State police yesterday arrested 18 people related to the mob, including Gerald Tillinghast, shown here at his arraignment, and Nicholas Pari, who was convicted in the 1978 murder of Joe "Onions" Scanlon.

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

Rhode Island’s economy may be struggling, but business grinds on in the underworld.

In a predawn roundup that brought back memories of Rhode Island’s heyday as a Mafia hotbed, authorities arrested 17 people yesterday, including two notorious aging mobsters and a onetime Cranston mayoral candidate, on charges of illicit activity ranging from drug- and gun-dealing to gambling and theft to counterfeiting, fencing stolen goods and insurance fraud. The purported contraband included counterfeit handbags and sneakers, jewelry, precious metals, catalytic converters and other stolen goods.

An 18th suspect was already in prison on unrelated charges. More arrests are expected in what authorities call “Operation Mobbed Up.”

In breaking up not one, but two, alleged criminal rings based at the Valley Street Flea Market in Providence, the state police may also have found a clue to solving a mystery that has endured in Rhode Island mob lore for three decades –– where is the body of “Joe Onions”?

One of the men arrested yesterday, Nicholas S. “Nicky” Pari, 71, went to prison for the 1978 gangland slaying of mob informant Joseph “Joe Onions” Scanlon, despite the fact that no body was ever found.

Pari, who his lawyer says is dying, told the state police after his arrest where he had stashed Scanlon’s body, prompting an afternoon excavation near an East Providence apartment complex.

Despite his failing health, Pari was charged with being the mastermind of “a large-scale criminal operation” based at the Valley Street Flea Market, at 500 Valley St.

In addition, longtime mob enforcer Gerald M. “Gerry” Tillinghast, 62, was accused of resuming his storied criminal career upon his release from prison last year, after serving 30 years for the 1977 murder of loan shark George Basmajian. Tillinghast allegedly ran a narcotics and gambling ring.

But in a sign of these tough economic times, the state police said, Tillinghast’s initial base of operations, a Cranston second-hand furniture and appliance store, went out of business, forcing him to move to the Valley Street Flea Market.

The flea market owner, Lloyd Morse, 50, of 46 Cliffdale Ave., Cranston, was also arrested, accused of acting as Pari’s “criminal partner.”

Morse’s prior claim to fame was a publicized feud with Cranston City Hall over the city’s efforts to force him to take down a 25-foot inflatable gorilla in his yard. The disagreement prompted Morse to add an inflatable dinosaur to his menagerie and to run for mayor as an independent in 2004 with the slogan, “It’s Gorilla Warfare in Cranston.”

The only other previously known mob associate arrested yesterday was Albino Folcarelli, 50, who once celebrated his release from prison with a party at the Foxy Lady strip club. Folcarelli operates Sunset Motors, on Sayles Street in Providence, a mob haunt where the state police allege that another man arrested yesterday, Jose Sousa, took a sledge hammer to a damaged car in a bid to commit auto-insurance fraud.

The mob isn’t as powerful as it once was, when figures like Tillinghast and Pari took orders from feared New England Mafia boss Raymond L.S. Patriarca in the 1960s and 1970s. Five of those arrested yesterday are old enough to collect Social Security, led by Anthony Delgiudice, 73, of 17 Seneca St., Warwick, who was charged with fencing stolen silver and gold jewelry.

“This is just one more nail in the coffin of organized crime in Rhode Island,” said Col. Brendan P. Doherty, the state police superintendent. “It’s not what it used to be, but as you can see, we have some old customers back.”

In another sign of the changing times, state police said that another defendant facing drug charges, Raymond Silva, 34, of Providence, is a member of the Almighty Latin King Nation.

“Twenty-five years ago, this would have never happened,” said Lt. Col. Steven G. O’Donnell, a veteran mob investigator.

Attorney General Patrick C. Lynch said that this case underscores the importance of remaining vigilant –– that organized crime is not just entertainment, a la The Sopranos, but a real-life drain on society.

“We have to stay at it,” said Lynch, “because they get their hands into everything.”

Operation Mobbed Up began in September 2007, when an informant told state police Detective Scot Baruti that Pari, of 4 Eben St., North Providence, was actively involved in running a large-scale criminal enterprise out of the Valley Street Flea Market.

Authorities enlisted undercover detectives with the Rhode Island and Massachusetts state police to infiltrate the operation, as well as court-authorized wiretaps. Detectives and their cooperating source were able to buy guns and drugs –– cocaine, marijuana and Vicodin –– from Pari and his associates, the state police said.

In one twist, payment was often made with counterfeit handbags and sneakers, with Morse allegedly acting as middleman.

Pari and his associates were also accused of fencing stolen goods, selling stolen jewelry and arranging the thefts of catalytic converters for automobile engines. Investigators said that there was a big black market for catalytic converters, which fetched $200 apiece.

Four months after the investigation began, Gerry Tillinghast got out of prison and, according to the authorities, began running his own narcotics and illegal gambling operation from Dyer Discount, at 492 Dyer Ave. in Cranston. But when Dyer Discount went out of business, and with Pari’s health failing, Tillinghast allegedly moved to the Valley Street Flea Market.

“We believe he wanted a piece of the pie after getting out of prison,” said O’Donnell.

Instead, Tillinghast led the parade back to prison for several of yesterday’s defendants, ordered held without bail due to prior convictions.

His hands cuffed in front of his body, Tillinghast was the first defendant led into the courtroom late yesterday afternoon for arraignment in Providence before District Court Judge Michael A. Higgins. Wearing a black shirt, blue jeans and white sneakers, he was led off to his old haunt, the Adult Correctional Institutions, ordered held without bail.

The courtroom was a commotion of manacled defendants, defense lawyers and distraught-looking friends and relatives of the defendants. A heavyset defendant, Joseph Perry, had trouble walking, shouting at a sheriff, “Don’t push me!” It was so crowded that another sheriff had trouble pushing Pari into court in a wheelchair past other handcuffed defendants.

Pari sat quietly in a sweatsuit, a baseball cap in his lap, a white gauze bandage at his throat. His lawyer said that he received a frantic call from Pari’s wife about 9 a.m. Her husband had been arrested at home, taken from his rented hospital bed, where he is receiving hospice care and breathing with the help of an oxygen tube.

Because of his poor health, Pari was allowed to remain free on $30,000 surety bond.

Instead of going to prison, said his lawyer, Gerrick Van Duesen, “Hopefully he can meet his maker on his own terms.”

Nicholas S. Pari, 71

North Providence

Lloyd Morse, 50

Cranston

Raymond Silva, 34

Providence

Albino Folcarelli, 50

Johnston

Reinaldo Cruzado, 22

Johnston

Jose Sousa, 49

East Providence

Thomas Salerno, 48

Cranston

Jacqueline Lovelace, 46

Providence

Carmine Appolonia, 56

Coventry

Anthony Delgiudice, 73

Warwick

Vaughn Parker, 37

Providence

Michael Borders, 47

Cranston

John R. Sousa, 63

Johnston

Gerald Kent, 43

Exeter

Joseph Perry, 71

Tiverton

Sean McCarthy, 37

Richmond

Not shown

James Rodrigues, 23,

North KingstownSuspects and charges

Nicholas S. Pari, 71

North Providence

Criminal prohibited from possessing firearms; unlawful sale of a concealable weapon; license or permit to carry a pistol; delivery of a controlled substance to a police officer; possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver; carrying a dangerous weapon while committing a crime of violence racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Gerald M. Tillinghast, 62

Cranston

Conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; conspiracy to commit bookmaking; conspiracy to commit organized criminal gambling; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Lloyd Morse, 50

Cranston

Delivery of controlled substance; unlawful sale of a concealable weapon; license or permit to carry a pistol; delivery of a controlled substance to a police officer; possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver; maintaining a common nuisance; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

John R. Sousa, 63

Johnston

Delivery of a controlled substance; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; bookmaking; conspiracy to commit organized criminal gambling; maintaining a common nuisance; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Albino Folcarelli, 50

Johnston

Conspiracy to commit insurance fraud; soliciting another to commit a crime

Jose Sousa, 49

East Providence

Conspiracy to commit insurance fraud

Joseph Perry, 71

Tiverton

Delivery of a controlled substance; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Michael Borders, 47

Cranston

Delivery of a controlled substance; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; bookmaking; conspiracy to commit organized criminal gambling; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Carmine Appolonia, 56

Coventry

Delivery of a controlled substance; possession of a controlled substance with intent to deliver; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance

Reinaldo Cruzado, 22

Johnston

Delivery of a controlled substance

Raymond Silva, 34

Providence

Delivery of a controlled substance; conspiracy to deliver a controlled substance; soliciting another to commit a crime

Vaughn Parker, 37

Providence

Delivery of a controlled substance

Thomas Salerno, 48

Cranston

Conspiracy to possess a controlled substance; racketeer influence and corrupt organizations

Anthony Delgiudice, 73

Warwick

License required to sell precious metals over $500

Gerald Kent, 43

Exeter

License required to sell/purchase precious metals over $500; conspiracy to sell/purchase precious metals over $500

Sean McCarthy, 37

Richmond

Receiving stolen goods; larceny over $500; conspiracy to commit larceny

Jacqueline Lovelace, 46

Providence

Larceny under $500; conspiracy to commit larceny; conspiracy to receive stolen goods

James Rodrigues, 23

North Kingstown

Larceny over $500; receiving stolen goods over $500 (Currently incarcerated at Adult Correctional Institutions on unrelated charges)

bmalinow@projo.com