The Barrel Mystery

by William J. Flynn

Another arrest followed that of Ortonello. It was that of Francesco Orlando, who was also a candidate against Vella. Orlando was tried and sentenced to a term of fifteen years, which he served and is now out. Needless to say that Orlando's sympathies and activities are not directed toward any movement favorable to the Morello crowd.

The trial of Ortonello shows the methods of the Mafia—methods that the Lupo-Morello gang would transplant to this country in the conduct of the trials of our courts of their criminal brethren if it could be done by them. Morello's powerful friends brought it about so that the two attorneys for Ortonello deserted him at the moment the case was to go to trial so that the unfortunate Ortonello was forced to take a young lawyer who knew little of the details of the case and who was not sufficiently versed in the practice of courts.

But worse still, the two attorneys that deserted Ortonello on the eve of his trial had all along advised him that his innocence was so evident that no jury would ever convict him. It was not, therefore, the attorneys told Ortonello, necessary to go to any great pains to prove his innocence. The value of this advice to the Mafia crowd may be brought out more strongly when I tell you that both of these attorneys were betraying Ortonello and keeping Morello's friend Streva, the powerful young leader of the Mafia, informed of every move of Ortonello. They advised Ortonello not to bring out any evidence that would be injurious to Streva or Morello. It would not be necessary to do this to prove his innocence, the two attorneys told Ortonello.

In vain Antonio Caronia testified in Ortonello's behalf that he had seen Morello hide the gun in the pile of rubbish at the river's edge shortly after the shooting took place. To offset this testimony of Caronia's, the Morello crowd worked upon the police and had the gun spirited away. Later on, it may be added here, the police official who was responsible for the hiding of this gun at the time of Ortonello's trial, was dismissed from the service for his conduct.

In vain did Ortonello's attorney bring out evidence that the bullet extracted from Vella's body was much larger than the caliber of the gun found in Ortonello's home. Testimony was admitted at the trial to offset this. A Mafia henchman was produced who declared that the bullet had been made larger because of hitting a bone in Vella's body and thus flattening the missile.

In vain was it shown that a grocery wagon had been placed in front of Ortonello's door more than an hour before the shooting and that this wagon had to be removed before the carabineers could get admittance to Ortonello's house when they went after him to bring him to the house of the dying chief. In vain was it brought out at the trial that Ortonello was in bed when the carabineers entered his room to take him into custody. In vain was it shown that he could not have got into the house or out of it while a grocery wagon was backed up to his door an hour previous to the time of the shooting and was still there when the carabineers arrived to arrest him. In vain was it shown that this grocery wagon had been drawn up in front of Ortonello's door by the groceryman next door who had come from Palermo that night with a large amount of groceries, and when the mail stage was to pass, and because the street was narrow, the groceryman backed the wagon up to the door and left it there until he could unload his goods.

In vain did the groceryman testify that he was unloading his wagon when the shot was fired, that he did not leave his wagon from then until the carabineers arrived, and that Ortonello had not entered the house nor come from it during that period. In vain was testimony given that the grocery wagon, being backed up to the door, prevented Ortonello from either coming out of the house or entering it.

In order to contradict the testimony of the grocer and three others who corroborated him concerning the wagon, friends of Vella went to a prostitute who lived in the rear of Ortonello's house and paid her money to testify that she had seen Ortonello after the shooting climb a rope and enter the rear window of this house. The window was forty feet from the ground. This woman is now dead, but before her demise she told the truth and declared that she had perjured herself for the money given her by the commander of the carabineers. This man was very bitter against Ortonello because he believed at the time that Ortonello had murdered his friend Vella.

To no avail was the testimony of an expert shoe-maker who showed the court that the footprints examined in the spot where Morello was seen hiding by the Di Puma woman, just prior to the shooting, were not the footprints of Ortonello nor of Orlando.

As further proof of the unfair trial suffered by Ortonello let me relate that the commander of the carabineers was so convinced of Ortonello's guilt, and so determined to prove a strong case against the unfortunate Ortonello that the commander went to the house of Biaggia Milone and frightened her by threats into testifying that she had seen Ortonello and Orlando do the shooting, that she had seen this from the window of her home, and that she had seen the two surveying the ground on the previous Sunday. This is the Milone woman whose cousin operated the grocery store in East Ninety-seventh Street, which was the headquarters distributing plant for the Lupo-Morello counterfeit money.