Add The New York Post on Google BELLEFONTE, Penn. — The frat boy accused of being the ringleader of a Penn State cocaine operation started dealing drugs tp become “popular” — and went from a nerdy Long Island kid to a party king known as the “The Godfather” on campus, according to testimony Wednesday.
Agostino Abbatiello, 24, allegedly gave away piles of free coke at afterparties and blew cash on a new wardrobe and “a $5,000 bong” after raking in big bucks dealing, his friend and alleged accomplice Lars Zeepvat told court.
“I saw a difference in Auggie. He started selling for money. And he started selling for popularity,” Zeepvat said after Abbatiello made his first major purchase of the drug in Spring 2023.
Abbateillo was released Wednesday on $250,000 secured bond after he was locked up without bail for a week for failing to turn himself him when prosecutors wanted.
The accounting major — who’s seen in past photos sporting unstylish glasses, ill-fitting suits and a bouffant hairdo — first rushed with Sigma Chai during the fall of his sophomore year in 2021, Zeepvat said during a preliminary hearing at Centre County Courthouse.
The pair and two other friends allegedly soon began driving to Philly to score cocaine and had begun selling it by their junior year, Zeepvat testified.
Abbatiello started buying bigger quantities from a dealer named “RJ,” who he knew from high school on Long Island, scoring a massive haul that earned him praise from the party crowd, Zeepvat said.
“First time he purchased from RJ it was the most we’ve ever seen and it was 100 grams,” Zeepvat said. “People were enamored with how much it was.”
“Augustino brought back the coke the first time he went to New York and put it on the social room [at the] frat house,” he said.
Zeepvat said they both did drugs themselves while selling bags for $60 to $120 dollars.
By senior year, the coke-snorting dean’s list student then began to deal larger amounts, and spending the dough on new clothing, a pricey bong and gambling up to $10,000 at a time, Zeepvat said.
Abbatiello then became a well-known dealer on campus known as “The Godfather,” Zeepvat said.
When Abbatiello moved into an apartment at the end of junior year, his pad became a drug den, he said.
“Auggie’s apartment was known as the afters party. We would go there and he would put a bag on the table and people would do free cocaine,” Zeepvat said.
He said Abbatiello would host between three and 12 people, sometimes charging for a line, depending on his relationship to the person.
Zeepvat admitted that he had cocaine problem and that, “Auggie was a way that I could use cocaine,” he said.
Abbatiello and other members of the ring now face a slew of criminal charges after authorities discovered that members of the Penn State fraternities, Sigma Chi and Delta Upsilon, reportedly coordinated with cocaine suppliers in New York and Philadelphia.
Thirteen of the frat brothers were busted for running the cocaine trafficking ring that forced young pledges to cut and bag the drugs, which were then peddled to students, according to prosecutors.
