Unfinished Justice: Inside the NYPD Cold Case Squad · Asterlight

The Mob Killings, Part 2

·31 min·10 clips

The episode begins with a warning about violent crimes and suicide ideation. Walter Mack is preparing for the trial of his life, and the case is built from overlapping investigations, hard evidence, and a tight sense of timing. The Westies are already in the picture. The team has tied them to the Mafia after the death of Irish gang leader Mickey Spillane, and the DeMeo-Cruz link to the auto crime case has given prosecutors another route into a wider killing spree. Mack carries the pressure with calm discipline. He is a federal prosecutor and a Vietnam veteran, and the episode uses that background to show how much control a sprawling trial like this requires. The witnesses matter most. Dominic and Vito testify about murders and their own involvement, and the questions they face are detailed enough to make the room feel like a working case file instead of a staged performance. Detective Harry Brady remembers Dominic's testimony clearly. He says Dominic was prepared, knew where the questioning was headed, and could talk about the life in his own words because he had lived it. The courtroom still has its own menace. Paul Castellano sits through the proceedings with a calm that borders on unnerving, while Nino Gadgi shows open contempt for cooperation and makes the room feel smaller. The danger stays real. The episode keeps returning to the idea that rats get killed in the street, which is why the prosecution's goal is not just conviction but protection for the people willing to talk. The case starts to look winnable. Walter and his team think they may be on track for multiple convictions under the RICO Act, and the show lets that confidence build before undercutting it. Then the momentum breaks. A call to turn on the TV interrupts the forward motion, and the episode closes with the sense that the story has not finished revealing what this trial will become.

As heard by us

A courtroom chapter where cooperation, surveillance, and RICO pressure the Mafia from inside the case.

Walter Mack's effort to bring down the Gambino crime family gives the episode its spine. The 1985 prosecution ties together the Westies, the DeMeo-Cruz auto crime case, and federal RICO strategy, while keeping the courtroom pressure front and center.

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Why you'd press play

If you want a 1985 federal Mafia trial where cooperation can decide who lives, press play.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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