Cops use chatroom to lure slay suspect
Jason...@virgin.net
Cops use chatroom to lure slay suspect
by Andrea Estes
Saturday, July 3, 1999
When a Wakefield man suspected of murder entered an Internet chatroom,
he expected to find romance - not the police.
But Stephen DiCenso, who had been ruled unfit to stand trial two years
ago, showed he was smart enough by carrying on a 10-month cyberaffair
with a coed named ``Julie Miller,'' authorities say.
DiCenso, 24, regaled Miller - who turned out to be ATF agent John A.
Mercer - with tales of his criminal escapades including his alleged
involvement in the 1996 dismemberment of 19-year-old Aislin Silva of
Medford.
DiCenso was arrested yesterday on a variety of gun charges, but
investigators say if they can prove he is competent, they will seek to
charge him and several others with Silva's murder.
According to a court affidavit filed by Mercer, he wooed his online
lover, whom he believed was a University of New Hampshire student, with
talk of drugs, guns and Silva's slaying.
He made $100,000 as a ``big-time'' Mafia ``weed dealer,'' he bragged,
and had bought a house and a Jaguar with his ``ill-gotten gains.''
Last April, Durham, N.H., police officer Michelle Foster, pretending to
be Julie, even met DiCenso in a Portsmouth, N.H. restaurant, the
affidavit says.
He showed her newspaper stories about Silva's disappearance and the
remains found in the dumpster.
But yesterday DiCenso appeared humbler, standing before a federal
magistrate charged with possessing a gun with an erased serial number,
having a machine gun and having unregistered firearms.
Authorities believe Silva's murder was ordered by gangsters who were
angry she had told police and ATF agents about a stash of stolen guns
DiCenso had stored at her apartment.
Silva's body was never located, but her tissue, blood and hair were dug
out of a Danvers dumpster on Nov. 14, 1996.
DiCenso, who suffered brain damage from a heroin overdose the day after
police found Silva's remains, yesterday communicated through a handheld
computer, and wobbled as he walked.
He looked confused.
``I want to go home,'' said DiCenso when asked by Magistrate Judge
Lawrence Cohen if he needed a lawyer. ``I haven't done crap in three
years.''
The judge responded, ``You're not going home today.''
In the affidavit filed yesterday, Mercer also reveals new, grisly
details about Silva's murder.
It started with Paul DeCologero, an alleged mobster, drug kingpin and
one-time health club owner, who allegedly ordered his nephew, Paul,
DiCenso and a third man, an unnamed informant, to rob a marijuana
dealer, Jeffrey North, court papers stated.
After breaking into North's Woburn apartment, the men stole two safes,
firearms, hand grenades, ammunition and 20 pounds of marijuana,
according to the informant.
The guns were stashed at Silva's apartment. But she talked too much and
tipped off police, the affidavit says.
On Nov. 6, a worried Silva showed up at a friend's house in a white
stretch limo with gold trim. DiCenso was taking her to New York City for
the weekend, she said.
A potentially key witness, Derek Capozzi, told the rest of the story to
an informant, the affidavit said.
A few days before Silva's murder, a recently released criminal named
Kevin Meuse tried to kill Silva by forcing her to overdose on heroin,
Capozzi was reported as saying.
On the day of the murder, Capozzi received a ``99'' page from Meuse - a
sign to meet him at the 99 Restaurant, where he was given an address.
When Capozzi got to the house, he ``observed DiCenso walk out of the
bathroom, covered with blood carrying a hacksaw and gloves,'' the
affidavit said.
Either Meuse or DiCenso handed him the saw and gloves and said ``get to
work,'' the affidavit says.
Capozzi cut Silva into approximately 15 pieces, placing the body parts
in bags, and the bags in the trunk of a rental car, the affidavit says.
Meuse then ordered DiCenso to ``scrub the bathroom with bleach and use
Drano on the pipes,'' the affidavit said.
The three men drove to Home Depot, bought two bags of lime and then
buried Silva somewhere in Danvers. The location is not specified in the
affidavit.
Fingerprints linked Meuse, 38, to the dumpster where Silva's tissue was
found, but he committed suicide in March 1997 after being arrested for
robbing an ATM.
Assistant U.S. attorney Christopher Bator, who is handling the case,
declined comment.
But first assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Pearlstein said yesterday's
arrest resulted from ``superb investigative work'' in an ``important
ongoing'' probe.
Paul DeCologero, 40, was an alleged member of a rogue Mafia faction that
tried to wrest power from jailed mob boss Francis P. ``Cadillac Frank''
Salemme. He was acquitted of murder and racketeering charges in January
by a federal jury.
Ralph Ranalli contributed to this report.