The women of this new show break the mob rule of “don’t ask, don’t tell.” In “A Love Story,” Cheryl accepts a dinner invitation from Phil even though she was engaged to another man. Phil was very taken by Cheryl and he asks to see her ring. He takes the ring off her finger, throws it across the restaurant and tells her you aren’t engaged any more, you are with me. And that’s how the “Love Story” begins.
Philly brings Cheryl presents every time he picks her up. He romances her. He owns a successful printing business in Manhattan. He never tells her he worked for the Colombo crime family as part of Sonny Franzese’s crew, or that he did printing for Sonny. Philly also laundered money for the mob. They were paying him $150,000 a week. That’s how he made the money that allowed them to take trips to the Bahamas, buy a four bedroom house and he even had car painted pink for her.
One day he calls Cheryl and tells her they are going furniture shopping. Philly picks up Cheryl and he brings her a single red rose. She is so busy talking about the furniture they are going to buy that she doesn’t realize that inside the rose is a 3.5 carat diamond engagement ring. Philly tells her to smell the rose. That’s how he proposed to her. They married and went on honeymoon, taking a 7 day cruise to the islands. Eight months later they had a baby girl, Melissa, and Philly gives Cheryl one million dollars. Two years later they have another daughter. Cheryl says her life was always picture perfect and always full of surprises.
This was far from the life Cheryl had known. Her father abandoned the family when she was five years old. Her mother had to raise four children by herself. Cheryl had three brothers and her hand me downs left a lot to be desired. So Philly’s romancing had swept her totally off her feet.
On September 22, 1993, after three years of marriage, Cheryl had to kiss her fantasy good bye as she woke up to a nightmare. The Feds were after Philly. One day, when he stops to fill up his gas tank, he is surrounded by law enforcement agents and taken into custody. A detective calls Cheryl to let her know. Cheryl says they really wanted to get Sonny Franzese and wanted Philly’s cooperation. They tell him that Sonny is his ticket out of jail and into the witness protection program. But Philly clamed up and gets his father to bail him out of jail. Cheryl still knows nothing about why Philly is in jail. He tells her time and time again not to worry, it’s not serious. Philly thinks he is protecting her by not telling her why he is in trouble. If she doesn’t know anything she can’t say anything. But in the end, Philly ends up being convicted of drug trafficking, racketeering and wire fraud.
Phil Caruso
One day, before he leaves the house, Philly takes off all his jewelry, puts it in his jewelry box and kisses Cheryl good bye. She gets a bad feeling. She decides to go down to the courthouse and arrives for what is the last day of his trial. She walks in during the judges sentencing and hears him read a list of crimes and then pronounce sentence, 15 years to life. That is all Cheryl heard. She didn’t know what to do. Philly was handcuffed and taken away and she was told to go home. The children were in day care for a couple of hours so she knew she needed to pick them up. Philly did not “flip” and refused to talk, so he ended up getting a long sentence. He was a “stand up” guy.
The news media were calling Cheryl, they were saying Philly was pushing cocaine. She didn’t know what to believe so she locks herself up in her house with her girls. Her fairy tale ended and everything after that was hell. She had no income, no money and the bills were coming in. Cheryl went into survival mode and got three jobs, working practically around the clock, 17 hour days, waitressing, hostessing and bartending, while her mother watched her children. She waited for 5 years and even drove the 11 hour trip to the prison, near the Canadian border, to talk to Phil and get answers, but he never told her about his involvement with the mob. She says, she couldn’t do it any more; she couldn’t handle his pain and hers. She stopped going to the prison and didn’t have time to read and answer the ten letters a day he was writing to her.
Reenactment Scene
While Philly was serving time, Cheryl was busy becoming financially independent and stable. She didn’t need Philly any more. When he is released in February 2000, after serving 7 years, he expects to be able to return home and take over, but Cheryl says no, it’s not happening. When they first met she says she was naïve, quiet and fun loving. She didn’t know anything. But, after everything that happened, she now understood everything and she could never go back to the way things were with him. She even gets an order of protection.
Philly felt rejected and he decides to teach her a lesson “mob style.” One day, at 8:00 at night, two sheriffs show up at her door. She thinks Philly has gotten into more trouble and tells them Phil is not there. They tell her they are there for her. Phil’s lawyer convinced a judge that she was abusing her children. They removed Cheryl from the home. She had to prove her innocence and the judge was livid. She also started her divorce case, which lasted five years. Philly was never allowed to come home again.
I found Cheryl’s story interesting. I have heard some skepticism about her claiming she didn’t know Philly was in the mob or where all the money was coming from. But, after watching this episode twice, I really tend to believe Cheryl. She was never involved in the mob or been around that lifestyle as far as we know. Phil had a successful printing business in Manhattan which could have afforded them a lavish lifestyle. I don’t think she had much reason to suspect him of being connected except for one thing which might have been a red flag. She asked about his business associates and he told her that they used to be connected, but weren’t any more. Most people know you do not just “retire or quit” the mob after you’ve made your money. But maybe she was naïve about things like that. It just goes to show she knows nothing about mob life.
The other thing that troubled me was that a year into their marriage, after she had their first child, Philly gives her one million dollars. I would love to know what happened to all that money? He was arrested two years later and she says there was no money, no income. But they already had the house, the furniture, the cars…so where did the million dollars go? I know it would be easy to spend all that money in two years, but Philly was still making money and supporting the family up until his arrest. It’s just a question that nagged at me after I watching the episode again.
I don’t think Cheryl is you typical mob wife. She didn’t “wait” for Philly, she drove to the prison to get answers, and she didn’t let him back into her life when he got out. She just seems to have “fallen” into the mob world, clueless and then pulled herself out for the sake of her girls. I think she did a damn good job.
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Picture Credit: Investigation Discovery
