Odessa, Florida
(December 31, 2018) BTN — The 69'ers
Motorcycle Club is a nationwide organization whose members pride themselves on
being part of the one percent — that is, the small fraction of bikers who shirk
society’s rules.
In the Tampa area, they called themselves the “Killsborough”
chapter. Inductees adopted names like “Pumpkin” and “Durty” and “Big Beefy.” They nurtured what prosecutors say was a criminal enterprise
focused on narcotics distribution. Last year, according to a federal
indictment, they graduated to murder.
A lone Harley-Davidson Motorcycle belonging to Club member
Their target was Paul Anderson.
Anderson was president of the Cross Bayou chapter of the
Outlaws Motorcycle Club, the predominant one-percenter club in the eastern
United States. Anderson’s brazen slaying in December 2017 during rush hour
on the Suncoast Parkway rattled local law enforcement. Sheriff's officials
warned of more violence.
What authorities didn’t reveal, though, was the story of a
deliberate campaign of violent retribution. That tale has since been spelled
out in court documents and transcripts related to the federal racketeering case
against five members of the 69'ers.
It all started when someone stole a couple of vests.
Allan Burt Guinto was a 69'er. They called him “Big Beefy,”
all 250 pounds of him. In a photograph obtained by law enforcement, the Brandon
man stands in a sleeveless black vest with a miniature Confederate flag behind
him and a long white, semi-circular patch on his side reading, “Killsborough.”
The patch, known as a “rocker” is how one-percenters
identify themselves and their clubs. The vests feature the 69’ers logo — a
red-tongued wolf, and often, an interlocked 6 and 9.
Guinto, 27, and another Killsborough member were wearing
their vests the night of April 18, 2017, when they attended a “bike night” at
the Local Brewing Company restaurant in Palm Harbor.
The Outlaws were there, too. And they didn’t take kindly to
the two 69'ers. The pair suffered a beating from a dozen sets of fists and
boots. Then the Outlaws took their cherished vests, according to court
documents.
Word got back to the other Killsborough members. Christopher
“Durty” Cosimano — their president, according to prosecutors — vowed they would
take the lives of two Outlaws in retaliation for the thefts.
Within a few months, prosecutors said, they made their first
try.
It all happened to James "Jimbo" Costa in the span
of 18 minutes one warm, breezy summer evening as he drove his Harley Davidson motorcycle
south across the Sunshine Skyway Bridge then north on U.S 41 into Hillsborough
County. Costa was a captain and a career firefighter with
Hillsborough County. He was also president of the St. Petersburg chapter of the
Outlaws Motorcycle Club, according to law enforcement. He retired from
firefighting in 2016 after news reports about his involvement with the club.
On July 25, 2017, he donned his black leather vest with the
Outlaws' logo — a skull and crossed pistons — and left a meeting in Pinellas
County.
A photograph shows Costa entering the Skyway at 11:14 p.m.
Fourteen seconds later, a white Chevrolet van appeared behind him. The van,
investigators learned, was registered to Cosimano, according to court records. Costa crossed the Hillsborough County line just before 11:32
p.m. and the van sped past. Someone inside fired a gun.
The van made a U-turn, Costa later told sheriff’s deputies,
then more gunshots. Costa ran, bleeding, to a nearby trailer park and called
911. Sheriff’s deputies used the bridge toll records to identify
Cosimano’s van. Deputies took DNA swabs and fingerprints from inside, but made
no arrests. Six days later, Pasco County Sheriff's Office investigators
wrote in a search warrant affidavit that Cosimano planned to assassinate Paul
Anderson.
Sheriff's deputies visited Anderson at home. They told him
they had heard about a hit placed on him. Anderson didn't seem surprised. "Paul advised there were a lot of people that wanted to
kill an Outlaw," according to the affidavit. He repeatedly denied knowing Cosimano, but still had a
message for him. "Tell him good luck," Anderson said, according to
the affidavit.
Deputies also interviewed Cosimano, but he denied knowing
Anderson or plotting against him, the affidavit said. Almost four weeks later, the Outlaws clubhouse in St.
Petersburg went up in flames. Footage played on TV news shows a fireball
engulfing the two-story stucco building on 18th Avenue S. In federal court
documents, prosecutors say Cosimano and Guinto set the blaze. On Dec. 21, 2017, Paul Anderson rode north in his pickup
truck along the Suncoast Parkway.
Department of Transportation toll cameras captured him at
4:53 p.m. as he cruised down the exit ramp to State Road 54. Seconds later, the
same cameras spotted two men on motorcycles, both with their license tags
covered. The riders wore black, their faces covered in bandanas and sunglasses.
One man wore a glossy German military-style helmet. They pulled up on either
side of Anderson's truck as he stopped at a traffic light, waiting to turn
left.
The helmeted man stepped off the bike, walked to the
driver's window and tapped on the glass. Then, before a handful of rush-hour
drivers, he pulled a gun. Bullets shattered the truck's windows. Anderson was
shot five times.
Images of the bikers saturated local news and
prompted a confidential informer to call law enforcement.
The informer told investigators Guinto contacted him after
the murder and asked for help getting rid of the gun. Investigators later
equipped the informer with a hidden camera, which he used to secretly record a
conversation with Guinto. Guinto admitted he had been in a car behind Anderson's truck
before the shooting, according to an arrest affidavit. He said he'd watched
Cosimano shoot Anderson, and that a second man, Michael "Pumpkin" Mencher,
52, was standing by in case anything went wrong. He said he was proud of the
killers, according to the affidavit. Federal agents already had reason to suspect the 69'ers.
Hours after the assassination, they set up surveillance on a
Riverview home rented to Erick "Big E" Robinson, 46. They reported
hearing mechanical sounds, which they suspected to be gang members taking
motorcycles apart. Mencher was later seen leaving the home on one of the two
motorcycles in the Suncoast Parkway surveillance images, investigators said.
They later searched the home and found the second bike, ridden by Cosimano,
they said.
Both bikes had been modified to make them less identifiable,
prosecutors said.
Within days, Cosimano, Mencher and Guinto were arrested.
Months later came a federal indictment alleging murder in the aid of a
racketeering and narcotics conspiracy, among other charges. The indictment
roped in Robinson, whom prosecutors said was in the car with Guinto and helped
dispose of evidence, and a fifth man, Cody "Little Savage" Wesling,
said to be directly behind Anderson's truck. Wesling, 28, was a "prospect," who was seeking to
become a full member of the 69'ers. Before his arrest, he was also a Polk
County firefighter.
Prosecutors discussed seeking the death penalty for the
group but ultimately ruled it out.
All five men remain jailed. If found guilty, each faces up
to life in prison.
Story: Dan Sullivan
