Now I know most of these women do not get directly involved with LCN business but, there is no doubt in my mind that the women do play a roll. For instance, Joe Massino's wife was writing checks out to a parking lot owner that Massino was extorting......... I am baffled out how they allow wives to play the, "He told me he worked downtown!" and, "He is very private and doesn't like me to ask about his work".

She has enough troubles between her ex-husband and their 3 sons so in my humble opinion, she ought to be left alone

If they were independently minded and worked like everyone else I would maybe feel pity for them but most of them don't work and the ones that do have businesses set up/stolen for them with illegally gained money and assets. OK maybe some of them are not aware and are not involved in what their husbands do for a living. Maybe they honestly think that working men spend all their time in social clubs, don't work 9-5 hours and earn hundreds of thousands - sometimes millions - worth of dollars from sitting on a building site reading porno magazines and playing cards.

I honestly don't know about the feds hitting the wives and families in the pocket financially. IDK how that works but I honestly can't see them having a leg to stand on if they went after assets that weren't illegally acquired.

I have often wondered though. The money they try to recover. Does this cover solely the huge monetary costs of bringing scumbags to trial? Or does some of the money they chase from mobsters/families go to victims of mob killings and/or extortion?

As I said, I don't have much sympathy for the families. The fathers & the families know what they are getting into by entering into this life. The wives have a joint responsibility to ensure that their children can go to college and get educated. They have the same responsibilities - bills, mortgages - that all of us shmucks have.

If they can't buy thousand dollar suits and fur coats anymore... my heart bleeds for them.

How much money has it cost New York bringing that serial killer lowlife Junior Gotti to trial? That scumbag is still on the streets living in a mansion and having several properties on the side.

Another thing too. There are miscarriages of justice. But there are people that can't afford Bruce Cutler as a lawyer and can't get to juries to escape justice.

There are people that get screwed by the law. It's just I don't think mobsters generally do.

My pity goes to the children who have been left orphaned and the women who have been left widows because of mob crime. That's it.

http://www.nydailynews.com/archives/news/father-calm-trial-son-killer-article-1.697765

It is people like Umberto Speranza, whose little boy was killed in the 90's Colombo Mob War, who has my sympathy.

Speranza and John Favara and their families are the real losers in all this.

The statute of limitations on perjury is five years. Unless they can roll it into a RICO and prove an ongoing criminal enterprise, which in the case of a mob wife is unheard of.

Anthony M. Destefano, in his excellent Joe Massino biography, "King of the Godfathers," notes that "It had been something of an unwritten rule that the wives were off limits to prosecutors, that their spouses would take the fall. But [Assistant US Attorney Ruth] Nordenbrook didn't like playing by that mobe rule and chafed when some of her colleagues in law enforcement wanted to. She lived up to her ideals by prosecuting Marie Attanasio, the wife of Louis "Ha Ha" Attanasio." She was also the prosecutor who went after the Josephine Massino/Barry Weinberg connection.

How do the wives avoid prosecution? The same way old mobsters who got life in prison get to go home for Christmas....bribery of judges.

The time delay between conviction and sentencing allows convicts ample time to "work with" the judges through their lawyers and money men to score leniency and sweetheart deals.

That's my opinion.