Cosa Nostra News

The nearly three-month-long enterprise corruption trial of Nicholas "Nicky Mouth" Santora and three other Bonanno mobsters in Manhattan's State Supreme Court ended in a mistrial. So ordered Supreme Court Justice Mark Dwyer -- after one juror needed to be replaced and a second declared he couldn't continue. After eight days debating the case (and three years since the defendants were arrested) jurors couldn't reach a verdict regarding gambling, prescription drugs and loansharking charges. The alleged crimes supposedly occurred between March 2010 and February 2012. Joan Vollero, a spokeswoman for the Manhattan district attorney’s office, said there will be a retrial. The New York Times quoted her saying: “The inability of one juror to continue deliberating is not a reflection on the overall strength of the case.”

"Skinny" Santoro After days of deliberations--including a week-long break--the four Bonanno crime family mobsters on trial in Manhattan Supreme Court must be dreadfully tired, as well as filled with pins and needles. It's not that bad, however. Apparently, Anthony "Skinny" Santoro is providing some much-needed comic relief, intended or not. The jury last week asked the judge for advice on how to avoid a hung jury. Apparently, they requested help settling disputes. Justice Mark Dwyer practically begged on bent knee that they continue to deliberate. He pointedly reminded them of their duty as jurors. "I'm bound by law to hold you for a reasonable time to reach a verdict. I know this is a complex count you're considering." Dwyer also noted that, considering how complicated the case is, they hadn't been deliberating all that long at all.

At the Nicholas "Nicky Mouth" Santora trial, a former Bonanno capo offered testimony regarding his current mob status, noting that even if a made man flips and testifies for the government, he's still an inducted member of the Mafia. James Tartaglione Anyone who is officially made a “soldier” keeps that title for life no matter what. Even if he flips, he's still a member, only he's considered "shelved," said James "Big Louie" Tartaglione at Santora's enterprise corruption trial. Former Gambino capo Michael "Mikie Scars" DiLeonardo  said the same during his own testimony. "The family can not make another person to take your spot until you are dead," he told Cosa Nostra News. The 78-year-old key witness for the prosecution, " Big Louie" Tartaglione, debuted this past week in the enterprise corruption trial of Vito Badamo, Ernest Aiello, Anthony “Skinny” Santoro and “Nicky Mouth” Santora, nullifying my th...

Nicky Mouth's 2012 arrest by federal agents. What is most amazing about reputed capo/former underboss Nicholas "Nicky Mouth" Santora -- whose criminal roots go back to the 1960s and whose mob career included years in Greenpoint's Motion Lounge social club during the FBI's 1970s Donnie Brasco infiltration of the Bonanno crime family -- is the fact that he's still alive and a power in gangland. At least he was a power on the street until his 2012 arrest by federal agents in an unrelated case. In 2013, he copped to a federal extortion charge in Brooklyn and was sentenced to 20 (or 30, reports disagree) months in prison. He was serving that sentence in the Federal Correctional Institution in Loretto, Pa., when he was indicted in 2013 along with his alleged crew, which consisted of associates and soldiers, by Manhattan's DA, Cyrus Vance. ( See actual indictment , which is 158-pages long and can be saved as a PDF.) Santora didn't bite when he was ...

From Left, Vito Badamo, Anthony Santoro, Ernest Aiello, Nicholas Santora. REVISED: On the heels of longtime Bonanno mobster Vinny Asaro's stunning acquittal in Brooklyn last November , the Manhattan D.A.'s  prosecutors this past week rolled out the long-brewing enterprise corruption trial of Bonanno capo Nicholas “Nicky Mouth” Santora and three crew members in Manhattan Supreme Court. And it seems that Joseph "Big Joey" Massino is not the prosecution's star witness.  The former Bonanno family's official boss faced eight murder charges, not seven as was  originally reported. Nicky Santora, has held a leadership role since the 1970s. Who else would have the institutional knowledge to finally pin enough on Nicky Mouth to possibly put him away for the rest of his life (and also faced seven murder charges)? (The turncoats testifying in this trial haven't been clearly identified in press reports, for reasons unknown to me.) Massino doesn't s...

Are those stitches in Nicky Mouth Santora's head? The big Bonanno trial is expected to begin, eventually, but it continues to get ensnared by delays. The defendants were rounded up last July; they are alleged members of a crew headed by longtime Bonanno heavyweight brokester Nicholas "Nicky Mouth" Santora , who also is on trial. Santora became a power on the street back in the late 1970s, when FBI agent Joe Pistone used his Donnie Brasco cover to infiltrate the same crew Santora belonged to, under Dominic "Sonny Black" Napolitano.

More details were recently released from the criminal complaint filed against the Bonanno crew indicted on Wednesday . The Bonannos have sold more than 300,000 Viagra and Cialis pills, with prices ranging from $5 to $20 per pill, according to the criminal complaint filed Wednesday when nine Bonannos were indicted with enterprise corruption -- the state's version of RICO.