Gangland Wire

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John “Curley” Montana and the Cleveland Mob Oct 28, 2024

In this episode of Gangland Wire, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins engages former FBI agent Fred Graessle, who shares insights from his thirty-year career with the Bureau. They discuss Graessle’s early experiences in Cleveland during a tumultuous period of organized crime, focusing on significant cases such as the violent conflicts involving Italian and Irish mobs.

Fred tells the famous story about the stolen informant list how it contained the name of John Curley Montana, and how this information forced Jimmy the Weasel Fratianno in as a cooperating witness.

Fred recounts the chilling details of John Curly Montana’s involvement with the kidnapping and murder of businessman Henry Podborny, illustrating the complexities of criminal conspiracies and the challenges of law enforcement. The episode also highlights the importance of informants, the rigorous investigative work required, and the collaboration among law enforcement in tackling organized crime, offering listeners a fascinating glimpse into federal investigations.
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Transcript
Welcome to Gangland Wire
[0:03]Gangland Wire. I am retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit, Detective Gary Jenkins. I even got promoted to sergeant before I left and went back to the intelligence unit for a period of time. Now I’ve turned podcasters, y’all know. And I have one of my many great expert former FBI agents. You know, we’ve had a lot of them on here today. It’s Fred Grassley. Fred, welcome. Thank you very much, Gary. Now, Fred, did I get your last name pronounced right? It’s Graessle. But anything close to that will work. Call me anything but late for dinner, right? I’m notorious for butchered names, as these guys know. Anyhow, Fred, Fred and I had a meeting not too long ago for lunch, and he had gotten hold of me. He’s retired out of the Cleveland office or Northwest Indiana office. I can’t remember which office you retired out of. Northwest Indiana. Northwest Indiana. And he moved to Kansas City, retired to Kansas City as a company. So I’m going to let Fred tell you a little bit about his background and his career in the FBI and a little bit of post-FBI, because I think that’s got to be interesting. So, Fred, tell us about yourself.
[1:21]Sure. I went to Indiana University and got a degree in accounting specifically to qualify myself to be an FBI agent. That was something I wanted to do ever since I was a small child. I graduated in 1973, went into public accounting for a couple of years, passed the CPA exam, and applied with the Bureau and got in pretty quickly in August of 1975 and was a special agent. For 30 years during that point in time. I spent my first 10 years.
[1:56]For you guys that don’t know, that was the route, one of the three routes into the FBI back in those days. Back at that time. They’ve added language skills since then, I think. But to be a lawyer or an accountant or a former law enforcement with two or three, four years of experience was the route to go in the FBI. So that’s correct.
[2:18]Anyhow, go ahead, Fred. I’m sorry to interrupt you. I spent my first 10 years in Cleveland, and that’s where this story is going to take place. But I spent the last 20 years in Northwest Indiana, first in Gary, Indiana, and then we moved out of Gary into Merrillville, Indiana. Northwest Indiana being one of the most violent and corrupt areas in the country. I got there in 1985. In the 1990s, Gary was the murder capital of the United States for four of the 10 years of the 90s. They were always in the top five. It’s just a very, very violent location. Perfect place for an FBI agent to work. Lots of great, great work in that area. And then I retired in 2005. I started my own forensic CPA firm as soon as I retired. And I started the firm initially in Indiana. I joined one of my clients for about a six-year stint. I was the vice president of franchise relations of a company by the name of Direct Buy. It was a consumer buying club throughout North America. And I also acquired the Kansas City territory for direct buy, which is what brought me out to direct buy or brought me out to Kansas City in the first place. And so my family and I moved out here. I kept flying back and forth to Northwest Indiana for the corporate headquarters, but we operated the club here for about
[3:41]
Fred Graessle’s FBI Journey
[3:38]six years and then ended up selling the club. I reopened my forensic CPA firm and I’ve been representing clients ever since.
[3:47]Most of my clients, in fact, all of my clients end up are victims of crimes in one form or another.
[3:55]All right. So any of you guys that have a company and you think you might be a victim of a financial cryboy, here’s a contact for you. Just get hold of me. If you can’t figure out him, I’ll have his contact information. So anyhow, Fred, you got hold of me and you told me this great, great story. And it starts with, really, it starts back in Buffalo, New York with the early guys or mafia members that came over from Sicily with John Curley, Montana.
[4:24]Who was a made member of the Buffalo family. So let’s, we’re going to get into that, uh, and then into his son who was in, in Cleveland and connected to the Cleveland outfit of the Cleveland family, and then into a big time crime where they kidnapped and murdered a businessman trying to get, I don’t know, as much as a $500,000 maybe from him, if I remember right. So John Curley, Montana comes to Buffalo from Sicily. And what do you remember about that’s the father that’s the father the man we’re going to be talking about tell us about him well he was born in sicily and came to the united states ultimately rose to the underboss of the buffalo crime family his son john became john curly montana moved to the cleveland area and became a made member of the of the cleveland la cosa nostra family. He was headed up by John Licavoli and actually had been reputed, alleged to have been a contract killer also with the Los Angeles mob.
[5:35]The informants had indicated that he had been out there as many as six times to commit hits on behalf of the Los Angeles mob. Fred, do you think that was because of, was that been because of his connection with Jimmy Fratianno, who was connected to both families, or did you know anything about that, how he, I think there was a, as I understood it, there was a pretty strong connection between the Los Angeles family and the Cleveland family. And that was linked strongly because of James Fratianno, Jimmy Fratianno, who had family in Cleveland. And he would repeat it. He would travel back and forth to visit family. And many times when he was there, he would visit with Licavoli, with the Cleveland crime family, and they’d talk things over. And so there, I think there was a connection there definitely with. Yeah. It’s always interesting how these guys are connected from city to city. And I know people here in Kansas city and they talk to me about their connection in another city, or they know somebody who has a connection in another city. Lots of times those relationships are created in penitentiaries. You’re in a cell with somebody or in a wing with somebody for a period of time from another family, a geographic area. And then you get out and you, you trust each other and you know each other. So it’s always fascinating to me how these guys know each other throughout the whole United States. So, you know, one last thing about Curly, Montana, your guys…
[7:03]Dad is is he was like in buffalo he he was like mr politician he was above the board businessman i think he had a lock on the taxi business in in buffalo until appalachian came out and and he got caught at the meeting and and he died out after that everybody knew he was exposed and before that they thought he was just you know mr businessman mr you know good john joe q john John Q. Citizen. So interesting thing about the Montana family. I’m sure he passed some of that along to his son as best he could. Anyhow, so let’s go back to Cleveland and his son, John Montana, and this case.
[7:46]
The Mafia’s Connection to Cleveland
[7:46]So let’s start. How’d you get into this, I guess? Go ahead.
[7:52]Leading up to this, you know, I’m a brand new agent. I get into Cleveland. I just happened to be there right at the start of some gang wars that of a gang war that was taking place between the Italian mob and the Irish mob at that point. And in 1970, I got there in December of 75. In early 1977, John Nardi, who was a defector from the Licavoli family, was blown up with a car bomb planted next to his car, 16 sticks of dynamite. And allegedly, Curley, Montana, put that bomb together. And that was used for that killing. About five months later, in October of 1977, Danny Green was similarly blown up. A Chevy Nova was pulled in next to his car when he was at a dental office or a dental appointment. And when he gets back out to his car, the bomb in that Chevy Nova was detonated. And allegedly, that bomb was put together by Curley. I don’t believe… The indications are that Curley actually detonated the bomb. The source information that came in was that he was an individual that had something to do with putting it together.
[9:10]After the Danny Green bombing, Curley Montana was interviewed by an agent on the Organized Crime Squad. And, of course, denied having any knowledge about the Danny Green bombing or anything like that. But offered to be available if the FBI had any other questions to feel free to give him a call and he’d be more than happy to talk to him. Well, the agent that talked to him then opened him up as a top echelon informant in the Cleveland informant files because he agreed to cooperate and make himself available. So in our records at the Cleveland office, Curley, Montana was was a, was listed as an informant. Then we get into the selling of the list. If you want me to swing into that. Yeah. Yeah. Let’s talk about that list. Yeah. Guys, you may or may not remember there was a famous situation that came up that Fratianno really brought Fratianno into the witness protection and becoming a cooperating witness. And that’s this list of top echelon informants from the Cleveland office that was sold and Fratianno freaked out. So tell us about that. Fred was right there on the seat, if you will, when this happened. Tell us about that and the people that were involved.
[10:26]Yeah. In February of 9th, the primary informant clerk, Geraldine Rabinowitz, and her husband, Raymond, were interested in getting a down payment for a home. Raymond worked at a Lincoln dealership on the east side of Cleveland. And coincidentally, the Chevy Nova that blew up next to Danny Green’s car came, came from the used car lot of that Lincoln, of that Lincoln dealership. What a coincidence. Oh yeah. What a, what a, what a coincidence. So the, her husband working at that unit was, was told that they’d buy individuals that they’d give them $16,000.
[11:06]If her, if his wife would bring them a list of all the informants for the Cleveland division. So she hand wrote all of the informants out on some paper and gets it out of the FBI office and they get the $16,000. On that list were four top echelon informants. And two of them were named informants and two of them were numbered informants. So the two named ones included another guy, not relevant to this story, and Curly, Montana. And then there were two additional numbered ones.
[11:42]And Rabinowitz informed the mob that she would try to do everything she can to find out who those numbered informants were. And so is back in town and he’s talking with Licavoli and Licavoli tells him, yeah, we got this broad in the FBI office that’s getting this information out of there. And she’s got a list of informants and includes these two named guys, including Curly Montana and two numbered guys. And she’s going to get us the identity of the two numbered guys.
[12:16]Well, Fratianno was concerned that he was one of those two numbered informants on that list.
[12:23]
The Infamous Informant List
[12:24]And that if Licavoli finds out, if she finds out and it is him, and Licavoli finds out, Licavoli might very well take care of Fratianno at that point. So Fratianno contacts retired FBI agent Larry Lawrence. I guess Larry must have been the agent that worked him for a while, and tells him that there’s a breach in the Cleveland office. And so Lawrence really just almost hangs up the phone and calls the Cleveland office and talks to the SAC and tells him, you’ve got a breach there. You’ve got the informant list has been compromised. And we eventually got the actual handwritten copy of the list back through a search warrant. But I can tell you all agents in the division had to personally contact every one of their informants that were on that list. And I had six that were on that list that I had to contact. And I can tell you I had six very unhappy informants with that process. But Geraldine Rabinowitz and her husband admitted what they had done. And I think by late March had pled guilty and both started serving time for that process.
[13:39]Wow. I tell you what, I would have hated to have done what you had to do and all the rest of you guys had to do. How embarrassing too. I mean, it’s just like, oh my God, it’s so embarrassing. Plus those top echelon informants. I know that the Bureau agents, even though the guy’s dead, if he’s never really been exposed in court, they refuse to acknowledge he was a top echelon informant. And I ran into that with a friend of mine here in Kansas city. And I know that guy was top echelon from something else. And I, I told Bill about it. He said, and he just looked at me like, what do you want from me? He was not, I know he knew it, but he was not going to ever confirm or deny. He was just, well, this, this is now because of the, the, the theft of the list. Yeah, I know. It’s just that became, became an issue on that. I think what guys don’t realize is the reputation of the bureau to keep those names quiet. Even after they’re dead, if they can, if you can’t do that, then other people will refuse or not will hesitate to come in because their family members are then subject to, you know, murder or at least being shunned by other family members because they all live in this little closed community anyhow. So it’s it’s huge. May monitor or maintaining the secrecy of these names. It’s just I can’t even maybe can’t even emphasize enough. And I doubt if you can’t either, Fred, how important it is to keep these names quiet.
[15:06]Anyhow, so. But that made Curly, Montana was a very important name for us in Cleveland. So that brings us into January of 1981, just a few years later, just a couple of years later after that, which is when the Henry Podborny matter came to light. I guess one question I would have here is then what happened with Montana after this list? I mean, Licavoli knew that he was on the list. Did he somehow convince them that he hadn’t really done anything or did other events conspire to keep him safe? Well, Fratianno supposedly had a conversation with Licavoli and convinced him that that list couldn’t be legitimate if it had Curly Montana. List because of all that, that he believed Curley would never front the family and he never did. But, but, but I think there was, there was some indication Licavoli was concerned that, that, that, uh, the FBI had set him up by giving that list and putting Curley Montana’s name on the list. Okay. Interesting. Interesting. Thank you for that. All right. Let’s move along to the Henry Podborny case. That was a fascinating case.
[16:23]
The Henry Podborny Case Begins
[16:24]Yep. So on January 30th of 1980, an informant contacts is being worked by the Organized Crime Squad.
[16:35]Informant contacts the agent that he’s working with and says, look, I just got approached by a guy by the name of Jim McLean. And McLean wanted, he gave me a check for $600 for cash that he wants, that’s drawn on the West Point Pallet Company in Berwyn, Illinois. And he wants me, the source, to find a friendly banker that’ll help him cash the check and help loot the company and take all the rest of the money out of the company. And McLean tells the source, you got to hurry because Podborny’s been iced and we got to get this done as quickly as possible. So Podborny owned this company, the pallet company. Right. It’s a company that he signs the checks and it’s the West Point Pallet Company. And McLean tells the source that this is Podborny’s company. Okay. McLean tells him, I’ve got the checkbook that’s got all the checks. And he says, and I’ve got his driver’s license and he’s, and he tells him I even look like, so I just need a friendly banker that’ll help me cash these checks. And we want to loot the company and get, get everything out of there. So the source immediately runs and contacts the organized crime agent that he’s working with. And that agent comes over to, I’m on the white collar squad, comes into the white collar supervisor’s office.
[18:04]And tells him the story. And then all of a sudden I get called into the supervisor’s office and I’m, I’m told that I’m going to be given this case.
[18:12]And so I’m sitting there. I literally, I have, I have a check in my hand. It’s a $600 check. The Bureau would never take a $600 check on, they never opened up a case on $600, but for the statement that Henry Podborny had been iced. So I get the case and I start working it. I have a partner by the name of Gary Hall, Excellent agent. And he was with me the whole way on this case. And so we started to get ready to get going. I contacted the Chicago office, which covers Berwyn, Illinois. And I had a friend of mine, Jack McCoy, went out literally in a quick undercover capacity going out to look for Henry Podborne at the West Point Pallet Company. Just said he was a friend of his and needed to talk to him. And the guy had one employee at the, at the, at the company and the employee said, well, you know, Henry left yesterday, which is January 29th. Supposedly he’s been separated from his wife, Dimple Pogborny of all names, but he’d been separated from Dimple and he was really distraught and Dimple contacted him and told him, come to Cleveland and I’ll reconcile the marriage. And so he immediately dropped everything, got a flight to Cleveland and left on the 29th. And the employee has not heard from Henry since that point.
[19:41]So now we have, at least at that point in time, we’ve confirmed that Henry Podborne, he has the company, he’s at least not accounted for at that point in time, and that he caught a flight the day before to get to Cleveland. We do some background on Jim McLean. McLean’s a, what we call an organized crime associate. He’s not a made member or whatever, but he’s occasionally used by their members to accomplish whatever they want to accomplish. and we start checking around. We check with some of the morgues and other hospitals to try and determine whether there’s somebody that supposedly fit Henry Podborny’s description had been turned in and nothing had shown up in that area. So we arranged to meet with the informant later that night and had him confirm with McLean on the phone that McLean still had the checkbook and they had the driver’s license and still wanted a friendly banker.
[20:40]We, on the other hand, at that point, had also contacted Society National Bank. I think it’s now Regions Bank, but back then it was Society National Bank. And we talked to the head of security and asked if we could meet with them, that we had a situation. And we wanted to bring in this Jim McLean guy and bring in the checkbook and the driver’s license of Henry Podborning. And that we wanted to catch him with that in the act because if something has happened to Henry Podborny, that would give us an extremely strong position with Jim McClain. And Society National Bank… Immediately agreed to work with us on this case. And they made available one of their branches on the west side of town.
[21:30]And we arranged to have the source tell McClain to be there at 5.15 the next day and that the banker would be waiting for him. In the meantime, at 5 o’clock, the bank dismissed all their employees. That was the closing time for the bank at that time. And we replaced all the employees with FBI agents, and I was going to be the friendly banker that McLean was going to meet with, or that we were hoping would meet with, and bring in the checkbook and the driver’s license. So we wait until 5.15 shows up, no McLean. 5.30, no McLean. 6 o’clock, no McLean. So we finally make the decision. We’ve got to go find McLean immediately and arrest him, hopefully getting the checkbook and the driver’s license. And then we can find out what happened to Jim McLean.
[22:25]And so we head out to Jim McLean’s house. It’s out in the country. He’s got a little bit of a driveway, but we’ve got some good trees and good coverage. So we were stationed at the home. It was pitch black when we got out there.
[22:40]We were pretty well concealed and we’re sitting there for a while and then eventually some headlights pull into the driveway and that was Jim McLean so at this point in time you know that.
[22:55]Henry Podborny is iced or on ice. You don’t really know if he’s dead or alive, but somehow he’s in, he’s in danger or he’s already dead. You don’t know. And McLean will know. And so you got to make a decision at this point in time. Do you carry on through and work McLean undercover a little bit, or you just go ahead and pop him and try to find out if maybe you can save Podborny. You don’t know, right? Is that what we’re at? Well, yeah, our decision to move was based on the premise that even though the indication was that he had been killed, there was some possibility that he might be being killed someplace. And we certainly didn’t feel that we had a lot of time to try to finesse that type of information out. So when McLean arrives home, we literally are right behind him. As he goes through the door, we’re right behind him, and we’re right there in the kitchen area, and he’s carrying a little satchel with him, and in that satchel turned up was the checkbook and the driver’s license. So now we have McLean with the driver’s license and the checkbook in his possession.
[24:14]Prior to all those events, we had gone to the United States Attorney’s Office and we had an assistant United States Attorney. We drew up an arrest warrant for McLean based on that fraudulent check that he had given the source earlier.
[24:31]So we were ready to go. We have, we have the arrest warrant. We get through there. We get, we get McLean in his house. He’s got the, the, the checkbook and the, and the driver’s license. I give McLean his rights and I tell him, I’m very concerned about what happened to Henry Podborny. And he looks at him and he said, so am I. I think they killed him. He said, I want to help. I want to cooperate, but I got to have, I got to have a lawyer before I say anything else. And, um, So we had to take him at that point. We called the prosecutor, and this was like at 10 o’clock or 10.30 at night.
[25:13]And we told, it was Nancy Schuster was the prosecutor. We told her, we got to get McLean in to see a judge first thing in the morning, and he’s got to have a public defender waiting there. And she said, no problem, we’ll be ready by 8 o’clock. So by eight o’clock the next morning, we picked him up out of the Cuyahoga County Jail, brought him back over to the federal courthouse. And there was a federal public defender waiting for him. And a judge was there for us to meet him in chambers and closed door session. And McLean pled guilty at that point in time to the check fraud and agreed to cooperate with us moving forward.
[25:55]Wow. That was fast. I mean, you guys were moving. That’s the faster I’ve ever seen the FBI move. Man, you guys, that’s like a tech unit local PD squad might work. I have never seen you guys work that fast. I got to tell you, we were really hustling. You were. So McLean’s agreement required him, obviously, to be honest with us, but also we only gave it to him because he assured us that he was not involved in the actual murder of, of Henry Podmorny. And so if, if, if that changed, then, then that agreement was going to be out the window, but we didn’t want to, we just didn’t want to pass off, give him a free pass for, for a murder situation. Yeah. He had to, he had to not have been involved in the murder.
[26:42]So we immediately start debriefing him and, and we probably spend about four or five hours going over the details, mentions that effectively Dimple and a daughter and son from a former marriage, both live in the Cleveland area, agreed that they should initially kidnap Henry Podborny and then cleat out his accounts. And that was later changed when the stepson, Gary Gabbard, who was a member of the Hell’s Angels motorcycle group and another Hells Angel by the name of Lee Juarez were present during the discussions. And they both said, look, dead men tell no tales. You know, we don’t need to kidnap him. We just need to get him, kill him and go clean out his accounts. And so that became the plan.
[27:36]The money that Henry Pogborny supposedly had was a result of a loan shark, not because of the West Point Pallet Company, but because he was allegedly engaged in a loan sharking operation with a U.S. Congressman in the Illinois area. And they had potentially millions out on the street, and they had a lot of money hidden in the house, money hidden in the warehouse, and money in safe deposit boxes in various banks.
[28:05]Dimple his estranged wife kept pressing him and pressing him for money and one of the reasons she left was because he wasn’t going to henry apparently wasn’t going to dip into the loan sharking money and so she just left and said i’m i’m done with you i’m through with you well they wanted to get their hands on that money and they knew that that money wasn’t going to be turned over in a divorce by any means nobody’s going to say well we have a loan sharking business, So here’s your half of the money. They needed Henry out of the way so that they could get in and search where they thought they had money available. And so that was the plan. Pod Borny flies into town.
[28:46]
The Plot Thickens
[28:47]And according to McLean, he was picked up at the airport by Robert O’Neill, who was a black male, just a thug in the Cleveland area, and taken back to O’Neill. O’Neill had a vacant bar that had gone out of business, but he still basically operated out of the bar. And he was taken back to O’Neill’s bar. And O’Neill and his sidekick, Lloyd Allen, were supposedly the ones present when Pod Borny was killed.
[29:20]But Pod Borny gets taken to the abandoned tavern. And O’Neill tells him that Dimple was inside the side door of the tavern just to go on in. And that’s what he did. And then nobody saw Henry Podwornie after that.
[29:36]McLean tells us that O’Neill brought out the checkbook and the driver’s license and gave it to her. And then they immediately drove and met with McLean, where McLean got the copy of the check. And that’s why he had the check and the checkbook the very same day.
[29:56]So that’s about the extent of what McLean told us. No mention of Curly, Montana at this time. Nothing like that came up. So this was absent Curly, certainly at that point in time. So our next step at that point is to get McLean to talk to Gale to find out what happened, actually happened to Henry Podmorny. And where is Henry Podmorny located? And so we’ve got several consensual recordings in which McLean is talking to Gale. Gale and Dimple and the brother Gary are now back in Berwyn. They left the day after Podborny showed up to get there to supposedly search and try and find the money that they thought was hidden back there. And in the first conversation that John McLean has with Lola Gale Toney, the daughter-in-law, Lola tells him that the money’s gone. We got here and the money is gone. It was supposedly buried under the floorboards in the attic, and those floorboards were torn up. There’s no money there. There’s no money in the safe, and they don’t know what happened. Lola makes an interesting statement, though, to McLean during this call. She says the letter showed up.
[31:23]And that’s all. And McLean just changed the topic, changed the subject at that point. And so later on, we asked McLean, what does she mean the letter showed up? And McLean just really passed it off as, I don’t know. I don’t know what she’s talking about. And then changed the subject back to trying to figure out where Henry Podborni was.
[31:44]So we try our our key now is is that she’s not revealing where henry is and and in in multiple attempts of talking to her she says that robert o’neill will not tell her what he did with him, and so now we’ve got we’re in a really tight spot at this point because if there is even the slightest chance that, that Henry’s alive. We’ve got to get her back from Cleveland or from Illinois. And, and we’ve got to find out where, where Henry is located. So we come up with a plan that McLean tells her if, if Podborny had an insurance policy, they can collect on that policy if his body’s found, but if they never find his body, he’s, they’re never going to, they’re going to, It’s going to be at least seven years or so before they can collect.
[32:34]
Lola’s Betrayal
[32:34]And so Lola says, well, let me check and find out. And we get a call back shortly, or McLean calls her back shortly later. And she goes, yeah, he did. He had a couple of policies. And so I’m going to catch a flight to Cleveland the next day, and we’re going to go to O’Neill and find out what he did with Henry.
[32:55]So the next day she flies in to Cleveland Hopkins airport and we’re sitting there, we’re surveilling. She literally brushes up against me. I’m on a phone outside the disembarkation area, but she literally walks right by me, goes out and she gets into a car with McLean. And the first thing they, they did was they pulled over and to a phone booth and she was, she was to call Robert O’Neill at that point. I remember there aren’t, there aren’t cell phones at that, at that point in time. So she had to go to a phone booth. She gets back in the car with, with McLean. And of course we’ve got the car fully wired and it’s transmitting everything that they’re talking about.
[33:40]And she says, Robert won’t tell me what, what happened with him. He doesn’t trust me. He wants to know why I’m asking, asking about Henry at this point. And I don’t know what’s going to happen. I don’t know where he is. So we make the point at that time that we’re going to affect an arrest on, on, on Lola. And we, we pose a, or we, we, we fake an arrest of McLean at the same time. So she doesn’t know that he’s, that he’s cooperating. And, and we take her back. We joined up with the Cleveland Homicide Unit at this time just because we knew we had a homicide on our hands. We also had other federal crimes too. So we take her back and we take her into the Homicide Unit. And Lola Galtoni absolutely flips over and cooperates immediately and identifies all aspects of the school. Hey, Fred, now remind us who Lola Gayle Tony is. What was her relationship? That’s the daughter-in-law. That’s the stepdaughter of Henry Podborny. Of Henry Podborny, okay.
[34:49]Yes. And she was the, uh, she’s the daughter of, of Dimple Podborny from a, from an earlier marriage. Okay. All right. All right. So go ahead. Yeah. So, yeah. So Lola admits the whole thing. She talks about her brother, Gary being there and the, and Lee Juarez, both Hell’s Angels being there when the, when the plan was, when it was discussed. And then it, it, it became apparent that they needed somebody to help them clean out the bank accounts. And since she had worked with Jim McLean in the past and knew that he was a con man and knew about banking. She gives him a call right away. And she says that in the planning aspect of it, they’ve got a problem with the house and the warehouse in Berwyn, Illinois, because Henry Podborny had Dobermans that he kept in those locations. And they were concerned about how to deal with the Dobermans. And so McLean, she says that McLean says, I’ll take care of that. I got somebody that knows how to do it. And he brings in another guy.
[35:50]And the guy says, listen, you’re going to do this. You need to have an alibi set up so that it looks like Henry’s still alive and he’s somewhere else in the country. So he says, get me a letter that Henry has sent to Dimple and make sure there’s no date on it. And I’ll see to it that it gets mailed from Buffalo, New York, and that’ll make it look like he misses Dimple, he’s looking for, and he wants to get back with the marriage. He also told them to take an advertisement out in the Chicago Tribune that says something like, Henry, all is forgiven, please come home. And that will make it look like Dimple was trying to make sure that he would come home. And so we got that, we found that advertisement and, and then Dimple, and then Lola tells us when she’s admitting to everything, she says, and the letter came from Buffalo that was, that was being sent by the guy. And I said, what guy are you talking about? And she says, it’s McLean’s friend, Curly Montana.
[37:01]Now that’s the first time we’d heard of Curly Montana with, with having anything to do with this case. And she gives us all this information. And so we decided at that point, since she’s now in custody, we’ve got to get these other guys in custody also for the same thing. So the Cleveland Homicide Unit got warrants for Robert O’Neill and Lloyd Allen for a kidnapping murder. Of course, we had the warrant for Lola. Dimple had admitted herself to a hospital in Berwyn, and so they got a warrant for her. And so she was arrested at the hospital, and guards were put on her room there. And of course, the brother, Gary Gabbard, was arrested and Lee Juarez was arrested. At this point in time, you still don’t have a body, though, or an actual witness who saw him murdered, correct? We don’t have, even Lola can’t say, I saw him killed. I saw him murdered. All she could say was that Robert said he killed him. Okay. And that he and Lloyd had done it. So now we have, at this point, we have six people in custody for kidnapping murder for an individual, and we have no body, we have no murder weapon, we have no witness that saw the murder, anything like this.
[38:27]And and lola was the only one that was what was the initially the only one cooperating until lee war as the the hell’s angel that wasn’t the family member lee war as says look if you guys will cut me a deal i’ll i’ll tell you what i know and so that the homicide unit got a deal cut with him right away and he says yep he said we were there we were with dimple we talked about the kidnapping.
[38:57]And, and of course he says, Gary’s Gabbard, the brother, the stepson is the one that said dead men tell no tales. So we’ve got to get that. We got to kill him instead of just, just kidnap him. And so with his, with his cooperation now, we thought, well, okay, we don’t have a body, but we’ve got, we got two people that were a part of the planning that to, to kidnap him and kill and kill him that are talking. We thought we were in pretty good, in pretty good shape until Lola says at the end of the day, after she’s cooperated and signed a statement, she says, you know, I decided I’m not going to cooperate. I’m just going to go to trial. You guys are going to have to take me to trial. That doesn’t mean we can’t use her information because she gave a voluntary
[39:45]
The Turning Point
[39:41]signed statement, but we’re going to have to take her to trial on the case. And the only cooperating witnesses at that point that knew anything about this where Jim McClain and Lee Warris.
[39:54]Well, we finally get a chance that after everything kind of calms down after all of these arrests, we’re now starting to put this case together to figure out how we’re going to go to trial without a body and murder weapon and such. But we finally get a chance to get McClain off to the side and tell him, tell us about Curly, Montana, McClain. And McLean says I didn’t tell you about him because I knew Curly Montana was not under arrest.
[40:28]And that if he knew I was snitching on him, he would kill me and my wife. And so that’s why I didn’t tell you anything about it. No, we had a real decision to make at that point. You know, what do you do with McLean at that point? He’s obviously held back critical information, but now he’s finally coming through with it. But only after we get Lola Gale, Tony tells us about Curly, Montana. him.
[40:55]So the decision is made is that he’s, he’s got to, he’s got to record a conversation with Curley and he’s got to, he’s got to try to do whatever he can to incriminate Curley on, on this case. And I got to tell you something, Jim McClain was, was, was very, very nervous with doing this because he feared Curley tremendously. But on April 6th, 1981, he has, has, he has the recording. we have a recorded conversation with Jim McClain and Curly Montana. And I’ve got a couple of excerpts here. If you don’t mind, I’ll just read them real quick as to what Curly says. They’re talking about the letter. McClain kept saying, I’m worried about that damn letter. And McClain says, they can’t prove we ever had the fucking letter. They got to prove it. We ain’t got to admit it. If we admit it, it’s possible, possible. They could indict us for the conspiracy, but you don’t admit it. It’s her word against ours. It’s her word against ours. And you say you didn’t have no letter. I’ll say we didn’t have nothing. I don’t know what you’re talking about. And they ain’t going to do nothing if we would both, but if we both admit it, possibly they would indict us on the conspiracy for shooting him. You understand?
[42:14]That’s the first time I heard that Henry Podborne has been shot. Yeah. Now that begs a question. That begs a question. What did McLean know? Right. So, and then he goes on and says, Jimmy, you go out there and say, you’re not involved in the disappearance. You’re not involved in the hit. You don’t know nothing. Neither do I. So fuck them. If you say we did the letter, well, we sent the letter. we could really become involved in the conspiracy part of killing him. And then the best line was right at the end of the conversation when Curley says, but you know, it’s only her word and ours. They can’t do a fucking thing about it. Remember that. And that was on the transcript. And that was one of the last things the jury heard before they went back to deliberate. Right. Now that letter, that letter was designed to make it look like he was still alive.
[43:12]And in a right. Because the general, the general information was, was, was Penry was going to be killed and the body was going to be disposed of and nobody was ever going to find that body. And so if they just have an alibi letter several weeks later, that makes it look like he’s alive in Buffalo. That’s going to be an alibi defense in this matter. Interesting so yeah so what do you guys do next you got them charged and then cleveland’s got some homicide charges on some of these guys right so how how does that going to work now i mean this you got two different jurisdictions you got the feds and the locals right which historically have maybe not worked so well together especially in cleveland so how do you go from here you got a lot of of tutorial decisions to make it seems to be like.
[44:04]We do. And coincidentally, you know, the two groups worked well together. And I got to tell you, you couldn’t have two more diverse groups than the White Collar Crime Squad and the Cleveland Bump. I know. I know. I’ve been there. These guys, I got to tell you, they’re great. They’re the consummate professionals in what they do. They deal with the scourge of the earth every day. And while they worked with the FBI before, I can tell you they never worked with the White Collar Crime Squad until this case came out. So we’re in a spot here now where we’re starting to corroborate everything that McLean has said, everything that Lola Galtoni has told us. And we’re starting to build a pretty solid case. And of course, there is no Henry Podborny that’s still out there walking around. So we put together a case that’s pretty decent.
[45:02]We’re all a little bit nervous that we’re going to trial without the body. But then on April 24th, I’m out driving in my bureau car. I get a radio message that I need to return to the office as quickly as possible. I do. And I walk in and they’ve got a phone set up with a recorder on it and everything’s all set. And I’m told that by the supervisor that an anonymous caller called in and wanted to talk to the case agent on the on the pod borning matter. and that he knows where the body is, but he’ll only talk to the case agent, which is me. So 20 minutes later, right on cue, the phone rings again, and it’s the anonymous caller.
[45:47]And he tells me on the phone, he says, man, he says, I know where that body is that you’re looking for, that Henry Podvorny, and I know it’s him. And I said, how do you know? And he goes, I’m just telling you, I know where the body is. And I want $10,000 to tell you where the body is. So now we have, I’m getting extorted for $10,000 to tell him, to be told where the body is on the case. So i eventually tell him look i can come i can come up with a hundred dollars and i promise you i’ll do everything i can to get the rest will you do will you work with that now and the guy goes sure meet me at and then he gives me the address where to meet him so we we all had we all rush out at that time i get to the it’s a filling station i i see him in his car he gets into my car and i said okay where do we go and he’s and he points right down a one of the road one of the main streets there on the east side of Cleveland. We go about half a mile and he says, stop. And we stop and there’s a big vacant lot and it’s in between two relatively six, seven story apartment buildings, really in dilapidated condition. But in the middle, in between the two was a vacant lot with a big pile of trash out in the middle of the lot.
[47:08]And the guy says he’s at the bottom of that bought that hill of trash out there in that lot. So while I stay in the car with him, the rest of the other agents and homicide people head out to the pile of trash. And then one of them comes running over and says, it’s Henry. Oh, man. So now all of a sudden it’s like, that’s pretty good. There you go. I said, well, how did you determine? And he had no ID on him, but on the inside pocket of his pants was a laundry mark that said H-Pod. So at that point in time, we were very confident we had Henry Podboarding. Now, the guy that points him out says, he points to one of the two apartment buildings. He says, the guy that works maintenance in that building told me that the body was out there. And his name is Wilbur Higgins. And he said, Wilbur told me that he was asked by Robert O’Neill to move that body and to get it moved. Otherwise, Robert O’Neill’s life was over with.
[48:19]And he was going to move the body that night. And so this guy got the idea, well, maybe I can make $10,000 by calling up the FBI. So anyway, we obviously we start the recovery of the body. The body is wrapped in a pool table cover. And we go over and we talk to Wilbur Higgins. But when we made the arrest of Robert O’Neill and Lloyd Allen, And we searched that dilapidated tavern that he had. And the one thing we all noticed was that there was a pool table there, but the cover had been ripped off of it. But nobody, I mean, that didn’t mean anything to us, other than the fact that it was cut out. But we found no evidence of Henry Podborny in that facility at that time.
[49:09]But now we have a body wrapped in a pool table cover. So now we take that pool table cover back to the tavern, and it’s the cover. So now we have a location connected with it. We interview Wilbur Higgins. Higgins tells us that he received a call from Robert O’Neill, that he was a friend of Robert O’Neill’s and Lloyd Allen, and that Robert O’Neill says, look, man, we dropped that body in that lot. And it was back on January 29th. and I need you to move that body. Man, my life’s on the line. If you don’t move it, something bad’s going to happen to me. Because this is now April 24th. That body was put out there on January 29th. So the temperature went from freezing to almost 60, 70 degrees, back again and then up again, and that body was starting to smell. And Robert O’Neill knew that somebody was going to find that body eventually.
[50:09]That’s why he asked, he called Wilbur Higgins and it told him to come down to the jail, which we confirmed from the visitation records that he comes down and he tells him, you got to move that body. And so that was the night he was going to move the body. We just happened to get the, get a guy that wanted to make 10,000 bucks to give us a call. But now we have the body. Yeah. So I guess my question, my question here is, first of all, did you pay him the $10,000? No. I guess I did. I did not. I did not. And yeah, there were some other situations where he agreed not to take any more. Okay. All right. Go ahead. Carry on. Yeah. So now the coroner got the name of Sam Gerber, a name that some people that are familiar with the series and the movie, The Fugitive, Sam Shepard’s murder case in Bay Village, Ohio. Um, Sam Gerber was the coroner on that particular case and had received some prominence in that thing. Well, Sam, Sam Gerber is still the coroner in Cuyahoga County at the time of this, this murder. The initial cause of death was pronounced as a blunt force trauma to the back of the head.
[51:27]And so that night, literally we got that ruling that night when we found the body. So we, at that point in time, we now had a cause of death and we have a location, which is the, the, the, uh, O’Neill’s bar. And we’re a lot farther way down the line until the next morning, Sam Gerber calls me up and says, Fred, you got to get down here right away. So I get down there and he says, hold out your hand. So I hold out my hand and he drops a 38 shell casing in my hand. He said, I just took that out of Podborny’s brain. He said, the cause of death has changed now to gunshot wound to the head. So now I said, well, you know, Dr. Gerber, I said, that’s the second time I heard that Henry Podborny had been shot. First time, obviously, was when Curly, Montana said. So now we have the cause of death now, the gunshot wound. But Gerber says, you got to go back to that tavern. And he said, you got to look up on the ceiling.
[52:32]Because most likely Todd Borny would have been down on the ground after they clubbed him and they shot him in the back of the head right where they had clubbed him. And that’s why it wasn’t noticeable initially. And he said, when that blood hit the back of the head, he said, that blood is going to splatter up on the ceiling and the upper wall. And nobody’s going to automatically see that, but they’re going to be tiny splotches of blood up there. So now we go back to the tavern again. This time we go with stepladders and we go in and we go up above right when you first walk in the side door. And we find 159 blood on the ceiling and the upper part of the wall.
[53:19]And, of course, it was Henry’s. And we literally took the ceiling down and the wall down. And during trial, we actually reconstructed that for the jury so that they could see exactly where the blood was. So now we had an exact location. We have the cause of death.
[53:38]
The Body is Discovered
[53:39]We have the body. And so we’re in infinitely better shape.
[53:43]All of the defense originally filed for a speedy trial act. I mean, they were, you know, there’s a, the state didn’t have a federal, but they, but they, they requested a speedy trial to set their, set their cases because at that time they knew we didn’t know, we didn’t have the body. And, and my guess is they’re thinking is let’s get this thing to trial with, and there won’t be a body. Well, all of a sudden now about a week and a half before the first trial, we have the body and they want to go, they want to delay. They want to delay their pieces on this thing. But the judge said, we’re going to trial. Your Honor, Your Honor, I need a continuance. I need a continuance, Your Honor. So interestingly enough, before we found the body, Dimple had two attorneys, one of them in Cleveland and one from Chicago. The Chicago attorney was a guy by the name of John Coghland, and the Cleveland attorney was Jerry Milano. Both expensive attorneys. So I’m wondering where she got the money to pay them. But at any rate, before we found the body, we were told by her defense attorneys that, hey, we have a defense. We have an alibi letter. And you guys, we got it all wrong. Henry Pyeborn, he’s still alive. And that’s their affirmative defense on this thing. Yeah. So now we know they have an alibi letter that’s not going to do them any good.
[55:09]So Nancy Schuster pulls what I would say is a genius move. We indict Curly Montana for mail fraud. Now that’s not, we know he’s going to get charged in the, in the kidnapping and the murder down the line, but let’s get our hands on that letter. We’ll indict him federally for mail fraud. And, and she gave me a subpoena to serve on the defense attorneys to turn over the letter that they’d said they had as an alibi letter, which they now, that’s now evidence in another case. and now it’s been subpoenaed and they have to turn it over. And the day after I served that subpoena on Jerry Milano, he walks up to me and throws the letter and it’s in a sandwich bag and says, there, Merry Christmas. And it turns out that’s the letter. It’s mailed from Buffalo, New York. And that was critical on the Curly, Montana case. Yeah, I can imagine.
[56:05]Made made every bit of that wire that consensual recordings you guys made made every bit of that like i mean it put him right in the middle of it just sucked it just nailed him right right in the whole thing was there any conjecture that he seemed to know that he’d been shot was there any conjecture that maybe he was a guy waiting inside the tavern that actually did the coup de grade was he there or was it just these hell’s angels guys we don’t know we don’t know the The evidence somewhat indicated that it was Robert O’Neill and Lloyd Allen who did it. But your point is very valid. We never found out who the shooter was. And that very, very simply could have been Curly, Montana. And I’ll tell you something that lends at least a little bit of credence to that. Is that when Lola Gayle Toney tells Jim McLean on the phone that the money’s gone, that the floorboards are up or torn up in the attic.
[57:02]Their first thought was that John Montana, Carly Montana, went up to home in Berlin knowing that the rest of the group back in Cleveland were occupied with getting rid of Henry. He may have beaten them up there to the ash, torn up floorboards, because he had been told where the money was hidden. And remember, he was going to take care of the dogs. He also offered to go up there and watch the house to see if it’s being surveilled by law enforcement, just in case somebody was looking for Henry Podborny. So he knew where the money was. It’s very likely that he got up there and got the money before everybody else did. Wow.
[57:48]That’s a hell of a case, man. That was one heck of a case, I got to tell you. And of course, it became… And once we found out that the Curly, Montana was involved in it, it’s like, you know, this is a real plus on this case. You know, we worked it obviously just as hard, but that was a nice finish for Curly, Montana. Yeah, you get a lot more help, a lot more prosecutorial resources, a lot more attention paid to it once you drop that mob guy’s name in there. There’s no doubt about it. So in the end now, who took convictions in state court for the actual murder? Did you have some convictions of actual murder? And then in federal court, what were your convictions? So explain to the guys kind of the difference in the two tracks and what happened there. Right. While they could have been charged with a kidnapping case, since they were charged in state court for kidnapping, I mean, there was no reason to, you know, they weren’t going to get a second charge on that one. But we did convict Curley, Montana, for mail fraud relating to that letter sent from Buffalo.
[58:59]And we convicted Jim McClain, pled guilty. And Lee Juarez eventually was convicted, I believe, federally on this, where he was an accessory in the planning stage. Lola Giltoni, convicted of a kidnapping murder. Dimple, kidnapping murder. Robert O’Neill, Lloyd Allen, both kidnapping murder. Gary Gabbard, kidnapping murder. And ultimately, the county, after I had left Cleveland, I left to go to Northwest Indiana. They indicted Curley and convicted him in state court. In state court, too. Wow.
[59:39]
Convictions and Legal Outcomes
[59:36]I guess most of the convictions ended up in state court, it sounds like. But you got the job done. That was a hell of a job, you guys. That was fine. I mean, we could have had two different settings. I think the state court was the far more appropriate venue for kidnapping murders. Yeah, yeah. The laws are much better for that state court.
[1:00:00]But all those times that Curley had allegedly been involved in hits and involved in other killings, they just couldn’t get anything on him for that one. But we just got lucky. And the white-collar squad and the organized crime squad worked very closely together in Cleveland. There was an organized crime unit of the U.S. Attorney’s Office there. And we worked. The white-collar statutes were used oftentimes to charge organized individuals. Yeah. So we had a very good working relationship. Yeah. Which is kind of interesting from a procedural standpoint. A lot of guys don’t know what white collar crime. You work with them. See, they want to take years to make a case and local homicide prosecutors. They want to do it now. They want to do it this month, this week and organized crime guys. They want to develop informants so they could get the bigger guy and the bigger guy and the bigger guy. So you have these three diverse units that have different kind of mandates, almost, if you will, different ways of working. And you all put it together. That’s amazing.
[1:01:07]Yeah, you’re absolutely right. And and that was, you know, initially we thought that that would that would create a real conflict on the thing. But I got to tell you, we worked we worked together closely. The county prosecutors, Carmen Marino and John Coghlan, not John Coghlan, I think it was his name in a second here, were, I mean, they were absolutely fantastic. And we were happy with the speed. Even when we didn’t have the body.
[1:01:32]You know, we felt we had such a strong team and the circumstantial evidence was really great. But, you know, without that body, you run the risk of having somebody. And in fact, the, the, the attorneys that represented Lola later told us that if we hadn’t found the body, they were just going to call one witness on their side and they were going to call Henry Podborning. And, and they, they knew that everybody would look at the back of the courtroom to see who comes in the door. And they were going to argue that that’s a reasonable doubt that she should have to. And it could work with a jury that could work. You can, you’re guaranteed almost a mistrial on a deal like that. You’re going to get at least one juror. Yeah, that’s exactly right. Interesting. Interesting. That’s another question I had, and all of a sudden I forgot what it was. Kind of a complicated case, but Fred, you really kind of distilled it down to the, and told it in such a way that, that we could follow along. And a lot of times these cases are complicated. And when you got organized crime and white collar crime and street criminals and, and all working together on something. And, you know, thank God they, they, they all started running their mouths and not wanting to do their own stuff. You know, this, if there’s a lesson to be learned is do everything yourself. No, not exactly.
[1:02:53]But, you know, a lot of a lot of violent organized crime acts or just straight straight murder acts, you know, there’s a there’s one of the underlying themes for a lot of that is, is that they’re after money or they’re after valuables of some sort. And that oftentimes follows the white collar statutes when it when it comes to, you know, fraud and stealing the money and that type of thing. So the two oftentimes do overlap.
[1:03:20]Yeah, really. You can also, I think oftentimes the organized crime prosecutor doing a RICO case will use some white collar crimes and what you guys have done to get one of the predicate acts that then say, oh, and this guy ordered it. So that’s, they always have to work hand in glove and you guys work well together. I’ll say that. Anything else you want to say about this case? It’s just been fascinating. You’ve got, you’re working on a screenplay, I know, and there’s not a book out there yet, guys, but he’s working on it. Yeah, I still got some pieces to put together, but, you know, there were a couple of real interesting points when we were looking for the body and thought we had located. Lee Juarez called us up a couple, oh, about a week or so after he was arrested and says, you know, I think if he’s being held someplace, we didn’t believe he was alive at that point by any means, but he said they may have put him in an abandoned hotel. Hotel, I believe it was Solon, Ohio. And he gave us the location of that. And that was one of these real little stripped down little hotels off the side of the road.
[1:04:28]And so we get this information late at night and myself and Gary Hall, agent that worked this with me, both decide, well, let’s go out and check this hotel out. Now there’s fresh snow on the ground at this point. And we get to the hotel and we pull into the parking lot and there’s obviously car tracks, you know, that have pulled into the parking lot. And there were a series of footprints, a trail of footprints going to unit number eight. In that hotel and back and forth, back and forth. And so Gary and I get out and, you know, we decide, Hey, we potentially have exigent circumstances or we need to, we need to find out what’s happening. Now I’d love to tell you that we just busted that door down, but it was actually a block. So we just opened it up. No drama.
[1:05:21]I’m not exactly sure that Gary and I combined could have broken that door. But anyway, the door was open. And there was nothing in there. But at midnight, we thought, well, you know, slight possibility this guy was part of the planning. He tells us he thinks that this might be a location. So that was one of the events when we’re trying to look up the body. Another location we looked at, we ended up bringing in a helicopter with the FLIR monitoring camera system. And they pointed out two locations on the property we were searching that were
[1:05:55]
Closing Thoughts and Reflections
[1:05:53]large enough to be a human body. Turned out they were deer uh that had been that had been buried there but so we had we were we were actively looking looking for the bottom for the body just without success until the very end yeah well yeah there’s there’s always those dead ends at any big investigation and you didn’t tell us all of them i know there’s always these different dead ends that you have to you go down but you’ve got to go down them and and they take a lot of time many times and but you gotta go down them because you just don’t know yep you sure do sure do all right red grassley it’s a it’s a great story i really appreciate you coming on and sharing this with the guys my guys that listen to the podcast and and i know they’re gonna they’re gonna be just like i was the whole time they’re gonna be engrossed in this one it’s a heck of a story.
[1:06:47]Well, I appreciate you giving me the opportunity to explain it in his podcast. All right, Fred, we’re going to have to have lunch again one of these days. It’s great to make your acquaintance right here in Kansas City. Guys, don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. Guys, don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. And if you are out there in your car, make sure you watch out for motorcycles. And if you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, go to the VA website. And hand-in-hand with PTSD is the problem with drugs and alcohol. Well, you know, Anthony Ruggiano, a former Gambino, I guess he was a prospect, if you will, a proposed member. Witness Protection came back out. He’s now running a drug and alcohol center, or he’s a counselor down in Florida, and he has a hotline on his number. And, you know, I’ve got some books out there, and I’ve got my new book. You can see back over my shoulder, Windy City Mafia, that I did from some of the early interesting stories that I did in the podcast. I just went to several different episodes and created a written chapter, if you will. Each chapter is different. Got some Al Capone, got some Harry Aileman, got some Frank Calabrese Jr.
[1:07:59]
Got some, I don’t remember what else. Anyhow, just get that book. It’s on Amazon. And I’ve got that other book about the skimming from Las Vegas, leaving Vegas, how the FBI wiretaps in and mob domination of Las Vegas casinos. And I got my two documentary films, gangland wire and brothers against brothers, the Sabella Spiro war for just a dollar 99 rental. So thanks a lot guys. And, and thanks again, Fred, I really appreciate you coming on and telling us this story. Thanks. Take

Who Managed the Ravenite? Oct 14, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I investigate the life of Norman DuPont, the notorious manager of the Ravenite Social Club, a key mob hangout. From my background as a former Kansas City Police detective, I share insights gained from footage of the club’s patrons and recount a violent confrontation at the Feast of San Gennaro with New York City cops, an incident that marked Norman DuPont’s descent into organized crime.
Exploring the club’s evolution under figures like Carlo Gambino and John Gotti, I detail the FBI’s struggles to infiltrate this secretive world. Club manager Norman DuPont’s life ended in a chilling act of murder, showcasing the brutal code of the mob.
I draw parallels to similar social clubs in Kansas City, reflecting on the culture of loyalty and secrecy that endures. #johngotti #gambinocrimefamily #normandupont #garyjenkins #ganglandwire #ravenitesocialclub
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Transcript
[0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police intelligence unit detective, and now podcaster and former filmmaker and author. I mean, I’ve just done it all here in my retirement. I’m just kidding. You know, I don’t take myself that seriously. I want to tell you a kind of a short story today about the manager of the Ravenite Social Club, Norman DuPont. I recently was looking at some video and i snagged some video to put up youtube shorts of people going in and out of the ravenite and so i i didn’t hear this one guy was so i threw it out you know to the fans on youtube and they said oh that’s norman dupont and and what you could tell he was like the guy running errands he was running in and out opening the door going next door and getting supplies and bringing them back to a little corner store there and bringing them back to the club. So Norman DuPont. And I thought, well, who is this guy? I started researching him. You can’t find out a whole lot about him. It’s kind of an interesting story later in his life. One of the first things I found out about him was he was kind of crazy.
[1:12]In 1990, it’s not too long before he committed a crime that sent him away for a long time. he was working at the Feast of San Gennaro down in Little Italy at Mulberry and Spring Street. And there was a child of an off-duty New York City police officer named Anthony Pinzone, and she complained that a concession game was not working properly. And a couple of off-duty cops went over to the booth and started making a complaint. And the booth attendant called out. All of a sudden, some other guys showed up and some other off-duty cops were in the area, showed up, and they have a.
[1:54]Have a big brawl and and the cops ended up getting the worst end of it these guys beat him with like sticks and iron bars or something and they all get they got went to the hospital retreated and released one of them was uh kept for a while he had a fractured skull so one of the persons arrested was the ravenite manager norman dupont they charged him a second degree of salt all uh it’s just like crazy crazy crazy now this uh he was manager at the ravenite and ravenite was an italian american heritage club which is we all know was the headquarters of goddy late you know it’s like after he ascended to the the throne if you will it’s a 247 mulberry street used as a mob mob hangout and became a storefront later on became a shoe store and a men’s clothing most recently but what’s the history of it this thing goes clear back to 1926 it was the alto knights social club which was an old street gang during prohibition used it and that’s what they call themselves the alto knights it was a hangout for lucky luciano and and others of that prohibition area mafia uh this name was taken from the order of saint james of alto passio uh 1957 carlo gambino.
[3:17]Gambino took over the family and became named the Gambino family, as we know now.
[3:26]He renamed the club the Ravenite in honor of his favorite poem. Now, who would have thought that Carlo Gambino would have a favorite poem?
[3:34]Go figure that one. He liked Edgar Allan Poe, and of course, the Raven was his favorite poem. And so we call it the Ravenite. Now, he hung out there, and he was the boss there, and people would come and see him there. But eventually, you know, Carlo Gambino was a guy. He was careful. He was always careful. And he quit going down there when he discovered the cops had a big interest in surveillance of that club and the FBI. You know, by this time, you know, if you’ve listened to my podcast with Gary Clemente telling about his father, Peter Clemente, Peter Clemente was in the first one of the first guys in a top hoodlum squad. One of the first italian guys in the top hoodlum squad and gambino was his his guy so he was probably down there watching gambino himself so gambino he he leaves that he understands now he didn’t pass that god he didn’t learn that lesson from him as we know the management of club then and the the head duck of the club then goes to anello della croce of course he’s the underboss for Gambino and he uses it until he dies. Gotti will come in and take it over as his club, leave the Bergen Fish and Hunt Club after he does away with Paul Castellano.
[4:53]
The Ravenite’s Surveillance Struggles
[4:53]The uh the club is is a there’s a it’s a constant battle between the fbi and the mafia to get bugs and wiretaps in places now you can always tap a phone out on the pole but you can you need to get a bug inside because people are really careful and then eventually they’ll become even more careful about talking inside anywhere and they do the walking talks but the fbi if you watch this most Most recent, Get Gotti on Netflix. I think it’s in the second episode, they tell about all the ways they tried to get bugs into the Rabonite. It was hard. They got a key bait, so they could go in and out at will, and it seemed like nobody was paying any attention to it. They were going in and out, and they kept putting in bugs, and nothing was working, nothing was working. And even when they did kind of work, they weren’t getting anything because as they find out, eventually, eventually they find out that Gotti was going out the back door of the club up some inside stairs into another apartment building. Some elderly Italian lady giving her a little bit of money and she’d leave and he’d have his meetings up there. They got the bug up there and the rest is history. Really, it really brought them down that that wiretapper, that bug up there really brought them down, you know, surveillance of it.
[6:13]Kind of helped the FBI when Gotti made everybody come in on Wednesdays, I believe. He also, another thing that’s not known is labor union guys who were connected to the Gambinos or wanted something from Gotti, was doing business with Gotti, was doing business with the mob. They would show up a lot and do those walking talks out front. So it helped the FBI determine who the labor union people that were corrupt.
[6:36]Melvin DuPont, he wanted to be a gangster so bad, I guess, because he eventually will make his bones. Now he’s, you know, he’s involved with this fight, but that ain’t a deal. There was a guy named Joy Fabozzi who had a car service company there in Manhattan and he owed money to Melvin DuPont or Melvin DuPont had, had, had verified him and vouched for him or something. The guy wasn’t paying DuPont. I believe he got drunk. He goes to the car service, and there’s a dispatcher there named Harmon Fuchs, and DuPont shoots and kills him just as a message to his boss. There’s a couple of low-rent scumbags, Tony Nose Perscietti and Guy Zappula, who are either with him or know about this, and they end up testifying against him, and he gets like 25 to life or something. Now, while he’s in prison, he has a teenage son who is drowned in an upstate boating accident there in New York. And the prison people will not, the management will not let him go out and go to the funeral. But he does get an agreement with his family that they’ll bury the kid. They bring the kid down into West Virginia so at least he’ll be buried close to his father’s in Glenville, West Virginia, the Gilmer Federal Prison.
[7:59]
Tragic Fate of Melvin DuPont
[7:59]And that’s kind of an interesting story.
[8:05]Another thing about these social clubs, I know, you know, they had several managers. And we look at our social club here in Kansas City, they’re always a target of the FBI and the intelligence people.
[8:20]And they’re really careful in and around them. But here we had one called The Trap. Everybody just called it The Trap. It really was a Northview social club. They even used to have a sign out front. When I was young, they had a sign out front. And you know i’d see these guys hang around out front they’d be inside to be playing cards they had the espresso machine and and the whole nine yards and and they’d have people they have games going on texas hold them and play gin and and different kinds of gambling games they know there’s always gambling on it of course and and in the back room there was a smaller room that’s where they’d have the bigger games and that’s where these guys would bring some big fat fish that they could fleece that this some of these business guys they’d want to you know have the the cachet of playing cards with the mob so they’d bring them into the back room and and of course fleece they’d pay for that little trip into the back room of the uh trap or the northview social club we always had a manager here too back when i first went in the unit it was a guy named turk harris he was italian i don’t know what his if his father was not italian or whatever his last Last name was Harris, but he was Italian. He used to tell everybody that he was like the head of the mafia in Kansas City. And he lived up above it. So he’s really hard to get into that thing. Anyhow, you could get it done, but it was hard to do.
[9:40]I know an FBI agent who was in the basement running some wire one night about four o’clock in the morning. And as he started out, there was some mob guy had been up in one of these upstairs apartments visiting a girl. And he was walking out the same time the FBI agent was walking out. The FBI agent just happened to hear him coming out the front door as he started to open the front door of the trap. and he pulls the front door shut and just looks out the window and sees this Willie Camisano Jr. Walking out and getting his car driving away.
[10:12]And then Bobby Maroon took it over after Turk Harris. I never knew what happened to Turk Harris. I don’t think he died.
[10:24]
The Trap: A Kansas City Social Club
[10:18]I think, I don’t know. He was kind of a loud mouth. I think people didn’t like him in the end. And a guy named Bobby Maroon took it over. He had been, I think, a joint at a West 12th Street bar, bar kind of a b-girl bar and he’d had that for quite a while and they trust him and and he helped run the gambling games there he actually ended up starting another game down the street uh upstairs above a pharmacy but he ran it until i think it finally closed down bobby maroon got old and died everybody started going to prison there in the 80s late 70s early 80s and and it just closed down it’s still sitting there today uh vacant i know a guy that went in there tried to buy it they They wanted like $100,000 for this just like run-down old storefront.
[11:06]It actually had a little restaurant adjoining it, but they wanted $100,000 for it. And this guy wanted to turn it into an Italian restaurant, and it’s down in our little Italy. So I don’t know. Somebody ought to do that with the Ravenite, get a hold of it, and turn it into a little bar and restaurant.
[11:26]
Conclusion and Future Projects
[11:22]I think it would go just a cachet of being able to go into the old Ravenite. But anyhow, so that’s the story of Norman DuPont and the Ravenite Social Club.
[11:32]Thanks a lot guys and don’t forget i like to ride motorcycles so watch out for motorcycles when you’re out there if you have a problem ptsd go to the va website and get that hotline number and along with ptsd is drugs and alcohol you got that problem you don’t have to be in the uh, the you don’t have to be a veteran you can go see anthony rugiano he’s a drug and alcohol counselor down in florida and he has a hotline on his uh website or his youtube page or something i don’t know he’s got one anyhow and and don’t forget to like and subscribe and tell your friends about us and you know hey i’ve got books and movies out there and movies to rent my documentaries you can rent and i got a book for sale in amazon i’m working on a couple other books i think i’m going to start trying to like take several podcasts and then make a short book of several chapters And each chapter will be whatever the podcast was that I did a particular week. What I’ve got so far is a bunch of Chicago stories. And so I’m working on that and I’ll do some New York stories and I’ll do some Midwest stories. I may do one with just Kansas City stories and some of my own experiences. I must start putting out a few short books as if I don’t have enough to do. But anyhow. So thanks a lot, guys. And keep coming back.

**Tony Spilotro Had a Bad Day** Oct 07, 2024
Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I describe details about the horrific demise of mobsters Tony and Michael Spilotro, as told in open court by the recently deceased Chicago Outfit member Nick Calabrese. Michael Spilotro thought he was gping to a meeting of the Chicago Outfit bosses so they could “make” him a member or get “whistled in.” Michael Spilotro was wrong; I think he and his brother, Tony, knew that. Nick Calabrese was the Chicago Outfit killer who told the story of who and how the Spilotro brothers were murdered.

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I also introduce my latest book (click the title to buy), “Windy City Mafia: The Chicago Outfit,” which features gripping tales from my podcast about the rise of organized crime in Chicago. Overall, the episode offers a chilling glimpse into the realities of mob life while encouraging listeners to engage further with organized crime narratives through my book.

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Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

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Transcript
[0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City police intelligence sergeant, detective sergeant later on back here in the studio of gangland wire with this episode. I’m you got to bear with me, guys. I’m going to do a little selling at the very start. I usually sell anything I got to sell at the end or asking for promote or for support or whatever.
[0:22]But at the start, we’re going to do a little promotion. I have a book that I just did and I’m going to give you, I’m going to reward you. I’m going to give you a story, an interesting story, but to start, I have a book here that I’ve done. Windy City Mafia, the Chicago outfit. You can see it back over my shoulder there. Like any good day ever seen any author being interviewed on a podcast on a, on YouTube, you’ll see they had the book propped up over their shoulder. So anyhow, I’ve done this book and what I did. So, stories from Gangland Wire. So I took a bunch of my different Chicago stories and I just take my show notes and the transcript and then distill that down into a short story. So it’s a variety of different chapters. Each one is different. Let’s see, I did an overview, The Rise of the Chicago Outfit, kind of an overview of that. Then I’ve got seven chapters, which I’ve got Scarface on the golf course, which I thought was a really funny story and a good one. The Trial of Al Capone, that’s a first-person account that I found, and I put some other things together and did a show on that. The rise of Tony Accardo, Joe Batters, the murder of Estelle Carey, which was a particularly horrific murder.
[1:40]I found a story about the Chicago Police Intelligence Unit serving a search warrant on an outfit gambling house, and they found a bunch of bookmaking records. Kind of near and dear to my own heart, I was part of the intelligence unit. We never served any search warrants. We set up some other people for vice to go serve the search warrants. Had an interview with Frank Calabrese Jr. And so I went back through that and pulled out a lot of the salient details about the Calabrese family. And finally, I did the executioner, Fear in the Chicago Outfit. What a catchy title for that chapter. And that’s really the story of Harry Aleman, which is, I mean, that guy was, he was a piece of work, wasn’t he?
[2:24]Anyhow, but the story I’m going to tell you today, oh, and that book will be on Amazon, both the Kindle and the hardcover version. And if you guys will go out right away and, you know, for, I think, $1.99, you can get that Kindle version. Even if you don’t have Kindle, hit that $1.99. If I can get a whole bunch of people to buy this thing the first 10 days or two weeks or so, Amazon will see that and they’ll say, oh, man. And so they’ll push it up in their algorithms and it’ll show it to a lot of other people who have bought books, true crime books about the outfit or any mob books. Because there’s a huge fan base out there that buy all kinds of mob books. And a lot of you guys are a lot of you guys that listen are those guys that buy those mob books. And I bought many, many myself. Now I get a lot of them sent to me, which is kind of nice. And I interview these authors while they send me their books. So I get all the latest books and I pass them along to one of my big supporters, Eric, Eric Tyler. I really appreciate what you’ve done for me in the past. I help him make my movie and and other things that you’ve done financially and emotionally and physically support the podcast and my work. Well, I get him those books.
[3:48]
Eyewitness Account of a Mob Murder
[3:43]And so, you know, that’s what it is. That’s my and and help me out if you can. I would really appreciate it. So today I’m going to tell you the story out of the words of an eyewitness of the murder of the two Spilotro brothers, Anthony or Tony Spilotro and his brother, Michael. You know, they were big out in Las Vegas and they got in trouble out there. And, you know, it’s really I think it’s interesting. It’s an insider’s account of a mob murder. You know they had had brought a lot of attention especially tony had brought a lot of attention onto the outfit out in las vegas and during the same time you know we’d started this here in kansas city uh listening to this guy named joe agosto talk about Spilotro talk about frank rosenthal talk about the skim coming back to kansas city from the stardust or from the Tropicana, and also talking about the Stardust and the fact Skim was coming out of that and going to Chicago.
[4:48]And so first two full days on a witness stand, there’s a guy named Nick Calabrese. Nick Calabrese’s brother was Frank Calabrese Sr. And he ran the 26th Street crew, which was a crew of killers. And of course, I interviewed Frank Calabrese Jr. About that life with his uncle Nick nick and his dad frank sometimes it’s like i talk to these guys like frank jr and he talks about his that was just his uncle nick when he was a little kid his dad was just you know dad.
[5:21]Uh, like some of these, uh, kids here in Kansas city, I talked to them once in a while and, you know, their grandpa or their great uncle was just Cork Civella. I mean, it was just grandpa, you know, to us, it was Cork Civella, a real killer to them. It was just grandpa. So I always find that really kind of fascinating. You know, Nick Calabrese kind of starts out right on the, off the bat. He said, uh, prosecutor asked him about what happened. And he said, well, he said, I tackled Spilotro’s brother, Michael, around the legs. And I heard Tony in the back ask if he could say a prayer.
[5:58]What happened next? The prosecutor said, you know, he said, I couldn’t, I didn’t hear anything anymore. You know, I, you know, you go into the action, everything else closes down. I’ve been there on that. You go into some kind of action, your hearing closes down. You don’t need your hearing more than likely. And you start taking the action. You’re looking for any kind of a danger to you. The article I read said that he just spoke in a monotone, calmly, and just like, matter of fact, well, you know, we did this and we did that. Nick Calabrese had been a longtime hitman along with his brother Frank and his 26th Street crew. In the months before the Spilotros were killed, he had been part of a team of mob killers, some of these other guys who we’ll name later on, that went out to Las Vegas trying to catch and kill Tony and Mike Spilotro out there. They were going to use explosives, and they even had a silencer-equipped Uzi, they said, followed him around, followed him to Goodman’s office and downtown, and back there where his home is, it’s on a cul-de-sac. I tell you what, I’ve been there, it’s in my, uh, Las Vegas mob tour on YouTube.
[7:08]It would be a hard one. It would be impossible to sit on. You can follow him in, but you couldn’t stay down in there. There’d be no way. Somebody would be calling the police on you. I mean, there’s just nobody moving in and out of that neighborhood. And everybody parks their cars in the garage. Nobody parks on the street. So it’s impossible to sit on that house. So the outfit acting on Joey Iupa’s orders said, let’s get them to come back to Chicago. So they came up with a ruse and said, Michael is going to be promoted. He’s going to be whistled in. He’s going to be a made guy and they’re going to promote Tony to be a capo. Now, Calabrese testified that one of his fellow hitman, John Farracotta, said that Tony Spilotro supposedly was targeted because he had an affair with the wife of what they called a Chicago bookmaker, which has to be Frank Rosenthal. Which is kind of a no-no, but I don’t buy that you would do all this because he had an affair with Jerry. Supposedly, they put out the story that he was moving drugs with a motorcycle gang out there. You know, big no-no, don’t move drugs. I don’t really believe that.
[8:21]I’m not sure why. If we want to speculate, I would say that Tony Spilotro had just gotten too big for his britches out there and brought a lot of heat. I mean, a lot of heat, and it really wasn’t particularly him, although part of it was because of him, but that heat all started in Kansas City, and it started on FBI wiretaps, and it spun off to Chicago because Lefty Rosenthal was doing all this crazy stuff out there and bringing all kinds of attention to himself, which brings law enforcement attention to him. Tony Splatro was also bringing a lot of law enforcement attention when he started this hole in the wall gang, which brought the Chicago, the Metro intelligence unit to actually combine with the FBI for the first time ever and a little task force and work on the hole in the wall gang, which then turned Frank Cullotta. So it’s, it was just a variety of things. It probably wasn’t either one of these two things.
[9:20]Calabrese talked about when he first was told that he was going to be part of this hit on Mike and Tony Spilotro, he told his brother, his older brother, Frank Singer, and Frank Singer said, well, why didn’t they ask me? I want to be there like a little kid. You know, why come? I’m not chosen for this team. Crazy. He ends up, he’s not there. I’m not sure exactly why. But 83 or so, I think the the skim trials that started and Iupa and Jackie Cerrone and Angela LaPietra are going to prison as well as, you know, Tuffy DeLuna and Nick’s Nick Civella had died. Cork Civella, Frank Balistrieri, John Scalise, Mashie Rockman, and Cleveland are all mob bosses. The whole skim thing was done and all that money that they’d been getting every month. I mean, hundreds of thousands of dollars between the trop and then all the four casinos that Alan Glick owned out there. The Stardust, the Hacienda, the Fremont, and God, I never remember the name of the other day. I had four casinos. They were skimming them out of that. That was going to Chicago. Chicago was divided up with Cleveland.
[10:38]Milwaukee and Kansas city Kansas city had the Trop covered 40 grand a month we recovered 80 grand when we took them off uh with the uh guy that was bringing the skim back and a regular guy named Caruso and had a junket that was going in and out of Kansas city to uh las Vegas so he you know had cover uh and he took 80 grand off of him that was two months skim so 40 grand a month out of the trop and and over a hundred thousand dollars maybe even a couple hundred depending on the month out of those other four casinos so it was a lot of money and and i think he felt like and we needed somebody to blame i would say and Spilotro you know he had drawn all this heat with the hole in the wall gang and Frank Cullotta was testifying by then but anyhow it was reported did later on that Aiuppa when he ordered the brother’s murder he said you know I’ve had enough of this and there’s.
[11:39]Been several people that have are bringing us down here and I don’t care how you do it just get him I want him done I want this done I want him out that’s when they they sent Nick Calabrese and some other some of these other guys out to Las Vegas kill him with explosives and the automatic weapons that didn’t work came back that’s when they scheme they hatched up this scheme to lure him to a meeting in a house in bensonville it’s a suburb up in Chicago with this promise of mob promotion for tony and and you make Michael get “whistled in” and break a lot of call he said you know he was asking about that and and he said you know they i don’t know if they call it made he said we just always called it being whistled in and that makes sense how let’s click over. Tony and his brother get together. They’re back in Chicago. Tony’s always maintained a house in Chicago, and Michael lived there mostly and had a wife and family there. So June the 14th, 1983 or 86, June the 14th, 1986, they get together.
[12:46]Michael left. He told his wife that, you know, I’m going to this meeting. I’m not sure this doesn’t look good, but I don’t know. His wife will later testify that he said if he wasn’t back by nine o’clock, it was no good. it. Michael Spilotro’s daughter also will testify that Michael told her he loved her at least 10 times before leaving on that fatal day, or should it be fateful day, fateful, fatal day. Both Tony Spilotro and Michael removed all their valuables and all their personal identification before they left. Now, I don’t know if that’s normal when you’re going to go to a meeting where you’re going to be made. I don’t particularly think it is. I don’t know. I I wouldn’t have showed up at that meeting. They said Tony Spilotro had a gun hidden on him, but he didn’t get a chance to get to it, apparently. Nick Calabrese will tell the court when he’s testifying that he was told to wait at a shopping center on 22nd Street, just west of Illinois Highway 83 in DuPage County, and somebody will pick him up.
[13:51]Waiting with him were John Ferricotta and another capo, Jimmy LaPietra, Angelo LaPietra’s son. Son i think and now the leader of the 26th street crew jimmy marcello who will be the really the next boss or as it probably was the boss at the time with Aiuppa in jail or on his way he picked him up in what calabrese called a fancy blue van one of these big uh navigator kind of vans early in the afternoon is a saturday afternoon they drove up to this bensonville subdivision uh went to irving park road and where all the homes looked alike all had uh you know these partial brick walls and then uh wood the rest of it bay windows in the front garage doing on two garages most of them have two car garages drove in the garage door was already up when they got there they just drove right in shut the garage door so nobody really might not even notice that blue van then what they do is they put the bodies in that blue van and back out and take off when He said when it got there, there was John Bananas DiFronzo, who will become the boss later on, Sam Wings Carlisi, who will have a short period of time at the boss, and Joe Ferriola is a longtime capo over in Chinatown and the 26th Street crew and has moved on up.
[15:09]He was the one who brought Harry Aleman in and schooled him and used him, and he was really the guy. If you wanted somebody killed, then you went to Joe Ferriola and he could get Harry Elman and some of the members of the Wild Buds to do that. There were this this Chicago outfit of the 70s and 80s that we’re talking about. This is the end of that really peak peak of the outfit. The final last straw, except I guess there’s still something going. And Calabrese will remark that Calabrese, that Wings Carlisi said he really got a good tan and.
[15:49]And then made some passing remark about when Nick Calabrese and John Farrakata were down in Phoenix recently.
[15:59]
The Execution of the Spilotro Brothers
[15:56]And he’s Ferracotta had spent a lot of money when he was down there. Well, Calabrese will say that Ferracotta runs in the bathroom. And when he comes out, he’s pale. He said, Calabrese testified. He said, I figure he thinks this is slow parties for him. And it wasn’t, he wasn’t marked for murder yet. He’d be killed about three months later because he’s the one that bots the, uh, Uh, Spoletro’s burial didn’t bury him deep enough and left before they really got buried really good. I think they got scared off. They thought somebody was coming. They all ran off at one dude, uh, taco. He had, uh, his wife, she ends up testifying against him. He has to call her to come and get him. About 30 minutes later, the Spoletro’s get walking upstairs and Nick Calabrese says, you know, I remember hearing somebody talking, saying, hello, there’s a few guys upstairs. Some of them were downstairs. Most of them were upstairs because they wanted to then push these guys downstairs when he went down the basement. It’s one time he really showed a little bit of tension and a little bit of emotion on the stand. They report that he exhaled audibly like, I’m wound up because I’m tense. I’m focusing, totally focusing on what I’m going to do. Look around at the rest of the courtroom.
[17:11]Marcello had no reaction and just, you know, deadpan. He was sitting there and this is in the family secrets trial. Actually, I think I forgot to mention that. Most of you guys probably know that. First one down the stairs, Nick says, was Michael Spilotro. Then he stepped forward at Green and said, how you doing, Mike? Because I knew him, you know, and you say, oh, yeah, how you doing? And would step towards him. About that time, this dude named Marino and several others jumped on him. So Calabrese said, I dove and grabbed his legs.
[17:44]He said, I noticed there was Louie the Mooch Eboli who was there and he threw a rope around his neck was strangling. And he said he remembered only one thing before he kind of, you know, as far as his hearing went blank, he said, I heard Tony Spilotro say, can I say a prayer? And, and all the rest of the waiting men, men just bum rust. These brothers just swarmed them.
[18:04]There’s nothing you could do when you got the weight of seven or eight men, even though you’re a tough guy yourself, you can’t do it. These guys are just as tough and many of them were bigger, swarmed them and kicked them and beat them and hit them with only with their fists.
[18:20]A lot of people said it was with some blunt instruments like, you know, axe handles or whatever, baseball bats or whatever kind of, you know, Hollywood thing you want to think of. But the coroner will say this blunt force trauma was from fists and feet and not from any instrument. And also there’s a rumor that they were found with dirt in their lungs that they were buried alive but the autopsy will show that their lungs are filled with blood from the beating so if they died from not being able to get air it was from all the blood that filled up their lungs from the internal damage that they were did as they beat them lotto brothers are dead you know and and they hope that their bodies will never be found as i said they didn’t bury them deep enough some farmer found them and kind of a uh you know it’s sad commentary on their end but the these long-time catholic tony splatter even wanted to pray at the end the Chicago archdiocese ruled that they cannot be given a catholic funeral at saint Bernardine in forest park because of their organized crime connections so they had a private service and a cemetery chapel it was located at the Queen of Heaven Cemetery in Hillsdale, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. It’s on June the 27th.
[19:36]Really not that long after they were killed and they were buried in the family plot up there. They had a wake at Salerno’s Galewood Chapel on North Harlem Avenue. And three of the killers, Joe Ferriola, Marino. God, I can’t remember his last first name. Let me know what his first name is. Marino. I should have looked it up. And Rocky InFelice all showed up at the wake.
[20:04]
Reflection on the Spilotro Murders
[20:01]So I once attended a mob associates funeral. And this guy one guy showed up and i thought uh-oh uh-oh one made guy showed up at this funeral who would have been the kind of guy that would would probably maybe orchestrated this thing he didn’t do it himself but i bet he he orchestrated it uh i have to tell that story someday i did so much on jimmy Duardi, i don’t remember i’ve got an old podcast on jimmy Duardi one of our a made guy who was a real old-time mobster but anyhow so that’s the story of the murder of the splatter brothers tony and Michael and who did it and what went down right from the mouth of a man who did it nick calabrese uncle to frank calabrese jr.
[20:50]Who i have a story about in my book so don’t forget my book windy city mafia the chicago outfit stories from gangland wire podcast. I’m gonna do more of these i’ll look up some more chicago stories that i think interesting and haven’t been told and retold a jillion times and i’m gonna do one on new york and i’m gonna do one on kansas city and so i’m just gonna kind of keep doing these all along as i have time to uh to do them it’s just kind of kind of fun for me too, and gives me another, uh, another stream of income. So if you guys will go whole bunch of you go buy this book, why, uh, it will help immensely. So thanks a lot, guys. Uh, don’t forget. I like to ride motorcycles and you know, all the rest of it. You got problems with drugs or alcohol or PTSD.
[21:33]There’s, there’s help available. If you’re a veteran, go to the VA and Anthony Ruggiano, former Gambino, uh, proposed member. I’ve been told not really a made guy. Um, they got, they got help for you out there. I’ve got other books, some other book, the Amazon site, and that’s the one about the skimming from Las Vegas from the Kansas City viewpoint and all the wiretaps that they used. You get the Kindle version. You can click on the transcripts that are used inside the book and hear the actual wiretaps. And I’ve got the two movies that are out there for I think is a dollar ninety nine rental gangland wire, which tells about the starting of the skim investigation and the whole big to do that really got the FBI into it. And then brothers against brothers, the Savella Sparrow war, which was about right on the heels of the start of the skimming investigation and all the wiretaps. Then this little war between some upstart young Turks, last name of Sparrow, broke out. And we all pulled out of that, let the FBI, all they did then was sit on the wiretaps. And we all went into in the middle of this war, really. So we about got caught up a couple of times right in the middle of it. So anyhow, thanks a lot, guys.

Stories From the NYPD Sep 30, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary interviews former NYPD officer Marique Bartoldus, who shares her 20-year journey in law enforcement. Marique’s book is Twenty and Out: A Compilation of Chaos experienced while serving 20 years in the New York City Police Department. Marique shares exciting life stories on the gritty streets with the NYPD in this well-written book. We discuss her experiences across various divisions, including patrol and SNU or Street Narcotics Unit, and the crazy work of an anit-crime cop in New York City. She explains and highlights the unpredictable realities of street police work. Marique shares gripping stories of high-stress encounters, the importance of quick thinking, and the camaraderie among officers. We also explore the impact of evolving crime trends, including fentanyl, and the personal toll of a career dedicated to community safety.

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Transcript

[0:00]Well, hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there. Good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I have a show today with a officer from the New York Police Department. We’re going to tell some New York Police Department stories. You guys know that I spent 25 years on the Kansas City Police Department. Well, Marique Bartolda spent 20 years on the New York City Police Department. She’s got some great stories. So welcome, Marique. Hey, how’s it going? Thanks so much for having me. Great. I’m really glad to have you on. I think I’m looking forward to our mutual friend, Vic Ferrari says that you have some good stories. And so we’re going to hear some good stories today. I’m sure of that. Now the book guys, the book guys is 20 and out. It’s a compilation of chaos experience while serving 20 years in New York city police department. Here’s a review. I must say that the author was descriptive enough to set the scene of each story. I love that she She explained everything, which made you feel like you were right there with her. I couldn’t put it down and love that each chapter was a job she went to or encountered. Great job, Marique. So that’s, you know, a great review. And you got like all five star reviews, I believe. And so, guys, you can get that on Amazon. I’ll have a link to it in my show notes. So, Marique, tell us a little bit about yourself, you know, your education. And where did you work with the PD before we get into some stories?

[1:22]So I grew up on Long Island in Malvern, which is right on the border of Queens and Nassau County. I went to New Paltz College. And while I was up there, I realized that I wanted to be a cop in New York City. So I left New Paltz, which is in upstate New York. I came back home and I went to school at John Jay College in Manhattan for criminal justice. I took a lot of law classes and I started going on the law track. I was really thinking maybe I wanted to be a lawyer. And I had taken the test for the New York City Police Department and they called me and I said, you know what? I don’t know about case law.

[1:58]Reading it is fun to, you know, get an A in class or, you know, whatever. But to do this like as a chore for the next 30 years might get a little boring. So I said, you know what? I’m kind of an adrenaline junkie and And I might as well just go work in the police department where I can be outside and not stuck in a room with four walls for the rest of my life. So I went into the academy July 1st of 2002. I graduated, I think, January 1st of 2003 or 2nd, somewhere around there. And then when I graduated the academy, I went into transit in the subways in District 20, which is like Queens North and somewhat into Queens South, a little bit of Brooklyn. Uh, and it wasn’t, it wasn’t my cup of tea. I had a lot of fun down there. A lot of good guys, um, was in the blackout of, uh, I think it was 2003 blackout where like the whole Northeast lost power and we had to go into the subways and rescue people off of the trains and stuff.

[2:55]There were some fun times down there, but it wasn’t the type of police work that I was really interested in. I was watching the RMPs, the police cars going flying by with lights and sirens and stuff, and I’m just sitting there watching turnstiles, and I’m like, that’s the kind of stuff I want to be involved in. So I put in transfer requests and ended up going to the 105th precinct, which is in Queens, right on the border of Queens and Nassau. Really big precinct, runs from like the Grand Central Parkway down to JFK Airport.

[3:27]And I went there, I went on patrol, which, you know, is the lowest part of the bar. I did 4 to 12, which was 3 in the afternoon to 1130 at night, which was my favorite tour to work. Work uh so work with a lot of fun guys on that tour you know busted chops got my chops busted uh and then i went to um i did a response order for a little while we basically only responded to in-progress jobs that kind of cover the gap in between tour changes uh then i went into a conditions unit which addresses quality of life issues like you know the guys who pee and the guys who drink with an open container because that was illegal at the time uh and then from From there, I went to SNHU, which is street narcotics enforcement, which is like dealing with low level street level drug rings. Then I went into anti-crime and then I did field intelligence at the precinct level for a few years. And then the NYPD started a new unit for animal cruelty to investigate animal cruelty. So I went there, which was a brand new unit, got that started, you know, did the training for it for, you know, the cops in the police department. Department, did a couple investigations. And then I realized that wasn’t for me.

[4:36]So I requested to go back. So I went back to the 105th precinct and I ended up going right back into the FIO spot, which was great because it was like my favorite spot. And the girl that had replaced me was getting promoted. So it worked out. And I stayed there for the rest of my career. And all in all, it was a blast. It was a blast. Had a really good time. So you’re using some, uh, some terminology. Some of these guys might not know RMP is radio motor patrol. That’s a police car with a radio in it, right? That’s a March police car. Yeah. Sorry. Sorry. Yeah. Talking to a fellow cop. I forget. Yeah. Sorry. Right. Yeah. And the next one was, you just said it, it was, uh, RIO or something. IO. What was that? Oh, FIO field. FIO is field intelligence officer. Oh, okay. Field intelligence officer. So, you know, I looked at some of your stories and, you know, I tell you what, especially dealing with emotionally disturbed people is one of the more difficult things that any cops has to do. I’ve got my own stories. I mean, there’s nothing like having to wrestle a naked man in the middle of the night in the middle of an intersection and it’s hotter than hell. You know, there’s nothing like that. They’re super slippery.

[5:55]They’re slippery as hell. Yeah. I know you got some stories and especially many times they’ll have a knife. I remember looking at a window and there’s this crazed woman with a big butcher knife just raised up looking out at me. It’s like, oh man. And, you know, we just walked away because we didn’t have really, she wouldn’t answer the door and we just had a call that, you know, there was some problem inside, you know, we just walked away from that one. So I know you got some stories about that. Yeah. You know, the knives are always a lot of fun. They make this situation very interesting when you get involved with somebody who’s emotionally disturbed. We had a lot of that. It’s actually, I think, a bigger problem than most people realize. I think the interesting part of the of the EDP or emotionally disturbed person is that you never really know when the switch is going to happen and they’re going to go from being completely compliant to like completely nuts and violent. So what you refer to with the knife, one of the stories that’s in my book.

[6:55]When I was on patrol, we had a call for a neighbor had called about her neighbor who was an EDP and had pulled a knife on her. So, you know, my partner and I get there and whenever you’re dealing with an emotionally disturbed person, you always have backup coming. There’s always another car coming. And in the NYPD, we never worked alone. We always had a partner with us in the car. So I knew there were at least two other cops coming. So we get there and the woman’s like, you know, this guy pulled a knife on me. He’s a little crazy. He went running back inside the house. He’s in there somewhere with a knife. So, okay. You know, all right, whatever. So I’m walking up the driveway and I’m looking into the windows to see if I can see him as I’m walking up, and to glued or taped to every single window pane were cloves of garlic.

[7:41]So I’m like, okay, so either, you know, this guy is a legit Italian and he just likes hanging garlic from all of his windows or, you know, he’s got some kind of Dracula complex and, you know, he’s got to protect himself from the outside world. So I said, okay, here we go. So the back door was open where he had run into. So, you know, you go to the door and you kind of stick your head in, you’re looking around and I don’t see anything. I don’t hear anything. So I yell out police and my PD and my partner and I walk in there and it leads to like a little kitchen area. So I look around. He’s not in the kitchen. So I was relieved about that because you never really want to deal with anybody in the kitchen because, you know, the implements of destruction that are in that room are numerous. And, you know, I don’t, you know, I don’t I don’t want to deal with a knife. And, you know, I got a gun, but I don’t really want to have to use it if I don’t really need to. So I was very happy to see that he wasn’t in the kitchen. So I moved through the living room and, you know, it is eerily quiet in this house. I don’t hear a TV. There’s no radio. There’s no sounds. I’m yelling NYPD, police, but I don’t really want to give away my position too, too much. So I get to the bottom of the stairs and I look up and at the top of the stairs, you can see like the hallway, which was very narrow with the railing.

[8:51]And I mean, the stairway was very narrow as it was. And I’m like, well, he’s got to be up of there. So I got to go carefully. So I take a couple of steps up and I’m looking, waiting. And, you know, I have my hand on my gun just in case, because I don’t know where this knife is. And I’m yelling NYPD and I hear nothing. So I keep going up a couple more steps. And all of a sudden he just pops out and there he is at the top of the stairs with the knife in his hand. So, you know, obviously I draw down on him and I’m like, all right, put the knife down, put it down, calm down. I’m not here to hurt you. You know, let’s just put the knife down. Let’s talk, you know just doing the whole the verbal judo of working on compliance instead of force so out of the corner of my eye i can see the other sector had arrived my backup and then my partner was there so i had like three other cops and they’re all big dudes you know so i’m not really too worried about it but i’m just looking at this guy and i’m like he’s got the high ground he’s got a knife this guy is just going to take a flying leap and stab me in my skull and that’s going to be lights up for me. This is not going to end well for me. I am at a tactical disadvantage. How am I going to handle this? So I’m just like, I’m drawing down on him and I’m just, you know, put the knife down. Don’t do it. Just put the knife down. I don’t want to hurt you.

[10:05]And he’s just not doing it. And he’s looking at me and you can see in his eyes, he’s a little off. He’s not all there. You can see he’s calculating his head. And I’m like, well, I’m not backing down, but going up is going to be a tricky move. So we’re kind of frozen in place for, it was probably a minute, but it felt like, you know, 10 or 11 years because it just, everything kind of slows down when you’re in those situations. It feels like forever. So all of a sudden he just, he goes running down the hall.

[10:32]So I take off up the stairs after him and I go running down the hallway and I see he doesn’t have the knife in his hand. So, you know, as I’m running down the hallway, I put my gun back away. I can hear my, the three guys that are my backup up the stairs. I can hear them stomping up the steps right behind me. So I go to grab him in the room and I, I go to put his, his arm behind his back and what an arm bar position. And I go to take him out. So I did this like leg sweep practice thing. I’m like, I got this leg sweep thing, you know, like me, my new karate moves. So I go to do the leg sweep and I hit the side of his ankle and he just stands there. He doesn’t move, doesn’t go down, like total failure of my maneuver. And I’m like, you got to be kidding me. And I was so mad. So meanwhile, my partners, I guess they didn’t know that the knife wasn’t in that hand. I don’t think they could have seen because my body kind of took up the whole hallway. way.

[11:24]So they see me try and like kick them down to the ground and I’m unsuccessful in my endeavors. So one of the guys, just his inertia just grabs the guy and just pummels them and they both go flying into the wall. And I’m just like sitting there like, man, I just, I was so excited to use my move and it should have worked and it just fell flat. And that was it. So we ended up, the knife was in the room. He had dropped it right next to him. So I didn’t notice it when I was running into the room. But so we got him cuffed up and, you know, he apologized for pulling the knife on me or whatever in a moment of clarity that he had for about two seconds. You know, so I call an ambulance for, you know, an EDP or whatever, and I have to escort him to the hospital because he was violent. So I get into the ambulance with him and he’s, you know, he’s giving the ambulance guy his information, like name and date of birth and all that stuff. And he’s like, yeah, so, you know, I’m the sun god Ra. Yeah.

[12:17]And I’m like, really? Okay. Tell me about that. What does being the sun god Ra entail? So, you know, he’s like talking about all this stuff or whatever. And I’m like, what’s up with the garlic? You know, like, I don’t understand that. And he’s just, so he just, I kind of like interrupted him at one point in his story and he did not appreciate the interruption. So I’m like, okay, you just, you just keep on rattling away. You’re handcuffed on the bed. You’re nice and safe. So, you know, I just sat back and kind of just listened to him for the ride. But at least in that scenario, for an emotionally disturbed person, you kind of like you kind of knew what you were getting yourself into because, you know, he was already violent and he knew it was going to be a problem. There was there was another time where we were actually my partner and I were completely fooled by this one chick. We had been called there by her family and they’re like, she’s crazy. She’s nuts. She needs to go to the hospital. And they’re showing me this key. Ask her what the key is for.

[13:08]So I’m talking to this girl and she’s like you and I. why she’s just normal every day, knows what year it is, knows the president talking about normal stuff. She’s on her phone. She’s like, you know, they’re just crazy. They don’t like me, blah, blah, blah. And I’m like, well, you know, she’s not exhibiting any signs of mental disturbance or, you know, something’s wrong with her. And I’m not really in the habit of like violating people’s fourth amendment rights and just, you know, putting them in a 72 hour mandatory lockup because the family isn’t for it. You know, like I can’t, you know, I don’t know what the situation is here. I don’t know what the problem is. She has an apartment. There’s a nice couch. It’s clean. There’s a coffee table, a TV. It looks relatively normal. I don’t see anything wrong with anything she’s saying. We can’t do anything. So the family was pissed at us. But, you know, I mean, what are you going to do? So we left.

[13:58]So a few hours later, we get a call for the same location for like loud music. The neighbor’s complaining that the apartment’s playing really loud music. So I’m I’m like, you know, I tell Central, the radio dispatcher, I’m like, okay, show me going back over there. You know, we had an EDP at that location earlier because our Central’s change every half hour, hour or so. So it wasn’t the same Central as it had been earlier that evening. So I go back over there and the door’s like ajar. So I walk in and there she is sitting on the couch and the music is just blaring and she lowers the music and my partner starts talking to her. And I’m thinking like maybe somebody’s in here and she’s kind of like hesitant to talk to us and is she being held against her will or somebody’s here that she doesn’t want or something so I’m like let me go look in the rest of the apartment just see if make sure nobody’s like you know hiding around a corner so I go into the kitchen no tables no toaster on the counter there’s just it’s nothing I go into the next room which I think would have been a dining room and there’s nothing there there’s no dining room table there’s no rug there’s no it looks like somebody Somebody had moved out and took all the furniture. And then I look at the window and where the window clasp is to lock the window, there was tinfoil.

[15:08]On all of the windows. And I’m like, okay, here we go. So, you know, I look around the next corner into the bedroom, no furniture. The only room that was furnished was the living room that we had happened to be in earlier in the day. So I said, okay, you know, tinfoil is a good sign of somebody who’s like a paranoid schizophrenic that they think people are listening and the tinfoil kind of blocks the signal from permeating their home. So I go into the room and I, you know, my partner doesn’t know this, right? Because she’s been talking to her the whole time. So to alert my partner without saying it outright, I said, you know, I mean, I’ll say I think in the book I use the name Jane. I don’t remember what her real name was. And, you know, I wouldn’t say it anyway. But I said, you know, Jane, what’s up with the with the tinfoil on your windows, dude? What’s going on with that? And she’s like, you know, so now my partner knows like something’s up. So she goes, well, there’s a mailman that sits in the back parking lot and he tries to listen to my conversation. So I put the foil on the windows to block him from listening. I said, okay, here we go. We got a little problem here. So I’m like, you know, your mom was talking to me earlier about a key or something. I’m like, what’s that key for? And she’s like, oh, it’s for the White House. She’s like, George Bush gave it to me. It’s for the White House. It opens the White House door. I’m like, okay. So I’m like, all right. So my partner keeps distracting her. So I kind of like turn away and I get on the radio and I’m like, you know, I need an ambulance to my location. I am an emotionally disturbed person here. Okay.

[16:32]EMS gets there, and I didn’t have any further coming. I told the other sectors, like, we’re good here. I figured my partner and I can handle her if she does try and resist, but she was relatively calm. She’s trying to do a fashion show. She’s putting on a jacket, and she’s walking back and forth and saying, look how gorgeous I am. I’m like, yeah, you look great, but those heels look like they hurt. Why don’t you just sit down and calm down a little bit and just take a rest off those six-inch heels you have that are going to be thrown into my eyeball in about two seconds.

[17:02]So EMS gets there and she goes into full blown, I’m not going with them. They’re not authorized. I don’t know who they are. You know, I have to go see the president and all this other stuff. So we tried to work with her. And as I’m sure you’re aware, it’s very hard sometimes to negotiate with emotionally stirred people. It’s you try and do your verbal judo. And I’m very big on let’s talk our way out of this instead of fighting our way out of this because it just makes everything so much easier. year. So he just wasn’t, she just wasn’t going. And I said, okay, now we have to handcuff her because she has to go to the hospital. She’s, she’s crazy. She needs meds to, you know, not to put it very nicely, but that’s just the fact of the matter. So we ended up wrestling with her a little bit. We get her into the handcuffs. So we’re in the ambulance and the EMS guy is asking her information on the way to the hospital. And she’s like, I’m not telling you anything. I’m not giving you any information. So the EMS guy looks at me and he’s like rolling his eyes. So I said, I lean over to her and I kind of like whisper and I’m like, listen, I work for the Secret Service. We are going to the White House, but we have to verify your identification. You’re being recorded right now. Give him your information. He is authorized to obtain it.

[18:12]She looks at me and she like opens her eyes and I’m like, yeah. So she turns to him and gives him the name, the address, the date of birth, you know, Social Security number, all kinds of irrelevant information to validate that, you know, she is the person who needs to go and speak to the president. I think it was Bush. I think President Bush was the president at the time. So I’m like, okay, at least she’s compliant. So now I’m thinking ahead to like the psych ward in the hospital, right? So it’s like the two double doors that are locked. You have to be buzzed in. Then you walk down like this long white hallway into like the little triage area where you sit with the nurse and they go over, you know, whatever the situation is and log them into the procedure to the hospital. So I’m like, you know, I don’t want any problems there because I’m thinking this chick needs help. And if they see that she is resisting in any form, they’re going to strap her down to the gurney. And I don’t, I, you know, I felt bad enough that she was in handcuffs. So I said, you know what, let me, let me prep her for this. So I lean over and I’m like, listen, this is where we’re going to go. We’re going to go into the hospital, but it’s actually a front for an underground tunnel that leads to the White House. And you’re going to go there and you’re going to be filmed. And if any of you, if, if you act out at all, it’s going to be recorded and you’re going to be denied access to talk to the president.

[19:23]She’s like, okay, okay. And she’s on board with this. So some people think about this and they’re like, yo, you are messed up for like going along with this chick’s mental disturbance and you’re just validating her mental instability. And for a point, yeah, okay, you have a point. But at the same time, if I don’t play into this, she’s going to get violent and it’s not going to end well for her. And it makes everybody’s lives easier. So we get to the hospital and I’m like, okay, here we go these are the doors remember you’re being monitored behave yourself be quiet just walk calmly so i had taken the handcuffs off of her before we got out of the ambulance so i’m like i think i think i have her now right because we had been talking and explaining and i was telling her about you know my secret service experience and all this other stuff i was just making up, so we get into the nurse’s office and meanwhile the ems guys looking at me like, these chicks are both crazy like i got two edps on this bus not just one which is you know like Like, whatever, man, it’s the mean to the end. So we get to the nurse’s station and we go in there and we sit down and the nurse is like, okay, you know, and I leaned over and I said, listen, this nurse is an assistant to the Secret Service. She has to vet you, give her your information. She’s authorized and whatever. So, you know, she gives her the information. The nurse is looking at me and that’s all she deals with is EDPs. So she’s like kind of keeping her mouth shut and she gets it and she’s going along with it. So they’re like, okay, you got to take your jacket off and everything. And she’s like, I don’t want my jacket because they give her the hospital gown.

[20:48]And I was like, no, you’re not allowed to wear long sleeves because we had an incident where somebody hit a knife up the sleeve and tried to stab the president. So we have to make sure that you don’t have long sleeves on. And she’s like, OK. So she takes the jacket off. And then they’re like, you know, we need your stockings because stockings can be used to like hang yourself. So they had to take have her take them off.

[21:08]So she’s like, no, I’m not taking my stockings off. And so I lean over to her and I say, listen, as the Secret Service was doing multiple investigations, we found out that there was a way to put metal filament into stockings that would act as recording devices. And we’re not we don’t want your conversation with the president to be recorded because it’s highly confidential. So now I hear my partner and the two EMS guys who have decided to hang around for the show laughing hysterically in the hallway. way. And I’m like, shut up. Like, I got this chick. Like, let’s just go. So, you know, they’re like, where is this chick? Where is she coming up with this stuff? But my EDP looked at me and she’s like, oh, I didn’t know that. I’m like, yeah, we just discovered that, too. It’s a pretty clever invention, but it’s a problem. And this is, you know, you’re having a highly classified meeting with President Bush. OK, OK. Takes off the stockings, give them to the nurse. So I’m like sitting there and I’m like, you know, the nurse is going to start admitting me because how am I even like, where is this coming up from in my head? I don’t even know. But I’m like, they’re going to admit me into the psych ward too, because they’re like, you must be crazy for like getting along with this intense psychosis here. So in any case, she went voluntarily and, you know, I guess she got the meds that she needed. But I think it was a few months later, I think I get a phone call from on the desk. So the desk phone only rings if it’s like a major person.

[22:30]So I answer to the phone and it’s like, you know, secret service agent, whatever. So I’m thinking in my head, it’s one of the guys pranking me, right? Like this is just some BS nonsense and I’m getting my chops busted. But the job was so far away. It was like months prior.

[22:45]And I’m like, that’s not really, you know, like the, the bull busting usually happens like immediately. It’s like a, the immediate gratification that you get from the child busting. So I’m like, I don’t know. I don’t think this, I think this might be legit. And the guy’s telling me he’s secret service agent. He’s got a, uh, a girl there and she was trying to get into the white house and she, you know, she’s saying my name and that I authorized the trip to the white house. And I’m like, oh my goodness. I’m like, I’m like, yeah. I said, does, does she have a key? And he’s like, yeah, she has one key on her. And I’m like, yeah, that’s my girl. That’s yeah. She’s just emotionally disturbed. She’s not trying to kill the president or anything. She’s not like a real threat. So I guess they psyched her down there. And then I think it was like a year later when I got to work, I was told somebody’s waiting for me. So I go over to where the civilians wait to talk to the cops. And there she is. And she thanked me. She’s on meds. And she understood that she was having visions or whatever was going on in her life and that she was on meds now. And she straightened herself out and she like wanted to thank me. And I was like, you know, you’re welcome. No problem. I’m glad that you got yourself healed. But that was a, that was an interesting time. And I think it was, you know, I think it kind of got out like, you know, Mons, which was the name that the guys called me at work. It was my maiden name.

[24:00]Mons is a little nuts. She gets along with the EDPs. So if you have an EDP job, send her over because the crazy recognizes the crazy and they, you know, they’ll, they’ll get along. And I’m like, yeah, man, whatever. whatever, you know, nobody got hurt. That’s the name of the game. So yeah.

[24:18]Speaking of crazy and crazy jobs, you talked about you were a street narcotics unit. I, I never really worked street narcotics, but that’s a crazy deal. Larry hit those streets and make those street buys and everything. But how was that? I enjoyed it. We had a team, it was five guys and the sergeant. So it was, you know, we were a very tight unit. We worked very close. And back then marijuana was legal. That was illegal in New York city. It’s legal now, but it was illegal. And I mean, for anybody who, I get a lot of people who are like, why are you locking people up for weed? It’s just a social thing, whatever. But from the experiences that I had, weed is always tied to some type of criminal act, whether it be gun possession, bigger, more, more powerful drugs that are, you know, felony drugs like heroin and crack and Coke. And it’s always tied to criminal activity. It’s not the innocent, you know, like hippie love and peace drug that people try and make it out to be. So the object of the game then was to get the drug dealers off of the streets to, you know, clean up the streets. We don’t want to see open deals and we don’t want to see open use. So I had a job one time, you know, and we would drive around in like unmarked van and an unmarked car.

[25:36]And we would, we would drive around and kind of just look and see what we found. And then sometimes we would target dealers and, you know, try and pick off the buyers and stuff. So one time it was like, you know, I worked six at night to two in the morning then. And so we’re driving around and we see this car. It was like a summer night. All the windows are down. And I mean, there was the cloud of smoke that was coming out of this car from the weed was like unbelievable. It was like, you know, it looked like somebody was barbecuing there. There was so much smoke.

[26:04]So and it’s clearly weed you could smell it as soon as you pull up so we we get there and, it’s like okay you know uh what what do we got going on guys how’s everything going you know just just verbally talking them down what’s up you guys are smoking weed no big deal you know like we’re just we’re just gonna you know it is it’s a desk appearance ticket we’re just gonna have to bring in you know cut you loose no big deal just we need you to step out of the car so So we always grab the driver first tactically because then at least the car can’t move. Right. Get the keys. Yeah. Like you got, you got to get the guy who can like run you over out of the car first. So, so we always remove the driver first. So we, we go to open the car door for him and he just grabs onto the door frame and he’s, it’s a tug of war for opening the door. So my partner’s in front of me and he’s trying to open the door and he’s a pretty strong dude. And I’m trying to like squeeze my hand in there so that, you know, I can just push the frame open and my boss is reaching over us trying to fight. And we’re in a tug of war for this stupid door. Cause he doesn’t want to open it. And I’m like, in my head, I’m thinking this is it’s weed. Like, it’s not like a felony. You’re not going to be going to jail. This is ridiculous. You’re going to go to the precinct and be released in a couple of hours. And that’s it. And he’s fighting. And the three of the girls in the car are just sitting there and they’re just like, you know, just smoking away as like, you know, cause it’s like, and in my head, it’s like, yeah, go ahead. I mean, you’re, we already got you for it. So whatever.

[27:27]So, um, so there’s like razors in the door handle. So he starts reaching for the razor. So my partner’s like, yo, he’s got bleeds. So now it’s like getting a little hairy. Cause I’m like, he’s going to start like slashing us. And that always gets messy with blood everywhere.

[27:40]

Stories of Emotionally Disturbed Persons

[27:41]So instead of doing that, when my partner yelled at, he got bleeds, he starts yelling.

[27:49]And sure enough, from across the street, out comes Mama in, you know, her pink fluffy slippers and her bathrobe and her hair curlers with the shower cap on. And she just runs across the street. Why are you beating up on my boy? Why are you beating on him? The police is violating.

[28:04]You know, and going through the whole normal tirade of, you know, how we’re violating people’s, you know, civil rights and all sort of nonsense. And I’m like, toots, he’s smoking weed. Like, calm down, back off, whatever. So we ended up, you know, getting them out of the car and he was still wrestling around with us. So I sat there and I said, bro, if you had just gone along and just put your hands up and been handcuffed, you would have been released from the precinct and you would have had the girls with you and you would have continued on your night and, you know, bought more weed and smoke some more. I’m like, but instead you decide to fight with us. You go grabbing bleeds. You know, you fought with us after we were trying to cuff you. Now you’re going to go for like resisting, which is like, now you got to go to the booking. So you like screwed yourself and you’re calling for mommy big mistake dude girls are not they’re not coming back you know and it’s like what are you doing so it was fun you know like the the pickup callers were always interesting like that and uh we we set up a couple of times on we had a a spot where it was a very organized drug deal where they had like hats for the guys who were actually having the weed and the steerer would take the money and he was a block away and he would text the seller so that if you went to go buy, you’d go and give your money to this guy. He would text the dealer, okay, he’s good for a dime or he’s good for, you know, a half ounce or whatever.

[29:23]And then you would walk over to the dealer and he would just give you the weed. So, and you know, sometimes they kept the stash for themselves or sometimes they kept it stashed like, you know, in a car on top of the tire or, you know, in the phone booth because they used to have the paid phone booths or whatever. So So sometimes he had it near him, but it was smart because then, you know, you’re either going to lose the weed or the money, usually never both, you know, in their minds. So we, we set up and it was, it was a summertime and we needed somebody to go on the roof of the supermarket to kind of call out the shots and see what was going on. And I’m like, all right, I’ll go up there. I’m going to get nice tan. It’s going to be, you know, nice and peaceful up there, you know, not realizing the roof was going to be 120 degrees in the sun and I was going to be just baking up there. I kind of forgot about those details that are kind of important. But so, you know, I’m up there and I’m calling out the shots and, you know, you kind of like, okay, this guy’s going to buy, this is what he’s wearing and you wait for him to kind of walk way off the set before my guys go and grab him. Cause you want to give the dealer a heads up, but in order to prove that he’s dealing, we have to have the products that he sold to show that he’s actually dealing weed and not like oregano or something. So we did that a couple of times and we had a couple of buyers. And so I’m like, okay, we’re good to take down the dealer. So my boss gives the go ahead for the takedown. So I’m watching from the roof.

[30:43]And I see my guys pull up and they go, you know, up to the dealer and the dealer sees them. And I’m like, oh, I saw the twitch. He’s going to run. He’s going. And sure enough, boom, he takes off, runs across the street, hops a fence and I lose them because there’s trees and stuff. So I’m, you know, I’m calling out like he’s in the yards, you know, go block over. He might be running through the yard. A little while later, my, my guys on my team come out with him and he’s limping a little bit or whatever, but nothing crazy. So I go back to the precinct and my boss is like, yeah, your, your boy is a, cause it was my arrest.

[31:13]So he’s like, he’s, he’s refusing medical attention. And I’m like, okay, whatever. I go into the cells and it was a guy that I had known, you know, he’s a well-known drug dealer. I’m like, what’s up, bro? And I see him standing there and I see the bone pushing against the skin of his leg. And I’m like, yo, your, your leg is broken, dude. You gotta go to the hospital. And he’s like, no miss. I’m okay. Just send me right through the bookings. and I was like, wow, this guy is like, he doesn’t care. He’s just going to deal with a broken leg. Like how much pain this guy must’ve been in. I told him, dude, you’re not going to make it through EMS and central booking. Cause once you bring the perps to central booking, which is where they hold them until their arraigns, they have to see EMS. And if EMS says they’re sick or something’s wrong with them, they go to the hospital, but they don’t like doing that because they know it delays. It pushes them back in line. They don’t get back into the line for arraignment until they get back from the hospital. So he didn’t want to go to the hospital. I said, listen, bro, you got to go to the hospital. I’ll bang out your paperwork. I’ll get your fingerprinted or whatever, but you got to go. And…

[32:15]I gave him, I gave him a lot of credit for that. I, he, he didn’t lie and say the cops beat him up. He, he hopped the fence and landed on a motorcycle and broke his own leg.

[32:23]So instead of being like, yo, cops beat me up. Look, they broke my leg. I’m suing for a hundred million.

[32:29]He was like, I, I, I hopped the fence. I landed on a motorcycle. It happens. And, uh, you know, he took it and he was even taking the pain. So I saw him after that. He always walked with like a cane or a limb, but I appreciated and gave him respect because at least he wasn’t a total scumbag you know really it is what it is yeah working the streets like that uh those street dealers and and into that thing man i tell you what it there’s action action action constant you know chasing people and trying to duke on them trying to catch them dirty and they’re trying to keep you from catching them dirty it’s it just there’s some wild ass stories we were we were working crack dealers and there’s like one on every other third corner so my guys just got the van you remind me the guy’s got the van and and we’d like somebody sit back and watch or somebody actually one of the narcs would go by and make it by of a rock 25 rock and then he radio and then we’d radio the guys in the van and in order not alert everybody else the van would start driving by kind of slowly and there was somebody two guys inside the sliding door and they’d pull pull up next to this guy. And he’s like, you know, thinking he’s going to make another sale. They’d open that door, reach out and snatch him, pull him in, slam the door and take off again. So we kept that going for about two hours. They didn’t, they, their, their dealers just kept disappearing.

[33:55]That’s almost like kidnapping right there. They don’t know what’s going on. It’s like, hold on a second. I am not dealing crack, man. Those dealers are going missing dancing like crazy over there. So you talked about, uh, working intelligence at the street level. So I, and I know that a lot of, when I was a young policeman, we had nothing like this at all. You know, you were just each individual beat cop, if you will, that you were, I was responsible to find out who was who in my district. Some people did that and some people didn’t because you had to get out of your car and go meet people and talk to people in order to find out, you know, who was, who was doing the crime and who was just, you know, styling and profiling, hanging on the street corners. And so So what was that like for New York? You had like an organized setup to do that. Yeah, it was, it kind of, the program kind of grew on its own and was really highly successful. So when I first went into the unit, it was me and my boss. It was just the two of us. So we were responsible for basically any time a prisoner came into the precinct, we would debrief them. You know, the detective squad would have their job of like, you know, if they, you know, confessions or if they knew anything about other stuff. But we were always interested in who’s got guns, who’s selling drugs. And, you know, if they know anything about the shootings or homicides or anything like that.

[35:19]So we would work jointly with the squad a lot of the time, but it was mostly the goal was to to sign up informants. So if, you know, they were willing to work, which a lot of people actually are, which was very helpful because sometimes the only way you’re going to get into some of these groups is with an informant. And it’s just the fact of the matter. And it’s like, you know, I would tell people, like, I don’t live in your neighborhood, but I’m sitting here trying to make your neighborhood safer so that, you know, your grandma can walk to the grocery store and not be robbed. And, you know, like, I know you know stuff.

[35:54]Information helps. You don’t know what can help us. Let us know. And, you know, so I would sign these guys up and we would work with them and create cases and do, you know, controlled buys of narcotics or gun sites and gun buys and stuff and ends up with search warrants. That was the goal, get a search warrant and get the guns and get the drugs and lock up the guy and build a good enough case where they would, you know, get jail time for their crimes. So it was a lot of fun because it was like you were kind of hiding in plain sight. You know, we had like a rental car and we’d go out and like even sometimes the cops that I worked with wouldn’t even see us set up on stuff. You know, we’d like we’d be watching or like our informant would be going somewhere to go do a buy. And like always happens, there’s just like a 911 call at the same location for something totally different. And you’re sitting there like, not right now, not right now. And I’m like, oh, gosh, this is going to – we got to like pull him – all right, pull the informant back.

[36:53]We got to wait for the cops to go because I don’t want the cops to lock up my informant when they just did a drug buy or something, you know. It’s like – so those things always happen. But it was a lot of fun. It was just me and my boss. We would go out there. We would do what we had to do. And we got a lot of guns and a lot of drugs off the street. It was a really successful program. And we worked with other FIOs or field intelligence officers from.

[37:16]Surrounding precincts and throughout the entire city so it was a it was a very it was very successful now did you have a liaison with the uh narcotics people that as you maybe develop somebody and then you could kind of work on up the chain did you get into that much or, atf or whoever you know you really had somebody who’s dealing a lot of guns did you liaison with other units like that yeah um i mean working as a cop which i’m sure you know you kind of you know when you’re on patrol you work with these guys and everybody kind of graduates to other units eventually some people stay on patrol because you know patrol’s awesome it’s a lot of fun and it works for people with steady hours and stuff yeah um but a lot of the time these guys would go into other units so i ended up working and it’s good because you have a rapport with these people already in these other units so we worked with uh narcotics a lot with guys that i worked with on patrol they went to narcotics so we worked with them jointly on cases uh we worked with the ATF and like the organized crime division of the NYPD on a bunch of cases on, you know, people selling guns and stuff.

[38:24]It was, it was good because it was, you know, you collaborated with these other units and you learn new tricks of the trade. Sometimes you taught them new tricks of the trade. And I mean, even there was one time we had some information that there was like some methamphetamine coming in from overseas.

[38:42]So we contacted JFK and we’re like, listen, we got a tip. This is what’s up. So they’re like, all right, come on down. And, you know, we’ll set up on this guy and we’ll grab when he comes off the plane. So NYPD doesn’t really have technical jurisdiction in that area. We kind of have to rely on the port authority police to go do their thing and like Homeland Security guys. So we go down there and it’s nice because you’re kind of like, it’s not you in charge, right? You’re just sitting back, you gave them the information, you know, you’re kind of, you’re, you’re doing surveillance is basically your only job. Keep an eye on this guy and make sure you don’t lose them. And of course our luck is a national geographic was doing some TV show, like, you know, uh, caught abroad or, um, smuggle smuggling abroad or something like that. There was a TV show. So we get there and I’m like, you’ve got to be kidding me. Like, I don’t want this on TV, but I guess it had been a slow week for them. And like the, the National Geographic guys were like, this is great. We got to get this on film and put it on TV. And my boss and I are like, this is, you know, we try and avoid the TV cameras. Like, you know, we don’t want our guy to get killed here.

[39:45]So, uh, you know, that, that threw a definite wrench in the operation, but the, it was going to be put on TV, like so far down the road that it wouldn’t have mattered or whatever. So we ended up, you know, grabbing that guy and he had like, I don’t know, 4,500 pills on him or something. And, you know, that was, that was fun. So you do work with other units and I guess because we all have, especially back then, we all had the same goal. So it wasn’t like.

[40:12]It wasn’t like we were working to get the accolades we weren’t working to get the medals and the recognition and anything if anything we didn’t want the recognition i don’t want my name on you know the the chief of department’s desk for any reason good or bad i want to be unknown, um but so you didn’t you didn’t work for things to get the awards and the medals and you know the promotions or whatever you kind of just did it because it was the right thing to do and who knows how many lives this is going to save and stopping people from od’ing and stuff.

[40:42]Especially when Fentanyl came out, you know, it was like, we gotta, we gotta really step this up and get this stuff off the streets because it’s going to kill a lot of people. So it was, it was a blast. I mean, even sometimes not to, I’m like going on and on here, but it’s just bringing up memories of like one time we were, we were going to pick up an informant, my boss and I to go do a buy. So I’m driving and we have a rental car we use like rental cars so it has no light package it’s got no no police nothing it just looks like a normal rental car I’m in a fishbowl rental car yeah that’s what I come a slick car so we always called a slick car we’d buy for our unit and the other undercover units they just buy use rental cars and each to each two guys had a rental or had a car assigned to them so yeah yeah maybe have a radio and a handy talk that was it yeah Yeah, that’s all you had was your radio that you brought with you. Like the car had no equipment, you know, it wasn’t, that’s, but it worked because nobody, nobody saw you, even though the windows weren’t even tinted. They just, it looks like a regular car. So, you know, I’m driving down the street and I come to like a four way stop and I look to my left and I just see this car flying.

[41:51]And I’m like, he’s not going to stop at that stop sign. And I’m looking at him and the driver, you know, most people drive in a like, like this, this guy is like up looking around, you know, like I can almost see the whites of his eyes. His eyes are so big and he’s flying and he blows right through the stop sign. And I said to my boss, I go, cause you know, he was on the phone checking his emails and stuff. I said, yo bro, he something’s up. He just did something. I don’t know what it is, but he did something wrong. And as I’m saying that my radio comes over the, the sector comes over the radio and they’re They’re like, yeah, we have a GLA, a stolen car. And he starts, you know, going over with the information.

[42:32]So I come over and I’m like, you know, FIO to the sector direct. I go, you got the plate on that car? And now, you know, I turn and I’m following him, right? And he gives the plate and I’m right behind the car. I’m like, yep, that’s him. So I put it over, then I’m following this car. That’s now a fresh steal, right? They just stole the car. So this guy doesn’t make me, but there weren’t a lot of cars on the road. So I’m kind of trying to follow. He had slowed down now that he was like further away from the scene. So I’m trying to follow him at like a half a block away, not letting him know that I’m following him. But I know eventually he’s going to make me because there’s no other cars on the road at this time. I’m like, you got to be kidding me. So he makes a couple of turns and then I’m like, all right, he’s made me. I said to my boss, I go, he’s going to bail. So I’m driving as I’m putting over, you know, westbound on this, eastbound on this, northbound on this, waiting for like, where are my sectors so that they can pull this guy over? You know, it’s like they’re trying to catch up to where I am. So he turns a corner. He guns it, turns another corner. And I see the cars stopped on the side of the road, driver door open, perps in the wind. I just see the tail of him go running through somebody’s backyard. So I slam on the brakes.

[43:40]I leave my car like sort of in the middle of the street next to the perp’s car. There’s nobody else in the car. So my boss goes running into the backyard. But I’m like, I’m not hopping all those fences. And I can hear because it was wintertime.

[43:56]

Navigating the Streets: Drug Enforcement

[43:53]I can hear him breaking branches as he’s going through the yard. So I’m like, I’m going to just head him off. So I go running in front of the houses as I’m hearing him hopping fences. I’m breaking the branches. And I’m putting over the addresses that the house that he’s behind or whatever. And he just he keeps going. I mean, these guys, you know, they’re gazelles. When they’re going, they are gone. They have the speed of cheetahs. I never caught anybody in my life. Never caught anybody in my life.

[44:21]Unless they break a bone. Yeah. It’s like, you’re just not going to catch them. You know, and of course I’m not prepared for like a foot pursuit. You know, I was going out on a bike. I’m lucky I had a vest on because usually I wouldn’t even, you know, I’d have it in the back of the car. But I just, for some reason, I think because it was cold, I just put an extra layer on. But so luckily I had that. But I was like, you know, I’m in like boots. I’m not in like running sneakers. You know, I’m like, this is just, I’m not set up for this.

[44:45]So I’m running down the block. I get to the end of the block and I hear him hop the last fence and I don’t hear anything now, but I hear the rest of the guys, the sirens and stuff are going to where my car I had left at a block previous. So I go over the radio. I set up a perimeter so that we have the whole block surrounded. Okay. And I kind of just turn the radio very low and I like kind of crouch down because I’m like, I know he’s in this yard. Right. So he hops the fence and I come out from the bushes and I just draw down on him. And I’m like, do not effing move. Stay right there. Get on the ground right now. And he just looks at me and I’m looking at him and I’m like, get on the ground, get on the ground. And he’s like, no. And he turns around and he hops the fence. And I’m like, son of a gun, man. You gotta be kidding me. I had him. I should have just tackled him. But, you know, I mean, I don’t know. Whatever. Hindsight 2020. I’m thinking he might have a weapon. You know, I’m by myself over here. Nobody knows where I’m at. And I’m a girl. I’m not as strong as he is. It’s just not, you know, you can do whatever moves you want, but it’s not hard to be overpowered. So I’m like, so he goes hopping back. So I put over the radio like he’s coming back to you guys because now I can hear, you know, my guys coming this way from the branches breaking. And then my boss comes over and he’s like, we got him. You know, I got him. I got him in the backyard. yard, you know, whatever. And I’m like, no, man, I sent him back to you. I had him like.

[46:08]So I was all aggravated about that. But then I get back to my car and my door that I had left open when I got into this foot pursuit was pushed the wrong way. So now it was like parallel to the front of the car, the motor, like it just totally got pushed. And I’m like, who hit my door? So one of the other cops comes over to me and he’s like, yo, bro, I’m sorry I hit your door. And I’m like, Like, this road is literally four car lengths wide. You had like an entire lane to go around my car, but you had to hit my door. I’m like, this is a rental car. It’s not like a peasy vehicle. Like, now we’re going to have to pay to fix it. Now I have to go to accident retraining, which is two days off the street. I’m like, you got to be kidding me right now. So yeah, I go to accident retraining and I’m like, yeah, I’m here because somebody else hit my car because I left my door open in hot pursuit. But this is my situation. No fun. But, and then I didn’t even take the collar because one of the other guys was like, you know, do you mind if I take this? And back then we weren’t, you know, I didn’t need to make arrests then. And I had so many already. I’m like, yeah, dude, you know, knock yourself out. You can have it. So I didn’t even, I didn’t even get the collar. I said, which is an arrest. It was like a lose all the way around. Yeah. Well, one thing about working intelligence, like you said, you just want to stay in the background, pull some string, get some shit done and move on to The next thing it keeps the report right now.

[47:32]Yeah, I don’t want to have to be responsible. I mean, not to, I feel like I’m rambling on with stories here, but every time you talk, it reminds me like I, we had a job because I did warrants, right? So I would do my own self-initiated search warrants, but then if patrol needed a search warrant for something, I would also assist them with it, especially because we had a lot of new guys and I would like to help them out. You know, like when I was a rookie, all the old timers helped me out. So I felt it was my responsibility to do the same with the new guys. So my boss and I are driving around doing recon for a bunch of cases that we had. And we hear like, you know, barricaded EDP with a gun in a house, right? Like hostage crisis, whatever. So I’m thinking to myself, well, they’re going to get him out. If he’s got a gun, they’re going to need a warrant. So let’s just go over there because they’re going to need us anyway. Anyway, so we take a ride over there. By the time we get there, the cops have the street totally taped off on both sides. You know, there’s crowds at either corner.

[48:26]The ESU tack truck, the big black one, you know, like the heavy duty like army tank one is in the middle of the street. You know, I can see the guys tacking up and I’m like, this is great. I don’t have to do a thing. I’m just going to hang back here behind the police lines and just kind of like watch because, you know, my job was going to be after all of the excitement kind of ended. So I’m sitting over there and my boss goes and sees a cop that he knows from another unit. So he goes over and talks to him. So I go over to like a bunch of civilians that are on the corner and I’m like, hey, guys, what’s going on? And, you know, I’m in plain clothes. We worked in, you know, jeans and a T-shirt was our uniform of the day. So they can see I’m a cop, though, because, you know, I have my vest on and my shield is, you know, on my on my belt and stuff. So I’m like, all right, what’s going on? And they’re like, well, you know, uh, our dad is, uh, is in the house and, uh, it’s, it’s, uh, you know, he’s, he’s got a gun and all this other stuff. And I’m like, your dad, I’m like, all right. I’m like, is anybody on the phone with your dad right now? Like, is your dad talking to anybody? And they’re like, no. And I’m like, oh, okay.

[49:28]Somebody, somebody missed a step here. I don’t know what happened, but I got here late. But so I said, can you do me a favor and call up your old man and let’s get him on the horn here. They call him up and he answers. And I’m like, hello, sir. You know, this is Detective Bartoldus from the NYPD. I hear you’re having a bad day. What’s going on in there? So now I’m like kind of involved, right? So as he’s talking to me, I said to the family, where is his house? Where’s your house? So they point. And I assume they point to this house across the street. So I said, OK. So I go underneath the police tape and I start walking. And my boss is like, Mons, where are you going? And I’m like, I got the guy on the phone. I’m going to go over there. And he just like rolls his eyes and starts laughing at me because he’s like, you can’t even, this is something you don’t even need to get involved in. And you’re still somehow involved. So I go walking down the block and, you know, I’m talking to him or whatever. And I’m like, well, you know, I go, I hate talking to you on the phone. Like, I like to talk to people face to face. Do you want to like come out here and just come and talk to me and, you know, whatever, like, I want to try and help you out here. This seems like a problem we can solve together. And he’s like, you know, all right, you know, I’ll try and come out. So now I’m, I’m halfway way down the block and I’m standing in front of where the ESU, you know, army tank truck is and I’m facing what I think is his house.

[50:41]And I hear my boss yelling, Mons, Mons. And I look at my boss and I’m like, I got it. We’re good. You know, I’m giving a thumbs up. I got it. And then I hear my name being called at the other end of the block. And I see my anti-crime guys at the end of the block. They’re like, Mons, Mons. And I’m like, yo, I’m good. I’m like, I got it. What’s up? You know, I’m like oblivious. I’m still talking to this guy on the phone.

[51:01]And then I hear somebody behind me yelling, Mons, Mons, look out. And I turn around and it’s my buddy who was now in ESU at the door of the barricaded EDP with the gun, which I had my back to the entire time. So here I am walking into this really serious scene, talking to the guy. And I had my back to the target location where like, I was a perfect target at this guy. I want to take a shot at me. And everybody’s yelling at me to tell me like, take cover. And I’m just like, yo, I’m good. I got this. We’re good. And they’re like, are you nuts? And I’m like, yes, I am. You know this about me already, but it’s okay. So, you know, the ESU captain like pops his head up from behind the truck and he’s He’s like, detective, come over here. You’re not safe where you’re standing. And I’m like, yeah, I see that now. Sorry about that. So I ended up talking to the guy. I said, listen, come on out. Let’s, you know, let’s talk this out or whatever. So I got him to come out and, you know, we got him in. And he was just, you know, he was an older gentleman. And I guess him and his wife just didn’t have a good day. And, you know, he just, he was at the end of his rope. So we were able to get out of that situation, you know, without any problems. But boy, did I take some serious shot busting on that one. I can’t even imagine what that would be. You’re supposed to be the intel guy. You’re the intel guy. You don’t know what house you’re supposed to be watching. I don’t know, man. Oh, yeah. Well, as they say, all’s well that ends well. Yeah.

[52:26]But that’s why being a cop is awesome. You never know what’s going to happen. You never know what the day is going to bring.

[52:32]

Understanding Anti-Crime Operations

[52:32]One last question. You mentioned anti-crime. And I’ve seen that term used in books and heard that term, but I never really knew exactly what that meant. What is an anti-crime squad at the NYPD?

[52:46]Um, it’s the goal is to prevent crime before it happens. So you go out in unmarked cars and plain clothes and you just kind of drive around and watch people and try and get the jump on people, grab the guns, stop the robberies from happening. Or if it’s already happened, you know, go find the part and, uh, and grab them. Okay. These are the guys that maybe go out, act as decoys, maybe like act like you’re drunk and falling down. You got a billfolder laying beside you. And then you got a little surveillance team watching for somebody to come up and try to take your money. Yeah. I mean, we, you have to get special permission to do that. We, I mean, I did, we did prostitution operations. So I would dress up as like a prostitute and do that kind of a thing. But in anti-crime, we didn’t really, we didn’t really have decoys set up. We didn’t kind of like put the bait out there and wait for somebody to jump

Cork Civella: Bonus Stories Sep 26, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary remembered a few more Cork stories so watch this to hear about Cork’s sex life and his gun buying gone wrong.
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Transcript
[0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City police detective in the intelligence unit. You know, we just did Cork Civella, Carl Civella, and I left a couple of stories out that were I thought were pretty good. And plus, I was involved in one and some members of the unit were involved in the other. So anyhow, let me tell you those stories is a little bonus for episode. And, you know, I could have gone back and tried to insert these in, but that’s kind of a pain. So I just did another little short podcast here. You know, back in 1981, we had a couple of guys, Harold Nichols and Randy Collins were out driving around, you know, doing their thing, you know, looking for mob guys, going to the city market, going to the trap, the social club and some of the other usual haunts. Maybe if they had a business that, you know, they hung out at and then maybe you’d pick up on them and you’d follow them to see where they went. You know, if you find them going to a spot that you never heard of before, you know, that’s how we caught, got those phones on a Tuffy DeLuna calling Las Vegas is following Tuffyand finally get him going in this hotel.
[1:05]Then you catch him going there again and somebody runs inside and you see him on the phone. Like, bam, you got it. That’s how it works guys. And so these guys were out cruising around, not thinking about anything, not doing anything. They were downtown. I remember they were downtown Kansas city, a lot of traffic back then. And 1981 or 80, I believe, yes, 1980, it was in the spring. And so they saw Quark Civella with a woman by the name of Rita Armillio. And they were, I don’t know, looking for a parking spot. And they thought, well, you know, let’s just pull over and, you know, see where they go. And they finally settled in a parking spot. and they both went into a store that sold guns and and so they documented that and and at the time cork and another guy named paul barcelona they kind of about the same age they were contemporaries they were friends and they both had a big head of white hair although barcelona’s i think was real and corks was a wig he had this huge big head of white hair gray gray white hair but it was a wig and he was a dapper. Have you ever seen that picture of him in that checkered sport coat and that white wig? He’s a very, very dapper dude.
[2:24]So he and Rita go in there and they run up and kind of peek in the window and they’re looking at handguns and so they don’t want to burn the deal. They just back off and then they follow them and they follow them over to Rita’s apartment and they both go inside.
[2:40]So, you know, you write that up, send it over to the Bureau. Bureau goes to the U.S. Attorney, and the U.S. Attorney said, okay, we’ll put them in front of a grand jury. So they get Ms. Armillio. Of course, they know Cork’s not going to say anything. They get Ms. Armillio to come, and she testifies that she wasn’t there that day. Says, no, he wasn’t with me. me i he he there was another guy named Paul Varselona that was with me you know i did go into that store you know we did look at guns i did buy one because they you know found the records by then that she bought a 38 caliber handgun but she said i did not ask mr Civella to get go with me to get that weapon i know that he’s not supposed to be anywhere near guns or around guns and i i know he’s got better sense he would not have gone if i’d asked him to and you know i just wanted that gun then they call Civella and he says no they call Varcelona and he says no cork says i wasn’t there cork actually wouldn’t refuse to testify and in in the end then they charged her with perjury for saying that Paul Varselona was there because they got the policemen nichols and collins to testify without a doubt without a doubt in their their mind that was Cork Civella and not Paul Varselona.
[4:06]Bam, perjury. So they charged her with perjury and they ended up giving her like, I don’t know, like six months and two year probation, some kind of a fine for impeding and hampering a grand jury investigation of whether Cork Civella unlawfully possessed a firearm.
[4:24]
Cork’s Encounter with the Law
[4:24]So that’s one little story about Cork. And here’s another one that would involve me, actually. Again, I was out like those guys, only it was nighttime. I was out cruising. I was out cruising around by myself, and I happened to see Cork. And he had this, at the time, it was a Salmon Lincoln Continental, a Mark. You know, he loved those Marks. He had ones with like the, looked like a spare tire in the trunk. And he got a he had a salmon one colored one then and he got a lime green one after that i think i mentioned that last week or in the other podcast the other show and yeah i see cork and he’s over in the north what we call the north side uh just outside of the north end or little Italy and he’s headed east on independence avenue so i just follow him behind him there’s no other cars on the street but you know i haven’t been following him for a long time and so i just drift along behind Behind him, I can see him a couple of blocks up in front, and he pulls into this joint called the Country and Western Playhouse. It’s owned by a mob guy named Sal Manzo, and it’s a real well-known mafia hangout. But it was a big club, Country and Western Playhouse. They had country and western music. They had a band, and they always, when they had a band, they had dancing, and they, you know, it was hopping. It was rocking and rolling. And so I let him go on in and, you know, I kind of sit outside a little bit, check the parking lot, see who all’s inside, if I recognize any cars.
[5:52]And finally I park and I go in, sit down at the bar and order a drink and kind of let, you know, you turn around and look around and people up on the dance floor. And I see a large party over in the corner.
[6:06]Kind of a special little secluded corner. And there’s Cork sitting in the middle of really a bunch of young people. I didn’t know any of them. There’s one young gal that was sitting next to him and he was like chatting up pretty good. And then she was actually, she was probably, he was probably 60, 65 at the time. And, uh, uh, you know, much younger than I am now, but he seemed like an old man to me because I was probably in my thirties, early thirties. And, and this girl was probably probably in her middle twenties. She was attractive and they were chatting up and then pretty soon they get up on the dance floor and they dance. This old guy kind of shuffles around a little bit. It was kind of humorous to watch. And then there’s a guy sitting next to me and I feel his eyes. He’s just staring at me. Finally, I turn, how you doing, dude? You know, what’s going on? What’s up? You know, what’s going on? You know, some pleasantry. And he’s a boy. He said, I’m glad you started talking. I said, what do you mean? I thought you’re a guy that cut me. So I’m like trying to watch court and make sure he He doesn’t head out. And if anybody else comes over and meet with him and talk to this guy and calm him down. And he said, I said, no, man, I don’t have a knife. I don’t carry a knife. It wasn’t me. Yeah, I know. After I heard you talking. So we start chatting and this is some grizzled old dude that I said, what do you do for a living? I said, I hunt night crawlers or like big ass worms that people use as fish bait.
[7:27]And he looked like he hunted night crawlers for a living. and thank God that he realized that I wasn’t the guy that cut him because that sucker might have cut me. And, you know, during those days, you know, like a deal like that, he usually would not take a gun everywhere I went, going to a bar like that. You know, don’t take a gun. There’s no use in it. I’m not going to do anything. Nobody’s going to, you know, either just a normal bar room brawl or something, you know, they might do something there, but you don’t need a gun for that, especially back then. I guess today you would. But I keep watching Cork and chatting this guy up and pretty soon he and this girl is, it’s getting kind of closer around one o’clock and closing time was one 30 and they get up to leave. And, and so I make my amends with this guy. So I do, I got to go. It’s been nice talking to you.
[8:15]He was like my best friend by the end of that night, follow Cork out, follow the girl leaves, Cork leaves. He follows her and she pulls up in the apartment just a few blocks away, way really they both go inside and you know i can see a light come on and so i can go find out who you know what apartment number it is and later on and then find a and and get to tag off her car so i can figure out who this is and i don’t even remember who she was now but it’s just you know another little night in the life of cork Civella and there’s actually there’s one more we were watching i’ve told this story i told it in my movie brothers against brothers and i’ve told it But before, I won’t belabor you with too much, but they had this war going on between the Speros and the Civellas.
[9:03]
The War Between the Speros and Civellas
[9:04]And Carl Spero had been wounded and made into a paraplegic, probably by a toughie, with a shotgun at a shootout or a shooting that happened at the Virginia Tavern at Admiral in Virginia. So we are now, myself, Harold Nichols, and I think Bobby Arnold was there. And so we’re watching Carl Spero. Our job is to watch him and make sure nobody kills him.
[9:32]And we did that for quite a while so he’s at the virginia tavern he just sitting in there by himself he’s got his cadillac out and back with his license plate that has s-p-e-r-o spiro on he like he was right in their face all the time sitting in there by himself uh in the middle of the afternoon hardly nobody you know a few people came and went so we’re just sitting back watching smoking and joking and and we see joe ragusa drive by then he disappears and we find out later that he went to a phone and he called cork and he tells cork he says cork he said uh he’s there all by himself you know nobody around and cork says you know what did you see any agents around he said no i didn’t see any agents at all was a g around no there’s no g you know i looked all around which he really didn’t he just drove by a couple of times but he didn’t drive up by us he didn’t easily seen us going ganged up in a parking lot cork says you know if you don’t see them they’re probably there then you know back off but he didn’t back off they went and got toughy and and another guy who couldn’t we couldn’t see who it was and they came up and they proud drove around and around as we moved in you can’t really like just let that go you can’t just sit back and wait there run in and shoot somebody and then run back out maybe kind of have to try to interrupt it in some manner it’s a dicey situation so we drive in closer and they spot us and they take off at a high rate of speed actually followed me for a little bit and took off.
[11:01]At a high rate of speed when they got up next to me and glanced over and they.
[11:05]Saw me and they you know i’m in this this kind of down the hills neighborhood.
[11:08]And you know i mean you know i’m a 30 something white guy reasonably fit and all that i mean i just probably had cop written all over me we never like got all raggedy and had long hair and beards for the most part.
[11:22]
Closing Thoughts and Resources
[11:23]Anyhow, so that’s a few more stories about corks of L. I forgot to put in there. So thanks a lot, guys. Don’t forget to like and subscribe.
[11:31]Don’t forget to, if you’ve got a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, get that hotline number off the VA website. And if you have a problem with drugs or alcohol, if you’re in the service, go to the VA. But if not, check out Angelo Ruggiano, a former Gambino guy.
[11:48]He has a website and he has a hotline number on that i believe at least he used to and i like to ride motorcycles so watch out for motorcycles when you’re out there and if you get on my facebook, gangland wire podcast and and we’ll make a lot of comments have a lot of interesting pictures and interesting uh interactions and the same way with my youtube channel get on that and and we and really read the comments a lot of them are a lot of fun a lot of times people get in little arguments but i never let that go too far homie don’t play that we do not go down those paths of people fighting with each other you know this is this is just for fun and if you have a different opinion about the mafia you know take it take it to the streets man or if you want to fight about it call each other names otherwise you can just simply state your position somebody else will state theirs for a fact i had one pretty interesting this last week a whole long thing about the jfk assassination at chucky nicoletti based on a comment on that show that i put on that i really thought was interesting a lot several interesting, comments on that one so there’s a good one to look at so we’re always here and provide you with mafia entertainment and keep coming back guys thanks a lot.

Cork Civella: KC Street Boss Sep 23, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary recounts the criminal life of Carl “Cork Civella,” a key player in Kansas City’s mob scene. From humble immigrant beginnings with his brother Nick to street boss of the KC Family, he is subservient only to his brother Nick. Gary highlights Cork’s unpredictable nature, significant street presence, loyalty to Nick as an enforcer, and reckless behavior that led to notorious incidents. This narrative provides insight into Kansas City’s unique mafia culture and sets the stage for future discussions on Kansas City’s influential organized crime figures.
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Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week.

Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire
Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

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Transcript
[0:00]Hey, all you wiretappers out there. I’m back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective, sergeant at the end. I want to tell you about Carl Cork Civella. I get a lot of guys commenting, hey, they want to know more about Kansas City. And I’ve done a little bit, and I’ve got some old stuff on Nick Civella, but it’s like several years old, and it’s not even on YouTube, I don’t think. And I don’t even know if you can find it on the audio app. I need to go get that out and re-edit it and put it up. But I’ve never really
[0:37]
The Civella Brothers’ Origins
[0:35]done Cork. And Cork is an interesting guy. Carl Cork Civella, born in 1910.
[0:41]Their father, he and Nick Civella, who is older brother, will become the mob bosses of Kansas City. And Nick will be more the major domo, if you will, the main mob boss. But Cork was right in there with him, as you’re going to find out. Now it’s Cork as i was told not corking he he’s named cork because he pops off i’ll give you a pretty good example of that he sometimes acts without thinking they were the sons of a Sicilian immigrant in Kansas City as you might well imagine they grew up in what we call the north end or Little Italy now this area is anchored by the holy rosary catholic church at 9 11 Missouri street uh it’s like these big church and the holy rosary church has always brought immigrants in and helped them learn English and get jobs they still do that to this day uh the don bosco center uh when the Vietnamese first started coming over after the war uh they came to the holy rosary church and the Don Bosco center where they learned English and they started moving in to little Italy i mean I mean, they were Catholic for the most part, and they took over a lot of Little Italy as this area changed. And, you know, the area looks like kind of like New York to me. It doesn’t look like anything else in Kansas City. It has this real big city look to it.
[2:06]These boys, Nick and Carl Civella, and they took the same path as a lot of immigrant children and a lot of the mob bosses and mob people I’ve talked about in every city in the United States. Their father actually was a pushcart peddler, I believe, and small businesses. Because mainly newly arrived immigrants that didn’t speak English couldn’t really get jobs in the United States. So they had to figure out, you know, start a restaurant or a push card, sell fruit on the street, whatever they could do, had to start their own business for the most part. And so their father had a small business and the boys took the same path as a lot of immigrant children. And like I said, all these mob guys I’ve talked about before, they left school early and they formed a small gang. Bang uh one of the things they got into was narcotics it got into narcotics too but first they got into tire theft that was a big thing they were tire thieves and and there was a several mob guys that had outlets out there so they could steal the tires go out into the suburbs if you will over into downtown uh and steal tires and bring them back and sell them through these uh black hand at the time associated outlets their father supposedly was victimized by the black hand which will maybe explain why this little gang led by Nick and Cork got into robbing some mafia-protected gangs.
[3:35]Cork did take a bust. He took a pinch and an arrest, and I don’t think he got a conviction for possession of heroin in the 1930s. You know, the mob was, was getting heroin out of, uh, Cuba to, uh, Tampa up to Kansas city. And we had a regular trade going.
[3:58]
From Tire Theft to Armed Robbery
[3:54]They kind of got out of it later on in life, but, but he did take a pinch for that. Now the Sabella gang will graduate from tire theft to armed robbery. And that’s when they started getting in trouble, you know, a lucrative place to rob that isn’t going to complain much. You don’t have to worry about the cops or gambling games. There’s gambling games all around. Now, some of them protected, some of them aren’t. And that’s where they first got in trouble was robbing some protected gambling games because Nick was always his own guy. He was never going to buckle down, buckle under to the old Mustache Pete’s.
[4:30]They tried to actually recruit his gang to do stuff for them. But again, he was his own guy. He always was. He was smarter than the average bear in this world. and he always remained smarter than the average bear in this world. Finally, in 1940, somebody gunned down a Civella gang member named Jake Maroon.
[4:52]Now, years later, his son or grandson, Bobby Maroon, will become the caretaker of the trap or the social club. But gunned down, Jake Maroon in an alley right behind the Northview Social Club or the trap at Fifth and Troops, which is in Little Italy. Nick will flee to Chicago at the time. Corky will just lay low. Corky, I shouldn’t call him Corky. You might get mad at me. Cork will just lay low. Somehow, a peace deal got brokered. Nick was able to come back, and they were able to come back to Little Italy, but everybody didn’t really agree to this peace deal. I think there was a guy named Big Jim Ballesteri who didn’t agree to it. I believe he was the one. We go through the war. As most mob histories are really incomplete during the war because a lot of guys took off and went to war, were drafted, and everything was really in disarray during the war. After the war, January 1946, a guy who was a long-time member of the Civella gang named Joe Buggy Ange was gunned down down in Little Italy at, I believe, 8th and Lydia, just east of Little Italy a little bit. A few days later, just a few days later, eight days later, I believe, Nick Civella and a Jackson County deputy sheriff named Cuccia.
[6:12]We’re sitting in Nick Zabella’s car in the parking lot of a liquor store just a few blocks south of Little Italy at 15th Street. Little Italy really stops about 7th Street. And two gunmen pull up in a car. They jump out. One’s got a shotgun. One’s got an actual machine gun. And they start filling that car full of lead. Well, Nick is sitting in the passenger seat, and the deputy sheriff has got in the driver’s seat for whatever reason. They kill the deputy. Nick rolls out and takes off running, and he goes back to Chicago. You know, during these times, he really established good connections in Chicago. They seem to like him up there. They say Cherry Nose Joey was kind of his mentor. Others will say when he comes back from Chicago this next time and Chicago actually brokers the deal. The story goes that Tony Accardo talked to the new boss in Kansas City in the late 40s, Tony Gizzo, and paved the way for Nick to come back. We know he came back in 1948 because he was arrested for gambling. Pretty soon, it’s noticed that Nick is now Tony Gizzo’s driver.
[7:22]
Nick’s Rise in the Mob
[7:18]So whatever, you know, however this worked out, nobody knows for sure. He comes back a reasonably important guy because he’s now the driver for the boss.
[7:29]And it’s really Tony Gizzo will die in 1953. They’ll have the murder of the two Charlies. Charlie Bonagio was kind of the boss. He was a politician slash boss. Gizzo was more of a gambler and a boss. He dies in 1953. Banaggio’s gone, and it’s believed that probably that’s when Nick Civella, a pretty young guy, started moving on in. By 1957, Nick Civella, and there’s an old Prohibition era Sicilian mobster named Joe Filardo.
[8:02]Who never really wanted to be the boss, but had been kind of on the ruling council, if you will, of Tano Lococo and Joe Filardo and a couple others who lived on into older age. Anyhow, Joe Filardo and Nick Civella are on a train on their way to the the Appalachian convention in upstate New York at Barbara’s place and the police catch them and supposedly nick’s belly said what are you doing he said well we’re looking for girls some people think that Florida was taking nick to the Appalachian meeting to introduce him as a new boss of kansas city i know there’s another guy he’s kind of an expert on this Bill Owsley is a retired FBI agent who was boss of the one squad for a long time and was the main agent that worked on the mob in Kansas City for his whole career, basically. He has a story that maybe Sam Giancana knew Nick Civella from his days in Chicago.
[9:00]Giancana wanted some more influence for Out West, and he was going to propose that Nick Civella get a seat on the commission along with Chicago. Now, I don’t know. A lot of people would argue with that. And a lot of people like to say that Chicago’s, you know, they would never share anything like that. But I don’t know. You never know. He’s smart. He expands his family’s, his crime family’s influence in the politics. He meets uh Roy Lee Williams who’s a local teamster boss and then who will go on to be you know he eventually will just before he dies become the international president uh he meets him on a jackson county committee to decide on who runs for office and who doesn’t so nick his brother cork we’re talking about court cork stays at his side but as an enforcer cork is not the kind of guy that you can put on this kind of a commission. He’s not that guy. He’s the guy you want for the street. He never really took on the official role of underboss or consigliere. He was always referred to as a brother.
[10:06]Eventually he’ll be known. You could call him the street boss, I would say, because he always spoke for Nick and he carried out Nick’s directions and people, when he spoke, they thought they were speaking for Nick. He was speaking for Nick. And some of these early things is we had a couple of mob soldiers named Felix Farina and Tiger Cardarella. They were charged with the attempted murder of a government witness in 1960.
[10:35]
Cork’s Role as Street Boss
[10:32]They needed an alibi. So Cork’s the guy that goes out on the streets. See, Nick was never the guy that went out and talked to people directly that weren’t, you know, like made guys or right next to him. He goes to the, he hits the streets. He finds a gambler that owes money, and he tells him he’ll forgive $5,000 in gambling debts for the guy if he’ll give the two hitmen an alibi, and he does that. Another thing he did, and this was 1960 and 1959, the mob-dominated Teamsters, Local 774, made a move to take over the Kansas City Fire Department and take away the firemen from the International Association of Firefighters. The IAFF union president was a real feisty battalion captain named Stanton Gladden, and he resisted. You know, but politics was all infused in the fire department, especially back then. Politically appointed fire chief offered a promotion to Stanton Gladden if he would.
[11:36]Support moving the IAFF out and the team sure saying, well, he was the president of the IAFF and he was not going to do that. He tried to get another lower ranking fireman and offered him a promotion to help with this. And Stanton Gladden learned about this and he exposed it to the media and it’s all in the newspapers. Now Cork has given the job to intercede. He offers Stanton and gladden the job of fire chief and he said the current chief will become known as the director of the fire department ef gladden will drop his resistance to the teamsters move gladden again refuses and over the next few months a mob controlled politician will offer gladden another promotion within the fire department if he’ll back off a little bit he won’t do it and finally somebody put a bomb in his car and he was severely injured uh out of that bomb but the teamsters never took over the IAFF or the Kansas City Fire Department. You know, another thing tells you a little bit about Cork. In 1960, we had a grand jury in Kansas City, and Nick and Cork were both waiting in the hallway, and there’s a lot of newsmen down at the other end of the hallway, and somebody snapped a photo, and Nick berated him. You know, hey, leave us alone. You know, we’re just businessmen. Cork threatened him.
[12:52]He actually threatened him, and then he exposed himself. He shook his dick at him. and got arrested for indecent exposure. That was Cork. Explosive and impulsive at the same time. During this time, the official underboss was Thomas Highway Simone. He died in 1968. And again, like I said, Cork was not named the underboss. He was always the same as Nick, but on the street. He was the street boss.
[13:17]He always spoke for him on the street. See, Nick Civella was not a street guy who was out in the joints. I never saw him out in a joint. You hardly ever saw him out in just a few places. Cork was out every night in the joints. He was running around to different businesses. He was down at the city market every day at DeFeo’s or hung around that particular area where people could find him. I know a guy whose father-in-law was a bondsman and politically connected in Kansas City, Kansas. And he told me that his father-in-law came over about once a week, about at least once a week, just to see Cork and talk to him. I asked him, I said, do you think Cork ran everything, you know, street stuff in KCK? And he said, yeah, he probably did. Not so much in Missouri, but in KCK, he definitely did. Because there was other members but the uh the willy Cammisano had a lot of uh stolen properties uh fencing outlets going and and different had a crew going here that were really good burglars and thieves he had to have his action i think kck was strictly for court and we’ll see a little more evidence of that later on nick.
[14:28]He might make a sporadic visit to the market, but didn’t hang around down. There was not a regular place. He did go to his lawyer’s office regularly and he used that space and he discussed business with Tuffy and made and received telephone calls out of the lawyer’s office. You know, I noticed he, I don’t remember seeing court down there and I don’t remember any of the wiretaps or the bugs mentioned in the Cork was there. And there was mainly, this was during the Las Vegas casino time. So a Cork was not, he was kind of involved in that, but, but not. Near as much as Tuffy and Nick were the ones that were really involved in the Las Vegas casino business and skimming from casinos and making those decisions
[15:11]
Cork’s Impulsive Nature
[15:07]and dealing with the people in Las Vegas and in Chicago, too. Cork did maintain close ties with corrupt politicians and law enforcement and KCK, like I said. He will attempt to organize and control several Kansas side strip clubs.
[15:22]There’s one guy named Vance Anderson had a pretty successful club over there called the Red Apple. And one time Cork had a couple, he had these two career criminals, Mike Ruffalo and Gene Shepard working for him. He told them to take a stick of dynamite and put it under Anderson’s Cadillac and detonate it out in the parking lot of the Red Apple. And later on, he went over to see Anderson. He said, you know, you got some problems, these young guys, you know, I can, I can protect, I can help you out here, you know, but you know, you got to bring me in here. And he wanted a piece of the clubs when he wanted. it you know and what’s interesting i noticed that over the next year or so anderson started making some moves to to partner up and buy other kansas side strip clubs so you know none of that ever really came out you know kind of an unusual situation with cork out of that he’s at the red apple he started dating a young stripper and she would i remember her she was beautiful she and he was like you know he was old at the time he was probably in his 60s you know i’m like 78, but he seemed old. He had this white wig he wore all the time, and he was a real dapper dresser, if you’ve seen any of the pictures on the internet.
[16:26]And he always drove a Lincoln Continental. He had a salmon-colored one for a long time, and he traded it for a kind of lime green Lincoln Continental. He didn’t have the black or the white or the gray. He had salmon-colored, and then he had green, lime green. Anyhow, he dated this Antoinette Lanfranca, who worked at the Red Apple. Some people say she was a manager over there some people say she was a stripper i i don’t know i remember over there and i remember following around a little bit whenever because she eventually she started dating another mobster named carl spiro who will become in a full-fledged war with him carl spiro and his brothers and car cork and nick Civella and tuffy de luna and the Civella family So go figure it out. Another thing about Cork, he had moved in on a gambler named Al Brandemeyer, which was interesting. I ran into this guy. He said his name was Brandemeyer recently. And I said, what’s your name?
[17:24]Father your grandfather uh have a meat market oh yeah yeah you know i said well what was the deal oh he was a big gambler and and you know a lot of stories about grandpa al but he didn’t really tell me too much but he had a you know like fresh meat distributors they got you know bought meat on the hook and had it butchered and they butchered it in there and supplied restaurants and and other their small stores and things like that and it pretty soon uh he lost a lot of money in gambling and he was he was a bookie too with him uh it became the brandemeyer meat company became the b and c mint company or the brandemeyer and Civella meat company Corky was a salesman he’d make the rounds of the restaurants as kind of a cover job and you know i know he was once overheard on a bug they tried to get a bug on him he was complaining about the business and he told other salesmen get out to all the goombas joints and he named off a couple of periphery uh guys who were italian and uh he said they’ll buy from us another story about cork as he was talking there was a new newly developed entertainment district called the river key it was right next to city market that’s a whole nother story on that get my movie gangland wire you’ll get that whole story but there’s a young restaurant owner named david bonadonna or freddie bonadonna his His dad was David Bonadonna, who was probably a made guy, a professional criminal.
[18:50]A low-ranking soldier in a crew for one of the other made guys, Willie Comisano. Cork was in Freddie’s joint. He put a new joint in this River Key area, this newly developed entertainment district. And Corky was running down, ragging on him, saying, you’re stupid. You had a good joint down on the boulevard. He had a nice place down in Southwest Boulevard. You’re stupid to move down here.
[19:19]And, you know, Freddie says, well, you know, whatever. Well, within a year, that place is immensely successful. The River Key was hopping. It was the place to be. And this young guy, Freddie Bonadonna, sees Cork comes in to sell him some more meat because he’s got a restaurant. And he said well cork he says you know we’re doing okay he said uh i don’t think you really knew what you were talking about of course yeah how much you making freddie probably a mistake he said oh about 10 grand a month now he wasn’t making that 10 grand a month but he said oh about 10 grand a month he wasn’t making that kind of money but so value believed it and he wanted in on the action but he couldn’t really move in on freddie because freddie’s father david was with With another guy named Willie Camisano, that will go spin off into another deal.
[20:07]
Cork’s Business Ventures
[20:08]Camisano wants a piece of Freddie’s action, and he ends up killing David. Like I said, that’s a whole other story about the River Key and the Camisanos. I have to do Willie Camisano one of these days. Cork had another plan. Here’s a longtime mobster named Paul Scola, Pauly the Pig. The Scolas all had the moniker of the pig. The first one was Sammy Scola or Sammy Hogg, and he was killed in the I did the story about the murder of Anton Ferris when the sheriff of Jackson County interrupted this hit that was going down and arrested Mad Dog. Charlie Mad Dog Gargata right in the act of killing this guy. And Sammy Scola, Pauly’s grandpa, was driving a car and the sheriff shot and killed him right away. As soon as he pulled up, he jumped out and he shot the dude sitting, he was a wheel man, shot him sitting behind the car. I know his great grandson. He is still not happy about the cops shooting the great grandpa, Sammy Hogg. Anyhow, Pauly, Thank you. Start coming in to Freddy’s and buddying up to Freddy and said, you know, I want to start a restaurant down here.
[21:25]And they both kind of had, Freddy has thinking about expanding. He had his eyes set on a place about the end of the block. He was like third in Delaware and down at fourth in Delaware. Freddy kind of had his eyes set on this other place because he could put another joint down there. And this guy knew it was open and he was wanting to put it down there. He’s hanging out down there. And Freddy’s dad, this is before he got killed. He encourages Freddy to help Scola. you know hey help this guy out paulie ends up getting that lease first and and he opens up a restaurant bar and he copies directly bonadonna’s menu and takes several key employees and pretty goes oh i see what that was all about now Cork Civella becomes a regular down to Scola’s place which means you know Scola’s with cork uh and several other bobs are like guy named johnny green amaro who was cork neighbor up in the neighborhood and nick Civella’s neighbor who was hanging out he was a main guy and a professional criminal and in his own right the name of the joint delaware daddies uh you know a little story about delaware daddies and this is like i said this i tell the story because this has to be cork’s joint it turns into a strip club of course you know and then cork likes those strip clubs you know so he can make money out of them river keys lost its popularity the the families aren’t coming down the young couples the regular Regular people aren’t coming down and there’s some strip clubs opening up. So he turns it into a strip club and, and he, he gets his used car manager.
[22:52]I think the, I won’t say what the guy’s name is because I’m not real sure.
[22:56]Anyhow, he’s a used car guy and he becomes the manager and he gets a local biker gang who he knew from his old used car gig where he used to be a salesman at. He gets a local biker gang to provide the strippers. I remember going in there and they’re all gagged up over the corner and galley get up and strip. And then she’d go back and sit down with the stripper. This is before they did the lap dances and all that. And these girls started stripping down to nothing. And this was totally verboten or forbidden at the time. Word gets around and a line forms and we hear about it. So I got the job. I get to go down there and I stand in line and it’s about 15 minutes down the line. And, you know, the manager’s there, and he’s talking to everybody, and he’s not taking even a dollar a coverage charge. He’d take it even a buck each. He would have made $1,000 a night, I think, because people were coming and going all night long. What he did was each person he came through, he asked, are you with law enforcement?
[23:58]
The Rise of Strip Clubs
[23:54]Like, you know, what the, well, WTF, you know. No, I work for the city. Well, what do you do? I’m in pollution control. Oh, okay. So go on then. They did strip totally. They even had a couple that would simulate sex late at night. Oh, it was wild. It was crazy. I remember this one night, this guy in the crowd, they’re all hooting and hollering, pushing up around the stage, watching these people.
[24:19]Act like they’re getting it on this one guy says man you didn’t even get it hard this dude they’re getting done he’s putting his clothes on he said man he said you get up here see what you can do that guy shut up then rated to join a few days later arrested this manager and several strippers and you know for some reason they never even reopened they just let it go after that they kind of reopened but then and this never took off again they didn’t have the same panache i guess and it didn’t last very much longer i think they’d made their money well this is during the middle 1970s nick has gone back to prison from an old gambling conviction he’s also gotten sick with cancer so he’s not really you know he’s still running things and you can hear him in the prison, they’ve got some wiretaps some bugs he’s still like sending messages out next going out or courts going up there and kind of you know running things by him and and we see court regularly at the trap of this city market and uh you know to the casual observer cork is now the boss but nick is still the boss trust me nick is still the boss well al brandemeier and bnc meat companies they’ve changed the mohawk meat company to take the Civella day by there so people won’t get nervous about doing business with them now we go into some whole another deal this really gets wild in kansas in the city to my put a bomb on the back door of the trap or the social club, just to send a message.
[25:43]There’s a guy named Carl Spero. His oldest brother has been killed, probably by the Civellas. They had to approve it. They had to approve of Nick Spero getting killed. Carl’s been in the penitentiary. See my brother, my movie, Brothers Against Brothers, for more on that. Carl Spero sends a guy named Leonard Crago, who was a bad, bad, bad man, to rob the Mohawk Meat Company and intimidate Al Brandenbaier, which he does. He puts him in the trunk of his car and he fires several rounds in there and says, tell Elnick Civella to A-Rab’s back in town. He was the A-Rab. And everybody knew by now who the A-Rab was. He was with the Spiros. Shortly after that, somebody kidnaps a Spiro associate named Johnny Brocato. He’s tortured and his body’s found. The contents of his stomach are still frozen. Meat market frozen. You know, I don’t know. Civella family member named Johnny Green Amaro. I mentioned him before, was hanging out down there at the Delaware Daddy’s. He’s gunned down his home, which is only a block from Cork and Nick’s house. It was a slap in the face of the Civellas. It was just getting wild.
[26:49]A young thief who was a friend of Carl Spiro’s and a friend of Fetty Bonadonna’s, he’s bragging that he’s the one that did it, and they kill Sonny Bowen a few days later. End up killing his partner, a guy that’s kind of his regular fall partner, rap partner, rides with him all the time, Gary T. Parker. They suspect Freddie’s been part of it because his father’s been killed because Freddy wouldn’t agree with some other things. Like I said, you need to watch that Gangland Wire movie and it’ll tell you a lot more about that. Freddy takes off to witness protection. Cork kind of tries to draw Carl Spiro in and pacify him, but he’s still out for blood.
[27:32]Another thing Cork did during this time, he oversaw a scam of government money. I bet Nick put this together and then he’s in penitentiary when this really is going down. There was a government program called CETA. I don’t remember what it stood for, but it’s supposed to help people get jobs. We had a bunch of CETA employees with the police department. They hired a bunch of parking control officers. They always civilianized the parking control people, write parking tickets and hire CETA employees for that because the government gave us money to hire them and some other civilian jobs. So Cork Civella set up something called the Columbus Park, which is what the Little Italy area is formerly called. The Columbus Park Safety and Energy Project. And they basically did nothing. And he got this guy, the Gene Shepard, to kind of set it up and hire all his friends and relatives. And they basically did nothing. He hired people as security consultants, clerks, secretaries, school counselors. And of course, Cork got a kickback from everything.
[28:34]Was during this time the fbi put their microphone in the bill of caprina pick up cork and toughy linda talking about las vegas and and one thing this court tells toughy tells cork and kind of gives you something about his nixon penitentiary and tells you about courts you know his influence here he he says cork you got to give the guy an answer right now we got to go find the phone so they go and find a phone and then we start following toughy and find their secret phone and put Taps on in. Really opens up that whole casino skimming investigation.
[29:08]
Cork’s Influence on the Streets
[29:09]But in the meantime, Tuffy is working with Nick really in a way on his own, but Nick’s gotten back out of the penitentiary about this time and working with him on the casino skimming and Cork’s still running everything on the streets. He’s the street boss. He’s taped reporting to Nick about the ongoing Spiro problem. Him he tells nick that he has a friend that’s all carl spiro coming up the villa capri which is kind of the Civella hangout bar late at night she saw carl spiro coming up there peeking in the window see who was in there he says well we’ve got we’ve got to do something and Cork’s complaining we got guys that aren’t doing anything you know they got to get off their butts and go do something You know, they’re just sitting around doing nothing. And next of all, you know, we’ve got some guys and named some old guys. And, and they talk about hitting Spero at the red apple strip club, which I mentioned before Anderson’s place. Cause he knows he goes over there. Cause Carl Spero has since taken up with Antoinette Lang, Franka, who was Cork’s old girlfriend.
[30:16]Small town here small town folks he said you know he said we got to be cautious nick counsels him to be cautious there’s cops everywhere he almost got caught one time we never could figure out what that was cork agrees and he speculates the difference some different guys that might be able to get next to carl spiro names off some guys one of them was like an ex-cop that i do i remember him early on he didn’t last very long there’s an informant that surfaced court tells Nick, I got guys out looking for him. And then they go back to Carl Spero and Carl’s living out in the country. And Cork says, you know, one of our guys, Willie Cammisano Jr., he’s a big hunter and he’s a good shot. He said, get a telescope rifle and shoot Spiro at his home, which is out in the country. And so they’re talking about, you know, sneaking up on the house. And Nick says, oh, you know, none of our guys, they can’t run across country like that. And so, but Cork is the guy that’s going to be out putting this together. St. Valentine’s Day, 1979, we raid all Cork and Nick and Tuffy’s houses and take down the casino case. There’s a couple more attempts to kill Carl Spiro during this time. And the third one finally is successful in 1984.
[31:37]
The Legacy of Cork Civella
[31:32]Cork is convicted of racketeering in a casino case and he is, he will die in prison. Cork was a bully. I had a source, a guy I know that’s been in that life, around that life, his whole life, and grew up over in Little Italy. And he told me a story about Cork. He said in the 1960s, he was at a mob joint, Melcher, Mel’s Pompeii Room out on Main. He was at Mel’s Pompeii Room. He had a date. Cork comes in, sits down at the table without any invitation. He starts flirting with a girl like the guy wasn’t even there. The guys he’s kind of a little guy of course cork ain’t the biggest guy in the world as far as you know fisticuffs and cork says hey hold up man she’s with me cork gave him a look and he said don’t you know who i am guy said yeah i know but get the fuck out of here and cork just laughed and kind of went to the bar cork was an impulsive blowhard no doubt about it but he was totally trusted by his brother and he was feared and respected on the streets if you’re gonna do business on the streets you know you had some respect and some fear of next about our cork Civella he always listened to his older brother nick though always listened to him as he would calm him down and he never went against him he always took him into consideration if he had to make a decision.
[32:52]So that’s kind of the long, he got a 10 to 30 year sentence in 1984 and he dies down in Texas in the federal prison down there. He had a kid, he’s had one child, Anthony or Tony Ripe, who will go on to be the boss after Nick dies and Cork goes to prison and Tony Ripe gets back out. Tony Ripe has a bunch of kids. A lot of people in town will say they know Nick Civella’s grandson. Well, it’s not. It’s his grandnephew. Nick Civella did not have children. Cork had one child, Anthony. He married Tuffy Luna’s sister, and then he had several children, and none of them really followed the family plan in the mob.
[33:37]So, guys, that’s the story of Carl Cork Civella. I hope all you guys have been asking about Kansas City stories. Well, there’s another one. I’ll make you happy, and I’ve got more. I just have to get back to them. There’s so many stories, you know, and so many stories in so little time, I guess.
[33:53]Just talked to a guy on the phone this morning talking about Joe Petrosino, but he wants to talk about the very first mob movie about the Black Hand in 1910, I believe, which was inspired by a case that Joe Petrosino worked on the Black Hand and the influence of the Mafia in movies over the years. So I thought that would be an interesting topic. So I look forward to that. Don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. motorcycles watch out for motorcycles when you’re out there if you have a problem ptsd and you’ve been in the service go to the va website get that hotline number if you have a problem drugs or alcohol go see anthony rugiano he’s a gambino man and uh now in uh in that witness protection he’s out here living on his own i don’t know what the story is with that i had him on my show once but i don’t think i asked him anyway he seemed to be operating okay and he’s a drug and alcohol called counselor he has a hotline i believe on his website or his youtube channel don’t forget to like and subscribe don’t forget to tell your friends about the show and maybe share it on your social media you know more people we get the better i like it and you know i got some books and and a movie at least i got one book i’m working on another one uh i got a couple movies.
[35:10]Uh out there that are for rent for like a buck 99 gangland wire brothers against brothers the sabella spiro war and my book about the skimming from las vegas and don’t forget if you get the kindle version i have the actual wiretaps link to the book you can listen to so i guess that’s all i got to sell other than myself and and i really appreciate all the comments you make on my youtube and my gangland wire podcast page and i’ve gotten to know a lot of you through that And I really like doing this, and let’s just keep doing it for as long as we can. Thanks, guys.

Wayne Newton and the Mob Sep 17, 2024

In this episode, we explore the intriguing life of Wayne Newton, “Mr. Las Vegas,” and his unexpected ties to organized crime. I share discoveries into a strange relationship between a Gambino family associate and this Las Vegas entertainer. I reveal Newton’s connections with mobster Guido Penosi amid his performances at the Copacabana Club. The narrative delves into how Newton’s rise to fame attracted the attention of the Gambino family, leading to offers of “protection” and entangling him in a web of crime, investigations, and betrayal. As the story unfolds, I reflect on the complexity of Wayne Newton’s legacy, inviting listeners to engage with our community as we continue to explore the captivating intersections of celebrity and organized crime. Wayne Newton was a dynamic showman in Las Vegas for many years, and his innocence led him to get into a business relationship with a mobster. He even allowed his mob connections to become involved with another Las Vegas entertainer, singer Lola Falana.

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Transcript
[0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers, good to be back here in the studio. This is like a little extra, as you’ll notice, you got this soon. We’re experimenting with trying to get my new logo, this part of this logo here on the top of the email that comes out if you’re a subscriber to Gangland Wire website, which if you’re not, you need to be a subscriber.
[0:19]Although I say you get a free book or a link to get a free book that I knocked out here a few years ago, and I need to change that book up a little bit. It a lot of people have gotten it be that as it may i’ve got to put out the keep experimenting putting out blog shots or blog pieces or a podcast and and i think we’ve got it fixed now so when this comes out if you go to the if you’re subscriber and you go to the email you’ll see a different picture you’ll see my new logo always had that old logo that i had for several years that had the wave sign and the green wave sign and the red gangland wire and i paid a guy to come up with this new logo. And, and, you know, and then I never could figure out how to get it up. Finally, my wife finally sat down. I convinced her to go into the back end and figure it out. And it took her about three hours to figure it out. You’d think it’d be easier than that, but it wasn’t. So I thought I’d do a little separate podcast here for you, just for fun. A story that I had always wondered about when I was younger was Mr. Las Vegas, Wayne Newton. I I don’t know if you know who Wayne Newton is. Most of you probably do. I saw his show once. I was out in Las Vegas and saw his show. He was getting older then. He’s probably, shoot, he’s older than me.
[1:33]But he’s had a lot of work done, and he obviously was wearing a girdle or something. He looked pretty slim and trim for his age and what I know about him. But he put on a hell of a show in Vegas. I mean, he is the consummate showman. I always had heard that Wayne Newton somehow was hooked up to the mob, but yet not really, or the mob, you know, being a Las Vegas entertainer like that, you got to have, you got to somehow get along with the mob back in the 70s and 80s. Now, since then, you don’t have to. I started researching, and I found that he once got himself hooked up with a New York mobster, not a Chicago guy. You would have thought it would have been Tony Splatro. This is a New York mobster named Guido Penosi. There’s not a lot known about Guido’s earlier years, other than he was convicted of murder as a juvenile.
[2:25]1971, Guido Penosi was convicted of tax evasion for not paying income taxes for several years during the 60s. But and he was a cousin to a capo in the Gambino family family named Frank Piccolo. I don’t know who Frank Piccolo was, and he didn’t really come into modern times. He was a cousin to this Capo in the Gambino family. During the 1960s, Guido Panossi had met Wayne Newton when Newton was performing at the Copacabana Club in New York City, which was well-known to be mob-connected. I think it was originally owned by Frank Costello. I think that was a club that they used in Goodfellas where they came back, you know, they let them in in front of everybody and gave them a special table up front. Kind of his, you know, this is living the high life of a mobster in New York City. You know, they were friends. They were really good friends. They say that, well, this was from court records, actually, when I researched it. Wayne Newton’s office calendar had Guido Penosi’s birthday marked on it. You know, I mean, I don’t keep anybody’s birthday marked on my calendar. And one time, Newton spent almost a whole month with Penosi down in Florida.
[3:32]Penosi intended the wedding of Newton’s brother. He’s got a brother named Jerry Newton, which I’d never heard of. One time, Wayne Newton flew to Los Angeles in 1976. He flew to Los Angeles with a whole band and performed for Penosi’s son free of charge. So let’s just say they were close friends. Wayne Newton always claimed he didn’t know anything about Penosi’s mafia connections. Infections a newsman once asked Wayne Newton about his friend he said the only thing i can tell you i met him at the Copacabana several years ago i thought he was just a fan he stayed in how we’ve stayed in contact i liked the guy guido penosi’s cousin is a guy named frank lewis piccolo or piccolo i’m not sure how you pronounce that uh we’ll say piccolo he was a he was a capo in the Gambino crime family but up in the Bridgeport Connecticut faction piccolo was a big guy stood stood six foot tall, weighed 200 pounds, had black curly hair, like, you know, always wanted to be six foot two and weighed 250 pounds, had a full head of black curly hair.
[4:32]As most of us do, his whole family lived up in Bridgeport. He was connected to the Gambinos in, faxing up in Bridgeport. In 1980, this Frank Piccolo tried to blackmail money from Wayne Newton. Newton had been trying to disengage himself from a financial investment in a Las Vegas, Las Vegas, Nevada tabloid newspaper, and that had some partners in it. And the partners were threatening Las Vegas police. He went to the cops out there and then they couldn’t stop these threats, whatever they were. I couldn’t really find out much more about it. It’s not that important. Anyhow, I just was being threatened.
[5:06]And he turned to Guido Penosi his old buddy, who then Penosi, you know, how these mob guys do. Well, here’s a guy that can help you. So Penosi referred Wayne Newton to Gambino guy from Bridgeport, Connecticut, named Piccolo. And he then came out to Las Vegas and used his influence and stopped these threats right in their tracks.
[5:27]Well, as usual with any mob guy, if you’re going to take something like that from a mob guy, you know, as a godfather said, you know, maybe someday you can do me a service. So, you know, of course, someday, you know, Wayne Newton can do Mr. Piccolo a service. And eventually he came back around to a business advisor, Wayne Newton, and he wanted him to purchase life insurance for a singer named Lola Falana from a particular insurance agent, which meant that Piccolo was getting a little piece of this action, whatever it was. Because Piccolo also told some associates in New York he was going to become a silent partner with Wayne Newton and they were going to purchase the Aladdin Hotel and Casino which became the Planet Hollywood Hotel and casino FBI got in on this and they ended up bugging Wayne newton and they got him on some conversations with these guys and and on june the 12th 1981 piccolo and Penosi were were indicted in Connecticut on conspiring to extort money and other valuable rights from Wayne Newton and this Lola Falana. Lola Falana was a famous singer back in the day, kind of Wayne Newton’s ilk. Now, Frank Piccolo will die before he actually goes to trial. And that September 19th, 1981, somebody shot and killed Frank Piccolo in a telephone booth in Bridgeport, Connecticut, right down the street.
[6:55]Now, later on, it will come out that Gambino boss, Paul Castellano, had him killed. He had been trying to encroach on the Genovese’s crime families, control of rackets in Connecticut.
[7:09]And Genovese and the Gambino family already had some really lucrative contracts. And if you know these construction rackets in New York City, they were together like the Windows case and some different cases like that and the Concrete Club and all that. And so when Piccolo was trying to horn in on some Genovese family business in Connecticut, Paul Castellano just gave him up and ordered his murder. So that’s a little story about Wayne Newton, famous singer in Las Vegas, a consummate showman. Never forget when he came out, it was like Elvis Presley’s show. And I never actually saw it in person, but I’ve seen clips of it. But has this special, you know, uh, dramatic music. And then he kind of appears to coming down some like escalator, like came down the gold escalator, if you will. But he came down the, uh, the escalator, uh, was transported down. It was like bigger than life. And, and he did put on a show.
[8:10]
Wayne Newton and the Mob
[8:07]He really put on a heck of a show. He worked his butt off. So that’s the story of Wayne Newton, Las Vegas, and his connections to the mob. And, and this is just a little special episode that I can put out to see if If you, if you got an email, if you’re a subscriber and you get the email, then there’s, you might notice that new logo of a back of a guy sitting, uh, like he’s listening to a wiretap or something, uh, instead of the old waveform and just gangland wire. So let me know.
[8:36]I appreciate everything you guys do for me and everything. All you guys had listened in and you guys had like, and share it. And I’ll tell you what that Joe Massino, when I did last month or a couple of three weeks ago. I need to spend that much work on them more often because, boy, it really did gangbuster. A lot of guys really liked that and obviously liked and shared it. So it went through the roof as far as likes and subscribes and all that and views or whatever, however you do that.
[9:05]
Support and Community Updates
[9:05]And so keep supporting me. I really appreciate it. And I’ll keep putting out this mob content and we’ll continue to have fun with all this. Don’t forget. I like to ride motorcycles and don’t like working on my website’s back end. That shit is hard, man. I hate doing that. Thank God. Thank you, Janice Colt, for taking care of me on that and for not charging me any money, but it keeps coming back. I like to ride motorcycles, and I know if you have a problem with PTSD, if you’ve been in service. As you know, go to that VA website. If you have a problem with drugs or alcohol, get hold of our friend, uh, former Gambino. And I see maybe he wasn’t really a made guy. He was, he was a prospect as they say in the motorcycle gang. Uh, he was a proposed member of Gambino family. Uh, it was a legacy. His dad was a made guy, Pat Andy.
[9:54]And he has a website that, uh, he does his show on and he has a hotline number and he’s a drug and alcohol counselor for a regular living. I don’t know if he’s still doing that, if he’s making enough money off his appearances and his website or his YouTube channel yet. He doesn’t have to keep working. I don’t know.
[10:13]If I didn’t have my pension coming in, I’d be working. Go in my Gangland Wire podcast group and like that and join that. We have a lot of great conversations and I got my YouTube channel and I got stuff for sale out there. If you want to go into my website and go on the the, uh, donate page. You don’t have to donate, but I got some of my stuff for sale. And I, you can also got always have links in the show notes to my,
[10:42]
Upcoming Books and Projects
[10:38]uh, uh, movies that are for rent on amazon.com. I’m working on coming up with a series of books. I’ve got the first one pretty well done on the Chicago outfit. I’ve just taken selected stories from old podcast, download the transcripts, ran that through chat GPT kind of makes sense out of it. And then rewrote of that into stories and so each chapter is a different story that i thought was interesting from my podcast and so we look for those coming out of me i’ll probably gonna do another special one trying to get people to really go and buy a whole bunch of them at one time they’ll be inexpensive they’re gonna be short books with separate chapters and it’ll be pretty inexpensive and so i’ll do one on new york probably next i gotta do one on kansas city and so i’m just to always coming up with something to, to sell or to entertain and educate people. It’s, you know, that’s what it’s all about is entertaining people in an edge or educating people in entertaining matters. So thanks a lot guys.

Wiretapping Carlo Gambino Sep 16, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we dive into the captivating tales of Gary Clemente’s father, Peter C. Clemente, who was a significant figure in the FBI’s Top Hoodlum Squad. Peter’s career spanned from 1950 to 1976, and he played a vital role in various high-profile cases within the Mafia. One notable event was the Appalachian Mob Conclave, where top mob leaders were detained, leading to the inception of the Top Hoodlum Program initiated by J. Edgar Hoover. Peter Clemente’s proactive approach led him to have a face-to-face encounter with Carlo Gambino, a powerful Mafia boss. Gambino was surprised by Peter’s bold move and their interaction provided valuable insights into Gambino’s demeanor and voice, essential for future investigations. Another riveting story recounts Agent Clemente’s extensive wiretapping operation on Carlo Gambino while he stayed at a motel in Miami Beach. The meticulous operation involved eavesdropping on Gambino’s conversations with his associates, shedding light on the inner workings of the Mafia. Furthermore, the episode touches on Peter’s involvement in debriefing Joe Valachi, a crucial informant who revealed significant information about the Mafia’s structure. Despite initial reluctance due to mistrust, Valachi eventually cooperated with an Irish-speaking agent, facilitating the gathering of invaluable intelligence.

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Transcript
[0:00]
Introduction
[0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there and back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, as you can see, this is retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit Sergeant and Detective Gary Jenkins. We have a great story today. The son of an FBI agent who was one of the early first agents that was assigned to the FBI’s top hoodlum squad and worked on Carlo Gambino and talked to Joe Vellacci and some really great stories. He’s going to have a book coming out called Untold Tales from the FBI Top Hoodlum Squad. Welcome, Gary Clemente. Good to see you, Gary. Another Gary. Yeah, really. You know, there was a lot of us named Gary in the early 1950s. Did you notice that? I think so. I think we were all named after Gary Cooper. That was why. I asked my mother once. She said, I don’t know. We just couldn’t think of anything else. But I think that’s what it was because nobody names their kid Gary now. There you go. There you go. I’m Italian myself, and Gary’s not a common Italian name. I know. I know. I was surprised when I saw your first name.
[1:09]Anyhow, Gary, it’s a pleasure to meet you, and I look forward to this interview. I read a little bit about you. I don’t remember how I found out about you on Facebook or I don’t know. I’ve got so many feelers out there for people that have books or have knowledge about the mob that I forget where it came from. But anyhow, I got a hold of you and you graciously agreed to come on the podcast in order to tell the guys about your book and about your father’s experiences. And I looked them up and and he was an early guy in the top hoodlum squad, wasn’t he? He sure was, Gary. He started off in the Bureau in 1950, and his career spanned from 1950 to 19. Just an interesting side note, at that time, there was a little bit of discrimination in the world at that time with Italians. And he was told after he became an attorney, my father was, that by a cousin of his, my father had expressed to him that, hey, you know, I’ve always been interested in being a part of the FBI. His cousin said to him, forget it, Pete. They don’t take Italians.
[2:17]Well, my father did not like that at all. So he marched out of the FBI office. Before you knew it, He was sitting across the desk from another agent being interviewed for a position, and he noticed that the agent’s name was John Garibaldi or whatever Italian name it was at that time. Well, that answered the question about whether they were going to take Italians or not.
[2:41]So from 1950 to 1976, that was the span of my father’s career. The early part of his career was based in Quincy, Illinois. Then he went to Cleveland.
[2:56]
Early Career Discrimination
[2:52]Then he was transferred to New York. And he was born and raised in Brooklyn. So his parents, his Sicilian-born parents, were very appreciative of that. My dad’s early career, very interestingly, was involved with doing security background checks for people applying for sensitive government positions. And the federal government at that time was really interested whether you were a member of the Communist Party USA or the Socialist Workers Party, believe it or not, which they don’t do that now. Now, and I asked my dad, fast forward, very short, later on when he was in his late 80s, I said, hey, Pop, those people that you used to investigate and arrest that were part of the Communist Party or, say, the Socialist Workers Party, that were trying to worm their way into the government, those people are now in the deepest reaches of our bureaucracies or Congress or Supreme Court and the White House. He said, absolutely.
[4:01]So that’s how much things have changed over the years, Gary.
[4:09]
The Appalachian Mob Conclave
[4:05]So the early part of his career was involved with security background checks. Then a seminal event happened.
[4:14]It was the Appalachian Mob Conclave, where all of the top mob leaders were having a meeting in Appalachian, New York, a small town in upstate New York. I’m sure that you’ve talked about this already a little bit, and it’s a famous story. But after the mob conclave happened, my father heard about it, and the FBI was talking about this disastrous meeting. Meeting among all these mobsters these men were running across the field because there was a road block set up on the edge of the edge of the property of joe barbara and they got panicked these were the top mob bosses that were running across the field stepping in cow pies throwing their wallets out left and right trying to evade the police and much of their identification was rounded up. People like Carlo Gambino were there. Mario Lansky was there as well, too. Mario Lansky was not a made mob guy with the Italian mob, but he worked with them. He was there, too.
[5:22]And what happened was they should not have arrested or incarcerated any of these people, which they haven’t. They actually detained them. But word got back to the Bureau. All of this This information got back to the Bureau. My father heard about it. The Bureau was starting to implement something called the Top Hoodlum Program that Hoover was beginning to formulate.
[5:48]My father wanted to be a part of this. He put in for a transfer out of the security detail into the Top Hoodlum squad that was being developed in New York. And that’s how he became a part of all of that. Interesting. Now, you know, we have never said your father’s full name. It’s Peter C. Clemente, correct? Peter Charles Clemente. That’s correct. Correct. And so he was a member of the Top Hoodlum Squad, which was, I remember in Kansas City, I have a friend who was an agent that came to Kansas City. He’s Italian from New York City, and he speaks Sicilian. He grew up with Sicilian grandparents, and he was a member of the Top Hoodlum Squad in Kansas City immediately, and because they knew they needed these guys who were Sicilian speakers.
[6:37]Exactly, exactly. The fact that my father could speak and understand Sicilian, like your friend, was very, very important at that time because many of these individuals were either from Sicily or mainland Italy. Many of these guys were from the Naples area. They had connections with a group called Camorra. The Camorra and the Sicilians really did like each other. They were pretty much rivals. They would have heated problems with one another. But they worked together nonetheless when it came down to this. Money, yeah. Came down to the money, the moolah, yes. That’s right. All those old regional differences just fall away. Al Capone was a Neapolitan, but he had plenty of Sicilians working with him. Exactly. He needed those people working with him to get on their good side.
[7:29]
Working with the Mafia
[7:30]Interesting. So now your father, he starts working the mob, the mafia. There’s one really great story that’s going to be in your book. It’s mainly what your book is going to be about. It’s the first of a series, guys. So start watching for this series. But there’s a story about your father and Carlo Gambino early on in both their careers, really. Can you tell us that story?
[7:55]Well, after my father became a part of the Top Hoodlum Squad in New York, He was the first one ever that the FBI asked him to do summary reports about an individual named Carlo Gambino, as well as Meyer Lansky. So he was the first one ever to put on paper into the government circles about who Carlo Gambino was, his life, his history, where he was born, all of this, to put this on record. So he was the first one to do that. As part of the top hoodlum squad, he had the idea while doing the summary report about Carlo Gambino. He said, you know what, I would like to pay this individual a visit. I would like to meet him face to face. That was his idea. It wasn’t brought down from the supervisors. So one day, Gary, he went out to Brooklyn, New York. He waited outside of Gambino’s home about a half a block away. It was a brownstone in Brooklyn. He waited for Gambino to come out of his house. He saw him give his wife, Kate Gambino, a kiss goodbye. Now, Kate Gambino happened to be Caldwell’s first cousin.
[9:20]Oh, yeah. Interestingly enough. And Kate’s brother was Paul Castellano, who was a very, very highly connected Gambino lieutenant at the time, who eventually became a head of the Gambino crime family after Gambino died peacefully in his bed. Not in a prison cell but in his bed so my my father waited for him to come down the steps after giving kate a kiss goodbye he comes up the the street he’s alone he doesn’t have any body cars wow that’s interesting why doesn’t he have any body cars well he doesn’t need any body cars He is the unofficial boss of bosses of all five Mafia families. I say unofficial, Gary, because at that time, he was never officially named the boss of bosses. Previous to that, several decades ago, when there was the big Mafia war that happened between many of the families, one of the mob bosses was named the boss of bosses officially by the other families.
[10:32]But Carlo was never officially named, but he was called the boss of the boss because he had that much power. His family was that big, over 200 members, which was considerable at that time. So he comes up the street. My father waits for him. He has no bodyguards.
[10:53]He says to him, Mr. Gambino, my name is Peter Clemente. I’m with the FBI. Yeah, I’d like to ask you a few questions if I could.
[11:04]Gambino is pretty surprised because nobody’s ever done this to him. And he has a very, very hot-like face. He has these very beady eyes. My father has always described him in his book as having the eyes of an eagle, of a bird of prey. And he had this very, very distinctive, some people called it a banana nose.
[11:29]But it was like the beak of an eagle or a bird of prey. And my father showing him his identification, his badge, his credentials, he looks up slowly from the credentials into his eyes. And my father could see this is not chopped liver. This is not a guy with a banana nose. You don’t mess around with this guy. Now, my father had a lot of experience in the Bureau at that time. Nothing dissuaded him from interviewing Gambino. This is something he wanted to do. He was an experienced agent at that time, early 30s. He knew what he was doing. Gambino immediately says to him, what is it you want from me?
[12:15]
First Encounter with Carlo Gambino
[12:15]Well my father said well I’d like to ask you a few questions about an associate of yours that you’ve been doing business with and what happened with your associations with him and Gambino immediately says I can’t I forgot to mention this is important the whole time.
[12:35]He was speaking Sicilian to Gambino the whole time. Good. That’s great. Yeah. And Gambino was not used to that in any way, shape, or form. And Gambino said, I see that you’re one of us. You speak Sicilian. You’re one of us. Why are you bothering me? What is it you want from me? He says, well, as I mentioned, I would like to ask you some questions about your association with your business partner. He said, well, I’ve got nothing to tell you. I’m an honest businessman. I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m an honest businessman.
[13:13]And he actually told my father, you should be ashamed of yourself. You are a spiro, S-P-I-R-O, spiro in Italian. In Sicilian, that’s police spy, which is the worst thing you could be, a police spy. You are nothing but a spiro. You should be ashamed of yourself. My father has looked at him and said, my father is not somebody to be trifled with at all. He said, I should be offended? I should be offended. Well, sir, you are the one that should be offended. You have disgraced the Italian-American people of this country, the hardworking Italian-American people that have come over here honestly and legally, like my mother and my father. You have disgraced all of us with the illegal events that you have put yourself through and your crime family through. You’re the one that should be ashamed. A shame. Well, you know, did not like that at all. Says something about.
[14:17]Not very nice in Italian that doesn’t mean I want you to come over and have, you know, a dinner with me. Something like, ma pan di me, F you. And it’s just, you know, he wheeled around. I’ve heard that. That’s right. We all know what it means. I don’t have to get explicit about it. He wheels around to his car. A couple of his bodyguards were in the car at the time. They opened the door. They’re looking at my father like they wish they could beat the hell out of my father.
[14:47]Gambino drives off and that was the end of his face-to-face interview now here’s the interesting part about it why did he do this Gary? why?
[14:59]Does he think that Gambino is going to arrest Gambino? What’s the reason for him having a face-to-face interview? Well I purposely left that out to explain that my father told me son there were two things there were two reasons why I wanted to have a face-to-face with him. Number one, I wanted to see if he was easily rattled or not. I wanted to profile him. I wanted to understand his personality, how he reacted to questions. Was he ruffled easily? Was he calm? How did he respond to my questions? And number two, the most important part was I wanted to hear his voice.
[15:44]I said, why did you want to hear his voice, Dad? He says, well, if we ever recorded him, if we had him on tape and I listened to him, I could identify him. As the man behind the voice in whatever recordings that we had of him. So that was the purpose of that.
[16:02]
Undercover Wiretapping in Florida
[16:02]Yeah, interesting. Yeah. And that kind of brings up the next story about the time that he did hear his voice over a wire, so to speak. It’s a great story. And I guess my first question with that is, it was down in Florida. So did your father get transferred to Florida or did he go down there because Gambino was down there? Well, the face-to-face meeting with Gambino wasn’t Brooklyn. That was in 1957 or 1958, to be exact about it. Two was when they had my father go down to the Golden Gate Motel. They called it a motel hotel. Yeah. And it was a very unassuming place. It wasn’t a fancy, fancy place. Gambino was the type of individual he did not like to attract attention, unlike John Gotti. He maintained a low profile. So he went to sort of a middle class hotel. Now, the Bureau knew that he was going to be there. My father knew he was going to be there. And they sent my father down from New York to Miami Beach, along with another agent. There was a local agent, and the two of them went to wiretap Gambino. Gambino had left his room at one point during his stay there. He was there for six weeks.
[17:25]This was a six-week wiretapping event. And while Gambino had left the room at one point, he was there with his wife, Kate, too. The FBI sound team got into the room and placed wiretaps into, you remember what they were, Gary, they’re called A-blocks. The A-blocks were a small two-by-two block that were placed on the floorboards where the phone wires were connected. This is what they used back then. They had small microphones that they put in the A-block. There was one A-block that they did that with.
[18:04]That’s how they picked up the sound. On the other side of the wall happened to be my father and another agent from the Miami office. And they were wiretapping with a reel-to-reel tape recorder, round and round and round, the conversations that Gambino had with his lieutenants and his associates that visited him during the course of six weeks. Wow, that was quite an early wiretap or early hidden microphone. And it sounded like it was hardwired, which is a lot better. The wireless just did not work very well back then. The hardwired worked a lot better. and they tied it into that phone line. So was he then, then they ran that directly into the hotel room next door. So they had a direct connection. And so they had real-time information, not record it and listen to it later. Is that what I hear you saying?
[19:02]Exactly. That’s exactly true. Now there are some interesting, very interesting stories. Yeah, that’s my next question. Yeah. What was going on? Why was he down there? Was he down there to connect with somebody in Florida. And I don’t think we said exactly what city this motel was in. Was it Miami or was it Tampa? This is Miami Beach. Okay. So why was he down there? Why was Carlo down there? 62. Well, it was never revealed exactly why he was there. For six weeks, I’m sure the part of it was to to get away from the the colder weather in new york but this was in march this was in march of 1962 so it was colder up in new york many of the mob guys came down to came down to florida you know because now as you know gary miami was an open mob city it was not it did not have a mob family. The closest mob city was Tampa. It was Santos Traficante that ran the Tampa outfit there. But Miami was deemed to be an open city. You could not operate there unless you had permission from the powers that be.
[20:17]With the commission and the Tampa guys to do business down there. There were a lot of mobsters that lived there, guys like Eddie Coco, Joe Bruno, so on and so forth. Many of them lived down there and had homes there. It was never determined exactly why Gambino was there, but it was to conduct mob business throughout his six weeks, to have some, to relax, enjoy the time with his wife there too, and to conduct business as well. Well, two of the guys that visited him mostly was Tommy Greco, a.k.a. Tommy Palmer, along with Jimmy Palmazano. Those were two of his lieutenants. And the interesting story was that one day, the three of them came back from being outside in Miami Beach, and they were being followed too closely, too closely by a couple of FBI agents with cameras.
[21:17]They saw the cameras and they got a little bit too close to them they were taking pictures, Tommy Greco, Tommy Palmer and Jimmy Parmizzano were extremely they were infuriated they come back into the room I want you to envision this this is like a movie on one side of the wall you have these mobsters on the other side of the wall FBI agents listening to them they come back into the room and they’re furious and what do you think they’re talking about they’re talking about those SOPs out there the FBI guys my father’s listening to this the FBI guys those FBI guys were following us they’re taking pictures of us blah blah blah F words this and the FBI should die in hell and all their mothers should rot so on and so forth and Gambino was trying to calm them down a little bit. And long story short, while this is happening, one of them said, it was Tommy. Tommy said, you know, they could be anywhere. Down the street, they’re following. They could be in the next room for all we know. Cut to the other side of the wall. My father’s listening to this. He’s on the headphones.
[22:33]And my father says to his partner, Frank, Frank, I think they’re on to us. They mentioned something about the FBI following them. My father said, why are they following? they’re blowing our cover my father was getting angry he’s telling Frank his partner they’re on to us and Frank is a little bit he’s very nervous about this he gets very nervous my father’s more calm about this Frank is a little more anxious about this and he hears that what are you talking about what are they saying my father has to listen to most of the conversation Gary because they speak Sicilian most of the time time. Frank doesn’t know Sicilian, so my father asked him to listen. He had to get out of the headphones most of the time. He says, they’re out to us. The FBI is out there following too close. Why are these idiots doing this? They’re blowing our cover. Frank eventually, over time.
[23:37]He’s trying to convince my father, maybe we should cut this short. We should cut the feed. And we should cut the operation. My father said, no, we don’t need to be doing that. Because my father’s hearing on the other side of the wall, Tommy and Jimmy getting so upset, they’re moving furniture, trying to find a bug. Yeah. They’re looking in the lab. They were looking under the bed. All of a sudden, Tommy said, he picks up something, holds it up. He said, it was a used condom. He was all like, what’s the place? He said, don’t.
[24:17]Carlo eventually calms him down. He’s a true leader. He starts telling them some funny stories. Calm down. Look, I don’t like it any more than you do, but they’ve got a job. We’ve got a job sort of attitude. So he calmed them down.
[24:39]Eventually, everybody went back to New York. Gambino and his luteus go back to New York. My father goes back to New York as well, too, wraps up the operation. But that is more or less a lot of it in a nutshell.
[25:00]
Joe Valachi Interview
[24:54]If you want to read more of the details, you can catch it in my book coming out soon. That sounds great. Sounds great. You know, one more thing, just a quick little story about his, the, the deal with Joe Valachi when they brought him in Joe Valachi spoke to say, and he was to say, and, and they, your father was going to be the guy that interviewed him. But what happened? Tell us one last little quick story about that, which will be in your book. What are your books? Also, I don’t know which one you’re going to have a series of books of these untold tales. So tell us that story. Well, when Valachi was ready to talk, sing like a bird, he was in the Atlanta penitentiary at that time.
[25:40]Vito Genovese was his boss, the boss of his family. And for some reason, Vito felt that Joe was not being honorable and loyal to him. And Valachi was placed in Atlanta the Atlanta pen for drug related charges, Genovese was also in the pen at the same time Vito was, Joe was getting very very paranoid because he thought that Vito was going to whack him in prison to the point where Joe accidentally killed somebody else thinking that he was going to be the killer of him, so he kills this guy well he got nervous to the point after that, That he told the authorities that if they’re going to whack me, I might as well talk. I might as well sing. So they immediately got him out of there. They knew how important this was. They brought him up to Monmouth, New Jersey, which was an army base. Monmouth, New Jersey. They sequestered him there.
[26:48]He was going to talk to the FBI, ready to sing like a bird. And they were going to have my father talk with him. And Joe was not trusting of the FBI at all and wasn’t trusting of any Sicilians at all in any way, shape, or form. He found out that my father was a Sicilian-speaking Asian, and I didn’t want to speak to any Sicilians. I didn’t trust them. I don’t want to talk. Maybe they’re going to have me whacked. So they had a nice Irish-sounding Asian named Jim Flynn. Lynn. Good night. They brought him in. And what happened, Gary, was they brought Jim in to speak with Valachi. He would, over the course of many days, would get information from him. Valachi would give Jim information about the mob, the hierarchy of the mob.
[27:46]We didn’t understand a lot of that at the time. It wasn’t official, official. show. Yeah, we knew there was a boss and underboss and all of that, but, Here was the nuts and bolts of it. There’s a boss, there’s an underboss, there’s a conciliarity, an advisor, there were the lieutenants, the button men, all of that. We hear that from Valachi, which is important. He’s using Italian-sounding terms like capo regime, capo di decina. The head of regime, a lieutenant, he would bring these Italian terms back to Jim. Jim would bring it back to my father. My father would decipher and translate these things, write all of it down. And that’s how we more or less understood the hierarchy of the mafia, how we work in all the terms of what they meant as well, too. So it was a good working relationship between Jim Flynn and my father at that time. Really? Peter C. Clemente was a hugely important agent in that whole developing the top hoodlum squad and investigation of the five families, especially. I can’t even imagine how much he brought to that investigation. It’s just, he’s never really been recognized as much as he ought to be, I don’t think. Do you?
[29:09]I agree. Joe Pistone, who portrayed himself as Donnie Brasco, he’s a true hero. Joe Pistone is, as well as my father. My father preceded him. So my father and the other agents at that time, not just my father, but many, many, many, many other agents at that time, laid the groundwork for eventually destroying the Mafia. Which really happened around 1980, 1989. This is after the chaos of Gadi. So the mob was really pretty much neutralized at that time. It was people like my father, people like Joper Stone, later on that laid the groundwork for destroying the mob. And we, you know, Gary, we don’t, I remember being young and receiving the information that my father had about the mafia, something called the mafia.
[30:04]
Legacy of Peter C. Clemente
[30:05]And I understood it to be very dangerous. It was very dangerous. These were ruthless people.
[30:14]We depict them as being romantic now. Because, you see, these Italians, these passionate Italians, they know how to tell a story and they’re very likable, but they were very, very, very ruthless people. You did not want to cross them. They would kill you in a heartbeat if you said or did the wrong things or crossed their paths in a way that you should not. So, yes, my father was a hero, definitely an American hero that should be learned about as a part of American history. Truly, truly, truly was. I admired men like that. I worked with some of them when I first went in the intelligence unit. And, you know, they just, wasn’t for them, we wouldn’t have known anything. Think they were the ones that that built you know the knowledge base because they had no knowledge when your father started in the 60s in kansas city the local police had no knowledge didn’t pay attention the fbi had no knowledge about who these guys were just had rumors but had no knowledge so these guys got in and they built that knowledge base that then allowed the future investigations all the way up to the commission case in the end and and the family secrets in in Chicago, otherwise those cases had never happened.
[31:33]Exactly, exactly. Well, you know, the FBI and the local police at that time were my father was a part of all of that. And you remember this too during your career. Those people at that time, Gary, they were salt of the earth people. My father’s generation was a part of the greatest generation. These were World War II guys. I met these agents. They were solid as a rock. They were people that you really, really enjoyed being around. Family, they were family men. They had good careers.
[32:09]Wives, children. The 1950s, nothing was better at that time. Now, there are many stories I could tell you about the agents that did have problems. You know, they were human beings just like everybody else. There were people that were, as you know too, you’re working. Other law enforcement people, maybe they drank too much. Maybe they had problems with seeing too many women. That’s part and parcel of being human beings. But for the most part, the FBI and law enforcement back there, they were salt of the earth people, dedicated people. It has changed. We don’t want to get into too much of that right now. But I think you and I believe that much of it has changed. change as far as the integrity and the core values of what.
[32:58]What what they have now as opposed to before yeah it’s just i don’t know it’s just different now i i don’t know it’s it is different for sure so gary clemente untold tales from the fbi top hoodlum squad i really appreciate you coming on the show and telling about your father peter c clemente who was you know no doubt an american hero and an unsung american hero but guys you get this book, you’re going to read about this unsung American hero and really the good solid basis for organized crime and why it was important to investigate them and the early guys,
[33:39]
Closing Remarks
[33:37]the problems they had and the great exciting stories. You can make two or three movies out of all this. I think, Gary, you say you’ve been a screenwriter. Maybe we’ll get a screenplay out of some of these stories, your father.
[33:49]There’s definitely some stories I could tell you. All right. Guys, don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. And if you are out there on those streets, watch out for motorcycles. And if you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to that VA website and get that hotline number. If you have a problem with drugs or alcohol, which goes along with PTSD many times, our friend, former Gambino soldier, Anthony Ruggiano, is a drug and alcohol counselor down in Florida now. And he has a hotline on his website. So that’s, if you go into get rehab with Anthony Ruggiano, give me a call. I want, I’m going to put you on the show. Tell me all about it. You probably won’t, but anyhow, don’t forget like, and subscribe and keep coming back. Hit the podcast. Facebook group up. Got a lot of good people that put on stuff on that. A lot of good mob conversations and we’re on Facebook and the Apple app. Give me a review. So thanks a lot guys. And thanks a lot. Gary Clemente.

Michael Vecchione on Gaspipe Casso Sep 09, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of the Gangland Wire podcast, Michael Vecchione, a former Brooklyn prosecutor and author, discusses his novels inspired by real-life experiences in the criminal underworld. Gary Jenkins and Michael Vecchione focus on Lucchese mobster Anthony Gaspipe Casso. These two veterans of the fight against the Mafia delve into themes of loyalty, betrayal, and the gritty realities of organized crime in New York City. Former porsecutor Michael Vecchione interviews Gaspipe Casso about his involvement in criminal activities, intricate alliances, and obstacles law enforcement faces in solving cases, which are highlighted, offering a glimpse into the dark world of organized crime. The discussion underscores the challenges of investigating organized crime and emphasizes the importance of ongoing efforts to combat the La Cosa Nostra.

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Transcript
[0:00]
Introduction to Gangland Wire
[0:00]Hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there. It’s good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins. You know, I’m a retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective turned podcaster. And this has been fun, guys. This is so much fun. And I’ve gotten to know some great people doing this over the last several years. And one of them is Michael Vecchione. Welcome, Michael.
[0:22]Thank you very much, Gary. I appreciate you having me back on. I love talking to you and talking to your audience. You know, it’s interesting, like Michael and I kind of speak the same language in many ways, because he was a prosecutor in the Brooklyn. He was a, you were the chief of the Brooklyn Rackets division, correct? That’s, that’s correct. Yeah. I had before that I was chief of the Homicide Bureau as well. And so I kind of had my hand in, in almost everything that went on in the DA’s office when I was, when I was there. So it was a very interesting experience. I got to tell I can imagine, you know, Michael knows where all the bodies are buried in Brooklyn, political and really, you know, it’s interesting you say that because the guy we’re going to talk about the gas pipe castle, when I spoke to him, gave me some locations for bodies. And, but we’ll get into that when we, when I tell you the story. Really? Let’s talk just a little bit about Michael and his books. First of all, guys, we’ve got a self-talk Mary, you know, and, and you’ll be interested in these books. He was on here before with Luigi the Zip, Homicide is My Business, and that was a big seller, at least for me, and I think it was for Michael, too. And he interviewed this guy who was a Sicilian who did a bunch of hits here who just liked Michael, if I remember right. That was a great show, Michael. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, it was. Luigi was a character that I will never forget, I have to tell you.
[1:49]Uh, I’ll have links to all these and to Amazon and the show notes guys at, we had crooked Brooklyn. We talked, I think we talked about that one and we had, uh, did we do murder on the bridge? I can’t remember what was, we did the one about, uh, people were getting killed in a hospital.
[2:07]Oh, that was Behind the Murder Curtain. Oh, okay. Behind the Murder Curtain. Behind the Murder Curtain. Yeah. And Murder on the Bridge, it was a case that I did. And it’s actually part of the novel series that I’m now working on. I made it into a, I fictionalized it. But it started out as, it was a young woman who was walking the Williamsburg Bridge between Manhattan and Brooklyn for exercise. And she was set upon one Sunday morning by a junkie who wound up killing her after she She didn’t have any money that he wanted money and she didn’t have any. He killed her and made it seem as if it was a sex crime and then went back later that night and burnt her body to beyond recognition.
[2:47]So it was a very, very important case to the district attorney when I got it because it involved a community that had a lot of votes in it. You know, the Hasidic Jewish community in Brooklyn is huge. Huge and this young lady was the victim of this guy that that i called and if you don’t mind i could just tell you a little a little bit when i tried the case and i summed up the case was so horrific and what he did to this young woman that all was left on the on the bridge where she was found was a shoe and her bra clasp and and the only way that we identified her was through dental records. It was just horrific.
[3:28]And when I summed up, I essentially told the jury that it was as if the devil
[3:36]
Fallen Angel Novel Series
[3:33]had come to Brooklyn and committed this crime. And that gave me an idea, but later on in my life, and I’m in the midst of it now, of a crime novel series, which I call Fallen Angel. And the premise is that the devil does come to Brooklyn and he is behind and instigating horrific crimes that need to be taken to, the perpetrators need to be brought to justice. And the government forms this committee, this group, to concentrate on bringing the devil and his minions to justice. And they hire a prosecutor. And the prosecutor happens to be the retired district attorney, the head of the rackets division in the DA’s office. So the books of Fallen Angel, book one and two are now on Amazon.
[4:25]And I’ve just turned in book three. It’ll be out in the fall. So I think that your listeners and your viewers will really like it, will really enjoy it. Because all of the cases, all of the crimes in the book that is part of a novel, but all of them actually happened. And I handled every single one of them when I was in a DA’s office. So that’s the spin. And it’s been very, very well received. I sold book one to Hollywood. And I’m hanging on now waiting to hear. year. We have a pilot written. And so anyway, that’s a little bit about what I’m doing at the moment and now talking to you. All right. And what we’re going to talk about is your other book that you did with a retired New York City detective, Tommy Dades, called Friends of the Family. Right, right. We’re going to not so much talk about the two, what we call mafia cops, I believe, Coppa and what was the other guy’s name? Eppolito. Eppolito, yeah. He was the one that was in and Goodfellas, I believe. Those were a couple of characters to us for sure. But we’re going to talk about Gaspipe Casso, who was their kind of control, would you say?
[5:31]Well, yeah, he controlled them. He actually called them his crystal ball because when he needed information about informants or needed something taken care of by them going into the police computer and getting information, he had an intermediary who he would go to and that intermediary would go to the mafia cops and they would provide the information they’d give them the information about who was who the rats were who the informants were and and then on at least one occasion they actually did a murder on his behalf so so those two guys were were quite a quite a pair i mean it was and they’re both by by the way, now deceased. So we can talk about them.
[6:15]Well, they were both in jail when they did get deceased, weren’t they? Yep. Yep. They did life. They got life in prison. They both died in jail. And it was, as my boss, the district attorney called it when we had our press conference, it was the most horrific case of corruption in the history of the New York City Police Department. And it was, it was. I would say in the history of the United States, it was It was the most horrific case of corruption by law enforcement, for sure. I don’t know any worse. Gas pipe was right in the center. But, you know, Gary, I got to tell you, before they went to work for gas pipe, they were working for someone in the Gambino family. Oh, really? And there was a falling out. The Gambinos did something to, I think it was the cousin of Eppolito. And when that happened, he said that he’s not going to do anything for them anymore. And gas pipe was looking for someone like them, somebody he could turn, someone he could lean on. And the intermediary that he went to was a guy named Bert Kaplan, who had been the intermediary between the mafia cops and the Gambinos.
[7:21]And, and, and he talked gas pipe into getting these guys on board. And, and it was a marriage made in hell, not in heaven, in hell. So really, yeah. And, and which brings us to Anthony gas pipe, Casso, a, a bad, bad dude. It started out in the Lucchese family, spent his entire career in the Lucchese family. I can’t remember. I was, he, how high did he get? Of course he had his own. He was the under boss. Okay. He was a concierge. He was all the under boss. And, and at the time that he and his, and the boss guy by the name of Al D’Arco went out on the land because they got word through the mafia cops and through their network that, that gas pipe was, and, and D’Arco were on a list to be arrested. They took off. So, yeah, he was an underboss, but he was a vicious, vicious guy, so bad that the federal prosecutors, when they arrested him and turned him and he became a witness, they called him Lucifer. That’s how bad a guy he was. That was their nickname for him. Really? Yeah. The feds, of course, turn him because they’ve always got the big stick, but he reached out to you or you reached out to him. I’m not sure. Tell us about that. You ended up talking to him after he went, after he turned.
[8:39]
Need for Inside Information
[8:39]So in the midst of the mafia cops, I knew we needed someone on the inside. We had some information, tangential information. Things were going along very well in the investigation. But I knew that if I was going to take the case to trial, and what we were concentrating on, Gary, was one murder that they were involved in. And I have to give you a little bit of the background as to why this particular guy was a target of gas pipes.
[9:11]Back when Paul Castellano was the head of the Gambino family, Castellano replaced Carlo Gambino as the boss of the family. And as you probably know, because you know the history of these guys as well as I do and probably better, Castellano was assassinated on the street in front of a steak restaurant in Manhattan, orchestrated by John Gotti and Sammy Gravano. The whole point of the plot was for Gotti to take over and become the boss of the Gambino family.
[9:49]So they did that. They set up the hit and Castellano was killed along with his driver, but it was an unsanctioned hit. It was not sanctioned by the other family bosses. And that kind of set off both Gas Pipe and Vincent the Chin Gigante, who was the head of the Genovese family.
[10:14]
Assassination Attempt on John Gotti
[10:09]And they decided that John Gotti had to be killed because of what he did. So gas pipe recruits gas pipe knew that every sunday god he would go to a particular social club in brooklyn for whatever i guess to collect money to meet with people in the family that kind of thing and so he recruited a believe it or not a musician a musician a munitions expert a bomb expert that he knew who was in the army and was a bomb maker. And he was also a wise guy.
[10:47]So the plan was for this bomb maker to make a bomb, sort of like an IED, a flat kind of bomb. And the plan was for the bomb maker to meet in this spot in Brooklyn on a Sunday morning. and he gas pipe was going to walk and did walk past the car.
[11:10]That was going to be the car that they were going to blow up because Gotti arrived and left in a car. So he tells me the story about how he was walking down the street, paper bag with what looked to be groceries and Italian bread sticking out and things of that nature. Like, you know, Sunday morning and I’m shopping and that kind of thing. And as he gets to the car, he bends down and he puts the IED under the car. So now it’s all set. He takes off, goes around the corner and waits. The bomb maker who was going to set the bomb off is across a double side a double it was a two-way street so it was a long distance between where he was and where the car was so instead and he was going to set the bomb off with a um with a remote device so instead of doing it from across the street where his car was this moron takes his car makes a u-turn and pulls up next to the car where these two guys get in and one of them he believes is Gotti and the other is his driver, Frankie DiCicco. And he gets, pulls up next to the car, sets it off and blows the car up. Now the idiot was right next to it and his car was badly damaged. He takes off and as it turns out, Gotti was not in the car. Gotti did not go that day. It was someone else.
[12:33]That sets off a chain of events. Gotti now finds out that Gas Pipe and Vincent de Chin, Giganti, were behind this plot to kill him.
[12:45]And since Giganti was a little bit more protected than I guess he felt Gas Pipe was, his plot was to kill Gas Pipe in revenge for attempting to kill him. And the gas pipe one day is driving his car in Brooklyn, of course, stops at a light and a car pulls up next to him. Four guys are in the car. He looks over, doesn’t think anything of it, and all four of them open fire and shoot gas pipe and then take off.
[13:16]Gas pipe doesn’t die. He’s injured. He’s injured very badly. He makes his way out of his car, crawls on the street to a Chinese restaurant that was right near the area, goes down to the basement of the Chinese restaurant and waits and calls someone to come and get him. And they get him, bring him to some doctor, and he gets taken care of. Now, gas pipe now makes it his life’s work to find out who those four guys were in that car and who was behind the assassination attempt. And he finds out. He finds out. How does he find out? Well, the mafia cops help him find out who it was who was in the car.
[14:01]
Mistaken Identity Hit
[14:01]Now, one of the names was a guy named nicky guido in that car one of the people in the car gas pipe goes to the mafia cops they now he wants to find out where nicky guido lives because he’s not he doesn’t recognize the name doesn’t know it and epilito i’m sorry caracapa who was still who was working in i guess the organized crime section of major case squad in the nypd had access to all of this these records and he puts it the name nikki guido gives a kind of a description and an area where he thinks he came from and he comes up with a name comes up with an address and it’s in south brooklyn which would be where they thought that this guy lived and they tell gas pipe gas pipe arranges for this guy Nicky Guido to be hit and it’s Christmas morning and, Nicky Guido is out on the street in front of his house with his uncle showing off.
[15:09]To his uncle his brand new car and a car comes up the block and stops while guido is in the car with his uncle and guido recognizes or sees that they have taken guns at it and now aiming to the car and he jumps on to his uncle to protect them they open fire and nikki guido is is killed saved his uncle. They take off. Turns out it was the wrong Nicky Guido. It wasn’t the guy who was in the car who shot at gas pipe. When the real Nicky Guido finds out what happened, he takes off and goes to California. He’s later found in California. So gas pipe, so that’s one mess. That was a miss. He still didn’t gab the names of all the others, although he ultimately gets That’s the mall. And he fought. One of the names is a guy by the name of Jimmy Heidel. Heidel was kind of a hanger on a guy that was a, an associate of the, of the Gambino family lived of course, and he lived in Staten Island, but he hung out in Brooklyn and gas pipe.
[16:19]It was the order to the mafia cops, find this kid and find out what he knows, and ultimately, we’re going to kill him. So they find out where they go to his home, where he lived with his mother in Staten Island, the mafia cops. And they ring the bell, but before they get to the door, they see a guy who looks like Jimmy Heidel. It turns out it was his brother, Frankie Heidel. They accost them on the street.
[16:52]And they say to Frankie, you’re coming with us, Frankie. He says, no, no, you’re looking for my brother. I’m not Jimmy, I’m Frankie. They say, okay, and they leave. They go to the mother now. I’m sorry, Frankie goes into his home and tells his mother what just happened. She goes out onto the street and they’re still sitting there. And she goes up to the car and confronts them. What are you doing what do you want with my kids that kind of thing and she sees both and they say it’s police business ma’am you know stay out of it we’re looking for so frankie had told him had told the the mafia cops where he thought his brother might be over in brooklyn and and they had a connection over there and they found out that he was in i think it was either a pool hall or bowling alley i forgot now what’s important about that is that years later mrs heidel first of all, she reports all of this stuff to the FBI, to the police, etc.
[17:55]
Hunt for Jimmy Heidel
[17:50]Nothing happens after her son disappears, Jimmy. And what happened is Jimmy is in Brooklyn and they find out where he is. And I think, as I said before, I think it was a bowling alley. And he comes out of the bowling alley and they grab him, the two cops, and they tell him, come with us.
[18:11]He doesn’t know what the hell is up. He just thinks that, you know, he’s being arrested. It’s another bullshit arrest on his part and gets in the car. They don’t drive to any precinct. They drive to a location in Brooklyn to a parking lot behind what used to be a Toys R Us, big Toys R Us store.
[18:29]And there in that parking lot, they transfer him from there to gas pipes guys. And the gas pipes guys drive him to a house not that far away, down to the basement. Where gas pipe is waiting for him and gas pipe tortures tortures the the hell out of him, he gives up all of the names in the car who were in the car and then gas pipe kills him that’s what happens now i mrs heidel by the way never found out until later on where what happened to to jimmy And Frankie Heidel, her other son, was also murdered by a different group for a different reason.
[19:18]And Tommy Dage, the detective who worked on the mafia cops case with me, was assigned to that homicide. And he got to know Mrs. Heidel. And the case broke for us when she decided, finally decided to tell Tommy about the visit in Staten Island by the mafia cops looking for her son. And so we were going to investigate, and we had enough, I believe, to at least open an investigation into the death of Jimmy Heidel. And that’s how we were going to go after the mafia cops, going after this murder case, which carried 25 to life, by the way, Gary, if I convicted him. So the investigation goes on, our investigation goes on, and I get to the point where I say to Tommy, we need somebody else. We need someone on the inside.
[20:11]We knew Kaplan was involved, but Kaplan at that point wasn’t talking. He had turned down helping the feds, even though they offered him a deal. He was in jail, by the way, for narcotics violations. So I said, where are we going to go? So it dawned on me one day, I said, let me give it a shot. Maybe gas pipe will talk to me. So I reach out to his lawyer. And I find out the gas pipe is in Brooklyn of all places now in jail. He’s waiting to testify in a federal case, not for the prosecution, but for the defense. So I call the U S attorney’s office. And I speak to a U S attorney and say, listen, you guys have him here. You produce them in case he’s needed as a witness. I want to go talk to him, but the federal jail Dale won’t let a local prosecutor in. I need your okay to go in and do it.
[21:06]I thought that this was a ground ball. Know what they told me? No, we’re not helping you. We’re not helping you. So I say, come on. And I’m working on him. And I’m working on him. In the meantime, I’m speaking to the lawyer. Because I’m thinking that ultimately I’m going to convince the feds to let me go in to see him. And I do convince the feds at some point to let me go in. So now I’m waiting for the lawyer to give me an answer. Is your guy going to talk to me? I told him I would give him a letter that he cooperated for whatever that was worth. The guy was doing 17 life sentences.
[21:41]So the lawyer finally gets back to me and he says, my guy, I’ll let you talk
[21:48]
Immunity Request for Gaspipe
[21:47]to my guy, but here’s what I want. I want immunity for the Jimmy Heidel murder. I said, well, it’s a state case. You’ve got the immunity. The guy’s doing 17 life sentences. I’m not going to go after him for Jimmy Heidel. I said, no problem. problem he goes well that’s not it not all i want the feds to give me immunity because they could fashion some kind of as he said bullshit charge for the jimmy i delving i said okay i’ll call the feds now i haven’t spoken to them about this yet uh you know about the immunity stuff yet until but they did say that they would have somebody go with me to the jail when i talked to him but of course gas pipe wouldn’t talk to me unless they gave him immunity once again gary they said to me No, we’re not giving him immunity. I said, are you going to really prosecute this guy? You’ve already got him for 17 lives. How much more time can the guy get? Gary, it was not that. That was not the reason. You know why they wouldn’t allow me to go in to talk to him or why they wouldn’t give me the deal?
[22:51]Because he had written a letter after they convicted John Gotti. Gas Pipe had written a letter saying that Sammy Gravano, who was the main witness in the case, was a liar. Lied about this, lied about that. They were concerned that if they gave Gas Pipe a deal, that somehow his claims about Gravano lying in the Gotti case would be used by an attorney to try to overturn the Gotti conviction. Because they had convicted Gotti by that point. They said, no, they’re not giving me. And they didn’t. They were very hard and fast. So I go back to the lawyer and I tell him, I can give you the immunity in state court, but I can’t do what I can’t do. You know, I can’t give you a federal immunity because they are not willing to give it to us. Let me talk to him. You got nothing to lose. The answer was no.
[23:47]So I never got to talk to gas pipe. Gas pipe would have been my witness with all the rest of the things I had in the Heidel case.
[23:57]Anyway, to make a very, very long story short, the feds steal the case from
[24:03]
Frustrations with Federal Handling
[24:01]us. They make a RICO case out of the whole thing. And it still sits. Every time I talk about it, my stomach starts to churn because the feds really, to use a Brooklyn term, really fucked me, Gary. They had no interest in allowing us to do this, to do this case, particularly when we made it and started it. After that, after the case sat for 10 years, the boxes with this case and it sat for 10 years in a federal courthouse or the U.S. attorney’s office never touched it. They never had any interest in doing it. In fact, when we started the case, they said to me, go ahead, knock yourself out. We don’t give a shit. It’s an old case. You know, you’re never going to make this. And then when we made it, when we started to make it, now suddenly, oh boy, now we can get this mafia cops business. And believe it or not, they took all the credit in the world for the case. Wound up convicting them.
[24:57]The first time the case was set aside, by the way, because it was a bogus kind of theory that they used that was then reversed on appeal and the conviction stood. So Pointwood gas pipe was something that always bothered me. I didn’t understand why this guy who was so willing to talk to the feds when they turned them wouldn’t talk to me, wouldn’t even have me visit. He didn’t have to commit to anything. Let me just talk to you and see if I can convince you. I couldn’t figure that out. I do get the answer and I get the answer from gas pipe and I’ll get to that.
[25:36]
FBI Agent on Colombo Payroll
[25:33]So I go on, the feds steal the case, they go on, do it. And I begin a case involving an FBI agent, a retired FBI agent who was on the Colombo family payroll, who was providing information to the Colombos through a capo named Scarpa, Greg Scarpa. And Scarpa was providing the FBI agent with information about his fellow mafiosi. And it was a again a marriage made in hell quite frankly and so i’m involved in this investigation.
[26:10]And part of the investigation involves i’m sorry a major part of the investigation involves greg scarpa who’s now dead at that time but his son gregory scarpa was alive and in, ad max in colorado he was doing life in not life he was doing something less than life but he was doing it in Colorado, the Ad Max in Florence, Colorado, the most secure prison in the United States. And I send word through his lawyer that we want to talk to him, tell him that I will give whatever letter they want in terms of cooperation. And his lawyer was very cooperative, a woman, a female lawyer, forgot her name. And I get a takeout order from the feds to take out Scarpa and Gregory Scarpa, bring him to New York and have him sit with us as we go through this investigation against this FBI agent, because he was intimately involved with everything his father did, everything. He knew the FBI agent, knew exactly what he had been doing, everything that we needed to make a case. So I brought him in and literally when he walked into my conference room, the first day the detectives had him and brought him in to me.
[27:25]He said, I introduced myself and he says, he says, ah, hi, you’re Mike Vecchione. I said, yep. He said, before I forget, gas pipe wants you to go see him. He said, gas pipe? What’s going on? He said, gas pipe is my neighbor down in, he had to sell next to Gregory Scarpa in Ad Max. I said, really? What’s he want to talk to me about? He said, I don’t know. He just knew I was coming to see you. And he told me that when you’re done with me, he wants to see, he wants to see you. I said, okay. So I go, we, we do our case. We do the case involving the FBI agent and it’s over. and I make an appointment to go down to visit Gas Pipe. He gave me permission. His lawyer gave me permission. Very strange that the
[28:23]
Visiting Gas Pipe in Butner, North Carolina
[28:19]lawyer would allow me at this point to go see him, but he did. He was in Butner, North Carolina in a prison hospital.
[28:29]So two detectives and myself took a trip down to North Carolina. Minor, we go into the prison and the prison authorities had arranged for us to have a room alone. And the detective and myself and one of the correction officers were standing in the room and we’re waiting for another correction officer to bring gas pipe to the room. And then suddenly there he is. He walks in. Guys introduced themselves. And then I introduced myself and he goes, you don’t have to, I know who you are. He says to me, A lot of guys in here have your picture on dart boards that they’re throwing darts at because of what you’ve done. I said, what have I done? Done what? My job. He started to chuckle. You know, that’s. So I said to him, did you read the book? Meeting friends and family. He said, yeah, I did. I said, so? He goes, about 95, 96% accurate. He said, I’ll take it. So we bring him in and and i say okay so here we are what do you want to talk to me about.
[29:35]So what he was interested in, Gary, was he was looking to find some way for us to go to the federal judge, a federal judge, and tell him how cooperative he was in solving old, unsolved homicides that he and the Lucchese’s were involved in. He was hoping that um you know that that somehow by miracle by miracle i said.
[30:07]Anthony you’re doing 17 life sentences what is what am i going to do for you he goes you never know i i really would appreciate you doing it plus he says you know i’m i’ve been in here i i’m i’m having it was like he was trying to tell me that he had some kind of an epiphany you know His whole life has now changed and he wanted to help us. And I said, okay, well, I’ll hear what you have to say. I said, but first of all, you’re going to tell me about the mafia cops case. So we talk and he tells me about how he hooked up with them through Burt Kaplan, why he wanted them on his payroll, what they did for him. Everything that i knew gary he corroborated and told me was you know gave me the imprimatur so to speak the mafia imprimatur yeah that was that was that’s what happened so i asked him i said listen why is it that you didn’t tell me this when i wanted to talk to you years ago when we We were doing the case. He said, Mike, the way I found out that you wanted to talk to me was I read it in your book.
[31:21]My lawyer never told me that you were looking to have me come in and talk to you in the DA’s office. He said, if I had known that, I would have been there. I would have gone. I would have come in and talked to you. It was like, I couldn’t go back. You know, the lawyer unfortunately has passed away and I couldn’t, I really couldn’t do anything to scream at the guy like, you son of a bitch. You know, how did you, how could you do that to me? And, but he said, yep. So I told, so he tells me the whole story and you know, Gary, I got to say that he was, we were pretty accurate. We were pretty, we were very accurate. He admitted to the screw up with, with Nikki Guido and, and told me all about Burt Kaplan, the guy that was his intermediary. He gave me the whole story and told me all about his life growing up and how he started with on the street, little street gang, and then ultimately wound up becoming, he wasn’t a Lucchese to begin with. I think he was in a Gambino family first. And then there was a swap, sort of like a baseball swap between him and someone else. There was a problem and wanted a Gambino’s with him. And so he moved over to the Lucchese family. And the one thing that I did find out is he mentioned how he was really upset.
[32:43]By people calling him gas pipe. He hated that name. He hated it. And I found out. I said, well, how did you get it? Where did it come from?
[32:54]He said, people tell me that my father, his father was a wise guy as well, was a collector, a guy who would go around collecting money that was owed to the wise guys. And he broke off one day, a guy was giving him a hard time, and he broke off the tailpipe of a car. And he beat the hell out of the guy with the tailpipe of the car. And his father was not called gas pipe. But when Anthony, his son, started to come up in the mafia world, they attributed, they He said, that’s so-and-so’s son, and they started to call him gas pipe. But he told me he hated it because I think that at some point, I was going to toss, call him that, gas or something of that nature. And it was like, no, you don’t call me that. My name is Anthony. And the other thing is that a lot of people call him Queso. They were always calling him Anthony Queso, cops in particular. He said, my name is Queso. so. So please call me by my correct name. And that’s what we did. So we spent, the first time we were there, we spent about two hours or more talking to him. And he gave me, he started out, told me what he wanted. He wanted my help. He wanted me to write a letter to the federal.
[34:19]I don’t know, parole authority, federal judge, to somehow keep it on record that he had helped. And I said, okay, I have no problem doing that, but you got to tell me what you’re going to give me. I need something. I can’t just write a letter if you don’t give me anything. So he starts out by telling me about a particular murder that occurred, and he was the one who actually did it. And he gave me this information about what it was. And I got to tell you, Gary, Larry, I don’t remember exactly the facts of the case and it’s not important because what he, what he said, I said, okay, so where, first of all, it’s only you telling me this. I can’t put you on the stand and expect the jury to buy just you, what your background. I said, you got to give me something more. For instance, where’s the gun? What’d you do with the gun? He said, I’ll tell you. I dropped it into Sheepshead Bay.
[35:09]
Searching for the Gun in Sheepshead Bay
[35:10]So are you familiar with what Sheepshead Bay is? Sheepshead Bay is a body of water that’s off the Atlantic Ocean in Southern Brooklyn. And it feeds, it’s a bay, a big one, and it has boats on it, pleasure boats, et cetera. And it feeds into the Atlantic. He said, I drove to Sheepshead Bay. He gave me the street. He gave me the spot. He said, I dropped the gun into Sheepshead Bay right there. I said, well, that will help. He said, if you get that gun, you can compare it to the bullets, et cetera, et cetera. I said, okay, I’ll do that. i said that’s one what’s what else you got so now he tells me about another hit that he does and i said so what’d you do with the body this time he says well we went down to carol gardens which is an area where i actually i was living at the time and and on this particular street he gave me the name of the street there was a sort of a little storefront kind of warehouse kind of thing and we dug up the floor, buried the body in the floor or in the wall. I don’t remember exactly. And then covered it up and that’s where the body is. I said, you think it’s still there? He says, yeah, nobody went to get it. Nobody even knows this, except I’m telling you. But that’s where I put the body. I said, okay. I said, you got other information? He gives me other information. Who else was involved? Where it happened? You know, that kind of stuff.
[36:32]So anyway, I’m going to skip ahead. So we, when we went home, I took two detectives, it was very right near the office where this location was. And we go down to this spot onto the street and I look and I say, oh no, I said, this now was the storeroom for one of the best Italian restaurants on Court Street was the name of the street. It’s a very, very, very well-attended, well-liked, delicious food. In the back was their storeroom for where they would keep their supplies.
[37:10]Mozzarella and tomato sauce and all this other stuff. We go in and we find the spot. We knew because he gave us that kind of details, the way the body was. It was completely renovated, completely bricked over. over everything. I said to the detective, we can’t take this apart. George, George Taro was his name. I said, George, what are we going to do? We’re going to go in this guy and ask the guy in the restaurant to allow us to, and you know how much it’s going to cost us to try to find this body? We’re never going to be able to find it. So we abandoned it. So what we did was we went to the NYPD and asked them if they would allow us to use the scuba team to go to Sheepshead Bay to search for the gun. At least maybe we can make a case with, make that case. Gary, three days of diving into Sheepshead Bay by the scuba team.
[38:08]I mean, it was years, 10, 15 years. You know where that gun probably is down now in the middle of the earth, you know, it sinks in, they never, never found it. So I can tell you one other, one thing that kind of jogged my memory about breaking up the back of the restaurant, when they killed Jimmy Heidel, they killed him after gas pipe tortured him. He killed him in the basement of a home that was owned by one of the Lucchese soldiers. So we knew exactly where or what the home was. We knew exactly where they had done it in the basement. We found all of this information out.
[38:57]
Searching for Evidence in the Lucchese Soldier’s Home
[38:49]And we sent, we said, I sent guys to the home now to see, we’re going to do this case. If we can find even remnants of blood down there, then it corroborates the story that we were getting from our, our informants, the witnesses that we had who were going to tell us all about this. So we get a search warrant for the house. Okay. Go down there, and we serve the search warrant on the owner. The owner now is no longer the Luke Hazy guy. It’s some family that owns the place now, but they said, sure, you can go down and look. It’s no problem, and if you need to, you can search around to do whatever you have to do. So I get a call.
[39:36]Detective calls me and said, actually, it was Tommy Dates. Tommy says, Mike, this place is entirely mirrored. Whoever bought the house after or maybe before put mirrors up all around the walls of the house. The floor was all covered with brand new flooring. He said, we never are going to be able to find any blood here. But we took some samples of some things that looked like blood from the floor and from the wall. And the medical examiner took it. Never turned out to be enough to find out what we did. And then finally, at the end, when I spoke to Gaspar, at the end of the interview, I said to him, listen, before I leave, you’re going to tell me what you did with Jimmy Heidel’s body because Mrs. Heidel deserves to know. He says, yeah, no problem. She says, I’m cooperating. I’m cooperating. I’m no problem. So he tells me that after they killed Heidel, they needed to dump the body. In an area of South Brooklyn, it’s now called Georgetown, believe it or not, they were building this entire new development of homes, blocks and blocks of homes. And they were digging up the earth to get ready to lay down the foundation.
[41:06]And they knew one of the bulldozer operators. Gas pipe tells me, yeah, we knew the guy. And we asked them, we bring the body. We asked them if he would allow us to bring it in there because he was going to, because suddenly he could bury it with the bulldozers. And then the next day, he said, the next day they were going to cement and build the foundation. So the body was dumped. Bulldozer dumped the dirt. Next day, this enormous housing development began to be built with the concrete, and that’s where Jimmy Heidel’s body is. Now, I told, we went home, and I told Mrs. Heidel, she was at least grateful for finding out where her son was. She’d never be able to find his body, but that’s where it was. And that was as a result of gas pipe telling me, you know, telling me what he did.
[41:57]So we we did the investigation to the best we could and we we didn’t come up with anything with gas for gas pipe but we went back down to talk to him again and said told him what the result was and he started giving us other information it was another case involving a an informant and and it was he he it was very difficult gary to to to make cases based on just Just the shreds of information that he was giving us, you know, better than I do. You can’t make cases unless you start to get some concrete information. I remember this happened here and it was this guy. And we’re talking about cases that are 15, 16, 20 years old. There was no way that we were able to do it. So I told him, I promised him, I said, listen, I will, I will, if you want me to, I will send a letter to tell a judge and give it to your lawyer that you did cooperate. You did attempt to help us solve these unsolved cases, as many as we had. I forgot how many he ultimately gave us.
[43:01]But I can’t promise you anything. I can’t go to the feds and say, you need to do something to help this guy. And I can’t make a case. Anthony, I just can’t make a case. So believe it or not, He kind of understood he was upset, but not to the point of, you know, giving me a hard time. He just said, I tried, you know, I tried. And, you know, it wasn’t that long after that.
[43:27]A few years after that, that he ultimately passed away from, he, from, he had, he had prostate cancer and that’s what he ultimately passed away. But, um, it was a, it was two, there were two meetings chock full of information. I mean, getting the whole, uh, attempt on Gotti’s life, the whole story, um, about that. We actually sent detectives to the garage where the, the bomb maker had driven his car after he, after he did the bomb. There was gas pipe said, you know, that car was never moved. It might be still there. He couldn’t pinpoint the actual garage that they drew, drove it to, but we were, you know, at least I would have loved to have at least tried to make a case against the bomb maker because he was still alive and he, he just died now too. But at the time he was alive and I could have, I could have made a case against her and he, you know, it, it, but I never, we could never find the car. The problem was that his information was old and difficult to track down. But he opened up like a, you know, he sang like a canary.
[44:38]
Analyzing Gas Pipe’s Demeanor
[44:39]I have to ask, Michael, about his demeanor. What was your impression, just your kind of gut impression of him, his aura, if you will? Yeah, he was very calm.
[44:52]Very collected, very polite talk, you know, with the, with the very heavy Dick Brooklyn accent, but, but not a madman, not the madman that the feds used to call the, you know, the call Lucifer. Yeah. He was a guy that, you know, he had a story to tell and things to say, and he, you know, and he did. And his, his demeanor was, was very calm. And quite frankly, if you didn’t know what he was and who he was, you would say, yeah, Very polite, nice guy, you know, and with 30 plus, 35 murders under his belt, but maybe more. So, but that was it. That was, there was nothing overt about the guy as far as, you know, giving you a hint that who, of who he was. He seemed to settle in. He was settled into prison life and, and, and actually, I think he probably enjoyed the two hours that we were together, got him out of whatever he was. And, you know, it was, it was interesting, an interesting kind of a situation. So, yeah, they say guys will, will try to do anything when he’s out there in Ad Max in Florence, Colorado, which is bad. It’s a, it’s a lonely existence in order to get out and, you know, mingling around with other prisoners as you’re then transferred and then take his handcuffs off and go into a room and get a cup of coffee with people that are, you know, not, you know, just have a certain amount of freedom.
[46:15]
Communicating Through the Sink: Scarpa and Gas Pipe’s Connection
[46:15]Absolutely. there’s one none i mean it’s an hour out it’s some other cell where you get to walk around you know yeah let me tell you one other thing and it’s interesting he was when he was a neighbor to to scarpa i asked both of them and i corroborate i asked scarpa and i corroborated it with with with gas pipe i said to scarpa how did you hey how did he tell you you know well do you are you because they don’t mingle they’re not because they’re both in segregation he goes you got to to understand he was next to me in the cell next to me and what we used to do was we would take a toilet paper roll when it was finished the paper was and you put it to the in the sink that is all the sinks are all connected and you blow out whatever water is in there and if you talk into the toilet paper roll and the other guy has his toilet paper roll and he has his ear to to his, he can understand what we’re, what we’re saying. He can, he can hear me. And I asked later on, I asked Casso the same thing. And he told me exactly the same story. He said, yeah, we talked through the sink. And, um, and that was, you know, that was, that was it. That’s how we, that’s how they would get messages to, to each other and discuss what’s going on and how things are. And that’s how we told him you’re going to see Vecchione. You got to tell him that he’s got to come back. So that’s my, that’s, that’s my, my, my adventures with, with gas pipe.
[47:41]
The Kansas City True Crime Writer Connection
[47:41]You just never know what’s going to happen. I have a guy actually, he’s a true crime writer in Kansas city. He’s mainly, he’s, he’s got a full-time job as a park ranger out West, but he’s originally from Kansas city and wrote a book about Kansas city. And he was checking on some people who are camping illegally at one of the national
[48:01]
Gas Pipe’s Surprisingly Calm and Polite Demeanor
[48:00]forest where he was working. And it was greg scarpa jr’s granddaughter i believe okay yeah yeah he’s got he has he has a bunch of granddaughters a bunch of grandkids i don’t know how many granddaughters he has yeah frank asker you know i said are you any kin to him because he’s he’s on my podcast group and listens to me and everything and yeah he stays up on this he said oh yeah that was my grandfather father i mean my my year with uh yeah i had scarpa with me for a year during the time that i needed him and what was working with him that was another whole interesting situation about him and and what is how his father treated him and things of that nature another for another podcast okay all right we’ll do that that would be it would be good you spent a lot of personal time with him oh yeah oh yeah that’s hard to find that kind of uh firsthand that’s why i ask you the aura of gas pipe castle So, because you look at his picture, his mugshot and he does look a little bit like the devil and that’s his tough guy.
[49:01]No, make no bone. I make no, you know, I don’t say that he wasn’t, he was, he gave off the idea that he was polite, but you knew that you shouldn’t mess with him. That would be, that would be the way I would characterize it. Interesting. Yeah. It’s always interesting that these guys talk as if you and I are talking about golf or something and talking about killing people or hiding bodies and doing something with the body. It’s just like they’re, they’re distance personally, they’re distanced from that a little bit. They don’t really affect them.
[49:30]Absolutely. Crazy. All right. Well, Michael, that’s your own. I really appreciate you coming on and telling this story and guys, don’t forget to look down in the show notes for links to his books. He’s got several of them and they’re good books. And if you didn’t read Luigi, the zip, that’s a, that’s a really interesting story. Unknown mob story of New York city. I think, you know, everything about New York city mafia, read that one. You’re going to find out a lot more and their relationship. To Sicilians already. Also, that’s another interesting thing is that relationship to Sicilians. I interviewed a guy from Sicily that was connected to the Bonanno family for a while. And he, it was right to me. It was interesting because he talked, he told the story of somebody that nobody knew anything about. He wasn’t really even that much of a criminal. He was a bookie and did a lot of things with them. And it’s just, you get this different idea about what, what that life inside that family is like day to day. And Luigi the Zip, he did that. Luigi was in it, boy. That’s for sure.
[50:35]All right. Thank you, Gary. I really appreciate the time and thank you for the, for the ads, for my books. I really hope that your listeners and readers, I’m sorry. And your, your viewers will, will go to them. I think that they’ll, they’ll enjoy them. All right. Thank you, Michael.
[50:54]
Reflections on Michael Vecchione’s Contribution to Fighting Organized Crime
[50:51]Have a good one. All right. Talk to you later. Well, guys, that was great. Great. I really like Michael Baccione. I really hope we’ll do some more with him and I hope he continues to do more and he has greatest success because he spent his time in the trenches in the Brooklyn Rackets Division. You know, you can imagine what that life was like. And he had some long, hard days as anybody that gets into this fight knows, because it’s 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If you’re going to do anything to help prosecute or to prosecute organized crime or the mob because they’re out there 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Don’t forget. I like to ride motorcycles.
[51:27]I don’t investigate organized crime anymore. I just research it. If you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to that VA website. I’ve got, if you’re on YouTube, I’ve got the screen grab of the website on the screen. If you have a problem with drugs or alcohol, which goes hand in hand with PTSD, be sure and check out Anthony Ruggiano. He has his own website. He’s got a hotline number on that. And he’s a drug and alcohol counselor down in Florida. So that would be cool. Have him be your drug and alcohol counselor. Don’t forget to like and subscribe, you know, punch that button down below. And if you’re on YouTube, so you’ll subscribe and you can subscribe on the Apple podcast app. Also give me a review. If you think about it, it’s hard to figure out how to do. I know that I love your comments on my YouTube channel, particularly. I really love your comments on that. I interact with a lot of people on that. Plus my gangland wire podcast, Facebook group, and it’s a private group. Now it’s got 60,000 people on it and we get a lot of great stuff on there a lot of great pictures a lot of good conversation from people who are in the know live the life or live in the neighborhoods of the life and if you can’t figure out how to get to it through facebook get hold of me and we’ll get you invited to it for sure you just got to be on facebook and like and subscribe like i said and don’t forget keep coming back i got a new podcast every week and quite often i’ll have a bonus episode in between. So thanks a lot guys.

The Gentleman was a Thief Sep 02, 2024

Dean Jobb, author of “A Gentleman and a Thief,” discusses his passion for writing about true crime stories and bringing history to life creatively. He focuses on the Jazz Age thief, Arthur Barry, known for daring jewel heists and his gentlemanly demeanor during crimes. Jobb delves into Barry’s heists, interactions with high society, and relationship with his wife, Anna Blake. The lack of sophisticated investigative techniques in that era allowed Barry to outsmart law enforcement, adding a thrilling element to the narrative. The cat-and-mouse game between Barry and Chief Detective Harold King highlights Barry’s antihero persona, making him a character that readers might root for despite his criminal activities.

click here to buy Dean Jobb’s book A Gentleman and a Thief: The Daring Heists of a Jass-Age Thief.

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[0:00]Guys, this is Gary Jenkins. As you all know, you regulars know, I’m a retired intelligence unit detective of the Kansas City Police Department and now a podcaster. And I have a couple of documentary films that deal with the Kansas City Mafia. But today we’re not talking about me. Today we’re talking to Dean Jobe. He wrote a heck of a book. The publicist for the book producer sent me a copy of the book. I don’t read all these guys, as you know, but I do start reading them and I make notes from them. But this one, I started reading it and I loved it. I was hooked. I read the whole thing all the way through. It’s called A Gentleman and a Thief, The Daring Jewel Heist of a Jazz Age Rogue, Arthur Barry. Now, Arthur Barry was a jazz age rogue, if there ever was one. So let me, I’m gonna read you a review before we start talking. A top shelf work of true crime, Job tells Barry’s tale with both rigor and pathos. Painting a tender portrait of a crook who was never fearsome.
[1:02]This is liable to steal the reader’s hearts. That’s from Publishers Weekly, and it is a great book. There’s no doubt about it. So, Dean Jobes, welcome, and start off talking a little bit about your own writing history and how you got onto this story and some background on you, and then we’ll talk about the book. Well, I’m a former journalist, and over the years I’d written books. My beat as a reporter was covering the courts, covering criminal trials and anything going on in the courthouse. And my background was in history, and the two kind of collided in a nice way that I started writing features about old cases in Nova Scotia, Canada, where I live, and just got hooked with the storytelling, the way that true crime can give you a window on the past and dramatic events, interesting storylines. But you can also learn a lot about history. So about 10 years ago, Algonquin Books, my publisher, published Empire of Deception, and it was about a Chicago con man in the 20s, the jazz age. I love the era. Connection to me was when his Ponzi scheme collapsed, he hid out here in Nova Scotia. So I had some local ties to that story.
[2:12]My last book was called The Case of the Murderous Dr. Cream about a Victorian era doctor who murdered as many as 10 people, most of them women, in three countries over a 15-year span. And it’s subtitled The Hunt for a Victorian Era Serial Killer because that was my focus. I wanted to know how he got away with it, which led me to understand a lot about the horrible plight of women in the Victorian era, the privilege that a doctor could use to avoid suspicion.
[2:44]And a lot about the era and the primitive early detection methods and forensics. So I teach part-time in a master’s program in creative nonfiction, and that’s what I bring to my books. The creative part not being…
[3:01]Making anything up, but the storytelling, creatively recreating scenes, recreating people and places, always faithful to, always well-researched and grounded in research, but really trying to bring history to life. And because of my background in legal coverage, I just gravitate to true crime stories. You sure did bring to life Arthur Berry, There’s no doubt about it. And the Jazz Age and the subculture that he operated in, both the criminal subculture and the subculture of the F. Scott Fitzgeralds of the world, of the very wealthy during this time. And so it just came alive to me. It was like reading a crime novel in a way. It was really, really well written. Well, I’ve described it as Catch Me If You Can meets The Great Gatsby, and that’s not really a stretch. Every good croak needs police on his tail, and there’s plenty in this story. But as well, The Great Gatsby was written during Barry’s heyday in the early 20s, and it described mansions and areas and the whole culture of New York’s upper crust on Long Island. In the exact places where Barry was casing mansions, crashing parties to find out where the jewels might be, and then breaking in later to steal what today would be millions and millions of dollars in jewelry.
[4:29]Yeah, it was amazing the amount of jewels that he stole and what it would have been worth. Of course, he got basically maybe 20% of what it was actually worth, which that’s the way a thief is. I mean, then they just go back and steal more. It’s not like they had to invest money into it. So he was truly a second story, man, too, is another thing I noticed about that. We talk about second story, man, this guy, Arthur Barry was a second story, but there’s no doubt about it. Yeah, the term may not be as well known today, but it really, it fit a fellow, Barry Zamo was this. He started out, he’d case a mansion and somebody he figured would have valuables, jewels up in their possession.
[5:11]And while the family was at dinner, he would find a ladder on the estate or nearby and put it up against the window, sneak in, sneak out, and of the second story. So he became very adept at that. And as time went on, he had to get a little more brazen because sometimes when people were home or weren’t home, they had their jewels on them. So he had to pick his time. And he discovered when people were home safely in bed was the time you could count on the jewels being there. So he would try to sneak into bedrooms and if he if he did confront somebody he was always gentle i mean the newspapers were calling him the gentleman bandit they didn’t know who it was but the this this kindly bandit who would assure people no you know don’t worry i’m only here for the jewels i won’t hurt you and sometimes even ask them how their night out was so he would try to put them at ease so he could go about his real job of finding and taking all the jewels.
[6:10]Really? And that Livermore heist was probably one of the best examples of that. So tell us about the Livermore heist.
[6:17]Well, this is one of his later ones, but it’s in the period. He’s for years looted mansions in Westchester County, north of Manhattan, and then in the Nassau County area of Long Island. And often those houses were empty or people were downstairs. But by 1920, his MO is, he has an accomplice to help him because it’s riskier confronting people in their homes. He’s been shot at. He knows the next time he breaks in, someone could have the drop on him and he could be looking down the barrel of a gun. So he gets a little muscle to help him, but he still has this put people at ease. And in the Livermore case, it started to become the heist from hell because they they figured the jewels were in a safe and livermore who was a wall street a gambler of the highest order and probably thought he could think these two hoods kept saying he couldn’t open the safe and one of the guys goes down the ladder again to get a chisel and a hammer to break the safe open so it means barry’s in the room a long time and he’s putting the the people people at ease. But Dorothea Livermore, the wife, starts thinking, you know, maybe I can play on this guy’s natural goodness. And he’s already taken some jewels, and she actually talks him into giving back a few rings for her and her husband that they said were like these pinky rings were so sentimental value.
[7:45]So he gallantly gave jewels back, which prompted his.
[7:51]His accomplice to say, let’s get out of here while we still got something.
[7:54]And they still did get lots of loot. But it was just this very rightly later claim that any other burglar is going to think this is nuts. But yeah, I did it. It seemed like the right thing to do. I gave back the loot as I was in mid-robber. Really. And another story I found interesting was maybe a little bit earlier in his career when he went out and partied with the Duke of Wales, who was the next king of England. And it was partying in one of these Long Island mansions. And, you know, if you’ve ever driven out in Long Island, I would have gotten New York listeners who probably had driven out. I was there once these huge mansions that sit back away from the road and, you know, with large grounds around them and, you know, right on the ocean and, and it would be easy to sneak up to them and then crawl up the side. Your worry would be if one of the staff happened to walk out or something. So, but, but he, they were having parties and he would infiltrate these parties. So tell us about that, his infiltration of parties. He had many methods. He would read the social pages and get a sense of who was around, who was in Palm Beach.
[8:59]He would figure out who’s rich and where they lived. Some wives, socialites, would appear in photos resplendent in their pearls and jewels. So this would help him and say, there’s a good target. But one of his methods was simply to put a tux on, jump over the wall of an estate, sneak up to the house and suddenly blend into a garden party, grab a cocktail like he belonged.
[9:24]And he was handsome. He knew how to dress. He knew how to feign an upper class accent. He was a working class Irish kid from Worcester, but he pulled it off. Incredibly charming. I mean, he was like a con man in these settings. But what he was doing was mingling and then finding an excuse to wander upstairs. And what he wanted to do was, where’s the master bedroom? Where are the jewels likely to be later? Which rooms should I open the window to unlock the window so I can get in? Is there an alarm system? He’s casing the joint is what he’s doing. But at this one particular party in 1924, the guest of honor was the Prince of Wales. Yes, the future Edward VIII, who was visiting Long Island in a well-publicized party holiday, and Barry bumps into him. And the people around the prince, the prince is saying, you know, he’s so constrained by royal duties, he’d love to see the town. And, Barry, who’s calling himself Dr. Gibson quite grandly, says, well, let’s go to town. I’ll show you around the speakeasies of Midtown Manhattan. And that’s what he does. So he spends this incredible night with the Prince of Wales.
[10:42]
The Night with the Prince of Wales
[10:39]And I had to start the book with this because it was just a gift. I mean, it was incredible because it really set the tone for how slick he was. But of course, it’s all leading to, he’ll come back a few nights later and try his luck at the jewels. Yeah, here’s this working class kid from, I guess, the Boston area. But he knew the underculture, underbelly, the seamy underbelly of New York City. And so he brings the Duke of Wales and introduces him around. I can imagine what some of his friends, people that knew him thought, like, how does he do this? Well, his wife later said they went to one of these restaurants or speakeasies and everyone was sort of like looking at Barry and she had no idea why. And even a waiter comes over and says, how’s the prince tonight? And finally fessed up that he’d had this encounter. out or but but it it wasn’t just as a as a patron barry was truly what they called a plunger and that’s the best way to say where that’s playing came from was he plunged into the nightlife of jazz age new york so he’s like nathan detroit a runyon-esque character from guys and dolls he’s he’s playing craps all the time usually losing which means he has to steal more money to to gamble. He probably was probably a gambling addict. He said he enjoyed gambling more than sex.
[12:06]And yeah, he lived that seedy sort of underworld life and knew some pretty bizarre characters, some dangerous, not so dangerous, some other con men. And of course, they, They all, at least on the surface, seemed to not realize what the others were doing. And sure enough, Barry passed himself off as a successful salesman who was pretty good at gambling to explain why he was often flush with cash. And a lot of people seem to have bought into that.
[12:36]Interesting. Let’s talk a little bit about his wife. He was Anna Blake. She was the love of his life. And she becomes an integral part of his life because when he gets caught, it, then he breaks out of prison and they lay low for quite a while. So tell us about Anna Blake. She’s kind of an interesting character. She stuck with him because she wasn’t really from the criminal underworld. It didn’t seem like she was in love with the guy. Not at all. And I was really pleased as I did the book that I was able to find out as much as I could about her because she’s kind of a shadowy character. In fact, to the point where surviving family members of Barry’s family who knew him while he was still alive. He lived till 1981.
[13:19]Young nieces and nephews were young at the time. I interviewed them now and they didn’t know he was married. So it was kind of like a forgotten family secret. But he meets Anna Blake, who is a district captain in the Tammany Hall organization. So she’s part political worker, part social worker. She’s on the ground responsible responsible for several blocks of what was then sort of the southern edge of Harlem. And she’s recently widowed. She meets Barry, falls hard for him. And I think truly, she had no idea what he did. Like everyone else, she thought he was just a successful salesman and gambler. But he’s obviously smitten with her because in 1927, after the Livermore or robbery we talked about, he is arrested and Anna’s with him.
[14:11]And worse, he’s made the mistake of giving her a ring he’d stolen. It wasn’t particularly valuable, but it was identified as loot from an earlier robbery.
[14:22]So she was about to be charged as an accessory. And certainly the police and the DA were putting the pressure on using this threat as pressure.
[14:35]
Anna Blake: The Love of His Life
[14:33]So Barry confessed to make sure she walked free. And so gentleman to the end he did a gentlemanly the gallant thing and she you know she talked about how you know this this destroyed her world but she stuck by him as you said and within a couple of years he’s going to break out of prison to be with her and that part of the story again as a writer of of non-fiction you know you want to you can’t you can’t make up things to fill in the gaps, but you keep researching and hoping. And I found seven or eight installment of my story, my life of love and fear with the world’s greatest jewel thief is what it was. It was headlined, but it was Anna Blake’s confessional. It was everything from how they met to what happened when she found out what he really did to their life on the run for years. And a lot of that material I would not have found. And of course, I had her voice. She was telling it firsthand. So yeah, she was a remarkable character. And a very strong woman, endured incredible heartbreak with dignity. And she was reviled in the press. A lot of reporters made it clear they did not believe that she wasn’t an accomplice, but I believe her.
[15:55]Interesting. Another thing is, you know, cops at the time were not the most professional and he didn’t have the scientific advances. Of course, there’s no cameras, there’s no DNA, none of that. And a sophisticated criminal like this can pretty easily duck most policemen, especially back then and most law enforcement. Now, they started hiring private detectives to go after people,
[16:23]
The Great Retrievers: Private Detectives on His Trail
[16:21]Some are former cops, I think. And so tell us about, there was a pretty interesting characters of those private detectives. Tell us a little bit about those private dicks that would chase after him. The private detectives, the insurance companies would often hire private detectives because they were looking to, well, recover jewels if they could. So if someone could find out who did it, they might get the jewels back. There became sort of an underground, less than honest way of doing this is if you could pay, if you could find the crooks and pay them, say, the 10 or 20% they get from a fence, you could get the jewels back and you don’t have to pay out any more money. So instead of paying the full $750,000 to replace jewelry insured to that level, you might pay $75,000.
[17:09]So Noel Scaffa is one of the private detectives who was actually, he was nicknamed the great retriever because he was so good at retrieving jewels. And Barry dealt with him in one of his big heists. And for a jewel thief like Barry, well, this is great because he doesn’t have to fence the jewels. He doesn’t have to worry about getting them out of settings or whatever. He’s got a guy who’ll just pay him, basically act like a fence good. Another private detective, well, the Burns Detective Agency was put on Barry’s tail by Percy Rockefeller, nephew of J.D. Rockefeller of Standard Oil fame because Barry robbed his place and again they didn’t know exactly who they were looking for but they were on his case but Barry’s biggest nemesis became in the private detective world was Val O’Farrell who was a very shady character in the 20s a former New York policeman let go for shady dealings I found a lot of material in FBI file on him that made it clear that the licensing authorities in New York were desperate to pull his license, but they couldn’t quite pin anything on him. But Val O’Farrell becomes important in a couple of ways. He is instrumental in Barry’s arrest through some of his contacts, and then when Barry’s on the run.
[18:37]He accuses Barry. In 1932, Barry was hiding out in New Jersey. And the crime celeb of that year, of course, in New Jersey, was the Lindbergh kidnapping. So with Barry on the lam, and the newspapers every once in a while when there’s a major jewel heist, they’d say, must be the work Arthur Barry.
[19:01]Now, he’s not. He’s not pulling these crimes, but his name is out there again. So, Val O’Farrell just weaves this thing and says, well, the kidnapper went to the second floor, used a ladder, wasn’t heard. That’s Barry Zemo. Now, Barry never kidnapped anybody, let alone a kid. He was a jewel thief. But this stuck. And actually, when Barry was finally caught, he was treated like a serious suspect. And this was before Bruno Hoppen was eventually arrested and put on trial for that crime. So, so yeah, private detectives were always in the background here, but Barry’s biggest nemesis was a guy named Harold King who was chief of detective in Nassau County. And he was a really progressive cop and he was under a lot of pressure from a lot of rich people to stop these, these, this marauder. And I mean, other than a brief shootout, he never really got close to him until 1927 when he finally, by luck, there was a tip-off and Barry fell into his hands. Well, that’s quite a story. I tell you what, Dean, I really enjoyed this story
[20:12]
Wrapping Up with Dean Jobe
[20:09]and I enjoyed having you on, talking to you in person. It was a great book, guys. A Gentleman and a Thief, the Durian Jewel Heist of a Jazz Egg Rogue named Arthur Barry.
[20:20]So you might want to take a look at that. He truly was a second story, man. I really appreciate you coming on the the show, Dean. Okay. Well, thank you. Look, I appreciate the chance to talk about them. If there’s any other little story you want to tell, feel free.
[20:36]No, I just hope readers, I hope realize we haven’t given it all away. There’s lots here to unlock. But I was really drawn to him because he’s an antihero. He’s a bad guy. Yeah, but he never hurt any of his victims. I mean, he invaded their privacy, maybe shattered their security. But these were people who could afford jewels and probably had them insured. And that means I think readers can’t help at times, a lot of times, rooting for him. you know, and as he, as he one-ups the, the rich and powerful and famous. Really? I believe. Well, guys check this book out and don’t forget, I like to ride motorcycles. So watch out for motorcycles when you’re out there on the street. And if you have a problem with PTSD and you’ve been in the service, be sure and go to the VA website, get that hotline number. And if you have a problem with drugs or alcohol, go see our friend, former Gambino soldier, Anthony Ruggiano is now a drug and alcohol counselor down in Florida. There’s a hotline on his website and like, and subscribe and come back, tell your friends about the show. And one more time, Dean Joe. Thank you. Thank you.

Sal Locascio: Master Of Making Money! Aug 29, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary shares a captivating story about the Gambino family’s best earner, Sal LoCascio. He highlights the family’s significance as big moneymakers, like Family boss Paul Castellano, a major earner. Jenkins shares intriguing details about a surveillance video he came across showing mob members at the Ravenite, sparking his interest in a moneymaker named Salvatore “Sal” LoCascio. Locasio’s frequent visits to the Ravenite drew attention to the Gambino family’s activities, leading to an investigation that uncovered a high-tech scheme in the late 90s involving internet and telephone services. Jenkins tells how LoCascio and Richie Martino orchestrated elaborate scams, including creating deceptive porn websites that charged visitors through hidden fees. The interview explores the intricate web of fraud, spanning from porn sites to phone cramming operations, all orchestrated by members of the Gambino family.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction to Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police detective [0:00]Hey, all you wiretappers out there, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective and sergeant by the time I got done, by the time I retired. Anyhow, I’m back here in the studio with another story about the Gambino family. You know, Gambino families were really a hell of a family. They were big moneymakers, you know, and Castellano was one of the bigger moneymakers. I don’t know what God he was thinking of. He wanted the power, but Castellano, under him, they really made the money. I’m going to tell you about one of the bigger moneymakers that I just stumbled across. [0:39]A lot of you guys may already know about it, but I was watching some video on YouTube, and I saw this surveillance video. It was really good. It was like they were right there on the street of some cars and people coming [0:53] Introduction to Sal “Tor” Locasio at the Ravenite [0:52]and going from the Ravenite. And this was after a guy he had taken over as you know if he’s going in and out of the ravenite and it showed a guy pulling up in a big black lincoln and looked like a mafia staff car and going in so i made a little short on it and i threw it out on my youtube channel and i said who are these guys and so they named this was sal salvator or tor locasio was going into the ravenite and actually that’s what brought all the gambino family into this conspiracy because he was in and out of the ravenite so much he had dumb ass john god he made everybody come in there all the time and you know say hey there’s a mob guy now let’s go see what he’s doing i’ve done that you see a guy coming and going and he’s talking with with you know real deal mafia members and he may or he may be a relative and then in this case his dad was frank locascio who was uh. [1:51]Longtime Capo and longtime Gambino family member and became Gotti’s consigliere. Locasio kind of, you know, he hadn’t really been that high profile during his time. Sal, or Tor, as they called him, Tor Locasio, had not been that high profile. [2:07]That was one of the reasons that the Gambino family ended up going down. Because, you know, what you do is you see that guy and then let’s go take a look at him. Let’s go get his trash.

Mrs. Mandelbaum and New York Organized Crime Aug 26, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Margalit Fox joins the Gangland Wire podcast to discuss her book, “The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum: The Rise and Fall of an American Organized Crime Boss” which delves into the story of the early fence Mrs. Mandelbaum. Mrs. Mandelbaum operated a successful New York City criminal empire focusing on stolen luxury goods and bank robbery for 25 years, evading jail time. Margalit explores how Mrs. Mandelbaum treated property crime as a business, offering discounts on luxury goods to cater to the middle class. The interview highlights Mrs. Mandelbaum’s organizational skills, elaborate front shop for her operations and involvement in major bank robberies. The discussion showcases Mrs. Mandelbaum’s strategic planning, financial investments, and the blurred lines between legitimate business and criminal enterprises at her dinner parties. The interview provides fascinating insights into Mrs. Mandelbaum’s pioneering role in early organized crime, shedding light on forgotten aspects of women’s history and criminal entrepreneurship in the 19th century. #newyorkcity #organizedcrimegroups #organzedcrime Click here To Buy The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum: The Rise and Fall of an American Organized Crime Boss. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! [0:00]Well, hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there. It’s good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Sergeant. And I have a another story for you today from the author of The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum. Now, you guys know what fencing is. If you don’t, a fence is a person that buys stolen goods from a criminal. And it’s extremely lucrative. I mean, it’s really, really lucrative and it’s hard to investigate, hard to really make a case on anybody. And my guest today, Margalit Fox, has written a book about one of the earliest fences in the United States who was, again, immensely successful. So Margalit, welcome. I really appreciate you coming on the show and telling the guys about The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum. Thank you so much, Gary. It’s my pleasure. So The Talented Mrs. Mandelbaum, which was just published by Random House last week, tells the true story of the first major organized crime boss in America. Now, all of us, when we think of a crime boss, we either think of Tony Soprano, or if we’re a certain age, we think of something from The Untouchables, a big, strapping, tough guy with spats and a Tommy gun during prohibition and emphasis on the word guy. However, the first. [1:28]Big deal. Crime boss in America was none of those things. It was a nice, zoftig Jewish mother of four named Mrs. Mandelbaum, who came here in steerage in 1850 with nothing more than the clothes on her back, and two decades later was running the most successful, most lucrative, one of the most extensive crime networks in America. She operated with complete impunity for 25 years, not spending a day in jail. Her modest haberdashery shop on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, disguised a criminal empire that centered on stolen luxury goods like silk and silver and diamonds, and eventually diversified into bank robbery. She had working for her an army of the country’s foremost shoplifters, housebreakers, and bank burglars whom she had personally recruit...

10 Legendary Black Gangsters Aug 22, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I explore the history of 10 Legendary Black Gangsters, highlighting key figures and organizations from the 1920s to the present day. We discuss the evolution of black organized crime in cities like New York, Detroit, Chicago, and Philadelphia, focusing on prominent individuals such as Nicky Barnes, Samuel Christian, Frank Matthews, and Larry Hoover. The narrative also investigates the international connections of figures like Jeff Fort, founder of Chicago’s El Rukan, and Demetrius Flanory of the Black Mafia Family (BMF). Finally, I look at the emergence of street gangs like the Crips and Bloods in South Central LA. Additionally, we touch on iconic figures like Ellsworth Bumpy Johnson and cinematic portrayals of gangster life in popular media. #blackgangster #gangster #bloods #crips #mafia #organizedcrimegroups #elrukanSupport the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction to Black Gangsters [0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. As most of you know, this is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. And I have a story today. [0:15]Correction on that. I have a show today that’s going to… Correction on that. I’m going to talk… Correction on that. Today, I’m going to talk about the top 10 black gangsters in all of kind of recorded history, if you will. Now, going back before the war, back in the 30s and 20s, there were black gangsters, but nobody really talked much about them. Going on up into the 40s and 50s, especially the 50s, newspapers started covering that kind of thing. And so there was quite a few pretty well-known guys that were part of their community. And they were, you know, professional criminals. They had an organization. They weren’t exactly the mafia, but they had something going on. It was all built around drugs, I believe, because that was the crime that you can make some real money at. So a big rise of this in the 60s and 70s as civil rights came in and, you know, like after the riots of 1968, There’s a huge shift in really in the black communities and in covering by the newspapers and covering black crime and by the police and their response to black crime. So let’s talk about those days, you know, New York, Detroit, Chicago, Philadelphia are kind of the most well-known cities when it comes to the history of black organized crime. [1:42]There were syndicates like the council headed by Nicky Barnes in New York and Philadelphia’s Black Mafia. You may have heard of that. I think I did a show of us around the more later Black Mafia with Sean Patrick Griffin. A man named Samuel Christian led that one in Philadelphia and, you know, illegal gambling and drug drug trafficking. But they also got into fencing, you know, and in Kansas City, we had a Black Mafia or at least what we did. The newspaper’s called the Black Mafia, led by a guy named Doc Dearborn and his partner, Eugene Richardson. And then the Kelton brothers had an organization. And I remember we even stopped a kid named James Calvin Bradley who just got out of the penitentiary. He was an armed robber. And the Kelton brothers had not only a heroin organization going, they had crews of young kids that were going out robbing banks. [2:40]

Joe Massino – Died in Witness Protection Aug 19, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I start with FBI agent Doug Fencl telling the story of revealing Joe Pistone’s true identity as an undercover agent to Bonanno-Capo Sonny Black. This revelation set off a chain of events leading to the downfall of high-ranking members of the Bonanno crime family, including boss Joe Massino. Delving into Joe Messino’s background, we explore his ruthless rise within the mob and the cunning maneuvers he orchestrated to maintain his criminal empire. Despite his affable facade, Joe Massino proved to be the most dangerous among his peers, orchestrating numerous murders and hits. As we encounter the seemingly unassuming Joey Massino, we witness his surprising criminal activities and his eventual rise in the mob scene, earning him the moniker Big Joey for his illicit ventures. Bonanno boss Rusty Rastelli mentored Big Joey as he went into various criminal enterprises, showcasing his intelligence, adaptability, and willingness to resort to violence. Through interviews and investigations, we uncover the intricate workings behind Joey’s criminal operations and his ascent within the mob ecosystem, from truck hijackings to becoming a trusted fence for stolen goods. The narrative delves into the power struggles and violent actions within the Mafia, precisely honing in on Joe Messino’s team and their meticulously planned murders, including the hit on three capos and the involvement of Donnie Brasco. Joe Messino’s adept money laundering tactics and his unwavering loyalty to Rusty Rastelli come to the forefront as we witness the intricate web of crime and consequences within the Mafia unfold. Ultimately, financial investigations and FBI infiltration led to the demise of Messino and his cohorts like brother-in-law Sal Vitale, underscoring the treacherous landscape of organized crime. Our exploration extends to Barry Weinberg, who evaded millions in taxes through illicit means before law enforcement capitalized on his vulnerabilities to transform him into an informant. This catalyzed a series of revelations about mob activities within the Bonanno family, culminating in the shocking turn of events where Joe Massino, the powerful boss, transitions into a government informant. Through strategic legal maneuvers and riveting courtroom drama, the formidable mob empire crumbles, bringing Massino’s reign of terror to a dramatic end. Join us as we unravel the chilling narrative of betrayal, survival, and the downfall of crime lords, shedding light on the dark underbelly of organized crime. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Peter Savino Takes Down the Chin Aug 12, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Larry McShane joins the podcast to discuss Vincent “The Chin” Gigante, focusing on Peter Savino, a key player in convicting Gigante. Larry wrote a book, “Chin: The Life and Times of Vincent Gigante,” detailing Gigante’s rise to power in the Genovese crime family. Gary learned that Savino went into Witness Protection and lived out his life in Kansas City. Savino’s role in the Windows case, where mob-operated companies rigged bids for window contracts in NYC, is discussed. Despite health issues, Savino’s testimony against Gigante proved crucial in court. The dynamic between Gigante and Savino, including their business dealings and personal connection, is explored. The podcast delves into the intricacies of organized crime, witness protection, and the downfall of Gigante, showcasing Larry’s expertise in mob history. Larry’s other book on Philadelphia mob boss Ralph Natale piques interest for future discussions. Click here to get Larry McShane’s Mob books. The Chin! Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Well, Hey guys, welcome back to the studio gangland wire. I’m on the zoom call here with Larry McShane. We were going to talk about the chin, but we’re going to talk more about one of the guys that, that really locked in the conviction on Vincent, the chin gigante back in the day and, and forced him to actually admit that it was all an act. This crazy bit was all an act. Larry, I really appreciate you coming on the show and you kind of are the, one of the experts on Vincent the Chin Gigante, you wrote the book. So first of all, tell us a little bit about the book. And I’ll put pictures of it on the YouTube and I’ll have links to Larry’s book and the show notes, guys. Yeah. The name of the book is Chin, the Life and Times of Vincent Gigante. [0:49]And it sort of traces his ascension from, you know, the son of Italian immigrants who settled in Greenwich Village, to his rise to the top of the Genovese crime family in the early 80s. I think the Genovese were kind of regarded as, I think the term they used to use was like the Ivy League of the New York mob. He ran it for a good long time until they finally convicted him in 1997, I believe. And one of the reasons, the biggest reason his reign was so long is because he managed to perplex prosecutors by pretending that he had a mental illness. [1:39]And his lawyers would argue in court that he was not mentally fit to stand trial. And this dragged on for a long time. I mean, there’s famous stories. The cops came to arrest him one time, and he was standing naked in the shower holding an umbrella over his head. And he would wander. He lived on Sullivan Street in Greenwich Village. And for years, he never left there. You know, and you could see him. He had a social club right across the street from the apartment that he shared with his mom. And that’s where he did his business. Conversations about business were not done inside the club. You know, they were very worried about bugs or surveillance. And he and whoever he wanted to speak to would wander up and down Sullivan Street, you know, gigante in his ratty looking bathrobe and slippers. And again, this he took over in 1981 and it took 16 years before they could finally prosecute him.

Mafia Shootout in Kansas City Aug 05, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. The Kansas City Mafia enforces their rules on bar owners like Ferris Anthon even when they have to resort to deadly and drastic measures. In this episode, we recount the harrowing experience of Sheriff Tom Bash, a fearless lawman in Jackson County, Missouri, during the 1930s. Witness the gripping account of Sheriff Tom Bash’s confrontation with the Kansas City Mafia in a deadly ambush, showcasing his valor and dedication to upholding justice. Through a riveting shootout, Sheriff Bash emerges as a local hero, shining a light on the pervasive mob activities and corruption of the era. Despite facing legal challenges and political interference, Sheriff Tom Bash’s legacy of courage and integrity perseveres, symbolizing the unwavering fight against criminal influence and the steadfast commitment to the rule of law.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Introduction to Kansas City Mob Incident [0:00]Hey, all you wiretappers out there, and this is going to be a special bonus episode about a Kansas City mob incident that had never happened before, and it’s never happened since. Here’s the situation. An armed police officer is taking his family home after an evening out, and he drives right in the middle of a mob hit. Now, what are you going to do? Oh, my God, I got my family here. This guy he was a sheriff and and i’ll i’ll go back over a lot of this because i did this before i did this story before but i need to do a little opening a new opening because something else would happen anyhow what i want to do is give a shout out to a couple of gangland wire fans i met the other night now steve saint john my friend steve saint john’s been on the show several times you know he’s the guy that that actually my squad worked on him helped put him in the prison forgot God, he was there about 10 years and came back out. He’s gone straight, done pretty well. We’ve become friends. So he asked me to go to the Kansas City Goats game, which is our arena football team. His son, Stephen St. John, is like the top sports radio broadcaster. He has a show, Stephen St. John Show, here in Kansas City. [1:15]And so we’re watching the game. It’s a lot of fun. And all of a sudden I look over and I see to my right, there’s this beautiful girl or woman coming up. She’s got blonde hair and she gets closer. She’s got these beautiful green eyes and she’s smiling and looking at me and nodding like she knows me. And I’m thinking, I don’t know this. Who is this? And so she gets right to me. She stops and sticks out her hands and introduced herself as Connie said. She was a longtime podcast listener. She grew up in Kansas City. She grew up over what we call the Northeast. Her family knew some of these different mob associated people. And so I’m trying to keep my composure. And man, beautiful girl. She thinks I’m cool because I have this podcast. But it’d be that I’m not. I’m not. Steve’s sitting over here. He’s cracking up because he knew this was coming. He had run into her. He knew her from somewhere else. And he ran into her at the concession stand. She’s working at the concession stand as a fundraiser for St. Pius, which is the big premier Catholic high school. And so lots of times they’ll take over a concession stand and run that stand and they get to kee...

**Nick Annunziata – The Man Who Played Johnny Roselli** Jul 31, 2024
Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Gangland Wire, I speak with Nick Annunziata, known for his role as Chicago Outfit member Johnny Roselli in Mafia Spies. We discussed his experience portraying Roselli. Nick relates that part of his preparation was to contact Albert Anastasia’s son, who knew Johnny Roselli. We discuss some JFK assassination theories involving Roselli. Nick shares insights on working on several Sopranos Episodes. He played Eddie Pietro, underboss for Rusty Millio, played by the well-known singer Frankie Valli. In season six, titled Luxury Longue, Nick describes the scene in which Sicilian gunmen murder Rusty Millio and Eddie Pietro, as well as other memorable Soprano events. Nick emphasizes the value of authenticity, camaraderie among cast members, and staying true to his principles in the entertainment industry. Among other things, Nick Annunziata is a world-class poker player, a certified weapons instructor, a musician, and a screenwriter. Check out Nick’s music – AnnunziatA- “Los Angeles” on ITunes, Spotify or Amazon #mafiaspies #mafiahistory #organizedcrime #chicagooutfit #johnnyroselli **Support the Podcast** Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”
To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00]Hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire and I have a really unusual different show for you and I know you’re going to like it. If you watch Mafia Spies that Thomas Meyer I interviewed a couple of weeks ago wrote that book and they created this docuseries about Johnny Roselli being involved with the CIA and trying to kill Castro and it’s a great docu-series. I just finished it myself, I think, this last weekend. Well, you got to watch it. Now, I have the actor, Nick Annuzziata, who played Johnny Roselli. Welcome, Nick. Nice to be here, Gary. Thanks for having me. So, Nick, you know, let’s talk about you playing Johnny Roselli. I just want to compliment you, first of all, and I don’t usually do this, as these guys know. [0:51]Thank you. I’m like Italian parents, you know, you got to do a lot to impress me. I mean, that’s the truth.

Mafia Spies: New Paramount Plus Docuseries Jul 22, 2024

Immerse yourself in the captivating world of Mafia Spies with Gary Jenkins, a retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective turned podcaster, as he welcomes special guest Thomas Maier, author of “Mafia Spies.” Thomas Maier provides unique insights into the JFK Assassination document release, offering a glimpse into the laborious process of sifting through countless pages with extensive redaction. Explore the intricate web of connections linking the JFK assassination, the Castro-CIA plot, and the involvement of notorious mobsters like Johnny Roselli and Sam Giancana. Journey into the covert operations conducted in Florida, where figures such as Santo Trafficante, head of the Miami mob, played a pivotal role. Gain a deeper understanding of the motivations driving Castro’s rise to power, the mob’s lucrative interests in Cuba’s thriving casinos, and the subsequent tensions with the U.S. government. Get an exclusive preview of the upcoming Paramount Plus docu-series, featuring expert commentary, gripping historical recreations, and colorful characters like Antoinette Giancana, offering a multifaceted perspective on this enthralling chapter of American history. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript 0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, glad to have you back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, a retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective turned podcaster, and I have a guest today and a show that I know all you guys in Chicago are going to be eating up and sharing with all your friends and telling people about because, as we know, there’s this It’s much discussed and many different theories about the murder of JFK and the mob involved and and the plot with Castro and Giancana and Johnny Roselli and and all these things. And I have a man, Thomas Mayer, who got all those JFK, that whole document dump that was released in the last few years and went through all that. And he created a book, Mafia Spies, which is also going to be a Paramount Plus docu-series. So you got to get Paramount Plus app to see that docu-series, I believe. But welcome, Thomas. Thank you, Gary. Thank you for having me. In fact, it comes out July 16th on Paramount Plus. So look forward to it. I mentioned the JFK document dump. [1:11]Tell us a little bit about what was that like? Like it was how many pages was that? It was just tons and tons of documents, much of which was had a lot of redaction. So that had to be really laborious to go through that. Right. Well, you know, it’s kind of like the little kid that has a pile of horse dung in there and said, you know, there must be a pony in there somewhere. [1:37]And, you know, there was no smoking gun, if you will, about JFK’s assassination directly. There was no surprises as to who may have done it besides Lee Harvey Oswald, who clearly was the assassin of JFK. But what it did provide was something that was really the missing link in the Warren Commission report, which was the fact that when the Warren Commission looked at, was charged with investigating JFK’s murder, Alan Dulles was put on the commission. He was the former head of the CIA who had been fired by JFK. And ironically, it was Bobby Kennedy who suggested Dulles go on that commission. But Dulles never disclosed to the other commission members that the CIA had the secret,

A Smuggler’s Blues: Adventures in Pot Smuggling Jul 15, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary talks with Tom Jenkins, the author of “The Next Run”. Tom recounts his experiences as a significant pot smuggler in the 60s. He shares fun stories of his adventures in Mexico and beyond. He details how he got started in smuggling, the evolution of the drug trade, and his close relationships with his Mexican contacts, particularly Abelardo. Tom also discusses the challenges and risks involved in smuggling, including the use of unconventional methods like hidden compartments in cars, plane landings in the desert, and dealing with flimsy suitcases for transporting drugs. Tom reflects on the changing attitudes towards narcotics over the years, mentioning the surge in marijuana dispensaries and the shift in perception from a mysterious substance to a recreational drug. He critiques the impact of narcotics on society, pointing out the devastating consequences of addiction and the flawed approach to drug enforcement. Tom also highlights his views on rehabilitation effectiveness for addicts and his observations as a physician regarding drug use.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Well, Hey, welcome all you guys out there. Glad to be back here in the studio of gang land wire. And I have a particularly interesting story. I, you know, I guys, you may, or you may not know what I get contacted by, uh, publicity companies and book companies all the time when they have a book that they think might be appropriate for the podcast. And so I got this and I always get the book and sometimes I read it. Sometimes I kind of glaze over and I’ll make notes out of it. Well, I got one. not too long ago called The Next Run. And those of you on YouTube, there it is. And I started reading it. And next thing I know, I’m like halfway through it and I haven’t put it down yet. It is a page turner. And we are lucky enough to have the author here and the man that lived this crazy, crazy life, Tom Jenkins. Welcome, Tom. [0:51]Thank you so much. Happy to be here. Well, it’s an honor to beat you, even though you were on the one side of the law and I was on the other all those years. But it’s really cool to beat you. And, you know, this whole marijuana thing, it’s it’s just gone crazy in the last few years. As you’ve noticed, anybody that’s of any age or pays attention to anything in the United States, there’s just there’s a daggone dispensary on every corner. Practically of every place I’ve been in the United States. Maybe there’s some states that don’t have it. And so I don’t know. There’s probably no more guys like you. There’s no more smugglers like you, are there, Tom? [1:35]I doubt it. Well, unless you look to the cartels, I think anyone would be absolutely crazy to try to get into this solo at this point. It’s all the cartels. Yeah, really. So what’s interesting, I think, is when you started, it was back in the 60s, and those of us that are a certain age, you know, we were in high school or just out of high school, maybe post-war baby boomers is what we are. Now we’re getting old, and pretty soon we’re going to finally die off and let the younger people run everything, which will probably be good. But, you know, there’s a lot of marijuana smoking, but there’s a lot of ditch weed.

Chicago’s Icepick: Pay or Die Jul 11, 2024

In this episode, Gary Jenkins, a retired Kansas City police detective, discusses the life of Jimmy “Ice Pick” Inendino, a prominent figure in the Chicago Outfit. Despite never holding a top leadership position, Inendino was a respected member known for his involvement in the criminal underworld. Jenkins delves into Inendino’s potential role as an informant, citing FBI documents that suggest he provided information on truck hijackings and other criminal activities. Jenkins explores Inendino’s connections to organized crime, detailing his association with the notorious Taylor Street Crew’s Wild Bunch and his role in enforcing the Outfit’s operations. He recounts an incident where Inendino and his associate, Harry Aleman, intimidated a bookmaker into paying tribute to the Outfit, showcasing their ruthless tactics in the criminal underworld. The podcast examines a specific event where Inendino and Aleman orchestrated the murder of a non-compliant bookmaker named Reitlinger, highlighting the brutality and coercion employed by the Outfit to maintain control over illegal operations. Jenkins narrates the chilling account of the hit, emphasizing the calculated and methodical approach taken by the perpetrators. Additionally, Jenkins sheds light on Inendino’s involvement in truck hijackings and the Chop Shop Wars, showcasing the violent and competitive nature of organized crime during that era. He speculates on Inendino’s dual role as both a criminal enforcer and a potential informant, offering insights into the complexities of navigating the underworld while potentially cooperating with law enforcement. The episode concludes with Jenkins reflecting on Inendino’s legacy and the intricacies of mob life in Chicago. Overall, the podcast paints a vivid picture of Jimmy Inendino’s criminal activities, his connections to the Chicago Outfit, and the ruthless tactics employed to maintain power and control in the underworld. Jenkins’ storytelling captures the intrigue and danger of organized crime, showcasing the complex interplay between loyalty, betrayal, and survival in a world where trust is a rare commodity.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Well, hey guys, welcome back to the studio. Gangland Wire, Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City police intelligence detective here. If you didn’t know, if you’re new to the show, anyhow, we got another show for you. I do. Me, me alone. No experts out there. Just me. I’m the expert on this one. James Jimmy I, or Jimmy I for ice pick, in Dandino. That’s a hard one to say, in Dandino. [0:25]He’s been long regarded. He was a loyal member of the Chicago Outfit, and he really, in the outfit, in the end, he was one of their top figures. He was never a big-time boss. I think he was the capo down in Cicero, which is, you know, where it all started in Chicago. He died of natural causes last year in 2023. So I was noodling around. I noticed some people did some stuff on him. [0:53] Jimmy I: The Informant Revelation [0:50]I was looking for some of these Chicago guys like that, which I think are really interesting. Interesting I did one on Chucky Nicoletti recently when I was noodling around I found out that it looked like Harry Aleman’s the one that killed Chucky typewriter Nicoletti and you know as far as his nickname Nicoletti I had a guy say that he had some letters tattooed on h...

Frank Morelli’s Journey: From Prison to Pasta Jul 08, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we learn about Frank Morelli’s remarkable journey, from owning a successful restaurant to starting a pasta company that went public. Frank was imprisoned for 38 months due to his involvement in reverse mergers and taking companies public. From Success to Struggle: Frank shares his story of success in the food industry, which took a tumultuous turn when his ventures into reverse mergers and taking companies public landed him in a federal detention facility for over three years. Prison Life and Unexpected Friendships: Despite the challenges of incarceration, Frank’s resilience shines through as he shares his experiences of regular workouts, extensive writing, and even becoming a suicide companion in the psychiatric ward. His unlikely friendship with Nikki Scarfo Jr., son of a notorious Mafia figure, adds a fascinating layer to his narrative. Diverse Connections: Frank’s circle of friends spans a diverse spectrum, from former Mafia members to individuals involved in criminal activities like the Pagan Motorcycle Gang and the Crips. Despite their backgrounds, Frank emphasizes the genuine friendships formed through his efforts to help them. Life After Prison: Upon release, Frank faced the daunting task of rebuilding his life. He discusses his experiences working various jobs and starting the MOBB brand, which is dedicated to promoting second chances. Reflections on Rehabilitation: Frank illuminates the stark differences in incarceration rates between the US and countries like Japan, advocating for a more rehabilitative approach to justice. His journey is a testament to the power of redemption and second chances. Cooking, Connections, and Healthy Living: Frank’s unique cookbook, intertwined with anecdotes from his Mafia-connected background, receives acclaim for its entertainment value and easy-to-follow recipes. With a focus on healthy living, Frank and host Gary highlight the importance of embracing second chances and making positive lifestyle choices. Conclusion: Frank’s journey from prison to pasta is an inspiring testament to resilience, redemption, and the transformative power of second chances. His story reminds us of the value of empathy, rehabilitation, and the pursuit of a healthier, brighter future.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Frank Morelli Speaker: [00:00:00] Well, hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I have a guest today Frank Morelli. Now Frankie or Frank Morelli is a cook and, and, and a healthy lifestyle guy, but he also served a certain amount of time in a federal. Institution with some guys like Nicky Scarfo Jr. And Frankie, the ice pick Narducci and guys like this now Mr. Morelli here Frank Morelli was not really a dyed in the wool criminal when he went in. We’re going to learn how he went in and learn about his cooking and his cookbook that has a lot of great Italian dishes. And, and I know we have lots of. Lots of fans, lots of Italian guys on here, but we have lots of fans of Italian cooking and anything Italian. So there’s, there’s a huge bunch of you guys I know will be interested in this cookbook and I’ve seen excerpts from it. He’s going to get me some there and I’ll do some giveaways,

F.B.I. Agent Killed! Jul 01, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I recount the thrilling tale of the Battle of Little Bohemia, a showdown involving infamous gangsters like John Dillinger and Babyface Nelson in the 1930s. The narrative vividly describes the chaotic raid on the Little Bohemia lodge by law enforcement under Melvin Purvis, showcasing a tense and dangerous confrontation filled with gunfights and dramatic escapes. The story delves into the planning challenges, unexpected twists, and tragic consequences, including casualties like Special Agent Carter Baum. The aftermath explores the criticism and emotional impact of the failed raid, offering a compelling insight into the relentless pursuit of justice and sacrifices made by law enforcement agents during that turbulent period.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers. Glad to be back here in studio Gangland Wire. I’m glad to have you here with me. You know, this is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective, now turned podcaster. [0:15] Inquiry from Greg Scavuzzo [0:11]And I have a show for you today that I’m kind of excited about. I did this a long time ago. I had a inquiry from Greg Scavuzzo on my YouTube channel. And Greg’s longtime listener, Kansas City guy, he said, hey, why don’t you ever do anything about those 30s bank robbers? We had a lot of those here around Kansas City. [0:39] Kansas City Massacre at Union Station [0:33]We had the, as you know now, by now, we have the Kansas City massacre down at the Union Station. So this month, I’m doing nothing but those 30s gangsters. And so I’ve got the Kansas City massacre at Union Station with Terrence O’Malley, [0:49] John Dillinger’s Escape from Little Bohemia [0:48]who’s a real expert on that. And I am doing the John Dillinger story, but not the John Dillinger escape from jail story. I am doing the John Dillinger escape from the Battle of Little Bohemia story, which is maybe not as well known. John Dillinger and his crew, after he escaped from jail at Crown Point, Indiana, he was on the lam. He got back in with some of his old buddies, Babyface Nelson and Homer Van Meter and two or three others. [1:17]And they were going around robbing banks and doing things and they needed to lay low. And the police, after that Crown Point jail thing, and they took that lady sheriff’s car and it was it was it hit the headlines. It was so flew in the face of law enforcement that people were starting to like back off from this. Hey, John Dillinger’s like Robin Hood thing. And law enforcement was after him. They were raiding pads in Chicago. They were raiding apartments. They were raiding places all over the Midwest. There were reports coming in from all kinds of, you know, he wouldn’t, if John Dillinger was in Northern Minnesota and a bank was robbed in Southern Missouri, John Dillinger got the credit and Clyde Barrow, Bonnie and Clyde, they got some of the same kind of a thing. People are always, you know, trying to say that was Bonnie and Clyde or that was John John Dillinger, because they were so well-known. Well, John Dillinger really was up in northern Wisconsin. [2:12]He and these gang members, Babyface Nelson in particular, and Homer Van Meter,

Union Station Massacre Part 3 Jun 24, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia as he interviews Kansas City Massacre expert Terence O’Malley. Today is June 18, 93 years after this event. This episode delves deep into the manhunt for the suspects, Pretty Boy Floyd, Verne Miller, and Adam Richetti. The Union Station Massacre was a significant event that shook the law enforcement community. We learn about the aftermath of the massacre, including the actions of infamous criminals like Pretty Boy Floyd, Adam Ricchetti, and Vern Miller. The narrative takes us through the events following the shootout at Union Station, including the individuals’ escape, pursuits, and ultimate fates. The intricate connections between different gangs, mobsters, and law enforcement agencies become apparent as we uncover how the Lazia gang aided Pretty Boy Floyd and Adam Ricchetti and later met tragic ends. Jimmy Needles LaCapra’s testimony sheds light on the inner workings of the criminal underworld and its interactions with law enforcement during that turbulent period. The relentless pursuit of justice and the repercussions of the massacre are explored, highlighting the intense crackdown on notorious criminals of the time. The episode also touches on how the Union Station Massacre differed from other criminal events due to the involvement of law enforcement officers, leading to heightened scrutiny and backlash against organized crime. Through historical accounts, personal anecdotes, and detailed investigations, we unravel the complexities surrounding the Union Station Massacre and its impact on the criminal landscape of that era. The final episode concludes with reflections on the significance of these events and the lasting repercussions felt by those involved. This comprehensive exploration offers a fascinating insight into a critical moment in criminal history and the relentless pursuit of justice that followed in its wake. Find Terence O’Malley’s documentaries at Black Hand Strawman. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] So welcome back, wiretappers, to the third in this series on the Union Station Massacre. You know, we’ve been through the day before and all the stuff that happened the day before, how they almost got caught in some little town down in South Missouri as pretty boy Floyd and Adam Reschetti are coming north. We learned what a drunk Adam Reschetti was and what happened when they got here in Kansas City, their hideout that’s still here in Kansas City. There’s a really nice house over there in what we call the Brookside neighborhood. And we learned all the shooting that day and how the guy they tried to break out of custody got killed himself. There was a mix up with guns that day and four officers got killed. It was just it was crazy that day. I really appreciate y’all tuning in. I hope you enjoyed this. As I said, Terrence O’Malley is a great storyteller. [0:53] Terrence O’Malley has the quintessential documentary that he made years ago about the Kansas City mob from Black Hand Days to Straw Man, which is the title of it, Black Hand Straw Man. Straw Man is the skimming from Las Vegas capers. And if you want a copy of that DVD, it’s not streaming anywhere. Get a hold of me, and I’ll get with Terrence, and we’ll make sure you get a copy. Don’t forget to like and subscribe,

Did Nicoletti Assassinate JFK? Jun 20, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we delve into the intriguing life of Charles “Chucky” Nicoletti, a notorious Chicago Outfit hitman known for his involvement in numerous mob hits and his alleged ties to significant events like the JFK assassination. Nicoletti’s background is painted with a turbulent upbringing, including shooting his father in self-defense, leading him to join the infamous 42 Gang alongside other notorious mob figures. His partnership with Milwaukee Phil Alderisio solidified his reputation as a feared hitter in Chicago. The episode explores Nicoletti’s involvement in high-profile hits, such as targeting the M&M brothers, which involved brutal torture methods made infamous in the movie “Casino.” His cold-hearted demeanor earned him the nickname “Typewriter,” though the moniker’s origin remains a mystery. Nicoletti’s demise came in 1977 when he was ruthlessly gunned down in his Oldsmobile in a suburban parking lot, suspected of being a part of internal mob conflicts as critical figures like Giancana, Richard Cain, and Mad Sam DeStefano faced similar fates. The narrative weaves through the intricate web of Chicago mob connections, hinting at ties to CIA operations, the JFK assassination, and the plot to kill Castro. The episode speculates on the possible motives behind Nicoletti’s assassination, pointing to shifting allegiances within the Outfit after the deaths of influential figures like Giancana and Ricca. The mysterious circumstances surrounding Nicoletti’s death, coupled with the demise of critical associates, emphasize the dangerous and volatile world of organized crime in Chicago during that era. Throughout the episode, the host reflects on the broader implications of Nicoletti’s story, urging caution on the roads and highlighting resources for PTSD, addiction, and seeking help. As the podcast delves deep into the underworld of Chicago mob history, the legacy of figures like Chucky Nicoletti serves as a chilling reminder of the ruthless nature of organized crime and its far-reaching consequences. #chicagooutfit #tonyaccardo #samgiancana #mafia #underboss #organizedcrimegroups Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kent City Police intelligence detective, here to bring you another mafia biography. You know, I’ve been doing these short bios to make sure everybody, when we talk about, we mention a name, you know, you have some place to go to say, hey, let’s look back on the website or because there’ll be like the whole transcript will be on the website and the synopsis of what I’m about to say about whatever mobster it is that I’m discussing. So we’re going to go to Chicago Outfit. In the 1960s, there was a man by the name of Charles Chucky Nicoletti, who was questioned by some FBI agents, one of whom was Bill Romer, Bill Romer Jr., who you all know, or a lot of you outfit guys will have heard of Bill Bill Romer, the FBI agent, he wrote several books, and he’s often cussed and discussed about how truthful he is in his books. He probably does use a little literary devices, a little literary license, as we say, to make a story come together and make it a little bit bett...

Union Station Massacre Part 2 Jun 17, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Today is June 17th, and exactly 93 years ago on this date, three desperados named Pretty Boy Floyd, Adam Richetti, and Verne Miller murdered four lawmen as they tried to break Frank Jelly Nash out of custody. In this episode, we delve into the detailed account of the Union Station Massacre with Terrence O’Malley, a renowned expert on organized crime in Kansas City. The incident involved a group plotting to liberate Frank Jelly Nash, a notorious bank robber, leading to a fatal confrontation at Union Station. As Terrence describes the events leading up to the massacre, a vivid picture emerges of law enforcement’s ill-fated attempt to transport Nash from Fort Smith to Leavenworth. The narrative unfolds with the assembling of lawmen at Union Station, including FBI agents and local police officers, to escort Nash. However, a mix-up with firearms escalates tensions, culminating in a deadly shootout as they prepare to depart in a car. Shots fired from inside the vehicle kill Frank Nash and Ray Caffrey, initiating a chaotic exchange of gunfire resulting in the deaths of several law enforcement officers. The aftermath of the massacre sees onlookers swarming the crime scene, hindering investigations. The city of Kansas City, already notorious for criminal activities, further solidifies its lawless reputation with this tragic event. As the podcast delves into the complexities of the Union Station massacre, intricate details emerge, including speculations on missing weaponry, law enforcement blunders, and the subsequent impact on the city’s history. The episode provides insights into the high-stakes nature of law enforcement operations during that era, highlighting the unpredictability of gun battles and the challenges faced by officers in such intense situations. Terrence’s storytelling expertise brings to life the cascading events that unfolded on that fateful day, shedding light on the complexities and repercussions of the Union Station Massacre. As the episode concludes, the host emphasizes the importance of awareness regarding PTSD and substance abuse, offering resources for those in need. Encouraging audience engagement through likes, shares, and subscriptions, the podcast aims to reach a broader audience while delving into intriguing historical accounts. The narrative, woven with personal anecdotes and historical insights, captivates listeners, offering a deeper understanding of the Union Station Massacre and its lasting impact on Kansas City’s history. Find Terence O’Malley’s work at Black Hand Strawman. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Introduction to Union Station Massacre Series [0:00] So hey guys, hey all you wiretappers out there, welcome back to the second in the three-part series on the Union Station Massacre. You know, I told you before, this is my friend Terrence O’Malley who did the quintessential documentary on the organized crime in Kansas City from the Black Hand days to the Straw Man days when they took off the Kansas City mob for skimming from Las Vegas casinos. Terrence O’Malley in Black Hand Straw Man covers the board. Unfortunately, you’re probably Probably not going to find it online, and I know it’s not on Amazon streaming. He has copies of it.

Union Station Massacre Part 1 Jun 10, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary thanks long-time subscriber Greg Scavuzzo for his continuing support and input. This and the next two episodes about the Union Station Massacre were In a recent enthralling episode of Gangland Wire, Gary hosts KC Mafia expert Terence O’Malley, and they examine the Union Station Massacre, a pivotal event in the history of Kansas City’s underworld. today is June 16th, the day before the actual Kansas City Massacre. The tale unfolds around Frank Nash, a notorious criminal figure involved in train robberies, whose career spanned from horseback holdups to bank heists using fast automobiles and Thompson machine guns. Nash was a character of intrigue, skilled in handling nitroglycerin and elusive to photographs, making him a charming yet dangerous criminal. The narrative weaves through Nash’s apprehension in Hot Springs, Arkansas, by FBI agents Joe Lackey and Frank Smith, setting off a chain of events that would culminate in the Union Station Massacre. As Nash is transported to Kansas City, other criminals like Pretty Boy Floyd and his sidekick Adam Ricchetti traverse towards the same destination. Floyd, a charismatic yet lethal figure, gravitated towards Kansas City due to existing connections and a history of evading capture. The episode unearths the convergence of different criminal elements in Kansas City, with Nash’s associate Vern Miller seeking assistance from Johnny Lazia’s gang to liberate Nash from custody. Through discussions between Lazia and Miller, Pretty Boy Floyd’s involvement in the plan emerges. We learn that KC mafia boss Johnny Lazia directs an underling named Sam Scola and Jimmy “Needles” LaCapra to help equip and connect Vern Miller with a traveling bank robber named Pretty Boy Floyd. The stage is set at Union Station, tensions rise, and a web of criminal affiliations and motives interplay in the lead-up to the tragic event. The host elucidates the intricacies of each character’s background, painting a vivid picture of Kansas City’s criminal underworld during the 1930s. From Nash’s multifaceted criminal career to Pretty Boy Floyd’s enigmatic personality and connections, the episode expertly navigates the complexities and alliances culminating in the fateful Union Station Massacre. As the narrative unfolds, listeners are immersed in a world where crime, power, and deceit intertwine, leading to a dramatic and tragic climax at Union Station. Please click here to see Terence O”Malley’s mafia work, Black Hand Strawman Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! [0:00] Hey, all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is the first of three special encore performances of my friend Terrence O’Malley, who did a documentary about the entire span of the mafia in Kansas City called Black Hand Straw Man. Now, unfortunately, you’re not going to be able to find that online, I don’t think. I know it’s not on Amazon. If you’re really interested in that, get a hold of me, and I’ll get a copy from him. I’ll tell you how much it is, and we’ll send it to you. The Union Station Massacre [0:33] But today, we’re going to talk about the Union Station Massacre. A friend of ours, big Kansas City fan, also a guy that I know a little bit about his family, Greg Scavuzzo,

Did Capone Murder the Leader of the White Hand Gang? Jun 05, 2024

Join us for this captivating bonus episode where we delve into a lesser-known tale surrounding the infamous Al Capone, brought to us by Paul Moses. In 1925, Capone found himself back in Brooklyn seeking medical attention for his son’s hearing issues amidst a backdrop of gang rivalry and violence. At this time, the Brooklyn waterfront was a hotbed of conflict between Irish and Italian gangs, with Anna Lonergan, a key figure adept at navigating the underworld’s secrets. The narrative unfolds with the tragic demise of Lonergan’s brother, Ritchie, triggering a chain of events leading to a fateful night at the Adonis Social Club. It was there that a confrontation erupted, culminating in a deadly shootout involving Capone, Frankie Yale, and other gunmen, leaving a scene of chaos and carnage. As details of the incident surfaced, Capone’s involvement drew police attention, yet he managed to evade severe repercussions due to lack of evidence. Through Paul Moses’ vivid storytelling, we are transported back to a volatile era where alliances shifted and power struggles played out on the gritty streets of Brooklyn. The interactions between notable gangsters like Capone, Johnnie Torrio, Frankie Yale, and Ritchie Lonergan paint a picture of a ruthless yet intriguing underworld landscape. The account of how the Brooklyn waterfront eventually transitioned from Irish to Italian dominance adds another layer of complexity to this enthralling narrative. As the episode concludes, we reflect on the legacy of figures like Paul Kelly, who straddled the line between criminality and legitimacy, leaving behind a complex and multifaceted legacy. Paul Moses’ expertise in unraveling these historical threads offers a glimpse into a bygone era of crime, passion, and intrigue, shedding light on the intricate dynamics that shaped the underworld of early 20th-century New York.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Bonus Episode Introduction [0:00]Hey, guys, a little bonus episode here. Paul Moses is back with us, and he’s going to tell us a really interesting, hitherto unknown story about Al Capone. At least I didn’t know it, and I bet a lot of you guys in Chicago didn’t know it. So, Paul, start out telling us, read something out of your book and lead us into that story and then expand on it a little bit, if you will. Well, first of all, people in Chicago surely know that Al Capone came from Brooklyn. On this particular case in 1925, he went back to Brooklyn. It was at a point in his life where his son was dealing with hearing problems, and it was a doctor in New York who Capone felt could take care of it. He was not well-known in New York at all. The newspapers didn’t really catch on to who he was. [0:45]So we begin with a woman named Anna Lonergan. Her brother is head of a gang called the White Hand, which terrorizes the Brooklyn waterfront. At that point, the Irish gangs had that control and the Italian gangs were moving in. Anna Lonergan knew plenty well what she was supposed to say to reporters or cops, and more importantly, what not to say. She was the newspaper’s queen of the mob, after all, having briefly been married to the leader of Brooklyn’s Irish white-hand gang before his untimely death. She was also sister of his successor, whose own premature death had drawn her and a newspaper reporter to the family’s apartment in a brick walk-up a...

Stories From the Italian Squad Jun 03, 2024

Gary Jenkins, a retired intelligence unit detective, brings you his unique perspective on organized crime. In this in-depth interview on Gangland Wire, the host welcomes Paul Moses, author of “The Italian Squad,” discussing the true story of immigrant cops fighting the Italian mafia in New York City in the early 1900s. Moses, a retired newspaper reporter and professor, sheds light on the immigrant experience, crime, and policing of the era. They explore the dangerous legacy of Joe Petrosino, assassinated in Sicily in 1909, and the immigrant detectives who followed in his footsteps. The conversation delves into the challenges faced by Italian officers dealing with newly arrived immigrants, language barriers, and community distrust towards law enforcement. Moses recounts gripping cases of the Italian squad, including kidnappings, extortion, and the complexities of navigating the emerging organized crime landscape. The interview highlights the political tensions within the police force, with Italian officers like Fiaschetti facing pushback and reassignments. As the mafia gains ground in New York, the significance of the Italian squad’s efforts in combating early criminal networks is underscored. The conversation also touches on the evolving cultural dynamics between Irish and Italian communities and the role of churches in fostering unity. Moses and the host emphasize the pre-prohibition origins of organized crime in America, setting the stage for the later prominence of figures like Lucky Luciano. The discussion concludes with insights into the historical context shaping the rise of the mafia and the ongoing relevance of immigrant experiences and crime dynamics in modern society. Overall, the interview thoroughly explores early law enforcement struggles, immigrant integration, and the complex interplay of cultural heritage and criminal activity in shaping New York City’s history. The engaging conversation offers a unique perspective on a lesser-known chapter in the American crime and ethnicity narrative.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Introduction and Background [0:00]Okay. Well, welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I have a man that I just met named Paul Moses. Welcome, Paul. Good to be with you. Now, guys, Paul Moses wrote a book called The Italian Squad. There it is if you’re on YouTube, and there’ll be links in the show notes down below. The true story of the immigrant cops who fought the rise of the Italian mafia in New York City. And I know you may have known if you’ve been been following me for a long time that I’ve done the show about Joe Petrosino, who was the quintessential, the mob buster that all of us know out in New York City. You know, we had a guy like Joe in Kansas City who got killed. They signboarded him, Paul. They signboard somebody means that you wait behind a signboard that was along a sidewalk with a shotgun. And when you walk by, they step out from that signboard and take you out. And they signboarded our guy here in Kansas City, who was kind of our Joe Petrosino. So it was a dangerous time for Italian policemen back then, wasn’t it? To be the next Joseph Petrosino was a dangerous job. Yes, it was. And Paul, tell us a little bit about yourself. How’d you get into this and a little bit about your background? Well,

The Incorruptibles and the Jewish Mob May 27, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we talk Arnold Rothstein, Meyer Lansky and the early Jewish mob. Gary interviews Dan about his book “The Incorruptibles: A True Story of Kingpins, Crime Busters, and the Birth of the American Underworld. ” Click here to get the book. The conversation touches on violent incidents within the Jewish community, leading to a discussion on the organization and association of various underworld groups such as pimps and casino owners. The influence of Tammany Hall in the political landscape, the power of newspapers in shaping public opinion, and the role of figures like Arnold Rothstein are explored as related to organized crime. Dan shares insights into the intricacies of the Jewish underworld’s organization, showcasing how the reform movements and vice laws of the time shaped criminal activities. The formation of the “Incorruptibles,” a team tasked with dismantling the Jewish underworld, becomes a focal point of the conversation as the book delves into the intricacies of their operations. The interview emphasizes the historical significance of early Jewish gangsters in paving the way for renowned figures like Arnold Rothstein and Meyer Lansky.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction to the Roots of Organized Crime [0:00]Well, hey, welcome, guys. Welcome, all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I got another episode here that I think you’ll find really entertaining and kind of go back to the roots of organized crime before there was a commission, almost when the mustache piece were just kind of a bunch of guys running around robbing all their neighbors and things like that and the immigrant experience, because at the same time, you had this large influx of Jewish people from Eastern Europe primarily coming in the United States and all settling in basically the same neighborhoods as the Italian immigrants. And Irish were already been there for a while. They play in this too. Because you guys all know, I’ve said this before, by the time the Italians and the Jewish people got here, the Irish already had all the government jobs sewed up. [0:52]They had the police jobs and they had the fire department jobs. And that was their way, the immigrant path. And so the Italians and the Jewish people, they have to start stores and restaurants because they’re not going to allow them in to these existing jobs or into the trades. And so they have to scuffle for whatever they can get. So we’re going to talk to a man today, Dan Slater, who has written a book about this time in New York City. It’s called The Incorruptibles, The True Story of Kingpin’s Crime Busters and the Birth of the American Underworld. Welcome, Dan. I’m really happy to have you here. here. Hello, sir. Thank you for having me. All right. So, Dan, tell us a little bit about yourself. You’ve been a reporter. You’ve written other books, I think, but I know you’ve been a reporter. Tell the guys a little bit about yourself. [1:37]Yeah. So I actually went to law school way back when, and I got out of law school. I think I lasted for a little, I think I, I think it was less than a year. I think that I was sworn into the New York bar and I left the profession three weeks later and went into journalism.

Who was the Real Boss: Nitti or Ricca? May 20, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this conversation between Gary and Camillus Robinson, aka “Cam,” they delve into the intriguing histories of Frank Nitti and Paul Ricca, pivotal figures in the Chicago outfit from the Capone era to modern times. Cam discusses his book “Chicago Swan Song: A Mob Wife Story,” detailing Lisa Swan’s experiences living in the shadow of the Calabrese mob family during the Family Secrets trial. They explore the power dynamics between Nitti and Ricca, highlighting Nitti’s enforcement role and Ricca’s political savvy and connections with mob bosses nationwide. The conversation transitions to discussions around Capone’s influence, with differing perspectives on Nitti’s power after Capone’s downfall and Ricca’s rise to prominence. They delve into the organizational structure of the Chicago outfit, noting the mentorship roles that Nitti and Ricca played in grooming future mob leaders like Tony Accardo and Giancana. The conversation also touches on the Kansas City-Chicago mob connections and their intertwined history. Gary and Cam reflect on the transition from the prohibition era to modern times, emphasizing Nitti and Ricca’s legacy and impact in shaping the Chicago Outfit. They shed light on the mob’s complex relationships and power dynamics, pointing out how the Chicago Outfit Bosses changed while the organizational structure persisted. Gary and Cam keep the audience engaged throughout their banter with their deep knowledge and entertaining exchanges. Chapters 0:00 Welcome to Gangland Wire 0:24 The Swan Song of Chicago Mob 3:49 Capone’s Shadow and Chicago’s Shift 11:22 Ricca’s Rise and National Connections 12:50 The Hollywood Scam and Its Players 14:52 Ricca’s Ascendancy and Tragic End 21:01 Chicago’s Organizational Structure 24:27 Chicago vs. New York Power Dynamics 25:08 Nitty and Ricca: Pivotal Figures 28:24 Mob Summit in Las Vegas Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome to Gangland Wire [0:00]Welcome, all you guys. Well, welcome, all you guys. I’m back here in studio Gangland Wire with my good friend, Camulus Robinson. I tell you what, Camulus, I don’t know. I never have said your name right. I get in trouble all the time for saying names. I like to call him Cam. So, Cam Robinson. Welcome, Cam. [0:24] The Swan Song of Chicago Mob [0:21]Cam it is, Gary. It’s good enough for me. It’s good to see you, man. Good to be back here. here if chandler’s is the worst i get that’s i don’t believe what i’ve got through my life it’s all right brother it’s all right you know you call me anything just don’t call me late for dinner as the man once said so anyhow uh cam had this idea and i thought it was a great idea to talk about frank nitty and paul Ricca but first cam as i said talk a little bit about your book uh the swan song chicago mob uh guy’s wife i don’t remind me the exact title and and i’ll have a link in the show notes down below guy really interesting book yeah thanks a lot chicago swan song a mob wife story it’s uh i worked with the massive um uh family secrets trial in chicago where they they took down 18 guys they solved 18 murders and brought down a bunch of mob figures and major hit men in the calabrese family specifically uh frank calabrese was a big hit manual he had a son frank calvary’s jr w...

Audie Murphy and the Mob May 15, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary found a little-known story about a famous WW2 war hero/movie star who took on Fifi Bucceri of the Chicago Outfit. Audie Murphy was the most decorated soldier in World War II. He also suffered from a gambling addiction after the war. In this fantastic story, we learn how he killed 50 Germans single-handedly to win the Congressional Medal of Honor and came home to a grateful public. Jimmy Cagney sponsored him in the Hollywood movie industry, where he became a film star in many action movies. The most famous was To Hell and Back. Murphy’s gambling addiction led him into the hands of two scam artists from Chicago. The rest is right out of an Audie Murphy movie. Let us just say that he was not afraid of the Mob. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Transcript [0:00]Well, hey guys, welcome back into the studio of Gangland Wire. Gary Jenkins here, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. I’ll tell you a story. I found this story in a book titled Pay, Quit, or Die. It was written by a former Chicago police detective named Don Heroin. And it’s a story that I never heard. I couldn’t find online. It was about a war hero that I I remember as a child, his name was Audie Murphy. [0:32]And the title of the chapter was from War Hero to Hollywood Star to Mob Buster, in a way. Anyhow, Audie Murphy. Let me tell you a little bit about Audie Murphy. [0:46]Every kid, everybody my age, post-war baby boomer that knew about World War II, Every boy probably has heard of Audie Murphy. It was a remarkable journey. He was born in 1925 down in Texas, made him just right to be a young man. 1941, whenever the war was really rocking and rolling, he fought in Europe. His early years were he grew up poor and in hardship on the farm now you know he may be poor to have have hard conditions but you know usually had enough to eat uh just that farm life is it’ll make you tough i’ll tell you i was raised on a farm man a little tough of your butt up went in the army in world war ii like everybody else even a lot of the mob guys went in And Johnny Roselli, I just read an article about him, and he went in, and by the end of the war, he ended up getting convicted in a Hollywood scam. But anyhow, he was probably just trying to hide when he went in the Army, trying to beat the case. Audie Murphy, he earned a staggering amount of awards and decorations, 33 of them all together, including the Medal of Honor. He was the most decorated soldier of World War II. [2:05]And when he came home, Life Magazine featured him. That was the magazine of the day. And Jimmy Cagney, James Cagney, was a real famous actor and producer, you know, both before the war, during the war, and after the war. And he brought him out to Hollywood and signed him to a contract, set him on the road to be a movie star. Now, he, Audie Murphy, was not a natural-born movie star. He was a little guy. He’s about 5’5″, 120 pounds, a real unassuming war hero, if you will. They gave him acting lessons. They gave him voice lessons. They gave him dance training. Cagney never really got him in a movie. He had to do some more stuff to get in the movie. They ended their association. This is after the war in 1947. [2:53]He sides on with an acting coach and continues his acting le...

Louis Milito: Another Gravano Victim? May 13, 2024

The interview delves into the life and criminal activities of Louis Milito, a mobster born in Brooklyn in 1942. The host, Gary Jenkins a retired Kansas City Police detective, discusses Molito’s upbringing in a neighborhood teeming with Sicilian immigrants and his involvement with the Rampers street gang alongside Sammy the Bull Gravano. Despite his criminal endeavors, Milito also pursued a career as a hairdresser, showcasing a surprising dichotomy in his persona. Milito’s criminal journey includes car theft, jewelry heists, and involvement in high-profile murders like that of “Johnny Keys” Simone, a Philadelphia mobster. Milito’s loyalty to Gravano and the Gambino crime family is highlighted through his involvement in various criminal activities under their command. However, a grave mistake occurs when Milito and Gravano mistakenly murder a 16-year-old instead of the intended target, leading to unforeseen consequences. The episode explores Milito’s continued involvement in criminal activities, including a murder ordered by the Gambino underboss, Frank DiCicco. Amidst power struggles and changes within the Gambino family, Milito’s dissent towards Gravano’s rise in the hierarchy sets the stage for his eventual downfall. As Gravano ascends through the ranks, tensions rise within the family, leading to Milito’s imprisonment for tax evasion in 1984. The narrative culminates in Milito’s final days filled with regret and poignant discussions with his wife, Lynda. The complex dynamics of loyalty and betrayal in the organized crime world are highlighted, showcasing the precarious existence mobsters like Milito navigated. Milito’s mysterious disappearance after a meeting with Gravano hints at a tragic end to his tumultuous life. The interview provides captivating insight into the intricate web of relationships, crimes, and internal conflicts that characterized Milito’s life as a mobster. Check out Lynda Milito’s book – Mafia Wife: A Story of Love, Muder, and Madness.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! [0:00]Well, hey guys, welcome to the studio of Gangland Wire. Glad to be back in here. I am a retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. Worked a mob for about 15 years in Kansas City. Well, guys, I’ve been talking about a lot of different mobs and a lot of different guys in the mob over the years. And here’s a new one that I had not heard of before. It was kind of important in his own way. The guy, his real name is Librio Milito. I think it’s Milito. [0:30]Anyhow, he was affectionately known as Louis Milito, and he made his entrance into the world on April 26, 1942. He was born in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. Big Sicilian population there, a real vibrant neighborhood, a lot of corner stores and social clubs. You know, that’s where Gotti and a lot of these other guys were growing up and hanging out around there. And he was born to Sicilian immigrants, and his upbringing was shaped by that rich cultural tapestry of this neighborhood. Luis Milito was a spirited youth, as they say. He found himself drawn in the world of petty crimes, as most of these guys were. Were, and he eventually became a member of the Rampers. Now, the Rampers was a local street gang known for its exploits throughout Brooklyn. And guess who else was a significant member of the Rampers? Our good friend, Sammy the Bull Gravano. Now, despite his diminutive stature,

Johnny Roselli: Hollywood Gangster May 08, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Mafia Biographies, delve into the captivating life of John “Handsome Johnny” Roselli. Born Filippo Sacco in 1905, Roselli’s journey traversed organized crime during Prohibition, connections with mob figures like Al Capone, and ventures into liquor imports and labor racketeering. Transitioning to Las Vegas, Roselli emerged as a key player in the casino scene and infiltrated Hollywood craft unions and production companies, showcasing his versatility. The narrative takes a surprising turn in the 1960s with involvement in a CIA plot to assassinate Fidel Castro, entwining mobsters and political intrigue. Roselli’s appearance before a Senate committee in the 1970s shed light on his connections to espionage and criminal activities. His mysterious demise in 1976 near Miami further added layers of speculation to his intricate life, leaving a legacy that echoes the complexities of crime, business, and political power in American history. Join us for more underworld biographies as we unravel captivating stories of mobsters.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome to Gangland Wire [0:00]Well, hey, welcome all you wiretappers back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. We’ve got another riveting episode of Mafia Biographies. You know, I’m bringing you these little short Mafia biographies. It’s your host, former intelligence unit detective, Kansas City Police Department, Gary Jenkins. And today we’re going to delve into the intricate life of John Handsome Johnny Roselli. He was a mobster who his life story weaves through the gritty streets of Chicago, started in New York, of course, goes out to L.A., Las Vegas. This is the gripping story of a man who was able to navigate both the criminal underworld and the covert world of espionage. But he also was able to navigate through the boardrooms and the film studios of the Hollywood major motion picture producers. It’s crazy. And we’re going to uncover the different layers of handsome Johnny Roselli. He was born Filippo Sacco, July 4th, 4th of July, 1905. I didn’t know he was that old. He’s born in Esperia, Italy. [1:04]Roselli’s early life was marked by an immigration to Boston at the age of six. He was raised in a world that was shaped by criminal undertones of the Prohibition era of America. Roselli’s destiny seemed sealed. His father, Vincenzo Sacco, had paved his way into the underworld before him. 1922, at the age of 17, Johnny Roselli faced a narcotics charge in Massachusetts. This caused him to move to New York. Then he moved to Chicago for a while. [1:38]And it was during this time that young Filippo Sacco metamorphosed into Johnny Roselli. That was a name that’s going to resonate through the echelons of organized crime throughout the rest of the 20th century. Johnny Roselli got to Los Angeles in 1924. His story takes an unexpected turn. He gets arrested and he pleads guilty to bootlegging. He’d become entangled with the notorious Cornero brothers out in L.A. And he really had ascended to a prominent role in getting liquor imports from outside the country into Southern California. Now, while he’s out there in LA, he forges a close relationship with the underboss, later become the boss, Jack Dragna.

The Bonanno Family: Betrayal and Ambition May 06, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this podcast episode, we delve into the intriguing life story of Joe Bonanno, a prominent figure in organized crime. Joe Bonanno’s life was intertwined with the Mafia’s tumultuous history from his early days migrating to the United States from Sicily. We witness his rise through the ranks of the New York City Mafia families, navigating through turbulent times marked by power struggles and alliances. Bonanno’s escapades take us through significant events such as the Castellammarese War and the infamous Appalachian Conference. His ambitious nature leads him to orchestrate intricate plots, including a scheme to eliminate rival mob bosses, ultimately resulting in a betrayal that shatters loyalties within the Mafia commission. As the podcast delves deeper, we witness Joe Bonanno’s retreat to Arizona, where retirement beckons after a series of family wars and power struggles. His legacy, marked by contradictions of honor and treachery, is explored in detail, shedding light on his involvement in the heroin trade and his untimely demise in 2002. Throughout the narrative, the complexities of Bonanno’s character and his role in shaping the New York City Mafia landscape are articulated with admiration and criticism. The episode concludes with reflections on the lasting impact of Joe Bopnanno’s actions, painting a picture of a man whose life danced on the edge between honor and treachery, leaving behind a legacy etched in the annals of crime history.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction to Mob Figure Biographies [0:00]Well, hey, guys, back here in the studio, Gangland Wire. This is retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins. I got another one of my short bios or biographies of famous mob people. I think I mentioned this before I’ve been doing these because, you know, we mention these names all the time, but everybody doesn’t know everything. [0:20]And so I’ll get these out. I’ve been putting them out on my Facebook or my podcast Facebook page, just a short short bio of these really famous mob guys. And so this is another one of them. This is Joseph Charles Bonanno. Joe Bonanno is a really interesting guy. And matter of fact, his family, the Bonanno family, Bonanno family, I think it’s Bonanno. Bonanno family is still known as the Bonanno family today. Nobody’s ever taken it over. Rusty Restelli had it for a while. He died and And Joe Messino had it, and he went into witness protection and justified against everybody as the boss of the Bonanno family. So go figure. Now, so in the vast realm of organized crime, which especially in New York, it is vast because it extends all up to New York. I mean, Buffalo and into Montreal and way outside of New York City down into New Jersey is huge. And these guys all connected to each other and did a lot of business with each other. And Joe Bonanno was right in the middle of all that. There’s a man whose life was forged in that fiery crucible we know as Sicily, where a lot of these guys came from. [1:34]And he was born Giuseppe Carlo Bonanno on a cold winter’s day, January 18th, 1905. And he was in the village of Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, which that’s, I don’t know how many mob guys came from Castellammare del Golfo. And it’s like,

Underboss: The Untold Story of Carl DeLuna in the Mob Apr 29, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Today, we delve into the intriguing saga of Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna, a notable figure in the Kansas City organized crime milieu. Known as a formidable Underboss with ties to the Civella family, Carl DeLuna commanded respect and fear for his powerful and ruthless demeanor. Though born in Brooklyn, he made his mark in Kansas City, engaging in various criminal activities ranging from armed robberies to overseeing a highly profitable skim operation that yielded substantial profits for the mob. DeLuna’s ascent to prominence involved close ties to influential mobsters such as Nick Civella, and he played a key role in crucial decisions affecting the mob’s operations. Tuffy’s presence was integral to the mob’s functioning, from enforcing discipline to managing sportsbook operations and ensuring the smooth running of illegal enterprises. His counsel was sought in pivotal discussions and actions, underscoring his role as a trusted advisor and enforcer. The dynamic between Tuffy DeLuna and Nick Civella sheds light on their relationship and how Tuffy’s advice influenced critical decisions. His involvement in maintaining discipline and resolving internal conflicts within the mob highlighted his importance as Nick Civella’s right-hand man. Tuffy’s ability to manage various aspects of organized crime made him a valuable asset to the underworld. Tuffy’s narrative also explores his clash with the Spero brothers and the ensuing violent confrontations that shook the Kansas City mob scene. The complex web of alliances, betrayals, and power struggles exemplified the volatile nature of organized crime and the deadly consequences those involved face. Tuffy’s role in orchestrating and executing violent acts to retain control over the criminal empire showcased his unwavering commitment to the Civella Family’s interests. When the Government finally arrested and convicted DeLuna, it marked the end of an era for the Kansas City mob. His enduring legacy as a powerful and influential figure in organized crime speaks to the intricate world of mob operations and the individuals who navigated its perilous waters. The compelling narrative of Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna’s life provides insight into the complex workings of organized crime, highlighting the power struggles, alliances, and betrayals that shaped the criminal underworld in Kansas City. Tuffy’s legacy as a formidable figure in the mob world and his lasting impact on the Kansas City crime scene solidify his place in the annals of organized crime history.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Introduction [0:00]Hey guys, welcome to the studio of Gangland Wire back here in cold old Kansas City. But I’ve got a story for you today. I’ve been kind of remiss in a way, not really paying that much attention to Kansas City. I need to start doing these. I had somebody on YouTube, I think, he said, why don’t you do some short bios of all your Kansas City, your main guys. [0:22]And so I’m starting to do that. This is going to be the first one, I don’t know if it’ll be the first one up. But anyhow carl angelo tuffy de luna he was such an interesting guy and he figured so big he was the arty pescano character in the movie and scorsese movie casino he was famous for

Chicago Cigarette Theft Foiled Apr 18, 2024

In this episode, we delve into a fascinating tale from the 1950s in Blue Island, Chicago, where Alfred Konecki, the president of F.W. Konecki & Sons Company, a tobacco distribution business, encountered suspicious activity involving a truck from Unity Refrigeration following their delivery vehicles. Two detectives, Bernard Kennedy and George Hanecki, were assigned to investigate the situation, setting up surveillance and observing a complex series of vehicles tailing each other. The detectives uncovered that the Unity Refrigeration Truck was being followed by a car driven by Robert Bradshaw, a salesman for the Kodaki Company, who claimed he was trailing the Unity truck due to suspicions about its activities. Upon halting the vehicles, the officers discovered familiar faces inside the Unity truck – Chicago Outfit Associate Frank Schweihs, Stanley Bajic and Sam Ciancio, armed with .38 caliber revolvers and a police scanner tuned to Chicago PD frequencies. Despite the lack of a solid case against them, the officers interrogated the trio, sending a clear message regarding their monitoring of criminal activities. This incident highlights the organized crime presence in Chicago during that era and the tactics employed to protect businesses from theft and extortion. The narrative offers a glimpse into the early days of Frank Schweihs, who would later play a significant role in criminal activities, including extorting money from establishments. The story underscores the challenges businesses face dealing with criminal interference and the intricate dynamics of law enforcement and organized crime in Chicago in the 1950s. It provides a window into a bygone era where local authorities often struggled to combat such activities, leaving individuals to navigate complex relationships with criminal elements. The intricacies of mob involvement in businesses and the strategies employed to mitigate threats offer a compelling perspective on the historical landscape of organized crime in major cities like Chicago. Transcript Introduction [0:00]So, wiretappers, we’re going to go to the little town, our little community of Blue Island in southwest Chicago. It’s down by, it’s north of Chicago Heights, a little bit west and north of Calumet City, south and west of downtown, like I said, right off of, looks like I-57. We’re going to look in at 131-36 Southwestern Avenue in Blue Island. Will find Alfred Konecki. He was the president of F.W. Konecki & Sons Company, which was a tobacco distribution company. They would take packages, you know, cartons and cases of cigarettes around for distribution to different places. A couple of his drivers reported that they had noticed a truck. [0:46]Kind of a van kind of a truck, marked Unity Refrigeration had been following their delivery vehicles around. [0:52]And they’d looked out, and that truck was parked near the Konecki garage at that time. So Mr. Konecki calls Chicago PD, and they assign a couple of detectives to come out and investigate. Detective Bernard Kennedy and George Hanecki, kind of a close name to Konecki, [1:12] Surveillance Operation [1:09]but I guess another one of those big, long German names. After the detectives respond, they set up a surveillance down the street, and they must have called Mr. Konecki by phone and let him know that they were set, because he then dispatched one of the trucks. One of his employees, an Elmer Jepson, left. As soon as Mr. Jepson left in the delivery truck, the Unity Refrigeration Truck pulled out and started following it north and kept following it north and north and went up to 87th Street. And about that time, the detectives noticed that a passenger car was also following the Unity Refrigeration Truck. So there was a triple surveillance going on here, double surveillance. They didn’t know what it is. So the first thing they did was stop the car that was following the Unity refrigeration truck. They found it was driven by Robert Bradshaw,

The Brilab Affair: Marcello’s Web of Corruption Apr 15, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary tells the story of Brilab (Bribery Labor), which initially aimed to uncover corruption in Louisiana and Texas and led to the indictment of New Orleans Mafia boss Carlos Marcello. Marcello, the kingpin of organized crime in the South, controlled operations across Louisiana, Texas, and Tampa, with significant influence over local officials. Joseph Hauser, an insurance salesman turned FBI informant, arranged a meeting between Marcello and undercover agents and proposed kickbacks for insurance contracts. Marcello agreed to use his influence to secure insurance contracts for the agents but demanded kickbacks in return. Louisiana State Commissioner Charles Romer accepted bribes to facilitate state insurance contracts but claimed the money was a campaign contribution, resulting in minimal charges. Marcello also expressed interest in gaining control over the Teamsters’ health and welfare insurance funds, citing the illness of Teamsters’ leader Frank Fitzsimmons as an opportunity to make this move. Marcello offered to secure Teamsters insurance contracts in exchange for a $2 million cash deposit in a safety deposit box under a fictitious name. Marcello’s involvement in Brilab highlighted his influence over officials and his ambitions to expand his criminal enterprises. The case revealed the extent of government corruption and the reach of organized crime in the United States during the late 1970s. Despite Marcello’s efforts, his plans to control the Teamsters’ insurance business were thwarted by law enforcement actions and the eventual downfall of critical players like Alan Dorfman.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [00:00:00] Well, hey guys, welcome all you wiretappers back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired KCPD intelligence detective, now turned podcaster and documentary filmmaker and author of books—or of one book, anyway—about the Las Vegas skim. But enough of that. I stumbled into a story. A friend of mine sent some old FBI files. That had to do with Abscam that he found doing some research he was doing. And it had an interesting story in it. Then there was a, I think it was a life magazine article that interpreted some of these files and, and it made it a little easier to research the story and write some script that I could explain it to you. Cause it’s about Abscam, and it’s about Brilab, and it’s about. My porn. Now, those were three really famous stings that the FBI did back in the 1970s and [00:01:00] 80s, and there’s a lot of controversy about them. A lot of, , there’s even some congressional hearings about the FBI and doing these reverse or these stings and Anyhow, but the title of my story today is how a leak prevented the FBI from recording a meeting of the Mafia Commission down in New Orleans during Mardi Gras times. Now speaking of missed opportunities during the casino skimming investigations, here in Kansas City we had a wire up. It was on a lawyer’s office and they picked up Nick Civella talking to his, brother or his nephew. George Chiavola, who was a Chicago police officer who had been carrying some of the skim money back and forth between Kansas city and Chicago. And, and he had Mr. Chiavola set up a meeting between himself,

Jimmy “The Bomber” Cataura Apr 08, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary and his guest, Camillus “Cam” Robinson, talk about the turbulent life of Jimmy the Bomber Cataura, a figure whose name became synonymous with Chicago’s underworld. Known as Jimmy the Bomber,” Jimmy Cataura’s story is a complex web of crime, suspicion, and intrigue. In 1952, Jimmy the Bomber surfaced in the newspapers concerning bombings in the Chicago area. Two Teamsters Union officials’ homes and a gasoline station where employees had refused to join the union were targeted. Despite being questioned, Jimmy couldn’t be linked to the bombings and was instead charged with disorderly conduct. Over the years, Jimmy’s alleged involvement in criminal activities continued to escalate. In 1967, he was linked to a murder investigation, but no charges were filed. 1972, Jimmy was among the men arrested on fraud and loan shark charges. The men had set up a fraudulent corporation that charged fees for financing loans totaling over one million dollars. Despite these brushes with the law, Jimmy the Bomber evaded conviction. A federal grand jury next indicted him for transporting a stolen vehicle across state lines, but the outcome of this case remains unknown. Jimmy’s reputation within the criminal underworld grew as the years went by. Jimmy the Bomber was rumored to be involved in various criminal activities, including stealing and selling stolen auto parts. However, his criminal empire began to crumble in the late 1970s as rival factions within the Chicago Outfit vied to control his chop shop rackets. South Side Boss Frank LaPorte died, and Al Pilotto took over. The new power wanted a piece of this chop shop racket. In 1978, Jimmy’s life came to a violent end when he was gunned down while sitting in his car. His death marked the end of an era, leaving behind a legacy of crime and intrigue that fascinates today. Join us as we unravel the life of Jimmy the Bomber Cataara, a man whose name became synonymous with Chicago’s criminal underworld. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [00:00:00] Hey, welcome all you wiretappers. Good to be back here in the studio of gangland wire. I’ve got my good friend, Camillus Robinson, cam Robinson. Welcome cam. Good to see you. I haven’t talked to you for a while. Hey Gary. I can’t tell you how much it it means to me to be back and be back in the the studio with you. It’s such a, such a great time. And I’m glad to be here and I’m really excited about today’s show. Really good. Yeah, we’re going to do Jimmy the Bomb Jimmy “The Bomber” Catuara. Is that how you pronounce that, Cam? ? Catuara, yeah. Catuara? Okay. That’s how I would say, yes. You know, you know how everybody laughs about how I drag out my bowels up here. Not as bad, much as they laugh about me. Right. One guy said, well, that hillbilly Tw that guy’s, God, he said, man, he, he can’t be telling me about the mafia. . I had to get everybody to to help me out with Joey. I Joey Aiuppa Yeah, you can’t do that. And I, and I do. I’ve got no, I am Italian. I’ve got no excuse. Yeah. See, I’m full excuse anyhow, we’re going to talk about Jimmy the Bomber Couture, you know, and, and Cam, [00:01:00] he came over as a child, I believe from Sicily. Now, if I’m wrong on that, let me know guys, but it,

What Happened to the French Connection Dope? Apr 03, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I delve into a fascinating tale involving corrupt individuals like Gaspipe Casso, a New York police cop named Vinny Albano, and a drug dealer named Herbie Pate. Albano, engaged in taking down the French Connection, conspires with Pate to steal French Connection heroin from the police property room. The duo starts selling the stolen heroin on the streets, making millions of dollars, with Gaspipe Casso taking a cut. However, tensions rise between Albano and Pate over money, leading to a lethal confrontation where Pate shoots and kills Albano in self-defense. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey, all you wiretappers out there, I got a fun little story here about Gas Pipe Casso, a corrupt New York police cop named Vinny Albano, not one of the two mafia cops, Caracapa and Esposito, and another Lucchese associate drug dealer named Herbie Potte. That’s P-A-T-E, I believe. Yeah, P-A-T-E, Herbie Potte or Potte. [0:29] Albano was part of the crew he worked narcotics and was part of the crew that helped take down the French connection so he knew about the dope and they knew about it being in the property room there was like what uh 70 some kilos in the property room at one time and so he got this Herbie Pott they both had been involved in a lot of crooked stuff and and with Gas Pipe Castle So he instructed Herbie Pate just how to to put on a police uniform and got some forged papers and access the property room. Well, well, this Herbie Pate goes in, he’s cracking jokes and he’s making the property room clerk laugh and that kind of thing. And he goes in and he walks out with all this French Connection heroin. Well, he and Vinnie, Vinnie Albano, they start selling it on the streets over the next. [1:17] Few weeks and months, and they’re making a lot of money. I mean, this was millions of dollars worth of heroin. Millions in Heroin and Betrayal [1:23] I mean, millions of dollars worth. And Gaspipe Castle was getting a piece of that action all along because they were associates in the Lucchese family, and he helped facilitate all this. So he always gets the action. Well, Albano was kind of a, he had a bad temper, shall we say, and he was suspicious. And Pate, he was like, you know, know he was a crook he no there’s no honor among thieves in this world and so they get arguing about money and albano is accusing pate of stealing from him albano drives to pate’s work and tries to run him down the car one evening and i don’t know what the work was but there must not have been anybody around he avoids him they albano gets out and he’s a tough guy but so So says Pate. Pate had gone to gas pipe and said, you know, I’ve got this problem with this crazy ass cop. [2:16] I need a gun. So gas pipe had given him a little 38, a little, I think it was a little chief air weight, I believe. And they’d given him a gun. So he’s got a gun stuck down his back pocket while they’re wrestling around. Pate was able to reach around and get that gun out and start shooting. Deadly Confrontation on the Street [2:32] And he shoots and he kills Albano right there on the street. Well, he’s not really that guy particularly. you know he’s a heroin dealer and a drug dealer and an associate but he’s not really that guy and and ...

Beneath the Bathrobe: The Dark World of Vincent Gigante Apr 01, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins takes you on a riveting journey through the dark corridors of mob history. Step into the shadows with Gary as he sits down with an esteemed reporter and author, Larry McShane, to unravel the enigma that was Vincent “The Chin” Gigante, a man whose life reads like a gripping crime novel. Larry McShane, a seasoned veteran of the city beat, delves deep into his book “Chin: The Life and Crimes of Mafia Boss Vincent Gigante,” shedding light on the man behind the myth. Vincent Gigante’s story is one of intrigue and terror, a tale of a professional boxer turned merciless assassin whose very name struck fear into the hearts of his enemies. Handpicked by the notorious Vito Genovese to lead the Genovese Family, The Chin amassed a fortune of over $100 million, all while evading the relentless pursuit of federal investigators. But beneath the facade of power and wealth lurked a mind shrouded in darkness. Gigante appeared as a madman to the outside world, roaming the streets in a tattered bathrobe, playing games in storefronts, and hiding a second family from his wife. Despite his bizarre antics, Gigante’s cunning and ruthlessness knew no bounds, as he controlled an underworld empire of nearly three hundred made men. It took decades of intense FBI investigation by federal authorities to bring down the man who seemed untouchable finally. We learn they not only sent The Chin to prison but also forced him to admit he had been acting like he was crazy to avoid prosecution for many years. Join Gary Jenkins and Larry McShane as they peel back the layers of myth and legend to reveal the chilling truth behind one of the most notorious figures in mob history.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Welcome all you wiretappers. Good to be back here in studio gangland wire. I have a really interesting guy today. You may have all heard of him. He wrote the book on the chin Gigante. I have Larry McShane. Welcome Larry. Hey, good morning. Thanks for having me. Well, Larry, start out talking a little bit about your book, you know, how you got into it and, and, you know, because we can always get it on Amazon. I’ll have guys, I’ll have links to the book in the show notes. So tell us about getting into your book. Yeah, I’d covered a lot of organized crime stuff in New York. I worked for Associated Press for a long time. And You know, I guess it’s, it’s the kind of thing where I looked around at some point and, you know, there had been guys were writing their own books, right? Sammy the bull, for example, there was a whole book about little Al DiArco and yet nobody had really done any kind of a project involving a Gigante [00:01:00] who I found as kind of the most compelling mob figure. Out of that generation and that time when the mob was finally kind of brought down by the FBI. He was interesting. And guys, the name of the book is The Chin. Let me give you the tagline on it. It is The Life and Crimes of Mafia Boss, Vincent Gigante. So by Larry McShane, like I said, I’ll have the the title, I mean, the link to the Amazon and the show notes. So how did you start out? Writing this book, did you like go to the FBI to do FOIA? Did you get, did you have some mob sources or just agent sources? Tell a little bit about the process of doing a, on a guy that’s so secretive that he put on this act,

Underworld Enigima: Sam Giancana Mar 27, 2024

Gangland Wire host, retired Detective Gary Jenkins, reports on the life and legacy of Sam Mooney Giancana, a prominent figure in the Chicago outfit and the mafia world. Giancana’s enigmatic nature and shadowy dealings are explored, tracing his journey from a member of the 42 gang to the pinnacle of the Chicago outfit. Known for his ruthlessness and criminal prowess, Giancana’s rise in the criminal underworld during the Prohibition era is detailed, showcasing his involvement in illegal activities like gambling, liquor distribution, and political rackets. The host sheds light on Giancana’s connections with influential figures like Al Capone, his alleged role in John F. Kennedy’s presidential victory, and his entanglement with the CIA in plots to assassinate Fidel Castro. The interview further brings to light Giancana’s partnership with Richard Cain, a corrupt law enforcement officer turned mob associate, expanding their operations to include gun smuggling, espionage, and international intrigues. The narrative takes a dark turn as Giancana’s mysterious death in 1975 is analyzed, with several theories suggesting mob involvement, internal power struggles, and CIA conspiracies behind his assassination. The interview speculates on potential conspirators, including Tony Accardo, Santo Trafficante Jr., and even the CIA, reflecting the convoluted web of betrayal, power dynamics, and covert operations that characterized Giancana’s tumultuous life. Ultimately, Sam Giancana’s legacy endures as a symbol of the murky intersections between crime and espionage, leaving behind a trail of unsolved mysteries, political entanglements, and violent retribution. The host encourages engagement from listeners, offering insights into mob history, sharing anecdotes, and inviting discussion on the complex and intriguing world of organized crime.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey, all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. You know, I’m doing these little kind of short, down-and-dirty bios of major mob guys, because I got to realizing that everybody doesn’t know all the details that maybe I know or that I’ve read about. I know a lot of you guys know a lot of stuff. A lot of you know a lot more than I know. But everybody doesn’t know everything about all these different guys. And I may mention the name, you know, Tommy Lucchese, Three Finger Lucchese. You might mention Vito Genovese or just, you know, Genovese, the Genovese family. So putting out these shorties to say this is who these guys are is bonus episode. So today I’m going to deal with the life and legacy of Sam Mooney Giancana, unveiling the enigma. And he was an enigmatic figure, which I think means I’m using that $25 word there, aren’t I? Which I think means he was kind of a shadowy character, kind of hard to understand, had a lot of secrets. And he did. You know, he like went to Mexico for quite a while. He had business interest all around the world and gaming in casinos and gambling. And he wouldn’t share some of that, which some of that came back to bite him, I think, in the end. [1:14] But he was born in 1908, May 24th in Chicago. He was he was a Chicago outfit guy. And he starts out. his journey into the crime world as a teenager in the 42 gang. Now, they say it wasn’t because they lived on 42nd Street.

Philadelphia Mob Lawyer: Robert Simone Mar 25, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary and his regular contributor, Australian lawyer and mafia researcher Tony Taourk look into the intriguing story of Robert Simone, a Philadelphia lawyer with deep ties to the mob. We learn that he was born in South Philadelphia in 1933, and Simone’s career took a dramatic turn when he defended showgirl Lillian Rees in 1961. Rees was charged in connection with the theft of half a million dollars from a wealthy Pennsylvania millionaire. Despite his limited experience in criminal law at the time, Robert Simone overturned Rees’ conviction on appeal, gaining attention in the media and among criminals alike. Simone’s involvement with Rees also led him to cross paths with mobsters, as Rees’ boyfriend and co-defendant was a mobster himself. Simone’s heavy gambling and drinking habits further connected him to the mob, as he often frequented bars where he encountered mobsters and borrowed money from mob loan sharks. One such loan shark, Frank Sindone, recommended Simone to other mobsters and eventually became Simone’s client in a successful acquittal for loan sharking charges. Simone’s reputation grew within the criminal underworld, and he attracted the attention of Roofer’s Local 30, a corrupt union that provided him with a steady stream of criminal cases. He also represented John McCullough, the head of the union, who was later murdered on the orders of the Philadelphia mob. Simone’s big break came when he represented mob boss Nicky Scarfo in a murder trial. The government charged Scarfo, along with his nephew, Phil Leonetti, and another mobster with the murder of a cement contractor. Despite the testimony of an eyewitness, Simone’s skills as a lawyer shone during this trial, showcasing his ability to sway jurors and play mind games in the courtroom to achieve a not-guilty verdict. Despite his success in defending Scarfo, Simone’s ties to the mob ultimately led to his downfall. He was disbarred 1989 for his involvement in a money-laundering scheme with Scarfo and other mobsters. Simone’s story is a cautionary tale of the dangers of getting too close to the criminal underworld.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [00:00:00] Welcome back in the studio of Gangland Wire. Good to be back here with you guys. I have our good friend from down under, Tony Taouk. Welcome, Tony. Thank you for having me, Gary. Oh, as you guys know, Tony is our expert on mob lawyers. We have done God. How many have we done now, Tony? We’ve done Goodman and who else have we done? Roy Cohen, Well, it’s coming out. It’s coming out. We’re recording this guys today, January the what? The third or the fourth and Corsak is coming out in two weeks. It’ll be out. I think a week from this Monday, I believe I’d have to look. I know. I just put it in to released so I can stay about two or three weeks ahead. Anyhow, Corsak, Sydney Corsak. Frank Regano. Oh, Regano. Yeah. From Traficante down in down in Florida. So good. Yeah. Well, we’re moving right on through them, Tony. We’re going to be through them all one of these days. Oh, Cutler. We did Bruce [00:01:00] Cutler. And see. I don’t know what we’ve got left after this. There’s some more guys out there. There’s kind of boring guys out there. They’re back in New York, I know. There’s a lot,

Unmasking the Real Spider in Goodfellas! Mar 20, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary looks into the intriguing life of Michael “Spider” Gianco, a real-life figure known from the movie “Goodfellas.” Born in 1954 in Brownsville, Brooklyn, Gianco was associated with the Bonanno and Lucchese families and was a Jimmy the Gent Burke protege. Referred to as Spider due to his long limbs and excellent burglary skills, Gianco was a trusted member who could climb into hard-to-reach places. He was involved in organized crime from a young age, engaging in car theft and other illicit activities. Gianco was a crucial player in a car theft and smuggling ring, specializing in stealing cars from locations like JFK long-term parking. He would deliver these cars to a junkyard in Brooklyn, where they would be sold or shipped to Haiti. Gianco made money for every vehicle he stole and was involved in various criminal activities orchestrated by Jimmy the Gent and Paul Vario. However, his relationship with fellow mobster Tommy DeSimone was strained, leading to a fatal confrontation in July 1970. During a poker game at Robert’s Lounge, DeSimone fatally shot Gianco after an argument, with Jimmy the Gent instructing DeSimone to bury the body. The murder, reminiscent of a scene from “Goodfellas,” shocked those present, and despite the body never being found, Gianco’s fate was sealed. The aftermath of Gianco’s death further illuminated the ruthless nature of organized crime, showcasing the dangers and consequences of underworld disputes. The intricacies of mob life, rule-breaking, and allegiances are dissected, leaving listeners pondering the complexities of this dark underbelly of society.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Wiretappers out there back here in the studio of gangland wire i want to take a look at kind of a short one again here about michael spider gianco michael spider gianco his he was spider in the movie goodfellas he’s the one that joe petty character shot in the foot and then later killed when when he bucked it back up to him let’s tell you a little bit as a real guy this really happened as you know you know everything really happened in goodfellas for the most part he was you have of a young guy back then, I guess. He was born in 1954. He was killed in 1970. That tells you anything. He was from Brownsville, Brooklyn, and grew up in the neighborhood, South Ozone Park, Queens area. He was a, you know, an associate of the Bonanno family and the Lucchese family, as all those guys around in that Roberts Lounge were, and there really was a Roberts Lounge, he was a protege of Jimmy the Gent Burke, he was a guy. [0:59] Who would go out and do stuff. He was, and what’s interesting about him, he could be trusted. He was from Italy, but he was from Sardinia, which is another island like Sicily off the coast of Italy. He was born Michael Gianfranco. He shortened it to Gianco when he got over here. And then of course, everybody became, started calling me Spider. Now, the reason they called him Spider is because he had really long arms and long limbs and he was a great burglar. where he could climb up and get into places and things like that. His family brought him over here when he was a kid. They settled in Queens. He was a runaway. He was just a bad kid growing up,

Mafia Confessions with Nick Parisi Mar 18, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Dive into the world of Joseph Parisi, the man who murdered Carlo Siniscalchi. Gary interviews author Nick Parisi about his book Mafia Confessions, “King of Bootlegers” Murder. This book sheds light on organized crime during the Prohibition era in the Springfield, Massachusetts, area. Nick offers a glimpse into this city’s early Italian-American criminal groups and the surrounding area and how his ancestor killed Carlo Siniscalchi, the King of the Bootleggers.” Mafia Confessions relies heavily on the diary of the author’s ancestor, Giuseppe “Joseph” Parisi, trial transcripts, and newspaper accounts. Nick Parisi provides a rare and intimate look into the thoughts, emotions, and connections of the man who murdered Carlo Siniscalchi, who was known as the “King of the Bootleggers.” We discuss the ensuing gang war and the trial, revealing the emotional turmoil of a high-level Italian criminal. While not a traditional biography, the book focuses on Parisi’s murder trial rather than his entire life story. The author highlights the challenges of balancing Parisi’s criminal past with the audience’s empathy, akin to rooting for a criminal in “The Shawshank Redemption.” Mafia Confessions fills a void in organized crime literature, particularly Springfield’s criminal history. The author emphasizes the importance of familial connections and heritage in understanding the rival factions and the impact of murders and revenge. Mafia Confessions’ authenticity and narrative captivate, making it a compelling read for anyone interested in Prohibition-era crime or Italian-American organized crime history. Click here to get a copy of Mafia Confessions from Amazon. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there. Good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. We have a show about the Springfield, Massachusetts mob and the foundings of it from a relative who has written a really interesting book. I have Nick Parisi here with me. Welcome, Nick. Thanks, Gary. Great to meet you. Nick, it’s Mafia Confession, King of the Bootleggers. Let me read you guys a couple of the reviews. Very well written by author Nick Parisi, he takes readers back to the days of Prohibition seen through the eyes of a family member who was there. [0:38] Here’s another one, one of the most gripping true crime stories I have ever read. Be warned, it is not for the fainthearted. This book will have you on the edge of your seat from start to finish. I highly recommend it for true crime aficionados and fans of mob thrillers. From Reader’s Favorite Awards. Praise for “Mafia Confession, King of the Bootleggers” [0:54] So you’ve got some pretty good praise there, Nick. Oh, yeah. I’m getting some good reviews. And even from some of the grandkids of the people that are in the book that are actually in the current mafia today in Springfield, they’re taking pictures with the book and telling me it’s so well done and they love it. Cool. I was actually expecting the opposite, to get some backlash from the other family, but they love it. They love it. They said I did it properly. I got the story right and they appreciate it. Cool. That says a lot in itself. I know these. It’s interesting. A lot of mobsters today,

Danny Greene: Celtic Warrior Mar 13, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Learn about the shadowy world of crime from the life of Danny Greene, also known as the Celtic warrior. If you haven’t seen it, watch “To Kill the Irishman,” a film featuring Christopher Walken and Paul Sorvino. Danny Greene was born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1933, orphaned three days after birth, and raised by paternal grandfather and aunt in Collinwood. Danny’s rebellious spirit and tumultuous relationship with his father and stepmother led to a challenging adolescence. Military Service and Union Involvement: After being expelled from high school, Danny Greene enlisted in the Marine Corps, where he excelled as a boxer and earned the rank of corporal. After military service, he became a longshoreman and quickly rose to become the president of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA). Double Life as an Informant: Danny Green became a top informant for the FBI, navigating the worlds of labor racketeering and organized crime. Criminal Activity and Conflicts: Formed the Celtic Club and allied with figures like John Nardi and Alexander Burns, leading to conflicts with the Cleveland Mafia. He was involved in bombings, violent clashes, and assassination attempts, solidifying his reputation as a formidable force. Downfall and Legacy: Despite his cunning intellect and adaptability, Danny Green’s luck ran out when he was killed by a car bomb in 1977. His death exposed a criminal conspiracy involving mafia families from Cleveland, New York City, and Southern California.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [00:00:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there. Welcome to gangland wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired intelligence detective, and this is your portal into the shadowy world of crime. Today we’re going to take a deep dive into the tumultuous life of Daniel John Patrick Green, a. k. a. Danny Green, the Celtic warrior. You may know him from To Kill the Irishman. Well, no movie, Christopher Walken was in it. I think, , Paul Cervino maybe was in it. My friend, Rick Perrello from Cleveland wrote the book and did a documentary and was involved in making the movie. Anyhow, Danny Green, he was a figure whose legacy is etched into the annals of organized crime, especially in Cleveland and the Midwest. Really? Now, so join me and we’re going to unravel the intricate details of Danny Green’s journey through power, betrayal, and the criminal underworld of Cleveland, Ohio. Danny Green was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1933. His early life was a saga of [00:01:00] hardship, aren’t they all? Don’t they all these organized crime guys grew up in some kind of hardship? He was orphaned three days after he was born, and he got the nickname Baby Green until his mother’s burial and his paternal grandfather and aunt took him in and raised him and named him His gave him his name and they were in the blue collar neighborhood of Collinwood in Cleveland. Danny’s tumultuous relationship with his father and stepmother later on in life set the stage for a really challenging adolescence if you can imagine that. Growing up in Collinwood, Danny developed a rebellious spirit and was always running away from home and you know he hit the streets and you know what happens when these young guys hit the streets. What is there out there?

Pasqualina Albano Mar 11, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Gangland Wire, we talk with the niece of the Bootleg Queen of Springfield, MA, Gina Cunningham, and Justin Cascio of Mafia Geneology about the mafia in Springfield, Massachusetts. We explore bootlegging during Prohibition, Pasqualina Albano’s rise to power, rivalries with other mafia groups, and the unique presence of women in the male-dominated subculture. We learn how she married a man from the NYC Genovese family and how this led to the Genovese Family’s continuing presence and influence in Springfield. We discuss Pasqualina’s assassination, the impact of the documentary about her, and the importance of open conversations about family history.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I really appreciate y’all tuning in every week or maybe twice a week sometimes. You know, I’ve got a show today about Springfield, Massachusetts. Now, I’ve gotten several inquiries. I think it was on my YouTube question and then on the Gangland Wire podcast Facebook page, which you guys ought to get on because we’ve got a huge, we’ve got 50,000 people on that thing with all Sharon Motley information. But about Springfield and I didn’t know a lot about it and and then I happened to see I think maybe on Justin’s Justin Cascio’s website or he made it into a post or somehow I saw about this new documentary that our other guy other guest had Gina Cunningham who is a great niece of an early. [0:48] Mob couple if you will a mob power couple in Springfield and so I thought you know let’s go go into this. She has a documentary. Gina is a great niece of Albano, who was the bootleg queen of Springfield during Prohibition. And Justin, of course, you guys know, runs the Mafia Genealogy Facebook page and website. And he has a ton of great Mafia family connections stretching back to Sicily on his website. And he’s a real expert in that. He has this great, I have to apologize to you on air here, Justin, that guy that stole your picture and wiped out your attribution to it and put it on my Facebook page or group. So, you know, we took it off and then I posted a link to it and I noticed you’ve updated it. I think we’re all square on that, but he has a lot of great information. And there’s this one photo he’s got that he made showing the five families in Manhattan and greater New York area and what their geographic outlines of the other domain would, as it were, would be. So welcome, guys. I really appreciate y’all coming on the show. Thank you, Jerry. So Gina, tell us a little bit about yourself personally and how you made this happen to make this documentary. Gina Cunningham’s Personal Journey and Documentary Creation [1:59] Okay, so my name’s Gina Cunningham. And obviously, when you hear Cunningham, you don’t think of an Italian American, but I’m half Italian American. But I grew up in a totally 100% Italian American family. And everything in my family was always a mystery, especially the the story of Pasqualina. We knew that we had a great aunt Pasqualina, but we didn’t know anything about her. My mother would take me to her grave where she would ask me to pray for Pasqualina. But when I asked why I was praying for Pasqualina,

Joseph “The Animal” Barboza Mar 06, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Joseph Barboza, aka the Animal, was born September 20, 1932. His criminal career went on from being a young thug and boxer to becoming a notorious mob hitman for the Patriarca crime family of New England during the 1960s. Starting his criminal life as a Mafia enforcer in Boston’s underworld, Barboza ended his criminal career as an FBI informant in 1967 and entered the Witness Protection Program. He was a star witness in the trial of six men convicted in the 1965 murder of Edward Deegan; a court sentenced four of the accused to death, and another two were sentenced to life imprisonment. Eventually, facts surface that Boston FBI agents helped set up these innocent men and used Barboza to frame the six defendants in a case of wrongful conviction for the Deegan killing. Barboza, himself, and Boston Mafia hitman Vincent Flemmi did this murder. Listen to learn about this case of corrupt FBI agents and more.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! transcript Buckle up as we navigate the shadows of organized crime and betrayal in this in-depth exploration of Joseph the Animal Barbossa’s life. , [00:00:00] well hey all you wiretappers out there. Guys, I’m back here in the studio, retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins. Join me as we navigate the twists and turns of Boston mobster Joseph the Animal Barbossa. His life, well, goes from the boxing ring to the criminal underworld and an unexpected role as a key witness in a gangland murder. Gangland Wire is the podcast that brings you an in depth exploration of these hidden stories that helped shape the American Mafia. Now buckle up, buckle up, I say, as we delve into the shadows of organized crime and betrayal. And I’m going to tell you the story of Joseph the Animal Barbossa. Joseph Barboza was born September 20th, 1932. His criminal career will go from a young thug and boxer to become one of the most notorious mob hitmen for the Patriarca crime family in New England. Starting as a mafia enforcer in the Boston’s underworld, he will end [00:01:00] his criminal career as an FBI informant in 1967 and enter the witness protection program. He was a star witness at the trial of six men convicted of a 1965 murder of a burglar named Edward Deegan. Four of these accused men were sentenced to death and two others were given life in prison. Eventually facts will surface that the Boston FBI helped set up these innocent men and used Barboza to help frame these defendants and they’ll become a case of wrongful conviction later on. But not after these guys spend most of their life in the penitentiary. Barbosa himself and Bo Boston Mafiaa hit man. Vincent Fleming actually did this murder.. Now Joseph Barbosa Jr’s early life, seemed destined for a different path. He was raised by Portuguese immigrants. His father, Joseph Barbosa Sr., was a middleweight boxer. His mother, Pamelda Camil, was a seamstress. He was fluent in Portuguese, Italian, and Spanish.[00:02:00] Young Barbosa, the animal, hadn’t got his nickname yet, but he follows in his father’s footsteps, and he trained as a boxer. He was ranked as a professional light heavyweight boxer and a member of the United States Boxing Association. He fought under the moniker of the Baron. Barbosa’s first boxing match was in April of 1949 against a...

Bloodlines and Betrayal: Civella vs. Spero Mar 04, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of the Gangland Wire Podcast, Gary Jenkins explores the intense gang war between the Civella and Spero families. Gary explains the key figures, Nick Civella and his brother Cork Civella, and outlines their roles within the mob. Jenkins also highlights Nick Spero, a flamboyant character with connections to the mob. He explains Nick Civella’s strict dress code, including rules against facial hair and the requirement for specific haircuts. He shares stories of Civella’s involvement in sports gambling charges and the first FBI wiretap that led to his indictment. The murder of Saul Landie and the attempted murder of Lester Moore further escalated tensions within the organized crime network. Moving on, Jenkins focuses on Carl Spero and his criminal activities. A professional criminal, Carl aligns himself with other professional criminals to create his own organization. The speaker emphasizes Carl Spero’s cautious nature and his crew’s efforts to avoid surveillance. He describes the stalking of the Spero faction by the Civella Faction. Tensions rise as both families continue surveillance efforts, culminating in a shooting incident at the Virginia Tavern that leaves Carl Spero paralyzed. In the latter part of the podcast, He provides updates on Joe Spero’s involvement in a bombing attempt and eventual capture. After Joe Spero is killed, Carl remains a target, facing multiple assassination attempts, including a dynamite bombing of his car. Jenkins highlights the collaboration between an undercover state trooper and a professional thief and as thet build a case against Spero. Ths stoy culminated in a bomb planted under Carl Spero’s office, signaling the end of the Spero-Civella War.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! [0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired KCPD intelligence detective. I’m going to tell you another story about my career and things that I lived through here in Kansas City, the 1970s mob wars. I told you about the war in the River Key, the war between the Commissaros and Bonadonna and the fallout from all that. Well, now I’m going to tell you about the Civella-Spero war. I did a movie on this. The Civella-Spero Mob War, I think was the name of it. I don’t know, but if you want to find it, you’ll find it. First thing I want to talk about is the Civella family. Nick Civella, he was a famous boss that came out of Appalachian. He was caught back there with Joe Filardo, who was an old gangster from the 30s and 20s. He was being introduced as a new boss in 1957. [0:51] Growing up in the mob, really, during those years, He had been the boss until he died. He had a brother, Cork Civella, who was a real firebrand. The guy really never had a little crew that worked for him. He seemed to be kind of an independent operator, although he always bent to the will of his older brother, Nick Civella. They called him Cork because he’d pop off. He was the kind of guy that he got mad at some newsmen one time during a grand jury hearing. They were all sitting around in the hallway outside the grand jury room. Cork was waiting to go in and he started getting mad at him for some reason. We don’t really know why.

Chicago Police Gambling Raid Mar 01, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I share a riveting story of a raid conducted by the Chicago Police Department’s Intelligence Unit on a high-stakes gambling operation. The operation, ordered by Captain Duffy, involved meticulous surveillance of key figures of the Outfit’s Westside crew, leading to the apprehension of nine individuals and the seizure of significant cash and incriminating records. Reflecting on the event, I highlight the strategic approach taken during the raid and the cooperation received from some of the individuals involved. This narrative provides a glimpse into the intense undercover operations and confrontations with organized crime that defined law enforcement efforts in 1960s Chicago.Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Det. William Flynn and the New York Mafia Feb 26, 2024

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins brings you his unique perspective on organized crime. The Bulldog Detective: William J. Flynn’s Battle Against the New York Mafia and More Introduction: In the tumultuous landscape of early twentieth-century America, where threats from organized crime, espionage, and terrorism loomed large, one man stood as a bulwark against the rising tide of criminality. Meet William Flynn, the Bulldog Detective, who played a pivotal role in shaping the course of American law enforcement. gary and author Jeffrey Simon look into the remarkable career of William Flynn, focusing on his crusade against the New York Mafia and his enduring legacy in the fight for justice. Early Life and Education: Born on November 18, 1867, in the heart of New York City, Flynn’s journey into public service began in 1897 after a standard public school education. Little did the nation know that this unassuming figure would become a central force in combating some of American history’s most notorious criminal organizations. Early Career: Starting as a Manhattan plumber, Flynn’s trajectory shifted dramatically when he joined the United States Secret Service. His early focus on counterfeiting soon led him to confront the Black Hand extortionists and the infamous Morello crime family members. Flynn’s tenacity and strategic acumen set the stage for his future battles against organized crime. Collaboration with Detective Giuseppe “Joe” Petrosino: Flynn’s path intertwined with that of Detective Giuseppe “Joe” Petrosino, who met an untimely end in 1909 while investigating gangsters in Sicily. Undeterred by Petrosino’s tragic fate, William Flynn continued the pursuit, successfully building a case that resulted in the imprisonment of Giuseppe Morello and his associates in 1910. Reorganization of the New York City Detective Force: In 1911, Flynn showcased his leadership skills by successfully reorganizing the New York City Detective Force. This began his rise in law enforcement, earning him recognition for his influential and innovative approach. World War I and Espionage Investigations: As the shadows of World War I loomed over America, Flynn’s role expanded to include investigating threats of sabotage. His dedication to national security became evident when he exposed a German-owned wireless station on Long Island, leading to the seizure of critical documents. Director of the Bureau of Investigation: Flynn’s crowning achievement came in 1919 when he was appointed Director of the Bureau of Investigation. Praised by Attorney General Palmer as “the leading, organizing detective of America,” William Flynn uncovered a German spy network operating on U.S. soil. His relentless pursuit of justice and national security earned him the nickname “the Bulldog.” Challenges, Resignation, and Reinstatement: Flynn’s hardline approach and public statements on German espionage strained relations within the German-American community, resulting in his resignation. However, in the face of escalating terrorist actions, Flynn was reinstated to lead the charge against the perpetrators, assigning a young J. Edgar Hoover to monitor suspected radicals. Semi-Retirement and Legacy: William Flynn ventured into business, founding a detective agency with his children after his tenure in the Bureau of Investigation. Despite challenges, he contributed to the field through writing and scenario development for the motion picture industry. Flynn’s Weekly Detective Fiction, the magazine he edited, became a lasting testament to his influence in crime fiction. Conclusion: William J. Flynn’s legacy is one of resilience, dedication, and an unyielding commitment to justice. His battles against the New York Mafia, German spies, and terrorists shaped the trajectory of American law enforcement. The Bulldog Detective’s story serves as a beacon, reminding us of the indomitable spirit required to confront and overcome the challenges of our times. William J. Flynn,

The Many Murders of Marshall Caifano Feb 21, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Marshall Caifano was a dangerous yet unassuming figure from Chicago’s mob scene.Background of Marshall Caifano: Caifano, a physically small but influential figure in the Chicago outfit, was brought up by Paul Ricca, a key behind-the-scenes figure in the outfit. Unlike the loud and flashy mobsters, Caifano operated quietly, focusing on strategic connections and criminal activities.Caifano’s Activities: Caifano was known for his involvement in various criminal activities, including the murder of mobster Bugsy Siegel in Los Angeles, which paved the way for the Chicago outfit to take over Las Vegas. He was also implicated in several other murders and extortion attempts.Caifano’s Style: Despite his criminal activities, Caifano maintained a low profile, appearing well-dressed and unassuming. He was known for his intelligence and ability to stay out of the spotlight, unlike other more flamboyant mobsters. Conclusion: Caifano’s story illustrates the complex and dangerous world of organized crime, where individuals like him operated in the shadows, wielding significant influence. His life and activities shed light on the inner workings of the Chicago outfit and its impact on various criminal enterprises. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript: Marshall Caifano [00:00:00] Gary Jenkins: well, hey, all you wiretappers out there back here in studio gangland wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City police intelligence detective. I worked a mob for 14 years altogether here in Kansas City from here to really to Las Vegas. We helped uncover the scheme and, you know, reached out to Chicago and Milwaukee and Cleveland. Anyhow. I’ve been telling these mob stories for a few years now in the podcast. Here’s another one. Kind of a short little story about a very unassuming but very dangerous little guy named Marshalll Caifano. from Chicago. Now, Marshall Caifano, I know that Red knew him and knows a lot about him. So you might want to check out Red Wemette channel or the Las Vegas blog, my blog with Adam Flowers. They may have a whole story on Marshall Caifano. This is kind of a short little story about him. He was a little guy.[00:01:00] And when he got old, I remember I ran into a couple of these mob guys, really old guys, guys out of the 30s that were still alive in the 70s. I got on the elevator with two of them once. Turned out they were going to their lawyer’s office. It was Joe Filardo and Tano Lococo. These were dangerous, dangerous men in the 30s. They were like these tiny little shriveled up. thin silver haired kind of, you know, like five foot tall, 105 pound, 110 pound guys. That’s the way Marshalll Caifano ended up and he was always was, they always were little guys, but He was a little guy physically, but he was a huge guy in the outfit and and he was a quiet guy, you know Paul Rico kind of brought him up. Paul was came out of the thirties is you know, kind of the behind the scenes boss when Accardo was more out front. Ricca was in penitentiary [00:02:00] down here at Leavenworth for a while and Cardo was really running things. He was going back Ricca forth and getting instructions. And when Ricca came back, he never really assumed like any kind of out front. Kind of a role while Accardo was more out front...

Gus Russo on Murray “The Camel” Humphreys Feb 19, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you a unique insight into the Mafia. Today, Gary interviews the noted Chicago outfit expert, Gus Russo, known for his books such as “Supermob,” “The Outfit,” and “Best of Enemies.” Gus Russo tells how Murray “The Camel” Humphreys is an intriguing figure in the Chicago Outfit. He provides insights into Humphreys’ early life, born with the Welsh name of Llewellyn in Illinois, growing up in poverty, and getting involved in petty crime. Gus continues by telling how Humphreys was able to climb the ranks of an organized crime family and become a valued and trusted advisor, political fixer, and business operative in the Chicago mafia known as “The Outfit.” Murray Humphreys was so well connected that when his daughter needed a prom date, he was able to induce Frank Sinatra to fill that role. Click here on Gus Russo to buy his books Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Gary: [00:00:00] Welcome all you wiretappers. Good to be back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I have a man who is probably one of the most respected mafia historians in the United States, Gus Russo Russo. You probably have heard of his books Supermob welcome, Gus Russo. I’m really glad you’re here. Hey, Gary. Thanks for having me. Supermob and all of a sudden, let’s see, and The Outfit. And do you have other Gus Russo: books, Gus Russo? Oh my goodness. Yeah, I’ve got about nine now. I think I’ve done a couple. I’ve done a couple of the Kennedys and I’ve got a really one that’s been really successful called Best of Enemies, an espionage book that’s being made into a feature. Your film so very excited Gary: about that. I read something about that. I’d forgotten about that interesting Well, what I’ll do guys is is I’ll have a link to his author’s page on Amazon So you can search among his books and and he is probably Like I said one of the most respected mob historians in the United States today. Oh along with, , Selwyn Rabb, probably. He ranks right up there with Selwyn Rabb, and, as [00:01:00] far as Chicago’s concerned, to me, he is the man for Chicago, and we all love Chicago up there, and I have to thank, speaking of Chicago, I have to thank my friend, Chicago native Ben Ellickson for sending me this book, The Outfit. He’s been after me to do this for a while and I don’t know, some of you get distracted by, you know, the glitz and the glamour of New York sometimes. I forget about my Chicago guys, I get back to them periodically. So he’s been, thank you very much for sending me this book because I did some shorts out of the book, a little one minute things for YouTube, just a little quick little stories out of the book. And now we’re going to do a full interview with Gus Russo Russo. And Gus Russo, I’ll tell you what, the Chicago guys, I’ll get, I’ll get an extra bump up in Chicago when that starts. I promise you that they love you in Chicago. But we’re going to talk about Murray Humphreys, Murray the Camel Humphreys, and I’ve wanted to do this guy for a long time. He’s an interesting guy, and one reason I feel a connection to him because my family came over [00:02:00] from Wales a lot longer before his family did. His mother and father came from Wales. Now here’s a Welshman who becomes a trusted, highly valued, Maybe upper echelon, if you will, member of the Chicago outfit. And Gus Russo just said, you know, he said,

Anatomy of a Golf Course Muder Part 2 Feb 12, 2024

Gary tells another account of the intriguing and often murky world of crime. In today’s episode, we unfold the gripping tale of how a hapless hitman, Daniel Bounds, was entangled in a web of deceit and betrayal that ultimately led to his demise. An Outfit member named Sam Guzzino orchestrated the entire murder attempt of Al Pilotto. He played a pivotal role in recruiting Bounds. Guzzino provided him with a weapon, trained him, and even supervised the rehearsals leading up to the crime. The chilling revelation unfolds as Guzzino stands by, watching as Daniel Bounds carries out the hit, only to vanish into the night. The Chicago Outfit has its own rules, and hitting a target involves high stakes. We explore the harsh reality that the target might survive if a hit goes wrong – if the bullets or the gun are faulty. Survivors often become dangerous witnesses, turning the tables against their assailants. In the case of Sam Guzzino and Daniel Bounds, this dilemma becomes a crucial aspect of their criminal enterprise. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey guys, hey all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio, Gangland Wire, retired intelligence sergeant Gary Jenkins. I need to do a follow-up on a short one I did about Al Pilotto the other day. I was on Facebook and a gal, Jimmy Free, and thanks for, at Ben Alex, and thanks for reminding me about this. There’s a whole other story about the The murder plot on Al Palato, the Chicago outfit, Southside crew chief leader, labor racketeering guy. He had a case pending at that point in time when this happened. And the outfit decided he needed to go. I mean, Al needs to go. Now, when they say you need to go, you probably need to go. Sam Guzzino and the Inept Hitman [0:47] Now, let me tell you about exactly how this whole thing went down. Now, I just brushed across the top of it, kind of a fun little story. Sam Guzzino, whose brother Richard Guzzino was in the foursome with Al Pallado. Go back and take a look at that if you haven’t seen it. [1:05] Sam Guzzino was an outfit member, and he was also the former father-in-law of the hit man on this deal, a guy named Daniel Bounds, who was a cab driver. He had been married to Guzzino’s daughter and fathered a child with her. They’d gotten a divorce, but he needed money, I suspect, and Sam Guzzino knew it. But now, Sam Guzzino is probably not the sharpest tool in the toolbox, wouldn’t you say? Hires this Peckerwood cab driver to do this important hit. This is a pretty important hit, and you don’t want this to go wrong, right? You don’t want this to go wrong. But he tells him, hey, I got a job for you. And Bounds reluctantly, according to the court transcript, accepted this assignment. The Deal and Promises Made [1:51] Sam, one thing he did, he said, I’ll make sure that you get a lot more access to your daughter. His granddaughter, and so that, and I’ll pay you some money, and he promised him a down payment of $2,000 plus a weekly amount, which was not said exactly what it was, plus another job, but a business that Sam owned, you know, Nate, and that’d be a cab driver in the morning, see his kid a little more often, have $2,000 in cash, not very much money for a murder, if you ask me, me but you know that’s that was the deal he also said after he got into this he said now you understand now you know a hit’s going down get this ...

Murder on the Golf Course Part 1 Feb 12, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In 1981, Southside Outfit crew chief Al Pilotto was still watching his tee shot in the air on the 8th hole at Lincolnshire Country Club when a gunman stepped out from behind the bushes and started shooting. Al survived and will die a natural death. The hitman was an amateur hired by one of the golfers, Sam Guzzino. In the end, Guzzino’s brother, Richard Guzzino, and Robert Ciarrocchi were convicted of training and arming Daniel Bounds to murder Pilotto. The Outfit took care of Sam Guzzino in the usual manner. Daniel Bounds testified and left town. Check out Part 2 for an anatomy of how this murder was carefully planned by the Marx Brothers and carrried out by the keystone cops. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! [0:00] Hey guys, welcome all you wiretappers. Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City Intelligence Unit detective here, back in the house again. Hey, I got a short story here for you again. Al Pilotto, he was a Chicago outfit crew leader, if you will, crew chief of the Southside crew. He was also big in the labor union racketeering. He was the head of Local 5 in the Laborers International Union. Union. They liked to play golf. Al Pilotto’s Assassination Attempt on the Golf Course [0:31] Now, he was out playing golf on a nice warm July day back in, oh, when was that? Back in 1980-something, 30 years ago or so. Anyhow, Tony Splattro was out in Las Vegas. Tony Accardo was running the outfit at the time because they both were co-defendants on a labor racketry charge. And like I said, he was out playing golf. He was He was playing with one particular guy was Sam Guzzino. And there was Rudy Bamonte and Nick Fusci. Early in the morning, 8 o’clock in the morning, they were just on the AT at the Lincoln Shire. It was 1981 is what it was. I just glanced up to see what it was. [1:17] Anyhow, he had a great tee shot off that AT, they say. And somebody jumped out behind the bush that was there and started shooting at him. and shot him four or five times with a handgun and ran off. Well, he goes down with his golf partners and supposes shot golf partners. These guys, I don’t know if they teed up and played on through and left him back there, or they just ran off. They didn’t call the police is the main point I’m trying to make here. Lack of Police Involvement and Speculation on Motives [1:45] They did not call the cops. Some neighbor lady heard the shots and called the police, and they came driving up looking to see what was going on there. There’s our friend Al Pilotto, bleeding like a stung hog, probably. So they take him to the hospital. He survives this assassination attempt, which there’s no other way to put it. It was an assassination attempt. And Al Pilotto, if you think about it, his chief enforcer was Billy Dauber, who was killed by some of the guys that worked under Joey Lombardo, through the wild bunch in angelo la pietra so you know his chief enforcer had been killed they had these they had a kind of a war in that south side what they called the chop shop war there’s a bunch of people been killed in that war so you know with these mob heads you have to really look around for the motives and see who benefits but again like i said he had a. Al Pilotto’s Indictment and Potential Motives for the Hit

Life in the Bonanno Family Feb 06, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we have a special guest, Jack Amato, who shares his experiences growing up in Sicily and the United States. He talks about his father’s encounters with the mafia and their journey from owning a restaurant in Brooklyn to buying a luncheonette in Glendale. Jack discusses how his father dealt with tough guys and troublemakers in the neighborhood, sometimes reaching out to wise guys for assistance. He also shares his experiences in the lunch wagon business and his involvement with figures like Joe Massino and Rusty Rastelli. The conversation then delves into the early days of running lunch wagons and catering businesses. Jack Amato discusses the relationships formed with prominent figures in the industry, such as mafia members like Joe Massino and Rusty Rastelli. They talk about the buying and selling of products, including cigarettes without a stamp, and the arrangement in which a percentage of sales would be paid to Joe Massino for the items provided. Jack Amato describes his personal experiences and interactions with various mobsters. He shares stories of confrontations, alliances, and even getting shot in the stomach during a robbery attempt. He discusses his decision to focus on the pizzeria business and interact with figures like Pizza Connection conspirators like Baldo Amaro and Cesar Bonaventura. Jack also relates his involvement in bookmaking and other ventures, including opening a maintenance and cleaning business. The conversation then turns as Jack Amato discusses legal troubles, accusations, and encounters with law enforcement. They talk about Jack being arrested and facing serious charges, including attempted murder and conspiracy. Jack Amato maintains his innocence and describes the pressure to cooperate with authorities. They also discuss the changing dynamics within the mob and the different power figures that emerged. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome, all you wiretappers out there. Good to be back here in the studio. Gangland Wire, you know, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins here. And I have a really interesting, different sort of an interview. We’ve got a man from Sicily. I started noticing this man on our podcast page. Gangland Wire podcast was posting and he has a book that he’s written and it tells about his life, you know, both in Sicily and when he came over. And when he came over, his family ended up, you know, getting jobs and being around some of the Bonanno families. So he has a lot of experiences with this from, shall we say, from the, not really from the associate side, not even associate, more like from just somebody that lived in the neighborhood and people that had to do business with mob guys and with his roots in Sicily. So his name is Jack Amato. So welcome, Jack. [0:57] Thank you for getting me to your show. You invited me to your show. Well, I’m really anxious to have you now. A Father’s Belief, part one. That’s the name of your book, correct? Yes, yes. All right, and you can get that on Amazon, I believe, can’t you? Yeah. Let’s move along. In this next segment, let’s move along to your life in the United States. And as your father, you know, he had a restaurant and there were mafia around and they had th...

On Our Watch Feb 05, 2024

Retired intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you a new podcast that he is excited about. On Our Watch: New Folsom is a gripping investigative podcast series brought to you by KQED. This show delves into the stories of two courageous correctional officers. These officers face severe consequences after exposing corruption and abuse within their ranks. Through powerful elements like interrogation tapes, 911 audio, prison phone calls, personal recordings, and emotional interviews, the show masterfully unravels the flaws in the accountability system. It’s a heart-pounding and explosive narrative that you don’t want to miss. But wait, there’s more! Stay tuned for an upcoming trailer that will give you a taste of the intensity and intrigue that awaits you. And once you’ve listened, find and follow On Our Watch wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you don’t want to miss out on the whole story. The journey begins with a man who dreams of becoming an investigator in Folsom, California’s most dangerous prison. He knows correctional officers promise to protect the innocent and hold each other accountable. However, inside the prison walls, promises are broken, fear, intimidation, and violence take control, and lives hang in the balance. It’s a stunning tale of two individuals who dare to challenge the unwritten brotherhood code and pay a heavy price. As this captivating case unfolds, it raises numerous crucial questions, and the pursuit of truth comes at an unimaginable cost. Get ready for On Our Watch, Season 2, a production from KQED. Starting on February 6th, you can expect weekly episodes to keep you on the edge of your seat. If you want to learn more, go into the app you are on now and find On Our Watch. Or click this link, On Our Watch. Trust me, this is one podcast series you won’t want to miss. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey guys, Gary Jenkins, retired intelligence unit detective here. We’re going to do something a little different today. I wanted to introduce you to a new show that I know you’re really going to want to listen to, On Our Watch. On Our Watch is an investigative podcast series from KQED. This season, it follows the stories of two correctional officers who pay a high price for exposing corruption and abuse by their fellow officers. The show shines a light on a broken accountability system through interrogation tapes, 911 audio, prison phone calls, personal audio recordings, and hours of emotional interviews. It’s an explosive, gripping narrative you need to hear. Next up, we have a trailer just for you. Take a listen, take it in, and then find and follow On Our Watch wherever you’re listening to this right now. The Dangerous Prison Job: A Promise and a New Family [0:43] You’re going to want to hear the whole story. He wanted to be an investigator. He said it was the most dangerous prison in California. Each day, people step inside prison walls, not to serve a sentence, but to do a job. I, state your name, recognize the badge of my office. Correctional officers promise to protect the innocent and hold each other accountable. And I accept it as a public trust. And in turn, Thayer promised a new family. Congratulations. Welcome to the family. Broken Promises and the Dark Reality Behind the Walls [1:27] But once behind the walls, those promises are hard to keep. He texted,

Growing up in Sicily Feb 04, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we have a captivating interview with Jack Amato, the author of “A Father’s Belief,” a book about his life in Sicily and his journey to the United States. Jack shares his experiences growing up in the fishing town of Carini and the matchmaking that led his family to immigrate to the US. He discusses his father’s work as a fisherman and the challenges they faced in their hometown. Moving on to his life in the United States, Jack talks about his early years in school and the language barriers he had to overcome as an immigrant. He also touches upon the presence of the Mafia in Sicily and the admiration for the Mafia folk hero Salvatore Giuliano. The episode concludes with a preview of the upcoming second part of the interview, where Jack will delve deeper into his experiences in the US, including his interactions with influential figures from the Bonanno family. Listeners are reminded to pay attention to motorcycles on the streets and provided with resources for PTSD and addiction support. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome, all you wiretappers out there. Good to be back here in the studio. Gangland Wire, you know, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins here. And I have a really interesting, different sort of an interview. We’ve got a man from Sicily. I started noticing this man on our podcast page. Gangland Wire podcast was posting and he has a book that he’s written and it tells about his life, you know, both in Sicily and when he came over And when he came over, his family ended up, you know, getting jobs and being around some of the Bonanno families. So he has a lot of experiences with this from, shall we say, from the, not really from the associate side, not even associate, more like from just somebody that lived in the neighborhood and people that had to do business with mob guys and with his roots in Sicily. So his name is Jack Amato. So welcome, Jack. [0:57] Thank you for getting me to your show. All right. You invited me to your show. Well, I’m really anxious to have you. Now, A Father’s Belief, part one, that’s the name of your book, correct? Yes, yes. All right, and you can get that on Amazon, I believe, can’t you? Yes. All right, good. We’ll have links to how you click on to get that book, and in the YouTube version, I’ll have a picture of it whenever we talk about it. Every once in a while, we’ll have a picture of it So people will know what it looks like. And then going to gangland, why our Facebook group and Jack post quite a little bit. And he’ll post a little bit about his book every once in a while and have a link to it and tell some stories from from his childhood and growing up in New York City. [1:41] But first of all, Jack, we just talked a little bit. And you have a really fascinating back story in Sicily before you got to the United States. So tell me a little bit about it. Tell the guys here a little bit about, you know, where you came from, What area was that in Sicily and what was life like over there? I was born in Carini, Sicily, province of Palermo. Life in Carini, Sicily and the Fishing Trade [2:03] The location of the town, it was on the hill. And then there was the mountains surrounded and the sea.

Battle for the River Quay Jan 29, 2024

In this episode, we explored the fascinating history of the River Quay area in Kansas City and its unfortunate downfall at the hands of organized crime. The conversation began by highlighting the initial grassroots development led by artists like Lou Marik and Philomene Bennett, who opened studios and attracted other entrepreneurs to the area. Marion Trozzolo renovated and leased old buildings to artists, boutique owners, and young restaurant owners. The area quickly became a hotspot for young people, singles, and live music lovers. The rise of the River Quay district also caught the attention of the mob, who wanted a share of its success. Members of the Civella family felt they owned this area next to the City Market. Nick Civella, the boss, operated through his brother Corky and underboss Tuffy DeLuna. Willie Cammisano, a capo for the mob, had a crew responsible for street rackets and enforcement activities. Despite the presence of the mob, many clubs and businesses thrived in the area. A large urban renewal project forced out 12th Street strip clubs owned by mobsters. Gary remembers working in the area and being offered drinks by generous bar owners. These events turned darker as tensions between a River Quay bar owner named Freddy Bonadonna, who owned a joint in the River Quay area, and the mob. The mob demanded a cut of his parking lot profits and assistance obtaining liquor licenses, but Freddy resisted their control. This resistance placed him at odds with the organized crime family and eventually led to dangerous confrontations. Freddy’s father, David Bonadonna, was found murdered in the trunk of a green Mustang, marking a tragic turn of events. Gary recounts this mob murder that was never solved and offers insight into the tight-lipped nature of the Kansas City mob when it came to disclosing information about murders. He shared stories about other mob members who were uncooperative with the FBI’s efforts to gather evidence. The conversation also mentioned a large brick building owned by Freddy and his brother, which was mysteriously blown up, leading investigators to suspect an insurance scheme rather than a mob war. The episode concluded by discussing the revitalization of the city market and downtown Kansas City, with new developments, lofts, clubs, and the construction of the T-Mobile Center. The River Quay area eventually recovered and became thriving once again, showcasing the city’s resilience. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, Gary Jenkins here, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective back here in the studio. I want to tell you a Kansas City story. I don’t often do Kansas City stories, but I like to do one every once in a while. And this is a story of give you a broad overview. [0:17] This is a story of a grassroots entertainment district development that was really ruined by the mob. Urban renewal, mob bombs, a lot of stuff going on in this. Murders, there was an area close to the city market. It was along one street called Delaware, which was on one side of the city market was Little Italy, where all the mob guys, their families first moved to, where they first got their first jobs is at the city market. On the other side, there’s this street that had actually been the original downtown of Kansas City. The old city hall was on this street.

Capone Shot Himself? Jan 24, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary shares an exciting story about Al Capone, the famous gang leader. It turns out that in the 1920s, Capone accidentally shot himself with his pistol. He ended up in the hospital with bullet wounds in his legs and groin. It reminded me of a similar mishap involving a policeman and his gun. Capone was playing golf with a guy named Johnny Patton, known as Burnham’s boy mayor. They were at a golf course called the Burnham Golf Lanes, where Capone had a .45 caliber pistol in his pocket. The gun discharged and injured him. Patton took him to the hospital in Hammond, where Capone was given a suite under the name Gary. He stayed with his guards until he recovered, and visitors were turned away to maintain his secrecy. The article mentioned some of his guards, including Louie “Little New York” Campagna and the Gennaro brothers. Capone seemed to be surrounded by tight security during his time at the hospital. Interestingly, the article also revealed that the golf course where the accident occurred was associated with the mayor of Burnham, who used the clubhouse for gambling and speakeasy activities. Overall, it’s an intriguing piece of Capone’s history, and if anyone knows more stories about him playing golf, feel free to share in the comments. Gary encourages listeners to check out the Gangland Wire Facebook Group, which boasts over 50,000 members. While occasional arguments arise, we strictly avoid engaging in politics or bullying. If anyone harasses or bullies others, we promptly block them. As the group administrator, I dedicate a significant amount of time to handle any problems that may arise. Additionally, I have two co-administrators who assist me with managing the group. If you’re interested in delving further into the Kansas City Mob, you can find my movies on Amazon. “Gangland Wire” explores the skim investigation from the Kansas City perspective, offering unique insights not covered in the film “Casino.” A hidden microphone placed in Ross Strada’s tavern known as the Villa Capri first revealed the Las Vegas connection. I also have another movie available for rent that focuses on the mob war in Kansas City called Brothers Against Brothers: The Civella Spero. If you prefer reading, check out my book Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. It is available on Kindle for $4.99. You’ll find links within the book to listen to the actual wiretaps and conversations. For those interested, I also have physical copies of the book. At the moment, I can’t think of anything else to promote, but I want to express my gratitude to all of you for tuning in. If you or someone you know is struggling with drugs or alcohol, I recommend visiting Anthony Ruggiano in Florida. He’s a former Gambino soldier who is now a drug and alcohol counselor, and he has a YouTube page where he shares valuable information. So, please remember to come back and listen to me every week. Support the Podcast Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:01] Hey, welcome all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. I found an old article I think is really interesting. In the Chicago Tribune in 1920-something, I don’t remember the exact date, Al Capone, the headline was,

Kansas City $2.5 Million Jewelry Robbery Jan 22, 2024

In this episode of Gangland Wire, we are joined by former KCPD detectives Jim Harrington and Rick Smith to discuss a famous case involving mobster Angelo Porrello. The case revolves around stealing millions of dollars in diamonds and jewelry from a high-end jewelry store in Kansas City. The detectives initially suspected that a car chase involving out-of-town robbers from Los Angeles might be connected to the theft. However, further investigation revealed that the robbers were involved in credit card fraud, making it unlikely that they were responsible. Undeterred by the lack of leads, Harrington and Smith took on the case and gathered information through tips and informants. They discovered a possible connection to a man named Clarence Burnett, who may have been involved in the robbery. The detectives observed that the theft involved suspects arriving in a Jeep Cherokee and splitting up to break into the safe and display cases. They also noted that the suspects had previously committed other robberies, indicating a progression in their skills and targets. During their investigation, the detectives found links to a bondsman in Kansas City who bought stolen jewelry from the targeted store. Through surveillance, they identified Burnett leaving the bondsman’s location, leading to a breakthrough in the case. This information was shared with the FBI, who conducted a sting operation and purchased stolen diamonds, one of which was identified as stolen from the jewelry store. As the investigation progressed, Burnett was arrested for cocaine possession and persuaded to cooperate with the FBI. His cooperation helped identify the rest of the crew involved in the robbery. Additionally, connections were made to the Porrello crime family, specifically Angelo Porrello and their pawn shop. The stolen merchandise was believed to have been unloaded at the pawn shop and sold through Joe Porrello’s legitimate jewelry store. The FBI played a crucial role in uncovering these connections. The case led to numerous sting operations and ultimately resulted in the arrests and prosecution of those involved. The detectives reflect on Clarence Burnett’s criminal associates and his progression from stealing cars as a young kid to his involvement with the mob. They discuss the possibility of inviting Burnett onto the show to share his story and explore the evolution of criminal activity. Throughout the episode, the detectives also discuss their experiences with surveillance, collaboration with the FBI, and some personal anecdotes from their time working on the case. They highlight the importance of teamwork and cooperation in solving complex cases. The episode ends with reminders to support the podcast and messages related to mental health and addiction issues. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Well, welcome all you wiretappers out there and back here in the studio, Gangland Wire. I have a really cool show for you, I think a couple of friends of mine, a couple of former KCPD guys, Jim Harrington and Rick Smith. Jim Harrington was a robbery detective and Rick Smith was a robbery detective at one time. Now they went on to have other things. Rick went on to be the chief of police and and Rick, you went. Were you a detective the whole time? In robbery, just in robbery. OK. Okay. So I remained in fact, in my whole career.

The Broadway Butterfly Must Die Jan 17, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, author Michael Wolraich and Gary discuss his book, The Bishop and the Buterfly. This is about the murder of Vivian Gordon, a prostitute connected to wealthy men, and Prohibition-era organized crime figures like Arnold Rothstein, Legs Diamond, Dutch Schultz, and others. The author explains the corruption within the government and political system, highlighting the investigation’s challenges and media coverage. We learned the investigators uncovered a collection of diaries with incriminating information about gangsters, leading to demands for an anti-corruption investigation. The climax occurs during a meeting between Mayor Jimmy Walker, investigator Samuel Seabury, and Franklin D. Roosevelt. We also touch on the history of New York City and Mayor LaGuardia’s efforts to clean up the city. Click here to find Michael Wolraich’s author page. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. Retired intelligence unit detective Gary Jenkins coming from Kansas City. And guys, I have Michael Wolraich here with us in the studio or on the Zoom. And he has a book called The Bishop and the Butterfly. I’ll have links to how you buy that book in the show notes. Here’s a picture of the cover. If you’re on YouTube, you’ll see that. It’s a really interesting look at New York City. The son of the seamy underbelly and the corruption of New York City during the 1930s just come out of prohibition, really, and going into the Depression era during this time. And there’s a prostitute named Vivian Gordon that has been murdered. A good murder mystery always starts out with a body. And so we start out with a body. Right, Michael? Exactly. Yeah. I mean, she was, you know, they discovered her and they didn’t know who she was at first. Her body was found in a gully in Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, which is a number. It was a popular dumping ground for bodies in the 1930s, maybe still is. Kind of describe, where did she fit in society? She was a prostitute and she was connected to the famous Polly Adler in some manner. And that Manhattan at the time, especially in New York City, was a smaller town. People knew each other. So how was she connected into that Simi underbelly, the mob and the rest of the people that were doing crimes? [1:25] Well, she was much more than a prostitute. That’s what she was originally convicted for in 1923, although that conviction is a little dubious. She claimed she was framed by her ex-husband who was seeking custody of her child, her eight-year-old child. And she was arrested and sent to the Bedford Reformatory upstate. And after that experience, she’s bitter, bitter. She’s lost her daughter. She’s branded as a prostitute. Then she turned to a life of crime. And she did some prostitution, but she was much more than that. She was best known for seducing wealthy men, wealthy New Yorkers, prominent businessmen, some politicians, and often blackmailing them as well, or blackmailing them after the affair was over. She ran stock frauds. she ran a call girl service. She did work for Polly Adler as a high-end prostitute sometimes, but they had a falling out in the late 1920s that the journalist reported that there was ...

Sidney Korshak – Mob Lawyer Jan 15, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary and Mob lawyer expert Tony Taouk continue exploring the world of mob lawyers and focus on Sidney Korshak, a mob lawyer and fixer for the Chicago Outfit. Korshak’s success was built on his connections, using them to negotiate criminal charges and bribe officials. He extended his influence to labor unions, Hollywood, and Las Vegas. Despite investigations, he remained anonymous and evaded severe consequences. We also touch on the role of Jewish gangsters in Las Vegas development. Lastly, we provide resources for veterans with PTSD and individuals struggling with substance abuse. Support the Channel Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Traqnscript [0:00] Welcome, all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. As you can see, if you’re on YouTube, it’s a nice cold day in Kansas City here, and we are going all the way back down to Sydney, Australia. You know our friend Tony Tok, who is, shall we say, a contributor and the mob lawyer aficionado and expert that we go to. We want to know about mob lawyers. I notice not many other people deal with mob lawyers out there, And we’ve dealt with, I don’t know, God, Bruce Cutler and Oscar Goodman and a bunch of them. So I know if you haven’t, if you’re interested in mob lawyers and you haven’t listened to those or watched them on YouTube, go back and find those that we have on mob lawyers because they’re a great show. Tony, welcome. Thank you for having me. It’s great to have you back. As we can tell by your accent, you’re down under and it’s winter here, but it’s getting summer down there. Is that correct? [0:55] That’s right. Right. It would be equivalent to, say, San Diego. Okay. Interesting. Well, it’s nice weather in San Diego. I know that. Year-round, it’s nice weather in San Diego. Sidney Korshak: A Shadow Among Shadows [1:07] So we’re going to talk about Sidney Korshak, and I’ve looked up stuff on him. I even had a book about him for a while. I borrowed from a friend of mine that was so dense, and I finally just gave it back to him. But I did a bunch of research for this show, and I know you’ve really done a lot of research, and I want to ask you some questions once you’ve learned about Sidney Korshak. Guys, he was a mob lawyer and fixer for the Chicago Outfit, started back in Capone days and came all the way up until whenever he died in the 80s, I think. And he was everywhere, but he was nowhere. Let me give you a quote I read about him was, in the land of dreams, Sidney Korshak was a shadow among shadows, just a wisp of air floating around the land of dreams or Hollywood. Nobody could ever quite get their hands on Sidney Korshak. So, Tony, tell us, how did he get started? I kind of gave it away. He started in Chicago under Capone, but tell us how he got started in his early days. [2:06] Well, he was born in Chicago in 1907, and he graduated from the University of Wisconsin, but he received his law degree from DePaul University in about 1930. Now, Gary, there are rumors that he was employed by Al Capone as a driver during his college years and that Capone even paid his college tuition. I personally don’t put much stock in that. Capone had all these hardened criminals at his disposal.

Dominic “Sonny Black” Napolitano Jan 08, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we explore the captivating story of Dominic Napolitano aka “Sonny Black” and his crew, prominent members of the Bonanno crime family. We delve into Sonny Black’s rise through the mafia ranks, his close bond with Joe Massino, and their involvement in various criminal activities. The dynamics between Sonny Black and Joe Pistone, aka Donnie Brasco, unfold in a tale of trust and betrayal. We uncover Sonny Black’s illegal activities and Joe Pistone’s undercover role, highlighting the dangers of organized crime. Lastly, we examine the aftermath and the impact on the Bonanno family. Plus, we hear retired FBI Agent Doug Fencl’s account of telling Sonny Black that the man he knows as Donnie Brasco is FBI agent Joe Pistone. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript …outside till I could see nobody else was in there, and I went in, and I introduced myself to him, and he’d heard my name before, so he knew who I was, and he went ballistic, and I mean… [0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there back here in studio of Gangland Wire, retired intelligence unit detective Gary Jenkins, I’ve got the story of Dominic Sonny Black Napoleon Tano. He is he will go down in history as the most stand up guy ever, I think, in the mob. You know, he and Joe Pistone, those are two names that are forever, I mean, forever intertwined in the history of organized crime in the United States. Their story is one of trust, betrayal, and the dangerous world of the Mafia, and believe me, we know it’s a dangerous spot out there. Sonny Black Napolitano was a really high -ranking member of the Bonanno family, and one of the five families that dominated organized crime in New York City during the mid -20th century. [0:44] He was known as a tough, savvy mobster, had risen through the ranks really by his personality, his strong personality, his leadership skills, and a sheer force of will. This guy, he was a man’s man. He was born in 1930, which doesn’t make him 93 today. That’s kind of hard to believe, isn’t it? A little history on him. His grandparents were immigrants from Naples now, so he’s Napolitano. He was not from Sicily. He was from Naples, so he is not born and bred mafia dude. Sonny Black was born with blonde hair, of all things, but by his 40s, it turned to kind of a gunmetal white silver color. And to hide that color, he dyed it black, which gave him the nickname Sonny Black. He was a really close friend to the future Bonanno crime family boss, Joe Massino, all through his mob career. [1:35] He lived in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. He was born there. He grew up there. He raised his children there. He died there. Sonny Black rose to prominence as a soldier when he was taken in the crew of a guy named Mike Sabella in the 1970s, the early 70s. Now, Mike Sabella was closely connected to Carmine the Cigar Galante and that faction, the Bonanno family. And he was demoted after the cigar was murdered. Now, the cigar, Carmine, just a little bit about him, you know, he was a really bad dude. He was one tough mafia gangster. If you’ve ever seen the picture of the guy laying dead with a cigar clamped between his lips, one of the most famous mob pictures, one of the most iconic mob murder scenes ever,

St. Louis Mafia Part 3 Jan 01, 2024

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. This episode delves into the ongoing mob war in St. Louis, focusing on the power struggle between the Syrians and the Italians. Led by Paul Leisure, the Syrians aimed to gain control of the labor union racketeering and diminish the influence of the Italians, who were closely aligned with Jimmy Michaels. The murder of John Spica, appointed by Tony Giordano to push out the Syrians, still remains a mystery to law enforcement. On the other hand, the Italians are facing internal disarray with a weak leader, Mike Trupiano, who has lost respect within the organization. Both factions heavily rely on the construction industry unions, which provide opportunities for corruption and control over job placements. Pauly Leisure, a meticulous planner, had already devised a plan to kill John Spica. Now, he and his crew set their sights on Jimmy Michaels. Attempting to ambush Michaels at a diner and his home failed, leaving them frustrated. They eventually decided to use a bomb, meticulously practicing the installation process on a stolen car identical to Michaels’. They discovered that Michaels often attended a Wednesday luncheon at a church, where he mingled with politicians and business leaders. On the day of the hit, the team arrived at the church undercover in a van, with one member keeping a watchful eye in a nearby tow truck. David Leisure successfully planted the bomb under Michaels’ car while Anthony Leisure had the remote control device. However, the bomb failed to detonate when they activated the transmitter. On high alert, they caught up with Michaels on the road, hoping to get close enough for the remote control to work. To their surprise, the van bombed Michaels’ car, causing his death in a gruesome manner. The van managed to escape the scene and sought refuge in Illinois, utilizing connections within the criminal underworld to cover their tracks. Michaels’ death sent shockwaves through the St. Louis community, suspecting Pauly Leisure as the culprit. St. Louis mafia boss John Battaglia confronts Leisure, but Leisure refuses to acknowledge his involvement. Leisure’s actions inadvertently benefit the Italian mafia, as Michaels’ ownership in a Las Vegas casino will transfer to remaining investors upon his death. Leisure takes over Local 110 and eliminates Michaels’ relatives from the union, further consolidating his power. This death raises concerns among mob bosses across the country, tarnishing their reputations. The situation in St. Louis remains tense, with some believing the dispute has been resolved, while uncertainty lingers. Leisure gains more power through an alliance with Raymond Flynn in Laborers Union Local 42, promising extra money to his loyal soldiers. In response, the Michaels family seeks revenge and contributes to a war chest to eliminate those responsible for Michaels’ death, putting bounties on the heads of Polly and Anthony Leisure. The host then transitions to a different segment, discussing the various tactics employed by the Leisures and their associates in seeking retribution. They assemble a hit squad, renting an apartment for secret planning. They collaborate with the Chief of Police in St. George for untraceable surveillance vehicles. They construct a bomb, leaving behind incriminating evidence and fingerprints. The hit squad manages to ambush Leisure, detonating a remote-control bomb under his car, severely injuring him. However, Leisure remains determined to seek revenge. The feud escalates further, leading to kidnappings and torture, with brutal methods including red-hot pokers and a blowtorch being considered. The host informs listeners of the evolving story, detailing their attempted bombings and multiple clashes with associates and rivals. Ultimately, the FBI begins turning people, leading to convictions for all the Leisures, with Paul Leisure receiving a 55-year sentence.

Angelo “The Gentle Don” Bruno Dec 27, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this segment, we delve into the life and influence of Angelo Bruno, the Philadelphia boss of the Mafia. We aim to fill in knowledge gaps and increase our understanding of the Mafia in the United States. Angelo Bruno, also known as the Gentle Don, stood out from others in the mob due to his preference for peace over violence. He was born in Italy and migrated to the United States as a child. One of his significant associations was with Carlo Gambino, the boss of the New York Gambino crime family. Bruno’s cousin, John Simone, connected him to the mob. To establish himself in the Philadelphia Mafia, Bruno changed his name from Antoloro to Bruno and was sponsored by Michael Maggio. Bruno married in 1931 and had two children. He owned various businesses, including an extermination company in New Jersey and an aluminum products company in Florida. Additionally, he had a share in the Plaza Hotel in Havana, Cuba. Throughout his life, Bruno faced several arrests for offenses such as illegal alcohol sales and gambling. In 1959, there was a plot to assassinate him, but he emerged as the boss of the family after the conspiracy was revealed. Bruno successfully evaded media attention and lengthy prison sentences for the next two decades. He prohibited his family’s involvement in narcotics trafficking and focused on traditional Costa Nostra operations like bookmaking and loan sharking. Some family members were discontent with this decision and suspected Bruno of profiting from the narcotics business secretly. This will ultimately lead to his murder. Support the podcast and subscribe to get a new episode every week. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Well, hey, guys, welcome back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. Gary Jenkins here, retired Kansas City Police intelligence detective with one more of my little short bios, not a real in-depth bio, but a bio of the Philadelphia boss, Angelo Bruno. You know, I’m doing these bios to kind of fill in any knowledge gaps because, you know, when you talk about to interview an author, for example, from a book and he’ll say something about, of course, Angelo Bruno was killed. Well, you know, sometimes we go, well, who is Angelo Bruno? Well, I know he’s from Philadelphia. Well, you know, what else about him? So I’m trying to help you all fill in your knowledge gaps and fill in my own too. Lots of times, you know, I can’t remember all this stuff, but if I do a story, I can remember quite a little bit of it. So I’m doing this story for me and for you and to increase my knowledge about the mafia in the United States. [0:48] He was from Sicily. He’s going to rule the Philadelphia crime family for two decades AIDS until his assassination. He was known as the Gentle Don. Now, we’ve all heard of the Gentle Don. Well, this is the Gentle Don, because he had a preference for conciliation over violence, which was in a stark contrast to what happened later on after he left. He was born in the Villababa province of Colton, Assetta, Italy. Bruno came to the United States as a child, settled in South Philly with his brother Vito. His father was a foundry worker. They opened a small grocery store at Fort North 6th Street in Philadelphia, in Feltonville, Philadelphia. So you guys in Philadelphia will probably know where that is. I’m not sure.

St. Louis Mafia Part 2 Dec 25, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Gangland Wire, I discuss the unusual setup between the St. Louis Italian Mafia’s Tony Giordano and a Lebanese-Syrian mob family boss named James “Horseshoe Jimmy” Michaels, the former leader of the notorious Cuckoo Gang in St. Louis during Prohibition. Michaels had an agreement with the Italian Mafia, and they had a peaceful coexistence. However, after the death of St. Louis mafia Don Anthony “Tony G” Giordano, the Leisure family, half Syrian and half Lebanese, saw an opportunity to challenge Michaels and his organization. They blamed Michaels for not retaliating for the murder of one of their brothers years prior. The Leisures were involved in labor union racketeering, which was also a focus of Michaels’ organization. I explore the background of John Spica, an underling of Giordano with a criminal history, including murder. Giordano was grooming Spica for more significant things within the mafia. He was a rising star in the St. Louis mafia, and Giordano saw him as a surrogate son. Giordano’s trust in Spica was evident when he made him a part owner of a cigarette and amusement machine company. This episode sets the stage for the conflict between Horseshoe Jimmy Michaels and the Leisures and the internal power struggles within the St. Louis mafia. During his early days in prison, John Spica attempted to muscle in on the narcotics traffic, but other convicts quickly put him back in line. In 1979, he made a serious error in judgment by putting his loyalty to his prison buddy, Carl Spero, above his subservience to the Mafia. The Sparrow brothers were engaged in a deadly war with the Kansas City Mafia, and Spica’s actions were seen as a betrayal. Nick Civella, a member of the Mafia, demanded that Spica be murdered. However, Tony Giordano, a boss in the St. Louis family, believed Spica could still be valid and convinced Civella to spare his life. A sit-down was arranged between Spica and Civella to try and reconcile their differences, but the meeting did not go well, leading to tensions between St. Louis and Kansas City. A power struggle among the Syrians in the Laborers’ Union will cause problems. Giordano has appointed his nephew, Mike Trupiano, as president despite not having the interests of the working class at heart. Trupiano, known more for being a gambler, is seen as a bumbling mobster. A federal informant records Trupiano saying derogatory things about the rank and file, adding to his lack of respect. Tony G, suffering from cancer, is grooming Trupiano to take over as boss, but many doubt his ability to lead. To increase Italian influence and decrease Syrian influence in the union, a plan is launched to take money and power from Ray Flynn, a closer ally of the Syrians. Spica, already on edge from his troubles in Kansas City, openly discusses his plan to take out Flynn. Despite being assured of his safety by Giordano, Spica is killed in a car bombing. The murder sparks a war between the different crime families in St. Louis, particularly the Italian Mafia, the Syrian and Lebanese factions, and the Local ruled by Art Berne in Illinois. These families all have a stake in the lucrative construction contracts and control over influential labor unions. The power dynamics and conflicts within the St. Louis underworld will dominate headlines for years. In the final episode of our podcast, we delve into the cold case of the Spica bombing. This mafia murder has remained unsolved, with nobody coming forward to provide any leads. The hope is that someone involved in another case will confess to the murder, but that is unlikely. Over the years, it becomes apparent that Nick Civella is the prime suspect, and Paul Leisure is relying on this to avoid retaliation from the Italians. We also explore the story of Matthew Trupiano, a do-nothing boss, while the Syrian factions battle it out for control of ...

The Business of Al Capone Dec 20, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we take a deep dive into the book “The Outfit” by Gus Russo, which explores the life of Al Capone and sheds light on the hypocrisy of the American justice system and the robber barons of the era. Capone ran his bootleg empire like a corporation, complete with divisions, managers, and a division of labor. He even had a political lobbying arm and a succession plan in place. Frank Nitti, who came from the Brooklyn to Chicago gangster pipeline, played a significant role in Capone’s organization. Starting as a barber, Nitti eventually became a top-shelf whiskey smuggler and took over as boss when Capone went to prison. However, the pressure of being the boss took its toll on Nitti, and he tragically committed suicide after taking the fall for a Hollywood extortion scam. Capone often compared his organization to supposedly legitimate companies and robber barons of the time, highlighting their mistreatment of employees and battles against labor unions. It was an era with few federal regulations, allowing businesses to operate as they pleased. Capone even influenced dairy companies to put expiration dates on milk bottles after his niece fell ill from rancid milk. These parallels between so-called legitimate companies and mobsters are fascinating, as they both operated with little concern for the well-being of others. In another part of our conversation, we delve into corruption involving banks and robber barons. During the time of the failing banks, certain individuals encouraged people to put their money into another bank that would also fail, yet no legal consequences were faced. We also discuss Joseph P. Kennedy, who engaged in unethical practices to acquire a chain of film theaters and was involved in bootlegging. Although he was initially convicted on false charges, his conviction was later reversed. Regarding Joe Kennedy’s involvement in bootlegging, there is limited concrete evidence, but we do know that his father had a bar and a wholesale liquor business. Kennedy seized the opportunity to capitalize on liquor sales during Prohibition until it was lifted. He then made a significant profit through exclusive contracts with British distillers. In comparison, Al Capone had a different approach to illegal activities. We want to give special thanks to Ben Ellickson for providing us with valuable reading material on this subject. Ben has also proven a great friend through his thoughtful gift of a Prohibition-era glass whiskey bottle and his expertise in operating a backhoe. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:01] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there back here in studio gangland wire, I got a little different studio look, a little different camera placement. Anyhow, I was messing around trying to clean some stuff up and put some books in the thing in the bookcase and throw some stuff away. So it’s still a mess in here, but it’s a little better of a mess. I want to talk a little more about that great book, The Outfit by Gus Russo. And thanks to Ben Ellickson for getting me that book. about Al Capone, and he talked about the hypocrisy of the American justice system and the robber barons at the time and kind of compared him...

St. Louis Mafia Part 1 Dec 18, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. This is the first in my three-part series on the history of organized crime in St. Louis, MO. This episode delves into the fascinating world of St. Louis crime families. We are joined by author Daniel Waugh, who has written several books on the topic. Daniel introduces his books, including “Egan’s Rats,” “Gangs of St. Louis, Men of Respect,” “Off Color: Detroit’s Purple Gang,” “Vinnita: The Birth of the Detroit Mafia,” and “Beithioch: The Life and World of a Chicago Gangster.” We discuss the diverse mix of Syrians, Irish, and Italians in St. Louis, eventually forming the Italian and Syrian mafia. We learn about the connection between the Detroit and St. Louis mafia, as many families from both regions come from the same Sicilian towns. Click here to find all of Daniel’s books on Amazon. Daniel takes us back to the early days of gangs in St. Louis, specifically discussing Egan’s Rats. This gang started as a riverfront gang and later became a political terrorist, engaging in illegal voting and other forms of intimidation. We also learn about Thomas Kenny, one of the early gangsters, and the relationship between Fred Killer Burke and Al Capone. Fred Killer Burke, who started as a small-time criminal in Kansas, joined Egan’s Rats and later became involved in bootlegging and high-profile thefts. One notable crime committed by Egan’s Rats was the robbery of the United Railways Company office in St. Louis. They got away with $39,000 in cash but had to carjack another motorist when their getaway car had a tire issue. After Egan’s Rats went to prison, some members joined the Cuckoo Gang and later attached themselves to the Purple Gang. Fred Burke, in particular, became an expert with the Thompson machine gun and was eventually taken in by the Capone mob, carrying out high-risk assignments. He was connected to the murder of Frankie Yale and the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. We also explore the Pillow gang, originating from Sicilian Mafiosi, and their transition from homemade whiskey to illegal stills and beer production. A war broke out between the Sicilian gangs and the Cuckoo Gang in 1926, resulting in the Cuckoo Gang inflicting heavy casualties on the mafia and forcing other mob bosses to intervene. This war dealt a major blow to the St. Louis mob’s reputation. We then delve into the Russo brothers and the migration of their faction to Cleveland and Detroit after they were killed during Prohibition. Thomas Licavoli established a powerful crew in Toledo, and his cousin, Jack Licavoli, became the boss of the Cleveland family. Another Licavoli brother, Pete, remained in Detroit before eventually moving to Arizona. Tony Giordano emerges after Prohibition and becomes connected to a gangland homicide. We also discuss the Syrian families led by Jimmy Michaels, who grew up in Soulard and formed the Cuckoo Gang. They partnered with older crooks and eventually became leaders themselves through criminal actions. Jimmy Michaels, in particular, became a prime suspect in multiple gangland homicides by the age of 22. We learn about the autonomous relationship between Jimmy Michaels and the Sicilian mafia and the emergence of the Leisure family, which later clashed with Michaels, leading to a war in the early 1980s. The St. Louis mob, managed by Chicago, made significant profits from gambling, union racketeering, and handling stolen goods. The Chicago outfit had a strong influence over the St. Louis mob, including approving the appointment of a new boss. We also touch on the corrupt practices within the St. Louis Police Department during Prohibition, including their access to Thompson submachine guns before the gangsters did. The Greenlease kidnapping and its connection to Irish gangster Jack Griffin is discussed, as well as the involvement of lawyer Morris Schenker, Joey Lombardo, and local politics.

Richie the Boot Boriardo Dec 13, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, we dive into the captivating life and legacy of Ruggerio “Ritchie the Boot” Boriardo, an infamous figure in organized crime. From his humble beginnings to his rise to power, we explore the triumphs and tragedies that defined his existence. Join us as we uncover the story of a man who became an emblem of a criminal empire. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey, guys, here’s a little bonus episode for you. The untold saga of Ritchie the Boot Boriardo. In a dimly lit underworld of crime and betrayal, one name echoed through the decades like a haunting refrain. Ruggiero Boriardo, also known as Boot, Ritchie the Boot. Born on December the 8th, 1890 in Naples, Italy, Boriardo’s life unfolded like a gripping drama, leaving an indelible mark on the annals of organized crime. From the gritty streets of Newark, New Jersey to the sprawling territories of North Jersey, Richie the Boot emerged as a formidable force, a capo regime in the New Jersey faction of the infamous Genovese crime family. His ascent to power was marked by a web of intrigue and ruthlessness that captivated the criminal underworld for over three tumultuous decades. [0:48] Boyardo’s early years were shrouded in mystery. He painted a vivid picture of a man molded by adversity. Placed in an orphanage as a child, he spun tales of being the illegitimate son of an Italian nobleman claiming descent from Matteo Maria Boiardo. His ominous moniker, the Boot, hinted at a heavy-footed disposition that struck fear in the hearts of his gangland foes. Richie the Boot: A Rollercoaster of Violence and Vendettas [1:11] In other words, he kicked their butt every once in a while. [1:15] Richie the Boot had a career criminal that was a rollercoaster of violence and vendettas. In In the early 1930s, he survived a vicious ambush, leaving him with 12 buckshot pellet wounds in his chest. There was speculation surrounding this attack, and this speculation pointed fingers at rival gang leaders, including the notorious Abner Zwilman or the Mazzocchi brothers. The attempt on Boyardo’s life thrust him into an unusual position. He was a victim turned the accused, and if prosecutors sought answers to a crime, it would remain shrouded in mystery because he didn’t get to talk. As the 1930s unfolded, prohibitions over, gambling’s coming in, Biordaro or Richie the Boot will ascend the rank of made man in the Luciano crime family. By the 1950s, when Vito Genovese rises to the boss of the old Luciano family and makes it into the Genovese family, Richie the Boot will become a key player for this new Genovese family. Richie the Boot’s Criminal Reign and Downfall [2:12] With the death of Aids Wilman in 1959, Richie the Boot sees control of Newark and all the rackets therein. Richie the Boot will wield power over gambling activities all the way to Cuba and Florida. The pinnacle of Boyardo’s criminal reign came crashing down in April 1969 when he was convicted of a conspiracy to violate gambling laws. He was sentenced to state prison and fined $1,000. [2:36] The once mighty mob boss found himself behind bars for really the first time in his life. And this investigation showed an association with ...

The Bombing of Charlie Cavallaro Dec 11, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary discusses the Youngstown Mob. with special guests Johnny Chechitelli and James Jimmy Naples, who share their experiences and insights. The conversation is about a tragic bombing that took place in 1962, where Charlie Cavallaro Sr. and his two sons were targeted. This incident sparks our interest in further exploring the history of the Youngstown mob. Jim Naples started a Facebook group called Youngstown Mob, which gained an impressive membership of 31,000. This online community eventually led to the creation of the Youngstown Mob Talk podcast, and their live shows also gained significant attention. A particularly intriguing guest who joined their group was Charlie Cavallaro Jr., who survived the bombing despite severe injuries. Despite his involvement in the mob, Charlie had never spoken about his experience. However, he agreed to talk to the podcast hosts, forming a friendship with them through their online platform. The guests tell us about an event they organized that focused on the Cavallaro bombing. They brought in Cecil Moses, the last living FBI agent who worked on the case codenamed CAVBOMB. Throughout the discussion, we learn about the various mafia factions involved in the Youngstown mob, such as LaRocca in Pittsburgh and Cleveland. The Naples faction, with Sandy Naples as its leader, engaged in racketeering and gambling operations. The story follows a familiar pattern of mafia conflicts, with the established mafia seeking a cut of Sandy’s successful operations. The hosts share their experience organizing the CAVBOMB show, where they brought together the Naples and Cavallaro families for a memorable evening with dinner and live music. The event was filmed, and plans are underway to release it on pay-per-view for Christmas. The conversation also touches on the history of remote car starters, the creativity of mob bombings, and Charlie Cavallaro Sr.’s involvement in the mob. Charlie traveled and worked in various cities, including Rochester, Buffalo, and Pittsburgh. Interestingly, despite facing numerous challenges and near-death experiences, Charlie survived and even became a family man. The hosts discuss the Youngstown mob’s involvement in gambling, including policy operations and the tradition of gambling in Youngstown dating back to the 1940s. They also explore the FBI’s investigations into the mob’s activities but acknowledge that their efforts were often ineffective in bringing down the mob due to their ability to care for themselves. To shed further light on the Youngstown mob, retired FBI agent Cecil Moses joins the conversation. He shares intriguing documents, including the story of an informant who was offered induction into the local mob and J. Edgar Hoover’s directive to persuade the informant to accept the offer. Moses also reveals that Youngstown was not under the rule of either Cleveland or Pittsburgh but operated separately by Italian factions. The conversation weaves in personal anecdotes, emphasizing the deep ties between Youngstown and the mob. The hosts discuss their interactions with judges and their grandfather’s behind-the-scenes influence on local politics. They also mention various live shows and events, including a master class with a prominent burglar and the role of Eddie Allen, the former chief of police who consulted on the Godfather film. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book,

Thomas Lucchese Dec 06, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. The Lucchese family, sometimes referred to as the "Brogada," was involved in a wide array of criminal activities such as extortion, loan sharking, and gambling. As a cunning and violent leader, Lucchese aligned himself with Vito Genovese during Genovese's bid to become the boss of bosses. However, Lucchese later allied with Lucky Luciano, Frank Costello, Meyer Lansky, and Carlo Gambino. He played a pivotal role in orchestrating a narcotics conviction against Genovese, which ultimately led to Genovese's downfall and marked the beginning of the Mafia's decline. Interestingly, connections between families exist even within the criminal underworld. An example of this is seen in the feudal world where Thomas Gambino, Carlos Gambino's son, married Frances Lucchesi, the daughter of Three Fingers Brown. It is these intricate webs of relationships that add further complexity to the fabric of organized crime. Despite his involvement in nefarious activities, Lucchese garnered a level of respect within the community due to his charitable donations to local organizations. He passed away in New York City in 1969, leaving behind a notorious and influential legacy as one of the most dominant mobsters of the 20th century. While not as widely recognized as figures like Lucky Luciano or Frank Costello, Lucchese operated behind the scenes, exerting significant influence. Support the podcast. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire Click here to "buy me a cup of coffee" To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Well, hey guys, Gary Jenkins here, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. Back here with one of my little short bios. I, you know, I did Vito Genovese recently. This is gonna be about Thomas Lucchese, better known as Tommy Brown or Three Fingers Brown. He was a prominent American mobster and the founding member of the Lucchese crime family. He was born June 10th, 1889 in Palermo, Italy and immigrated to the United States with his family at a young age. So he's like a real Sicilian. [0:28] Tommy Brown or Tom Lucchese earned his nickname Three Fingers after losing parts of two fingers Rise in organized crime during prohibition [0:34] on his right hand in an industrial accident when he was working at a cement plant when he was a kid. That didn't hold him back. Little Tommy Lucchese became involved in organized crime at an early age, quickly rose through the ranks of the underworld because of prohibition primarily. You can see the photo up here of him holding up his right hand with only three fingers. In his early years, Tommy Lucchese was a close associate of the mobster Gaetano Reina, who was a real old school Sicilian mobster and an old Mustached Pete Blackhanders. He worked as a hitman and an enforcer for the Reina crime family, and he was known for his first endeavor. Lucchese's early criminal activities and rise in power [1:11] Tommy Lucchese hired guys to wash store windows in East Harlem and set up a little business when he was young. When a store owner refused to pay the Casey's guys to wash the windows, mysteriously, vandals broke out those same windows. And then, of course, they came back around and, you know, hey, we can probably stop those windows from being br...

Louis “Louis the Coin” Colavecchio Dec 04, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Gangland Wire, host Gary Jenkins dives into the thrilling story of Louie, “Louis the Coin” Colavecchio, a mob associate from Providence, Rhode Island, with guests Andy Thibault, the author of the book “You’d Think It Was More,” and retired Connecticut State Police officer Jerry Longo, who arrested Louie. The book delves into Louie’s life as a master thief and counterfeiter, providing intriguing stories about the Rhode Island mob. After reading a column that Andy and Jerry had published together, Louie approached Andy with his manuscript. With the help of their friend Franz Dusky and Jerry, they worked on the manuscript for several years and got it published. The book is set to be released next June. Jerry shares his experience as a Bureau of Criminal Investigations member and his involvement in catching the individual responsible for counterfeiting casino tokens. They collaborated with law enforcement in New Jersey and Connecticut, employing a unique approach to track the suspect’s presence in the casino using the inventory system. The suspect was eventually caught with evidence of counterfeiting tokens for various casinos. The conversation continues with discussions about Louie’s connections to the Providence mob and the involvement of the Patriarca crime family in his operations. The main speaker reflects on Louie’s charismatic personality and how he maintained a presence in the casinos despite being banned by many. Louie’s criminal activities ranged from insurance scams to counterfeiting money, and he had various professions, including being a metallurgist and reverse engineer. The conversation concludes with discussions on the gaming industry, Louie’s preferences for playing slot machines for perks, and his involvement in other illegal activities. Click here to get the book, https://louisthecoinbook.com/ Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Welcome all you guys back here to the studio Gangland Wire. This is Gary Jenkins, retired Kansas City, Missouri, police intelligence detective turned radio show host, or in this case, podcast host. And I really appreciate y’all listening. And I have a pretty interesting story about the Providence, Rhode Island, Patriarcha a mob or a mob associate guy named Louie, the coin. Colavecchio. And he was right next to Patriarcha. I read this book called, you’d think it was more. And this guy was a master thief, a master criminal, and he could counterfeit anything. It’s just, it’s a crazy story, I think. And it’s really well written by our guest here, Andy Thibault. And we have Jerry Longo, retired from the Connecticut State Police, who actually arrested Louis the Coin at the end. So we’ll get to hear about that and the relationship he developed with this guy, because all these kinds of really good criminals, they always have really good personalities, I’ve noticed. Do you ever notice that, Jerry? [1:00] Huge personalities. I mean, they’re good. I tell you, this book, it sounds interesting. I haven’t really got a chance to read it all, but I read enough of it to make notes that it’s got some great stories in it about the Rhode Island mob. Here’s what an assistant U.S.

Giacomo “Black Jack” Tocco Nov 30, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode of Gangland Wire, we delve into the fascinating story of Giacomo “Blackjack” Tocco, an influential figure in the Detroit Mafia. Tocco, who was born in 1927 and spent his entire life in Detroit, came from a Mafia lineage. His father, William “Black Bill” Tocco, was one of the founding members of the Detroit Mafia, known as the partnership. Tocco’s ascent within the ranks was facilitated by his familial connections, as well as his reputation for violence and intimidation. The partnership controlled various illicit activities, including gambling, loan sharking, and drug trafficking, but their most lucrative venture was their control over Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters Union. We catch a glimpse of Tocco’s appointment as boss through an FBI surveillance squad, who witnessed the event at a hunting farm in rural Michigan. Tocco’s intelligence, leadership abilities, and knack for consolidating power cemented his status as one of Detroit’s most formidable and feared bosses. Moving on, this part of the podcast focusses on a well-known photograph that has circulated on mob Facebook pages. When Joseph Zerrilli died in 1977, the most senior Mafia member, John Prizola, took the reins. Before Zerrilli died, he had given a blessing to his nephew, “Black Jack” Tocco to be considered as the future boss. When Prizola died two years after Zerrilli, Partnership members honored Zerrilli and named Giacomo “Black Jack” Toco boss. He became one of the most powerful bosses the city had ever seen because of his intelligence and leadership abilities. In 1979, Black Jack Tocco was appointed as the boss of the Detroit Mafia. In an interesting sidenote to Tocco’s appointment, FBI agent Greg Stejskal and his surveillance squad were watching a rural Michigan farm the day Black Jack Toco was anointed boss. They even trespassed into the back of this farm and grabbed a photo of Black Jack talking with Anthony Corrado and Vito Giacalone immediately after the ceremony. During his tenure as boss, Tocco oversaw the Partnership’s various illegal activities and was responsible for the organization’s continued success. It is later revealed that “Black Jack” Tocco orchestrated numerous illegal activities and expanded the Mafia’s influence, especially in Las Vegas. Despite his involvement in organized crime, Tocco was also respected within the Detroit Italian-American community for his philanthropic work and involvement in community events. Tocco’s reign came to an end in 2014, marking the end of an era for the Detroit Mafia. Despite losing their grasp on the Teamsters and facing intense scrutiny from the FBI, Tocco will forever be remembered as a dominating presence in the Detroit Mafia. Additionally, I take this opportunity to remind our listeners to exercise caution on the roads and seek assistance if they are grappling with PTSD or substance abuse. Our friend Anthony Ruggiano, a former member of the Gambino crime family, is now a drug and alcohol counselor in Florida. Make sure to visit his website for valuable resources and treatment options. Lastly, we would greatly appreciate it if you could like, subscribe, and leave a review on podcast platforms. Your support means a lot to us, and we eagerly await your intriguing mob stories in our Facebook group. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos.

A Murder in Nassau County Nov 27, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins tells a captivating story of Tommy Karate Pitera and his associates. We start off with the tale of Billy Bright, a New York kid who teams up with Frank Gangi, a man with a mafia background. Together with Arthur Guvernaro, they embark on a large-scale marijuana operation. However, when Guvernaro becomes unreliable and starts stealing from the business, Billy and Frank decide to take action. They lure him to a stash house and attempt to shoot him, but Guvernaro manages to escape only to run into a police car, where he eventually dies, revealing the culprits in his dying declaration. After serving a prison sentence for weapon possession, Frank and Billy face threats of revenge from Guvernaro’s brother, Louis Bob. Seeking protection, they turn to Tommy Karate Pitera, a respected Bonanno soldier known for his karate skills and ability to earn money for the family. With the backing of Tommy and the powerful Bonanno and Genovese families, Frank and Billy feel secure. However, their troubles continue when Greg Reiter, an associate of John Gotti Jr., enters the picture. Reiter complains to Frank Michael Harrigan, claiming that Harrigan and Gotti Jr. are squeezing him out of a business venture. Unfortunately for Reiter, Harrigan is aligned with Tommy Pitera, making it difficult for him to go against Pitera’s interests. Harrigan decides to discuss the situation with Pitera and arranges a meeting with Reiter, unaware that they are being watched by DEA agents. Pitera suggests meeting in a Nassau County parking lot, with Billy Bright serving as backup. Pitera reaches out to Michael, another individual involved in their dealings, and calmly informs him that Greg Reiter needs to be dealt with immediately. Harrigan, initially hesitant, is swayed by the fear of losing money and potential involvement of dangerous individuals. When Reiter questions why this is happening, Pitera pulls out a shotgun and shoots him multiple times. Ken Harrigan points at Pitera in response to Reiter’s confusion. Reiter dies shortly after, and his body is placed in Harrigan’s car trunk. The three men then bury Reiter in a wildlife sanctuary in Nassau County. Despite witnessing such brutality, Harrigan continues doing business with Pitera until he eventually distances himself. Harrigan faces legal consequences and is implicated in Pitera’s trial. Gansey, who testified against Pitera and joined witness protection, initially intended to give an interview but later retracted and may have passed away. Pitera, meanwhile, currently serves a life sentence for his involvement in drug dealings and sells paintings. Rumors circulate that Bright was killed in prison by the A.B. gang, allegedly hired by Greg Reiter’s brother, Mark Reiter, seeking revenge. It is noteworthy that they couldn’t get the A.B. to kill Tommy Karate, suggesting that Tommy himself pulled the trigger in Reiter’s shooting. In further discussion, we explore Tommy Karate’s power and the mob’s influence within the federal prison system. While other groups hold some power, the ABs seem to have the most sway, not just in prisons but across the entire system. It’s yet another fascinating tale of murder and the mob in New York City. We appreciate your support and encourage you to like, review, and subscribe to our podcast. New episodes are released weekly, with occasional bonus episodes. If you ride motorcycles, stay alert on the streets, and if you’re dealing with PTSD, don’t hesitate to seek help from resources like the VA website and hotline. Anthony Ruggiano, a Gambino guy, is also available on his website, YouTube channel, and hotline to assist with drug and alcohol problems. Lastly, we welcome corrections if there are any inaccuracies in our presentation. Thank you once again for your support. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a be...

Rob Angelo “The Hook” LaPrietra? Nov 26, 2023

We have an incredible story to share in today’s episode. It revolves around three burglars, Jerry Scalise, Art Rachel, and Bobby Palia, who were connected to the Chicago outfit. These individuals were planning to break into the home of the deceased leader of the vicious Chinatown crew, Angelo “the Hook” La Pietra. However, this case is even more intriguing because La Pietra was already deceased, yet his widow was still residing there. At the same time, the FBI was conducting an investigation into these criminals. As a former cop, I can tell you that catching criminals in the act is an exhilarating experience. In 2010, the FBI had been closely monitoring Scalise, Rachel, and Palia, who were known to be highly skilled thieves. The FBI obtained audio intercepts of their conversations, which further piqued their interest. Interestingly, these intercepted conversations hinted at the possibility of solving the infamous Marlboro Diamond Theft that had taken place in 1980. Scalise and Rachel, the leaders of the group, were involved in this diamond theft in London, where the Marlboro Diamond, worth millions of dollars, was stolen and never recovered. The FBI also overheard the burglars discussing their plan to break into La Pietra’s house. They even mentioned using toothpaste to hide any holes they would drill. The FBI’s primary interest, however, was gathering information about the whereabouts of the stolen Marlboro Diamond. As it turns out, the decision to target La Pietra’s house was fueled by the discovery that a high-ranking mob member, Nick Calabrese, possessed a considerable amount of cash and diamonds. This inspired the thieves to target La Pietra’s widow, as they believed valuable items would be inside the house. This wasn’t just a typical burglary but a full-blown home invasion. The FBI had been diligently tailing these criminals and collecting evidence against them. Finally, in early April 2010, the FBI made their move and apprehended Scalise, Palia, and Rachel outside La Pietra’s home. The burglars were caught red-handed with various tools such as drills, blades, a ladder, tool bags, black tape, and flashlights. They seemed to have all the necessary items to carry out their intended robbery. The presence of glass cleaner could have been an attempt to remove fingerprints, while the black tape was likely intended to restrain both the widow and the housekeeper. Deciding when to intervene in a crime is always challenging for law enforcement. In this case, with evidence of the criminals’ plans and witnessing their movement towards the target location, the FBI decided it was time to take them into custody. Scalise, Palia, and Rachel were all charged with attempted burglary and a gun possession charge. They received equal sentences for their involvement in the crime. Catching criminals in the act is a thrilling experience for law enforcement, especially when it involves dismantling an entire crew. We appreciate your support and also like to remind you to be cautious of motorcycles on the road. If you or someone you know is dealing with PTSD, we recommend reaching out to the VA for assistance. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Chicago Outfit Burglary Gone Wrong [0:00] Well, hey, guys, welcome all you wiretappers back here in the studio. Gangland wire again.

Chicago Outfit Goes to London Nov 24, 2023

In this episode, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins dives into the thrilling story of two master thieves from Chicago, Jerry the Monk Scalise and Art the Brain Rachel. These notorious criminals were part of the infamous Wild Bunch and were involved in various criminal activities in Chicago. However, their story takes an interesting turn when they fly to London in 1980 to steal the famous Marlboro Diamond, a massive 45-carat diamond. Lawrence Graff, the owner of Graff’s Jewelry Store in Knightsbridge, London, had acquired a reputation for luxury jewelry and had famous diamonds like the Emperor Maximilian and Idol Eye in his collection. In 1980, he purchased the Marlboro Diamond, which had an intriguing history as it originally belonged to Gladys Marie Spencer Churchill, the wife of the 9th Duke of Marlboro. On September 11th, 1980, two men, eventually revealed as Jerry “the Monk” Scalise and Art “the Brain” Rachel, entered Graff’s store to assess its security measures. Two days later, they returned dressed in suits that allowed them easy access. Armed with a gun and what appeared to be a hand grenade, they threatened the security guard and swiftly grabbed the Marlboro Diamond along with other valuable pieces from the display. Unbeknownst to the thieves, Colin Prothero, an alert accountant on his lunch break, and his girlfriend witnessed their suspicious behavior and promptly informed the authorities about the incident. Prothero even managed to jot down the license plate of their getaway car, which turned out to be a rental from Hertz at Heathrow Airport. While the thieves made a hasty escape, the alert account followed them on foot through the bustling streets of London without being noticed. He observed their every move and noted important details that aided the investigation. Meanwhile, the owner of Graff’s store had already called the police, and London detectives were on their way. The car was rented in the names of Joseph Scalise and Art Rachel, who had checked into the Mount Royal Hotel. The hotel staff confirmed their presence on September 4th, indicating that the thieves had meticulously planned their crime. The detectives began checking flight manifests at the airport and discovered that Scalise and Rachel were on a British Airways flight bound for Chicago. The cunning thieves had already taken a cab to the airport and even sent a package along the way, leaving witnesses who remembered their actions. Scotland Yard swiftly contacted the Chicago police, who intercepted and arrested the thieves upon their arrival. Jerry “the Monk” Scalise and Art “the Brain” Rachel They were extradited to London, where the court convicted them based on eyewitness testimonies and additional evidence. Both Scalise and Rachel received 15-year sentences in a British prison. To this day, neither of the thieves has admitted their involvement in the robbery, maintaining their innocence. Despite their advanced age, Jerry the Monk Scalise and Art the Brain Rachel are still recognized as skilled criminals. However, their return to Chicago proved to be their downfall as they were met by Scotland Yard and the FBI upon arrival. The authorities detained them, much to their confusion, as they claimed they had merely gone on a trip to London. It is speculated that their familiarity with the leniency surrounding criminal activities in Chicago led to their carelessness in London. They likely underestimated the increased surveillance and scrutiny in a big city like London, ultimately leading to their capture. In addition to this thrilling tale, Gary Jenkins takes a moment to remind listeners to be mindful of motorcycles on the road. Furthermore, he encourages those who have served in the military and are struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to visit the VA website for assistance and access to the hotline. He thanks you for tuning in and joining us on this captivating journey. And remember,

Corleone Sicily with Justin Cascio Nov 20, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary discusses with Justin Cascio, a mafia genealogist, his book In Our Blood: The Mafia in Corleone, Italy, In Our Blood: The Mafia Families of Corleone. We explore the roots and activities of the Mafia in Western Sicily, debunking many romanticized notions. We also discuss the migration of mafia families to the United States and their influence in various cities. The conversation concludes with insights into the rise of the Mafia as a political force. Listen n to learn more about the history and impact of the Mafia. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when you check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Transcript Introduction to Mafia genealogist Justin Cascio [0:00] Well, welcome all you wiretappers back here in the studio of Gangland Wire. You know, I have a guest that we had him before, Justin Cascio. And if you follow my Facebook group, you’ll see him post a little bit. And he is a mafia genealogist. Justin, welcome. I really appreciate you coming back on the show. [0:19] Thanks for having me on, Gary. Justin, I remember us talking before. Now, you’ve written a book about your search for the roots the Mafia in Corleone, Italy, or Sicily. Tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got into this work. Mafia genealogy is kind of interesting. I think you have a personal connection, don’t you? [0:39] I do. I first heard the name Corleone from my grandmother when I was a little kid. So way too young to have watched The Godfather. It took me years before I made that connection between the mythical, fictional Don Corleone and the place where my grandfather was from. Both of his parents were born in Corleone, which is a little mountain town about an hour away from Palermo. If you drive it today, I think it’s about an hour. Country town, but it’s also a transportation hub, and it was also a center of culture in the mostly rural place that didn’t have a lot of institutions of higher learning, for instance. It attracted skilled artisans, so it had some wealth. It was a little more of a destination than any of the other villages that surround it. So Corleone was just a little bit special in Sicily’s history. Discussion on the roots of the Mafia in Corleone [1:30] William Sturkey You know, I noticed as I was doing a little research before you came on the show here that, for example, Ciro, the artichoke king Terranova, and Tommy Gagliano, and the Dragna family are all from the little town of Corleone, and I’m sure there’s others from that province right around there between there and Palermo. That was a hotbed of mafia activity to the roots of the mafia in the United States, correct? Absolutely. The Mafia started in Western Sicily, just that one little tip of the island. [1:58] Interesting. Does that go all the way back to when the French soldier supposedly, raped or came on to a Sicilian woman and they had the real night of the Sicilian Vespers, or is that after that, in that area? The Sicilian Vespers happened in Palermo. The Mafia started a little later, maybe in the 1800s, maybe as early as the late 1700s. And most people would say that it started in Western Sicily and probably in the countryside, although some theorists say that they think it started in the city.

Giacamo Tocco – Detroit Partnership Nov 15, 2023

In this episode of Gangland Wire, a Retired KCPD Intelligence Detective looks into the fascinating story of Giacomo “Blackjack” Tocco, an influential figure in the Detroit Mafia. Tocco, born in 1927 and spent his entire life in Detroit, came from a Mafia lineage. His father, William “Black Bill” Tocco, was one of the founding members of the Detroit Mafia, known as the Partnership. Tocco’s ascent within the ranks was facilitated by his familial connections, as well as his reputation for violence and intimidation. The partnership controlled various illicit activities, including gambling, loan sharking, and drug trafficking, but their most lucrative venture was their control over Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters Union. We glimpse Tocco’s appointment as boss through an FBI surveillance squad, who witnessed the event at a hunting farm in rural Michigan. Tocco’s intelligence, leadership abilities, and knack for consolidating power cemented his status as one of Detroit’s most formidable and feared bosses. Moving on, this part of the podcast focuses on a well-known photograph circulated on mob Facebook pages. The picture captures a conversation between Greg Stejskal, his accomplice Anthony Corrado, and Vito Giacalone, which took place after a ceremony. Stejskal and his partner trespassed onto someone else’s property to get close enough to the house for the photo. It is later revealed that Thomas “Black Jack” Tocco, who was the boss during that time, orchestrated numerous illegal activities and expanded the Mafia’s influence, especially in Las Vegas. Despite his involvement in organized crime, Tocco was also respected within the Detroit Italian-American community for his philanthropic work and involvement in community events. Sadly, Tocco’s reign ended in 2014, marking the end of an era for the Detroit Mafia. Despite losing their grasp on the Teamsters and facing intense scrutiny from the FBI, Tocco will forever be remembered as a dominating presence in the Detroit Mafia. Additionally, I take this opportunity to remind our listeners to exercise caution on the roads and seek assistance if they are grappling with PTSD or substance abuse. Our friend Anthony Ruggiano, a former member of the Gambino crime family, is now a drug and alcohol counselor in Florida. Make sure to visit his website for valuable resources and treatment options. Lastly, we would greatly appreciate it if you could like, subscribe, and leave a review on podcast platforms. Your support means a lot to us, and we eagerly await your intriguing mob stories in our Facebook group. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript [0:00] Hey, guys. Welcome back here to the studio of Gangland Wire. Gary Jenkins, retired intelligence unit detective here in Kansas City. I’m going to bring you a story today about Giacomo Blackjack Tocco. He was a prominent figure in the Detroit Mafia. He was well known for his ruthless tactics, but he had a lot of leadership skills. Born in 1927, in February of 1927 in the suburbs of Detroit. So he’s a lifelong Detroit resident. He was a Mafia legacy because his father, of William Black Bill Tocco was a founding member of the Detroit Mafia family, also known as the partnership. You know, they have never had the outfit in Chicago, then the partnership in Detroit. Now, Black Bill,

Canadian Mafia Nov 13, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, he interviews Peter Edwards, a reporter from the Toronto Star who specializes in covering organized crime. Peter’s Background: Peter Edwards explains his extensive experience as a journalist at the Toronto Star, specializing in organized crime. He mentions his numerous books on the topic, including an encyclopedia on organized crime. He also notes that he collaborates with reporters from other cities due to the mobility of organized crime figures. Sicilian Mafia in Canada: The discussion delves into the history of the Sicilian Mafia’s presence in Canada, focusing on the 1950s and the influence of individuals like Carmen Galante. The conversation also highlights the role of Frank Catroni, Vic Catroni, Nicoli Rizzuto, and Vito Rizzuto of the Montreal Mafia. Power Struggles: The conversation covers the power struggles within the Montreal Mafia, including Vito Rizzuto’s leadership and subsequent imprisonment in the United States. The murder of three Capos in New York is mentioned, and the intriguing involvement of a mob figure from Montreal in that event is discussed. Changing Alliances: Peter Edwards discusses how organized crime in Canada is evolving, with a shift away from strict family lines. He emphasizes the importance of alliances and connections between different criminal groups, which have become more prevalent with the advent of the Internet. Hells Angels: The conversation turns to the Hells Angels, exploring their rise in Canada. They discuss the structured nature of the Hells Angels and their complex, sometimes unscrupulous, alliances. The shift from being “thugs” to a formidable organization is highlighted. Modern Activities: The discussion touches on the diversified activities of organized crime, including involvement in strip clubs, girls, and white-collar crimes. The role of gambling in power struggles between different crime groups is also mentioned. Organization and Alliances: The conversation elaborates on the structure and alliances of the Hells Angels. It is noted that the Hells Angels prefer to be seen as equals rather than a pyramid structure, which is common in the traditional mafia. Biker Clubs and Mob Associations: The conversation delves into the concept of biker clubs, their affiliations, and how they can be incorporated into the larger Hells Angels network. Peter explains how different provinces in Canada have different criminal organizations, with the Drangheta being more prominent in Toronto. Drug Trafficking: The conversation briefly touches on the historical “French connection” for smuggling heroin into Montreal and then into New York City. The ease of drug trafficking across the Canada-U.S. border and strategies for evading law enforcement are discussed. Changing Tactics: The conversation mentions how criminals adapt to law enforcement efforts. Criminals are now forming alliances, sharing loads, and utilizing encrypted messaging, making it difficult for authorities to track their activities. The use of GPS technology to target victims is also highlighted. Covert Assassinations: The conversation discusses the changing tactics in assassinations, with drive-by shootings becoming more common, increasing the risk to bystanders. Starbucks and High-End Operations: Criminals are increasingly seen at high-end locations like Starbucks. They spend on expensive coffee, reflecting their evolving operations and changing preferences. Overall, the conversation provides insights into the shifting dynamics of organized crime in Canada, the roles of different criminal organizations, and their adaptation to modern challenges, including the use of technology and changing criminal tactics. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick...

Anthony Accardo Impersonates a Lawyer Nov 01, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this bonus episode, we explore the fascinating relationship between Tony Accardo and Paul Ricca, two influential figures in Chicago’s organized crime scene. Ricca held Accardo in high esteem, appointing him as his second in command and entrusting him with the outfit’s leadership during Ricca’s incarceration. Together, they orchestrated a strategy to infiltrate labor unions and extort funds from Hollywood studios during the 1940s. Accardo’s skills proved invaluable as he managed to secure Ricca’s early release and that of their associates, serving only three years of a ten-year prison sentence. While Ricca and Accardo were behind bars, they devised a cunning scheme to maintain communication through a lawyer named Elmer Bernstein and his associate Joseph Bulger, who was, in fact, Accardo in disguise. Unfortunately, this scheme was eventually uncovered, leading to a federal trial where Accardo and Bernstein faced conspiracy charges to defraud the government. Remarkably, despite overwhelming evidence against them, they were acquitted, showcasing the immense power and influence of the outfit. With Ricca stepping back, Sam Giancana emerged as the new face of the Outfit. However, Giancana’s downfall eventually paved the way for Joseph Aiuppa to become the new boss. This episode sheds light on the pivotal role played by Accardo as Ricca’s chosen successor. As we conclude, I’d like to remind you to support veterans dealing with PTSD and to remain vigilant and mindful of motorcyclists on the road. If you or someone you know struggles with substance abuse, I encourage you to contact Anthony Ruggiano’s treatment center in Florida. To learn more about Anthony Ruggiano and access additional resources, you can easily find his website by searching for him on Google or YouTube. Thank you all for your continued support of the show. Your presence and engagement mean so much to me. As always, please show your support by liking, subscribing, and leaving reviews for the podcast. I apologize for neglecting to mention these in recent episodes. I truly value your connection and enjoyment of the content. Thank you wholeheartedly for being a part of this journey with me. Subscribe to get new gangster stories every week. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Tony Accardo: The Genuine Godfather [0:00] Well, hey, all you wiretappers out there, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, another little shorty, another bonus episode. This is going to be about Tony Accardo, your favorite from Chicago, the genuine godfather, as Bill Romer once called him, the big tuna, a real Joe Batters, as Al Capone called him. So speaking of Al Capone, according to legend, and I’m going to have to look at my cheat seat. Paul Ricca once said of Ocardo, this guy has more brains at breakfast than Al Capone had all day long. So Paul Ricca had high expectations and a high regard for Tony Ocardo, who would be his second in command, basically, and would step in for him when Ricca went to the prison in 1943, I believe it was. In the 40s, the outfit sent some guys out to Hollywood, California, and infiltrated the, I believe, the Stagehands Union, and they’d already infiltrated the Projectors Union in Chicago, in the movie theaters. So they got out to California,

Andrea Giovino – Get Gotti Nov 01, 2023

In this episode of Gangland Wire, Gary looks into the life of Andrea Giovino and her long-standing involvement with the mafia. Growing up in Brooklyn, Andrea’s family was deeply intertwined with organized crime, with her mother running illegal gambling games and her brothers becoming contract killers for various crime families. During our interview, Andrea shares intimate details of her time in the drug trade and her relationships with prominent mob figures. She is in the recently released Netflix documentary, “Get Gotti,” which sheds light on the infamous mobster John Gotti. Andrea reveals that she had a personal connection to Gotti’s inner circle, as she was once the live-in girlfriend of Bonanno capo Frank Lino, who later became a government witness against his own son. With her firsthand experiences, Andrea provides an intriguing perspective on the documentary and its portrayal of the mob’s inner workings. Furthermore, Andrea opens up about her past relationships with drug dealers, including her involvement with a Gotti-connected heroin dealer named Mark Reiter. She later married another drug dealer named John Fogarty, who had strong ties to the Gotti family and a reputation for being tough. Andrea shares the challenging dynamics of her relationship with Fogarty, suspecting him of committing a murder and eventually praying for his arrest as a means to escape the chaos. Andrea’s life takes a sharp turn when Fogarty is caught in a drug deal and subsequently arrested. At this time, her phone is tapped, uncovering conversations about violent threats and debt collection. Both Andrea and her brother are also arrested and charged. However, Fogarty eventually confesses to several murders, spending six years in prison before entering witness protection. During this tumultuous period, Andrea herself provides valuable information to the authorities and is rewarded with a settlement, which enables her to relocate to a small town in Pennsylvania under the protection of DEA agents. Reflecting on her past, Andrea reveals how her upbringing in a neighborhood plagued by poverty and influenced by street guys led her into the mafia lifestyle. Initially attracted to their way of life, she found herself dating and associating with high-profile organized crime figures like John Gotti. Andrea recounts a story where she sought the assistance of respected figure Danny Marino to recover funds that she had put down on a house. This anecdote highlights the deep sense of loyalty and protection within organized crime. However, as Andrea’s life unravels, she becomes increasingly disillusioned with the criminal lifestyle. She loses custody of one of her children and faces threats on her life. Today, she is unafraid to speak out against criminal activities and is determined to turn her life around. Andrea displays a newfound appreciation for integrity, honesty, and a humble life. She encourages others, especially women, to avoid being enticed by bad characters or the allure of quick money, emphasizing the importance of education and making better choices. As the conversation draws to a close, they discuss the consequences faced by those involved in criminal activities, dispelling the misconception that they can avoid prison time. Despite her own struggles and regrets, Andrea is grateful for her past experiences, as they have allowed her to grow and develop a deep understanding of the wrongs inherent in that lifestyle. She expresses appreciation for the support of her listeners and encourages them to engage with her content, as well as explore Andrea’s book, “Divorced from the Mob,” and the Netflix series, “Get Gotti.” Additionally, she highlights resources for individuals dealing with PTSD, substance abuse, and encourages feedback and discussion. Get 50% off order from Factor Foods by using the code gangland50 Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee”

Frank Ragano and Santo Trafficante Jr. Oct 30, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary and Australian contributor Tony Taouk examine the life and career of mob lawyer Frank Ragano. He started defending mafia boss Santo Trafficante Jr.’s Bolita bankers and runners, defended James Hoffa, and advised Carlos Marcello on some matters. One of the most exciting things Frank Ragano claims was that Santo Trafficante Jr. and New Orleans mob chieftain Carlos Marcello ordered the assassination of JFK. He claimed that Santo Trafficante Jr. confessed this to him shortly before his death. More specifically, Trafficante supposedly said he regretted killing John Kennedy and that he should have killed his brother, Robert Kennedy. Tony Taouk is an Australian lawyer and a Mafia researcher who specializes in the subject of mob trials and mob lawyers. He has also traveled to the United States and visited mob-related sites in New York, Chicago, and Las Vegas. Get 50% off order from Factor Foods by using the code gangland50 Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well hey guys back here in the studio gangland wire. This is your intelligence unit detective Gary Jenkins retired former guys. We’re here with Tony toke from Down Under. He is our expert on mob lawyers. We’ve done several in the past. Tony, we did Oscar Goodman last. And what did we do before that? Oh, we did Roy Cohn and today we’re going to do Frank Ragano. And guys, there’s a heck of a book out there Mob Lawyer if you want to know a lot more about them. What we’re going to say about Frank Ragano get this book that he co wrote with a really highly respected well known mob historian Selwyn Rob wrote the Five Families I believe was his quiz, his premier work. And so it’s called Mob Lawyer. So Tony, let’s talk a little bit about how he got started. I was reading the book and it looks like as a young lawyer down in Tampa Ybor City, there’s a lot of numbers racket or boleto going on. And as any young lawyer, he starts taking some of these low level cases, probably in city court, more than likely that’s what it would be here in Kansas City or maybe the lower level the associate Circuit Court taken on some of those and I believe, Santos Trafficante took notice that a man what do you remember about how I got into this business of being a mob lawyer? Tony Taourk 01:26 Well, frankly, Ragano was born in 1923. He grew up poor in Tampa, Florida. His parents were working class Sicilian immigrants. He actually fought in the Second World War and he received a Bronze Star for bravery. After the war, he went to the University of Tampa and Stetson Law School on the GI Bill of Rights. He clerked for the Florida Supreme Court, and was admitted to the Florida Bar in 1952. Now, during his stint with the Florida Supreme Court, he attracted the attention of a Pat Whittaker. He was a maverick criminal defense attorney in the Tampa area, who was the go to lawyer for local mobsters. Now, Whitaker took Ragano under his wing and encouraged him to start his own practice and promised to refer him work. He’s big break came in 1954 when Florida mob boss Santo Trafficante and 34 men were arrested on gambling and bribery charges. This was in connection with the whole Bolita operation that you just referred to, I think we didn’t get represented Trafficante, who was quite because Ragano was quite young at this point.

NYPD and Corruption Oct 26, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary talks with retired NYPD cop turned-author Vic Ferrari. Vic has written several books depicting his experiences as an NYPD officer and detective. They discuss a recent documentary, Blue Code of Silence, and a narrative movie about the same subject, Prince of the City. Vic and Gary discuss the problems of working with Federal law enforcement when uncovering corruption within a police department. Click here to find Vic Ferrari’s books on Amazon Get 50% off order from Factor Foods by using the code gangland50 Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Gary Jenkins: [00:41:00] Well, hey guys, Gary Jenkins here, retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective. I’m here with my good friend Vic Ferrari, another retired copper out of New York City. Welcome, Viv Ferrari: Vic. Hey, Gary, how you doing today? Thank you for having Gary Jenkins: me on your show. Well, it’s really great to have you back. I love talking to you. Gary Jenkins: You know, it’s kind of like, you know, I sit down with my buddies once a while, about I don’t know, once a week, he’s easily for coffee or we go play golf and we, you know, we ended up telling old war stories. Of course it is. There’s such an ease between coppers and their life, right? Viv Ferrari: We speak the same language. Gary Jenkins: It’s funny. It’s, it’s, it’s a club, I guess. We have our own little club. It’s like the Palma Boys social club that Tony Fat Tony Salerno had, or the Bergen Hunt and Fish Club Ravenite that Gotti Viv Ferrari: had. Yeah. I never saw the rate. Well, I did see the Ravenight years later, the Bergen Hunt and Fish club. I never saw, but the Palmer boys. Viv Ferrari: Yeah. Remember Gary Jenkins: that one, that one. [00:42:00] So anyhow, of course, this, this podcast is mainly about organized crime, but we like to spin off into other things. I’ve got a ton. I’ve got 400 and some organized crime stories out there, probably 375, but I like to spin off and other things. I’d like to give you guys. Kind of a little inside look at police department and police officers, detectives, and how we work with other agencies, particularly the FBI, the U S attorney’s office. Gary Jenkins: Now happened to be watch actually Ken Couture, one of my Facebook guys that helps me administer my administrate my podcast group on Facebook posted a link or a post about a documentary called the Code Blue of silence. It was a, if you remember seeing the movie about the Prince of the city and this NYPD detective, Bob Lucy, who ended up working with us attorney’s office and the FBI and, and exposed a lot of corruption and both [00:43:00] in, in lawyers and bail bondsmen and, and other cops and in the court system in New York city. Gary Jenkins: And I remember watching that movie Prince of the city. Back in the early seventies and it, like it brought it home, you know, working with the U S attorney’s office and Vic and I were talking just before we turned on the recorder here is like, it’s like dealing with a steamroller. If you get in their way, they’re just going to power over you. Gary Jenkins: You got to do exactly what they want. And Bob Leuci found that out. And so I watched this Code Blue of Silence, which by the way, guys, I’d recommend is a really good documentary. I found it on Plax, PLAX.

Sam Manninaro’s Big Score Oct 23, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews David Rabinovitch, an EMMY-winning investigative journalist and filmmaker, about his uncle Wolf Rabin and his association with Pittsburgh mafia member Sam Mannarino. David wrote a book titled Jukebox Empire: The Mob and the Darkside of the American Dream and told several stories from his book. Sam Mannarino was a prominent La Cosa Nostra figure in Western Pennsylvania when he went into business with Wolf Rabin. Mannarino and his brother, Gabriel “Kelly” Mannarino, controlled gambling and related activities in New Kensington for the Pittsburgh Crime Family. Of interest is that Sam Mannarino also had an interest in the Sans Souci casino in Cuba in the 1950s. This Cuban connection will be instrumental in the laundering of stolen bonds. David tells a story of international crime that stretches from the US to Canada to Cuba and Switzerland. David’s uncle, Wolf Rabin, got into the Jukebox business in the 1930s and developed many organized crime connections. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Get 50% off on your Factor Food order use code gangland50 at checkout Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, David Rabinovitch GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well welcome all you Wiretappers out there. It’s good to be back here in studio gangland wire. I have a really interesting story. I didn’t remember how I got onto this somewhere on the internet of course. And it was about a man named Wolf Rabin now what a cool name Wolf Rabin. And he got involved with Sam Mannarino, who was a many of you all know is a big time Pittsburgh mafia member and they did a international kind of a crime and then I found there’s a book on it, you know, and then it’s by I believe a relative of south of not Sam Manariono but of Wolf Rabin, and so I have that man here, David Rabinovitch. Thanks a lot for coming on, David. David Rabinovitch 00:41 Nice. Thank you for inviting me Gary was one thing in my family we pronounce to Rabin. GARY JENKINS 00:48 Rabbit work. Okay. All right, a little more Russian, Russian. My grandpa used to say those Russians, David Rabinovitch 00:57 My grandfather left Ukraine GARY JENKINS 01:04 in hell really interesting. David is an Emmy winning documentary filmmaker and has a bunch of stuff out there. So David wants you tell the guys a little bit about your history your boat a few days, if you will. David Rabinovitch 01:19 Know, this is pretty much all I’ve ever done. Since I was a teenager, I had the good fortune to have some wonderful mentors who a bureau chief from Time magazine, who might wind up breaking the ever start. I’m 19 years old. I grew up in Canada. So I worked a lot for media and Broadcasting Corporation, pretty young agent, we the longest producer, on staff and at 21 or 22. So we documentaries, really all over the world. I moved to the the United States 45 years ago and continue doing well. I think one of the most significant films made during my career was a film called Politics of Poison, which was an investigation of the use of chemicals known as Agent Orange. The other kind of major production that I’ll mention is still I’m this is a mini series called Secret Files of the Inquisition. And this is a four part Docudrama, based on files from the Vatican archive other archives in Europe that reveal jus...

Vito Genovese was not a nice man Oct 18, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this short episode, Gary tells a short overview of the feared Mafia boss Vito Genovese. Get 50% off use the code gangland50 when check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Billy D’Elia and Russell Bufalino Oct 16, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, I speak with author Matt Birkbeck about the life of William “Big Billy” D’Elia, a prominent figure in the mafia. We discuss D’Elia’s role as a negotiator for the mob and his close relationship with Russell Bufalino. The conversation delves into behind-the-scenes dealings, connections to influential individuals, and the complexities of the criminal world. We highlight the scarcity of information about the Russell Bufalino family and the power they held. One fascinating aspect that emerges is Billy’s role as a negotiator for the mob across different industries, including films, music, and politics. We discuss his connections with influential individuals like Nick Civella and Tony Ripe Civella, the nephew who took over the family business. A notable episode involves Billy intervening when Donald Trump wanted Michael Jackson to perform at his casino, ultimately becoming Jackson’s co-manager. The book offers unparalleled insights into the inner workings of organized crime, including behind-the-scenes dealings and Billy’s rise to power within the mob. We uncover Muhammad Ali’s visit to Ted Kennedy on Russell Bufalino’s behalf, showcasing these hidden alliances’ unpredictable nature. The power and respect commanded by Bufalino become evident as we explore anecdotes of his interactions with figures like Frank Sinatra. We also touch on Bufalino’s influence through his connection to the Teamsters Union. We recommend Matt Birkbeck’s book for true crime enthusiasts and provide valuable resources for listeners dealing with PTSD and substance abuse. Get the Book The Life We Chose by Matt Birkbeck. Get 50% off your Factor Foods order – use the code gangland50 when you check out at Factor Foods Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Introduction of special guest Matt Birkbeck [0:00] Welcome, all you guys back here in the studio Ganglans Wire where I have a special guest today, Matt Birkbeck. He wrote The Life We Chose, and he examines the life of William Big Billy D’Elia. Did I get that right, Matt D’Elia? You got that right. Well, Matt, welcome. I’m really happy to have you on the show. Thanks for having me. And you write a lot about Russell Bufalino and who Big Billy D’Elia came up under. So that’s something that my guys out here really want to know about, because he was such an important mafia member nationally. Bufalino was, and D’Elia, Big Billy, he came up under him. He kind of took over his kind of mantle, it looks to me like, from reading your book. Guys, let me tell you a couple of quotes. You may all know mafia reporter, my favorite mafia reporter and expert, George Anastasia. And he said about The Life We Choose, he said it’s a riveting, extraordinary account of one of the last 20th century goodfellas. And Nicholas Pelleggi, who is the, of course, Las Vegas expert, called it a good read and an unforgettable story. So there’s pretty high praise, Matt, from guys like that. Matt Birkbeck’s other true crime books [1:14] What other true crime books do you have? So this was my, I believe it was my seventh book. So I’ve written about Robert Durst in my first book, A Deadly Secret. [1:25] I wrote two books on a really interesting case involving a girl who was kidnapped as a toddler, called Books for a Beautiful Child and Finding Sharon,

Jilly Greca – The Man Who Cleared the Way for Donnie Brasco Oct 11, 2023

In this episode of Gangland Wire, Gary Jenkins delves into the story of Donnie Brasco, aka Joe Pistone, and his introduction to the mob through a minor criminal named Jilly Greca. Jilly, whose real name was Angelo J. Greca, was a member of the Colombo family and owned a store in Brooklyn called Acerg that was a front for stolen goods. Jilly and his crew would meet at the store to plan heists and socialize. Donnie Brasco became close with Jilly and started hanging out at the store, discussing scores and sharing stories. Jilly’s crew was involved in stealing from docks, warehouses, and truck lines, with inside connections to dock workers and truck drivers. Donnie, an undercover FBI agent, gained acceptance among the crew and played a role in getting Jilly indicted. Donnie engaged in illegal activities throughout his undercover work but constantly fed information to the FBI. Jilly was later killed, possibly due to the information provided by Donnie. Jilly’s capo, Charlie “Moose” Panarella, was a renowned and feared mafia figure known for torturing and killing a powerful capo named Dominic Mimi Schiallo. Despite Jilly’s lack of earning power, his murder became necessary due to his potential murder charge and the risk he posed to the crew. Moose Panarella was eventually exiled to Las Vegas but was called back periodically by Carmine Persico to carry out murders. The episode concludes with reminders to seek help for PTSD or substance abuse, and recommendations for resources, like Joe Pistone’s book, “Donnie Brasco: My Undercover Life in the Mafia.” Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript The Mysterious Jilly Greca – Donnie Brasco’s First Target [0:00] Well, hey guys, Gary Jenkins here, back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, bringing you a story. I’ve been asked several times about Donnie Brasco or Joe Pistone, and how did he really get started? And one guy mentioned that the very first guy was Jilly Greca. As a matter of fact, I think it was a comment on YouTube or email or Facebook. I don’t remember, but he asked about Jilly Greca and a little bit about him and he said this was the very first guy that got Joe Pistone going into the Bonanno family and actually the Colombo family and then the Bonanno family. And, you know, I looked it up. I did all the research I could. There isn’t a lot about this guy. He’s kind of a minor guy who was just your career criminal in New York City back in the 50s and 60s and 70s. Joe Pistone talked about him a little bit, not a lot. I think it was kind of, it was just one more stepping stone on Joe Pistone’s career to fame, which he has done that. Let me tell you what I could find out about him. You know, his real name was Angelo J. Greca. [1:13] And he was born in 1927, which made him, you know, in his 50s and 60s back in those days. He did a stint behind bars in the early 70s. He got arrested in Switzerland on the charges of conspiracy to transport and sell a $100,000 U.S. Treasury note that had been stolen from a New York brokerage firm. Now, the mob used to do that. They’d steal these Treasury notes or these bonds that could be cashed, and they’d take them to Switzerland, and take them to a bank and get loans against them, because then they’d just hold on to it until the loan was finally called years later, because they weren’t making the payments,

Rochester Mob War Oct 09, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. He welcomes Mafia author Blair Kenny, who lived through the Rochester Mob wars and has written on the battle between the A-Team, the B-Team, and later the C-Team. We explore the rise and fall of Frank Valenti, the boss of the Rochester crime family in the 1960s and 1970s. Valenti ran a tight ship, appointing Samuel Russotti as his second-in-command, Rene Picarreto as his advisor, and five other men as his captains. He assigned them different rackets, such as gambling, extortion, loan sharking, insurance fraud, arson, narcotics, and weapon trafficking. He also orchestrated a series of bombings in 1970 to divert the attention of the authorities from his operations. However, Valenti’s reign was challenged by Russotti, Picarreto, and one of his captains, Salvatore Gingello, who accused him of pocketing money from the family. They also had the support of the Bonanno crime family from New York. Valenti refused to step down, but he lost his most trusted ally and bodyguard, Domenic Chirico, who was shot and killed. Valenti decided to leave Rochester and retire in Phoenix, Arizona, where he was later arrested and convicted of extortion. He died in 2008. After Valenti’s departure, Russotti took over as the boss, with Picarreto and Gingello as his right-hand men. The family seemed stable until January 1977, when they were all arrested and convicted of murdering Vincent Massaro based on fabricated evidence. They received 25 years to life sentences. Thomas Didio became the acting boss but soon faced problems from within and outside the family. So tune in and learn more. To find Blair Kenny’s book, click on The Rochester Mob Wars. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

John Gotti and Bruce Cutler Oct 02, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary and Tony Taouk discuss the famous mafia attorney Bruce Cutler and his representations of John Gotti. We learn why a judge denied Bruce Cutler the ability to represent Gotti at his last trial. We also learn how Bruce Cutler represented a Chicago Outfit boss after Chicago got permission to hire him from Gotti. Tony Taouk is an Australian lawyer and a Mafia researcher who specializes in the subject of mob trials and mob lawyers. He has also traveled to the United States and visited mob-related sites in New York, Chicago, and Las Vegas. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS Tony Taourk, GARY JENKINS GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well welcome all you Wiretappers. I’m back here in studio Gangland Wire with our good friend from Down Under Tony Taourk. Tony. Welcome. Tony Taourk 00:09 Glad to be here. GARY JENKINS 00:11 All right, Tony. It’s good to have you and I understand that it’s winter down there while it’s summer here. Always seems kinda weird. I’m talking to a dude in Australia sit there in Kansas City. Tony Taourk 00:23 Live Yes. Match up courtesy, GARY JENKINS 00:27 magic of the inner that this morning down there just before you go to work in your office. And it’s evening here just as I’m getting ready to get off. Yeah. Anyhow, so we’re gonna talk about Bruce Cutler, guys. You know, Tony is our expert on mob lawyers. And we’ve done Frank Ragano and Roy Cohn. And we do another one or just those two. Oscar Goodman, Oscar, Oscar Goodman. How could I forget Oscar Goodman, the guy that cross examined me and Oscar Goodman. So we’ve been fun shows are fun stories. And nobody really talks about in these other podcasts out here. I don’t see him talking about the mob lawyers. And they play an important part in Bob history, a huge part in mob history. And somebody policemen always think that they’re part of the mob now Bruce Cutler, he, he may have been he actually was kicked off a case because and I’ll let Tony go into that he knows more about that than I do. But Bruce Cutler it was famous because of John Gotti. And he was and he played the cameras too. And he played doing like an audience in the theater all the time, too. So Tony, tell us a little bit about how Bruce Cutler got his start. Tony Taourk 01:42 Well, Bruce was born in Brooklyn, New York in 1948. So his father was a Police Officer turned lawyer. That sounds familiar. GARY JENKINS 01:50 That’s me. Tony Taourk 01:54 He went to Hamilton College in Brooklyn, poly prep, where he had been an aggressive linesman on the football team and a champion wrestler which kind of explains his pagination civic courtroom style, which I’m gonna go into later. He graduated from Brooklyn Law School in 1974. He worked as a trial attorney with the Brooklyn da from 1974 to 1981. And then he joined private practice with Barry Slotnick. He went towards Barry Slotnick. Now bearish last week’s bearish topics famous small representative representing Bernie gets the vigilante subway shooter in the 1980s is one of the premier criminal defense lawyers in New York. And now, Heartland met John Gotti early 1985 while he was working for Slotnick, and in April 1986, Gotti went on trial for in Brooklyn, on racketeering charges bought by a zealous prosecutor.

Scarface Capone v. Dapper Don John Gotti Sep 25, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary and Camillus “Cam” Robinson compare and contrast the lifestyles, management styles, and organizational abilities of Scarface Al Capone and The Dapper Don, John Gotti.Overview Al Capone and John Gotti are two of the most infamous figures in the history of the American Mafia. They both rose to power through their involvement in dealing in contraband, racketeering, murder, gambling, and other crimes. However, they also had notable differences in their personalities, styles, and fates. Here are some points of comparison and contrast between them: Early Years Al Capone was born in Brooklyn, New York 1899, to Italian immigrants from Naples. He dropped out of school at 14 and joined a street gang led by Johnny Torrio, a mentor who later brought him to Chicago. John Gotti was also born in Brooklyn, New York, in 1940 to Italian-American parents with roots in Naples. He also dropped out of school at 16 and became involved in various gangs and criminal activities. Rise to Power Al Capone became the boss of the Chicago Outfit, one of America’s most powerful crime syndicates, after he orchestrated the murder of his rival, Big Jim Colosimo, in 1920. He expanded his empire by eliminating or allying with other gangs, bribing public officials, and controlling all bootlegging activity and other Chicago illicit businesses. John Gotti became the boss of the Gambino crime family, the largest and most influential Mafia group in New York, after he ordered the assassination of his predecessor, Paul Castellano, in 1985. He consolidated his power by promoting loyal associates, intimidating rivals, and cultivating a public image as a charismatic and generous leader. Publicity: Al Capone was known for his flamboyant lifestyle and lavish spending. He wore expensive suits, drove luxury cars, and frequented nightclubs and restaurants. He also donated money to charities and soup kitchens, earning him some popularity among the poor. He was often featured in newspapers and magazines as a celebrity gangster. John Gotti was also fond of dressing well and living large. He frequented social clubs, bars, and casinos, where he mingled with celebrities and politicians. He also enjoyed media attention and often gave interviews or made statements to reporters. He was nicknamed “The Dapper Don” for his style and “The Teflon Don” for his ability to evade prosecution. Downfall Al Capone’s downfall came because of his tax evasion. Despite being suspected of numerous crimes, he was never convicted of anything more severe than contempt of court until 1931, when he was found guilty of failing to pay taxes on his illegal income. He was sentenced to 11 years, where he contracted syphilis and suffered mental deterioration. He was released in 1939 and died in 19471. John Gotti’s downfall came because his underboss, Sammy Gravano, turned government informant and testified against him. After being acquitted in three previous trials, he was convicted of murder and racketeering in 1992. A Court sentenced Gotti to life without parole, where he died of cancer in 2022. It should be noted that no Outfit members testified against Capone, while several Mafia members testified against Gotti. Don’t forget to look at Chicago Swan Song: A Mob Wife’s Story, co-written by Camillus with Lisa Swan, the wife of Frank Calabrese Jr., about her life in the Calabrese Crew. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Veg...

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra – Part 6 Sep 18, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this sixth and final episode of the six-part series documenting the life and crimes of the marijuana smuggler kingpin Jimmy Chagra, Gary tells tells about the trial, imprisonment and death of Jimmy Chagra. Hey all you wiretappers welcome back to the end of Jimmy Chagra. A little recap, Jimmy Chagra was the son of Lebanese immigrants who settled in El Paso after the last Mexican Revolution. His brothers Lee and Joe both became successful Texas criminal attorneys specializing in defending smugglers. Jimmy Chagra makes connections with Colombian marijuana growers and starts exporting shiploads of high grade Colombian weed landing on the East coast. After losing a couple of shiploads, a couple of planes and a pilot, he throws in with another smuggler. This partnership goes south, and the new partner starts informing and setting up Jimmy Chagra. In November 1978 someone ambushes US Attorney James Kerr as he drives away from his El Paso home. Kerr has been on a crusade to put together a conspiracy charging Jimmy and his brother Lee Chagra under the narcotic kingpin laws. In November 1978, someone fires several rounds at James Kerr as he leaves his El Paso home. One month later, A couple of off-duty solders rob Lee Chagra at his law office and murder him. Jimmy Chagra is distraught after the murder of his brother and suspects the Feds may have orchestrated the murder of his brother. He makes some vague threats and names Judge John Wood as the possible man behind the murder of his brother. In March of 1979, 3 months after Lee Chagra’s murder, El Paso cops arrest the suspects. One confesses and shortly after everybody knows this was a run of the mill robbery planned by the uncle of his brother’s landlord who hired a couple of soldiers from nearby Ft. Bliss to do this robbery. No big dastardly federal plot here. But Jimmy has other worries. The Feds have indicted him and many others in his network and he is arrested about the same time. Of course, this case will be heard by Maximum John Wood and prosecuted by James Kerr. The government ensured that Judge Wood will preside over Jimmy’s trial because they indicted him in Midland Texas. Maximum John hears all the criminal cases in the Western District of Texas. Jimmy’s main relief from his grief is the action around the table in Las Vegas. He does not believe the men really confessed to robbing and murdering his brother Lee and suspects a government coverup. He is arraigned in Judge John Wood’s court. The US Attorney removes James Kerr from this prosecution. The new attorney reindicts Jimmy Chagra in El Paso and adds the continuing criminal enterprise and designates him the Kingpin. These charges can result in life in prison. He is out on bond when the Benny Binon hosts a month’s long poker game between Nick the Greek and Johnny Moss. This game will be the inspiration for the World Series of Poker. Las Vegas is hopping. Binon’s Horseshoe is the only casino left that will take Chagra’s crazy giant plays. He would arrive and place 100 K on a blackjack table and demand to risk it on one turn of the cards. Binon claimed later that between the time the court released Jimmy on bond and his trial, the Horseshoe lost 2 million dollars to Jimmy Chagra. Everybody noticed he played as if there were no tomorrow. Jimmy noticing the recent publicly generated for Oscar Goodman, he hired him for his El Paso case. Jimmy’s brother, Joe Chagra, joined Goodman on the defense team. I read that Jimmy really wanted his brother Lee and was distraught about his murder. Joe Chagra filed a motion for Judge Wood to recuse himself because of public remarks made by Wood. It seems he had called this case “The Colombia connection” case and was known to leak derogatory information to the media. A year before, Judge Wood had remarked to Lee Chagra in open court,

Remo catches Frank Sinatra at Social Club Sep 13, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Remo Franceschini was a famous mafia-busting NYPD Intelligence officer. This is another story of his vaunted career. Gary tells about how Remo worked on a Lucchese Capo named Big Sam Cavalieri. He installed a hidden microphone inside his social club on Second Avenue between 111th and 112th. Among other tidbits of information, he heard the Lucchese acting boss, Carmine Tramunti, Mr. Grebs, call Jilly Rizzo and invite him to a feast at the social club. He asked Rizzo to bring some of the NY Yankees players who frequented Jilly’s, and Rizzo replied, “Sure, and Franks in town, so I will get him.” Everybody in that world knew he meant Frank Sinatra. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well hey guys, I’m bringing you another story of the well known and hated and feared New York copper Lieutenant Remo Franceschini and nobody hated him more than John Gotti because Gotti knew that Remo focused a lot of manpower on Gotti and a lot of attention on Gotti especially once he ascended to become the boss of the Gambino family after they killed Paulie Castellano. The NYPD intelligence unit was not like the FBI. Now Remo Franceschini’s worked for the NYPD intelligence unit. And they investigated all five families that kind of depending on you know, where what looked fine, what looked interesting what looked possible, or if there was some crime had been committed that had a lot of heat on it. That was maybe a mob connected deal. Then they might focus on a particular guy or particular family, but they didn’t just focus on one family like the Bureau has, you know, the banana squad my friend Doug pencil worked on the banana squad, and they have a separate squad the Gambino squad is separate squad for everyone in the families at that time. Now looking back over remote career, I found a great story about him, exposing the fact that Frank Sinatra was meeting with wiseguys there in New York City. He had put a wire on a phone and installed a hidden mic inside an East Harlem Social Club operated by a Lucchese family Capo named Big Sam Cavalieri. This club was located for you New York listeners the club was located on Second Avenue between 11th and 12th street I don’t have any more info than that Remo put a listening post inside the basement of a low rent apartment a couple of blocks away now that’s why they would do it in New York tap in but find the the line for the phone and put the microphone inside someplace and then run it down and along with the phone lines and up outside up to a pole and then maybe down a pole and then drop it back down into a listening post and they just put one down in the basement of this apartment building and they just go sit in there on on there all by themselves sometimes they’re made they’d have to guys it’s kind of depends on who was available and they may be sitting in there and they may not Remo usually sat on this listening post by himself he’s probably one of those guys this is when he was still a detective he’s probably one of those guys that everybody else was wanting to go shopping or go dog off someplace he would go ahead and keep working.

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra Part 5 Sep 11, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this fifth episode of the six-part series documenting the life and crimes of the marijuana smuggler kingpin Jimmy Chagra, Gary interviews Jason Cavanagh, an expert on Charles Harrelson, and they examine whether or not Jimmy Chagra paid Charles Harrelson to assassinate Federal Judge John H, Wood aka Maximum John. Cavanagh extensively researched Charles Harrelson’s life and relationship with his two sons. One of those sons is the famous actor Woody Harrelson. Jason produced and hosted a 10-episode podcast series titled Son of a Hitman. Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Jason Cavanagh 00:00 Well hey guys, all you Wiretappers out there. Welcome back to the show. You know, I’m back here to studio gangland wire. But I’ve got a famous man here. A guy that that agreed to come on the podcast, Jason Kavanagh. You know, I got on to Jason. I was researching his stories, Jimmy Chagra story and I found this podcast called Son of a Hitman and I listened to it was about Charles Harrelson who was the man who was convicted of murdering Judge John Wood and Jimmy Chadwick was not convicted. He was arrested and accused of paying Charles Harrelson and Jason did a real in-depth. Deep Dive into the life of Charles Harrelson, the hitman who has a great podcast. It’s called Spn of a Hitman. And I highly encourage you to listen to that. Jason, welcome. I really appreciate you coming on the show. Thanks so much for having me. Now working guys find that Son of a Hitman is not on the Apple app. So you explain to him how to find that. 01:00 Sure. So it is you know, we originally produced it for Spotify with Spotify. So it is exclusive to Spotify at the moment. Although actually today, I just spoke to Spotify, we’re going to be getting a wide release where it’s going to be available on all platforms in the near future, probably in a couple of weeks. So at the moment, check it out on Spotify. But yeah, it will be it will be wide very soon. 01:23 Okay. And by the time this is released, guys, just look out look for set of the Hitman on whatever podcast app you’ve gotten, you’re gonna be able to find it. So I looked at this story. And it’s a story that just keeps on givin this Jimmy chakra and his whole marijuana smuggling operation as we’ve already had a couple of episodes, three episodes by now. And it’s just, it’s the most complex, interesting. And he is the most complex and interesting guy and story that I have done that I can find so much information about to it’s just, it’s amazing. And I want to go in on a deep dive on Charles Harrelson with Jason because he is the expert on Charles Harrelson. And as you all know, he is the father of Woody Harrelson, the actor. And as I understand and what he’s not really crazy about anybody doing that there’s no movies about this. I don’t know if you’ve noticed that guys, but there’s no movies about this. And I don’t know if there ever will be. Jason, you know, we talked a little bit before in Harrelson goes back into South Texas, Texas roots and he was a Texas criminal for sure. From day one. Tell us a little bit about that first murder. I think that that Berg murder, the first 02:39 murder that Charles Harrelson was charged with was Alan Berg. He was a carpet salesman in Houston, Texas. I was introduced to the story of Charles, you know, based on the rumors, you know, he claimed that he had been involved in the JFK assassination. So that was how I, like entered into the story in the first place began looking at it then of course, the judge would murder. The assassination of a federal judge in 79 is huge news. But then when you you know, you start doing research looking back further, right, he killed this carpet salesman, whether it’s the first murder he committed, I don’t know. It’s the first murder he was charged with. He was found not guilty for this murder.

Angelo LaPietra Extorts Two Million Dollars Sep 06, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary and James Cosenza from the Chicago Mob Trials YT channel discuss how Angelo LaPietra extorted two Million dollars from a prominent Chicago real estate businessman named Victor Cacciatore. In the famous Family Secrets trial, Cacciatore testified against the notorious Chicago organized crime syndicate known as The Outfit. He told about how the Chinatown Crew boss; Angelo LaPietra extorted two million dollars from him. Nick Calabrese also testified that he was the person who made the actual threats. Victor Cacciatore was a prominent Chicago businessman, lawyer, and banker who died in 2014. He was also a victim of extortion by the Chicago Outfit, a notorious organized crime syndicate that dominated the city for decades. He told how he kept getting threats from two men asking for money, and later, he found dead rats in his car and other similar threatening behavior. Cacciatore visited Angelo LaPietra, the boss of the Chinatown crew, and asked for help. He didn’t realize that this man, the feared Angelo LaPietra, was behind these threats. This Family Secrets trial was a landmark federal prosecution that exposed the inner workings and crimes of the Outfit. Victor Cacciatore was not a member of the Chicago mafia but rather a successful entrepreneur who faced threats and violence from them. He was also a philanthropist who supported various causes and institutions in the Italian. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well welcome all you Wiretappers here in Kansas City and my studio Gangland Wire. It’s a very stormy day. We had a hell of a storm last night. I had to go out in the balcony and pick everything up this morning blew plants over. It was crazy last night here in the middle of a Midwestern summer. But speaking of the Midwest, I have as you can see, on your screen, I have James Cosenza of the Chicago mob trials YouTube page. So I’m saying that slow so you can write that down. James Cosenza COSENZA. And it’s the Chicago mob trials YouTube page. Welcome, Jim. I really am happy to have you back on here. Pleasure to be here. Gary. Good to see you. Tell the guys a little bit about your YouTube page. What they’re gonna see on it. Okay, my, James Cosenza 00:50 my YouTube channel is Chicago mob trials by JCosenza. And basically, it’s an insight, a perspective from a court buffs view. Back in the 90s to the early 2000s. I attended 25 plus major federal trials downtown Chicago. So my little YouTube stories are basically an insight from what it was like being an observer at some of these large trials. So basically, I’m just talking about all the major federal trials that I went to in one thing I wanted to point out is all these trials are open to the public. Any one of us can go at any time. And I highly recommend if there is a trial in your area in your city, by all means go check it out. It’s pretty interesting. GARY JENKINS 01:45 Yeah, I wish I had done a bunch of ours back in the day, but I don’t know I just, you know, you just forget about it. You don’t think about it, and all of a sudden it’s gone. It’s here and it’s gone. I could have attended all those Skim trials.

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra Part 4 Sep 04, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this second episode of the six-part series documenting the life and crimes of the marijuana smuggler kingpin Jimmy Chagra, Gary tells tells about the life and death of Lee Chagra, Jimmy Chagra’s brother and lawyer. But first we learn about the attempted murder of the Chagras’ nemesis, Assistant U.S. Attorney James Kerr and shortly after someone murders Lee Chagra. Hey Wiretappers, welcome to the ongoing series on the shenanigans of the El Paso drug smuggler Jimmy Chagra. By now as a little recap, Jimmy Chagra was born to Lebanese immigrants in El Paso Texas. He started his life working at his parent carpet store. Kind of a cliché, a Lebanese rug merchant. His two brothers, Lee and Joe Chagra become well respected and almost famous drug lawyers. As best as I can tell, neither of them became involved in the drug smuggling ventures of Jimmy. But Lee was a flamboyant degenerate gambler, and he ran though a lot of dirty money from other smugglers. Lee’s main nemesis was a Texas Assistant U.S. Attorney or AUSA named James Kerr. The Judge he practiced in front of was John “Maximum John” Wood. Jimmy has earned millions from his ventures smuggling high grade Colombian marijuana up the Atlantic Coast to New England where they off-loaded into a safe house and distributed it throughout the United States. He had a bad year in 1977 where he lost two airplanes and a lot of dope. He threw in with another smuggler and made an enemy. Fellow smuggler Henry Wallace ended that year working with the DEA to make a case on Jimmy Chagra. The Federal law enforcements in the southwest circling around the Chagra enterprise. James Kerr had been a young Department of Justice attorney how had written the continuing criminal enterprise section of the 1970 Drug Control Act. The Department of Justice moved him to El Paso to prosecute these drug conspiracies and he found a friend in Judge William Wood. Some lawyers would even later say they thought the two were too friendly and often saw them socializing together away from work. They both hated drug dealers and were on a warpath to rid the country of this scourge. James Kerr learned that Lee had been charged in Tennessee for a conspiracy to distribute marijuana after he had defended a local smuggler. The Tennessee court quickly dismissed this charge after Lee asked for the production of evidence and got a hearing. The only evidence of Lee Chagra’s involvement was the unsubstantiated word of one defendant about a meeting at Chagra’s law office. Kerr was looking at the entire Chagra family as part of a conspiracy, so he traveled back to Tennessee to review this case. He was convinced that Lee Chagra was the actual brains behind his brother, Jimmy, Jack Stricklin who was involved in the Ardmore bust, and others. He pulled a little-known section from the 1970 Drug Control act that gave a road map how to prosecute a drug organization as a Continuing Criminal Enterprise with a special sentence for the person deemed as the Kingpin. That is what they used on my friend Steven St. John to get him 12 years. He was offered many chances to talk, and he refused. The US Attorney called a special grand jury to investigate this conspiracy and the Chagra’s knew that the government was declaring war on them. James Kerr would not finish what he started. On November 21, 1978 AUSA James Kerr was driving his one luxury he permitted himself, a Lincoln Continental. A series of gunshots ran out from a van causing him to dive down onto the floorboard. When he peered out, he could see nobody. Responding El Paso cops find his car had been riddled with .30 cal. bullets and buckshot but none of them struck Kerr. A AUSA like Kerr could have many enemies and the FBI and local cops asked informants and did an area canvass and came up empty, except for a possible suspect van. On December 28, just 37 days later,

Carlos Lehder Cartel Kingpin Aug 30, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews true crime author Ron Chepesiuk about an upcoming series on VIX TV he helped write. Ron is a well-known and prolific author and expert on the South American cocaine cartels. In this episode, we discuss Carlos Lehder. We learn that Lehder began his criminal career stealing cars and making small sales of marijuana. He met the famous cocaine smuggler (see Blow with Johnny Depp) George Jung in prison. In the film Blow, Carlos connected Jung with Pablo Escobar, and together these two men brought thousands and thousands of cocaine kilos into the United States. They were the first to use airplanes that flew directly from the Colombian jungles to Norman Key in the Bahamas. These men sent planes or boats to Florida from their own private island. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra Part 3 Aug 28, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. We last heard the inside story of the enormous Folly Cove marijuana smuggling operation. Gary continues this six-part series in Part 3 where he tells several harrowing stories of Chagra’s bold marijuana smuggling capers. In the Fall of 1976, we can see the beginning of the end for Jimmy Chagra. At that time, Jimmy made friends with two Las Vegas-based private pilots that often flew him to Vegas on gambling junkets. He recruited Jerry Wilson and Dick Joyce pilots to help fly in loads. Wilson will go on to invent and become fabulously wealthy from inventing the Soloflex. Chagra recruited these two pilots to fly Colombian weed from the Cayman Islands. They were both private pilots in Las Vegas, and Jimmy had used their air service when he flew back and forth between El Paso and Las Vegas on gambling junkets. By 1976, Jerry Wilson was flying a DC-4 and Dick Joyce a Cessna 310. The DEA had put trackers on other planes used by these men, but not the new DC-4 and Cessna. In December 1976, DEA and Customs had information Chagra was expecting shipments from Colombia, and they were probably going to a rural area around Ardmore, Oklahoma. This is a middle size town about halfway between Ok City and Dallas Ft. Worth. On December 30, 1976, Dick Joyce landed his Cessna 310 in New Orleans, told Customs he was coming in from the Cayman Islands, and headed to Ok City. Agents found no drugs on this plane. They alerted DEA and an army of DEA and Customs agents, and the Air Controllers went on the alert as Joyce took off. They tracked him as he headed north through Texas. At about the same time, other air traffic controllers had a request from a DC-4 for a place in Texas to refuel. A DC 4 is a huge plane with 4 propeller-driven engines. The pilot claimed he was carrying Radioactive waste. Th DC-4 landed, refueled, and took off again before anyone could get there. Next, Ft. Worth air controllers saw blips for two planes traveling parallel heading north. One was a DC-4, and the other was Dick Joyce in his Cessna 310. Customs and the DEA were all over this. Joyce and Wilson were using a known scam called the piggyback formation. A plane with a known destination would fly close to the plane carrying the contraband to appear as one plane. When they reached the destination, the aircraft with the narcotics drops down quickly while the other empty plane continued the planned route. It was New Year’s Eve, but the DEA assembled a large ground crew who drove to Ardmore, OK, and alerted the Oklahoma Bureau of Investigations. This combined force blasted in the early morning hours toward Ardmore. The DC-4 lost one engine, and for unknown reasons, both planes landed at a small airport just south of Ardmore. This gave the agents the exact location. When they arrived, the cops stopped 4 U-Haul trucks and drivers with the marijuana. They caught the pilots and two others driving away from the scene in rental cars. The authorities arrested ten men and recovered 17,000 lbs of pot in 276 burlap bags. The searches on the U-Haul trucks were shaky, and they would have difficulty linking the pilots with the planes. They missed Jimmy Chagra at the scene. Jimmy’s brother, Lee Chagra, will coordinate the legal defense. Before the El Paso 10 trial, as they became known, another unfortunate event occurred in Colombia. The Colombians fronted the load lost at Ardmore, and Jimmy had to make good. The Colombian supplier was Lionel Gomez, who operated out of Santa Marta, Colombia. This small city on the northeast coast is one of the points nearest to the Caymans and other Caribbean Islands. Chagra sent one of the Ardmore defendants, Jerry Wilson, and another pilot down to get another load. This plane was overloaded, and they crashed on takeoff. Wilson was injured but not badly, while the co-pilot burned over 70% of his body and was taken to a local clinic.

Working with DEA Agents Bonus epsiode Aug 22, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this short bonus episode, Gary tells about his experiences working with the agents of the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA). Listen to the end and hear a short trailer from a new podcast series titled Betrayal on the Bayou. Gary encourages you to check this new series out and listen by clicking here in BETRAYAL ON THE BAYOU. Support the Podcast Venmo @ganglandwire Donate at Gangland Wire

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra Part 2 Aug 21, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this second episode of the six-part series documenting the life and crimes of the marijuana smuggler kingpin Jimmy Chagra, Gary interviews one of Chagra’s low-level smugglers. Kermit Schweidel tells about the famous Folly Cove operation. In this famous operation, Jimmy Chagra partners with two other El Paso smugglers, and they orchestrate an entire sea-gong freighter load of Colombian marijuana. After an adventurous trip up the Atlantic Coast, they arrive off the Massachuttas coast at Folly Cove. Here Kermit Schweidel and others off-load the post and distribute it to hiding spots throughout the United States. Click here to buy Folly Cove: A Smuggler’s True Tale of the Pot Rebellion written by my guest Kermit Schweidel. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Kim Schwiedel Kim Schwiedel 00:00 Well, of course everybody started out using it, smoking it and liking it. The whole trick was, hey, I can I can buy half a pound or a pound or a kilo. I can break this down and sell it to my friends and then I can smoke for free. That’s probably how 90% of the people that were in it started. Just wanted some good good old free pot, our geographic location on the border being what it was. It was very tempting to take that pound and turn it into five pounds or 10 pounds and the border was wide open. GARY JENKINS 00:38 Welcome while you Wiretappers out there. Back here in the studio Gangland Wire. I have a most interesting show today. Kim Schweidel I pronounced that right Kim? Yes, sir. Well, thanks a lot Kim. You know, guys, I’ve started down a path. You know, I like to do stories and take deep dives on the things and into the eggs that I started looking at this whole you know, the killing of Judge woods and by Woody Harrelson, his dad, Charles Harrelson and the Jimmy Chagra thing. And so I started looking at this guy named Jimmy Chagra and he was as he was Lebanese heritage out of El Paso, and he was supposedly this huge drug smuggler, and then I find out he has this whole life up in Las Vegas. And he’s, he’s spending millions and millions of dollars gambling in Las Vegas, I thought this is a heck of a story. And I got into it. I was noodling around on the internet and, and he’s supposedly Jimmy and his brother Lee had something to do with it may we’ll find out today. They made some huge score, bringing really a high quality Colombian pot from Colombia and a freighter of some kind, semi big ship, one of the early examples of this kind of smuggling in the narcotics business, clear up to Boston. And then the mothership has the little baby ships that bring it on to the shore, and they hide it up in Boston and then go from there. That was it was a big deal. And I found Kim here who wrote a book on that was part of that. So Kim, welcome. I really appreciate you coming on the show. Well, thank Kim Schwiedel 02:19 you, Gary. It’s nice to be here. GARY JENKINS 02:21 So can you tell us the name of your book and show that show that to us? Kim Schwiedel 02:25 That’s the book Folly Cove A Smuggler’s Tale of the Pot Rebellion. And it really it really kind of takes place in the in the y...

The Dallas Mafia Family – Bonus Episode Aug 16, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary gives an overview of the La Cosa Nostra in Dallas, Texas. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well welcome all you Wiretappers out there back here in studio Gangland Wire. As you can see, I don’t know why I say that each time. I’m going to look at the Dallas family now. Dallas. It was part of the Midwest families of those Dallas was they weren’t really connected to Kansas City or Chicago. They were more connected if anybody to Carlos Marcello down in New Orleans, you know southern people. There’s a little bit of action down in Houston and a regular family in Dallas, the first man who be like The Godfather, shall we say the first one from Sicily was a Carlo Paraino to Carlo Paranio came to the United States from Sicily in 1901, with his brother Joseph who will work with him and become his underboss. As he formed a family. They first settled in Shreveport, Louisiana, which is real close to Dallas. I don’t know if you know how close that is, but it’s real close. He began the Dallas faction in 1921, with Joseph as his underboss he will be described as mob historians look back as the original head of the mafia in Texas. Carlo Piraino was born in Corleone, Sicily in 1876. At the same hometown as one of the early New York bosses Giuseppe Morello. He married Carlo Pariano married an 18 year old Italian girl in 1903. They had a son, Angelo and 1904. By the time Carlo and his brother Joseph moved to Dallas. It was probably 1905 Six after Angela was born. The April 1910 census says that the family lived temporarily at 7744 Main Street in Dallas. That household had Carlo and Clemencia, which would be the young 18 year old girl from Sicily that he married his son Angelo, and his brother Joseph Piraino, when his bride Lina Carlo ran a real estate business out of his house and Joseph worked as a grocery salesman, supposedly, Joseph wouldn’t really settled in Texas, he moved back to Louisiana for a while. And then by 1914 or 15, he and his family came back to Dallas. Prohibition takes off and of course, they start getting into that and bootlegging and running speakeasies and, and organizing all that all the way up to the Midwest, everybody did throughout the whole United States. You know, that’s the mother’s milk for the mafia throughout the whole United States. So the National Crime Syndicate as we began to know what to buy the 80s and 90s was formed out of prohibition, Carlo dies of natural causes in 1930. And Joseph takes over the family and becomes a boss. He owned a lot of bars and gambling operations, of course, and some labor rackets in construction business and which has begun in Dallas over the years has underboss was Joseph Civello. Joseph Civello was born in 1902. And he was a native born he was born in West West Baton Rouge Parish, Louisiana. And Baton Rouge is even closer to New Orleans and really almost part of New Orleans. So definitely connections back to the New Orleans family. His father was a farm laborer and came to the United States around 1900 and had a whole bunch of brothers and sisters and Joseph Civello. His father, turnips Abello,

The Life and Crimes of Jimmy Chagra Part 1 Aug 14, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary Starts a six-part series documenting the life and crimes of the marijuana smuggler kingpin Jimmy Chagra. In this first episode, Gary starts a story that will eventually end with the 1979 murder of Texas Western District Court of Texas Judge John Wood, aka Maximum John. This investigation became the FBI’s most expensive operation since the JFK assassination. The Bureau collected 500,000 pieces of information, conducted 30,000 interviews, and had hundreds of hours of recorded conversations. In the end, the government convicted Woody Harrelson’s father, Charles Harrelson, of being the trigger puller, Harrelson’s wife for obtaining the murder weapon, a lawyer named Joe Chagra for conspiracy, and Elizabeth Chagra, the wife of marijuana smuggler Jimmy Chagra for delivering the payment to the wife of the hitman, Harrelson. The government charged the mastermind behind this plot, a marijuana smuggler named Jimmy Chagra. Jimmy Chagra hired famous Las Vegas mob lawyer Oscar Goodman, and in Goodman’s biggest win ever, the jury found him not guilty. Folks, get ready for a ride because I am taking you down many twists and turns through the seamy underbelly of the southwest Texas underworld. To give you an idea of where we are going, let’s start back to the 1960s. The 1960s counterculture demanded Marijuana, and the descendant of a Lebanese Immigrant started smuggling marijuana and made millions. His brothers, Joe and Lee Chagra went to law school and practiced criminal law in El Paso. Lee Chagra became the go-to lawyer for drug smugglers along the border. Richard Nixon started the war on drugs. An attorney named James Kerr went from private practice into the U.S. attorney’s office, and he is assigned to a court overseen by a hanging judge named John Wood, aka Maximum John, because of the draconian sentence he hands down. Jimmy Chagra is bubbling to the top of the DEA hit list because of his larger-than-life persona and gambling habits in Las Vegas. A tip to all you big-time criminals, keep a low profile. This story contains the attempted murder of AUSA James Kerr outside his home, the murder of Lee Chagra shortly after, the arrest of Jimmy Chagra, and the murder of Judge John Wood. The investigation of these events was the most extensive and expensive FBI investigation since the JFK case in 1963. They will conduct over 30,000 interviews, gather 5000,000 pieces of information, and record hundreds of hours on hidden microphones and wiretaps. I will start with El Paso because that city is just as much a character in this story as the individuals. El Paso has long had the reputation as a wild west kind of town. El Paso earned this reputation over its long checkered history. It is an old town, and the Spanish built a mission here in 1659. El Paso del Rio Grande del Norte, or the Pass of the Great River of the North, became an important trading center on the south bank and will be renamed Ciudad Juarez. After Sam Houston and other settlers fought off Mexican troops, they formed the nation of Texas. Missouri merchants split off from the Sana Fe trail to carry trade goods to Juarez and south to Chihuahua City. Smugglers, bounty hunters for Comanche and Apache scalps, gamblers, and adventurers found a home in El Paso. Of all the old west cities, only El Paso maintains the reputation of being a wild city in modern times. At one time, the Director of U.S. Customs said that if he stopped all smuggling through El Paso, the economy of both sides of the border would collapse. DEA made El Paso the center of all their nationwide intelligence gathering about the international narcotics smuggling trade. The 1970s Drug scene During the 1970s, under President Richard Nixon, the United States started the never-ending war on drugs and promoted draconian laws to deal with drug organizations called Kingpin laws.

Tony Accardo Impersonates a Lawyer Aug 09, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. During the 1940s, an Outfit turncoat named Willie Bioff implicated all the Outfit’s higher echelon in an extortion scheme. They had infiltrated labor unions connected to the film business and started extorting money from Major Motion Picture Studios. After they went to prison, Anthony Accardo was left. Paul Ricca had a plan to run the Outfit through Accardo. Listen to hear that plan. This episode was brought to you by BetterHelp Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Diary of a Chicago Mob Wife Aug 07, 2023

Retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews former Mob Wife, Lisa Calabrese Swan, about her life with Frank Calabrese Jr. and the Calabrese family. Lisa takes the listener from her first days meeting a young, exciting, handsome man named Frankie Calabrese. She did not know or even understand what his family was all about. She describes the gradual realizations she experienced as she saw Frank Calabrese Jr. becoming more involved in the Outfit life as he descended into an addiction to cocaine. She stuck by him like any good Outfit wife until she could not handle the stress. Losa Swan found life as a Mob Wife to be anything but glamorous and exciting. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Get the book by Lisa Swan by clicking on the title, Chicago Swan Song. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Lisa Swan 00:00 My husband was dealing cocaine and using cocaine and I would find bags of cocaine in his closet in his drawers, and I was totally against drugs. And I would just dump everything in the toilet 1000s of dollars of cocaine in the toilet. And it was something that didn’t belong to him or he was selling for somebody else. And any time I looked, I found it. And I made sure I got rid of it. Yeah, I think was he was gone for a weekend, or he didn’t come home one night. So I packed all this stuff and put it on the front steps. And when his friend went to drop him off, he goes, is that a suitcase and Frank is like, yeah, keep going. 00:40 Welcome all you wiretappers, good to have you back here in the studio. And as you can see, if you’re on YouTube, I have two special guests. Now one of them. You guys all know cam Camillus Robinson and the other you may not know, but you may know something about her ex husband, Frank Calabrese Jr. And her name is Lisa Swan. And Lisa and my friend cam have partnered up to write a book about her life with a mob I believe it’s called and married with a mob what’s the name of it? Chicago Swan Song: a mob Wife’s Story. Been through a couple iterations of the title but but that one really sort of summed up Lisa’s story. Chicago Swan Song: A Mob Wire’s Story. Okay, great. Well, welcome. They said they really had anxious to get your story. Thanks, Gary. How did you guys first get together? Me and Cam are me and Frank, where are you? and Cam first? How did you? 01:35 So um, my ex husband and I are very, very close. We’re best friends. And he suggested that I do a do a interview with the guys. And I had a lot of fun. It was very cathartic to talk about stuff and throw in a little humor. And then I talked to Ken because he wanted to do another spot. And I said, Hey, can we can we write a book? Can we do something with it? Listen, go bigger. And he’s like, I was gonna ask you the same question. Cool. So the rest was history. And I did a lot of zoom calls from where I worked, because I work a lot. And we we plugged through and got it done. Good. The second question would be you and Frank Calabrese Jr. How did you guys get together? Do you guys go to high school together your high school sweetheart? Or will your older? No, we lived in the neighborhoods next to each other. So I was in Galewood,

David Berman – From Capone to Bugsy Seigel Jul 31, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. David Berman was a Jewish-American organized crime figure active in Sioux City, Iowa, the Twin Cities, and the Las Vegas Strip. He was a casino gambling pioneer in Las Vegas, a partner with mobster Bugsy Siegel at the Flamingo Hotel. Berman died in 1957 during surgery. Berman began his criminal career at 13 by running a crew of teenage thugs committing petty extortions and eventually a string of illegal distilleries. He then went on to supplement his earnings by also running his own armed robbing crew. Later after a time in the Twin Cities and serving in WW II, Berman moved his crew to the Las Vegas strip and operated there in concert with Genovese Family associates Bugsy Siegel, Dutch Goldberg, and Moe Sedway. According to journalists Ed Reid and Ovid Demaris, Berman was involved in the mob’s investigation into Siegel and the missing profits of the Flamingo Hotel and Casino. Both journalists further allege that Berman “had talked to Benny many times about it, warning him that if the matter was not settled soon, he was going to find himself minus a head.” Twenty minutes after the 1947 assassination of Bugsy Siegel in Beverly Hills, California, Gus Greenbaum, Moe Sedway, and David Berman walked into the lobby of the Flamingo and announced that they were in charge. This episode was brought to you by BetterHelp Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Bad Henry with Ron Chepesiuk – Bonus Episode Jul 26, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you a little different show today. He interviews well-known true-crime author Ron Chepesiuk about his latest book. In Bad Henry, Ron strays from his usual topic of organized crime, drug cartels, and cocaine smuggling to the work of serial killers. Click here to find a copy of Bad Henry. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Frank Costello – The Underworld’s Prime Minister Jul 24, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews author Ronald Fried about his book on Frank Costello. Mr. Fried researched Costello and crafted a novel using actual situations and Costello’s exact language taken from newspapers, court proceedings, and transcripts from the famous Kefauver hearings. He tells how Frank Costello helped the Mafia transition from bootlegging during Prohibition into the 1930s and showed them how to transfer the organization into interstate gambling. Some of the stories he learned were how Costello ensured his slot machines had a step stool for kids to reach the coin slot. We learn how Costello was such a serious gambler that he would drink water and challenge other men to see who could urinate for the longest time. He won every time. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup, click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 But welcome all you Wiretappers out there back here in the studio of gangland wire in the studio with me and Ron Fried. Right. Okay, Fried has written a book about the Prime Minister of the underworld. And he was an immensely important man in that transition from the old mustache Pete days on into the modern crime syndicate. He was kind of the, I’d say the brains behind Lucky Luciano, in my opinion. But anyhow, rod has written a book about the Prime Minister of the underworld. So rod, welcome. Ronald Fried 00:33 Thanks a lot. Thanks for having me. GARY JENKINS 00:35 So tell me, I know this is a novel, it’s a novelized form, but it’s based on facts. Right? How did you go about, you know, how do you go about doing that? Transport, translating facts into the novelization form? Ronald Fried 00:51 Well, one of the things that I noticed I worked on a TV show about the history of organized crime, about founding of the New York Mafia, what I noticed is that a lot of the mistakes historical errors or rumors or myths, or plain old nonsense, from One Book To the next book to the next book get repeated, repeated, repeated. So I thought it was really hard to get at the truth, for a number of reasons. One is that it’s not as though like the History Department at Harvard University of study, this is exactly what happened. The other the other problem is that all the people who were there when these events unfolded, were actually criminals, right? And one thing we know about criminals is they lie a lot, right? They do not tell the truth. And they make up stories, and they’re very self aggrandizing. When you’re dealing with the history of organized crime, particularly those sort of mythical days of the 20s 30s 40s, and 50s, is there’s a lot of exaggeration, a lot of lies, there’s a lot of nonsense people want to believe things that simply aren’t true. So I thought that a novel would be would be one way to try to get at the truth. However, I wanted it to be historically accurate. So what I did was, I wrote a novel in which everything that Frank Costello said is, on the record, he actually said, so what he said in court, what he said in interviews, and what he said in the keep over hearings, televised congressional hearings about organized crime in America. That’s all those are actually his words. He gave interviews,

NYPD: Stories from Vic Ferrari Jul 17, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviewed author and retired NYPD Detective Vic Ferrari. Gary and Vic exchange several stories from the streets. Vic starts with a brush with an NYPD Internal Affairs investigation that connects directly to the new podcast, The Set: The Story of the Dirty 30. Vic describes how his father worked as a butcher in a Mob-owned meat locker. Vic tells about other confrontations with the New York Mafia before becoming a cop. Click here to find Vic’s books.Click here to find Vic’s new podcast. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

From Luciano to Scarpa Jul 10, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews fellow podcaster Adrien Martinez from Invest in Yourself and A Lifetime of Mafia Stories. Go to @investinyourself6878 to see his show. We show and discuss clips from his new Mafia history documentary. You will learn about mob figures like Lucky Luciano, Joe Bonanno, Vic Amuso and Greg Scarpa. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

The Crack Cocaine Wars – Bonus Jul 05, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary tells a few stories from his days as a soldier in Ronnie Reagen’s War on Crack Cocaine. He also plays a trailer from a new podcast titled The Set. The parent company of this new podcast helped Gangland Wire out by broadcasting free promos. In exchange, Gangland Wire is doing free promos for this new exciting documentary-style podcast titled The Set. This is the story of the NYPD officers assigned to the 30th Precinct in Harlem. I hope you will give it a try. Click here to go directly to this new show, The Set. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

The Black Mafia Jul 03, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary tells stories about the Black Mafia in Kansas City, from their early days when they dominated the Heroin market to the murder of a prominent Black politician, Leon Jordon, to the epic war between Sam Haley and Aaron Gant. Finally, he ends with a disturbing story about a drug house robbery. The primary connection between the La Cosa Nostra Mafia and the Black Mafia appeared to be between a fence named Jimmy Ciarelli and a black liquor store owner called Baby Face Norris and one of the suspects in the Leon Jordan murder named Jimmy Willis. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 Hey, all you Wiretappers out there. Good to be back here in the studio Gangland Wire. I’ve got a story of the Black Mafia in Kansas City. Now, I’ve often been asked what connections did the Italian Mafia have with professional black criminals or African American criminals. And there was some. And it all revolves around drugs and politics. So let’s go back to some of the early days in the late 60s and early 70s. What we had in Kansas City there, the heroin racket, back in the day, blacks had heroin, and the Italians got the heroin and sold it to the blacks go all the way back to the French Connection days and Carmine Galante in New York. Now, by the late 60s, early 70s. Our local African American guys got a connection in Los Angeles to get heroin now it was seemed like it was peckerwoods out there. It wasn’t Italians. Anyhow, they got that but they were kicking up a little bit to the Italians, and they needed to coexist with the Italians at the time. And so it’s kind of started this ongoing relationship that neither party really ever acknowledged to anybody. But it started coming out in little bits and pieces. Because I guess we really go back to the old 18th and Vine, the Kansas City song Wilbert Harrison, Kansas City song about being a 12th. And bind goes way back. But 18th and Vine, by the late 50s and 60s, was the place and it’s all black clubs and jazz clubs and everything were there and there was a corner liquor store owned by a guy named Joe Centimano, Cokie Joe or Crazy Joe, they called him 01:45 and he was a connection with the blacks because he was in the black community. Now he was connected primarily because of politics. It was late 60s, there formed a black political organization named freedom Incorporated. And there were other black, political, smaller black political organizations. And Joe was the mom’s contact with those people. There’s a guy down the street that had a liquor store called a blueprint liquor store, a guy named maybe face north and they called him babyface north and he continued to be that for years and years really until he died up until I don’t know the 80s there was a mob guy named Jimmy Cirelli that would show up talking to one of our Capos Willie the rat Cammisano. He was a professional thief and offense and he would be down at Baby Faces Blue Front liquors every day. Now, back in the day, when I first came on the police department, baby face was always good for couple of six packs. If you’re getting off of work and you want some beer of our if we had the ce...

The Bone Harvesting Conspiracy with Michael Vecchione – Bonus Jun 28, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. He interviews former Brooklyn prosecutor Michael Vecchione about the case of the disgraced dentist who started a bone harvesting business. If you ever got a dental implant, you know the dentist uses a bone graft to prepare for the implant. This fact creates a market in human bone. Michael Vecchione tells about a case he worked on where he investigated and prosecuted a dentist who was robbing human bodies to get bone for resale. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Support the Podcast. Click here if you want to listen to the new podcast called The Set. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Dirty Money: The Prosecutor and the Mafia Cops Jun 26, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. He interviews former Brooklyn prosecutor Michael Vecchione, who helped uncover the Mafia Cops Louis Eppolito and Steve Caracappa. Michael Vecchione tells how he worked with NYPD Det. Tommy Dades to expose these traitors to law enforcement. They learned how Eppolito and Caracoppa worked under the direction of Lucchese’s Underboss, Anthony Gaspipe Casso. Michael Vecchione tells how a mother saw Eppolito on TV promoting his mafia book and remembered he was a cop looking for her son, Jimmy Hydell, just before someone murdered him. Starting with this clue Vecchione and Dades gathered all the information they could find on these two cops and exposed their life-long pattern of committing crimes for the Mafia. Eppolito’s Mob connections were deep. His father, Ralph “Fat the Gangster” Eppolito, acted as a Gambino soldier and enforcer. His uncle was James “Jimmy the Clam” Eppolito, a Gambino captain who led gambling and other rackets. “Jimmy,” who made his son, James Jr., a family member, had once worked for family boss Carlo Gambino and associated closely with racketeer Carmine Lambordozi. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Support the Podcast. If you want to listen to The Set podcast click here. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 They had one called gangster capitalism and I asked them if they do a promo for me on their show if I do a promo for them on my show and they agreed they did. I recorded a little promo put it on gangster capitalism, and I gotta, I gotta get pretty good run up. Welcome all you guys back here in the studio of gangland wire, have a show today that we’re going to deal with official corruption a little bit. And the reason I’m doing this show is I want to give a little plug for some people another podcast company that our favor to that and so I am returning the favor. Now they have a new podcast just coming out called the set 00:37 suit up in my uniform. And you’re going out on patrol. What are we going to do tonight? What we’re going to rob some drug dealers and I know how to do it really well. 00:52 Listen to and follow the set an odyssey originals documentary podcast series available wherever you get your shows. I’m not a 01:00 bad guy man. But I love being that dirty mother. GARY JENKINS 01:06 That’s s e t and it’s about the what was became known at the time as the dirty 30 which is a precinct in Manhattan. And there was all this crap money flowing around during the 90s and and there’s people that took money so when became quite a investigation publicly and these guys are taking a dive deep dive into it. They’ve got some of the former cops and criminals that are have given them interviews. So that will be an interesting podcast and I’ll have a link to it in the show notes. So that’s my promo for the set at Miko. Vets. Yone is my guest here and he’s been on before, if you remember the Luigi, the zip, the Sicilian hitman. Well, this is Michael Vecchione. And the man that interviewed Luigi zip and came up with a lot of really interesting insights into the Sicilian Mafia and the city city and mafia in New York City, and kind of how that works. And I know a lot of you really liked that show. So welcome,

Remo Franceschini and the New York Mafia Jun 19, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary tells how NYPD Intelligence Unit Lt. Remo Franceschini led an investigation into Bonanno boss Phil “Rusty” Rastelli for extorting money from lunch wagon drivers in New York City. Next, he tells how Lt. Franceschini learned about a mob hit and missed putting detectives on the scene before the murder. We also learn about the Bonanno Family funeral fight. Remo Franceschini quickly became a hero cop when he saved his partner’s life in a violent gun battle with an armed robbery suspect. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript GARY JENKINS 00:00 Hey guys, it’s Gary Jenkins and welcome back in the studio Gangland Wire, which we’ll get to say my name I don’t know most people do say that but I think all you guys probably know who I am by now. I would hope anyhow. So I’m starting a series of shorts about the exploits of the colorful New York City Police mob Buster, Lieutenant Remo Franceschini, it’s hard name for me to say Franceschini. I got it there. Franceschini. Remo was known to every mob boss in New York City as a tough, incorruptible and determined, dude. And he worked his way up to the different branches of the NYPD intelligence. He started out as a street policeman, of course, got a shootout saved his partner got like the Medal of Honor whatever they got in New York City, and ended up in the intelligence unit kind of like me, No, I never gotten the shoot out and say my partner but I ended up in the intelligence unit, and started out in the early days working to street mob guys and narcotics dealers. And eventually, by the end, he’s taken on the boss’s head on and they all know who he is. Now, he did have a short stop along the way in his career working on Black Panthers and other groups advocating civil disorder, which I did some of that to the Black Panthers was gone. But there were some other groups and the Klu Klux Klan here in Missouri, worked on them for a while, not very much fun, not as much fun as a mob guys. One of the early cases he had was he went after a boss, who was actually the acting boss after Carmine Galante went to prison on a narcotics conviction. This guy’s name was Phil Rastelli. He was running the Bonanno family. The Bonanno family was extorting lunch truck operators. Now we’ve all gotten a sandwich from a lunch truck, right? They’ve got those quilted aluminum backs to them and they flop down the sides and they have coffee and they have cold drinks and on ice and they have sandwiches you know pre made sandwiches. Some of them are a little more fancy we always call them Tomaine wagons. I remember we had one guy. It was little more fancy downtown. He was an Italian guy and he specialized in really good cold cut sandwiches that had salami and prosciutto and bologna and Italian beef and the big ones we called them Hurt Your Mouth. They were so big, that huge big pieces of bread. They were great sandwiches. Oh, we also had meatball sandwiches, hot meatball sandwiches and Italian steak sandwiches and variety of other things. And anyhow, these lunch wagons are all over the place especially at one time I’m not in that world now. They’re still now their food dress.

Big Tuna Accardo and his Red Mercedes Jun 12, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary and Chicago Outfit expert and author Camillus Robinson discuss Mafia Boss Anthony “Big Tuna” Accardo and the most significant criminal charge he ever faced. The IRS charged Anthony Accardo with tax evasion, just like Al Capone. Accardo went to a jury trial where several people testified that he was a beer salesman and always drove his Red Mercedes Benz sports car when he called on customers. They had to do this because he had deducted his depreciation, mileage, and gasoline for his work use of this unlikely car. We learn that future Southside Chicago Height’s Capo Al Pilotto was instrumental in testifying for Accardo. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Camillus Robinson GARY JENKINS 00:00 Well welcome all you Wiretapperss back here in studio Gangland Wire got my good friend Camilius “Cam” Robinson. Welcome cam. Camillus Robinson 00:06 How you doing? Very good to see you. GARY JENKINS 00:08 Well, it’s a cold up there in Chicago with cold and hell down there. Camillus Robinson 00:12 Yeah, it is it was in the it was in the teens earlier I might get up into the midterm needs to GARY JENKINS 00:16 do. Anyhow, we’re going to talk about the big Tuna or Joe Batters, Anthony Accardo today and him and I both stumble across this little story. And I mentioned to him and he’d already knew something about it. And it’s the little red sportscar story. This is really fascinating, I think, in the lender in the 50s. Tony Accardo had the perfect job. He was a beer salesman, I remember as a kid guys wanted to get a job with the pearl brewery or on the brewery truck, because you got all the free beer you wanted to drink. Accardo had it for other reasons. Of course, you know, he was an outfit guy. He was he was the boss at the time. And he had a lot of connections with Chicago bars and liquor distributors and places to buy beer when you say Camillus Robinson 01:09 Damn, that’s where you make the pickups. Three pickups, cash. That’s where GARY JENKINS 01:13 you pick up the case, man. sports gambling was going on out. That’s where the deals are made. And that’s where that’s where the gamblers were, that’s where the money was. And he made $65,000 a year as a beer salesman. For everyone round he got he also got I mean, look at my notes here. He got five cents a case on all Foxhead beer. he sold. He was working for this company. It wasn’t really a mob company particularly but he was he was the mob guy representing them. And it probably was more of a mob company. We realize he deducted his expenses and like car expenses. Other expenses depreciated. That is a concern. But what’s interesting is his car was a little red sports car, but it wasn’t just any little red sports car. Was it what was it? I know you’re this Camillus Robinson 02:06 guy as a car guy, you know, I know your motorcycle guy. But so for me the 300 SL, Mercedes Gullwing. We know what’s going on because Gary, I wondered for years, Gary found a great quote from the judge talking about the up and down doors. But 300 300 SL Goldwing was the first supercar I sat in one at an auction it’s got a steering wheel ...

Oscar Goodman: Mafia, Law, and Justice Jun 05, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary and mob lawyer expert Tony Taouk examine the life and career of famous mafia lawyer Oscar Goodman. Based in Las Vegas, Oscar Goodman has been the Midwest and Western Mob’s go-to lawyer for his 40-year career. Oscar Goodman remained professional in all his encounters with Mob bosses like Tony Spilotro, Nick Civella, Lefty Rosenthal and many others. Mr. Goodman’s most dramatic courtroom victory had to be when he obtained a Not Guilty verdict for the El Paso drug kingpin, Jimmy Chagra. In this case, juries convicted Woody Harrelson’s father, Charles Harrelson, for the murder of Texas Federal Judge John “Maximum John” Wood in El Paso. The government claimed that Jimmy Chagra paid Harrelson to murder the judge. Harrelson’s wife, Chagra’s wife, and Chagra’s brother were all convicted in the same case. Tony Taouk is an Australian lawyer and a Mafia researcher who specializes in the subject of mob trials and mob lawyers. He has also traveled to the United States and visited mob-related sites in New York, Chicago, and Las Vegas. This episode is brought to you by BetterHelp. Remember to click on www.BetterHelp.com/gangland for 10% off Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS Lefty Rosenthal, Announcer, GARY JENKINS, Tony Taourk, Harry Reid, Oscar Goodman, Tuffy DeLuna, Nick Civella 00:00 Frank Rosenthal was obviously ruffling a few feathers because he’s high profile battle with the authorities in Las Vegas to obtain his gaming license was attracting too much attention which the mob, especially the Chicago outfit tended to shun. Apparently he made it even worse when he started his own talk show on television. 00:22 Ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Why stop snowing. 00:30 And Frank Rosenthal was who was already a colorful gambling figure he had attracted the attention of the authorities because of his ties to the Chicago outfit. He was a bookmaker gambler, and he was also implicated in multiple sports bribery scandals over the years, so he was already attracting a lot of attention. They just wanted him to come down. 00:55 lack of better word. 01:00 I think that’s what it was referred to that why tap? Isn’t that right? 01:03 Yeah. Yeah, that’s it. Well, welcome. While you were to average out there, back here in studio of Gangland Wire, I’m on the Zoom call. If you’re on YouTube, with our friend, Tony Taourk from Sydney, Australia. Tony is a lawyer down there, and he has a huge interest in mob lawyers and being lawyer, you know, you got to have interest in other lawyers. And when you look into them, you want to see a lot more about how they work and what made them successful or not successful. I know I do the same thing when I read about Mob lawyers. And so Tony has done that. And you know, we’ve done one other show about Roy Cohen with him, which was really interesting. I didn’t know hardly anything about Roy Cohn at the time. Tonight, we’re gonna do Oscar Goodman. I know a lot about Oscar good. And then because I sat in the witness chair while he cross examined me one time scared the heck out of me. He wasn’t that big a deal, but I didn’t have that much to say. Anyhow. So welcome, Tony. It’s really good to have you back. 02:00 Thank you for having me, Gary. 02:02

Mafia Dreams – The Young Italians May 29, 2023

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews non-fiction author Frank Hayde about his newest book, Mafia Dreams: A True Crime Saga of Young Men at the End of an Era in Kansas City. Frank tells how an FBI investigation into the insurance crimes of Travis Riley ended with his son, Joe Riley, being shot to death during a drug reverse-sting in an Airport hotel room. The FBI turned their sights on Riley’s son, Joe Riley, to put pressure on the Father and learn where he had hidden all his hidden assets. Joe Riley delivered himself up to the FBI because he was trying too hard to be a gangster. He was inexperienced and easily tricked. Before that investigation was done, an FBI agent shoots and kills Joe Riley. This story also tells about the demise of the KC Mafia and how the FBI used the grand jury immunity process to jail many young men whose only crime was to be seen talking to a made guy and then refuse to testify. Other books by Frank Haye are The Mafia and The Machine, The Italian Gardens: A History of Kansas City though its Most Favorite Restaurant. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Frank Hayde 00:00 Welcome all you Wiretappers out there good to be back here in studio Gangland Wire. I have a Kansas City story but it kind of stretches out to Las Vegas you’re gonna hear a little tidbit little interesting teaser about Oscar Goodman, the famous mob lawyer which is you know, I’ve done a story about so Welcome Frank. Hey, I really appreciate you coming on the show Frank. 00:24 Thanks for having me back Gary 00:26 Now we did another show about the Mafia and the Machine is like the history of the mob and Kansas City so Frank is steeped in the mafia in Kansas City. And go back and check that show out I think I titled it the Mafia and the Machine and but whatever you can find it you know, Google Frank Hatde HAYDE on YouTube or you know, gangland wire and Frank Hayde Mafia and the Machine. You’ll you’ll find it I’ll have a link to it down below guys. We’re going to talk about his new book mafia dreams a true crime saga of young men at the end of an era in Kansas City. Frank, you told me this is about these young guys that came along after we did the straw man caper. And all the old guys Nick’s about died, Corky Civella, Tuffy DeLuna and Tony Ripe Civella and Charlie Mortena. All of them went to jail for long periods of time. And these are the next generation of Mob guys. So, Frank, start, tell me how did you get into this book? How did you get into this? It’s an interesting story with twin twist. 01:32 Right? Well, you know, after I wrote them off you in the machine, I worked with the DiCapofamily, and we wrote the history of Italian Gardens restaurant, this very iconic restaurant in Kansas City, it was downtown at 12 iand Baltimore for 75 years run by the same four families that were all in a related by blood and marriage. It was a real icon of the city, very much a landmark restaurant. And you can kind of experience the history of Kansas City through the history of Italian Gardens. So that was a really fun book fun project. And that’s how I got clued into this story, that the DiCapos and other people that were closely associated with Italian Guardian mention this story.

NYPD Secrets: Bugging the Ravenite – Bonus May 25, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this bonus episode, Gary tells five short stories about the New York City Police Intelligence Unit and their efforts to plant hidden microphones on John Gotti and Neil Dellacroce in and around the Ravenite Social Club. Gary found these first-person accounts in a book titled Cop Talk : True Detective Stories From the NYPD by E. W. Counts. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS 00:00 Hey all you Wiretappers out there back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, this is kind of a shorty want to take care of you guys in the especially the audio. I started working on a book written by some New York City policemen or they like collaborated with another author and they told a lot of stories about being in New York City policeman and in particular they got a bunch of guys from the Intelligence Unit to tell stories and so I was going through them and they were great stories about trying to bug the Ravenite Social Club which was Gotti’s social club and Dellacroce social club also, before then before that, you know, it’s this social club the Raven night on 477 I think Mulberry Street and he has in Mulberry Street down there little it lay in Manhattan. It goes all the way back to Albert Anastasia. And then Carlo Gambino took it over and then Carlo Gambino, you know if you know anything about him at all, he likes to keep a low profile. And by the time he took it over and been there for a while there was so much heat on it and so much police and agents, FBI agents attention that he left there, and he gave it to Neil Dellacroce. So he took it over and then God he will eventually take it over. So it’s got a long and storied history, it’s a shoe store. Now by the way, I’ll put some pictures up here on the YouTube channel. But the NYPD we’re working on it big time because like Gambino noted noted there’s a lot of attention paid to it and they got what what the FBI was called a plant or an observation point. And that would be a upper floor apartment with a window and where you could see the front of the social club but we did it down here in Kansas City boy and we were in what we call Little Italy or Columbus Park down here for our social club and it was really hard to get matter of fact we the FBI talked about buying a whole house but that house was not for sale and it was right across the street but there was nothing else really speak up we had a spot there was a buy at a community center there was almost a block away now with with binoculars you could pick out tags and then after a while you knew guys cars so didn’t have to actually see the tag and note that so it’s okay but you couldn’t really exactly see the front you could only see the cars as they pulled along Troost and then took a left and parked somewhere around the club or if they went east and west on Fifth Street and if they came from the east and parked on the east side you didn’t you couldn’t see him from that particular plant we had it was kind of a temporary deal anyhow I want spent Super Bowl Sunday up there watching to see who was coming and going and and if we’d see one of the name targets on the FBI wiretap affidavit column that the wire room and say so and so is there and then they could turn on the bug that was insid...

Unveiling Harlem’s Infamous Purple Gang May 22, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews well-known mob historian and author Scott Dietche about his most recent book, Hitmen: The Mafia, Drugs, and the East Harlem Purple Gang. Scott Dietche is a nationally recognized expert on organized crime in the United States. This Tampa-based author has written books like Garden State Gangland: The Rise of the Mob in New Jersey, The Silent Don: The Criminal Underworld of Santo Trafficante Jr., Cigar City Mafia: A Complete History of the Tampa Underworld, and The Everything Mafia Book. Click anywhere on the highlighted text to find these books. In Hitmen, Scott tells of this minor league New York City Mafia crew known as the Purple Gang. These gangsters aspired to make their Purple Gang into the 6th Family by selling narcotics, committing murder, and extortion. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS mafia, gang, east harlem, purple, connection, drug, genovese, family, murders, tied, heroin, mob, early 70s, guns, killings, la cosa nostra, florida, gangs, new york, drug dealers SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Scott Dietche 00:00 The early years of the purple gangs appearance on the drug scene were a tumultuous era for many of the mob like drug syndicates operating in New York City, including the ones operating in East Harlem. But within the gangs own ranks internal strife and petty beefs led to several killings that law enforcement scrambled to solve more often than not, they were added to the list of unsolved gangland homicides. This early violence was one catalyst that led to the myth us of the Purple Gang as something akin to an elite hit squad for hire in the underworld. There were a lot of blood spatter drug related homicides, everybody suspected them the Purple Gang of doing a bunch of them, but we couldn’t prove it. The drug game was a violent one and the gang was certainly amenable to dispatching business rivals with little to no provocation. A 1976 DEA report stated much like the original Purple Gang that terrorize Detroit during the Prohibition era, the members of the current Purple Gang appear to have an enormous capacity for violence, involvement in numerous homicides and a lack of respect for other members of organized crime. Well, welcome 00:59 Welcome all you wiretappers out there, that little snippet you heard was a little bit from Scott oout his new book about the Purple Gang of East Harlem, New York. I’ll have links to get it but welcomes Scott, it’s really good to have you. 01:14 Yeah, great to be back. Good to see you again. 01:16 Alright, Scott’s been on here before he did a show and we did a show about the New Jersey mobs. And what was that gangland Garden State gangland Garden State gang land so I’ll have a link to find that down below guys. Really good books. And Scott does his research. I’ll tell you right now he does his research. Scott also does famous for the Ybor City or Tampa area mob tour, which I took and if you look on my YouTube channel, you can download a 10 minute segment of what you would see so if you’re, you’re down in Tampa in the winter, particularly I don’t think you do it in the summer days got 01:53 no we don’t walk around. It’s not conducive to walking outside during the day. 01:57

KC Confidential: Inside the Kansas City Mafia May 15, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews KC Mafia historian Frank Hayde, author of The Mafia and the Machine. They discuss the KC Mob from Prohibition to the Murder of the Two Charlies. Charlie Binnagio became a dual threat when he joined Tom Pendergast and became a political boss and the mob boss of Kansas City. His bodyguard, Charlie Gargotta, remained in the shadowy world of mafia hitmen and enforcers. Someone will murder both of the men dramatically. These dramatic murders expose the unholy partnership between the Mafia and the Machine. Get Frank Hayde’s book The Mafia and the Machine Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Frank Hayde 00:00 Well, hey, all you Wiretappers out there. It’s good to be back here in studioof Gangland Wire. First of all, I want to introduce you to my friend and fellow mob historian Frank Hayde, as you can see right there. I know many of you and because I’ve seen you on Facebook talking about the Mafia and the Nachine. Well, this is the dude that wrote the mafia machine, the first the first definitive history of the mob in Kansas City. So and you know, my friend Bill Ouseley wrote another one called Open City, but this was the first one and, you know, Frank, I know he was working on at the time and all sudden, the both of them came out at about the same time, if I remember right, and, you know, Frank helped me out with an interview, if you guys have seen my Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup about the theft of the 1946 election, which a lot of you have, and if you want to see it, you got to go to my website, and I can, I can rent you a link for $1.99. But Frank helped me out with that. And, you know, he’s just he is an expert on the mob and Kansas City, there’s the whole over you, you know, me I, I mainly know about the skim days and the days when I was a copper, but I don’t know that old history, like, like Frank does. And today, we’re going to talk about the joining of the Irish political machine and the Italian Mafia, and a man named Charlie Binnagio. That came out of it. Frank, welcome. I really appreciate you being here. 01:28 Gary Thank you for having me. It’s great to be on your show. 01:31 So we’ve talked many times, and emailed and that kind of thing, different things. And first time, we’ve really had a show like this together. So this will be fun. Now, before we really get started, guys, Frank, tell them a little bit about the new book, which is really exciting, because this is something I live in and was around during the time when this this subject was was hot. So tell me a little bit about your new book, 01:53 I do have a new book coming out that is, in a way a sequel to the Mafia and the Machine, in the sense that it covers the case, the underworld in the 1990s. So you know all the other treatments of the KC mob, basically ending the 80s with the skin and the big takedown and straw man. So this story kind of pushes the timeline forward into the 1990s. The book is going to be called mafia dreams. The subtitle is, what is myself but the subtitle is a true a true crime saga of young men at the end of an era in Kansas City. So it’s about some young guys who were trying to break into the life in the 1990s,

John Drummond aka “Bulldog” Covers the Outfit May 08, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this episode, Gary interviews Bulldog John Drummond. The listener learns about filming the Chicago Outfit up close and personal. Bulldog Drummond tells about a situation where it got almost too personal for Bulldog and his camera crew. Bulldog and his film crew watched as Chicago outfit associate and enforcer William “Billy” Dauber and his wife Charlotte left the Will County courthouse after the judge continued his hearing for cocaine and weapons charges. Bulldog wanted to follow the couple to find their county home because he had heard it was like a fortress. Bulldog’d editor ordered them back to downtown Chicago because he wanted coverage of another incident at the Cook County courthouse. The crew did not know that an Outfit hit team was waiting to follow the Daubers with guns, not cameras. They narrowly missed becoming witnesses and possibly victims of an Outfit hit team in the act of killing the Daubers. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Well, hey guys, all you wiretappers out there, another show of Gangland Wire back here in the studio. You can see my little library over there. A couple of last legal manuals I’ve got over there, those black and gold things, I need to get rid of them too. So today I went back to an old interview where I did with John Bulldog Drummond. You guys in Chicago will remember John Bulldog Drummond he was a very famous, very well known dynamic TV reporter at the time over the 50s 60s and 70s is kind of cut his teeth on the 1968 Democratic National Convention. Actually, I interviewed him years ago and and we just went on, I just let him have his head and he just told about all his different Bob stories and his relation to him. And he’s got some good ones we start off with let’s see, I had to make some notes here. We started off with what he remembers about Jerry Scalise and Rachel coming back on the airplane from England after they stole the Marlboro diamond and then when they got caught trying to break into Angelo law presenters house, then we go to oh, he he does the whole thing on Tony Spilotro and Lefty Rosenthal. But I think I think the best story in here, and it’s worth going through the early stories, he talks pretty fast, but I know you guys in Chicago will enjoy listening to Bulldog grumman’s voice again. But he almost got caught up in a mob hit of Billy Dauber, who was in a mob enforcer got killed with his wife. So he’s got a really good story on that. He’s got several other stories. A man named John, DeJohn, that he developed as a source was also talking to the Feds that that app the guy got killed shortly after the last time he met with him and the guy was telling him all kinds of good info about the outfit at the time. And it was kind of a minor guy, but he knew some stuff. And the guy got hit about a week later and Bulldog was told by somebody else that this guy was hit because he was getting too close to Bulldog and he was afraid that that Bulldog would expose too many of their secrets on the television on their own his new show. So it’s it’s a fun, interesting, wild ride through 70s and 80s Chicago outfit from the viewpoint of one of your more famous newsman John Bulldog Drummond. 02:29 What happened that day I recall when it happened,

Bobby Salerno – Outfit Killer May 01, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Chicago Outfit Historian James Cosenza about the second trial of Outfit gambler, fixer, and killer Bobby Salerno. We learn Salerno worked with a Cicero shakedown and hit team that went too far when they murdered bookmaker Hal Smith. An Outfit associate named B. J. Jahoda turned witness after the Hal Smith murder because they used him to set up Smith without his cooperation and foreknowledge. Salerno was represented by his son, defense attorney Alex Salerno. James reports that during the trial, the prosecutor elicited from Jahoda that Salerno and others killed Smith because he refused to pay any extra tribute to the crew. He felt he had paid enough “street tax.” When a crew member named Solly DeLaurentis asked for more, Smith refused, and they got into a loud argument in a public place. James Cosenza did not perceive that B. J. Jahoda was a believable witness. He spoke with Bobby Salerno at the water fountain during a break. Salerno said he was so proud that his son, Alec Salerno, was one of his two lawyers at the Defense table. He said, “I told my son that if he lost, don’t feel too bad because I have been around, and I can take it.” In this trial, the government used William B.J. Jahoda, who had been Solly DeLaurentis’ driver, as their star witness. Jahoda owned the Long Grove, Illinois home where the crew murdered Hal Smith. Jahoda testified that he was ordered to bring Smith to his house for a “talk.” Instead, Bobby Salerno, Robert (Bobby the Gabeet) Bellavia, and Louis (Louie Tomatoes) Marino murdered Hal Smith. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, James Cosenza 00:00 During B. J. Jahoda’s testimony now he was the star witness against Bobby Salerno. He was a kind of a tough witness to listen to. And they called the break outside in the hallway near the water cooler. For some reason, Gary, I was so aggravating, a little little disturbed by B. J. Jahoda’s testimony that I made a couple of comments out loud that I normally don’t do. And to my surprise, Bobby Salerno actually replied and spoke to me. And he told me I’ll never forget it. He said that you can see my son Alex, who’s representing me is a very fine attorney. And I told Alex, before this trial started, if we lose, I don’t want you to hang your head low. I want you to continue to be a top defensive lawyer. Don’t let this trial affect your career in any way. Don’t worry about me. I’m an old fighter. I’m a boxer. I can handle it. Then he went on to say And I’ll never forget this. He said, you can see I have my son. Alex is a very fine attorney. He was very proud of his son representing them. He’s like my second kid. She’s going to law school right now. And I’m listening. Then he put his head down. He’s like, my third kid, he dropped out of school in the ninth grade. And he kind of smiled. He’s like, Jimmy, two out of three ain’t bad. And that was that. That was my little conversation with Bobby that two of his kids are successful. And the third one dropped out of school. 01:29 Well, that’s interesting. We’ll welcome you guys back here in studio ganglion. We’re got James M. Black back on again. He’s my friend in Chicago,

Scarpa Assaults Vic Amuso Apr 24, 2023

Retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Robert McNeese, a man who served many years in two different federal prisons and was the cellmate of Lucchese Boss Vic Amuso. He was nearby when Colombo mobster Greg Scarpa Jr. attacked and injured Vic Amuso. Robert tells precisely how this fight started and what resulted. Robert McNeese tells how Danny Marino introduced him to the federal prison Mafia society. Marino suggested that Vic Amuso take him in as a cellie. Robert McNeese became good friends with Amuso, which gave him credibility with every other Mafia nab he met in the Federal prison system. He tells about Mafia prison life, prison guard corruption, and how he received a life sentence while in prison for a much shorter bank robbery sentence. The most exciting story is how he befriended a female inmate and learned information that assisted authorities in finding the bodies of two dead children and earned an early out. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Robert McNeese 00:00 The one day that was had open court on handball, Greg Scarpa, Jr. and his friend approached Vic and his friend aspect that they wanted to play doubles. And Vic said no, because you know dudes old man’s a snitch, and I don’t know if if he’s tainted, you know, he might be one two, I don’t know. So later that day or that evening, we had all had some pasta not to pick was Washington’s bowl out in my closet. He was bent over that. And Greg Scarborough Jr. You’re walked in there with a pipe and cracked him in the back of the head with a Game Over 170 stitches. They locked down the hole. Actually, they lock down the entire Bureau of Prisons when it happened. And then they ship colonial was out of there, and I went to Atlanta, and then about two weeks later, Vic showed up in Atlanta. But welcome 00:43 Welcome all you Wiretappers out there back here in the studio Gangland Wire, got a show for you today with a man named Robert McNeese. I got onto him. I can’t remember he was on another podcast I think and I listened to his stories and and he was great update you I was impressed and and we have Robert McNeese here Welcome, Robert. Thank you. I’m really happy to have you on the show we you know, we’ve had a couple three conversations and you know, I understand you live up in Cedar Rapids Iowa right now and there’s about five feet of snow or something 01:20 there’s enough there’s a lot of snow today and I’m Blizzard blizzard conditions today. 01:26 Let’s start off with you met a lot of mob guys in prison and and you got a lot of great stories, you also got noticed by Paramount Pictures. And they want to tell your life story even though you’ve never written a book and and I’m not sure how they got ahold of you exactly, but somebody told them about your story. And they were impressed enough with with your life experiences that they want to do a whole series on you. And I believe it’s gonna be called The Honorable Man. Is that correct? 01:57 Yeah they got onto me from Bill Staxx. Okay. 02:00 Just tell us a little bit. I think everybody’s curious about that. How does that go down when they just like call you or did Bill introduce you? Or whatever? How does that work? 02:10 Well, I got a call. Bill Staxxs reached out to me. He had interviewed a guy that I was incarcerated with, and he gave him my information.

Ray Liotta Mafia Actor Apr 21, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary found a clip of Ray Liotta telling about working on the set of GoodFellas and how one of the Mafa Cops, Lou Eppolito stole his wallet. He also adds a story about how Gaspipe Casso refused to hire the Mob cops because they wanted too much money. Gaspipe paid some other mob guy to do a hit, and the guy murdered the wrong man. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS JEFFREY SUSSMAN, GARY JENKINS, Ray Liotta 00:00 Hey all you wiretap errs out there welcome back to the studio is kind of low shorty I was noodling around and I found this clip of Ray Liotta talking about filming Goodfellas and dealing with Lou Eppolito The mom one of the mafia cops Steven Caracappa and Lou Eppolito where the mafia cops they were New York City policemen that that really they should have been mob guys then they were mob guys that went on the police department work there waves and positions that one of them was in the intelligence unit and actually for a while and then there was a homicide Dick I think they also did hits for mainly for Gaspipe Casso. Eppolito wrote a book and was pretty popular and he was consulting with on Hollywood movies and even at a small bit part in Goodfellas. And I think maybe it’s something else to do in the movies. But I thought Ray Liotta had some really interesting stories about working with the mob working with Joe Pesci working with Eppolito on Goodfellows check this out 01:02 Bob was there dinero Lorraine pesci didn’t make it though. Oh, he didn’t know he sent the letter. Oh, really old fashioned Bob read it. Did he really um basically it said sorry I can’t be there but the even curses when he writes he’s a funny guy. That is that might be the greatest scene ever. I mean really? It still makes me nervous even though I know what’s happening in that scene. So Goodfellas eatery right? You learn to ride a horse do you learn to be a mobster for a movie like that? And can you even What they said they gave me a guy who used to be a cop whose family was in the mob and he later went mob and I remember one day we go to we go to lunch right we go we get there eating and I want to pay he’s he’s you know he’s telling me things and sharing things with my my wallets left they’re like what the heck oh my gosh, what I do with my wallet? We go back No, this is like in Queens people all over the place walking up and down. And all of a sudden I walk boom there’s my wallet. There’s no question he took it from me. He took it from me and then I guess after he threw it on the streets and Oh look there it is. Why do you think that heavy he had a he’s a douche All right, well, that’s a good reason. The the night that I got the part Lorraine and I found out we went to Marty’s apartment then we went to a place called rails. You know it? Yeah, sure. And then we went there, we’re having a nice dinner. Then all of a sudden, towards dessert. All these guys start coming up. And basically they were auditioning, but but they did it by saying I knew a guy who did this than the other one Thompson. I knew a guy who did that and their stories got worse and worse and you know they were talking about themselves. So they were just not now I got some you think that’s a whacking? That kind of thing. Oh,

Steel City Mafia Apr 17, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. Gary interviews the author of Steel City Mafia: Blood Betrayal and Pittsburgh’s Last Don. Starting with the bombing of mob associate Paul Hankish, this is a story of Mafia life in Steel City with all its blood and betrayal. Paul Hankish was the boss of Wheeling West Virginia and he kicked up the Pittsburgh Family. Plus, we learn about the last Don and how a 1/2 Sicilian named Chuckie Porter became Underboss and took down the family. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Paul Hodos 00:00 So you may have heard of Paul Hankish. He was a Wheeling associated Pittsburgh mobster, his nickname was No Legs basically how he got that nickname is pretty interesting story. He was an up and coming bookmaker and gambler and his rival and Wheeling was getting a little nervous about him in 1964. Paul Hankish on one morning was coming out of his house and he got into his car and started the car. Fortunately for him, there was a dynamite bomb in the engine block, his car exploded. Basically there was a shock wave throughout the neighborhoods and windows were blown out. The authorities arrived pretty quickly. Luckily for him, he was conscious throughout the ordeal was car was on fire. He was stuck in there. His one leg was partially severed and the other one was completely blown off. When the police arrived. He was basically just screaming come and help me please. And so they got him out, took them to the hospital and it ended up that they had to amputate his other leg. That’s how he basically had to go and wear prosthetics to walk with crutches basically for the rest of his life. 00:55 But welcome all you Wiretappers back here in the studio of Gangland Wire, I’ve got a story that I think a lot of you guys would really be interested in because it was such a big response to my friend Steve say John talked about being in the penitentiary down at Springfield in the hospital penitentiary with Lefty Ruggerio. And he told a story about a man named Paul Hankish. And we’re going to talk about Paul Hankish, a little bit and his connection to the Pittsburgh crime family and more about the Pittsburgh mob. So welcome my guest, Paul Hodos. Paul, welcome. 01:28 Thank you, Gary. Nice to be here. 01:30 It’s really great to have you here. And this is perfect this Paul Hankish had so many questions about Paul Hankish said I know my friend Steve, who I see every Wednesday anymore kind of interesting story may being a Copper and really be in charge of the Surveillance crew that helped get him put in the penitentiary and we become friends in the last few years after he got out and he led the straight life. But after he got out, he’ll really be interested to hear more about Paul hankies. And I know I have a lot of guys, especially my friend, Rob Starr, who wants to hear more and more about the Pittsburgh crime family. And it is an interesting small little family kind of like the Kansas City family. So you have done a lot of history, a lot of background into that. And tell us about your own personal history how you got into this. 02:17 So I’m actually from Western Pennsylvania, originally, I live in Maryland now. But I’m from the area where the current family was based,

Crooked: Interview about a Corrupt 1920’s Attorney General Apr 10, 2023

Retired Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Nathan Masters about his new book Crooked: The Roaring ’20s Tale of a Corrupt Attorney General, a Crusading Senator, and the Birth of the American Political Scandal. We learn about a corrupt U.S. Attorney General named Harry Daugherty, the puppet master behind President Warren G. Harding’s unlikely rise to power. Daugherty was well-known to maintain cozy relations with bootleggers and gamblers like Arnold Rothstein and other scofflaws. When his constant companion and trusted fixer, Jess Smith, is found dead of a gunshot wound in the apartment the two men share, a corruption-busting senator from Wyoming and the incorruptible J. Edgar Hoover go to work. This book is packed with political intrigue, salacious scandal, and many similarities to our modern era of political discord. Nathan Masters’ thrilling historical narrative shows how this intricate web of inconceivable crookedness set the stage for the next century of American political scandals. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Nathan Masters 00:00 Yeah, so one of the scenes that really got me going when I started writing this book was something that happened on Memorial Day 1923 at the Wardman Park in fashionable Hotel in Washington where the Attorney General lived, there was a gunshot somebody and there was a man dead from a gunshot wound inside the suite that the Attorney General lived in. And the first law enforcement officer in the scene was none other than the head of what became the FBI, a man named William J. Burns, which if you think about it, it’s a pretty unusual circumstance to have the head of the FBI investigating a local homicide. I’ll read it from my book here a little bit inside the bedroom suite 600 E. Burns found the body of a man named Jeff Smith 50 crumpled at the foot of two beds, in his right hand was a 32 caliber revolver, single bullet had plowed through his head. This was clearly a matter for the local authorities burns knew better than to summon the police immediately, the situation called for discretion for a few in Washington had known as much as the man who now lay before him in a bloody heap, then the book just sort of unfolds from there. 00:56 Thanks a lot. That’s great. Yeah, guys, welcome. I’ll you work average out there. You just heard a little bit out of a new book out crooked. And it’s going to tell us all more than we ever want to know about a variety of things. If you remember back when you were a kid, you heard about the Teapot Dome scandal. There was this corrupt administration under Warren G. Harding, where the President and the founding of the FBI came out of this and just a lot of other interesting stories. The Attorney General the FBI was investigating their own attorney general and he was crooked as heck, as you can tell, but that was his sweet. So welcome. Nathan masters. Thanks a lot, Nathan, for coming on the show. 01:37 Well, thanks for having me, Gary. 01:39 So we’re a little bit about your background. You were in public TV, get background Public TV. Tell us a little bit about that. 01:47 Yeah, I’ve hosted a public television show called last la that explores Los Angeles history through the archives. I’ve been doing that since 2016. So I have a lot of experience digging through archival materials for compelling stories to share th...

Did Al Capone Really Do That? Apr 03, 2023

Retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins researched many well-known myths about Al Capone. In this episode, Gary explains the myths and the real story behind each myth. If you want to learn my about these myths, go to My Al Capone Museum website. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS scalise, capone, chicago, al capone, policemen, people, sicily, gangsters, big, starts, sicilian, gun, named, real, jenna, banquet, kill, olson, outfit, firing SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS 00:00 They can see he’s got a blue steel turned out a 30 caliber gun in his hand and he starts firing at them as he falls down. Well, he already had a severed femoral artery in his leg at the time, but he’s still going and, of course, they open up on him. And he’s still alive when they call an ambulance and Genna, Genna starts kicking at the ambulance drivers and you know, take that you son of a bitch. I tell you what, he was a bad dude. Hey, oh, all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio gangland wire. Good to be back here. And I have a story for you today about the myth about how Al Capone had this big banquet and he had some guy there who was a traitor that he knew about and he called him out and he beat him to death with a baseball bat and made famous in the movie. The Untouchables was Sean Connery and and I can’t think of that the guy’s name you know who it is who played Eliot Ness? Anyhow, Connor, he played the tough old Irish, Chicago copper. First of all, I saw a video the other day my my daughter My granddaughter told me about this is a true crime podcast on YouTube. And this wouldn’t work on the audio platform that I mainly use. A lady starts telling about some horror crime primarily some kind of a true crime deal, but she also instructs people on how to put on makeup the time so I thought well, well, there’s a gimmick. We’re always looking for a gimmick. There’s a gimmick. Here’s a gimmick. So what can I do? Alright, here’s what I’m thinking I should tell you how to clean and get a 4026 Smith and Wesson my old service pistol ready to go but you know I tell you what, I don’t know if I can tell that story a true crime story or keep concentration because it takes way too much concentration, I be going God Damnit , where is that spring, how does that thing spring go back in there. I forget how to do that. First. Whe I first got this gun, it was a pain in the butt. It was a good gun and I never had to use it for anything. But it’s always here in the house. For home protection anyhow. So let’s get on with the story of the two guys that really incurred the wrath of Al Capone and the kind of the the basis for that story. There was two men from Sicily named Alberto Anselmi and Giovanni Scalise. They came to Sicily Rackley running from came that they came to Chicago actually running from Benito Mussolini. Mussolini was after the mafia and he had warrants out for him for things like consorting with known criminals and some basic, you know, general, kind of a warrant like that. Even just putting them all in jail, but they were they were cold blooded, black hander mafia killers from Sicily. I came to Chicago and of course, the first time they first place they came to in Chicago was a Taylor Street area and the Patch and little Italy had actually had two areas, Little Italy and then little Sicily was just north of that a...

Did Tony Accardo Spoil HIs Daughter? Mar 29, 2023

Retired intelligence detective tells about the time that the daughter of Tony Accardo took off with her friend on an unapproved trip out west. “The Boys” had given her a Triumph Sports car as a gift, probably for graduation. Without permission, she convinced her best girlfriend to accompany her on a driving trip out west. She neglected to tell her father, feared mob boss Tony Accardo. Gary received an anonymous email from this friend’s sister, who told the story. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

The KC Mob and Narcotics Mar 27, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins brings you the best in mob history with his unique perception of the mafia. In this video, Gary interviews retired Assistant US Attorney Chuck Ambrose. He tells us the story of two brothers who were mob associates. Steven Vest was married to the granddaughter of Joe Filardo. Filardo took Nick Civella to the famous Mob Meeting in upstate New York when New York State Troopers arrested them. Steven Vest was a vicious and greedy cocaine dealer. Chuck tells how a witness described a double murder and pointed out the burial site. This investigation took the FBI into a dark underground of addicts, cocaine, and drug houses. Among many other crimes, Steven and Darrell Vest murdered two Colombian drug mules, buried the body, and kept the cocaine claiming the couriers never arrived. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS mob, kansas city, book, couriers, case, money, son, homicide, brothers, food stamp fraud, prosecutors, running, kilos, business, chuck, cocaine, spend, cartel, vest, rules SPEAKERS Chuck Ambrose, GARY JENKINS 00:00 One thing I can get into a little bit if you want me to is that you got the old mob mythology that they never did dope. But we all know that not the case. Even the New York families were running heroin wherever the money was the fastest. That’s where they win. You are listening to gangland wire hosted by former Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit detective, Gary Jenkins. 00:24 Welcome all you Wiretappers out there back here in the studio gangland wire. And I have an old friend of mine in many ways. We crossed paths many times. But we didn’t really know each other. He worked with the guys that worked for me, I was a sergeant in the intelligence unit. So I kind of stayed out of the day to day activities. And I had, you know, 12 guys that I was overseeing what everybody was doing and, and so my guys work with US Attorney’s Office and a particular FBI agent, who was one of the best I’ve ever met Larry Tongate. We have the US attorney that’s Assistant US Attorney that a lot of the guys worked with on several narcotics cases involving the mob in Kansas City. Chuck Ambrose, welcome, Chuck. Thank you, glad to be with you. It’s great to have you and kind of get to know you. Like I said, I heard your name so many times from these guys. But somehow we just our paths never crossed, never met face to face. So it’s really been good catching up with you. Before we started recording to hear some of the stories we’re not going to tell on the area. You have been writing crime fiction, and you have used your experience as a US Attorney here in Kansas City and other places a lot to create the storylines in these books. And that’s really sounds interesting. Chuck why don’t name off some of those books. 01:38 Okay, well, the first I wrote just a little bit of background I did several years in DC before moving to Kansas City, I’d come home every day and tell my wife what we’ve been doing it work and he can’t make this stuff up, he ought to write a book. So I finally did. The first one published about 10 years ago now is Capital Kill set in DC and it had to do with a Jamaican posse and a serial killer. And most of my books are based on either real cases or real investigations. Sometimes I will blend two or three into one novel.

Scarpo versus Trafficante: A Florida Story Mar 20, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Tony Scarpo about his family and how they fought to establish themselves independently of the Trafficante Mafia Family. Tony’s grandfather migrated from Bari, Italy, to the Pennsylvania coalfields and moved to Tampa, Florida, for an opportunity. His grandfather, Antonio, fought off gangsters in Pennsylvania, and his father, Art Scarpo, found himself in the same battle when they opened a bar and restaurant in Tampa. When the Scarpo family arrived, they encountered the powerful Trafficante family, an established American Mafia family. Tony Scarpo grew to adolescence witnessing and helping his father and uncles fight back against the Trafficantes. As an adult, Tony Scarpo achieved great success as a diamond importer and has become a generous philanthropist. At one point, he asked his sister, “Did we live through what I remember?” This put him on a path to document and memorialize his exciting family history in this book. Tony has obtained interest from a motion picture company, and a screenwriter is working on a script. Please click here to buy the book La Mia Famiglia: Never Let Them Steal Your Name. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS tampa, father, book, mafia, people, dad, family, mob, anthony, italian, story, began, fbi, bar, growing, narcotics, man, sat, brothers, bookmaking SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Tony Scarpo 00:00 I don’t know the circumstances of how this meeting came about. He may have been invited. He may have been forced, or he may have been thinking he was going to dinner with friends, but he found himself at a scene straight out of the godfather. Two men he had never seen before asked him to join them for a cup of coffee. The meeting was to take place at hares diner on Hillsborough Avenue. When my dad entered to the well known restaurant, he was escorted back to a dimly lit banquet room, wondering why the main diner tables weren’t sufficient. He heard the door slam behind him. They’re sitting at a four top or two men waiting to meet him. He noticed several other men scattered throughout the room, all standing with their eyes focused intently on him, each man standing at attention as if waiting for some sort of signal. Well, thanks a lot. Anthony. Welcome while you are tappers out there. Back here in the studio gangland wire. You just heard a little short reading from Anthony’s book about the Trafficante mafia and family and his father growing up in Tampa, Florida. Welcome, Anthony. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Well, this is kind of a long torturous trip we took to get here. This date one time, folks, I hate to admit it, but I dropped the ball here. And Anthony got ahold of me a couple of years ago, just before COVID hit. And somehow I was looking back at my old podcast by my podcast group on Facebook and the messages and I see this not that well, what the heck, I never did talk to him. Let’s go find him because I’m thinking about doing something with Scott detail. Or Scott is going to talk about the Purple Gang up in Harlem. But Scott Deitche. If you guys don’t know he is kind of the main premiere historian of the southern Florida crime families. And he has the Ybor City mob tour, which I took if you look on my YouTube channel, you’ll find my kind of going on that tour so you can get a taste for what that’s like right ...

The Purple Gang of New York Mar 15, 2023

Retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins explains the Purple Gang of East Harlem in this bonus episode. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Mafia Lawyers – Roy Cohn Mar 13, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews an expert on Mob lawyers, Australian lawyer Tony Taouk, about Roy Cohn. We learn that Mr. Cohn was a flamboyant fixture in New York City and “made his bones” as the advisory lawyer to Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Committee on Un-American activities during the 1950s. One of Roy Cohn’s most famous mob cases was the time he helped Carmine Galante beat a parole revocation. To contact our guest or get a good lawyer in Syndey, Australia, Click here Tony Taouk is an Australian lawyer and a Mafia researcher who specializes in the subject of mob trials and mob lawyers. He has also traveled to the United States and visited mob-related sites in New York, Chicago, and Las Vegas. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Roy Cohn, Tony Taouk, Carmine Galante 00:00 And this grandfatherly man said that I’m gonna leave 00:04 the country good. What 00:05 are you gonna do when you get to the country? 00:07 Well, I mean, I tried peppers last week now I’m gonna plant tomatoes. 00:11 His name is Carmine Galante, the late Carmine Galati, who the papers said was the godfather of the mafia. Okay. 00:18 You think that had an influence on the federal judgment? He held that you were right in the parole customers role? I 00:23 think so 00:24 he thinks a farmer ought to be able to say the right thing. 00:26 So I mean, it’s very well known that what I do, 00:29 I don’t have to believe a person is innocent. Like we thought we got Galante or Tony Salerno or something like that. I don’t have to believe in their innocence in a particular case, I have to believe one of two things. Number one, that that person is innocent in the particular case, or that there are some extraordinary circumstances which make the prosecution unfair. 00:50 Well, hey all you wiretappers out there. Welcome back to the studio of Gangland Wire. We got a special show if you listen to that little promo that was Carmine Golante talking with his lawyer Roy Cohen right after Roy did a deal that got him out of jail. He was talking about that what he was gonna go do. I’ve got a an Australian lawyer, Tony Taouk, from down-under from Sydney, Australia, who is an expert on mob lawyers. And we’re gonna do a series of shows and today we’re gonna do one about Roy Cohen. Roy Cohen is not a household name when it comes to the mob lawyers, but he was a mob lawyer as well as the lawyer for Donald Trump and, and a lot of other people in New York City and that character all on his own. So I just thought it was an interesting guy. And that’s gonna be our first one there. We’re gonna do some of the other famous mob lawyers over the next several months. So just sit back and listen to my friend Tony Taouk. from Down Under and I will have a link to his website if you’re in Sydney and you need a lawyer. Thanks a lot for helping me out Tony. Good. We’re just gonna cut right into this guy’s 01:55 he’s one of the most he’s a toxic combination of brilliant and evil is probably one of the most interesting and complex and a moral character. I have least in the legal world, 02:09 really. I have to agree when it first started coming down. Now he was Donald Trump’s legal advisor. I’m thinking he’s still alive. He’s still around doing, man. I mean, he goes from Joe McCarthy to Donald Trump then stops at the mafia in bet...

Drew DiDonato – How to Rob a Bank Mar 08, 2023

Retired Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins interviews Andrew DiDonato, a former mafia associate of the Gambino crew that Nicky Corazzo skippered. Andrew tells how Corazzo took him in and groomed him to be a part of his crew and how he made money for the Gambino family. He learned the hard way that there is no real honor in the mafia, only greed. As he brought in guys from other families and created a bank robbery crew, Corazzo became jealous and wanted more money and more money while Drew took all the risks. He describes a successful bank robbery in great detail. Andrew DiDonato and his co-author Denny GFriffin released a popular book about his exploits. Click here to get Surviving the Mob: A Street Soldier’s Life inside the Gambino Crime Family. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS money, knew, bags, life, lawyer, run, people, kill, friend, bank robbery, pinched, gary, day, put, nicky, street, lived, problems, location, years SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Andrew DiDonardo 00:00 Hey all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio gangland wire. Nice sunny day here in Kansas City. This is the second of a two part episode with Andrew D DiDonato. A Gambino family Nicky Corazzo crew associate and in this he tells about, a litle bit about his life getting into the Mob, how they recruited him how they groomed him. He tells in great detail, you got to wait a little bit for it stick with it about doing a big bank robbery, which is really interesting. Now he did it. Then it ends up down about how he ended up going into witness protection. Actually, he never went into witness protection. He lived in New York as you see him on Facebook every once awhile, I think he if you remember from the last episode, he was talking about being in the car business, I think he’s in the car business, I need to get ahold of him and see how he’s doing and what’s going on with it was really a good guy. I really liked talking to him and would mind talking to him to get an update on what’s going on. You know, he was involved with Nicky Corazzo in that crew during the time when Michael DiLeonardo ends up coming in and and he knew about that whole deal where John Gotti Jr. was gonna try to kill or actually was only gonna have him beat up and then the guy tried to kill him, Curtis Sliwa. And so he was real close to all those guys that were close to God. And he was. I mean, he was in there and he was a moneymaker for him. And he got tired of being, you know, the guy that made all the money. And while they got all the gravy, and he took all the risk at the end, which is the way it is in the mob, listen to this and bear with it, especially if you want to hear about that armed robbery because it’s a great story. And he’s a good storyteller. As you know, if you’ve listened to that last one. You haven’t listened to the one I put that before, go back and find it. And it’s just like a couple of weeks ago, I’m gonna put this up right away. Listen, guys, it’s a good one. It really is no Ilana, there’s no Ilana, these guys were robbed everyone, mothers with the lights off, there’s money on the table. There’s no honor here. That’s a fabricated thing. It’s a fabricated thing to brainwash young guys like me to think that when they’re out there doing these things, justified in their actions. For many years, I carried myself again, I was part of this honor system, I was wanted to be a man of respect, there is none.

Anthony Ruggiano – Gambino Associate Tells All Mar 06, 2023

Retired Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins talks with former Gambino Crime Family associate Anthony Ruggiano about his life as the son of Gambino member Fat Andy Ruggiano. Anthony Ruggiano was born into Mob life and never had a chance. It was a typical day for him as a young man to meet others at his Father’s Social Club and plan scores like sending people out to the suburbs with stolen credit cards. He would meet them on their return and pay them a small amount on the dollar for various electronic goods and other small high-dollar items. Then take these items to the retail fence he used. This was his college and internship. He got hooked on the action, drugs, and alcohol from this dangerous fast-paced life. Ultimately, he couldn’t take it any longer and realized he could not maintain this lifestyle and stay alive. He went into treatment and then long-term recovery. He found he could not return to criminal life, and Anthony now works at an addiction treatment center. For help from Anthony, if you have a problem, call 855-963-2113. To see Anthony’s show click here on his YouTube channel, Reformed Gangsters. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcription 00:00 Hi my name is Anthony Ruggiano Jr. and I am the son of Anthony Fat Andy Ruggiano who became a main member of the American mafia in 1953. When I became a teenager at 16, I followed my father into that life and he started schooling me he was a member of the Gambino crime family at that time, I started to work with him at the age of 16. I started using drugs around that time and committed crimes with him when I was age 23. I went to prison for the first time when I came out. I was friendly with John Gotti through my father’s Association, I stopped running around with that Crow and also continued using drugs. My father was a high ranking member of the Gambino family in 1984. My father was arrested by the FBI at that point in time I was still in the street I started freebasing cocaine and I guess that’s what I crossed over the line into addiction my father was doing for two years in prison, John Gotti was the boss of the Gambino family at the time. I had a very good relationship with them. Welcome all you wiretappers out there. It’s good to have you back here in the studio gangland wire. I have a really special guest today. And if you’re out there on YouTube, and you’re a real mob fan and YouTube Bob fan, you know there’s a lot of guys that were formerly in the life that are out there on YouTube. Sammy the bull, Michael Franchese, but we have another guy who was part of the Gambino family Anthony ruggiano, Jr. and I’ve got him right here in the studio with me if you’re on YouTube, and if you’re not, you’re gonna hear him in a few minutes. Thanks a lot, guys for listening and welcome, Anthony. Oh, well, thanks. Thanks for having me. I’m really glad Glad to have you on here. This is like kind of a new phenomenon you guys that were formerly in the live with YouTube channels Bobby Luisi. And there’s just a quite a few of you. So it’s, you know, what a what a what a difference of 30 years makes 01:53 very true very true. 01:56 I’m waiting for somebody in Kansas City to come in and start a YouTube channel or want to co host with me I don’t see it covered though. There was a big mob family in Kansas City at one time I don’t know what happened to them well, as well you know, there’s still one of our last surviving guys just died yesterday actually,

Gone in 60 Seconds with Vic Ferrari Feb 27, 2023

Vic Ferrari's colorful and unique storytelling style entertains and enlightens simultaneously.

Drew DiDonato – Gone in 60 Seconds Feb 22, 2023

Retired Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins interviews former Gambino associate Andrew DiDonato. As he is known on the street, Drew was a premiere car thief for the Nicky Corazzo crew in Brooklyn. He tells the best stories about car chases with cops, stealing a car belonging to Paul Castellano’s son-in-law, and finding a handgun with a book containing handwritten notations about loan shark collections and a lot of cash. Click here to get Andrew’s Book Surviving the Mob Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript SUMMARY KEYWORDS car, money, friend, nikki, knew, listen, gambino crime family, genovese, bought, life, receipt, robbing, doors, give, hear, stolen, street, crew, told, put 00:00 Hey guys, welcome to Studio I got a heck of a story for you today. This is a guy Andrew de Donato grew was a member of or associate of the Nicki Carazzo crew and the Gambino family for a long time. And he has some stories and and I’m gonna taste them early on or is the best story ever heard about a car chase that he had, but we keep listening about 15 minutes in about the time that he and a buddy his stole a car belonging to the son in law Paul Castellano and in that car when it was a nice Mercedes that guy was, I won’t tell you the story. You got to listen to this story. When they got home, they found stuff in that car that Paul Castellano wanted back and his kappo Nicky Corrado was on the phone before he could even really get in and get back in and look at the car. He knew there was some stuff in the car, I knew there was a bag in the car, Nikki Corrazo said, you know, he just you gotta return that you gotta return that. And so, you know, the story of of what he found and his returning the car. And what happened after that is, it’s tell you this is one you guys got to share with your friends. You got to share this to everybody, this guy and he’s a heck of a storyteller too. So, so settle back and listen to this interview with Andrew DiDonado. 01:23 Friend of mine, Richie had a Mercedes Benz that, you know, on their cell that he was looking to put together, we found one in color, we took it, he took it out of a shopping center, we brought it to the location we were chopping the car, we couldn’t cut it the way we usually do where we can make a Pepsi came out of it. We had actually drive the shell out at night. And we had to get it out because a friend of mine we will use in his family’s garage at the time at this one location. What happened was, we had to signal setup that we were going to go out about two in the morning, a friend of mine was standing on a corner with a flashlight. I’m inside the garage and I’m crimping the why I’m crimping all the oil lines to the oil lines don’t squirt, and you know leave a trail back to the garage where we chopped the car. And then my friend comes up to me and says bottom line that you didn’t want to hear and your whole wildest dreams because we listened to I need that steering wheel. Like I can’t give it a steering wheel. I said I got to drive this car out. Because listen, it’s a wood wheels and naughty wheel. He goes it’s gonna cost about 500 If I gotta buy in the store. I said all right, right take this the steering wheel off the car and I put a vise grip on now the car’s got no seats in it just a shell engine is no trunk deck. There’s no hook. There’s no doors. There’s no not a friend of mine is standing outside. With a flashlight. He gives me the old gold single that it’s able ...

What happened Sin City Gangsters? Feb 20, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins discusses the new book Sin City: The Rise and Decline of the Mob in Las Vegas with author Jeffrey Sussman. As you may know, your host, Gary Jenkins, chased the #mafia around Kansas City while they were secretly skimming millions from Sin City or Las Vegas casinos. Jeffrey Sussman has extensively researched the rise and fall of the Mafia in Las Vegas. Sin City had no home-grown Mafia family, and starting with Meyer Lansky, Bugsy Siegel, and Frank Costello, they built the Strip into a money-making machine. When Atlantic City opened, The New York mobsters took control of all gambling action in Atlantic City, while the Chicago Outfit moved into Sin City big time. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here! Transcript Jeffrey Sussman Feb 07, 2023 12:50PM • 20:59 SUMMARY KEYWORDS las vegas, casinos, money, teamsters, mob, built, chicago, tony, rosenthal, howard hughes, buy, people, book, gangsters, jeffrey, character, lefty, moe, hand, friend SPEAKERS JEFFREY SUSSMAN, GARY JENKINS 00:00 A lot of people don’t realize is that the flamingo hotel was not started by Bugsy Siegel as portrayed in the movie bugzy. It was actually started by a man named Billy Wilkerson, who owns the Hollywood Reporter, and a number of other places in Hollywood, including several restaurants. He started a flamingo and named it the flamingo but it had nothing to do with Bugsy Siegel’s girlfriend Virginia Hill, which was the premise in the movie that the flamingo got its name for because Bugsy Siegel named it after Virginia hill. It never happened that way. 00:36 Welcome while you are to average out there. Good to be back here in studio gangland wire. We have my repeat guest Jeffrey Sesemann. Jeffrey, welcome. 00:45 It’s a pleasure to be with you again, Gary. 00:47 Well, Jeffrey, we’ve done boxing in the mob. We’ve done some other older mob things that you and I talk a year or so ago about this new book about the kind of the origins in Las Vegas, how it developed, you get a copy of that book there, hold that up. 01:04 I have a copy of the book. It’s called Sin City gangsters, the rise and decline of the mob in Las Vegas. And it was just published. 01:12 Cool. So guys, I’m gonna have links to the Amazon site where you can buy that book, I highly recommend you buy the book and and looking forward, you’ll see that your intrepid host, Gary Jenkins gets a little credit. 01:24 Absolutely. Well deserved credit. 01:28 So definitely that he interviewed me and he recorded what I knew about Las Vegas courts. My knowledge of Las Vegas, as you all know, is really from Kansas City. And that’s about the skimming and what happened in the Kansas City area of the skimming investigation in the 1970s. But I was happy to help Jeffrey and I wish you all luck in the world. And so how did you happen to get started this year in the easterner right what you boxing in the mob has been one of your things boxing is your real thing. So head right into this. 02:00 Well, I met three different people at different points and it sparked my interest. In the late 1970s. I met a man named Big Julie Weintraub, who looked like an ex heavyweight fighter, you know, he had a broken nose and he was about six foot five 250 pounds. And he was the creator or the inventor of what was called the Las Vegas junket where he would take high rollers to the dunes hotel,...

Mr. Stinky Feet Finds a Killer Feb 16, 2023

Retired intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Jim Cosgrove, aka Mr. Stinky Feet, a Kansas City children’s entertainer and author. Mr. Cosgrove reports on a multi-year investigation he conducted and chronicled in his book Ripple: A Long Strange Search for a Killer. This investigation takes him into the Low Country of South Carolina, where he finds the local crime boss and his underlings may have been the killers. Subscribe to the Podcast for a new gangster story every week. Support the Podcast. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Donate to the podcast. Click here!

Tony Accardo and his Daughter Feb 14, 2023

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins tells some stories he got from a childhood friend of the Tony Accardo family. We learn about the time “the boys” gave the daughter a new Triumph sports car. She graduated from high school, and she and a girlfriend headed west without parental approval. They had a few real schoolgirl adventures while Tony and the families worried. This and more. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript 0:00:00 Hey, all you wiretappers out there. It’s gonna be a little short bonus episod. Wiat while we get adjusted here. I got a call. Actually, I got an email from a lady who lives in Chicago though, and she grew up with Tonia Accardo’s daughter. She and her sister lived in the same neighborhood in River Forest. About the big mansion with the pool in the bottom. First thing she told me was, I remember going in that mansion. She said it was really special. Said mister Carlo just said, you know, walk around, take a look, do whatever you want. So she met remembers going down into the basement where there was a big pool you remember. Right? And she said she saw a huge she thought it was a swordfish. She probably had the, like, the the sword down on them. Now. Maybe not a big tuna, but a big zordfish on the wall. She said it was really scary for her as a kid. And she said, remember seeing a a ball. Down there. And then she said she added, well, that was the vault that those two men were robbing. So I guess everybody in the neighborhood knew about somebody breaking into his house. Now she goes on to tell me her sister actually was better friends with with, I believe, the older daughter. Tony Accardo. 0:01:07 You know, I had that one story with Carlo Miceli, who was a young man, was asked by Tony to take his daughter to the school prom, and they ended up going up into Wisconsin drinking all night after they ditched the bodyguards. When he got back, Ricardo said, yeah, I understand, son. He knew his daughters. And they were they were wild. She talked about how they’d like one of them had a bunch of people over for the pool, for a pool party, and she hit all their regular clothes. Nobody was happy with that. One time she locked the gate so nobody could get out. She was always playing tricks like that. This was the older one. As I said, she was a wild hare. 0:01:46 The boys, as my informant tells me, the boys gave her a Triumph sports car sometime during the sixties. As a graduation present, and this is late in the year. So, schools out and she and my informant’s sister take off on an an unannounced, unapproved trip in this Triumph Sports Car, and they go out west. So they get to the Grand Canyon’s She remembers her sister told her that they rode the mules down into the bottom of the Grand Canyon, came back out there driving out across the desert down in the southwest and they had a flat tire. Well, you know, these little Italian American princesses aren’t gonna change their own flat tire. They’ve never had to change tire. A truckload of pickup truckload of of Native Americans, Indians came along. They stopped. And and so these five guys got out and and they loosened the lug nuts on their flat tire. They got the spare out. The other four lifted up the triumph and just held it up while the guy pulled the flat tire off and put the spare back on. 0:02:47 So I’d tell you these two girls that were on a real adventure. I wish I knew more of these stories.

Lucky Luciano and Operation Underworld Feb 13, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Matt Black about his new book about how Navy Commander Charles Haffenden recruited Lucky Luciano and Socks Lanza into Operation Underworld. We learn the U.S. Navy was alarmed by the sinking of the world’s largest cruise liner, USS Normandie, while it was cocked at New York Harbor being converted to a cargo and troop ship. The Navy had reports of the FBI arresting German spies and saboteurs on American soil. They were terrified these German spies might cripple the Navy’s efforts to get troops and supplies to the European Theater of War. Commander Haffenden recruited Socks Lanza, the mafia’s kingpin for the harbor area. Once he worked successfully with Lanza and incorporated his contacts into Operation Underworld, Lanza introduced him to Luciano. Then Commander has to get the approval of Thomas E. Dewey and other local and state authorities. Once he got everybody on board, he transferred Lucky Lucian to a prison close to New York and promised the state would release him after the war. Click here to get the book on Amazon. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Lucky Luciano Operation Underworld Tue, Feb 07, 2023 10:26AM • 44:03 SUMMARY KEYWORDS luciano, book, mafia, underworld, longshoremen, ship, operation, people, lucky luciano, adonis, waterfront, new york city, navy, sicily, teamsters, world war, story, big, prison, new york SPEAKERS GARY JENKINS, Matthew Black 00:00 They didn’t go to you know Luciano right away the Navy went to the district attorney’s office told them what they needed and they came up with you know, a few names that might be able to help. The first one you know, that really ended up being a lot of help was this mid level gangster named Socks Lanza. And Socks’ is nicknamed because he socked everybody. I mean, he’s like a big 275 pound man, you know, he’s got these enormous hands, you know, and he’ll punch you with brass knuckles. He was also the czar of the Fulton Fish Market. 00:33 Well, hey, all you are Wiretappers out there. It’s good to be back here in the studio. You know, we’re in the middle of winter right now here in Kansas City. It might be warm by the time I get this out, or at least warmer than it is right now. But this is about halfway between Christmas and New Year’s and then anybody that lives back East. I know you guys have had it. They’ve got it has been ordered back. They’re really cold here, but not so much snow. Anyhow, today. i It’s a treat for me. I don’t know about you guys. I hope you find it as a treat. But it’s a real treat for me. Ever since I was started in this mob stuff. I read my first mob book when I was probably in my teens, maybe early 20s I can’t remember and there’s this story about Lucky Luciano and World War Two and some naval officers and maybe in his in a movie or something a little bit about it. But I’ve never known the details on that. And it’s it’s kind of like a myth about Lucky Luciano. And you know, I like to get below where the myth it starts and what really gets that myth going. And what really happened in World War Two because you guys I don’t know how old you are. A lot of you are closer to my a lot of your post war baby boomers and, and I was just remarking to my wife, I really long from the time when everybody was together and World War Two. And those next few years afterwards. We were like together as a country. And I don’t know we’ve we’ve seemed like we’ve lost that. Anyhow,

There’s More Bodies Out There! Feb 06, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews noted true crime filmmaker and author Rick Porrello. You will remember Mr. Porrello from Kill the Irishman, the story of the Cleveland Celtic Warrior, Danny Greene. Rick has a new Book titled There’s More Bodies Out There: The True Story of a Mafia Associate and a Cop Who emerge as Suspected Serial Killers. Rick was able to obtain a series of prison interviews with Richard Henkel, who started life as an armed robber, became known to the Pittsburgh Mafia as a man who could kill without remorse, and participated in a famous hostage-taking standoff in Pittsbhurg’s Western Prison. Along the way, Richard Henke befriended Gary Small when he was an Edgewood Borough police officer and brought him into his schemes. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript Rick Porrello edited bodies Thu, Jan 05, 2023 4:07PM • 24:06 SUMMARY KEYWORDS pittsburgh, youngstown, henkel, book, murder, mob, prison, cleveland, life insurance, story, kill, suspected, gary, writing, enforcers, mobsters, organized crime, hear, big, 70s 00:00 I first heard about Richard Henkel when I was writing my book super thief. And I learned that he was responsible for sending a bomb to a massage parlor to a prostitute who worked a massage parlor and sending it to her as a under the guise of a Christmas gift and blowing her up. He killed her, basically to keep her quiet over something else that had happened. And I was aghast and realize, Wow, this might be a story and a character that I want to look into. 00:31 Well, guys, I got a great show for you today. Rick Porello is going to be on here in a minute, a good friend of mine, ex cop, retired cop from back in Cleveland area, done a bunch of stuff you just heard kind of him talking to him a little bit of the low taste of what you’re gonna hear about from him. So let’s welcome Rick Porello. 00:50 And I was aghast and realize, Wow, this might be a story and a character that I want to look into. 00:57 Man, that guy was that guy was that cold Dude, why they? 01:00 He sure was I think he’s still he still is, you know, I’ve been in contact with him for over a year now about 10 months going into the completion of the book. And I first learned about Gary when I was writing my book, super thief, which goes back probably 15 years from working with Phil, Phil Christopher, the master burglar, the sub subject of my book, super thief. And he just kind of mentioned Richard Henkel in passing and, you know, said that he was involved in the murder for, for life insurance. And, you know, when you’re a writer, sometimes you hear you hear stories, or you’re a story or you hear about a certain character and sort of inserted plants a seed, you know, he kind of file that away. And that’s exactly what happened with with this character, Dick Henkel, Richard Henkel on file that away and years later, I started looking into him a little bit, I read a book actually a kind of a short story in a book called Pittsburgh characters. You know, he’s a Pittsburgh, he’s a pit he certainly is a Pittsburgh character. And it was written written by that particular short story was written by a journalist by the name of Paul Marciniak. And it basically tells the, the, you know, that the nuts and bolts of of, of Henkel story and just what a character I mean, he’s basically a mob that yeah, he’s, he’s a mob associate connected with the Pittsburgh mob, Youngstown, in a contract killer, or,

How to Research and Write Crime Fiction Jan 30, 2023

Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews a mystery and thriller fiction writer, Jode Millman about her research and writing process. In Ms. Millman’s recent thriller, Hooker Avenue, she was inspired by a true crime involving sex workers in the Hudson Valley of New York. She also had a personal connection to those crimes. During the late 1990s, eight sex workers disappeared from the mean streets of Poughkeepsie, N.Y., and for two years, the police took little action to locate them. Finally, in September 1998, after one woman escaped from the attacker’s clutches, the john, Kendall Francois, admitted to killing the women, and he buried them in his home. The perpetrator had solicited the women on the steps of Ms. Millman’s law office. Naturally, these heinous crimes and the lost lives of the victims haunted her. I wanted to discover whether Hollywood has perpetuated the early 20th Century stereotype of sex workers as boozy, broke, and burned out. She wanted to break through the Hollywood image of a sex worker and depict these women in their true form. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chicago Mob War – Sam Carlisi Jan 30, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins and Outfit historians Camillus Robinson and Paul Whitcombe discuss Sam Carlisi, The Chicago Outfit, and the time when the government after Sam Carlisi and his crew. They operated in Western Cook and DuPage Counties throughout the 1980s. Sam Carlisi was called “Wings” and some people believe it was in his youth he was known for his unrivaled ability to elude the authorities. Others claim it was because he flew around the country to connect with other mob families and was a traveling emissary for the Outfit. James “Litte Jimmy” Marcello worked for Sam Carlisi as his chauffeur, emissary, and all-around right-hand man. Carlisi’s third in command was Anthony Zizzo. On the street, guys knew “Little Tony” Zizzo as that boss of Frank Bonavolante, the head of the crew’s gambling operations, and Anthony “Big Tony” or “Tony the Hatch” Chiaramonti, who managed the crew’s juice loan racket. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript Sam Carlisi Well welcome all you are Wiretappers out there we are back here in studio gangland wired. And if you’re on YouTube, you can see I have a couple of 00:07 guests that have been on here regularly and semi regularly. Cam Robinson and Paul Whitcomb from Chicago. We’re going to Chicago today, folks. So welcome cam and Paul, I really appreciate you guys coming on help and tell his story. Thanks for having us. Glad to be here. 00:26 As you know, now cams got a book out there somewhere and I’m supposed to get an interview with Frank Calabrese a Jr’s wife who is who he wrote the book with a story of being married to the Mob, shall we say in Chicago? how’s that coming along? Okay, so final edits I’ve seen the cover and we’ve turned everything in should be going to print here very soon. All the all the edits it’s written and done and they just everything is set to pop so they’re good to go. What was the final title? 01:02 Final title we went with was Chicago swan song a mob wife story. Okay. All right. Guys, this one Yeah. latest ones for that guys. And I’m gonna have an interview with him and Lisa Swan here probably about the time that comes out. So we’ll we’ll be you’ll be hearing from us on Facebook and and on the podcast here. We want to see that book get read by a lot of people don’t wait cam. Absolutely. Yeah. The more the merrier or more the merrier. 01:32 You want readers I understand being an author or podcasts or whatever you want people to to digest your work. I just want to know people are digesting my work. You know, there’s there is the money angle to it. But I think it’d be really valuable information, a real different insight into Chicago outfit. We’ve never had that before. Yeah, it is that validation is sort of seeing what what goes on is I think Paul said it best what comes home with a monster comes home for dinner. So you know, it was it was Paul’s wording in in the interview the we did the initial interview and I really think that that says it I mean, this is this is what what the family is going through, I think we sort of getting windows with Carmela soprano, or Karen Hill and we’ll be good fellows. But we really take a deep dive and it’s it’s quite a story. Yeah, or even Gerard and Karen and Deborah Gravano you know, they get caught up in that ecstasy thing down in Phoenix and and all of them caught a case behind it. So I mean, you know, the family that does crime together goes to jail together. 02:39

Mob Stories from the Front Line – Bonus Jan 19, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary jenkins tells a couple of stories about the recently deceased Kansas City mobster, Willie Cammisano. Transcript Well hey all you wiretappers out there back here in the studio as you can see. We had our the last man standing in the way the Kansas City mafia and he’s younger than me actually he’s only seventy-three Willie Camposanto Jr. Died today. HIs father was the feared mafia enforcer and Capo named Willie the rat or Willie rats they mean Willie rats because he had rat terrier that he let go around and kill rats now Willie Jr. We used to call him Willie the mouse. A lot of people call him Little Willie, but he was he was his father’s son and they were both feared mafia enforcers so Willie Jr. I remember one time we tried to run in on him he was he had a connection with a guy that had a Buy Here – Pay Here used car lot. He was probably getting money out of that. We had a guy undercover got a all decked out with a crapola car and he came in is like looking to buy a car and loaded up his trunk with a bunch of property that looked like it might be stolen. And so he said, you know, he said I got a deal here and they knew that Willie JR. He’s a big hunter and a fisherman you know had fishing equipment had really high end fishing equipment he had some other things I don’t remember what all they had exactly, but mainly the fishing equipment and and so he came in two or three times and he tried to move in a little closer when Willie Jr. was there and tried to interest him in some of this fishing equipment he had you know, come on, take a look at this in the trunk and you know, really high end stuff and, and Willie Jr. Just you know, he didn’t even hardly talk to him because they have no and walked back away and just stayed away from a guy. So he was he was pretty canny. He was a kind of a guy we’d follow Him and follow Him and not really see anything but yet he’d always had to disappear and then something would happen I know we had a murderer one night and the last guy he was playing darts with the victim was playing darts with Willie comes out of Jr. And we were all around and watching this that night and then that guy left and we stayed there Willie he disappeared. Somehow he slipped under our radar and that guy was found dead the next day. So you know go figure we don’t know. Another time. Kind of interesting little story is there’s an FBI agent friend of mine was he was working on putting in a hidden microphone with a technical team, a black bag team, that came in from town putting a microphone in the trap or the Columbus Park social club. So on top of the social club there was about three stories of apartmen ts. The real old building was over what we call a little bit later the North End. Tony is down in the basement finishing up some of the worrying couple of the other guys the real highly technical guys they brought in from out of town were already out and gone. He was putting up the word you know talking that back up in and making sure everything was cleaned up and looking around and given that the final inspection and he started out the front door because what these guys did we were running we were at what we call Jigger and for him that night and we just got like hung around and a marked police car and wore the uniform in case somebody came in said Hey, what are you doing. We would fly into action right away. And so he was he was on his way out and he got to the front door and that the stairs that went up to those upstairs apartments were right next to the front door of the social club. So he or somebody does he opens the door he is somebody clunking down and he closes the doors quietly and the other door the apartment opens up so he kind of hunkers down he looks out there’s Willie come was auto Jr. Walking out getting his car was parked just down the street and driving off. This is about like 430 in the morning. You know he then done his thing and went out and partied the night befo...

Luigi the Zip – A True Mafia Hitman Jan 16, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Michael Vecchione about his book; Homicide Is My Business: Luigi the Zip―A Hitman’s Quest for Honor. A retired New York City criminal prosecutor, Michael Vecchione, tells how he met Luigi Ronsisvalle and gives us an intimate look at the life of a professional killer. Luigi told Mr. Vecchione about his journey from Sicily to his arrival in the United States and his first murder for hire to his last. We learn that Luigi the Zip had an ambition at age twelve to be a made man in the Mafia. He appeared in front of a presidential commission and said, “American child falls in love with baseball, I fall in love with Mafia.” Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript Hey, are you are tappers out there? It’s good to be back here in the studio with you gangland wired is going right on. Retired intelligence Sergeant Gary Jenkins here and I have on this as if you’re onto YouTube, you can see on the screen Miko Vecchione, is that correct, Michael? That’s correct. All right, great. And, Michael, I know if you’re on social media at all you and Bob stuff, you’ve seen this book we’ve seen come up, a lot of people are sharing this about Luigi, the zip. And he is the author of this book. So Michael, first of all, tell us a little bit about yourself how you are interested in you know what your work history, I know a little bit about it, but tell these guys about your work history. And then how you got interested in writing these my books? Sure. First of all, thank you, Gary, for having me. It’s such a pleasure to be here. And, and I, I have been involved in law enforcement, 00:58 probably for well over 40 years. I started way back in 1973, in a Brooklyn district attorney’s office after I graduated from law school, and, and I wound up leaving, after after about seven and a half years, to go into first Police Department as as an attorney for the New York City Police Department. And then after that, my own law practice for 10 years. At that point, the District Attorney in Brooklyn, a guy by the name of Joe Hines, Charles, Joe Heinz, had been elected and, and was looking to, to expand the trial aspect of the office, he had come up with this idea of dividing the borough, the Brooklyn, County of Brooklyn or county of Kings, into into five separate areas. And when police precincts in those five separate areas, was served by different bureaus in the in the office. And so the people who were working in the ADH, who were working in those bureaus got to know the police officers, detectives, the informants, the bad guys, and and he needed someone to try cases and asked me if I wanted to come back and I did. For I came back, I was promoted to Deputy Chief for the homicide bureau. Then I was promoted to homicide chief at about three months later, then Chief for trials and ultimately, in 2001. Just before 911, I was promoted to Chief for the rackets division. 02:30 And I retired from the office in 2013 as chief of the rackets division and first deputy district attorney and, and all those years, Gary, I was trying cases myself, in addition to being the supervisor, I wouldn’t ask people to do what I wouldn’t do and, and I wrote homicide duty going out to talk to pre two witnesses and defendants and precincts in the middle of the night. I did all of that stuff. And, and it was a it was I have to say that it was it was a very rewarding career. I really loved what I did.

How the Mafia Robs Jewelry Salesmen Jan 15, 2023

Retired Mafia Detective Gary Jenkins tells how Mafia gangsters set up and rob jewelry salesmen. You may not know, but every day in the U.S., thousands of honest, hardworking salesmen load up their sales cases and hit the road to show their samples of gold, silver, or platinum jewelry with diamonds, rubies, emeralds, or other precious stones embedded. Mafia associates gather intelligence constantly on these salesmen. Gary tells about a gang working for the infamous Chicago Police Superintendent William Handhardt and gives an example from his own experience in Kansas City. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcript Guy Altabello dealt with Hanhart second command a guy named Joseph Basinski. Ultra Bella will provide the names addresses car descriptions and license numbers and schedules of the various salesman that called on his son how to rob a jewelry salesman I happen to see on Facebook this morning, Mike Byrne up in Chicago, puts out Chicago Tribune articles and he put one out about William Hanhart. And some of his juries that gang he had a big gang of Chicago outfit kind of a lot of associates and professional criminals up there that went around robbing jewelry salesmen in jewelry stores. So how to rob a jewelry salesman in every major American city, jewelry salesman ply their trade by the hundreds of 1000s throughout the country, carrying jewelry samples around in jewelry salesman cases and call on independent Europe jewelers, and you know, they just travel around like any independent traveling salesman does. They travel in cars, they stay in hotels, they eat on the road, they stopped for gas, they use the bathroom, they do all the other normal roadtrip activities, which makes them kind of vulnerable to these guys mak es them a soft target. 01:14 Professional Jewelrey. The professional jewel thief needs intelligence on these guys though. So when the FBI broke up this jewelry theft ring of Chicago police superintendent William and heart a lot of these trade secrets were revealed and we kind of knew what they were but they got some solid information. When they when they took this whole crew down. There’s in this article and Tribune they had a guy learned they had a guy named Guy Ottobello of Elmhurst. And he worked in his son’s jewelry store which was called Altabellos. And it was in Wheaton, which is a far west kind of Chicago, small town suburb, and Guy Altabello dealt with Hanhart second command a guy named Joseph Basinski. Alta Bello will provide the names addresses, car descriptions and license numbers and schedules of the various salesman that called on his son or his son’s store, he could even give him approximate time of how long they would be in the Chicago area and when they came and when they might come back. And example this was real specific was one day in 1996 Altabello passed along the description of a salesman’s rental car that called on his store that day Hanhart then used the police aboard that you know, a called a sergeant a Sarja you know, as Commander Hanhart you know, would you find out about this cards and rental company cards, so they found out everything they could from rental company, and they get more of a fix on the guy and and then they start trying to find the guy that see where he goes next or where he’s staying what hotel he’s in, and, and and they know that he’s gonna have maybe $100,000 worth of jewelry or less or more, they’re gonna have he’s gonna have a lot. Now,

The Night of the Sicilian Vespers Fact or Myth? Jan 11, 2023

Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins looks closely at the week after Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky murdered the last of the old-school Mob guys, Salvatore Marazano. For many years, several books by respected authors repeated a story that as many as 60 old-school Black Handers were murdered across the United States. The accepted theory was that Luciano cleared the decks all over the United States to make space for the new young mafioso and the National Crime Syndicate. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Art of Mafia Geneology Jan 09, 2023

Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Mafia genealogist about the art and science of searching out and documenting the family roots of various mob bosses. Justin Cascio has a great website called Mafia Geneology. Click the link to read some of the many stories Justin has learned and shared on his site. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Joe Valachi Love Him of Hate Him? Jan 02, 2023

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins and Camullis Robinson deconstruct Joe Valachi. What was his criminal background? What kind of crimes did Joe Valachi commit? Who was he connected to? Why did he think he was targeted for murder? Joe Valachi was born in 1904. He was not the sharpest tool in the toolbox. Joe Valachi was uneducated but possessed great native intelligence and good memory for mafia stories. In 1963, he will put that memory to work for the government and gave the American public the first glimpse into the secretive world of the Cosa Nostra mafia. Unlike many of these guys, Joe Valachi’s family came from southern Italy, not Sicily. They came from Campania. The father was a brutal alcoholic. Joe left school and took to the streets and gang life. Joe Valachi earned his lifelong nickname of “Joe Cargo” as a young kid because he could build scoters from wooden crates better than anybody. He started his criminal career with a Smash and Grab gang known as the Minutemen. He graduated to burglary and armed robbery. He served about a year in Sing Sing, where the guards assigned him to break rocks with a sledgehammer. After release, he was shot in the back of his head by a passing police officer who interrupted his gang in the middle of a burglary. They got away in a stolen car. The gang thought he was dead, so they dumped his body and fired several shots in the air to attract the cops. The gang thought the cops would find his body and believe he was shot in a gang fight. No cops showed up, and the gang returned. They noticed he was still breathing and took him to a neighborhood doc who used Scotch as an anesthetic while he removed the bullet. He later claimed all that work breaking rocks in Sing Sing made him so tough that this bullet could not kill him. He married a member of the Reina family and joined the Gaetano Reina mob family. Please listen to this story because we will change your mind about the most famous Mafia turncoat until Sammy the Bull testifies. For example, Joe was the first man ever to reveal the Mafia induction ceremony. We know what he said was true because his description matches every mob guy’s description since that time. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast. Transcription 00:00 Hello, welcome Wiretappers out there. Back here in studio gangland Noir. We have our good friend that many of you guys keep asking about when are you going to get cam back on Camilliuss “cam” Robinson welcome cam Hey Gary, how you doing glad to be here as always, hey, I get jealous of you people never asked me course I’m always here. Are you gonna have com back? 00:24 I tell you this in my industry I’m in the railroad man business has been you know, things have been crazy. So work has been Yeah, our work schedule has been something so yeah, it’s, it’s I’ve not been doing as much as I like 00:37 to you know, my son’s in the railroad business too. And they you guys are busy trying to keep those that supply chain going from the West Coast to the East Coast and it’s hard to do. It’s difficult. There’s so many parts that have to go together. It’s amazing. 00:54 Yeah, it’s it’s it’s quite a spiderweb All right, 00:57 well, it’s World Series time. I wonder if we’re gonna have a Yankees Phillies World Series again, you know, they had one back in I think 2009 I believe and and the Yankees won. So we’re looking at maybe Yankees Phillies? I don’t know what do you think you’d love it that 01:15

The Gangs of New Zealand Dec 26, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins looks closely at the gangs of New Zealand. He finds that most of these organized gangs are formed around motorcyles and other established motorcycle gangs like the Mongols, the Hells Angels, or the Bandidos. As with most organized gangs like this in other parts of the world, they make money from the sale and distribution of narcotics. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Sammy the Bull Gravano Part 2 Dec 19, 2022

In Part 2 of this story, retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins continues looking into the drug investigation and conviction of Sammy Gravano. The listener learns how local drug dealer Michael Papa befriends Gravano’s son, Gerard Gravano. The Phoenix narcotics squad is picking up rumors about a new gang selling ecstasy, muscling other street-level dealers, and claiming to be under the protection of the famous Gambino hitman, Sammy Gravano. The local cops still do not believe this to be true, but they continue investigating. The U.S. Customs arrested an Ecstasy courier at the border and turn him into an informant. They learn he has been supplying a friend of the Gravano family named Michael Papa. This is the final piece that allows the police to bring in the DEA and go up on a wiretap of Papa. They quickly learn that Papa and Gerard Gravano used poorly coded conversations about selling drugs. From this, they spin off into more wiretaps, some of which are on Sammy Gravano and his family’s phones. These taps lead them to the final conversation they use to file charges against the Gravano family. Gerard Gravano calls his mother and tells her his Dad said it was ok to send 70 to give to Mike. Sammy Gravano’s daughter transported the money to Sammy Gravano. he calls his wife and complains the delivery was short $5,000. Sammy Gravano and his wife argue, and later Gravano admitted he miscounted. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lucky Luciano and the Havana Meeting Dec 15, 2022

In this episode, Gary takes a close look at the 1946 mob meeting in Havana, Cuba. In 1946 Charles “Lucky” Luciano was residing in Italy after his deportation by the United States. He obtained an Italian passport issued in his real name, Salvatore Lucania, and obtained visas for travel in Mexico, Cuba, and several South American nations. Once he obtained these travel documents, Luciano journeyed to Caracas, Venezuela, then to Mexico City, and finally to Havana, Cuba. Luciano’s old friend Meyer Lansky met him in Cuba. Acting on Luciano’s orders, Lansky reserved several rooms and a meeting room at the Hotel/Casino Nacional from December 22 to January 1. Lansky recommended that his friend Luciano purchase a $150,000 interest in the Hotel Nacional because he had an important government official, President Fulgencio Batista as a silent partner. Luciano agreed because this operation would get him back in business only 90 miles from the United States and give him official government protection in Cuba. Leading up to Christmas Day of 1946, well-known American mob bosses started arriving at the Hotel Nacional. They were all there to welcome Luciano back from exile and to acknowledge his position within the North American crime families. As would be the custom, they all arrived with cash envelopes for the boss of bosses. Lansky scheduled a dinner where Luciano was publically acknowledged as the boss, and Lansky, Frank Costello, Joe Adonis, and the other bosses presented him with envelopes totaling around $200,000. They even flew Frank Sinrata in, and several cousins of Al Capone accompanied him. During the next few days, the bosses discussed some mob leadership problems in New York City, who may invest in Cuban casinos, the mob-controlled narcotics operations, and the work being done by Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel to develop Las Vegas into a gambling mecca and problems with the Flamingo casino/hotel. Since Luciano was not allowed inside the United States, Frank Costello had been running his mafia family. Vito Genovese was straining at the harness to be the new boss. Luciano obtained a consensus from the other mob bosses that he was the boss of all bosses or the capo de tutti capi. But by the time this entire meeting was over, Luciano was deported back to Italy, and he would never be the Boss of Bosses. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Sammy the Bull Ecstacy Case Part 1 Dec 12, 2022

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins takes a deep dive into the Sammy the Bull Gravano story that sent him back to prison after he avoided a life sentence due to his work as a member of the Gambino Crime Family. This story starts when the government released Sammy the Bull from his five-year sentence after they allowed him to avoid racketeering, extortion, and murder convictions from his lifetime serving the Gambino crime family. He appears around 1995 in Phoenix, Arizona. Gravano opens Marathon Construction Company and Creative Pools. His wife, daughter, and son all appear in Phoenix simultaneously. The listener will learn how Gravano is living under the name Jimmy Moran and getting recognized by many people. He released his book, Underboss, and appeared on 60 Minutes. His wife and son opened Uncle Sal’s Italian Restaurant, and he is often seen there. A local newspaper, Arizona Republic, learned Gravano was living and working in the area, and they published a story. A Gambino-sponsored hit team arrived. Gravano’s son, Gerard Gravano, starts hanging out and partying with a local weight lifter and ecstasy dealer named Michael Papa, who was part of a White Nationalist gang known as the Devil Dogs. Despite all this, Gravano became involved in a drug-selling operation. Gary looks at the origins of the local investigation into the new party drug Ecstacy and who sells it to ASU students and others at local clubs and Raves. Local police are astounded to learn the ring leader may be the most famous turncoat mafia member of all time, Sammy the Bull Gravano. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael Marcello Social Security Scam Dec 09, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins looks into the recent conviction of Michael Marcello for scamming Social Security. Michael Marcello is the brother of former Chicago outfit Boss James Marcello. He used to run all the Video Poker business for the Outfit. Michaele Marcello got into his first big trouble during the Family Secrets trial in 2007. He was meeting in a bugged visiting room with his brother Jimmy. The FBI overheard him taking orders and carrying out Outfit business. For example, he was directed to give Nick Calabrese’s family $4,000 monthly to keep him quiet. he helped gather tips from a corrupt US marshall about the location of a government witness, Nick Calabrese. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Christmas in Las Vegas with Adam Flowers Dec 09, 2022

Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Adam Flowers, the host of Mob Vlog TV and the operator of Vegas Speciality Tours, about what to do and see in Las Vegas over the Christmas holiday. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Rise of Tony Accardo and Ross Prio Dec 05, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins tells how Tony Accardo started in the Circus street gang stealing from stores, pedestrians, and loading docks in Chicago’s Loop. Accardo caught the eye of Al Capone during prohibition and was brought in as a bodyguard. He was able to recruit and manage his own crew with Ross Prio and the three Doms, Dominick DiBella, Dominic Nuccio, and Dominick Brancato. From this power base, Accardo started his rise. His first real show of ambition was when he decided he should become the president of the Unione Siciliana. He used this deadly crew to murder the sitting president, Vincent Benevento. From this point, Anthony Accardo was taken very seriously by both the Sicilian faction and the non-Sicilian faction in the Outfit. He was smart enough to keep Ross Prio and Paul Ricca close to him when he took over as the boss. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Curtis Warren Liverpool Drug Smuggler Dec 01, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins tells the story of Great Britain’s most successful drug dealer Curtis Warren. He started as a bouncer in various clubs around the British seaport of Liverpool. Using this job, Warren connected with all the drug dealers and started learning the game from the inside. At the height of cocaine’s popularity as a party drug, Curtis Warren and an established smuggler named Brain Charrington used Charrington’s yacht to slip into France. From France, they secretly traveled to Venezuela and arranged a deal with the Cali cartel to smuggle 900 kilograms of cocaine in steel boxes concealed in lead ingots. When their shipment arrived in the UK, customs officials were not very suspicious, but they cut open one lead ingot. They found nothing and let the entire shipment pass. The Dutch police obtained knowledge of these shipments and alerted the UK customs. Curtis Warren and Charrington already had a second 900-kilogram shipment en route from South America. Customs impounded the ship and found the second shipment. They arrested Warren, Charrington, and twenty-six other members of the crew. Curtis Warren was born under a lucky star because, at court, the British police announced that Charrington was a police informant for the North-East Regional Crime Squad. British Customs officials continued their prosecution, despite protests from the police. In Newcastle Crown Court, it soon became apparent that Charrington was so well informed by his police handlers that the Crown decided to drop all charges against Charrington. Curtis Warran was eventually acquitted of all charges. Warren was not stopped. He became one of the most successful and inventive drug dealers in Europe. For example, he purchased a vineyard in Bulgaria. He set up cocaine shipments from South America to his winery in Bulgaria. He infused his bottles of wine with cocaine for shipment to England. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. and To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

A Different Look at the NBA Betting Scandal Nov 28, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Sean Griffin, author of Gaming the Game: The Story behind the NBA Betting Scandal and other nonfiction crime-related books. Sean has a different take on the NBA referee in the eye of the storm, Tim Donaghy. After the recent Netflix documentary, Sean started speaking out about how the media takes everything Tim Donaghy claims as the truth. Sean published his book based on an examination of the date, and he came to different conclusions. For example, Sean believes the mafia never knew who Donaghy was, destroying the claim that he was afraid to stop giving his picks to his favorite bookie. Sean believes that Tim Donaghy did make some dubious referee calls on games he bet on the outcome. This is a must-listen interview if you are interested in the NBA and the huge gaming interests surrounding these contests. For example, did you know some gamblers can bet large enough amounts in China or Japan to influence the line? Then after they know they have changed the line arbitrarily, they make their real bets in the United States. One of these gamblers told Sean about the Mafia, “We are the whales; they are the fish.” Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Robert Borelli: From the Mafia to the Ministry Nov 23, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews former Gambino associate Robert Borelli about his life as an understudy to Anthony “Fat Andy” Ruggiano in the Gambino family. Gary learned that a young Robert Borelli witnessed a mob murder and refused to talk or testify. After he went to trial as part of this murder charge, he was found not guilty. When he returned to the streets, he was lauded as a real stand-up guy and taken into the crew of Nicky Corrazo. It was after Robert Borelli became addicted to narcotics and was on his way out of the Mob’s good graces and into a life of prison and worse that he is converted to Christianity. Robert Borelli has a book titled The Witness: A Tale of the Life and Death of a Mafia Madman. Robert can be contacted by clicking this link. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Uncle Charlie Killed Dutch Schultz Nov 21, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Allen Geik about his book Uncle Charlie Killed Dutch Schultz. Geik’s uncle was Charlie Workman, who was a significant tool in the arsenal of the Murder Incorporated murderous toolchest. Charlie Workman was one of the men who killed Dutch Schultz. Mr. Geik was unaware of Charlie Workman and only knew him as Uncle Charlie, a man who seemed to have shadowy connections and no regular job. He was talking with Workman’s son recently when he was informed of the connection. After learning about his infamous ancestor, Allen Geik began researching by talking with other family members, looking at newspaper archives, then FBI files. He found a fascinating story of the 1930s Jewish gangsters, and he incorporated this into his book Uncle Charlie Killed Dutch Schultz. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Kenji Gallo: The Man who put Theodore “Teddy” Persico away Nov 16, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins talks with former Colombo associate and California strip club owner Kenji Gallo. In the second of a three-part series of interviews about the Christain conversion experiences of mobsters, we learn that Kenji Gallo had been a successful mob associate in southern California and made connections back east with Teddie Persico. He was recruited by the FBI to work as an informant, but he refused to incriminate his old California friends. He went to the New York City area and was accepted into the Colombo family as an associate. After a series of events that caused him to go into witness protection, he dropped out of sight. In his early days in Wit Sec, Kenji Gallo meets some good Christian people, and he is attracted to this life. Kenji has since changed his life and runs a successful gym and personal training business. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Sal “Sally Ubatz” Polisi Talks Gotti and Other Subjects Nov 15, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews former Gotti associate Sal Polisi about his life from the mean streets of new york, to prison, to witness protection, and his post-mafia life. Gary has a candid conversation with Sal Polisi about his life in the mafia, how he turned and testified against John Gotti, and his post-mafia life. Sal Polisi started life as a New York street kid, was a drug dealer and mob associate, a protected witness, and ended as an author, a screenwriter, and a filmmaker, who now lives peacefully in the desert. Look for him next year in Fear City 2, a Netflix series that looks at the 5 Families through the eyes of mafia members. He has written his life story called The Sinatra Club. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Trial of Mike “The Large Guy” Sarno Nov 07, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Jim Cosenza about his recollections of the characters and the evidence in the trial of Chicago Outfit Capo Mike Sarno. Sarno was also known as the “Large Guy” or “Big Mike” for obvious reasons. I recommend you go back and listen to my two-part interview of retired ATF Agent Lou Valoze because he tells what it was like to work his way into a crew bossed by Sarno associate Mark Polchan. Mike Sarno inherited Jimmy Marcello’s video poker operation after he went to prison in the Family Secrets trial. This video poker organization will be Sarno’s downfall. Sarno exhibited typical Chicago Outfit behavior when he demanded all small video poker machine operators pay him a piece of the action. He found one man who refused, and the business got violent. After a bombing of a rival operator, the government infiltrated and turned a key associate who wore a wire. This is a very exciting story of the Chicago Outfit and how they had not progressed much since prohibition in their brutal tactics. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Story of Michael Franzese Christian Conversion Nov 04, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins looks into the conversion experience of several mobsters in this and two future shows. In this video, he tells listeners about Michael Franzese. Additionally, Gary tells about Ernie Davino, a now-deceased member of Tony Spilotro’s Las Vegas Hole in the Wall gang, and his Christian conversion experience. Michael Franzese is the son of Colombo Family Capo, John “Sonny” Franzese. Check out my interview with S.J. Peddie back on April 11, 2022. Gary learns that Michael Franzese was a very successful member of the Colombo Family, like his father. Michael’s particular road to success led him to the famous gas tax scam. He created numerous small corporations. he would use one corporation to start selling wholesale gasoline to retail outlets in the NYC area. In New York, the retailer collects all the gas tax and pays it to the wholesaler along with the price of the gasoline. The wholesale distributor is supposed to pass the gas tax to the State and city governments. Franzese’s corporation failed to pass along the tax. When the governmental agencies started pressing for their money, he abandoned that corporation and started the same business under the name of another corporation and did the same procedure. He earned millions with this scheme. He earned so much that he went to Hollywood and got into the film business and high-end nightclubs. It was from this high point that he ended up in solitary confinement, where a Christian Correctional Officer passed a bible through the food slot in his small cell. A lonely and dejected Micahel Franzese started reading and had a conversion experience. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Paul Shiro Released Nov 03, 2022

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, the Chicago Outfit had a loyal soldier named Paul Shiro. The guys called him “The Indian” because he had facial features like a Native American. This man was a killer. I once did a story on four businessmen who were all killed with a gun firing .22 caliber bullets, and they were all killed inside one elevator. Paulie Shiro was the chief suspect when he moved to Phoenix to be the Outfit’s representative and work with Tony Spilotro in Las Vegas. When a casino employee named Jay Vandermark threatened the Las Vegas skim operation, the Outfit dispatched a hit team to murder Vandermark. A Chicago mob associate named Emil Vaca “set up” Vandermark. Later, the Outfit became worried that Vaca might turn into a witness. Paul Shiro helped Nick Calabrese murder Emil Vaca. When Nick Calabrese and his nephew Frank Calabrse Jr. became witnesses in the 2007 Family Secrets trial, they put Shiro in prison. He has been trying to get out on compassionate leave for a couple of years because of Covid-19. Finally, after a judge turned him down, Shiro has reached the time he can be released to a halfway house and will be completely free next year. Will Shiro return to his old criminal activities? Will Shiro return to Chicago or Phoenix? Will Paul Shiro try to find Nick Calabrese or Frank Calabrese Jr. and take revenge? Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bonus MRBALLEN PODCAST: STRANGE, DARK & MYSTERIOUS STORIES Nov 01, 2022

Hey guys, I am releasing a special short segment from a very interesting true crime podcast. Not my usual mafia fare, but I hope you find this to be a fun look at another style of true crime storytelling. You can find this podcast on the Amazon Music Podcast App. This is the spine-chilling case of Haley Zega, who disappeared from a hiking trail for 51 hours after getting separated from her grandparents. When search and rescuers finally found her and asked how she survived, she said a friend helped her. She described this friend… 4 years old, black hair… brown eyes. This “friend” was initially dismissed until they realized a girl had gone missing in that exact spot 23 years earlier and was never found. That missing girl 23 years ago was also 4 years old and had black hair and brown eyes!

The Four Mistakes that created the Teflon Don Oct 31, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins examines John Gotti’s first RICO trial to determine why the jury failed to convict him. We learn about the four mistakes made by the prosecution team of Diane Giacalone and John Gleeson. The first was the attempt to force Wilfred “Willie Boy” Johnson to testify by exposing him as a long-time FBI Top Echelon Informant. Willie Boy replied, “I can’t testify against John. He is my friend.” Diane Giacalone was long on trial experience but short on facing the likes of Bruce Cutler. The defense took one of the government’s former informants and turned him on to the prosecutors. Matt Traynor was a bank robber, and when the government refused to pay him for his testimony against Gotti, he testified that Ms. Giacalone had tried to bribe him and offered him her panties as an enticement to help. The defense also got Traynor to claim that John Gleeson’s wife had obtained a narcotic drug from her work at a hospital, and Mr. Gleeson had given it to him in jail. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

How did Mikey Scars get his nickname? Oct 24, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Michael DiLeonardo and learns about his early history and how he got his famous nickname, Mikey Scars. Michael DiLeonardo, aka Mikey Scars, was a made man in the Gambino crime family. He was made by the Underboss, Sam the Bull Gravano. On the night that Mikey Scars was inducted into the Family, John Gotti Jr. was also inducted. John Gotti Sr. was now the boss after he had Paul Castellano murdered, so he thought it looked bad if he inducted his own son. I’m not sure who he thought he was fooling by having Gravano conduct this ceremony, but who knows the mind of a mobster? Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here. Please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Stockton Police Surveillance Oct 18, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins congratulates the Stockton Police Department on their successful surveillance to catch a serial killer. He explains, using his own experience, just how difficult this operation is for the officers involved. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Al Capone and the 1933 World’s Fair Oct 15, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews William Hazelgrove, the author of Al Capone and the 1933 World’s Fair. He learns that this World’s Fair was one of the critical reasons the government created the special squad of Treasury agents to take Capone down by any means necessary. Mr. Hazelgrove describes how a group of anonymous businessmen called the Secret 6 pressured the Federal government to take down Capone. The negative publicity generated by the 1929 St. Valentine’s Day massacre was still in the public’s imagination. They wanted the fairgoers to feel safe. We learn how the long career of the famous Fan Dancer, Sally Rand, was launched by this event. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Top Hoodlum Program Oct 12, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews retired FBI Agent Bill Ouseley about the FBI and their Top hoodlum Program. Bill was one of the early agents the Bureau assigned to investigate solely La Cosa Nostra-style organized crime. We learn this happened after the 1957 raid of the New York farm of Mob boss Joseph Barbara, now known as the Apalachin meeting. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chicago Outfit and the Hotel Employees and Restuarant Employees (HERE) Union Oct 10, 2022

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins and Mob historian and writer Camillius “Cam” Robinson discuss the Chicago Outfit and their infiltration of the Bartenders and Beverage Dispensers Union, which became an international union called Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees Union until the present day, where it is known as Unite HERE. Edward Hanley rose to lead this powerful union with the help of Joey Aiuppa and the Chicago Outfit. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Paul Ricca of the Chicago Outfit Oct 05, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins looks at the life of the Chicago Outfit’s Paul Ricca. We learn he probably was responsible for the suicide of Frank Nitti, that he was a “behind the scenes” boss and made decisions with Anthony Accardo for many years. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast. but hey are you wirecappers out there I have a story today it’s kind of a rehash I’ve been one of my old audio stories I did the uh just last week I think or a couple weeks ago now I posted a story on YouTube that was primarily uh audio and it was the story of it was an interview of a guy named Carlo Morelliwho was a guy that took Tony accardo’s daughter to the uh to her senior prom a couple other Accardo stories and it’s pretty interesting it’s kind of a one that once in a lifetime gig to get an inside information like that and Carlos deceased since I uh recorded that interview but somebody made a comment in the YouTube or the YouTube posting about and did you ever talk about Paul Rica or Paul the waiter who was a a Chicago boss out of the 40s and early 50s on up into the 60s who stayed way in the background a lot of people don’t know the name of 1:03 Paul Rican he was a really important guy 1:07 in in the Chicago outfit back in those 1:09 days so I dug out my old interview I did 1:12 an interview of him I never put it up on 1:13 YouTube so I dug up some pictures in 1:16 order for you to have some something to 1:19 look at while I tell the story of Paul 1:22 the waiter Rika uh interesting guy you 1:26 know he he stayed in the background just 1:28 like Tony Accardo did he and the cardo 1:31 really would sit together at Norwood’s 1:34 male restaurant that’s Meo restaurant 1:38 and I think the building still exists in 1:40 in Norwood I think is the name of the 1:43 suburb in Chicago anyhow they would sit 1:45 up there and people would come up and 1:47 and bring in envelopes and and they’d 1:50 make decisions and he always stayed in 1:52 the background with ocardo and and they 1:55 let guys like Sam giancana be out front 1:58 and you know he was a like a lightning 2:01 rod for uh for the FBI and and they sat 2:04 back there and never went to jail again 2:05 although the government never really 2:07 quit trying to deport Paul Rica which I 2:10 you know listen to the store and you’ll 2:12 learn a lot more about Paul Rica you 2:14 know one interesting little tidbit about 2:16 him he was once accused of doing a hit 2:18 in Kansas City of a guy who was running 2:22 a bunch of slot machines out in the 2:25 county and not kicking up to the Mob and 2:27 he was warm several times now I don’t 2:29 they showed his picture now why they 2:31 show this picture I don’t know uh but he 2:34 was uh during the 50s he well let’s 2:37 listen to the stories he’s a really 2:39 interesting guy well Paul Rica or Paul 2:42 the waiter Rika was born July 10 1898 he 2:46 died October the 11th 1972. he rose from 2:50 being a small time member of the Kimura 2:54 Mafia in Naples Italy to the boss of the 2:56 Chicago outfit by the time he died in 2:59 1898 Paul the waiter Rica was born 3:01 Felice de Lucia in Naples Italy by 1915 3:05 a 17 year old Felice de Lucia was an 3:09 associate of the Neapolitan Kimura Mafia 3:12 he got his first real taste of mob life 3:14 when he was ordered to murder a man 3:16 named Emilio perilio Elise de Lucia was 3:20 arrested and at trial a sicilian named 3:22 vicenzo capasso testified that he saw 3:26

Did the Yakuza Buy a Rocket Launcher? Oct 03, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins discusses the Yakuza with retired ATF agent Ignacio Esteban. We learn about the case where the government caught them buying rocket launchers. Ignacio Esteban is a true-crime author who has written a book on his illustrious career working undercover on drug dealers in South Florida. Since retirement, Mr. Esteban has written books on the Russian Arms dealer Viktor Bout, Sonny Barger, and the Hells Angels, several traditional organized crime organizations. In this episode, we focus on the Japanese Yakuza. Recently HBO Max released a series titled Toyko Vice. This series was based on the real-life experiences of an American reporter, Jake Adelstein. Ignacio Esteban tells us about the history of the Yakuza and about real-life cases that American law enforcement has made on this jap[anese criminal organization and the influence of the Yakuza in America. Esteban describes the Yakuza ritual of Yubitsume, or the cutting off of one’s finger. He explains this is a method an underling uses to show penance or an apology for some failure of an assignment handed out by his boss. If this is the first offense, the offender cuts off the tip of his left little finger. He must then present the severed part to his boss. We learn this practice is starting to be used less because the result marks them as actual members of the Yakuza to law enforcement. This practice began many years ago from the traditional way of holding a Japanese sword. A samurai warrior held a sword and the bottom three fingers of each hand gripped the sword tightly, with the thumb and index fingers slightly loose. When the little finger is removed, the sword grip is lessened. As more fingers are lost, the warrior because less effective with his sword. We learn about the famous tattoos exhibited by Yakuza members. Many, if not all, long-time members will have their entire bodies covered with tattoos. In public, to prevent identification by the Police, they always wear long sleeves and trousers. They are called Irezumi in Japan, and the ink is inserted beneath the skin using hand-held needles of sharpened bamboo or steel. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Crooked City: Youngstown Part 2 Sep 26, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Johnny Chechitelli, one of the producers of a new limited series podcast called Crooked City: Youngstown. This Ohio Rust Belt City was one of the most corrupt mobbed-up towns in the area. Located an hour from Pittsburgh and an hour from Cleveland, members of both organized crime families staked claims. In this episode, we learn about Jim Traficant, one of the most corrupt politicians in the country. Click here to go to the Podcast Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Who took “Big Tuna” Accardo’s daughter to prom? Sep 21, 2022

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins talks with the man who took the daughter of Tony Accardo or “Big Tuna” to her prom and later helped out at her wedding. The Prom relationship never was; he was more of a bodyguard. Carlo Morelli grew up in Chicago and was a fly on the wall to many Outfit activities. Listen to the story of a high school kid who took Big Tuna’s daughter to prom, ditched the bodyguards to go drink beer in Wisconsin, and brought her home about daylight the following day. Carlo had an uncomfortable confrontation with the most feared mobster in Chicago and lived to tell the story. Carlo Morelli first encountered Tony Accardo at Meo’s Restaurant. He had become friends with Trip Meo, the wife of the owner, Charles Meo. Tony Accardo and Paul Ricca used this location as a place where they could always be found, and they conducted many meetings at a corner table. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, Please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Crooked City: Youngstown Part 1 Sep 19, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Johnny Chechitelli, one of the producers of a new limited series podcast called Crooked City: Youngstown. This Ohio Rust Belt City was one of the most corrupt mobbed-up towns in the area. Located an hour from Pittsburgh and an hour from Cleveland, members of both organized crime families staked claims. Click here to go to the podcast Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Why did Gottti Murder Castellano? Sep 13, 2022

Retired intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins has looked into the story behind why John Gotti believed he must murder Paul Castellano. It started with the crash of a Lear jet off the coast of Florida and ended in a hail of bullets in front of the Manhatten eatery known as Sparks Steakhouse. In this podcast, Gary explains the chain of events that led to the plot to kill the boss, Big Paulie Castellano. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Tony Mirra – The Man Who Vouched for Joe Pistone Sep 12, 2022

Retired Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins tells the Wiretappers about the violent and brutal life of Bonanno Capo Tony Mirra. Tony Mirra comes from a Mafia legacy and rose through the ranks. He was so vicious and a good killer that Carmine “The Cigar” Galante used him to take out enemies. Mirra saw promise in a young newcomer named Donnie Brasco, who claimed to be a good jewel thief. The Feds put Mirra away, and Bonanno soldier Lefty Ruggerio “stole” Brasco (Joe Pistone). When Mirra left prison, he demanded Brasco back like he was a piece of property. They settled the dispute in a proper mafia manner by having a sit-down. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Allen Dorfman Murder Case File Review Sep 07, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins examines the Lincolnwood Police case file and initial investigative steps taken by the detectives the day someone shot Allen Dorfman in the head in front of Irvin Weiner. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Murder of Allen Dorfman Sep 05, 2022

Retired KC Police Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews Chicago Outfit author and historian Camillus “Cam” Robinson about Teamster Pension Fund advisor and Outfit associate Allen Dorfman and why the Outfit murdered him. Camillus Robinson explains how Allen Dorfman became embroiled in a scheme with Kansas City Teamster Roy Williams and Outfit Capo Joey “The Clown” Lombardo to bribe Nevada Senator Howard Cannon. The Teamsters were engaged in the political fight of their lives. Congress was working on legislation enabling the trucking companies to achieve independence from the Teamster’s Union. Senator Cannon had worked to delay and/or quash a trucking deregulation bill that would allow the big companies to hire more independent truckers. The Teamsters learned of an issue in Senator Cannon’s home neighborhood where he was trying to stop a high rise from being built. The Union purchased the land earmarked for the development and told Cannon, “Don’t worry, it’s yours now.” The government had Dorfman’s office wired for sound, and they could hear many conversations Dorman had with Joey Lombardo and others about Outfit business. Gary plays one tape allowing the listener to hear Joey Lombardo threaten a casino owner, Morris Shenker, in a demand he pay money to Dorfman because “the people who own Dorfman” do care about this money. The government also heard Dorfman discussing a transfer of power within the Outfit when the boss Joey Doves Aiuppa became so ill with heart problems that he was stepping away. In this conversation, Dorfman indicates that Jackie Cerone was incapable and too “hot-headed” and that Tony Spilotro had been the heir apparent until he moved to Las Vegas, Nevada. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Loan Shark Beating Customer Aug 31, 2022

Bonus Episode – Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins plays a tape of loan shark Frank Robertson beating a customer. Steve St. John and Gary discuss this business. Support the podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Rise an Fall of Tommy Karate Aug 29, 2022

Retired intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins tells about the mob career of Tommy Karate Pitera. He got his name because, as a young man Tommy Pitera was often bullied because of his squeaky voice. He studied karate and became so proficient that he was given a scholarship and studied for several years in Japan. When he returned to New York City, Bonanno family members noticed his abilities and recruited Pitera to work as an enforcer and loan collector and gave him his moniker. Soon, he was taken into a crew, and once he committed his first murder, he became a very important member. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Viktor Bout – Arms Dealer Aug 26, 2022

Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews retired ATF agent Ignacio Esteban about his book on the infamous Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout. We learned that in March of 2008, Bangkok, Thailand authorities arrested Bout as he left a Bancock hotel after DEA agents and informants engaged in a recorded negotiation for weapons. Colombian FARC informants agreed to make a deal with Bout for millions in military-grade weapons. This arrest was the culmination of a DEA sting operation using high-ranking members of Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia or FARC, a Communist-leaning band of rebels in the jungles of Colombia SA. Agent Esteban has written many books on aspects of organized crime, and the most recent is Viktor Bout – The World’s Most Notorious Arms Dealer. Viktor Bout was a shadowy international arms dealer since the fall of the old USSR. He quickly adapted to the chaos in Russia and started selling military weapons to rebel groups in Africa. From here, he gained a notorious reputation and was soon selling arms worldwide. He was an international man of mystery who lived on the run, was close to his crews, spoke many languages, and enjoyed the protection of the KGB and Putin since he rose to the head of the Russian government. Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Robert Mazur and Money Laundering Part 2 Aug 25, 2022

In this second two-part interview, retired Intelligence Detective Gary jenkins questions Robert Mazur about his experiences that resulted in his second book, THE BETRAYAL. In this interview, we learn that a corrupt federal agent was telling drug dealers who he was and what he was doing. Even though he had worked the Columbian cartels and was known in cocaine circles to be an agent, he returned to Panama, where he moved effortlessly into Colombia’s Cali drug cartel. Robert Mazur noticed an unsettling shift in the cartel’s inner circle. He learned that someone had assassinated some of his Colombian contacts. He discovered someone was following him everywhere he traveled in Panama. Mazur became obsessed with learning who had exposed his operation and will find out who betrayed him. He will narrowly escape with his life. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Robert Mazur and Money Laundering Part 1 Aug 22, 2022

Retired intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews one of the most famous yet unknown undercover agents in the United States. Robert Mazur started his law enforcement career with the US Customs, the IRS, and the Drug Enforcement Administration over a 25-year career. He was one of the first agents to work “deep cover.” This means he lived out his part and did not go home from the office, like FBI Agent Joe Pistone. Robert Mazur will learn how to launder illegally derived cash and has become one of the world’s leading experts on underworld financial shenanigans. Over his long and storied career, Robert Mazur worked five years as a deep undercover agent for US, UK, French, and other agencies. Robert shares his insights on how this world works as he recounts his unique and dangerous experiences. Robert Mazur has written two books containing many exciting stories of his adventures working long-term undercover infiltrations. In THE INFILTRATOR, Mazure tells how he worked his way up to have face-to-face dealings with people who reported directly to Pablo Escobar. During this time, he began to have illicit dealings with bankers associated with the Bank of Credit & Commerce International (BCCI), the 7th largest privately held institution in the world. He exposed how corrupt bankers helped launder billions for drug traffickers, illegal arms dealers, terrorists, tax evaders, corrupt third-world leaders, and other criminals. This book was made into a major motion picture with the same name and starred Bryan Cranston. In his second book, THE BETRAYAL , Robert Mazur tells how a corrupt federal agent almost cost him his life. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Mafia Cops – Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa Aug 15, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews true crime author Jeffrey Sussman about the “Mob Cops” Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa, one of the many stories in his new book Big Apple Gangsters (Boxing and the Mob, Holocaust Fighters, Sin City Gangsters, Rocky Graziano: Fists Fame and Fortune) about one story from his new book Big Apple Gangsters: The Rise and Decline of the Mob in New York. This book was just released in paperback. Gary chose to discuss the Mafia cops with Jeffrey from this book’s many New York City mob stories. Louis Eppolito was actually a mafia legacy and came from a long line of Eppolitos who were made men. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Sonny Barger and the Hells Angels Aug 12, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviewed retired ATF Agent Ignacio Esteban about his book Full Throttle: Riding with the Hells Angels, the Life of Sonny Barger. This book is a free download until Monday, August 15, on Amazon. Ralph Sonny Barger was born October 8, 1938 and died recently on June 29, 2022. He was the original icon of an American outlaw biker. Sonny Barger was also an author of many books and an actor who was a founding member of the Oakland, California, chapter of the Hells Angels Motorcycle Club in 1957. Ignacio tells us how Barger started life with an alcoholic, abusive father, and a missing mother. In 1955, as a teenager, he lied about his age to join the military. When the army discovered he was underage, they gave him an honorable discharge. He was good mechanically and liked motorcycles. He joined a small San Francisco area gang known as the Panthers, which quickly went defunct. He joined a small club known as the Oakland Hells Angels, and when the leader went to prison, Sonny Barger became president. He learned several other California motorcycle gangs claimed the name of Hells Angels, so he traveled around and convinced them to form one club, even writing rules and bylaws. An example of the little-known tidbits that Ignacio Esteban passes along in his book is the story about how Barger wrote a letter to President Lyndon Johnson during a time when the War in Vietnam was not going well. Hells Angels President Barger advised United States President Johnson that he and the entire Hells Angels gang would travel to Vietnam, and he promised they would kick the butts of the Viet Cong and win the war quickly. LBJ did not respond. Transcript SPEAKERS Ignacio Esteban, GARY JENKINS 00:00 Welcome all you Wiretappers out there. Back here in studio Gangland Wire with our now regular almost frequent contributor Ignacio Esteban, retired ATF agent. Welcome, Ignacio. 00:12 Hey, Gary thanks for having me again. I enjoy being out here. 00:15 I know you do. And you guys you need to do look him up on Amazon. He’s got a whole bunch of books out there that are easy reads and you can learn anything you want about crime, guns, anything that that you might want to find out about. He’s got a book about it on Amazon. So just look him up. You can just look at the show notes and and I’ll put links to his Arthur page on Amazon and I’ve done other shows with him. So look back at my other shows and, and you can learn more about ATF Retired agent Ignacio Esteban? 00:52 That’s the one with ATF. 00:54 Yeah. How do you? How do you do first? You first retired? Did you feel like did you like did you bother you telling people you retired? It did me. I didn’t like say that was retired? 01:07 Yeah. I mean, it kind of didn’t because I was in headquarters. I did my two years there. Yeah. And I felt good. I mean, most of my career was with doing the investigation that being proactive. But you know, I learned a lot behind the scenes or to what will help you know, things really happen behind the scenes. So I was okay with it. And I really never thought I was dabbling with my autobiography, ATF Undercover. But I never thought I was gonna be a prolific writer like this. I was gonna do this. There’s something I didn’t think about really, yeah. And it’s really taken life. And I never thought I’ll be on podcast shows and YouTube shows. I never thought this and I’ve done over almost, I was telling you earlier about 25 shows and county. I’ve got some I did Australia. I did one in India, which is a written interview. And now I’m doing a show in London. A three part series is going to be doing in a few weeks. And then good thing is there might be something else bigger, which I’m working on a screenplay. So I’ll let you guys know down the road. What’s going to happen if this could be something big, so we’ll see. Great, 02:06 keep us keep us up on that. So what we want to talk about I had noticed that Ignacio had a book on the Hells Angels and ...

Jack Tocco’s Promotion Photo Aug 08, 2022

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins interviews retired FBI agent Greg Stejskal about the day he and his surveillance team followed a Detroit Mafia boss and took photos of Jack Tocco, Vito Giacalone, and Anthony Corrado meeting the day Toco was promoted to Boss at a mob meeting on the Timberland Game Farm near Detroit. Greg also tells about his work on the Jimmy Hoffa case and the Unabomber case. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” Venmo me @ganglandwireAgent Stejskal was assigned to the Detroit FBI Surveillance Squad. One summer day in 1979, they were watching a known mob business when they saw Detroit mob upper-level guy named Jack Tocco arrive in one car and then leave in a van with several others. They immediately called in the rest of their squad and started flowing. They trailed behind and saw the van enter the Timberland Game Ranch about 50 miles west of Detroit. They set up the watch at the front gate of this ranch and soon started seeing Lincolns and Cadillacs arrive. they suspected they might be seeing another high-level mob meeting like the one in 1957 at Apalachin New York. Even though they had no idea what was going on, they knew this was important and Greg and his partner, Keith Cordes proceeded to the rear of this private hunting preserve to try for a vantage point where they might get a glimpse of the Ranch’s grounds and buildings.Throwing caution to the wind, they trespassed and entered the private property with their only weap[on, a Canon SLR with a 300 mm lens. They walked for 10 minutes or more until they could see a clearing and some buildings. They radioed out to the rest of the team their location and set up at the end of an archery target range where they could see some of the men gathered together. They figured they were safe as they had never heard of mob guys doing archery. Soon three men moved to the head of the archery range where the archers might stand and engage in conversation. Greg snapped several photos even though he was totally ignorant of what they were observing. He could recognize through the lens that these men were Jack Tocco, Vito “Billy Jack” Giacalone, and Anthony “The Bull” Corrado. Seventeen years later the FBI indicted 17 members of the Detroit family for violation of the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) statute, conspiracy, and all the related predicate crimes. The US Attorney admitted this photo into evidence to show the past relationship between these men. Along with the photo, the other observations made of the Detroit mob meeting and Vito Giacalone admitting there is a Mafia family in Detroit, the government was able to convict all the men charged with a RICO violation. To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lefty Ruggerio and Joe Pistone Aug 03, 2022

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence detective Gary Jenkins interviews Joe Pistone, Retired FBI agent Doug Fencl and a former cellmate of Lefty Ruggerio and friend of Gary’s Steve St. John. We learn that Lefty Ruggerio was difficult to be around and as Joe once stated, “I would hate to be locked up with Lefty.” Lefty Ruggerio was a lifetime made-guy in the Bonanno Crime Family of New York City. He was a key figure in the undercover assignment of FBI agent Joe Pistone who adopted the name of Donnie Brasco when he infiltrated the Bonanno crew under Capo Sonny Black Napolitano. Al Pachino played Lefty in the well-known movie titled Donnie Brosco. Johnnie Depp portrayed agent Pistone. Joe Pistone tells how Lefty hated air conditioning and fresh air. They were in Florida together and lefty refused to allow Joe to turn on the car air conditioning or lower the windows on a hot Florida day. During this time in the car, LEfty chained smoked his favorite cigarettes, English ovals. Joe remembers that Lefty always wanted more and more whenever he did anything for Lefty. Steve St. John, former cellie of Lefty, tells how he was incarcerated in the Federal hospital facility in the Springfield Missouri Federal Correctional Institution with Lefty Ruggerio. Steve remembered making a cake for Lefty’s birthday and upon presentation, Lefty replied, “Well what else ya got for me?” The FBI assigned now-retired agent Doug Fencl to the Bonanno squad and one of his jobs was to make contact with Ruggerio. Doug tells us that he went to see Lefty Ruggerio and tell him that Donnie Brosco was Agent Joe Pistone. He said he caught Lefty alone in his social club when he approached him with this explosive piece of information, Lefty lost his cool and started screaming incoherently. Lefty was so upset that he stormed out of the club into the street leaving agent Fencl alone inside the club. Doug also tells the story of how he broke this news to Sonny Black Napolitano. He hoped to turn Sonny Black because this situation would cause Sonny Black to become a pariah among his Bonanno Family peers. He said Sonny Black never blinked an eye and showed no visible emotion. Doug said that Sonny Black asked Doug to wait up a minute and he explained, “You know that I can’t do that (meaning turning witness).” Doug said he replied, “I understand.” Of course, someone murdered Sonny Black not long after. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

ATF Undercover in South Florida Aug 01, 2022

Retired Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins interviews US Customs Agent turned ATF Agent Ignacio Esteban about his career. Esteban started with US Customs and was assigned to the Miami International Airpot where he interdicted millions in smuggled cocaine. He explains the uncomfortable options they give drug mules who swallow condoms filled with drugs. He later transferred to the ATF because they did so much undercover work. Agent Esteban was ideally suited to infiltrate south of the border drug operations because his family was from Cuba and he speaks Spanish like a native. He explains the history of the mob and Castro among other important historical details from that area. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lou Valoze ATF Undercover in the Outfit Part 2 Jul 25, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins interviewed ATF agent Lou Valoze about his efforts to infiltrate an Outfit crew under Mike Sarno, aka “The Large Guy.” Lou tells how he used his MMA abilities and his motorcycle gang undercover persona to befriend a close associate of Mike Sarno named Mark Polchan. Mike The Large Guy Sarno used the Outlaw motorcycle gang member Polchan to help do burglary and robbery scores and intimidate business rivals with bombings. Mike Sarno had been promoted above his pay grade after Frank Calabrese Jr. had been jailed and convicted in the Family Secrets trial. Mike Sarno was working with people like Mark Polchan, who took in at face value a stranger like this ATF agent, Lou Valoze. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Mass shoootings and what can be done -Bonus Episode Jul 21, 2022

A bonus episode! Retired Detective Gary Jenkins and retired ATF Agent Igancio Esteban discuss the recent spike in school shootings and other mass murders. Agent Esteban recently wrote a book titled “The Worse Mass Shootings in American History and How to Stop Them From Happening Again.” Click this link to get the book. Click this link to see all of Agent Estebans books. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lou Valose ATF Undercover in the Outfit Part 1 Jul 18, 2022

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit Detective Gary jenkins interviews retired ATF Agent Lou Valose about his undercover work on the Chicago Outfit and how he infiltrated a crew led by Outfit Associate Mark Polchan. Lou tells how he got his start working undercover stings that focused on buying “crime guns” from criminals who either had stolen them or traded drugs for them on the black market. He did not know, but he was really training for the biggest infiltration of his career. He will infiltrate the dangerous and feared Chicago Motorcycle gang called the Outlaws and then the Outfit. Marck Polchan will lead him to Mike “The Large Guy” Sarno and expose the Outfit to prosecution. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” A fellow agent who knew his work called him and asked if he would try to infiltrate a southside Outlaw Motorcycle gang leader’s pawnshop because they suspected he had done some bombings for the Chicago organized crime group known as the Outfit. When he arrived, he found this man’s name was Mark Polchan and he operated a pawnshop where he dealt with stolen property. Lou and other agents devised a plan to get the positive attention of Polchan. First, they knew he loved Mixed Martial Arts (MMA), and Lou was an MMA fighter. He started working at an MMA gym nearby in Cicero and was working his way into this subculture. He needed to get close to Polchan, so the agents had a novel idea, one agent knew a dentist and they purchased old gold teeth that the dentist had removed. He dropped by Polchan’s Pawnshop/jewelry store in Cicero and asked if he would buy gold teeth. Polchan replied he would and shortly after Lou returned with the gold teeth, some with roots still attached and a red stain that looked like blood on them. Polchan was impressed and also wanted to know more about his MMA career. Using these two things, Lou Valose worked his way into the inner circle of Polchan’s crew. He learned about his connection to a made guy named Mike “The Large Guy” Sarno. This guy had recently taken over the old Frank Calabrese Sr. crew after the Family Secrets convictions decimated the Outfit. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

ATF Goes Undercover into the Hells Angels Jul 11, 2022

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins interviews retired ATF Agent Jay Dobyns about his undercover investigation of the Mesa Arizona Hells Angels. ATF assigned Jay Dobyns and other agents to a long-term undercover investigation they labeled Black Biscuit. This operation resulted from a deadly shoot-out between Hell’s Angels members and the Mongols Motorcycle club in Laughlin, Nevada. Venmo me @ganglandwireClick here to “buy me a cup of coffee” Agent Dobyns and other agents obtained a cooperator and created the appearance they belonged to the Solo Angles Motorcycle Club from Tijuana, Mexico. They claimed they needed to buy guns and send them south to arm their fellow Solo Angles because of a rival Mongols gang. This ruse got the Mesa Hells Angel’s attention because they were bitter enemies of the Mongols stemming from the Laughlin Nevada shoot-out. Jay Dobyns was able to get the confidence of Mesa Bob, the local Hells Angles leader. After several months of working their way into the club and becoming “prospects”, the ATF decided to take down everybody they could charge. As a way to implicate the Mesa crew even deeper into a more serious crime, they devised a plan to tell them they were going to Mexico and murder a Mongol MC club member. To cement in the final take-down, the agents got a Mongol vest with their colors and dressed up another undercover officer. They placed him in a recently dug desert grave and spread animal blood and brains, and other tissue on the body, and then photographed the scene. They smeared the Mongol’s colors with the viscera and brought it and the photos back as proof they committed this murder. Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here; please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Life of Bill Bonnano Jul 04, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins and mob historian Camillius “Cam” Robinson discuss the life and times of New York Mob boss, Bill Bonanno. GET THE MAGIC MIND 40% DISCOUNT CLICK ON THIS LINK – MAGIC MIND – PUT THE CODE GANGLAND20 IN THE BOX AT CHECKOUT Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Plot to Kill Sammy the Bull Jun 27, 2022

Retired Kansas City Police Intelligence Detective Gary Jenkins examines the Gotti plot to kill Sammy the Bull Gravano. After Gravano served his time from his plea arrangement, 5 years for a lifetime of murder, assault, extortion, and racketeering. He was relocated to Tempe Arizona in the Witness protection program but left after a few years because he did not like the constraints. In 1995, he relocated to Scottsdale Arizona, started a construction company, and lived an open life. he even gave interviews to Diane Sawyer on 60 minutes and to the Arizona Republic newspaper. This enraged the Gotti family, especially after they learned he was collaborating on a book about his life in the Gambino family and his rise to underboss for John Gotti Sr. He even hired a publicist to get more press attention, the exact thing he claimed he did not like about John Gotti. TO GET THE MAGIC MIND DISCOUNT CLICK ON THIS LINK – MAGIC MIND – PUT GANGLAND20 IN THE CODE BOX AT CHECKOUT Gary tells the story of how Peter Gotti ordered two Gambino soldiers, Thomas “Huck” Carbonaro and Eddie Garafola, to murder Gravano. Salvatore “Fat Sal” Mangiavillano gave an interview to Ed Scarpo of www.cosanostranews.com in which he described the story of how he helped a New York hit team further a plot to kill Sammy the Bull Gravano on the orders of Gambino boss, Peter Gotti. Sammy the Bull Gravano described this attempt on his life in his podcast episode titled, A Hit Team From New York Came To Arizona To Kill Me. Fat Sal Mangiavillano was born in Italy and came to the US as a child. He never got his citizenship and lost his first green card after a criminal conviction. As an adult, Fat Sal worked with a sophisticated crew of New York thieves who perfected the art of breaking open bank night deposit boxes and then graduated to bank burglaries and invasion-type bank robberies. In other words, he was an upper-echelon professional criminal worthy of a whole podcast himself. Sal was known for his resourcefulness. For example, he made a homemade gaff with three-pronged spears to pull money out of night deposit boxes. During one Queens, New York, heist, he rigged a remote-controlled drill to cut through concrete and steel. His organized crime pals dubbed his capers “Fat Sallie Productions.” Fat Sal told Ed Scarpo that when he was a 16-year-old car thief, he first met a guy named Thomas Huck Carbonaro at a Gravano-connected chop shop. This was in the early 1980s. Huck was a little older and a member of Sammy the Bull Gravano’s crew. He got friendly with Huck when he saw him working as a doorman at an after-hours bar owned by Sammy the Bull Gravano. By 1988, Fat Sal has a crew chopping and tagging stolen cars. This means he would either chop the stolen car into body parts to be sold as used parts to auto-body repair shops or -re-tag a stolen car with another VIN number and title from a salvaged car. of interest, Chris Paciello was one of the guys bringing him stolen cars. Through these connections, he met a young smash and grab thief named Tommy Dono. He claims he and Tommy got arrested in a case of mistaken identity for mugging an off-duty cop. The cops handcuffed them to a radiator at the police station and beat them for several hours off and on. In the end, the cops brought in their fellow officer who exclaimed, “These aren’t the guys they were Puerto Rican.” He said he and Tommy Dono bonded over this incident and started working together. During this time, Fat Sal learned about alarm systems and other technical skills needed to do the more lucrative scores. He was retagging stolen cars and sending them to Atlanta at his own body shop by this time. In 1993, he claimed a guy from a Colombo crew included him on a bank score if he could shut down the ADT alarm system for New York so they could hit a bank safety deposit vault in Brooklyn. He said that since Tommy was “on record” or associates with Huck and the Gravano crew, they included Huck on this score.

Richard Stout and Jack Garcia – The FBI Fight Dirty Cops Jun 20, 2022

Retired KCPD Intelligence Unit Detective Gary Jenkins interviews retired FBI agents Richard Stout and Jack “Jack Falcone” Garica. Richard Stout worked on public corruption in South Florida during the 1980s. Agent Stout uncovered a small cabal of corrupt Broward county Florida cops. Together, these agents conducted an operation that snared the ringleader, former Deputy Richard Tauber, and another deputy Kevin Frankel. They also took down two civilians named Robert Baccari and Christopher Provenzano. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” Agent Stout learned that Deputy Richard Tauber acted more like he was an organized crime associate than a deputy sheriff. He was able to insert an unc=dercover agent into Tauber’s circle and when the agent suggested that Tauber could earn a large payoff if he transported a large cache of stolen diamonds from Florida to New York. During the first meeting with this agent, Tauber openly bragged about how he could get anything done because of his police connections. He would later introduce his friends Baccari and Provenzano to help with future shipments of diamonds and what he thought was cocaine. Jack Garcia was introduced as the mafia boss from an unspecified Northeast mob family and these men continued bragging about how much they could do with the inside connections with all police departments because Tauber could always flash his badge and claim to be working his own undercover case. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Family Secrets Trial Part 2 Jun 13, 2022

Chicago Outfit historian James Imlach tells listeners about watching Frank Calabrese Sr. testify on his own behalf and how he could not hold his anger back. He also describes how funny and engaging Joey Lombardo was when he took the stand in his defense. Finally, he describes the rambling testimony of former Chicago cop Twan Doyle and how he had other Chicago cops testify what a great cop he had been. Then he watched as the prosecutor asked this question of each character witness, “Did you ever go visit a mob boss in prison?” Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Family Secrets Trial Part 1 Jun 06, 2022

In Part one of a two-part series, Chicago Outfit historian James Imlach tells how he attended the entire Family Secrets trial in 2007. The Family Secrets investigation started on July 27, 1998. Outfit associate Frank Calabrese Jr. mailed a letter from prison to the FBI and said he was willing to cooperate and help the FBI make murder cases on his father, Frank Calabrese Sr. Hence, the codename of the investigation became Family Secrets. Frank Jr. requested to meet in person with FBI agents and promised he could give good information about his father’s murders and other Outfit activities. Frank Jr. had stolen hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash from his father to feed his lifestyle and cocaine habit. He was afraid his father would eventually have him murdered. During the next few months, Frank Jr. “wore a wire” on his own father inside the prison. The agents reviewing these tapes heard Frank Sr. bragging about his many crimes to his son. One of the most significant intercepts was details about the murder of Outfit member Frank Fecarotta in 1986. Frank Jr. also told them he had returned to the scene and retrieved the gun. More importantly, they learned that Frank Sr. lost a blood-stained gove at the scene. They reviewed the Chicago PD evidence and found they had recovered a blood-stained glove close to the murder scene. James Imlach provides a colorful and personal view of what it was like to sit through this two-month log trial. Some of the tidbits are a first-hand view of watching Frank Calabrese Sr. and Joey Lombardo testify in their own defense. Another is getting a first-hand account of watching a son testifying against his killer father in the same room less than a few yards away, that would be something to see. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Frank Balistreri and the Milwaukee Mob May 30, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary talks to Milwaukee author and mob historian Gavin Schmitt about the history of the Milwaukee organized crime family. One of the first things we learn is that Milwaukee rarely enforced the Volstead Act and consequently, the mob was important in smuggling from Canada but inside the city of Milwaukee, it was hard to tell that alcohol was a banned substance. Gavin continues to explain the rise of the Frank Balistreri crime family. Frank Balistreri became to head of the Milwaukee family and he was instrumental in Midwest organized crime activities. Frank Balistreri and the Teamsters are the most current and important stories we discussed. He was able to help influence the Central State’s Teamster’s Pension Fund to loan money to Allen Glick to buy the Stardust casino. In return, Glick ensured the mob could skim money from the count rooms. Gavin Schmitt has several books on Milwaukee crime. For your purposes check out The Milwaukee Mafia: Mobsters in the Heartland Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

How to Turn an Informant! May 26, 2022

In this bonus episode, Gary tells about when he developed his first long-term organized crime informant. Turning a mob associate into an informant is a nuanced and delicate process. Gary began by merely revisiting the guy many times at his business as they developed a friendship and trust. He knew the guy had something to hide, but the prize goes to the guy who waits and watches. Finally, the new friend confessed his crime. As usual, it was not near as bad as the guy thought, and Gary was able to make sure he could avoid prosecution easily. This is when the real work starts. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chuckie “I love to use a blow torch” Russell May 23, 2022

Charles Chuckie Russell was a vicious and brutal Chicago Outfit thief. He was a member of the Grand Avenue crew after Joey the Clown Lombardo went away in the Family Secrets trial. He was married to the sister of the new Grand Avenue Crew boss Albert Vena. Chuckie Russell took in an informant who was working for the ATF. He planned the home invasion robbery with this guy and told him how much he wanted to use a blow torch on their victim and take his money and jewelry. In the meantime, the informant introduced Chuckie Russell to an ATF agent who had guns for sale. In the end, they did a buy-bust on Russell and he never got to torture his home invasion victim into giving up his safe combination. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Murder of Roger Wheeler May 19, 2022

In 1981, Boston hitman Johnny Martorano murdered businessman and owner of World Jai Lai Roger Wheeler in the parking lot of the Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Johnny Martorano was hired by the infamous and now deceased Whitey Bilger to perform this hit because Roger Wheeler presented a threat to an embezzlement that benefited Bulger. This weekend the PGA Championship golf tournament is played at this same exclusive private club. It costs an undisclosed amount to join and then 30K yearly dues. This has a little side story about retired FBI agent Paul Rico. Authorities arrested Rico for participating in this murder, but he died of natural causes after being arrested in Florida and taken back to Oklahoma for trial. A Tulsa businessman Roger Wheeler had made a ton of money in the Tech industry and invested in the Florida Jai Lai business. Jai Lai is a weird game played with rackets and hard rubber balls. The main thing about this is that it generates a lot of gambling interest, and that is followed by organized Crime interest. Roger Wheeler hired retired FBI agent Paul Rico who was retired from the Boston office, to run his security. As we now know, Boston FBI agent John Connelly was convicted of helping Whitey Bulger and protecting him in exchange for tips on the Italian mafia in Boston. Rico was the man who taught Connelly everything he knew. Bulger and his Winter Hill gang were stealing thousands of dollars from Wheeler’s Jai Lai operation. Roger Wheeler became suspicious when he noticed the money drain. Whitey Bulger learned of this and hired Boston area hitman Johnny Martorano to kill him. It has been claimed that FBI agent Paul Rico supplied information about Wheeler’s address, cars, and day-to-day activities to further this plot. Martarano went to Tulsa and waited in the Southern Hills Golf Club parking lot until he saw Wheeler leaving the clubhouse and entering his car. Martorano will later testify, “We spot his Caddy, but remember, I’ve never seen this guy. So we park a few rows closer to the club. I’m in full disguise—we’d picked up that stuff at a theatrical store in Tulsa. Full beard, sunglasses, a baseball cap. Finally, I see a guy coming down the hill from the club to the parking lot, it might be Wheeler. I let him walk past our car; then I fall in behind him. If he gets in the Caddy, I clip him. If he goes to another car, just keep walking. But it’s him; he’s getting in the car. He doesn’t hear me; he’s about to close the door, but I grab it to keep it open. Startled, he jumps back in the seat, and I let him have it: one shot between the eyes, .38 snub nose.” The president of Wheeler’s World Jai Lai was named John Callahan. He was involved in the embezzlement and the plot. A year later, Bulger thought he was a weak link, and Martarano murdered him also. Martorano went on the lam for 16 years. With tips from Bulger, the FBI arrested him in 1995. He made a deal and gave statements against the FBI agent Paul Rico, Whitey Bulger, and his fall partner Steve “The Rifleman” Flemmi. Martorano made his deal, admitted to 20 murders, served 8 years in prison, and was released in 2007. He gave an interview on 60 Minutes a year later in 2008. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Porn and the Mafia May 16, 2022

Gary and Cam Robinson discuss organized crime’s infiltration of the pornographic film business. Specifically, Colombo Family member Tony Peraino. He was this crime family’s biggest earners because Tony Peraino developed pornography into one of organized crime’s biggest moneymakers after narcotics and labor racketeering. Tony Peraino was aided by his brother Joe “The Whale” Peraino, his sons Louis “Butchie” Peraino, and his nephew, Joseph Peraino, Jr. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” They got their start with the biggest porn star ever, Linda Lovelace. Louis Peraino produced the movie Deep Throat and his father Tony loaned him the initial $22,500 in production costs. The Perainos leased the theatres and allowed employees to account for all proceeds. They ensured compliance by sending their associates known as “checkers” to manage the movie houses. They reaped huge profits from such successes as Deep Throat, The Devil and Miss Jones, and Wet Rainbow. In instances where they do not have a direct financial share in film, as in the case of Behind the Green Door and The Life and Times of Xaviera Hollander, crime figures pirated those films and distributed them illegally, earning money without any investment. Successes of several films have given several pornographic moviemakers with Mafia connections money to go into producing and distributing legitimate films. Anthony and Louis Peraino used the Deep Throat profits to build financial ownership of garment companies in New York and Miami and investment companies. The Perainos also controlled various adult and porn industry interests in New York, Los Angeles, and South Florida. These businesses included adult bookstores and adult movie theaters. The Feds took notice and prosecutors went after the Peraino family. In 1975, they obtained convictions of Anthony and brother Joseph Peraino on racketeering charges. In 1976, they convicted Anthony of conspiracy to ship obscene material interstate. Before appearing for sentencing, he jumped bail and disappeared for the next five years, reportedly to Italy. In 1981, in poor health, Anthony turned himself into authorities. Anthony was sentenced to ten months in prison and $15,000 in fines for his 1976 conviction and jumping bail. The Peraino brothers for into a dispute over their pornography empire. The Colombo Family mediated and the dispute was settled in favor of Anthony. Not too long after, an unidentified assailant shot Anthony’s brother Joseph and nephew Joseph Jr. in a residential area of Gravesend, Brooklyn. Joseph Sr. was paralyzed, and Joseph Jr. was killed. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here; please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bonus Forced Sex Trafficking: What It Is and How You Can End It May 12, 2022

Chris Armitage wrote a book on Sex Trafficking in the United States. This is a short interview to alert listeners to this problem and help Chris get his message out to a greater audience. As I suspected, drug gangs and sex trafficking go together. To find a copy, click on Forced Sex Trafficking: What it is and How Can You End It Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chicago Woman found Butchered May 12, 2022

Gary tells the story of a party girl named Estelle Carey, who was found beaten, tortured, and burned in her Chicago apartment. Estelle was a B-girl and chip hustler in the Rush Street Colony Club owned by Outfit associate Nick Circella, aka Nicky Dean. He was purportedly the first person who suggested and helped the outfit start an extortion racket that ended with the arrest and conviction of many bosses. Along with Willie Bioff, Circella was getting ready to testify against Outfit men like Paul Ricca, Charlie “Cherry Nose” Gioe, Frank Nitti, Johnny Roselli, and others in Hollywood Extortion trial. Once this former paramour of Circella, Johnny Roselli, and others was found murdered, Nick Circella clammed up and refused to testify. These men will eventually be convicted in the Hollywood Extortion and serve about three years in prison. The main witness who was not scared off by the murder of Estelle Carey was Willie Bioff. he will eventually be murdered along with his wife after years in hiding. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes, click here; please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lou Romano on Gene Borrello and John Alite May 09, 2022

Lou Romano is a guy that grew up in a New York Mafia neighborhood where young men either became cops, firemen, or joined the mob. As an adult and as a true-crime author, he became friends with mob guys Gene Borrello and John Alight. He was able to write books about both these men. His first was Mafia International with John Alite. His second was Born in the Life: Gene Borrello Lous has a whole list of fictional works based on real-life mob experiences. One title is Besa and thanks to the information provided by John Alite, Lous takes the reader inside the Albanian Mafia. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews mob author Lou Romano on his books Born in the life: Gene Borrello and Mafia International John Alite. Lou is a prolific crime author with many historical fiction books and the Vic Gonnella Detective Series. Check out his Amazon page by clicking on his name above. Lous is from a mafia neighborhood and has a mob family legacy so he talks and writes with great authority on this subject. He remains in contact with Gene Borrello and John Alite so we learn about their lives today as much as their history. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Mobsters in Leavenworth May 02, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews retired Leavenworth Correctional Officer Ken Lemaster. We hear great stories like the time he asked Bufalino, “Hey what did you do with Hoffa’s body?” How about the time the Kansas City Underboss Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna was watching the Defenbaugh trash company pick up the dumpsters and he told Ken, “I’m glad to see a company I have stock in has a big government contract.” He has a bunch more like these. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Why did the Rat Pack open Giancana’s Villa Venice? Apr 26, 2022

Gary tells about Giancana's Villa Venice. In the Chicago suburb of Northbrook, Sam Giancana opened a fancy supper club called the Villa Venice. This club opened to great reviews at Christmas time, 1962. The club sold out for a week because Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., and Frank Sinatra put on a floor show. The Villa Venice was a beautiful place with an illegal gambling casino nearby. Outfit mobsters took gamblers back and forth to the Villa Venice. During the show, Dean Martin made jokes about playing the joint for free. Later when Sammy Davis Jr. was interviewed by FBI agents, he stated, “Baby, let me say this,” explained Davis, who lost his left eye years earlier in a car accident. “I got one eye, and that one eye sees a lot of things that my brain tells me I shouldn’t talk about. Because my brain says that, if I do, my one eye might not be seeing anything after a while.” The club was open until it burned to the ground in 1967. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to "buy me a cup of coffee" To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bombs, Bullets, & Bribes: Cleveland’s Shonder Birns Apr 25, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee”Rick Porrello discusses Cleveland’s infamous Jewish mobster, Shonder Birns. Besides Bombs, Bullets, & Bribes: The True Story of Shonder Birns, Rick Porrello wrote and produced the movie about the life and death of Danny Greene in Kill the Irishman. Birns was a prohibition-era mobster that remained out of the Mafia’s control because he focused on running the Policy game and partnered with African-Americans. Birns had to lean on the soon-to-be-famous boxing promoter Don King in one interesting story about his policy business. Rick tells story after story about how Shonder Birns partnered with Danny Greene and even left him in charge of his policy business and his wife when he went to prison. In the end, it was suspected that Danny Greene was responsible for the bomb that tended the colorful life of Shonder Birns. Rick Porrello also wrote Superthief: A Master Burglar, the Mafia, and the Biggest Bank Heist in U.S. History Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Did the Mob Really Make Steven Seagal Cry? Apr 20, 2022

Sammy Gravano tells a story he heard from some FBI agents about how Steven Seagal cried like a baby and wanted to be hugged after he testified. Here is the whole story about why Seagal ever testified against the Mob in the first place. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Did Sonny Franzese Flirt with S. J. Peddie Apr 18, 2022

Gary talks with Sandra “S.J.” Peddie about her series of interviews and subsequent book on John Franzese aka Sonny Franzese. This is the story of a Colombo crime family underboss John “Sonny” Franzese. Franzese gave Ms. Peddie, an award-winning author, unprecedented access to his life in interviews both before and after his release from federal prison at age 102. FBI Director Herbert Hoover had once ordered an all-out assault to put Sonny Franzese in prison. Franzese was feared, loved, and most importantly respected by other New York mobsters during his lifetime of criminal activity. We learn that the famous Copacabana club staff always made sure he had a table even if they had to set a table on the stage. He became the manager and friend Bobbie Darrin, the only singer Sinatra envied. Ms. Peddie tells all the inside stories as a teaser to her well-received book Sonny: The Last of the Old-Time Bosses John “Sonny” Franzese. If you want to get the book, click on the highlighted title. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Did Marshall Caifano kill Ray Ryan? Apr 14, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Ray Ryan was a wealthy developer, casino owner, and Texas oil Man. He beat Nick the Greek Dandolos out of a lot of money in a poker game. Later, the Chicago Outfit’s man in Vegas, Marshall Caifano, went to Ryan and threatened to expose him as a cheat in this game unless Ryan paid him off to keep his mouth shut. Ryan refused and ended up testifying against Caifano. At trial, a jury convicted Caifano and sentenced him to ten years. Thirteen years after the trial, on October 18, 1977, Raymond Ryan worked out in his exercise club in Evansville, Indiana, left, entered his Lincoln Continental Mark IV, and died from a bomb rigged to the car. I suspect Caifano, what do you think? Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Pittsburgh’s Deep Throat Sam Mannarino Apr 11, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here This episode is for our Pittsburgh supporter and Wiretapper Robb Starr. Rob is a talented artist and sometimes bruised up skateboarder. I found a story about a Pittsburgh long-time mob member named Sam Mannarino on The American Mafia website. Sam Mannarino was a prominent La Cosa Nostra figure in Western Pennsylvania, and he and his brother, Gabriel “Kelly” Mannarino controlled gambling and related activities in New Kensington for the Pittsburgh Crime Family. Of interest is that Sam Mannarino also had an interest in the Sans Souci casino in Cuba in the 1950s. Pittsburgh Mob boss John LaRocca forced Sam Mannarino into retirement in 1958. He had drawn too much attention with many run-ins with law enforcement and his health was bad. After this forced retirement, his boredom led him to start meeting with the FBI for informal talks over coffee. The agents assigned him an informant number and wrote reports on his information without his knowledge. He was what my friend Steve St. John calls a professional verifier. He never gave up accurate, current info, but he helped them understand what happened in the past. They often referred to him as a “retired racketeer” when they wrote reports on his information. An example of the information that Sam Mannarino told federal agents was about his early days in the Pittsburgh Family. He said he started as a driver for gangster Pittsburg boss Giovanni Bazzano. He ran errands and took Bazzano to meetings with other gangsters. Mannarino recalled all of Bazzano’s old associates had handlebar mustaches. He said Bazzano liked him and helped him get started with his mafia life. Giovanni Bazzano was murdered in less than a year for taking part in an unsanctioned hit. Mannarino remembered that Bazzano was called to a sit-down in New York. Later he learned that several guys killed his boss with about 80 ice pick stabs. Mannarino said he thought his boss had it coming and felt no sympathy for his mentor Sam Mannarino explained how he helped the Pittsburgh Crime Family muscle into gambling clubs in the 1920s and 1930s. He said he and a guy named Joseph Rosa first offered a fair price for ½ ownership then used intimidation and violence and if the owner of a gambling club resisted, Mannarino said they first their property and then escalated to breaking their bones. He told one story about they convinced the owners of one gambling club to cooperate by lining them up against the wall at gunpoint and threatening to kill them in the style of the “St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.” Mannarino said, “the two operators broke completely and pleaded to be allowed to share their gambling profits.” Mannarino said that when “Jewish gamblers” saw him walking down the street, “they all disappeared as though hiding from the plague.” Sam Mannarino admitted to the FBI that he was a member of “La Cosa Nostra or whatever you want to call it.” FBI agents asked him if Pittsburgh Crime Family boss John LaRocca had sponsored him and his brother into the organization, and he grinned and replied, “Who else?” Mannarino shared the details about his induction ceremony. At the time he divulged this information, few other LCN members had ever talked about their induction ceremonies with federal law enforcement. He told agents that his finger was pricked during the ceremony, but no holy card was used nor was any fire ever lit. Mannarino couldn’t say if holy cards were used in other induction ceremonies, but he personally “never got no burns on my hands that way.” He claimed that Pittsburg had not conducted any induction ceremonies for a long time. Mannarino told federal agents about the “honor” of being a member of La Cosa Nostra and spelled out the membership rules. He said a member couldn’t kill another member without permission. A member could only kill another member if his hono...

Crazy Joey Gallo Part 2 Apr 11, 2022

Gary and Camillius “Cam” Robinson examine the entire life of Crazy Joe Gallo from the perspective of his henchman Pete the Greek Diapoulos. This is Part 2. Pete the Greek was a childhood pal of Crazy Joey Gallo who remained a part of his crew and was actually sitting with Crazy Joey Gallo that fateful night at Umberto’s Clam House when unidentified gunmen entered and walked directly to their table firing their guns. Pete the Greek had a handgun and he was wounded as he returned fire. the government will charge Peter Diapoulus with having a gun and he will spend a year in jail. These same cops never charged anybody with the murder of Crazy Joey Gallo. Pete the Greek collaborated with a well-known writer named Steve Linakis. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Guys called Crazy Joey Gallo “Joey the Blond” because he had blond chest hair. Around 1950 when Gallo had a charge pending, the court had him diagnosed with mental illness at the Kings County Hospital Center in Brooklyn. They believed he had schizophrenia. During this time, the cops started calling him Crazy Joey. He was a violent maniac who might beat down somebody just because he didn’t like the way they looked. He went to prison for about ten years, where he learned the Evelyn Wood speed reading technique. He read, read, and read, giving himself a graduate degree level of knowledge in just about everything. After he got out of prison that last time in the early 1970s, he dressed the part of a New York hipster of the 1950s. He liked a dark shirt, white tie, and pinstripe suit. He would wear sunglasses inside. He became friends and the pet of many sophisticated New Yorkers like David Steinberg, Ben Gazzara, Peter Falk, playwright Neil Simon, and Joan Hackett. Just before his murder, a TV show called, How They Cover Me was about media coverage of celebrities. He was to appear with Gore Vidal, Abbie Hoffman, Otto Preminger, and Bella Abzug. Cam and I tell the Joey Gallo story and the First and Second Colombo War. A famous book by New York Columnist Jimmy Breslin titled The Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight is about the Gallos and their war with first the Persico family and then the Colombo family. Mario Coppola used many of the situations and incidents in the Colombo wars in the Godfather. Peter Diapoulos tells in “The 6th Family” how he first met Crazy Joey. He was leaving their grade school, and he saw Gallo fight with a much bigger kid. Diapoulos said he started to step in when Gallo told him to lay back. He then grabbed a large flower pot and broke it over the bigger kid’s head, knocking him out. He started hanging out with Joey, Frankie “Punchy” Illiano, and a guy called Mike the Bandit at a candy store on 36th and 14th Avenue. Later in his life, Punchy will move to the Genovese crew with Joey’s brother Albert “Kid Twist” Gallo and live out his life as a mobster. They started burglarizing neighborhood homes and graduated to robbing small businesses. He told a story about how Mike the Bandit got a massive 1939 LaSalle. They used to pick up this neighborhood girl named Marilyn, and they would take turns doing her in the back seat. He told a story about them renting horses in Prospect Park. When Gallo’s horse was balking, Crazy Joey got off and punched the horse several times. He was also hanging out with Larry “Kid Blast” Gallo, Joey’s brother. They used to get into fights at Prospect Hall, where they had Knights of Columbus-sponsored dances. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Crazy Joey Gallo Part 1 Apr 04, 2022

Gary and Camillius “Cam” Robinson examine the entire life of Crazy Joe Gallo from the perspective of his henchman Pete the Greek Diapoulos. Pete the Greek was a childhood pal of Crazy Joey Gallo who remained a part of his crew and was actually sitting with Crazy Joey Gallo that fateful night at Umberto’s Clam House when unidentified gunmen entered and walked directly to their table firing their guns. Pet the Greek had a handgun and he was wounded as he returned fire. the government will charge Peter Diapoulus with having a gun and he will spend a year in jail. These same cops never charged anybody with the murder of Crazy Joey Gallo. Pete the Greek collaborated with a well-known writer named Steve Linakis. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Guys called Crazy Joey Gallo “Joey the Blond” because he had blond chest hair. Around 1950 when Gallo had a charge pending, the court had him diagnosed with mental illness at the Kings County Hospital Center in Brooklyn. They believed he had schizophrenia. During this time, the cops started calling him Crazy Joey. He was a violent maniac who might beat down somebody just because he didn’t like the way they looked. He went to prison for about ten years, where he learned the Evelyn Wood speed reading technique. He read, read, and read, giving himself a graduate degree level of knowledge in just about everything. After he got out of prison that last time in the early 1970s, he dressed the part of a New York hipster of the 1950s. He liked a dark shirt, white tie, and pinstripe suit. He would wear sunglasses inside. He became friends and the pet of many sophisticated New Yorkers like David Steinberg, Ben Gazzara, Peter Falk, playwright Neil Simon, and Joan Hackett. Just before his murder, a TV show called, How They Cover Me was about media coverage of celebrities. He was to appear with Gore Vidal, Abbie Hoffman, Otto Preminger, and Bella Abzug. Cam and I tell the Joey Gallo story and the First and Second Colombo War. A famous book by New York Columnist Jimmy Breslin titled The Gang that Couldn’t Shoot Straight is about the Gallos and their war with first the Persico family and then the Colombo family. Mario Coppola used many of the situations and incidents in the Colombo wars in the Godfather. Peter Diapoulos tells in “The 6th Family” how he first met Crazy Joey. He was leaving their grade school, and he saw Gallo fight with a much bigger kid. Diapoulos said he started to step in when Gallo told him to lay back. He then grabbed a large flower pot and broke it over the bigger kid’s head, knocking him out. He started hanging out with Joey, Frankie “Punchy” Illiano, and a guy called Mike the Bandit at a candy store on 36th and 14th Avenue. Later in his life, Punchy will move to the Genovese crew with Joey’s brother Albert “Kid Twist” Gallo and live out his life as a mobster. They started burglarizing neighborhood homes and graduated to robbing small businesses. He told a story about how Mike the Bandit got a massive 1939 LaSalle. They used to pick up this neighborhood girl named Marilyn, and they would take turns doing her in the back seat. He told a story about them renting horses in Prospect Park. When Gallo’s horse was balking, Crazy Joey got off and punched the horse several times. He was also hanging out with Larry “Kid Blast” Gallo, Joey’s brother. They used to get into fights at Prospect Hall, where they had Knights of Columbus-sponsored dances. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Camorra with Jeff Nadu Mar 28, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews The Sit Down Guy You Tube host Jeff Nadu. the Jeff tells the early history of the Camorra. We learn it started in Naples and was an unofficial government. The early Camorra families protected the people from the central authorities. By the 1970s and 1980s, Raffaele Cutolo made an unsuccessful attempt to unify the Camorra families in the manner of the Sicilian Mafia, by forming the New Organized Camorra. The Camorra control the milk and fish industries, the coffee trade, and most Napolitiano bakeries. Roberto Saviano, an investigative journalist and author of Gomorra, still lives in hiding. In 2004 and 2005, the Di Lauro clan and the Scissionisti di Secondigliano fought a bloody feud which came to be known in the Italian press as the Scampia feud. The result was over 100 street killings. At the end of October 2006, a new series of murders took place in Naples between 20 competing clans, costing 12 lives in 10 days. The government sent more than 1,000 extra police and carabinieri to Naples to fight crime and protect tourists. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Charlie Spillers Undercover in Mississippi Mar 21, 2022

Gary interviews Charlie Spillers, a former Marine, undercover agent, federal prosecutor, and Justice Attaché for Iraq. Charlie shares storied from his book, Confessions of an Undercover Agent: Adventures, Close Calls, and the Toll of a Double Life, an Amazon #1 New Release nationwide in law enforcement memoirs. Charlie Spillers describes some of his most harrowing experiences during 10 years of undercover police work and his many narrow escapes. Best-selling author Ace Atkins stated, “Charlie Spillers is a natural-born storyteller with one hell of a story to tell…. I loved it. A great read.” Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chicky Cecchetelli Genovese Bookie Mar 14, 2022

Gary interviews former Western Massachusetts Wiseguy David (Chicky) Cecchetelli. He was the biggest bookie in Springfield, Mass. In the early 2000s Genovese associate, Chicky operated a multi-million-dollar sports gambling business. In 2005, he pled out and admitted to taking in over $3,000,000 worth of bets. The court sentenced him to a year in federal prison. In the 2000s, Chicky worked for Springfield mob capo Anthony (Bingy) Arillotta. Both men came up in the mob under Springfield crime boss Adolfo (Big Al) Bruno. Anthony Arillotta followed Bruno as a Springfield capo before he turned on the New York-based Genovese bosses. He testified and left the mafia. One of the interesting subjects we discuss is the fact that the FBI recently served a search warrant on his nephew’s house where Chicky was living. They charged him with being a felon in possession of a firearm because they found some bullets and a gun in his bedroom. However, Chicky’s felony was for sports gambling, and that formerly illegal behavior is being legitimatized by state and federal law all over the US. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

David True – ATF Agent Mar 07, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews retired ATF Agent David True about his book Gangsters, Outlaws, and Mobsters: A Missouri History of Twentieth-Century Crimes and Criminals. Agent True was assigned to the Kansas City area for the majority of his career. In this episode, Gary and David recount the first organized “sting” operation in the United States. In 1978 The Kansas City Police Special Investigations Unit led by Major Sid Harlow joined the ATF and rented a storefront in the Northeast area of the city. They recruited a well-known professional criminal named Al Murie to take an undercover agent around to bars and clubs and spread the word that they were buying stolen cars, guns, jewelry, or anything else that they could turn for a buck. Al Murie was a local character who was a sprint car driver at Midwest racetracks who supported his racing by stealing record albums. He was well-known by the KC Mafia and during the course of this investigation, he introduced the undercover into the mob’s social club known as The Trap.” David True was the agent who handled all the logistics and liaison with other agencies for this project. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Scott Deitche and Ybor City Mob Tour Mar 05, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here A short bonus podcast of an interview I conducted with Mob author Scott Deitche while we had drinks and smoked cigars at the King Corona Cigar Bar . Scott Deitche and Gary discuss the history of the Tampa Mafia. Scott Deitche is a skilled mob historian and has written eight books on subjects from the Tampa Mafia and other Ybor City history to the New Jersey mob in Garden State Gangland. Click here to see Scott’s Amazon author page. be sure to take the Ybor City Mob tour and Scott will be your tour guide. Tell him that I sent you and click here to make reservations. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chad Marks Prison Storyteller Feb 28, 2022

Chad Marks Crime Chad Marks tells how a court gave him a forty-year forty sentence in the Federal Prison System. At age 24, Chad Mark was facing most if not all of his life in prison for a non-violent drug crime. To make matters worse, if that is possible, the Bureau of Prisons sent him one of the worst and toughest federal prisons in the system. Chad Marks survived 17 years in places where beatings, stabbings, and death were part of every day. After he was able to obtain an early release he wrote Blood on the Razor Wire to tell the story of how he turned a life of despair into a life of hope. In this book, the reader can feel the disappointment, hope, fear, and desperation of never knowing if today will be your last day in every paragraph. Chad Marks – The Rest of the Story During his time “behind the walls,” Chad taught himself the law and became known as “Lawyer,” by both staff and prisoners. Chad Marks secured releases and/or reduction of sentences for many fellow inmates. He taught classes in basic reading and writing to many inmates. He found himself teaching Alternative to Violence Project Seminars, Leaders Breed Leaders, and many other rehabilitative programs. In 2019 Chad wrote and filed his own Moptio0n for Reduction of Sentence and a court sided with him and reduced his 40 year sentence to 20 years. After his release Chad Marks continues his work for prisoner’s rights as a paralegal for Freedom Fighters & Prison Consultants. He is also the owner of FEL$CON, a business that provides services to prisoners across the country. Chad Marks – The Entertainer Chad is the kind of guy who never stays still. In addition to his other work and his book, Blood on the Razor Wire, he produces a series of YouTube Videos on his On The Razor Wire Channel, . Check out his Channel for many great prison stories. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Deep Cover: Mob Land Feb 21, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire or Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews Jake Halpern about his interviews with Ned Timmons and Bob Cooley. Jake hosts Deep Cover: Mob Land which is a new podcast in its second season. Deep Cover takes a single subject and situation and develops it out to its conclusion. For example, in the first season, Jake starts interviewing a retired FBI agent named Ned Timmons as he tells how he was assigned to work undercover on a Motorcycle Gang. By the end of the first season, Jake has interviewed other agents, several convicted marijuana smugglers as the listener hear how the first simple undercover assignment ended with Ned Timmons helping to make a case on General Manuel Noriega. In the second season just released, Jake interviews Bob Cooley who was a corrupt Chicago Mob lawyer. Jake discusses how Cooley bribed Judge Frank Wilson to bring back a “not guilty” verdict in the murder trial of the infamous Chicago Outfit hitman Harry Aleman. He was able to get interviews with an Outfit man who knew Colley as a “fixer,” Franke Forliano (Aleman’s daughter), and several FBI agents who worked this case. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Keith Bulfin and the Cartel Money Feb 14, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Keith Bulfin in Australia This week Gary interviews an Aussie who met a Mexican Cartel Moneyman in an Australian prison. When Keith got caught up in some financial crimes as a young man, the Australian authorities sentenced him to three years in a high-security prison. Keith tells how he was set upon by the heavy thugs in prison when he met a Mexican banker. Daniel Gomez was on the run from Mexico after catching a case for helping a drug cartel launder money. Once Gomez learned he was not the usual simple-minded criminal but was actually an account and banker in his pre-prison life, they became friends. Gomez had already used his money to buy protection while inside this prison and he included Keith under his umbrella. During the next three years, these two men became close and shared secrets about washing dirty money. Australian authorities had alerted the American DEA about this relationship and 3 years later when Keith Bulfin was released, agents approached him with an offer of post-prison work. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” The DEA sent Keith Bulfin to San Diego where he established some bank accounts and shell companies. During this time, Daniel Gomez had been extradited back to Mexico. When Keith came to Mexico, his first job was to deliver the first half of a 30 Million dollar payment to a Mexican judge to get a case against Gomez dropped. He began taking bags of money and depositing them into a variety of accounts. he was instructed to create legitimate sources of income. In one case, he bought fast-food franchises throughout Mexico. He bought a South American mining company and this company purchased other smaller mining companies. In most cases, the Cartel found persons willing to enter into these businesses as the straw owners. He said most of the employees never knew about the Cartel ownership. he related these persons who purchased the businesses were known as “White Knights.” Keith Bulfin is exposed In his last case in Mexico, the DEA sent a long-time undercover agent with him to record some transactions because Bulfin had refused to carry any kind of recording device. This agent was a DEA employee from Columbia and had operated in that country for a long time. They were meeting some other Cartel bankers at a hotel in Mexico City. The bankers knew Keith but they were surprised when the agent showed up using the cover he was a banker in business with Bulfin. They tested the agent with some financial questions and he failed. At about this time, they received a call that two traffickers from Colombia were on their way up to discuss laundering their money. The agent immediately went to the bathroom, the Mexican bankers were looking at Bulfin with accusing eyes. The Coilumboans entered the hotel room, the agent exited the bathroom with a gun and started firing. In the melee, the agent and Bulfin escaped the hotel. He returned to Australia and then made a call back to Gomez. he agreed to return to Mexico and he was able to reach an agreement that saved his life. he said he would not give up three cartel groups and for some reason, he was allowed to leave. To find Bulfin’s book, Undercover: A Novel of a Life click here. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Red Wemette on Bob Cooley Feb 07, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews Red Wemette about Chicago attorney Bob Cooley and Red’s time as a contract agent for the FBI during the late 1970s and 1980s. Red Wemette owned a porn store making him a target for extortion from the Chicago Outfit. The FBI installed a hidden camera and microphone in Red’s office and taped many incriminating conversations between Red and Frank “The German” Schwiehs about outfit business. During this time, he heard about a Chicago attorney named Bob Cooley who was famous for putting in the fix for clients in Cook County courts. Red tells about his own connections into the Cook County court system and how he bribed judges himself. Bob Cooley was probably the most famous “fixer” because he was able to fix any case through bribery up to and including murder cases for mob hitmen. Bob Cooley owed a lot of money to gamblers when he offered his services to the Chicago area U.S. attorney and FBI. They started an ambitious multi-year project they called Gambet, which stands for “Gambling Attorney.” Cooley exposed many judges, cops, and other employees in the criminal justice system as corrupt. He even revealed how he had paid a judge $10,000 to obtain a not-guilty verdict in a slam dunk murder case against Outfit hitman Harry Aleman. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael McGowan – The guy who made the case on Bobby Luisi Jan 31, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews retired FBI agent Michael McGowan about working long-term undercover projects in the New England and Philadelphia area during the 1990s. In his book Ghost: My 30 Years as an Undercover Agent, Michael McGowan takes the reader on a thrilling ride through the Boston, Philadelphia, and Rhode Island crime families. In his first story, listeners learn how Agent McGowan used the infamous Philadelphia informant Ron Previtte to get an introduction to Boston Bobby Luisi. Of interest is the fact that Gangland Wire had Bobby Luisi on the show during the last year, so to hear the other side of this story I suggest you go back and relisten. During this investigation, Agent McGowan was able to tape a phone call with Bobby Luisi and Philadelphia mob boss Joey Merlino and participate in a conversation about bringing in several kilos of cocaine. This was just the beginning of Agent Mcgowan’s thrilling stories. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

East Village Mafia Jan 24, 2022

Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary interviews retired New York City Chief of Investigations Thomas F. Comiskey. Over his career, Tom Comiskey exposed and prosecuted corruption in New York City’s anti-poverty programs and public schools. In his non-fiction account of the Mob in lower Manhattan, Mr. Comiskey cuts through the myths and legends surrounding the East Village organized crime families. Hidden among East Village tenements, storefronts, neighborhood coffee shops, avant-garde art galleries, and alternative rock music venues, the Mafia ran rackets, murdered enemies, and corrupted politicians. From the 1920s to 1990, mob icons from Lucky Luciano, Joey Gallo to Bill Bonanno lived in or frequented the East Village. Tom Comiskey is a wonderful storyteller and this book should be a “must-have” for the library of every true mob historian. You can find East Village Mafia by clicking on this highlighted type. This takes you directly to the Amazon page. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Casino Leakage Jan 17, 2022

Your host Gary Jenkins tells the little-known story about the time when Nick Civella ordered a moratorium on all skimming activities from the Tropicana casino. During the fall of 1978, Nick Kansas City Mob boss Civella became obsessed that one of his inside men at the Tropicana was stealing from the skim. A Sicilian immigrant named Joe Agosto had infiltrated the Tropicana and obtained the confidence of the owners and was managing the famous Folies Bergère floor show. Agosto had placed another well-known casino executive named Carl Thomas as the casino manager. Thomas had come from jobs at Circus Circus, Slots-a-Go-Go, and most recently The Stardust. Thomas was a long-time friend of Alan Dorfman and other Teamsters officials. he had skimmed money from all his casinos for the Chicago Outfit and Dorfman. Thomas put together a trusted team and he brought in several of his old employees to set up an organized approach to skimming from the Tropicana. What none of these men knew was the FBI was listening to a series of conversations between Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna, the KC Underboss, and Joe Agosto. Nick decided he should order Thomas and Agosto to stop all skimming or declare a moratorium. he wanted Thomas to watch his crew and other casino employees to see if they started stealing from other places. After a few weeks, Nick ordered both of these Tropicana employees to travel o Kansas City for a meeting. The FBI wiretaps picked up the plans for this meeting. They knew when and where a couple of weeks prior to the date. They were able to plant a listening device and the take from this device would eventually bring down the entire skimming operations at the Tropicana and the Stardust. This story contains some of those clips and tells this story. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

.22 Cal. Killers Jan 03, 2022

The .22 Caliber Killings: Inside the Mafia’s Infiltration of Two FBI Field Offices During the post War period to 1968, the FBI and a few local police department Intelligence Units made liberal use of extrajudicial hidden microphones and wiretaps. In 1968, Congress passed the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. This statute authorized the first legal use of audio surveillance by law enforcement. The FBI created a large list of confidential informants. Many of them were street-level thugs and a few high-ranking mobsters. Since they did not have extensive electronic surveillance, they needed these men for probable cause to obtain the new legal wiretaps. Of these valuable informants, fifteen made-men were placed on the extremely confidential Top Echelon Informant list. Venmo me @ganglandwireSupport the podcast and click here to buy me a cup of coffee Access the Top Echelon List In 1971, a young lady named Irene Kuczynski was a typist at the FBI’s Newark field office. A New Jersey Mob associate named Peter Szwandrak learned about this employment when he worked at Western Electric with her husband George. Peter told George Kuczynski a New Jersey Mob boss named John “Johnny D” DiGilio would pay for any files his wife could get and copy. George Kucznskui was already a spouse abuser and when his wife refused, he beat her several times until she agreed to get some files. DiGilio gave George $100.00 per delivery of any files his wife copied and brought home. DiGilio was extorting money from shipping companies and conducted a loan sharking business. He learned from the FBI documents that two members of his crew, loan shark and gambler Vincent Capone, and Frank Chin, an electronics expert who moonlighted doing wiretaps and sweeping for government microphones, were talking to the Bureau. The FBI caught the Kuczynski’s and they agreed to testify. In July of 1975, the government charged Peter Szwandrak and Harry Lupo with the theft of FBI documents. They could not make a case on DiGilio. After this acquittal, unknown persons shot and killed Vincent Capone while his Cadillac was stopped at a traffic light. Someone murdered Frank Chin in the basement parking lot of his Manhattan apartment. In an interesting turn of events, the FBI lab results revealed that both men were killed by the same 22‐caliber pistol. FBI goes into high alert Once they discovered the theft of documents in the New Jersey field office was linked to the murder of witnesses, the FBI went on high alert. During the middle 1970s, they had noticed informants were being killed at every level. The newspapers reported on a rash of .22 cal. murders during this time and the FBI knew these were mostly informants. The FBI knew this entire leak of informant data did not come from the single theft at the New Jersey Field office. They theorized that the mob had paid persons to infiltrate the FBI throughout the United States. Cleveland has a Mole Cleveland mobster Anthony “Tony Lib” Liberatore had a car dealership and he learned that one of his employees named Jeffrey Rabinowitz was engaged to a young woman named Geraldine “Gerri” Linhart and that she was a clerk in the Cleveland office of the FBI. Gerri Linhart was getting a divorce. She did not earn much working for the Bureau and she was trying to sell a house she had received in the settlement. She had a hard time getting this house sold Liberatore had someone contact her and they promised to make her financial troubles disappear. She was advised that she only need to do some favors in return. She started selling files to Liberatore and his capo James “Blackie” Licavoli. Among those files was a complete list of FBI informants. An example was the name Danny Greene who was in a battle with the Italian mafia over control of a labor union. He had been informing on the Mafia for years. In an interesting turn of events, the Cleveland Teasmster official Jackie presser was a Top Echelon Informant but he had demanded his n...

New Years Bonus Jan 01, 2022

Gangland Wire 2021 I wish all you guys a Happy and Prosperous 2022. Like everybody else, I feel like I just lost a year and more. The podcast kept me going and all of your emails, comments on the Gangland Wire Facebook page and the website, your emails, and every other way you sent me good wishes made my work worthwhile. I was able to finish my third documentary film, Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup. I especially thank every wiretapper who invested their time and money into making this a better production. My friend and fellow filmmaker, Terence O’Malley were able to put on the third annual Mafia Film Festival and premiere Ballot Theft in November. We are almost back to normal. I appreciate every PayPal and Venmo donation more than you will ever know. Some of the highlights over the year were the Montreal Mafia with Cam Robinson, the four-part series on the Pizza Connection, the Elaine Smith interview on Ken Eto, One of my personal favorites was with Steve St. John and Joe Pistone on Lefty Ruggerio, My last interview ever with my recently deceased friend Denny Griffin as a tribute to Frank Culotta, and the two-part interview with Michael DiLeonardo. Gangland Wire 2022 This next year, I will continue researching stories and finding great guests who lived the life of a mobster or a copper or agent who investigated the mob. Please feel free to send me suggestions for guests and mob stories. I plan on spending a little more time with my YouTube channel, Gangland Wire. Until this last year, I had looked at this as a method to entice folks to my audio podcast. I have learned that many folks watch YouTube and never go to the podcast apps. I plan on another motorcycle tour of mob sties in the spring with my friend Kate Kozal. We are heading south through Hot Springs Arkansas (Owney Madden and the prohibition era resort for many mobsters). We will travel south into Louisana and end up in New Orleans where we will look at many mob sites along the way. Basil Banghart Chicago Mobster Basil Banghart was known as “The Owl” because of his unusually large eyes. In the 19202 and 30s, the cops and the press knew him as an underworld legend. He was a man that escaped from every prison from Atlanta to Soledad. He could fly planes, drive like a race car driver while shooting a machine gun with deadly accuracy. He committed mail heists that totaled at least a million dollars. Prison officials labeled him a professional criminal with an unfavorable prognosis. In short, Basil Bqnhart was an astute criminal who was without social conscience or scruples. Additionally, they reported his I.Q to be 107. A couple of older professional thieves named Gerald Chapman and George Dutch Anderson took a liking to Basil Banghart in the Atlanta Federal pen. They tutored him in the fine arts of mail robbery and prison escapes. In this first sentence at the federal pen in Atlanta, Banghart made his first escape attempt by jumping 25 feet from a window into a marsh area outside the walls. Authorities captured him across the county in Montana shortly. He escaped again with George Chapman in 1927 and the police caught him a year later trying to steal a car in Pittsburgh. Adding insult to injury, during this arrest and transport back to Atlanta, Banghart escaped again. He was being escorted by an F.B.I. agent. He was able to get to a phone alone and he called the local police and claim he was an F.B.I. agent who was escorting a prisoner he had been overpowered by the prisoner and the prisoner had taken the agent’s gun and credentials then handcuffed the real agent. He described the agent and claimed he was really the prisoner. When the cops arrived with drawn guns and confronted the agent, Banghart was able to walk out during the confusion and melee. The police found him a few months later in Knoxville in February of 1930. After he returned to Atlanta, Banghart escaped again and was arrested less than a year later in January 1932 committing an armed robbery ...

Prison story with Steve St. John Dec 27, 2021

Gary interviews Steve St. John about an interesting character Steve met in prison. Stephen Blumberg once lived off a $72,000 annual family trust fund. But, he helped a dark secret compulsion that will send him to prison more than once. Blumberg started as a child removing doorknobs and stained glass windows from the old houses that were slated for destruction in his childhood home of St. Paul. MN. His interest in Victorian architecture started his fascination with rare books. he found in college that the University of Minnesota library held thousands of like. Blumberg initially took items as a way to create a reference collection for his own use. Steve tells some great prison stories about this strange man. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” In 1990, federal authorities arrested Stephen Blumberg for the theft of thousands of rare books from 268 or more universities and museums throughout the United States and Canada. The government valued this haul at about US $5.3 million. In 1991, a federal judge sentenced Blumberg to 71 months in prison gave him a $200,000 fine. It was this conviction that sent him into a federal joint with my friend Steven St. John. On December 29, 1995, he completed his sentence and the BOP released him. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder Coverup click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

John Ambrose U.S. Marshall Dec 25, 2021

Witness Protection Failed The story of John T. Ambrose Merry Christmas Wiretappers. I am here in the studio alone today, and while noodling around, I found an interesting Chicago Outfit story that I had never heard. A U.S. Marshall named John Ambrose was assigned to help protect a government witness named Nick Calabrese. He revealed the location of this important witness in the Family Secrets trial. Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” U.S. Marshall’s Office The well-respected U.S. Marshal’s office is responsible for the security of government witnesses. The Mob and the Chicago Outfit, in particular, are well known for witness intimidation and even murder. So, WitSec (Witness Security) is a dangerous job on one hand while being boring on the other. According to the U.S. Marshals Service website, that agency is the nation’s oldest federal law enforcement entity, serving our country since 1789. President George Washington appointed the first 13 U.S. Marshals. At that time, Congress tasked them with arresting fugitives, the housing and transport of prisoners after arrest, before conviction and sentencing, plus witness security. The Marshals must protect all federal judges and their courtrooms. To the present day, they are a little-known but very active law enforcement agency. In the fiscal year 2010 alone, the Marshals Service arrested more than 36,100 federal fugitives. They are often assigned to Federal Task Forces in large cities for drug investigations when they are not out chasing criminals. The most sensitive function of the Marshals Service is the WITSEC or Witness Security Protection Program. The Marshals Service provides for the security, health, and safety of government witnesses and their immediate family members when there is evidence they are in danger because of their testimony. Most of their protectees were witnesses in organized crime, drug trafficking, terrorism, and other significant criminal enterprises prosecutions. The program started in 1971, and Marshals have relocated and protected more than 8,300 witnesses and 9,800 of their family members since that time. So far to date, no WITSEC participant who followed security guidelines was harmed while under the active protection of the U.S. Marshals. But there have been leaks, and today I am going to tell you about one. Nick Calabrese One of the most crucial witnesses against the Chicago Outfit was Nick Calabrese. We have interviewed his nephew Frank Calabrese Jr, and I suggest you go back and listen to that for more on the Calabrese crew. But Nick worked under the direction of his brother Frank Calabrese Sr. as part of a murder team and juice loan collection service. They were part of the 26th Street crew or Chinatown crew under a capo named Angelo The Hook LaPrietra. The headquarters was a social club called the Old Neighborhood Italian American Club at 26th and Princeton. On July 28, 1995, the federal government indicted Nicholas Calabrese and nine other organized crime figures using threats, violence, and intimidation to enforce the loan-sharking racket from 1978 until 1992. The other defendants were Frank Calabrese, Sr., Frank Calabrese, Jr., Kurt Calabrese, Robert Dinella, Philip J. Fiore, Terry Scalise, Kevin Kudulis, Louis Bombacino and Philip Tolomeo. Nick Calabrese eventually was found guilty of racketeering. On August 27, 1997, a Federal judge sentenced Calabrese to 70 months in federal prison. Now that is only five years and ten months. At his sentencing, Nicholas Calabrese apologized to the court, saying, “I caused a lot of problems for a lot of people.” I assume he had made his deal by then. As part of the plea arrangement, Calabrese admitted taking part in 14 murders ordered by The Hook LaPietra. The Chicago Tribune reveals the Secret After Nick Calabrese agreed to testify, the F.B.I. interviewed him in a federal correctional facility in Milan, Michigan. In 2003, an enterprising Chicago Tribune reporter named John Kass l...

Dominic Taddeo – Rochester Mob Dec 20, 2021

Dominic Taddeo and the Rochester Crime Family Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup click here Gary and his regular contributor Mob author and historian Camillius Robison discuss this obscure but important mob figure, Dominic Taddeo. The Rochester New York crime family was thought of as a major crew under Stefano Magaddino, the boss of the Buffalo New York Family. He asserted ownership and ran it through a member of the Buffalo family named Jake Russo. Russo was a weak leader and fell out of favor with Maggidino. Stanley Valenti from Buffalo and Frank Valenti, brothers, worked under the Pittsburgh mob boss, Jake LaRocca. Russo mysteriously disappeared in September 1964. Frank Valenti declared himself boss of Rochester. Magaddino was getting older and his inaction allowed Valenti to create his own Rochester Mafia family and he got recognition from the Commission. Frank Valenti ruled with an iron fist and after several high-profile mob murders in the late 1960s and in 1970s, law enforcement brought in a lot of assets to break the Rochester family. The Valentis fomented an audacious plan to defer law enforcement interest. On Columbus Day, 1970, members of the Rochester family planted bombs in two Black churches, the Monroe County Office Building, the U.S. Federal Courthouse, and the home of a union official. This ruse worked and the police and FBI suspected anti-Vietnam War protesters or other radical groups and shifted resources away from La Cosa Nostra. Amazed that his plan had succeeded, Valenti ordered further bombings to three synagogues and the home of a federal judge. They also hatched a plan to assassinate the county sheriff. After this audacious plan worked with some limited success, Valenti was confronted by some of his underlings about his running a separate crew and keeping all the profits to himself. By the end of the 19790s, the Valentis left Rochester and a new regime took over. the new leaders were Samuel “Red” Russotti became boss. Salvatore Gingello was the underboss and Piccarreto retained the position of consigliere. They had the backing of the New York Bonanno family and this ended any influence the Pittsburgh Family exerted over Rochester. Taddeo picks the winning side By the 1980s, Dominic Taddeo had risen to be one of the most vicious hitmen of the Rochester family. He became part of a hit team known as the A-Team working for the boss “Red” Russotti. During this time the Rochester family experienced a long mob war with many murders. In 1982 and 1983, Taddeo shot Nicholas Mastrodonato, Gerald Peluso, and Dino Tortatice to death during local mob wars. Rochester Consigliere Rene Piccarreto ordered A-Team hit man Dominic Taddeo to eliminate members of the renegade team. Taddeo was responsible for murdering Nicholas Mastrodonato on May 25, 1982. That August, Taddeo shot and killed Thomas Peluso, who was trying to take over the Rochester gambling operation. Taddeo shot Thomas Peluso, wounding him, and killing his brother Gerald. In August 1982, Taddeo killed Dino Toratice. Then in 1983, He shot Thomas Marotta seven times on April 13. Marotta survived and was known as the Rochester Clay Pigeon. In October 1987, federal authorities named Dominic Taddeo as a suspect in the shootings. He disappeared from sight for the next three years until someone captured him in 1989 and brought him back to Rochester. Dominic Taddeo pleads guilty to the murder of three men. A court sentenced Taddeo to 24 years in prison on that guilty plea and later the court gave him an additional 30 years on RICO charges. On the Lam The most interesting story out of Rochester and this murderous hitman, Dominic Taddeo is stranger than fiction. The FBI learned he had been storing cash, guns, camouflage clothing, binoculars, silencers, and other firearms accessories in several different New York and Pennsylvania storage facilities.

Jeffrey Sussman and Holocaust Fighters Dec 13, 2021

Jeffrey Sussman and the Holocaust Boxers This episode is a little different because we don’t deal with organized crime but with our friend Jeffrey Sussman on boxers who fought for the Auschwitz Concentration Camp guards and other Jewish fighters and the Nazis. One more thing, I am experimenting with placing a transcript of the show in the show notes. Let me know if you like or dislike this in the show note. Gary Jenkins 1:33 Welcome, all you Wiretappers Gangland Wire is back here in the studio. We’re talking with our good friend Jeffrey Sussman back in New York City. Welcome Jeffrey, great to have you back. Jeffrey Sussman 1:44 Thank you, Gary. It’s a pleasure to be back. Gary Jenkins 1:47 Guys. Jeffrey’s working on a book on Las Vegas. And he just interviewed me a little bit about what I remembered about the skim and that era of Las Vegas asked me a lot of detailed questions is going to be an overall view of Las Vegas, I would say right. Jeffrey Sussman Speaker 2:02 It’s going to be a view of how the mob first came to Vegas in the late 1940s. And then how corporate America kind of took it over in the 1980s 90s. Gary Jenkins 2:12 Interesting. There’s a guy kind of working on a documentary about this overall view of the mob from Los Angeles to Las Vegas. And then the mob got involved in the casino business. I did a little bit of research working with him on it. And it’s interesting how back then, the Los Angeles Police was more like the mafia. And then they move up to Las Vegas one of them did and start one of the early casinos and then the Italian Mafia kind of moved in behind this Los Angeles vice commander. I heard about you have another book that came out recently called Holocaust Fighters, Boxers Resisters and an Avengers I’m sorry, folks, I’ll send I couldn’t read my own writing down here. These guys that used to be I, you know, I’m not the slickest podcast host in the world, but we have a good time here. But Jeff, I’m really interested in this topic. I know you have a long-standing interest in boxing for can’t really remember the reason now your father took you to boxing a lot when you were a kid and you knew some boxers. Jeffrey Sussman 3:17 Well, my father was an amateur boxer. He gave me boxing lessons when I was 12 years old. And then after that, he knew a man named Lou Stillman, who had a famous boxing gym in New York called stillness. And he took me there and Lou Stillman arranged for a middle way. He gave me ten boxing lessons. And this was in the late 1950s. And the unbelievable price for the 10 boxing lessons was $100. And when I finished like a Stillman gym t-shirt, and I asked this guy the middleweight if I could get in the ring and box with someone, and I was a little skinny kid said to me, don’t be an idiot. You’re never gonna get out of the room. You’re gonna be killed. Gary Jenkins 3:59 You were in Stillman gym in the 1950s era right in the middle of lot of mobsters. Jeffrey Sussman 4:07 There were a lot of mobsters. And that’s where the subject of one of my books Rocky Graziano used to train. And as a matter of fact, the only film that I think is available of Stillman is in the movie Somebody Up There Likes Me, which is a film of that Rocky Graziano and part of it was filmed in that gym. I think it was torn down in the early 1960s. And there’s an apartment building. Gary Jenkins 4:27 Interesting. I just met a guy named Fratto, from Des Moines and he said his uncle was in the plane when Rocky Graziano went down. Jeffrey Sussman 4:37 That was Rocky Marciano. Gary Jenkins 4:38 I mean, oh, that was Rocky Marciano. That’s right. I got my Rockys mixed up. Jeffrey Sussman 4:42 A lot of people do. Gary Jenkins 4:44 Okay, so let’s talk about the Holocaust fighters. How’d you get interested and find out about this interesting topic? Jeffrey Sussman 4:52 My Interest in boxing led me into this because I came across a fighter named Harry Haft and I read a book about him and I became fascinated.

David Paul and MS-13 Dec 06, 2021

MS – 13 David Paul served with the Suffolk County Police Department for 20 years. Since that time, he has written true crime books, helped with Russian Organized Crime investigations, and has become an expert in the infiltration of Long Island by the MS-13 gang from El Salvador. This podcast tells the story of the MS-13 gang, how they got from El Salvador to Long Island, and about the crimes they have committed. David Paul, police officer, Russian organized crime expert, screenwriter and MS-13 expert David’s most popular book is Unearthing a Serial Killer and can be found by clicking on the title. In this book, David tells the horrifying story of Alex J. Mengel’s violent and brutal crime spree in the suburbs of New York City. He became the ‘Most Wanted’ man in North America in 1985. Thirty years later, other acts of evil committed by Mengel, were uncovered and that is what led David Paul to write Unearthing a Serial Killer. Transcript of the MS -13 story I am trying something new and I had the audio podcast transcribed and below you will find the unedited transcript of the entire show. let me know how you like hits effort. I have to pay a transcribing service and I cannot decide if it is worth the cost to have this done. Steven Colbert: You are listening to gang land wire hosted by former Kansas city police intelligence unit, detective Gary Jenkins. Gary Jenkins : Welcome while you are camera’s out there. I’m here on the cell phone, actually not the zoom this time. So there won’t be a video with my friend, David Paul, who is a retired Suffolk county police officer from [00:00:30] up in New York. He lives in upstate New York. Now he’s retired. He’s written a book on a serial killer, but more importantly for you. Guys’ information. He’s worked a lot on Ms. 13 and you know, we do organized crime primarily on this show. We’ve strayed out into serial killers a little bit, but we lack organized crime and learning about that. He knows about Russian organized crime even speaks Russian pretty fluently. It looks to me like, so now I couldn’t judge that because you can say anything to me in a Russian accent. [00:01:00] And then I just assume you were speaking Russian David. Welcome. Hi David Paul: Gary. Hey, thanks for having me on. I appreciate Gary Jenkins: It. All right. Cool. And I saw you on LinkedIn. I think for, at first, I am always just noodling around trying to find somebody, a guest for the show. That sounds interesting to me and I love getting other ex-coppers out there that are doing this kind of media stuff or writing books, doing documentary films. Like I am, I’ve done a couple of three books and then four documentary films all together as these guys know. [00:01:30] And so I love talking to you guys. So let’s talk a little bit about your and my police experience. Now. I was in the organized crime unit and that’s for most of my career. I did a little bit of everything. What did you do back there in separate county? David Paul: I’ll tell you what I was in the car of my whole career. I just didn’t have enough political juice to make the phone ring. Yeah. And you know, we had a saying great job, terrible career, but it, I had a lot of fun, especially [00:02:00] my first, you know, 10, 11 years. So I worked actually in Brentwood, Bayshore, which is in Suffolk county, long island. And it’s probably the biggest hub of Ms. 13 guys in New York state, to be honest with you. So I was in patrol for, uh, another whole 21 years. My last 13 or 14, I did the midnights, which I knew would know, not a lot of good decisions, man, after midnight. Gary Jenkins: Oh [00:02:30] man, I tell you what the worst call is at about four 30 or so in the morning disturbance or domestic disturbance or just disturbance because at four 30 in the morning, people have been drinking all night long and they are nuts. Nothing good comes up. Disturbance called after about 4, 4 30 in the morning, the earlier ones,

Nick “Nick the Blade” Gesuale Nov 29, 2021

Nick The Blade – early years Eugene “Nick the Blade” Gesuale was a notorious Capo in the Genovese Crime Family. He also was the infamous “Pittsburgh Connect” in the movie Goodfellas and the guy that sup[plied narcotics to Henry Hill. Nick the Blade Gesuale grew up in the East Liberty section of Pittsburgh. He stared in the mob as a numbers runner like many other budding young gangsters. He dropped out of Central Catholic High School and started learning the trade of cutting hair at the Pittsburgh Beauty Academy. He will use this skill during his many years in prison. This seems like an unusual occupation for the real tough gangster Gesuale, but he was as tough as they come. The cops arrested Nick the Blade as many as 13-14 times from 1959 to 1981. The prosecutor could never get a conviction because all the witnesses refused to testify. Gesuale got this nickname, Nick the Blade, after he sued a knife in several fights. I found stories about his famous temper and knife ability like he sliced up a man’s face for checking out his girlfriend and he supposedly stabbed a guy at a brawl after a basketball game. The Pittsburgh police arrested him for many assaults in the 1970s and ’80s, including a shooting in a parking lot, and after they arrested him for running over a man with his car. As usual, no convictions because the victims refused to cooperate with the prosecution. Nick the Blade in Prison It was reported in Real Crime magazine a prisoner once said that Nick the Blade was a throwback gangster who did not “mess around” and “if he had a problem with you, he would tell you and if it was serious, he would strap up and you would not see it coming even at 70 years old.” The Genovese Family in Pittsburgh Most people think that the Genovese Family was restricted to New York City but they often had small enclaves of territory in upstate New York and in Pennsylvania. The mob has been active in western Pennsylvania since the 1920s because it was prime territory for bootlegging during Prohibition and there was already a sizable Sicialian populatio. The Genovese branch in Pittsburgh has been well konw for running narcoitics, gambling, loansharking and labor racketeering in Steel City for many years. FBI records show that Nick the Blade Gesuale “made his bones” for the gangland murder of a low level gangster named Alphonse Marano in 1967. The Pitsburgh underboss Joseph “Jo Jo” Pecora ordered this maan murdered becuse he had unknowlingly introduced an undercover IRS agent to himslef and other mobsters. Later after the resulting investigaiton the IRS arrested Pecora at the mob Marano’s social club where Marano was runing a interstate gambling racket. Nick the Blade and Narcotics Nick the Blade Gesuale became a well-known and notorious feared mobster by the 1980s. Another criminal reported to Real Cime that he was Pittsburgh’s biggest heroin trafficker by the 1908s. A judge would describe him as vicious, amoral, and that he was “as bad as it gets” in the criminal underworld. The IRS claimed he had earned as much as a million dollars in 1980 dollars during this time. He was a kilo weight dealer. Throughout the 1970s and into the 1980s, Nick the Blade was one of Pittsburgh biggest narcotic’s traffickers. The Pittsburgh mafia bosses used Nick the Blade as an enforcer because they knew he was an all-in Mafia member and would practice the code of Omerta. He was a liaison between Outlaw bikers and the Mafia because he was in the narcotics business with the bikers. Fearsome Drug Kingpin and the Goodfellas connection A Pennsylvania Crime Commission report in 1990 claimed the LaRocca/Genovese La Cosa Nostra family and the Pagans motorcycle gang were the largest and most feared narcotics organization in western Pennsylvania. The FBI once asked the Pittsburgh mob boss, John LaRocca, why he kept around a volatile man like Gesuale. Larocca replied, “He keeps the heat off of us.” Nick the Blade lived a lavish life flaunting his wealth everywhere.

Gotti in USP Marion Nov 22, 2021

John Gotti Arrives In this reboot of an old podcast, I talk with my friend David Layman who was a guard at the federal prison at Marion. He describes the day Gotti arrived at the Reception and Diagnostic Unit. David said men gathered around looking and watching like a movie star was being processed. He heard people yelling how much they loved Gotti, how they would do anything for him, and other expressions of admiration for the former mob boss. David tells about the day-to-day life of the famous mob boss inside the walls of Marion. Learn more about his relationship with the feared prison gang, the Aryan Brotherhood. David noticed Gotti sat with the leaders of the AB at meals. He observed that during this time the Aryan Brotherhood engaged in business-like conversations with Gotti. He claimed that after meeting Gotti, the feared prison gang changed some tactics and did not rise to minor slights or signs of disrespect from other prisoners. They maintained a more business-like demeanor. Gotti takes a beat-down David was the second guard to arrive on the scene when Walter Johnson was beating Gotti down. We get an insider’s version of both the events leading up to the beating and the aftermath. Gotti will die in prison and Walter Johnson will be released. Johnson does not stay out long until he is convicted of killing a Washington DC police officer. Show notes by Gary Jenkins Venmo @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Jesus Ruiz Henao aka Mr. Big Nov 15, 2021

Jesus Ruiz Henao Gary interviews the well-known true crime author Ron Chepesiuk and Jesus Ruiz Henao (aka Mr. Big). Gary gets the inside story of the largest single cocaine supplier to Great Britain during the 1990s. The famous English law enforcement organization known as MI-5 reported to British newspapers that when they took down the Henao organization, the price of cocaine increased by 50%. Henao tells the story of a young immigrant who works hard to establish himself in the cocaine business in Columbia. He gets an opportunity to help expand his bosses operation to Europe Jesus Ruiz Henao and the Sicilians Ron Chepesiuk and Jesus tell how his Columbian boss sent him to meet with the Sicilian mafia in Sicily. They liked what he had to say so much that they directed him to meet with a member of the mafia in London England. He learned that the British Isles are considered an open market with lax law enforcement to cocaine smuggling and drug use in general. He takes this information back to Columbia and over the next few years, they set up a supply line of cocaine from Columba to ports in Spain and Portugal where the cocaine is transported overland to England. Along the way, he bribes border guards, customs officials, and various law enforcement officers to keep out of trouble. During this time Jesus Ruiz Henao maintained a very low profile while living in England. He even went so far as to keep a regular job as a delivery driver to maintain his cover. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Polly Adler: The Madam to the Mob Nov 08, 2021

Madam Polly Adler Non-fiction author Debby Applegate discusses the famous New York madam Polly Adler. We learn how Ms. Adler came to America as a Russian Immigrant Jew and how she rose to prominence and achieved a certain amount of fame in New York Society in the same manner as other Jewish emigrants like Meyer Lansky. With most other opportunities denied her because she was Jewish, she turned to crime. Starting from the Brownsville Jewish ghetto in New York City, she learned that the only work available to her would result in a lifetime of drudgery and starvation. When a pregnancy results from date rape, Polly turned to a back alley abortionist. From this start, Polly Adler decided she is a ruined woman and turned to prostitution. Polly Adler and the Mob During prohibition, law enforcement directed a lot of attention toward the existing house of prostitution. Like the speakeasies, this drove the prostitutes underground. Polly Adler was an organizer and a natural leader. She rented an apartment and started a “Call House.” She had a book of clients that was growing all the time. She entertained men at her house and called in other girls. The famous gambler and mob fixer of the World Series, Arnold Rothstein took notice and admired her business sense. He gave her his approval among his underworld pals and her business grew. She was introduced to Lucky Luciano, Dutch Schultz, and Frank Costello among others. Lucky always used her girls when he wanted to entertain out-of-town guests. Dutch Schultz and Polly Adler had a strong relationship to the point that when Schultz was on the run from Tom Dewey’s men and other gangsters, he hid out in Polly’s house. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Giovanni Rocco Undercover with the Mob Oct 25, 2021

Giovanni Rocco Giovanni Rocco tells Gary his experiences as he infiltrated the DeCavalcante crime family AKA The Real Sopranos. Rocco was able to gain the confidence of the DeCavalcante hierarchy. He tells about the problems and rewards of working undercover on extended investigations that took years. He uses the tough guy characters he saw as he grew up in a working-class family in Bayonne New Jersey. He was a cop’s kid but also a wayward kid who is bored and looking for action. He started working the mean streets of northeast Jersey as a telephone repairman. He joins a police department and because of his father. Once he pays his dues as a patrol officer, because of his local accent and attitude, his Chief puts him undercover in a biker gang. This starts Giovanni Rocco on a long career of working so far undercover that at times he forgets who he really is. Charlie “The Hat” Stango Giovanni Rocco assumes the identity of Giovanni Gatto as he moves closer to an organized crime crew headed by Charlie Stango. Giovanni Rocco was part of a DEA/FBI task force and they provide him with “swag” or property that he can use to give the appearance that he has access to stolen property. He used these high-end designer clothes and shoes to trade for cocaine. Stango takes notice of Giovanni Rocco aka Gatto and recruits him into his crew as an associate. From here he will help make cases on many New Jersey mobsters. At the end of this investigation, the Feds placed Giovanni and his wife into Witness Protection and they now live under new identities. Giovanni Rocco uses his experiences in working undercover to help other former law enforcement officers who experience PTSD from their work. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon William Jahoda Oct 21, 2021

William Jahoda William Jahoda was an Outfit gambler connected to Rocco Infelise, the ruthless consigliere of the Chicago mob. He and others run the most profitable gambling house in Chicago. The entire operation is dubbed the Good Ship Lollipop. At first, under Solly DeLaurentis, the Lake County crew are making money and not making any waves. This operation turns into a mess of greed, jealousy, and murder. After William Jahoda is forced to lure a couple of men to their deaths, he becomes disillusioned. Then he falls in love with a girl who recently dated his crew’s boss Solly DeLaurentis and he knows this could mean death for him. He decided to become a government witness. He contacts Thomas Moriarty of the IRS Intelligence unit because he has heard that Infeliise has a federal agent on his payroll. Moriarty is well now to be a straight incorruptible agent. Jahoda will meet with Moriarity and wear a wire on his Outfit bosses. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Vincent Rizza Oct 18, 2021

Vincent Rizza Vincent Rizza was a former Chicago cop who was a tipster to Outfit members, a gambler, a sports bookie, and a cocaine addict. His claim to fame later in life is that his daughter Pia Rizza was on a Mob Housewives TV show. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Ken Eto Oct 11, 2021

Ken Eto and Vince Solano An American-born man of Japanese extraction left the internment camps after World War II and landed in Chicago. Ken Eto was a professional gambler who received notice from the Outfit. By the 1970s, Vince Solano, boss of the Rush Street crew took over all Bolita action and he placed Ken Eto in charge. The FBI made a gambling case on Eto and before he appeared for sentencing, he assured Solano that he could do the time and he would not turn into a witness. Vince Solano did not want to take a chance and he dispatched two of his men named Jasper Campise and John Gattuso to murder Eto. they bungled the hit and Eto survived. A few months later Solano had his two errant hitmen murdered. Ken Eto and Elaine Smith FBI agent Elaine Smith had made the original case on Eto. She was part of the team who turned Eto and she became his minder turning the time when he started testifying about every Outfit secret he knew. They even flew him to Kansas City for the Las Vegas casino skim trials where he identified the Outfit hierarchy and told the jury that this was a criminal organization and was able to identify the hierarchy and tell how they worked. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Mario Rainone Oct 07, 2021

Mario Rainone Mario John “the Arm” Rainone saw a couple of guys tailing him and thought he was being set up for a hit. Rainone was preparing to take out a building inspector after his boss ordered the hit. As he followed his intended victim, he noticed a couple of other Outfit men named Rudy Fratto and Willie Messino were flowing him. He realized that he was actually the intended target. Rainone ran to his vehicle and escaped. he contacted the FBI in Chicago and told his story. He had been known as a vicious enforcer and collector for the OUtfit and the agents were skeptical. They offered to help only if he would wear a wire and help make cases against his Outfit bosses. Rainone must have given himself away because after obtaining a couple of conversations on his wire, someone exploded a bomb on his mother’s front stoop. He gave up his chance for witness protection pleaded guilty to extortion and racketeering. Lennie Patrick Mario Rainone cooperated long enough to record damaging conversations with Outfit enforcer Lenny Patrick. This was a significant find for the FBI. Lennie Patrick was a Jewish gambler how had murdered his way to the top of the Jewish sports bookmaking underworld on the west side of Chicago. The Outfit granted him the right to handle all those bookies and essentially made him a crew leader. After Rainone’s revelations, the FBI made a case on Patrick and he turned on the OPutfit’s main political fixer Gus Yaras and the boss at the time, Sam Carlisi. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Paul Panczko Oct 04, 2021

Paul Panczko Gary, Camillus Robinson, and Paul Whitcolmbe discuss the chain of events that started with Paul “Peanuts” Panczko and ended with the FBI making informants and government witnesses out of Duke Baisle and Gerald Scarpelli. These two men were long-time Outfit thieves, armed robbers, burglars, hitmen, and enforcers. First, we go back to Paul Panczko. He was a well-known career criminal who did burglaries and other crimes with his brothers. They were known as the Polish Robinhoods. He was once arrested by Chicago cop Dennis Farina (famous for his role as Lt. Mike Terrillo on Crime Story) for carrying a gun. The Chicago PD turned him and he started wearing a wire. He would commit a robbery of the Balmoral racetrack with outfit associate James “Duke” Basile. The FBI approaches Basile and he turns and wears a wire on Gerald Scarpelli. Gerald Scarpelli By 1989, what Paul Panczko put into motion when he helped turned Basile starts bearing results. Basile wore a wire on a more important Outfit member named Gerald Scarpelli. He was a member of the hit team called the Wild Bunch and had participated in many hits. Basile gets him to admit o many of his crimes and even tells about a mob graveyard in DuPage county. The FBI was able to find three bodies in this area. Basile’s information on Scarpelli allowed the FBI to turn him and he made a 500-page confession in which he detailed many Outfit secrets. He admitted to helping in 10 murders. He will commit suicide while the feds held him in the Cook County jail. Many folks speculate that Outfit heavy Frank “The German” Schweihs murdered him because he was in the same jail and even in the same general area. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Betty Tocco Sep 30, 2021

Betty Tocco Outfit wife Gary, Camillus Robinson, and Paul Whitcombe take a look at Betty Tocco, the wife of Al Tocco who was the boss of what was called the South Side Crew. He had married a beautiful brunette but she should have gotten a clue. She claimed their first date was a visit to a brothel so Al Tocco could pick up some money. Over the years, he abused Betty Tocco while threatening her life. He often told her to pack all her belongings because they were going on the lam and disappeared himself for long periods. Al Tocco was a protege of Al Pilotto who had been the long-time boss of this south-side crew. They extorted money from gamblers, prostitutes and loaned money at loan sharks’ rates of interest. To not repay the loan shark Al Tocco invited a beating or worse from Tocco or his chief enforcer Clarence Crockett. Betty Tocco the final straw She testified that she did not really understand what Tocco was until on Father’s Day, he called her in a panic. Al directed Betty Tocco to pick him up in rural Indiana next to a cornfield. On the ride home Al Tocco raged about how they had murdered the Spilotro brothers and he was in charge of disposing of the bodies. They were interrupted and his men ran off and left him stranded. She will later testify that she had to cancel a barbeque planned for that afternoon with her relatives. She said, “What was I supposed to tell them that my husband just killed the Spilotro brothers and buried their bodies.” She also testified that he said Billy Dauber was killed because he was talking. She will be the first mob wife to testify against her husband. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

1989 Year of the Stool Pigeon Robert Cooley Sep 27, 2021

Robert Cooley Outfit Stool Pigeon Robert Cooley and his impact on the Chicago Outfit is examined in this first of seven short episodes on the year 1989 which became known as the Year of the Stool Pigeon. Outfit historians Camilius Robinson and Paul Whitcombe discuss the importance of Robert Cooley. He was a former Chicago Police Officer, son of a Chicago cop who worked as a lawyer in the notorious and corrupt Cook County court system. Cooley volunteered his services to the FBI out of a guilty conscience and he had a side benefit of being able to walk away from a huge gambling debt. Harry Aleman and double jeopardy Harry Aleman was a notorious hitman and enforcer for Joe Ferriola boss of the Cicero Crew. The FBI turned an Outfit associate named Lou Almeida. The Outfit learned that Almeida was going to testify that he drove the getaway car when Harry Aleman murdered a low-level Teamster named Billy Logan. The Cook County prosecutor found another eyewitness and took Aleman to a jury trial. Someone in the Outfit contacted Robert Cooley because he had participated in putting in the “fix” on many cases. He knew which judge, bailiff, clerk, or police officer he could bribe. In the Aleman murder case, Cooley made sure a judge named Frank Wilson was assigned to the trial. He told Aleman’s defense attorney to ask for a bench trial and he paid Judge Wilson a $10,000 bribe. Sure enough, Wilson returned a not-guilty verdict stating the eye-witness and the getaway driver were not believable. Cooley turns After Robert Cooley turned into a state’s witness, he testified about the bribe to Judge Wilson. The Cook County prosecutor refiled the same murder case against Harry Aleman. The defense claimed double jeopardy or that the state cannot try the same case again after a not-guilty verdict. The new judge ruled that the corruption was so bad the first trial was not really a trial. the prosecution also used former Chicago cop Vince Rizza who will be discussed in a later episode. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Dave Schratweiser on Joey Merlino Sep 20, 2021

Joey Merlino returns to Philadelphia Dave Schratweiser is the co-host of Mob Talk Sitdown with well-known Philadelphia Mob reporter and author George Anastasia. Dave talks with Gary about the most recent activities out of the Philadelphia organized crime family. Right after we recorded Dave texted me and let me know about another breaking story and that was Joey Merlino had returned to the Philadelphia area from his home in Florida. He reported that Merlino made the rounds and visiting with his Philadelphia contacts all weekend plus he was seen visiting the Mob headquarters at 9th and Christian. dave’s sources reported he attended a Phillies game against the Colorado Rockies two nights in a row. He said to look for him to release some photos because mob fans made use of their cell phones. Dave reported he was later seen at a South Philly sports bar watching the Eagles/Falcons postgame show. Philadelphia FBI record Mafia induction Ceremony Even though Joey Merlino is the boss of the Philly Family, the business must go on. He left his underboss Steven Mazzone to run the day-to-day business. I am betting Joey Merlino is not happy with his underboss because while Merlino was in Florida, Mazzone allowed an FBI informant to wear a wire into the room where he was conducting a “making” ceremony. Now, these tapes are being played in court much to the disapproval of Skinny Joey Merlino. A Capo named Dominic Grande was recorded directing future mob activities and directing them to establish a stronger presence in Atlantic City. Dave agrees that this is a most embarrassing situation for the Philadelphia family. The Actual Ceremony During the ceremony, a mobster was recorded asking someone, “Now, you’ll use these, for us. Right?” The FBI explained this was a reference to a gun and knife laying on the table. Just like the few other first-hand reports of a Mob induction ceremony, someone stated, “If I betray this family, betray my friends, I’ll burn in hell forever.” Later the Agent heard someone introducing the new members to the LCN members that were present. They even heard Grande being called a “Caporegime.” .

The Philadelphia Black Mafia with Sean Griffin Sep 13, 2021

Philadelphia Black Mafia – the origins Gary interviews former Philadelphia Police officer turned college professor Sean Patrick Griffin on the Philadelphia Black Mafia. The Philadephia Black Mafia was one of the bloodiest crime syndicates in modern US history. From its roots in Philadelphia’s ghettos in the 1960s, it grew from a rabble of street toughs to a disciplined organization. They exerted their influence across the entire Eastern Seaboard via murders and other intimidation tactics. Known in its “legitimate” guise as Black Brothers, Inc., they held regular meetings. The Philadelphia black mafia maintained employees who were investigators, treasurers, and enforcers. They controlled Philadelphia drug dealing, loan-sharking, numbers rackets, armed robbery, and extortion. The founder Sam Christian was the most feared man on the streets of Philadelphia. He was a thinker and a planner. He saw how influential the Nation of Islam was, he formed a partnership with them. Soon, this deadly combination executed rivals, extorted Mafia bookies, and eliminated all other local gangs. The Black Mafia was suspected in more than forty murders. In one crime, they sent a hit team to Washington DC in 1973 and murdered two adults and five children in Washington, D.C. This attack was because the occupants of the house were connected to the hanafi Muslin sect and they had been critical of Elijah Muhammed the leader of the Nation of Islam. After the DC police arrested the entire hit team, they continued domination of Philadelphia crime. they were known to exploit prominent lawyers and civil rights leaders. Even after the government arrested and convicted the older members, a younger Junior black mafia emerged to dominate the Crack Cocaine market. Sean Patrick Griffin Sean Patrick Griffin, Professor of Criminal Justice at The Citadel (Charleston, SC), received his Ph.D. in the Administration of Justice (Sociology) from The Pennsylvania State University. Dr. Griffin had written books and articles on police legitimacy, police abuse of force, the social construction of white-collar crime, securities frauds, professional sports gambling, international narcotics trafficking, money laundering, political corruption, labor racketeering, and organized crime. Dr. Griffin also wrote the best-selling book, Black Brothers, Inc.: The Violent Rise and Fall of Philadelphia’s Black Mafia (Milo, 2005/2007). Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael DiLeonardo Bonus Sep 05, 2021

In this short episode, Michael DiLeonardo tells how he was inducted into the Gambino crime family by Sammy the Bull Gravano. He was inducted with John Gotti Jr. and John Gotti asked Gravano to conduct the ceremony because it did not look good for him to induct his own son. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To buy my Kindle book, Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos. To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Jimmy Burke aka Jimmy the Gent Aug 30, 2021

Jimmy Burke in the Movies A listener named Paul Blackwood from Edinburgh Scotland emailed me with some great compliments on the show and suggested I do a story that focuses on “Jimmy the Gent” Burke. I looked around and he is mentioned in several podcasts but only as part of the famous Lufthansa heist. James “Jimmy the Gent” Burke is one of the most famous Mob associates of all time. We use the word “associate” because he was not Sicilian or even Italian or 1/2 Italian. We know about him mainly because another mob associate, Henry Hill, turned on Burke and became a government witness. Jimmy Burke led a crew of professional thieves and this was documented in the book titled Wiseguys by Nicholas Pileggi. Filmmaker Martin Scorsese produced and directed a film from Pileggi’s book titled GoodFellas When Robert DeNiro took the part of Jimmy Burke, his place in mob history was cemented. In my humble opinion, this book and film were arguably the best and most accurate depictions of the day-to-day life of a mob crew. The screenwriters in the 1990 film Goodfellas changed the name of Jimmy the Gent Burke to “Jimmy Conway.” Some claim that the real-life gangster Jimmy Burke was so happy to have Robert DeNiro play him that he phoned him from prison to give him a few pointers. Author/screenwriter Nicholas Pileggi denies this, saying DeNiro and Burke had never spoken, but admitting that there were men around the set all the time who had known all of the principal characters very well. In another Hollywood depiction of this crew, Burke was played by Donald Sutherland in the television film The Big Heist. Jimmy Burke History He was born in Bronx, New York. He was the illegitimate son of Jane Conway, a prostitute who was an immigrant from Dublin, Ireland. The name of his father was never known. At age two the social services placed little Jimmy Conway in the first of many foster homes. A large part of his early years was spent in a Roman Catholic orphanage run by nuns. They say he never saw his mother again and never knew who his father was. As with many of these throw-away kids, he was in many different foster homes and other institutions for orphans. he would suffer physical and sexual abuse in these places. A pivotal event shaped his future life at age 13. He got into an argument with a foster father while the car was moving. The man turned to smack Burke in the back seat and crashed the car. The foster father died in that crash. The deceased man’s widow blamed Burke gave him regular beatings until he was taken back into foster care. Sometime after this incident, a family named Burke took him in as a foster child. He finally got lucky and they created a clean, comfortable and safe environment for the teenage Jimmy Burke. He lived out his teenage years on Rockaway Beach close to Ocean Promenade. Burke never forgot their kindness and for the rest of his life, he visited these foster parents and when he started making money he would leave unmarked envelopes of cash for them periodically. The “Burke” family adopted him and he took the family name. Some folks believe that he buried part of the 1978 Lufthansa heist loot at the Burke house. It is a fact that the majority of the take from this Caper has never been found. As he approached his later teen years, Burke’s trouble with the law became more serious. At age eighteen in 1949, authorities sentenced him to five years in prison for forgery. He was passing counterfeit checks for a Colombo family member named Dominick “Remo” Cersani. The police made him for passing $3,000 dollars of these counterfeit checks at an Ozone Park bank. After his arrest and Burke refused to inform after being offered a free ride because they wanted the mobster Remo, not an 18-year-old underling like Burke. He refused and earned Remo’s eternal gratitude. Remo nicknamed Jimmy “the Irish Guinea” When he went to prison, Remo arranged for his protection from other mob members already incarcerated. The Early Years

Vito Genovese with Anthony DeStefano Aug 23, 2021

Vito Genovese – The Deadly Don Gary interviews Pulitizer Prize-winning Anthony DeStefano on his most recent true crime history, The Deadly Don. Mr. DeStefano writes about the rise and fall of Vito Genovese. This is the very first comprehensive telling of this feared mafioso. Like most mobsters, he began his criminal career on the mean streets of lower Manhattan. He returned to Italy during the 1930s and was stuck there once World War II began. Genovese thrived, running a black market operation under the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini. The Return of the Don After the Second World War was over, Vito Genovese returned to his place as the underboss of the Lucky Luciano Family where he made a fortune as the head of an illegal narcotics empire. DeStefano writes about the role Genovese played in the creation of the Mafia, his rise to the top after he pushed Frank Costello aside to take over the Lucky Luciano family. We discuss Genovese’s narcotics conviction that led to the creation of the most famous mob informant of all, Joe Valachi. Anthony DeStefano Anthony DeStefano has been a prolific and skilled chronicler of the New York Crime Families. He wrote Top Hoodlum: the Frank Costello Story, Gotti’s Boys, Vinnie Gorgeous: The Ugly Rise and Fall of a New York Mobster, King of the Godfathers: The Rise and Fall of Joey Massino, The Big Heist, Gangland New York, and Mob Killer. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bobby Luisi Aug 16, 2021

Boston Bob Luisi Bobby Luisi was a mafia legacy growing up in the North End of Boston. His father and other relatives worked for the Boston capo Jerry Angiulo. As a young man, Bobby got into home construction and was doing week until the market crash in the 1990s. Bobby Lusi drifted back to his roots, the La Cosa Nostra. He had a good name and he organized some young drug dealers, opened up a loansharking business, and got into some gambling action. The Boston Family had a lot of internal conflict after the death of Raymond Patriarca. Bobby tells how he was under a lot of heart from the various federal agencies and the State Patrol when he had a problem with a Boston Capo under Patriarca. Boston Bob goes to Philadelphia Bobby Luisi tells how he was good friends with Gerald “Jerry’ Oumette from Providence Rhode Island and he negotiated for Luisi to join a Gambino faction. When that fell through, he migrated south to Philadelphia. Here he was connected to Joe “Skinny Joe” Merlino and George Borgesi who welcomed him into their organization. As he got set up with his own crew, a Philadelphia turncoat mobster named Ron Previte recruited him and introduced him to an FBI undercover officer. This introduction will end his career in the Mafia. Bobby Luisi becomes Pastor Alonso Esposito The FBI Undercover and informant Ron Previte set up Bobby Luisi and he was convicted of drug dealing. During his prison time, he agreed to testify against a Boston mobster and he was released in 2o12. But, he never testified and ended up working construction in Memphis Tennessee under the name Alonso Esposito. It was here that he had a change of heart and started a Christian ministry and became pastor Alonso Esposito. At the present time, he has returned to his original name Bobby Luisi and he is working on a book about his life in the mob. bobby Luisi has a Youtube Channell called the Bobby Lusi Show where he interviews other former mobsters about life in the mob. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Jimmy Fratianno – Bonus episode Aug 12, 2021

Jimmy Frattiano and the Two Tonys This is a bonus episode with a telling of the story of how Fratianno made his bones by murdering the Two Tonys from Kansas City. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Jimmy Fratianno and his Lawyer Aug 09, 2021

Jimmy Fratianno and the Lawyer Dennis McDonald was a civil lawyer who became fast friends with Jimmy Fratianno just before he went into witness protection. This is a rare interview with Dennis McDonald who gives listeners a rare insight into a member of the La Cosa Nostra. After a life of crime, the government was expending a lot of resources on nailing Jimmy Fratianno. As this was happening, he wanted to hire a civil lawyer to file a lawsuit in a business deal. He interviewed a San Franciso area lawyer named Dennis McDonald and hired him. this began a friendship that would last the rest of his life. Gary was asked to appear on another podcast as an expert on Fratianno and during his preparation, he located Dennis Mcdonald on his retirement ranch in Montana. This is an interview of Mr. McDonald’s remembrances of his time as Jimmy Fratianno’s confidant, friend, and advisor. James Aladena Fratianno – Background James Aladena “Jimmy the Weasel” Frantianno started his life of crime in Cleveland. As with most of these guys, he started stealing as a teenager. As a matter of act, he was being chased by a cop who exclaimed he looked like a Weasel as he ran away. Others picked up on that nickname and he was known by the sops and the press as Jimmy the Weasel the rest of his life. As with most young Italian immigrants, he did some time and never talked to the cops. He was released from a long robbery sentence right after World War II and again like many Americans, life in California seemed to hold opportunities he could not find in Cleveland. Older mobsters advised Jimmy Fratianno to find Johnny Roselli, the Chicago Outfit man in California for connections. He quickly fell in as an enforcer and collector for Mickey Cohn’s gambling operation. When the split came between Cohn and Jack Dragna, Fratianno chose his paisans in the Mafia. He orchestrated the murder of the Two Tony’s, Tony Brancato and Tony Trombino for holding up protected gamblers. Dragna rewarded him with his induction into that crime family. Jimmy Fratianno went on to own a successful trucking company and a roving fixer for other mob families throughout the United States. He will end his mob career as a co-boss of the Los Angeles Family with Tom Dragna. After he is asked to help murder his friend Frank “The Bomp” Bompensiaro, Dragna tries to discredit him with other mobsters. He learned he has significant government problems and about to be charged with a murder conspiracy with Frank Fertitta for the bombing murder of Cleveland racketeer Danny Greene. the final straw was when he noticed a couple of men in his neighborhood who he believed were sent to kill him. He will end up in witness protection after these events. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Dan Moldea on Finding Jimmy Hoffa Jul 26, 2021

Dan Moldea Dan Moldea describes himself as Ahab and his White Whale is the missing Teamster boss James R. Hoffa and maybe even solving the crime. In this episode, he tells about this journey from a clandestine meeting with Chicago Outfit hitman Charles Crimaldi to a more credible source who was close to one of the men who may have disposed of the body. The Books of Moldea Mr. Moldea has reported on the mob, union racketeering, and political corruption all of his adult life. He is the author of books about the rise and fall of Jimmy Hoffa, the murder of an Ohio businessman, the Mafia’s penetration of Hollywood, its links to Ronald Reagan, and its influence on professional football, as well as works about the assassination of Senator Robert Kennedy, the O.J. Simpson murder case, the suicide of White House Deputy Counsel Vincent Foster, the Anthony Pellicano wiretapping scandal and prosecution, and corruption in higher education via the student-loan program and for-profit colleges. Click here to see his books. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Mad Sam and Sam Giancana Part 5 Jul 19, 2021

Crimaldi tells about Mad Sam DeStefano going to Outfit boss Sam Giancana and asking for a package deal to murder three men. One was a man named Leo Foreman and Giancana gave his permission. The second was a man Peter Cappollitti who owed Mad Sam money. Giancana refused his permission reminding DeStefano about a time in the recent past where Capolitti was in other trouble and DeStefano had pleaded for Cappolettii’s life because Cappy owned juice money to him. The third was a business deal that had gone bad and a partner named Earnest “Rocky” Infelise owed DeStefano money. Giancana told Mad Sam to use his own judgment but Infelise was connected and there could be trouble with another mobster named Joey Aiuppa. Crimaldi tells how they kidnapped Infelise and after a promise to pay when a big jewelry score came in, they released him. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Crimaldi talks about other murder plans Part 4 Jul 15, 2021

Charles Crimaldi tells Robert Wiedrich about his day-to-day life. He recounts a situation where he warns off a guy he did not want to kill but warned the guy, if he showed up a certain place, Crimaldi would have to kill him. He tells about the time DeStefano wanted him to murder a judge. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Day to Day life of a Hitman Part 3 Jul 12, 2021

Crimaldi tells about the day-to-day life of working for a maniac like Mad Sam DeStefano. He tells how DeStefano got himself placed in a hospital while incarcerated. He paid off the guards to leave the room while he conducted his loan shark business. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Charles Crimaldi Part 2 Northlake Hospital Jul 08, 2021

Suburban Hospital Hideout In this episode, Charles Crimaldi tells Chicago Tribune reporter Robert Wiedrich about Northlake Community Hospital. He alleges the Outfit owned a man he knew as Dr. Bruni and this doctor would admit wanted men and allow them to hide from the authorities. He said the Outfit might take over a whole ward on a weekend and run big Gin Rummy tournaments. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Charles Crimaldi – Outfit Hitman Part 1 Jul 05, 2021

Charles “Chuckie” Crimaldi – Portrait of a Hitman Chicago mob hitman Charles Crimaldi once explained his job this way: ”I’ve broken arms, and I’ve broken legs, and I’ve watched a man die with a knife in his throat. But most of them had it coming, so what’s the difference? I have no regrets.” This series of shows is taken from a 1973 Chicago Tribune series by reporter Robert Wiedrich. He titled this “Portrait of a Hitman.” This well-known mob reporter obtained a series of interviews with Crimaldi in a series of secret locations. We learn how Crimaldi had turned on his Outfit boss “Mad Sam” DeStefano because he had ordered him murdered. The reason for this was because Mad Sam had gone to prison and his wife, Anita, was going to close out the books on his loan sharking business. Crimaldi had expected to take over this business and was disappointed. Crimaldi claimed that Mad Sam did not want his books closed and his wife told her husband that Crimaldi quit the business and this caused his debtors to stop paying. Shortly after that, a man tried to run Chuckie Crimaldi off the road and Crimaldi viciously beat him and told him to take a message back to Mad Sam that he better send someone better than this to do this job. An enraged Mad Sam sent two others to murder Crimaldi and he was able to avoid them. Sam DeStefano and the Leo Foreman Murder The main thing that Crimaldi had on DeStefano was the murder of a gambler named Leo Foreman. He testified that Mad Sam DeStefano personally participated with Tony Spilotro in this murder. Crimaldi will help the government with several other Chicago outfit investigations before he is relocated to Texas. The Death of Charles Crimaldi After 40 years in hiding, Crimaldi died in 2020. He was living in Austin Texas and was using the name of Chuck Cazzola. He owned a plumbing company and brought a little of Chicago with him by starting a Chicago-style Italian beef stand in the Texas capital. In 1976, he co-wrote the book, Crimaldi, Contract Killer with journalist John Kidner. This book has gone on the rare book list with copies going for $150.00 and more. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Nate Hendley on Dutch Schultz Jun 28, 2021

Nate Hendley Gary interviews the well-known Canadian true crime author Nate Hendley. Recently, He released his book Dutch Schultz: The Brazen Beer Baron of New York on Kindle for the first time. Mr. Hendley tells some of the best stories about this crude, repulsive 1930s mobster. For all his faults, Dutch Schultz could read the public’s desire for vice. As prohibition ended, he moved quickly into a previously untapped racket that the Italian mafia had not touched. He realized there was a lot of money in the little ten-cent bets made by many African-Americans in New York City. He eventually took over all the different Black policy operations except one. Schultz encountered an African-American policy kingpin who happened to be a woman named Stephanie Saint- Claire and her Lieutenant, Ellsworth “Bumpy” Johnson. Stephanie “Queenie” Saint-Clair Stephanie Sinclair, at age 15, immigrated from the Caribbean island of Guadeloupe to Montreal, Canada to be a domestic worker. She left Canada shortly and moved to New York City in 1912. She moved into Harlem where the first man she met tried to put her on the streets as a prostitute. He was murdered in a fight and she started her own business selling drugs with the help of a new boyfriend. As they made more and more money in the drug business, she tried to leave this new man. In a fight, she pushed him away so abruptly that he struck his head and died. She made more and more money in the drug business. As she got more successful she employed bodyguards, bribed cops, and set her ambitions on getting into the policy racket. She became the most well-known and successful policy operator in the city. Dutch Schultz and Stephanie Sinclair Queenie Saint-Clair refused to pay Dutch Schultz a piece of her action for protection. She had Bumpy Johnson and his men vandalize various storefronts of businesses where Dutch Schultz’s Policy agents worked. She also tipped off the police about Schultz. Resultingly, the police raided several of his policy operators and his personal home. They arrested more than a dozen of his employees and seized around $10 million. Ms. Saint-Clair never submitted to Dutch Schultz but she did retire from the business and turned everything over to Bumpy Johnson. The books and blog of Nate Hendley This Canadian author is based in Toronto and he has been entertaining readers with his stories of organized crime mobsters like Al Capone and Dutch Schultz, bank robbers like Bonnie and Clyde, scam artists, and a great story about a wrongful murder conviction. Click here to see all books by Nate Hendley. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Carlos Marcello Deported to Guatemala Jun 21, 2021

Ron Rawson on Carlos Marcello Ron Rawson is our resident expert on all things Mafia in New Orleans. He has researched the Marcello crime family for many years. We discuss the origins of the Italian mafia and the famous murder of the former New Orleans Chief of Police, David Hennessy. Even though the suspects were unknown, police arrested and charged nineteen members of the Sicilian community. After these men had been acquitted for lack of evidence, a large mob gathered at the Parish prison. They stormed the prison and seized all remaining defendants. Some accounts report that three were lynched from a lamp post or a tree and the others were clubbed to death. The New York Times reported this to be the largest mass lynching in the United States with all eleven men murdered by hanging. Was the New Orleans mob boss really deported to Guatemala? By 1950, Carlos Marcello was known as the crime boss of New Orleans. He had forged a partnership with the New York crime boss Frank Costello and was becoming a national figure. During this time, the INS tried to deport him based on a 1938 narcotics conviction. Marcello’s attorneys fought this off with a dispute over the policies and procedures of the INS. By 1961 Robert Kennedy became the Attorney General of the United States. He remembered how Marcello had refused to testify in a recent Senate Committee of Labor Racketeering and he ordered his deportation to Guatemala. Kennedy based his decision to deport on a fraudulent Guatemalan passport Marcello had obtained some years before. There are many stories told about this supposed deportation but Ron Rawson cuts through all the myths and tells the real story. Ron Rawson and Facebook Ron Rawson posts under the name Sam Marcello and is the administrator of several New Orleans interest Facebook groups. Look for Cresent City Mafia, Murder and Mysteries or New Orleans: Whistles in the Night Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Stephen Metelsky on Hells Angels and other mobs Jun 14, 2021

Stephen Metelsky Gary interviews Stephen Metelsky about his life as an Intelligence Unit officer with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP). Stephen left his career as a Mountie and entered the academic world but he did not leave undercover work behind. He wrote about many famous undercover operations in his new book Undercover: Stories From the Underworld of Law Enforcement. Stephen went into the academic world and he is a criminal psychology professor at Mohawk College in Hamilton, Ontario. He also lectures about organized crime in the faculty of arts of sciences at Queens University in Kingston, Ontario. Stephen developed and conducts training for undercover officers. Undercover: Stories from the Underworld of Law Enforcement Stephen Metelsky wrote a book with a vivid collection of the harrowing journeys of police officers who entered into the underbelly of organized crime and infiltrated dangerous gangs and other criminal organizations. He tells stories of death-defying experiences that put the reader in a front-row seat to police stories rarely shared by cops. He ranges from the hunt for cartel leader Pablo Escobar to the investigation of the famous Canadian mobster Vito Rizzuto. The reader learns about the infiltration of biker gangs, installing listening devices on New York mob boss Paul Castellano, biker clubhouses, and the Gambino crime family. Hells Angels Metelsky tells about one of the cases that he featured in his book. Jay Dobyns was an ATF agent who infiltrated the Hell’s Angels biker gang. Dobyns went so far as to fake a murder of a rival Mongols gang member to ingratiate himself with his Hell’s Angels club and other harrowing stories. Bonnano Crime Family Stephen Metelsky was part of a task force that turned a Canadian mobster named Vincent Morena in an operation codenamed Project O’Tremens. their informant was able to convince the Buffalo Crime family to induct him into the family and allowed the RCMP to videotape the induction ceremony. In the end, they charged members and associates of the Bonanno and Gambino families of with drug trafficking, loansharking, and firearms charges in a joint U.S.-Canada operation. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Boxing and the Mob with Jeffery Sussman May 24, 2021

The Mob and Boxing with Jeffrey Sussman Jeffrey Sussman is the author of 15 non-fiction books including the subject of this podcast, Boxing and the Mob: The Notorious History of the Sweet Science. Recently, Gangland Wire interviewed him about Murder Inc. taken from his popular book, Big Apple Gangsters: The Rise and Decline of the Mob in New York. Mr. Sussman has a long interest in the sport of boxing and he has several books about this checkered history. In this podcast, Gary interviews him about the history of mob interference in the sport. Boxing is one of the easiest sports to fix for gamblers because there is only one person who needs to cooperate. Mr. Sussman has also written Rocky Graziano: Fists, Fame, and Fortune, Max Baer and Barney Ross: Jewish Heroes of Boxing, No Mere Bagatelles, a biography of handbag designer, Judith Leiber, and Power Promoting: How to Market Your Business to The Top! Jeffrey Sussman tells the listeners about the seamy underbelly of boxing during the entire twentieth century. Taken from his book, he has researched into organized crime characters like Owney Madden, Frankie Carbo, and Frank Palermo, and details many of the fixed matches in boxing’s storied history. He also discusses the influence of the mob on legendary boxers—including Primo Carnera, Sugar Ray Robinson, Max Baer, Carmen Basilio, Sonny Liston, and Jake LaMotta—and whether they caved to the mobsters’ threats or refused to throw their fights. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

David Bowman and Tony Spilotro May 17, 2021

David Bowman and Las Vegas Metro Intelligence David Bowman is one of the unsung heroes in law enforcement’s battle for Las Vegas with the imported Chicago outfit mobsters, Tony Spilotro, Frank Cullotta, Larry Neuman, and many others. He tells about getting into the drug business at an early age. It is pretty obvious that David Bowman is not a hardened career criminal and went to the wrong side of the law because of the incredible opportunity that the illegal narcotics trade provided. During this time, he became, at first, an ordinary informant and then continued to become an undercover agent into the activities of the Hole in the Wall gang, Tony Spilotro, and Frank Cullotta. This was during the time when Spilotro and Cullotta’s Hole in the Wall Gang was ripping cash, jewelry, and other valuables away from stores by cutting a hole in the wall or roof of each victim. David Bowman and Frank Cullotta After 38 years of silence, David Bowman tells his story in “Bringing Down Cullotta” The story Casino couldn’t tell you.” He got a very interesting push to tell his story. He was taking Frank Cullotta’s las Vegas Tour and reminded Frank that they once knew each other during the heyday of the Hole in the Wall Gang. He told Frank that he had once stolen about $100,000 worth of cocaine and other narcotics from his apartment and that he had been an informant for Las Vegas Metro Intelligence and had informed on his activities as well as on Tony Spilotro. Frank was not angry but realized this was a story that needed telling. He put David in touch with his co-author Denny Griffin and together they collaborated on this story behind the story of the Hole in the Wall Gang. Last year David and his co-author Denny Griffin published “Bringing Down Cullotta” The story Casino couldn’t tell you.” Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Buford Pusser and the Dixie Mafia May 10, 2021

Buford Pusser True Crime author and blogger Synova Cantrell tells the true story behind the murder of Tennessee Sheriff Buford Pusser. The well-known Walking Tall movies depict the story of this tough southern named Sheriff Buford Pusser and his fight with the State Line Mafia or more [popularly known as the Dixie Mafia. Actors like Joe Don Baker, Bo Svenson, and, in the most recent remake, “Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson have portrayed this modern-day Wyatt Earp as he took a stand against this southern-fried version of the mob. Buford Pusser’s story of his battle against The Dixie Mafia was more than an action movie. He was real and so was the Dixie Mafia. The Dixie Mafia The Dixie Mafia was also known as the State Line Mob and they controlled many rural counties in the Mid-South states of Tennesse and Kentucky. A man named Carl Douglas “Towhead” White was an important lieutenant in this organization. White was in prison when Sheriff Burford Pusser had a confrontation with his girlfriend Louis Hathcock. She tried to get the drop on Sheriff Pusser and he retaliated killing her. Towhead White was enraged and he called his boss Kirksey Nix who ordered his men to set up and kill Sherriff Pusser and his wife, Pauline. Later that same year, 1967, Sherriff Buford Pusser and his wife Pauline were responding to the report of a disturbance in the early morning hours before dawn. As they passed a rural church where this disturbance was reported they found nobody was in sight. As they passed the New Hope Church, a black car drove out from behind the building and started following the Pusser’s car. The driver of the Cadillac flashed on its headlights raced up beside Pusser’s police car and opened fire. Pusser stomped on the accelerator and pulled away from their pursuers. They backed off and in a few miles he pulled over to check on his wife. The unknown assailants had hit Pauline Pusser in the head and as he checked on her, the Cadillac appeared again and shot Pusser in his face. He will survive but his wife died from her wounds. The Cadillac’s passenger opened fire, hitting Pauline in the head. The sheriff ducked and stepped on the gas. The engine roared to life, and the car lurched ahead of the assassins. He sped up the road a couple of miles until he was sure he had lost his tail, and then pulled over to check on Pauline. Moments later, the assassins again found their mark, and gunshots rang out, hitting Sherriff Pusser in the face and jaw blowing it apart. Somehow the sheriff would survive the attack, but Pauline was killed. At first, Pusser declared he knew who was responsible and named Towhead White, George McGann, Gary McDaniel, and Kirksey Nix. After 18 days in the hospital and a dozen surgeries to repair his face, Pusser declared he couldn’t tell who had shot him. This set into motion a vendetta that ended only when Buford Pusser died in a suspicious one-car accident. Synova Cantrell Synova Cantrell is a prolific true crime author and blogger as well as an expert coach and teacher in the art of writing. She is well-known for her distinctive fedora. Ms. Cantrell not only documents historical accounts of criminal activity and she volunteers with the Missouri Missing organization. Synova blogs on cold cases to hopefully generate new witnesses and suspect information. She publishes the Murdered In Mississippi website and the synovaink.com website and she features Mobster Monday posts highlighting stories about the Dixie Mafia. Synova is available for coaching and consulting of new authors via her Synova’s Simply Biz author coaching service. Synova authored Unorganized Crime; a biography of the ex-gangster Sidney Heard of Chicago, IL. Check back for an interview in Gangland Wire about this thrilling tale of a Chicago gangster who brought the mob to Lubbock Texas. She has a best-selling series, Seriously Stupid Criminals, in both paperback and e-book formats. She is the winner of the Poisoned Cup Award from Crime Masters of America in...

Ray Morrow – Broken Shield, An Undercover Officer’s Perspective May 03, 2021

Ray Morrow – His Path to Undercover Work Retired F.B.I. agent Ray Morrow Ray Anthony Morrow grew up in Aliquippa, PA. He followed the proper path toward a career in law enforcement. He graduated from Penn State University with a B.S. Degree in Law Enforcement & Corrections/ Behavioral Science. His first job was with the Federal Bureau of Investigation where they hired him to be a File Clerk in the FBI’s Identification Division. As soon as he was old enough, he obtained an appointment from the U.S. Secret Service Uniformed Division. They assigned Ray to the White House Detail where he protected the President of the United States and the First Family. By 1980, he gravitated to private security and Allegheny International hired him away from the Secret Service as an Executive Protection Specialist. Here he used his skills to bodyguard the President of Allegheny International which is a Fortune 500 Company. After building this impressive resume as a personal security specialist, Ray was able to achieve his original dream, in February 1987, the FBI appointed him as a Special Agent. The FBI assigned Ray Morrow to Louisville, KY where he got his first taste working with undercover agents and informants in the division’s Drug Squad. In May 1989, just two years after his initial appointment, the FBI selected Ray for an undercover assignment where he served as the primary undercover agent in a 2-year police corruption matter. The Cleveland office of the FBI had received many reports of significant corruption among officers of the Cleveland, Ohio police department. This assignment will place at risk Agent Morrow’s life at times and his marriage at other times. In this podcast, Ray Morrow tells this gripping story of how he lived the life of an intermediate-level criminal, ran an illegal casino, convinced Cleveland cops to guard drug and money shipment that passed through Cleveland, ran a tee-shirt printing shop as a cover, and juggled his family life and his professional life with the professional life almost taking away his family life. Ray’s work resulted in the indictments and arrests, of 30 Cleveland Police Officers. Ray Morrow – Broken Shield, An Undercover Officer’s Perspective My fellow podcaster retired FBI agent Geri Williams writes this about Ray Morrow’s book. “What most people know about the FBI comes from novels, TV shows, and movies. However, with his memoir, Ray Morrow shows you what it’s really like to be an undercover FBI agent, including the personal sacrifices made by the agent’s family and loved ones. This is the real deal. Outstanding book. Must read!” I must say that I have read many similar books, but I never found a book that I found so hard to lay down and go on to sleep. Broken Shield depicts the tremendous technicalities of FBI work, the danger of undercover life, and the toll that life takes on families. My friend Ray Morrow did this in such a way that we all can understand it. you must get Broken Shield: An Undercover Officer’s Perspective by clicking on the title. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael DiLeonardo part 2 Apr 26, 2021

Michael Mikey Scars DiLeonardo This is a re-release of an interview I did last year but it must be listened to again or maybe for the first time. I was able to make contact with Mikey Scars DiLeonardo via telephone. This is a the second of a two part re-release of my first interview. Michael is a relocated federal witness in WitSec or Witness Protection. Mikey Scars is a Mafia legacy because his Sicilian-born grandfather, Vincenzo DiLeonardo, was a captain in the Brooklyn faction run by Salvatore D’Aquila who was the boss of bosses at that time. Mikey Scars Michael DiLeonardo grew up in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn with many other future members of the New York Five Families. He got the nickname of Mikey Scars because a dog took a large chunk out of his check leaving a scar. Michael’s father nor his uncles became associated with the Mafia but his brother, Robert DiLeonardo was part of the Colombo crime family until he was murdered on the orders of the Cosa Nostra. Michael DiLeonardo and the Sammy the Bull Gravano Michael DiLeonardo knew Sammy the Bull for many years during his life in the Gambino family. he went into the construction business and found that was where Gravano focused most of his attention. Gravano presided over his mob induction ceremony and they both have ended up in the Witness protection. Cammy the Bull has gone outside the program after he took a hit for selling narcotics. He now has a podcast. We learn that Mikey Scars was left twisting in the wind by the Gotti family when he went into prison. They would pick up money from DiLeonardo’s business and not take anything to his wife while he was incarcerated. he told them that he would get out one day but nobody seemed to help. Mickey Scars on Turning Government Witness Folks, this is one of the most interesting and revealing interviews I have ever done. If you want to get a peek behind the curtain of life in the Cosa Nostra in New York City, listen to Michael DiLeonardo’s interview. Mikey Scars describes his grueling decision to abandon every rule and ethic that he held as a made man when he turned witness. He felt the mob left him no choice in this matter after the way the family disrespected him. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael DiLeonardo Part 1 Apr 19, 2021

Michael DiLeonardo This is a re-release of an interview I did last year but it must be listened to again or maybe for the first time. I was able to make contact with Michael “Mikey Scars” DiLeonardo via telephone. Michael is a relocated federal witness in WitSec or Witness Protection. Michael DiLeonardo was a real mafia legacy in that his Sicilian-born grandfather, Vincenzo DiLeonardo, was a captain in the Brooklyn faction run by Salvatore D’Aquila who was the boss of bosses at that time. Mikey Scars Michael DiLeonardo grew up in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn with many other future members of the New York Five Families. He got the nickname of Mikey Scars because a dog took a large chunk out of his check leaving a scar. Michael’s father nor his uncles became associated with the Mafia but his brother, Robert DiLeonardo was part of the Colombo crime family until he was murdered on the orders of the Cosa Nostra. Michael DiLeonardo and the Gambino family Michael DiLeonardo grew up around Paul Castellano’s Veterans and Friends Social Club and as he matured, the older guys noticed him and eventually took him into their confidence. Michael tells a riveting chronological story of his entry into a life of crime. In this first episode, he gives a detailed description of the night that Sammy the Bull Gravano presided over his induction ceremony. It seems that John Gotti Jr. was inducted the same night and John Gotti Sr. did not attend because he thought it would look bad. Folks, this is one of the most interesting and revealing interviews I have ever done. If you want to get a peek behind the curtain of life in the Cosa Nostra in New York City, listen to Michael DiLeonardo’s interview. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

John Pennisi from Wit Sec Apr 12, 2021

John Pennisi John Pennisi is the interview subject. A very unusual former mobster. john Pennisi writes a regular blog titled Sitdown News (click to find this). He has become an accomplished author as he creates a new life outside his former life as a soldier in the Lucchese crime family. John Pennisi and Staten Island The Lucchese crime family has held a strong presence on Staten Island for many years. John Pennisi tells Gary how he was actually a member of the Brooklyn facion of the Lucchese family but they operated out of Staten Island. over the years, with the Mafia clan holding a clandestine initiation ritual here and numerous members of its so-called Brooklyn crew operating on the borough, a mob snitch said last week. How John Pennisi landed in Witness Protection John describes himself as a “cooperating witness” because he never wore a wore or “worked” undercover. He started cooperating with the Federal Bureau of Investigation sometime after October 2018, when he walked into the Bureau’s office to share his “concerns and basically crimes that he committed. That was just the beginning of his sharing the secret information about the Lucchese crime family and other New York City mobsters. www.sitdownnews.com Here is some information he wrote about: SECRET INITIATION Pennisi said he became a member of the Lucchese family in 2013, during a secret initiation ceremony at a house on Staten Island on his wife’s birthday. Matty Madonna, the acting boss of the Lucchese family, presided over the ceremony, he said. In the darkness of a basement, Pennisi sat in front of a table. “There was a gun, a knife, there was a picture of a saint, an ashtray, a lighter, and like a diabetic pin, needle to check your blood,” said Pennisi. Below are some interesting titles of his blog pieces The Fashion Of Cosa Nostra Bonanno Wiseguy Falsely Makes Himself A Boss Nefarious Way of Johnny Sideburns “A Mob Handbook,” Below are some excerpts from his blog A clueless La Cosa Nostra candidate John (Butch) Arpino allegedly seeks advice from Pennisi on how one wiseguy should let another know that he too is a wiseguy. When Pennisi repeats the curious inquiry to John (Johnny Sideburns) Cerrella, a then-acting Lucchese captain, the boss shakes his head and says, “It is truly unbelievable, a guy like that got no business [becoming a made man]. What’s it come to? They now gotta hand them a f–king handbook after they straighten them out!” “The Gotti Chaperone Ended Up with a Broken Bone” documents a circa-2000 snafu involving the Gotti family. Peter Gotti accompanied his niece, Victoria, on a trip to see her father, Gambino godfather John Gotti, in the federal pen at Marion, Ill. After the visit, Uncle Pete ordered a longtime associate to chaperone his niece, who wanted to take in a movie. “No harm was done, just two adults enjoying a night at the movies,” Pennisi writes. However, days later, Victoria’s hotheaded Gambino capo husband, Carmine (Bull) Agnello, “got wind of the movie night.” He summoned the chaperone to his Jamaica junkyard and allegedly broke his arm with a baseball bat. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Paul Ricca – The Power Behind the Outfit’s Throne Apr 06, 2021

Paul Ricca – the beginnings In this episode, Gary examines the life of a young Italian immigrant named Paul Ricca who started his mob career with murder. He fled to Cuba in 1920. Once safely in Cuba, Ricca had the good fortune to meet a member of the Camorra mafia named Giuseppe Esposito who was known as “Diamond Joe” and a well-known leader in Chicago’s bootlegging business. Diamond Joe was just beginning to form a bootlegging gang and had joined with Sam Giancana and his Chicago street gang known as the 42 Gang. When Ricca arrived at the Italian section of Chicago he reconnected with Diamond Joe and went to work as a waiter in a restaurant owned by his mentor. Modern mob historians believe that was the source of his moniker. Paul Ricca was a very pleasant and charismatic young man who soon made many friends among the mobster of the day. One of these new friends was Al Capone who soon hired Ricca into his organization. He rose quickly in the Capone organization and was close personal friends with Capone He was Capone’s best man at his 1927 wedding. The rise of Paul the Waiter When the government convicted Capone and sent him to the Atlanta U.S. Penitentiary, he obtained Frank Nitti’s agreement that he would promote Paul Ricca to be the new underboss of the Outfit. Nitti was a poor excuse for a boss and the intelligent and resourceful Ricca would become the boss in reality while Nitti was the known boss. As a matter of fact, Charles “Lucky” Luciano refused to deal with Nitti and demanded that Ricca became Chicago’s contact with the National Crime Syndicate. Ricca would even overrule Nitti’s orders and Nitti never seemed to mind. Paul Ricca and the Hollywood Scam Prohibition ended in 1933 and the Chicago Outfit moved west to the untapped markets in Hollywood California. The Outfit saw the film industry as a huge cash cow just waiting to be milked. Ricca sent Johnny Roselli out with a plan to infiltrate labor unions involved with the film industry. Once they got control of those unions, they used another mobster named Willie Bioff to extort money from the Hollywood moguls of the time. Bioff had already created a shakedown operation of Chicago movie theater projectionists and the National Union of Theater Projectionists. Bioff infiltrated the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and began to extort millions of dollars from major motion-picture studios. Bioff got a little too big for his britches and started living a lavish Hollywood lifestyle with a mansion, expensive suits, gold jewelry, expensive cars, and solid gold business cards. Actor Robert Montgomery, president of the Screen Actors Guild tipped off the IRS and a California federal grand jury was called to investigate. Bioff was indicted for tax evasion and related crimes, as well as extortion and racketeering in 1943. Bioff was unable to stand the thought of prison so he testified against Chicago Outfit bosses Paul “The Waiter” Ricca, Philip D’Andrea, Charlie “Cherry Nose” Gioe, Johnny Roselli, Lou Kaufman, and Frank “The Enforcer” Nitti. Book Promo for the Crooked Sourwood: Kentucky’s Forgotten Tragedies Click on this title to learn more about this Crooked Sourwood: Kentucky’s Forgotten Tragedies by Steven Wright. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Russell Shorto Mar 29, 2021

Russell Shorto -Johnstown Mob Gary interviews the author of Smalltime: A story of My Family and the Mob. Mr. Shorto is the namesake and grandson of Johnstown Mafia gambler and long-time close associate of Youngstown Pennsylvania boss, Joseph (Little Joe Ragno) Regino. The grandson, Russell Sorto grew up knowing there was something dark and mysterious about his grandfather but the family never talked about this. As an adult, Mr. Shorto has become a successful author of non-fiction books. But, not in the true crime genre with titles like Revolution Song: A Story of the American Revolution, New Amsterdam: A History of America’s most Liberal City, Descarte’s Bones, and the Island at the Center of the World. He has also written extensively for the New York Times. As an adult, an older relative encouraged Mr. Shorto to use his research and writing skills to investigate this secretive relative. Francis Ford Coppola said, “Russell Shorto’s Smalltime draws a convincing portrait of a time when Italian Americans weren’t permitted to live in certain neighborhoods or rise too high in the political firmament. This remembrance of his grandfather’s and great-uncle’s lives―of slots and pinball machines, ‘tip seals,’ ‘skeeched dice,’ and places like the Melodee Lounge and City Cigar―mixes great history and lovely, lingering memories: ‘Long conversations about spaghetti sauce and aunts who kissed you on the lips: those were the ways we were Italian.’” Johnstown Mob Mr. Shorto’s namesake grandfather, Russell Shorto became an important figure in the gambling world of Johnstown in the post-war era because an important mafia figure, Joseph (Little Joe Ragno) Regino married his sister, Millie Shorto in 1932. At that time future Pittsburgh Mob Boss Sebastiano (John) LaRocca lived two doors down from his friend and fellow mob member Joe Regino. Joe Regino became his Capo de Decina in Johnstown. Regino made sizeable contributions to political campaigns and this opened up gambling in Johnstown. This is where Mr. Shorto’s grandfather and brother-in-law of the mob boss, Joe Regino, got his life career of helping to run Johnstown gambling rackets. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Anthony Celano NYPD Mar 22, 2021

Anthony Celano Retired Intelligence Detective Gary interviews a crime-mystery writer Anthony Celano. He is a retired New York City Police Department Intelligence Detective. Gary and Tony had very similar careers and this episode is like a couple of old friends who worked the mob telling war stories. He tells the greatest story about a confrontation he had with John Gotti when he was sitting surveillance on his house Anthony Celano Mystery-Writer Tony Celano started his Sgt. Markie series in 2019. The first in this exciting series is The Case of Two in the Trunk: A Sergeant Markie Mystery. Tony Celano uses his real-life experiences and situations to dramatize his character’s story. The second book in this series is The Case of the Crosseyed Strangler. Tony is hard at work on his third Sgt. Markie mystery novel. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Abe Reles: A Brotherhood Betrayed Mar 15, 2021

Abe Reles: A Brotherhood Betrayed Gary interviews Michael Cannell, the author of four non-fiction books and former sportswriter and editor for the New York Times. His most recent book, A Brotherhood betrayed: The man Behind the Rise and Fall of Murder Inc. tells the story of Murderer Incorporated’s most prolific killer, Abe Reles. The feared Albert Anastasia had turned to a group of young ambitious Jewish gangsters to carry out murders for the Mafia. They were so feared by other gangsters and they committed so many murders that the press dubbed the group Murder Inc. The Making of a Killer Abe Reles grew up on Manhatten’s lower east side and like most of his peers, he gravitated to a life of crime. Like most young men, he followed the older gangsters. He even adopted the nickname of “Kid Twist” after hearing about an older Jewish gangster named Max “Kid Twist” Zweiback. The most prominent Jewish gangster of the day was Lepke Buchalter. During the 1930s, chaos among organized crime members ran rampant. the boss of bosses, Lucky Luciano, and the other bosses formed the Commission. In one of their early moves, they created a hit team to handle rebellious young gangsters and bring them in line with the established Mafia Commission. They noticed Abe “Kid Twist” Reles as a man they could trust and picked him to be the anchor of this new hit team that became known as Murder Inc. Abe Reles: The Canary Who Sang But Couldn’t Fly Law enforcement and the press noticed the rise in unexplained and unprosecuted murders of gangsters. Thomas Dewey was the crime-busting politically ambitious prosecutor. He chose an aggressive Irishman named William O’Dwyer as his assistant and gave him the job to eliminate this professional criminal culture that had dominated New York City since prohibition. O’Dwyer found a good informant named Harry Rudolph who ratted on Abe Reles. It was not long before Kid Twist realized this only chance to avoid the Electric Chair was to become a cooperating witness against Lepke Buchalter and other mafia bosses. The Mafia Commission put out the word that anyone who killed Abe Reles would be paid $100,000. By 1941 a momentous trial was underway that threatened New York’s most brutal mob bosses, specifically the Lord high Executioner, Albert Anastasia. O’Dwyer based his case on a star witness, Abe Reles. The police stashed Kid Twist in a hotel room at the Coney Island Half Moon hotel and maintained 24 hours a day guard on the door. But before he could testify, the guards found his shattered body on the rooftop of an adjoining building. The first question was whether or not it was a botched escape or murder. They did find several sheets tied together and hanging out the window. The Grand Jury ruled he had tied these sheets to a radiator and when he tried to slide down them, he lost his grip and fell to his death. Michael Cannell’s A Brotherhood Betrayed documents the rise and all of Murder, Inc. through Reles’ life span from punk gangsters, to a top hitman to stool pigeon, and ending with his death. on a Coney Island rooftop. He colorfully depicts a time when crime became “organized” crime. The time of wise-cracking mobsters with names like Kid Twist, The Mad Hatter, The Prime Minister of the Underworld, and Tick Tock Tannenbaum. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast Transcript Hello, welcome while you are tappers out there back here in the studio gangland wire. I have a really interesting story today an interview a guest with 00:09 Arthur from New York, the writer writes a story about the canary who could fly but couldn’t sing now, if you’re any kind of a Mob aficionado,

Raymond Patriarca Mar 10, 2021

Raymond Patriarca the Early Years Raymond L.S. Patriarca started like every other major mafia figure of the 20th century. First, his parents were Sicilian. His father, Elatario Patriarca emigrated from Sicily in the early 1900s. He married a woman named Mary and they lived in Worster Massachusetts where Raymond was born. The Patriarca family moved to Federal Hill, an Italian neighborhood in Providence Rhode Island in 1908. Raymond’s father ran a bar and liquor store where young Raymond got his first exposure to criminals. When Raymond was 17, his father died leaving his widow and two daughters, and two sons. By that time, all the Patriarca kids were old enough to work and, like most immigrants, they all lived in the same Federal Hill house. Raymond will later tell a congressional committee that he “drifted a little” when his father died. As a teenager, Raymond Patriarca worked as a bellhop and supposedly shined shoes. He probably spent more time stealing, hijacking trucks and running from the police from his record of arrests. Like every other rising young criminal during prohibition, authorities arrested him for transporting illegal alcohol. By the 1930s, he gained a reputation as a professional criminal. He got involved in a plot to free two prison inmates where the participants killed a prison guard and trusty. He was sentenced to a year and a day in the federal prison at Atlanta in 1931 for transportation of a female over a state line for the purposes of prostitution or the Mann act. In 1932, he is charged with committing an armed bank robbery down in Massachusetts but the witnesses refuse to ID him. He was becoming so well known that the Providence police list him as a public enemy and they arrest him on sight and bring him in for at least a few hours. The Development of Raymond Patriarca and the Providence Family During the turn of the century, many Sicilians immigrated to the Federal Hill area of Providence RH. They brought the Black Hand mafia with them. In 1917, a person named Frank “Buttsey” Morelli moved to Providence with his family. He and his brother Joseph formed a robbery gang. Some claim they were the real robbers, not Sacco and Vanzetti, who killed the guard and pay clerk in that famous 1920 Braintree Massachusetts robbery. During those years, most people would consider Frank Morelli to be the face of the Mafia in Providence’s Federal Hill. Boston Family Gaspare Messina and Joseph Lombardo were the early bosses of the entire New England area based out of Boston. During the Castellammare War in New York, Other Mafia bosses appointed Gaspare Messina temporarily as the boss of bosses for a couple of years. Joseph Lombardo served as Messina’s underboss and he organized several Sicilian gangs and his most important accomplishment was that he helped eliminate the powerful Irish Gustin gang. As these men got older, Filippo Buccola arrived in Boston from Palermo Sicily. Joe Lombardo will never rise higher than Underboss and Buccola will become the Boss of Boston. At this time, I believe the Boston family was like the big brother over Providence and the rest of New England. Kind of like Chicago and Kansas City. According to the famous New England mob turncoat Vinnie Teresa, Boston’s underboss Joe Lombardo ordered Buttesy Morelli into retirement and Filippo Buccola became the boss of Boston and Providence in 1947. The Prime years By 1954, Filippo Buccola retired to Sicily. Raymond Patriarca was a Capo under Buccola and a well-known successful mobster. He had organized several small crews under his leadership. These men made big jewelry scores, bank, and armored car robberies and he opened several gambling establishments in Providence and the surrounding area. Patriarca allied with two different New York mob families. He had business interests with the Colombo family. During this time, Enrico “Henry” Tameleo transferred from the Bonanno family to be Patriarca’s underboss.

Bill Roemer and Informants Mar 08, 2021

Bill Roemer FBI Bill Roemer was one of the first FBI agents assigned to Chicago’s Organized Crime Squad. He and his fellow agents in the C-1 Squad (organized Crime Squad) lost their access to many off-the-books wiretaps and hidden microphones. Once the Omnibus Crime Control Bill passed in 1968, Congress made it illegal and punishable by a prison sentence to conduct electronic surveillance without a warrant. To replace that source of intelligence on the Outfit, Chicago agents started developing “deep throat” informants. Gary Jenkins examines two of Roemer’s most important informants. In FBI documents, they were identified as Sporting Goods and Romero. Sporting Goods Roemer claimed that “Sporting Goods” was a “street boss” who was considered a source for more than ten years. It is not known exactly when but I believe he had been providing tidbits since the early 1970s and some people allege he started full bore about 1974. Romer never mentioned his ethnicity, never said he was Italian, Jewish, or other. A Chicago Outfit street boss would be a guy who managed a crew and directed gambling, bookmaking, and other criminal activities within an assigned territory. The traditional Outfit territories were the South Side of Chicago, the North Side, and the Loop. The Outfit unlike the New York Families was not a La Cosa Nostra Organization from top to bottom. Sporting Goods likely was not an “inducted member” of the Mafia or a Made Guy. Some non-Italian mobsters like Jake Guzik, Murray Humphreys, or Gus Alex had crews and managed others and Accardo and bosses since Al Capone gave them a lot of power and responsibility. Romer claimed that “Sporting Goods” provided the FBI with names of corrupt politicians, law enforcement members, updates on the general activities of Outfit members. Roemer talked about how he and “Sporting Goods” maintained an ongoing close friendship and even had dinner together every Friday for years. Roemer introduced “Sporting Goods” to his wife and she often talked to him on the phone when he called Roemer at home and even joined them for dinner once in a while. “Sporting Goods” suffered a heart attack in the middle 1980s and died. Romer claimed that “Sporting Goods” offered to give Roemer him a large sum of early retirement money. Roemer later recalled this death with sadness indicating the closeness of that relationship. Romer provided clues that “Sporting Goods” was an older man with polish and intelligence. He was a successful mobster, but he was developed emotionally to develop a real friendship with Roemer and his wife. I believe that the guy was not a member of the LCN because Romer specifically identified “Romano” as an LCN member. Romano Roemer described “Romano” described as a “top tier” mobster who was “high up in the rank of the Chicago mob.” Furthermore, he described him as an inducted LCN member. In Accardo, Roemer indicated that Romano was a capo. He wrote, “When Dominic DiBella, the capo on the North Side of Chicago, died, we weren’t able to ascertain who his successor was. I went to my source, the made guy who was in the same position as DiBella, and learned that it was Vince Solano. Another interesting fact about this revelation is that just before DiBella died, the entire hierarchy of the Outfit met at a restaurant to pay him some tribute. You all will know this as the famous “Last Supper” photo taken just before DiBella died. So Romero had to be there and the name of every mobster at the meeting is known. Of all the mobsters who were present that day and could be called a capo and a made member of the LCN, only Vince Solano and Dominic Butch Blaise are possibilities. It is well known that Romano had informed on Sam Giancana during the 1960s and had even visited him in Mexico. Romano remained was close to Giancana after his return from Mexico in 1974. Roemer wrote about how he dealt with Romano. He would meet him for dinner and state some mob gossip wrong like it was a fact and wait for “Roman...

Real Oklahoma Outlaws Mar 01, 2021

Justice and Davis Gang Gary interviews retired Oklahoma City Detective Sergeant Richard Mullins about his career and his investigation of the Justice and Davis criminal gang. This was a group of long-time professional criminals who terrorized business owners during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s. By the end of their run, they specialized in large grocery stores because they kept large sums of money to cash checks. Books by Richard Mullins Retired Detective Sergeant Richard Mullins had written and published two excellent true crime books. The first book, Real Oklahoma Outlaws: the Tue Story of the Davis and Justice Crime Families, tells the story of the famous Justice and Davis criminal gangs. He tells in exciting detail how he investigated these extended criminal families until he brought several of them to justice. His second book tells the story of George Machine Gun Kelly from the viewpoint of his wife Kathryn Kelley, Kathryn: The True Story Of Machine Gun Kelly’s Wife Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Alain Olivier Part 2 Feb 22, 2021

Most Wanted and The Trial of Alain Olivier Most Wanted, starring Josh Hartnett and Jim Gaffigan, is the real-life story of a French Canadian drug addict named Alain Olivier and how the Royal Canadian Mounted Police intimidated him into setting up an undercover narcotics operation. This plan went horribly wrong and ended with a Mountie getting killed under suspicious circumstances. In this second interview, Alain Olivier tells about his trial, 100-year sentence, and subsequent life in a Thai prison. The film crew of Most Wanted went to Thailand and used the actual Bang Kwang prison as a set for the time Olivier was in prison. Alain Olivier tells about how the Mounties testified against him to obtain a sentence of death. Once the court passed down a death sentence, they commuted it to 100 years because he was Canadian and Canada does not have a death penalty. Most Wanted and Prison Life Alain Olivier tells how one of the Mounties walked up to him during his trial and took a picture of him wearing his 40 pounds of chains for their family photo album. Alain alleges these Officers perjured themselves at trial and misrepresented him as a career criminal. In the end, one of them looked at him and stated “Good Luck Frency.” This became the title of his book and click on the title to find Alain Olivier’s website and the book. Olivier explains in horrifying detail how he survived inside a Thai prison for 8 long years. Exoneration The film Most Wanted shows how Alain Olivier adapted to prison life and even thrived by helping his fellow prisoners. A Canadian journalist traveled to Thailand and interviewed Olivier inside the infamous Bang Kwang prison (click for a link to photos of the prison). Canadian journalist Victor Malarek was suspicious after asking his RCMP contacts about the buy-bust and they refused to talk about what should have been their greatest narcotics arrest. He followed up and learned the Mounties were hiding something. After a series of articles appeared, a Canadian attorney was able to get Olivier returned to Canada to finish out his 100-year sentence after 8 years in Thailand. Shortly after, the Canadian courts released Olivier. He is fighting today to restore his good name and to cause reform within the RCMP. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Alain Olivier Part 1 Feb 19, 2021

Alain Olivier Most Wanted Recently Gary watched an Amazon Prime movie titled Most Wanted. The film starred Josh Hartnett, Jim Gaffigan, and Antoine Olivier Pilon. This film was about a Royal Canadian Mounted Police operation that went horribly wrong. The Mounties needed a big drug dealer that was importing China White heroin from the Southeast Asian Golden Triangle. Listen while a recovering drug addict named Alain Olivier tells how he was arrested in Thailand for heroin trafficking. In the second of this tw0-part interview, Alain Olivier will tell about his time in an infamous Bang Kwang prison in Thailand, Alain Olivier set-up Jim Gaffigan plays the part of a real-life professional informant who promised his RCMP handlers a real important guy who had the contacts to import multiple kilos of heroin from Thailand. gaffigan’s character brought in the young Alain Olivier to work on his charter fishing boat. The RCMP created a program that they believed would allow them to pass themselves off as mafia members or at least bug0time criminals. First, the Gaffigan character sold Olivier as a guy who had been to Thailand based on the fact that Olivier had gone on a backpacking trip to Thailand and he had used heroin over there. Once he had the confidence of his RCMP handlers, he brought the young Olivier in by offering him a job and allowed him to live on his boat. In an intricate series of subterfuges, the Gaffigan character convinced Olivier he was going to South America to set up a big cocaine deal. During that time, he introduced an undercover Mountie as an organized crime figure. While the Gaffigan character was going to be gone, he instructed Olivier to allow the undercover cop access to his boat for a weekend. The cop arrived to take the boat out with another man. When he returned, he returned alone and Olivier found an expended shell casing and a substance that looked like blood. he alerted Gaffigan and he indicated that the undercover had murdered the guy. Olivier was young and inexperienced in this level of crime so he bought the story. Mr. Olivier tells us that this setup was used in other RCMP drug operations. The RCMP Plot Once the Monties realize that Olivier believes they are members of a criminal organization, they start pressuring him to set them up with a drug connection in Thailand. He pleads to the Gaffigan character to convince them that he really cannot do this because the only dope he ever brought back from Aisa was a little brown heroin be bought in Nepal when he was backpacking over there. Gaffigan convinces him that he has to try or they will kill him. The RCMP introduces in “The Fat Man” who supposedly the big boss. They buy him a ticket to Bangkok and essentially babysit him until the plane leaves. Once they are in Thailand, they intimidate him into finding a drug connection. The RCMP Plot Goes South Olivier keeps asking around until he finds someone who introduces him to two girls who can get 2 kilos. He tells his handlers and they set up a buy-bust. When the arrest goes down, an undercover Mountie is killed. Olivier claims he heard a shot just before the man died but his fellow officers claim he fell out of a pickup truck during the arrest and he died from head injuries. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Lennie Patrick Chicago Outfit Enforcer Feb 01, 2021

Lennie Patrick Flips Gary and Cam discuss an Outfit gangster named Lennie Patrick with Chicago mob historian and attorney Paul Whitcombe. Paul and Camillus Robinson are associated with John Touhy and the Killers Kings and Clowns You Tube Mob channel and the Mafia Facebook group, Killers Kings and Clowns. In 1992, Paul was a law clerk for the trial Judge Patrick Alesia when 78-year-old Lennie Patrick testified against the Outfit’s chief political fixer and then boss Sam “Wings” Carlisi and several others. He traded off what would have been a life sentence for racketeering and extortion for a 2-year sentence and is testimony in this famous trial. Besides the discussion about Lenny Patrick in general, Paul tells great stories about events during the trial like his small talk with spectator Antoinette Giancana and the time the defense lawyers presented a theory that Lenny Patrick was the actual killer of JFK and they claimed he shot from the “grassy knoll.” Paul tells about how he was given the entire unredacted JFK murder file to review for any mentions of Lenny Patrick. Plus, he had to review a Cuban documentary film about the assassination for any evidence that Patrick was the killer. Lennie Patrick and the Outfit Patrick grew up in the Jewish section of Lincoln Park on the Near Northside during Prohibition. At age 15, Patrick quit school and started a life of crome. An Outfit capo named Joey Glimco noticed him when he started gambling at dice games at the Chicago taxi driver’s union. Like most young mobsters, Patrick graduated to armed robbery. In 1932 it is suspected he murdered his first man. He got into a fight with a gambler named Herman Glick and Glick knocked Patrick out. Patrick returned a week later and shot the man in his head. Patrick and his stick-up crew started robbing banks when the police caught them. An Indiana court sentenced him to 10 years in about 1933-34. He left prison in 1940 and returned to Chicago. He was a trusted and seasoned gangster by then. He was noticed by Outfit up and comers like Paul Ricca, Sam Giancana, and Milwaukee Phil Alderisio. He got involved with an Outfit gambler named Dave Yaras. The Italian dominated Outfit granted Patrick control of all book-making in the Jewish neighborhoods. It was during these years that he met the man he would eventually turn on, Outfit political fixer Gus Alex. over his first few years as an Outfit bookie, he would murder West Side book-maker Harry Krotish, a rival gangster named Edward Murphy, a man named David Zatz, and Milton Glickman. When he went into the witness program Patrick claimed he murdered a man who scammed him out of $165,000 for a phony sportsbook. Patrick “made his bones” and was a tough and respected Chicago Outfit mobster. The Patrick crew Lennie Patrick was probably making over $800,000 a year from his sportsbook. He was a lucky gambler and liked to gamble like most of the mob bosses in Chicago. it is claimed he once won a huge amount of money gy taking the Jets over the Colts in the 1969 Super Bowl. He must have seen something in Joe Nameth. He and his crew also extorted local business by starting fires or planting bombs. He claimed he and Dave Yaras extorted $300,000 from Allen Dorfman. These activities were all under the direction of the Outfit and he was a non-Italian who had his own crew on the Northside of Chicago. The FBI watched him meet with all the upper echelon Outfit Capos and boss at different times and appeared to be the equal of any other capo. Lennie Patrick was a mean vicious gangster Patrick showed no mercy and had few scruples. it is said that one time he offered a young kid some money for helping to push him out of the snow. When the kid refused the money, he decided the family must be wealthy. Thereupon, he extorted thousands of dollars from the kid’s father who owned a neighborhood pizza joint. In another example, Patrick’s own brother, Michael owed him $250,000. When the brother was unable to pay,

Dustin Marks – A Crossroader Talks Jan 25, 2021

Dustin Marks is a Magician Dustin Marks tells listeners how he was drawn to perform magic tricks as a child. He notices that all the good magicians are based in Las Vegas. As a young adult, he moved to Vegas after a series of dead-end jobs. After a few months, he discovers that all the good magicians met on Wednesday nights at Gary Darwin’s Magic Club. He had to ask questions and search for a few months before finding this club. Like he was told, all the good magicians meet there on Wednesdays. They take him under their wing, and he increases his skills dramatically. From these professional magicians, he learns about the underground group of professional casino rip-off artists known as “Crossroaders.” Dustin Marks Meets Crunch He learned from his magician friends at Gary Darwin’s that a man known only as Crunch was a professional Crossroader, and Justin tells how he met Crunch. He learned that Crunch was well known at a local magic shop so Dustin befriended a clerk at this store. The clerk agreed to call Dustin if he saw Crunch in the store. A few weeks later, the clerk is good to his word and Justin runs over to the store and introduces himself to Crunch. The rest is history as Crunch takes Justin under his tutelage and, that very day, invites him to his home and begins a series of classes in how to cheat casinos. Dustin Marks on Cheating Casinos He tells about working with large crews to take a casino for over $100,000. We learn that this crew will have a couple of dealers already working at the casino and several players to set up the deck by taking all the chairs at a particular table where another crew member is the dealer. After a few plays, the dealer gets the card into the correct order as the players drift away. Another member of the crew will come to the table and demand that he be the only player and will place large bets on several hands. He will take several tricks and leave. They will come back on another shift and do this again. They will move to another casino with a cooperating dealer and do it again. Another technique for earning smaller amounts at a steady pace required him to have a dealer as his partner. Dustin Marks on Techniques We learn many techniques to get better odds, some even legal. One is called card palming. He could keep an extra card in one hand and switch it out with a bad card in his hand. Another is “pressing your bet.” In that technique, if the player gets a very good hand, say a 19 or above, he can slip another chip on the betting line to increase his bet after he knows his hand is good. Justin said how the same thing applies if he got a bad hand, and he talked about ways to take away a chip and lower the bet. The legal method of getting an edge is to find a dealer who is sloppy and might show cards as he dealt. The Cheater’s Appearance One of the main lessons Dustin Marks learned as he cheated casinos was he needed to blend into the background and not draw attention to himself. he explained how the cameras are really designed to prevent the dealer from stealing and to provide evidence for lawsuits. If the guys watching the “eye in the sky” started watching the cheater because he drew attention to himself, the cheater was finished. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Jeffrey Sussman on Greg Scarpa Jan 18, 2021

Jeffrey Sussman Gary interviews Jeffrey Sussman who is the author of 15 non-fiction books. Mr. Sussman’s most recent book, Big Apple Gangsters: The Rise and Decline of the Mob in New York, is the subject. He has also written extensively about professional boxing as well as the subject of Marketing. with books like Boxing and the Mob: The Notorious History of the Sweet Science; Rocky Graziano: Fists, Fame, and Fortune; Max Baer and Barney Ross: Jewish Heroes of Boxing, and Power Promoting: How to Market Your Business to The Top! Greg Scarpa In this interview, Gary and Jeffrey discuss his chapter on Greg Scarpa or the “Grim Reaper.” Scarpa started as a young mobster in the Profaci crime family. Later he will graduate to be a Capo and hitman for the the Colombo crime family. He will fuel his success as a gangster by making a deal with the FBI. During his entire mob career Greg Scarpa acted as an informant in exchange for Burau turning a blind eye to his crimes. The Grim Reaper and the KKK During the summer of 1964, KKK members murdered three Civil Rights workers as they drove through the small town of Philadelphia Mississippi. The FBI sent many agents to solve this crime as seen in the film, Mississippi Burning with Gene Hackman. In that movie, hackman depicted a rouge FBI agent who threatened sexual torture to solve this crime and locate the victim’s bodies. In reality, Jeffrey tells us the FBI brought their prize informant down, gave him a gun, and pointed out the most likely suspects. Scarpa kidnapped an appliance store owner by buying television and taking him prisoner as he delivered the TV. Greg Scarpa beat the man to a bloody pulp and when he still refused to divulge the perpetrators and location of the bodies, Scarpa threatened castration. The man quickly confessed. A grateful FBI paid Scarpa $100,000 as a reward. They pointed him at another unsolved murder and when they refused to pay him another $100,000, he returned to New york. Greg Scarpa Loses an Eye On December 29, 1992, Greg Scarpa was on house arrest and wearing an electronic monitoring device. Lucchese family mobsters, Michael DeRosa and Ronald Moran, were doing a drug deal with Scarpa’s son, Joey Scarpa. They tried to cheat him over the money and threatened to kill him. Joey Scarpa told his Dad about this intimidation and the father and son hit the streets looking for retribution. Even though he was being monitored by his ankle monitor, the father and son drove to DeRosa’s house. During a short gun battle, they shot DeRosa. Ronald Moran was there and he fired back. Scarpa was wounded in his eye. Scarpa and his son drive back home where he poured whisky into his wound. The phone was bringing and he told the caller from the monitoring company that he had just stepped out to the pharmacy to get some medicine. Prosecutors learned about the ambush and revoked Scarpa’s house arrest. The Mobster gets AIDS Prison and death During the time of the above gunfight, Greg Scarpa was suffering from HIV and was into full-blown AIDS. He had received his infection from a blood transfusion. In a lawsuit against his doctor, the court learned about another complaint filed against this defendant doctor for allegedly sedating two different male patients. While they were under sedation, the doctor supposedly sodomized the patients. Mr. Sussman tells us the judge, in this case, remarked, “let’s see here we have a mafia hitman plaintiff and a defendant medical doctor who is accused of sedating and sodomizing patient.” Scarpa settled for $300,000 in cash payments to his family. On December 15, 1993, a federal judge sentenced Greg Scarpa. On June 4, 1994, Gregory Scarpa Sr. died in the Federal Medical Center (FMC) for prisoners in Rochester, Minnesota, from AIDS-related complications. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here.

Chris Paciello – South Beach Celebrity Jan 11, 2021

Chris Paciello – The early days Chris Paciello was born Christian Ludwigsen in the Borough Park section of Brooklyn to an Italian mother and non-Italian father who was an addict and a petty thief. Chris’s father was a street guy who rarely took care of his family. His mother moved Chris to an Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn and they began using her maiden name, Paciello. Chris started as a petty thief, boosting car stereos at age 15, and graduated to stealing cars. He became close with the New Springfield Boys, a young crew often used by both the Colombo and Bonanno families for small jobs, arson, robbery, intimidation. Like most young men of the 1980s-90s, they dabbled in street-level drug dealing. Paciello maintained his mafia connections for use later in his criminal career. Chris Paciello – First big score Paciello got his first big break in the early 90s when he noticed some young guys loading bales of marijuana into a panel truck. Chris was always quick to see an opportunity and he followed the panel truck until the men dropped it on the street and left it unguarded. Chris knew how to hotwire an automobile so he called in his crew and they took the marijuana. Since Paciello was in a group with mafia connections, a Bonanno Capo named Anthony Graziano demanded a piece of this theft. Graziano demanded $50,000 in cash. Paciello gladly paid this tribute because they actually made over three times that amount. Chris Paciello – Armed Robbery Chris Paciello and the New Springfield Boys decide to go for the big money and robbed six banks over the next few months after the marijuana caper. Modeling themselves after the Point Break robbery crew, they meticulously planned each robbery. They cased the locations, used crash cars, knew the schedules of the armored car arrivals and the personal schedules of every bank employee. Paciello was building for the future with each bank robbery and one even netted them over $300,000. Chris Paciello – A job goes wrong Paciello was always on the prowl for a bigger job and more money. He was a thinking robber and looked into the porn industry because they usually dealt in cash. He learned about a porn magnate named Sami Shemtov who owned many porn shops in New York City. Even while many of these porn stores were co-owned by mob members, Paciello started running surveillance on Shemtov. he learned where he lived and believed he must keep a cash hoard inside his home Chris recruited outside his normal crew and convinced mob associates and members of a Bonanno crew called the Bath Avenue crew to help him. Bonnano associates Jimmy Calendra and Tommy Reynolds went to Shemtov’s home. Reynolds was a crack addit and unreliable to the poin that he spent the whole day smoking in preparation for the home invasion. Paciello and his crew arrived at Shemtov’s. Calendra and Reynolds went to the door, while Paciello waited in the car. Shemtov’s wife answered the door. Reynolds was jittery and afraid and for some reason he pulled his trigger killing Ms. Chemtov in front of her 9-year old daughter. The two men fled back to Pacielloo and the getaway car with no money. Newspapers later reported that Shemtov diod not have a safe and did to keep his store rfeceiuopts at home. Chris Paciello – Still out there Paciello left New York after this crime and invested much of his money into a Miami South Beach club called Risk. During this time, he hedged his bets and started proving the FBI information. He was very successful in the Miami club scene and sooner partnered with a local celebrity named Ingrid Casares and opened Club Liquid. He became friends with many movie stars and music legends like Madonna during these days. On December 1, 1999, New York charged Paciello in the 1993 murder of Judith Shemtov. Sofia Vergara and other wealthy customers of his South Beach club posted his three million dollar bail. After a year of negotiation, Paciello pleaded guilty to s single racketeering charge.

Ron Fino – Mr. Undercover Dec 28, 2020

Ron Fino- Undercover Contractor This is the audio from a Zoom call in which the Gangland Wire Supporters and I talk with Mr. Undercover, Ron Fino. Ron started as a Union business manager in the Buffalo New York area. His father was a member of the Buffalo Family under Stephano Maggadino. He saw how the mob abused their power and harmed union employees. Ron has always looked out for the folks with less power over their circumstances. Mr. Fino contacted the FBI and volunteered his services. They had him sign a contract to work for them as a paid undercover agent. Throughout his career, Ron passed along information on the Buffalo family, the Chicago Outfit, the Cleveland mob, New York City mobsters, the Russian mob, and he even passed along information from the west coast crime families. Later in his life, the FBI and CIA coordinated and sent him into Middle Eastern terrorist organizations to uncover arms deals. Ron Fino and his exploits are documented in his book, Mr. Undercover. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Joe Pistone and Deep Cover Dec 14, 2020

Joe Pistone Podcast In this episode, Gary interviews the famous retired FBI Agent Joe Pistone aka Donnie Brasko, and his podcasting partner Leo Rossi. Joe Pistone has started his own true-crime podcast based on stories from his 6-year undercover assignment. Agent Joe Pistone infiltrated the Bonanno Crime Family. He tells about working with Lefty Ruggerio and other stories. This podcast is titled Deep Cover and you can find it on all podcast apps. Click here to find their website Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos This week on December 16th, Amazon will allow free downloads of my book, Leaving Vegas. This is the second of a limited duration Christmas present for listeners and their friends. Be sure and tell everybody and share on your social media outlets. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Jack Garcia aka Jack Falcone Dec 07, 2020

Jack Garcia – the early days Joaquin “Jack” Garcia was actually born in pre-Castro Cuba. His family immigrated to the U.S. in the early days of Castro because his father was going to be arrested by the new regime. As a child, Jack was often the target of bullies because he did not speak English. His size and demeanor quickly put an end to the bullying. He grew into a 6′ 4″ 250-pound college football player. he became interested in law enforcement and tried several times to join the FBI. Finally, he saw an advertisement that the FBI was looking for native Spanish speakers and applied to that program. When he was finally accepted after many attempts, he learned the Bureau had rejected him before because they learned the CIA had a file on him and his family. Jack Garcia – first undercover assignment The FBI, after rejecting him for being Cuban born, took advantage of his natural Cuban accented Spanish. Jack chose the undercover name, Jack Falcone. TheFBI assigned him to work on Omega 7, an anti-Castro Cuban terrorist group. They also had him infiltrate all the various Cuban groups in Miami, the FALN – Puerto Rican terrorist organization, and investigate Cuban spy cells sent by Castro. He found himself the target of a death threat and the Bureau sent him back to the New Jersey and New York City area. Jack Garcia – the Mafia After several years working different Hispanic narcotics gangs where he acted as a money launderer and took down a group of dirty cops in Florida, the FBI decided they might send him into a mafia group. he was able to befriend a Gambino capo, named Greg DePalma. DePalma loved to use Garcia’s size to intimidate other mobsters and associates. Leaving Vegas: The True Story of How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos This week on December 19th and 11th, Amazon will allow free downloads of my book, Leaving Vegas. This is a two-day only Chrs=istmas present for listeners and their friends. Be sure and tell everybody and share on your social media outlets. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Frankie Carbo Nov 30, 2020

Frankie Carbo- the early years Paul John Carbo (born Paolo Giovanni Carbo; AKA Frankie Carbo was a New York City Mafia soldier in the Lucchese crime family. He was a gunman and assassin for “Lepke” Louis Buchalter in the Murder Inc. organization. Authorities arrested Carbo seventeen times for murder. He will gravitate to California and continue his murderous habits. In 1939, he was a suspect in the murder of informant Harry “Big Greenie” Greenberg in California. “Kid Twist” Abe Reles agreed to testify against Franky Carbo in this case. In one of the most famous suspicious deaths in mob history, Kid Twist Reles will either be pushed out a window or otherwise sustain a fatal fall from an 8th story window while under police protection. The prosecutor dismissed the case against Carbo. Informants at the time claimed Carbo was responsible for murdering Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in Beverly Hills, California in 1947. Boxing Promoter During World War II, Carbo started promoting boxing matches in California. He joined with a group of other boxing promoters known as the Combination. They will become successful and promote many high-profile matches and fix those same matches for Mob gambling interests. Frankie Carbo had become the mob’s unofficial commissioner for boxing and controlled many fighters. They did not put in the fix on every fight. One of the more famous fixes was Kid Galivan and Johnny Saxon. Carbo Lieutenant, Blinky Palermo from Philadelphia, controlled Saxon. After a fifteen-round fight, the referees awarded the match to Saxton. Most boxing fans believed Kid Galivan won that match. Franky Carbo and Sonny Liston By 1959, Franky Carbo and his partner Blinky Palermo owned a piece of heavyweight boxer Sonny Liston. He would win the World Heavyweight Championship in 1962. From the start of his pro career in 1953, St. Louis crime family mobster John Vitale had been an owner of Liston’s first contract and he sold a piece of Liston to Carbo and Blinky Palermo. At the time, Carbo was imprisoned after the government convicted him of the undercover management of prize-fighters and unlicensed matchmaking. At the time law enforcement and the entire sports world knew that Vitale and other mobsters-controlled Liston’s contract. Liston fought 12 fights under the control of Vitale, Carbo, and Palermo. Franky Carbo and Legal troubles After serving a sentence for racketeering in 1960, a Senate investigation committee on mob influence on boxing subpoenaed Carbo and others to a hearing. Franky Carbo took the Fifth Amendment 25 times, answering “I cannot be compelled to be a witness against myself.” In 1961, after that hearing, the FBI made a case of conspiracy and extortion on Carbo and Palmero. This was for threats made to the National Boxing Association Welterweight Champion Don Jordan. Attorney General Robert Kennedy served as a prosecutor and the court sentenced Carbo to 25 years in Alcatraz Island Penitentiary. Granted early parole due to ill health, Carbo was released from prison. He died in Miami Beach, Florida on November 22, 1976. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Listener Zoom call How Larry Newman committed murder In McHenry Nov 23, 2020

Larry Newman Committed Murder in McHenry County Paul Scharff learned who murdered his father years before from his former babysitter. Paul’s father, Ron Scharff, was closing his neighborhood tavern on June 2, 1981. A man walks in that Ron knew. What he did not know was that this man was carrying a grudge because Ron had thrown the guy’s ex-wife out of the bar, and she complained that he had disrespected her. Larry Newman was a murderer who served several years for a triple murder of some folks he felt had disrespected him. he took the bar owner, Ron Scharff, and his barmaid into the back room and coldly executed them. He flew back to las Vegas and rejoined his crew popularly known as the Hole in the Wall Gang. Chicago mob enforcer Frank Culotta ran this gang for Outfit member Tony Spilotro. Frank had told Newman not to carry out his vendetta. Frank and Spiolotro were both terrified of Newman, and he committed the crime and even told Frank when he returned. A few years later when Frnka enters the witness protection program and his deal required him to testify about any crime where he was a participant or even had any knowledge. Today’s guest on this fan Zoom call tells his story of how he learned who murdered his father, his subsequent mission to force the Mchenry County Sheriff’s office to acknowledge this fact, and his campaign to root out corruption in this county. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Diamond Jim Moran Nov 16, 2020

Diamond Jim Moran and New Orleans Bobby Brocato Jr, nephew of the famous Diamond Jim Moran, aka James Brocato, has published a New Orleans history/Mafia history/New Orleans cuisine cookbook/family history book titled Food for Kings: A New Orleans Legend. In this episode, I interview Mr. Brocato about his famous grandfather. Diamond Jim Moran, the Boxer Diamond Jim Moran started life as an Italian immigrant who shined shoes on the streets of New Orleans. As a teenager, he found he had a talent and love for the sport of boxing. Just like Joey Aiuppa, Chicago outfit boss, he changed his name to the Irish Moran to attract more fans to his corner. He had a reasonably successful boxing career but moved into refereeing to earn money. He made friends with many celebrities, sports figures, mobsters, and politicians during his boxing career. Diamond Jim Moran and Prohibition Diamond Jim opened his first restaurant during Prohibition. Ming Toy, an Irish Chinese joint, had the usual speakeasy upstairs. Here Diamond Jim created relationships with Louisiana state and local politicians of the era. He would become remarkably close with the famous Huey P. Long and even serve as his bodyguard on occasion. Because of his prohibition connections, he became an associate of the New York mobster, Frank Costello, who was installing slot machines in New Orleans and later in the entire state. Diamond Jim alleged that Costello tipped him about a plot to assassinate Huey P. Long. Diamond Jim Moran and the La Louisiane Diamond Jim became wealthy from his various business dealings and bought the famous La Louisiane restaurant in New Orleans. Here he was host to many of America’s celebrities. Because of their shared Italian heritage, Diamond Jim and baseball player Joe DiMaggio would have a lifelong friendship. It was an accident during the preparation of meatballs that became Diamond Jim’s claim to fame. He knew he must not miss an opportunity for publicity. One day, his wife lost her diamond engagement ring while making meatballs. Diamond Jim knew that his wife had cooked her ring inside a meatball, and a customer would find that ring. He announced that night that a customer would discover this diamond ring in a meatball, and they may keep it. Diamond Jim told his wife not to worry because this stunt will earn him enough to buy her a bigger diamond. He was correct, and this became a periodic publicity stunt. He would get an inexpensive diamond ring and place it in a meatball and advertise this as the place where you may find a diamond-studded meatball in the order. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

The Trenchcoat Robbers Nov 09, 2020

William Kirkpatrick – Big Trenchcoat Robber This is the story of the trenchcoat robbers, one of the most successful bank robbery teams in all history. In the 1970s, William Kirkpatrick was often followed by the KC Police Intelligence Unit because he was a well-known booster or shoplifter connected to the Mob. I remember we once got information from a small town in Illinois where he had been caught by a random patrol car as he was trying to steal a car. He was on foot and the cops found he was dressed in black, had a pistol in a shoulder holster, and was carrying a mask in his pocket. We never figured out what he was doing at that time. We will learn later that he was stealing a car to use in a bank robbery. During the 1970s-1980s Kirkpatrick was well known for stealing record albums and fencing them with a Kansas City mob guy named Tiger Cardarella. Tiger had Tiger’s Records and it was the most popular record store in KC because he had all the newest releases and they were always discounted to about 75% of the sticker price. One time an ATF agent and myself noticed his car, a large 1975 Thunderbird was parked at a Ford dealership. We had heard he had special air shocks so when he filled his truck with record albums, the car would not sink to an unnatural level. So, we approached the service manager and asked for his help. He gave us the keys and we checked the trunk and found it filled to the brim with record albums and looking underneath, we saw the air shocks. Over the next few years, our friend Billie Kirkpatrick will graduate from boosting trips to a more dangerous yet more lucrative criminal activity. Bank Robbery! William Kirkpatrick was kind of a good old boy who grew up around mob members and other professional criminals in northeast Kansas City. Ray Bowman – Small Trenchcoat Robber Ray Bowman became the second man in the Trenchcoat Robbers team. During these years, he met another record booster named Ray Bowman. Both Kirkpatrick and Bowman sold all their record albums to a Kansas City mafia member named Tiger Cardarella. Tiger gave these men and a whole stable of other boosters shopping lists of record albums, tennis rackets, watches, leather coats, and other goods he would buy. Tiger had a famous record store named Tiger’s Records. Every booster in the city wanted to get Ray Bowman as a partner because he was very close-mouthed, He maintained good practices and procedures like he always scoped out the record stores and looked for the lazy and indifferent clerks before he boosted. Ray Bowman and William Kirkpatrick had known each other for many years and they started working together. During this time, Ray Bowman lived a big-spending fast lifestyle. He spent all his money on cocaine for club girls, rented limos, owned a Corvette, dressed in expensive clothes, and splurged on thousand-dollar dinners with his friends. A girlfriend at the time remembered that he was very antigovernment and was a survivalist. He purchased guns and ammo that he kept in a special locked room in his house. These guys made boosting outfits consisting of oversize pants and shirts with special pockets and long trench coats with booster sleeves or hidden pockets in the lining where they would conceal the albums. Bank Robberies After a series of successful bank robberies, this team perfected their disguises by always wearing trenchcoats. The FBI codenamed them the Trenchcoat Robbers. In 1997, they made a big score. In January both men met in suburban Tacoma Washington. They checked into a local hotel, ate out in the best restaurants, and even attended a piano concert. They staked out the Seafirst bank of Lakeland Washington. For one month they surveilled the bank and its activities. They figured out they always had a large amount of cash when it was payday at a nearby Army base. They noticed this bank took in excess cash from other branches and cash from an Indian casino. On Feb 10, 1997, Kirkpatrick used a Jeep master key he had made to steal...

Halloween Extra – St. Valentine’s Day Massacre Oct 31, 2020

The Massacre on St. Valentine’s Day Gary investigates follows the journey of the bullet-riddled bricks for the wall where four assailants lined up seven members of the Bugs Moran gang and shot them down. This podcast includes an interview with Geoff Shumacher, Director of the Mob Museum, about how they obtained the bricks and about their current display. On St. Valentine’s Day morning in 1929 four men, two of them wearing police uniforms, wheeled up in front of the Clark Street building housing the S.M.C. Cartage Co. They arrived in a Cadillac touring car, with big running boards similar to those used by police detectives. They entered into a long, narrow garage where they surprised seven members or followers of the Bugs Moran gang and got the drop on them with Tommy guns and shotguns. The seven were lined up against the north wall with their hands raised above their heads. The occupants of the garage turned and faced the bricks with a minimum of protest, no doubt thinking it was just another innocuous police raid. Then the counterfeit cops opened fire with military precision, sending as many as 100 rounds of ammunition into the unsuspecting victims as they collapsed in bloody heaps. The two uniformed cops then marched the other two murderers out as if they were under arrest and drove away. It has been learned that Al Capone hired Fred “Killer” Burke and three other former members of Egan’s Rats, a St. Louis gang, to carry out this attack. The S.M.C. Cartage Building The building at 2122 Clark Street (click the highlighted link to see) quickly became an unofficial tourist attraction after newspapers printed the photos of the corpses and named the location. In 1949, a young couple turned the building into an antique furniture business. They had no idea of the building’s bloody past. They soon learned of the building’s bloody past when more tourists and curiosity-seekers than customers visited. The business closed and in 1967, the building was demolished leaving the bullet-riddled wall from the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. The Death Wall A Canadian businessman George Patey read about the demolition and he called Chicago Mayor Richard J. Daley. The mayor’s office told Patey to call the National Wrecking Co., which was knocking down the garage. After Mr. Patey negotiated the purchase with the Wrecking company, he purchased all the bricks that made up the wall the victims stood against as they were murdered on St. Valentine’s Day Massacre. The wrecking company sold the 7 1/2-foot-wide by 11-foot-high that had bullet-riddled bricks for an unknown price. The Exhibition of the Wall During that time, thousands of tourists had visited the death car of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow and Mr. Patey knew this was a valuable tourist attraction. In 1973 a casino owner purchased the blood-spattered 1934 Ford for $175,000 at an antique automobile auction. The death car today is displayed at Whiskey Pete’s Hotel and Casino in Primm Nevada. Mr. Patey had each of the 417 bricks numbered and packed in sequence and stored in seven barrels. He then had the wall reconstructed but everyplace he tried to display the artifact, in Canada a p[public outcry stopped the display. Patey offered the bullet-scarred wall to a crime museum, but the museum failed. Finally, in 1972, he opened a night club called the Banjo Palace. He rebuilt the all in the men’s restroom. He covered it with glass and made it into the back wall of the men’s urinal. Above the urinal, Patey placed a sign that said, “Piss On It. It’s History Down the Drain!” The women customers were so excited about seeing the wall that they would even enter the man’s bathroom while the men were using it. When he closed the club and had wall deconstructed, he found that 7 bricks from the original 417 were missing. These bricks have never been found. Missing Bricks from the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre The Chicago Tribune searched police records for the missing bricks and could not find them.

The Grave Robbing Mobsters Oct 26, 2020

The Grave Avron Goldbogen or Michael Todd started in the construction business and then got his start in the film industry when he worked on soundproofing stage sets when the pictures changed from silent to talking films. He would go bankrupt during the depression but soon rebounded first ventures into the construction business. After WW II, Michael Todd worked on a new big-screen film process called Cinerama. He then broke off and developed another Widescreen film process that would become known as Todd-AO. His first success was a film version of a popular musical, Oklahoma. His next big hit was Around the World in 80 days, which would win an Academy Award for the Best Picture of 1957. In 1958, Michael Todd was killed in an airplane crash. He was at the high point of his career. At that time, he was married to the most popular and beautiful actress in Hollywood, Elizabeth Taylor. They lived the Hollywood legend throwing grandiose parties on a lavish. After he died, Michael Todd left an estate estimated from $3 million to $5 million. After his death and internment, a story circulated that Elizabeth Taylor placed a 10-caret diamond ring valued at $100,000.00 on her husband’s finger before his burial. Anyone who did even a little research about the accident could figure out that Michael Todd hadn’t enough body left for Elizabeth to put any ring. Reporters questioned the manager of the Albuquerque, N.M. funeral home that processed Todd’s body immediately after the crash, and they learned that Todd’s body had been burned “100 percent” and had to be identified by dental charts. He said, “We did not attempt to embalm Mr. Todd’s body.” A spokesman for Miss Taylor said that to their knowledge, there were no valuables in the grave. After a well-attended funeral in Todd’s native Chicago, the family buried his few remains inside a full-size casket for the show: this was in the Jewish Waldheim Cemetery in the Chicago suburb of Forest Park. The Crime In June of 1977, 20 years later, a lady visiting a nearby grave noticed a recently open grave under the headstone containing the names of Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen and Michael Todd. Responding authorities quickly learned this was the grave of the famous movie director, Michael Todd, and the third husband of movie star Elizabeth Taylor. The Chicago police described this grave as being 100 feet south of Roosevelt Road, just west of Des Plaines Avenue. They found that unknown persons had opened the casket, and the remains of Mr. Todd were missing. They speculated the graverobbers had to do their digging sometime between 5 p.m. Friday, when the cemetery closed, and Sunday morning when it reopened. Their investigation noted the gravediggers buried the casket only about 4 ½ feet deep in the Congregation Beth Aaron section of the cemetery. Hidden by large branches they placed near the gravesite, the thieves pried open the coffin’s bronze lid and smashed through a glass case to remove the remains. Crime scene technicians could not find any fingerprints, and searchers found some digging tools they believe were used by the graverobbers. Forest Park police received no other complaints about disturbing graves in the cemetery. The cops got in touch with Elizabeth Taylor and learned she had received no threats or ransom demands, and, in an unusual coincidence, she visited the grave the previous Friday was the first time in years. She said she had some time to kill between flights at a stopover at O’Hare International Airport. Within a couple of weeks, the famous Hollywood private eye, Anthony Pellicano, got involved. He claimed he received instructions from an informant on where to find the body. He directed cemetery workers to a plastic body bag with human remains inside hidden under a pile of branches and leaves in an out of the way section of the Jewish Waldheim cemetery. Of note, they could see a heavy canvas web belt like an airplane seatbelt inside the bag with the remains.

Jerry Catena Oct 19, 2020

Jerry Catena the early years Gerardo Jerry Catena was born in 1902 in South Orange, NJ. He made early connections to Jewish gangster “Longy” Zwillman working as a bodyguard and chauffeur. Later, he worked for racketeer Willie Moretti—the inspiration for Luca Brasi. Through Moretti, Catena made connections with Luciano, Costello, Adonis, and Genovese, and took part in the Castelamarese War. Catena had a younger brother, Gene, who followed him into the rackets. The Catena brothers were both very smart, capable leaders, but Jerry was very business savvy. He learned from “Longy” Zwillman to diversify his interests, and Catena had as many legal businesses as illegal. He was the kind of man Sammy Gravano would describe as a “racketeer and a gangster.” Jerry Catena was close with Frank Costello and had heavy interests in gambling making him a millionaire. But he could also read the tea leaves—Catena was the underboss of New Jersey under Vito Genovese, and he knew Don Vito was making moves. While Catena was in charge of all Luciano/Costello Family interests in New Jersey, capos Tony “Bender” Strollo, Mike Miraglia, and Tommy Eboli were also turning on Costello. When Costello was shot, Genovese became boss, and Catena had Jersey all to himself—he even attended the Apalachin Meeting with Genovese in 1957 and was arrested. Jerry Catena and the Great Atlanta & Pacific Tea Co. (A & P) Catena owned points in the Sands, the Fremont, and the Horseshoe Casinos, and was a major stockholder in Bally Corp, the jukebox, pinball, and slot machine manufacturer. The Chicago Outfit also had a large interest in Bally. For our story though, the Catena Brothers owned a distributing firm called Best Sales. Best Sales got a contract from Ecology Corp, a subsidiary of the North American Chemical Co to distribute a detergent called “Poly-Clean.” The problem is the FDA had labeled their product “dangerous to users.” That didn’t bother the Catena brothers. The North American Company’s sales jumped from $3,000,000 to $5,000,000 in one year when Best Sales became their exclusive distributor. Some might call their methods unorthodox, others would say that burning down any store that doesn’t buy palates of Poly-Clean was just high-pressure sales in 1960s North Jersey. Membership has its benefits. The Catena brothers sent representatives to the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Co. (A&P) grocery store chain. A&P did their research and wanted no part of substandard detergent. The Catena brothers had other ideas. Suddenly, A&P stores started burning down, first one, then another…six stores totaling $60 million in damages. However, A&P was a national chain. They didn’t realize they were being “muscled.” Several managers were beaten, two were murdered, one died by suicide. Gene Catena was recorded saying he wanted to “knock A&P’s brains in.” A&P contacted law enforcement, and even with New Jersey corruption, a federal investigation into arson and the deaths of supermarket employees is unwanted. The Catena brothers had to back off. Later, in 1967, North American Chemical realized who owned Best Sales, they tried to discontinue their relationship. It didn’t look good to be in business with leg-breakers. Jerry Catena agreed that North American must pay him $24,000 a year for 13 years to stop sales on North American’s behalf. He literally extorted this payment. Later, in 1970, long after the Catenas had shut down Best Sales, North American was still in business. So much so that the government seized 938 cases a toxic detergent with the names “Ecolo-G,” and “Bohack.” Maybe North American Chemical could have taught the Catenas a few things. As a company, they believed there was no reason to get rid of a good-selling product just because some law labels it “dangerous to consumers.” They gave it a catchy name, called in the mob to be their sole distributor, and made millions. Later, when the mob got too pushy, they paid them less than 10% to take a hike,

Gay Bars and the Mafia Oct 12, 2020

Genovese Capo Matty the Horse Ianiello and Gay Bars Author Phillip Crawford Jr. has released a dramatic and shocking account, The Mafia and the Gays, showing how the New York Mafia and the Chicago Outfit used the societal fear and loathing of to earn money. The Genovese man who oversaw the segment of Mob business was Matty the Horse Ianiello. He is known best for his control of Manhatten’s Times Square and 42nd Street Combat Zone of peep shows, strip clubs, and gay bars. In the 1950s-1960s, homosexual acts were banned by most state laws and city ordinances. Vice Units of most large city police departments spent a certain amount of their time in enforcing these laws. They often targeted taverns catering to gay men and women. The mob and men like Matty the Horse Ianiello had connections with the cops and for a piece of the action or a fee, they could buy off a Vice Unit and prevent raids. Mr. Crawford did extensive research and supports his stories with excerpts from Freedom of Information Act requests from FBI files. Gay Bars and Frank Costello Frank Costello associate and jukebox king Alfred Miniaci funded dozens of gay bars and other joints controlled by the Mafia in the 1950s and 1960s including the Peppermint Lounge. Miniaci supplied slot machines in the 1930s to Frank Costello. He actually had dinner with Costello on May 2, 1957, the night he was shot. Vito Genovese Crawford reports that during a messy divorce from Vito Genovese, Anna Genovese testified that her husband controlled several gay clubs using frontmen. Among those was Club 82 where tourists enjoyed drag shows. Club 82 and several other Manhateen gay clubs became sots where addicts could find heroin dealers and Genovese took a piece of that action. Matty the Horse Ianiello helped Genovese get control of gay clubs in order that they become an integral part of Genovese narcotics distribution network. Joe Columbo In the 1970s, a man named Steve Ostrow owned and operated the iconic Continential baths. A gay bathhouse was a place where gay men could hook up and have anonymous sex with others. Ostrow has said that he used the Columbo family for trash service, jukeboxes, other vending machines, and to pay off cops. This was a huge place that dealt in cash making it a perfect mobbed-up place. He tells a story about how Ostrow was delinquent by $17,000.00 in New York State taxes. A Colombo loan shark fronted this money. Steve Ostrow was the man singing the Star Spangled Banner for Colombo when he was murdered. Joe DiVarco Mr. Crawford tells how Chicago Outfit capo DiVarco controlled the Rush Street area and all gay bars paid him off for protection against the Chicago Cops. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Zoom Call with Dennis Griffin Sep 28, 2020

Frank Cullotta RIP December 14, 1938- August 20, 2020 In this episode, Gary hosts a Zoom call with podcast supporters who have either donated money or time to keep the podcast going. Since Frank Cullotta died recently, I have true crime author Dennis Griffin as a special guest. Dennis tells many stories about his life helping Frank Cullotta compose, edit and publish the three books on his life. In addition, Dennis Griffin has written several other true crime books like Surviving the Mob: A Street Soldier’s Life inside the Gambino Crime Family with Andrew DiDonato, The Battle for Las Vegas, A Family Business: The Life and times of Joey “The Fixer” Silvestri, Wrong Number: Call Girls, Hackers and the Mob in Las Vegas, Survival: From Childhood Sexual Abuse Victim to World Boxing Champion, Rogue Town. Just click on his name to see all those books. Frank Culotta’s Las Vegas Tour Podcast listener Berry Parks of Kansas City took Frank’s tour of mob sites and Casino the movie spots recently. He was able to tell many stories from that tour. Berry said that since the pizza place was closed where Frank usually took guests and he was not hungry, they just sat in the car and Frank told stories and answered questions for about an hour. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

An Australian Fan interviews Gary Sep 21, 2020

Australian Fans Dan Bashford from Southwest Australia and I talk organized crime in both Kansas City and Australia. Dan is a long time podcast supporter and an ardent fan of all things organized crime. I got up early and did a special Zoom call with him to answer questions about the mob and my career and in the process, I asked him questions about Australian organized crime activities. Donate Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Saratoga Springs, Arnold Rothstein and the Mob Sep 14, 2020

Arnold Rothstein develops Carpet Joints Greg Veitch, retired Chief of Police has written two excellent mob history books a bit a little known but an important period of organized crime history. Starting at the turn of the century, Saratoga Springs New York developed local mineral springs and a race track into a well-known spa retreat for the rich elite of New York City. The race track gambling drew the mob to this summer retreat. Arnold Rothstein built a large opulent casino called the Brook. he drew other gamblers like Meyer Lanskey, Joe Adonis and Frank Costello. These guys and other organized crime figures copied the idea of going to a resort area, bribing local officials, and building large clubs that included floor shows, fine dining, and a casino. Soon, similar operations became known as “Carpet Joints” and they spread across the country. Greg Veitch This former chief of Police is a life long multi-generational inhabitant of Saratoga Springs. He has written two important books that tell about his town’s response to gamblers, prohibition, and political chicanery from the turn of the century to the end of the Depression. You may find his work at the below websites. Home https://www.northshire.com/book/9781605714776 https://www.northshire.com/book/9781605713496 Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast N

Niko Vorobyov and Dopeworld Sep 07, 2020

Niko Vorobyov explores the world of dope Gary interviews author Niko Vorobyov about his book Dopeworld. (click here to purchase) Listeners learn how Niko started out selling Ecstasy and Marijuana in the London rave scene and ended up doing some time in a British prison. Instead of plotting how to commit more and better crimes upon his release, Niko sharpened his writing skills like well know former prison inmate writers Seth Ferranti or Gunnar Lindblom. Niko’s plan upon his release was to emulate the great character, Hunter S. Thompson, and take his readers on a gonzo journalist trip inside the work of international drug trafficking. How to Tour a Cocaine Plantation In one story, Niko tells about taking an escorted tour of a South American cocaine plantation. He learned about this from staying in hostels in Columbia. Niko Vorobyov is one brave dude. Niko Vorobyov interviews a Phillipino death squad member When he goes to the Philippines, he learns that the dictator, Rodrigo Duterte, employs “death squads” to combat drug dealing. Niko tells about the most danger he experienced while on his worldwide tour of the narcotics world. He was able to get a face-to-face interview with a Filipino man how was part of a government death squad. Niko’s interview subject sat between Niko and the exit making him incredibly nervous. The man wore a balaclava to hide his identity and waved a pistol in Niko’s face while as he asked him how many people the man has killed. Show Notes by Gary jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Bonus – The Murder of Sol Landie Sep 03, 2020

Sol Landie and Nick Civella In January of 1970, four days before the KC Chiefs met the Minnesota Vikings in Super Bowl IV, KC bettors were laying thousands on a Chief’s victory. An FBI agent climbed a pole directly across the street from the Northview Social Club, aka The Trap, and hooked up a couple of wires. About 20 blocks away at the local FBI headquarters, Agents gathered their coffee mugs, ashtrays, and snacks and put on earphones and settled in for a long boring day. It was not but a few minutes when agents heard a bookie named Frank Tousa scolding his sub-agents and directing their activities. They heard the big bettors like Sol Landie calling. Tousa expressed concern about how much money was going down on the Chiefs. A day before the January 11 Super Bowl, they heard Tousa call Nick Civella and report they had $47,360.00 in bets on the Chiefs that he needed to lay off to another bookie. He needed to keep his book balanced. How sports gambling works The mob does not like to bet, they want an equal amount of bets on both sides of a contest. They earn their money by taking a 10% vig or lug from the losing bettors. When Tousa called Nick Civella he got him to talk about this problem and giving directions on what to do. Nick Civella was caught by his own words. The US Attorney charged Nick with running a gambling enterprise and in October 1970, Agent Bill Ouseley and his partner Lee Flosi arrested him. The Court set a $5,000 bond. The Investigation and Sol Landie Over the next few months, agents subpoenaed bettors to a grand jury. One large sports bettor was a scrapyard operator named Sol Landie. He freely admitted that he had placed the bets in question and he became an important witness because he had called in from Kansas solidifying an interstate gambling case. The Kansas City Strike Force During this same time, the US Attorney designated Kansas City as the Midwest Office for Organized Crime and Racketeering which became known as the Strike Force. They designated several of their best Associate US Attorneys as members of the Strike Force. Each federal agency, FBI, DEA, ATF, Treasury assigned certain agents to work with the Strike Force. A brilliant attorney named Michale DeFeo was designated the lead attorney and 3 other attorneys were assigned along with small support staff. They took over the Civella gambling investigation s their first case. The plan to murder Sol Landie A Mob underling named Johnny Frankovigilia, aka Johnny Franks, learned that the government witness list included the wealthy scrapyard owner Sol Landie. While it will never be known for sure, all indicators make me believe that Johnny Franks wanted to prove his worth to Nick Civella and he decided to eliminate Sol Landie. In November 1970, less than a month after Nick Civella was released on bond. Johnny Franks called an African-American associate named Thomas Jefferson Lee to his gas station at 10th and Hardesty on the northeast side of Kansas City. He offered him money to “take care of ” Sol Landie. Lee said he would see what he could do and left. Shortly after than Lee approached 4 young African American guys. Lee recruited 25-year-old Ronnie Willaims and is cousin Marquis Williams who in turn offered 17-year-old Lee Johnson and Earl Howard $1,000 each to murder a white man who owned a scrap yard’s house. He instructed them to make this murder look like a robbery because the victim was a witness against “somebody big.” The night they killed Sol Landie Lee gave Ronnie Williams gave them the address of Landie’s scrapyard and a description of his Buick Riveria along with 3 marijuana joints. They drove to the scrapyard and found the car. Willimas found out Landie lived in the 74 hundred block of Washington Street and they made a few runs until they found the Buick at a house. Later that night, because e Willimas told them Johnn Franks wanted this done before the weekend was done, they started drinking and smoking marijuana.

The Mob and the Teamsters Part 3 -Roy Lee Williams Aug 31, 2020

In this 3rd and final episode, Gary and Cam take the Teamsters and the Mob to its conclusion through the transfer of power after Hoffa to the last mob influenced president, Kansas City Teamster boss Roy Lee Williams The Big Skim with Roy Lee Williams and Frank Ranney Dorfman and Presser’s legacy is a loan made to a young real estate developer named Allen Glick in 1974. Glick had known Bill Presser for some time when he was introduced to Milwaukee boss Frank Balistrieri as someone who could help him with a Teamster loan. Balestrieri went to his Teamster affiliate Frank Ranney who reached out to Roy Lee Williams. Williams got direction from Nick Civella, who reached out to Maishe Rockman and the Cleveland mob and Bill Presser for the pension fund loan to buy four casinos for $64,000,000. The loans were signed, the casinos purchased, and the Cleveland, Milwaukee, and Kansas City mobs began to receive skim money from the Fremont, the Hacienda, the Stardust, and the Marina casinos. The casinos were insured by Allen Dorfman’s insurance agency. Angelo Lonardo testified that shortly after the skim began, the three families began fighting amongst themselves regarding profit share. They went to Joey Aiuppa and Tony Accardo (Jackie Cerone was in prison) to mediate the dispute, and in return, they received a 25% share of the skim, cutting the total take into four equal pieces going to each family. New York families were not receiving any benefit from these loans—they lost a great deal of control of the National Teamsters when Tony “Pro” Provenzano went to prison from 1966-1970. Nationally, all mob families held tight control of their area and regional Teamsters locals and Joint Councils (the Provenzanos kept running Local 560), but without a presence on the Pension Board, the Chicago Outfit had de facto control of the union. Hoffa Makes Trouble Hoffa had been fighting furiously to undo the Justice Department ruling blocking him from accessing the union. Jimmy still had tremendous power in the Teamsters, and was able to make things happen from the outside—he could even delay Pension loans. He had crisscrossed the country meeting with mob figures looking for help with politicians who could get him re-instated. As incentive, Jimmy offered to stop Hoffa loyalists from gumming up the works…they all turned him down. The mob knew Jimmy didn’t like sharing power, and they never could have gained so much control if Hoffa had been running the union. Hoffa began speaking to the press about taking back his union. He went on talk shows and gave interviews. He showed up at Teamsters headquarters badmouthing Fitz. As time went by and Hoffa watched other people change the union, he got desperate. Jimmy began challenging mob bosses. Through his lawyer Frank Ragano, he reached out to Carlos Marcello and Santo Trafficante demanding their support. Normally, other families would have to go through Detroit to speak to Hoffa, but Jimmy did his own thing—he was his own boss, but he was also not protected. Part of Jimmy’s problem was his on-going war with Anthony Provenzano. Hoffa felt he might have a chance to return to labor if he was able to win the Teamster Presidency outright, member or not, but he needed Provenzano’s support as a Vice President to do it. Hoffa and Provenzano were unable to make peace at several meetings, and Hoffa became more and more desperate. Hoffa began threatening to have his loyalists call in all of the Pension loans made to mob front men. This would likely send control of the pensions into receivership and outside mediation. The mob didn’t want any extra eyes on their business. In addition, Hoffa’s public war against Fitz was getting out of hand. He was constantly drawing attention to Fitz playing golf with the President and creating bad will. Hoffa had been meeting with Charles Allen, a thug who worked under Frank Sheeran, to discuss murdering several members of the Teamsters Board of Trustees.

The Mob and the Teamsters Part 2 Frank Fitzsimmons Aug 24, 2020

Cam and Gary continue discussing the Teamsters and the mob. In this episode, they examine Jimmy Hoffa and his efforts to consolidate bargaining with all trucking companies and have one agreement rather than separate agreements with each company, how he used mob muscle, how he ended up in prison and his deal with the devil to get released. Master Freight Agreement Many people view the Pension as the only interchange between the mob and Hoffa, but the relationship went both ways. From 1961-1964, with the help of his fellow Teamster Frank Fitzsimmons and the Executive Board, Hoffa put together the Master Freight Agreement. He negotiated, cajoled, called in favors, and threatened over the course of three years with every Local and shipper in the country in order to set flat salary rates for shipping everyone was willing to accept. Problem was, no one wanted to accept, locals, or shippers, and this is where Jimmy got creative. When the president of some Teamster local decided he wanted more for his members than the Agreement, Jimmy would work with the local mob to get him voted out or knocked around until he agreed. If some business didn’t want to agree to a price across the board, Jimmy called strike, and the mob broke the place up, tires were slashed, windows were broken. When members somewhere didn’t like the deal Hoffa was putting together, he worked with a shipper to hire scab (non-union) labor on the sly until the Teamsters guys started to get hungry from not working. This was incredible negotiation, but even with the mob’s help, it took 3 years to put this contract together. At the same time the Master Freight Agreement was being drafted, Hoffa was also dealing with the legal issues leftover from Bobby Kennedy, jury tampering, and unresolved issues with the mob. Hoffa had appeals, which he would lose, and he would go to prison in 1967. The mob was tired of Jimmy being so tight with the purse strings. They eyed the billion-dollar pension fund and did not want Jimmy to refuse any loans they recommended? The mob groomed Frank Fitzsimmons to move up and replace Hoffa. Jimmy Goes Away When Jimmy went to prison in 1967, he left specific instructions. Allen Dorfman in Chicago and Bill Presser in Cleveland would control the pension. Frank Fitzsimmons would be the acting president. Jimmy went to the infamous “Mafia Row” in Lewisburg. Vinnie Teresa wrote that he was tight with Carmine Galante. He had a falling out with Tony Provenzano while there, which was overseen by Lucchese consigliere Vinny Rao. John Gotti, Paul Vario and Henry Hill were there. It was while Jimmy was away that the mob learned how good it could be. Fitzsimmons was much easier to deal with than Jimmy. The mob liked him for the same reason Jimmy did…he just couldn’t say no. In addition, Allen Dorfman and Bill Presser strengthened their own factions within the Teamsters. Dorfman controlled the money, while Presser and Cleveland built a huge power base. Roy Lee Williams was the only Teamsters official who had the respect of the men, and this gave him a great deal of power within the organization. With Tony Provenzano in prison since 1966 no longer on the Executive Board, the New York Genovese family’s grasp of the Teamsters slipped. The Chicago Outfit wrestled control of the organization and the pension fund—and eventually Las Vegas—away from The Genovese and the New York Mafia. Chicago, Kansas City, and Cleveland would stand at the top of the Teamsters for several more years. The Mob Moves On with Frank Fitzsimmons Hoffa intended to run the union from his prison cell, using Fitz as his mouthpiece; Hoffa wanted to keep total control, but after years of abuse, Fitzsimmons rebelled…and the Board supported him. The mob liked their new control without Hoffa. Hoffa could say no to the mob, and because of his popularity with the men, he was too powerful to ignore, but with Hoffa gone, the mob directed their area locals and Teamster Delegates to fall in behind Frank Fitzs...

The Mob and the Teamsters Part 1 Jimmy Hoffa Aug 17, 2020

In episode 1 of this 3-part series on the Mob and the Teamster’s Union, Gary and Cam discuss the early days of Jimmy Hoffa as he moves up in the Union making connections with mobsters and earning the respect of his fellow union members The Mob and the Teamsters, Part I: Jimmy Hoffa and the Pension Jimmy Hoffa (b.1913) James Riddle Hoffa joined the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in the early 1930s. He made his way through the ranks from city to city making connections in each city. In Detroit, he was tied up with the Giacalone’s; in Chicago, Red Dorfman introduced him to Joey Glimco, and later Murray “Curly” Humphreys, Tony Accardo, and Paul Ricca. In New York, Hoffa met Johnny Dioguardi and Tony Provenzano; in New Orleans, he met Carlos Marcello. Hoffa knew how to use the mobs to exploit businesses. These associations earned him the support he needed for the nomination to Vice President of the Brotherhood under Dave Beck, but everyone knew who was the real power behind the throne. A membership drive was Hoffa’s top priority. At this time, the Teamsters membership had just passed a million and was still on the rise. Unions were very competitive for membership at this time. The AFL-CIO had just merged in 1955, but the Teamsters were still very independent. Hoffa could use his mob connections to pound the union competition with Molotov cocktails and crowbars, but he needed to give workers a reason to want to be a Teamster. The Pension Hoffa combined many smaller work pensions from 22 states into the Central States, Southeast and Southwest Areas Pension Fund, or Central States for short. In doing so, Hoffa gained the trust and support of the membership. Members could now change employers without losing their pension. In the beginning, employers paid two dollars a month for each Teamster on their payroll, members could contribute as they saw fit. With membership heading towards two million, the fund very quickly had tens of millions. Hoffa set up a board of trustees to help administer the pension. As part of a deal with the Chicago and Cleveland mobs, Red Dorfman’s son Allen, and Cleveland’s Bill Presser were members of the board, but the end of the day, Hoffa had total control. Allen Dorfman was made head of Union Casualty insurance company, while Bill Presser was the President of Cleveland’s 40,000 member Joint Council 41. The Cleveland connection would soon bear fruit. The Teamster’s pension fund and Las Vegas Moe Dalitz, a friend of Bill Presser from Cleveland and of Hoffa from his early Detroit time, suggested that a $4,000,000 loan could be used to help him build the Dunes Casino. Later, Dalitz himself received $1,000,000 to complete the construction of his Sunrise Hospital in his new town of Las Vegas. Moe Dalitz and the Mayfield Road Jewish gangsters from Cleveland built the Desert Inn in Las Vegas in 1949, and were seeking social acceptance. A few years later, Hoffa would loan then another $8,000,000 to buy the Stardust Hotel and Casino. Hoffa loaned additional money to Dalitz for the Star Dust ($6,000,000) and the Freemont ($4,000,000). In 1963, when the Dunes changed ownership, Dalitz helped St. Louis figure Morris Shenker secure the millions he needed to maintain it. Additional loans were made to Cesar’s Palace, the Landmark, Circus Circus, the Aladdin, and the Four Queens, basically creating the entire Vegas Strip. These loans gave the mob a presence in Vegas, with each family planting flags in various locations throughout the city. The Skim sent regular money to every mob family in the country. By 1961, the Central States had lent over $91,000,000 in low interest (6%) loans. By 1963, 2/3 of the fund’s $200,000,000 assets were in real estate loans. Hoffa received a 10% commission on each loan. Allen Dorfman is said to have made approx. $3,000,000 in insurance commissions. Bill Presser used the pension to put all his friends and family into businesses ranging from bowling alleys to sports coliseums,

Netflix Fear City and Joe Cantamessa Aug 03, 2020

RICO and The Comission As you wiretappers know last week Netflix released Fear City which is a 3 part series on how the FBI and the US Attorney convicted the bosses of the Five New York Families; the Bonanno, Colombo, Gambino, Genovese, and Lucchese families. These bosses formed The Commission, and on a national basis, you can add the Chicago family boss to the Commission. The Commission settles disputes and makes decisions about approved and unapproved activities for La Cosa Nostra crime families. Fear City tells how courageous agents and prosecutors used the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO, to take the New York bosses down as an organization. The codename for this operation was The Commission. The Director Sam Hobkinson wove together individual stories from street agent Charlotte Lang, Tech agent Joe Canatmessa, FBI supervisor Jim Kossler, to the Us Attorney Rudy Guliani. These agents followed, watched, waited, tapped phones installed microphones while the attorneys put together and presented the evidence and proved the mafia was an organization that committed corrupt acts. Joe Cantamessa bugs the Comission bosses In this episode, I interview tech agent Joe Cantamessa. He was the agent who made the entries into homes, bars, automobiles, and social clubs to install hidden listening devices. I highly recommend you watch this series. The producers bring the viewer previously unheard stories and video of FBI tech agents at work. Joe tells how they had to steal a mobster’s car, put in a microphone, and leave it where it could be found. To enhance the idea the car was stolen by regular car thieves, they removed the hubcaps. In another story, he tells how he was inside planting a microphone when somebody called the police on them. he looks out and sees about 5 NYPD cruisers. His boss came out of the surveillance van and convinced them they should just leave with no further investigation. he noticed that microphone never produced any evidence. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Netflix and Fear City Charlotte Lang Interview Jul 29, 2020

Fear City Recently Netflix released a 3-part series title Fear City. This documentary tells the story of how the New York office of the FBI made a RICO case on the heads of the 5-Families otherwise called The Commission. Charlotte Lang In this episode, I interview retired FBI agent Charlotte Lang who was recently a key figure in the Netflix documentary Fear City. The FBI first assigned Ms. Lang to review wiretaps searching for evidence that the Commission gave the order to murder Bonanno acting boss Carmine Galente. Ms. Lang tells how she was also assigned to monitor Paul Castellano while he met with Fat Tony Salerno at a lunch meeting in an upscale Manhatten restaurant. Ms. Lang revealed that she and another female agent, who was obviously pregnant, entered an upscale Manhatten restaurant and convinced the hostess that they had to sit at an adjacent table to Castellano because otherwise, her pregnant friend would be too close to the air conditioner. They were able to pick up several nice tidbits of conversation over this 3-hour lunch. In a review of old surveillance tapes of the Ravenite Social Club agents found that a Bonanno member named Bruno Indelicato arrived at this Gambino social club shortly after the Galente murder. The producer of Fear City was able to obtain this footage showing Indelicato being congratulated by various Gambino members including the underboss Dellacroce. Ms. Lang tells how they found a witness who got the license number and description of the Galante hit team and from that they suspected Indelicato. They were able to find the car and obtain some fingerprints. She and her partner tracked down Indelicato and obtained a set of major case prints to compare with a palm print on the suspect car. The fingerprint examiners got a match and they charged Indelicato with the Galente murder. Ms. Lang explains that the tape of Indelicato being congratulated by the underboss of another family after the murder was one more piece of evidence that tied this murder to the other mob bosses. The takedown of the Commission The final piece of evidence was actual proof that the bosses of the 5 families would meet. she tells how they were able to obtain information that a Commission was going to take place. They set up a surveillance and obtained video footage of all 5 bosses and underbosses leaving a house. The documentary Fear City contains the actual surveillance footage of this activity. Show Notes by Gary Jenkins Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Joey Doves Aiuppa and the Big Fish Jul 27, 2020

Joey Doves Aiuppa and the Muskie Mobsters and fishermen are notorious liars. Something about the nature of both lives lends itself to exaggeration. This is an example of where the two worlds meet. In 1949 angler Louis Spray reportedly caught the largest Muskie ever at the Chippewa Flowage in Wisconsin. The fish was 69 lbs, 11 oz, and there is a picture of Louis in a red flannel, corduroy field hat, and the fish is as long as he is tall. There have been several claims through the years of other fish, 1992, Art Lawton’s record fish, originally thought to be 69 lbs, 15 ozz, and 64 ½ inches long was found to have been falsely reported. Throughout the years, many people have accused Louis of fishing illegally or stuffing ground-up fish parts into dead muskie mouths to increase weight. Affidavits and accusations abound. Perhaps the strangest story about Louis Spray’s muskie record comes from Chicago, from a mobster who would one day be known for his exaggerations where animals were concerned. Other sources I found describe Spray as a Prohibition Era rum runner, familiar with Chicago gangsters throughout the Wisconsin area. The affidavits I found, are all full of stories of Spray buying record fish…he holds records from 1939-1949. When he wasn’t fishing or drinking, he was lying, and he carried a gun everywhere he went. Joey “Doves” Aiuppa was a fisherman He was known to editors of several fishing publications. He liked fishing for crappy, but more than anything, Aiuppa liked fishing for muskie. Aiuppa was fishing with Spence Petros of Fishing Facts magazine one day and asked if Petros was familiar with Louis Spray. Petros was familiar with Aiuppa, and Spray—he knew about the World Record Muskie. Aiuppa told Petros while fishing that he actually caught the record muskie and sold it to Spray for $50. Petros questioned him. He was fishing beneath the Winter Dam, where the Chippewa Flowage begins. Petros knew that was a restricted area. “That’s why I was fishing at night,” Aiuppa replied. Petros asked why Aiuppa didn’t just turn in the fish himself. He replied, “Do you know what ‘on the lam’ means?” Joey Doves Aiuppa or Louis Spray? So here we have two men, one whom multiple sources claim is a liar, who holds a record, and another who is named for his prodigious hunting abilities, who only ever told one person about his world record catch. I don’t know about you, but my money is on Doves. Show Notes by Camillus Robinson Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

The Great Bookie Robbery Jul 13, 2020

Great Bookie Robbery; Melbourne, April 21, 1976 “Ray Chuck” Bennett “Ray Chuck” Bennett was a career criminal (“crim”) in Australia—also known as “The General,” for his ability to plan jobs. He was a well-known bank-robber and smuggler. In the early 1970s, he left Australia and joined the “Kangaroo Crew” in England, pulling heists around the UK when he was arrested. While in prison, he worked closely with a British crew called the Wembley Mob learning military-style techniques for burglary. Using these tactics, he came up with the idea to rob the cash office of the Victoria Club when he returned to Melbourne. This was where all of the legal bookies would gather and tally up bets before the armored truck delivered cash to the Victoria Club. Ray Chuck Bennett decided that the best time to hit the Club would be on cash day. Book-making is a cash business, which would prove to be a double-edged sword. Ray Chuck (like many criminals in Australia) was a member of the Federated Ship Painters and Dockers Union (“Dockies”). The Painters and Dockers is kind of like the Australian equivalent of the Teamsters or the Laborer’s Union; criminals ran in, all had no-show (“ghost”) jobs, and in 1993, it was deregistered—officially because membership had fallen below 1000. The Painters and Dockers is important because this union (these work conditions) led men to be very close. They trusted each other, and they knew who had which skills. Ray Chuck built his team of fellow criminals who were also union brothers. The Planning Ray Chuck Bennett and his team planned the job for months. They rented an office two floors above the target and familiarized themselves with the layout. While there, the men tampered with elevators, causing them to constantly jam between floors, they bypassed the building’s security. They removed the bolts of the fire escape door, cut them in half, glued them, and replaced them, so they could just kick the door open. They even broke into the empty cash office at night and ran practice drills. For the months leading up, Ray Chuck and his men worked out, getting into shape for the robbery, running and boxing. They quietly, separately gathered weapons so as not to draw too much attention. The team was Ray Bennett, Ian Carroll, Laurie Prendergast, Normie Lee, Vinnie Mikkelson, Brian and Les Kane. The Robbery Right off, the armored truck was 15” late because of a flat tire, but the men waited down the street, armed in two vehicles, a panel van, and a large, loud semi with trailer, chosen for the noise. They pulled the van down the alley and the semi in front of the club, the loud engine rumbling. They pulled on balaclavas and kicked the fire door off the hinges. Once inside, they subdued the 118 people in the lobby, used bolt cutters to remove locks, and eventually got away with 118 calico bags full of cash…they were inside for 11 minutes. The Brilliant Escape A Melbourne criminal who was known to represent some of the suspected gang members would later tell a couple of different stories of how they escaped. It is said that even he was uncertain which is true. One story is that they all jumped in the van and drove away while an old truck they had parked out front blocked traffic and delayed police access. The second (and more likely based on the attorney’s smirk) is that the men had a safe in their upstairs office. While the people were subdued, rather than running out to the van, they ran up two flights of stairs and hid the money in that safe and it never left the location. They then sped away in an empty van. Whatever the case, the estimated cash take was $8-$15 million. The Victoria Club reported $1.2 million—the bookies vastly under-reported their business for tax purposes, and because most were corrupt, using the money for political pay-offs. The Aftermath Each man took half a million to spend immediately and they stored the rest until they could launder it or send it out of the country.

George Freeman – Australian Kingpin Jul 06, 2020

George Freeman, Lenny McPherson, Stan Smith: Sydney Australian Crime Lords George Freeman was born in 1935. First arrest was 1947 for theft. Born in 1935, he left school around 1946 and began work as a stable hand, continued petty crime, ended up in Boy’s Home, which is kind of like a Juvenile Detention Center. These places were terrible for young boys. Older boys brutalized them in a lot of ways. Many of Australia’s best-known criminals did time in these awful places. They were scarred for life. George Freeman spent most of the 1960s as a mid-level thug, racking up arrests and finding his way. He was always able to make money reliably setting odds on horse-racing. This is how he met Lenny McPherson and Stan Smith Lenny McPherson (b. 1921) McPherson was first arrested at 11. He also did time in Juvenile Detention and was brutalized by older boys and guards. He spent the 1950s in and out of jail for various violent crimes and made connections in the Sydney underworld. He became a career criminal with a network including prostitution, robbery, extortion, gambling, and protection rackets. He rose to power in the 1960s-1970s. McPherson committed a series of violent murders in the 1960s, eliminating his competition and consolidating his power over crime in New South Wales He developed contacts inside law enforcement and one time an honest cop found McPherson with an envelope containing a list of potential jurors to his murder trial. He had a large Protection racket, aided by officers in the notoriously corrupt New South Wales Police. For decades, the police literally helped criminals steal, kill rivals, and sell drugs. Triumverate: Lenny McPherson, Stan Smith, George Freeman Stan Smith (b. 1937) He was a partner in the group’s protection racket of Sydney’s King’s Cross—the night club/gambling district Stan Smith’s name arose in the investigations of 25 shootings during the 1950s-60s. He was shot in during a break-in of a rival’s home. He survived, said nothing to police, then several weeks later, the rival was machine-gunned to death on the street. McPherson took control of gambling in Sydney: loan-sharking and running casinos. He noticed George Freeman had a head for numbers and offered him a job as an SP Bookmaker (“starting price”) setting odds in their new casinos. Politicians, police, celebrities all gamble in their Sydney casinos. These three control all gambling in Sydney Smith puts together a massive marijuana smuggling operation, eventually integrating heroin. Freeman and McPherson do not like the drug trade. Stuart John Regan: 1960s-70s Regan was a psychopath in the criminal world. He murdered indiscriminately, drawing unwanted attention to the Sydney underworld. Finally, Regan actually murdered his girlfriend’s 2-year old son. Police will look the other way for a lot, but when children start disappearing, something has to be done. Freeman and Smith got the contract, shooting him eight times, one for every person he had killed. Connections to the Chicago Outfit Joseph Dan Testa He was a “developer” or an Outfit clean man who came to Australia in 1965 and made criminal connections with McPherson and Freeman. Testa invested money with McPherson in Grants Constructions Pty, Ltd. Testa owned property throughout Florida and Chicago. He had close ties with “Milwaukee Phil” Alderisio. At this time, Alderisio was responsible for Outfit gambling holdings in the Caribbean. McPherson sent George Freeman and Stan Smith to Chicago for six weeks with Joseph Dan Testa in 1968. McPherson also visited Chicago during this time. The theory is the Outfit was attempting to finance/buy into casinos in Australia and likely discussing the distribution of video poker machines. Las Vegas—the story told in Freeman’s biography George Freeman: An Autobiography. George Freeman used a forged passport to travel to Las Vegas. He met with Testa and others to discuss legal casinos being set up in New South Wales.

The Boy on the Bicycle Jun 29, 2020

Another case of wrongful conviction True crime author Nate Hendley tells about a horrid case of wrongful conviction in 1950’s Toronto Canada. In a change of pace from organized crime stories, Gary Jenkins interviews Mr. Hendley about his latest book, The Boy on a Bicycle: A Forgotten Case of Wrongful Conviction in Toronto Canada. On September 15, 1056, a passerby found the body of seven-year-old Wayne Mallette on the grounds of the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto. The police found he had been sexually abused prior to his murder. In this interview, Mr. Hendley tells how the police coerced a confession out of young Wayne Mallette and failed to find the real killer, Peter Woodcock, until after he killed two more children. Nate Hendley is a prolific true crime author who resides in Canada. Please visit this site at www.natehendely.com or click here to Amazon and see all his books. The suspect Toronto police detectives learned that a 14-year-old boy named Ronald Moffat had worked at the National Exhibition grounds and his parents had recently reported him as a runaway. They found this boy and subjected him to hours of intense interrogation. Just like many other cases of wrongful convictions, the investigators soon broke the boy down and obtained a confession. Like many other wrongful confession cases, all the evidence available that he killed Wayne Mallette was the suspect’s confession. Meanwhile, the real suspect, Peter Woodcock, was still riding his bicycle around Toronto and using it to lure children into a place where he would molest and kill them. If a suspect confesses, he must have done it Gary tells his own story of how he was a young inexperienced detective when he obtained a false confession from a teenage murder suspect. Thankfully, a veteran detective stepped in and asked a few key questions about the suspect’s memory of the crime scene and the kid got all the details wrong. They released this kid and about 2 weeks later the true suspect was arrested. In this case, a reliable witness reported the probable murderer was riding a bicycle. If the police had looked into their suspect Wayne Mallette, they would have learned he had a balance problem from damage to his inner ear and he was unable to balance on a bicycle. Meanwhile, a budding young serial killer named Peter Woodcock murdered and sexually abused two more children until he was captured and convicted. Amazon describes this as “A shocking true story, about a coerced confession, fumbled police investigation, a miscarriage of justice, and the star lawyer who fought to free Moffatt from custody.” Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Ken Eto and the FBI Jun 22, 2020

FBI Agent Elaine Smith and Ken Eto Ken Eto was a Japanese-American who became the highest known Asian-American in any Organized Crime family in the United States. He was called Joe the Jap or Toyko Joe by his peers in the Chicago Outfit. In this podcast, I interview retired FBI agent Elaine Smith about Eto because she worked up a gambling case on him and after it became known the government was sending Eto to jail, his Chicago Outfit boss, Vincent Solano ordered his murder. Ken Eto History Ken Eto was born in California prior to World War II. He was raised by socially conservative and strict Japanese immigrant parents. The government forced the Eto family along with thousands of other Japanese-Americans into Idaho internment camps for the duration of the War. Ken Eto spent the War at the Minidoka War Relocation Center. During this time, he learned he had a great mind for numbers and a memory for what cards had been played or not played during endless poker games in the camp. Ken Eto moved to Chicago in 1959 to make his fortune. The Chicago Outfit and Ken Eto Once Ken Eto arrived at Chicago, he sought out high stakes poker games where he was known as a consistent winner. The men who protected these games were Outfit up and comers like Turk Torrello, Vince Solano, Sam Giancana, and Joey Aiuppa. They noticed this newcomer was winning consistently and they forced him to pay a street tax on his earnings. In return for the money he made the Outfit, they assisted him in setting up a large Bolito or numbers operation. He was known to turn over up to $200,000 a week. Eto was responsible to pay off the Chicago cops to the tune of $3,000 per week. He became a huge earner for the Outfit. How The FBI got onto Ken Eto A new FBI agent named Elaine Smith talked her way into being assigned to the Organized Crime Squad at the Chicago FBI office. Ms. Smith was from Chicago and being steeped in the lore of the Outfit had long wanted to work cases on these guys. One of her first assignments was to look into Ken Eto. The squad had dismissed Eto as a minor player and of no consequence because of his ethnicity. Agent Smith learned he was a major earner for the Outfit. Once she made her case and it became known that the US Attorney was going to convict him, Eto’s Outfit boss, Vince Solano, got nervous. He “whistled in” Eto for a meet. Ken Eto assured Solano that he could easily take a gambling conviction and do his time. Vincent Solano was irrationally afraid that Eto would turn government witness. Elaine Smith turns Eto into a witness On February 10, 1983, Eto pleads guilty and gets prepared for sentencing. On February 10, 1983, Vince Solano sends hitmen Jasper Campise and John Gattuso to pick him up and take him to a dinner meeting. Solano was unaware of Eto’s culture and Samurai spirit or he would never have worried about him turning witness. Eto believes this is the way his life ends as he enters the car. He has instructed his wife on what to do if he is killed. Campise and Gattuso direct him to a restaurant that Eto has never heard body talk about. They park in a side street. Eto noticed that the hitmen’s hands are shaking and they keep incessantly and nervously talking about how great this food is going to taste. All of a sudden the men pull guns and fire to Ken Eto’s head and body. They push him out of the car and leave him on the street. Ken Eto staggers into an open drug store and calls for an ambulance. Elaine Smith answers a late-night phone call and leans of this murder attempt while on a Colorado ski trip. When she returned she is able to turn Eto against his bosses. She will spend the next week’s, months, and even years with Eto going around the country testifying against various Outfit members. Elaine Smith maintains a relationship with Eto until his death from natural causes while in Witness Protection living in a small Georgia town. Support the Podcast Hit me up on Venmo for a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer @ganglandwire

Paul Derry and the Canadian Hell’s Angels Jun 15, 2020

How Paul Derry ended working with the Hell’s Angel’s Paul Derry started in Halifax Nova Scotia as a teenage informant earning $20.00 for revealing where a drug stash was kept and then warning the dealer that the cops were on their way to sieze his marijuana. By the end of his colorful career as a professional criminal and informant, he goes deep undercover into the Nova Scotia Hell’s Angels gang. Paul Derry talks strip club During his early criminal career, Derry started dealing in junk pot and fell in with the Grim Reapers motorcycle club. He became a key member of a group that helped provide attractive girls from eastern European countries to Canadian strip clubs. Derry said he went to work for a business called the Exotic Globe Network. He explained this business made connections with Eastern European human traffickers who recruited girls. They kept an immigration lawyer on retainer to handle the immigration matters. Once the girls arrived in Canada, he was part of a group that helped the girls settle in group apartments. He continued to providing transportation in vans to various strip clubs and protection while the girls were performing. He revealed that he had to deal with the interpersonal drama between the girls more than any other problem. In this area of his background, Derry expressed the most regret. He has since done volunteer work for human trafficking organizations and tried to help stop the abuses of girls caught up in this web. Hell’s Angels rules for cocaine business Derry graduated to cocaine dealing with the Nova Scotia Hell’s Angels as it became so popular and lucrative. He learned that he must not use his product and he had to keep making money for the club to remain accepted. It was during this time he established a regular relationship with an RCMP officer named Shane Halliday. He tells about the Hell’s Angel clubhouse rules. In this club, they owned a bar that was frequented by many “hanger on” “wanna be” motorcycle gang members. The club connected an inner sanctum clubhouse to the bar where only patch wearing members and close associates could enter. For an associate member to enter, he had to be helping the Hell’s Angels MC club in some manner. Derry was able to gain this access because he was making them money with cocaine sales. Nova Scotia Hell’s Angels and a murder plot A path wearing club member named Neil Smith recruited Derry to help murder a biker named Sean Simmons. Neil Smith put together a hit team to kill Simmons over some old perceived wrong that remains murky today. Derry alerted the RCMP but they failed to get active at the outset of this murder plot. On the day of this murder, Derry happened to be at the clubhouse when Smith got a call from one of his hit team. Smith learned that Simmons was at his house. Smith immediately ordered Derry and another guy to go with him. They drove directly to the Simmons house before Derry could make a phone call. He tried other methods of dissuading this action without success. Once the designated hitman did the murder and the team dispersed, Derry telephoned his RCMP contact and explained what happened. The Mounties ordered Derry to get the co-conspirators on tape making incriminating statements in order to make a murder case. They wired up Derry’s house for sound and video and fitted him with a “Wire.” Soon, he was wearing a “wire” inside the Hell’s Angels clubhouse. He had a close call when a member grabbed him and hugged him without warning. Derry laughingly explained he guessed the guy thought he must have some hard nipples where the “mike” wires were taped on his chest. Paul Derry spends the next 10 years in court Derry explains how he gathered enough evidence to obtain charges. The Hell’s Angels discovered his role and sent a hit team to kill him but he was hidden away by the RCMP by this time. He spent the next 10 or more years retelling his story before a variety of different juries and then appeals courts. During this time,

Boring Mobster Life Jun 08, 2020

Nate Hendley on Joe Pistone In this episode noted Mob author and historian, Nate Hendley and Gary discuss the boring life of a mobster. Nate points out that Joe Pistone wrote in his book, Donnie Brasco, about how the Bonanno crew sat around a social club or bar all day exchanging small talk, gossip, other mob stories, and possible scores. He was allowed into this crew by a made guy named Anthony Mirra.Benjamin “Lefty” Ruggiero took Pistone under his wing and instructed him in the ways of the Mafia. They worked under a capo named Mike “Mimi” Sabella. Later Pistone reported to captain Dominick “Sonny Black” Napolitano. After Pistone surfaced, the Bonanno family held “Sonny Black” responsible for Pistone being accepted and trusted by his crew. They murdered him for his mistake. Cops and mobsters are not so different When we scratch the surface of any mob guy, underneath, we find the day to day life is basically the same repetitive boring existence that most folks fell on a daily basis. I liken it to the life of a street police officer, hours of boredom followed by moments of sheer terror, and then a few more minutes of exhilaration mixed with a gut-wrenching fear that we all hide pretty well. Don’t forget about buying me a shot and a beer on Venmo @jenkslaw. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Joe the Shark Lopez – Chicago mob Lawyer Jun 01, 2020

The Shark Gary was able to land this interview with Joe the Shark Lopez, well known Chicago criminal attorney. He has represented Outfit guys like Frank Calabrese Sr. in the Family secrets trial and many Columbian and Mexican drug kingpins. We learn that Joe Lopez started out to be a divorce attorney until he was given a federal case where a woman was charged with possession of a single kilo. At is first hearing, he obtained a filing of no probable cause and the judge dismissed these charges. Joe the Shark Lopez was hooked on criminal law. We learn he had resisted this because he had known many lawbreakers from his youth who had no money for a lawyer. He thought the way to earn the big money was divorce. He did not predict the huge increase in cocaine clients who actually had money. The Cocaine Pipeline I-35 Joe the Shark Lopez discloses he learned that once the Columbian cocaine growers and producers started suing Mexican cartels to add cocaine to their regular marijuana smuggling routes, most cocaine traffic moved from Florida to the Texas border with Interstate 35 being the cocaine highway. Chicago is the largest consumer area at the end of that pipeline making a lot of defendants seek out the Shark. How to dress like the Shark Joe Lopez dresses the part. he describes his choice in sits as black Armani, his hairstyle is a ponytail, his shoes are expensive pointy-toed Italian and he drives a very nice car. Civil Asset Forfeiture Joe Lopez has a lot of experience in dealing with the government seizing assets from purported drug kingpins. He explains how government agents often abused these laws and he was part of a committee that rewrote the Civil Asset Forfeiture rules and procedures. The Outfit and Cocaine Trafficking In one large cocaine case, the government charges Outfit associates, Victor Pleschia, Frank Bonavolante, and Camillio Grassi in a multiple kilo cocaine distribution cases. Victor Pleschia hired the Shark. He explains the interesting facts around the case. For example, the prosecution presented evidence that one defendant spent $15,000.oo in one wild Miami weekend and then brought a load back to Chicago. The shark relates how in an unusual twist, the judge appointed two separate juries for two different defendants. Listeners will get a real education inside the criminal justice system from the aspect of a defense attorney. Don’t forget about my Venmo account to buy me a shot and a beer @ganglandwire. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Al Capone Stories – Myth or Reality May 25, 2020

Al Capone Myths Exposed Cam Robinson and Gary Jenkins interview Mario Gomes, Al Capone historian and blogger on www.myalcaponemuseum.com . Mario has made it his mission to expose the various myths that have been perpetrated about Al Capone and his life. Was Al Capone a cocaine fiend? For example, after the modern Al Pacino film, Scarface became a massively popular film about a cocaine-addicted Cuban drug lord, rumors arose that this film was based on the first Scarface film released in 1932. Some folks believed that this first Scarface was based on Al Capone and that he was a cocaine fiend like the modern-day Scarface. In fact, cocaine in powder form was not available and that Al Capone was never known to take any kind of drugs and even only drank beer sparingly. How were the St. Valentine’s Day massacre and the murder of Frankie Yale connected? He also tells the real story about the St. Valentine’s Day massacre and how it was connected to the murder of Capone’s first mentor, New York mobster, Frankie Yale. Mario explains how Al Capone hired a group of St. Louis killers called the “Americans” to commit the Valentine’s Day massacre and how a ballistic expert connected one of the Chicago Tommy Guns used on that massacre to the murder of Frankie Yale in faraway Brooklyn. Did Capone offend President Herbert Hoover? Mario tells a story about how Capone threw a big noisy party at his Florida mansion and disturbed his neighbors. He ran into a neighbor named J.C. Penny and told him he would not charge him for the music and invited him to a future party, When the department store magnate advised Capone that the President was staying with him, Capone arrogantly said, “Well, tell him to come too.” It is believed that an offended President Hoover, upon his return to Washington, told the Treasury Department to go after Capone after that encounter. A new Capone fact revealed! Wiretappers, be sure to listen to the very end of the show because Mario tells about a new and never discovered Al Capone fact he has unearthed. Don’t forget about my Venmo account to buy me a shot and a beer @ganglandwire. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Anthony “Tony” Strollo May 18, 2020

Anthony “Tony” Stollo: the early days First of all, I must tell you that I am stopping the extra episode every week until we get another “Shutdown.” Things are opening up here in KC and I want to play a little golf. This week Cam and I take a look at an early Lupara Blanca or “White Shotgun” murder. We learned during our Pizza Connection research that this means a mafia murder where the body is never found. Strollo was born in Manhattan on June 14, 1899, to Italian immigrants Leon and Jennie Strollo. He grew up in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village where the Lucky Luciano Crime Family was known to dominate. He started his work life as a truck driver and progressed into the rackets during the late 1920s. Lucky Luciano promoted Tony Strollo to a capo and his underboss was Vito Genovese. The infamous mob turncoat Joseph Valachi was one of the “soldiers” assigned to Tony Strollo as one of his crew. Valachi would later claim that he disliked Tony Strollo because he thought Stollo was conceited. Tony Strollo and his personal life Tony Strollo married a Jewish woman named Edna Goldenberg and they lived in Greenwich Village and would later move to the suburbs in Fort Lee, New Jersey. Tony Strollo had several children with his wife and none of them grew up to be in the rackets Tony Strollo was the son of Calabrian immigrants Leone and Giovannina Nigro. Strollo had two brothers, Emilio and Dominick. His path in the Mob Strollo was a well-known underworld leader in Greenwich Village. He ran loansharking, gambling, and bookmaking rackets from Greenwich Village to the Hudson River docks. He maintained financial interests in cafes and night clubs in the Village. He controlled New Jersey Teamsters Local 560 and he made sure that Hoffa confidant and future enemy Anthony “Tony Pro” Provenzano was elected president of the local. Strollo had a close relationship with New Jersey politicians. What happened? Vito Genovese attempted to have Frank Costello (temporary boss for Lucky Luciano) murdered and Costello steps down allowing Genovese to become boss. Joe Valachi jumps bail on a narcotics charge and Strollo convinces him to turn himself in and go to prison. Vito Genovese is convicted of a narcotics charge and ends up in the same prison as Valachi. Genovese suspects Valachi and another Strollo subordinate named Vincent Mauro of giving information to help the feds make his narcotics case. The Profaci family suspect Strollo of inciting the Gallo brothers to challenge them before brokering a peace deal Blanca Lupara for Tony Strollo On April 8, 1962, Anthony “Tony” Strollo, disappeared on Sunday evening, April 8, 1962. He went out for a walk and kept on going? Edna filed a missing person report with the local police and said he was last seen with an unknown associate driving away from their Fort Lee, New Jersey, home. The body of Tony Strollo was never found To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Richard Cain – Outfit Cop May 14, 2020

How did Richard Cain become a Chicago cop Gary interviews Chicago Outfit historian and Administrator of the Chicago Outfit – Old and Current News and Articles Mike Byrne. Richard Cain was born to an Irish-American father and Italian-American mother. He would sometimes go by Richard Scalzitti. Richard Cain started as a private Investigator learning about wiretapping and conducting surveillance. by the time he was in his twenties, he was recruited by Sam Giancana to join the Chicago Police Department. Sam wanted a trustworthy “bagman” to help find and pay Chicago police officers. Interestingly, at the same time, a man named William Hanratty will also join the Chicago PD. He will rise to become a high ranking officer and retire after a long career. Both men were actually associate members of the Outfit. Richard Cain and the Cuban revolution He takes a leave of absence and gets a job as an investigator working for Richard Ogilvie who was the U. S. Attorney in the Chicago area investigating Tony Accardo. He leaves from there and works with Cuban Revolutionaries prospering for the Bay of Pigs. After his return to Cook County in 1962, he works on Richard Ogilvie’s successful campaign for Cook County sheriff. Ogilvie appoints hi as his chief criminal investigator. By 1964, Cain is caught lying to a grand jury about his recovery of stolen legal drugs. At the same time, he is accused of being an accessory to a bank robbery. He eventually serves time for all these crimes and is no longer able to infiltrate law enforcement. Richard Cain and Sam Giancana Giancana is demoted by Accardo and exiled to Mexico. Richard Cain shows his true allegiances and follows Giancana to Mexico. he becomes the liaison between Chicago and Giancana who was still running international rackets from Mexico. FBI agent Bill Rohmer has made a career of putting Giancana in jail and he is able to turn Cain into an informant during this time. Richard Cain returns to Chicago along with Giancana. He starts making moves like forming a burglary gang with Marshall Caifano. It is believed that he and Giancana may have had dreams of returning Giancana to the position of boss in the Outfit. The death of Richard Cain On December 20, 1973, witnesses reported that Richard Cain was talking with four unidentified men at a booth in Ross’s Sandwich Shop on the north side of Chicago. They claimed that two of the four men left by a back door and the others left via the front. A short time later, two masked gunmen entered carrying a shotgun, a pistol, and a two-way radio. The witnesses said they used the radio to communicate with someone outside. They ordered all the patrons and the staff to line up against a wall like this was a robbery. They went down the line asking for money and when they got to Cain, the man with the shotgun pulled him away from the wall and shot him point-blank in the head. At that, the second gunman fired his pistol into Cain’s head. They ran out the door to a waiting getaway car. The aftermath of the murder FBI Agent Bill Rohmenr will tell everyone and report in his books that Richard Cain had been his informant for years. He claimed that Cain requested that if he was ever murdered by the Outfit that Rohmer should let everyone know that he (Cain) had been a top-echelon informant for years. Less than two years later in 1975, an unknown assassin murdered Sam Giancana in his home as he prepared some peppers and sausage for dinner. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Lucky Luciano and the Night of the Sicilian Vespers May 11, 2020

Lucky Luciano and the Night of the Sicilian Vespers Gary interviews well known true crime author Nate Hendley about Charles “Lucky” Luciano and how he recruited other young gangsters to kill the old Mustache Petes and created the modern National Crime Syndicate. Francis Ford Coppola used this scenario in his fictional recounting of these events in The Godfather. Many people have mythologized these events and distilled them down to a single night where teams of young mafia assassins spread across New York and New Jersey murdering all the Black Hand Mustache Petes to seize control of organized crime organizations. We learn that this was actually a two-part operation in that Lucky Luciano first made a secret deal with a rival boss named Sal Maranzano, to kill his boss, “Joe the Boss” Masseria. In return, he would become Maranzano’s second-in-command. On April 15, 1931, Luciano met Joe the Boss Masseria at a restaurant called Nuova Villa Tammaro on Coney Island. After dinner, the men played cards and Luciano excused himself to the bathroom. Several gunmen entered the joint and murdered Joe the Boss. Supposedly the killers were Albert Anastasia, Vito Genovese, Joe Adonis, and Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel. After a short time as the second in command, Luciano realized the younger mobsters needed to kill off the final ruling Mustache Pete who was still an old Black Hand member, his new boss Sal Maranzano. On September 10, 1931, several Jewish gangsters disguised as government agents entered Maranzano’s office. They stabbed the old boss multiple times before administering a coup de grace with a gun. In an often-repeated fable, they moved on to other Sicilian bosses that same night, and this would become known as the “Night of the Sicilian Vespers” Gary and Nate discuss the origins and sources for this often-repeated story. They agree that Maranzano created the first Five Families in New York and after Lucky Luciano murdered him and took over, he created the National Crime Commission and the modern-day mafia organization in the United States. Nate Hendley True Crime Author Books Nate Hendley has written over a dozen books, primarily in the true-crime genre. The Boy on the Bicycle: A Forgotten Case of Wrongful Conviction in Toronto. This book is about 14-year old Ron Moffatt of Toronto, who was wrongly convicted of murdering a child in 1956. The real offender was notorious serial killer Peter Woodcock. The Boy on the Bicycle was released in August 2018 by Five Rivers Publishing, a Canadian company that has published several of my other true-crime books. “Hendley tells this important and disturbing story with objectivity and restraint, letting the facts speak for themselves as the reader’s sense of outrage builds. Moffatt has never received an apology for his mistreatment, let alone monetary compensation for an ordeal that derailed his life for years. Worst of all, his arrest meant Peter Woodcock remained at large long enough to kill again.”—Dean Jobb, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, April 2020 “The Boy on the Bicycle is an exceptional read and serves as a unique time capsule of the times and mores of post-WWII Toronto when murders were rare and sexual predators were practically unheard of … It was Mr. Hendley’s wish to finally tell Ron’s story after these many years, which he has done in a direct, yet compassionate manner. Five stars!” —The Miramichi Reader “The amazing story of a 62-year-old wrongful conviction is revealed in a riveting new book, The Boy on the Bicycle, by Nate Hendley, a seasoned true-crime writer and former Ontario regional director with the Professional Writers Association of Canada.” —Sootoday.com “Hendley’s telling of the tale is crisp and clear with compassion for all of the victims, both the murdered children and the man who spent a year of his youth behind bars, blemished for life by another man’s crimes … I highly recommend this book to all lovers of the true-crime genre.” —Donna Carrick, Host,

Danny Greene – The Celtic Warrior May 07, 2020

Danny Greene – The Celtic Warrior Gary and Cam interview Rick Porrello, the author of Kill the Irishman: The War that Crippled the Mafia, The Rise and Fall of the Cleveland Mafia, Superthief, Bombs, Bullets, and Bribes. Danny Greene and the Cleveland Mafia Danny Greene was an up and coming young hoodlum who started working the docks as a stevedore. He used his popularity and machismo to become the President of the local International Longshoremen Association (ILA) until he was convicted of embezzlement. The FBI recruited him as a Top Echelon Informant during this case and he remained in the capacity until death. it was during this time that he was introduced to Jimmy Hoffa and the Cleveland mafia family started to notice him. Danny Greene Goes Rogue A well-known Mafia associate, Jewish gangster Alex “Shondor” Birns, hired Greene as an enforcer for the mob’s “numbers” racket. He is involved in organizing the local trash truck businesses into a mob dominated association. Cleveland mob underboss, Frank Brancato, started employing Danny Greene as muscle to enforce garbage-hauling contracts and to stop independent operators from cutting prices. He will botch a couple of assassination attempts and the mob loses confidence in him. Greene and Shonder Birns have a falling out over a drug deal that went bad and a loan that /Greene wanted to start another business. He joins forces with a jealous Italian mobster named John Nardi and attacks other young Irish criminals and breaks from the mafia in a public manner. The Cleveland mob declare an all-out war against Danny Greene and anybody associated with him. Cleveland will experience a number of bombing attmepts until a large explosive ends Danny Greene and his climb to the top of Cleveland’s rackets. Rick Porrello Rick grew up in Cleveland and he became interested in the mafia when he learned that his grandfather and three uncles were murdered in mob disputes during prohibition. In the small world category, we discuss the fact he had an extended relative named Angelo Porrello who was a Kansas City crime family member. Rick’s most well-known work came after he released his book, Kill the Irishman. He was a police officer and eventually the Chief of Police in a Cleveland suburb when the famous mob war between Danny Greene and the ruling mafia faction broke out in the 1970s. Kill the Irishman recounts that story in vivid detail from law enforcement, family members, and gangsters who participated. The book was made into a popular documentary film and finally, a narrative style true crime movie, Kill the Irishman, starring Christopher Walken, Vincent D’Onofrio, Val Kilmer, Tony Darrow, and Robert Davi. DonateTo rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. Click here for the store page. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

The ‘Ndrangheta in Australia May 04, 2020

History of the ‘Ndrangheta In this episode, Gary and Cam examine the history of organized crime in Australia as a big shout out to Sydney fan Dan Bashford. They examine how the ‘Ndrangheta became the largest and most powerful criminal organization in Australia. The ‘Ndrangheta organization originated from the state of Calabria in Italy. After WW II, many criminal members took part in the large immigration from post-war decimated Italy to the vast empty agricultural land in Australia. Once these criminals arrived with millions of other immigrants, they established seven ‘Ndrangheta families to mimic their homeland groups. The ‘Ndrangheta move into narcotics The ‘Ndrangheta members started buying up land and grew produce and soon moved into the most powerful and successful growers and wholesalers of produce in the early 1950s. They eventually controlled all the major wholesale produce markets. In these large tracts of land, they used legitimate crops as cover to grow marijuana between the rows of fruit trees and other citrus crops. The crime families will move into cocaine from South America and Heroin from Southeast Asia as their influence expands. They constantly adapt and move into whatever drug is lucrative as shown by a 2013 bust where Australian police interrupted and seized 15 million ecstasy pills hidden in 3000 tins of tomato paste as it was arriving from Naples, Italy. They arrested a descendant of one of the original crime families named Pasquale Barbaro as the leader of this narcotics ring. Following is the documentary made by the ABC Four-Corners investigative TV series To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. Click here for the store page. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Mob Blunders Apr 27, 2020

What is the biggest Mob Blunder ever? In this episode, Cam Robinson and Gary Jenkins discuss blunders by various organized crime families. We believe the largest and most devastating was the murder of Jimmy Hoffa on 6/30/1975. After his release from prison, Hoffa began campaigning to reclaim the leadership of the teamsters. The mafia enjoyed greater control under Frank Fitzsimmons and did not want Hoffa’s return. In addition, Hoffa began making threats to speak to authorities and to call in loans made by the pension fund for mob casinos. Hoffa disappeared while waiting for a meeting with Detroit capo Tony Giacalone and Genovese Capo Tony Provenzano. Result: The disappearance created a national scandal, drawing attention to the rampant corruption of the Teamsters. The FBI investigation disrupted mafia business for months. Congress increased scrutiny of the Teamsters, and the series of weak leaders followed the Teamsters down the drain, ending mob control of the once powerful union. 1977: Employee Retirement Income Security Act ends mob control of Central States Pension Fund 1979: Deregulation weakened the power of the Teamsters costing the mob national power 1991: General elections rather than indirect election by delegates—mafia no longer controlled presidency DonateTo go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Sidney Heard – The Unorganized Gangster Apr 23, 2020

Sidney Heard and the Kuggerrand Fraud In this episode, I interview Synova Cantrell about her book, Unorganized Crime: You Don’t Have to be Italian To Be a Wiseguy. Synova formed a friendship with a professional criminal named Sidney Heard and chronicled his flamboyant life in Unorganized Crime. Synova Cantrel is a prolific author who has written seven true crime books (click here to see them) and one on how to write and sell your book. In addition, she conducts a series of classes on how to write and sell your book and is available for consultation to new authors. The Unorganized Gangster Sidney Heard grew up in Chicago and learned the ways of the Outfit at an early age. he will move south to Amarillo Texas where he did not have to compete with an established organized crime ring. He became a well-known arsonist and con artist. His most significant crime came after he read about a large theft of South African Krugerrands. He seized the opportunity and counterfeited thousands of dollars worth of Krugerrands. He started moving them into the market by giving the impression he was selling the counterfeits at a big discount because they were part of the recent theft. He even used them to trade with Mexican drug dealers for cocaine. This gold scandal grossed him over a quarter of a million dollars. He will eventually work as a federal informant and be part of the most famous Supreme Court decision ever decided in criminal law, Gideon v. Wainwright. DonateTo go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Frank Costello and Huey P. Long Apr 20, 2020

Frank Costello goes South In this episode, Casey McBride, Frank Costello historian, discusses how a well known New York mobster formed a relationship with the flamboyant Huey P. Long, Louisiana’s governor, and then-Senator during the 1920-1930s. Frank Costello and Phil “Dandy Phil” Kastel set up the slot machine business in New York City. They disguised them as candy machine and the slots would dispense a mint on a losing pull and money on a winning pull. He soon had around 25,000 machines running in the northeast part of the United States. In 1933, Fiorello LaGuardia ran for the mayor of New York City on a clean government platform. After the voters elected him, he declared war on mob corruption of city officials and this meant a war on the slot machine business because it was a significant provider of graft. Frank quickly adapted and made a move south to Louisiana after making a deal with Huey P. long who ran the entire state like a dictatorship. DonateTo go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Ori Spado The Accidental Gangster Apr 16, 2020

How Ori Spado became a friend to many mobsters We interview Ori Spado, the Accidental Gangster this week. Mr. Spado started out as an insurance man who pioneered the extended warranty business for new car dealerships. This part of his life has nothing to do with organized crime but we learn that Spado started in New York where he made connections with some of the early gangsters like John “Sonny” Franzese Russell Bufalino, Meyer Lanskey, and Frank Costello. These men were gangsters who also had a head for business and saw the potential in Ori. He got into trouble with his insurance business by trying to grow too large and too fast. After that failed, he migrated to Hollywood California taking his business and organized crime connections with him. Ori goes to Hollywood In Hollywood, he established relationships with folks like President to be Ronald Reagan, talent agency head Jack Gilardi, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Jon Voight, Milton Berle, and Acadamy Award-nominated producer Agostino (Dino) De Laurentiis. Ori tells how he became a Hollywood Fixer or a man who can be counted on to take care of problems. He collected owed debts, scared away stalkers, or caused studio executives to live up to their agreements. He used his rumored connections with notorious mob bosses like Meyer Lansky, Sonny Franzese, and Russel Buffalino, which were real, to cause folks to do the right thing. These mob connections will eventually get him indicted on a RICO charge and Ori Spado will spend time in a Federal Prison. Ori Spado has documented his strange and exciting life in his book titled The Accident Ganster and it can be purchased on Amazon or on his website. Here is an example of an Amazon review. “A fascinating read from start to finish. Not only about the history of organized crime but the journey of one mans ability and willingness to think for himself and reflect on his own actions.” Donate To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael McCollum and the Hells Angels Apr 13, 2020

Michael McCollum has a rough start McCollum started early in a life of crime after his father, a motorcycle gang member, was the victim of a murder attempt where a dynamite bomb was detonated at their family home. Former law enforcement officer Gary Jenkins interviews former Hells Angel and Chicago Outfit Associate Michael McCollum. After having a dramatic enlightening, Michael turned his life around and is working on a book about his life on the wrong side of the law. That is when he is not working out in the gym. Michael’s life started with a rival motorcycle gang planting a dynamite bomb in his home in an effort to send a message to his father. DonateTo go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Larry Henry, Mob Museum Blogger on Nicholas Pileggi Apr 11, 2020

Interview with Mob Museum The Mob in Popular Culture blogger Larry Henry. Gary and Larry Henry discuss the film Casino and the work of Nichols Pileggi.

Too Politically Sensitive Apr 08, 2020

In this podcast, our guest Lieutenant (Ret) Michale Callahan tells how the Illinois State Police assigned him to review a murder investigation after they learned that the television show Dateline was doing a show that will allege the defendants were wrongfully prosecuted. Lt. Calahan’s assignment will lead to the court overturning two murder convictions and free one of these men from Death Row. He tells how an embarrassed Illinois State Police hierarchy will impede and hound him into retirement. He said that he had no more than started opening the case file for review when a local police officer called him and expressed concern about his reputation and said that he was not “a dirty cop.” Callahan wrote a book about his experience, and he titled it “Too Politically Sensitive” after a State Police Commander ordered him to drop his search for the truth because this murder was “too politically sensitive.” In July 1986, Paris Illinois firefighters responded to a residence engulfed in flames. They discovered that his fire was an intended coverup when they found the bodies of the young couple who lived there. Dyke and Karen Rhoads were a cute young couple who grew up in this area and were well known by many to be ordinary working folks. The pathologist will discover that someone had stabbed both victims to death. The local cops requested help from the Illinois State Police, and the area command assigned several State Troopers to help. The case went unsolved for several months until a well known “town drunk” claimed he knew something about this homicide. He implicated two other local men who were heavy drinkers themselves. He claimed he was passed out in their car outside the victim’s home the night of the homicide, and he awoke to see one of these men, Randy Steidle, holding a knife and with blood on his clothes. The investigators struggled to come up with a motive or any suspects, until the so-called town drunk, Darrell Herrington, said he knew something about the murders. He told police that he had been drinking with two locals — Randy Steidl and Herb Whitlock — the night of the incident and had passed out in the back of Steidl’s car on the way home. He told investigators that he awoke outside the Rhoads’ home and heard a woman screaming and that later, he saw Steidl with a knife and blood on his clothes. The investigators did not move on this information at first, and in about two months, a woman named Debra Reinbolt came forward and claimed to have been inside the victim’s house during the murders and claimed she witnessed Steidl and Whitlock do the deed. The investigators quickly arrested both men, and these two witnesses would testify. The prosecution claimed the motive was a drug deal gone wrong. In 1986, an Illinois jury convicted both men, and they sentenced Whitlock to life in prison, while they convicted Steidl of killing both Dyke and Karen and sentenced to death. In 2000, the TV show Dateline investigated this case and found a mass of evidence that indicated Steidl and Whitlock were the victims of malicious and wrongful prosecution. The Illinois State police assigned our guest, retired lieutenant Michale Callahan to review the case file. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Pizza Connection Episode 4 – the Investigation Apr 06, 2020

The Bonanno Family and drug smuggling In 1972, the Bonanno War is over, Joe and Bill Bonanno are out in Arizona. The Commission appoints Phil “Rusty”Rastelli the new boss of the Bonano crime family. Carmine Galante, the old Bonanno Consigliore completes a long prison sentence and returns to New York. Carmine Galante was at the original 1957 meeting in Sicily with Joe Bonanno, Lucky Luciano and members of the Sicilian mafia, among who were Gaetano Badalamenti and Tomasso Buscetta. During the 1960s, the Bonanno family and the Gambinos, as well as the Lucchese family, worked with Sicilians to bring heroin into the US via what became known as the French Connection. The French Connection becomes the Pizza Connection After the French Connection heroin pipeline dried up, the Sicilians created clandestine labs in Sicily and imported the raw product from Afganistan, Pakistan and other places in the Middle East. Carmine Galante had graduated to be the Bonanno Family boss and he imported several Sicilians to work directly for him. The local mafia members derisively nicknamed them Zips. Carmine Galante used two of them, Cesare Bonaventre and Baldassare “Baldo” Amato as his bodyguards. More Sicilians or “Zips” emigrated to the United States and started pizzerias, restaurants, and bakeries in New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, Michigan, and Illinois. In Brooklyn, Bonavatre and Amto started a high stakes baccarat game at the Café Viale on Knickerbocker Street. Another Sicilian named Salvatore Catalano showed up and opened a bakery. He and these two men were often seen together in long conversations and often used a payphone in that area. The plot to kill Carmine Galante The Zips were part of a conspiracy to kill Carmine Galante. Galante’s bodyguards Bonaventre and Amato were noticeably absent when two other men entered Joe and Mary’s Italian Restaurant on Knickerbocker Ave in NYC and murdered him. A Zip named Salvatore Catalano was believed to have taken over the Bonanno Family for a short period of time until the Commission could appoint Joe Messino as the new acting boss because Phil “Rusty” Rastelli was still in prison. Joe Pistone enters the picture It was during this time that undercover FBI agent Joe Pistone infiltrated a Bonanno crew. He developed a relationship with a mobster named Lefty Ruggerio. Lefty once pointed out Catalano and claimed he was granted the concession for heroin for the entire United States. The FBI passed this along to New York City agent Carmine Russo who had already started working on Catalano and other Zips and he suspected narcotics activity. The Pizza Connection task force takes down the entire operation These three Sicilians would become the objects of the Pizza Connection investigation as the FBI watched them, put pen registers on their payphone, and eventually installed wiretaps. They hear lots of code talk that was obviously drug transactions. They could not put narcotics in the hands of Catalano, Bonaventre, or Amato until they got a call from a Philadelphia DEA agent. They learned he was dealing with a Sicilian pizza shop owner for multi-kilos of heroin and the pen registers tied this drug transaction back to the Zips in NYC. This investigation will take many twists and turns but eventually lead to taking down the largest heroin ring in the United States. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Pizza Connection Episode 3 – FBI Retired Agent Leon Flosi Apr 03, 2020

Agent Leon Flosi and Giovanni Falcone In this third episode of the Pizza Connection story, I interviewed retired FBI agent Leon Flosi about Judge Giovanni Falcone and the Sicilian mafia. Agent Flosi was originally assigned to the Kansas City office where I became acquainted with him. He played an important part in the Strawman case in which he and Agent Bill Ouseley started the case that exposed how the mob’s infiltration of the Teamster’s Union led to their scheme to skim millions from Las Vegas casinos. We learn that Agent Flosi was a native-born Italian and the Bureau promoted him to be the assistant legal Attache in Rome Italy as the Strawman case went to trial. He developed a friendship with the famous mafia fighter, Judge Giuseppe Falcone. Together they set up an unprecedented working relationship between the New York City FBI office and Sicilian law enforcement. Agent Flosi creates the Italian-American Law Enforcement Task Force Agent Flosi reveals how he even encouraged a relationship between the Italian police, Judge Falcone, and the FBI to combat the importation of heroin into the United States. He even brought Judge Falcone to his home in Chicago and how the judge was able to relax without fear of his mafia stalkers for the first time. The murder of Giuseppe Falcone Eventually, the Mafia will set up and murder Judge Falcone. Agent Flosi reveals that the Mafia set up an ambush on a road that Judge Falcone traveled down on a regular basis. They set a huge cache of explosives in a culvert under this road. They established a look-out spot on top of a nearby hill and when the assassins saw Judge Falcone’s motorcade cross the culvert they detonated the bombing causing his death. The Italian police found cigarette butts and empty water bottles at the ambush lookout site. They never made any arrests leading to a conviction of this horrific crime. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Pizza Connection Episode 2 – Tommaso Bruscetta Mar 30, 2020

Tommaso Buscetta documentary Welcome Wiretappers to episode 2 of this Pizza Connection series. In this episode, Cam and I take a look at the famous Sicilian mafia boss Tommaso Buscetta. He is the subject of a documentary available on Amazon Prime called Our Godfather and I inserted the trailer for this film below. He is also the subject of a recently released narrative film titled the Traitor and the preview is inserted below. Buscetta and smuggling Tommaso Buscetta was a flamboyant mafia kingpin who graduated from being a Sicilian mafia soldier smuggling cigarettes around the Mediterranean Sea to a most-wanted transnational criminal and drug smuggler. Buscetta becomes involved in transnational heroin smuggling with Gaetano Bladalmenti from South America. Both had ended up on the strong end of a mafia war in Sicily when a clan led by Salvatore Riina murdered many of their associates and even non-involved relatives. Judge Falcone turns Tommasso Buscetta into a witness We learned that when he was arrested and extradited back to Italy from Brazil, his fellow Mafia bosses in Sicily killed his two sons and other family members to ensure that he would not talk. They calculated wrong and he did talk and he testified. He became the first Sicilian mafia boss to come in and be a witness and he helped convict over 400 Sicilian mafia members at the largest trial ever conducted in Italy. Our Godfather Documentary The Traitor To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Pizza Connection Episode 1 – The Beginning Mar 27, 2020

Pizza Connection: the biggest case against the mafia Welcome Wiretappers, Cam and I welcome you to the first of a 4-part series on the famous Pizza Connection investigation. Because this case was so intertwined with the Sicilian Mafia and the American Mafia, we start with a little history of the Mafia in Sicily. We know this is by no means comprehensive but it is an overview of that legacy. The Pizza Connection case will be a major blow against the Mafia in Sicily. The Sicilian Mafia before WW II The Sicilian mafia goes back to the 1800s and was formed to protect Sicilians from the central government in Rome and other foreign intruders. The formation of the modern Mafia did not begin until after a period of repression starting in the 1920s under the dictator Mussolini. A story about how and why he started his anti-mafia campaign was in 1924. The story goes that Mussolini visited Sicily in 1924 and passed through the town of Piana dei Greci where he was received by mayor/Mafia boss Francesco Cuccia. In those days, often the top politician would also be a mafia member or even a boss. At some point, Mayor Cuccia, noticing the big military escort, whispered into Mussolini’s ear: “You are with me, you are under my protection. What do you need all these cops for?” Mussolini rejected this offer of protection. Mayor Cuccia felt slighted and humiliated and instructed his constituents to stay home when El Duce made a speech. In turn, Mussolini felt humiliated and swore revenge. Over the next year, Mussolini sent his police and soldiers to repress the citizens and jailed over a thousand members of the Mafia. Many fled to New York City during this time bringing the legacy of the Sicilian mafia with them. The Sicilian Mafia after WW II During WWII all of Europe and the Mediterranean region dissolved into armed conflict and all the smuggling routes stopped. After the war disruption ended, a newly revitalized Sicilian mafia quickly redeveloped old contacts and went right back to their smuggling business after the War. Most, if not all, the jailed and exiled mafioso were released from jail or returned to Sicily and easily worked their way into the good graces of the occupying American troops. All the previous fascist government leaders were on the run or jailed by the Americans. The Mafia was poised to move into government positions with the help of the American army. Over the next decade, the Mafioso will develop and adapt to the new way of life and modern money-making rackets. The post-war government rationed cigarettes and the American Army had an endless supply of cigarettes. The mafioso developed black market contacts with corrupt army quartermasters and started a thriving cigarette smuggling business. These cigarette smuggling groups and routes will soon end and heroin will take the place of American smokes. From the French Connection to the Pizza Connection In this podcast, the listener learns about the birth of the Sicilian heroin business that starts with the French Connection and ends with the Pizza Connection. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Special Bonus episodes coming soon Mar 25, 2020

Your host, Gary Jenkins and Camulius Robinson want you to know that we are well and still making podcasts like crazy. Cam and I are going to release several in the next week to help entertain all the wiretappers during this time of crisis. After a lifetime of running into the breach where the public was in danger, I feel like doing a few extra podcasts and releasing them is the least I can do. Please disregard all the requests for donations inserted into these because we are good here and during this time of financial insecurity, we need to protect our families. Cam and I wish you all well and I am sure we will all survive and prosper after this time of fear, insecurity, and uncomfortableness. I am not used to being restricted in any manner and now I have to practiv=ce a lot more self-discipline than I want to practice. We will pull together and make it, of that I am sure. Stay safe all you wiretappers and keep your distance. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Michael O’Keefe on creating crime fiction Mar 23, 2020

Michael O’Keefe is a retired 1st Grade Detective from the NYPD. For twenty-four years, he worked in the toughest neighborhoods in New York, specializing in investigating Homicides and other violent crimes. He was born and raised on the mean streets described in his fiction. His characters and settings are drawn from the people he encountered there—on both sides of the law. oOf interest to the podcast is the fact he was raised around the men who would become involved in the Pizza Connection case and this will be the subject of a multi-episode piece on the podcast next month. Mike’s first full-length novel is Shot to Pieces and it was published this last year. This novel will be the first of a series about his fictional character based on his own life and career, Paddy Durr. He is presently near completion on two others. He lives on Long Island with his family, where he writes a little, and practices the ancient martial arts of lawn, and swimming pool maintenance—when he is not coaching football. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Utica New York Crime Family Mar 16, 2020

Cam and I discuss a little-known mafia family in upstate New York. From 1970 to 1992, Salvatore and Joseph Falcone led organized crime in Utica, NY. This family went back to the late 1930s. They were a powerful crew of the Buffalo, NY Maggadino Family, also known as The Arm. The New York State troopers arrested both men at the Apalachin Meeting in 1957. This crew was made up of approximately 15-20 “made” members. the famous witness, Joseph Valachi, claimed they were a separate family but it is more likely they were a powerful autonomous crew under Stefano Magaddino. In 1972 the older brother Salvatore Falcone died in Miami and in 1974 Buffalo boss Stefano Magaddino died. The younger Falcone brother, Joseph is aging and to outsiders there appeared to be a leadership vacuum. Carmine Persico ordered members of the Colombo Family to move into the area. Tony Falange, a top lieutenant of Falcone begins making moves, showing disrespect to Falcone. For example, he often failed to attend meetings or ask permission to expand the business. Someone robbed Falcone’s safe of $54,000. By September of 1976 Albert Marrone, a young Turk, was released from prison after using violence to collect on a loan. He immediately began making threats against everyone and expressed his intention to take over Utica’s rackets. Marrone had a history of violence and had been implicated in two murders in the early 1970s. By October 1076, things got crazy. Albert Marrone and his girlfriend were at dinner with local mob attorney Louis Brindisi and his wife. Brindisi excused himself, after which, Marrone became very nervous. Later that evening, Marrone walked toward his apartment when he was shot. He shielded his girlfriend, but he was killed. There are conflicting reports as to who was responsible. But it is believed that Donato “Danny” Nappi and Jack “Jake” Minicone were two of the shooters. They were working for the Colombo Family. Marrone is known to have threatened Colombo Family representatives. On the other hand, a Falange Lieutenant named Angelo Conte was reported to have wanted Marrone dead. The strongest supposition was that the Colombo family members acted without permission, despite being advised that Marrone’s actions could be dealt with in a sit-down. This unilateral action by the Colombo family—a sign of disrespect—is believed to have sparked further conflict in Utica. This all sets the scene for a long and protracted bloody mob war for the Utica New York rackets. The Colombos move in and start to extract a street tax on the bookies and they are met with much resistance. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Wearing a Wire on Steve St. John Bonus episode Mar 11, 2020

Our Venmo subscribers are responsible for this special bonus episode that I call “Wearing a Wire on Steve St. John.” If you don’t who Steve is, I once helped a new FBI agent on a drug case by doing surveillance on Steve in 1991. The FBI was working on Steve because they had an informant tell them that Steve had a connection to get Dilaudid and was supplying several street dealers. We worked Steve because he was known to be connected to several mob members in Kansas City. Mainly, we wanted to turn him and he never turned even after being charged as a drug kingpin. He would get 10 years and served his time in a variety of Federal institutions. After Steve’s release, he turned his life around and became successful in the used car business and has recently retired. We meet up periodically for donuts and coffee at the Donut King or waffles at a Waffle House. He is always telling me stories about his time in prison or other stories of the streets back in the days when I was a young cop and he was a young bail bondsman, fence and drug dealer. We were talking recently and I decided to record a story and release it as a bonus episode. I will do more in the future. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Undercover State Trooper and the KC Mob Mar 09, 2020

In this episode, the host, Gary Jenkins, interviews retired Missouri State Trooper Tom Gray about his months-long undercover investigation of Kansas City Mafia figures who were buying stolen property. The main target was a man named James H. Bradley Jr. or “Junior” as he was known. Because he operated a popular restaurant across the street from City Hall and Police Headquarters, a Kansas City cop would not be able to operate undercover. A police major had obtained the cooperation of the courts, the prosecutor and the County jail to get a prisoner out without any charges pending. Actually, this man, John Horn, had charges pending, but those charges were held back from public view and he was released into the custody of the KC police Department. The judge, in this case, required the police department to babysit with Mr. Horn and they were not to let him out of their sight until he had proven his worth enough that the prosecutor and the judge would agree to dismiss his charges. The Kansas City Police White Collar Crime and Intelligence Unit joined forces to make sure all the rules were followed. The police borrowed a Missouri state trooper who was working a drug case in Columbia, Missouri and was unknown in Kansas City. During the next several months, Trooper Tom Gray would arrive at the safe house where officers stayed overnight to watch Horn and they would “go to work.” They had a budget to buy property like women’s clothing, jewelry, cigarettes, canned hams, and other items. They took this supposedly stolen property to Junior Bradley’s Pumpernik Deli and sold them to him for about twenty-five cents on the dollar. He paid the sellers in cash and then resold this property out of the back room of his deli or a retail location he operated in the city market. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

John “Sonny” Franzese died at 103 Feb 27, 2020

Sonny Franzese came up the usual path to the life of a career criminal and Cosa Nostra boss. He started as a Brooklyn member of a juvenile gang and slowly graduated through Prohibition to become a member of the Profaci family. He was court-martialed during WW 2 and it was reported he exhibited “homicidal tendencies” In 1965 the FBI labeled him the most prominent loan shark in the Greater New York area. He became a modern-day celebrity mobster who was often seen at the famous Copacabana club in the company of stars like Dean Martin or boxer Rocky Graziano. He bought a record label called Buddha and promoted different celebrity musicians. He is known to have financed a few normal Hollywood quality films and as well as an independent film that became famous with the title of Deep Throat. By his last years, the government jails him for an old bank robbery case where he was sentenced to fifty years. He is finally given his release at age 103 in 2017 after the original 50-year sentence had expired. In an ironic twist, his own son, John Franzese Jr. testified against him in the case that sent him to jail for his final years. He had another son named Michael Franzese who has left the mafia business via the Witness Protection program and is in show business at the present time. His son. John Jr. is trying to shop his biography with no takers so far. John “Sonny Franzese Sr. died on February 20, 2020, at age 103. When he left prison, he was the oldest living inmate. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Montreal Mafia Part 2 Feb 24, 2020

In this second episode Gary and Cam go into the reason why Vito Rizzuto was charged in the famous murder of the three Capos in New York City. This story is a great example of how no good deed goes unpunished. During upheaval in the Bonanno family, a Bonanno Capo named Joe Messino gets approval from the Commission to remove three opposing Capos in his family to clear the way for him to become the new boss. Messino calls on Vito Rizzuto to help with this hit. Unbeknownst to Rizzuto, this same Joe Messino will later become the first Mob boss to make a deal with the FBI and among other information, he gave up, he named Rizzuto as a member of the hit team that murdered the three Capos. Vito will be extradited back to the U.S. and serve about 10 years in prison. The Montreal underworld will deteriorate into warring factions without the steady hand of Vito Rizzuto. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Montreal Mafia Part 1 Feb 17, 2020

After watching the Netflix series Bad Blood, Gary and Camulius Robinson take on the Rizzuto crime family and the Montreal Mafia. We believe because of the lack of prohibition, the Canadian mafia was not as fast-growing and organized as the American crime families. Nevertheless, they are a very interesting crime family that grew and prospered because of the personal drive and charisma of Vito Rizzuto. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Frank Costello with Casey McBride Feb 10, 2020

Host Gary Jenkins interviews fellow mob historian and expert on the life of Frank Costello, the Prime Minister of the Underworld. Casey is also a musician and he had created several original music compositions to be used in the podcast and the recently released mob documentary film, Brothers against Brothers” The Civella Spero War. In this episode, Casey and Gary discuss the use of Frank Costello in the recent Starz series, The Godfather of Harlem with Forrest Whitaker. Casey will get back to true crime as he continues telling the listeners about the life of Frank Costello as he got older and how he was able to become a senior statesman for the New York Mafia. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Lucky Luciano and the Dannemora Priest Jan 27, 2020

In this first of 2 episodes about Lucky Luciano, Gary tells a story about Lucky Luciano and the Dannemora priest. In 1936, the politically ambitious mob busting special prosecutor Thomas Dewey obtained a guilty verdict against Charles, “Lucky” Luciano for compulsory prostitution or for being a pimp. The state sent him to the Dannemora prison or Little Siberia which is as far away from New York City as possible. He arrived at Dannemora prison as just one more downstate inmate, a long fall from being the boss of bosses in New York City. Around this time the Catholic church assigned a young priest named Father Ambrose Hyland to minister to the inmates. Father Hyland asked himself, why is there no church building on the grounds. He proceeded to raise private money and obtained the warden’s permission to build a church on the actual prison grounds. By 1939 the inmates finished building the church and Father Ambrose would be able to say, “As far as I know, it is the first church in the United States to be dedicated to Saint Dismas.” He named the church after St. Dismas because he was known as the ‘good thief’ and is recognized as a Saint of the condemned. As the story goes, Dismas was one of the two thieves crucified with Christ. Many convicts volunteered their time and talents like a safe-cracking nitroglycerin expert, a forger, and a stickup man. Charles “Lucky” Luciano called “the most dangerous gangster” by his prosecutor made an unusual offer to Father Hyland. Luciano learned that Father Hyland had $5,000.00 in seed money from the Cardinal, but the cost of construction would exceed that amount. Luciano told Father Hyland that he was an expert at picking the winners of horse races and the results were posted in the New York papers every day. He had a paper and pointed out three horses on the race card for the following day. Luciano pointed at those names and said, “Bet it on these three horses tomorrow.” Father Hyland declined but he had to look at the race results for the following day. Sure enough, all three were long shots and all three came in as winners. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Leavenworth 7 Jan 20, 2020

After a few shows about John Gotti, this week, Gangland Wire will go to a 1930s story about a Leavenworth prison break that went wrong for both the prisoners and the town of Leavenworth. I interviewed former Leavenworth prison guard and prison historian Kenneth LeMaster. Kenneth tells the story of how prisoners behind the walls were aided by notorious bank robbers Frank “Jelly” Nash and George “Machine Gun” Kelly to facilitate a mass escape of seven desperate inmates. On December 11, 1931, chaos erupted behind Leavenworth’s limestone walls, and these criminals grabbed the warden hostage and escaped into the adjacent town of Leavenworth, Kansas. The nearby Ft. Leavenworth sent troops to restore order inside the institution, and many guards and local law enforcement engaged in running gun battles with the escaping inmate. When the prison emergency whistle alerted the town, all local officers and gun-wielding citizens joined the manhunt. Our guest, Kenneth LaMaster, tells an exciting story about flying bullets, first-person accounts, news reports, and official FBI files. Kenneth LeMaster has written three books on the infamous Leavenworth prison. Click here to go see the three books about Leavenworth Penitentiary written by Kenneth LeMaster. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Kill the Irishman Jan 17, 2020

Gary and his social media marketer, Basel Tarabishi, discuss the mob film Kill the Irishman. We both loved this modestly budgeted film because the screenwriter constructed a tight script with colorful characters without making them into cartoon characters. This film tells the real story of a 1970s mob war involving an old line but little known mob family in Cleveland Ohio. Gary compared this mob dispute in Cleveland with the 1970s mob dispute in Kansas City which is the topic of his latest film, Brothers against Brothers: The Civella Spero War. The film was stocked with all the usual suspects in a mob film with Paul Sorvino playing the classic overweight mob boss Tony Salerno, Robert Davi playing a hard-eyed hitman, Ray Ferrito, Vincent D’Onofrio playing an ambitious young mafia associate John Nardi and Christopher Walken playing a veteran Jewish mobster named Alex “Shondor” Birns. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Future of the Gambino/Gotti Family Jan 13, 2020

Happy New Year Wiretappers! In anticipation of a special Newsmax television special on John Gotti, Gangland Wire researched the most recent information on who might be the new leadership group of the former Gambino/Gotti crime family. Well known former Fox and Friends anchor, Greg Kelly. will interview your Gangland Wire host Gary Jenkins about organized crime on this live show that Newsmax will broadcast on January 16, from 7:00 to 8:00 PM CST. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

John Gotti and the Informant part 2 Dec 30, 2019

Merry Christmas Wiretappers! In part 2, I interview Steve St. John, a former prison inmate who served time with retired New York Police Detective William Priest who was an informant for John Gotti. I recently reacquainted myself with Steve St. John after a mutual acquaintance told me he had gone straight and was asking questions about some of the officers and agents who worked on his case. I was the sergeant in charge of a surveillance team who helped the FBI build a case against Steve for trading Dilaudid for stolen property. After I met him, I was convinced he had made a significant life change and we have become friends. Steve was a great help in the making of my last movie Brothers against Brothers: The Civella Spero War. I wanted a stripper to offer a lap dance to an actor playing an undercover cop and he found me a lady to fill that role. I needed a vintage car and he had a friend who has more than 30 vintage cars. Steve has some great stories about working in a prison bakery with the ex-police detective. He also was friends with the Gotti capo named Joe Butch Corrao who brought Gotti the inside police source. We learn that Joe Butch was not a man to fool with, even as he became advanced in age and many other prison stories. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

John Gotti and the Informant Part 1 Dec 25, 2019

This case starts with the FBI taping members of Gambino Capo John Gottis’s Bergen Hunt and Fish Club crew. This included his brother Gene Gotti and his good friend Angelo Ruggerio along with John Carneglia. Ruggerio was the main target and the Bureau uncovered their multi-million dollar a year heroin distribution ring. Additionally, Ruggerio was a big mouth who talked incessantly about everything. He even bad-mouthed his friend and boss, John Gotti. Even though when Ruggerio was with John Gotti, he was constantly stroking his ego and complimenting him. These tapes would be used as a big part of a probable cause affidavit to get a listening device placed inside big Paul Castellano’s home. Ruggerio and Carneglia were John Gotti’s closest allies in his crew and both participated in the murder of John Favera who was the man who accidentally hit and killed Gotti’s kid in an accident. In 1985, both men would help John Gotti murder his boss, Paul Castellano. Both had their own reasons for wanting Castellano dead because by the time of this murder in the FBI was moving on them for the heroin case and Paul Castellano had ordered the murder of the last member of the Gambino family caught dealing drugs. Plus, Castellano knew about the tapes made by the FBI because they were part of the evidence against him and he demanded that Ruggerio give them up to his lawyer. Ruggerio refused and appealed to his uncle, long-time Gambino underboss Aniello Dellacroce. He kept Castellano fended off until he died in 1985. Shortly after Dellacroce died, Gotti and his crew moved on Paul Castellano and with that murder, Gotti would ascend to become the boss of the Gambino crime family. During these years, Angelo Ruggerio would be caught trying to bribe a telephone man to find out about FBI wiretaps and he would have two mistrials because of jury tampering. He hired a couple of different private investigators to watch the courthouse and catch jurors entering cars to get their car registration names. He then sent someone out to attempt to bribe them. In the end, both Gene Gotti and John Carneglia were convicted and given 50-year sentences. Gene was released in 2015 after serving 29 years in prison. During all the is time there is a New York City police officer working in the Public Morals squad which is the Vice squad. They worked prostitution, illegal casinos, bars that violated liquor laws and all in all a fertile ground for bribes. On December 3, 1984, he is taking his wife and mother in law to a celebration at St. Barbara’s Greek Orthodox church in Manhattan. He was driving across the Manhattan Bridge when his car stalled and stopped. It was raining and low visibility. As traffic backed up and horns were blasting, a speeding car hit the officer pinning him against his car. At the hospital, doctors had to amputate his left foot at his ankle that day and over the next few months, they would take off more of his leg up to his thing. Intelligence Unit.” Once he was back to duty in 1986, The NYPD turned down the officer’s application for an on-duty disability. He did get a 1.4 million settlement from the driver’s insurance. The NYPD assigned this man as an Intelligence Unit analyst where he had access to sensitive information on organized-crime cases. Remember this was during the time that Gotti’s was taking over the Gambino family. He was able to obtain confidential information like the locations of electronic listening devices (wiretaps and bugs), the identity of confidential sources of information and cooperating witnesses, and the timing of prospective indictments. It was during this time that the feds figured out john Gotti had paid an old lady to vacate her apartment and he could access her apartment from inside the Ravenite Social Club. It was a tape from that microphone planted inside a VCR and wired directly to a telephone line that was a leased line monitored from the Manhattan FBI office. A Gotti Capo named Joe Butch Corrao and a guy Gotti like...

Merry Christmas Wiretappers Dec 24, 2019

Myself, Cam Robinson, Larry Henry, Bill Ouseley, Casey McBride, Synova Cantrell, and all the staff here at Gangland Wire Crime Stories wish all our friends a very happy Holiday season. I am off for Texas where I hope it is a bit warmer. It makes me wonder, is there any organized crime in Texas? Well, we will have to explore that someday in the future. As my Chrismas gift to the Wiretappers, I have recorded 2 episodes with a previously unknown little story about the Gotti crime family. This is the story of the informant that offered his services to Gotti. When Sammy the Bull Gravano came in and was telling all, FBI agents asked him about an NYPD police detective who had bee giving Gotti information. While they thought they knew from some great police work done by an agent, Gravano solidified this information. this episode drops on Christmas morning. Then the next day I have a second episode interviewing a man who was in federal prison with this same ex-police informant. I thank all of you who have donated, bought the KC Mob Tour App, bought Brothers against Brothers, Gangland Wire, or Leaving Vegas: How FBI Wiretaps Ended Mob Domination of Las Vegas Casinos and listened to my stories.

Mob Town with Larry Henry Dec 23, 2019

Retired police Intelligence Unit detective Gary Jenkins interviews Mob Museum blogger Larry Henry about his special pre-screening of the newest mob film, Mob Town. Larry reports this film has many comedic moments. The film’s director and writers tell the story of how a New York State Trooper, Edgar Croswell, discovered a meeting of mob chieftains from every major American city on Nov. 14, 1957. This film has some star power with David Arquette starring as Sergeant Edgar Croswell, Danny A. Abeckaser as Joseph Barbera, Sopranos Meadow Soprano, Jamie-Lynn Sigler starring as the wife of the host, Josephine Barbera and Gino Cafarelli who played Mayor Frank Rizzo on The Irishman, as Carmine Galente. A couple of great casting decisions were when the Director tapped the man who played the opera singing bad guy in the Goonies, Robert Davi as Vito Genovese and a Garry Pastore as Albert Anastasia. Pastore has been in many action films and he plays Matty the Horse Ianniello in the Duece. After that, we discuss my most recent mob documentary, Brothers against Brothers: The Civella Spero War. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Gangland Wire Reviews The Irishman Dec 16, 2019

In this episode, Cam Robinson and I give our thoughts on the recent Scorsese movie about the murder of James Riddle Hoffa, The Irishman. Neither of us believes Frank Sheerhan. We would like to think that he was the Forrest Gump of the 1960s and 1970s mob hits, but Lee Harvey Oswald, Bay of Pigs, Allen Dorfman and Joey Gallo? Too much for us. But listen and decide for yourself. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Brothers against Brothers: The Civella-Spero War Dec 04, 2019

Hey all you Wiretappers, As you may know, I recently finished my second documentary film Brothers against Brothers on the Kansas City crime family. In this film, Brothers against Brothers, I examine a mob war that pitted KC Mob boss, Nick Civella and his brother Carl “Cork” Civella against four “young turks” Nick, Mike, Joe, and Carl Spero. I have it for sale on my Website shop page and I offer it as a reward for any donation of $25.00 or more to the show. But for the small amount of $1.99 you can go to Amazon and rent the film. Even if you want the DVD with unedited raw interviews as special features please consider renting the film within a few days after you get this podcast. If enough of you download it at the same time and you give it a lot of reviews, Amazon will pump it up in their algorithms and offer it to more folks. In that simple inexpensive manner, you can give the podcast an immense boost. I make about 50% on digital downloads but the money I make from my regular fans is nothing compared to all the others out there who will then get an email with my film as a recommendation. This is a gift to the podcast that keeps on giving. The same thing happened to my other film Gangland Wire, but it took over a year to build enough downloads and reviews to get Amazon to promote that film. I want to cut that time down to a few weeks. I pulled out all the stops for this documentary. I hired a video company to produce reenactment scenes and film interviews. I hired actors and got friends to help film scenes inside a strip club and a mob hangout. I take the viewers to the actual locations for some of the interviews of the officers who worked the case. I released it last week at the Kansas City Mafia Film Festival and I got lots of favorable comments. Click here to go to Amazon for the movie rental. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Unfound Missing Mobsters Dec 02, 2019

Don’t forget to hit me up on Venmo. Recently, I was a guest on the podcast Unfound. The host of this show researches stories about people who went missing and have never been found. He contacted me to ask about mob guys who went missing and were never found. In this episode which is actually the Unfound show produced on my stream, I tell about a couple of Kansas City mobsters who went missing and were never found. Jimmy Towles was a career criminal who worked in a gang of jewel thieves who were controlled by the Civella crime family. when he left with one of his gang members one day, he never returned. Sal Manzo was a very closely connected associate of Carl Civella. He helped with the sportsbook, he managed a bingo operation that the KC family skimmed thousands from every week. He was involved in finding and fencing stolen property. He disappeared one day and a few weeks later an unidentified person called a well known KC police detective and instructed him to take a look for Manzo inside a trash can in the Italian section of Kansas City. The detective drove to the area the caller described and found the clothes that Manzo was wearing his last day. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The LaStella Restaurant Incident Nov 27, 2019

Welcome Wiretappers, don’t forget to hit me up on the venmo app and buy me a cup of coffee. First, I must warn you I had some sound problems, and Cam’s voice sounds like he is on the phone. In the last of this 4 episode series on Mob meetings, Cam Robinson and I look into the “Little Apalachin” meeting in 1966. In 1966, MYC police arrested thirteen members of organized crime a Queens NY Italian restaurant called the LaStella. The arrested Carlo Gambino, head of the crime family that bears his name; Thomas Eboli and Mike Miranda of the Genovese Family; Joseph Colombo; Aniello Delacroce, underboss of the Gambino Family; Joseph N. Gallo, the Gambino Family’s consigliere; Dominick Alongi, Eboli’s driver; and Anthony Cirillo, a Genovese soldier. From Florida, Santo Trafficante, Jr. and New Orleans boss Carlos Marcello, his brother Joseph Marcello, Jr., Anthony Carolla, and Frank Gagliano. They took the owners of the restaurant, Joseph and Jack Taliercio, in for questioning. The story goes that two New York police officers noted several black limousines parked outside and took a close look inside. They found the largest gathering of major Mafia bosses held since the Apalachin conclave of 1957. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Apalachin Meeting: Rounding up the Mobsters Part 2 Nov 14, 2019

In Part 2, I discuss what happened during and after this famous raid. Don’t forget to buy me a shot and a beer on your Venmo app at ganglandwire. Edgar Croswell was a detective sergeant in the New York State Police. He had some problems with a resident named Joseph Barbara Sr. Sgt. Croswell had done an extensive background check on Barbara and paid close attention to the Barbara estate. Croswell was in a good place to do this because he worked as an investigator for the State Criminal Investigation Bureau. He worked out of the Vestal substation near Binghamton, New York. Sgt. Creswell had found that Joe Barbara was a suspect in the 1931 murder in Wyoming, Pennsylvania. Months later, Pennsylvania police found a Thompson submachine gun in Joe’s car, which was linked to a gangland shooting in New York City. In 1933, Barbara was again arrested for double murder linked to Mafia activities. Later, in 1933, he was a suspect in a brutal torture-murder of a Scranton, Pennsylvania bootlegger named Albert Wichner. Sgt. Croswell learned that in the 1940s, Barbara had built an 11-room home with five outbuildings on fifty-three acres of land surrounding it. Barbara formed a small group of mobsters in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Joe established a legitimate business running a soft drink bottling plant, and somehow, through some political pressure in Albany, New York, received a district beer distribution license and was also awarded a franchise by the Canada Dry Company to bottle and distribute their products. Knowing all this background would propel Sgt. Croswell to take the action that led to mob bosses fleeing through the upstate New York woods in their expensive suits and alligator shoes. On November 13, 1957, an area motel called the State police substation and complained about someone passing a bad check. Sgt. Creswell and his partner, Trooper Vincent Vasisko, drove to the motel late in the afternoon. While they were talking to the owner’s wife, Helen Schroeder, Croswell noticed a cocky young man he knew as Joe Barbara Junior pull up in his Cadillac. The sergeant and the trooper ducked into a small lounge off the office area as Junior entered the motel office. They listened as Barbara Junior booked three double rooms for two nights. He mentioned that his father was hosting a meeting with folks involved in the soft drinks industry. However, he refused to tell the manager the names of the guests or when they were arriving. He paid a deposit and left. Sgt. Croswell smelt something fishy was up, and they left to check out Barbara’s bottling plant to see if anything suspicious was going on there. The plant was closed, and no cars were in the lot. They drove half a mile to the Barbara estate. Here, they sighted four automobiles. The next day, November 14, 1957, the mafia bosses, their advisers, and bodyguards, approximately one hundred men, met at Joe Barbara’s 53-acre estate in Apalachin, New York, about 200 miles northwest of New York City. Sergeant Croswell thought Barbara may have been involved in some kind of bootlegging operation so he called in treasury agents, Arthur Rustin and Kenneth Brown. They agreed to come from Binghamton, a 30-minute drive, and help. Croswell called his boss and got permission to set up on surveillance of the Joe Barbara estate. Croswell and his partner Vincent Vasisko and the two treasury agents drove up to McFall Road where the estate was located. They smelled a strong order of meat cooking over an open flame with dozens of men standing around the outdoor barbecue pit. They saw the area in front of Joe Barbara’s garage was filled to capacity with parked cars, expensive cars like Cadillacs, Imperials, Lincolns, and Chryslers. There were so many that they were parked in an adjoining pasture as an overflow lot. The officers quietly exited their cars and entered the field and started writing down license numbers. A small group of men from the barbeque pit area walked away and into this field,

Apalachin Meeting Part 1 Nov 11, 2019

Don’t forget to buy me a cup of coffee on your venmo app at ganglandwire. This is the first of a two-part series on the now-famous Apalachin meeting, and I got my good friend retired K-9 Sergeant Cate Kozalto sit in on the show. If you want to learn more about Cate, check out my YouTube channel and see our motorcycle tour of Bonnie and Clyde sites from Iowa to Louisana. There are lots of questions out there about the famous Apalachin meeting. I have heard every rumor and speculation possible. Kate and I will try to go through this dispel some of the rumors, and get to the truth. We are doing this because I understand there is a movie about the meeting to be released in 2019. First, we need to pronounce it correctly. I noticed that our frequent guest Bill Ouseley always said Appa -lake-in. I looked it up and as usual, he is correct. So I will quit saying Appalachian and say Appa-lake-in The famous Apalachin meeting has taken on mythical proportions in popular culture. In Kansas City, we brag how New York cops arrested our long-time boss, Nick Civella at a train station very close to this meeting, and he was with prohibition-era Kansas City crime boss, Joe Filardo. This event gave the Kansas City crime family credibility on a national scale. The earliest mention in popular culture was in the Peter Mass book, The Valachi Papers. The movie of the same title also depicted the meeting. Charles Bronson played Joe Valachi. The Apalachin Meeting was loosely depicted in the 1959 film Inside the Mafia. This film starred Cameron Mitchell. Inside the Mafia is a 1959 film noir crime film based on a true incident. It was based on the Albert Anastasia murder and the subsequent Apalachin Meeting. The meeting was comically depicted in the 1999 film Analyze This with Robert DeNiro and Billy Crystal. Narration near the beginning of the 1990 Martin Scorsese movie Goodfellas Henry Hill, played by Ray Liotta said, “It was a glorious time, before Apalachin, before Crazy Joe Gallo took on a mob boss and started a war…” In the film, the name Apalachin was mispronounced – Henry Hill’s character pronounces the “ch” in Apalachin like in the word “chin,” but it is correctly pronounced like a “k.” The full name is pronounced “Apple-lake-in.” Why was this Apalachin meeting necessary? By this time, the mobsters knew that local police, the FBI, and most importantly, the Federal Bureau of Narcotics were using electronic surveillance methods or bugging telephones and rooms. In 1957, the phone was good but not the best, and there was no such thing as conference calls, let alone Skype or FaceTime conference calls. I believe they wanted to look at each other face to face when they made decisions about the future of the National Crime Commission. Transportation was constantly improving, and interstate crime was becoming more accessible. Las Vegas was on the horizon, and other western cities were growing to create more opportunities for gambling and labor racketeering. Narcotics were a question. The Federal Bureau of Narcotics had gathered a lot of information about the various criminal organization, and narcotics was becoming known as dirty money. Was the profit worth the risk? However, one of the main reasons for this meeting was a struggle for control between the more Americanized liberal factions and the old-school conservative factions of the mafia. The progressive wing wanted to move more into business crime and avoid killings and interfamily wars, while the conservatives wanted to keep everything open. First, let’s go back and see who some players were and how they got there. In 1957, a National Crime Syndicate existed. In 1931 after the last old Mustache Pete, Sal Marazano, was killed by Lucky Luciano and his crew, the bosses of the New York 5 families along with Buffalo New York boss Stephano Magaddino and Chicago’s Al Capone formalized the geographic boundaries and created a set of rules, like for example, for a man to be approved as a made man,

Mob Meeting in Philadelphia – November is Mob Meeting month Nov 07, 2019

Wiretappers, this is the first of a 4 part series on mob meetings. Since November 14 is the 62nd anniversary of the famous Apalachin meeting in upstate New York, I decided to focus on mob meetings in November. Next week, I will release 2 episodes on the Apalachin meeting. The Chicago Tribune reported that sometime in 1979, representatives of the Outfit traveled top Philadelphia to discuss the new gambling mecca in Atlantic City and Las Vegas casinos. At the meeting, they reported that the Outfit was granted all rights to action in Las Vegas while the 5 Families and Philadelphia Family was granted exclusive rights to Atlantic City. Representatives of Carlo Gambino, Joseph Bonnano, Vito Genovese, Thomas Luchese and Joseph Columbo, Angelo Bruno family of New Jersey aides from the Tony Accardo and Joseph Aiuppa families attended. The National Cosa Nostra commission consisted of seven members and the Detroit based Zerrelli family of Detroit did not attend the meeting because of internal unrest after the death of Mr. Zerrilli and the Stefano Magaddino family of Buffalo, N.Y., was not represented. Under terms of the agreement, any East Coast mobsters now involved in illegal activities in las Vegas must report to Outfit Capo Anthony Spilatro and a cut of any action should be turned over to Spilatro as a tribute to Chicago mob bosses. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Genovese Family in Springfield Massachusetts Oct 28, 2019

Hey Wiretappers, don’t forget t but me a cup of coffee on your venmo app. in this episode of our ongoing examination of the new England crime families, Camilius Robinson and I take a look at the far western Massachusetts city of Springfield. In the earliest days, this city was organized by members of New York’s Genovese family. The first known boss was “Big Nose Sam” Cufari. He was born around the turn of the 19th Century in Bianco, Reggio di Calabria. Historically this was the home base for the Ndrangheta, two organizations similar to the Sicilian Mafia and the Neapolitan Camorra. Another early Springfield associate with ties to pre-Castro Cuba is Carlo Mastrototaro, who would later occupy positions in both the Patriarca and Genovese families. As Raymond Patriarca rose to power he made arrangements for tribute from this Genovese crew operating inside what Patriarca believed to be his territory because it was part of New England. Over the years, this crew participated in the usual mob activities of sports gambling, loan sharking, truck hijacking and all of the other vices. Sam Cufari died in 1983 and Francesco “Skyball” Scibelli took control of this longtime outpost of the Genovese crime family. he was born and raised in Springfield’s South End neighborhood. He focused on the lucrative sports and illegal casino gambling business. He would get two convictions for those activities in the early 196os and the judge ordered him out of organized crime activities and sentenced Scibelli to 19 months in jail. The papers at the time hailed this sentence as the “end of organized crime in Springfield.” He ignored the judge’s admonition and eventually went on to run “Springfield” for the New York-based Genovese crime family from the early 1980s until 1998, two years before his death in 2000 at the ripe age of 87 of natural causes. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Wild Guy William Grasso Oct 21, 2019

Hey Wiretappers, don’t forget to buy us a shot and a beer on your Venmo app. Just hit up ganglandwire to help with the podcast expenses. Today my regular contributor Camilius Robinson provides us with more stories from Raymond L.S. Patriarca and his new England Crime family known as the “Office.” Wild Guy William Grasso began his mob career in New Haven CT as an associate of Columbo family under a Capo named Ralph “Whitey” Tropiano who was a bad guy in his own right who once killed his entire crew on mob orders. He allegedly was one of the men who killed Willie Moretti, the New Jersey boss of the Genovese family. In the early days, Grasso ran dice games and street loans for Tropiano, but he was a big thinker. He put together a plan to take over the entire garbage industry for New Haven, CT. He was convicted of this conspiracy and the government gave him a 12-year sentence. This turned out to be beneficial in the long term, Grasso was fortunate to have a cellmate named Raymond L.S. Patriarca, the boss of all organized crime in New England. When Wild Guy William Grasso was released from prison he switched allegiance from the Columbo family to Patriarca. He began to work closely with Raymond Patriarca, enforcing territorial lines between the New York families and the New England Borgata. In the late 1960s, the Five Families shared Connecticut and most of Massachusetts, but Raymond L.S. Patriarca did not accept their intrusion. Patriarca began taking over all of New England and pushing the other families out. Grasso helped him with this while still insulating Patriarca. Wild Guy Grasso’s old boss Columbo capo Ralph Tropiano is in prison when Grasso returned to New Haven. During the late 1970s, the New England Gambino family representative Paul “the Greaser” Agresta disappeared, and capo John “Slew” Palmieri was killed by a car bomb. In 1978, Columbo representative Sal Annunziato was released in from prison and he disappeared in 1979. Grasso’s old boss and Genovese capo Ralph Tropiano was shot and killed in 1980. With these moves Grasso eliminated the Gambino, Genovese, and Columbo families from New Haven for Raymond Patriarca, taking control of everything east of the Housatonic River in Connecticut. Wild Guy William Grasso dressed modestly, reportedly buying his clothes from K-Mart, wearing cheap shoes, and living in a ranch home in a quiet neighborhood at 147 Tuttle Dr. in New Haven. He knew the police were after him and was careful about surveillance. He drove 40-50 miles to make local calls from different payphones and would park on the side of the highway just to lose tails, and he refused to discuss business indoors. The FBI would report they never had anything incriminating on Grasso. He owned a restaurant called Franco’s on Franklin Avenue, New Haven’s Little Italy, and rarely left the area. He was a health fanatic and demanded his food be free of salt. Grasso was also militant about how it was prepared and would erupt if anything was out of place. He was tyrannical in the treatment of his men, demanding half of their income. Across the board, he treated everyone, mob members, and civilians, all ages, terribly. He is later described as a “real gangster,” not flashy or showy. Hartford, CT was historically an open city for the mob. It was not officially claimed, so anyone could operate there without permission until Grasso moved in. Grasso approached Genovese town capo Tony Volpe at Valle’s Steak House and tells him to leave town and Volpe complies. The Five Families understand that the Patriarcas are too powerful on their own turf, so new partnerships must be formed. Wild Guy William Grasso lined up all book-makers between Connecticut and Rhode Island and demanded percentages. Grasso oversaw all gambling in Connecticut. Court testimony states Grasso was bringing in millions a week just in eastern Connecticut. In 1984, Grasso’s mentor and boss, Raymond L.S. Patriarca died of a heart attack.

Boston Organized Crime with Emily Sweeney Oct 16, 2019

Don’t forget to hit me up on Vemno at ganglandwire and buy me a cup of coffee to help with expenses. This is a republished story from November 2018 to finish out our month on the New England Organized Crime scene. Boston Globe Reporter Emily Sweeney has covered it all as a reporter and blogger. In her spare time, she has written two books on the history of organized crime in the Boston area. Emily covers local news and writes the “Blotter Tales” column for the Globe. A native of the area, she was born in Dorchester, graduated from Northeastern University and played on NU’s championship-winning women’s ice hockey team. Emily has been on the Boston Globe staff since 2001. She currently serves on the board of directors for the New England First Amendment Coalition (NEFAC) and the New England Society of News Editors (NESNE). Emily’s first book is titled Boston Organized Crime and contains many rare photographs from Boston organized crime history. Learn about all the bookies and loan sharks, gangsters and wiseguys, hoodlums and hitmen from New England. Emily’s book documents famous Boston crimes and criminals from the Great Brink’s Robbery, Charlie “King” Solomon and his death inside the Cotton Club in Roxbury and Blackfriars Massacre, where authorities found five gangsters men dead, slumped a card game in a cramped basement office. In Boston Organized Crime, true crime author and reporter Emily Sweeney takes the reader on a dark path looking at Boston’s famous crimes and criminals. using her exclusive access to a rare collection of crime scene photographs, mug shots, and police documents. This book reveals the places and people who set the scene for the modern rise of Whitey Bulger. Emily’s second book, Gangland Boston chronicles Boston’s organized crime from the La Cosa Nostra and prohibition-era Irish gangs to the rise of Whitey Bulger. Boston gangsters have played a major role in shaping the area’s history. Gangland Boston is packed with photos and Sweeney reveals the hidden history of the time when the North End was wrought with gun violence and Hanover Street was a virtual shooting gallery. A time when Mickey the Wiseguy ruled the underworld. Sweeney writes how gang violence unfolded during Prohibition and the Italian mafia rise to power. She documents the development of the major Irish gang, the Gustin Gang and the reader learns the little known fact that the leader of the Gustin Gang was an Olympic athlete? As a bonus for Boston residents or mob fans that may visit Boston, Sweeney’s book contains the exact addresses where mobsters lived, worked, and played around Greater Boston Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the Gangland wire store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here

Joe Broadmeadow on Bobby Walason Oct 14, 2019

Wiretappers, don’t forget to hit me up on Venmo. In this second of a two-episode series with retired East Providence RI Police Captain Joe Broadmeadow, we discuss his second book about members of Raymond L.S. Patriarca’s crime family. In Broadmeadow’s book, Unmade: Honor, Loyalty, Redemption he tells about the unusual crime career of Bobby Walason. Bobby Walason’s father threw him out of the house and he was left to fend for himself on the mean streets of Providence RI at age 12. Walason learned to survive and even thrive on the streets and inside juvenile detention centers until a court sentenced him to adult prison at age 16. He gravitates to the toughest men inside because he is a very tough kid and a skilled street fighter. in an unusual situation, young Bobby comes to the aid of Patriarca crew leader Gerard Ouimette and another prisoner named Raymond Patriarca takes notice. Walason is invited into the “gangster side” of this Rhode Island prison and the older mobsters groom him as a new crew member. Upon release, he gravitates to Ouimette’s tavern called the Bronx Tap Room and becomes a feared enforcer for the Patriarca crime family. Bobby Waalson finds that he has life skills that will serve him better as a legitimate businessman and the story of how he extracts himself from a mafia family who believes death is the only way out, is one of the most gripping stories I have ever heard. Once again Joe Broadmeadow uses his skilled writing style and police officer’s insight into this life to tell a compelling story of, as the title states, “Honor, Loyalty, Redemption.” Joe Broadmeadow is a skilled writer who uses his insights as a cop who investigated Organized Crime to tell compelling stories about life in the New England mob. He has a new book being released on October 8, 2019, It’s Just the Way it Was: Inside the War on the New England Crime Family and other Stories. He writes this with Brendan Doherty, a retired Rhode Island State Police Officer who worked the mob for the majority of his long career. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Joe Broadmeadow on Jerry Tillinghast Oct 07, 2019

Wiretappers, don’t forget to hit me up on your Venmo app. In this week’s episode, I interview retired East Providence (RI) Police Captain Joe Broadmeadow. He is a skilled and prolific true crime author who has written several non-fiction books and articles on members of the New England Crime Family, headed by the infamous Raymond L.S. Patriarca. In this episode, we discuss his book Choices: The Jerry Tillinghast Story. Joe met Jerry Tillinghast after he served a very long murder sentence. He was a bit wary at first, but Jerry wanted his story told and was so sincere, that joe was won over and agreed to help a man who had once been on the wrong side of the law in a major way. Joe Broadmeadow weaves the good, the bad and the ugly of Tillinghast’s life into a remarkably personal and intimate account. Jerry grew up a hardscrabble life on the Jerry and Harold Tillinghast streets of Providence. We learn he escaped by enlisting in the United States Marine Corps and fighting in Vietnam. In a pivotal moment in his life, he becomes a victim of the politics of that war and his learned behavior of never talking to authorities. He returning to Providence an angry young man and made a choice to hang with the wiseguys. He was a tough young guy who rightfully earned the reputation of a “feared mob enforcer.” Raymond L.S. Patriarca and his chief crew leader, Gerard Ouimette would become his mentors and father figures. Joe tells the inside story of the famous Bonded Vault heist and how Jerry beat that case. But a much more serious case awaited Tillinghast and Joe tells how Jerry Tillinghast was caught up in a mob murder known as the George Basmajian Homicide. We learn how his brother, Harold Tillinghast was falsely accused in that murder and Jerry refused to cooperate with the authorities in a manner that could exonerate his brother but would then implicate another mobster. As a result, his brother, Harold, served a long sentence for a murder he did not commit. Joe Broadmeadow is a skilled writer who uses his insights as a cop who investigated Organized Crime to tell compelling stories about life in the New England mob. He has a new book being released on October 8, 2019, It’s Just the Way it Was; Inside the War on the New England Crime Family and other Stories. He writes this with Brendan Doherty, a retired Rhode Island State Police Officer who worked the mob for the majority of his long career. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Raymond Patriarca and the Genovese and Gambino Families Sep 30, 2019

Welcome Wiretappers, don’t forget to hit me up on Venmo and buy us a shot and a beer. In this episode host Gary Jenkins and his main contributor Camulius Robinson take a look at Raymond L.S. Patriarca and New England Crime Family or the “Office” and their relationships with New York’s Genevose and Gambino families in connection with the pornography business. The office is concentrated in Providence, RI, and Boston, MA. The Patriarca family had interests in the Desert Inn in Las Vegas, as well as all of the standard mafia income-generating methods. Raymond L.S. Patriarca was well-connected politically, and headed the family for 30 years, from 1954 until his death in 1984. We find the Patriarca family “Office” is especially interesting, because like New York and Chicago, they stood alone. Angelo Bruno in Philadelphia basically answered to Carlo Gambino, and Cleveland belonged to the Genovese family and deferred to them, likewise with Kansas City and Milwaukee leaned on Chicago. The Patriarca family though is unique. They weren’t isolated like the Marcellos or the Trafficantes, where they didn’t need to answer to anyone. Raymond Patrarca ran two cities, Boston and Providence, and later with Grasso’s help, they took Connecticut from New York in the 1970s, about the same time Philadelphia was losing Atlantic City to New York. Law enforcement really shut them down by the early 90s. When Raymond died in 1984 and tried to make his son the next boss, historically, that always leads to a problems (e.g. Bonannos, Columbos, Gambinos), then the FBI recorded an Office making ceremony in 1989 in Medford, MA, followed by all of the RICO cases in 1991, they were basically done. There have been a few recent arrests, but like other Cosa Nostra families, they are all brainless thugs nowadays. The Genoveses were a Manhattan-based crime family and have historically created wide-ranging partnerships with other crime families across the country, most notable Chicago, Cleveland, and New England. These relationships can be traced to Lucky Luciano’s philosophy of partnership. Vito Genovese had very close ties to Boston-based faction of Patriarca family The Gambinos were a very powerful New York family, and they had vast interests in pornography, and closer ties to the Patriarcas in Providence, RI. Jerry Angiulo was Patriarca’s Boston area crime boss and he shared interests in certain money-making ventures with the Genovese Family under Sam Cufari as previously agreed to by Raymond Patriarca earlier Genovese leadership. In 1980, Carlo Mastrototaro and Jerry Angiulo were co-owners of a United Books porn shop in. Joe Palladino, the manager of the store, owed Angiulo $200,000, and the weekly vig was $2000. The weekly gross of a porn shop in 1981 was between $2500-$3500. United Books was the only porn shop in Worcester…until November of 1980. In November 1980, Carlo Mastrototaro, looking to expand, seeks permission from New York to open a second porn shop—Green, Street News & Smoke Shop. He is put in touch with Kenneth Guarino of the Gambino family. Genovese soldier, Carlo Mastrototaro supplied this store with pornography from Guarino, the Gambino soldier. The Boston suburb of Worcester, MA now has two porn shops. Joe Palladino who owned the original porn shop was worried about the competition, and his loss of revenue which cuts down his ability to pay his cut to Jerry Angiulo. He goes to see Mastrototaro who tells him he has permission from New York. Palladino returns to Angiulo and Jerry Angiulo is furious. He does not want to share any porn business and feels like both the Genevose and Gambino families are showing his disrespect. FBI wiretaps record much of his rants on this subject and they are already building a case on the new England pron business. . While we don’t know exactly what happened as a result of Angiulo’s escalation, we know what happened to everyone involved. In April 1981, Ken Guarino was sentenced to 2 years in prison for his part i...

Johnny Roselli and Hollywood Sep 16, 2019

Don’t forget to buy me a shot and a beer on my @ganglandwire Venmo app. This week I am joined by Larry Henry, the Mob in Popular Culture blogger for the Las Vegas Mob Museum. He and I discuss “Handsome Johnny” Roselli who was an influential mobster for the Chicago Outfit who helped that organization control Hollywood and the Las Vegas Strip. Roselli was born in Brooklyn and traveled around the country as a young man. He made some connections ion Los Angeles and ended up working in a bootlegging business during prohibition for a Los Angeles mobster named Tony Cornero. This operation was under the control of Jack Dragna, the mafia boss of southern California. He would gravitate into working on the off-shore gambling boats operating out of Santa Monica and helped run a race wire. He first met Al Capone in Los Angeles when the police gangster squad was trying to run Capone out of town. He would become a western representative for the Chicago Outfit over his lifetime and would probably be called a member of the Outfit and not a member of the Dragna crime family. Meanwhile back in Chicago, a man named Willie Bioff was extorting money from n Chicago area movie theaters by controlling the Stagehand’s Union. When the Outfit learned of this they incorporated Bioff’s scheme and expanded it to the actual studios themselves in Hollywood. Johnny Roselli was already involved in Los Aneles and Outfit boss Paul Ricca, Roselli’s mentor, appointed him to oversee Willie Bioff major extortion plots against the major film companies like Fox, Universal and Warner brothers. Bioff would get indicted by the IRS after the famous actor Robert Montgomery tipped them off about these extortion activities. Bioff became a witness and testified against Paul Ricca, Tony Accardo, Roselli, and other Chicago mobsters. The government convicted them in 1943, and the judge handed down ten-year sentences. The Outfit had backed Harry Truman in the 1948 election and his Attorney General, Tom Clark, helped them all get paroled after serving only three years. After the government released Roselli from prison, he returns to Hollywood, and he finds work in the film industry where he helps produce Film-Noir gangster movies before moving on and becoming involved in a plot to kill Castro and become embroiled in the rumors of the Outfit’s involvement in the assignation of President John F. Kennedy. Larry Henry worked in television and newspaper media in 1970’s Nevada before changing careers to become a journalism professor and then headmaster at the Haas Hall academy in Fayetteville Arkansas. He has been blogging about the Mob and Las Vegas for the past several years. Larry organized the Mob World Summit that was held in the Las Vegas Mob Museum in 2018 and in the Hot Springs Arkansas Gangster Museum in 2019. We are hosting the 2020 Mob World Summit in Kansas City next June. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Carmine Galente Sep 09, 2019

Carmine Galante was born Camillo Galente on February 21, 1910, in East Harlem, New York City. Like many La Cosa Nostra mobsters his parents, Vincenzo “James” Galante and Vincenza Russo, had emigrated to New York City in 1906 from Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily. His father had worked as a fisherman. The Galante family had the three brothers Camillo, Samuel, Peter Galante, and two sisters, Josephine and Angelina Galante. Camillo would get his name changed to Carmine Galente. He married Helen Marulli, and they had three children; James Galante, Camille Galante, and Angela Galante. He left his wife and lived with Ann Acquavella for most of his adult life. They had had two children together. The authorities sent 10-year-old Carmine to reform school for petty thievery. He was a natural leader who formed a juvenile street gang on the Lower East Side. Galante had dropped out of seventh grade during Prohibition and became a young Mafia associate. He was a small-statured but violent young man who used his violent tendencies to become a leading enforcer by the time he was in his mid-20s. In 1931, a prison shrink diagnosed Galente as a psychopath. Carmine Galent or “The Cigar” became a valuable member of the Bonanno crime family and was a valuable asset and associate to Joseph Bonanno. Joe Bananas will promote Galente to caporegime and then underboss. He was always loyal to Bonanno and sided with him in a mob war with Carlo Gambino. Joe Bonanno was heavily involved in the heroin trafficking from the middle east, and he sent Galante to Montreal, Quebec to work Vincenzo Cotroni of the French Connection. Joe Bonanno will take Carmine Galante to a 1957 meeting in Palermo, Sicily and conspire with the Sicilian mob to import heroin into the United States. Lucky Luciano who was living in Sicily also attended that meeting. The Bonnano family recruited young unknown Sicilian men to help distribute the narcotics. These men became known as “Zips” and most came from the Galente family home of Castellammare del Golfo, Trapani. They worked as bodyguards, contract killers, and drug traffickers. Galante placed total trust and confidence in his new immigrants. The Federal Bureau of narcotics will charge Carmine Galante with heroin distribution in 1960. An interesting fact is that William Bentvena (“Billy Batts” murdered by Tommy DeSimone) was also a codefendant. The defendants intimidated and coerced the jurors and witnesses throughout the trial culminating in a mistrial because the jury foreman had “fallen” down some stairs. In a second trial the jury sentenced Galent to 20 years in federal prison. The government released Carmine Galente from prison in the 1970s, and he moves to consolidate and control all narcotics trafficking in the northeast. Galante refused to share any drug profits with the other families. Galante understood that many of his fellow mobsters wanted to kill him, he was so bold that he once said, “No one will ever kill me; they wouldn’t dare.” Genovese crime family boss Frank Tieri started a conspiracy with other New York family leaders to murder Galante. They even obtained approval from Galent’s old boss, Joseph Bonanno, even though he was retired to Arizona. In 1979, the Mafia Commission ordered Galante’s execution. On July 12, 1979, Anthony “Bruno” Indelicato, Dominick Trinchera, and found Carmine eating lunch on an open patio at Joe and Mary’s Italian-American Restaurant at 205 Knickerbocker Avenue in Bushwick, Brooklyn. Galante was dining with several other Bonanno family men and with his two Sicilian bodyguards, Baldassare Amato, and Cesare Bonventre. These three men walked to the outdoor patio wearing ski maks and opened fire with shotguns and handguns. They killed Galante and two others instantly. An enterprising New York Post photographer climbed to a fire escape behind the patio and took the famous picture of Carmine Galente crumpled on the floor with his ever-present cigar clenched between his teeth and one open eye s...

The Aiuppa Bribery Case Aug 26, 2019

In the 1960s, the Chicago Outfit owned practically all the local government officials and a lot of cops. In this podcast we tell about a failed bribery attempt. An incorruptible Cook County Deputy named Donald Shaw refused this bribery attempt, even though an older and higher ranking officer named Dutch Bergbrieter encouraged him to meet with “Joey Doves” Aiuppa and to take the offered bribe. It seems that Officer Shaw had raided a tavern for illegal gambling and when the proprietor offered a bribe, Officer Shaw arrested him for attempted bribery. As the case got close to trial, Outfit gambling boss Joey Aiuppa asked Officer Shaw if he couldn’t forget the exact details of this interaction. This game was protected by the Outfit and this is their promise of protection from competition and law enforcement. Officer Shaw went to Cook County sheriff Richard Ogilvie. The sheriff organized a sting operation where he got Chicago PD officers “wire up” Officer Shaw who in turn approached Cook County Deputy Lt. Dutch Bergbrieter to set up a meeting with Aiuppa. In this podcast we use the actual words spoken by Aiuppa, Bergbrieter and Donald Shaw because the transcript was given to the Chicago Tribune who reported in detail on this story. Aiuppa’s words show the guile and cleverness of a good Outfit fixer and a man who will rise to become the boss by the end of career. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Indiana Organized Crime Aug 19, 2019

First of all Wiretappers, don’t forget to buy me a cup of coffee on Venmo at ganglandwire. Today we must thank our frequent guest host and mafia researcher screenwriter Camulius “Cam” Robinson. In this episode Cam goes deep into the Chicago Outfit’s influence over the Northwest Indiana organized crime rackets. In the Indian state line city of Chicago Heights, IL over 50% of the population was Italian while Indiana did not have the large Italian population. Despite its rural image Indiana organized crime was a real thing. Lake County, IN Fell under Chicago Heights crew of Chicago Outfit Anthony Pinelli: early boss of NWI under Capone after Chicago consolidation, later retired to California and LA Family Frank LaPorte boss of Chicago Heights (famous photo with Capone sitting on lawn), boss of whole crew (IL/IN) until 1972 Al Pilotto 1972-1982 indictment Al Tocco/Dominick Palermo 1982-1990 Indiana capos: Gaetano “Tommy” Morgano: deported to Sicily 1963 after a gambling conviction rather than go to prison Frank Zizzo (ran operations 1963-1988): owner of Pepper Pot Pizza in Gary and Highland—NOT Santini’s Pepper Pot in Portage or Valparaiso (no lawsuits) Bernard “Snooky” Morgano (b. 1936): son of Tommy, indicted in 1990, released in 1996 Snooky Morgano’s organization: Anthony Leone (b. 1939) : nephew of Morgano and lieutenant,;ran street tax and gambling rackets in the area; lived in a “huge house” in Valparaiso; went into Witness Protection after testifying in syndicate trail in NWI in 1989; but left voluntarily in 1991 to return to the area and spend the holidays with his sons; he was active in the Special Olympics; and died March 13, 2019 Peter “Cadillac Pete” Petros (b 1935): street tax collector for Leone Sam “Frog” Glorioso (b 1942): street tax collector and soldier, he was a steel worker Sam Nuzzo (Merrillville): 80% of illegal gambling in Lake County Efrain “Puerto Rican Frankie” Santos: ran bolita in East Chicago, partner in operation with Ken Eto, controlled Latino crime in the area, Chicago came to appreciate Santos more than Morgano James A. “Sonny” Peterson (East Chicago): controls policy rackets in predominantly black neighborhoods, involved in scam with County Commissioner to sell nursing home to County at elevated price Funny Indiana Organized Crime: Al Roy Watkins: lottery operator turned federal witness, reported to Anthony Leone 1983—Anthony Leone and Al Roy Watkins both laid off as foremen at Gary Works of US Steel, so they started a lottery with &10,000 loan from Bernard “Snooky” Morgano $600-$700 per day in the beginning, $3000 later per day, every day, except Christmas—that’s a holy day Same numbers as Illinois Lottery Pick-Four, and they drove to Illinois and use that state lottery to “lay-off” number combinations that would break the bank 55% of every dollar to costs (15% to mob, 10% to cops, 30% to lottery winnings), 45% to Leone and Watkins Leone was said to carry a gun and lived in a “very huge house” in Valparaiso, IN Leone sold the lottery for $10,000 to a new lottery group, and gave Watkins nothing, but assured he could go with the sale and continue running it…basically throwing Watkins in. Watkins later said, “He sold me like a slave. Poor Vincent “Pee Wee” Lozado: gambling operator in Merrillville, IN, caught talking to under-cover Gary police officer Paid 10% street tax to Morgano through Leone—also had to pay 15% to Santos, because“all Latins involved in illegal activity paid street tax to Puerto Rican Frankie” Leone owed Lozado $10,000, so Lozado left and worked only for Santos Christmas 1985, Leone took Lozado’s business back and demanded 10% plus $1,000 a month street tax, plus the 15% he was forced to pay Santos. Lozado couldn’t complain to anyone, because they were all connected to the Outfit, so he told undercover officers he was only making book to continue paying the street tax he owed. In 1990, he was indicted and went to prison for 3 years.

David Breakspear on Cops Aug 12, 2019

Don’t forget to buy me a cup of coffee on your venmo app at ganglandwire. In this show we talk with our British friend, David Breakspear. He spent a large part of his life “under care” as they say in Great Britain. This means he was incarcerated because of life on the wrong side of the law. In this episode former cop and host, Gary Jenkins talks with a reformed man, writer, mob historian, and criminal justice reform activist David Breakspear about their respective experiences with cops and crooks. David currently blogs for the mob history site. Click on this sentence to see his blog pieces. David created his own blog site, Journey of a Reformed Man. Go to that site to read more of David’s excellent writing and insightful knowledge of British criminal justice and their prison system. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Last Brother Standing Aug 08, 2019

This is a possible title for my upcoming documentary about the Kansas City mob war of the 1970s. This is the story of the ruling Civella brothers, Nick and Cork Civella and the upstart young Turks, Nick Spero and his brothers, Mike, Joe and Carl Spero. A quick overview if you don’t remember the multi-episode podcast I did on this conflict. Basically it is the generation gap played out in a mob war. The old school Nick and his brother Cork Civella were born in the early 1900s and the young Turk Speros were born during WW II. Just like the Baby Boomers resisted the previous generation’s conservative values and influence on society, the Spero brothers resisted the conservative mafia leadership of the Civellas. A quick overview begins with the eldest brother Nick Spero coming of age as a career criminal who joins a mob robbery crew traveling around the country robbing grocery stores. They always kick a piece of this action up to Nick and Cork Civella after a successful score. One of these crew members is a blood relative of other mob members named Sam Palma. He is arrested for a Texas supermarket robbery and the night before he is scheduled to plead guilty, someone murders him. Unknown persons set up this murder to look like a suicide and mob informants implicate Nick Spero. This must have been the desire of Nick Civella because Spero graduates to set up a scheme to hijacking trailers of merchandise from trucking companies. I have one story that lets you know how sharp this guy was. The mob dominated Teamster’s Union makes sure he get a job working for a national truck line, Yellow Freight. He sets up a trailer load of liquor to be stolen. Nick goes to management and Yellow Freight security, claiming he can get this trailer back. Quickly he located the entire trailer minus a few cases of booze. probably for his trouble. A grateful Yellow Freight management team promoted Nick to a position of authority. He was access to all truck schedules and cargo manifest and given a voice in whether or not an employee will be prosecuted. Yellow Freight notices that more and more trailers of merchandise like electric knives, perfume, batteries, film, and booze are missing and presumed stolen. Nick is hard to fire with his mob connections though the Teamster’s Union but finally, Yellow Freight pays him a cash settlement to resign. Nick moves on to running traveling jewelry theft gangs of which his youngest brother, Carl Spero is the team leader. He gets another Teamster job and is so popular that he is elected a union steward. Nick Spero has a part-time job for a mob-connected c=vending company and he successfully intimidates many stores and bars into installing these companies’ vending machines. He seems to be a young mobster on a management track Remember, this is the 1960s and by 1970, Nick Spero has effected the look and dress of other young people. In other words, he grows his hair out and sports a large Fu Man Chu mustache. He is seen wearing flowery bell-bottom pants and colorful shirts. The conservative Nick Civella has always dictated that none of his men shall have facial hair and they all dress in dress shirts and slacks with a snap-brim hat or fedora, exactly like Nick and Cork Civella. Informants start reporting that Nick Civella does not like or trust Nick Spero because of his dress but more importantly his demeanor. He is loud, flamboyant and is seen as a leader among his peers in the criminal underworld. These attributes are all great for the boss if he can control the man, but in this case Nick Spero once made the following statement when asked about joining the Civella organization rather than operating on his own and paying a tribute. “I ain’t no jockstrap, they use you up until the stretch is all gone and then they throw you away. I have always been my own man. i don’t listen to anybody but my father and he is dead.” This just the first few minutes. This story goes on the describe a war to the death from two opposing fac...

John “Pudge” Matassa Aug 05, 2019

John “Pudgy” Matassa, Jr is reportedly connected to the Outfit’s Northside/Rush Street crew. He is the son of retired Chicago Police officer. Northside/Rush Street crew history Covered Rush Street, which was the entertainment district of Chicago, and the rest of the Northside of Chicago, extorting porn shops (Red Wemette), night clubs, bars, as well as traditional loan-sharking, and gambling. Several members have held leadership positions in the powerful LIUNA (Laborors International Union of North America) and other unions. Territory is north of Chicago River or the Eisenhower Exp north to Rogers Park Northside crew ran a large casino-type operation out of the Grand Plaza Hotel in Rosemont. Several members owned tables Northside Crew Members Ross Prio long-time capo, back to the days of Frank Nitti. Prio took over after murder of Ted Newberry when Capone went to prison. Jimmy “the Monk” Allegretti ran all vice on the Northside until he was imprisoned in 1962. He was released for health reasons (diabetes and bad heart) and died on the plane en route to Chicago Felix “Milwaukee Phil” Alderisio started off as a hitman early on, later moved up and ran a protection racket on Rush Street until he became underboss under Sam Giancana 3 Doms—Dominick DiBella (Last Supper photo), Dominic Nuccio, and Dominic Brancato—were bosses of the Near North Side and was close to Ross Prio working in various capacities as a drivers and enforcers “Innocent” Vincent Solano (Last Supper photo) boss of North Side after Prio’s death in 1972—originally driver for Prio. Oversaw all gambling, prostitution, and extortion. Long-time president of the LIUNA. Best known for sending hit men after Ken “Tokyo Joe” Eto Jasper Campise—North Side muscle brutally killed for botched Ken Eto hit John Gattuso—deputy sheriff and hit man for Solano, also murdered brutally for failing to kill Ken Eto Joseph DiVarco—street boss for Solano collecting “street tax” from businesses on Rush St, loan-sharking, prostitution died in 1992 Matassa’s Union history: LIUNA 1985—Matassa joined the Laborers International Union of North America, Local #2 1987-1989—Matassa becomes business agent (BA) of Local #2 and delegate to the LIUNA District Council, and eventually the Vice President, with Solano being the President of Local #1 1992—Vince Solano dies, Matassa became President and Coordinator of Committees gaining access to the Pension Fund 1993-1994—Matassa takes control of the LIU Chicago Political League (and fund), and the training fund Matassa uses his financial access to embezzle millions from the LIUNA 1998 Fed placed Chicago District Council of the LIUNA—19,000 members—into a trusteeship forcing Matassa out Matassa fought for several years to maintain control Failed to hold contested elections for 25 years Fun facts about Pudgy Matassa Mike Glitta, an elder in the Northside crew, was cousin to Matassa’s “Uncle” Mike introduced Pudgy around and helped him to promote in the Outfit 1988—Matassa supposedly took part in a formal ceremony to become a “made” member of the Outfit along current boss Salvatore “Solly D” Delaurentis. Historically, the Outfit shunned such formalities, mocking the more traditional mobs in other cities, but during the 80s (’83 or ’85), it is rumored that someone—Joe Ferriola or possibly Joey Aiuppa—started initiating members Pudgy Matassa dealt directly with Ken Eto and was responsible for security over Eto’s protected games Matassa had a close friend on the Chicago PD Tactical Unit, and used Ken Eto to set up another gambler, giving his associate the time and location of the game, which was then raided Matassa was close friends with Jasper Campise and they co-owned gambling tables at the Grand Plaza underground casino Attended Campise’s wake and told authorities he knew nothing about Campise’s murder Pudgy Matassa was involved in the scheme to bribe US Marshall John Ambrose into revealing the whereabouts of informant Nick Calabrese

Bonus John “Pudge” Matassa – One Man’s Opinion Aug 05, 2019

This is a short bonus episode containing the opinion of a Wiretapper who is a member of the Chicago Laborers’ District Council LiUNA. This is a real deal strong Chicago union who looks out for 20,000 members. Give this a listen and then go onto my next episode in which myself and Cam Robinson examine the government’s case and the Outfit history of the participants. I was once a member of the United Automotive Workers Local 249 and I understand the benefits and need for a strong labor union. Ben Ellickson makes an interesting point, a mobbed up union representative may work harder on an individual worker’s grievance than another guy who is not connected. he has one great story about how that worked for one member. Don’t forget to hit me on your Venmo app and buy me eggs for my Hammy from Denny’s. You have to listen to get this inside joke. Just a little Podcaster’s humor. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The execution of Louis Lepke Buchalter Jun 24, 2019

Louis “Lepke” Buchalter was a 1930s New York City racketeer. Authorities believed Albert Anastasia appointed him to run his Murder, Inc., enforcement squad. Crime buster Thomas Dewey will set his sights in Lepke as an example of Mob violence and will eventually prosecute him for murder and obtain a death sentence. Eventually, Lepke will appeal to the governor for a commutation from his execution and the person who denies that appeal is Thomas Dewey. A New York City jury sentenced Louis Buchalter, Emanuel “Mendy” Weiss, and Louis Capone to death in 1936 for the murder of Joseph Rosen. The victim was a trucking contractor that had been forced out of business by Anastasia led rackets. Anastasia believed that Rosen, who was out of the trucking business and running a candy store, had agreed to testify for Manhattan Special Prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey who was investigating mob influence in the trucking industry. The FBI and other law enforcement believed that Buchalter had ordered as many as eighty murders in his underworld career by this time. During the trial, Lepke and his co-defendants insisted they were innocent of the killing of Rosen and they had been framed. After the jury found them guilty and they appealed, all state appeals were denied. It is claimed that some of the reviewing judges did claim the state’s evidence was not very strong against the three mob associates. Buchalter, Weiss, and Capone had been able to use legal maneuvers to obtain several delays of their final execution date. The last delay was the most dramatic because the lawyers obtained this final postponement within an hour and a half of their scheduled appointment with the prison Death Chamber. At 9:35 p.m. on Thursday, March 2, Governor Thomas Dewey ordered a 48-hour postponement and granted lawyers time to file a last-ditch appeal to federal courts. They argued that that U.S. Attorney General Francis Biddle improperly released Buchalter from federal prison to be executed for his state conviction. Just like in the movies, the warden at Sing Sing, William E. Snyder, received a phone call from Governor Dewey and he sent word of the postponement to the prisoners through the prison chaplain, Father Bernard Martin. The courts were not moved and Lepke, Capone, and Weiss were electrocuted at Sing Sing Prison, March 4, 1944. If they had lived until June 6, 1944, they would have heard about D-Day. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Willem Holleeder Part 2 Jun 17, 2019

Holleeder challenges the Hells Angels In Part 2, David Amoruso continues the story of Dutch master criminal Willem Holleeder and how he became the leader of a major Dutch motorcycle gang called the No Surrender. and eventually challenged the American based Hells Angels. It will be during this time he starts extorting money from a real estate named Willem Endstra. Holleeder and Willem Endstra launder dirty money Along the way, we learn that Willem Holleeder becomes an extortionist of wealthy European real estate investors. Holleeder went into business with a real estate businessman named Willem Endstra and involved him in money laundering. Holleeder had a dispute with Endstra and he became an informant about Holleeder and his criminal activities. Holleeder has Endstra and another partner murdered while they are on holiday in Thailand. Dutch police investigate a top criminal (topcriminelen) By 2006, Dutch police have charged Holleeder with murder and extortion and his trial was dubbed the trial of the century. Holleeder’s lawyer, Bram Moszkowicz, argued that media pronunciations on Holleeder as one of the “topcriminelen” had prejudiced the case against him. David Amoruso I recommend you go to David’s website, Gangstersinc by clicking here. David has written about American gangsters and famous American crimes as well as the La Cosa Nostra, Camorra and ‘Ndrangheta in Italy and Sicily and other European criminal organizations. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show.

Willem Holleeder Part 1 Jun 10, 2019

Willem Holleeder In this story about Willem Holleeder, I interview a Netherlands based crime writer David Amaruso about the John Gotti of the Netherlands. He was a young guy from the middle class with all the advantages of a nice family until his father’s alcoholism caused the Heineken Brewery to fire him. Holleeder gets back at the Heineken company Willem Holleeder burst into the European public’s imagination for his audacious kidnapping of Heineken beer baron, Freddy Heineken. Anthony Hopkins starred in a biopic film titled Kidnapping Freddy Heineken adding to the myth of Willem Holleeder as a master criminal. He recruited some other small-time criminals and they walked away with about 20 million in U.S. dollars. Authorities solved this crime and in 1987, they caught him hiding in Paris. A Dutch court sentenced Hollender to 11 years in prison. Authorities released him in 5 years. Prison time In Part 1, David Amoruso tells the story of the kidnapping of Freddie Heineken, who was involved, how they were caught, and how this crime caught the public’s attention. The public and the press saw Willem Holleeder, aka “The Nose,” as a mythical benevolent criminal following in the footsteps of Robin Hood, Jesse James, John Dillinger, and John Gotti. The men who joined in this kidnapping were Cor van Hout, Jan Boelaard, Frans Meijer, and Martin Erkamps and all served prison sentences. the authorities were never able to recover several millions of the Ranson. While in prison, Holleeder met other gangsters and emerged from prison a full-fledged gang boss intent on living the life of a master criminal. David Amoruso I recommend you go to David’s website, Gangstersinc by clicking here. David has written about American gangsters and famous American crimes as well as the International Camorra and ‘Ndrangheta in Italy and Sicily and other European criminal organizations. To go to the store or make a donation Click Here. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast

Gerald Scarpelli and the Wild Bunch May 27, 2019

Scarpelli made several attempts to “go legitimate,” first by investing several thousand into a jewelry boutique, and when that failed, he worked at a shipping company owned by his brother. He ultimately wanted to own an auto salvage yard, but as a felon, licensing would have been difficult to obtain in Illinois. To make ends meet, he had a partnership with a small-time, unsuccessful bookie, and had his Outfit salary. Scarpelli’s first arrest was in 1960 for robbery and served three prison terms through the years, but it was in the 1970s he did his major work. He was arrested in 1972 for armed robbery, but given probation, then he violated probation in 1973 with another armed robbery in Illinois, for which he received 15 years, but claimed his confession was made under duress. Released from prison in 1976 after the US Supreme Court ruled in his favor in Gagnon v. Scarpelli, he immediately worked as a hitman for many Outfit leaders and was a member of the Wild Bunch. He is credited with numerous murders for which he would have received orders, most notably Ned Bakes, a Capone-era mobster whose real name was Ignacius Spacchesi, who was once wanted for questioning in the murder of Bugsy Siegel. In 1977, Chicago Heights lieutenant Al Tocco sought out his former associate, Gerry Scarpelli and the Wild Bunch for assistance in the Chop Shop Wars. Scarpelli and his partner Scalise killed junkyard owner Richie Ferraro and later his partner Frank Theo, both of whom were close to Scalise. Scarpelli would go on to commit several more murders as part of the Wild Bunch, finally taking part in ending the group with the murders of former partner Tony Borsellino and Petrocelli, with whom Scarpelli fell out. Despite Scarpelli’s close ties to Petrocelli, Butch attempted to use his position to rob from Scarpelli. In the late 70s, Scarpelli and Duke Basile teamed up to rob two Brinks trucks. The first was in October of 1978 in Hammond, IN, the second was for $346,000 April of 1979, in Tinley Park. In addition, they robbed a Brinks courier in the lobby of a bank in Elmwood Park for $324,000, all of which netted him over a million dollars. After these armed robberies, Butch Petrocelli claimed “street tax,” in the name of the Outfit, but didn’t kick back to his bosses. This tax created a rift between Scarpelli and Petrocelli and Scarpelli demanded justice from Cicero capo Joe Ferriola, who knew nothing about the tax. This was the final straw for Butch Petrocelli. Scarpelli spent the 1980s hustling, committing small robberies, and working for the Cicero crew. Throughout 1986 and 1987, he worked with Duke Basile on a number of robberies, often describing his Outfit work. Throughout this time, Basile was an FBI informant wearing a wire. At one point, the FBI trailed Scarpelli and Basile to a safe garage where vehicles and weapons were stored. They observed Scarpelli storing several firearms in preparation for a robbery that the FBI had set up in a residence the FBI had wired for sound. The FBI then returned to the garage and rendered the weapons inoperable. After Scarpelli and Basile committed the robbery in Michigan City, the FBI approached him and advised him of his situation. Scarpelli initially refused to cooperate but agreed in time. He spent several hours speaking to the FBI describing the daily activities of the Outfit and offered to wear a wire, but because he was a murderer, the FBI would not release him. On the record, Scarpelli complained about the bosses, and the difficulty making real money. He stated murder was just business, and he was not compensated for it. Scarpelli later recanted his earlier statements and complained that they were not the product of free-will. When his legal appeals against his testimony were found to be without merit, Scarpelli went to the correctional center shower and hanged himself. The FBI later stated that much of the information given has proven to have been deliberately false. Murders:

Butch Petrocelli and the Wild Bunch May 20, 2019

Don’t forget to buy me a coffee on Venmo at ganglandwire. This week, Chicago writer and Outfit historian, Camillius “Cam” Robinson and I talk about Butch Petrocelli and the Wild Bunch. As a special bonus in the sho0w notes, Cam has written a short piece with additional facts and stories about Butch and this feared hit team of young Turks in the Outfit. I had a great time talking with Gary on Gangland Wire. I thought it might be helpful to include a bit more information on our buddy Butch as a companion to the podcast. I’ll expand further on the Wild Bunch as a whole in future blog posts. If there are any other areas of mob interest, whether Chicago, New York, or parts in between, comment below, and I’ll do what I can. William “Butch” Petrocelli was born on Taylor Street in 1938 to Aurelio and Assunta, immigrants from Abruzzi, Italy. He was the eighth of nine children, and while Aurelio dug ditches in Chicago, Butch wondered if maybe there were better ways to make a buck. His older brother John would go on to become a sergeant in the Chicago PD, joining the force in 1954, but by 1957, Butch was given probation for cartage theft, a new hobby he had picked up with his good buddy, a young Harry Aleman. They were off to an early start. Butch spent most of the 60s as an Outfit member-in-training, collecting juice loans, and protection money…he didn’t mind getting a little rough. By 1969, Butch and Harry got in trouble for roughing up a contractor over a couple of thousand dollars owed to the Outfit. Even with first-hand testimony from undercover officers, the case never even made it past the grand jury. Membership has its privileges. In 1971, Sambo Cesario was blown away by two masked men. Between 1973-74, Butch and Harry, and their new pal Jimmy Inendino were robbing houses with a stolen sheriff’s badge. Then in 1974, Harry’s uncle, Joe Ferriola came out of prison, and Turk Torello wanted to crack down. There would now be a street tax on all book-making, gambling, and loan-sharking in the city. Joe Ferriola knew just the men for the job: Butch Petrocelli, Harry Aleman, Tony Borsellino, and Harry Aleman…The Wild Bunch was born. One after another, recalcitrant bookies fell, either in line, or on the pavement, the Wild Bunch weren’t picky, but they were effective. Chris Cardi, Nick Galanos, Tony Reitinger, the hits just kept coming. In 1977, the Feds tried to serve a warrant on Butch for illegally purchasing firearms. He sped from the scene, leading them on a chase through the city, until he finally lost them in the Old Neighborhood. That charge was dropped too. His brother John, the cop, was diagnosed with cancer in 1978, and Butch was at the hospital almost every day, even driving John to the Mayo Clinic when he didn’t seem to be improving. John died later that year. Butch’s marriage had also broken up by that time. As a reward for his efficiency, Butch (seen with Rocco Infelice) received control of all three race tracks in the Chicago area. Meanwhile, “Jimmy I” and Harry both got 30 years on a RICO charge for the burglaries Butch took part in. Butch looked out for his friends, To help out the Alemans, he took over Harry’s collections…then he had Tony Borsellino killed. 1980 started badly for Butch, and ended worse. Eleftherios Valentzas, a well-liked restaurant owner and bookmaker, was shotgunned to death after agreeing to testify against the Petrocelli crew—the bosses weren’t impressed. Then the $100,000 Butch put together for Harry’s family seems to have gotten misplaced. Finally, he threw a huge Image by Ross Stanger Christmas party in a Gold Coast hotel for the whole Outfit; this was Butch’s mob now…or so he kept telling people. It probably wasn’t a surprise when Angelo LaPietra and Joe Ferriola called Butch to come in for a sit-down. I likely was a surprise when Frank Calabrese threw a rope around his neck and slit his throat. Butch was bound up in a sleeping bag and left in his red 1977 Ford LTD,

Bonus episode The Chicago Tribune and the Outfit Apr 27, 2019

In this special bonus episode, I thank our generous contributors with an extra episode in which our most faithful fan, Chicago resident and mob historian Ben Ellickson does a dramatic read of an in-depth article about the upper echelon of the Chicago Outfit published on August 18, 1963, and written by one of their best mob reporters, Thomas Powers. I thank Ben for his never-ending support with his time, talent and treasure. A little background on why Mr. Powers may have believed that Sam Giancana was getting too much publicity. In 1961, Frank Sinatra introduced a man named Profirio Rubirosa to President John F. Kennedy. Rubirosa was a young Dominican who was close to the Dominican dictator Trujillo. Many persons suspected that Sinatra obtained a verbal commitment from Rubirosa to open up the Dominican Republic to gambling casinos if Trujillo were suddenly deposed. Sinatra flew Rubirosa to the Kennedy Compound at the Cape and they spent several hours out fishing with the president. Less than a month after that meeting, President Kennedy gave CIA Director Alan Dulles the okay to assassinate Trujillo. Sam Giancana began his plans to rebuild the Dominican Republic into another pre-Castro Cuba. Sam was making his moves when an FBI bug picked up on Giancana’s plans to turn the Dominican Republic into another Cuba. The agents heard some references to using their influence with the White House. Hoover told President Kennedy about this intercept and in anger, he and Hoover agreed they should institute “Operation Lockstep” to show Giancana who was boss. Chicago FBI agents followed Giancana and stayed immediately behind him in a car, sat next to him in restaurants, walked a few steps behind when he was walking, played in a foursome immediately behind Giancana when he golfed. Well-known FBI agent Bill Rohmer took this harassment to a new level when he met Giancana and his girlfriend, famous singer Phyllis McGuire, at O’Hare airport and Giancana claims that Rohmer, “whistled and howled at me and yelled how pretty I looked said I was queer and everything like that.” Giancana was drawing publicity because of his famous girlfriend as well as from government surveillance. The Trib learned that the Outfit bosses were tired of all the heat and wanted to displace Giancana as the boss. This article was released in 1963 and Giancana will hang on until 1966 when the government jails him for refusing to testify after being given a grant of immunity. As we now know, Tony Accardo and Paul Ricca, the real Outfit powers named Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa, the new Outfit boss. When the Government released Giancana in 1967, he left the country for Mexico and stayed until 1974 when Mexican authorities deported him. During this time Accardo learned about Giancana’s international casino connections in Iran and the Caribbean and he ordered him to share those profits. Sam refused claiming he developed that stream of income on his own. In contrast, during the same time, KC boss Nick Civella developed a skim inside the Tropicana without any help from Chicago and he voluntarily sent money to Aiuppa monthly. Sam will be killed by an unknown person or persons at his Chicago home in 1975. This murder was just before he was to testify in front of the Church Committee about his dealings with the CIA. In death, Sam Giancana remains as much of a man of mystery and controversy as he was in life Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast. .

Roy DeMeo Apr 22, 2019

How did Roy DeMeo get into a Life of Crime Roy Albert DeMeo was born into the Mafia neighborhood of Bath Beach Brooklyn. As a teenager, he starts loansharking while enrolled in James Madison High School. It would be during this time he is noticed by a Gambino crime family soldier named Nino Gaggi who takes him under his wing. Growing up in this atmosphere young Roy DeMeo, not unlike Henry Hill, notices that the men who have the money as represented by cash, cars, jewelry, and neighbor respect are all “connected guys” like Nino Gaggi. Early adulthood Nino Gaggi uses his Gambino connections to increase young Roy’s loanshark business by investing his cash into the young loan shark and sent him men who needed larger loans than DeMeo’s high school friends. Roy DeMeo will find other criminal opportunities as an associate to Gaggi’s crew. He recruited other neighborhood guys to steal cars and sell drugs. One of his first recruits is a high school friend named Chris Rosenberg. DeMeo finds Rosenberg hanging out at a popular Canarsie gas station where he was basically a street dealer. Roy had connections and money that allowed Rosenberg to deal with narcotics in larger amounts. With Roy as his partner, Chris became an illegal drug wholesaler with street dealers working for him. In the early 1970s, Chris introduced some of his friends to Roy. Joseph “Dracula” Guglielmo, Anthony Senter, and brothers Joseph Testa and Patrick Testa became the core members of Demeo’s crew. A New Murder Inc. After a life devoted to crime in his teens and early 20s, Nino Gaggi will mentor Roy Demeo as an associate of the Gambino crime family. He became a proficient killer who will live on in mob lore for the deeds of “DeMeo crew.” Joey Testa and Anthony Senter, who became known as the “Gemini Twins,” were the most feared crew members. DeMeo owned a Brooklyn tavern at 4021 Flatlands Ave. that he named the Gemini Lounge. During this time he recruited another psychopathic killer named Henry Borelli. DeMeo was a gun nut and he stored an impressive arsenal of machineguns, automatic rifles, and silencers in a storeroom at the lounge. He installed his cousin, crew member Joseph “Dracula” Guglielmo, into the adjoining apartment as a security procedure to prevent the NYPD cops and/or FBI from planting listening devices. The building is still there, and in an ironic twist, it is now the Purpose Life Church. Like the Jimmy Burke crew meeting at the nearby Bamboo Lounge, the DeMeo crew came in almost every day and drank, planned scores, critiqued past scores, gossiped as any mafia crew might do at their social club. Roy DeMeo had once worked as a butcher in his early life, and some mob historians claim the Gemini Lounge was more like the killing floor in a slaughterhouse except they killed and butchered humans instead of pigs. I remember a Sopranos’ episode where they cut up Richie Aprile’s body in Satriale’s Pork Store using the utensils normally used for the pork. The FBI claimed the DeMeo crew was responsible for as many as 200-300 murders from the mid-1970s to the early 1980s. Law enforcement often described the Demeo crew as the deadliest and most feared Mafia crew of the 5 Families in New York. They were described as “sadistic homicidal maniacs,” “the crazy killers,” “ice-cold murderous maniacs,” “lethal animals,” “barbaric psychopaths,” and “brutal psychopathic killers.” Law Enforcement at the time estimated the DeMeo crew contained over 40 men who were each trying to outdo each other as vicious, ruthless, bloodthirsty psychopathic killers. Roy DeMeo infiltrates the Brooklyn Credit Union In one of his more sophisticated operations, Roy joined the Borough of Brooklyn Credit Union and used his Gambino influence to gain a position on the board of directors. Roy DeMeo used his position at the credit union to launder illegal profits from loansharking and drug dealing as well as other rackets. He became the money launderer for many New York drug dealers.

Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso Part 2 Apr 15, 2019

As Anthony Casso progressed in his mob career, he became more suspicious and violent. One of the many interesting stories about Gaspipe is his interactions with the Russian Mafia of Brighton Beach. Gaspipe Casso was a very prolific thief during his life. He was not choosy who he worked with as long he could make money. He developed a close alliance with a Ukrainian mob boss named Marat Balagula. This guy had multi-billion dollar gasoline tax avoidance scams going on in and around Brighton Beach. The Russians formed small companies and purchased gasoline as wholesalers. At that time the wholesalers were supposed to collect the tax and pay it to the government. These small gasoline wholesale companies collected the taxes from the retailers and failed to pay the government entities as required. When an investigation followed, the companies folded and they created new companies. The Russian Mafia learned Gaspipe Casso’s friend, Balagula, was paying off Casso. The Russian mobsters started a campaign to discredit him among other Russians and they said because Barat was a punk and had no balls. They were wrong about Balagua, he was a ruthless killer and a smart dude. He knew that the combined force of the Italian crime families would end any threat from the other Russians. In 1986, a Russian boss named Vladimir Reznikov, entered the Rasputin nightclub in Brighton Beach and confronted Balagula. He pushed a 9mm Beretta into Balagula’s face and demanded $600,000 immediately and a future percentage of the gasoline profits. Balagula promised to get the money to which Reznikov replied, “Fuck with me and you’re dead, you and your whole fucking family; I swear I’ll fucking and kill your wife as you watch, you understand?” Anthony Casso heard about this and told Balagula, “Send word to Vladimir that you have his money, that he should come to the club tomorrow. We’ll take care of the rest.” Casso also requested a photograph of Reznikov and a description of his car. When Reznikov arrived at Balagula’s nightclub to pick up his money, a Gambino associate named Joseph Testa killed. Gaspipe Casso would later claim, “After that, Marat didn’t have any problems with other Russians.” During the 1990s, several high ranking members of the Lucchese family had gone over to the government. Peter Chiodo had committed numerous murders for Casso. Casso became enraged at Chido or rather at his wife for meddling in family business, He ordered a hit on Chiodo’s wife. It seems she had advised him to take a plea in a case and he did not consult with his boss, Anthony Casso. After a murder attempt on Peter Chido, he entered Witness Protection. Casso will soon follow him into the program after he realized the government had several good witnesses and a massive amount of evidence against him. Gaspipe, the head of the Lucchese Crime family would enter into the witness protection program. In one of the biggest and most shocking reveals, Casso disclosed that his two NYPD detective friends who helped him with hits were on the Lucchese payroll. It would be learned that Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa had committed eight murders ordered by Casso. They had given Casso information and he used this info to commit other murders. The turncoat cops revealed the names of many police and FBI informants. After Gaspipe helped law enforcement dismantle the Lucchese family, he was accused of continuing to commit crimes and other disruptions inside a federal witness protection facility. The U.S. Attorney dropped him the Witness Protection Program. He is currently serving a life sentence without parole at the Supermax ADX Florence prison in Florence, Colorado. Donate HereTo go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso part 1 Apr 08, 2019

Gaspipe Casso – the early years Anthony “Gaspipe” Casso was born May 21, 1940. Before his career ended with the U. S. Marshal’s office and Witness Security, mob bosses would promote him to the formal position of Underboss of the Lucchese crime family. Gaspipe Casso will gain the reputation of being a “homicidal maniac.” Anthony Casso was the youngest of the three children born to Michael and Margaret Casso. Casso’s grandparents had emigrated from Campania, Italy, (the Naples area, not Sicily). Michael Casso was a low-level soldier in the Genovese crime family and worked on the docks in Brooklyn. His parents asked a Capo in the Genovese family, Salvatore “Sally” Callinbrano, to be little Anthony Casso’s Godfather. Since this guy was a powerful influence on the Brooklyn docks and his father probably benefited from that relationship. Casso dropped out of school at 16 and got a longshoreman’s job. As a young boy, Casso became a crack shot, firing pistols at targets on a rooftop which he and his friends used as a shooting range. Casso also made money shooting predatory hawks for pigeon tenders. During these years Anthony Casso was short at 5’6 but was a very solid 185 pounds. He joined a street gang known as the South Brooklyn Boys. Christopher Furnari, a Lucchese Capo, noticed a teenage Anthony Casso and put him to work as a collector of his loan shark money. Christopher Furnari saw his value as a criminal and brought him into his gambling operations and drug dealing. How did he get the moniker – Gaspipe Over the years, there have been various stories of how Casso got the nickname “Gaspipe” Casso claims it is from his father, Michael, and passed along the story that his father used a gas pipe to threaten union dissidents. Others have claimed that his father made extra money hooking up illegal gas connections. Gaspipe Casso never liked the nickname but it stuck to him for life. Few people and mainly only cops would ever say it to his face. It was said that some close friends did call him “Gas.” Like most mob guys in his early 20s, he married and his wife’s name was Lillian. They would have a daughter and a son. Gaspipe makes his bones In the 1970s, he appears to have “made his bones” by murdering a drug dealer who was a suspected stoolie or snitch. By 1974, at age 32, The Lucchese family made him a full member, of the Lucchese crime family. Gaspipe partnered with another young soldier, Vittorio Amuso, and started a criminal partnership that would last for years. They committed scores of crimes, including drug trafficking, burglary, and murder. Later in life Gasspipe will claim to be one of the greatest burglars ever known. He claimed in a 60 minutes interview that he was an expert with a magnesium burning bar to open heavy safes and bank vaults. He believes the character played by James Caan in Thief was based on him and his exploits. I really don’t agree with that because this crew as based in Chicago and they had a real deal Chicago burglar Chicago Outfit burglar as a technical advisor and he had a small part in the film. The next episode Anthony Casso will have a successful career and become an important capo in the Gambino family. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bob Gross Serial Killer Part 2 Mar 25, 2019

In part 2 of this story of fear and horror on Kansas City streets. Gary and newspaper reporter Ian Cummings examines how Bob Gross once escaped any penalty because a rural deputy sheriff thought he could alter evidence to make a stronger case. Gary and Ian tell how a team of Kansas City police detectives finally brought Bob Gross to justice using modern technology. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Bob Gross Serial Killer part 1 Mar 18, 2019

Authorities could have predicted that a teenager named Robert “Bob” Gross might end up a suspect in sex crimes. They just did not know how far he would take his obsession. As with many sex offenders, he became enamored neighbor girl’s underwear drawer. He liked to creep around and window peep. To some, this may seem like normal boyhood sexual curiosity, but these behaviors often end up as adult obsessions that many men take to the next level of kidnapping, rape, and murder. This is the story of one of those guys who was mostly a free man during his life. The Kansas City Police Department spent millions on man-hours investigating and following Gross. He made a few slip-ups that took him off the streets for periods but never for his real crimes of murder. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Frank Costello and the Honest Cabbie Mar 11, 2019

A few days after D-Day in June of 1944, the Prime Minister of the New York Underworld, Frank Costello took a short cab ride. When he exited the cab, he left behind two envelopes containing $27,200.00 in hundreds and fifties. Probably gambling receipts because he was known as the slot machine king of New York City. The honest cabbie was named Edward Waters. He found the envelope and turned it into the NY police. After the story hit the papers, Costello made a claim alleging this was his money and it was from a debt he collected from a friend. Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia wanted to make a point and fought Costello, claiming the money should go to the police pension fund. A court case followed. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Chris Spina and Chicago Corruption Feb 20, 2019

As you know, this podcast runs on donations and purchases of my books, movie and the Kansas City Mob Tour app. I have over 200 free episodes out there with interviews of ex-mobsters, cops and federal agents, all mostly about the mob across the United States. We did a first-person interview with a parachuting skyjacker, a prison interview with the bank robbing Boonie Hat bandit and interviews with the investigators of serial killers. I thank Ben Ellickson, Mark Ryan, Berry Parks, Rich Sullivan and I have added an easy method of supporting the show. I got a Venmo account. If you have Venmo, just send a dollar or two to ganglandwire. Kind of like buying me a cup of Starbuck’s coffee. Remember my story about the “Starbucks kind of girl?” I am a Starbucks kind of guy, but you can buy me a McDonald’s senior coffee if you want. So, do that or go my gangland Wire website and click on the sip page to donate with a credit card or buy my movie or book. And you can help for free by liking and sharing my gangland wire facebook page, my twitter feed or Instagram. Since you had to listen to that advertisement, now on to this bonus episode. The City of Chicago is well known for its corruption. They had it all: kickbacks on snow removal contracts, hauling contracts, and ghost employees. This corruption can be found mostly out of the famous or infamous Pat Marcy’s 1st Ward. He ran this Ward like his own personal fiefdom for years. If you listened to my show with Mike Byrne on the Outfit hitman, Harry Aleman, you will remember that the fixer lawyer Robert Cooley testified that Pat Marcy was involved in the payoff of Judge Frank Wilson ensuring that Aleman was found not guilty in the murder of Billy Logan. In 1991 Chicago’s Inspector General Alexander Vroustouris conducted an investigation into the Department of Streets and Sanitation. He found 37 employees on the payroll but he found no evidence that they reported to work. All 37 were from the 1st Ward. He took this information to the Daley administration. After negotiating with the politically powerful Laborer’s International, the city fired a handful and suspended the majority. I guess they came back to work after their suspension? The City Inspector General was not done yet. In 1993, he has uncovered another Outfit-connected piece of corruption. A First Ward resident named Chris “Christy the Nose” Spina was a foreman assigned to a Streets and Sanitation scrap metal yard. He used city crews to periodically clean up all the scrap and sell it to private scrap yards. In one deal he received $6,000.00. When that was exposed the City sternly transferred him to the Bureau of Signs and Markings. There, the City paid him $41,000 per year plus overtime. The FBI reported they often observed Spina driving Outfit Capo Joey Lombardo to meetings with other Outfit members. He was the perfect driver because he was an Outfit guy with no criminal record. The City Inspector found the City was paying Spina during the time he was seen with Lombardo and he was even putting in for overtime pay. I guess when Joey had a late meeting, Chris needed the overtime. It’s not over with yet, during this investigation they found Spina supervised his two brothers, John and Anthony Spina who were arrested for weapons charges during the city internal investigation. This was during the time when Lombardo was released from his last prison sentence and he took out an ad in the Tribune claiming. “I am not a made member of the Chicago Mob and if anybody hears my name in connection with any criminal activity, please notify the FBI, local police and my parole officer, Ron Kumke.” Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Jimmy the Weasel Fratianno Feb 18, 2019

In this episode, we taped an interview with Jimmy Fratianno expert George Custer at the MobWorld Summit in our Las Vegas hotel room. We learn that Jimmy the Weasel started as a Cleveland mobster, then passed through the Chicago outfit and ended up in southern California by the 1950s. He made his bones by killing two Kansas City mobsters in Los Angeles. this murder was made famous in the popular Hollywood film, Kansas City Confidential as the Killing of the Two Tonys. Fratianno had a long career as a good earner for the mob and would rise to be a co-boss of the Los Angeles family. He knew how to play the angles and was an informant for the FBI all along to keep the heat off of himself and onto his rivals. In the end, the Bureau forced him into the Witness protection program and he spent the next several years and the last years of his life as a government witness. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Frank Schwiehs Hijacker Feb 14, 2019

In 1954, the Chicago Outfit found it lucrative to hijack trucks filled with cartons of cigarettes. They had dozens of corner stores who did not question the history of a case of Lucky Strikes if the price was right. In 1954, an alert tobacco distributor named Alfred Koenecke noticed a truck was following his delivery trucks. He called the Chicago PD and they assigned Det. Bernard Kennedy and Det. Geroge Hanennecke. Mr. Koenecke called the detectives and told them the suspicious truck was marked Unity Refrigeration was parked nearby his distribution warehouse. The detectives responded and Mr. Koenecke dispatched a delivery truck. The detectives started following the Unity Refrigeration truck who was following the Koenecke Distribution truck. they noticed another car was also following the Unity Refrigeration truck. they stopped that car and found a Koenecke salesman and a Chicago foot patrolman who had just been picked up by the salesman. The identified them and resumed their chase. they caught up with the Koenecke trucj=k and the Unity Refrigeration truck. The detectives stopped the uNity Refrigeration truck and found career criminals Frank Schweihs, age 22, Stanely Bajic and Sam Ciancino. Inside the glove compartment, they found a .38 pistol and a police scanner set to the Chicago PD frequencies. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

Women and Undercover Narcotics Feb 11, 2019

In this episode, we interview retired Undercover Detective Reyne Reyes. She worked in the most dangerous job of all the Street Narcotics Units before she arrived to work for your host in the Intelligence Unit and then later in the Major Case Narcotics Unit. One of the fun stories she shares is about the time we sent her into a bar owned by a mob bookie. Jackie Dale Norris was soon attracted to Detective Reyes and tried to hire her to work in his massage parlor. He offered many times to share his hot tub with Det. Reyes. This is typical of the delicate balancing act a woman must handle when she works undercover. Reyne was one of the best. She thinks fast on her feet and always has a good explanation and cover story ready, no matter the circumstances. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the store or make a donation click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, please give me a review and help others find the podcast.

The Great River Hills Caper Jan 31, 2019

River Hills In keeping with last months subject about a team of cops running surveillance and catching somebody during a caper, this bonus episode Gary will tell about his first successful surveillance. As they used to say in Dragnet, I was assigned to the day watch out of Central Patrol, The Field Investigations Unit. Along with my partner, John Fraise, we responded to Police Headquarters to interview a larceny suspect. When we checked him out of Central Detention, we found our man wearing a security guard uniform. After reviewing the arrest report, we figured this was more likely embezzlement and a not very big one at that. He was charged with stealing a couple of hundred dollars in tools from a company where he was the night watchman. I could sense his fear of going across the street to the Jackson County Jail so we pressed him about any other crimes he might help us clear. He mentioned he had recently worked at a downtown apartment complex known as River Hills. I remembered something so I quickly stepped outside and called our crime analyst and found, just I suspected, an unknown suspect had recently entered many River Hills’ apartments with a key and taken thousands in cash and jewelry. I called my partner out of the interrogation room and I remember saying, “There is meat on this bone.” I explained the recent burglary pattern with no forcible entry. and we knew if we could turn him into an informant, proper surveillance would stop these burglaries. We returned to confront our quarry. We leaned on him and reminded him what happens when he can’t post bond on his larceny case. We then threw him a safety line, “help us and we will help you.” He started breaking down and within an hour we learned he had given a master key and a list of tenants, apartment numbers and home phone numbers to a man named Darryl Gilyard. He admitted he knew Gilyard had burglarized some apartments because later Gilyard had paid him some money. He had been reassigned by the contract security company so he didn’t know how many burglaries Gilyard had committed with his master key. Clip Art provided by Clipartof Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Hole in the Wall Gang Part 3 Jan 28, 2019

Larry “Lurch” Newman The FBI waits outside Bertha’s Gifts and Furnishings for the Hole in the Wall Gang In this third and final installment in my report on Tony Spilotro and his Hole in the Wall gang, the reader will learn how the gang plan a big burglary at Bertha’s Gifts and Furnishings. The only problem is they took in a government informant before the score. As they plan a huge score in the burglary of Bertha’s Gifts and Furnishings, Sal Romano reported every move to his FBI control. By 1981, Spilotro knows he is in for a series of legal challenges. He is facing a RICO indictment for conspiring to skim money from Las Vegas casinos. He knows the government has dedicated a huge amount of resources and they are very serious. He knows his Chicago Outfit bosses, Joey Aiuppa, Jackie Cerone and Angelo LaPietra are all facing these same charges. He needs money and a lot of it. Oscar Goodman, his Las Vegas lawyer does not work cheap. If the government convicts Spilotro, more than likely he goes away for a long stretch and he must earn money to provide for his family in the eventuality. Las Vegas Metro Intelligence Commander Kent Clifford and FBI agent Emmet Michaels are very focused on the Spilotro burglary crew for several reasons. First because of the bad publicity from the Frankie Bluestein killing, second because of the threats against Sgt. Gene Smith and Det. David Groover of Metro and thirdly because of Commander Clifford’s trip to Chicago to threaten Outfit bosses. They need a win. The FBI and Las Vegas Metro form a task force with the specific intent to bring down Spilotro. They will get a huge break. How the FBI and Metro Intelligence finally joined forces Because of the former Sheriff, Ralph Lamb, and his corrupt Intelligence Unit detectives, the FBI has had to hide what they are doing from local law enforcement. In 1981, David Helfry, the USA Attorney in Kansas City, and his staff were working with Bill Ouseley and agents in Chicago, Cleveland, Milwaukee and Las Vegas to put together the skimming cases. They are putting folks in front of a grand jury and trying to get somebody to turn and explain how the skimming works to the trial jury. Even though Metro Intelligence has cleaned up its act, they are still distrustful of the FBI and vice versa. Since much of the FBI information is coming from a Federal Grand Jury, they cannot share that intelligence with the local cops. The FBI has this Top Echelon Informant (Lefty Rosenthal) in Las Vegas and this information cannot be shared. Then a couple of Chicago agents turn a guy who will make all the difference. The FBI will require local cooperation to pull off what they believe will be the blow that brings down Spilotro and his Hole in the Wall Gang. When the government decides to take down a crew and forms a partnership with the local cops, the target does not have a chance. By this time, the Spilotro Task Force was very familiar with all the usual Hole in the Wall Gang hangouts. Many times, unless there is a specific operation going, the Intelligence guys will merely hang around the known spots like clubs, casinos, apartments or homes to see who their targets meet and follow them to maybe identify other businesses they go into or to see what other activities they participate in. The officers might see Cullotta or another member of the gang frequenting another bar or business where they had a friend or a source working and they would later visit the place to find out what the crook was doing there. Many people think this is a waste of time and the officers themselves may not realize or understand exactly what they are seeing during these kinds of surveillance. In his case, they were observing Tony Spilotro with Frank Cullotta, Ernie Davino, Larry Newman, Wayne Mateki, Leo Guardino, and Joe Blasko quite a lot. They knew these were all career criminals and had done high-end burglaries or robberies in the past. The cops suspected they may be the famous Hole in the Wall Gang,

Hole in the Wall Gang Part 2 Jan 21, 2019

I am adding a new method of supporting the podcast. If you have the venmo app, how about donating an average of fifty cents an episode or just hit me up for a buck every time you think of it. In this second installment, I will talk about the activities of the Hole in the Wall gang as they stole, drank, gambled and ate pizza in Las Vegas. Remember during this time the Chicago outfit and 3 other Midwestern families had manipulated the Teamsters Union pension fund to loan money to a man named Allen Glick. He purchased the Stardust, the Hacienda, the Fremont and the Marina. The Stardust would be the flagship. Frank Balistrieri, boss of the Milwaukee family, had ordered Glick to promote a current stardust employee named Frank Rosenthal to a position of authority in his corporation. In 1971, Chicago Outfit boss Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa ordered Tony Spilotro to move to Las Vegas in support of their interests. Aiuppa is replacing an aging Chicago Outfit member named Marshal Caifano who has been Chicago’s man in Vegas. Spilotro opens a gift shop in Circus Circus under his often-used alias, Anthony Stuart. The Circus Circus owner, Jay Sarno, had received a 43-million-dollar Teamster’s loan and could not question this new gift shop operator. Tony Spilotro will eventually be found out by the Nevada Gaming Control board and placed in the Black Book of banned persons. As a item of interest, Spilotro invested $70,000.00 in this Gift shop and will sell it for over $700,000.00 dollars. Law enforcement is starting to watch Spilotro and he must use other people to pass messages back and forth between himself and Lefty Rosenthal. They need to avoid any overt contact because the FBI has forged a working relationship with Las Vegas Metro Police Intelligence and Nevada Gaming Control and they are all watching closely by the later 1970s. Frank Cullotta was not known to Vegas authorities and Spilotro brings him out to Las Vegas to assist. During this time, Spilotro needs to make money and he knows how to do big time scores, like jewelry stores, banks, fur stores and robbing drug dealers. He opens a jewelry store called The Gold Rush limited to use as his headquarters and a front to fence stolen good. This store was just off the strip at 228 West Sahara and is a vacant lot now. By this time in his life Tony Spilotro is the only real boss of organized crime in Las Vegas. As the boss, tony does not go on scores. Aiuppa has assigned Joey the Clown or Joseph Lombardo to be Spilotor’s Chicago contact. Spilotro has recruited Frank Cullotta who will recruit other Chicago burglars to join his crew. Between Spilotro and Cullotta, they put together guys who law enforcement will name The Hole in the Wall Gang. One of the men Frank Cullotta recruited was a career criminal named Ernie Davino. Unlike the others, Ernie Davino was not from Chicago, he was a New Jersey mobster who had migrated to Las Vegas on his own. He was the son of Ernest “Tubby” Davino, a leg breaker and enforcer for New York mobster Albert Anastasia in the 1950s. Ernie Davino would later claim that he and a man named Leo Guardino started the Hole in the Wall Gang and eventually fell in with Frank Cullotta and Tony Spilotro. I think Ernie Davino and Frank Cullotta both wanted to be the alpha male of the gang but Frank’s connection to Tony Spilotro gave him the upper hand. No matter who started this gang, it is undisputed that by the end, this was Frank Cullotta and Tony Spilotro’s gang. Another burglar Frank recruited was Wayne Matecki. He was a good candidate because he never moved out to Las Vegas and was unknown to local cops plus he didn’t have a criminal record. Anytime Frank lined up a score, Mateki would fly into town and leave immediately after from an airport in California or Arizona. Frank tested Mateki early on by having him hide inside a Las Vegas store after closing. Frank directed him to hide inside when the store closed. Then Mateki was to gather up the fur coats and other expe...

Hole in the Wall Gang Part 1 Jan 14, 2019

The making of the Hole in the Wall Series I am adding a new method of supporting the podcast. If you have the venmo app, how about donating an average of fifty cents an episode or just hit me up for a buck every time you think of it. Now on with the show. This is the first of a 3 part series telling the story of the Chicago Outfit member Tony Spilotro Hole in the Wall Gang. In this first episode, your hosts tell about the early beginnings and the Las Vegas background that allowed such a gang to start. We use a few dramatic depictions of interviews with the participants who are not available. Plus we use interviews of a few of the actual people involved like Frank Cullotta and FBI agent Emmet Michaels, former Las Vegas Metro Commander Kent Clifford, and Mob historian Michael Green. If we can’t get an original participant in these events because they are dead of impossible to find, we are using actors, lets give credit to our actors, Ben Ellickson of Chicago, the comedian Cojac of Kansas City and the man of a thousand voices, Alex Virgo of Kansas City. Every good thief wants that one big score. How many movies have there been made about the big score or the last score before a master thief retires? My first one I remember was probably the Thomas Crown Affair, but there have been plenty like Heat, Heist, Oceans 11, 12, and Oceans 8 with an all-female cast. What is your favorite caper film? Personally, mine is Heat with Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino. The background on the Hole in the Wall Gang In this first episode, we look at the Hole in the Wall gang that starts stealing fro Sears stores and from drug dealers and ends with the last big score, the 1981 burglary at Bertha’s Gifts and Home Furnishings at 896 East Sahara Street in Las Vegas. The Bertha’s store was started by Bertha Ragland who came to Vegas right after WW II and opened a fine china and home furnishings store. She would eventually add a high-end jewelry store inside the home furnishing store. Bertha Ragland was a colorful and well-known successful Las Vegas businesswoman. Remember this was over 30 years ago and while credit cards were being used, in Las Vegas most still dealt in a lot of cash. The cash transaction report, or CTR, was in use but widely ignored by many financial institutions until the later 1980s when the DEA got very tough on money laundering. It was a well-known fact to her employees that she did not trust banks and kept large amounts of cash and jewelry inside a safe in the store. To take you back to the late 1970s and early 1980s, remember Jane Byrne, she was mayor of Chicago and in 1981 she moved her family into the Cabrini Green high-rise housing project for 3 weeks. In 1981 The ground-breaking cop show, Hill Street Blues based on the Chicago PD was released. I was watching the Kansas City mob boys as they tried to regain some organization after the skimming search warrants were served in 1979 and Joe Agosto turned government witness. The FBI attacks the Outfit In 1981, Anthony Accardo was the real power behind the throne of the Chicago outfit while Joey Doves Aiuppa was the boss to all outside observers. The FBI was conducting a multi-prong attack on the Outfit and their connections to the Teamster’s union and Las Vegas casinos in Operation Strawman 1 and 2. In Operation Penfdorf the FBI taped Teamster’s official Allen Dorfman plotting to skim Teamster money with Outfit Capo Joey the Clown Lombardo and others. Operation Greylord and Operation Gambet were uncovering and identifying the Outift’s penetration of the Cook County Circuit court and other Chicago government entities. 1981 will be the last good year for the Chicago Outfit. A burglary in the Las Vegas store named Bertha’s Gifts and Furnishings will provide one of the most important witnesses to come forward in the Outfit’s history. Frank Cullotta meets Tony Spilotro First, we will examine another event that starts a relationship that ends at a big score at Bertha’s.

Hole in the Wall Gang Burglary Gang Jan 09, 2019

Hole in the Wall Gang Frank Cullotta Frank Cullotta committed many crimes and had long been part of a burglary gang in Chicago. Gangland Wire is releasing a 3 part series on Tony Spilotro and his Hole in the Wall Gang burglary gang Our main source of interviews comes from Frank Cullotta, a former gang leader. Frank emerged from the Witness Protection program to author several books with well known true crime author Denny Griffin, act and work as a mob film technical adviser and currently operates Frank Cullotta’s Casino Tour. He can be reached to book the tour at 702-622-0850 or email him at fcullotta@yahoo.com. This loose confederation of career criminals was directed by Chicago Outfit member Tony Spilotro. Who was in this Burglary Gang? During the 1970s, Spilotro recruited his childhood friend Frank Cullotta to be the street leader of this burglary gang. Cullotta moved to Las Vegas and he recruited a relocated New Jersey mobster named Ernie Davino and Chicago Outfit associates Wayne Mateki, Leo Guardino and Larry Newman. Tony Spilotro added an ex Las Vegas Metro cop named Joe Blasko. These men created havoc in the Las Vegas burglarizing jewelry stores, fur boutiques, and the homes of the wealthy. They committed murders for hire, robbed drug dealers and pimps, and loan sharked. They became the Chicago Outfit crew in Las Vegas by 1981. Support the podcast Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. I am adding a new method of supporting the podcast. If you have the venmo app, how about donating an average of fifty cents an episode or just hit me up for a buck every time you think of it. To go to the our store and donate click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here,

Harry “The Hook” Aleman Part 4 Dec 24, 2018

Robert Cooley testifies In this 4th and final episode chronicling the life and times of feared Chicago outfit enforcer Harry “The Hook” Aleman, Gary, and David Byrne of the Facebook page The Chicago Outfit Old and Current news and articles, discuss the witness Robert Cooley who will testify that the judge in Aleman’s first trial took a bribe. This revelation destroys Aleman’s double jeopardy protection and how the government was able to force Aleman to stand trial a second time after being found not guilty for the same murder. Operation Greylord, exposed corruption and bribery in the Cook County courts. Because of Robert Cooley and his exposing corruption in Chicago, FBI agents exposed many clerks, judges, and police officers as corrupt. We hope to get the FBI agent Terence Hake in soon to talk about this investigation. In 1986, 3 years after Operation Greylord was concluded a Cook County criminal defense attorney named Robert J. Cooley walked into the FBI office and offered to work. He knew where a lot more bodies were buried. He had seen the success of Operation Greylord and felt guilty about his past use of bribery for the Outfit but felt powerless. The final straw was when he was forced by his mob contacts to bribe a judge to find for a defendant who had severely beaten a Chicago policewoman, he had enough. Cooley had started his career as a young Chicago cop before law school and came from a long line of Chicago cops who were not corrupt, and he had seen enough. Robert Cooley testifies Robert Cooley was not innocent in all this and had been a go-between for bribes. He was a heavy gambler and confident of many Outfit guys. Cooley’s main contact in the outfit was Marco D`Amico, who was in the Elmwood Park crew and ran a major bookmaking organization and juice loan business. He even intimidated a bookie to forgive a $50,000 gambling debt owed by the lawyer Cooley. Of course, no good deed goes unpunished, and later Cooley will wear a wire on him after he and his FBI friends set up D’Amico on a robbery, gambling, and extortion conspiracy which became the predicate acts for a racketeering charge. He was close personal friends with Aleman’s old partner, Butch Petrocelli. Robert Cooley told many stories during his debriefing and named many court officials who were involved in bribery. These were men who had escaped the dragnet of Operation Greylord. The FBI realized they should mount another long-term undercover investigation and they named this Operation Gambat short for Gambling Attorney. Because Cooley had also been acting as a bookmaker and held high-stakes poker games in his office, he was close to the Outfit’s gambling enterprise. So in addition to exposing more Cook County court corruption, the FBI also used him to gather information on Outfit gambling. During his debriefing he told the agents that back in 1977, he had delivered a $10,000 bribe to Judge Frank Wilson at the Outfit’s request, to deliver the not guilty verdict in the Billy Logan murder case. Cooley described exactly how this happened. He was called to a meeting with Cook County Outfit fixer Pat Marcy at a downtown restaurant called Counselors Row. Cooley reported that march and another outfit fixer named John D’Arco always sat at this same table to meet and discuss court cases, gambling business, and other Outfit business. The FBI will place a hidden mike here only to have it found by a busboy. It was at this table that Pat Marcy told him that Aleman’s case must be fixed and asked his advice. Cooley told Marcy that this was very sensitive and must be handled delicately because Aleman drew a lot of attention. He knew that for a judge to find a murder defendant not guilty, he must have some disputing fact or facts to enable him to say the state had not proven its case beyond a reasonable doubt. Cooley was a close personal friend to Judge Frank Wilson and often visited him in his chambers. He knew that Wilson had heavy expenses maintaining a country club...

Harry “The Hook” Aleman Part 3 Dec 17, 2018

Lou Almeida This is the third of a four-part series on one of the most feared enforcers in the history if the Chicago Outfit. In this episode the Gary discusses how Lou Almeida and Harry Aleman murder Billy Logan hit with Chicago Outfit – Old and Current News and Articles Facebook page administrator and Outfit expert Mike Byrne. In 1975, a state trooper arrested Lou Almeida in Ohio en route to a murder “some guy” in Pittsburgh. I could not find any more about this guy he was supposed to kill but I bet he was set up by somebody. State police stopped his car on suspicion and found a loaded pistol with a silencer. An Ohio court sentenced Lou Almeida to ten years in prison where he attempted suicide. He began cooperating with the government shortly afterward, cutting a deal for early release and entry into the witness protection program. Lou Almeida had quite a story to tell and it will end in Outfit history being made. His information will lead to the first time ever that a person was tried twice for the same crime by the same jurisdiction. The murder of Billy Logan was on Sept. 27, 1972, and number 2 on the Aleman hit list, the next one after he and probably Butch Petrocelli hit the guy called “Sambo” the guy who married the former girlfriend of Milwaukee Phil. Billy Logan is set-up According to Lou Almeida, Teamster’s steward Billy Logan refused to cooperate with the Outfit’s plans to steal cargo from his trucks, and Aleman was sent to kill him. Almeida said that in August of 1972, he and Aleman discussed a plan to kill Logan. He alleged Aleman gave him two license plate numbers and Logan’s home and work addresses, writing “Death to Billy” on the same piece of paper. Almeida then trailed Logan to learn his habits and schedule. As our friend Frank Calabrse Jr, said, “He layed on” (watched and followed) Billy Logan for 2 weeks.” Lou Almeida learned Billy Logan drove a taxi during the day and returned to his sister’s house for dinner and then left at 1:00 PM every evening for his teamster job as a dispatcher with Interstate trucking in Cicero. Almeida testified that eleven days before the murder, on Sept. 16, 1972, Aleman directed Almeida and another hood to burglarize a home in suburban Oak Lawn where Aleman believed $40,000 in cash was kept in the basement. But after tying up a woman in the home and terrorizing her baby, Almeida and his buddy left with only $1,800 and some jewelry. Aleman was not happy with the take but paid Almeida his customary $500.00 fee. he gave him $500.00 for each job no matter the entire take. A few nights later, on September 27, 1972, Almeida drove Aleman to Logan’s home and the two killers sat in the dark and waited. By this time, Harry knew that Billy Logan stayed at his sister’s house and left for a second job at 11:00 Pm every evening. Lou Almeida drives the get-away car Billy Logan, then 37 years old, had grown up on Chicago’s Near West Side, an area known as “Little Italy.” He lived on the second floor at 5916 W. Walton St. with his sister, Betty, who was divorced. His sister, Joanna, and her children lived on the first floor. Logan, a part-time cab driver, awoke for his second job on the night shift at Interstate trucking, dressed, and stopped to say good night to his sister. Logan’s nephew William Dietrich was on the front porch and watched his uncle walk across the street to his parked car and then heard a voice say, “Hey, Bill, come here.” Almost simultaneously, three gunshots rang out: two from a shotgun, a third from a pistol. He heard his uncle yell out “Oh, my God,” Logan’s sister Betty raced out the street where he lay dying. “He was still alive. He mumbled something. His keys fell. Betty held his head and refused to let it go crying, “I don’t want his head on the ground.” One witness described this as like a scene in the movies. A Witness A neighbor named Bob Lowe was walking with his dog up to the scene because he wanted to catch Billy before he left for work.

Harry “The Hook” Aleman Part 2 Dec 10, 2018

Harry Aleman and Butch Petrocelli Harry Aleman matured into a full-fledged member of the Chicago Outfit. It was like he was born to fill the purpose of stealing, intimidating, and serving Chicago Outfit bosses in many ways. Although he was slightly built, 5 feet 8 inches tall and 145 pounds, Aleman became so feared in underworld circles in the 1970s that small-time hoodlums trying to collect gambling debts simply invoked his name to collect. Two Chicago loan sharks were convicted of extortion and sent to prison in 1978 for collecting a $6,500 debt from a South Side tavern owner by saying that Aleman would come after him if he didn’t pay. Prosecutors said it was a ruse and Aleman was not involved in any way. Harry the Hook teamed up with a childhood friend named Butch Petrocelli. The team hung out at the Survivors Athletic Club on Taylor Street. This was the kind of mobster social club you see in the movies. The cappuccino machine was always going. In the winter the men sat around tables and talked or played cards. As the weather warmed up, by summertime, the dangerous-looking inhabitants were standing out front wearing wife-beaters or polo shirts and sansabelt slacks. Inside Petrocelli and Aleman developed skills as bomb makers by packing 2-inch pipes with black powder and a little nitroglycerin. These were used to get the attention of any businessman who refused to cooperate with the gang. This duo first came to the attention of law enforcement in 1969. A painting contractor told agents that he had lost $6,000.00 to an Outfit bookmaker and he had been threatened with death if he did not pay the “Vig” (interest) on the debt because they converted it to a juice loan. He had been accosted by two men who beat him up, threatened to bomb his house and kill his wife. He made arrangements to meet these two men and make a payment and alerted the agents. When he arrived at the pre-selected meeting spot, the agents caught Harry Aleman and Butch Petrocelli parked nearby. The victim identified them as the two men who had beat and threatened him. A grand jury has presented this evidence and no indictment was ever returned. This would not be the first case that Harry Aleman ever had just disappear inside the Cook County judicial system. Harry Aleman will never be a made guy and never be a boss but he will become the leader of home invasion crews, hit teams, keep the Taylor Street’s Crew’s bookies in line, and collect from loan shark victims who were behind. A lot of high-powered businessmen, lawyers, accounts, and normal men can make deals, make the hard business decisions and attract capital to create powerful companies. Most Outfit guys could probably not do any of these things except for the hard-faced, empty-eyed killers like Harry Aleman, Frank the German Schweihs, Carl Tuffy DeLuna, Anthony Spilotro, and many others. Men who have no compunction about saying “I will kill you” and their eyes show they mean it. Harry Aleman was one of the best. A small man who could switch from an easy-going intelligent demeanor to project a menace and threat with no remorse in a split second. Butch Petrocelli and the murder of Sambo Cesario Harry and Butch Petrocelli were a powerful duo, not the dynamic duo exactly but they were a powerhouse pair in the outfit. One of the earliest murders they were suspected of was Sam Sambo Cesario. Actually, Sambo Cesario had once been an uncle of Harry’s by marriage until he divorced Aleman’s aunt Viola Ferriola. She was also Outfit Capo Joe Ferriola’s sister. Sambo was a well-known and feared Outfit member who had been described as a Capone man and a middle echelon mobster in the 1950s. In June 1971 Sambo married a woman named Nan Partipilo. He had kept this relationship hush-hush because she had been the girlfriend of Felix “Milwaukee Phil” Aldersio who was on a death bed in prison at that time. Many young mobsters wanted the approval and favor of a guy like Milwaukee Phil. On October 19, 1971,

Harry “The Hook” Aleman Part 1 Dec 07, 2018

Harry Aleman – the early years We talk with Mike Byrne, Administrator of the popular Facebook group The Chicago Outfit – Old and Current News Articles. Harry “The Hook” Aleman was born Harry Peralt Alemen on January 19, 1939 in Chicago. He has been accused of as many as 18 murders by the Chicago Crime Commission and most folks believe that number is way low. He was an important tool in the Outfit’s enforcement of street tax on bookmakers and other gray area businesses like porn shops and the bar business. If you remember our friend Red Wemette talking about Frank “The German” Schweihs being the collector and enforcer for Joe Lombardo and the Grand Avenue Crew, and Harry Aleman was the collector and enforcer for Joe Ferrolia and his Taylor Street Crew. Aleman’s mother was Italian, his Mexican father was a native of Durango, Mexico. Aleman grew up in a 3 floor brownstone style building at 917 S. Bishop Street in Chicago that was owned by his maternal grandmother. All the extended family of uncles, aunts and cousins lived here just west and south of the Loop. who became, as Aleman put it “sort of a Mexican godfather” who was allegedly involved in narcotics trafficking. Years later in a probation interview Harry Aleman described his father Louis Aleman as “sort of a Mexican godfather” who was allegedly involved in narcotics trafficking. His mother Mary was an abused wife and Harry would become the target of his father’s angry fists as he grew up. Harry once stated, “My father was hard on me, extremely hard,” “He beat me every day until I left home. He used his fist or a horsewhip. If I looked at him the wrong way, he beat me. If my mother stepped in, she got hit herself.” Harry was given a respite from his father’s abuse when Louis Aleman went to prison for a 4 year robbery bit from about 1946 to 1950. Young Harry Aleman excelled in Crane Tech high school from 1951-1955. He was a halfback on the football team, a member of the physics club and took up boxing at the North Side Duncan YMCA club. His boxing career gave him his nickname “The Hook” because he had a devastating left hook. He graduated in 1955, rare for a hoodlum of that generation, and enrolled in the Chicago Academy of Fine Arts and graduated in 1958 with a commercial art diploma. It seems that Harry Aleman had displayed skill at painting and this ability will provide him with something do during his subsequent incarcerations. Aleman’s official police record starts after graduation from the Academy of Fine Arts. He told the probation officer that during this time he sold race track tout sheets and worked at the produce markets on the Near West Side, where he sold produce and was able to sell some of his drawings. In 1960, his police record shows he was arrested for malicious mischief, in 1961, gambling, in 1962, possession of burglary tools assault and criminal damage. In 1965 he was arrested for aggravated assault. In 1966, grand theft auto and armed robbery. In 1968, criminal damage to property in 1969, aggravated kidnapping. In 1960, Harry became infatuated with a beautiful young spunky widow named Ruth Mustari who worked at a Rush street bar. When he first met Ruth, she was having trouble with a former boyfriend named Richard Fanning. On December 10, 1960, Mr Fanning was found beaten and stabbed to death near his South Side home. In 1964, he married Ruth Mustari, a widow with four children. Ruth’s first husband, Frank Mustari, had been an Outfit connected mobster as well. He was killed in 1957 in an attempted murder of a hijacker and tavern owner. In this case, his victim was armed and shot first. The man was killed a few months later. Ruth was the ultimate mob wife. She always stood by her husband’s story that he was a commercial artist and that, in true mob tradition, the family was dead broke most of the time. A great story on Ruth the classic mob wife happened in 1976. Harry Aleman was indicted for the murder of Billy Logan,

Carlo Morelli and Mad Sam DeStefano Dec 07, 2018

Carlo Morelli was born in the Italian section of Chicago known as the Patch. While we often tell negative stories about young men who came out of the Patch, this episode and the next episode will tell about a talented young man of Italian descent who overcame the negative influences of the culture and how he overcame and grew up to have a long and successful career in fashion design, the hospitality business and finally as a chef and television host. In this and the next episode, Mr. Morelli recounts how the Chicago Outfit affected his early life. In this episode Aaron and I learn about Mr. Morelli’s almost disastrous confrontation with the most brutal and vicious Chicago Outfit loan shark of all times Mad Sam DeStefano. At the tender age of 11 years, Carlo Morelli won a citywide art festival and an art scholarship to the Chicago Art Institute. During these years, he lived in the famous old Maryland Hotel an area close to the near north side entertainment and bar are along Rush street. By this time in the 1960s, the North Rush Street area had taken on a seediness like most American cities during that time. Like other downtown hotels, people down on their luck, prostitutes, strippers, small time criminals and men seeking cheap rooms for assignations were the primary residents. Although small, the rooms were cheap at less than $200.00 monthly. Much like 42nd Street in Times Square, this Rush street area that once saw posh supper clubs now was host to adult movie theaters and strip clubs that were actually thinly-disguised places of prostitution. Of course, the Outfit was very prevalent and controlled the area’s clubs. The Chicago cops found this area to be a lucrative source of bribes to leave the clubs alone by not enforcing liquor laws and parking restrictions around certain establishment along with other little corruptions. At age 15, Carlo Morelli had the chutzpah to live and prosper in this atmosphere. He made friends with the strippers and prostitutes by using his costume design and repair skills to save them a lot of money with their wardrobes. In a supper club known as Meo’s Norwood House, in the Northwest suburb of Norridge, the wife of one of the owners had an idea to promote a weekly lingerie fashion show for the benefit of the wise guys who frequented this place. At that time and for many years after, Chicago Outfit bosses Anthony Accardo and Paul Ricca met their in a corner table and most Outfit decisions at that time were made at that table. Ms. Meo sought the help of young Carlo Morelli to create original lingerie and other sexy garments to attract the Outfit men. Many mob girl friends who were also strippers were employed as the runway models. When a mob guy’s girl friend appeared on stage, the men would buy the outfit. In one case, the new girl friend of Sam DeStefano made a miscalculation that brought down the wrath of Mad Sam onto her and our friend Carlo Morelii. Well, Mr. Morelli survived this and other brushes with the Outfit and by the age of 23, he held a much acclaimed International Debut of Fashion and quickly launched The House of Carlo fashions. His fashion career led him to Hollywood where he was a wardrobe and costume designer on productions such as The Dean Martin Show, The Perry Como Show, Red Skeleton, Bonanza, and Hogan’s Heroes, and feature films, The Son’s of Katie Elder, War Lord, and Harlow! Click here to learn more about Carlo Morelli. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Freddy Geas killed Whitey Bulger Nov 02, 2018

In this podcast, Aaron and I interview our friend who is a former prison guard at the maximum security federal prison at Marion, Illinois. He will talk about the procedures in handling high profile prisoners and special circumstances like dealing with former informants inside the system. Breaking news, a known Springfield, Massachusetts area mob member and others entered the cell of Boston gangster and former FBI Top Echelon informant James “Whitey” Bulger and beat him to death with padlocks deposited in socks or “Slocks.” This murder happened within hours of his arrival at this federal prison in West Virginia. Additionally, authorities report, the assailants gouged out Bulger’s eyes and tried to cut out his tongue. For certain, these killers sent a message to other mobsters who might think about cooperating with the government. So far prison authorities believe that Fotios “Freddy” Geas, a West Springfield Massachusetts Mafia hit man serving a life sentence for the 2003 slaying of the leader of the Genovese crime family, is the prime suspect. They have video surveillance of several men entering Bulger’s cell around 6 a.m., according to authorities. Freddy Geas, his younger brother, Ty Geas and onetime Genovese crime family boss named Arthur Nigro were convicted in 2011 by a federal jury after being charged with several violent crimes dating back to 2003. One of those crimes was the murder of Springfield mob boss Adolfo “Big Al” Bruno. At that time, the Geas brothers were feared enforcers for Anthony Arillotta, the boss of a mafia family in Springfield. Freddy Geas had a particularly good reason to hate informants or government witnesses because in the Bruno murder, his old boss Anthony Arillotta turned on him and became an FBI informant after all three were charged with Bruno’s murder. Arillotta testified that Geas and a man named Gary D. Westerman committed several murders and that he and Geas killed Westerman. Geas is doing life for these crimes. To learn more about life behind the walls of a federal prison, go to our guests’s You Tube page As the Key Turns by clicking here. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

The Real French Connection Oct 22, 2018

Aaron and Gary go into the real story behind the French Connection, a popular film staring Gene Hackman. The French Connection film followed Robin Moore’s true crime book that documented the exploits of famous New York Police narcotics detectives Eddie Egan and Sonny Grosso. In this episode Gary and Arron examine the real story behind how these two detectives exposed the largest heroin ring in New York City. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Heroin and the Kansas City Mafia Part 2 Oct 15, 2018

In this second episode, retired FBI agent Bill Ouseley tells abut how the Kansas City Crime family set up a heroin pipeline from Cuba to Tampa to Kansas City and other Midwest metropolitan areas. Bill tells about an early heroin arrest in Kansas City that uncovered a large cache of heroin and cocaine. This arrest led to the arrest of a future KC mob boss in Kansas City. Bill tells how the first Federal Bureau of Narcotics were the first officers to work undercover and develop information on the American mafia. Bill tells about one of the first cooperating witness, Carl Caramusa, from Kansas City led to the exposure of the Kansas City narcotics ring that was dealing about 12 million a year. If you want to know more about the Kansas City Mafia read Bill’s second book, Mobsters in our Midst, Click here ti purchase. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Heroin and the Kansas City Mafia Part 1 Oct 08, 2018

Retired FBI agent Bill Ouseley discusses the history of heroin use and trafficking in the Untied States. During the mid-1800s, Chinese immigrants arriving in California introduced opium smoking to America and soon organized gangs were smuggling and distributing opium throughout the region. Opium dens and the habit of getting high on this drug spread across the United States. The Harrison Act of 1914 made the use of these heroin and other opiates illegal except for medical purposes. By 1925, a black market for opium was very attractive to the formed mafia gangs in New York. It is believed there were about 200,000 heroin addicts in the 1920s United States. the use of opiates and marijuana became more popular during the jazz era on the 1930s and 1940s. In Kansas City Missouri, several mafia members saw the quick profits to be earned in dealing drugs. Bill Ouseley is a noted mob historian in regards to the Kansas City mafia family and he tells how the international heroin trade worked in Kansas City. Click here to buy Bill Ouseley’s book “Open City” and learn more about the Kansas City mob. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Sam Giancana Part 2 Sep 24, 2018

In Part 2, David, Aaron and Gary discuss Sam Momo Giacana and his rise in the ranks and how that leads to his downfall. Momo Giancana would rise to the top of the Chicago Outfit duing the 1960s and 1970s. He will become a high profile gangster who draws the attention of the press and the FBI. Agent Bill Rohmer and other Chicago agents will commence Operation Lockstep and follow Momo everywhere he went in a very aggressive manner. Momo Giancana will go to court and get an order requiring the agents to stay back at least one foursome on the golf course. Chicago Outift members will eventually think he has become too high profile when he becomes involved in a plot to kill Castro with the CIA. We learn that Momo Giancana acheived success by investing in international gambling success after he moved to mexico to take the heat off from the Chicago FBI. Tony Accardo demanded that Momo Giancana give a share of the profits to The Outfit and Sam refused. He beleived he did this all by himself and was therefore outside the Outfit’s jurisdiction. Accardo was overheard telling a mutual acquaintance the he must “explain him the facts of life. And I mean life” to Momo. Giancana, stubbornly refused to pay. This gave Accardo had another reason to end the life of Momo Giancana Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Kenji Gallo Sep 10, 2018

Kenny “Kenji” Gallo was born to a well to do Japanese-American family in ritzy suburban Orange County, California. Kenji started his criminal career as a quiet but hyperactive kid who entered into the drug trafficking world of the cocaine fueled 1980s in Southern California. He became a gun-toting international drug trafficker who owned a nightclub, produced porn movies, and was arrested for the murder of his own best friend. He married a porn star and became a jet-setting playboy thug. Kenji would make millions for himself and others in stock fraud, extortion, gambling, and the sex trade. An almost spiritual epiphany caused Kenji Gallo to volunteer as an undercover informant with the FBI. His fresh start trying to regain his soul almost caused him to lose his life. After Kenji Gallo retired from the action filled life as an F.B.I. undercover agent, he wrote Breakshot: A Life in the 21st Century Mafia. This riveting memoir captures the American underworld from Orange County to South Florida to New York City in all its tawdry spectacle. You may find Kenji Gallo on Instagram @kenjioc and @betterlivedlives Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Ron Fino – Mr. Undercover Aug 20, 2018

When Aaron and I were at the MobWorld Summit 2018, we had the opportunity to interview Ron Fino. I met him at the previous Las Vegas Mob Con when we were co-presenters in 2104. Ron Fino was born into a Buffalo mob family, the son of a Mafia Capo, Joe Fino. As an adult, Ron would see how the mob boss Stefano Magaddino, corrupted unions and government officials. Ron joined the corrupt Laborers’ Local 210, controlled by Magaddino. he stood up for his union members and was elected business manager on a platform to clean up the union. After an overly successful election, he found that powerful members of the Buffalo Mafia got all the good jobs and were corrupting the labor/management relationship. Ron Fino made the decision to become a contract employee for the FBI. He would report to his control agent about the Buffalo mafia’s activites for the nest 17 years. His cover was eventually blown and the FBI assigned him to work undercover in Russia, the Middle East and Belarus. He found himself in the middle of international arms negotiations and he was involved in a peace deal to bring peace in Gambia after a coup ousted their president. He had to drop out of the undercover life and he now works as a private detective in the Washington DC area. A major film company is exploring a project on his life with Robert DeNiro and a documentary film, titled Mr. Undercover is scheduled for release next year. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. https://youtu.be/boblW8t4wCI

Harry Jones Kansas City Mob Reporter Aug 06, 2018

For our media on Monday, the Kansas City Mob is the subject of your interview of a retired Kansas City Star reporter who covered the Kansas City Mob extensively in their 1970s heyday. Harry Jones developed sources deep within the mob and federal and state law enforcement. He even shared one professional informant used by the media, the FBI and the Kansas City police Intelligence Unit. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show. To go to the our store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Rob the Mob Part 2 Tommy Uva goes down Jul 23, 2018

Movie coupleMichael Pitt Nina AriandaReal CoupleTommy Uva, Rosemarie DeToma Tommy Uva thought he was smart In the movie, Tommy Uva made the mob guys strip to their underwear and lay on top of each other and act like they were humping the bottom guy. I found nothing to substantiate that but I did find that Tommy Uva did make them drop their pants as he made his escape to the waiting Rosemarie. They did use the exact same Mercury Topaz and never changed the license plate as best I can tell. The FBI listens: Reality or Fiction The film depicts the FBI was listening on a hidden microphone as he did one of these robberies and that they took photos of the men as they ran outside in their underwear. And the film shows one of the agents giving a New York Post reporter, played by Ray Romano, the story and one of the photos. I can find no documented support of that story. It appears that these robberies were never reported to the police, which makes sense, and there were no media reports of them until much later. Many reporters and cops did pick up the rumors during the time Tommy Uva and Rosemarie terrorized the 5 families inside their “Safe place.” The mob guys never reported these robberies to the police. Gotti takes revenge We know about this suicidal “rob the mob” spree because Christmas eve 1992, a maroon mercury Topaz pulls up to a traffic light at Woodhaven Boulevard and 103rd Avenue in the Ozone Park neighborhood of Queens, Gotti territory. Before the light can change two men run up on each side of the topaz and empty their handguns into the driver and passenger. The car creeps across the intersection, striking another car and coming to rest up against a building. Responding cops find the lifeless bodies of Tommy and Rosemarie Uva in the Topaz. Within two weeks of the double slaying, police from the 106th Precinct investigating the crime, began to receive hints from street informants that the couple had been earmarked for death by the mob in retaliation for robbing their social clubs. John Gotti gives the order to take revenge and the feds can prove this from our previous subject Michael DiLeonardo aka Mickey Scars a captain in the Gambino crime family. Gotti or Joe Massino: who gets the credit The government was able to prove that John Gotti Junior had received confirmation from Gotti Senior, incarcerated for life in prison, to go ahead and eliminate the Uvas. According to testimony Gotti Junior had informed Bonanno leader Joe Massino that the rumors going around indicating Bonanno soldiers Anthony Donato and Vincent Baciano had murdered the Uvas were untrue and that they, the Gambinos, claimed the hit as theirs. It was our Skinny Dom that did the job,” Gotti Junior is alleged to have said in various meetings, according to testimony from the government’s informants. “It was our trophy.” https://youtu.be/8xdEKS_51vU To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. .

Rob the Mob Part 1 Jul 16, 2018

Rob the Mob Movie In this first of a 2-part series, Gary and Aaron reveal that John Gotti inspired the Bonnie and Clyde couple made famous for robbing New York City mafia social clubs. The story was made into a crime film in 2014. Rob the Mob was directed by Raymond De Felitta and written by Jonathan Fernandez. The film stars Michael Pitt, Nina Arianda, Andy García, Ray Romano, Aida Turturro, Frank Whaley, Michael Rispoli, and Joseph R. Gannascoli and is based on a true story. It was released on March 21, 2014. Rob the Mob: The Real Story Rob the Mob begins in 1992 when a drug addict ex-con named Tommy Uva got a job with his wife and fellow drug addict Rosemarie at a debt collection agency. The boss, Michael Schussel, would later say that they were both were entranced with Gotti and the mafia. He described the pair as Mafia groupies who had at one time asked for days off to attend the trial of the Gambino boss John Gotti. The movie suggests that was where Tommy Uva got the idea because Sammy the Bull testified that mob guys played high stakes card games and never carried guns inside the social clubs. Sammy the Bull did testify at that trial and it would be probable that he would say something like this. Gotti was in a trial during the spring of 1992. Why pick Mafia social clubs Like most drug addicts, the Rob the Mob couple made decisions based on their chemical feelings of invincibility and never thought ahead to the future or to the consequences of their actions. It is said that in one club, as he was brandishing his heist weapon of choice, an Uzi sub-machine gun, one of his victims pointed out the foolhardy nature of his choice of robbery venues. He looked at the man through his ski mask and replied: “Everybody dies.” The movie depicts Tommy trying to figure out what to do with a fully automatic Uzi and having trouble with his first robbery by accidentally firing off long bursts. When you fire a long burst from an automatic weapon, the continuous recoil moves the barrel up. This is one technical depiction that the film got right. Many people asked why they picked these social clubs and one New York reporter said, “Maybe they were just plain stupid. After they got started doing these robberies, the stress took its toll. Rosemarie fainted at work after people were passing around a newspaper that contained an article about one of their robberies. Tommy would be fired for fighting with Rosemarie at work. To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Ed Scarpo on Michael DiLeonardo Jul 03, 2018

Peter Gotti and Michael DiLeonardo New York Mafia expert Ed Scarpo tells about his relationship with Michael DiLeonardo, aka Mikey Scars, since he went into the witness protection program. DiLeonardo gives very few interviews but he did give this one Ed Scarpo of www.cosanostranews.com. After the incarceration of John Gotti, the Commission allowed his older brother Peter Gotti to be acting as the Gambino Family boss of the Gambinos. Ed tells us that after Michael DiLeonardo was indicted for labor racketeering, extortion, loan sharking, witness tampering, and the murder of Fred Weiss, the new Gambino boss, Peter Gotti stopped all money going to him. DiLeonardo was told he was suspected of robbing the family. DiLeonardo made some vague threats and reminded the new Gambino boss that he may be home one day. After that, Peter Gotti announced that DiLeonardo was”shelved.”That was the turning point for DiLeonardo, and he told Ed Scarpo that he felt betrayed and how it crushed him. he told Ed that this act of disloyalty caused him to turn witness and go into the witness protection program. The other story I asked Ed about was the murder of a NYPD undercover police officer named Anthony Venditti and the wounding of his partner, Kathy Burke. On January 21, 1986, Officer Anthony Venditti and Kathleen Burke were following a Genovese family member named Federico Giovanelli. the officers became separated and Officer Venditti was shot and killed as Officer Burke approached the scene. She was wounded and would later testify at Giovanelli’s trial. Giovanelli denied she was a witness to the scene. Ms. Burke has written a book about her life as a NYPD cop. In the first trial in the summer of 1987, the jury ended in a deadlock after Burke was combative and testy under the defense lawyers’ questioning. The second trail ended in deadlock after another major prosecution witness withdrew the part of his testimony in which he had said Mr. Giovanelli was one of the murders. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Ned Day and the Mob Part 2 Jun 11, 2018

In this second of a two part interview with former Las Vegas newsman and current Mob Museum blogger Larry Henry we talk Vegas and the mob and about the famous muckraking reporter Ned Day. Larry was the political editor at the Las Vegas Sun during those days. Back when “the mob ran the town.” Currently, Larry is an official blogger for the Mob Museum in Las Vegas and as as his own blog titled The Mafia Chronicles. Yes he is. Last week, Larry told us about Day’s colorful exploits began in his mobbed-up Midwestern hometown, Milwaukee. This week he will tell more about his career in Las Vegas Ned Day will die while snorkeling in Hawaii on September 3, 1987. Some claim he was murdered. If you want to meet myself, Aaron and Larry Henry, come to the MobWorld Summit at the Plaza hotel from June 15-17, 2018. Meet and greet Friday night in Oscar Goodman’s Plaza Hotel then Panel discussions with mob experts at the hotel during the day with a Saturday evening trip to the Mob Museum. Finally panel discussions on Sunday. All for $100.00. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. D

Ned Day and the Mob Part 1 Jun 04, 2018

In this first of a two part interview with former Las Vegas newsman and current Mob Museum blogger Larry Henry we talk Vegas and the mob and about the famous muckraking reporter Ned Day. Ned Day Since we could not interview the late Ned Day, we opted for a man who knew him and the organized crime beat Day covered in 1970s Las Vegas. Larry was the political editor at the Las Vegas Sun during those days in Sin City when some would say “the mob ran the town.” He left Vegas for the slower paced life in Northwest Arkansas and became the managing editor at KFSM-TV, a CBS Affiliate. Currently, Larry is an official blogger for the Mob Museum in Las Vegas and as as his own blog titled The Mafia Chronicles. Larry tells how Ned Day, whose car was firebombed in 1986, upset mob figures with his hard-hitting stories about Mafia control of local casinos and street rackets. That bombed proved that Day’s work was uncovering long held mob secret control of Vegas casinos. Ned Day is considered one of the most fearless mob reporters of his generation. Larry tells us that Day’s colorful exploits began in his mobbed-up Midwestern hometown, Milwaukee. Actually we learn that Day started on the wrong side of the law in his formative years. This may explain how he was able to work the mob beat so well later in life. In Milwaukee of the 1960s, Ned Day was a self-described gambler and pimp, worked in mob boss Frank “Mad Bomber” Balistrieri’s strip clubs and ran a tout sheet providing tips on horse races down in Chicago. Day was once arrested for passing bad checks and held the dubious fame of a marriage to a former Miss Nude International. Ned Day enrolled in the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and a professor steered him into journalism. the rest is history. Ned Day will die while snorkeling in Hawaii on September 3, 1987. Some claim he was murdered. To see his work watch the below linked You Tube mob documentary featuring narration by Ned Day. If you want to meet myself, Aaron and Larry Henry, come to the MobWorld Summit at the Plaza hotel from June 15-17, 2018. Panel discussions with mob experts at the hotel with a Saturday evening trip to the Mob Museum. All for $100.00. Click on MobWorld Summit for tickets and more information. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. D

Gotti and Prison May 07, 2018

Our friend from the federal prison at Marion, former guard David, continues in this episode telling about his experiences with New York City crime boss, John Gotti. We learn that when Gotti arrived at the Reception and Diagnostic Unit, he was greeted like royalty by other prisoners. David tells about the day-to-day life of the famous mob boss was like inside the walls of Marion. Learn more about his relationship with the feared prison gang, the Aryan Brotherhood. David was the second guard to arrive on the scene when Walter Johnson was beating Gotti down. We get an insider’s version of both the events leading up to the beating and the aftermath. Gotti will die in prison and Walter Johnson will be released. Johnson does not stay out long until he is convicted of killing a Washington DC police officer. To Donate click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally, Prison Stories Apr 30, 2018

If you have not listened to the 7 part interview with the parachuting skyjacker Martin J. McNally, please stop and go back to listen to those episodes. In this episode, David, a retired Marion prison guard, recounts stories from his life as a guard in the maximum security prison at Marion Illinois. During his time at the facility, he was assigned to the cell block where Martin J. McNally resided. David came to the prison after McNally’s dramatic escape attempts with another well known skyjacker, Garrett Brock Trapnell. David tells more than stories about Martin J. McNally, he also tells what life behind those walls is really like on a day to day basis. David has been telling his stories on his You Tube Channel “As The Key Turns.” https://youtu.be/wHm2uID30ck Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. D

Scott Deitche on Garden State Gangland Apr 23, 2018

We interview noted mob historian and author Scott Deitche about his latest book, Garden State Gangland and the listener learns about the New Jersey crime families. As a bonus, Scott also tells the Wiretappers about Santos Trafficante Jr. and the development of the Tampa crime family. Scott has written six books on organized crime, including Garden State Gangland: The Rise of the Mob in New Jersey, Cigar City Mafia: A Complete History of the Tampa Underworld, The Silent Don: The World of Santo Trafficante Jr., and Rogue Mobster: The Untold Story of Mark Silverman and the New England Mafia. He has written dozens of magazine articles on organized crime and has been featured on The Discovery Channel, The History Channel, A&E, local news shows, and radio. Scott conducts periodic Mafia tours of Cigar City and the different mob historic locations. One of his most interesting books is titled Cocktail Noir. He relates, “I thought Noir was a great concept because a lot of these crime stories and films have bars and drinks that are either important information gathering points and help the story move forward, or they really set the mood of the character and help define them. A great example is Kiss Me Deadly. Mike Hammer goes into the bar www.nationalcrimesyndicate.com and says, ‘Give me a bourbon and leave the bottle.’ Something about a scene like that says all you really need to know about the type of day he had.” Cocktail Noir blends alcohol, mixers and gangster stories and is shaken, not stirred for a delightful montage of short stories. Most recently Scott has gone on the Board of Directors of the Las Vegas Mob Museum. He lives in St. Petersburg, Florida with his family. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Jose Miguel Battle – A Cuban American Mob Story Part 2 Apr 16, 2018

Jose Miguel Battle David Shanks spent most of his law enforcement career working on Jose Miguel Battle and his mafia organization known as The Corporation. Jose Miguel Battle started his life as a corrupt police sergeant taking bribes from american mobsters like Meyer Lansky and passing them along to corrupt Cuban officials in the Batista government. Battle joined the CIA backed anti-Castro revolutionaries and was captured at the Bay of Pigs. Jose Miguel Battle became known as the “Hero of the Bay of Pigs.” Once the American government freed Battle and his fellow revolutionaries from a Cuban prison, he came to south Florida with a brand new plan. He wanted to be part of the Italian La Cosa Nostra mafia. It is said he watched the Godfather dozens of times. Jose Miguel Battle approached Tampa boss, Santos Trafficante Jr. and was granted permission to form subordinate crime organization under the protection of the Trafficante Family. All he had to do was earn money and pay the Trafficante family a share. From here, Battle started running bolita games and slowly took over all the existing bolita organizations from Florida to New Jersey and even into New York City. Having all the south Florida criminal contacts soon steered him to the cocaine business by the 1980s. using his criminal contacts, Battle became one of the most successful cocaine dealers on the east coast. Jose Miguel Battle with an iron hand and murder was most often his choice in a dispute. David Shanks, of the Miami/Dade Organized Crime Division, made his life’s work into investigating The Corporation and Jose Miguel Battle. David is now retired and your podcast host became friends with him over the past year. While he granted a well known true crime writer, T. J. English, the rights to tell his story in the book, The Corporation, David lived this story and is in the studio to give our Wiretappers his first hand account of this epic investigation. David reports that the book has already been optioned to Paramount for a motion picture, They have signed Benicio Del Toro to play the part of Battle and Leonardo DiCaprio to produce the movie and to play the part of David Shanks. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free. D

Jose Miguel Battle – A Cuban American Mob Story Part 1 Apr 09, 2018

Nick Civella – A Reporter’s View Apr 02, 2018

Bill Norton covered the Kansas City mob boss Nick Civella and the crime beat for the Kansas City Star newspaper from his first day as a reporter. In the 1970s, the KC Police Department furnished a bare bones office with one desk and a telephone for the crime reporter. Bill did not report to the Star offices but rather went to work each day at police headquarters. He developed police sources as well as many criminal sources during his tenure. Bill gradually was able to leave the reporting of day to day crime and became the Star’s expert on the mafia. Bill tells how he learned from the older reporters about covering Nick Civella and relates several funny stories about his various interactions with the KC crime family. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Scott Burnstein and the Detroit Mob Mar 05, 2018

Support Gangland Wire Scott Bernstein was one of my first contacts in the true crime mob world. I found his website and blog Gangster Report and realized this guy was a serious student of organized crime. another thing I notices was he also had developed his own sources within the criminal organizations as well as law enforcement. He does a podcast with his co-host Al Profit, Click here to go to the feed. Scott comes from the infamous Bernstein family who created Detroit’s Purple Gang. Abe Bernstein was the original leader and his brother’s Joseph Bernstein, Raymond Bernstein, and Isadore Bernstein were members of this bootlegging operation during Prohibition. Scott became fascinated with the Mob when he was a young law student assigned to work with the Illinois Attorney General’a office in Cook County, Illinois. He has gone on to a successful career as a writer and documentary filmmaker. In this podcast Scott tells his history and about the inner workings of the Detroit family and how they got heir hands caught in the Las Vegas Casino cookie jar before Chicago and Kansas City got caught. Scott’s Gangster Report has stories about historical mob figures as well as what is going on in the mob today. A great resource for the mob fan. Scott has authored a number of mob books including Motor City Mafia and Mafia Prince with Phil Leonetti. Al Profit and Scott Bernstein have collaborated on 3 documentary films, Finding Jimmy Hoffa, The Frank Matthews Story, Detroit Mob Confidential and The T. Stuckey Story: How a man dreamed of forming a record company with Eminem and ended up in prison. Click on the below picture to find these books and films. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Melvin Purvis and the Battle of Little Bohemia Feb 19, 2018

Support Gangland Wire The famous and controversial F.B.I. agent Melvin Purvis was most famous for his fanatical pursuit of the Midwest bank robbing gangs led by John Dillinger and George “Baby Face” Nelson. We like to find those other lesser known stories about well known criminals and the men who investigate them. We found a first hand account of the Battle of Little Bohemia in a 1937 newspaper article written by Melvin Purvis. After Escaping the Crown Point Jail on January 24, 1934, (click here to hear our episode on the Dillinger jailbreak, John Dillinger reunites with Baby Face Nelson, Homer Van Meter and others to go on a bank robbery spree. Dillinger had investigated getting his face changed by plastic surgery and having his fingerprints obliterated. He almost died on the operating table and the sugary was postponed. The Chicago Police, led by Capt. John Stege, beat the bushes for the newly formed Dillinger/Nelson gang. Melvin Purvis and his fellow Chicago agents run down hundreds of leads. On the afternoon of April 20, 1934, Nelson, Dillinger, Van Meter and other gang members, accompanied by Nelson’s wife Little Bohemia Dillinger Museum Helen and three other girlfriends needed a brief respite from the crime spree. They select the secluded Little Bohemia Lodge in Manitowish Waters, Wisconsin as a hideout. Dillinger’s attorney, Louis Piquett, was friends with the lodge owner Emil Wanatka. Wanatka’s wife made an excuse to go to a local store and there she informed a friend, Henry Voss about their new guests. A note was sent to the Chicago F.B.I. Melvin Purvis and his bank robbery squad tooled up with guns and bulletproof vest, chartered a small plane and flew to the nearest airport. they called in other agents from the St. Paul office who drove up. Agent Purivs learned the gang was preparing to leave and he ordered his squad into action. They even had to commandeer a local automobile to get to the scene. Actor Paul Kim does a dramatic reading of this amazing first person article. The Battle of Little Bohemia ends with the Dillinger gang escaping and a dead F.B.I. agent. Furthermore, the agents kill an innocent bystander. The Dillinger guns severely wound two more agents and two innocent bystanders. Public criticism of the F.B.I resulted in a widely circulated petition demanding Purvis’ suspension. Politicians called for the resignation of J. Edgar Hoover. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

William Hanhardt – Cop on the Chicago Outfit payroll Feb 12, 2018

William Hanhardt as he leaves the Federal Building. Guv claims he masterminded a jewelry thief ring including the time he served as Chief of Detectives for the Chicago Police Department. CST/Brian Jackson In the 1950s, most large Police Departments had a few corrupt officers. We were not different here in Kansas City. We got a break in 1960 the city hired a square jawed and square in every other way, F.B.I. agent named Clarence Kelley. He was able to sideline or fire the most corrupt cops. Unlike the Chicago outfit, the Kansas City Mob family did not have many local officers on their payroll. In 1976, we did expose and arrest a cop burglary ring. My Intelligence Unit partner, Bobby Arnold was placed on a surveillance of a cabinet shop owned by one of the cops involved. It was winter and he brought a sleeping bag because the surveillance point was unheated. A few days after he brought the sleeping bag home, his wife went into the kitchen one night and found an infestation of roaches scurrying for cover. They knew the sleeping bag was the culprit. The Intelligence Unit working with F.B.I. agents uncovered a ring of officers who were working off duty at a Sears warehouse and stealing large appliances and furniture from the docks. They all plead guilty and received a 5 year sentence with probation granted. All were vested in the retirement system and took retirement before they plead guilty to protect their retirement. Recently I noticed a headline in a tribune article posted by Mike Byrne on his The Chicago Outfit-Old and Current news and articles Facebook page. The headline was, “EX Chicago Top Cop who ran mobbed up jewelry ring dies.” I found that William Hanhardt had been a high ranking Chicago Cop who was exposed in the Family Secrets testimony. It was reported that even back in his early career, the Outfit paid him as much as $1,000 monthly and provided a new car every two years. In 1953 William Hanhardt made headlines early in his career with big busts and shootouts. In 1962 encountered 3 robbers with a machine gun and had a shoot out killing 2 robbers. He made headlines in a hot case involving the kidnapping and murder of a Hillside police officer named Anthony Raymond. Three men were stopped by Officer Raymond shortly after they robbed a restaurant of $5,000.00. They got the drop on him, killed him and buried him. Our friend, William Hanhardt had an informant tell him who the suspects were and where to find the body. It will come out later was that the suspects were part of an Outfit robbery crew and the Outfit bosses decided to give them up to the cops to help Handhardt. William Hanhardt and tommy gun William Hanhardt was a bigger than life colorful character who cultivated reporters, politicians and FBI agents. He was always able to provide background information about many Chicago crimes, political liaisons. But buy 1979 he had fallen under suspicion and he was demoted down to the traffic squad after he was accused of playing footsie with mobsters who ruled the city’s corrupt downtown ward. Yet, just months later, he was promoted to being chief of detectives by the new Police Superintendent Richard Brzeczek after the election of Mayor Jane Byrne. In 1993 Teamsters official Allen Dorfman was killed by a couple of outfit hitmen. Officers processing the scene found Hanhardt’s contact information in Dorfman’s phone book. Even after his name turned up in Dorfman’s black book, Hanhardt was allowed to enjoy the twilight of his police career as a district commander. In 1986, while still on the job, one of his last official acts was to testify in the Nevada conspiracy trial of Anthony Spilotro, the Chicago Outfit’s man in Las Vegas. Hanhardt’s testimony helped discredit one of the mobster’s key accusers, Frank Cullotta. Spilotro got a mistrial and was awaiting a second trial when he was killed In October 2000, he was indicted as the leader of a band of thieves who stole $5 million in jewelry over 12 years beginning in 1984...

David Schratwieser – Mob Reporter Feb 04, 2018

As we continue with our Media and the Mob series on the first Monday of each month, this week Aaron and I interview veteran Philadelphia television reporter Dave Schratwieser who has been an investigative reporter with Philadelphia FOX 29 News since 1994. Dave has investigated Philadelphia organized crime and corruption as well as government and judicial malfeasance. Dave talks about gathering and maintaining his extensive network of sources in the judiciary, law enforcement and organized crime. Dave brings us up to date on the current mob situation in Philadelphia including the latest on Skinny Joe Merlino. Dave and the famous Mob reporter and author George Anastasia produce and distribute a series of You Tube videos called Mob Talk. See an example below. These mob experts discuss the most recent events as well as historical events regarding the Philly organized crime families. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Frank Calabrese Jr. Part 2 Jan 29, 2018

Support Gangland Wire In part 2, Frank goes into how his father groomed him as a teenager for the Outfit life and his adult life as a soldier in the Calabrese crew ran by his uncle, Nick Calabrese. He describes how the Calabrese Frank at Mob-Con crew became the “go to” hit team for the Outfit bosses. He describes how meticulous the crew would prepare to do a murder. Yet, one of those murders done by Nick Calabrese would be his undoing. An Outfit member named John Fecarotta was responsible to bury the bodies of Anthony “Ant” and Mike Spilotro. He did a poor job and a farmer found those bodies shortly after the murder. Laprietra ordered Calbrese to murder Fecarotta. The hit did not go smoothly and before Fecarotta was killed he wounded Frank Junior’s Uncle, Nick Calebrese. As Nick ran away, he left a bloody glove close to the scene and when another informer accused him of that murder, the police only had to go to their evidence room, retrieve this glove and they would find Nick’s DNA in the glove. After Frank turned on the outfit and agree to testify, his uncle Nick Calabrese became the first actual member of the Outfit to go into the Witness Protection program and testify about the 14 murders he had committed with his brother at the order of Outfit bosses like Joey Lombardo, James Marcello and his own brother, Frank Calabrese Sr. Frank Calabrese Sr. in prison Frank Jr. tells a story about wearing a wire on his father in the prison yard. It seems a fellow prisoner had recently given Frank Jr. a prison tattoo and his father tried to pull up his shirt to see this new tattoo. Frank had to create a scene to not be discovered. Listeners will learn about the codes used by Outfit members and we play short clips from hidden FBI microphones and Frank translates the dialogue. Frank tells how he did not go into the Witness Protection program but did move to the Southwest part of the United States and stayed out of the public view for almost 10 years. At the present time he feels comfortable enough to return to Chicago since his father has died and the rest of the folks he testified about are either dead or almost dead and in prison. Frank currently manages the Bella Luna restaurant and conducts the Family Secret Outfit Tours of well known crime scenes and other Outfit connected locations. Call him at 847-261-4435 or stop by the Bella Luna at 731 North Dearbon, Chicago, IL. the tour ends at the Bella Luna for dinner and more questions to Frank. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Frank Calabrese Jr. Part 1 Jan 22, 2018

Support Gangland Wire Aaron and I interview Frank Calabrese Jr. and learn the inside story of what it is like to grow up in an Outfit family and then go into the family business. Frank Calabrese Sr. separated his work life from his family until he realized his namesake son, Frank Calabrese Jr., had the brains and fortitude to into his father’s business, loansharking, extortion and gambling. Frank Jr.’s first inkling that his father was different came when he had to do a school report about what his father did for a living. He asked Frank Sr. and the reply was to tell them that “I am an engineer.” Frank Jr. said, “You don’t drive a train” and his father said that he was an operating engineer. The Calabrese family started in the old Sicilian neighborhood known as the Patch and later moved to Elmwood Park, another Sicilian neighborhood, where many other Outfit families lived. Frank Senior moved much of extended family into a 3 story home. In the “Compound” Frank Senior’s word was the law. Frank Junior did all the normal high school activities and was a great football player but the lure of the streets got in the way. Frank tells how his father was “whistled in” and became a member of the Chinatown crew headed by Angelo “The Hook” LaPrietra. Aaron and I have spoken with other men who lived the life, but Frank is one of the more introspective we have interviewed. He shares fascinating insights into the Outfit and the mind set of Outfit members. Once Frank made the decision to get out, he had to make a terrible decision, he had to come to the “other side” if he wanted to live. Frank would in fact “wear a wire” and testify against his own father. He will eventually collaborate with another author and write his life story in the book Operation Family Secrets: How a Mobster’s son and the FBI brought down Chicago’s Murderous Crime Family. Bella Luna Frank tells how he did not go into the Witness Protection program but did move to the Southwest part of the United States and stayed out of the public view for almost 10 years. At the present time he feels comfortable enough to return to Chicago since his father has died and the rest of the folks he testified about are either dead or almost dead and in prison. Frank currently manages the Bella Luna restaurant and conducts the Family Secret Outfit Tours of well known crime scenes and other Outfit connected locations. Call him at 847-261-4435 or stop by the Bella Luna at 731 North Dearbon, Chicago, IL. the tour ends at the Bella Luna for dinner and more questions to Frank. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

The Railroading of F. B. I. Agent Paul Rico Dec 18, 2017

Support Gangland Wire May 27, 1981 was a beautiful spring day at the exclusive Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, Oklahoma. A respected successful Tulsa businessman named Roger Wheeler finished his regular golf date with friends. He showered, dressed, had one drink with his golf buddies and walked to his car. This day seemed normal in every aspect except for a late model brown nondescript sedan occupied by two men parked in the lot. Mr. Wheeler entered his car and as he prepared to start the engine, a heavyset, black-bearded man with dark sunglasses walked up to him, raised a revolver and fired one round into Roger Wheeler’s face, killing him instantly. The shooter returned to the waiting driver of the brown car they quietly drive away. Among other successful business ventures, Roger Wheeler owned World Jai Alai, Inc., a sports/gaming organization based in Florida. At that time, World Jai Alai Inc. employed retired F.B.I. agent Paul Rico as a vice president of security. The Tulsa Police investigation was intense but failed to identify any suspects. The detectives would immediately focus on Wheeler’s connection to the Jai Alai business because of the gambling associated with this obscure sport. Mike Huff, one of the original officers responding to the crime scene, would become the detective assigned to pursue the case. Over the next two decades Detective Huff learned that the trail led to Boston gangsters John Martorano, Whitey Bulger, Stevie “The Rifleman” Flemmi and their South Boston Winter Hill Gang. On October 2, 2003, 22 years later, retired agent Paul Rico is indicted and arrested for the murder of his former employer, Roger Wheeler. By this time 78 year old Paul Rico was in poor health Paul Rico when he was arrested, placed into the general population of the Miami jail where is subjected to insults and assaults by the inmates. He is held without bond for several months during the extradition process and transported to Tulsa Oklahoma. He never regain his freedom or even have a chance to clear his name at a preliminary hearing before he would die because of improper health care by the jail staff while handcuffed to a hospital bed on January 18, 2004. What happened in between to culminate in this tragic end is the subject of an investigation by two retired F.B.I. agents, Chris Kerr and Joe Wolfinger. They learned that Paul Rico was a well respected agent with the reputation as a fearless, flamboyant gang-busting agent who earned this reputation while assigned to the Boston office. Agents Kerr and Wolfinger complied their evidence in a book titled, Rico: How Politicians, Prosecutors and the Mob Destroyed one of the F.B.I.’s Finest Special Agents. We do a conference call with these agents and learn that the actual shooter of Roger Wheeler was a Boston gangster named John V. Martorano and his wheel man was a member of the Boston Winter Hill gang named Joe McDonald, who will later die of natural caused in 1997. The agents lead us down a twisted path that reveals how James Whitey Bulger, Steve “The Rifleman” Flemmi were paid by a former employee of World Jai Alai named John Callahan to arrange the murder of Roger Wheeler. Bulger later orders Martarano to kill John Callahan because they fear he will testify. Martarano and Flemmi will make deals to avoid the death penalty and admit to this murder conspiracy and claim that Paul Rico provided them with a piece of paper that contained the automobile and license number and the address of the Southern Hills country club as part of the conspiracy. My own conclusion after this interview is that a police investigator and prosecutor led a grand jury to indict Paul Rico on the flimsiest of evidence and their hunger for headlines resulted in the besmirching of the reputation of a honest and dedicated F.B.I. agent. The tragic and unfortunate result was that Paul Rico was then killed while in the care of the Tulsa authorities. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show...

Chicago Outfit Hit Car Nov 06, 2017

Chuckie Nicoletti and ‘Milwaukee Phil’ Alderisio On May 2, 1962, Chicago cops responded to a suspicious party radio call at 1750 SupeStor st. in Chicago. They encountered Chicago Outfit members Philip (Milwaukee Phil) Alderisio, an Outfit trigger-man and loan shark, and Charles Nicoletti, a west side gambling boss sitting in a nondescript 4 door 1962 Ford automobile. As they searched this car, the officer uncovered one of the Outfit’s dirty and horrible little secrets. These guys were probably on a stakeout waiting on their victim in a “hitmobile.” The officers checked the registration and found it was registered to a man named Alter Getz of 9430 S. New England Ave., Oak Lawn. Their investigation revealed this address is a vacant lot. The two mobsters were charged with using a fictitious address to register this Ford and Judge Harry G. Comerford ruled the state failed to prove Alderisio and Nicoletti were guilty of using a fictitious address on the registration form for state license plates or of displaying plates listed to a fictitious address. Years layer, Investigators learned that in May 1962 these 2 guys and Tony Spilotro took part in the famous torture of Billy McCarthy and a few days later grabbed Jimmy Miraglia and killed him. The torture of Billy McCarthy was made famous in the head in a vise scene on the opening of the film, Casino. The Ford had three hidden switches under the dashboard. Two of these were for disconnected tail lights and stop-lights so that the car would be difficult for police to follow in a chase. The third switch turned on an electric motor to open a hidden compartment in the back rest of the front seat. The compartment was fitted with brackets to hold shotguns or rifles. The back of the front seat was changed to provide a hiding place for bulky objects. Detective John Willems points the into compartment, whose door was motor-operated by a hidden dashboard button. The car is held in the police auto pound and “Walter Gezt” never claimed his brand new car Charles “Chuckie” Nicoletti grew up in an impoverished and dysfunctional family in Chicago; his parents were both natives of Santa Caterina Villarmosa, Sicily. They lived at 737 S. Campbell Avenue in Near West Side, Chicago. On February 27, 1929, at the age of 12, Charles shot and killed his own father, allegedly in self-defense. As is drunken father attacked him with a knife, Charles ran into a bedroom, where a gun was kept in a bureau drawer. Nicoletti was exonerated by the Cook County coroner. He dropped out of school in eighth grade and soon joined the “Forty-Two Gang.” At the time, the gang’s members included such future Outfit members as Giancana, Sam “Teets” Battaglia, “Lew Farrell,” “Mad Sam” DeStefano and William “Willie Potatoes” Daddano. On March 29, 1977, Outfit killers shot Nicoletti three time in the back of his head while he was sitting in his car in the parking lot of the Golden Horns Restaurant. Chicago mob assassin Harry Aleman is the suspected hitman. Felix Anthony “Milwaukee Phil” Alderisio began his criminal career as a teenager during the Prohibition era. He hung out around locations where he knew he could find Outfit boss Al Capone‘s like his Lexington Hotel headquarters. He wanted to get noticed and get a messenger’s job. In the early 1930s, Alderisio dream came true and he began working with Sam Battaglia and John Marshall Caifano as an enforcer. Rising steadily through the ranks during the Great Depression, Alderisio soon gained a reputation for brutality. By the end of the decade, Alderisio was working under Jake “Greasy Thumb” Guzik, the Outfit’s financial expert, as a bagman delivering payoffs to Chicago judges and police officials. Alderisio was suspected in carrying out 13 or 14 “hits” for The Outfit. Alderisio was part of a burglary crew that operated in Chicago’s upscale Gold Coast district. These thieves specialized in rare gems and jewelry, which they fenced to Outfit-controlled jewelry stores and wholesa...

Anthony DeStefano on the Lufthansa heist Oct 30, 2017

Anthony DeStefano is a veteran reporter who covered the Five Families in New York City for over three decades. He recently sat through the trial of New York mob boss Vincent Asaros who was charged with conspiracy in the famous 6 Million dollar cash and jewelry robbery from a Lufthansa Air cargo warehouse. He is currently a reporter for Newsday in New York City, specializing in criminal justice and legal affairs. Anthony has covered all of the important criminal trials in NYC. He reported on The Happy Land Social Club Fire, the trial of Gambino crime boss Peter Gotti, former Bonanno crime boss Joseph Massino, and the so-called “Mafia Cops.” He also covered the case against Wall Street Ponzi schemer Bernard Madoff from 2008 through 2014. He has written several true crime books on New York crime families, including The Last Godfather: Joseph Massino and The Fall of The Bonanno Crime Family” (Citadel Press), Mob Killer: The Bloody Rampage of Charlie Carneglia, Mafia Hit Man, Vinny Gorgeous: The Ugly Rise And Fall Of A New York Mobster, The War On Human Trafficking, Gangland New York, and most recently The Big Heist: The Real Story of the Lufthansa Heist, the Mafia, and Murder. Go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Narcos with Ron Chepesiuk Oct 09, 2017

Support Gangland Wire This is a repeat of last week, I forgot to attach the audio and then was out of town all week. Sorry for the delay of the audio podcast. The subject of this episode is Narcos, the story of the Cali Cartel. Ron Chepesiuk hosts the Crime Beat Radio show on the Artists First network. Just click on the highlighted show tile and be entertained. Ron Chepesiuk is a former college professor who got into true crime as a young man and has become one of the foremost experts and internationally known author, speaker and investigative reporter on organized crime. in this show Aaron and I talked with him about Frank Matthews, “Black Caesar”, the first well known drug kingpin who disappeared with about 20 million dollars in 1973. Ron tells how Frank Matthews made the one of the first international connections with South American drug dealers and organized drug markets all over the United States in the 1970s. Ron later discusses how he was in Columbia covering the narcotics problem when he met a Colombian woman and married her. this commenced a life long study of Columbia, narco-traffickers and the Colombian government. When he first started, he was warned to not go outside of Bogota and today, Ron reports that the former drug capitol of Medellin is now a preferred place for North Americans to visit and even live out their retirement. The listener learns about the inside workings of the Cali Cartel and how they quietly became the most successful drug organization after Pablo Escobar was killed. Ron tells of his first hand experiences and stories about the same events depicted in the recently released Netflix series Narcos, Season Three. Ron operates Strategic Media Books, LLC, www.strategicmediabooks.com, an independent U.S. publisher of original paperback and e-book editions that aims to bring its outstanding publishing program to the widest possible audience. Founded in 2010, Strategic Media Books publishes nonfiction that includes true crime, biography/memoir, business, history/current affairs, and lifestyle, as well as cutting-edge and inspirational fiction. Strategic Media Books also publishes a book series titled “Gangsta Chronicles.” This series focuses on true and gritty stories from the street and the world of crime. Strategic Media Books’ authors have received numerous literary honors and awards, taking many of the industry’s top prizes. Ron Chepesiuk is an optioned screenwriter and the award-winning author of numerous books – three of them optioned for movies. On Ron’s Crime Beat Radio he has interviewed such guests as Robert F. Kennedy Jr., F. lee Bailey, Henry Hill, Noam Chomsky, George Jung, Joe Pistone ( aka Donnie Brasco) and Chris Kyle , American Sniper , among others. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

John Dillinger Escape – Episode 2 Sep 25, 2017

Crown Point jail In episode 2, we discuss the frantic flight of John Dillinger and Herbert Youngblood. Lillian Holley and every law enforcement officer in the Midwest was on the lookout for Dillinger. He was wearing out his Robin Hood status among citizens by this time and this would help. The Dillinger gang gets back together and conducts a raid on a police station where they take guns and bullet proof vests. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

John Dillinger Escape – Episode 1 Sep 18, 2017

Dillinger escape car Dillinger with Sheriff Lillian Holley In this first episode of the exciting story of John Dillinger and his jailbreak the listener learns how John Dillinger was wanted for killing a police officer during a bank robbery when he was captured in Tucson Arizona. He was extradited to Indiana where he was held without bond in the Lake County jail, located in Crown Point, Indiana. Lake County had a woman sheriff, Lillian Holley, who would pose for publicity pictures with her famous prisoner. On May 3rd, 1934, myth has it that Dillinger carved a gun out of either a bar of soap or a wooden washboard. A trusty named Sam Cahoon entered an exercise area where Dillinger was being held with others waiting to take their Saturday night bath. Dillinger took the trusty hostage with the gun and left the exercise area. He found a county fingerprint expert, Ernest Blunk, in the corridor and used him as a hostage to lure in other guards and locked them up. Using Blunk as a hostage, he and another prisoner, Herbert Youngblood, went outside and encountered a county mechanic and several county sheriff patrol cars. He asked which one was the fastest and the mechanic indicated to a V-8 Ford and they took the mechanic and Blunt along as they drove away. This was the car owned by Sheriff Holley, adding insult to injury. The fugitives drove away and later released their hostages, broke the spotlight off the police car. and were soon were observed crossing the state line between Indiana and Illinois. This brought the F.B.I. into the investigation. This podcast is taken directly from the newspapers articles written at the time by means of a dramatic reading by the professional actor, Paul Kim. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Owney Madden and Primo Carnera Sep 11, 2017

We talked in our first episode on the Irish mob about Owney Madden getting into promoting and managing and gambling on professional boxing. Like professional criminal activities, for young Irish and Italian guys, professional boxing was a manly way out of their crushing poverty. Many people during this time observed that Madden became a different person at a boxing match. He would jump up and scream advice, shadow box and generally become just like any other crazed fan at any athletic match. We talked in our first episode on the Irish mob about Owney Madden getting into promoting and managing and gambling on professional boxing. Many people during this time observed that Madden became a different person at a boxing match. He would jump up and scream advice, shadow box and generally become just like any other crazed fan at any athletic match. Primo Carnera ad Max Baer Owney Madden purchased the contract of a boxer named Primo Carnera. He was born in 1906 in Venice Italy, he weighed 15 to 20 lbs at birth. The Carnera family soon realized the potential of their broad-shouldered son. The Carnera family were poor peasants and they did their best to ensure that their son earned good money. As a teenager, Primo had moved to France and got a job as a strongman in a circus. He went into professional boxing and fought many fights in Europe. From his earliest matches, many were rumored to be fixed fights. Primo was a simple gentle young man who was easily manipulated by his handlers. He was ill-equipped for the limelight of the boxing world. He grew to be 6 feet 6 inches tall and weighing in at 275 lbs, an imposingly large man by any standards. He became a celebrity in Europe and in 1929 he came to the US on a well-publicized series of fights against American boxers. Primo was an instant media attraction. He was like the Andre the Giant of boxing. His language struggles caused him to be unintentionally funny and he was once asked how old he was and he replied with his weight, 275. During the 1920s and 1930s New York gangster Owney Madden financed several Hells Kitchen amateur boxing clubs and was credited with keeping many young men out of problems with the law. He bought out Carnera’s contract and started setting up fights. He and his partner in crime, Frenchy LeMange became corner men at Carnera’s fights and could be seen giving fight advice during the breaks in the rounds. Carnera was the unwitting participant in a series of fixed fights. This corruption in professional boxing was continually investigated by the New York State Boxing commission. But during this time, a lot of control over the fight game was given to gamblers like Owney Madden. After Carnera arrived in the U.S., he triumphed by KO in 89 of 103 professional fights. Madden and his gang bribed, physically intimidated, or used other dirty tricks to ensure that Carnera won each fight. They had to because Primo Carnera had a glass jaw, he could be knocked out by even the lightest tap to the chin. In his defense, Carnera’s size became his key defensive trait. It never made him a popular fighter and he always drew crowds—even when it seemed obvious that his fights were fixed. he had the reputation of a dumb oaf and the newspapers nicknamed him the ‘Ambling Alp’ for the way he staggered around the ring. An interesting note, Primo Carnera’s story has been told a few times in the movies. His early life as a circus strongman was told by the famous Italian Director Frederico Fellinni in La Strada, released in 1954. In 1947, Bud Schulberg, a boxing columnist and Hollywood screenwriter published a slim novel about prizefight corruption entitled The Harder They Fall. This was loosely based on the career of Primo Carnera. He wrote the screenplay by the same title and it depicted a giant immigrant who spoke broken English who is taken advantage of by hustling fight promoters and gangsters. In the plot the gangsters sent him, unknowingly,

Westies Part 2 Jimmy Coonan goes down Sep 04, 2017

Jimmy Coonan brought the Westies into the 20th Century and presided over the most bloody and violent gang in New York City history James Coonan was a baby boomer born December 21, 1946. He became known as “Jimmy C.” As we said last week, Jimmy C. took over the Hell’s Kitchen Irish mob after he made a deal with Gambino member Roy Demeo to kill the previous boss, Mickey Spillane, in 1977. During his time as boss of the Westies, they gained a reputation as a vicious crew of murderers. He opened up the gang to the lucrative drug dealing rackets as well as continuing extortion, numbers, loansharking and counterfeiting rackets in the area. Coonan forged a strong alliance with the Gambino crime family in the late 70s, and became their hit-squad and enforcement arm for the next 10 years. Jimmy Coonan’s criminal career started in his teens. His father was an accountant and not involved in criminal activity. Mickey Spillane or someone in his gang kidnapped Mr. Coonan for ransom and someone pistol whipped Coonan’s father. Jimmy was ashamed that his father was treated like this and he swore revenge against Mickey Spillane. Jimmy C. purchased a machine gun and got on top of a Hells Kitchen tenement building waited for Micky Spillane. He took aim and fired a whole 30 round magazine in one long burst at Spillane and some men with him. Coonan failed to murder Spillane and his followers, not even wounding one man, but Spillane got the message. In 1969, Police arrested Coonan on kidnapping and murder beefs. He got a sweet deal in a pea bargain and was released in late 1971 and continued his war on Mickey Spillane. Coonan joined with the Italians because Spillane had refused the Mafia’s efforts to control criminal activities in and around the Jacob Javit’s convention center. The Genovese crime family wanted to run all mob activity associated with the convention center. The story is that the Genovese crime family sent a team of heavily-armed hitmen to kill off Spillane’s gang. The hit-squad killed 68 members of Spillane’s gang with most of them killed by being gunned down. At least 30 of Spillane’s gang were killed by bombings. The Genovese crime family took over Spillane’s construction business, and all of his organized crime businesses, and from that point on the Genovese crime family also ruled all of Hell’s Kitchen with an iron fist. During the early 1970s, Coonan recruited a gang of young Irish hoods and they began kidnapping, beating, and murdering any Spillane loyalists. One of these new recruits was 24-year-old Vietnam Vet by the name of Mickey Featherstone. Any resident of Hell’s Kitchen who who took Spillane’s side were subject to beatings, kidnappings, store vandalism, and robberies. Those who chose Coonan were immune from these harsh activities because Spillane’s gang was on the run and unable to retaliate. Mickey Featherstone was a complete nut case. He was born on the upper West Side and his mother worked with the VFW and his father was a U. S. Customs officer. He was blond haired and baby-faced. He volunteered for combat in Vietnam and would claim he spent time killing with the Special Forces. There is a story that he was uncircumcised and he got drunk with a bunch of medics. He passed out and when he awoke, he found they had given him a circumcision. He received a medical discharge in 1967 after just a year, claiming to have hallucinations. Featherstone achieved neighborhood fame for single-handedly running a group of toughs from New Jersey out of a Hell’s Kitchen bar with a rifle. In another bar room fight in 1971, he shot and killed a guy named Linwood Willi. In this case, he was found not guilty due to insanity. He was released from the mental hospital 4 years later. During this incarceration Featherstone was injected with Thorazine. Featherstone’s violence caught the eye of Coonan. In 1977 when Mickey Spillane was killed outside his apartment, Featherstone was arrested but acquitted for his killing.

Westies Part 1 from Owney Madden to Mickey Spillane Aug 28, 2017

The Irish Mob, thanks to Dean from Ireland in the next two episodes we will examine the Irish Mob or the Westies. The Hell’s Kitchen area of NYC is from about Central Park on the west side of Midtown Manhattan west of Broadway to the Hudson River from Battery Park street to 59th street. This is sometimes referred to as the 5 Points area of NYC. Many Irish immigrants settled in this area find work on the Hudson River docks. Martin Scorsese produced the film The Gangs of New York and it tells the story of the early Irish gangs fighting the Protestant gangs. Since it is on the west side of Manhattan, it was natural to call the Irish gang The Westies. The name Hells Kitchen purportedly came from 2 cops watching a small riot between rival Irish gangs and one sad this place is like Hell and the older cop said no this place is so hot it is more like Hell’s Kitchen. As the new century arrived, in 1901 an Irish woman named Mary Madden left a drunken petty criminal husband, Francis and her 2 sons in England and came to new York looking for work. By 1902 she was able to bring her sons, Owney and Martin Madden over. The father never made it to the US. The family found a new home in New York’s Irish community in Hells Kitchen and this will shape Madden’s life permanently. The thousands of other Irish emigrant families will become Madden’s loyal. Settling in New York’s Hell’s Kitchen, little Owney Madden joined the Gopher Gang. He was known as “The Killer” after gunning down an Italian gang member in the streets, after which he shouted, “I’m Owney Madden, 10th Avenue!” No witnesses came forward linking Madden to the crime. By age 18, Madden had become a prominent member of the Gophers and was suspected in the deaths of five rival gang members. He was earning as much as $200 (like $2000.00 today) a day from the Gophers’ criminal activities, such as the gang’s protection racket which forced local businessmen to pay in the face of firebomb threats. Madden’s movie star looks and his wealth from his rackets made him a prince of Hells Kitchen. He was violently jealous and he once shot and killed a store clerk named William Henshaw, who had asked out one of Madden’s girl. Henshaw died of his wounds and Madden police was arrested. The case had to be dismissed after no corroborating witnesses came forward. Over the next three years, the Gophers reached the height of their power. The Hudson Dusters were threatened by Madden’s power and they ambushed him outside a 52nd Street dance hall on November 6, 1912. Madden refused to identify his attackers to police, stating “My boys will get ’em. It’s nobody’s business but mine who put these slugs in me!” Shortly after several members of the Dusters were killed. In 1914, Madden became involved in a dispute with Little Patsy Doyle, a prominent member of the Dusters, over a woman named Freda Horner. Doyle informed police of Madden’s operations. Madden sent a message to Doyle through one of his girl friends, a Margaret Everdeane, to ask Doyle to meet Madden and hash out a peace agreement. As Doyle arrived at this meeting on November 28, 1914, Madden ambushed Doyle and killed him. The police questioned the woman and she confessed to her role in the killing and named Madden. Madden was eventually sentenced to 20 years at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, New York. After serving nine years of his sentence, Madden was released on parole in 1923, 3 years after the start of prohibition. The Gopher gang had broken up, and many members of his own faction were either in Sing Sing or working for other bootlegging gangs. Upon his release, he was given a job by a former member of Madden’s street gang, Larry Fay who had a taxi cab company as a cover for his bootlegging activities. He needed Madden’s killer reputation to maintain control of his territory. Fay employed Madden to boss a gang of strong-arm men to help him gain control of the most profitable cab-stands along Broadway.

Harry Reid is Clean Face part 3 Jul 31, 2017

Joe Agosto In this third and final interview, we learn that the mob did not give nicknames to anyone except the people they believed were helping them in their skimming efforts so it is a bit suspicious when the mobsters called Harry Reid, Clean Face. A good example was a State Gaming Agent named Bybee, when they referred to him he was Bybee. Another example was when Agosto and DeLuna talked about the Governor Elect Bob List before he was the governor, he was called by his last name “List” but when the when they talked about Harry Reid, Gaming Control Board Chairman, he was known as Clean Face, just like Frank Rosenthal was “Crazy” or “Newspaper” or “Lefty” and the attorney Jay Brown was “Channel One” or when Oscar Goodman was called “Senior.” Another school of thought is that Joe Agosto was claiming to have a direct connection with Gaming Control Board chairman, Harry Reid. He talked in convoluted terms and was hard to decipher. It might be noted that Joe Agosto did not bring any smoking gun evidence on Harry Reid when he became a government witness. The listener can make up their own mind as to the influence and control that organized crime had over Harry Reid. Lefty Rosenthal Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Harry Reid is Clean Face Part 2 Jul 24, 2017

Nick Civella In this second part of the Bill Ouseley interview, we learn more about the inner workings of Las Vegas casinos and Las Vegas politicians and why they were suspicious of Clean Face Harry Reid. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Harry Reid is Clean Face Part 1 Jul 17, 2017

Nick Civella In the first of a three part interview with retired F.B.I. agent William Ouseley, we discuss the lessons learned from the Las Vegas wiretaps that exposed the Kansas City, Chicago, Milwaukee and Cleveland mob’s skimming from the Stardust and the Tropicana. In those intercepts, agents learned that a man named Joe Agosto had been able to position himself as the manager of the Les Folies Bergere show at the Tropicana casino during the 1970s. Joe Agosto was an organized crime associate and underling of Nick Civella and the Kansas City crime family. William Ouseley was the case agent in this investigation and therefore responsible for gathering and interpreting all the evidence. he was able to figure out that Agosto reported directly to Civella’s underboss, Carl “Tuffy”DeLuna on a regular basis. In this 3 part series, we play some clips from these tapes and retired agent Ouseley interprets what the mobsters are discussing. They use a variety of code words and the most important was “Clean Face. Agent Ouseley was able to determine this was the name the mobsters used when the discussed the Chairman of the Nevada Gaming Control Board, Harry Reid. Most people will know him as the recently retired Senator from Nevada. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

The Mob in the Netherlands and Europe Part 2 Jul 10, 2017

In this second part, Mafia blogger and expert David Amorouso from Gangsters Inc. tells us more about the influence of the American mob on illegal European casinos. Most European countries have state regulated casinos, but there was a demand for more gambling that the state run casinos could provide. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

The Mob in Europe Part 1 Jul 03, 2017

Interview with Mob expert David Amoruso. he maintains and writes for the mob blog site gangster.inc. We discuss the influence of the American La Cosa Nostra mob in Europe. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Frank Cullotta and Tony Spilotro Part 2 Jun 26, 2017

Hole in the Wall Gang after the Bertha’s bust In Part 2, Frank goes into more depth about his work with the Hole in the Wall Gang. Spilotro obtained inside information that the owners of Bertha’s jewelry story in Las Vegas kept as much as a million dollars in jewelry and cash inside the safe. They planned to commit this burglary on the long weekend of the 4th of July, 1981. It was late June or early July in Las Vegas, Nevada. Frank Cullotta and the Hole in the Wall Gang members, Ernie Davino, Leo Guardino, Joe Blasko, and Larry Neumann were planning the hit on Bertha’s Gifts and Home Furnishings on 896 E Sahara Ave, Las Vegas. It was an exclusive resale shop Bertha’s Location today for the finer connoisseur of home furnishings and jewelry. This was going to be at least a million dollar score for the Hole in the Wall Gang with a nice kick up to Tony Spilotro and the Chicago Outfit. This was not going to be easy, not even for the Hole in the Wall Gang. The Hole in the Wall Gang got their name from the media. When they reported on burglaries in Las Vegas the reporters noticed the perpetrators gained access by breaking through the wall or roof of their target buildings. They did this to avoid being detected by alarm systems. Back then, alarms were wired around windows and doors, and it was very rare that an expensive motion detectors are used. The newspapers reported on these robberies and called them the Hole in the Wall Gang. However in the case of Bertha’s, they did have the expensive motion detectors. Frank has gone into Bertha’s a couple of times to case the joint out. He found they had motion detectors and so he determined the way to get into Bertha’s was to go through the roof over the safe and drill through the ceiling of the safe. He knew they did not have a motion detector inside the safe. What he did not know was they had an informant inside their crew. Frank suspected that one crew member could be a snitch. He tells how he was contacted in Las Vegas by two Chicago cops and they told him about a mutual acquaintance named Sal Romano. It seems that the Chicago PD had a case on Romano and the FBI had taken the case away and it seemed to disappear. Frank knew this meant trouble for anyone connected to Romano. He informed Spilotro and he refused to believe that Romano was working with the Feds. You have to listen to the exciting conclusion of this story and the story of his encounter with Spilotro’s widow recently. Tony S. Thanks to Paul Scharff and his Murder in McHenry, 1981 for info for this article. Thanks to Casey McBride for the track music. To learn more about Frank’s Las Vegas tour click here. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Frank Cullotta and Tony Spilotro Part 1 Jun 19, 2017

How Frank Cullotta met Tony Spilotro In this first of a 2 part interview of Frank Cullotta, we talk to a guy who was a career criminal from his teenage years and rose through the ranks of the Chicago Outfit from being an associate who made money as a burglar to becoming a “Mustache” or a “guy” in Tony Spilotro’s crew. If Spilotro was the boss of the Chicago Outfit in Las Vegas, then Frank was his Underboss. Frank came up on the west side of Chicago and first met Tony when they were 12 years old. Joey Aiuppa sent Tony Spilotro out to Las Vegas to monitor Lefty Rosenthal’s activities when he needed a backup, he called Frank Cullotta. Spilotro, Culotta and others at the Upper Crust Spilotro and Mad Sam Destefano Frank tells how the Chicago outfit placed Tony Spilotro with the vicious Outfit Associate, Mad Sam DisteFano to learn the loan sharking business and to keep an eye on Outfit money invested with Mad Sam. When I mentioned that I heard that Spilotro and Mad Sam’s brother killed Mad Sam, Frank hints that he will reveal the details of Mad Sam’s murder in his new book. Tony Spilotro made Frank the boss of his “Hole in the Wall Gang.” This was a crew of professional criminals who participated in many “high end” home and business burglaries in southern Nevada and Arizona. Frank shares the story of his relationship with Spilotro and some of the crimes that Spilotro committed. Frank reveals the real story behind the famous torture scene in the film, Casino, where the Joe Pesci character is tightening a vise on a man’s head. https://youtu.be/3-d5yU-aQ34 He has co-authored 3 books with famous mob author, Dennis Griffin. His most recent is The Rise and Fall of a Casino Mobster. To learn more about Frank’s Las Vegas tour click here. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Van Gogh and the Camorra Jun 05, 2017

Octave “Okkie” Durham, the thief behind one of the biggest art heists in history went on various Dutch talk shows to discuss how he stole two Van Gogh paintings worth millions from the Van Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam in 2002. He claims he sold them to a Camorra drug boss. He also claims to have stayed at the home of then-FC Barcelona striker Patrick Kluivert while on the run from police. Durham is the subject of a documentary titled The Man Who Stole Two Van Goghs by Dutch news show Brandpunt. The 2002 Van Gogh heist in Amsterdam was a simple, grab a ladder, break into a second floor window and go out the back door to a waiting car while the police knocked on the front door. Durham and a friend, had been casing the famous Van Gogh museum for some time before they finally decided to go ahead and execute their plan. Using a stolen ladder, some rope, and a hammer the two men entered the museum filled with hundreds of millions worth’ of exclusive art. They grabbed Vincent van Gogh’s View of the Sea at Scheveningen and Congregation Leaving the Congregation Leaving the Reformed Church at Nuenen Reformed Church at Nuenen. As professional as “Okkie” may claim to be, he left behind a baseball cap with his DNA in it, putting authorities on his tail almost immediately. A lack of evidence and urgency, however, kept police from searching the burglar’s residence or other locations, giving him enough time to move the paintings to a safe location. He was unable to sell these priceless paintings to his regular contacts. One man, a Dutch drug boss Cor van Hout was eager to buy the paintings to use them as a bargaining chip for a court case, but he was shot to death before he and Durham could reach a deal. Durham then received a call from a man known as “Pinocchio,” who quickly closed the deal and purchased the two Van Gogh paintings. “Pinocchio” was an important player in the Amsterdam underworld. He lived there for twelve years and owned Coffeeshop Rockland, where tourists enjoyed smoking some weed. Pinocchio is Raffaele Imperiale, an Italian drug boss with close links to the Neapolitan Camorra. Durham has never told how much Imperiale paid for the paintings. In September of 2016 when Imperiale offers the paintings to Italian authorities in exchange for lowering his prison sentence. He has been sentenced to 12 years in prison for drug trafficking. He has yet to serve a day of his sentence as he remains a fugitive, living a life of luxury in Dubai. Life wasn’t so sweet for Durham, though. When police are on his tail he manages to flee to Spain where he eventually runs into Patrick Kluivert, star player of FC Barcelona. The two men knew each other from the old neighborhood back in Amsterdam. Durham tells Kluivert he is staying at a hotel and Kluivert asks him to stay with him at his mansion. The fugitive art thief is hesitant and tells Kluivert he is on the run from police and his presence might cause Kluivert some unwanted media attention. The Barcelona striker is dismissive however, telling “Okkie” he is in the media every day anyway. Thanks to David Amoruso the True Crime Blog, Gangstersinc.com In 2013, Italian police recovered the paintings during a raid. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYLvypoCToo Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Joe Raimo and the Black Hand Part 2 May 29, 2017

In the second and final episode Gary and Aaron reveal the subsequent investigation by the Kansas City Police Department. Officer Joseph Raimo was assassinated at 11:15 PM on March 28, 1911 at 5th and Holmes. The officer was noted for his bravery and diligence in the performance of his duties. He had been especially assigned to the various Italian cases, and his untiring efforts aroused considerable enmity among the criminal classes of that nationality. Officers will use every means to bring to justice the perpetrators of this foul crime. March 29, 1911, KC Police arrest 4 men for the murder of Paulina Pizano. They are Lorenzo Messina, Nick DeHernnado, Sam Genuso and Joe Denusisio. The paper identifies as Syrians. They are found in possession of 3 shotguns exactly like the shotguns left by the assassins of Joe Raimo. We don’t know the disposition of these three men. By April 7, 1911, 300 copies of a reward poster were published in both English and Italian. The City Council offered a $1,000.00 reward. The Police Board discussed offering their own reward, but they never offered any reward. Because Joseph Raimo had recently become a member of the Police Relief Association, his widow was to be paid about $1500.00 from a life insurance policy they purchased for each officer. The Police board did pass a resolution to ask the court council to pay Raimos’ widow his salary for 6 months. During the next few days, speculation abounded. Some Italian residents speculated that the “bad” Italians were trying to raise a lot of money in the United States to be sent back to Italy to pay for the defense of a member of the Camorra. When asked what that had to do with the death of Joe Raimo, the residents said that Officer Raimo must have possessed that knowledge and since he was a man who treated all alike and would do his duty to stop them from using criminal methods to obtain this money. They also speculated that the spectacular killing of a man like Joseph Raimo would strike terror into the hearts of the gang’s proposed victims making their work easier. By this time, all Italian residents understood that only Sicilians could be members of the Black Hand and the public murder of a police officer was more likely to be a Black Hand crime. During the investigation, the KC Star printed an article explaining the two different Italian criminal organizations. One gang was the Camorra and to be in the Camorra, the member had to be from Naples. The paper said these two organizations never worked together and the Camorra was highly organized. The Camorra was a degeneration of several secret societies that brought about the unification of Italy. They learned the Black Hand was Sicilian and any members had to be from Sicily They believed the Black Hand was more a criminal method rather than an organization. They hold power by inveigling hope in some by hope of gain, in others by the fearful knowledge of its unscrupulous vengeance people it deems as traitors to their organization. The paper asked the question, does the Black Hand in Kansas City have anything to do with the Black Hand anywhere else? The police and the KC Star had obtained the Black Hand Letter by this time. They are convinced this was a legitimate Black Hand letter because it was written in Sicilian and in the manner the Sicilian words were pronounced. They noted the letter was written by two different people because there were two distinct handwriting styles. They connected this with the fact there were two assassins. A prominent Italian businessman agreed to provide some information on the Black Hand if he could remain anonymous. He said that until a couple of years ago, there was no La Mano Nera. Since that time, he knows of several businessmen who have received extortion letters from the Black Hand or La Mano Nera. He said they feel safer paying the protection money than going to the police and that is how they obtained power. He told the story of a friend who received an extortion l...

Joe Raimo and the Black Hand Part 1 May 22, 2017

Kansas Police Officer Joe Raimo was born September 23, 1879 in Naples Italy. He came to the United States, in 1892, when he was 13 years old. The Raimo family lived in Chicago until 1897. Joe and his mother moved to Kansas City, where he married, Genaverffa (Jennie) DiFeo on July 3, 1898. They were married by Father Cesare Spigardi at her parent’s home in the Italian neighborhood at 910 Missouri Ave. Their first child, Frank Joseph Raimo was born May 26, 1900. They would have six children altogether, but only 4 lived, Frank, Josphine, Benjamin and Fanny Joe Raimo was hired as a Kansas City on June 28, 1909 and he was the first Italian police officer hired. Chief Wentworth Griffin assigned him the North End or the Italian neighborhood. He actually lived in his patrol area at 521 Charlotte. In December, 1910, a Paulina Pizano, who runs a North End grocery store at 301 Campbell, received a black hand letter asking for $50.00. The next month, in January, 1911, another shopkeeper, Vincenzo Lasiado, was killed in front of his store at 412 East 4th St. Joe was investigating these murders when he received a threatening letter from the Black Hand. In February, 1911, Joe was off duty in a saloon over by the city market when he overheard three men talking about these murders. As they talked, one man looked around the saloon and recognizes Joe. After that, he had have informants that are warning me of a plot to have him killed. and it got a threatening letter. It is translated here. “Mr Raimo, Traitor, the others want money and you know it and this notice brings you death. Beware! The last notice!” In this episode Gary and Aaron interview the ghost of Joe Raimo and tell about the murder and how his son, Frank, found the Black Hand letter and gave it to Kansas City Star reporters. Thanks to Alex Virgo for his impersonation of Officer Joe Raimo. Click here to see a performance. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Joe Petrosino and The Black Hand May 08, 2017

Petrosino Park Joe Petrosino was the first cop to investigate the Mob in the United States. Steven Taltry has written a thrilling account of Petrosino and his investigation into Petrosino and His Italian Squad the Black Hand, an organization that will morph into the American Mafia. His book, The Black Hand, has been optioned to be made into a film starring Leonardo DiCaprio. Joe Petrosino was able to penetrate the secrets of the American Mafia because he spoke Sicilian and had many friends and relationships with Sicilian immigrants. He even prevented the Mafia from extorting money form the beloved Italian singer, Caruso. In this episode we interview New York Times best selling author Steven Taltry. Mr Taltry made his bones as police reporter during the cocaine wars in Miami during the 198os. He’s written for the New York Times Magazine, GQ, Playboy, the Irish Times, the Chicago Review and many other publications. Talty is the author of five non-fiction books: Mulatto America, about the mixing of black and white culture throughout American History; Empire of BlueWater, the story of the great pirate captain Henry Morgan; The Illustrious Dead, about Napoleon’s invasion of Russia and the typhus epidemic that doomed it; Escape from the Land of Snows, an account of the Dalai Lama’s escape from Tibet in 1959; and Agent Garbo, the story of the greatest double agent of World War II, Juan Pujol. His first work of fiction, a crime novel called Black Irish, introduces the Harvard-educated detective, Absalom Kearney, and marks the beginning of a new crime series. He is also the co-author of the New York Times bestselling account, A Captain’s Duty, with Captain Richard Phillips, the hero of the Maersk Alabama hijacking. The book is being made into a film starring Tom Hanks, to be released in late 2013. Visit the facebook page Petrosino Square. Don’t forget to listen to Aaron on the Big Dumb Fun Show, live on Monday nights. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Alan Gunnar Lindbloom and the Detroit Mob Part 2 Apr 17, 2017

In this second episode, Alan tells more about his book To Be a King and the problems of writing inside a prison. We learn a lot about how to rob a drug dealer. You just get a contact inside a strip club to tip you off when a high roller is on the premises. Get your crew together and wait for the dealer to leave. Most often, the dealer will go to an all night diner for breakfast after partying with strippers. At that time, a decision must be made, do you storm the diner an hold everybody at bay while you rob the dealer or follow him home. If you follow him home, the skilled holdup man will kick open the front door immediately after the dealer enters. Gives him less time to get to any guns. Alan finishes with the story of how he was sentenced to 13 years in prison. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Gunnar Alan Lindbloom and the Detroit Mob Part 1 Apr 16, 2017

Gunnar Alan Lindbloom visits Gangland Wire in this first of a two part series on his life in the Detroit underworld. Gunnar was the 1/2 Sicilian which kept him out the the Brogata or La Cosa Nostra or as the they call it in Detroit, the Syndicate or Combination. Gunnar was born into the extended family of Detroit Mob boss Jack Tocco. He was recently released from a 13 year stretch in the Michigan state prison system. While inside he authored 8 books. His book To Be A King is released either today or within the next few days click here to find this book. In our first episode Mr. Lindbloom tells about his young adult life growing up Tocco. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

The Trial of Al Capone Part 2 Apr 03, 2017

This second episode recounts in great detail the interactions between jurors in the famous trial of Al Capone for income tax evasion. CAPONE JURORS NATE C. BROWN, 64, retired, Protestant, SL Charles. BURR DUGAN, 54, farmer Catholic McClare. T. HEINRICHS, 52, engineer. Protestant, Thornton. GEORGE H. LARSEN, 41, breadmaker, Protestant, Thornton A. G., 65, country store owner, Protestant. Prairie View. W. F. McCORMICK, 58, receiving clerk. Catholic. Maywood. M. E. MERCHANT, 30, real estate broker. Catholic, Waukegan. ARTHUR O. PROCHNO 49, insurance, Protestant, Edison Park C. SMART, 43, painter, Protestant, Libertyville. JOHN A. WALTER, 54, abstracter. Protestant.,Yorkville. LOUIS P. WEIDLING, 62, pointer. Protestant, Wilmington. LOUIS T., 64, retired, Protestant, Chicago. “We were taken to quarters in the Great Northern hotel. We had to stay in our rooms. There were three rooms for twelve men. Some of us had to sleep double. We readily saw that we were going to Capone Jury be more prisoner than the defendant in the case. We decided we might as get acquainted. We divided into groups which could be broadly and roughly defined as students, gossipers, and jokers. Among us, it developed, were a couple of men who had as jurors in the income tax case of Ralph Capone, Al’s brother, a year or two before. They had convicted him. I was told that these men wanted to get on Al Capone’s case to give him some of the same medicine. Our guards were Deputies Frank Otto and Ladd Purcha. They telephoned our families that we would not be home. Next all our clothing was minutely examined. Pockets were turned Inside out. Cuffs of trousers were rolled down. Even sleeves were turned inside out. Correspondence was carefully censored. We were not allowed to talk over the phone to our families, even in the presence of a deputy. We were not allowed to see our wives. Our newspapers were strictly censored. The deputies wielded scissors very expertly, cutting out headlines and stories pertaining to the Ca. pone trial. Once they slipped. We saw a five-line item about Philip D’Andrea, Capone’s bodyguard, who was arrested in court while carrying a gun. This little item was con. in a news column entirely unrelated to the Capone case. This 2 how the deputies missed it. When they learned about it they became greatly excited. I assured them, however, that only a few of LIs had seen the item. I destroyed it. Not only newspapers, but magazines also, were censored. Nor did the radio escape. We wanted to go in a body to either a Protestant or Catholic church. This was denied. Capone with Defense and Prosecution It wasn’t long before I clashed with the jury guards. I took notes of the testimony the first. morning. During the recess the guard ordered me to stop taking notes. He said it was not allowed. I told him to ask the judge. He said he could not do this. I pointed out that jurors ought to be permitted to take notes the same as lawyers and others who were more familiar with the trial of cases. I don’t know if the guard asked the judge, but, anyway, I was permitted to take notes. They proved helpful later on. As the trial progressed I for one got the idea that the government lawyers were making a good case out of nothing and that they did not want Capone’s tax money, which he had offered in compromise, so much as they wanted him and the honor that went with a conviction. We all were impressed with the bearing and evident fairness of Judge Wilkerson and the conduct of the prosecution and defense lawyers. District Attorney George E. Q. Johnson, Dwight N. Green, Samuel Clawson, and Jacob I. Grossman for the prosecution. Michael Ahern and Albert Fink for the defense. We naturally studied Capone considerably and noted that he had a ready smile. We were highly concerned with every bit of evidence, every exhibit, every witness. We were particular- ly interested in the grandiose things that we had read about Capone, some of which now were being un- folded to us .

The Trial of Al Capone Part 1 Mar 26, 2017

Al Capone Juror I found a detailed newspaper account written by a juror shortly after the October 5, 1931 trail of Al Capone for income tax evasion at the federal courthouse in downtown Chicago. For several weeks before the scheduled start of the Capone trial, informant Eddie O’Hare notified the prosecutor and the lead Treasury Agent investigator, Frank Wilson, that Capone’s organization had a complete list of prospective jurors and was already “passing out $1,000 bills,” promising political jobs, giving away tickets to prize fights, and “using muscle too.” Wilson and the U.S. Attorney Johnson got a list of 10 names from O’Hare, names 30 to 39 on the jury list. Wilson and U. S. Attorney Johnson related O’Hare’s story to Judge Wilkerson in his chambers. Wilkerson told the men that he hadn’t yet received his jury list for the Capone trial, but when he did, he would call them. When the names on Wilkerson’s list turned out to match exactly with the names on O’Hare’s list, the judge met once again with Wilson and prosecutors. The judge seemed curiously unconcerned and said “Bring your case into court as planned, gentlemen.” Frank Wilson Treasury Agent He told the government’s attorneys. “Leave the rest to me.” On the first day of trial, Capone and his attorney smiled at jurors as they sat at the defendant’s table. Judge Wilkerson took his seat at the bench and looked out over the packed courtroom. He called the bailiff to the bench. “Judge Edwards has another trial commencing today,” he told the bailiff. “Go to his courtroom and bring me his entire panel of jurors; take my entire panel to Judge Edwards.” Al Capone’s smile sank when he saw the jury was switched. The prosecutor outlined the 23 charges of tax evasion against Capone in the government’s opening statement. The first witness, Charles W. Arndt, a tax collector for the United States, told jurors that Al Capone failed to file any tax return at all during for the years 1924 through 1929. Thus begins the famous trial of Al Capone. In this two part story, I will recount the trial from the perspective of a juror. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Mad Sam DeStefano Chicago Outfit Part 2 Mar 19, 2017

“Mad Sam” was truly a crazy sadist. He liked to muse about feeding his victims to victims to the pigs. He drove to pig farms just to watch them for hours. A government witness, Charles Crimaldi, claimed DeStefano made his wife Anita take his gun and put the end of the barrel in her mouth, then demanded that she pull the trigger. When she pulled the trigger and the gun didn’t go off, DeStefano began to laugh and told her that he had removed the bullets. He would tell this story over and over again to his mob associates for amusement. FBI Agent William “Bill” Roemer wrote that the Bureau assigned him to visit and question “Mad Sam” in his home. Agent Roemer said DeStefano would walk down the stairs in his pajamas, with his penis hanging out. The visiting agents would drink coffee and they noticed it had a unique taste. “Mad Sam” claimed the coffee was made from special Italian coffee beans. Roemer learned that DeStefano had been urinating in the coffee. A story is told that DeStefano forced a stranger into his car at gunpoint, took the man to his house. he forced his wife to perform oral copulation on this stranger. We know this because afterward, the man went to the nearest police station and reported the incident. Sam brought his brothers, Mario and Michael into the Outfit loan sharking business. Mario was an excellent associate because he was almost as sick as “Mad Sam.” Michael was not cut out for this business and developed a heroin addiction. DeStefano’s Outfit bosses ordered Sam to kill his brother, Michael. On September 17th, 1955 the Chicago Police received a call with the location of a fresh body in a car’s trunk. The cops found a dead Michael, he was shot in the body, but not in the head. The body was cleaned up and was made sure to be found early. It was during this time, the early 1960s that a young jewel thief and enforcer named Tony Spilotro was coming up in the Outfit. “Mad Sam” took Spilotro in as a juice loan collector. Mad Sam claimed he personally mentored Tony Spilotro. The first scene in Casino is a man with his head in a vise as the Joe Pecsi character questions him. Two men named Billy McCarthy and Jimmy Miraglia had stepped out of line because they committed a triple murder in the Outfit neighborhood of Elmwood Park. In May of 1962, the Outfit bosses gave Mad Sam’s collector Spilotro the job of killing McCarthy and Miraglia along with Charles Nicoletti. Spilotro was friends with Frank Cullotta and he got Cullotta to set up McCarthy. They kidnapped 24-year-old Billy McCarthy. The men started torturing McCarthy to find out the name of his accomplice. Spilotro had placed the man’s head in an industrial vice and started squeezing it tighter and tighter. Suddenly, McCarthy’s eye popped completely out of its socket. At that point, he revealed his accomplice’s name. Later the killers found Jimmy Miraglia and they merely killed him. Years later, Tony Spilotro told this story to his friend Frank Cullotta. Spilotro was impressed by Nicoletti’s reaction to the gory scene: “Boy, this is a heartless guy. He was eating pasta when Billy’s eye popped out.” Frank Cullotta tells a story about the one time that he was with “Mad Sam.” Frank thinks that he just needs to talk to his lawyer, so they go to the lawyer’s office. Sam started yelling and screaming at this lawyer because he did not take care of a guy on a case like he said that he would. He started calling him names, grabbing him, and threatening the lawyer. “Mad Sam” zips down his pants and starts to urinate on the lawyer. The lawyer thanks “Mad Sam” for not killing him on the way out. Frank cannot believe that this really happened. “Mad Sam” had one the biggest, if not the biggest loan shark business in the 50-60s in Chicago. “Mad Sam” enjoyed his line of work. The fact that he was probably bringing in around a million dollars a year on “juice” loans, was not his favorite part. His favorite part was collecting the debts when people didn’t or couldn’t pay.

Mad Sam DeStefano Chicago Outfit Part 1 Mar 13, 2017

Sam “Mad Sam” DeStefano will become the Chicago Outfit’s most notorious loan shark and sociopathic killer. No less an authority than FBI agent and mob fighter, William F. Roemer, Jr., considered DeStefano to be the worst torture-murderer in the history of the United States. Samuel DeStefano, Jr. was born on September 13, 1909 in Streator, Illinois. Samuel DeStefano, Sr. was a laborer and later had a produce market. He and his wife Rosalie DeStefano (née Brasco), immigrated from Italy to the United States in 1903. Destefano, Sr., would rise in status and later a real estate salesman. Mad Sam’s father was not an Outfit member and would die of natural causes, in 1942, at age 77. His mother, Rosalie, was a housewife, who throughout her life was supported by the contributions of her children. She died in October 1960. In all, the DeStefanos had six children, four sons and two daughters. In the early 1900s the DeStefano family moved to Herrin, Illinois, where Sam Sr. worked in the local coal mine. After the labor-related turmoil surrounding the Herrin Massacre,(this was a coal mine strike and union members killed several strikebreakers), the DeStefano family moved north to Chicago’s Little Italy. By the age of 17, on September 12, 1926, Sam Jr. was arrested in Chicago as a fugitive for breaking out of jail. He became involved in gang activity and in July, 1927, several hundred Westside gang members showed up threatening violence against a police sergeant for arresting DeStefano and shooting DeStefano’s associate Harry Casgrovi. In November 1927, Chicago police arrested DeStefano and another gang member Ralph Orlando on charges of kidnapping and the rape of a 17-year-old girl. DeStefano was found guilty of rape but was sentenced to only three years because the police arrived before DeStefano had actually raped the girl. In 1930, DeStefano joined the infamous Forty-Two Gang. This gang became a conduit for Sam and fellow gang members like future Outfit boss, Salvatore “Sam” Giancana to move up into Al Capone’s Chicago Outfit. The Outfit would hire gang members as beer runners or truck drivers and help fence their booty from various robberies and burglaries. Sam “Momo” Giancana had built a reputation as a skilled wheel man and became the first Forty-Two member to join the Outfit. He eventually became a protégé of Tony “Joe Batters” Accardo and Paul “The Waiter” Ricca. With his induction, Giancana was able to eventually bring a number of his fellow gang members like Mad Sam into the Outfit. Many former Forty-Two members like Joey Aiuppa would go on to rule the Outfit well into the 1970s. Al Capone’s bootlegging and gambling operations brought Mad Sam into the Outfit. In 1932, a policeman shot and wounded him during a grocery store robbery. DeStefano appeared at a hospital on Chicago’s West Side with bullet wounds, which he refused to explain. In 1933, DeStefano got his first taste of the big time when he was was convicted of a Wisconsin bank robbery. The judge sentenced him to 40 years in prison. But after 11 years, the Wisconsin Governor released in him in December 1944. DeStefano got a job in a printing plant but he was soon returning to prison for possessing counterfeit sugar ration stamps. This was an opportune sentence, because while in the Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary, DeStefano became close to Outfit members Paul Ricca and Louis Campagna. DeStefano was released in 1947 and the Outfit helped him obtain a civil service job in Chicago as a garbage dump foreman. By the 1950s, DeStefano became one of the most well known loan shark operators in Chicago. he had cash left over from his Wisconsin bank robbery and he began investing in Chicago real estate. He bought a 24-suite apartment building and used the rent money as legitimate income to bribe local aldermen and other politicians. DeStefano soon became known as the most successful fixer in Chicago as he bribed city officials, prominent judges, and law enforcement officers.

Bob Berdella Serial Killer Part 4 Jan 23, 2017

L-R Aaron, Gary and Troy In this fourth and final episode of our interview with Troy Cole, we learn about Berdella’s frantic efforts to avoid the death penalty. First, he tries to plead guilty to one count of murder. The father of one victim attacks Berdella at a hearing. The prosecutor quickly moved and avoid Berdella from controlling any of the court procedures. He makes a last ditch attempt to save his house from state confiscation. Finally, a deal is struck and in exchange for the prosecutor not asking for the death penalty, Berdella agrees to cooperate and tell the authorities the names of all his victims reveal what he did with the bodies. Troy Cole and his main detective along with the Chief Prosecutor and trial prosecutor meet for hours with Berdella. He reveals in gleeful detail exactly what happened inside his house of horrors. he will explain all the codes in the torture logs he kept. In the end, Berdella goes to the Missouir State Pen for several life terms. In a few years, after creating as much administrative haqvoc as possible, Berdella dies from a heart attack in 1992. the ironic fact about his death was he had written to a Kansas City minister and complained many times about how the Prison authorities withheld his heart medicine. He was taken back to his home town of Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio and buried with his father. Click here to see gravesite. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Bob Berdella Serial Killer – Part 3 Jan 17, 2017

In Part 3, Troy Cole relates how his detectives encountered problems trying to identify the young men in the photos found in the home of Bob Berdella. Most of these men had lived lives estranged from long time friends and even family. By the end of the first week into this investigation, a whole special squad was formed with detectives from Homicide, Sex Crimes and Vice. They set up a command post inside the show-up room. The word got around that this was a very high profile case with lurid details. Cops, having a morbid curiosity like most folks, wanted to learn all the gory details. Troy soon found that from high level commanders down to the newest rookie all had a desire to see the torture photographs the detectives found. Troy consulted with his commander, Lt. Col. Bob Jenkins, and they decided to move the command post to a secret location to keep away the distraction of the curious. They found a large room at a little used police building. Once some phone lines were installed, the entire squad moved. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Bob Berdella Serial Killer – Part 2 Jan 07, 2017

In episode 2, Troy Cole tells about the search of this chamber of horrors. The house was in complete disarray, kind of like a teenage kid’s room. When Bob got done with something, he just threw it down. Except for the torture logs which were found on the second floor. An interview of Christopher Bryson revealed he had been kept captive and injected with several unknown substances that created burning and stinging sensations. As the officers searched the second floor they found a room exactly as the room described by Bryson. The bed had tethers on the headboard and they had been burned through exactly as Bryson had described how he made his escape. In another bedroom, under a mattress, a searching detective found an envelope containing a couple of hundred Polaroid photographs.In these photos, Cole found images of several other young men. To his horror, these men seemed to be tethered to the same bed and were being tortured. Other detectives find a skull on the first floor and in close proximity they found a bag of loose teeth. At this time, Cole heads home to watch the NCAA. shortly after, he is called back to the scene because the searchers were finding more evidence that this was a homicide scene. One of the Polaroids contained human body hanging from a basement rafter that had be be dead. Cole explains that this body showed signs of liver in the lower extremities. More homicide detectives are called in and subjected to the inch by inch search of a filthy, stinky, gross chamber of horrors. These detectives worked until 2:00 AM Easter Sunday morning. A forensic pathologist is called out and he examines the skull and loose teeth. The pathologist concludes this skull is not an old artifact or fake and is probably a recent death. The next morning Cole and CSI Captain Ron Canady examine the yard as other detectives return to searching the interior. Capt. Canady notes there is a place in the yard with the ground disturbed. this plot is about the size of a grave. He calls in a back hoe and the second shovelful reveals a human skull with the hair still attached. At that time, Cole thinks that all those young men he had seen in the Polaroids were dead and buried in the back yard. Troy Cole realizes he is now into one of the biggest criminal cases he has ever worked. The Crime Lab Supervisor, Gary Howell, takes over the crime scene. He calls in a group of recruits from the academy to dig the yard up with hand shovels. To go to the store click here To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Bob Berdella Serial Killer – Part 1 Jan 07, 2017

L-R Aaron, Gary and Troy This is the first of a 4-part series of interviews with retired Kansas City Police Department Sergeant Troy Cole. On April 2, 1988, Homicide Sergeant Troy Cole was preparing to leave work and looking forward to watching his Oklahoma Sooners play Arizona in the NCAA tournament that night. He received a call from the police dispatcher that a naked man wearing a dog collar and leash was claiming he had been kidnapped and tortured. A uniformed officer, Larry Lewis, had requested the Crimes Against Person’s Unit Supervisor be notified. Sgt. Cole sent 2 Sex Crimes detectives, Ashley Hurn and Darwin Dupree, out to investigate. Shortly after, Detective Hurn called Sgt. Cole and said this looked like it might be a real kidnapping and crime and the suspect was a Bob Berdella. Most police officers encountering this kind of scene will approach skeptically until the evidence proves this is not just a falling out of lovers. Note – if you don’t like it that cops are skeptical when confronted with this street scenario, go out and work the streets and then come back and talk. 4315 Charlotte The naked man, Christopher Bryson, points out a nearby house, 4315 Charlotte St., and claims that is the house where he was held captive by a man named Bob. Det. Hurn sends Mr. Bryson to a nearby hospital and returns to his office to prepare a search warrant for the house. Police Officer Cindy Cherry is left to guard the home when a man drives up and asks what is going on. Officer Cherry learns this is the owner of the home Bob Berdella. He is placed under arrest for forcible sodomy based on Bryson’s allegations. While Sgt. Cole will get to watch his favorites, the Oklahoma Sooners, defeat Arizona, what seemed to start as a simple gay lovers quarrel will soon dominate Troy Cole’s life for several months. In the next episode, Sgt. Cole tells how his team will uncover evidence that will force him to merely hear the reports of how the Kansas Jayhawks defeat his Sooners for the NCAA championship on April, 4, 1988. Sgt. (Ret.) Troy Cole and former KC Star and now Washington Post reporter, Tom Jackman, published an account of this case, the Rites of Burial. To go to the Store click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Janitor In a Drum – Part 2 Dec 19, 2016

Korner Sandwich in 2016 In this last episode of 2016, Retired Chicago P.D. Detective Jim Padar tells how he learned the real story behind why Chicago Outfit associates Samuel Marcello and Joseph Grisafe were killed. He also reveals how they learned about the subjects who placed the bodies in the drum and what happened to those men. Read this story and many other great cop stories from the mouths of the men how lived the job, Jim Padar and his son, Chicago cop Jay Padar by clicking here. To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Janitor In a Drum – Part 1 Dec 12, 2016

In our last episode we told a story about how just before Thanksgiving day in 1973, Chicago Outfit associates Samuel Marcello and Joseph Grisafe parked in front of a fire hydrant at Taylor & Western on the west side of Chicago. They would enter the Korner Sandwich Shop just down the block and never be seen again, until the next summer. A month later in January , Sam Rantis, the sandwich shop owner, was found in the trunk of his car at O’Hare International Airport, dead. On a hot July night, 6 months later, Chicago Homicide Detective, Jim Padar and his partner will be assigned to go investigate a body in a drum. In the first of 2 episodes, now retired Det. Padar will tell about how he and his son, Chicago Police Officer Jay Padar, collaborated to tell this and many other real stories of life on the Chicago Police Department. Additionally, Jim will recount his first persons observations of that night and explain how he investigated what he called the Janitor in a Drum case. Read this story and many other great cop stories from the mouths of the men how lived the job, Jim Padar and his son, Chicago cop Jay Padar by clicking here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click here, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Angelo Lonardo – Cleveland Mob – Part 2 Nov 08, 2016

In the Cleveland mob war the Danny Greene gang (Danny was backed by mob associate and teamster John Nardi who had been mad because he thought he should be boss over Licavoli) the city experienced almost 40 car bombings. Nardi was killed on May 17, 1977 by a car bomb in the parking lot of the Teamster Hall in Cleveland. After eight failed attempts to kill Greene, the Cleveland mob boss, Jack Licavoli contracted Ray Ferritto to assassinate him. First Ferritto killed Bill McDuffee, Greene’s right hand man. The next try was for Greene. While Greene was inside a building with his car in the parking lot, Ferritto and Ronald Carrabbia planted a box bomb inside a bomb car, they parked the car next to Greene’s. When Greene came out was entering his car, Carabbia set off the bomb, killing Greene. Ferritto later heard that the Cleveland crime family wanted him dead, so he flipped and made a deal with the authorities. The building where this all took place is called “Brainard Place” and still stands today. It can be easily seen as you enter/exit the Interstate-271 Exit 32 ramps. In the aftermath of the conflict, many Cleveland Mafiosi, including the boss, Licavoli, were convicted of various crimes. After Licavoli was sent to prison for the murder of Danny Greene in 1982, Angelo Lonardo, the son of Prohibition mob boss Joseph Lonardo, took control of the Cleveland crime family. He led the family until 1984 when he was convicted of running a drug ring and was sentenced to life in prison. He then became an informant, making him the highest-ranking Mafia turncoat up to that time. During these turbulent times, the FBI in Kansas City was tapping phones and building a case against the Chicago, Milwaukee, Kansas City and Cleveland mobs for skimming from Las Vegas casinos. In the subsequent trials, Angelo “Big Ange” Lonardo confirmed what the wiretaps had demonstrated, and Maishe Rockman had told him. It must have been extra tough to testify against his brother-in-law, Mashie Rockman. He will testify that a man named Allen Glick went to Frank Peter Balistrieri, a mob boss in Milwaukee, and asked for his influence to get a 62 million dollar Teamster pension fund loan. Balistrieri asked Nick Civella in Kansas City to get the cooperation of Kansas City Teamster boss Roy Lee Williams and for Milton Rockman to use his relationship with Cleveland Teamster president Jackie Presser and Chicago influenced Allen Dorman of the Teamsters to get loan approval. The loan was approved, and Glick bought the Stardust, The Hacienda, the Frontier and the Marina casinos. Soon, Chicago installed lefty Rosenthal inside the Stardust, and at least 100,000 a month started flowing to these four mob families. Big Ange testified that Rockman was the pickup man for the Cleveland share. This share was as much as $40,000 monthly, with Lonardo getting $10,000 monthly. Teamsters Jackie Presser and Roy Williams received about $1,500.00 a month. Lonardo alleges that Milwaukee and Kansas City mobs align with the Chicago Outfit. Cleveland is aligned with the Genevose Family in New York City. Big Ange will get out of prison and return to live openly his last years in Cleveland. After leaving the witness protection program, Angelo Lonardo lived quietly in northeast Ohio until his death in March of 2006 at the age of 95. He remains one of the most significant figures in the history of the American Mafia. To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Angelo Lonardo – Cleveland Mob – Part 1 Nov 01, 2016

Angelo Lonardo Angelo Lonardo “Big Ange” In the 1980s, the FBI recorded Cleveland Mob Underboss, Joey Gallo, “Angelo Lonardo is probably one of the most respected guys in the whole United States.” Gallo went on to state, “He’s really the kind of guy we needed in this town a long time ago, but you know, nobody ever listened to him because… he don’t express himself… But out of everybody that’s left, this guy commands a lot of respect… I respect him not only because I have to because, I’m telling you, he’s a great guy.” Even police detectives and F.B.I. agents had a certain respect for Lonardo. “To me, he was almost like the movie version of The Godfather,” a policeman commented. “He was always the gentleman, not a tough street rat. He was someone who recognized us as people in the same general line of work – on an opposing team, of course.” Like KC Underboss Tuffy DeLuna, Lonardo maintained respect for the police. When detectives would arrive at his home to execute a search or arrest warrant, Lonardo and his wife would treat them like guests even inviting them to sit and have coffee. I was part of a search warrant team at DeLuna’s house and he did the same thing. In 1982, Lonardo was charged in a major drug ring operated by Joey Gallo and others. Strike Force prosecutor Donna Congeni was impressed with Lonardo’s demeanor in the court room. “He was the epitome of class,” she once remarked. She later said, “Because of his years of careful training in the art of secrecy and insulation, with meetings held in back rooms and decisions made with nods and coded phrases, our case against Angelo Lonardo was difficult to prove.But once drug ring leader and informant Carmen Zagaria testified about Lonardo’s methods, the jury could see his power and control.” As a result of sentences handed down by U.S. District Court Judge John Manos, Angelo Lonardo, Joe Gallo and several others would be destined to life behind federal bars. Lonardo survived the most hazardous pitfalls of Mafia involvement – mob bullets and prison. Through a lifetime of earning money from criminal and legitimate enterprises, he had spent only eighteen months incarcerated. After his incarceration for the narcotics conviction in 1983, F.B.I. agents began visiting Lonardo and offered deals in exchange for his testimony. They promised to get him out of prison on an appeal bond. Lonardo had inside knowledge of the Midwest mob’s skimming operation in Las Vegas. In August of 1983, the government brought Lonardo to Kansas City to testify before the U.S. grand jury investigating this skimming from several Las Vegas casinos. Lonardo refused to testify, despite an offer of immunity and a judicial order. Soon thereafter, Lonardo must have been weighing his options. He is looking at life in prison, He had an appeal pending but after that was denied, he quietly slipped away to a prison pay phone and called the agent who had visited him. He had made a painfully tormenting decision that would have far-reaching effects throughout the national underworld. “Are you still there?” he quietly asked. At age 77, the highest ranking Mob boss who ever came over broke the code of Omerta and became a government witness in the Las Vegas skimming trials. Senator Nunn: Thank you, Senator Roth. Mr. Lonardo, why don't you proceed. Mr. Lonardo: My name is Angelo Lonardo. I am 77 years old, and I am a member of the La Cosa Nostra. I am the former underboss of the Cleveland organized crime family. I became a member of La Cosa Nostra in the late 1940's, but have been associated with the organization since the late 1920's. When I was "made" or became a member of La Cosa Nostra, I went through an initiation ceremony. I later learned that to be proposed for membership in La Cosa Nostra, you would have to have killed someone and stood up to the pressure of police scrutiny. Today, you do not have to kill to be a member, but just prove yourself worthy by keeping your mouth shut or by being a "stand-up" guy.

Murder Incorporated – Part 3 Oct 25, 2016

After the deaths of the Mangano brothers, Costello pushes Anastasia as the new boss of that family. The Commission confirmed Anastasia’s ascension to be boss of the renamed Anastasia family. To take control of the Luciano family, Genovese needed to kill Frank Costello. However, Genovese could not kill Costello without also eliminating Anastasia. To do that, Genovese needed allies. Frank Costello Vito Genovese used Anastasia’s brutal behavior against him. The behavior that had been useful to the New York mob was used by Genovose to portray Anastasia as an unstable killer who would bring extra bring law enforcement pressure on the Cosa Nostra. Genovese claimed that Anastasia had been selling memberships to his crime family for $50,000, a clear violation. The famous mob turncoat, Joseph Valachi, testified that Anastasia had been losing large amounts of money betting on horse races, making him even more unpredictable and brutal. This set the scene for Anastasia’s underboss, Carlo Gambino, to take sides and establish himself as a boss. Genovese offered Gambino the leadership of Anastasia’s family in return for his help. Genovese also received approval from Meyer Lansky. Genovese could not kill Anastasia without Lansky’s support. Lansky had developed a gambling business in Cuba and when Anastasia tried to get a piece of this action, Lansky refused. When Anastasia started his own casino racket in Cuba, Lansky threw his support to Genovese. Genovese then makes a move on Costello. On May 2, 1957, gunman Vincent Gigante shot and wounded Costello outside his apartment building. Although the wound was superficial, it persuaded Costello to relinquish power to Genovese and retire. Genovese now controlled what is now called the Genovese crime family. Joseph Bonanno would later credit himself with arranging a sitdown where he kept Anastasia from immediately taking Genovese to war in response. Five months later, on the morning of October 25, 1957, Anastasia entered the barber shop of the Park Sheraton Hotel at 870 7th Avenue (now the Park Central Hotel, on 56th Street and 7th Avenue) in Midtown Manhattan. Anastasia’s driver parked the car in an underground garage and then took a walk outside, leaving Anastasia unprotected. As Anastasia relaxed in the barber chair, two men—scarves covering their faces—rushed in, shoved the barber out of the way, and fired at Anastasia. After the first volley of bullets, Anastasia allegedly lunged at his killers. However, the stunned Anastasia had actually attacked the gunmen’s reflections in the wall mirror of the barber shop. The gunmen continued firing and Albert Anastasia finally fell to the floor, dead. Initially, the NYPD concluded that the Anastasia hit had been arranged by Genovese and Gambino, and Joe Gallo it was carried out by a crew led by “Crazy Joe” Gallo of the Profaci family. At one point, Gallo boasted to an associate of his part in the hit: “You can just call the five of us the barbershop quintet.” This ends the long and brutal life of the man known as the Lord High Executioner of the New York Mob. Thanks to Wikipedia for help. To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Murder Incorporated – Part 2 Oct 18, 2016

To reward Anastasia’s loyalty, Luciano placed him and Louis “Lepke” Buchalter, the nation’s leading labor racketeer, in control of the Syndicate’s enforcement arm, Murder, Inc. This was a group of Jewish and Italian killers that operated out of the back room of Midnight Rose’s, a candy store owned by mobster Louis Capone in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn. Some experts claim Louis Buchalter Sentencing Murder Inc. may have executed over 500 persons. Lepke and many other members of Murder, Inc., eventually were prosecuted for some of these murders, while Anastasia was never prosecuted for his Murder Inc. role. Some even doubt that he even was involved, since he was the Underboss of a family during this time and he would have merely ordered the murders. As a cover, Anastasia claimed that he was a “sales representative” for the Convertible Mattress Corporation in Brooklyn. On June 7, 1936, Luciano was convicted on 62 counts of compulsory prostitution. On July 18, 1936, Luciano received a 30 to 50-year sentence in state prison. Vito Genovese became acting boss, but he was forced to flee to Italy in 1937 after being indicted on a 1934 murder. Frank Costello now became acting boss of the Luciano crime family. In May 1939, Anastasia allegedly ordered the murder of Morris Diamond, an official of a trucking union in Brooklyn. Diamond was a Teamsters Union official who had opposed mobster Louis Buchalter‘s attempts to maintain control of the Garment District in Manhattan. With the 1941 arrest of Myrder Inc. hitman, Abe Reles, on murder charges, law enforcement began to take down Murder, Inc. Reles was a gang leader from Brownsville, Brooklyn who had been supplying Anastasia and Murder, Inc. with hired killers. To escape a death sentence, Reles volunteered to testify against Anastasia and others. His testimony convicted seven members of Murder Inc. Reles also had information that could implicate Anastasia two particular murders. Anastasia offered a $100,000 reward for Reles’ murder. On November 12, 1941, Reles was being guarded in a room in the Half Moon hotel in Coney Island during an ongoing trial. Abe Reles was found dead on a restaurant roof adjacent to the hotel. Specualtion was that the law enforcement guards were paid off to turn the backs. The evidence appeared to indicate Reles had tied together sheets and fell as he attempted to slide down and escape. In the spring of 1942, Anastasia allegedly ordered the murder of an associate named Anthony Romeo. Like Reles, Romeo was going to testify and implicate Anastasia in several murders. However shortly after, Romeo’s body was discovered near Guyencourt, Delaware. During World War II, Anastasia purportedly originated the plan to use mafia members on the New York Waterfront to protect against German sabotage and to obtain the cooperation of the Sicilian mafia to help allied troops as they invaded. In return, Anastasia orchestrated a deal to obtain lighter treatment for Luciano while he was in prison, and after the war, a parole. In 1942, Anastasia joined the U.S. Army. Attaining the rank of technical sergeant, Anastasia trained soldiers to be longshoremen. In 1943, as a reward for his military service, The Untied States Army made sure he was granted citizenship. In 1944, Anastasia was honorably discharged from the Army. In 1948, Anastasia bought a dress making factory in Hazleton, Pennsylvania and left his waterfront activities in the control of his brother Anthony. In 1951, the U.S. Senate summoned Anastasia to answer questions about organized crime at the Kefauver Hearings. Anastasia refused to answer any questions. Despite being a mob power in his own right, Anastasia was nominally the underboss of the Mangano crime family under boss Vincent Mangano. During his 20-year rule, Mangano had resented Anastasia’s close ties to Luciano and Costello. Mangano was particularly irked that Luciano and Costello obtained Anastasia’s services without first seeking Mangano’s permission....

Murder Incorporated – Part 1 Oct 12, 2016

Long before Albert Anastasia forms Murder Incorporated in 1919, he and his brothers arrived in New York City, working on a freighter. Jumping ship, the brothers stayed in the United States, working as longshoremen on the Brooklyn waterfront. It was not long before Anastasia was convicted of murdering a brother longshoreman, George Turino, as the result of a quarrel. Anastasia was sentenced to death and sent to Sing Sing State Prison Charles “Lucky” Luciano in Ossining, New York to await execution. Due to a legal technicality, however, Anastasia won a retrial in 1922. Because four of the original prosecution witnesses had disappeared in the meantime, Anastasia was released from custody in 1922. Anastasia was convicted of illegal possession of a firearm and sentenced to two years in prison in 1923. During the 1920s, Anastasia had become a top leader of the International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA), controlling six union local chapters in Brooklyn. Anastasia allied himself with Giuseppe “Joe the Boss” Masseria, a powerful gang leader in Brooklyn. Anastasia soon became close associates with future Cosa Nostra bosses Joe Adonis, Charles “Lucky” Luciano, Vito Genovese, and Frank Costello. In what would become a pattern, in 1928, Anastasia was charged with a murder in Joe the Boss Masseria Brooklyn, but the witnesses either disappeared or refused to testify in court. In 1930, Lucky Luciano finalized his plans to take over the organized crime rackets and form a National Crime Syndicate in New York. Luciano plotted to kill the two old-line Mafia factions headed by Masseria and Salvatore Maranzano. Luciano joined with Anastasia, Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel in the plot. Anastasia reportedly assured Luciano that he would kill everyone for Luciano to reach the top. Anastasia knew his future as a mobster was assured if Luciano’s plans were completed and he created the National Crime Syndicate. Luciano then secretly gave his support to Maranzano. Luciano lured Masseria to a meeting at a Coney Island, Brooklyn restaurant. During their meal, Luciano excused himself to go to the restroom. As soon as Luciano was gone, Anastasia, Vito Genovese, Joe Adonis, and Bugsy Siegel rushed into the dining room and shot Masseria to death. No one was ever indicted in the Masseria murder. In Maranzano’s subsequent reorganization of New York’s mafia into its current Five Families, Anastasia was appointed underboss of the Vincent Mangano, crime family which will become the modern Gambino crime family. In September 1931, Maranzano was himself murdered and Luciano became the preeminent mobster in America or Boss of Bosses. To avoid future power struggles and turf disputes, Luciano established the National Crime Syndicate, consisting of the major family bosses from around the country and the so-called “five families” of New York. The Syndicate was meant to serve as a deliberative body to solve disputes, carve up and distribute territories, and regulate lucrative illegal activities such as racketeering, gambling, and bootlegging (which came to a close with the repeal of Prohibition in 1933). The Italian-American Mafia had their own body, known as the Commission. Anastasia’s Murder Incorporated will become the enforcement arm of the Commission. Thanks to Mafia Wiki for help with this account of events. To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Red Wemette and the Chicago Outfit Oct 02, 2016

William “Red” Wemette was an FBI informant who testified against against the most feared and dangerous Chicago Outfit killers of modern times. I must note that Red was not the usual infomant but more a contract agent. He was not providing information as a trade to get out of a criminal charge, he was gathering information as a public service. He was paid, but this work was so dangerous, the pay was minimal compared to the risk and time involvement required. In this exciting interview Red Wemette calls in from an undisclosed location in a warmer climate (his words) and recounts how he got started as an undercover contract agent for the F.B.I. He explains how he was not trying to inform his way out of a criminal case, he just saw the arrogance and brutishness of the Chicago Outfit and wanted to help stop them. Red recently released a biography of his exploits in a book titled “Nobody Cares and What I did About It! The Red Wemette Story of the Chicago Outfit” through Joshua Tree Publishing in Chicago, IL. Red operated a pornography shop in Chicago and in Chicago if you are involved in any grey area business like a porn shop, you must pay a “street tax” to the outfit. Red was so angry about this interference with his business that he contacted the FBI and agreed to wear a wire and allow a hidden video camera to be installed in his office have his discussions with the mobsters recorded. Red reveals the Outfit Capo who was to receive his street tax money was the notorious Joseph “Lumpy or Joey the Clown” Lombardo. He met with FBI agents in 1971 at the Lion House in the Lincoln Park Zoo and agreed to become a Hidden Camera contract agent and provide information on Chicago Mob activity and figures. Wemette had video cameras concealed in his apartment that captured his regular meetings with organized crime figures. Frank “the German” Schweihs One of the most dangerous killer ever produced in Chicago was Frank “The German” Schweihs. “The German” took a liking to Red and often showed up at his office telling stories into the hidden recording equipment. Click here to see a news story that contains some of that hidden video footage. Wemette has been a key witness in a number of federal trials of mobsters and other Chicago area crime figures ending with the well known and important Family Secrets trials. If you have ever wanted to see what it is like to live on the wild side—all from the safety and security of your own armchair, listen to this interview and then read Nobody Cares and What I Did About It! The Red Wemette Story of The Chicago Outfit. To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Richard Grissom Jr.: Apartments Painted and Girls Murdered – Part Two Sep 26, 2016

The Investigation and Arrest In Part 2 of this horrifying story, retired detectives, Joe Langer and Tom Robinson tell about the Theresa Brown subsequent man hunt for Grissom. After he escaped arrest in the nearby town of Lawrence, Kansas, Grissom steals a car and drives to Corpus Christi, Texas on the Gulf of Mexico. He was a body builder and attractive man who could be quite charming to young women. While Kansas City apartment complex residents lived in fear and changed their locks, Grissom was living it up in the Texas beach resort community known as Padre Island. He got lonely and called an old girl friend in Chicago. By then, the national news had picked up the murder investigation and manhunt story. She had seen this Christine Rusch and had talked with other mutual friends in Kansas City. She was smart enough to not alert him and kept him calling back for several days while she alerted the Kansas City Metro Squad investigation team. Langer and Robinson were instructed to fly to Padre Island. Grissom begged the girl to come to Texas and she agreed to help set up an arrest situation. Hear the inside story of a dramatic arrest at a Texas airport. Joan Marie Butler To purchase premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally- Part 7 Sep 01, 2016

Prison Break The Department of Justice sentencing guidelines send Mac to the famous maximum security federal prison at Leavenworth, Kansas. Here, he has a fateful meeting with another skyjacker named Gordon Trapp Brocknell. And, just when you think it is all over for Martin Joseph McNally, the case takes another unusual twist at the Super Max Penitentiary in Marion Illinois. McNally and his new friend and fellow skyjacker Garret Brock Trapnell wait in the prison yard while Barbara Oswald, a women in love with Trapnell, hijacks a helicopter and forces the pilot to fly to the prison. Mac and Trapnell see and hear a helicopter in the sky. As the chopper pilot, Allen Barklage, descends, gunfire explodes and the female passenger is killed. The chopper goes back up and lands outside the prison. Mac tells how Trapnell just collapsed, while he and another prisoner frantically try to get back inside the prison exercise yard. As they climb back down off the last roof, a guard spots them. Now, you think this story is over, not yet. Trapnell had one more escape attempt in him. The daughter of Barbara Oswald, Robyn Oswald will attempt to hijack a plane as it lands in Kansas City. She uses a bomb looking device to force the plane to divert to Marion, Illinois. Here, she demands the release of her mother’s lover, Gordon Brock Trapnell. Martin McNally Mac tells how he goes on to be a “jailhouse lawyer” helping inmates with legal research and appeals. Finally, Mac is released after 37 years. He has been out on two life paroles and totally square for about 6 years. Mac was helped with housing by a prison ministries program and he subsequently helped with counselling other newly released inmates. He has an upcoming hearing to be finally released from his parole. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 6 Aug 24, 2016

Arrest and Trial Of McNally Martin J. McNally in Lineup Shortly after, Mac arrives back home with a new plan. He is going to skyjack another plane and ask for a million dollars this time. As Mac makes contacts with his criminal associates, one of them alerts a Detroit police officer who passes this along to the F.B.I. This contact agrees to work with the Bureau and wears a wire trying to get Mac to implicate himself on tape as well as reveal his plan for the next skyjacking. The F.B.I. puts a full court press surveillance on Mac over the next couple of days. After a meeting with the wired up informant, the F.B.I. makes the arrest and searches his house in the Detroit suburb of Wyandotte, Michigan. The U. S. Attorney returns Mac to St. Louis for trial because that is where the crime occurred. Mac retains a lawyer but the evidence is very strong. McNally’s attorney appeals on the basis the F.B.I. entered his home prior to obtaining a search warrant. After hearing compelling evidence this breach of the law may have occurred, the judge ruled against him. Mac settles in to serve two life terms for skyjacking. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 5 Aug 15, 2016

The Hunt for the Skyjacker Skyjacker Martin J. McNally continues telling how he lands safely in a farm field. He determines he is in Indiana by the license plates. After hiding over night, hearing helicopters come and go, he decides to make his way to the closest town. After a nearly being struck by a passing car, the local sheriff stops to check him out. Mac convinces the sheriff he has been visiting a friend in the area and after a fight with his brother, he is trying to return home. The law enforcement officer gives him a ride into Peru, Indiana where he checks into a local hotel.As he enters the sheriff’s car, he has a small pistol in his back pocket. Being confident he has fooled the sheriff, Mac pitches the Beretta .25 pistol into the weeds next to the road. While Mac is hiding in the local hotel, searchers find the clothes, his parachute and his gun. A local farmer finds the money. After a discussion with his son, the farmer turns in the money. Mac said if the man had kept the money, even if he gets caught, he would never have revealed he lost the money. After several calls back to Detroit trying to get a ride home, Walter Petlikowski answers and agrees to drive down. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 4 Aug 08, 2016

Skyjacking Interrupted Actual Parachute In Part 4, convicted skyjacker Martin J. McNally (“Mac”) relates how a local St. Louis man is drinking at the Lambert Airport Mariott Inn lobby bar. The bar patrons are watching this skyjacker drama live on a television. A patron abruptly leaves the bar with a comment something like, “hold my drink and keep watching, you’ll see something!” Mac has taken a lesson in how to strap on a parachute, received the 1/2 million cash in a leather American Airlines pouch, given several possible destinations to the Captain and ordered the plane to take off. As the aircraft taxis down the runway, the pilot yells American Airlines Mail Pouch back, “Oh my God, there is a car on the runway!” Mac feels a thump and the planes skids to a stop. With all the window shades closed for security, Mac becomes very tense. The flight crew assures him this is no plot to storm the plane and somebody has crashed into their nose gear. Mac directs the Captain to obtain another plane and have it parked next to his plane. The F.B.I. and American Airlines comply with the skyjacker’s orders. All the money, guns, parachutes and flight crew board the new plane. He has specified another Boeing 727 because he needs the rear stair for his mid-air exit. He directed the pilot to fly north from St. Louis toward Toronto. He ordered the plane to fly low over the Canadian airport so he could look out and verify they were over Canada. After that he requested the pilot to fly toward New York City. He reveals how he had trouble lowering the rear stairs and the plane had to slow down to 300 mph. After one last check of the altimeter and the heading, Mac orders the entire crew to stay up front. He closes the First Class curtain, walks back to the stairs and straps the 45-50 pounds of cash around his waist with a leather belt. You must listen to his ordeal of going down these stairs and finally letting go into the night. At this time, he does not have any idea where the plane is in relation to the ground. He has a thought they could be over Lake Michigan, but dismisses that with the thought that he is a good swimmer. He later learns that the weight change when he left the plane alerted the Captain he was gone. The pilot alerts the F.B.I. tracking plane and they mark the spot. As Mac falls he spins out control, he is able to find the rip cord and deploys the parachute. He feels a jerk in his leg as the money bag is affected by the chute opening. Listen to learn how Mac felt as he watched the money satchel fall away into the darkness. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 3 Aug 04, 2016

The Hijacking Our D. B. Cooper copycat, Martin J. McNally, continues with his fascinating account of a real life skyjacking. He has selected Lambert Field in St. Louis and has arrived at the gate. Mac gets on the plane and takes his seat. This plane is a Boeing 727 arriving from New York and proceeding on to Tulsa Oklahoma. When the Captain announces the descent into Tulsa, Mac takes his attache case and heads to the rear bathroom. Inside, he puts on a cheap wig and takes out his “grease gun.” He exits the bathroom and observes the M3 Grease Gun flight attendant has gone to the front of the plane. He frantically waves to get her attention and motions her to come to the back. As she arrives, he produces the gun. Mac instructs her to tell the captain the plane is to turn around and return to St. Louis. She does that and returns to the rear. The Captain announces they are returning to St. Louis because a passenger has requested this action. Because the passengers start to grumble and look around, Mac orders the stewardess to remove the rear seat passengers and seat them closer to the front, leaving several empty rows between himself and the passengers. He notices one man glaring at him and may have an idea about taking action. Mac stares him down and gives him a growl. The man quickly complies and moves to the front. This is just the beginning of a harrowing ride back to St. Louis and back into the air while American Airlines gathers up the $502,200.00 cash ransom Mac has demanded. We learn the odd number was part of his overall plan to bury the $500,000.00 and use the $2200.00 as walking around money until he can return for the ransom. A very unexpected event will happen as Mac gets the money and starts to make his getaway. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 2 Jul 31, 2016

The Preparation In the first episode, Mac told how he heard about the successful skyjacking of D. B. Cooper and started his own skyjacking plan. In this second episode of our interview with convicted skyjacker, Martin J. McNally, we learn about how Mac selected his target airport and airline. He believed that any airline would come up with the ransom demand. He recruited an old partner in crime, pool hustler Walter J. Petlikowski. Mac’s friend did not want to take part in the actual skyjacking, but he agreed to take Mac to the airport. Since Mac had lived in Detroit all his life, he eliminated that airport as a target. After several trips to nearby airline terminals (Chicago O’Hare, Indianapolis and Lambert Field in St. Louis) he selected Lambert Field because of its lack of security. M3 Grease Gun Mac made two attempts. On his first trip, he told Petlikowski to wait in a nearby bar and if he called, then the skyjacking was off and he was to pick Mac up at the airport. On that attempt, mac got in line for a flight and then noticed there was a magnetometer at the gate. He backed out. Mac said he considered just walking up to the ticket agent and taking them hostage then taking over the flight on the ground. He dropped that idea and called his partner. They returned to Detroit. For the second attempt he checked out the Lambert Field American Airlines gates and they did not have magnetometers or any other security. He purchased a ticket and returned a few days later. This time, he did not call Petlikowski at the nearby tavern. Mac passed through security and was in the air shortly. As the Captain announced they were about to land in Tulsa, he decided it was now or never. Mac had determined the bathroom was in the rear of the plane. He took his attache case into the bathroom, put on a wig and took out his gun. This was an assault type weapon he had altered to look like a “machine” gun or a grease gun. He had a hard time getting the Flight Attendant’s attention as she had gone to the front of the plane. Shortly after, she was given his ransom demand and the Captain announced they were returning to St. Louis. Listen in for more exciting details of this D. B. Cooper copy cat. Or, could he be D. B. Cooper? To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Al Capone – The Early Days Jul 18, 2016

Al Capone was born in the Brooklyn borough of New York City. He was a small time criminal and belonged to several different gangs including the powerful 5-Points Gang in lower Manhattan. He received his scar when he insulted a woman at a bar. Her brother, a gangster named Frank Gallucio, slashed Capone’s face. His boss in the 5-Points gang, Frankie Yale, made Capone apologize to Gallucio. In an ironic turn of events, Capone would later hire Gallucio as a bodyguard. Johnny Torrio Listen as the well known mob expert and author Bill Friedman tells the stories of Capone’s entrance into the Chicago underworld and subsequent rise. All these stories and many more can be found in his book, 30 Illegal Years to the Strip. In 30 Years, Mr. Freidman tells the stories of the beginnings and early history of the Chicago Outfit leaders, John Torrio, Al Capone and Frank Nitti. In this interesting and easy to read book, Mr. Freidman also recounts the history of Ben Siegal, Meyer Lansky, Charlie Luciano, Frank Costello, Joe Adonis and Moe Dalitz. At about 20 years of age, Capone had a bar fight. He believed he killed his opponent and sought refuge with a transplanted New Yorker, Johnny Torrio. Jim “Big Jim Colosimo had recruited New York mobster Torrio to Chicago. Torrio was helping to oversee Colosimo’s vast prostitution activities. James “Big Jim” Colisimo On May 11, 1920, unknown persons killed Big Jim Colosimo. Johnny Torrio took over his rackets. Capone was suspected of that murder. During the 1920s, the Torrio Italian-dominated gang would engage in a turf war with the North Side gang led by Dion O’Banion. For a time, a truce was maintained. By October, 1924, Torrio either arranged or approved the murder of O’Banion at his flower shop. Hymie Wiess and Bugs Moran took over O’Banion’s rackets. Wiess made his top priority, revenge for O’Banion’s murder. In January 1925, the Wiess/Moran faction ambushed Capone leaving him shaken but unhurt. Twelve days later, a similar attempt was made on Johnny Torrio. He was shot several times. Shortly after, Torrio handed control to the 26-year-old Al Capone. By this time prohibition was making everybody a lot of money. Capone became the owner of illegal breweries and a transportation network that reached to Canada. He also consolidated and enhanced the gang’s political and law-enforcement protection. Al Capone was more prone to violence than Torrio and he freely used this tactic to increase revenue. Capone henchman often blew up any speakeasy that refused to buy their illegal alcohol. The famous St. Valentine’s Day Massacre is often attributed to Capone, even though he was conveniently in Florida when that went down. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes click, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Martin J. McNally – Part 1 Jul 14, 2016

Several months back, Aaron and I posted an episode telling about a 1972 D.B. Cooper copycat skyjacker named Martin J. McNally. In 1972, D. B. Cooper inspired McNally and several others to skyjack passenger planes and use parachutes to escape. After posting this story, Martin McNally (“Mac”) was googling his own name and found my podcast episode about his escapade. He reached out by commenting in each episode comments section. Mac wrote that he thought our episodes were entertaining and funny, but we got a few facts wrong. I emailed him back and he agreed to a taped D. B. Cooper interview. I was surprised because I knew he had received 2 life sentences for Air Piracy. Mac said he had been released from Federal prison a few years back and he is on life parole. We packed up the recording equipment and drove to Mac’s residence a few hours away. He does not want to reveal where he lives and we agreed to hold that confidence. In this first episode, Mac tells us about his childhood and young adult life up to the time he gets serious about doing this skyjacking. He remembers the exact moment that he got the idea to skyjack a Martin J. McNally passenger plane. He was listening to a Detroit DJ talking about how D.B. Cooper got several hundred thousand dollars and disappeared. Mac said it was like a light bulb came on and he started planning to make his fortune from this crime. Could Martin J. McNally really be D.B. Cooper? Compare the photos, be your own judge. The F.B.I. thought he was at one time. To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes go to, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

F.B.I. Black Bag Jobs part 2 Jul 09, 2016

When Ed Tickel was installing F.B.I. wiretaps, he led a secret life as a burglar. He was the son of a respected FBI agent and well-liked by his coworkers. I found a report about this secret life in a book titled The Secrets of the FBI by investigative reporter Ronald Kessler. He was known as a guy who could defeat any lock, crack any safe and make any covert entry required. Many agents attended lavish parties held at his 5-acre horse farm in Virginia. They all supposed this lavish lifestyle that included Porsche automobiles was paid for by a unique lock he invented. he was the guy who worked on ensuring the Director’s home was burglar-proof. Ed Tickel led this secret life until one night on April 16, 1980, Earl Thorton, an FBI janitor, caught him while cleaning FBI Headquarters after hours. Like Frank Willis, the night he discovered the locks of the Watergate complex taped open, Earl Thorton stumbled into something that did not rock the nation, but it did rock the FBI. At 5:30 p.m. Earl Thornton opened the door to the Federal Credit Union on the eighth floor of FBI headquarters. He turned on the lights. Thornton was about to start vacuuming when he saw crouching behind a counter a stocky man with brown hair in front of an open safe. After a pause, the man behind the counter jumped up and yelled, “Freeze FBI!” Mr. Thorton was looking at Ed Tickel holding a pistol, and immediately behind him was an open safe door. Tickel would claim he had received a call for help at the Credit Union and while inside he saw this black man enter, and he was merely making an arrest. The problem with this story was he remained hidden behind the counter for several minutes until Mr. Thorton spotted him and more importantly, the purported person calling for help could never be produced. Tickel subsequently failed a polygraph test. When the FBI’s head polygraph examiner told Tickel he was not truthful, Tickel replied, ” I knew this would come down to a contest between experts, and I respect you very much.” In the examiner’s mind, Tickel admitted he was not telling the truth, and the polygraph examiner was correct in his interpretation. When this investigation was referred to the Department of Justice, John Hume, U.S. attorney, learned this was not the first FBI investigation of Ed Tickel. He found that Tickel had been investigated for using his FBI position to help a friend under investigation for a $200,000.00 jewelry store burglary and theft in North Carolina. Hume re-opened that case, and his investigation determined that Tickel’s credit card had been used in the area of this diamond theft at the time of this theft. He kept digging into Tickel’s activities and found he was suspected of many crimes. One strange crime was the misappropriation of government property, to be more precise, FBI radios. Ed Tickel was a member of Richard Petty’s pit crew in the late 1970’s early 80’s. He can be seen at the celebration of Petty’s 1979 Daytona 500 win! If you watch any video’s of the end of that race, you can see Ed on the hood of Petty’s car (the guy with the curly dark hair) as Richard drove the crew into Victory Lane. The radios mentioned earlier were used during some of the NASCAR races that Ed was a part of. These radios helped usher in the now standard two-way communications between drivers and crews during races and practice seen in NASCAR today. An investigation determined that Tickel had been selling stolen rings and loose diamonds aside from his activities in the credit union. He also sold stolen cars and stole two-way FBI radios for friends. Tickel was acquitted in federal court in Washington of burglarizing the FBI credit union. However, he pleaded guilty to having misappropriated the radios. After a nine-day trial, Tickel was also convicted in Alexandria, Va., of charges connected with a jewelry theft from a jewelry store — interstate transportation of stolen goods, making false statements, obstruction of justice, and tax evasion.

F.B.I. Black Bag Jobs Part 1 Jul 05, 2016

This show is about F.B.I. Black Bag operations and the men who do this. Without the skill of the “bag men” the important microphones would not have installed and the Mob control over the Tropicana and Stardust Casinos would never have been uncovered. In this episode, I tell about an FBI agent that went bad, Ed Tickel. In the 1970s, this agent made many surreptitious entries inside and outside the country. He was what is known as an expert in NDE (non destructive entry). He was a legend within the Bureau. One time, the story goes, he was sent to Tehran, Iran to break into our embassy to retrieve some hidden documents after the hostages were released. He was an expert lock picker. For some locations, the Bureau wanted to have their own key, in that case, the lock expert used a technique called lock impressioning. The first method of impressioning occurs by stealing the key and using a soft substance like clay or wax to make an impression of the key. A duplicate can be made from the impression. The other more difficult is known as “manipulation based impressioning” a key. Ed Tickel was an expert in this technique. The target lock manufacturer is identified and a blank key that fits that lock is purchased. The hard metal blank is then copied onto a softer metal. The bag man needs some time in front of the lock. He inserts the specially made blank and manipulates it to get an impression of the pin location and depth. The blank is withdrawn with almost unseen impressions of the lock pin locations. The locksmith uses an ultraviolet light or maybe a microscope to identify the pin locations. He then files away the pin areas creating a duplicate key. Ed Tickel once hid inside a large refrigerator box placed in front of the door in a highly traveled area to impression a key. He used this refrigerator box again to protect himself from a guard dog while he made a key impression of the front door lock of a mob guy’s business. In Kansas City we had three well known microphones installed. One was inside the Villa Capri tavern, the second was inside the law office of John Patrick Quinn and the third was inside the house of Josephine Marlo. The first two, being a business were relatively easy. Just watch the owners at home, in case they have a sudden notion to go back to the business. The third was at a private home located in a neighborhood populated by KC Mob boss Nick Civella and his friends and relatives. Our friend and sometimes guest, retired agent, Bill Ousely called this putting a microphone inside the Lion’s Den. Tickel and local the back bag expert conferred and came up with a plan. They created a telephone problem. They responded disguised as telephone repairmen to survey the residence and place a microphone inside the telephone. They realized the telephone mike was not placed close enough to any meetings. Listen for the rest of the story. Take a short survey and help us get a sponsor Gary To hear premium podcast click here. To rent Gangland Wire, the documentary, click here. To subscribe on iTunes go to, give me a review and I will send you a link to see the film for free.

Tropicana Casino Skimming Jun 24, 2016

In this episode, Tropicana Casino Skimming, Aaron and I talk about how KC boss Nick Civella used Joe Agosto to Frank “Lefty” Rosenthal infiltrate the Tropicana casino. I use the below actual wiretap audio to help tell the story. Nick Civella is concerned with the skimmers stealing and Civella wants a moratorium on all Tropicana skimming. The code names are: Carl DeLuna is Deluna Nick Civella is Zio or uncle Joe Agosto (Tropicana employee) is Caesar Carl Thomas (Tropicana employee )is Mr. C Don Shepard (Tropicana employee) is Pecoradu (Sicilian for Shepherd) Lefty Rosenthal is Crazy Joe Cusamano (Stardust emplyee)is Car Dealer Tony Spilotro (Chicago Outfit member) is Little T Diel Gustafason (Tropicana investor) is Hunter Jack Urich (Tropicana investor) is Transmission Joseph Agosto -Tropicana DELUNA: So we talked for, they talked for quite a long time, you know I’m not sticking my mouth in there too much but once in a while and in the final end, Zio (uncle) asked him what do you think happens to “C”? He says well, I think that maybe you should go ahead and declare this moratorium, go ahead and do it, uh, for whatever period of time. And Mr. Zio says well, I would be hard put if Little Joe re-, Caesar’s requesting this, to tell him not to, you know we’ll rely on Mr. “C” to tell us. AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: We asked him another question. We asked him if Tu Pecoradu (The Shepard) was capable of spotting any bad leakage. AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: He says he positively thinks so because if we used ‘im, this guy was cu noi-altri (with us) down at the big place with Crazy. AGOSTO: (unintelligible). DELUNA: He said we used him down there, he did a wonderful job, had him in both joints. The other one downtown. AGOSTO: right DELUNA: — You know had him in bo-, he said he did a good job. Yes, he is capable. DELUNA: Uh, we pushed on him that when he gets with you, when youse two gets together, that he should try to push you, we know how busy you are in and outta town — AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: But to try to get, to meet you once a week like we been talking about, you know? AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: Someplace away, not his joint or your joint. AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: Some little coffee, someplace else. All right. Also we’ll put it in his head to put in your head Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna that, look forward to, let’s see if we could work out the mechanics of a safe, discreet way that Caesar and Mr. DC” could sometime in the next couple of months have a nose to nose meeting with Mr. Zio (Mr. Uncle or Nick Civella). AGOSTO: I see. DELUNA: Let’s start thinking about it now. Let’s say the moratorium is going to last two, three months, whatever it last us, you know? AGOSTO: Umph. DELUNA: Four or whatever it is. Before the end of the mor-, moratorium a month or so before the end. AGOSTO: Umph. DELUNA: See if we could start thinking about it right now for a safe, discreet way for Mr. “C” and Mr. Caesar to meet with uh, Zio. AGOSTO: All right. (overlapping DELUNA: Okay. So he’s supposed to tell you these things AGOSTO: I like the arrangements. Tell Zio (Uncle) I wanna thank you urn, to have ah, make such decision because I think it’s a proper decision. DELUNA: here’s another thing that he said. He said that Caesar and Pecoradu (Shepard) AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: — get along real well together. They have a nice relationship with each other and he knew, that you two guys were together. AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: Uh, that is uh, Caesar and uh, Pecoradu (Shepard). AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: And he knew of some exchange of, of dialogue between you two — AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: And one of you said that this is uh, should be uh, a fifty million dollar joint or something like that. I forgot the words. AGOSTO: Right. DELUNA: And the Pecoradu (Shepard) answered yeah, but it’s got a thirty million dollar management. They’re not happy, truly happy with the management. AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: So Mr. “C” put the bum on Zio — AGOSTO: Yeah. DELUNA: — is it possible that Caesar could see his way c...

Milwaukee Mob Story – Part 2 Jun 21, 2016

In part 2, Aaron and I talk about the crime that our friend Schlecter, aka Joe Sharpino, did to get himself in witness protection. A woman named Sally Papia came from Chicago to Milwaukee and opened a nice club called Sally’s Steak House. She was the girl friend of a Chicago Outfit guy named Frank Buccieri. She was described as a raven haired firecracker who thought she was the queen bee of Milwaukee Organized Crime, because of her Chicago relationships. She hired three local mob associates and professional criminals to help run the club. Chicago Outfit guys would come into town and eat here, then never pay any respect to the Milwaukee mob boss, Frank Balistreri or “Fancy Pants.” Balistreri was known to call Sally a “wannabe in a fucking skirt.” Sally, the mob moll, hired a chef and paid his tuition at a good culinary school. He left shortly after to open his own restaurant, the Northridge Inn. She became enraged and hired a mob associate named Joseph Basile to burn it down. On December 29, 1974, Joseph Basile called Jacob Schlechter to set the Northbrook Inn on fire that very night. Schlechter did so in the company of his wife, who later contacted the police and began supplying information concerning the ongoing conspiracy. Following the fire, Schlechter went to Basile’s home to collect money for his work. Basile gave Schlechter $100 and told him that another $900 would be forthcoming from out of town. Schlechter asked what the fire was all about, and Basile told him that it was ordered because the chef had “screwed over” Sally Papia and because of a “personal grievance” Basile had against this chef. On New Year’s Eve, two days after the fire, Papia ran into the Chef at a local restaurant. Dropping a lighted match into an ash tray, Papia said, “I told you this was going to happen.” In early January, Schlechter asked Basile for the balance of the money due him for setting the fire. Basile deflected the request by advising Schlechter that they were getting pressure from Frank Balistrieri, who had lost some juke boxes in the Northbrook Inn fire, and that Schlechter should not tell anyone of his involvement in the fire. On January 7, a friend of Basile’s named Russell Enea approached Schlechter in Sally’s Steak House and asked him if he knew anything about the fire. Schlechter, complying with Basile’s order to keep mum, said that he did not. Three days later, apparently satisfied that Schlechter could be trusted, Baisile sent Enea again to approach Schlechter. Enea directed him to break the Chef’s wrists “so he never cooks again.” Enea said that “Max” would get in touch with Schlechter to talk about the job. Shortly thereafter, a friend of Sally’s named Max Adonnis contacted Schlechter and told him to kidnap the Chef and take him to a garage so that Adonnis and Enea could break his wrists personally. Adonnis explained to Schlechter that this Chef owed Sally Papia $5,000, that he had “screwed over Sally,” and “he wasn’t going to get away with it.” Adonnis gave Schlechter a slip of paper listing the Chef’s address, the make of his car and its license plate number. A week later, Adonnis passed along a photo of the Chef taken in Papia’s restaurant on which Papia’s handwriting appeared. During the next couple of weeks, Schlechter and Adonnis attempted to locate the Chef without success. On January 18, Enea, disturbed by the lack of progress, approached Schlechter and, gesturing with his wrists, inquired what Schlechter was doing about the chef. Schlechter recruited a friend named Holland and renewed his efforts to locate the Chef, but failed to do so. One evening, Adonnis saw the Chef working at another at a restaurant and obtained his new address, place of employment and license plate number. He passed this information on to Schlechter with instructions to do the job right away. After purchasing a baseball bat and two ski masks for use in the assault, Schlechter and Holland went to the Chef’s place of employment in the early mor...

Milwaukee Mob Story – Part 1 Jun 13, 2016

I met retired F.B.I. Agent Gary Magnesun in Las Vegas- he had been assigned to the Milwaukee Organized Crime Squad and then transferred to Las Vegas. In Milwaukee, he was assigned to the first Organized Crime squad. In Las Vegas, he was assigned to the investigation of Lefty Rosenthal and Tony Spilotro and the Stardust skim. When I went out to Vegas to interview folks for my film, he cooperated and gave me a great interview. Before I went out, I obtained his book Straw Man in which he tells about his career. I noted a name, Jacob Schlecter, and a description of 6’6′ 250s lbs and a leg breaker mentality. I remembered back to a narcotics investigation and surveillance we once did with the DEA. We had a man that fit this description but with a different name. I asked Gary about this and it seems this was the same guy. To go back, We had a tip and an informant that claimed he could buy weed from a mob guy named Joe Sharpino, who had a tow truck and worked out of a body shop on Independence Ave in Kansas City. The DEA could find no criminal record on this guy. We checked with the FBI and the Intelligence Unit records and sources and found this guy to be a mystery. The DEA were able to make a few small controlled buys thought the informant. The informant is reporting the guy has some connection with local La Cosa Nostra family. The guy was an independent two truck driver who mainly hung around the body shop. The body shop was not known to be a mob front. The informant was buying more and more weed, but in small quantities. He was laying the groundwork to introduce a female DEA agent in as a big buyer with lots of customers in the suburbs. We rented a nearby apartment and watched the body shop recording every license number that came and went. No mob guys were showing up. If this was a mob guy, he was not associated with any local mob folks, and if this was his real name, he had no criminal record. The informant would be seen going into the body shop and leaving, then contacting the DEA agent with a story about how Joe Sharpino was going to break somebody’s legs because they owed the body shop money. I had an informant who sold used cars. He offered Joe Sharpino a car repossession job that we set up. The guy was suspicious or something because he turned down the job. After a couple of weeks into this, the informant reported his tow truck driver had a heart attack. He went into St. Luke’s hospital for heart surgery. While he was recuperating, the informant relates that he has a Universal Life minister’s certificate and the supposedly mob guy wants the informant to marry him and his girl friend while he is still in the hospital. After several jokes about how to “wire up” the informant and record the ceremony, we let that go and the informant married the target and his new wife. Finally the guy got back to his tow truck and the body shop. The informant makes the introduction to the female agent and she makes her pitch. The guy agrees and claims he can supply 50 pounds of weed. By this time, the DEA rules dictate they must identify the guy in order to continue the investigation and put these kinds of resources into it. I asked the KCPD Fingerprint Unit supervisor to make personal calls to the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) at the FBI headquarters. This revealed some very odd results. The DEA took these results to the US Attorney’s office. They contacted the Witnesses Protection folks at the US Marshall’s. After a consultation and looking at our skimpy case, the US Attorney ordered the DEA to stand down. The guy disappeared shortly after. Next episode, I tell how he got put in the witness protection program. www.ganglandwire.com For tee shirts and premium episodes click on the Store. Click here to rent Gangland Wire, the documentary film, only $1.99.

Illegal Gambling before Las Vegas – Part 2 Jun 08, 2016

In his 30 Illegal Years to the Strip Bill Friedman explains how Al Capone, Frank Nitti, Charles Luciano, John Torrio, Moe Dalitz, Meyer Lansky and Joe Adonis and Frank Costello created the modern criminal gambling Syndicate that ruled organized crime in the United States. He wrote “The seven leaders of the three dominating Prohibition gangs imported the world’s finest liquors on a massive scale. Although they conducted their business in an illegal and dangerous world, these seven espoused traditional business values and rejected the key tools of organized crime – monopoly, violence, and vendetta. This made them the most unlikely gangsters to rise to underworld leadership. But they earned every criminal’s respect, and fate made them the most powerful gangland leaders in American history.” In the second episode, Mr. Friedman tells how Frank Costello was not your usual old time mobster. He believed in making concessions and agreements that benefited everybody, not violence benefiting nobody. He opened exclusive high end nightclubs like the Copacabana in New York City. He had the largest slot machine route in the United States. After an assassination attempt ordered by rival mobster, Vito Genovese, Costello proved he was against violence and went so far as to refuse to identify Vincent “The Chin” Gigante as the man who attempted to assassinate him in 1957. “The Chin” would go on to be the boss of the Genevose family. “The Chin” was famous his later years to feign mental illness and walk the streets of Greenwich Village talking to himself, dressed in pajamas and a bathrobe. He would later be convicted of racketeering and die in prison. Shortly after the murder attempt, Frank Costello retired as an active mob boss of the Luciano Family and Vito Genovese would take over. The “Chin” would succeed Vito Genovese, using a series of high profile mobsters acting as if they were the Boss. During his retirement, Costello was known as “The Prime Minister of the Underworld.” He still retained power and influence in New York’s Mafia and remained busy throughout his final years. Like the Godfather in the Mario Puzo story, Costello occupied himself with gardening in his later years.. On February 18, 1973, after 11 days in the hospital, Frank Costello died of a heart attack. It was his 82nd birthday. Photo of Frank Costello by Al Aumuller, World Telegram staff photographer – Library of Congress. New York World-Telegram & Sun Collection. Books by Bill Friedman www.ganglandwire.com To make a donation or purchase premium podcasts episodes go to https://ganglandwire.com/store

Illegal Gambling before Las Vegas Part 1 May 31, 2016

In his 30 Illegal Years to the Strip Bill Friedman explains how the early Mob bosses created illegal gambling empires after prohibition. Some of these men went on to help create modern Las Vegas. Al Capone, Frank Nitti, Charles Luciano, John Torrio, Moe Dalitz, Meyer Lansky and Joe Adonis and Frank Costello created the modern criminal Syndicate that ruled organized crime in the United States. He wrote “The seven leaders of the three dominating Prohibition gangs imported the world’s finest liquors on a massive scale. Although they conducted their business in an illegal and dangerous world, these seven espoused traditional business values and rejected the key tools of organized crime – monopoly, violence, and vendetta. This made them the most unlikely gangsters to rise to underworld leadership. But they earned every criminal’s respect, and fate made them the most powerful gangland leaders in American history.” In this 2 part series, Bill focuses on Frank Costello and how he rose to be the Boss of Bosses and retired peacefully to die a natural death. Bill has an interesting theory. He believes that what we know as the modern Las Vegas entertainment and convention mecca would never have been, except for these mobsters. Bill would say the early casino operators were incapable of managing and successfully operating a gambling casino. They soon turned to the men who knew how to run a casino, the Mob.

Murder in McHenry – Paul Scharff – Part 3 May 10, 2016

In Part 3, Paul Scharff tells about his struggle to help clean up the McHenry County Sheriff’s office and elect a new sheriff. Paul runs into reluctance on the part of the sitting sheriff and he embarks on his own investigation into why the McHenry county authorities do not want to verify Frank Culotta’s claim that Larry “Lurch” Neumann killed his father, Ron Scharff. He learns the sitting sheriff was even called out to Nevada to testify in the Bertha’s Gift’s burglary trial. He was going to be used to discredit the main government witness, Frank Culotta who was testifying against Tony Spilotro, Larry Neumann and his other Hole in the Wall Gang members.

Murder in McHenry – Paul Scharff – Part 2 May 05, 2016

In Part 2, our special guest, Paul Scharff tells about his first contact with the McHenry County Sheriff’s Investigator. Paul learns they have never looked at Larry “Lurch” Neumann. When Paul first contacts the Sheriff’s investigator, they try to discourage him by intimating he may learn information about his father that he does not want to hear. They had put this off as a killing by a jealous lover of the bar maid killed at the same time. He talks to Frank Culotta and finds out that Neumann is a real psychopath that killed for money as well as fun. Culotta tells him the story of how Neumann got a phone call from his ex-wife and was very angry when he hung up. Cuoltta asked him about the call and Nuemann said this bar owner in Chicago had thrown his wife out of the bar. Neumann said he had to go back and kill the guy because this was disrespectful to him. Culotta and Neumann were part of a burglary gang headed up by Chicago Outfit member, Tony Spilotro. Culotta knew the boss, Spilotro, would not approve of a revenge killing. This is the kind of unnecessary murder that can bring heat on the Outfit. Culotta sends a guy back to Chicago with Neumann on his next trip home in an attempt to prevent this killing. For unknown reasons, Neumann was still able to kill Ron Scharff and get back to Las Vegas. Frank Culotta, Larry Neumann and other members of Spilotro’s Hole in the Wall Gang were set up by the Las Vegas F.B.I. and the Las Vegas Metro Intelligence Unit on July 4, 1981. Spilotro’s gang was dubbed the Hole in the Wall Gang because they cut usually cut a hole in the wall or roof of jewelry store to steal diamond and gold jewelry. They used this entry method to escape the usual window and door burglary alarms. Only one month, almost to the day, after Neumann killed Ron Scharff, F.B.I., Agents Emment Michaels and Dennis Arnoldy along with Metro Police Intelligence Commander Kent Clifford and his squad waited for the Hole in the Wall gang. On July 4, 1981, the officers watched as the gang cut a hole in the roof of Bertha’s Gifts at 896 East Sahara, Las Vegas. Once the gang was inside, they surrounded the building and arrested everyone. This was the end of this gang. The gang members posted bail and Spilotro ordered him to kill Frank Culotta and another gang member. Culotta learned of this plot and entered the Witness Protection program. His testimony would help put Neumann in prison for life on another unrelated killing. Culotta would testify against Spilotro in both Las Vegas and Chicago. He was not convicted on either case, but the Chicago judge hearing that case would be convicted of bribery charges a few years later.

Murder in McHenry – Paul Scharff – Part 1 May 01, 2016

In 1981, 10 year old Paul Scharff was awakened and told the news that his father, Ron Scharff, was killed by unknown persons at his McHenry County neighborhood tavern. Twenty-eight years later, Paul receives a call telling him who killed his father. In this story, we learn that sometimes the bad guys are the good guys and the good guys are the bad guys. This is the fascinating true story of a mob killer working with the son of a murder victim to uncover the truth behind his father’s death. Paul Scharff received a phone call from a family friend in 2008. The friend, Jim Hager, related that his daughter, Holly Hager — Paul’s one-time babysitter — had read a book that she believed included a segment on Ron Scharff’s killing. Although the names of the victims and the specific location of the crimes weren’t included, she felt everything else matched. Jim agreed and reached out to Paul. Paul immediately buys a copy of Cullotta: The Life of a Chicago Criminal, Las Vegas Mobster, and Government Witness by Mob killer turned government witness, Frank Culotta. At this time, Culotta was in the Witness Protection program, hiding from his former Chicago Outfit bosses. The Culotta story was actually written by well known true crime author, Dennis Griffin. Paul soon found Mr. Griffin and told him of his connection. By this time, Paul knew this book had been published in 2007 and he had heard nothing from the McHenry County Sheriff. To contact Culotta, Dennis Griffin connects Paul with Culotta’s former handler, retired F.B.I. agent, Dennis Arnoldy. After being vetted by the former agent, he is put in direct touch with Culotta. In this episode, Paul tells us how he learned about his father’s death and the friendship he developed with Frank Culotta, a former associate of his father’s killer, Larry Newman. He learns Newman’s mob boss was Tony Spilotro (“The Ant”), a dangerous and feared Chicago Outfit member. Frank Culotta will say that even The Ant was afraid of Newman, also known as Lurch, because he looked like the Adam’s Family TV show character. Culotta tells Paul that Lurch killed Ron Sharff because he learned that Ron had thrown Lurch’s ex-wife out of his bar. Paul becomes suspicious of the McHenry County Sheriff’s office because they are not following up on this information. Paul learns that if any law enforcement agency collaborates Culotta’s information, this makes him a more creditable witness in other mob trials. This is the first of three exciting and interesting episodes.

Chicago Mob Diamond Theft -Segment 2 Apr 12, 2016

In the second episode, Aaron and I discuss the mystery of what happened to the Marlborough Diamond. The listener will learn about the subsequent investigation and arrest of The Monk and The Brain in another audacious scheme long after the Marlborough Diamond caper. In what may be their last crime outside of prison, the 72 year old dynamic duo plan an armored car robbery. The investigating agents learn about another plan. Scalise and Rachel along with a third man are soon caught in the act of a home invasion robbery. The surprising detail is the victim was to be the widow of deceased Chicago Outfit boss, Angelo “The Hook” LaPietra. The Feds had installed a hidden mike to listen to Scalise and Rachel. The agents soon heard the Scalise gang was inspired by the FBI’s March 23 raid of the home of imprisoned Mob boss Frank Calabrese Sr. where the Feds found $720,000 in cash and $500,000 worth of jewelry hidden in the wall behind a family portrait. Scalise wondered if Angelo LaPietra might have had a similar in-home hiding place. The Mafia blog site Mafia Today reports that Scalise told Rachel and Pullia that he considered LaPietra and Calabrese to be “the same guys” and equally distrustful and unlikely to use a bank’s safe-deposit box. The monitoring agents learned the home invasion was not just about money. Scalise called LaPietra “a miserable person,” remembering the Hook sitting imperiously in the corner of his Italian social club, eyeing all who walked in. “Every little thing made him nuts,” Scalise said; even though the soldiers had paid to join the club, “nobody wanted to go there.” Agents speculate that Scalise and his gang did not have to fear from the new Outfit bosses. The Chicago Outfit’s top boss is 83-year-old John DiFronzo. He is known to be very cautious.

Chicago Mob Diamond Theft – Segment 1 Apr 06, 2016

In this new two part series, I tell about Chicago Mob associates Jerome “Jerry” “The Monk” Scalise and Arthur “The Brain” Rachel. These two guys were master criminals of the Chicago Underworld. Some claim that in the Michael Mann film Thief, the James Caan character, known only as Frank, was modeled on Scalise and the Jim Belushi character, known only as Barry, on Rachel. Thief marked the first film appearance of actor and former Chicago cop Dennis Farina. Another interesting tidbit about the Thief cast was the appearance of real Chicago Mob associate, John Schiavone aka, John Santucci. He played a corrupt cop and was a technical adviser. A few years later, a guy, driving a new Corvette and wearing a production jacket from Thief, started showing up at the Virginian Tavern, a noted 1980s Kansas City mob bar. We soon learned this was John Schiavone who acted under the name, John Santucci. He was seen with some KC theives and then disappeared. We never really learned why he was here. As we always say, “7 million stories in the naked city and this was just one of them.” He would go on to be charged a few years later in a scheme to steal from vending machines. The kicker is, we saw him with a guy who specialized in breaking into vending machines, Gene Maggio. That may not sound like much but think of a 20 story hotel with a coke and candy machine on every floor. In this episode, Aaron and I set the scene for the theft of the famous Marlborough diamond. Jerry Scalise and Art Rachel travel from Chicago to London, England with the plan to steal the most famous diamond of the day. In 1980, The Monk and The Brain pulled off an audacious theft of the over one million in diamonds from the famous Graff Jewelers store in exclusive Knightsbridge section of London. Among the diamonds they took was the 45 caret Marlborough diamond. The former owner of the Marlborough diamond was the Duchess of Marlborough, the niece of Winston Churchill. At the live podcast, I got some great podcast feedback from a nice young woman whose name I can’t remember. She needs to email me, I have a gift for your important feedback.

Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa – Segment 3 Feb 04, 2016

For this third segment on Joey Doves, I have gone back to my Freedom of Information Act documents on his criminal history. Aaron and I discuss raids on two clubs he owned. The Frolics and the Magic Lounge were in the 4800 block of Cermak Road, Cicero, Illinois. From the F.B.I. documents, I learned they were notorious strip clubs. The local police had refused to take any action after repeated complaints by the Cicero Minister’s Council. Finally, a State’s Attorney investigator named Spencer T. Roswell, led a raid on these clubs in 1962. Roswell, a former F.B.I agent, was successful in carrying out the raids, but had a little trouble obtaining any convictions in Cook County, Illinois. After all, it was the Cook County judicial system where Tony Spilotro would have a murder case dismissed. Go to www.ganglandwire.com to see the written blog posts about organized crime and other crime stories.

Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa – Segment 2 Jan 29, 2016

In this episode, Aaron and I examine exactly how Aiuppa got the nickname, Joey Doves. Most mob fans know he got caught with several hundred dead doves while on a hunting trip in Kansas. We will tell you where in Kansas, who he was hunting with and exactly how this Federal Gaming Law violation went down.

Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa – Segment 1 Jan 29, 2016

I recently did a short written blog piece on Joey Doves. Aaron and I did a two-part episode on Joey Doves on Gangland Wire Crime Stories. In this first segment, we examine Aiuppa’s early criminal career. One unusual aspect is something I found in his FBI file. The FBI believe he had a relationship with the famous bank robber, John Dillinger and other Midwest bank bandits.

Nick Civella and the Chicago Outfit Segment 2 Jan 21, 2016

In the second segment, Bill Ouseley tells about Chicago mobster, Charles “Cherry Nose” Gioe and his connection to Nick Civella and the 1950s KC Mob Boss, Anthony “Tony” Gizzo. Gizzo was made famous during the Estes Kefauver hearings when asked how much money he usually carried and he pulled a stack of hundred dollar bills from his pocket and counted out twenty-five of them. Gioe and other Chicago Outfit members were doing a “bit” in Leavenworth for extorting money from Hollywood film studios. During that time, Chicago Outfit members would travel to KC and Tony Gizzo would meet and transport them to Leavenworth for visits. During Nick Civella’s last Chicago visit, he made friends with Gioe. When Civella was allowed to return, Gioe and probably Chicago Mob Boss Tony Accardo, paved the way and Nick was given the job as Tony Gizzo’s driver. Apparently, all was forgiven and Nick would soon rise from driver to Under-Boss to Boss of the KC Family.

Nick Civella and the Chicago Outfit Segment 3 Jan 21, 2016

In this third and final segment, we learn about Nick Civella, Carl “Tuffy” DeLuna and their relationship with Joseph “Joey Doves” Aiuppa and the Chicago Outfit. Nick Civella teamed up with the Chicago, Milwaukee and Cleveland Mobs to influence a 62 million dollar Teamster’s Pension Fund loan and finance a man named Allen Glick to buy the Stardust, Hacienda, Frontier and Marina hotel/casinos. This is the situation that Martin Scorsese used to create his fictional film, Casino. Tuffy and Nick go to Chicago to work out details and set the details of how they would skim money as a payback for getting Glick the loan. Once Lefty Rosenthal gets the skim started, it goes to Chicago and Chicago sends a percentage back to Milwaukee, Cleveland and Kansas City. In FBI wiretaps, we hear Tuffy and Nick discussing if Nick should call Lefty Rosenthal directly or should he get permission from Chicago Outfit bosses first.

Nick Civella and the Chicago Outfit Segment 1 Jan 21, 2016

In the first of three episodes, Aaron and I invite retired F.B.I. Agent Bill Ouseley to discuss the connection between the Chicago Outfit and the Kansas City crime family. We will discuss the early days of Nick Civella’s criminal career and how his trouble with the Kansas City La Cosa Nostra forced him to flee to Chicago on two separate occasions. The second time Nick returns from Chicago, Kansas City mobsters ambush him and a Civella associate is killed. Another Civella associate, Joseph “Buggy” Anch, was killed a few days before this attempt. He returns to Chicago. I studied Bill Ouseley’s books, Mobsters In Our Midst and Open City to prepare for this show. www.ganglandwire.com

The Mob and the Boosters – Gangland Wire Jan 15, 2016

Shoplifting seems like a crime done by kleptomaniacs, dysfunctional movie stars or teenagers. Well, there is a huge contingent of professional shoplifters working stores somewhere in the world,as you read this blog. In criminal lingo, a shoplifter is known as a “Booster.” Mostly, they are drug addicts trying to feed their habit. Most work in pairs or larger teams. I remember seeing a report from Metro North Mall back in the 1990s. The clerk stated 4-6 individuals entered the Macy’s store and as they spread out, store security became alerted. The clerk and security officer reported they all were speaking a foreign language and appeared to be Europeans from their dress. One was spotted concealing a armful of cashmere sweaters inside a large purse. As the security person followed the “booster” out into the mall, another one of this group bumped into the officer and pushed him and distracted him while the woman with the sweaters ran out the mall. The security guard ran into the parking lot and obtained a license number off a car leaving at a high rate of speed. A check of this license number revealed an Hispanic name and a Los Angeles name address. We checked with LAPD and learned this name and address was associated with a large group of professional boosters who were all from Argentina, South America. In Kansas City during the 1970s, 80s and 90s, we had several retail outlets owned by Mob associates. They were supplied by the area’s professional boosters. In at least one case, James Harvey Bradley, known as “Junior,” paid his boosters stolen narcotic pills for the boosted items. He had a retail outlet at the City Market and sold some items out of his restaurant known as the Pumpernik Deli, 11th and Walnut. This podcast is a broad overview of the Mob and the fencing of stolen goods. I have sent out several Freedom of Information Act requests for individuals arrested for being involved with Junior Bradley as well as record album boosters who sold to Tiger Cardarella. In 2016, Aaron and I will go into the cases in great detail. Aaron Gnirk and I would like to thank our listeners for this freshman season of Gangland Wire Crime Stories. This is the last podcast of our first season. I have several others in the hopper. I think you will like to hear the inside scoop on how the mob made money from fencing and narcotics. I am also working on the Bob Berdella serial killer case, the unsolved $400,000.00 theft of art objects from the Truman Library and the plot to kidnap Muriel Kaufman.

James S. Duardi and the Oklahoma Connection part 2 Sep 30, 2015

In this podcast, learn how a mob hit gone wrong can be ignored by a Federal judge because of a disagreement with the Strike Force. The U.S. Strike Force was formed to cut though jurisdictional boundaries and eliminate inter agency rivalries. In major American cities with La Cosa Nostra families, the Department of Justice created a separate division titled the Strike Force. Each city had an Assistant U.S. Attorney to lead the Strike Force. Several other attorneys were hired to prosecute Strike Force cases. Each Federal agency like the F.B.I., A.T.F. , D.E.A., Agriculture Dept, I.R.S. and Immigration assigned agents to the strike force. They were to select high value targets like Nick Civella, Cork Civella, Tuffy DeLuna or Jimmy Duardi and later drug kingpins were added to the targets. Bill Ouseley explains the result of the Oklahoma case and how the Strike Force works.

James S. Duardi and the Oklahoma connection Sep 30, 2015

This podcast is the first of a two-part series about Kansas City Mob associate James S. “Jimmy” Duardi. Jimmy Duardi was a mobster from the old school. His personality had a range from being a most pleasant fellow to a cold deadly killer. He was the nephew of Gaetanno LaCoco who was a old time mafia leader during prohibition. Retired F.B.I. Agent Bill Ouseley is a guest for this series. Jimmy Duardi and several others, notably Nate Brancato, conspired to take over a large night club in the Grand Lake of the Cherokees, an Oklahoma resort area. During the course of this operation, the conspirators bribed the County District Attorney, Frank Grayson, members of his staff and the county sheriff. Jess Roberts, owner of the Mr. Yuk Club, was the intended victim. The final plan was to open up the county for illegal liquor by the drink, gambling and prostitution at this club and other clubs. This plan went awry when Duardi underlings, Clifford Bishop and Jack Michael King attempted to assassinate Jess Roberts, the owner of the Mr. Yuk Club.

Nick Civella and the Teamsters -3 Aug 20, 2015

In the third and final episode I tell about the Mob influence over the Teamster’s local in Cleveland, Ohio and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, In Cleveland a man named Jackie Presser would double deal his way to the top job as president of the Teamsters. His father, Bill Presser, was a guy with connections to both Jimmy Hoffa and Cleveland Mob. Like Allen Dorfman and Roy Lee Williams, he served in WWII. During the 1950s, Jackie Presser rises to International Vice president of the Teamster union. In the early 1970s, his father, Bill Presser is under indictment for corruption charges relating to Union activities. Bill and Jackie Presser agree to become government informants to stop the charges against Bill Presser. They will use their FBI connections to keep Jimmy Hoffa from regaining any Teamster power. Jimmie Hoffa disappears in 1975 and the Pressers were some of the folks that benefitted from his death. Jackie Presser became a Top Echelon Informant for the Bureau for the rest of his life. By 1980, he is poised to become the next national president. He has become important to the election of Ronald Reagan though his influence over Teamster votes. He will become a member of the Reagan transition team in regards to union affairs. When his organized crime connections are reported and it is demanded he be separated from the Reagan administration, Reagan officials claim he is no longer connected to them because his work on the transition team is over. In 1983, he is backed by all the mob families to become the next president of the Teamsters. He has given the FBI the information required to indict Roy Lee Williams and Allen Dorfman for an attempted bribery of Nevada Senator Howard Cannon. Dorfman will soon be executed in a Chicago parking lot and Roy Lee Williams will be stricken with terminal cancer and he turns government witness. In April of 1983, Top Echelon FBI informant Jackie Presser becomes the next president of the Teamsters Union. During this time, his FBI agent handlers purportedly approve of a scheme for him to add ghost members to a Cleveland Teamster Local. Roy Lee Williams turns government witness and gives enough information to indict Jackie Presser for fraud in his addition of ghost employees to a local union. He was able to collect money for each ghost employee. His FBI handlers were indicted for approving of this scheme. However, documents revealed they did not act without approval and the indictments were dropped. Another example of the problems in handing informants. In Milwaukee, Wisconsin, Boss Frank Balistrieri was being followed by a lone agent, Gary Magnensun. This is a great example of why just watching mob guys is worthwhile. Listen to Agent Magnensun tell about a discovery he made on day. During this time, Kansas City FBI agents were telling Milwaukee about phone calls coming from Nick Civella to Milwaukee boss Balistrieri. This enabled them to go up on several phones and install some hidden microphones. In the end, the FBI exposed the domination of the Teamster’s Union by Organized Crime interests. the Labor Department and Justice Department placed the Teamster Pension Fund and the Union under the care of government selected trustees until new elections had been held. Listen below for the conclusion of Nick Civella and the Teamsters

Nick Civella and the Teamster – 2 Aug 20, 2015

In the second episode, you will learn about a WW II veteran named Allen Dorfman who returned from combat. Like Roy Williams, Dorfman was a hero and had been awarded the Silver Star. Dorfman’s step-father Paul “Red” Dorfman was a long time Teamster’s official with ties to the Chicago Outfit. In 1949, Red Dorfman was one of only 2 trustees of the Teamster Pension fund, called the Welfare Fund at that time. He set up his wife, Rose Dorfman, and son, Allen Dorfman, as owners of a Chicago branch office of the Union Casualty Co. They were given the responsibility of managing and investing what became the Central States Teamster’s Pension fund. Allen was owned by the Chicago mob. I play a clip from a hidden mike where “Joey the Clown” Lombardo explains to casino owner, Morris Shenker, about Allen Dorfman’s relationship to the Chicago mob. This clip is part of my film and available on this website. I tell an interesting story about how the FBI learned of a meeting at Phil Simone’s house in Nick Civella‘s neighborhood. Phil Simone was a truck company terminal manger and associate of Civella. Dorfman and Lombardo had come to Kansas City and were meeting with Nick Civella in a Crown Center hotel room. Agent Bill Ouseley was able to listen though a door and hear of plans for a future meeting in KC to discuss Teamster pension fund business. From this and other wiretap information, they knew that the Simone home would be the site of a secret meeting. They were able to get a court order for a hidden mike and had time to do the install. This was, like the Marlo house, within visual distance of all the Civella’s homes. A Kansas City-North neighborhood known as Filamena Acres. The day came and agents watched KC Teamster, Sam Ancona, pick up Dorfman at the airport. They watched as Nick Civella made great efforts to “clean” off any surveillance. They were all set and poised at the tape recorders in the “wire Room.” Then, nothing, nada, bupkis, no sound but a TV running. Later, they learned the meeting was held in a bedroom. At that time, mikes could not be placed inside a bedroom or bathroom.

Nick Civella and the Teamsters Union – 1 Aug 20, 2015

This is the first episode of a three part episode discussing how the Midwest Mob families obtained influence over the Central States Teamsters Pension Fund. I am a member of the Board for the Kansas City Police Pension Fund. We have 800 Million dollars invested. If 5 Board members were to agree to make a multi-million dollar loan to an individual to buy a casino, we could do that. That is exactly what happened to the Central States Teamster’s Pension Fund. By the time Prohibition ended, every major city from Kansas City east to New York City had politically powerful criminal organizations known as La Cosa Nostra, The Mob, The Mafia, the Syndicate, The Outfit, the Clique or in general “This Thing Of Ours.” The Teamsters Union was one of the most powerful and corrupt unions in the United States by this time. In 1953 the long time president Daniel Tobin retired and his handpicked successor Dave Beck was elected. Beck was notoriously corrupt and he took steps to ensure he was Teamsters president for life. James R. “Jimmy” Hoffa was an up and comer and in 1956 he conspired with a New York gangster named Johnny Dio to rig the next Teamster’s president’s election. At this time, in Kansas City, we had an up and comer in Local 41, named Roy Lee Williams. Roy Lee Williams started driving trucks in 1935. As with most able bodied men in 1941, Williams went to war. He came back a war hero with a Silver Star. The first known contact between Hoffa and Williams was around 1950 when Hoffa appointed Williams as a Trustee to a Local in Wichita, Kansas. By 1952, Williams was appointed to a Joint Council that supervised all Locals in Western Missouri and Kansas. He soon became the President of Local 41 in Kansas City, MO. As Williams and Hoffa rose in the ranks of the Teamster’s Union, they both sought the assistance of the Mob. Retired FBI agent Bill Ouseley relates the first known contact between Nick Civella and Roy Lee Williams. They were both on a Jackson County Democratic Party committee. The committee’s purpose was to recommend candidates for various city and County offices. Just like Hoffa and Dio, Williams and Civella found they could use each other’s talents to ensure better contracts for Teamsters and provide work for the Mafia. Civella came up with a plan to provide a special medical insurance for Kansas City Teamsters. He had a local doctor who would provide all Teamster’s members office visits. Williams was to charge each member $1.00 monthly. This would be about $4,000.00 per month. Williams would pay this to the doctor and the doctor would “take care” of Civella. Williams resisted this unnecessary medical plan (they already had health insurance). A mob guy named Thomas “Highway” Simone confronted Willams and threatened to kill Williams’ wife and children and then kill Williams. The plan was adopted. Bill Ouseley reports in his book, Mobsters in Our Midst that the Teamsters started a drive to take control of the Firefighters Local 42 In Kansas City. The Fire Fighter’s president was a Battalion Captain named Stanton Gladden. He resisted the Teamster efforts. A politically appointed “Fire Chief” named Edgar Grass offered a promotion to a popular Fire Captain to support the Teamster’s Union among the rank and file. Gladden threatened to expose this offer. Nick Civella’s brother, Cork Civella, asked Gladden to meet and discuss this issue. Civella offered his influence on the city council to get Gladden promoted to Fire Chief while Chief Grass would be given a position as “Director” of the Fire Department. In return, Gladden had to stop exposing the Teamsters influence over the promotional process and the existing fire chief. Gladden declined this offer and subsequently released an affidavit proving this allegations of improper influence over the promotional process by Teamster’s advocates. Shortly after that Gladden started his car and a bomb exploded. He was severely injured. This bombing created so much publicity that th...

Klu Klux Klan Part 3 Jul 01, 2015

These three episodes became very topical just as I recorded them. In a free society, we have to protect the worst of us under the law. Democracy is not neat and clean and sometimes not pretty. Do you want the rule of the mob or the rule of law?

Klu Klux Klan Part 2 Jul 01, 2015

The conundrum in a free society, where does free speech pass from protected to censored? In the recent killings by white power advocate, Dylann Roof, folks are stirred to anger by the image of Roof with a Confederate battle flag. I believe that the majority of popular opinion right now is for banning of this flag. Supporters of the flag as an artifact commemorating soldiers who died in the Civil War are vigorously resisting any restriction of flying this flag. The conflict has become an extension of the already vehement disagreement between liberals and conservatives. Remember, this is the country that allowed members of the American Nazi party to conduct a public march through the streets of Skokie, Illinois, a majority Jewish Chicago suburb. Anyway, enjoy the next episode of the KKK and the Kansas City Police department.

Klu Klux Klan Part 1 Jun 25, 2015

Starting with Episode 8, I am inserting a photo we took of the Klan members we targeted and arrested in this Intelligence Unit investigation. Episode 8 was Dennis Mahon, the Imperial Dragon of all the White Knights of the KKK. This Episode is Daniel Mahon, the Keagle of the Oklahoma White Knights. In Episode #9, I tell how our investigation began with a conflict between the Missouri White Knights of the Klu Klux Klan and American Cablevision as well as the City Council of Kansas City. Do not try to make sense of any organizational structure of these White Power groups. They will claim to be members of the White Knights of the KKK from both Oklahoma and Missouri as well as members of the White Aryan Resistance (WAR), the National Socialist Party, the Nazi party, the Skin Heads or some other name.

Episode 7 The Bowery Jun 19, 2015

We have new opening and closing segments with local music from Odd-O-Matic, a new independent group with an electro-punk beat with hip-hop undertones. Search for them on Facebook and like their page. To purchase their music go to Itunes. Episode 7 – The Bowery finds me investigating a River Quay area bar. Can you believe, I witnessed a live sex act? This one is definitely X rated for language. Subscribe to my podcast and tell your friends. Remember, we need to get some donations to pay for studio time. Go to my Shop page and be a part of the Gangland Wire team. Get a Gangland Wire Tee-shirt for your donation. Upcoming, I recorded a 3-part series on a Klu Klux Klan investigation and another on solving the mystery of the missing Enunciator.

Episode 6 Wrap Up Apr 08, 2015

I am researching the next exciting story right now. In 1990, the Kansas City Police Intelligence Unit conducted an investigation into Kansas City Klu Klux Klan activities. Now, listen below to a short wrap up of the Civella/Spero mob war. If you have enjoyed my true crime stories, please support this work and go to the shop page and make a donation.

Episode 5 Take-down Apr 03, 2015

This is the exciting conclusion where the informant, Lyle Neal, finally is shown the actual bomb and gets to watch Joe Spero test the bomb remote control detonator.

Episode 4 The bomb Apr 03, 2015

In this episode, I tell about the Civellas working on their Las Vegas skim while Joe Spero makes his first attempt to kill Tuffy DeLuna. This may have been better titled as the gang that could not detonate a bomb. Listeners will get an inside look at the difficulty in knowing a murder was about to happen and waiting to make an arrest that will result in a conviction.

Episode 3 Informants Apr 03, 2015

In this episode I tell about the development of some informants. For example, one guy had worked for a mob owned used car lot and auto repair garage. He had been able to listen through a thin wall and hear some snippets of mob plans. When we approached him and asked about his work at this mob owned business, we were making a “cold call.” In other words, we asked him for information without any pressure. We did not know about a situation where Carl Spero involved him in a the theft of a piece of heavy equipment. he thought we knew and he immediately told us everything he knew about the Spero crew. in another case, a guy got in too deep and knew the only way out was to seek law enforcement protection or end up dead.

Episode 2 Ambush at the Virginian Apr 03, 2015

As KCPD Intelligence and the FBI monitor Civella family soldiers and the Spero brothers, the war heats up. I will tell how law enforcement almost stumbled into the middle of a mob hit going down at a public place.

Episode 1 Civella versus Spero Apr 03, 2015

In this exciting podcast, I will describe how the origins of the Civella/Spero war began. The murder of Nick Spero followed by revenge from his brothers.

Gangland Wire – Crime Stories Welcome Apr 03, 2015

This post marks the first of my podcast series, Gangland Wire -Crime Stories. After this first short explanation episode, the next 5 episodes will chronicle the 1970s gang war between the Nick Civella crime family and the upstart Spero brother’s faction. I hope this to be the beginning of a long lasting series of Kansas City true crime stories. Some will be cases I was personally involved with and others I research. Sometimes, I will be able to obtain interviews with actual participants. If, you are entertained and enlightened by my true crime stories, please make a donation to this cause. It will be up to the listeners to keep this podcast on the air. To make a donation, use your venmo app and buy me a cup of coffee or a shot and a beer at ganglandwire. I have created a Paypal button on my “Shop” page. Click on the Paypal button and this takes you to the Paypal page. If you have a Paypal account you can designate an amount to donate from that account. If you do not have a Paypal account, go to the Paypal page and look at the section just below the words “forgot email or password?” Click on the sentence, ” Pay with a debit or credit card, or PayPal Credit.” This takes the user to a section that allows them to use a credit card. Rest assured, your credit card information is as well protected by Paypal as Amazon or any other major online store. Hit the play button in the below podcast player.

Crime Beat Radio Nov 01, 2013

I was interviewed on the Crime Beat Radio show last night. Co-hosts R0n Chepesiuk and Willie Hyb have the world's biggest audience in the true crime genre with over 200,000 listeners. Both are true crime authors in the area of organized crime. They both are very excited about the new perspective Gangland Wire brings to the subject with the extensive use of the actual wiretap audio from government archives. Click here to listen to the interview. Check out Crime Beat shows and more about Ron and Willie, go to Crime Beat Radio.

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