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Jurors glimpse finance dealings as tapes playedAlleged racketeers on trialBy Mary Sue PennAs FBI agents secretly listened in, alleged mobsters meeting at Taste of Italy restaurant in Calumet City talked in 1986 about paying the sheriff and “the coppers” and getting tailed by “the G — the government.Little did they know they would hear their words played back to them over a tape recorder five years later in a federal courtroom in Hammond, Ind., with a judge and jury listening in as well.U.S. Attorneys contend the tapes contain conversations among reputed south suburban and Northwest Indiana mob boss Dominick “Tootsie Palermo, 73, of 15516 Westminister, Orland Park; Nicholas “Jumbo” Guzzino, 50, of 104 Southgate Ave., Chicago Heights, and Bernard “Snooky” Morgano, 54, of Valparaiso, Ind.The tapes were played as part of the government’s prosecution. Palermo, Guzzino, Morgano and three other men are on trial on charges of conspiracy to extort payments from operators of illegal gambling operations in Northwest Indiana.Palermo, a field representative with the Labors International Union Local 5 in Chicago Heights, and Guzzino, a business agent with the union, are being held without bond at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago.Both have been implicated in the murder of crime syndicate figures Anthony and Michael Spilotro, who were found buried in an Indiana cornfield.On Thursday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Thill introduced into evidence photos of Palermo, Guzzino, Morgano and others outside the restaurant on the various days the tapes were recorded, from January to June in 1986. FBI special agents testified to seeing the three go in and out of the restaurant, sometimes on a daily basis.The restaurant is owned by Guz-zmo’s family.In the taped conversations, the men identified as the alleged mobsters by the government can be heard stirring their coffee and discussing everything from their health to sums ’ of money they are collecting and distributing.In a hushed voice, a man the FBI identified as Morgano tells a man identified as Palermo, “I take a thousand dollars a week to the sheriff. No more do I give him two. See before I used to have to give him two. Now he’s givin’ me one, and I take one off the top, and that’s where the two thousand dollars comes from.”And later, he says, “And this here six-sixty, I gave seven hundred to the two coppers. Five to the black copper, five. Two to the black copper, and five to the county copper on the Vice Squad.”While the sheriff is not identifiedfjft.Kiwanis Club urges people to observe Family Day Sundayby name, Stephen Stiglich has been the Lake County, Ind., sheriff since 1985.In a conversation recorded April 8,1986, a man identified by the government as former south suburban mob boss Albert Caesar Tocco talks with Guzzino and Palermo.The tape starts out with Guzzino telling Tocco, “You look like sunshine today.”Palermo and Guzzino offer Tocco coffee and a hot dog, but he turns them down.Tocco then discusses governmentI take a thousand dollars a week to the sheriff. No more do I give him two. See before I used to have to give him two. Now he's givin' me one, and I take one off the top, and that's where the two thousand dollars comes from.— Man's voice on tape in U.S. District Courtsurveillance of Guzzino’s house.“Wally and Skip come and seen me, says there were two cars watchin’ your house,” Tocco said. “... One car was by the car wash and one was on Lowe Avenue.”He goes on, “One was an ’83 gray Pontiac, Firebird, Indiana plate. The agent, they stopped one agent, his name is Walker. The car’s registered in Cedar Lake, (Ind.).”Later he adds, “Said they were there from yesterday afternoon, from late in the mornin’. He talked I guess to one of the coppers... talked to ’em, and he says we’re on surveillance. The two cars, one on Lowe Avenue or something like that.”Some of the discussion can not be deciphered.Then Tocco said, “I could use a f... vacation.”Palermo responds, “Yeah, but you don’t want that kind.”“I don’t give a f....,” Tocco said. “I could do two, five, six. Just to relax and straighten the f... thing out...” Some words after that could not be heard.Tocco was convicted in 1989 of running a protection racket, demanding payments known as “street taxes” from owners and operators of chop shops, salvage yards and gambling and prostitution operations in the south suburbs and Northwest Indiana.He also was linked to nine gangland slayings during his trial, including the Spilotro brothers.He was sentenced to 200 years in prison and sent to the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago.On trial with Palermo, Guzzino and Morgano are Sam Nuzzo, Jr., 45, of Merrillville, Ind., Sam “Frog” Glorioso, 49, of Gary, and Peter Petros, 57, of Chicago.
Newspaper Details
Homewood Star
Homewood, Illinois, US
Sun, Aug 04, 1991
Page 3
Full Page
Clipped by
Neal V.
IL, USA 07 May 2020
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