Post by Mathius Young

On this day, June 4, 1994, American capo & hitman for the Colombo crime family, & FBI informant, nicknamed The Grim Reaper & The Mad Hatter, Gregory Scarpa Sr., died in prison, from complications of the AIDS Virus. During the 1970s & 1980s, Scarpa was the chief enforcer & a veteran hitman for Colombo boss Carmine Persico. He was sentenced to life in prison in 1993 for murder. Scarpa committed 3 murders in 1991, & is suspected to have committed a minimum of 80 murders from the early 1950s to 1992. The FBI believe he murdered 100 to 120 people. Scarpa was a stylish dresser, who often carried $5k in his pocket for purchases & bribes. Scarps owned homes in Brooklyn & Staten Island, Las Vegas, Nevada, & Singer Island, Florida, but often used an apartment in Manhattan’s Sutton Place. A career criminal, Scarpa became a caporegime in the Colombo family, where he was involved in illegal gambling, loansharking, extortion, hijacking, counterfeit credit cards, assault, stock & bond thefts, narcotics, & murder. Many of the highest-ranking members of the Colombo family today were members of Scarpa's crew. In March 1962, Scarpa was arrested for armed robbery. To avoid prosecution, Scarpa agreed to work as an undercover informant for the FBI, beginning a 30-year relationship with the agency.