Cosa Nostra News

Federal authorities busted five people in New Jersey and Florida for being part of a national conspiracy to scam Federal healthcare programs out of $93 million. ( Some would say this case could potentially make a Brooklyn Federal Judge look somewhat foolish, as is explained below .) Thomas Farese, aka Tom Mix, alleged Colombo consiglieri. The US Attorney's office also announced that two people connected to the scheme (which involved orthotic braces) in New Jersey already pleaded guilty. The charges the five men are currently facing—health care fraud and conspiracy to commit health care fraud—are punishable by a maximum potential penalty of 10 years in prison and a $250,000 fine, among other things. Neither the US Attorney nor the Justice Department included reference to the Colombo crime family, even though two of the five men are known to have longtime ties to the New York crime family . Thomas Farese (aka Tom Mix), 78—the alleged former consiglieri and street boss for the Colombo...

T rue crime Mafia shows on mainstream TV usually focus on the same handful of figures: John Gotti, Al Capone, etc..... Recently we realized some could construe that we've also been focusing on mobsters with mainstream appeal, with tons of blog space devoted to two of the most high-profile mobsters in US history: John Gotti and Salvatore (Sammy the Bull) Gravano. Our coverage included publishing transcripts related to the former Gambino boss and underboss.  Albert (Chinky) Facchiano As we've previously noted (somewhere), our motive is only to publish historical information that previously wasn't accessible online. Nevertheless, we decided to balance the scales somewhat by focusing on the following unknown wiseguy.... Before we leave the topic, the two series: 1992 Testimony of Gambino Underboss Salvatore (Sammy the Bull) Gravano The Ravenite Transcripts: John Gotti's Secret Meetings In Mrs. Cirelli's Apartment Real-deal wiseguys are ready to kill for their mob family...

Providence, Rhode Island was once Raymond Loreda Salvatore Patriarca's fiefdom, and now it's where violent confrontations between outlaw motorcycle clubs are on the up. Santo Trafficante Jr., once among the most powerful Mafia bosses in the United States. controlled organized criminal operations in Florida, where the Outlaws, or the American Outlaw Association, is the dominant outlaw motorcycle club. Last year in Newark, New Jersey, a Hells Angels associate was brutally beaten with baseball bats in what law enforcement believed was part of a broader attempt by the Pagans Motorcycle Club to expand its territory into northern New Jersey. Outlaw MC violence was spotlighted this summer in Las Vegas, when an undercover agent who infiltrated a Las Vegas chapter of the Vagos Motorcycle Club for two years offered a glimpse into the underworld of outlaw bikers as he testified during a federal racketeering trial. “If the leadership decides to declare war,” Agostino Bra...

Gerard (Skeevy) Bellafiore, 49, a former Colombo associate known for illicitly withdrawing -- robbing -- millions from banks , died this past July under "somewhat" mysterious circumstances, as per Gang Land News. Skeevy does his thing. "Cardiopulmonary arrest" was the recorded cause of death, as per a court filing by Miami Federal Detention Center warden Gio Ramirez. Bellafiore died July 5 at Jackson Memorial Hospital, where he'd been transferred several months prior to his death, for undisclosed ailments. But, as Gang Land reports, eight weeks later, the Miami Medical Examiner's Office still has yet to release an official explanation regarding what specifically caused Bellafiore's death. In July 016, Bellafiore was wearing a mask and hefting a customized gaff hook--a large handled hook used to gut fish-- while attempting to rob a night-deposit box at Chase Bank on U-S 1 in Jensen Beach. A Martin County sheriff’s deputy arrived in re...

In April 1998, five Luchese associates decided to rob their way to Florida. They drove from Brooklyn, committing robberies along the way. Robert A. Pasquince is serving a life sentence for murder. Anthony Lanza, Robert Pasquince, and the brothers Anthony and Charles DiGirolamo were in the car. The fifth man has never been identified, as per our research. (We include links to all source material.) They made it all the way to the Sunshine State before killing anyone. That happened in Pinellas County, Florida, outside Tampa Bay, on April 23 of that year. As per a local news report , Pasquince (Robert is his first name, the paper either got that wrong or Pasquince pulled a ruse and it initially worked) and an accomplice walked into a Subway sandwich shop around lunchtime and placed an order. Ann Marie Sherman, 24, and one other person were working at the time. Sherman was supposed to have been off, but a coworker had called in sick so she'd volunteered to work the shift...

It's not very often a governor, his cabinet, three federal prosecutors and other government officials go to bat for a former drug addicted mob associate -- but that is exactly what happened yesterday. Murder scene Kevin Bonner, for the past decade, had been serving 24 years of a state sentence at an undisclosed federal prison. And yesterday his sentence was commuted, thanks to the Feds, as well as the state of Florida. Bonner has put away, or on trial, a multitude of Gambino wiseguys. A former Woodhaven resident, he has testified about mob mayhem and murder going back to the early 1980s. Gov. Rick Scott and Cabinet "ended the long prison sentence of a robber-turned-mob informant whose testimony prosecutors say helped break up the Gambino crime family in Florida and New York," according to the Miami Herald. Also lending their support via letters were three federal prosecutors -- Tampa U.S. Attorney A. Lee Bentley III, New York U.S. Attorney Preet Bhar...

Jerry Chilli*   died last Saturday from throat cancer; a private funeral mass will be held in Florida, which is where the Bonanno capo spent the greater part of his adult life. (Especially after New Jersey law enforcement officials, in no uncertain terms, told him to depart New Jersey.) Jerry Chilli, at the top of the game. Chilli was a stone-cold gangster who shunned the limelight, who never "talked" and never took a step back, even when he knew there could be a steep price to pay. He was a tough guy with his fists who made his bones with a gun. The younger of two brothers (his brother moved up faster and earned more), Jerry Chilli served lots of prison time, which some chalk up to his involvement with the notorious Costabile "Gus" Farace, the mob associate who executed an undercover federal agent on Staten Island in 1989. (A 1991 made-for-television film about Farace is available on DVD featuring several actors who today are high profile, including Sa...

The "massive" federal racketeering conspiracy indictment that broke this past Thursday named 46 mobsters, of which 39 were arrested. Compound lotion kingpin Joey Merlino.... Among the arrested was Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino, whom the Feds say still runs the Philadelphia mob family, which was also named in the indictment (though not a single mobster was yanked off the streets of Philly by the Feds during the "East Coast LCN Enterprise" bust, as it's been dubbed.) The U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York unveiled the indictment, which depicts a seemingly immense, sprawling collaboration involving four of New York's Five Families: the Gambino, Genovese, Luchese, and Bonannos -- and Philadelphia.

A Martin County Sheriff's Deputy with 13 years of experience shot a bank burglar early last Monday morning in Florida. The robber, Gerard Bellafiore, 47, has more experience at his job -- robbing banks using an improvised fish hook -- than the deputy does enforcing the law. He's been robbing banks since around the early 1980s, working back then with former mobsters such as Chris Paciello and James "Jimmy" Calandra. Surveillance photos of Bellafiore at work before being shot multiple times. A Mafia member told Cosa Nostra News that Bellafiore at one time had ties to a Colombo mobster. "He was associated through default to (Vincent) Chikie DeMartino," said the source, noting that DeMartino spells his nickname that way, not  as others spell it . DeMartino, he added, "was one of the leading shooters on the (Vittorio "Little Vic") Orena side," as well as "one of the most dangerous guys on the street during the Colombo w...

Things are going from bad to worse for Philadelphia's alleged mob boss. First, his fine-dining establishment in Boca was put on the block a mere months following its grand opening. Then Skinny Joey was linked to a group of c onvicted criminals and individuals with organized crime ties  who "dumped tons of contaminated soil and construction debris near residential areas and waterways in New Jersey in recent years." Joey Merlino may no longer be able to indulge in gambling in Pennsylvania following an altercation. Now the Pennsylvania State Gaming Control Board no longer wants Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino strutting into any of the state's casinos -- as George Anastasia reported last week for Philly Voice -- so t hey filed a petition to prohibit Merlino from doing just that .

Michael Blutrich grew up in Brooklyn, New York. After graduating from Georgetown in 1974, he opened his own firm on Park Avenue, Blutrich, Falcone & Miller. The current Governor of New York, Andrew M. Cuomo, was a partner in the firm (1985-1988). Michael Blutrich was featured on 60 Minutes The news show will revisit the Scores case. In the 1990s, using stolen money, Blutrich started investing in restaurants and nightclubs including the strip club Scores . At some point, he started working in cahoots with Steve Sergio, described by 60 Minutes as a Gambino associate. (See script of the episode, An Unlikely Informant  here.)