ID: 'So Successful … It’s Criminal'

By Ed Scarpo
Investigation Discovery launches eight new true-crime series and renews 23 for the 2011-12 season, including "Nothing Personal," about murders caused by hitmen. Detail available here, on TV by the Numbers.

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If Uncle Joe Retires What Happens in Philadelphia?

By Ed Scarpo
Joseph (Uncle Joe) Ligambi, who recently got out of prison following two mistrials for what primarily amounted to gambling-related charges, says that he is done, finito, with Cosa Nostra. He wants to drop the harness and relax, to summer in Longport and winter in Florida. In 1980, violence on the streets of Philadelphia rose sharply following boss Angelo Bruno's murder. Does Ligambi mean it? If he’s being sincere, then who will step in and take over?  Too many wiseguys, if history is our guide. The volatility for which the Philadelphia crime family was once well-known can return as swiftly as the time it takes to pull a trigger. Two generations historically at odds with each other have been working together (the old Scarfo gang and the Merlino young turks). The ability to rivet these two enclaves together is among the skills "Uncle Joe" is credited for having. But with or without him, shifts in power are inevitable as the family's composition changes (...
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Decades of Mob Violence Behind Waterfront Case

By Ed Scarpo
The week before Christmas 2014, three North New Jersey-based Genovese crime family mobsters pleaded guilty to waterfront racketeering in a case going on for years -- since January 2011's Mafia Takedown Day . The guy who owned the “Godfather’s Garden.” But the Genovese family's control of the New Jersey waterfront goes back decades and includes many storied mobsters of the past who killed and were killed for control of the lucrative waterfront rackets of the Garden State. The Genovese family even ran its own hit squad, which focused on murdering FBI informants, among others. The bloodless indictment by comparison likely will end with three men serving three-year prison sentences. The key count in the indictment is conspiracy to extort members of the International Longshoremen’s Association for Christmastime tribute payments, according to New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul J. Fishman and Eastern District of New York U.S. Attorney Loretta E. Lynch . Genovese s...
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Bonanno Boss's Prison Letters Kick Off Second Dominick Cicale Forum

By Ed Scarpo
"Mikey Nose" (Commenced 11am, Saturday, Jan. 10)... We can thank Michael "Mikey Nose" Mancuso for our starting point.... I don't think any other blog or news organization on the planet has ever gotten such direct insight from the man widely considered to be the official boss of the Bonanno family . The Nose is from the Bronx, where Vincent "Vinny Gorgeous" Basciano, either former acting boss or current official boss, hailed from.
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Onetime "Shooter and Gentleman" Gene Gotti Embittered by Prison

By Ed Scarpo
"In this life, there’s a lotta hypocrisy that you just learn to live with—like there’s a rule against dealing drugs, and Gene Gotti [another Gotti brother], is doin’ a long bit for that; you’re not supposed to go with other goodfellas’ wives—happens all the time; you’re not allowed to kill a big boss without the other families’ permission—John Gotti and Sammy whacked Nasabeak [Beak-nose Paul Castellano] and almost started a war."  --Michael "Mikey Scars" DiLeonardo "Ah, Christ on the fucking cross. Right now I'd give my fucking life just to have fucking Buffalo win one."--John Gotti courtesy of Wikimedia Commons  A Brooklyn-based Bonanno crime family associate who served time with Gene Gotti took issue with the headline to this story today and contacted us accordingly. He strongly disagrees with our use of the word "Gentleman." "You're losing your touch. Don't get it twisted: I would never bow down to Gene Gott...
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Deborah Merlino Certainly Doesn't Exemplify the Stereotypical Mob Wife

By Ed Scarpo
The biggest bombshell in   Joseph (Skinny Joey) Merlino's federal racketeering trial in Manhattan arguably had nothing to do with any of the crimes listed in the indictment . We love gossip, especially gossip about extramarital affairs. Skinny Joey with wife Deborah Consider that the main charge facing Merlino is his alleged involvement "in a scheme targeting providers of health insurance by causing, and causing others to cause, corrupt doctors to issue unnecessary and excessive prescriptions for expensive compound cream that were then billed to the Victim Insurers." Who really cares about poor victimized insurance companies?  USA Today recently profiled some of the most-reviled companies in the United States, and wouldn't you know: "Few industries are as widely detested as the insurance industry." (FYI, "American consumers appear to especially dislike health insurance giant Cigna.") Genovese turncoat John (JR) Rubeo...
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Alite: "Once Junior Went In, I Couldn't Flip Fast Enough"

By Ed Scarpo
EXCLUSIVE We assume it's in the book, what John "Junior" Gotti revealed today. You may have read the story,  EXCLUSIVE: John (Junior) Gotti brags he lied to feds - NY Daily News : "When the mob scion sat down with federal prosecutors in 2005 to discuss crimes of fellow mobsters, he planned to give them bad information and useless leads, Gotti and his lawyer revealed in an interview with the Daily News. 'No one suffered but me,' he said of the decision." John A. "Junior" Gotti Joe "The German" Watts and Danny Marino might disagree. And some other guys who brawled in a Queens bar one evening in the 1980s may also disagree.
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