Phil Leonetti - Leonetti in The Construction Business

Leonetti in The Construction Business

In the late 1970s, Scarfo made Leonetti president of his company, Scarf Inc. a cement contracting business. Vincent Falcone, who also was in the cement contracting business took on Phil as an apprentice, showing him the ropes and how to get started. An Atlantic City contractor who knew Phil said, "The kid seemed to be genuinely interested in learning the business", but Vincent Falcone was less than impressed with the quality of the work done by Scarf Inc. and from time to time, Falcone would belittle Leonetti and Scarfo. In the summer of 1979, Vincent DePasquale, a building contractor and close friend of Salvatore Merlino said to Merlino that both Nicky Scarfo and Phil Leonetti were crazy and that they should be banned from the contracting business. The New Jersey State Commission of Investigation in 1986 reported that Nat-Nat, a rebar construction firm owned by Lawrence (Yogi) Merlino and Scarf, Inc. a concrete work firm owned by Phil Leonetti did sub-contracting work on nearly a dozen casino and public works projects between 1981 and 1985, including The Golden Nugget, Caesars, Harrah's, Tropicana, Hilton, Showboat, Bally and Resorts casino-hotels. Phil ripped off both unions and contractors by rigging bids and refusing to pay standard health and welfare benefits for union workers.