Did anyone check out the 5-part History Channel (US cable) documentary The World History of Organized Crime that ran last week? Part I: Sicily was fascinating. For instance, the boss of Sicilia at the turn of last century, Don Vito Cascio Ferro, was alleged to have uttered upon his death " life is... so beautiful... "

I watched a couple of the shows one night. I especially liked the parts about Tomasso Buscetta and his war with the Corleonesi. Very informative, and the scene in the courtroom with all those wiseguys in cages in the back yelling was classic.

Did you see anyone we know?

I'm sorry I missed that one. It sounded really good.

damn, im mad i missed that, is it going to re-air or something?

It will re-air if you don't watch it...of course I'm kidding.

Yeah....they'll show it again in a few months. When everybody (but us mafiaphiles) forgets that it was on this time.

Forgive me my fellow Gangster BB members, but I must amend my earlier post. Upon further review (after all I taped it hehe), it was not Don Vito Cascio Ferro who uttered the immortal line, it was Don Calogero Vizzini, the same Don Calo from Mario's 'The Sicilian.' His last words were "How beautiful life is."

Very similar to our own Don Vito's last words! (in the book, anyway).

Ya I know...

POSTED BY GLOBAL MAFIA 10/30/01-THIS STORY HAS BEEN E-MAILED TO YOU.

News desk > The Commission Rides Again

The Hierarchy of the New York Mafia met for the first time of the new century. After a decade of constant indictments and Federal RICO cases, the five families of New York have convened for the first time in over ten years.

The commission has ruled over the American Mafia since its inception in 1931 and has been the Mafia's power core, where every family in the USA is allowed a seat on the board of the directors. The commission's unofficial headquarters is New York Where the five families have remained the powers behind the throne.

The latest meeting met in the middle of last year and was spearheaded by Bonanno boss Joe Massino. The Bonanno's seat on the commission was suspended for many years during the seventies and eighties because they were heavily involved in heroin traffiking, which sent the family into turmoil particularly when Carmine Galante boss of the family in the seventies was killed, which brought about a huge power struggle between two factions vying for leadership of the clan.

These days the Bonanno crime family have emerged as a major force in New York. Under the leadership of Joe Massino who was released from prison in November 92 the Bonanno family has grown in size and influence and has allegedly made connections to clans working in Canada.

Last years meeting was put together by Massino who is the only official boss not currently serving time. Acting boss of the Gambino family Peter Gotti was also in attendance along with representatives for Carmine Persecio (jailed boss of the columbo clan), Vincent Gigante (Jailed boss of the Genovesse clan) and Vic Amuso (Jailed boss of the Lucchese clan), the representatives are not yet known as reports are sketchy. This latest event discussed a range of topics such as how to run business, more effectively and updating policy.

The meeting comes after a time of rebuilding and restructuring after a decade of onslaught from the justice department. All though the Mafia's power has diminished dramatically, the five families have been quietly rebuilding their power base. As some of the unions they once controlled went into trusteeship the Mafia has found a way to retake some of the local teamster unions that have been integral to the mobs power base for many many years. This latest meeting is evidence that the 5 families are quietly gaining momentum once again after a turbulent decade where many of the old godfathers have been incarcerated.


This is a new era for Cosa Nostra as the modern bosses must find new ways to take their families forward into the 21st century as they look to continue to take back what they lost during the dark days of the nineties.

Hey thanks again Ed for your valued input and knowledge. I havn't heard any of that yet until now.

The last paragraph intrigued me the most. The way I felt about La Cosa Nostra was that it was almost dead compared to other organized crime goings on. Ok it will linger around for a while but will never be the force it once was. Will the new bosses find a way to get back on top? Who knows. For all we know they could be more powerfull than we thought now with alot of hidden power. Or they could truly be worthless. Only time can tell.

They can certainly use some web-sites and internet portals to traffic stolen products or to initiate some new credit-card heists.....There you go JG, a real chance to become a "friend of the friends"...

News and Features about Organized Crime, Mafia and Cosa Nostra taken from National and Local News Sources. In an attempt to get you this type of coverage in a timely manner we can not be responsible for the content of the following material.
11-7-01
Feds: Bank Was Mob Family Biz.
By KATI CORNELL SMITH,
New York Post

November 7, 2001 -- A Mafia crew, headed by a reputed Bonanno family underboss, had the run of a Long Island bank where wiseguys raked in profits through illegal loans and even doled out a beating in the conference room, prosecutors charged.

Federal authorities arraigned seven defendants, including mob underboss Salvatore "the Chief" Vitale and former European American Bank branch manager Joseph Cuccio, charging them with extortion, money laundering and a host of other crimes.

The 35-count racketeering indictment was handed up at Central Islip federal court. With Cuccio working on the inside, the reputed mobsters set up shop at EAB's Melville branch where they met with their loan-sharking victims and had access to personal account information since 1995, a law-enforcement official said.

"This case is particularly significant because of the success this Bonanno crew had in infiltrating a major financial institution through the corruption of a single high-placed bank official," U.S. Attorney Alan Vinegrad said.

But the crew's idea of customer service was distinctly mob-style, according to the indictment. They used gun threats and baseball bats to extort payment and caned a "customer" in the bank's conference room in December 1998, according to the indictment.

The bank allegedly served as Vitale's headquarters from 1995 to last April for money laundering, collecting gambling debts, certifying false financial information and manipulating cash transaction records to avoid federal reporting requirements.

Prosecutors say the Bonanno crew also ran a gambling operation out of a second business: the Changing Times Bar and Grill in Farmingdale. The judge set bail for Vitale, 54, of Syosset, at $500,000 and ordered he await trial under home detention.

WHO SAID OC WAS DEAD

They're going to beat it, unless they plead guilty and then they'll probably get 5-10yrs. Bonnano is definitely back in volcano, not just by being the driving force of The Commission but with Massino not in prison they're stronger than ever.

I agree with that as long as they hold their ground,no rats,it looks like the bonanno's w/massino and the genovese w/the quiet dom could be one and two very soon,after gotti dies they will both have a say as to who runs the gambinos
and then you could see only 3 major families left
in the country,i would imagine that there will be
some blood-shed and a few less gottis around.

News and Features about Organized Crime, Mafia and La Cosa Nostra taken from National and Local News Sources. In an attempt to get you this type of coverage in a timely manner we can not be responsible for the content of the following material.
11-7-01
Colombo 'Boss' Loses Round.
By KATI CORNELL SMITH
New York Post

November 7, 2001 -- Reputed acting Colombo crime boss Alphonse "Allie Boy" Persico yesterday lost his bid to keep potentially incriminating evidence out of his upcoming federal racketeering trial.

Judge Reena Raggi ruled against Persico after his lawyers argued FBI agents performed an illegal search two years ago while raiding Persico's apartment.

FBI agents testified they made a mistake while executing the search warrant for a cell phone they believed would link Persico to the slaying of ex-underboss William Cutolo.

Alphonse Persico, who faces trial in January on charges of loan-sharking, extortion, securities fraud and drug dealing, is not charged with the Cutolo murder.

Raggi ruled the FBI appears to have made an honest mistake after hearing agents testify they found the phone within moments of entering the apartment - but didn't recognize it as the right device.

Continuing the hunt, they stumbled on hidden loan-sharking records and cash, prompting them to get a warrant that allowed them to seize the evidence, investigators said.

From: News and Views | Crime File |


Drugs Poison to Mob
Narcotics traffic opened door to feds

By MIKE CLAFFEY and MICHELE McPHEE
Daily News Staff Writers

In the upstate home of mobster Joseph Barbara, a watershed event for the Mafia was about to take place.

It was Nov. 14, 1957, and all the bosses and top luminaries of all five crime families were at Barbara's stately stone house in Apalachin. The Dapper Don of the '50s, Joseph Bonanno, was there. So were Vito Genovese and Carlo Gambino.

They were there to lay down an edict: La Cosa Nostra and drugs should never mix.

Eugene (Bubsie) Castelle
Nearly a half-century later, modern-day mobsters are ignoring their no-drugs decree — a trend that is slowly killing the Mafia.
Drug trafficking prosecutions are gutting four of the five major crime families in New York, sweeping scores of wiseguys off the streets.
Law enforcement — which for decades had been frustrated in attempts to nail even the most ruthless of mobsters — was suddenly making significant arrests, and drugs were the key.

Federal prosecutors have been "extremely successful in using the drug laws as a tool to break the back of these LCN [La Cosa Nostra] families," said Assistant U.S. Attorney Jim Walden, a veteran mob prosecutor. "As long as mobsters continue to peddle drugs openly on our streets, they make it easier for us to catch them."

Last week, reputed Luchese underboss, Eugene (Bubsie) Castelle and his alleged capo, Joseph (Joey Flowers) Tangorra, were busted along with five underlings and accused of running a cocaine network that flooded south Brooklyn with drugs.

Tangorra, 51, allegedly had been selling drugs since 1987 out of a flower shop on 13th Ave., earning him his nickname. Assistant U.S. Attorney William Gurin charged at a bail hearing last Thursday that Tangorra sold quantities of more than five kilos at a time, moving into a supervisory role in the Luchese family following the busts of other leaders. Castelle, 40, started off as a small-time pot dealer in the neighborhood but also moved quickly up through the Luchese ranks due to the vacancies created at the top by law enforcement action.


Joseph (Joey Flowers) Tangorra
Both men have been ordered held without bail.

The Mafia always had dabbled in the drug trade, but it didn't become a major player until the 1980s, experts said. The first major bust involving the mob and drugs was the infamous Pizza Connection case in the early 1980s that snared mobsters for dealing heroin out of city pizzerias.

Since then, virtually every don has quietly okayed drug dealing — as long as the bosses were getting a cut. "It's always been done with a wink and a nod," said a veteran mob lawyer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "It was always, "Don't do it, I don't want to know about it.' [Gambino boss Paul] Castellano just winked. [John (Dapper Don)] Gotti just winked."

The one exception is the Genovese family, which mostly has abided by Vincent (Chin) Gigante's old-school beliefs, law enforcement sources said.

And lately, the mob has deepened its ties to drugs, law enforcement sources said. To wit:

In 1998, alleged Gambino family soldier Frank Fapiano was busted along with 20 other low-level gangsters on federal drug charges. All pleaded guilty.
In 1999, alleged Colombo soldier Frank Guerra pleaded guilty to drug charges. Guerra allegedly dealt drugs for Theodore Persico Jr., a nephew of the former Colombo boss.
Last Wednesday, alleged Bonanno soldier Joe Chilli was among six reputed mobsters busted on drug conspiracy charges. Last year more than two dozen members of a Bonanno-affiliated organization, the Bath Avenue Crew, were arrested for drugs in a sweep that also snared capo Anthony Spero on murder conspiracy charges.
And arrests frequently lead to more arrests.

Because of the Rockefeller drug laws and stiff federal racketeering statutes, gangsters who deal drugs almost always are assured of hefty sentences behind bars — giving them an incentive to sing for the feds.

"When the hats drop on these guys for a drug sale charge, the first words out of their mouth is "Officer, what can I do for you?'" said one law enforcement source.


James (Froggy) Galione
A 1996 Luchese case — in which 38 Luchese gangsters and associates, including reputed soldier James (Froggy) Galione, pleaded guilty to drug charges — eventually helped authorities get enough evidence to nail Castelle and Tangorra last week.

In that case, two of Galione's underlings, Ronald (Messy Marvin) Moran and Michael (Mikey Flattop) DeRosa, began cooperating with the government, giving up enough information to lead to last week's indictment, sources said.

And when mobsters and drugs mix, it makes law enforcement's job easier. All of the Mafia drug crew takedowns over the last five years started on the streets with investigations by NYPD detectives, prosecutors said.

"Drugs are going to break the mob," said Special Agent Lewis Rice, who heads the Drug Enforcement Agency's New York office. "The NYPD, DEA and FBI is a strong and unstoppable team, and drugs are always going to help us bust down the mob," Rice said.

News and Features about Organized Crime, Mafia and La Cosa Nostra taken from National and Local News Sources. In an attempt to get you this type of coverage in a timely manner we can not be responsible for the content of the following material.
11-7-01
U.S. Arrests 7 in Mafia Use of a Bank on L.I.
November 7, 2001

By ALAN FEUER, New York Times

At first glance, the European American Bank on Broad Hollow Road in Melville, on Long Island, seemed like a typical suburban retail branch. There were teller windows and safe deposit boxes. Customers filed in and out, withdrawing and depositing their money.

Behind closed doors, however, things were different, the authorities said. Federal prosecutors say the bank was actually run by sophisticated gangsters who used it as a front for money-laundering, loan-sharking and collecting gambling debts.

Yesterday, seven people, including the No. 2 man in the Bonanno crime family, were charged with what amounted to turning an ordinary- looking bank branch into a one-stop shopping center for financial crimes. The Mafia's grip on the bank was apparently so strong that a former branch manager was indicted.

Even as patrons signed deposit slips at the teller windows, the men were working in back, the prosecutors said, laundering illegal money and going over numbers debts. Once, the government said, a man who was late on his illicit payments was taken to the branch's conference room and beaten with a cane.

"The use of this E.A.B. branch as a bank for the mob afforded the Vitale crew a legitimate place to carry out their illegitimate business," said Alan Vinegrad, the United States attorney in Brooklyn, where the indictment was returned. Mr. Vinegrad said that E.A.B. and Citibank, which recently acquired E.A.B., had cooperated fully in the case.

The "Vitale crew" was named for Salvatore Vitale, 54, who was described as the underboss, or second in command, of the Bonanno family. In 1987, Mr. Vitale was acquitted in another racketeering case, in which he was accused of hijacking a pair of trucks.

Mr. Vitale's arrest dealt a significant blow to the Bonannos, who are still reeling from the conviction of their consigliere, or No. 3 man, in April. The consigliere, Anthony Spero, was found guilty of ordering the deaths of three men, including a petty thief who unwittingly broke into his daughter's house in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn.

The only member of the Bonanno family's top administration still at large is Joseph C. Massino, the government says. Mr. Massino, who has long been described as the family's boss, is Mr. Vitale's brother-in-law. He was also acquitted in the 1987 racketeering case.

Although Mr. Massino has been a target of law enforcement officers since he was found not guilty 14 years ago, he has always said he was a legitimate businessman. He says he works as a consultant for King Caterers, a company in Farmingdale, N.Y., that furnishes sandwiches, hot dishes and snacks for street vendors.

"I don't believe there is such a thing as the Mafia," Mr. Massino said in an interview last year. "A bunch of Italian guys go out to eat, and they say it's Mafia."

Yesterday's indictment asserted that Mr. Vitale's crew did not operate only out of the bank in Melville. They were also accused of using a Farmingdale restaurant called the Changing Times Bar and Grill to divide up their gambling profits and betting slips.

Six other men, five from Long Island and one from Queens, were charged in the indictment with Mr. Vitale: Joseph Cuccio, 51, the former bank manager, of Lake Ronkonkoma; Thomas Driscoll, 42, of North Massapequa; George Fillipone, 56, of Farmingdale; Lawrence Neder, 56, of Old Bethpage; Daniel Talia, 35, of West Babylon, and Vincent DeCongilio, 49, of Ozone Park.

They each face a maximum of 20 years in prison on the racketeering charges. Mr. Cuccio faces an additional 30 years on a bank fraud charge.

WHITEY BULGER WAS ONE OF MEANEST BASTARDS EVER TO
RUN A CREW,IRISH GANGSTER OUT OF BOSTON,READ THE BOOK BLACK MASS {EXCELLENT READ}

11/12/01
Reputed Mobster's Brother Charged.

November/2001

By ROBERT O'NEILL, Associated Press Writer

BOSTON (AP) - John Bulger, brother of reputed mobster James ``Whitey'' Bulger, was charged Friday with perjury and obstruction of justice, accused of lying to federal grand juries investigating his fugitive brother.

According to the indictment, Bulger told a grand jury in 1998 he had not heard from his brother directly or indirectly since James Bulger's 1995 disappearance.

The fugitive had contacted John Bulger through an intermediary in 1996, prosecutors said. Bulger also told a grand jury in 1996 that he did not know that his brother had a safe deposit box. The Indictment claims he made a payment in 1996 for a box in Clearwater, Fla., opened by James Bulgerfour years earlier.

Bulger was charged with two counts each of perjury and obstruction of justice and released on$10,000 bond after a brief appearance before a federal magistrate Friday.

``John Bulger always has loved his brother and will continue to love his brother,'' said his attorney,
Charles Gormley.

``This is an accusation by the government and that's it.'' Bulger, 63, is scheduled to be arraigned Tuesday. He faces a maximum sentence of five years in prison on each of the perjury charges and10 years on the obstruction charges, as well as a maximum $250,000 fine for each.

Gormley said Bulger would plead innocent. James Bulger helped run Somerville's Winter Hill Gang from the 1970s through the mid-1990s. Wanted in the murders of 19 people, he has been missing since January 1995 and is now on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list with a $1 million reward for information leading to his capture.

Investigators have tried to keep track of any attempts by James Bulger to contact John Bulger or his other brother, William Bulger, who is president of the University of Massachusetts. FBI agentsconfiscated the hard drive from John Bulger's courthouse computer in April, shortly after he retire from his longtime position as Boston Juvenile Court Clerk-Magistrate, according to published reports.

At the time, Gormley denied his client had had any contact with James Bulger since 1995.

Feds dig for mob victims in Hopkinton
by Maggie Mulvihill, Jonathan Wells and Franci Richardson

Wednesday, November 14, 2001

Armed with information from former New England Mafia boss Francis P. ``Cadillac Frank'' Salemme, authorities began digging yesterday in Hopkinton for the bodies of two brothers allegedly murdered by Salemme and gangster Stephen ``the Rifleman'' Flemmi, 34 years ago.

Salemme, 67, who has been cooperating in the ongoing probe of Boston crime lord James J. ``Whitey'' Bulger, Flemmi and their allies in local law enforcement, told authorities precisely where the bodies of Edward J. ``Wimpy'' Bennett and his brother, Walter Bennett, were buried, sources said.

Salemme, who is imprisoned in Kentucky, was flown to Boston last week and led investigators to the rifle range at the Hopkinton Sportsman's Association and indicated where the Bennetts' remains could be found, sources said.

``He pointed the spot right out,'' said one law enforcement source. At the end of the day yesterday, authorities had not recovered any human remains, but they are expected to resume digging early this morning.

Massachusetts State Police Maj. Thomas Foley, who is heading the criminal investigation into the Bulger gang, refused to say yesterday who investigators were looking for in the ground at the Hopkinton hunting club.

``This is a long period of time we're dealing with. It's based on long-term memory,'' Foley said, confirming only that the excavation was expected to yield at least one organized crime murder victim. ``We wouldn't start a dig like this unless we were confident we'd be successful.''

Before they were murdered in 1967, Edward and Walter Bennett, along with brother William Bennett, controlled a large gaming and loan-sharking enterprise in Dorchester and Roxbury.

Salemme and Flemmi carried out the Bennett murders to curry favor with New England Mafia bosses who felt the Bennett brothers were operating on their turf, officials have said.

According to court documents, Edward Bennett was killed in January 1967 and Walter was slain the following April. Neither body was ever found.

William Bennett, who had pledged to avenge his brothers' murders, was found dead in a snowbank in Dorchester eight months later.

If the Bennett brothers' remains are found, it will bring to eight the number of alleged Bulger and Flemmi murder victims dug out of Massachusetts soil.

Since January 2000 authorities have unearthed six bodies from makeshift graves in Dorchester and Quincy. Investigators were directed to those burial grounds by Bulger's longtime lieutenant, Kevin Weeks, who is in prison and cooperating.

Flemmi, 67, is currently charged with 10 murders, but the Bennett brothers are not among them. In May, as part of a plea bargain, federal prosecutors withdrew those murder charges and Flemmi pleaded guilty to multiple racketeering charges. In August, he was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison but has yet to go on trial for the other murders.

It was unclear yesterday what benefit Salemme might derive by directing authorities to the Hopkinton grave site, considering the federal government dismissed charges that he participated in the Bennett murders when he pleaded guilty in 1999 to racketeering and other crimes.

Sources said Salemme's chief motivation was revenge against Flemmi, his longtime criminal partner, who secretly served for decades as an informant for the Boston FBI, providing incriminating evidence against local Mafia figures.

One law enforcement source said yesterday Salemme ``wants more time off'' the three years that remain on his federal sentence.

Salemme's decision to lead authorities to a Mob graveyard could be just a warm-up for much more damaging testimony he is expected to give. In March, the Herald reported that Salemme has agreed to testify against Flemmi, Bulger and the two former FBI agents who handled them as informants - John J. Connolly Jr. and H. Paul Rico.

According to a sealed federal court filing examined by the Herald, Salemme has already provided information to the grand jury on Connolly, Flemmi and Bulger. In addition, Salemme has agreed to provide ``significant additional assistance'' in the federal government's ongoing probe of Rico's dealings with Flemmi as an informant and the agent's possible involvement in a 1981 murder.

Connolly is awaiting trial on an array of criminal charges involving his extraordinarily close relationship with Bulger and Flemmi.

Bulger, who is charged with killing 19 people, disappeared in 1995 shortly before he was indicted. He has been a fugitive since and is now ranked second on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List - behind Osama bin Laden - with a $1 million reward offered for information leading to his capture.

In December, 1999, Salemme told a federal grand jury that Connolly, the former FBI agent, tipped Flemmi to the impending 1995 indictment against Salemme, Flemmi and Bulger. Flemmi was arrested in downtown Boston as he prepared to flee, and Salemme and Bulger went on the lam.

11-19-01
Brothers Plead Guilty in Mob Payoffs for Construction Businesses.

By ELISSA GOOTMAN


CENTRAL ISLIP, N.Y., Nov. 14 A pair of brothers prominent in the construction industry pleaded guilty today to charges that they paid off organized crime figures in exchange for labor peace.

The brothers, Joseph and Fred Scalamandre, operate several Long Island construction companies and have worked on a number of publicly financed projects. They pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy before Judge Jacob Mishler of Federal District Court here and were released on $100,000 bonds.

Between 1991 and 1998, the Scalamandres conspired to pay members of the Luchese organized crime family about $40,000 a year to influence construction trade unions, according to the indictment.

In addition, the Scalamandres were charged with tax evasion. The authorities said the brothers directed their subcontractors to create nearly $1 million worth of false invoices. The subcontractors were paid with company checks, which they converted to cash they returned to the Scalamandres. The invoices were charged to public and private contracts, prosecutors said, and the cash they generated was not reported on federal income tax returns.

As part of their plea agreement, the Scalamandre brothers agreed to pay the federal government $5 million in restitution.

They face up to 10 years in prison and are scheduled for sentencing on Jan. 18.

The Scalamandres' lawyers issued a statement saying the Scalamandres had made payments to mob figures only under duress. The brothers "dreaded having to make the payments and did so unwillingly over a several year period," the statement said. "The tax charge simply reflects the way in which Joe and Fred generated the cash needed to make these payments."

Also today, prosecutors announced guilty pleas entered by two subcontractors who acknowledged they had acted as fronts for the Scalamandres on contracts governed by the Minority Business Enterprise Program.

"The Scalamandres defrauded government agencies, evaded taxes, paid off organized crime leaders for `labor peace' and perverted a worthy minority-business program, all for their own selfish ends," Alan Vinegrad, the United States attorney in Brooklyn, said in a statement.

Regarding the '57 Apalachin meeting: I had read that the purpose was to put the official blessing on drug trafficking (as well as to officially anoint Vito Genovese, the principal drug-dealing advocate, as Capo di tutti Cappi.).
Regarding Joey Massino: there's a great undercover photo of him in the book, "Donnie Brasco." Hard to miss him anywhere.

12/01 Philadelphia Mob Boss Sentenced.
Monday 2:45 PM ET

By MICHAEL RUBINKAM, Associated Press Writer

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Philadelphia mob boss Joseph ``Skinny Joey'' Merlino was sentenced Monday to 14 years in prison for racketeering.

``Ain't bad,'' Merlino, 39, told family members sitting in the gallery. ``Nine's better than the death penalty.''

Merlino's lawyer said his client would do only about nine years with credit for time served.

While a jury acquitted Merlino of the most serious charges against him last July, he and six co-defendants were convicted of a series of racketeering offenses including extortion and illegal gambling.

The sentence handed out by U.S. District Judge Herbert Hutton was less than what prosecutors had asked for. Merlino was also ordered to repay almost $338,000 and was fined $25,000.

Prosecutors had asked the judge to go above federal sentencing guidelines and give Merlino up to 24 years behind bars. The guidelines called for 11 to 14 years.

Merlino and six others found guilty after a racketeering trial that featured testimony from several top mob informants, including former mob boss Ralph Natale. Natale testified that he set loose Merlino and the others to commit murder and mayhem in Philadelphia and New Jersey.

But his story did not always jibe with the accounts of three other mobsters, and the jury acquitted Merlino of three murders, two attempted murders and murder conspiracy.

Prosecutors decided before the trial not to seek the death penalty.

Merlino succeeded Natale as boss of the Philadelphia-South Jersey mob after Natale was jailed in 1998.

Merlino's co-defendants will be sentenced over the next several days.

The trial was the government's third major assault on the Philadelphia mob in 13 years. A 1988 case led to the downfall of mob boss Nicodemo ``Little Nicky'' Scarfo and 15 associates, while a 1994 indictment put mob boss John Stanfa away for five consecutive life sentences.

With Merlino in prison, ``other people have assumed leadership positions,'' prosecutor David E. Fritchey said. ``But with each one of these prosecutions, they suffer blows of attrition. We're down to the fourth string.''

While Stanfa tried to avoid the spotlight, that was not the case for Merlino. His dark good looks, lavish spending, flashy clothes and beautiful wife made him a celebrity in the city. He threw an annual Christmas party for the homeless, with turkeys, Santa and presents for children.