Boston mob boss resurfaces in Memphis as pastor

MEMPHIS — Memphis loves a good prodigal son story. But the faith community here seldom encounters an account quite as gripping — quite as foreboding — as the testimonial of mob boss-turned-minister Robert "Bobby'' Luisi Jr.

"I was involved between Philadelphia and Boston in at least a half a dozen murders,'' says Luisi, who has used the name Alonso Esposito since entering a federal witness-protection program three years ago.

From an easy chair in his modest Cordova ranch home, the 55-year-old ex-mobster looks more like a benign uncle — broad shoulders and a slight paunch with clipped, black hair graying at the temples — than a man who once cleared $40,000 a week trafficking cocaine.

Esposito has been much sought-after by the local news media since The Boston Globe identified him last week as a one-time Mafia crime boss who may know something about the 1990 infamous heist of $500 million of artwork, including three Rembrandts, from a Boston museum.

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He's resurfaced in Memphis as a charismatic preacher, head of Alonso Esposito Ministries.

"The only way I had to fight this thing was the name of Jesus,'' Esposito says in this thick Boston accent, reflective of his days growing up in Little Italy in that city's boisterous North End. "I seen the power of his name.''

As cars whip past his quiet cul-de-sac and his German shepherd Sampson yaps out back, he tells his story and why he decided to so publicly come out from behind the veil of government protection. He had no ties to Memphis, other than his long affection for Elvis Presley, he says, moving here at the FBI's direction.

"I can't talk about that,'' he says flatly.

Still, there's plenty he will talk about. For one, he's not afraid of any reprisals.

"I have to follow my faith and what the Lord wants me to do,'' he said. "I'm going to tell you I can never hurt anybody again. I have too much love in my heart. I'm ashamed of the things that I've done. I hurt people in the past. I'm a man. I'll always defend myself and my family first. But I'm not worried about anybody.

"See you got to understand something — I never ratted on anybody. No one seems to understand that. Except for that Rico Ponzo, I didn't rat on anybody. So I want you to express that: I'm not a rat and I didn't rat on anybody.''

His story starts in 1973, when, at age 12, he got his first job as a runner for the Patriarca crime family, collecting coins from illegal gambling machines in the organization's various "social clubs.'' He tried to find legitimate work as a young adult, but saw the lure of other men his age, in their early 20s, driving Cadillacs. He eventually got into cocaine trafficking and survived a gang war in 1993.

"I had to pick a side and get involved. I just started coming up and building up my cocaine business. I'd say by '95 or around that time I was already a millionaire.''

That same year his mob-connected father, Robert Luisi Sr., and his brother, Roman, were murdered along with two others in a Boston restaurant. That, in a way, was the start of Esposito's spiritual journey. He says he saw them both after the shooting in a vision as he tried to nap one day in his son Robbie's room. He talks of the experience in the draft of a book he's writing called From Capo to Christian — The Life of Robert. C. Luisi Jr.:

"When they reached the foot of Robbie's bed they both sat and began staring at me with blank expressions on their faces. As they both stared at me through the glass panels of the door I began staring back, wondering why they were here in my house. Just then my father spoke several words to me, saying,

"He has chains for you."

By now, I was sitting up on the couch staring at both my unwelcomed guests, not knowing what to do next I shouted,

"The both of you get out of my house — NOW!"

Esposito says he realizes his tale sounds strange. He wasn't hallucinating, he insists.

"I have a gift to see the spiritual. I've had it since I was a kid. This is why I was able to see my father,'' he said.

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Still, he wasn't done with crime — not yet. As The Globe reports, his attempt to become a "made man'' in New England was blocked, so he hooked up with a Philadelphia organization that made him a capo, or boss, in 1998 and allowed him to run his cocaine business from Boston "in exchange for tribute.''

The arrangement led to his arrest and eventual conviction for cocaine distribution. According to federal court records in Boston, he was sentenced to 188 months. On his way to prison he had another overpowering vision.

"So that night I went from a die-hard gangster, murderer, drug dealer, extortionist, anything that you could think of, to accepting Christ,'' he said. "Now, you could call it, say he hallucinated or this or that, but I'm going to tell you: A haunting went on all the way into prison with me. Straight as an arrow.''

He testified about the experience at his 2002 trial like this: "It was an awakening. I realized my lifestyle was wrong."

Sorting out Esposito's past as Robert Luisi is difficult. The Globe reported he confessed to ordering the 1997 murder of a rival, but he said this week his proffer to prosecutors involved admitting a part in as many as six murders.

Liz McCarthy, spokeswoman for the U.S. Attorney's Office in Boston, said the office has no comment.

Esposito testified against racketeer Enrico "Rico" Ponzo, who two years ago was sentenced to 28 years in prison, Though Esposito said he had once planned to kill Ponzo, he said his testimony only laid a foundation for Ponzo's business dealings and didn't involve specific incriminating information.

Esposito said the FBI recently expressed renewed interest in the 1990 art theft at Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. He said he told agents an associate had once told him the paintings were beneath the concrete slab of a home in Florida, but that he knew little else.

"I really couldn't help them.''

Since his release from prison, Esposito has lived quietly in Memphis, working for a time for a cabinet maker, getting married and exploring his faith. He is active in a local church, Faith Keepers Ministries, has self-published a book, The Last Generation, that examines his views of Christianity, and has his own website, alonsoesposito.com, where he discusses his faith and ministry.

"I think it's all very sincere,'' said Larry Easton, former pastor of an interdenominational church in Boston who knew Esposito years ago and recently rekindled their friendship. Easton said Esposito first came to him inquiring about faith back in the '90s when he was still in the mob but wasn't ready then to commit. "He was very conflicted. His father was deeply involved in the mob and he idolized him.''

Esposito says he realizes some people will dismiss his conversion as a fraud, but it doesn't bother him.

"That old me is dead. I love being Alonso Esposito. Bobby Luisi's dead and buried. The blood of Christ washed the blood off my hands.''

Follow Marc Perrusquia on Twitter: @MarcPerrusquia