Cosa Nostra News

FINAL A Springfield, Mass., man with a last name that harkens back to local mob royalty has been nailed for assaulting a wire-wearing informant described in court papers as a debtor. Skyball's descendant? Anthony J. Scibelli of Springfield. Anthony J. Scibelli, 51, of Springfield, was arrested on July 2 and was held at the Wyatt Detention Facility in Rhode Island until his release to home confinement on Monday by a federal judge. He is a “ruthless mobster,” federal prosecutors say, who used violence to collect debts for a loan shark. Scibelli faces one charge for extortionate loan collection from an incident during which he allegedly assaulted a debtor while he wore a wire for the Massachusetts State Police and FBI. (The debtor had been wearing the wire since May.) Scibelli also allegedly used mace and a taser to collect debts, and spat on another man who reportedly died shortly after the incident, whatever that means (court documents don’t specify). He faces a ma...

Even though Joseph (Joe Cago) Valachi was made during the 1930-31 fighting of the Castellammarese War, his initiation ceremony seemingly was a warm and fuzzy affair that commenced only after the men in attendance had chowed down on home-cooked macaroni and drank red wine. Anthony (Bingy) Arillotta Valachi chronicled getting his button--in what is generally considered a “classic” initiation ritual--among a great many other  things in his bloated  autobiography The Real Deal , which can be viewed on Thomas Hunt's American Mafia website . Genovese turncoats and the Mafia's most solemn ceremony, the induction of new members, is the focus. As noted in a previous story on Anthony (Bingy) Arillotta, former boss of the Genovese crime family's Springfield crew, this month's GQ in the U.K. includes a cover story on the American Mafia in which Arillotta details his induction ceremony, during which he'd been asked to strip naked. Anthony Arillotta was the fourth ...

Ralph Santaniello punched C raig J. Morel    in the face during their initial meeting and told him he was dealing with the boss of the "Springfield Crew" which had "New York" behind it.... Two members of the Genovese crime family's Springfield crew, including its boss, face sentencing on Tuesday in federal court in Worcester. Ralph Santaniello, alleged boss of Springfield crew in August 2016. Giovanni (Johnny Cal) Calabrese and crew boss Ralph Santaniello were convicted following a wide-ranging probe into Mafia activity in western Massachusetts. They were among five area residents convicted for loansharking and the 2013 shakedown of tow company operator Craig J. Morel for $20,000. In testimony, Morel detailed how three generations of wiseguys with the Genovese crime family had sought since 2000 to extort his towing business, which was awarded with a lucrative municipal contract. Also turns out Joseph (Skinny Joey) Merlino wasn't the ...

Genovese crime family associate Gerald Daniele, 53, of Longmeadow, Mass., was sentenced Monday (March 12) in federal court in Worcester for loansharking. Genovese crime family associate Gerald Daniele, 53. U.S. District Court Judge Timothy S. Hillman sent him to prison for two years, followed by three years of supervised release. Daniele was arrested with four other men in the Genovese crime family's Springfield crew in 2016 for extorting legitimate and illegitimate businesses in western Massachusetts. He admitted that he gave loans and threatened an individual with physical violence while demanding repayment. The extortions took place during a six-month period in 2015.  In December 2017, Daniele pleaded guilty to one count of using extortion. Daniele is ordered by U.S. District Judge Timothy Hilllman to report to jail by May 7. Advertising Continuing story of John Alite... Last December, Daniele pleaded guilty to one count of using extor...

Richard Valentini, 52, of East Longmeadow, Mass., the one member of the Genovese crime family's notorious Springfield crew who flatly refused a plea agreement, wanted very much to go to trial and prove his innocence, as noted earlier this month . Each of the charges Valentini was convicted of carries up to 20 years in prison.  Well, he got part of his wish. He went to trial. However, the jury this past Monday didn't go for his version of events. Instead, they found him guilty of one count of conspiracy to interfere with commerce and one count of interference with commerce by threat or violence . Valentini was one of five reputed members of the Genovese crime family's " Springfield Crew " who were arrested in August as part of the " East Coast LCN Enterprise"  case that alleges wide-ranging Mafia-related activity in New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Florida ( and New Jersey, supposedly ). U.S. District Court Judge Timothy Hillman sche...

Five alleged members of the Genovese crime family's Springfield crew were arrested on Aug 4, 2016 as part of the " East Coast LCN Enterprise" case that alleges wide-ranging Mafia-related activity in New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and Florida ( and New Jersey ). From the five arrested only Richard Valentini is going to trial, as of now. Arrested were Ralph Santaniello, Giovanni (Johnny Cal) Calabrese, Gerald Daniele, Francesco (Frank aka Sammy Shark) Depergola, and Richard Valentini. In the time since, Santaniello, Calabrese, and Depergola have copped out in this case, while Depergola issued an intent to plead guilty.  As of November 28, only Valenti faces trial in this case, which the Feds describe as a Mafia extortion case. Valenti's attorney Jared Olanoff, however, is filing a "flurry of motions" to get a change of venue before the jury trial commences on Dec. 11 as scheduled, as Stephanie Barry reported on November 27 on ...

Museum with empty frame awaits stolen painting's return. Note:   I checked with Philly mob expert George Anastasia for confirmation: there's no historical knowledge regarding a New England branch of a Philadelphia mafia family. Robert Gentile, "an aging, unremarkable wiseguy from Hartford [Connecticut]" grew from obscurity into infamy after the widowed wife of a dead longtime associate told the FBI that Gentile was linked to a half-billion-dollar heist that occurred some 25 years ago. He'd been an off-the-radar mobster with a criminal history stretching back to the 1950s when he was suddenly publicly identified as the FBI's chief suspect in one of the world's most perplexing crimes, the "officially unsolved" robbery of Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in March of 1990. Experts to this day puzzle over why the robbers took certain artworks and not other more-valuable pieces. The Hartford Courier ran a story breaking the news ...

From the Providence Journal : BOSTON MOB: The Rise and Fall of the New England Mob and Its Most Notorious Killer,” by Marc Songini. St. Martin’s Press. 369 pages. $27.99. This is a colorful, even gleeful, account of murder, mayhem and corruption during the heyday of the New England Mafia. As you can imagine, despite the title, a lot of it is about Rhode Island and Raymond L.S. Patriarca, who ran the “Office,” as it was called , from the Coin-O-Matic office on Atwells Avenue in Providence. Three strains run through the book by Boston-area journalist Marc Songini. The fast-reading narrative begins and ends with the turbulent history of Joseph Barboza, or Joseph Barboza Baron after he changed his name. Of Portuguese descent and from New Bedford, he worked with many of the other figures in the book.