By MICHELE McPHEE
New York Daily News Police Bureau Chief

What's worse: Jail or death?

That's the question William Cutolo Jr. pondered one June night in 1999 as he sat in his car outside alleged Colombo crime family boss Alphonse (Allie Boy) Persico's Brooklyn home, contemplating murder.

William Cutolo Jr.

Weeks earlier, Cutolo's father, Colombo capo William (Wild Bill) Cutolo, had vanished. Billy Jr. was sure Persico had a hand in the disappearance.

Like a mobster Hamlet, Cutolo struggled with whether to follow his rage and take the life of the man he believed had destroyed his family. But then he looked at a picture of his wife and son, and drove away.

He decided there was a better way to get back at Persico: put on a wire and put Allie Boy behind bars.

William (Wild Bill) Cutolo with sister Barbara DePalo.

"My father always wished death on someone before jail, so I used that mentality. Jail is worse than death," Cutolo said last week as he told his story, calling from somewhere in the United States where he, his wife and their son, William Cutolo 3rd, are in the federal witness protection program.

"It's the easiest thing to jump out of this car and go clip him," Cutolo, 30, told the Daily News. "What is that going to do? I get no closure.

"I weighed the pros and cons and figured the right way, the honest way, would be to do what I did," he said. "I could have killed him right there."

Alphonse Persico.

Cutolo's call to The News -- a violation of his cooperation agreement with federal prosecutors -- followed revelations that his aunt placed an In Memoriam notice in the paper last month that was a virtual horse's head in the bed aimed at her mob-turncoat nephew.

"My beloved brother," Barbara DePalo's notice read. "I'm sorry your family took the easy way out. Especially the Pansey on his crusade. I promise to take care of him just as you would."

The "Pansey," DePalo told The News in a story in Friday's editions, was her "rat" nephew, who committed the ultimate violation of La Cosa Nostra's code by cooperating with the feds.

But Cutolo countered that his aunt is "a kook" who was lashing out at him because her family has scattered around the country since he turned against the mob.

"My aunt has a venom in her. She can't stand me because I decided to help in the investigation, and there is no family for her," Cutolo said. "I don't think anyone who is halfway normal would not wonder if I did the right thing or the wrong."

'Heard From Your Pops?'

His decision was sparked by what happened on Wednesday, May 26, 1999, when he said his father was lured to a "gangster meeting" in a park at 92nd St. and Shore Road, in the shadow of the Verrazano Bridge.

He was never seen again.

The hours after the mysterious meeting were particularly unnerving for Cutolo, because on Wednesdays, the son and his "Pops" had a routine.

They would get haircuts at Bruno's Barbershop in Bensonhurst, then head to his father's Dyker Heights hangout, the Friendly Bocce Club, for dinner with "the boys," Cutolo said.

Every get-together was the same, he said. The men would sit around a 15-foot wooden table to eat, drink and play cards.

But there was one rule that was never broken at the club. No one ate a morsel without the elder Cutolo taking his place at the head of the table and saying grace.

"I would sit at my father's right-hand side, with 20 to 30 guys having dinner, playing cards," Cutolo said. "Ordinarily, no one would dare sit down and touch the food until my father said grace. He was a firm believer in stuff like that."

In the hours after Wild Bill Cutolo was last seen, his son desperately tried to reach him, beeping him with a private code: a phone number followed by "08." So, by the time he entered the club at 7:30 p.m., his heart was racing.

Then, alleged Colombo underboss John (Jackie) DeRoss -- who had sat at the table and begun to eat before the "macaroni had dropped" -- asked Cutolo a question that sent a shiver down his spine.

"Have you heard from your Pops?" Cutolo remembered De- Ross said.

"The minute he asked me that, I had chills come up my back," Cutolo said. "I knew my father wasn't coming back.

"I had no idea what the next step was. My whole life basically revolved around my father, and not having him was like losing my right hand," Cutolo said. "I didn't want to be around the people I felt were responsible for my father's death."

'Payback' Time

Three weeks later, FBI agent Gary Pontecorvo and NYPD Detective Tommy Dades taped a recording device to the young wiseguy's chest. They sent him into Mafia haunts to talk business with alleged gangsters, to try to ferret out his father's killer -- an undercover initiative Cutolo dubbed "Operation Payback."

Each recording Cutolo made started the same: "This is for you, Dad."

The information Cutolo gathered during 17 months helped the government snare more than a dozen Colombo gangsters, including Persico, who pleaded guilty to racketeering charges and is facing 13 years in prison. DeRoss was found guilty of extortion and is awaiting sentencing.

No one was charged in the murder, but Cutolo believes Persico had it "out for [my] father" since the Colombo wars of the early 1990s, which left more than a dozen gangsters dead and landed nearly 50 others behind bars.

During the internal struggle, Wild Bill Cutolo sided with Victor (Little Vic) Orena, who was feuding with Persico's father, Carmine, for control of the family.

Alphonse Persico's attorney, Barry Levin, could not be reached for comment yesterday.

Unburied Pain

"I loved him so much," Cutolo said of his father. "During the war, I willingly would have risked my life for him. I'm his son. I didn't want to let him down again.

"My aunt said my father is rolling in his grave," he said. "Well, if my aunt knows where his grave is, she should let me know so I can go bury him. I promised I would not rest until I found him. Dogs, cats, rabbits, birds -- they all get buried. I won't give up until they find my father."

In the meantime, Cutolo said, his life has been destroyed. His mother and sisters refuse to speak to him, and DePalo's message calling him Pansey just made things worse.

"In their eyes, they still feel that I am wrong. I made them have to pick up and leave," Cutolo said. "My life has been hell since the minute I lost my father, and it hasn't let up yet."

Original Publication Date: 6/10/02