'He would shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli'

For jurors who have sat through a summer in Courtroom 2525 listening to testimony from more than 100 witnesses, the contrast couldn't have been starker on Wednesday.

The defense attorney, wearing a hypnotic pink-and-black checkered tie, reveled in his role as the mob lawyer, talking loudly about constitutional rights and the American Revolution. He blasted the government's case, contending the FBI could stand for "Forever Bothering Italians" and calling the prosecution's star witness a bald-faced liar who "would shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli."

And then there was the federal prosecutor, standing at the lectern in a dark, conservative suit as he spoke with barely controlled anger. He told the jury that the 18 gangland slayings at the heart of the case stretched over 40 years and illustrated the cruelty of a ruthless Outfit that "survived and prospered at the expense of who knows how many victims."

The defense lawyer, Joseph Lopez, ripped star witness Nicholas Calabrese as a crybaby and "a walking piece of deception." Not so, said the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, who defended Calabrese as a product of the city's underworld, an Outfit soldier who had been forthright about "a very horrible life."

The dueling closing arguments in the Family Secrets conspiracy trial came as the jury is set to begin deliberations as soon as Thursday.

Mars, the longtime chief of the organized-crime unit in the U.S. attorney's office in Chicago, will wrap up his closing argument Thursday, and U.S. District Judge James Zagel, presiding over the landmark trial, will then instruct the jury.

Lopez represents Frank Calabrese Sr., an accused mob hit man alleged to have taken part in 13 of the murders. His brother, the star witness, and his son both cooperated against Calabrese, giving the case its Operation Family Secrets code name.

As he delivered his remarks, Lopez circled in front of the jury, looking up at his slick PowerPoint presentation, replete with cartoon characters, including a bawling infant. He urged the jury to remember that his client was cloaked in innocence "like Casper the Friendly Ghost" and that the jury system was the product of "bloodshed on American soil."

"Don't forget Valley Forge, where George Washington marched his troops on bleeding feet," he said.

The case amounts to a family feud, Lopez said, featuring Nicholas "the grim reaper" Calabrese and "I cannot do time" Frank Calabrese Jr., his client's wayward son. Jurors can keep or throw out whatever evidence they want, he said, piecing information together "just like putting something together from IKEA."

Lopez reminded jurors that from the witness stand, Nicholas Calabrese never looked them or his brother in the face, instead he stared straight ahead. Lopez assailed Nicholas Calabrese, saying he hated his brother and refused to take real responsibility for the 14 murders to which he admitted by trying to claim he was under his brother's thumb. When times got tough, Lopez said, Calabrese cried to "Mommy FBI."

On his turn, Mars credited Nicholas Calabrese for lifting the veil on many of the 18 murders, giving closure to victims' families and defended his credibility. "The issue is not whether you like Nicholas Calabrese," the prosecutor said. "That's not why we're here. The issue is whether you believe him."

Mars told jurors to remember Calabrese's demeanor on the witness stand, saying he wasn't reading off a prepared script.

Calabrese provided his best memory, Mars said, unlike Frank Calabrese Sr. or Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, who took the stand in their own defense and told jurors that they only acted like mobsters.

Frank Calabrese Sr. "told nothing but lies," Mars said, citing testimony in which he claimed he admitted to some murders to impress his son, who, unbeknownst to him, wore a wire for the government as the two talked in prison.

When he testified in July, Nicholas Calabrese was subjected to rigorous questioning by "some of the best cross-examiners in town," Mars said. "They did not catch him in a lie, much to their chagrin."

Frank Calabrese Sr. was captured on hours of recordings discussing seven of the murders in the case and describing events that were unknown to the public, Mars said. That should be a truth-detector when it comes to Nicholas Calabrese's account and whether he was just building a story around things he had heard, he said.

In fact, Mars said, Nicholas Calabrese has never heard the undercover tapes to this day. It would have to be "by the purest of coincidences that [each brother] lied in exactly the same way," he said.

Lopez attacked the government case for presenting no physical evidence, no DNA evidence linking his client to any murder and no fibers, hairs or fingerprints.

Both brothers are simply boasting for their own reasons, Lopez said.

Frank Calabrese Sr. told the truth when he testified that he was just in the business of street loans and had a mobbed-up partner, Lopez said. Calabrese had a job that put money into the hands of those involved in organized crime, he said, and they would not risk involving him in violence. "You don't put the earner out on the street to catch the arrow," he said.

The jury should blame Frank Calabrese Jr. for dragging his father into damaging conversations, Lopez maintained. The son asked the father questions about life in the Outfit, Lopez said, and Frank Calabrese Sr. didn't want to look like a chump by denying it. The tapes are simply two men trying to "out B.S." each other, he said.

Two other defense closing arguments also took place Wednesday.

Attorney Paul Wagner, who represents reputed mob figure Paul "the Indian" Schiro, said a lying Nicholas Calabrese provided the main evidence against his client, too, fingering him for killing witness Emil Vaci in Phoenix in 1986. Ralph Meczyk the lawyer for former Chicago police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle, said his client was only helping a friend when he gave police information to Frank Calabrese Sr. But Lopez and Mars couldn't even agree on whether the criminal enterprise known as the Outfit, the basis for the key racketeering charge, existed in many of the years outlined in the case.

Mars said Nicholas Calabrese acted—and killed—on behalf of that enterprise. Lopez called it a myth and said the only enterprise he is aware of was "the Starship Enterprise."

Even the infamous "Last Supper photo" of reputed mob leaders sitting around a table in an Italian restaurant depicted just a bunch of "grumpy old men drinking Corvo," Lopez said. "The enterprise died with them on the last clam," he said.

Thanks to Jeff Coen

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Onlookers Flock to Family Secrets Trial

"There he is, there's Calabrese and there's the Indian and there's Joey the Clown," said Lee Anne Roggensack, excitedly pointing out three of the elderly defendants in the Family Secrets mob conspiracy trial, where closing arguments conclude Thursday. Roggensack, 48, skipped a planned vacation so she could attend, sitting in the courtroom for at least 18 days.

The 10-week trial has spawned a subculture of its own: Chicagoans who feel as if the mob was a shadowy but ever-present force as they grew up in this city, and who wanted to see some of its most flamboyant characters in the flesh -- and put behind bars.

In Roggensack's case, a mobster's godchild was her stepdaughter's godfather, she said, "but he wasn't in the mob." And her son-in-law worked at a hot dog stand owned by a jailed mobster.

"Everybody of a certain age and beyond in Chicago has an organized crime story," said John J. Binder, author of "The Chicago Outfit," a history of the city's mobsters. "They either lived near someone or their grandfather drove a beer truck during Prohibition or there was this bar they used to go into."

Decades after its heyday, the Chicago mob is still famous around the world. Untouchable Tours buses weave through the city daily, showing the site of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre and other notorious locales. When the Biograph Theater reopened last year, much was made of its fame as the spot where federal agents gunned down John Dillinger.

Mobsters are often romanticized and glorified, but most people at the trial had a decidedly negative view of the five defendants -- Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, Paul "the Indian" Schiro, James Marcello, former cop Anthony Doyle and Frank Calabrese Sr. -- who among them are charged with 18 murders, racketeering, extortion, loan-sharking, gambling and other crimes. The alleged victims include Outfit members Michael and Anthony Spilotro, brothers who were beaten and buried alive in an Indiana cornfield in 1986.

"It's been undermining the integrity of our city forever," said Pat Reynolds, 73, who spent 24 days in the courtroom and fears that a planned vacation to Telluride, Colo., will make her miss the verdict. "I've always had to explain my city, that it's wonderful and beautiful in spite of this."

Paul Bird, 83, and Robert Madden, 80, said they went to Oak Park High School just west of Chicago with reputed mobsters and their children. Al Capone lived not far from them at one point, they said, and Bird said he went to summer school with a daughter of William "Sweet Willie" Bioff, known for extorting Hollywood studios through the movie projectionists union.

The trial featured Calabrese Sr.'s own son, Frank Jr., as well as Frank Sr.'s brother Nicholas, himself a member of the Outfit, both testifying against him. In conversations secretly taped by Frank Jr. in a federal prison in Milan, Mich., Calabrese Sr. described burning prayer cards on the hands of "made" members and covering a body with "the lime that eats."

He testified he was merely trying to impress his son, since he was jealous of Frank Jr.'s close relationship with Nicholas.

Thanks to Kari Lydersen

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Arrivederci to a Chicago Hero from Little Italy

In federal court Tuesday morning, lawyers for five accused mobsters were poised to try and sell a jury on the sad, sad story about how their clients were misunderstood. Not murdering gangsters. And not guilty.

But somehow, sitting there, all I could think about was Florence Scala, who died that very morning, just hours before defense attorneys embarked on the last lap of a historic trial.

Florence certainly didn't need to stick around for that. Nor would she have bought a word of it.

She knew everything she needed to know about the Lombardos, Marcellos, Calabreses and their kind in 88 years spent on Taylor Street in the heart of Chicago's Little Italy. On the Near West Side where she lived and worked and died, she had no patience for these "other" Italians and said so many times.

"They were men from the old country who lorded it over people in the area," she once told author Studs Terkel. And those men had sons and their sons had sons. Some of them were politicians like John D'Arco Sr., the committeeman of the mobbed up First Ward. And Pat Marcy, the political rainmaker of the First Ward, who made sure the right kind of people became judges so they could guarantee "the right" kind of verdicts were handed down in Cook County. Harry "The Hitman" Aleman got one of those lucky decisions once. So did Anthony "The Ant" Spilotro. But Harry, in federal prison, isn't lucky anymore, and Tony is dead.

Florence fought the Chicago Outfit in the early 1960s. And the politicians on their payroll. Not to mention big business and real estate interests that saw a huge payday in gentrifying her neighborhood. And the genteel boards of upstanding civic organizations who sympathized with powerbrokers more than ordinary citizens. In her view, they all sold out the melting pot of immigrants whose modest houses and hard lives filled the enclave that was her community by never once consulting them. And when this small Italian woman with olive skin and big, dark eyes didn't blink, they didn't like it. And when she began to organize young and old, Italian and non-Italian, students and laborers to demand a voice in civic decisions, they couldn't believe the nerve of a Taylor Street housewife.

That's why, in 1962, the thugs who did the bidding of the bosses bombed her back porch as she tried to run for alderman herself. She lost a lot of wars but held the hearts of grateful people who marvelled at her courage.

"She tried to save the soul of Chicago," Studs Terkel told me by phone Tuesday. "It was a glorious sight."

Some of us who loved and admired Florence wanted to honor her before she died. In 2005, I wrote a column suggesting the city rename the library in Little Italy for her because she was instrumental in getting it put there.

A note from Florence arrived two days later. "Libraries should be named for authors, poets and writers who enrich our lives. I do not agree with proposing my name to rename the Roosevelt Library. Happy New Year Carol & thanks. Florence S."

When Florence said no, she meant no. That went for the Outfit, City Hall or an upstart columnist. Not a sentimentalist or a silly dreamer, she was a revolutionary in sensible shoes. She will always be my hero.

Arrivederci, Florence.

Thanks to Carol Marin

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Dueling Closing Arguments in Federal Court Over Family Secrets Case

Prosecutors and defense attorneys dueled in closing arguments at the "Family Secrets" mob trial Tuesday, each putting their own views on the evidence presented over the last 10 weeks.

Prosecutors asked jurors not to buy the spin of defense attorneys while the defense, in turn maintained it was the government's witness who is not believable.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Markus Funk, continuing his presentation from Monday, focused on the murder of Anthony and Michael Spilotro, two mobsters who were themselves brutally beaten to death in 1986.

Prosecutors, relying on the testimony of turncoat mobster Nick Calabrese, maintain the two were lured to a home near Bensenville or Wood Dale and killed there by a dozen other mobsters, including defendants James Marcello of Lombard and Frank Calabrese Sr.

The Spilotros were killed in 1986 after Anthony Spilotro began attracting too much "heat," or attention to mob activities, in Las Vegas. "And why was Michael killed? Because he was Tony's brother," contended Funk, noting that the mob couldn't take the chance that Michael Spilotro might seek revenge on them. And he ridiculed Frank Calabrese Sr.'s testimony that had him claiming he only found out after the fact about Nick Calabrese killing fellow mobster John Fecarotta when he went to see Nick Calabrese, his brother, recovering from a bullet wound sustained during the killing.

"Now, of course, in Frank Calabrese Sr.'s world, he's totally uninvolved," scoffed Funk.

Why then, is Frank Calabrese Sr. on tape, discussing with his son how he was just a few blocks away at the time of the killing, driving around in vain trying to find Nick?

"Once again, what is Frank Calabrese Sr. doing? 'Play-acting' (on tape?) Trying to impress his son?" said Funk. "It's laughable."

But after Funk's presentation, Marcello attorney Mark Martin keyed in on a statement made by Nick Calabrese that high-ranking mobster Rocky Infelise was at the Spilotro slayings. He pointed to transcripts of phone recordings made of Infelise's home that show him making and receiving phone calls during the alleged time of the killings.

That proves Nick Calabrese is a liar, Martin said. "If you find he's lying about the Spilotro murders -- and he is -- then you can't believe a word he says," said Martin. "Heaven help us if his word is proof beyond a reasonable doubt."

Lombardo's lawyers next took the podium, with Susan Shatz pointing out that the man Lombardo worked with, Irv Weiner, had more reason to murder plastics plant owner Daniel Seifert than Lombardo did. In fact, both men stood to go to prison from Seifert's testimony in an upcoming criminal trial regarding theft of union funds.

Prosecutors say Irv Weiner was under Lombardo's control while defense attorneys say it was the other way around.

The fact that Lombardo's fingerprint is on the application to the title of a car used in Seifert's killing is explainable, they maintain, by the fact that it was notarized in Weiner's office where Lombardo spent a lot of time, Shatz said. "I think it is reasonable" to believe that, Shatz said.

Rick Halprin, another Lombardo lawyer, conceded that Lombardo's testimony at times was not credible, particularly when he maintained that when he was recorded using the word "we" to discuss shaking down massage parlor owners, he didn't really mean "we."

"He (Lombardo) was made to look like a fool by a very skilled prosecutor," said Halprin.

Lombardo's shaky testimony was due to the fact that he doesn't believe jurors, aware of his past convictions for mob activities, would give him a fair shake, Halprin said.

What Lombardo doesn't understand, Halprin maintained, was that those tapes don't matter much because they don't clearly show the activity was done for the Chicago mob, something required to convict of conspiracy. And Halprin also attacked other prosecution witnesses like Patrick Spilotro, brother to the slain mobsters and dentist to Lombardo. He called Patrick Spilotro's testimony that Joseph Lombardo discussed the murders with him "not credible."

Patrick Spilotro, who was present for closing arguments, said it was Lombardo's team that wasn't credible. "Smokescreen, lies and deception," Patrick Spilotro said of Halprin's arguments. "They're doing what they have to do, but truth and justice will prevail."

Thanks to Rob Olmstead

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Rent-a-Mobster

Reputed top Chicago mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo was "not truthful" at times in his testimony in the Family Secrets trial and was made to look like "a ridiculous old fool" under cross-examination -- but he was nothing more than a "rent-a-mobster," Lombardo's own attorney told jurors in his closing argument Tuesday.

Lombardo's lawyer, Rick Halprin, said Lombardo was never a made member of the mob but hung out and hustled with businessmen with deep mob ties. At times, Lombardo hustled himself into prison, Halprin said.

Lombardo has long retired from any Outfit connections, Halprin said, invoking the so-called withdrawal defense that's unique to Lombardo's case. "We are not talking about redemption here," Halprin intoned toward the end of his argument. "We are talking about a decided change in lifestyle."

"Redemption, I dare say, for Mr. Lombardo is in the not-too-distant future," Halprin said. Lombardo, at 78, is the oldest of five defendants on trial.

Prosecutors have tried to tie Lombardo to more recent Outfit activity by the testimony of Pat Spilotro, who was Lombardo's dentist and the brother of slain mobsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro. Pat Spilotro turned Lombardo in to the FBI when he was on the lam last year.

In court, Spilotro testified that his longtime patient mentioned his troubles, including that the New York mob was trying to muscle into Chicago. Halprin called Spilotro's testimony "not credible."

Outside the courtroom, Spilotro said he was telling the truth. "They're doing what they have to do up there," Spilotro said of the defense attorneys. "But the truth and justice will prevail."

Lombardo didn't always tell the truth on the witness stand, Halprin acknowledged. "He's frightened to death of you," Halprin told the jury. Lombardo didn't tell the truth when he pretended not to know what certain mobsters were the area bosses of. He is afraid jurors will judge him for his past. "He truly believes, no matter what his lawyers tell him, that you're going to punish him for that," Halprin said.

Another defense attorney, Marc Martin, gave the first closing statement, for reputed Outfit boss James Marcello, and focused on savaging the credibility of the government's star witness, Outfit killer Nicholas Calabrese.

Calabrese testified that Marcello took part in three murders and one attempted murder, but Martin argued Calabrese lied to save himself from the death penalty. "Do you think he would lie?" Martin asked of Calabrese. "Do you think he would lie to save his life?"

Thanks to Steve Warmbir

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