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Over the weekend, another former Sopranos cast member did his part to tear a new hole in the fragile Reality/Fantasy Continuum, and is being held for killing a NY cop during a bungled burglary:

Lillo Brancato Jr., 29, was hospitalized in critical condition with gunshot wounds suffered when the officer shot him after catching two men breaking into a home. Brancato's friend Steven Armento, 48, was also shot and in critical condition.


Prosecutors were in the process Sunday of charging Armento with first- and second-degree murder and Brancato with second-degree murder in the death Saturday of Officer Daniel Enchautegui, 28, said Steven Reed, a spokesman for the district attorney's office. [...]

Brancato, who was arrested in June for heroin possession, was arrested again in Yonkers two days before the shooting after one of Armento's daughters called in a harassment complaint, Yonkers police said. He was charged with disorderly conduct.

You may or may not recall that Brancato played a junior mobster who was personally offed by Tony and Big Pussy after a botched hit on Christopher, once again adding to the eerie life-imitating-art-imitating-life cycle that seems to mark the post-Sopranos existence.

Also, a friend reminded us this morning that Brancato grew up a couple of neighborhoods over from us, and we find ourselves unexpectedly thankful that blogging got us off of the mean streets of Yonkers.