Mafia News

Nobody Knows Anything About the Operations of the Assassins.

(Date: May 17, 1903 ) “There is just as much mystery about this society in Italy,” said my informant, “as in the United States. You might live in Palermo or Messina with all your neighbors members of the Mafia, and yet never hear the word mentioned. It is something that no one cares to talk about. We only know that money is extorted right and left, because it is certain death to refuse, and unless these murderers are caught red-handed, they are rarely convicted. Continue Reading »

4 others refused. No decisions made on fate of Rizzuto.

They may have spent Christmas in prison, but they will be home to greet the new year with court-imposed restrictions.

Fourteen people, including a former customs agent, an Air Canada baggage handler and a taxi driver, were released on strict bail conditions yesterday until their trials for allegedly taking part in an elaborate plan to import cocaine into Canada through Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in Dorval. Continue Reading »

Actor James Gandolfini may be too old to exercise, but that does not worry him, for he feels that he needs to be overweight to play Tony Soprano in ‘The Sopranos’. Continue Reading »

A night of terror staged by drug mafias left at least 16 persons dead in Rio de Janeiro, Brazilian media reports said Thursday.

The reports said that in the late-night violence, heavily-armed groups of drug mafia members drove around the city, attacking police patrols and guardposts with gunfire and grenades. Continue Reading »

The Financial Police of Palermo have carried out, during 2006, 430 seizures of goods belonging to members of the mafia, for an overall value of approx. 490 million euros, including 49 companies. Continue Reading »

Napoli ati-mafia investigation unit has seized goods worth around 10 million euro to Cipriano Chianese, an entrepreneur from Caserta who works in the waste disposal sector. According to the investigators the man is a friend of the Casalesi mafia family. The seized goods are some companies, one of these companies works in the sector of waste disposal in Campania and southern Lazio. Police have also seized a 18 meter boat. Continue Reading »

A top Mexican Mafia member, who controlled Hispanic street gangs that operated across Orange County, CA, was sentenced on December 18 to 14 years in federal prison after pleading guilty earlier this year to violating federal racketeering and narcotics laws.

Peter Ojeda, 64, was sentenced by United States District Judge David Carter in a packed Santa Ana courtroom. Continue Reading »

NEW YORK - For more than two decades, the federal RICO law was a pitiless tool in the fight against organized crime - corralling, convicting and incarcerating a long string of mob bosses once considered untouchable.

But in 2006, federal prosecutors lost a pair of major RICO cases: Second-generation mob boss John A. “Junior” Gotti walked after three mistrials, and the most corrupt officers in NYPD history - “Mafia Cops” Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa - had their convictions overturned. Continue Reading »

LOS ANGELES - An imprisoned Mexican Mafia member pleaded not guilty Tuesday to federal charges alleging he controlled two cliques of the 18th Street gang from behind bars.

Ruben Castro, 46, is serving a life term in federal prison for a 1997 racketeering conviction. Continue Reading »

In 1994, an underboss of the Lucchese crime family, Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso, flipped. He was in federal custody, facing numerous murder and racketeering counts, when he informed FBI agents that, in return for a “pad” of $4,000 a month, two New York City Police Department detectives had regularly slipped him confidential information from police and FBI organized-crime files: names and addresses of confidential informants — who were then knocked off — tipoffs on raids and phone taps, and advance warnings of arrests. Continue Reading »