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“This girl was never touched by him.” said Ann Barbarino Crane, whose brother is accused of molesting their niece when the girl was under 13, told CLIFFVIEWPILOT.COM. “I’ve gotten drunk with Joe a number of times and he never said anything to me, and we always talked about everything.”
The alleged victim told jurors in Hackensack last week that Joseph Barbarino molested her several times over two years and even had intercourse with her.
The charges arose after prosecutors pegged Barbarino, now 53, for the cold-case murder of his younger brother, Vincent.
A third brother, Michael, claims he witnessed the murder, as well as several instances of sexual abuse, but a defense attorney says his credibility is shot by his own criminal history. Michael, a former heroin addict who has served time in state prison on weapons, burglary and assault charges and for a time was institutionalized, was 4 at the time.
“I am on probation and report two times a week. I get [urine] tested every week, and pass every part of the test,” Michael Robert Barbarino told CLIFFVIEW PILOT. “I have not [done] any drugs after my arrest in 1997, and stopped drinking about 4 years ago.”
Several years ago, Ann tipped off detectives that Michael was carrying a loaded gun — for which he ended up spending six years in prison.
At one point, the two brothers were locked up at the same time. So investigators wired Michael, hoping to get Joseph to confess the murder to him. Michael, instead, told his brother he was wired.
One family, one huge cauldron of mind-boggling behavior that, if proven, is more a story from a hillbilly backwoods than the Bergen County town of Lodi.
Vincent was just 6 years old when he was butchered at a Lodi construction site, two blocks from the family’s home, April 5, 1972. He had been sexually abused, an autopsy showed.
For various reasons, police at the time couldn’t produce a killer. Conspiracy theories abounded, including that the Barbarinos at the time had connections in local law enforcement.
The case remained cold until John Molinelli became the Bergen prosecutor. Leaning heavily on new forensics, he established a squad that the past several years has cleared dozens of crimes that had been abandoned by his predecessors.
With the help of Lodi Police Chief Vincent Caruso, Molinelli’s investigators not only found people who’d clammed up before deciding to speak. They also have new evidence, the prosecutor says.
In November 2006, while searching Barbarino’s home, investigators found a letter in which Joseph — who was 15 at the time — wrote of having sex with his brother before young Vincent was stabbed to death, his skull crushed, his body left half-naked.
Assistant Bergen County Prosecutor Wayne Mello and defense attorney Ray Beam are working either end of the sex assault trial, which resumes Tuesday in Superior Court in Hackensack.
Meanwhile, family members are arguing on message boards with those who believe Joseph is guilty.
“Joe is the type of person that if he did something wrong wouldn’t be able to hold it in,” Ann Barbarino Crane insisted, in an exclusive interview with CLIFFVIEWPILOT.COM. “She was never left alone with him.
“I have two daughters at the time in question and he never touched them.”
They’ve also argued with themselves over the murder, with Michael Barbarino, 42, insisting that justice finally be served and proclaiming himself “the star witness,” and Ann claiming he made up the murder tale as revenge against “Jo-Jo” for sexually abusing him.
Seven Barbarino children and their parents, as well as various other kind, shared the two-story, ramshackle house, where Joseph and other relatives still live today.
Another brother, Tony, who was a teenager in 1972, spent several years in a juvenile facility in connection with a burglary.
Joe’s current wife used to be married to Michael.
And if Joseph does stand trial for murder, it could be in Family Court instead of criminal court.
After all, he was a juvenile himself when Vincent was killed.
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