Self-proclaimed mob boss: 'I know where Hoffa is buried'

Tony Zerilli talks exclusively to Defenders

DETROIT – Tony Zerilli wants the Hoffa case solved before the secret dies with him.  He said he told the FBI he was not involved in the hit

Tony Zerilli told the Local 4 Defenders, "They wanted to know what happened to Hoffa and I said I am in prison. If that is not an alibi then I don't know what the hell is."

1964: Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa is convicted on one count of conspiracy and three counts of mail and wire fraud for improper use of the Teamsters' pension fund. He would eventually receive a five-year sentence to run consecutively with an earlier eight-year sentence for attempted bribery of a grand juror in a Tennessee case. He ended up serving less than five years, with President Richard Nixon commuting his sentence to time served in December 1971.

 

Zerilli says he and Hoffa were friends.  When Hoffa wanted to become the teamster boss Zerilli talked Hoffa's competition into dropping out of the race. "All he wants is his pay and expense account and use of the Teamster plane and he wanted to run with the rat pack- Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin and the whole rat pack." Hoffa became Teamster president and never forgot Tony Zerelli's favor. Lead investigators and prosecutors call Zerilli the best witness ever to come forward.

READ: Alleged Mafia boss talks about where Jimmy Hoffa's buried

Keith Corbett, a retired federal prosecutor said, "The bureau had a short list of people that they wanted to talk to about that and I can't think of anybody on that list who was more highly placed than Anthony Zerilli."

Zerilli said if he had not been in prison he would have put a stop to the plot to kill Hoffa when he got out of prison.  He said he was told what happened.  "All this speculation of where he is where he is not they say he was in a meat grinder it is all bologna. What happened to Hoffa was very simple - he got picked up over there he was buried where I said he was buried."