Greg Scarpa Jr. Interview ~ Part 1

(upbeat music) ♪ Later days, later days ♪ ♪ Later days, later ♪ - Hi everyone, welcome to later days, I'm Joe Paletto. Gregory Scarpa Jr. was the son of the notorious hitman, Gregory Scarpa. Greg Scarpa Jr. succeeded his father as Capo in the Colombo family after his father contracted HIV/AIDS, following a contaminated blood transfusion in 1986. Scarpa Jr. was sentenced to 40 years in prison for racketeering, and he was recently granted a compassionate release after serving 33 years. - Hey, how are you? - Okay, fine, nice to meet you, and I wanna thank you for everything. - I appreciate you taking the time. - I know it's been an interesting few days for you and Larry, right? - Yes. - Tiring, I'm sure. It must be nice kind of having some time and kind of getting settled a little bit, I might imagine. - Yes, definitely. - Yeah, we had a good couple of days, and it felt good about it, you know? - It's always very delicate. I mean, kind of going back, you've been away for 30 years, right? So, the world has changed, and that's one of the things that I was really interested to know you were in solitary for how many years? - Well, I was in solitary, you know, when the new case came, I was first, I had an earlier case that I was sentenced to 20 years all the year, and I was getting out like 11 years, eight months, and it was almost up, and without even making it out to the street, they indicted me again. They were all from me, all kinds of crates, which, you know, I actually should have took it, you know, even though it was like another 20 something years and they wanted to give me, but I went to trial, I lost them, they gave me 40 years, okay, on top of what I already did. So, and once I did that, lost it, well, fighting that case, I was doing four years in solitary right there before that was over. So, finally, it was over, and I said, okay, but then they sent me right to the Supermax in Colorado, which I had to do now another 12 years over there before I got out. They told me there are a Colorado thing, it's an 18 month program or a three year program, you're probably gonna be a three year program, but when the three years, they just kept me there, and I asked them about it, and they said, well, we're looking into it, another three years passed, and another three years, it was just ridiculous, and I was there for 12, so between the four and the 12, I'm in 16. - You were 16 in solitary? - Yeah. - How do you deal with that? How do you get through the day? - In Colorado, what they did was they had a small, black and white TV that would a couple of channels that really weren't interesting, you know what I mean? And you will look at that a little bit, but what I did was I ended up just saying, well, I'm gonna make this work for me. I'm looking at three years, so I'm thinking that it's coming each time, then I started looking at it, I'm just gonna make this work for me, and I just started watching that I don't eat too much, and I started working out, working out. And I gotta be honest, which I got like an ox in there. I was doing like, I don't know if you know what burpees are. - Squats? - Right, they're like squat thrush, you know, you go down and jump up, right? I was doing 500 and pump and twice, which makes a thousand push ups. I was, you know, I was really, really in good shape, you know? And a matter of fact, there was so much work that one time, I saw somebody staring at me, just as I was finished, he was looking through the door. There's like a Saudi port, you're really in deep. And annoying me that this guy staring at me, whoever he was, and I said, you know, I said, what the fuck are you looking at? I told him like that, you know? So he goes, all right, Greg, and he waved, and I did why I had to recognize him, it was the warden. I said, oh, I said, oh, warden, you know, you have your regular clothes and I don't receive one as soon. I apologize, I told him, you know? But yeah, it was all right. You know, like I said, I got in shape and, you know, I only had 13 minutes a month on the phone that they allowed me. - That's it? - That was it, and that was horrible. You know, I got four kids, my mom, you know what I mean? So it was rough, you know? - Yeah. - That was your day, so you have very limited amount of phone time every month, and then like your day is what? How much in the cell do you get any free time in like fresh air? - Yeah, the only fresh air they give you is before the sun come up. Before the sun come up, they take that for about 40 minutes in a cage, like a dog, you know what I'm saying? And you don't see no sun and nothing like that, you know? - Or anybody else, you're going days and days and days, you're not even talking, right? - Outside that 40 minutes, they have other cages that you could talk to, you know what I mean? But you got it? That's how I was able to actually correspond with Terry Nichols there, that Oklahoma city bomb there. - Right, he was in the Super Max as well. - Right, right. - I think Sammy was in the Super Max too for a time, wasn't he? - Just for a little time, he was there. They brought him up there, he might have been up there for, geez, maybe I would say a couple of months. - You didn't have any interaction with Sammy at that time, did you? - Yes, I did. Matter of fact, they moved him, who passed me, I thought it was him, I heard it was him, and then we talked a little bit. And what they did for some reason though, they brought me to, not as like besides solitary there, there's a solitary solitary and they moved me off of that and they put me into a place where I didn't see nobody talking to nobody, it's me, what happened over here? Sammy also thought me, maybe because of me, they moved them, you know what I'm saying? But you know, they played those kind of games. - Right. When you're having that much time to yourself, what are you thinking about? Are you thinking about everything I would imagine? - Yeah, you're mind you just, you know, you sit there. You know, I thought about my kids all the time, you know, I'm hoping that they're okay. My mom's getting old, you know, you know, you're doing a lot of thinking and, but then you're trying to get off there and just going to work it out and, you know, just wait for the next meal, try and make something out of it. It was rough, but you'll be surprised what your body can endure. You can endure a lot if you just keep your head, yeah. - I mean, you were essentially going in three-year increments, right? I mean, that kind of was keeping you going. - Right. - You know, so the three years and another three, then another three and it just kind of never stopped. - It never stopped, it never stopped. And then what happened was, you know, I get lucky, so to speak, I guess, well, I did. I got lucky, because I was writing the judge that I need some kind of help, you know, a lawyer. And I don't have the money for a lawyer, you know? And I had a clear blue after about, I don't know how many years, but I end up getting a letter that I have an attorney now to get in touch with her. And her name was Georgia Heind. She just was just fantastic. You know, we were picking heat on the BOP and everything else. And what they did was, they said, listen, we're gonna give him, we could give him an interstate compact deal. And all these federal prisons don't want him, okay? They don't want him, because, you know, I got into a problem with this. Vicki Mousseau was a boss of the Lucaisie crime family. I actually, you know, beat him up bad, okay? And what happened was, being him, being the boss of another family and me being in the Columbus, they were afraid that there's gonna be like wars in the prison and all that kind of stuff. And anytime they heard my name, they said, no, we don't want him. We don't want him. So they were telling me, listen, nobody wants you. What are you doing? So I said, well, send me home, that nobody wants me, you know? So they thought it was a joke, you know? But listen, we could give you an interstate compact deal. Okay, what is that? - Yeah, what is that? - Yeah, so what they said is that you could leave over here and we could send you to a state prison, okay? If you go to a state prison, we can't tell you, we don't know where they're gonna accept you and where you're gonna go. Do you want this deal? I said, anything to get out of there. Joe said, I said, yeah, I want it, okay? And before you know it, they made some moves and the word was getting around them leaving. And I said, wow, I can't believe this, you know? I got out of there and they sent me to Iowa State Prison. When I went in there, Joe, don't forget now, the supermax, you don't see no dirt, no green grass, nothing. It's all cement, even in your cell, the desks, cement, stool, cement, your bed, cement, everything. And outside the same way. Now I go to this Iowa State Prison, Joe, when I went outside, okay? There's this big ball field, everything green grass, it was a bench I sat down and I watched them playing ball. I saw a handball court, a tennis court. I saw a basketball court and I said, wow, I thought for a minute, I was free. I'm looking around, I said, wow, you know? But I got a little fast, you know? I realized I'm still in prison, you know what I'm saying? But there was great getting out of there. And then I got back into, I was able to use the phone more, eat better, exercise better, you know, playing ball and stuff like that, and pastime, most of the time was playing handball, that's a big thing. If you were playing handball in prison, that's a number one thing that's important. You know, playing handball, you know? Is there handball tournaments in prison? I mean, is there like a number one player in? Yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah. And you know, the thing is my age, I had the mold talking to himself because being in New York, Joe, I played handball outside as a kid, you know what I'm saying? Now I'm going there, it was just a matter of coming back to me, it's like riding a bike, and I was beaten these 20-year-old, 25-year-old, 30-years-old, this is how can this be possible? And I got to see if I could find it. I also got like printouts of, you know, the prison newspaper saying like about me playing handball at my age, you know, and stuff, and what I'm doing, you know? How old were you at that point? At that point, I was in my 60s, beaten these 25-year-old, 28-year-old kids. Yeah, and after 30 years, compassion, at release, how old are you now when you got out? You've been out a few months. Right, when I got out, I was 68, 69 years old. I'm 70 now, so I'm out of here. You lose track, I might imagine, because there's no calendar, right? I mean, you kind of. Yeah, well, they do, you know, they have like education classes, they've got different programs that you can belong and they'll have a calendar in there. Yeah, you can buy a calendar in commissary. But if you're in solitary for all of those years, or what, you know, 16 years, I mean, you're pretty much in its cement and it's no light, you really don't know the day, the year, you know? Absolutely, yeah, and yeah, that was rough, like I said, you know, when I would miss my kids birthdays, and you know, they would feel bad, and, you know, that was another thing too, right? I'd write a lot of letters, you know, I'd write a lot of letters, that kept me going, you know, when I get letters back from my kids and stuff like that, that was great, you know, I forgot. Yeah, yeah. They had a shower in the room. I couldn't even go out and, like, go out to, you know, for a walk and get a shower in the room. Which one's in bed? I mean, you know, at least like a workout and a sweat and then hop in the shower right there, you know? But everything ran on the floor next to the bed. It's all cement. All cement, all cement, yeah. But then the shower was in the corner. It was stainless steel. Yeah, that was the only thing that was stainless steel. But the mistake that they did make Joe in this, I don't know how many millions that this had a cost to make this prison dead. Nobody 11 is eight, okay? And the millions, what a mistake they make. I'm gonna tell you the mistake they make. The drains like in the sink. So you see your little drain, it's got about four holes in it. You press the button, the water goes down. Now, the mistake they make is we find out that get the toilet paper, you know, the cardboard in the middle of the toilet paper. You take that cardboard out, you put it on the holes and push in all the water goes move. And I'm now able to talk to my neighbor, guy downstairs. He does the same thing. And we had like a, our own little phone, okay? But they ended up finding out about that. So they're listening, you know, and they would come by, what are you doing, you know, and stuff when we'd have to stop, you know, but we're able to talk a little bit to each other, you know, when we came because we just blow out the water and laugh at them, so to speak, you know what I mean? Like, look at these dopes. You know, wow, somebody figured out that you can actually blow out the water through the sinks with the, yeah, the toilet paper roll, right? And you'd be able to talk to somebody. I mean, how did that conversation start? Like hello, who's there? - Yeah, it was me. Yeah, yeah, you just go, you know, who's this? Number four, or whatever, yeah, yeah, it's me. How you doing? Okay, good, how you been feeling, you know, whatever it was, you know what I'm saying? And look who's working tonight. We got a headache with this guy, you know, and all that kind of stuff. It also worked in the shower. Okay, the shower had the drain. You needed the bigger roll. You used to left the paper on it, you put it on in, blow it out, and you're able to talk to maybe four or five or other different guys. - So you just blow the water out of the drain and you be able to get this? - It's amazing, it was amazing. That they did, that this was supposed to be so, you know, and here we are able to correspond a little bit, you know what I mean? - No, yeah, exactly, don't kind of keep you going. - Yeah, yeah. A lot of time reflecting about the old days. Did you relive a lot of stuff? - Oh, yeah, for sure, for sure. Yeah, you relive a lot, had remorse on a lot, and also, you know, what are you gonna do? That was the life, you know what I'm saying? That's what it was all about. This is what I was brought into, you know what I mean? And, you know, I got to say, be honest, I enjoyed. But of course, the next one I got there was very luxurious. All the women, the cause, I mean, you know, did you say, wow, as a young kid, I'm seeing all this, the older guys enjoying laughing, playing cards and never working. So, you know, I kind of got hooked in there. And my father brought me around right from the start as I was 16 years old. He brought you in at 16, brought me in at 16, and not only that, he told me about, you know, I know you know, you read it in your newspapers, you know, because they used to put the newspapers and stand down. And it was one of these papers that they find out everything they used to put Gregory Scop, who lives on Marsha Place. He's a lieutenant in the Colombo crime family, you don't listen to that. So, I kind of, you know, as a young kid, you know, everybody reading it. I, you know, my sister would bother a little bit, you know, I could remember. But I kind of ate it up a little, you know what I'm saying? You were out of school at 16, you were done? Well, it was just about that time that my father got to be honest with me. He was a little strict with school. Okay, because he wanted me to go to school and, and not there. But he also taught me how to fight and, you know, protect myself if needed. You know, he was good with that, okay? And what happened was the one day, I mean, there was a lot of fights after school back then, guys used to fight, and all that kind of stuff. You know, who's tougher and, you know, and what happened was one day, I was having a fight after school. And there was a whole bunch of people watching, you know, kids watching from the school to see who's the tougher and who's going to win. And, you know, I used to win a lot. I was good for, like I said, I was taught since I was young, had a fight, okay? So how old are you right now in this, for this, right now, I'm like 15 years old. Okay, okay, I want to fight. And what happens is, fighting this kid, he was tough. You know, I used to fight in the ring also. And this kid was fighting, we were fighting. And he ends up catching me with a good shot right here in the head, and it blew right up. Like, I had like a golf ball right here on my head, right? And I'll be right there. Yeah. And I kind of felt like I might lose this fight because he hit me good, okay? And what happened was I get lucky because the cops ended up coming, okay? So the fight was broken up, everybody leaves, okay? Now I go home. My sister's home, she would go down the basement, it's a finished basement. It's just the guy's ice, and this, and she's patting my head. We don't want my mom to save my mom. She'll go, sure enough, she comes walking downstairs, and she blows her top. You're in trouble again, but waiting till your father comes home, you know, just down there. So my father comes home. He looks at me, and he had a face on him, he says, and he says, I saw him look right at my head. He goes, what happened? I said, yeah, you know, I got into a fight that, and the guy called me with a good shot. He says, good shot, look at your head. So I says, yeah, he hit me good, he called me good. I said, you know, he didn't win, it was broken up by the cops, you know? He says, well, you listen to me. I couldn't believe he said this. You listen to me now, I had a, this is really bothering me. I said, dad, it was a fight. He said, listen to me, and listen to me clear. I'll never forget this. He says, tomorrow morning, you go to school. The minute you see this guy, I don't care if you're in school. I don't care if you're in the principal's office. I don't care where he is. If you don't put him in the hospital, don't come home. I said, well, my God, that was unbelievable, you know, I said, all right. That's what I did. I came in the morning before we went into school and I ended up sending to the hospital. You know, I told him, I said, we'll meet after school and we'll do it again. So he says, no, no, he said, I think I proved the point. You know, you don't prove nothing, you know, you didn't, you didn't prove nothing. We'll meet again. He said, no, I'm not going to meet you again. I said, then we're going to do it here, okay? And then I hit him and like my father insisted, don't come home. If I don't put him in the hospital, I put him in the hospital. And, you know, he was happy about that, you know what I mean? And I got kicked out of school and that's when he started taking me into Brooklyn, you know. You grew up on Staten Island, but your dad did business in Brooklyn or did you grow up in Brooklyn? Well, no, I was in Brooklyn until the third grade of the Island of an age that is the third grade, you know, I was a kid and then we, at that time, my mom and my family, because I was always, as I was growing up, I wanted to live in the country. You know, Staten Island was like the country back then. And I thought it was the country at that age, you know. There was dirt roads, you had to think of ferry to get there, never mind the bridge, okay? So my mom found this old big, big house out there that she was going to fix up. And that's where we moved, like the third grade I was out there in Staten Island. So I actually Staten Island is where I was raised out there and my father and your right was used to every day going to Brooklyn. And back at night, we'd have dinner together at night, you know. And you know, that was it. You know, I mean, he was at that age, he was teaching me a lot playing ball, you know, my father was my world at that time, you know, I mean, he was my world. I'd go to Lillie, every chance he'd get, he'd come to see me. But we were shooting at that young age when I was in Lillie, I'd tell you how. I used to play well positions, he made me a good ball player. And now I also told me how to pitch, okay, you know, I'm thinking about baseball, you pitch short. Yeah, yeah. I played baseball as well. Okay. Good. So what happens is this day I'm pitching and he told me to curve ball and knock the ball and little change up and all that stuff, right? So anyway, he hears I'm pitching, he makes his way up to the scorer's booth, which is on top of home plate, looking down over the field. So I'm out there pitching and you say, you keep looking up to me. I'm going to tell you what to, what to throw. You know, he just had to do his thing, you know, so I look up and he would go curve, curve ball. You know, I throw that curve and the guy missed it and I'd be all, you know, we started doing team of work back then, we were teaming up, you know. He was guiding you through the, the little league pitching sequences because he had to be a part of it. Yeah, he was manipulating or he was, he was controlling whatever situation it was, even a little league game. Even little league game. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Really something. When you were around the dinner table, are you talking to your siblings? I mean, you would read about your dad in the local newspaper. Yeah. What kind of conversations did you have with your siblings about your dad? I mean, right. My little brother, but he's only about three years younger than me, but he was small and really had no conversation about that. He didn't even know about what was in the newspaper, but my sister, who is a couple of years older, she, she heard about it, people told her and she read it and she almost was crying, you know, she came to me, she says, Greg, you know, Daddy's singing, Daddy's Mafia, Daddy's Mafia. And now, you know, at that time, like since he was teaching me at a fight and I love my father and I says, well, Daddy's Mafia, I know that's Mafia is one big powerful thing that I heard, you know, and I step, don't worry, no, no, Daddy's, you know, that's true, that's Debbie. If he is, don't worry about it, it's a good thing. People are going to walk away from us, don't worry about it, we've got none to worry about if he's Mafia. If he ain't don't, you know, oh, I don't know, Greg, listen to me, Deb, don't worry about it. That was the only conversation, you know, that we more or less had, you know, but I would ask him questions and he'd have this little smirk on, but not in front of my sister or anybody, just with me, you know, and then I got to be honest with you, you know, they would be out of something like that. I would have to go into my pops room, bedroom, you know, I'd be looking through the closet and mainly what I found in there was holsters for door hats, you know, all this kind of stuff. And I said, wow, you know, I also found badges and stuff, so I was all confused. Also, what happened, it used to happen was that he would come home with like a whole crew of guys, like five guys that I all knew, you know, one was my, he confirmed me, confirmation was my godfather, okay, him and, you know, like a few other guys, they'd come in with duffel bags, emptied on the table and out would come out all kinds of gold diamonds, single diamonds, watches, everything, okay, and I'd be looking, I was young, you know, and I'd be looking and, you know, and my father would look at me, he says, "Greg, do you listen to me? If anybody asks you what your father does for a living, you tell him I'm a jeweler, here it is." So, okay, that, you know, and, and with that, you know, there'd be certain things out. I was young, I grabbed a, a little bowl of diamonds, I went into corner and I was looking at them, right? And they would, they would say, "Where's this cup, you know, just that and everything?" And my mother was saying, "What are you missing? What happens is this Johnny, a Johnny sapon arrow, you know, he, that's that, my godfather's older brother," he says, he said, "There, there's over there, your son is playing with the diamonds, he says, "Coney, that was my mother, it goes, "Coney, listen to me, he says, your son is going to be like us, he's going to be bad." My mother says, "Don't you, dad, don't start, this kid is going to be a doctor or a lawyer, you just leave him alone, you know, yeah, sure enough, like I said, when I go into Brooklyn as I got all the, after the incident, the fighting takes me into Brooklyn, you know, the funny thing is, who I meet in Brooklyn right off the bat is, we're going on 86 feet, I'm going to show you who my boss is. So I say, "Oh, you know, I'm thinking he, I said, I thought you were the boss." Right? So he goes, he says, "No, he says Greg, you got to remember one thing, everybody has a boss." I say, "All right, yeah, he says, matter of fact, that's them going across the street now, and he says, you see the guy with the head on, the little guy says, "Yeah, he says, that's Joe Colombo." I says, "Really?" That's, you know, he used to read the Colombo family, you know, and he was, he had this desk in a, in a cantaloupe, but real estate office, you know, he had his own desk over there for a front. That's where we went in, me and my father, it was on my birthday. You met Joe Colombo on your birthday? On my birthday, yeah, my 16th birthday. So when I walk in with my father, my father says, "Yo, this is my son, Greg, he's birthday today." "Oh, yeah, good, you know, and I was fighting at the time too, you know, in the ring." He says, "Oh, it's nice to meet you there, Junior." He says, "And I want you to know one thing." He says, "I did see you fight a little bit." He says, "You know, in the ring, me and a few friends and everything." He says, "You're good." He says, "But I saw you take a lot of hard shots on the head." He says, "Well, you know, it's part of the fight, you know, I'm a little shy with him, you know." And he says, "Yeah, he says, but he said, "I just want you to know." He says, "There's a lot of easier ways to make money than getting hit on the head." So my father left, he left. And he says, "Here, and I want you to have this, you gave me 500 bucks. This is in the 60s." That was, you know. So, yeah, you know, so when I looked at it, my father says, "Greg," he says, "Give that back to him." I'm starting to give it back to him. Jokos, no, no, no, you keep that. My father's a Greg. Now, here I am in the mirror. My father's saying, "Give it back to him." He's telling me to keep it, okay? So, and I'm starting to give it back again and he says, "Hold it, hold it." He says, "And he tells my father, he says, "Greg, I'm not going to say it again, but who's the boss over here?" So he says, "I, since you put it that way, Jokos," he says, "Put the money in your pocket, Greg." And there it was, you know what I mean? Now, I'm going to 13th Avenue and stuff like that, next day, I know I'm 17 years old. I got a driver's head, I got a license, I got a brand new Cadillac, a 17. Well, no, a 17, I got a brand new Corvette, which was my first one. He bought it for me, my father. My brand new Corvette, which, you know, the Corvette Jotere, at that time, Joe, they were only like 5,500. Right. I think I wish we would have bought 10 of them, but who, you know, and after that was a year old, traded in for like all the other guys at Cadillac, you know what I mean? And you started dressing like everybody else, I might imagine. But that's it, exact dressing like everybody else, and, you know, I had a girlfriend, you know, and I think he was trying to keep that away from me. I loved the girl. She was beautiful, okay? The name was dying in and I ended up marrying her, you know, at that age, I ended up like, you know, with the money that I was making, I was able to get her a $20,000 engagement ring. Right. Huge back then. It's huge now. I mean, that's a lot of money, period. Right. Yeah. You know, I married her and things didn't work out, but I had two kids with her. Went on from there. You know, watching these guys with the girls and stuff like that was a dance problem, where she was seeing when we'd go out, all my father's friends, him with different girls, other than their wives, saying, and she's thinking, well, if they're all doing it, he's going to do it. You know, I'm saying that's one of those things, so that was problems right there, you know. Joining us next time will be Larry Mazza, a key member of the Scarpa crew, Larry and Greg have not seen each other in over 30 years. Thank you for listening. Later days is an Astrolite production, produced by Joe Paletto and Carl Dürflur, engineered by Carl Dürflur, production director David Gross, production managers, Michelle Garimoni and Kelsey Kupich.