After a chaotic mistrial earlier this month, a federal juice loan extortion case with ties to a larger probe of the Chicago Outfit ended Monday when prosecutors announced they were dropping all charges.
Defense attorneys admitted to the jury that Galione punched Mucerino in the face that night, breaking his nose and shattering more than a dozen bones in his face. But they denied the assault had anything to do with the collection of the loan — an element that prosecutors had to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.
Coleman granted the U.S. attorney’s office two weeks to decide whether it would move forward with another trial. At the hearing Monday, which lasted about a minute, Assistant U.S. Attorney Sean Franzblau announced the charges were being dropped without giving a specific reason. Among those under investigation were a close relative of Outfit loan shark Joseph “Joe Gags” Gagliano, a twice-convicted mob bookmaker reputed to be a “capo” in the Elmwood Park crew, and gambling chief Marco “The Mover” D’Amico, the onetime second-in-command in Elmwood Park who died in 2020 at age 84, the records show.
None of those allegations made it into Cassano’s trial, though by the time it ended, the underworld flavor of the case was hardly a well-kept secret. For days, the jury had listened to testimony about high-interest loans, a brutal assault over one alleged debt, bookies, illegal sports gambling, and off-the-books gaming machines that populate Italian-American social clubs across the Chicago area.
Source: Loan Digest (loandigest.net)
United States Latest News, United States Headlines
Similar News:You can also read news stories similar to this one that we have collected from other news sources.
Source: chicagotribune - 🏆 8. / 91 Read more »
Source: cbschicago - 🏆 546. / 51 Read more »
Source: cbschicago - 🏆 546. / 51 Read more »
Source: ABC7Chicago - 🏆 284. / 63 Read more »
Source: fox32news - 🏆 547. / 51 Read more »
Source: chicagotribune - 🏆 8. / 91 Read more »