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A federal judge has taken the rare step of ordering self-described anti-terrorism investigator Paul David Gaubatz to remove from his Web site some of the 12,000 documents that his son allegedly stole from the Council on American-Islamic Relations. U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly also ordered Gaubatz to return documents used in his book, "Muslim Mafia: Inside the Secret Underworld That's Seeking to Islamize America," which was co-authored by Paul Sperry and portrays the council as a subversive organization that's allied with international terrorists. The 15-year-old nonprofit civil rights and advocacy organization says its goals are to "enhance understanding of Islam"...

Reporting from Naples, Italy - In most respects, it was a typical mob shootout: members of feuding clans facing down their rivals on the main street of the small town of Lauro, exchanging gunfire from their cars until three people lay dead and four others wounded. The difference, though, was that the battle between the Cava and Graziano families involved women only. As townspeople looked on in horror, two mothers in their 50s and a 16-year-old girl were slain in their Audi on the streets of the Naples-area community. Yet even after the deadly 2002 firefight, prosecutors were slow to...

SPRINGFIELD, Pa. - Singer Al Martino, who played the Frank Sinatra-type role of Johnny Fontane in "The Godfather" and recorded hits including "Spanish Eyes" and the Italian ballad "Volare" in a 50-year musical career, died Tuesday. He was 82.

The president of a national labor union was arrested Tuesday for allegedly taking $20,000 in bribes from a St. Louis lawyer, the U.S. Attorney's office said.

* He despised Frank Sinatra. "My father hated Sinatra, and wouldn't dare attend a concert of his," Victoria writes. "In fact, Dad never attended a concert in his life . . . He said they were 'too loud' and 'a breeding ground for trouble.' " * He thought most pro baseball players were "lowlifes." When one of Victoria's sons told Gotti that he wanted to play pro baseball, Victoria writes that Gotti began to rant, "You need to be a good liar, a good lowlife. You need to take steroids, and anyone who takes steroids is a garbage pail. You...

Here's another of the Mafia's trademark offers-you-can't-refuse: pay or be eaten by a crocodile. Italy's anti-Mafia police unit said Wednesday it has seized a crocodile used by an alleged Naples mob boss to intimidate local businessmen from whom he demanded protection money.

Just like the film, the making of 'The Godfather’ was an ugly story of fear and dysfunction. What was the formula that made The Godfather one of the most successful films of all time? Surely it would take an unusually harmonious combination of talents working in concert, a rare balance of commercial entertainment and artistic challenge, a run of luck those involved couldn’t miss. Related Articles The Godfather - memorable lines But all wasn’t plain sailing on Francis Ford Coppola’s film in 1972. It was nominated for 11 Oscars, winning three, and on its $6 million budget grossed $101million for...

A shipwreck apparently containing toxic waste is being investigated by authorities in Italy amid claims that it was deliberately sunk by the mafia.An informant from the Calabrian mafia said the ship was one of a number he blew up as part of an illegal operation to bypass laws on toxic waste disposal.

Colorful in public, ruthless and murderous in private, former Boston Mafia boss Gennaro "Jerry" Angiulo died this past Saturday of renal failure due to kidney disease. He was 90. For those of you unfamiliar with "The Underboss," you're about to get an education.

"All fairy night clubs and gathering places are illegal, and operate only through pay-offs to the authorities. They are organized into a national circuit, controlled by the Mafia which also finds unique opportunity to sell dope in such dives. Many gangsters like it that way, too, after indoctrination in prison." -- Jack Lait & Lee Mortimer, 1952

One conversation was between Gotti and his father in 1998 John Gotti Jr. won the right Tuesday to play edited versions of prison conversations at his upcoming trial that his defense contends show that the mob scion had rejected the gangster life. However he lost bids to delay his upcoming murder conspiracy trial and limit the prosecution's evidence. This is the fourth time Gotti Jr. is being tried on allegations that he still ran his late father's Gambino crime family years after allegedly relinquishing "the life." Some of these prison conversations have been played previously at trial. One conversation...

Mystery deepened Wednesday over a missing Russian-crewed cargo ship last seen in July in the English Channel, as experts debated whether pirates, a mafia quarrel or a commercial dispute were to blame. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered his navy to join the search for the Arctic Sea, which left Finland with its timber cargo on July 23 bound for the Algerian port of Bejaia -- but has not been seen for two weeks. Swedish police say the ship was hijacked in the Baltic Sea on July 24, when masked men claiming to be anti-drugs police boarded the ship, tied up...

The First Family Terror, Extortion, Revenge, Murder, and the Birth of the American Mafia By Mike Dash Random House. 375 pp. $27 Reviewed by George Anastasia His name was Giuseppe Morello. He came to New York City in 1892 from Corleone, the town in western Sicily whose name Mario Puzo borrowed to create literature's most famous Mafioso. A half-century before The Godfather, he was the face of organized crime in America. That's the takeaway from The First Family, Mike Dash's highly researched and smoothly written book on the origins of the Mafia in the United States. Focusing primarily on New...

Everything was for sale -- from politicians to kidneys. Separate federal probes targeting rogue rabbis in Brooklyn and corrupt public officials in New Jersey led to the arrests yesterday of 44 people, including three mayors and five religious leaders. All the suspects in both investigations were brought down by the same shady developer, who wore a wire for three years while he bought off politicians, passed supposedly dirty money for laundering and even arranged for a $160,000 kidney sale. "The list of names and titles of those arrested today sounds like a roster for a community leaders' meeting," said Weysan...

A bizarre lawsuit filed by Gregory McKenna in a U.S. District Court in Missouri accuses Apple, the St. Louis Police Department, the FBI, and an auto mechanic, of conspiring to stalk, extort and torture the plaintiff. McKenna, representing himself, explains the conspiracy and Italian Mafia connections throughout a 124-page document. After purchasing an iPod shuffle on eBay, McKenna claims he quickly discovered that the device was manufactured "with an illegal receiver as the Mafia proceeded to transmit extortion threats and audible harassment to it." The plaintiff became even more convinced of Apple's involvement after allegedly purchasing a new iPod mini...

DNA tests linked a reputed Genovese capo - along with 11 million other white men - to hairs found in a hat at the scene of a gangland rubout, a forensic scientist testified Thursday. Michael (Mikey Cigars) Coppola went into hiding in 1996 to avoid giving a DNA sample. He remained a fugitive for more than a decade. Coppola is on trial in Brooklyn Federal Court for racketeering and blowing away gangster John (Johnny Coca Cola) Lardiere outside the Red Bull Inn in New Jersey on Easter Sunday 1977. The killer dropped a blue cap - likened by one police...

Russia's energy giant Gazprom has signed a $2.5bn (£1.53bn) deal with Nigeria's state operated NNPC, to invest in a new joint venture.The new firm, to be called Nigaz, is set to build refineries, pipelines and gas power stations in Nigeria.

One summer afternoon, two “Japanese” men in their 50s on a slow train from Italy to Switzerland said they had nothing to declare at the frontier point of Chiasso. But in a false bottom of one of their suitcases, Italian customs officers and ministry of finance police discovered a staggering $134bn (€97bn, £82bn) in US Treasury bills.

ROME — Two Japanese nationals were detained by Italian financial police last week after trying to enter Switzerland with $134 billion worth of undeclared U.S. bonds, mostly Treasury bonds, an Italian daily said Wednesday. The Japanese consulate general in Milan confirmed that the detention had taken place and said it was trying to confirm with Italian authorities whether the two were indeed Japanese nationals and their identities. According to the report in il Giornale, two unidentified Japanese in their 50s concealed the bonds, including 249 U.S. Treasury bonds each worth $500 million, in a suitcase with a false bottom that...

The mafia has always been known for the ways in which they made a living. Shaking down businesses demanding monthly payments in return for protection and getting their hands into any kind of business they could and stealing as much money from that business as they could, are just a few ways they managed to build powerful empires. The mafia in the USA has pretty much been wiped out and forced to go into hiding. Today the mafia is beginning their re-emergence in the form of the United States Government… We, the people of this country who have worked hard...

As the world waits to see if the Pakistani military has the will and the ability to save the country from the Taliban, an equally pressing question confronts the international community: How can the Taliban’s funding sources be located and severed in order to prevent them from becoming the first nuclear-armed terrorist group? In an interview last week, General David Petraeus said that the Taliban is being funded with “hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars” annually from drugs, foreign donations, and “locally generated” sources of income, particularly organized crime. As their responsibility for up to a third of the...

Obama's Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel, most well known for his rapid-fire temper, his foul language and his Sopranos'-style political diplomacy, reportedly has a squishy side few could imagine. According to an anonymous source close to the Obama Administration, fracturedrepublic can reveal it has evidence suggesting "Rahmbo", as recently as March, 2009 was actively taking part in what is arguably the most insipid, and least celebrated sport in America today… weasel Jell-O wrestling. Click here for more...

The Russian parliament and media refer to him merely as a “Russian businessman.” But to much of the rest of the world, Viktor Bout is known as the “Merchant of Death,” the most notorious member of the dark fraternity of global weapons traffickers who arm terrorist organizations, as well as the tyrannical regimes and brutal warlords and militias responsible for horrendous genocidal slaughters over the past two decades. Since his March 2008 arrest in Bangkok, Thailand, in an elaborate U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration sting, Viktor Bout has been in Bangkok’s Klong Prem Special Prison awaiting trial. The U.S. Department of...

SPRINGFIELD---U.S. Sen. Roland Burris today said he shouldn’t be blamed for any lack of candor while under oath earlier this year before a special Illinois House panel about his appointment to the seat because his duty was only to answer the questions posed by the committee members and nothing more. Briefly speaking to reporters at the Illinois Department of Employment Security, Burris said it was not his responsibility during his January appearance before the panel weighing then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s impeachment to go out of his way to describe how he got Blagojevich’s appointment. “See, you all have got it all...

From The Soprano State: New Jersey’s Culture of Corruption, by Bob Ingle and Sandy McClure, p. 213: “[Former Chief of Staff to New Jersey Governor James Florio Joseph C.] Salema could have spent up to 10 years behind bars for steering government bond business to First Fidelity in exchange for payments in a scheme that netted him hundreds of thousands of dollars,” the Trentonian reported. U.S. District Judge Sonia Sotomayor instead sentenced him to six months in a halfway house and six months of home detention, fined him $10,000 and gave him 1400 hours of community service.

It could have been a face-off between a mob boss and Bank of America honcho Ken Lewis. It could have happened had Italian police not thwarted a $2.2 billion scam orchestrated by the Sicilian Mafia to be carried out on already burdened financial firms, like BofA, international banking giant HSBC and now-defunct brokerage Lehman Brothers. Cops busted as many as 20 people across the globe, including in the Italian provinces of Sicily, Puglia and Tuscany, as well as Spain, Venezuela and Brazil. Among those arrested during yesterday's international bust was Leonardo Badalamenti, son of famous Cosa Nostra boss Gaetano Badalamenti,...

One night, one fight could wind up costing Joseph Milano his business, his home, his life savings and his parents' life savings. After more than a decade of staying out of trouble, trying to rebuild his life, everything he worked so hard to achieve seems lost, Milano said Tuesday. Accompanied by his wife, Kristy, Milano was standing in an employee hallway at the Flagler County Courthouse where he had just lost something else: his attorney. Milano, 41, aka Joey Calco, a former mob hit man turned federal witness, posted $250,000 bail and is facing two charges of aggravated assault with...

<p>DES PLAINES — Illinois Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias is threatening to pull state business from Wells Fargo & Co. unless the bank stops trying to liquidate a company that makes suits for President Barack Obama.</p> <p>Giannoulias made the ultimatum outside a Hartmarx Corp. factory in Des Plaines Thursday. Chicago-based Hartmarx is the nation's largest maker of men's tailored clothing.</p>

Barack Obama's decision to paint the hedge funds in the Chrysler case as anti-American obstructionists is prompting death threats against them. That's at least what their lead laywer Thomas Lauria is saying, reports The Detroit News. He said in court that the threats have been turned over to the FBI. We assume Lauria is being honest -- you don't say this stuff in court and turn it over to the FBI if it's rubbish -- though we'll note that Lauria is being pretty provocative in his attempt to win the war of public opinion in the Chrysler case. He's of...

Mama Gotti's had it. "Why don't you just kill him now!," the matriarch of the Gotti clan yelled at Judge Kevin Castel at the end of a hearing for her son John A. (Junior) Gotti in Manhattan Federal Court. "They're trying to kill him before trial," she said. "These are the good guys? God help us." Victoria Gotti erupted after Castel shot down Junior's request to have a second lawyer assist in his defense when he goes to trial on conspiracy charges in September. "They fight like little b------, instead of men," Mrs. Gotti said after the hearing. It will...

The FBI is on alert for the biggest Mob reunion of all time with six of the world’s most powerful Mafia bosses due to be paroled within months of each other. All of them held key roles in New York’s five criminal “families” before being jailed for racketeering, extortion, conspiracy to murder and loan sharking. At least a dozen more underlings will also be freed this year. Agents fear the mass release will trigger an unprecedented gangster bloodbath as the bosses reclaim their old positions. One senior FBI officer said: “Six of the Mafia’s most notorious capos and underbosses are...

Mexican drug traffickers are funneling cocaine to Italian organized crime, and some shipments are moving through Dallas. "We've got some of the major cartel members established here dealing their wares in Europe," said James Capra, head of the Drug Enforcement Administration's Dallas office. .... Across the Atlantic, demand for cocaine is high and prices are up. A kilo sold for $20,000 in Dallas is worth up to three times as much overseas, experts say. Mexican cartel operatives in North Texas "are dealing with Italy, Spain, you name it," he said. "They can operate their logistical center from here and coordinate...

So now the Obama Administration, who wants control of the banking industry, is faced with banks backing out of the bailouts because the Democrats are taking to big a bite. What to do? Boortz explains: Sources indicate that Obama can get around the rules by not providing direct aid to financial companies. What you do here is set up some special entity that will act as a middleman. The government pays the middleman, and the middleman then sends the money off to the financial institution. Since the financial institution isn't getting bailout money "from the government" the Barney restrictions don't...

Is confessed Ponzi scheme swindler Bernie Madoff a front man for the Mafia? This is a speculation, but an interesting one supported by numerous facts, points out Lawrence Velvel, dean of the Massachusetts School of Law at Andover, one of the thousands of investors that was taken in by the Wall Street fraudster. Rather than cooperate with authorities to lighten an anticipated stiff sentence, Madoff refuses to talk about how he made perhaps $200 billion “disappear into thin air.” “One might ordinarily think that Madoff might cooperate in tracing the money if, in return, his time in the slammer would...

From across Italy and well beyond its borders, they came to march against “the mob.” Up to 150,000 people gathered in Naples for one of the biggest anti-Mafia rallies in recent years. The relatives of victims held pictures of their loved ones. One banner read: “You didn’t kill them. They are walking with us.”

CLICK THESE LINKS TO GET THE REAL STORY: Malu Motta: “I need one governor so he can pardon me.” , Kenoi Fundraiser payout? Gotti lawyer on Pali murder case , Billy Kenoi at Shooters—and the Pali shooter—the connections , Billy Kenoi helped Pali Shooter Today, a jury in federal court found Ethan Motta and Rodney Joseph, Jr. guilty of murder and other related charges. It took the jury less than two days of deliberating to reach the verdicts which were announced around 3:45 Friday afternoon. According to evidence and testimony the government presented during the trial, all of the men...

Nearly three years ago, the two men, Stephen Caracappa and Louis J. Eppolito, were convicted of serving as assassins and spies for the Mafia while they were employed as detectives for the Police Department. “These two defendants have committed what amounts to treason against the people of the City of New York and their fellow police officers,” said Judge Jack B. Weinstein of United States District Court. He sentenced Mr. Eppolito to life plus 100 years, and fined him $4.75 million; Mr. Caracappa got life plus 80 years, and a fine of $4.25 million. The judge said both men were...

Police pulled an arsenal of rifles, shotguns, handguns and ammo out of the Staten Island home of a 54-year-old man this morning, authorities said. A small army of plainclothes and undercover police officers armed with a search warrant descended on the 864 Jewett Ave. home of Gary Granato, 54, this morning. Inside the Westerleigh residence, they found close to 80 firearms, and a hefty stash of ammo, authorities said. Here's a photo gallery from the raid: SlideshowAt this point, it's not clear why Granato had collected so many weapons, an NYPD spokesman said this afternoon. Police arrested him on weapons...

As Italy's Banks Tighten Lending, Desperate Firms Call on the Mafia By Mary Jordan Washington Post Foreign Service Sunday, March 1, 2009; A01 ROME -- When the bills started piling up and the banks wouldn't lend, the white-haired art dealer in the elegant tweed jacket said he drove to the outskirts of Rome and knocked on the rusty steel door of a shipping container. A beefy man named Mauro answered. He wore blue overalls with two big pockets, one stuffed with checks and the other with cash. The wad of bills he handed over, the art dealer recalled, reeked of...

A self-confessed Mafia 'rat' has testified that he once planned to kill John Gotti Jr. By Our Foreign Staff Last Updated: 3:13PM GMT 26 Feb 2009 John Alite, who has accused his former best friend of involvement in the drugs trade and in several murders, told a federal court in Brooklyn that he intended to kill the alleged Mob boss because he believed he had gone "soft". He broke the Mafia's code of silence ahead of giving full testimony in Mr Gotti's trial later this year. The alleged head of New York's Gambino crime family has pleaded not guilty to...

Camelot Unplugged by: Heather Latham, February 25, 2009 Catholicism was (almost) John F. Kennedy’s downfall in his campaign for president, according to Shaun Casey of the Wesley Theological Seminary, at a recent Center for American Progress (CAP) event. The way Casey tells the story, it is a miracle that Kennedy even won. Most people either hated or were afraid of the idea of a Catholic president, according to Casey. Catholicism was a mysterious religion steeped in symbolism. Casey says that in the opinion of many people, Catholics were practically European. Casey argues that Americans were afraid that if Kennedy was...

The Camelot Code by: Malcolm A. Kline, February 18, 2009 A new book on the 1960 presidential election is more misleading than informative. Since it is written by the man who served as Barack Obama’s religious advisor in the 2008 campaign for the White House, the misdirection—whether it be the result of superficial research or political intent—does not make for a good omen. In The Making Of A Catholic President: Kennedy v. Nixon 1960, Shaun Casey of the Wesley Theological Seminary points to Catholic John F. Kennedy’s win over Protestant Sen. Hubert H. Humphrey, D-Minn., in the West Virginia primary...

Watch the video that TV stations are refusing to show because of gay intimidation. http://www.silencingchristians.com/

NEW YORK (AFP) – US federal prosecutors on Wednesday indicted an alleged New York mafia boss dubbed "Jackie the Nose" in the murder of a man he believed to be a police informant. John D'Amico, alleged capo of the Gambino organized crime family, was indicted along with associate Joseph Watts in the 1989 murder, the FBI and US attorney's office said. According to the indictment, the two defendants carried out orders from then Gambino boss John Gotti to kill a man who they "believed was serving as a federal government witness." "One of the purposes of the Gambino crime family...

Bernard Madoff, the Mafia, and the Friends of Michael Milken February 3rd, 2009 by Mark Mitchell In 2005, Patrick Byrne, the CEO of Overstock.com and future Deep Capture investigative reporter, began a public crusade against illegal naked short selling (hedge funds and brokers creating phantom stock to manipulate stock prices down). He said, over and over, that the crime was destroying public companies and had the potential to trigger a systemic meltdown of our financial markets. Soon after, I began to investigate a network of short sellers, journalists, and miscreants. I concluded that many of the people in this network...

James "Little Jimmy" Marcello, a former boss in the Chicago Outfit, has been sentenced to life in prison. Marcello was convicted alongside other mob leaders in the massive Family Secrets trial in 2007. Joey "The Clown" Lombardo and Frank Calabese, Sr., were convicted in the same trial and also sentenced to life. Marcello was found responsible for the murders of Tony "The Ant" Spilotro and his brother Michael. Tony Spilotro was known as the Chicago mob's man in Las Vegas. The murders of the Spilotro brothers were the subject of the Hollywood film, "Casino." U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel...

Released in court hearings January 30, transcripts of tape recorded conversations between alleged Pali Golf Course shooter Ethan 'Malu' Motta and a confidential informant reveal several previously unknown details of Motta’s activities. The January, 2004 shootings allegedly resulted from two gangs fighting over who would provide so-called “security” for illegal gambling operations at several O`ahu locations. But the transcript reveals Motta’s reach goes far beyond gambling parlors. In one particularly interesting exchange Motta explains, “I need one governor, ah, so he can pardon me.” Reading further, it becomes clear who the alleged underworld killer is nominating for the State’s top...

Ethan "Malu" Motta of Hilo will be represented by Charles Carnesi, whose clients include accused Gambino crime family scion John "Junior" Gotti, in a racketeering and murder trial....Where the money is coming from to pay Carnesi's fees and expenses — estimated by some court observers to be potentially in the hundreds of thousands of dollars is not known. But Hawaii County Mayor Billy Kenoi did raise funds for Motta's defense....

Now that Barack Obama has handed the IRS over to tax cheat Timothy Geithner maybe he now should turn the unions back over to the Mafia.