Banker Becomes Focus of Mob Testimony

Friends of ours: Frank "Toots" Caruso, Nicholas Calabrese, Bruno "The Bomber" Roti, Fred Roti
Friends of mine: Fred Barbara

Mayor Daley's friend Fred Bruno Barbara -- who found himself accused in court this week of participating in a mob bombing two decades ago -- has had a lot of jobs over the years. Truck driver. Garbage kingpin. Multimillionaire investor.

His latest: banker.

Barbara, who once was found not guilty of trying to collect an illegal "juice" loan from an undercover FBI agent, last year joined the boards of directors of two banks -- one in Evergreen Park, another on Chicago's Northwest Side.

Barbara, who once was found not guilty of trying to collect an illegal "juice" loan from an undercover FBI agent, last year joined the boards of directors of two banks -- one in Evergreen Park, another on Chicago's Northwest Side.

In April 2006, he was appointed to the board of Evergreen Community Bank. A Barbara business partner, car dealer Joseph Rizza, was already a board member. The bank was purchased by Evergreen Private Bank earlier this year, and Barbara and Rizza remain on the board. "Fred's been a very good board member," said Darin Campbell, president and chief executive of Evergreen Private Bank.

Last October, Barbara and state Sen. James DeLeo (D-Chicago) got state approval to join the board of Belmont Bank & Trust, founded last year by James J. Banks, a zoning attorney who is the nephew of Ald. William Banks (36th).

Barbara, 59, who has homes in Oak Brook and Palm Beach, Fla., has been arrested five times but never convicted of any crime, records show. So state regulators had no reason to exclude him from a bank board, according to state regulators. "These are allegations, and we can't and don't make licensing decisions because someone is alleged to have done something," said Scott Clarke, assistant director of banks and trusts for the Illinois Division of Banking.

With his application to join the Belmont Bank board, Barbara submitted documents to the state showing he and four reputed mobsters -- including his cousin Frank "Toots'' Caruso -- were found not guilty 24 years ago when they were charged with trying to collect an illegal high-interest loan from an undercover FBI agent.

In court testimony Tuesday, admitted mob hit man turned government informant Nicholas Calabrese said Barbara joined two reputed mobsters when they bombed the now-defunct Horwath's Restaurant, a well-known mob hangout in Elmwood Park.

Barbara -- a grandson of early Chicago mob boss Bruno "The Bomber'' Roti -- never was charged in connection with the Horwath's bombing. He didn't return calls for comment.

Barbara built a fortune as a city contractor, getting city trucking business while his uncle, the late Ald. Fred Roti, was a powerful member of the City Council and -- according to an FBI document made public after Roti died -- a "made" member of the mob.

Barbara sold his company, Fred Barbara Trucking, in 1997 in a deal that could have brought him as much as $100 million, records show. He became a consultant to the company that now operates the mayor's much-criticized blue-bag recycling program.

Barbara's wife, Lisa Humbert, had a trucking company that was fired from the city's Hired Truck Program after, in the wake of a Chicago Sun-Times investigation, the city determined she wasn't running the business, as she'd claimed. She'd gotten city work by claiming to have a women-owned business.

Thanks to Tim Novak

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15 Emmy Nominations for The Sopranos

A month after fading abruptly to black, “The Sopranos” received Emmy nominations today for best dramatic series and for the performances of five of its principal actors, including James Gandolfini and Edie Falco.

When the 59th Annual Emmy Awards are presented on Sept. 16, “The Sopranos” and “Heroes” will be competing against three other nominees for best dramatic series: “Grey’s Anatomy” on ABC, “House” (Fox) and “Boston Legal” (ABC).

In the category of best actor in a drama, Mr. Gandolfini, whose Tony Soprano may or may not have survived the series’ final act, will square off against Hugh Laurie of “House”; Denis Leary of “Rescue Me” (FX); James Spader of “Boston Legal” and Kiefer Sutherland of “24” on Fox.

In addition to Ms. Falco, the nominees for best actress in a dramatic series are Sally Field for “Brothers and Sisters” (ABC); Kyra Sedgwick, “The Closer” (TNT); Minnie Driver, “The Riches” (FX); Mariska Hargitay, “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit” (NBC) and Patricia Arquette, “Medium” (NBC).

Among all series, “The Sopranos” was the most nominated, with 15, including nominations for best supporting actress for Lorraine Bracco, who played Tony’s psychiatrist, Dr. Melfi, and for Aida Turturro, who played his sister. Michael Imperioli, who played Tony’s nephew Christopher, whose death in a car accident was hastened by Tony, was nominated in the category of best supporting actor.

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Supreme Court Chief Justice Targeted by Mob?

It could have been just idle chitchat among bored prison inmates. The problem was, they weren't your average inmates, and the subject of their threatening chatter was the chief justice of the United States.

Languishing at the federal penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pa., mobsters from three top Mafia families allegedly had murder on their minds in 1979, according to recently released FBI documents. The intended victim was Warren Burger. At least that was the story a confidential informant told the FBI two years later.

What seemed to make the idea plausible were the players — big names in two of New York City's Mafia families and a Montreal don, the documents show.

The bureau took the information seriously enough that Burger was alerted. In addition, FBI headquarters in Washington approved going to mobsters in seven U.S. cities to warn them off doing anything rash.

The documents appear to reveal, for the first time, a purported Mafia plot against the chief justice of the U.S.

The FBI's 15-month investigation, which petered out when agents came up dry on evidence, was detailed in part in 143 pages of documents that were released in response to Freedom of Information Act requests.

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Chicago Mob Hitman Reveals His First Hits

Friends of ours: Nicholas Calabrese, Frank Calabrese Sr., Michael "Bones" Albergo, Frank "Gumba" Saladino, Tony Accardo
Friends of mine: Ronnie "Menz" Jarrett

Nicholas Calabrese paused a moment in the silent courtroom, his voice dropping off as he spoke Tuesday of the first time he took part in a murder for the Chicago Outfit.

"We gotta put somebody in a hole," Calabrese said his brother, Frank Sr., told him without elaboration in the summer of 1970. At first, Calabrese said, he thought it was a test of his courage. The brothers then proceeded to dig the hole at a construction site near old Comiskey Park. But the real test came days later, Calabrese said, when he helped hold down a man's arms while his brother strangled him with a rope -- and then slit his throat just to make sure he was dead. Nicholas Calabrese, then in his late 20s, didn't even know the victim's name, he testified.

"He was put in the hole, and we started shoveling the dirt in," said Calabrese, again pausing to keep his composure. "During this time I wet my pants I was so scared."

His brother didn't catch on, Nicholas Calabrese said, because "I had a lot of dust and dirt on my pants so you couldn't really tell."

Sitting nearby on Calabrese's first full day on the witness stand in the landmark Family Secrets trial in the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse was Frank Calabrese Sr., one of five defendants, who was resting his chin in his hand and smirking.

Nicholas Calabrese's testimony Tuesday was a flurry of mob imagery -- multiple murders, bombings, scraps of paper with scribbled notes about "street taxes," a 300-pound enforcer nicknamed "Gumba" and buried Outfit cash. He spoke of sending warnings with dead chickens and puppy heads, and mice strung up with "little nooses" and left on a windshield.

And he used nickname after nickname. There was "Mugsy," "young Mugsy," Johnny "Bananas" and Johnny "Apes," not to be confused with Angelo "the Monkey."

And there was Michael "Bones" Albergo, a collector of high-interest "juice" loans. Nicholas Calabrese said Albergo had once warned that if he was going to jail, he wasn't going alone. Calabrese said he only learned it was "Bones" in the hole near the White Sox ballpark years later when he saw Albergo's photo in a pamphlet put out by the watchdog Chicago Crime Commission.

Nicholas Calabrese, the government's star witness, is expected to blame his brother, a reputed leader of the mob's 26th Street crew, for more than a dozen Outfit killings in the 1970s and '80s. He began with the slaying of Albergo, whose remains authorities searched for unsuccessfully after Calabrese began cooperating in 2002.

While testifying in sometimes lurid details about the gangland slayings, Calabrese kept his composure, occasionally gesturing with his hands to make a point. He traded in the sweatsuit he wore on Monday for a palecollared shirt, worn untucked, and blue pants.

He sometimes leaned toward a computer screen on the witness stand to look at a betting slip or identify a photograph, a reflection of the image visible in his eyeglasses.

After describing Albergo's death, Calabrese recounted four more murders in which he said he took part. The next was the 1976 homicide of 27-year-old Paul Haggerty, a convict who was living in a halfway house and whom Outfit bosses wanted to question about his dealings with a suburban jewelry store.

Calabrese said he had arrived at his brother's Elmwood Park home and gotten another cryptic greeting. "He said, 'Don't make any plans, we're gonna be busy,'" Nicholas Calabrese said, continuing to refuse to look in his brother's direction after quickly identifying him in court earlier Tuesday.

For weeks, Calabrese said, he had followed Haggerty with a team that included hit man Frank "Gumba" Saladino and mob associate Ronnie Jarrett, nicknamed "Menz," the Italian word for half, because he was half Irish and half Italian.

The men watched Haggerty's movements for patterns, Calabrese said, following him to the bus and work. Eventually, they snatched him and drove him to Jarrett's mother-in-law's garage, he said.

After Haggerty was questioned, Calabrese said, he was left alone with him for a time, his hands cuffed and his eyes and mouth taped. He said he gave Haggerty some water and helped him use the bathroom, but the rest of the men soon returned with a stolen car to finish the job.

"I held him and Ronnie held him and my brother strangled him with a rope," he said.

Calabrese also testified about the murder of burglar John Mendell, who was killed in 1978 as an example for burglarizing mob boss Tony Accardo's home. Mendell was lured to the same garage where Haggerty was killed and then he was jumped, Nicholas Calabrese said. His brother strangled Mendell with a rope, but this time there was a twist, he said.

"My brother handed me the knife, and he said 'You do it,'" Calabrese said.

Asked by a prosecutor whether he did as instructed, Calabrese answered, "Yeah, yes I did." Next, Calabrese testified about the murders of thief Vincent Moretti, who was also killed in the wake of the Accardo burglary, and Donald Renno, who made the mistake of being with Moretti at the time.

Calabrese said he helped his brother kill Moretti at a Cicero restaurant using a rope, pulling one end as he braced a a foot against the victim's head. He said the brothers referred to the slayings in code as "Strangers in the Night," the song that was playing on the restaurant's jukebox as the slaying took place.

Though he wasn't an eyewitness, Nicholas Calabrese said, his brother told him of how in 1980 he drove a car that blocked one driven by federal informant William Dauber and his wife, Charlotte, enabling mobsters to fatally shoot the couple from a passing van in Will County.

Earlier Tuesday, Calabrese told jurors about a variety of work he carried out for his brother beginning in 1970, collecting "street taxes" and juice loans and running gambling operations. He also dutifully followed directions when it came to extorting businessmen, he said, using dead animals as threats until he had to scare one into paying by blowing out the back window of his car with a shotgun.

Calabrese said his brother had hundreds of thousands of dollars to lend on the street, a claim that caused Frank Sr. to rock back in his chair and chuckle with his hand in front of his mouth. Once, Nicholas Calabrese said, his brother misplaced more than $400,000 by losing track of a safety-deposit box. Another time, he said, the brothers buried $250,000 in cash in a steel box in Wisconsin. But on digging it up later, the money was wet, mildewed and smelly. "We tried to use cologne," Calabrese testified. "It made the smell worse."

Calabrese said cash collections had to be split, with half going to their boss, Angelo LaPietra. Calabrese said he sometimes drove the payment to LaPietra's Bridgeport garage, stuffing the envelope into a barbecue mitt that was hanging from a nail. He flipped the mitt over and pointed its thumb in the opposite direction to alert LaPietra to the hidden cash, he said.

Calabrese said that in the 1980s he and his brother bombed several businesses, including the Drury Lane Theatre in Oakbrook Terrace; Marina Cartage, which is owned by Michael Tadin, a friend of Mayor Richard Daley; and Tom's Steakhouse in Melrose Park.

Calabrese said he never learned the motives for the bombings, but prosecutors have said that the Outfit sometimes resorted to violence to extort street taxes from even legitimate businesses.

An explosive was set off against the wall of the Oakbrook Terrace theater during off-hours. "We talked about how loud it was," Calabrese said.

Calabrese said he also threw a dynamite-packed device onto the roof of the steakhouse. It landed near an air-conditioning unit and exploded, he said. "I lit the fuse in the bag," he said. "I got out of the car and jumped up on a Dumpster."

Calabrese said he sometimes brought along "Gumba" Saladino, who was 6 feet tall and weighed 300 pounds, to collect late payments on juice loans.

"I told him, 'You stand behind me and don't say nothing, just look at the guy,'" Calabrese testified. "'Give him one of those looks.'"

Calabrese said he warned the debtors that the 5-percent-a-week loans weren't going away and that "next time, I'm not gonna come -- he's gonna come." He said he then would point toward the imposing Saladino.

Thanks to Jeff Coen

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Chicago's Mayor Friendly with Alledged Mob Associate?

Friends of ours: Nicholas Calabrese, Angelo "The Hook" LaPietra, Frank Calabrese Sr., John Fecarotta, Anthony Doyle
Friends of mine: Fred Barbara

Will Chicago reporters ask Mayor Richard Daley about the Fred Barbara issue Wednesday? It came up Tuesday during the Chicago Outfit trial of reputed mobsters in the Family Secrets case.

Barbara, successful trucking boss, waste hauler, and mayoral fashionista, has made fortunes on city deals under Daley and is currently a consultant on the city's blue bag program. He's a friend of the mayor, and of the mayor's political brain, Tim Degnan, who, like the mayor, is a son of Bridgeport.

Tuesday's testimony of key Outfit witness Nicholas Calabrese also put Barbara with another son of Bridgeport: Angelo "The Hook" LaPietra, the late boss of the Outfit's Chinatown crew. A key Outfit killer turned government informant said that LaPietra and Barbara were present at the arson bombing of Horwath's Restaurant in Elmwood Park in the early 1980s.

It is important to note that Barbara has not been charged with any crime recently. We tried contacting Barbara on Tuesday to ask about Calabrese's testimony, only to be told that he wasn't available for an interview with me. And federal prosecutors and defense lawyers couldn't comment because of a gag order.

So, let's clear this thing up. Is the guy with "The Hook" at Horwath's the mayor's Fred Barbara or some cunning impostor? Who best to resolve this issue than Daley?

Surely, reporters will ask him Wednesday, if he doesn't bolt town for another fact-finding mission, not to Rio, but perhaps to trace the last steps of the Virgin Mary in Ephesus, while the Outfit crew from his neighborhood turns under federal heat back home.

Barbara is a political donor who sold his South Side garbage-transfer station and landfill for $58 million. He knows his way around politics and business. But what's new today is that Nick Calabrese mentioned Barbara from the witness stand. Calabrese put him at the scene at one of the Outfit bombings of west suburban restaurants in the early 1980s, as the Outfit pressured businesses and sent unmistakable messages to them.

Some of the establishments Calabrese mentioned during questioning from assistant U.S. Atty. Mitchell Mars included the following: The bombings of the Drury Lane Theatre in Oakbrook Terrace, Tom's Steakhouse in Melrose Park, Marina Cartage (the Chicago trucking company owned by another mayoral buddy recently turned Barbara rival, Mike Tadin) and Horwath's on Harlem Avenue.

Calabrese testified that Fred Barbara was with LaPietra and that the two men bombed Horwath's together. Nick testified that he and brother Frank Calabrese Sr., who is one of the Outfit bosses on trial in this case, bombed Tom's Steakhouse. All four and others met at mobster John Fecarotta's hot-dog stand in Melrose Park before the bombings, and afterward, to compare notes, Nick Calabrese said.

"It was me, my brother, and Johnny Fecarotta at Tom's," Nick Calabrese testified. "At Horwath's, there was Fred Barbara and Angelo LaPietra."

These two sentences will most likely be buried in news accounts of the larger Outfit case, because Nick also described four brutal murders in which he held people down while his brother strangled them with a rope. And Nick also testified about the severed heads of dogs thrown onto front lawns, and dead chickens, and a bizarre Outfit assignment:

To kill several pet shop mice, put tiny nooses around their tiny necks, and dangle them from the windshield of an extortion victim. But the sentences about Barbara are important sentences, if Calabrese was telling the truth, if "The Hook" took Barbara on the Horwath's bombing. The act of arson would bind a businessman to the Chinatown crew, as insurance of sorts against any future testimony.

After they met at the hot-dog stand, Calabrese said the groups went their ways. Fecarotta was known to his friends and "family" as "Big Stoop."

Fecarotta later lived up to the nickname when he botched the burial of the Spilotro brothers, forcing the Outfit to kill him on Belmont Avenue. In that killing, Nick got wounded and left a bloody glove at the scene. It was held in the police evidence room where alleged Chinatown juice collector and Chicago cop Anthony Doyle (also of Bridgeport) worked. The FBI asked about the glove. Doyle allegedly told the Outfit. And the historic case began.

I'll write about the Calabrese murders in other columns, I have the right to delay that, since you're getting that news anyway and because, well, I broke the story about Calabrese disappearing from prison and into the witness protection program, which caused a panic among the Outfit.

For now, let's remember what the mayor's friend, Fred Barbara, told the Sun-Times in 2004 about the federal juice loan charge of which he was acquitted in 1983.

"Show me my connection to organized crime," he said. "Did I turn the corner? You show me anything in the last 24 years that reflects to that nature."

I'd bet Nick Calabrese hasn't talked to the feds just about the Outfit in Bridgeport. I'd bet he's talked to them about politics too.

Thanks to John Kass

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