Staten Island Mafia Bigwigs Arrested on Drug Charges

Joseph Sclafani was among those
arrested in the Staten Island drug bust. 

Three heavyweight mobsters were arrested by the Feds for running three marijuana "grow houses" and a cocaine distribution ring on Staten Island, reports SILive.com.

"The arrests read like a Gambino crime family who’s-who list," the site reports. "Joseph Sclafani, 46, who in 1989 harbored a fugitive mobster who killed a DEA agent in the borough's Charleston section; Neil Lombardo, 55, who shot and wounded an informant’s brother; and Afrim Kupa, 38, a professional heist man with ties to Albanian organized crime and the Gambinos," all were picked up by law enforcement last night.

DEA agents raided a grow house on New Dorp Lane, seizing 150 marijuana plants, according to law enforcement sources. Kupa was arrested in his posh estate on Kensico Street in Richmond; federal agents found a kilo of cocaine -- "and the suspect wearing an ankle bracelet from a past arrest, sources said."




The marijuana operation lasted more than three years, federal authorities allege.

DEA agents first raided a grow house this past April — "a sophisticated, hydroponic lab run out of an auto repair garage at 3075 Veterans Rd. West — and arrested two men, Keith Levine, 33, of Eltingville, and Michael Arroyo, 37, of Sunnyside, according to prosecutors," reports SILive.com.

The bust was front-page headlines and spurred an accomplice to shut down a second grow house on Seguine Avenue.

Read complete article: Staten Island marijuana, cocaine bust lands 3 mob heavy-hitters in cuffs