The police in New York say that surveillance video shows murdered mob boss Frank Cali shaking hands with his killer moments before being shot dead outside his home.
Francesco “Franky Boy” Cali was gunned down outside his Staten Island home Wednesday, bringing to mind some of the most famous mob hits of yesteryear.
Police say the surveillance video shows the hit in full detail. The video reveals the 53-year-old crime boss heading out of his front door on March 13 when a pickup truck rams into his parked Cadillac Escalade.
The occupants of the pickup truck are then seen in a conversation with Cali, and the man who will shoot the mobster is seen shaking hands with his victim just before opening fire. Dermot Shea, chief of detectives, adds that the killer is seen handing Cali a license plate, which had broken off of the Cadillac, but as Cali turns his back on the man, the shooter quickly draws a pistol and opens fire.
The video also clears up one misconception police had early in the investigation: that Cali was run over.
The video shows Cali running from the gunfire and sliding underneath his car to try and hide from the killer. Police initially thought that the victim was run down as well as shot, but the video disabused them of the notion.
The killer fired 12 shots, police say, but Cali was hit only six times. That was enough to end his life as the mobster died on the scene from the wounds.
The relevant segment of the video ends with the killers fleeing and people inside Cali’s home exiting the building to view the shocking scene.
A police source says that the video proves it was a planned hit. “It’s not like they came out, started a fistfight,” the source told the New York Post. “The importance of that is — it’s almost as if proof of the concept that hitting the car was contrived.”
Cali becomes the first Mafia boss murdered in New York since Paul Castellano was gunned down outside Sparks Steak House in Midtown in 1985.
New York police now fear a brewing mob war due to Cali’s murder.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.
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