August 11, 2016 This Week in Gang Land
By Jerry Capeci

Undercover G-Man Stings The Powerful Genovese Crime Family

Shades of Joe Pistone and Big Jack Garcia! A young FBI agent has joined the ranks of those undercover icons by accomplishing the unthinkable: He has stung the Ivy League of organized crime in New York — the powerful, sophisticated Genovese crime family. Posing as a wannabe wiseguy for three plus years, the G-man got close enough to two family capos to tape-record numerous discussions about the crime family's rackets.

Law enforcement sources spoke with awe of the undercover work that led to last week's blockbuster indictment. Among the 46 mobsters and associates of five families snared was Philadelphia mob boss Joseph (Skinny Joey) Merlino and three Genovese capos. They said the results of the agent's secret mission were so good, and linked so many defendants to so many crimes, that it took four months longer for prosecutors to obtain racketeering charges than they had originally planned.

Authorities say the agent — and a mob turncoat who vouched for the G-man — recorded "thousands of hours" of discussions to snare the defendants in a laundry list of criminal activity. The racketeering case alleges illegal gun sales, arson, assault, extortion, credit card scams and health care fraud in addition to the mob's moneymaking staples of bookmaking and loansharking.

"What the undercover did was amazing," said one law enforcement official. "He started out driving, waiting in the car outside while the wiseguys went inside. Then he progressed where he was invited inside to meetings at restaurants and other places. And the FBI had an agent sitting at the table wearing a recorder as capos and other made guys were discussing their business."

Despite his growing acceptance, the ever-wary Genovese leadership still remained out of sight. Sources say the agent "wasn't close" to being proposed for membership, and never met family boss Liborio (Barney) Bellomo, or other top family leaders. But he was a "trusted" associate who drove his immediate mob superiors to the lower Manhattan social club on Market Street run by Peter (Petey Red) DiChiara, whom Gang Land disclosed in February to be a "street boss" for the closeted Bellomo.

Merlino, 54, and two capos, Pasquale (Patsy) Parrello, 72, the owner of Pasquale's Rigoletto in the Bronx, and Eugene (Rooster) O'Nofrio, a convicted cocaine dealer based in Connecticut, are among a handful of arrested defendants who are behind bars as dangers to the community.

According to a court filing, the agent, identified in the indictment as UC-1, served as a driver for O'Nofrio. He "captured hundreds of hours of inculpatory conversations involving O'Nofrio and others" during the last two years of the sting as the 74-year-old capo oversaw the family's Springfield Massachusetts crew as well as one that operated on Mulberry Street.

All told, the sting operation lasted about four and a half years, according to a prosecution memo that sought to detain 11 of the 41 defendants who were arrested in the tri-state area, in Springfield, and in Florida, where Merlino remains behind bars. Two defendants, including Genovese capo Conrad Ianniello, were already in prison on other charges. Three are fugitives.

The investigation began in late 2011, after a longtime Parrello cohort flipped after being jammed up by the Westchester District Attorney's office for an assault when a wiretap picked up two mob associates discussing a baseball bat beating of a panhandler who had bothered women customers of Patsy's restaurant. Gang Land is withholding his name — for now.

Court papers say the cooperating witness, CW-1, and a now deceased gangster, Ronald (The Beast) Mastrovincenzo had assaulted the victim in the Bronx in a plot with defendants Israel (Buddy) Torres and Anthony (Anthony Boy) Zinzi. On tape, The Beast was heard explaining the assault to Zinzi: "Remember the old days in the neighborhood when we used to play baseball? A ball game like that was done."

It's unclear if the CW was implicated in other crimes before he turned, or the specifics of his deal, but on December 16, 2011, according to court papers, he tape recorded his first conversation for the feds. In it, he got Vinci to say that he "might have to throw bricks through windows" or have to "break knee caps" to resolve a dispute Parrello was having with a rival gambler whose game was undercutting one that Patsy controlled in Yonkers.

Sometime later, the cooperating witness,introduced the undercover agent around as being "with" Parrello, the Bronx mobster who hosted sitdowns and other business meetings at the popular restaurant he has owned for decades on Arthur Avenue in the Belmont section.

The sting moved into high gear in 2014, sources say, the same year O'Nofrio told the agent that he would soon be promoted to acting capo and take over Ianniello's two crews because the nephew of the late Genovese powerhouse Matthew (Matty The Horse) Ianniello had been convicted of unrelated racketeering charges and would begin a three year prison stretch.

That's when Rooster O'Nofrio "claimed" the UC, and when Parello delegated the CW to work closely with Merlino, especially with lucrative health care scams involving Medicare and other insurance plans that cover prescription pain creams that Skinny Joey was running in Florida, where he moved following his release from federal prison in 2011.

"You're with me now, you work for me now," O'Nofrio told the agent, according to one source.

Taking over Ianniello's crew was a big deal for Rooster, a Connecticut-based soldier. He was finally moving into the big time, he boasted, telling the agent that Ianniello had told him: "I'm going to put you at the helm. I want you acting (crew) boss. I already told them, I want you," according to a court filing.

"I had to go meet certain guys," O'Nofrio told the UC, according to the papers, "First time I met them. They said he (Ianniello) wants you."

On the tapes, O'Nofrio is heard implicating himself in selling untaxed cigarettes, extortion, and loansharking in talks with the agent and with CW-1, court papers say. "Again and again," the papers claim, Rooster "used threats of violence to collect debts." In snippets that cite him as a dangerous felon, he is quoted as saying that a cohort should "crack the guy's fucking head" to get the money he was owed, and that O'Nofrio would hit another deadbeat "in the head with a fucking hammer" if he didn't come across with the cash.

Sources say that from 2014 until March of this year, when the covert aspect of the investigation ended, the agent was meeting "almost every day with Rooster." This made life difficult not only for the UC but also for the under-staffed three-person FBI squad — agents William Inzerillo and -------, along with NYPD detective Andrew Macelhinney — that was running him. The team was with the G-Man all day and night, whenever he was "working," as one source put it.

None of them would talk about the undercover aspect of the case. The FBI, which consistently declines to discuss its reduction of resources against the mob, has also been mum. But several current and former agents who have been involved in other undercover operations agreed to speak anonymously. Most marveled at the accomplishments, of both the UC, and the short-staffed FBI squad that backed him up.

"There's a tremendous amount of grunt work," said one source who has been involved in several stings. "The undercover never goes out without backup, never goes somewhere alone. There are always agents on the outside; they're recording him, their surveilling him, they're there just in case (of a problem.)"

"The FBI hasn't had a guy in like that in more than 10 years," said one source, referring to Jack Garcia the Cuban-born superstar agent who infiltrated the Gambino family in 2003 and helped send more than 30 mobsters and associates to prison, including the family's hierarchy at the time.

"Informers and CWs do it, but anytime you are able to put a good guy at the same table with gangsters, it's a great accomplishment," said Garcia. "This is a law enforcement officer who walked among them, someone without criminal baggage. It's a great investigative technique. It gets information about their crimes. It shows weakness on their part, and it demoralizes the hell out of them, no matter how much their lawyers badmouth it in court."

"When you have a law enforcement officer pose as a bad guy, and convince these so-called wiseguys he's really one of them — and he infiltrates their so-called secret criminal society — it's a feather in the cap of law enforcement," said Garcia. "It's one for the good guys."

It Could Have Been Worse For Skinny Joey, But Not Much

He got hit with racketeering charges anyway, but Philadelphia mob boss Joseph (Skinny Joey) Merlino was spared four months of possibly incriminating conversations about gambling, mob sitdowns and alleged health care scams last year because of an agreement between federal prosecutors in New York and the City of Brotherly Love, Gang Land has learned.

Federal law enforcement sources in both cities say that the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office initially asked its Philadelphia counterparts not to charge Merlino with violating his strict post-prison restrictions because jailing him would prevent a cooperating witness from taping conversations with him. But eventually it okayed the move by the Philadelphia U.S. Attorney's office to charge him.

As it turned out, Skinny Joey got four months behind bars, but served about 10 days less, when the Third Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the violation on technical gcolumn865.htmrounds, and he was released in early April of last year.

Merlino's three-year supervised release began on September 7, 2011. Less than three months before his restrictions would end, on June 18, 2014, he was spotted meeting Philadelphia wiseguy Joseph Ciacaglini. When FBI agents in New York learned about it, they informed prosecutors, who asked their counterparts to hold off because of their probe.

Initially they did. Eventually, though, according to several sources, New York prosecutor Andrea Kramer acquiesced in the move by the feds in Philly to charge Merlino with VOSR, and they did on August 26, of 2014. But since the official violation wasn't filed until after his supervision ended on September 6, 2014 the appeals court tossed it.

Sources say that months earlier, Genovese capo Patsy Parello released the wired up CW to work closely with Merlino in Florida.

Neither U.S. Attorney's office responded to a request for comment. Merlino, who has spent about half of his life behind bars, wise-cracked to Gang Land last year that his Court of Appeals victory means that next time the feds nail him, "They owe me four months."

But the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's Office decision to go along with the feds in Philadelphia was no laughing matter to several members of the multi-faceted New York probe that included the NYPD, the FBI, and the Westchester District Attorney's office. Said one: "If they had pushed, Philadelphia would have gone along, and we would have had a stronger case."

Sources say Merlino, who relocated to the Sunshine State when he got out of prison, was tape recorded several times by the task force's CW both in New York and in Florida, where he owns Merlino's, an Italian restaurant in Boca Raton, where he lives.

In court papers, prosecutors say that the "overwhelming proof of his guilt" that they have acquired against him in their probe, combined with his previous convictions for racketeering, show that Merlino is a danger to the community and is a threat to flee, and should be detained permanently until trial.

His detention hearing is slated to take place tomorrow in Fort Lauderdale Federal Court.

Preet's Prosecutors Go 0 For 5 In First Round Of Detention Hearings

The prosecution team that Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara assembled for last week's major mob indictment hasn't done very well convincing federal judges in New York and Florida to lock up eleven defendants that prosecutors have deemed to be dangers to the community. As a matter of fact, they have done very badly.

The only gangsters who have been held without bail so far are six mobsters and associates who agreed to detention at their first appearance before a judge in order to come up with a suitable bail package to offer at a later proceeding when his attorney argues for bail.

Judges granted bail for all five defendants who have had bail hearings up until now, rejecting contentions by prosecutors Amanda Kramer, Abigail Kurlan, Jessica Lonergan, Jonathan Rebold, and Lauren Abinanti that they were dangers to the community, or threats to flee before trial.

The quintet includes Alex Conigliaro, 56, of Staten Island, a Genovese soldier charged with two extortions and gambling charges. Magistrate Judge Frank Maas ordered a $1 million personal recognizance bond, co-signed by three relatives and secured by $250,000 in property. Judges also set bail for mob associates Mitchell (Mitch) Fusco, 52, of Yonkers, Harold (Harry) Thomas, 71, and Anthony (Anthony Boy) Zinzi, 73, of the Bronx, and Pasquale (Pat C) Capolongo, of West Palm Beach.

Two defendants — Zinzi, who is at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, and Capolongo, who is detained in Florida — are still behind bars, however. Their releases were stayed when prosecutors filed notice they are appealing those findings to the Manhattan Federal Court Judge assigned to the case, Richard Sullivan.

New York Magistrate Judge Barbara Moses set a personal recognizance bond of $200,000 for Zinzi, a longtime Parrello associate with prior convictions for homicide and drug dealing. He is charged with arson, assault, three extortions, loansharking, and the illegal sale of weapons.

West Palm Beach Magistrate Judge William Matthewman set a $2 million personal recognizance bond co-signed by three relatives for Capolongo, 67, a longtime bookmaker-loanshark with a dozen prior convictions who is also currently waiting trial on racketeering charges in Florida.

In arguing for his detention, prosecutors contended that a 2014 conversation recorded by the Queens District Attorney's office showed that Pat C had placed a tracking device on the CW's car over a $30,000 debt and that he then encouraged a cohort to whack the CW if he had any trouble with him — without ever knowing that he was a cooperating witness.

"If Capolongo was willing to go to such lengths to collect a gambling debt, the government has grave concerns about what he would do in retaliation for cooperating with the government," the prosecutors stated in asking Judge Sullivan to overturn the Florida judge's decision.

In an 11-page ruling, Matthewman criticized the government for having a stand-in FBI agent from Miami with no first-hand knowledge of the case testify about what a New York agent had told him about Capolongo and the CW, and found that "the government's evidence that Capolongo constitutes a danger to CW-I and CW-1's family was not substantial or compelling."

In addition to Zinzi and Capolongo, the other defendants still behind bars pending bail hearings are: Genovese soldier Ralph Balsamo, 46, of the Bronx, mob associates Israel (Buddy) Torres, 66, of Queens, and Mark (Stymie) Maiuzzo, 37, of Scarsdale, and the trio charged as the leaders of the racketeering conspiracy, Patsy Parrello, Skinny Joey Merlino and Rooster O'Norfio.

Thanks Dom

already a thread on this article

http://www.gangsterbb.net/threads/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Number=890412#Post890412

Probaly just combine the thread.

Thanks domwoods74. It's been taken down in the other thread.

Also, correct me if I just read this wrong, but it says that the CW was assigned by Parrello to work with Joey Merlino. So it wasn't so much that the Feds were out to get him, but he fell into their lap?

Lol Dom posted it first.

Can't wait for this undercover agent's book. lol