Lawyer opens defense of accused ex-DEA agent: 'He didn't do the things the government says he did'

At the start of former Drug Enforcement Administration Agent Joseph Bongiovanni’s corruption trial Monday, his lawyer did not dispute that an Amherst drug trafficker paid a quarter million dollars in supposed bribes.

“What we dispute is this had anything to with Joseph Bongiovanni,” defense attorney Parker MacKay told a federal jury.

“Make no mistake, Mr. Bongiovanni took no bribes,” MacKay said, suggesting that the retired agent’s lifelong friends from North Buffalo who became marijuana traffickers instead tricked an Amherst drug trafficker into thinking he was getting protection for the $2,000 and then $4,000 monthly payments that they kept for themselves.

Jurors heard opening statements Monday in a retrial in which Bongiovanni is accused of accepting at least $250,000 in bribes from the Ron Serio drug-trafficking organization in exchange for protecting its members from arrest and alerting them of informants.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Tripi portrayed Bongiovanni as a dishonest and corrupt DEA special agent who violated his oath and duties to enforce the nation’s drug laws in exchange for bribes he needed amid personal financial stress.

U.S. vs. Joseph Bongiovanni, Round 2: Retrial starts Monday on bribery and corruption charges against former DEA agent

“His interest was in protection – not investigation,” Tripi told the jury.

The prosecutor told jurors they would learn how drug traffickers “flipped, turned and twisted” a federal agent.

Bongiovanni used his training, position and access to sensitive law enforcement information to further two criminal protection schemes, Tripi said, one that shielded childhood friends from North Buffalo who grew up to be marijuana traffickers, and the other protecting a longtime friend, Peter Gerace Jr., who faces his own charges of bribery and sex- and drug-trafficking.

“He did it out of greed and desperation,” Tripi said. “He did it out of warped sense of loyalty.”

Bongiovanni’s defense attorneys – MacKay and Robert Singer – will attempt to convince jurors that dropped investigations by fellow DEA agents, and other law enforcement agencies, were not because of corruption.

Judge acquits Bongiovanni of one of his bribery charges

“Sometimes, investigations just simply die,” MacKay said. “The government has spent a lot of time speaking about what (it thinks) this case is about. We don’t expect the evidence to show the same things. He didn’t do the things the government says he did.”

The trial marks the second attempt by federal prosecutors to convict Bongiovanni of corruption charges.

Bongiovanni, 60, faces 11 charges:

• Two counts of conspiracy to defraud the U.S., for reportedly accepting at least $250,000 from a drug-trafficking organization whom he thought was associated with Italian organized crime to shield its members from arrest and provide them with information about investigations and cooperating sources, and also to protect Gerace from arrest and prosecution.
• Two counts of conspiracy to distribute controlled substances.
• One count of a public official accepting a bribe, reportedly from the Ron Serio drug-trafficking organization.
• Five counts of obstruction of justice, related to reportedly false entries in DEA reports and memos about his dealings with Gerace.
• One count of making false statements to a U.S. agency, for denying that he initiated contact with Gerace or witnessed Gerace use narcotics.

At Bongiovanni’s first trial earlier this year, the jury delivered a partial verdict on the bribery and corruption charges.

On April 12, the jury in the eight-week trial found Bongiovanni guilty on one count of obstruction of justice and one count of lying to federal agents, both counts involving a case file kept in his home after his retirement. Jurors acquitted Bongiovanni of deleting data on his DEA-issued cellphone when he retired. They did not reach a verdict on 12 other charges, including obstruction of justice, bribery and lying to a U.S. agency.

Last month, U.S. District Judge Lawrence Vilardo acquitted him of one of the bribery counts – that he was paid by Gerace an undetermined amount to help Gerace and his Pharaoh’s Gentlemen’s Club avoid federal narcotics investigations and induce the FBI to abandon an investigation.

In his ruling, Vilardo said there was “simply is no evidence – circumstantial or otherwise” from which a jury could infer beyond a reasonable doubt that the money was a bribe. The judge said “only surmise and guesswork could lead a jury to determine that the money constituted a bribe rather than a gratuity for past actions or in the hope of future action, or a reimbursement or genuine gift to a longtime friend.”

Back to homepage

Subscriber Login

Keep reading with a digital access subscription.

Subscribe now

At the retrial, prosecutors intend to elicit testimony, show text messages to and from Bongiovanni, and present what they call false and misleading internal DEA reports to prove Bongiovanni had become a “double agent” to protect childhood friends they say had become drug-dealing criminals.

Key testimony will come from:

Lou Selva: A childhood friend of Bongiovanni’s, Selva testified at the first trial that he got into Michael Masecchia’s marijuana-growing operation by helping cultivate, harvest and transport the Southern Tier crops, and eventually grew marijuana in his home’s basement. More damaging to Bongiovanni’s defense, Selva testified he convinced the former federal agent to take the monthly $2,000 and then $4,000 month bribes to protect Masecchia and Serio as their drug-trafficking organization expanded between 2008 and 2017.

“I’ll have your back,” Bongiovanni told Selva, according to Tripi, when Selva broached the topic of protecting the marijuana traffickers.

“You’ll hear a lot about Lou Selva that should make you question what he says,” MacKay said, calling Selva undependable and hoping to improve the outcome of his own situation with prosecutors.

Ron Serio: He testified at the first trial that he financed the bribes. Before his arrest, Serio distributed thousands of pounds of marijuana and eventually cocaine and fentanyl pills across Western New York. The Amherst man found narcotics suppliers locally, in New York City, California and Vancouver, Canada. He bought marijuana from Masecchia, but as his operation grew, he went from being a customer of Masecchia’s to his partner. Serio said he paid at least $250,000 in bribes to Bongiovanni between 2010 and 2017 as a way to get names of anyone informing law enforcement officials about his drug-trafficking organization. Serio testified he never met Bongiovanni, by design.

Tripi described how the suspected scheme worked: Bongiovanni would meet with Selva, his best friend, once every month or so. They would exchange information that Selva would bring back to Masecchia. Then Serio would provide money to Masecchia, who would meet and provide the cash bribes to Bongiovanni.

“The defendant was protecting them from the inside,” Tripi told jurors.

MacKay said Serio was deeply addicted to drugs – taking 40 OxyContin pills a day – and facing drug and weapon charges when he talked about Bongiovanni with “hopes of bettering his position” with prosecutors, the defense attorney said.

Ex-DEA informant dies before he can testify as key witness in Bongiovanni retrial

Robert Kaiser: Unlike at the first trial, Kaiser won’t testify in person at the retrial. Kaiser died in May. Prosecutors intend to read to jurors his testimony from the first trial. Kaiser said he signed up as an informant for the DEA with Bongiovanni as his handler. Kaiser testified there was no limit to how much cocaine or marijuana he could have bought from Serio. But Kaiser testified Feb. 20 that nobody at the DEA asked him to provide incriminating information against Serio. Prosecutors view Kaiser’s testimony as bolstering their assertion that Bongiovanni feigned an investigation against Serio.

Bongiovanni knew how to manipulate confidential sources such as Kaiser to keep them from providing information to federal and local law enforcement agencies that would threaten those he was protecting, Tripi said.

“He, basically, put the informants on ice,” Tripi said.

Even worse, he revealed their identities to drug traffickers and told the traffickers to stay away from them, Tripi said.

After Amherst police arrested Kaiser, they turned him over to the DEA to help with what Amherst investigators thought would be an investigation into Serio’s drug trafficking.

Instead, “it was like serving the chicken to the wolf,” Tripi said.

Katrina Nigro: The role for Gerace’s ex-wife in the retrial may not be as crucial in the retrial, given that Vilardo acquitted Bongiovanni of accepting a bribe from Gerace. She testified to putting two envelopes stuffed with what she thought was cash into Bongiovanni’s hands at Gerace’s request. Even without the bribery charge, one of the conspiracy to defraud the U.S. counts involves Bongiovanni’s dealings with Gerace, so prosecutors could look to testimony from her as important for proving that count.

“She doesn’t know what’s in them,” MacKay said of the envelopes she previously testified giving to Bongiovanni.

Anthony Casullo: The retired DEA agent testified at the first trial about a contentious encounter he had with Bongiovanni. Casullo said Bongiovanni told him Gerace called him when a stripper overdosed at Pharaoh’s, and that Bongiovanni said, “I told him to get her out of there.” Prosecutors see that reported exchange as showing an improper relationship between Bongiovanni and Gerace. Then Bongiovanni asked Casullo “if I hated Italians,” Casullo testified. “He said we should be investigating Black people and Hispanics,” Casullo said, but noted Bongiovanni used derogatory epithets for them.

“He denied that ever happened,” MacKay said of Bongiovanni’s response to Casullo’s accusation. “He has it out for Mr. Bongiovanni.”

Tripi told jurors the Casullo’s testimony will show how Bongiovanni stifled investigations into Masecchia and Gerace.