This Week In Gang Land April 21, 2011
By Jerry Capeci
Ex-Mafia Kingpin: G-Man Helped Me Beat The System




Ex-mob boss Joe Massino says he got some crucial help from the other side of the law.

During his historic testimony, the turncoat Mafia kingpin said that during his murder-filled life of crime he received several critical heads-up warnings from four law enforcement officials, including an FBI agent who was on the payroll of a Colombo crime family pal.

The unnamed FBI agent, Massino testified, alerted the up-and-coming Bonanno family capo in March of 1982 that he was about to be indicted for a triple murder. The tip allowed Massino to evade prosecution for five years. While in hiding, Massino was able to study the evidence the feds presented in court against other Bonanno cohorts, and ultimately use it to win a controversial acquittal at trial.

Massino also testified he had personally paid off two NYPD detectives in the 1960s to beat gambling and burglary charges. But he said he never met the agent. Still, the rotund, rock-sure gangster voiced no doubt that the corrupt G-man existed, and that he had supplied “reliable information” to the mob on other occasions.

“He never gave us a bad tip,” he testified, without elaborating.

The mobster was sick with “walking pneumonia (and) couldn’t move” when he learned about the upcoming indictment, Massino testified, but the following day he nonetheless “took off” and spent the next 28 months “on the lam” in the Pocono Mountains region of Pennsylvania.

It turned out to be a very worthwhile sojourn.

Later that year, two Bonanno mobsters were convicted of conspiring to kill three rival mob capos in 1981 and sentenced to 15 years. At his trial in 1987, aided by the delay and a preview of the government’s case, Massino was acquitted of racketeering charges that included the murders of the three capos.

Massino, who takes the stand today for his fifth and probably last day of his testimony against onetime acting Bonanno boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano, has thus far not identified the Colombo mobster who delivered the prison-saving information to him.

But Gang Land has learned that Massino’s secret wiseguy source was a tough Brooklyn gangster named Pasquale (Junior) Palermo, a brother of mobster Vincent (Vinny Ocean) Palermo – the onetime acting DeCavalcante boss who flipped 11 years ago after he was hit with racketeering and murder charges in a massive FBI onslaught that decimated the so-called real Sopranos.

Sources say Junior Palermo was a charter member of the infamous Bypass Gang who lived fast and hard until he suffered a heart attack and died in 1984, two years after he alerted Massino that he was about to be indicted.

It’s unclear exactly how Massino hooked up with Junior Palermo, but sources say the former Bonanno big was friendly with both Palermos – who hailed from the Brooklyn stomping grounds of former family consigliere Anthony Spero, who was “made” in 1977 on the same day as Massino.

Like Massino, the Palermos were involved in food-based enterprises. Vinny Ocean, as his mob nickname suggests, was in the sea food business, while Junior Palermo owned restaurants in New York and Puerto Rico, according to FBI reports obtained by Gang Land.

On July 28, 1978, the Palermo brothers teamed up to whack their uncle John Suarato soon after he had fired shots at their mother’s house and “thrown acid at their nieces and nephews who were playing outside of their mother’s home,” according to an FBI report.

Suarato, a Gambino family bookmaker, “was upset” that a recently deceased brother had left him “a small sum of money and a trailer,” and not the $100,000 he felt he deserved. He held his sister, the Palermo brothers’ mom, responsible, the FBI report states.

Junior Palermo obtained permission to whack Suarato from Colombo capo Charles (Moose) Panarella, who kept the contract secret from the Gambino crime family. When New Jersey mob boss John Riggi learned about it, he ordered Vinny Ocean to take part, saying “it would be embarrassing to the DeCavalcante family if (he) did not,” says the report.

“I knew him really well,” former Colombo capo Salvatore (Big Sal) Miciotta said of Junior Palermo.

“He was a tough guy, a low key guy who made a ton of money with the Bypass Gang,” said the former cooperator. The gang was a loose-knit crew of Colombo and Luchese gangsters whose name stemmed from their adept ability to bypass alarm systems at banks and jewelry stores. The crew carried out hundreds of burglaries in the 1970s and 1980s. In 1990, New York FBI boss Jim Fox credited them with netting an astounding $100 million in loot during a five-year spree from 1985 to 1990.

“I remember one day, he was broke, had no money, so I picked up the tab at a diner. The next week, he was driving a Mercedes,” said Miciotta. “That’s when I learned he was with the Bypass Gang.”

Headed by Luchese leaders Vittorio (Vic) Amuso and Anthony (Gaspipe) Casso, the gang killed one turncoat member and shot a second in the head after Casso’s own law enforcement sources – Mafia Cops Lou Eppolito and Steve Caracappa – tipped him that they were informers.

“He had a lot of moves and he was a pretty decent guy, but he made a U-turn” after he hooked up with Casso and the Bypass Gang, recalled Miciotta. “He was a big coke user and dropped dead of a heart attack while he was in his 40s,” said Big Sal, with a twinge of sadness in his voice.

Junior Palermo’s FBI connections were news to Miciotta, however, and sources say that Vinny Ocean has also disavowed any knowledge that his brother had an agent on his payroll when the feds raised the subject with him.

FBI spokesman Jim Margolin declined to answer any questions. In a statement, he said: “The FBI takes allegations of official corruption very seriously, and this claim by Mr. Massino’s Colombo family contact was thoroughly investigated when we learned of it. We uncovered no evidence to support it.”

But on the witness stand, Massino, a street-smart high-school dropout who gave the feds $7 million in cash and another $5 million in gold when he flipped in 2004, sounded thoroughly convinced that his “good friend” Junior Palermo had gotten his insights from a corrupt FBI agent.

“The FBI agent, any time he told us something, you take it to the bank,” said Massino. Or maybe even to a jewelry store.


Massino Recalls; Judge Forgot
The jury can easily tell that Joe Massino is proving to be a strong, pretty unflappable witness. What it won’t learn is that he’s got a better memory than even the judge.

The ex-mob boss proved that when he was asked on the stand about the secret session he had with Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis on the day he decided to become the first New York Mafia boss to defect to the government.

When asked about that day – July 30, 2004 – the burly gangster threw the defense for a loop when he insisted to attorney Richard Jasper that he had never asked for a “shadow counsel.” The term is legalese for an attorney appointed to represent a criminal who is secretly agreeing to cooperate with the government but who doesn’t want his official lawyer to know about the deal. In Massino’s case, he received one after he appeared before the judge in a sealed session that would enable him to work undercover for the feds.

But “shadow counsel”? Massino said he never used the term.

“I never used them words,” said a confident sounding Massino. He added that he was “positive” when Jasper pressed him about it.

Jasper and co-counsel George Goltzer were taken aback for good reason. Before trial, Garaufis had clearly told the defense team that Massino had uttered those exact words during the secret proceeding that the judge conducted that fateful day, a session whose transcript the judge refused to unseal.

Massino conceded that he had asked the judge to appoint a new lawyer for him without informing his then-defense team. But he insisted that he had never previously heard the term in connection with mobsters who decide to cooperate. Both defense attorneys quickly got their antennae up. The exact words weren’t such a big deal. But anytime a defense lawyer can show clearly that a witness is mistaken about something, it helps the defendant.

Outside the presence of the jury, Garaufis told the defense team that he would double check the record. But he stated that in his recollection of the event, Massino had stated: “I want you to appoint me shadow counsel.”

On Monday morning, before Massino took the stand for Day Four of his testimony, Garaufis announced that he had unsealed the official court transcript of July 30, 2004. A check by Gang Land discloses that Massino is absolutely right: He never used “them words.” But Garaufis did – no less than four times. That was enough to confuse the judge – but not the ex-gangster.

Benedetto Aloi; Dead At 75
Benedetto (Benny) Aloi, a Colombo powerhouse who once headed up the crime family’s labor operations and who was slammed with one of the heaviest prison terms ever meted out for a labor racketeering conviction, was laid to rest last week. He died April 7 of natural causes at age 75.

Convicted of extortion charges calling for 33 months behind bars in the so-called “Windows case” in 1991, Brooklyn Federal Judge Raymond Dearie hammered Aloi with a prison term of 16 1/2 years based on unproved allegations that he and wiseguys from three other families conspired to whack prosecution witnesses against them.

The unusually harsh sentence survived numerous appeals, and Aloi was released from a federal prison hospital in March of 2009. He remained under strict federal supervised release provisions that prohibited him from meeting with his codefendants or any member or associate of the Colombo family.

He seems to have laid low since then. Aloi, affectionately called “Rocky” by his Floral Park neighbors, was not overheard in any of the hundreds of tape recorded discussions obtained by FBI operatives, or seen meeting with any of his former mob cohorts.

“He was clean since he got out of prison,” said one law enforcement official, who couldn’t help adding, “as far as we know.”

It wasn’t always the case. In 1989, Aloi was a major player in the faction headed by upstart acting boss Victor (Little Vic) Orena. (left) That December, he accompanied Orena to a meeting with the Administration of the Luchese family to iron out problems the families had with concrete companies that each family controlled, according to former Luchese acting boss Alfonse (Little Al) D’Arco.

In 1991, “Benny was like out,” D’Arco testified at Orena’s 1992 murder trial. “He was under arrest” in the Windows case, in which members of four crime families were charged with bid-rigging and bribery charges in the awarding of some $40 million of replacement window contracts in New York City public housing.

According to court records, Aloi dutifully forked over $100 of his monthly Social Security payment of $1227 towards his $100,000 fine. The payments didn’t chip away too deeply at the debt. He died owing an estimated $98,000. It will be chalked up as a bad debt.

Aloi was buried at Holy Rood Cemetery in Westbury, following a two day wake at Park Funeral Chapel in Garden City. Survivors include his widow Marie, and his brother Vincent, a Colombo family capo.



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I knew there was an FBI agent there and if Massino is telling the truth, which I suspect he is, then that agent is probably the same one Anthony Casso used. The FBI is deathly afraid of informants like Massino. They managed to discredit Casso and throw away the key, but I don't think that's gonna be the case with Massino. He will see the sunlight one day. If he hasn't already. As sickening as that sounds.

one less standup colombo to take the reins....

i honestly believe that massino has been out. how else would he gain weight when seen at trial? commisary and prison food only goes sooooo far

You're probably right. He may be reporting to some halfway house or something, but I doubt it's more than that.

I wonder why more mobsters don't go on the lam? The cases are usually so stacked against them, it makes sense. Casso and Amuso did it, Massino did it. Alphonse Persico went on the lam for years.... Beats prison I would think.

alot of them dont get the "heads Up" about when an indictment comes down or just dont have the necessary resources (cash, places) to go on the lam.

They usually put LCN informants on military bases to segregate and protect them, but also because they get more freedom than a protected wing at a prison. The food is better too.

I bet that is where Big Joey has been.

As far as sentence reduction, I bet he still serves some time unless he testifies in cases other than Vinny G. He was convicted of 8 murders.

i really believe we will hear from big joey after he shit cans vinny. there gonna use him in any angle they can.

Not many people know this, but I have some inside scoop for you. Joe Massino is planning to run on the same ticket as Donald Trump in 2012.

maybe he writes a book? i hope so but doubt it

we havent seen any major mob guy write a book in a while

Didn't have a clue that Vinnie Ocean Palermo and his brother were from Brooklyn.What part of BK?Bath beach like Spero?

Who were the two Bonanno mobsters that was convicted of conspiring to kill three rival mob capos in 1981 and sentenced to 15 years?