It's Not the Hollywood Mob, It's the Chicago Outfit

In the mobster movies, a car pulls up and heavy men in hard shoes get out. And in the quiet suburban house, the wiseguy turned government witness stands foolishly in his new kitchen, oblivious in his bathrobe, scratching, boorishly guzzling milk from the carton.

The guns come up. The milk spills. The feds lose another witness.

Happily, it didn't happen in real life to Nicholas Calabrese, the Chicago Outfit hit man turned star government witness in the Family Secrets trial that sent mob bosses, soldiers, even a corrupt cop to prison. Calabrese is very much alive. Yet in federal court this week, the story of Outfit penetration of witness security is playing out in the case of Deputy U.S. Marshal John Ambrose, accused of leaking sensitive information about Calabrese—including his movements—to Chicago's mob.

It's a difficult case to prove, since U.S. District Judge John Grady tossed out key evidence on Thursday. He invited an appeal by telling the jury "I made a mistake" in allowing secret prison tapes to be played linking Ambrose's late father, a Chicago cop convicted in the Marquette 10 police drug scandal, with other crooked cops connected to the Outfit.

Whether Ambrose is found guilty or not, it's obvious that imprisoned Outfit boss Jimmy Marcello and his sleepy brother Michael—who testified in a rumpled orange jumpsuit Thursday—believed they'd cracked the security around Calabrese.

The Marcellos knew of Calabrese being driven around town to murder locations where he briefed the FBI on unsolved hits that formed the basis of Family Secrets, which sent Jimmy and others to prison for life. They knew Calabrese called his wife from a phone dialed as Ambrose guarded Calabrese.

The Marcello brothers knew all about it in January 2003, weeks before I revealed in a Feb. 21, 2003, column that Calabrese was talking to the FBI about a series of unsolved homicides—including the murders of Anthony and Michael Spilotro—and that his federal prison records had disappeared.

Though I'm flattered the Marcellos are loyal readers, and that Ambrose's defense would try to use my column to argue that the leak could have come from just about anywhere, Mickey Marcello testified Thursday that he knew about Calabrese because a law-enforcement source was spilling.

According to Marcello, a fat reputed Chicago mobster, Johnny "Pudgy" Matassa Jr., would tell him what the source learned. Then Marcello would drive to federal prison to tell Jimmy. Then, unbeknownst to the Marcello brothers, the FBI would tape what they said.

"John says his source was giving him a list of names," the balding Mickey testified. "... I had John. He had who he had, who I presumed was a law-enforcement officer."

Matassa and Marcello would meet, but not over checkered tablecloths, candles stuck in bottles of Chianti.

"One time it was Dunkin' Donuts, various restaurants, places like that," Marcello said.

He said Matassa told him about others Nick Calabrese was helping the FBI to investigate, including the boss, John "No Nose" DiFronzo—implicated but not charged in the sensational Spilotro murders. And about Anthony "The Trucker" Zizzo, who later disappeared from a Melrose Park restaurant lot and has never been found.

Mickey Marcello, a font of information, developed a severe case of Fedzheimers when asked about Joe "The Builder" Andriacci, and those two brothers from Bridgeport, Bruno and Frank "Toots" Caruso. Andriacci and the Carusos were not charged.

"Andriacci. 'The Builder,' " said Ambrose lawyer Frank Lipuma during cross-examination. "Is he a mob boss?"

"I don't know," Marcello deadpanned.

"Are you aware of the Carusos who run Chinatown/Bridgeport?" Lipuma asked.

"No," Marcello said. "I'm not aware of that."

"Aren't they associated with organized crime?"

"They know a lot of people," sighed Marcello. "I guess you could say that. That they know a lot of people."

So do the Marcello brothers. They knew a guy who knew a guy who knew Nick Calabrese was taking the FBI to places where murders were committed.

That's not Hollywood.

It's Chicago.

Thanks to John Kass

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Mob's Secret Language Revealed

Rub your stomach? That's code for John Matassa, also known as "Pudge" for his love of the sweets.

Brush your nose? Must be talking about boss John "No Nose" DiFronzo.

Rubbing fingers together denotes hush money paid out to a moulieri, or wife.

For the benefit of a federal jury hearing the case against accused turncoat federal agent, Michael "Mickey" Marcello on Thursday deciphered the gestures and phrases he and his brother used to discuss mafia business while behind bars.

Marcello told jurors the information he discussed with his brother, Outfit street crew leader Jimmy Marcello, in a Michigan prison came from "the baby sitter," the guy whose father died behind bars and who dialed phone numbers for a wanted hit man-turned-witness in protective custody. But Mickey Marcello, reluctantly testifying Thursday in his prison-issue orange togs and laceless shoes, said he never knew the source's real name or how he got access to the secrets.

Prosecutors fingered deputy U.S. marshal John T. Ambrose as the man who leaked word to the mafia about Nick Calabrese, the protected witness Ambrose guarded.

The FBI got smart to the leaks in 2003 when they caught the Marcellos on tape talking about Calabrese's covert cooperation with federal investigators. But the brothers talked in code and used a slew of gestures to disguise their conversations about criminal Outfit business. And they almost never named names.

One tape in particular was played twice for jurors Thursday before U.S. District Judge John Grady then decided to strike it from the record. On it, Jimmy asked where the news of Calabrese's cooperation came from.

"The guy who is giving it to you?" James asked.

"The guy who is his babysitter," Michael responded.

"Oh yeah?"

"Baby sitter guy. Same guy."

"Same guy that was at the other place with him?"

"(Nods affirmatively) Same guy that took him the first time."

Baby sitter guy, Marcello said, is a law enforcement source whose father was part of the "Marquette 10" police corruption case and since has died, which describes Ambrose's father.

Marcello, 58, pleaded guilty in 2007 to racketeering charges in the Family Secrets mafia case and is now serving his sentence. Thursday the judge had to constantly remind Marcello to sit up and speak into the microphone.

Marcello's answers came in short bursts, rarely in full sentences, as if he never got over a lifetime of communicating in code to foil eavesdropping investigators and evade wiretaps. Granted immunity by Judge Grady, Marcello didn't balk at any of the questions, but punctuated his answers with lots of "whatever you call it, I don't know."

Mickey Marcello's source was John Matassa, who Marcello said was still separated by several sources from the leaker.

"But you didn't know the information was coming from the marshal's office, right?" defense attorney Frank C. Lipuma asked.

"Right," Marcello said.

"There's no indication you know where Matassa got the information from, right?"

"Right."

Thanks to Lauren Fitzpatrick

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Al Capone Love Song

A softer side of famed Chicago mobster Al Capone is on display this week as a Boston archives dealer attempts to sell an inscribed copy of an original song penned by the gangster for $65,000.

Capone apparently wrote "Madonna Mia" while serving time for income tax evasion in Alcatraz in the 1930s. After obtaining a copy of the lyrics last year, a suburban Chicago man has been working with musicians to record the love song and plans to release it Monday on his Web site. "It's a very touching Italian love ballad," said Rich Larsen of Prospect Heights, who runs Caponefanclub.com. "I think it shows that Capone actually had a softness in his heart and a gentle way about him in certain ways."

When he wasn't ruling Chicago's criminal underworld, Capone was a music fan. He loved opera and featured the hottest jazz musicians of the day in his clubs. Capone read music and could play the banjo and the mandola, which is similar to the mandolin. Larsen claimed Capone persuaded Alcatraz wardens to allow inmates to form a band, and Capone, for a time, made music behind bars.

"Madonna Mia," believed to be an ode to his wife, Mae, was the only song Capone is known to have written. The lyrics read, in part, "Madonna Mia, you're the bloom of the roses, you're the charm that reposes, in the heart of a song/Madonna Mia, with your true love to guide me, let whatever be-tide me, I will never go wrong."

The lyrics are signed by Capone in pencil and inscribed to a Jesuit priest who befriended the mobster in his final years. Capone died in 1947.

Thanks to Joel Hood

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Witness Testifies Behind Large Screen to Protect His Identity at Deputy US Marshal Trial

A witness in the trial of Deputy U.S. Marshal John Ambrose was heard, but not seen, by courtroom observers as he testified from behind a large screen erected to protect his identity.

The witness, identified only as Inspector 1, is an officer of the U.S. Marshals Witness Security Program, and was in charge of a security detail when mobster Nicholas Calabrese came to Chicago on two occasions in 2002 and 2003 to cooperate with a federal investigation.

Proceedings took place behind an eight-foot-high gray wall that was erected this morning along the front row of the courtroom's gallery. About 15 spectators, including two disappointed courtroom sketch artists, stared at one side of the wall while listening to questioning about security procedures in place during Calabrese's two visits.

Ambrose, 41, was assigned to those security details and is on trial on charges he leaked information about Calabrese's cooperation to a family friend who allegedly passed the sensitive details on to organized-crime figures.

Prosecutors in the case successfully argued in pre-trial hearings last week that the identities of personnel from the Witness Security Program should be protected as they testify in court. Attorneys for Ambrose opposed the measures, saying that the presence of unusual security precautions would "sensationalize" the trial. But U.S. District Judge John Grady ruled that there were valid reasons to keep the identities of Witness Security Program personnel secret and ruled that a wall should separate courtroom observers seated in the gallery from the judge, jury, attorneys and witness. More hidden witnesses are expected to testify this afternoon from behind the screen.

Thanks to Robert Mitchum

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Peter Gotti Denied by Judge in Attempt to Overturn Conviction

Looks like Peter Gotti will be in jail until his dying day.

A federal judge Wednesday shot down the former crime boss' latest attempt to overturn his 2004 conviction for ordering a hit on mob rat Salvatore (Sammy Bull) Gravano.

Manhattan Judge Harold Baer shrugged off the so-called Dopey Don's claims that prosecutors violated his rights by withholding details of a conversation between Gravano and his FBI supervisor Bruce Mouw.

"The fly in the ointment is the failure on [Gotti's] part to explain how the fact of an allegedly ongoing relationship between Gravano and Mouw could have impeached Mouw's credibility," Baer wrote. "Gravano did not testify at the trial and apparently his only role at the trial was as the target that [Gotti] had directed to be killed," Baer added.

Baer said Gotti's lawyers could have simply read media accounts of the recorded conversations between Mouw and Gravano.

Gotti, 69 and in poor health, was sentenced to 25 years for ordering a hit on Gravano - who was nabbed in a drug bust before it could happen.

Gotti already had begun serving a nine-year sentence on a Brooklyn racketeering conviction, and together with the 25-year term he began serving in 2005, he won't be eligible for release until 2032, when he would be 92.

Thanks to Thomas Zambito

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