In exchange for killing Michael Galdieri, George Bratsenis, 74, admitted a year ago to accepting thousands of dollars from another political strategist, Sean Caddle. Galdieri was murdered in his Jersey City apartment; he was stabbed to death before the place was torched.
On Wednesday, Mr. Galdieri, a career criminal with a history of bank robberies and a murder conspiracy was given a 16-year sentence for the 2014 murder of a New Jersey political consultant for financial gain.
The 16-year prison term and 5-year period of supervised release were both handed down on Wednesday in federal court in Newark by U.S. District Judge John Michael Vazquez.
Bomani Africa, who shared a New Jersey prison cell with Bratsenis in the early 2000s, pled guilty to murder last month and was given a 20-year term. He revealed that Bratsenis was involved in Galdieri’s murder.
State politics were shaken by the news of Galdieri’s murder, as New Jersey is notorious for political corruption and scandals like the 2013 “Bridgegate” affair, in which traffic jams were deliberately created near the major George Washington Bridge as political vengeance.
In the political world of northern New Jersey, Caddle was a household name. Democratic U.S. Senator Bob Menendez and Democratic state Senator and gubernatorial candidate Raymond Lesniak were among his past clients.
Caddle’s cooperation with investigators was mentioned briefly and obliquely in the plea agreement, but what exactly he gave them was not specified. In January 2022, he pleaded guilty to plotting murder for pay, but he has yet to be given a sentence. Both the U.S. attorney’s office and Bratsenis’s lawyer have declined to comment.
Why Caddle was connected to the two ex-cons and why federal prosecutors have been so tight-lipped about the crime are all mysteries that have yet to be solved.
