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When Mobsters Refuse to Retire


Valin

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AARP
Once you're in the mob, you're in for life — just ask America's population of aging gangsters
George Anastasia,
December 2015/January 2016

1140-Oldfellas-organized-crime-standing.
The feds are cracking down. The rival crews are moving in. And the arthritis is acting up. It's not easy getting old in the mob. Just ask these aging wise guys (illustrated from left): Thomas "Tommy Shots" Gioeli, Vincent "Vinny" Asaro, "Tommy D" DiFiore, Joseph "Uncle Joe" Ligambi and Joseph "Scoops" Licata. — Photo illustration by Justin Metz

They shared a long lunch of filet mignon, yellowfin tuna, and chicken with broccoli rabe, washing it down with four bottles of expensive Tuscan red. Ten wiseguys sat at an Italian restaurant in New Jersey, laughing and joking and talking. It could have been a scene from TV's The Sopranos. The men, from New York, Philadelphia and Newark, dressed the part — open-collared shirts, pinkie rings and Rolexes. Outside on that May afternoon in 2010, the FBI had set up surveillance cameras. Inside, at the table, a federal informant wore a body wire.

The conversation roamed, which would be expected during a five-hour meal among old friends. Sometimes so many guys were talking at once, it was hard to understand the point of the get-together.

But when nostalgia overtook the table, the words and meanings were clear.

(Snip)

As that now-infamous lunch at the New Jersey restaurant was winding down, Joe Licata rose and offered a toast. Speaking in Italian and English, the capo said, "To everybody's health — all the good guys. Anywhere — the good guys!"

Two years later, Licata and tablemate Joseph "Uncle Joe" Ligambi, the reputed Philadelphia boss, were reunited in a federal courthouse, facing trial in a case built largely around the restaurant tapes. Edwin Jacobs Jr., Ligambi's lawyer, argued to the jury that his client hadn't done anything except reminisce about old times with former colleagues. Their table talk was no different, Jacobs contended, than what goes on in a VFW hall or Sons of Italy meeting.

In the end, juries agreed: Licata and Ligambi escaped convictions. Licata was found not guilty, and the government dropped its case against Ligambi after two mistrials. Christopher Warren, Licata's attorney, says the government had it all wrong and everyone in the courtroom knew it.

"I think the jury saw Licata as a grandfather who drank too much wine and talked too much," Warren says. "You don't put him in jail. You put him to bed."

 

 

H/T Cosa Nostra News

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