New Jersey Fun with the DeCavalcantes

The FBI still goes after Cosa Nostra or mafia families, and in the last few years they have hit the New Jersey-based DeCavalcantes pretty hard.

Last week a judge gave Charles “Beeps” Stango, a capo in the DeCavalcante family, ten years in a case that included murder-for-hire.  

The DeCavalcante crime family is the crime family that the show Sopranos was loosely based on.  Law enforcement now claims that they operate under the Gambino crime family. I laugh out loud when I think about the Sicilians, who run the Gambinos, actually wanting to deal with a bunch of American Cosa Nostra.

Beep’s crew engaged in everything from bookmaking, to loansharking, to selling cocaine and untaxed cigarettes.  The FBI was watching them and intercepted some good wire talk about their drug deals.  One of the conversations they were able to record was one of Beeps talking about the structure of the family and who did what.  It is a very damning recording.  He explains that he goes way back with Goombah Frankie, aka Frank Nigro, who was also taken down in the investigation.  Nigro also happens to be the consigliere of the family.  

Beeps explains to the informant who made the recording what place the consigliere holds in the family.  Equal with the underboss, but a representative of all the men.  

He goes on to explain that if you have a beef, you go to your capo, who takes it to the consigliere, who will settle the dispute.

This is where he tells the informant that the family is under the Gambinos now after being independant since the beginning.

Beeps brags about “planting the family flag,” or setting up crews, in New Orleans, Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

Beeps then had a beef with another capo and another made guy in his crew.  He told the informant that they were disrespectful to him and the underboss.  He wanted the guy hurt, acid thrown in his face or put in a wheelchair.  

He wanted the informant to use a crew from outside Elizabeth, New Jersey that would not be recognizable to the locals.  He considered throwing “pineapples” (grenades) to blow up the guy.

The informant found two unknown outlaw bikers who would do the job.   Beeps offered them fifty thousand dollars to handle the guy.  This time he wanted him dead and he told them.  He also told his son on the phone, and Nigro, while it was being recorded.

The recordings go on and on about setting up the murder and why.  They are between Beeps and Nigro, Beeps and his son and many with the informant. The two would-be hitmen would later turn out to be undercover FBI agents.  

They recorded a meeting at a bar with his son Anthony and two females, where they discussed starting a high end escort business.  They went over paperwork the girls would sign stating that they would not commit illegal acts.  Beeps wanted his son to open a bar as a front for the business.

The informant also did a couple of ‘buy walk’ cocaine deals.  A ‘buy walk’ is when law enforcement buys illegal drugs, pays for them, and lets the dealer go about business.  This is different when law enforcement does ‘buy busts’ and takes everyone down at the time of the deal.  They did a couple of deals with Anthony for two hundred grams of cocaine to strengthen the case against him.  Then the FBI upped the amounts to five hundred gram deals.

The informant got some great tapes of them discussing where they got the cocaine from and how it was brought into the country.

The six others arrested with Beeps Stango have all plead guilty and will be sentenced.

In the old days, a capo would be insulated from street dealings - and forget about having to “hire out” a killing.  The guys in any mafia crew would not get paid to murder - they just did what they were told to do.  Old age and repeated government assaults have weakened the family.

I doubt Beeps Stango will ever be a play on the street again.

The DeCavalcante Organized Crime Family

I was just having a conversation about the FBI using deep undercover agents like Donnie Brasco and Jack Falcone.  The people I was discussing the subject were wondering why the FBI would spend so much time and money on the Cosa Nostra.  They felt that it was no longer a threat.  I explained to them that the Cosa Nostra was still International in scope and much more dangerous than the flavor-of-the-moment crime group.  

Lets go back to the 80s.  Jamaican Posse, Medellín Cartel and many Mexican groups along the border, but they have no staying power. The Cosa Nostra is like a cancer that you can't get rid of, even with aggressive treatment.  They are able to bounce back because of their structure and because they are a secret group.  When the FBI takes down a crew or the administration, others, known and unknown, can step up and keep running the organization.  

I was surprised when I heard the FBI took down a crew in the DeCavalcante family of New Jersey.  The other families in New York have such a foothold in New Jersey that I forget that the state has its own family.  The FBI had an agent undercover for 3 years in the DeCavalcante family and they were active.  Charles Stango lived in Henderson, Nevada just outside of Las Vegas, but he was still a Capo in the DeCavalcante family.  Anthony Stango, his son, lived in Brick Township, New Jersey and handled his father’s day-to-day operations in New Jersey.  Charles Stango, also known as “Beeps,” took money from the undercover FBI Agent who has been under since 2012.  The Agent had become close to Beeps and last year, just before Christmas, Beeps shared his plans to murder a member of the family.  

Beeps had given the contract to the FBI undercover and told him to kill or maim the other man known as the “Pet” because he had disrespected an older member of the family.  He wanted him shot or blown up in his business in Elizabeth, NJ.  

The order was given in Las Vegas in a meeting between Beeps and the FBI agent and it was recorded by the agent.  Beeps had assured the agent that the DeCavalcante Administration was on board with the murder.  The FBI had the proof because they had intercepted calls between Frank Nigro the family Consigliere and Paul Colella who was the go-between to higher ups in the administration. They all sought and were given permission to murder the wayward member.

Beep’s son and other crew members also distributed cocaine on a large scale in New Jersey and were caught by the FBI.

They were looking to expand into Toms River, New Jersey, where they were going to open a nightclub as cover for a high-end escort business that would cater to businessmen in the area.

Sex sells, and the amount of money that a high end escort business can bring in is staggering.

When I told the FBI and IRS about Nici’s Girls and Exotica 2000 they could not believe the amount of money they made.

In all, the FBI was able to take down 10 members and associates of the DeCavalcante Family from two crews. This was a different bust than other recent ones, because they didn't take down a gambling or shylock operation, which is the staple of Mafia.  They did bust them for selling large amounts of cigarettes.

This quote from U.S. Attorney Fisherman sums it up well, “Though its ranks have been thinned by countless convictions and its own internal bloodletting, traditional organized crime remains a real problem.”

Uncle Manny

I thought I would write this week’s blog about Emmanuel "Manny" Garofalo or “Uncle Manny” as he is known to close friends.

Manny has been in the news a lot in the past year. I especially loved last week’s article in the New York Papers where Manny claimed  he was selling his house because of the notoriety of his Nephew’s wife Alicia Garofalo on the reality show Mob Wives.  Manny said he was putting his Seagate Brooklyn Palace on the market to move someplace where people had no idea he was connected with the Organized Crime likes of Alicia.

I will make a couple of observations about this joke of an excuse that Manny is making up. I have found written stories about Manny as far back as 1979 when he ran a Carting/Dumping/Demolition Company and here is a quote from the New York Times, "Commissioner Steisel identified two companies as ‘probably the worst’ offenders. He said they were both owned by Emanuel Garofalo."  He was written up again as an illegal dumper in the New York Times, February 1983.  Did it bother Manny? Apparently not, because in 1985, once more the New York Times reports Kevin Smyley, inspector general of New York City's Sanitation Department, refers to three brothers named Garofalo who operate waste hauling companies in Brooklyn as ''the James brothers of garbage.''  

In September, 1994, Manny again made the papers as a  known “Organized Crime Figure” who was around some of the legends of the underworld.  This time it was the Los Angeles Times his name was printed in.  A man named Harold Glantz was arrested for a massive scam where he bilked investors out of 30 million dollars in a "Prime Bank Note and Roll Program Scam."  I gave Harold the nickname "Scissors Man" after he got into an argument with Manny in Manhattan and Manny stabbed him in the leg with a pair of cheap scissors he bought at a near by store.  Manny told me that Harold owed him a Million dollars.  It really bothered Manny because he told me to go see Harold’s son who lived just off Sunset Blvd in Los Angeles.  The good part is, I was wired up and when I went back to Los Angeles, the FBI was there to watch.  I just told the kid to have his father get in touch with Manny.  That is a Federal Crime, because Manny had me cross state lines to deliver a threat.  

Manny was next arrested by the FBI with a real upstanding crowd of people. John Gammarano; Salvatore Lombardi; Dominick Truscello; Barry Nichilo; Gaetano Vastola; Steven Long and Steven Crea.

I will start with John Gammarano aka Johnny G.  He was a member of Danny Marino's crew but he would be appointed to the Gambino Family Construction Panel which would include Cousin Eddie Garafolo, Delmonico, Frankie Fappiano,, Richie Gotti, Thomas Carbonaro, and Mikey Scars.  All the Crime Families in the area put together these panels to oversee their construction and Union Rackets in order to avoid problems.

The next upstanding citizen is Salvatore Lombardi , aka “Sally Dogs” a one time Genovese Capo who was heavily into drugs such as Quaalude and Heroin.  He is a also the Uncle of Big Ange on Mob Wives.  

Barry Nichilo was a Gambino associate who Sammy Gravano put away.  Steven Crea aka “Wonder Boy” would first be appointed to the Luchese Family Construction Panel and later became and is still the Boss of the family.  Dominick Truscello aka “Crazy Dom” was also on the Construction Panel for the Luchese Family and later he would become a Capo in charge of the Prince Street Crew.  

The last notable Felon in his close circle is Gaetano Vastola aka “Corky” Vastola, the Underboss of the DeCavalcante Family in New Jersey. He was a very big player in the record business and later in construction racketeering. He spent time locked up with John Gotti who was convinced he would flip, so he asked the Boss of the Family to kill him.  That blew up and they were charged with attempted murder.  Corky was locked up for a long stretch after that.

So all of these “friends” of his cannot be worse than being associated with Alicia Garofalo on Mob Wives.  Manny has even been in the papers five times since his last arrest, where he was crying about Sandy and his losses.

I used to meet him early and run around all day with him.  He is a user and a criminal, and the FBI has it all on tape, so why would the Judge release him with time served?  Community service?  This guy threatened my life, the lives of my family, stole money from me, but he is now free?  Maybe one day he will have his own TV show and run around Las Vegas and Hollywood.