 | The New York City bus system had a problem when mechanics found a GPS tracker during routine maintenance in Nov 2016. The Staten Island depot was evacuated and explosives experts were called in to make sure it wasn’t a small bomb. The undercarriage of every bus in the five boroughs was searched for similar devices using mirrors on metal poles. The tracker came from an unlikely source, Colombo capo Joseph Amato Sr. who had reported it lost. Amato had been keeping tabs on his girlfriend by secretly sticking the GPS on her car. |  Joey Amato |
 Philip Lombardo and Dominick Ricigliano were charged. | The capo sent the woman emails bragging about his influence and power on Staten Island. One said, “This is my island. Not yours. I have the eyes all over.” In another, Amato — who in 1995 was convicted in the shooting of a 15-year-old witness, boasted that “I’m called a MAN’S MAN!!!” Events eventually snared 20 people — including 11 members and associates of the Colombo crime family. They were busted on charges including racketeering, loansharking and extortion. |  Wiretaps on the phones of Amato, his son Joseph Amato Jr. and Colombo soldier Thomas Scorcia resulted in “thousands of intercepted phone calls and text messages.” |
