Free Republic

Auburn, NY -- Three days before Christmas, Auburn Police Chief Gary Giannotta laid down the law for his command staff. At the closed meeting Dec. 22 in the department basement, Giannotta gave this ultimatum: Tell your patrol officers to write more vehicle and traffic tickets — at least one each per shift — or there will be repercussions for those who don’t.... Threatening to punish employees who fail to make a ticket quota violates state labor law. Tuesday, the Auburn police union took Giannotta to task for his proclamation, and two college criminal justice experts questioned the ethics of his...

A judge told two decorated former detectives Monday that they will get the maximum - life in prison - for moonlighting as hitmen for the mob. U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein said he would not formally impose the sentence on Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa until at least June 23. At that time, the defendants will argue they were not adequately represented by their lawyers at their trial. ``This is probably the most heinous series of crimes ever tried in this courthouse,'' the judge said.(snip) Prosecutors said the detectives committed some of the murders themselves, and delivered up other...

(New York - AP, December 1, 2005) - After losing a fight to get his racketeering case thrown out, Louis Eppolito, a retired police officer accused of moonlighting as a hit man for the mob, insisted today that he was a "good cop." Lawyers for Eppolito and another ex-officer, Stephen Caracappa, argued at a pretrial hearing in Brooklyn federal court that the indictment was legally defective. A judge disagreed and set a trial date for February 21st. Prosecutors claim Eppolito and Caracappa accepted thousands of dollars a month to settle scores for the Luchese organized crime family while still on...

NEW YORK - A judge on Friday threw out a racketeering murder conviction against two detectives accused of moonlighting as hitmen for the mob, saying the statute of limitations had expired on the slayings. U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein also granted a new trial to the defendants, Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, on money laundering and drug charges. Defense attorneys had argued that the five-year statute of limitations had expired on the most serious allegations against the pair — that they committed or facilitated eight killings between 1986 and 1990 while on the payroll of both the New York Police...

NEW YORK - Louie Eppolito had a story to tell. And, more importantly, one to sell. The decorated ex-New York police detective, who also happened to be the son of a mobster, was living in Las Vegas and trying to peddle doomed screenplays with titles like "Murder In Youngstown." Eppolito was looking for an investor in his latest project — and he was unconcerned about the source of the cash. "If you said to me, `Lou, I wanna introduce you to Jack Smith, he wants to invest in this film,' (and) he says, `$75,000 comes in a (expletive) shoe box,'...