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Gerardo “Jerry” Antoniello, 29, was fatally shot in the head during a violent home invasion, while his father, Bartolomeo “Romeo” Antoniello, 61, suffered a brutal pistol-whipping. The incident occurred on September 9, 2009, in Ozone Park, Queens.
Jerry later died at the hospital, as members of the New York City Police Department gathered evidence in the bloody aftermath of the attack.
“It was a horrendous, violent scene,” recalled Keith Welz, who was serving as a detective with the NYPD’s Queens Homicide Squad at the time. He described it in an episode of New York Homicide titled “Blood Runs Blue,” which airs new episodes on Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen. “It was a mess.”
This case held particular significance for New York’s Finest. Carmine Antoniello, Jerry’s brother, was a police officer with the 106th Precinct in Queens during this tragic event.
“The NYPD does feel like one big family,” said Denis Broderick, a detective with the NYPD Queens Homicide Squad. “When something happens to one of us, you feel it.”
Who were Gerardo “Jerry” Antoniello and Bartolomeo “Romeo” Antoniello?
Jerry was a maintenance supervisor at a school, where he was well-liked by co-workers. “He loved life,” said his brother Carmine. “He wanted to find himself a serious girlfriend and start a family.”
Romeo met his wife, Gaetana, in Italy in 1970. They came to New York, where he found his own slice of the American dream. He had a home, three sons, and a pizza restaurant called Romeo’s that he’d run for decades in Queens.
Romeo had just come home from the pizzeria when two young men in masks ambushed him and demanded money. “My father was carrying $300, proceeds from the pizzeria, and he threw the money at the people,” said Carmine. “They didn’t even bother to take it.”
The perpetrators beat Romeo with guns. Jerry tried to intervene and protect his father. He was attacked so brutally that his teeth were knocked out and he collapsed on the floor. Then the gunman fired the shot that ended up later killing Jerry.
Police seek a motive to the brutal murder
“Mrs. Antoniello remembered hearing one of the individuals say, ‘This is what you get,’ and shot Jerry in the back of the head,” Broderick said. Investigators had a lot to consider, like whether the murder could be tied to his brother Carmine being a cop, as payback for an earlier police bust.
Detectives tested that theory by reviewing Carmine’s cases and interviewing people connected to them. “It didn’t seem that this had anything to do with Carmine’s profession,” Broderick said.
Investigators considered the fact that the pizzeria was a cash-based business. “During his interview, Romeo stated that he felt like he was maybe being followed,” said David Moser, a detective with the NYPD’s Queens Homicide Squad.
“Maybe somebody saw Romeo counting money in his pizzeria and… committed the home invasion,” Jerry’s friend Michael Catalano said on New York Homicide.
Could the slaying have been an inside job? With assistance from Romeo’s son, Angelo Antoniello, detectives compiled a list of pizzeria employees and interviewed them.
This line of investigation turned out to be a dead end, according to investigators. “The employees love working there,” said Broderick. “They love the guy.”
Police uncover a pattern of push-in thefts in Queens
Detectives learned that before the Antoniello homicide, there had been four push-in robberies in Ozone Park in eight months. “It was young Black men pushing into older white men’s houses,” said Welz.
Victims included a garbage man, a salesman, and a landscaper. Investigators discovered that there was another direct tie to the Antoniello case. One of the other push-in victims was Romeo’s cousin.
“My father didn’t know that his cousin had been attacked prior to my brother Jerry being killed,” Carmine said. “We found out from the detectives.”
Detectives had a crime scene unit reprocess the cousin’s house, where a hair was collected from a stairway. The evidence was processed through CODIS, a criminal database, and a match was found.
Suspects and a mob connection emerge
The individual was brought in for questioning and agreed to become an informant. “He subsequently entered into a plea agreement with the district attorney’s office, and he was able to provide us with more information,” Moser said.
The witness admitted that he was part of a robbery ring. He told investigators that he was hired to do the home invasion of the landscaper and that he knew who was behind Jerry’s murder.
The source identified two individuals by their street names. Police determined them to be Jason Burrell, a felon on parole, and Rashod Cowan. Romeo’s cousin identified Burrell in a photo array as one of the robbers at his residence.
Burrell was charged with the home invasion. Cowan was also arrested. Burrell told police that a man he knew only as “The Boss” hired him and provided him with a home invasion kit — a bag with masks and duct tape.
When The Boss included guns for the Antoniello robbery, Burrell wanted out of the job. He subcontracted the robbery to two other men he knew by their street nicknames.
A social club’s card game comes into focus
Investigators pushed to identify the boss. “Burrell tells investigators that the boss was part of a card game, and this card game takes place at a social club with individuals with mob ties,” retired homicide prosecutor Jarrett J. Ferentino told New York Homicide.
Burrell claimed that the boss went to these card games to find out who had money. That’s how Romeo and his cousin were targeted for cash.
Detectives determined the boss was Francis LaCorte, 29, an associate of the Gambino crime family. With that knowledge in hand, investigators methodically built their case before making an arrest.
“There’s surveillance video of Burrell and LaCorte in and around the time of the homicide,” Welz said. The footage showed a bag — presumably the robbery kit with guns — being transferred.
More arrests made in Antoniello case
Incriminating phone records tying Burrell, Cowan and LaCorte to push-in robberies were collected. “It was blatant what they were texting,” said Broderick. But there were no messages between LaCorte and the shooters.
On May 17, 2011, Burrell and Cowan pleaded guilty to robbery charges in the Antoniello case and agreed to testify against LaCorte.
LaCorte was arrested and charged with 22 counts, including Jerry’s murder. On March 29, 2012, LaCorte pleaded not guilty to all charges. At his trial, he was found guilty on 13 charges, including murder. LaCorte was sentenced to 50 years to life.
Through dogged detective work, investigators determined the identities of the shooters to be Leon Whitfield and Antoine Burroughs.
Upon their arrests, both suspects pleaded guilty to robbery. “Whitfield gave very, very terse descriptions of what happened with very little detail,” said former Assistant U.S. Attorney Rachel Maimin.
Burroughs admitted he shot and killed Jerry, but claimed it was an accident. “But you don’t bring a loaded gun to an armed home invasion without realizing someone can be murdered,” said Maimin.
On December 16, 2015, Whitfield and Burroughs were sentenced to nearly 34 years in prison. By that time, Romeo had died from cancer.
“My father was diagnosed with cancer before Jerry was killed,” said Carmine. “His oncologist had said that he had made a turn for the better, but after witnessing my brother being killed in front of him, he lost his will to survive.”
To learn more about the case, watch the “Blood Runs Blue” episode of New York Homicide. New episodes of the show air on Saturdays at 9/8c p.m. on Oxygen.
