SO we get to the last 2. I will start with the Genovese family. The "Cadillac" of crime families. This was the Luciano family until he was deported and Vito Genovese took over. I won't get too much into the history but Lucky didn't really want Vito to run his family. He along with Carlo Gambino and others set up Vito on drugs charges and had his sent away. However the family kept the Genovese name. You may have heard of Joe Valachi. He was one of the first rats. He was televised blowing the Mafia wide open, admitting it existed when law enforcement denied that fact. However since then there have only been 10 rats. By far the smallest number of any crime family in the states. They are currently believed to be the most powerful mafia family left in NYC or the states in general. They are considered the Cadillac because of the fewest rats ever plus it is believed they are and pretty much always have been the wealthiest and most powerful family BUT a lack of rats makes it hard to prove. Unlike the Gambino family that has been all over the news the Genovese are much less known, so it really is up in the air between mafia "experts" which of the 2 families is the most powerful.
Finally we get to the Gambino family. If you have heard of the mob, its probably them. John Gotti? Gambino. Roy Demeo, Gambino. Big Paul Castellano, maybe the most famous hit in NYC history also Gambino boss. Sammy the Bull, I think he even had a TV show, Gambino rat. The Gambinos have always been rich and powerful it is a toss up between them and the Genovese who truly is the top dog. Carlo Gambino as I said probably was the most successful boss and after trying to hide and be quiet he would truly hate what men like Gotti have done to the family bearing his name. The Gambinos have fallen off in the last few decades. Carlo died and made Big Paul the boss. First Paul wasn't a great boss, he was greedy and not well respected. Paulie made a mistake and had his most deadly enforcer killed, leaving it open for Gotti to kill him. From then on Gotti ruined the family. Being so public invited the FBI to crush the family. Then passing it on to a son who had no business running it was another nail in the coffin. A family that literally was top dog from the 50s-80s was put into utter ruin.
That's the families. I didn't put a ton in on the last 2 as they are going to come up as I talk about the 3 men I wish I could chat with. Charlie Lucky Luciano, Roy Demeo, Vito Rizzuto and honestly the man who killed the Gambino family or at least made it so Gotti could. The rat that inspired this blog Dominick Montiglio.
So from the beginning of my mob obsession Lucky was the guy I wanted to be. We have nothing in common. He came from nothing to be a very rich and powerful man. At 14 I wanted to pretend like I had it rough. I didn't. The desire didn't change though. I still want to be wealthy or at least now as an adult safe and secure. Also I mean I don't want power anymore BUT then it seemed awesome to have 500 men loyal who would do anything you needed. What I have read and heard over and over though is Lucky didn't have to be a mobster. He was CEO material. I mean I don't know how "good" it is to say you revolutionized crime but that is what he did. Up until him MOST organized crime was gangs doing basic street shit. Robbery, Blackmail nothing that really made them wealthy and powerful. Or they had some wealth and power but not to the dizzying heights they would hit. Also fighting constantly happened and basic stupid racism held everyone back. Organizing into families and setting ground rules literally was to crime what the Ford assembly line was to modern manufacturing. The 5 families of course brought general peace to NY but it was Lucky who though "Hey maybe if we handled shit in a professional way everyone is safer, we earn more and the cops are less likely to look into us." Its one thing to have an illegal gambling ring. A few bucks and cops might look the other way. However bodies in the streets can't be ignored as easy. Also he was the first one to really say, hey lets work with other people, no we don't have to "make" them into our little club but working together will make us all more money. He seemed to live by the two phrases "Everyones gotta eat" & "Better to have a friend than an enemy" personally I think those are 2 great ideas. He was put in prison but even there the US government asked him for help during WWII because his men controlled NY docks. Depending on what sources you read, they either did help or they did nothing. I tend to lean towards they did something as he was released from prison after. Yes deported back to Italy but a free man. I think his story could be a great movie. He has appeared as a character on numerous shows and movies but I don't think there has ever been a good portrayal. A true story showing everything including the fact he even ratted once to save himself. Don't make it godfather like so he comes off a hero but an honest portrayal. SO thats Mafiaoso 1 I would like to talk to
Roy DeMeo is mobster #2. He was not a revolutionary figure like Lucky but he was the most feared man in NY. The thing is most of what is known about Roy comes from Dominick who is a rat and is a well known liar so it is hard to know what is fact and what is fiction. However by the time Roy finished high school in 1959 he was already a loan shark and would be a career criminal until his murder in 1983. Roys resume reads honestly like a criminal in a movie. Starts with loan sharking, goes into pornography, car theft, drug trafficking. Joins a bank board of directors and used it to launder money. Eventually the bank folded. However the biggest thing that he will be known for is murder. The book about him and his crew is titled Murder Machine and it is believed over roughly a 10 year period they killed somewhere between 200 - 300 people. If the true number was in the middle 250 thats 2 people a month or a murder every 2 weeks. Their first kill was a revenge hit where they dismembered the body. However after that they got so good at it, they called it the Gemini Method (As most were done in Roys lounge The Gemini) and dismembered and disposed the bodies. They were that effective the number of victims will never be known. It even became murder for hire, other mobsters hired them as did "civilians" to kill people such as rapists and pedophiles. The flipside was they were viewed as out of control and the Gambino Boss Paul Castellano would not "make" Roy. It wasn't until Roy brokered a partnership with the notorious Westies gang that Paul finally made him a made man. After that things got even bigger, Roy headed a car theft ring shipping stolen cars to the middle east. Making $30,000 / week just on that. Or $165,000 in todays money $8.5 million a year. The fact was he was the Gambino families muscle or the most feared part of it. So here is where Roys story becomes part of overall mafia history. 1976 Carlo Gambino dies. He names his brother inlaw Paul as boss. This divided the Gambino family. Many thought it should have been Pauls underboss Aniello that should have been boss including Aniellos understudy a young John Gotti. Aniello though was old school and accepted it keeping the peace and staying underboss. Paul also had an ace in the hole. Paul was a capo before being boss and when he became boss he made Nino Gaggi his replacement capo. Gaggi was Roys boss and they were very loyal to Paul. Gotti is on wire tap admitting he was scared of the DeMeo crew and would not move against them. Long as they were around Paul was safe. Roy however made some big mistakes, including murdering a door to door vacuum sales man trying to raise money for college that he mistook for a Cuban assassin. There is a lot more to that story but I am trying to keep it short. However killing a college student in broad day light was the last straw. In 1983 Paul ordered Roys murder and when everyone was too scared to do it (Allegedly numerous Gambino men were offered the contract) he went directly to Roys "loyal" crew and someone did it. Within 2 years Aniello would pass away and much of Roys crew were behind bars leaving an opening for Gotti to kill Big Paulie. That of course changed the Gambino family forever and began their downfall. Wanting to chat with Roy isn't even so much about talking to him but learning about the mob. The simple fact is he ran the most feared crew in NY was a massive earner but according to his sons book was an great father, not letting those 2 worlds mix. His actions would protect and eventually help bring down Americas first family of crime, yet his name really isn't known. We all know Gotti, Capone even Luciano is fairly known BUT DeMeo who had such an impact is an unknown. Also another person I would love to see a GOOD movie made on. Both the serial killing gangster & the dedicated family man.
So DeMeo is an unknown in the grand scheme of things someone who had an even bigger impact and is Dominick Montiglio. A bit about Dom. He is a pathological liar. That I gotta say is a common theme with rats. This even came up when he lied on trial, which came out later on. However he was born into a mafia family or at least his uncle Nino was big time. As I said Nino was one of Big Pauls main guys so as Paul rose so did Nino. Nino was so gangster that he made Dom quit when he was voted class president as they "Shouldn't cooperate with authority" It is proven Dom did have a semi decent musical career and did serve in Vietnam. Though he claimed to be in amazing victories which were also proven lies. He did try and move away from NY and his mobbed up uncle but did come crawling back. Here is where it is hard to tell fact from fiction. There can be 0 doubt he was around the DeMeo crew a lot. He claims that they reported to him. A unmade nephew of a mobster. That is hard to believe. He also makes claims that he was friends with Carlo Gambino. It is known Carlo was a "man of his people" but again how close were they really? He claims to have made a ton of $$$, that might be true, if he was riding the coattails of the DeMeo crew and his uncle he very well could have been very well off. So many of his claims have been disproven but at the end of the day he did know and work with one of the most dangerous mob crews ever. Yet he never really got his hands dirty, that's why it is hard to say if he was a gangster or just a hanger on. The simple fact is though he brought down the Gambino crime family. I kind of broke it down earlier but Big Paulie made a huge mistake at least strength wise killing Roy. Gotti and Co would not move against Paul knowing he had the murder machine backing him. Killing Roy embolden him. Then Dom turning rat was the nail in the coffin. Doms testimony put the crew in jail. All of Pauls best "hitters" were in jail and Gotti now had zero fear of retaliation. So he hit Paul and then his stupidity would be the ruin of the Gambino family. So after 50 years of being the most powerful criminal organization in the States, an unmade rat brought them down. Supposedly Doms testimony put 56 mobsters away. The chain of events that he set off helped Gotti become boss. Gotti of course would ruin the Gambino family. He was never meant to be a boss, he was thug not a leader. Not Lucky or Don Carlo. Just a thug. He would do shit as dumb as leave his son in charge.... An even worse leader and that would drop the Gambinos out of power. I will say for Gotti though he never turned rat. His underboss Sammy the Bull would, another brutal blow to the mob but Gotti lived Omerta. The Bonnanos would step up and become the power in the mob BUT they too got busted by the FBI and when a possible death sentence was given to their boss Joe he would flip and become rat. His turning honestly was the death blow to the mafia. Maybe not the death blow as in they are gone but it is doubtful the mob will ever again have the power they once did. Without a doubt it was the FBI and other law enforcement agents that take the credit. It was their hard work that brought these guys down but in the background there is always a rats actions. Without Dom there is no hit on Paul, without that there is no Gotti. Without Gotti, possibly the Gambinos are run better and not destroyed. Without that there is no power vacuum for the Bonnanos. Hell it stretch's into Canada. With the falling of the Bonnanos we see Vito Rizzuto tried and convicted. That led to another power vacuum (Which we will get to) which has led to numerous murders in Canada. There is a current mob war going on here after the fall of Vito & again at the back of it all you can see Doms work. A man never "made" into a family but his actions would have dramatic impacts for years.
Last I am closing with Vito Rizzuto. The Rizzuto family is supposedly a crew in the Bonnano family. It was something they did right, coming north. It gave the boss a place to hide when needed and also would be a massive money maker. Vito helped in the murder of the 3 Capos. Made famous by Donnie Brasco. This is a massive moment because not long after that the Bonnano family was in disgrace. At this point it seems like the Rizzuto family didn't have to worry about the "big boys" anymore. They could pretty much do what they wanted. Which meant out growing the Bonnano family. Vito supposedly spoke 5 languages fluently. They had connections in both Venezuela and Italy. Depending on who you read during this time Vito would grow his family into the "6th" family which easily rivalled the 5 families in NY in wealth and power. Possibly surpassing them. For him family was legit family and most his highest ranking men were all relatives. Competent relatives, not like Gotti jr. It made it doubly hard to crack the family as not only was it the mafia they would betray but their own blood. During the bloody biker wars in Montreal the police would go as far as reaching out to Vito to try and broker peace. It didn't work but that is how much power the believed he wielded. On top of that seeing him across Canada has sparked thoughts he controls organized crime throughout the nation. That is not true, there isn't one super boogey man that does that BUT it does show the man has reach across the nation. It wouldn't even be the RCMP that would break the Rizzuto clan but ratting from NY on the murder of the 3 capos. This of course was the beginning if the end for him. He was quoted as having said him going to jail would be a disaster for crime in Montréal. It would create a vacuum that would lead to blood shed. He was not wrong. Street level crime rose but even worse for Vito he did not listen to Machiavelli, like all good gangsters should. To paraphrase Machiavelli said "If you take someone's shit you better fuck them up so bad they aint coming back." Rizzutos had taken power from the Violis but let some of them run to Buffalo. Yes it took 30 years but they smelled blood. Soon as Vito was gone both his father and son were murdered. His right hand also went missing and is presumed dead. As in any good mob story though Vito was released from prison and returned to Montreal. All of a sudden his enemies start dropping. However it wasn't the godfather movie finished with revenge, in 2013 Vito died of pnuemonia. 800 people attended his funeral. The bodies continue to drop in Montreal, supposedly 165 as the Rizzutos try to retain control yet the RCMP believe the glory days of that clan is also over.
So thats it, some of why I think the mob is so interesting. Its a real life Game of Thrones. What I wrote here was a drop of a drop in the ocean. I could write blogs for years on all the stories of the past 150 years of the modern mob. The rise of some, betrayal of others and the many murders to keep power in the real life game of thrones. Also that was 3 men I would love to have a chance to meet and talk to. Lucky because of his business brilliance. Probably learn more about business from him than all the schooling I could take. DeMeo, well damn people always want to know what makes serial killers tick.... He was one without a doubt but some how put it to use making him a feared gangster and also somehow was supposedly a great father. How can a person live such a double life? Rizzuto cause he was Canadian and rivalled the biggest mafia bosses from NY. Allegedly actually had more power and reach than most. I don't really want to meet Dom. I do think though it is crazy that one of the big reasons the mob did go down was an unmade rat, a nobody took out a titan. Sorry for the 2 parter, I know it was a lot and maybe lost a few people half way through but after listening to a bunch of mob podcasts my fascination was sparked again.
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