Many years ago the author of The Lancet p.106, Jan. 14, 1978 did treat people from both sides at The Maxillofacial Pain Clinic at Fort Hamilton. He had previously been offered a laboratory by East Germany which he stupidly and moronically declined. His federal personnel file is available. I have been told that he did dine at Ponte's in Manhattan. He has had a lifelong habit of not being interested in money, charging his patients etc. He did receive an offer from St. Vincent's many years ago that he foolishly declined. I would like to see something come of the work of my not yet dead friend and since the US simply talks trash about healthcare I invite the down but not out crew to see if any geezers remember the work of my friend, the first named author of The Lancet p.106, Jan. 14, 1978. Perhaps someone remembers Phillip Magnano. Note the article in Oggi about my friend's ability to treat the cause of the suicide disease, trigeminal neuralgia. It is easy to cause pain but much more profitable, pleasurable and amusing to to cure same. Also up for release is the first step in treating, curing and/or explicating Lou Gehrig's disease.
Time is of the essence. I only play long shots and don't bet horses but my friend's work was viewed favorably, personally and fondly by
Vladimir K. Zworykin - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_K._Zworykin
Vladimir Kosmich Zworykin (Russian: Влади́мир Козьми́ч Зворы́кин - Vladimir Koz'mich Zvorykin) (July 29 [O.S. July 17] 1888 – July 29, 1982) was a ...
Biography - Second marriage and calling - Death - Honors
Manfred von Ardenne - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manfred_von_Ardenne
Manfred von Ardenne (20 January 1907 – 26 May 1997) was a German ... In 1937, Ardenne developed the scanning transmission electron microscope. During ...
Career - Personal - Honors - Books
You may find me at 1063 Hempstead Turnpike Franklin Square. Just ask for Palm Sunday.
Mafia Is Down—but Not Out
Crime Families Adapt to Survive, Lowering Profile and Using Need-to-Know Tactics
Feb. 18, 2014 10:02 p.m. ET
For more than two decades, New York
City's five organized-crime families were plagued by convictions brought
on by strengthened federal laws and the increasing habit of
higher-ranking members cooperating with the government.
Those
years of high-profile decline created a perception that the city's
mafia is on the verge of extinction. But law-enforcement officials and
mob experts say the five families, while not the force they once were,
are far from sleeping with the fishes. They have survived, the experts
said, because of their persistence and ability to adapt.
"I
don't know that I'd say La Cosa Nostra was what it was in its heyday
but I wouldn't say by any means it's gone away," said Richard Frankel,
special agent in charge of the Criminal Division for the Federal Bureau
of Investigation's New York office.
Reputed Gambino family crime boss John Gotti leans
back during a break in testimony in New York Supreme Court in Manhattan,
Jan. 23, 1990.
Associated Press
Mr. Frankel, who supervises the FBI's
organized crime squads in New York, said he believes the city's Cosa
Nostra has quietly staged a comeback and is now more powerful than it
has been in years.
Despite the waves of
prosecutions, each of the five mafia "borgatas"—the Genovese, Gambino,
Luchese, Bonanno and Colombo—"still exists and each still has its
hierarchy," said John Buretta, a former federal prosecutor who headed
the organized-crime unit for the U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn.
One
recent indictment that attests to organized crime's staying power,
authorities said, is the Jan. 23 arrest of 78-year-old Vincent "Vinnie"
Asaro, in connection with the 1978 Lufthansa heist of $6 million in cash
and jewels at John F. Kennedy Airport.
The reputed Bonanno captain and four
other reputed Bonanno members were charged with running a loan-sharking,
extortion, gambling and murder enterprise from 1969—nine years before
the Lufthansa robbery—to the present day. The defendants have pleaded
not guilty.
The five families are no
longer the federal government's top criminal concern in New York City.
Counterterrorism and other criminal networks—such as Russian, Balkan,
Asian and African organized syndicates that generally coexist peacefully
and sometimes collaborate with the five families—have attracted
investigators away from La Cosa Nostra, Mr. Frankel said.
Years
ago, the FBI had a squad dedicated to each family. Now there are two:
C-5, which handles the Genoveses, Bonannos and Colombos, and C-16,
assigned to the Gambinos and Lucheses. A 2010 audit by the Justice
Department's Office of the Inspector General found that after Sept. 11,
2001, organized crime is the FBI's sixth priority behind terrorism,
espionage, cybercrime, public corruption and protecting civil rights.
At
the NYPD, amid budget squeezes, the current 5,000-detective headcount
is about 2,000 below the 2002 level. There has been an "across the
board" reduction of detectives in precincts and specialty squads
including organized crime, said Michael Palladino, president of the
NYPD's detectives' union. The number of detectives investigating
organized crime has remained stable in the past three years, though. The
NYPD didn't return a request for comment.
As
the ranks of organized-crime investigators decreased, the mafia adapted
to law enforcement's investigative techniques. Unlike the in-your-face
approach that media mob star John Gotti adopted in the 1980s, today's
mafia has reverted to its roots and tried to become as invisible as
possible, officials and experts say.
For
instance, the Genovese family, which has traditionally been the
largest, most powerful and most secretive, now likely uses a rotating
panel of leaders to run day-to-day affairs to avoid any one boss from
being targeted by prosecutors, Mr. Buretta said. Other crime families
use a "street boss" model where lesser-known mobsters carry out the
orders of imprisoned leaders, he said.
Today's
crime families are also less territorial and more open to collaboration
than the mobsters of past decades, said Inspector John Denesopolis, the
commanding officer of the New York Police Department's Organized Crime
unit. "As long as they are earning, they are less concerned," he said.
Another
emerging trend in the past several years, Mr. Denesopolis said, is
mafia families emulating the need-to-know tactics seen in terrorist
cells—one group in the family isn't made aware of what crimes another
group in the same family is involved in.
What
hasn't changed much since the 1930s are the five families' bread and
butter crimes: loan-sharking, extortion, gambling, narcotics and
infiltrating organized labor, Mr. Frankel said. They aren't as involved
in sophisticated financial frauds—such as stock pump-and-dump scams—as
they were in the early 1990s, Mr. Frankel said. But they are resourceful
when it comes to new opportunities, he added, citing recent
prosecutions of offshore Internet gambling websites and trafficking in
Viagra.
Hundreds of inducted members in
the five families are still behind these enterprises. The Genovese lead
with close to 200 such "made" men, while the Colombos and Lucheses are
the smallest, with about 100 each, said Jerry Capeci, a longtime crime
reporter who operates the website Gang Land News. The numbers are less
than years ago but not substantially so, he said. There are also several
thousand additional criminal associates, Mr. Denesopolis said.
Leadership
ranks are also being replenished as many "sophisticated, capable" mafia
veterans who are currently incarcerated will soon complete their
sentences, said Mark Feldman, chief assistant Brooklyn District Attorney
and a former chief of the Brooklyn U.S. Attorney's organized-crime
unit.
Law-enforcement officials say one
trend has worked in their favor lately: the growing frequency of
soldiers and leaders breaking oath of Omerta—the pledge allegiance to
the family and agreeing to a code of honor that includes a vow of
silence if arrested.
In 2004, Bonanno
leader Joseph Massino shocked the underworld by becoming a government
witness—the first head of one of the five families to do so. He has
testified or provided information against other accused mobsters in
several cases, including in the latest Lufthansa heist charges. He
testified against reputed Bonanno leader Vincent Basciano, who was
convicted in 2011 on racketeering and murder charges.
"Joe's
cooperation had to shake the confidence in the code of honor in as
dramatic a way as any cooperator ever had," Mr. Buretta said.
A
recently retired NYPD detective who worked organized crime for more
than 20 years, said old-timers followed the rules "to the letter" and
would never talk to him or his partners after an arrest. "With these
young kids, the rules are just suggestions," he said.
"They're
younger, a lot of them have young kids and they don't want to look at
25 to life," he said. We sit them down and tell them, 'Listen, the next
the time you pick up your baby daughter she's going to be 27 years old.'
"
Write to Sean Gardiner at sean.gardiner@wsj.com
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