No Show Jobs

In a time when many newspapers have gone out of business or are struggling severely to remain in business, somehow the Colombo family still managed to work its magic and create “no-show” jobs in the newspaper industry.  The Mafia job world is much like the rest of the working world in the sense that the good jobs are given to those who have never worked, have no relevant education or experience, yet have connections. The Colombo family conspired with highly placed newspaper and mail deliverers’ Union to supply Benjamin Castellazzo Jr. with a Union card.  This is a slap in the face of the approximately 1600 hard working union members.  These members work long and hard to get into the Union and then a guy like Benji Jr gets in through the back door.

Benji Jr is the 48 year old son of Benjamin Castellazzo Sr, a long time Colombo crime family capo and acting underboss. Senior was known on the streets as “The Claw” for his fondness of taking money from those beneath him.  Senior was given 63 months in Federal Prison after being taken down on “Mafia Take Down Day.”  Senior moved into a trailer park in NJ and his wife was on food stamps, but the judge didn't care and still gave the 75 year old Benji the time.

A long-time Colombo associate Rocco Miraglia, another son of a member, conspired to get

Benji Jr. Union membership and a plum job with NMDU.  Rocco was the foreman at the New York Daily News and he contacted Anthony Turzio who worked at El Dario to help make up a fake work history in the newspaper industry.

Rocco made a call to the Vice President of the NMDU and told him he was putting together a fake resume for Benji Jr.  They claimed he worked at the NYDN and El Dario when in fact he never worked at either.  This would entitle Benji Jr. to get a Union Priority number which others who don't have a daddy highly placed in the Colombo family had to toil for years to obtain.

On August 21st, 2009 Benji Jr. was given his union number and on September 8 he was sworn into the union.  They then asked the business at Hudson News to place Benji in a job with the company.  They had Benji Jr. fill out an application with the false work history and bullshit references for the Hudson News. A week later a highly place union official spoke to Benji Jr. who was having some problems getting into the Hudson News and told him that he would get him transferred to the NYDN.

What these guys did not know was that the FBI was on to them and they had wiretapped on their phones.  The FBI watched as they sent the application for the Hudson News via overnight mail to Benji Jr. in New Jersey.  They listened when they called the Union and created a web of lies.

This is typical mob stuff, guys who work get guys who don't hired for plum jobs.  Lucky for the hard working union members, the FBI was on to the scheme.  Now we shall see how much time they all get.