Around this time Gerard T. Ouimette was released from prison. Ouimette was a �feared and ruthless� figure whose arrest record dated back to the 1950s. In 1972 Ouimette was found guilty of conspiring to murder a former associate and sentenced to 10 years. Malinowski describes Ouimette�s stay with the state of Rhode Island:
��Ouimette had free run of the state Adult Correctional Institutions. His meals were catered from local restaurants. His 5-year-old son was smuggled into the prison for a sleepover. For a while, he head a phone installed in his maximum-security cell.�
Ouimette, at the time of Coppola�s murder, was looking forward to working with him once he got out. After his release to a halfway house Ouimette and Paula Coppola had an affair. Buehne was upset with Paula over the incident and notified his police handlers that Ouimette was back on the street.
Ouimette told Paula that Buehne�s friend, Paulie Calenda owed him and Bobby DeLuca $125,000 and that they was going to collect. Buehne saw this as an opportunity to set up Ouimette and with the help of the police and Calenda they lured the dangerous felon into a bugged meeting in Calenda�s living room. During the recorded meeting Ouimette tried to impress his audience with tales of his relationship with John Gotti and the other New York families. Malinowski shares a portion of the conversation:
�I got some nice friends in New York, you know what I mean? You know I was around John for about 10 years. His brothers are dear friends of mine. John writes to me. His brother writes to me from the can. And I got a good relationship with every crew in New York.�
The police had Buehne and Calenda set up a payment schedule to satisfy the debt, but the plan was for Calenda to renege. At Camille�s Roman Garden, the former Marconi�s restaurant on Federal Hill, Buehne and Paula met Ouimette to tell him that Calenda refused to pay the whole amount. During dinner the entire conversation was recorded by Paula, who was outfitted with a hidden bug in her bra.
�Tell him, �If you don�t come up with the [amount] it�s open season on him,� Ouimette told them�
On March 18, 1995, Providence detectives broke down Ouimette�s door with a battering ram and arrested him. On February 1, 1996, Ouimette was sentenced to life in prison after he was found guilty of trying to extort $125,000 from Calenda with Robert DeLuca. Ouimette became the first criminal in Rhode Island to be sentenced under the new �three-strikes-and-you�re-out� law. DeLuca received 10 and a half years.