Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello was ordered to stand trial on assault charges today after a government witness testified that back in July he agreed to pay $2,000 to have mob rival Marty Angelina beaten.
Frank "Frankie the Fixer" DiGiacomo said Monacello paid him the money in two installments and that part of one payment included $700 that DiGiacomo owed Monacello.
Testifying at a preliminary hearing this morning, DiGiacomo, 45, said Monacello originally talked about killing Angelina, but later said he just wanted him "beat up really bad."
Dressed in a tee shirt and work pants and sporting a goatee, DiGiacomo spent about 45 minutes on the stand. The former South Philadelphia plumber began cooperating with the State Police late in 2007.
Deputy Chief State Attorney General Erik Olsen offered testimony from DiGiacomo and from State Trooper Glenn Hopey to support the charges in the case. Olsen also played parts of three conversations secretly recorded by DiGiacomo.
Over the objections of defense attorneys who argued the government had failed to support the charges, Municipal Judge Bradley Moss ruled that the case could move forward to trial.
Monacello, 41, is charged with soliciting an aggravated assault and attempted aggravated assault.
While not part of today's testimony, investigators have said that Monacello had a falling out with Angelina over the collection of gambling debts.
Monacello and 16 others were arrested in July on gambling and loansharking charges related to an organized crime investigation in Delaware County dubbed operation "Delco Nostra."
The alleged plot against Angelina was uncovered during that investigation.
Thanks to George Anastasia
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Reputed Gambino Hit Man, Charles Carneglia, Heads to Trial
It was the mob equivalent of a performance evaluation, and Charles Carneglia wasn't doing well. Gambino crime family captain Gene Gotti, prosecutors say, thought Carneglia's work was sloppy for an assassin.
"You stabbed somebody, Charles," the brother of the notorious Mafia boss said in a secretly recorded conversation in a prison visiting room.
"I know that, I know that. I know," Carneglia said.
Authorities say the conversation was about the fatal stabbing of a rival mobster during a beef outside a bar in Queens in 1977—one of five murders prosecutors will try to pin on Carneglia at a trial set to open Thursday in federal court in Brooklyn.
It's a case rife with gory details of Carneglia's alleged exploits, including claims the body of one victim of his hit team—a neighbor who accidentally ran over John Gotti's 12-year-old son—was dissolved in a vat of acid. The defendant wasn't charged in the neighbor's murder, though a judge has ruled that prosecutors can still tell jurors about the death—without mentioning the acid. There was no immediate response to a message seeking comment from Carneglia's attorney.
Carneglia was one of 62 people arrested last year in what authorities described as one of the largest roundups ever of suspected members and associates of a New York crime family. Since then 60 have pleaded guilty to lesser charges, and one case was dropped.
The jury will hear testimony from several mob turncoats who recently agreed to help investigators tackle unsolved slayings, some decades old.
Prosecutors allege the trail of bodies left behind by Carneglia includes those of a court officer gunned down in 1976 before he was to testify against Carneglia in a gun possession case; a Gambino associate stabbed to death in 1983 during an argument with Carneglia over money; a Gambino soldier killed on orders by John Gotti in 1990 in the parking lot of the World Trade Center; and an armored car security guard shot in the back during a heist in 1990.
Since his arrest, Carneglia has displayed a defiant streak: Prosecutors say when told he was facing charges under RICO—the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act—he quipped, "Who's RICO, Edward G. Robinson?" And the Daily News reported that at one court hearing he stared down the daughter of one of the victims, telling her, "Wrong guy."
The 62-year-old defendant once sported a long gray beard and pony tail—a look one prospective juror told the judge made him appear "a bit on the shady side." He since has shaved off the beard and gotten a hair cut.
If convicted, Carneglia faces a possible life prison term.
Thanks to Tom Hays
"You stabbed somebody, Charles," the brother of the notorious Mafia boss said in a secretly recorded conversation in a prison visiting room.
"I know that, I know that. I know," Carneglia said.
Authorities say the conversation was about the fatal stabbing of a rival mobster during a beef outside a bar in Queens in 1977—one of five murders prosecutors will try to pin on Carneglia at a trial set to open Thursday in federal court in Brooklyn.
It's a case rife with gory details of Carneglia's alleged exploits, including claims the body of one victim of his hit team—a neighbor who accidentally ran over John Gotti's 12-year-old son—was dissolved in a vat of acid. The defendant wasn't charged in the neighbor's murder, though a judge has ruled that prosecutors can still tell jurors about the death—without mentioning the acid. There was no immediate response to a message seeking comment from Carneglia's attorney.
Carneglia was one of 62 people arrested last year in what authorities described as one of the largest roundups ever of suspected members and associates of a New York crime family. Since then 60 have pleaded guilty to lesser charges, and one case was dropped.
The jury will hear testimony from several mob turncoats who recently agreed to help investigators tackle unsolved slayings, some decades old.
Prosecutors allege the trail of bodies left behind by Carneglia includes those of a court officer gunned down in 1976 before he was to testify against Carneglia in a gun possession case; a Gambino associate stabbed to death in 1983 during an argument with Carneglia over money; a Gambino soldier killed on orders by John Gotti in 1990 in the parking lot of the World Trade Center; and an armored car security guard shot in the back during a heist in 1990.
Since his arrest, Carneglia has displayed a defiant streak: Prosecutors say when told he was facing charges under RICO—the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act—he quipped, "Who's RICO, Edward G. Robinson?" And the Daily News reported that at one court hearing he stared down the daughter of one of the victims, telling her, "Wrong guy."
The 62-year-old defendant once sported a long gray beard and pony tail—a look one prospective juror told the judge made him appear "a bit on the shady side." He since has shaved off the beard and gotten a hair cut.
If convicted, Carneglia faces a possible life prison term.
Thanks to Tom Hays
First Conviction from "Operation Delco Nostra" Organized Crime Investigation
State prosecutors have scored their first conviction stemming from the "Operation Delco Nostra" organized-crime investigation that led to 17 arrests last summer and exposed an alleged plot to attack Philadelphia mobster Martin "Marty" Angelina.
Daniel Diedrich, a former supervisor in the Delaware County Domestic Relations Department, pleaded guilty yesterday in Media to one count of bookmaking. He was sentenced to two years' probation and fined $1,000.
Diedrich, 34, of Clifton Heights, was a low-level member of the sophisticated bookmaking, gambling and loan-sharking organization that authorities say was run by Nicholas "Nicky the Hat" Cimino between 2002 and 2007.
"He was not in a management position. He was a worker," said Chief Deputy Attorney General Erik Olsen.
Olsen said there was no evidence that Diedrich had engaged in any illegal activity while working in the county courthouse.
The other defendants, including reputed Philly mob associate Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello, are scheduled for a hearing in Delaware County court in March on charges that include gambling, bookmaking, criminal conspiracy and corrupt organizations.
Monacello, 42, of South Philadelphia, who authorities say answers to jailed former consigliere George Borgesi, is also charged in Philadelphia with soliciting aggravated assault. According to a grand-jury presentment, Monacello tried to hire someone to have Angelina - allegedly a "made" member of the mob - beaten so badly he'd be hospitalized.
Monacello's preliminary hearing on that charge is set for next week.
Borgesi, imprisoned in West Virginia, was convicted in 2001 during a 14-week racketeering trial along with former Philadelphia crime boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino.
Thanks to William Bender
Daniel Diedrich, a former supervisor in the Delaware County Domestic Relations Department, pleaded guilty yesterday in Media to one count of bookmaking. He was sentenced to two years' probation and fined $1,000.
Diedrich, 34, of Clifton Heights, was a low-level member of the sophisticated bookmaking, gambling and loan-sharking organization that authorities say was run by Nicholas "Nicky the Hat" Cimino between 2002 and 2007.
"He was not in a management position. He was a worker," said Chief Deputy Attorney General Erik Olsen.
Olsen said there was no evidence that Diedrich had engaged in any illegal activity while working in the county courthouse.
The other defendants, including reputed Philly mob associate Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello, are scheduled for a hearing in Delaware County court in March on charges that include gambling, bookmaking, criminal conspiracy and corrupt organizations.
Monacello, 42, of South Philadelphia, who authorities say answers to jailed former consigliere George Borgesi, is also charged in Philadelphia with soliciting aggravated assault. According to a grand-jury presentment, Monacello tried to hire someone to have Angelina - allegedly a "made" member of the mob - beaten so badly he'd be hospitalized.
Monacello's preliminary hearing on that charge is set for next week.
Borgesi, imprisoned in West Virginia, was convicted in 2001 during a 14-week racketeering trial along with former Philadelphia crime boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino.
Thanks to William Bender
Feds Keeping an Eye on Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio
Ever since Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio, reputed mob boss of the Patriarca Crime Family, took the reigns from Boston's Francis "Cadillac Frank" Salemme in 1996, he's been able to avoid significant legal troubles from law enforcement. But, that stretch may be coming to an end.
Manocchio, 80, is not charged with any crime at this time. However, the Target 12 Investigators have learned within the last several months, FBI agents served a search warrant on Manocchio. Investigators reportedly found a small amount of cash in Manocchio's possession. Cash, investigators said, they could trace as tribute money; which is money paid up to a mob boss.
According to Target 12 sources, Manocchio immediately began shopping around for an attorney. However, it is unclear who, if anyone, he's retained.
Sources on Federal Hill - the Providence neighborhood out of which Manocchio runs the crime family - said they haven't seen Manocchio since the feds moved in, leaving many to wonder if he went on the run. However, law enforcement sources said Manocchio often travels during the winter, and they are not concerned about his absence at this point in time.
Although the FBI won't comment if Manocchio is part of an ongoing criminal investigation, it's no secret agents are keeping an eye on him.
In fact, shortly after arriving in Providence to head up the FBI's Organized Crime Unit for New England, FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jeffrey Sallet approached Manocchio on Federal Hill in 2007, introduced himself and let him know he was watching.
Thanks to Target 12
Manocchio, 80, is not charged with any crime at this time. However, the Target 12 Investigators have learned within the last several months, FBI agents served a search warrant on Manocchio. Investigators reportedly found a small amount of cash in Manocchio's possession. Cash, investigators said, they could trace as tribute money; which is money paid up to a mob boss.
According to Target 12 sources, Manocchio immediately began shopping around for an attorney. However, it is unclear who, if anyone, he's retained.
Sources on Federal Hill - the Providence neighborhood out of which Manocchio runs the crime family - said they haven't seen Manocchio since the feds moved in, leaving many to wonder if he went on the run. However, law enforcement sources said Manocchio often travels during the winter, and they are not concerned about his absence at this point in time.
Although the FBI won't comment if Manocchio is part of an ongoing criminal investigation, it's no secret agents are keeping an eye on him.
In fact, shortly after arriving in Providence to head up the FBI's Organized Crime Unit for New England, FBI Supervisory Special Agent Jeffrey Sallet approached Manocchio on Federal Hill in 2007, introduced himself and let him know he was watching.
Thanks to Target 12
Friday, January 30, 2009
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Courtroom Outbursts Don't Prevent Life Sentence for Reputed Mob Crew Boss Frank Calabrese Sr.
With the national media finally interested in Illinois corruption, it's too bad they were focused on Springfield's dancing monkey show and not on what happened in a federal courtroom in Chicago on Wednesday.
That wasn't a monkey dancing on a string. It was an ape. The kind of ape that pulls the strings on the dancing monkeys.
His name is Frank Calabrese, the former Chicago Outfit Chinatown crew boss, convicted of racketeering conspiracy involving seven murders in the FBI's historic Operation Family Secrets case of 18 unsolved hits. Six other bodies were attributed to Calabrese at his sentencing.
Calabrese, 71, wore a wrinkled orange jumpsuit, with old man glasses attached to his head with a thick felt strap. Yet when he'd raise his paws you could see they were once powerful enough to strangle a man until his eyes popped out. Or stab him to death. Or beat him to death. Or pull a trigger. Or set off a bomb and more.
One of the victims was Paul Haggerty, who was 27 in 1976 when the Calabrese crew picked him up to question him about missing jewels. Haggerty was handcuffed, his eyes and mouth taped shut and tortured. Frank strangled him with a rope. They cut his throat and dumped him in the trunk.
On Wednesday, Haggerty's widow, Charlene Moravecek, confronted Calabrese as a parade of victim families told their stories to U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel.
"God bless you!" Calabrese told Moravecek. She rounded on him, shouting, "Don't you mock me! Don't! Your honor, I don't want to hear from him."
Calabrese's own son, Kurt—a convicted Outfit loan shark—appeared before Zagel as a victim, saying his father beat him, belittled him, threatened to bite the nose off his face and kill him. "He was more an enforcer than a father," Kurt said, turning to Frank. "And I want you to apologize for what you did to me and my brother."
Frank shouted that his sons and his hit man brother Nick, who turned federal witness, had betrayed him with lies. "You better apologize for the lies you are telling, that's what you better do!" Frank bellowed, the old man gone now, the Chinatown strangler rampant. "Tell them about the money you stole, the million dollars [cash] you stole from me and the $110,000 that didn't belong to you!" Frank Calabrese said, of mob cash he'd stashed away before going to prison in the 1990s. "If I was such a bad dad, why didn't I do anything to you then? You were treated like a king!"
Kurt stalked out of the courtroom, and I followed him down the hall, where he was leaning against a wall, emotional. "That's the last time I'm ever going to see my father," Kurt told me. "I just wanted him to apologize."
What about the missing $1 million? Did you take it? "No," Kurt said. "All I wanted was an apology. But you see how he was. He still thinks he's the boss."
Frank Calabrese finally got his say, insisting he never killed or beat anyone, that he helped Connie's Pizza, not merely charged them street tax, and that his juice loans were more user-friendly than payday loans. "I'm not no big shot," he said. "I'm not nothing but another human being." He added that his brother Nick was a coward. "Which is why I called him Alfredo, from ' The Godfather,' " speaking of the fictional Corleone who betrayed his own brother.
Zagel gave Frank Calabrese life in prison, saying he'd never seen a case in which two sons and a brother testified against a father. "Perhaps you didn't have a loving family," Zagel said. "Your crimes are unspeakable."
During the Family Secrets trial, the connection between Chicago politics and the Outfit came up often. In one bit of testimony in 2007, Mayor Richard Daley's friend Fred Bruno Barbara, the trucking boss and Rush Street investor, was identified by Nick Calabrese as a willing driver for mob boss Angelo "The Hook" LaPietra on bombing runs.
Daley got so angry when asked about Barbara that he turned purple and shrieked. The governor of Illinois could have called him "cuckoo."
For generations, the Outfit has formed the base of the iron triangle that runs things, and no understanding of politics in Illinois is complete without them.
Sentencing of other bosses continues on Monday. The dancing monkey show in Springfield will be over by then, but if the national media wants to understand Chicago, they should show up in federal court to see how the apes behave.
Thanks to John Kass
That wasn't a monkey dancing on a string. It was an ape. The kind of ape that pulls the strings on the dancing monkeys.
His name is Frank Calabrese, the former Chicago Outfit Chinatown crew boss, convicted of racketeering conspiracy involving seven murders in the FBI's historic Operation Family Secrets case of 18 unsolved hits. Six other bodies were attributed to Calabrese at his sentencing.
Calabrese, 71, wore a wrinkled orange jumpsuit, with old man glasses attached to his head with a thick felt strap. Yet when he'd raise his paws you could see they were once powerful enough to strangle a man until his eyes popped out. Or stab him to death. Or beat him to death. Or pull a trigger. Or set off a bomb and more.
One of the victims was Paul Haggerty, who was 27 in 1976 when the Calabrese crew picked him up to question him about missing jewels. Haggerty was handcuffed, his eyes and mouth taped shut and tortured. Frank strangled him with a rope. They cut his throat and dumped him in the trunk.
On Wednesday, Haggerty's widow, Charlene Moravecek, confronted Calabrese as a parade of victim families told their stories to U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel.
"God bless you!" Calabrese told Moravecek. She rounded on him, shouting, "Don't you mock me! Don't! Your honor, I don't want to hear from him."
Calabrese's own son, Kurt—a convicted Outfit loan shark—appeared before Zagel as a victim, saying his father beat him, belittled him, threatened to bite the nose off his face and kill him. "He was more an enforcer than a father," Kurt said, turning to Frank. "And I want you to apologize for what you did to me and my brother."
Frank shouted that his sons and his hit man brother Nick, who turned federal witness, had betrayed him with lies. "You better apologize for the lies you are telling, that's what you better do!" Frank bellowed, the old man gone now, the Chinatown strangler rampant. "Tell them about the money you stole, the million dollars [cash] you stole from me and the $110,000 that didn't belong to you!" Frank Calabrese said, of mob cash he'd stashed away before going to prison in the 1990s. "If I was such a bad dad, why didn't I do anything to you then? You were treated like a king!"
Kurt stalked out of the courtroom, and I followed him down the hall, where he was leaning against a wall, emotional. "That's the last time I'm ever going to see my father," Kurt told me. "I just wanted him to apologize."
What about the missing $1 million? Did you take it? "No," Kurt said. "All I wanted was an apology. But you see how he was. He still thinks he's the boss."
Frank Calabrese finally got his say, insisting he never killed or beat anyone, that he helped Connie's Pizza, not merely charged them street tax, and that his juice loans were more user-friendly than payday loans. "I'm not no big shot," he said. "I'm not nothing but another human being." He added that his brother Nick was a coward. "Which is why I called him Alfredo, from ' The Godfather,' " speaking of the fictional Corleone who betrayed his own brother.
Zagel gave Frank Calabrese life in prison, saying he'd never seen a case in which two sons and a brother testified against a father. "Perhaps you didn't have a loving family," Zagel said. "Your crimes are unspeakable."
During the Family Secrets trial, the connection between Chicago politics and the Outfit came up often. In one bit of testimony in 2007, Mayor Richard Daley's friend Fred Bruno Barbara, the trucking boss and Rush Street investor, was identified by Nick Calabrese as a willing driver for mob boss Angelo "The Hook" LaPietra on bombing runs.
Daley got so angry when asked about Barbara that he turned purple and shrieked. The governor of Illinois could have called him "cuckoo."
For generations, the Outfit has formed the base of the iron triangle that runs things, and no understanding of politics in Illinois is complete without them.
Sentencing of other bosses continues on Monday. The dancing monkey show in Springfield will be over by then, but if the national media wants to understand Chicago, they should show up in federal court to see how the apes behave.
Thanks to John Kass
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Reputed Mob Boss, Frank Calabrese Sr., Sentenced to Life in Prison
A Chicago Outfit boss convicted in the landmark Family Secrets trial in 2007 was sentenced to life in prison in federal court downtown this afternoon.
A jury convicted Frank Calabrese Sr. and other Chicago mob bosses in a conspiracy stretching back to the 1960s, linking them to numerous gangland slayings.
Speaking to Calabrese during sentencing, U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel told him, "Your crimes are unspeakable."
Last April, a federal judge denied a new trial for Calabrese, saying he didn't find that an alleged threat by Calabrese against a prosecutor tainted jurors.
Calabrese allegedly was seen mouthing: "You are a [expletive] dead man."
Some defense lawyers argued that the alleged threat could have prejudiced the juror who saw it. The juror apparently discussed it in deliberations and later reported it to prosecutors. But a judge heard from the juror in a closed-door hearing and ruled that jurors are permitted to observe defendants in court.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
A jury convicted Frank Calabrese Sr. and other Chicago mob bosses in a conspiracy stretching back to the 1960s, linking them to numerous gangland slayings.
Speaking to Calabrese during sentencing, U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel told him, "Your crimes are unspeakable."
Last April, a federal judge denied a new trial for Calabrese, saying he didn't find that an alleged threat by Calabrese against a prosecutor tainted jurors.
Calabrese allegedly was seen mouthing: "You are a [expletive] dead man."
Some defense lawyers argued that the alleged threat could have prejudiced the juror who saw it. The juror apparently discussed it in deliberations and later reported it to prosecutors. But a judge heard from the juror in a closed-door hearing and ruled that jurors are permitted to observe defendants in court.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Top Ten Ways Rod Blagojevich Can Improve His Image
10 Star in new television series, "America's Funniest Haircuts"
9. Quit politics and become a fat, lovable mall cop
8. Start pronouncing last name with Jerry Lewis-like "BLAGOOOOYYYYYJEVICH"
7. Offer a senate seat with no money down, zero percent interest
6. Team up with John Malkovich and Erin Brockovich for hot Malkovich-Brockovich-Blagojevich sex tape
5. Change his name to Barod Obamavich
4. Safely land an Airbus on the Hudson River
3. I don't know...how about showing up for his impeachment trial?
2. Wear sexy dresses, high heels and say, "You Betcha!"
1. Uhhh...resign?
9. Quit politics and become a fat, lovable mall cop
8. Start pronouncing last name with Jerry Lewis-like "BLAGOOOOYYYYYJEVICH"
7. Offer a senate seat with no money down, zero percent interest
6. Team up with John Malkovich and Erin Brockovich for hot Malkovich-Brockovich-Blagojevich sex tape
5. Change his name to Barod Obamavich
4. Safely land an Airbus on the Hudson River
3. I don't know...how about showing up for his impeachment trial?
2. Wear sexy dresses, high heels and say, "You Betcha!"
1. Uhhh...resign?
Reputed Mob Hit Man, Charles Carneglia, Given Extreme Makeover in Time for Trial
Fearsome reputed hit man Charles Carneglia has undergone a wiseguy makeover on the eve of his federal trial.
A prison barber did wonders for Carneglia, transforming him from a scary Charles Manson look-alike to a craggy Gorton's Fisherman. Carneglia's ponytail is gone. The stringy, white hair and flowing beard have been neatly trimmed.
The fearsome enforcer for the Gambino crime family, who is charged with five murders, wore a cardigan sweater for jury selection Monday and a powder-blue pullover Tuesday.
Despite the radical change, Carneglia's previous look was apparently burned indelibly in the mind of at least one prospective juror who got a glimpse of the old Charles last week in Brooklyn Federal Court on the first day of jury selection.
"His appearance gave me the impression he was guilty," the anonymous juror told Judge Jack Weinstein. "He looked a little bit on the shady side with the ponytail and the beard."
The juror was excused, and Carneglia glared at him as he left the room.
Defense lawyer Curtis Farber insisted there is no plan to make Carneglia look less sinister. "He looks the same to me," Farber said, adding that Carneglia had trouble getting in to see the barber and having his dentures fixed over the 11 months he has been in the Metropolitan Detention Center.
Federal prosecutors have lined up at least 10 cooperating witnesses to testify at the blockbuster Mafia trial beginning Thursday.
They include the late John Gotti's self-described "adopted son" Lewis Kasman and Gambino associate John Alite, who will be the star witness against John A. (Junior) Gotti at his trial late this year.
Thanks to John Marzulli
A prison barber did wonders for Carneglia, transforming him from a scary Charles Manson look-alike to a craggy Gorton's Fisherman. Carneglia's ponytail is gone. The stringy, white hair and flowing beard have been neatly trimmed.
The fearsome enforcer for the Gambino crime family, who is charged with five murders, wore a cardigan sweater for jury selection Monday and a powder-blue pullover Tuesday.
Despite the radical change, Carneglia's previous look was apparently burned indelibly in the mind of at least one prospective juror who got a glimpse of the old Charles last week in Brooklyn Federal Court on the first day of jury selection.
"His appearance gave me the impression he was guilty," the anonymous juror told Judge Jack Weinstein. "He looked a little bit on the shady side with the ponytail and the beard."
The juror was excused, and Carneglia glared at him as he left the room.
Defense lawyer Curtis Farber insisted there is no plan to make Carneglia look less sinister. "He looks the same to me," Farber said, adding that Carneglia had trouble getting in to see the barber and having his dentures fixed over the 11 months he has been in the Metropolitan Detention Center.
Federal prosecutors have lined up at least 10 cooperating witnesses to testify at the blockbuster Mafia trial beginning Thursday.
They include the late John Gotti's self-described "adopted son" Lewis Kasman and Gambino associate John Alite, who will be the star witness against John A. (Junior) Gotti at his trial late this year.
Thanks to John Marzulli
Monday, January 26, 2009
Mobster, Paul "The Indian" Schiro, Given the Maximum Time in Prison
The first defendant to be sentenced in the Family Secrets mob conspiracy case was given 20 years in prison by a federal judge today, the maximum amount of time he could receive for his role in the conspiracy.
Paul "the Indian" Schiro had appeared emotionless during the landmark 2007 trial, but addressed U.S. District Judge James Zagel briefly today as he was about to learn his punishment.
Schiro accused Assistant U.S. Atty. Markus Funk of "misquoting things," and said he had no idea why the jury had found him guilty. "I went to trial with co-defendants I never met in my life," Schiro said.
Zagel said there was plenty of evidence linking Schiro to the conspiracy, and to the 1986 murder of Emil Vaci. The jury had been unable to reach a verdict blaming Schiro for that killing, but Zagel said Schiro had been involved.
He likened Schiro to a sleeper agent who was an Outfit associate allowed to carry out his own burglary activity. But Schiro never hesitated when asked to help kill Vaci, who was shot to death in Arizona after he began being interviewed by a grand jury.
"There was no evidence of his hesitation," Zagel said. "He was available."
Four others were convicted in the case, and their sentencings are set to begin within days, beginning Wednesday with Frank Calabrese Sr. The defendants were accused in a decades-long conspiracy that included 18 gangland killings.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Paul "the Indian" Schiro had appeared emotionless during the landmark 2007 trial, but addressed U.S. District Judge James Zagel briefly today as he was about to learn his punishment.
Schiro accused Assistant U.S. Atty. Markus Funk of "misquoting things," and said he had no idea why the jury had found him guilty. "I went to trial with co-defendants I never met in my life," Schiro said.
Zagel said there was plenty of evidence linking Schiro to the conspiracy, and to the 1986 murder of Emil Vaci. The jury had been unable to reach a verdict blaming Schiro for that killing, but Zagel said Schiro had been involved.
He likened Schiro to a sleeper agent who was an Outfit associate allowed to carry out his own burglary activity. But Schiro never hesitated when asked to help kill Vaci, who was shot to death in Arizona after he began being interviewed by a grand jury.
"There was no evidence of his hesitation," Zagel said. "He was available."
Four others were convicted in the case, and their sentencings are set to begin within days, beginning Wednesday with Frank Calabrese Sr. The defendants were accused in a decades-long conspiracy that included 18 gangland killings.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Informer: The Journal of American Mafia History - January Issue
The January 2009 issue of
INFORMER:
INFORMER:
The Journal of American Mafia History
is available now.
is available now.
CONTENTS
- Martyr: Lieutenant Joseph Petrosino
- The Mob's Worst Year: 1957, Part 2 of 2
- Kansas City Mafia Membership, 1910s-1940s
- Author Interview with Scott Deitche
- Book Review of Ouseley's Open City
- Ask the Informer: Pollaccia, Society of the Banana
- Top 10 Mob News Stories of 2008
- Deaths: Rosenthal, Scala, Valenti, Spero.
Informer is also available for purchase as a preprinted and bound magazine delivered to your home.
Print subscriptions: http://mafiainformer.blogspot.com/
Single copy preview/purchase: http://magcloud.com/browse/Issue/5921
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Operation Family Secrets Mob Trial Sentencing to Continue This Week
Federal agents tried for more than three decades to penetrate the deepest secrets of Chicago's organized crime family -- the names of those responsible for 18 ruthless murders aimed at silencing witnesses and meting out mob vengeance. They even called the investigation Operation Family Secrets.
Their patience was rewarded six years ago when a mob hit man began to spill the family secrets as part of a deal to keep himself out of the execution chamber. And starting this week, three aging dons of the Chicago underworld convicted in September 2007 as a result of that testimony are due to receive long sentences -- quite likely life.
Two alleged henchmen also convicted after the 10-week Family Secrets trial are expected to get long sentences as well.
"These were the main guys who ran the crime syndicate -- they were ruthless, they were absolutely ruthless," says retired police detective Al Egan, also a former longtime member of an FBI-led organized crime task force.
Wisecracking mob boss Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 80; convicted loan shark and hit man Frank Calabrese Sr., 71; and James Marcello, 66, all face a maximum of punishment of life in prison.
Former Chicago police officer Anthony Doyle, 64, and convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 71, weren't convicted of any murders but the jury found them guilty of participating in what prosecutors say was a long-running conspiracy that included killings, gambling, loan-sharking and squeezing businesses for "street tax."
The case is a major success for the FBI in its war on the mob.
"It led to the removal or displacement of some of the most capable guys in organized crime," says author John Binder whose book, "The Chicago Outfit," tells the story of organized crime in the nation's third largest city. And it sends a strong message to members of organized crime: Do you really want to be the guy at the top? Because we're going to get you in the future."
Lombardo is the most colorful defendant. He was sent to federal prison in the 1980s for conspiring with International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Roy Lee Williams and union pension fund manager Allen Dorfman to bribe Sen. Howard Cannon, D-Nev., to help defeat a trucking deregulation bill. Cannon was never charged with any wrongdoing and the bill became law with his support.
When Lombardo got out, he resumed life as the boss of the mob's Grand Avenue street crew, prosecutors say. He denies it but his attorney, Rick Halprin, told the trial he ran "the oldest and most reliable floating craps game on Grand Avenue."
When the Family Secrets indictment was unsealed, Lombardo went on the lam for nine months. And when he was brought before Zagel, the irrepressible clown quickly lived up to his nickname. The judge asked him why he had not seen a doctor lately.
"I was supposed to see him nine months ago," Lombardo rasped, "but I was -- what do they call it? -- I was unavailable."
"A little joke now and then never hurts," he told the trial. But the jury found him responsible for gunning down a federal witness.
The jury also found Calabrese responsible for seven murders.
His own brother, Nicholas Calabrese, 66, testified that Frank liked to strangle victims with a rope and slash their throats to make sure they were dead.
Nicholas Calabrese became the government's star witness after he dropped a bloody glove near the scene of a mob murder. He agreed to talk out of fear that agents would match his DNA to that on the glove and he would be sentenced to death.
Among other things, he said his brother Frank liked to give names to their mob hits.
One was known as "Strangers in the Night," he testified. That was because the Frank Sinatra song was playing on the jukebox while two men were strangled in 1978 in a suburban Cicero restaurant.
Marcello was at one time the mob's big boss, according to federal investigators.
The jury held him among those responsible for the murder of Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro, at one time the Chicago mob's man in Las Vegas and the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the movie "Casino."
Spilotro and his brother Michael were found buried in a shallow grave in an Indiana cornfield.
Doyle is the only one of those convicted at the trial who is not accused of direct involvement in the murders.
Schiro was sentenced to prison for 5 1/2 years in 2002 for being part of a gang of jewel thieves run by the former chief of detectives of the Chicago police department, William Hanhardt. Prosecutors claimed he was to blame for a mob hit in Phoenix. But the jury deadlocked on the case.
Nicholas Calabrese is to be sentenced Feb. 23.
Thanks to CBS2
Their patience was rewarded six years ago when a mob hit man began to spill the family secrets as part of a deal to keep himself out of the execution chamber. And starting this week, three aging dons of the Chicago underworld convicted in September 2007 as a result of that testimony are due to receive long sentences -- quite likely life.
Two alleged henchmen also convicted after the 10-week Family Secrets trial are expected to get long sentences as well.
"These were the main guys who ran the crime syndicate -- they were ruthless, they were absolutely ruthless," says retired police detective Al Egan, also a former longtime member of an FBI-led organized crime task force.
Wisecracking mob boss Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 80; convicted loan shark and hit man Frank Calabrese Sr., 71; and James Marcello, 66, all face a maximum of punishment of life in prison.
Former Chicago police officer Anthony Doyle, 64, and convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 71, weren't convicted of any murders but the jury found them guilty of participating in what prosecutors say was a long-running conspiracy that included killings, gambling, loan-sharking and squeezing businesses for "street tax."
The case is a major success for the FBI in its war on the mob.
"It led to the removal or displacement of some of the most capable guys in organized crime," says author John Binder whose book, "The Chicago Outfit," tells the story of organized crime in the nation's third largest city. And it sends a strong message to members of organized crime: Do you really want to be the guy at the top? Because we're going to get you in the future."
Lombardo is the most colorful defendant. He was sent to federal prison in the 1980s for conspiring with International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Roy Lee Williams and union pension fund manager Allen Dorfman to bribe Sen. Howard Cannon, D-Nev., to help defeat a trucking deregulation bill. Cannon was never charged with any wrongdoing and the bill became law with his support.
When Lombardo got out, he resumed life as the boss of the mob's Grand Avenue street crew, prosecutors say. He denies it but his attorney, Rick Halprin, told the trial he ran "the oldest and most reliable floating craps game on Grand Avenue."
When the Family Secrets indictment was unsealed, Lombardo went on the lam for nine months. And when he was brought before Zagel, the irrepressible clown quickly lived up to his nickname. The judge asked him why he had not seen a doctor lately.
"I was supposed to see him nine months ago," Lombardo rasped, "but I was -- what do they call it? -- I was unavailable."
"A little joke now and then never hurts," he told the trial. But the jury found him responsible for gunning down a federal witness.
The jury also found Calabrese responsible for seven murders.
His own brother, Nicholas Calabrese, 66, testified that Frank liked to strangle victims with a rope and slash their throats to make sure they were dead.
Nicholas Calabrese became the government's star witness after he dropped a bloody glove near the scene of a mob murder. He agreed to talk out of fear that agents would match his DNA to that on the glove and he would be sentenced to death.
Among other things, he said his brother Frank liked to give names to their mob hits.
One was known as "Strangers in the Night," he testified. That was because the Frank Sinatra song was playing on the jukebox while two men were strangled in 1978 in a suburban Cicero restaurant.
Marcello was at one time the mob's big boss, according to federal investigators.
The jury held him among those responsible for the murder of Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro, at one time the Chicago mob's man in Las Vegas and the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the movie "Casino."
Spilotro and his brother Michael were found buried in a shallow grave in an Indiana cornfield.
Doyle is the only one of those convicted at the trial who is not accused of direct involvement in the murders.
Schiro was sentenced to prison for 5 1/2 years in 2002 for being part of a gang of jewel thieves run by the former chief of detectives of the Chicago police department, William Hanhardt. Prosecutors claimed he was to blame for a mob hit in Phoenix. But the jury deadlocked on the case.
Nicholas Calabrese is to be sentenced Feb. 23.
Thanks to CBS2
Blagojevich's Brother Tied to Betty Loren-Maltese
His last name is Blagojevich but his first name is Robert. He's the older brother of the embattled Illinois governor.
Who is Robert Blagojevich and why was the FBI listening to his cell phone calls?
Robert Blagojevich has been his 'brother's keeper' since last August or at least the keeper of his brother's multi-million dollar campaign fund, a political fund that Robert Blagojevich's lawyer says is likely to be indicted before it's all over.
The I-Team found that one of the most puzzling questions about the governor's brother concerns someone else's campaign fund.
On election night 2002, when Rod Blagojevich watched the returns roll in and won his first term as Illinois governor, brother Robert was there with him. But at the same time, according to state election records, Robert's financial services firm had an interest in another Illinois elected official, Betty Loren Maltese.
Maltese is the controversial and now imprisoned mayor of Cicero.
For more than two years, Maltese' bulging campaign fund had invested millions of dollars through a company headquartered in Tampa, Florida, the firm Invest Financial Corporation. Its CEO at the time was Robert Blagojevich, the governor's older brother.
State records show that between July of 2000 and September of 2002, Robert Blagojevich's company paid Maltese' campaign fund nearly $3.3 million. The dozens of entries are listed as investment dividends, interest and proceeds from the sale of U.S. Treasury bills.
Some of the investment payments from Robert Blagojevich's company occurred even after Mayor Maltese was convicted of swindling $12 million from the town through an insurance firm.
Lawyer Michael Ettinger, who represents the governor's brother in the current federal investigation, was unaware of the link to Betty Loren Maltese.
On Wednesday at the I-Team's request, Ettinger had Robert Blagojevich review the state records and Blagojevich reported that "he knows nothing about it" and that the investments must have been made by some other affiliated bank even though his was listed 41 times.
Since taking over as chairman of his brother's campaign fund, Robert Blagojevich has been paid $12,500 a month.
The FBI listened to as many as 50 phone calls between Robert, his brother the governor and others. Many of the calls were from Nashville, Tennessee where Robert Blagojevich lives in a stately colonial. The former U.S. Army commander is a real estate developer there, and a key fundraiser and board member for the YMCA.
"Selfless person, doesn't want recognition. Actually would rather not have it," said Michael Check, Nashville YMCA. But when federal authorities charged the governor last month, his brother was "fundraiser a" in the criminal complaint. In one conversation the governor allegedly told his brother that he wanted to collect cash upfront for the appointment to Barack Obama's Senate seat.
It was just a few months earlier, in May, that Robert Blagojevich gave the commencement speech at his alma mater, University of Tampa.
Oddly, even though his brother the governor also attended University of Tampa, Robert did not once utter his brother's name during the speech.
As for the Betty Loren Maltese financial affair, there are Blagojevich family ties to the crooked mayor of Cicero.
Governor Blagojevich and ex-mayor Maltese have one friend in common: Eddie Vrdolyak, the former Chicago alderman and longtime village attorney in Cicero. Gov. Blagojevich's first job was as a clerk in Vrdolyak's law firm and it was a relationship that rekindled when Blagojevich was elected governor. Vyrdolyak himself is now headed to federal prison for a kickback scheme involving one of the governor's top appointees.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Who is Robert Blagojevich and why was the FBI listening to his cell phone calls?
Robert Blagojevich has been his 'brother's keeper' since last August or at least the keeper of his brother's multi-million dollar campaign fund, a political fund that Robert Blagojevich's lawyer says is likely to be indicted before it's all over.
The I-Team found that one of the most puzzling questions about the governor's brother concerns someone else's campaign fund.
On election night 2002, when Rod Blagojevich watched the returns roll in and won his first term as Illinois governor, brother Robert was there with him. But at the same time, according to state election records, Robert's financial services firm had an interest in another Illinois elected official, Betty Loren Maltese.
Maltese is the controversial and now imprisoned mayor of Cicero.
For more than two years, Maltese' bulging campaign fund had invested millions of dollars through a company headquartered in Tampa, Florida, the firm Invest Financial Corporation. Its CEO at the time was Robert Blagojevich, the governor's older brother.
State records show that between July of 2000 and September of 2002, Robert Blagojevich's company paid Maltese' campaign fund nearly $3.3 million. The dozens of entries are listed as investment dividends, interest and proceeds from the sale of U.S. Treasury bills.
Some of the investment payments from Robert Blagojevich's company occurred even after Mayor Maltese was convicted of swindling $12 million from the town through an insurance firm.
Lawyer Michael Ettinger, who represents the governor's brother in the current federal investigation, was unaware of the link to Betty Loren Maltese.
On Wednesday at the I-Team's request, Ettinger had Robert Blagojevich review the state records and Blagojevich reported that "he knows nothing about it" and that the investments must have been made by some other affiliated bank even though his was listed 41 times.
Since taking over as chairman of his brother's campaign fund, Robert Blagojevich has been paid $12,500 a month.
The FBI listened to as many as 50 phone calls between Robert, his brother the governor and others. Many of the calls were from Nashville, Tennessee where Robert Blagojevich lives in a stately colonial. The former U.S. Army commander is a real estate developer there, and a key fundraiser and board member for the YMCA.
"Selfless person, doesn't want recognition. Actually would rather not have it," said Michael Check, Nashville YMCA. But when federal authorities charged the governor last month, his brother was "fundraiser a" in the criminal complaint. In one conversation the governor allegedly told his brother that he wanted to collect cash upfront for the appointment to Barack Obama's Senate seat.
It was just a few months earlier, in May, that Robert Blagojevich gave the commencement speech at his alma mater, University of Tampa.
Oddly, even though his brother the governor also attended University of Tampa, Robert did not once utter his brother's name during the speech.
As for the Betty Loren Maltese financial affair, there are Blagojevich family ties to the crooked mayor of Cicero.
Governor Blagojevich and ex-mayor Maltese have one friend in common: Eddie Vrdolyak, the former Chicago alderman and longtime village attorney in Cicero. Gov. Blagojevich's first job was as a clerk in Vrdolyak's law firm and it was a relationship that rekindled when Blagojevich was elected governor. Vyrdolyak himself is now headed to federal prison for a kickback scheme involving one of the governor's top appointees.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
FRONTLINE/WORLD TELLS THE INSIDE STORY OF AN ANTI-MAFIA MOVEMENT IN ITALY
Near the start of this episode of the PBS international newsmagazine FRONTLINE/World, Vincenzo Conticello, a restaurant owner in Palermo, Sicily, describes his first run-in with the Mafia: “A man I had never seen before asked to meet with me and said: ‘I’m your tax collector. ... Pay me $800 a month, and you’ll have no more problems.’” Conticello continues: “I looked at him. I felt an intense fear. Still to this day, when I think about it, my heart drops. I lost my breath. The Mafia was right there in front of me.” The surprising tale of what happened next to Conticello would open a new chapter in the region’s long history of Mafia dominance and provide the dramatic spine of a story that would resonate through Italy. “I realized that it wasn't just my personal battle,” Conticello tells FRONTLINE/World. “It was the battle of an entire city.”
In Taking on the Mafia, airing Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2009, at 9:00 p.m. ET on PBS (check local listings), FRONTLINE/World producer and reporter Carola Mamberto tells the inside story of how the restaurant owner—backed by an upstart anti-Mafia movement of young people and an elite anti-Mafia law enforcement team—combined for a rare victory in the nation’s uphill battle against mob bosses who have kept the country in their grip for decades.
“The Mafia feeds itself as if it were Dracula, this vampire that bites into people and sucks the economy,” says Lirio Abbate, whose controversial recent exposé on the Mafia led to an attempt on his life. “Shop owners and businessmen are scared, and so they pay and don’t report it. Some are so terrified that they’ll deny it in court, even if they are caught on film.”
To catch mafiosi in the act and to persuade their extortion victims to cooperate, the police have undertaken an extensive surveillance effort. In the case of Conticello’s restaurant, the police cameras rolled as one mobster after another entered the restaurant to get him to pay the extortion which locals call “the pizzo.” “In Palermo, 80 percent of businesses pay the pizzo,” one of Sicily’s top anti-Mafia cops, Jacopo Mannucci, tells FRONTLINE/World. “Even market stands pay protection. They pay $80 to $150. For larger companies, the payments can be thousands of dollars, up to $15,000 per month.”
Paying the pizzo to the Mafia has been a pillar of Mafia power for decades, but after a series of high-profile Mafia murders in Palermo, an anti-Mafia spirit began to grow among the city’s next generation, among them two young people considering opening a pub who instead started a protest movement after they realized they’d be forced to give a larger part of their profits to the mob. “Why [did we decide] to focus on the pizzo rather than drugs, weapons or other shady deals?” Laura Nocilla and Raffaele Genova, the founders of the Goodbye Pizzo movement, tell FRONTLINE/World. “Because we immediately realized that it was the tool for the Mafia to create a culture that accepts their control of the territory. If you take that away, everything else the Mafia does will collapse.”
Ultimately in this story, members of the Goodbye Pizzo movement—young people, shop owners and even some members of the Palermo establishment—pack a Palermo courtroom as the restaurant owner Conticello faces his moment of truth and points a finger at one of the men who had tried to shake him down, leading to some rare Mafia prosecutions. “What I have made is a small opening, a small hole,” Conticello says. “We have to hammer every day so that it becomes bigger, and we can advance in this ongoing war.”
In Taking on the Mafia, airing Tuesday, Jan. 27, 2009, at 9:00 p.m. ET on PBS (check local listings), FRONTLINE/World producer and reporter Carola Mamberto tells the inside story of how the restaurant owner—backed by an upstart anti-Mafia movement of young people and an elite anti-Mafia law enforcement team—combined for a rare victory in the nation’s uphill battle against mob bosses who have kept the country in their grip for decades.
“The Mafia feeds itself as if it were Dracula, this vampire that bites into people and sucks the economy,” says Lirio Abbate, whose controversial recent exposé on the Mafia led to an attempt on his life. “Shop owners and businessmen are scared, and so they pay and don’t report it. Some are so terrified that they’ll deny it in court, even if they are caught on film.”
To catch mafiosi in the act and to persuade their extortion victims to cooperate, the police have undertaken an extensive surveillance effort. In the case of Conticello’s restaurant, the police cameras rolled as one mobster after another entered the restaurant to get him to pay the extortion which locals call “the pizzo.” “In Palermo, 80 percent of businesses pay the pizzo,” one of Sicily’s top anti-Mafia cops, Jacopo Mannucci, tells FRONTLINE/World. “Even market stands pay protection. They pay $80 to $150. For larger companies, the payments can be thousands of dollars, up to $15,000 per month.”
Paying the pizzo to the Mafia has been a pillar of Mafia power for decades, but after a series of high-profile Mafia murders in Palermo, an anti-Mafia spirit began to grow among the city’s next generation, among them two young people considering opening a pub who instead started a protest movement after they realized they’d be forced to give a larger part of their profits to the mob. “Why [did we decide] to focus on the pizzo rather than drugs, weapons or other shady deals?” Laura Nocilla and Raffaele Genova, the founders of the Goodbye Pizzo movement, tell FRONTLINE/World. “Because we immediately realized that it was the tool for the Mafia to create a culture that accepts their control of the territory. If you take that away, everything else the Mafia does will collapse.”
Ultimately in this story, members of the Goodbye Pizzo movement—young people, shop owners and even some members of the Palermo establishment—pack a Palermo courtroom as the restaurant owner Conticello faces his moment of truth and points a finger at one of the men who had tried to shake him down, leading to some rare Mafia prosecutions. “What I have made is a small opening, a small hole,” Conticello says. “We have to hammer every day so that it becomes bigger, and we can advance in this ongoing war.”
Underworld Histories 2: Chicago
IF YOU were an underworld mobster would you really like the nickname "The Clown", or "The German" – or what about "Mad Sam"?
Then there's "Joe Batters" – sounds like someone who works at a fish and chip shop, doesn't it?
But they are all real-life and real scary members of Chicago's underworld: Joey "The Clown" Lombardo (also known as Lumpy), Frank "The German" Schweihs and Samuele "Mad Sam" DeStefano.
Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo (also known as Big Tuna) was the chief executive of the Chicago Outfit, that city's notorious crime gang founded by none other than Al Capone. According to this doco, Accardo earned the Joe Batters moniker because of "his talent of breaking skulls with a baseball bat".
Underworld Histories 2: Chicago is littered with such marvellously rich quotes which could be discarded as the stuff of comic book gratuitousness if it weren't recorded fact.
Like this quote from a former mob member about an associate who was being tortured with an ice pick: "Billy wouldn't come up with anything, so finally they stuck his head in a vice and they started tightening until . . ."
(OK, look away now, or up to the ceiling, like the camera does in Reservoir Dogs when they're ripping that guy's ear off, because I'm about to give you the end of this quote and it's a bit squeamy. So skip to the next paragraph if you need.)
". . . until his eyeball popped out. Then they cut his throat."
Eeee-yuk. Horrible, horrible stuff . . . but you just have to watch it somehow – like a train wreck. Or like when I saw Huey Lewis from the '80s band Huey Lewis And The News playing the part of celebrity lawyer Billy Flynn in Chicago on Broadway a few years back.
He was awful . . . eye-poppingly awful. It was a wonder a Chicago mobster on vacation in New York didn't open his violin case and rat-a-tat-tat him right there on stage. But back to America's "second city".
Underworld Histories 2: Chicago details the rise and fall of the Outfit from the Prohibition days of the 1920s through to the wild and wicked '60s and '70s and touches on how the city now copes with its bloody heritage, saying law enforcement agencies now have the upper hand on mobsters.
"For the people of Chicago," the narrator (who's Rory O'Shea, by the way, but who really sounds like he's channelling Phil Hartman's Simpsons character Troy McClure) says, "organised crime is the history and the foundation of the city."
The underworld of Chicago was just that. The city is located on the banks of Lake Michigan and in the mid 19th century much of it was built on stilts to avoid flooding. The bullets and bashings went on in the gloomy shadows around those stilts. But there were a few light moments in the history of the Outfit – the classic being Mad Sam DeStefano.
There's some great footage of him arriving for a pre-trial in the mid-1960s.
He's carried into court on a stretcher and he's rambling incoherently through a bullhorn to the crowds outside.
It looks like a scene from Get Smart. But once again, there is a seriousness behind all this.
DeStefano was convicted of rape and sentenced to three years' imprisonment when he was just 18. He was known as Mad Sam for his sadistic torture methods and the way he'd froth at the mouth and laugh uncontrollably when being interviewed by police.
Considered by some to be a devil worshipper, he also built his own sound-proof torture chamber in his basement.
If ever Heath Ledger had needed an archetype for The Joker, then this was the guy.
Actually, come to think of it, Huey Lewis doesn't look too horrendous against these mobsters. Now that's scary.
Thanks to Geoff Shearer
Then there's "Joe Batters" – sounds like someone who works at a fish and chip shop, doesn't it?
But they are all real-life and real scary members of Chicago's underworld: Joey "The Clown" Lombardo (also known as Lumpy), Frank "The German" Schweihs and Samuele "Mad Sam" DeStefano.
Tony "Joe Batters" Accardo (also known as Big Tuna) was the chief executive of the Chicago Outfit, that city's notorious crime gang founded by none other than Al Capone. According to this doco, Accardo earned the Joe Batters moniker because of "his talent of breaking skulls with a baseball bat".
Underworld Histories 2: Chicago is littered with such marvellously rich quotes which could be discarded as the stuff of comic book gratuitousness if it weren't recorded fact.
Like this quote from a former mob member about an associate who was being tortured with an ice pick: "Billy wouldn't come up with anything, so finally they stuck his head in a vice and they started tightening until . . ."
(OK, look away now, or up to the ceiling, like the camera does in Reservoir Dogs when they're ripping that guy's ear off, because I'm about to give you the end of this quote and it's a bit squeamy. So skip to the next paragraph if you need.)
". . . until his eyeball popped out. Then they cut his throat."
Eeee-yuk. Horrible, horrible stuff . . . but you just have to watch it somehow – like a train wreck. Or like when I saw Huey Lewis from the '80s band Huey Lewis And The News playing the part of celebrity lawyer Billy Flynn in Chicago on Broadway a few years back.
He was awful . . . eye-poppingly awful. It was a wonder a Chicago mobster on vacation in New York didn't open his violin case and rat-a-tat-tat him right there on stage. But back to America's "second city".
Underworld Histories 2: Chicago details the rise and fall of the Outfit from the Prohibition days of the 1920s through to the wild and wicked '60s and '70s and touches on how the city now copes with its bloody heritage, saying law enforcement agencies now have the upper hand on mobsters.
"For the people of Chicago," the narrator (who's Rory O'Shea, by the way, but who really sounds like he's channelling Phil Hartman's Simpsons character Troy McClure) says, "organised crime is the history and the foundation of the city."
The underworld of Chicago was just that. The city is located on the banks of Lake Michigan and in the mid 19th century much of it was built on stilts to avoid flooding. The bullets and bashings went on in the gloomy shadows around those stilts. But there were a few light moments in the history of the Outfit – the classic being Mad Sam DeStefano.
There's some great footage of him arriving for a pre-trial in the mid-1960s.
He's carried into court on a stretcher and he's rambling incoherently through a bullhorn to the crowds outside.
It looks like a scene from Get Smart. But once again, there is a seriousness behind all this.
DeStefano was convicted of rape and sentenced to three years' imprisonment when he was just 18. He was known as Mad Sam for his sadistic torture methods and the way he'd froth at the mouth and laugh uncontrollably when being interviewed by police.
Considered by some to be a devil worshipper, he also built his own sound-proof torture chamber in his basement.
If ever Heath Ledger had needed an archetype for The Joker, then this was the guy.
Actually, come to think of it, Huey Lewis doesn't look too horrendous against these mobsters. Now that's scary.
Thanks to Geoff Shearer
Friday, January 23, 2009
$5,000 Reward Offered for Capture of Chicago Gangster
Robert D. Grant, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is asking for the public's help in locating GILBERTO VARGAS, age 31, whose last known address was 6134 North Kedzie in Chicago. VARGAS has been the subject of a nationwide manhunt, coordinated by Chicago FBI's Joint Task Force on Gangs (JTFG), since October of 2008 when he was charged in a criminal complaint filed in U.S. District Court in Chicago with violation of federal drug laws.
VARGAS is alleged to be a member of the Spanish Cobras street gang and is believed responsible for overseeing the distribution of crack cocaine at various locations throughout the City of Chicago. VARGAS was among 30 suspected gang members and associates who were charged in October of 2008 as the result of an investigation code named "Operation Snake Charmer". VARGAS is one of only two defendants from this investigation, who is still at large.
VARGAS is described as a Hispanic/male, 31 years of age, 6'2" tall, medium build, weighing approximately 180 pounds. He has black hair, brown eyes and slight facial hair. He is also known to use the street name of "Twin" as he has a twin brother with the same name, Gilberto Vargas. VARGAS has the letters "MOB" tattooed on his left arm and the phrase "Trust no nigga, Love no bitch" tattooed on his stomach.
In appealing to the public for help in locating VARGAS, Mr. Grant announced that a reward of up to $5,000 is being offered for information leading to his location and arrest. Anyone recognizing VARGAS or having any information as to his current whereabouts is asked to call the Chicago FBI at (312) 421-6700.
VARGAS has an extensive criminal record, including charges for crimes of violence, and as such should be considered "Armed and Dangerous".
The Chicago FBI's Joint Task Force on Gangs is comprised of FBI Special Agents and Detectives from the CPD, Gang Crimes Unit.
The public is reminded that a complaint is not evidence of guilt and that all defendants in a criminal case are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
VARGAS is alleged to be a member of the Spanish Cobras street gang and is believed responsible for overseeing the distribution of crack cocaine at various locations throughout the City of Chicago. VARGAS was among 30 suspected gang members and associates who were charged in October of 2008 as the result of an investigation code named "Operation Snake Charmer". VARGAS is one of only two defendants from this investigation, who is still at large.
VARGAS is described as a Hispanic/male, 31 years of age, 6'2" tall, medium build, weighing approximately 180 pounds. He has black hair, brown eyes and slight facial hair. He is also known to use the street name of "Twin" as he has a twin brother with the same name, Gilberto Vargas. VARGAS has the letters "MOB" tattooed on his left arm and the phrase "Trust no nigga, Love no bitch" tattooed on his stomach.
In appealing to the public for help in locating VARGAS, Mr. Grant announced that a reward of up to $5,000 is being offered for information leading to his location and arrest. Anyone recognizing VARGAS or having any information as to his current whereabouts is asked to call the Chicago FBI at (312) 421-6700.
VARGAS has an extensive criminal record, including charges for crimes of violence, and as such should be considered "Armed and Dangerous".
The Chicago FBI's Joint Task Force on Gangs is comprised of FBI Special Agents and Detectives from the CPD, Gang Crimes Unit.
The public is reminded that a complaint is not evidence of guilt and that all defendants in a criminal case are presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
Upper Level Black Mafia Gangster Pursued by U.S. Marshals on America's Most Wanted
Paul Buford: Deputy U.S. Marshals in Detroit say they're hot on the trail of an elusive gang member, wanted for his role in the upper echelon of the Black Mafia Family criminal organization. Paul Buford has a long, violent criminal past, and he's the only fugitive not yet captured as a result of the DEA's first wave of national BMF arrests.
Darryl Crenshaw: Deputy U.S. Marshals say accused Connecticut girlfriend-killer Darryl Crenshaw slipped into Mexico to escape from authorities. But an AMW tipster remembered seeing that familiar face in a Mexican jail -- and helped take Crenshaw down.
Marjan Rroku: When two teenage Albanian sisters met Marjan Rroku at a Bible study group, they thought he was a great guy. But five years later, he had taken the life of one sister and sent the other fleeing to the US. After a close encounter on a Washington D.C. Metro train, police fear the killer is in pursuit again.
Jose Sastre-Cintron: Police say when a man known as Jose Sastre-Cintron proudly flashed his gun at a house party in Harrisonburg, Va., people knew there'd be trouble. But no one could have guessed just how much: before the melee was through, cops say Sastre-Cintron would shoot an 18-year-old girl, steal a car, and disappear into the night.
Greg Adrian: Cops in the City Of Angels are on the lookout for a father accused of physically and sexually abusing his own 12-year-old daughter in November of 2007. When Adrian's daughter blew the whistle on his latest string of abuse, police say he fled to Vegas. Now, Los Angeles detectives believe that Adrian is in the north Las Vegas area and could be traveling in a 1990's, red, 4-door Honda sedan.
Danny Williams: Cops say that Danny Williams shot two unarmed men after a neighborhood barbecue. Now, police need your help to get this armed and dangerous thug off the streets.
Unknown Sandra Brady Killer: It was one of New Mexico's most mysterious unsolved Jane Doe cases: a pair of hikers found a murder victim, buried in a shallow grave in the unforgiving desert. But when AMW brought you the story two weeks ago, a tipster called our hotline and helped cops crack the case. The "Boots" Jane Doe now has a name: Sandra Jean Brady.
Robert Fisher: Cops in Scottsdale, Ariz. say Robert Fisher murdered his entire family and blew up their home to cover his tracks. Police are working a few promising leads and they're re-analyzing some of the physical evidence recovered from Fisher's abandoned getaway to get a better DNA profile.
Unknown Phillip Washington Killer: Dallas money courier Phillip Washington, 50, was brutally killed while he made his last stop of the night a year ago, and his tragic death was caught on surveillance tape. Now, one of his old friends -- a prominent local journalist -- has come to AMW.com to get his family some justice.
Cameron Pitre: According to cops, Cameron Pitre murdered his ex-girlfriend on Nov. 23, 2008. Police say Pitre had become increasingly hostile, and Ashley Hardey, his ex-girlfriend, was very cautious in his company. Despite her wariness, Ashley was murdered when police say Pitre forced his way into Ashley's home and shot her multiple times.
Darryl Crenshaw: Deputy U.S. Marshals say accused Connecticut girlfriend-killer Darryl Crenshaw slipped into Mexico to escape from authorities. But an AMW tipster remembered seeing that familiar face in a Mexican jail -- and helped take Crenshaw down.
Marjan Rroku: When two teenage Albanian sisters met Marjan Rroku at a Bible study group, they thought he was a great guy. But five years later, he had taken the life of one sister and sent the other fleeing to the US. After a close encounter on a Washington D.C. Metro train, police fear the killer is in pursuit again.
Jose Sastre-Cintron: Police say when a man known as Jose Sastre-Cintron proudly flashed his gun at a house party in Harrisonburg, Va., people knew there'd be trouble. But no one could have guessed just how much: before the melee was through, cops say Sastre-Cintron would shoot an 18-year-old girl, steal a car, and disappear into the night.
Greg Adrian: Cops in the City Of Angels are on the lookout for a father accused of physically and sexually abusing his own 12-year-old daughter in November of 2007. When Adrian's daughter blew the whistle on his latest string of abuse, police say he fled to Vegas. Now, Los Angeles detectives believe that Adrian is in the north Las Vegas area and could be traveling in a 1990's, red, 4-door Honda sedan.
Danny Williams: Cops say that Danny Williams shot two unarmed men after a neighborhood barbecue. Now, police need your help to get this armed and dangerous thug off the streets.
Unknown Sandra Brady Killer: It was one of New Mexico's most mysterious unsolved Jane Doe cases: a pair of hikers found a murder victim, buried in a shallow grave in the unforgiving desert. But when AMW brought you the story two weeks ago, a tipster called our hotline and helped cops crack the case. The "Boots" Jane Doe now has a name: Sandra Jean Brady.
Robert Fisher: Cops in Scottsdale, Ariz. say Robert Fisher murdered his entire family and blew up their home to cover his tracks. Police are working a few promising leads and they're re-analyzing some of the physical evidence recovered from Fisher's abandoned getaway to get a better DNA profile.
Unknown Phillip Washington Killer: Dallas money courier Phillip Washington, 50, was brutally killed while he made his last stop of the night a year ago, and his tragic death was caught on surveillance tape. Now, one of his old friends -- a prominent local journalist -- has come to AMW.com to get his family some justice.
Cameron Pitre: According to cops, Cameron Pitre murdered his ex-girlfriend on Nov. 23, 2008. Police say Pitre had become increasingly hostile, and Ashley Hardey, his ex-girlfriend, was very cautious in his company. Despite her wariness, Ashley was murdered when police say Pitre forced his way into Ashley's home and shot her multiple times.
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Mob Connected to Multi-State Theft Ring?
There were new details Wednesday about possible mob connections to a multi-state theft ring broken up by Pennsylvania State Police.
Fox 29's Dave Schratwieser reports one of the defendants offered to wear a wire against the local mob and name names -- some very familiar names.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett mentioned possible mob connections to the theft ring. But now court documents and mob experts gave Fox 29 News an inside look at what those connections might be and where they might lead.
Authorities were tight-lipped about possible mob connections during Tuesday's takedown of an interstate theft ring that victimized area golfers, but they didn't deny a potential link. "There's a potential organized crime component, but we can't go into any great detail at this point on that," Corbett said.
The ring allegedly stole credit cards from golfers' cars at local country clubs to finance a $100,000 high-end shopping spree. Troopers wouldn't get specific, but court documents obtained by Fox 29 say accused ringleader Michael Pacitti offered to take troopers on a guided tour of the local mob.
"You've got an individual who was willing to give up some information, wear a wire, talk about organized crime, talk about drug dealing, talk about robberies," Inquirer mob reporter George Anastasia said.
Pacitti told troopers he would "do whatever's necessary" to stay out of jail. He promised to name names, but sources said he never mentioned mob boss Joe Ligambi or his top lieutenants. "It's intriguing because it's just another part of a big pot that's bubbling here," Anastasia said.
According to the court documents, after Pacitti offered to wear a wire against the mob in Philadelphia, he changed his mind, but then offered to give troopers information about one of his co-defendants and his ties to a well-known mobster under investigation across the bridge, in New Jersey.
That mobster was Nicky Scarfo Jr., the target of a wide-sweeping FBI probe. Pacitti said he could connect theft ring suspect Todd Stark to Scarfo. Starks' name already surfaced in that case and sources said he could face federal charges.
"This is all part of an ongoing investigation, an ongoing game, and these guys are caught in the middle of it," Anastasia said.
Sources said Pacitti's documented, but unsuccessful offer to help troopers paints him into a corner with both the mob and investigators. It's still unclear how much he really knows.
Stark on the other hand could be feeling the heat. State police said he and his co-defendants remain behind bars on $50,000 bail.
Thanks to Fox 29
Fox 29's Dave Schratwieser reports one of the defendants offered to wear a wire against the local mob and name names -- some very familiar names.
Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett mentioned possible mob connections to the theft ring. But now court documents and mob experts gave Fox 29 News an inside look at what those connections might be and where they might lead.
Authorities were tight-lipped about possible mob connections during Tuesday's takedown of an interstate theft ring that victimized area golfers, but they didn't deny a potential link. "There's a potential organized crime component, but we can't go into any great detail at this point on that," Corbett said.
The ring allegedly stole credit cards from golfers' cars at local country clubs to finance a $100,000 high-end shopping spree. Troopers wouldn't get specific, but court documents obtained by Fox 29 say accused ringleader Michael Pacitti offered to take troopers on a guided tour of the local mob.
"You've got an individual who was willing to give up some information, wear a wire, talk about organized crime, talk about drug dealing, talk about robberies," Inquirer mob reporter George Anastasia said.
Pacitti told troopers he would "do whatever's necessary" to stay out of jail. He promised to name names, but sources said he never mentioned mob boss Joe Ligambi or his top lieutenants. "It's intriguing because it's just another part of a big pot that's bubbling here," Anastasia said.
According to the court documents, after Pacitti offered to wear a wire against the mob in Philadelphia, he changed his mind, but then offered to give troopers information about one of his co-defendants and his ties to a well-known mobster under investigation across the bridge, in New Jersey.
That mobster was Nicky Scarfo Jr., the target of a wide-sweeping FBI probe. Pacitti said he could connect theft ring suspect Todd Stark to Scarfo. Starks' name already surfaced in that case and sources said he could face federal charges.
"This is all part of an ongoing investigation, an ongoing game, and these guys are caught in the middle of it," Anastasia said.
Sources said Pacitti's documented, but unsuccessful offer to help troopers paints him into a corner with both the mob and investigators. It's still unclear how much he really knows.
Stark on the other hand could be feeling the heat. State police said he and his co-defendants remain behind bars on $50,000 bail.
Thanks to Fox 29
Monday, January 19, 2009
Are the Mafia and the CIA Conspiring to Silence an American in Canda?
An American man claiming the Mafia and the CIA are conspiring to silence him -- just as they killed his father and grandfather -- was denied refugee protection in Canada because he could not prove the conspiracy in court.
The complicated tale of Michael Ellero, 44, of Phoenix, is told in some 700 pages of self-penned prose, a treatise he claims documents his work for the U. S. Department of Justice, payments by the Mafia to relatives of Hillary Clinton, and a nefarious campaign to destroy him after reporting office misdeeds to his boss -- including the involvement of a lawyer in the death of a colleague.
He claims the CIA used psychological tricks against him and the FBI was investigating his mysterious uncle, who had multiple identities. "My grandfather was killed, my father was killed, and [then] I learned that there was an attempt against me," Mr. Ellero wrote in documents presented in the Federal Court of Canada, seeking emergency permission to stay in Canada.
Family members were coerced to co-operate with the Mafia, his phone calls were intercepted, documents were stolen from his bedroom and his job applications were inexplicably ignored, he said.
He did not get a chance to make his full case, however, because of another alleged conspiracy, this one by Canadian officials, he claimed: He was not permitted to enter his treatise into evidence and portions of the audio recording of his refugee hearing were erased.
Further, he is indignant that a Canadian immigration official suggested he might have a mental problem.
Mr. Ellero came to Canada in 2005 and a month later made a claim for refugee protection.
"Allegedly, his opponents are fearful that the book he has written will be published in due course, thereby exposing the corruption 'in the federal government and elsewhere in the United States,' " Justice Michel Shore wrote in his 17-page ruling. "[He] claims he did not seek state protection from the U. S. authorities because he believes that the police cannot provide physical protection for him against 'the evil and perils of the world.' "
The Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) rejected his claim two years ago because he was found not to be credible. He appealed to the Federal Court to overturn that decision but was denied; he then made an unsuccessful motion for that decision to be reconsidered.
He next claimed that returning him to the United States would place his life in danger. Officials found "no substantial grounds to believe" such a fate awaited him. Mr. Ellero once again took his case to the Federal Court, asking that his pending deportation be halted.
After a hearing in Ottawa last month at which Mr. Ellero represented himself, Judge Shore denied his appeal. "An applicant's subjective fear of returning to his/her country does not constitute irreparable harm. Objective evidence of harm related to danger must be demonstrated," he ruled. "The applicant has not shown that he would be subject to a serious likelihood of jeopardy to his life, liberty or security as a result of the removal."
On Dec. 19,Mr. Ellero was turned over to U. S. officials south of Ottawa. He was inspected by U. S. border guards and released, said Kevin Cosaro, a spokesman for U. S. Customs and Border Protection.
Giovanna Gatti, a spokeswoman for the IRB, declined to comment on the specifics of Mr. Ellero's complaints, but said the Federal Court is the appropriate venue for anyone disputing the handling of their case.
Mr. Ellero could not be reached for comment.
Thanks to Adrian Humphreys
The complicated tale of Michael Ellero, 44, of Phoenix, is told in some 700 pages of self-penned prose, a treatise he claims documents his work for the U. S. Department of Justice, payments by the Mafia to relatives of Hillary Clinton, and a nefarious campaign to destroy him after reporting office misdeeds to his boss -- including the involvement of a lawyer in the death of a colleague.
He claims the CIA used psychological tricks against him and the FBI was investigating his mysterious uncle, who had multiple identities. "My grandfather was killed, my father was killed, and [then] I learned that there was an attempt against me," Mr. Ellero wrote in documents presented in the Federal Court of Canada, seeking emergency permission to stay in Canada.
Family members were coerced to co-operate with the Mafia, his phone calls were intercepted, documents were stolen from his bedroom and his job applications were inexplicably ignored, he said.
He did not get a chance to make his full case, however, because of another alleged conspiracy, this one by Canadian officials, he claimed: He was not permitted to enter his treatise into evidence and portions of the audio recording of his refugee hearing were erased.
Further, he is indignant that a Canadian immigration official suggested he might have a mental problem.
Mr. Ellero came to Canada in 2005 and a month later made a claim for refugee protection.
"Allegedly, his opponents are fearful that the book he has written will be published in due course, thereby exposing the corruption 'in the federal government and elsewhere in the United States,' " Justice Michel Shore wrote in his 17-page ruling. "[He] claims he did not seek state protection from the U. S. authorities because he believes that the police cannot provide physical protection for him against 'the evil and perils of the world.' "
The Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) rejected his claim two years ago because he was found not to be credible. He appealed to the Federal Court to overturn that decision but was denied; he then made an unsuccessful motion for that decision to be reconsidered.
He next claimed that returning him to the United States would place his life in danger. Officials found "no substantial grounds to believe" such a fate awaited him. Mr. Ellero once again took his case to the Federal Court, asking that his pending deportation be halted.
After a hearing in Ottawa last month at which Mr. Ellero represented himself, Judge Shore denied his appeal. "An applicant's subjective fear of returning to his/her country does not constitute irreparable harm. Objective evidence of harm related to danger must be demonstrated," he ruled. "The applicant has not shown that he would be subject to a serious likelihood of jeopardy to his life, liberty or security as a result of the removal."
On Dec. 19,Mr. Ellero was turned over to U. S. officials south of Ottawa. He was inspected by U. S. border guards and released, said Kevin Cosaro, a spokesman for U. S. Customs and Border Protection.
Giovanna Gatti, a spokeswoman for the IRB, declined to comment on the specifics of Mr. Ellero's complaints, but said the Federal Court is the appropriate venue for anyone disputing the handling of their case.
Mr. Ellero could not be reached for comment.
Thanks to Adrian Humphreys
U.S. Marshal Teaches Students About Witness Protection Program
Taking a page out of a realistic fiction book, some eighth-grade students at St. Patrick’s School on Friday learned that a federal program aimed at toppling crime is literally a life-changing event.
Supervisory Deputy U.S. Marshal Tom Cassels has been in the federal agency since June 1992. He told about 30 students at the Terre Haute private school of his service as a federal marshal in the Witness Security Program, where he worked for about 21/2 years, starting in 1996.
That witness protection program was authorized by the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970 and amended by the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. Since its inception, more than 7,500 witnesses and more than 9,500 family members have entered the program, according to the U.S. Marshal Service’s Web site.
The program provides for the health and safety of government witnesses, along with their families, whose lives are in danger as a result of testimony against drug traffickers, organized crime members, terrorists or other major criminals. It involves relocating a person to a new community.
“We basically try to remove [witnesses] from an area that is threatening and put them in an area that is not threatening. It is basically a new identity,” Cassels said.
“The vast majority of these people were participants in a criminal activity or organization. The chance that someone is an innocent lamb that just happens to be there does happen, but not in most cases. These are people who weigh the options of going to prison for 30 years or testifying to help bring down people in the upper levels” of an organization, he said.
“No one has ever been killed or injured as long as they abide by the protocols of the program,” Cassels said.
Protocols, Cassels told students, include not contacting family members, friends or former boyfriends or girlfriends. “You have to severe all ties, period,” he said. “If it is grandma’s birthday, you don’t call her. If grandma dies, you don’t go to the funeral. That is one of the most dangerous times. That is when people say, ‘hey, this relative died, let’s see if anyone shows up.’”
“That is one of the main things than can get somebody terminated from the program, as you have to comply with all the restrictions and protocols,” he said.
Another violation is getting arrested, such as for drunk driving. A police department, using a person’s fingerprints, could discover a person’s previous identity. “We can’t lie to another [police] department,” Cassels said.
The students have been reading “Zach’s Lie,” a book published in 2001 by author Roland Smith. The book follows fictional 13-year-old Jack Osborne, whose father flies a small airplane that actually is a front for illegal drug trafficking. After his father’s arrest, his father’s former “business associates” don’t want him to talk. His family is placed into the federal Witness Security Program. Jack Osborne has to change his name to Zach Granger and moves from Texas to Elko, Nev., along with his mother and sister.
To bring the book to life, school librarian Tammy Kikta had students eat lunch family style, much like was done at the Nevada Hotel in the book. In addition, a room was decorated much like a custodian’s work room under a high school stage, where the book’s character gets away from criminals who had discovered the family in Nevada.
Cassels said relocating is “very, very hard, especially on a kid.” He said in some cases, worried parents have not let children “out to play in a year, fearing they would say a name or say where they used to live.”
Still, once placed into a safe environment, which includes a new job, witnesses are generally on their own security-wise, Cassels said. He said witnesses have to get a job and work to support their families. Most of the effort is on their part. If they are willing to work for themselves, the program will work to assist them,” he said.
Christopher Schenck, a 13-year-old eighth-grader at St. Pat’s, said the book and the visit from Cassels taught him the Witness Security Program “is a life-changing program. You really have to leave your life behind.”
Prior to hearing Cassels, students used a computer program to change hair color or eye color, as if in the program. Cassels said he could not comment if that was common practice, but said generally it is enough to geographically move a person to where someone would not recognize him. “It is really enough to hide in plain sight,” he said.
Thanks to Howard Greninger
Supervisory Deputy U.S. Marshal Tom Cassels has been in the federal agency since June 1992. He told about 30 students at the Terre Haute private school of his service as a federal marshal in the Witness Security Program, where he worked for about 21/2 years, starting in 1996.
That witness protection program was authorized by the Organized Crime Control Act of 1970 and amended by the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984. Since its inception, more than 7,500 witnesses and more than 9,500 family members have entered the program, according to the U.S. Marshal Service’s Web site.
The program provides for the health and safety of government witnesses, along with their families, whose lives are in danger as a result of testimony against drug traffickers, organized crime members, terrorists or other major criminals. It involves relocating a person to a new community.
“We basically try to remove [witnesses] from an area that is threatening and put them in an area that is not threatening. It is basically a new identity,” Cassels said.
“The vast majority of these people were participants in a criminal activity or organization. The chance that someone is an innocent lamb that just happens to be there does happen, but not in most cases. These are people who weigh the options of going to prison for 30 years or testifying to help bring down people in the upper levels” of an organization, he said.
“No one has ever been killed or injured as long as they abide by the protocols of the program,” Cassels said.
Protocols, Cassels told students, include not contacting family members, friends or former boyfriends or girlfriends. “You have to severe all ties, period,” he said. “If it is grandma’s birthday, you don’t call her. If grandma dies, you don’t go to the funeral. That is one of the most dangerous times. That is when people say, ‘hey, this relative died, let’s see if anyone shows up.’”
“That is one of the main things than can get somebody terminated from the program, as you have to comply with all the restrictions and protocols,” he said.
Another violation is getting arrested, such as for drunk driving. A police department, using a person’s fingerprints, could discover a person’s previous identity. “We can’t lie to another [police] department,” Cassels said.
The students have been reading “Zach’s Lie,” a book published in 2001 by author Roland Smith. The book follows fictional 13-year-old Jack Osborne, whose father flies a small airplane that actually is a front for illegal drug trafficking. After his father’s arrest, his father’s former “business associates” don’t want him to talk. His family is placed into the federal Witness Security Program. Jack Osborne has to change his name to Zach Granger and moves from Texas to Elko, Nev., along with his mother and sister.
To bring the book to life, school librarian Tammy Kikta had students eat lunch family style, much like was done at the Nevada Hotel in the book. In addition, a room was decorated much like a custodian’s work room under a high school stage, where the book’s character gets away from criminals who had discovered the family in Nevada.
Cassels said relocating is “very, very hard, especially on a kid.” He said in some cases, worried parents have not let children “out to play in a year, fearing they would say a name or say where they used to live.”
Still, once placed into a safe environment, which includes a new job, witnesses are generally on their own security-wise, Cassels said. He said witnesses have to get a job and work to support their families. Most of the effort is on their part. If they are willing to work for themselves, the program will work to assist them,” he said.
Christopher Schenck, a 13-year-old eighth-grader at St. Pat’s, said the book and the visit from Cassels taught him the Witness Security Program “is a life-changing program. You really have to leave your life behind.”
Prior to hearing Cassels, students used a computer program to change hair color or eye color, as if in the program. Cassels said he could not comment if that was common practice, but said generally it is enough to geographically move a person to where someone would not recognize him. “It is really enough to hide in plain sight,” he said.
Thanks to Howard Greninger
More Future Presidential Candidates from Chicago?
The Weather Channel reported record low temperatures across the Midwest Friday, setting new records in Chicago. The wind chill index was fifty degrees below zero at O'Hare Airport. Now everyone wants to run for president just to get out of Chicago.
Thanks to Argus Hamilton
Thanks to Argus Hamilton
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Is Mob Killer Confined Like Hannibal Lecter?
He may not have been a cannibal like movie madman Hannibal Lecter, but a lawyer for prolific mob killer Frank Calabrese Sr. says the Chicago Outfit boss is confined in jail just like the fictional psychopath in "Silence of the Lambs."
Calabrese attorney Joe "The Shark" Lopez filed a pre-sentencing motion in federal court alleging that "the Defendant (Calabrese, Sr.) is shackled like Hannibal Lecter in the movie 'Silence of the Lambs'. As a result, the Defendant cannot shake his attorney's hand which is a civilized way to greet another person. The Defendant also cannot read a document on his own since his hands are shackled."
Hollywood's Hannibal Lector, a serial killer who would then devour his victims, was entombed in a subterranean prison from homicidally insane. Famously portrayed in 1991 by actor Anthony Hopkins, Lector was restrained in a straight-jacket and a muzzle, intended to prevent him from sinking his teeth into anyone else.
Lopez tells the I-Team that the only restraint not yet used on Calabrese is the protective face-mask. "I am sure it is coming," stated Lopez "and I think he will never leave (solitary confinement.) This is unheard of for a U.S. citizen. It's reserved for terrorists."
Calabrese, known in Outfit circles as "the Breeze," is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 28. The motion, which will be heard in court next Thursday, is aimed at gaining permission for Calabrese to meet with a private investigator hired by Mr. Lopez.
As the I-Team reported in December, Calabrese has been held in solitary confinement after authorities say they determined he was a violent security threat.
"The Defendant does not know which information the Attorney General was provided; but, it is his position that it is false" Calabrese contends in the court motion. "Accordingly, he is ready to submit to a lie detector test along with the persons who may have made false statements to representatives of the United States."
Lopez maintains that it is impossible for Calabrese to prepare for his defense while being held like Hannibal Lecter. "The Defendant's calls are restricted; and, as of today's date, he has not seen his children. He has seen his wife with whom he was allowed a visit through a glass window and shackled" states the motion.
Among the children Calabrese has not seen, is his Frank Jr. who testified against him during the Operation Family Secrets mob murder trial in 2007. Calabrese believes that government prosecutors do not want him investigating what may have motivated his son to become a witness."Namely, the real reason he began to cooperate and the fact he recruited individual "A" to put the spin of the lousy father before the public eye rather than the real reason of avarice and greed," according to the filing.
A spokesman for United States Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald on Friday declined to comment on the Hannibal Lecter motion.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Calabrese attorney Joe "The Shark" Lopez filed a pre-sentencing motion in federal court alleging that "the Defendant (Calabrese, Sr.) is shackled like Hannibal Lecter in the movie 'Silence of the Lambs'. As a result, the Defendant cannot shake his attorney's hand which is a civilized way to greet another person. The Defendant also cannot read a document on his own since his hands are shackled."
Hollywood's Hannibal Lector, a serial killer who would then devour his victims, was entombed in a subterranean prison from homicidally insane. Famously portrayed in 1991 by actor Anthony Hopkins, Lector was restrained in a straight-jacket and a muzzle, intended to prevent him from sinking his teeth into anyone else.
Lopez tells the I-Team that the only restraint not yet used on Calabrese is the protective face-mask. "I am sure it is coming," stated Lopez "and I think he will never leave (solitary confinement.) This is unheard of for a U.S. citizen. It's reserved for terrorists."
Calabrese, known in Outfit circles as "the Breeze," is scheduled to be sentenced on Jan. 28. The motion, which will be heard in court next Thursday, is aimed at gaining permission for Calabrese to meet with a private investigator hired by Mr. Lopez.
As the I-Team reported in December, Calabrese has been held in solitary confinement after authorities say they determined he was a violent security threat.
"The Defendant does not know which information the Attorney General was provided; but, it is his position that it is false" Calabrese contends in the court motion. "Accordingly, he is ready to submit to a lie detector test along with the persons who may have made false statements to representatives of the United States."
Lopez maintains that it is impossible for Calabrese to prepare for his defense while being held like Hannibal Lecter. "The Defendant's calls are restricted; and, as of today's date, he has not seen his children. He has seen his wife with whom he was allowed a visit through a glass window and shackled" states the motion.
Among the children Calabrese has not seen, is his Frank Jr. who testified against him during the Operation Family Secrets mob murder trial in 2007. Calabrese believes that government prosecutors do not want him investigating what may have motivated his son to become a witness."Namely, the real reason he began to cooperate and the fact he recruited individual "A" to put the spin of the lousy father before the public eye rather than the real reason of avarice and greed," according to the filing.
A spokesman for United States Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald on Friday declined to comment on the Hannibal Lecter motion.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Restitution Filing Doubles Value Requested for Mob Murder Victims
In a separate court filing, the lives of 14 mob murder victims have gone up in value.
Federal prosecutors originally filed court motions last fall citing the earnings potential of victims and the monetary loss to their relatives. At that time, restitution to be paid by top Chicago mobsters convicted in Operation Family Secrets was put at $3.9 million.
Updated figures filed in federal court on Friday put the restitution at $7,450,686.00. Prosecutors say the increased value is based on new information provided to experts who figured the restitution. Government lawyers are asking the court to force lead mob defendants to split that figure five ways and be made to pay survivors of those who were rubbed out by assassins.
The convicted hoodlums who are being asked to pay up are: Frank Calabrese Sr., James "Jimmy the Man" Marcello, Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, Paul "The Indian" Schiro and Anthony "Twan" Doyle.
All of the men are due to be sentenced by the end of February, at which time Judge James Zagel is expected to impose restitution and also $20 million in fines that the government has requested.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Federal prosecutors originally filed court motions last fall citing the earnings potential of victims and the monetary loss to their relatives. At that time, restitution to be paid by top Chicago mobsters convicted in Operation Family Secrets was put at $3.9 million.
Updated figures filed in federal court on Friday put the restitution at $7,450,686.00. Prosecutors say the increased value is based on new information provided to experts who figured the restitution. Government lawyers are asking the court to force lead mob defendants to split that figure five ways and be made to pay survivors of those who were rubbed out by assassins.
The convicted hoodlums who are being asked to pay up are: Frank Calabrese Sr., James "Jimmy the Man" Marcello, Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, Paul "The Indian" Schiro and Anthony "Twan" Doyle.
All of the men are due to be sentenced by the end of February, at which time Judge James Zagel is expected to impose restitution and also $20 million in fines that the government has requested.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Despite Winning Multiple European Film Prizes, The Academy Awards Appear to Snub "Gomorra" for Now
OVER THE years, your correspondent has always been puzzled by the huge success of the American TV drama series The Sopranos , a work which dealt, in an often humorous way, with the everyday vicissitudes of a New Jersey mobster and his family.
Sure the series was cleverly scripted, brilliantly acted and intelligently told but, in the end, its hero was a violent godfather and the underlying protagonist was organised crime.
How would Irish viewers react to a soap opera about the Murphys in mid-80s Belfast and the difficulties they faced in trying to resolve the conflicting requirements of home life and being effective Provo operatives?
One suspects that no matter how well written the series was and no matter how many intriguing philosophical, social or political themes it touched, many in this country would still be outraged.
Organised crime is neither funny nor entertaining.
The point was perhaps made this week when Matteo Garrone’s film Gomorra , based on a hard-hitting expose of the Neapolitan Mafia, the Camorra, was adjudged by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts not good enough to make a shortlist of nine for the Oscar nominations for Best Foreign Language Film.
The academy boffins will no doubt tell us that, interesting as it is, Gomorra simply was not up to the mark.
Yet, how come the film picked up the Grand Prix award at Cannes last year, not to mention five prizes at the 2008 European Film Awards?
How come Gomorra , based on the two-million-plus bestseller by Roberto Saviano, has won widespread critical acclaim not only in Italy but also across Europe? No, clearly this is a good and important film but one for which Hollywood simply does not have the stomach.
The Mafia are just fine when it is a question of mobster Tony Soprano in a heart to heart chat with his therapist but a lot less appetising, it would seem, when we we are talking about the grizzly, bloody and violent everyday drug-reality of today’s Naples.
Naples-born Italian film director Gabriele Salvatores, himself a Foreign Film Oscar winner in 1992 with Mediterraneo, finds the exclusion of Gomorra “absurd”.
He believes Academy members tend to prefer films aimed at the widest possible public, telling Turin daily La Stampa this week: “Sure, Gomorra might seem difficult because there is no obvious storyline to follow, no central character with whom to identify and because it doesn’t have a happy ending, but we are in 2009.”
Maybe the Academy has a point. Cinema and show business, after all, are about entertainment and there is nothing entertaining about organised crime.
The grimy, grubby cinéma vérité style of Gomorra has been called “too realistic” by one British critic, who said he had difficulty working out whether he was watching “real people or professional actors”.
In truth, this was a fair observation since at least three members of the Gomorra cast have subsequently been arrested for Camorra-related offences. It seems that some small-time godfathers just could not resist the chance of acting in a film, acting out their own everyday lives.
Curiously, in the very week that Gomorra was being overlooked for the Oscars, life not so much imitated as outstripped art when wanted Camorra killer Giuseppe Setola was arrested near Caserta, close to Naples.
Setola, a member of the Casalesi family, which features in Saviano’s book, was arrested on Wednesday after a three-day flight that began with him escaping down a sewer and ended with a dramatic rooftop chase. Wanted by police for no less than 18 murders in the last nine months, (including the killing of six Africans at Castel Volturno last September), Setola allegedly has a great devotion to the Kalashnikov rifle.
One ex-Camorrista, now turned state’s witness, told investigators that when he was deciding to pull off a “job”, Setola would tell his “soldiers”: “I’ve already got a life sentence and I’ve nothing to lose, so we’ll do this my way – we go in shooting, we’re not here to make jewellery.”
In today’s world, much has been (correctly) made of the fact that organised crime has long since moved into a whole series of legitimate businesses, including high finance, as a way to recycle its drug-created money. Setola, however, was not one such “financier”.
Describing him this week, senior Neapolitan mafia investigator Franco Roberto said: “Setola is no psychopath. He is neither mad nor a fanatic. He does not kill in the name of Allah, he kills only for business.”
Living in grime and filth, and literally like a sewer rat, hardly makes for your average Hollywood hero. The problem about Gomorra is that it features many such unappetising characters.
Perhaps, this is just one case where the Hollywood boffins simply cannot stand too much reality. That is, of course, unless the Academy intends to give the Best Picture Award to Gomorra and prove us all wrong.
Thanks to Paddy Agnew
Sure the series was cleverly scripted, brilliantly acted and intelligently told but, in the end, its hero was a violent godfather and the underlying protagonist was organised crime.
How would Irish viewers react to a soap opera about the Murphys in mid-80s Belfast and the difficulties they faced in trying to resolve the conflicting requirements of home life and being effective Provo operatives?
One suspects that no matter how well written the series was and no matter how many intriguing philosophical, social or political themes it touched, many in this country would still be outraged.
Organised crime is neither funny nor entertaining.
The point was perhaps made this week when Matteo Garrone’s film Gomorra , based on a hard-hitting expose of the Neapolitan Mafia, the Camorra, was adjudged by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts not good enough to make a shortlist of nine for the Oscar nominations for Best Foreign Language Film.
The academy boffins will no doubt tell us that, interesting as it is, Gomorra simply was not up to the mark.
Yet, how come the film picked up the Grand Prix award at Cannes last year, not to mention five prizes at the 2008 European Film Awards?
How come Gomorra , based on the two-million-plus bestseller by Roberto Saviano, has won widespread critical acclaim not only in Italy but also across Europe? No, clearly this is a good and important film but one for which Hollywood simply does not have the stomach.
The Mafia are just fine when it is a question of mobster Tony Soprano in a heart to heart chat with his therapist but a lot less appetising, it would seem, when we we are talking about the grizzly, bloody and violent everyday drug-reality of today’s Naples.
Naples-born Italian film director Gabriele Salvatores, himself a Foreign Film Oscar winner in 1992 with Mediterraneo, finds the exclusion of Gomorra “absurd”.
He believes Academy members tend to prefer films aimed at the widest possible public, telling Turin daily La Stampa this week: “Sure, Gomorra might seem difficult because there is no obvious storyline to follow, no central character with whom to identify and because it doesn’t have a happy ending, but we are in 2009.”
Maybe the Academy has a point. Cinema and show business, after all, are about entertainment and there is nothing entertaining about organised crime.
The grimy, grubby cinéma vérité style of Gomorra has been called “too realistic” by one British critic, who said he had difficulty working out whether he was watching “real people or professional actors”.
In truth, this was a fair observation since at least three members of the Gomorra cast have subsequently been arrested for Camorra-related offences. It seems that some small-time godfathers just could not resist the chance of acting in a film, acting out their own everyday lives.
Curiously, in the very week that Gomorra was being overlooked for the Oscars, life not so much imitated as outstripped art when wanted Camorra killer Giuseppe Setola was arrested near Caserta, close to Naples.
Setola, a member of the Casalesi family, which features in Saviano’s book, was arrested on Wednesday after a three-day flight that began with him escaping down a sewer and ended with a dramatic rooftop chase. Wanted by police for no less than 18 murders in the last nine months, (including the killing of six Africans at Castel Volturno last September), Setola allegedly has a great devotion to the Kalashnikov rifle.
One ex-Camorrista, now turned state’s witness, told investigators that when he was deciding to pull off a “job”, Setola would tell his “soldiers”: “I’ve already got a life sentence and I’ve nothing to lose, so we’ll do this my way – we go in shooting, we’re not here to make jewellery.”
In today’s world, much has been (correctly) made of the fact that organised crime has long since moved into a whole series of legitimate businesses, including high finance, as a way to recycle its drug-created money. Setola, however, was not one such “financier”.
Describing him this week, senior Neapolitan mafia investigator Franco Roberto said: “Setola is no psychopath. He is neither mad nor a fanatic. He does not kill in the name of Allah, he kills only for business.”
Living in grime and filth, and literally like a sewer rat, hardly makes for your average Hollywood hero. The problem about Gomorra is that it features many such unappetising characters.
Perhaps, this is just one case where the Hollywood boffins simply cannot stand too much reality. That is, of course, unless the Academy intends to give the Best Picture Award to Gomorra and prove us all wrong.
Thanks to Paddy Agnew
Friday, January 16, 2009
Josepth Quartieri, Fugitive Who Attends Mobster Funerals, Leads to AMW Tips that Take US Marshals on Strange Ride
Joseph Quartieri: It looked as if AMW tips had heated up the cold case of a mobster accused of almost killing a cop in a botched robbery in 1979. But when the leads started to unfold, U.S. Marshals were in for a strange twist.
Esnel Jean: North Miami detectives will never forget the gruesome sight of a woman and two children killed and buried in a homemade crypt. They say the man behind the horrific murders is Esnel Jean, a Haitian voodoo priest. Jean remains the focus of an international manhunt and they need your help to help capture him.
Bradley and Luann Chase: Bradley Chase is back in Indiana after eight years on the run. Chase and his wife Luann were captured in October after appearing on Fifteen Seconds of Shame. It only took AMW viewers 12 hours to capture the duo after they got the publicity they never wanted.
Yaser Said: They say he killed his daughters. In a crime that shocked the nation, two young women were found shot to death in the back of a taxi, and their father is one of the nation's most-wanted men.
Lance Atkins: On Sept. 10, 2008, while attending a birthday party, cops say Lance Atkins got into a heated argument with his sister's boyfriend, Corey Bowman. Cops say Lance got angry, pulled a gun and shot Corey before fleeing the scene.
Anthony Thomas: The U.S. Marshals are hunting a man who they say has a terrible obsession: child pornography. Cops say Anthony Thomas, of Lafayette, La., looked at child pornography websites on his work computer, and a grand jury handed down an indictment against him, but now he's nowhere to be found.
Ricardo Rivera-Torres: Police are looking for Ricardo Juan Rivera-Torres, who they say killed a man in a botched Harrisburg, Pa. robbery. Police say they've rounded up Rivera-Torres' co-conspirators, and now they need your help to take down the last man standing.
Ronald Jackson: Cops in Henrico County, Va. say a brazen daytime break-in left one man seriously injured and another man on the run from law enforcement. Cops say Ronald Jackson is wanted for breaking into a neighbor's home and stabbing his victim seven times with a screwdriver.
Unknown Tim Edwards Killer: After just one visit to Montana Del Oso Ranch in New Mexico, Tim Edwards knew he had found a place to retire. Captivated by the scenery and sunsets, Tim and his wife Lynn moved to the ranch from Arizona, but the land was hiding a deadly secret.
Ramon Gaspar: Police say a 29-year-old woman was resting at a Los Angeles hospital after a surgery when a male nursing assistant, Ramon Eduardo Gaspar, entered her room and molested her.
Unknown Silver Nugget Shooter: On June 25, 2006, someone opened fire inside the Silver Nugget Casino in North Las Vegas, Nev. Cops need you to look at the surveillance video, and they need your tips to bring the shooter to justice.
Adji Desir: Adji Desir, a 6-year-old developmentally disabled Florida boy, has been missing since Saturday, Jan. 11, 2009. Police need your help to bring him home to his family.
Unknown “Cheerleader Letters” Author: Dozens of mysterious letters containing a powdery substance are popping up all over the country and federal agents, including the FBI and the U.S. Postal Inspector, are on the manhunt for the sender -- who has been deemed a domestic terrorist.
Esnel Jean: North Miami detectives will never forget the gruesome sight of a woman and two children killed and buried in a homemade crypt. They say the man behind the horrific murders is Esnel Jean, a Haitian voodoo priest. Jean remains the focus of an international manhunt and they need your help to help capture him.
Bradley and Luann Chase: Bradley Chase is back in Indiana after eight years on the run. Chase and his wife Luann were captured in October after appearing on Fifteen Seconds of Shame. It only took AMW viewers 12 hours to capture the duo after they got the publicity they never wanted.
Yaser Said: They say he killed his daughters. In a crime that shocked the nation, two young women were found shot to death in the back of a taxi, and their father is one of the nation's most-wanted men.
Lance Atkins: On Sept. 10, 2008, while attending a birthday party, cops say Lance Atkins got into a heated argument with his sister's boyfriend, Corey Bowman. Cops say Lance got angry, pulled a gun and shot Corey before fleeing the scene.
Anthony Thomas: The U.S. Marshals are hunting a man who they say has a terrible obsession: child pornography. Cops say Anthony Thomas, of Lafayette, La., looked at child pornography websites on his work computer, and a grand jury handed down an indictment against him, but now he's nowhere to be found.
Ricardo Rivera-Torres: Police are looking for Ricardo Juan Rivera-Torres, who they say killed a man in a botched Harrisburg, Pa. robbery. Police say they've rounded up Rivera-Torres' co-conspirators, and now they need your help to take down the last man standing.
Ronald Jackson: Cops in Henrico County, Va. say a brazen daytime break-in left one man seriously injured and another man on the run from law enforcement. Cops say Ronald Jackson is wanted for breaking into a neighbor's home and stabbing his victim seven times with a screwdriver.
Unknown Tim Edwards Killer: After just one visit to Montana Del Oso Ranch in New Mexico, Tim Edwards knew he had found a place to retire. Captivated by the scenery and sunsets, Tim and his wife Lynn moved to the ranch from Arizona, but the land was hiding a deadly secret.
Ramon Gaspar: Police say a 29-year-old woman was resting at a Los Angeles hospital after a surgery when a male nursing assistant, Ramon Eduardo Gaspar, entered her room and molested her.
Unknown Silver Nugget Shooter: On June 25, 2006, someone opened fire inside the Silver Nugget Casino in North Las Vegas, Nev. Cops need you to look at the surveillance video, and they need your tips to bring the shooter to justice.
Adji Desir: Adji Desir, a 6-year-old developmentally disabled Florida boy, has been missing since Saturday, Jan. 11, 2009. Police need your help to bring him home to his family.
Unknown “Cheerleader Letters” Author: Dozens of mysterious letters containing a powdery substance are popping up all over the country and federal agents, including the FBI and the U.S. Postal Inspector, are on the manhunt for the sender -- who has been deemed a domestic terrorist.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
John Connolly, Former FBI Agent, Gets 40 Years in Prison for Role in Mob Hit
A judge sentenced a rogue FBI agent to 40 years in prison on Thursday for the 1982 mob-related killing of a witness who was about to testify against Boston mob members, court officials said.
Disgraced ex-FBI agent John Connolly Jr. "crossed over to the dark side," said Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Stanford Blake. The sentence will run consecutively to a 10-year racketeering sentence.
Connolly, 68, was convicted in November of second-degree murder in the death of businessman John Callahan, an executive with World Jai-Alai. Callahan's bullet-riddled body was found in the trunk of a Cadillac parked at Miami International Airport.
Connolly's fall from celebrated mob-buster to paid gangland flunky captivated a South Florida courtroom for weeks. In testimony at his sentencing hearing last month, he denied having any role in Callahan's death.
"It's heartbreaking to hear what happened to your father and to your husband," he told members of Callahan's family. "My heart is broken when I hear what you say."
He explained, in the face of vigorous cross-examination, that rubbing elbows with killers and gangsters and winning their confidence was part of his job. His attorney argued that Connolly did what the FBI wanted him to do, and now was being held responsible.
Connolly did not testify at his trial.
Prosecutors had asked that Connolly be given a life sentence, saying the 30-year minimum was not enough because Connolly abused his badge.
In a Boston Globe interview published last month, however, Connolly vigorously denied being a corrupt agent. "I did not commit these crimes I was charged with," Connolly told the newspaper. "I never sold my badge. I never took anybody's money. I never caused anybody to be hurt, at least not knowingly, and I never would."
During his two-month trial, jurors heard that Connolly told his mob connections that Callahan, 45, was a potential witness against them, setting him up for the gangland-style slaying.
According to testimony, Connolly was absorbed by the very gangsters he was supposed to be targeting -- members of South Boston's notorious Winter Hill gang. His story was said to be the inspiration for the character played by Matt Damon in the 2006 Martin Scorsese movie, "The Departed."
Connolly's tale was closely followed in New England, where he grew up in Boston's "Southie" neighborhood, the same area long dominated by the Winter Hill gang and its notorious leader, James "Whitey" Bulger. Sought in 19 slayings, Bulger is the FBI's second most-wanted fugitive.
During the first two decades of his FBI career, Connolly won kudos in the bureau's Boston office, cultivating informants against New England mobsters. Prosecutors said Connolly was corrupted by his two highest-ranking snitches: Bulger and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi.
Connolly retired from the FBI in 1990 and later was indicted on federal racketeering and other charges stemming from his long relationship with Bulger and Flemmi. He was convicted of racketeering in 2002 and was serving a 10-year federal prison sentence when he was indicted in 2005 in the Callahan slaying.
During testimony, jurors heard that Connolly was on the mob payroll, collecting $235,000 from Bulger and Flemmi while shielding his mob pals from prosecution and leaking the identities of informants.
The prosecution's star witnesses at the Miami trial were Flemmi, who is now in prison, and mob hit man John Martorano, who has admitted to 20 murders, served 12 years in prison and is now free.
Callahan, who often socialized with gangsters, had asked the gang to execute Oklahoma businessman Roger Wheeler over a business dispute, according to testimony. Martorano killed Wheeler in 1981 on a golf course, shooting him once between the eyes, prosecutors said.
After Connolly told Bulger and Flemmi that Callahan was going to implicate them in the slaying, Martorano was sent to do away with Callahan, prosecutors said. But one star witness did not testify -- the former FBI agent who inspired the 1997 film "Donnie Brasco." He refused to take the stand after the judge denied his request to testify anonymously.
Thanks to Rich Phillips
Disgraced ex-FBI agent John Connolly Jr. "crossed over to the dark side," said Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Stanford Blake. The sentence will run consecutively to a 10-year racketeering sentence.
Connolly, 68, was convicted in November of second-degree murder in the death of businessman John Callahan, an executive with World Jai-Alai. Callahan's bullet-riddled body was found in the trunk of a Cadillac parked at Miami International Airport.
Connolly's fall from celebrated mob-buster to paid gangland flunky captivated a South Florida courtroom for weeks. In testimony at his sentencing hearing last month, he denied having any role in Callahan's death.
"It's heartbreaking to hear what happened to your father and to your husband," he told members of Callahan's family. "My heart is broken when I hear what you say."
He explained, in the face of vigorous cross-examination, that rubbing elbows with killers and gangsters and winning their confidence was part of his job. His attorney argued that Connolly did what the FBI wanted him to do, and now was being held responsible.
Connolly did not testify at his trial.
Prosecutors had asked that Connolly be given a life sentence, saying the 30-year minimum was not enough because Connolly abused his badge.
In a Boston Globe interview published last month, however, Connolly vigorously denied being a corrupt agent. "I did not commit these crimes I was charged with," Connolly told the newspaper. "I never sold my badge. I never took anybody's money. I never caused anybody to be hurt, at least not knowingly, and I never would."
During his two-month trial, jurors heard that Connolly told his mob connections that Callahan, 45, was a potential witness against them, setting him up for the gangland-style slaying.
According to testimony, Connolly was absorbed by the very gangsters he was supposed to be targeting -- members of South Boston's notorious Winter Hill gang. His story was said to be the inspiration for the character played by Matt Damon in the 2006 Martin Scorsese movie, "The Departed."
Connolly's tale was closely followed in New England, where he grew up in Boston's "Southie" neighborhood, the same area long dominated by the Winter Hill gang and its notorious leader, James "Whitey" Bulger. Sought in 19 slayings, Bulger is the FBI's second most-wanted fugitive.
During the first two decades of his FBI career, Connolly won kudos in the bureau's Boston office, cultivating informants against New England mobsters. Prosecutors said Connolly was corrupted by his two highest-ranking snitches: Bulger and Stephen "The Rifleman" Flemmi.
Connolly retired from the FBI in 1990 and later was indicted on federal racketeering and other charges stemming from his long relationship with Bulger and Flemmi. He was convicted of racketeering in 2002 and was serving a 10-year federal prison sentence when he was indicted in 2005 in the Callahan slaying.
During testimony, jurors heard that Connolly was on the mob payroll, collecting $235,000 from Bulger and Flemmi while shielding his mob pals from prosecution and leaking the identities of informants.
The prosecution's star witnesses at the Miami trial were Flemmi, who is now in prison, and mob hit man John Martorano, who has admitted to 20 murders, served 12 years in prison and is now free.
Callahan, who often socialized with gangsters, had asked the gang to execute Oklahoma businessman Roger Wheeler over a business dispute, according to testimony. Martorano killed Wheeler in 1981 on a golf course, shooting him once between the eyes, prosecutors said.
After Connolly told Bulger and Flemmi that Callahan was going to implicate them in the slaying, Martorano was sent to do away with Callahan, prosecutors said. But one star witness did not testify -- the former FBI agent who inspired the 1997 film "Donnie Brasco." He refused to take the stand after the judge denied his request to testify anonymously.
Thanks to Rich Phillips
Monday, January 12, 2009
Junior Gotti Witness, John Alite, Targeted in Planned Hit
Mobsters ordered the murder of a witness against John A. (Junior) Gotti days after he was indicted for three gangland slayings, prosecutors revealed Friday.
The contract on Gotti childhood pal John Alite circulated through a Florida prison in a handwritten note last summer, Manhattan Assistant U.S. Attorney Elie Honig said in court papers.
Honig said the feds have no evidence linking Gotti, 44, to the plot, but they raised it in asking a judge to reject Gotti's efforts to be freed on bail awaiting trial.
"The government mentions the contract here simply to show the Gambino crime family has many loyal followers and supporters who are willing to use extreme measures to protect Gotti and others from prosecution," Honig wrote. "Throughout his life in the Mafia, a simple word from Gotti has been enough to order the commission of crimes, including violent attacks and murder. The same is true now."
Gotti's lawyer, Charles Carnesi, had a different view: "It was put in [the bail motion] to be inflammatory," he said. "Even they acknowledge he had nothing to do with it."
In September, Florida prosecutors said they had uncovered a jailhouse plot by the Latin Kings to kill an unidentified witness. That witness appears to be Alite.
The note written on a rag was addressed to the "Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation" and added, "the [terminate on sight] is in lockdown now. How iz u gunna get to him now?! We know hes locked up in Pine County. Pep in da street is payin good to get the job done. So finish that [terminate on sight] ASAP."
In a 2003 jailhouse chat intercepted by the feds, Gotti said he had become so tired of mob life that he wished he was a member of the notorious Hispanic street gang. "I'm ashamed of who I am," Gotti said. "I'd rather be a Latin King."
Prosecutors confirmed that Alite, who ran Gambino crime family operations in Tampa, will be taking the stand against his old pal. He pleaded guilty to two mob slayings and has been cooperating since February 2007.
Gotti is expected in New York next week following a Florida judge's order transferring the case to Manhattan Federal Court. He's being held in an Atlanta federal lockup.
Gotti is scheduled to appear in Manhattan Federal Court on Thursday.
Thanks to Thomas Zambito
The contract on Gotti childhood pal John Alite circulated through a Florida prison in a handwritten note last summer, Manhattan Assistant U.S. Attorney Elie Honig said in court papers.
Honig said the feds have no evidence linking Gotti, 44, to the plot, but they raised it in asking a judge to reject Gotti's efforts to be freed on bail awaiting trial.
"The government mentions the contract here simply to show the Gambino crime family has many loyal followers and supporters who are willing to use extreme measures to protect Gotti and others from prosecution," Honig wrote. "Throughout his life in the Mafia, a simple word from Gotti has been enough to order the commission of crimes, including violent attacks and murder. The same is true now."
Gotti's lawyer, Charles Carnesi, had a different view: "It was put in [the bail motion] to be inflammatory," he said. "Even they acknowledge he had nothing to do with it."
In September, Florida prosecutors said they had uncovered a jailhouse plot by the Latin Kings to kill an unidentified witness. That witness appears to be Alite.
The note written on a rag was addressed to the "Almighty Latin King and Queen Nation" and added, "the [terminate on sight] is in lockdown now. How iz u gunna get to him now?! We know hes locked up in Pine County. Pep in da street is payin good to get the job done. So finish that [terminate on sight] ASAP."
In a 2003 jailhouse chat intercepted by the feds, Gotti said he had become so tired of mob life that he wished he was a member of the notorious Hispanic street gang. "I'm ashamed of who I am," Gotti said. "I'd rather be a Latin King."
Prosecutors confirmed that Alite, who ran Gambino crime family operations in Tampa, will be taking the stand against his old pal. He pleaded guilty to two mob slayings and has been cooperating since February 2007.
Gotti is expected in New York next week following a Florida judge's order transferring the case to Manhattan Federal Court. He's being held in an Atlanta federal lockup.
Gotti is scheduled to appear in Manhattan Federal Court on Thursday.
Thanks to Thomas Zambito
"Tony Roach" Petitions to Exterminate the Rest of His Prison Sentence
The Roach just won't go away.
Anthony (Tony Roach) Rampino, a notorious hit man for late Gambino crime boss John Gotti, is getting a second shot at beating his 25-to-life sentence for heroin trafficking.
The reputed killer will appear in Manhattan Supreme Court on Jan. 29 for resentencing after a state appeals court overruled a judge who had rejected his bid for a reduced sentence.
Having served 10 years, Rampino conceivably could walk out a free man if Justice Arlene Goldberg gives him time served. Law enforcement officials say that would be a travesty of justice.
The Roach was more exterminator than pest for the Gambino crime family back in the day. Rampino was a backup shooter in the 1985 assassination of then-Gambino boss Paul Castellano outside Sparks Steakhouse in midtown, cops say.
He's also been fingered as a member of the hit team that murdered Gotti's neighbor John Favara in 1980 after Favara killed Gotti's young son in a traffic accident.
"He's a hard-core associate of organized crime," said Mark Feldman, a former federal prosecutor who supervised the 1987 narcotics case against Rampino for the Brooklyn district attorney's office. "He's as Mafia as a guy gets without being a made member,'" said Feldman, a managing director for BDO Consulting.
Rampino lived above Gotti's Bergin Hunt & Fish Club in Ozone Park. He was never inducted into the Mafia because of his heavy drug use. He reportedly earned the nickname 'The Roach' because he smoked every bit of a marijuana joint.
Federal prosecutors did not charge him with the Castellano or Favara murders because he was serving a life sentence for selling a kilo of cocaine to an undercover cop.
Although Rampino never appealed his conviction, he filed a petition seeking a reduced sentence in 2004 after state lawmakers overturned severe drug terms known as the Rockefeller Drug Laws.
Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said the revised penalties are not intended for thugs like Rampino. "Rampino's sentence reflected who he was and the violence he was involved in," Brennan said.
Even behind bars Rampino has been incorrigible, losing more than 500 days of "good time" for misbehavior.
Thanks to John Marzulli
Anthony (Tony Roach) Rampino, a notorious hit man for late Gambino crime boss John Gotti, is getting a second shot at beating his 25-to-life sentence for heroin trafficking.
The reputed killer will appear in Manhattan Supreme Court on Jan. 29 for resentencing after a state appeals court overruled a judge who had rejected his bid for a reduced sentence.
Having served 10 years, Rampino conceivably could walk out a free man if Justice Arlene Goldberg gives him time served. Law enforcement officials say that would be a travesty of justice.
The Roach was more exterminator than pest for the Gambino crime family back in the day. Rampino was a backup shooter in the 1985 assassination of then-Gambino boss Paul Castellano outside Sparks Steakhouse in midtown, cops say.
He's also been fingered as a member of the hit team that murdered Gotti's neighbor John Favara in 1980 after Favara killed Gotti's young son in a traffic accident.
"He's a hard-core associate of organized crime," said Mark Feldman, a former federal prosecutor who supervised the 1987 narcotics case against Rampino for the Brooklyn district attorney's office. "He's as Mafia as a guy gets without being a made member,'" said Feldman, a managing director for BDO Consulting.
Rampino lived above Gotti's Bergin Hunt & Fish Club in Ozone Park. He was never inducted into the Mafia because of his heavy drug use. He reportedly earned the nickname 'The Roach' because he smoked every bit of a marijuana joint.
Federal prosecutors did not charge him with the Castellano or Favara murders because he was serving a life sentence for selling a kilo of cocaine to an undercover cop.
Although Rampino never appealed his conviction, he filed a petition seeking a reduced sentence in 2004 after state lawmakers overturned severe drug terms known as the Rockefeller Drug Laws.
Special Narcotics Prosecutor Bridget Brennan said the revised penalties are not intended for thugs like Rampino. "Rampino's sentence reflected who he was and the violence he was involved in," Brennan said.
Even behind bars Rampino has been incorrigible, losing more than 500 days of "good time" for misbehavior.
Thanks to John Marzulli
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Oscar Goodman Supports the Federal Stimulus Package Funding Mob Museum
After taking a hail of bipartisan bullets in recent days over the suggestion that a federal stimulus package should help pay for a proposed $50 million museum here on the history of organized crime, the project’s godfathers are returning fire, complaining that Washington pols are scapegoating the museum and the city.
The planned Las Vegas Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, a k a “the Mob Museum” on its own Web site, is to include interactive exhibits where visitors can snap their mug shots, stand in police lineups and wiretap one another. Such a center, Mayor Oscar B. Goodman said in an interview Thursday, is “absolutely falling within the four corners of what President-elect Obama is trying to achieve.”
“This is a project where all the plans are in place and we can start it within 30 days,” said Mr. Goodman, a former criminal defense lawyer who represented several Mafia figures in the 1970s and 1980s.
Citing studies showing that 250,000 tourists a year would visit the attraction and noting that tourism is to Las Vegas what car sales are (or were) to Detroit, the mayor continued: “I don’t know why Mitch McConnell would take on this project. It’s a great project.”
Senator Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican and the minority leader, attacked the museum this week as a kind of localized earmark project that does not belong in legislation Congress passes to jumpstart the flailing economy.
Jon Summers, a spokesman for Senator Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat and the majority leader, said Mr. McConnell’s statements were “moot because Senator Reid has been clear that there will be no earmarks” in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan, as President-elect Barack Obama calls it. Instead, Mr. Summers said, the money is likely to go to federal agencies for disbursement based on criteria not yet decided.
Slated to open in 2010, the museum would occupy the entire 42,000 square feet of a three-story neoclassical building that was the first federal courthouse in Clark County and one of the sites of the 1950 hearings into organized crime led by Senator Estes Kefauver, Democrat of Tennessee.
The creative director of the planned museum, Dennis Barrie, who also curated the International Spy Museum in Washington and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, said the structure was the second-oldest in Las Vegas and needed a $26 million restoration.
So far, $15 million has been raised, including about $3.6 million in federal grants and a nearly equal amount in state and local money, since 2001. A full-throttle fund-raising effort is to begin later this year. The federal government deeded the building to the city for $1 in 2000 with the stipulation that it be put to a cultural use. Restoration has begun.
“I’m sure it’s good fodder for politicians,” Mr. Barrie said, “but the interesting thing about the mob museum is that it’s a real look at the history of organized crime in America that goes back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries when the mob came out of the various ghettos and how it influenced America. A lot of people, what they know about the topic is what they learned from Hollywood.”
That said, Tony Soprano and Michael Corleone would get their due in a room about the Mafia’s influence on popular culture, and visitors would be exposed to unvarnished tales of the exploits of law-enforcement and mob figures, said Ellen Knowlton, a retired special agent in charge for the Federal Bureau of Investigation who is the museum’s chairwoman.
“We’re trying to make sure this project is as accurate as possible,” Ms. Knowlton said, “so there are people involved who have had organized crime in their life or family. I don’t want to go beyond that to say who is participating. But it’s interesting that a number of people want their family’s side of the story told accurately.”
Even within Las Vegas, though, the project is controversial. The mayor acknowledged that some Italian-Americans were so alarmed when he first hit upon the idea in 2002 that he backed off quickly, joking that he had actually proposed a “mop museum.”
The F.B.I. supports the museum and has agreed to lend records and other artifacts to be exhibited. But among those opposed is a former federal prosecutor, Donald Campbell, who had a hand in breaking the mob’s hold on Las Vegas in the 1980s. “I don’t think we should ever romanticize a criminal activity,” Mr. Campbell said.
A spokesman for Senator McConnell, Don Stewart, said the senator was not attacking the idea of the museum so much as Mayor Goodman’s inclusion of it on the list of projects he would jumpstart with stimulus money. “The parameters for this bill need to be, does it create jobs, is it a waste of the taxpayers’ dollars, is it something that will help us long-term, not just a temporary thing, ” Mr. Stewart said.
Supporters say the museum will do just what the bill intends.
“This project exactly meets the criteria," said Alan Feldman, a museum board member and senior vice president of the casino giant MGM Mirage, the state’s largest private employer. “It is a construction project. It’s a legacy project; it’s a project that stimulates the economy by putting a wonderful tourist attraction downtown.”
Either way, Mr. Goodman is clearly enjoying the national attention the museum financing plan has prompted. “This is $1 million worth of publicity for us,” he said. “I love it. Just spell my name right.”
Thanks to Steve Friess
The planned Las Vegas Museum of Organized Crime and Law Enforcement, a k a “the Mob Museum” on its own Web site, is to include interactive exhibits where visitors can snap their mug shots, stand in police lineups and wiretap one another. Such a center, Mayor Oscar B. Goodman said in an interview Thursday, is “absolutely falling within the four corners of what President-elect Obama is trying to achieve.”
“This is a project where all the plans are in place and we can start it within 30 days,” said Mr. Goodman, a former criminal defense lawyer who represented several Mafia figures in the 1970s and 1980s.Citing studies showing that 250,000 tourists a year would visit the attraction and noting that tourism is to Las Vegas what car sales are (or were) to Detroit, the mayor continued: “I don’t know why Mitch McConnell would take on this project. It’s a great project.”
Senator Mitch McConnell, a Kentucky Republican and the minority leader, attacked the museum this week as a kind of localized earmark project that does not belong in legislation Congress passes to jumpstart the flailing economy.
Jon Summers, a spokesman for Senator Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat and the majority leader, said Mr. McConnell’s statements were “moot because Senator Reid has been clear that there will be no earmarks” in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan, as President-elect Barack Obama calls it. Instead, Mr. Summers said, the money is likely to go to federal agencies for disbursement based on criteria not yet decided.
Slated to open in 2010, the museum would occupy the entire 42,000 square feet of a three-story neoclassical building that was the first federal courthouse in Clark County and one of the sites of the 1950 hearings into organized crime led by Senator Estes Kefauver, Democrat of Tennessee.
The creative director of the planned museum, Dennis Barrie, who also curated the International Spy Museum in Washington and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland, said the structure was the second-oldest in Las Vegas and needed a $26 million restoration.
So far, $15 million has been raised, including about $3.6 million in federal grants and a nearly equal amount in state and local money, since 2001. A full-throttle fund-raising effort is to begin later this year. The federal government deeded the building to the city for $1 in 2000 with the stipulation that it be put to a cultural use. Restoration has begun.
“I’m sure it’s good fodder for politicians,” Mr. Barrie said, “but the interesting thing about the mob museum is that it’s a real look at the history of organized crime in America that goes back to the late 19th and early 20th centuries when the mob came out of the various ghettos and how it influenced America. A lot of people, what they know about the topic is what they learned from Hollywood.”
That said, Tony Soprano and Michael Corleone would get their due in a room about the Mafia’s influence on popular culture, and visitors would be exposed to unvarnished tales of the exploits of law-enforcement and mob figures, said Ellen Knowlton, a retired special agent in charge for the Federal Bureau of Investigation who is the museum’s chairwoman.
“We’re trying to make sure this project is as accurate as possible,” Ms. Knowlton said, “so there are people involved who have had organized crime in their life or family. I don’t want to go beyond that to say who is participating. But it’s interesting that a number of people want their family’s side of the story told accurately.”
Even within Las Vegas, though, the project is controversial. The mayor acknowledged that some Italian-Americans were so alarmed when he first hit upon the idea in 2002 that he backed off quickly, joking that he had actually proposed a “mop museum.”
The F.B.I. supports the museum and has agreed to lend records and other artifacts to be exhibited. But among those opposed is a former federal prosecutor, Donald Campbell, who had a hand in breaking the mob’s hold on Las Vegas in the 1980s. “I don’t think we should ever romanticize a criminal activity,” Mr. Campbell said.
A spokesman for Senator McConnell, Don Stewart, said the senator was not attacking the idea of the museum so much as Mayor Goodman’s inclusion of it on the list of projects he would jumpstart with stimulus money. “The parameters for this bill need to be, does it create jobs, is it a waste of the taxpayers’ dollars, is it something that will help us long-term, not just a temporary thing, ” Mr. Stewart said.
Supporters say the museum will do just what the bill intends.
“This project exactly meets the criteria," said Alan Feldman, a museum board member and senior vice president of the casino giant MGM Mirage, the state’s largest private employer. “It is a construction project. It’s a legacy project; it’s a project that stimulates the economy by putting a wonderful tourist attraction downtown.”
Either way, Mr. Goodman is clearly enjoying the national attention the museum financing plan has prompted. “This is $1 million worth of publicity for us,” he said. “I love it. Just spell my name right.”
Thanks to Steve Friess
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination
A new book has been released
, Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination, was written by Lamar Waldron. In the book it proposes that Mafia Mobster Boss, Carlos Marcello from New Orleans had JFK killed.
This is not a new theory, but the book cites a testimony from Marcello where he said “Yeah, I had the son of a bitch killed. I’m glad I did. I’m sorry I couldn’t have done it myself.” It seems that Marcello does not care who knows that he orchestrated the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
The former mobster boss also claims that he knew Jack Ruby, and he had him kill Lee Harvey Oswald. The new book which has 848 pages also looks at the links between Marcello and the murders of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
, Legacy of Secrecy: The Long Shadow of the JFK Assassination, was written by Lamar Waldron. In the book it proposes that Mafia Mobster Boss, Carlos Marcello from New Orleans had JFK killed.This is not a new theory, but the book cites a testimony from Marcello where he said “Yeah, I had the son of a bitch killed. I’m glad I did. I’m sorry I couldn’t have done it myself.” It seems that Marcello does not care who knows that he orchestrated the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
The former mobster boss also claims that he knew Jack Ruby, and he had him kill Lee Harvey Oswald. The new book which has 848 pages also looks at the links between Marcello and the murders of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King.
How to Build Your Own Organized Crime Family
Electronic Arts Inc. (NASDAQ:ERTS) and Paramount Digital Entertainment announced that The Godfather® II videogame will be shipping on February 24th in North America and on February 27th in Europe. The Godfather II allows players to both act like a mobster and think like a Don, by immersing them in a 1960’s organized crime world. As a Don, players can build a crew and grow their family in an effort to become the most powerful mob syndicate in America. Players will be able to choose how and when to use their Made men, either by commanding them directly in battle as part of their crew, or by sending them to do a job in another part of the world – bombing rival family rackets, attacking their businesses, or defending your own.
Players who pre-order The Godfather II at participating retailers worldwide will receive an exclusive crew member, named Tommy Cipolla, to hire into their family. While the other soldiers at the start of the game come equipped with one specialty and level-one firearms, Tommy will be the only crew member to possess two specialties – arsonist and medic – as well as carry a level-two double-barreled shotgun. With Tommy in your family, players will have a strategic advantage in the game, using his advanced skills either directly in battle, or sending him to take over and defend rackets on his own.
The Godfather II takes the open-world genre in an entirely new direction. Part of the fascination with The Godfather fiction is the feeling of power that comes with being the Don of an organized crime family – and The Godfather II game puts the control in your hands. While at its heart The Godfather II remains an action game, it also features deep new strategic gameplay mechanics never before seen in an open-world game. The strategic elements to the game allow you to extend the fantasy of building and running your own organized crime family. This means that you have to build and invest in your family, manage your businesses, and reach out to corrupt officials – all of which is done through the revolutionary Don’s View. The Don’s View is a 3D representation of your criminal empire in all three cities; it allows you to coordinate your strategy, plan hits on rival Made men, attack enemy rackets, and much more. The Godfather II delivers the ultimate organized crime experience by allowing you to call the shots.
Developed at the EA Redwood Stores studio, The Godfather II will be coming to the Xbox 360® videogame and entertainment system, PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system, and PC. The Godfather II has been rated M for Mature by the ESRB and 18+ for PEGI.
Players who pre-order The Godfather II at participating retailers worldwide will receive an exclusive crew member, named Tommy Cipolla, to hire into their family. While the other soldiers at the start of the game come equipped with one specialty and level-one firearms, Tommy will be the only crew member to possess two specialties – arsonist and medic – as well as carry a level-two double-barreled shotgun. With Tommy in your family, players will have a strategic advantage in the game, using his advanced skills either directly in battle, or sending him to take over and defend rackets on his own.
The Godfather II takes the open-world genre in an entirely new direction. Part of the fascination with The Godfather fiction is the feeling of power that comes with being the Don of an organized crime family – and The Godfather II game puts the control in your hands. While at its heart The Godfather II remains an action game, it also features deep new strategic gameplay mechanics never before seen in an open-world game. The strategic elements to the game allow you to extend the fantasy of building and running your own organized crime family. This means that you have to build and invest in your family, manage your businesses, and reach out to corrupt officials – all of which is done through the revolutionary Don’s View. The Don’s View is a 3D representation of your criminal empire in all three cities; it allows you to coordinate your strategy, plan hits on rival Made men, attack enemy rackets, and much more. The Godfather II delivers the ultimate organized crime experience by allowing you to call the shots.
Developed at the EA Redwood Stores studio, The Godfather II will be coming to the Xbox 360® videogame and entertainment system, PLAYSTATION®3 computer entertainment system, and PC. The Godfather II has been rated M for Mature by the ESRB and 18+ for PEGI.
Al Capone's Hideaway and Steakhouse
Al Capone's Hideaway and Steakhouse was once actually one of the 10,000 speakeasies in the Chicago area controlled by Capone. Built in 1917 as Reitmayer's Resort and Beer Garden, the establishment catered to tourists and well-to-do residents who built summer homes along the shore of the Fox River in the Valley View area north of St. Charles.
With the passage of Prohibition, the Reitmayers entered a wild and daring time, manufacturing their own liquor and catering to some shadowy figures. In case of a raid, secret copper lines carried the illicit booze into a hidden storage area in the hen house.
In 1972, Bill Brooks Jr., a computer salesman visiting the area, noticed the rundown old beer garden and restaurant and bought it. Preserving the pine plank floors and walls, Brooks decorated his restaurant with memorabilia from the Prohibition Era. If you like history, allow a little time on your visit for reading newspaper stories of mob hits, receipts and letters from Capone's business, and looking at photographs of the Chicago Outfit.
Bill Brooks III, 32, who was born and raised upstairs of the restaurant, said Al Capone's Hideaway and Steakhouse ages and trims all its steaks in-house. Two charcoal grill chefs, Brooks' uncle Mike Mosher and Ray Heaberlin, have worked the grill for 35 and 32 years respectively. Every week, the duo serve about 1,200 customers and use 1,400 pounds of charcoal. The menu is loaded with steaks, seafood, bullet holes, pictures of Capone and his cronies and, naturally, Eliot Ness.
Capone's business, of course, was illegal liquor. He once said, "When I sell liquor, they call it bootlegging. When my patrons serve it on silver trays on Lake Shore Drive, they call it hospitality."
Legal liquor has become an important part of the Brooks' Alphonse Capone Enterprises. The Brooks family wholesales Roaring 20's Wine, Microbrews and Spirits. A vodka called Tommy Gun Vodka is sold in a glass bottle shaped like a 20's era Tommy Gun, complete with a barrel and two handles. Their vodkas are distilled in Poland. One, named Kul, Polish for cool, scored 91 of a possible 100 points in recent taste testings conducted by the Beverage Testing Institute. Kul, which retails for $10.95, was awarded a Gold Medal and Best Buy. "Kul got a higher rating than many $30 vodkas," said Brooks.
"The restaurant will always stay a part of our lives," said Brooks. "It's the base foundation for everything else, even though the liquor business can do in a month what the restaurant does in a year."
With the passage of Prohibition, the Reitmayers entered a wild and daring time, manufacturing their own liquor and catering to some shadowy figures. In case of a raid, secret copper lines carried the illicit booze into a hidden storage area in the hen house.
In 1972, Bill Brooks Jr., a computer salesman visiting the area, noticed the rundown old beer garden and restaurant and bought it. Preserving the pine plank floors and walls, Brooks decorated his restaurant with memorabilia from the Prohibition Era. If you like history, allow a little time on your visit for reading newspaper stories of mob hits, receipts and letters from Capone's business, and looking at photographs of the Chicago Outfit.
Bill Brooks III, 32, who was born and raised upstairs of the restaurant, said Al Capone's Hideaway and Steakhouse ages and trims all its steaks in-house. Two charcoal grill chefs, Brooks' uncle Mike Mosher and Ray Heaberlin, have worked the grill for 35 and 32 years respectively. Every week, the duo serve about 1,200 customers and use 1,400 pounds of charcoal. The menu is loaded with steaks, seafood, bullet holes, pictures of Capone and his cronies and, naturally, Eliot Ness.
Capone's business, of course, was illegal liquor. He once said, "When I sell liquor, they call it bootlegging. When my patrons serve it on silver trays on Lake Shore Drive, they call it hospitality."
Legal liquor has become an important part of the Brooks' Alphonse Capone Enterprises. The Brooks family wholesales Roaring 20's Wine, Microbrews and Spirits. A vodka called Tommy Gun Vodka is sold in a glass bottle shaped like a 20's era Tommy Gun, complete with a barrel and two handles. Their vodkas are distilled in Poland. One, named Kul, Polish for cool, scored 91 of a possible 100 points in recent taste testings conducted by the Beverage Testing Institute. Kul, which retails for $10.95, was awarded a Gold Medal and Best Buy. "Kul got a higher rating than many $30 vodkas," said Brooks.
"The restaurant will always stay a part of our lives," said Brooks. "It's the base foundation for everything else, even though the liquor business can do in a month what the restaurant does in a year."
Friday, January 09, 2009
Will Mob Museum Get Funding from the Federal Stimulus Package?
The mob museum just can’t seem to get any love in this town.
Republican Sen. John Ensign on Wednesday became the latest Nevada lawmaker to say there’s no way Las Vegas’ proposed Mob Museum is going to get a dime from the federal economic stimulus package.
“It’s not going to happen — there’s no way it’s going to happen,” Ensign said. “If folks tried to put things like that in the bill, it could bring down the bill out of embarrassment.”
The mob museum could have become Nevada’s own “bridge to nowhere,” a toxic asset depicted by Republicans in Washington as a prime example of potentially wasteful government spending in the recovery package.
Except that the idea never gained much ground here. It arose only because Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, himself a former mob lawyer, suggested last month that if Washington wanted to boost the economy, it could kick in some bucks for the museum he is trying to develop.
Republicans saw Goodman’s comment as a chance for political fungo. They raised the idea in Washington so they could swat at it. Political Web sites picked it up and it became a sensation.
To be sure, cities all over the country have been putting together wish lists of projects that could create jobs and boost their economies. In Las Vegas, the hometown industry could benefit from the tourist traffic of a new museum — which is being developed, incidentally, with the FBI field office’s former special agent in charge.
Nevada’s lawmakers aren’t necessarily opposed to the museum — remodeling of an old post office where it is to be housed has been supported with federal funding in the past. But Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, the majority leader, has made it clear there will be no pet projects, often called earmarks, in the stimulus package.
Democratic Rep. Dina Titus said funding the mob museum would not be her top choice for stimulating the Southern Nevada economy.
On Wednesday, Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley added her thoughts, saying in a statement: “While I am not opposed to the concept of a museum like this, I do not and will not support federal tax dollars being allocated in this stimulus package specifically for this project.”
No walk-around money for the wise guys, it seems, at least not this time around.
Thanks to Lisa Mascaro
Republican Sen. John Ensign on Wednesday became the latest Nevada lawmaker to say there’s no way Las Vegas’ proposed Mob Museum is going to get a dime from the federal economic stimulus package.
“It’s not going to happen — there’s no way it’s going to happen,” Ensign said. “If folks tried to put things like that in the bill, it could bring down the bill out of embarrassment.”
The mob museum could have become Nevada’s own “bridge to nowhere,” a toxic asset depicted by Republicans in Washington as a prime example of potentially wasteful government spending in the recovery package.
Except that the idea never gained much ground here. It arose only because Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman, himself a former mob lawyer, suggested last month that if Washington wanted to boost the economy, it could kick in some bucks for the museum he is trying to develop.
Republicans saw Goodman’s comment as a chance for political fungo. They raised the idea in Washington so they could swat at it. Political Web sites picked it up and it became a sensation.
To be sure, cities all over the country have been putting together wish lists of projects that could create jobs and boost their economies. In Las Vegas, the hometown industry could benefit from the tourist traffic of a new museum — which is being developed, incidentally, with the FBI field office’s former special agent in charge.
Nevada’s lawmakers aren’t necessarily opposed to the museum — remodeling of an old post office where it is to be housed has been supported with federal funding in the past. But Nevada Sen. Harry Reid, the majority leader, has made it clear there will be no pet projects, often called earmarks, in the stimulus package.
Democratic Rep. Dina Titus said funding the mob museum would not be her top choice for stimulating the Southern Nevada economy.
On Wednesday, Democratic Rep. Shelley Berkley added her thoughts, saying in a statement: “While I am not opposed to the concept of a museum like this, I do not and will not support federal tax dollars being allocated in this stimulus package specifically for this project.”
No walk-around money for the wise guys, it seems, at least not this time around.
Thanks to Lisa Mascaro
Thursday, January 08, 2009
The Chicago Crime Commission is Fighting to Survive
There is turmoil at the top of the Chicago Crime Commission, the nation's oldest organization of citizen crime fighters.
After leading the fight against a Rosemont casino and a high-level role in the Operation Family Secrets mob trial, the Chicago Crime Commission last week closed its doors and moved out of its long time headquarters in the Loop. A spokesperson says they are waiting for new office space to open. But the recently departed president says the commission was out of money late last year and couldn't make payroll.
"We simply were out of money at the time that I decided I had to resign," said James Wagner, Former crime commission president.
Decorated former FBI agent Jim Wagner left the crime commission last October without public explanation. Now, he tells the I-Team they were teetering on collapse. "I believed it was when I resigned, I was not at all confident that they would be able to continue," said Wagner.
It was thriving 90 years ago, along with the mob. The crime commission received its charter and was run by civic and business leaders. Prohibition triggered a gangland war, led by notorious hoodlum Al Capone. The crime commission began a decades-long fight against the outfit and the public corruption that fuels it.
"To come to its demise is very sad for me," said Robert Fuesel, former crime commissioner.
Former IRS investigator Bob Fuesel ran the commission 15 years ago. He says he accepted a $930,000 donation from the estate of a late board member. "That money is now all gone. People came in and started with high salaries and hired people that weren't needed," said Fuesel.
By last fall, the organization was in dire shape. "We didn't have what you would call a staff," said Wagner.
The latest public filings show the commission spends more than it brings in.
After Wagner, business magnate J.R. Davis took over what's left as chairman, board member and president. "He has no law enforcement experience and he is holding three positions, being a one man office...It's just a sham operation, there is nothing going on over there," said Wagner.
In an email, Davis cited the commission's "very formidable financial position" but said it's not "in the best interest of law enforcement to outline specific financial details of the commission."
"My concern is that all power is vested in one individual and I'm not sure that's a healthy situation for any independent not for profit to operate in that fashion," said Wagner.
State records reveal that a former crime commission employee is under investigation for alleged theft of funds.
The case was referred to the FBI and on Wednesday a bureau official says the matter is pending.
Despite the turmoil, a crime commission spokesperson contends they are not out of business and promises new innovative programs that address gang violence and public corruption as well as new members of their leadership team.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
After leading the fight against a Rosemont casino and a high-level role in the Operation Family Secrets mob trial, the Chicago Crime Commission last week closed its doors and moved out of its long time headquarters in the Loop. A spokesperson says they are waiting for new office space to open. But the recently departed president says the commission was out of money late last year and couldn't make payroll.
"We simply were out of money at the time that I decided I had to resign," said James Wagner, Former crime commission president.
Decorated former FBI agent Jim Wagner left the crime commission last October without public explanation. Now, he tells the I-Team they were teetering on collapse. "I believed it was when I resigned, I was not at all confident that they would be able to continue," said Wagner.
It was thriving 90 years ago, along with the mob. The crime commission received its charter and was run by civic and business leaders. Prohibition triggered a gangland war, led by notorious hoodlum Al Capone. The crime commission began a decades-long fight against the outfit and the public corruption that fuels it.
"To come to its demise is very sad for me," said Robert Fuesel, former crime commissioner.
Former IRS investigator Bob Fuesel ran the commission 15 years ago. He says he accepted a $930,000 donation from the estate of a late board member. "That money is now all gone. People came in and started with high salaries and hired people that weren't needed," said Fuesel.
By last fall, the organization was in dire shape. "We didn't have what you would call a staff," said Wagner.
The latest public filings show the commission spends more than it brings in.
After Wagner, business magnate J.R. Davis took over what's left as chairman, board member and president. "He has no law enforcement experience and he is holding three positions, being a one man office...It's just a sham operation, there is nothing going on over there," said Wagner.
In an email, Davis cited the commission's "very formidable financial position" but said it's not "in the best interest of law enforcement to outline specific financial details of the commission."
"My concern is that all power is vested in one individual and I'm not sure that's a healthy situation for any independent not for profit to operate in that fashion," said Wagner.
State records reveal that a former crime commission employee is under investigation for alleged theft of funds.
The case was referred to the FBI and on Wednesday a bureau official says the matter is pending.
Despite the turmoil, a crime commission spokesperson contends they are not out of business and promises new innovative programs that address gang violence and public corruption as well as new members of their leadership team.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)