Son of notorious boss of the Colombo crime family now delivers pizza in Brooklyn
He's a mob prince and a pauper.
In yet another sign of the decline of the Mafia, the son of the boss of the beleaguered Colombo crime family is delivering pies for a Brooklyn pizzeria, the Daily News has learned.
Ex-con Lawrence Persico, 60, the son of Carmine "the Snake" Persico, was observed making deliveries for Mia’s Pizza Shop on 13th Ave. in Dyker Heights on a busy Friday evening this month.
Persico would park his black Nissan Altima on 85th St. near a fire hydrant, walk inside the pizzeria and emerge minutes later carrying a plastic bag of takeout or an insulated bag for carrying pizza boxes.
“My, how the mighty have fallen,” observed a law enforcement official who viewed photos of the pizza bag man taken by The News. “I guess that’s how he gets his dough.”
Carmine Persico, 82, was convicted in 1986 of murder in the historic Commission case. Eight mobsters — including the heads of the Genovese, Lucchese and Colombo families — were found guilty of racketeering, extortion and other crimes. Persico is due to be released in 2050 if he lives that long.
The FBI says he is still the official boss of the family, having held the reins despite his long incarceration and a bloody civil war in the early 1990s.
Lawrence is the middle of Carmine Persico’s three sons. Former acting boss Alphonse "Allie Boy", 62, is serving a life term, and Michael, 59, described by the feds as a powerful associate of the family, will soon be sentenced for a loansharking conviction and will be going away for at least three years.
Lawyer Mathew Mari, who is representing Carmine Persico in a motion to reduce his sentence, insisted that Lawrence does not actually work at the pizzeria.
“He hangs out there,” Mari said. “He knows the owner and he’s helped out a few times. It’s not a job.”
Mari said Lawrence Persico has had a tough time since he was convicted more than a decade ago of holding a no-show operating engineer job in the Colombo labor racketeering case. He was sentenced to 21 months in prison and hasn’t been able to find work.
“He’s down on the b---s of his ass,” said a family friend.
According to court papers, Lawrence was diagnosed with bipolar disorder as a teenager, and his ups-and-downs with mental illness have left him, at times, estranged from his biological family.
He is on the hook to the government for a $759,000 forfeiture judgment from the criminal conviction. His last payment of $50 was made in January, according to court records.
“I never felt a sense of freedom ... Instead I felt this tremendous frustration with my pending debts to the government, as well as my legal, personal, and family debts,” Lawrence wrote to Judge Sterling Johnson in 2005 after he was released from prison.
The owner of the pizzeria did not return a call for comment.
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/brooklyn/son-mob-boss-delivers-pizza-brooklyn-article-1.2612348
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