Paying The Price Because Of His Mobbed Up Dad
December 05, 2010 Dapper_Don
After 35 years on the tough docks of New York Harbor, Anthony Furina Sr. insists he's guilty of just one thing: sharing a surname with his mobbed-up dad.
Furina says the family tree was enough for the Waterfront Commission to hang him and his son, revoking their licenses to work as the latest salvo in a four-year vendetta.
"They try to justify their being, and they grab someone with a name - 'organized crime,'" a fuming Furina said. "It seems like they're trying to make the son pay for the father's sins. And the grandson."
Furina, 55, lost his pier superintendent's license in July - two months after Anthony Jr. was stripped of his license over a 2008 Jersey Shore bar fight. Both lacked "the good character and integrity" to keep their jobs, the commission ruled.
The elder Furina was accused of creating a private "fiefdom" on the docks, while the son, 27, was dinged for his "willingness" to lie about his Belmar, N.J., brawl.
Anthony Sr., son of Genovese family associate Nicky Furina, says his record was spotless until seven agents handcuffed him on March 20, 2009. Furina later sued, claiming the arresting cops injured his right wrist so severely he needed three surgeries.
His crime: driving two trucks aboard a cargo ship, a task assigned to longshoremen under commission rules. Furina says his decision to take the wheel was nothing more ominous than workplace safety.
Anthony Jr.'s arrest was his first, too - and he pleaded guilty to a simple disorderly persons charge.
It "is a conspiracy to remove me, because of suspicions of my father still being involved in the docks," Furina says. "My father went to prison. He's 79. He has nothing to do with me....My son, they revoke his license permanently? They do whatever they want because his name is Furina."
Nicky Furina left the docks in November 2005 after serving 10 months in New Jersey for shaking down union members seeking better jobs and benefits, his son said.
The Furina family patriarch, his son notes sarcastically, was hardly the only pier worker with a past. "If there was character and integrity on the docks, there wouldn't be six people working," said Anthony Sr.
His hyperbole is not far off: 61% of longshoremen with a prior arrest were approved for their licenses, the commission said. Overall, one in four workers employed on the docks has a prior arrest.
The 2009 report by the state inspector general noted the commission was 14 years behind in its review of harbor business licenses. But it found time to revoke 34 work "passes" between July 2008 and June 2010 - including the two Furina licenses.
Anthony Sr., who bears a passing resemblance to Oscar-winning director Martin Scorsese, grows irate while recounting his battle. "They're trying to make me lose my house, my mortgage, my kid," Furina said in his suburban New Jersey condo. "For what? All I did was go to work every day."
Things are no better for his son, who's attending night school and plans to get married in January. Both Furinas are representing themselves in Manhattan state Supreme Court to get their jobs back.
Waterfront Commission general counsel Phoebe Sorial said the agency doesn't comment on pending cases. But a law enforcement source confirmed Anthony Sr., while the subject of rumors about doing his father's bidding, had no criminal history.
Anthony Sr. first tangled with the agency in November 2006, when it revoked his license in a dispute over his job title. He challenged the decision and won.
Furina said he expects to triumph again. "The target shouldn't be on my back, or my son's back, because they're wrong," he said, leaning into his words. "And, yes, it's gotten personal. I'm not backing away from this. I'm gonna fight them as long as it takes."
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/ny_crime/the_mob/2010/12/05/2010-12-05_mafia_sins_of_his_father_dockworker_sez_familys_mobbedup_past_cost_him_and_son_t.html#ixzz17HGhi3tP
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