NY- Long Island’s self-proclaimed “law and order judge” found himself on the other side of the law yesterday – charged with peddling stolen diamonds and laundering $130,000 in cash for the Genovese crime family.
Federal prosecutors said David Gross, 43, was caught red-handed in an FBI sting, and detailed the Nassau County judge’s downfall in shocking detail in a 71-page affidavit unsealed in federal court in Central Islip.
“It boils the blood and chills the spine to see a sitting judge in the midst of a mob-directed money-laundering conspiracy,” said Assistant FBI Director Mark Mershon.
The feds said Gross, a Democrat who is running for reelection, was a big fish hooked unexpectedly in a probe of illegal L.I. gambling.
Sporting gavel cufflinks, Gross declined comment after his arraignment on charges of conspiring to launder money and receive and dispose of stolen merchandise. He was released on $500,000 bond and has been suspended from the bench, a state court spokesman said.
If convicted, he could get up to 20 years in prison.
Elected to district court in 1999, Gross handled civil and criminal cases, including the arraignment last Sunday of a 26-year-old man charged in the brutal murder of his doctor father.
Recently, Gross self-published a book called, “If the Robes Fit … A View from the Bench,” where he writes in the introduction: “My first year on the district court bench confirms what I suspected when I was a lawyer – you don’t have to be a genius to be a good judge.”
On his campaign Web site, he poses next to Sen. Hillary Clinton and calls himself the “law and order judge.” There is no mention of a 2000 incident when he made headlines for showering nude in public.
Authorities first learned of his criminal associations from a reputed Genovese soldier, Nicholas (Beaver) Gruttadauria, who told an undercover FBI agent that he had dined with “the judge” at mobbed-up Parkside Restaurant in Corona, Queens.
Later, Gruttadauria introduced the agent to Gross in a bugged suite at the posh Garden City Hotel, where the agent offered the judge a finder’s fee to help move some hot rocks.
According to FBI agent Thomas Holmes, Gross readily offered the services of a crony named “Jesse the Jeweler.”
He also suggested laundering the illicit proceeds from the gem sales through the owner of a Freeport, L.I., seafood restaurant, who would fake invoices for catered fund-raising parties.
“Who’s to say otherwise? That’s an easy wash,” Gross allegedly said.
Gruttadauria, 62, and 13 others were ordered held without bail on money laundering and gambling charges.
