By Ralph Cipriano

Working for Vince Fumo was like working for Vito Corleone, especially if you wanted to quit.

That’s the story a federal jury heard today from Vince’s vengeful son-in-law.

"Vince is like the Mafia; you don’t get out." The quote from Fumo’s son-in-law, Christian Marrone, was lifted from a transcript of what Marrone told a grand jury in 2006

The Mafia reference was dropped during cross-examination, after Fumo’s defense lawyer, Dennis Cogan, asked Marrone, "You really hate this guy, don’t you?"

"I wouldn’t characterize it as hate," said Marrone, who wasn't too convincing. Marrone, after graduating from college, worked as a legislative aide to the state senator from 1997 to 2002. During that time, Marrone said he fell in love with Fumo’s daughter, Nicole, and married her in 2003.

Fumo was not invited to the wedding.

"After what he did to my family," Marrone said he decided that "He (Fumo) was an evil person."

"Didn’t you say Vince is like the Mafia?" Cogan pressed Marrone, before handing him the grand jury transcript.

Marrone read it over and acknowledged that indeed he did tell the grand jury that. He told Cogan what he meant was leaving Fumo was like "leaving the Mafia," adding, "Once you’re in, you don’t get out."

Fumo is on trial in a 139-count political corruption case. The former state senator has been accused of using state employees such as Marrone as servants to cater to his personal and political needs, while leading a lavish lifestyle and systematically defrauding taxpayers of $3.5 million. The former state senator, a political titan in Pennsylvania for three decades, has pleaded not guilty to federal charges of fraud, conspiracy to obstruct justice, and filing false tax returns.

In court today, Marrone testified that while he was working for Fumo in 2001, he attempted to jump to then-U.S. Senator Rick Santorum’s staff. Marrone is a Republican like Santorum; Fumo is the quintessential Philadelphia Democrat. Marrone said he told Fumo about his plans, and he thought that Vince had given him his blessings.

But subsequently, Marrone said, he found out that somebody on Fumo’s staff had told Santorum not to hire Marrone. He didn’t get the job, and Cogan suggested that Marrone blamed his father-in-law for that.

When Marrone finally did leave Fumo’s employ in 2002, to take a job in the Montgomery County District Attorney’s office, Marrone said that once again, he thought he was leaving with Fumo’s blessings. He told the jury how he sent Fumo a gracious letter, thanking him for hiring him and being a mentor. After Fumo read the letter, Marrone testified, he hugged his future son-in-law.

But then Fumo withheld Marrone’s last paycheck, because, Marrone charged, Fumo was angry about Marrone’s wedding plans with Fumo’s daughter. Marrone said that a member of Fumo’s staff also threatened to have law enforcement officials show up at the Montgomery County District Attorney’s office, to confiscate a state computer that Marrone had not yet returned.

Marrone also charged in court that once Fumo found out he was not going to be invited to his daughter Nicole’s wedding, friends of Fumo suddenly planned a surprise birthday party for the state senator. The party was held six weeks before Fumo’s birthday, Marrone said, on the night before Marrone married Nicole Fumo.

Although Cogan countered that Fumo’s birthday party was a surprise planned by friends, Marrone claimed that Fumo had deliberately orchestrated the surprise birthday party. It was all a plot to upset "my little sister-in-law," said Marrone, who added that his sister-in-law was distraught over which event she should attend, Nicole’s wedding, or Fumo’s surprise birthday party.

"That was done deliberately to harm us," Marrone told the jury.

But Marrone didn’t stop there. During an increasingly contentious cross-examination, Marrone charged that the state senator was also an atheist who had once ordered him to poison a neighbor’s barking dog. Marrone said he refused to carry out the hit.

Cogan attempted to show that Marrone’s real motive for testifying against his father-in-law was a vendetta. To prove his point, Cogan showed Marrone an e-mail that Fumo had sent out to friends and family to inform them that "Aunt Nancy died this afternoon" of cancer.

Marrone flagged the e-mail, and e-mailed Nicole, writing, "What shit," adding that Fumo "never even believed in God."

What Marrone didn’t know at the time was that Fumo had intercepted the e-mail, an event that further irritated his son-in-law.

"You really hate this guy, don’t you?" Cogan asked again.

"I believe that Vince Fumo is an evil individual for a number of reasons," Marrone replied.

Earlier, when Cogan and Marrone were sparring over the printed record, and what nasty things Marrone had previously told officials about Fumo, Marrone free-lanced from the witness stand, telling Cogan that he and Fumo had talked about many, many subjects, not all of which were written down. He then asked Cogan if he would like to hear about some of them.

Like the time Fumo ordered him to poison a dog, Marrone volunteered to Cogan. In testimony earlier this week, Marrone had detailed a long-running dispute between Fumo, who lived in a mansion on Green Street, and a next-door neighbor who had a continuously barking dog. On Fumo’s behalf, Marrone previously testified, he had complained about the dog to the office of Councilman Jim Kenney, as well as the captain of the Ninth Police District.

But according to Marrone, Don Fumo then proposed whacking the dog.

"The state senator wanted me to put poison in a piece of meat and throw it over the fence,’ Marrone told Cogan. "I refused to do it."

An incredulous Cogan asked Marrone if he had ever told that story before. Marrone insisted he told the FBI, although he said he didn’t know what the agents wrote down and what they didn’t.

"Don't shoot the messenger," Marrone told Cogan.

Marrone also told Cogan that somebody connected with Fumo had obtained a copy of Marrone’s personnel file with the Montgomery County District Attorney’s office, and subsequently leaked it to a reporter at Philadelphia magazine. Cogan asked who connected with the senator had leaked the personnel records, but Marrone said the reporter wouldn’t tell him.

In his third full day on the stand, Marrone seemed weary. He talked about "when I first began testifying," which he added, "seems like a month ago."

After his experiences with Democrat Fumo, Marrone didn’t have any better luck working for a Republican. Marrone told the jury he worked for District Attorney Bruce Castor for two years before he was fired by the district attorney, he said, for supporting a political opponent of Castor’s.

The real reason he didn’t get along with Castor, Marrone previously told the jury, was that "Bruce is the type of person who loves himself more than anybody else."

He didn't say how Castor felt about dogs.