United States v. Scarfo, 850 F.2d 1015 (3d Cir. 1988)

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit, June 29, 1988 (Weis, J.); argued March 7, 1988, rehearing denied July 25, 1988. The caption reads “Nicodemo Scarfo a/k/a ‘The Little Guy.’” The court affirmed his conviction for Hobbs Act conspiracy and extortion.

The court states: “The evidence at trial permitted the jury to find that Nicodemo Scarfo is the ‘boss’ of the Philadelphia La Cosa Nostra, the organized crime group operating in eastern Pennsylvania and parts of New Jersey.” It describes how a city councilman and another man “conspired with the Scarfo organization to extort $1 million from a real estate developer, Rouse & Associates, in exchange for Beloff’s politically indispensable cooperation in the Penn’s Landing redevelopment project on the Philadelphia waterfront,” with negotiations conducted through Nicholas Caramandi, who later testified for the Government.

On the jury, the court wrote: “In view of these unusual circumstances, the trial judge granted the government’s motion to empanel an anonymous jury.” It also upheld the admission of other-crimes evidence and summarizes cooperating-witness testimony about the group’s rules. The quoted sentence about Scarfo is the court’s statement of what the evidence permitted the jury to find, and it is the basis of the role line on the Scarfo page.