The feds will soon add more murders and other charges to the racketeering indictment they used to send Bonanno boss Joseph Massino back to prison last week after a decade atop the once-impenetrable crime family, Gang Land has learned. 

Additional charges are expected against Massino, as well as his brother-in law, family underboss Salvatore Vitale, who were partners “in an many as seven (mob) hits,” according to court papers filed by federal prosecutors in Brooklyn. 

With a storied 22-year-old mob hit as a centerpiece, prosecutors drafted an indictment designed primarily as a holding action to detain Massino without bail before he could head for the hills and devise a way to beat a case he knew was coming, sources said. 

“He had a 10-year run. We wanted him off the streets now,” one law enforcement source explained.

Massino, who celebrated his 60^th birthday on Jan. 10, a day after his arrest, is charged with taking part in the August 1981 murder of Dominick (Sonny Black) Napolitano, a capo the Bonannos held responsible for the infiltration of the family by FBI agent Joe Pistone. Vitale, 56, was charged with a 1992 murder. Both were detained without bail.

On Jan. 6, FBI agents, fearing Massino might flee, began round the clock surveillance on him. That day, capo Richard (Shellackhead) Cantarella, 59, (right) was taken out of general prison population at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC). Since the transfer followed

similar moves of Cantarella’s mobster son Paul, 31, (left) and capo Frank Coppa, 61, the feds felt sure the wily Mafia boss would correctly assume the three had begun cooperating, and would split the scene.

As Gang Land reported last week, news of the turncoats – the first known family defectors in 40 years – spread quickly among the Bonannos when the families of both Cantarellas disappeared from their Staten Island homes on the same day Shellackhead was moved.

“We didn’t want a repeat of last time,” said the official, pointing to a successful ploy the cagy gangster used two decades ago when the feds were breathing down his neck.

In 1981, after allegedly taking part in Napolitano’s execution, Massino fled, avoiding the first racketeering trial to result from Pistone’s undercover work. When forewarned about upcoming arrests, mob bosses often flee, hoping to fashion a defense by using insight obtained about the evidence while the case proceeds without them. Massino returned in 1984, went to trial in 1987, and was acquitted of all charges, including murder.

Sources said the current murder charge against Massino stems from information provided by Coppa, (right) a capo who took part in the Napolitano hit in a Staten Island house along with capo Frank Lino, now 65, as Massino waited outside as a “backup shooter.” Lino, due to complete 50 months for stock fraud later this year, learned about the indictment from a television news account at his federal prison in Loretto, PA, said one source.

As the feds use additional evidence from Coppa and the Cantarellas to shore up their case, the Last Don has

been forced to plan his defense without his first choice, lawyer Mathew Mari, who had represented the Cantarellas and was forced to bow out because of a potential conflict of interest.

But Massino has not been sitting on his hands in his cramped quarters at the MDC. Following a flurry of visits from a virtual Who’s Who of noted criminal lawyers, Massino retained Manhattan solo practitioner David Breitbart.

Breitbart, who represents Liborio (Barney) Bellomo, a former acting Genovese boss and codefendant of family boss Vincent (Chin) Gigante, was the only attorney to best top Manhattan federal prosecutors and Pistone in the first trial to result from his undercover work.

Benjamin (Lefty Guns) Ruggiero – played by Al Pacino in “Donnie Brasco,” the 1997 movie about the case – and two others were convicted of racketeering charges that included murder, robbery, gambling and drug dealing. A fourth defendant was found guilty only of drug dealing. They received sentences ranging from five to 15 years.

During a five week trial against then-assistant U.S. attorneys Louis Freeh and Barbara Jones – Freeh would later serve as FBI Director and Jones is a Manhattan Federal Court Judge – Breitbart won an acquittal of all charges for Bonanno soldier John (Boobie) Cerasani. (left)

Breitbart refused to speculate yesterday about plans by prosecutors Greg Andres and Ruth Nordenbrook to lodge additional charges against Massino. “I have examined the indictment, conferred with my client and intend to tell the government that we are interested in a speedy trial,” he said.

Defense lawyer Joseph Corozzo – his father Joseph (JoJo) is the Gambino family consigliere and his uncle Nicholas is a jailed capo – never ran away from his heritage, or changed his name. 

For the waterfront racketeering trial of Gambino boss Peter Gotti, (right) brother Richard Gotti and five others, however, Corozzo has changed the way he pronounces it.

Instead of the usual Core-ROZ-zo, he pronounced it Core-OTZ-AH during jury selection and during his opening statement yesterday on behalf of his client, capo Richard Gotti. 

Corozzo’s gambit is an effort to keep his bloodlines from hurting his client when the names of his father and especially his uncle, who was involved in many high-level meetings with Peter Gotti, come up during the trial.

A few months ago, when cooler heads expected the case to be resolved by plea bargains, Richard Gotti (left) waived the right to complain about any prejudice from any evidence that disclosed that his lawyer was related to Gambino family mobsters.

Gang Land wonders what Corozzo would do if former Luchese acting boss Joseph (Little Joe) Defede follows the lawyer’s lead and testifies that while he was running his crime family he had high-level meetings with Peter Gotti and Little Nick Core-OTZ-AH.

Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti

Mob Star: The Story of John Gotti – the book it took yours truly and Gene Mustain 17 years to do – tells the complete saga of John Gotti, from his treacherous rise to his defiant downfall. Although we didn't know it at the time, we began working on "Mob Star" in 1985, when we began covering the Gotti story as news reporters.

The first edition came out in 1988, and we finished this new edition three days before Gotti died in June 2002. We added a postscript, and Alpha Books has distributed it to the nation's bookstores.

With a 40,000-word update, the new edition contains the entire Gotti saga right up to his time in prison and his death from throat cancer.

The 378 page, full-size book uses eight additional chapters, a prologue and an epilogue to complete the story we began telling (better than any other reporters, we might add!) when we covered the Gotti-orchestrated, midtown Manhattan assassination of former Gambino boss Paul Castellano.

For the last and best words on Gotti, this is the book to have. It is specially priced at Amazon.com at $11.87, more than five bucks off the suggested retail price.

    Not Really For Idiots

Whether you're a Gang Land regular or an occasional visitor, you'll enjoy  "The Complete Idiot's Guide to The Mafia," a book I wrote for Alpha Books. It's filled with real stuff about real wiseguys and insight about the ways that mobsters make their money. It's 343 pages of true stories of life and death, honor and betrayal. Get it at your local book store, or at Gang Land's favorite, Amazon.com, where the powers that be have knocked the price down to $13.27, so low I am concerned that the Godfather of online booksellers has forgotten about my end.