George Di Benedetto – “George of All Trades”

Di Benedetto's underworld career came to an abrupt end at the end of a blade.

George Di Benedetto was born in 1927 and resided at 44 Milton Street in Islip in Suffolk County. Di Benedetto started his criminal career by the mid-1940s.

By 1966, he was identified as a Bonanno Family “associate” later “allied” with Colombo Family soldier Frank (The Bug) Sciortino in a children’s charity racket operated on Long Island.

George Di Benedetto

Starting in 1967, Sciortino, Di Benedetto, and Nathan Plotkin took over the operation of the defunct Children's Center Rehabilitation Fund. They maintained the newly regenerated charity fund in the Leeds Building based at 215 Deer Park Avenue in Babylon.

Plotkin was put up as the "beard" or "frontman" because both Sciortino and Di Benedetto had extensive criminal records.

Sciortino, who lived in Massapequa at the time, was the owner of the Star Carting Co., a rubbish removal firm in Brooklyn.

He also held a hidden interest in the popular Chateaubriand Restaurant in New Hyde Park and was well-known as a notorious mob figure on Long Island.

Sciortino had a previous record for possession of a gun, felony assault, and grand larceny. He had been awaiting trial in Bridgeport, Connecticut for felonious assault and attempted murder, and in Nassau for attempted extortion and coercion.

Frank Sciortino

Di Benedetto had a record dating back to 1943 for possession of dangerous weapons, bribery, assault, and the sale of narcotics for which he served a federal jail sentence.

Dangerous Weapons and Fireworks

In 1969, both Di Benedetto and Sciortino were arrested after an early morning raid by detectives of the intelligence unit working in cooperation with rackets squad officers.

The searches of their homes produced 6 loaded handguns and 50 crates of fireworks. Sciortino was charged with felony possession of dangerous weapons; Di Benedetto was charged with possession of fireworks.

Children's Charity Fund

In 1970, Di Benedetto, Sciortino, and Plotkin were finally arrested after having been indicted by a Suffolk County grand jury for the mob-linked Children's Charity Fund after repeated complaints to the Suffolk County District Attorney started an investigation into this long-running fraud scheme.

All three suspects were charged with three felony counts of grand larceny, promoting gambling, and falsifying business records.

They were charged with an additional 48 counts of misdemeanors, conspiracy, possession of gambling records, and petty larceny. They faced a maximum of 60 years of jail time each.

Suffolk DA Aspland and Rackets Squad commander Saverio Fierro said they believed that the suspects were about to expand the charity fraud into a nationwide scam "but I think we hit them in sufficient time to cripple them," he said.

The scam worked by placing hundreds of collection boxes in various stores, bars, and restaurants, and selling 50 cent and $1 tickets for a nonexistent raffle which reportedly had the potential to yield the winner $75,000.

They had printed 12,500 chance books and had distributed 3,000 plastic containers for donations. People buying chances were promised prizes of a car, a color television set, and other items, but a raffle was never actually held.

All three were convicted of the scam. Sciortino was sentenced to nine months in the Suffolk County jail. He could have received a maximum of one year on his plea.

Plotkin was placed on probation for five years and was fined $1000. He could have received a maximum of 44 years in jail. He was convicted on a felony charge of falsifying business records and 39 additional misdemeanor counts of petty larceny and conspiracy.

At the End of a Blade

Di Benedetto had a police record of seven arrests for policy, bribery, sale of heroin, assault, grand larceny, and scheming to defraud.

He was convicted of selling heroin (three years in federal prison), a reduced charge of bribery conspiracy, and scheming to defraud for the charity racket (two years).

Di Benedetto's underworld career came to an abrupt end at the end of a blade.

George Di Benedetto – “George of All Trades”

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George Di Benedetto – “George of All Trades”

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