FBI Agent Says Gambino Captain Wanted Him To Become Made Man

NEW YORK -- As an undercover FBI agent, Joaquin Garcia infiltrated the mob with remarkable ability. He befriended an ailing Gambino captain, dined in style and was introduced to wiseguys.

Garcia testified Tuesday that he was so persuasive that the captain -- on trial in Manhattan court -- recommended he become a made man.

"We had discussions that he was going to propose me to La Cosa Nostra," Garcia testified at the racketeering trial of Gregory DePalma. "So he was going to put my name on the list."

Prosecutors played a Nov. 5, 2004, tape of conversations between Garcia and DePalma in a car and a restaurant in which the agent said he was grateful for the chance to join the family. "I'm honored for that," Garcia said. "You know that I will never let you down."

The tape is among 5,000 hours of conversations the government says were recorded when Garcia started working for DePalma shortly after the Gambino captain finished a prison sentence for racketeering in February 2003. Garcia said he posed as Jack Falcone, or Big Jack, until 2005.

DePalma was arrested again before Garcia could be inducted into the family.

For a second day, Garcia testified in a courtroom ordered closed to protect his identity. Reporters listened in a nearby room to an audio feed of the proceedings.

The trial is unusual because Garcia lived in the belly of the mob for so long and because the defendant is an ailing 74-year-old man who prosecutors claim has tried to exaggerate his illnesses to win leniency from judges.

The government played a tape of a conversation in which DePalma, who sits in court with an oxygen tube in his nose and a blanket over his lap, could be heard boasting of his acting ability after he was sentenced in 1999.

"The judge said, 'I never sentenced a man in my life that was this sick,"' DePalma is heard saying on the tapes. "He says, 'How can I give this man time?"'

DePalma said he wore an oxygen mask and did not shave for a week before the court appearance, according to the tape.

"Oh, I got the global award, the Academy," he said. "I got the Emmy."

Garcia testified there was some truth to DePalma's frailty.

"Greg DePalma's an ill man," Garcia told the jury. "Make no mistake about that. He's had a series of heart attacks, diabetes. He has half a lung."

The agent also called DePalma a "strong man."

He added: "I used to joke with him, 'You're just like a cockroach. You could survive a nuclear attack."'

On Monday, jurors listened to secretly taped conversations in which DePalma boasted of his power and prestige after he was freed from prison. DePalma's defense lawyer told the jury last week that his client was a great exaggerator trying to be something he was not.

-AP

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It looks like we may have another "Donnie Brasco" type of a book/movie coming out.


Don Cardi