A pair of Yorkshire terriers yap nonstop at her feet. United States of America, Appellee, v. Gregory Scarpa, Jr., Defendant-appellant, 897 F.2d 63 (2d Cir. "You know how a home has its own scent?" It's the borough where many mobsters took their families in the 1980s after Brooklyn became buried in crack vials, but to mob royalty it's Siberia. ", Her mother didn't have such misgivings. Discover (and save!) "He didn't even know he was hit," recalls Big Linda. Now they are stuck with each other, seemingly forever, in their prefab corner of Staten Island. "It was the worst thing that ever happened to me," says Little Linda. 1990) case opinion from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit [9], Imprisoned since 1996 for his conviction, Scarpa, as of 2017, has been fighting for two decades now in an effort to get his conviction overturned, which had proven unsuccessful. The fast cars are gone, as are the handsome wiseguys lounging in the front room, ordering in Chinese food with stolen credit cards. [7], Rodney Stich claims that the FBI covered up Scarpa's reports to protect FBI supervisor Lindley DeVecchio from murder charges. [8], In 2005, Scarpa would tell police that Oklahoma City Bombing conspirator Terry Nichols had told him about a cache of explosives hidden in his old home. Feb 5, 2017 - This Pin was discovered by Jeff D. Discover (and save!) After someone threatened Little Linda's brother, Joey, Scarpa headed out to hunt. "Greg Jr told me he didn't want to do it because he had a wife and a baby and was happy with his life, but he couldn't say no to his father. ", Eleven months later, Joey was shot dead in a drug deal. We think we know the women of the mob—loud, crude, fond of bling, and indifferent to the crimes that support their families in tacky splendor. I Married a Mobster airs on Investigation Discovery on Wednesdays at 10:30 p.m. You have 4 free articles remaining this month, Sign-up to our daily newsletter for more articles like this + access to 5 extra articles. Scarpa died of the virus in the federal penitentiary in Rochester, Minn., in 1994, at 66, shriveled from his brawny 200 pounds to less than half that. See why nearly a quarter of a million subscribers begin their day with the Starting 5. That same year, Scarpa Jr. had his dad and Joseph DeDomenico murder limousine driver Alfred Longobardi, with whom Scarpa Jr. had a feude, said the feds. "All I want is a real home for my kids," she says over lunch a few days later at Sparks Steak House (her choice), a stop on her beer route, where mobster Paul Castellano was famously gunned down on the sidewalk in 1985. "I thought he was invincible. His father had made it look like his son was the boss and Greg Jr never got over the betrayal. Scarpa began cruising the streets with his crew, looking for enemies. Joey Scarpa was the beloved son of Linda Schiro and Greg Scarpa Sr. and sister of Linda Scarpa. Co-workers at the bureau who had long been uneasy with DeVecchio's methods pushed the case. Scarpa had been jailed in New York City with Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of 1993 attack on the World Trade Center. As they act out the traditional Kabuki of mob-wife life, clawing at each other, throwing back pi–a coladas, and hopping into their shiny cars, she wonders if, late at night, once the camera crew has headed back to Manhattan, they think about the crimes the men in their lives have committed, the drugs on the street, where the money that paid for their granite kitchen counters came from, the mothers without sons. As the wife of Greg Scarpa, the notorious mob boss, 'Big Linda' Schiro spent much of her life living in the lap of luxury. The war's opening salvo took place in the Scarpas' driveway in Brooklyn, when gunmen from a rival faction opened fire on Scarpa in his Lincoln, just steps away from where he had kissed Little Linda goodbye as she loaded her infant son into her Mercedes. "Let's not forget he killed people, Ma—a lot of people," she says, interrupting. Scarpa is not scheduled to be released until 2035, but, in late December 2015, U.S. District Court Judge Edward Korman unexpectedly issued an order reducing Mr. Scarpa’s sentence to 30 years. His longtime FBI handler, Lindley DeVecchio, confirmed the story on 60 Minutes in May. But they still treated him like he was a threat. To continue reading login or create an account. Scarpa Jr. and Nichols were both serving federal prison sentences in Colorado, ... Gregory “Grim Reaper” Scarpa Sr., ... Clemente said Dresch adored his wife, Linda, whom he married at age 19. Even now, the thought is like another kick to the gut; a stab of anger, then a flood of guilt. His ex-wife, Connie, was a sister to Gus Farace’s father. Getting mired in the drug trade proved fatal to the old-line crime families; it spelled the death of omertà, the code of silence that had kept the men out of jail. May 23, 2018 - This Pin was discovered by Raphael Marangoni. Six years later, Scarpa Jr. murdered DeDomenico because he believed DeDomenico was “committing lucrative crimes without sharing the proceeds with other crew members,” according to federal prosecutors. He took the fall and the sentence was 20 years [he later had his sentence increased on racketeering charges]. FBI interview record of Gregory Scarpa, 265A-NY-258172, 1996 July 18. She met Scarpa when she was 17, from a family with less than nothing; he was a made man already and married with four kids. She watches her daughter's kids halfheartedly while Little Linda is in Manhattan, trudging from restaurant to restaurant. This is all they have, this sheetrocked rental with kids' bikes in the living room and half-empty plastic cups of Arizona iced tea everywhere. [2][10], However, a New York Stete Federal Appeals Court later ruled that a Judge Korman had overstepped his authority by shaving 10 years off of Scarpa's sentence, and reinstated the 40 year prison sentence [2], warnings of the 1996 Olympic Games bombings. Occasionally she clicks to the new TV-ratings hit Mob Wives to watch the women, some of whom she's known since childhood and sees in the neighborhood. [2] Yousef also implied having assistance from a foreign government and claimed this government would offer Scarpa asylum. In 2005, Scarpa Jr helped the FBI find a cache of weapons under the home of … "I think about the people whose kids my father killed and I wonder, how can I call myself a victim?" Greg Scarpa was no ordinary mob guy. Her three youngest kids are the product of a relationship she had after her father and brother died, with a man who was arrested dozens of times for beating her. "I never thought anything would happen to Greg," she says. From the daughter of a jailed hitman to the ex-wife of a crime boss, each one has experienced their fair share of betrayal, fear and loss. "Greg bought me a whole new wardrobe. From the daughter of a jailed hitman to the ex-wife of a crime boss, each one has experienced their fair share of betrayal, fear and loss. The son of an infamous New York mafia hit man and Colombo family captain Gregory Scarpa nicknamed the “Grim Reaper” was convicted on racketeering charges and sentenced to 40 years. "In the end I used to wheel him out to the yard in his chair, and the guards would be all around us," recalls Big Linda. Guy R. Scarpa, 81, passed away peacefully at his home on November 10, 2020 after a period of declining health. "He kept saying, 'I'm fine,' and he had this big hole in this head." Five years ago, the Brooklyn district attorney's office tried to go after DeVecchio, the FBI agent, for feeding Scarpa information that might have led to murder. For all the body count of the mob war, the friends gone, the possessions lost, Greg Scarpa's tortured end—that's what finally broke both Lindas. With a history of psychiatric hospitalizations, Big Linda has nowhere else to go. He returned with his eye shot clean out of the socket. The death of Greg Scarpa came as the American mob itself began its final descent. It was one thing to do a five-year bid for extortion, another entirely to be facing the 25-to-life sentences of the Rockefeller drug laws or RICO, the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act. Scarpa Sr., 60 years old when I talked to him, had married into the Farace family. In 1986, at the age of 58, Mr. Scarpa was the father of five children by his wife and a mistress. Through the years he confided to her about everything—the robberies, the killings, how the bureau let it go on despite the pileup of bodies. He earned the moniker "the Grim Reaper" because he preferred to do the killing himself instead of jobbing out the task to hit men. Scarpa had been jailed in New York City with Ramzi Yousef, the mastermind of 1993 attack on the World Trade Center. Gregory Scarpa, Sr. (May 8, 1928 – June 4, 1994) also known as "The Grim Reaper", was a soldier for the Colombo crime family and an informant for the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). He was born on February 24, 1939 in Meriden, CT … In the 1950s, Scarpa married Connie Forrest; she and Scarpa had one daughter and three sons, including Gregory Scarpa Jr. Greg Jr. would follow his father into the Colombo family, e… Prosecutors recruited Big Linda as their star witness, though she says she told them from the beginning that over the years she'd told people, falsely, that DeVecchio hadn't crossed the line. 1970s Greg Scarpa Sr. with family. She became afraid of getting close to anyone. Together, the happy couple had one daughter and three sons, including Gregory Scarpa Jr., who would follow his father into the business when he finally came of age. Little Linda, who for decades refused to be interviewed, is still uncomfortable talking about the pain of her past. "I used to ask them, 'What do you think he's going to do now, like this?' Even when her father was alive, Little Linda and her mother never got along. The FBI, under pressure from Congress, searched the house and found the explosives where Scarpa said they would be. Scarpa failed a polygraph examination. He used to call them "a pit bull and an alley cat." "It was my first time on a plane," she recalls. Photo: Gregory Scarpa, Sr. In his order, Judge Korman not only shaved time off the sentence, but also castigated the government for its “implausible, contradictory and factually unsupported reasons” for opposing the lighter prison term. His death was … [4], On March 31, 1996, Scarpa claimed that Yousef had sent a bomb through the DHL postal service. Her picture was everywhere: "Mob Wife Lies on the Stand." But I just couldn't take it. The FBI called their informant and secretly flew him down to Mississippi. Mobster Monday: Greg Scarpa – Synova’s True Crime Stories Less. It's a soap-opera life, in the worst sense.". He emerged from the sedan unscathed, but a year later, a dozen men were dead. The Real Mob Wives: Scarpa Widow Linda Schiro's Lonely Life she says. [3] On June 13, Scarpa named Abdul Hakim Murad as a co-conspirator in a plan to bomb an airplane. ", For Big Linda, the trip with Scarpa to Mississippi was a high point. Little Linda pays the rent with her small salary from selling beer for a wholesaler door to door at restaurants; no one, not even the feds who arrested him in 1992 for murder and racketeering, ever figured out where Greg Scarpa's millions went. Joey was reportedly killed by a friend, Vincent Rizzuto, over a drug deal. "This is not some glamorous fantasy," says Schiro, known as Big Linda, while her daughter is called Little Linda. Joey Scarpa is the loving father of LindaMaria Scarpa and husband of Maria Scarpa.The brother-inlaw of Elvira, Peter,The beloved son-inlaw of Maria,Steve and Tony We will forever keep him alive until we all meet again.We all miss your special ways joey. He was Greg Scarpa, ... pleading for his life, by Scarpa’s oldest son, Greg Jr., ... and Big Linda became a sort of common-law wife to Scarpa and confidante in all things Colombo. [3] On July 18, the day of the bombing, Scarpa would say that Yousef had previously warned a Jerry Koupakis not to fly on any TWA aircraft on the morning of July 18. Every day, Little Linda tries to think of a way to escape what has become of her life, but mob princesses don't get much in the way of job training, and she comes up empty. [3] The FBI report did not name the foreign government, but Wikipedia citing Simon Reeve's The New Jackals notes that "Yousef's maternal uncle, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, was living in Qatar as the guest of a Qatari cabinet official." She spends most of her days at the kitchen counter of the rented, sparsely furnished Staten Island condo that she shares with Linda and three of Linda's four children. Even when their husbands are in jail or under indictment, we imagine mob wives ensconced in their own garish version of suburbia, channeling Victoria Gotti with their French manicures, leopard-print stilettos, and cascades of hair. And although he provided the government with information gleaned from Mr. Yousef about terrorist tactics and possible attacks, federal officials said nothing ever came of it. He was murdered a few months after his father died of AIDS in prison. [5] Scarpa would also say that Yousef credited Bojinka (Bojinga) with the Dhahran bombing of June 26, 1996, [6] and that Yousef had people from England scouting the Atlanta Olympic Games. The son of an infamous New York mafia hit man and Colombo family captain Gregory Scarpa nicknamed the “Grim Reaper” was convicted on racketeering charges and sentenced to 40 years. ", But it wasn't just Scarpa's brutality that made him a historic figure in Mafia lore: it turns out he was an FBI informant for most of his years in the mob. We love … Scarpa was born to first-generation emigrants from the impoverished village of Lorenzaga of Motta di Livenza near Venice, Italy. Outside on the concrete stoop, her daughter's kids yell for money to go to Burger King; the sliding doors look out at a strip of asphalt. Early 1970s Greg Scarpa Jr. at home. But Scarpa Sr. insisted to me that he’d had no contact with the Farace family for 20 years. S andra Harmon never meant to get involved with the mafia. One of Joey's friends also took a bullet; Little Linda sat with him in the back seat of her father's car, holding in his brain matter until the ambulance arrived. Scarpa got the disease in the late 1980s, from a transfusion following a bleeding ulcer. Colombo Family soldier Gregory “The Grim Reaper” Scarpa, Sr. and wife Connie Forrest. Before she started exchanging letters with the convicted mobster Gregory Scarpa Jr, she … Rare interview featuring Colombo crime family "Capo" Gregory Scarpa Sr. with Harold Dow of CBS 'Street Stories' which screened November 12, 1992. But, as it turns out, being married to the mob, particularly in its declining years, is often a far grittier proposition—lonely, dangerous, and squalid. https://medium.com/crimebeat/the-mafias-grim-reaper-ea7d37f67f95 Instead of gazing at a banquet-length dining table laden with stolen diamonds and gold, as she did many nights during her 30 years with Scarpa, Schiro clears a place amid the box of Cheez-Its and sleeves of Oreos to rest her elbows and put her graying head in her hands. "This is hell, my life. Birth reference information for Gregory Scarpa Jr. Appeals Court Reinstates 40-Year Sentence for Brooklyn Mobster, FBI interview record of Gregory Scarpa, 265A-NY-258172, http://www.peterlance.com/302/71896p2.htm, FBI interview record of Gregory Scarpa, Jr. 265A-NY-258172, FBI interview record of Gregory Scarpa, Jr., 265A-NY-258172, http://www.defraudingamerica.com/scarpa_index.html, Colombo family soldier Gregory Scarpa Jr may be in line for an early prison release. In the 1950s, just as his own criminal career was taking off, Greg met and married Connie Forrest. your own Pins on Pinterest A classic coddled mob princess, by her midteens she knew something was terribly wrong. In 1973 he left his wife to live with her and Little Linda and Joey. So valued was he—the bureau used his information to nail dozens of his rivals—that in 1964, when J. Edgar Hoover couldn't locate the bodies of the three murdered Freedom Riders, James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner, he sent Scarpa to beat the information out of Ku Klux Klan members (it worked). Taking the lead of Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano, who snitched on the entire Gambino family, foot soldiers and made men alike started talking to get a better deal. One of the guys who donated was a bodybuilder who'd gotten infected by a steroids needle. It is a lifetime away from the decked-out three-story house in the Midwood section of Brooklyn, the home in Florida, and the apartment Scarpa had use of on Sutton Place. Once he shot and killed a guy who was hanging Christmas lights. Preston - Sandra Lee ( Hess) Scarpa, 80, of Preston, passed away at Autumn Lake Healthcare in New Britain on Thursday, Dec. 13, 2018.She was born on Nov. 14, 1938, to the late Jacob and Dorothy (Stath DeVecchio, promoting a book on his relationship with the mobster and its aftermath, told Anderson Cooper that Scarpa had become a close friend. ", In the end, it wasn't a prison shiv or pistol fire that killed him; it was AIDS. Scarpa made these predictions one month before the Olympic Park bombing and the loss of TWA flight 800. ", Little Linda flinches when she hears her mother get lost in such reveries. Gregory J. He was widely considered the most brutal member of New York's most violent, dysfunctional mob family, the man at the center of the Columbo war of the early 1990s. "I would give up everything just to see Joey's face again.". And through his decades on the street, he seemingly never tired of the work. Son Gregory Scarpa, Jr. getting married. "Greg" Scarpa, Jr. (born Aug 4, 1951) [1]is a reputed mobster and prison informant who predicted that al-Qaeda would bomb the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta and an airplane flying out of New York. "Time to shut up.". your own Pins on Pinterest 1990 Greg Scarpa Sr. with grandchild turning (my sweet) sixteen. (His son Greg Jr. would go on to become a wiseguy, and is now serving a 40-year sentence.) Big Linda spends her days on the computer, an old desktop, scrolling through the website she made about Joey, full of soft-focus snapshots of mother and son, and chatting online with her support group for parents of murdered children. Through the years he confided to her about everything—the robberies, the killings, how the bureau let it go on despite the pileup of bodies. Nowhere can the collateral damage of life in organized crime be more clearly glimpsed than in the faces of Schiro, 65, and her daughter, Linda Scarpa, 42, whose life stories are depicted in the new Investigation Discovery television series I Married a Mobster. The mob may not be dead, but it certainly is doddering: in a massive January sweep that arrested 125 mobsters across the country, the six leaders caught in the net had an average age of 72. Linda Schiro’s “stepson” Greg Jr., was also involved in mafia business. Today she is flat broke, her son, Joey, is dead, murdered, her “stepson,” Greg Scarpa Jr., is doing a long stretch for drug dealing and she is mad as a hornet that Connie Scarpa got the loot. 1970 IACRL PROGRAM. But really, at this point, I can't imagine how I'd ever get it.". Enter Gregory Scarpa. The dogs scarf down bits of Oreos and chips from the floor. Don't Boycott Beijing's 2022 Winter Olympics. [2], Scarpa claimed that Yousef had told him of plans to bomb an airplane or kidnap a US Attorney to cause a mistrial in Yousef's 1996 trial. In 1973 he left his wife to live with her and Little Linda and Joey. Today virtually every important mobster is locked up, including Sonny Franzese, the 93-year-old boss of the Columbo family, who was sentenced to eight years in 2011. According to his girlfriend, Linda Schiro, Scarpa had checked into a hotel in Neshoba County and winked at one of the agents. Which may be why he was able to elude prison for so long. Every time he hit her, her mind raced to what her father would have done to the guy. Sandra Harmon: Gregory Scarpa Jr. the oldest of Greg Sr’s six children was a promising young athlete who worshipped his ruthless and manipulative father, and was slowly drawn into his dark world. "I work like a dog to put this roof over your head, Ma," says Little Linda. Gregory Scarpa Jr (left), 69, is son of late mobster Gregory Scarpa (top inset). The lowest moment came near the end of the seven-month war. "The heyday of organized crime is definitely over," says George Anastasia, the Philadelphia Inquirer mob expert and author of Blood and Honor, "but you can just look at these women and still see a trail of destruction. Sure, being Greg Scarpa's daughter had its perks—restaurant tables materialized and tabs evaporated, the kids on the street grew silent as she passed, shopkeepers just "gave you stuff," but when she had even a minor beef with someone—a boyfriend, a valet at the club—the guy disappeared or turned up battered. (His son Greg Jr. would go on to become a wiseguy, and is now serving a 40-year sentence.) Worst of all, the phone quit ringing, leaving her alone with her website and her memories. Just ask Linda Schiro, widow of notorious Columbo capo and executioner Greg Scarpa. A few minutes later, the agent turned up at their hotel room and handed Scarpa … The family was happy and Greg’s illicit businesses afforded them a comfortable life. To her, it was just another humiliation in a life full of them. "I had that growing up, even with all the horror, and I want that for my kids. Trevor meets the women 'married to the Mob' & uncovers the stark realities of life in a crime family. The trial gave her something to do, a purpose, and she liked being a part of the action again. "He really was a very charming guy. In what is hard not to see as divine retribution, he had insisted the blood come from his foot soldiers; he was afraid of AIDS in the hospital blood supply. Gregory Scarpa, Jr. with his fiancee. Scarpa, she says, was gentle and generous at home, a classic protective dad with a marshmallow center. The mob talks about family values, but there's never really been any of that. No wonder Tony Soprano was so depressed: the job of don just isn't what it used to be. "I loved my father—he was everything to me. Scarpa, a former captain in the Colombo Crime Family, [2]is the son of late former Colombo Crime Family Caporegime and FBI informant Gregory Scarpa. “To me, Gus Jr. is considered a nothing, a nobody,” Scarpa Sr. told me. I learned about the extraordinary love affair between Greg Sr. and a woman named Linda Schiro. Scarpa was the brother of Colombo mobster Salvatore Scarpa, who may have introduced Scarpa to the Colombo family. "I kept telling him he was going to be OK, though I knew he wasn't. "Putting his family in danger was the beginning of him just going off," says Little Linda, looking over at her son, now 20 and home from college, dozing on the sofa with the television blaring. But in 2008, when an old tape recording surfaced of her telling an interviewer that the agent hadn't done anything illegal, the case fell apart. ", Her daughter shoots her a look of pure contempt, black eyes narrowing just like her father's.

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