June 18th - Jury selection begins.
June 20th - On the day the trail is set to start, Kurt Calabrese, the son of mob hit man Frank Calabrese Sr. finds what appears to be a bomb on his back porch. The device turns out to be fake.
June 21st - In opening statements, federal prosecutors lay out the details in the deaths of 18 men and women allegedly slaying by The Outfit. "This is not 'The Sopranos,' This is not 'The Godfather.' This case is about real people, real victims," said Assistant U.S. Attorney John Scully.
June 26th - Jurors hear secret tape recordings between reputed mobster Frank "The German" Schweihs and the owner of an adult book store. The recordings are full of threats and profanities as Schweihs makes it clear the bookstore owner shouldn't be paying any other mobsters who want street tax payments.
June 29th - The widow of Daniel Siefert, a businessman gunned down in front of his young child, testifies that she believes the masked gunman who killed her husband is mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo. The woman's husband was to be a federal witness.
July 3rd - Bookmaker Joel Glickman decides not to testify against reputed Outfit hit man Frank Calabrese Sr. It will mean a prison stay of several months for Glickman. "I respectfully refuse to testify," Glickman told the court when asked whether he ever had to pay a street tax to Calabrese Sr.
July 4th - Frank Calabrese Jr., testifies that his father threatened him with a gun. "He stuck it in my face and told me, 'I'd rather have you dead than disobey me,'" he told jurors. Calabrese Jr. is a star witness in the Chicago trial.
July 10th - Frank Calabrese Jr. testifies about the slaying of the Spilotro brothers and how Tony threatened his attackers. "Tony put up a fight. He kept saying, 'You guys are going to get in trouble, you guys are going to get in trouble.'" The bodies of the Spilotro brothers were found buried in an Indiana cornfield.
July 11th - Riveting secret conversations were played for jurors of Frank Calabrese Sr. discussing who was the rat in his mob crew. The evidence points to his own brother. In the tapes, Calabrese Sr. also talks about the hit on Spilotro and that one of his sins was sleeping with the wife of mob associate Frank "Lefty" Rosenthal.
July 13th - Frank Calabrese Jr., the son of reputed hit man Frank Calabrese Sr. testified that he loves his father but not his "Outfit" ways. Calabrese Jr. is a star witness in the federal case against his father.
July 16th - When a mobster says he wants to collect "a recipe" for him, he's talking code to get someone to muscle a victim for street tax payments. Jurors got a taste of mobspeak during today's testimony.
July 18th - Hitman Nicholas Calabrese implicates a close friend of Chicago Mayor Daley's as taking part in a restaurant bombing 20 years ago.
July 19th - The mob hit of Anthony "Tony the Ant" Spilotro and his brother, Michael, were detailed by Outfit hit man Nicholas Calabrese. The hits took place in the basement of a Chicago home. Spilotro and his brother were lured there with the promise of mob promotions.
July 20th - Killer Nicholas Calabrese called himself a "coward" on the witness stand as he spilled the Outfit's family secrets.
July 24th - Pat Spilotro visited Nicholas Calabrese in prison and asked what his brothers, Anthony and Michael, did wrong to deserve getting killed.
July 30th - Bookmaker Michael Talarico took the stand against former mob boss Frank Calabrese, Senior. Talarico says Calabrese made him pay a "street tax."
Days after Michael testified, his brother, civil attorney Al Talarico sat in as counsel for Calabrese. Talarico originally requested to be Calabrese's lawyer, but was denied.
Calabrese's lawyer is defense attorney Joseph "The Shark" Lopez. Calabrese is accused of murdering 13 people during his mob career.
July 31st - Anatomy of a Skim: Prosecutors in Chicago say former mobster Paul "The Indian" Schiro may be tied to an Arizona murder and casino skim. Authorities say Schiro along with hitman Nicholas Calabrese took part in the murder of Emil Vaci.
Vaci testified to a grand jury in Las Vegas about the disappearance and presumed murder of slot-skimmer George Jay Vandermark. Vandermark oversaw the mob-run skim at the slots at the former Stardust casino.
Calabrese testified against Schiro, saying they both played a part in the murder.
Aug. 3rd - The former mistress of top Chicago mob boss James Marcello turned against him on the stand Thursday.
During the Family Secrets trial Thursday, the daughter of Michael Spilotro also tied Marcello to her father's brutal murder in 1986. Attorneys for Marcello questioned why Spilotro's daughter didn't mention this key fact to the FBI after the murders.
Michael Spilotro and his brother were both killed in the hit. Another Spilotro brother, Patrick, is expected to testify Monday about what he knows about the Chicago outfit mob.
The Spilotro brothers' murders were featured in the Hollywood movie "Casino."
Aug. 6th - Some Chicago police brass took payoffs from mob burglars, according to new testimony Monday in the Family Secrets mob trial.
As CBS 2's John "Bulldog" Drummond reports, the eye-opening testimony came from Sal Romano, a dog-loving career burglar who was whisked from Federal court by the FBI.
Romano learned the tools of the burglar trade as a youngster in Chicago.
Romano began co-operating with the government 30 years ago and closed his career as an informant with a $40,000 bonus in 1987. He specifically named the one-time chief of detectives William Hanhardt and policemen at areas five and six.
Other than the convicted Hanhardt, Romano did not name any specific cops as wrong-doers.
Romano on Monday implicated defendant Paulie "The Indian" Schiro in burglaries and other crime in Las Vegas.
Romano himself was the target of a planned gangland assassination ordered by Las Vegas crime boss Tony Spilotro and his henchmen Frank "Far-Away Frank" Cullotta.
Aug. 7th - A career burglar with ties to the mob testified Tuesday about his corrupt connection with police and attorneys in the Chicago mob trial.
Sal Romano who worked under Anthony Spilotro says he indirectly bribed police through Chicago attorneys in several mob operations. Romano also discussed his work in Las Vegas with a variety of career criminals.
He says he worked with Spilotro, who was killed in 1986, and Paul "The Indian" Schiro, another defendent in the trial. While on the stand, Romano also confessed to several robberies and home invasions during his mob career.
Aug. 9th - A notorious mobster is set to take the stand next week in the Family Secrets trial.
Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo will take the stand in his own defense next Monday. He's accused of taking part in the 1974 shotgun murder of businessman Daniel Seifert.
Lombardo, along with four other mobsters, were convicted of concealing Mafia ownership of the Las Vegas Stardust resort and casino back in 1986.
Prosecutors are wrapping up their case, which has put the highest levels of the Chicago outfit mob on the stand.
Aug. 13th - Federal prosecutors Monday rested their case 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.
Aug. 14th - Reputed mob boss Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo told a jury Tuesday he once shined police officers' shoes and ran a dice game approved by a Chicago alderman but denied he committed the murder that could send him to federal prison for the rest of his life.
Aug. 15th - Reputed top mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo testified today that he was busy filling out a police report about his stolen wallet around the time his friend Daniel Seifert was killed in 1974.
Aug. 16th - "I only acted like a mobster." Reputed mob figure Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, continuing to testify in his own defense at the landmark Family Secrets trial today, said he was having breakfast and waiting for a shop that sold garage-door remotes to open when federal witness Daniel Seifert was killed in 1974.
Aug. 17th - "No Time to Kill People." Frank Calabrese Sr. went from eating oatmeal for dinner as a child to making millions of dollars from illegal street loans but denied Thursday from the witness stand that he ever killed anyone for the Chicago Outfit.
Aug. 20th - Frank Calabrese Sr., reputed mob hitman accused of killing 13 people, lost his cool in federal court Monday morning after a judge restricted his testimony in the Family Secrets trial.
Aug. 21st - A mobster's "Judas kiss" -- It was Christmas Eve 1996, and reputed Outfit hit man Frank Calabrese Sr. was seeing his brother Nicholas out the door after breaking out the Napoleon brandy, when his brother made an unusual request.
Aug. 22nd - Reputed mob hit man Frank Calabrese Sr., a portrait of grimaces, glares and barely contained rage, simmered for hours on the witness stand Tuesday as a federal prosecutor questioned him -- until, finally, he boiled over.
Aug. 23rd - A former Chicago Police officer said Wednesday he repeatedly drove five hours to visit Frank Calabrese Sr. in federal prison in Michigan despite being extremely bored, often not understanding what Calabrese Sr. was talking about and feeling as if he had been paroled when he finally left.
Aug. 24th - A retired Chicago Police officer admitted that he told an Outfit bookmaker and loan shark the date -- but only the date -- when Chicago Police handed over key evidence in a mob hit to the FBI.
Aug. 28th - A federal jury heard Frank Calabrese Sr.'s Greatest Hits as a federal prosecutor played tape after tape of Calabrese Sr.'s own secretly recorded voice describing in detail mob hits he allegedly committed.
Aug. 29th - Reputed top Chicago mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo was "not truthful" at times in his testimony in the Family Secrets trial and was made to look like "a ridiculous old fool" under cross-examination -- but he was nothing more than a "rent-a-mobster," Lombardo's own attorney told jurors in his closing argument Tuesday.
Aug. 31st - Prosecutor: Don't buy Lombardo's song and dance. Alleged top mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo is still part of the Chicago Outfit because he lied from the witness stand to protect the organization, a federal prosecutor said Thursday in the government's final argument in the Family Secrets trial.
Sept. 4th - Jury begins deliberations.
Thanks to LVN
Thursday, September 06, 2007
Intimidation Request by Jury in Mob Trial
A federal court jury considering the biggest Chicago mob trial in years has asked for the legal definition of the word "intimidation."
Federal Judge James Zagel told attorneys about the jurors' request late this morning. He asked attorneys to return at 1:30 with proposals on how the word should be defined.
The five defendants are accused of engaging in a racketeering conspiracy including 18 murders dating back to 1970, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion. Save 15% when you Shop by PBS Series! Expires 9.17.07
In the indictment, the Chicago Outfit is accused of using threats, violence and intimidation to discipline members and associates -- and also to collect street tax and juice loan debts.
The jury is in its third day of deliberations.
Federal Judge James Zagel told attorneys about the jurors' request late this morning. He asked attorneys to return at 1:30 with proposals on how the word should be defined.The five defendants are accused of engaging in a racketeering conspiracy including 18 murders dating back to 1970, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion. Save 15% when you Shop by PBS Series! Expires 9.17.07
In the indictment, the Chicago Outfit is accused of using threats, violence and intimidation to discipline members and associates -- and also to collect street tax and juice loan debts.
The jury is in its third day of deliberations.
Reputed Gambino Sentenced for Conspiracy to Commit Murder Conviction
Dominick Pizzonia shuffled into Federal District Court in Brooklyn yesterday wearing a faded and wrinkled prison uniform, his hair almost completely gray. Mr. Pizzonia, a reputed Gambino crime family captain, looked more like a middle school mop man than a hardened mobster, fragile as he entered the courtroom for sentencing after being convicted in May of conspiracy to commit murder.
Judge Jack B. Weinstein sentenced Mr. Pizzonia, 65, to 15 years in prison, a point between the 20-year maximum that prosecutors were pushing for and the 7-to-10-year term his lawyers were hoping for.
For Mr. Pizzonia, it was the latest in a long string of court proceedings that included testimony by made men, murderers and Mafia turncoats who were brought in to detail or dispute his role in the 1992 killings of Thomas and Rosemarie Uva.
The Uvas were a married couple from Ozone Park, Queens, who rode roughshod through very rough circles, robbing mobsters with an Uzi and — for a time — apparent impunity. The robberies earned them the nickname Bonnie and Clyde, as well as a bounty on their heads, according to witnesses and prosecutors. They robbed Mafia social clubs, forcing their victims to empty their pockets and drop their pants. Perhaps their gravest mistake was robbing the social club that Mr. Pizzonia managed — not once, but twice.
Prosecutors said that Mr. Pizzonia wanted the couple dead, and had given orders for anyone who found them to kill them. He even went to John A. Gotti, the boss of the Gambino family at the time, for permission for the killings, prosecutors said.
The Uvas had become marked for death by the Bonanno, Gambino and Colombo crime families.
The couple were gunned down on the morning of Dec. 24, 1992. Several bullets crashed through the windshield of their car, striking each of them in the head three times. The killings took place not far from their Queens home and Mr. Pizzonia’s social club on nearby Liberty Avenue. Mr. Pizzonia was charged with the killings, but in the end a jury found him guilty only of racketeering conspiracy for participating in planning the killings.
Joseph R. Corozzo, Mr. Pizzonia’s lawyer, pointed out the government’s disdain for Mafia members yesterday, but he cited what he said was its willingness to offer freedom or lesser charges to those who snitch on — or lie about — a bigger fish.
At trial, Mr. Corozzo cast doubt on the government’s case, picking apart the testimony of its star witnesses, who were mostly Mafia defectors, bookies and criminals, one of whom is in the federal witness protection program. The jury returned a not-guilty verdict on the more serious charges.
Prosecutors, arguing for the maximum sentence, reiterated yesterday that Mr. Pizzonia had boasted of putting an end to the Uvas. They reminded the judge that trial testimony had indicated that when another crime family tried to take credit for the killings, Mr. Gotti told the bosses of that family that it was “our Skinny Dom,” as Mr. Pizzonia is known, who killed the couple.
By yesterday afternoon, the fireworks that had preceded the day had faded. There was no commotion as the judge read Mr. Pizzonia’s sentence.
Mr. Pizzonia was seated at a large conference table in Judge Weinstein’s courtroom, directly opposite the judge. Mr. Corozzo sat to his left. The prosecution team sat to the left of Mr. Corozzo, and in the three-row gallery behind Mr. Pizzonia sat his wife and two sons and other supporters, mostly stoic old Italian men with clean-shaven faces and work-worn hands.
Before the judge rendered the sentence, he likened Mr. Pizzonia’s life to a work of cinema, a film with a split screen and a single actor portraying two roles, masterfully at times. On one side of the screen, Judge Weinstein said, you have the church member who was quiet, generous and courtly. But on the other is a hardened criminal who has been “a lifelong member of a vicious gang.”
“How much credit can be given to the worthy side?” Judge Weinstein asked. “In this case, not much.”
Thanks to Trymaine Lee
Judge Jack B. Weinstein sentenced Mr. Pizzonia, 65, to 15 years in prison, a point between the 20-year maximum that prosecutors were pushing for and the 7-to-10-year term his lawyers were hoping for.
For Mr. Pizzonia, it was the latest in a long string of court proceedings that included testimony by made men, murderers and Mafia turncoats who were brought in to detail or dispute his role in the 1992 killings of Thomas and Rosemarie Uva.
The Uvas were a married couple from Ozone Park, Queens, who rode roughshod through very rough circles, robbing mobsters with an Uzi and — for a time — apparent impunity. The robberies earned them the nickname Bonnie and Clyde, as well as a bounty on their heads, according to witnesses and prosecutors. They robbed Mafia social clubs, forcing their victims to empty their pockets and drop their pants. Perhaps their gravest mistake was robbing the social club that Mr. Pizzonia managed — not once, but twice.
Prosecutors said that Mr. Pizzonia wanted the couple dead, and had given orders for anyone who found them to kill them. He even went to John A. Gotti, the boss of the Gambino family at the time, for permission for the killings, prosecutors said.
The Uvas had become marked for death by the Bonanno, Gambino and Colombo crime families.
The couple were gunned down on the morning of Dec. 24, 1992. Several bullets crashed through the windshield of their car, striking each of them in the head three times. The killings took place not far from their Queens home and Mr. Pizzonia’s social club on nearby Liberty Avenue. Mr. Pizzonia was charged with the killings, but in the end a jury found him guilty only of racketeering conspiracy for participating in planning the killings.
Joseph R. Corozzo, Mr. Pizzonia’s lawyer, pointed out the government’s disdain for Mafia members yesterday, but he cited what he said was its willingness to offer freedom or lesser charges to those who snitch on — or lie about — a bigger fish.
At trial, Mr. Corozzo cast doubt on the government’s case, picking apart the testimony of its star witnesses, who were mostly Mafia defectors, bookies and criminals, one of whom is in the federal witness protection program. The jury returned a not-guilty verdict on the more serious charges.
Prosecutors, arguing for the maximum sentence, reiterated yesterday that Mr. Pizzonia had boasted of putting an end to the Uvas. They reminded the judge that trial testimony had indicated that when another crime family tried to take credit for the killings, Mr. Gotti told the bosses of that family that it was “our Skinny Dom,” as Mr. Pizzonia is known, who killed the couple.
By yesterday afternoon, the fireworks that had preceded the day had faded. There was no commotion as the judge read Mr. Pizzonia’s sentence.
Mr. Pizzonia was seated at a large conference table in Judge Weinstein’s courtroom, directly opposite the judge. Mr. Corozzo sat to his left. The prosecution team sat to the left of Mr. Corozzo, and in the three-row gallery behind Mr. Pizzonia sat his wife and two sons and other supporters, mostly stoic old Italian men with clean-shaven faces and work-worn hands.
Before the judge rendered the sentence, he likened Mr. Pizzonia’s life to a work of cinema, a film with a split screen and a single actor portraying two roles, masterfully at times. On one side of the screen, Judge Weinstein said, you have the church member who was quiet, generous and courtly. But on the other is a hardened criminal who has been “a lifelong member of a vicious gang.”
“How much credit can be given to the worthy side?” Judge Weinstein asked. “In this case, not much.”
Thanks to Trymaine Lee
Part Two of Family Secrets Mob Trial Coming Next Spring
While jurors deliberate over the evidence in the family secrets mob murder trial, it appears act two of the saga will now unfold next spring.
CBS 2’s John “Bulldog” Drummond has learned federal prosecutors are planning an all-out blitz on another high-profile Chicago mob figure.
Frank “The German” Schweihs was severed from the family secrets trial last spring reportedly because of health reasons. He was apparently suffering from cancer. But a source says the 77 year old has made a miraculous recovery. If his health holds, he’ll be brought back to Chicago for a trial in the spring, possibly in April.
For a time, Schweihs, known as “The German” in underworld circles, led the feds on a merry chase until he was arrested in an apartment complex in Berea, Kentucky.
Schweihs, a feared mob enforcer, was convicted in 1989 for shaking down Red Wemette, an adult book store owner. Schweihs was secretly recorded on videotape boasting that no one could move in on his territory. It was an expletive-filled tirade.
“This joint has been declared for years. There’s no one has the right to come in __ and in our domain. I don’t give a __ who the __ he is. If it’s Al Capone’s brother and he comes back reincarnated, ok. This is a declared __ joint and no one has the right to come and ___ with this, ok,” Schweihs said.
Schweihs did time on the extortion charges and now faces a new variety of accusations including his alleged involvement in the murder of a government witness, Daniel Seifert. Seifert was gunned down outside his Bensenville factory in September of 1974.
Schweihs has been a suspect in a number of other high-profile slayings including the murder of Admiral Theater impresario Patsy Ricciardi. Schweihs’ name was on the lips of mob investigators when mob associate Allen Dorfman was shot to death outside a Lincolnwood hotel in January of 1983. But in those slayings, Schweihs was never charged with being involved.
In the 1970s, every time there was a gangland slaying, Schweihs’ name came up, but there was never any proof that Schweihs was involved and he never was charged.
Thanks to John "Bulldog" Drummond
CBS 2’s John “Bulldog” Drummond has learned federal prosecutors are planning an all-out blitz on another high-profile Chicago mob figure.
Frank “The German” Schweihs was severed from the family secrets trial last spring reportedly because of health reasons. He was apparently suffering from cancer. But a source says the 77 year old has made a miraculous recovery. If his health holds, he’ll be brought back to Chicago for a trial in the spring, possibly in April.
For a time, Schweihs, known as “The German” in underworld circles, led the feds on a merry chase until he was arrested in an apartment complex in Berea, Kentucky.Schweihs, a feared mob enforcer, was convicted in 1989 for shaking down Red Wemette, an adult book store owner. Schweihs was secretly recorded on videotape boasting that no one could move in on his territory. It was an expletive-filled tirade.
“This joint has been declared for years. There’s no one has the right to come in __ and in our domain. I don’t give a __ who the __ he is. If it’s Al Capone’s brother and he comes back reincarnated, ok. This is a declared __ joint and no one has the right to come and ___ with this, ok,” Schweihs said.
Schweihs did time on the extortion charges and now faces a new variety of accusations including his alleged involvement in the murder of a government witness, Daniel Seifert. Seifert was gunned down outside his Bensenville factory in September of 1974.
Schweihs has been a suspect in a number of other high-profile slayings including the murder of Admiral Theater impresario Patsy Ricciardi. Schweihs’ name was on the lips of mob investigators when mob associate Allen Dorfman was shot to death outside a Lincolnwood hotel in January of 1983. But in those slayings, Schweihs was never charged with being involved.
In the 1970s, every time there was a gangland slaying, Schweihs’ name came up, but there was never any proof that Schweihs was involved and he never was charged.
Thanks to John "Bulldog" Drummond
"Usurious" Request from Jury
Jurors in the Family Secrets mob conspiracy trial deliberated for a second day Wednesday without reaching a verdict, but not before complaining about the temperature in the jury room and becoming perplexed for a time over the definition of an uncommon word in the indictment.
Jurors deciding the fate of four reputed Outfit figures and a former Chicago police officer issued their first written questions to U.S. District Judge James Zagel since deliberations began Tuesday. Zagel has presided over the 10-week trial.
Jurors asked for additional fans because the room where they are deliberating was stuffy.
The jury also wanted a dictionary.
After joking about whether it would be unpatriotic to give the jury an Oxford English Dictionary, Zagel asked jurors instead to tell the court which words they wanted defined.
The jury indicated the confusion was over one word—"usurious," which appears on the second page of the indictment. The defendants are accused of charging "usurious" rates on high-interest "juice loans."
The word is defined in most dictionaries as "of or constituting usury," which is defined as the practice of lending money at excessively or illegally high interest rates.Before the court had supplied an answer, jurors told the judge that they were able to glean the definition from the indictment itself.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Jurors deciding the fate of four reputed Outfit figures and a former Chicago police officer issued their first written questions to U.S. District Judge James Zagel since deliberations began Tuesday. Zagel has presided over the 10-week trial.Jurors asked for additional fans because the room where they are deliberating was stuffy.
The jury also wanted a dictionary.
After joking about whether it would be unpatriotic to give the jury an Oxford English Dictionary, Zagel asked jurors instead to tell the court which words they wanted defined.
The jury indicated the confusion was over one word—"usurious," which appears on the second page of the indictment. The defendants are accused of charging "usurious" rates on high-interest "juice loans."
The word is defined in most dictionaries as "of or constituting usury," which is defined as the practice of lending money at excessively or illegally high interest rates.Before the court had supplied an answer, jurors told the judge that they were able to glean the definition from the indictment itself.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Judge Kicks Out Two Mob Trial Jurors
After a federal judge removed two jurors for already having made up their minds, the jury in the Family Secrets mob trial began its first full day of deliberations Tuesday but went home early without reaching a verdict.
Last week, two jurors in the case communicated to the judge that they had already made up their minds, and the judge, after consulting with attorneys in the case and holding a closed-door hearing, removed them. Special offer! Save 50% on You've got treats! 8-14 thru 9-30-07
Jurors are supposed to enter deliberations with an open mind.
On trial are reputed Chicago mob bosses James "Little Jimmy" Marcello and Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo; reputed Outfit killer Frank Calabrese Sr., accused of 13 murders; the mob's alleged man in Phoenix, Paul "The Indian" Schiro; and retired Chicago Police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle, accused of helping Calabrese Sr. track down a mob snitch.
Speculation centered on Schiro as presenting the most challenge for the jury.
Out of all the defendants, Schiro is the only one who wasn't caught on audio or videotape.
Also, only one witness -- Outfit killer and star government witness Nicholas Calabrese -- directly put Schiro in the one murder he's accused of: the 1986 slaying of Schiro's friend and business partner, Emil Vaci, who had the misfortune of getting called before a grand jury on a topic of interest to the Chicago mob.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Last week, two jurors in the case communicated to the judge that they had already made up their minds, and the judge, after consulting with attorneys in the case and holding a closed-door hearing, removed them. Special offer! Save 50% on You've got treats! 8-14 thru 9-30-07
Jurors are supposed to enter deliberations with an open mind.
On trial are reputed Chicago mob bosses James "Little Jimmy" Marcello and Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo; reputed Outfit killer Frank Calabrese Sr., accused of 13 murders; the mob's alleged man in Phoenix, Paul "The Indian" Schiro; and retired Chicago Police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle, accused of helping Calabrese Sr. track down a mob snitch.
Speculation centered on Schiro as presenting the most challenge for the jury.
Out of all the defendants, Schiro is the only one who wasn't caught on audio or videotape.
Also, only one witness -- Outfit killer and star government witness Nicholas Calabrese -- directly put Schiro in the one murder he's accused of: the 1986 slaying of Schiro's friend and business partner, Emil Vaci, who had the misfortune of getting called before a grand jury on a topic of interest to the Chicago mob.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Kurt Calabrese Speaks Out
All Kurt Calabrese ever wanted was a father.
Not the man -- Frank Calabrese Sr. -- who sat on the witness stand during the Family Secrets trial to face charges he killed 13 people for the mob.
Not the man who blamed his brother and his sons for conspiring to frame him for the crimes.
Not the man who denied he beat his sons and brought them into the loansharking business.
"All I wanted him to be was a dad," Kurt Calabrese said. "Why couldn't he be a dad?"
At one point from the witness stand, Frank Calabrese Sr. gestured out to Kurt, who was sitting in the gallery. "Ask him!" Calabrese Sr. said, as if Kurt Calabrese would confirm his testimony.
He would not have. Kurt Calabrese did not testify at trial and has not spoken publicly about his father or what life was like with him -- until now. But after his father made allegation after allegation from the witness stand, Kurt Calabrese is reluctantly breaking his silence in an exclusive interview with the Chicago Sun-Times.
"I'm not looking for anybody to feel sorry for me," Kurt Calabrese explained. "I hope maybe they can understand it.
"I don't hate him," Kurt said of his father. "I hate what he's done, and I hate how he's treated our family. But I don't hate him, because that's not me. I'm not a hateful person."
Without the turmoil in the Calabrese family, there may never have been a Family Secrets case.
Frank Calabrese Sr.'s eldest son, Frank Jr., agreed to record his father secretly while they were both in federal prison in 1999 on a loansharking case -- a case that also landed Kurt in prison. Frank Calabrese Jr. led jurors through the recorded conversations, in which Calabrese Sr. seems to admit taking part in mob murders.
Frank Calabrese Sr.'s brother, Nicholas, also testified against him at trial, admitting to killing at least 14 people, some with Frank Sr.
On the witness stand, Frank Calabrese Sr. often had a two-word response to the allegations: "No way."
Calabrese Sr. said he never hurt anyone, unless it was to defend someone against bullies. He used diplomacy to collect his juice loans, he said. He said his brother Nicholas tried to turn his two sons against him.
Calabrese Sr. said he loved his sons so much he pleaded guilty in the loansharking case -- so Frank Jr. and Kurt could get less time in prison. But his sons betrayed him, Calabrese Sr. suggested, by agreeing with their uncle, Nicholas, to frame him for mob murders and take his money.
At one point, Frank Calabrese Sr. had Kurt Calabrese subpoenaed to testify, a move that baffled Kurt. The subpoena was withdrawn. "For him to want to get me on the stand made no sense," Kurt Calabrese said. "I wasn't going to lie. The truth wouldn't have helped my father."
Kurt Calabrese worked for his father and made stops to collect loan payments but was not involved in the violence of his father's street crew, according to testimony and law enforcement sources. "My father was very good at what he did. I don't like what he did. I don't condone what he did," Kurt said.
Kurt Calabrese pleaded guilty to a tax charge and was sentenced to two years in prison, getting out in 1999. "At the direction of my father, I did those things. Since I've come home from prison, that life is over," said Kurt Calabrese, who is now in the restaurant industry.
Kurt rejected the notion that his father pleaded guilty to help him. On the contrary, he said, he pleaded guilty to help his father. Kurt Calabrese said his lawyer was told by authorities at the time that if he didn't plead guilty, the negotiated pleas for his father and brother wouldn't be accepted. So he took the deal.
When he next saw his father -- who did not know of his decision -- his father pleaded with him to sign the plea agreement, Kurt recalled. "My father told me, 'If you don't take this plea, I'm gonna die in prison,' " he said.
Kurt Calabrese scoffs at his father's allegation he was involved in framing him -- along with his brother and his uncle -- in the Family Secrets case. "I wish I could tell you I was that smart," Kurt Calabrese said.
His uncle Nicholas never pitted him or Frank Jr. against his father, Kurt Calabrese said. In fact, his uncle Nicholas was more like a father to him than anyone, he said.
His uncle would at times try to stop his father from beating him, Kurt Calabrese said. In spite of his claims to the contrary, Frank Calabrese Sr. regularly beat his two oldest sons, Kurt Calabrese said. "My father said he didn't like bullies," Kurt Calabrese said. "The biggest bully I've ever known is my father."
Kurt Calabrese, who shows his emotions readily, said his father verbally abused him until he broke down. His father would punch him, throw things at him and kick him when he was down on the ground, Kurt recalled.
One trial witness told the FBI Frank Calabrese Sr. once got so mad at him he was foaming at the mouth. Kurt Calabrese remembers that face: The quivering chin, the reddening skin, the spit coming out of an enraged mouth. Then the violence.
He still sees that face in his nightmares, he said. "There were times when he hit me, and I didn't think he was going to stop," he said.
As for the tapes on which his father talks about the mob murders, Kurt Calabrese was shocked his father would ever discuss such things with anybody. But he wasn't shocked his father did them. He wonders what his father makes of the victims' families, sitting in court. "I hope when he sees these people, he knows they are there and dealing with things they shouldn't have to deal with," Kurt Calabrese said.
The trial has been hard on his family too, Kurt said. He is thankful every day for his mother, his wife and his children. The day jury selection began, a fake bomb was found at his Kenilworth home, prompting police to evacuate the area. "This is my whole family," Kurt Calabrese said of the havoc his father has created. "This didn't have to happen."
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Not the man -- Frank Calabrese Sr. -- who sat on the witness stand during the Family Secrets trial to face charges he killed 13 people for the mob.
Not the man who blamed his brother and his sons for conspiring to frame him for the crimes.
Not the man who denied he beat his sons and brought them into the loansharking business.
"All I wanted him to be was a dad," Kurt Calabrese said. "Why couldn't he be a dad?"
At one point from the witness stand, Frank Calabrese Sr. gestured out to Kurt, who was sitting in the gallery. "Ask him!" Calabrese Sr. said, as if Kurt Calabrese would confirm his testimony.
He would not have. Kurt Calabrese did not testify at trial and has not spoken publicly about his father or what life was like with him -- until now. But after his father made allegation after allegation from the witness stand, Kurt Calabrese is reluctantly breaking his silence in an exclusive interview with the Chicago Sun-Times.
"I'm not looking for anybody to feel sorry for me," Kurt Calabrese explained. "I hope maybe they can understand it.
"I don't hate him," Kurt said of his father. "I hate what he's done, and I hate how he's treated our family. But I don't hate him, because that's not me. I'm not a hateful person."
Without the turmoil in the Calabrese family, there may never have been a Family Secrets case.
Frank Calabrese Sr.'s eldest son, Frank Jr., agreed to record his father secretly while they were both in federal prison in 1999 on a loansharking case -- a case that also landed Kurt in prison. Frank Calabrese Jr. led jurors through the recorded conversations, in which Calabrese Sr. seems to admit taking part in mob murders.
Frank Calabrese Sr.'s brother, Nicholas, also testified against him at trial, admitting to killing at least 14 people, some with Frank Sr.
On the witness stand, Frank Calabrese Sr. often had a two-word response to the allegations: "No way."
Calabrese Sr. said he never hurt anyone, unless it was to defend someone against bullies. He used diplomacy to collect his juice loans, he said. He said his brother Nicholas tried to turn his two sons against him.
Calabrese Sr. said he loved his sons so much he pleaded guilty in the loansharking case -- so Frank Jr. and Kurt could get less time in prison. But his sons betrayed him, Calabrese Sr. suggested, by agreeing with their uncle, Nicholas, to frame him for mob murders and take his money.
At one point, Frank Calabrese Sr. had Kurt Calabrese subpoenaed to testify, a move that baffled Kurt. The subpoena was withdrawn. "For him to want to get me on the stand made no sense," Kurt Calabrese said. "I wasn't going to lie. The truth wouldn't have helped my father."
Kurt Calabrese worked for his father and made stops to collect loan payments but was not involved in the violence of his father's street crew, according to testimony and law enforcement sources. "My father was very good at what he did. I don't like what he did. I don't condone what he did," Kurt said.
Kurt Calabrese pleaded guilty to a tax charge and was sentenced to two years in prison, getting out in 1999. "At the direction of my father, I did those things. Since I've come home from prison, that life is over," said Kurt Calabrese, who is now in the restaurant industry.
Kurt rejected the notion that his father pleaded guilty to help him. On the contrary, he said, he pleaded guilty to help his father. Kurt Calabrese said his lawyer was told by authorities at the time that if he didn't plead guilty, the negotiated pleas for his father and brother wouldn't be accepted. So he took the deal.
When he next saw his father -- who did not know of his decision -- his father pleaded with him to sign the plea agreement, Kurt recalled. "My father told me, 'If you don't take this plea, I'm gonna die in prison,' " he said.
Kurt Calabrese scoffs at his father's allegation he was involved in framing him -- along with his brother and his uncle -- in the Family Secrets case. "I wish I could tell you I was that smart," Kurt Calabrese said.
His uncle Nicholas never pitted him or Frank Jr. against his father, Kurt Calabrese said. In fact, his uncle Nicholas was more like a father to him than anyone, he said.
His uncle would at times try to stop his father from beating him, Kurt Calabrese said. In spite of his claims to the contrary, Frank Calabrese Sr. regularly beat his two oldest sons, Kurt Calabrese said. "My father said he didn't like bullies," Kurt Calabrese said. "The biggest bully I've ever known is my father."
Kurt Calabrese, who shows his emotions readily, said his father verbally abused him until he broke down. His father would punch him, throw things at him and kick him when he was down on the ground, Kurt recalled.
One trial witness told the FBI Frank Calabrese Sr. once got so mad at him he was foaming at the mouth. Kurt Calabrese remembers that face: The quivering chin, the reddening skin, the spit coming out of an enraged mouth. Then the violence.
He still sees that face in his nightmares, he said. "There were times when he hit me, and I didn't think he was going to stop," he said.
As for the tapes on which his father talks about the mob murders, Kurt Calabrese was shocked his father would ever discuss such things with anybody. But he wasn't shocked his father did them. He wonders what his father makes of the victims' families, sitting in court. "I hope when he sees these people, he knows they are there and dealing with things they shouldn't have to deal with," Kurt Calabrese said.
The trial has been hard on his family too, Kurt said. He is thankful every day for his mother, his wife and his children. The day jury selection began, a fake bomb was found at his Kenilworth home, prompting police to evacuate the area. "This is my whole family," Kurt Calabrese said of the havoc his father has created. "This didn't have to happen."
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Meet the New Boss(es)?
Robberies are "scores," criminal charges "beefs" and getting sent to prison "going away" in the language of witnesses testifying at Chicago's biggest mob trial in years.
Scheduled to begin deliberations today, jurors in the "Family Secrets" mob trial have heard testimony about a kiss like the one Michael gave his brother Fredo in "The Godfather;" about mob wannabes initiated as full-fledged "made guys" by cutting their fingers and burning holy pictures in their bare hands in secret basement ceremonies.
Testimony also has attempted to link alleged mobsters with a host of unsolved gangland murders in and around Chicago, including those of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, long known as the Chicago mob's man in Las Vegas, and Spilotro's brother, Michael.
Both were found in June 1986 buried in a cornfield in Newton County, Ind.
Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78, is one of five men on trial accused in a racketeering conspiracy that allegedly includes 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion tied to the Outfit, as Chicago's organized crime family is known.
The others are reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62; and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70, the brother of prosecution witness and admitted hitman Nicholas Calabrese.
Yet with five men in their 60s and 70s as prosecutors' targets -- one of whom alternates between a cane and a wheelchair -- the testimony seems more a throwback to the days of Al Capone than it does any representation of the mob today.
Experts insist that isn't the case. Even if the Outfit isn't what it was in decades past, it isn't 6 feet under either, they say. "People say, 'Look at how old these guys are on trial, it's a geriatric organization,"' said John Binder, author of "The Chicago Outfit."
"What you're seeing is just part of the organization," he said. "They're still doing gambling, they've still got some labor racketeering, they've got their hooks into some unions (and) they're still doing juice lending."
While the allegations date mostly to the 1970s and 1980s, Binder said the mob's influence still lingers.
In fact, the trial itself has served as a reminder that it's not necessary to watch "The Untouchables" for examples of the mob's reach. "What the trial has made clear is even when they are in prison they continue to exert influence and control," said James Wagner, the leader of the Chicago Crime Commission who investigated the mob for years when he was an FBI agent.
Some say it's naive to suggest that because so many of the reputed mobsters, including those on trial, are old, that the Outfit doesn't have people ready to step in and take over.
Binder compared the mob to a major company. "It's important in management to groom people," he said. "The Outfit is good at it; they've shown the ability to bring people up."
In addition to the murders of the Spilotro brothers, the "Family Secrets" mob trial included details about three other unsolved murders -- those of William and Charlotte Dauber and Nicholas D'Andrea.
Forty-five-year-old William "Billy" Dauber, 45, and his wife, Charlotte, were shot to death on the rural Monee-Manhattan Road in Will County as they were driving from a court hearing in Joliet to their home in Monee. Dauber, leader of the mob's stolen auto ring in the southern suburbs and Northwest Indiana, was himself a mob assassin.
The Daubers' 1980 Oldsmobile was riddled with bullets on the morning of July 2, 1980, by killers who used a high-powered rifle and shotgun while riding in a stolen van found abandoned and burned two miles from the murder site.
The body of the then-49-year-old D'Andrea, of Chicago Heights, was discovered Sept. 13, 1981, in the trunk of his burned out Mercedes-Benz two miles east of Crete.
His son Richard was arrested and his brother Mario, 42, of Chicago Heights, was killed by federal agents during an undercover drug buy in October 1981 after Mario D'Andrea pulled a gun when an undercover Drug Enforcement Administration officer identified himself.
Speculation at the time was that Nicholas D'Andrea was killed in connection with the attempted assassination of south suburban mob boss Alfred Pilotto, who was shot while playing golf with his brother, Henry, in July 1981. Henry Pilotto was at the time the police chief in Chicago Heights. Both Pilottos survived the shooting attempt.
Thanks to Don Babwin
Scheduled to begin deliberations today, jurors in the "Family Secrets" mob trial have heard testimony about a kiss like the one Michael gave his brother Fredo in "The Godfather;" about mob wannabes initiated as full-fledged "made guys" by cutting their fingers and burning holy pictures in their bare hands in secret basement ceremonies.
Testimony also has attempted to link alleged mobsters with a host of unsolved gangland murders in and around Chicago, including those of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, long known as the Chicago mob's man in Las Vegas, and Spilotro's brother, Michael.
Both were found in June 1986 buried in a cornfield in Newton County, Ind.
Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78, is one of five men on trial accused in a racketeering conspiracy that allegedly includes 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion tied to the Outfit, as Chicago's organized crime family is known.
The others are reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62; and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70, the brother of prosecution witness and admitted hitman Nicholas Calabrese.
Yet with five men in their 60s and 70s as prosecutors' targets -- one of whom alternates between a cane and a wheelchair -- the testimony seems more a throwback to the days of Al Capone than it does any representation of the mob today.
Experts insist that isn't the case. Even if the Outfit isn't what it was in decades past, it isn't 6 feet under either, they say. "People say, 'Look at how old these guys are on trial, it's a geriatric organization,"' said John Binder, author of "The Chicago Outfit."
"What you're seeing is just part of the organization," he said. "They're still doing gambling, they've still got some labor racketeering, they've got their hooks into some unions (and) they're still doing juice lending."
While the allegations date mostly to the 1970s and 1980s, Binder said the mob's influence still lingers.
In fact, the trial itself has served as a reminder that it's not necessary to watch "The Untouchables" for examples of the mob's reach. "What the trial has made clear is even when they are in prison they continue to exert influence and control," said James Wagner, the leader of the Chicago Crime Commission who investigated the mob for years when he was an FBI agent.
Some say it's naive to suggest that because so many of the reputed mobsters, including those on trial, are old, that the Outfit doesn't have people ready to step in and take over.
Binder compared the mob to a major company. "It's important in management to groom people," he said. "The Outfit is good at it; they've shown the ability to bring people up."
In addition to the murders of the Spilotro brothers, the "Family Secrets" mob trial included details about three other unsolved murders -- those of William and Charlotte Dauber and Nicholas D'Andrea.
Forty-five-year-old William "Billy" Dauber, 45, and his wife, Charlotte, were shot to death on the rural Monee-Manhattan Road in Will County as they were driving from a court hearing in Joliet to their home in Monee. Dauber, leader of the mob's stolen auto ring in the southern suburbs and Northwest Indiana, was himself a mob assassin.
The Daubers' 1980 Oldsmobile was riddled with bullets on the morning of July 2, 1980, by killers who used a high-powered rifle and shotgun while riding in a stolen van found abandoned and burned two miles from the murder site.
The body of the then-49-year-old D'Andrea, of Chicago Heights, was discovered Sept. 13, 1981, in the trunk of his burned out Mercedes-Benz two miles east of Crete.
His son Richard was arrested and his brother Mario, 42, of Chicago Heights, was killed by federal agents during an undercover drug buy in October 1981 after Mario D'Andrea pulled a gun when an undercover Drug Enforcement Administration officer identified himself.
Speculation at the time was that Nicholas D'Andrea was killed in connection with the attempted assassination of south suburban mob boss Alfred Pilotto, who was shot while playing golf with his brother, Henry, in July 1981. Henry Pilotto was at the time the police chief in Chicago Heights. Both Pilottos survived the shooting attempt.
Thanks to Don Babwin
Tuesday, September 04, 2007
After Two Plus Months of Testimony, Jury Begins Deliberations Today
Deliberations are set to get under way Tuesday morning in the Family Secrets trial, as jurors begin to sift through more than two months of testimony on whether the five defendants played roles in a conspiracy to further the goals of the Chicago Outfit.
Before leaving the courtroom in the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse last week for the Labor Day weekend, jurors determined they would work from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily as they try to reach a verdict.
Federal prosecutors contend that reputed Outfit figures James Marcello, Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, Frank Calabrese Sr. and Paul "the Indian" Schiro as well as former Chicago Police Officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle should be convicted in a racketeering conspiracy spanning four decades.
All are charged in Count 1, the racketeering conspiracy charge, which takes up 18 pages of the indictment and alleges that an enterprise known as the Outfit collected street tax, operated illegal gambling businesses, made juice loans, obstructed justice and protected itself with violence and murder.
During the trial, Marcello and Lombardo were accused of being mob bosses, while Calabrese, accused in 13 of the 18 slayings in the case, was alleged to have been a leader of the mob's 26th Street, or Chinatown, crew.
Much of the case could depend on how jurors view the testimony of the government's key witness, Calabrese's brother, Nicholas, whose accusations implicated each defendant. Prosecutors urged jurors to believe the account of a man they described as an Outfit soldier who admitted to taking part in 14 murders.
Defense lawyers urged the panel to reject Nicholas Calabrese's testimony, calling him a liar and a killer who invented information against their clients in a bid to one day win his freedom. Much of his testimony detailed murders he allegedly committed with his brother.
Jurors also heard hours of secretly made recordings of four of the five defendants allegedly discussing Outfit business.
A pool of 17 jurors -- nine women and eight men -- heard the closing arguments last week.. But two of them are expected to be dismissed after having given the court a note indicating they had made up their minds already about the case, a no-no for jurors.
U.S. District Judge James Zagel ordered that the identities of the jurors be kept secret even from the lawyers and prosecutors, who know them only by number. Court officials have not yet disclosed which 12 jurors will be involved in the deliberations and which are alternates.
If jurors convict the men of racketeering conspiracy, their deliberations would not be over. At that point, lawyers would make another round of arguments, and the jury would then decide which defendant can be held accountable for which murder in the case.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Before leaving the courtroom in the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse last week for the Labor Day weekend, jurors determined they would work from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily as they try to reach a verdict.
Federal prosecutors contend that reputed Outfit figures James Marcello, Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, Frank Calabrese Sr. and Paul "the Indian" Schiro as well as former Chicago Police Officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle should be convicted in a racketeering conspiracy spanning four decades.
All are charged in Count 1, the racketeering conspiracy charge, which takes up 18 pages of the indictment and alleges that an enterprise known as the Outfit collected street tax, operated illegal gambling businesses, made juice loans, obstructed justice and protected itself with violence and murder.
During the trial, Marcello and Lombardo were accused of being mob bosses, while Calabrese, accused in 13 of the 18 slayings in the case, was alleged to have been a leader of the mob's 26th Street, or Chinatown, crew.
Much of the case could depend on how jurors view the testimony of the government's key witness, Calabrese's brother, Nicholas, whose accusations implicated each defendant. Prosecutors urged jurors to believe the account of a man they described as an Outfit soldier who admitted to taking part in 14 murders.
Defense lawyers urged the panel to reject Nicholas Calabrese's testimony, calling him a liar and a killer who invented information against their clients in a bid to one day win his freedom. Much of his testimony detailed murders he allegedly committed with his brother.
Jurors also heard hours of secretly made recordings of four of the five defendants allegedly discussing Outfit business.
A pool of 17 jurors -- nine women and eight men -- heard the closing arguments last week.. But two of them are expected to be dismissed after having given the court a note indicating they had made up their minds already about the case, a no-no for jurors.
U.S. District Judge James Zagel ordered that the identities of the jurors be kept secret even from the lawyers and prosecutors, who know them only by number. Court officials have not yet disclosed which 12 jurors will be involved in the deliberations and which are alternates.
If jurors convict the men of racketeering conspiracy, their deliberations would not be over. At that point, lawyers would make another round of arguments, and the jury would then decide which defendant can be held accountable for which murder in the case.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Rat Pack' Party Girl Will Confront Former Cop/Mafia Hit Man in Court
Janie McCormick, of Vadnais Heights, will finally get the chance to throw the book at the former New York hero cop turned Mafia hit man who allegedly bamboozled her out of $45,000 of her life savings.
The book in this case is "Breaking My Silence,'' the title of McCormick's soon to be self-published memoir of her life as a childhood sex abuse victim and former Las Vegas "Rat Pack'' party girl during the 1960s and early '70s. The tale was supposed to first be a script that convicted rogue cop Louis Eppolito reportedly pledged to write himself and turn into a movie.
McCormick, whose encounter with the corrupt former cop before his federal racketeering trial was the subject of a 2005 column, was informed last week by federal authorities that they want her to testify against Eppolito at his federal tax-evasion trial.
The timing couldn't be better for McCormick. The book should be out shortly after the trial starts Sept. 24. "I want to look at that rat fink face to face,'' says McCormick, now a 66-year-old great-grandmother living the suburban life. "If I have the book in my hands, I just might throw it at him."
Eppolito, 57, and his former New York Police Department detective partner, Stephen Caracappa, were convicted last year of federal racketeering conspiracy charges for setting up or carrying out at least eight mob-directed slayings while they wore the badge.
The charges shocked even a city long accustomed to cyclical and high-profile police corruption scandals. The two men were sentenced to life prison terms. But a judge tossed aside the convictions a month later on the grounds that the five-year statute of limitations on racketeering had expired. The two men remain in custody pending appeal.
Before the New York trial, Eppolito and his wife were indicted in Las Vegas - where the two rogue cops relocated after their retirements - on charges the couple avoided paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in income taxes. The couple has denied wrongdoing.
The undeclared income came mostly from Eppolito's work selling movie scripts to Hollywood as well as his appearances as a character actor. Eppolito played bit roles in notable Hollywood films, including the classic mob flick "Goodfellas'' and Woody Allen's "Bullets Over Broadway.''
Receipts of the $45,000 McCormick allegedly paid Eppolito for the busted movie deal are part of the evidence federal prosecutors are expected to present at trial.
McCormick, who borrowed against a house-cleaning service she operated in the White Bear Lake area, Dust Busters of Minnesota, was forced to declare bankruptcy and set aside her quest to tell her story. The alleged scam nearly derailed the quest and also her desire to raise awareness about prostitution and sexual exploitation.
Surprisingly, Eppolito is barely a footnote in the book, which is told in a gritty and blunt style. It's a name-dropper sure to raise eyebrows, if not some controversy.
McCormick discloses in the book how a stepfather molested her. In dialogue-rich narrative, she also chronicles how that abuse, which stretched from when she was a toddler to adolescent years, paved the road to prostitution.
That journey ultimately led her to become, as she describes it, a member of the elite "Queen Bee'' club of casino call girls working Sin City.
She was dubbed "Baby Jane'' by the hotel casino pit bosses who matched her with high rollers, and most of McCormick's clients "were show business personalities or millionaires good for the hotel business,'' she writes in the book.
She describes liaisons with the likes of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Peter Lawford, Vic Damone and comedians Joe E. Lewis and Jerry Lewis, whom she describes in the book as "one of the nicest men I ever met.''
She also relates how legendary golfer Sam Snead recruited her one time to keep rival Arnold Palmer up all night before the morning of a major Vegas tournament. Snead ended up winning it. McCormick recalls she got an expensive chinchilla jacket for her work.
She also details a traumatic abortion, an abusive "house pimp'' and shoddy silicone breast implants that led to a double mastectomy later in life.
Media communications and libel law attorney Mark Anfinson, hired by McCormick to vet the book, calls it "powerful and compelling stuff.''
"I'm very surprised that a publishing house has not picked this up,'' Anfinson said. "When you review copy for invasion-of-privacy concerns, you want to remain detached. But it was exceedingly hard to do with (the book) because it was so moving. It has a ring of authenticity as you go through it.''
McCormick hopes the book will give her some credibility as she tries to persuade legislators to enact tougher laws and enforcement directed at the demand side of the sex trade - the "johns.'' She believes, as others do, that American law enforcement has mostly given the customer a pass. She cites Sweden and Norway as countries that do a better job of going after the men who drive the trade.
She's dead right. As she writes in her book about the Rat Pack stars and other well-heeled Las Vegas clientele: "I often thought about how these men passed us working girls around like dessert trays ... I also wondered, after spending thousands of dollars on some dames, [how] these guys could go back to their wives and kids, hold up their heads, and look at themselves in the mirror.''
Thanks to Ruben Rosario
The book in this case is "Breaking My Silence,'' the title of McCormick's soon to be self-published memoir of her life as a childhood sex abuse victim and former Las Vegas "Rat Pack'' party girl during the 1960s and early '70s. The tale was supposed to first be a script that convicted rogue cop Louis Eppolito reportedly pledged to write himself and turn into a movie.
McCormick, whose encounter with the corrupt former cop before his federal racketeering trial was the subject of a 2005 column, was informed last week by federal authorities that they want her to testify against Eppolito at his federal tax-evasion trial.
The timing couldn't be better for McCormick. The book should be out shortly after the trial starts Sept. 24. "I want to look at that rat fink face to face,'' says McCormick, now a 66-year-old great-grandmother living the suburban life. "If I have the book in my hands, I just might throw it at him."
Eppolito, 57, and his former New York Police Department detective partner, Stephen Caracappa, were convicted last year of federal racketeering conspiracy charges for setting up or carrying out at least eight mob-directed slayings while they wore the badge.
The charges shocked even a city long accustomed to cyclical and high-profile police corruption scandals. The two men were sentenced to life prison terms. But a judge tossed aside the convictions a month later on the grounds that the five-year statute of limitations on racketeering had expired. The two men remain in custody pending appeal.
Before the New York trial, Eppolito and his wife were indicted in Las Vegas - where the two rogue cops relocated after their retirements - on charges the couple avoided paying hundreds of thousands of dollars in income taxes. The couple has denied wrongdoing.
The undeclared income came mostly from Eppolito's work selling movie scripts to Hollywood as well as his appearances as a character actor. Eppolito played bit roles in notable Hollywood films, including the classic mob flick "Goodfellas'' and Woody Allen's "Bullets Over Broadway.''
Receipts of the $45,000 McCormick allegedly paid Eppolito for the busted movie deal are part of the evidence federal prosecutors are expected to present at trial.
McCormick, who borrowed against a house-cleaning service she operated in the White Bear Lake area, Dust Busters of Minnesota, was forced to declare bankruptcy and set aside her quest to tell her story. The alleged scam nearly derailed the quest and also her desire to raise awareness about prostitution and sexual exploitation.
Surprisingly, Eppolito is barely a footnote in the book, which is told in a gritty and blunt style. It's a name-dropper sure to raise eyebrows, if not some controversy.
McCormick discloses in the book how a stepfather molested her. In dialogue-rich narrative, she also chronicles how that abuse, which stretched from when she was a toddler to adolescent years, paved the road to prostitution.
That journey ultimately led her to become, as she describes it, a member of the elite "Queen Bee'' club of casino call girls working Sin City.
She was dubbed "Baby Jane'' by the hotel casino pit bosses who matched her with high rollers, and most of McCormick's clients "were show business personalities or millionaires good for the hotel business,'' she writes in the book.
She describes liaisons with the likes of Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Peter Lawford, Vic Damone and comedians Joe E. Lewis and Jerry Lewis, whom she describes in the book as "one of the nicest men I ever met.''
She also relates how legendary golfer Sam Snead recruited her one time to keep rival Arnold Palmer up all night before the morning of a major Vegas tournament. Snead ended up winning it. McCormick recalls she got an expensive chinchilla jacket for her work.
She also details a traumatic abortion, an abusive "house pimp'' and shoddy silicone breast implants that led to a double mastectomy later in life.
Media communications and libel law attorney Mark Anfinson, hired by McCormick to vet the book, calls it "powerful and compelling stuff.''
"I'm very surprised that a publishing house has not picked this up,'' Anfinson said. "When you review copy for invasion-of-privacy concerns, you want to remain detached. But it was exceedingly hard to do with (the book) because it was so moving. It has a ring of authenticity as you go through it.''
McCormick hopes the book will give her some credibility as she tries to persuade legislators to enact tougher laws and enforcement directed at the demand side of the sex trade - the "johns.'' She believes, as others do, that American law enforcement has mostly given the customer a pass. She cites Sweden and Norway as countries that do a better job of going after the men who drive the trade.
She's dead right. As she writes in her book about the Rat Pack stars and other well-heeled Las Vegas clientele: "I often thought about how these men passed us working girls around like dessert trays ... I also wondered, after spending thousands of dollars on some dames, [how] these guys could go back to their wives and kids, hold up their heads, and look at themselves in the mirror.''
Thanks to Ruben Rosario
Monday, September 03, 2007
Family Secrets Closing Argument: Required Reading on The Chicago Way
As the Family Secrets trial was put into the hands of the jury, City Hall offered up poetic symmetry in choosing a book for all Chicagoans to read as part of its One-Book-One-Chicago program:
"The Crucible" by Arthur Miller, a social commentary about witch hunts and innocent people caught up by the mob.
No, not the mob on trial in Family Secrets, the other mob, the mob as in the commoners, the ignorant, uninformed, superstitious peasants easily manipulated into burning the innocent politicians -- um, ah, I meant those innocent witches -- at the stake.
If city fathers truly want something Chicago should read, how about the transcript of Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars' closing argument in the Family Secrets trial on Thursday?
It has been a trial of Outfit history, 18 unsolved murders, fear and betrayal, with hit man Nick Calabrese testifying about the murders he committed with three of the five defendants.
Think of a pitcher tossing a perfect game and you'll see Mars delivering that closing argument, throwing heat, following through with near-perfect mechanics, fitting all the defendants into the conspiracy.
Mars doesn't look like a Major League ballplayer. He's a bit below average in height, a graying guy in a gray suit, like a million other guys you see on the train. He doesn't seek publicity, and doesn't go out of his way to schmooze reporters. But he's clearly big league. And after what he accomplished, if the jury acquits any of the federal primates, we might as well change the name of this city to something more fitting, like Andriachiville or Tootsie-Town.
"Our system works only when those who should be held accountable are held accountable," Mars told the jury.
He named those charged with racketeering and murder conspiracy: Joseph "The Clown" Lombardo, Frank Calabrese Sr., James Marcello and Paul "the Indian" Schiro.
For weeks, Schiro was the scariest man in the courtroom, hardly moving an eyelid, still as a lizard, the iceman. Schiro is serving another federal prison term, having pleaded guilty for being part of the Outfit-sanctioned jewelry heist crew led by former Chicago Police Chief of Detectives William Hanhardt.
Mars had special contempt for the fifth defendant, accused Outfit debt collector and former Chicago Police Officer Anthony "Twan" (Passafiume) Doyle.
Doyle is not accused of murdering gangsters, but of leaking police secrets about key murder evidence to his Chinatown confederate, Frank Calabrese Sr., in taped prison visits in which electric shocks, cattle prods and physical examinations for Calabrese's brother Nick were discussed. That famous tape involved Outfit code, talk of "purses," defined by the feds as evidence, and a "doctor," defined by the feds as reputed Outfit street boss Frank "Toots" Caruso, who is not charged in this case.
"And one corrupt cop who tried to help the organization and be the inside man. He knows exactly what the purse is. He knows exactly who the doctor is. ... Let's give the guy a physical, let's give him a prod," Mars mocked, reminding the jury of what Doyle said on that tape.
The others on trial put on a defense because they had no choice. But Doyle could have taken a plea deal and served five years or so. He didn't take the deal, though I presume his lawyer will still receive a nice fee and Doyle will have time to ponder what it means to be, in his words, a chumbalone.
A few days ago, Marcello's lawyer, Marc Martin, joined the other defense lawyers in ripping into Nicholas Calabrese, calling him a liar and questioning his testimony, particularly about Marcello's involvement in the sensational 1986 murders of Outfit brothers Anthony and Michael Spilotro. Nick testified that the men waiting for the Spilotros in a suburban home wore gloves. Martin argued the Spilotros would have fled after seeing one gloved hand.
"They weren't going to get out of the house no matter what they thought," said Mars, adding that Marcello and his accomplices "could have worn T-shirts that said, 'We're Here To Kill the Spilotros.' It didn't matter. They weren't getting out of there."
Marcello sat without expression, offering his profile to the jury, looking at himself on the courtroom screen. It was an FBI surveillance photo taken at a Venture parking lot, Marcello with Outfit bosses Joe Ferriola, Sam Carlisi and Rocky Infelice next to some shopping carts.
They weren't in a restaurant with checkered tablecloths. And I thought of those who say there is no Chicago Outfit; and of inside men placed in inside spots, in the police evidence storage section or as lords of the detective squads, while honest cops get passed over for promotions, or are squashed like bugs for the slightest infractions.
I'm still waiting for City Hall to choose an appropriate book for official city reading, perhaps "CAPTIVE CITY: Chicago in Chains.
" by Ovid DeMaris, "The Outfit
" by Gus Russo or "Chicago: City on the Make
" by Nelson Algren.
Or, better yet, that closing argument by Mitch Mars in a crucible of a case, in which the Chicago Way was boiled down, reduced to its base elements.
Thanks to John Kass
"The Crucible" by Arthur Miller, a social commentary about witch hunts and innocent people caught up by the mob.
No, not the mob on trial in Family Secrets, the other mob, the mob as in the commoners, the ignorant, uninformed, superstitious peasants easily manipulated into burning the innocent politicians -- um, ah, I meant those innocent witches -- at the stake.
If city fathers truly want something Chicago should read, how about the transcript of Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars' closing argument in the Family Secrets trial on Thursday?
It has been a trial of Outfit history, 18 unsolved murders, fear and betrayal, with hit man Nick Calabrese testifying about the murders he committed with three of the five defendants.
Think of a pitcher tossing a perfect game and you'll see Mars delivering that closing argument, throwing heat, following through with near-perfect mechanics, fitting all the defendants into the conspiracy.
Mars doesn't look like a Major League ballplayer. He's a bit below average in height, a graying guy in a gray suit, like a million other guys you see on the train. He doesn't seek publicity, and doesn't go out of his way to schmooze reporters. But he's clearly big league. And after what he accomplished, if the jury acquits any of the federal primates, we might as well change the name of this city to something more fitting, like Andriachiville or Tootsie-Town.
"Our system works only when those who should be held accountable are held accountable," Mars told the jury.
He named those charged with racketeering and murder conspiracy: Joseph "The Clown" Lombardo, Frank Calabrese Sr., James Marcello and Paul "the Indian" Schiro.
For weeks, Schiro was the scariest man in the courtroom, hardly moving an eyelid, still as a lizard, the iceman. Schiro is serving another federal prison term, having pleaded guilty for being part of the Outfit-sanctioned jewelry heist crew led by former Chicago Police Chief of Detectives William Hanhardt.
Mars had special contempt for the fifth defendant, accused Outfit debt collector and former Chicago Police Officer Anthony "Twan" (Passafiume) Doyle.
Doyle is not accused of murdering gangsters, but of leaking police secrets about key murder evidence to his Chinatown confederate, Frank Calabrese Sr., in taped prison visits in which electric shocks, cattle prods and physical examinations for Calabrese's brother Nick were discussed. That famous tape involved Outfit code, talk of "purses," defined by the feds as evidence, and a "doctor," defined by the feds as reputed Outfit street boss Frank "Toots" Caruso, who is not charged in this case.
"And one corrupt cop who tried to help the organization and be the inside man. He knows exactly what the purse is. He knows exactly who the doctor is. ... Let's give the guy a physical, let's give him a prod," Mars mocked, reminding the jury of what Doyle said on that tape.
The others on trial put on a defense because they had no choice. But Doyle could have taken a plea deal and served five years or so. He didn't take the deal, though I presume his lawyer will still receive a nice fee and Doyle will have time to ponder what it means to be, in his words, a chumbalone.
A few days ago, Marcello's lawyer, Marc Martin, joined the other defense lawyers in ripping into Nicholas Calabrese, calling him a liar and questioning his testimony, particularly about Marcello's involvement in the sensational 1986 murders of Outfit brothers Anthony and Michael Spilotro. Nick testified that the men waiting for the Spilotros in a suburban home wore gloves. Martin argued the Spilotros would have fled after seeing one gloved hand.
"They weren't going to get out of the house no matter what they thought," said Mars, adding that Marcello and his accomplices "could have worn T-shirts that said, 'We're Here To Kill the Spilotros.' It didn't matter. They weren't getting out of there."
Marcello sat without expression, offering his profile to the jury, looking at himself on the courtroom screen. It was an FBI surveillance photo taken at a Venture parking lot, Marcello with Outfit bosses Joe Ferriola, Sam Carlisi and Rocky Infelice next to some shopping carts.
They weren't in a restaurant with checkered tablecloths. And I thought of those who say there is no Chicago Outfit; and of inside men placed in inside spots, in the police evidence storage section or as lords of the detective squads, while honest cops get passed over for promotions, or are squashed like bugs for the slightest infractions.
I'm still waiting for City Hall to choose an appropriate book for official city reading, perhaps "CAPTIVE CITY: Chicago in Chains.
" by Ovid DeMaris, "The Outfit" by Gus Russo or "Chicago: City on the Make" by Nelson Algren.Or, better yet, that closing argument by Mitch Mars in a crucible of a case, in which the Chicago Way was boiled down, reduced to its base elements.
Thanks to John Kass
Not Letting Family Secrets Slide
There was a break in the courtroom action at the Chicago Outfit trial called Family Secrets, so I took a walk outside the federal building, wondering how to explain my obsession to you.
Recently, a few readers have asked me to switch gears, to give you all a break from endless murders, political corruption and the Outfit's proficiency in putting key people in key spots, including City Hall and the Police Department. But I can't walk away. Not now. Not yet. Not until Friday, with Family Secrets almost at the end.
I'm compelled to cover it, having broken the story about hit man Nicholas Calabrese disappearing into the federal witness protection program in 2003, in a column that explained how the Outfit panicked, with Nick talking, foreshadowing a few of the 18 unsolved Outfit murders that have now been solved.
Yet there's more to this than a reporter following an old story. I stood out there on Dearborn, thinking, with traffic rolling past, when a big truck from the Rosebud Restaurants squealed its brakes, the sound piercing me, and there it was, the reason for being there:
Family Secrets is the whole ballgame in Chicago. It's not merely some interesting trial with colorful gangsters and flamboyant lawyers in wild ties. It is more than mere drama, more than some nice read.
Family Secrets reveals the infrastructure of a great metropolis, illuminating part of the iron triangle that runs things, with the Outfit at the base of the triangle. Certain politicians who pick judges and who influence development and zoning, and certain cops form the protective sides. This iron triangle won't be approved as the 2016 Olympic logo at City Hall, where the mayor keeps losing his hair as the inner workings of the Chinatown crew in his old neighborhood opens like clams at Cafe Bionda or Tavern on Rush.
We've heard witnesses talk about murders and extortion. But we've also seen something amazing -- mob bosses such as Joey "The Clown" Lombardo and Frank Calabrese Sr. explaining their worldview from the witness stand.
There is no Outfit, they insist. But Calabrese did explain how sports bookmaking and loan sharking -- the Outfit's lifeblood -- works, with millions upon millions at play. He lectured on how to build a sports book, using layers and layers of buffers, intermediaries, an organizational web that reaches into the pockets of every person who places a bet on a ballgame, on Rush Street and beyond.
We've learned how critical it is for the Outfit to nurture public servants, alleged sleepers like defendant Anthony "Twan" (Passafiume) Doyle, who worked the evidence section in the Police Department, and who is on federal tape talking in a prison visit with Calabrese Sr. about murder evidence and cattle prods for those who betray Outfit secrets, like Frank's brother Nick.
Are there any more secrets? Sure, a few.
Secrets about Bridgeport money finding its way to Rush Street; building inspectors who help bar owners, providing the right occupancy permits; and links between nightclubs that stretch from Bellevue and Rush to Springfield.
Other secrets have bubbled up from the witness stand, names of other men not charged, like Joe "The Builder" Andriacci and Frank "Toots" Caruso, referred to by the feds, but not by Chinatown, as "The Doctor."
Still, there are other stories I could work on, such as the lame excuse by Chicago Bears linebacker Lance Briggs' on how he trashed his Lamborghini after spending hours recreating at the Rush Street club Level, which is a mere sneeze away from Carmine's.
Or that one about the Republican Senator from Idaho, waving a sensuous, anonymous hello to a stranger at an airport washroom in the next stall; or Senate Democrats cringing now that the boss of Iran has all but thanked them for giving him the chance to fill the power vacuum in Iraq.
Family Secrets was overshadowed weeks ago by the story about a Channel 5 reporter in a pink bikini top at a pool party. And Chicago's Outfit trial will be washed from broadcast memory soon, with that tape in a county courtroom, the one of R&B singer R. Kelly allegedly having sex with an underage girl.
Local TV will gorge on that sex tape, promoting it at 5, 6 and 10 and the next morning, and the national networks that have ignored Family Secrets will feast on the sex tape, the face of the girl obscured, but not her body and not his, in the name of journalism, and of providing us an embrace that we can't live without. But Family Secrets is important, too, an embrace Chicago's lived with for decades.
"As you know, this case involves the history of organized crime in Chicago, for over 40 years," said Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, the lead prosecutor, told the jury.
"The Outfit has survived and prospered with greed, depravity, corruption. People are hurt. People die," said Mars, delivering the beginning of a closing argument he's waited almost his entire career to give.
Mars will finish on Thursday, and I'll be there.
I just have to see this one through.
Thanks to John Kass
Recently, a few readers have asked me to switch gears, to give you all a break from endless murders, political corruption and the Outfit's proficiency in putting key people in key spots, including City Hall and the Police Department. But I can't walk away. Not now. Not yet. Not until Friday, with Family Secrets almost at the end.
I'm compelled to cover it, having broken the story about hit man Nicholas Calabrese disappearing into the federal witness protection program in 2003, in a column that explained how the Outfit panicked, with Nick talking, foreshadowing a few of the 18 unsolved Outfit murders that have now been solved.
Yet there's more to this than a reporter following an old story. I stood out there on Dearborn, thinking, with traffic rolling past, when a big truck from the Rosebud Restaurants squealed its brakes, the sound piercing me, and there it was, the reason for being there:
Family Secrets is the whole ballgame in Chicago. It's not merely some interesting trial with colorful gangsters and flamboyant lawyers in wild ties. It is more than mere drama, more than some nice read.
Family Secrets reveals the infrastructure of a great metropolis, illuminating part of the iron triangle that runs things, with the Outfit at the base of the triangle. Certain politicians who pick judges and who influence development and zoning, and certain cops form the protective sides. This iron triangle won't be approved as the 2016 Olympic logo at City Hall, where the mayor keeps losing his hair as the inner workings of the Chinatown crew in his old neighborhood opens like clams at Cafe Bionda or Tavern on Rush.
We've heard witnesses talk about murders and extortion. But we've also seen something amazing -- mob bosses such as Joey "The Clown" Lombardo and Frank Calabrese Sr. explaining their worldview from the witness stand.
There is no Outfit, they insist. But Calabrese did explain how sports bookmaking and loan sharking -- the Outfit's lifeblood -- works, with millions upon millions at play. He lectured on how to build a sports book, using layers and layers of buffers, intermediaries, an organizational web that reaches into the pockets of every person who places a bet on a ballgame, on Rush Street and beyond.
We've learned how critical it is for the Outfit to nurture public servants, alleged sleepers like defendant Anthony "Twan" (Passafiume) Doyle, who worked the evidence section in the Police Department, and who is on federal tape talking in a prison visit with Calabrese Sr. about murder evidence and cattle prods for those who betray Outfit secrets, like Frank's brother Nick.
Are there any more secrets? Sure, a few.
Secrets about Bridgeport money finding its way to Rush Street; building inspectors who help bar owners, providing the right occupancy permits; and links between nightclubs that stretch from Bellevue and Rush to Springfield.
Other secrets have bubbled up from the witness stand, names of other men not charged, like Joe "The Builder" Andriacci and Frank "Toots" Caruso, referred to by the feds, but not by Chinatown, as "The Doctor."
Still, there are other stories I could work on, such as the lame excuse by Chicago Bears linebacker Lance Briggs' on how he trashed his Lamborghini after spending hours recreating at the Rush Street club Level, which is a mere sneeze away from Carmine's.
Or that one about the Republican Senator from Idaho, waving a sensuous, anonymous hello to a stranger at an airport washroom in the next stall; or Senate Democrats cringing now that the boss of Iran has all but thanked them for giving him the chance to fill the power vacuum in Iraq.
Family Secrets was overshadowed weeks ago by the story about a Channel 5 reporter in a pink bikini top at a pool party. And Chicago's Outfit trial will be washed from broadcast memory soon, with that tape in a county courtroom, the one of R&B singer R. Kelly allegedly having sex with an underage girl.
Local TV will gorge on that sex tape, promoting it at 5, 6 and 10 and the next morning, and the national networks that have ignored Family Secrets will feast on the sex tape, the face of the girl obscured, but not her body and not his, in the name of journalism, and of providing us an embrace that we can't live without. But Family Secrets is important, too, an embrace Chicago's lived with for decades.
"As you know, this case involves the history of organized crime in Chicago, for over 40 years," said Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, the lead prosecutor, told the jury.
"The Outfit has survived and prospered with greed, depravity, corruption. People are hurt. People die," said Mars, delivering the beginning of a closing argument he's waited almost his entire career to give.
Mars will finish on Thursday, and I'll be there.
I just have to see this one through.
Thanks to John Kass
Marcello Pulls Out Shamrock for Good Luck
The last thing you'd expect at the Outfit trial would be a big green shamrock next to Jimmy Marcello's name.
It reminded me of that nightmare suffered by Christopher Moltisanti, the young mobster in "The Sopranos," who wakes up from a coma to tell his crew that he has seen hell for Italian wiseguys: Eternity spent in an Irish bar where every day is St. Patrick's Day. But the jury in the Family Secrets trial of five alleged Outfit members wasn't dreaming Tuesday, and there it was, the green Irish good-luck charm, the clover that decorates the hat of the mayor on St. Patrick's Day, up on the big screen as Marcello's lawyer tried to debunk the prosecution case.
"You've heard he was a made member of the Outfit, and that only those who are 100 percent Italian can be made," said Marc Martin in his closing argument Tuesday. "Well, look at his birth certificate. His mother is Irene Flynn. Her father was James Flynn. Her mother was Katherine Lavin, and we know she's Irish because she's one of 14 children."
Marcello rocked in his chair, bald head gleaming under bright federal fluorescent lights, black eyebrows, scowling, as Irish as a pierogi in a frying pan. He'll need a new nickname soon, so pick one: O'Marcello, or McCello?
The shamrock demonstrates how desperate the Outfit is these days, but it allowed Martin to attack the testimony of key prosecution witness and confessed hit man Nicholas Calabrese, who testified that Marcello was a made man and part of several murders, including the 1986 killings of gangsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro.
"The only thing that was made about Nicholas Calabrese's testimony about Jimmy Marcello is that he made it up," Martin told the jury.
They just stared at him, perhaps because those taped conversations from prison weigh more than a shamrock.
Earlier, Assistant U.S. Atty. Markus Funk elaborated on taped conversations between defendant, Chinatown loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr. and former Chicago Police Officer Anthony Doyle, who in a pre-Marcello moment years ago, changed his name from Passafiume to Doyle when his sponsors put him on the Police Department, where he would work in the sensitive evidence room.
Funk played the tape of Doyle sharing information about a key piece of evidence: the glove lost by Nicholas Calabrese after he murdered his friend, John "Big Stoop" Fecarotta after the botched Spilotro burial.
In that tape, Doyle and Calabrese speak of giving electric shocks to Frank's brother Nick, who they feared was talking to the feds. There was talk of many volts and a cattle prod inserted just so.
Doyle testified last week that he'd read about electroshock therapy in a magazine and meant no harm. Funk argued this was pure nonsense. "Do you honestly believe this man is talking about something he read in a psychiatry magazine? That's Anthony Doyle, the Freud of the Chicago Police Department," Funk said in a quote of the year, as several jurors shifted uncomfortably in their seats. But if Doyle was indeed the Outfit's Sigmund Freud, he could have counseled Joey "The Clown" Lombardo, who has been suffering an extreme case of juryphobia since he testified earlier in the trial, according to Lombardo's own lawyer, Rick Halprin.
"He doesn't trust you," Halprin told the jury. "He's frightened to death of you. He does not believe that any of you will give him a fair shake, and that you'll judge him on his past."
That past includes two federal Outfit convictions, one for bribing a United States senator from Nevada, and the other involving skimming millions of dollars from Las Vegas casinos. And there is still that Lombardo fingerprint on the title application for a car used in the 1974 murder of federal witness Daniel Seifert, who would have testified against Lombardo, Tony Spilotro and others.
Halprin commanded the courtroom, using his voice and posture, an absolutely impressive performance that was worth the wait, a pro's pro. But the problem isn't Halprin's fine work, but the evidence, like that fingerprint.
Another problem is the testimony from dentist Pat Spilotro, who insisted recently that Lombardo was an Outfit boss who told him the murders of his brothers were unavoidable. Halprin accused Pat Spilotro, sitting in the third row on Tuesday, of exaggerating to push his own anti-Lombardo agenda.
"It's all smokescreen, lies and deception," Pat Spilotro told me in the hallway outside the courtroom. "I only tell the truth. My family tells the truth. Lombardo was absolutely part of this."
There were several other tough Irishmen watching in court and they don't need shamrocks. One was Ted McNamara, the FBI agent on the Outfit squad. Another was Assistant U.S. Atty. John Scully, prosecuting his last case in a career of putting wiseguys in prison. And that other guy, a Patrick named after the Irish saint who drove out the snakes out of Ireland eons ago.
His name is U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald. He doesn't need shamrocks. All he needs is time.
Thanks to John Kass
It reminded me of that nightmare suffered by Christopher Moltisanti, the young mobster in "The Sopranos," who wakes up from a coma to tell his crew that he has seen hell for Italian wiseguys: Eternity spent in an Irish bar where every day is St. Patrick's Day. But the jury in the Family Secrets trial of five alleged Outfit members wasn't dreaming Tuesday, and there it was, the green Irish good-luck charm, the clover that decorates the hat of the mayor on St. Patrick's Day, up on the big screen as Marcello's lawyer tried to debunk the prosecution case.
"You've heard he was a made member of the Outfit, and that only those who are 100 percent Italian can be made," said Marc Martin in his closing argument Tuesday. "Well, look at his birth certificate. His mother is Irene Flynn. Her father was James Flynn. Her mother was Katherine Lavin, and we know she's Irish because she's one of 14 children."
Marcello rocked in his chair, bald head gleaming under bright federal fluorescent lights, black eyebrows, scowling, as Irish as a pierogi in a frying pan. He'll need a new nickname soon, so pick one: O'Marcello, or McCello?
The shamrock demonstrates how desperate the Outfit is these days, but it allowed Martin to attack the testimony of key prosecution witness and confessed hit man Nicholas Calabrese, who testified that Marcello was a made man and part of several murders, including the 1986 killings of gangsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro.
"The only thing that was made about Nicholas Calabrese's testimony about Jimmy Marcello is that he made it up," Martin told the jury.
They just stared at him, perhaps because those taped conversations from prison weigh more than a shamrock.
Earlier, Assistant U.S. Atty. Markus Funk elaborated on taped conversations between defendant, Chinatown loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr. and former Chicago Police Officer Anthony Doyle, who in a pre-Marcello moment years ago, changed his name from Passafiume to Doyle when his sponsors put him on the Police Department, where he would work in the sensitive evidence room.
Funk played the tape of Doyle sharing information about a key piece of evidence: the glove lost by Nicholas Calabrese after he murdered his friend, John "Big Stoop" Fecarotta after the botched Spilotro burial.
In that tape, Doyle and Calabrese speak of giving electric shocks to Frank's brother Nick, who they feared was talking to the feds. There was talk of many volts and a cattle prod inserted just so.
Doyle testified last week that he'd read about electroshock therapy in a magazine and meant no harm. Funk argued this was pure nonsense. "Do you honestly believe this man is talking about something he read in a psychiatry magazine? That's Anthony Doyle, the Freud of the Chicago Police Department," Funk said in a quote of the year, as several jurors shifted uncomfortably in their seats. But if Doyle was indeed the Outfit's Sigmund Freud, he could have counseled Joey "The Clown" Lombardo, who has been suffering an extreme case of juryphobia since he testified earlier in the trial, according to Lombardo's own lawyer, Rick Halprin.
"He doesn't trust you," Halprin told the jury. "He's frightened to death of you. He does not believe that any of you will give him a fair shake, and that you'll judge him on his past."
That past includes two federal Outfit convictions, one for bribing a United States senator from Nevada, and the other involving skimming millions of dollars from Las Vegas casinos. And there is still that Lombardo fingerprint on the title application for a car used in the 1974 murder of federal witness Daniel Seifert, who would have testified against Lombardo, Tony Spilotro and others.
Halprin commanded the courtroom, using his voice and posture, an absolutely impressive performance that was worth the wait, a pro's pro. But the problem isn't Halprin's fine work, but the evidence, like that fingerprint.
Another problem is the testimony from dentist Pat Spilotro, who insisted recently that Lombardo was an Outfit boss who told him the murders of his brothers were unavoidable. Halprin accused Pat Spilotro, sitting in the third row on Tuesday, of exaggerating to push his own anti-Lombardo agenda.
"It's all smokescreen, lies and deception," Pat Spilotro told me in the hallway outside the courtroom. "I only tell the truth. My family tells the truth. Lombardo was absolutely part of this."
There were several other tough Irishmen watching in court and they don't need shamrocks. One was Ted McNamara, the FBI agent on the Outfit squad. Another was Assistant U.S. Atty. John Scully, prosecuting his last case in a career of putting wiseguys in prison. And that other guy, a Patrick named after the Irish saint who drove out the snakes out of Ireland eons ago.
His name is U.S. Atty. Patrick Fitzgerald. He doesn't need shamrocks. All he needs is time.
Thanks to John Kass
Chicago Outfit Miniseries Heads to Jury Deliberations
When Chicago's biggest mob trial in years got under way, prosecutors urged jurors to throw out any Hollywood notions they'd picked up from "The Sopranos" or "The Godfather."
Ten weeks later, as jurors prepare to begin deliberations, they could write a miniseries based on what they heard in the courtroom about the Chicago Outfit, as the city's organized crime family is known.
There was an admitted hit man, who would "shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli," according to a defense attorney. A son who pretended to reconcile with his father, then recorded their prison conversations for the feds - including one about how men burned holy pictures in their cupped hands at the ceremony to become a "made" guy.
So-called friends allegedly luring friends to their deaths. Bodies buried at construction sites. Secret meetings in parking lots. Code words used in jailhouse conversations. And a dentist, determined to solve the crime of his murdered brothers, who had an on-the-lam alleged mobster show up at his office with a toothache.
The jury is scheduled to begin deliberations Tuesday in the federal racketeering conspiracy case against five defendants: reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78, reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65, convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70, retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62, and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70. Survival Kit In Sardine Can: $12.97
Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said the 10-week trial was about "the history of organized crime in Chicago," and asked jurors during his closing arguments to hold the defendants accountable for murder, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion.
Defense attorneys, meanwhile, attacked the case as one built largely on the testimony of a hit man who admitted lying to authorities in the past and was only cooperating with the government now to escape the death penalty. Attorney Joseph Lopez told jurors the FBI stands for "forever bothering Italians."
Much of the testimony centered on 18 long-unsolved murders, including the killing of one man whose story has already been picked up by Hollywood. Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the psychopathic burglar played by Joe Pesci in Martin Scorsese's 1995 film "Casino."
In the move, Pesci's character and his brother are beaten with bats in a cornfield and buried alive. In court, jurors heard what admitted hit man Nicholas Calabrese alleges happened.
Calabrese, the brother of defendant Frank Calabrese Sr., testified for the government that mobsters were mad at Tony Spilotro because he was "bringing too much heat" on them and romancing the wife of a Las Vegas casino executive.
He said the brothers were lured in June 1986 to the basement of a suburban Chicago home where they were told Tony would be dubbed a "capo," or mob captain, and Michael a "made guy."
Instead, Calabrese said, the men were jumped by about 14 men who beat and strangled them to death. The bodies were soon discovered in a shallow grave in an Indiana cornfield, but a forensic pathologist who helped conduct autopsies told jurors there was no evidence they were still breathing when buried.
Jurors also heard from the Spilotros' brother, Patrick, a dentist who choked back tears on the witness stand. He said Lombardo appeared at his suburban Chicago dental office in January 2006 to have a tooth abscess treated while wanted by authorities in the "Operation Family Secrets" case.
The dentist told the court he had spent years speaking to people who might know something about his brothers' deaths and feeding that information to the FBI. Lombardo was no exception, Spilotro said, telling the jury he asked Lombardo why his brothers ended up dead. "I recall his words vividly," Spilotro said "He said, 'When you get an order, you follow it. If you don't, you go, too.'"
Lombardo was arrested after he made another visit to the dentist's office.
Three of the defendants testified.
Lombardo, who lived up to his "clown" nickname by wisecracking on the stand, told jurors he's not a member of the Outfit and learned everything he knows about the mob from James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson movies.
Doyle testified that during a secretly recorded conversation with Frank Calabrese Sr. in prison, he had agreed with much of what the prisoner wanted without knowing what it was, and that the code words Calabrese used were "mind-boggling gibberish."
Calabrese Sr. told jurors that he associated and did business with Outfit members, but insists that he never took the oath of a so-called made guy. But first, he had to endure the testimony of his brother Nicholas, who admitted participating in more than a dozen murders and placed his brother at seven killings. He linked all the defendants but Doyle to a murder scene.
Nicholas Calabrese was labeled a "grim reaper," a "walking piece of deception" and a man who would kill you for serving him cold pasta by Lopez, representing Calabrese Sr.
Calabrese Sr. also listened as prosecutors asked his namesake - son Frank Calabrese Jr. - to translate conversations with his father at a federal prison in Michigan where both were serving time for a loan-sharking conviction.
In one example, Calabrese Jr. told jurors that when his father described a mob associate as "not a nice girl," that meant the man was cooperating with authorities.
Lopez said the elder Calabrese pleaded guilty to loan sharking thinking it would help his son. Calabrese Sr. was only boasting on the tape, making up tales to impress his "low life" son, Lopez said.
Prosecutors mocked many of the explanations offered by defense attorneys as unbelievable or ridiculous, and they asked jurors to disregard the claim by Lombardo's defense that any criminal activity he was once engaged in, he withdrew from long ago.
Mars said one thing jurors should have learned from the trial is, "Once you belong to the Outfit, you belong for life."
"These are people that cheat, steal and kill each other," he said. "They can make who they want, they can break who they want."
Thanks to Tara Burghart
Ten weeks later, as jurors prepare to begin deliberations, they could write a miniseries based on what they heard in the courtroom about the Chicago Outfit, as the city's organized crime family is known.
There was an admitted hit man, who would "shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli," according to a defense attorney. A son who pretended to reconcile with his father, then recorded their prison conversations for the feds - including one about how men burned holy pictures in their cupped hands at the ceremony to become a "made" guy.
So-called friends allegedly luring friends to their deaths. Bodies buried at construction sites. Secret meetings in parking lots. Code words used in jailhouse conversations. And a dentist, determined to solve the crime of his murdered brothers, who had an on-the-lam alleged mobster show up at his office with a toothache.
The jury is scheduled to begin deliberations Tuesday in the federal racketeering conspiracy case against five defendants: reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78, reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65, convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70, retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62, and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70. Survival Kit In Sardine Can: $12.97
Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said the 10-week trial was about "the history of organized crime in Chicago," and asked jurors during his closing arguments to hold the defendants accountable for murder, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion.
Defense attorneys, meanwhile, attacked the case as one built largely on the testimony of a hit man who admitted lying to authorities in the past and was only cooperating with the government now to escape the death penalty. Attorney Joseph Lopez told jurors the FBI stands for "forever bothering Italians."
Much of the testimony centered on 18 long-unsolved murders, including the killing of one man whose story has already been picked up by Hollywood. Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the psychopathic burglar played by Joe Pesci in Martin Scorsese's 1995 film "Casino."
In the move, Pesci's character and his brother are beaten with bats in a cornfield and buried alive. In court, jurors heard what admitted hit man Nicholas Calabrese alleges happened.
Calabrese, the brother of defendant Frank Calabrese Sr., testified for the government that mobsters were mad at Tony Spilotro because he was "bringing too much heat" on them and romancing the wife of a Las Vegas casino executive.
He said the brothers were lured in June 1986 to the basement of a suburban Chicago home where they were told Tony would be dubbed a "capo," or mob captain, and Michael a "made guy."
Instead, Calabrese said, the men were jumped by about 14 men who beat and strangled them to death. The bodies were soon discovered in a shallow grave in an Indiana cornfield, but a forensic pathologist who helped conduct autopsies told jurors there was no evidence they were still breathing when buried.
Jurors also heard from the Spilotros' brother, Patrick, a dentist who choked back tears on the witness stand. He said Lombardo appeared at his suburban Chicago dental office in January 2006 to have a tooth abscess treated while wanted by authorities in the "Operation Family Secrets" case.
The dentist told the court he had spent years speaking to people who might know something about his brothers' deaths and feeding that information to the FBI. Lombardo was no exception, Spilotro said, telling the jury he asked Lombardo why his brothers ended up dead. "I recall his words vividly," Spilotro said "He said, 'When you get an order, you follow it. If you don't, you go, too.'"
Lombardo was arrested after he made another visit to the dentist's office.
Three of the defendants testified.
Lombardo, who lived up to his "clown" nickname by wisecracking on the stand, told jurors he's not a member of the Outfit and learned everything he knows about the mob from James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson movies.
Doyle testified that during a secretly recorded conversation with Frank Calabrese Sr. in prison, he had agreed with much of what the prisoner wanted without knowing what it was, and that the code words Calabrese used were "mind-boggling gibberish."
Calabrese Sr. told jurors that he associated and did business with Outfit members, but insists that he never took the oath of a so-called made guy. But first, he had to endure the testimony of his brother Nicholas, who admitted participating in more than a dozen murders and placed his brother at seven killings. He linked all the defendants but Doyle to a murder scene.
Nicholas Calabrese was labeled a "grim reaper," a "walking piece of deception" and a man who would kill you for serving him cold pasta by Lopez, representing Calabrese Sr.
Calabrese Sr. also listened as prosecutors asked his namesake - son Frank Calabrese Jr. - to translate conversations with his father at a federal prison in Michigan where both were serving time for a loan-sharking conviction.
In one example, Calabrese Jr. told jurors that when his father described a mob associate as "not a nice girl," that meant the man was cooperating with authorities.
Lopez said the elder Calabrese pleaded guilty to loan sharking thinking it would help his son. Calabrese Sr. was only boasting on the tape, making up tales to impress his "low life" son, Lopez said.
Prosecutors mocked many of the explanations offered by defense attorneys as unbelievable or ridiculous, and they asked jurors to disregard the claim by Lombardo's defense that any criminal activity he was once engaged in, he withdrew from long ago.
Mars said one thing jurors should have learned from the trial is, "Once you belong to the Outfit, you belong for life."
"These are people that cheat, steal and kill each other," he said. "They can make who they want, they can break who they want."
Thanks to Tara Burghart
Origin of the term "The Outfit"
Virtually every story about the Family Secrets trial now winding down in Federal Court refers to the local organized crime network as "The Outfit."
At some point recently the name started sounding odd to me -- how did a term normally associated with clothing come to refer to a vicious conglomerate of thugs and killers? Is it a media creation, or something mob guys use in referring to their enterprise?
I put the question to John J. Binder, a professor of finance at the University of Illinois at Chicago and author of "The Chicago Outfit" (Arcadia Publishing, 2003). It was a topic he had researched, he said:
"`Outfit' shows up frequently in the literature of the old west to describe groups of men on a ranch or on a cattle drive," he said.
The idea being that, ideally, such a group works together in a coordinated way, much like a full outfit of clothing works together when one is well dressed, Binder said.
The word was used in a similar way in the military at least as early as World War I, Binder said: "Your squad, your unit, your outfit...same difference," he said. And the same idea: "Not a disorganized gaggle of people, but a coordinated outfit," Binder said.
Early bootleggers ran in what the media commonly referred to as "gangs," Binder said. But in Chicago after the end of prohibition, these gangs consolidated and began referring informally to their enterprise as "`our outfit,' lower case o," Binder said.
This evolved into "`The Outfit,' upper-case o," Binder said, and became as something of a code word. It was and remains a distinctly Chicago term for what elsewhere goes by "the mob," "the syndicate," "the arm" (in Buffalo) and various Italianate names.
Yet Binder said his research leads him to suspect that Outfit guys stopped saying "Outfit" in around the early 1960s when the media started using it so much it lost any value it might have had as a code word.
"I you ever hear someone claim to be `in the Outfit' or `close to the Outfit,' he's a wanna-be," Binder said.
Try that on for size.
Thanks to Eric Zorn
At some point recently the name started sounding odd to me -- how did a term normally associated with clothing come to refer to a vicious conglomerate of thugs and killers? Is it a media creation, or something mob guys use in referring to their enterprise?
I put the question to John J. Binder, a professor of finance at the University of Illinois at Chicago and author of "The Chicago Outfit" (Arcadia Publishing, 2003). It was a topic he had researched, he said:
"`Outfit' shows up frequently in the literature of the old west to describe groups of men on a ranch or on a cattle drive," he said.
The idea being that, ideally, such a group works together in a coordinated way, much like a full outfit of clothing works together when one is well dressed, Binder said.
The word was used in a similar way in the military at least as early as World War I, Binder said: "Your squad, your unit, your outfit...same difference," he said. And the same idea: "Not a disorganized gaggle of people, but a coordinated outfit," Binder said.
Early bootleggers ran in what the media commonly referred to as "gangs," Binder said. But in Chicago after the end of prohibition, these gangs consolidated and began referring informally to their enterprise as "`our outfit,' lower case o," Binder said.
This evolved into "`The Outfit,' upper-case o," Binder said, and became as something of a code word. It was and remains a distinctly Chicago term for what elsewhere goes by "the mob," "the syndicate," "the arm" (in Buffalo) and various Italianate names.
Yet Binder said his research leads him to suspect that Outfit guys stopped saying "Outfit" in around the early 1960s when the media started using it so much it lost any value it might have had as a code word.
"I you ever hear someone claim to be `in the Outfit' or `close to the Outfit,' he's a wanna-be," Binder said.
Try that on for size.
Thanks to Eric Zorn
Do you believe "The Clown" or an admitted hit man?
Jurors will have to decide when they begin deliberations Tuesday in Chicago's biggest mob trial in years. They got the case Thursday night after prosecutors made a last pitch to sway them to believe the testimony of their star witness, admitted hit man Nicholas Calabrese.
Defense lawyers have pegged Calabrese as "a walking piece of deception" whose testimony shouldn't be believed, even suggesting that if Calabrese says it's raining, someone ought to go outside to check. But prosecutors say it's the five men on trial who can't be believed, including reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, whose lawyers have claimed he turned his back on the mob long ago and therefore isn't part of the illegal activity prosecutors allege.
"Lombardo's word is no good," prosecutor Mitchell Mars told jurors. Mars tossed off Lombardo's so-called withdrawal defense saying, "he withdrew from nothing."
Lombardo, 78, and the others are accused in a racketeering conspiracy that allegedly includes 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion tied to the Outfit, as Chicago's organized crime family is known.
The other defendants are reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62; and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70, who is Nicholas Calabrese's brother.
The trial started in June and prosecutors wrapped up the final two hours of the rebuttal portion of their closing arguments on Thursday.
Prosecutors have used Nicholas Calabrese's testimony to link all but Doyle to the scene of at least one murder. Save up to 60% in the Geek Outlet Today!
Calabrese agreed to blab mob secrets to avoid the death penalty after his DNA was matched to blood on a glove at a 1986 murder scene, defense attorneys say. During the trial, he has admitted to taking part in about a dozen of the killings laid out in the indictment.
Marcello's attorney Marc Martin has accused Calabrese of inventing a tale about the most high-profile homicide in the case "because he felt he had to solve the crime to get his deal to save his life."
That's the killing of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, who was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael, in 1986 and buried in an Indiana cornfield. Tony Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the 1995 movie "Casino." In the film, Pesci's character was beaten with bats and buried alive.
Calabrese testified that Michael Spilotro was strangled and died quickly, leaving behind only a spot of blood.
Mars told jurors Calabrese doesn't have to account for any lack of blood at the scene, but he explained that the fatal injuries were internal and didn't break the skin.
Mars also told jurors Calabrese didn't immediately give up Marcello when he began cooperating with federal officials because Marcello was paying him $4,000 a month to keep his mouth shut. "That's what he was paid to do," Mars said.
Thanks to Deanna Bellandi
Defense lawyers have pegged Calabrese as "a walking piece of deception" whose testimony shouldn't be believed, even suggesting that if Calabrese says it's raining, someone ought to go outside to check. But prosecutors say it's the five men on trial who can't be believed, including reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, whose lawyers have claimed he turned his back on the mob long ago and therefore isn't part of the illegal activity prosecutors allege.
"Lombardo's word is no good," prosecutor Mitchell Mars told jurors. Mars tossed off Lombardo's so-called withdrawal defense saying, "he withdrew from nothing."
Lombardo, 78, and the others are accused in a racketeering conspiracy that allegedly includes 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion tied to the Outfit, as Chicago's organized crime family is known.
The other defendants are reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62; and convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70, who is Nicholas Calabrese's brother.
The trial started in June and prosecutors wrapped up the final two hours of the rebuttal portion of their closing arguments on Thursday.
Prosecutors have used Nicholas Calabrese's testimony to link all but Doyle to the scene of at least one murder. Save up to 60% in the Geek Outlet Today!
Calabrese agreed to blab mob secrets to avoid the death penalty after his DNA was matched to blood on a glove at a 1986 murder scene, defense attorneys say. During the trial, he has admitted to taking part in about a dozen of the killings laid out in the indictment.
Marcello's attorney Marc Martin has accused Calabrese of inventing a tale about the most high-profile homicide in the case "because he felt he had to solve the crime to get his deal to save his life."
That's the killing of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, who was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael, in 1986 and buried in an Indiana cornfield. Tony Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the 1995 movie "Casino." In the film, Pesci's character was beaten with bats and buried alive.
Calabrese testified that Michael Spilotro was strangled and died quickly, leaving behind only a spot of blood.
Mars told jurors Calabrese doesn't have to account for any lack of blood at the scene, but he explained that the fatal injuries were internal and didn't break the skin.
Mars also told jurors Calabrese didn't immediately give up Marcello when he began cooperating with federal officials because Marcello was paying him $4,000 a month to keep his mouth shut. "That's what he was paid to do," Mars said.
Thanks to Deanna Bellandi
"We're Here to Kill the Spilotros" T-Shirts
Alleged top mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo is still part of the Chicago Outfit because he lied from the witness stand to protect the organization, a federal prosecutor said Thursday in the government's final argument in the Family Secrets trial.
Lombardo, at 78, is arguing he has long retired from any mob activities and should not be convicted of taking part in any recent mob conspiracy. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said Lombardo "dummied up" on the witness stand when asked about the Outfit.
Lombardo, at 78, is arguing he has long retired from any mob activities and should not be convicted of taking part in any recent mob conspiracy. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said Lombardo "dummied up" on the witness stand when asked about the Outfit.
"Outfit? Doesn't know anything about that," Mars said.
After Mars finished his rebuttal argument, the jury got the case and will begin deliberations on Tuesday, taking the holiday weekend off.
"I submit to you it's now time to hold accountable four defendants, Lombardo, Marcello, Calabrese and Schiro, who've gotten away with murder for far too long," Mars told the jury, referring to alleged mob bosses Lombardo and James Marcello, alleged mob killer Frank Calabrese Sr. and the Outfit's reputed man in Phoenix, Paul Schiro. In all, the government alleges 18 mob murders in the indictment.
Mars also asked the jury to convict retired Chicago police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle of trying to help his friend Calabrese Sr. learn the identity of a mob snitch. Doyle is not accused of any of the murders.
In his argument, Mars focused on Lombardo and his alleged participation in the murder of Daniel Seifert in 1974. Seifert was a businessman who was to testify against Lombardo in a Teamster pension fund fraud case. But when Seifert was executed, the case against Lombardo was dropped.
Mars presented 17 reasons why Lombardo should be convicted in Seifert's murder, from Lombardo's fingerprint being found on a title application for a car used in the murder, to trial testimony from Seifert's brother, who said Lombardo warned him to straighten out his brother in the weeks before the murder.
Mars also attacked a defense argument involving the murders of mobsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro in 1986.
The government's star witness, confessed mob hitman Nicholas Calabrese, the brother of Frank Calabrese Sr., said he was one of about a dozen mob killers who pounced on the Spilotro brothers as they descended into the basement of a Bensenville area home.
Nicholas Calabrese said all the killers were wearing gloves. Defense attorneys pounced on that detail to bolster their argument Calabrese was never there. They argued the killers wouldn't have worn gloves because it would have been a dead giveaway to the Spilotros that they were about to be killed. But Mars said the Spilotros had no time to react when they were jumped and beaten to death when they entered the basement.
"Everybody could have worn T-shirts saying, 'We're here to kill the Spilotros.' They weren't getting out of the house alive," Mars said.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Lombardo, at 78, is arguing he has long retired from any mob activities and should not be convicted of taking part in any recent mob conspiracy. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said Lombardo "dummied up" on the witness stand when asked about the Outfit.
Lombardo, at 78, is arguing he has long retired from any mob activities and should not be convicted of taking part in any recent mob conspiracy. But Assistant U.S. Attorney Mitchell Mars said Lombardo "dummied up" on the witness stand when asked about the Outfit.
"Outfit? Doesn't know anything about that," Mars said.
After Mars finished his rebuttal argument, the jury got the case and will begin deliberations on Tuesday, taking the holiday weekend off.
"I submit to you it's now time to hold accountable four defendants, Lombardo, Marcello, Calabrese and Schiro, who've gotten away with murder for far too long," Mars told the jury, referring to alleged mob bosses Lombardo and James Marcello, alleged mob killer Frank Calabrese Sr. and the Outfit's reputed man in Phoenix, Paul Schiro. In all, the government alleges 18 mob murders in the indictment.
Mars also asked the jury to convict retired Chicago police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle of trying to help his friend Calabrese Sr. learn the identity of a mob snitch. Doyle is not accused of any of the murders.
In his argument, Mars focused on Lombardo and his alleged participation in the murder of Daniel Seifert in 1974. Seifert was a businessman who was to testify against Lombardo in a Teamster pension fund fraud case. But when Seifert was executed, the case against Lombardo was dropped.
Mars presented 17 reasons why Lombardo should be convicted in Seifert's murder, from Lombardo's fingerprint being found on a title application for a car used in the murder, to trial testimony from Seifert's brother, who said Lombardo warned him to straighten out his brother in the weeks before the murder.
Mars also attacked a defense argument involving the murders of mobsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro in 1986.
The government's star witness, confessed mob hitman Nicholas Calabrese, the brother of Frank Calabrese Sr., said he was one of about a dozen mob killers who pounced on the Spilotro brothers as they descended into the basement of a Bensenville area home.
Nicholas Calabrese said all the killers were wearing gloves. Defense attorneys pounced on that detail to bolster their argument Calabrese was never there. They argued the killers wouldn't have worn gloves because it would have been a dead giveaway to the Spilotros that they were about to be killed. But Mars said the Spilotros had no time to react when they were jumped and beaten to death when they entered the basement.
"Everybody could have worn T-shirts saying, 'We're here to kill the Spilotros.' They weren't getting out of the house alive," Mars said.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Juror Communication Subject of Secret Hearing
There was a secret court hearing in the Family Secrets case that was closed to the public. The contents are under seal. But the Chicago Sun-Times learned it involved a juror in the case. The hearing caused the trial to start late Thursday, just before 3 p.m. Court is supposed to start at 9:30 a.m.
So what was the issue?
It did not involve someone trying to tamper with the juror, according to people familiar with the situation. It apparently involved some communication the juror made.
U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel, who by all accounts did an excellent job presiding over the trial, said he would unseal the matter after the trial is over.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
So what was the issue?
It did not involve someone trying to tamper with the juror, according to people familiar with the situation. It apparently involved some communication the juror made.
U.S. District Court Judge James Zagel, who by all accounts did an excellent job presiding over the trial, said he would unseal the matter after the trial is over.
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
'He would shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli'
For jurors who have sat through a summer in Courtroom 2525 listening to testimony from more than 100 witnesses, the contrast couldn't have been starker on Wednesday.
The defense attorney, wearing a hypnotic pink-and-black checkered tie, reveled in his role as the mob lawyer, talking loudly about constitutional rights and the American Revolution. He blasted the government's case, contending the FBI could stand for "Forever Bothering Italians" and calling the prosecution's star witness a bald-faced liar who "would shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli."
And then there was the federal prosecutor, standing at the lectern in a dark, conservative suit as he spoke with barely controlled anger. He told the jury that the 18 gangland slayings at the heart of the case stretched over 40 years and illustrated the cruelty of a ruthless Outfit that "survived and prospered at the expense of who knows how many victims."
The defense lawyer, Joseph Lopez, ripped star witness Nicholas Calabrese as a crybaby and "a walking piece of deception." Not so, said the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, who defended Calabrese as a product of the city's underworld, an Outfit soldier who had been forthright about "a very horrible life."
The dueling closing arguments in the Family Secrets conspiracy trial came as the jury is set to begin deliberations as soon as Thursday.
Mars, the longtime chief of the organized-crime unit in the U.S. attorney's office in Chicago, will wrap up his closing argument Thursday, and U.S. District Judge James Zagel, presiding over the landmark trial, will then instruct the jury.
Lopez represents Frank Calabrese Sr., an accused mob hit man alleged to have taken part in 13 of the murders. His brother, the star witness, and his son both cooperated against Calabrese, giving the case its Operation Family Secrets code name.
As he delivered his remarks, Lopez circled in front of the jury, looking up at his slick PowerPoint presentation, replete with cartoon characters, including a bawling infant. He urged the jury to remember that his client was cloaked in innocence "like Casper the Friendly Ghost" and that the jury system was the product of "bloodshed on American soil."
"Don't forget Valley Forge, where George Washington marched his troops on bleeding feet," he said.
The case amounts to a family feud, Lopez said, featuring Nicholas "the grim reaper" Calabrese and "I cannot do time" Frank Calabrese Jr., his client's wayward son. Jurors can keep or throw out whatever evidence they want, he said, piecing information together "just like putting something together from IKEA."
Lopez reminded jurors that from the witness stand, Nicholas Calabrese never looked them or his brother in the face, instead he stared straight ahead. Lopez assailed Nicholas Calabrese, saying he hated his brother and refused to take real responsibility for the 14 murders to which he admitted by trying to claim he was under his brother's thumb. When times got tough, Lopez said, Calabrese cried to "Mommy FBI."
On his turn, Mars credited Nicholas Calabrese for lifting the veil on many of the 18 murders, giving closure to victims' families and defended his credibility. "The issue is not whether you like Nicholas Calabrese," the prosecutor said. "That's not why we're here. The issue is whether you believe him."
Mars told jurors to remember Calabrese's demeanor on the witness stand, saying he wasn't reading off a prepared script.
Calabrese provided his best memory, Mars said, unlike Frank Calabrese Sr. or Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, who took the stand in their own defense and told jurors that they only acted like mobsters.
Frank Calabrese Sr. "told nothing but lies," Mars said, citing testimony in which he claimed he admitted to some murders to impress his son, who, unbeknownst to him, wore a wire for the government as the two talked in prison.
When he testified in July, Nicholas Calabrese was subjected to rigorous questioning by "some of the best cross-examiners in town," Mars said. "They did not catch him in a lie, much to their chagrin."
Frank Calabrese Sr. was captured on hours of recordings discussing seven of the murders in the case and describing events that were unknown to the public, Mars said. That should be a truth-detector when it comes to Nicholas Calabrese's account and whether he was just building a story around things he had heard, he said.
In fact, Mars said, Nicholas Calabrese has never heard the undercover tapes to this day. It would have to be "by the purest of coincidences that [each brother] lied in exactly the same way," he said.
Lopez attacked the government case for presenting no physical evidence, no DNA evidence linking his client to any murder and no fibers, hairs or fingerprints.
Both brothers are simply boasting for their own reasons, Lopez said.
Frank Calabrese Sr. told the truth when he testified that he was just in the business of street loans and had a mobbed-up partner, Lopez said. Calabrese had a job that put money into the hands of those involved in organized crime, he said, and they would not risk involving him in violence. "You don't put the earner out on the street to catch the arrow," he said.
The jury should blame Frank Calabrese Jr. for dragging his father into damaging conversations, Lopez maintained. The son asked the father questions about life in the Outfit, Lopez said, and Frank Calabrese Sr. didn't want to look like a chump by denying it. The tapes are simply two men trying to "out B.S." each other, he said.
Two other defense closing arguments also took place Wednesday.
Attorney Paul Wagner, who represents reputed mob figure Paul "the Indian" Schiro, said a lying Nicholas Calabrese provided the main evidence against his client, too, fingering him for killing witness Emil Vaci in Phoenix in 1986. Ralph Meczyk the lawyer for former Chicago police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle, said his client was only helping a friend when he gave police information to Frank Calabrese Sr. But Lopez and Mars couldn't even agree on whether the criminal enterprise known as the Outfit, the basis for the key racketeering charge, existed in many of the years outlined in the case.
Mars said Nicholas Calabrese acted—and killed—on behalf of that enterprise. Lopez called it a myth and said the only enterprise he is aware of was "the Starship Enterprise."
Even the infamous "Last Supper photo" of reputed mob leaders sitting around a table in an Italian restaurant depicted just a bunch of "grumpy old men drinking Corvo," Lopez said. "The enterprise died with them on the last clam," he said.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
The defense attorney, wearing a hypnotic pink-and-black checkered tie, reveled in his role as the mob lawyer, talking loudly about constitutional rights and the American Revolution. He blasted the government's case, contending the FBI could stand for "Forever Bothering Italians" and calling the prosecution's star witness a bald-faced liar who "would shoot you in the head over a cold ravioli."
And then there was the federal prosecutor, standing at the lectern in a dark, conservative suit as he spoke with barely controlled anger. He told the jury that the 18 gangland slayings at the heart of the case stretched over 40 years and illustrated the cruelty of a ruthless Outfit that "survived and prospered at the expense of who knows how many victims."
The defense lawyer, Joseph Lopez, ripped star witness Nicholas Calabrese as a crybaby and "a walking piece of deception." Not so, said the prosecutor, Assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars, who defended Calabrese as a product of the city's underworld, an Outfit soldier who had been forthright about "a very horrible life."
The dueling closing arguments in the Family Secrets conspiracy trial came as the jury is set to begin deliberations as soon as Thursday.
Mars, the longtime chief of the organized-crime unit in the U.S. attorney's office in Chicago, will wrap up his closing argument Thursday, and U.S. District Judge James Zagel, presiding over the landmark trial, will then instruct the jury.
Lopez represents Frank Calabrese Sr., an accused mob hit man alleged to have taken part in 13 of the murders. His brother, the star witness, and his son both cooperated against Calabrese, giving the case its Operation Family Secrets code name.
As he delivered his remarks, Lopez circled in front of the jury, looking up at his slick PowerPoint presentation, replete with cartoon characters, including a bawling infant. He urged the jury to remember that his client was cloaked in innocence "like Casper the Friendly Ghost" and that the jury system was the product of "bloodshed on American soil."
"Don't forget Valley Forge, where George Washington marched his troops on bleeding feet," he said.
The case amounts to a family feud, Lopez said, featuring Nicholas "the grim reaper" Calabrese and "I cannot do time" Frank Calabrese Jr., his client's wayward son. Jurors can keep or throw out whatever evidence they want, he said, piecing information together "just like putting something together from IKEA."
Lopez reminded jurors that from the witness stand, Nicholas Calabrese never looked them or his brother in the face, instead he stared straight ahead. Lopez assailed Nicholas Calabrese, saying he hated his brother and refused to take real responsibility for the 14 murders to which he admitted by trying to claim he was under his brother's thumb. When times got tough, Lopez said, Calabrese cried to "Mommy FBI."
On his turn, Mars credited Nicholas Calabrese for lifting the veil on many of the 18 murders, giving closure to victims' families and defended his credibility. "The issue is not whether you like Nicholas Calabrese," the prosecutor said. "That's not why we're here. The issue is whether you believe him."
Mars told jurors to remember Calabrese's demeanor on the witness stand, saying he wasn't reading off a prepared script.
Calabrese provided his best memory, Mars said, unlike Frank Calabrese Sr. or Joey "the Clown" Lombardo, who took the stand in their own defense and told jurors that they only acted like mobsters.
Frank Calabrese Sr. "told nothing but lies," Mars said, citing testimony in which he claimed he admitted to some murders to impress his son, who, unbeknownst to him, wore a wire for the government as the two talked in prison.
When he testified in July, Nicholas Calabrese was subjected to rigorous questioning by "some of the best cross-examiners in town," Mars said. "They did not catch him in a lie, much to their chagrin."
Frank Calabrese Sr. was captured on hours of recordings discussing seven of the murders in the case and describing events that were unknown to the public, Mars said. That should be a truth-detector when it comes to Nicholas Calabrese's account and whether he was just building a story around things he had heard, he said.
In fact, Mars said, Nicholas Calabrese has never heard the undercover tapes to this day. It would have to be "by the purest of coincidences that [each brother] lied in exactly the same way," he said.
Lopez attacked the government case for presenting no physical evidence, no DNA evidence linking his client to any murder and no fibers, hairs or fingerprints.
Both brothers are simply boasting for their own reasons, Lopez said.
Frank Calabrese Sr. told the truth when he testified that he was just in the business of street loans and had a mobbed-up partner, Lopez said. Calabrese had a job that put money into the hands of those involved in organized crime, he said, and they would not risk involving him in violence. "You don't put the earner out on the street to catch the arrow," he said.
The jury should blame Frank Calabrese Jr. for dragging his father into damaging conversations, Lopez maintained. The son asked the father questions about life in the Outfit, Lopez said, and Frank Calabrese Sr. didn't want to look like a chump by denying it. The tapes are simply two men trying to "out B.S." each other, he said.
Two other defense closing arguments also took place Wednesday.
Attorney Paul Wagner, who represents reputed mob figure Paul "the Indian" Schiro, said a lying Nicholas Calabrese provided the main evidence against his client, too, fingering him for killing witness Emil Vaci in Phoenix in 1986. Ralph Meczyk the lawyer for former Chicago police officer Anthony "Twan" Doyle, said his client was only helping a friend when he gave police information to Frank Calabrese Sr. But Lopez and Mars couldn't even agree on whether the criminal enterprise known as the Outfit, the basis for the key racketeering charge, existed in many of the years outlined in the case.
Mars said Nicholas Calabrese acted—and killed—on behalf of that enterprise. Lopez called it a myth and said the only enterprise he is aware of was "the Starship Enterprise."
Even the infamous "Last Supper photo" of reputed mob leaders sitting around a table in an Italian restaurant depicted just a bunch of "grumpy old men drinking Corvo," Lopez said. "The enterprise died with them on the last clam," he said.
Thanks to Jeff Coen
Thursday, August 30, 2007
Onlookers Flock to Family Secrets Trial
"There he is, there's Calabrese and there's the Indian and there's Joey the Clown," said Lee Anne Roggensack, excitedly pointing out three of the elderly defendants in the Family Secrets mob conspiracy trial, where closing arguments conclude Thursday. Roggensack, 48, skipped a planned vacation so she could attend, sitting in the courtroom for at least 18 days.
The 10-week trial has spawned a subculture of its own: Chicagoans who feel as if the mob was a shadowy but ever-present force as they grew up in this city, and who wanted to see some of its most flamboyant characters in the flesh -- and put behind bars.
In Roggensack's case, a mobster's godchild was her stepdaughter's godfather, she said, "but he wasn't in the mob." And her son-in-law worked at a hot dog stand owned by a jailed mobster.
"Everybody of a certain age and beyond in Chicago has an organized crime story," said John J. Binder, author of "The Chicago Outfit
," a history of the city's mobsters. "They either lived near someone or their grandfather drove a beer truck during Prohibition or there was this bar they used to go into."
Decades after its heyday, the Chicago mob is still famous around the world. Untouchable Tours buses weave through the city daily, showing the site of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre and other notorious locales. When the Biograph Theater reopened last year, much was made of its fame as the spot where federal agents gunned down John Dillinger.
Mobsters are often romanticized and glorified, but most people at the trial had a decidedly negative view of the five defendants -- Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, Paul "the Indian" Schiro, James Marcello, former cop Anthony Doyle and Frank Calabrese Sr. -- who among them are charged with 18 murders, racketeering, extortion, loan-sharking, gambling and other crimes. The alleged victims include Outfit members Michael and Anthony Spilotro, brothers who were beaten and buried alive in an Indiana cornfield in 1986.
"It's been undermining the integrity of our city forever," said Pat Reynolds, 73, who spent 24 days in the courtroom and fears that a planned vacation to Telluride, Colo., will make her miss the verdict. "I've always had to explain my city, that it's wonderful and beautiful in spite of this."
Paul Bird, 83, and Robert Madden, 80, said they went to Oak Park High School just west of Chicago with reputed mobsters and their children. Al Capone lived not far from them at one point, they said, and Bird said he went to summer school with a daughter of William "Sweet Willie" Bioff, known for extorting Hollywood studios through the movie projectionists union.
The trial featured Calabrese Sr.'s own son, Frank Jr., as well as Frank Sr.'s brother Nicholas, himself a member of the Outfit, both testifying against him. In conversations secretly taped by Frank Jr. in a federal prison in Milan, Mich., Calabrese Sr. described burning prayer cards on the hands of "made" members and covering a body with "the lime that eats."
He testified he was merely trying to impress his son, since he was jealous of Frank Jr.'s close relationship with Nicholas.
Thanks to Kari Lydersen
The 10-week trial has spawned a subculture of its own: Chicagoans who feel as if the mob was a shadowy but ever-present force as they grew up in this city, and who wanted to see some of its most flamboyant characters in the flesh -- and put behind bars.
In Roggensack's case, a mobster's godchild was her stepdaughter's godfather, she said, "but he wasn't in the mob." And her son-in-law worked at a hot dog stand owned by a jailed mobster.
"Everybody of a certain age and beyond in Chicago has an organized crime story," said John J. Binder, author of "The Chicago Outfit
," a history of the city's mobsters. "They either lived near someone or their grandfather drove a beer truck during Prohibition or there was this bar they used to go into."Decades after its heyday, the Chicago mob is still famous around the world. Untouchable Tours buses weave through the city daily, showing the site of the St. Valentine's Day Massacre and other notorious locales. When the Biograph Theater reopened last year, much was made of its fame as the spot where federal agents gunned down John Dillinger.
Mobsters are often romanticized and glorified, but most people at the trial had a decidedly negative view of the five defendants -- Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, Paul "the Indian" Schiro, James Marcello, former cop Anthony Doyle and Frank Calabrese Sr. -- who among them are charged with 18 murders, racketeering, extortion, loan-sharking, gambling and other crimes. The alleged victims include Outfit members Michael and Anthony Spilotro, brothers who were beaten and buried alive in an Indiana cornfield in 1986.
"It's been undermining the integrity of our city forever," said Pat Reynolds, 73, who spent 24 days in the courtroom and fears that a planned vacation to Telluride, Colo., will make her miss the verdict. "I've always had to explain my city, that it's wonderful and beautiful in spite of this."
Paul Bird, 83, and Robert Madden, 80, said they went to Oak Park High School just west of Chicago with reputed mobsters and their children. Al Capone lived not far from them at one point, they said, and Bird said he went to summer school with a daughter of William "Sweet Willie" Bioff, known for extorting Hollywood studios through the movie projectionists union.
The trial featured Calabrese Sr.'s own son, Frank Jr., as well as Frank Sr.'s brother Nicholas, himself a member of the Outfit, both testifying against him. In conversations secretly taped by Frank Jr. in a federal prison in Milan, Mich., Calabrese Sr. described burning prayer cards on the hands of "made" members and covering a body with "the lime that eats."
He testified he was merely trying to impress his son, since he was jealous of Frank Jr.'s close relationship with Nicholas.
Thanks to Kari Lydersen
Arrivederci to a Chicago Hero from Little Italy
In federal court Tuesday morning, lawyers for five accused mobsters were poised to try and sell a jury on the sad, sad story about how their clients were misunderstood. Not murdering gangsters. And not guilty.
But somehow, sitting there, all I could think about was Florence Scala, who died that very morning, just hours before defense attorneys embarked on the last lap of a historic trial.
Florence certainly didn't need to stick around for that. Nor would she have bought a word of it.
She knew everything she needed to know about the Lombardos, Marcellos, Calabreses and their kind in 88 years spent on Taylor Street in the heart of Chicago's Little Italy. On the Near West Side where she lived and worked and died, she had no patience for these "other" Italians and said so many times.
"They were men from the old country who lorded it over people in the area," she once told author Studs Terkel. And those men had sons and their sons had sons. Some of them were politicians like John D'Arco Sr., the committeeman of the mobbed up First Ward. And Pat Marcy, the political rainmaker of the First Ward, who made sure the right kind of people became judges so they could guarantee "the right" kind of verdicts were handed down in Cook County. Harry "The Hitman" Aleman got one of those lucky decisions once. So did Anthony "The Ant" Spilotro. But Harry, in federal prison, isn't lucky anymore, and Tony is dead.
Florence fought the Chicago Outfit in the early 1960s. And the politicians on their payroll. Not to mention big business and real estate interests that saw a huge payday in gentrifying her neighborhood. And the genteel boards of upstanding civic organizations who sympathized with powerbrokers more than ordinary citizens. In her view, they all sold out the melting pot of immigrants whose modest houses and hard lives filled the enclave that was her community by never once consulting them. And when this small Italian woman with olive skin and big, dark eyes didn't blink, they didn't like it. And when she began to organize young and old, Italian and non-Italian, students and laborers to demand a voice in civic decisions, they couldn't believe the nerve of a Taylor Street housewife.
That's why, in 1962, the thugs who did the bidding of the bosses bombed her back porch as she tried to run for alderman herself. She lost a lot of wars but held the hearts of grateful people who marvelled at her courage.
"She tried to save the soul of Chicago," Studs Terkel told me by phone Tuesday. "It was a glorious sight."
Some of us who loved and admired Florence wanted to honor her before she died. In 2005, I wrote a column suggesting the city rename the library in Little Italy for her because she was instrumental in getting it put there.
A note from Florence arrived two days later. "Libraries should be named for authors, poets and writers who enrich our lives. I do not agree with proposing my name to rename the Roosevelt Library. Happy New Year Carol & thanks. Florence S."
When Florence said no, she meant no. That went for the Outfit, City Hall or an upstart columnist. Not a sentimentalist or a silly dreamer, she was a revolutionary in sensible shoes. She will always be my hero.
Arrivederci, Florence.
Thanks to Carol Marin
But somehow, sitting there, all I could think about was Florence Scala, who died that very morning, just hours before defense attorneys embarked on the last lap of a historic trial.
Florence certainly didn't need to stick around for that. Nor would she have bought a word of it.
She knew everything she needed to know about the Lombardos, Marcellos, Calabreses and their kind in 88 years spent on Taylor Street in the heart of Chicago's Little Italy. On the Near West Side where she lived and worked and died, she had no patience for these "other" Italians and said so many times.
"They were men from the old country who lorded it over people in the area," she once told author Studs Terkel. And those men had sons and their sons had sons. Some of them were politicians like John D'Arco Sr., the committeeman of the mobbed up First Ward. And Pat Marcy, the political rainmaker of the First Ward, who made sure the right kind of people became judges so they could guarantee "the right" kind of verdicts were handed down in Cook County. Harry "The Hitman" Aleman got one of those lucky decisions once. So did Anthony "The Ant" Spilotro. But Harry, in federal prison, isn't lucky anymore, and Tony is dead.
Florence fought the Chicago Outfit in the early 1960s. And the politicians on their payroll. Not to mention big business and real estate interests that saw a huge payday in gentrifying her neighborhood. And the genteel boards of upstanding civic organizations who sympathized with powerbrokers more than ordinary citizens. In her view, they all sold out the melting pot of immigrants whose modest houses and hard lives filled the enclave that was her community by never once consulting them. And when this small Italian woman with olive skin and big, dark eyes didn't blink, they didn't like it. And when she began to organize young and old, Italian and non-Italian, students and laborers to demand a voice in civic decisions, they couldn't believe the nerve of a Taylor Street housewife.
That's why, in 1962, the thugs who did the bidding of the bosses bombed her back porch as she tried to run for alderman herself. She lost a lot of wars but held the hearts of grateful people who marvelled at her courage.
"She tried to save the soul of Chicago," Studs Terkel told me by phone Tuesday. "It was a glorious sight."
Some of us who loved and admired Florence wanted to honor her before she died. In 2005, I wrote a column suggesting the city rename the library in Little Italy for her because she was instrumental in getting it put there.
A note from Florence arrived two days later. "Libraries should be named for authors, poets and writers who enrich our lives. I do not agree with proposing my name to rename the Roosevelt Library. Happy New Year Carol & thanks. Florence S."
When Florence said no, she meant no. That went for the Outfit, City Hall or an upstart columnist. Not a sentimentalist or a silly dreamer, she was a revolutionary in sensible shoes. She will always be my hero.
Arrivederci, Florence.
Thanks to Carol Marin
Wednesday, August 29, 2007
Dueling Closing Arguments in Federal Court Over Family Secrets Case
Prosecutors and defense attorneys dueled in closing arguments at the "Family Secrets" mob trial Tuesday, each putting their own views on the evidence presented over the last 10 weeks.
Prosecutors asked jurors not to buy the spin of defense attorneys while the defense, in turn maintained it was the government's witness who is not believable.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Markus Funk, continuing his presentation from Monday, focused on the murder of Anthony and Michael Spilotro, two mobsters who were themselves brutally beaten to death in 1986.
Prosecutors, relying on the testimony of turncoat mobster Nick Calabrese, maintain the two were lured to a home near Bensenville or Wood Dale and killed there by a dozen other mobsters, including defendants James Marcello of Lombard and Frank Calabrese Sr.
The Spilotros were killed in 1986 after Anthony Spilotro began attracting too much "heat," or attention to mob activities, in Las Vegas. "And why was Michael killed? Because he was Tony's brother," contended Funk, noting that the mob couldn't take the chance that Michael Spilotro might seek revenge on them. And he ridiculed Frank Calabrese Sr.'s testimony that had him claiming he only found out after the fact about Nick Calabrese killing fellow mobster John Fecarotta when he went to see Nick Calabrese, his brother, recovering from a bullet wound sustained during the killing.
"Now, of course, in Frank Calabrese Sr.'s world, he's totally uninvolved," scoffed Funk.
Why then, is Frank Calabrese Sr. on tape, discussing with his son how he was just a few blocks away at the time of the killing, driving around in vain trying to find Nick?
"Once again, what is Frank Calabrese Sr. doing? 'Play-acting' (on tape?) Trying to impress his son?" said Funk. "It's laughable."
But after Funk's presentation, Marcello attorney Mark Martin keyed in on a statement made by Nick Calabrese that high-ranking mobster Rocky Infelise was at the Spilotro slayings. He pointed to transcripts of phone recordings made of Infelise's home that show him making and receiving phone calls during the alleged time of the killings.
That proves Nick Calabrese is a liar, Martin said. "If you find he's lying about the Spilotro murders -- and he is -- then you can't believe a word he says," said Martin. "Heaven help us if his word is proof beyond a reasonable doubt."
Lombardo's lawyers next took the podium, with Susan Shatz pointing out that the man Lombardo worked with, Irv Weiner, had more reason to murder plastics plant owner Daniel Seifert than Lombardo did. In fact, both men stood to go to prison from Seifert's testimony in an upcoming criminal trial regarding theft of union funds.
Prosecutors say Irv Weiner was under Lombardo's control while defense attorneys say it was the other way around.
The fact that Lombardo's fingerprint is on the application to the title of a car used in Seifert's killing is explainable, they maintain, by the fact that it was notarized in Weiner's office where Lombardo spent a lot of time, Shatz said. "I think it is reasonable" to believe that, Shatz said.
Rick Halprin, another Lombardo lawyer, conceded that Lombardo's testimony at times was not credible, particularly when he maintained that when he was recorded using the word "we" to discuss shaking down massage parlor owners, he didn't really mean "we."
"He (Lombardo) was made to look like a fool by a very skilled prosecutor," said Halprin.
Lombardo's shaky testimony was due to the fact that he doesn't believe jurors, aware of his past convictions for mob activities, would give him a fair shake, Halprin said.
What Lombardo doesn't understand, Halprin maintained, was that those tapes don't matter much because they don't clearly show the activity was done for the Chicago mob, something required to convict of conspiracy. And Halprin also attacked other prosecution witnesses like Patrick Spilotro, brother to the slain mobsters and dentist to Lombardo. He called Patrick Spilotro's testimony that Joseph Lombardo discussed the murders with him "not credible."
Patrick Spilotro, who was present for closing arguments, said it was Lombardo's team that wasn't credible. "Smokescreen, lies and deception," Patrick Spilotro said of Halprin's arguments. "They're doing what they have to do, but truth and justice will prevail."
Thanks to Rob Olmstead
Prosecutors asked jurors not to buy the spin of defense attorneys while the defense, in turn maintained it was the government's witness who is not believable.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Markus Funk, continuing his presentation from Monday, focused on the murder of Anthony and Michael Spilotro, two mobsters who were themselves brutally beaten to death in 1986.
Prosecutors, relying on the testimony of turncoat mobster Nick Calabrese, maintain the two were lured to a home near Bensenville or Wood Dale and killed there by a dozen other mobsters, including defendants James Marcello of Lombard and Frank Calabrese Sr.
The Spilotros were killed in 1986 after Anthony Spilotro began attracting too much "heat," or attention to mob activities, in Las Vegas. "And why was Michael killed? Because he was Tony's brother," contended Funk, noting that the mob couldn't take the chance that Michael Spilotro might seek revenge on them. And he ridiculed Frank Calabrese Sr.'s testimony that had him claiming he only found out after the fact about Nick Calabrese killing fellow mobster John Fecarotta when he went to see Nick Calabrese, his brother, recovering from a bullet wound sustained during the killing."Now, of course, in Frank Calabrese Sr.'s world, he's totally uninvolved," scoffed Funk.
Why then, is Frank Calabrese Sr. on tape, discussing with his son how he was just a few blocks away at the time of the killing, driving around in vain trying to find Nick?
"Once again, what is Frank Calabrese Sr. doing? 'Play-acting' (on tape?) Trying to impress his son?" said Funk. "It's laughable."
But after Funk's presentation, Marcello attorney Mark Martin keyed in on a statement made by Nick Calabrese that high-ranking mobster Rocky Infelise was at the Spilotro slayings. He pointed to transcripts of phone recordings made of Infelise's home that show him making and receiving phone calls during the alleged time of the killings.
That proves Nick Calabrese is a liar, Martin said. "If you find he's lying about the Spilotro murders -- and he is -- then you can't believe a word he says," said Martin. "Heaven help us if his word is proof beyond a reasonable doubt."
Lombardo's lawyers next took the podium, with Susan Shatz pointing out that the man Lombardo worked with, Irv Weiner, had more reason to murder plastics plant owner Daniel Seifert than Lombardo did. In fact, both men stood to go to prison from Seifert's testimony in an upcoming criminal trial regarding theft of union funds.
Prosecutors say Irv Weiner was under Lombardo's control while defense attorneys say it was the other way around.
The fact that Lombardo's fingerprint is on the application to the title of a car used in Seifert's killing is explainable, they maintain, by the fact that it was notarized in Weiner's office where Lombardo spent a lot of time, Shatz said. "I think it is reasonable" to believe that, Shatz said.
Rick Halprin, another Lombardo lawyer, conceded that Lombardo's testimony at times was not credible, particularly when he maintained that when he was recorded using the word "we" to discuss shaking down massage parlor owners, he didn't really mean "we."
"He (Lombardo) was made to look like a fool by a very skilled prosecutor," said Halprin.
Lombardo's shaky testimony was due to the fact that he doesn't believe jurors, aware of his past convictions for mob activities, would give him a fair shake, Halprin said.
What Lombardo doesn't understand, Halprin maintained, was that those tapes don't matter much because they don't clearly show the activity was done for the Chicago mob, something required to convict of conspiracy. And Halprin also attacked other prosecution witnesses like Patrick Spilotro, brother to the slain mobsters and dentist to Lombardo. He called Patrick Spilotro's testimony that Joseph Lombardo discussed the murders with him "not credible."
Patrick Spilotro, who was present for closing arguments, said it was Lombardo's team that wasn't credible. "Smokescreen, lies and deception," Patrick Spilotro said of Halprin's arguments. "They're doing what they have to do, but truth and justice will prevail."
Thanks to Rob Olmstead
Rent-a-Mobster
Reputed top Chicago mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo was "not truthful" at times in his testimony in the Family Secrets trial and was made to look like "a ridiculous old fool" under cross-examination -- but he was nothing more than a "rent-a-mobster," Lombardo's own attorney told jurors in his closing argument Tuesday.
Lombardo's lawyer, Rick Halprin, said Lombardo was never a made member of the mob but hung out and hustled with businessmen with deep mob ties. At times, Lombardo hustled himself into prison, Halprin said.
Lombardo has long retired from any Outfit connections, Halprin said, invoking the so-called withdrawal defense that's unique to Lombardo's case. "We are not talking about redemption here," Halprin intoned toward the end of his argument. "We are talking about a decided change in lifestyle."
"Redemption, I dare say, for Mr. Lombardo is in the not-too-distant future," Halprin said. Lombardo, at 78, is the oldest of five defendants on trial.
Prosecutors have tried to tie Lombardo to more recent Outfit activity by the testimony of Pat Spilotro, who was Lombardo's dentist and the brother of slain mobsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro. Pat Spilotro turned Lombardo in to the FBI when he was on the lam last year.
In court, Spilotro testified that his longtime patient mentioned his troubles, including that the New York mob was trying to muscle into Chicago. Halprin called Spilotro's testimony "not credible."
Outside the courtroom, Spilotro said he was telling the truth. "They're doing what they have to do up there," Spilotro said of the defense attorneys. "But the truth and justice will prevail."
Lombardo didn't always tell the truth on the witness stand, Halprin acknowledged. "He's frightened to death of you," Halprin told the jury. Lombardo didn't tell the truth when he pretended not to know what certain mobsters were the area bosses of. He is afraid jurors will judge him for his past. "He truly believes, no matter what his lawyers tell him, that you're going to punish him for that," Halprin said.
Another defense attorney, Marc Martin, gave the first closing statement, for reputed Outfit boss James Marcello, and focused on savaging the credibility of the government's star witness, Outfit killer Nicholas Calabrese.
Calabrese testified that Marcello took part in three murders and one attempted murder, but Martin argued Calabrese lied to save himself from the death penalty. "Do you think he would lie?" Martin asked of Calabrese. "Do you think he would lie to save his life?"
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Lombardo's lawyer, Rick Halprin, said Lombardo was never a made member of the mob but hung out and hustled with businessmen with deep mob ties. At times, Lombardo hustled himself into prison, Halprin said.
Lombardo has long retired from any Outfit connections, Halprin said, invoking the so-called withdrawal defense that's unique to Lombardo's case. "We are not talking about redemption here," Halprin intoned toward the end of his argument. "We are talking about a decided change in lifestyle."
"Redemption, I dare say, for Mr. Lombardo is in the not-too-distant future," Halprin said. Lombardo, at 78, is the oldest of five defendants on trial.
Prosecutors have tried to tie Lombardo to more recent Outfit activity by the testimony of Pat Spilotro, who was Lombardo's dentist and the brother of slain mobsters Anthony and Michael Spilotro. Pat Spilotro turned Lombardo in to the FBI when he was on the lam last year.
In court, Spilotro testified that his longtime patient mentioned his troubles, including that the New York mob was trying to muscle into Chicago. Halprin called Spilotro's testimony "not credible."
Outside the courtroom, Spilotro said he was telling the truth. "They're doing what they have to do up there," Spilotro said of the defense attorneys. "But the truth and justice will prevail."
Lombardo didn't always tell the truth on the witness stand, Halprin acknowledged. "He's frightened to death of you," Halprin told the jury. Lombardo didn't tell the truth when he pretended not to know what certain mobsters were the area bosses of. He is afraid jurors will judge him for his past. "He truly believes, no matter what his lawyers tell him, that you're going to punish him for that," Halprin said.
Another defense attorney, Marc Martin, gave the first closing statement, for reputed Outfit boss James Marcello, and focused on savaging the credibility of the government's star witness, Outfit killer Nicholas Calabrese.
Calabrese testified that Marcello took part in three murders and one attempted murder, but Martin argued Calabrese lied to save himself from the death penalty. "Do you think he would lie?" Martin asked of Calabrese. "Do you think he would lie to save his life?"
Thanks to Steve Warmbir
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Prosecution Reminder - Cross the Outfit: End Up Dead
Defense attorneys were to get their last shot Tuesday after a federal prosecutor reminded jurors at a big Chicago mob trial what happens to people who cross the Outfit: "You end up dead."
That's according to assistant U.S. Attorney Markus Funk in a 280-minute closing argument that stretched over two days.
Defense attorneys were to start their arguments Tuesday afternoon.
Five defendants are accused of taking part in a conspiracy that included 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion. They are reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78; convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; and retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62.
Funk sought to recap for jurors highlights of the trial that started June 21. He detailed gruesome killings, including events leading up to the trial's most high-profile death -- that of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, who was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael, and buried in an Indiana cornfield.
Tony Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the 1995 movie "Casino." In the film, Pesci's character was beaten with bats and buried alive.
Thanks to NBC5
That's according to assistant U.S. Attorney Markus Funk in a 280-minute closing argument that stretched over two days.
Defense attorneys were to start their arguments Tuesday afternoon.
Five defendants are accused of taking part in a conspiracy that included 18 long-unsolved murders, illegal gambling, loan sharking and extortion. They are reputed mobster Joseph "Joey the Clown" Lombardo, 78; convicted loan shark Frank Calabrese Sr., 70; convicted jewel thief Paul Schiro, 70; reputed mob boss James Marcello, 65; and retired Chicago policeman Anthony Doyle, 62.
Funk sought to recap for jurors highlights of the trial that started June 21. He detailed gruesome killings, including events leading up to the trial's most high-profile death -- that of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, who was beaten to death along with his brother, Michael, and buried in an Indiana cornfield.
Tony Spilotro, known as the mob's man in Las Vegas, was the inspiration for the Joe Pesci character in the 1995 movie "Casino." In the film, Pesci's character was beaten with bats and buried alive.
Thanks to NBC5
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