The father of murder victim Joey Comunale is suing the parents of the killer’s two accomplices claiming they played a role in covering up his son’s grisly murder.
Patsy Comunale filed a complaint against Gordon Gemma and Suzanne Dilione in a New York state supreme court on Tuesday – exactly two years after his son’s death.
The defendants are the respective parents of Max Gemma and Larry Dilione, two men who were suspected of helping James Rackover kill Comunale at Rackover’s Manhattan apartment in 2016.
Comunale was stabbed multiple times, strangled, and beaten, and his body was found in a shallow grave in Oceanside, New Jersey, after being burned.
Rackover, 27, was found guilty of second-degree murder earlier this month.
Dilione, 30, is still awaiting trial for murder and Gemma, 30, has been charged only with helping in the clean up attempt.
Joey Comunale’s father Patsy has filed a complaint in New York State Supreme Court claiming the parents of Max Gemma and Larry Dilione aided in covering up his son’s murder
Joey Comunale, 26, from Connecticut, was stabbed, strangled, and beaten and his body was found in a shallow grave in Oceanside, New Jersey, after being burned in November 2016
Comunale’s father is now accusing Mr Gemma and Ms Dilione of conspiring with their sons to conceal Joey’s murder by ‘concocting a false narrative’ and interfering with the investigation to protect them from prosecution.
‘With the knowledge that Joey had been murdered and that his body was buried in a shallow grave in Oceanport, New Jersey, Defendants Gemma and Dilione intentionally lied to the police and instructed Max and Larry to lie to the police to prevent the recovery of Joey’s remains,’ the suit states.
Comunale is seeking damages for extreme emotional distress, humiliation, mental and physical anguish, emotional injuries, and economic losses.
In October, Comunale took the stand at Rackover’s trial and was left in tears as he testified about the last time he saw his son alive.
When gruesome crime scene pictures were shown, revealing Joey’s burned and mud-covered remains, both Patsy and Joey’s mother, Lisa Comunale, were said to have struggled to keep their composure in court.
Joey’s murder was highly publicized because of Rackover – the ‘surrogate son’ of celebrity jeweler Jeffrey Rackover.
Rackover, Comunale and Dillione had been at Rackover’s Upper East Side apartment after a night of drug-fueled partying.
The pair met Comunale at a Greenwich Village nightclub and the trio had returned to Rackover’s home but got in a fight in an apparent row over cigarettes.
Other reports indicated at the time that it was because Comunale had rejected their sexual advances.
James Rackover, the ‘surrogate son’ of celebrity jeweler Jeffrey Rackover, was found guilty of murder on November 2
Rackover’s friends, Max Gemma (left) and Larry Dilione (right) were believed to have assisted him in the crime. Gemma has been charged with helping in the clean up attempt while Dilione is awaiting trial for murder
Comunale, a Hofstra graduate, was stabbed multiple times, strangled and beaten.
His body was found in a shallow grave in Oceanside, New Jersey, after being burned.
Police were led to Rackover and Dilione after reviewing surveillance cameras which picked up Rackover’s car. His EZ Pass also showed him traveling through tolls which led to the site.
They first threw the body out the window of Rackover’s 2nd floor apartment and left it in a garbage bag outside the building but thought better of their plan, drove it to New Jersey, set it on fire and buried it.
Rackover’s defense was that it was Dillione who beat Comunale to death and that he only helped him dispose of the body the next day in New Jersey.
Comunale has accused Gemma’s father Gordon Gemma (pictured) of helping him conceal Joey’s murder
A jury rejected that version of events on Friday and convicted him of second degree murder, hindering prosecution and concealment of a human corpse.
He now faces life behind bars and will return to court to be sentenced on December 5 and faces 25 years to life behind bars.
Comunale’s trial is yet to begin. He is due in court in 2019.
After the verdict, which was delivered in four hours over two days, Comunale’s father said: ‘These guys don’t deserve to be on the streets ever again.’
The conviction comes days after the jury was told by the son of Good Day New York anchor Rosanna Scott that Rackover confessed to the killing in 2016.
Louis Ruggiero testified on Monday that Rackover confessed not only to killing him but to driving his body out to New Jersey afterwards then coming home and ordering pancakes from a diner.
‘I slit his throat and I stabbed him and we wrapped the body up in a comforter and threw it out the window so the cameras wouldn’t see,’ Louis Ruggiero recalled James Rackover saying.
‘James looked at me and said, ‘I did something really bad,’ Louis Ruggiero testified Monday in Manhattan Supreme Court.
Ruggiero,the District Attorney’s star witness in the murder trial, said Rackover told him that Lawrence Dilione, one of the other men in his apartment during the incident, got into a fight with Comunale and knocked him unconscious.
Pictured above are the grief-stricken parents of Joey Comunale, mom Lisa (left) and father Patsy, during Rackover’s murder trial
‘I gave [Comunale] a few lickings as well, and I didn’t want a dead body in my living room, so I slit his throat and I stabbed him and then we wrapped the body up in comforters and threw the body out the window,’ Ruggiero testified, quoting what Rackover told him.
The jury was also shown evidence including the bloody clothes he was wearing on the day of the attack.
The attack, Dilione said, happened after a fight over cigarettes.
Claiming that he was responsible only for punching the young man, Dilione told a court in March how he watched Rackover stab him once the fight got out of hand.
‘I turned around and that’s when I saw the knife being pulled out of Joey’s head,’ he said.
Jurors were shown evidence from night Joey Comunale, 26, was killed in 2016. A once white bedsheet is splattered with blood and a gold chain necklace was caught inside the sheet. Joey’s friend said he was wearing the chain the night he was killed
This photo shows pants recovered from the trash that had blood stains all over them
Dilione claimed that the fight started when Comunale accused him of taking free alcohol and drugs from him and Rackover without paying his way.
He allegedly said: ‘James is bringing cocaine, I’ve got cigarettes, what the f*** are you bringing to the table.’
It was previously reported the fight was over Comunale rejecting the pair and their sexual advances.
Furious, he lunged at him and began beating him, he said.
‘I said, ‘I’ll take the blame,’ but he said ‘Look at my hands,’ and they were covered in blood. At that point [Rackover] started to strangle him,’ he said.
Rackover was born James Arthur Beaudoin and is a Florida native.
He had been arrested multiple times for burglary, armed robbery, and drug possession before Comunale’s death.
At some stage afterwards, he met Rackover and moved to New York City where they each held apartments in the same building.
‘Jeffrey never had children, he developed a relationship with this young man and introduced him to his family,’ private detective Bo Dietl, a friend of 30 years, told DailyMail.com in 2016.
‘Jimmy was a troubled young man and Jeffrey hoped to get him back on his feet.’
Jeffrey even got James a job at Willis Towers Watson insurance company along with his own apartment.
‘Jeffrey was on the 32nd floor and James on the fourth floor,’ said Dietl.
‘They first met, I believe, at a health club about three-and-a-half years ago.
‘Jimmy moved into the apartment about a year ago. Jimmy changed his name to James Rackover because Jeffrey liked this kid so much.’