Meldish was a stone cold killer so maybe Crea jr thinked that its better to don't risk his life and pass the contract to his crew members.
I'd rather do the hit myself than have two guys do the hit and get caught then rat me out, or rat me out 10-20 years from now when they are facing heavy time for other stuff.
Except neither Londonio or Caldwell have ratted anyone out (yet). So throw that argument out the window.
I have news for you. If you order an underling to commit a hit, you can generally get away with a 15 year plea deal, due to the fact that you're guilty of "murder conspiracy" as opposed to first-degree murder or whatever. If you commit the murder yourself, and pull the trigger, you're looking at life.
And what the fuck do you except Madonna or Crea Sr. to do? The way the hit went down implies that Meldish wasn't looking to attend any meetings, so they whacked him outside his house. Madonna & Crea Sr. are geriatrics, their reflexes aren't so slow, their eyesight probably isn't too good, their hand-eye coordination probably isn't too good. This isn't an unfair assumption, due to their age. What's the bet that, due to all of this, Meldish would be able to get the better of them and return him? Or, even if they do whack him, what's the bet that, due to all of the reasons I outlined, they'll do something wrong and accidentally leave evidence? Then you've got a life sentence for first-degree murder-in-aid-of-racketeering.
If you ORDER a hit, and it passes through the rigors of a chain-of-command, you've insulated yourself to point where it is very hard for the feds to make a case against you. I don't know exactly how they pinched Madonna and Crea Sr., but I can tell you that it's not their fault the hit was solved so quickly. Caldwell and Londonio fucked up big time, they used their own fucking car and hung around the scene for ages before and after, they managed to tie Caldwell's cellphone records to the scene, they caught Londonio a week beforein a car with a shit-ton of guns. Those two are dimwits, and they are the reason the hit was solved. That was most likely an oversight on Crea Jr.'s part. It doesn't indicate a "fumbling administration."
[quote=MightyDR]Sounds like standard chain-of-command for a mob hit. I wouldn't think 82 year old Madonna would pull the trigger himself. Or any boss for that matter. I can't remember too much of the details from the case. How did they all get indicted for the hit?
Basciano allegedly went trigger man himself for his own hits as Acting boss because he couldn't trust anyone.