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Operation Goodfellas Drug Probe Smashes Mob-Linked Ring

By Ed Scarpo
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David Antinuche, 51, and four alleged accomplices were busted following a 10-month narcotics probe in Queens and Brooklyn dubbed “Operation Goodfellas.”


Undercover officers made 19 purchases, buying a total of 300 grams of cocaine and 150 grams of heroin with a combined street value of $35,000. At least two batches of the heroin contained the synthetic opioid fentanyl.

The undercovers convinced Antinuche, an alleged Gambino associate, to introduce them to his suppliers, said Deputy Inspector Dominick D’Orazio, commanding officer of the NYPD’s Criminal Enterprise Investigative Section.

Antinuche’s rap sheet includes previous busts for attempted murder, robbery and drugs, officials said.

He and Robert Henricks, 42, were both arrested Tuesday at their home at 73-32 53rd Road in Maspeth, where cops seized several glassine envelopes of heroin and drug paraphernalia.

Three other men — Santiago Villarraga, 23; Samuel Rivera, 47; and Eliescer Matta Medina, 25 — were also busted, and two others…
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John Junior Gotti Was Back In Queens Court This Week But Not As A Defendant; He Was An Athletic Supporter

By Ed Scarpo
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You'd think a guy like John (Junior) Gotti  would've had enough of courtrooms to last five lifetimes.



Yet even though he's survived four racketeering trials, as he never fails to remind, each of which ended in a hung jury, and even though he was detained without bail for 30-something months, apparently Junior has not had enough.

The Dapper Don's son/former lead decision maker on a Gambino crime family ruling panel made an appearance at Queens court earlier this week, on Tuesday, to stand tall for an MMA fighter-turned-accused bank robber.

And the MMA fighter in question was NOT Junior's son, John Gotti III, who's also an MMA fighter.

Rather, the accused was Sergio DaSilva, who robbed an Astoria CitiBank in August 2017. Donning a ski mask, leaping over a three-foot glass partition, and allegedly threatening to shoot people, he dashed off with around $45,000. And was promptly arrested.







Cops reportedly identified DaSilva via the telltale fingerprints he left at t…
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Genovese Capo Angelo Prisco Wiretap Transcript: "I Hate Them F---ing Gangsters, They Single-Handedly Destroyed This Whole Life"

By Ed Scarpo
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EXPANDED; FINAL VERSION 
Shoutout to "John," thanks for the tip.... I appreciate ALL tips. Please keep em coming....




Following is a transcript of Genovese capo Angelo Prisco; the recording on which it is based was made on December 24, 2004.

Prisco apparently is relaxing and speaking candidly about a range of topics with his driver, Jeff Santini, who Prisco had considered a protege of sorts.

But don't think for a moment that the seemingly easygoing Prisco was slowing down. The man you hear casually shooting the breeze was, at that very time, helming a crew that engaged in violent home invasions during which victims were tied up and beaten inside their homes. Not even other wiseguys were off limits.  As the FBI later alleged: Prisco had told his crew members about his own personal robbery "policy" -- specifically, that they should "play dumb" if it turned out that they had robbed someone with organized crime ties.

Santini was driving Prisco to a meeting …
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In 1977 Wealthy Queens Businessman In Lottery Ticket Business Was Target Of "Well-Planned Execution"

By Ed Scarpo
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POSTSCRIPT ADDED AT END

One cold, snowy night in February 1977, Arthur Milgram, the owner of New York State's biggest lottery ticket vending company, drove to a luxury apartment building in Little Neck, Queens, where he'd been staying the past month.


He wasn't living in the swanky Monte Excelsior apartments. Rather, Milgram, who was separated from his wife, had subleased one of its apartments.

He was hiding out there in fear for his life.

Built in 1964, the 240-unit Monte Excelsior still stands. Among its amenities is an onsite parking lot -- and it was across that snow-covered unlighted parking lot that, on that February night, Milgram drove his rented 1977 Buick Electra 225 and parked in one of the spots.







At around 11:45 pm Milgram exited the car and headed towards the building's rear door. As he stepped onto the stretch of concrete between the parking lot and the building, a gunman opened fire.

Because there were no witnesses and his body wasn't found until ear…
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Was There Really An East Harlem Mafia-Linked Purple Gang, And Who Named Them?

By Ed Scarpo
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In November 2013, after a Luchese associate was murdered in the Bronx, a flurry of mainstream news stories referenced an obscure 1970s gang with reputed Mafia links.


The so-called Purple Gang, which roamed the South Bronx and Harlem, whacked and in most cases, dismembered its victims, a butcher's bill that was, in December 1977, pegged at 17, including police informants.

The gang was involved in the large‐scale distribution of "kilos" of heroin in Harlem and the Bronx; it was known to pull off "muscle” jobs for Mafia families, too.

Apparently the Purple Gang seized opportunity by stepping up when law enforcement cleared away existing narcotics trafficking rings such as the one that was part of the "French Connection" case. The Purple Gang also supposedly entered the contract killing business after it got into drug trafficking. Prior its members essentially cut their teeth as glorified coffee boys in decade-long apprenticeships.

Remember the "young Hen…
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Murdered Luchese Associate Was Beloved Father And Grandfather

By Ed Scarpo
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Sylvester (Sally Daz) Zottola, 71, was fatally shot five times while waiting on a cup of coffee at a McDonald’s drive thru in the Bronx on Thursday, October 4.



He was allegedly killed for a Joker Poker business. Five men have been nabbed to date for the murder, though the Albanian gangsters who are reputedly the true driving force behind the shooting have yet to be identified.

The alleged Luchese associate was laid to rest at St. Theresa Catholic Church in  the week after the shooting. Reportedly nearly 300 people attended his funeral.

A police source told the Daily News that Zottola was “a real old-fashioned mobster” reputedly  involved in gambling and loansharking.

Zottola's daughter, Debbie Zottola, shortly after her father's funeral, gave a heartfelt interview in which she said that she'd like to see her father remembrered in a "good and proper light."






In an effort to provide a more balanced view of the man, we want to share some of the sentiments she express…
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Killing Time, New ID True Crime Show, Accuses Bonanno Capo Of Snitching. He Didn't

By Ed Scarpo
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You dirty rat...

"Sleep No More," the debut episode of Killing Time, a new Investigation Discovery true crime series, created an incorrect -- and potentially dangerous -- impression about a Bonanno capo by depicting him as a snitch who made a deal against his criminal confederates.



It's the kind of impression that could get wiseguys killed.

The episode -- which aired on Tuesday, January 1, as part of a marathon of sneak peeks of pending ID programming -- centered on the ghastly, reprehensible murder in November 2004 of 52-year-old state Appellate Division court clerk Peter Porco in the upstate town of Bethlehem in Albany, New York.

Frank Porco, aka The Fireman, a capo in the Bonanno crime family, was questioned by police following the murder because he was a distant relative of the victim's -- and because he's Mafia.

"Frankie the Fireman Porco essentially became a snitch," an investigator says, inaccurately, during the Sleep No More episode. "He co…
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Guess Who's Watching You On Facebook

By Ed Scarpo
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On Facebook? Have pretty pics of you and your family, and all those wonderful things you own?



There's nothing wrong with that. Apparently tens of millions are doing it.





But if you're part of that presumably tiny sliver of the US population that owes money to certain individuals of the bent-nose type, you might want to think twice.

Some loansharks who want their money are turning to social media to find "deadbeats," Cosa Nostra News has learned.

"They forget," one source told us, speaking "very definitely" on background, chuckling as he spoke.

 "They disappear from all the bars and no one sees them, but they don't think twice about plastering their life on Facebook."




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