Endlich mal wieder was Neues von der MM (Miami-Mafia).

Doch halt - diesmal geht's um die NY-Mafia...

In Antwort auf:

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Just how the Battle was fought: CIA-trained and Mafia-tutored

A resident of Union City before moving to a Florida compound, Jose Miguel Battle, 75, proved that hard work, American training and some alleged murders can lead to criminal success.

A former Havana vice cop during the rule of Cuban strongman Fulgencio Batista Zaldívar, Battle first came under the U.S. government's radar when he and other Cuban expatriates were trained by the CIA in the ill-fated Bay of Pigs invasion.

Battle was captured with other members of Brigada 2506 by Fidel Castro's troops. To this day, he is a loyal dues-paying member of the Brigade, now a Cuban patriotic and fraternal organization.

[...]

Law enforcement, as well as the President's Commission on Organized Crime in 1985, paint a portrait of Battle as head of a ruthless organization called "the Corporation."

Known as the "Cuban Godfather," Battle controlled illegal lotteries and other gambling in New York, New Jersey and Florida.

According to commission testimony, it started in the late 1960s, when Battle met with Santo Trafficante, a well-known organized crime figure in Tampa, Fla., who used his influence with the New York City crime families to help set up the Cuban ex-cop.

Battle was to run illegal numbers among Hispanics in four New York City boroughs and Hudson County, taking over territory that had once belonged to Mafia families. Witnesses testified before the commission that the New York operation alone employed 2,500 people and grossed $45 million a year, a figure taken from tally sheets seized in gambling raids.

Starting in the 1970s, Battle spent nearly two decades living in Union City at the old Ice House projects - what is now the Union Plaza at 45th Street and Palisade Avenue. At the time, Union City had the largest Cuban population outside of Florida.

Battle moved to Miami around 1985, just about the time that a Hudson County grand jury was examining his organization's extensive influence over the Union City municipal government, including the Police Department.

[...]

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http://www.nj.com/news/jjournal/index.ss...2500.xml&coll=3

hier gibts noch mehr:

http://www.nj.com/news/jjournal/index.ss...2500.xml&coll=3

In Antwort auf:

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CUBAN KINGPIN, SON INDICTED

The 'Corporation' is tied to years of killings, bombings

Thursday, June 02, 2005
By KEN THORBOURNE
JOURNAL STAFF WRITER

Jose Miguel Battle Sr. - the "Cuban Godfather" and onetime Union City resident - was indicted on Tuesday by a grand jury in Miami on charges ranging from illegal gambling to firebombings to cold-blooded executions.

For several decades, Battle's organization, known as the "Corporation," dominated illegal gambling in Spanish-speaking neighborhoods of the Northeast, including Union City, West New York and the Bronx, law enforcement officials said.

Deadly serious about wiping out rivals, Battle, now 75, is charged with having henchmen carry out four firebombings and five premeditated killings in South Florida and New York.

[..]

The firebombings left eight innocent people dead, including a 3-year-old girl who was killed with her 18-year-old sister in a Manhattan shoe store in 1984 that doubled as an illegal gambling den for a Mafia family Battle was feuding with at the time, according to new reports.

Asked to put Battle in criminal context, Jack Hill, the longtime chief of detectives with the Hudson County Prosecutor's Office, called Battle - also known as "El Padrino" - "very big, very bad."

"Most of his direct influence in this county goes back to the '70s and early '80s when he controlled almost all the 'bolita,' the Spanish numbers and cocaine trafficking," Hill said. "There were numerous homicides in Hudson County that were attributed to his organization."

In the early 1980s, Hill traveled to Miami to testify in a homicide case against Battle, a former Havana Vice Enforcement police officer who participated in the Bay of Pigs invasion.

Battle was charged with orchestrating the shooting death of a drug trafficker named Ernresto Torres in a Miami apartment, Hill recalled.

Torres' girlfriend, Idalia Fernandez, survived being shot herself during the incident and testified in court to help indict and convict Battle, Hill said.

"(But) the twist came a year and half after that," Hill noted. "Battle had the conviction reversed on a technicality and pleaded guilty to manslaughter for time served."

And another deadly twist was to come.

"Eventually Battle's people found her (Fernandez) in New York and killed her in 1984 or 1985," Hill said.

In 1986, Conrado Pons of North Bergen, one of the Corporation's reputed enforcers, was convicted of setting a string of fires at competing numbers outlets in Manhattan, the Bronx and Brooklyn.

In one of his more fabled revenge murders, Battle sent a hit man into a Bronx hospital in 1983 dressed as a nurse to shoot the recovering patient suspected of killing his brother, according to a published report.

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Mit mafiösen Grüßen

http://www.gambletribune.org/print947.html

BBC report

Press Release des US-Justizministeriums:

http://www.usdoj.gov/usao/fls/050531-02.html

In Antwort auf:

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
For Information Contact Public Affairs
May 31, 2005 Yovanny Lopez, Public Affairs Specialist, (305) 961-9316

SUPERSEDING INDICTMENT SPECIFIES THIRTEEN MURDERS TO CHARGES AGAINST THE CORPORATION AND ITS MEMBERS

Marcos Daniel Jiménez, United States Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, and Charles J. Hynes, District Attorney for the Kings County District Attorney’s Office, announced today the return of a Superseding Indictment detailing thirteen (13) homicides committed by members of a large organized crime syndicate, known as the “Corporation.” Among those charged in the Superseding Indictment are: Jose Miguel Battle, Sr.; Manuel Isaac Marquez, Sr.; Jose Miguel Battle, Jr.; Julio Acuna; Gustavo Battle; Orlando Cordoves; Jorge Davila; Jose Aluart; Jorge Nunez; Norberto Fernandez; Argelio Jimenez; Evelyn Maribel Runciman; and Valerio Cerron. This investigation was spearheaded by the South Florida Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force and South Florida High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area Task Force, and is the culmination of a ten-year investigation into the illegal activities of individuals involved in running the Corporation. This indictment supersedes the 2004 indictment.

[....]

As alleged in the Superseding Indictment, the Corporation, which is currently based in South Florida, has operated since the 1960's in multiple jurisdictions, including New York, New Jersey, and in various locations overseas. According to the Superseding Indictment, the Corporation has conducted extensive illegal gambling operations, trafficked in narcotics, and used violence and intimidation to conduct its operations, including the commission of multiple murders. Indeed, the Superseding Indictment specifically lists four arsons in New York, set in the mid 1980s, which resulted in the deaths of eight (8) innocent individuals. The Corporation was also allegedly involved in narcotics trafficking and money laundering. Their money laundering activities extended to Lima, Peru, where the Corporation set up a casino to launder their ill-gotten money.

Also detailed in the Superseding Indictment are five (5) premeditated killings occurring in South Florida and New York. Among the deceased are Jannin Toribio and Laura Sirgo, Ernesto Torres, Jose “Palulo” Enriquez, Idalia Fernandez, Angel Roberto Mujica, and Omar Broche. According to the Indictment, these murders were authorized and committed by members of the Corporation in furtherance of their racketeering conspiracy.

Since its formation in 1964, the Corporation has allegedly generated millions of dollars in illegal revenues for its members each year. The Superseding Indictment seeks forfeiture of over $1.3 billion in illegally generated funds.
United States Attorney Jiménez, referring to the particularly violent nature of this criminal enterprise, stated, “This racketeering group maintained power and control over a large metropolitan area through violence and intimidation. Arson and murder were a routine part of their business operation. The goal of this prosecution is to help dismantle this violent enterprise.”

District Attorney Hynes added, “Far from being a victimless crime, illegal policy gambling exacts a horrible toll on a wide range of victims. It is a black market tax on the most vulnerable members of our community that diverts millions of dollars yearly from our local economies to the coffers of the Corporation and its leaders, including Jose Battle, Jr. As today’s Superseding Indictment confirms, the Corporation’s upper echelon managers repeatedly resorted to violence, even arson and murder, to protect their ill-gotten gains. Our participation in this joint investigation and prosecution underscores my long-term commitment to vigorously prosecuting illegal gambling and disgorging the Corporation and its leaders of the profits of these crimes.”

[...]

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