Dana Truppiana Mob Times

Nicolo Rizzuto was an Italian-Canadian crime boss and founder of the Rizzuto crime family, the Sicilian Mafia organization based in Montreal, Quebec. Rizzuto was born in Cattolica Eraclea, Sicily, Italy, in 1924, and immigrated to Montreal in 1954 with his wife, son and daughter. He married into the mob through his wife Libertina Manno's family, beginning as an associate in the Sicilian faction of...

Joseph Lonardo, also known as "Big Joe", was a Sicilian emigrant to the United States who became the first crime boss of the Cleveland crime family, which he structured from a competing number of organized crime gangs. When national Prohibition began in 1920, Lonardo became a dealer in corn sugar, an essential ingredient in the manufacture of corn whiskey. Lonardo became a "sugar baron" by driving...

Carmine Galante was an American crime boss, gangster, drug-trafficker, and head of the Bonanno crime family. As he always smoked cigar, he was also called "The Cigar" and "Lilo." He was extremely ruthless and cruel, and utterly indifferent to human life, which scared not only other Mafia members but also the law enforcement agencies. While he was in prison, he was diagnosed as a psychopathic and n...

Roy Albert DeMeo was an Italian-American mobster in the Gambino crime family of New York City. He headed a group referred to as the "DeMeo crew", which became notorious for the large number of murders they committed and for the grisly way they disposed of the bodies, which became known as "the Gemini Method". The crew was responsible for a very large number of murders, upwards of 200, with the maj...

"The Prime Minister of the Underworld," Frank Costello, was the ideal racketeer. Costello grew up in East Harlem, where he led the 104th Street Gang, a group of young Italian hoodlums. After serving a year in prison for concealing a weapon, he allied himself with Lucky Luciano and expanded his bootlegging and gambling operations into New York, Florida, Louisiana, and other states. The mafia's poli...

Vincent Louis Gigante also known as "The Chin", was an American mobster who was boss of the Genovese crime family in New York City from 1981 to 2005. Gigante started out as a professional boxer who fought in 25 matches between 1944 and 1947. He then started working as a Mafia enforcer for what was then the Luciano crime family, forerunner of the Genovese family. Gigante was one of five brothers; t...

Virginia Hill was an American organized crime figure. An Alabama native, Hill became a Chicago outfit courier during the mid-1930s. Hill was famous for being the girlfriend of mobster Bugsy Siegel. Also, some personal thoughts on mental health, therapy, and PTSD. 👉 SUBSCRIBE to the channel : https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCR8y... Also watch : Charles "Lucky" Luciano : https://youtu.be/65BASz8-a...

Real name Salvatore Lucania, this gangster was known to be the supreme leader of the American Mafia, as well as the leader of the 5 Costa Nostra families in New York in the 30s to 50s. Yes, he was the godfather of godfathers in the United States at that time. He was the one who created the Commission (a kind of American organized crime government). Luciano started his criminal career in the Five P...

John Joseph Gotti Jr. (October 27, 1940 – June 10, 2002) was an American gangster and boss of the Gambino crime family in New York City. He ordered and helped to orchestrate the murder of Gambino boss Paul Castellano in December 1985 and took over the family shortly thereafter, becoming boss of what was described as America's most powerful crime syndicate. Gotti and his brothers grew up in poverty...

Vincenzo Colosimo, known as James "Big Jim" Colosimo or as "Diamond Jim", was an Italian-American Mafia crime boss who emigrated from Calabria, Italy, in 1895 and built a criminal empire in Chicago based on prostitution, gambling and racketeering. He gained power through petty crime and by heading a chain of brothels. From about 1902 until his death in 1920, he led a gang that became known after h...

Born near Naples, Adonis came to America as a child and in the 1920s became a follower of Lucky Luciano. He was one of the assassins of crime czar Giuseppe Masseria in 1931, leading to Luciano’s supremacy in organized crime. As a rackets boss, Adonis specialized in labour racketeering, gambling, and hijacking. In 1951 he was convicted of violating gambling laws and sentenced to two to three years...

Nicodemo Domenico "Little Nicky" Scarfo Sr. (March 8, 1929 – January 13, 2017) was a member of the American Mafia who became the boss of the Philadelphia crime family after the deaths of Angelo Bruno and Phil Testa. During his criminal career, Scarfo had a murderous reputation, also engaging in organized crime activities such as drug trafficking and gambling. In 1988, he was convicted of multiple...

Giosuè Gallucci, also known as Luccariello, was a crime boss of Italian Harlem in New York City affiliated with the Camorra. He dominated the area from 1910–1915 and was also known as the undisputed "King of Little Italy" and "The Mayor of Little Italy", partly due to his political connections. He held strict control over the policy game (numbers racket), employing Neapolitan and Sicilian street g...

Born Calogero Mincore (Minacori) on Feb. 6, 1910 in the ancient North African port city of Tunis, when Tunisia was a French protectorate, Carlos Marcello arrived in New Orleans as an infant and later would rise from obscurity to become one of America’s most enduring and most beguiling celebrity gangsters of the 20th celebrity. In his prime, Marcello was a Louisiana cultural icon and political deal...

Joseph Charles Bonanno (born Giuseppe Carlo Bonanno; Italian: [dʒuˈzɛppe ˈkarlo boˈnanno]; January 18, 1905 – May 11, 2002), sometimes referred to as Joe Bananas, was an Italian-American crime boss of the Bonanno crime family, which he ran from 1931 to 1968. Bonanno was born in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, where his father was also involved in organized crime. At the age of three, Bonanno immi...

Salvatore Maranzano (July 31, 1886 – September 10, 1931) was an Italian-American mobster from the town of Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, and an early Cosa Nostra boss who led what later would become the Bonanno crime family in New York City. He instigated the Castellammarese War in 1930 to seize control of the American Mafia, winning the war after the murder of rival faction head Joe Masseria in...

Joe Gallo's life, his struggle with mental illness, Anastasia's murder, Gallo's crew kidnapping top members of the Colombo family for ransom, the McClellan Trials, the two Colombo Wars, his marriage to two women, Joseph Colombo's shooting at the Italian American Civil Rights League's 2nd Unity Day, his iconic death outside Umberto's Clam House, two innocent people murdered by accident in revenge s...

Lee D'Avanzo is a mobster best known for being the leader of the New Springville Boys. This gang was allegedly the farm team for the Colombo Crime Family and the Bonanno Crime Family. Lee was born March 7, 1969, at a time when being a mob gangster was still glamorous and popular. He once dated Karen Gravano, daughter of Salvatore “Sammy the Bull” Gravano. They dated for about ten years. Then, Lee...

Francesco Paolo Augusto, also known as "Franky Boy", was an American mobster and the eventual acting boss of the Gambino crime family. Law enforcement considered Cali to have been the Gambinos' "ambassador to Sicilian mobsters" and had linked him to the Inzerillo Mafia family from Palermo. According to Assistant U.S. Attorney Joseph Lipton, he was "seen as a man of influence and power by organized...