Nicky the Mouth: Bonanno Capo

Nicky Santoro has had a long run in the Mafia.  He was part of the Sonny Black crew that was taken down by FBI Special Agent Pistone aka Donnie Brasco. He has been part of the Bonanno crime family for decades as an associate, made guy, capo and underboss.  Today he is an inmate with the state of New York awaiting trial.  He has gotten away with a lot over the years, but something he can’t get away from has caught up to him: father time.  He is in a hospital bed,  on a no bail hold, and he has filed a lawsuit against the New York City Department of Corrections for negligent and malicious treatment.

I was down at BaMonte's in Brooklyn one Saturday many years ago, and I met Nicky in the parking lot with a loud mouth Colombo guy.  Nicky gave us some NFL jerseys.  Soon after that he was made a capo, then back to a soldier and finally after the boss Joey Massino flipped, he was briefly the underboss of the family.

He has been locked up on a number of charges in the past, but now he is just old and sick.

The state case of enterprise corruption ended in a mistrial last year after two months of trial.

The state is going to retry it, but they want to keep Nicky locked up.

The heart of the case revolves around an online gambling book and the selling of prescription drugs. This is hardly like the Tommy “Shots” Gioeli case. The problem is he has gotten away with a lot in the past.

In 1994 Genovese associate Michael D’Urso and his cousin Bonanno associate Sabatino Lombarti were playing cards at San Giuseppe social club in Greenpoint, Brooklyn when Giancarlo “John” Imbrieco shot D’Urso in the head and then shot Lombardi.  D’Urso survived the hit, but his cousin was killed.

He went to his Genovese capo Rosario Gangi, who told him not to retaliate.  The shooting went down because another Genovese associate owed them $60,000 for a gambling debt.  D’Urso tried to get one of the people involved in the hit, but failed twice.  He was warned by Gangi that if it was him who was behind the failed attempts, he was in big trouble.  So D’Urso went to the FBI and started wearing a wire.  He wore it for three years and took down at least 60 guys, including two bosses of the Genovese family.

It seems John Imbrieco who is now more than 15 years into his 20 year plea deal has asked the judge who sentenced him to give him some leniency.

Imbrieco wrote Judge Leo Glasser and told him that he was a changed man.  He has been a model prisoner, taking plumbing classes and even spin class.

Imbrieco noted that his coconspirator had their case overturned. The Judge asked prosecutors to work out a timed served deal.

The family of Sabatino Lombarti are outraged.  Lombarti might have been a loan shark, but he didn't shoot two people in the back of the head for money.

Once again more drama in the mafia world. I wonder, since most of these guys are getting up in years, if they will find a litigator to keep on retainer who specializes in mafia “slip and fall” civil suits?

Sonny Franzese will be 100 this year and he has not filed one yet.

A Semi-Victory for the Bonanno Family

People probably wonder why state and federal law enforcement agencies spend so much time and resources to put away a few men.  There are, after all, cartels, sex traffickers, Russians, Albanians, Chinese and the big one: Islamic terrorists on the streets of New York.

The Cosa Nostra is like no other group.  The Bonanno family is the cockroach of the underworld.  Law enforcement thinks they got rid of them, yet they come out of the woodwork again and again.

They lost their namesake boss Joe Bonanno when he went power hungry and caused a war. Then he wrote a book.  They had a rough time when the family broke into factions and part of the Sicilian crew did their own thing.  Then came Donnie Brasco, a jewel thief who became part of their crew.  They even drew in the legendary boss of Tampa, Santo Trafficante, and the boss of Milwaukee, Frank Balistrieri.

One of the guys who had interactions with Donnie Brasco was Nicky Santoro. Nicky Santoro has been an associate, a soldier, a capo and even an acting underboss.  Nicky has lived in that world his whole life.

On May 10, 2016 Nicky Santoro won a small victory in a Manhattan courtroom.  Nicky, Vito Badamo, Ernst Aiello and Anthony Santoro had been on trial for the last two months.  They faced charges including Enterprise Corruption which is the state's version of RICO.  

They took part in bookmaking, loan sharking, and get this: selling Viagra.  They infiltrated Teamsters Local 917.  

The jurors heard over 450 intercepted phone calls and heard from cooperating informants. The problem?  Not much action.  No murders, just talk.  The Bonannos just won another trial when the Feds took on Vincent Asaro.  They charged Vincent with the Lufthansa Heist at JFK that was immortalized in the film Goodfellas and a murder with Jimmy Burke.   The problem is they were decades old cases.

Nicky and his crew had a Costa Rican internet based sports book that brought in millions. Nicky was heard on tape telling Vito Badamo that he had to know everything he was doing in the street.  That no card games could happen without him.  

The state may try again or maybe they will settle for a plea if they will take one.

When I was in Brooklyn we met Nicky Santoro at BaMonte’s in Brooklyn.  He was selling knock off NFL Jerseys and he gave me one. I did record that day.  I saw a guy close with Craig Marino (Colombo soldier) and John Baudanza (Lucchese soldier) in the place meeting with some guys.  Jerry Degerolamo is there and he asked me not to say anything.  Jerry would later go down with Craig and John in a stock fraud case.  I hear both of those guys are out in a halfway house.

The people who were handling me at this time toyed with the idea of trying to sell Nicky and the Bonannos a warehouse full of knockoff software. They decided to go with Teddy Persico instead because he was a loose cannon.  

Nicky's boss was Joe Massino, who had changed the Bonanno family name to the Massino family after Joe Bonanno’s book disgraced the name.  Joe would later go with Team America and become the first boss to flip.  Nicky is still living the life. I wonder if he is happy?

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.

Frank "Curly" Lino

Born on October 30th, 1938 in Gravesend Brooklyn Frank "Curly" Lino had his life's path already mapped out for him.   Frank's mother married Frank Lino Sr in a marriage arranged by the boss of the Genovese Family, Vito Genovese.  Frank would never get past the 10th grade at Lafayette High School in Brooklyn because he started running with a Mafia farm team: the Avenue U Boys.  He used to pull off robberies with the Avenue U Boys but he was soon running a floating game for a made Genovese Soldier.

Frank has lived a charmed life.  It may not have been the best life but he lived it to the max.  In May of 1962 he got involved with two other men to pull off a robbery of a tobacco store in Brooklyn.  While it was going down two NYPD Brooklyn Detectives were shot and killed.  Frank was picked up soon afterward and beaten severely in the station house by other detectives who he claimed stapled his hand and shoved a broomstick up his ass.  He did have a broken leg and arm.  The NYPD has put broomsticks up others asses, so who knows.

The court placed him on 3 years probation after he threatened to sue the city.  The other men were given the death penalty that was later commuted to life in prison.

This was not the last time Frank would be a torture victim due to his criminal activity.  During the heyday of the Mafia, the real life “Luca Brazi” for Junior Persico, a man named Hugh "Apples" Macintosh (or just Mac) grabbed Frank out of a bar. Mac brought him to a basement where he beat him and tortured him for two days trying to make him give up the names of his friends that had a beef with Persico.  He never gave up their names even after he was beaten so badly he suffered a weird eye twitch - a blinking twitch that remained for the rest of his life. So Mac let him go after telling him 'the reason you are being let go is because you didn’t rat. If you did we would have killed you"  Frank was so afraid he never looked back until he was well away from that place.

He was made on his 40th Birthday in 1977 in Little Italy.  It has been said it was because of his cousin Eddie Lino who was with John Gotti and a major drug dealer.  Gotti was very close to Joey Massino at this time.  

Frank was asked by his Capo Sonny Red Indelicato to drive him to a peace meeting at a social club in Brooklyn. Sonny Red decided to have Frank drive him to the meeting instead of his son Bruno because he did not really trust the other Capos. He told his son Bruno to kill all the Zips and the rest of the Capos if he did not return. There was a lot of internal strife in the Bonanno Family at the time because the self proclaimed boss Carmine Galante had been murdered by Bruno and others on orders from the Commision. Rusty Rastelli was the real boss but he was locked up, so his most trusted Capo Big Joey Massino was working hard to keep the family together.  The Zip Faction, The Canadian Faction, Sonny Black and Joey Massino all lined up against the other three capos.  Sonny Red, Dominick Trinchera and Philip Giaccone were all opposing Rusty but they were called into this last ditch peace offering.  Things seemed to be going fine when Frank saw three hooded come down the stairs into the club.  He saw Joey Massino hit Sonny Red in the head with something and another man jump out of a closet with a gun.  He saw Giaccone thrown up against a wall and shot before he fled so fast that nobody on the hit team could stop him.

He then went into hiding but the powers that be did not want him dead.  They wanted Bruno who had escaped the massacre.  Frank was close to him and knew where he was hiding out.  He met with the Underboss of the Gambino Family who gave him a chance to live, if he murdered Bruno.  Frank pretended to be looking for Bruno, when he really already knew where he was.  The Bonanno Family powers gave the contract to Sonny Black who then gave it to Lefty Ruggiero and Donnie Brasco.   Things went downhill from there because Donnie Brasco was an undercover FBI Agent and the Commission's case came down and Bruno was picked up.  

Frank was then asked to bring Sonny Black to a meeting because it had come out that Donnie Brasco was an FBI Agent and he was vouched for by Sonny Black.  Sonny knew he was not long for this world so he left his jewelry at home for his wife.  They got to the house where the meeting was to take place and Frank showed him to the basement.  Sonny went first and a few steps down Frank shoved him and when he fell the shooter fired into his body but the gun jammed.  Sonny Black told them to "Hit him one more time, Make it good"  They did.  They would cut off his hands because he shook them with an FBI Agent and Frank Lino's son helped dispose of Sonny Black.  The world of the Mafia is crazy because years later when I was at BaMontes in Brooklyn a guy wearing a black over coat was walking back and forth smoking a cigarette.  I was watching him and Nicky Santoro a Bonanno Capo told me that he was Sonny Black’s kid.  So Sonny's kid is still around those guys.

Frank did it all on the street, from drugs, robbery, pump and dump, extortion to Gambling.  He made money from Family Union contracts with school buses.  He had conspired with the Lucchese Family to kill a Gambino associate until Sal Vitale the Underboss had a sitdown with Nicky Corrozzo who told him I dont care what the kid did, what he stole its done, we have big plans for him.  So that was it for that hit.  Good for Frank because when he was locked up later he was going to get shanked in the yard of a prison.  When the huge Bonanno family indictments came down he learned that Sal Vitale had flipped and he knew it was over.  He flipped becoming the first of many Bonanno's to testify for the Government.  He would implicate his own relatives in many Mafia crimes and for that he was rewarded with just 8 years by the judge and is now out and a free man.

I hope he lives a good life and enjoys his freedom.  He is older and he knows what he did.