| Anthony (Gaspipe) Casso, onetime underboss of the
Luchese crime family, began cooperating with federal prosecutors and the FBI in
early 1994, a little more than a year after he was caught with his pants down while hiding
out with an old girlfriend in central New Jersey. Prior to his capture, he had been
a fugitive more than 30 months. After
becoming a
turncoat, he admitted a role in 36
gangland style
slayings, including the
spectacular 1986 bombing death of former Gambino underboss
Frank DeCicco. When Casso
defected,
he gave the
feds chapter and verse about two corrupt NYPD
detectives who were on his payroll and who had tipped him off to pending
indictments and done much worse. They tipped him off about informants -- whom Casso then had murdered -- and even took part in a gangland-style slaying.
The feds had hoped Casso would help bring the
corrupt detectives to justice, and had also
planned to use him as a witness at the racketeering and murder trial of
Genovese boss Vincent (Chin) Gigante. But Casso
committed crimes while in a special prison unit for cooperating witnesses,
got caught in a lie or two, and never testified at any trial.
In the summer of 1998,
Gaspipe was sentenced to life without parole.
In late 2004, however, Burt Kaplan the mob associate who
was a
go-between for Casso and the detectives,
so-called Mafia
Cops Louis Eppolito and Stephen
Caracappa, took up where Casso had left off. In early 2005, the ex-detectives were hit with racketeering charges that included complicity in
eight murders from 1986 through 1990, including two in which they fired the
fatal shots. On April 6, 2006, they were found guilty of all charges,
and like Casso, will
likely remain in prison for the rest of their lives . |
