| Location | New York City, United States |
|---|---|
| Organised by | Law enforcement |
| Charges |
Operation Wasteland was an undercover investigation into organized crime rings that controlled New York City's waste disposal industry from the 1950s until 1995. [1] The investigation resulted in the indictment and conviction of more than one hundred participants in price-fixing and bid rigging of waste hauling contracts in the city.
The story is detailed in the 2002 book Takedown, the Fall of the Last Mafia Empire by Douglas Century [2] and the former New York Police detective Rick Cowan who went undercover for three years to investigate the cartel of trash and recycling services. [1] Cowan pretended to be Dan Benedetto, head of a paper recycling firm to investigate what the book describes as "multi-million-dollar-per-year dynasties that these guys had always expected their grandsons and great-grandsons would inherit." [1] After the cartel's fall in 1995, some businesses in the city reportedly paid as much as 90 percent less for solid waste services. [1] Operation Wasteland is also covered the 2005 book Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage by Heather Rogers. [3]
