Mafia Boss Tries Witchcraft to Thwart Prosecutors

A federal judge Thursday unsealed a handwritten incantation that Bonanno crime boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano stashed in his shoe to put a curse on prosecutors, FBI agents and mob turncoats during his 2006 racketeering trial.

Basciano has been jailed under conditions usually reserved for terrorists because the feds suspect it was a hit list to eliminate the gangster's enemies.

Basciano's lawyers say it was merely Santeria witchcraft meant to drive away bad vibes.

The spell goes: "Before the house of the judge, three dead men look out the window, one having no tongue, the other no lungs, and the third was sick, blind and dumb."

The words are to be repeated on the way to court and inside the courtroom, an Internet gypsy book of magic says.

Basciano must have been a lousy warlock, because he was convicted of murder and racketeering.

The beleaguered mafioso got a break from his stifling confinement yesterday after Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis ordered the government to allow Basciano to spend one hour in the courthouse with his mistress and their 6-year-old son - under the supervision of FBI agents.

Thanks to John Marzulli

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Threat to "The Sopranos" Eliminated

A federal jury on Wednesday ruled against a man who says he helped "The Sopranos" creator David Chase develop ideas for the hit HBO mob drama.

The jury dismissed the claims of Robert Baer, ruling the aspiring writer and former prosecutor was not owed anything for help he provided while Chase wrote an early draft of the pilot.

Chase's lawyers hugged after hearing the verdict, which came after less than two hours of deliberations on the trial's fifth day.

Baer claimed he arranged meetings with police and prosecutors during a three-day tour of New Jersey mob sites in 1995 and engaged in subsequent conversations — sparking ideas for what became the hit HBO mob drama that ended in June.

Both men testified that Baer turned down compensation from Chase three times. But Baer claimed Chase agreed to "take care of him" if the show was a hit. Baer said no monetary figure was ever discussed. Chase never offered him a writing job on the show.

Chase's attorneys contended it was not the industry practice to pay advisers for help during the writing of a pilot.

Chase said Baer himself was not an expert in the Mafia, and that Baer introduced the Emmy-winning writer-producer to people with knowledge. When Chase rewrote "The Sopranos" pilot after it was rejected by Fox and other networks, he turned to "a true Mafia expert," Dan Castleman, his defense maintained.

Castleman, chief of the Manhattan district attorney's investigations division, testified that he provided free consulting services to Chase, over several dozen phone calls, as Chase worked on rewriting the pilot.

Castleman didn't enter into a contract as a technical adviser with HBO until after the pilot was written. He was paid $3,000 for help in filming the pilot, and got $1,000 for each of the 12 subsequent episodes in the first season. He declined to say how much he was paid for his role throughout the five seasons that followed until the show ended in June.

Castleman also eventually appeared on the show nine times in the role of a federal prosecutor, and prosecuted Tony's uncle, Corrado "Junior" Soprano, in his federal trial in Newark.

Thanks to Janet Frankston Lorin

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Las Vegas Museum to be Mobster Lite?

Where's the respect?

Las Vegas, the flamingo city of lights, has the gumption to be planning a mob museum. But since Las Vegas is the town where the mob tried to go straight, this proposed museum will probably be more like Mobster Lite.

Imagine: Chicago -- the town run by Al Capone, where the St. Valentine's Day Massacre became the iconic event of the Era of the Mobster, where John Dillinger was welcomed with a hail of bullets outside the Biograph Theater, where police and judges raked in bribes by the tens of millions during Prohibition -- being upstaged by upstart Las Vegas.

Where do they get the ego? Even the most famous Las Vegas mob hit -- of Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel -- took place in Los Angeles.

Chicago, New York and maybe Cleveland were home to the real gang activity of the teens and '20s. Hundreds of larger and lesser mobsters in those towns met their violent rewards on the streets, in barber chairs and at quiet restaurants with checkered tablecloths.

Las Vegas was the Johnny-come-lately spot with only a few mob hits as the violence waned and the old crime families withered on their way to going straight.

The FBI thinks the museum is a good idea.

The feds, of course, want good local billing in it. They certainly were more successful in cleaning up Las Vegas than they were in Chicago (but far more credit in Las Vegas goes to the Nevada Gaming Commission).

At such a museum there probably is money to be raked in. They better just hope New York and Chicago mob families don't demand a cut.

Many think America's old mobsters looked like James Cagney, Marlon Brando, Al Pacino and George Raft rather than Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano or syphilis-marked Capone.

Still, menacing gangsters behind glass in an air-conditioned museum would be more palatable than on the doorstep in the morning, demanding protection money as you open your mom-and-pop sundry store.

Give Las Vegas three bars on a slot machine for coming up with another tourist draw. But this museum sounds like it might be to the old mob what fine cabernet is to bathtub gin.

Thanks to TCH

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