The Ridgewood Blog Brings a Free Market Laissez-faire Point of View to Local, New Jersey State and National Issues.
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Jersey City NJ, the FBI found no evidence of missing Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa during a search of land under a New Jersey bridge, a spokeswoman said Thursday.
Continue reading FBI Says No Evidence of Jimmy Hoffa Buried Under New Jersey Bridge
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Ridgewood NJ, Back in March, the Ridgewood blog reported that Melissa Gorga of RHONJ opened up a second location for her aptly named shop , “Envy” in the Village of Ridgewood . Ridgewood is being billed by marketers as “a quaint Bergen County town, where many future housewives could possibly hail from“.
Continue reading Ridgewood and “Real” Housewives Mix at Melissa Gorga aptly named shop , “Envy”
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Saddle River Nj, It was the early 80’s and local NJ con man Thomas Giacomaro was pulling in $300,000 a week selling cocaine.
If a customer was late paying a drug debt, Giacomaro and his crew had creative ways of making him pay.
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Saddle River NJ, If you want to be the “king” of all con men, you have to start young.
So instructs local author Thomas Giacomaro, who penned his lauded memoir, The King of Con: How a Smooth-Talking Jersey Boy Made and Lost Billions, Baffled the FBI, Eluded the Mob, and Lived to Tell the Crooked Tale, in 2018.
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Saddle River NJ, Well, it was twenty years ago today…when a bunch of FBI guys got hit in the head with a million bucks, falling from the New Jersey sky.
Until that moment, April 2002 had been going okay for NJ con master, Thomas Giacomaro, author of the 2018 memoir The King of Con: How a Smooth-Talking Jersey Boy Made and Lost Billions, Baffled the FBI, Eluded the Mob, and Lived to Tell the Crooked Tale.
True, he was doing 18 months for embezzlement at Fort Dix prison, just south of Trenton. But it was easy time in a low-security prison. And he was such a clean, neat inmate…he was a shoo-in to get out by Christmas.
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Saddle River NJ, Notorious NJ con artist and mob-associate, Thomas Giacomaro, refused to become a mafioso “made man” in the early Eighties. Why, you ask?
He didn’t want to kiss the ring.
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Saddle River NJ, Childhood memories of spring are usually happy and bright: Icicles dripping, chocolate Easter bunnies, putting your sneakers on after a long, Jersey winter.
For local anti-hero, Thomas Giacomaro, spring reminds him of the day he saw his father almost kill two men.
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Saddle River NJ, Was Will Smith having a mental breakdown when he assaulted Chris Rock at the Oscars on Sunday night? Was he on drugs?
I’ve heard both theories—and more. But Denzel Washington has the one Smith likes best because it takes the blame off him.
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Saddle River NJ, in honor of last night’s Academy Awards—and actor Will Smith’s unhinged outburst—local bad-boy-turned good, Thomas Giacomaro, tells us his nickname was once “the Italian Hannibal Lecter.”
The Anthony Hopkins drama, The Silence of the Lambs, swept the Oscars exactly 30 years ago winning five main categories—Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Actress, Best Director, and Best Screenplay.
A decade later, Giacomaro—who penned his 2018 memoir The King of Con: How a Smooth-Talking Jersey Boy Made and Lost Billions, Baffled the FBI, Eluded the Mob, and Lived to Tell the Crooked Tale, earned the moniker—in prison.
Continue reading AND THE OSCAR FOR BEST PSYCHO PERFORMANCE GOES TO…
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Saddle River NJ, If you try to Google-map it, the house is shrouded in shrubbery and leafy Northern Red Oak.
But it’s still there, the 8,000 square-foot mansion on Fox Hedge Road in Saddle River, NJ—a potential upcoming shooting location this fall for the upcoming docuseries, The King of Con, and former home of local legend, Thomas Giacomaro.
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Saddle River NJ, Last week’s episode of The Walking Dead had pizza purists yelling molto bene when the show delivered a reprimand to ignorant Pizza Hut eaters: Never, ever, put pineapple on a pizza.
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Saddle River NJ, The colorful bloom of spring always reminds New Jersey businessman Thomas Giacomaro of his first enchanted meeting with celebrated mystery novelist, Mary Higgins Clark.
Continue reading MARY HIGGINS CLARK: “HE’LL MAKE ME RICH AND FAMOUS!”
This month marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Francis Ford Coppola’s Academy Award-winning masterpiece, The Godfather
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Saddle River NJ, this month marks the 50th anniversary of the release of Francis Ford Coppola’s Academy Award-winning masterpiece, The Godfather.
One-time NJ con artist and Genovese associate, Thomas Giacomaro, will never forget seeing the film for the first time as a teen and being spellbound.
“I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen,” he recalls. “The Cadillacs, the suitcases filled with money, the guys beaten up by the docks, the guns, the corrupt union bosses…”
He’d already seen it all in real life.
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East Rutherford NJ, It’s no wonder the American Dream megamall—dubbed “the ugliest building in the world,” by ex-Gov Chris Christie—is down in the dumps.
The 3 million-square-foot eyesore and retail fiasco is situated where the old NJ Meadowlands dump used to boil and fester fifty years ago. And for those of you who have a nose for remembering, the stinging odor of that swamp on Route 20 in East Rutherford still lingers.
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Ridgewood NJ, Former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie had scolding words last Sunday for his one-time ally and friend, Donald Trump.
“He actually told the truth by accident,” Christie said on ABC’s This Week, “he wanted the election to be overturned.”
Christie’s no stranger to liars and conmen. He came face to face with the best almost 20 years ago.
Continue reading CHRIS CHRISTIE AND HIS EXTRAORDINARY CON MEN
