Chris Petti, San Diego Mob Guy
Bill Schenley
Photo: http://gaming.nv.gov/images/petti_thumb.jpg
FROM: The San Diego Union-Tribune ~
By Phillip J. LaVelle
San Diego mob figure Chris Petti, whose attempts to earn money for the
Chicago mob ultimately led to convictions of several underworld bosses
as well as financier Richard Silberman, has died, the FBI confirmed
yesterday.
A close associate of slain Las Vegas rackets boss Anthony "Tony the
Ant" Spilotro, Petti had lived in Chula Vista and reportedly had been
in poor health.
Born Christopher George Poulos in Cicero, Ill., Petti died on New
Year's Eve, according to an obituary notice published Friday. He was
78.
Petti was long regarded as a low-level hood - a law enforcement
official once suggested his lack of respect made him the Rodney
Dangerfield of the mob - but his expletive-laced phone conversations,
picked up in FBI recordings, led to major federal convictions here.
According to the FBI, Petti sought to fill the void created by the
1986 murder of Spilotro, who was beaten to death, along with younger
brother, Michael, and buried in an Indiana cornfield.
Petti was in frequent contact with Spilotro's bosses in Chicago and
was directed to collect money still on Spilotro's books and to scout
out earning opportunities.
According to court records, his extortions included threats to chop
off one man's legs; in another, he told a victim that he owed the mob
$87,000 and needed to come under Petti's wing.
"When you eat alone, sometimes you choke," Petti threateningly told
the man, according to court records.
One potentially major venture caught his bosses' attention: a scheme
to infiltrate a casino planned in North County by the Rincon tribe.
During that late 1980s investigation, Silberman unexpectedly showed up
in FBI surveillance, plotting with Petti and an undercover FBI agent
to launder hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Silberman had been a top aide to former Gov. Edmund G. "Jerry" Brown
Jr. and was married to then-county Supervisor Susan Golding. Silberman
was convicted in 1990 and sent to prison. He and Golding divorced, and
she went on to serve two terms as San Diego mayor.
With the Silberman trial out of the way, federal prosecutors returned
to the Rincon case. Top leaders of the Chicago mob were indicted in
1992; two were convicted the next year and sentenced to three years in
prison.
Petti pleaded guilty that year in a deal calling for 9½ years in
prison but no requirement to testify against his bosses.
When U.S. District Judge William B. Enright asked if Petti was indeed
guilty, he at first replied: "I guess so."
Petti gave a firmer answer when pressed by the judge.
He also served a concurrent term in prison for a Las Vegas federal
drug offense.
Petti's lawyer in the San Diego case was famed criminal-defense
attorney Oscar Goodman, known for his defense of mobsters such as
Spilotro. Today, he is mayor of Las Vegas. The prosecutor was Carol
Lam, now U.S. attorney for San Diego and Imperial counties.
Retired FBI agent Charlie Walker, who had tracked Petti for years,
said the Rincon case revealed Petti's ambitions.
"A lot of law enforcement thought he was a two-bit punk, that he
didn't have any connections, but he did," Walker said yesterday.
Walker said he gained "a bit of grudging respect" for Petti for his
refusal to turn informant.
"You hate to say you respect anyone (in the mob)," said Walker, "but
the one thing about Chris . . . when we arrested him, he had plenty of
opportunities to cooperate, if he wanted to, but he steadfastly
refused.
"He went to his grave with a lot of secrets. I would have loved to
have talked to him," said Walker, now assistant federal security
director for the San Diego branch of the Transportation Security
Administration.
No doubt it would have been an interesting story.
Petti was listed in Nevada's "black book" of people - many of them mob
figures - banned from Silver State casinos.
In a confidential, 1975 intelligence report, the California Department
of Justice listed Petti as a "close associate" of San Diego mob boss
Frank "The Bomp" Bompensiero, who would be gunned down,
gangland-style, in 1977 while walking to his home in Pacific Beach
from a nearby pay phone.
It was later learned that Bompensiero had been an FBI informant.
Infamous mob turncoat Aladena "Jimmy the Weasel" Fratianno claimed
during San Diego federal court testimony in 1982 that Petti and
Spilotro had plotted to kill him.
Fratianno, who collaborated on an autobiography titled, "The Last
Mafioso," went on to earn millions of dollars testifying against Mafia
figures. He died in 1993.
Petti co-founded P&T Construction in the 1970s; at one time the
company was believed to be involved in aluminum-siding schemes
involving Bonanno crime-family figures.
He had multiple arrests - for theft, extortion, gambling and other
crimes - but few convictions. Among them: a 1970s conviction for a
baseball-bat assault in La Jolla.