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Monday, January 29, 2018

An Underboss is Whacked, Because Even Mobsters Don’t Like Heroin

John Turano was working a shift at his father’s Italian-American restaurant, Joe and Mary’s, on July 12, 1979, when Carmine “Lilo” Galante walked through the door. A mob strongman and regular patron, Galante was escorted — along with two Sicilian bodyguards — to his usual table in the back courtyard. Temperatures soared that summer day in New York City, but the guards still wore full leather jackets to hide their heavy artillery. Galante, after all, had plenty of enemies.

Having served a stint in prison for attempted robbery in the late 1930s, Galante transitioned from strong-arm work for Vito Genovese to establishing his power base in Williamsburg, Brooklyn — Bonanno family territory. He shared a couple common enemies with Joe Bonanno, the most prolific being Carlo Gambino, and eventually rose to rank of underboss in the Bonanno family. While known as a cold-blooded killer — the NYPD suspected him of numerous mob-related murders — authorities could never find anyone to testify against the feared mobster.

“[Galante’s] foray into the drug world really got kicked into high gear in the ’50s,” says Christian Cipollini, author of Murder Inc.: Mysteries of the Mob’s Most Deadly Hit Squad. Galante traveled to Canada and Sicily to oversee narcotics trafficking, “and it wasn’t long before he gained recognition by law enforcement as a major player in drug trafficking.” The feds busted Galante, sending him to prison in 1962 for 20 years. Finally paroled in the early 1970s, Galante set out to regain his control of the dope business. The problem? His fellow mobsters didn’t like it.

That fateful afternoon, Galante, 69, was having lunch with a friend and bodyguard Leonard Coppola, 40, and Turano’s father, Giuseppe, 48 — also a Bonanno associate. Smoking a cigar and enjoying the conversation, Galante certainly didn’t expect what happened next. John remembers three masked men walking into the restaurant. One pointed a gun at him, telling him not to move. But before the shooters reached the courtyard, the son shouted a warning to his father. The gunman turned and fired, wounding the young Turano before joining his cohorts in the courtyard, where they unleashed a barrage of bullets.

Underboss Carmine Galante is whacked


“They blew Lilo away while he was eating lunch, in broad daylight,” says Mafia historian Ed Scarpo, author of Cosa Nostra News: The Cicale Files, Volume 1: Inside the Last Great Mafia Empire. John hid throughout the onslaught, and after the gunmen and bodyguards fled, he found the bodies. Galante had been blown off his chair and flung into the tomato patch behind him — a cigar in his mouth and a Zippo lighter in his hand. Coppola also was killed, and Turano was mortally wounded, dying later in the hospital.

Galante had reckoned he was untouchable as a former underboss to Joe Bonanno, and as a man who’d held to the code of omertà doing his jail time, he felt he deserved to get back what he lost. Assuming a leadership role without permission was one thing, but Galante had also started killing off his rivals in the Gambino family to take over the drug trade — and that was a step too far.

“His apparent desire to basically reap all the rewards of the New York Mafia’s lucrative drug trade — by cutting out most of the other mafiosi from the profits — became Galante’s ultimate downfall,” says Cipollini. Someone at Galante’s level in the mob hierarchy doesn’t usually get assassinated without a lot of other important peers giving the OK. But Bonanno family crime boss “Joseph Massino wanted him out of the way,” Scarpo explains.

Galante paid the ultimate price for “hubris and greed,” says Scott Burnstein, author of Motor City Mafia: A Century of Organized Crime in Detroit. “He came out of prison and went against typical mob protocol by declaring himself boss without the universal approval of [the Bonanno] crime family.” To further complicate things, Galante isolated himself from his troops by creating his own handpicked inner circle of young native Sicilians to do his drug trafficking and strong-arm work. The irony? It was those very Sicilians — his bodyguards — who sold him out. Those armed bodyguards at his side weren’t killed that day because they had, in fact, betrayed Galante.

Galante’s rackets and drug dealings were taken over by Massino and the others who had plotted to take him down. Anthony “Bruno” Indelicato, a Bonanno soldier, was convicted of the murder in 1986 at the famous Mafia Commission trial and sentenced to 40 years.

Since then, the picture of Galante’s last meal has become an iconic image, representing what can happen when an ambitious mobster makes a power grab. While certainly not the first mobster to dabble with drugs, says Burnstein, “he was one of the first to do it so brazenly and unapologetically.” Rather than let him consolidate as a drug kingpin, the Bonnanos decided Galante had overstepped and that he had to pay the ultimate price.

Thanks to Seth Ferranti.

Friday, January 26, 2018

Young and Scantless #YNS Street Gang Members Charged with Racketeering, Kidnapping, and Trafficking Crack Cocaine #DetroitOne

New charges were filed in the prosecution of the northwest Detroit street gang Young and Scantless (YNS).

Acting Assistant Attorney General John P. Cronan of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division; U.S. Attorney Matthew J. Schneider of the Eastern District of Michigan; Special Agent in Charge James Dier of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Detroit Field Division; and Police Chief James E. Craig of Detroit made the announcement.

The second superseding indictment charges George Eubanks, 30, of Detroit, and James Bowens, 37, of Detroit with taking part in the YNS racketeering enterprise. The charges describe YNS as one of the most dangerous in the city of Detroit, known for its ruthless reputation and violent acts including seeking to intimidate, injure and kill rival drug dealers to eliminate competition; attempting to instill fear in the community in order to discourage cooperation with police and witnesses from reporting YNS-related crime; and posting numerous intimidating photographs and videos to social media.

Five YNS members, including alleged leader Edward Tavorn, 31, of Detroit, were previously charged with a variety of crimes including a murder, robberies that turned into murders, shootings, a home invasion, arson, and narcotics distribution.

The latest indictment also charges Tavorn, Eubanks and Bowens with a narcotics conspiracy in which Eubanks and Bowens agreed to sell drugs in West Virginia on Tavorn’s behalf while Tavorn was incarcerated on pending charges. The indictment alleges that in furtherance of the plot, Eubanks and Bowens possessed firearms; Bowens kidnapped and fired gunshots at a victim to force the victim to rent a vehicle for gang members to use to transport narcotics to West Virginia; and Eubanks and Bowens possessed with intent to distribute approximately 550 grams of cocaine base.

The charges are the result of the Detroit One initiative, a collaborative effort between law enforcement and the community to reduce violent crime in Detroit.

Thursday, January 25, 2018

Thomas Lindstrom, Chicago Futures Trader, Pleads Guilty to Causing More Than $13 Million in Losses from Fraudulent Trading Scheme

A Chicago futures trader admitted in federal court that he caused more than $13 million in losses through a fraudulent trading scheme that resulted in the collapse of his firm.

Thomas Lindstrom used deep out-of-the-money options on ten-year Treasury Note futures to make it fraudulently appear that his trading at Chicago-based Rock Capital Markets LLC was profitable, thereby obtaining greater financial compensation for himself. Over a six-month period in 2014 and 2015, Lindstrom obtained compensation of $285,000, while his fraud scheme caused a loss of more than $13.7 million and led to the collapse of Rock Capital.

Lindstrom, 55, of Winnetka, pleaded guilty to one count of wire fraud. U.S. District Judge Harry D. Leinenweber set sentencing for June 19, 2018. Lindstrom acknowledged in the plea agreement that at the time of sentencing, the Court will order him to make full restitution in the amount of $13,776,518.

The guilty plea was announced by John R. Lausch, Jr., United States Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois; and Jeffrey S. Sallet, Special Agent-in-Charge of the Chicago office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The government is represented by Assistant U.S. Attorney Sunil Harjani and Special Assistant U.S. Attorney Lindsey Evans of the Securities and Commodities Fraud Section of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Chicago. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which filed a civil enforcement lawsuit against Lindstrom, provided assistance.

A tick is the minimum price increment at which an option on a futures contract could trade. Prior to 2016, the Chicago Board of Trade set the minimum settlement value of all options on futures contracts at one tick, even if the actual value of the option was considerably less. For options on ten-year Treasury Note futures contracts, one tick was approximately $15.63.

Lindstrom admitted in a plea agreement that he acquired hundreds of thousands of deep out-of-the-money options on ten-year Treasury Note futures, and on certain occasions he used spread transactions to pay effectively less than one tick apiece. Lindstrom made the trades knowing that these options would likely expire worthless – resulting in losses – but would temporarily appear to have substantial value in his trading account because the minimum settlement value was one tick.

Lindstrom concealed the scheme by telling Rock Capital’s owner that the options were profitable, when in reality Lindstrom’s trading was causing substantial losses.

Wire fraud is punishable by a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison.

Thursday, January 18, 2018

Minestrone for the Mobster's Soul: Life Lessons from the Movie Mafia

14 Life Lessons gathered from growing up on the west Side of Chicago in the 60's and 70's, utilizing Mob and Mafia movies. This is a self-help book for mob wannabes who can gather valuable insights into applying concepts such as loyalty, honor, respect and the law of omerta into their daily lives. Each chapter features a story followed by a lesson influenced by movie characters from our favorite films like THE GODFATHER, GOODFELLAS, CASINO, BRONX TALE, etc. Two cousins grow up fast as the they become "associates" of "the Outfit" in Chicago and learn what it takes to survive in this environment. The book concludes with a list of the top 100 mob movies of all time, complete with reviews.

Minestrone for the Mobster's Soul: Life Lessons from the Movie Mafia.

Indictments Announced against 10 Mafia Suspects from the Bonanno, Genovese and Luchese Crime Families

Federal authorities indicted ten suspected members of the Sicilian mafia with extortion, loansharking, wire and mail fraud, narcotics distribution, and conspiracy to commit murder on behalf of the Cosa Nostra.

After several raids in the New York city area—including one at the “Xcess Gentlemen’s Club” on Staten Island—nine of the ten accused mobsters were taken into custody. Eight of the men worked for the Bonanno family, while the other two are members of the Genovese and Luchese crime families, respectively.

All of the suspects have been charged with racketeering conspiracy, according to a news release from US Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Each man faces up to 20 years in prison per charge.

Joseph Cammarano Jr., one of the accused, is also known as “Joe C” and is the Acting Boss of the Bonanno Family, according to US federal agents.

Cammarano reportedly took over as leader of the Bonanno family in 2015, when the group was still rebuilding itself after a series of federal round-ups which took place in the early 2000s, according to The New York Daily News.

The 58-year-old Brooklyn native has pleaded “not guilty” to all charges.

Albert Armetta, known as “Al Muscles”, faces an indictment for assaulting a victim on Halloween night in 2015 “for the purpose of gaining entrance” to the Bonanno crime family.

Two other indictments include a gun-running operation and a scheme to defraud FEMA of US$ 80,000 in Superstorm Sandy recovery money, according to CBS New York.

Among the others charged are George “Grumpy” Tropiano, Eugene “Boobsie” Castelle and John “Porky” Zancocchio, captain and “Consigliere” of the Bonanno Family.

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