Broker tied to ex-Hub mob leader

Jaffe did business with Angiulo in '70s

Robert Jaffe was never implicated in SEC inquiry. (Palm Beach Daily News)

Before Bernard L. Madoff, Robert M. Jaffe did business with another notorious rogue: former Boston mob leader Gennaro Angiulo.

Jaffe, under investigation for his ties to the Wall Street investor who authorities say confessed to running a Ponzi scheme, was the stockbroker to Angiulo and his brothers, reputed members of the Boston Mafia, before they were sent to jail on racketeering charges in 1986.

He first represented the Angiulos when he worked at the investment firm E.F. Hutton in the 1970s, and the Angiulos followed him when he became the Boston branch manager at Cowen & Co. in 1980, according to a Boston Globe article in 1985 that quoted Cowen's lawyer, Lawrence Leibowitz.

Jaffe's name surfaced in an inquiry by federal securities regulators into whether Cowen failed to report large deposits the Angiulos made into their brokerage accounts there. It was part of a broader federal investigation of alleged money laundering by the Angiulos.

Neither Jaffe nor Cowen was ever implicated, and the Securities and Exchange Commission inquiry appears to have ended quietly. An SEC spokesman yesterday said such investigations are typically confidential and could not offer any more information on its results.

A spokesman for Jaffe, Elliot Sloane, confirmed he was the broker for the Angiulo family, but said: "This is ancient history and has no bearing on the current Madoff tragedy. . . . The investigation found that Cowen and Bob did nothing wrong. Cowen severed ties with the Angiulo family and Bob continued to work at Cowen for several years."

A separate investigation by Justice Department officials resulted in one bank, Provident Institution for Savings, pleading guilty and paying a $100,000 fine for failing to report 49 large transactions involving the Angiulos.

Among the transactions were $250,000 in cashier's checks the Angiulos purchased from Provident that were made payable to Cowen & Co., according to an FBI affidavit filed in the case against the Angiulos. The affidavit also said the Angiulos purchased $270,000 of cashier's checks from Bank of Boston that paid for investments with Cowen & Co.

When questioned about the transactions in February 1985, Jaffe told the Globe that a brokerage account for the Angiulos had been "initiated," but "no money had ever been deposited and no transactions enacted," according to a story published on Feb. 27, 1985.

Two weeks later, the Globe reported that an unidentified representative from Cowen & Co. acknowledged the company had in fact received money from the Angiulos, who maintained nine accounts with the firm.

The Angiulo brothers, Gennaro, Francesco, Donato, and Michele, were arrested in 1983 and convicted three years later in the region's first sweeping federal racketeering case against the mob. A woman who answered the phone at the home of Gennaro Angiulo, who was released from federal prison in 2007, yesterday said he would have no comment.

Jaffe, a 64-year-old Newton native, is under scrutiny for his role in connecting investors with Madoff, whose alleged fraud has resulted in billions of dollars in losses for individuals and the shuttering of several prominent charitable foundations. Since leaving Cowen, Jaffe has been a vice president of Cohmad Securities, a brokerage partly owned by Madoff. While Jaffe was based in Boston, Cohmad's office is on the same floor as Madoff's in Manhattan's Lipstick building.

Massachusetts securities regulators have subpoenaed Jaffe and Cohmad, and are trying to determine if they failed to protect the investors steered to Madoff, according to Secretary of State William F. Galvin.

Jenn Abelson can be reached at abelson@globe.com; Casey Ross at cross@globe.com.