Cosa Nostra News

UPDATED Michael (Mikey Nose) Mancuso should've been made years earlier than he was. It was a prison sentence for murder that delayed his induction into the Bonanno crime family. Vinny Gorgeous tells Anthony Donato what's what as Dom Cicale seems to spot surveillance activity. In 1984, Mikey Nose left his mortally wounded wife Evelina on a bench outside Jacobi Hospital in the Bronx. (Early reports noted that there had been two bullets in her head.) Mancuso had pleaded guilty to manslaughter and served 10 years in state prison. His induction into the Mafia was delayed because he had to serve that sentence, informants told the FBI. Mancuso was named acting boss in November 2004, making him the third acting Bonanno boss since Joseph Massino was arrested in 2002. Mancuso was also the fifth consecutive boss or acting boss of the Bonanno crime family to be convicted of a violent crime (the previous four were Anthony Spero, Massino, Anthony Urso, and Vincent Basciano). ...

By Ida Libby Dengrove Boots, left, and his lawyer Klein. REVISED SLIGHTLY: We'd hate to hazard a guess as to how many Mafiosi are named in Selwyn Raab's excellent Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires . But we do know one who is not mentioned. Raab not only failed to name this Bonanno family gangster; the former New York Times investigative reporter also inadvertently credited onetime Bonanno consiglieri Anthony Spero for something that resulted from the innovation of this unnamed mobster.

Gotti, left, Gravano, back in the good old days of "La Cosa Nostra." John Gotti and Salvatore "Sammy Bull" Gravano drove into Bath Beach in Brooklyn to visit Tommy "Karate" Pitera. At a diner, the trio -- the Gambino boss and underboss, and a soldier in the Bonanno crime family -- discussed a mob hit. (Why they'd enjoy a meal in a diner in the midst of so many delectable Italian restaurants, this writer doesn't know. This writer does have a strong notion what the agenda was, however. Read on, please...)  The Bath Ave. Crew noticed the three men seated at a table in the eatery and "showed their respect" with a bottle of bubbly."

Joey Calco Publishers Marketplace  reports: "The Joey Calco Story (former Bonanno hitman) by Richard Cagan (out May 2014)." Cagan is a published author of several books, including one mob book, Mafia Cop: The Two Families of Michael Palermo; Saints Only Live in Heaven . I've never read it or him. Looks like former Bath Avenue Crew member Joey Calco wants to tell his story. It was supposed to have been released already -- only, where is it? As many of you -- especially former and current residents of  Bath Beach -- no doubt recall, Calco — a turncoat with two murder convictions under his belt — had reinvented himself in the witness protection program as Joseph Milano, the owner of Goomba’s Pizza in Florida . But that version of life imploded on him back in 2009, when he made that infamous videotaped leap over the counter seen 'round the world after two customers had the balls to complain and then demand their money back because Joey screwed u...

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...

Anthony Spero , former consiglieri/acting boss of the Bonanno crime family, died nearly six years ago. The once-supremely powerful "Old Man" of the American Mafia was 79 when he passed, a guest of the Federal Medical Center of the Butner Federal Correctional Complex in North Carolina. Spero died in prison in 2008. Spero lived it, walked it, talked it, breathed it. The only thing that may have captivated him as much as "the life" were his pigeons. That and frying chicken cutlets in the back of his club on Bath Avenue in Bath Beach, Brooklyn. He also ran the Big Apple Car, a limo service. He spent near-uninterrupted decades on the street before finally going away for life in 2002 on racketeering and murder charges in a case considered surprisingly circumstantial in that no direct testimony against him was ever offered. According to the book "Mob Boss," about Al D'Arco's life in the Luchese family, it was noted that  while servi...

Paul Gulino, left, with Jimmy Calandra. Story is here:  Bath Avenue Crew Rose High, Fell Hard

COSA NOSTRA NEWS EXCLUSIVE Interview with Belinda Rossetti  Belinda, give us a shout if and and when you see this! These men who hold high-level positions in Mafia crime families... what are they like? Because they do exist - they are not a figment of David Chase and Jerry Capeci's imaginations.They are not characters on TV shows or in films. Men who hold rank -- bosses, underbosses, consiglieris, either official or acting -- are human beings who get out of bed one foot at a time. Frequently, they go to prison and die there. Sometimes they die in their own bed of natural causes.... Belinda Rossetti (message to her: Belinda, get in touch with me when you can...)  What are they really like, these man who must be as wise as a fox and as strong as the lion, who must balance a strong business sense with the primal capacity to order the deaths of men. We met recently with Belinda Rossetti, a lovely dark-eyed bella donna who works as a paralegal for a hig...