Gangland 12/23/2021

[Dr031718]

Feds: 80% Of Americans Believe in Miracles Like John Pennisi's House-Shaking Sign From The Grave

John PennisiGang Land Exclusive!The trio of federal prosecutors who convicted four gangsters of the murder of Michael Meldish are too young to have heard Grace Slick and Marty Balin sing that great love song "Miracles," in 1975 where they both croon, "If only you believe in miracles," and then add, "We'd get by."

Lacking that kind of imagination, the prosecutors cited a 2010 survey that 80% of Americans believe in miracles as the basis for arguing that jurors would have found the Luchese foursome guilty even if they had heard turncoat mobster John Pennisi testify about his own firm belief in miracles and a paranormal sign he received from his late grandparents that convinced him to cooperate with the feds.

And even the 20% "who do not" believe in miracles, the prosecutors wrote, "surely know that their religious, or just superstitious friends and neighbors can testify truthfully and accurately" about a "religious experience." That's what Pennisi had in 2018 when he feared the mob wanted to kill him, they wrote. After days of "mental agony," they stated, he "prayed for a sign, invoking saints, rosary beads, and his deceased grandparents."

Alexandra RothmanPennisi, the prosecutors stated, decided to quit the Mafia when "a rack of dishware in his home began shaking for an extended period of time." He called his mother who confirmed what he heard. That's when Pennisi "regarded it as some sort of sign that he should leave the Mafia life and instead seek shelter with the FBI," say prosecutors Hagan Scotten, Celia Cohen and Alexandra Rothman, apparently writing with a collective straight face.

In asking the trial judge to reject the defense argument that jurors would have believed that Pennisi was "paranoid" and suffered "florid delusions" and voted to acquit if they had heard his mind-boggling story, prosecutors argued that this "newly discovered evidence" was much ado about nothing — like all the assertions in its 666 page filing that includes 545 pages of exhibits.

The only difference between the others and this assertion, which prosecutors took a few pages to rebut, is that this "claim about Pennisi's mental health is at least new,'' they told White Plains Federal Judge Cathy Seibel. It stems from something he said two years after the trial during a podcast this year with former law enforcement official Gary Jenkins, as Gang Land first reported back in June.

Celia CohenOn that fateful weekend in mid-October of 2018, Pennisi recalled for Jenkins, he felt "sick to (his) stomach" and was unable to take his son's advice to contact the FBI. But on Monday morning he prayed to his grandparents who "had passed away" for guidance, and they gave him the "sign" he needed.

"I didn't live by a train station," Pennisi continued. "You had to walk (there.) There was no planes flying around. It wasn't an earthquake. Gary, I swear to you, I had wine glasses and different glasses and dishes in the house. Everything was shaking in the house," he said in a high pitched voice, imitating the sound of glasses clicking, "bing bing bing bing bing bing."

"I even called my mother up and I says, 'I want you to listen to something.' This went on for hours. She says, 'What is that?' I says, 'It's the glasses. I prayed to Grandma and Grandpa. It's the glasses and the dishes and the house is shaking.' Gary, I can't even explain it. And THAT was my sign to go."

Hagan Scotten"These statements," the prosecutors wrote, "fall far short of the standard for retrial based on newly discovered evidence" since "Pennisi's account of the shaking dishes obviously has nothing to do with the defendants' guilt or innocence." It might be "impeachment" material but appeals courts have held that "new evidence that is merely impeaching will not ordinarily justify a new trial," they stated.

The prosecutors argued that it would be "particularly difficult to see how cross-examination" about the matter could "probably lead to an acquittal" since "there is no evidence that Pennisi was hallucinating." Noting that Pennisi is the only source of information about the paranormal event, they wrote that "he called his mother on the telephone, and she heard whatever he was hearing."

"That Pennisi chose to interpret the rattling as a religious sign hardly makes him a witness that most jurors would necessarily reject," the prosecutors wrote, noting the vast majority of "Americans who believe in miracles," according to a 2007-2010 study on religion by The Pew Research Center, a prominent non-profit nonpartisan group.

Grace Slick, Martin Balin"Pennisi's testimony was not of the sort that could be hallucinated," the prosecutors wrote. "It would be ridiculous to assert that Pennisi simply imagined this all as a result of his faith." Instead, the defense lawyers "strain to bend Pennisi's podcast miracle to fit inapt theories," including "paranoia" and "florid delusions," the prosecutors contended.

"Pennisi's belief that his shaking dishes were a sign that he should cooperate with law enforcement," cannot be described as "paranoia or florid delusions," or "what the defendants describe as his 'untreated mental condition,'" they wrote. The info was merely "new impeachment material" which does not mandate a new trial since Pennisi's "credibility had already been shown to be questionable," say prosecutors Scotten, Cohen and Rothman.

More than likely the incident was a sign of "depression," they opined. "Had the Court allowed cross-examination on this subject," they wrote, "it is not likely a jury would have refused to credit Pennisi's thorough, heavily corroborated testimony because he suffered from depression and had once interpreted an unusual event as a sign to abandon his allegiance to the mob."

In fact, the prosecutors declared, "the defendants were far better off with the argument they actually made at trial, which was that Pennisi should not be credited because he had previously committed perjury to benefit himself."

Judge Cathy SeibelThat argument may fly with Judge Seibel — no matter what her take is on miracles — but it certainly doesn't with Luchese leaders Matthew (Matty) Madonna and Steven (Stevie Wonder) Crea, and underlings Christopher Londonio and Terrence (Ted) Caldwell. They're each serving life sentences for the 2013 gangland-style slaying of Meldish, the former Purple Gang leader.

Defense lawyers also questioned the spin that the government put on Pennisi's reaction to the account of what the wife of lead prosecutor Scotten said when she saw an FBI picture of the mobster coming out of a wake with the same sad look on his face that Scotten's father had when he had been diagnosed with cancer.

The prosecutors said the defense argument that Scotten's comment on Pennisi's facial expression "stoked Mr. Pennisi's perception that the Luchese Family was seeking to kill him" makes "no sense." They argue that since "the family member in the story was unnecessarily sad because he had been misdiagnosed with cancer . . . the implication would be that Pennisi's fear of the Luchese Family was misplaced," not that "he looked sad" because they wanted to kill him.

John Pennisi Gang Land thinks the prosecution may need a miracle to convince Judge Seibel of that. Here's what Pennisi recounted about the time Scotten told him about the day Mrs. Scotten saw the look on the mobster's face and told her husband that it reminded her of the look that her father-in-law had on his face when he thought he had cancer.

"He said his father was misdiagnosed with cancer, but before he knew it was a misdiagnosis, he's thinking that he has cancer, because he was told he had cancer," Pennisi recalled for his then podcast partner and Gambino associate Anthino (Hootie) Russo.

"And he's sitting on his porch and someone took a picture of him. There was a parade going by the father's house with elephants. The father was in another world, like looking into another world with his head down. She compared that picture of that guy thinking he was dying to me," Pennisi said.

"I didn't think I was dying. I didn't know what the hell was going on. But it was so heavy on my mind, that the agents happened to catch that picture of me. And you could see the picture says a thousand words of what was on my face. I was so puzzled. I knew something was wrong, but that confirmed it when I went to that wake. And it was bad. It was bad."

During the wake, he said, "it was like I had the plague, and you don't know how that feels. Like these are people who I considered my brothers and they're walking away from me. You know shaking my hand and walking away. And they're giving you the cold shoulder. And it's — don't forget who they are either. It was serious."

The defense lawyers argue that Pennisi's account about the wake picture establishes that the government stoked his perception that the Lucheses "were seeking to kill him," and "actively contributed" to a bias that Pennisi expressed from the witness stand toward the defendants, especially Madonna and Crea, the leaders of the family that had allegedly marked him for death.

"In our reply next month," said attorney Anthony DiPietro, "We will address each of the prosecution's meritless attempts to excuse the powerful new evidence that completely eradicates both its theory of the prosecution on the Meldish murder charge, and the reliability of its cooperating witnesses. We remain overwhelmingly confident that a new trial will be ordered once this new evidence is evaluated by the courts." The defense response is due January 14.

Feds Give Johnny T An Early Christmas Present

John TortoraFederal prosecutors have changed their minds about trying to convince a federal judge that Genovese wiseguy John (Johnny T) Tortora ordered the 1997 murder of a Yonkers police informer who was stabbed to death following a barroom brawl and whose body was found 100 feet away under an underpass of the Saw Mill River Parkway.

"The government no longer intends to prove" that Tortora, 64, had anything to do with the murder of Richard Ortiz at his sentencing next month on unrelated obstruction of justice and gambling charges as they had planned to, prosecutors informed Manhattan Federal Judge Sidney Stein last week.

Prosecutors Justin Rodriguez and Christopher Clore had been slated to present testimony from two cooperating witnesses who had fingered Tortora as the man behind the killing. The feds were poised to make the argument even though they had dropped the murder charge in an effort to convince Stein to give Johnny T the statutory maximum seven year sentence he faces according to his guilty plea.

The prosecutors gave no reason for their about face. But there's little doubt that they opted against having a full blown hearing after Tortora's lawyers said they planned to call at least nine witnesses, including two retired detectives who had investigated the case for years, who would finger the government's two witnesses as the killers and absolve Johnny T of any involvement.

James HarkinsAs he has stated in numerous court filings, attorney Barry Levin told Gang Land this week that his witnesses, who were located by investigator James Harkins, were planning to testify that Abdill (Chino) Saez, who had been arrested for the killing back in 1997 but never prosecuted, had killed Ortiz under orders from Luchese associate Carmine Francomano Jr.

Levin and co-counsel Richard Levitt have argued for more than a year that Francomano Jr. ordered the killing of the 29-year old Ortiz because Francomano believed Ortiz was the snitch who gave information to Yonkers Police in the early 1990s that cops used to shutter a social club run by his dad, Luchese mobster Carmine (Snappy) Francomano.

But sources say that after Francomano Jr. was quietly arrested for the murder in 2015, he told Yonkers detective John Geiss and FBI agents that Johnny T "ordered the killing because he suspected that Ortiz had stolen money from Joker Poker machines that Tortora had in several bars and other locations in Westchester at the time."

The two detectives, Frank Pellegrino and William Rinaldi, were prepared to testify, Levin told Gang Land, that they had done a thorough investigation, had interviewed over 55 witnesses, including Francomano Jr., "and they made it very clear that Johnny Tortora was never a suspect in that murder."

Barry LevinLevin said Rinaldi had stated that he "knew Johnny his whole life" and said, "If we could have gotten Johnny for this we would have nailed him in a second. He broke our balls for years. I would have loved to get Johnny for this but he was never anywhere near the case."

"Pellegrino told me last week," said Levin, "that they knew that Francomano Jr. was a low level street hustler who worked for his father and was responsible for the murder and they thought they had given prosecutors enough evidence to charge him with the murder, but they never did."

When Geiss and the feds got around to charging Francomano Jr. with the murder in 2015, the mob associate fingered Tortora for the slaying and "insisted that he had told detectives that back in 1997," said Levin. "But they say he never did," the lawyer continued. "He fingered Johnny T to save himself because he knew the feds were investigating my client."

Tortora's plea agreement calls for seven years behind bars. The probation department has recommended a five year prison term. But since the murder is no longer part of the sentencing, Levin says he will argue for a time served sentence for Johnny T — the 19 months he spent locked up as a danger to the community based on a killing he had nothing to do with.

Judge Stein ordered both sides to submit their revised sentencing memos before Tortora's scheduled sentencing on January 24.

Judge Sets A Trial Date For Colombo Family Case; Then Bows Out

Andrew RussoIn her last day presiding over the monster racketeering case against Colombo crime family boss Andrew (Mush) Russo and 13 codefendants, Brooklyn Federal Judge Allyne Ross scheduled a very tentative trial date in November of next year and ordered a Bonanno soldier released from prison because his medical problems were not being treated properly by his federal prison jailers.

In a surprise move on Monday, Ross, who has been a senior judge for 10 years and is not required to state a reason, gave up the case. The defendants include Russo's top aides, underboss Benjamin (The Claw) Castellazzo and consigliere Ralph DeMatteo, as well as the heir apparent to the throne, capo Theodore (Skinny Teddy) Persico, nephew of the late boss Carmine (Junior) Persico.

It was reassigned to Judge Diane Gujarati, a former Manhattan federal prosecutor who was appointed to the Brooklyn bench in September of last year.

In her last decision in the three month-old case, Judge Ross set a $1.5 million bond for wiseguy John (Bazoo) Ragano who will now be able to spend Christmas at home since home detention is a condition of his release. The move came after Ross called the Metropolitan Detention Center and confirmed assertions by defense attorney Joel Stein that his client had not been receiving the prescribed medication he needed for the glaucoma he suffers.

Judge Diane GujaratiRagano, 59, who was sentenced to 51 months by Ross in a 2014 racketeering case and was released from prison in 2017, is charged with loansharking, drug dealing and fraud in schemes with several Colombo wiseguys and associates. But he is not named in the racketeering count which alleges a 20-year-long shakedown of a Queens based construction workers union.

Earlier, in a long back and forth colloquy, Ross told attorney Joseph Corozzo, who represents Persico, that in her view prosecutors had acted in "good faith" in turning over most of the voluminous discovery in the case. She also refused to remove the "complex case" designation that stops the 70-day speedy trial clock from running.

Judge Ross did agree to schedule a trial date, one that is likely to be revisited by Judge Gujarati once she gets up to speed on the case.

The competency hearing that prosecutors and defense lawyers asked Ross to schedule for Russo last month never came up during Friday's session. Before it began, each side informed the court that it had selected an "evaluator" to conduct a "psychiatric and/or psychological" examination of Andy Mush before the competency hearing, and they wished to continue discussing the matter until December 30.

Prosecutors stated that they had been involved in plea negotiations with several unnamed defendants and would be offering plea deals to all defendants next month — with the likely exception of Russo, whose status as mentally competent to assist in his own defense is in question.

Editor's Note: It makes no difference whether you celebrate Christmas, or believe in Santa Claus: Gang Land wishes you and everyone close to you a Merry Christmas.

[Shellackhead]

Thanks for posting

[Dapper_Don]

thanks for posting!

[Tonyd621]

Thank for posting.
Is this Francomano Jr guy is he now perceived as an informant? Is he an informant? In the life?
I remembered he was involved in a case in 2009 that involved bribes in the NYC buildings dept. That was a pretty interesting case because of deep the Lucchesse were able to get in the construction trades...

[Amershire_Ed]

Thanks for posting

[Dave65827]

Another Pennisi article what a surprise

[JohnnyS]

Thanks for the post!

[SonnyBlackstein]

Is this Francomano Jr guy is he now perceived as an informant? Is he an informant? In the life?

100%


Thanks for the post Dr.

[joeycigars]

Colombo crime family case ,
Prosecutors stated that they had been involved in plea negotiations with several unnamed defendants and would be offering plea deals to all defendants next month — with the likely exception of Russo, whose status as mentally competent to assist in his own defense is in question.


In a surprise move on Monday, Ross, who has been a senior judge for 10 years and is not required to state a reason, gave up the case

It was reassigned to Judge Diane Gujarati, She was a United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York,


If I were a defendant I wouldn't be happy about this judge reassignment,
See who takes the pleas or goes to trial ...always interesting,

[Pmac2]

that guy teddy persico must be nuts. i wonder if he gets a slap on the wrist because he was kinda just there. wasnt really a force behind the union extortion. but if he gets another 6 8 yrs that would be some type of record in mob familys. like this guy did 40yrs in prison on 5 6 different cases his longest stay on the street was like 6months

[Pmac2]

just go bag grocerys

[Rocco]

Pennisi articles are getting old. Thanks for posting and Merry Christmas fella's !

[funkster]

The silly ass passive aggressive jab articles are getting old...be a professional and just post the story.

[CornerBoy]

teddy has money too! thats the crazy part. Actually who knows what he has. Think Carmine left a package? The persico's have the limo company, house upstate, house in Dyker thats worth maybe a few million. But do allie boy and michael have the dough to support him?