Gangland 11/11/21

[Dr031718]

Once Open and Shut, New DNA Evidence Makes The Case Of Slain Luchese Loanshark A Whodunnit

Anthony Pandrella Gang Land Exclusive!Forensic experts for both sides in the murder case of Anthony Pandrella, the accused killer of Luchese family loanshark Vincent Zito, have found DNA traces of an unknown third person on the murder weapon found lying next to the victim's body, Gang Land has learned.

The intriguing evidence of a third person's DNA on the handgun that killed the 78-year-old Zito, who was found dead in the living room of his Brooklyn home three years ago, has turned what had been considered an almost open and shut case into a murder mystery. It has also become a focal point of heated pre-trial arguments in the case.

Pandrella, 62, has been detained for 32 months on the basis of what seemed like strong evidence against him. The feds say he shot and killed Zito between 8:10 and 10:23 AM on October 26, 2018, a timeline that stems from home security videos that show the burly Gambino gangster entering and leaving the Sheepshead Bay home where Zito was found dead by a grandson who returned home from school around 3 PM.

But the new DNA findings have thrown a wrench into the feds' case and lawyers for both sides are now arguing fiercely before Chief Judge Margo Brodie about what it all means.

Vincent ZitoThe government's expert, Jaclyn Costello, a veteran criminalist for the NYC Medical Examiner's Office, detected the DNA on the trigger, according to court filings in Brooklyn Federal Court. Defense expert Harold Baum, who toiled 11 years for the New Jersey State Police after 18 years for the New York ME's office, found the DNA traces on the "hand grip" of the pistol.

Since reports of DNA traces of an unknown person on the murder weapon can't be viewed as a good thing for the prosecution, the defense had nothing bad to say last week about the finding by Costello, a supervisor who has been with the ME's office for nearly 12 years.

But prosecutors Matthew Galeotti and Kristin Mace slammed a similar finding by Baum, as well as his claim that Pandrella's DNA on the gun "could have originated from transfer from another object" in the Zito home as unreliable, and not fit to be mentioned at trial.

Galeotti and Mace, chief of the Brooklyn U.S. Attorney's criminal division, argued that Baum "failed to provide the bases for those opinions" in the filings by defense attorney James Froccaro. Baum, they said, should be precluded from testifying about either opinion.

Jaclyn CostelloFroccaro argued that Costello hadn't been more specific about unknown DNA on the "ridges of the trigger" than Baum had been for his opinion that there were DNA traces on the "hand grip." But Judge Brodie disagreed and ordered Froccaro to file an amended report by his expert.

But following an angry back and forth with Galeotti, Froccaro seemed to prevail on the notion that Baum could testify about the "real possibility" that there was a transfer of Pandrella's DNA from many objects in the Zito home to the murder weapon. After all, the government plans to show jurors video evidence that Pandrella was in the home for more than two hours on the day of the murder.

"There is no evidence of transfer," said Galeotti. "There's no basis to say that there's an absence of evidence. He hasn't reviewed anything in this particular case. We don't even know what he would suggest is missing. This is actually the first time anyone's hearing about this. No one's performed that analysis. (He's) just getting up there and suggesting that there could be more information."

"If he's going to testify to that as an expert, we would need to understand why he is saying that," the prosecutor continued. "What the basis for that is. What he reviewed. None of that is happening here. There's no disclosure about that whatsoever. There's a theoretical possibility of transfer, and that's his expert opinion, fine. But anything beyond that, there's no basis."

Kristin Mace"My client was in that apartment for more than two hours" and "his DNA was obviously all over the apartment," said Froccaro, who accused the prosecutor of pontificating as if he were "testifying" as an expert. "If I had been involved from day one," the lawyer continued, he would have "had an expert go in and examine all the articles in the apartment" but since his client was "arrested a year later," he was left with "whatever evidence there is. There's a gun."

"What else do they want me to examine judge," Froccaro continued. "I'm not even allowed in the house and I've been trying to get into the house for two years now. What would I be able to examine in order to flesh out the point that my client's DNA was all over the apartment and could have been transferred? If Mr. Galeotti wants to testify let him answer that."

The prosecutor didn't, but the duo went back and forth some more until Brodie ruled that Baum could "opine theoretically about the transfer of DNA" but left open the question as to whether he could testify about any possible transfer of DNA. Whether any " DNA transfer occurred in this case will depend on the evidence before the Court at trial and will require disclosure of the basis of that opinion in advance of such testimony," she ruled.

Brodie also made two positive rulings for Pandrella regarding the linchpin of the defense case — that Zito was somehow killed after Pandrella left the house even though no one else was spotted entering or leaving on the home security video. The judge ruled that Dr. Michael Baden, the renowned and often controversial former NYC ME, could testify as an expert that Zito died hours after Pandrella left his old friend's home.

James FroccaroBrodie also ruled that Medical Legal Investigator (MLI) Kathleen Liggio could testify about the opinion she gave the FBI a year after the killing that the time of death was sometime after 12:30 that afternoon. The judge reserved a final decision on whether Liggio could be used as a defense expert until she receives additional information about the MLI's qualifications.

Froccaro argued that Baden "reviewed the victim's autopsy report as well as the reports, photographs and statements of (Liggio and a second MLI) who examined the victim's body" at the scene, and he determined that "the rigidity, lividity and temperature of the victim's body indicate that death occurred during the early afternoon of October 26, 2018."

Galeotti countered that Dr. Jonathan Arden, a former ME for the District of Columbia who is currently a pathologist for the state of West Virginia, wrote those factors "do not support" Baden's opinion, and told Brodie that she should at least conduct a hearing to determine whether Baden could back up his claim.

Galeotti stated that Baden had used "unreliable" data and unscientific summaries that he gleaned from reports by Liggio and MLI Derry Chow as a basis for his finding and argued that Baden's "output was unreliable" and that his conclusion was the "kind of core argument that is usually decided at a hearing."

Judge Margo Brodie"No it's not, counsel. No it's not," the judge corrected, noting that Galeotti's main thrust was that Baden's opinion differed from his expert's. "There is no basis for a hearing that I can see," said Brodie. "You can argue all you want counselor; I am not buying that argument. You can cross-examine Dr. Baden as to the basis, and you can point that out to the jury and they can weigh it."

Galeotti argued that Liggio, who told police that Zito did not kill himself when she examined his body at 6:30, and "estimated that the victim had been dead less than six (6) hours," according to an FBI summary, did not have the training or expertise to testify as an expert about the time of death.

In a long, rambling reply to a query from the judge, Galeotti argued that not only wasn't Liggio qualified "to come up with a time of death opinion," she "did not make that determination" contemporaneously. She had merely "provided an opinion on time of death" many months later when she was "asked about many factors" about the murder scene in an interview with the FBI, he said.

Michael BadenFroccaro countered that it made no sense that "she can testify that she provided the time of death, but not as an expert," asserting that the government's experts "based their opinion, at least in part, on the information she provided." He also argued that he should have "an opportunity to question her at a hearing" since the feds had stopped him from speaking to her.

"I find it hard to believe that the first person on the scene, who was there when the body was warm would not be in the best position to evaluate the time of death," said Froccaro. "And she never told anybody about it until a year later! I'm sorry," the lawyer continued, "I just can't accept that at face value."

"I really need to get more info from her on the issue," said Froccaro. "She volunteered to the government long after the case started that she did have an estimate on the time of death so I find it hard to believe that she coudln't be qualified as an expert. It's what she does for a living," the lawyer said.

"My suggestion," Brodie told the prosecutors, "is that you make the witness available to Mr. Froccaro or I'm going to have a hearing" to determine whether or not Liggio can testify as an "expert witness" or merely as a "lay witness" at trial. The judge set a follow up conference for next month. Trial is scheduled to begin in May.

Lawyer: Keystone Kops Kaper By NJ Prosecutors Should Mean Freedom For My Client

Marco LaraccaA lawyer for a Luchese associate who allegedly took part in a 2017 home-invasion of former reality star Dina Manzo for her ex-husband is demanding the dismissal of charges against his client, James (Jimmy Balls) Mainello. The basis for his claim? Fatally screwed up record keeping by federal and state prosecutors in New Jersey.

In a court filing, lawyer Marco Laracca detailed a hard-to-fathom account of how bungled communications by the New Jersey U.S. Attorney's office and the Monmouth County Prosecutor's office (MCPO) led to state prosecutors accusing Laracca with corrupt activity for giving codefendant Thomas Manzo secret phone records that the lawyer had supposedly received from state prosecutors. That never happened, says Laracca.

Laracca insists that Manzo never got the records of a key 2015 phone call from him in early 2019, as assistant prosecutor Caitlin Sidley had wrongly stated at a detention hearing for Manzo in May — and as Gang Land dutifully reported on May 27. Court records show that the state gave the lawyer those records in August of 2020, and that FBI agents did not find them in a November 2019 search of Manzo's Paterson NJ banquet hall, The Brownstone, as Sidley also stated in May.

The screwup began in January of 2020, according to a slew of exhibits filed by Laracca with his motion to throw out the case against Mainello, when the MCPO gave the feds the 2015 phone records that state prosecutors thought might be helpful in the investigation they were conducting into an alleged 2015 assault by Manzo against Cantin.

Thomas ManzoWhat happened then, according to an email from a New Jersey federal prosecutor, is that the U.S. Attorney's office "inadvertently included" the 2015 phone records with documents FBI had seized from Manzo's restaurant in November of 2019 in response to a request for that info by Sidley's office.

Exactly why that happened, and why Sidley, her office, as well federal prosecutors didn't notice and correct their sloppy work involving major cases that they were both working, obviously hand-in-glove with each other, is a mystery that neither office would discuss with Gang Land.

But according to Laracca, who has asked Superior Court Judge Joseph Oxely to throw out the case for prosecutorial misconduct, he was able to prove that he was wrongly accused of corrupt activity only after he compared records of an FBI search of The Brownstone he received in August 2020 with records of the same FBI search of the banquet hall that he got early this year. Laracca said he only reviewed the records this year after he was accused of corrupt activites in May.

That's when Laracca learned, according to his filing, that the same folder of records "allegedly taken from The Brownstone in November of 2019" that he received this year included "two pages of phone records . . . that did not exist the first time the folder was produced" and was given to him back in 2020.

"The two pages of phone records were inadvertently included by our office with the records we produced in response to the (later) request," assistant U.S. attorney Ben Kuruvilla stated in a September 17 email to Laracca. "These two pages of phone records were not recovered from the search of the Brownstone," Kuruvilla wrote, "but in fact were supplied to our office by MCPO in January of 2020."

James Mainello"The phone records," the federal prosecutor wrote, "do not relate to the federal criminal case" by his office but "relate only to Monmouth County's case" against Manzo and Jimmy Balls.

In his motion to dismiss the case against Mainello, Laracca cites alleged "prosecutorial misconduct" by the MCPO's office for "presenting false evidence and perjured testimony to the grand jury" that voted a new indictment charging his client and Manzo with the 2017 assault against Dina Manzo and her then boyfriend David Cantin.

Mainelli, 52, was first arrested in May of 2019. He was detained without bail until July, when he was released under home detention, two months after Manzo was granted bail following 10 days behind bars following his arrest.

Gang Land expects that Manzo will file a "me too" motion with Judge Oxely, as well as a similar motion for relief in the pending federal case in which he is charged with getting Luchese monster John Perna to assault Cantin at a strip mall in 2015 in return for a hugely discounted wedding party at The Brownstone.

Andrew (Mush) Russo, A Mafia Boss In Any Language

Andrew RussoIt's no secret that aging Colombo crime family boss Andrew (Mush) Russo is badly slipping as far as the cognitive aspect of life goes.

Russo, who is 87, was released to home confinement two weeks ago after a U.S. Magistrate Judge agreed that the elderly Mafioso is a shell of his old self and didn't belong in jail. Even the Metropolitan Detention Center agreed that he doesn't belong locked up.

But as recently as a year ago, according to records filed by the feds in a bid to show that the geezer gangster still has at least most of his marbles, Russo was holding the kind of Mafia-style half-English, half-Italian conversation that is designed not to be understood in either language, at least to anyone outside Cosa Nostra.

The conversation between Russo and consigliere Ralph DeMatteo was recorded by the FBI on September 28 of last year. It seems to capture what the feds say was a "lucid Russo agreeing to meet with his consigliere." According to the feds, the transcript shows that Mush was fully capable of taking part in and understanding "a cryptic conversation that included DiMatteo referencing having held a meeting where he needed to turn off his phone."

In the following excerpt, allegedly concerning the crime family's long-running extortion by capo Vincent (Vinny Unions) Ricciardo of a Queens-based construction union, "Russo spoke carefully, including using coded and cryptic conversations, frequently alternating between English and Italian," prosecutors wrote.

Ralph DeMatteoRD: Hey
AR: Hey, che fai? ["What are you doing?"]
RD: Come stai? ["How are you?"]
AR: Dove stai tu? ["Where are you?"]
RD: Brooklyn.
AR: Again, ti ho chiamato 'sta mattina. Tu mai rispondi ["I called you this morning, you never answered."]
RD: I was out from earlier this morning, I, I was with you. U telefono stava chiusu. ["The telephone was turned off."] You know what I mean?
AR: Yeah capisciu. Tu vieni ca ora? Or no? ["I understand. Are you coming here now?"]
RD: No, domani mattina ["I'll go in the morning"] I'll be there nice and early, 10:00.
AR: Ok, alright.
RD: You alright with that?
AR: Yeah. Tutte cose buone? ["Everything okay?"]
RD: Yeah yeah everything's great. Yeah.
AR: (UI - voices overlap)
Vincent RicciardoRD: No, no. Ci ho lasciato ["I left ..."] ["You don't know"] he wanted me to but I had to run somewhere else. Mi capisci? ["You understand me?"]
AR: Whatever, alright. (UI)
RD: Parlamu domani mattin' ["We'll talk tomorrow morning."]
AR: Yeah, stasera non puoi venire? [You can't come tonight?] Where are you now?
RD: I'll never make it.
AR: Ok, addio. Domani. ["Goodbye. Tomorrow."]

The argument by the feds, however, went for naught. The magistrate rejected it as old news and ordered Russo's home release.

The excerpt also shows that while there are fewer agents in the FBI's squads that investigate Italian American organized crime groups in New York known as the Five Families, the feds do have persons or online gizmos that do a pretty good job of translating Italian street talk into readable English

[Dapper_Don]

thanks for posting

[AntComello]

Thanks for posting

[Pmac2]

ty.

[JohnnyS]

Thanks for posting.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Thanks Dr.

The old 'Speaking Italian will fool them' code.

[Southshore88]

Thanks for posting

[Pmac2]

Interesting russo talked it and understands it. I figured he wouldnt have a clue like gotti and others. I would guess his parents spoke it at home was andy russo father in the mob to

[Amershire_Ed]

What was the wiretap where it was two wiseguys talking about diet and exercise? Like eating grapefruit for breakfast or something. This Russo convo kinda reminded me of that.

[Rocco]

Capeci is being a little harsh calling Johnny a monster no? lol
"getting Luchese monster John Perna "

[Shellackhead]

Lol that’s basic Italian even us Spanish speaking can decipher that. What Ralph said at the end is Sicilian now that’s harder

[UTC]

Very interesting DNA evidence in the first case.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Capeci is being a little harsh calling Johnny a monster no? lol
"getting Luchese monster John Perna "

Typo. The keys are adhacent.

[newera_212]

What was the wiretap where it was two wiseguys talking about diet and exercise? Like eating grapefruit for breakfast or something. This Russo convo kinda reminded me of that.

I think that was the old wire taps on Genovese guys Fritzy Giovanelli and Frank Condo. Talking about vitamins, acupuncture, diet, getting enough sun, exercise, etc. - they were also complaining about how miserable it was to have to hang out with The Chin and how Chin would always cheat when playing cards, and complaining about how gay the Greenwich Village Halloween parade was.

[PolackTony]

What was the wiretap where it was two wiseguys talking about diet and exercise? Like eating grapefruit for breakfast or something. This Russo convo kinda reminded me of that.

I think that was the old wire taps on Genovese guys Fritzy Giovanelli and Frank Condo. Talking about vitamins, acupuncture, diet, getting enough sun, exercise, etc. - they were also complaining about how miserable it was to have to hang out with The Chin and how Chin would always cheat when playing cards, and complaining about how gay the Greenwich Village Halloween parade was.

That was an amazing convo lol.

“Whaddya doin’, eatin’?”

“Yeah, I’m eatin’ a pear”