Mob enforcer Vince "Big Vince" Filipelli sentenced to 66 months in prison

A federal judge described mob enforcer Vince "Big Vince" Filipelli as a "money maker for an organization that has a history of violence," before sentencing him to 66 months in prison yesterday on an extortion charge.

U.S. District Court Judge Noel Hillman imposed the sentence following a three-hour hearing in federal court in Camden, during which Filipelli said he accepted responsibility for what he had done.

"I know what I did was wrong," the former professional bodybuilder said. "There's nobody to blame here but me."

Filipelli, 54, of Cherry Hill, pleaded guilty to the extortion charge in April after he was taped threatening to put a deadbeat gambler "in the hospital" if he did not come up with $13,000 he allegedly owed to a mob gambling operation.

The gambler was, in fact, a state police undercover investigator wearing a body wire.

The hearing yesterday was the fourth extended proceeding before Hillman, who throughout the process sought detailed explanations from the defense and prosecution on virtually every issue raised in the case.

In an impassioned argument, Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven D'Aguanno asked Hillman to sentence Filipelli at the high end of the sentencing guideline range of 57 to 71 months that applied in the case.

D'Aguanno, who has been involved in the prosecution of several prominent Philadelphia-South Jersey mobsters, including jailed mob boss Joseph "Skinny Joey" Merlino and several of his top associates, said Filipelli's actions epitomized the "above-the-law" attitude typical of organized crime figures.

"They think that they are their own little government. . . . That none of the laws apply to them," said the prosecutor, who urged Hillman to send a message to other mobsters by sentencing Filipelli to substantial jail time.

Filipelli has been identified as a "made" member of the Philadelphia mob and boasted about that on one of the tapes made in the extortion investigation.

In the 1990s, he served as a bodyguard and enforcer for mob boss John Stanfa. Arrested in 1994 along with Stanfa and 22 others, Filipelli pleaded guilty to a racketeering extortion charge two years later and was sentenced to 54 months in prison.

During a series of hearings before Hillman, and again yesterday, defense attorney Donald Manno argued that while his client had a history of involvement with the mob, the current case was not an organized crime extortion.

The tapes on which Filipelli threatened the state police undercover investigator and boasted that he was a member of the mob, Manno said, were an example of his client's "loud mouth, puffing, making himself into something he is not."

During a confrontation in the parking lot of a South Philadelphia strip club in which he first confronted the man he thought was a deadbeat gambler, Filipelli told him, "This ain't

The Sopranos

, this is real f-in' life."

In his comments to Hillman before sentencing, Filipelli said, "This was not an organized-crime case. This was me, Vincent Filipelli, trying to make money from gambling."

Filipelli still faces state charges in connection with the investigation.

The New Jersey State Police brought the FBI into the probe after Filipelli traveled from Cherry Hill to Philadelphia - across state lines - to confront the undercover agent.

At the time of his arrest in October 2006, Filipelli also was charged by state authorities with bookmaking and with drug and weapons offenses related to steroids and a stun gun found in his home.

Those charges are pending.