Defense attorneys for New England mobster Paul (Paulie the Plumber) Weadick are fighting to keep mention of Weadick’s past mafia dealings, including allegedly taking part in more than one homicide conspiracy, out of his upcoming trial for the murder of Boston nightclub owner Stevie DiSarro. Weadick was convicted of second degree murder in a 1982 gangland slaying and did seven years in prison. He’s also a suspect in at least one other mob-connected murder in the 1990s.
The 63-year old Weadick is charged with holding DiSarro’s legs as he was strangled to death in the Sharon, Massachusetts home of a mob-boss superior on May 10, 1993. His trial is scheduled for next month.
DiSarro’s remains were unearthed in Providence, Rhode Island in March 2016. Former New England mafia don Francis (Cadillac Frank) Salemme was subsequently ripped out of the Witness Protection Program and charged with ordering the hit for the belief that DiSarro, a business partner of Salemme’s, was cooperating with authorities and stealing from a rock music venue they owned together. Salemme, 84, started cooperating with authorities in 1999 while serving a prison term for racketeering, however denied knowledge of DiSarro’s disappearance.
According to a 2016 indictment, DiSarro was lured to Salemme’s home in suburban Boston 25 years ago this spring where Salemme’s son, Francis (Frankie Boy) Salemme, Jr. and Weadick killed him and he watched on. Frankie Boy Salemme, Jr, who died of AIDS in 1995, is alleged to have done the garroting. The elder Salemme, boss of the Patriarca crime family in the early-to-mid 1990s, and Weadick, have pled not guilty in the case.
In court briefs filed this week, Weadick’s attorneys seek to bar any evidence of their client’s prior mob activity from the jury. Weadick is a reputed associate of modern-day New England mafia boss, Carmen (The Big Cheese) DiNunzio and his Gemini Social Club crew out of Boston’s North End. Prosecutors want to point out to jurors in the DiSarro case that Weadick has previously acted as a collector for mafia-backed gambling and loansharking rings, a go-between for Italian and Irish crime lords in the Boston area and may have participated in multiple mob murders.
Back in 1980s, Weadick pled guilty to manslaughter in the June 1982 murder of New England mafia associate Joe Mistretta, a business partner of his in the narcotics trade. Mistretta was found stuffed in the trunk of a car outside Weadick’s Burlington, Massachusetts home, just minutes after being slain. Police immediately arrested Weadick drenched in Mistretta’s blood in the midst of cleaning up the hit which had taken place inside his residence. Another gangster pal of Weadick’s named James Haney killed Mistretta by shooting him three times in the back of the head.
Frankie Boy Salemme, Jr. picked Weadick up from the prison gates upon his release after seven years behind bars for the crime in 1989, a fact prosecutors want to make known to the jury in presenting their case against Weadick. Months later, the Salemmes and DiSarro bought The Channel nightclub in South Boston. Both the younger Salemme and Weadick were employed at the club as an assistant manager and bouncer, respectively.
Around this time, Cadillac Frank ascended to the boss’ seat in the Patriarca crime family, outlasting rivals in a power struggle that left him thirsting for revenge against those who had opposed his rise to leadership. Over the next five years, Salemme bumped off several members of a rival faction in the New England underworld responsible for trying to kill him in an assassination attempt outside a pancake house in June 1989 where he was shot.
Authorities believe Weadick took part in Cadillac Frank’s purge. He is considered a suspect in the 1994 slaying of Mike Romano, Jr., son of a rival faction chief. Romano, Jr. was shot at point blank range changing a flat tire, his assailants mistaking him for another mob dissident present at the unsuccessful pancake house hit. The Romano family filed suit last fall against the FBI for wrongful death and gross negligence in the Romano, Jr. murder over the fact that Mark Rossetti, one of Salemme’s top lieutenants and hit men in the 1990s purge, was a confidential informant for the government.
The post Lawyers In New England Mob Murder Trial Don’t Want Defendant’s Violent History, Gangland Affairs Brought Up To Jury appeared first on The Gangster Report.