Tragic by Robert Tanenbaum

 

Shots ring out and union leader Vince Carlotta lies dead on the street.  But is it a robbery gone wrong as the witnesses report?  NYC District Attorney Butch Karp doesn't think so.  Vince had been fighting the old style leadership, specifically Charlie Vitelli and the two had met with some other leaders at a restaurant to talk over their differences and see if Vitelli was willing to step down.  Word on the street was that this was a hit.

The killers were small time thugs and were quickly apprehended.  The gunman was a Russian hitman, hoping to make his name.  He recruited two friends neither of whom had ever been involved in a violent crime.  The getaway driver confessed and agreed to testify at the trial of the other two.  Both were convicted and imprisoned.

But Karp wants the real villain, the man who ordered the hit.  That is Charlie Vitelli and he killed to keep his power and the money he and his top associates had been siphoning from the pension fund for years.  When the chief financial officer flips, Karp has a chance to put Vitelli away.  Will he be successful?

This is the twenty-fifth novel in the Butch Karp series.  Readers will get behind the scenes looks at how a trial is prepared and played out.  There are mystery witnesses, attempted coercion of other witnesses and plans to kill those who dare stand up to Vitelli.  Karp's wife, Marlene, is not as prominent in this novel as in others in the series but does appear.  This book is recommended for mystery readers.