Testimony in Chicago mob trial

As both a gun dealer and an undertaker, Ernie Severino was able to serve the Chicago mob in many ways. Now he's helping the feds.

The 60-year-old Severino testified yesterday in the trial of five alleged mobsters. They're accused of taking part in a racketeering conspiracy that included illegal gambling, extortion, loan sharking and 18 murders. One of the murder victims was Butchie Petrocelli, the leader of the so-called "Wild Bunch."

Severino testified yesterday that back in 1980, he supplied Petrocelli with 100 guns. When other mobsters pressed Severino to hand over some items he'd been keeping for Petrocelli, Severino balked, fearing Petrocelli would come back and get him. On the stand yesterday, Severino said they answered: "He's not coming back." Petrocelli turned up dead.

Calabrese's Credibility Attacked In Mob Trial

Thomas Breen, who represents defendant Jimmy Marcello,(Innocent)Calabrese's Credibility Attacked In Mob Trial suggested that the admitted mob hitman Nick Calabrese may have made it all up.

"You have told a story about the Spilatros being killed, and you weren't even there," Breen told Calabrese.


"Yes, I was," Calabrese answered.

But Breen grilled him on his exact memory of the June 1986 killings, and about how Calabrese had said everybody in a DuPage county house was wearing gloves when the Spilotros arrived, but that they still weren't spooked by the obvious sign of an Outfit hit.

Breen also recalled a prison conversation between Calabrese and Pat Spilotro, brother of the murder victims, who came to see him in prison.

"You told Pat Spilatro that you didn't know anything about his brothers being killed," Breen said. "And for one short moment you were telling the truth."

"No," Calabrese replied.

Breen then used the government's own PowerPoint presentation to make a point of his own, Wojciechowski reported, starting with the killing of Michael Albergo and the list of participants Calabrese testified to. Breen started scratching off the mobsters who were dead or in prison when Calabrese first came to authorities.

When some of the lists were left with only Nick Calabrese and Breen's client, Jimmy Marcello, the attorney asked, "You knew you wouldn't get any kind of a deal from the government if you only named dead people, right?"

Calabrese answered "no," Wojciechowski reported.

Calabrese also said he was haunted by the memory of murdering several friends but added that his own brother would have killed him if he had hesitated.

Nicholas Calabrese, the star witness at the trial of his brother, Frank, and four other alleged members of the Chicago mob, said the memory of murdering friends Johnny Fecarotta and Michael Spilotro is a heavy burden.

"It's a lot of weight to carry," Calabrese told Breen.

He exploded when Breen suggested he might have enjoyed killing mob associates Fecarotta and Michael Spilotro, brother of Tony Spilotro, the model for the Joe Pesci character in the movie "Casino."

"No, I didn't enjoy it," Calabrese said. "I live with it every day, and you're trying to make it out like I enjoyed killing my friend."

Frank Calabrese, 69, Marcello, 65, and the three other defendants are charged with taking part in a racketeering conspiracy that included extortion, gambling, loan sharking and 18 long-unsolved mob murders.

Nicholas Calabrese agreed to become a government witness five years ago after his DNA was found on a bloody glove found at a murder scene. He said he feared that unless he cooperated, he would get the death penalty.

Breen suggested that Calabrese was lying to curry favor with federal prosecutors and make certain that he stays out of the execution chamber for the crimes he has committed.

Breen noted that by far the majority of the mobsters Calabrese named as carrying out murders, some going back to the 1970s, were already dead when he gave their names to the FBI. A key exception was brother Frank.

"Your brother, Frank, the man you hate, is on there," Breen said, pointing to a list of alleged killers, most of them long since deceased.

Calabrese testified that he used to hate his brother but no longer.

"You've forgiven him," Breen said at another point.

"I haven't forgiven him, I just don't hate him," Calabrese testified.

Calabrese had testified earlier that his brother was a tough, domineering boss who forced him to commit murder and beat his own son, Frank Calabrese Jr. The son was also a witness for the prosecution. When not painting Calabrese as a liar, Breen tried to get him to boast about his exploits as a hit man for the Chicago Outfit -- the name that the city's organized crime family calls itself.

"Give yourself some credit, Sir, you were pretty good," Breen said.

"As I said," Calabrese retorted, "I was stupid and dumb. It doesn't take much to become a coward and do that."

Calabrese offered a portrait of the mob world as one of constant dread, with death at the hands of angry organized crime bosses always just around the corner. He said specifically that if he had declined to carry out a hit, his brother would have immediately murdered him.

Breen recalled testimony earlier in the trial in which Calabrese described the ceremony at which he became "a made guy" in the Chicago Outfit. Breen asked Calabrese if he received a gift on the occasion.

"You get a little insurance on your life," Calabrese said.

"Is that the gift?" Breen asked.

"You are allowed to walk out alive," Calabrese said.

Biggest Chicago Mob Trial in Years

Son and brother give evidence against alleged boss of mafia syndicate

It must rank among the greatest compliments the late Mario Puzo, author of the Godfather, ever received. A court in Chicago recently heard Frank Calabrese Sr commend the description in the novel of a mafia initiation ceremony as "very close" to the truth.
Coming from Mr Calabrese, that was high praise indeed. He is alleged to be a head of one of Chicago's most notorious crime syndicates, the Outfit. The plaudit came in a secretly taped conversation in which the 70-year-old alleged mobster describes the elaborate ritual used to welcome a member into the inner circle.


A member is "made" only after he has committed at least one murder, he says. He is then taken by the head of his street crew into a room where he finds a knife, a gun, a candle and a card bearing a religious image all laid out before him. His fingers are cut and the card is set alight and thrown burning into his hand. As the flames rise up, the new member chants three times: "If I give up my brothers may I burn in hell like this holy picture."
In what is one of the largest mafia trials in US history, 14 co-defendants from the Outfit were originally indicted. Two have died since the FBI swoop began, and seven pleaded guilty. The five others now on trial include Frank Calabrese Sr, Joey "the Clown" Lombardo and a former Chicago police officer, Anthony "Twan" Doyle. Between them they are accused of running a crime syndicate responsible for 18 unsolved murders.BUT THEY NEVER TELL YOU ABOUT Mr Lombardo being the gentlemen of the neighborhood of the kids he coached inall kind of kids in sports, These men are given false titles by the trial that has no backbone to even be a trial...........

At heart this is a case about betrayal, hence its FBI codename, Family Secrets. Two weeks ago Mr Calabrese sat in court listening to the testimony of Frank Calabrese Jr, his son. Last week he heard Nicholas Calabrese, his brother. Both are star witnesses for the prosecution.

In one poignant moment, the court was played a tape of Mr Calabrese Sr talking to his son in jail where they were both serving time. He grows sentimental and says: "I think what happened in here, is you and I got to understand each other a little bit." Unbeknown to the father, Frank Jr was wearing hidden recording equipment.

The jury members - all granted anonymity for their own protection - have had a course in mob etiquette, codes and morality. Each day the court has been filled with the rich vocabulary of the Chicago mob. There are the nicknames: Mr Calabrese is Frankie "Breeze"; another defendant is Paul "the Indian" Schiro; there is a witness called "Richie the Rat" Mara and the late capo di tutti capi is Joey "Doves" Aiuppa. Other codes include "Scarpe Grande" - big shoes - meaning the FBI. A "sit-down" is when disputes among members are settled in darkened rooms. Order is strictly imposed, with murders having to be cleared by a capo in almost military style.

There have been moments of levity, such as when Nicholas Calabrese told the jury of pouring cologne over $250,000 of buried bank notes that had started to rot. "It made the smell worse." But there have also been descriptions of cruelty, intimidation and cold-blooded killing. Businesses slow to pay "street taxes" are given a warning: a puppy head is put through the door or a dead rat strung up in the window. Should that fail to work, bombs are planted - the court heard of bombings of a Chicago steakhouse and a theatre.

And then there are the murders. Nicholas Calabrese, giving testimony in exchange for a lighter sentence, has taken the jury through many of the 14 killings he claims the Calabrese brothers and others in the Outfit arranged.

The first "flattening" came in 1970.

"We gotta put somebody in a hole," Frank Sr allegedly told his brother. The brothers strangled the victim, slit his throat and then buried him. "I wet my pants I was so scared," Nicholas Calabrese told the court.

The most notorious killing was of the Spilotro brothers, an incident used in the film Casino. Anthony Spilotro, who ran the Outfit's Las Vegas operation, was bringing too much heat from the FBI. He was lured to Chicago on the pretext that his brother would be "made" as a member of the inner circle, but instead of the initiation the pair were strangled and beaten to death by 10 other members of the syndicate.

Behind it all is a twisted sense of morality. In the tapes, Frank Sr never expresses remorse for killings. But he does say he regrets burning the holy pictures on his hand during the initiation. "That bothers me," he tells his son.

Anthony Spilotro was killed in part because of his affair with the wife of a casino executive. Frank Sr shares his reaction when he learned of the tryst: "Nail went in the coffin, right then."

In this sealed moral universe, loyalty to the family is supreme. The younger Frank Calabrese told the court that his father once told him: "Your family, the Outfit family, came before your blood family. It also came before God."

That is the commandment that the two main witnesses have broken. Over the three weeks the elder Calabrese has listened to his brother and son rat on him, smiling broadly. From time to time he has chuckled. After an intense day of evidence, his lawyer was asked by reporters how his client was feeling: "He's happy to see his son," he said.

The case continues...........Or should we say the farce continues..!!!!!!