Gangland September 7th 2023

[Dr031718]

Chris Colombo, the son of the late Mafia boss Joe Colombo, was one of the smartest bookmakers to ever take a bet. He ran one of the biggest, most profitable bookmaking operations in the world until he was busted in 2004. Chris says that unabashedly in Taking Action With Chris Colombo, a video podcast about gambling that he began just in time for the start of the pro football season.

Colombo, 61, says he'll give viewers a pick, when he's got a good one. Most importantly, he'll explain the ins and outs of sports betting, including sucker bets to avoid. In his first two episodes, Colombo, whose dad had a few things to say about The Godfather, has indicated that his podcast will be a "no holds barred" affair — much more than just the words of a self-impressed tout.

As proof, even though it can't be good for business, Colombo's producers didn't edit out Bronx-based attorney Murray Richman's statement that legalized gambling, the premise of his podcast, is "destructive of our society."

We'll get to Richman's take on legalized gambling and a few gems about the legal system from Don't Worry Murray, whom Colombo has never hired but has known for decades. The ex-bookie states that Richman is the best lawyer he's ever met.

But first, there are more than a few great mob tidbits tucked into the show. For instance, Colombo said the iconic horse head in the bed scene in The Godfather was a fictionalized version of a terrifying deed that wiseguys carried out to get the very rich business magnate, film producer Howard Hughes to stop blackballing Frank Sinatra from the movie business.

According to Colombo, the nasty caper that Sinatra buddies pulled off against the reclusive millionaire entrepreneur stemmed from the same fury expressed by Jack Woltz, the movie mogul portrayed so well by John Marley in the movie: Hughes was furious that Ol' Blue Eyes had married Ava Gardner, the starlet that Hughes had showered with jewels and other gifts in his many failed marriage proposals to her.

The terrifying scene comes shortly after Johnny Fontaine complains to Don Corleone in the opening wedding scene that Woltz won't cast him for a role and The Godfather utters his famous line, "I'm gonna make him an offer he can't refuse."

Fontaine was Sinatra and Woltz was Howard Hughes, says Colombo. He notes that "Hughes used to cultivate actresses and give them stardom at a very young age" after he "took his liberties" with them, which "guys back East and Midwest really frowned upon because they felt that everybody is someone's daughter or someone's mother, and should be treated with respect."

Colombo says he's "not sure" if it was in the late 1940s or early 1950s before Sinatra won an Academy Award in the 1953 film From Here to Eternity. But he says it was after Ava Gardner had "stopped dating Hughes and he went insane." In revenge, Hughes was holding Sinatra back from films. "He was trying to block him there and he was blocking him in other films." They tied the knot in 1951, but the marriage was rocky. They divorced in 1957.

"Somebody went out to speak with him" and "tried to negotiate" with Hughes and get him to "stop blocking (Sinatra's) career," but "Howard Hughes was not being very accommodating," so here's how the unnamed friends of Sinatra got Hughes to relent, Colombo said.

"(Hughes) had a racehorse and he paid a lot of money for it. He wasn't going to race it. He wanted to put it out to stud, kind of like he considered himself. When he refused and he continued to hurt Sinatra," said Colombo, "they had a vet castrate it and put it in his bed while he was sleeping."

"I'm an animal lover," Colombo continued, but he said he "didn't disagree" with how Sinatra's unnamed friends handled the situation.

"I'm happy they sent the vet, and the way I see it," Colombo opined, "it was kind of a subliminal message. I think Howard Hughes thought he was a stud and he was living vicariously through that horse. So I guess the message was if you keep acting like that, you could lose your balls, too. Pardon me. I shouldn't have said that. I apologize."

"That is a true story," said Colombo who made no bones that he favored Sinatra in the feud with Hughes. The podcaster let Gang Land, and all his viewers know that he was speaking from the basement of the home his dad built in Blooming Grove and that he was sitting at a giant pool table that Sinatra had given his father years before Joe Colombo was shot at an Italian American Civil Rights League rally in Colombus Circle.

Colombo said he viewed Hughes as an ogre who had "a position of power" that he used to seduce young women. He, like a "lot of people did love" Sinatra, who was "very charismatic" and "a strong-willed individual" who "had a decent sense of humor on top of it all," he said.

Last week, Taking Action With CC broke the news that attorney Richman, who has tried more than 400 trials to verdict since hanging out his shingle 59 years and nine months ago, had tried his last case. Richman tried 33 cases to verdict in a two-year period, more trials than many lawyers ''try in their whole lives," he recalled.

"It's absolutely a wonderful experience," said Richman, 85. "And I love trying cases and I always said that trying cases is the most fun you can have with your clothes on," he said. He decided to pack it in earlier this year, he said, when he "got tired" by noon time at a Bronx trial, and he realized he "was unable to go forward for the rest of the day."

Don't Worry Murray is still the main honcho behind Richman Hill & Associates, which features lawyers Renee Hill and Stacey Richman on the firm's website.

And Richman isn't shy about stating his views on dealing with the government: You should never let any federal agent into your home to question you about anything, he says. He adds that the U.S. government isn't "the fairest government in the world" when it comes to its criminal justice system, and prosecutors stack the deck against defendants "even worse today than" than they did "30 years ago."

"I always tell people never to let the FBI or any government agency into your home," he said. "Don't let them in. If they come to your door to serve a subpoena, let them serve the subpoena outside. Don't invite them into your home. They're like bedbugs. You never get rid of them after that."

Colombo readily agreed as Richman explained how a client of his who had bought a "sheet of $1 bills" from the IRS became a suspected counterfeiter when an FBI agent entered his home and saw the memorabilia "on his wall" and was subpoenaed.

And be careful about saying, "No," to a federal agent, Richman said, recalling how a former business agent, who had retired seven years earlier, was convicted of lying to an FBI agent after he was asked if he had ever taken any bribes. The unwary ex-business agent said of course not. If he had said, "Yes," he could not have been charged with a crime since the statute of limitations had passed, pointed out Don't Worry Murray.

The best answer, Richman agreed, would have been, "Talk to my lawyer."

The discussion remained friendly, even when Richman seemed to knock the entire premise of Colombo's video podcast when Colombo asked, "What do you think of legalized gambling?"

"I think it is destructive of our society," said Richman, who argued that it was hypocritical for something that was wrong and illegal for decades, to now be okay just because it was legal, and the government was now getting a piece of the action.

"What do you do with the guys they put in jail for gambling?" he asked. "And the judges who used to give lectures on how many families have broken up because of gambling? Is it less so now because they're legal? The state's getting their cut, they're getting their piece of the action. And now we have marijuana."

"And you know what's coming next?" the outspoken barrister asked and answered. "Heroin, cocaine. Go ahead. Go and enjoy it. As long as the state gets a piece."

Colombo punted, brought up the hassles he had fighting his gambling charges for 12 years – an exaggeration of about four years – that finally landed him behind bars for a year, and ended his show with nothing but praise for Don't Worry Murray.

"Murray Richmond," said Colombo, "sets the standard as a defense and trial attorney, friend, neighborhood guy. You name it, he's done it. He's been with the toughest, he's been with the smartest, he's been with the dumbest, but he always comes out on top with his clients."

Mikey Nose Back Behind Bars

Mafia Boss Michael (Mikey Nose) Mancuso went back to prison yesterday with at least two things fresh in his mind: Number one, when he is released next August he has got to steer clear of a bunch of folks for three years — that is unless he wants to risk another return trip to the Big House. Number two, should he get careless and run into an old pal he's not supposed to meet, well, he's got an excellent lawyer to help him out.

Those were the last things Brooklyn Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis told the Bonanno crime family boss when he sentenced him to 11 months behind bars and three years of post-prison supervise release after finding him guilty of two charges of violating his prior restrictions following a 15-year stretch for a 2004 mob rubout.

To make sure there was no doubt about his finding, Garaufis cited numerous meetings the 68-year-old mob boss had with eight convicted organized crime figures. These included Bonanno crime family underboss, John (Johnny Joe) Spirito, with whom Mancuso was spotted between October 7, 2020, and September 8, 2021, encounters that were established by photos and the testimony of FBI agent Jarryd Butler.

In addition, Mancuso was seen consorting with two mob capos, one from his own crime family as well as a Colombo skipper.

The meetings he had with the eight gangsters, the judge stated, violated Mikey Nose's prohibition against meeting with any ex-cons and also with the ban against associating with any individual "with an affiliation to any organized crime groups."

Prosecutor Michael Gibaldi noted that many of those meetings were with underlings that enabled Mancuso "to continue his affiliation and operation of the Bonanno crime family." Gibaldi argued that the maximum allowable sentence of two years was "appropriate" because of the repeated contacts Mikey Nose had with organized crime members.

In a bit of a surprise, the U.S. Probation Department, which had lodged the two VOSR charges against Mancuso, undercut Gibaldi's argument. When asked for its opinion, probation officer Ryan Lehr recommended a prison term only at the "upper end" of the listed sentencing guidelines for Mikey Nose's violations, namely five to 11 months.

In her initial request to Garaufis, lawyer Stacey Richman conceded that Mancuso had violated his conditions of supervised release. But she argued that most of his meetings were social affairs attended by wives and girlfriends. Richman pushed for a sentence of home confinement if the judge was "inclined to give any aspect of incarceration."

The attorney also stressed that while Mancuso "became complacent" with the prohibitions of his supervised release, during the entire year that the government was secretly watching and listening to her client, he committed "no crimes."

Richman argued that Mancuso "requires the Court's protection from the overreaches" of the government which pursued her client "during the time of the pandemic" when "the world was upside down" and could find "no criminality."

If Garaufis felt the need "to impose any incarceration," Richman insisted that a sentence at the "low end of the guidelines" was a long enough "wake-up call" for her client. She asked that Mancuso be allowed to self-surrender to whatever facility would be designated for him by the federal Bureau of Prisons.

She lost on the amount of time, but she prevailed on the request fo a self-surrender, which took place yesterday. The location of Mancuso's new home away from home is a closely guarded secret that will likely be disclosed today.

But wherever Mikey Nose ends up for the next 11 months, he knows because Judge Garaufis told him, that when he gets out, he's got a "very fine lawyer" who did "an excellent job" for him from the time he was charged with a VOSR back in March of last year, until the day he was told to report back to prison on September 6.

Two New Wrinkles In The 'Smoking Gun' Murder Case, But Stevie Blue Is Still His Main Witness

Bonanno soldier Stephen (Stevie Blue) Locurto is still the main witness in his effort to get his life sentence for his "smoking gun" murder conviction thrown out. But his lawyer just added two new wrinkles to the mobster's 13-year-old claim that he would have pleaded guilty to the killing and be out of prison by now if he hadn't received bad legal advice from an appeals lawyer.

Locurto, 63, no longer seeks four documents about plea negotiations that were written by former supervisory federal prosecutor Greg Andres that Stevie Blue and his attorney have long asserted will back up their contention that he would have accepted a plea deal calling for 20 years for his 1986 murder of a rival gangster in Manhattan if he'd gotten good legal advice.

In a filing yesterday, attorney Bernard Freamon wrote that he was "abandoning his request" for the Andres documents as well as his intention to call Locurto trial lawyer Harry Batchelder as a witness in an effort to obtain the 2004 and 2005 documents. To get them, the judge had ruled, both Andres and Batchelder would have had to testify they had no memories about the negotiations.

Freamon has stated that the documents would have backed up their claim that even though no formal plea deal was offered, there was one available that Locurto would have accepted if an appeals lawyer had not told him that even if he were convicted at trial, the longest sentence he could have received was 20 years in prison.

In yesterday's filing with U.S. Magistrate Judge Sanket Bulsara, Freamon added attorney Alan Nelson, an official for the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan to the "witness list" that the lawyer submitted five days earlier that includes Andres as well as former assistant U.S. attorney John Buretta, the prosecutor in the Locurto case.

Nelson, who served as Freamon's co-counsel for Locurto until 2020, has never before been mentioned as a possible witness in the case. In a May 7, 2020 filing, Nelson stated that he had begun working three days earlier as Budgeting Director for the appeals court's list of court appointed attorneys who represent indigent defendants, and asked to be relieved.

The government, which stated on September 1 that it "intends to rely upon documentary evidence and the witness declarations" that have been filed previously, and that it would assess Locurto's witness list before determining whether to "call any witnesses in response," hadn't done so when Gang Land checked yesterday.

Locurto, who won a Manhattan Supreme Court acquittal in 1987 of the "smoking gun" murder of gangster Joseph Platia even though he was arrested with the murder weapon in his pocket minutes after the killing, was found guilty at his Brooklyn Federal Court trial in 2006 and sentenced to life behind bars.

If he can convince the Court that but for alleged "ineffective assistance of counsel" advice, he would have pleaded guilty and accepted a deal of 20 years in prison, he would likely be home in short order, since he has been behind bars since his arrest in 2004.

His hearing is scheduled to take place next week.

[JohnnyS]

Thanks for posting.

Mancuso is at Allenwood Low.

[Little_Al1991]

I’m surprised Capeci didn’t quote Garaufis saying “Put some meat here on this bone for me”
Jerry’s still the best in this business

[aray22]

Thanks for posting.

Mancuso is at Allenwood Low.

With Ronnie G, who was one of the captains in favor of Cammarano taking over.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Amazed Johnny Joe didn't get violated.
Something happening there.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Thanks for posting.

Mancuso is at Allenwood Low.

With Ronnie G, who was one of the captains in favor of Cammarano taking over.

Interesting. Both tough guys. Love to be a fly on that wall

[AntComello]

Thanks for posting.

Mancuso is at Allenwood Low.

With Ronnie G, who was one of the captains in favor of Cammarano taking over.

Interesting. Both tough guys. Love to be a fly on that wall

Ronnie g would knock Mancuso out lol

[Blunts]

Thanks for posting.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Ronnie g would knock Mancuso out lol

I don't mean physically. Ronnie doesn't seem to give much of a f for respecting the food chain. Wouldn't be surprised if he gets himself shelved.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Always thought Ronnie got a hell of a bid for running a loanshark ring. 14 years. And he pled out. Murderers barely get more on pleas.
Plus over a mil in restitution and his house. Almost worth fighting it. What are they going to give you 25 years for extortionate credit and loan sharking?

[johnny_scootch]

Amazed Johnny Joe didn't get violated.
Something happening there.

Absolutely agree something else is going on here. It doesn’t make any sense, they have him red handed.

[aray22]

Always thought Ronnie got a hell of a bid for running a loanshark ring. 14 years. And he pled out. Murderers barely get more on pleas.
Plus over a mil in restitution and his house. Almost worth fighting it. What are they going to give you 25 years for extortionate credit and loan sharking?

I'm pretty sure his original plea was supposed to be like 8 or 9 years.

[newera_212]

Always thought Ronnie got a hell of a bid for running a loanshark ring. 14 years. And he pled out. Murderers barely get more on pleas.
Plus over a mil in restitution and his house. Almost worth fighting it. What are they going to give you 25 years for extortionate credit and loan sharking?

Same here. Plus he's basically a 9/11 survivor too. Volunteered at the cleanup at least. Not going to say he got railroaded but he did get a lot of time. It might have something to do with him running that same conspiracy on a previous incarceration, carrying a gun on him to visit his probation officer, the house, etc . In the eyes of the government the guy made no attempt to be anything but a gangster and they made an example out of him. Wonder how long he would have made it if Borrello didn't flip

[CabriniGreen]

Thanks for posting.

Mancuso is at Allenwood Low.

With Ronnie G, who was one of the captains in favor of Cammarano taking over.

This could be potentially good for Mancuso. A chance to consolidate his relationship with a key member of the family outside his inner Bronx core.

Let's see if he's capable of diplomacy...