For nearly a decade, families have been going to a small cafe on the outskirts of Long Island to buy pastries and gelato. Many are unaware of the age-old activity going on just a few feet away: Mafia members are running a secret underground gambling den in the shop.
The business is one of several across the island and in Queens that has served as a front for two of New York’s oldest crime families and their illegal money-making schemes, according to two reports. The federal status was unsealed Tuesday. As other gambling clubs threaten their fortunes, an active Nassau County detective offers to conduct police raids on them, in exchange for payouts, prosecutors say. said.
On Tuesday, nine prominent members and associates of the Genovese and Bonanno clans – including the detective – was charged in a fraud case brought by the United States attorney’s office in Brooklyn focusing on illegal salons and money laundering and extortion schemes.
Federal prosecutors say over 10 years, the gambling operations have generated “significant revenue” for the two families as they hid under the guise of businesses like football clubs and repair shops. shoes. The Long Island coffee shop alone typically earns them more than $10,000 a week, money laundered for the leaders of crime families.
Breon S. Peace, US attorney for the Eastern District of New York, said in a statement Tuesday that the arrests “demonstrate that the Mafia continues to pollute our community with illegal gambling.” legitimacy, extortion and violence while using our financial system to serve them criminal conspiracies.”
He added: “What is even more disturbing is the shameful conduct of a detective who betrayed his oath of office.”
The Nassau Police Department and the county’s largest police union did not immediately return requests for comment.
The power of the city’s five legendary Mafia clans began to decline during the 1980s and 1990s, due to ferocious prosecute disrupted their leadership and the authorities aimed at their control of the unions. In particular, the Bonanno family saw a string of damaging convictions and defections throughout the 2000s, including the family’s longtime boss, who started cooperate with the authorities following a 2004 conviction for a series of murders.
Families still exist, but in much less common numbers.
In recent years, they have faced charges of similar types of organized crime – extortion, illegal gambling, fraud – in both large-scale conspiracies extended down the East Coast for others to remain at the helm of the family. The cooperation between the families is also a frequent subject of several indictments.
In the Brooklyn case, the Genovese and Bonanno crime family began running a Long Island cafe – known as Gran Caffe in the Lynbrook area – around May 2012, according to the indictment.
The members of the two clans agreed to split the profits between the gambling establishment and each help keep it afloat: The unions of both clans would collect the profits and then distribute them to the level members. higher, prosecutors said.
In their detention records sent to the judge, prosecutors argued that “the degree of danger posed by the defendants’ release” should not be underestimated and that the men represented a significant flying risk. . Citing previous criminal convictions and violent histories of some of the men, prosecutors wrote that they should only be released under strict supervision conditions and after posting strictly secured bonds.
The case was prompted by a multi-year joint investigation by several agencies, including federal prosecutors in Brooklyn, the FBI, and the Nassau district attorney’s office.
