A career you can age in

Retirement, apparently, is not for everyone.

As is the case of four men - no strangers to the criminal justice system, wise guys with ties to organized crime - who were charged a couple of weeks ago with the armed robbery of two Manhattan jewelers. 

While dressed as construction workers - presumably the kind who had no-show jobs on The Sopranos, not the sort who actually swing hammers - Vincent Cerchio (69), Michael Sellick (67), Frank DiPietro (65), and Vincent Sapgnuolo (65) allegedly clipped $2M in jewelry. 

A fifth fellow - just a kid - was also charged. Samuel Sorce (25) was supposedly the wheelman for one of the robberies. Guess the old geezers wanted someone with quicker reflexes, better eyesight, and a heavier foot as their getaway driver. 

Mr. DiPietro’s lawyer, Mathew J. Mari, said his client was not guilty. Mr. DiPietro did work in construction, Mr. Mari said, had led an “exemplary life” in recent years and believed that he and the others had been arrested because of their résumés.

“He said, ‘They’re just trying to pin it on us because we’re career criminals,’” Mr. Mari said. (Source: NY Times)

Props to Attorney Mari for use of the royal - or is it criminal? - "we"? 

Anyway, those résumés are a mixed bag - impressive, but not magnificently so - as far as criming goes. 

Spagnuolo has done time for manslaughter and has a couple of robbery convictions. 

DiPietro is bigger time on the unsavory index:

In 1999, he pleaded guilty to fatally shooting a grand jury witness who had testified about a Lucchese-related drug conspiracy, court records show. The victim was found in a car in a remote area of Staten Island after being shot four times in the head. Mr. DiPietro was sentenced to 19 years in federal prison and released in 2016.

Leave the gun, take the cannoli?

As an aside: how do you get a sentence of only 19 years for shooting a grand jury witness four times in the head. 

Cerchio, an associate of both the Lucchese and DeCavalcane crime families, has been in and out of the stir on robbery and racketeering counts, including a "scheme to rob trucks of counterfeit cigarettes."

So, is it less of a crime if you steal counterfeit cigarettes from less than honest characters who traffic in counterfeit cigarettes?

Sellick's c.v. includes a few stints in federal prison for armed bank robbery. He's also a jailbreaker who got caught.

While these men all seem old to me to be committing crimes, which generally is a young man's game, "organized crime has long been the province of older men."

Elie Honig, a former top federal organized-crime prosecutor in Manhattan, cited several reasons for what he called the “perpetual graying” of the Mafia. For one thing, it takes years to climb the ranks; rarely is a member inducted, or “made,” before he is in his 50s. For another, Mr. Honig said: “There’s no such thing as retirement from the mob. They don’t have a pension plan.”

I guess Uncle Junior on The Sopranos feigning (or not) senility, and real-life mafiosi Vincent "The Chin" Gigante roaming around NYC's Little Italy in his bathrobe, aren't that far off the mark. 

The old geezers of organized crime stay engaged when they should be getting the hell out of the way and letting Gen X, Millennial, and Gen Z hoods get a bite of the apple. 

Defense of the aging jewelry-theft gangsters is so far revolving around mistaken identity. But defense of advanced age organized crime figures typically involves bathrobes, "walkers, wheelchairs and oxygen machines."

See youse guys in court. 

Never really thought of organized crime as a profession you could age in, but here we are. At least if they're convicted they won't have to worry about their lack of pensions. On the other hand, if cold blooded murder only "earns" 19 years in prison, stealing jewelry may only get these fellows a couple of months reprieve of their pension-less existence.