The Bonanno Family Saga

The Bonanno family keeps getting hammered by law enforcement from every direction. The media likes to portray the Cosa Nostra as dead.  They make fun of the guys who get taken down, but the truth is, all the other crime groups wish they were like them.

The Cartels.  What happened to the Medellin Cartel?   The Cali Cartel?  The organizations before and since are gone.  Most of the drug Cartels are just that: drugs networks.  They are usually run by one person and when they get arrested or killed it's over.  They do not diversify into other areas like Unions, political corruption, waste, carting and the list goes on.  Cosa Nostra does that, and everything they can make money doing.

In July of 2013 the Manhattan District Attorney’s office came down on the Nicky Santoro crew of the Bonanno family.  They arrested 9 men including their Capo Nicky Santoro.

The media has made a big deal that they were selling Viagra and Cialis pills. What they failed to tell you is that they were trying to move 300,000 of them plus tens of thousand of Oxycodone pills.

They also ran a bookmaking operation that pulled in 7 million in bets.  It was a typical sportsbook feature, a special website and an 800 number that you could place bets.  Then they would settle up on Tuesdays if it was a grand or more either way.

One of the guys indicted, Nicholas Bernhard, was president of International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 917 which had about 1900 members. He is charged with using his position with the Union to enrich himself and the Bonanno family.

He had one of his guys loaning money to Union members and taking action for the sports book.

ERNEST AIELLO and VITO BADAMO were both acting Capo’s at various times during the investigation.  

Anthony Santoro known as Skinny was a soldier beneath them.  

They are on trial now and it is expected to go on until April.  The way the trials have been going I would not be surprised to see them all walk.  

If anyone has watched Donnie Brasco they may recall when Donnie walks into a Social club and some guys are busting open a parking meter.  That was in the late 1970’s early 1980’s.  That is what street guys do.  They hustle however they can to make cash.  Some guys make more than others.  I knew guys who made fake subway tokens and they made money doing it.  Others sold phone cards for long distance calls.  Some guys are in karting and they make money that way.

Nicky Santoro was part of the Sonny Black crew portrayed in Donnie Brasco. They claim the Bruno Kirby character was loosely based on him.  

I know that he was selling knock off NFL team jerseys in the mid 2000’s because he gave me a box in the Bamonte’s parking lot.  Today the FBI is looking for terrorists and Mexican drug cartel members moving tons of heroin.  They have let up on the five New York families of the Cosa Nostra. The last time they did that, the Bonanno family regrouped and rebuilt itself up into a good sized family.  You cannot count them out just yet.

Alessandro Taloni & Vito Rizzuto

Charged with importing over 100,000 Kilograms of marijuana from Canada to New York and Philadelphia between 1998 and 2012, this drug trafficking organization reached from California to Montreal and took in over a Billion dollars.  They worked with the Hells Angeles, Mexican Cartels, Bonanno Family and the Rizzuto Family.

A large amount of the Marijuana was grown hydroponically in Canada and then smuggled across the border in the US via the Indian Reservations that straddle the US-Canadian border.  This was an easy way for them to bypass US Customs at other entry points on the border.

They would use profits from marijuana to purchase cocaine from the Sinaloa Cartel and distribute it across the East Coast and Canada. They would obtain sizable loads of cocaine from the Cartel. They would break them down to between five and ten kilo's to smuggle into Canada.

The indictment has so many counts of exporting in excess of 1,000 kilograms of marijuana that it is hard to follow.  Then they had the problem that was recently so well portrayed by Walter White on Breaking Bad. They had to do something with all the cash. The Feds posed as money launderers that could help move money and make it clean.

Alessandro Taloni is a name most people have never heard.  He was an important part of the Bonanno Family's drug connection.  Taloni was born in Italy but has lived in Montreal for many years.  It was here that he became friendly with Vito Rizzuto and his crime family.  Taloni was an unknown until the head of the Drug Trafficking asked a DEA informant to move 1 million dollars in cash for him.  The Informant and the DEA told them they would move 200,000 at a time for a 6% charge which means they would launder 188,000 for the organization. A man in Los Angeles met with the Informant and after that meeting he was followed back to the Beverly Hills Hotel where he met Taloni and gave him a large suitcase which he placed in his trunk.  Taloni then left and drove to a home in Woodland Hills where he took the suitcase from the trunk and brought it inside.  The DEA sat on them in the house until Taloni left.   The DEA later pulled him over and found $80,000 in cash, a couple prepaid cell phones and an encrypted Blackberry.  The big surprise came when they searched his person and found Taloni was carrying a business card for a man named “Vito Rizz” and another for his Café Consenza in Montreal that served as his branch of the Bonanno family’s headquarters.

Vito Rizzuto

This was an eye opener for the DEA because Vito was as big as you get in International Organized Crime.  The DEA then went to the house in Woodland Hills and searched it where they found 49 kilo's of cocaine and 1.7 million in cash, numerous prepaid cellphones and a encrypted Blackberry.  Taloni had dropped off the cash but this was not the first time he had been observed in the company of the drug dealers. A few months before the Anaheim Police were watching a local cocaine dealer who met a man named Marc Canel-Pierre.  They followed Marc to Beverly Hills where he met Taloni in a parking lot.  They spoke for a few minutes and then Taloni removed a large bag from his trunk and gave it to Marc.  They then followed Marc to his home where they got a search warrant and found 34 kilo's of Cocaine and 1.6 million in cash.

Taloni loved Ferrari cars and the Ferrari racing team.  Many of his support letters from friends and family speak about his love of the cars.  All the cocaine was stamped Ferrari so I wonder how much pull he had in the organization.  I’ve read all his letters of support and one of them is a blessing from the Pope! I guess it didn't help much because he was given 10 years just the other day.  The one thing I find interesting is the fact that Taloni, who had a hair product business that sold to hair salons kept doing business in Beverly Hills.  That city seems to be very popular with the Zips.