Gangland October 3rd 2024

[Dr031718]

Bazoo Will Roll The Dice At Trial For The First Time Against His Buck Naked Accuser

For the first time in a criminal career that spans four decades and involves major crimes including racketeering and attempted murder, Bonanno soldier John (Bazoo) Ragano has refused to accept a plea deal. He will take his chances at trial in the unusual federal loansharking case he was charged with early this year.

His trial begins next week on charges that involve the same $150,000 "juice" loan with weekly interest payments of $2250 that Ragano, 62 was first accused of giving to mob associate Vincent Martino, 46, in 2021. Bazoo pleaded guilty to loansharking and resolved that case in 2022. He began serving a 57-month prison term in 2023.

In this go-round, Ragano is charged with continuing to use extortionate means to collect the loan from Martino for about eight months after he pleaded guilty to the original loansharking charge. The new crime took place, according to court filings, from November of 2022 until July of 2023, when Bazoo was tape recorded telling Martino, whom he'd ordered to take off his clothes, that he'd "slap the shit out of" him if he didn't pay off the $150,000 loan.

On the plus side for Bazoo, Brooklyn Federal Judge Hector Gonzalez has blocked prosecutors from telling the jury that one of Ragano's other wiseguy nicknames is "maniac," and that his rap sheet goes back 45 years.

But they will be able to tell the jury that Bazoo pleaded guilty to loansharking involving the $150,000 loan he gave to Martino in the 2021 case, when the men were codefendants in the racketeering case that accused the Colombo family hierarchy and four other members of extorting more than $600,000 from a union official during a 20-year-long shakedown.

Neither man was alleged to have been involved in the union shakedown. But Martino, in addition to being an alleged victim of Ragano, was also accused of being an alleged partner of the Bonanno soldier in a year-long drug trafficking conspiracy to purchase marijuana from growers in California and distribute it in New York that ended in September of 2021.

The key evidence against Ragano, whose deadline to accept a government plea offer expired two weeks ago, is unquestionably his tape recorded words to Martino on July 5, 2023.

On that day, Martino showed up at the salvage yard where Ragano worked and accused the mobster of cooperating with the feds against him, and stated he wasn't going to pay off the loan. Bazoo called him a "fucking scumbag," ordered him to undress, and allegedly threatened to retaliate if he didn't pay off the balance of the $150,000 loan.

"I'll see you when I get out tough guy," Ragano told Martino, adding: "Don't forget I know where you're at now."

Over defense objections, Gonzalez ruled that Martino will be permitted to testify that two salvage yard workers terrified him when they suddenly and ominously appeared behind Bazoo right after he ordered Martino to strip naked during their taped talk, when Ragano correctly assumed that Martino was cooperating with the feds.

In their court filings, defense attorneys Joel Stein and Kenneth Womble have argued that despite the seemingly threatening words that their client uttered on July 5, the government has no real evidence that Ragano ever threatened to use violence against Martino in an effort to collect the balance of the $150,000.

The lawyers have claimed that Martino, under orders from his FBI handlers, "provoked" their quick-tempered client to utter an "understandably vehement response" as part of a "preconceived plan" to level a "false accusation" that their true-blue wiseguy was a snitch. The government's goal, they said, was to get Bazoo to utter an "angry retort" in an effort to convict him of a crime of which they had not been able to obtain any evidence in the prior eight months.

"If the confrontation was about money," why did Martino "begin the conversation by launching into and continuing his barrage of false accusations" instead of "discussing" the $150,000 extortionate loan that Ragano had pleaded guilty to giving to Martino in 2022, wrote Stein and Womble, citing a portion of the taped talk that prosecutors hadn't mentioned.

Ragano: Come here. What's going on?
Martino: I gotta end this thing.
Ragano: What do you mean end it?
Martino: Because you fucking snitched on me bro.
Ragano: I snitched on you?
Martino: Yea.
Andrew KosloskyRagano: What are you talking about?
Martino: You gave me up on the weed case bro.
Ragano: I gave you, get the fuck out of here? What are you losing you fucking mind? Are you trying to get stupid on me bro? Is that what you’re trying to do?
Martino: No.
Ragano: How the fuck are you gonna tell me I snitched on you on the weed case? What are you losing your fucking mind? I'm going to jail for 57 months.

That's when Ragano shouted, "Okay, well then take off your fucking shit right now my man," according to portions of the taped talk that was detailed by prosecutors. "Take off your fucking pants right now, lemme see, I want to see," he said.

Gonzalez ruled that prosecutors will also be able to play the excited tape recorded call Martino made seconds later as he ran away from the yard and was struggling to put on his clothes. On the tape, Martino tells an FBI agent that "two guys with a fucking tire iron" had showed up and frightened him as he was being threatened by Ragano.

The judge also ruled last month that prosecutors can play several tape recordings in which Ragano is heard boasting to turncoat mob associate Andrew Koslosky about violent actions he could take against Martino if he wanted to since prosecutors assured him there was a "nexus" between the conversations and Martino, namely that he was aware of what Ragano had said.

Those conversations took place in 2021, after Koslosky was arrested by the FBI and agreed to cooperate with the feds.

Koslosky quickly became the key witness in the Colombo family case. He acknowledged his own role in a fraud scheme with Ragano, as well as a plot to embezzle $10,000 a month from the benefit funds of the union whose president the Colombos were extorting, and wore a wire for several months.

Prosecutors Devon Lash and Andrew Reich say the taped talks will corroborate the expected testimony by both Martino and Koslosky that Ragano was a mobster who had a propensity to commit violence to get his way, and would use it to get Martino to succumb to his alleged threats against him.

At least two conversations seem to have a "nexus" to Martino. In a June 1, 2021 discussion about Ragano's plans to distribute California-grown marijuana in New York, they wrote that Bazoo recalled having told Martino "that he could betray" him and their cohorts in the marijuana scheme by not sharing proceeds with them or getting his pals to rob Martino and the others.

Bazoo stated he could "send two guys in to rob them," they wrote. "I mean this is not something new to me," Ragano continued. "What do you guys think I was born yesterday? Are you fucking kidding me? I got guys that could go rob the farmer if I wanted to. I hang out with gangsters in fucking jail, guys that did time, 25 years, that are hung up for money and would do anything."

And on June 2, 2021, they wrote, Ragano, frustrated by the slow progress of the pot distribution scheme, stated, "What am I a fucking jerk off? I'm in the street all day hustling my ass off. I'm the only fucking gangster around here that'll go to jail. Stop jerking me off man, you gave me the shit for 600, I can go sell it for 1,000, I'll be in the street a gangster, like a n****, you're giving it to me for the same price the n**** are paying, you ain't doing nothing for me!"

But sources say that in recent sealed filings, attorneys Stein and Womble have cited recent discovery material they received to contest the assertion by prosecutors that there is a "nexus" between the Koslosky tapes and Martino, and have asked Gonzalez to block the prosecutors from using any of the Koslosky tapes at trial.

In the government reply, the sources say, prosecutors dispute the defense claim and have asked the judge to permit as many as six Koslosky taped talks into evidence against Ragano.

Testimony in the trial, which is expected to take between one and two weeks, is scheduled to begin Tuesday.

He's A Grown-Up Gotti Now, And Guilty In $1 Million Covid Relief Funds Fraud

Carmine G. Agnello, who starred with his mother Victoria in Growing Up Gotti 20 years ago, has lots in common with his mobster father, Carmine (The Bull) Agnello and his late grandpa, Mafia boss John Gotti. And like them, and quite a few other Gotti family members, he's likely to spend a few years behind bars, based on his command performance in federal court last week.

Agnello, 38, pleaded guilty to fraud charges for obtaining $1.1 million in Covid relief funds from the Small Business Administration for his scrap yard business during the Covid-19 pandemic and using it for his own personal use, which included investing $420,000 in a cryptocurrency business. Sources say this too was a losing proposition for Agnello, who has a "gambling problem."

Victoria Gotti, his mom and reality TV show co-star, was there in Central Islip Federal Court to support Agnello, and she discussed her finances and her son's gambling problem with the judge. She then cosigned an unsecured $500,000 bond to secure his release pending his sentencing.

In her discussion with Judge Nusrat Choudhury, the former New York Post columnist daughter of the late Dapper Don referred to Carmine as "my song." Gotti, who earns rental income from real estate property she owns, told the judge that her son has been undergoing treatment for his gambling addiction, which the judge ordered Agnello to continue during his release, as part of his bond.

Technically, Agnello faces up to 30 years in prison because the fraud was related to "a presidentially declared major disaster or emergency." His plea agreement, worked out by prosecutor Bradley King and lawyer James Froccaro, calls for a prison term of 33-to-41 months, and restitution of $943,000, the unpaid balance of the loan money he received from the SBA.

The plea agreement grants Agnello the right to appeal a sentence greater than 46 months as excessive, and assures him that the government will not seek a sentence greater than 41 months. He is scheduled to be sentenced on May 7.

Agnello admitted submitting his first fraudulent claim with the SBA for "COVID-19 emergency-relief funds meant for distressed small businesses" on April 4, 2020, a week after then-President Trump signed the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act.

Between April 2020 and November 5, 2021, Agnello admitted he fraudulently obtained about $1.1 million in emergency business loans for Crown Auto Parts & Recycling, a Queens-based business that he operated, according to court filings. To get the loans, the filings say, he submitted phony documents about his number of employees, and false information about what the money would be used for, and lied when he stated that he had never been arrested.

And the lie, it turns out, was about the first time that Agnello got in trouble with the law over his dealings in the junk yard-scrap metal business.

In 2018, Agnello was charged with operating an illegal scrapyard, LSM Auto Parts & Recycling, and with felony charges of falsifying business records for crushing about 400 cars during a two-month period that year without having a license to operate the business. He ended up copping a no-jail misdemeanor plea deal that cost him $5600 in fines and forfeiture.

He's not likely to avoid a prison term this time, and — if and when that happens — Agnello will be the only member of the Gotti or Agnello family behind bars. His father completed the nine year bid he received for racketeering charges involving the junk yard business he ran in Queens, and the elder Carmine Agnello wangled a no jail plea deal for a similar racket he was charged with running in Cleveland in 2016, where he now resides.

Young Carmine's Mafia boss grandad, and Peter Gotti, each died behind bars. Gene Gotti, and his brothers Vincent, and Richard, have all completed their respective prison terms. So has Richard Gotti's mobster son, also named Richard, as well as Carmine's uncle John, the erstwhile Junior Don, who stymied the feds last shot at him with a hung jury in 2009. So has the Dapper Don's namesake grandson, John J. Gotti, who was released from state prison last year.

Luchese Gangster Joe Cutaia Is Ailing & Down For The Count, But Feds Want Him to Stick Around Awhile Longer

Joseph (Spanky) Cutaia, the Luchese family associate who was arrested for a slew of drug and alcohol violations while on supervised release four months ago, has caught a series of tough breaks while confined at the dreaded Metropolitan Detention Center, Gang Land has learned.

Cutaia was hoping at his first status conference to get a sweet plea deal and go home, or at least to be moved to a different facility, anywhere but the MDC. Instead, he learned that the Probation Department was pushing to add more charges to his VOSR — charges that could get him sent back to prison for the statutory maximum of two years.

But even before his lawyer and the feds could get together and begin trying to iron out a deal, the 45-year-old gangster "fell and broke his back," according to a non-medical source. Cutaia was hospitalized where he underwent spinal surgery.

At that point, on September 5, his lawyer Thomas Mirigliano and prosecutor Devon Lash got a two-week adjournment in the case. That was soon extended an additional two weeks after Lash submitted a joint letter to Brooklyn Federal Jjudge Eric Vitaliano. That delay ends tomorrow, October 4.

In her letter, the prosecutor wrote that "Cutaia has a prior back injury and has a history of back pain" and "underwent successful spinal surgery at a local hospital on September 11, 2024" to repair an injury he had suffered at the MDC.

"According to medical officials at the MDC," Lash stated, Cutaia was "recuperating at a local rehabilitation center following the surgery and is expected to remain there for, at least, the next several weeks."

That session is still scheduled to take place tomorrow. But Gang Land's source regarding the injuries the gangster suffered at the MDC, doesn't think that's going to happen because Cutaia was still undergoing "rehabilitation" at an outside facility, even though the Bureau of Prisons database has him confined at the MDC.

Cutaia was sentenced to 20 years in prison following his arrest in 2009 as a member of a violent mob crew that took part in numerous home invasion robberies in the New York area. He was resentenced to 15 years last year when Vitaliano threw out a controversial weapons possession count that added a mandatory 10 years to his sentence. He was released in December.

At his arraignment for his VOSR, Lash argued that "toll records and monitored prison calls" established that Cutaia had "contacted several previously convicted members and associates of organized crime," following his release from prison and that he still "has significant ties" to the Luchese family and should be detained as a danger to the community. Vitaliano agreed.

Maybe so, but since he’s flat on his back and still detained, Cutaia’s threat level may yet be taken down a notch or two.

Editor's Note: Gang Land is a taking a slide next week. We'll be back with more real stuff about organized crime in two weeks, on October 17.

[Amershire_Ed]

Thanks for posting

[Brovelli]

I know I brought this up already but I hope Jerry does a piece on the ILA. There’s been stuff the last few years on a few gigante family members on the Jersey waterfront and I’m sure Jerry is the most likely source to know if daggett has any links to the Genovese family still or anyone else.

[Tonyd621]

So, this informant, Martino is involved in a west coast east coast drug trafficking operation w/ the same guy he is wearing a radio and testifying against?

[scott22]

Yes, his ties to Barney and Danny and Patty exist today .

Video and Article dropping in a few hours.

Scott