Galante wants racketeering charges tossed

Citing possible tainted wiretap evidence and charging that prosecutors have used "highly prejudicial phrases," defense attorney Hugh Keefe has asked a federal judge to dismiss at least some of the charges against western Connecticut garbage czar James Galante, according to a story by John Pirro of the Danbury CT News-Times.

Galante was arrested in 2006 along with 28 other individuals charged with participation in a "property rights" scheme to eliminate competition and to control pricing in the waste hauling industry.

Genovese Crime Family bigshot Matthew "Matty the Horse" Ianniello was among those indicted. Prosecutors say Ianniello received regular payments from the hauling firms allied through the property rights racket. Ianniello pleaded guilty in December 2006. Many of the other defendants have reached plea deals. Galante, who faces more than 100 counts related to racketeering, extortion, wire fraud and witness tampering, maintains his innocence.

Keefe argued that prosecutors improperly obtained authorization for a telephone wiretap that yielded much of their evidence. He also insisted that the indictment used phrases like "mob tax" and "tribute payment" to link Galante with organized crime and inflame potential jurors in the case.

Killers Krivoi, Ivanitsky sentenced to 25-to-life

Two Ukrainian immigrants, Marat Krivoi and Vitaly Ivanitsky, were sentenced yesterday to 25 years to life in prison for the 1992 killings of two men in Brooklyn, according to the New York Times. The killers were convicted in separate trials this past August.

According to authorities, Krivoi is the former son-in-law of Boris Nayfield, a leading figure in the Russian Mafiya.

Krivoi (left) reportedly ordered the shooting death of Boris Roitman, 21, and personally killed Thien Diep, 24. He feared that criminal associate Roitman was serving as a police informant and ordered him killed by Pyotr Sarkisov, according to prosecutors. Roitman died of a shotgun blast to the chest on Aug. 26, 1992. Diep, a high-stakes pool player, was shot in the head by Krivoi during a Sept. 23, 1992, robbery, as Ivanitsky served as lookout and driver.

Prosecutors said Krivoi, then in his early 20s, was the leader of a gang specializing in burglary and extortion. He has been imprisoned since 1993 for two other killings.

Prosecutors were hampered in their efforts to resolve the Roitman and Diep killings by witnesses' unwillingness to testify. Informants began providing evidence in the cases only in 2006, 14 years after the killings occurred.

Mob-linked drug criminal shot to death in Canada

Constantin "Big Gus" Alevizos, 45, was shot to death Jan. 30 at a halfway house in Ontario, Canada, according to a story by the Canwest News Service. With bullet wounds through his torso, Alevizos was clinging to life as police arrived, but he was pronounced dead on arrival at the local hospital.

Authorities say Alevizos (right) was sentenced last February to three years in prison for participating in a drug conspiracy. Thirty-one other people were convicted of conspiracy in the drug ring, which police believe was part of a Montreal Mafia incursion into Ontario.

One of Alevizo's closest friends, Gaetano Panepinto, has been linked with the Montreal-based Rizzuto Mafia organization as well as outlaw motorcycle gangs and high-volume drug dealers.

Police have no suspects in the killing.