Trash web snares office holders

Two politicians associated with Danbury trash hauler James Galante escaped jail time June 4 after pleading guilty to charges stemming from the federal investigation of Galante”™s mob-enforced carting businesses.

State Senate Minority Leader Louis DeLuca received a six-month suspended sentence for conspiring with Galante to send a Galante associate to “visit” the husband of DeLuca”™s granddaughter. DeLuca, who suspected the man of domestic violence, was placed on probation for two years, fined $2,000 and ordered to donate $1,500 to charity.

Former Waterbury Mayor Joseph Santopietro was sentenced to five years probation and fined $30,000 for his role in helping Galante perpetuate the mob-enforced “property rights” scheme that limits carting competition and inflates prices.

Santopietro was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Ellen Bree Burns in New Haven federal court; DeLuca by Judge Joan Alexander in the state”™s Superior Court in Waterbury.

DeLuca, 73, admitted he met with Galante in a Woodbury diner in 2005 and agreed to have Galante deal with the alleged domestic situation, providing Galante with the name and address of the family member he wanted Galante”™s associate to visit. He admitted he thought Galante was “on the fringes” of organized crime, but claimed there were no legal remedies to the family situation.

The visit by Galante”™s associate was thwarted on the day it was to occur when state police posted a trooper outside the associate”™s home. “Thankfully, no one was hurt,” Assistant State”™s Attorney Mike Gailor told the court. Federal authorities were conducting an undercover investigation of Galante”™s carting businesses at the time, and learned of the planned physical assault through wiretaps.

In an affidavit attached to DeLuca”™s arrest warrant, an undercover FBI agent posing as a Galante associate was told by DeLuca last September that he would “keep my eyes open” and “blunt” any legislation that could hurt Galante”™s businesses. He turned down a $5,000 bribe offered by the undercover agent because, he said, he was “afraid of them guys . . . tracing things and (expletive) like that.”

DeLuca was arrested June 1 on a misdemeanor charge of conspiracy “to commit threatening” in the second degree, pleading guilty to the charge the following Monday. He said he was “ashamed and sorry for my action,” but did not indicate whether he would resign as state senator from the 32^nd District.

 

 

Minimal player

Santopietro, 48, pleaded guilty in March to one count of conspiring to violate the Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act while he was a consultant for Galante”™s Diversified Waste Disposal trash-hauling business in Danbury. Prosecutors said Santopietro met Galante when both were in federal prison ”“ he for embezzling federal funds, bank fraud and tax evasion and Galante for federal tax violations.

Santopietro was sentenced to five years probation, the first six months of which he will be confined to his home, because he is needed at home to care for his wife, Julie Porzio. Porzio was a divorce lawyer who was badly wounded when a client”™s estranged husband shot and killed her client and shot her before taking his own life outside a Middletown courthouse two years ago.

Prosecutors agreed not to recommend a sentence because of Santopietro”™s family circumstances. “He was definitely a minimal player in this conspiracy,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Gustafson said in court.

Santopietro was one of 29 people charged in connection with the federal probe of Galante”™s carting businesses in western Connecticut and eastern New York state. Galante has pleaded innocent to 72 counts that include racketeering, extortion, witness tampering and mail and wire fraud.