FBI investigation does damage to East Coast Mob Strongholds

FBI agents recently arrested 127 Mafia members in New York City and other East Coast metro areas in what is being hailed as the largest nationally coordinated crime takedown in FBI history.

New details are coming to light regarding the investigation that culminated in arrests and warrants being served beginning beginning before dawn on January 20, 2011.  Over 500 FBI personnel, together with 200 local, state, and other federal law enforcement offiNewcers, took part.  The investigation involved key agencies such that included the York Police Department and the Department of Labor Office of Inspector General.  On that first day, more than 110 of the 127 subjects charged had been taken into custody.

Members of New York’s infamous Five Families—the Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Luchese crime organizations—were rounded up along with members of the New Jersery-based DeCavalcante family and New England Mafia to on charges that include murder, drug trafficking, loan sharking, arson, illegal gambling, witness tampering, labor racketeering, and extortion.  In one case involving the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA) at the Ports of New York and New Jersey, investigators allege the extortion had been commonplace for years.

More than 30 of the subjects indicted were “made” members of the Mafia and included several high ranking family members.  With most of the arrests concentrated in New York, it is expected that this will derail some operations of the crime families.

According to Janice Fedarcyk, Assistant Director in charge of the FBI’s New York Field Office, “The notion that today’s mob families are more genteel and less violent than in the past is put to lie by the charges contained in the indictments unsealed today.  Even more of a myth is the notion that the mob is a thing of the past – that La Cosa Nostra is a shadow of its former self.”

The Mafia, also known as La Cosa Nostra, may have taken on less of a criminal role in parts of the United States, but the Five Families are still “extremely strong and viable,” according to Dave Shafer, Assistant Special Agent in charge who supervises FBI organized crime investigations in New York. 

The investigation for a nationally coordinated LCN takedown originated at the Department of Justice last summer.  Among those charged were:

• Luigi Manocchio, age 83 (former boss of the New England LCN)
• Andrew Russo, age 76 (Street boss, Colombo Family)
• Benjamin Castellazzo, age 73 (Acting underboss, Colombo Family)
• Richard Fusco, age 74 (Consigliere, Colombo Family)
• Joseph Corozzo, age 69 (Consigliere, Gambino Family)
• Bartolomeo Vernace, age 61 (Gambino Family administration)

According to the official FBI press release, the LCN operates in many U.S. cities and routinely engages in threats and violence to extort victims, eliminate rivals and obstruct justice. In the union case involving the ILA, court documents allege that the Genovese family has engaged in a multi-decade conspiracy to influence and control the unions and businesses on the New York-area piers.

“If there’s money to be made,” said Diego Rodriguez, special agent in charge of the FBI’s New York criminal division, “LCN will do it.” He noted that today’s Mafia has adapted to the times. “They are still involved in gambling and loan sharking, for example, but in the old days the local shoemaker took the betting slips. Now it’s offshore online gambling and money laundering. If you investigate LCN in New York,” Rodriguez added, “it’s a target-rich environment.”