When former police detective Hector Rosario of Nassau County, New York was convicted this week of lying to the FBI about his dealings with the mob, he joined an infamous list of law enforcement investigators who sold their soul--and their gold shield--to get payments from organized crime.
Former Nassau County detective Hector Rosario, 51, was convicted of lying to the FBI about ties to the mob.
Federal prosecutors said Rosario, 51, had a second 'job' with the Bonanno crime family for ten years, tipping off operators of illegal gambling spots in Queens and Long Island about police investigations. But perhaps the most egregious thing Rosario did was look up the home address of a possible witness, who knew about inner workings in the Bonanno family.
"This corrupt detective chose to prove his loyalty to an organized crime family over the public he was sworn to protect," said John Dunham, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.
The gambling dens were often located inside coffee shops and sports clubs. The feds said Rosario even staged a phony police raid at a rival gambling spot run by the Genovese crime family inside a Merrick, Long Island shoe repair shop.
When the FBI turned up at Rosario's Mineola home in January 2020, he denied knowing anything about the gambling locations. But agents already had wiretap audio of Rosario dealing with mob associates. Rosario was indicted in August 2022 and then fired by the Nassau County Police Department after 15 years on the job.
Rosario faces five years in prison for lying to the FBI, but he was spared a possible 20 year sentence, when the jury decided to acquit him on obstruction of justice charges.
His conviction brought me back more than 30 years to the case of NYPD Detective William Peist, who eventually pleaded guilty to selling information to 'Dapper Don' John Gotti's associates in the Gambino crime family.
Daily News headline from early 1990’s tells how NYPD Detective William Peist helped John Gotti.
Peist lost one of his legs in an accident but continued working, assigned to the NYPD Intelligence Division. There, he had access to many details about mafia investigations, including Gotti's role in the mob hit on previous Gambino godfather, Paul Castellano.
Peist used to work as a part-time chief at the luxurious Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.
But he turned to mob money, because he was apparently angry about a pending lawsuit against New York City that was connected to his accident. Federal prosecutors said Peist fed the NYPD information about Gotti to a capo in the Gambino family.
Peist was indicted in December 1991 and pleaded guilty in 1993.
Yet when it comes to the most notorious case of cops selling their shields to the mob,
nothing quite compares to the story of the so-called "Mafia Cops," Detectives Stephen Caracappa and Louis Eppolito, who were convicted of carrying out kidnappings and murders for organized crime figures.
“Mafia Cops”—Stephen Caracappa and Louis Eppolito—in an NYPD squad room.
Somehow, Louis Eppolito managed to become an NYPD detective, even though his father was a Gambino crime family associate, while his uncle and cousin were 'made members' of the Gambinos--later killed in mob hits. Eppolito also appeared in the classic film "Goodfellas," directed by Martin Scorcese.
Stephen Caracappa was assigned, as detective, to the NYPD Organized Crime Homicide Unit, which would have given him valuable access to case files of interest to the mob.
Federal prosecutors later said Eppolito and Caracappa made hundreds of thousands of dollars carrying out kidnappings and murders for crime families, most frequently for the Luccheses and Gambinos. They were also involved in money laundering and witness tampering, along with the narcotics trade. And even though both retired in the early 90's and moved to Las Vegas, the feds said the two were working for the mob from the mid-1980's to the mid 2000's.
Both men were convicted at federal court in Brooklyn in 2006 and sentenced to life in prison. Stephen Caracappa died in 2017 at the age of 75. Eppolito died two years later, at 71.
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