Below is my crime fiction short story The Seventh Street
Shooting.
The story
originally appeared in American Crime Magazine.
The Seventh Street Shooting
By Paul Davis
After a late evening dinner with my
wife, I headed upstairs and took a shower.
I shaved under
my neatly trimmed short beard and brushed my teeth. I applied a roll-on
deodorant under my arms and splashed a bit of aftershave on my neck. I walked
into my bedroom and began to dress. I slipped on a pair of dark gray slacks, a
black leather belt, black socks, black Italian leather loafer shoes and a
powder blue dress shirt, sans tie.
I placed my
reading glasses in my shirt's pocket, and I placed my gold wedding band on my
finger, and I slipped on my Rolex Submariner watch with the black leather band
on my left wrist. I placed a gold chain over my head, and it fell to my chest
under my shirt. The gold chain held the original U.S. Navy dog tag that was
issued to me way back in February of 1970 when I entered Navy Boot Camp. The
gold chain also held a small, finely carved and detailed Scuba diver.
My beautiful
wife, who bought me the Rolex Submariner watch just prior to our wedding, also
bought me the gold Scuba diver to commemorate her first Scuba diving experience
with me in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
I placed my key
ring with my house and car keys and my other Navy dog tag into my left pants
pocket, and my cellphone and a pocketknife with a short but sharp blade into my
right pants pocket. I slipped a clip-on holster with my .38 hammerless Ruger
revolver to my belt on my left side. If need be, I could cross-draw the gun
with my right hand.
I put on my
black sports jacket and placed my slim, black leather long notebook/wallet into
my jacket’s left breast pocket. I placed my mini-tape recorder into my jacket’s
right breast pocket.
I was showered,
shaved, well-dressed, and armed. I was on my way to meet a murderer.
I was meeting
Robert “Bobby Buddha” Regalbuto at a neighborhood bar in South Philly.
Regalbuto read my crime column in the local paper and emailed me using the
email address I listed below the newspaper column. He wrote that he remembered
me from school and the old neighborhood, and he wanted to offer me a story for
my column.
I remembered
Regalbuto as well. I recall that he was a violent and half-crazed hoodlum who
became a drug addict and was sent to prison for murder in the 1970s.
As I stood at
the bar and sipped a vodka on the rocks, I watched the front door. Mark
Terranova, my good friend and a retired Philadelphia police detective, sipped
his beer at the other end of the bar. Like me, he was armed. I had mentioned to
Mark that I was meeting Regalbuto in a bar, and he insisted on backing me up
from a short distance.
When Regalbuto
walked in the bar I recognized him immediately, although he was older, grayer
and much thinner than the last time I saw him. He walked up to me and shook my
hand. He said that I had changed, but he recognized me from my photo that
accompanied my column.
Regalbuto was a
member of the Dalton Street and Oregon Avenue street corner gang back in the
late 1960s. The teenage gang, known as the “D&O,” was a notorious and
troublesome group, well known to the police and other street corner gangs in
South Philadelphia.
I knew Regalbuto
as we both attended Thomas Junior High School together in the mid-1960s,
although he was more than two years older than me. We had several friends in
common as I was good friends with several D&O gang members.
Regalbuto
thanked me for meeting me and suggested we take an empty table at the back of
the bar. He ordered a Ginger Ale from the bartender, explaining to me that he
no longer drank, took drugs or smoked. We sat at the table and Regalbuto began
to tell me his story.
Regalbuto said
he moved away from South Philadelphia some years ago after he was released from
prison. He had served 10 years for shooting and killing a man in a quarrel
while both of them were high on heroin. He was guilty of second-degree murder,
he acknowledged, and he served his time. He told me that he rekindled his
Catholic religion while in prison. And although many years had passed, he now
felt compelled to confess to the police about another murder he committed back
in 1968.
Regalbuto spoke
of the Seventh Street shooting that saw two men murdered and several others
wounded.
I recall vividly
the 1968 murders on Seventh Street in South Philly. I was there.
I’ve seen more
than my share of violence. Growing up in South Philly in the 1960s, I saw a
young soldier fresh from basic training shoot and murder his romantic rival in
a hallway in the South Philadelphia High School. I also witnessed a drive-by
shooting that murdered two young men on a corner on Broad Street.
And later, as a
newspaper crime reporter and columnist, I’ve been on the scene almost
immediately after several murders. I recall drinking in a bar when we heard a
car crash. We rushed out of the bar and saw a car that had crashed into a home
on Oregon Avenue. The driver was slumped over the steering wheel, two bullets
in his head, the latest victim in an internecine mob war in South Philly. And
later, while out for a morning walk, I heard police and ambulance sirens close
by, so I hurried over to a scene where a notorious mob guy had just been shot
to death on his doorstep.
A few years
later, while out on a ride-along with a Philadelphia police sergeant, he was
called to the apartment of a waitress who had been shot and killed. The young
woman had been shot through her mouth, we learned, while playing a sex game
with her boyfriend.
But the Seventh
Street shootings were the first murders I ever witnessed.
I was 15 years
old going on 16 in 1968. I was a half-a-hoodlum hanging on the corner of 13th
Street and Oregon Avenue, three block west of the D&O gang’s hangout at
George’s Luncheonette. We were friendly with the D&O teenagers as we all
went to school together and we freely mixed at the teenage dances.
Two of the
wildest D&O hoodlums liked to come to 13th and Oregan and hang
out in our luncheonette, JP’s. Joseph “Crazy Joe” Villotti was “scary crazy,”
as one of the 13th and Oregon Avenue teenagers described him.
Villotti was
tall, lean and muscular with a rough face and dark brown hair. He had a raspy
voice and an insane laugh. He reminded me of a thinner version of the actor
Marlon Brando in the film On the Waterfront.
The teenagers at
both the D&O corner and 13th and Oregan feared being the focus
of Villotti’s attention. Villotti was sadistic and a bully with a warped sense
of humor. He would shake down the focus of his attention, taking their money or
car, and he would also force the teenager to accompany him on some crazy errand.
Thankfully, he
never picked on me as he was afraid of my older brother Eddie. My brother, who
stopped hanging with us on 13th and Oregon Avenue and graduated to
hanging out with our “old heads,” the previous generation who were then in
their mid-20s and went clubbing throughout the city. Eddie, a genuine tough
guy, was no bully and he often defended those who were bullied.
Although
Villotti was “bat shit” crazy, he was sane enough to know that he could not
beat my brother, and a loss to Eddie would hurt his fearsome reputation.
When Villotti
visited JP’s, he was often accompanied by another wild man, a big and heavy
teenager named Robert Regalbuto, known as “Bobby Buddha.”
He was given the
nickname by a teenager who one day saw Regalbuto’s huge bare belly over baggy
swim trunks at the Bellmawr Lake, a man-made lake surrounded by sandy beaches
that was a popular South Jersey resort for South Philly teenagers back in the
1960s.
Having earlier
seen a photo in school of the statue of Buddha with a huge stomach, the
teenager began to call Regalbuto “Bobby Buddha,” and the nickname stuck.
When Villotti
and Regalbuto walked into JP’s, many of the guys stiffened. As I was protected
by my brother’s reputation, I found the two bruisers to be amusing, although I
felt bad for the guys they bullied and abused.
One warm
evening, as we stood on the corner outside of JP’s, Villotti pulled up in a car
with Regalbuto and other D&O hoodlums. Two other cars loaded with D&O
gang members pulled up behind Villotti’s car.
Villotti urged
us to get into a car and follow them to Seventh and Edwin Streets, where they
were going to “fuck up some black guys.” Villotti explained that the black guys
had “jumped” a white guy and put him in the hospital.
One of the
D&O guys opened up his car trunk and handed out baseball bats and pipes to
our guys. Michael “Mikey Head” Tabone took a bat, as did Anthony “Big Man”
Manfredi. Harry “Bud the Dud” Keitel took a five-inch pipe. I didn’t take a
weapon as I was the youngest kid there, and I had no intention of fighting. As
an aspiring crime writer, I got into the car and drove to Seventh Street as I
wanted to watch the fight.
When the four
cars screeched to a halt on Seventh Street, we piled out of the cars, bats and
pipes in hand. Several black guys came out of the candy store. In the lead was
a big and tough-looking guy. I also saw several black guys come out of a bar
from across the street as well as other boys and men from row homes on Edwin
Street.
The big, tough
looking guy asked Villotti, “What the fuck, Joe?”
Obviously, the
hoodlum knew Villotti. Villotti responded by pulling out a .45 automatic and
shooting the man in the chest. Regalbuto pulled out a .38 revolver and shot
another black guy.
Pandemonium
ensued. The white and black guys clashed on the street, swinging fists, bats
and other weapons. Tabone, not the bravest of guys, left his car running on the
corner and took off running up Edwin Street. Not too brave myself at the time,
I followed Tabone. About halfway up Edwin Street, a large elderly black woman
stood in her doorway, called me a “white motherfucker,” and threw a large,
cast-iron frying skillet at me.
The skillet hit
me on the right side of my forehead. I fell to my knees and prayed – “Dear God,
please don’t let me pass out.”
Thankfully, I
didn’t pass out, and I was able to get up and run for two more blocks. Then I
walked several more blocks back to 13th and Oregon Avenue.
Tabone beat me
home. He was telling the other teenagers on the corner about the street fight
and how gunshots rang out. He also spoke of beating up a couple of black guys,
which was of course a lie.
I too lied,
explaining the huge lump on my forehead. I told the guys that I was hit by a
baseball bat.
“The
neighborhood, the newspapers and the TV all said this was a racial thing,”
Regalbuto explained as we sat in the bar. “Yeah, race relations were not good
back then, but the shooting had nothing to do with race. Me and Joe made a drug
deal with Martin King, known as “The King,” a black heroin dealer who hung out
at a candy store at Seventh and Edwin Streets.
“We bought
heroin on credit from King as we were steady customers of his. We were supposed
to sell the dope and then pay King. But Joe and me were stone cold heroin
addicts then, and we shot up more dope than we sold.”
Regalbuto said
that Joe had the crazy idea of instead of paying King what we owed him, we
should just kill him.
“Joe also had
the idea of making the murder of King look like a race war between the Italians
and the blacks.”
Regalbuto said
Villotti murdered King and he murdered King’s number two, a hoodlum named Billy
Jones.
“Villotti was a
cold-hearted psychopath,” Regalbuto said. “He often spoke of the murders with
great relish and showed no regret. I’m different.”
Villotti died of
AIDS some years prior in prison, while Regalbuto said he renewed his faith in
Jesus Christ while serving his sentence. He confessed his murder to a priest
and now he planned to turn himself into the police the following morning.
There was no
statute of limitations on first degree murder.
I wrote about
the Seventh Street shooting in my next newspaper column. I included my own
involvement.
This was the
first time, publicly or privately, that I admitted to being beaned with a
cast-iron skillet by an elderly woman and not hit in the head with a baseball
bat by a gang member.
© 2025 Paul Davis
Note: You can read my other crime fiction
short stories via the link below:
Paul Davis On
Crime: My Crime Fiction Stories
