Five Families: The Rise, Decline, and Resurgence of America's Most Powerful Mafia Empires (130 page)

The reactions of law-enforcement officials to Gotti’s conviction were based on public statements and interviews with Joseph Fried, a New York Times reporter, and with prosecutors and FBI agents, including Jim Fox, and with U.S. Attorney Andrew Maloney. The discord over the withholding of information about a possible attempt to tamper with the Gotti jury in the 1990 state assault trial was obtained from interviews with Robert Morgenthau, the Manhattan District Attorney; Michael Cherkasky, the assistant D.A., and lead prosecutor in the trial; Ronald Goldstock; Maloney; and Bruce Mouw. The tracing and arrest of William Peist is based on court records, and interviews with Mouw and other FBI agents. The dispute over FBI authorization to publish
Boss of Bosses
was based on interviews with Fox and former FBI agent Joseph O’Brien. Salvatore Gravano’s sentencing and details of his life afterwards, and his indictments on narcotics and murder conspiracy charges, were derived from court records in Arizona, New York, and New Jersey; Gravano’s statements in
Underboss
; Gravano’s testimony in 2003 at a federal trial in Brooklyn; and interviews with John Gleeson, the federal prosecutor, and with Mouw and other FBI agents.

Gotti’s living conditions at the federal prison in Marion, Illinois, were based on statements by Bureau of Prisons officials and interviews with Gotti’s lawyers, Bruce Cutler and Richard Rhebock. Information on Gotti’s criminal and personal activities were obtained from court records and from interviews with FBI agents, including Mouw, and NYPD Detective Lieutenant Remo Franceschini. Additional information about Gotti was derived from FBI debriefings of Gravano, his testimony, and his accounts in
Underboss
. Evidence and materials found in John A. Gotti’s office were noted in affidavits by New York State Organized Crime Task Force investigators, and in federal and New York State court documents. John J. Gotti’s prison conversations with relatives were included in court documents submitted by federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York concerning the pre-sentencing of his son, John A. and the trials of his brother Peter. Details of Gotti’s funeral are based on personal reporting and accounts in New York newspapers. Details of the trial and sentencing of Peter Gotti and his relatives are based on personal reporting and court records. Estimates of John J. Gotti’s illicit wealth were derived from interviews with FBI officials, principally Jim Fox when he was the head of the bureau’s New York office, and with Mouw.

The description of Anthony Casso’s boyhood in Brooklyn, his nickname, his crimes, and his associations with Mafia members were compiled from multiple
sources: telephones interviews with Casso in 2003, in the presence of his lawyer, John D.B. Lewis, from the federal penitentiary in Florence, Colorado; Casso’s NYPD arrest record; interviews with a former NYPD detective and boyhood acquaintance of Casso, who asked to be unidentified; interviews with federal prosecutors Gregory O’Connell and Charles Rose; FBI reports on debriefings of Casso; a pre-sentence investigation report by federal probation officers in 1998; and a letter from Casso to Federal District Court Judge Frederic Block. Information on Casso’s involvement in murders was contained in his pre-sentencing report and his debriefings by the FBI. His associations with Christie Furnari and Vittorio Amuso were obtained from his letter to Judge Block, FBI debriefings, and interviews with O’Connell. Details of the murder plot against John Gotti and Frank DeCicco were based principally on debriefings of Casso by the FBI and interviews with O’Connell, who also interrogated Casso. Additional information about the plot was included in statements made to the FBI by Alphonse D’Arco, the former acting boss of the Lucchese family. Conversations between the Gambino family conspirators and Casso concerning the planned murder of Paul Castellano were obtained from FBI debriefings of Gravano and his statements in
Underboss
. Details of Gotti’s escape from the bomb plot was derived from FBI debriefings of Gravano and his statements in
Underboss
. The account of the attempted assassination of Casso is based on NYPD records and a telephone interview with Casso from prison. Antonio Corallo’s designation of Amuso to be his successor as Lucchese boss was obtained principally from Casso’s letter to Judge Block; Casso’s statements to FBI agents and to federal prosecutors; and a telephone interview with him.

Information about the Lucchese’s family history and its factional composition was based on FBI debriefing reports of former Lucchese members, including Alphonse D’Arco, Anthony Casso, Anthony Accetturo, and Peter Chiodo. Additional details were obtained in interviews with Accetturo, Ralph Salerno, Gregory O’Connell, and Richard Rudolph, a former FBI agent on the Lucchese Squad. Descriptions of the murders that occurred after Casso and Amuso gained control of the Lucchese family and the motives for the slayings were cited in FBI reports on debriefings of D’Arco and Chiodo; testimony by D’Arco and Chiodo at several trials; reports by the FBI on debriefings of Casso; a pre-sentencing report on Casso in 1998 by federal probation officers; a telephone interview with Casso in 2003; Casso’s guilty plea in 1994, and NYPD reports on the murders. The background to the murders of Robert Kubecka and Donald Barstow was obtained mainly from FBI debriefings of D’Arco; court records; and a telephone interview with Casso. The dispute over negligence in protecting Kubecka and Barstow was based on allegations and testimony in a civil suit by relatives of the two victims and interviews with federal prosecutors and officials in the New York State Organized Crime Task Force. Information about the financial
arrangements, wealth, and policies of the Lucchese family’s Casso-Amuso administration were based on statements to the FBI and trial testimony by D’Arco and Chiodo; a suit by the Justice Department to seize the assets of Casso and his wife; Casso’s testimony before a Senate Committee examining Russian organized-crime activities; and U.S. Labor Department investigations of racketeering in the Garment Center. Descriptions of Casso’s spending sprees were obtained in interviews with federal prosecutors Gregory O’Connell and Charles Rose and FBI agent Richard Rudolph.

Details of D’Arco’s meetings with Casso were contained in FBI debriefings and D’Arco’s testimony in trials of Lucchese family members. Information on D’Arco’s background and criminal record were obtained from NYPD and from court documents of his arrests and convictions and from his statements to the FBI about his activities in the Lucchese family. The background on Peter Chiodo was based on details in his 1991 indictments on RICO charges; statements he made in FBI de-briefings; and from interviews with prosecutors Charles Rose and Gregory O’Connell; and interviews with Richard Rudolph, a former member of the FBI’s Lucchese Squad. The accounts of the attempts to kill Chiodo and his relatives and his defection are based on statements to the FBI and testimony by D’Arco and Chiodo at trials. Additional information was provided by O’Connell in interviews. The circumstances leading to D’Arco’s defection were obtained from his interrogations by FBI agents; interviews with Rose and O’Connell; and D’Arco’s trial testimony.

Information about Anthony Accetturo’s criminal activities in New Jersey and Florida and his relationships with Lucchese leaders Ducks Corralo, Vic Amuso, and Anthony Casso were obtained in an interview with Accetturo. Additional details of his crime career were provided by Robert Buccino, a New Jersey law-enforcement official and boyhood friend of Accetturo’s, and New Jersey State Police intelligence files. Accounts of Accetturo’s disputes with Amuso and Casso and attempts to kill Accetturo were derived from interviewing Accetturo; trial testimony by Al D’Arco; and FBI debriefings of D’Arco and Casso. Accetturo’s explanation for becoming a cooperative witness was spelled out by him in a lengthy interview with the author. The historical information about the formation of the New Jersey Mafia crews was obtained from reports by investigators in the New Jersey Attorney General’s office who interrogated Accetturo. Accetturo’s description of the American Mafia’s contacts with Sicilian mafiosi is contained in a report by Italian government investigators who questioned him in New Jersey.

The discovery of Casso’s secreted cash was included in a court affidavit by federal prosecutors. Details of the search for Casso and his capture were obtained from FBI agents, particularly Joseph Valiquette. Information about Casso’s plans to escape from the Metropolitan Correctional Center and discussions about killing Judge Eugene Nickerson are included in a pre-sentencing report for Casso prepared by federal probation department officers. Additional details about the escape, assassination plot, and Vic Amuso’s renunciation of Casso were provided by Gregory O’Connell and FBI agents. Casso’s conduct and conditions at La Tuna Prison were based on interviews with O’Connell, Agent Richard Rudolph, and La Tuna officials. Casso’s assertions that two NYPD detectives were on his payroll and carried out murder assignments for the Mafia were made in a telephone interview with him and in interviews with FBI agents, federal prosecutors and his lawyer, John D.B. Lewis. Casso’s claim that an FBI mole supplied him with confidential information was reiterated by him in a telephone interview in 2003 with the author and Lewis. Additional evidence about Casso’s relationships with the accused detectives was contained in the March 2005 indictments of former detectives Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa.

Facts and statements concerning the sentences of D’Arco, Chiodo, and Accetturo were obtained from court hearings and trial testimony. Additional information about Accetturo’s sentence, his value to law enforcement, and his views concerning his prison sentence and the decline of the Lucchese family are based on an interview with him and interviews with his lawyer, Robert G. Stevens, and Robert Buccino, a New Jersey law-enforcement official who investigated Accetturo; and internal reports by the New Jersey State Attorney General’s Office. The evaluation of Anthony Casso’s importance in the Lucchese family were compiled from interviews with O’Connell, former FBI agents, and Accetturo.

Material on Vincent Gigante’s strolls and his appearance on Greenwich Village streets were based on personal observations in the 1980s; from interviews with neighborhood residents and merchants; and interviews with FBI agents, particularly John Pritchard III, former head of the Genovese Squad. Information about the East Side town house occupied by Gigante was obtained from New York real estate records. Details about Gigante’s attire and behavior inside the town house were compiled from testimony at court hearings and trials, and from an interview with Charles Beaudoin, the FBI agent in charge of surveilling the town house. Gigante’s personal and early criminal background were assembled from NYPD arrest records, court
proceedings and interviews with former NYPD detectives who investigated Gigante. The origin of the nickname, “Chin,” was obtained in an interview with Gigante’s brother the Reverend Louis Gigante. Details about Gigante’s surrender in 1957 for the attempted murder of Frank Costello and his trial came from court records and accounts in
The New York Times
. Court records and the
Times
were the principal sources for Gigante’s arrest and conviction along with Vito Genovese on narcotics charges. Statements by psychiatrists and physicians concerning Gigante’s mental competence were obtained from court records. Gigante’s rise in the Genovese family following his release from prison in the 1970s is based largely on statements to the FBI by Vincent Fish Cafaro, a soldier and confidant of Anthony Fat Tony Salerno. Cafaro’s statements to the FBI are the main source for details about Philip Lombardo’s leadership of the Genovese family in the 1970s. The incident involving a frightened truck driver seeking Gigante’s intervention with a mobster-controlled union local is contained in a report on organized-crime influence, published by the International Brotherhood of Teamsters in 2002. Salvatore Gravano’s meetings with Gigante were described in his testimony at hearings on Gigante’s competence to stand trial. Additional background material on Gigante was obtained in interviews with Pritchard, Donald S. Richards, a former head of the Genovese Squad, and other squad agents and supervisors.

Details of the FBI’s psychological warfare tactics against Gigante and attempts to bug cars and the Triangle Club were obtained mainly from interviews with Richards and Pritchard. The description of the Triangle Club and Venero Mangano’s club were based on personal observations. Mangano’s background was derived from court and FBI records. Information on Gigante’s odd behavior in public came from court hearings and trial testimony, and from interviews with Agents John Pritchard, Charles Beaudoin, and Pat Marshall. The comments from Barry Slotnick, Gigante’s lawyer, were made in contemporaneous interviews. Father Louis Gigante’s background was obtained from accounts published in
The New York Times
. Information about Vincent Gigante’s two households and children were obtained from court records, probation reports, and FBI surveillance reports. The background on Morris Levy was based on real estate records, indictments, trial records, and accounts in the
Village Voice
. Additional information about Levy was provided by Pritchard, who was involved in FBI investigations of Levy’s relationships with the Genovese family. Telephone-tap recordings of Gigante’s conversations regarding the East Side town house were included in court hearings. Details of the FBI’s attempts to secretly observe Gigante in the town house from the Ramaz School were obtained in interviews with Dr. Noam Shudolsky, a school official, and Pritchard. Additional information about the surveillance was contained in trial testimony by Beaudoin and follow-up interviews with him. Former FBI supervisors James Kallstrom and Pritchard supplied information about the attempts to plant bugs in the town house and in Dominick Canterino’s car.