Ivory Ed is a mob boss up in the northeast. They call him that because of his broad, radiant smile. Right now he’s not smiling in prison awaiting trial in federal court for "racketeering."

Before he got sent to the slammer, Ivory Ed developed a keen dislike for a DEA agent we’ll call "Harry." This narc had the uncanny ability to know Ivory Ed’s whereabouts at any given moment - or so it seemed.

This was in 1996, the year that Ivory Ed Terwilleger got caught in the crossfire of a gunfight up in Philadelphia. He was shot once in the posterior.

ER doctors removed the slug with no complications. About a month after he was released from the hospital, Ivory Ed and Harry had a chance meeting downtown on Walnut Street. The narc whispered the following message to the mob boss:

"When the medics dug that slug out of your butt, we installed a sterile tracking device no bigger than a miniature Christmas tree light. It’s made of ‘selnadium’ which cannot be detected by any known electronics. Using a GPS (global positioning satellite) I can find your butt anytime, day or night. You can’t hide. Not from me. See you in court, buddy-boy!"

And that’s what Harry the Narc told Ivory Ed the mob boss that day in Philadelphia. The narc’s story was actually a boldfaced lie, but who knew?

Should Ivory Ed believe the narc or not? After more than a year, Ivory Ed could stand it no longer. He ordered his lawyer to ask the federal district court to force investigators to tell the truth: "Did they or did they not surgically implant a tracking device in the buttocks of Ivory Ed Terwilleger?"

The judge said it sounded like some DEA agent was playing a joke on Ivory Ed. But the judge signed the order anyway.

Federal investigators denied they’d do such a thing. "You gotta be kidding," said one fed, "what judge in his right mind would give us permission to plant an electronic bug inside somebody’s body?"

There’s no way we can answer that question because there’s no such thing as "selnadium," the narc just made that up.