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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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The mafia has long been known for their use of symbolic means to send a message with some murders.
The movie Donny Brasco featured the story of an FBI agent that successfully infiltrated the mafia using the alias of Donny Brasco. A mafia associate introduced the agent as a "friend of ours", meaning Brasco was a "made man" and had him shake hands. Because of that he d his hand cut off when he was killed.
Someone who is "too greedy" might have money stuff in his anus and if his greed involved drugs,there would be money in both his mouth and anus.
When a woman was killed it was usually because she knew too much.
Early in the evolution of the mafia their murders were easy to identify by the pricky pear on their chest.
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Mon Oct 31, 2016 12:47 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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An informer might have a dead canary in their mouth and have been shot in both eyes.
Kill someone associated with a mafia associate and have the eyes removed and placed in a fist.
Tucker had a gag in his mouth. Some one who spoke and they shouldn't have might have a handkerchief or a pebble in their mouth. The symbolism of a rape is a sign of humiliation over a betrayal or violation.
To punish, Cartel leader Pablo Escobar would rape a man's wife and kill his children in front of him before killing the man.
To discard 2 bodies out in a landfill is treating the bodies like trash. The history of the landfill used for the Tuckers is that a century ago the spot was a slaughterhouse for the Home Packing Co. Probably only some one from Toledo would find that place.
And why the bags and pillowcases on the heads. Were they "over their head" in something? Or maybe I am overthinking this thing. |
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Mon Oct 31, 2016 1:21 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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A former Toledo Police Chef formed a special unit to watch and listen in to the mafia in town. He formed the specialized unit in 1975 because the FBI was in town so much watching the Detroit mafia. In 1981, although the unit reported no violence, local politicians disbanded the unit. Thousands of documents came up missing, probably discarded, although some hoped they had been given to some of the many organizations calling for information.
In 2000 the Toledo Blade described the number of FBI and local police observing the attendees of the funeral of Leonard "Chalky Red" Yaranowsky, The documents were 23 pages of previously classified documents. The unit had secretly recorded the comings and activities of the gambling kingpins.
Some of the Toledo mob were also involved in the infiltration of the Las Vegas casinos. Toledo mob associate , Irving(Slick) Shapiro was an unindicted co-conspirator in the Frontier casino case. His cooperation allowed the federal government to make real inroads on organized crime influence and control over the Vegas gaming industry. Shapiro was the vanguard for Detroit to get licensing in the Frontier. |
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Mon Oct 31, 2016 2:10 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Chalky Red Yaranowsky and fellow Jewish goodfella Slick Shapiro were in charge of the Toledo gambling operation on behalf of Whitey Besase and his second-in-command Tony Paul . Michigan State Police call Tony Paul and Shapiro
While following the mafia who commuted both ways between Detroit and Toledo, it became apparent to the FBI that many of the Detroit group kept girlfriends in Toledo. Tony Zerillo had a long time girlfriend who operated a popular restaurant and lounge in Toledo called FIFi's.
Toledo catered to those seeking excitement and had numerous underground gambling clubs, There was Slick Shapiro's Grenada garen and the Aku Aku club inside th Town House Motel that Shapiro both owned and oversaw. Shapiro and Besase's lieutenant, Bill Pompillo owned mancy's steakhouse and the Roman Garden's Bath House. |
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Mon Oct 31, 2016 2:53 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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The Detroit Mafia & The Buckeye State: Toledo, Other Ohio Towns ...
gangsterreport.com/the-detroit-mafia-ohio-toledo-other-ohio-towns-long-fell-under-...
Feb 24, 2016 - Since the 1950s, Detroit's interests in Toledo and other Michigan mob ... know, especially in that line of work,” retired Detroit FBI agent Mike Carone said. ... backdoor gambling clubs financed by members of organized crim
This is an excellent resource for information on the Detroit/Toledo mafia.
Retired FBI agent Mike Carone told how "we'd be be in Toledo watching the boys from Detroit, sometimes as much as Michigan", He noted they went there as much for pleasure as business. Once in 1978, the FBI agents got stranded in a snowstorm after watching Zerilli and Giacalone meet with their underlings before they had dates with girlfriends.
Joe Zerilli, Shapiro, and Pompelli (Aladdin) all left for Las vegas in the 70's. Black Bill Tocco died and five years llater in 1977, Whitey Besase died.
Charlie Cards, a Besase protege along with Tony Paulwere recruited to be the shot callers in Toledo according to MIchigan State Police reciords. |
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Mon Oct 31, 2016 3:31 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Report: 1970s Detroit drug kingpin, acquitted murderer Frank Lee Usher, arrested
Gus Burns | fburns@mlive.com By Gus Burns | fburns@mlive.com
on May 22, 2015 at 7:35 AM, updated May 22, 2015 at 7:36 AM
DETROIT, MI -- Frank "Nitti" Lee Usher, who was convicted and later acquitted for the 1978 murders and beheading of three people, was arrested on suspicion of dealing heroin Thursday, WJBK-TV, Fox 2 News reports.
Fox 2 reports ATF agents and Wayne County sheriff's deputies arrested Usher Thursday morning after searching his large home in Southfield. He could be arraigned Friday.
William P. Jackson, 41; Joanne Clark, 33; and William J. McCoy, 33, were assassinated inside an east side Detroit night club on July 18,1978.
Detroit police arrested Usher and two other men, suspected hit men and acquaintances of Usher's from California. A jury convicted Ushe of murder, for which he was sentenced to life in prison in 1979.
"Police said the three victims were shot in the head and decapitated," said this Afro American news story from 1979 following Usher's arrest. "The killers also cut off the men's hands and one of the woman's hands.
"The victims' heads were placed in brown plastic garbage bags and put next to the bodies, which were lined up side-by-side in the back of a van."
Detroit Police Lt.Gerald Stewart said after Usher's arrest said evidence potentially tied him to as many as 14 other unsolved murders committed between 1977 and 1979.
After serving 10 years of his life sentence, Usher successfully appealed on a technicality and received a new trial. He was acquitted on March 30, 1989 but served at several more years for federal conviction, including operating a continuing criminal enterprise.
1982 appeal with details from 1978 triple murders
Usher, with another founder, Harold Morton, led the Muder Row Gang, the "most feared drug conglomerate in Detroit," from its founding in 1975 to 1979, according to Gangster Report, a website founded by Detroit crime historians Al Profit and Oakland Press reporter Scott M. Burnstein.
"Usher and Morton, oversaw a lethal crew of lieutenants and street workers that reached close to 50 people and slung the finest of European heroin," the Gangster Report says. "Like many black drug lords of the past, the Murder Row boys were supplied with their product by the city's Italian mob contingent." |
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Tue Nov 01, 2016 7:33 am |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Heads removed- hit on their heads?
hand removed- stealing money ?
"Police said the three victims were shot in the head and decapitated," said this Afro American news story from 1979 following Usher's arrest. "The killers also cut off the men's hands and one of the woman's hands.
"The victims' heads were placed in brown plastic garbage bags and put next to the bodies, which were lined up side-by-side in the back of a van."
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More on the the Detroit mobster wars can be found on Scott Burnsteins Gangster Report- He seems to be the ultimate expert. Burnstein is the grandson of Abe Burnstein, one of the original "Purple Gang" in Detroit.
The relationship between the mob and Murder row was a natural one. Big Frank Nitti was introduced to Detroit mafia drug kingpins Giovanni “Papa John” Priziola and Raffealle “Jimmy Q” Quasarano, a pair of men with deep ties in the international narcotics market, by mob Street Boss, Anthony “Tony Jack” Giacalone, Usher’s early mentor in the underworld. Most Italian mobsters traditionally look down on aspiring Black criminals and racketeers, but Tony Jack took a quick liking to a young Usher in the 1960s, kept a close eye on him and put him to work as a gofer. For years, Usher could be found flanking Giacalone at his usual haunts around town, eagerly absorbing everything he could from the city’s toughest mobster and taking pride in being allowed to be part of his inner-circle. In the ultimate sign of acceptance, Tony Jack tagged Usher with his nickname, “Frank Nitti”, a reference to Frank “The Enforcer” Nitti of the infamous Al Capone mob in Chicago during Prohibition.
Last edited by untanglingwebs on Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:29 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Tue Nov 01, 2016 7:50 am |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Jimmy Hoffa's Corpse Most Likely Cremated At Detroit Mob's Central ...
gangsterreport.com/jimmy-hoffa-made-to-disappear-at-detroit-mob-owned-central-sa...
Jimmy Hoffa's Corpse Most Likely Cremated At Detroit Mob's Central Sanitation ... Central Sanitation in Hamtramck, Michigan, a Detroit mob-owned trash company. ... trash-hauling trade with their co-ownership of Central Sanitation at that time.
written 40 years after Hoffa's disappearance. |
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Tue Nov 01, 2016 4:19 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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JIMMY HOFFA’S CORPSE MOST LIKELY CREMATED AT DETROIT MOB’S CENTRAL SANITATION
Scott BurnsteinDetroit and Featured and Mafia and Mafia Insider and Midwest and Mob Hitshoffatiny
hoffa
Many American crime experts and former and current members of federal law enforcement believe slain Teamsters titan Jimmy Hoffa had his corpse incinerated at Central Sanitation in Hamtramck, Michigan, a Detroit mob-owned trash company. Central Sanitation was a business that belonged to deceased Motor City mafia lieutenants Peter (Bozzi) Vitale and Raffaele (Jimmy Q) Quasarano, the closest of friends and both longtime Hoffa associates and high-ranking organized crime figures connected to homicides in the past.
Hoffa was kidnapped and killed 40 years ago this week. He vanished from a Metro Detroit restaurant parking lot the afternoon of July 30, 1975 en route to a gangland sit down with Detroit mob street boss Anthony (Tony Jack) Giacalone and Genovese crime family capo Anthony (Tony Pro) Provenzano. His body has never been found and no charges were ever filed in the case, though it’s still an open investigation. Some sociologists have dubbed the Hoffa mystery the most iconic unsolved crime in U.S. history. Four decades later, never-ending debates related to the whereabouts of Hoffa’s remains have turned the ongoing search and surrounding hysteria whenever a new tip arises every couple years or so into modern mythology.
But what if there’s nothing to find? What if any and all remnants of his body cease to exist and have since the very hour he breathed his last breath? That’s where Vitale and Quasarano allegedly come in.
“Within a half hour of taking two in the head, Jimmy Hoffa was ashes,” says a Detroit mob insider and respected wiseguy. “All this running around looking for a body is laughable, there ain’t nothing to find. And he wasn’t the first either. Bozzi Vitale and Jimmy Q got rid of a bunch of bodies the exact same way. Abracadabra, you’re corpse is suddenly gone, no evidence, no nothing. It’s not that complicated.”
Hardly ever seen apart, Bozzi and Jimmy Q were both raised in Sicily and known to be partners in narcotics, gambling and loansharking operations. They were each a prime suspect in the Hoffa investigation from the jump and dominated the area’s trash-hauling trade with their co-ownership of Central Sanitation at that time.
The FBI was tracking their movements in the days leading up to and after Hoffa went missing and saw them have dinner with Tony Giacalone and Detroit mob Godfather Joseph (Joe Uno) Zerilli at Larco’s, a favorite mafia haunt in Motown on July 28 and then break bread with Genovese crime family street boss Anthony (Fat Tony) Salerno on August 1 in New York’s Little Italy.
Zerilli’s son, Anthony (Tony Z) Zerilli, the syndicate’s imprisoned “acting” underboss the summer Hoffa got clipped, came forth to the FBI in the final years of his life in 2012 and fingered Bozzi Vitale and Jimmy Quasarano in the actual hit, along with current reputed Detroit mafia heavyweight Anthony (Tony Pal) Palazzolo. Zerilli told investigators that Tony Giacalone informed him Hoffa was driven to property owned by his cousin and the Family’s then “acting” boss Giacomo (Black Jack) Tocco in Oakland Township, Michigan by the trio of wiseguys and once they arrived in a farmhouse at the property, smacked in the head by Palazzolo with a shovel and buried there, possibly alive.
The FBI looked into the Zerilli tip and searched the property to no avail. Tony Z died in the spring, no longer part of the mob’s hierarchy in Detroit. He was No. 2 in charge from 1974 until he was jailed in 2002. His dad passed in 1977, turning over the reins of the crime family to Tocco despite Tony Z being the original heir apparent to the throne. Tocco preceded him to the grave though, succumbing to heart failure last July, the city’s sitting don for the previous three and a half decades. Tony Jack and Tony Pro died of natural causes in 2001 and 1988, respectively.
q and v
Pete Vitale (left) and Jimmy Quasarano (right) in an FBI surveillance photo snapped in 1978
Bozzi Vitale and his older brother Paul (the Pope) Vitale – another Central Sanitation co-owner – were captains in the Michigan mafia responsible for overseeing the city’s Greektown neighborhood, downtown Detroit’s central entertainment district, for years.The Vitales were stationed out of the Grecian Gardens restaurant, a mob hangout in the heart of Greektown at the east end of Monroe Street, the neighborhood’s main drag. Coming up in the rough-and-rugged rustbelt underworld of the 1930s and 40s, they were groomed by fearsome Detroit mafia capo Pietro (Machine Gun Pete) Corrado, the original gangland “Pope” of Greektown.
As a young hood, Bozzi Vitale was Machine Gun Pete’s driver and bodyguard. When Machine Gun Pete and his top crew boss Salvatore (Tootie) Buffa both died of sudden heart attacks a few years a part in the 1950s, the Vitales inherited Buffa’s rackets and were appointed capo of his crew, while Corrado’s two sons Dominic and Anthony took over their dad’s regime. Binding the families even tighter, Dominic (Fats) Corrado and Anthony (Tony the Bull) Corrado married Paul Vitale’s two daughters.
Jimmy Quasarano was a suave, savvy and reputedly lethal Motown drug czar who would rise to the crime family’s consigliere slot or No. 3 in charge in the late 1970s. Besides being thought to have taken part in Hoffa’s slaying, Quasarano is suspected to have participated in the planning or carrying out of at least a dozen other mob murders. Married to the daughter of a Sicilian mafia don, Jimmy Q (sometimes referred to by his men as “Jimmy the Goon”) cut his teeth as the driver, bodyguard and all-around right-hand man of beloved longtime Detroit mob consigliere Giovanni (Papa John) Priziola. He replaced Priziola as consigliere following Priziola’s death due to natural causes in April 1979 – he’d been serving in the post on an “acting” basis for several years before that. Although he kept an office at Central Sanitation, Quasarano could be found most days at his Motor City Barber Supply, the Motor City Boxing Gym (where he staked fighters) or cavorting with his buddy Bozzi at the Grecian Gardens.
Jimmy Q and the Vitales had been linked to Hoffa by federal authorities in various (mostly) illegal capacities dating back to the days right after Prohibition when Hoffa was establishing himself as a presence in the local Detroit labor community with fire-and-brimstone speeches, a charismatic swagger and savvy, bulldog-tough leadership backed with fierce knuckle-dragging firepower supplied by his friends in the mob. Men like the Vitale brothers and Quasarano.
The fiery one-time Teamsters President locked horns with his former allies in the mafia over his desire to take back his presidency after serving a prison sentence in the early 1970s. Throughout the mid-to-late 20th Century, organized crime dominated the ranks of the Teamsters labor union underlying Hoffa’s meteoric ascent to being one of the country’s the most recognized and powerful men in both industrial and political terms. He was incarcerated in 1967 for bribery, fraud and jury tampering and in 1971 relinquished his role as president of the union to his VP and protégé, the more controllable and oafish Frank Fitzsimmons, in hopes of getting an early release, which was granted by a pardon that came straight from the White House and sitting Commander and Chief Richard M. Nixon, by the end of that same calendar year .
Upon hitting the streets, Hoffa made it clear publically he intended on seeking reelection to the great dismay of the very same mafia bosses he used as muscle to take office in the first place and who were ordering him to retire because they preferred Fitzsimmons’ more easy going and persuadable style as
Teamsters boss than his fearless, harder to control, bull-in-a-china shop-approach. Hoffa neglected the demand to forgo his bid to reclaim the presidency and threatened to expose the ties between the union and organized crime if the mob didn’t stop blocking his path. The mob decided to nip the problem in the bud – they solved it by murdering him.
Tony Giacalone lured Hoffa out in the open to be killed with the promise of a critical “burying of the hatchet” meeting with Tony Provenzano, Tony Jack’s cousin via marriage and an east coast Teamsters powerbroker with whom Hoffa was feuding with but needed on his side for the sake of his reelection bid. The supposed sit down was scheduled for 2:00 p.m. on July 30, 1975 at the Machus Red Fox in Bloomfield Township, Michigan, a ritzy suburb less than 10 miles north of Detroit city limits and home to auto executives, judges, lawyers, doctors and professional athletes. Tony Jack and Tony Pro intentionally didn’t show. Giacalone, the man put in charge of arranging Hoffa’s assassination, sent a hit squad in their place, to pick him up under the guise of taking him to another location where he’d be meeting with the “Two Tonys,” and executed him at a nearby residence instead.
Many FBI and Gangster Report sources say within 45 minutes of Hoffa being murdered, his body was driven in the trunk of Tony Jack’s son’s car to Jimmy Q and the Vitales’ Central Sanitation in Hamtramck and promptly torched in the trash company’s incinerator. Suspiciously, Central Sanitation itself burned to the ground in a suspected, but never indicted arson fire that occurred in the months after Hoffa disappeared.
Hamtramck is a city within a city, resting on Detroit’s near northwest side and holding a rich gangland history as well as a reputation for being home to the most culturally diverse set of neighborhoods in the whole state of Michigan. The municipality was so corrupt during Prohibition that the city was put under Martial Law and taken over by the state to rid it of the dirty politicians that existed from top-to-bottom in Hamtramck city hall at that time. In other words, it was a perfect city for wiseguys like Jimmy Q and the Vitale brothers to set up shop.
Central Sanitation was an offspring of Tri-County Sanitation, another FBI search destination in the Hoffa investigation and equally notorious in the annals of the Detroit underworld. Tri County was formed in 1962 by the Vitale brothers and Bozzi Vitale’s soon-to-be son-in-law, mob prince, Joe Barbara, Jr., who was young (30), ambitious and according to numerous federal informants, extremely deadly, having already been named a suspect in more than one gangland homicide. Barbara, Jr., known on the streets then as “Joe the Clipper,” was the son of rural Pennsylvania mob don Joseph (Joe the Barber) Barbara, Sr., the famous host of the ill-fated 1957 Apalachin, New York mafia summit.
About three years after the Apalachin summit was raided by the police, making huge headlines around the world, Barbara, Jr. moved to Detroit and began dating Bozzi Vitale’s daughter, finally marrying her in 1963 in an extravagant ceremony attended by a who’s who of mob dignitaries from across the country. With Barbara, Jr. at the helm and the Vitales providing the capital, connections and back-up artillery (not that he needed much), Tri-County quickly became the biggest sanitation company in Southeastern Michigan. It also might have doubled as a gangland graveyard. An FBI memo from 1978 cites confidential informants claiming “at least 10 bodies were disposed of on Tri-County Sanitation property.”
Joe Barbara, Jr. following his racketeering conviction
Joe Barbara, Jr. (center) following his racketeering conviction
Before he was indicted in 1968 for racketeering and extortion revolving around activities related to Tri-County, Barbara, Jr. had expanded his and the Vitales’ interests in the trash biz into Ohio, teaming with the legendary Toledo underworld character Leonard (Chalky Red) Yaranowsky to open the King Road Dump Truck Company. But his 1968 bust eventually got him booted from the sanitation industry all together and forced Barbara, Jr. to sell his stakes in both Tri-County and King Road. In 1972, Barbara, Jr. sold his interests in the two businesses to Nick Micelli, Bozzi Vitale’s other son-in-law and attorney. Then Micelli and the Vitales’ made a five million-dollar stock deal (1.5 million cash) orchestrated by Barbara, Jr. to sell Tri-County to a Boston-based trash-hauling company while keeping their workers employed and hidden points on the backend of the sale.
The Vitales partnered with Jimmy Q, went to a bank and got a loan to start Central Sanitation. Barbara, Jr.’s racketeering case stemmed from his alleged rape of Delores Lazaros, the wife of an imprisoned Greek Detroit mafia associate, Peter (Birmingham Pete) Lazaros, the syndicate’s payoff king and primary bagman in the 1950s and a majority of the 1960s. After Pete Lazaros failed killing Barbara, Jr. in an unsuccessful hit attempt that took place in the parking lot of a suburban hotel (The Kingsley Inn in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan), he joined Team USA and testified against Joe the Clipper at trial, helping convict him and send him to the pen for six years. During a recces at the highly-publicized trial, Lazaros and Barbara, Jr. got into a shouting match in the court hallway and Lazaros accused Joe the Clipper of stuffing the wife of another mobster down a drain pipe.
Central Sanitation was only in operation for less than five years and shut down after a March 1976 fire that gutted the place, possibly erasing any evidence of Hoffa’s remains.
“Probably the best intelligence we received regarding how Hoffa’s body was done away with was the Central Sanitation angle,” retired U.S. Prosecutor Keith Corbett recalled. “We were being told a lot of bodies were disposed of, incinerated there in the 1970s. Vitale and Quasarano were running out of there at that point in time and both those two fellas were pegged pretty early on as being involved in this murder in some capacity or another, so it wasn’t a leap on our part to put two and two together, plus the information we were getting fed was leading us to that conclusion. Betting odds would dictate, the fact that the place mysteriously burnt to the ground shortly thereafter wasn’t a coincidence.”
Corbett was at the helm of the federal government’s courtroom assault on Jimmy Q and Bozzi Vitale when they were convicted of racketeering offenses in 1981 spawning from the “bustout” and extortion of a Wisconsin-based Italian cheese company with outlets in Michigan, Illinois, California and Connecticut and financed by a Teamster-backed pension-fund loan. The racketeering case was rolled into a tax fraud indictment tied to the sale of Tri-County Sanitation that the pair incurred the same month in 1979.
The government was aided tremendously in both cases by Nick Micelli, who heavily in debt to Jimmy Q and others from his gambling habit and threatened with prison time, gave up his father-in-law and Quasarano to the feds and testified against them in court. On the stand he recalled Jimmy Q informing the cheese company’s owner, “The big fish is swallowing the little fish and frankly you’re lucky we didn’t break your legs.”
Micelli, his wife and kids moved to the west coast in the wake of the trial. He continued practicing law in Beverly Hills, dodging a retaliatory hit only because he was married to Bozzi’s daughter. A heated conversation about whether or not Micelli should live or die between Vitale and Quasarano was intercepted by FBI audio surveillance. “I don’t care how mad we are at him (Micelli), we’re not going to make my little girl a widow and let my grandkids grow up without a dad, that’s not happening on my watch,” Bozzi pointedly told Jimmy Q.
Later on in the same snippet of the wiretap feed, Quasarano was heard telling another associate immediately after Vitale left his office at Motor City Barber Supply, a different story. “That rat bastard owes me 150 large and five years,” Jimmy Q hissed, referencing Micelli’s gambling debt and the ensuing five-year prison term he had in front of him. “He’s going to get it (get killed), it’s just a matter of when.”
Micelli would be felled by a heart attack at the age of 50 in 1994, not on Quasarano’s order as he had predicted. Paul Vitale died in 1990, Bozzi Vitale in 1998. Jimmy Q held on to 2002, passing away at the ripe old age of 92. Joe Barbara, Jr. is 84 today and did another 5-piece in the can because of a racketeering pinch in the 1980s. |
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Tue Nov 01, 2016 4:23 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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915 F. 2d 1574 - United States v. W Turner
Home
915 F.2d 1574
UNITED STATES of America, Plaintiff-Appellant,
v.
Howard W. TURNER, Defendant-Appellee.
No. 90-1277.
United States Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.
Oct. 5, 1990.
Unpublished Disposition
NOTICE: Sixth Circuit Rule 24(c) states that citation of unpublished dispositions is disfavored except for establishing res judicata, estoppel, or the law of the case and requires service of copies of cited unpublished dispositions of the Sixth Circuit.
Before KEITH and MILBURN, Circuit Judges, and WILLIAM K. THOMAS, Senior District Judge.*
PER CURIAM:
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The United States appeals from the district court's January 19, 1990 order sentencing Howard Turner to three years probation and assessing a total of $23,350 in fines and supervision costs, pursuant to his guilty plea. For the reasons set forth below, we AFFIRM the district court's downward departure in sentencing Turner.
I.
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On July 14, 1989, a grand jury indicted Turner, together with his co-defendants Howard Turner, Jr., Charles Stockman, William Odom, and Roy Gould, on the charge of conducting an illegal gambling business, in violation of 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1955. On October 13, 1989, Turner pled guilty without the benefit of a Rule 11 plea agreement. Turner persuaded each of his co-defendants to enter pleas of guilt, notwithstanding the fact that at least one of his co-defendants had extremely limited involvement.
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Prior to October 1988, Turner was the leader of an illegal numbers operation in Flint, Michigan. Turner had as many as forty people working for him. His average daily collections were approximately $5,200.
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Turner's presentence report indicates that he is a black male, fifty-nine years of age, who has resided in Flint his entire life. He retired from General Motors Corporation after 31 years of employment. He has been active in community organizations for most of his adult life.
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Turner accepted responsibility for his role as a leader in the gambling operation. The presentence report indicated that Turner was statutorily eligible for probation pursuant to 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3561.1 But under the Sentencing Guidelines, he is not eligible for probation.
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Turner was assigned a base offense level of 12. U.S.S.G. Sec. 2E3.1. Due to his aggravating role as a leader and organizer, Turner's offense level was increased by four levels under U.S.S.G. Sec. 3B1.1(a). Turner was given a two-level reduction under U.S.S.G. Sec. 3E1.1 for acceptance of responsibility, because he admitted that he managed a gambling organization and he described how it operated. Turner's total offense level was 14. Turner had no prior convictions, placing him in a criminal history category I. The guidelines specify a sentence range of 15 to 21 months. U.S.S.G., Ch. 5, Pt. A, Sentencing Table.
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Turner's Sentencing Memorandum urged the court to make a downward departure from the Sentencing Guidelines. Turner's counsel raised the following mitigating factors to support his argument for downward departure:
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1. The crime of operating an illegal gambling enterprise is a victimless crime;
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2. Turner has an excellent civic history reflected by his participation in various community organizations and service on many community boards;
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3. Turner is black, and the record reflects "a great degree of disparity" in the sentencing of blacks as contrasted to the sentencing of whites for the same crime;2 and
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4. Under Michigan law, conducting a private lottery is a misdemeanor offense; therefore, had Turner been prosecuted pursuant to state law, it is likely that he would be sentenced to probation.
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On January 19, 1990, the district court sentenced Turner to three years probation; he was also assessed a $20,000 fine, $3,300 for supervision costs, and $50. In imposing this sentence, the district judge made the following comments:
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Defendant has had a perfectly clean record all his life. He has had no convictions of any kind. He has been, for 31 years, an employee at General Motors with evidently a very good record, now retiring with a pension. It is clear that he has been involved in lots of community work. It is a difficult question. I think I will depart downward because I think 15 months, which is the minimum that I would give if I followed the guidelines, I think is just far too much. Fifteen months imprisonment here and I have an armed robber who held up banks with a 32 month guideline, that is not up today but coming up Monday, which I am going to have to depart upward. Now to suggest 15 months for this man when an armed robber would only get 32 months just leaves me not very happy. The problem I have, and I am going to depart downward, is whether I depart downward to total probation, and that is a difficult decision to make. Let me adequately state my reasons for departing downward and then I will determine whether I am going to impose some imprisonment plus probation or whether it will be straight probation.
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Now I will say much of the same, part of what I am going to say is exactly what I said with reference to the prior case. I don't think the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines here, particularly the one that is as high as this one, adequately considered the mitigating aspect on prosecuting gambling offenses in a state like Michigan where, as I pointed out, not only is gambling legal, it is a state institution. It is one in which all citizens are urged by radio, television, newspaper ads and billboards to gamble, and as I said there and I say again in this case, there is an inherent hypocrisy in this situation which I think demands departure below the guidelines.
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I think the community work and the steady employment of this gentleman for more than 30 years could not have been adequately considered by the Sentencing Commission in setting a sentence like this. I think that is an additional reason for downward departure. From everything I have seen, he has been an exemplary citizen who not only took care of his wife and his family and worked regularly but involved himself in all sorts of community activities, and I think that is a very important part. It is rare that I see a defendant before me with the record of 31 years of steady employment, full support of his family, and a person who is involved in the kind of community activities that he has and spent so much time in it. All these I think are important in our reasons for departing downward.
16
Now I recognize that the Defendant is the organizer and that has been clearly admitted by both the Defendant and his counsel, and clearly the most culpable of any of the Defendants that I have had so far. But I am inclined to think that it can be taken care of by the payment of a significant and substantial fine. So I am going to place the Defendant on probation for a total of three years. He is to pay a fine of $20,000, $3,000 supervision costs, and a $50 special assessment, all of which are to be paid within 30 days. The conditions of probation are that he shall not commit any crime, federal, state or local; that he shall abide by the standard conditions of probation recommended by the Sentencing Commission; that he is prohibited from possessing any firearms or dangerous weapons; and he shall not open any additional lines of credit without approval of the Probation Department until all costs and the fine have been paid. He shall fully provide the Probation Department with complete access to any financial information of his own that he has.
17
Joint Appendix at 31-34 (Sentencing Hearing Transcript).
18
On February 20, 1990, with the approval of the Solicitor General, the United States filed a notice of appeal from the sentence imposed upon Turner. This court has jurisdiction over the appeal of the United States pursuant to 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3742(b).
II.
A.
19
Title 18 United States Code Section 3742(b) authorizes appellate review of a sentence that "(1) was imposed in violation of law; (2) was imposed as a result of an incorrect application of the sentencing guidelines; (3) is less than the sentence established in the applicable guideline range to the extent that the sentence includes a lesser ... term of imprisonment ... than the minimum established in the guideline range." A court is required to impose a sentence within the appropriate guideline range "unless the court finds that there exists an aggravating or mitigating circumstance of a kind, or to a degree, not adequately taken into consideration by the Sentencing Commission in formulating the guidelines that should result in a sentence different from that described." 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3553(b). "In determining whether a circumstance was adequately taken into consideration, the court shall consider only the sentencing guidelines, policy statements, and official commentary of the Sentencing Commission." Id.; United States v. Joan, 883 F.2d 491, 493-94 (6th Cir.1989). The guidelines are meant to cover the "heartland" of typical cases. Departures are warranted only for atypical cases--"one[s] to which a particular guideline linguistically applies, but where conduct significantly differs from the norm." Sentencing Guidelines Manual, Ch. 1 at 1.6 (Nov.1989). This Court has adopted the First Circuit's reasoning that "there must be something 'special' about a given offender, or the accouterments of the crime committed, which distinguishes the case from the mine-run for that offense." United States v. McDowell, 902 F.2d 451, 455 (6th Cir.1990) (quoting United States v. Aguilar-Pena, 887 F.2d 347, 350 (1989)). The court must state the "specific reason" for imposition of a sentence outside the guideline range. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3553(c)(2). Mistretta v. United States, 109 S.Ct. 647, 652 (1989); United States v. Newsome, 894 F.2d 852, 856 (6th Cir.1990).
20
This Court has adopted a three-step procedure to be used in determining whether a district court has appropriately departed from the guidelines. United States v. Brewer, 899 F.2d 503, 506 (6th Cir.1990); accord United States v. Diaz-Villafane, 874 F.2d 43, 49 (1st Cir.1989). First, the reviewing court must determine whether the case is sufficiently unusual to warrant departure. This determination is purely a question of law. Second, the reviewing court must determine whether such unusual circumstances exist. This is a factual determination which may only be set aside for clear error. See 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3742(e). Third, the reviewing court must determine whether the direction and degree of departure were reasonable. 18 U.S.C. Sec. 3742(e)(3). Brewer, 899 F.2d at 506. If this Court concludes that the district court's departure was based on factors adequately considered by the guidelines, then the review may end. United States v. Hays, 899 F.2d 515, 519 (6th Cir.1990).
B.
21
The United States argues that the district court erred in relying on factors considered within the guidelines as a basis for downward departure. While we assign error to the district court's reliance upon certain factors, we find that the district court properly determined that Turner's substantial civic involvement warrants a downward departure from the Sentencing Guidelines.
22
The guidelines clearly state that a defendant's age, employment record, family ties and responsibilities, and community ties are not "ordinarily relevant" in determining whether a sentence should be outside the guideline range. See U.S.S.G. Secs. 5H1.1, 5H1.5, 5H1.6. Moreover, Turner's "perfectly clean record" was reflected in his criminal history Category I. "The lower limit of the range for a Category I criminal history is set for a first offender with the lowest risk of recidivism. Therefore, a departure below the lower limit of the guideline range for a Category I criminal history on the basis of the adequacy of criminal history cannot be appropriate." U.S.S.G. Sec. 4A1.3.
23
The record does not suggest that the Turner's age, his employment record, his family ties and responsibilities--factors upon which the district court based, in part, its downward departure--are so exceptional that downward departure is warranted. Cf. Brewer, 899 F.2d at 508 ("While the record indicates that defendants enjoy community support, are still involved in the community, and have children at home, these circumstances were adequately taken into consideration by the Commission when formulating the guidelines. These factors ... are not ordinarily exceptional, and therefore, a downward departure based on these factors is usually not warranted."). Therefore, the district court erred in basing its departure on Turner's age, employment record, and family ties and responsibilities.
24
The district court found that Turner's community work could not have been adequately considered by the Sentencing Commission in setting the sentence. Characterizing Turner as "an exemplary citizen," the district court noted that he has rarely seen a defendant with a record of community involvement equal to Turner's.3 We find Turner's community involvement sufficiently unusual to warrant departure.
25
The extent of Turner's civic and community involvement is sufficiently distinguishable from the facts in Brewer where this Court found that the district court "failed to point out why the defendants' community support ... were 'substantially in excess' of those generally involved in other bank teller embezzlement cases." Brewer, 899 F.2d at 508. In the present case, Turner's community and civic activities are "substantially in excess" of most individuals regardless of their criminal history. It seems ill-conceived to deprive the Flint community of Turner's service by sentencing him to prison when other means of punishment are available.
26
Moreover, Turner's community activities transform this case from an ordinary to an atypical one. The Sentencing Commission's policy statement advises that "[w]hen a court finds an atypical case, one to which a particular guideline linguistically applies but where conduct significantly differs from the norm, the court may consider whether a departure is warranted...." United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual, 4(b), Policy Statement (Nov.1989). The policy statement further indicates that the Commission "does not intend to limit the kinds of factors (whether or not mentioned anywhere else in the guidelines) that could constitute grounds for departure in an unusual case." Id.; see also Brewer, 899 F.2d at 513 (Chief Judge Merritt, dissenting). Thus, the district court did not err in relying on Turner's civic involvement as a basis for its downward departure. Moreover, the degree of the departure was reasonable under the circumstances.
C.
27
The district court's only other reason for its downward departure was that the Sentencing Commission did not adequately consider the mitigating aspect of prosecuting gambling offenses in states where state sponsored gambling is legal. The district court is correct in finding that neither the Sentencing Guidelines the policy statements, nor the official commentary speak to this issue. This Court, however, has found that Michigan's enactment of gambling laws is "clearly a proper exercise of the state's police power in an effort to promote the public welfare." United States v. Washington, 879 F.2d 1400, 1401 (6th Cir.1989) (holding Michigan statutes banning private lotteries do not violate due process). The Washington court reasoned that the Michigan legislature's choice to attack only the dangers presented by private lotteries is rational. Id. Therefore, "Michigan's sponsorship of a state lottery does not vitiate the state's legitimate objections to private lotteries." Id. While Washington addresses the state's interest in banning private lotteries, it has a limited application to the issue of whether the Sentencing Guidelines adequately considered the mitigating aspect of state sponsored gambling on sentences for private gambling activity. The government contends that the goal of national uniformity in sentencing would be seriously undermined if the severity of the sentence for the same behavior were to vary according to whether there is a state-run lottery in the jurisdiction where a defendant is sentenced.
28
Departure from the guidelines is warranted only when there is a special circumstance which distinguishes the case from others involving the same offense. See McDowell, 902 F.2d at 455. The prevalence of state-sponsored lotteries throughout the country precludes a determination that this case is atypical because of Michigan's lottery. Therefore, the existence of Michigan's lottery is not sufficiently unusual to warrant departure.
29
Finally, the government argues that the court's personal displeasure with Michigan's state-run lottery is not a proper factor on which a downward departure can be based. Aguilar-Pena, 887 F.2d at 353 ("Judicial dissatisfaction alone, no matter how steeped in real-world wisdom, cannot be enough to trigger departures, less the entire system crumble."). However, the record in Turner's case does not support a finding that the district court's displeasure alone was the basis for its downward departure. Therefore, we will refrain from addressing this contention further.
III.
30
Turner's exceptional community involvement was not adequately taken into consideration under the Sentencing Guidelines. On the sole basis of Turner's community activity, we find the district court's downward departure appropriate. We, therefore, AFFIRM the Judgment Including Sentence under the Sentencing Reform Act of The Honorable Horace W. Gilmore, United States District Judge for the Eastern District of Michigan.
31
Judge Thomas would reverse and respectfully dissents.
*
The Honorable William K. Thomas, United States District Judge for the Northern District of Ohio, sitting by designation
1
18 U.S.C. Sec. 3561 provides:
A defendant who has been found guilty of an offense may be sentenced to a term of probation unless--
(1) the offense is a Class A or Class B felony and the defendant is an individual;
(2) the offense is an offense for which probation has been expressly precluded; or
(3) the defendant is sentenced at the same time to a term of imprisonment for the same or a different offense.
2
Turner's counsel indicated that only one person in Genesee County has been sentenced to prison for violating 18 U.S.C. Sec. 1955. This person was black, and he had operated an illegal gambling organization for twenty-five years. Defendant's Sentencing Memorandum at 8
On appeal, Turner acknowledges that the Sentencing Guidelines do not permit the sentencing judge to consider race as a factor in sentencing, since one of the purposes of developing the guidelines was to eliminate the gross racial disparities in sentencing. However, Turner argues that the disparity evident in sentencing blacks for operating an illegal gambling enterprise is a factor supporting downward departure.
As the district judge did not rely on the alleged racial disparity in sentencing, this issue is not properly before the Court in its review of whether the downward departure was justified.
3
Turner is engaged in an exceptional number of civic activities which include:
1
Member, Quinn Chapel AME Methodist Church for more than 50 years;
2
Member, UAW 659 Committee for 25 years; Unit Executive Board; UAW Convention Delegate;
3
President, Veterans Club;
4
Former Member, Flint Optimist Club;
5
Member, John W. Stevens Lodge, Omen Temple, Saginaw Valley Consistory, Prince Hall FAM;
6
Member, 7th District Black Caucus;
7
President, UPCA Housing Corporation;
8
Member, NAACP;
9
Member, Urban League of Flint;
10
Member, Veterans of Foreign Wars, George Carver Post;
11
Delegate, State Democratic Conventions;
12
Board of Directors, Dan Haley Scholarship Fund; and
13
Member, YMCA
Additionally, Turner was founder of a service organization for the mentally disturbed and founder of a Korean war veterans organization, Veterans for the Promotion of Civic Activities. |
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Wed Nov 02, 2016 8:24 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Police have long said Prosecutors were unwilling to prosecute illegal gambling and they had to work with federal agencies. $5,200 a day doesn't seem like much if you have 40 people working for you. Turner was also the owner of the "Beaver's" bar that was closed by the Prosecutor for the violence there.
Last edited by untanglingwebs on Fri Nov 04, 2016 10:01 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Wed Nov 02, 2016 8:28 pm |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Denny McLain- Society for American Baseball Research
sabr.org/bioproj/person/6bddedd4
(excerpts)
Dennis Dale McLain
Born: 3 / 29 / 1944 at Chicago, IL (US)
More From SABR
Searches: Pictures • Bibliography
Stats: Baseball Reference • Retrosheet
Corrections? Additions?
If you can help us improve this player's biography, contact us.
Denny McLain
This article was written by Mark Armour
.........In February 1970 Sports Illustrated featured McLain on its cover next to the headline “Denny McLain and the Mob, Baseball’s Big Scandal.”5 The mob? According to the magazine, in early 1967 McLain invested in a bookmaking operation based in a restaurant in Flint, Michigan; several of his partners were part of the Syrian mob. When a gambler named Edward Voshen won $46,000 on a horse race, his bookie couldn’t pay it off, suggesting instead that Voshen find the bookie’s partners. One of his partners was McLain. Voshen spent several months trying to get his money, finally enlisting the aid of mobster Tony Giacalone. According to the magazine’s sources, Giacalone met with McLain in early September and, while threatening much worse, brought his heel down on McLain’s toes and dislocated them. This would have coincided with time of McLain’s ankle-toes injury in September 1967. The magazine also reported that Giacalone had bet heavily on the Red Sox and Twins to win the pennant, and had made a large bet on the Angels in McLain’s final start.
McLain denied most of the story. He admitted to investing in the bookmaking business to the tune of $15,000, but claimed that his partners reneged on him, causing McLain to withdraw his support. He told Bowie Kuhn, baseball’s commissioner, that he was completely uninvolved in the ring at the time of the Voshen bet, but oddly admitted that he had loaned $10,000 to one of the partners to help pay off the debt. Furthermore, he had never met Giacalone, and McLain retold the story of his toe injury. (In subsequent years, McLain recalled that it was an ankle sprain, not injured toes.) Just prior to spring training, Kuhn suspended McLain indefinitely while he conducted an investigation.
The problem with all of these accusations was that many of the people making them were criminals and lowlifes, as Sports Illustrated acknowledged. Although he has continued to deny the allegations regarding his injury, his denials have been in themselves damning. In his 2007 memoir I Told You I Wasn’t Perfect, he wrote that he was heavily distracted in September 1967. “I was spooked about the ghost of Ed Voshen and worried about being exposed,” he wrote. “I kept expecting someone to tap me on the shoulder and say, ‘Hey, where’s my money?’ or that my car was going to blow up.”6 This fear is precisely why baseball has a paranoia about gambling.
.....Denny made a living for a while hustling on the golf course. While involved with a financial services company in Tampa, he turned to loan sharking and bookmaking. With losses piling up, he and his colleagues got more adventurous. He once made $160,000 smuggling a fugitive out of the country in his airplane.
Eventually, the US Justice Department began to sniff around Denny’s associates, several of whom were willing to talk. In March 1984 McLain was indicted on charges of racketeering, extortion, and cocaine trafficking. McLain was tried, convicted, and sentenced to 23 years in prison. Thirty months later, an appeals court threw out the verdict on procedural grounds, setting McLain free, and the government ultimately decided to not retry the case.
.......It wasn’t enough. In 1993 McLain and a friend bought Peet Packing, a struggling 100-year-old meatpacking firm in Chesaning, Michigan. Within a month after the sale, $3 milion was taken from the company’s pension fund, and by 1995 the company was bankrupt. Though he denied knowledge of the financial illegalities, McLain and his partner were eventually convicted on charges of embezzlement, money laundering, mail fraud, and conspiracy. McLain spent seven more years in prison.
Released in 2003, McLain made appearances and lived a life as a former baseball hero. His wife, Sharon, divorced him when he returned to prison, but they remarried when he got out. They raised four children: Kristen, Denny Jr., Tim, and M
Last revised: July 1, 2015 |
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Fri Nov 04, 2016 9:58 am |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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| There is no naming of the "Syrian Mob" referenced in this article. Is this part of the Chaldean Mob mentioned earlier? |
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Fri Nov 04, 2016 10:03 am |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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Denny McLain and the Raccoon That Changed Baseball...
seamheads.com/blog/2015/08/18/denny-mclain-and-the-raccoon-t...
Aug 18, 2015 ... Denny McLain and the famous 1967 American League pennant race, ... drinking and gambling at a seedy Flint club and steakhouse named the ...
Baseball Prospectus | The Downfall of Denny McLain
www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=1666
Feb 28, 2003 ... Mantle signaled for a fastball letter high, McLain delivered it, and Mantle hit it ... Detroit right-hander Denny McLain was cruising along in the top of the ... a bookmaking operation based out of a restaurant in Flint, Michigan; many of ... When a gambler named Edward Voshen won $46,000 on a horse race in ...
Denny McLain | Society for American Baseball...
sabr.org/bioproj/person/6bddedd4 |
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Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:05 am |
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untanglingwebs
El Supremo
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The "seedy" restaurant said to be owned by a low level mobster was the Shorthorn Steak House, located at 910 South Dort Highway, just south of Court Street. The Corporations Division showed the owner as Donald L. Wyant. Incorporated in 1962, the business was dissolved in 1980. All that remains is a concrete slab .
Chinonis Realty sued the business twice in 1977 and the cases linguired for years. Paul Gadola was the attorney for the Shorthorn and Mary and Donald L. Wyant.
McLain had a damaged foot in September 1967 that affected his game. McLain denied allgation s that Giacalone had damaged his foot by stomping on it. Rumors are Giacalone had bet heavily on McLain's final start.
McLain had numerous explanations for the foot injury including chasing a racoon. It has been said McLain was cheated on his investment. The mob took the profits and gave him the losses.
Last edited by untanglingwebs on Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:33 am; edited 1 time in total |
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Fri Nov 04, 2016 11:22 am |
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