Bonanno Mobsters Sold Cocaine In Manhattan Gelato Shop, Feds Say

BROOKLYN, NY — Four mobsters from Brooklyn and Long Island — including two who allegedly sold cocaine in a Manhattan gelato shop — were arraigned Thursday after an international crime sting, federal prosecutors said. A two-year undercover investigation documented drug trafficking, money laundering and loansharking by members of the Bonanno and Gambino crime families, prosecutors said.

Paul Semplice and Paul Ragusa of Brooklyn and Damiano Zummo and Salvatore Russo of Long Island were among 13 mobsters charged in a sting that stretched into Canada, where nine other people were arrested, prosecutors said.

Investigators got goods on the mobsters after an informant was initiated as a member of the Bonanno family, prosecutors said. They were indicted on Tuesday and arrested on Wednesday.

“Today’s arrests send a powerful message that this Office and our law enforcement partners here and abroad are committed to dismantling organized crime groups wherever they are located — whether local or international in scope,” Bridget M. Rohde, the acting U.S. attorney for New York's Eastern District, said in a statement.

Zummo, an acting Bonanno family captain, and Russo, a Bonanno associate, are accused of trafficking 10 kilograms of cocaine between the two of them, according to court records. They sold more than a kilogram of that for $38,000 inside the Manhattan gelato shop on Sept. 14, records say.

Zummo, of Roslyn Heights on Long Island, is also accused of laundering money by writing checks to a fake consulting company, court records say. He allegedly took a 10 percent cut of each transaction, prosecutors said.

Semplice, a member of the Gambino family, was separately charged with extorting multiple people in Brooklyn between October 2016 and March 2017 by giving them loans with interest rates as high as 54 percent a year, court records say.

Recorded conversations suggest Semplice threatened his victims and bragged about how much money he was collecting, according to court records.

"I give him $1,000 a week, every two weeks," he said of one victim on a recording. "I'm banking this. I'm banking $7,000 a month."

Prosecutors say Ragusa, an associate of both the Bonanno and Gambino families, transported nine guns for a $2,000 fee despite being a three-time convicted felon. The weapons included two AK-47 assault rifles, another automatic rifle, a semi-automatic rifle and several pistols, court records say.

Each man faces at least a decade in prison if convicted. Zummo and Russo's drug trafficking charges carry a 10-year minimum prison sentence and a maximum of life in prison. Simplice could get 20 years for the loansharking charges, and Ragusa faces 15 years to life for the weapons possession charges, prosecutors said.

(Lead image via Shutterstock)