Crime

Trump Support Cited As Mental Incapacity In Slaying Of Reputed Mob Boss -- A Totally Normal Headline That Would Make Absolutely No Sense Before 2014

We've come a long way really quickly.

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It’s hard to believe that less than a decade ago, Americans would have thought the era of mob killings was limited to Sopranos reruns and Donald Trump was a bankruptcy artist with a reality show and terrible taste. Fast forward and the reputed Gambino family crime boss is gunned down in his driveway and attorneys contend the defendant did it because he’s deep into the QAnon conspiracy theory that buoys Donald Trump’s administration. It’s 2019 and “supporting the President of the United States” is an insanity defense in a murder trial and that actually sounds entirely plausible.

Anthony Comello admits that he shot Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali 10 times, but his attorney Robert C. Gottlieb of Gottlieb & Janey is arguing that “He ardently believed that Francesco Cali, a boss in the Gambino crime family, was a prominent member of the deep state, and, accordingly, an appropriate target for a citizen’s arrest.”

Gottlieb’s motion claims that Comello’s QAnon fascination — a right-wing conspiracy theory that believes there’s a secret government plot against Donald Trump — “evolved into a delusional obsession.” The spoiler alert is that QAnon is never not a delusional obsession. Even as conspiracy theories go, QAnon requires an absurd departure from basic common sense to string together into a coherent worldview. At its very core, QAnon is founded on the ludicrous premise is that there’s some highly organized, all-powerful “deep state” that can mobilize to thwart Trump’s agenda but couldn’t figure out how to fix the election in the first place. Even the Russians can figure that out!

Despite the whole thing making less sense than an episode of Ancient Aliens, Comello’s lawyers argue that the defendant took it entirely seriously and showed up with a gun and handcuffs to arrest Cali on suspicion of some unknown link to this conspiracy against Trump, which is downright insane because there’s almost no chance someone living in Staten Island with lots of money potentially wrapped up in construction, gambling, and large-scale graft was anti-Trump.

It’s not Comello’s first attempt to make a QAnon arrest. From Law & Crime:

According to the defense, Comello tried twice in February to perform a citizen’s arrest of NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio. He also contacted U.S. Marshals to help him arrest U.S. Reps. Maxine Waters (D-Calif., 43rd District), and Adam Schiff (D-Calif., 28th District). Authorities, uh, didn’t help. (The Times said that law enforcement confirmed these incidents.)

So he tried to get U.S. Marshals to help him get an 80-year-old congresswoman, but he figured storming the Corleone compound was the job he could handle on his own. For the record, this decision is not the basis of the nascent insanity plea and that’s because it’s still not as crazy as trafficking in the MAGA world in the first place.

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Man Who Killed Mafia Boss Also Wanted to Do Citizen’s Arrest of Maxine Waters: Defense [Law & Crime]

HeadshotJoe Patrice is a senior editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news. Joe also serves as a Managing Director at RPN Executive Search.

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