Fla. takedown nets 11 in alleged Mafia crew
MIAMI (AP) – An FBI agent posing as a crooked businessman with ties to shady bankers was key to the indictment announced Thursday of 11 people on charges they ran a South Florida racket for New York’s Bonanno organized crime family.
The unidentified agent was able to gain the trust of the crew and its leader, Thomas Fiore, by seeming to provide them with access to foreign bank accounts to launder criminal cash as well as help with drug trafficking and sale of stolen goods, according to the indictment.
All the while, the undercover agent wore a hidden recording device that captured their conversations. The FBI also recorded numerous telephone conversations between Fiore, other members of the crew and senior Bonanno bosses.
Although he was not a formally inducted or “made” Mafia member, prosecutors said in the indictment that Fiore “would travel to New York in order to consult with the hierarchy of the Bonanno crime family and pay tribute to various Bonanno crime family members.”
Fiore, 46, has been in custody in Palm Beach County since February on state charges of being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm. He pleaded guilty last year to state racketeering charges and had been on probation before federal agents found the weapon during a search of his Boynton Beach home, according to court records.