Gangster prayed as signal for murder of victim
William Cutolo Thou shalt not kill — even if you’re praying in a church garden beforehand.Colombo crime boss Thomas “Tommy Shots” Gioeli plotted a top gangster’s murder in the same Long Island church garden where he regularly prayed to his maker, mob turncoat Dino Calabro revealed yesterday.
The genesis of the slaying of Colombo mobster William “Wild Bill” Cutolo is just another example of Gioeli’s unorthodox religious practices.
Prosecutors have claimed that Gioeli was involved in the 1982 murder of former Catholic nun Veronica Zuraw, who was hit by a stray shotgun blast when Gioeli and another thug were allegedly killing a pornographer and his son.
BLOOD BROTHERS: Thomas Gioeli (right) allegedly plotted a mob hit to take place in the home of Dino Saracino (left), a witness said yesterday.
Gioeli routinely prayed in the Massapequa, LI, church garden not far from his Farmingdale home, Calabro chirped yesterday in Brooklyn federal court. But any heavenly help Gioeli might have earned from his garden devotionals was offset by all the blood on his hands, which Calabro detailed.
In 1999, Colombo boss Alphonse “Allie Boy” Persico and crime-family captain Jack DeRoss became concerned that Cutolo would make a play to take over the strife-ridden clan, Calabro testified.
One day that year, Calabro said, Gioeli summoned him to the church garden to discuss Cutolo’s body, if not his soul.
“He told me he had just left Pooch and Betty Boop,” said Calabro, explaining that those were nicknames for Persico and DeRoss.
Gioeli then made a hand gesture, covering up several fingers, to indicate Cutolo, whose other nickname, “Billy Fingers,” reflects digits missing from one of his hands.
“They wanted to kill him,” Calabro said of Cutolo, who was lured to the house of Calabro’s cousin “Little Dino” Saracino.
There, Calabro testified, “I shot him in the head.”
Gioeli allegedly directed Calabro and others where to bury Cutolo’s corpse.
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