Gangsters Inc's Mob Books

The Last Godfather

By Anthony M. DeStefano

http://www.tonydestefano.com/

The last of the old-world Mob Bosses—and the ultimate betrayal

The Last Godfather is the epic inside story of Joseph Massino, the mob boss of New York’s Bonanno crime family for more than 20 years, who was betrayed by his closest friend, underboss, and brother-in-law, Salvatore Vitale. Based on interviews with Massino's family and friends, as well as law enforcement officials and confidential sources, The Last Godfather for the first time reveals:

The close relationship between Joseph Massino and John Gotti.

How Massino set up the 1981 execution of three rival Bonanno crime family captains in a Brooklyn social club.

The bloody mob war of 1980–81 that brought Massino to power and how, after the imprisonment of John Gotti and Vincent “Vinnie the Chin” Gigante, Massino emerged as the most powerful gangster in America.

How Massino was involved in the murder of Sonny Black, an incident portrayed in the film Donnie Brasco.

He was the last of his kind—a mob boss with old-world values, a man steeped in omerta, the mob code of silence, and a man who valued loyalty above all else. While his arrogant friend John Gotti was being secretly recorded by the FBI, Joseph Massino, head of the Bonanno family, quietly became known as “The Ear” by ordering his men to point to their ear instead of saying his name out loud. And while the heads of the four other New York families were behind bars, Massino stayed out of the spotlight¯and out of jail.

For more than twenty years Massino ran what was called the largest criminal network in the U.S., employing over 250 made men and untold numbers of associates. The Bonanno family was responsible for over 30 murders, even killing a dozen of its own members to enforce discipline and settle scores. Massino ran a tight organization, obsessively checking his social club for bugging devices and frustrating FBI surveillance by declaring that his crew shouldn’t go to funerals and wakes. But in the end Massino would be brought down from the inside by the underboss who was not only his closest and most trusted friend¯but also his brother-in-law.

The Last Godfather is the epic inside story of the rise and fall of Joseph Massino, written by a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter who interviewed Massino's family and friends, as well as law enforcement officials and confidential sources. It’s the story of the brutal mob war that made Massino head of the Bonanno family and the most powerful gangster in America. The family made millions of dollars smuggling heroin into the U.S. and running rackets involving loansharking, gambling, theft, and extortion. Ultimately, The Last Godfather is a Shakepearean tragedy of epic proportions, as Salvatore “Good Looking Sal” Vitale, Massino’s childhood friend and brother-in-law, cooperates with the FBI to convict him on charges of racketeering and murder.

And in the end, faced with the federal death penalty and the prospect of leaving his family penniless, Massino played his only card and finally talked to the FBI. His tragic fall marked the end of a Mafia tradition—and maybe even the death blow to the Bonanno family.

Anthony M. DeStefano was part of the team of New York Newsday reporters who won the 1992 Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the August 1991 subway crash in Manhattan. He has covered organized crime for Newsday and been the lead reporter on several major criminal trials, including that of subway gunman Bernard Goetz. He lives in New Jersey with his wife, Susan.

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The Vendetta

Hardcover: 363 pages
Publisher: PublicAffairs (October 11, 2005)
ISBN: 1586483013

From Publishers Weekly
Purvis's fascinating story of his father, once internationally famous for his role in the violent takedown of John Dillinger and now an obscure figure, limns a true American tragedy. The senior Purvis's meteoric rise to prominence at the FBI, just coming into its own, placed the genteel lawyer at the center of the war on crime that gripped the nation in the early 1930s. His enthusiasm and dedication caught the notice of FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, who promoted him repeatedly and gave him more and more serious responsibilities. But Hoover's pettiness and paranoia led him to turn on his protégé, even reaching out decades after Purvis's departure from the Bureau to block him from other jobs. The book's impact is lessened somewhat by florid writing ("Something evil came to Wellsville in the dead of night"). Purvis (with People magazine writer Tresniowski) could have compensated for the existence of rival narratives such as Bryan Burrough's definitive Public Enemies by dwelling more on his own memories of his father, rather than giving details of manhunts for gangsters, but he succeeds in giving Melvin Purvis the accolades he deserves.

Black Brothers, Inc. : The Violent Rise and Fall of the Philadelphia Black Mafia

Paperback: 336 pages
Publisher: Milo Books (May 15, 2005)
ISBN: 1903854369

Book Description

The Black Mafia was one of the bloodiest, and least known, crime groups in modern US history. From its inception in Philadelphia's black ghettos in the late 1960s, it grew to become a citywide organization with links across the Eastern Seaboard. Holding regular, minuted meetings for up to 60 affiliates, the syndicate - known in its "legitimate" guise as Black Brothers Incorporated - appointed treasurers, "investigators" and enforcers and came to control drug dealing, loansharking, numbers racketeering, armed robbery and extortion.

Sean Patrick Griffin, a former Philadelphia cop turned academic, reveals how the group was founded in 1968 by the hulking Sam Christian, who gathered around him a ferocious crew of gunmen. They ruthlessly eliminated rivals and were soon carrying out "hits" for the Black Muslims, who ultimately controlled political and street power in many neighborhoods. They took on the existing La Cosa Nostra crew in the city, strong-arming the mob's associates into paying for protection, and cowed the brutal 20th and Carpenter Street Gang.

The Black Mafia was responsible for more than 40 killings, the most chilling being the massacre of two adults and five children in Washington, DC, in 1973 in a feud between rival Muslim factions. Despite the intense police pressure and arrests that followed, they continued to operate with vigor, exploiting their ties to high-profile lawyers, politicians and civil rights leaders.

A heavy round of convictions and lengthy sentences in the mid-1980s shattered the Black Mafia's strength-only for their "youth" branch to re-emerge as the Junior Black Mafia, a potent and equally destructive force.

Researched with scores of interviews and unique access to informant logs, witness statements, wiretaps and secret FBI files, Black Brothers, Inc. is the first serious account of a growing phenomenon-African American organized crime-and its consequences, and a landmark investigation into the modern urban underworld.

About the Author
Sean Griffin is a former Philadelphia police officer who is now Associate Professor in the Administration of Justice at Penn State Abington. He has authored numerous articles on organised and serious crime and been an invited panelist on national crime forums.

The Encyclopedia Of International Organized Crime

For the Sins of My Father : A Mafia Killer, His Son, and the Legacy of a Mob Life

Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Broadway (September 9, 2003)
ISBN: 0767906896

Product Description: A suspenseful, emotionally charged real-life Sopranos: The son of New York's most notorious Mafia killer reveals the conflicted life he led being raised by a cold-blooded murderer, who was also a devoted family man, and the wrenching legacy of Mafia family life.

Al DeMeo will never forget the day in 1992 when a coworker, a fellow trader at the New York Stock Exchange, taunted him with a copy of the hot new book Murder Machine, chronicling the horrific criminal life of DeMeo's father, Roy, the head of the most deadly gang in organized crime. The moment sent DeMeo into a psychological tailspin: How could he have spent his life looking up to, and loving, a vicious killer?

For the Sins of My Father recounts the chilling rise and fall of the man who led the Gambino family's most fearsome killers and thieves, through the eyes of a son who had never known any other kind of life. Coming of age in an opulent Long Island house where money is abundant but its source is unclear, Al becomes Roy's confidant, sent to call in loans at age fourteen and gradually coming to understand his father's job description--loan shark, car thief, porn purveyor and, above all, murderer. But when Al is seventeen, Roy's body is found in the trunk of a car, a gangland slaying that places Al between federal prosecutors seeking his testimony and a mob crew determined to keep him quiet.

Desperate to abide by the father-son bond, but equally determined to escape his father's dangerous and doomed life, Al Demeo embarks on a courageous quest for the truth, reconciliation, and honor. With the implacable narrative drive of a thriller and the power of a painfully honest memoir, For the Sins of My Father presents a startling and unprecedented perspective on the underworld of organized crime, exposing for the first time the cruel legacy of a Mafia life.

American Mafia : A History of Its Rise to Power

Hardcover: 336 pages
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.; 1st edition (January 6, 2004)
ISBN: 0805072101

From Publishers Weekly
Reppetto's history of the American Mafia, from its humble turn-of-the-century beginnings in small Italian neighborhoods to the 1950-1951 Senate's Kefauver hearings on organized crime that made the mob front-page news, seeks to set the record straight about one of America's most mysterious organizations. Though Reppetto, a former cop, acknowledges that the American Mafia was an outgrowth of the Sicilian and Neapolitan criminal guilds, he finds only a loose connection between the American Mafia and its old country counterparts. Citing the bad business practices of killers like Al Capone, Reppetto makes it clear that it was the mob's political ties, especially to the Tammany groups in Manhattan and the mayor's office in Chicago, and not murder and mayhem, that made rich men of many Italians (as well as Poles, Irishmen and Jews) who came to America with nothing. Without condoning their tactics, Reppetto makes a strong case that the men who laid the foundation for a national "syndicate" were empire builders along the lines of the Astors and Vanderbilts, and that the Mafia's decline since the 1950s is as much a reflection of the lack of new, strong mob leadership as it is a result of less political protection and a federal crackdown that stemmed from the mob's newfound notoriety. Though this book doesn't answer every question about the Mafia in America, it does present a thought-provoking depiction of the mob devoid of the sensationalism prevalent in many other portrayals.

Cosa Nostra : A History of the Sicilian Mafia

Hardcover: 400 pages
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan (October 29, 2004)
ISBN: 1403966966

Product Description:
The Italian-American mafia has its roots in a mysterious and powerful criminal network in Sicily. While the mythology of the mafia has been widely celebrated in American culture, the true origins of its rituals, laws, and methods have never actually been revealed. John Dickie uses startling new research to expose the secrets of the Sicilian mafia, providing a fascinating account that is more violent, frightening, and darkly comic than anything conceived in popular movies and novels. How did the Sicilian mafia begin? How did it achieve its powerful grip in Italy and America? How does it operate today? From the mafia's origins in the 1860s to its current tense relationship with the Berlusconi government, Cosa Nostra takes us to the inner sanctum where few have dared to go before. This is an important work of history and a revelation for anyone who ever wondered what it means to be "made" in the mob.

The Last Gangster : From Cop to Wiseguy to FBI Informant: Big Ron Previte and the Fall of the American Mob

Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Regan Books; 1st edition (March, 2004)
ISBN: 0060544228

From Publishers Weekly Covering much the same ground as his 1998 book, The Goodfella Tapes, which also dealt with the Philly mob's decline in the 1990s, true-crime journalist Anastasia here focuses on Ron Previte, a crooked cop who became a big moneymaker for the Philadelphia underworld before turning informant for the Feds. The author entertainingly chronicles Previte's long catalogue of brutal misdeeds, but offers little insight into the man's character. There are a few factual errors (e.g., Cleveland underboss Angelo Lonardo did not begin to cooperate with the government until the mid-1980s), but the larger flaw is the effort to inflate Previte's role in diminishing organized crime's influence not only in the City of Brotherly Love but also in the country as a whole, as the subtitle suggests. In addition, Anastasia fails to make a convincing case for the extent of Previte's local impact, undercutting his thesis several times by citing other factors—the elevation of greed, an upsurge in violence, other informants—leading to the demise of the syndicate built in large part by the late Angelo Bruno. The author knows how to enhance the basic story with the odd bit of background detail (like a defense lawyer's favorite sandwich), but the book's primary appeal will be to Mafia buffs eager to read everything written on the subject.

Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish-American Gangster

Hardcover: 468 pages
Publisher: ReganBooks (February 15, 2005)
ISBN: 0060590025

From Publishers Weekly The American mob has long been seen as run by Italians and their henchmen. Edgar-nominee English (Born to Kill) sets the record straight, emphasizing that Irish ingenuity first established the mob in the U.S. Close to two million Irish inundated the American Northeast in the aftermath of the Irish famine of the 1840s. "[T]he formation of a gang," writes English, "carried with it the whiff of a noble gesture," and the Irish personality--full of resentment, rebellion, suspicion and clannishness--mixed with poverty proved to be perfect for this new way of life. Prohibition--the high point for the Irish mob in America--first was viewed by the Irish as a WASP attack on their way of life, and eventually as a way to get rich. But Prohibition was also the beginning of the end of super-Irish gangsters. English covers the bootlegging escapades of Joseph P. Kennedy and--number one on the FBI Most Wanted List--Boston's Whitey Bulger. But there are also colorful details about the likes of "Mad Dog" Coll, "Two Gun" Crowley and mayors Walker of New York and Curley of Boston. This is an intense, erudite yet sometimes horrifying account of violent Celtic criminals who make the Dead End Kids look like choirboys. 16 pages of b&w photos. Agent, Nat Sobel. (Feb. 15)

Takedown: The Fall of the Last Mafia Empire

Mass Market Paperback: 384 pages
Publisher: Berkley Publishing Group (October 1, 2003)
ISBN: 0425192997

From Publishers Weekly
In 1992, New York City detective Cowan was investigating a truck bombing at a Brooklyn garbage transfer station when the "mobbed-up" thugs responsible for the crime showed up to further intimidate Sal Benedetto, the facility's owner. Thinking fast, Benedetto introduced Cowan as his "Cousin Danny," thereby averting disaster-and allowing Cowen entry into a landmark investigation in which he went undercover as Danny Benedetto to expose the Mafia's billion-dollar monopoly of the city waste removal business. By the time the grand jury indictments were handed down, Cowan had spent years on the case, helped put away dozens of mobsters and incurred lasting emotional trauma from the strain of leading a double life. Recalling it here in vivid, riveting detail, Cowan (aided by journalist Century) reconstructs a time when he was deeper undercover in the garbage "cartel" than any city cop had ever been, with the close calls to prove it. Whether he's boosting a wiseguy's car to plant a bug, navigating confrontations with goons wielding two-by-fours and baseball bats or suffering through a Mafia Christmas party with a malfunctioning radio transmitter burning into his leg, Cowan's exploits play on the page like scenes from a well-mounted mob movie. The Hollywood producer with the rights to his story won't have to spend a penny juicing it up: this is a well-told, gripping tale of a heroic investigation.

Tough Jews : Fathers, Sons, and Gangster Dreams

Paperback: 304 pages
Publisher: Vintage; 1st Vintage Books ed edition (April 20, 1999)
ISBN: 0375705473

Amazon.com
When we think gangster, hood, or wiseguy, we often associate these characters with such names as Capone, Luciano, or even Corleone. However, when organized crime reared its ugly head in the late 1920s in Brooklyn, at the foundation were men like Meyer Lansky and Ben Siegel--both Jews. Rich Cohen's romantic account of Jewish gangsters, Tough Jews, brings to life the story of Jewish involvement in the world of organized crime. Cohen persuasively achieves his objective by recounting the stories he heard from his father, who grew up with his friends (including broadcaster Larry King) at the end of the gangster era in Brooklyn, finding heroes in men like "Kid Twist" Reles and Bugsy Goldstein. The intriguing tales Cohen heard, although slightly embellished over time, offer a rare glimpse into a world that can barely be related to today's generation of Jews living in America. These Jews went to prison for committing violent felonies, not white-collar crimes, and got the chair for it. Inspired by their stories, Cohen went on to conduct extensive research through old journals, police records, and court reports to uncover the real stories behind the tales he heard as a boy.

Cohen warmly discusses his father's fascination with these powerful, charismatic figures, and openly envies his experiences at a time before Jewish people lived under the debilitating shadow of the Holocaust. In addition, Cohen shows compassion for the need of his father's generation to look up to "someone who gives them the illusion of strength."

The Underboss: The Rise and Fall of a Mafia Family

Paperback: 257 pages
Publisher: PublicAffairs; 1st Public edition (April 1, 2002)
ISBN: 1586481088

From Publishers Weekly

The undoing of a Mafia underboss related with underdone flair or tension, this picks up momentum halfway through with the re-creation of the FBI's bugging surveillance, Operation Bostar, conducted in 1981 in Boston's ethnic North End, where Gennaro J. Angiulo's bookmaking operation was headquartered. Case agent was Edward Quinn, romanticized by the authors, reporters at the Boston Globe , to heroism. Still, the tale is not without a measure of real valor, especially given the ennui endured by the agents monitoring 850 hours of often boring, frequently garbled tape recordingstedium that caused them all to gain weight from gobbling donuts. An interesting aspect of the case proves to be the successful prosecution of Angiulo under the challenged federal Racketeering Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Actby which he was ultimately convicted. And when he has served his 45-year term, there is a mandatory life sentence awaiting him for his conviction for accessory to murder.

Rothstein : The Life, Times, and Murder of the Criminal Genius Who Fixed the 1919 World Series

Paperback: 464 pages
Publisher: Carroll & Graf (September 9, 2004)
ISBN: 0786714530

From Publishers Weekly
Writing a biography of the notoriously secretive Arnold Rothstein, a rum-and-drug-running, bookmaking loan shark who became one of the richest men in the world, is a gamble that, for the most part, pays off for Pietrusza (Judge and Jury: The Life and Times of Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis). After a brief look at Rothstein's Jewish upbringing, Pietrusza concentrates mostly on his "business" interests and does an especially fine job of analyzing the involvement of the "Great Brain," as Rothstein was known, in fixing the 1919 World Series. Quick to point out that the fix "was not the perfect crime," the author tracks down almost every lead associated with what is still one of America's most astonishing crimes thanks to how the caper was played out in the public eye. Strong investigative journalism helps Pietrusza make sense of the complex back stories of Rothstein's fathering of the American drug trade and the gambling debt that led to his murder. While seeking to expose the truth behind Rothstein's dealings and death, the author sweeps readers are into the seedy world of Tammany Hall politics, violent mobsters, dirty cops and paid-off judges. While many of these side stories prove worthwhile entertainment, the vast amounts of information needed to explain them allows the reader only glimpses of Rothstein's true personality. Still, while some readers may clamor for a more intimate portrait of the subject, Pietrusza persuades in his assertion that Rothstein really had only one true emotion: greed.

Blood and Honor: Inside the Scarfo Mob, the Mafia's Most Violent Family

Paperback
Publisher: Camino Books (October 1, 2003)
ISBN: 0940159864

From Library Journal
The violent rise and precipitous fall of the Philadelphia/Atlantic City Mafia family led by the bloodthirsty Nicky Scarfo has received extensive coverage in Joseph Salerno and Stephen J. Rivele's The Plumber ( LJ 1/90), Donald W. Cox's Mafia Wipeout ( LJ 2/15/90), and Frank Friel and John Guinther's Breaking the Mob ( LJ 6/15/90). Journalist Anastasia's riveting account is based primarily on his interviews with Scarfo associate Nick Caramandi, a confessed murderer and extortionist-turned-government witness who helped convict the entire Scarfo hierarchy. His story rings true, and it is one of treachery and viciousness, all blood and no honor. Easily the best of the Scarfo mob books, it is recommended for organized crime collections. -Gregor A. Preston, Univ. of California Lib., Davis

Goodfella Tapes

Paperback: 256 pages
Publisher: Avon; Reissue edition (May 1, 1998)
ISBN: 0380796376

The Mob Only Spoke in the Strictest Confidence. . .
As mob families go, the Philadelphia Mafia is the most dysfunctional family of all -- with brother turning against brother, sons turning on their fathers. In 1993 an embittered legacy of rivalry and hatred exploded in a brutal, bloody battle between old world mobster John Stanfa and the young, flamboyant Joey Merlino. However, this would be warfare different from any other. This time, the FBI had it all down on tape.

And the FBI Was Listening...
Veteran true crimes journalist George Anastasia takes you inside the world of mobsters at war, and FBI agents so close on the heels that they even watched one hit unfold live through a surveillance camera. Drawing on the transcripts themselves, here are mobsters bragging, lamenting, and marking their comrades for death.

Among Them:

John Stanfa, the violent often irrationally paranoid old style mob don battling a new generation of savage young turks.
Rosario Bellocchi, the young Sicilian-born hitman in love with his boss's lovely daughter who would do anything to get ahead -- even kill his best friend.
John Veasey, the five foot six inch, two hundred pound mad dog hitman who once had to postpone a hit -- in order to visit his parole officer.

After four years, two thousand conversations, and dozens of shoot outs -- some on crowded Philadelphia Streets -- the goodfella tapes made a perfect net to catch some of the most vicious mobsters in America.

The Way of the Wiseguy

by Joseph D. Pistone
Running Press; ISBN: 0762418397

From Publishers Weekly

The romanticized view of the mob gets a reality check in this fascinating guide to the real Cosa Nostra from Pistone, who successfully infiltrated one of New York City's five families as an FBI undercover agent in the late 1970s and early 1980s. During his six years posing as Donnie Brasco, Pistone managed to gain the trust of countless mobsters and was almost formally made a member of the Mafia. That access led to numerous investigations and prosecutions resulting in more than 100 convictions, including those of the bosses who formed the mob's ruling body, the Commission. Pistone's first book, the bestselling Donnie Brasco (later filmed with Johnny Depp in the lead role), presented a detailed chronological narrative of his infiltration. This time, he has organized his experiences into short chapters describing what the gangsters he worked with were really like, with titles such as "A Typical Day in the Life of a Wiseguy" and "How Wiseguys Take over a Business." He makes abundantly clear that the codes of honor depicted in popular culture and self-serving Mafiosi memoirs are myths, as is the notion that the old-timers steered clear of drug-dealing for moral reasons. The book also contains an amazing extraâ€"a CD of an actual FBI surveillance tape in which thugs talk about the idea of doing in Donnie Brasco.