Updated news on the Gambino, Genovese, Bonanno, Lucchese and Colombo Organized Crime Families of New York City.

Monday, August 30, 2010

Genovese captain pleads guilty to conspiring to murder



A reputed acting captain in the Genovese crime family pleaded guilty today to conspiring to murder a hitman working for the Russian mob in the early 1990s.
Anthony "Tony D." Palumbo -- who was previously charged last year with also shaking down owners of local bartending schools --- admitted in a Manhattan federal courtroom that he was “a member of an enterprise engaged in racketeering activity” who participated with others to “murder an individual of Russian descent.”
The plan, which was hatched in late 1992 or early 1993, never came off. It was to lure the unidentified hitman to a Bronx social club, "where Palumbo would murder [him]," the indictment said.
Prosecutors charge that his racketeering activity also included extortion, loan sharking and gambling.
He is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 3 and faces up to 10 years behind bars.
The indictment against Palumbo, who the feds say was named head of the Genovese family's New Jersey operations in 2006, also tied him to the 1992 murder of a mobster’s cousin.
He was accused of conspiring to have Angelo Sangiuolo whacked for robbing Palumbo's gambling joints in the Bronx.
Sangiuolo -- whose rubout was allegedly sanctioned by then-Genovese boss Vincent "The Chin" Gigante -- was later lured to his death by his first cousin Angelo Prisco, a Genovese captain who was sentenced to life last year after triggerman John "Johnny Balls" Leto turned rat and testified against him.
The remaining suspected member of the hit team -- alleged getaway driver Paul "Doc" Gaccione -- was arrested in April and charged with murder.
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Sunday, August 29, 2010

Government Accused Of Misconduct In Gambino Case


Don Carlo GambinoImage via Wikipedia When federal authorities charged recently that the Gambino crime family had been involved in sex trafficking with girls as young as 15, one prosecutor suggested that the activity might represent “a new low for the Gambino family.”
But now a defense lawyer in the case contends that the government helped promote that same kind of illegal activity.
The lawyer, Gerald J. McMahon, said in newly filed court papers that one of the men running the trafficking ring was a convicted sex abuser who had a cooperation agreement as a federal witness.
“A reasonable person might wonder,” Mr. McMahon wrote, “whether the government — in its zeal to make a racketeering case against the Gambino family — allowed a 15-year-old girl to be shamefully and criminally exploited.”
The witness began cooperating with the government in 2008, court papers show, while the sex trafficking occurred in 2009. While he was a witness, he acted as the 15-year-old girl’s pimp, Mr. McMahon said.
The lawyer, who represents 1 of 14 defendants in the case, has asked a judge, Lewis A. Kaplan of Federal District Court in Manhattan, to dismiss the indictment on grounds of “outrageous government misconduct,” legal papers show.
Federal prosecutors, who have not yet responded to the motion, declined comment.
James Margolin, an F.B.I. spokesman in New York, also would not discuss the case, but said, “This office would not — and did not — approve of any criminal activity involving a minor, much less the sexual exploitation of a minor.”
The court filings do not detail the witness’s activity in the prostitution ring. But because the United States attorney’s office in Manhattan does not permit cooperators to engage in illegal activity that is not part of an authorized investigation, the witness’s role in the trafficking ring — except for the use of an underage prostitute — was most likely approved, and his activity known to the authorities.
The government originally charged that the ring operated from 2008 to 2009, but last week prosecutors told the judge there was an error in the indictment, and that the ring had lasted for three months in the summer of 2009.
Either way, Mr. McMahon said by phone, the government should not have allowed the witness to be involved, and then should have supervised him better. “They let this thing get away from them a little bit,” he said.
The decision by the government to enlist a cooperator can be fraught with peril; such witnesses, particularly in Mafia cases, often have unsavory pasts and may have been deeply involved in the crimes being investigated. If the government plans to use them in continued illegal activity as part of an undercover operation, they must be tightly monitored.
Federal prosecutors in Manhattan typically require cooperating witnesses to admit to all previous crimes — even those the government is unaware of — and to stop committing them. If witnesses violate those provisions, the office may rip up the agreement and even prosecute them, said Anthony S. Barkow, a former prosecutor who runs a center on criminal law at New York University School of Law.
“The Justice Department takes very seriously the obligation of a cooperator to cease misconduct,” Mr. Barkow said. “They are supposed to turn the page, and because they’re working with the government, they need to live life by the rules.”
Mr. McMahon, in his court papers, identified the witness as Jude Buoneto, who he said raped one girl and sexually abused another in the 1990s. Mr. Buoneto once also ran a brothel with his mother in Brooklyn, Mr. McMahon wrote.
Prosecutors have described the Gambino witness only as CW-1 in court papers. They say he pleaded guilty in the 1990s at age 19 to misdemeanor offenses of acting in a manner to injure a child under 17, and sexual abuse in the third degree. They say CW-1 will be called to testify at trial, and have indicated that he has knowledge of Gambino crimes that go beyond the trafficking ring.
The Gambino indictment, announced in April, charged the 14 defendants with years of criminality, including traditional Mafia crimes like extortion, gambling and loan sharking. But it was the alleged involvement of some defendants in sex trafficking, apparently a first in a Mafia case, officials said, that drew the most attention.
The women who worked as prostitutes were all under 20, and were recruited in New York and New Jersey, prosecutors said. The defendants advertised on Web sites like Craigslist, drove the women to their appointments and kept about half of their fees, the government said.
Questions about the witness’s role also arose at an early bail hearing for another defendant, whom prosecutors had accused of helping to come up with the idea of the prostitution ring.
That man’s lawyer, Seth Ginsberg, told Judge Kaplan that he was troubled by the fact that the government apparently had knowledge of the ring and that its “cooperating witness was engaged in sex trafficking with a minor.”
Judge Kaplan replied that “the government has to make a judgment in many cases about where the greater good lies.”
He cited Winston Churchill’s decision in World War II to allow the German bombing of Coventry, England, because to interfere would have revealed the Allies had broken German codes and there would have been even greater damage to the Allied war effort.
“No comfort to the people of Coventry,” Judge Kaplan said, “but the decision the government has to make in a case like this is not unlike that.”
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Friday, August 27, 2010

Reputed Montreal Mobster Arrested


Vito RizzutoImage via WikipediaIn Montreal, QC Canada police have arrested four individuals including reputed mobster Antonio "Tony" Mucci on weapons charges as reported by Paul Cherry for The Gazette.  Also arrested were Carmine Serino and Jesse Petrocco -- described by police as Mucci's bodyguards -- and an unidentified woman as reported by CBC News.  Mucci once was considered by some as a possible successor to reputed boss Vito Rizzuto who currently is doing time at the federal penitentiary in Florence, CO on a racketeering conviction as reported by Paul Cherry for The Gazette.
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Albanian Mafia fueling Al Qaeda terrorist activity in US: Kosovo schools and orphanages open


The FBI Seal where the circle of stars represe...Image via Wikipedia
Chief perpetrators of drug and people smuggling, human body part and weapons sales, sex slavery, passport theft, forgery, abductions and murder, the Albanian Mafia remains to be domineering in their criminal activity both domestically and abroad.
“The Albanian criminal enterprises, operating largely in New York and other Eastern seaboard cities, represent a major challenge to federal agents because of their propensity for violence and brutality,” FBI officials indicate.
"They are a hardened group, operating with reckless abandon," said Chris Swecker, the FBI assistant director for the Criminal Investigative Division according to a CNN report.
Interpol stated that “Kosovo Albanian Mafia hold the largest share of the heroin market in Switzerland, in Austria, in Belgium, in Germany, in Hungary, in the Czech Republic, in Norway, and in Sweden.”
The head of Sweden’s anti drug unit believes that the gangs supplied “hundreds, maybe thousands, of kilos of heroin” to the Scandinavian countries. The Albanian Muslim Mafia clans are dispersed in Kosovo and Macedonia as well as Albania proper.
The Italian Mafia and the Albanian Mafia
"I hate these f**** Albanians," a captain in the Genovese crime family was captured saying on tape. The captain continued,
"If you have a beef with them you have to kill them right away. There's no talking to them."
Reports indicate that the Albanian Mafia including immigrants from Kosovo has replaced the Italian La Cosa Nostra Mafia, an offshoot of the Sicilian Mafia.
To understand the capacity and how far the arms reach of the Albanian Mafia is to understand briefly the magnitude of La Cosa Nostra aka The Italian-American Mafia:
There are five main New York City Mafia families, known as the Five Families: the Gambino, Lucchese, Genovese, Bonanno and Colombo families.
The Italian-American Mafia aka La Cosa Nostra dominated organized crime in the U.S. It used this status to maintain control over much of the organized crime activity in Chicago, Detroit, Boston, Buffalo, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Providence, New Jersey, and New York City, as well as in other cities in the Northeastern United States and across the country, such as Las Vegas, Tampa, New Orleans, Miami, Kansas City, Milwaukee, and many others.
La Cosa Nostra often referred to as the “original Mafia,” was at one time thought to be one of the largest organized crime groups in the United States and held dominance of the National Crime Syndicate.
The Albanian Mafia has been thought to greatly exceed this dominant power and poses as an outstanding figure as one of the most violent crime organizations in operation particularly with their strong connections in Europe union.
Replacing La Cosa Nostra in its rank, size, power and figure in organized crime, the Albanian Mafia holds itself as a domineering force in the Mafia underworld.
Further, a predominant Catholic Mafia is being replaced by a predominant Muslim Albanian FIS.
The Gambino crime family recruits ethnic Albanian assassins
In the 1970s, the Italian Mafia, more specifically the Gambino family recruited and employed Albanians as couriers, transporters, and more significantly assasins as a result of their proficiency.
By 1996, ethnic Albanians were the main assassins for the Gambino family.
At least two of the Gambino Family’s major players or “high level associates,” including Zef Mustafa  were of Albanian enthnicity. Mustafa allegedly made over $700 million for the Gambino family, was later arrested for a $19 million dollar internet heist, and subsequently released on a $5 milliion bond disappearing from the United States.
Reputation
“The ethnic Albanian mafia is very powerful and extremely violent,” said Kim Kliver, chief investigator for organized crime with the Danish National Police.
“If you compare them to the Italian Mafia, the Albanians are stronger and not afraid of killing.”

"The Albanian criminals were special from the beginning," said Francesca Marcelli, an organized-crime investigator for the Italian government.
Marcelli continued:
"When they started appearing here in 1993, they were much different than other immigrants. They have strong motivations and are very violent. Some of them actually pulled machine guns on the son of an Italian Mafioso. To do that in Italy is unbelievable."
In the north of Italy, the Albanians have taken the prostitution racket away from the country's toughest Mafia branch, the 'Ndrangheta.
A representative from the Polish Mob in 2002 was found saying:
“I’m willing to do business with just about anyone. Dominicans, Blacks. Italians. Asian gangs. Russians. But won’t go near the Albanian mob. The Albanians are too violent and too unpredictable.”
Ties to Kosovo Liberation Army and Al Qaeda
Alleged ties to Al-Qaeda, the Albanian Mafia, one of the most powerful criminal organizations in the United States and Europe stretches throughout the United States, Canada, Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Serbia.

The FBI believes largely that the Albanian Mafia could be involved in “terrorist financing,” adding more specifically, “ties to organizations suspected of involvement in terrorist financing.”
Even more so, support of Al Qaeda prove notable in the following:
Yossef Bodansky, former Director of House Task Force on Terrorism, committed to saying,
“The Albanian mob will not commit acts of terrorism…but will aid Al Qaeda..The role of the Albanian Mafia-tightly connected to the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA a declared terrorist organization) is laundering money, providing technology, safe houses and other support to terrorists within this country.”
Most if not all of the KLA has been trained and financially supported by Al Qaeda.
(Kosovo was marked as a potential recruiting ground for Islamic extremists. The large numbers of young Muslims living in abject poverty in Kosovo plays ideally into the hands of terrorist recruiters. Al-Qaeda is extremely interested in the region because the Muslim families are large and teenagers make up half of Kosovo’s population, making Kosovo a prime reservoir for the recruitment of young Mujahedeen.)

  • 24 Wahhabi mosques , 14 orphanages and 98 primary and secondary Wahhabi funded schools have been built in Kosovo since 1999. Wahhabism Islam across the spectrum from revival and reform to global jihad is thought to be the chief spiritual source of the Al Qaeda terrorists.

(Chairman Kyl, Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security on Thursday, June 26, 2003 stated: “I come before this body to describe how adherents of Wahhabism, the most extreme, separatist, and violent form of Islam, and the official sect in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, have come to dominate Islam in the U.S. “)

  • Djamel Beghala, Al Qaeda operative, arrested in Dubai was found with a manufactured Albanian false passport. Under interrogation, Beghala identified a major European Al Qaeda cell planning to blow up the US Embassy in Paris.

  • Al Qaeda assassins of Ahmed Shah Massoud possessed passports doctored by the Albanian Mafia. The assassination of Massoud is considered to have a strong connection to the September 11, 2001 attacks on U.S. soil. Massoud had warned against a potential terrorist attack in his speech to the European Parliament several months earlier.

Krasniqi Albanian crime family, the KLA and Al Qaeda


The US District Court in New Jersey charged 6 (six) on terrorism related charges directly related to a pattern of Islamist terrorist support operations by Bosnian and Albanian radicals in New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The men were charged with conspiring to conduct the attack were within area where Bosnian Islamists worked with “Islamic charities” to develop terrorist training operation before and after September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States.

Of the 6 (six) men, 4 were ethnic Albanians, 3 of the 6 are members of the Duka family.  The Duka family operate a roofing business in Brooklyn, New York, demographically close to Cherry Hill, New Jersey, the home of Florin Krasniqi.

Krasniqi in 1998-99, raised $30 million from the Albanian community in the United States for the KLA and smuggled hundreds of high-powered American sniper rifles to Kosovo for guerrillas, which were distributed by his extended family clan in the region.

Krasniqi, an Albanian born from the southern most part of Kosovo, was a major supplier of weapons from the US to the KLA, through Niam Behzloulzi aka Houlzi.

Houlzi a major KLA figure linked to Al Qaeda, was the 2nd ranking leader in the KLA providing explosives for terrorist attacks on Madrid in March of 2004 and in London in July of 2005.
Arrests of the Krasniqi crime family 2010

In June 2010 the FBI and NYPD arrested heads of the Krasniqi operating primarily out of New York, Connecticut, Michigan and elsewhere on charges from murder to kidnapping to drugs to racketeering:

  • Bruno Krasniqi
  • Saimir Krasniqi
  • Erkliant Sula
  • Skender Cakoni
  • Gjovalin Berisha
  • Nazih Nasser
  • Gentian Nikolli
  • Shkelzen Balidemaj
  • Plaurent Cela
  • Albert Tamali

Gentian Caro, Marjan Tamali, and JoAnna Pakulski were arrested by the Royal Canadian Police. Caro was extradited to the United States; Tamali and Pakulski are awaiting extradition.
Dukagin Nikollaj and Vsi Lnu are still at large according to the FBI.

  • July 2, 2010, Sr. Aide to Deputy Prime Minister of Albania, 27-year-old Almir Rrapo was arrested on charges of murder and racketeering. Rrapo was a senior member of Krasniqi.

  • August 24, 2010, Krasniqi member, Florian Veshi, 26 years old, was also arrested.
http://www.examiner.com/adoptive-families-in-san-francisco/albanian-mafia-fueling-al-qaeda-terrorist-activity-wahhabi-schools-and-orphanages-open-kosovo
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Thursday, August 26, 2010

Authorities Bust Wannabe Crime Family In PA


Mafia crime family structure treeImage via WikipediaState police yesterday arrested four Penn Hills men and accused them of operating a criminal organization patterned after the Italian Mafia that carried out 17 burglaries, an armed robbery and other crimes in Pittsburgh and its eastern suburbs.
The suspects, with the map of Italy tattooed on their shoulders, referred to themselves as the "Penn Hills Family," police said.
The Pennsylvania State Police organized crime unit charged Louis Anthony Amendola, 23, of McCrady Road, Thomas Ryan Maxwell, 19, of Cedarwood Drive, Philip Edward Vecchio, 21, of Garlow Road, and Shane Andrew Kesneck, 22, no address listed, with burglary, criminal conspiracy, being members of a corrupt organization, robbery, theft, assault and criminal attempt.
Vecchio and Amendola face additional charges of indecent assault.
Three members of the group were caught in February 2009 robbing a store in Penn Hills, police said. One of them identified the group leaders and told police about the organization.
Police said Amendola served as the organization's "self-appointed boss," and often called the group "la Cosa Nostra," or "Our Thing" -- the name used to refer to the traditional Italian Mafia.
A criminal complaint accuses Amendola of selling stolen items and distributing money as "shares" to members. He assessed a "tax" or penalty by withholding payment to members who made mistakes, police said. Vecchio and Kesneck served directly under Amendola in the organization, according to the complaint.
The men -- who police say formed the group while students at Penn Hills High School -- are accused of meeting regularly to plot their crimes and then employing lookouts to watch for police.
They used walkie-talkies and cell phones to communicate with each other when they broke into businesses and homes in Pittsburgh, Plum, Wilkins and Penn Hills between June 3, 2008 and Feb. 22, 2009, police said. In some cases, they cut power and telephone lines to avoid triggering alarms.
Stolen items included cash, jewelry, big-screen TVs, laptops, MP3 players, liquor and even 13 aluminum handrails from the bleachers at Penn Hills High School.
The group is accused of robbing an employee of Vocelli Pizza in Penn Hills of $1,445 at gunpoint on Sept. 6, 2008, while she was making a night bank deposit.
In addition to breaking into homes, the men are accused of burglarizing the Step Up hair-styling salon in Plum three times. They are implicated in burglaries at the Kollel Jewish Learning Center in Squirrel Hill, Keeley's Beauty Shop in Penn Hills, the Churchill Country Club in Penn Hills, the CVS pharmacy in Penn Hills and the Rivertowne Inn restaurant in Verona.
The men were in Allegheny County Jail last night awaiting arraignment.
Vecchio is the son of Democrat activist and former Penn Hills school board member Erin Vecchio as reported by WTAE.
Video

http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/pittsburgh/s_696525.html

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Wednesday, August 25, 2010

Alleged Mobster Roberto Settineri Pleads Guilty


Fort Lauderdale, FloridaImage via Wikipedia
Roberto Settineri, the Miami Beach, FL wine merchant who prosecutors claim is an intermediary between the Gambino crime family and the Santa Maria de Gesu clan from Cosa Nostra or the Sicilian Mafia, pleaded guilty today "to a conspiracy charge of scheming to shred financial records for Ponzi con man Scott Rothstein" as reported by Jay Weaver for the Miami Herald.  Rothstein was a politically connected Fort Lauderdale, FL attorney sentenced to fifty years in prison last June for running a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme which involved using his firm Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler as a front to sell phony legal settlements to investors.
Video Of Roberto Settineri's March 2010 Arrest (Settineri is the first arrest depicted):
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Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Trial Update: Vincent Basciano



Prosecutors need more time:  Brooklyn federal prosecutors said they need three weeks more to reply to a request by Vincent Basciano for information in government files about self-described government informant Jospeh Barone. There is just so much that Basciano wants that it will take that much longer to dig out and search, prosecutors said in a letter to Judge Nicholas Garaufis. Not clear if Basciano will go along with the request but it is up to Garaufis.  Basciano said he is fighting a death penalty case and needs all the information that may be relevant.

http://tonydestefano.com/id3.html

Friday, August 20, 2010

Genovese Associate Gets 30 Years For Role In Slaying Of Jeweler


A Bay Terrace mobster who served as a lookout during a fatal botched jewelry heist in West Brighton two years ago was sentenced this morning to 30 years in prison. In April, a Brooklyn federal court jury convicted Anthony Pica, 31, of robbery conspiracy and weapons charges, as well as causing death through firearm use stemming from the slaying of jeweler Louis Antonelli, 43, of Grasmere.
antonelli.jpg
Detectives and police officers stand near the black SUV in the small alleyway where Louis Antonelli was shot.
 
 
Prosecutors contend that Antonelli was shot on April 29, 2008, because he wasn't making tribute payments for jewelry sales at a mob social club in Brooklyn.
According to Brooklyn federal prosecutors, Pica, a Genovese crime family associate, and Christopher Prince, 27, of Ocean Breeze, kept a watch on a restaurant on Broadway where Antonelli was eating. The two men sat in Prince's luxury Range Rover.
Once Antonelli emerged from El Sabor Tropical restaurant and approached his black 1995 GMC Yukon sport utility vehicle, he was ambushed by Charles Santiago and Joseph Gencarelli.
Santiago twice shot Antonelli in the chest before he and Gencarelli fled empty-handed. Antonelli was carrying jewelry valued at $250,000, according to court testimony.
Antonelli was rushed to nearby Richmond University Medical Center, West Brighton, but died of his wounds May 12.
Santiago, 27, of Grant City, pleaded guilty in October to robbery conspiracy and weapons counts and will spend 30 years to life in prison as part of his deal.
Gencarelli, 28, a former city Department of Environmental Protection sewage-treatment worker from Grant City, claimed he only went along for the robbery and had no idea plans included shooting Antonelli.
He and Prince, an alleged Genovese associate, have also cut plea deals. All three defendants await sentencing as does Salvatore (Sally Fish) Maniscalco of Brooklyn, who prosecutors said recruited the stickup gang.
A sixth man, New Dorp resident John (Wizzie) DeLutro another lookout, was in "near-constant" telephone contact with Pica, said the U.S. attorney's office for the Eastern District of New York.
DeLutro, 33, and Maniscalco, 36, have both been linked to the Genovese family.
DeLutro was sentenced in May to 20 years in prison after previously pleading guilty to robbery conspiracy.
Investigators also suspect Jason Aiello, Antonelli's companion on the day he was shot, of setting up the jeweler for a cut of the illicit proceeds. Aiello died in a shootout with police in July 2008 in Rosebank.
Also charged in the case was Genovese capo Anthony (Big Nose) Antico.
Prosecutors allege the longtime mob bigwig ordered the robbery on Antonelli; however, a Brooklyn federal court jury acquitted him of that charge last month.
But jurors convicted Antico, 74, of running an illegal gambling parlor on Sand Lane, South Beach, from 2004 to 2006. He was also found guilty of conspiring to rob the winner of a $1 million Pick Six horse-racing bet in 2008.

http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2010/08/bay_terrace_mobster_sentenced.html

Carpenters Union Official Pleads Guilty


Lucchese crime familyImage via WikipediaBrian Hayes, a former business agent for Local 608 of New York City's Carpenters Union, has pleaded guilty to racketeering charges involving taking bribes from a contractor in exchange for allowing it to avoid obligations under a labor agreement as reported by Bruce Golding for the New York Post.  Hayes was among ten union officials and contractors variously indicted last August on racketeering, bribery, fraud and perjury charges. To date, nine defendants, including ex-union boss Michael Forde and reputed Lucchese associate Finbar O'Neill, have pleaded guilty in the case, and the remaining holdout -- benefit funds trustee Joseph Oliveri, an alleged Genovese associate -- is scheduled for trial on September 7. 
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Vito Rizzuto Loses Bid For Ealy Release From Jail



Vito Rizzuto, the reputed boss of the Montreal Mafia who was convicted in 2007 on a racketeering charge involving the 1981 murder of three Bonanno crime family capos in New York City, has lost a bid before a federal appeals court to get an early release from the penitentiary in Florence, CO where he is serving a ten-year term as reported by The Montreal Gazette.  The decision by the U.S. appeals court is here.
It's been a brutal year for the Rizzuto clan:  last July family leader Agostino Cuntrera and his driver and body guard Liborio Sciascia were shot to death; last June reputed consigliere Paola Renda apparently was kidnapped off the streets; last December Nick Rizzuto Jr., the son of the imprisoned reputed boss, was gunned down; and in August 2009 convicted drug trafficker Frederico Del Peschio, a close associate of the family, was murdered. 

Thursday, August 19, 2010

Gambino lawyer OK to work, as long as family isn't involved in alleged crimes


Federal Bureau of Investigation mugshot of Jos...Image via WikipediaA lawyer with blood ties to the Gambino crime family can continue working on a mob case because none of his relatives were involved in the alleged crimes, a judge has ruled.
The feds sought to disqualify Joseph Corozzo on grounds that he serves as "house counsel" to the Gambinos, where his father, Joseph, is the reputed consigliere and his uncle, Nicholas, is a reputed capo.
Prosecutors also cited previous rulings that barred Corozzo from representing other Mafia defendants, including a pending Brooklyn case where he was accused of obstructing an investigation of client Gaetano Napoli’s alleged crimes.
Nicholas "Little Nick" Corozzo is a ...Image via WikipediaManhattan federal court Judge Lewis Kaplan rejected those arguments, saying nothing was proven against Corozzo in the Napoli case.
Kaplan also said "the government has not identified any actual conflict of interest" involving current client Michael Scarpaci, a reputed mob associate who is among 14 defendants charged in the feds’ latest case against the Gambinos.
A spokeswoman for the Manhattan U.S. Attorney’s Office declined to comment.
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Cleveland gangster Danny Greene's explosive life captured in 'The Irishman' and two docs


Federal Bureau of Investigation surveillance p...Image via WikipediaFilmmakers are fascinated by Cleveland's legendary thugs. Especially if their deaths were triggered by exploding automobiles in the 1970s. A new movie and two new documentaries will arrive in 2011, feeding America's unending appetite for mob stories with a grisly slice of Cleveland's criminal past. "The Irishman," out next March, spotlights gangster Danny Greene, whose life was famously extinguished by a car bomb in a Lyndhurst parking lot; racketeer Shondor Birns, shredded by a car bomb on Detroit Avenue near West 25th Street; and mafia-connected Teamster official John Nardi, wiped out by a car bomb just off East 22nd Street near Carnegie Avenue.
Birns was killed in March 1975. Nardi in May 1977. Greene in October 1977. Bang. Bam. Boom. If you were a Cleveland mobster in the '70s, public transportation would have been a smart choice.
Our ever-striving region actually topped the nation in something in 1976, though it was a dubious distinction: No. 1 in bombings. There were 37 in Cuyahoga County, including 21 in Cleveland. Car bombs were relatively cheap to make, easy to plant, could be detonated from afar, and destroyed lots of evidence.
The film stars Irish actor Ray Stevenson as Greene, Vincent D'Onofrio as Nardi, Paul Sorvino as mob boss Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno, Val Kilmer as a Cleveland detective, and in a stroke of inspired casting, Oscar-winner Christopher Walken playing Birns.
Legendary Cleveland gangster Danny Greene will receive new notoriety in 2011 as the subject of a Hollywood movie and two documentaries.
•Catch some vintage TV footage of Danny Greene on youtube.
•See the trailer for "The Rise and Fall of the Irishman" documentary.
•Ray Stevenspn talks to Movieset.com about playing Danny Greene.
•Christopher Walken talks to Movieset.com about playing Shondor Birns.
•"The Irishman" is slated for release on March 11. It stars Ray Stevenson, Christopher Walken, Val Kilmer and Paul Sorvino. Directed by Jonathan Hensleigh, it is based on the book "To Kill the Irishman: The War that Crippled the Mafia" by Lyndhurst Police Chief Rick Porrello. A new edition of the book will also hit stores next March.
•The documentary "Danny Greene: The Rise and Fall of the Irishman," is due in March 2011. Producer-director Tommy Reid mixed archival footage and interviews with former Cleveland law enforcement officials and members of Greene's family.
Bio (formerly the Biography Channel) will also air a new Greene documentary as part of its "Mobsters" series early next year. The as-yet untitled film is being produced by Greg Scott and Mike Burke of Chicago's Towers Productions. Based on the book "To Kill the Irishman: The War That Crippled the Mafia," by Lyndhurst Police Chief Rick Porrello, it was shot in Detroit last summer and is slated to open next March before St. Patrick's Day. So is the documentary, "Danny Greene: The Rise and Fall of the Irishman." A third film, a documentary for the Bio channel's "Mobsters" series, is scheduled to air early next year.
The question isn't why there's suddenly a rash of Danny Greene movies. The question is: With such a camera-ready life, why haven't several been made already?
A fearless hood who grabbed headlines for nearly 15 years, Greene was a colorful character. Literally. He dressed in green, drove green cars, signed his name in green ink. He embraced Irish history and Celtic lore.
Alternately a union troubleshooter, embezzler, and enforcer, Greene dabbled in racketeering, gambling, and loan-sharking.
He excelled at beating the rap, which may have been attributed to his other occupation: FBI informant. Police have long assumed, but never proven, that Greene conspired to take out Birns, a rival in Cleveland's lucrative numbers racket, and later mafia underboss Leo "Lips" Moceri, whose body was never found.
Greene also possessed an amazing feline facility for dodging death, surviving at least four murder attempts.
"He was larger than life," said Porrello. "Very charismatic. Very bold. The people hired to kill him didn't want to get too close. He had this air of invincibility."
Former friend and business associate Mike Frato shot at Greene from a passing car when Greene was jogging with his dogs near Cleveland's White City Beach in November 1971. Greene pulled out a gun and shot back, killing Frato. Charged with manslaughter, he was later acquitted. Self-defense.
Had Greene's exploits played out in New York, he would have been a more notorious national figure. Perhaps Martin Scorsese would have already directed the definitive gritty production starring Robert De Niro.
But Greene is a Cleveland story, from his early days at the Parmadale orphanage to the streets of Collinwood, to a brief stint in suburban Willoughby. And though his dangerous life was marked by the sensational bursts of violence and mob intrigue that Hollywood loves, a new movie also means opening old wounds for those he left behind: five children and two ex-wives who still live in the area.
Danny Kelly, Greene's oldest son, was 17 when his dad was killed. Growing up, he helped out with various tasks including crawling under his dad's car to check for plastic explosives. Kelly, who goes by his mother's maiden name, is not involved with the film and declined to discuss it. The one question he agreed to answer was: What was your dad like?
"He was Irish, Irish Catholic," said Kelly. "He believed the man upstairs pulled the strings and that there was someplace to go after this. Where he is today, he wouldn't trade places with either me or you here. He was truly intrepid. He did everything with humor. If you know somebody that has that charisma, that magnetism of the Irish personality, that was him. He probably could have been governor or senator if he hadn't gone the other way."
And one more thing. "He was an orphan. Most of the orphans I know are always scared that eventually they're going to not have something again. They tend to want to grab everything they can get right now."
danny-greene-courthouse-1973.jpg 
Danny Greene leaves a courthouse with his lawyer in 1973. For years he beat the rap and several murder attempts.
Greene, the ultimate street hustler, first became a public figure when he headed up the Longshoreman's union on Cleveland's docks in the early 1960s.
"He reminded me of Marlon Brando in 'On the Waterfront,' " said Ed Kovacic, a former Cleveland Police detective, and later police chief, who spent years tussling with Greene and his cohorts.
"After you broke through that veneer that he put on, you could see he was such a convoluted character. He had so many sides. So many faces. Basically, he was a pretty decent guy who got caught up with living up to reputation, the image of being Danny Greene."
The image also included generosity. Greene helped out neighbors with money and favors. On Thanksgiving and Christmas, he bought dozens of turkeys and passed them out to needy folks in Collinwood.
OSU student's fascination with Greene led to movie
"The Irishman" has been in the works since 1997. It began with a Buckeye.
Tommy Reid, a student at Ohio State University in the mid- '90s, would drive up to Cleveland with friends for various weekend excursions. That's when he started hearing stories about the area's explosive criminal past.
"My heritage is Irish and Italian," said Reid. "I wanted to tell a story that had significance in both nationalities, and me being from New Jersey, which has always been kind of home to the mob, you know, the East Coast, I saw the Danny Greene story as an ideal mission and purpose for my career."
Reid was so taken with the saga, that he is also the producer and director behind the documentary "Danny Greene: The Rise and Fall of the Irishman." """'"He hooked up with Porrello in 1997 and acquired an option on the book before it was published.
Porrello, who grew up in Cleveland Heights, had his own colorful past. He toured the world as a drummer for Sammy Davis Jr., and later became an author with the book "The Rise and Fall of the Cleveland Mafia," which featured his own grandfather and great-uncles as players in the bootleg wars of the 1920s and 1930s.
But Porrello was also a kid who longed to be a cop, ever since his parents gave him a police scanner for Christmas when he was 10. His day job for the past 22 years has been on the Lyndhurst police force.""
As Reid pitched his movie dreams in Los Angeles, Porrello waited. And waited.
"There were times when I was on the road on the midnight shift, I'd go sit on that spot where Danny was killed and have coffee and I'd wonder, 'Will that movie ever get made? Will they be filming right here in this parking lot?' "
Reid, who worked for a talent agency before becoming a producer, spent years trekking Hollywood's perpetual path of heartbreak: meetings that led to meetings followed by meetings that led nowhere. He did, however, have Tara.
"My sister is an actress, Tara Reid, the 'American Pie' series and everything. She helped out a lot opening doors to already established producers and talent. She could call Sean Penn and talk to him about it. Through her I met the right actors, the right companies."
Reid finally cut a deal with a production company, Code Entertainment, which recently landed a distributor, Anchor Bay Films. There are no less than 14 producers, co-producers and executive producers now attached to "The Irishman." Once the project took off with director Jonathan Hensleigh ("The Punisher") and its strong cast, the question became where to shoot.
Reid always assumed they would make the film in Cleveland. But as with all movie budgets, money talks. He went searching for tax credits.
As "The Irishman" was headed into production in 2009, the Ohio House and Senate were still debating competing tax-incentive bills for filmmakers. One finally passed, but it was too late for Reid and company. Michigan already had one in place. That's why Detroit plays Cleveland in "The Irishman."
Reid was able to shoot part of his documentary in Cleveland in 2008. He hopes to release it a week or so before the movie next March and use them to cross-promote each other. The documentary includes interviews with one of Danny's ex-wives, Nancy, and one of his daughters, Sharon.
"I was 21 when my dad died," said Sharon. "I had just gotten married two months earlier." She described the experience of making the documentary as "a little surreal."
After her parents divorced, she said, "we had a great life growing up in Willoughby. We didn't know what was going on. You didn't know what your father did back then. He was just this big guy to us."
One bombing leads to another and another
"The Irishman" chronicles Greene's rise to power, his battles with Birns and his alliance with Nardi. "The story is just so compelling that actors respond and really want to play these historic figures," said Reid. "For an actor like Christopher Walken to play Shondor Birns, that's fun."
shondor-birns-the-irishman.jpg 
Shondor Birns, Public Enemy No. 1, met his own car bomb demise in 1975.
Arrested more than 50 times, Alex "Shondor" Birns was dubbed Public Enemy No. 1. He excelled at extortion, assault and murder. A former club owner, he knew how to keep drinks, food and favors flowing to cops, lawyers, judges and reporters. Years before clashing with Greene, Birns battled Don King, erstwhile Cleveland felon and later hair-raising boxing promoter.
On the evening of March 29, 1975, Birns walked out of a strip club, Christy's Lounge on Detroit Avenue near St. Malachi Church, and went to start his Lincoln Continental Mark IV. He was 70.
Nardi, secretary-treasurer of Vending Machine Employees Local 410, lacked Birns' public profile. He and Greene collaborated on gambling and money-skimming schemes that increasingly trampled on the turf of Cleveland mafia boss James "Jack White" Licavoli. "Greene had the street power, and Nardi knew how the mob game worked," said Porrello.
Never convicted of a crime, federal agents still ranked Nardi high in the local mob's chain of command, a distinction he succinctly denied to reporters just a month before his death, saying, "I ain't nobody."
On the afternoon of May 17, 1977, Nardi left his Teamsters office and walked over to his Olds 98. He was 61.
The bomb that killed Birns was wired to his car. The one that killed Nardi was planted in the car beside his and detonated by remote control. It was almost identical to the bomb and method used five months later to get Greene. The police called it a "Trojan Horse attack."
Nardi's murder was never solved. Neither was the blast on Birns, though Kovacic said, "I'm convinced that Danny did it."
The mob finally caught up with Greene because they had tapped his phone and learned of a dentist appointment on the afternoon of Oct. 6, 1977. For weeks, he had been switching cars to throw off potential bombers. This time, two men planted the explosives in a Chevy Nova, which they parked next to Greene's Lincoln Continental after he went inside. About a half-hour later, Greene walked out and reached to open his car door. He was 47.
Greene's death served as a profound propellant for future busts. It ended up being his most significant act.
The police got lucky with eyewitnesses. Nine men were indicted initially. The 79-day murder trial stretched from February to May 1978. It's the longest continuous criminal trial in the history of Cuyahoga County, longer even than the infamous Sam Sheppard case in 1954. The trial, and subsequent federal cases, led to 22 convictions for Greene's murder or other crimes.
Those eventually sent to prison included Licavoli (played in the film by Tony Lo Bianco), hitman Ray Ferritto (played by Robert Davi), and accomplices Pasquale "Butchie" Cisternino, and Ronald Carabbia, who was paroled in 2002.
The aftershocks provoked mob insiders Angelo "Big Ange" Lonardo and Aladena "Jimmy the Weasel" Fratianno to "flip," turning state's evidence and fingering former associates. The domino-effect helped dismantle chunks of the La Cosa Nostra from New York to Los Angeles.
Greene walks away from early bombing
More bizarre than the bombing that killed Greene is the one that didn't.
Two years earlier, at 3:50 a.m. on May 12, 1975, a bomb shattered glass and ripped through the bottom floor of Greene's office and apartment at 15805 Waterloo Road in Collinwood. Greene was on the second floor and crashed down into a pile of bricks and crud, breaking several ribs.
"I felt the floor give out," he later explained. "The next thing I knew I was in a heap of rubble. An icebox was over me. I dug myself out. I heard dogs whining and cats crying." Two of his cats were killed, but his girlfriend, Denise, managed to survive, crawling down from the mangled mess, while the bathrobe-clad Greene, spitting up blood, worked to dig his way upwards.
"There are three reasons somebody bombs somebody," said Kovacic that morning. "Either it's to make someone start doing something, to make someone stop doing something, or to kill someone. This was to wipe out Danny Greene."
But instead of fleeing the country, or at least the county, Greene set up a temporary trailer on the lot after the debris was hauled away. In utter defiance, he sat outside with friends and posted a sign, "Future Home: Celtic Club."
Then, in taunting tones right out of a mob movie screenplay, Greene talked to the TV cameras.
"I'm in between both worlds, the square world and the street world," he said. "I think I have trust on both sides, but I have no ax to grind. If somebody wants to come after me, we're over here by the Celtic Club. I'm not hard to find."
As a sign of some strange homage to Greene, or lack of real estate development, what became a vacant lot is, today, a vacant lot. The stark gap is just east of the Beachland Ballroom and Tavern. In cheeky Collinwood, a trio of artists painted a huge burnt sienna mural on the side of the building facing the bomb site.
In big capital letters, it reads, "KABOOM!"
http://www.cleveland.com/moviebuff/index.ssf/2010/08/cleveland_gangster_danny_green.html
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Bari Escaped Family’s Shadow To Make His Own Life


By Raanan Geberer
Brooklyn Daily Eagle
BROOKLYN — When attorney Frank Bari was growing up, he didn’t know that much about his father, “Zim’s,” past. But little by little, his father would let little details slip.
Eventually, Bari found out that his father had been a mob figure with ties to such legendary gangsters as Albert Anastasia, Brooklyn’s “Tough Tony” Anastasio (Albert’s brother, despite the different spelling), Frank Costello and Lucky Luciano.
Not only his father but his grandfather, Anthony Carfano (Little Augie Pisano), was “different,” although Frank mainly knew him as a doting, loving grandfather. His grandfather was killed by one bullet to the neck and another to the head — after coming into conflict with Meyer Lansky and Santo Trafficante in Florida. Bari recently told the Eagle that he had the idea of writing a book about his background since he was a public affairs specialist with the Coast Guard and learned the basics of journalism. Bari met his collaborator, Mark C. Gribben, a former reporter with the Detroit Free Press, when he and his father were in Detroit looking for information about an uncle, Jake Trager, who had been connected with the Purple Gang.
Now, Under the Williamsburg Bridge: The Story of an American Family, by Frank Bari with Mark C. Gribben, is available in hardcover from Trafford Publishing. “My father died in 2007 — if he knew I’d written any of this, I’d be in the grave,” Bari told the Eagle.

Although Frank’s father (who used many different names) came from the Manhattan neighborhood “under the Williamsburg Bridge,” he had plenty of connections to Brooklyn. “He knew all the guys at Midnight Rosie’s,” says Bari, referring to the Brownsville candy store where members of Murder Incorporated would gather to await their next assignment. Also, his father and a partner once had a store — a legitimate store — on Navy Street, back when that neighborhood was basically the “red light district” for the nearby Brooklyn Navy Yard.
In addition to talking about his father, Bari writes about some famous episodes in gangland history. For example, Charlie “The Bug” Workman, a friend of his father’s, told him the history books have it all wrong about Dutch Schultz’s murder. Schultz, he claimed, was killed not because he threatened to kill Manhattan District Attorney Thomas E. Dewey — although that was true — but because Schultz was horning in on established mob interests in New Jersey.
To be fair, there was a heroic side to Bari’s father, too. “Zim,” during the 1930s, joined the Marine Corps as an alternative to going to jail, and came to love the Corps and all it stood for. During World War II itself, he served as one of Merrill’s Marauders, a special-forces Army unit that fought in Burma and was famous for its missions behind Japanese lines.
Frank’s own life is also interesting. He was basically a wild kid, dropped out of high school and had a brief stint as a singer. (At a mob-affiliated nightclub, Crazy Joe Gallo told him, “If you sing good, you can keep the tux. If you don’t, we’ll bury you in it.”) He was drafted by the Army, but instead, while drunk, enlisted in the Coast Guard, thinking it would be easier. Instead, he found himself serving with one of the river patrols in Vietnam.
Afterward, he got his GED and went to St. John’s University and to Touro Law School. Through a connection he made when he was serving as an 18-B attorney (an attorney hired by the court to defend indigent defendants), he ended up defending many Asian criminals, not only Chinese but also Korean. Many of the Asian gangs’ antics as described by Bari seem similar to the old-time Italian mob: “To be accepted as a member of the Flying Dragons, Leon [a gang member] was required to commit five muggings without using any weapons while he was being watched by another member of the gang.” Some of Bari’s work also entails defending ‘working girls’ and their madams.
Today, Bari writes, the children of the old-time Italian mob are moving away from “the life,” and into the American middle class. As an example, he gives his friend “Baby John” DeLutro. Baby John’s father was an alleged member of the Gambino family, but the son chose another route and is now known as the Cannoli King of Little Italy. … “No visit to Little Italy is complete without a visit to Baby John’s Caffe Palermo.”

http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=27&id=37535

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Trial Update: Vincent Basciano


Nicholas GaraufisImage via Wikipedia
The upcoming death penalty case of Vincent Basciano, featured in King of Godfathers in Chapter 28, is getting a bit melodramatic and interesting again. In recent court filings it has been revealed that Joseph Barone, a self described Bonanno and Gambino associate who recently escaped a racketeering conviction, wrote Judge Nicholas Garaufis, the judge handling Basciano's case. In his letter dated January 31, 2010, Barone said that it was he, working undercover inside the Bonanno family, who prevented a number of murders. Barone didn't tell Garaufis which murders were prevented but his lawyers said in different federal court filings that Barone provided the FBI with info about the alleged attempt by Basciano to assassinate Garaufis and prosecutor Greg Andres. That alleged plot involves the so-called "hit list" which Basciano said was merely a Santeria spell list.  Barone's letter to Garaufis asked him to help him with the treatment he was getting in jail. (Barone's attorney at one point wanted to subpoena Garaufis for the recently completed trial in Manhattan federal court).  Barone also wrote that his former girl friend is the star witness against Basciano but didn't mention any name.
    Having learned of Barone's correspondence with Garaufis and Barone's claim about the assassination plot, Basciano's attorney Robert Goltzer and others on the defense team asked for any all government records about Barone. Such information "is critical to counsel's preparation for Basciano's upcoming capital trial," said Goltzer to Garaufis in a letter last week. The defense has to have the material to investigate potential aggravating factors that could lead to a potential death sentence, said Goltzer. On August 13, Garaufis publically filed the letter sent to him by Barone.
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Monday, August 16, 2010

Alleged Mobster Roberto Settineri To Plead Guilty


Don Carlo GambinoImage via WikipediaRoberto Settineri, a Miami Beach, FL wine merchant who prosecutors claim is an intermediary between the Gambino crime family and the Santa Maria de Gesu clan from Cosa Nostra or the Sicilian Mafia, is set to plead guilty following his arrest last March for allegedly conspiring to launder money and obstruct justice at the behest of Scott Rothstein in an FBI sting as reported by The Associated Press.  Rothstein was a politically connected Fort Lauderdale, FL attorney sentenced to fifty years in prison last June for running a $1.2 billion Ponzi scheme which involved using his firm Rothstein Rosenfeldt Adler as a front to sell phony legal settlements to investors. 
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Wednesday, August 11, 2010

Real life Donnie Brasco Says Mexican Drug Cartels More Dangerous Than The Italian Mafia


Joe Pistone, the legendary retired FBI special agent who infiltrated the Bonanno crime family as Donnie Brasco, says "he would rather deal with the Italian Mafia than Mexican drug cartels" because the wise guys are more discriminating in whom they kill as reported by Daniel Borunda for the El Paso Times:
Pistone said the Mafia kill only other people involved in mob activity, as opposed to some other organized crime groups willing to kill innocents to get to a specific target. "These other groups are way more violent. They don't have a value on life," Pistone said. " ... Italians really try to fly under the radar in killing people."
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Monday, August 9, 2010

Stallone Confirms Role In Gotti Movie


Sylvester Stallone 66ème Festival de Venise (M...Image via Wikipedia
Sylvester Stallone has confirmed the rumors that he intends to play the late Mafia don John Gotti in a biopic, and also shed light on what the focus of the project will be on.

In a Q&A chat with fans over at Ain't It Cool News, Stallone said, "The Gotti project is still in its incubative form. The John Gotti story was already aptly portrayed by my friend Armand Assante [in the HBO telepic Gotti], so what intrigues me is the aftermath of power, when the lion of the streets is now relegated to an 8X10 foot cell for the remainder of his life."

He added, "Also the thoughts that pervade his mind coupled with the impact he had on the children near and dear to him provide an inordinate amount of material. Yet the project is still far away from coming into being. "
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'Ice' man to testify vs. Gotti pal


John GottiImage via Wikipedia
A crooked Diamond District jeweler is cooperating with the feds and poised to testify against one of the late John Gotti's most trusted henchmen, The Post has learned.
Brian Greenwald admitted laundering a load of cash for Joseph Watts, allegedly among the mob's highest-ranking associates, records show.
Greenwald said Watts gave him $70,000 in "old $20 bills" to buy a stolen diamond.
Greenwald then resold the hot rock, giving Watts back his money in crisp new hundreds, according to the legal papers.
Greenwald, 39, ratted out Watts as part of a plea deal for engineering a botched FedEx truck hijacking in Hell's Kitchen in December 2007, according to other court records.
Lawyers for Greenwald and Watts declined comment.
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Thursday, August 5, 2010

Reputed Gambino boss John "Jackie the Nose" cuts three-year plea bargain


FBI Mugshot of John 'Jackie Nose' D'Amico, cur...Image via WikipediaThe reputed boss of the Gambino crime family plea-bargained to an assault charge today in an alleged 1989 murder plot against a suspected informant.
John "Jackie the Nose" D'Amico faces a maximum three years in the slammer for conspiring "to commit an assault against Frederick Weiss with a dangerous weapon so as to prevent Weiss from cooperating against the Gambino family as a potential witness."
According to papers filed in Manhattan federal court, D'Amico allowed co-defendant Joseph Watts, a reputed high-ranking Gambino associate, to recruit members of his crew for a planned hit on Weiss, a private sanitation exec who had run afoul of the late mob boss John Gotti.
But Watts' plan didn't come off and authorities believe Weiss was instead murdered by members of New Jersey's DeCavalcante crime family as a favor to the "Dapper Don."
D'Amico, 74, had faced life in prison and forfeiture of $4 million under a wide-ranging racketeering indictment handed up last year.
A source close to the defense suggested that the feds cut the graying gangster a big break because the case against him was "very, very weak" and D'Amico -- who's been described as a "degenerate gambler" -- "probably doesn't have two nickels to rub together."
A spokeswoman for the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office declined to comment.

 http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/reputed_gambino_bargain_john_jackie_v9EpvCLWsK9I4LE7inyA3J#ixzz0vlz2xuTV

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Hero cop and private eye John McNally is 'longtime associate' of Gotti hired gun, fed files reveal



He was a hero cop, an ace detective and a private eye extraordinaire - but now prosecutors say John McNally is an unindicted co-conspirator to one of the mob's most vicious hit men.
McNally, 76, is the "longtime associate" of John Gotti's hired gun, Joseph Watts, and has worked with him on extortion and money laundering for years, documents filed in Manhattan Federal Court say.
"At this point, he's really old and really sick," said a friend of McNally, who assisted in the recovery of the Star of India sapphire as a detective and helped win the O.J. Simpson case as private eye.
"They are just trying to besmirch his career, to embarrass him."
McNally has been eyed by the FBI before, most notably when he was working with F. Lee Bailey on the Simpson defense team in the 1990s, and when he did "security" in the 1980s for Gene Gotti, the Teflon Don's brother.
But now McNally's name is all over government papers filed against Watts, who is charged with racketeering in connection with a slew of homicides during the mob's go-go 1980s.
One hit is among the most notorious of all - the murder of Gambino godfather Paul Castellano that paved the way for Gotti to take over the New York mob.
McNally isn't tied to any of those homicides, or with any of the crimes committed by Watts' co-defendant John D'Amico - who is expected to take a plea today in exchange for a three-year sentence.
But McNally's name is linked to more recent extortion and money-laundering allegations against Watts.
"In January 2007, Watts longtime associate John McNally, a retired NYPD detective who has performed various services for Watts, traveled from Florida to New York to try to collect at least $30,000 that [Wail] Al-Khalib owed Watts," according to a court paper filed last week.
Prosecutors also allege that Watts once transferred approximately $200,000 from a Swiss bank account to a Staten Island bank where McNally then paid off debts.
Calls to the ex-cop's phone were not answered.
 
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Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Acting Gambino Boss Plea Deal in '89 Hit


FBI Mugshot of John 'Jackie Nose' D'Amico, cur...Image via Wikipedia
Reputed acting Gambino crime family boss John "Jackie the Nose" D'Amico is poised to cut a deal tomorrow in a case tied to a 1989 murder plot, court papers reveal.
D'Amico "will plead guilty . . . to a superseding information" that will be handed up in Manhattan federal court, where he was indicted last year for allegedly scheming to kill suspected informant Fred Weiss, the filing says.
Prosecutors disclosed D'Amico's anticipated plea in papers detailing evidence against co-defendant Joseph Watts. He's charged with recruiting members of D'Amico's crew for a hit team to help him murder Weiss, a private sanitation exec.
Watts' plan was never realized. Authorities believe Weiss was instead whacked by other mobsters, from New Jersey's DeCavalcante crime family.

 http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/gambino_plea_deal_in_hit_suHiGtQ83Y15Q11VfAIRUO#ixzz0veNs8cly
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