Turncoat role may cost mob boss a wife

BY ANTHONY M. DESTEFANO
STAFF WRITER

January 29, 2005

Bonanno crime boss Joseph Massino lost his crime family when he decided to become an informant. Now he is likely to lose his wife.

Massino's long-suffering wife, Josephine, who stayed with him through 44 years of marriage, a number of criminal trials and headlines about his old girlfriend, is considering hiring a divorce attorney in coming weeks, a close family source said.

The source, who asked not to be identified, said Josephine Massino, 61, was devastated by the news that her spouse had become a turncoat against his acting street boss Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano.

Josephine Massino, along with two of the couple's daughters, were a constant presence at Massino's trial last year in which he was convicted of racketeering partly on the testimony of his brother-in-law, Salvatore Vitale. Massino faces a life sentence. She couldn't be reached for comment Friday.

Massino's wife religiously brought food - either homemade or restaurant bought - for the 300-pound mobster to eat in court during recess in the two-month trial.

After Massino, 62, was convicted in July, the jury also ordered him to forfeit more than $10 million in assets, including the separate residences of his wife in Howard Beach and mother in Maspeth.

While there was speculation Massino agreed to help the FBI to save himself from the death penalty and save some assets for his wife, Josephine Massino was unaware of his decision, said the family source.

Court records, as well as legal and law enforcement sources, said Massino agreed last year to wear a wire at the Brooklyn federal detention center to gather evidence used to snare Basciano on a mob murder charge. Massino also told investigators that Basciano suggested murdering the chief crime family prosecutor, believed to be Greg Andres.

Massino on Friday told his current lawyers on his death penalty case, Flora Edwards and David Stern, that he had a "shadow" counsel to represent him in his new dealings with the government, legal sources said.

Edward McDonald, a defense attorney who was formerly head of the Brooklyn Organized Crime Strike Force, has been appointed as Massino's counsel, according to Stern and David Breitbart, who represented Massino in the 2004 rackets trial. McDonald, who handled the investigation into the fabled 1978 Lufthansa cargo heist at Kennedy Airport, couldn't be reached for comment.