![]() ![]() The two were convicted in 2006 and sentenced in 2009. Weinstein, who presided over the “Mob Cops” trial, once remarked that the “two defendants have committed what amounts to treason against the people of the City of New York and their fellow police officers.” Early suspicions NYPD detective Stephen Caracappa worked with Eppolito on behalf of New York Mafia families. “I have never dealt with anything this egregious,” John Peluso, assistant special agent for the DEA’s New York field office, told the Associated Press. Eppolito and Caracappa not only betrayed their police colleagues, but accepted large bribes to deliver police records to a top organized criminal for years, and, worse, acted willingly as his hit men while working as police officers. Both men, unwaveringly, professed their innocence.Ī decade after their sentencing, the so-called “Mob Cops” case remains both disturbing and extraordinary. ![]() On March 6, 2009, a federal judge sentenced Eppolito to life in prison plus 100 years, Caracappa to life with 80 extra years, and fined each more than $4 million. The two, following a 2006 trial in federal court in Brooklyn, were convicted of eight contract murders, two of which they did themselves, and counts of racketeering, bribery, kidnapping and other felonies, from 1979 to 2005. In March 2005, DEA and FBI agents converged on and arrested Eppolito and Caracappa as the pair walked into Piero’s, an Italian restaurant in Las Vegas. It was a story law enforcement had heard a decade before – from Casso himself – but now they had what they considered a solid witness. Casso also paid Eppolito and Caracappa much more to assist in eight murders, including $70,000 for one whack. Kaplan said that from 1986 to 1993 he met many times with two NYPD detectives, Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, to perform services for them and deliver $4,000 in monthly payoff money from Lucchese crime family underboss Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso in exchange for confidential information on police informants and investigations. He wanted it shortened to see his granddaughter. Kaplan, a 71-year-old longtime Mob associate and former mastermind of a $10 million marijuana sales ring, had completed only eight years of his 27-year prison sentence. Alamy Stock Photo.Ī former New York garment dealer, Burton Kaplan, sat down with DEA agents in 2004 to tell them an incredible story about two retired New York Police Department detectives. Two of the defendants, 62-year-old Gennaro Geritano and 76-year-old Mario Leonardi, were additionally busted for allegedly selling over 30,000 untaxed cigarettes throughout New York.Īttorney General Schneiderman and NYPD Commissioner James O'Neill announced the arrests as part of the joint investigation of the Attorney General's Organized Crime Task Force and the NYPD's Criminal Enterprise Investigations Section.Ten years ago this month, ex-New York Police Department detective Louis Eppolito was handed a life sentence for his participation in Mob-related murders, bribery, kidnapping and racketeering. ![]() Officials also discovered an illegal cigarette operation during the course of their investigation. "No matter how complex or clever the scheme, we will continue to work with our law enforcement partners to take down traditional organized crime." ![]() "These defendants allegedly went to great lengths to trap their victims with exorbitant rates, all while evading our gambling laws and taking offshore bets," said Attorney General Schneiderman. The gambling activities were supposedly found to have handled millions of dollars worth of wagers on college and professional sports. The defendants, led by 76-year-old purported Genovese "made member" Salvatore DeMeo, were found to have been allegedly running a lucrative loan sharking and gambling operation through a website based in Costa Rica. The arrests were the result of a joint long-term investigation known as "Operation Shark Bait", which was conducted by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman's office and the NYPD. NEW YORK (WABC) - Thirteen reputed members of the Genovese crime family were indicted on Thursday for operating an illegal off-shore gambling ring. ![]()
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