Cosa Nostra News

Former Colombo acting boss Joel (Joe Waverly) Cacace, 78, who ordered a string of gangland hits and was suspected of ordering the murder of an NYPD cop back in the day, is currently residing in a Brooklyn halfway house located near where the battle-scarred veteran mobster came up, on Waverly Avenue in Fort Greene, according to Gang Land News , which today reported that he was released from a federal prison in Kentucky last month. Joe Waverley once fought off three would-be kidnappers, one to the death. Joe Waverly will depart the halfway house this May, according to the BOP, when he completes the 20-year prison sentence handed down to him for copping to four gangland slayings, including the 1987 mistaken identity murder of administrative law judge George Aronwald--who was the father of a former federal prosecutor who the late Colombo family kingpin Carmine (Junior) Persico condemned to death. In 2004, the onetime consiglieri, facing a sweeping indictment and devastating turnc...

Tommy Shots Gioeli, a one-time street boss of the Colombo crime family, recently hit the jackpot, winning a $250,000 settlement for an August 2013 accident that "knee-capped" him while playing ping-pong behind bars. Tommy Shots nabbed in 2008. But the Feds have other ideas -- they want that money to help cover the $360,000 court-ordered restitution Gioeli owes to a bank and a fur store.  So now Tommy Shots -- about five years away from his release date -- is battling it out with Federal prosecutors, as  Larry McShane reports for The Daily News . Gioeli, acting as his own attorney, filed an 83-page court document from his Connecticut prison cell arguing that the money is his. He wants the restitution order amended based on his limited “level of contribution” to the two heists. Gioeli, citing case law, argued it was “both noteworthy and relevant” that a 2012 ruling found the federal courts lacked the “inherent power” to impose payback as part of...

UPDATED Thomas (Tommy Shots) Gioeli was once an acting boss in the Colombo crime family. For many years he supervised a violent crew of killers. These days, well, you probably couldn't imagine.... Tommy Shots during his arrest for a whole lotta heavy gangland crimes..... During the 1991-93 Colombo war , Gioeli, a staunch ally of of Carmine Persico, alleged imprisoned boss, t hough Junior denies this , and his shooters played a key role in the street battles against the larger Vittorio "Little Vic" Orena faction . After the war, Gioeli rose steadily in the ranks, in large measure due to his ability to serve as a steady link between the Colombo family's two once-warring factions. He was trusted by mobsters who belonged to both the Perisco loyalists and the Orena rebels. His acting capo was Paul “Paulie Guns” Bevacqua , onetime Orena loyalist. Another former member of the rebel faction was  Joel “Joe Waverly” Cacace , who paid Gioeli an historical ...

A vicious capo in the Colombo crime family who was one of two hit men responsible for killing an off-duty cop got something he probably never gave: mercy. Dino Calabro Dino (Big Dino) Calabro, 59, was sentenced to 11 years on Friday when he appeared in Brooklyn's Federal district court "shrunken and remorseful... begging a judge for mercy," as The New York Times reported. His pleas were answered when the judge, noting the importance of Calabro's assistance as a witness, sentenced him to 11 years rather than life. Not everyone would agree with the judge's proclamation about Big Dino, whose testimony never brought to justice the Colombo mobsters allegedly responsible for the cold-blooded slaying of an off-duty NYPD officer. Calabro was arrested in 2008 so he still has two more years to serve before disappearing into the witness protection program . (And if it's less than two years due to "good behavior," does it really matter?) ...

High-ranking mobster Thomas "Tommy Shots" Gioeli lived on Long Island until his 2012 conviction in Brooklyn federal court. He is probably one of the most powerful mobsters to have lived full-time on Long Island. (Powerful meaning his role as the Colombo crime family's muscle.) A young Dino Calabro, left, with Tommy Shots. He and his wife Maureen raised a family in a modest house in Farmingdale. Tommy Shots' one-time right-hand man, Dino Calabro, moved next door with his family as well. The former Colombo capo later testified against Tommy Shots, who taught him how to kill while also dazzling him with the "glamour" of the Mafia lifestyle, as "Big Dino" said on the stand. "I wanted what (Gioeli) had,” Calabro told Assistant U.S. Attorney James Gatta. “He had the power to get me in the family.” “Tommy Shots” Gioeli was a staunch Persico ally during the 1991–93 war. He ran a crew of shooters who played a key role in the str...

Little Dino Seems juries are having trouble with turncoat testimony, though judges seem to be taking up some of the law enforcement slack when they can by basically ignoring jurors' verdicts and imposing the most draconian sentences permissible. Take the recent case of  Dino "Little Dino" Saracino , 41. The gangster must be feeling a range of emotions as he readies himself for transport to a federal prison where he will spend a half century, 50 years, for racketeering and conspiracy charges. Now consider this: That is actually more than double the 18 years given to his former boss, Thomas "Tommy Shots" Gioeli . Interestingly, the same judge doled out both sentences. It seems a bit unfair considering Little Dino was carrying out orders. Yes, he knew he'd earn his button, and as a former gangster once in the same position  put it: "I wanted the order. I wanted to be completely in and trusted , and to believe that he liked me that much,...

Little Dino Dino "Little Dino" Saracino , 41, who won an acquittal for the 1997 murder of off-duty  police officer Ralph Dols in a split verdict, was sentenced to 50 years for racketeering. The Colombo soldier allegedly won his button by carrying out the Dols hit for then-acting boss  Joel "Joe Waverly" Cacace , who wanted Dols hit for marrying his ex-wife. “It seems like what he mainly wanted out of life was to be a member of the Mafia and he attained that goal,” said Federal Judge Brian Cogan. Both Cacace and former acting boss Thomas "Tommy Shots" Gioeli also were cleared, by separate juries, of the Dols slay. Last week, Gioeli was sentenced in Brooklyn federal court to 18 years in prison for racketeering and murder conspiracy. In a split verdict that stunned many trial watchers , Gioeli and Saracino were acquitted in 2012 of several murders that could have sent them away for life. In addition to Dols, the two  were also clear...

The U.S. attorney general ordered prosecutors to seek the death penalty against mobster Joel ( Joe Waverly ) Cacace for ordering the murder of an NYPD cop, officials said in a New York Daily News  article . Cacace, 69, a former acting boss for the Colombo crime family, is charged with putting a contract on Officer Ralph Dols after the cop married the mobster's ex-wife. Joe Waverly survived two attempts  on his life. Dols was off duty when he was gunned down outside his home in Brockton in 1997.

The Mafia once was synonymous with the toughest criminal organization in the world, powerful enough to sink its tentacles into so many aspects of American capitalism, it was deemed a second, shadow government. But that was then, and this is now. The mob is certainly not as powerful and rich as it once was, but one thing it's still good at is finding ingenious ways to earn. Dino Calabro (left) and Ralph Scopo Jr., who dreamed up the scam of controlling the "coffee boys." One of the more clever and profitable revenue generators was dreamed up by members of the Colombo crime family, according to published reports, who apparently realized that literally nothing is too small to steal -- not even coffee .