Vinny TV pleads guilty

Badalamenti only faces about two years in prison, apparently the Feds weren't too excited to put Hector Pagan on the stand.

Bonanno crime boss Vincent Badalamenti pleads guilty to felony

Exclusive: Mob turncoat Hector Pagan won't testify, killing plotline on reality show 'Mob Wives'

BY JOHN MARZULLI / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Monday, April 9, 2012, 3:00 AM

The boss of the Bonanno crime family will plead guilty Monday to a felony charge, preventing his former mob associate from testifying against him — and likely killing a key plotline on the reality show “Mob Wives.”

Vincent (Vinny TV) Badalamenti and many of his Bonanno cohorts were indicted for racketeering earlier this year, largely due to secret recordings made by turncoat Hector Pagan, the ex-husband of “Mob Wives” star Rene Graziano.

Badalamenti’s lawyer pushed for a trial, but the government made a plea offer he couldn’t refuse.

Prosecutors will drop the racketeering and extortion charges, leaving Badalamenti to plead guilty to the nonviolent collection of an unlawful debt, lawyer Ronald Fischetti confirmed to the Daily News.

Pagan’s turn on the stand would have fueled this season’s drama on “Mob Wives.”

He appeared on the show last summer around the time he began wearing a wire, and characters have yakked about his treachery.

In the mother of all betrayals, Pagan even taped incriminating conversations with his father-in-law, capo Anthony (TG) Graziano, who is also expected to plead guilty tomorrow.

Badalamenti faces about two years in prison, far less than the 10 years he could have gotten if convicted after a trial. When he’s sprung, he can return to running his Brooklyn bagel shop.

The feds had already cut generous deals with other co-defendants, signaling they weren’t thrilled with the prospect of putting Pagan on the witness stand.

Pagan may have cut the best deal of all with the feds because he committed at least one murder — the fatal robbery of Luchese associate James Donovan — and may never have to play the role of rat.

Badalamenti’s decision not to fight the charges will also benefit his co-defendants — they will all earn additional time off on their sentencing guidelines because everyone listed in the indictment opted for a plea deal.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/bona...4#ixzz1rYpR8TCS

Seems like an intelligent guy. So much for the Gotti way and not taking deals. Doesn't look like he's cooperating as everybody is taking a deal. With that short of a sentence, can he still be looked to for the top spot?

Badalamenti will still be the official acting boss and if anything while he is away it will be probably a panel of capos running the family

This has come up before. In my opinion, the whole point of having an acting boss is a guy who is on the street, readily accessible, and able to run things day-to-day. Once a guy is in prison, he really can't function as an acting boss anymore. So it wouldn't surprise me if we see another guy become acting boss or, like you said, a panel - which is basically a few captains all being acting bosses.

Yes.
Acting boss is no rank within a Family. Most of the times it´s a captain who temporarily steps up to "act" as the boss when the official boss is away. As soon as the acting boss no longer can serve in this capacity, that is if he for example gets incarcerated, he is removed and replaced by another captain.
The same goes with acting captains who are still ranked as soldiers but temporarily steps up to head a crew when the official captain is away.

isnt danny leo tho still officialy acting boss ?

No. Leo is still in prison. Nobody can be an acting boss of a Family while in prison.
Unless Leo was made the official boss of the Genoveses, he probably holds a capo rank today.

yh your right about the acting boss thing but when you look at sites they still have him as acting boss which is strange!

Leo was the last known acting boss. Perhaps the charts are outdated and the creators of them don´t bother changing them.
Anyway, as I said, no Mafiamember can serve as acting boss while in prison. As Ivy said, the acting boss must be on the streets so he can handle the day to day business.

Simply not updating the charts that have Leo as acting boss would be understandable. But not anyone who would argue that Leo is still acting boss. Not just since he's been in prison, but also, since then other info came out that the family was being run by a rotating panel of top guys including Benny Eggs, Barney, Ernie Muscarella, and Larry Dentico. And the year after that, when Tino died, it was reported he had been on a 3 man panel overseeing the family - which probably included some of the other guys above.