Search for an escaped mob hitman who killed three men ends in Hialeah
Dominic Taddeo, the New York mobster who was imprisoned in Florida for killing three people and attempting to kill two others, could have been freed from federal custody in February 2023.
Instead, Taddeo, a hit man from a Rochester, NY, crime family, took it upon himself to seek freedom early when he escaped from federal custody on March 28. He had been moved to the halfway house near Orlando in February from the medium-security FCI Coleman prison in Wildwood in Sumter County, according to the Bureau of Prisons.
Taddeo, who pleaded guilty in 1992 to racketeering charges that included the killings of three men during mob wars in the 1980s, managed to score just a week away from the feds.
On Monday, the 64-year-old hit man was captured in a Hialeah apartment at 350 E. 21st St. Marshals did not release details on why he was at the apartment or what relationship he had with whomever occupied the residence
“The tenacious work of the involved deputy marshals and the cooperation between our offices resulted in the quick capture of Mr. Taddeo,“ said U.S. Marshal Bill Berger of the Middle District of Florida in a statement.
Deputy Jesse Bravo of the U.S. Marshal’s Service said that inmates who escape from custody usually get charged, but whether or not more time is added to Taddeo’s sentence remains to be determined.
According to the U.S. Marshal’s Service, from 1990 to 1992 Taddeo was convicted of federal racketeering charges and pleaded guilty to multiple other cases involving weapons offenses, drugs, and “enterprise corruption” among other offenses that included the killing of three men on behalf of the La Cosa Nostra, a Rochester-area crime family.
The three men he killed in 1982 and 1983 were Nicholas Mastrodonato, Gerald Pelusio and Dino Tortatice.
“He twice failed in knocking off Rochester mob captain Thomas Marotta, including in an April 1983 shooting when he hit Marotta with half a dozen shots. He hit him again three times just six months later, yet Marotta survived both attempts,” The Daily Mail reported.
“This guy was a very violent individual. He was involved in cocaine trafficking, assault. They found a cache of weapons at his home,” Jeff Burbank of The Mob Museum in Las Vegas, told CBS4.
According to The Associated Press, a federal judge in western New York had denied Taddeo’s request for compassionate release last year. Taddeo claimed health problems, including hypertension and obesity, put him at risk for serious complications from COVID-19. Prosecutors said medical records did not show that Taddeo was particularly unhealthy.
This story was originally published April 5, 2022 at 12:38 PM.
