Gangland Wire

The .22 Caliber Killings: Inside the Mafia’s Infiltration of Two FBI Field Offices  During the post War period to 1968, the FBI and a few local police department Intelligence Units made liberal use of extrajudicial hidden microphones and wiretaps. In 1968, Congress passed the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968. This statute authorized the first legal use of audio surveillance by la...

Gangland Wire 2021 I wish all you guys a Happy and Prosperous 2022. Like everybody else, I feel like I just lost a year and more. The podcast kept me going and all of your emails, comments on the Gangland Wire Facebook page and the website, your emails, and every other way you sent me good wishes made my work worthwhile. I was able to finish my third documentary film, Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murde...

Gary interviews Steve St. John about an interesting character Steve met in prison. Stephen Blumberg once lived off a $72,000 annual family trust fund. But, he helped a dark secret compulsion that will send him to prison more than once. Blumberg started as a child removing doorknobs and stained glass windows from the old houses that were slated for destruction in his childhood home of St. Paul. MN....

Witness Protection Failed The story of John T. Ambrose Merry Christmas Wiretappers. I am here in the studio alone today, and while noodling around, I found an interesting Chicago Outfit story that I had never heard. A U.S. Marshall named John Ambrose was assigned to help protect a government witness named Nick Calabrese. He revealed the location of this important witness in the Family Secrets tria...

Dominic Taddeo and the Rochester Crime Family Venmo me @ganglandwire Click here to “buy me a cup of coffee” To go to the store or make a donation or rent Ballot Theft: Burglary, Murder, Coverup  click here Gary and his regular contributor Mob author and historian Camillius Robison discuss this obscure but important mob figure, Dominic Taddeo.  The Rochester New York crime family was thought of as...

Jeffrey Sussman and the Holocaust Boxers This episode is a little different because we don’t deal with organized crime but with our friend Jeffrey Sussman on boxers who fought for the Auschwitz Concentration Camp guards and other Jewish fighters and the Nazis.  One more thing, I am experimenting with placing a transcript of the show in the show notes. Let me know if you like or dislike this in the...

MS – 13 David Paul served with the Suffolk County Police Department for 20 years. Since that time, he has written true crime books, helped with Russian Organized Crime investigations, and has become an expert in the infiltration of Long Island by the MS-13 gang from El Salvador.  This podcast tells the story of the MS-13 gang, how they got from El Salvador to Long Island, and about the crimes they...

Nick The Blade – early years Eugene “Nick the Blade” Gesuale was a notorious Capo in the Genovese Crime Family. He also was the infamous “Pittsburgh Connect” in the movie Goodfellas and the guy that sup[plied narcotics to Henry Hill. Nick the Blade Gesuale grew up in the East Liberty section of Pittsburgh. He stared in the mob as a numbers runner like many other budding young gangsters.  He droppe...

John Gotti Arrives In this reboot of an old podcast, I talk with my friend David Layman who was a guard at the federal prison at Marion. He describes the day Gotti arrived at the Reception and Diagnostic Unit. David said men gathered around looking and watching like a movie star was being processed. He heard people yelling how much they loved Gotti, how they would do anything for him, and other ex...

Jesus Ruiz Henao Gary interviews the well-known true crime author Ron Chepesiuk and Jesus Ruiz Henao (aka Mr. Big).  Gary gets the inside story of the largest single cocaine supplier to Great Britain during the 1990s. The famous English law enforcement organization known as MI-5 reported to British newspapers that when they took down the Henao organization, the price of cocaine increased by 50%. ...

Madam Polly Adler Non-fiction author Debby Applegate discusses the famous New York madam Polly Adler. We learn how Ms. Adler came to America as a Russian Immigrant Jew and how she rose to prominence and achieved a certain amount of fame in New York Society in the same manner as other Jewish emigrants like Meyer Lansky. With most other opportunities denied her because she was Jewish, she turned to...

Giovanni Rocco Giovanni Rocco tells Gary his experiences as he infiltrated the DeCavalcante crime family AKA The Real Sopranos. Rocco was able to gain the confidence of the DeCavalcante hierarchy. He tells about the problems and rewards of working undercover on extended investigations that took years. He uses the tough guy characters he saw as he grew up in a working-class family in Bayonne New Je...

William Jahoda William Jahoda was an Outfit gambler connected to Rocco Infelise, the ruthless consigliere of the Chicago mob. He and others run the most profitable gambling house in Chicago. The entire operation is dubbed the Good Ship Lollipop. At first, under Solly DeLaurentis, the Lake County crew are making money and not making any waves. This operation turns into a mess of greed, jealousy, an...

Vincent Rizza Vincent Rizza was a former Chicago cop who was a tipster to Outfit members, a gambler, a sports bookie, and a cocaine addict. His claim to fame later in life is that his daughter Pia Rizza was on a Mob Housewives TV show. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation  click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentary, click here.  To rent Gangland Wire,...

Ken Eto and Vince Solano An American-born man of Japanese extraction left the internment camps after World War II and landed in Chicago. Ken Eto was a professional gambler who received notice from the Outfit. By the 1970s, Vince Solano, boss of the Rush Street crew took over all Bolita action and he placed Ken Eto in charge. The FBI made a gambling case on Eto and before he appeared for sentencing...

  Mario Rainone Mario John “the Arm” Rainone saw a couple of guys tailing him and thought he was being set up for a hit. Rainone was preparing to take out a building inspector after his boss ordered the hit. As he followed his intended victim, he noticed a couple of other Outfit men named Rudy Fratto and Willie Messino were flowing him. He realized that he was actually the intended target. Rainone...

Paul Panczko Gary, Camillus Robinson, and Paul Whitcolmbe discuss the chain of events that started with Paul “Peanuts” Panczko and ended with the FBI making informants and government witnesses out of Duke Baisle and Gerald Scarpelli. These two men were long-time Outfit thieves, armed robbers, burglars, hitmen, and enforcers. First, we go back to Paul Panczko. He was a well-known career criminal wh...

Betty Tocco Outfit wife Gary, Camillus Robinson, and Paul Whitcombe take a look at Betty Tocco, the wife of Al Tocco who was the boss of what was called the South Side Crew. He had married a beautiful brunette but she should have gotten a clue. She claimed their first date was a visit to a brothel so Al Tocco could pick up some money. Over the years, he abused Betty Tocco while threatening her lif...

Robert Cooley Outfit Stool Pigeon Robert Cooley and his impact on the Chicago Outfit is examined in this first of seven short episodes on the year 1989 which became known as the Year of the Stool Pigeon. Outfit historians Camilius Robinson and Paul Whitcombe discuss the importance of  Robert Cooley. He was a former Chicago Police Officer, son of a Chicago cop who worked as a lawyer in the notoriou...

Joey Merlino returns to Philadelphia Dave Schratweiser is the co-host of Mob Talk Sitdown with well-known Philadelphia Mob reporter and author George Anastasia.  Dave talks with Gary about the most recent activities out of the Philadelphia organized crime family. Right after we recorded Dave texted me and let me know about another breaking story and that was Joey Merlino had returned to the Philad...

Philadelphia Black Mafia – the origins Gary interviews former Philadelphia Police officer turned college professor Sean Patrick Griffin on the Philadelphia Black Mafia. The Philadephia Black Mafia was one of the bloodiest crime syndicates in modern US history. From its roots in Philadelphia’s ghettos in the 1960s, it grew from a rabble of street toughs to a disciplined organization. They exerted t...

In this short episode, Michael DiLeonardo tells how he was inducted into the Gambino crime family by Sammy the Bull Gravano. He was inducted with John Gotti Jr. and John Gotti asked Gravano to conduct the ceremony because it did not look good for him to induct his own son. Show notes by Gary Jenkins To go to the store or make a donation  click here To rent Brothers against Brothers, the documentar...

Jimmy Burke in the Movies A listener named Paul Blackwood from Edinburgh Scotland emailed me with some great compliments on the show and suggested I do a story that focuses on “Jimmy the Gent” Burke. I looked around and he is mentioned in several podcasts but only as part of the famous Lufthansa heist.   James “Jimmy the Gent” Burke is one of the most famous Mob associates of all time. We use the...

Vito Genovese – The Deadly Don Gary interviews Pulitizer Prize-winning Anthony DeStefano on his most recent true crime history, The Deadly Don . Mr. DeStefano writes about the rise and fall of Vito Genovese. This is the very first comprehensive telling of this feared mafioso. Like most mobsters, he began his criminal career on the mean streets of lower Manhattan. He returned to Italy during the 19...

Boston Bob Luisi Bobby Luisi was a mafia legacy growing up in the North End of Boston. His father and other relatives worked for the Boston capo Jerry Angiulo. As a young man, Bobby got into home construction and was doing week until the market crash in the 1990s. Bobby Lusi drifted back to his roots, the La Cosa Nostra. He had a good name and he organized some young drug dealers, opened up a loan...