Spent months casing La Grange bank, eyed presumed fortune in Bridgeport house

"The Monk" and "The Genius" once stole the 45-carat Marlborough diamond in broad daylight from a London jewelry store -- a theft that made headlines across the world in 1980.

Nearly 30 years later, despite their advanced age, they spent months casing an armored car picking up money at a bank every Thursday morning in west suburban La Grange, authorities said Friday.

Authorities say the former home of late mob boss Angelo LaPietra was being cased.

The senior citizen burglars were careful, listening to the police on scanners, switching cars, driving erratically to see if the cops were tailing them, authorities said.

But they weren't careful enough.

While the alleged thieves were surveilling their targets, a team of FBI agents was surveilling them.

Joseph "Jerry" "The Monk" Scalise, 73, of Clarendon Hills, Arthur "The Genius" Rachel, 71, of Chicago -- both convicted in the Marlborough diamond theft -- and their associate, Robert "Bobby" Pullia, 69, of Plainfield, were arrested Thursday night. They were about to break into the former home of LaPietra, where a female relative of his still lives, prosecutors allege.

"It really shows what they proved in the Family Secrets trial is true," said retired FBI mob expert James Wagner, referring to the recent federal case against aging mob leaders. "No matter how old they are, they're still dangerous. What you have to realize is these guys don't have a pension."

The three men were being held without bond until a detention hearing next Wednesday. They are the chief suspects in the 2007 robbery of another La Grange bank. Scalise allegedly left DNA in a getaway car, court records show.

Scalise believes the new charge against him is "nonsense," said his attorney, Terry Gillespie.

The three men, longtime partners, were charged with planning to knock off the La Grange bank, which they cased for months every Thursday morning when an armored car would make its pickup, authorities said.

Scalise was considered such an expert on robbing banks that Hollywood director Michael Mann hired him as a consultant to his 2009 movie "Public Enemies," which is about prolific bank robber John Dillinger.

Scalise often acted as the getaway driver because of his distinctive deformed hand that he feared would be remembered by witnesses in a bank, authorities said.

Scalise is more commonly known among his associates as "The General," said defense attorney Joseph "The Shark" Lopez, who has represented numerous mob clients. Scalise got the nickname because he often tucks away his deformed hand, like Napoleon.

While Hollywood director Mann praised Scalise in interviews for his intelligence and sensitivity, Scalise appears to show another side, according to secret recordings the FBI made by putting a listening device in his van.

At one point, Scalise said of an unnamed cooperating witness in the Family Secrets case: "We got to spare some time [and] a bullet for that f------ piece of s---," according to the FBI.

Scalise, who once cooperated with the feds himself in a drug case, was also implicated in the 1980 murder of hit man William Dauber and his wife, but was never charged.

Source: www.suntimes.com

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