcement because if you kill a federal agent the government's gonna get you like he didn't say don't kill me I'm a federal agent which is sometimes what the recommendation is okay but he at least leaves them with that hint that they don't need that trouble probably the most realistic part of that exchange is when he has to use the bathroom at the end because that's what you feel like after walking out at one of those places what did I say yeah I need a men's room gonna be sick I may have soiled myself mr. Prado so the following clip shows the day-to-day mob life of Tony Soprano and his crew [Applause] Oh a long-lost Lita it's pretty much accurate about the day-to-day doings in a mob crew and family they spent a lot of time smoking playing cards talking about nonsense they just spend a lot of time together if you're working undercover against the mob you have to know that you're going to be tied up for hours and hours and hours talking about basically nonsense and maybe five or ten minutes of criminal conversation I work three different cry LCN families for about ten years and I enjoyed my time with them as far as talking to them about different things they're pretty funny they have good senses of humor they have interesting stories and not everything is criminally related Tony Oh a canary are you doing oh yeah good good FBI agents assigned to the organized crime squad it's like a little bit of a cat-and-mouse game that we play we you know you'll you'll make sure they know you're there and you're exchanged pleasantries you never know what one of them may decide to call you and want to jump over the to the other side it's a good given take and it they just make sure that each other knows the other is out there next up Goodfellas Paulie hated phones you wouldn't have won in this Hallie used to get all this calls secondhand then you'd have to call the people back from an outside phone in this scene here the fear of telephones is very accurate in the LCN back in the 70s or 80s they used to feel free to be on the telephone but once the federal government specifically the FBI started to wiretap their phones they became extremely cautious on the phone so that in and of itself and that scene is very accurate never guy that's all they did all day long was take care of paulie's phone call what's not accurate and that same scene though is they take the message and they run across the street directly across the street from his house and use a payphone so with surveillance the FBI would recognize that's the phone that they wanted to be listened to next everything was one-on-one Paulie hated conferences he didn't want anybody hearing what he said and he didn't want anybody listening to what he was being told the use of wiretap which is legally known as title three interceptions those interceptions were first used heavily during the early 80s mafia members still were sloppy or lazy and would use the phones and many of them were caught because of that but the discipline members wouldn't touch the phone so even if they had to take a plane trip to Las Vegas or Chicago if it was that important they just wouldn't talk to anybody until they were face-to-face in person next up the Scarface they're conducting money-laundering transaction and in general what money-laundering means as you're taking dirty money which is money made from criminal activity in this case drug trafficking and converting it into legitimate income they have so much drug proceeds they can't walk into the bank and deposit it so they have to convert into another financial form I know this is a famous movie and it's back in the day but those are antiquated arrests procedures anyway we did if that's not the way you arrest people an undercover operation there's two one two you're in one room with one door and you can put 20 agents outside they pull out their weapons and those weapons can be taken again away from you so just let them leave and let the other guys grab you're under arrest for violation of the RICO statute you got a right to remain silent anything you say can and will be taken together I wanted you guys to come when the federal agent stood up to arrest him he claimed he was violating the RICO statute the RICO statute is what's known as the racketeer and influence corruption organization Rico is a very powerful federal tool that we use which basically you're allowed to attack the enterprise as opposed to the individual so back in the day in the Mafia when a when a mob boss ordered a murder he didn't commit the murder but he could be held responsible as part of the enterprise also this idea that undercover agents make the arrest in sight the legal citations etc that's in my opinion that's not accurate I don't remember ever arresting anybody I worked undercover against I would always leave and let somebody else arrest them you've done your job next up the Irishman I get someone for next Tuesday and the following clip Frank played by Robert De Niro sells meat off of a truck to the mob [Music] the part that was most realistic to me was the common street hustle that Frank engages in he's employed with a meet company obviously but he's making a side business selling some of it off the back of his truck and as you noticed in the clip he makes sure to take care of the people that he needs to take care of in order for the scam to work this is very common in urban areas at this time area if you look historically at the Fulton fish market in their connection to the LCN in New York the LCN basically ran that place for years and it wasn't until the mid 80s late 80s that that relationship became known and prosecuted in federal court it's a case study that's often shown about the relationship between the mob and legitimate business how many you want at least five he slit a couple of sides of beef off and then the next thing was him sitting at the table having dinner with the mob and talking about getting more steak etc that's not a very savvy mobster as far as I'm concerned just because somebody gave you a steak dinner they don't get a seat at the table the mob will take you in if you're making them money but you got to make of real money they're called earners he's that's what an earner is described for somebody who can make money for the mob and they'll tolerate him or give him some acceptance but he's not sitting around hearing all the secrets at the table that's for sure next the cement shoes in Billy Bathgate I can tell you that I've never known heard or seen anyone put in cement shoes it's not a technique that I'm familiar with it doesn't make any sense to me because who's going to allow themselves to let somebody put tip feet in cement without resisting I'm not sure why Bruce Willis would allow himself to be put in that position unless he was unconscious or not able to defend himself true detective in this following clip the undercover officer participates in an armed robbery in order to get information on a current investigation and it goes horribly wrong what's wrong is that the undercover officer initiates and encourages violence that can't happen that's not realistic law enforcement personnel can only react to violence and self-defense we cannot initiate or encourage violence if you're in an undercover capacity and you're asked to commit an act of violence by the people you with the bottom line is you have to get away or not do it when you're actually in real undercover work as law enforcement you have to set yourself up in a position that you're not considered just another neighborhood thug you want to be a money guy you want to be a driver somebody who just doesn't grab a baseball bat and hit somebody across the back of the head next up narcos in this clip Pablo Escobar meets with Carlos who will be flying his cocaine into the United States the real game change was filling laterz planes with coquí's data we what I think they got right was the manner in which cocaine was transported from Colombia to the United States in the late 70s early 80s this was before there was a interdiction effort on the part of the US government so planes were allowed to enter the United States with very little notice and that's originally how trafficking started between Colombia and the United States café's a caballo has en todo stop Pedro is dilatory toy so close you'll be how much government is possible pilot kiemas - a motor but Tranter see Tomas so they wanted to take out the interior of the plane to maximize the loads which was a common occurrence in those days those were basically drug planes and used for nothing else so by removing some of the interior items they were able to put more cocaine which is less cover risk if you can get more in in one shot then you're taking less risks that it will be seized is too personal Carlos but under the weather I wouldn't suspect that Pablo Escobar would make himself available to somebody that he doesn't know and somebody who's been in prison who very well could have been an informant I think there would have been more of a delay between introducing the pilot to Escobar as the top dog if I was Pablo Escobar I never would have been around the airport that day you've now seen it Hollywood get some things right and some things wrong the bottom line is after watching all these clips my advice to you would be the risk is not worth the reward and crime does not pay [Music]

Channel: Vanity Fair

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Keywords: mafia, true crime, fbi agent, criminal expert, criminal expert reviews, crime movies explained, criminal expert vanity fair, vanity fair true crime, mafia movies, fbi agent reviews, mob movies, mob movies and tv, undercover agent, undercover fbi agent, mob tv, mob movie, mike mcgowan, the departed, the sopranos, goodfellas, scarface, the irishman, true detective, narcos, reservoir dogs, fbi analyzes, crime expert, vanity fair, mob review, mafia movie

Id: Tgr7LTRWkLo

Length: 20min 48sec (1248 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 24 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/HankMoodyMFer]

Man This guys career is astonishing. Guys like him and joe pistone are total badasses, balls of steel.

I highly recommend his book “Ghost: My 30 years as an FBI undercover agent”. I’m really Looking forward to the movie that is getting made.

[u/[deleted]]

So how much did this guy get paid to feed this narrative to the public?