Fwd: NEW YORK COSA NOSTRA IN THE 21ST CENTURY

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from the NEW YORK DAILY NEWS:

21st Century Mob: How the Mafia learned to adapt for the future

BY John Marzulli, Thomas Zambito and Greg B. Smith
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS

Sunday, June 7th 2009, 4:00 AM

09 Monaster/News

Bodyguard Thomas Bilotti lies on the street next to car after he and crime boss Paul Castellano were shot to death outside East Side steakhouse.

The old Mafia Charles (Lucky) Luciano, the original boss of the families.

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New York City's Five Families owned the 20th Century. Now they must confront the 21st — still alive, still armed and still dangerous.

Today's traditional Mafia family has ventured far from its roots as an ultra-secret society formed in the streets of New York at the dawn of the Depression.

The evolution has been epic.

To some, it appears a gang of criminals has turned into a popular culture commodity, spawning movies and TV shows that will long outlast the real-life story.

In that version, the bosses are in jail, the gang is undone, and all that's left is the book and movie deal.

In reality, the mob somehow survives, transforming, changing, adapting to the new economies and technologies — sometimes a jump quicker than law enforcement.

"As the economy goes, these guys go," said Michael Gaeta, supervisor of the New York FBI's organized crime unit. "Despite our attacks, they've managed to adapt."

Strategically, law enforcement sources say, the mob is closer to its roots, returning to the shadows, avoiding the public walk-talks that brought law enforcement to their door.

They still reap ill-gotten gains from traditional sources. They still have some control over corrupt contractors and unions, and illegal gambling continues as a primary source of wealth.

They've also diversified, crafting new scams befitting a new century.

"They're clearly not as visible as they used to be," Gaeta said. "You're not going to see the regular meetings you used to see. They're much more compartmentalized.

"They're smarter about the way they conduct business. At meetings, they make sure everybody leaves their cell phone at the door."

Today's Mafia families no longer perform the ornate induction ceremonies in which a card depicting a saint is burned and a gun is displayed. They've ditched the saint and the gun.

Still, they induct new members when old ones die, and they find new ways to steal.

Several families, for instance, got in on the housing boom of 2002-2007 through corrupt construction companies and unions, court papers and sources say.

Records show mob-linked companies have been subcontractors on most of the major projects of the last few years, including highway repair, the midtown office tower boom, the massive water treatment plant in the Bronx, even the rebuilding of the World Trade Center.

"They were taking full advantage of that — even if it was only=0 Aremoving waste from a construction site," one source said. "They'd have their favorite companies getting jobs. If the union was a problem, they'd take care of it."

Each family had a different method of adapting to the new century.

In the Wall Street boom, a Luchese soldier formed a fake hedge fund, operating out of a one-family house in Staten Island. He conned hundreds of wealthy investors into putting their money in bundled mortgage securities — one of the major causes of the economy's collapse.

When the housing bubble burst, a Genovese crew cashed in on the wave of foreclosures through house-flipping schemes in suburban Westchester.

The Gambino family stole credit card numbers via Internet porn sites, laundered gambling money through an energy drink company called American Blast, and took over a company that distributed bottled water — a far cry from the Prohibition days of bootlegging.

All the families use the Web to enhance their multi-million dollar illegal gambling empires through offshore betting shell corporations.

As part of the new mob order, the penchant for violence has diminished.

That is a sea change in New York that also represents a return to the old ways.

For years, the five families divided up New York City in mostly peaceful co-existence, with occasional bouts of behind-the-scenes violence usually wrought by internal power struggles.

Bloodshed began to escalate in the 1980s, as bodies turned up in Staten Island swamps, the World Trade Center garage, even at the doorstep of Sparks Steakhouse in midtown Manhattan.

Then came a major shift in the mob's ability to enforce the vow of silence known as ‘omerta.' In 1991, Gambino underboss Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano decided to become an informant.

A wave of informants followed, which deteriorated into shootouts in the streets and dozens of suspected informants who disappeared.

Since 2000, the number of bodies has dropped precipitously, law enforcement sources say. They take this as a sign that the mob once again craves a lower profile to avoid scrutiny.

"They keep things calm," one source said. "They try to keep things looking legit. They'd rather take 5 cents from 1,000 people than $10,000 from one."

They've also adopted management changes. Since the conviction of all the major bosses of the middle 20th century, all five families have struggled to find replacements who will last.

Three of the five families have retired the official boss altogether, forming flexible leadership panels that mediate disputes and enforce the so-called rules.

"They retrenched. They became much less visible," said one law enforcement source. "The days of John Gotti nonsense, you don't see that anymore."

Today, the mob's haunts aren't what they were. Neighborhoods of Italian immigrants that once served as Ground Zero of Mafia-dom are ethnically diverse, with many former residents relegated to suburbia.

The days when mobsters hung out at inner city social clubs — and FBI agents watched from nearby vans with tinted windows — are rare.

Some of the best-known clubs have just vanished:

Gravano's old hangout, Tali's Bar in Bensonhurst, where bar owner Mikey DeBatt was whacked in the back room by one of Gravano's crew, is a Vietnamese restaurant.

John Gotti's Ravenite Social Club is a trendy shoe store.

The Palma Boys Club, where the Genovese family met is an empty store front with lime green walls, is up for lease.

The Wimpy Boys Club in Gravesend — where a mob moll was once shot in the head and her ear turned up weeks later — is now Sal's Hair Stylist.

But just because they can't be seen doesn't mean they aren't there.

Today, the Daily News starts a three-day look into how New York's five families confront the 21st century — who's running things and how they've rebounded from the prosecutorial blitz that put much of their hierarchy behind bars .

Today we look at the two most powerful groups — the Gambino family and the Genovese family. In upcoming days, we'll examine the other families, the modern-day waterfront and dramatic stories from a mob insider and the family of a murder victim.

gsm...@nydailynews.com

Beyond Gotti: New ways to make loot

by Thomas Zambito
Daily News Staff Writer

Sunday, June 7th 2009, 4:00 AM

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Smith/News

Carlo Gambino, 67, reputed to be the Mafia's "Boss of All Bosses."

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John Gotti

Mug shot of John Giovanni Gambino

The Gambino crime family has come home.

The gang of wiseguys that spawned John Gotti has returned to Brooklyn, the place where family boss Carlo Gambino gave his name to on e of the world’s deadliest criminal enterprises.

The last time Brooklyn held such a distinction was when Gambino’s brother-in-law, Paul Castellano, headed the family. That ended in 1985, when Gotti’s henchmen gunned down “Big Paul” and his bodyguard outside Manhattan’s Sparks Steak House.

That moved the seat of power to Queens and a little social club called the Bergin Hunt & Fish Club, where overweight mobsters in velour sweatsuits strolled Ozone Park streets on walk-talks as FBI agents clicked away on surveillance cameras.

These days, the FBI says those secret chitchats are more likely to take place in the heart of Bensonhurst, along an 18th Ave. that looks a lot different than the one where mob snitch Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano plotted some of his 19 rubouts.

Asian eateries rival Italian salumerias and greasy pizza places. Tali’s — the bar where mob associate Mike DeBatt was killed on orders from Gravano in 1987 — is a Vietnamese restaurant.

The boss’ job has been handed over to a three-man panel that includes Gotti acolyte Daniel Marino, a veteran wiseguy who earned his bones making money, not murder, FBI agents say.

Marino, with the help of longtime gangsters Giovanni (John) Gambino and Bartolomeo (Bobby) Vernace, oversees a slimmed-down criminal gang of 200 made men and 300 associates that fills its coffers with cash from drugs, extortion and loansharking, the FBI says.

While the feds have choked off most of the Gambinos’ influence in the city’s major labor unions, they refuse to concede a surefire moneymaker that’s been their golden goose for decades.

Over the last year, the FBI has turned up so-called “wildcat unions” made up of wiseguys whose Mafia ties have gotten them permanently banned from organized labor.
Of course they’re always looking for new ventures.

Take energy-drink maker, American Blast Ltd. Manhattan federal prosecutors say longtime Gambino associate Joe Watts used the Manhattan company to launder the proceeds from Gambino criminal schemes. His daughter, Robyn Russo, is the CEO and Marino’s son, Dan Marino Jr., is the president.

“It’s certainly not the end of them,” says Gerald Conrad, a veteran agent who heads the FBI’s Gambino squad from Queens offices not far from Gotti’s old base in Howard Beach. “They’re still making wiseguys.”

Help comes from overseas in Sicilian recruits whose old-world ways make them more likely to honor a Mafia oath of omerta that’s been destroyed over the past two decades by dozens of defections.

Marino  was Gotti’s go-between to the Westies, an Irish-American gang from Hell’s Kitchen known for its brutality.

The Gotti family’s loyalty to Marino fizzled when Gotti’s son, John A. (Junior) Gotti, took over the family when his father went to prison in the early 1990s.

Gotti ordered up a hit on Marino and soldier John Gammarano in the early 1990s, because he suspected them of skimming profits from construction-extortion schemes, mob snitch Michael (Mikey Scars) DiLeonardo testified. The hit was foiled when three other wiseguys showed up unexpectedly.

Today, Marino lives on 85th St. off 12th Ave., next door to his buddy Gammarano, the feds say. Gambino, 68, is a distant relative of Carlo and has done time for importing heroin into the states.

When in Manhattan, Marino stays at the St. Regis.

“He likes nice things, but he’s not like a John Gotti,” Conrad says. “He likes guys carrying his coat.”

Unlike Gotti, whose walk-talks outside the Ravenite in Little Italy were captured by FBI cameras, Marino doesn’t bother with social clubs.

His favorite haunt is a down-home restaurant in Staten Island called Italianissimo.

He’s not the only one who can’t keep himself away from the scallopini and saltimbocca. Italianissimo’s Web site boasts a photo of a smiling former Mayor Rudy Giuliani stopping in for a bite.

tzam...@nydailynews.com

Genovese family has avoided rat infestation-unlike many rivals

by Greg B. Smith
Daily News Staff Writer

Sunday, June 7th 2009, 4:00 AM

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Vito Genovese

=2 0 Smith/News

Venero (Benny Eggs) Mangano (l.) being arrested.

The crime family formed 80 years ago and named after Vito Genovese has endured like no other.

The Genovese family has somehow avoided the top-level defectors who have hobbled all four of New York’s other families.

The Genovese clan — considered the most powerful crime family in America — has found insidious new ways to make money in the 21st century.

Take the subprime mortgage frenzy that forced thousands of homes into foreclosure. A Genovese associate found a way to get a piece of that.

The caper was run by Dominick DeVito, a 45-year-old dedicated con artist the FBI identifies as an associate of reputed Genovese capo Patsy Parrello.

During the runup of housing prices from 2002 to 2004, DeVito ran a bogus real estate20investment scheme, buying up multimillion dollar properties in suburban Westchester County.

He and his pals made up income histories to con banks into handing out multiple mortgages, then sold them at inflated prices.

They also took out more loans using the inflated values of the houses as collateral, then defaulted on the loans. Several houses wound up in foreclosure.

They managed to fit three scams into one, obtaining insurance payments by claiming water damage caused by broken pipes in the homes — after breaking the pipes themselves.

DeVito was sentenced in March to 51 months in prison and is to surrender Sept. 15. His lawyer, George Santangelo, declined comment on DeVito’s mob ties.

The Genovese family benefitted from the loosening of due diligence by banks during the housing spike. Prosecutors say loanshark victims sometimes obtained home equity loans to pay off debts to their mob bankers.

The Genovese family also found ways to use new technology to improve on old reliable scams such as illegal gambling , law enforcement sources say.

In last year’s prosecution of Daniel Leo, former boss of the family, prosecutors said he controlled multiple bookmaking operations that reaped millions of dollars.

What was new was that not all transactions were person-to-person: some customers placed bets through offshore sites via the Internet.

The mob also may have inspired a Long Island con man’s $100 million Ponzi scheme. Nicholas Cosmo owed Genovese family associates tens of thousands of dollars in gambling debt, authorities said.

Cosmo was busted in January and investigators have since questioned a Genovese associate turned mob informant, Michael (Cookie) D’Urso, about Cosmo.

The Genovese family also took full advantage of the city’s building boom through control of several construction firms. They even got in on the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site.

A reputed Genovese a ssociate, Nicholas Calvo, was listed as a “sales associate” on the payroll of Nacirema Construction, a subcontractor hauling debris in the rebuilding of Ground Zero.

When Calvo was busted in a racketeering indictment in February 2008, the city barred Nacirema (that’s American spelled backward) from employing him.

Currently the family relies on a rotating panel of veterans who have finished prison stints, including the aging Venero (Benny Eggs) Mangano, Ernest Muscarella, Liborio (Barney) Bellomo and Lawrence (Little Larry) Dentico, sources say.

Until last year the family still held on to territory they’d long controlled — the school bus drivers’ union, Local 1181.

The union’s ex-president, Salvatore (Hot Dogs) Battaglia, was a Genovese soldier who took payoffs from most of the school bus companies that transport public school students. Two more union officials were busted last week.

The family st ill divides up control of the New Jersey waterfront with the Gambino family — a phenomenon that dates back to the ’50s and makes clear the family still uses violence when it feels the need.

This became apparent during a 2005 trial exposing the family’s control over the longshoremen’s union.

One defendant, Lawrence Ricci, a Genovese capo in charge of the Jersey waterfront, was found shot in the head in the trunk of a silver Acura in Jersey. Sources said he was killed because he’d refused an order to plead guilty to avoid a trial.

“They throw him in the trunk of a car in the middle of a public trial for us to find him,” said an FBI source. “It’s them saying, ‘All right, now what are you going to do?’ It’s 2005 and we’re still finding bodies in the trunks of cars.”

gsm...@nydailynews.com