Cosa Nostra News

Recent news about a purported contract killing reminded us of notorious Colombo capo Greg Scarpa, who was a longtime top-echelon FBI informant as well as a key power in the fight for control of the Colombo family in the early 1990s. Anthony Scarpati, left, and Greg Scarpa. The Colombo family mob war, which left 12 dead on the streets of New York City and many wounded, commenced November 18, 1991, when the first shots were fired. That day Scarpa was pulling out of his driveway while daughter Linda, with her infant son, was behind him in another car also pulling out---when a van and panel truck abruptly blocked them in and several heavily armed men wearing ski masks leaped out and opened fire with automatic weapons. All shots missed their mark (though they did leave a row of holes in Linda's fender). Deeply angered that the gunmen—supporters of acting boss Victor Orena Sr. who were trying to depose imprisoned official boss Carmine Persico—had risked hitting Linda and her son, Scarpa ...

The Cutolo family (specifically, the family of Billy Cutolo, Wild Bill's son) will appear tonight on MTV's Families of the Mafia (see trailer below), which details the stories of "five notorious Mafia-tied families as they continue to navigate away from the underlying life of organized crime that still haunts them to this day." Billy Cutolo, Senior left, Junior Five because New York has Five Families? Though the members of the five families on this reality TV show — rather than continuing to profit off a criminal lifestyle invented by Sicilian bandits possibly in the 19th century —a re seeking to depart organized crime — presumably to join the world most of us inhabit, the one filled with legitimate, tax-paying suckers.   Cutolo—like former Gambino underboss Salvatore (Sammy the Bull) Gravano —is a legitimate former inhabitant of the world of organized crime in New York City  ( and from when it counted, in the heady, deadlier days of the 1980s and 1990s ).... Aside...

The following by Nick Christophers tells the story of the relationship between William (Wild Bill) Cutolo and his son (and a wiseguy-in-progress)--as well as the the larger (and fatally consequential) story of the relationship between the two Cutolos and the Colombo crime family. William (Wild Bill) Cutolo Wild Bill was the underboss of the Colombo crime family. He was also a labor racketeer, among other things--including a father and husband who suddenly and mysteriously disappeared. He was last seen near Shore Road and 92nd Street in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, on May 26, 1999. He was 49. Cutolo's whereabouts remained unknown for nearly a decade, until 2008, when an informant tipped off Federal agents about where he was buried.   We've detailed the story of Wild Bill multiple times -- now, we'll let Nick tell it ..... Nick's story is jampacked with vivid detail that poignantly depicts, among other things, how Bill Jr. slowly came to the realization that something truly ...

In late 1993 through September 1994, the Feds conducted an experiment that involved putting 21 members of the Colombo crime family close together in one section of the dormitory-like Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in Brooklyn to enable the accused to "more easily get legal homework done" for upcoming trials, which had to do with crimes allegedly committed during the Colombo war.   The experiment failed miserably.  William (Wild Bill) Cutolo and members of his Colombo crime family crew. The wiseguys took over a wing of MDC in Brooklyn , terrorizing inmates and guards alike, and stealing and hoarding so much food that prisoners elsewhere in the MDC went hungry. The Colombos even turned the TV room into their own private club, replete with Italians Only sign. ( Gang Land News and some of the New York dailies reported on the Colombo clubhouse inside the MDC.) The charismatic William (Wild Bill or Billy Fingers) Cutolo--then a capo in the Colombo crime family -- an...

COSA NOSTRA NEWS EXCLUSIVE Former Colombo street boss Thomas (Tommy Shots) Gioeli , 67, is seeking to get out of prison about four years early because of the COVID-19 public health emergency, according to an email sent by the Victim-Witness Coordinator for the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Eastern District of New York, a copy of which was forwarded to Cosa Nostra News today. Tommy Shots arrested. Gioeli was sentenced to 18 years for a 2012 conviction for several racketeering and murder conspiracy charges, and is currently housed at Danbury FCI. His BOP-designated release date is May 2, 2024. (Gioeli had faced 20 years at sentencing, but the judge gave him a break that baffled many law enforcement officials.) The following email is from Lisa Foster, the Victim-Witness Coordinator for the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Eastern District of New York. We're publishing the full contents of the letter (because why not?) We deleted the phone number and access code. Anyone who wants t...

And another masterpiece graciously shared with us via the proprietor of  The Colombo Crime Family Blog ... “ I was busy even before and after I got (inducted into the Colombo family), sit-downs, everything, and nobody ever questioned. ‘Cos he’s a big deal now, he’s got his hands in everything. ”— John Cerbone, in mid-2014, referring to Amato's status in the Colombo family. Joey Amato (Source: Gang Land News). For the past decade now, Colombo family captain Joey Amato has been on thin ice in more ways than one. After fifteen years in the can, Amato, now 60, was released in 2009 and forced to rejoin a Mafia clan that had once marked him for death. Since then, he has delicately climbed the ranks of the Colombo family, becoming the captain of a crew and facilitating the inductions of his top men. Labeled by Jerry Capeci as the Colombo family's Staten Island boss, Amato has also been namedropped more than a few times by the feds, and it appears to be only a matter of tim...