Former Bonanno crime family associate Hector Pagan took stand as the governments key witness against mafia wannabes Richard Riccardi and Luigi Grasso. Riccardi and Grasso are on trial for the murder of James Donovan a check cashier during a 2010 robbery of an auto body shop. Pagan has already admitted to being part of the robbery and firing the fatal shots that killed Donovan and is now testifying as part of his deal with the government. The ex-husband of “Mob Wives” star Renee Graziano was believed to have turned rat back in 2011 agreeing to wear a wire secretly recording conversations with his former father-in-law and Bonanno family capo Anthony Graziano among other family leaders.
“Hector Pagan”
During his testimony in Brooklyn Federal Court on Tuesday Pagan revealed that he has actually became a government witness all the way back in 2006. He said that he cut a deal back then with the government to take the focus off of him and he also pocketed $15,000 in exchange for the information he supplied. It is unclear as to what kind of information he supplied the feds with about the Bonanno family those five years before agreeing to wear a wire against his father-in-law and others in 2011. But his cooperation is once again paying dividens as he testifies in the present murder case in which he was the shooter.
If found guilty of their parts in the robbery and murder that netted them each $50,000 dollars Grasso and Riccardi are both facing life in prison.
