The History of the FICA Landfill (II). Mid-1977 to the summer of 1978: Mafia affiliations surface
June 29, 2010 by admin
On the left, mobster “Matty the Horse” was affiliated with the FICA landfill. On the right, operations at the landfill cease when the Health Department steps in.
By mid-July of 1977, a temporary injunction against further dumping at the Van Wagner Road property was finally granted. A few weeks later it was discovered that portions of the firm were owned by Matthew Ianniello—or “Matty the Horse”— a major crime figure in New York City, and by Benjamin Cohen, a close associate of Ianniello’s. Joseph Fiorillo’s brothers were also said to own a part of the business. His brother Vincent was sentenced to jail for lying to a grand jury about his relationship to another organized crime family. Within a month after the injunction, at least two contempt of court actions were filed by the Dutchess County Health Department. Despite the orders, more than 110,000ft3 of garbage was illegally placed at the site in the following months.
To complicate matters, in 1978, New York State adopted a new Environmental Conservation Law. Landfill firms no longer had to have the official approval of the Health Department; a complete landfill-operating permit application was enough to continue operations. Since Dutchess Sanitation had submitted a permit application, the firm was allowed to resume dumping. Faced with this new obstacle, the Health Department decided to try another route. They launched an in-depth examination of the site, which led to the discovery that much of the garbage had been dumped at the property in violation of health codes. The Department then took matters into their own hands; a guard was placed at the property 24 hours a day to prevent any dumping. In the summer of 1978, though, a state justice again overruled the Health Department. The justice decided that the Van Wagner landfill should remain open until the state made an official decision on the firm’s pending application.
Information from: Metal Contamination and Distribution in Casper Creek Poughkeepsie, New York. Chromium Concentrations Near the FICA Landfill. Elizabeth L. Belk, Dept. of Geology, Vassar College, 1995.
Kipp, Dennis. “Trash overflow closes town landfill after years of complaints, lawsuits.” The Poughkeepsie Journal 26 June 1983: D1.
Lubasch, Arnold H. “New York Sues Reputed Mobster to Force Cleanup of Landfill.” The New York Times 6 Oct. 1987.
Photo credit: http://electronicenglish.org/jpegs/ggg/mattythehorse.jpg