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Grand Jury: Philly's Cosa Nostra 'Alive and Well'

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By Ed Scarpo Monday, May 30, 2011

"Philly's La Cosa Nostra, once deemed 6 feet under, is alive and well, grand jury report shows," according to Newser.com.

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Who Fat Andy Loved; John Gotti's Other Side: Anthony Ruggiano Junior, Part FOUR

By Ed Scarpo Saturday, November 16, 2019

In the 1960s and 1970s, Anthony (Fat Andy) Ruggiano had one of the biggest crews in the Gambino family, and he wanted to keep it that way. Fat Andy, Fritzy Giovanelli, sitting Lenny DiMaria, far right in gray Sonny Franzese He had had around 70-75 guys in his crew, and out of all of them, Andy wanted to straighten out only one, Nicky Corozzo. Fat Andy "didn’t want to make anybody his equal at one point," said Anthony Junior. "He had a big crew with him and he liked it that way. He wound up being right." Andy and Anthony (Tony Lee) Guerrieri even got into an argument over Fat Andy's reluctance to make any of his guys. Tony Lee had wanted to put Anthony (Tony Pep) Trentacosta up to be straightened out with Nicky. Fat Andy prevailed, however, and they both decided that only Nicky would get made. Once Andy proposed Nicky, Nicky went out of his way to express his gratitude to Ruggiano. "After my father proposed Nicky, Nicky went to my father&#

Hoodwinked: Restaurateur on Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares Was a Mobster

By Ed Scarpo Sunday, August 14, 2011

Peter (Peter Pasta) Pellegrino, formerly of the Babylon, New York restaurant Peter’s Italian Restaurant, really is -- or was -- a gangster. Gordon gives a pep talk. Peter is ready for action..... The once-promising Bonanno crime family member who appeared in Kitchen Nightmares now calls himself a brokester . And the Bonanno crime family, with which he was once affiliated has disowned him. So has the rest of New York's Cosa Nostra, according to FBI documents and Peter Pasta himself. But before all that he appeared on an episode of Kitchen Nightmares in which he acted very much like the mobster he allegedly was trying to become around the time of filming. (See Peter's Italian Restaurant menu here .) Back then Peter Pasta was an up-and-coming Bonanno associate who "earned" $15 grand a week from bookmaking. At the time, he also owned two boats that he'd park in a pricey nearby Babylon harbor called Great South Bay. Gang Land News's Jerry Capec

Mob Wife Ex-Husband Hector Pagan In Brooklyn Halfway House With April 2021 Release Date

By Ed Scarpo Sunday, December 13, 2020

Back in 2014, despite the heartfelt pleas of a murdered man's daughter, Brooklyn Federal Judge John Gleeson sentenced Hector (Junior) Pagan to 11 years in prison —and offered a thoughtful comment. James Donovan was killed during a botched robbery in 2010. He said, “We can only hope” that by time Pagan is released “we have prepared him for re-entry into society to mitigate the risk” of what would happen if Pagan returned to a life of crime. How far Judge Gleeson's hope gets us is something we will discover very soon. The former Bonanno associate/Mob Wives bit player is getting out of the can in a few months..... He is currently residing at the Brooklyn RRM (a halfway house where he and other Federal offenders receive "community-based services that will assist with their reentry needs.") Pagan's official reentry date is April 18, 2021. Renee Graziano's ex-husband got a reduced sentence in 2014 because he flipped and testified against two cohorts who were involve

Mafia Excellence: Inside the ‘Ndrangheta’s Criminal World

By Ed Scarpo Friday, November 10, 2023

With apologies to Andrew Machin for taking way too long to post this first-rate story (probably the longest story in this blog's history). By Andrew Machin The 'Ndrangheta is a secret society. Its organizational and operational rules and rites are based on this inherent characteristic. Therefore, it is no coincidence that there are various similarities with Freemasonry, which has a particularly large membership in the Italian region of Calabria, where the 'Ndrangheta is rooted. A valuable source in this regard proved to be Giuliano De Bernardo, former Grand Master of the Grande Oriente d’Italia (GOI). The GOI was and is the principal Masonic obedience in Italy. In his testimony at a trial in Reggio Calabria in 2019, De Bernardo explained the fundamental trait that unites the two organizations as follows: “I tried to figure out what the specific [nature] of the 'Ndrangheta-Freemasonry relationship was... I believe the joint point is in the ritual. Even though they us

Bath Avenue Crew Rose High, Fell Hard

By Ed Scarpo Monday, August 18, 2014

This story from 2014 is one of the most popular on this site—and we didn't even know it until very recently (for reasons stemming from the fallibility of generalized analytics data.) Members of the Bath Avenue Crew were as young as 8 years old when they began to align themselves with the biggest, baddest gang in America: Cosa Nostra, specifically the Five Families. Bath Avenue Crew founding members. They saw the wiseguys on the street pulling up to the curbs in their big shiny Cadillacs, loafing around social clubs wearing pricey suits and sporting hundred-dollar haircuts and manicured fingernails. But the guys presented more than just a cold, distant image to watch; Mafia members interacted with the kids, joked around with them and showed them there were other ways to make it through life. The wiseguys doled out twenty-dollar bills like they were nothing. The wiseguys patted them on the back, told them they were "good kids," and maybe asked them to watch the cars

Notorious Bonanno Wiseguy Bruno Indelicato Released From Prison

By Ed Scarpo Wednesday, June 29, 2022

Longtime Bonanno wiseguy Anthony (Bruno) Indelicato, 75, who shot his way into the annals of American organized crime, was released from prison on May 20, 2022, as per the BOP inmate locator website. Bruno Indelicato, left, Frank Lino. The son of the brutally murdered Alphonse (Sonny Red) Indelicato, a capo who led a doomed faction of the Bonanno family, Bruno was in his heyday a feared stone killer with a legendary appetite for cocaine. Indelicato was one of three masked gunmen who walked into Joe & Mary’s restaurant in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn one hot July day in 1979 and blasted Carmine Galante at close range while the volcanic, would-be usurper enjoyed a customary, post-prandial cigar. Indelicato’s efforts to protect the family’s boss paid dividends: Indelicato was among a slew of Bonanno soldiers elevated to capo by a grateful Philip (Rusty) Rastelli in the wake of the Galante hits. But Cosa Nostra being Cosa Nostra, it wasn't long—a couple of years—before Bruno&#

Deborah Merlino Certainly Doesn't Exemplify the Stereotypical Mob Wife

By Ed Scarpo Monday, February 19, 2018

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

Who Really Killed Tommy Two-Guns DeSimone?

By Ed Scarpo Monday, December 28, 2015

It's one of gangland's most high-profile, enigmatic hits -- and the identity of the killer has been debated for decades. Joe Pesci immortalized a vicious killer in Goodfellas. Thomas "Tommy Two-Guns" DeSimone killed a made member of the Mafia -- and for that, among other things, he was killed in what's been described as a classic setup. The truth is, we know very little about this murder, including who pulled the trigger. (Or fired up the chainsaw, depending on who you believe). DeSimone disappeared, meaning there's zero evidence as to how he was killed; in fact, it can't be said with absolute certainty that he was killed. Still, he was killed . Guys like him don't just disappear into thin air. They'd never leave New York because everything they want -- a certain lifestyle, basically -- is in New York and cannot be duplicated anywhere else. At the same time, there's no shortage of answers as to who and the why. Answers sell books an

RIP Angelo Prisco Underling Michael Visconti (Who Talked To A Former Federal Prosecutor In A Podcast Before He Died)

By Ed Scarpo Thursday, July 20, 2023

"John Gotti (went around in) a suit telling everybody he’s the boss. Our guys (in the Genovese family) had mothball holes in their sweaters, but they had $50 million in cash in their apartment." —Michael Visconti, ex-Genovese family associate "Angelo Prisco's mentor was Mario Gigante. (Prisco) was a very strong guy. He ran the Purple Gang along with Danny Leo in Harlem , and they came up through the ranks together." Michael Visconti enters court in 2006. Credit: RecordOnline . The violent East Harlem-based Purple Gang reportedly boasted more than 100 members in the 1970s and was known for committing crimes ranging from narcotics and firearms trafficking to whacking and dismembering people, many of them informants for law enforcement. Members of the organization, who reportedly spent their youths running errands for local drug dealers, were linked to the Bonanno, Luchese, and Genovese families. By the 1980s, the Purple Gang started to fade as members were incr

San Giuseppe Cigars Does It Again With Another Successful Event

By Ed Scarpo Friday, November 24, 2023

By Nick Christophers It was an odd warm evening in October as a crowd gathered in the outdoor yard of Bacaro Restaurant in Massapequa, Long Island. Why did such a crowd begin to fill the outdoor yard? It was for another smoking event hosted by San Giuseppe Cigars. On the heels of their last party at Patrizia’s this was on a smaller scale but was a rocking evening, nonetheless. Owner Joe Bonnano, left, Nick Christophers, far right, and John Michael The cigar company has been in business for over two years and has made a mark in the cigar industry. The owner, Joe Bonanno, has made it his business to create and offer a unique cigar for any palette. Being a cigar smoker himself he knows what his clientele is looking for. He has established a factory in the Dominican Republic where the blends are made a distribution company in Deerfield, Florida and their corporate office is in Melville, New York. “All the cigars are made in the DR at my factory. We blend them there and import different bl

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Popular Stories

Hoodwinked: Restaurateur on Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares Was a Mobster

By Ed Scarpo Sunday, August 14, 2011

Peter (Peter Pasta) Pellegrino, formerly of the Babylon, New York restaurant Peter’s Italian Restaurant, really is -- or was -- a gangster. Gordon gives a pep talk. Peter is ready for action..... The once-promising Bonanno crime family member who appeared in Kitchen Nightmares now calls himself a brokester . And the Bonanno crime family, with which he was once affiliated has disowned him. So has the rest of New York's Cosa Nostra, according to FBI documents and Peter Pasta himself. But before all that he appeared on an episode of Kitchen Nightmares in which he acted very much like the mobster he allegedly was trying to become around the time of filming. (See Peter's Italian Restaurant menu here .) Back then Peter Pasta was an up-and-coming Bonanno associate who "earned" $15 grand a week from bookmaking. At the time, he also owned two boats that he'd park in a pricey nearby Babylon harbor called Great South Bay. Gang Land News's Jerry Capec

Mob Wife Ex-Husband Hector Pagan In Brooklyn Halfway House With April 2021 Release Date

By Ed Scarpo Sunday, December 13, 2020

Back in 2014, despite the heartfelt pleas of a murdered man's daughter, Brooklyn Federal Judge John Gleeson sentenced Hector (Junior) Pagan to 11 years in prison —and offered a thoughtful comment. James Donovan was killed during a botched robbery in 2010. He said, “We can only hope” that by time Pagan is released “we have prepared him for re-entry into society to mitigate the risk” of what would happen if Pagan returned to a life of crime. How far Judge Gleeson's hope gets us is something we will discover very soon. The former Bonanno associate/Mob Wives bit player is getting out of the can in a few months..... He is currently residing at the Brooklyn RRM (a halfway house where he and other Federal offenders receive "community-based services that will assist with their reentry needs.") Pagan's official reentry date is April 18, 2021. Renee Graziano's ex-husband got a reduced sentence in 2014 because he flipped and testified against two cohorts who were involve

Notorious Bonanno Wiseguy Bruno Indelicato Released From Prison

By Ed Scarpo Wednesday, June 29, 2022

Longtime Bonanno wiseguy Anthony (Bruno) Indelicato, 75, who shot his way into the annals of American organized crime, was released from prison on May 20, 2022, as per the BOP inmate locator website. Bruno Indelicato, left, Frank Lino. The son of the brutally murdered Alphonse (Sonny Red) Indelicato, a capo who led a doomed faction of the Bonanno family, Bruno was in his heyday a feared stone killer with a legendary appetite for cocaine. Indelicato was one of three masked gunmen who walked into Joe & Mary’s restaurant in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn one hot July day in 1979 and blasted Carmine Galante at close range while the volcanic, would-be usurper enjoyed a customary, post-prandial cigar. Indelicato’s efforts to protect the family’s boss paid dividends: Indelicato was among a slew of Bonanno soldiers elevated to capo by a grateful Philip (Rusty) Rastelli in the wake of the Galante hits. But Cosa Nostra being Cosa Nostra, it wasn't long—a couple of years—before Bruno&#

The 1981 Three-Capo Murders: Part One

By Ed Scarpo Wednesday, November 23, 2022

Members of the Bonanno family who believed that the meeting set for the night of May 5, 1981*, was just another attempt at peace either were killed—or realized the confirmation of their worst fears. Phil Lucky, left, Sonny Red, Big Trinny. Source: Wikia . A trio of captains helming a dissident faction of the Bonanno family were invited to that meeting in an attempt to make the peace. It wasn't the first meeting that sought to head off possible bloodshed, but the family's loyalist faction made sure it was the last. Alphonse (Sonny Red) Indelicato , Philip Giaccone, and Dominick (Big Trin) Trinchera were not men to be trifled with. The three had together grown increasingly disillusioned with Philip (Rusty) Rastelli's prison house leadership and had begun to make their feelings known. Phil Giaccone, who had been Joe Massino's skipper for six months in 1978, had been targeted first, but the hit was called off, possibly because the decision had been reached that the better

Where In The World Is Onetime Bonanno Capo Dom Cicale These Days?

By Ed Scarpo Saturday, November 12, 2022

Well, Sierra Leone, Pakistan, and Guatemala—to name three places that Dominick Cicale, former Bonanno crime family capo, has visited on business during post-Cosa Nostra life over the past nine years. Dom Cicale at St. Joseph School for Girls. "The country's first lady asked for the water machine to be placed in that school because she went there as a young girl," Dom said. (Yes, this is kind of an unusual story for this blog to publish, we admit....) After being released from prison, Dominick met with a rabbi "who works to better humanity," he said. A source told us that Dom "offered to work to help society at large, and he has made great strides working with Yehuda Kaploun. Currently president of RussKap Water, Dominick has worked in various global locations to provide healthy water around the globe." Kaploun told us that Dominick has been "a model of redemption since his release." Diamond mine in the Eastern Province of Sierra Leone that Do

Bath Avenue Crew Rose High, Fell Hard

By Ed Scarpo Monday, August 18, 2014

This story from 2014 is one of the most popular on this site—and we didn't even know it until very recently (for reasons stemming from the fallibility of generalized analytics data.) Members of the Bath Avenue Crew were as young as 8 years old when they began to align themselves with the biggest, baddest gang in America: Cosa Nostra, specifically the Five Families. Bath Avenue Crew founding members. They saw the wiseguys on the street pulling up to the curbs in their big shiny Cadillacs, loafing around social clubs wearing pricey suits and sporting hundred-dollar haircuts and manicured fingernails. But the guys presented more than just a cold, distant image to watch; Mafia members interacted with the kids, joked around with them and showed them there were other ways to make it through life. The wiseguys doled out twenty-dollar bills like they were nothing. The wiseguys patted them on the back, told them they were "good kids," and maybe asked them to watch the cars

RIP Tough Tony: Sources Say Elusive Genovese Family Powerhouse Was Official Consiglieri

By Ed Scarpo Wednesday, November 09, 2022

Longtime Genovese family powerhouse Anthony (Tough Tony) Federici, who ran a landmark Queens-based Italian restaurant, died this morning of natural causes, sources tell Cosa Nostra News . Still from YouTube interview with Tough Tony Federici. While the elusive Federici long claimed he was retired from the position of capo in the nation's most powerful Mafia clan, the Genovese crime family, sources say Tough Tony, aka Tony Park Side, was part of the Genovese crime family's formal hierarchy, holding the position of official consiglieri, at the time of his death. Prior, he'd been acting underboss of the crime family. Federici, who remarkably appeared in several YouTube video interviews about six years ago (three of which are posted below), was the longtime owner of Park Side Restaurant, a popular Italian restaurant located in the heart of Corona, Queens that his parents opened in 1960 under a different name. And, despite the incessant denials, Federici was a power in the Genov

Bikers Bloodied Up At Least Three Bonanno Wiseguys At Long Island Funeral Parlor, Gang Land Reports

By Ed Scarpo Thursday, July 28, 2022

Defense lawyers using the "musical consiglieris" defense in the courtroom apparently wasn't the only reason why Michael (Mikey Nose) Mancuso, boss of the Bonanno family, took the drastic step of expelling (aka shelving) his own acting boss and three others from the crime family back in 2019. Mikey Nose Mancuso. Credit: Noah Goldberg/Daily News . It also had something to do with betrayal: ex-acting boss Joseph (Joe C) Cammarano tried to take control of the crime family while Mikey Nose was still in prison, according to today's Gang Land News , which reports that details of Joe C's maneuvering against Mancuso came to light via testimony at the Bonanno racketeering trial . Gang Land also reported today that tensions between Mikey Nose and Joe C. ramped up significantly last week, to the extent that there was a big brawl at a Long Island funeral parlor during a wake for Cammarano's father-in-law, Vito Grimaldi. "Mikey Nose is a torpedo—a killer." I

Gene Borrello, Former Mob Associate-Turned-Fledging Podcaster, Sent Back To The Can For Six Months

By Ed Scarpo Saturday, February 11, 2023

Turncoat Bonanno associate/former podcaster Gene Borrello has been sent back to jail again for violating the conditions of his supervised release. Gene Borrello in hot water once again. Borrello, 38, was given a six-month sentence by a judge in Brooklyn federal court on Wednesday for participating in podcasts about organized crime and for associating with other criminals while doing so. “You want to know [why] I went out there?” Borrello said of his podcasting antics as per a Daily News repor t. “I’ll be honest with you. Every other cooperator is on there and I’m not allowed to. Sammy Gravano is on there talking about killing people.” “I don’t like being made a fool of,” the judge said. “It bothers you, of course — that’s the essence of trust.” Borrello helped Brooklyn federal prosecutors put away more than 21 mobsters and then spent about five years in prison for committing crimes that otherwise could've earned him a life sentence. A judge sentenced him to time served and probatio

Former Bonanno Capo Dom Cicale's Debut Podcast To Focus On Plot To Take Out Mikey Nose

By Ed Scarpo Friday, February 10, 2023

Trailer added below An unassuming Instagram post will lead curious mob watchers to some potential intrigue, assuming they value recent Bonanno crime family history. Dom Cicale's podcast will debut next week. The Instagram post touts an upcoming podcast by former Bonanno capo Dom Cicale. Cicale briefly mentioned the podcast, Mafia RoundTable, in a recent story we did on some of his legit post-Cosa Nostra doings. Cicale is planning to launch the podcast series with an historical bang: The debut episode, to be posted online next week on Valentine’s Day, will touch on secret codes, schtupping a Luchese soldier’s wife, issues of trust—and plotting against Michael (Mikey Nose) Mancuso (who is the official top Banana on the street today). It is quite the devious, twisted little plot, as Dom tells it—replete, in all its sociopathic splendor, with a manufactured fall guy. In addition to the podcast, Dom has something else potentially in the works with another podcaster, category killer (