The catalog of my investigation of the burial site of Jimmy Hoffa in an alcove under the Pulaski Skyway in Jersey City
Federal agents admit that the FBI dug in the wrong place in 2022
July 30, 2025, is the 50th anniversary of the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa
I will appear at a free and live national ZOOM event on Thursday, July 10, 2025, at 7:00 P.M. (Eastern), sponsored by the Teamsters Labor History Research Center at George Washington University—twenty days before the anniversary of Jimmy Hoffa’s murder.
Rest assured—even at 75—I can still get a crowd rocking. . . . So, be there or be square.
Regardless of where you live and/or work, please join me from the comfort of your homes and offices on ZOOM. . . . Make your reservations early.
For me, it's "use it or lose it" time after my 50-year investigation of Hoffa's killing that started on Day One.
This is the series of columns on Mobology about my relationship with the FBI during the murder investigation.
Having specialized in investigations of the Teamsters and the Mafia since December 1974, I hit the ground running and began my research about this case the day after Hoffa vanished eight months later.
My first book, The Hoffa Wars, was published in 1978.
Here is my series summary:
* On November 4, 1975, Ralph Picardo—an associate of Anthony Provenzano, a capo in the Vito Genovese Mafia family who had engineered the killing of Jimmy Hoffa—told FBI Special Agent Robert Garrity of Detroit that, among other things, Hoffa was 1) murdered in Detroit, probably by Salvatore Briguglio, one of Provenzano’s top lieutenants, 2) placed in a 55-gallon oil drum, 3) loaded onto a Gateway Transportation truck, and 4) shipped to New Jersey.
Picardo added that the Provenzano crew often buried their victims at the PJP Landfill in Jersey City, aka “Brother Moscato’s Dump.” He suggested that Hoffa was likely buried there as well. (Picardo died on January 26, 2004, while in the U.S. Federal Witness Protection Program.)
* Beginning on April 28, 2007, I had a seven-year series of exclusive interviews with Phillip “Brother” Moscato—a soldier in the Genovese crime family and the co-owner of the Jersey City dump with his partner, Paul Cappola.
Moscato revealed to me that “Picardo basically had it right,” confirming on tape that 1) Vito Giacalone picked up Hoffa at the Red Fox, 2) Hoffa was murdered by Salvatore Briguglio, 3) he was stuffed in a 55-gallon oil drum, 4) he was shipped via Gateway Transportation to New Jersey, and 5) Hoffa was taken to his landfill where he was buried. (Moscato died on February 16, 2014)
Moscato spoke to me, in part, because I was the only reporter, living or dead, who had interviewed Sal Briguglio on tape, live and in person, on October 25, 1976, at Teamsters Local 560 in Union City. (Briguglio was murdered on March 21, 1978.)
* Beginning on September 7, 2019, I conducted a series of exclusive interviews with Frank Cappola, the oldest son of Paul Cappola, Moscato’s partner.
Frank told me that 1) Moscato had tasked his father to receive Hoffa’s body and bury it, 2) his father, upset with the assignment, unilaterally decided not to bury the body at the dump as instructed but, secretly, in an adjacent alcove under the Pulaski Skyway that was owned and operated by the State of New Jersey, 3) the senior Cappola placed the oil drum that contained Hoffa's remains at the bottom of a hole and covered the drum with a load of other barrels that contained toxic waste, and 4) the only person Paul Cappola told was his son, Frank.
On September 29, 2019, Frank Cappola and I drove to the landfill. He showed me the alcove under the Pulaski Skyway where his late father revealed to him that he had buried Hoffa. I filmed the entire tour.
On October 7, 2019—at my request—Frank executed a sworn declaration, attesting to the details he had shared with me and no one else about the exact location. He also agreed to take a polygraph test if the FBI requested it. (Sadly, Cappola died on March 16, 2020, before the FBI responded to us.)
In short, Ralph Picardo told the FBI The Truth in 1975. And both Phil Moscato and Frank Cappola told me The Truth in 2007 and 2019, respectively.
* In September 2020, six months after Frank Cappola died, I received a call from a federal agent at the FBI’s field office in Newark. He asked for my cooperation during the bureau’s review of Frank’s claims.
With no hesitation, I agreed to cooperate fully.
My first voluntary act was to create an online webpage for the FBI that included key documents, timelines, photographs, and videos, among other materials.
On March 11, 2021, I attended a command performance in Newark to deliver a formal presentation to a joint meeting of the FBI’s Detroit and Newark field offices, as well as to representatives from the U.S. Attorneys’ Offices in Michigan and New Jersey.
After my floor show, a large group of us drove to nearby Jersey City and visited the alcove under the Pulaski Skyway, where I gave those present a similar tour to the one Frank Cappola had given me on September 29, 2019.
In October 2021, the FBI provided a sworn affidavit to the U.S. District Court for New Jersey, requesting a search warrant for the alcove.
Based primarily on the information I had given to the FBI—particularly the sworn declaration that Frank Cappola had executed—a federal judge determined that probable cause existed that Hoffa’s body was buried at the site.
During its initial search on October 25-26, 2021, the FBI reportedly performed a cursory examination of the alcove with no major excavations.
Subsequently, my team conducted two ground-penetrating-radar (GPR) tests—the first on November 16, 2021, and the second on April 19, 2022, which were carried out by different technicians who came to identical conclusions.
Both had discovered what appeared to be steel barrels at the same specific location in the alcove.
After the second test, my team disclosed to the FBI its important findings, providing documents and photographs of this specific perimeter in the alcove.
To our complete shock, in the aftermath of its extensive excavation during the first week of June 2022, the FBI announced that, after executing a second search warrant in the alcove, nothing of any importance was found.
However, in the weeks that followed, I obtained conclusive proof that the FBI crew, during their June excavation, had completely missed the location that my team had spoon-fed to them.
The exact perimeter was untouched by either an excavator or even a shovel.
And federal agents from the FBI field offices in both Detroit and Newark have acknowledged their mistake during my interviews with them.
For the past three years, while the FBI has been overwhelmed with other critical, more timely investigations, my team and I have been denied any access to the alcove.
Still, our work continues.
Here are the installments of my series:
* November 26, 2023: “Working on the FBI’s ‘one-way street” (Part 1)
* December 10, 2023: “Frank Cappola enters the fray” (Part 2)
* January 14, 2024: “The FBI calls six months after Frank Cappola dies” (Part 3)
* January 21, 2024: “My team and our negotiations” (Part 4)
* February 25, 2024: “The first GPR test in November 2020” (Part 5)
* March 3, 2024: “My command performance before a star-studded crowd at the FBI field office in Newark” (Part 6)
* March 10, 2024: “The Mystery Mound” (Part 7)
* March 17, 2024: “The FBI executes a search warrant for the alcove” (Part 8)
* April 7, 2024: “Napco detects a third location in the alcove” (Part 9)
* April 14, 2024: “The FBI digs in the wrong place” (Part 10)
* April 21, 2024: “Napco doubles down on the location of Hoffa’s unmarked grave” (Part 11)
* December 11, 2024: 49 years ago today, the FBI served a search warrant on "Brother Moscato's Dump," aka the PJP Landfill in Jersey City: Will Jimmy Hoffa's remains be found before the 50th anniversary of his murder in July 2025? (Extra 1)
* December 15, 2024: This week is my 50th anniversary as an independent investigative journalist: The birth of a cautionary tale (Extra 2)
* January 26, 2025: In 2018, a tweeter claimed that I got whacked a week after the release of my 1989 book about the NFL and the Mafia: I have yet to see his documentation, but here's what I know (Extra 3)
* February 9, 2025: Jimmy Hoffa Jr. told me that his father knew Jack Ruby: Then he denied it during an interview with the staff of the U.S. House Select Committee on Assassinations (Extra 4)
* March 2, 2025: Mob lawyer Frank Ragano confessed to delivering Hoffa's contract on JFK to Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante: In 1978, I rejected Ragano's $250,000 offer to buy the rights to my book, The Hoffa Wars, in which I alleged that Hoffa, Marcello, and Trafficante engineered the President's murder (Extra 5)
* March 16, 2025: Intermezzo: On the alleged roles of Hoffa-Marcello-Trafficante in the JFK murder: Attorneys, investigators, and journalists, along with AI, credit The Hoffa Wars with reporting it first (Extra 6)
* March 30, 2025: Financing the murder of Jimmy Hoffa: How the case against a corrupt federal judge and his connections to the Mafia led me to Hoffa's alleged burial site (Extra 7)
* June 10, 2025: For the 50th anniversary of the murder of Jimmy Hoffa, the Teamsters have invited me to speak about my 51 years of investigating Hoffa, the Teamsters, and the Mafia (Extra 9)
* July 2, 2025: AI sites weigh in for the 50th: "Who is the world's expert on the Jimmy Hoffa murder case?": I appreciate the trophy, but here is my list of the top current investigators who have also made important contributions (Extra 10)
And here is a selected bibliography about my investigation of the alcove in Jersey City:
* Dan E. Moldea, Gang Land News, “The disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa:
40 years later.” July 30, 2015* John Marzulli, New York Daily News, "New evidence emerges on Jimmy Hoffa's possible fate, suggests feds were on right track searching N.J. dump," July 30, 2015
* Dan E. Moldea, FoxNews.com, "Dan Moldea: Has Jimmy Hoffa’s grave been found?" November 21, 2019
* John Wisely, Detroit Free Press, "Search for Hoffa may have new lead, expert has best tip ever in search for grave," November 21, 2019
* Debate: The Mob Museum, "Dan Moldea, Eric Shawn, Vince Wade (video)," December 11, 2019
* Dan E. Moldea, The Mob Museum, “DEM on Frank Cappola and the alleged
location of Hoffa's remains (2019-2020),” Part One: July 8, 2020* Dan E. Moldea, The Mob Museum, “Here is the alleged unmarked grave of Jimmy Hoffa,” Part Two: July 21, 2020
* Dan E. Moldea, Deadline Detroit, "Is this enough evidence to obtain a search warrant for Jimmy Hoffa's grave?" July 30, 2020
* Scott Burnstein, Gangster Report, "Hoffa hysteria," July 31, 2020
* Scott Burnstein, The Mob Museum, "Following the Facts," August 4, 2020
* Dan E. Moldea, The Mob Museum, “On the 46th anniversary of the murder of Jimmy Hoffa,” Part Three: July 30, 2021
* Michael Wilson, New York Times, "Search for Jimmy Hoffa Leads FBI to Jersey City Landfill," November 18, 2021
* James Barron, New York Times, "A New Search for Jimmy Hoffa," November 23, 2021
* Ted Shaffrey, Associated Press. Video interview with DEM, "FBI looks in N.J. for Jimmy Hoffa's remains," November 24, 2021
* Roger Schneider, Associated Press, "Theories in the disappearance of Jimmy Hoffa," (excerpt), November 25, 2021
* Allan Lengel, Deadline Detroit, "Allan Lengel interviews FBI-SAC Timothy Waters of the Detroit field office," December 7, 2021
* Dan E. Moldea, "On Phillip Moscato Jr.," February 28, 2022* Dan E. Moldea, "On Eric Shawn of Fox News," April 7, 2022
* Michael Wilson, New York Times, "Search for Hoffa Under Jersey City Bridge Came Up Empty, FBI Says," July 21, 2022
* Ed White, Associated Press, "FBI: No sign of Jimmy Hoffa under New Jersey bridge," July 21, 2022
* See Dan E. Moldea on YouTube, reading his statement below, July 28, 2022* Dan E. Moldea: Deadline Detroit, "Moldea: 'I Still Believe That Jimmy Hoffa Was, Or Is Buried in New Jersey,'" July 28, 2022
* Jack Goldsmith, Lawfare, "47 Years of Feckless Digging," July 29, 2022
* Jeff Burbank, The Mob Museum, "Latest Search for Jimmy Hoffa's Remains
Joins Long List of Fruitless Attempts," September 9, 2022* Tommy Canale, Before the Lights, “Interview with DEM on Jimmy Hoffa,”
January 16, 2023
* Scott Burnstein, Gangster Report, "The search for Hoffa: An update," November 17, 2023
My interviews with key characters
Below is a list of the key characters in the Jimmy Hoffa murder drama—along with, where applicable, the dates of their deaths.
Notably, I am the only person in the world, living or dead, who has interviewed all of those with asterisks (*) next to their names.
Those without asterisks, like Russell Bufalino and the Giacalone brothers, did not respond to my requests for interviews, as was the case with Tony Provenzano—although I did question his brother, Salvatore Provenzano, during my exclusive interview with the Andrettas and the Briguglios, along with their attorney, William Bufalino, on October 25, 1976.
Also, even though I tried hard, I could not get to the FBI's key federal witness, Ralph Picardo—who died in 2004 but whose information, in my opinion, is still the firewall of the Hoffa case—because he was in the Federal Wit-Sec Program.
And, sadly, I did not realize the importance of Paul Cappola, Sr—who allegedly buried Hoffa—until eleven years after he passed in 2008, even though I had started interviewing his partner at the PJP Landfill, Phillip “Brother” Moscato, in 2007.
Here is the list of key characters in the Hoffa caper:
* Stephen Andretta, December 12, 2022
* Thomas Andretta: January 25, 2019
* Stanton Barr: November 13, 2019
* Salvatore Briguglio: March 21, 1978
Russell Bufalino: February 25, 1994
* William Bufalino: May 12, 1990
* Frank Cappola (DEM source): March 16, 2020
Paul Cappola, Sr.: March 8, 2008
* Allen Dorfman: January 20, 1983
Anthony Giacalone: February 23, 2001
Vito Giacalone: February 19, 2012
* Louis Linteau: October 13, 1978
* Lawrence McHenry: January 17, 1994
* Rolland McMaster: October 25, 2007
* Phillip Moscato, Sr.: February 16, 2014
* Charles O’Brien, February 13, 2020
Ralph Picardo (federal witness): January 26, 2004
Anthony Provenzano: December 12, 1988
* Salvatore Provenzano: May 27, 2013
* Jack Robison: July 27, 2003
* Leonard Schultz: September 6, 2013
* Jim Shaw: March 31, 1987
* Frank Sheeran: December 13, 2003
* Donovan Wells (federal witness): September 5, 2019
Still alive, as of this writing (July 6, 2025):
* Gabriel Briguglio, living in New Jersey
Acknowledgments
Many thanks to our documentary production team for their outstanding work on the “Ahab-White Whale” project. They include our team captain, Beaux Carson of Carson Signature Films, Ari Mark of Ample Entertainment, Richard Lawrence of Rebel Entertainment, Bob Burke, the late Frank Cappola, Eric Dezenhall, Joy DiBiaso, Andrew Dunn, Doug Dupin, Eric Emerich, George Farris, JG, Conrad Martin, Sean Nugent, Jon Oberg, Jimmy and Kevin O’Keefe of Napco, Gerry Pallay, Roger Simmons, Tom von Stein, and Sean Weppner.
Among others, friends, colleagues, and key supporters, including some who disagree: David Ashenfelter, Marty Bell, Scott Burnstein, the late Fabrizio Calvi, Jerry Capeci, Joe Conason, David Corn, the late Bob Davis, Tim Davis, Mark Dawidziak, Susan Eisner, Paul Egan, Bill Fargo, Mark Feldstein, Ron Fino, Mike Gale, Jack Goldsmith, Harry Gossett, Jim Grady, Tommy Hammett, Larry Henry, Debbie Jojola, the late Jon Kwitny, Tom Lange, Laurence Leamer, Allan Lengel, Nancy Lubin, Phil Manuel, Alice Martell, Ethelbert Miller, Karl Milligan, the late Phillip Moscato, Sr., Geno Munari, Rich Munsey, Jules Nasso, the late Nancy Nolte, Mark Olshaker, Tom O’Neill, the late Mark Perry, Andy Petepiece, Mike Pilgrim, Kristina Rebelo, Gus Russo, the late Carl Shoffler, Geoff Schumacher, Eric Shawn, Leo Sisti, Marc Smolonsky, Jodi Solomon, John Sopko, Jeff Stein, Joel Swerdlow, Jim Switzer, Jo Thomas, the late Don Wells, Danny Wexler, Dave Williams, John Wisely, and the late John Zeitts.
Fantastic work.