John Ambrose, the former deputy U.S. marshal convicted of leaking confidential information to a reputed Outfit associate, was punched out at a high school wrestling meet Friday after an altercation in the stands.
Joliet police wouldn’t identify the man who was struck, but Ambrose told the Tribune he was “the victim of an aggravated battery attack” at the meet. He declined to comment further.
According to Joliet Police Deputy Chief Al Roechner, a visiting fan in the stands was being “very vocal” during a match at Plainfield South High School and was confronted by the parent of a Plainfield South wrestler. Providence Catholic was the visiting team, witnesses said.
The wrestler, who is 17, saw his parent arguing and ran into the stands, punching the visiting fan in the face, Roechner said.
Police arrested the student, Roechner said. Though the visitor was bleeding, Roechner said he declined medical treatment.
The boy was released to his parents, Roechner said. Kendall County State’s Attorney Eric Weis said his office, which covers Plainfield South, has not yet received a referral for prosecution on the matter.
Tom Hernandez, spokesman for Plainfield Community Consolidated School District 202, said the district was aware of an "incident" that took place at Friday's meet.
He declined further comment but said the district was looking into whether any student would be disciplined.
“We are doing our own investigation, as we always do,” Hernandez said Sunday. “We will take appropriate steps as warranted.”
In 2009, a federal judge sentenced Ambrose to four years in prison after he was convicted of telling a reputed mob associate that hit man Nicholas Calabrese was secretly cooperating with authorities.
Ambrose’s attorney said the decorated former deputy U.S. marshal was just bragging to a family friend about being in Calabrese’s security detail, but prosecutors said Ambrose knew the information would be relayed to the mob.
Calabrese’s testimony in the 2007 Family Secrets trial helped convict five alleged organized crime members, including his brother Frank Calabrese Sr.
Thanks to By John Keilman and Alicia Fabbre.
Tuesday, December 05, 2017
Monday, December 04, 2017
Irish Godfather, "Dapper Dan" Hogan, killed by car bomb #OnThisDay
“Dapper Dan” Hogan, a St. Paul, Minnesota saloonkeeper and mob boss, is killed on this day in 1928 when someone plants a car bomb under the floorboards of his new Paige coupe. Doctors worked all day to save him–according to the Morning Tribune, “racketeers, police characters, and business men” queued up at the hospital to donate blood to their ailing friend–but Hogan slipped into a coma and died at around 9 p.m. His murder is still unsolved.
Hogan was a pillar of the Twin Cities underworld. His downtown saloon, the Green Lantern, catered to (and laundered the money of) bank robbers, bootleggers, safecrackers and all-around thugs. He was an expert at defusing petty arguments, keeping feuds from getting out of hand, and (the paper said) “keep[ing] the heat out of town,” which made him a friend to many lawbreakers and a valuable asset to people (like the crooked-but-well-meaning police chief) who were trying to keep Minneapolis and St. Paul from becoming as bloody and dangerous as Chicago.
Hogan and the police both worked to make sure that gangsters would be safe in the Twin Cities as long as they committed their most egregious crimes outside the city limits. If this position made him more friends than enemies–“his word was said to have been ‘as good as a gold bond,'” the paper said, and “to numbers of persons he was something of a Robin Hood”–it also angered many mobsters who resented his stranglehold on the city’s rackets. Police speculated that some of his own associates might have been responsible for his murder.
As the newspaper reported the day after Hogan died, car bombs were “the newest form of bomb killing,” a murderous technology perfected by New York gangsters and bootleggers. In fact, Hogan was one of the first people to die in a car bomb explosion. The police investigation revealed that two men had entered Dapper Dan’s garage early in the morning of December 4, planted a nitroglycerine explosive in the car’s undercarriage, and wired it to the starter. When Hogan pressed his foot to that pedal, the bomb went off, nearly severing his right leg. He died from blood loss.
The first real car bomb–or, in this case, horse-drawn-wagon bomb–exploded on September 16, 1920 outside the J.P. Morgan Company’s offices in New York City’s financial district. Italian anarchist Mario Buda had planted it there, hoping to kill Morgan himself; as it happened, the robber baron was out of town, but 40 other people died (and about 200 were wounded) in the blast. There were occasional car-bomb attacks after that–most notably in Saigon in 1952, Algiers in 1962, and Palermo in 1963–but vehicle weapons remained relatively uncommon until the 1970s and 80s, when they became the terrifying trademark of groups like the Irish Republican Army and Hezbollah. In 1995, right-wing terrorists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols used a bomb hidden in a Ryder truck to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
Hogan was a pillar of the Twin Cities underworld. His downtown saloon, the Green Lantern, catered to (and laundered the money of) bank robbers, bootleggers, safecrackers and all-around thugs. He was an expert at defusing petty arguments, keeping feuds from getting out of hand, and (the paper said) “keep[ing] the heat out of town,” which made him a friend to many lawbreakers and a valuable asset to people (like the crooked-but-well-meaning police chief) who were trying to keep Minneapolis and St. Paul from becoming as bloody and dangerous as Chicago.
Hogan and the police both worked to make sure that gangsters would be safe in the Twin Cities as long as they committed their most egregious crimes outside the city limits. If this position made him more friends than enemies–“his word was said to have been ‘as good as a gold bond,'” the paper said, and “to numbers of persons he was something of a Robin Hood”–it also angered many mobsters who resented his stranglehold on the city’s rackets. Police speculated that some of his own associates might have been responsible for his murder.
As the newspaper reported the day after Hogan died, car bombs were “the newest form of bomb killing,” a murderous technology perfected by New York gangsters and bootleggers. In fact, Hogan was one of the first people to die in a car bomb explosion. The police investigation revealed that two men had entered Dapper Dan’s garage early in the morning of December 4, planted a nitroglycerine explosive in the car’s undercarriage, and wired it to the starter. When Hogan pressed his foot to that pedal, the bomb went off, nearly severing his right leg. He died from blood loss.
The first real car bomb–or, in this case, horse-drawn-wagon bomb–exploded on September 16, 1920 outside the J.P. Morgan Company’s offices in New York City’s financial district. Italian anarchist Mario Buda had planted it there, hoping to kill Morgan himself; as it happened, the robber baron was out of town, but 40 other people died (and about 200 were wounded) in the blast. There were occasional car-bomb attacks after that–most notably in Saigon in 1952, Algiers in 1962, and Palermo in 1963–but vehicle weapons remained relatively uncommon until the 1970s and 80s, when they became the terrifying trademark of groups like the Irish Republican Army and Hezbollah. In 1995, right-wing terrorists Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols used a bomb hidden in a Ryder truck to blow up the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.
Friday, December 01, 2017
Mob Fest '29: The True Story Behind the Birth of Organized Crime
Bill Tonelli arrives on the scene with his brilliantly subversive Byliner Mob Fest ’29: The True Story Behind the Birth of Organized Crime. Tonelli investigates the long-standing myth of the mob’s founding—a legendary week in May 1929 in which a who’s who of American crime (Al Capone, Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky, and Frank Costello, among many others) were said to have assembled in Atlantic City
, the hedonistic Playground of America, to make peace and divvy up the country’s illegal enterprises. But what really happened that criminally star-studded week on the Jersey Shore?
At this informal summit, mobster bosses allegedly gathered to invent the concept of “organized crime” in America. Prohibition had transformed all of them from two-bit thugs into underworld bigwigs, and they had a vested interest in keeping illicit booze flowing easily across state lines. In Atlantic City, these hoods played as hard as they worked—if indeed they worked at all. “As legend has it,” writes Tonelli, “as many as thirty top gangsters [enjoyed] wild parties and heroic feasts, with fancy ladies provided for any who hadn’t brought his own. In short, this was nothing like the office meetings you and I have been made to attend.”
How many of these accounts are actually true, and why do they vary wildly in their retelling? Did the mobsters really wheel around the Boardwalk in rolling chairs, smoking cigars and cutting deals? Did they threaten one another in swank conference rooms in the Ritz-Carlton? Did they force Al Capone, fresh from the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago, to turn himself in to the cops in order to take the heat off everyone else? And what about the infamous photo of Nucky Johnson—“the benevolent but undisputed king” of Atlantic City, better known as Nucky Thompson on Boardwalk Empire—strolling the boards arm in arm with Capone? Was this a staged shoot caught by early paparazzi or a Prohibition-era Photoshop job designed to ignite conspiracy theories that would thrive for years to come?
At a time when the early mob days are all the rage, Tonelli sifts the facts from the malarkey and in so doing shows that when it comes to the birth of organized crime, a good lie is hard to beat.
, the hedonistic Playground of America, to make peace and divvy up the country’s illegal enterprises. But what really happened that criminally star-studded week on the Jersey Shore?At this informal summit, mobster bosses allegedly gathered to invent the concept of “organized crime” in America. Prohibition had transformed all of them from two-bit thugs into underworld bigwigs, and they had a vested interest in keeping illicit booze flowing easily across state lines. In Atlantic City, these hoods played as hard as they worked—if indeed they worked at all. “As legend has it,” writes Tonelli, “as many as thirty top gangsters [enjoyed] wild parties and heroic feasts, with fancy ladies provided for any who hadn’t brought his own. In short, this was nothing like the office meetings you and I have been made to attend.”
How many of these accounts are actually true, and why do they vary wildly in their retelling? Did the mobsters really wheel around the Boardwalk in rolling chairs, smoking cigars and cutting deals? Did they threaten one another in swank conference rooms in the Ritz-Carlton? Did they force Al Capone, fresh from the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre in Chicago, to turn himself in to the cops in order to take the heat off everyone else? And what about the infamous photo of Nucky Johnson—“the benevolent but undisputed king” of Atlantic City, better known as Nucky Thompson on Boardwalk Empire—strolling the boards arm in arm with Capone? Was this a staged shoot caught by early paparazzi or a Prohibition-era Photoshop job designed to ignite conspiracy theories that would thrive for years to come?
At a time when the early mob days are all the rage, Tonelli sifts the facts from the malarkey and in so doing shows that when it comes to the birth of organized crime, a good lie is hard to beat.
Thursday, November 30, 2017
Member of #MS13, "Street Danger", Pleads Guilty to RICO Conspiracy Involving Murder of 15 Year Old
An MS-13 member pleaded guilty in federal court in Boston to racketeering conspiracy involving the murder of a 15-year-old boy in East Boston.
Henry Josue Parada Martinez, a/k/a “Street Danger,” 22, a Salvadoran national formerly of East Boston and Montgomery County, Md., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct enterprise affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity, more commonly referred to as RICO conspiracy. U.S. District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV scheduled sentencing for March 1, 2018.
During an investigation of MS-13 in Massachusetts, Parada Martinez was identified as a member of MS-13’s Molinos clique, which operated in East Boston and other parts of Massachusetts. Parada Martinez admitted that on Sept. 7, 2015, he was one of four individuals who murdered a 15-year-old boy on Constitution Beach in East Boston. Agents subsequently recorded conversations with Parada Martinez in which he acknowledged being a member of MS-13, admitted that he was one of the men who murdered the victim, and identified other MS-13 members who committed the murder with him.
After a three-year investigation, Parada Martinez was one of 61 individuals named in a superseding indictment targeting the criminal activities of alleged leaders, members, and associates of MS-13 in Massachusetts. Parada Martinez is the 26th defendant to plead guilty in this case.
Parada Martinez faces up to life in prison, five years of supervised release, and will be subject to deportation upon completion of his sentence. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
Henry Josue Parada Martinez, a/k/a “Street Danger,” 22, a Salvadoran national formerly of East Boston and Montgomery County, Md., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct enterprise affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity, more commonly referred to as RICO conspiracy. U.S. District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV scheduled sentencing for March 1, 2018.
During an investigation of MS-13 in Massachusetts, Parada Martinez was identified as a member of MS-13’s Molinos clique, which operated in East Boston and other parts of Massachusetts. Parada Martinez admitted that on Sept. 7, 2015, he was one of four individuals who murdered a 15-year-old boy on Constitution Beach in East Boston. Agents subsequently recorded conversations with Parada Martinez in which he acknowledged being a member of MS-13, admitted that he was one of the men who murdered the victim, and identified other MS-13 members who committed the murder with him.
After a three-year investigation, Parada Martinez was one of 61 individuals named in a superseding indictment targeting the criminal activities of alleged leaders, members, and associates of MS-13 in Massachusetts. Parada Martinez is the 26th defendant to plead guilty in this case.
Parada Martinez faces up to life in prison, five years of supervised release, and will be subject to deportation upon completion of his sentence. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
Tuesday, November 28, 2017
Coordinated U.S.-Canadian Takedown Results in Arrests of Members and Associates of Gambino and Bonanno Organized Crime Families
Earlier, three indictments were unsealed in United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York charging four defendants with narcotics trafficking, loansharking and firearms offenses. The defendants—Damiano Zummo, an acting captain in the Bonanno crime family; Salvatore Russo, an associate of the Bonanno crime family; Paul Semplice, a member of the Gambino crime family; and Paul Ragusa, an associate of the Bonanno and Gambino crime families—were arrested. In a coordinated operation, Canadian law enforcement authorities arrested nine organized crime members and associates in Canada, including members of the Todaro organized crime family, who are charged with, among other crimes, narcotics trafficking.
Bridget M. Rohde, Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and William F. Sweeney, Jr., Assistant Director-in-Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Office (FBI), announced the charges.
“Today’s arrests send a powerful message that this Office and our law enforcement partners here and abroad are committed to dismantling organized crime groups wherever they are located — whether local or international in scope,” stated Acting United States Attorney Rohde. “The recording of a secret induction ceremony is an extraordinary achievement for law enforcement and deals a significant blow to La Cosa Nostra.” Ms. Rohde praised the exceptional investigative efforts of the FBI, and extended special thanks to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and the New York City Police Department (NYPD). Ms. Rohde also expressed her thanks to the Office’s law enforcement partners in Canada, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the GTA Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit Public Prosecution Service of Canada, Ontario Regional Office.
“Criminal enterprises, both national and international, contribute to the breakdown of a lawful society,” stated FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Sweeney. “And yet, the allure of this gangland culture is often embraced and glamorized in movies and on television, where the threats posed to our economic and national security are seldom displayed. Dismantling and disrupting major international and national organized criminal enterprises is a longstanding area of FBI expertise, which is significantly enhanced through collaboration with our law enforcement partners and our Canadian partners. While we have more work to do, this operation is a giant step in the right direction.”
The coordinated investigation lasted more than two years and revealed criminal activity spanning the United States and Canada. As detailed in court filings, in 2015, one of the defendants sponsored a confidential informant to become a full-fledged member of the Bonanno crime family and as part of the investigation, law enforcement secretly video- and audio-recorded the induction ceremony, which occurred in Canada.
As detailed in the indictment and other court filings, Zummo, an acting captain in the Bonanno crime family, engaged in a cocaine trafficking conspiracy with Bonanno associate Salvatore Russo and others introduced by the confidential informant. In one transaction, on September 14, 2017, Zummo and Russo sold over a kilogram of cocaine inside a Manhattan gelato store. Zummo is also charged with laundering over $250,000 in cash by providing business checks issued to a fictitious consulting company that purported to bill the company for consulting services. Zummo took a fee of approximately 10 percent for each money laundering transaction.
As also detailed in the indictments and other court filings, Semplice, a member of the Gambino crime family, is charged with conducting a loansharking scheme in which he and others extended extortionate loans with interest rates of up to 54% per year. The alleged scheme generated thousands of dollars per week for Semplice and others. Paul Ragusa, a long-standing associate of the Bonanno and Gambino organized crime families, is charged with being a felon in possession of nine firearms, including three automatic assault rifles and one silencer. As alleged, Ragusa transported the firearms in exchange for $2,000 in cash.
If convicted, Zummo and Russo each face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years and a maximum sentence of life imprisonment; Semplice faces a maximum sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment on each of three loansharking charges; and Ragusa faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years and a maximum sentence of life imprisonment under the Armed Career Criminal Act.
The charges in the indictments are merely allegations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
The government’s case is being handled by the Office’s Organized Crime and Gangs Section. Assistant United States Attorneys M. Kristin Mace, Tanya Hajjar and Drew Rolle are in charge of the prosecution.
The Defendants:
DAMIANO ZUMMO
Age: 44
Residence: Roslyn Heights, New York
SALVATORE RUSSO
Age: 45
Residence: Bellmore, New York
PAUL SEMPLICE
Age: 54
Residence: Brooklyn, New York
PAUL RAGUSA
Age: 46
Residence: Brooklyn, New York
Bridget M. Rohde, Acting United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, and William F. Sweeney, Jr., Assistant Director-in-Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Office (FBI), announced the charges.
“Today’s arrests send a powerful message that this Office and our law enforcement partners here and abroad are committed to dismantling organized crime groups wherever they are located — whether local or international in scope,” stated Acting United States Attorney Rohde. “The recording of a secret induction ceremony is an extraordinary achievement for law enforcement and deals a significant blow to La Cosa Nostra.” Ms. Rohde praised the exceptional investigative efforts of the FBI, and extended special thanks to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), and the New York City Police Department (NYPD). Ms. Rohde also expressed her thanks to the Office’s law enforcement partners in Canada, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the GTA Combined Forces Special Enforcement Unit Public Prosecution Service of Canada, Ontario Regional Office.
“Criminal enterprises, both national and international, contribute to the breakdown of a lawful society,” stated FBI Assistant Director-in-Charge Sweeney. “And yet, the allure of this gangland culture is often embraced and glamorized in movies and on television, where the threats posed to our economic and national security are seldom displayed. Dismantling and disrupting major international and national organized criminal enterprises is a longstanding area of FBI expertise, which is significantly enhanced through collaboration with our law enforcement partners and our Canadian partners. While we have more work to do, this operation is a giant step in the right direction.”
The coordinated investigation lasted more than two years and revealed criminal activity spanning the United States and Canada. As detailed in court filings, in 2015, one of the defendants sponsored a confidential informant to become a full-fledged member of the Bonanno crime family and as part of the investigation, law enforcement secretly video- and audio-recorded the induction ceremony, which occurred in Canada.
As detailed in the indictment and other court filings, Zummo, an acting captain in the Bonanno crime family, engaged in a cocaine trafficking conspiracy with Bonanno associate Salvatore Russo and others introduced by the confidential informant. In one transaction, on September 14, 2017, Zummo and Russo sold over a kilogram of cocaine inside a Manhattan gelato store. Zummo is also charged with laundering over $250,000 in cash by providing business checks issued to a fictitious consulting company that purported to bill the company for consulting services. Zummo took a fee of approximately 10 percent for each money laundering transaction.
As also detailed in the indictments and other court filings, Semplice, a member of the Gambino crime family, is charged with conducting a loansharking scheme in which he and others extended extortionate loans with interest rates of up to 54% per year. The alleged scheme generated thousands of dollars per week for Semplice and others. Paul Ragusa, a long-standing associate of the Bonanno and Gambino organized crime families, is charged with being a felon in possession of nine firearms, including three automatic assault rifles and one silencer. As alleged, Ragusa transported the firearms in exchange for $2,000 in cash.
If convicted, Zummo and Russo each face a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years and a maximum sentence of life imprisonment; Semplice faces a maximum sentence of 20 years’ imprisonment on each of three loansharking charges; and Ragusa faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years and a maximum sentence of life imprisonment under the Armed Career Criminal Act.
The charges in the indictments are merely allegations, and the defendants are presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty.
The government’s case is being handled by the Office’s Organized Crime and Gangs Section. Assistant United States Attorneys M. Kristin Mace, Tanya Hajjar and Drew Rolle are in charge of the prosecution.
The Defendants:
DAMIANO ZUMMO
Age: 44
Residence: Roslyn Heights, New York
SALVATORE RUSSO
Age: 45
Residence: Bellmore, New York
PAUL SEMPLICE
Age: 54
Residence: Brooklyn, New York
PAUL RAGUSA
Age: 46
Residence: Brooklyn, New York
Leader of #MS13 East Coast Program Pleads Guilty to Racketeering Conspiracy
The leader of the MS-13 East Coast Program pleaded guilty in federal court in Boston to racketeering conspiracy.
Jose Adan Martinez Castro, a/k/a “Chucky,” 28, a Salvadoran national formerly residing in Richmond, Va., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct enterprise affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity, more commonly referred to as RICO conspiracy. U.S. District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV scheduled sentencing for Feb. 26, 2018.
After a three-year investigation, Castro was one of 61 persons named in a superseding indictment targeting the criminal activities of alleged leaders, members, and associates of MS-13 in Massachusetts.
MS-13 leaders incarcerated in El Salvador oversee individual branches, or “cliques,” that are grouped into “programs” throughout the United States. During the investigation, Castro was identified as the leader of MS-13’s East Coast Program. On Dec. 13, 2015, Castro was recorded as he ran a meeting of East Coast Program clique leaders in Richmond, Va. During the meeting, Castro and others discussed sending money to El Salvador to support MS-13, the need to work together to increase the gang’s strength and control, and the need to violently retaliate against anyone who provided information against the gang.
Castro is the 25th defendant to be convicted.
Castro faces up to 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and will be subject to deportation upon the completion of his sentence. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
Jose Adan Martinez Castro, a/k/a “Chucky,” 28, a Salvadoran national formerly residing in Richmond, Va., pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conduct enterprise affairs through a pattern of racketeering activity, more commonly referred to as RICO conspiracy. U.S. District Court Judge F. Dennis Saylor IV scheduled sentencing for Feb. 26, 2018.
After a three-year investigation, Castro was one of 61 persons named in a superseding indictment targeting the criminal activities of alleged leaders, members, and associates of MS-13 in Massachusetts.
MS-13 leaders incarcerated in El Salvador oversee individual branches, or “cliques,” that are grouped into “programs” throughout the United States. During the investigation, Castro was identified as the leader of MS-13’s East Coast Program. On Dec. 13, 2015, Castro was recorded as he ran a meeting of East Coast Program clique leaders in Richmond, Va. During the meeting, Castro and others discussed sending money to El Salvador to support MS-13, the need to work together to increase the gang’s strength and control, and the need to violently retaliate against anyone who provided information against the gang.
Castro is the 25th defendant to be convicted.
Castro faces up to 20 years in prison, three years of supervised release, and will be subject to deportation upon the completion of his sentence. Sentences are imposed by a federal district court judge based upon the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors.
Wednesday, November 22, 2017
John F. Kennedy Assassination a Mafia Conspiracy
Deputy Sheriff Harry Weatherford
, the best shot in the department, was assigned to the top of the County Records Building by Sheriff Decker to protect the president. When Oswald's first shot struck Kennedy, Officer Weatherford saw the pigeons fly from the School Book Depository Building. But he had no target.
When Oswald fired his second shot, Weatherford saw the muzzle flash from the sixth floor window. Jacquelyn was scrambling from the limousine to escape the hail of bullets as Oswald's finger tightened on the trigger for his third shot, which was intended for her.
Just a micro-second before Oswald fired, Weatherford's bullet passed in front of Oswald causing his third shot to go high over Jacquelyn and hitting the curb on the south side of Elm Street.
John F. Kennedy Assassination a Mafia Conspiracy.
, the best shot in the department, was assigned to the top of the County Records Building by Sheriff Decker to protect the president. When Oswald's first shot struck Kennedy, Officer Weatherford saw the pigeons fly from the School Book Depository Building. But he had no target.When Oswald fired his second shot, Weatherford saw the muzzle flash from the sixth floor window. Jacquelyn was scrambling from the limousine to escape the hail of bullets as Oswald's finger tightened on the trigger for his third shot, which was intended for her.
Just a micro-second before Oswald fired, Weatherford's bullet passed in front of Oswald causing his third shot to go high over Jacquelyn and hitting the curb on the south side of Elm Street.
John F. Kennedy Assassination a Mafia Conspiracy.
Monday, November 20, 2017
Congrats to @JordanBuckner of @MyTeaSquares! The @Forbes #30Under30 Recipient is on a Social Mission in Chicago's Englewood Neighborhood
In addition to creating delicious snacks
, Tea Squares is a Chicago based company with a social mission to fuel economic development in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago. They have launched a fellowship program that employs underserved young adults and trains them on marketing, business, and finance skills.
Jordan Buckner, Forbes 30 Under 30 2018 recipient and founder of TeaSquares, has created a new tea infused snack crafted to enhance mental focus. By infusing their delicious energy bars with organic tea, they harness the benefits of tea’s naturally occurring caffeine and L-Theanine, which combine to provide enhance mental focus and fuel for your day.
Their social mission is tied in part to the location of the business: on West 75th Street in Englewood, an almost entirely African-American neighborhood that has struggled mightily with economic decline, population loss and violent crime over the past four decades. Tea Squares is part of a rising effort based on one of the tenets of the Good Food movement: that food businesses can play a catalytic role in restoring economic vitality to struggling communities (both urban and rural).
Tea Squares: Tea Infused Energy Snacks (Variety Pack).
, Tea Squares is a Chicago based company with a social mission to fuel economic development in the Englewood neighborhood of Chicago. They have launched a fellowship program that employs underserved young adults and trains them on marketing, business, and finance skills.
Jordan Buckner, Forbes 30 Under 30 2018 recipient and founder of TeaSquares, has created a new tea infused snack crafted to enhance mental focus. By infusing their delicious energy bars with organic tea, they harness the benefits of tea’s naturally occurring caffeine and L-Theanine, which combine to provide enhance mental focus and fuel for your day.
Their social mission is tied in part to the location of the business: on West 75th Street in Englewood, an almost entirely African-American neighborhood that has struggled mightily with economic decline, population loss and violent crime over the past four decades. Tea Squares is part of a rising effort based on one of the tenets of the Good Food movement: that food businesses can play a catalytic role in restoring economic vitality to struggling communities (both urban and rural).
Tea Squares: Tea Infused Energy Snacks (Variety Pack).
Friday, November 17, 2017
Salvatore "Toto" Riina, Notorious Mafia #BossofBosses Has Died
Mafia “boss of bosses” Salvatore “Toto” Riina died early Friday in a hospital while serving multiple life sentences as the mastermind of a bloody strategy to assassinate Italian prosecutors and law enforcement officers trying to bring down the Cosa Nostra
, Italian media reported. He was 87.
Riina died hours after Italy’s justice minister had allowed the crime boss’ his family members bedside visits Thursday, which was his birthday, after he had been placed in a medically induced coma at a hospital in Parma. Italian media said his health had deteriorated after two recent surgeries.
News of the death was carried by the ANSA news agency, RAI state TV and all major newspaper websites. The Justice Ministry was not able to confirm the news immediately, and the prison would not take calls.
Riina, one of Sicily's most notorious Mafia bosses, was serving 26 life sentences for murder convictions as a powerful Cosa Nostra boss. He was captured in Palermo, Sicily's capital, in 1993 and imprisoned under a law that requires strict security for top mobsters, including being detained in isolated sections of prisons with limited time outside their cells.
Prosecutors accused Riina, who ruthlessly directed the mob's criminal empire during 23 years in hiding, of masterminding a strategy, carried out over several years, to assassinate Italian prosecutors, police officials and others who were going after the Cosa Nostra, when he allegedly held the helm as the so-called boss of bosses.
The bloodbath campaign ultimately backfired, however, and led to his capture.
Riina was born in the mountain town of Corleone in central Sicily. The town's name was borrowed for the main character in the “Godfather” novels by Mario Puzo, written years before Riina rose in the Mafia ranks.
Investigators believe that Riina, the son of a Corleone farmer, jockeyed his way to the top of the Mafia by pitting rivals against each other, and then standing out of the way of the bloodshed that felled one boss after the other in the 1970s.
He went into hiding in 1969 after being ordered by the state to leave Sicily after he had finished serving a five-year prison sentence for Mafia association. During his decades on the lam, the only picture authorities had of the fugitive was more than 30 years old.
More than one Mafia defector had said that Riina had come and gone as he pleased during the years as Italy's top fugitive. Riina was handed his first life sentence in 1987 after being tried in absentia on murder and drug trafficking charges.
For decades, Riina seemed to mock law enforcement as he reigned from underground over the mob's drug trafficking network and ordered the deaths of top anti-Mafia fighters.
But after bombs killed Italy's two leading anti-Mafia magistrates, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, two months apart in 1992, the state stepped up its crackdown on Sicily's Mafiosi.
Anti-Mafia investigators worked with turncoats to zero in on the “capo dei capi,” locating Riina and blocking his car on a Palermo thoroughfare on Jan. 15, 1993.
Riina steadfastly refused to collaborate with law enforcement after his capture.
The archbishop of Monreale, which includes Corleone, said Friday that Riina's death “ends the delusion of the Cosa Nostra boss of bosses' omnipotence.”
“But the Mafia has not been defeated, and therefore we should not let down our guards,” Archbishop Michele Pennisi said in an email to the Associated Press.
Pennisi said he had no information on whether family members intended to transfer Riina's body to Corleone, but he said that a public funeral would not be allowed since Riina was a “public sinner.”
“If the family members ask, a private prayer in the cemetery will be considered,” he added.
, Italian media reported. He was 87.Riina died hours after Italy’s justice minister had allowed the crime boss’ his family members bedside visits Thursday, which was his birthday, after he had been placed in a medically induced coma at a hospital in Parma. Italian media said his health had deteriorated after two recent surgeries.
News of the death was carried by the ANSA news agency, RAI state TV and all major newspaper websites. The Justice Ministry was not able to confirm the news immediately, and the prison would not take calls.
Riina, one of Sicily's most notorious Mafia bosses, was serving 26 life sentences for murder convictions as a powerful Cosa Nostra boss. He was captured in Palermo, Sicily's capital, in 1993 and imprisoned under a law that requires strict security for top mobsters, including being detained in isolated sections of prisons with limited time outside their cells.
Prosecutors accused Riina, who ruthlessly directed the mob's criminal empire during 23 years in hiding, of masterminding a strategy, carried out over several years, to assassinate Italian prosecutors, police officials and others who were going after the Cosa Nostra, when he allegedly held the helm as the so-called boss of bosses.
The bloodbath campaign ultimately backfired, however, and led to his capture.
Riina was born in the mountain town of Corleone in central Sicily. The town's name was borrowed for the main character in the “Godfather” novels by Mario Puzo, written years before Riina rose in the Mafia ranks.
Investigators believe that Riina, the son of a Corleone farmer, jockeyed his way to the top of the Mafia by pitting rivals against each other, and then standing out of the way of the bloodshed that felled one boss after the other in the 1970s.
He went into hiding in 1969 after being ordered by the state to leave Sicily after he had finished serving a five-year prison sentence for Mafia association. During his decades on the lam, the only picture authorities had of the fugitive was more than 30 years old.
More than one Mafia defector had said that Riina had come and gone as he pleased during the years as Italy's top fugitive. Riina was handed his first life sentence in 1987 after being tried in absentia on murder and drug trafficking charges.
For decades, Riina seemed to mock law enforcement as he reigned from underground over the mob's drug trafficking network and ordered the deaths of top anti-Mafia fighters.
But after bombs killed Italy's two leading anti-Mafia magistrates, Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino, two months apart in 1992, the state stepped up its crackdown on Sicily's Mafiosi.
Anti-Mafia investigators worked with turncoats to zero in on the “capo dei capi,” locating Riina and blocking his car on a Palermo thoroughfare on Jan. 15, 1993.
Riina steadfastly refused to collaborate with law enforcement after his capture.
The archbishop of Monreale, which includes Corleone, said Friday that Riina's death “ends the delusion of the Cosa Nostra boss of bosses' omnipotence.”
“But the Mafia has not been defeated, and therefore we should not let down our guards,” Archbishop Michele Pennisi said in an email to the Associated Press.
Pennisi said he had no information on whether family members intended to transfer Riina's body to Corleone, but he said that a public funeral would not be allowed since Riina was a “public sinner.”
“If the family members ask, a private prayer in the cemetery will be considered,” he added.
Wednesday, November 15, 2017
Born to the Mob: The True-Life Story of the Only Man to Work for All Five of New York's Mafia Families
Frankie Saggio reminisces about the era of true wise guys like his Uncle Philly -a contemporary of Al Capone
. After all, it was Frankie's uncle who "taught him the value of a dollar and how to steal it from someone else." Uncle Philly was from a day when being in a mafia family meant being bound by blood and honor, not like modern day families whose only concern is money.
For Frankie, the only way to avoid the modern mob treachery is to avoid getting involved with any single mob family, working "freelance" for all five. Frankie can do this because he is one of the biggest earners in the business, pulling down millions and kicking a share upstairs to the bosses. Though he fights the decision, Frankie is tied by blood to the Bonanno family, Uncle Philly's family, and current home to Philly's murderer. Soon after joining the Bonannos, Frankie narrowly escapes an assassination attempt and is busted for a major scam. With little choice, and even less loyalty to the Bonannos, Frankie turns himself over to the Feds on the one condition that he will tell the feds everything, but will not squeal on his own relatives.
Born to the Mob: The True-Life Story of the Only Man to Work for All Five of New York's Mafia Families.
. After all, it was Frankie's uncle who "taught him the value of a dollar and how to steal it from someone else." Uncle Philly was from a day when being in a mafia family meant being bound by blood and honor, not like modern day families whose only concern is money.For Frankie, the only way to avoid the modern mob treachery is to avoid getting involved with any single mob family, working "freelance" for all five. Frankie can do this because he is one of the biggest earners in the business, pulling down millions and kicking a share upstairs to the bosses. Though he fights the decision, Frankie is tied by blood to the Bonanno family, Uncle Philly's family, and current home to Philly's murderer. Soon after joining the Bonannos, Frankie narrowly escapes an assassination attempt and is busted for a major scam. With little choice, and even less loyalty to the Bonannos, Frankie turns himself over to the Feds on the one condition that he will tell the feds everything, but will not squeal on his own relatives.
Born to the Mob: The True-Life Story of the Only Man to Work for All Five of New York's Mafia Families.
Tuesday, November 14, 2017
4 Years Ago, Whitey Bulger Sentenced to 2 Life Terms + 5 Years, for 11 Murders #OnThisDay
In Boston
, MA, crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger was sentenced to two life terms plus five years imprisonment for 11 murders and other racketeering charges, on this day, in 2013.
Whitey Bulger: America's Most Wanted Gangster and the Manhunt That Brought Him to Justice.
, MA, crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger was sentenced to two life terms plus five years imprisonment for 11 murders and other racketeering charges, on this day, in 2013.
Whitey Bulger: America's Most Wanted Gangster and the Manhunt That Brought Him to Justice.
Monday, November 13, 2017
6th Member Of “Manche Boy Mafia” Sentenced To Federal Prison
U.S. District Judge Susan C. Bucklew sentenced Demeko Wells (22, Tampa) to four years and nine months in federal prison for conspiracy to commit credit card fraud and aggravated identity theft. He pleaded guilty on July 19, 2017.
According to court documents and statements made in court, from at least January 2015 through November 2016, Wells and others affiliated with the “Manche Boy Mafia” or “MBM” organization conspired to commit credit card fraud and identity theft in the Tampa Bay area. Investigators learned that these individuals had purchased stolen credit and debit card account numbers online from various websites, some of which used bitcoins as their currency. The conspirators purchased or stole reloadable gift cards and used a machine to emboss the stolen account numbers and their own names onto the front of these altered gift cards, thereby generating counterfeit credit cards. The conspirators then used these counterfeit cards at various retailers around the Tampa Bay area to purchase gift cards and electronics, which they either kept or sold for cash.
Investigators determined that these individuals had engaged in hundreds of successful transactions with counterfeit credit cards, and had possessed and used thousands of stolen account numbers from individuals across the United States. In total, Wells was held responsible for more than $350,000 in intended or attempted purchases with counterfeit credit cards and stolen account information.
Wells’s co-defendant, Maurice Lewis, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and aggravated identity theft and was sentenced on October 17, 2017, to 61 months in prison.
In a related case, fellow MBM members, Brandon Lewis and Terrance Cobb, were each sentenced to 5 years and 1 month in federal prison; Dontae Williams was sentenced to 5 years and 10 months in federal prison; and Davon Smith was sentenced to 5 years and 5 months in federal prison - all for engaging in a conspiracy to commit credit card fraud, credit card fraud, and identity theft.
According to court documents and statements made in court, from at least January 2015 through November 2016, Wells and others affiliated with the “Manche Boy Mafia” or “MBM” organization conspired to commit credit card fraud and identity theft in the Tampa Bay area. Investigators learned that these individuals had purchased stolen credit and debit card account numbers online from various websites, some of which used bitcoins as their currency. The conspirators purchased or stole reloadable gift cards and used a machine to emboss the stolen account numbers and their own names onto the front of these altered gift cards, thereby generating counterfeit credit cards. The conspirators then used these counterfeit cards at various retailers around the Tampa Bay area to purchase gift cards and electronics, which they either kept or sold for cash.
Investigators determined that these individuals had engaged in hundreds of successful transactions with counterfeit credit cards, and had possessed and used thousands of stolen account numbers from individuals across the United States. In total, Wells was held responsible for more than $350,000 in intended or attempted purchases with counterfeit credit cards and stolen account information.
Wells’s co-defendant, Maurice Lewis, pleaded guilty to conspiracy and aggravated identity theft and was sentenced on October 17, 2017, to 61 months in prison.
In a related case, fellow MBM members, Brandon Lewis and Terrance Cobb, were each sentenced to 5 years and 1 month in federal prison; Dontae Williams was sentenced to 5 years and 10 months in federal prison; and Davon Smith was sentenced to 5 years and 5 months in federal prison - all for engaging in a conspiracy to commit credit card fraud, credit card fraud, and identity theft.
Thursday, November 09, 2017
Genovese La Cosa Nostra Crime Family Associates Plead Guilty to Extortion
Two associates of the Genovese La Cosa Nostra (LCN) crime family pleaded guilty in federal court to extortion-related charges.
Ralph Santaniello, 50, and Giovanni Calabrese, 54, each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to interfere with commerce by threats or violence; one count of interference with commerce by threats or violence – aiding and abetting; one count of conspiracy to use extortionate means to collect extensions of credit; and one count of using extortionate means to collect extensions of credit – aiding and abetting.
U.S. District Court Judge Timothy S. Hillman scheduled sentencing for Jan. 29 for Mr. Santaniello and Jan. 30 for Mr. Calabrese.
The men were arrested and charged in August 2016 along with three other associates, Gerald Daniele, Francesco Depergola and Richard Valentini.
Mr. Santaniello and Mr. Calabrese, along with their alleged co-defendants, were associates of the New York-based Genovese LCN crime family and engaged in various criminal activities in Springfield, including loansharking and extortion from legitimate and illegitimate businesses, such as illegal gambling businesses and the collection of unlawful debts.
The defendants allegedly used violence, exploited their relationship with LCN, and implied threats of murder and physical violence to instill fear in their victims.
In 2013, Mr. Santaniello, Mr. Calabrese, Mr. Depergola and Mr. Valentini allegedly attempted to extort money from a Springfield businessman. Mr. Santaniello assaulted the businessman and threatened to cut off his head and bury his body if he did not comply. Over a period of four months, the businessman paid $20,000 to Mr. Santaniello, Mr. Calabrese, Mr. Depergola and Mr. Valentini to protect himself and his business.
In addition, during a six-month period in 2015, it is alleged that Mr. Daniele extended two extortionate and usurious loans to an individual, and then, along with Mr. Santaniello and Mr. Calabrese, threatened the individual if he did not make payments on the loans.
Ralph Santaniello, 50, and Giovanni Calabrese, 54, each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to interfere with commerce by threats or violence; one count of interference with commerce by threats or violence – aiding and abetting; one count of conspiracy to use extortionate means to collect extensions of credit; and one count of using extortionate means to collect extensions of credit – aiding and abetting.
U.S. District Court Judge Timothy S. Hillman scheduled sentencing for Jan. 29 for Mr. Santaniello and Jan. 30 for Mr. Calabrese.
The men were arrested and charged in August 2016 along with three other associates, Gerald Daniele, Francesco Depergola and Richard Valentini.
Mr. Santaniello and Mr. Calabrese, along with their alleged co-defendants, were associates of the New York-based Genovese LCN crime family and engaged in various criminal activities in Springfield, including loansharking and extortion from legitimate and illegitimate businesses, such as illegal gambling businesses and the collection of unlawful debts.
The defendants allegedly used violence, exploited their relationship with LCN, and implied threats of murder and physical violence to instill fear in their victims.
In 2013, Mr. Santaniello, Mr. Calabrese, Mr. Depergola and Mr. Valentini allegedly attempted to extort money from a Springfield businessman. Mr. Santaniello assaulted the businessman and threatened to cut off his head and bury his body if he did not comply. Over a period of four months, the businessman paid $20,000 to Mr. Santaniello, Mr. Calabrese, Mr. Depergola and Mr. Valentini to protect himself and his business.
In addition, during a six-month period in 2015, it is alleged that Mr. Daniele extended two extortionate and usurious loans to an individual, and then, along with Mr. Santaniello and Mr. Calabrese, threatened the individual if he did not make payments on the loans.
Wednesday, November 08, 2017
Felix "Lic Vicc" Beltran, #ElChapo CFO and #Chicago Fugitive, Captured in Mexico
He is the money man behind the world's richest drug dealer, according to U.S. drug investigators.
Felix "Lic Vicc" Beltran was indicted in Chicago in 2015 on allegations he was chief financial officer for the notorious Sinaloa Cartel and its feared leader Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. Even as El Chapo was arrested and continues to await trial in New York City, Felix Beltran had been a fugitive from justice in the Chicago case.
Until now.
The I-Team has learned that Beltran was arrested last Thursday in suburban Mexico City. 30 anti-organized crime agents raided a 9th floor apartment in the tony Santa Fe district southwest of downtown Mexico City where they say the Sinaloa CFO was hiding out.
Beltran is the son of Victor Manuel Félix Félix, "El Señor," who served as Chapo's chief financial officer and consiglieri until his detainment in 2011. According to authorities, "El Vic" served as his father's successor, handling most of the cartel's finances. Police say he was also in charge of the cartel's money laundering operation, and supervised the cartel's heroin production and export into the United States. Some reports have described him as El Chapo's "consigliere," the top advisor to a crime boss-usually associated with the Mafia.
As the I-Team reported in 2015, the U.S. Treasury Department described Félix Beltrán as "a high-ranking Sinaloa Cartel trafficker" and the newly installed head of the lucrative Mexico-to-Chicago trafficking operation. That same year, federal prosecutors in Chicago charged him with drug trafficking and money laundering, charges from which he remained a fugitive until his apprehension.
Authorities suspect that Beltran took over as leader of the cartel's Chicago distribution hub after the arrests of Pedro and Margarito Flores, twin brothers from Chicago who helped to bring down El Chapo himself.
Despite cutting off Sinaloa's head with the arrest of El Chapo, his cartel continues to reap major profits from exporting narcotics to Chicago investigators have said.
Federal prosecutors in Chicago declined to say whether they would seek Beltran's immediate extradition. There was a Chicago court filing in his case on Monday but it was ordered seal by Judge Ruben Castillo.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie and Ross Weidner.
Felix "Lic Vicc" Beltran was indicted in Chicago in 2015 on allegations he was chief financial officer for the notorious Sinaloa Cartel and its feared leader Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman. Even as El Chapo was arrested and continues to await trial in New York City, Felix Beltran had been a fugitive from justice in the Chicago case.
Until now.
The I-Team has learned that Beltran was arrested last Thursday in suburban Mexico City. 30 anti-organized crime agents raided a 9th floor apartment in the tony Santa Fe district southwest of downtown Mexico City where they say the Sinaloa CFO was hiding out.
Beltran is the son of Victor Manuel Félix Félix, "El Señor," who served as Chapo's chief financial officer and consiglieri until his detainment in 2011. According to authorities, "El Vic" served as his father's successor, handling most of the cartel's finances. Police say he was also in charge of the cartel's money laundering operation, and supervised the cartel's heroin production and export into the United States. Some reports have described him as El Chapo's "consigliere," the top advisor to a crime boss-usually associated with the Mafia.
As the I-Team reported in 2015, the U.S. Treasury Department described Félix Beltrán as "a high-ranking Sinaloa Cartel trafficker" and the newly installed head of the lucrative Mexico-to-Chicago trafficking operation. That same year, federal prosecutors in Chicago charged him with drug trafficking and money laundering, charges from which he remained a fugitive until his apprehension.
Authorities suspect that Beltran took over as leader of the cartel's Chicago distribution hub after the arrests of Pedro and Margarito Flores, twin brothers from Chicago who helped to bring down El Chapo himself.
Despite cutting off Sinaloa's head with the arrest of El Chapo, his cartel continues to reap major profits from exporting narcotics to Chicago investigators have said.
Federal prosecutors in Chicago declined to say whether they would seek Beltran's immediate extradition. There was a Chicago court filing in his case on Monday but it was ordered seal by Judge Ruben Castillo.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie and Ross Weidner.
Tuesday, November 07, 2017
Did Al Capone use the Hammond Distillery to Super Charge His Empire During Prohibition?
When the nation went dry, the Hammond Distillery went belly up. But is there truth to the rumors that gangster Al Capone moved the distillery’s product across the state line to help fuel his organized crime empire?
Rich Barnes, former president of the Hammond Historical Society, said he heard Capone purchased the distillery’s existing inventory when Prohibition began and sneaked it across the state line.
Before Prohibition killed the Hammond Distillery, it was arguably the second largest in Indiana, cranking out 25,000 to perhaps 50,000 gallons of alcoholic beverages daily.
The distillery was such a big operation in Hammond that its owner, John E. Fitzgerald, had a seat on the Chicago Board of Trade, allowing the distillery to make large grain purchases to fuel production, Barnes said.
The early days
The Hammond Distillery was on the southeast corner of Calumet Avenue and 150th street, just north of the Grand Calumet River. It began operations in December 1901, according to Barnes.
In The Lake County Times’ first issue, on June 18, 1906, the Hammond Distillery said it had a capacity of 25,000 gallons daily, offering Hammond Bourbon, Hammond Sourmash, Hammond Rye Malt Gin, Hammond Dry Gin, Cologne Spirits and Refined Alcohol.
In 1909, Fitzgerald built a $50,000 plant that would eliminate the need to keep cattle at the distillery to consume the byproduct. Instead, the new building would have enormous evaporates that, it was said, would use 700 to 800 tons of copper. That would dry the slop so it could be shipped to farms for cattle feed.
On Dec. 16 1911, the distillery paid $40,742 in excise taxes to the federal government for a record-breaking shipment of whiskey, taxed at $1.10 per gallon. “Three revenue days like today would pay the cost of building the splendid Hammond federal building,” The Times reported that day.
Drying up
The push for Prohibition began before the Civil War, but accelerated in the progressive era, fueled by the push for women’s suffrage.
Jason Lantzer, assistant director of the University Honors Program at Butler University in Indianapolis, is considered one of the state’s top experts on the alcoholic beverage industry. “The temperance pledge card, there were several of those large national campaigns starting before the Civil War that (would) sweep the country,” Lantzer said. But a card in the wallet won't protect you from lure of saloons, the thinking at the time went, so Prohibition was needed to enforce abstinence.
“Until we remove the temptation, good people are going to (be) hurt by Demon Rum, and King Alcohol and John Barleycorn and all the other wonderful names they had for alcohol,” Lantzer said.
Finally, in 1917, the reformers succeeded in Indiana. “Indiana goes dry ahead of the nation, so we actually enact Prohibition in April 1917, giving brewers, distillers, saloons, everybody a year before they have to close down,” Lantzer said.
“We are not the only country to do that. Just about every nation has some sort of restriction on alcohol, and the rational is twofold — one is on the battleground that soldiers are not drunk, and the other is that grain can be better used for foodstuffs. So there is a definite slowing down on the national level,” Lantzer said.
Business shifts
The Hammond Distillery was hit hard by Prohibition, although World War I kept it in business. It got a government contract to produce alcohol for use in making smokeless gunpowder.
On Dec. 27, 1917, Peter W. Meyn, president of the Lake County Savings & Trust Co., bought the distillery for $65,500 “as an investment to locate a new industry,” The Lake County Times reported. Before Prohibition, the plant was worth five times that price.
Former saloons, a majority owned by breweries by the time Prohibition is passed, become ice cream parlors, selling ice cream and soft drinks, Lantzer said.
A lot of the breweries switched over to other products, whether near beer, which has such a low alcohol content that it didn’t violate Prohibition laws, or medicinal alcohol, or milk and other nonalcoholic beverages. “A lot of the breweries own their own canning and bottling infrastructure, so they switch over to canning and bottling, or at least try to,” Lantzer said.
Organized crime
Barnes said he heard that “Scarface” Al Capone moved alcohol across the state line to fuel his criminal empire. That has Lantzer intrigued.
“There’s this mythology that organized crime in the greater Chicago area, in Northwest Indiana, had to all been linked to Capone,” Lantzer said. “And there’s enough truth to that in that you do have definite Capone-owned or -operated outfits and purchases of different things, and it became very easy to mythologize that that was also by Capone. Whether or not we ever will be able figure out it was or not. But if had to do with organized crime it must have been linked to Al Capone.”
Here’s how it works: “This building was around in the 1920s, so it must have been used by Capone, or there are these stories that they were used by organized crime. Whether that actually happened, I don’t know, but that’s what I’ve been told, or that my uncle’s cousin told him that Capone came here on vacation or something,” Lantzer said of the mythology
Lantzer has heard the rumors, too.
“There’s a story that Capone owned or ran bootleg liquor out of the Paramount Theater in Hammond. Whether or not that’s true, I have no idea.”
May 8, 1929, brought the Capone empire into Hammond if it wasn't there already. That’s when the bodies of three gangsters were found in what is now Douglas Park. Two of them, Giovanni Scalise and Alberto Anselmi, had been implicated in the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.
Right across the state line, in Calumet City, known then as West Hammond, the Capone gang or his organization owned several establishments.
Bootleggers
Could the Hammond Distillery have been in clandestine use during Prohibition? It’s feasible, Lantzer said.
Unless the distilling apparatus was scrapped, it would be easy to continue production, Lantzer said. “So if you’re Capone, you don’t have to bring all that malt in from, say, Canada, and you definitely don’t have to rely on people who were sort of figuring it out on their own, a sort of bathtub gin and moonshine and whatnot.”
What the Hammond Distillery had that other would-be producers didn’t was the know-how to make good alcoholic beverages. “The problem wasn’t the availability of things. If you’ve got corn, yeast and some sugar and can fashion a still, you can make yourself some alcohol. The problem was whether it would be good. Or whether you would kill your customers, because that doesn’t really breed a lot of confidence and repeat confidence when it gets around that Joe down the street bought from you and he’s dead now because he drank what you made,” Lantzer said.
Former alcoholic beverage sites were a target of frequent federal, state and local enforcement agencies. “They knew where those were. So it’s not uncommon for those places to get visited.”
“Maybe it’s fun to attach it to Capone, but maybe it’s a way to say that wasn’t really us, that was an outside element. I think that is something for the 1920s that we need more study on," Lantzer said.
Attacks at the distillery
The distillery saw repeated attacks.
In 1919, The Lake County Times reported, 10 barrels were stolen. In 1921, “whiskey bandits” stole 2,000 gallons after attacking the guards. In 1922, a barrel of whiskey was found in the gasoline tank of a new Auburn Six automobile at the distillery. Thirty bandits cleaned out the distillery in September 1923, and there had been other thefts earlier that year.
Prohibition agent Robert Anderson was shot to death at the Hammond Distillery on April 16, 1923. He had been stationed there less than a year. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has a page dedicated to him on its website.
On Jan. 28, 1924, The Lake County Times published a banner headline, “Rob Hammond Distillery As Guard Gets Drunk.” Twenty armed bandits stole thousands of dollars worth of whiskey before the Prohibition agents could move it to another location.
After Prohibition
In 1933, Prohibition was repealed. The distillery was incorporated in December 1933 with 100,000 shares of stock to be listed at $10 apiece on the Chicago Board of Trade. The plan was to resume distiling operations at the building then occupied by Nowak Milling Corp., with Nowak moving its feed mill to another site.
In March 1934, the distillery was delisted from the Chicago Board of Trade, and plans were made to seek private financing.
On Aug. 15, 1934, the plug was finally pulled on the plan to restart the distillery.
When the plan to restart the distillery was announced, whisky was selling at $1.25 to $1.75 a gallon. A year later, the price had dropped to 40 cents as additional capacity came on line.
Nowak operated at the site until February 1938, when owner Maxwell M. Nowak told The Times he couldn’t afford to pay high taxes and still expect to make a profit.
Thanks to Doug Ross.
Rich Barnes, former president of the Hammond Historical Society, said he heard Capone purchased the distillery’s existing inventory when Prohibition began and sneaked it across the state line.
Before Prohibition killed the Hammond Distillery, it was arguably the second largest in Indiana, cranking out 25,000 to perhaps 50,000 gallons of alcoholic beverages daily.
The distillery was such a big operation in Hammond that its owner, John E. Fitzgerald, had a seat on the Chicago Board of Trade, allowing the distillery to make large grain purchases to fuel production, Barnes said.
The early days
The Hammond Distillery was on the southeast corner of Calumet Avenue and 150th street, just north of the Grand Calumet River. It began operations in December 1901, according to Barnes.
In The Lake County Times’ first issue, on June 18, 1906, the Hammond Distillery said it had a capacity of 25,000 gallons daily, offering Hammond Bourbon, Hammond Sourmash, Hammond Rye Malt Gin, Hammond Dry Gin, Cologne Spirits and Refined Alcohol.
In 1909, Fitzgerald built a $50,000 plant that would eliminate the need to keep cattle at the distillery to consume the byproduct. Instead, the new building would have enormous evaporates that, it was said, would use 700 to 800 tons of copper. That would dry the slop so it could be shipped to farms for cattle feed.
On Dec. 16 1911, the distillery paid $40,742 in excise taxes to the federal government for a record-breaking shipment of whiskey, taxed at $1.10 per gallon. “Three revenue days like today would pay the cost of building the splendid Hammond federal building,” The Times reported that day.
Drying up
The push for Prohibition began before the Civil War, but accelerated in the progressive era, fueled by the push for women’s suffrage.
Jason Lantzer, assistant director of the University Honors Program at Butler University in Indianapolis, is considered one of the state’s top experts on the alcoholic beverage industry. “The temperance pledge card, there were several of those large national campaigns starting before the Civil War that (would) sweep the country,” Lantzer said. But a card in the wallet won't protect you from lure of saloons, the thinking at the time went, so Prohibition was needed to enforce abstinence.
“Until we remove the temptation, good people are going to (be) hurt by Demon Rum, and King Alcohol and John Barleycorn and all the other wonderful names they had for alcohol,” Lantzer said.
Finally, in 1917, the reformers succeeded in Indiana. “Indiana goes dry ahead of the nation, so we actually enact Prohibition in April 1917, giving brewers, distillers, saloons, everybody a year before they have to close down,” Lantzer said.
“We are not the only country to do that. Just about every nation has some sort of restriction on alcohol, and the rational is twofold — one is on the battleground that soldiers are not drunk, and the other is that grain can be better used for foodstuffs. So there is a definite slowing down on the national level,” Lantzer said.
Business shifts
The Hammond Distillery was hit hard by Prohibition, although World War I kept it in business. It got a government contract to produce alcohol for use in making smokeless gunpowder.
On Dec. 27, 1917, Peter W. Meyn, president of the Lake County Savings & Trust Co., bought the distillery for $65,500 “as an investment to locate a new industry,” The Lake County Times reported. Before Prohibition, the plant was worth five times that price.
Former saloons, a majority owned by breweries by the time Prohibition is passed, become ice cream parlors, selling ice cream and soft drinks, Lantzer said.
A lot of the breweries switched over to other products, whether near beer, which has such a low alcohol content that it didn’t violate Prohibition laws, or medicinal alcohol, or milk and other nonalcoholic beverages. “A lot of the breweries own their own canning and bottling infrastructure, so they switch over to canning and bottling, or at least try to,” Lantzer said.
Organized crime
Barnes said he heard that “Scarface” Al Capone moved alcohol across the state line to fuel his criminal empire. That has Lantzer intrigued.
“There’s this mythology that organized crime in the greater Chicago area, in Northwest Indiana, had to all been linked to Capone,” Lantzer said. “And there’s enough truth to that in that you do have definite Capone-owned or -operated outfits and purchases of different things, and it became very easy to mythologize that that was also by Capone. Whether or not we ever will be able figure out it was or not. But if had to do with organized crime it must have been linked to Al Capone.”
Here’s how it works: “This building was around in the 1920s, so it must have been used by Capone, or there are these stories that they were used by organized crime. Whether that actually happened, I don’t know, but that’s what I’ve been told, or that my uncle’s cousin told him that Capone came here on vacation or something,” Lantzer said of the mythology
Lantzer has heard the rumors, too.
“There’s a story that Capone owned or ran bootleg liquor out of the Paramount Theater in Hammond. Whether or not that’s true, I have no idea.”
May 8, 1929, brought the Capone empire into Hammond if it wasn't there already. That’s when the bodies of three gangsters were found in what is now Douglas Park. Two of them, Giovanni Scalise and Alberto Anselmi, had been implicated in the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.
Right across the state line, in Calumet City, known then as West Hammond, the Capone gang or his organization owned several establishments.
Bootleggers
Could the Hammond Distillery have been in clandestine use during Prohibition? It’s feasible, Lantzer said.
Unless the distilling apparatus was scrapped, it would be easy to continue production, Lantzer said. “So if you’re Capone, you don’t have to bring all that malt in from, say, Canada, and you definitely don’t have to rely on people who were sort of figuring it out on their own, a sort of bathtub gin and moonshine and whatnot.”
What the Hammond Distillery had that other would-be producers didn’t was the know-how to make good alcoholic beverages. “The problem wasn’t the availability of things. If you’ve got corn, yeast and some sugar and can fashion a still, you can make yourself some alcohol. The problem was whether it would be good. Or whether you would kill your customers, because that doesn’t really breed a lot of confidence and repeat confidence when it gets around that Joe down the street bought from you and he’s dead now because he drank what you made,” Lantzer said.
Former alcoholic beverage sites were a target of frequent federal, state and local enforcement agencies. “They knew where those were. So it’s not uncommon for those places to get visited.”
“Maybe it’s fun to attach it to Capone, but maybe it’s a way to say that wasn’t really us, that was an outside element. I think that is something for the 1920s that we need more study on," Lantzer said.
Attacks at the distillery
The distillery saw repeated attacks.
In 1919, The Lake County Times reported, 10 barrels were stolen. In 1921, “whiskey bandits” stole 2,000 gallons after attacking the guards. In 1922, a barrel of whiskey was found in the gasoline tank of a new Auburn Six automobile at the distillery. Thirty bandits cleaned out the distillery in September 1923, and there had been other thefts earlier that year.
Prohibition agent Robert Anderson was shot to death at the Hammond Distillery on April 16, 1923. He had been stationed there less than a year. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has a page dedicated to him on its website.
On Jan. 28, 1924, The Lake County Times published a banner headline, “Rob Hammond Distillery As Guard Gets Drunk.” Twenty armed bandits stole thousands of dollars worth of whiskey before the Prohibition agents could move it to another location.
After Prohibition
In 1933, Prohibition was repealed. The distillery was incorporated in December 1933 with 100,000 shares of stock to be listed at $10 apiece on the Chicago Board of Trade. The plan was to resume distiling operations at the building then occupied by Nowak Milling Corp., with Nowak moving its feed mill to another site.
In March 1934, the distillery was delisted from the Chicago Board of Trade, and plans were made to seek private financing.
On Aug. 15, 1934, the plug was finally pulled on the plan to restart the distillery.
When the plan to restart the distillery was announced, whisky was selling at $1.25 to $1.75 a gallon. A year later, the price had dropped to 40 cents as additional capacity came on line.
Nowak operated at the site until February 1938, when owner Maxwell M. Nowak told The Times he couldn’t afford to pay high taxes and still expect to make a profit.
Thanks to Doug Ross.
Author of "John F. Kennedy Assassination: A Mafia Conspiracy" Discusses His Theory
Jim Gatewood, author of "John F. Kennedy Assassination a Mafia Conspiracy," as well as several other books, was the guest speaker for the Kilgore Rotary Club on Wednesday.
Gatewood spoke about the Nov. 22, 1963, assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, and discussed Mafia history and other facts which cement his theory that the Mafia was behind the assassination, in conjunction with Cuban leader Fidel Castro.
The Dallas historian gave historical facts about Mafia activity in Dallas, including details on the life of Benny Binion, now famous for opening the Horseshoe Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas and a noted Dallas businessman around the time of the Depression.
Gatewood wove a tale which started back around the time of the Depression, and the path involved noted mobsters from New York, Dallas, Chicago and several other eastern U.S. cities, along with Texas historical figures such as Lone Wolf Gonzales and Frank Hamer, the Texas Ranger who helped gun down Bonnie and Clyde in Louisiana.
He tied all of that history together with a story about Oswald and his involvement in the Mafia and his association with Cuban Freedom Fighters who were mad because JFK had supposedly issued an order to have Fidel Castro killed.
According to Gatewood, Oswald waited on the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository with a look-alike, a Cuban Freedom Fighter who would take the shot if Oswald would not. There were also Cuban Freedom Fighters along the motorcade route to signal the pair when it was time to be ready to fire.
Gatewood said law enforcement in Dallas County knew about an assassination attempt and had their own shooter on the top of the County Records Building to look for snipers. That shooter fired on Oswald's gun after two shots had been fired at Kennedy, causing Oswald's third shot to hit the curb and ricochet into the guard rail.
Oswald hit the president and Texas Gov. John Connally with his first two shots and, according to Gatewood, was firing at Jackie Kennedy with the third shot to make an impact on the shooting that would earn him kudos with the mob.
Oswald missed his ride in a car to the Highland Park Airport, but his look-alike was able to get on the plane.
Jack Ruby, a noted mob figure in Dallas, told Oswald if he missed his plane he should meet him at his apartment, which was near the rooming house where Oswald lived. But, before he could get there, he met Dallas police officer J.D. Tippett and shot him. Then, Oswald was captured at the Texas Theater and Ruby was sent by mobsters to gun him down on Sunday morning, which was seen by millions on national television.
Ruby remained quiet, pleaded guilty to murder of Oswald and died of cancer in prison.
Gatewood offered to discuss his theory with anyone who wanted, and he said he has all of the documentation anyone would want to back up his theory.
Thanks to Greg Collins in 2009.
Gatewood spoke about the Nov. 22, 1963
, assassination of President Kennedy in Dallas, and discussed Mafia history and other facts which cement his theory that the Mafia was behind the assassination, in conjunction with Cuban leader Fidel Castro.The Dallas historian gave historical facts about Mafia activity in Dallas, including details on the life of Benny Binion, now famous for opening the Horseshoe Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas and a noted Dallas businessman around the time of the Depression.
Gatewood wove a tale which started back around the time of the Depression, and the path involved noted mobsters from New York, Dallas, Chicago and several other eastern U.S. cities, along with Texas historical figures such as Lone Wolf Gonzales and Frank Hamer, the Texas Ranger who helped gun down Bonnie and Clyde in Louisiana.
He tied all of that history together with a story about Oswald and his involvement in the Mafia and his association with Cuban Freedom Fighters who were mad because JFK had supposedly issued an order to have Fidel Castro killed.
According to Gatewood, Oswald waited on the sixth floor of the Texas Book Depository with a look-alike, a Cuban Freedom Fighter who would take the shot if Oswald would not. There were also Cuban Freedom Fighters along the motorcade route to signal the pair when it was time to be ready to fire.
Gatewood said law enforcement in Dallas County knew about an assassination attempt and had their own shooter on the top of the County Records Building to look for snipers. That shooter fired on Oswald's gun after two shots had been fired at Kennedy, causing Oswald's third shot to hit the curb and ricochet into the guard rail.
Oswald hit the president and Texas Gov. John Connally with his first two shots and, according to Gatewood, was firing at Jackie Kennedy with the third shot to make an impact on the shooting that would earn him kudos with the mob.
Oswald missed his ride in a car to the Highland Park Airport, but his look-alike was able to get on the plane.
Jack Ruby, a noted mob figure in Dallas, told Oswald if he missed his plane he should meet him at his apartment, which was near the rooming house where Oswald lived. But, before he could get there, he met Dallas police officer J.D. Tippett and shot him. Then, Oswald was captured at the Texas Theater and Ruby was sent by mobsters to gun him down on Sunday morning, which was seen by millions on national television.
Ruby remained quiet, pleaded guilty to murder of Oswald and died of cancer in prison.
Gatewood offered to discuss his theory with anyone who wanted, and he said he has all of the documentation anyone would want to back up his theory.
Thanks to Greg Collins in 2009.
Friday, October 20, 2017
New Family Secrets Mob Bus Tour Hosted by @FrankCalabres15 Inflames Victims Families
A century-old code of silence practiced by the Chicago Outfit is being broken several days a week on a bus tour by a former gangster who is taking his personal mob knowledge to the streets.
The "Family Secrets Tour," hosted by Frank Calabrese Jr., is a two-hour guided expedition to mob murder sites around Chicago. "Frank Jr. takes you to the actual crime scenes he experienced firsthand while working as a member of his father's Chinatown crew," states a description of the tour.
Calabrese's new business, at $40.00 per person, began in early October and will "teach you what it was like to think, look, and act like a mobster and how to blend in with the mean streets of Chicago."
"Family Secrets" was the name of an FBI investigation into mob murders and rackets that began in 1998 when Calabrese Jr. wrote a letter to authorities offering to help prosecute his father. Frank "the Breeze" Calabrese was an Outfit boss and killer who controlled his mob crew-and his own family-with an iron fist.
14 mob bosses and associates ended up charged in the landmark case and Calabrese Jr. was a main witness. When the investigation and court cases were finished in 2007, federal investigators had solved 18 gangland murders dating back to 1970.
Now, ten years later, the reformed hoodlum is leading a new bus tour that takes patrons to locations where wayward mobsters were rubbed out. Calabrese Jr. gives his account of growing up in the mob and describes the hits, runs and errors of his family's murderous rackets.
"Don't do this to us. We've suffered enough" said Ellen Ortiz, whose husband Richard was murdered by Frank Calabrese Sr. in 1983. The widow Ortiz, 75, says junior's bus tour is "disgraceful."
Richard Ortiz was a Cicero bar owner whom Calabrese Sr. believed to be dealing drugs and floating juice loans without the blessing of the mob. The Outfit boss blasted Ortiz several times with a shotgun, obliterating his face. Now the thought of Calabrese Sr.'s son leading a tour to mark that murder and others grates on Ellen Ortiz. "It's not right, it's not right" she told the I-Team.
Her son, 12 years old at the time his dad was killed, now has a more direct observation of Calabrese's Family Secrets Tour. "He was the rat so I think the rat should just crawl back in his hole" said Tony Ortiz, now 46.
"The tour doesn't focus on murders -- it focuses on the evolution of the Chicago mob" Calabrese Jr. said in an interview with the ABC7 I-Team. He maintains the tours are therapeutic for him. "I haven't really thought deeply why the exact reason is I'm doing this. For a few reasons. I mean I want to make money too just like anybody else. I want to do good."
The son-of-a-mob-boss, who wrote a 2011 book about his experiences as well, said he is not trying to glorify Outfit life. "They have that right to say 'was he making money, you know?' I'm trying to take something that was bad and make it good for more than one reason" Calabrese Jr. said.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie and Christine Tressel.
The "Family Secrets Tour," hosted by Frank Calabrese Jr., is a two-hour guided expedition to mob murder sites around Chicago. "Frank Jr. takes you to the actual crime scenes he experienced firsthand while working as a member of his father's Chinatown crew," states a description of the tour.
Calabrese's new business, at $40.00 per person, began in early October and will "teach you what it was like to think, look, and act like a mobster and how to blend in with the mean streets of Chicago."
"Family Secrets" was the name of an FBI investigation into mob murders and rackets that began in 1998 when Calabrese Jr. wrote a letter to authorities offering to help prosecute his father. Frank "the Breeze" Calabrese was an Outfit boss and killer who controlled his mob crew-and his own family-with an iron fist.
14 mob bosses and associates ended up charged in the landmark case and Calabrese Jr. was a main witness. When the investigation and court cases were finished in 2007, federal investigators had solved 18 gangland murders dating back to 1970.
Now, ten years later, the reformed hoodlum is leading a new bus tour that takes patrons to locations where wayward mobsters were rubbed out. Calabrese Jr. gives his account of growing up in the mob and describes the hits, runs and errors of his family's murderous rackets.
"Don't do this to us. We've suffered enough" said Ellen Ortiz, whose husband Richard was murdered by Frank Calabrese Sr. in 1983. The widow Ortiz, 75, says junior's bus tour is "disgraceful."
Richard Ortiz was a Cicero bar owner whom Calabrese Sr. believed to be dealing drugs and floating juice loans without the blessing of the mob. The Outfit boss blasted Ortiz several times with a shotgun, obliterating his face. Now the thought of Calabrese Sr.'s son leading a tour to mark that murder and others grates on Ellen Ortiz. "It's not right, it's not right" she told the I-Team.
Her son, 12 years old at the time his dad was killed, now has a more direct observation of Calabrese's Family Secrets Tour. "He was the rat so I think the rat should just crawl back in his hole" said Tony Ortiz, now 46.
"The tour doesn't focus on murders -- it focuses on the evolution of the Chicago mob" Calabrese Jr. said in an interview with the ABC7 I-Team. He maintains the tours are therapeutic for him. "I haven't really thought deeply why the exact reason is I'm doing this. For a few reasons. I mean I want to make money too just like anybody else. I want to do good."
The son-of-a-mob-boss, who wrote a 2011 book about his experiences as well, said he is not trying to glorify Outfit life. "They have that right to say 'was he making money, you know?' I'm trying to take something that was bad and make it good for more than one reason" Calabrese Jr. said.
Thanks to Chuck Goudie and Christine Tressel.
Reports Claim Mexican Drug Cartels Sent an Illegal Immigrant to Start #CaliforniaFires
Acting ICE Director Tom Homan has announced that a suspected northern California arsonist, Jesus Fabian Gonzalez, is a Mexican national who is in the United States illegally. This supports legal marijuana industry leaders’ fears that the Mexican drug cartels are behind the area’s recent deadly wildfires.
Earlier, Breitbart reported that Gonzalez is an illegal alien who has twice been deported back to Mexico. Several days ago, the news broke that ICE had formally issued a detainer for Gonzalez.
Authorities initially arrested Gonzalez after they observed him walking out of a park that had just been set ablaze. Gonzalez claimed he had started the fire because he was cold. It was 78 degrees outside at the time.
On October 14th, GotNews exclusively reported that both senior DHS officials and legal marijuana industry leaders suspected cartel involvement after observing the disproportionate impact the wildfires were having on the state’s legal marijuana crops.
Snopes subsequently set out to debunk GotNews’ reporting, labeling it “unproven.” Its researchers wrote “According to statistics published by the California’s Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, arson (the cause claimed by Got News) was responsible for just 0.37 percent of the 291,282 acres of land burned by wildfires in the state in 2015 and 7.8 percent of fires overall.” Snopes neglected to mention that the Sonoma County Sheriff’s office arrested a suspected arsonist on October 15th.
Similarly, High Times rebuked GotNews’ original story as “actual fake news,” and attacked GotNews’ sources.
Full Details with links at GotNews.
Earlier, Breitbart reported that Gonzalez is an illegal alien who has twice been deported back to Mexico. Several days ago, the news broke that ICE had formally issued a detainer for Gonzalez.
Authorities initially arrested Gonzalez after they observed him walking out of a park that had just been set ablaze. Gonzalez claimed he had started the fire because he was cold. It was 78 degrees outside at the time.
On October 14th, GotNews exclusively reported that both senior DHS officials and legal marijuana industry leaders suspected cartel involvement after observing the disproportionate impact the wildfires were having on the state’s legal marijuana crops.
Snopes subsequently set out to debunk GotNews’ reporting, labeling it “unproven.” Its researchers wrote “According to statistics published by the California’s Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, arson (the cause claimed by Got News) was responsible for just 0.37 percent of the 291,282 acres of land burned by wildfires in the state in 2015 and 7.8 percent of fires overall.” Snopes neglected to mention that the Sonoma County Sheriff’s office arrested a suspected arsonist on October 15th.
Similarly, High Times rebuked GotNews’ original story as “actual fake news,” and attacked GotNews’ sources.
Full Details with links at GotNews.
Thursday, October 19, 2017
10 Years Later, Frank Vincent's @ChicagoOvercoat, is Still Finding New Audiences, Watch it Free!
On September 29, 2007, a group of young filmmakers just out of Columbia College began principal photography on their first feature film. They penned an ambitious script written from the perspective
of men in their sixties looking back at their lives with regret. In order to get the green light, the team needed to attach a star, so they sent the script to acclaimed actor Frank Vincent. Frank loved the character and signed on to the project despite the age of the crew, and the rest was history.
Chicago Overcoat, stars Frank as Lou Marazano, an aging mob hit man who tries to do right by his family and get back a piece of the glory days
. Kathrine Narducci (The Sopranos) co-stars as Frank’s on-again, offagain girlfriend, along with veteran actors Danny Goldring (Boss) as a tenacious homicide detective and Mike Starr (Dumb and Dumber) as a no-nonsense street boss. The cast also features Emmy Award winner Armand Assante (American Gangster) and Golden Globe winner Stacy Keach (American History X).
After premiering at the Chicago International Film Festival in 2009, Chicago Overcoat got picked up by Showtime in 2010. The movie was then released on Redbox, Netflix, Amazon, Blockbuster Express, iTunes, and Hulu, to name a few. Most recently, Chicago Overcoat became available to stream for free to all Amazon Prime members, where it is now finding yet another audience.
Chicago Overcoat Free on Amazon Prime.
The tenth anniversary of principal photography is a bittersweet occasion for the cast and crew, as it follows the news of Frank’s passing on September 13 due to complications from heart surgery. The team was gearing up to commemorate the occasion when they learned about Frank. “The world lost a legend, and I lost a personal hero,” said writer/producer John W. Bosher. “Frank is truly missed.”
Frank’s distinguished career has included memorable performances in such iconic films as Raging Bull (1980), Wise Guys (1986), Do the Right Thing (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Jungle Fever (1991), Casino (1995), and Cop Land (1997), in addition to his co-starring role as Phil Leotardo on HBO’s The Sopranos (2004-2007), for which he received a Screen Actors Guild Award for “Outstanding
Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series” in 2008.
Frank’s rare starring role in Chicago Overcoat gave him an opportunity to truly shine, and his performance earned the praise of many critics, including Bill Zwecker of the Chicago Sun-Times, Reece Pendleton of Chicago Reader, and Rob Christopher of The Chicagoist. In Variety’s review, critic Alissa Simon noted that Chicago Overcoat “boasts the most charismatic mafia murderer since Tony Soprano...” Frank also received a “Best Actor” nomination at Italy’s Milano International Film Festival Awards in 2010.
But to the Chicago Overcoat team, Frank was much more than a movie star. “We became quite close with Frank and his wife over the years,” said associate producer/casting director Chris Charles. “And we had plans to work together on other projects.” Looking back at Chicago Overcoat, the group also recognizes that Frank was one of the major reasons for the film’s success, which ultimately helped launch their careers. “Frank really took a chance with us,” Chris added. “And we’ll never forget it.”
of men in their sixties looking back at their lives with regret. In order to get the green light, the team needed to attach a star, so they sent the script to acclaimed actor Frank Vincent. Frank loved the character and signed on to the project despite the age of the crew, and the rest was history.
Chicago Overcoat, stars Frank as Lou Marazano, an aging mob hit man who tries to do right by his family and get back a piece of the glory days
. Kathrine Narducci (The Sopranos) co-stars as Frank’s on-again, offagain girlfriend, along with veteran actors Danny Goldring (Boss) as a tenacious homicide detective and Mike Starr (Dumb and Dumber) as a no-nonsense street boss. The cast also features Emmy Award winner Armand Assante (American Gangster) and Golden Globe winner Stacy Keach (American History X).After premiering at the Chicago International Film Festival in 2009, Chicago Overcoat got picked up by Showtime in 2010. The movie was then released on Redbox, Netflix, Amazon, Blockbuster Express, iTunes, and Hulu, to name a few. Most recently, Chicago Overcoat became available to stream for free to all Amazon Prime members, where it is now finding yet another audience.
Chicago Overcoat Free on Amazon Prime.
The tenth anniversary of principal photography is a bittersweet occasion for the cast and crew, as it follows the news of Frank’s passing on September 13 due to complications from heart surgery. The team was gearing up to commemorate the occasion when they learned about Frank. “The world lost a legend, and I lost a personal hero,” said writer/producer John W. Bosher. “Frank is truly missed.”
Frank’s distinguished career has included memorable performances in such iconic films as Raging Bull (1980), Wise Guys (1986), Do the Right Thing (1989), Goodfellas (1990), Jungle Fever (1991), Casino (1995), and Cop Land (1997), in addition to his co-starring role as Phil Leotardo on HBO’s The Sopranos (2004-2007), for which he received a Screen Actors Guild Award for “Outstanding
Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series” in 2008.
Frank’s rare starring role in Chicago Overcoat gave him an opportunity to truly shine, and his performance earned the praise of many critics, including Bill Zwecker of the Chicago Sun-Times, Reece Pendleton of Chicago Reader, and Rob Christopher of The Chicagoist. In Variety’s review, critic Alissa Simon noted that Chicago Overcoat “boasts the most charismatic mafia murderer since Tony Soprano...” Frank also received a “Best Actor” nomination at Italy’s Milano International Film Festival Awards in 2010.
But to the Chicago Overcoat team, Frank was much more than a movie star. “We became quite close with Frank and his wife over the years,” said associate producer/casting director Chris Charles. “And we had plans to work together on other projects.” Looking back at Chicago Overcoat, the group also recognizes that Frank was one of the major reasons for the film’s success, which ultimately helped launch their careers. “Frank really took a chance with us,” Chris added. “And we’ll never forget it.”
Wednesday, October 18, 2017
3 #MS13 Members Plead Guilty in Savage Death of Teen Girl in Gangland Revenge Killing
Three MS-13 affiliates pleaded guilty to their roles in the savage death of a teenage Virginia girl in what prosecutors say was a gangland-style revenge killing.
As part of a deal with prosecutors, Cindy Blanco Hernandez, 19, Aldair J. Miranda Carcamo, 18, and Emerson Fugon Lopez, 17, pleaded guilty to a host of charges that included abduction and in two instances, gang participation. The three will be key witnesses in the trials of three other gang members charged with directly killing 15-year-old Damaris A. Reyes Rivas.
The January killing of Reyes Rivas, which ultimately resulted in the arrest of 18 young people, galvanized the country and highlighted the brutal nature of one of the nation’s most violent and powerful street gangs.
According to the prosecution, Reyes Rivas was taken to a Virginia park, where she was stabbed with a knife and jabbed with a stick by a large group of MS-13 members. Her body eventually was discovered after it was dumped under a highway overpass on the outskirts of Washington, DC.
FBI agent Fernando Uribe testified in July that Jose Cerrato, a 17-year-old alleged gang member, filmed and narrated the killing on a cellphone with the intention of sending the footage to MS-13 leaders in El Salvador. It’s unclear if the video was ever sent to El Salvador, but Uribe testified that Cerrato was promoted in the gang for his role in the murder, the Washington Post reported.
Reyes Rivas allegedly was killed as revenge for the death of 21-year-old Christian Sosa Rivas. Sosa Rivas was killed around New Year’s Eve after he purportedly was lured to a local park by Reyes Rivas. Some of the eight people charged in connection with his death are believed to have thought Sosa Rivas was a member of a rival gang who was claiming to be an MS-13 member, and the defendants’ purpose was “gaining entrance to and maintaining and increasing position in MS-13 according to the Justice Department.”
Reyes Rivas’ killing was uncovered when investigators found the videos of her killing while looking into Sosa Rivas’ death.
According to testimony by Uribe, 17-year-old Venus Romero Iraheta, an alleged MS-13 cohort and girlfriend of Sosa Rivas, blamed Reyes Rivas for luring Sosa Rivas to his death before stabbing her in the neck with a knife 13 times.
Wilmer A. Sanchez Serrano, 21, another MS-13 affiliate, is accused of stabbing Reyes Rivas in the neck with a sharpened stick.
MS-13, which has become a major focus of President Trump’s Justice Department, was founded more than two decades ago in Southern California by immigrants fleeing El Salvador’s civil war. Its founders took lessons learned from the brutal conflict to the streets of Los Angeles, and built a reputation as one of the most ruthless and sophisticated street gangs in the country.
With as many as 10,000 members in 46 states, the gang has expanded beyond its initial and local roots and members have been convicted of crimes ranging from kidnapping and murder to drug smuggling and human trafficking, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent Jason Shatarsky told the Associated Press.
The gang now has a large presence in Southern California, Washington, DC, and many rural areas on the East Coast with substantial Salvadoran populations like the Carolinas. And in any community where the gang operates, its members often prey on their own people, targeting residents and business owners for extortion, among other crimes.
As part of a deal with prosecutors, Cindy Blanco Hernandez, 19, Aldair J. Miranda Carcamo, 18, and Emerson Fugon Lopez, 17, pleaded guilty to a host of charges that included abduction and in two instances, gang participation. The three will be key witnesses in the trials of three other gang members charged with directly killing 15-year-old Damaris A. Reyes Rivas.
The January killing of Reyes Rivas, which ultimately resulted in the arrest of 18 young people, galvanized the country and highlighted the brutal nature of one of the nation’s most violent and powerful street gangs.
According to the prosecution, Reyes Rivas was taken to a Virginia park, where she was stabbed with a knife and jabbed with a stick by a large group of MS-13 members. Her body eventually was discovered after it was dumped under a highway overpass on the outskirts of Washington, DC.
FBI agent Fernando Uribe testified in July that Jose Cerrato, a 17-year-old alleged gang member, filmed and narrated the killing on a cellphone with the intention of sending the footage to MS-13 leaders in El Salvador. It’s unclear if the video was ever sent to El Salvador, but Uribe testified that Cerrato was promoted in the gang for his role in the murder, the Washington Post reported.
Reyes Rivas allegedly was killed as revenge for the death of 21-year-old Christian Sosa Rivas. Sosa Rivas was killed around New Year’s Eve after he purportedly was lured to a local park by Reyes Rivas. Some of the eight people charged in connection with his death are believed to have thought Sosa Rivas was a member of a rival gang who was claiming to be an MS-13 member, and the defendants’ purpose was “gaining entrance to and maintaining and increasing position in MS-13 according to the Justice Department.”
Reyes Rivas’ killing was uncovered when investigators found the videos of her killing while looking into Sosa Rivas’ death.
According to testimony by Uribe, 17-year-old Venus Romero Iraheta, an alleged MS-13 cohort and girlfriend of Sosa Rivas, blamed Reyes Rivas for luring Sosa Rivas to his death before stabbing her in the neck with a knife 13 times.
Wilmer A. Sanchez Serrano, 21, another MS-13 affiliate, is accused of stabbing Reyes Rivas in the neck with a sharpened stick.
MS-13, which has become a major focus of President Trump’s Justice Department, was founded more than two decades ago in Southern California by immigrants fleeing El Salvador’s civil war. Its founders took lessons learned from the brutal conflict to the streets of Los Angeles, and built a reputation as one of the most ruthless and sophisticated street gangs in the country.
With as many as 10,000 members in 46 states, the gang has expanded beyond its initial and local roots and members have been convicted of crimes ranging from kidnapping and murder to drug smuggling and human trafficking, Immigration and Customs Enforcement Special Agent Jason Shatarsky told the Associated Press.
The gang now has a large presence in Southern California, Washington, DC, and many rural areas on the East Coast with substantial Salvadoran populations like the Carolinas. And in any community where the gang operates, its members often prey on their own people, targeting residents and business owners for extortion, among other crimes.
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