Rackover given maximum scentence in Comunale murder

NEW YORK — Pat Comunale didn’t mince words Wednesday when he finally got his chance to address the man convicted of killing his son.

“This coward is no Rocky,” Comunale said in the Manhattan courtroom, referencing a recorded jailhouse conversation the defendant had about beating the charges “like Rocky.”

“He is a punk who went from jail to the penthouse and back to jail, where he belongs, all because he’s stupid.”

James Rackover — one of two men accused of killing 26-year-old Joey Comunale in 2016 — was sentenced Wednesday to more than 28 years to life in prison.

Judge James Burke issued the maximum sentence to Rackover, 27, who was found guilty last month of killing Comunale, a popular Westhill High School graduate.

Rackover was also found guilty of concealment of a human corpse and hindering prosecution.

Burke sentenced Rackover to 25 years for the murder and 3 2⁄3 years for the lesser charges. He will be eligible for parole in 2047.

Rob Caliendo, one of Rackover’s attorneys, said his client will appeal the sentence.

Pat Comunale called his son’s murder “monstrous” and living proof of “pure evil.”

“Joey was everything to us,” he said before the sentencing. “We wake up every day with the horror of what happened to him . ... There’s no more holidays, no more birthdays, just days that go by.”

Lawrence Dilione, who has also been charged with murder, will go on trial next. A third man, Max Gemma, was also in the apartment when Comunale was killed, according to police. Gemma was charged with hindering prosecution and tampering with evidence. He is expected to go to trial last.

Comunale had just met Dilione outside a New York nightclub and accompanied him and five others to Rackover’s apartment on Nov. 13, 2016.

While inside the apartment, Dilione and Rackover allegedly beat, stabbed and attempted to dismember Comunale, then threw his body out of a 30-foot-high window. Police said they then drove 60 miles to Oceanport, N.J., where they buried the body in a shallow grave.

In brief comments to Burke, Assistant District Attorney Antoinette Carter said Rackover, an ex-con from Florida, was afforded a comfortable life because of his relationship with his surrogate father, Jeffrey Rackover, who helped him get a job, a home in a posh Sutton Place apartment, as well as a Mercedes-Benz.

Jeffrey Rackover, known as the “jeweler to the stars,” boasts famous clients including Melania Trump, Oprah and Jennifer Lopez.

Carter said the defendant took the Rackover name as a way to conceal their true relationship. In a lawsuit filed against Jeffrey Rackover, the Comunale family argued that father and son were actually lovers.

“He lived a life of unmerited privilege,” Carter said of James Rackover.

Maurice Sercarz, Rackover’s lead attorney, argued his client was an immature victim of abuse.

He said Rackover left Florida partly because of an abusive household.

Sercarz said his client’s parents were teenagers when they had him and his father was bipolar.

Sercarz said Rackover’s father beat his children regularly and abused his wife. Sercarz said Rackover was the main caregiver for the family.

During his time in Florida, Rackover was arrested several times and violated probation more than once, including when he left for New York.

“When my client left Florida, he did it to put behind him the hardship he suffered,” Sercarz said. “My client has spent his entire adult life seeking the equivalent of a family.”

Carter said the “brutal” and “barbaric” murder of Comunale could not be blamed on Rackover’s negligent biological father.

“Moving to New York simply became an opportunity to commit more serious crimes,” Carter said, adding that Rackover had discussed plans to burglarize homes and rob friends.

She claimed he stole thousands from his surrogate father.

Burke said the evidence spoke volumes, even though there was no “understandable reason” for the crime.

He argued the murder was precisely the rare case in which maximum consecutive sentences was warranted.