Underboss

Mob underboss Philip Leonetti today was sentenced to the maximum of 45 years in prison for racketeering. Leonetti, 36, neatly dressed in a navy blue sweater and gray slacks, stood impassively as U.S. District Judge Franklin S. Van Antwerpen rejected a defense request that Leonetti be placed on probation. "In light of the number of racketeering acts - (including) four murders . . . - I don't believe that probation is a reasonable alternative in this case," Van Antwerpen said.

Mob underboss Steven Mazzone was sentenced yesterday to nine years in prison as the dismantling of the Merlino organized-crime family continued before U.S. District Judge Herbert Hutton. The sentence, the third imposed this week - Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino got 14 years on Monday, and Frank Gambino got 71 months on Tuesday - is part of the final round in a five-year investigation in which Merlino and his top associates were targeted. But according to law-enforcement officials at the federal and state level, it is hardly the end of the government's systematic attack on the mob. Merlino, Mazzone and crime-family consigliere George Borgesi, who is scheduled to be sentenced today, all have additional "problems," state and federal law-enforcement sources say. And reputed acting mob boss Joseph Ligambi, who took the reins of the beleaguered Philadelphia mob after Merlino was imprisoned in 1999, is also the focus of intense scrutiny.

Details, details. Mind-numbing details. Shoot him in the chest, or between the eyes? Do it in his cafe, or on the sidewalk? Take out just the monkey or the moosey guy, too? And oh, by the way, how's the roast beef in that place? If words were bullets, reputed South Philadelphia Mafia underboss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino would be dead a thousand times over. But, as a federal jury learned this week from a score of secretly recorded audio tapes, planning a mob hit is not like the movies.

Reputed mobster Joseph Merlino arrives at his mother's home in the 1500 block of Hartranft Street in South Philadelphia. Authorities say Merlino, released from jail yesterday, is set to be an underboss in the mob.

A hearing yesterday was postponed until Sept. 14 for Gaetano Polidoro, 24, who is facing charges of carrying firearms without a license. Polidoro is also suspected of gunning for Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino, the reputed underboss of the Philadelphia crime family.

Acting mob underboss Steven Mazzone, described by feds as a "dangerous criminal," yesterday took the first step in a fight for his life. Meanwhile, a mob associate in the case, Ralph "Ralphie Head" Abbruzzi, asked a judge if he could go to Disney World. Mazzone, 36, of Bouvier Street near Wolf, pleaded not guilty to a murder racketeering conspiracy that, if convicted, could send him away for life - or death. Asked if his jailed client would cooperate with the government, Mazzone's attorney, Joseph Santaguida, said "He wouldn't.

Angelo Lonardo is the eldest and loftiest statesman of the Mafia to have bound himself over to the federal prosecutors as certified authority on its secrets. Lonardo was an underboss of the Honored Society's Cleveland family in 1980 when he was sentenced to life without parole with 103 extra years thrown in after being convicted of narcotics dealings he still swears he never touched. He was in his 70s by then, and whatever strength of character had qualified him for his great office was so enfeebled that a year in prison was enough to set him crying mercy to the FBI. Lonardo completed his metropolitan debut as a government witness at the trial of six paladins of the Mafia's presumed ruling commission one day last week.

In his third day on the witness stand, ex-mob boss Ralph Natale shocked the court, numbed by too many tape recordings. Yesterday, Natale fingered the hit man who in 1993 shot the son of mob boss John Stanfa in a rush hour hit in Schuylkill Expressway traffic. Natale identified reputed mobster Gaeton Lucibello, 46, as the shooter who critically wounded Joseph Stanfa. The government star witness claimed defendant Steve Mazzone, now reputed underboss, told him about Lucibello during a 1993 prison visit.

More rats - Nos. 4, 5 and possibly 6 - have been caught in the federal mob trap. The latest and biggest is jailed mobster Gaetano "Horsehead" Scafidi, 35, who served two masters in a bitter mob war in 1993. Scafidi is "definitely cooperating" with federal authorities, according to knowledgable sources. Scafidi is expected to identify reputed acting mob boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino as the triggerman in two mob hits, a mastermind in others, and name other high-ranking mobsters in other crimes as well.

His own uncle, a tough guy's tough guy, had cut a deal with the feds and was ready to rat him out. His own voice was on FBI tapes, purportedly discussing gangland murder plots and drug deals, more evidence that might persuade a jury to convict him of crimes that could keep him in prison for life. And, having concocted a variety of unsuccessful plots two years ago to bump off a Mafia underboss, Louis Turra probably viewed himself as a prime candidate for a mob vendetta in or out of prison.

An ongoing state investigation into a South Philadelphia drug-trafficking and loan-sharking ring may create additional criminal problems for jailed mob underboss Joseph "Mousie" Massimino. Massimino, 61, is suspected of financing part of the operation, according to court documents. Charges are expected to be filed later this year in the case, which is being handled by the Pennsylvania Attorney General's Office. In a motion filed in federal court earlier this month, authorities said the investigation was focused on convicted South Philadelphia drug dealer William "Billy" Andrews, whom they described as a "close associate" of Massimino's.

Reputed mob underboss Joseph "Mousie" Massimino was ordered held without bail Friday on racketeering and gambling charges detailed in a 50-count indictment handed up earlier in the week. U.S. District Court Judge Felipe Restrepo cited Massimino's lengthy record of arrests and convictions in accepting prosecutors' arguments that the 61-year-old would be a threat to the community if released. Massimino, of South Philadelphia, has been arrested 34 times, according to a detention memo filed by the prosecution, and has been convicted of federal drug trafficking and state racketeering charges.

After a federal magistrate denied him bail yesterday, Joseph "Mousie" Massimino, the reputed underboss of the Philadelphia mob, left the courtroom shaking his head. It wasn't a close call for U.S. Magistrate L. Felipe Restrepo. John Han, a trial lawyer with the U.S. Department of Justice, said Massimino, 61, had a criminal case file dating to 1968 with 40 arrests, including three prior felony drug convictions, and a 2004 conviction in New Jersey for racketeering and related offenses for which he was sentenced to 10 years.

MAYS LANDING, N.J. - Nearly a year after spitting in the face of a Margate police officer, mob underboss Martin Angelina was sentenced Friday to a year's probation and fined $1,000 for aggravated assault. Angelina, 48, said little during the sentencing hearing before Atlantic County Superior Court Judge Bernard DeLury. Neither he nor his lawyer, M.W. "Mike" Pinsky, would comment as they left the third-floor courtroom. Dressed in a blue striped polo shirt and jeans, the once roly-poly wiseguy appeared tan and fit as he stood before DeLury at his brief court appearance.

Mob associate Louis "Bent Finger Lou" Monacello pleaded guilty yesterday to plotting an assault on reputed mob underboss Martin Angelina. Monacello, 43, appeared before Philadelphia Common Pleas Court Judge Charles J. Cunningham 3d during a brief hearing in which he admitted that he paid an associate to arrange to have Angelina beaten. Under a plea agreement, he was sentenced to five years' probation that will include nine months of house arrest. The plot was set in motion in the summer of 2008 when Monacello and Angelina had clashed over the collection of gambling and loan-sharking debts, according to law-enforcement sources familiar with the investigation.

Joseph "Mousie" Massimino, the reputed underboss of the Philadelphia mob, is coming home after serving more than five years of a 10-year sentence on a New Jersey racketeering charge. Judge Anthony Pugliese reduced Massimino's sentence to time served during a sentence-reconsideration hearing yesterday in Camden County Superior Court. In issuing what amounted to a get-out-of-jail card to the 57-year-old mob leader, Pugliese accepted the arguments of Massimino's lawyer who said, "He's done more than enough time, considering the nature of the crime.

Jailed mob underboss Joseph "Mousie" Massimino, who has completed half of a 10-year New Jersey state prison sentence for racketeering, wants to go home. Denied parole in February, and told he would have to spend at least 14 more months in jail, the 59-year-old South Philadelphia mob leader now hopes the judge in his case will reduce his sentence to time served and place him on probation. That's the thrust of a motion for sentence reconsideration filed by Massimino's lawyer, Jeffrey C. Zucker.

Did the mob have a piece of the action? That question swirls around the New Jersey investigation into former Flyers star Rick Tocchet's alleged million-dollar bookmaking operation. With Tocchet, now an assistant coach with the Phoenix Coyotes, expected in New Jersey this month for arraignment, state investigators offered few new details about the high-profile case yesterday. Rumors of mob connections have fanned the flames - already a full-scale conflagration in Canada - of a story that has more questions than answers.

Joseph "Mousie" Massimino, identified by law enforcement investigators as the acting underboss of the Philadelphia-South Jersey mob, is no longer welcome in Atlantic City's casinos. The New Jersey Division of Gaming Enforcement filed a petition yesterday to add Massimino, 51, to the industry's so-called exclusion list. The Southwest Philadelphia resident and longtime mob associate was one of 11 individuals recently cited in what Thomas N. Auriemma, acting director of the division, said was a crackdown on undesirables.

Mob underboss Steven Mazzone was sentenced yesterday to nine years in prison as the dismantling of the Merlino organized-crime family continued before U.S. District Judge Herbert Hutton. The sentence, the third imposed this week - Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino got 14 years on Monday, and Frank Gambino got 71 months on Tuesday - is part of the final round in a five-year investigation in which Merlino and his top associates were targeted. But according to law-enforcement officials at the federal and state level, it is hardly the end of the government's systematic attack on the mob. Merlino, Mazzone and crime-family consigliere George Borgesi, who is scheduled to be sentenced today, all have additional "problems," state and federal law-enforcement sources say. And reputed acting mob boss Joseph Ligambi, who took the reins of the beleaguered Philadelphia mob after Merlino was imprisoned in 1999, is also the focus of intense scrutiny.