Organized Crime Still Active in Las Vegas

Las Vegas Metro Police arrested seven Mongol motorcycle gang members on a variety of charges out of an estimated 10 to 11 gang members believed to be in Southern Nevada.

"This has effectively dismantled both chapters in Southern Nevada," said Lt. David Logue, head of Metro's intelligence unit. Mongol chapters operated in Las Vegas and Henderson, he said.

Its members and their charges include:

• -- Harold Reynolds, known as "Face," 40, of Las Vegas, charged in federal warrants with racketeering influenced and corrupt organizations (RICO) conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and cocaine.
• -- David Padilla, also known as "Lazy Dave," 36, of Las Vegas, charged in federal warrants with RICO conspiracy, racketeering influenced and corrupt organizations, conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and cocaine and conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine.
• -- Ismael Padilla, also known as "Milo," 33, of Las Vegas, charged in federal warrants with RICO conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and cocaine.
• -- William Ramirez, also known as "Moreno," 38, of Las Vegas, charged in federal warrants with RICO conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and cocaine.
• -- Jason Hull, also known as "Big Jay," 33, of Las Vegas, charged in federal warrants with RICO conspiracy, conspiracy to distribute methamphetamine and cocaine.
• -- John Babcock, also known as "Sinister," 43, of Las Vegas, charged in a state warrant with unlawful transfer of a firearm.
• -- Gary Lawson, also known as "T.C.," 49, of Las Vegas was taken into custody in California as part of the operation.

Metro Police said at least nine motorcycles were confiscated, along with five revolvers, a chrome-plated pistol, three shotguns, numerous rifles and semi-automatic weapons. Some weapons and money were on display at a Tuesday news conference, said Bill Cassel, public information officer for Metro Police.

The federal racketeering indictment unsealed in Los Angeles also alleges the name "Mongols," which was trademarked by the gang, is subject to forfeiture.

The massive law enforcement crackdown against the Mongols, dubbed "Operation Black Rain," began three and a half years ago by various agencies, including local police, the U.S. Attorney's Office and the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said Lt. David Logue, Metro Police intelligence chief.

Four agents outside of Nevada went undercover and earned a patch, becoming Mongol members, Logue said.

Former national Mongol president Ruben Cavazos was arrested at his home near South Hills Country Club in West Covina, authorities said.

Law enforcement officers served a total of 110 federal arrest warrants and 160 search warrants in Southern California, Nevada, Oregon, Colorado, Washington state and Ohio. Seven of those warrants were served in Las Vegas by members of Metro Police, Henderson and North Las Vegas SWAT teams. No one resisted arrest and there were no injuries, Logue said.

Mongol members have been involved in previous criminal activity in Las Vegas.

Nine men, two of them Mongol members, were named in a federal grand jury indictment unsealed in April 2004 in Las Vegas on 73 counts of murder in connection with a shootout at Harrah's Laughlin casino at a 2002 gathering known as the River Run that left three people dead. Others involved were from the rival Hell's Angels motorcycle gang, authorities said. The shootout killed Salvador Barrera, Robert Tumelty and Jeremy Bell.

About a half dozen people formed the gang in the 1970s because they were banned from joining the notorious Hell's Angels motorcycle group due to their Hispanic heritage. The Mongol gang began attracting members with criminal tendencies as it grew and was then labeled "outlaw" by law enforcement officials.

The Mongols tend to recruit younger, more violent people from street gangs, said Thomas L. Chittum III, resident agent in charge in the Las Vegas branch of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

Thanks to Mary Manning

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Bond Denied for Reputed Tampa Gambino James Cadicamo

A man the government says directed a Gambino crew that muscled into Tampa is emerging as a key figure in the case against a Tampa man accused of being part of the notorious organized crime family. After hearing arguments, a federal judge denied bail today for James V. Cadicamo, who was arrested in August along with four other men charged with participating in a vast racketeering conspiracy under the umbrella of the Gambino crime family. At the same time, John A. "Junior" Gotti was named in a separate, similar indictment handed up by a federal grand jury in Tampa.

Cadicamo's defense attorney, Ronald K. Cacciatore, said a key witness against his client will be John Alite, who is awaiting trial on similar charges. Alite was part of a case that went to trial in 2005 against Ronald "Ronnie One Arm" Trucchio and three others. But Alite was in prison in Brazil after fleeing to Latin America.

Cacciatore and a federal prosecutor agree that John Alite was a dangerous criminal when he was on the streets, but they differ on Cadicamo's relationship with Alite.

Prosecutors described Alite as a crime crew leader who answered to Trucchio and was friends with Gotti.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Jay Trezevant said Alite was thinking about cooperating with the government when he fled the country in 2003 after hearing threats against his life. Trezevant said Cadicamo was in frequent contact with Alite as he traveled in Cuba, South America, Greece and Africa. After he was arrested, Alite called Cadicamo from a prison in Brazil.

Cacciatore said in court papers that Alite extorted and threatened Cadicamo. A witness says Alite said he was going to hurt Cadicamo before Alite went to jail, Cacciatore said. He told the same witness he was going to persuade another witness to turn on Cadicamo and hurt him, Cacciatore said.

"I've counted at least 15 people who Mr. Alite has threatened," Cacciatore said. "Prior to Mr. Alite's arrest, … he threatened a lawyer in New York, threatened to whack him."

Cadicamo, on the other hand, has never been convicted of a violent felony and is "not going to harm anybody," Cacciatore said. "He's not going anyplace" if he is freed on bail.

Trezevant described Cadicamo as a dangerous person who committed crimes while he was on probation. He associated with members of a crew in New York that was called the "Young Guns," Trezevant said, and made plans to harm a federal witness.

Trezevant played a portion of a recorded conversation between Cadicamo and his father, Victor, after Cadicamo was arrested. Cadicamo can be heard telling his father to get rid of items. Trezevant suggested this involved evidence Cadicamo didn't want authorities to find.

"I want you to go in my closet downstairs," Cadicamo says at one point.

"I took care of it already," his father responds.

Asked about the recording after the hearing, Victor Cadicamo said his son was talking about watches he didn't want anyone to steal.

Thanks to Elaine Silvestrini

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U.S. Customs and Border Protection Joins the National Gang Intelligence Center

The FBI is pleased to announce the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has joined the National Gang Intelligence Center (NGIC). Established in 2005, the NGIC is an FBI led multi-agency effort that integrates the gang intelligence assets of the FBI and other federal, state, and local law enforcement entities to serve as a centralized intelligence resource for gang information and analytical support
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“The addition of CBP will only strengthen the partnership of the NGIC aimed at combating violent crime and gangs,” said Assistant Director Kenneth W. Kaiser.“ The NGIC provides the law enforcement community with a one-stop-shop mechanism for submitting requests for information and conducting relational analysis of gang information as it pertains to past and present gang investigations.”

“CBP has to be an intelligence driven organization to provide information to frontline officers to protect the nation from criminal gangs,” said U.S. Customs and Border Protection Commissioner W. Ralph Basham. “CBP's Office of Intelligence and Operations Coordination recently announced an Anti-Gang Initiative related to fighting the growth, migration, criminal activity, and affiliation of gangs who pose a threat to our nation's security and to public safety. We welcome the ability to add the resources of NGIC to our ongoing efforts to collaborate with other federal agencies and our state and local partners to combat this unique threat.”

The NGIC is designed to combine the manpower and resources of partner federal agencies responsible for investigating and gathering intelligence on violent street and motorcycle gangs. The center supports law enforcement agencies through timely and accurate information sharing and strategic/tactical analysis of federal, state, and local law enforcement information focusing on the growth, migration, criminal activity, and association of gangs that pose a significant threat to communities throughout the U.S.

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Chicagoland Antique Advertising, Slot-Machine & Jukebox Show

The Chicagoland Antique Advertising, Slot-Machine & Jukebox Show is the largest show of its type in the world! It's very popular with dealers and collectors from across the country and around the world for it's wide range of high-quality antique collectibles. Please don't confuse the show with typical antique shows. Their dealers generally don't bring furniture, glassware, dishes or other similar types of antiques to the show. The public is cordially invited to attend this semi-annual event, held in 2 exhibition halls at the beautiful Pheasant Run Resort Hotel.

Show Days and Times:

• Saturday, November 15th, 2008 - 9:30 am-5:00 pm - $7.00 per person
• Sunday, November 16th, 2008 - 9:30 am-3:00 pm - $7.00 per person
• Friday, November 14th, 2008 is Early Bird Preview Day - $50.00 per person 7:00 am-5:00 pm (Good for admission all 3 days)

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Is Pope Benedict XVI on the Lam from the Mob?

John Paul II set a powerful precedent for how a Roman Pontiff can take on the Italian Mob. In May 1993, after a high-profile spate of Mafia killings, the Pope denounced the Mob's "culture of death" in an emotionally charged sermon in Agrigento, Sicily, the home turf of Cosa Nostra. "I say to those responsible: Convert!" he intoned, shaking his clenched fist and index finger. "One day, the judgment of God will arrive!" Two months after the dramatic papal appeal, the Mafia bombed two historic churches in Rome.

Pope Benedict XVI was certainly aware of that confrontation as he prepared this past weekend to visit Pompeii. The southern Italian city, near the ruins of an ancient site buried by a Mount Vesuvius volcanic eruption, lies in the heart of the region controlled by the Camorra. The Naples-based organized crime syndicate has lately tightened its grip on the impoverished region, with more killing sprees and a high-profile death threat against a young writer. But unlike John Paul, Benedict said nothing at all about the Mob in his Sunday homily. Did the Pope back down in the face of one of Italy's most entrenched and destructive evils?

Many were counting on another papal mention about the Mob as violence in the region reaches new heights. Last month, a Camorra death squad unleashed a fury of submachine-gun fire, killing seven immigrants in a single attack. A week ago, reports surfaced of a pointed death threat against Naples writer Roberto Saviano, 28, whose best-selling book Gomorrah, and the movie based on it, reveal the extent of the Camorra's influence and dirty dealings. While the Pope remained silent, more than 100,000 people signed a petition this week in support of Saviano, including Mikhail Gorbachev, Desmond Tutu, Orhan Pamuk, Günter Grass, Jose Saramago and Jonathan Franzen. "It is intolerable that all this can happen in Europe, and in 2008," reads the petition. "The state must make every effort possible to protect (Saviano) and defeat the Camorra." The movie version of Saviano's book, directed by Matteo Garrone, won second prize at the Cannes film festival this year and is Italy's entry for the Best Foreign Language Oscar.

When reporters asked why the Pope had said nothing on such a burning topic in Pompeii, Vatican spokesman Reverand Ciro Benedettini said Benedict had intentionally avoided referring to the Camorra as a "show of respect for decent people" of the region, who "are the vast majority." The Pope, the spokesman added, had also talked about organized crime in a visit last year to Naples, though admittedly not with the same confrontational tone as John Paul did in Sicily.

Benedict's silence has generated a small rumbling of dissent from both inside and outside the church. "It could seem that there is fear now to confront the Mob, and call it by its name," Don Vitaliano Della Sala, a leftist priest from nearby Avellino, said in a Monday radio interview. He drew a parallel between Benedict's decision not to speak out Sunday and the controversy stirring over Pope Pius XII's alleged silence about the Holocaust during World War II.

That analogy seems a stretch: the Italian authorities' decades-long battle to uproot the Mob bears little comparison to the Nazis' state-run policy of genocide. But the comparison between Benedict and his immediate predecessor is illuminating. John Paul not only possessed a pastoral charisma that made him beloved among his flock, but also he could call on a reserve of public passion in order to confront a problem facing his church or the world at large. That kind of fire is simply not in this Pontiff's arsenal.

Thanks to Jeff Israely

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