When AJ Soprano and his pals vandalized the pool at his prep school on “The Sopranos,” it wasn’t a snitch that brought them down — it was pizza.

Specifically a pizza with double meatballs, pepperoni, sausage, peppers, onions and extra “moozadell.” After cops confront the pizza man with the evidence and ask who had purchased the pie, he reluctantly drops a dime on AJ. The teen faces expulsion — and the wrath of his mob-boss father.

But this saucy scenario isn’t limited to fiction. In the last two years, pies have helped crack nearly a half-dozen high-profile crimes.



Pizza deliveries tipped cops off to international fugitives and preserved DNA evidence that blew open a gruesome DC-area quadruple homicide. Most recently in Illinois, a mugging of a pizza man led investigators to criminals who had just murdered a man in Georgia.

Call it a slice of justice.

“Pizza hunger trumps better judgment,” says Candice DeLong, a former FBI criminal profiler and host of “Deadly Women” on Investigation Discovery.

“Because none of these people would have been in prison today if they hadn’t picked up the phone and called up for a Domino’s pie.”

Pizza enthusiasm knows no bounds — especially among these crooks.

Super (Pizza) Man

They messed with the wrong pizza guy.

Napoleon Harris III was a linebacker for the Minnesota Vikings, then a state senator, and finally an entrepreneur — opening two Beggars Pizza shops in Illinois.

On the night of Sept. 6, the 250-pound ex-gridiron warrior decided to personally handle any late-night orders at his Harvey, Illinois, location after telling his delivery person to go home.

When the 37-year-old Harris arrived at the delivery location, there was a man waiting for him on the porch — and three others who jumped out of the bushes and tried to choke him to death.

Harris fought back, though the crooks managed to steal his wallet — and the pizza — before fleeing in a car. Harris hopped into his car, called the police and chased them to a lumberyard.

By the time the cops arrived, the men had fled, but the police found blood in their vehicle, which had been registered to Lester Roy Jones, a 44-year-old man whose body was found in an abandoned house in Georgia a few days later. It was Jones’ blood inside the car, and investigators discovered that three of the four suspects who jumped Harris had lured Jones with the Grindr dating app before murdering him, dumping his body in a house and heading to Chicago, where they encountered the long arm of the pizza man.

With the help of Harris’ descriptions of the perps, investigators arrested Malik Mayer, Lawrence Hines and a juvenile. US Marshals are still after the fourth suspect.

Vegan Vengeance

Perhaps the most ironic pizza detective work involved the case of superstar vegan chef Sarma Melngailis, who revolutionized the New York culinary scene with her Pure Food and Wine raw-food restaurant.

She had celebrity devotees like Alec Baldwin and Woody Harrelson, an Ivy League pedigree and a lithe figure honed by years of vegan living.

But desperate times call for animal products.

Melngailis and her grifter hubby, Anthony Strangis, were on the lam for 10 months after allegedly stealing $2 million from the business and stiffing employees.

In May, the foodie fugitives were nabbed in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, after ordering a Domino’s cheese pizza and chicken wings to their Fairfield Inn & Suites room. Strangis tipped off police because he used his own name while ordering. The pair were charged with 24 counts of theft, labor fraud and tax crime charges.

A Rich Slice

Perhaps Domino’s should get some sort of commendation from federal law enforcement agencies because in December, a call to them helped solve an international manhunt that captivated the nation.

Ethan Couch, otherwise known as the “Affluenza Teen,” fled from Texas with his mother after a video surfaced of him playing beer pong, which was potentially a violation of his probation. Instead of reporting to a court hearing, Couch and his mother, Tonya, high-tailed it out of town.

The 18-year-old had already fueled outrage in 2013, when he was convicted of killing four people in a drunk-driving crash. The spoiled teen was spared jail time because his defense successfully argued that his sheltered upbringing in Texas left him ill equipped to comprehend the severity of his horrific actions.

After he and his mother fled their home state, pursuing US Marshals got their break after one of the Couches’ cellphones was used to order a Domino’s pizza.

“They were doomed from the start,” says DeLong. “Affluent suburbanites aren’t necessarily equipped to be on the lam and not get caught.”

Authorities traced the call to a home in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico.

Though mother and son were gone by the time authorities arrived, the pizza-craving duo were soon nabbed on the street near the seaside promenade.

The Telltale Crust

Businessman Savvas Savopoulos, his wife, Amy, 10-year-old son Philip and housekeeper Veralicia Figueroa were held captive overnight in the family mansion in May 2015. They were brutally murdered before their home in the tony Woodley Park section of Washington, DC, was set ablaze. Firefighters discovered the grisly scene.

Before the murders, the killer had demanded a ransom of $40,000. The funds were delivered by an assistant to Savopoulos, which prompted numerous theories about who could be responsible for the reprehensible crimes.

But in the end, it came down to DNA on a Domino’s pizza crust.

And it was left by Daron Wint, an ex-con and former employee of Savopoulos’.

During the standoff, Amy ordered Domino’s and asked the deliveryman to simply leave it on the porch. Wint must have scarfed it down and left the crust behind. A manhunt was launched from DC to Brooklyn. Investigators found Wint near the Maryland-DC border, arrested him and charged him with 12 counts of first-degree murder.

“Crime makes people like this hungry,” says DeLong. “It does not spoil their appetite. And they generally aren’t the type of people to go out for a wholesome meal.”

Pizza Patrol

Sometimes pizza is a tool of intervention. In 2015, a story circulated on Reddit about a woman who called 911 and “ordered” a large pie so as not to tip off her assailant.

When the dispatcher told the woman she had called 911, she calmly responded, “Yeah, I know. Can I have a large with half pepperoni, half mushroom and peppers?”

When pressed again about her call, the woman stayed the course.

‘It wasn’t a good end of the day for the criminals, no matter how many free toppings they got.’ - Candice DeLong, former FBI profiler

“Ummm . . . I’m sorry, you know you’ve called 911, right?”

“Yeah, do you know how long it will be?”

The quick-thinking 911 dispatcher checked the address and saw there had been multiple domestic violence calls to the home. When cops arrived, they saw the woman was beaten up and her boyfriend was drunk. He was arrested.

Media outlets tracked down Keith Weisinger, the dispatcher and author of the Reddit post. Now an attorney in Portland, Oregon, he said the call happened about 10 years ago.

“Whether she had thought of this trick before, or it just came to her, she indicated the urgency of her situation without giving away the true purpose of her call,” he told Buzzfeed.

DeLong says pizza may be responsible for more detective work than has been reported.

“I think it’s probably more common than you know,” she says.

“It wasn’t a good end of the day for the criminals, no matter how many free toppings they got.”