Aug 18, 2006 10:47 pm US/Eastern
Judge: Salvati-Limone Lawsuit Will Go On
Each Wrongfully Spent More Than 30 Yeas In Jail
BOSTON (CBS4) ―
A judge ruled Friday that civil claims against the federal government in the cases of four men exonerated in a 1965 gangland killing may go forward.
Joseph Salvati and Peter Limone each spent more than 30 years in prison for the murder of Edward "Teddy" Deegan. They were freed in 2001 after a state judge found that FBI agents hid wiretap tapes and other information from state prosecutors that would have cleared them to protect an FBI informant and former mafia hit man, Joseph "The Animal" Barboza.
Salvati and Limone and the families of Henry Tameleo and Louis Greco, who died in prison, have sued the government.
U.S. District Judge Nancy Gertner declined to dismiss the claims of Salvati and Limone, and some of those brought by the Tameleo and Greco families. She still is considering other claims by the Tameleo and Greco families.
In asking Gertner to dismiss the cases, the federal government said the FBI was under no obligation to share its evidence with state prosecutors.
"For all intents and purposes, everything is set in motion," Salvati's attorney, Victor Garo, said Friday. The trial is set for November.
A Justice Department attorney did not immediately return a telephone message after business hours on Friday.
In 2004 Gertner turned down another government bid to dismiss the lawsuits on grounds that the alleged FBI misconduct took place before 1974, at a time when civil lawsuits against the federal government were barred.
On Wednesday, government lawyers asked a to throw out several multi-million dollar lawsuits.
Salvati and Limone spent thirty years in prison for the murder. Five years ago, long hidden FBI documents proved, Salvati and Limone's innocence.
In 2001, a Middlesex Superior Court judge ruled FBI agents withheld evidence that might have proved Salvati and Limone's innocence and the state dropped the charges.
Salvati's attorney, Victor J. Garo said the FBI in 1968 helped mob hit man Joseph "The Animal" Barboza frame Salvati, and three others in the bureau's war on organized crime.
FBI files show the bureau knew that one of its criminal informants gave false testimony that convicted Salvati and three other men who had no connection to the crime.
"I say as an officer of the court, that we believe we have the evidence to show that the federal government supported perjury in the Deegan murder case," Garo said outside the court Wednesday.
In court Wednesday, a United States Assistant District Attorney argued an FBI agent did not instigate the prosecution of Salvati and Limone.
(© 2006 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. The Associated Press contributed to this report.)
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