Columnist Jeff German: Mob needs to start a retirement program

Friday, Sept. 20, 2002 | 5:39 a.m.

FRESH BULLET HOLES still are visible inside Astro Auto Sales on South Main Street, a chilling reminder left behind by a hot-tempered member of the mob's Senior Division.

When Sam Manarite, an 83-year-old reputed soldier in New York's Genovese crime family, walked into the used car dealer's colorful glass-enclosed lobby and started firing off rounds two weeks ago, he yelled out: "Who do you guys think you're f...ing with?"

If Manarite wasn't so old, and the bullets so real, it would have been a perfect scene for the "Sopranos" on HBO.

Owner Dino Boggino and manager John Pasqualone were too busy ducking for cover under a computer desk 20 feet away to pay much attention to what Manarite was saying. They knew little about his suspected Mafia ties.

They did know, however, that Manarite was unhappy about having to pay for repairs for a 1984 Nissan ZX his son Robert had bought in April. Manarite previously had been at the dealership complaining about the car to his other son, Sam Jr., who worked as a detailer there.

Today, in the after-shock of the Sept. 9 shooting, Boggino and Pasqualone are planning to take their business out of the area, and Manarite, who turns 84 on Oct. 15, is sitting in the Clark County Detention Center facing a string of charges, including two counts of attempted murder with a deadly weapon.

Mafia watchers, meanwhile, are shaking their heads in amazement, and the likes of Bugsy Siegel, Sam Giancana and Tony Spilotro, all a part of organized crime's history in Las Vegas, probably are rolling over in their graves.

Lawmen have been saying for some time that the mob's influence in Las Vegas, long regarded as open territory for the nation's crime families, has declined dramatically in recent years.

This illustrates it. If Manarite is the best the mob can show us, it's in worse shape than lawmen think.

"The mob's just not what it used to be," says Jerry Hanford, supervisor of the FBI's Organized Crime Squad in Las Vegas. "A number of the individuals we investigate are becoming geriatric."

Manarite may have distinguished himself on the streets in the Octogenarian Club, but certainly not in the underworld.

Former FBI agent Michael Howey, who retired last year after investigating organized crime here for more than 20 years, says Manarite committed a cardinal sin within the Mafia by not hiring someone else to shoot up Astro Auto Sales to give himself an alibi.

"I don't think he had anybody to turn to," Howey says. "Through attrition everybody he's connected to has either died off or is in prison."

And so Manarite, with arthritis in his hands and a few steps slower in his stride, allegedly did it himself in broad daylight, leaving a trail of evidence and witnesses who should be able to send him to prison for the rest of his life.

John Branco, a longtime underworld figure who turned government witness, says the shooting is an example of why the mob should have a retirement program.

"When a guy reaches a certain age, they should just boot his ass out," says the 67-year-old Branco, who now lives outside Nevada under an assumed identity. "They'd save themselves a lot of embarrassment."

Branco, who served time with Manarite in federal prison, describes him as a "goofy guy who screwed up a lot.

"Nobody really showed him a whole lot of respect," Branco recalls. "He always did things he shouldn't do, and then he apologized for them."

Howey says Manarite, regarded as a tough-talking loan-shark in his younger days, has a reputation for being a hothead.

He once was convicted of threatening to beat a man with a golf club and later investigated for threatening to harm the federal prosecutor who obtained a 1993 money laundering conviction against him.

While in prison Manarite reportedly had talked about wanting to hire someone to "whack" the prosecutor. But FBI agents never were able to gather enough evidence to charge him, and ultimately Manarite was paroled in May 2000. He began his supervised release in San Diego, but returned to Las Vegas at the end of June to be with his sons.

Pasqualone says Manarite made some threats at Astro Auto prior to the shooting, but no one really took him seriously because he apologized for his actions.

"We sit here bewildered at what possessed him to do this" Pasqualone says. "I think it's beyond most people's comprehension."

Police report that even Manarite was in a state of shock when they arrested him at a nearby car lot about 20 minutes after being called to the dealership. He was so out of it that officers didn't bother to read him his Miranda rights or ask him questions about the shooting.

Manarite isn't talking at the moment. He's being represented, not by a high-priced defense attorney, but by the county public defender's office, which will have an uphill battle keeping him out of the slammer.

Call it a loss for the mob's Senior Division. And another blow to its stature in Las Vegas.