Mob enforcer denied bail on extortion charges

Date: 02-11-2006 Posted by: Anabolic Info TeamUnited States

The judge cited alleged threats that ex-bodybuilder "Big Vince" Filipelli made to undercover officers.
By George Anastasia
Inquirer Staff Writer
Mob enforcer Vincent "Big Vince" Filipelli was trying to explain to a deadbeat gambler the rules of the underworld:

He bet. He lost. Now he had to pay.

And if he didn't, Filipelli added, he would "hunt him down and put him in the hospital."

That was the message the hulking, former competitive bodybuilder delivered to a gambler named "T.J." during a meeting in the parking lot of a South Philadelphia "gentleman's club" back in May, according to an FBI agent who testified yesterday at Filipelli's bail hearing in federal court in Camden.

What Big Vince didn't know at the time was that T.J. was a New Jersey State Police trooper working undercover in an organized crime gambling investigation. The parking lot meeting was picked up on both audio and videotape as part of a 15-month probe.

After a protracted five-hour bail hearing yesterday, U.S. Magistrate Judge Ann Marie Donio pointed to that threat as the primary basis for granting the government's motion to have Filipelli, 53, held without bail.

Three witnesses outlined the confrontation, which took place in the parking lot of Crazy Horse Too, an upscale go-go bar and restaurant on Columbus Boulevard in South Philadelphia.

Filipelli met that day with T.J. and Lou, two men who had been placing bets with a mob-linked Internet gambling operation. T.J. was State Trooper James Calderelas. Lou was Trooper Leonard DiJoseph.

FBI Agent James Titcombe, who was part of the joint federal-state probe, provided a detailed account of several meetings Filipelli had with the undercover investigators. Titcombe said Filipelli, a former Mr. America bodybuilding champion, boasted about his acts of violence and the fact that he was a "made" member of the mob.

While none of the tapes was played in open court, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jacquline Carle quoted from them in arguing that Filipelli was a danger to the community and should be denied bail.

Filipelli was charged with gambling, extortion and traveling interstate to make a violent threat when he was arrested last week. Those charges were formalized in an indictment returned by a federal grand jury yesterday.

Carle, in her closing argument, referred directly to one tape-recorded conversation in which Filipelli bragged that he had burst into an office and in front of 40 people had beaten a gambler who had refused to pay.

" 'He tried to get cute with me,' " Carle said, quoting the conversation recorded in April in which Filipelli told DiJoseph about the assault. " 'I put the kid in the hospital.' "

Donald Manno, Filipelli's attorney, had argued that the conversations were "street talk" and "puffing" by his client. "No one was assaulted," Manno said.

But Donio ruled the testimony was strong enough to support the government's request for no bail in the case.