One of the mobbed-up suspects busted in the NBA gambling scheme is Nicholas “Fat Nick” Minucci — whose vicious, racially charged baseball bat beating of a black man in Howard Beach, Queens, captivated New Yorkers for months more than two decades ago.
Minucci — a Gambino associate who now stands accused of playing on “cheating teams” in the rigged card games — was convicted of the vile hate crime assault on then 22-year-old Glenn Moore in 2006.
Minucci, who was then 19 years old, chased down Moore on the morning of June 29, 2005 and hit him in the head with a Louisville Slugger while shouting the n-word.
“You f- – -ing n- – – – -! What are you doing in my neighborhood?” he shouted, according to prosecutors.
At his dramatic three-week-long trial, Minucci — who was not a known mob associate at the time — claimed he wasn’t a bigot and said he only chased down Moore because he thought he’d come to Howard Beach to steal cars.
Fat Nick, who reportedly lost 50 pounds as his case played out, also tried to argue that the “n-word” is so commonly used by rappers that it had lost much of its racist punch.
Minucci’s friend, Frankie Agostini, also testified against him, describing the horrifying cracking sound the bat made as it struck Moore’s head.
“It sounded like Barry Bonds hit a home run. Bing! Like that,” Agostini testified in Queens Supreme Court.
Moore suffered from a fractured skull and “dementia as a result of head trauma,” Dr. Steven Cercy, a neuro-psychologist testified at Minucci’s trial in June 2006.
A Queens jury ultimately found Minucci guilty after deliberating for less than seven hours, and he was ultimately sentenced to 15 years behind bars. It was not clear when he was released, but he was eligible for parole in 2019.
Minucci — who once said in an interview that he was first called “Fat Nick” at age 9 and said he spent a lot of time playing cards in prison — had also previously been charged with another bias attack for shooting paintballs at Sikhs outside a Queens temple on 9/11, law-enforcement sources said in 2005.
He also dodged a legal bullet in 2004 when the attempted murder charges he faced in a stabbing case were reduced after the victim mysteriously died before a trial.
Back then, Minucci had been accused in the 2002 stabbing of then-15-year-old John Rich of Broad Channel, who the following year fell under the wheels of an A train at the Beach 98th Street station in Queens.
Rich’s family at first thought Minucci may have had something to do with his death but later came to believe it was due to errors by transit workers.
In that case, Minucci pleaded guilty to lesser charges of assault, and got five years’ probation.
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