Colombo underboss begs for mercy from judge because he lives in a trailer park and is on food stamps
Where poor-mouthing mobster Benjamin Castellazzo lives, in West Creek, N.J., with wife who
gets food stamps, the Colombo underboss said in court papers.
gets food stamps, the Colombo underboss said in court papers.
IF A Mafia crime boss’ home is his castle, this Colombo crime family poorfella lives on the wrong side of the train tracks.
Reputed underboss Benjamin "The Claw" Castellazzo made a shocking disclosure in court papers that he lives in a New Jersey trailer park and his wife receives food stamps.
Castellazzo, 75, is making a pitiful pitch to avoid a lengthy jail term when he’s sentenced later this month for extorting Brooklyn’s La Quila construction company and The Square, a Staten Island pizzeria.
Beset by physical ailments and subsisting on Social Security, Castellazzo is hoping to ride off into the sunset with his wife, children and grandchildren and is pleading for Judge Kiyo Matsumoto to give him far less than the eight years he faces.
Benjamin Castellazzo
The high-ranking mobster earned his nickname because he was notorious for finding out what illicit rackets his fellow mobsters were doing and “getting his claws” into a piece of the action, a source said.
But Castellazzo apparently doesn’t have much to show for all of the extortion and loansharking over the years.
Defense lawyer James DiPietro showed photos of Castellazzo’s mobile home, tidy garden and the eat-in kitchen that show it looks cozy, but a far cry from some of the luxurious residences where his mob peers hung their fedoras.
Castellazzo was convicted of trying to get a slice of the action from
The Square pizzeria on Hylan Blvd. in Staten Island.
The late Gambino boss Paul Castellano lived in a $3 million neoclassical mansion called the White House, in Staten Island. Former Bonanno boss Joseph Massino made a deal with the government so his wife could keep their faux mansion in Howard Beach, Queens.
Colombo top boss Carmine "The Snake" Persico’s wife lives in a brick mansion fit for a king in Dyker Heights, Brooklyn, although her husband has resided in a federal prison for the past 25 years. Former Lucchese underboss Anthony "Gaspipe" Casso’s waterfront home in Mill Basin, Brooklyn, must be jinxed because State Sen. Carl Kruger ended up in prison, like Casso, after buying and renovating the garish-looking palace.
Real estate websites state the two-bedroom trailer homes in Castellazzo’s retirement community sell for $40,000 or can be rented for about $1,000 a month.
Where high-living TV mobsters live on The Sopranos.
Castellazzo has been jailed since an historic roundup of more than 100 gangsters by the feds in January 2010. FBI agents hit the mobile home on Robin Court in West Creek, N.J., early in the morning but didn’t find Castellazzo, only his wife of more than 50 years.
The agents finally reached Castellazzo on his cell phone and he was in Brooklyn, apparently staying with a friend, sources said.
Facing eight years in the big house, Castellazzo is cutting a contrite pose.
“I have reflected on my life during the past two years. . . . I am not proud of the life I have led,” he wrote, adding that he wants to end his days in the company of his wife, children and grandchildren.
“These loved ones are the only family I deem important,” he added.
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