Salvatore LoCascio (born July 21, 1958) is a reputed former

caporegime A ''caporegime'' or ''capodecina'', usually shortened to ''capo'' or informally referred to as "captain", "skipper" or "lieutenant", is a leadership position in the Mafia (both the Sicilian Mafia and Italian-American Mafia). A ''capo'' is a "made m ...

in the New York

Gambino crime family The Gambino crime family (pronounced ) is an Italian American Mafia crime family and one of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the American Mafia. ...

. His father, Frank LoCascio, was the acting underboss (1988-1990), and acting consigliere (1990-1992) for John Gotti.

Early life

LoCascio grew up in Eastchester, New York. In 1985, with $115,000 that he received from wedding gifts he started his own business, Creative Program Communications, Incorporated with a few friends.

The Scores case

In 1998, LoCascio and Michael "Mikey Scars" DiLeonardo were arrested for attempting to extort money from Scores, a famous upscale

strip club A strip club (also known as a strip joint, striptease bar, peeler bar, gentlemen's club, among others) is a venue where strippers provide adult entertainment, predominantly in the form of striptease and other erotic dances including lap dances. St ...

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

. However, the case against LoCascio was weak, so prosecutors offered to drop the charges. In return, LoCascio pleaded guilty to

tax evasion Tax evasion or tax fraud is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to red ...

for deriving income from illegal gambling. He was sentenced to ten months, part of which was home arrest, and a $1.5 million fine. At the time of his plea, Locascio ran numerous 900 number phone services, from

psychic A psychic is a person who claims to use powers rooted in parapsychology, such as extrasensory perception (ESP), to identify information hidden from the normal senses, particularly involving telepathy or clairvoyance; or who performs acts that a ...

hot lines to sports scores.

Pornography and credit card fraud

While serving his time in home, LoCascio was already building what would be called the largest consumer fraud in American history. Along with Gambino mob soldier Richard "Richie" Martino, LoCascio created a number of

pornographic Pornography (colloquially called porn or porno) is sexually suggestive material, such as a picture, video, text, or audio, intended for sexual arousal. Made for consumption by adults, pornographic depictions have evolved from cave paintings ...

websites. These websites were formed through a partnership between Martino and Norman Chanes, a direct marketer. The scam required an age verification check before an adult could access a "free preview" of the sexual content. To perform an age verification check, the customer had to enter their credit card information. The websites clearly stated that the viewer was getting a ''free preview'' and their credit card would not be charged. In reality, Locascio and crew were fraudulently charging $25 to $75 on these accounts. Local phone carrier services had been allowing third party telecommunication companies to bill existing customers for services rendered. Typically this would include items such as

voice mail A voicemail system (also known as voice message or voice bank) is a computer-based system that allows callers to leave a Voice recording, recorded message when the recipient has been unable (or unwilling) to answer the Telephone, phone. Calls may ...

and overseas long distance charges. The LoCascio crew then set about billing customers located primarily in the United States mid west for charges they had not requested. This billing was facilitated through the now defunct USP&C of

Overland Park, Kansas Overland Park ( ) is the largest city in Johnson County, Kansas, United States, and the List of cities in Kansas#Highest population listing, second-most populous city in the state of Kansas. It is one of four principal city, principal cities in ...

. The scheme is known as ' cramming'. Soon complaints from victims of both the internet sites and phone bills caught the attention of the US Justice Department. By February 2004, the entire LoCascio crew had been arrested. Federal prosecutors estimate that the Gambinos grossed approximately $500 million from the phone cramming operation. LoCascio was sentenced to two years in federal prison; he was released on August 1, 2008.

References

* * * {{DEFAULTSORT:LoCascio, Salvatore 1961 births Living people American gangsters of Italian descent Gambino crime family American people convicted of money laundering People from Scarsdale, New York American people convicted of tax crimes