Life in Supermax Solitary Seems to Be Fine for NYC Mobster

Life in solitary in the federal Supermax prison in Colorado doesn't sound too bad for ex-New York City Bonanno family crime boss Vincent (Vinny Gorgeous) Basciano, says the New York Daily News. The newspaper published a photo in which Basciano, 51, grins ear to ear and waves to the camera while sporting a trim figure in prison-issued sweatpants and a T-shirt. His skin has a healthy glow, and his graying hair is meticulously groomed.

The photo didn’t surprise prison spokesman Douglas Cramer, who said, “The reality is, we don’t run a dungeon.” The mob boss is serving two life sentences for killing an associate and a neighborhood junkie who threatened to kidnap his son. He gets time to work on his tan. “If [inmates] want to sunbathe in the rec cage, they can do that,” Cramer said. “They can do calisthenics and pushups.” How does the hair look so good? “We have a contract with outside barbers, and we pay for a haircut once a month,” he said. Basciano gets basic cable TV in his 23-hour-a-day cell, which includes prison channels with educational and religious programming. He can play video games on the TV, including Bingo, word search and crossword puzzles.

Las Vegas Celebrates Criminal Roots With New Mob Museum

On the 83rd anniversary of the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre, Las Vegas on Tuesday opened a new $42 million museum dedicated to the mobsters that helped create the desert Sin City, reports the Associated Press. Las Vegas has long been enamored with its gangster roots. Its longtime former mayor played himself in the mob flick “Casino” and hotels here often promote their nefarious origins. But the publicly funded Mob Museum, located downtown, represents a new height in its devotion to lawlessness.

It’s the second mob-themed attraction to open in Las Vegas in the past year. The Mob Experience at the Tropicana casino on the Las Vegas Strip quickly shut down because of slow ticket sales and other problems. It’s slated to reopen later this year under the name Mob Attraction Las Vegas. City officials said their version will perform better because it’s an authentic examination of the decisions and circumstances that made Las Vegas an international symbol of debauchery and excess. The museum is housed in a former Depression-era federal courthouse where the seventh of 14 U.S. Senate hearings on organized crime was held in the early 1950s.

Colombian Cartels 101

By Lisa Riordan Seville

What did the DEA learn from its battle with the Medellin and Cali cartels?

Boston Globe Discloses Bulger Tipster; Is Ex-Miss Iceland In Danger?

Ex-actress and Miss Iceland 1974 Anna Bjornsdottir was the tipster who led the FBI to one of its most wanted men, Boston gangster James "Whitey" Bulger...

Bulger Prosecution Could Cost Millions, Take Several Years

Will Whitey Bulger Tell How He Corrupted FBI Agents?

Whitey Bulger, the ruthless Boston crime boss who spent 16 years on the lam is said to have boasted that he corrupted six FBI agents and more than 20 police officers. If he decides to talk, reports the Associated Press, some of them could rue the day he was caught. "They are holding their breath, wondering what he could say," said Robert Fitzpatrick,  former second-in-command of the Boston FBI office.

The 81-year-old gangster was captured Wednesday in Santa Monica, Ca., where he apparently had been living for most of the time he was a fugitive. After he was flown to Boston, prosecutors asked that Bulger be held without bail, saying he is a danger to the community, might flee and may try to threaten witnesses. He did not request bail. Bulger, former boss of the Winter Hill Gang, Boston's Irish mob, embroiled the FBI in scandal after he disappeared in 1995. Bulger had been an FBI informant for decades, feeding the bureau information on the rival New England Mafia, and he fled after a retired Boston FBI agent tipped him off that he was about to be indicted.

Daytime TV Ad Blitz May Have Solved Bulger Case

Within 24 hours after getting a phoned tip, FBI agents and Los Angeles police arrested Boston organized crime figure James "Whitey" Bulger and his longtime...

FBI Finally Gets Boston Crime Boss Bulger In L.A. After 15 Years

Legendary Boston crime boss James "Whitey" Bulger, on the run for more than 15 years, was arrested yesterday in Santa Monica, Ca., the Los Angeles Times...

Philadelphia Mob Case--Big Deal or Mostly Non-Violent Gambling?

In 2007, retiring Philadelphia federal organized crime prosecutor Barry Gross declared, "We defeated the mob." Did yesterday's sweeping indictment...

Former NYC Crime Boss Tells Jury How He Ran Part of The Mob

Joseph Massino, the longtime boss of the New York City area's Bonanno crime family, yesterday became the first to testify against a former confederate, reports the New York Times. In federal court in Brooklyn, Massino, 68, spent nearly five hours cataloguing his misdeeds, including murders. Asked by a prosecutor, “What powers did you have?,” he replied, “Murders, responsibility for the family, made captains, break captains.”

Massino told a jury that the man on trial, Vincent Basciano, the family’s former acting boss, had spoken to him about ordering the 2004 killing of Randolph Pizzolo, a Bonanno associate Basciano is charged with ordering Mr. Pizzolo’s murder. For much of the day, Massino established his credentials and gave the jury his view from the top, his philosophy of mob management and his personal history — all larded with a steady stream of culinary metaphors and references. “If you need somebody to kill somebody, you need workers — it takes all kinds of meat to make a good sauce,” said the onetime restaurateur, catering consultant. and coffee truck owner, referring to Basciano’s skills both as a killer and as an earner for the crime family.

U.S. Has Major Stake in Mexico's 'Seesawing' War on Crime

With news of fresh mass killings alternating with stories of significant arrests, the New York Times analyzes what it calls "the seesawing battle for the right to claim victory at a critical juncture in Mexico's organized crime war." Mexican and American officials, crediting American training of the military and what they consider to be an increasingly professional federal police force, point out that more than half of the 37 most wanted crime bosses announced last year have been captured or killed. The government also maintains that the murder rate declined in late 2010.

But the public does not seem to believe it. A recent poll found that more than 70 percent of respondents believed that the country’s security had worsened since 2009. A political analyst called it "a disconnect between what the government thinks it is achieving and what the public perceives as happening." Both Mexican and American officials are facing growing pressure to prove that their strategy is working. With Republicans now in control of the House of Representatives, the Obama administration will face renewed scrutiny to account for the $1.4 billion, multiyear Merida Initiative, the cornerstone of American aid in Mexico’s drug fight.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/02/world/americas/02mexico.html?_r=1&scp=2&sq=mexico&st=cse

125 Arrested In Biggest FBI Organized Crime Bust

Criminal accusations spanning several states and several decades, encompassing figures from seven mob families, led to the arrest of nearly 125 people on federal charges yesterday, reports the New York Times. The charges included murders, including a double homicide over a spilled drink in a bar. There were also run-of-the-mill activities associated with organized crime: racketeering, extortion, loan-sharking, money laundering, gambling, and the like.

The charges were 16 indictments handed up in federal courts in four jurisdictions. Federal officials called it the “largest mob roundup in F.B.I. history.” For Attorney General Eric Holder, it was an opportunity to preside over the kind of law enforcement operation that was once the core mission of the Justice Department, but that has been largely overshadowed by terrorism issues. Questions were raised by the diffuse nature of the indictments, which involved myriad unrelated criminal activity. The sweep began before dawn, with 800 federal agents and state and local investigators fanning out across the region.

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/nyregion/21mob.html?_r=1&hpw

How Much Weaker Is Today’s Organized Crime?

The new charges against organized crime figures raises the question of how much weaker the mob is than it used to be. The Wall Street Journal notes that when three leaders of New York’s five reputed Mafia families were convicted in 1986, then-FBI director William  Webster said that, ”Traditional organized crime is never going to be the same again.” What was known as the Commission case was the catalyst for the fragmentation of La Cosa Nostra.

Yesterday, Attorney General Eric Holder said that, ”Members of La Cosa Nostra are among the most dangerous criminals in our country.” The Journal says that in recent years, the mob has been viewed mostly as television entertainment. Mark Feldman, a former federal prosecutor, said the mob has been “severely battered by the cases brought against it over the last two decades, but they’re not dead. There’s still wherewithal for them to regenerate and there is still a culture and still people who are attracted to the easy money.” The FBI shifted resources to terrorism and white-collar crime cases after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, said Bruce Mouw, a former FBI agent handling organized crime cases. ”If the mob knew how few agents are assigned they would be heartened,” said Mouw. “If the FBI continues to shift resources away, these guys will regroup and rearm.”

Link: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703921504576094381770982452.html?mod=WSJ_NY_LEFTTopStories

U.S. Arresting 130 In Major Organized Crime Crackdown

Link: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/21/nyregion/21mob.html?_r=1&hpw

New Yorker Killed For Mob Family, Then Decimated It As Turncoat

The New York Times profiles Salvatore Vitale, who killed for New York's Bonnano crime family, then decimated it as a federal informant. His criminal life story is laid out in a document federal prosecutors in Brooklyn filed last month. It touches on 23 murders, 11 of which Vitale directly participated in, and many other crimes that he and other mob figures committed. The document also tells how the Bonannos were ruined through Vitale’s betrayal in 2003 of the crime family and his own extended family, as he became a star government witness. His testimony helped to imprison 51 mob figures, including Joseph Massino and the last four acting bosses of the Bonanno family.

Vitale, 62, is to be sentenced on Friday. Prosecutors have called his cooperation “groundbreaking by any measure,” and filed the 122-page document to seek a more lenient sentence than the mandatory life term set forth in the advisory sentencing guidelines. In a 10-year assault on the Bonanno family, the FBI and prosecutors have convicted a total of 135 members and associates, making Vitale perhaps the most prolific mob turncoat since Salvatore Gravano, who testified against the Gambino boss John J. Gotti.