Trial begins for deputy accused of leaking secrets

Prosecutors accused a deputy U.S. marshal of committing "a criminal betrayal of trust" as his trial on charges of leaking secrets to the mob began Monday, but his lawyer said he merely went too far in boasting about his job.

John T. Ambrose, 42, whose birthday was Sunday, sat expressionless as Assistant U.S. Attorney T. Markus Funk accused him of stealing secrets provided to prosecutors by the only so-called made member of the Chicago Outfit ever to switch sides.

"A criminal betrayal of trust -- that's what this case is about," Funk said. Ambrose not only took information from a secret file "he knew was going back to an organized crime figure" but lied about it when federal officials confronted him, he said.

Ambrose had access to the file because he was assigned to guard the life of Nicholas Calabrese -- the star witness in the government's landmark Operation Family Secrets investigation which ultimately sent three major bosses to prison for life.

There is no allegation that Ambrose jeopardized Calabrese physically. But prosecutors say the information in the secret file was valuable to organized crime.

The file was kept at a "safe site" maintained by the Justice Department's ultrasecret WITSEC -- for witness security -- program established to protect witnesses from mobsters, terrorists and others who might want to silence them with violence.

Ambrose is accused of accessing the file while working the graveyard shift at the safe site while Calabrese visited Chicago to be questioned by prosecutors.

He then allegedly passed the information to William Guide -- a former police officer who went to prison in a corruption case and later opened a pizza parlor.

Federal officials realized something was wrong when alleged mob figures James and Michael Marcello mentioned they had a mole within federal law enforcement. The conversation was secretly taped in the visiting room at a federal prison in Milan, Mich., when Michael Marcello visited his inmate brother.

They said the mole was the son of a police officer who had gone to prison as a member of the Marquette 10 -- officers convicted of corruption in the early 1980s. Both Ambrose's father and Guide went to prison in the Marquette case.

Funk stressed that Ambrose is not accused of being part of the mob. But he said passing the information on what Calabrese had told FBI agents and federal prosecutors would effectively deliver it to the mob and Ambrose knew that.

Defense attorney Francis Lipuma scoffed at that. Ambrose was proud of his job as a deputy marshal guarding a key witness and wanted to tell Guide, who became like a father to him after he left prison, he said.

"He was boasting about what he had done," Lipuma said.

"Neither Nick Calabrese nor any of his family were ever harmed, no agents were ever harmed," Lipuma told the jury.

The so-called WITSEC file contained information about Tony "The Ant" Spilotro, the Chicago mob's one-time man in Las Vegas and the prototype for the Joe Pesce character in the movie "Casino." He and his brother Michael were later murdered and buried in an Indiana cornfield.

Also mentioned in the file were reputed mob bosses John "No Nose" DiFronzo and Anthony Zizzo, who drove away from his west suburban home in August 2006 never to be seen again. Lawmen say they suspect he was murdered but no body has ever been found