BUFFALO, N.Y. — As they prepare to retry former DEA agent Joseph Bongiovanni on charges that he accepted bribes to protect drug dealers, federal prosecutors have filed a motion opposing a request by Bongiovanni's lawyers that their client be relieved from wearing an ankle bracelet.
They are also now accusing Bongiovanni of trying to intimidate a key witness against him.
As a condition of his continued release Bongiovanni has been required to wear the ankle bracelet to monitor his whereabouts.
His lawyers want a judge to order the probation department to switch to an another form of monitoring, claiming the ankle bracelet is now aggravating a medical condition.
They say Bongiovanni was treated with cancer drugs which, according to his lawyers, have caused his legs to swell, resulting in the ankle bracelet is purportedly now causing abrasions.
While his doctors suggested Bongiovanni don compression socks to keep the swelling down, the socks would interfere with operation of the ankle bracelet.
Bongiovanni's lawyers are requesting to have him instead be monitored through an app on his phone, called Smartlink, where he would also have to submit a photo of himself and his location.
However, federal prosecutors say this would only allow probation officers to monitor Bongiovanni on a periodic, rather than consistent, basis, which they claim is important as they are now advising the court, that they are "looking into acts of suspected retaliation against at least one witness who testified against Bongiovanni in his first trial."
In court papers prosecutors contend further that the ankle bracelet, "functions as a powerful deterrent against the kinds of tampering and retaliation that the government is especially concerned about here ... while the Smartlink system cannot"
They specifically mention Anthony Casullo, Bongiovanni's former partner at the DEA, who claimed Bongiovanni dissuaded him from investigating Peter Gerace. Gerace, a co defendant who will be tried separately, owns Pharaoh's gentlemen's club and is accused of drug and sex trafficking. The government accuses Bongiovanni of taking bribes from Gerace in exchange for looking the other way.
As 2 On Your Side reported during the first trial, Casullo claimed Bongiovanni made remarks to him outside the courtroom during one day of his testimony, which the government refers to in its papers as "harassment in response to testimony."
"Considering Mr. Bongiovanni's past efforts to intimidate government witness Anthony Casullo and the current investigation into a suspected act of witness retaliation, this court should not remove the ankle bracelet that deters Mr. Bongiovanni from tampering with, or retaliating against, witnesses," prosecutors said.
Bongiovanni's lawyers say their client has consistently demonstrated throughout the course of the now five-year-old case against him that he poses no risk of flight.
The government counters, however, that since Bongiovanni was convicted of two charges at his first trial, for which he awaits sentencing, he should be considered a flight risk now.
In court papers they referred once again to alleged mob ties, saying Bongiovanni enjoys "connections to resource rich associates of organized crime," which is something Bongiovanni and his lawyers have staunchly denied.
After jurors were unable to reach a verdict on most of the charges against Bongiovanni, including the most serious of the 15 he was indicted on, a second trail is now scheduled to begin on July 29.