miami.com
Posted on Fri, Dec. 05, 2003
10 mob figures linked to murders
The U.S. attorney's office indicts 10 reputed New York mobsters for racketeering conspiracy that stretched from Queens to South Florida.
BY LARRY LEBOWITZ
llebowitz@herald.com
ON THE GAMBINOS: U.S. Attorney Marcos Daniel Jimenez announces the arrests of crew members. BOB EIGHMIE/HERALD STAFF
INDICTMENTS
A rising star in the Gambino organized crime family and nine members of his lethal crew were indicted Thursday, accused of inflicting two decades of mayhem on New York City and South Florida.
Reputed Gambino captain Ronald ''Ronnie One-Arm'' Trucchio, 52, and nine of his soldiers are facing racketeering conspiracy charges that carry sentences of up to life in prison.
''They traveled the I-95 corridor, turning Queens County and South Florida into plunder zones,'' Queens District Attorney Richard Brown said in Fort Lauderdale.
U.S. Attorney Marcos Jiménez and Brown declined to discuss specifics, but the indictment lays out a broad swath of criminal activity dating back to 1986.
The group, they said, is linked to three South Florida murders, 50 bank robberies mostly in New York, a $2.5 million armored-car heist in Howard Beach, dozens of armed robberies and home invasions, arson, extortion, kidnapping, drug dealing, credit-card fraud, illegal weapons shipments and witness intimidation.
Authorities said some of the men indicted Thursday have been linked to some of the most sophisticated auto theft and ''chop shop'' operations in New York City.
One of the crew members indicted Thursday is Edward ''Crazy Eddie'' Callegari, who has been identified in published reports as a suspect in three October 1995 murders.
The bodies of nightclub bouncer Vincent D'Angola, and his girlfriend, former exotic dancer and aspiring massage therapist Jamie Schneider, were discovered in D'Angola's Fort Lauderdale apartment. The bullet-riddled body of Little League coach Mark Rizzuto was discovered the next day in his Boca Raton home.
Law enforcement sources have said D'Angola and Rizzuto apparently ran afoul of Callegari and another crew member, Martin Bosshart, over the proceeds of a credit-card fraud scam they were running.
SHOT ONCE
Bosshart, who rented an apartment in Deerfield Beach in the mid-1990s, was murdered in Queens in January 2002. Police said he was shot once behind the ear while urinating on a fence overlooking the Belt Parkway.
No one has ever been charged with the murders of D'Angola, Schneider or Rizzuto.
Details from the South Florida murders are expected to come out with future court filings and hearings.
''Stay tuned,'' Jiménez said.
The reputed leader, Trucchio, hails from Ozone Park, in Queens, and received his ''One-Arm'' nickname as a result of a childhood car accident.
Trucchio started out as a Gambino crew member in the mid-1980s, during the heyday of the late Gambino boss John Gotti, but was recently promoted -- or ''made'' in mob parlance -- to ''caporegime'' or captain. According to the indictment, Trucchio supervised the crew's activities, was paid tribute from its ill-gotten proceeds and represented its interests when they intersected with other organized-crime figures.
Lead prosecutors Paul Schwartz, Lawrence LaVecchio and Terrence Thompson said Trucchio identified potential robbery, extortion, kidnapping and assault victims. They said Trucchio also directed the intimidation of government trial witnesses with force and violence.
Trucchio is currently serving a one-to-three-year state sentence in New York after pleading guilty earlier this year to charges that he ran a $30 million-a-year-gambling ring in Queens.
On Oct. 30, the day after he was sentenced in the gambling case, Trucchio was re-arrested and charged with state welfare-fraud charges in New York. Authorities said Trucchio stole more than $100,000 in welfare benefits while cruising around Queens in a $40,000 Cadillac DeVille.
Trucchio allegedly told Social Security and Medicaid officials he didn't have a job, but told the car dealership that he was an 11-year employee at a Queens restaurant that paid him $72,000 a year.
Several of the crew members lived in South Florida for short periods, but most of them were based in Ozone Park.
''There has always been a strong connection in organized crime circles between New York and South Florida,'' Jiménez said. ``Organized crime is not something that should be glamorized on television. It's a cancer that should be eradicated from our community.''
`YOUNG GUNS'
The indictment detailing the criminal highlights of the crew that sometimes called themselves ''The Liberty Posse'' or the ''Young Guns'' was unsealed Thursday in Fort Lauderdale.
The four remaining crew members who weren't already behind bars were arrested in New York. The case was investigated by the FBI and New York police, with assists from the Broward Sheriff's Office and Fort Lauderdale, Coral Springs and Boca Raton police. |
