DiNunzio Brothers

The brothers DiNunzio have had a long history around the Mafia going back decades. Last week I wrote about the Boston Mafia or the Patriarca Family based in Providence, Rhode Island.

Carmen has long been thought to be the Underboss of the family, handling business out of his Cheese Shop in the North End.  Anthony DiNunzio is his younger brother who was the acting boss of the family until he became the sixth boss to be taken down in a very short time.

Carmen DiNunzio came out to Los Angeles when he was on the lam from things in Boston.  

He met a former Boston transplant Anthony Fiato in Los Angeles where he had done well in Organized Crime circles.  Anthony Fiato had hooked back up with Los Angeles Capo Mike Rizzi and they had gone to New York and met with the Administration of the Gambino Family.  They wanted to do their own thing in Los Angeles, start their own family.  Pete Milano the boss of Los Angeles would eventually bring Anthony into the family.  He was made and then he did his own thing.  Anthony would have over a million dollars in shylock loans on the street when Carmen hit town.  Anthony did not want to take Carmen in so he brought him to his old friend Joe Sica.

Joe Sica and his brothers were long time players in Organized Crime on the West Coast. That is why I find it very amusing when Hollywood makes movies about Mickey Cohen the so-called “Boss of Los Angeles.”  One of the guys that was close to Joe was Chris Petti who would end up in San Diego. Chris was close to Tony Spilatro and others in the Chicago Outfit.  Chris came up with a plan to get in on the ground floor of the Rincon Indian Casino. The Rincon Tribe was looking for groups to bid on, build and ultimately run a Casino on their reservation.  Chris had the perfect backers… The Outfit, and they had a long history of getting inside Casinos and skimming them.  

They had an inside man in the tribe, but the Outfit told Chris to find other investors because they had another casino that was losing money.  That is where the FBI came in with an Undercover Agent posing as a Colombian dealer looking to launder cash.  They would end up taking down Chris, the administration of the Outfit, Carmen DiNunzio and his brother Anthony.

Luigi Manocchio became the boss of the Boston Family in 1996 after many years of fighting inside the family.  In 2004 he made Carmen his underboss.  Anthony was a Capo in Boston using the Gemini Social Club as his base.

Carmen was soon involved in a scheme to sell the Massachusetts Highway Department 300,000 cubic yards of loam soil from a company he had an interest.  He then decided to bribe a man he thought was an agent of the Highway Department (who was actually an FBI Agent). The FBI had flipped the middle man in the deal and he set up Carmen.  Carmen gave the informant $10,000 to give to the agent and then he gave him another $5,000 in cash at another meeting.  Then they provided the agent with a sample of the loam that they would supply.  It would have been a great score getting a contract to supply loam to the Big Dig but the FBI took him down.

Manocchio was a greedy boss and his men did not like him and there started to be decent, so he would step aside for Peter Limone.  Peter Limone had been locked up for 33 years for a murder that the FBI and their informant Joseph Barboza set him up.  He was released after the FBI found “real” evidence and it only took 33 years. He was released and won a 26 million dollar settlement from the FBI.  He then got right back into the family and busted again.

In steps Anthony DiNunzio as acting boss of the family and what he finds makes him very unhappy.  He went right to work in Rhode Island to beef up their rackets and one of them was

the adult sex industry business (strippers, escorts, porn). The family had made big money from these businesses and Anthony wanted to bring that back to profitability. He had a Eddie Lato a Capo in the family start picking up from the businesses in Rhode Island.  Then he had sitdowns with senior members of the Gambino Family to let them know they would be hitting up a guy who ran stripclubs and adult Bookstores in Rhode Island.  They contacted the Gambinos because the guy was friends with some soldiers in the family.  In the 1980’s the guy was close to Chris Richichi a Capo in the family based in Las Vegas. The Gambinos gave Anthony the green light to shake the guy down.

The crew would meet at a Chinese restaurant in Boston Billy Tse’s until they found out the whole place was wired up and the Feds had taped them.  The FBI then grabbed some of them after a meet and found cash from the stripclubs on them.  

Anthony was caught on tape speaking about his leadership of the family.  He said when he took over he changed everything and that anyone who did not toe the line was shelved (meaning they were no longer active members of the family) Then he told the guy that anyone who did not follow his rules would be buried alive until they died.  He also claimed that even if he was locked up he was still the boss.   He would continue to dig a deeper hole for himself when he was a senior Gambino guy he spoke about sponsoring a guy to be made and then afterward the guy telling him he is 100% with him.  

Anthony would end up pleading guilty and taking a 6 year sentence on November 14, 2012.  His brother Carmen took a 6 year plea deal in 2009 so they are for now off the streets.

Mike Rizzi and Killers in the Mafia

As I’ve touched on before in this blog, contrary to Hollywood Portrayal or popular belief, there were plenty of Workers or Killers in the LA Family.  Just like every mafia family, every man would have to at least participate in a murder to become a Made man.  Nowadays, this is not so true.  Even all Associates were encouraged to kill back then.  You don’t actually have to pull the trigger, stab someone or strangle someone to participate.  You could be the getaway driver, the crash car, a lookout, or the person setting up the kill.  All those roles meet the requirement of participating in a murder prior to being made.  The only reason to kill someone is to protect the family, promote the family, protect the territory, or for some violation of the rules.  There are no unauthorized killings allowed. There is no one cleaning up after an unplanned murder, everything is planned, down to digging the grave or having a disposal site for the body in advance.  Anyone who actually pulls the trigger earns respect by the rank and file but is feared by leadership, because they always fear that they are next or that they will be challenged for leadership positions.  

Those who participate in murders are NEVER paid.  There are no killers for hire in the mafia.  Anything you read or hear in the news about the Mafia putting a 500K contract on someone’s head is bullshit.  People kill because they are told to kill or asked to kill, in order to earn respect.  Anyone who says they were hired to be a hitman by the mob is lying.  There are always eager young men looking to get noticed who are willing to kill.  

One of LA’s more notable workers was Mike Rizzatello, aka Mike Rizzi.  After Dominic Brooklier passed away, Pete Milano took over leadership of the LA family in 1984.  He inherited Capo Mike Rizzi.  Pete really had no idea what to do with Mike, because Mike Rizzi was the exact opposite of Pete.  Pete was a businessman.  Mostly a gambler, a bookmaker, successful in his businesses.  Mike Rizzatello was a strongarm guy, a worker, who had fought in the Columbo war in Brooklyn on Joey Gallo’s side.  He had done many years in prison.  Mike was a hard luck guy who could never make enough money.  So he was a short buck artist.  He would just shake someone down and take a thousand dollars, rather than thinking long term and shaking them down 500 a month for life.  

So Pete in many ways feared Mike Rizzi.  This created a rift in the family.  The young tougher guys looked up to Mike and wanted to make a harder image or a throwback to the old days, which would not work at the time.  What the family needed was to move into legitimate businesses that they could control with a monopoly, with the hammer in the background, but not so overt.  However, a lot of the young guys could not see this and wanted to act like cowboys shaking down criminals and drug dealers for quick money.   So Mike Rizzi and Anthony Fiato went to New York to meet with the Underboss of the Gambino family, Neil Dellacroce and Joe Piney Armone.  Rizzi was well liked by both of them, and other members of the Gambino family.  They authorized him to run his own family or crew in Los Angeles, separate from Pete.  They also saw Pete as weak.  In retrospect, it's clear that Pete’s leadership was the strongest path for the family to take.  

Mike Rizzi started his own family in LA and made Anthony Fiato his underboss.  He had a sizeable contingent of young, hard men who followed him over from Pete’s side.  Mike’s constant need of money, kept him in constant trouble with the law.  After a few prison terms, and finding out the news that Anthony Fiato, his former right hand man, and his brother, had worn a wire for the feds, he found himself in Orange County, California, where he reconnected with an old friend with a new name, Bill Carrol.  Bill and Rizzi had met in Chino State Prison many years before when Bill was known by his real name, which is now erased because of Witness Protection.  I’m not sure what his real name was.  

Anyways, Bill had muscled his way into Orange County’s premier strip club, the Mustang Club, located in Santa Ana, California.  The Mustang Club had been started by another convicted criminal, going by the name Jimmy Casino.  Jimmy Casino made a ton of money from the Mustang Club, but spent it all as quickly as it came in, and didn’t pay his taxes.  This was Bill Carrol’s opening.  He loaned money to Jimmy Casino, and soon it became apparent that Jimmy Casino’s flamboyant ways were going to sink the Mustang Club.  

One night, Jimmy Casino and his girlfriend came home and were ambushed by a couple of men who killed him and raped his girlfriend.  Bill Carrol stepped right up and took over the club.  This left the door open for Mike Rizzi, who was always looking for income, to get his hands in the club through his friendship with Bill.  Joseph Grosso, a limo company owner, controlled the lingerie sales inside of the club.  The club also had a bouncer named Big George Udavitch (big is an understatement for this massive man), who also happened to be relocated through witness protection, for testifying against Joe Piney and the Gambino family.  Soon it became apparent that Bill Carrol was not going to share the wealth with his prison friend Mike Rizzi.  

So one night, Bill Carrol, Joseph Grosso and Mike Rizzi went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant in Santa Ana.  After dinner, they asked Bill Carrol to drop them off at Mike Rizzi’s car in a parking garage near South Coast Plaza.  As soon as they pulled to a stop in the garage, Mike Rizzi reached his large arm around Bill Carrol’s neck and Joseph threw himself around Bill’s legs.  Mike placed a pistol with a silencer on it to the back of Bill’s head.  He snarled, “This is for not letting us eat.”  He fired three times.  Carrol jerked and blood splattered everywhere.  They released Carrol’s now lifeless body and exited the car, their ears ringing.  They got into Joseph’s car, and drove away.  At dawn, a bloody, but somehow still alive, Bill Carrol, stumbled out of the parking garage where he startled security guards who called police and paramedics.  At first, Bill Carrol refused to name the person who shot him.  Big George Utavitch bragged that he had disposed of the bloody clothes and weapon.  A few days later, Big George Utavitch, who was gathering cash to head back to New York, received a call in his hotel room at El Toro California.  He was told that someone would meet him and bring him cash at a nearby Irvine parking lot.  When Big George arrived, someone got into the passenger seat of his car, and fired two bullets into his head.  He was able to get out of the car and walk around toward the trunk, where he got shot again, this time he was killed.  As a side note, this location was close to Fat Bobby Paduano’s mortgage business.  Fat Bobby is a long time LA mafia Associate.  Bill Carrol was hidden away by the Feds where he recovered from being shot but was blind as a result.  When the Feds agreed to drop some federal charges against him, he fingered Mike Rizzi as the shooter and Joe Grosso as his accomplice.  Everyone always wonders why Mike at his age, and his high rank, would take part in a murder, and use an untested associate.  Mike Rizzi, in his 60’s and sick with emphysema, was once again desperate for cash, and could not do hits alone because of medical issues.  Mike was put on trial, and was convicted.  He went away to the highest security prison in the state of California until he became sicker and was moved to a Medical prison.  He was released a few weeks before he passed away in Cathedral City (near Palm Springs).  At his funeral there were no members of the LA Family.

Bill Carrol dissapeared into witness protection once again.

Pete Milano lived a long and prosperous life and died in Westlake California in 2012 a free man.

Read more about the recent guilty conviction in the murder case of Jimmy Casino here:

http://articles.latimes.com/2013/may/01/local/la-me-ln-casino-murder-conviction-20130501

If you want to read more about Mike RIzzi, read Anthony Fiato’s blog:

mafiaslugger.blogspot.com/‎

The Gangster Brothers- Anthony Fiato

Its important to talk about the Gangster brothers before we move on into the 1980's in the Los Angeles Mafia Family.

Who are the Gangster Brothers?  The Fiato Brothers! They were two tough Boston transplants that moved to LA and made people stand up and take notice.  The first time I ever heard about these brothers was when I was being questioned by an FBI Special Agent named Carl.  He had an LA Times paper and he said to me. "You think you are tough? These guys are tough!" He handed me the paper and it was folded so I could see the LA Times story written about them. My thought on seeing the article was how tough could they be if they flipped. This was long before I flipped and it was before I grew up.  I used to look at guys who went away or went straight as weak. After I lived life and got older, I started to see the life for what it was...A dead end.

Anthony Fiato and his family had moved to LA from Boston in 1960.  From the stories he told me, Los Angeles blew his mind. He had a cousin who worked at the record store on Sunset and Laurel where he would go and listen to records. Anthony's father had come to LA to give his family a better life.  He had a job waiting for him at the Villa Capri, a well known Italian restaurant in Los Angeles.

The Villa Capri is where Anthony Fiato met the LA Underworld. Michael Rizzitello aka Mike Rizzi was a Bartender, Johnny Roselli and Jimmy Frattiano were regulars, along with many of the LA Family guys.  If anyone ever read Jimmy Frattiano's the Last Mafioso, he describes taking a woman out to the Villa Capri and being treated like royalty.  That would not be the first or last time that Anthony would interact with LA Guys.  One time Jimmy Frattiano and a few others came in for a private dinner.  Anthony put them in a private room which really pissed off the Gangster Squad, who was following everyone.  

I had a lot of long talks with Anthony and the guy is smart. He knows Cosa Nostra better than anyone and he was around during the Golden age of the Mafia.  There was no RICO or WitSec and the Mafia had a long memory and a longer reach.

One of the guys Anthony would get to know well was Joe Sica. I’ve blogged before about Joe Sica and his brothers, what they were able to do in the Southern California Underworld was huge.  So many successful Mobsters got their start around Joe, it is really crazy that not many people have heard of them. I only wish I could have met them. Anthony would meet him at the Formosa Cafe.  He did a lot of work for LA guys down in Watts.  

When his family decided to head back to Boston, Anthony went also, and he soon learned that he had been in the Mafia Minor Leagues. He returned to Boston, to the North End and it was locked down by guys in Patriarca Family. He was soon hooked up with Nicky Giso and JR Russo, heavy hitters for the family.  I can only imagine what he learned from these guys.  The fact that he was well respected by all of them is a testament to how he operated.

He later made his way back to LA where he hooked up with his old buddy Mike Rizzi.  Anthony was older and his younger brother Larry was now also grown up.  The two of them made a fearsome pair in a time when most people were smaller.  These two brothers were well over six feet tall.  They didn't take crap from anyone and soon they made names for themselves.  Anthony is the most feared of the two because he was sharp and he would get you. He knew how to hustle and make money.  He ran clubs, collected money and soon became a shylock’s shylock.  He had his own Shylock business going and he was bringing in cash from the vig every week. A Shylock makes loans to people who cannot get a loan from a bank or someone who needs cash now. I always liked drug dealers or guys who could steal because they would have huge fluctuations in their cash flow.  Gamblers are always a steady source of vig because no gambler wins every time.

He had built up his reputation as a fierce guy who got things done.  This is when Robert "Puggy" Zeichick came to Anthony to provide him muscle and protection for his Shylock business.  Anthony was soon the biggest Shylock in LA and everyone wanted to be around him.  

He went to New York with Mike Rizzi and they met with Aniello Dellacroce, the powerful underboss of the Gambino family.  This was a far stronger Gambino Family than John Gotti's.  The Gambino's at that time had 23 street crews all over the US and Mike Rizzi was well known to them as a man of action.  Soon after the meeting Mike Rizzi and Anthony were back in California taking care of business for the Gambino's.  Mike Rizzi was a Capo in the LA Family but he had little use for them.

Anthony and Mike Rizzi had their own “family” and they had little use for the LA Family which was now being run by Peter "Shakes" Milano. Pete was known as a bookmaker and “business” guys like Mike Rizzi and Anthony scared him.  Pete was a boss more like Big Paul Castellano of the Gambino Family.  Big Paul had his term cut short on a Manhattan street one winter evening by a thug named John Gotti and his men.  

Pete had started beefing up the family by bringing in new blood.  He Made his brother Carmen, who was a lawyer, who worked with his father and the Family for years.  Carmen had worked with the Unions and even went to New York to meet guys with his father, he was known.  Carmen had been disbarred and now he was the underboss of the family.  Pete had also Made another faction, which I will call the Buffalo faction.  This was Jimmy Caci, Rocco Zangari, Steve Cino and Bobby Milano.  Anthony and Mike Rizzi did not like this at all.  Mike and Anthony were the guys who did all the heavy work for the LA Family.

Anthony had built his Shylock up to the point where he was pulling down 30k a month from it.  He had other bookies laying their action off with his people.  Anthony was a man of action and when people heard that he was coming to see them they were afraid. The problem that was brewing was with Mike Rizzi.  Mike was a heavy guy, but he was a short buck guy.  This was because he was never good at making money. He did everything for the here and now.  Mike's crew with guys like John DiMattia and John Bronco was never good at bringing in the cash.  John DiMattia is a tough talking wannabee who can’t do a thing, the guy is not tough at all.  He was roughed up by a well known lawyer and it would come out that he was talking to the LAPD Vice.  John Bronco, this guy was a guy who could beat up a smaller guy, but he never had the balls to go any farther.  John had done many years in the can for counterfeiting and while he was down his daughter had gotten involved in a plot to kill her husband.  John was released so he could go wear a wire against the killer.  John would later flip again in Las Vegas in the 1990's.

Anthony and his brother were soon making bigger waves in the LA Underworld. This brought the attention of the FBI to their operation.  Soon a man who was close to Mike Rizzi was wearing a wire in their home.  The FBI also bugged the house and one early AM they raided the home.  

Anthony did not know it at the time, but his brother agreed to cooperate. Anthony is a very sharp guy, there are few guys in the life that I have spoken to as much as I did with him.  He knows the world and where things will go. Anthony also decided to go with Team USA and wear a wire.

The LA Family had wanted to bring Anthony into the fold but he had rebuffed all their attempts until now.  He went with them and soon they wanted him in the family   The guy to step up and propose him was Consigliere Jack LoCicero and later Capo Louie Gelfuso would be the second guy to propose him.  You need two made guys to propose someone to be made in the family.  Anthony’s family was well known to the LA guys so that part was out of the way.  Anthony had done work for the family years before so they knew about him.  Pete, always the careful one, had Louie Gelfuso reach out to Frankie Skyball aka Scibelli, a Capo in charge of Genovese Family's Springfield, Connecticut crew. He knew all the guys in Boston and Providence and he knew Anthony.  

I was told this by Louie Gelfuso after The Animal in Hollywood was out in bookstores. Louie also told me that they were going to have a ceremony to induct members into the family but when Jimmy Caci and his faction arrived they did not like the fact that Fat Bobby Paduano was at the house.  So they left and called it off.  So Anthony was short changed in the ceremony department much like Mike Rizzi.  Louie Gelfuso came to him and told him he was in the family.  Later Pete sent for him and went over the rules and spoke to him about having a legit business.

Anthony and his brother took down over 60 guys from West Coast to the East Coast.

If it was not for Anthony, I would not be here now writing this blog.  So many times I wanted to just bail out of the informant thing with the FBI.  Anthony made me realize that it was all a waste and the guys in the life were all users. I made it through the program and started writing. For the whole Fiato story, buy his book “The Animal in Hollywood” or read his blog.

The Real Dirt on "The Gangster Squad"

I saw The Gangster Squad last night and it was not even close to what really happened.  It goes to show you that "Based On A True Story" is not really real.  It is Hollywood real.  Which is some person writing these stories that has no idea about what he writes.  Okay they read books, speak to a few old coppers and then put their own spin on events and it is now real! The problem is that these people have no idea how real people act.  What motivates a Gangster?

The movie is full of guys holding Tommy guns with drums blazing away one handed.  Pick up a Thompson Sub Machine empty. It was made out of steel and wood.  When you add the fifty round drum it is almost fifteen pounds.  They have a forward grip because when fired it begins to climb.

Hollywood loves Mickey Cohen!  He was the only Gangster in Los Angeles.  Wrong!
Micky was a Gangster with ties to Chicago and New York.  He had no rank because he was Jewish.  He never muscled anyone from Chicago.  La Cosa Nostra was the strongest during these years. The Chicago Outfit was an organization with so much power that Micky Cohen could not even look at them wrong. The Outfit was extorting movie studio's during the 1930's. 

There were two much more powerful groups in Los Angeles at this time.  Hollywood chooses to ignore the facts. Los Angeles La Cosa Nostra Family then under the Boss Jack Dragna. Jack Dragna was tough and he was a cousin of Tommy Lucchese one of the heads of the Five Families in New York.  So powerful was Tommy Lucchese that the family still bears his name today.  Jack Dragna had over sixty made men at that time and many more associates.  The LA Family decided they wanted what Micky Cohen had in terms of rackets.  They killed his men who were out on bail and made some disappear so Micky was on the hook for the bond.  They blew up his house.  They shot him, they even shot a policeman that was protecting him.  Some of the best accounts can be found in Jimmy Frattiano's book  "The Last Mafioso"  Jimmy Frattiano along with Charles "Charley Bats" Battaglia are the one's that really killed the Two Tonys aka Tony Brancato and Tony Trombino. Micky Cohen had nothing to do with it.  Jack Dragna died of a heart attack long after Micky Cohen was locked up, Cohen never took shots at him or killed him as the movie portrayed. Micky Cohen never made him bark like a dog and never spoke bad to him. The way they had Sean Penn snarling and cussing was a joke.  Lets use logic.  Micky Cohen was a Gangster surrounded by guys who were muscle for hire.  they have no blood bond, no oath, they were just paid.  How could a man slap, talk down to or even kill these outlaws?  Come on!  Louis Tom Dragna the former boss of the Los Angeles Family is alive today at 92.

The other group that Hollywood ignores was the Sica Brothers.  They lived in the valley and they controlled vast amounts of rackets in California.  Joe Sica was their leader and he would never take any nonsense from Micky Cohen.  They were tough and smart.  They flew under the radar.

Micky Cohen was like John Gotti, all media!  He was like a reality star today.

There were two race wires for book makers in the 1940's.  One was run by Chicago and the other by New York.

Jack "The Enforcer" Whalen was a tough Irish Hood who was liked by the Gangster Squad because he was Irish and he took no shit from the Italians. Jack met his end not being shot by Micky Cohen in his apartment building.  Jack went to Rondelli’s restaurant in the Valley to confront Micky Cohen over a debt. Jack was unarmed and he was killed by someone hired by Micky.  Micky was there but did not kill him.  In the movie, the grand ending is Micky being arrested for killing Jack, and the star witness is what sent him to Alcatraz.  This is far from the truth, as he didn't kill Jack, and he was sent to jail for tax evasion ten years after the movie portrayed his arrest.

Jack Whalen beat up Los Angeles Capo Mike Rizzi.

Anyone who wants to know what these people were really like should read my friend Anthony Fiato's book and his Blog.    Anthony knew all these men and he can tell you what it was really like.

All truth aside, the movie was an enjoyable one.  Acting was great (minus Sean Penn's overacting), time period portrayal was awesome, costumes and scenery all done well. 

Anthony Fiato

@LAmobslugger

kickass blogger - hollywood goodfella

Hollywood · http://af11.wordpress.com/ 

There are a few guys left from that time.  So find out the truth now!

KENJI OC