How big is China? Bigger than you can wrap your mind around. Really. 1.3 billion people are hustling, trying to figure out what to do with themselves in a booming 21st century China. It’s a place that makes New York look boring, according to one author. A place where endless business opportunities come up against a stonewall, ironfisted government. A country where the only place to be different — a punk, a poet, a prostitute — is underground.
Taking months to research and travel around and hang out, Zachary Mexico executes in his first book what most merely wonder about. "China Underground" explores the untold stories of young, on-the-fringes Chinese men and women.
Drug dealers, wannabe rock stars, and even the Chinese mafia make an appearance in this fascinating collection of 16 true-life essays.
Here’s what Mexico had to say about his first effort:
JC: What was your initial fascination with China?
Mexico: I guess I started studying the language when I was 15. I went to boarding school in Massachusetts. I went there [China] the next year in 1995. And I guess I just found it to be a crazy, amazing place.
JC: Were these stories hard to find?
Mexico: Yes and no. I had twice as many and I took out the ones that I didn’t think were as good. Some people were hard to find. A couple of people I had known before. And I found a couple of people on the Internet. Some I met by chance.
JC: Which of the chapters was most difficult to research? Let me guess, was it the gay culture?
Mexico: That really was quite difficult. The city I had heard was a huge, gay hotbed. But it wasn’t or it was a complete lie. I went out to all these gay clubs and it was really difficult to get people to talk about it especially.
Another one that was difficult was the mafia guy and the drug dealer. Neither of those guys knew I was writing about them.
JC: Anything you wanted to include in the book, but didn’t make the cut?
Mexico: There were these guys who were making fake everything. Fake passports, fake bags, fake ID cards. In China, there’s fake everything. Even fake beer ... I went there [an area where they make the fake items] with a friend and they wouldn’t let me back in. And there were all these Chinese Rastafarians I was hanging out with, but at some point I couldn’t find them anymore.
JC: So, let’s talk about the mob. The Chinese mafia, the Black Society, or 'hei shehui.' What was most surprising about the Black Society? Anything you didn’t expect?
Mexico: I expected it to be this huge organized system where it’s secrets handed down from generation to generation, but it’s not. There’s no brotherhood. It’s not like the Sopranos. It’s not guys sitting down talking about territory. It’s more like gangs.
JC: You befriended a Chinese mafia member named Wang Dalong. You described his birthday party as an event filled with Mandarin pop love songs, cake fights, and lambshank barbecues. It sounds so magical. But then you talk about Dalong’s confession that he wants to go straight. And yet he cruises away from the scene just like a gangster. Part of him seems innocent and others seem well ... just like a gangster. He seems to be a bunch of contradictions. What was Dalong really like?
Mexico: I think anyone who is doing that kind of thing for a living is like that. He was a very nice guy. The kind of guy who wouldn’t hurt a fly, unless you [mess] with him. Then he’d probably kill you.
JC: Do you keep in touch with him? Do you think he has/will choose the straight life?
Mexico: Yeah, I’ll see him in a couple of weeks. I don’t know what he’s doing. I know he opened a smoothie shop and it closed.
JC: In your chapter called 'The Chickens,' about Chinese prostitutes, you describe young women of various ages (some as young as 15) who sleep with countless men. Prostitution is illegal in China but also very common. There’s also a seven-tier system of prostitution that the Chinese government has established. Tell me more about that world.
Mexico: There’s prostitutes all over the place. It is certainly not surprising. When I was 16, I stayed at the Holiday Inn and there were prostitutes there. In China, it is socially more acceptable for a guy to go to a prostitute than it is here.
JC: You also delved deeper into Chinese gay society. Nine Dragons, the gentleman in your essay whom you profiled pretty carefully, sounds like he leads a horribly oppressed and hidden life. Is this typical of gay men in China? What is it like to live that life?
Mexico: I think it is certainly weird, especially in the less urban areas. It is not condoned at all.
But in the cities you can get by. I have a friend who’s a dude but just dresses as a woman all the time, and he seems to do okay.
JC: You explore Wuhan, the city that is the capital to underground Chinese punk rock. Tell me how the punk band scene in China compares to that of the U.S.
Mexico: In China, it reminds me of how everyone sounded here in the early 1990s. Everyone sounds like old Green Day.
Thanks to Lori Kozlowski
Thursday, March 05, 2009
Pauline Pipitone Breaks Silence On The Senseless Murder Of Her Son During A Botched Mob Hit In 1986
It happened on Christmas Day, 1986. A mafia hit man shot and killed Nick Guido on a Brooklyn street. Except it was the wrong man. The address was supplied by two detectives on the mob payroll -- Louis Eppolito and Stephen Caracappa.
On Friday they will be sentenced in federal court. But before then, the mother of Guido has broken her silence in an exclusive interview with CBS 2 HD.
"The door was open; the car door. He was just laying there. The blood just coming out the car," Pauline Pipitone said. "I touched his hand. I said, 'No, I want to touch him.' His fingers were cold.
Guido was showing his uncle his new car. The 26-year-old was a telephone installer, waiting to hear from the FDNY if he'd been accepted. When the killer walked up, Guido shoved his uncle down, and covered him with his own body.
"Nicholas got the whole, um, 10 bullets," Pipitone said.
Guido was killed on the orders of Anthony "Gas Pipe" Casso, then the underboss of the Lucchese crime family.
When asked if there is ever a day that goes by that she doesn't think about her son's death, Pipitone said, "No way. No way." She added that even though 22-plus years have gone by since the killing, "I cry every day and every night."
"I'm his mother. He was my whole life."
The killer was looking for another Nick Guido, but the mafia got the innocent man's address, the feds said, from two crooked New York City detectives at the time – Eppolito and Caracappa. Pipitone said she wants them to live long lives … behind bars.
"I want them to live a long time and know what I'm going through. That won't give me any peace, but still … I'll still be crying," Pipitone said.
A week after Guido was gunned down the letter came in the mail saying he had been accepted for training with the fire department.
When Eppolito and Caracappa are sentenced Friday, it will be for nine murders they either carried out or arranged for the mob.
Nick Guido was the only innocent man.
Thanks to Pablo Guzman
On Friday they will be sentenced in federal court. But before then, the mother of Guido has broken her silence in an exclusive interview with CBS 2 HD.
"The door was open; the car door. He was just laying there. The blood just coming out the car," Pauline Pipitone said. "I touched his hand. I said, 'No, I want to touch him.' His fingers were cold.
Guido was showing his uncle his new car. The 26-year-old was a telephone installer, waiting to hear from the FDNY if he'd been accepted. When the killer walked up, Guido shoved his uncle down, and covered him with his own body.
"Nicholas got the whole, um, 10 bullets," Pipitone said.
Guido was killed on the orders of Anthony "Gas Pipe" Casso, then the underboss of the Lucchese crime family.
When asked if there is ever a day that goes by that she doesn't think about her son's death, Pipitone said, "No way. No way." She added that even though 22-plus years have gone by since the killing, "I cry every day and every night."
"I'm his mother. He was my whole life."
The killer was looking for another Nick Guido, but the mafia got the innocent man's address, the feds said, from two crooked New York City detectives at the time – Eppolito and Caracappa. Pipitone said she wants them to live long lives … behind bars.
"I want them to live a long time and know what I'm going through. That won't give me any peace, but still … I'll still be crying," Pipitone said.
A week after Guido was gunned down the letter came in the mail saying he had been accepted for training with the fire department.
When Eppolito and Caracappa are sentenced Friday, it will be for nine murders they either carried out or arranged for the mob.
Nick Guido was the only innocent man.
Thanks to Pablo Guzman
Tampa Gambino Case to be Tried in New York
Five men who were arrested last year at the same time as John "Junior" Gotti will join him in New York after a judge today ordered their trial to take place there.
The men, including Tampa resident James Cadicamo, had asked that their racketeering case be moved to New York because the majority of the crimes they are accused of happened in or near that city.
The other defendants in the case, all from the New York area, are John A. Burke, David D'Arpino, Michael D. Finnerty and Guy T. Peden.
The prosecution argued that the case should be tried in Tampa because important aspects of the conspiracy were centered in Florida.
The prosecution contends the defendants were a faction of the Gambino organized crime family that tried to gain a foothold in Florida. The indictment, however, also detailed murders, robberies and drug crimes in New York and New Jersey.
U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday, who previously ordered Gotti's trial be transferred to New York, again sided with the defense and ordered the related case also be transferred.
In a 19-page order, Merryday wrote that New York and the surrounding areas are "the undoubted 'nerve center' of the enterprise and the locus of the enterprise's malefactions."
Thanks to Elaine Silvestrini
The men, including Tampa resident James Cadicamo, had asked that their racketeering case be moved to New York because the majority of the crimes they are accused of happened in or near that city.
The other defendants in the case, all from the New York area, are John A. Burke, David D'Arpino, Michael D. Finnerty and Guy T. Peden.
The prosecution argued that the case should be tried in Tampa because important aspects of the conspiracy were centered in Florida.
The prosecution contends the defendants were a faction of the Gambino organized crime family that tried to gain a foothold in Florida. The indictment, however, also detailed murders, robberies and drug crimes in New York and New Jersey.
U.S. District Judge Steven D. Merryday, who previously ordered Gotti's trial be transferred to New York, again sided with the defense and ordered the related case also be transferred.
In a 19-page order, Merryday wrote that New York and the surrounding areas are "the undoubted 'nerve center' of the enterprise and the locus of the enterprise's malefactions."
Thanks to Elaine Silvestrini
Al Capone Spaghetti Sauce
Italian-American gangster Al Capone’s favourite spaghetti sauce recipe has been found 62 years after his death.
The Sun has reported that Capone’s great-nephew Dominic Capone, 33, who played the “Scarface” gangster in a TV documentary, plans to market the mix.
He said: “It’ll make Chicago famous for something more than tommy guns.”
Alphonse Gabriel ‘Al’ Capone, commonly nicknamed Scarface, was a gangster who led a crime syndicate dedicated to smuggling and bootlegging of liquor and other illegal activities during the Prohibition Era of the 1920s and 1930s.
Born in 1899 Brooklyn to Southwestern Italian immigrants Gabriele and Teresina Capone, Capone began his career in Brooklyn before moving to Chicago and becoming the boss of the criminal organization known as the Chicago Outfit.
By the end of the 1920s, Capone had gained the attention of the Federal Bureau of Investigation following his being placed on the Chicago Crime Commission’s ‘public enemies’ list.
Although never successfully convicted of racketeering charges, Capone’s criminal career ended in 1931, when he was indicted and convicted by the federal government for income-tax evasion.
Thanks to ANI
The Sun has reported that Capone’s great-nephew Dominic Capone, 33, who played the “Scarface” gangster in a TV documentary, plans to market the mix.
He said: “It’ll make Chicago famous for something more than tommy guns.”
Alphonse Gabriel ‘Al’ Capone, commonly nicknamed Scarface, was a gangster who led a crime syndicate dedicated to smuggling and bootlegging of liquor and other illegal activities during the Prohibition Era of the 1920s and 1930s.
Born in 1899 Brooklyn to Southwestern Italian immigrants Gabriele and Teresina Capone, Capone began his career in Brooklyn before moving to Chicago and becoming the boss of the criminal organization known as the Chicago Outfit.
By the end of the 1920s, Capone had gained the attention of the Federal Bureau of Investigation following his being placed on the Chicago Crime Commission’s ‘public enemies’ list.
Although never successfully convicted of racketeering charges, Capone’s criminal career ended in 1931, when he was indicted and convicted by the federal government for income-tax evasion.
Thanks to ANI
Tuesday, March 03, 2009
Gotti Family and Police Embarrassed by Testimony of Star Witness at Reputed Mafia Assassin's Trial
The murder trial of a reputed Mafia assassin has become an embarrassment for both the family of late mob boss John Gotti and police, thanks to sensational testimony by the government's star witness.
John Alite has linked his former best friend John "Junior" Gotti to a series of gangland slayings, boasted that he slept with reality television graduate Victoria Gotti and claimed two police officers were in on another hit. The defendant, Charles Carneglia, has dismissed the testimony against him as a betrayal by "rats" and "canaries."
Most of the singing at Carneglia's ongoing trial in Brooklyn has been done by Alite, a Gambino organized crime family associate who grew up wanting to be a made member but wasn't allowed to because he's Albanian, not Italian.
In several hours on the witness stand, Alite, 46, explained he was breaking a sacred rule by testifying: "Don't do what I'm doing _ ratting."
He told jurors that he grew up in Queens wanting to be a mobster, and won the younger Gotti's admiration in the 1980s _ Gotti was best man at his wedding _ by dealing cocaine and kicking up a cut of the profits to Gotti, even though drugs were considered taboo in the family. He also described how he and Gotti's married sister were "seeing each other on the sneak" _ an allegation that prompted an angry denial by Victoria Gotti.
"He's an insect," the one-time star of "Growing up Gotti" told the Daily News. "He would hump a cockroach."
Alite also claimed that two lawmen _ a current Suffolk County officer and a retired New York Police Department detective _ gave him backup in the drive-by shooting of a rival drug dealer in 1988. He testified the NYPD officer was "involved in crimes for 20 years" and made millions of dollars. Suffolk County officials declined comment on Monday. The NYPD said it had no record of the officer named by Alite.
Alite's testimony at the Carneglia trial also offered a preview of the murder case against Gotti, who as pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he was involved in three slayings in the late 1980s and early 1990s and charges of possessing and trafficking more than 5 kilograms of cocaine.
Three previous trials in 2005 and 2006 ended in hung juries and mistrials after Gotti used the defense that he had quit the mob for good in the 1990s. His lawyers say the new allegations are based on cooperators who are lying to protect themselves.
Alite testified that a newly promoted Gotti drafted him for a hit on an associate who had dared to ignore one of his father's orders. The younger Gotti rose through the ranks while his famous father ruled the New York mob in the 1980s and '90s.
"It was his first job as a captain, and he wanted to get it right," the witness said.
Alite said he tried to track the target down in Atlantic City, N.J., but was pulled off the job when Gotti changed plans. Prosecutors say Carneglia gunned down the victim in the World Trade Center Parking lot in 1990.
The result left Gotti "elated," Alite said.
Alite also implicated Gotti in the other two killings prosecutors have charged he was involved in _ the slayings of two men in Queens amid drug turf disputes in 1988 and 1991. Alite said they were carried out on Gotti's say-so.
Carneglia was one of 62 people arrested last year in what authorities described as one of the largest roundups ever of suspected members and associates of a New York crime family. Since then, 60 have pleaded guilty to lesser charges, and one case was dropped.
Prosecutors allege Carneglia gunned down a court officer to prevent the officer's testimony against him in a 1976 weapon possession case. They say the trail of bodies also included that of a rival mobster stabbed to death in 1977 during a fight outside a diner, a Gambino associate killed in 1983 during an argument over money and an armored car security guard shot in the back during a heist in 1990.
The case has produced one of the gorier allegations to emerge recently in mob lore: that the body of John Favara _ a neighbor killed for accidentally running over the elder Gotti's 12-year-old son _ was dissolved in a vat of acid. Jurors have been allowed to hear testimony that Carneglia was involved in disposing of bodies, but not about the acid.
On Monday, a former NYPD detective who helped arrest Carneglia testified that the suspect ranted against cooperators saying, "I can't believe these rats and canaries," and fretted over possibly being put behind bars for life.
"I don't want to spend the next 30 years in jail," the witness quoted Carneglia as saying. "I'd rather get the needle."
Attorneys for Carneglia, 62, say the case against him hinges on flimsy, outdated evidence. They labeled cooperating gangsters such as Alite a collection of "thieves, murderers and liars."
The elder Gotti died behind bars in 2002, while serving a life term for racketeering and murder.
Thanks to Tom Hays
John Alite has linked his former best friend John "Junior" Gotti to a series of gangland slayings, boasted that he slept with reality television graduate Victoria Gotti and claimed two police officers were in on another hit. The defendant, Charles Carneglia, has dismissed the testimony against him as a betrayal by "rats" and "canaries."
Most of the singing at Carneglia's ongoing trial in Brooklyn has been done by Alite, a Gambino organized crime family associate who grew up wanting to be a made member but wasn't allowed to because he's Albanian, not Italian.
In several hours on the witness stand, Alite, 46, explained he was breaking a sacred rule by testifying: "Don't do what I'm doing _ ratting."
He told jurors that he grew up in Queens wanting to be a mobster, and won the younger Gotti's admiration in the 1980s _ Gotti was best man at his wedding _ by dealing cocaine and kicking up a cut of the profits to Gotti, even though drugs were considered taboo in the family. He also described how he and Gotti's married sister were "seeing each other on the sneak" _ an allegation that prompted an angry denial by Victoria Gotti."He's an insect," the one-time star of "Growing up Gotti" told the Daily News. "He would hump a cockroach."
Alite also claimed that two lawmen _ a current Suffolk County officer and a retired New York Police Department detective _ gave him backup in the drive-by shooting of a rival drug dealer in 1988. He testified the NYPD officer was "involved in crimes for 20 years" and made millions of dollars. Suffolk County officials declined comment on Monday. The NYPD said it had no record of the officer named by Alite.
Alite's testimony at the Carneglia trial also offered a preview of the murder case against Gotti, who as pleaded not guilty to charges alleging he was involved in three slayings in the late 1980s and early 1990s and charges of possessing and trafficking more than 5 kilograms of cocaine.
Three previous trials in 2005 and 2006 ended in hung juries and mistrials after Gotti used the defense that he had quit the mob for good in the 1990s. His lawyers say the new allegations are based on cooperators who are lying to protect themselves.
Alite testified that a newly promoted Gotti drafted him for a hit on an associate who had dared to ignore one of his father's orders. The younger Gotti rose through the ranks while his famous father ruled the New York mob in the 1980s and '90s.
"It was his first job as a captain, and he wanted to get it right," the witness said.
Alite said he tried to track the target down in Atlantic City, N.J., but was pulled off the job when Gotti changed plans. Prosecutors say Carneglia gunned down the victim in the World Trade Center Parking lot in 1990.
The result left Gotti "elated," Alite said.
Alite also implicated Gotti in the other two killings prosecutors have charged he was involved in _ the slayings of two men in Queens amid drug turf disputes in 1988 and 1991. Alite said they were carried out on Gotti's say-so.
Carneglia was one of 62 people arrested last year in what authorities described as one of the largest roundups ever of suspected members and associates of a New York crime family. Since then, 60 have pleaded guilty to lesser charges, and one case was dropped.
Prosecutors allege Carneglia gunned down a court officer to prevent the officer's testimony against him in a 1976 weapon possession case. They say the trail of bodies also included that of a rival mobster stabbed to death in 1977 during a fight outside a diner, a Gambino associate killed in 1983 during an argument over money and an armored car security guard shot in the back during a heist in 1990.
The case has produced one of the gorier allegations to emerge recently in mob lore: that the body of John Favara _ a neighbor killed for accidentally running over the elder Gotti's 12-year-old son _ was dissolved in a vat of acid. Jurors have been allowed to hear testimony that Carneglia was involved in disposing of bodies, but not about the acid.
On Monday, a former NYPD detective who helped arrest Carneglia testified that the suspect ranted against cooperators saying, "I can't believe these rats and canaries," and fretted over possibly being put behind bars for life.
"I don't want to spend the next 30 years in jail," the witness quoted Carneglia as saying. "I'd rather get the needle."
Attorneys for Carneglia, 62, say the case against him hinges on flimsy, outdated evidence. They labeled cooperating gangsters such as Alite a collection of "thieves, murderers and liars."
The elder Gotti died behind bars in 2002, while serving a life term for racketeering and murder.
Thanks to Tom Hays
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