Co-defendant plays blame game in body-parts trial

Besides the gruesome details of bodies being chopped up for profit, the September body-parts trial of three Philadelphia funeral-home operators is expected to include finger-pointing by one of the co-defendants against the two others.

Defense attorney Glenn Zeitz, who represents operator James McCafferty, 38, said in court yesterday that any illegal harvesting of body parts at Liberty Cremation Inc., in Kensington, had been "done without his [McCafferty's] knowledge and approval."

"What was done there was done by the co-defendants," Zeitz said. "I'm going to have to point the finger at the co-defendants."

The co-defendants - brothers Gerald Garzone, 48, and Louis Garzone, 65 - owned two-thirds of Liberty Cremation, Zeitz said, while his client, with one-third interest, had "no controlling interest" and had "tried to pull out unsuccessfully" from the business.

Zeitz yesterday tried to sever his client's trial from the Garzones' in Common Pleas Court.

As reported in the Daily News yesterday, Michael Mastromarino, 44, the owner of now-defunct Biomedical Tissue Services of Fort Lee, N.J., and the alleged mastermind of the multimillion-dollar scam to harvest diseased body parts of 244 Philadelphians, is expected to enter an open guilty plea here after he is sentenced in Brooklyn on May 21.

Assistant District Attorney Bruce Sagel said in court yesterday that he expects to ask the judge to sentence Mastromarino on the two leading charges of operating a corrupt organization and conspiracy. Prosecutors, therefore, will not expect him to plead guilty on all 1,725 counts, some of which will be merged or dropped.

Arguing against Zeitz's motion to sever, Sagel said that McCafferty and the Garzone brothers had been partners "not just in crime, but in cremation. . . . They sent the bodies together; they recovered the money together."

Sagel also contended that McCafferty wanted to get out of Liberty Cremation "because he wasn't getting enough money. . . . He wanted to get more money!"

Judge Glenn Bronson denied Zeitz's motion to sever, saying that the finger-pointing argument was not enough to require a severance at trial.

Sagel also asked the judge to order the Garzones and McCafferty, who are out on bail, to surrender their passports. Sagel acknowledged that there was no indication they would not show up for trial, but it's "better to be safe than sorry."

McCafferty told the judge he does not own a passport. The Garzone brothers agreed to surrender theirs to their lawyers.

The judge made clear he "will try them in absentia" if they flee.

Mastromarino's top "cutter," Lee Cruceta, has already pleaded guilty here and in New York.

The body-parts scandal shocked the nation and those who had loved ones' bodies handled by Liberty Cremation or Garzone Funeral Home Inc.

Agnes Folger, who was in court yesterday, said afterward that she believes that the body parts of her husband Joseph Folger, had been stolen by the Garzones. Joseph Folger, a World War II veteran, died in 2004 at age 81.

"It haunts me every day of my life," she said. "I can't take it." *