In a Mafia induction ceremony in 1989, Robert Deluca drew blood from his trigger finger as fellow alleged mobsters burned a Madonna prayer card and vowed to never betray the mob’s code of silence.
“As burn this Saint, so will burn my soul. I enter into this organization alive, and I will have to get out dead,’’ Deluca recited in Italian as he became a “made man” in the mob at the Medford initiation that was secretly bugged by the FBI.
Newscenter 5 has learned that Deluca, who is a reputed capo in the New England crime family, has betrayed the blood oath. He has agreed to cooperate with the FBI and act as a star witness in the James “Whitey” Bulger case, several sources said.
In 1995, DeLuca was indicted along with Bulger, Steven “The Rifleman” Flemmi, James “Jimmy the Bear” Martorano and Francis “Cadillac Frank” Salemme in a plethora of racketeering charges. But, by the time Deluca and his codefendants were arrested, Whitey Bulger was gone. He was tipped off to the pending indictment and went on the lam until his arrest in Santa Monica this June.
While Whitey Bulger was on the run, Deluca pleaded guilty to six counts of conspiracy, racketeering and interference with commerce by threats of violence charges and served 34 months in a federal prison, according to court documents.
By the time Bulger – who topped the FBI’s Most Wanted List – was captured, law enforcement sources said Deluca was losing his Rhode Island power base as the Mafia’s leadership roles shifted back to Boston.
In recent months, Deluca vanished from his base on Federal Hill and has not been seen in the North End. His North Providence home has been sold. His wife and two kids have vanished. “We saw the moving truck there and they were gone,’’ said Grace Olsen, Deluca’s next-door neighbor.
Deluca is one of several mob bosses to “flip” in recent years. In New York, Bonanno crime family boss Joseph “Big Joey” Messina cooperated with the government to avoid a death sentence. The Philadelphia Mafia’s boss, Ralph Natale, also made a deal.
“Historically it was very rare,’’ retired Massachusetts State Police Det. Lt. Bob Long said of Mafia leaders becoming cooperators. “Now rumors are that Deluca is doing the same thing…
“It appears that the old days of following the code of silence, the omerta, of this thing of ours is crumbled. It’s like a bygone era,” said Long.
Deluca’s neighbor said living next to a mob boss had its benefits. “We were very sad to see him go,’’ Olsen said.
When asked if she knew about his cooperation agreement, she nodded. “Knowing him and having broken bread with him,’’ she said, “I think that he did what he had to do to protect his young family.”
Thanks to Michele McPhee
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
J. Edgar Hoover and the FBI's Reputation Soared with High-Profile Arrests of Gangsters
It is fitting to begin in the heart of Washington D.C., where J. Edgar Hoover lies at rest.
He was a local kid who grew up on Capitol Hill, just a few blocks away.
He's buried in his family plot
, but Rebecca Roberts, program director at Congressional Cemetery, says former FBI agents built the fence and added a bench - creating a memorial that draws new recruits. "Every now and then some young men in dark suits with little wires coming out of their ears come in the front gate of the cemetery, coming to pay their respects to the director," Roberts said.
The director for an astonishing 48 years, starting in 1924, J. Edgar Hoover became one of the most powerful men in American history - a man who collected secrets and knew how to use them.
He made the FBI a symbol of professional law enforcement and a source of pride for Americans: "The Federal Bureau of Investigation is as close to you as your nearest telephone," Lowell Thomas said in a 1930s newsreel. "It seeks to be your protector in all matters in its jurisdiction. It belongs to you." But Hoover also turned the Bureau into his personal fiefdom: "Presidents were afraid of firing Hoover," said author Ron Kessler. "Congress didn't want to do any oversight. The FBI was a law unto itself."
Kessler has written three books about the FBI. He says that, ironically, in the beginning Hoover, a young Justice Dept. lawyer, was charged with cleaning up a corrupt division. "Hoover emphasized the need for professionalism, not hiring people just because they were friends of someone or family members," Kessler said. "He established the fingerprint operation, he established the indexing system with files."
He also established the FBI Academy, to train agents in crime-busting techniques - making sure he got the credit. In fact, the Bureau's reputation (and Hoover's) soared with high-profile arrests of gangsters like John Dillinger. But out of the spotlight, the director was consolidating his power in another way - collecting dirt. "Hoover, for one thing, would tell for example the head of the Washington field office, 'I want material on Congressmen,' and that would include affairs that they might be having, or they were picked up for seeing a prostitute the night before," said Kessler. "And then he would make sure that they knew that he knew what they had done."
Hoover kept files on celebrities like Marilyn Monroe, John Lennon, Elvis Presley, and even Albert Einstein - "In part because he wanted to have little gossip items to impart to presidents," said Kessler, "or on the other hand, just to maintain his aura as being this powerful person who knew everything."
"That is complete fabrication," said Cartha "Deke" Deloach, now 91, who was one of Hoover's top lieutenants. He insists that if the FBI kept files on public figures, it was for legitimate reasons.
Case in point: The information that President John F. Kennedy was sharing a girlfriend, Judith Campbell Exner, with Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana. "That came to our attention because of a wiretap and microphone that the Attorney General approved, the White House knew about them, that we had on Giancana," said Deloach. "As a result, the White House sometimes would call Exner and it would be overheard by a wiretap."
As for the bugging of Martin Luther King Jr., who feuded with Hoover over the Bureau's enforcement of civil rights, the FBI's alleged justification for tapping King was an investigation into two of his advisers who were said to be Communists. But the taps ended up recording evidence of King's extramarital affairs.
"Hoover was outraged that King was having affairs and projecting himself as a minister, but at the same time Hoover also was jealous of King because he got the Nobel Prize, and that really infuriated Hoover," said Kessler. "Hoover just totally went after him. He would even write letters to people who wanted to give awards to King saying, "You know, we shouldn't do that.'"
Hoover may have amassed information on the sex lives of many prominent figures, but his own personal life has long been the subject of speculation. "There were for years reports and rumors that Hoover used to cross-dress," said Braver.
"Yeah, the rumor that Hoover cross-dressed and wore a red dress to the Plaza was a concoction of someone who actually had been convicted of perjury and was quoted in a book," said Kessler. "It didn't happen."
But how about Hoover's relationship with his top deputy, Clyde Tolson? "Tolson and Hoover would go on vacations together, would take adoring pictures of each other, would have lunch and dinner together almost every single day," said Kessler. "There is no actual evidence of a sexual relationship, but I believe he was homosexual, and that he had a spousal relationship with Tolson."
"Deke" Deloach says he never saw anything other than friendship between the two men, but that Hoover was aware of rumors. "He's actually said to have agents go and visit people and say 'I understand you're talking about the director,'" said Braver.
"I did," Deloach said. "I was told to do it, saying, 'You have made remarks concerning Mr. Hoover being a homosexual. Give me the evidence.' And they'd always back down."
Through the years, under eight presidents, Hoover became so entrenched that he was all but untouchable.
LBJ allowed Hoover to serve beyond the 70-year age limit. He signed an executive order exempting him from compulsory retirement for an indefinite period of time. And Richard Nixon didn't fire him, either. "Nixon was afraid to do it," Deloach said.
"Were people afraid to do it because they were afraid Hoover would go ballistic on them and start leaking out bad stuff about them?" Braver asked. "That was part of it. They were afraid of him."
Hoover died in 1972 at age 77.
His funeral was a state occasion. But shortly after his death, details began leaking of a controversial domestic spying program, known as COINTELPRO, and of Hoover's own personal abuses - for example, using FBI agents to work on his home.
"What do you think happened to Hoover along the way?" asked Braver.
"Hoover, being as powerful as he was and having all this adulation all the time, did think he was God," said Kessler. "Initially he was very far-sighted. He did create this great organization. But as time went on, he became a despot."
Shortly after Hoover's burial, Clyde Tolson, who inherited Hoover's entire estate, bought the closest available plot. And almost 40 years after J. Edgar Hoover's death, we are still wondering about his secrets - Those he used, and those he kept.
Thanks to Rita Braver
He was a local kid who grew up on Capitol Hill, just a few blocks away.
He's buried in his family plot
, but Rebecca Roberts, program director at Congressional Cemetery, says former FBI agents built the fence and added a bench - creating a memorial that draws new recruits. "Every now and then some young men in dark suits with little wires coming out of their ears come in the front gate of the cemetery, coming to pay their respects to the director," Roberts said.The director for an astonishing 48 years, starting in 1924, J. Edgar Hoover became one of the most powerful men in American history - a man who collected secrets and knew how to use them.
He made the FBI a symbol of professional law enforcement and a source of pride for Americans: "The Federal Bureau of Investigation is as close to you as your nearest telephone," Lowell Thomas said in a 1930s newsreel. "It seeks to be your protector in all matters in its jurisdiction. It belongs to you." But Hoover also turned the Bureau into his personal fiefdom: "Presidents were afraid of firing Hoover," said author Ron Kessler. "Congress didn't want to do any oversight. The FBI was a law unto itself."
Kessler has written three books about the FBI. He says that, ironically, in the beginning Hoover, a young Justice Dept. lawyer, was charged with cleaning up a corrupt division. "Hoover emphasized the need for professionalism, not hiring people just because they were friends of someone or family members," Kessler said. "He established the fingerprint operation, he established the indexing system with files."
He also established the FBI Academy, to train agents in crime-busting techniques - making sure he got the credit. In fact, the Bureau's reputation (and Hoover's) soared with high-profile arrests of gangsters like John Dillinger. But out of the spotlight, the director was consolidating his power in another way - collecting dirt. "Hoover, for one thing, would tell for example the head of the Washington field office, 'I want material on Congressmen,' and that would include affairs that they might be having, or they were picked up for seeing a prostitute the night before," said Kessler. "And then he would make sure that they knew that he knew what they had done."
Hoover kept files on celebrities like Marilyn Monroe, John Lennon, Elvis Presley, and even Albert Einstein - "In part because he wanted to have little gossip items to impart to presidents," said Kessler, "or on the other hand, just to maintain his aura as being this powerful person who knew everything."
"That is complete fabrication," said Cartha "Deke" Deloach, now 91, who was one of Hoover's top lieutenants. He insists that if the FBI kept files on public figures, it was for legitimate reasons.
Case in point: The information that President John F. Kennedy was sharing a girlfriend, Judith Campbell Exner, with Chicago mob boss Sam Giancana. "That came to our attention because of a wiretap and microphone that the Attorney General approved, the White House knew about them, that we had on Giancana," said Deloach. "As a result, the White House sometimes would call Exner and it would be overheard by a wiretap."
As for the bugging of Martin Luther King Jr., who feuded with Hoover over the Bureau's enforcement of civil rights, the FBI's alleged justification for tapping King was an investigation into two of his advisers who were said to be Communists. But the taps ended up recording evidence of King's extramarital affairs.
"Hoover was outraged that King was having affairs and projecting himself as a minister, but at the same time Hoover also was jealous of King because he got the Nobel Prize, and that really infuriated Hoover," said Kessler. "Hoover just totally went after him. He would even write letters to people who wanted to give awards to King saying, "You know, we shouldn't do that.'"
Hoover may have amassed information on the sex lives of many prominent figures, but his own personal life has long been the subject of speculation. "There were for years reports and rumors that Hoover used to cross-dress," said Braver.
"Yeah, the rumor that Hoover cross-dressed and wore a red dress to the Plaza was a concoction of someone who actually had been convicted of perjury and was quoted in a book," said Kessler. "It didn't happen."
But how about Hoover's relationship with his top deputy, Clyde Tolson? "Tolson and Hoover would go on vacations together, would take adoring pictures of each other, would have lunch and dinner together almost every single day," said Kessler. "There is no actual evidence of a sexual relationship, but I believe he was homosexual, and that he had a spousal relationship with Tolson."
"Deke" Deloach says he never saw anything other than friendship between the two men, but that Hoover was aware of rumors. "He's actually said to have agents go and visit people and say 'I understand you're talking about the director,'" said Braver.
"I did," Deloach said. "I was told to do it, saying, 'You have made remarks concerning Mr. Hoover being a homosexual. Give me the evidence.' And they'd always back down."
Through the years, under eight presidents, Hoover became so entrenched that he was all but untouchable.
LBJ allowed Hoover to serve beyond the 70-year age limit. He signed an executive order exempting him from compulsory retirement for an indefinite period of time. And Richard Nixon didn't fire him, either. "Nixon was afraid to do it," Deloach said.
"Were people afraid to do it because they were afraid Hoover would go ballistic on them and start leaking out bad stuff about them?" Braver asked. "That was part of it. They were afraid of him."
Hoover died in 1972 at age 77.
His funeral was a state occasion. But shortly after his death, details began leaking of a controversial domestic spying program, known as COINTELPRO, and of Hoover's own personal abuses - for example, using FBI agents to work on his home.
"What do you think happened to Hoover along the way?" asked Braver.
"Hoover, being as powerful as he was and having all this adulation all the time, did think he was God," said Kessler. "Initially he was very far-sighted. He did create this great organization. But as time went on, he became a despot."
Shortly after Hoover's burial, Clyde Tolson, who inherited Hoover's entire estate, bought the closest available plot. And almost 40 years after J. Edgar Hoover's death, we are still wondering about his secrets - Those he used, and those he kept.
Thanks to Rita Braver
Monday, November 14, 2011
Chicago Mob Hangouts in Wisconsin
Members of the U.S. temperance movement believed that eliminating the demon alcohol would cure society of many ills. It would solidify family life, get people back to work, and make society more respectable. Little did they suspect that Prohibition would create effects quite the opposite.
Banning the sale, manufacture and transportation of alcohol from 1920 to 1933 did not cure Americans' thirst for it. In effect, Prohibition forced the supply chain underground. With liquor no longer legally available, gangsters stepped in to fulfill the public's craving.
Chicago was well-known as a gangster city, with mob figures such as Al Capone, Baby Face Nelson, "Polack Joe" Saltis and others. When pressure from the law got hot in Chicago, some gangsters found remote, wooded northern Wisconsin the perfect place to hide out.
Scattered throughout the North Woods are the old haunts of the Capone brothers Al and Ralph, Saltis, Nelson and John Dillinger.
A recent road trip took me back to the remnants of that time when the Roaring '20s, followed by the Great Depression, accentuated the "sin" in Wisconsin. A tour of these historical places is a great way to see the state and learn about an era that affected the development of many small towns of the North Woods.
Among the most well-known stops along the way:
Little Bohemia Lodge in Manitowish Waters: Once a resort where the FBI botched a shootout with John Dillinger's gang and Baby Face Nelson, and recently immortalized by the movie "Public Enemies" with Johnny Depp, it's now a restaurant still called Little Bohemia. The rooms where Dillinger stayed have been turned into a little museum and left mainly as they were, with bullet holes intact.
Dillman's Bay Resort in Lac du Flambeau: Cabin No. 5 is where Baby Face Nelson holed up after the shootout at Little Bohemia, holding an Ojibwe couple hostage for three days.
Minocqua still has several places once allegedly frequented by gangsters, including Norwood Pines Supper Club, which had gambling and a brothel upstairs. BJ's Sportshop on U.S. Highway 51 used to house "Trixies," the most famous whorehouse in the North Woods. The Belle Isle Sports Bar and Grill had a direct line to Arlington Race Track near Chicago. Bosacki's Boat House restaurant also was a popular hangout for the Chicago mob.
Couderay : Al Capone's home on Cranberry Lake was privately operated and open to the public but closed in 2009. Capone used to fly alcohol in from Canada and unload it at his dock. Not far away at Barker's Lake Lodge near Winter, Saltis built a log lodge with cabins for his friends and fellow gangsters. Saltis was a mob boss from Chicago who operated speakeasies. The resort is still open for business and has a nine-hole golf course built by Saltis.
Garmisch USA near Cable: Was built as a lodge by wealthy Chicago businessman Jacob Loeb, who hired the famous attorney Clarence Darrow to represent his teenage nephew after the youth killed another young boy for the thrill. Garmisch still has the beautiful old lodge and now has many cabins as well.
Hurley, Hayward and hell made up what locals called the Devil's Triangle: They were rough logging towns that became notorious for their speakeasies and brothels during Prohibition and were often frequented by the likes of Capone and his cronies. Brothels and bars lined Silver St. in Hurley, where many establishments had tunnels connecting each other, and one allegedly ran under the Montreal River into Michigan. One block of Silver St. still houses strip clubs.
What is now Dawn's Never Inn has the rooms of an old brothel upstairs where Al Capone used to stay.
Mercer : Located on Highway 51 between Hurley and Minocqua, Mercer was the longtime home of Al Capone's older brother Ralph, who ran a couple of taverns. Mitch Babic, now in his 90s, was a fishing and hunting guide for the rich and famous and chronicled Mercer's history over his lifetime with photographs. He knew Ralph well and claims to have been at Little Bohemia on the night of the shootout with Dillinger as a teenager.
Thanks to Gary Porter
Banning the sale, manufacture and transportation of alcohol from 1920 to 1933 did not cure Americans' thirst for it. In effect, Prohibition forced the supply chain underground. With liquor no longer legally available, gangsters stepped in to fulfill the public's craving.
Chicago was well-known as a gangster city, with mob figures such as Al Capone, Baby Face Nelson, "Polack Joe" Saltis and others. When pressure from the law got hot in Chicago, some gangsters found remote, wooded northern Wisconsin the perfect place to hide out.
Scattered throughout the North Woods are the old haunts of the Capone brothers Al and Ralph, Saltis, Nelson and John Dillinger.
A recent road trip took me back to the remnants of that time when the Roaring '20s, followed by the Great Depression, accentuated the "sin" in Wisconsin. A tour of these historical places is a great way to see the state and learn about an era that affected the development of many small towns of the North Woods.
Among the most well-known stops along the way:
Little Bohemia Lodge in Manitowish Waters: Once a resort where the FBI botched a shootout with John Dillinger's gang and Baby Face Nelson, and recently immortalized by the movie "Public Enemies" with Johnny Depp, it's now a restaurant still called Little Bohemia. The rooms where Dillinger stayed have been turned into a little museum and left mainly as they were, with bullet holes intact.
Dillman's Bay Resort in Lac du Flambeau: Cabin No. 5 is where Baby Face Nelson holed up after the shootout at Little Bohemia, holding an Ojibwe couple hostage for three days.
Minocqua still has several places once allegedly frequented by gangsters, including Norwood Pines Supper Club, which had gambling and a brothel upstairs. BJ's Sportshop on U.S. Highway 51 used to house "Trixies," the most famous whorehouse in the North Woods. The Belle Isle Sports Bar and Grill had a direct line to Arlington Race Track near Chicago. Bosacki's Boat House restaurant also was a popular hangout for the Chicago mob.
Couderay : Al Capone's home on Cranberry Lake was privately operated and open to the public but closed in 2009. Capone used to fly alcohol in from Canada and unload it at his dock. Not far away at Barker's Lake Lodge near Winter, Saltis built a log lodge with cabins for his friends and fellow gangsters. Saltis was a mob boss from Chicago who operated speakeasies. The resort is still open for business and has a nine-hole golf course built by Saltis.
Garmisch USA near Cable: Was built as a lodge by wealthy Chicago businessman Jacob Loeb, who hired the famous attorney Clarence Darrow to represent his teenage nephew after the youth killed another young boy for the thrill. Garmisch still has the beautiful old lodge and now has many cabins as well.
Hurley, Hayward and hell made up what locals called the Devil's Triangle: They were rough logging towns that became notorious for their speakeasies and brothels during Prohibition and were often frequented by the likes of Capone and his cronies. Brothels and bars lined Silver St. in Hurley, where many establishments had tunnels connecting each other, and one allegedly ran under the Montreal River into Michigan. One block of Silver St. still houses strip clubs.
What is now Dawn's Never Inn has the rooms of an old brothel upstairs where Al Capone used to stay.
Mercer : Located on Highway 51 between Hurley and Minocqua, Mercer was the longtime home of Al Capone's older brother Ralph, who ran a couple of taverns. Mitch Babic, now in his 90s, was a fishing and hunting guide for the rich and famous and chronicled Mercer's history over his lifetime with photographs. He knew Ralph well and claims to have been at Little Bohemia on the night of the shootout with Dillinger as a teenager.
Thanks to Gary Porter
Sunday, November 13, 2011
The Russian Mafia's Pakhan
In the Russian Mafia, the equivalent of the Don is called the Pakhan. This boss controls four operating "cells" through his second in command. The number two man is called the Brigadier. Given that this organized crime family structure originated in Russia, where secret police once ruled with terror and fostered a paranoid environment, the Pakhan employs spies to keep an eye on the Brigadier. The cells are made up of the usual suspects - soldiers who deal in drugs, prostitution, extortion, bribery and all manner of criminality. The members of the individual cells do not know members of the other cells, though they all report to the Pakhan. Just as the American Mafia mirrors the legitimate capitalistic world, the Russian Mafia reflects the communist regime where it was spawned.
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Mafia Inc.: The Long, Bloody Reign of Canada’s Sicilian Clan by André Cédilot and André Noël
As with its actors and professional football players, Canada’s Mafia families were long considered to be little more than farm teams for their many big brothers to the south. Montreal journalists André Cédilot and André Noël turn this notion on its ear to show that, perversely, this country’s organized crime underworld is arguably deeper, darker and more violent than the goings-on in New York’s five boroughs or elsewhere.
Cédilot and Noël, veteran crime reporters for La Presse, spin an exhaustive and compelling read. Much like the mob itself, Mafia Inc.’s narrative tendrils are long and widespread, and converge on an imposing subject: Montreal’s Rizzuto clan. Hailing from Sicily, Nick Rizzuto arrived in Montreal and in short order usurped the Cotroni clan to become patriarch of the country’s most important crime family. His son Vito, who helped cement the deal with bullets pumped into the bodies of rivals, eventually took over.
For whatever reason—luck of the devil, the RCMP’s zealous ineptitude, or what Cédilot and Noël call “Canadian judicial authorities’ incomprehensible indolence” toward the mob—Vito stayed out of jail, and his decades-long reign expanded the family’s influence to New York, Italy and beyond. The book is larded with keen details. For example: who knew that the Lebanese civil war was the reason why Montreal organized crime moved from hashish to cocaine, or that leaders of Quebec’s biker gangs had a childlike adoration of Montreal’s Mafia types?
The genius of Mafia Inc. is its all-important connections between organized crime, legitimate business and government. The chapter on the alleged cozy relationship between former Liberal minister Alfonso Gagliano and the Rizzuto clan (Gagliano denies any Mafia ties) is alone worth the price of admission. And the authors show how the Rizzutos, like any big and violent Mafia clan worth its salt, were crippled much as they started: with hubris and a hail of bullets.
Thanks to Martin Patriquin
Cédilot and Noël, veteran crime reporters for La Presse, spin an exhaustive and compelling read. Much like the mob itself, Mafia Inc.’s narrative tendrils are long and widespread, and converge on an imposing subject: Montreal’s Rizzuto clan. Hailing from Sicily, Nick Rizzuto arrived in Montreal and in short order usurped the Cotroni clan to become patriarch of the country’s most important crime family. His son Vito, who helped cement the deal with bullets pumped into the bodies of rivals, eventually took over.
For whatever reason—luck of the devil, the RCMP’s zealous ineptitude, or what Cédilot and Noël call “Canadian judicial authorities’ incomprehensible indolence” toward the mob—Vito stayed out of jail, and his decades-long reign expanded the family’s influence to New York, Italy and beyond. The book is larded with keen details. For example: who knew that the Lebanese civil war was the reason why Montreal organized crime moved from hashish to cocaine, or that leaders of Quebec’s biker gangs had a childlike adoration of Montreal’s Mafia types?
The genius of Mafia Inc. is its all-important connections between organized crime, legitimate business and government. The chapter on the alleged cozy relationship between former Liberal minister Alfonso Gagliano and the Rizzuto clan (Gagliano denies any Mafia ties) is alone worth the price of admission. And the authors show how the Rizzutos, like any big and violent Mafia clan worth its salt, were crippled much as they started: with hubris and a hail of bullets.
Thanks to Martin Patriquin
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