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2024-03-29T06:00:21Z
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The Mother Snake: Profile of female Shanghai crime boss She Aizhen
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-mother-snake-profile-of-female-shanghai-crime-boss-she-aizhen
2021-05-14T09:47:36.000Z
2021-05-14T09:47:36.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-mother-snake-profile-of-female-shanghai-crime-boss-she-aizhen" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237160863,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237160863?profile=original" /></a>By “Asian Gangsters” for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Female gangsters have always been a rare phenomenon in any time and place. Female gangsters like Bonnie Parker and Griselda Blanco are some of the best known lady outlaws, but little is known about the women from the east. Shanghai, China which was historically a breeding ground for organized crime, produced many females who rose to prominence in the underworld. One of these women was She Aizhen 佘爱珍.</p>
<p>She Aizhen’s (photo above, left) name is mostly unknown, but she was notorious in her day. Aizhen was a not just a female criminal, she was a certified gangster who struck fear into the hearts of many Chinese. Her interesting biography includes her days pulling off heists on the street, all the way to working for a secret police force during World War 2. Aizhen’s unbelievable story will show people that not only men were respected in the Chinese underworld.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237161069,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237161069?profile=original" /></a>Tiger mom</strong></span></p>
<p>Aizhen was born in the year 1900 in Shanghai to a wealthy family comprised of descendants of Qing royalty. As a young girl, she was always the toughest one in school and she beat up many of her classmates. Aizhen (right) was fascinated with gangsters at a young age and desired to be an outlaw. At the age of 14, she got pregnant from an older gangster from the neighborhood. The boy didn’t want to marry her, so she threatened him with a knife until he accepted marriage. This is when she realized that she he could bully anyone into submission. She became a loyal housewife until the unexpected death of her son at 9 years old. After the death of her son, she divorced the young man and began to work in a casino in Shanghai.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The Green Gang</strong></span></p>
<p>Around the early 1920s Shanghai was booming and became known as the Sin City of the East. Gangsters ran the city and it was infested with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Casino" target="_blank">casinos</a>, opium dens and whore houses. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-overview" target="_blank">Green Gang</a> dominated the all these rackets. The Green Gang were best known for its three prominent leaders: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-shanghai-triad-boss-du-yueh-sheng" target="_blank">Du Yuesheng</a>, Huang Jinrong and Zhang Xiaolin. Aizhen caught the attention of an older leader from the Green Gang named Ji Yunqing 季云卿. They became so close that Ji and his wife adopted Aizhen as their daughter. This led to her formally joining the Green Gang as a low level gangster. She became involved in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Extortion" target="_blank">extortion</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Robbery" target="_blank">robberies</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drug dealing</a> and shootouts - and she earned the reputation as the number one female gangster in Shanghai next to Huang Jinrong’s wife Lin Guisheng.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237161289,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237161289?profile=original" /></a><em>Photo: Green Gang members.</em></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Asian Bonnie and Clyde</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237161669,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237161669?profile=original" width="122" height="199" /></a>Ji Yunqing eventually introduced She Aizhen to another prominent Green Gang gangster named Wu Sibao 吴四宝 (left). Wu was a well-respected figure in the underworld and he earned a fortune from running casinos. He had the reputation of a merciless gangster who would routinely torture his enemies. Wu was also Ji Yunqing’s bodyguard and he saved Ji’s life from an assassination attempt. To repay his trusted bodyguard, Ji promised Wu his newly adopted daughter to marry—She Aizhen. Wu and She eventually got married and became the Asian Bonnie and Clyde. </p>
<ul>
<li><strong>ALSO READ: Famous movie star and respected gangster - Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/famous-movie-star-and-respected-gangster-profile-of-14k-triad-bos" target="_blank"><strong>14K Triad boss Michael Chan</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Despite Wu’s reputation as a tough guy, it was said that even he feared his wife. On one instance, Aizhen caught her husband fooling around with a female singer, so she went to the singers house with armed men and shot in the air as she scratched the skin off her face. After Wu heard about the incident he feared for his own life and begged on his knees for his wife’s forgiveness.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Mother Snake</strong></span></p>
<p>Fast forward the late 30s. Wu Sibao became associated with the Wang Jingwei regime, which was a puppet state of Japan during their conquest of China. Wu and Aizhen became prominent members of the “No.76” which was the secret service of the puppet regime. They were employed to intimidate, beat, and sometimes kill Chinese people who were plotting against the Japanese. From 1939 to 1943, the No. 76 was involved with over 3000 assassinations and kidnappings.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-deadly-battle-for-control-over-new-york-s-chinatown" target="_blank"><strong>The deadly battle for control over New York’s Chinatown</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>One famous case of the secret service was the torturing and killing of Zheng Pingru 鄭蘋如. Zheng was an outspoken anti-Japanese social figure from Shanghai, which got her tortured by Aizhen and eventually shot dead. Aizhen’s role in the brutality earned her the name “Mother Snake” and she was considered the most feared woman in Shanghai.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Shootout with British police</strong></span></p>
<p>Despite She and Wu’s government collaboration, they were still outlaws and heavily involved in the underworld. In 1941, She Aizhen and others were in a major shootout with British police after police asked them to hand in their guns when they were crossing the British Shanghai International Settlement border. The shootout ended with people dead on both sides, but Aizhen miraculously survived. Her driver and bodyguards were killed but Aizhen was found taking cover in a car covered in shattered glass. Aizhen became a legend in the Shanghai underworld after the shootout.</p>
<p>In the spring of 1942, Wu Sibao planned a major heist against the Japanese. He heard the Japanese wanted to ship a large amount of gold to the Zhengjin Bank. Wu Sibao sent gangsters to ambush the vehicles carrying the gold on Sichuan Road. The Japanese men fled, and Wu’s men successfully took over the vehicle. The problem was the driver fled with the key which caused the men to stall. The delay allowed Japanese authorities to come and arrest all the men.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mama-san-godmother-of-the-chinese-underworld" target="_blank"><strong>Mama San: Godmother of the Chinese Underworld</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237160492,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237160492?profile=original" width="146" height="199" /></a>Wu Sibao was eventually found guilty for masterminding the failed heist and he was imprisoned. She Aizhen bribed the Japanese so her husband can have good treatment in prison. Li Shiqun 李士群 (right), the leader of the No.76, bailed Wu out of prison one month later. Three days after his release, Wu was found dead in the city of Suzhou. The cause of death was said to be poisoning. It is believed that Li Shiqun poisoned Wu on orders from the Japanese. A year later Li Shiqun was also found poisoned to death, which led many to believe that She Aizhen avenged her husband’s death, however the case remains a mystery till this day.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Exile</strong></span></p>
<p>At the end of World War 2, China was liberated after Japan surrendered to the allies in 1945. Any former collaborators with the Japanese were considered traitors and they were executed or imprisoned. She Aizhen was tried for her collaboration and sentenced to 7 years in prison. After her release she immediately fled to Hong Kong.</p>
<p>While in Hong Kong, She Aizhen reunited with another traitor from the Wang Jingwei regime named Hu Lancheng. Hu was a prominent figure in the regime and he was married to the famous feminist novelist Eileen Chang. She Aizhen became Chang’s rival and made it her goal to steal her husband. Despite Eileen Chang’s talent and beauty, Hu Lancheng could not resist She Aizhen’s charm and the two became a couple. Shortly after, the two fled to Japan to avoid further prosecutions.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237162262,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237162262?profile=original" /></a><em>Photo: She Aizhen and Hu Lancheng</em></p>
<p>In Japan, She Aizhen and Hu Lancheng officially got married in 1954. She Aizhen ran a restaurant and was very popular amongst the Chinese community in Japan. She managed to get herself locked up again for a short period of time for unknown trivial matters. After her final imprisonment, She Aizhen lived a peaceful secluded life with her husband until his death in 1981. She Aizhen’s death date is unknown but it is rumored she died not long after.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-origins-of-the-chinese-mafia" target="_blank"><strong>Triads: Origins of the Chinese Mafia</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>She Aizhen was a tough woman who didn’t let her gender define her role in society. The time period in which she lived, makes her life even that much more extraordinary. Although She Aizhen is considered a traitor to the Chinese, she will still go down as a legendary figure in the history of organized crime. We hope this article will teach more people about this forgotten gangster lady.</p>
<p><strong><em>For more on Asian Gangsters check out this <a href="https://www.instagram.com/asian_gangsters/" target="_blank">instagram page</a> or watch the videos on this</em></strong> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCo8NubkCy2A_70gyjpnXSYQ" target="_blank"><strong><em>YouTube channel</em></strong></a></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/triads-overview">Triads section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
Famous movie star and respected gangster - Profile of 14K Triad boss Michael Chan
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/famous-movie-star-and-respected-gangster-profile-of-14k-triad-bos
2021-04-27T06:00:00.000Z
2021-04-27T06:00:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/famous-movie-star-and-respected-gangster-profile-of-14k-triad-bos" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237153892,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237153892?profile=original" /></a>By "Asian Gangsters" for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Most people know the Chinese Triads as super secret societies that are shrouded in mystery. Despite the tradition of secrecy, some Triad members are celebrities. One of these men is legendary Hong Kong actor Michael Chan. He was not only an amazing actor but a respected gangster as well. Some of Chan’s leading roles are forever classics in the history of Hong Kong film. He had a long career on the streets and on the big screen, and he is one of the men we think of when we think about the dark side of Hong Kong cinema.</p>
<p>Michael Chan was born Chan Wai-man (陳惠敏) in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Guangdong" target="_blank">Guangdong</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=China" target="_blank">China</a> in 1943. His family relocated to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=HongKong" target="_blank">Hong Kong</a> when Michael was a young boy. He grew up in a Hakka village in Tsuen Wan, which is located in the New Territories region of Hong Kong. The family was lower class, and he was forced to become a man at an early age. By the time Michael was 12 he was working in a spinning mill to support the family. Around the same time, he was hustling on the streets and joined a local youth gang. Joining a street gang as a young kid was a normal part of life in Hong Kong in this era. Chan was also training in martial arts, which would eventually shape his criminal and film career.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>From law enforcement to the 14K Triad</strong></span></p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237154652,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237154652?profile=original" /></a></strong></span><strong><em>Photo: Chan during his acting days, showing his Triad tattoos.</em></strong></p>
<p>When Chan was 17 he became a correction officer in a Hong Kong prison, so he could see the other side of the law. By 19 years old he was promoted to a street officer with the anti-drug unit in Hong Kong. In the prison and on the streets, Chan made many underworld connections, and he became closely associated with the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-overview" target="_blank">Triads</a>. His relationship with the Triads eventually got him kicked out of the police force. This is when he decided to become an official member of one of the largest Triad groups, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=14K" target="_blank">14K</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Asia’s Most Wanted Drug Lord - Profile of Triad boss</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/asia-s-most-wanted-drug-lord-profile-of-triad-boss-tse-chi-lop-ni" target="_blank"><strong>Tse Chi Lop, nicknamed “Brother Number Three”</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>When Chan first joined the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-overview" target="_blank">Triad</a>, he became heavily involved in the drug trade and night club scene in Tsim Sha Tsui. Chan described the 60s and 70s in Hong Kong as a wild time for partying with a booming night scene. Chan and his crew took full advantage of the newfound decadence. Chan claims he ran the entire Tsim Sha Tsui area and had almost all the businesses in the area paying him extortion money. He eventually became a “red stick” in the 14K, which is a high ranking title given to trained fighters who run the enforcing part of the gang. It was said that Chan once had at least 500 loyal men at his command.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Behind every strong man is a strong woman</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237154495,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237154495?profile=original" /></a>At age 25, Chan met a teenage girl named Wu Guoying (right, next to Chan). Wu helped out his criminal career by collecting extortion money. She also took the blame for Chan in a gun case and ended up serving 2 years in prison for her man. Chan also was involved in an affair with a Japanese actress that he met on set. Despite his disloyalty, Wu remained by his side, and the two would remain lifelong partners.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Fighting</strong></span></p>
<p>Chan eventually put his fighting ability to legitimate use and he got into professional martial arts in the late 60s. Chan won many fighting competitions in the 70s and 80s, including two <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kickboxing" target="_blank">kickboxing</a> championships and a few boxing matches. In 1983, at 39 years old, he participated in the "World Elite Fighting Competition" and took only 35 seconds to knock down Japanese boxer Tsuyoshi Mirosaki, which was aired on live tv.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237155075,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237155075?profile=original" /></a>Fame</strong></span></p>
<p>In the early 70s, Chan (photo right, Chan on far left with famous actor Jackie Chan on far right) pursued a career in film and has had a long successful acting career. Being inspired by another gangster actor Jimmy Wang Yu, Chan felt he could do the same. Chan’s acting resume is filled with movies of multiple genres, but action pictures were definitely his specialty. Most of Chan’s acting roles he portrayed a gangster, street fighter or professional martial artist. He has a long discography and some of his famous films are Broken Oath, Gangland Odyssey & Bloody Brotherhood.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/hong-kong-triads-and-their-lucrative-movie-industry" target="_blank"><strong>Hong Kong Triads and 'their' lucrative movie industry</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Chan worked with the Shaw Brothers and Golden Harvest production companies, which were known for their triad connections. Although these companies were known for trapping artists in contracts, Michael Chan’s respect in the underworld allowed him freedom in the industry. He formed close relationships with famous men such as Bruce Lee, Chow Yun Fat and Jackie Chan. Bruce Lee’s relationship to Michael Chan and other gangsters led many people to question the official story of Bruce Lee’s death. In a recent interview, Chan claimed that Bruce Lee was a perfect fighter and no gangster would dare touch him.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237155088,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237155088?profile=original" /></a><strong><em>Photo: Chan and Bruce Lee</em></strong></p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Retired?</strong></span></p>
<p>Chan recently has claimed that he is retired from crime but he was arrested in 2013 for attending a Wo Shing Wo (和勝和) Triad meeting. He was arrested again in 2018 for attending a Triad meeting in Cambodia. That same year Chan attended a ceremony marking the establishment of the World Hongmen History and Culture Association headquarters, alongside former 14K boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triad-boss-wan-kuokkoi-aka" target="_blank">Wan Kuok-koi</a> aka "Broken Tooth". Despite his involvement, in a recent interview Chan said that the triads have mostly lost their honor and patriotism, which is something many gangsters of all nationalities say about the modern world. This may be a contributing factor to his supposed retirement.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-origins-of-the-chinese-mafia" target="_blank"><strong>Triads: Origins of the Chinese Mafia</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>In his late 70s, Chan is still involved in the film industry. He had a role in a successful 2017 gangster film titled Chasing The Dragon. Chan also does work behind the scenes and still has a close relationship with Jackie Chan. He was in the news most recently for admitting he has lung cancer in September 2020. Chan also announced he’s getting officially married to his longtime partner, Wu Guoying.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237155862,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237155862?profile=original" /></a>Michael Chan’s life was something out of a movie. He accomplished something that many gangsters wish they could do, and that is being a celebrity to the public while still being respected on the streets. Michael Chan will forever be a legend in Hong Kong and his legacy in the underworld and cinema will last forever.</p>
<p><strong><em>For more on Asian Gangsters check out this <a href="https://www.instagram.com/asian_gangsters/" target="_blank">instagram page</a> or watch the videos on this</em></strong> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCo8NubkCy2A_70gyjpnXSYQ" target="_blank"><strong><em>YouTube channel</em></strong></a></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/triads-overview">Triads section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
“We have to do some damage control” - Profile of Moroccan-Dutch female drug boss Naima Jillal
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/we-have-to-do-some-damage-control-profile-of-moroccan-dutch-femal
2021-04-02T11:00:00.000Z
2021-04-02T11:00:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/we-have-to-do-some-damage-control-profile-of-moroccan-dutch-femal" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159869,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159869?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Women who climb to the top of the underworld remain a rare breed, but every now and then several manage to break through that glass ceiling. Among them Moroccan-Dutch drug boss Naima Jillal, dubbed “The Godmother of Cocaine” by the media. Just when police began finding out about her prominent position she vanished without a trace.</p>
<p>Jillal wasn’t a complete stranger to Dutch police. Born and raised in the city of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Utrecht" target="_blank">Utrecht</a>, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Netherlands" target="_blank">Netherlands</a>, she was first arrested in 2005 and charged with making threats. In the years that followed she was busted for <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Fraud" target="_blank">fraud</a>, growing <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Marijuana" target="_blank">marijuana</a>, and assault. In her defense, she told police that she was in a lot of debt and borrowed money from a lot of people.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159896,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159896?profile=original" /></a>Becoming a narco middlewoman</strong></span></p>
<p>Just a woman down on her luck, trying to make it. But then, in 2014, she began popping up in several major drug trafficking conspiracies. Tons of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a> were being shipped through ports in the Netherlands and Belgium in containers filled with fruit. Jillal emerged as the broker behind many of these lucrative shipments.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Profile of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-of-moroccan-drug-boss-ridouan-taghi-he-who-talks-goes-and" target="_blank">Moroccan drug boss Ridouan Taghi</a> - “He who talks, goes. And everyone around him goes to sleep”</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>She achieved this because she had all the right contacts, she knew the right people in the right places. From the drug dealers on the streets to the drug bosses paying for the shipments and the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-cartels" target="_blank">drug lords</a> in Costa Rica and Ecuador supplying the goods, the corrupt custom agents who were able to let shipments go through to the people transporting the stuff to its destination.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Auntie” goes on shopping sprees</strong></span></p>
<p>She was the spider in the web and by acting as a middle(wo)man between these contacts, she rose in stature and power. Because she was a lot older than many of the contacts she worked with, she was named “auntie” by her underlings and colleagues.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/wife-of-el-chapo-busted-on-international-drug-trafficking-charges" target="_blank">Wife of “El Chapo” busted on international drug trafficking charges</a>, aiding husband’s prison break</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Operating out of the beach resort of Puerto Banús near Marbella in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Spain" target="_blank">Spain</a> where she lived in a luxury apartment, she enjoyed the riches that came with her job. She was mother to a son and would frequently take him on expensive shopping sprees in Spain and the Netherlands in which they would spend tens of thousands of euros on whatever they wanted. She even bought her son an apartment in the expensive Zuidas neighborhood in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Amsterdam" target="_blank">Amsterdam</a>, the Netherlands.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237160287,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237160287?profile=original" /></a>“Everything is fucked now”</strong></span></p>
<p>Then, on May 30, 2016, shit goes bad. Using encrypted phones, an alleged drug boss sent Jillal a text message: “Those containers are gonna be scanned. We are fucked, auntie. We can’t get to them. This is about a lot of money and long prison sentences, auntie. Everything is fucked now.”</p>
<p>One of these containers was filled with 4000 kilograms of cocaine hidden among a load of pineapples from Costa Rica. For some reason, customs at the port in Rotterdam received a tip and they planned to scan these containers to see what was inside. When they did, they found the load.</p>
<p>“We have to do some damage control,” Jillal texted back to the worried drug boss. “We will just put out a new story.” The drug boss answered: “Agreed.”</p>
<p>Apparently, the new “story” worked. Jillal continued bringing in shipments. But things were not well. Stories later emerge about Jillal in which she is accused of fleecing drug bosses. She offered gangsters to buy into a piece of shipment. This meant that drug bosses were able to spread the risk if a load was caught. But Jillal would allegedly bring in more buyers than was needed. She would than tip off the load to authorities and pocket the cash. Whether true or not, these type of stories are an indication that her position within the underworld was coming under serious pressure.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The vanishing</strong></span></p>
<p>In October of 2019, 52-year-old Jillal underwent a stomach reduction. According to rumors, because she had enough of people calling her fat. She needed rest to recover, but business is always calling. For unknown reasons, she traveled from Spain to the Netherlands that same month.</p>
<p>On the evening of October 20, she was picked up by a car in front of her luxury apartment in Amsterdam. It is the last time she is seen or heard from.</p>
<p>Since her disappearing, there have been many rumors. Multiple crime groups were keeping an eye on her – and not to keep her safe from harm. Some people said she was playing a double role for various rival crime groups, some claim that she might have been working as a police informant.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: The man supplying France with 10% of its hashish:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-man-supplying-france-with-10-of-its-hashish-profile-of-french" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of French drug boss Moufide Bouchibi</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>All pretty good reasons for any gangster to have her killed. This outcome becomes more likely when police put out a report that gruesome photos of a dead Jillal are circulating in the underworld. These photos allegedly show her lifeless corpse cut up in several pieces.</p>
<p> </p>
<p><span style="text-decoration:underline;"><strong>UPDATE</strong></span>: On April 25, 2022, prosecutors in the case against drug boss Ridouan Taghi presented evidence they claim was taken from Taghi's encrypted cell phone. The evidence consists of one photo showing a naked woman bound to a chair. On her belly lay a cut off thumb or finger and a toe. A second photo shows the woman lying on the ground on her stomach. Metadata shows the pictures were taken on the night of Jillal's disappearance. Though it has not been definitively determined whether the woman is indeed Jillal, prosecutors suspect it is. </p>
<p>Taghi's lawyer denies her client has anything to do with this murder and says it is unclear how these photos ended up on this phone.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
The man supplying France with 10% of its hashish: Profile of French drug boss Moufide Bouchibi
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-man-supplying-france-with-10-of-its-hashish-profile-of-french
2021-03-28T08:00:00.000Z
2021-03-28T08:00:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-man-supplying-france-with-10-of-its-hashish-profile-of-french" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237162892,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237162892?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>They call him “Mouf” or “Poto” and they know he is one of France’s biggest narcotics traffickers. 41-year-old Moufide Bouchibi allegedly supplies France with 10 percent of its annual hashish intake. Police were on to him, but he proved more difficult to take down than they first expected.</p>
<p>Bouchibi was born in Orsay, France, and is of Algerian descent. He grew up in the region in and around <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Paris" target="_blank">Paris</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=France" target="_blank">France</a>. Around 2000, he was busted for his role in a largescale <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Hashish" target="_blank">hashish</a> trafficking network that operated in Paris and Strasbourg. The photo police took of him at that point would remain the only picture of him they would have in the decades to come.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Setting up shop in North Africa</strong></span></p>
<p>After his release from prison, he moved first to Spain and then to North Africa, staying in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Morocco" target="_blank">Morocco</a> and his home country of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Algeria" target="_blank">Algeria</a>. Far away from French law enforcement, he set up an international organization and coordinated multi-ton shipments of hashish from <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Spain" target="_blank">Spain</a> to France using go-fast boats to evade detection. French investigators allege that at one point, he was supplying the country’s consumers with 10 percent of their annual hashish need.</p>
<p>The profits were huge. He is credited with importing 50 to 60 tonnes of hashish a year to Europe, which would have netted him up to €70 million euros per year.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/iran-allegedly-protects-moroccan-dutch-drug-gangsters-it-used-to" target="_blank">Iran allegedly protects Moroccan Dutch gangsters</a> it used to murder its “enemies of the state” abroad</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>But his name was known. In 2011, French authorities seized 1.3 tons of hashish belonging to Bouchibi's organization. Police tracked him down in Morocco in 2012, but he manages to escape arrest and take refuge in Algeria from where he continues his operations. He was convicted in absentia of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drug trafficking</a> in France and sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2015. Authorities caught him in Tunisia two years ago, but he managed to regain his freedom.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Good vibes in Dubai</strong></span></p>
<p>He then fled to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Dubai" target="_blank">Dubai</a> in the United Arab Emirates. The emirate is notorious for becoming a safe haven for fugitive gangsters and drug traffickers from all over Europe, men like Moroccan-Dutch drug boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-of-moroccan-drug-boss-ridouan-taghi-he-who-talks-goes-and" target="_blank">Ridouan Taghi</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/camorra-overview" target="_blank">Camorra</a> boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/italian-police-bust-drug-trafficking-camorra-clan-and-retrieve-st" target="_blank">Raffaele Imperiale</a>. Baking under the desert sun, they invest their illicit funds and lead lavish lifestyles.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/los-castanas-two-brothers-and-spain-s-most-notorious-drug-cartel" target="_blank">Los Castañas</a>: Two brothers and Spain’s most notorious drug cartel</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Bouchibi was one of them.</p>
<p>Until last week, when, on the evening of Sunday, March 21, he was arrested by local authorities after being identified via fingerprints in a red notice by Interpol. He will now have to face a long time locked up, devoid of the luxury he has grown accustomed to.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
From the Caribbean to Dubai and Europe: Profile of international drug boss Shurendy “Tyson” Quant
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/from-the-caribbean-to-dubai-and-europe-profile-of-international-d
2021-01-28T14:24:47.000Z
2021-01-28T14:24:47.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/from-the-caribbean-to-dubai-and-europe-profile-of-international-d" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159898,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159898?profile=original" /></a>By Milko for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Drug boss Shurendy Quant (photo above) came from a small island in the Caribbean, but quickly saw his influence grow from the tropics into the rainy streets of Western Europe. His network enabled him to allegedly establish cocaine pipelines in Jamaica and launder dirty money in Dubai. And he did it all while still in his early 30s.</p>
<p>Shurendy (sometimes also spelled Shurandy) Quant is from the Caribbean island of Curacao, a former colony of the Netherlands. He is one of the alleged leaders of the No Limit Soldiers, a notorious <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gangs" target="_blank">gang</a> that traffics <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a> from the Dutch Antilles to the Netherlands in Europe.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/norman-s-cay-from-notorious-cocaine-pipeline-of-the-medellin-cart" target="_blank">Norman’s Cay</a>: From cocaine pipeline of the Medellin Cartel to a fraudulent festival for rich millennials</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>The gang is known as ruthless. It is alleged to be behind the assassination of politician Helmin Magno Wiels on May 5, 2013. Dutch crime boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Holleeder" target="_blank">Willem Holleeder</a> is alleged to have contracted the No Limit Soldiers to commit the murder of his two sisters, who testified against him in court, and that of journalist Peter R. de Vries. The two members of the No Limit Soldiers were doing time in the same prison as Holleeder. Holleeder became (in)famous in the Netherlands after masterminding the kidnapping of beer magnate Freddy Heineken in 1983.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Coke pipeline in Jamaica</strong></span></p>
<p>Quant traveled to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Jamaica" target="_blank">Jamaica</a> in October of 2012. According to authorities, he was setting up an international drug pipeline in Montego Bay. He was arrested by police in St. Ann, Jamaica, in April 2013 and extradited to Curacao on April 11. Upon arrival on Curacao, he was placed on a plane to the Netherlands.</p>
<p>Quant was arrested as the main suspect in Operation Athena, an investigation into largescale cocaine smuggling. Fifteen others were also arrested. Authorities claim Quant was the leader of this organization and involved in big cocaine shipments and several murder conspiracies.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: The Black Cobra:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/dutch-boss-henk-orlando-rommy" target="_blank"><strong>Profile of Dutch crime boss Henk Orlando Rommy</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>On January 24, 2014, then 31-year-old Quant saw Dutch prosecutors demand he be sentenced to 15 years in prison if he was to be found guilty of the charges against him. His trial was a massive affair. He was flown by helicopter from the maximum-security prison in Vught to the courtroom in the city of Haarlem.</p>
<p>But the court acquitted Quant of all charges on March 6, 2014. According to the judges, there was insufficient evidence. Most of it consisted primarily of text messages he is alleged to have sent from his encrypted BlackBerry phone. The court ruled it could not determine whether or not Quant sent these messages himself.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>More money, more problems</strong></span></p>
<p>Quant’s legal troubles were still far from over. Starting in 2019, a special team consisting of law enforcement agencies from Curacao, Sint Maarten, and Aruba began investigating Quant’s activities.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Stoned to Death - Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/stoned-to-death-profile-of-jamaican-crime-boss-wayne-sandokhan-sm" target="_blank"><strong>Jamaican crime boss Wayne “Sandokhan” Smith</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>This resulted in Quant’s arrest on November 26, 2020, while he was staying in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Dubai" target="_blank">Dubai</a> in the United Arab Emirates, a known hotspot for drug traffickers from all over the world. 37-year-old Quant was charged with ordering several gangland <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Murder" target="_blank">murders</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kidnapping" target="_blank">kidnapping</a>, leading a criminal organization, and money laundering.</p>
<p><em><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Milko" target="_blank">Milko</a> (a pseudonym) is a Dutchman who has studied organized crime in the Netherlands, its history, and its offshoots in foreign countries for over two decades. He is also very knowledgeable about crime in other European countries and is eager to share his information.</em></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
“They don’t have the balls to kill me” – Profile of Bonanno Mafia family hitman “Tommy Karate” Pitera
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/they-don-t-have-the-balls-to-kill-me-profile-of-bonanno-mafia-fam
2021-01-23T12:32:06.000Z
2021-01-23T12:32:06.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/they-don-t-have-the-balls-to-kill-me-profile-of-bonanno-mafia-fam" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237157670,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237157670?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Mafia hitman or crazy serial killer? Every so often people ask this question when they come upon a very capable and active mob assassin. A murderer like Bonanno crime family soldier “Tommy Karate” Pitera brings up the same discussion. Was he just very good at his job or did he enjoy the art of death a little too much?</p>
<p>Thomas Pitera was born on December 2, 1954, in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gravesend" target="_blank">Gravesend</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Brooklyn" target="_blank">Brooklyn</a>, New York. His father was a candy salesman and was an honest, hard-working citizen, who did his best to provide and care for his wife and two children; his son Thomas and his daughter Theresa.</p>
<p>Growing up, Tommy Pitera was bullied relentlessly. He had a high-pitched voice that made him a laughing stock of the neighborhood. Both boys and girls would laugh in his face. He was frequently attacked – slapped, kicked, and spit on. The bullying killed something inside the younger Pitera.</p>
<p>It also lit a fire that would turn him into a deadly killing machine.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Becoming “Tommy Karate”</strong></span></p>
<p>After watching Bruce Lee’s Kato character kick ass in television series The Green Hornet, Pitera was certain he had found his calling: He would become a martial artist! After persuading his mom and dad, he joined a <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Karate" target="_blank">karate</a> school in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn and quickly became one of the class’ best students.</p>
<p>His teacher noticed his pupil’s progress. To prove his skills, Pitera signed up for a big martial arts tournament. He beat seven opponents to win the championship. Along with the accolades, came a cash prize and a ticket to live in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Japan" target="_blank">Japan</a> and learn martial arts from the local masters. He went to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Tokyo" target="_blank">Tokyo</a> and studied under sensei Hiroshi Masumi. He ended up staying in Japan for 27 months.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237157880,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237157880?profile=original" /></a><em><strong>Photo: An aging Pitera showing his Van Damme move in prison.</strong></em></p>
<p>When Pitera returned to New York in 1976, he came back as a man. He had confidence, walked tall, and held his chin up high. His hands now were, to use a cliché, deadly weapons. Gone were the days that anyone could hurt Tommy Pitera.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Making his bones</strong></span></p>
<p>But people might still smirk when they heard his voice. In order to totally silence everyone around him, he had to go beyond a black belt. He had to hook up with a shadowy, secretive organization that ruled Gravesend and many parts of New York, the United States, and beyond. He had to join the Mafia, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=LCN" target="_blank">La Cosa Nostra</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/a-personal-table-at-rao-s-bonanno-mobsters-chat-about-loot-from-l" target="_blank">A personal table at Rao’s</a>: Bonanno mobsters chat about loot from Lufthansa heist at famous East-Harlem restaurant</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>It wasn’t hard for a guy with Pitera’s skillset to be welcomed by the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a>. Especially since they all knew him from the neighborhood. He had grown up around them and they trusted him. Now it was time to see if he had what it took to be one of them.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237158097,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237158097?profile=original" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Pitera (right) with an underling.</strong></em></p>
<p>He became close to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">Bonanno family</a> mobster Anthony Indelicato, the son of “Sonny Red” Indelicato, a powerful capo in the Bonannos. Bruno was known as a stone-killer with a bad cocaine habit. Because of who his father was and also his capabilities as a hitman, the Mafia chose to ignore his drug use.</p>
<p>After hooking up with Indelicato, Pitera became immersed in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family" target="_blank">Bonanno family</a> and its various players. He showed they could count on him when it came to executing murder contracts or getting rid of bodies. Besides being a skilled martial artist, Pitera had become an expert on how one can hurt, kill, and dispose of the human body. He read countless books on torture and killing and was eager to put his new knowledge in practice.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-hook-life-and-bloody-crimes-of-feared-chicago-mafia-enforcer" target="_blank">The Hook</a>: Life and bloody crimes of feared Chicago Mafia enforcer Harry Aleman</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Things were going according to plan, but then Mafia politics almost blew apart Pitera’s mob career and ended his life along with it.</p>
<p>After Bonanno family boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/death-in-the-afternoon-the" target="_blank">Carmine Galante</a> was gunned down in the summer of 1979, various factions within the family began vying for the top spot. Pitera, being Indelicato’s right-hand man, was part of the faction that ultimately lost the power struggle. Indelicato’s father and two other captains were killed in one swoop and Indelicato’s life was only spared after he promised not to seek vengeance. Knowing how the world of Cosa Nostra worked, he backed down and promised to toe the line.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>A “Made” Man</strong></span></p>
<p>Pitera’s mentor had lost a lot of clout. But he had no problem finding new mentors. The new powers - men like <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-boss-joseph-massino" target="_blank">Joseph Massino</a> and Anthony Spero - could put his deadly talents to good use, and frequently did. They found that when they handed Pitera a contract, he would take care of it immediately and exactly as ordered.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237157670,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237157670?profile=original" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Bonanno crime family underboss Anthony Spero (left) and Pitera.</strong></em></p>
<p>As a result of his stellar track record, in the 1980s Pitera was initiated into the Bonanno crime family and became a “made” member of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a>. Now the days of smirks and disrespect were officially long gone. Whenever he walked the streets or sat down in a restaurant, people would know who he was and who he was with. No one would dare look at him funny. Pitera finally had achieved what he always wanted.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-at-the-drive-thru-bonanno-family-mobster-shot-in-the-head" target="_blank">Murder at the Drive-Thru</a>: Bonanno family mobster shot in the head while getting coffee at McDonald’s</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Pitera’s mob connections gave him a direct in with some of the country’s biggest narcotics traffickers. <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">Drugs</a> became his primary racket and source of income. He invested some of the money in two bars; the Cypress Bar and Grill and the Just Us Bar, which he used as his headquarters.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Killing machine</strong></span></p>
<p>His unique selling point, however, was his ability to kill and dispose of bodies. His reputation grew to such an extent that even other families began asking him to take care of certain jobs. Like Gambino crime family capo Edward Lino, who himself was a capable hitman, who allegedly approached Pitera to help him whack one of Gambino mob boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gotti" target="_blank">John Gotti</a>’s longtime associates, “Willie Boy” Johnson.</p>
<p>Johnson, it turned out, was an informant. When Gotti found out, he went ballistic and ordered him killed. He handed the contract to Lino, who then called on Pitera. Johnson was shot to death on August 29, 1988, precisely as ordered. Pitera once again came through for his friends.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Trafficking drugs and dismembering bodies with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/trafficking-drugs-and-dismembering-bodies-with-the-graewe-brother" target="_blank">the Graewe brothers</a>, associates of the Cleveland Mafia</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>As the years progressed, Pitera added more notches to his belt. He had no hesitation when it came to pulling the trigger. He would shoot a guy in the head and not think twice about it. Matter of fact, he would then strip the body naked, pull it into a bath tub and dismember it. Afterwards he would put the various body parts in different bags and bury them at one of his favorite burial grounds in Staten Island. Before he would get in his car, he would step into the bloody bathtub and clean himself until no trace of the gruesome job was left.</p>
<p>It was just a part of work.</p>
<p>Or was it?</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Hitman or Serial Killer?</strong></span></p>
<p>Killing is part of the Mafia underworld – or any underworld for that matter. But most mobsters draw a line when it comes to killing those outside of their criminal world. Be they civilians, cops or women and children.</p>
<p>Pitera did not draw those lines. When the love of his life, a woman by the name of Celeste LiPari, died from a drug overdose, it became clear that Pitera was an equal opportunity murderer. LiPari was beautiful, but she was also a junkie.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237158695,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237158695?profile=original" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Pitera with Celeste LiPari</strong></em></p>
<p>LiPari went out clubbing and used cocaine and heroin to have a good time. She was usually accompanied by her good friend Phyllis Burdi, who was similar to LiPari in that she was another pretty neighborhood girl who had gotten addicted to the product peddled by many of the area’s mobsters.</p>
<p>Though both women had chosen this lifestyle, Pitera blamed Burdi for having a bad influence on LiPari. When she OD’ed, Burdi’s days were numbered.</p>
<p>Burdi was close to Frank Gangi, a member of Pitera’s crew. Pitera had ordered him to let him know when he saw Burdi, but Gangi could not bring himself to hand over the woman he had such a special relationship with.</p>
<p>Like LiPari and Burdi, Gangi too was a junkie. He snorted cocaine to get high and drank booze to fall asleep. After hanging with Pitera and being present when “Tommy Karate” killed people and dismembered their corpses, his drug use only increased.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/i-chopped-him-up-so-bad-profile-of-decavalcante-mafia-family-sol" target="_blank">“I chopped him up so bad”</a> - Profile of DeCavalcante Mafia family soldier Anthony Capo</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>After running into Burdi, Gangi succumbed to her charm and the pair went on a cocaine binge. At one point they ran out of coke and Gangi phoned an associate asking him whether he could come get some more stuff. He and Burdi then went the associate’s apartment. The man in question, an Israeli drug dealer, was also an associate of Pitera. While Burdi and Gangi were there, Pitera called the man.</p>
<p>But the Israeli was out on a morning run and Gangi picked up the phone. He was unable to lie to Pitera, purely out of fear, and told him Burdi was with him. Pitera told him to keep her there and that he would come right over.</p>
<p>Pitera arrived, walked into the bedroom where Burdi was sleeping and pumped three bullets into her. He then moved her body into the bathroom and began dismembering her body in the jacuzzi. He placed her severed head on the edge of the tub, creating an image that would haunt Gangi for the rest of his life.</p>
<p>Killing a woman is not that much of a stretch for a Mafia assassin. But it did put Pitera in a select group of Mafiosi. What sets Pitera apart from most of them, however, is that he would take certain things off the body of his victim – jewelry etc. – and keep it at his home. This behavior is usually seen in serial killers and it clashed with Pitera’s modus operandi of a secretive, careful mobster, who tries to erase any proof of his crimes.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/how-the-sicilian-mafia-flooded" target="_blank"><strong>How the Sicilian Mafia flooded the US with heroin</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Because despite this foolish behavior, Pitera was known among both fellow mobsters and members of law enforcement as a man who was very aware of his surroundings and did his best to evade the eyes of police and federal agents. He would cover his mouth when he went on walk talks with other gangsters, would use evasive tactics when driving his car to a meeting, switch cars, wear disguises, and he never talked on the phone.</p>
<p>Of course, all of that does not matter when your own people stand up to testify against you. Pitera’s murders had a profound effect on his underling <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gangi" target="_blank">Frank Gangi</a>. After seeing his close friend Burdi killed and beheaded by Pitera, he cracked and told authorities all about his boss’ deadly activities.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Death touch</strong></span></p>
<p>Authorities pounced on Pitera on June 4, 1990, when they arrested him and several crew members and charged him with drug trafficking and seven murders – though prosecutors believed him to be involved in over sixty gangland killings. During a search of his home in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gravesend" target="_blank">Gravesend</a>, federal agents found all sorts of tools of his trade: from automatic weapons to knives and Samurai swords, as well as countless books about assassination techniques, torture and the dismemberment of cadavers.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159300,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159300?profile=original" /></a><em><strong>Photo: Pitera after his arrest by DEA agents. They broke his nose as they wrestled him to the ground.</strong></em></p>
<p>Prosecutors demanded the death penalty for Pitera. His life was hanging in the balance during his trial. If that bothered Pitera, he didn’t show it. After a short but eventful trial, he was convicted on June 25, 1992, of six murders and operating a large-scale drug ring. He was acquitted of murdering “Willie Boy” Johnson.</p>
<p>As the jury deliberated on Pitera’s sentencing, he turned to one of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=DEA" target="_blank">DEA</a> agents who had been hunting him. “I bet you they don’t have the balls to kill me,” Pitera told the agent. Whether it was about “balls” is up for debate, but the jury indeed rejected the death penalty and Pitera was sentenced to life in prison, instead.</p>
<p>Pitera continues serving his sentence and has remained loyal to the code of silence. Inside prison, he has taken up drawing. He sells his drawings online via a website. You can also find his work on Instagram where he has an account.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Bonanno crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
Kill to be on top of the hill - Profile of Genovese Mafia family soldier Louis Auricchio
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/kill-to-be-on-top-of-the-hill-profile-of-genovese-mafia-family-so
2021-01-10T08:44:05.000Z
2021-01-10T08:44:05.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/kill-to-be-on-top-of-the-hill-profile-of-genovese-mafia-family-so" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237154266,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237154266?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>In the Mafia, you don’t get to the top without leaving a trail of dead bodies in your wake. You have to kill to be on top of the hill. Whether you’re John Gotti, Carlo Gambino or Vito Genovese. Their soldiers know this all too well. Genovese crime family soldier Louis Auricchio was among them.</p>
<p>Auricchio was born on May 27, 1958 in Somerset, New Jersey. He came up in the crew of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese Mafia family</a> capo John Joseph DiGilio Sr. Known by the nickname “Johnny Dee,” DiGilio was a former professional <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Boxing" target="_blank">boxer</a>, who was made by mob boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn" target="_blank">Vito Genovese</a> in the 1950s, and went on to oversee the Genovese family rackets in New Jersey.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>The rise and fall of “Johnny Dee”</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237154300,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237154300?profile=original" /></a>By the 1970s, he was a powerhouse in the unions, becoming secretary-treasurer of International Longshoremen's Association Local 1588 in Bayonne, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=NJ" target="_blank">New Jersey</a>. For the right price, DiGilio (right) offered labor peace. It was one of the mob’s bread-and-butter rackets, ensuring the families of a steady flow of income – both legit and illegitimate.</p>
<p>Authorities were cracking down on La Cosa Nostra’s strong grip on <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Union" target="_blank">unions</a>, though. Mobsters and union officials were being subpoenaed and indicted left and right. In 1988 it was DiGilio’s turn. It was part of doing business in the life. It was what was expected even. What wasn’t was representing yourself during a racketeering trial. Yet that was exactly what DiGilio did.</p>
<p>His mob superiors did not appreciate his efforts. They were especially pissed off when the jury acquitted DiGilio but found his fellow Genovese family-connected defendants guilty. DiGilio’s success would be short-lived. Literally.</p>
<p>His dead body was found floating in the Hackensack River on May 26, 1988. He was shot in the head five times. The <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese family</a> has its own way of meting out justice – and it is final.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: A friend of Vito’s - Profile of Genovese crime family mobster</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/a-friend-of-vito-s-profile-of-genovese-crime-family-mobster-salva" target="_blank"><strong>Salvatore “Sally Burns” Granello</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>His murder remained unsolved for years to come. The code of silence was taken seriously within the Genovese family, an organization so disciplined that its members never uttered the name of their boss, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/genovese-boss-vincent-chin" target="_blank">Vincent “Chin” Gigante</a>, aloud. Instead, they pointed to their chin when they referred to him.</p>
<p>While authorities were investigating the gangland killing of DiGilio, Auricchio was fighting his own legal battle with them. He was found guilty of evading over $300,000 in taxes from 1981 to 1983. The jury was deadlocked on a cocaine conspiracy charge. While Auricchio was in federal prison, authorities were getting closer to solving the murder of his boss. And their intel pointed to him as being the triggerman.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“I shot John”</strong></span></p>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237155265,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237155265?profile=original" /></a>In 1993, an investigation by the New Jersey State Police and the Division of Criminal Justice uncovered detailed information that led to a state indictment of Auricchio on charges that included the 1988 murder of DiGilio. Auricchio (right) didn’t put up much of a fight. He pleaded guilty to first-degree state charges of aggravated manslaughter and racketeering in March of 1994.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: “I’m in waste management!” - <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/i-m-in-waste-management-genovese-mafia-family-soldier-frank-giovi" target="_blank">Genovese Mafia family soldier Frank Giovinco</a> guilty of racketeering</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>“I shot and killed him,” Auricchio said in court. “I shot John.” He admitted that he conspired with other Genovese family mobsters to murder DiGilio. He said he shot DiGilio several times in the back of the head with a .38 caliber handgun from the back seat of his own black Lincoln Continental, driven by George Weingartner, a former Bayonne police officer.</p>
<p>Later in 1994, Weingartner, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese family</a> capo Angelo Prisco and 11 other Genovese mobsters were indicted on racketeering and other charges related to the murder of DiGilio. Again, a death caused for an unexpected turn of events.</p>
<p>During the trial in 1998, Weingartner was found dead in an idling car in the garage of his Brick home, asphyxiated by carbon monoxide. It was ruled a suicide but when the mob is involved things are never as clear cut as they seem.</p>
<p>Prisco pleaded guilty in 1997 to state charges of conspiracy to commit racketeering and arson for hire and was sentenced to 12 years in prison. The other co-defendants were also convicted.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237155090,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237155090?profile=original" width="216" height="370" /></a>Doing time, moving on up</strong></span></p>
<p>By then, Auricchio (right) was already doing time for his role in the killing of DiGilio. On June 10, 1994, he had been sentenced to 30 years in New Jersey state prison on the murder charge, with a minimum of 15 years without parole. He was sentenced to 20 years, 10 without possibility of parole, on the racketeering charge, with the sentences to run concurrently with each other and with a federal sentence for racketeering that was imposed one month earlier.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-genovese-crime-family-boss-liborio-bellomo" target="_blank"><strong>Genovese crime family boss Liborio Bellomo</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Auricchio did his time and kept his mouth shut. He got out of prison in December of 2010 after his sentence was up. There were rumors that he had taken over DiGilio’s old crew and was appointed as capo within the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese family</a>.</p>
<p>Things remained quiet until news of his passing was announced. He died on January 5, 2021, at age 62.</p>
<p><em>Photo at top of page and one to the right are courtesy of <a href="http://www.pinterest.com/domwoods74/" target="_blank">Dom Woods</a>.</em></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family">Genovese crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
The Chinese Godfather - Profile of Chinese-Italian crime boss Zhang “Il Uomo Nero” Naizhong
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-chinese-godfather-profile-of-chinese-italian-crime-boss-zhang
2021-01-03T16:30:00.000Z
2021-01-03T16:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-chinese-godfather-profile-of-chinese-italian-crime-boss-zhang" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237151477,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237151477?profile=original" /></a>By Joe Francis for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Since Italy and Europe are becoming more diverse, the Italian organized crime groups no longer have a monopoly on crime in Italy. Not only are ethnic <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Albania" target="_blank">Albanians</a> on the rise, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/nigerian-mafia-in-italy-now-on-the-same-level-as-the-camorra-poli" target="_blank">Nigerian</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-overview" target="_blank">Chinese gangs</a> are also making way. The thought of non-Italians being involved in crime in the homeland of organized crime is a shock to many but a reality. Chinese gangs with loose connections to the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-overview" target="_blank">Triads in Asia</a> are involved in many rackets such as <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drugs</a>, illegal <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling" target="_blank">gambling</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Prostitution" target="_blank">prostitution</a>, human smuggling and of course violence. Now in Italy, many Chinese from the Zhejiang and Fujian province of China have been flocking to the Northern Italian cities such as Tuscany, Florence and Milan. Most of these immigrants are honest hard workers, but some of them have different motives. Zhang Naizhong is one of these newcomers who is taking advantage of the situation and runs a multimillion-dollar criminal enterprise.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>ALSO READ: Asia’s Most Wanted Drug Lord - Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/asia-s-most-wanted-drug-lord-profile-of-triad-boss-tse-chi-lop-ni" target="_blank"><strong>Triad boss Tse Chi Lop, nicknamed “Brother Number Three”</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237151891,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237151891?profile=original" /></a>59-year-old Zhang (right), who is known as “Il Uomo Nero” (The Black Man), is an immigrant from the Zhejiang province and his gang is some of the most powerful Asian gangsters in Europe. They have been involved in almost every crime imaginable but their luxury comes primarily from human trafficking, prostitution, slave labor and importing cheap goods. Italian law enforcement has stated that Zhang has a complete monopoly on the importation of Chinese goods. Through traditional <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a> methods, he built an empire to become the main man in the distribution of goods from China to thousands of Chinese companies in Europe.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>ALSO READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/triads-origins-of-the-chinese-mafia" target="_blank"><strong>Triads: Origins of the Chinese Mafia</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Zhang was first noticed by law enforcement in 2011 after a slew of murders between a Fujianese gang and Zhang’s Zhejiangese gang, which resulted in Zhang becoming the head man in charge. His reputation as a killer keeps him in power and he was quoted saying: “If you join me you will live; if you go against me, you will die”.</p>
<p>Then in 2016 he drew more attention when three Chinese prostitutes that were held captive by gangsters in Milan decided to kill themselves by jumping off a balcony. In January 2018, Zhang and 32 members of his group were arrested and accused of belonging to a criminal organization, but they were eventually released due to lack of evidence.</p>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237152486,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237152486?profile=original" /></a><strong><em>Photo: Alleged members of Zhang's organization</em></strong></p>
<p>Police say Zhang manages to stay off the radar due to him dealing only with other Chinese people and not the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/italian-organized-crime" target="_blank">Italian Mafia</a>. It was noted that the victims of Chinese gangster killings are almost always other Chinese, which keeps Italian gangsters and police away. Also, Zhang and the gang speak the Zhejiang dialect which makes it almost impossible for Italian authorities to spy. This also caused the Italian authorities to reach out to Chinese authorities for assistance. Today, Zhang Naizhong is a free man but currently fighting a usury case in Prato, Italy. The extent of his control on his former racket is under investigation, but he is still believed to be the most powerful Chinese gangster in Italy.</p>
<p><strong><em>For more on Asian Gangsters check out this <a href="https://www.instagram.com/asian_gangsters/" target="_blank">instagram page</a> or watch the videos on this</em></strong> <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCo8NubkCy2A_70gyjpnXSYQ" target="_blank"><strong><em>YouTube channel</em></strong></a></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/triads-overview">Triads section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out our <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/blog/gangsters-inc-on-social-media">social media channels</a></strong></li>
<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
“The Sopranos… Is that supposed to be us?” – Profile of DeCavalcante Mafia family soldier Joseph Sclafani
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-sopranos-is-that-supposed-to-be-us-profile-of-decavalcante-ma
2020-09-21T15:29:17.000Z
2020-09-21T15:29:17.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-sopranos-is-that-supposed-to-be-us-profile-of-decavalcante-ma" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159066,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159066?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>“The Sopranos… Is that supposed to be us?” Joseph “Tin Ear” Sclafani (photo above) was caught saying on tape. Sclafani, a longtime <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante crime family</a> soldier, was surprised to see his own environment portrayed on television. And maybe kind of proud as well. Sclafani was a made man who took pride in his job and the secretive brotherhood he belonged to.</p>
<p>As a young man, Sclafani learned discipline in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Army" target="_blank">United States Army</a>, where he served from 1955 to 1957. He also learned to maintain his fitness there. He continued to do between 100 to 150 pushups a day well into his 50s and 60s.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Ripped it right off ‘em”</strong></span></p>
<p>After leaving the Army, he got involved in the hustle and bustle of the New York and New Jersey underworld. He began <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Loansharking" target="_blank">loansharking</a> and was involved in some <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling" target="_blank">gambling operations</a>. He also did some <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Robbery" target="_blank">robberies</a> and broke into warehouses, making off with a large variety of products.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: “I chopped him up so bad” - Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/i-chopped-him-up-so-bad-profile-of-decavalcante-mafia-family-sol" target="_blank"><strong>DeCavalcante Mafia family soldier Anthony Capo</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>“A pallet of this, a pallet of that,” Sclafani was recorded saying to an informant. “I was the score guy. We stole mink coats from Jews in Boro Park. We’d sit in a car, see them walking down the street. You ripped it right off ‘em, jump in the fucking car, and you’re gone.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159463,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159463?profile=original" /></a>Twenty murders</strong></span></p>
<p>He became a made member of New Jersey’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante La Cosa Nostra family</a> in 1982. He acted as chauffeur for DeCavalcante family leader John D’Amato (right), who he would drive to meetings with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview" target="_blank">Gambino crime family</a> leader <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gotti" target="_blank">John Gotti</a> at his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Ravenite" target="_blank">Ravenite social club</a>.</p>
<p>Sclafani wasn’t shy about his violent tendencies. He frequently bragged about having 20 gangland killings under his belt. He used his reputation as a capable hitman to make money off labor racketeering and the extortion of businessmen.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>INTERVIEW: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mafia-author-shares-dark-stories-behind-garden-state-gangland-the" target="_blank">Mafia author shares dark stories behind Garden State Gangland</a>: The Rise of the Mob in New Jersey</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>But for all his tough guy qualities, he never seemed to rise in the crime family’s rankings. As he got older that began to stung. Like in the 1990s, when he didn’t move up to become a capo. Instead, Joseph Giacobbe was made captain, a man who was forgetting certain things, like who had been whacked and why. But regardless, Sclafani was overheard saying: “He may be older than me, but he ain’t got as much as I got.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Surrounded by rats, but standing tall</strong></span></p>
<p>As he was talking to Ralph Guarino, a person he regarded as a friend – and future friend of his; a made member of La Cosa Nostra – Sclafani was being taped by the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=FBI" target="_blank">FBI</a>. His friend turned out to be a rat. On December 2 of 1999, Sclafani and scores of other <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante family</a> mobsters were arrested.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237159490,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237159490?profile=original" /></a>Sclafani was hit with extortion and gambling charges. Several of his co-defendants decided to flip almost instantly, including his former capo and one of the DeCavalcante family’s leaders, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/turncoat-mobster-once-again" target="_blank">Vincent “Vinny Ocean” Palermo</a> (right).</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Profile of New Jersey</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/new-jersey-decavalcante-family-boss-john-riggi-dies" target="_blank"><strong>Mafia boss John "The Eagle" Riggi</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>But not Sclafani. He was old school and a stand-up guy. He made his bed and would sleep in it. He pleaded guilty and took his sentence of 8 years behind bars. If anyone still needed convincing of Sclafani’s loyalty to omerta, his lawyer Francisco Celedonio emphasized: “He is not cooperating with anybody about anything.”</p>
<p>He went on to do his time and was released from prison on July 29, 2005.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“The Sopranos… Is that supposed to be us?”</strong></span></p>
<p>While the FBI had their mole recording the DeCavalcante mobsters discussing topics ranging from the mundane to the criminal, they also caught the wiseguys discussing the hit HBO show <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Sopranos" target="_blank">The Sopranos</a>, which had just premiered that year.</p>
<p>“Hey, what's this fucking thing, 'Sopranos'. What the fuck are they... Is that supposed to be us?” Sclafani was taped asking.</p>
<p>“You are in there, they mentioned your name in there,” DeCavalcante family capo Anthony Rotondo answered.</p>
<p>“Yeah? What did they say?” Sclafani replied.</p>
<p>“Watch out for that guy, they said. Watch that guy,” the goodfellas in the car with Sclafani and Rotondo joked.</p>
<p>“Every show you watch, more and more you pick up somebody. Every show,” Rotondo said.</p>
<p>“Yeah, but it's not me,” Sclafani said. “I'm not even existing over there.”</p>
<p>“What characters,” Rotondo concluded. “Great acting.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“Tin Ear”</strong></span></p>
<p>To conclude on a bit of a side note: Sclafani got his nickname because he was deaf in his right ear.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family">DeCavalcante Crime Family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
“I chopped him up so bad” - Profile of DeCavalcante Mafia family soldier Anthony Capo
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/i-chopped-him-up-so-bad-profile-of-decavalcante-mafia-family-sol
2020-06-08T16:30:00.000Z
2020-06-08T16:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/i-chopped-him-up-so-bad-profile-of-decavalcante-mafia-family-sol" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237151282,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237151282?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Every Mafia family has its go-to guy when it comes to violent acts. For New Jersey’s DeCavalcante crime family one of those men was Anthony Capo, a soldier with a hair-trigger temper who relished hurting people and making bones.</p>
<p>Capo (photo above) began using his “muscle” for the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante family</a> as an associate under capo Vincent Rotondo and would later fall under Vincent’s son Anthony. He was involved in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling" target="_blank">gambling</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Extortion" target="_blank">extortion</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Loansharking" target="_blank">loansharking</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">narcotics</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Fraud" target="_blank">fraud</a>, armed <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Robbery" target="_blank">robbery</a>, and available whenever the bosses needed someone to “send a message”. He was convicted in 1985 for leaning on a debtor who had borrowed money from Vincent Rotondo.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Wild kid</strong></span></p>
<p>During his criminal career, Capo acquired a reputation for being a wild kid. He would not hesitate to beat you up or shoot you where you stood. To emphasize this, he would frequently share stories about his violent exploits.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mafia-author-shares-dark-stories-behind-garden-state-gangland-the" target="_blank">Mafia author shares dark stories behind Garden State Gangland</a>: The Rise of the Mob in New Jersey</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Like the time someone came to Capo’s bar to demand money he was owed. “I handled myself pretty well,” Capo was recorded saying. “I pat myself on the back. I hit him good. He gets up and goes: ‘I got our number and I got your number.’ He didn’t die, he didn’t die. I beat him, I cut him, I chopped him up so bad, then I stick him in the car. I called his brother. I said: ‘Here he is.’ He said: ‘Where’s my brother?’ I said: ‘Your brother is under the car.’ He said: ‘Who did this to him?’ I said: ‘I did this to him. This is why… ba, ba, ba.’” </p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237151861,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237151861?profile=original" /></a>A favor for John Gotti</strong></span></p>
<p>Many members of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante crime family</a> were close to members of New York’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview" target="_blank">Gambino crime family</a>. Capo for instance worked with powerful Gambino family associate Joseph Watts and was involved in his multi-million-dollar loansharking racket. <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/new-jersey-decavalcante-family-boss-john-riggi-dies" target="_blank">John Riggi</a> (right), the DeCavalcante family boss, was a good friend of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gotti" target="_blank">John Gotti</a>, boss of the Gambinos. It wasn’t so surprising then, that Gotti asked his friend in Jersey for a favor. He needed someone whacked.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: Profile of</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/new-jersey-decavalcante-family-boss-john-riggi-dies" target="_blank"><strong>DeCavalcante crime family boss John "The Eagle" Riggi</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>That someone was Fred Weiss, a property developer from Staten Island who had earlier been an editor for the Staten Island Advance newspaper. Weiss had gotten involved in a mob-run illegal waste dump and after the whole racket was busted by authorities, the Mafia decided it did not trust Weiss with keeping his mouth shut.</p>
<p>The murder contract was handed to DeCavalcante family capo Anthony Rotondo, who, in turn, recruited <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/turncoat-mobster-once-again" target="_blank">Vincent Palermo</a>, Jimmy Gallo, and Anthony Capo. With Capo behind the steering wheel of the getaway car, which was owned by his wife (Capo was at least smart enough to switch license plates), he could see how Palermo shot Weiss in the face. Killing him gangland style.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237151496,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237151496?profile=original" /></a>“A gay homosexual boss”</strong></span></p>
<p>By 1991, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family" target="_blank">DeCavalcante family</a> was run by John D’Amato (right), after Riggi was imprisoned on racketeering charges. D’Amato wasn’t a popular guy – he borrowed money and didn’t pay back. He wasn’t well liked by his underlings, but what were they gonna do?</p>
<p>The problem for D’Amato was that his girlfriend didn’t like him that much either. She began spreading a rumor that he was bisexual and had sex with men. This was an explosive accusation for the Mafiosi in his crime family. Being gay wasn’t something that was acceptable in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a>. As Capo himself said: “Nobody's going to respect us if we have a gay homosexual boss sitting down discussing La Cosa Nostra business.”</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>INTERVIEW:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/interview-john-gotti-jr-sits-down-with-gangsters-inc" target="_blank"><strong>John Gotti Jr. sits down with Gangsters Inc.</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>D’Amato’s underlings decided they would kill their boss. Capo was designated as the triggerman. Capo and another mobster picked up D’Amato and drove him to a garage in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Brooklyn" target="_blank">Brooklyn</a>, using some bullshit story wiseguys always tell the person they are lulling into safety. Once they arrived, Capo shot D’Amato in the head. His body was put in the trunk of the car and disposed of later.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Hitman turned rat</strong></span></p>
<p>Still, after all this work, Capo was just a soldier, no matter what his last name might be. He remained one until December 2, 1999, when he was arrested on various racketeering and murder charges. Despite being one of the most feared men of the streets, Capo took little time deciding on his future. Instead of taking his chances in court and prison, he flipped and agreed to testify against his Mafia colleagues.</p>
<p>He then vanished into the Witness Protection Program together with his family. On January 23, 2012, at 52 years old, Capo died of a heart attack.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-decavalcante-crime-family">DeCavalcante Crime Family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
The boss his son – Profile of Gambino Mafia family associate Joseph Gambino
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-boss-his-son-profile-of-gambino-mafia-family-associate-joseph
2020-05-17T11:50:21.000Z
2020-05-17T11:50:21.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-boss-his-son-profile-of-gambino-mafia-family-associate-joseph" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237140660,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237140660?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>As far as Mafia bosses go, Carlo Gambino is one of the most legendary. His name remains notorious as it is still branded on one of New York’s five La Cosa Nostra families. Being the son of such a man, then, came with the inevitable perks. And some drawbacks as well. As his son Joseph found out.</p>
<p>Joseph Gambino grew up differently than his old man. He studied at New York University and had a bright future ahead of him if he kept his mind focused. But why study when he could be out making great money working in a business controlled by his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-boss-carlo-gambino" target="_blank">dad</a>?</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>“We don’t call the police”</strong></span></p>
<p>So, by the 1950s, he started working for Consolidated Carriers Corp., a trucking company that went on to become a powerhouse in the Garment District delivering goods. It would make Joseph and his older brother Thomas, who was a capo in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview" target="_blank">Gambino family</a>, rich men. But it also made them a target for law enforcement.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-guys-that-do-more-than-killing-gambino-mafia-family-mobsters" target="_blank">The Guys That Do More Than Killing</a>: Gambino Mafia family mobsters busted for large variety of crimes</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>The State Police sent in undercover officers posing as clothing manufacturers and truckers in a sting operation to see how legitimate this business really was. During one job interview, an undercover officer was told by Joseph what would happen if he wronged the company: “We don’t call the police — we take care of it ourselves.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Mob tax</strong></span></p>
<p>Besides Consolidated Carriers, the Gambinos ran over a dozen other trucking companies, including Clothing Carriers, Greenberg's Express and GRG Delivery. New York City garment producers were pressured to take deliveries from a trucking company that was either controlled by the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview" target="_blank">Gambino</a> or the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-lucchese-crime-family" target="_blank">Lucchese family</a>. Otherwise they were forced to pay twice. This amounted to a mob tax which added as much as 7 percent to the price of finished garments.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/murder-on-the-dancefloor-the-demise-of-gambino-mafia-family-soldi" target="_blank">Murder on the Dancefloor</a>: The demise of Gambino Mafia family soldier Anthony Mascuzzio</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>In October 1990, the investigation was wrapped up and resulted in the indictment of Joseph and his brother Thomas along with several others on a hefty list of racketeering charges. The two Gambino brothers faced up to 25 years behind bars.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Crime pays… millions</strong></span></p>
<p>After several weeks of trial, on February 26, 1992, Joseph and Thomas made a very lenient plea deal. They pleaded guilty to antitrust charges and were told by prosecutors that if they paid a multi-million-dollar fine and promised to leave the garment district they would not be sentenced to time in prison.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/philly-underboss-crazy-phil-leonetti-talks-about-hanging-out-with" target="_blank">Philly underboss “Crazy Phil” Leonetti talks</a> about hanging out with Meyer Lansky, calls Merlino a “lowlife”</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Joseph and Thomas forked over $12 million dollars and simply walked away from the business. They had to sell all their delivery companies and all of their 400 trucks to individuals with no connections to organized crime before March of 1993. Their $12 million dollar fine could be paid in stages and had to be paid in full by September 1995.</p>
<p>There was some criticism over the deal, of course. Joseph and Thomas Gambino had made a killing while they held the Garment District in a chokehold. “Prosecutors conceded that in addition to leaving the Gambinos free men, it would leave them with a considerable portion of their estimated $70 million to $100 million fortune,” the New York Times reported at the time.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/interview-john-gotti-jr-sits-down-with-gangsters-inc" target="_blank"><strong>INTERVIEW: John Gotti Jr. sits down with Gangsters Inc.</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Who said crime doesn’t pay?</p>
<p>Joseph Gambino lived out the remainder of his life in freedom and away from the mob. The Gambino family was now under firm control of the Gotti clan and had moved on from the days of the Gambinos. Joseph Gambino passed away in March of 2020 at age 83.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview">Gambino crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
Stoned to Death - Profile of Jamaican crime boss Wayne “Sandokhan” Smith
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/stoned-to-death-profile-of-jamaican-crime-boss-wayne-sandokhan-sm
2020-04-13T12:34:42.000Z
2020-04-13T12:34:42.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/stoned-to-death-profile-of-jamaican-crime-boss-wayne-sandokhan-sm" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237138487,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237138487?profile=original" /></a></p>
<p>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>A Jamaican street legend. That’s who Wayne “Sandokhan” Smith was. He will forever be known as the man who – after police treated his girlfriend harshly - attacked a police station, killed three officers, stole their guns, and got away – if only temporarily.</p>
<p>Born in 1962, Smith grew up in poverty in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kingston" target="_blank">Kingston</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Jamaica" target="_blank">Jamaica</a>. The island offered little opportunity for the majority of its inhabitants, who had to make do with what they had. For those who had nothing, it meant turning to a life of violence and crime to get by and put food on the table. It was their only way out.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>From Jamaica to New York and Kansas City</strong></span></p>
<p>School definitely wasn’t, for Smith (photo below) at least. He left and got involved in crime. His first arrest occurred in 1979, for <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Robbery" target="_blank">robbery</a>. Within a few years, he had become the “Don” of a posse bearing his nickname that ruled the Kingston neighborhoods of Olympic Gardens, Waterhouse, Callaloo Bed, and Riverton City, and even had established branches in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=NY" target="_blank">New York City</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kansas" target="_blank">Kansas City</a> in the United States.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-jamaican-shower-posse-a-family-business" target="_blank">The Jamaican Shower Posse</a>: A Family Business by Dudus Coke</strong></li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237138882,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237138882?profile=original" /></a>Smith’s posse smuggled drugs (<a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Marijuana" target="_blank">marijuana</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a>) into the United States and had his men traffic money and guns back home. If a war broke out on either side of the ocean, the posse would go to war with its rivals on both sides simultaneously. The Jamaicans took their gangster reputation extremely seriously and would die defending it.</p>
<p>No wonder then, that a man of Smith’s (photo right) stature was wanted by police on several shootings and various other offences. He managed to evade capture, however, hiding out in his heavily guarded neighborhood where police would have to come in heavily armed and ready for war if they would want to arrest him.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Diss my girl and I’ll burn down a police station</strong></span></p>
<p>Then, in November 1986, tension erupted in an explosion of violence and death. Accounts vary, but one thing is certain: in their pursuit of Smith, police officers had mistreated or disrespected Smith’s girlfriend. Upon hearing about this, Smith vowed revenge. The police officers involved were from the Olympic Gardens station so that is where he targeted his murderous rage.</p>
<p>He got together several trusted posse members, devised a plan and began tooling up - making several Molotov cocktails and grabbing M-16 rifles. Around 1:00 a.m. on November 19, the group led by Smith attacked the Olympic Gardens Police Station, a structure comprised of two floors with the upper floor housing the bedrooms for personnel and the ground floor the guardroom, armory, and jail.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/fbi-arrests-jamaican-gangster-sought-for-4-murders-day-after-it-p" target="_blank">FBI arrests Jamaican gangster</a> sought for 4 murders day after it placed him on its Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Sergeant Ezra Cummings, Constable Raymond Thomas and District Constable Archibald Robinson were caught completely by surprise. Burning Molotov cocktails flew through the air and engulfed the station in flames as Smith and his posse fired their automatic weapons at the officers. The three aforementioned policemen were murdered in cold blood. The posse looted the armory and made off with an unknown number of weapons, including more M-16s.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Manhunt</strong></span></p>
<p>One officer had managed to hide and alert his colleagues. By then Smith and his crew were nowhere to be seen.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/sandokhan--jungle-justice-for-a-ruthless-killer_11944365---double" target="_blank">attack shocked the nation</a> and every cop in Jamaica had his eyes on this case. Investigators soon discovered a big lead: one of the Molotov cocktails had failed to explode and a fingerprint was lifted from it pointing straight to a man named Kenneth Whorms.</p>
<p>Police found him at a house in Waterhouse in Kingston where they shot and killed him. Inside the house, they found several of the stolen weapons, including one of the missing M-16s.</p>
<p>The next man linked to the case, Nicholas Henry, was caught in Waterhouse as well. More of the weapons were recovered and Henry was eager to share details with investigators in return for his life.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/top-5-drug-lords-killed-while-on-the-run" target="_blank"><strong>Top 5 drug lords killed while on the run</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>After he told them all about the attack and killing of the three police officers, he pointed to Smith as the man who masterminded everything. Henry’s story was corroborated when police raided one of Smith’s safehouses. Inside they found the plan of attack on the police station. But they had just missed the big man himself.</p>
<p>Smith realized there was no way he could remain in Jamaica and booked a flight out of the country. He was at the airport in Montego Bay when his escape plan was thwarted by an immigration officer who discovered his travel documents were false.</p>
<p>Caught and standing in front of police, he allegedly confessed to the murders, saying: “The police [disrespected] my girlfriend and so I decided to retaliate.”</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Trials and prison breaks</strong></span></p>
<p>Smith was charged with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Murder" target="_blank">murder</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Arson" target="_blank">arson</a>, and robbery. It looked like the game was over for Smith. He was at a courthouse jail awaiting his trial on September 17, 1987. Then, out of nowhere, he escaped.</p>
<p>Exactly how this happened remains somewhat of a mystery. Smith says a man came and opened his cell door, telling him he was free to go. But once Smith arrived back at his old haunts, his friends and family convinced him that he should turn himself back in. They told him he was being set up by police, who would swoop in with an execution squad and take him out. Smith went to his lawyer and turned himself in.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/drug-kingpin-freeway-rick-ross-moving-tons-of-cocaine-with-a-nod" target="_blank">Drug kingpin “Freeway” Rick Ross</a>: Moving tons of cocaine with a nod of approval from the Reagan White House</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>After a short trial, on March 17, 1988, Smith was found guilty on all charges and sentenced to death.</p>
<p>Authorities weren’t done with him just yet, though. They also charged him with the murder of Eddie Curniffe, who was killed in October 1986 in the midst of a gang war. Again, the verdict was guilty and the sentence death.</p>
<p>Sitting on death row, facing a certain ending, Smith tried every trick in the book and pulled off another prison break on June 15. By now, he was the most wanted man in Jamaica and his behavior came to reflect it. Several weeks after his escape he got in a shootout with police. He was wounded but got away again.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Murder spree</strong></span></p>
<p>Ten days later, he shot and killed Moses “Bredda” Bent in Riverton City. Four days after that, on July 31, Smith and several members of his posse took 16-year-old Robert Wynter from his house and accused him of being a snitch. They tied the young teenager to a car and literally stoned him to death.</p>
<p>Smith was spinning out of control, living from hour to hour, getting more violent with each passing day. He remained the Don, but was making life hell for every gangster operating in the area, especially members of his own posse. Police constantly raided neighborhoods and came down hard on everyone in their hunt for “Sandokhan”.</p>
<p>Enough was enough, someone decided. The big “Bad Man” needed to go. On September 8, 1988, Smith’s bullet-riddled corpse was found lying in the bushes. The bullets were fired by one of the M-16s stolen in the attack on the Olympic Gardens Police Station.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/black-organized-crime">Black organized crime</a> section on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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Bullets couldn't stop him - Profile of French crime boss Jacky Imbert
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/french-boss-jacky-imbert
2019-11-11T18:30:00.000Z
2019-11-11T18:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/french-boss-jacky-imbert" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236973091,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236973091?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso for <a href="http://www.gangstersinc.org" target="_blank">Gangsters Inc.</a></p>
<p>Jacky Imbert was a French gangster. A suspect in numerous underworld murders. In an interview with Le Nouvel Observateur magazine in 1993, Imbert said: "The cops always came to ask me about the jobs I didn't do. For the ones I did do, I never saw anyone."</p>
<p>In 1963 Jacky "Mad Jacky" Imbert appeared in a police report for the first time. He was a suspect in the killing of mobster Andreani Baptiste outside a gaming room in Paris. The police reported: "Mad Jacky is a very dangerous individual: a veritable contract killer." In 1967 he was again the main suspect in the drive-by killing of Marseille crime boss Antoine Guerini. After his murder Imbert, sharing with Gaetan "Tani" Zampa, took over the city’s lucrative prostitution, drugs and protection rackets. But his partnership with Zampa didn’t last long. They had a dispute over protection rights. <br /> <br /> On February 1, 1977 three men were waiting for Imbert outside his home. Police think one of them was Zampa. They shot Imbert and left him for dead. Legend has it that one of the men said: “A swine like him isn’t worth a coup de grâce. Let him die like a dog!” Doctors removed 22 bullets from his body, but Imbert survived. His right arm was paralysed, Le Monde then wrote: "small matter – he will learn to shoot with the left". What followed was Mad Jacky’s revenge; 11 of Zampa’s associates were shot down. Imbert was arrested as he allegedly prepared for another killing. No charges were brought against him and he was released after 6 months. When he came out a truce had been declared.<br /> <br /> Jacky Imbert then seemed to lead a quiet life. He spent his time travelling to his properties in the Caribbean and Italy. In the 1980s he described himself as a PR man for a Paris discotheque owned by Russian born businessman Richard Erman. It seemed Mad Jacky had retired from a life of crime. But police would disagree....<br /> <br /> Police were investigating a criminal operation run by the Russian Mafia to build a clandestine cigarette factory in a warehouse in a suburb of Marseille. As a part of that investigation police tapped a phone conversation between Imbert and Richard Erman. Imbert said: "Look, all these ups and downs, they are beginning to cause me problems, you get it?" Police were convinced this was evidence he was part of the operation run by the Russian mafia. In October 2003 he was arrested in a police raid on his home.<br /> <br /> <a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9236975487,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9236975487?profile=original" /></a>In November 2004 the trial started. The state prosecutor asked for a 5 year prison term for Imbert. The highest term asked in the case. Prosecutor Marc Gouton said: "Everyone here has testified that without Imbert’s authorisation nothing could be done. He has a very strong character. He is not a man who takes orders. He gives orders and others carry them out" However, prosecution witnesses later retracted their initial testimony to investigators. The only evidence linking Imbert to the alleged scam is the telephone call with Erman, which, as his lawyer pointed out in court, is open to interpretation. “The case against him is so hollow, so inexistent, so empty, that I am reduced to answering a charge based on the intonations of a voice,”.<br /> <br /> In December 2004 the court in Marseille sentenced him to 4 years in prison for masterminding the operation. It seemed Imbert’s long run had run out. However he appealed. On April 8, 2005 at age 75, Imbert was cleared of taking part in the scam to manufacture contraband cigarettes. The appeal court found that the telephone tap evidence against him was unconvincing.</p>
<p>In the end, Imbert passed away quietly. He died on November 11, 2019, at age 89.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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“Chappi” and the Medellin Cartel: Profile of German crime boss Heinz Bernhard Chapuis
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/chappi-and-the-medellin-cartel-profile-of-german-crime-boss-heinz
2019-07-04T10:53:10.000Z
2019-07-04T10:53:10.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><strong><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/chappi-and-the-medellin-cartel-profile-of-german-crime-boss-heinz" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237124483,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237124483?profile=original" /></a></strong>By Milko</p>
<p>German crime boss Heinz Bernhard Chapuis had quite the career. He was once viewed as his country's biggest drug boss. But as many if not all in his line of business, his rise was followed by a downfall, so much so that it prompted a judge to emphasize it when he sentenced him to prison.</p>
<p>Nicknamed “Chappi,” Heinz Chapuis was born in Cologne, Germany. The German media called him “the number 1 in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Germany" target="_blank">Germany</a>’s organized drug underworld since the 1990s.” He allegedly had contacts with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Colombia" target="_blank">Colombia</a>’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Medellin" target="_blank">Medellin Cartel</a> and ran his criminal empire from the city of Lanaken in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Belgium" target="_blank">Belgium</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-of-spanish-drug-boss-sito-minanco-who-can-t-stop-smugglin" target="_blank">Profile of Spanish drug boss Sito Miñanco</a>, who can’t stop smuggling tons of cocaine despite his fame</strong></li>
</ul>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237124670,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237124670?profile=original" /></a>On August 9, 1996, he was sentenced to 15 years in prison. According to the court in Cologne, Chapuis headed a drug gang which had trafficked <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a> into <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/europe-overview" target="_blank">Europe</a> between 1991 and 1994. He did his time and was released from prison in 2006.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Downfall</strong></span></p>
<p>Out on the streets, it didn’t take long for Chapuis to get in trouble again. On April 10, 2008, the now 55-year-old drug boss was arrested again. He was charged with trafficking cocaine and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Meth" target="_blank">meth</a> and allegedly tried to sell an undercover cop 2 kilos of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a>.</p>
<p>In August of 2008, Chapuis was sentenced to 5 years in prison. The judge pointed out the drug kingpin’s fall from grace, saying: “Back in the day, you wouldn’t have gotten out of bed for 2 kilos of cocaine.”</p>
<p>His criminal career wasn’t the only thing going downhill. On March 3, 2010, Chapuis was released from prison because of his poor health. He was coping with depression, insomnia, and tinnitus.</p>
<p><em><strong>Milko (a pseudonym) is a Dutchman who has studied organized crime in the Netherlands, its history, and its offshoots in foreign countries for over two decades. He is also very knowledgeable about crime in other European countries and is eager to share his information.</strong></em></p>
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<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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Profile of Spanish drug boss Sito Miñanco, who can’t stop smuggling tons of cocaine despite his fame
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-of-spanish-drug-boss-sito-minanco-who-can-t-stop-smugglin
2019-05-19T17:19:09.000Z
2019-05-19T17:19:09.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
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<div><p><strong><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-of-spanish-drug-boss-sito-minanco-who-can-t-stop-smugglin" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237120673,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237120673?profile=original" /></a></strong>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Sito Miñanco is one of Spain’s most infamous drug bosses, with international contacts from the Medellin cartel to Panamanian dictator Noriega. His exploits were turned into a Netflix tv show while he himself was still actively smuggling thousands of kilos of cocaine.</p>
<p>José Ramón Prado Bugallo was born on September 23, 1955, in Pontevedra in the Galician region of Spain. He became known as Sito Miñanco and started out smuggling <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Tobacco" target="_blank">tobacco</a>. The Spanish coastline offered fishermen in the towns that dotted the area multiple opportunities to add to their meager income and trafficking cigarettes was a golden ticket for many of them. Even though, officially, it was a crime.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Smoking</strong></span></p>
<p>But back in those days, the 1970s, everyone smoked. Fathers and mothers, sons and daughters, teachers and priests. People even smoked indoors! Ashtrays were just as standard as a salt and pepper set on a dinner table. If you were among the men helping to smuggle this product across the border so it could be sold at a cheaper price, then you weren’t viewed as a criminal, no, you were just as beloved by the community as the thing you trafficked in. Miñanco was no exception and could count on the support of many of the area’s inhabitants.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237121063,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237121063?profile=original" /></a><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Meeting the Medellin Cartel</strong></span></p>
<p>Though he had the support of most of the people, authorities were trying their hardest to bring him down. In the early 1980s, they succeeded, and Miñanco was sent to prison for tobacco smuggling. Inside a penitentiary in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Spain" target="_blank">Spain</a>’s capital <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Madrid" target="_blank">Madrid</a>, he met a man that would change his life: Colombian drug lord <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Ochoa" target="_blank">Jorge Luis Ochoa</a>, a man that wasted no time on cigarettes, but made it snow around the world as he and the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Medellin" target="_blank">Medellin cartel</a> showered the globe with <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cocaine" target="_blank">cocaine</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/pablo-escobars-war-on-colombia" target="_blank"><strong>Pablo Escobar's War on Colombia</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>The main force behind the Medellin cartel was <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Escobar" target="_blank">Pablo Escobar</a>. In those days he was already fast becoming a household name that stood synonymous for death, violence, and drug addiction. Ochoa was one of Escobar’s most trusted and respected partners and as such offered Miñanco a direct connection to the biggest cocaine source in the world.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Dating the niece of a dictator</strong></span></p>
<p>Miñanco, however, found more ways into the coke boom. He traveled to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Panama" target="_blank">Panama</a> and fell in love with Odalys Rivera, the niece of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Noriega" target="_blank">Manuel Noriega</a>, the country’s dictator. Panama was used by Escobar and other Colombian drug lords as a place where they could stash their illicit income. Noriega was paid handsomely to turn a blind eye towards any of the activities the narco kingpins explored in his nation.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-real-dea-agents-of-narcos-javier-pena-and-steve-murphy-talk-a" target="_blank"><strong>The Real DEA Agents of Narcos Talk Fact & Fiction</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Dating the niece of Panama’s dictator and having done time with one of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Colombia" target="_blank">Colombia</a>’s biggest drug lords, Miñanco established a firm place in a global cocaine pipeline that saw drugs flow from South America and Panama into Spain’s Galician coastal region.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237121478,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237121478?profile=original" /></a>Buying a football club</strong></span></p>
<p>He made millions and began acting in much the same way Pablo Escobar did in Colombia. In 1986, he bought Pontevedra football (soccer) club Juventud Cambados and helped them climb from the bottom leagues up to the Segunda División B. To celebrate the club’s promotion, Miñanco treated all the players and staff to a tour through Panama and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Venezuela" target="_blank">Venezuela</a>. When the club’s old and dilapidated stadium needed a renovation, Miñanco stepped in with cash and built a new stand that could hold 2,000 fans.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Smuggle, bust and rewind</strong></span></p>
<p>Spending money like water on his own football club, big yachts and luxurious cars and mansions annoyed those in law enforcement. In 1990, he was busted smuggling 2.5 tons of cocaine and sentenced to 20 years in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Prison" target="_blank">prison</a>. He got out early and was arrested again in 1997, this time for smuggling 6,000 kilos of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Hashish" target="_blank">hashish</a>. He was also indicted for his role in smuggling 5,000 kilos of cocaine. That shipment earned him a prison sentence of almost 17 years in 2004. He was also fined nearly €400 million euros.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gangster-pets-animal-tales-from-the-american-mafia-to-pablo-escob" target="_blank"><strong>Pablo Escobar and his personal zoo</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Each time he was sentenced, Miñanco kept his mouth shut and did his time. Each time, he was released early and went right back into the world of fast money. In February of 2018, he was arrested again. Authorities allege that he ran an international <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drug organization</a> - with members from <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Italy" target="_blank">Italy</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Albania" target="_blank">Albania</a>, and the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Netherlands" target="_blank">Netherlands</a> - from his prison cell.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237121881,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237121881?profile=original" /></a>Prison bars could not stop Miñanco’s influence. In 2011 it became known he had bribed the warden at Huelva prison where he was locked up. Director Francisco Sanz had received two Mercedes-Benz cars in exchange for favorable treatment inside his penitentiary.</p>
<p><span style="font-size:14pt;"><strong>Fame</strong></span></p>
<p>Such exploits intrigued producers of Netflix television series <em>Fariña</em>. They wrote a screenplay which they sent to the imprisoned drug boss. Police agents discovered the play inside his cell during a search. <em>Fariña</em> aired in 2018 on <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Netflix" target="_blank">Netflix</a>, starring Javier Rey as Miñanco. The series was released under the English title <em>Cocaine Coast</em>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/norman-s-cay-from-notorious-cocaine-pipeline-of-the-medellin-cart" target="_blank">Norman’s Cay</a>: From cocaine pipeline of the Medellin Cartel to a fraudulent festival for rich millennials</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Despite the Hollywood fame, Miñanco continued his criminal activities. He’s operating on an international level and has a brand name built on decades of experience and a solid reputation carved in stone. Whether he will be able to undertake such activities while breathing fresh air as a free man is an outcome that is a lot less certain.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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<p> </p></div>
A friend of Vito’s - Profile of Genovese crime family mobster Salvatore “Sally Burns” Granello
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/a-friend-of-vito-s-profile-of-genovese-crime-family-mobster-salva
2018-11-08T14:58:06.000Z
2018-11-08T14:58:06.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/a-friend-of-vito-s-profile-of-genovese-crime-family-mobster-salva" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237105276,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237105276?profile=original" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>It helps to have friends in high places. It enables one to have more opportunities, but also to get away with mistakes or grave crimes even. If one’s friend is powerful enough, one could get away with anything. Until that friend is gone, of course. Like in the case of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese family</a> mobster Salvatore Granello (photo above).</p>
<p>Granello made his bones working for <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn" target="_blank">Vito Genovese</a>, a man who was feared as the embodiment of evil by men who feared little to nothing. Genovese and Granello built reputations as stone-cold killers in decades that were filled with such men. Their deadly capabilities enabled them to rise in the world of organized crime and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=LCN" target="_blank">La Cosa Nostra</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: A Man Alone:</strong> <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/a-man-alone-the-story-of-genovese-family-mobster-david-petillo" target="_blank"><strong>The Story of Genovese Family Hitman David Petillo</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>Known as “Sally Burns” or “Solly”, Granello had his finger in many pies. Union racketeering, hijackings, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Extortion" target="_blank">extortion</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling" target="_blank">gambling</a>, you name it. He even had the Oriente Park Race Track and the casino and restaurant and bar in Hotel Sevilla Biltmore in Havana, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Cuba" target="_blank">Cuba</a> before Fidel Castro seized power and kicked the American gangsters out of the country.</p>
<p>In the United States, Granello ran a huge loansharking operation and owned tons of nightclubs, inheriting most of them from <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family" target="_blank">Genovese family</a> capo <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Strollo" target="_blank">Anthony “Tony Bender” Strollo</a>, who disappeared without a trace in 1962. It is presumed he was whacked on orders of the family’s boss and namesake Vito Genovese.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/when-the-american-government-asked-the-mafia-for-a-favor-the-assa" target="_blank">When the American government asked the Mafia for a favor</a>:The assassination of Fidel Castro</strong></li>
</ul>
<p style="text-align:center;"><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237105875,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237105875?profile=original" /></a><em>Photo: Vito Genovese mugshot</em></p>
<p>Throughout Granello’s mob career, he and Genovese remained close. The Cosa Nostra chief’s office was nearby Granello’s apartment and he would frequently come by for a visit. Genovese wasn’t Granello’s only (in)famous friend. Boxing legend Rocky Graziano was godfather to his youngest daughter.</p>
<p>But with friends in high places comes a high profile. By the 1960s, Attorney General <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kennedy" target="_blank">Robert Kennedy</a> had Granello in his crosshairs and got him sent to prison on tax evasion charges. It was the beginning of his downfall.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-life-and-death-of-mafia-capo-anthony-carfano" target="_blank"><strong>The Life and Death of Mafia Capo Anthony Carfano</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>While in prison in 1968, Granello got news no parent ever wants to hear: his son Michael had been murdered. It couldn’t have been a surprise. 19-year-old Michael was a drug addict who earned his money by playing Russian roulette: He robbed members of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mafia" target="_blank">Mafia</a>. Taking after his father’s violent streak, Michael once beat a mobster half to death with a baseball bat during a robbery.</p>
<p>The mob wasn’t having it and shot-gunned young Michael to death while he was sitting in his car.</p>
<p>Granello vowed to avenge his son’s murder. A vow that no doubt made several men feel extremely uncomfortable.</p>
<p>By then rumors were circulating that Granello’s own time was up as well. Upon his release from prison in 1970, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=FBI" target="_blank">FBI</a> knocked on the mobster’s door to inform him that he was marked for death. Granello closed the door on them and went on with his life.</p>
<p>A life that was increasingly more difficult. He faced serious charges stemming from a federal sting operation set up by lawyer Herbert Itkin, who convinced Granello he could get him access to the Teamsters pension fund. An enthused Granello brought several high-ranking mob friends of his into the scheme only to see everyone end up in handcuffs when it turned out Itkin was cooperating with the FBI.</p>
<p>According to former <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-lucchese-crime-family" target="_blank">Lucchese crime family</a> acting boss <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/lucchese-acting-boss-alphonse" target="_blank">Alphonse D’Arco</a>, several mob leaders were very angry with Granello for introducing Itkin to them and bringing them in on this caper.</p>
<p>Normally, with this much heat on him, Granello would talk to his dear old friend. His blood brother. Vito Genovese. The big boss man. The Mafioso with all the right connections and the power of a god. But Vito had passed away in 1969 while doing time on federal narcotics charges and Sally Burns was without his protector.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>READ: </strong><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-humble-origins-of-joe-masseria-and-lucky-luciano" target="_blank"><strong>The Humble Origins of Joe Masseria and Lucky Luciano</strong></a></li>
</ul>
<p>He probably didn’t think it mattered. He was a killing machine and would continue to do what he did best. If he could just beat the charges, it would be business as usual and he’d get his revenge. On September 24, 1970, 47-year-old Granello met with associates of his in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Manhattan" target="_blank">Manhattan</a>’s Little Italy. He told them he had another meeting set up and left.</p>
<p>It was the last time he was seen alive.</p>
<p>On October 6, Granello was found in the trunk of an automobile on New York’s Lower East Side. He was shot to death and had four .22-caliber bullet wounds in his head.</p>
<p>After police found his dead body there were several theories as to why he was killed. It was because he threatened to avenge his son, went one theory. It was because he brought in an informant and caused the arrest of several other mobsters, said Al D’Arco. It was because they feared he would become a snitch himself, went another.</p>
<p>They whacked him because he was vying for the top spot in the Genovese family, several reports claimed. Then there were some anonymous sources who claimed Granello had taken advantage of several young girls, even raping some of them, and that the Mafia was fed up with his despicable behavior.</p>
<p>Whatever the motive, one thing is clear. Without his pal Vito’s powerful hand above Granello’s head, the Mafia wasted little time in shooting it off.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family">Genovese crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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Blacklisted: Albanian mob boss Naser Kelmendi built a criminal business empire on white heroin and ecstasy
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/blacklisted-albanian-mob-boss-naser-kelmendi-built-a-criminal-bus
2018-02-03T15:33:39.000Z
2018-02-03T15:33:39.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/blacklisted-albanian-mob-boss-naser-kelmendi-built-a-criminal-bus" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237098093,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237098093?profile=original" width="600" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Authorities have Naser Kelmendi’s number. The United States government blacklisted him under the Kingpin Act in 2012 because, it claims, he heads a crime family responsible for trafficking drugs through Afghanistan to Turkey and into Europe. Still, moving throughout Eastern Europe, Kelmendi proved an elusive target as he expanded his Mafia empire in the Balkans.</p>
<p>Born on February 15, 1957, in Peja, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kosovo" target="_blank">Kosovo</a>, Kelmendi, an ethnic Albanian, is alleged to be running one of the most powerful crime families in the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Balkans" target="_blank">Balkans</a>, a region that stretches from the Serbian-Bulgarian border to the Black Sea and is known for its ancient smuggling routes. He began his career in Sarajevo in the early 1990s and would later use his sons Elvis, Liridon, and Besnik as loyal henchmen.</p>
<p>According to Bosnia's State Investigation and Protection Agency (SIPA) and Interpol records, he runs a large criminal network that is involved in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Extortion" target="_blank">extortion</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Loansharking" target="_blank">loan sharking</a> and lots of smuggling through the Balkans, trafficking <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Heroin" target="_blank">heroin</a>, weapons, and cigarettes from countries like <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Afghanistan" target="_blank">Afghanistan</a> and Turkey into <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/europe-overview" target="_blank">Europe</a>.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-turkish-drug-boss-cetin-goren" target="_blank">Profile of Turkish drug boss Cetin Gören</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>His ill-gotten gains were invested in countless legitimate businesses. He owns hotels, a trucking business. You can buy a lot of property when you traffic narcotics across Europe. Authorities say that from at least 2000 through 2012, Kelmendi, as the head of his mob clan “managed and directed the purchase, preparation, transport, sale and distribution, of large amounts of heroin, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Ecstasy" target="_blank">ecstasy</a>, speed, and other <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drugs</a>, as well as drug precursors such as acetic anhydride acid, through a well-established organized criminal network.”</p>
<p>His network included someone who worked as a drug manager and mixer, a person who was a manager directing shipments between <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Turkey" target="_blank">Turkey</a>, the Balkan region, and the Netherlands, and an individual who was a distributor in Serbia. All three would later turn against Kelmendi and testify about the crimes they committed on his orders. </p>
<p>Before that happened, they worked alongside Kelmendi’s son Liridon, who was a distribution manager of drugs to Serbia and other European countries, Mehanovic Haris, who functioned as driver and bodyguard, Sead Akelic was another driver, Zeljko Bozic was an auto mechanic who created hidden car compartments for narcotics, Hakija Krlic and Ilijier Jastrati were the group’s contacts in Turkey, and Asmir Kalac coordinated drug shipments.</p>
<p>Much of the smuggling was done using hidden car compartments such as specially modified chambers in gas tanks, hollowed-out furniture, false bottom trucks, hidden in fruits or in clothing, and by using a variety of other methods.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/albanian-organized-crime-gangs-are-taking-increasing-control-over" target="_blank">Albanian gangs taking increasing control over Europe's drug markets</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Through well-coordinated drug trafficking routes, large shipments of ecstasy pills were picked up in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Netherlands" target="_blank">the Netherlands</a> and transported to Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo, where they were repackaged and transported onwards to the city of Istanbul in Turkey where the ecstasy was exchanged for heroin and other <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Drugs" target="_blank">drugs</a>. The drugs received in Istanbul were then transported back through Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo and then delivered and sold to dealers and distributors throughout Europe.</p>
<p>As his success grew so did the stature of his connections. He is alleged to have close ties to some of Kosovo's leading politicians and several powerful businessmen, including Fahrudin Radoncic, who owns Bosnia's largest newspaper.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237098858,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237098858?profile=original" width="600" /></a>At that point, a simple mob boss turns into something much more dangerous: A player in the world of global business and politics. It is no wonder then that the United States Department of Treasury added Kelmendi (photo above) to its Kingpin list in 2012.</p>
<p>Shortly thereafter, the Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina issued a warrant for Kelmendi’s arrest. The indictment charged him with drug trafficking and the 2007 murder of Bosnian crime boss Ramiz “Celo” Delalic, who was beefing with Kelmendi and other members of the nation’s underworld.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-greek-crime-boss-alexandros-angelopoulos" target="_blank">Profile of Greek crime boss Alexandros Angelopoulos</a>, nicknamed "The Greek Escobar"</strong></li>
</ul>
<p>Delalic was a Bosnian Muslim warlord who started a career in organized crime after the wars in the Balkans. Prosecutors say Delalic was interfering with Kelmendi’s international drug trafficking operations in Sarajevo and throughout the region by giving Bosnian law enforcement authorities information about Kelmendi’s criminal activities. Kelmendi also held Delalic responsible for the murder of close associate Sever Lekic.</p>
<p>If that wasn’t enough, Delalic allegedly used old war resentments and events to publicly discredit other crime groups, led by gangsters of other ethnicities such as the one led by Darko Elez. Despite all the ethnic tensions and violence during the Balkan wars, the areas mob clans always managed to function. War is bad for business and, business, is what everyone is there for. With Delalic trying to stir up old beefs based on ethnicity, everyone agreed he had to be eliminated.</p>
<p>According to the indictment, in 2006 Kelmendi hired two notorious Serbian hitmen, Strahinja Raseta and Nebojsa Vukomanovic, to murder Delalic. He and several other crime figures paid them €100,000 euro. To make sure things went according to plan, Kelmendi personally travelled to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Serbia" target="_blank">Serbia</a> to hand over the money to a middle-man who was to forward it to the assassins once the job had been completed.</p>
<p>It was almost certain the execution would go according to plan. How could it not? Raseta and Vukomanovic were stone-cold killers and part of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Raseta" target="_blank">Raseta crime family</a>. They belonged to a crew led by Milan “Sandokan” Ostojic operating out of the town of Sabac in Serbia. Murdering people was their core business, informants told police. Raseta usually was the man who pulled the trigger, with Vukamanovic close by assisting when necessarily. Ostojic would take requests and hand out the assignments.</p>
<p>Experienced and cold blooded, the men fulfilled their contractual obligations. On a summer night in June 2007, at around 23:30, Raseta fired 27 bullets into Delalic with his Heckler & Koch. To make sure, he walked over and fired several more bullets into the fallen crime boss’ head.</p>
<p>It took several years, but in late 2012 authorities had hit Kelmendi with charges that he was behind this brutal gangland slaying. They had him. Of course, with an influential man like Kelmendi things are never that easy.</p>
<p>When authorities went looking for him, they found out their target had already fled the country. They issued an international arrest warrant, which resulted in the capture of Kelmendi on May 6, 2013, by police in Pristina, Kosovo. Because the two countries don’t have an extradition agreement, however, Kelmendi was out on the streets the next day. Yet another warrant was issued, this time finally leading to Kelmendi’s imprisonment while awaiting his trial.</p>
<p>The 61-year-old mob boss strenuously denied all charges against him. In court he found people who believed him. They acquitted him of organized crime and murder charges. Still, they found him guilty of narcotics trafficking. How could they not, seeing the mountain of evidence? On Thursday February 1, 2018, he was sentenced to 6 years in a Kosovar prison.</p>
<p>It is highly doubtful that his story ends here.</p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/europe-overview">European organized crime section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
<li><strong>Check out the latest news on organized crime and the Mafia at our <a href="https://gangstersinc.ning.com/blog/list/tag/news">news section</a></strong></li>
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<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
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Profile: Original New York Mafia family boss Giuseppe Profaci
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/profile-original-new-york-mafia-family-boss-giuseppe-profaci
2016-09-21T10:30:00.000Z
2016-09-21T10:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-original-new-york-mafia-family-boss-giuseppe-profaci"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237069078,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237069078?profile=original" width="520" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Giuseppe Profaci was one of the five original New York mob bosses, leading what would become known later as the Colombo crime family of La Cosa Nostra. His tenure spanned several decades and countless violent incidents, including a Mafia uprising within his own family.</p>
<p>Born in the Sicilian village of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Villabate">Villabate</a> on October 2, 1897, Profaci quickly took to a life of crime. According to mob historian Thomas Hunt, Profaci was sent to prison late in 1920 after he was found guilty of "forgery with intent to defraud." His family was involved with the Villabete Cosa Nostra clan.</p>
<p>Once he got out from prison, Profaci decided to try his luck in the country of endless opportunities: The United States of America. He arrived in New York City in 1921 and eventually settled in Chicago. After several years in which he ran a grocery store and bakery, he decided to return to New York. Back in the Big Apple, he began an olive oil import business.</p>
<p>He also got involved with the city’s criminal element, specifically the Sicilian gangsters in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Brooklyn">Brooklyn</a>, a borrow where relatives of the Magliocco clan were already well-established. Within a very short period of just three years since returning to New York, Profaci emerged as a leader while other powerful Mafia figures in Brooklyn were murdered.</p>
<p>His promotion as boss notwithstanding, these were violent and uncertain times for New York’s Italian mobsters as two bosses fought to control it all. In 1930, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-mafia-s-boss-of-bosses-whacked-at-his-office">Salvatore Maranzano</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/kill-the-chinaman-1">Giuseppe Masseria</a> turned the city into a warzone in what became known as the Castellammarese War.</p>
<p>While all the smaller families had to choose sides and pick up guns, Profaci took on a different role. According to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Joseph Bonanno</a>, who was a close friend of Profaci and himself a Mafia boss, “Profaci’s sympathies were with the Castellammarese [led by Maranzano], but his Family would never take part in the war directly,” Bonanno wrote in his autobiography. “Maranzano urged Profaci to remain officially neutral and to act as an intermediary with other groups.”</p>
<p>When the big war ended, Maranzano came out on top. But only for a short time. He was considered out of touch with his troops and a faction led by <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles “Lucky” Luciano</a> organized his demise and subsequent murder. Where Maranzano had placed himself at the head of the table as boss of bosses, Luciano opted a different approach, dividing the New York underworld into five different families led by five bosses who held total control over their family and affairs.</p>
<p><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-mafia-s-boss-of-bosses-whacked-at-his-office">American Mafia's boss of bosses whacked at his office</a></strong></p>
<p>Giuseppe “Joe” Profaci was one of these five original bosses, alongside <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Luciano">Luciano</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Bonanno">Bonanno</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Mangano">Vincent Mangano</a>, and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gagliano">Tommaso Gagliano</a>. These men all had a seat on the Commission, a governing body that oversaw <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in">mob operations in the United States</a>, and included several crime families from other American cities.</p>
<p>The year was 1931, and life was good. These were the golden years for the mob. Profaci raked in money from illegal gambling, extortion, loansharking, and drug trafficking. He also had his legitimate businesses, including a very successful olive oil company, which earned him the nickname “The Olive Oil King” and would later serve as inspiration for Mario Puzo’s <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Godfather">The Godfather</a> in which character <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Corleone">Vito Corleone</a> runs an olive oil import business, called Genco Olive Oil, as well.</p>
<p>By the 1950s, however, times had changed. Authorities turned on the heat and Profaci was fighting the IRS over unpaid taxes and US Immigration Services who tried to revoke his citizenship. The bomb burst into the open when Profaci was among dozens of other Mafia leaders arrested in Apalachin, where he attended a meeting of mobsters from all over the country.</p>
<p><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mob-meeting-at-apalachin-the">Mob Meeting at Apalachin</a></strong></p>
<p>If that wasn’t enough, the sixties arrived. Depending on who you ask, those were either the best or worst years of their life. For Profaci they were the worst and his last.</p>
<p>His underlings were beginning to grumble. They were unhappy with how much money they earned, chief among them <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mafia-rebel-crazy-joey-gallo">Joseph Gallo</a>, a soldier who operated out of Red Hook, Brooklyn. In February of 1961, Gallo and his crew did something that was so ballsy, no one saw it coming.</p>
<p><strong>Read: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mafia-rebel-crazy-joey-gallo">Profile of Mafia rebel “Crazy Joe” Gallo</a></strong></p>
<p>They kidnapped several men who were very close to Profaci. Though it remains sketchy as to who exactly were kidnapped, several names pop up frequently. They were: Profaci’s right-hand man Joseph Magliocco, his brother Salvatore "Frank" Profaci, John Scimone, Sally "The Sheik" Mussachio, and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Colombo">Joseph Colombo</a>. They also tried to kidnap Profaci himself, but he managed to escape and flee to Florida, while his family was undergoing a civil war.</p>
<p>Profaci was seething. But like any Sicilian Mafioso worth his salt, he didn’t act like it. He began negotiations with the Gallo crew, promising them more money and operations. At the same time, he got one of Gallo’s crew members, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/colombo-boss-carmine-persico">Carmine Persico</a>, to switch sides. Persico then helped Profaci set up Joe Gallo’s brother Larry by luring him to a bar where he was to be strangled to death. As the rope cut tight around Larry Gallo’s throat, a cop walked by the bar and interrupted the hit attempt, saving Gallo’s life.</p>
<p>From that point on both sides were fighting each other out in the open. They “went to the mattresses,” as they say. Armed soldiers drove around the city looking for their rivals.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, the war caused loss of income and stress for the other families as well. At a Commission meeting, the other bosses told Profaci about their concerns. <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-boss-carlo-gambino">Carlo Gambino</a> urged Profaci to step down as boss and retire to put an end to the unrest within his family. Gambino was supported by <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/lucchese-boss-gaetano-lucchese">Gaetano Lucchese</a>.</p>
<p>Profaci, however, was angered by their proposal. As was his close ally Joseph Bonanno. Faced with an all-out mob war between four families, Gambino and Lucchese backed down and Profaci continued as boss.</p>
<p>Around this time, Profaci was already very ill. He had liver cancer and knew time was running out. While the war raged on, he died on June 6, 1962, in South Side Hospital in Bay Shore, New York. The Gallos were no longer his problem, but would continue to cause plenty of headaches for several of his successors in the years to come.</p>
<p><em>Thanks to Thomas Hunt for his help with this profile.</em></p>
<ul>
<li><strong>Back to the <a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/the-colombo-crime-family">Colombo crime family section</a> on Gangsters Inc.</strong></li>
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<li><strong><a href="https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/about-gangsters-inc">About Gangsters Inc.</a></strong></li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Copyright © Gangsters Inc.</strong></p>
<p> </p></div>
“This is for you, Frank!” – Profile of Mafia boss Frank Costello
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/this-is-for-you-frank-profile-of-mafia-boss-frank-costello
2016-07-16T10:30:00.000Z
2016-07-16T10:30:00.000Z
Gangsters Inc.
https://gangstersinc.org/members/GangstersInc
<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/this-is-for-you-frank-profile-of-mafia-boss-frank-costello"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237070070,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237070070?profile=original" width="520" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>“What have you done for your country as a good citizen?”</p>
<p>“Well…. I don’t know what you… what you mean by that?”</p>
<p>“When you’re looking back over the years now till that time when you became a citizen, and now standing twenty odd years after that, you must have in your mind some things that you have done that you can speak of to your credit as an American citizen, if so: What are they?”</p>
<p>“Paid my taxes!”</p>
<p>The date is March 13, 1951, and with his witty answer mob boss Frank Costello just caused an entire courtroom packed with reporters, lawyers, and politicians to erupt with roaring laughter. Though it was funny, Costello was not trying to be the class clown. This was Costello defending himself, taking a stand against the men on the other side of the room asking him all these pointed questions about his character, his criminal record, his friends, his businesses. Each question dripping with contempt. By 1951, Costello was involved in so many enterprises – both illegitimate and legitimate – that he could have named several things that spoke to his “credit as an American citizen,” but he chose not to. Instead, he picked as an answer one of two certainties in the life of an American citizen. Pay your taxes, and you’re a good citizen. Don’t pay your taxes, and you’re <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Capone">Al Capone</a>. It’s a fine line. With his snappy comeback Costello made that crystal clear to the men opposite of him.</p>
<p>Those men were part of the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Kefauver">Kefauver Committee</a> on Organized Crime in Interstate Commerce. In 1949, the American Municipal Association, which represented over 10,000 cities, petitioned the federal government to combat the growing influence of organized crime. Senator Estes Kefauver of Tennessee headed the special committee which, during the course of 15 months, met in fourteen major U.S. cities and interviewed hundreds of witnesses in order to investigate organized crime in America.</p>
<p>As the committee hit the Federal Courthouse in Foley Square, New York, in March of 1951, the American public had become very intrigued by the whole spectacle. The proceedings were aired live on television and it gave many upstanding citizens their first look at actual gangsters and crime bosses. As Frank Costello sat down to answer questions put to him by the committee an estimated 30 million people tuned in to watch.</p>
<p>Costello, wearing an expensive tailor-made suit, with his slick hair combed back, and gruff voice with a <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=NY">New York</a> accent, gave viewers a glimpse at what would become the stereotypical American mobster. However, he wanted no part of the cameras, his lawyer demanded that reporters could not film his face. The committee obliged and the cameramen zoomed in on the mob boss’ hands instead. For the next three days, Costello was questioned and grilled, while people at home watched his hands twist and clench, clasp and unclasp, his fingers drumming on the table as his horse voice grew tired and annoyed.</p>
<p>He didn’t have to sit down and answer any questions. He could’ve pleaded the fifth as protection against self-incrimination and make it a short and boring appearance, just like his fellow mobsters <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-lucchese-crime-family">Thomas Lucchese</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-genovese-crime-family">Vito Genovese</a>, and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview">Albert Anastasia</a> had done. But Costello didn’t want to prove the committee’s investigators correct in their allegations that he was a criminal overlord. So, he sat down and grumbled his way through the proceedings coming across as every bit the hoodlum the Kefauver Committee claimed him to be.</p>
<p>It wasn’t the first time Costello’s plans to mislead an official in court failed. On March 11, 1915, he was arrested and charged with being in possession of a gun without written permit. As he appeared before the judge, Costello’s lawyer did his utmost best to portray his 24-year-old client as a respectable citizen who only had the gun because he worked in a neighborhood which had men of “bad character” roaming around against whom he had to defend himself.</p>
<p>The judge wasn’t buying it. “I find that in 1908, that is, seven years ago, he was arrested for assault and robbery, and in that case he was discharged,” the judge began. “I find that in 1912 he was again arrested for assault and robbery, and he was discharged in that case. (…) I have looked him up, and I find that while there are a good many letters in regard to him (attesting to his character), nevertheless, I find his reputation is not good. On the contrary it is bad.”</p>
<p>Costello was sentenced to one year in prison. When he was released he kept a low profile, instead of robbing purses from ladies, he stuck to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Gambling">gambling</a> and ran a small crap game. But he didn’t find a legitimate job. Nor did he go looking for one. In those days Italians were not in high demand. That was one of the reasons he Americanized his name to “Frank Costello.”</p>
<p>Born in the little town of Cosenza in Calabria, Italy, on January 26, 1891, he came into this world as Francesco Castiglia, the son of Luigi and Ucone. In 1895, his father left Italy to make a better life for his family in the United States. Other relatives, including Francesco, followed a few months later. The family eventually settled in East Harlem’s Little Italy.</p>
<p>While his father ran a grocery store at 232 East 108<sup>th</sup> Street, a 10-year-old Costello did his best to make some money on his own. “He ran errands for saloon keepers, sold papers, and ran a little crap game for the other kids, paying off the Irish cop who strolled the beat,” author Henry Zeiger writes in Frank Costello. “He did some menial work in a piano factory and a notions house. When he was 14 he signed on as a deckhand, and for two years shuttled between New York and Central and South America as an ordinary seaman.”</p>
<p>But all that honest, hard work did not quite pay off as young Costello had hoped. He saw the men walking around the neighborhood. Dressed in fine suits, always loaded with money, they never had to work hard a day in their life, it seemed. At age 17, he had found the job he wanted. He went out and, allegedly, robbed a pocketbook. Police were on him though and charged him accordingly, but thanks to testimony of his family who provided him with an alibi, the case was dismissed. In 1912, Costello was charged with robbing a woman who was on her way to the bank with $1,600. Again, the charges were dismissed. Though he dodged those two arrests, they came back to haunt him when the judge sentenced him to one year in prison in March of 1915 after he was convicted of carrying a concealed gun.</p>
<p>As someone who made a living gambling, it was inevitable that Costello meet <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-big-bankroll-the-rise-and-fall-of-new-york-mob-boss-arnold-ro" target="_blank">Arnold Rothstein</a>, the infamous Jewish crime boss known as “The man who fixed the 1919 World Series.” Learning from the “master” himself, Costello saw that in the underworld using ones brain could get you farther than just a gun. As Rothstein schooled him in the ways of bookmaking and gambling, both men were presented with a far more lucrative business opportunity: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blog/list?tag=Prohibition">Prohibition</a>.</p>
<p>When you look at organized crime in the United States, there is a distinct difference between the years before prohibition and the years during and following prohibition. It’s night and day. With prohibition, gangsters were given a popular, successful, and, up until that moment, legitimate enterprise all to themselves. Drinking alcoholic beverages was and remains a favorite pastime of many hardworking citizens. But as people tend to do, there were those who abused the beverage in excess and caused quite a ruckus.</p>
<p>In Last Call: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition, author Daniel Okrent writes: “By 1810 the number of distilleries in the young nation had increased fivefold, to more than fourteen thousand, in less than two decades. By 1830 American adults were guzzling, per capita, a staggering seven gallons of pure alcohol a year. “Staggering” is the appropriate word for the consequences of this sort of drinking. In modern terms those seven gallons are the equivalent of 1.7 bottles of a standard 80-proof liquor per person, per week—nearly 90 bottles a year for every adult in the nation, even with abstainers (and there were millions of them) factored in. Once again figuring per capita, multiply the amount Americans drink today by three and you’ll have an idea of what much of the nineteenth century was like.”</p>
<p>It was a non-stop St. Patrick’s Day topped off with Mardi Grass and a dessert of Spring Break.</p>
<p>Or, to use the language of the time, men and women drank their fill and engaged in lewd behavior. They gambled, whored, and fought. Couples were screaming in the streets while others urinated lying down on the sidewalk. The four year-old United States Brewers’ Association declared in 1866 that hard liquor caused “domestic misery, pauperism, disease and crime.”</p>
<p>By the early 1900s things reached a boiling point and a movement to prohibit the sale and consumption of alcohol engulfed the nation all the way into the chambers of powerful politicians in Washington. In 1917, the anti-booze movement won over congress resulting in the official start of prohibition on January 16, 1920.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237070460,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237070460?profile=original" width="219" /></a>The modern-day American Mafia had been given its goose with the golden eggs. Rothstein and Costello wasted no time in grabbing this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Already having amassed a fortune from gambling and other rackets, Rothstein became a premier financier of bootlegging gangsters looking to smuggle booze into the United States. He did so for Jewish crime bosses Waxey Gordon and Max Greenberg, and he also did it for young up-and-coming hoodlums like Frank Costello and men like <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/how-meyer-lansky-laundered-the-american-mafia-s-dirty-cash-and-ma">Meyer Lansky</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/very-bad-men-how-jewish-racketeers-beat-the-system">“Lepke” Buchalter</a>, and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles “Lucky” Luciano</a>. Backed by Rothstein, Costello made a fortune running shipments of Scotch from Canada to the United States.</p>
<p>More importantly than riches, Rothstein provided these young gangsters with a blueprint on how to run a criminal enterprise. He was the perfect role model. With Rothstein it was all about the money, all other nonsense was ignored. He didn’t discriminate, he worked with the Italians and with the Irish. His objective was to run a smooth and extremely profitable operation. Nothing else mattered.</p>
<p>Unfortunately for Rothstein, his knack for gambling and his talent for predicting the odds proved insufficient in foreseeing his own demise. On Sunday, November 4, 1928, he was shot multiple times at the Park Central Hotel in Manhattan, New York. At the hospital, he refused to identify his assailant, telling police: “You stick to your trade. I'll stick to mine.” He did, and died two days after being shot.</p>
<p>The death of gambling czar Arnold Rothstein heralded the era of the Italian Mafioso. With prohibition in full swing, the Italians were quick to expand and take over territory from the more established Irish and Jewish gangs. It was business as usual for Frank Costello, even without his mentor and financier. He was now part of the gang led by <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-humble-origins-of-joe-masseria-and-lucky-luciano">Giuseppe “Joe the Boss” Masseria</a>, a Sicilian-born mobster in his early forties who had immigrated to the United States as a teenager and had taken it upon himself to live up to his nickname and conquer the New York underworld. During the late 1920s, Masseria had established himself as a criminal powerhouse. He surrounded himself with many of Rothstein’s prized pupils, besides Frank Costello there were <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles Luciano</a> and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn">Vito Genovese</a> as well, and was on his way to becoming America’s undisputed boss of bosses.</p>
<p>But Masseria was not a popular leader and seen as a tyrant by many of the crime families now under his control. A group led by another Sicilian immigrant, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-mafia-s-boss-of-bosses-whacked-at-his-office">Salvatore Maranzano</a>, was building a formidable opposition to “Joe the Boss” and his muscle. They began rising up against Masseria’s forces and the stage was set for a bloody showdown that has gone down in history as one of, if not the most important event to shape the modern American Mafia.</p>
<p>It was dubbed the Castellammare War.</p>
<p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-mafia-s-boss-of-bosses-whacked-at-his-office">Salvatore Maranzano</a> came to the United States around 1925 after leaving his birth town of Castellammare del Golfo in Sicily. There, he was a “chief warrior” of the local Mafia clan. Now, in New York City, Maranzano was to put his expertise to work as the leader of the revolt against “Joe the Boss.”</p>
<p>And he did.</p>
<p>One by one Masseria’s men were picked off by Maranzano’s hit men. Once it became clear that Masseria was losing the war, many of his underlings jumped ship and sided with Maranzano. Though loyalty is praised unanimously among Mafiosi it is a trait many lack when push comes to shove. Of course, it is nothing personal. Just business. So too for the young <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles “Lucky” Luciano</a>, who joined the forces of Maranzano and offered his boss up on a silver platter. Of course, he expected some things, some favors, in return.</p>
<p>On April 15, 1931, Masseria had a meeting at the Nuova Villa Tammaro in Coney Island. It was to be a relaxed meet with some of his trusted friends. They’d have lunch, play some cards, and laugh the misery of war away while trash talking each other’s card skills. He could need some distraction from the war. It was all around him now. Visible. As he got to the meet in his armored car with bulletproof windows surrounded by three bodyguards who ushered him inside safely. A while later, those same bodyguards were nowhere to be found as four assassins came through to the door and fired their weapons until “Joe the Boss” lay dead in a pool of his own blood surrounded by playing cards. A newspaper photographer took a photo of the crime scene which showed Masseria clutching the ace of spades, the death card, in his hand, but it is generally believed that photo to have been staged by a reporter looking for more than just the truth.</p>
<p>Now, it was Maranzano’s time. The “chief warrior” had become the new boss of bosses and began acting accordingly. With the war over, several people were promoted to a higher rank, new members were made, and new rules were mandated. Maranzano was a fan of Roman legend Julius Caesar and was modeling his organization after the legions from ancient Rome. At the top there was the boss. Who was helped by his second-in-command, his underboss. There were various streets crews or decani led by a capodecina shortened to capo or captain in English. A crew consisted of soldiers and associates, some of whom were Italian and initiated members of the Mafia while others were on their way to becoming a member. All New York families were to follow this structure.</p>
<p>Despite being the all-powerful boss of bosses of New York City, Maranzano did not feel at ease. He felt there were some loose ends he needed to take care of. Top of the list was <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles “Lucky” Luciano</a>. He explained to an underling at the time that he couldn’t get along with Luciano and his pal <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn">Vito Genovese</a> and that they had to get rid of them before they could control anything. He also added Frank Costello and many other prominent mobsters like Al Capone to his kill list. Maranzano told his henchman he had one more meeting with Luciano and Genovese the next afternoon at his office in Midtown, Manhattan. After that they would go to the mattresses, mob speak for going to war.</p>
<p>That day, September 10th, 1931, Maranzano was at his office arranging false identification documents, a specialty of his, for some fellow Italians. Later that afternoon, he expected Luciano and Genovese to show up. He would put on a charade and perhaps lay the groundwork for a deathtrap.</p>
<p>Things took a different and unexpected turn though.</p>
<p>Five men claiming to be federal agents entered Maranzano’s office and quickly took control. One man held a couple of people waiting in the anteroom at gunpoint, while the others took Maranzano into his office.</p>
<p>There, he realized these were not the usual federal agents that would raid his business. For one thing, they had knives and were trying to stab him to death. The assassins had picked knives because gunshots would attract a lot of unwanted attention in Midtown, Manhattan, in broad daylight on an afternoon when people were shopping, working, and wandering the streets.</p>
<p>But the killers had underestimated the old mob boss’ tenacity. While they were stabbing him Maranzano fought back ferociously. As Maranzano did everything in his power to <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/american-mafia-s-boss-of-bosses-whacked-at-his-office">stay alive</a>, the hit men had had enough and fired several bullets into his body. With the sound of gunshots cracking through Manhattan, they fled the scene of the crime as fast as they could.</p>
<p>With the second boss of bosses murdered by the same men he purported to control, his successors did away with the title and set up a new system for the mob in New York. There were to be five families in the city and its boroughs, each with its own boss who was free to do as he pleased. A national Commission oversaw and settled disputes between the various families. Each family had a seat on the Commission and counted as one single vote. When decisions had to be made all families would vote on the matter with the majority settling it.</p>
<p>The man who led this transition and moved the American Mafia into the modern era was <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/luckys-luck-how-charlie">Charles “Lucky” Luciano</a>. As the one who set in motion the murder of both self-proclaimed <em>boss of bosses</em>, the young Luciano - he was 33 years old when Maranzano was killed - emerged as leader of what used to be known as the Masseria family. The other four New York families were headed by <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Joseph Bonanno</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-lucchese-crime-family">Tommaso Gagliano</a>, <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/gambino-crime-family-overview">Vincent Mangano</a>, and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/profile-original-new-york-mafia-family-boss-giuseppe-profaci">Joseph Profaci</a>.</p>
<p>As one of Luciano’s early partners, Costello rose with his pal and became part of the upper echelon of the Mafia in New York. In the mob, as in everyday life, it’s all about connections, who you know, who knows you, for Costello being friends with the top boss at that time was his ticket to the throne. Even if he, at that point, had not even considered playing that role yet.</p>
<p>Why would he? There was plenty of money to be made without being in the top position. Costello and his fellow mobsters were still reaping the lucrative benefits of Prohibition and, after a decade of bootlegging, had become richer than they could ever have imagined. The rest of the country, however, did not enjoy the same wealth. The Great Depression had made a serious impact on folks around the country. With alcohol outlawed the U.S. government was unable to tax it, losing a very significant portion of its revenue stream as a result. The mob knew that Prohibition would never last. The goose with the golden eggs would soon be moved to the slaughterhouse and they would need to look for other business ventures to replace it.</p>
<p>When Prohibition ended on December 5, 1933, the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/organized-crime-in">American Mafia</a> had already moved on.</p>
<p>In Costello’s case, moving on did not necessarily mean to something new, rather, he stuck to what he knew best: gambling. He had invested his bootlegging riches in his gambling empire, boosting his bookmaking operations and owning thousands of slot machines in New York and, after New York mayor Fiorello H. LaGuardia cracked down hard on the local racket, New Orleans in Louisiana. These machines were a goldmine for Costello. As Selwyn Raab writes in Five Families: “LaGuardia’s police raids on slots suppliers uncovered records revealing that in 1932 alone, Costello’s machines brought in $37 million.”</p>
<p>With that much money pouring in – first from Prohibition and throughout from various other rackets - the mob was able to buy its way into the highest rungs of power. Luciano and Costello were treated as royalty by politicians when they attended the 1932 Democratic Party convention in Chicago where Franklin D. Roosevelt was nominated for the presidency. Costello, especially, was legendary for his ability to swoon those in power. “Costello was a suave and diplomatic man,” Mafia boss Joseph Bonanno wrote in his autobiography. “His skill at cultivating friendships among politicians and public officials was such that it earned him the nickname ‘the Prime Minister.’”</p>
<p>As said before, the bootlegger was viewed very differently than the common hoodlum. His money helped get him in the same room as the president, sure, but it was the reputation of having made his fortune by providing an illegal good which never should’ve been illegal in the first place that made it possible for politicians to not only accept money from men like Luciano and Costello, but associate with them out in the open.</p>
<p>Not everyone was willing to play ball. In the 1930s, prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey made a name for himself going after New York’s “beer baron” <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/top-4-stone-cold-gangsters-who-look-like-wimps">Dutch Schultz</a>. The German-born crime boss was so fed up with the prosecutor breathing down his neck that he began plotting his murder. When word of his plans reached the Commission, however, it was not Dewey’s life that was to end, but Dutch Schultz’s. The Mafia bosses were against murdering members of law enforcement and public officials as they were afraid the blowback would be devastating to their operations. As boss Vincent Mangano allegedly put it at one such Commission meeting, “If we all lose our heads, we’ll wind up burning our own foundation.”</p>
<p>On the night of October 23, 1935, Schultz was in the men’s room of the Palace Chop House, a restaurant in downtown Newark, New Jersey, taking a piss when gunmen stormed the restaurant and shot him and three members of his gang. He died the next day.</p>
<p>His Commission-sanctioned murder was another example of business triumphing over personal issues. The days of rowdy outlaws were gone. The Italian-American Mafia had brought law and order to the underworld.</p>
<p>When the German-born crime boss was murdered, Dewey refocused his attention on another gangland chief. His investigators had dug up some leads that “Lucky” Luciano was an enormously powerful gangland figure involved in various illicit activities and that he controlled prostitution in New York City. After flipping several prostitutes and pimps, Luciano found himself in court facing prostitution charges. When the smoke cleared, he was sentenced to 30 to 50 years in prison. The most powerful Mafia boss in the U.S. had been brought down and was branded a pimp.</p>
<p>The two men closest to Luciano were Frank Costello and <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn">Vito Genovese</a>, serving as his consigliere and underboss. After he was convicted, Genovese took over for Luciano as acting boss of the family. It didn’t last long, though. Fearing that he’d be hit with charges connected to the murder of gangster Ferdinand Boccia, Genovese went on the lam to Naples, Italy, with $750,000 in cash.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237069891,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237069891?profile=original" width="150" /></a>With Luciano and Genovese gone, Costello was solely left in charge of a criminal empire that spanned the United States and stretched into countries abroad. The power was his now, but thanks to his predecessors he also knew that this power had limits. He knew he had to play it smart, stay one step ahead of the law and his rivals, and, now, also put on a straight face for the media and public as the mob came under more intense scrutiny from authorities investigating the scope of their operations.</p>
<p>So here he sat. In a courtroom. As cameras filmed him, focused on his hands, and sent the video reels to televisions in living rooms across the country while he tried to put on the appearance of a man who had nothing to hide. He tried, but failed. And he knew it.</p>
<p>Trying to find a way out of this media spectacle, Costello got his doctor to write him a note saying he was “suffering from acute laryngotracheitis,” which gave him an irritated and hoarse voice. (*One said to be the inspiration for Marlon Brando’s Vito Corleone character’s voice.) Unfortunately for Costello, senator Kefauver wasn’t having any of it and refused to excuse to sickly mobster from testifying.</p>
<p>After a snappy back-and-forth between Costello and Kefauver, Costello turned to the committee’s chief counsel Rudolph Halley and asked, “Mr. Halley, am I a defendant in this courtroom?"</p>
<p>“No,” Halley answered.</p>
<p>“Am I under arrest?” Costello asked.</p>
<p>“No,” Halley replied.</p>
<p>“Then I am walking out,” Costello said adamantly. “Under no conditions will I testify until I am well.”</p>
<p>Was he really not well? Had the committee gotten under Costello’s skin? Or were there other issues that made the wise street hustler lose his cool? Because though he was not a defendant he did have to abide by some laws, that he must have known of, laws he broke by refusing to testify and walking out of the courtroom. He was held in contempt and sentenced to over a year behind bars.</p>
<p>It was the beginning of the end.</p>
<p>For a man who only showed his hands on national television Costello quickly gained celebrity status among reporters and the public while also becoming an enormous target for law enforcement. In those days the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) was a prominent government branch to go after untouchable prohibition kingpins after it took down Chicago boss Al Capone. Now they were sifting through the tax records of Mr. and Mrs. Costello and once again they hit a jackpot. Costello’s wife had spent close to $600,000 dollars over a six-year period. A sum that could not be explained when looking at Costello’s reported income, not by the IRS nor by Costello and his wife. The IRS had succeeded in taking yet another gangland legend off the streets.</p>
<p>Hassled by the law, doing time in prison, Costello was distracted and did not pay full attention to what was happening on the streets. He was losing control of his family and forces in the shadows were mounting a strong offensive to grab power from his hands.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.facebook.com/GangstersInc" target="_blank"><img class="align-left" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237070900,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237070900?profile=original" width="188" /></a>On the evening of May 2, 1957, around 11pm, 66-year-old Costello arrived in front of his luxurious apartment in Central Park West after a late night dinner. He got out of the car and walked into the building, past the doorman who held open the door for him, towards the elevator. Then out of nowhere, a “fat man” wearing a dark fedora popped up. He yelled “This is for you, Frank!” A loud gunshot rang out and a bullet raged towards Costello’s head knocking him to the ground where he lay bleeding profusely as the “fat” hitman fled the scene in a waiting black Cadillac with getaway driver.</p>
<p>The Prime Minister of the Underworld’s reign had come to a bloody end.</p>
<p>While Costello had gotten accustomed to being top dog, he had underestimated <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/get-the-right-man-how-the-fbn">Vito Genovese</a>’s thirst for power. When <em>Don Vitone</em> had returned from Italy, Costello ignored all the tell-tale signs of a man hungry to take back what he deemed rightfully his.</p>
<p>The bullet to the head helped Costello come to terms with this reality.</p>
<p>Surprisingly, he survived the attempt on his life. But he got the message and retired from the mob. He would still be available for those seeking his advice, but no longer was he of any significance. He died of natural causes on February 18, 1973, at the ripe old age of 82. </p>
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Nathan Barksdale, inspiration for The Wire, dead at 54
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/nathan-barksdale-inspiration-for-the-wire-dead-at-54
2016-02-17T19:01:21.000Z
2016-02-17T19:01:21.000Z
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/nathan-barksdale-inspiration-for-the-wire-dead-at-54"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237055282,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237055282?profile=original" width="451" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>Nathan Barksdale, the Baltimore drug boss who inspired one of the best, if not the best, television series, has died in federal prison, the Baltimore Sun confirmed yesterday. He was 54. Barksdale ran a violent heroin trafficking organization in the Murphy Homes public housing complex in <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/baltimore-a-gangster-history">Baltimore</a> in the 1980s.</p>
<p>His criminal career caught the eye of David Simon, who tailor-made it for the HBO television series The Wire. “We mangled street and given names throughout <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/baltimore-a-gangster-history">The Wire</a> so that it was a general shout-out to the west-side players,” Simon later said in an interview.</p>
<p>Barksdale met with Simon beforehand and told him, “I said to the man, just don't make me a snitch. Ain't nothing I can do to stop it, just don't do that, and I won't kill your ass.”</p>
<p>Simon didn’t. Avon Barksdale became a television icon and one of the show’s most beloved/hated characters.</p>
<p>Nathan Barksdale’s nickname, however, was “Bodie,” and that was also the name of one of the young Barksdale crew members who eventually did wind up informing on his superiors.</p>
<p>The success of The Wire brought Barksdale plenty of attention and in 2010 he released a DVD about his <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/baltimore-a-gangster-history">own life</a>, titled “The Avon Barksdale Story: Legends of the Unwired.” In it, Nathan Barksdale is interviewed by actor Wood Harris, who played the part of Avon Barksdale.</p>
<p>In the documentary, Barksdale talks about growing up in the projects and getting involved in crime. He talks about the time he was shot, saying, “I've been paralyzed, I was temporarily blind. It's horrible being shot.”</p>
<p>But he gave as good as he got. In 1985 he was convicted of torturing three people in an 11th-floor apartment in Murphy Home and sentenced to 15 years in prison. Once out and a minor celebrity thanks to The Wire, he once again got caught up in the drug world and was sentenced to 4 years behind bars.</p>
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Profile of Montreal Mafia Boss Vito Rizzuto (1946 - 2013)
https://gangstersinc.org/profiles/blogs/montreal-mafia-boss-vito-rizzuto-1946-2013
2013-12-23T19:30:00.000Z
2013-12-23T19:30:00.000Z
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<div><p><a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/montreal-mafia-boss-vito-rizzuto-1946-2013"><img class="align-center" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237026288,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237026288?profile=original" width="520" /></a>By David Amoruso</p>
<p>“And like that, poof. He's gone.”</p>
<p>Vito Rizzuto, leader of the Mafia in Montreal, passed away today at age 67. He was hospitalized on Sunday for heart problems and was suffering from lung cancer. His death, of natural causes no less, comes as a huge surprise. Rizzuto was an enigma throughout his criminal career and had a knack for not just surviving the treacherous North American underworld, but emerging as its most powerful boss.</p>
<p>“The man known as the Teflon Don dies quietly? [It was] quite a surprise to many, many people,” Julian Sher, the senior producer of CBC's the fifth estate and an investigative journalist who has covered the Montreal Mafia extensively, told <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/vito-rizzuto-montreal-mafia-s-teflon-don-dies-1.2474011" target="_blank">CBC News</a>.</p>
<p>It’s an unnatural end for Vito Rizzuto, a man who was at the center of a war for underworld supremacy. A man who lost his son and his father to the violence that ripped through Montreal since his arrest for a triple murder made famous by the movie Donnie Brasco.</p>
<p>It was more than just a triple homicide, more than just a power play, for Vito Rizzuto though. It was meant to strengthen the ties between the New York <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-bonanno-crime-family">Bonanno Family</a> led by “Rusty” Rastelli and its Montreal faction led by Vito’s father Nicolo, who had seized control in 1978 when he arranged the <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/the-mafia-of-montreal-a-short">violent death of Paolo Violi</a>.</p>
<p>Three years later, it was Vito’s turn to show that he was truly mob royalty destined for a distinguished career in the Mafia. He did not disappoint. As a member of a four-man hit squad, he hid in a closet with a shotgun in his hands awaiting the arrival of <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/aftermath-of-a-hit-the-murder">three Bonanno Family captains</a> who planned to overthrow Rastelli as boss.</p>
<p>As the men arrived, Rizzuto jumped out of the closet, aimed his shotgun and yelled “It’s a holdup!”</p>
<p>They didn’t stand a <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/aftermath-of-a-hit-the-murder">chance</a>.</p>
<p>Before the smoke-filled room cleared, only two men remained standing: <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/bonanno-boss-joseph-massino">Joseph Massino</a> and his brother-in-law Salvatore Vitale. All the others, including Rizzuto, had fled the scene. Yet, he’d find out that he could not run fast enough to escape what had just occurred. Massino would eventually become the new Bonanno Family boss, with Vitale as his underboss. When both men flipped and became government witnesses, it wasn’t long before Rizzuto heard a knock on his door.</p>
<p>But that was all in the future. That day, Rizzuto had done good. He had proven himself. With his father in firm control of the Montreal faction and the ties with New York stronger than ever, Rizzuto’s career looked golden.</p>
<p>In Montreal, Vito brokered deals and peaceful partnerships with and between the city’s various criminal groups. Mafiosi, Hells Angels, South American drug cartel guys, the Irish mob: They all respected and listened to Vito Rizzuto, who was fluent in English, Italian, Spanish, and French. There was no doubt there was a criminal hierarchy and that Rizzuto sat at the top of the food chain.</p>
<p>Hundreds of millions were pouring in from narcotics trafficking. The money was laundered through various companies in exotic locations before it came home to Montreal where it was invested in real estate and legitimate businesses.</p>
<p>Business was booming, but it was never enough. In the Mafia you come in alive and you go out dead. You are in it for the long haul, till they close your casket. And so father and son Rizzuto kept stacking millions on millions and participated in newer and bigger investments.</p>
<p>By the late 1990s, the Montreal faction had significantly outgrown the New York Bonanno Family. The student had become the master. While the New York mobsters were getting by on loansharking, gambling, and extortion, the Rizzuto Clan was involved in the prestigious construction project that would create a bridge between Sicily and Italy’s mainland Calabria. It was worth billions. Using his connections, Vito was looking to launder some of his ill-gotten gains through the project.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1bMrLhx" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237027071,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237027071?profile=original" width="184" /></a>The Rizzutos had established contacts with everyone, ranging from Mafiosi and politicians to Italy’s Royal family. And their influence didn’t stop in North America and Italy. They were involved in far-away places like Chile and Singapore as well.</p>
<p>Smart, smooth, and silent, the Rizzutos kept expanding their criminal empire. Nobody could stop them it seemed.</p>
<p>Until that that long awaited and much feared moment finally arrived. In the United States, Bonanno underboss Salvatore Vitale had spilled the beans and fingered Vito in the killing of the three Bonanno captains. The Feds hit Vito with an indictment and on January 20, 2004, members of the Anti-gang Squad of the Montreal Police knocked at the front door of Rizzuto's luxurious mansion in the Northwest of Montreal.</p>
<p>Three years later, standing in front of an American judge, Rizzuto pleaded guilty to participating in the hit on the three captains. He was sentenced to ten years, which he was to serve in the United States.</p>
<p>As Vito sat in prison, his Clan was experiencing quite a few setbacks. The first came in 2006 and was named <a href="http://gangstersinc.ning.com/profiles/blogs/montreal-mafia-bust-project">Project Colisée</a>, a huge police operation which saw the entire Rizzuto leadership under indictment and behind bars, including Vito’s father Nicolo.</p>
<p>The arrests left a large void on the streets of Montreal where gangsters now operated without the law and order that Rizzuto’s reputation provided them. Some even got ideas of becoming the new Vito Rizzuto. It was a recipe for disaster and Vito couldn’t do a thing about it as he sat in his cell.</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1bMrLhx" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237027285,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237027285?profile=original" width="280" /></a>Weakened by Vito’s absence and the indictments of Project Colisée, the Rizzuto Clan was facing a hostile environment made up out of ambitious gangsters from various groups who had their eyes on the top spot.</p>
<p>Slowly but surely, the streets turned red with blood.</p>
<p>Fire bombings, kidnappings, and hits in broad daylight: Montreal was becoming the set of a movie produced by Quintin Tarantino and directed by Martin Scorsese. The peace maintained by Vito had disappeared and been replaced by all-out war.</p>
<p>One by one, people close to Vito were taken out of the equation. Two men on this list stand out. In 2009, a few days before Christmas, Vito’s son Nick Jr. was murdered in broad daylight. Almost a year later, in November of 2010, Vito’s father was killed as he was sitting down for dinner with his family at his mansion in Montreal, located next to the home of his imprisoned son. A sniper fired a round through the window, killing the 86-year-old mob boss as his family watched in horror.</p>
<p>As the media and public screamed outrage over the brazen killings and authorities were scrambling to find information about the assassins, Vito sat in his prison cell. Powerless.</p>
<p>In the months after, the general consensus was that Vito was finished as boss. He had no allies, he had lost his power, hell, would he even be up to the task after experiencing such a loss? Wouldn’t he prefer to simply retire and fade into the shadows rather than risk the death of his relatives or that of himself?</p>
<p><a href="http://amzn.to/1bMrLhx" target="_blank"><img class="align-right" src="{{#staticFileLink}}9237027658,original{{/staticFileLink}}" alt="9237027658?profile=original" width="345" /></a>We got our answer in October of 2012 when Vito (right) was released from his American cell and put on a plane back to Canada. He did not pack his bags, nor did he take the first flight to South America. He went home to his Montreal mansion and settled back in.</p>
<p>Within a month of his return, Vito began exacting his revenge. It was swift, silent, ruthless, and bloody.</p>
<p>72-year-old Joe Di Maulo was shot to death in the driveway of his suburban Montreal home. He was once a friend of the Rizzutos but had switched sides when Rizzuto was in prison.</p>
<p>At the time of Di Maulo's murder, a police officer told newspaper the Star: “It's a clear message that there is no peace. There is no conciliation. It's a war: kill or be killed.”</p>
<p>“He was able to reassert power very brutally in Montreal and we saw, I think, something like close to a dozen murders and deaths related to that gang war. In fact, there was one shooting in Montreal just four days ago,” Julian Sher told <a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/vito-rizzuto-montreal-mafia-s-teflon-don-dies-1.2474011" target="_blank">CBC News</a>.</p>
<p>Last month, wealthy Montreal baker Moreno Gallo was shot dead in front of a crowd of witnesses at an Acapulco pizzeria. The 68-year-old was executed three years to the day after Rizzuto’s father, Nicolo, was shot dead by a sniper in the kitchen of his mansion, in front of his wife and daughter.</p>
<p>“He wasn’t the very forgiving kind,” said <a href="http://montreal.ctvnews.ca/montreal-mobster-vito-rizzuto-dead-at-67-1.1605065" target="_blank">CTV Montreal</a>’s Stephane Giroux.</p>
<p>Not very forgiving indeed. And with a long list of enemies he wished dead. Hence the surprise when the news broke that Vito Rizzuto, boss of the Montreal Mafia, had died of natural causes at a hospital. No shotgun blast. No sniper round. No bomb explosion. His heart just stopped ticking.</p>
<p>His death signals an uneasy and unclear future for a Montreal underworld already shaking from an ongoing mob war.</p>
<p>“Now that [Vito’s] gone it's going to unleash a lot of unprecedented jockeying for the - for his position, his power his financial empire - it's all going to be played out on the streets across Canada,” author Adrian Humphreys, who wrote a book about the rise of the Rizzuto family titled <a href="http://amzn.to/J9nDSN" target="_blank">The Sixth Family</a>, told <a href="http://montreal.ctvnews.ca/montreal-mobster-vito-rizzuto-dead-at-67-1.1605065" target="_blank">CTV News</a>.</p>
<p>Former RCMP organized-crime analyst Pierre De Champlain agrees, telling the <a href="http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/montreal-mob-boss-vito-rizzuto-dead-at-67-report/article16088523/" target="_blank">Globe and Mail newspaper</a>, “It’s news no one was expecting. This will trigger a lot of upheaval.”</p>
<p>The king is dead, long live the king!</p>
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