Lawyer on Lombardo: Hustler? Yes, Gangster? No

Friends of ours: Joey "The Clown" Lombardo, Frank Calabrese Sr., Anthony Doyle, Nicholas Calabrese
Friends of mine: Frank Calabrese Jr.

Lawyer Rick Halprin stood a step from the jury box Monday at the Family Secrets trial and painted a picture of a vastly misunderstood Joey "the Clown" Lombardo.

Lowering his normally deep, echoing voice, Halprin contended the reputed leader of the Outfit's Grand Avenue street crew was "a hustler and not a gangster," telling jurors that his client's ambition got him tangled up with the wrong crowd and mislabeled a mobster. "Joey Lombardo is not, was not and never has been a capo or a made member of the Chicago Outfit," Halprin said.

His remarks came after federal prosecutors completed seven weeks of often-dramatic evidence and the defense opened for the five men on trial in a conspiracy case that at its heart involves 18 long-unsolved gangland slayings.

The trial's next few days could be pivotal as Lombardo and another key defendant, Frank Calabrese Sr., are expected to testify on their own behalf, their attorneys said. Former Chicago Police Officer Anthony Doyle, another defendant in the case, may testify as well.

The investigation's Family Secrets code-name came as a result of cooperation by Calabrese's brother and son. In recent testimony, the brother, Nicholas, an admitted Outfit hit man, implicated Calabrese in more than a dozen of the mob killings. The son, Frank Jr., also testified after secretly recording conversations with his father.

The task could be tall as well for Lombardo, 78, as he tries to dispel his image as one of Chicago's most clever and colorful organized-crime figures of recent decades.

In a highly unusual, strategic move Monday, Halprin delivered his opening statement on Lombardo's behalf weeks after the landmark trial began in late June and other defense lawyers addressed jurors. Halprin denied his client took part as charged in the massive criminal conspiracy but admitted he had one connection to questionable activities on the West Side. "He did, in fact, run the oldest, most reliable craps game on Grand Avenue," Halprin said with a smile.

Lombardo sat back at his defense table, watching his lawyer. At one point he looked toward the courtroom gallery while adjusting his glasses, as if gauging reaction.

Halprin's remarks lasted about 30 minutes. He stood away from a lectern, gesturing with his hands and explaining Lombardo's point of view.

Halprin portrayed Lombardo as a businessman who fell into trouble after mixing with the wrong people. He was friends with men such as mob-connected bail bondsman Irwin Weiner and labor racketeer Allen Dorfman and got swept up in their schemes, he said. Lombardo was convicted with Dorfman in an attempt to bribe the late U.S. Sen. Howard Cannon of Nevada, Halprin told jurors, and was later convicted of skimming millions of dollars from a Las Vegas casino. But Lombardo played a minor role, Halprin said, and didn't see a dime of any casino cash. He was snared in the case because he spent time at Dorfman's office while the FBI was wiretapping conversations there.

In prison in the 1980s, Lombardo had an epiphany, the lawyer said. "He knew for the rest of his life, in the public's perception, [it would be]: reputed mobster, reputed gang boss," Halprin said. "He decides to withdraw from his past life."

Lombardo took out a newspaper ad in the early 1990s claiming he wasn't a made member of the mob and asking anyone who witnessed him commit a crime to call his probation officer or the FBI.

He has held to a lawful lifestyle ever since, Halprin said, working at an upholstery factory and minding his own business.

Jurors would not see a witness come into the courtroom and identify the Lombardo of the past decade as anything "other than older, smarter, wiser and a decent citizen," Halprin promised.

Halprin denied Lombardo played any part in the 1974 murder of federal witness Daniel Seifert, the lone killing in which he has been implicated. Seifert was fatally shot before he could testify against Lombardo and others in a fraud case. But Halprin said his client was 20 miles away in a restaurant at the time of the killing.

Also Monday, a defense witness testified he witnessed the 1983 murders of Richard Ortiz and Arthur Morawski and contradicted the testimony of Nick Calabrese, the government's star witness. Terry Pretto, 56, who was the first witness called for Frank Calabrese Sr., testified he lived above the Cicero bar owned by Ortiz at the time of the murder.

Pretto said several times that he was "petrified" to be testifying and faced the wrong way as he was about to be sworn in Monday. U.S. District Judge James Zagel asked him to turn around and face the bench. "Sorry guy," Pretto said.

The gray-haired Pretto said he left his pregnant wife upstairs to buy a six pack of beer on the night of the shooting when he saw a man standing in front of Ortiz's car. Pretto said a single gunman with no mask or gloves shot the men. He identified the gunman as a Cicero police sergeant.

Calabrese testified that he and his brother carried out the killing after Ortiz crossed the Outfit.

On cross-examination by Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, Pretto acknowledged he never gave a statement about what he contends he saw until May 2000, 17 years after the murders.

Mars pressed him for details, and Pretto admitted again that he was flustered. "I'm scared," said Pretto, even telling the prosecutor "you might come after me tonight."

"No, I guarantee it won't be me," Mars answered.

Mars also asked if it was possible Pretto was naming the police officer because he had a grudge against him. He asked if Pretto remembered giving a statement saying that the officer had once handcuffed him in Cicero and beaten him up.

Pretto said he didn't recall. "I've been handcuffed a lot of times in Cicero," he said.

Thanks to Jeff Coen

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Feds Rest Their Case at Family Secrets Trial

Federal prosecutors rested their case Monday at the racketeering trial of alleged mob boss Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo and four other reputed members of the Chicago underworld.

U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel quickly denied requests by the defendants for immediate acquittal and began setting the stage for perhaps a week of defense witnesses -- including Lombardo himself -- at Chicago's biggest mob trial in years. "It's quite plain that all of these motions for acquittal at the end of the government's case must be denied and I deny them," Zagel said.

Besides the 78-year-old Lombardo, those on trial are James Marcello, 65, Frank Calabrese, 69, Paul Schiro, 70, and Anthony Doyle, 62.

They are charged with operating Chicago's organized crime family -- known as the Chicago Outfit -- as a racketeering enterprise that included gambling, extortion, loan sharking and 18 long-unsolved murders.

Among those murdered was Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, for years the mob's man in Las Vegas and the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the movie "Casino." He and his brother Michael were beaten and strangled in 1986 and buried in an Indiana cornfield.

Lombardo plans to take the witness stand in his own defense sometime this week, attorneys said. Defense attorneys for Calabrese and Doyle did not rule out the possibility that their clients also could testify.

Lombardo's defense is based on the claim that, after serving years in prison for attempting to bribe a U.S. senator and involvement in Las Vegas casino skimming, he swore he would never take part in any further crimes.

Zagel said he would allow Lombardo to talk about his withdrawal from a life of crime despite grumbling from prosecutors that it amounted to letting him vouch for his own good behavior.

On cross examination, prosecutors are guaranteed to ask him why he went on the lam for months after the indictment was unsealed. He was arrested after FBI agents cornered him in an Elmwood Park alley.

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Gambino Ambassador to Sicilian Mobsters

Friends of ours: Frank "U Frankie" Cali, Gambino Crime Family, Dominic "Italian Dom" Cefalu

A reputed Gambino crime-family soldier serves as ambassador to Sicilian mobsters trying to pump millions of dollars in illicit drug and extortion proceeds into real estate and other business in New York, officials said yesterday.

Wiretapped conversations picked up by Mafia-hunters in Palermo identified Frank "U Frankie" Cali as the suspected Gambino point man between his crime family and their counterparts in Sicily, Italian authorities said.

Sources said the only Frank Cali listed in the Gambino family in the United States is a 42-year-old Sicilian native living Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. He could not be reached for comment last night.

The bombshell disclosure came after Italian police rounded up 14 suspected mobsters in Palermo on an array of charges, including aiding fugitive boss Salvatore Lo Piccolo, one of Palermo's most powerful mob figures and possible successor to Bernardo Provenzano, the undisputed boss of bosses. Provenzano was captured last year after 43 years on the lam.

The probe uncovered evidence that Cali, who has close ties to a once-prominent Mafia family in Italy, the Inzerillos, would likely help the Sicilians launder tens of millions of euros in speculative real-estate deals in Brooklyn and retail businesses in Manhattan. Authorities did not disclose what those investments might be.

Telephone wiretaps and listening devices discovered close relations between the Palermo families and the American Mafia, according to a statement by Palermo police.

The Mafia has already made an agreement with the Italian-Americans in view of shared opportunities, Pietro Grasso, Italy's national anti-Mafia prosecutor, said at a recent news conference. In this new strategy, the American connections are indispensable.

Grasso explained that the Sicilians have a difficult time laundering their money in their homeland and are increasingly turning to the United States and other countries, where they have allies to launder cash.

Last May, The Post reported that the Sicilian mobsters, with their infamous history of violence and drug trafficking, were re-emerging as major powers in the Big Apple, and their ranks were expected to grow with the release of notorious Pizza Connection Mafiosi.

Sources say Cali appears to be a legitimate businessman, but investigators believe he is closely aligned with Dominic "Italian Dom" Cefalu, 60, who is currently considered the underboss of the Gambino crime family.

Thanks to Murray Weis

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