#85 A FAMILY JEWEL ROBBER-- SHOULD BE A NETFLIX MOVIE....SEASON 2

 

                                            Richard Pearson's Criminal Career (Continued)



Richard Pearson had been sentenced to 16 years for the Delong Ruby Ransom and for the jewel robbery of the Jordon Marsh department store. He was paroled on November 1972. I was hopeful that my research would find him finally living a quiet life absent any criminal drama. Sadly, that was not Richard’s way and he swore that he would never return to prison “even if he had to take a couple of policemen with him.”

Richard immediately resumed to his criminal ways.

On February 7,1973, Richard was caught by Pompano Police after a high-speed chase where his white and gold Cadillac reached speeds of 100mph and where he tried to force other cars off the road at a roadblock. When stopped, police found a gun under his seat, he was wearing a stolen gold necklace and had another stolen women’s gold watch; in the trunk were burglar tools including a police radio, lock picks, guns, and alarm by-passers. He was charged with aggravated assault with a motor vehicle, but the charges of carrying a concealed weapon by a felon, possession of stolen property and burglary tool were dropped and Richard was released on bail.


                                                                            1973

He was restless (and likely in need of cash) so nearly every day, he and his partner, Paul Sheley, committed spur-of-the moment robberies. In the back of his car, he had a machine that could make keys for any lock. 

They were planning an elaborate hotel heist, and needed some easy money to finance this caper. Wearing wigs and carrying guns, Pearson and Sheley, forced a jeweler and his wife into the vault of their store at the Suniland Shopping Center.  As the burglars loaded $50,000 worth of jewels into a satchel,  the jeweler freed himself and gave chase. Richard dropped the bag of loot and pulled out his gun, but instead of the safety, he pushed the wrong catch and the ammunition clip fell to the ground. The jeweler fired his .38 and hit Richard in the right side under his armpit. The two burglars, pretending to be undercover police, flagged down a passing motorist and ordered them to drive them to the hospital. (However, they never went in for medical attention as there was a police presence.) The next day, police received a tip and “shotgun-carrying detectives cleared an entire floor of the Biscayne Boulevard Motel, burst into a room and arrested recently-paroled playboy jewel thief, Richard Pearson. A day-old wound in his side and a loaded .38 under his pillow, Pearson, clad only in his underwear surrendered meekly.” He was charged and found guilty of  the bungled robbery of the Suniland jewelry store and sentenced to life in Raiford Florida State Prison. 



While in jail for the above, he was then charged, as the mastermind, with conspiring to rob the plush Doral Hotel in Miami Beach of $2.5 million in cash and jewels.  Richard’s plan was for his crew to dress as bus boys, clerks and doormen, use automatic weapons and silencers to seize the hotel lobby, take hostages, “pinch out” the locks on the hotel’s safe deposit boxes, and take the contents. It was a well-planned crime; the only problem was that the two hotel-security guards who had been sitting in on the planning sessions for six months were actually undercover men from the sheriff’s department. At the final planning meeting, police broke into the room, arrested the conspirators and also then charged Richard and Paul Sheley, who were already in jail.

Pearson’s first trial for the Doral Hotel conspiracy trail resulted in a mistrial. More drama occurred before the second trial. Pearson’s partner, Sheley, escaped prison by walking out with a work-release paper signed under another name (Sheley’s skill at escape was evident when marshals found in his cell “beautifully-made sets of  lock picks concealed in toilet articles such as toothpaste, shaving cream and deodorant tubes.) A very dangerous man, Sheley was armed with a sawed-off shotgun, a police pistol and police identification.  The underworld grapevine said that he was determined to ambush the police convoy and free Pearson; thus, it was a heavily armed deputy caravan that accompanied Pearson to trial.

Richard pled guilty to the Doral Hotel conspiracy and received a 12 year federal sentence. At his sentencing, Richard “smiled and waved to his teary-eyed, red-haired wife." Officially Richard and divorcee Patricia Lafferty did not marry until June 26, 1981, in Pinnelas, Florida, but it seemed that Patricia was calling herself Mrs. Pearson throughout the 1970s. In 1977, she was actively lobbying for better prison conditions and railing against prison official who were misusing inmates’ funds. “The accusations included an alleged $28,000 shortage, and the alleged diversion of Thanksgiving turkeys by prison supervisors to their guards.” She publicly complained about the prisons' overcrowded conditions and grossly inadequate medical care and that while there was no money for legal aid to help inmates, the prison system was run as one of Florida's biggest businesses which didn't hesitate to spend millions on new buildings. Patricia also strongly believed (wonder why!!) that conjugal visits for inmates would alleviate some of the social tensions in the overcrowded Florida prisons. She confirmed stories of violence in the prison and said that the prison system exploited prisoners by punishing those who spoke out about problems and rewarded those who keep silent. Her husband, Richard, she testified had not been considered for parole because she was a vocal critic of the prisons. “I’m sure my husband will go into the box for what I’ve said today.” Later that year, Patricia was charged with trying to smuggle hashish into the prison. “Mrs. Pearson arrived at Glades Correctional Institute to visit her husband at 8:30 am and carried a plastic bag and clutch purse. Guards found hashish in her purse and she was arrested…Mrs. Pearson has been under suspicion for some time but [we] never believed anyone would try to brazenly carry something like that in.” Patricia claimed she was set up, that she was familiar with prison routine and would not have tried to smuggle anything into prison in her purse. "Women", she said, "smuggled items into prison stuffed into their bras or underwear."

                                                              Patricia (Lafferty) Pearson

In 1974, Richard suffered a heart attack and requested permission to travel, under police guard, to a private heart specialist for treatment. The judge decided that Richard could get good enough treatment at the Raiford Prison. "Besides", noted the judge, "Pearson came bouncing in here like he was in pretty good shape for a man with a heart condition."


                                                        Raiford Florida State Prison

In 1978, the IRS came after Richard for his 1973 income tax filing. In 1973, Pearson had been out of jail for just a short time, yet the IRS concluded he had “earned” $16,272; this came from police reports of goods Pearson had allegedly stolen, but never convicted of, and from cash and jewels seized when he was arrested that year. His taxes and penalties were assessed at $6000. But before the IRS could go to trial, the government and Patricia, “his petite red-haired wife” agreed to a settlement. The IRS got to keep the proceeds from a tax sale of a gold coin and a gold watch seized from Pearson in 1973. “I think we won a moral victory,” said Patricia Pearson, who referred to her husband as a “gentle man with a lot of class.”


 

                                                                                                                                                                    RECAP OF A CRIMINAL CAREER

Richard’s expertise as an expert in out-smarting electronic alarm systems qualified him to teach electronics in the Avon Correctional Institution in central Florida. 

In 1979, robbers overpowered the two armed guards of the Palam Beach Towers and looted the 186 security boxes of $ million. Tower residents were suing the building owners claiming that there should have been better security. Pearson was called by the defence to testify as an expert witness and to prove that their clients had, indeed, provided adequate security. “The Towers was a prime target. Criminals knew residents had jewels in the boxes. That was the opinion in the underworld”,  Pearson testified. “The only thing management could have done to prevent the robbery was more security guards.”  “Guards are the greatest deterrent. I don’t care if they are 80 years. They’re unpredictable.” “Detection systems that use television cameras, super-sensitive listening devices and alarms are an inconvenience” Pearson said, “but they can be easily compromised.” And if the Towers had been bugged with cameras and sound, Pearson said he and other would-be thieves probably would have just sequestered themselves in the building and then waited for a chance to come out at night to commit the robbery. Asked if professional thieves used electronic systems in their own homes, Pearson said they did, recalling the night he and his wife returned to their Miami home. “There were two hooded men. Our alarm never went off.”

Pearson was allowed to talk about his own robberies who said that he had disarmed more than 350 burglar alarm systems in a criminal career that began in 1959. He described in detail how to get around sophisticated intrusion alarms. Security systems, Pearson said, could be circumvented using a combination of modern technology and indiscretions of such people as off-duty security guards and even “friendly telephone repairmen.”  Pearson testified that he had gotten through 150 to 200 local alarm systems—the kind that ring bells when a building is entered—and about 60 remotely monitored silent alarms in his over 20 years career as a jewel thief. Using diagrams and scientific formulas, Pearson explained how he would isolate the remotely-protected building by tapping into the telephone. He told how he cased heists by following off-duty guards to bars, drinking with them and listening as they talked about their supposedly crook-proof systems. In other heists, Pearson would chat up telephone repairmen to get information.

The Judge later ruled that Pearson was a non-expert on the grounds that “it’s a bad precedent to say a criminal has a special skill…just because he shoots his big egomaniac mouth off” and that could lead to murderers and rapists who might be called to testify as non-expert witnesses in other civil cases. After testifying, Pearson was returned to Avon Correctional Institute.

It seems that Richard was released from prison in the early 1980s…and again he resumed his criminal ways. In 1985, while on parole, he was arrested as one of a gang of armed robbers who preyed on jewelry stores and pharmacies in central Florida. This crime ring wore disguises (three piece suits, hats, wigs, beards), used handguns or shotguns and herded customers into back rooms and netted between $1 and $1.5 million over 14 months. Ninety percent of the stolen goods was used to support drug habits. Richard was charged with violation of his federal probation.

In June 1986, Richard was arrested, along with 3 other men, and charged with operating a cocaine network that imported, processed and distributed large amounts of cocaine in four states. The four men met in Broward County fast-food restaurants and discussed drug deals in coded telephone conversations. The indictment said the group bought its cocaine from a source outside the US, then processed and shipped the cocaine to a number of states. The men were charged with possession of multi-kilograms of cocaine and held without bond.

I am not sure if/when Richard was released from prison. He died, aged 60,  in Sarasota, Florida on July 19, 1990- cause of death, place of burial, etc unknown. Patricia died June 16, 1999 in a hospice in Port Charlotte, Florida.


RICHARD DUNCAN PEARSON                                                                                                                   b. Oct 11, 1930 in New York, New York                                                                                                       m. Helen S ?     divorced Aug 14 1969 in West Palm Beach                                                                         m. Roberta ?  (1933-)        divorced May 18 1973, Miami                                                                           m. Patricia Ann Lafferty (1928-1999) on Jun 26 1982 in Pinellas, Florida                                                d. Jul 19, 1990 in Sarasota, Fla                                                                                                              step grandson of 4th cousin 3x removed (Netterfield-Farnum line)


PS--Every family has its outliers, and nothing captures the imagination quite like finding a black sheep, like Richard, among the branches. A black sheep--a rogue, rebel and rule-breaker--challenges the narrative of "ordinary" revealing that our kin are human, flawed and bold. In pursuing stories, a family historians doesn't just seek names and dates, but uncovers the messy and vivid truths that connect us to the past. Richard's life of criminality is not admirable and not to be condoned, but it does give a compelling tale to tell.



                                                                                                                                     

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

  1. Such an interesting account of an interesting character! I was anxiously awaiting Part 2!!!!!!

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  2. Held my interest all the way through.

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