New England Organized Crime, LCN and the Irish

[Junior]

Mobster sought FBI protection from state investigators
Fox Undercover, Tuesday, 23 August, 2011

BOSTON (FOX 25 / MyFoxBoston.com) - A high-ranking mob informant demanded that the FBI protect him as the investigation from the Massachusetts State Police closed in on him and his associates, newly released court documents show.

The revelations come from transcripts of calls secretly recorded by the State Police between the informant, identified by FOX Undercover as purported mob captain Mark Rossetti, and his FBI handler.

The transcripts were filed in court by defense attorney Bob George, who represents two of Rossetti’s co-defendants. George’s motion and other publicly filed court documents do not identify the informant’s name, which is under seal.

The transcripts show that the informant asked the FBI about the state police’s targeting him, saying, “... A little common courtesy... (the state police) could have at least went to you and talked about it."

Rossetti also tells the FBI that he expects to be protected, saying, "...if guys start going to jail... You're gonna help me and all that... Keep me away from that."

The FBI handler tells Rossetti... "you don't have anything to worry about... But if that happens we'll have to deal with it as it comes."

Rossetti is accused of running a violent criminal enterprise involved in everything from drug dealing to gambling.

The new details are coming days after two retired state police organized crime investigators spoke out to FOX 25, saying the FBI never should have used Rossetti as an informant, especially in the wake of the Whitey Bulger case.

“You think the FBI knew he was committing all those crimes while he was an informant?” asked FOX Undercover reporter Mike Beaudet.

“They should have. It was easy enough,” said Bob Long, a retired state police mob investigator.

Jack O’Malley, who once ran the State Police organized crime unit, said, “They did their best to improve relations and say we made mistakes. We're going to fix those mistakes. We're not going to make those mistakes again, and only 15 years plus later those mistakes seem to have happened all over again. It's almost a mirror image of the Bulger-Flemmi case.”

George filed the transcripts as part of a motion asking a judge to unseal records about the informant. He believes those records could shed even more light on the case.

FOX Undercover earlier reported that the FBI at first told the state police that Rossetti was not their informant. In a statement both agencies say they cooperated on the case.

[Junior]

Boston mob boss Bulger wins more time for legal defense
Lauren Keiper, Reuters, September 14, 2011

BOSTON (Reuters) - Attorneys for accused mob boss James "Whitey" Bulger, who spent 16 years on the run from authorities, were granted more time on Wednesday to sort through mountains of documents provided by prosecutors.

"I have tens of thousands of documents to go through before I can even get a handle on the case," Defense attorney J.W. Carney Jr. told reporters after a brief initial status conference in federal court in Boston.

Granting the defense request for two more months to process the materials, Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler set the next status conference in the Bulger case for November 21.

Bulger was not in court for the hearing, but some family members of his alleged victims were present.

The 82-year-old gangster pleaded not guilty in July to all charges against him, including 19 alleged murders from the 1970s and 1980s. Bulger for years led the Winter Hill Gang, a mostly Irish-American organized crime operation that terrorized Boston.

Carney said it was "much too early" to estimate a possible trial date and added that his client was doing well and being treated professionally and fairly while in prison.

Bulger and longtime girlfriend Catherine Greig, 60, were arrested in Santa Monica, California on June 22 with a stash of about 30 firearms and $822,000 in cash hidden in holes in the wall of their apartment.

Bulger fled Boston in late 1994 after receiving a tip from a corrupt FBI agent that federal charges were pending. Greig joined him a short time later and has been charged with harboring Bulger as a fugitive.

Greig pleaded not guilty to the charge against her and remains behind bars while her attorney prepares additional materials in a request for release.

[Junior]

Jailed crime boss set to be freed Saturday
By Brian Boyd, South Coast Today.com
September 15, 2011

Convicted SouthCoast crime boss Timothy J. Mello is scheduled to be released Saturday after serving a federal sentence, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons.

Mello, who was once known as "Timmy the Bat," pleaded guilty to racketeering charges in November 2003. He admitted to running a crime ring on New Bedford's waterfront that extorted ownership of a fish house, dealt narcotics, controlled gambling and silenced witnesses.

Mello, 54, was sentenced in May 2004 to spend 12 years in federal prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release. Federal inmates can earn "good time" off or have their sentence reduced by one year if they complete a residential drug rehabilitation program, but it's not clear why Mello is expected to be released this week.

In March, he was transferred from the federal medical facility at the former Fort Devens Army base in Massachusetts to a residential re-entry center in an undisclosed location under the supervision of Community Corrections Management in Philadelphia. The CCM field office oversees halfway houses in eastern and middle Pennsylvania and New England.

At the time, he was scheduled to be released this Saturday, The Standard-Times reported. According to the Bureau of Prisons' website, as of Wednesday evening, he is still scheduled to be released that day.

A spokesman for the bureau, Ed Ross, said the online inmate information represents the most current planned date of release. He could not say whether Mello will be under a supervised release.

Mello, who prosecutors said had ties to New England organized crime leaders, avoided a possible life sentence by cooperating with the government. He provided prosecutors with information in several other cases that included a public corruption probe.

Four other defendants, including Mello's partner at Tempest Fisheries in New Bedford, Erik Orman, and his enforcer, Frank "Bruno" Moniz, also pleaded guilty to various federal crimes. Mello is still listed as president of Tempest, according to an annual report filed with the state earlier this year.

[Junior]

RI mobster sentenced to 7 years
Boston.com, Sep 21, 2011

PROVIDENCE, R.I.—A Rhode Island mobster has been sentenced to seven years in prison for a murder-for-hire plot that was never carried out.

U.S. District Court Judge William Smith sentenced Anthony "The Saint" St. Laurent Sr. on Wednesday in Providence.

The 70-year-old St. Laurent appeared in court in a wheel chair and with an oxygen tank. He pleaded guilty on March 24 to the use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of a murder-for-hire. St. Laurent faced up to 10 years in prison, a $250,000 fine and three years of supervised release.

Prosecutors say St. Laurent plotted to have fellow mob member Robert "Bobby" DeLuca killed. St. Laurent has acknowledged in court papers to being a member of the Patriarca crime family.

[Junior]

Reputed mobsters busted in raid
By Tim White, WPRI.com
September 23, 2011

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Longtime reputed Mafia captain Edward "Eddie" Lato, alleged mob soldier Alfred "Chippy" Scivola and two reputed mob associates were arrested by Rhode Island’s FBI-led Organized Crime Task Force, the Target 12 Investigators have learned.

Lato, Scivola, Raymond "Scarface" Jenkins and Albino "Albi" Folcarelli are named as defendants in a second superseding indictment filed Thursday as part of the federal government's case against Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio. Theodore "Teddy" Cardillo and Richard Bonafiglia are also defendants.

All four men are being held at the Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls pending a detention hearing next week.

"In simple terms the Providence Organized Crime Task Force has shattered 'omerta,' the New England [La Cosa Nostra's] code of silence,” said Jeffrey Sallet, head of the Providence office of the FBI.

Sallet said the men were arrested early Friday morning without incident.

Lato was charged with five counts, including RICO conspiracy and extortion conspiracy. His name is now one of seven linked to a far-reaching crackdown into organized crime that began with Manocchio's arrest in January.

“Specifically they conspired and agreed to the use of threats of force to induce owners and operators of certain adult entertainment businesses in Providence to provide monthly protection payments in cash," said U.S. Attorney for Rhode Island Peter Neronha.

According to the indictment, the strip clubs allegedly shaken down were the Cadillac Lounge, the Satin Doll, Desire, Cheaters, the Foxy Lady and several others in Connecticut.

Court documents reveal Lato attempted to continue to collect the payments -- up to $6,000 a month -- even after Manocchio was taken into custody.

“We better get that back," Lato is quoted as saying in the court documents. "I don’t [expletive] know how we are gonna get that back.”

Neronha declined to say if the comments were picked up on a wiretap.

The U.S. Attorney's office said they have seized "at least" $2 million in assets from the defendants, money that was allegedly obtained through criminal activities.

The court documents also reveal Lato allegedly travelled to Boston as recently as May to deliver a $5,000 cash payment to a "high-ranking" member of the Boston mob.

Folcarelli and Scivola are charged with threatening violence to collect $25,000 owed to them by another person. Neronha would not say if the money owed was from a gambling debt.

The indictment states the wife of the victim became scared after Scivola tried to visit the debtor at his workplace, and she withdrew $20,000 from a retirement account. Court documents say Folcarelli became concerned that a member of the family might go to police.

“Ray [Jenkins] turned us on to a family of stool pigeons," Folcarelli is quoted saying in the indictment. "If this kid talks, we got a headache.”

Lato has been in and out of prison over the past two decades for various arrests. He currently has a case pending with the attorneygeneral's office for organized criminal gambling . Jenkins was arrested in 2006 as part of a sweep in which several individuals with alleged ties to organized crime were picked up on gambling charges.

Neronha was joined at Friday afternoon's press conference by Assistant U.S. Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer and John T. Foley, assistant special agent in charge of the FBI’s Boston field division, as well as officials from the Rhode Island State Police, Attorney General Peter Kilmartin's office and the Providence Police Department.

The Organized Crime Task Force in Rhode Island is made up of investigators from the FBI, the U.S. Attorney's office, the IRS, the state police and the Providence Police Department.

[Junior]

FBI pays reward in capture of accused mobster 'Whitey' Bulger
Los Angeles Times, September 23, 2011

The FBI confirmed Friday that it has paid a $2.1-million reward to the informers who helped end the 16-year manhunt for fugitive crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger and his companion, captured in June in Santa Monica.

But the identities of those who led the agency to the Santa Monica apartment where Bulger and Catherine Greig were arrested June 22 remain a mystery, according to news reports.

On Friday evening, the Boston Herald reported this statement from the FBI's Boston division:

"On Monday, Sept. 19, 2011, the Boston Division of the FBI received final authorization from the United States Department of Justice to pay the $2.1 million reward to those responsible for providing information which directly led to the arrest of former Top Ten Fugitive James 'Whitey' Bulger and his companion Catherine Greig. This information was generated as a direct result of the FBI’s Public Service Announcement (PSA) campaign, which was initiated on June 20, 2011.

"The FBI offered $2 million for information leading to the arrest of Mr. Bulger, and $100,000 for information leading to the arrest of Ms. Greig. As of Friday, Sept. 23, 2011, the FBI has paid this reward money to more than one individual.

"To protect the anonymity and privacy of those responsible for providing information which directly led to the arrests of Mr. Bulger and Ms. Greig, the FBI will not comment further regarding this matter."

Bulger, 82, was on the FBI's 10-most-wanted list in connection with 19 homicides and other crimes in Boston. He has pleaded not guilty to the charges.

Greig, 60, has also pleaded not guilty in the case.

A Las Vegas man, Keith Messina, 45, said he tried to collect the reward because he spotted Bulger in Santa Monica in 2008 and called the television show "America's Most Wanted," according to news reports.

The FBI denied his claim and told his lawyer that the money was given to a tipster in Iceland, reports said.

Messina reportedly plans to file a lawsuit, seeking a share of the reward money.

[Junior]

Alleged RI mobster, age 70, requests bail
Boston Globe, September 28, 2011

PROVIDENCE, R.I.—An alleged Rhode Island mobster is asking to be freed on bail in strip club extortion case.

Alfred "Chippy" Scivola (skee-VOH'-lah) says in court papers filed Wednesday that he is an "order-taker" and not a senior or leadership member of the New England branch of the mafia.

The 70-year-old Scivola has been held without bail since his arrest on Friday. He is scheduled to appear in U.S. District Court in Providence on Thursday for a detention hearing.

Scivola has pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy and extortion conspiracy.

The Johnston resident also cites his declining health and pacemaker for heart disease as proof that he is not likely to flee. His wife brought prescription medications to his arraignment.

Scivola says he's accused of playing a minor role in the scheme.

[Junior]

Judge denies bail for RI mobsters Lato and “Chippy” Scivola
By W. Zachary Malinowski, Journal Staff Writer
Providence Journal, September 30, 2011

PROVIDENCE — Two longtime mobsters appeared in federal court on Thursday for hearings that would determine whether a judge would let them go home.

One of them, Edward C. Lato, described by the authorities as a powerful capo regime in the New England La Cosa Nostra, didn’t bother making a case. He and his court-appointed lawyer, Mark L. Smith, of North Smithfield, knew the chances of making bail were less than zero. But his codefendant, Alfred “Chippy” Scivola Jr., held out hope that his lesser status in the criminal organization as a “soldier” might sway the judge.

In the end, U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge David L. Martin reached the same conclusion for both men. He ruled that they pose a “danger to the community” and should remain jailed until they stand trial on racketeering and extortion-related charges.

“The weight of the evidence against Mr. Lato is very strong,” Martin said at the morning hearing.

Four hours later, with Scivola seated before him, he proclaimed, “While the evidence may not be overwhelming, it is strong.”

Both men were sent back to the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility in Central Falls where they are jailed with ex-New England crime boss Luigi “Baby Shacks” Manocchio and four other mob associates who are accused of extorting money from strip clubs and others who owned the criminal organization money.

At 2 p.m., Scivola, 70, was escorted into the second-floor courtroom in khaki-prison garb and handcuffs. The bald, corpulent mobster sat at the defense table with reading glasses and paid close attention to the proceedings. About a half-dozen family members and friends sat together in one side of the courtroom. The other side was occupied by reporters and mob investigators.

His lawyer, Victor J. Beretta, of Providence, conceded that his client had a criminal record, one that “some may say borders on extensive,” but he argued that the convictions did not involve violence or causing physical harm to anyone. He also said that Scivola, who suffers from heart disease, diabetes and respiratory problems, has never missed a court date when he has faced prosecution for crimes he committed in Rhode Island and Connecticut.

Scivola pulled out an inhaler and took several deep breaths as the proceeding dragged on.

Finally, Beretta said, his client is simply accused of “delivering an envelope” and providing someone with directions.

“The case against Mr. Scivola is weak, your honor,” he said.

Assistant U.S. Attorney William Ferland disagreed, saying that Scivola was formally inducted into the New England mob in 1996 and that his longevity in the organization has elevated him to respected status as a “senior” member. That status, he said, gives Scivola the ability to instill fear into anyone who crosses him.

“They fear what will happen if they don’t produce the money,” he said.

Ferland produced an FBI transcript from a secretly recorded meeting between Scivola and a cooperating witness named, “Mark” that took place on July 12 outside Café Roma on Atwells Avenue.

Mark, who was in a car, slipped Scivola $2,000, and said: “Give this to Eddie [Lato],” he said. “It’s the two-thousand for the Cadillacs,” a reference to the Cadillac Lounge strip club in Providence.

Mark also talked to Scivola about time in spent in the federal prison at Fort Devens in Massachusetts.

U.S. District Court Magistrate Judge David L. Martin rendered his decision after listening to arguments from Scivola’s lawyer and a prosecutor for the federal government.

Earlier in the day, Martin ordered Edward C. Lato, another mobster and Scivola’s codefendant in the case, to remain held without bail, too. They have been jailed at the Donald W. Wyatt Detention Facility since they were arrested last Friday on charges that they were extorting protection payments from several Providence strip clubs.

At the morning hearing, Martin cited 18 of Lato’s criminal convictions dating to the 1960s and a 70-month federal prison sentence as the primary reasons for denying him bail. He also alluded to last week’s indictment that identified him as a ranking leader in the New England La Cosa Nostra.

“The weight of the evidence against Mr. Lato is very strong,” Martin said. “His release would pose a danger to the community.”

Lato, who like Scivola, was dressed in a khaki prison outfit and sneakers, sat impassively at the defense table and wore reading glasses as he perused court papers outlining the racketeering and extortion charges lodged against him.

Smith, Lato’s lawyer, did not argue for Lato’s release. He said that he met with him on Wednesday at the Wyatt jail, and they realized “it would be futile” to argue for bail.

[Junior]

R.I. mob figure conspicuous by his absence
By W. Zachary Malinowski, Staff Writer
Providence Journal, October 3, 2011

PROVIDENCE — Where’s Bobby?

That’s the question that has been on the minds of mobsters, law-enforcement officials and followers of organized crime since four mobsters and mob associates were indicted last week on federal racketeering and extortion charges for shaking down several strip clubs and collecting $25,000 from a woman they threatened at work.

But the indictment makes no mention of Robert P. “Bobby” DeLuca Sr., a major player in the New England La Cosa Nostra for more than three decades.

In papers filed in U.S. District Court, federal prosecutors noted that “made members” of the mob have cooperated with them in their investigation, and they have and will continue to rely on them in the prosecution of Edward C. Lato and Alfred “Chippy” Scivola Jr., made members of the New England mob, along with mob associates Raymond “Scarface” Jenkins and Albino “Albie” Folcarelli.

“During the course of this investigation, the FBI has developed additional witnesses, including formally initiated or made members of the New England La Cosa Nostra, who will testify that the [mob] exists, and will further testify about the activities of its members,” the papers say.

The prosecutors, William Ferland and Sam Nazzaro, also wrote that “these witnesses” will testify about the secret mob initiation ceremony in which the “made men” take a blood oath of loyalty to omerta, otherwise known as La Cosa Nostra’s code of silence. Part of the oath requires the mobsters to engage in acts of violence, including murder, when called upon by ranking members of the criminal enterprise.

DeLuca is an expert on mob initiations. In 1989, he was one of several mobsters, including then-mob boss Raymond J. “Junior” Patriarca, whom the FBI captured on tape during an induction ceremony in a house outside of Boston. DeLuca was one of the mobsters who, that day, became a “made man,” or full-fledged member of La Cosa Nostra.

The recording was the first time the FBI had ever recorded a mob induction, and it has been played at countless mob trials to show that the Mafia does indeed exist.

DeLuca’s star rose quickly in the mob. Once a small-time hood, the now-inducted wiseguy hitched his wagon to Boston-based mob boss Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme. But the high times were short-lived. In 1996, DeLuca was sentenced to 10½ years in federal prison for his role in the shakedown of Paulie Calenda, a Cranston businessman and mob associate.

The jury was convinced at the colorful trial, featuring sobbing strippers, mob informants and gangland thugs, that Gerard T. Ouimette, a feared mob enforcer, threatened Calenda for a $125,000 extortion payment. The panel also concluded that Ouimette was acting under orders from DeLuca.

The court papers filed last week do not identify the cooperating mob witnesses in the recent sweep, but they have fueled plenty of speculation that DeLuca has switched allegiances and is now working for his longtime nemesis: the Justice Department.

It’s ironic that some believe DeLuca is now a government informant, an accusation he cast about 10 years ago against fellow mobster Anthony M. “The Saint” St. Laurent Sr.

The indignity of being called a turncoat so infuriated St. Laurent that he solicited a Taunton, Mass., man to kill DeLuca. St. Laurent, 70, who is in a wheelchair and has been seriously ill for more than a decade, was charged and convicted of orchestrating the murder-for-hire scheme. He was just sentenced to seven years in federal prison.

At a recent news conference announcing the indictment and arrests, Peter F. Neronha, the U.S. Attorney for Rhode Island, refused to identify DeLuca or anyone else as witnesses for the government. Instead, he said, that he would only discuss what was in the indictment.

Jim Martin, Neronha’s spokesman, issued a standard “no comment” to a series of questions about DeLuca.

Is DeLuca cooperating in the federal investigation? Has he joined the federal witness protection program? Are the federal authorities concerned about the safety of the mobster, his wife and two small children?

“No comment,” he said.

The same questions were posed to state police Supt. Steven G. O’Donnell, a longtime mob investigator who has tracked DeLuca’s criminal activities for more than 20 years.

“I can’t tell you if he’s cooperating or not,” he said. “I have no concerns for Bobby’s safety or anybody’s safety” who chooses a life of organized crime. “That’s the world they live in.”

In North Providence, there is no sign of DeLuca, his wife, Gina, a former hairdresser, or their two young children. At first, nobody thought much about not seeing him around. Each summer, he would travel to Saratoga Springs in August for the annual horse races, but this summer he never returned to his old haunts.

In June 2009, Gina DeLuca bought the large, 4,746-square-foot colonial-style house for $340,000 from Christina Schadone, wife of Rep. Gregory J. Schadone, D-North Providence. On Aug. 1, less than two months ago, the house next to Greystone Elementary School, was placed on the market for $335,000.

The furniture has been cleared out and little more remains than steel-brushed appliances and a chandelier in the front foyer.

Paul M. Martellini, the acting police chief in North Providence, said he knew that the mobster lived at the address, but his department has received no reports of foul play involving the DeLucas. He checked the department records and said that police responded to the house on the morning of July 1 for a false alarm. At the time, he said, the family was living there.

“We have had no contact with him other than the alarm,” Martellini said. “We didn’t know that he hasn’t been around.”

After DeLuca wrapped up his federal prison sentence, he returned to Rhode Island and spent a few years in the state prison system.

Over the past six years, DeLuca, now 66, has worked at the SideBar & Grill, a small restaurant and nightclub at the corner of Dorrance and Pine streets. The establishment’s owner is lawyer Artin H. Coloian, once a top aide to ex-Providence Mayor Vincent A. Cianci Jr.

Coloian hired DeLuca back in 2006 when he was in a work-release program at the Adult Correctional Institutions. He remained a fixture at the restaurant after he completed his prison sentence. He was often seen hanging out with Coloian or puffing a cigar as the two strolled down Dorrance Street.

Coloian, who has defended DeLuca in the past, insisted that his client is not cooperating with the federal authorities, but he refused to say whether he’s still employed at his restaurant.

“I’m not obligated to tell you who my employees are or are not,” he said, adding that he would not disclose the last time he saw the mobster.

[Junior]

Safety of Bulger tipster feared, By Joe Dwinell, Boston Herald, Monday, October 10, 2011

The outing of an Icelandic woman as the snitch who dimed out Southie mobster James “Whitey” Bulger could put her in danger and may have a chilling effect on other witnesses who could think twice before coming forward, former prosecutors warn.

The FBI — which vowed confidentiality to the tipster — also could take a hit if it comes out that the agency was involved in the leak, experts say. The FBI did not return calls yesterday.

The woman’s identity was made public yesterday in a Boston Globe story on Bulger’s life on the lam. Her background, photo, husbands, career and $2 million reward were detailed by the newspaper and now she faces the global media frenzy alone.

“They can’t guarantee her 100 percent safety going forward,” said former U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan. “It’s unnecessary publicity and unnecessary harassment.

“There is a huge risk to the (tipster) program, generally, to be able to cultivate informants if their identification is at risk,” added Sullivan, a partner in the Ashcroft Law Firm. “It has a chilling effect.”

The 82-year-old Bulger is behind bars, accused of 19 murders during his reign of terror in South Boston. He and his galpal Catherine Greig, 60, were arrested in their Santa Monica, Calif., apartment complex June 22 after 16 years on the run. The guessing game on who fingered the Top 10 Most Wanted fugitive began almost immediately after his arrest.

Former federal prosecutor Michael Kendall told the Herald yesterday exposing the woman may be a “constitutional right — but it doesn’t mean you should.”

He said she’s “lucky” that “everybody in the old gang hates” Bulger and are more than happy he’s rotting in prison. “I can’t imagine he has a friend left in the world, nor should he,” Kendall added.

But, the former prosecutor said terrorism and organized crime cases could suffer setbacks from her identity being leaked.

“You want to protect (informants) from fear or thought there’s any risk,” he added.

In most cases, the Herald does not use names of tipsters or those who witnessed a crime.

Roxbury community activist Jamarhl Crawford said he isn’t so sure the Icelandic woman is danger-free.

“Maybe Whitey is ticked off and has a crazy friend,” Crawford said. He added the woman’s exposure adds fuel, somewhat, to the stop-snitchin’ debate. Sure, she collects a $2 million reward — but her life will never be the same.

“This is so hypocritical with some of the other things that are kept secret,” he said. “The hunt is now on for her. People — TMZ — are probably flying to Iceland right now. Her life will be upside down.

“It seems the only names that are withheld are the ones that protect powerful people,” he added. “She’s a regular citizen ... and now her name is out.”

[Junior]

FBI’s use of alleged mobster questioned
By Peter Schworm and Milton Valencia
Boston Globe, October 10, 2011

Associates of Mark Rossetti are calling for the dismissal of key evidence in the criminal case against them, accusing State Police of a delay in telling a judge involved that the reputed mobster was working for the government and that an FBI supervisor lied to state investigators about his use.

The FBI’s alleged denial of its relationship with Rossetti contradicts previous claims from the agency and State Police that the two agencies had cooperated during the investigation into Rossetti’s alleged crime ring. The information was revealed in a court motion filed last week by Robert A. George, who is representing two men accused of participating in the ring.

The court documents contend the State Police later learned Rossetti was probably working with the FBI and misled a Superior Court judge, John T. Lu, by withholding the information when seeking the court’s permission for wiretaps.

The wiretaps were approved in January 2010, a few months before Rossetti was arrested on charges of trafficking heroin. Investigators intercepted 44 phone calls between Rossetti and his FBI handler between January and when he was arrested in May.

“It is undisputed that the State Police knew that the federal informant was their prey before Jan. 7, 2010, yet not only kept his status but also his investigative importance from Judge Lu until after he had been intercepted on their wiretap,’’ according to the motion.

The disclosures, which cite a sealed affidavit filed by prosecutors in 2010, raise new questions about the FBI’s relationship with Rossetti, and whether the agency’s apparent secrecy may compromise a pivotal investigation.

Rossetti is accused of running a vast and violent criminal enterprise that engaged in gambling, loan sharking, and drug dealing. He is suspected in at least six homicides, law enforcement officials say.

In filing the motion, George contends that investigators obtained the wiretap that led to the arrests of Joseph Giallanella and Michael Petrillo through misleading pretenses, and argues the evidence should be suppressed. The men are alleged to have been involved in the crime ring.

“It is ironclad law that the Fourth Amendment forbids the government to make false or misleading representations to the court, in order to protect the confidentiality of its informants,’’ the motion stated.

Spokesmen for the FBI and the State Police declined to comment because the case is before the courts.

A spokesman for the state’s attorney general could not be reached for comment.

In the motion, George cites the sealed affidavit that alleges that in December 2008 or January 2009, a FBI supervisor denied to State Police that Rossetti was an informant.

State Police said they may be targeting Rossetti, and the supervisor did not react “in any appreciable way.’’

In August 2009, Rossetti told a State Police sergeant he had talked with the FBI in the past, and that the FBI had previously “done a favor for him.’’

This August, the Globe reported that Rossetti was an FBI informant, citing court documents. In response, the FBI and State Police released a statement saying the FBI learned of Rossetti’s alleged criminal activity from State Police, and was prepared to cut ties with him. But State Police urged the FBI to maintain the association for “logical strategic reasons.’’

“The FBI cooperated for months with the Massachusetts State Police, assisting their organized crime unit until the investigation was complete,’’ the statement said.

The statement did not describe how long Rossetti worked with the FBI, or whether he provided useful information.

In the motion, George writes that since the “cat is out of the bag’’ in terms of Rossetti’s relationship with the FBI, the court should focus on why state investigators did not disclose him as an informant.

In previously filed court documents, Rossetti said he believed he would be protected by the FBI after he realized he was being targeted by State Police.

According to taped conversations contained in the court documents, Rossetti’s FBI handler told him not to worry, that “my job is to keep you anonymous and keep you safe.’’

“You don’t have anything to worry about if things down the road happen, but if that happens, we’ll have to deal with it as it comes,’’ the handler told Rossetti. “I will have to start working it out.’’

George has filed several motions to learn more about Rossetti’s relationship with the FBI, including several affidavits that were filed under seal with the court.

The affidavit cited by George was made available because of his repeated requests for the documents.

Lawyers for other codefendants in the case have submitted similar requests, arguing that Rossetti’s involvement with the FBI, and state investigators’ awareness of it, undermine the charges against their clients.

Under established law, a defendant cannot be charged with conspiring with a ring leader if that ring leader was working on behalf of the government.

State prosecutors who oppose the requests for information argue that Rossetti’s relationship with the federal government had no influence on their case.

[Junior]

Hearing set on alleged RI mobster's bail request
Boston Globe, October 24, 2011

PROVIDENCE, R.I.—Lawyers on both sides of a request for bail from an alleged former New England mob boss will have their say in front of a federal judge next month.

Prosecutors and defense attorneys for Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio are scheduled to deliver arguments in the bail issue on Nov. 16 in U.S. District Court in Providence.

The 84-year-old Manocchio has been locked up since March when an earlier ruling granting him bail was overturned. He is accused of shaking down Providence-area strip clubs. Manocchio pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy, extortion and extortion conspiracy charges.

Manocchio's lawyers say he should be allowed to await trial under GPS monitoring at the home of his physician brother. Prosecutors oppose the request.

[Junior]

No Bail for Ex-Boston Mobster Bulger's Girlfriend
Associated Press, ABC News, Nov 5, 2011

A federal magistrate judge has rejected a request for bail by the girlfriend of former Boston mobster James "Whitey" Bulger, ruling she'd been on the run for years and would likely flee again.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Jennifer Boal said Friday that Catherine Greig (grehg), had already shown a willingness to leave home and family when she fled with Bulger in 1995. She said no bail conditions would guarantee Greig wouldn't flee before trial.

Greig faces a charge of conspiracy to harbor a fugitive for helping Bulger escape capture for more than 16 years. Bulger is accused of participating in 19 murders. The pair was caught in California in June.

Friday's ruling came shortly after Greig's lawyer filed a motion urging Boal to rule, so he could appeal if bail was denied.

[Junior]

Bulger Too Sick To Face Trial?
WCVB TV Boston ABC 5
December 16, 2011

BOSTON -- There are questions about the health of former Boston mobster James "Whitey" Bulger and whether it could affect the case against him.

NewsCenter 5's Michele McPhee reported that the 82-year-old Bulger is struggling with incontinence and visits the prison infirmary on a daily basis.

It is not clear whether Bulger's infirmary trips are a sign of a more serious illness.

Some relatives of Bulger's alleged victims said they're worried that he may not live long enough to go on trial. No trial date has been set.

Bulger, who was on the FBI's most wanted list for more than a decade, was arrested in Santa Monica, Calif., in June on a federal racketeering indictment charging him with the murders of 19 people. He has pleaded not guilty to 32 counts of racketeering, extortion, money laundering and weapons charges.

Bulger is accused of running a criminal enterprise in South Boston from the 1970s until he fled the area in 1995 when he was warned of a pending federal indictment.

The families of some of the victims that Bulger stands accused of murdering are worried that Bulger's medical issues will allow him to evade justice.

"My family is starving for closure," said Tom Donahue, who's father, Michael, was slain in 1982 while he was giving a friend a ride home.

He said Bulger forever damaged his life.

"I was 8 years old when my father was snatched from me. My whole life I've been living with this. No rest. No closure. Constant down emotions," Donahue said.

Bulger's lawyers have made no comment on his health.

Bulger's girlfriend, Catherine Greig, was denied bail last month and is set to go to trial in April on charges she harbored a fugitive.

[Junior]

RI man wants separate trial in strip club case
Boston.com, December 23, 2011

A Rhode Island man indicted alongside several alleged mobsters accused of shaking down Providence-area strip clubs is seeking a separate trial.

Albino “Albi’’ Folcarelli says in court papers filed Friday that it would “grossly unfair’’ to make him stand trial with his co-defendants.

His attorney says the allegation against Folcarelli isn’t related to the strip clubs the other defendants are accused of extorting since 1993. And prosecutors describe Folcarelli as a mob associate, but not a mobster himself.

The 53-year-old Folcarelli pleaded not guilty to extortion conspiracy in September. Prosecutors allege that in July 2010 he went to the workplace of an unnamed person. That person later paid $20,000, which Folcarelli shared with two co-defendants.

Folcarelli’s co-defendants include 84-year-old Luigi “Baby Shacks’’ Manocchio, whom prosecutors say is the ex-boss of the New England mafia.

[Junior]

Ex-Boston mobster Bulger treated for chest pains
Associated Press, San Francisco Chronicle
Wednesday, December 28, 2011

Former Boston mob boss James "Whitey" Bulger (BUHL'-jur) has had his first trip from prison to hospital for treatment of chest pains.

The 82-year-old Bulger has a history of heart problems. He previously told federal agents that he had traveled to Mexico to purchase heart medication during his time on the run.

Bulger was taken to a Boston hospital for treatment last week before returning to the Plymouth jail. A Boston Medical Center spokeswoman did not immediately return a call for comment.

The longtime FBI informant was captured in June in Santa Monica, Calif., after more than 16 years on the run. He was living with longtime girlfriend Catherine Greig (grehg).

Bulger has pleaded not guilty to charges stemming from allegations that he participated in 19 murders.

Greig has pleaded not guilty to a conspiracy charge.

[Junior]

Families fear ailing Bulger may avoid trial
By Nick Bramhill, Independent
Tuesday, January 3, 2012

RELATIVES of James 'Whitey' Bulger's victims are praying the Irish-American lives long enough to stand trial for 19 murders.

The 82-year-old, who has a history of heart problems, was rushed to a hospital in Boston last Thursday, where he was treated for chest pains.

The notorious mobster was returned to Plymouth jail later that day, where he is being held without bail in his cell for 23 hours a day.

It has been learned the ex-fugitive mobster was advised to stay in the hospital for further treatment, but instead opted to return to the facility.

Steven Davis, whose sister Debra was allegedly one of Bulger's multiple victims, said: "I'd like to see him live long enough to be tried, convicted, suffer a little bit like he made all the victims suffer and all their families.

"If he dies before he's tried, he's going to take all his sins to the grave with him."

His attorney and Federal authorities refused to comment on Bulger's hospital trip.

His life of crime was depicted in the 2006 Martin Scorsese-directed movie 'The Departed'.

The next hearing in Bulger's case is January 11 in Boston.

[Junior]

Alleged RI mobster wants to see evidence
NECN.Com, Wed, Jan 11, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — An alleged Rhode Island mobster accused of helping shake down Providence-area strip clubs wants more information about the case against him.

A lawyer for Alfred "Chippy" Scivola (skee-VOH'-lah) asked in court papers filed Wednesday to see the evidence against him, including transcripts and testimony from expert witness.

The 70-year-old Scivola was indicted last year on charges of racketeering conspiracy and extortion conspiracy. Prosecutors say Scivola and others extorted "protection payments" from strip clubs beginning in the mid-1980s. Reputed former New England mob boss Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio was arrested last January in connection to the alleged scheme.

Prosecutors say Scivola and alleged Rhode Island mob capo Edward "Eddy" Lato continued to the extortion plot even after Manocchio's arrest.

Scivola, Lato and Manocchio have pleaded not guilty and are being detained.

[Junior]

Prosecutor: Bulger will try to 'manipulate' system
Boston Globe, January 11, 2012

BOSTON—A federal prosecutor is asking a judge for a speedy trial for former Boston mobster James "Whitey" Bulger, saying he believes the 82-year-old will try to "manipulate the system" so he's never brought to trial for his alleged role in 19 murders.

But Bulger's lawyer said the former leader of the Winter Hill Gang is "preparing for trial."

During a status conference in federal court Wednesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Kelly said prosecutors have turned over reams of evidence to Bulger's lawyers and want to expedite the case.

Defense attorney J.W. Carney Jr. said the volume of evidence is "enormous" and he and four other lawyers are still going through it.

Bulger was captured in June in Santa Monica, Calif., more than 16 years after he fled Boston to evade prosecution.

[Junior]

Feds: reputed mobster had weapons arsenal in Conn.
Boston Globe, February 15, 2012

HARTFORD, Conn.—Federal prosecutors say a 75-year-old Manchester man charged in a probe of illegal prescription drug trafficking is a "made member" of the mafia who had a large arsenal of explosives, guns and other weapons at his home.

Federal agents say they searched Robert Gentile's home on Friday in the drug investigation and found sticks of dynamite, several guns, ammunition, homemade silencers and brass knuckles.

Gentile and an associate, 75-year-old Andrew Parente of Hartford, were charged after the search with illegal possession and distribution of prescription painkillers including Oxycontin and Percocet. A federal magistrate judge in Hartford on Tuesday called Gentile a danger to society and ordered him detained without bail.

Prosecutors say Gentile is a member of a Philadelphia crime family. His lawyer denies the mob allegation.

[Junior]

No deal for another accused mobster
By Tim White, WRPI.com
February 23, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Despite signing an agreement with prosecutors, another accused mobster has backed away from a plea deal.

Alfred “Chippy” Scivola, 70, held off on changing his plea to guilty Thursday. His lawyer, Victor Beretta asked for a continuance to work out some of the details in the agreement.

Scivola is one of eight defendants in a sweeping mob case that took down the reputed former boss Luigi “Baby Shacks” Manocchio.

Scivola had signed a deal to plead guilty to racketeering conspiracy. He was accused of being part of a scheme that shook down strip clubs for protection money.

Outside court, Beretta declined to say what the issue was with the deal. It is still expected they will come to an agreement sometime next month.

Earlier in the same courtroom, mob associate Raymond “Scarface” Jenkins changed his plea to guilty. He will face between 33 and 41 months in prison. U.S. District Court Judge William Smith will sentence Jenkins on May 11.

Investigators say Jenkins was part of crew that shook down a used car salesman from Johnston. Ultimately, the man’s wife drained $20,000 from their retirement account out of concern for her husband’s safety. In all the man was extorted for $25,000, according to court documents.

Also pleading guilty on Thursday was Richard Bonafiglia, a longtime mob associate who once worked at the Cadillac Lounge in Providence - one of the strip clubs investigators say was paying protection money to the mob.

In court, trial attorney for the Department of Justice Sam Nazzaro said Bonafiglia was hired by the Cadillac in November 2005 and served as the "eyes and ears for the criminal enterprise."

"He did not answer to management at the Cadillac Lounge, but rather the enterprise," Nazzaro said.

Bonafiglia has a lengthy criminal record and faces up to 105 months in prison when he is sentenced in June.

Investigators present

Sitting in on the plea hearings were several investigators from the Organized Crime Task Force who have worked this case for years, including FBI Special Agent Jeffrey Cady, State Police Corporal Matthew Moynihan and longtime Providence Police detective Jack Whalen as well as former task force member Lt. Kevin Hawkins of the state police.

For Whalen, who has been with the Providence Police Department for 23 years – 13 of which battling mobsters – the plea hearings came just 24 hours from retirement and marked the end of a long-running probe into the New England La Cosa Nostra that he was a part of.

In fact, he was one of the investigators who detained Manocchio at a Florida airport in 2011 just before the aging – and now admitted – mobster was about to board a plane to return to Rhode Island. Since then, Manocchio has been behind bars awaiting the outcome of the case.

Whalen is a familiar face at mob hearings and has collared many of the defendants in this case. The list includes Jenkins, a longtime enforcer for the mob. The pair exchanged cordial words and a handshake prior to the hearing.

Not present for the plea hearings was FBI Special Agent Joseph Degnan, who recently retired. He would most certainly return to the courtroom as a witness if any of the defendants end up going to trial.

Deal called off

The plea agreements faced a similar bumpy road on Wednesday with one accused capo regime backing away from the pre-arranged plea deal.

Edward “Eddie” Lato said while he agreed with some of the facts laid out in court, he said he did not receive any money from the Satin Doll strip club in an alleged shakedown scheme. He also took issue with the characterization that he helped run some of the criminal enterprise.

“I don’t know nothing about the Satin Doll,” Lato told Judge Smith. “I didn’t oversee anything.”

Smith told both sides he couldn’t allow the plea hearing to go forward if the defendant didn’t agree with all the facts. He told Lato's lawyer, Mark Smith, to meet with his client in the near future.

On Wednesday Manocchio, 84, of Providence, pleaded guilty to one count of racketeering conspiracy. Federal prosecutors said he once ran the New England crime family and profited from an extortion scheme where he shook down strip clubs for protection money.

During the hearing, Judge Smith asked Manocchio if anyone threatened him to sign onto the plea deal.

“I don’t know who that would be,” Manocchio said with a laugh. “But no.”

Smith is scheduled to decide Manocchio’s fate May 11, 2012, but his lawyer – Joseph Balliro of Boston – asked if the date could be moved up because his client wants out of the Wyatt Detention Center in Central Falls where he’s been held for nearly a year.

“He’s extremely anxious to get out of Wyatt,” Balliro said. “It’s an ugly place for a man of his age.”

[Junior]

Former RI mob Boss Manocchio enters guilty plea; mobster Lato has second thoughts
By W. Zachary Malinowski, Providence Journal, February 22, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Luigi "Baby Shacks'' Manocchio, the former head of the New England mob, pleaded guilty on Wednesday to a felony charge of racketeering conspiracy. Another mobster, Edward C. Lato, refused to do the same despite signing a plea agreement last week.

Lato, 64, disputed facts presented by federal prosecutor Sam G. Nazzaro, who told the court that Lato had collected protection payments from two Providence strip clubs.

"I don't know anything about the Satin Doll in terms of getting any proceeds out of there,'' Lato said.

Lato also disputed Nazzaro's assertion that he was promoted to a ranking position in the mob and oversaw collection of the extortion payments.

Lato's plea hearing will continue next week.

Manocchio, 84, who faces a minimum of 5 years and 3 months in prison, will be sentenced on May 11.

[Junior]

Girlfriend of notorious Boston gangster James (Whitey) Bulger agrees to plead guilty
By Janon Fisher, NEW YORK DAILY NEWS, Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Catherine Greig, the girlfriend of notorious Boston gangster James (Whitey) Bulger, has agreed to plead guilty to charges she helped him escape — but she won’t have to rat out her man.

The feds nabbed Greig, 60, along with her mobster lover after they had evaded the law together for almost 17 years.

A plea agreement filed Monday, first reported by the Boston Globe, stipulates that she won’t have to testify against him. “In early 1995, I agreed to join Bulger and travel with [him] during his flight from law enforcement,” she wrote in the agreement.

She could face five years in federal prison on charges of harboring a fugitive, identity theft and conspiracy.

Bulger, who went on the lam in 1995 after his FBI handler tipped him off to a pending racketeering indictment, accused of 19 counts of murder and a host of other crimes.

[Junior]

Two New England mobsters plead guilty in Providence strip club extortion case
By Associated Press, Washington Post, Published: March 13, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Two Rhode Island men on Tuesday admitted to their roles in the extortion of Providence-area strip clubs by the New England mafia, bringing the number of mobsters convicted in the shakedown case to three.

Edward “Eddy” Lato, 64, and Alfred “Chippy” Scivola Jr., 71, pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy during separate hearings in U.S. District Court in Providence. Both men were initially scheduled to plead guilty last month, but their change-of-plea hearings did not go forward as planned.

As part of plea agreements, Lato admitted to having a leadership role in the mob and Scivola acknowledged being a mobster. Lato also agreed to playing a role in a separate shakedown plot that targeted a used-car salesman working in Johnston. Lato and Scivola will be sentenced on June 8.

The most high-profile figure in the case, Luigi “Baby Shacks” Manocchio, 84, pleaded guilty last month to racketeering conspiracy and agreed to prosecutors’ claim that he was a former boss and underboss of the New England mob. He is set to be sentenced on May 11.

The strip-club extortion plot went back to about 1992 and netted $800,000 to $1.5 million in ill-gotten gains through protection payments paid by places, including the Cadillac Lounge, prosecutors have said.

The payments were set aside for the mafia by Thomas Iafrate, 70, a former bookkeeper at the Cadillac Lounge, according to prosecutors. Iafrate started serving a 2 1/2-year prison sentence for racketeering conspiracy last month. The monthly payments ranged from $2,000 to $6,000, the indictment said.

In January 2011, authorities arrested Manocchio and Iafrate. After their arrest, Lato sought to continue to collect protection payments from the Cadillac Lounge, said U.S. Department of Justice Trial Attorney Sam G. Nazzaro.

Lato initially balked at prosecutors’ assertion that he was a mob leader, but later made the admission after consulting with his defense attorney. Last month, a federal judge interrupted Lato’s change-of-plea hearing after he disputed parts of prosecutors’ version of his case. He is facing between just under eight years and a little bit more than nine years in prison as a part of a plea agreement.

Scivola, who blew kisses to his family before being led away in handcuffs, is facing a sentence between three years and five months and a little more than four years.

Another man, Richard Bonafiglia, 58, who was a bouncer at the Cadillac Lounge, pleaded guilty last month to racketeering conspiracy as part of the strip club case. A co-defendant, Theodore “Teddy” Cardillo, 68, who was a manager at the Cadillac Lounge, has pleaded not guilty to charges and is awaiting trial.

In a separate scheme, prosecutors said Lato shared in money extorted from a used car-salesman. The salesman paid $20,000 last fall to reputed mob associate Raymond “Scarface” Jenkins, 47, and another $5,000 to a different, unidentified person, prosecutors said. Jenkins pleaded guilty last month to extortion conspiracy.

An alleged mob associate, Albino “Albi” Folcarelli, 54, has pleaded not guilty to accusations he went to the dealership before the salesman paid Jenkins with money withdrawn from a spouse’s retirement account. Folcarelli is awaiting trial.

[Junior]

'Ruthless' reputed mobster dies at 88
By Tim White, WRPI.com
Friday, March 16, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Rudolph Sciarra, once considered a high-ranking member of the Patriarca crime family, has died, the Target 12 Investigators have learned.

Sciarra, 88, of Johnston, died Wednesday at a nursing home of natural causes.

"He was a feared, ruthless, individual on the street. He had hands like cement blocks," said one longtime mob investigator who asked not to be identified. "The name 'Rudy Sciarra' struck fear in people."

Sciarra's granddaughter asked that the information for the wake and funeral remain private. She added the man who made headlines was not the one she knew growing up.

“He was one of the most wonderful men I’ve ever known," Brianna Gemery said in a telephone interview. "He and my grandmother practically raised me and I loved them like they were my own parents.”

Rhode Island State Police Colonel Steve O’Donnell said at one time Sciarra was considered a capo regime in the family and had the nickname “The Captain.”

“He was a very loyal trusted enforcer to Patriacra crime family. In his day he was one of the most feared individuals,” O’Donnell said. “Even in an elderly state he still had the warped respect of the membership based on his violent history.”

Former Superintendent of the State Police Brendan Doherty referred to Sciarra as "the real deal."

"He was an old school La Cosa Nostra member; loyal to Raymond [Patriarca Sr.] and Louie Manocchio," Doherty said. "He schooled Edward Lato and Rocco Argenti."

Despite his reputation, Doherty said it always stood out to him how loyal he was to his longtime wife, Lucy.

"When I started on the state police he was a fugitive and we were out looking for him," Doherty said. "By the time I got to know him he was well established and not conducting street crimes, he was a capo.”

Throughout the years, Sciarra had several brushes with the law.

In 1985 he pleaded no contest to charges that he supplied the gun in the gangland slaying of Raymond F. "Baby" Curcio, the crime Doherty said he was a fugitive from justice for. At the time police said Curcio was a drug addict and had broken into the home of the brother to now-deceased mob boss Raymond L.S. Patriarca.

Prosecutors allege Patriaca ordered the hit, but he died before ever going to trial.

More recently, Sciarra pleaded no contest to charges in 2003 that he was involved in a gambling ring along with admitted mobster Anthony "The Saint" St. Laurent.

Law enforcement sources tell Target 12 that Sciarra would get a weekly visit from the reputed former mob boss Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio. Those visits ended with Manocchio's arrest in January 2011.

The 84-year-old Manocchio pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and will be sentenced on May 11.

O’Donnell worked as a corrections officer at the Adult Correctional Institution when Sciarra was serving time for the Curcio murder.

“He was quiet,” O’Donnell said. “He was polite.”

[Junior]

Feds: mob associate close to being made
By Tim White, Target 12 Investigator
WPRI.Com, Wed, April 4, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WPRI) - Just before his arrest accused mob associate Albino “Albie” Folcarelli was told he would be recommended for “membership” into the Patriarca crime family by a high-ranking member of the mob now working for the government, the Target 12 Investigators have learned.

Prosecutors spearheading the sweeping mob case – just weeks from trial – filed a motion Wednesday that goes into greater detail at just how much the unidentified turncoat mobster is willing to share about the operation of the New England La Cosa Nostra.

The mysterious unidentified mobster who wore a hidden microphone for the FBI is referred to as the “Made Member” throughout the document.

“The evidence will show however, that Made Member had agreed to propose the defendant Folcarelli for membership in the NELCN and that it was well known within the organization that Folcarelli was to be proposed for membership when the leadership next ‘opened the books,’” prosecutors wrote.

Experts say the term “open the books” is when mob leadership decide to induct new members into their ranks.

Prosecutors William Ferland and Samuel Nazzaro filed the document to object to a motion by Folcarelli. Defense attorney James McCormick is asking the judge to exclude any evidence describing the operations of the mafia or any evidence of Folcarelli’s prior arrests, convictions and “reputation for violence.”

Folcarelli is accused of intimidating a Johnston used car salesman into forking over $25,000 to the mob. Investigators say the victim’s wife tapped a retirement account in order to pay off the debt.

In the document, prosecutors wrote Folcarelli’s motion to exclude evidence about the existence of the mob “would in effect rewrite the Indictment and attempt to lead a jury to believe that the defendant is a law abiding auto body shop owner, who just happened to pull into [the victim’s] place of employment, asked for him and finding him not there left.”

Folcarelli visited the victim’s work and drove by the home in an effort to be seen and cause fear, prosecutors said.

Prison Connection

It was the car salesman’s brother – identified as a former prison guard at the Adult Correctional Institution – who warned the victim that Folcarelli was a man to be feared, according to the document.

We’re now learning the former correctional officer is poised to take the stand at trial.

“He will further testify that he knew Folcarelli from ‘the ACI’ where Folcarelli was an inmate and Folcarelli’s reputation caused him concern,” prosecutors wrote. “The brother will testify that he sought the assistance of Made Member because he was afraid and he knew that he, the NELCN member, could bring his influence to bear on these two associates and direct them not to bother [the victim] or his family at home.”

Earlier filings revealed the cooperating “Made Member” was also indicted in the case after investigators learned he was part of the crew allegedly shaking the car salesman down. The government said it was the mobster’s pending arrest that moved him to cooperate with the FBI.

Two others involved in the car salesman scheme have already pleaded guilty in the case, including mob associate Raymond “Scarface” Jenkins and Edward “Eddy” Lato.

Charges accusing Lato in the car salesman extortion scheme were dropped as part of a plea agreement. Instead, Lato pleaded guilty to one count of racketeering conpriacy for shaking down strip clubs for protection money. He faces up to 9 years behind bars when he is sentenced on June 8.

Also pleading guilty in this case is the former boss of the crime family, Luigi “Baby Shacks” Manocchio, 84 of Providence and mobster Alfred “Chippy” Scivola, 71 of Providence.

Mob associates Thomas Iafrate and Richard Bonafiglia also pleaded guilty for their role in the strip club scheme.

Only Folcarelli and accused mob associate Theodore Cardillo are slated for the May 1 trial.

U.S. District Court Judge William Smith will hear arguments on the pending evidence motions filed by Folcarelli next week.

Mysterious “RD”

So far court documents have only identified the cooperating wiseguy as having the initials “RD,” further fueling speculation that it is reputed mobster Robert “Bobby” DeLuca.

A spokesperson for the Rhode Island U.S. Attorney’s office declined to comment on the identity of the cooperating witness.

DeLuca is a longtime figure in Rhode Island’s underworld. His induction into the mob was famously caught on an FBI wire in a Medford Massachusetts apartment in 1989.

The recording was an embarrassment for the mob and has been used repeatedly to prove La Cosa Nostra’s existence.

The explosive tape earned then boss Raymond “Junior” Patriarca – who can be heard on the tape performing the ceremony – eight years behind bars.

For his part, DeLuca’s time behind bars lead to strong allegiance with the Boston faction of the crime family, in particular the ex-boss Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme.

As Target 12 first reported in 2009, DeLuca was being watched closely by law enforcement as a potential new underboss in the crime family after Manocchio stepped down and the center of power once again shifted back to Boston.

DeLuca was a regular at Sidebar and Grill restaurant in Providence, where he worked while still on probation.

He hasn’t been seen in the state since August, just weeks before the second superseding indictment decimated the ranks of the Rhode Island mob.

[Junior]

Boston mobster's lawyers to discuss evidence
Boston Globe, April 14, 2012

BOSTON—Lawyers for mobster James "Whitey" Bulger are due in court to update a judge on a long-running dispute over evidence turned over to the defense by federal prosecutors.

Bulger, the former leader of the Winter Hill Gang, is charged with participating in 19 murders. He was captured in Santa Monica, Calif., last year after 16 years on the run.

Bulger's lawyers have been sparring with prosecutors over the voluminous amount of evidence expected to be used at Bulger's trial. The defense has repeatedly complained that prosecutors have turned over a mountain of disorganized documents.

Last month, U.S. Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler told the two sides to cooperate. Defense lawyers and prosecutors are due in U.S. District Court Wednesday to give Bowler an update.

Bulger's trial is scheduled to begin Nov. 5.

[Junior]

Reputed Mass. mobster gets 7 years in prison
Boston.com, April 25, 2012

BOSTON—A Winthrop man prosecutors say was an enforcer for a crime ring associated with the New England Mafia has been sentenced to seven years in prison.

Darin Bufalino pleaded guilty Tuesday in Suffolk Superior Court on charges of attempted extortion and conspiracy to commit attempted extortion.

The sentence will run concurrently with a seven year armed robbery sentence in Essex Superior Court. The 51-year-old Bufalino was also sentenced to five years of probation.

His lawyer said he wanted to put the cases behind him.

Bufalino was part of a multiagency effort that resulted in the arrests of several men allegedly involved in crimes including extortion, drug trafficking and robberies.

The suspected leader of the network, Mark Rossetti of Boston, was indicted in October 2010 and his case is pending.

[Junior]

Feds charge Anthony DiNunzio, alleged leader of New England mob, dealing ‘severe blow’ to Patriarca crime family
By Milton J. Valencia and John R. Ellement, Boston Globe Staff, Tuesday, April 25, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. -- Anthony L. DiNunzio has been the acting boss of the New England mob since 2009 and once bragged that he would enforce discipline on the gangsters under his rule by burying them alive if they refused to follow his orders, according to a federal indictment.

DiNunzio, who was arrested in Boston’s North End this morning and appeared in court here a few hours later, allegedly took over as leader of the Patriarca crime family in late 2009 or early 2010, shortly after the Rhode Island-based gangster, Luigi “Louie” Manocchio gave up the job. Manocchio, who is in his mid-80s, has pleaded guilty to federal charges.

According to the indictment, DiNunzio accepted both the title of boss of the New England mob and the thousands of dollars in extortion payments that Manocchio had collected for decades from strip clubs in Rhode Island. Authorities allege that the mob collected $2 million from the clubs since about 1993.

DiNunzio also allegedly bragged that if he was ever arrested, it would not change the way he, or the New England mob, operates.

“If I go to the can, I’m still the boss,’’ DiNunzio is quoted as saying during a Dec. 7, 2011, meeting with a member of the New York-based Gambino crime family.

DiNunzio was arrested at the Gemini Social Club on Endicott Street in the North End without incident and made his initial court appearance accompanied by his Boston attorney, Robert Sheketoff. (Earlier today, officials had incorrectly reported that DiNunzio was arrested in East Boston Tuesday night.)

Wearing glasses and a windbreaker, the burly East Boston resident calmly answered routine questions posed to him by court officials during the brief hearing.

Sheketoff did not challenge a request by federal prosecutors that DiNunzio be held in custody until a formal detention hearing, which is set for May 3.

According to Assistant US Attorney William Ferland and court records, Anthony DiNunzio is facing one count of racketeering conspiracy, one count of extortion conspiracy, and five counts of traveling in aid of racketeering.

Anthony DiNunzio is the brother of Carmen “The Cheese Man” DiNunzio, who was the acting boss of the New England mob until his imprisonment in 2009 on federal charges related to the Big Dig.

In the indictment, Anthony DiNunzio described his management style.

“As soon as I took over, I changed everything,’’ he is quoted as saying.

He described what he would do to anyone who balks at his orders. “I get to watch you die in the ground. ... I’ll bury you right in the [expletive] ground. ... You’re alive. They stay there. I stay there 10 [expletive] hours until your [sic] dead. And I’ll dig you back up and make sure you are dead,’’ he is quoted as saying during a June 22, 2011, meeting at My Cousin Vinny’s restaurant in Malden.

In June 2010, DiNunzio met with Manocchio and other mob members at Billy Tse’s Chinese restaurant in Boston to discuss business, according to the indictment. One year later, he told a senior member of the Gambino crime family that he had discovered that federal law enforcement had the restaurant wired with surveillance equipment.

“We met, me and two other guys,’’ he is quoted as saying. “They had us on tape. I just found out yesterday … the whole place was wired no matter what table we sat at.”

Rhode Island US Attorney Peter F. Neronha; James M. Trusty, chief of the organized crime section in the US Justice Department; and Richard Deslauriers, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Boston office, told reporters today that authorities are steadily dismantling the mob.

Neronha said DiNunzio is the ninth member, or associate, of the New England mob to face charges in Rhode Island and that six of them have pleaded guilty.

“Organized crime likes to believe their reach is long. Our reach is longer,’’ Neronha said. “The prosecutors and the investigators in the case have really dealt a severe blow to organized crime. These are not light punches, these are heavy blows, and we hope they will have an effect, and continue to have an effect.’’

Rhode Island State Police Colonel Steven O’Donnell said DiNunzio was “just another boss that got arrested. ... Over the decades, the law enforcement network out there has basically dismantled the New England Cosa Nostra as we know it.’’

Neronha’s office and the FBI have been investigating New England’s mobsters for the past several years with a focus on the alleged shakedown of Rhode Island strip club operators.

Last September, federal prosecutors charged six people with participating in the extortion scheme focused on Rhode Island’s adult entertainment industry since the 1980s.

In a seven-count indictment unsealed in Providence last year, federal authorities said leadership of the Mafia in New England had shifted back to Boston. Those court documents did not identify Anthony DiNunzio by name but did describe a meeting in the North End where the crime boss collected $5,000 in cash.

In the indictment unsealed today, authorities said FBI agents searched DiNunzio after the meeting and took the cash from him but did not arrest him.

DiNunzio later told an associate “it was marked money.” He later told a different associate, “Come on, let’s go have a steak for lunch because we are probably going to get pinched tomorrow.”

[Junior]

Boston mobster has fatal heart attack at Penn Station -- and cops find $180,000 in his backpack
By Robert Gearty and Corky Siemaszko, New York Daily News, Thursday, May 3, 2012

Here is the $179,980 question: Who gets to keep the cash that was found in a Boston mobster’s backpack after he was felled by a heart attack in Penn Station?

The feds believe 75-year-old William Coyman was ferrying drug money to Philadelphia when he collapsed last August, and they’ve asked a judge to give them the cash, sources said Thursday.

Meanwhile, a lawyer for Boston bank robber John Burke, who now runs an outfit called 180 Entertainment in the City of Brotherly Love, has filed a lawsuit in pursuit of the loot.

The lawyer, Steven DiLibero of Providence, R.I., has not explained what kind of business Burke runs or what the money was for.

But Coyman’s son, also named William, said his pop was a courier for the company and suspects it’s funny money. He also wants nothing to do with it.

“The people connected to that money are probably not good people,” he said Thursday. “That’s accurate.”

Investigators, however, are not sure if Coyman intended to deliver the dough — sources said he had an Amtrak ticket from Boston to New York, but no ticket to Philadelphia.

The mobster’s son, who now lives in northern California, said his dad’s unsavory connections have been “embarrassing my whole life” and declined to discuss this case.

“I really didn’t want to talk about this,” he said.

“My dad was a great man. But he had a colorful history.”

Did he ever.

Coyman hailed from Boston’s Charlestown section, a spawning ground for Irish mobsters, and had a rap sheet going back to 1955, the feds said.

He served two seven-year prison stretches for drug offenses, including one in New Hampshire after he was caught with cocaine and $20,000 stolen from a department store.

His last legit job was as a driver for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 25 up in Boston, which was linked to the mob in the 1990s and accused of putting hoods on the payroll.

Coyman’s name surfaced in several news articles about allegations that union officials were shaking down Hollywood film crews working in Boston. But he was never charged with putting the arm on anybody.

His shady history surfaced after Coyman suddenly collapsed on the Penn Station platform and police found the two plastic bags inside his backpack, each containing wads of cash bundled with rubber bands.

As medics worked in vain to revive Coyman, drug sniffing dogs also found traces of narcotics on the backpack and in the briefcase Coyman had been carrying, sources said.

Informed by his son that Coyman worked for 180 Entertainment, agents from the Drug Enforcement Administration visited the small, unremarkable house in a blue collar neighborhood and noticed three things that immediately made them suspicious — two luxury cars and a small boat parked in the driveway.

It remains unclear if Burke lives at this address. But the Associated Press, which broke the Coyman story, reported Burke is also from Charlestown and was sent to prison in 1988 for six bank robberies in Florida.

Then in 1994, while Burke was still behind bars, he was caught in an FBI sting conspiring with buddies back in Boston to distribute five kilos of cocaine. He was finally paroled in October 2010.

But Burke didn’t stay out of trouble for long. He was arrested for violating his parole on April 20 after flunking a drug test, the AP reported. He has also been accused of leaving the country without permission.

Real estate records show the Philadelphia house is owned by Anthony Fedele, a former business partner of the late music producer Stephen Epstein.

Epstein was a pal of Joseph “Skinny Joey” Merlino, the onetime boss of the Philadelphia mafia.

The Philadelphia Daily News, citing government documents, reported Thursday that Merlino remains that city’s top mobster even though he now lives in Florida.

[emilysweeney]

Hey there, I'm new to this board.

If you're interested in the history of the mob in New England, you should check out my new book, "Boston Organized Crime"

It contains 200+ historic mugshots and crime scene photos from the 1920s up to the present day.

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[Junior]

New England Mafia a shell of former self
By Milton J. Valencia, Globe Staff
Boston Globe, May 8, 2012

Anthony DiNunzio, the alleged don of the New England Mafia, sat in a federal courthouse in Rhode Island last week, draped in tan prison garb, nodding as a federal judge said he faces a lengthy prison term if convicted of racketeering and extortion.

Luigi Manocchio, DiNunzio’s 84-year-old predecessor, will go before a judge in Rhode Island on Friday to be sentenced for extorting protection payments from strip clubs.

And Mark Rossetti, one of the most feared captains in the New England mob, is being held in Massachusetts on state charges of extortion and bookmaking. He has been cooperating with the FBI as an informant. Meanwhile, Robert DeLuca, a notorious captain from Rhode Island, has disappeared from the area and is widely reported to be cooperating with authorities against his fellow made members.

This is the leadership of the New England Mafia, a skeleton of the organization glorified in novels and in Hollywood. No more than 30 made, or sworn-in, members make up an organization that in its heyday was more than 100 strong, law enforcement officials say.

Investigators, legal observers, and court records describe an organization that continues to erode, as made members and associates abandon the code of silence and cooperate with investigators. The younger crop is addicted to drugs, and the older, wiser members have either died or have gone to jail, officials said.

“This is not your father’s Mafia,’’ said Massachusetts State Police Detective Lieutenant Stephen P. Johnson, who oversees organized crime investigations as head of the Special Service Section.

He said the arrest of the 53-year-old DiNunzio by federal authorities from Rhode Island on April 25, about two years into his reign as boss, also shows that law enforcement has been able to suppress the workings of the Mafia to the point their crimes are minimal.

DiNunzio is the sixth consecutive head of the New England Mafia to be charged: His predecessors have all been convicted, and the area has not seen a don hold as much power as Raymond L.S. Patriarca, the longtime head of the Patriarca crime family, did until his death in 1984.

Patriarca, who died at the age of 76, controlled an empire in the 1960s that stretched from Rhode Island to Maine, specializing in loan sharking, illegal gambling, and profiting on stolen goods, according to FBI documents released after his death.

“In this thing of ours,’’ Patriarca once told an associate while under electronic surveillance, “your love for your mother and father is one thing; your love for The Family is a different kind of love.’’

Johnson and other investigators still expect someone will take DiNunzio’s place, knowing that, for some, the thought of living the “Sopranos’’ lifestyle is too attractive to ignore.

“If it wasn’t for the Sopranos, we’d be able to suppress it even more,’’ Johnson said. “You’ve got to continually prune at the mob, because if you don’t it will grow like a weed.’’

Anthony Cardinale - a Boston lawyer who has represented a Who’s Who of Mafia figures including former bosses Francis “Cadillac Frank’’ Salemme and the late Gennaro Angiulo - said that as long as there are criminals who need protection, there will be organized crime.

“As long as there’s drugs going on, and bookmaking, there will always be a mob,’’ he said. “Even with all the risks involved, there will still be somebody policing the bad guys, and that’s what the mob guys do.’’

He added, however, “as far as I’m concerned, it’s a dying occupation, in a sense that anyone who’s out there should realize that if they look to the left or look to the right, they should realize someone is working with the FBI or wearing a wire . . . which is unheard of.’’

According to prosecutors, at least two Mafia figures have cooperated against DiNunzio: One of them is a senior member of the New York-based Gambino crime family who has reportedly committed suicide, and the other is said to be DeLuca.

DiNunzio can be heard in wire recordings saying, “You get no shot today, no shot at all.’’

DiNunzio is the younger brother of convicted mobster Carmen “The Cheeseman’’ DiNunzio, the former underboss who was jailed for trying to bribe an undercover agent posing as a state highway worker, and separately for extortion and gambling.

Both brothers started their careers in organized crime with the Chicago Mafia, and were convicted in 1993 of extorting gamblers in Las Vegas for a Chicago Mafia crew based in Southern California. They served several years in prison before making their way to Boston.

Anthony DiNunzio became acting boss of the Patriarca family in early 2010, following the arrests of his brother and predecessors Peter Limone, who is in his late 70s, and Manocchio.

Limone is serving probation for bookmaking. Manocchio and several members of his crew have pleaded guilty to extorting strip clubs in Rhode Island.

Soon after becoming boss, Anthony DiNunzio allegedly demanded 50 percent of the strip club payments that were going to Manocchio’s crew, a demand that would prove to be his downfall. He faces up to 20 years on some charges, and a judge has ordered that he be held without bail.

Longtime Mafia observers said the arrest of DiNunzio was disappointing, embarrassing even, given that the once-proud organization has resorted to shaking down strip clubs.

“It’s just not glamorous now,’’ said Arlene Violet, a former Rhode Island attorney general and radio personality who has written a musical about the mob lifestyle. She recalls the days when made members ran businesses and matched wits with Wall Street.

“When your scheme is shaking down strip clubs, oh brother,’’ she said. “It’s so sleazy. Their crimes aren’t as sexy anymore.’’

Even in Boston’s North End, where prosecutors said DiNunzio showed up regularly at the Gemini Club, a small, members-only social club on Endicott Street, locals said the Mafia’s working was virtually non-existent.

“I’ve never heard of anybody being pressured here,’’ said Joanne Prevost Anzalone, former president of the North End Chamber of Commerce. “I think it’s always been a little exaggerated here to begin with. . . . You don’t walk down the street here and see anything you don’t see in any other neighborhood in the city.’’

But according to prosecutors, DiNunzio wanted power, and he sought to define his reign as soon as he took the helm. He explored ways to extort new businesses, and used the threats of violence to keep his underlings in order. He had questioned whether any of his members were cooperating with the FBI, and he suspected Salemme, who is in a witness protection program, was talking. He sent someone to look for the former boss.

DiNunzio had also worked quickly to reestablish a crew in Rhode Island, following the arrest of Manocchio and the arrest of his crew in September 2011.

He named an existing made member captain, so that he could continue the extortion of strip clubs, according to prosecutors. But the new captain, prosecutors said in court last week, wanted to install his own crew, to replace everyone he knew to be under investigation.

“They’re all in trouble up there, they ain’t coming home,’’ the new captain reportedly said.

[Junior]

Francis Salemme is not a snitch, says ex-mobster’s lawyer
By Laurel J. Sweet, Boston Herald, Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Retired New England Mafia godfather Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme has been a lot of things, including an underworld assassin, but he’s no rat, his lawyer said yesterday.

“He’s not cooperating against anybody and he never will,” attorney Steven Boozang told the Herald.

The now 78-year-old ex-mobster’s name was dropped Thursday at a detention hearing in Providence for the reputed new boss, Anthony DiNunzio, 53, of East Boston, who was charged last month with racketeering, extortion and conspiracy as part of a year-long investigation by the FBI of gangland shakedowns of strip clubs.

In arguing against freeing DiNunzio on bail, assistant U.S. Attorney William Ferland told a federal judge DiNunzio’s associates had told him Salemme was “giving up everybody.” DiNunzio, he said, wanted Salemme tracked down.

“Fortunately, Mr. Salemme is tucked away safely,” the federal prosecutor said.

But Salemme’s lawyer said his client is no longer a part of organized crime or the lifestyle of a wise guy.

“He rode off into the sunset. That’s it. He’s not a witness in this case or any other,” Boozang said. “That was a rumor started by a rat trying to deflect attention from himself. (Salemme) was one of the smarter ones who put that portion of his life behind him.”

Boozang said Salemme is “just living a healthy lifestyle.”

He declined to say whether any prosecutors have tried to reach Salemme to try to convince him to testify in any proceeding.

“He could have hurt people. He didn’t,” Boozang said. “He’s not that guy. He’s just not made that way.”

[Junior]

Former New England Crime Boss Sentenced
By Laura Crimaldi, Associated Press
CBS Connecticut, May 11, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) _ The former New England Mafia boss was sentenced Friday to 51/2 years in prison for his role in the shakedown of Providence strip clubs, becoming the first ex-mob leader to be locked up in a case that has ensnared nine people described by prosecutors as having ties to organized crime.

The sentence for the 84-year-old Luigi “Baby Shacks” Manocchio means he may live out his final days in prison. He turns 85 next month.

Manocchio’s role in the extortion plot went back to about 1992 and netted $800,000 to $1.5 million in ill-gotten gains through protection payments paid by strip clubs, including the Satin Doll and Cadillac Lounge, according to prosecutors.

Manocchio maintained at his sentencing that he never personally threatened anybody.

Last month, authorities arrested reputed acting New England mob boss Anthony L. DiNunzio, 53, on charges connected to the same plot. DiNunzio, who lives in the East Boston section of Boston, has pleaded not guilty and is being held without bail.

Edward “Eddy” Lato, 65, the captain of the mob’s Rhode Island crew, and mob member Alfred “Chippy” Scivola, 71, have also pleaded guilty to charges in connection to the scheme. They await sentencing.

The payments were set aside for the Mafia by Thomas Iafrate, 71, a former bookkeeper at the Cadillac Lounge, prosecutors said. Iafrate is serving a 21/2 -year prison sentence for racketeering conspiracy. The monthly payments ranged from $2,000 to $6,000, the indictment said.

Manocchio started overseeing the collection of the protection payments in 1995 after another member of the Mafia was imprisoned, prosecutors said. Manocchio resigned his position as crime boss in 2009 but remained a member of the organization, according to authorities.

Another man, Raymond “Scarface” Jenkins, 48, was sentenced Friday to 3 years and 1 month in prison for his role in a plot hatched by the mob to shake down a used-car salesman for $25,000. He pleaded guilty to extortion conspiracy.

Prosecutors say the used-car salesman, who owed a debt to a third party, approached Jenkins about the situation and asked for help.

Jenkins agreed to intervene, but the salesman later said he could not come up with the money he once thought he could get, prosecutors said.

An admitted mob associate, 54-year-old Albino Folcarelli, went to the Johnston dealership where the salesman worked to intimidate him, according to prosecutors. The man was not there at the time of the visit and two people called to warn him to stay away from work, prosecutors said. Later, Folcarelli drove into the driveway of the salesman’s home, prosecutors said.

After that, the man paid $20,000 to Jenkins, and $5,000 to a different person, prosecutors said. The funds, prosecutors say, were withdrawn from a retirement account belonging to the salesman’s wife.

Folcarelli has pleaded guilty to extortion conspiracy. He is scheduled to be sentenced in July.

[Junior]

Agents Find 2 Guns, No Art at Alleged Gangster's Connecticut Home
By Alyssa Newcomb, ABC News, May 10, 2012

None of the priceless masterpieces from a record art heist were found today in a search by the FBI on the property of an alleged mobster, according to his attorney.

Authorities conducted the search today on the property of Robert Gentile, 75, who was arrested in February on federal drug charges. The warrant allowed ground-penetrating radar to be used so agents could search for weapons, said A. Ryan McGuigan, Gentile's attorney.

The search today yielded two guns.

"Nobody cares about [the guns]. What they were looking for was stolen art," McGuigan told ABCNews.com at the end of the day.

The search warrant marked the second time the FBI had searched Gentile's property. Both warrants were for weapons, McGuigan said, because the statute of limitations on the art theft case had expired.

Among the masterpieces stolen more than 20 years ago were works by Degas and Rembrandt.

In March, a federal prosecutor said Gentile may have some connection to the art heist at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in 1990, the Associated Press reported.

The U.S. attorney's office declined to comment today on the search or what connection Gentile could have to the heist.

During the early hours of March 18, 1990, two men disguised as police officers were let inside the museum through a security door. The museum's guard was told the officers were responding to a call.

Once inside, the thieves asked the guard to step away from the security desk, saying there was a warrant for his arrest. The move kept the guard more than a safe distance from the museum's emergency alert button.

The other guard was called to the security desk, where the thieves handcuffed the workers and marched them into the basement. The men were secured to pipes and their hands, feet and heads were duct-taped.

When the guards' morning replacement arrived, he discovered 13 pieces of art were missing, including work by Degas, Rembrandt, Manet and Vermeer. The art heist has produced few leads -- even with seasoned investigators on the case -- until now.

Gentile was arrested on federal drug charges after he allegedly sold prescription drugs to an undercover agent. McGuigan said he believes it was a ruse to allow authorities to search Gentile's home, because the statute of limitations on the art heist had expired.

"It is our contention he was set up by the FBI to sell drugs to an undercover agent so they could execute a search warrant on his home," McGuigan said.

The first search yielded firearms, ammunition and homemade silencers, adding more federal charges to Gentile's rap sheet. McGuigan said the FBI claimed the first search wasn't thorough enough, so they issued a warrant for a second search, which included the ability to use ground-penetrating radar in Gentile's yard.

"They're pretty thorough. The FBI doesn't miss things," McGuigan said, underscoring his point that his client's alleged crimes were a ruse to search his property for the missing paintings.

The heist has remained at the top of the list of the FBI's Art Recovery Squad. The works are worth an estimated half a billion dollars, making it the largest art theft in history, according to the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

Twenty-two years later, empty frames continue to hang in the museum as placeholders for the works the museum hopes will one day be returned.

Gentile pleaded not guilty to federal weapon and gun charges last month and is being held without bond.

[Junior]

Accused mobster Bulger's defense gets time to review case
By Scott Malone, Reuters, May 29, 2012

BOSTON (Reuters) - A U.S. judge on Tuesday gave attorneys for alleged former crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger, charged with 19 murders, two more weeks to assess whether they can properly prepare for his trial.

Bulger's attorney repeated his complaint that he had been unable to sift through the hundreds of thousands of pages of evidence that date back to a 1999 indictment for crimes alleged to have been committed in the 1970s and 1980s.

"We continue to be overwhelmed by the amount of discovery that we have to go through," the attorney, J.W. Carney of Boston law firm Carney & Bassill, told U.S. Magistrate Judge Marianne Bowler at federal court in Boston.

Prosecutors contended that Bulger, who fled Boston in late 1994 after a tip from a corrupt Federal Bureau of Investigation official that his arrest was imminent, was trying to avoid trial on the charges when he was arrested in Santa Monica, California, almost a year ago.

"He fled the district 16 years ago to avoid trial," Assistant U.S. Attorney Brian Kelly said in the status hearing on Tuesday. "It is no secret that he is trying to avoid being put in front of a jury."

Carney denied that Bulger was seeking to avoid trial.

Bulger, 82, did not attend the hearing. He has pled not guilty to charges linked to murders that occurred in the 1970s and 1980s, when federal prosecutors say he ran the Winter Hill Gang, a mostly Irish-American criminal organization. His trial is scheduled to begin November 5.

Carney also said that his efforts to defend Bulger have been hampered by prosecutors' request to keep much of their evidence under seal. Judge Bowler instructed the two sides to meet to go over what parts of the documents would be brought up at trial and what could be made public.

After the hearing, Bulger's attorney told reporters he believed prosecutors were trying to keep some evidence under seal to avoid exposing corruption in Boston's law enforcement community. Bulger had long served as an FBI informant.

"The government doesn't want to have everyone know about the depth of corruption that went on for decades in this city," Carney told reporters.

Bulger and his girlfriend, Catherine Greig, were arrested at their apartment hideout a few blocks from the ocean on June 22, 2011, days after the FBI renewed its media campaign seeking tips on his whereabouts.

His story was the inspiration for Martin Scorsese's 2006 Oscar-winning film "The Departed."

The case is United States v. James J. Bulger, U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts, No. 99-10371.

[Junior]

Accused mobster won’t hear ‘Mafia’
By Matt Stout, Boston Herald
Saturday, June 2, 2012

Prosecutors looking to pin breaking and entering charges on reputed mafia capo Mark Rossetti will find themselves in a curious position at next week’s trial — they won’t be able to detail to jurors the alleged honcho’s mob ties despite a state trooper’s testimony that Rossetti is known as a killer.

Judge Jeffrey Locke handed Rossetti and accused mob “associate” Yasmani Quezada a victory entering their trial in Suffolk Superior Court when he barred prosecutors from incorporating allegations Rossetti ran a stable of “soldiers” as a captain of the La Cosa Nostra crime family into the first of several cases against the accused East Boston crime kingpin.

Rossetti and 30 others were indicted in 2010 on charges related to an alleged three-county, mob-run crime ring, including extortion, drug trafficking, robberies and assaults. Next week’s trial, which is expected to begin Monday, only involves charges of breaking and entering with the intent to commit a crime in connection with a March 2010 break-in at a Hyde Park home.

State trooper Nunzio Orlando took the stand for two days of pretrial testimony, in which he said he knew of Rossetti’s reputed mob ties since he was “13, 14 years old,” and said Rossetti’s “reputation is he’s a killer, that he’s killed numerous people.”

But Locke noted that Massachusetts lacks a criminal organization, or RICO, statute, and that in taped conversations between Rossetti and others, there was no evidence Rossetti was handing down orders as a mafia captain.

“This so-called (La Cosa Nostra) is not directly relevant to any issue in this case,” Locke said. “It suggests, one is in the mob, then one is going to commit crimes. It adds a tremendous risk ... that is classic propensity evidence.”

[Junior]

Mobster gets nearly 4 years in RI extortion case
By Laura Crimaldi, North Jersey.com
Thursday, June 7, 2012

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — A New England Mafia member was ordered Thursday to serve nearly four years in federal prison for his role in the shakedown of Rhode Island strip clubs, becoming the second admitted mobster and fifth person overall to be sentenced in the case.

Alfred "Chippy" Scivola Jr., of Johnston, was sentenced in Providence to three years and 10 months by a federal judge who imposed the punishment sought by prosecutors. Under a plea agreement, Scivola had faced between three years, five months and four years, three months in federal prison.

The 71-year-old Scivola pleaded guilty in March to racketeering conspiracy. He blew a kiss to his family as he was led away from the courtroom in handcuffs.

Scivola's role in the extortion of strip clubs by the mob for monthly protection payments dates to 2002, according to a plea agreement signed in February. The agreement says the plot netted $800,000 to $1.5 million in ill-gotten gains.

Defense attorney Victor Beretta said the evidence ties Scivola to the scheme beginning last year and argued Scivola got involved at the end of a decades-long scheme.

"If you come in at the end of a 30-year conspiracy ... you cannot be held responsible for everything that came before you," Beretta said.

Beretta also described Scivola as a good family man and "loyal and true friend," who has a pacemaker and requires treatment for respiratory and heart problems. He asked that Scivola be given a less severe sentence.

Rhode Island U.S. Attorney Peter F. Neronha praised Scivola's sentence.

"We're just moving along. The dominoes are falling," Neronha said. He added prosecutors will "keep the pressure on" the mob after the final case is settled.

The extortion investigation has ensnared nine people described by prosecutors as having ties to organized crime.

Five people have been sentenced to prison in the case, including three mob associates and former New England mob boss Luigi "Baby Shacks" Manocchio. Manocchio, 84, was ordered last month to serve 5½ years in prison for his role in the plot.

Reputed acting New England mob boss Anthony DiNunzio was arrested in connection to the scheme in April. DiNunzio, who lives in the East Boston section of Boston, has pleaded not guilty and is being held without bail.

Edward "Eddy" Lato, 65, the captain of the mob's Rhode Island crew, has pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and faces sentencing next week.

Assistant U.S. Attorney William J. Ferland said Scivola was inducted into the Mafia in 1996. He detailed Scivola's history with the crime family, including his involvement in a strip club extortion plot in Connecticut. Ferland also said Scivola traveled out of state on behalf of the mob, going to New Haven, Conn., in 2008 to meet with the New York-based Gambino crime family and meeting in 2011 with reputed New England mob captain Mark Rossetti, of Boston, to discuss the flow of money from the strip club plot.

Ferland asked the judge to impose a sentence that would send a message to those who might be drawn to the "glamour" associated with the Mafia and warned that the extortion case has not erased the New England crime family completely.

Monthly payments from strip clubs were set aside for the Mafia by Thomas Iafrate, 71, a former bookkeeper at the Cadillac Lounge and Satin Doll strip clubs, prosecutors said. Iafrate is serving a 2½-year prison sentence for racketeering conspiracy.

Theodore Cardillo, 69, who prosecutors say was a manager at the Cadillac Lounge, has pleaded not guilty to charges and awaits trial.

[Junior]

Whitey Bulger: 10 years in prison sought for mobster's girlfriend
By Laura J. Nelson, Los Angeles Times, June 9, 2012

The longtime girlfriend of Boston mob boss Whitey Bulger should spend a decade in federal prison because she knowingly protected one of the Northeast’s most violent fugitives for more than 16 years, prosecutors said.

In a sentencing memo filed in U.S. District Court, prosecutors say Catherine Greig not only concealed Bulger’s identity, but made it possible for him to live in hiding — paying bills, picking up prescription medication, and targeting people whose identities she and Bulger could later steal. The pair were finally discovered last year in Santa Monica.

“This is no garden variety harboring case,” First Assistant U.S. Atty. Jack Pirozzolo wrote in the filing, submitted Friday in Boston. “It is the most extreme case of harboring this District has seen.”

Greig is scheduled to be sentenced Tuesday.

Bulger, 82, pleaded not guilty to charges linked to 19 slayings from the 1970s and '80s during his time as the leader of the Winter Hill Gang, an Irish American crime ring in Boston, prosecutors say. He also worked as an FBI informant. Bulger is awaiting trial.

Greig, 61, pleaded guilty in March to charges of identify fraud, conspiracy to commit identify fraud and conspiracy to harbor a fugitive.

Although the charges Greig faces could result in a maximum of 15 years in prison, prosecutors have said she could get as little as 32 months. The prosecution recommended a longer prison term and asked that Greig pay a $150,000 fine.

“High-profile defendants such as Bulger require substantial assistance if they are to remain fugitives,” Pirozzolo wrote. “… Greig must know that there is a high price to be paid for choosing personal affection and loyalty over their legal obligations.”

After an FBI agent warned Bulger in late 1994 that he was about to be indicted, the mob boss fled Massachusetts with one girlfriend in tow, prosecutor say. He came back to Boston a few weeks later. He dropped off the first girlfriend and picked up Greig, who left her car and poodles with the first girlfriend, prosecutors said.

Prosecutors say Bulger and Greig spent the first year on the run posing as a married couple, traveling to Chicago, New York and Louisiana. They settled in Santa Monica, where they lived in a rent-controlled apartment not far from the Pacific Ocean. Behind a secret wall in the two-bedroom apartment, Bulger stashed 30 weapons and more than $820,000 in cash, prosecutors say.

Bulger spent years on the FBI's "10 most wanted fugitives" list. He and Greig were arrested in June 2011 in Santa Monica after a tipster recognized them.

[Junior]

'Mob boss' James 'Whitey' Bulger's girlfriend jailed
BBC News, June 13, 2012

The woman who helped alleged Boston mob boss James "Whitey" Bulger evade capture for 16 years has been sentenced to eight years in prison.

Catherine Greig, 61, was captured along with her boyfriend in California in June 2011.

Mr Bulger, once on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted List, is awaiting trial on 19 murder charges.

Greig's lawyer told the court that Mr Bulger is still the "love of her life" and she does not think he is guilty.

However, she pleaded guilty to conspiracy to harbour a fugitive as well as identity fraud in March 2012.

She acknowledged in court she had agreed to join him on the run in early 1995 and supported him with false ID documents.

As part of the plea agreement, she will not be forced to testify. Her sentence includes a $150,000 (£96,332) fine and three years supervised release.

Mr Bulger, 82, is accused of leading Boston's Winter Hill Gang and was also an FBI informant against a rival mafia gang.