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Mafia during the 1980’s

January 20, 2016 by admin in

The Mafia right after the prohibition era divulged into different types of illegal activities to make huge profits and there emerged several Families that took control of their respective region. However, each era saw the emergence of a different group that took the lead in crime and had its own importance.

The 1980s

The small skirmishes, which is said to have accompanied consistently till now among the different Mafia families, was said to have converted into a full-fledged battle which had erupted during the 1980s. It was during this period that Mafiosi in tends and hundreds were said to have been killed in the various gang wars which took place. The early 1980s saw major upheavals to take place with the socio-political Mafia world clime changing very fast and scales were noticed to be tilted towards its favor.

Emergence of the Corleonesi Crime Family as a powerful one

Initially, the Corleonesi Crime family had been shunned by the Mafia bosses. The different reasons cited for the same was because this family had come from very little power and also hailed from Corleone, a small rural town. The Corleonesi family had been avoided for quite a long time, until its leadership was assumed by the ruthless Luciano Leggio. It is only after his coming to power that the family started to gain support from other families around. Leggio, along with his new found power got into the habit to have rival Mafia bosses to be eliminated. As Leggio had to go into hiding to escape law, Riina, his successor followed the same policy like his predecessor and exhibited similar ruthlessness. On 23rd April, 1981, Bontade, the Corleonesi family’s rival was gunned down to death, which is a clear testament of their ruthlessness and determination to eliminate their opponents. Another rival name Inzerillo got gunned with bullets some days later.

30th November 1982 can be regarded to be an interesting day for the history books, when in twelve different incidents which took place in Palermo saw twelve Mafiosi to be murdered, with few cadavers who turned up in those faraway places. Over 500 Mafiosi were said to have been killed, while about 160+ had disappeared from 1980 onward.

Using brute, violent and powerful force, it is without doubt that the Corleonesi Crime Family had become unarguable the most violent and powerful force of the decade. When compared to the functioning standard of the Sicilian ways of murdering State authorities when there was no other choice left with the Mafia, the Corleonesi Family simply did not spare any one. State figures who were anti-Mafia also had been their target.

Mafia and the Undercover Agents

January 20, 2016 by admin in

The Mafia is said to exist in the United States of America for more than a century now and the prohibition era, saw them to get a stronghold in the region of their operation. The different mafia families were reputed to undertake various types of criminal activities, which even included gang wars and other aspects that caused huge issues for the government departments to function properly. Added to this, the involvement of numerous police officials and government employees with the Mafia to help them with their operation and to escape from the clutch of the law only created more trouble and their consolidation of their power in the region.

Making an impact on the Mafia

For the FBI and legal organizations to make serious impact on Mafia, what they are required to know is what actually goes in the organization, what type of activities are undertaken by them and to get inside information about the Caporegimes, the Dons and other Mafia family members as well as their associates. The legal department can always conduct raids on illegal gambling rings, drug deals, etc., to arrest those who are involved. But the fact is that the Mafia is likely to find new recruits and to have the arrested members to be bailed out, thereby increasing their gang numbers. Hence, for creating a real damage to the Mafia Family, it is necessary for the legal department to have the top to be arrested like the Don, caporegime, Underboss and his capos.

Undercover roles

This is where the undercover agents were said to play an important role whose task was to infiltrate into the Mafia family. But the FBI agent who is working undercover in the role of an enforcer or mob associate can be a dangerous job. In case, this person is caught during the act of providing information to the legal department or his truth of being an undercover is discovered, then he is likely to get executed without any second thinking.

Importance of the undercover agents

The Undercover agents are said to still be considered to plan an important role in the fight against Mafia families by the FBI. In 1998, in Cleveland, a sting was orchestrated by the undercover agent, which had helped to net over forty corrupt police officials. Since their work is dangerous and can even lead to their being tortured to death, their nature of work always remains a secret. These undercover make use of assumed names.

Mafia and Organized Criminal activities

January 19, 2016 by admin in

According to the experts Organized crime has been defined as criminal activities, which is performed by extensive proficient criminal group, which depends upon illegal activities for earning huge amounts in profits. Financial profits which are gained through the functioning of different types of illegal activities are known as black money. These organizations are controlled by centralized syndicate and have synchronized actions.

What is Mafia all about?

Mafia is regarded to be a term which is used to describe different organizations which are responsible towards performing or coordinating variety of organized methods of criminal activities. The Mafia in the U.S. is also called the ‘Mob’. The very first Mafia which had come into existence was the Sicilia Mafia also called ‘La Cosa Nostra’. The person employed with the Mafia was known as ‘Mafioso’.0909

Other Mafiosi

There do exist ‘Mafia’ across the globe and are called popularly the Serbian Mafia, Albanian Mafia, Russian Mafia, etc. with their names being based upon their location. There are many organizations, which are considered to be similar to that of the Mafia, however, are called by various names. Few are mentioned below:

  • Chinese Triads
  • Irish Mob
  • Japanese Yakuza
  • Unione Corse
  • Neapolitan Camorra

The Mafia can be termed to be a gathering of numerous criminal organizations, who are controlled like that of a business, while having hierarchical structure.

Knowing the hierarchy

  • The ‘thugs’ or ‘soldiers’ are at the hierarchy bottom, who work on the less significant tasks like money extortion, etc.
  • Above them are the ‘enforcers’, who are actually bodyguards of those who protect their establishment and hire other criminals for carrying out odd jobs. Own financial establishments are possessed by the enforcers.
  • Above the enforcers are the ‘Commissioners’, who have the capability and power to control or handle the whole city or a widespread region.
  • The boss is above them, who control the individual organization from the multiple organizations of the Mafia Family.
  • Top of the pyramid structure sits ‘The Godfather’, whose word is final and has to be followed by every member of the chain without any question.

Multiple organizations present within the Mafia are known to specialize in specific crime types. They are responsible for crimes such as smuggling or narcotics trafficking, extortion, gambling, hideous crimes like kidnappings, assassinations, murders and prostitution. The Mafia organization which is specialized in assassinations, while having killed any person if ordered to, was known infamously among the media as ‘Murder Inc.’.

Louis Cafora – The Mafia member who carried out legitimate business

January 19, 2016 by admin in /

Louis Cafora was a member of the Colombo Crime Family and his activities included that of being an agent of loan sharking. Furthermore, he also was indulged in activities of that of a drug trafficker, working for the Lucchese Crime Family. Cafora was popularly called in the circle as ‘Fat Louis’ or ‘The Whale’. His parents had migrated from Italy’s Campania region of Senerchia to the US.

His name

A small difference is present in the surname of Louis’. It is said to have been either used by his parents in this manner or misspelled by the INS, or there could be a possibility of Louis trying to have his name modified a bit for protecting and to hide the family’s name, since he got popular notoriously because of his dangerous criminal and illegal activities that he undertook. But, he did not maintain any kind of relations with The Genovese Crime Family capo, Vincent Cafaro.

Characteristic features

When it came to his physical appearance, Louis Cafora was very tall and quite fat even during his childhood days and he is said to be conscious about the same. He was often noticed to prepare Italian dishes for the gang members as he just loved cooking variety of things and experimenting new things.

His criminal activities

Louis was involved actively in the different Mafia activities. It was with the joining of the Lucchese Crime Family that his criminal life started. However, he did not go into performing those street crimes for his boss. Rather, he preferred working towards pursuing different legitimate deals on behalf of Lucchese Mafia Family. He had managed to have a lease on the parking lot at Downtown Brooklyn. It was through its management that Louis got to influence several officials within the State Transportation Department of New York. Paul Vario, his official Capo is known to have several meetings with subordinates at the parking lot that was leased out by Louis. This way, they could stay safe and ensure that all their meetings and the discussions that are held here are kept a top secret and not recorded by the law enforcement officials in any manner. This parking lot was used by Louis for storing those stolen cars on behalf of Henry Hill. With his income on the increase, he was able to derive a powerful position within the Mafia Family.

All about Robert’s Lounge and the Mafia

January 19, 2016 by admin in

It was James Burke, popularly called ‘Jimmy the Gent’, who is said to be the owner of Robert’s Lounge, a bar saloon. He was considered to be Lucchese crime family’s associate. This place is known to have served as the criminal headquarters between 1957 and early 1979.

Significance of Robert Lounge

The lounge was said to be utilized as supermarket for selling t hose goods which was stolen by James Burke as well as his group. This lounge was a criminal hub, where different types of criminal activities were planned for being executed. One such plan that was said to be made sitting at Robert’s Lounge was the Lufthansa Heist, something that has gone down in history, although for the wrong causes.

Location

The location of the saloon was near to J.F.K. International Airport’s, Air Cargo Center. There were also present other hangouts in the vicinity, which included Vesuvio Restaurant of Don Pepe, Bargain Auto Junkyard, Aqueduct Race Track and dress factory of Moo Moo Vedda.

About the Lounge

Initially, the saloon was a simple bar, where blue collar employees were said to be frequent visitors. However, with time, as James Burke including other members of Lucchese Family began to frequent the place, the other customers were driven away.  Slowly, it had become a criminal hangout.

Other essential facts about the lounge

The lounge was known notoriously for the ‘graveyard’ also. Dominick Cersani was killed by James Burke to seek revenge, since the former is said to have cooperated with the District Attorney of Queens and assisted in capturing the stolen cigarette load of Burke. The saloon’s backyard became Dominick’s grave after his murder. Also, another person had been murdered and buried within the saloon, who was Michael Gianco, popularly called the ‘Spider’. Gianco had worked as night manager and bartender. He was killed over an ordinary issue by Thomas DeSimone. His body was buried in the lounge’s basement. The worst part is that when the FBI had carried out thorough research of the Lounge and its basement, they were not able to find any of the bodies as has been claimed to be buried here. The reason for the bodies not to be found within the Lounge was because details of the search warrant were found out by Burke before the actual search was to be carried out by the FBI. Hence, he had the bodies taken out and displaced to another place.

Knowing about the Rochester Mafia Family

January 19, 2016 by admin in

The Rochester Mafia Family is regarded to be another New York based organized crime family which was found around 1950s by Buffalo crime family. This family is known to operate in the county of Monroe and also that of Western New York. It is involved actively in various types of criminal activities such as gambling, extortion, prostitution, racketeering and loan sharking.

Members of the family

The Rochester Family’s initial official boss was Costenze Stan Valenti. He along with Frank Valenti, his brother got arrested. For a period of 16 months, Stan was jailed and both the brothers in 1964 came down to New York with Angelo Vaccaro, the associate of Pittsburgh family. Frank had become the Pittsburgh crime family’s capo and went on to become the head of the Rochester Family.  The boss of Buffalo Family, Stefano Magaddino was told by him that his family would now start operations independently.

Activities of the family

Frank Valenti in 1970 had planned to bomb numerous churches and public buildings in the city, which is remembered in history as Columbus Day Bombings. Samuel Red Russotti, the Underboss along with Rene Piccarreto the consigliere and Salvatore Sammy Gingello, the capo in 1972, informed Frank that he was no longer the family boss. This made Frank to flee away to Arizona. After his leaving the position, Russoti was declared the boss and Gingello his Underboss, while Piccarreto still remained the consigliere. Although things went on smoothly for a while, police officials did come across several evidences to have all the top level members of this mafia family to be arrested and put behind bars. During this period, Thomas Didio had been elected to become the acting boss.

The top level arrested members were released from prison. Russotti thought that dealing and manipulating Thomas Didio could be easy and to be taken care of later on, something that went on to become a wrong assumption made. It did result in a dispute to be created among the group members. One group comprised of Piccarreto, Russotti, Gingello along with others, while the other group comprised of Stan Valenti, Thomas Didio, Angelo Vaccaro, Rosario Chirico and others. In the ensuing war for accession for leadership, Didio and Gingello were killed. The family’s criminal activities after this slowly declined and presently not proof is left if the Rochester family actually exists still now or has completely got dispersed.

Information about the Black Mafia Family

January 19, 2016 by admin in

The United States is known to be the home to several Mafia families that have got their strongholds in their own respective region and are considered to be powerful criminal organizations. Among the different Mafia families present here, one such family is the Black Mafia Family, which was known commonly as the BMF. This family was founded in 1980’s. It was in the year 2000 that it derived the short name as ‘BMF’ by which it commonly called and popular.  It is among the crime families which were based in Michigan, Detroit. Its territory of operation included the regions of Florida, California, Tennessee, Georgia, Michigan and Missouri. This family is known to have allies with Campanella Park Piru and the Crips.

Its activities

Black Mafia Family is said to have an estimated 400 members, from which over 150 members had been charged by the law enforcement officials by far. The members of this group are from the African-American ethnic group. This family has been involved actively in different types of criminal activities which included murder, drug trafficking, money laundering cases and much more.

Its establishment

It was Terry and Demetrius, the Flenory Brothers, who had established the Black Mafia Family. According to reports, the brothers had established numerous distribution cells to shave cocaine supplied to the different U.S. cities by 2000. Two hubs were established by the brothers to carry out their varied activities, with one being in Atlanta, Georgia, which was operated by Demetrius. The other hub was in the Californian city of Los Angeles, where Terry operated. It was through the Los Angeles hub that they had made good connections with several Mexican drug cartels.

Other activities

In order to hide their mafia criminal activities and to make their black money to be white, the Flenory brothers in 2000 started a legitimate business. They began with BMF Entertainment, a company for Hip-Hop music. Different types of facilities were offered to plenty of artists through this company. Some of them are Bleu DaVinci, Young Jeezy, etc.

But in 2005, this family saw a decline in its activities, especially with the then Drug Enforcement officials convicting several of its members. Apart from its 150 member indictment, both the brothers had been sentenced to a life imprisonment for thirty years, which automatically saw the doom of the BMF Mafia family and helped United States to get rid of one criminal organization.

All about the Mafia families of the 1930’s era

January 19, 2016 by admin in

The Mafia families were said to have come from Sicily, at a time, when their activities there were hampered by the law authorities and were either forced into exile or arrested, convicted to be sentenced to life term or hanged till death. To escape this, they had fled to the United States, where they diversified into different regions and established their control over their respective areas.

Influence of the Mafia

With the alcohol prohibition being lifted in the year 1933, the Mafia bootlegging industry was in grave danger to lose its business. Very soon, the Mafia had its trade to be shifted to prostitution and drugs as alcohol became easily available. The changes noticed in this scheme were regarded to be the master plan of Salvatore Luciana, who was popularly called Lucky Luciano by many. This Mafia legend had a clear vision. After few bloodbath series, which obliterated traditional Mafia clans that is known to have preferred Omerta against profiteering, another scheme was said to be engineered by Luciano for preserving source of livelihood. With alcohol business more than finished, prostitution and drugs seemed to the Mafia members to be an assuring financial option. However, for carrying out these illegal activities, the Mafia was required to team with the Irish and Jewish rivals. This alliance did last long for 40 years and more.

Trading in heroin and other illegal drugs

Heroin was regarded to be a viable alternative, since not many heroin addicts is said to have existed like that of alcoholics. Although the heroin market lacked in numbers, but it did provide the facility to transport it without any hassle, since heroin is much lighter in weight and can be easily shipped and distributed to any region within the U.S. It was discovered by Luciano that when his prostitutes were drugged, they had turned to become much more subservient, while being more eager to perform and provide immense satisfaction to their clients. Furthermore, usage of heroin did drive the prostitute to get into serious addiction, which automatically meant that the Mafia can add them to their existing customers for the illegal trade carried out by them.

Other activities

Among all this aspects, another idea struck Luciano, which was forming of the multi-family commission that is likely to approve and regulate the mafia activities. It was the bosses who represented their respective families of which the notorious among them was regarded to be Al Capone.

Trivia #5

January 18, 2016 by admin in

Login in the game first before submitting your answers! If you were not logged in before, login in the game then refresh the page before submitting your answers. The player with the highest score wins. In the case of a tie, the pot is split. Cheating will prevent your from playing in the future. Sharing your answers with others will decrease your chances of winning the prize.

Reward: 50 Points.

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The Commission and the Mafia families

January 18, 2016 by admin in

It was Meyer Lansky and Lucky Luciano, who in 1931 had established The Commission in New Jersey’s Atlantic City. However, its formation did not help prevent the gang wars which ensued. But the frequency and scale of gang wars that did take place got reduced to a considerable extent. Once a Mafia family had declared war on the other group, then the aggressor family automatically found itself at war not only with the other family, but also with that of the Commission and remaining Mafia members. The Families, in this manner were provided with a powerful incentive for having their disputes negotiated without actually indulging in wars or bloodshed of any sort.

Importance of the Commission

The Commission at times appointed a new Don of a Family for settling wars as well as internal conflicts. However, the previous Don or the usurper was assassinated. The Bonanno War fought by the Bonanno Family is a classic example of this type of case.

History of The Commission

Originally, it comprised of Dons from 7 Mafia families, Five Family leaders of New York (Tommy Gagliano, Vincent Mangano, Joe Profaci, Joseph Bonanno and Lucky Luciano), Buffalo (Stefano Magddino) and Al Capone from the Chicago’s Outfit, representing everything present in Western U.S. But after the Apalachin Convention held in 1957, The Commission allowed the entrance of two more family leaders.,  who were Joseph Zerilli ‘Joe Z’ of Detroit Partnership and Angelo Bruno ‘Gentle Don’ of Philadelphia Crime Family. But over 1960’s and 70’s, these positions declined.

Current affairs of the Commission

Currently, the membership of The Commission is said to comprise of bosses from the Five Families, Philadelphia Crime Family and The Chicago Outfit. Due to the recent FBI crackdowns on the Mafia families, its activities were being kept a guard secret from public view.

Enrolling members

Joining the syndicate was also allowed to the non-Italian mobsters. However, voting power was considered to be limited strictly to that of the Italian members. The Commission’s Financial Advisor and Luciano’s chief advisor was Lansky. The Commission had no ‘Boss’, but there was the post of a Chairman, who was nominated.

The aims and beliefs of The Commission were enforced via Murder, Inc. operation, which was notorious and ran from Brooklyn. It was by voting that The Commission approved and authorized the service. With the target numbers limited generally to a few or single individuals, The Commission, in this manner prevented confusion circumstance, which otherwise may have resulted in gang wars, while minimizing exposure to the press.

RICO Law and the Mafia

January 18, 2016 by admin in

The RICO is regarded to be an important tool that is used by the American government for fighting organized crime and the different mafia families. RICO is actually a law and not a special police branch or military wing. It stands for Racketeer Influenced & Corrupt Organizations, US Code, Sections 1961 – 1968, Title 18. It was during the year 1970 that the law was passed with an intention to fight the Mafias. The task is achieved by having the prosecutors to be enabled and permitting the law to take action against the whole organization, rather just few individuals.

What is Racketeering?

Racketeering is regarded to be accumulating money through unlawful means. Racketeering involves almost any type of crime. The person, under RICO, is an enterprise member, having committed any of the two crimes out of 35 with 8 being state crimes and 27 federal crimes, within a period of 10 years could placed under the racketeering case. People who were found to be guilty might be sentenced to prison for up to twenty years and/or fined around $25,000.  Besides it, the government confiscates and all the cash which the person earns from racketeering which he needs to forfeit. The Act also has provisions for extended penalties to cover performed criminal acts, for instance, killing uncooperative entrepreneur, bribing union leader, extorting money and the like, which amounted to racketeering. Even if the Mafia members were not involved in any individual crimes, they still could be prosecuted. This way, the Mafia Don’s basic and most common defense tactics got eliminated, since they used to send new recruits and low level soldiers for committing crimes to ensure that they never get prosecuted.

Meaning of racketeering activity under law

  • State statute violation against arson, kidnapping, murder, gambling, bribery, robbery, obscene matter, extortion, dealing with listed chemical or controlled substance.
  • Act of counterfeiting, bribery, embezzlement, theft, fraud, justice obstruction, dealing with obscene matter, racketeering, slavery, money laundering, gambling, murder-for–hire commissions, as well as numerous other offenses which Title 18 of Federal criminal code covers.
  • Union fund embezzlement
  • Securities Fraud or Bankruptcy
  • Drug Trafficking
  • Assisting, aiding or bringing aliens into the country illegally
  • Money laundering activities and related offenses
  • Terrorism act

Immense damage was caused to the Mafia families with the formation of the RICO Act. With RICO being seen as a threat, the defendant Mafia members assume to plead it guilty towards lesser charges, since their asset seizure would mean difficulty in having the lawyers paid for their services.

Philadelphia Mafia family – One of the most violent Mafia family in the US

January 18, 2016 by admin in

The Philadelphia Mafia family is also known as Philadelphia South Jersey Mafia/Mob, South Philly Mob/Mafia or Philly Mafia/Mob. This mafia family is based and formed in South Philadelphia, operating in different metropolitan regions of the state, New Jersey and Southeastern Pennsylvania.

History of the family

This family is said to be known for its notoriousness, violence, especially because of its involvement in multiple mob wars and presence of violent bosses. It was between 1959 and 1980, under the reign of Angelo Bruno that this family had enjoyed immense prosperity and peace. It is this period that the media and law enforcement agency had started to name it as Bruno crime family. However, in 1980 Bruno was murdered because of a complex dispute that arose which involved New York Mafia and disgruntled mafia members and subordinates. With his death, this crime family saw gradual decline in its power. Multiple internal wars took place, which saw the rising of two of the most violent bosses of the family.

The reign of Scarfo

Nicodemo Scarfo had become its boss after the death of Bruno and during his time, the family was called Scarfo crime family.  Although during his 10 year reign, the family enjoyed immense power, it had become highly dysfunctional. But, the short tempered Scarfo had a penchant for violence. It was under his reign that the family got into narcotics trafficking, demanding every criminal to pay up street taxes if they operated in a region that Scarfo assumed belonged to be his own. Even moderate disputes led to executions. During the 1980’s, the Scarfo family saw the murder of 20 of its own men. The increased violence made the New Jersey Police, Pennsylvania State Police and the FBI to react. Few mobsters were convinced to become government witnesses, which included the nephew of Scarfo, for escaping prison or death. In 1988, with the arrest and sentencing of Scarfo and his top allies, his downfall came.

After Scarfo

Scarfo was succeeded by John Stanfa, but very soon his leadership was disputed and the family was in war, which ended with his arrest in 1994. Merlino then took over the leadership. The 30 years of internal warfare, violence and government interference saw the family to get weakened severely. Still, it has been regarded to be among the country’s active Mafia families. Presently, it is engaged more into betting operations, extortion, loan sharking and illegal sports.