Dramatic surveillance footage released Tuesday shows the suicidal son of a Luchese mobster botching a rubout of a Brooklyn merchant with ties to the same crime family.
Peter Argentina, 49, who sources said is affiliated with the Luchese crew, narrowly survived Monday's wild assassination bid at his tire shop on Linden Blvd. in East New York.
Eleven minutes later, Argentina's would-be killer, Carl Lastorino, 45, was shot dead by cops as he tried to hail a livery cab a few blocks away from the tire shop.
Lastorino, 45, was the son of a capo and consigliere in the Luchese crew who was locked up by the feds in the 1990s, the sources said.
The video shows him walk into the tire shop about 4:40 p.m. armed with two .38-caliber pistols and a death wish as he confronted Argentina.
"Are you Pete?" he asked, according to NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne.
"Yeah, I'm Pete," Argentina responded.
"This is for you, Pete," Lastorino responded as he squeezed the trigger at least once.
Argentina held his right hand up in front of his body, and Lastorino's first shot hit his hand. He also suffered a
second gunshot wound to his right shoulder, possibly from the same round, Browne said.
Lucky to be alive, Argentina darted into the next room.
"He is running for his life," Browne said.
The camera was still rolling as Argentina ran between two long racks of tires, Lastorino following behind with his pistol blazing.
Argentina later told detectives he did his best to elude the hapless gunman.
"I was trying to run serpentine, but I ran out of room," he said, according to Browne.
Lastorino had fled the tire shop and was already inside the livery cab when an NYPD sergeant and his partner spotted him while rushing to the shooting scene.
Witnesses also pointed him out, Browne said.
The officers did a quick U-turn and approached the livery cab from the rear, guns drawn. Browne said that Lastorino got out, aimed one of his pistols at them and yelled: "You are not going to take me alive."
Each cop fired a single round; both shots hit Lastorino in the chest. He later died at Brookdale University Hospital.
Lastorino's father, Frank Lastorino Sr., was sent to federal prison in 1993 for conspiracy to commit murder, the sources said.
Although his brother is also a Luchese wiseguy, Carl Lastorino was not a member of of the mob clan and polce do not believe the shooting was rooted in organized crime.
The gunman, who had been unemployed for the last three years, left suicide notes for his mother and sister, police said.
"The notes leave little doubt that he contemplated suicide," said NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne.
In the note to his sister, Lastorino wrote: "I can no longer live as a failure."
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