The Everything Mafia Book (27 page)

St. Louis, Missouri

The St. Louis crime family thrived during Prohibition and had more than its share of gang violence. Vito Giannola was the first St. Louis don. The most famous was Anthony Giordano. The St. Louis mob appears to have had an independent streak. Its leadership did not attend the Apalachin conference that ended in disaster. Giordano was a skilled leader, and as a result he projected an image of power and influence that the family did not really have. It was a second-tier family. This was evident after Giordano’s death— the family went into its death throes after the don’s demise. His succeeding boss, Matthew Trupiano, was busted for running a high-stakes poker game, a far cry from the millions the family once made skimming from the casinos in Vegas. Trupiano died of a heart attack in October 1997, but some say the small family has hobbled along.

The gangsters of St. Louis had colorful names for their families in the days of Prohibition. The most powerful organizations called themselves the Green Ones, the Pillow Gang, the Egan’s Rats, the Hogan Gang, and the Cuckoos. Eventually one familiar name, the Mafia, reigned supreme.

Denver/Pueblo, Colorado

This underworld outfit began in the 1880s and was more like a Western movie than a gangster melodrama. The first boss was a French-Canadian named Lou Blonger. He ran saloons that also featured prostitution as an attraction. This was common in the Old West. Blonger’s career lasted from the wild and woolly 1880s until the 1920s, when he was finally imprisoned.

To counter the mob violence, the citizenry turned to an equally unsavory organization, the Ku Klux Klan, to restore order. The mayor, chief of police, and many cops were Klansmen. The KKK did not vanquish vice in Denver; they controlled and profited from it. The American Legion took on the Klan and won, eliminating the KKK’s influence in the police force.

The Italians finally arrived in the 1930s in the persons of Pete and Sam Carlino. They brought their brand of bootlegging into the Wild West. The Mafia was split into two groups, both trying to stake their claim as the rightful racket kingpins of Colorado. The Smaldone brothers, with such fearsome nicknames as “Chauncey,” “Checkers,” and “Flip-Flop,” ruled their factions out of Denver, while Jim Coletti ran Pueblo. Without new recruits the local mob family dwindled. The Smaldones were reduced to a crime family of three. Checkers died in 1996, Flip-Flop died in 1998, and Chauncey died in 2006. The Denver/Pueblo family is no more.

The West Coast Families

California was not quite the immigrant bastions that states back East were. Consequently the Mafia presence in cities like Los Angeles and San Jose were comprised mainly of transplants from New York and Chicago. But while the mobsters that made up the bulk of these small-time gangs were from some of the biggest crime families in the country, their exploits out West were decidedly minor league.

Los Angeles, California

The mob in Los Angeles never got much respect, even though they oversaw gambling, loansharking, and pornography. Founded by Joseph Ardizzone, the most influential Los Angeles Mafioso was Jack Dragna. He oversaw a small family of mostly East Coast transplants, nicknamed the “Mickey Mouse Mafia” by the Los Angeles Police Department. Dragna was involved with Hollywood unions and bookmaking. Dragna died in 1956 and was replaced by Frank DiSimone, followed by Nick Licata and then Dominic Brooklier. After Brooklier died, the family fell under the control of Peter Milano. The continually down on its luck family was plagued by informers, constant law enforcement surveillance, and a complete lack of respect on the streets. Though they should have faded away long ago, Milano still leads the now long-in-the-jaw Mickey Mouse Mafia.

San Francisco, California

Concentrated in the heavily Italian North Beach neighborhood, the Bay Area crime family remained a small, local criminal organization, never achieving much power outside their territory. The first don was named Frank Lanza, and he was the boss during Prohibition. Two other dons followed before Lanza’s son James took over in the 1960s. He was not a grandiose hood who loved the limelight. The family received some notoriety after Jimmy Frattiano became a government witness, but faded into obscurity after Lanza’s death.

Did a mobster ever sue the press for libel?

Joseph Cerrito of San Jose, California, sued Life magazine when the periodical identified him as the head of the San Jose crime family. The case was eventually dismissed.

San Jose, California

Onofrio Sciortino was the lyrically named founder of this low-key California family. He was replaced by Joseph Cerrito, a Sicilian native who operated a successful auto dealership in Los Gatos. Cerrito died in 1978 of a heart attack and the San Jose Mafia family died with him.

The Gulf Coast Connection

The humid Deep South was not only home to one of the earliest mob families in the country but boasted two of the most powerful mob bosses in the history of crime. Between the crews in Tampa, New Orleans, and the small outpost of Dallas, the Mafia controlled illegal gambling, narcotics trafficking, and even moonshine production. These crime groups were small, but their influence in world affairs was enormous, including the alleged involvement of all three families in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Tampa, Florida

Though Miami and South Florida has been host to mobsters from around the country, Florida has a homegrown Mafia family, based in Tampa. The Tampa family made its initial fortune in gambling, specifically
bolita
(Spanish for “little ball”), a numbers game popular in the ethnic enclave of Ybor City. The Tampa family also had no compunction about getting into the narcotics business. They were one of the first families to aggressively get into the game. The Tampa mob also had connections in Cuba. The island nation was a paradise and a playground for the mob and wealthy Americans who went there to gamble and indulge in other vices. This all changed when Castro seized power in 1959.

Florida actually had another homegrown “Mafia” family, the Cracker Mob. This group of rural mobsters controlled gambling, drugs, prostitution, and moonshining throughout rural Florida and was closely tied in with the Tampa crime family.

Some of the earlier mob powers in Tampa were Ignazio Antinori, Ignazio Italiano, Salvatore Italiano, Alphonso Diecidue, and Santo Trafficante Sr. The most famous Tampa Mafioso was Santo Trafficante Jr., who succeeded his father as boss of the family after Sr.’s death in 1954. Trafficante Jr. became one of the most respected Mafia leaders in the country, forging alliances with mobsters from the United States, Canada, Italy, Spain, and Southeast Asia. Trafficante died in 1987 and was allegedly succeeded by Vincent LoScalzo.

New Orleans, Louisiana

In the twentieth century, the name of Carlos Marcello was synonymous with the New Orleans Mafia. Born in Tunisia, Carlos Marcello was a five-foot-four-inches tall, stockily built powerhouse. With a thick Cajun accent, Marcello did not fit the mold of the stereotypical American gangster.

The New Orleans mob was always very independent. It went its own way and did not answer to the Commission up North, which regulated just about every other Mafia family large and small. Just as the American South is regarded as laid back, with people and events that move along at a leisurely pace, so too the New Orleans Mafia’s structure was a looser confederation of individuals and groups of criminals.

The Mafia in New Orleans operated bars and restaurants in the famous French Quarter, site of the yearly Mardi Gras celebration. It was a popular surveillance assignment for the local FBI!

Carlos Marcello continued to thrive and feign influence and prestige in the New Orleans rackets. He had his sticky fingers in drugs, gambling, and also in less harmful enterprises that the Mafia has always had an interest in—pinball machines, jukeboxes, and vending machines.

What is the longest reign of a Mafia don?

Stefano Magaddino ruled the Buffalo crime family for fifty years until his death in 1974. No other don approaches this tenure. They were ousted by either natural or unnatural causes long before they could celebrate this milestone anniversary.

Carlos Marcello became the don of the New Orleans crime family in 1947. A conference was held, and he was appointed by the other members of the New Orleans crime family. It created bad blood but no bloodshed. It was an unusual example of Mafia power transference. Most involved someone getting whacked.

Marcello shared the philosophy of most of his fellow gangsters. In a sense they were akin to the political Libertarian Party, which endorses the legalization of drugs and prostitution. Marcello believed he was giving the people what they wanted. He wasn’t concerned with whether or not people’s lives were destroyed by drug abuse or alcohol addiction—that was the individual’s responsibility.

Carlos Marcello