![]() ![]() The Steenburgs had figured that hiring a sober driver seemed like the safe thing to do.Īs the celebrants piled into the Excursion, they found sickly neon-colored lights, padded benches, and floorboards that had rusted through. Seventeen of them, including Amy’s three sisters, Axel’s brother, and several other young couples, were going day-drinking at Brewery Ommegang in Cooperstown, some 50 miles away. Axel Steenburg, a 29-year-old bodybuilder who worked at a semiconductor plant, was organizing a 30th-birthday celebration for his wife, Amy, and a big crew. The windshield sticker was gone.Īt 1 p.m., Lisinicchia pulled the limo up to a home in the town of Amsterdam. Nauman Hussain wanted him to take the Excursion out on a job. But on Saturday, October 6, a little after 9 a.m., Lisinicchia got a call. The Excursion’s regular driver, a 53-year-old named Scott Lisinicchia, knew the vehicle had problems and preferred to operate Prestige’s other limousines. Someone had crudely disabled one of the lines with a vise grip. Six months earlier, the limo had failed inspection for a long list of deficiencies, including corroded and compromised brakes. The Hussains always managed to get it back on the road. They regarded it as an insult to their profession and “violated” it whenever they could. State inspectors knew Prestige’s Excursion well. It was a party vehicle, or a party gag, the kind of limo that made you wince and check the leather seats for stains. ![]() The Excursion was a beast, a 10,000-pound SUV that had been chopped in half and welded back together with 12 extra feet of carriage in the middle, effectively turning it into a bus. “This motor vehicle has been declared UNSERVICEABLE.” ![]() The inspector examined Prestige’s vehicles and placed an orange-and-white sticker roughly the size of a license plate on the windshield of its workhorse, a Ford Excursion. Nauman’s father owned Prestige Limousine, a small company touting “modern, classy vehicles” for “exquisite wedding, prom, event, and special occasion” transportation in the Albany area, and Nauman operated it day to day, sometimes answering to his father’s name. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the FBI or the Mafia because it's such a cool chapter in both of their histories.On September 4, 2018, Nauman Hussain, a 28-year-old professional paintball player, was working at his family’s business when a state inspector arrived for a routine visit. And it's weird that Robb never appears in the Donnie Brasco movie considering how much they worked together. Still, Robb's story is amazing and it deserves to be told on a much greater scale, maybe even more than Donnie Brasco's. Ultimately, Robb betrayed these guys and I wonder if there was any guilt about it. I would have liked more insight into what Robb went through emotionally, especially since he was so close with the mob members and their families. ![]() The few sentences describing Robb's difficulty toning down his language and acquired taste in flashy clothes and expensive shoes after his time with the American mob, as well as the few sentences about the difficulty he had in spending so much time away from his family, aren't enough. Robb later single-handedly infiltrated the Sicilian mob and played a key part in one of the largest international drug busts to date.įor all of the time Jacobs spent with Robb and all the interviews he did with Robb's FBI coworkers, though, the book lacks a personal touch that I wish it had. I know I'm not related to him, but this is a great story about one of the first undercover FBI agents and one of only two who were offered membership in the American Mafia (the other being Joe Pistone, better known as Donnie Brasco). I first became interested in this book because I share a last name with Ed Robb and he did undercover work in the same place my dad used to live. ![]()
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