Aug 21 2007
Judge: McKeesport woman’s role in bank heist not a Mafia hitBy Jason Cato
Driving a getaway car following a bank heist is considered a violent crime under U.S. law, but not to the degree of a Mafia hit man hacking up and disposing of a body, a federal judge told a government prosecutor Monday.
Assistant U.S. Attorney James Love argued that Martha Jones, 43, of McKeesport, should be sent to jail after she pleaded guilty yesterday to two counts of acting as an accessory after the fact to bank robberies, because she committed a violent crime. Love used a ruling by a federal judge in Brooklyn to try to make his case.
Dominick Cicale, a Bonnano crime family captain, claimed he hadn’t committed a violent crime because the victim was dead when he helped dismember a corpse and hid it, Love said.
“Obviously, we don’t have facts nearly that serious or gruesome, but they’re still the same,” Love said.
The New York judge didn’t buy Cicale’s argument, and Senior U.S. District Judge Gustave Diamond didn’t buy Love’s.
“This, of course, is quite a different situation,” Diamond said.
Jones will remain free on bond until her Nov. 20 sentencing hearing, Diamond ruled.
Jones was indicted in April on five charges related to a string of bank robberies, in which prosecutors said she helped Maurice Miller by dropping him off near banks and waiting while he robbed them. In December and January, the duo robbed National City Bank branches in McKeesport and Dravosburg and a Citizen’s Bank branch in Pitcairn, the indictment states.
In June, Miller was sentenced to 123 months in prison.
Judge: McKeesport woman’s role in bank heist not a Mafia hitBy Jason Cato - TRIBUNE-REVIEW - Tuesday, August 21, 2007 - http://www.pittsburghlive.com/x/pittsburghtrib/news/cityregion/s_523202.html
