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Winter spent a good portion of each school day sitting outside the principal’s office, begging forgiveness.
    One day the nuns caught Jimmy Hoffman painting a mustache on a hallway statue of the Virgin Mary. Statues of Jesus and Saint Joseph had been similarly defaced. Hoffman had signed the art work with the letters “J” and “H.” Suspecting that Hoffman had an accomplice, the nuns called in Henry Winter for questioning. Henry feigned innocence, insisting that the letters “J” and “H” stood for Jimmy Hoffman. In another room, the nuns were threatening Jimmy with a priest. The word “Hell” was mentioned several times during the interrogation. Fearing eternal damnation, Jimmy Hoffman finally told all—confessing that the letters “J” and “H” really stood for Jimmy and Henry.
    â€œThe nuns never even offered Jimmy a deal,” Henry remembered years later.
    When they were thirteen, Jimmy and Henry were picked up by a team of Nassau County detectives as they walked along a pipeline in a wooded section of Valley Stream, taking potshots at squirrels with a BB gun. The cops, responding to a “man with a gun” call on the radio, surrounded the youths as they emerged from the woods at dusk, pulling their own weapons and yelling, “Freeze!”
    Hoffman and Winter literally wet their pants. The equally shaken cops drove the kids home, warning them to be more careful.
    At fourteen, Henry was in trouble again. He was driving to school one morning when he turned the corner and struck a fifteen-year-old boy riding a bicycle. The boy flew over Henry’s car, breaking his leg. Cops led Henry away.
    Although the charges against Henry were later dropped because of his age, Millie Winter’s insurance company had to pay a sizable claim. Henry neglected to tell the cops investigating the accident that the car was actually his, or that his mother had registered and insured it for him.
    The first time Henry Winter got near a cash register, when he was fifteen, he shortchanged it. Working in the sporting goods section of a Times Square department store near his home, he started running his own sales. Winter’s buddies got an automatic 50 percent cash discount on everything from baseball gloves to fishing poles. Usually, anybody shopping in Henry’s department got a bargain.
    He watched intently one day as a black child tugged on his mother’s arm, begging her to buy him a Giants helmet and shoulder pad set carrying a twenty-five dollar price tag.
    â€œHow much do you have,” he finally asked the woman.
    â€œTen dollars.”
    â€œSold. Bring it over here.”
    A store detective spying on the transaction later led Henry into a back room, where it was determined that he was both underage and working under an assumed name—Bruce Winter.
    â€œI’m really only fifteen,” Henry said confidently. “That makes me a youthful offender.” The manager threw up his hands and fired the underage thief.
    Henry graduated from Valley Stream Central High School in 1969. A card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association, he boycotted his graduation ceremony rather than join in a student demonstration.
    â€œEveryone was supposed to refuse to stand during the national anthem. It was being done in high schools all across the country. But I argued about it because I thought we should stand. It’s our country.” Henry went fishing on graduation day.
    As the first kid in his class with a car, Henry was very popular. He drove a 1956 Chevy Bel Air that his older sister Millie had painted over with large red roses and white daisies. A huge smiling face with two eyes stared out from the front grill. With his shoulder-length blonde hair and an interest in marijuana cigarettes, Henry was known on the streets of Valley Stream as Flower Power Hank.
    In high school he had the rare ability to get along with both jocks and