Mobster Once Hot for Mob Wife Seeks Reduction

UPDATED
Gambino soldier Joseph Sclafani caught a break a year ago, when he successfully got his prison sentence reduced.

Joseph Sclafani, a Gambino soldier, is trying to catch another break by getting his drug trafficking sentence further reduced.
Joseph Sclafani 

Now, according to a motion filed Monday, Jan. 18, in Brooklyn federal court, he's trying to get more time whacked off his sentence, perhaps as much as three years. 

In January of 2015, Sclafani's original 2013 sentence of 15 years for drug trafficking was reduced by about a year. This was a result of changes made to sentencing guidelines. Now, however, his lawyer is arguing that Sclafani still was improperly sentenced last year and deserves more time off his sentence.


He and his lawyer sought approval for an order that will reduce his prison sentence.

UPDATE: Federal Judge John Gleeson issued an order directing the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York "to show cause on or before 3/28/2016, why the petition should not be granted."

The Johnson v. United States case is the peg on which Sclafani's motion hangs. His lawyer will argue that he was convicted for Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the 2nd Degree but that he shouldn't have been sentenced for this as a "crime of violence."

Timothy C. Parlatore, Sclafani's lawyer, filed a petition dated January 18, 2016 (Case 1:11-cr-00345-JG) in which he alleges that his client was improperly determined to be a career criminal and, as a result, was incorrectly sentenced.

"At Mr. Sclafani’s original sentencing hearing, held before this Court on August 16, 2013, the defense argued that Mr. Sclafani should not be sentenced as a career offender ... because his 1990 conviction for Criminal Possession of a Weapon in the 2nd Degree ... should not qualify as a crime of violence..."

The basic argument is that Sclafani should be re-sentenced to 121 to 151 months. He was re-sentenced on January 8, 2015, to 168 months.

If the motion is granted, Sclafani could be released one to three years earlier than his current release date, which is Oct. 20, 2023, according to the BOP website. He's currently at McKean FCI.

Today, Judge Gleeson will make the determination.

Sclafani was involved in one of the American Mafia's biggest headaches ever. Its name was Costabile "Gus" Farace, a demented mobster who murdered a DEA agent -- and eventually was himself killed by other mobsters in 1989. 

It was his role in the Farace case that caused Sclafani all the extra time he's trying to get knocked off his drug-trafficking sentence now.

The gangster got caught running drugs -- and lost this babe...


Sclafani, somehow stupid enough to be driving Farace when he was one of the most wanted men in the U.S., was seated beside him in a parked car when the guns started blazing. Sclafani, shot out of his shoes, was severly wounded and taken to the hospital, where he was arrested.

The hits didn't end there, however. Since Sclafani's father was not only a Gambino big shot but a member of John Gotti's inner circle, Gotti demanded the Bonanno family kill all the members of the hit team. He settled for one body.

There was at least one other slaying linked to Farace.

"The arrests read like a Gambino crime family who’s-who list," SILive.com reported. 

"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 one evening.

Sclafani was planning to marry former Mob Wives star Ramona Rizzo when his arrest interrupted things. Not to be deterred, the two attempted to still get married, though the Feds thwarted this effort by denying the mobster's motion for a furlough to visit his terminally ill father. Prosecutors objected saying that the furlough was an attempt for Sclafani to steal some time to marry Rizzo.

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