26th Street CrewThe 26th Street neighborhood is contained within the Armour Square community area of Chicago, named after the Armour Institute of Technology, the original name of the Illinois Institute of Technology.

The neighborhood was the site of Al Capone’s Headquarters, the Lexington Hotel, and the 26th Street crew is considered a direct descendant of the original Colosimo-Torrio-Capone syndicate because many of the people who worked for Colosimo and later Torrio and capone lived there. Much of the area has been replaced by an interstate roadway and public housing, reducing the size of the Italian enclave. Nevertheless, it probably is the strongest street crew neighborhood in metropolitan Chicago.

The original boss of 26th Street was Bruno (“The Bomber”) Roti, whose son became the chief deputy sheriff for Cook County in the 1980s; another became alderman of the First Ward and was later convicted of corruption. When The Bomber gave up his position, he was replaced by an assistant who died in 1983 and was succeeded by Angelo (“The Hook”- from which he hung his torture victims) LaPietra. In 1987, LaPietra was convicted in the Las Vegas skimming case- the government place a court-authorized bug in the storefront headquarters of the 26th Street crew.(He died of natural causes in 1999, a year after being released from prison.) The crew has extensive involvement in gambling and loansharking.

North Side CrewThe North Side racket area is located within the Near North Side community, which includes the city’s “Gold Coast” and downtown entertainment area. By the turn of the century, a portion of the Near North Side was already referred to as the “Gold Coast” because of the large number of luxurious homes that were built along the lakefront. The turn of the twentieth century also brought large numbers of Italian, particularly Sicilians, to the area, eventually replacing earlier immigrant groups. The “dark people,” as they were called, soon dominated the area.

The natural clash between the well-to-do families of the eastern part and the immigrant families of the western portion of the near North Side resulted in a central area that became progressively less desirable as a residential district.

The North Side was the focus of Harvey Zorbaugh’s classic community study The Gold Coast and the Slum (1929:198), which described the North Side “as a community in the process of disintegration where church, school, family, and government have ceased to have any influence on community life.

The connection between the Northern Side community and the Chicago Outfit can be traced to Prohibition, Al Capone, and the Unione Siciliana. In 1929, Capone’s handpicked successor to the leadership of the Unione was murdered by the Aiello brothers allied with Bugs Moran. Capone responded by sending a cohort of men led by Frank Nitti into the area. They systematically bombed Aiello-Moran alky stills and speakeasies all over the North Side. The blasting continued until the St. Valentine’s Day massacre of 1929 ended the Aiello-Moran axis forever and left the Capone syndicate firmly in control of Chicago’s Near North Side.

The North Side was known as a “honky-tonk town,” as saloons, cabarets, and rialtos marked every block on Clark Street from Grand Avenue to Division Street. Today, there is nothing left of the Clark Street rialto, though neighboring Rush Street contains numerous restaurants and upscale liquor establishments, and further north into the Forty-third and Forty-fourth Wards are numerous night sports featuring blues and jazz, for which Chicago is famous.

Lottery king Ken (“Tokyo Joe”) Eto, born in 1920 of Japanese ancestry, paid thousands of dollars a month in street taxes to the North Side crew to remain in business. In 1983, he was converted of operating an illegal lottery business that grossed nearly $6 million between May 4, 1980, and august 20, 1980. Facing imprisonment, he met with the crew’s street boss, Vincent Solano, head of Laborers Union Local 1.Eto assured Solano that he could be trusted to be a “stand-up guy,” but the street boss was apparently unconvinced. In 1983, Tokyo Joe was taken for a ride by two men, one a cook County deputy sheriff, shot three times in the back of the head, and left for dead. But Eto survived. Later that year, the bodies of Eto’s would-e assasins were found in the trunk of a car with multiple stab wounds---being “trunked” was a apparently the Outfit’s penalty for botching a murder. Eto went into the federal witness protection program.

The North Side crew made headlines in Chicago during the 1990s, mostly because of Lenny Patrick’s activities.

Lenny Patrick Leonard Patrick was born in England (or possibly in Chicago to English parents, Jew who had somehow acquired Irish surnames) in 1913. He grow up in the Jewish community on Chicago’s West Side, where he became a legend for his easy use of violence and strong defense of the neighborhood. His criminal record includes a seven-year sentence for a 1933 Indiana bank robbery. He has admitted committing two murders and ordering four others, all during the 1930s and 1940s. He has been closely associated with Gus Alex, a major Outfit power and political fixer, for decades. With a crew of vicious enforcers, Patrick was responsible for gambling and loansharking operations on the North Side and northern suburbs. He also controlled several legitimate industrial laundering companies that rented towels, linens, and uniforms.

According to court records, the Patrick group extorted money from seven legitimate business: In each case, members of his crew approached the owners of the businesses and demanded payments of between $50,000 and $500,000.

In 1992, after being accused of extortion from numerous legitimate firms and gambling operators, Patrick pled guilty and agreed to become a government witness. Gus Alex and the crew’s primary enforcer were found guilty of extortion. Alex, at age 76, was sentenced to 15 years. Patrick’s contribution to the success of the federal government, however, is dubious. According to court records, “While Patrick purported to cooperate with the government beginning on November 6,1989, his cooperation was at best halfhearted, and he continued at the same time to participate in the conspiracy and to hie his participation from the FBI.”

STRUCTURE OF THE AMERICAN MAFIA: THE NEW YORK VERSION

Just as they have different histories, OC in New York and Chicago represent two versions of the American Mafia.

In the New York version, the basic unit is the family, or Borgata. However, the actual name by which a group is known may vary. In New England, for example, it is the “Office.” Group in the New York metropolitan area are known as “families.” Although any number of members may be related, the term Family does not imply kinship by blood or marriage. Each crime unit is composed of members and associates.

MembershipItalian Mafia refers to a newly initiated member as being “made into a man” (Paoli 2003)—“wiseguy,” “button” or “receiving his button,” “being straightened out,” “amico,” and “friend of ours.” And many share a similar initiation ceremony. Testifying before a senate subcommittee (“Russian Organized Crime” 1996; 46), Anthony (“Gaspipe”) Casso, imprisoned former underboss of the Lucchese Family, stated,

To become a “made” member, you would have to be sponsored by a captain of the family, who would bring you to the boss of the family and sponsor you to become a “made” member. They have a ceremony with the boss, the consigliere, and the underboss present at the time, and the captain who brings you in. They prick your trigger finger and make it bleed, and then they put a little piece of paper; they set it on fire and you burn it in your hand, and you repeat after them that you will never betray La Cosa Nostra, or you will burn like the paper is burning in your hand. And your life does not belong to you anymore; your life belongs to them.

In 1989,two electronic eavesdropping devices were placed in the basement ceiling of a house in the basement ceiling of a house in Medford, Massachusetts, a Boston suburb. The bugs recorded the initiation of four men into the crime Family then headed by Raymond Patriarca, Jr., who presided at the ceremony.

[patriarca] we’re all here to bring in some new members into our Family and more than that,to start maybe a new beginning. Put all that’s got started behind us. ‘cause they come into our Family to start a new thing with us……

Michael Franzese, a captain in the Colombo Family, reports a two-stage process. First, he was formally proposed: taken by an old-time member to meet the Family boss, who explained the rules: “After the meeting, my name, along with those of the other potential inductees, was circulated around the other four families” (Franzese and Matera 1992: 124). Franzese was then assigned to caporegime for a probationary period of nearly a year. In 1975, he was formally inducted in a ceremony similar to those already described.

Former NYPD detective Ralph Salerno (with Tompkins 1969) reports that recruitment into OC involves the careful study of neighborhood youngsters by those who control membership. A potential recruit must exhibit recognition of the authority of the organization and a willingness to perform various criminal and noncriminal functions (usually minor at first) with skill and daring and without asking questions. Robert Woetzel (1963: 3) points out, “The standards of the teenage gang from which the potential criminals come are the same as those of an adult conspiracy”: a code of loyalty and exclusive “turf” (territory). The gang boy may also have a criminal record and an antisocial attitude, which indicate that he is a “stand-up” kid, the proper credentials for a career in OC.

Reymond Martin, a former ranking officer with the NYPD, describes why recruitment is made easy in certain Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn (1963: 61):

On so many street corners in Bath Beach, in so many luncheonettes and candy stores in Bensonhurst, boys see the mob-affiliated bookies operate. They meet the young toughs, the mob enforcers. They hear the tales of glory recounted—who robbed what, who worked over whom, which showgirl shared which gangster’s bed, who got hit by whom, the techniques of the money rolls in.

An undercover FBI agent describes the day an associate was “made”—initiated as a member of the Bonanno crime Family (Pistone 1987: 64): “When he came back, he was ecstatic, as proud as a peacock. ‘Getting made is the greatest thing that could ever happen to me,’ he said.’I’ve been looking forward to this day ever since

I was a kid’….. That night we partied together for his celebration. But now everybody treated him with more respect. He was made guy now.” After completioonof his initiation, Jimmy (“the Weasel”) Frantianno “was so excited that he could feel his legs tremble.” Becoming a member of the Los Angeles crime Family of Jack Dragna “made im a special person, an inheritor of enormous power. It was something he had wanted for as long as he could remember” (Demaris 1981: 3).

To be eligible for membership, a young man (there are no female member) must be of Italian descamily underboss Sam Gravano state, “Years and years ago, you had to be Italian on both sides. Then it became that you only had to be that on your father’s side. Not your mother’s. Because they say you are what your father is, you carry his name. Like Jhon Gotti’s wife is part Russian Jew. So his son , Jhon Junior, got made, right? He’s part Italian and part Russian Jew” (Maas 1997: 84). One source reports tht this change in qualifications occurred in 1975 as a response to recruiting difficulties experience by the New York Families (Volkman 1998).There is also evidence that one can get credit for killing someone by assisting in the murder rather than carrying out the killing itself. An OC group is also interested in criminals who have proven to be moneymakers, “earners” who can increase the group’s income.In 1988, the former underboss of the Cleveland Family testified before a congressional committee:

My name is Angelo Lonardo. I am 77 years old, and I am a member of the La Cosa Nostra. I am the former underboss of the Cleveland organized crime family. I became a member of La Cosa Nostra in the late 1940s, but have been associated with the organization since the late 1920s. When I was “made” or became a member of La Cosa Nostra, I went through an initiation ceremony. Ilater learned that o be proposed for membershipin La Cosa Nostra, you would have to have killed someone and stood up to the pressure of police scrutiny. Today, you do not have to kill to be a member, but just prove yourself worthy by keeping your mouth shut orby being a “stand-up” guy. However, if you are called upon to kill someone, you have to be prepared to do it.

CrewsMembers and associates are organized into crews, semi-independent units nominally headed by a caporegime, a capodecina, a street boss, or even a soldier. Crews generate finances, which they share with their crews chief, who shares it with the caporegime or with the boss. These crews have been described in a number of popular books on OC.FBI agent Joseph Pistone (1987: 51-52), in his undercover role, describes the crew of a soldier in the Bonanno Family, whose “headquarters” ws the back room of a store stocked with expensive clothing—stolen merchandise: “Although tese were lower-echelon guys in the mob. They always had money. They were always turning things over. They always had swag around…. You name it, they stole it. Jilly’s crew would hit warehouses, docks, trucks, houses…. There wasn’t one hour of one day that went by when they weren’t thinking and talking about what they were going to rob…. The mob was their job”.

The crew headed by Jhon Gotti, a Caporegime and later boss of the Gambino Family, was headquarters at the Bergin Hunt and Fish Club, a (very) private storefront in the Ozone Park section of the New York City borough of Queens: “The Bergin men were good customers in the small cafes and stores operating on slim margins. Around his neighbors, Gotti acted like a gentlemen; around him they acted as though he were a successful salesman. He began saluting the community with fourth of July fireworks displays and barbecues; some residents began saluting him by alerting the club when men resembling undercover detectives were around” (Mustain and Capeci 1988: 112).

The BossAlthough he is at the center of the universe of an American Mafia unit, the boss does not have a complete overview of the decentralized activities of his members. In the past, the boss was usually a senior citizen—it takes many years to gain the respect of members and the knowledge and connections needed by the group.It is a sign of weakness that many of the current Cosa Nostra bosses are relatively young, as well as volatile and violent. In 1996, for example, Liborio Bellomo, acting head of the Genovese crime Family, the largest in the United States, was indicted on racketeering charges in New York—at age 39 (Van Natta 1996).

Typically, the boss operated out of a fixed location: a restaurant, a private club, or his own business office. Raymond Patriarca (Sr.), the New England crime boss who died of natural causes in 1984 at age 76, operated out of his vending-machine business, the National Cigarette Service, in the federal Hill section of Province, Rhode Island. Vincent Teresa (and Renner 1973: 95) state that the entire area around Patriarca’s headquarters was an armed camp: “It was impossible to move through the area without being spotted and reported.” Throughout the day, Patriarca received visitors, sometimes legitimate persons asking for a favor, usually to resolve a dispute, but more frequently “a parade of the faithful bearing tithe, cold cash for the middle drawer in the dirty back room of a cigarette vending-machine business in a run-down section of Providence. It could be the receipts from a wholly owned subsidiary or rent from a franchise. In a complex maze of interests, he completely controlled some markets, especially those involving gambling, loansharking, and pornography, and dabbled in others such as truck hijacking and drug trafficking in which freelancers negotiated fees to do business” (O’Neill and Lehr 1989: 43).

The boss of the Genovese Family in New York operated out of an Italian restaurant in lower Manhattan, to which he was driven every day from his home in long Island by a chauffeur bodyguard. In the back of the restaurant was a table for varying periods. Strangers were not welcome in the restaurant, which was located in the heart of an Italian neighborhood dominated by the Genovese Family. There was no place to park; all parking spaces were taken by members of the Family or their associates. Anyone walking in the area who was not recognized would be reported to the Family members at the restaurant. If a stranger entered the restaurant, he or she was told that a reservation was needed—but the restaurant refused to take reservations (Abadinsky 1983). Joseph Colombo, whose crime family bears his name, operated out of a neighborhood real estate firm, Cantalup realty co., in the Bensonhurst section of Brooklyn. He was on the books as a licensed real estate salesman—the licensing test was fixed (Cantalupo and Renner 1990). Gambino Family boss Jhon Gotti operated out of the Ravenite Social Club on Mulberry Street in Manhattan’s Little Italy; every Wednesday, Gotti would discuss business on the street or in an apartment was bugged by the FBI (Coffey and Schmetterer 1991).

A boss has a number of men who report directly to him. They carry messages and perform assignments as necessary; they also physically protect the boss. In many crime groups, particularly those in New York, where five Families—and one from New Jersey—operated ,most of the activities of Family members are not under the direct or indirect supervision of the boss. He often finds out about many of the activities of members only as the result of periodic briefings by the captains.

Crime boss Joseph Bonanno (1983: 157) describes how he operated as “Father” of his Family:

Internal disagreements between Family members were solved at the grassroots level by group leaders or by the consigliere. A Family member’s personal or business problems were usually handled in this manner, and the problem rarely had to be brought to my attention.

On the other hand, if a Family member wanted to go into business with a members of another Family, such an association would need the approval of the fathers of the respective families. A family member’s relations with non-Family members was his own affair.

Other than meeting with other Fathers and meeting with group leaders within my Family on an ad hoc basis, being a Father took up relatively little of my time. Family matters were largely handled by the group leaders under me. Indeed, there were many Family members I never met. If I convened a Family meeting, I met only with the group leaders, who in turn passed the information to the people in their groups.

The CommissionAll crime bosses bosses are linked in a rather informal arrangement known as the “commission,” but only the bosses of the most powerful groups—particularly those in New York, Chicago, Buffalo, and Philadelphia—are considered actual commission members. “The national commission regulates joint ventures between families, intervenes in family disputes, approves the initiation of new members, and controls relations between the U.S. and Sicilian branches of La Cosa Nostra” (PCOC 1986a: 37). The commission, reports Bonanno (1983: 159), can arbitrate disputes. Having no direct executive power, however, it has to depend on influence: “It had respect only insofar as its individual members had respect. More than anything else, the Commission was a forum.”

In addition to the “national commission,” which is a body that rarely, if ever, meets as a group, the bosses of the New York Families constitute a commission that serves to arbitrate disputes and deal with joint ventures between their families. In 1986, in what became known as the “Commission Case” (United States v. Salerno, 85 CR 139, SDNY,1985), a number of New York bosses were convicted of conducting the affairs of “the commission of La Cosa Nostra” in a pattern of racketeering that violated the case revealed the role of the commission in New York:

Regulate and facilitate relationships between the five Families Promote and facilitate joint ventures between Families Resolve actual and potential disputes between Families Regulate the criminal activities of the Families Extend formal recognition to newly chosen Family bosses and resolve leadership disputes within families Authorize the execution of Family members Approve of the initiation of new members into the Families

The power of approving the initiation of new members keeps Family size stable and prevents wholesale initiation, which would be likely in times of intra-Family conflict. During the struggle to lead the Colombo Family (1991-1993), for example, the commission would not permit either faction to initiate new members and thereby gain an advantage over its opposition.

Rules of the American Mafia Always show respect to those who can command it. Report any failure to show respect to one’s patron immediately. Violence must be used, even if only of a limited type, to ensure respect. Never ask for surnames. (Underboss Sam Gravano testified that there were many people in his crime

family whose last names he did not know.) Never resort to violence in a dispute with a member or associate of another Family. Never resort to, or even threaten, violence in a dispute with a member of your Family. Do not use the telephone except to arrange for a meeting place, preferably in code, from which you will

then travel to a safe place to discuss business.

Avoid mentioning specifics when discussing business—for example, names, dates, and places—beyond those absolutely necessary for understanding.

Keep your mouth shut—anything you hear, anything you see, stays with you, in your head; do not talk about it.

Do not ask unnecessary questions. The amount of information given to you is all you need to carry out your instructions.

Never engage in homosexual activities. If your patron arranges for two parties to work together, he assumes responsibility for arbitrating any

disputes between the parties. The boss can unilaterally direct violence, including murder, against any member of his Family, but he

cannot engage in murder-for-hire, that is, make a profit from murder. (The murder need not be related to business: Paul Castellano ordered his son-in-law murdered, believing his philandering responsible for the boss’s daughter’s miscarriage.)

The boss cannot use violence against a member or close associate of another Family without prior consultation with that Family’s boss.

The principal form of security in the American Mafia is an elaborate system of referral and vouching. Vouching for someone who turns out to be an informant or undercover officer entails the death penalty.

THE STRUCTURE OF THE AMERICAN MAFIA: THE CHICAGO VERSION

Chicago differs from New York in the Outfit was always a cooperative venture with other groups, although the Italians were dominant. There is an absence of independent entrepreneurs and important decisions are made at the executive level. Moving into a new business or new territory is determined at the top of a truly hierarchical organization. For example, when it was decided to get into the lucrative video poker machine business, an important question had to be answered: should distribution be controlled centrally, or should each crew be allowed to distribute in its own territory? The boss, apparently in consultation with his advisors, decided on decentralization (Herion 1998).

The outfit is led by a boss who at various times has actually been akin to a chief executive officer responsible to one or more persons constituting an informal board of directors. This was the case during the leadership of Sam Giancana, who reported to Tony Accardo and Paul Ricca. Ricca died in 1972, and until his death 20 years later, Accardo served as something analogous to a powerful president who appoints the prime minister. Assisted by a committee of older and influential members who assume some type of senior status, the boss controls three area bosses. Each area boss has responsibility for a particular part of the Chicagoland area. He oversees the activities of street bosses who direct the day-to-day activities of crew members.

But every Outfit guy is on call. “It’s worse than the FBI or the military. If they get a call at three in the morning: ‘Go see Howard and collect some money; give him a whack or break his legs,’ they can’t say ‘I’m tired.’ They’ve got to do it.” And they can be called to a meeting at any time: “Refusing to go to a meeting is a killing offense. It’s the way they test loyalty. They call him in—call him in for ‘a cigar,’ where they get their ass chewed out by the boss. It’s an easy way to set someone up for a murder. If you don’t show up you got a problem; if you do show up…” (O’ Rourke 1997).