Mob Con 2013

Andrew DiDonato, Me, Frank Calabrese Jr.

This weekend was Mob Con 2013 and it was fun! Great audience and so many good speakers.  

I spent most of my time with Frank Calabrese Jr and Andrew DiDonato, great guys!

Frank told a story about how he was taken down by the FBI in Chicago. He was downstairs in his place and his family was in their beds, when the FBI knocked on his door and asked for him to come out.  Frank got his shirt on and then went to his front closet, because his alarm box was in the closet, and he noticed Agents watching him warily through the window. Frank yelled “I'm just turning off the alarm!” to assure them he wasn’t reaching for a gun, and then he opened the door. They told him that he was being arrested.  As he was getting cuffed his wife came to the top of the stairs and asked what was going on.

Frank: Its the FBI, I’m just getting arrested.  Go back to bed.  

Wife: What?  What should I do?  

Frank: Call my Father.  

FBI: We already got him, Frank.

Frank: Okay, call my Uncle.  

FBI We picked him up already too.

Frank: Okay, then just call my brother.  

FBI: We got him tonight also.  

Frank: Honey, just wait for me to call.  

Frank’s story is not just a Mafia story, it is the story of a dysfunctional family and the evil that is Organized Crime.  I highly recommend his book Operation Family Secrets.

Andrew DiDonato had some great stories about being a working street guy in a Gambino Crew. One of those stories was about when he went on the lam.  He was out on parole and one night he got a call from his parole officer who wanted to see him the next day in his office.  Andrew instantly knew that something was wrong because he had already checked in once that week and he had never been asked to come twice.  So he shows up to his P.O.s office and he is sitting there when two guys he knew where FBI agents were buzzed in to the office.  They were giving him the hard stare when they went into the inner office and then the front door buzzed and Andrew made a split second decision and he scrambled through the door. He had his lawyer call his P.O. that night and arrange for his surrender but the P.O. would not tell him a thing.  So his lawyer said fine you find mister DiDonato and hung up.  That started Andrews last 14 months on the street as a Gambino associate.

This was a great weekend because all of us have a kind of support system and its nice to speak with people who have been through the same things in life.

Andrew DiDonato wearing a "Breakshot: The Game is Rigged" Shirt

I was thinking a lot this weekend about all the times I was in Las Vegas with the LA guys.  Hitting Nicky Blairs with Jimmy Caci. Eating at Johnny Mashes place with Steve Cino or meeting up with Steve before he was put in the Black Book.  Watching Keely Smith and Bobby Milano put on a great show.  Old times and even some good times. The good times were good but it does not change what the life was and that was and always will be a dead end.

I have a Las Vegas story that I will tell.  I went with Fat Steve Cino to a Blueberry Hill restaurant in Henderson NV.  Steve could go to Blueberry Hill because they had tables, not just booths, as he was too big to fit into booths.  I liked Steve because he was a gentleman, but he was way, way, way overweight! He was so big that he used to go to his friends salvage yard drive his car onto the scale and they would weigh the car.  He would get out and they would weigh it again!  That was how big he was then!

We were meeting John Bronco and Tony Angeletti at Blueberry Hill for a talk about everything that was going on in Vegas.  They brought a guy with them named Tony Muso who at one time had worked for Ted Binion, the owner of the Horseshoe Casino.  John Branco had two things he wanted to get out.  One was he and Tony claimed that Herbie Blitzstien was a rat. They had a card made of a rats body with Herbie head on it and had brought a newspaper article about Herbie going into some jewelry store for the Cops.  They claimed that this made Herbie a rat.  

They wanted to do something to him. This was their idea and they were pushing it.  Steve Cino told them to chill out but they kept up. Steve told them that he was doing things with Herbie.  They then moved onto Ted Binion who John Bronco wanted to rob.  John owned a lawn service, so he mowed Ted's yard. These guys were petty and between John and Tony Muso they had the whole Binion heist planned.  I left with Steve and both of us shook our heads. I found out later that Ted Binion was warned by Law Enforcement that there was a threat to rob him, but Herbie was never warned.

What a waste.  

Vegas brought back old memories, good and bad, and we created some new ones. It was great swapping stories with Andrew and Frank and I'm already looking forward to doing it again at MOB Con 2014 next year!

New Women's Breakshot Shirts

Selling shirts at Mob Con 2013

Frank Calabrese Jr and I on stage speaking at Mob Con 2013

Las Vegas: Operation Thin Crust

The last Las Vegas Mafia cases were Operation Button Down and Operation Thin Crust.  Operation Button Down was a nationwide assault on the leaders of the Mafia.  Operation Thin Crust was an FBI operation started in Las Vegas aimed at Mafia crews working in Las Vegas.

Las Vegas is what is known as an open city in the Mafia world.  The Chicago Outfit ran the city for many years because they had the most interest in Casinos because they used Teamster loans to finance the Casinos. So when you see any film or something written and they say the Las Vegas Mob it is written by someone that has no clue.  The big rule for many years was that you were never supposed to kill in town because it would disrupt the Casino business.  

Operation Thin Crust

John Branco

The Operation was started by the FBI using a Fat Con Man named Tony Angeiletti and an undercover Agent that was called Charlie Morone.  Fat Tony opened up a Social Club behind the Rio in an industrial area and he was soon sucking up to the LA Families Underboss Carmen "Flipper" Milano.  Fat Tony named his club The Seabreeze after Carmen's Sea Breeze Distribution.  Carmen was the underboss and when I was in Las Vegas I would go see him with Jimmy Caci or Steve Cino. We would often meet at an Italian Deli owned by a Gambino guy named Johnny Mash.  The FBI soon realized that Fat Tony was a lying con man so they changed directions in their investigations. Fat Tony and another street hood in Las Vegas, John Branco, both were informants and neither knew that Charlie Morone was an undercover Agent.  John Branco was a long time low level street hood who was still trying to play the tough guy.  He was a big guy who would beat up smaller men but he could not do any work.  He was also an informant and had worn a wire for the FBI when his daughter was involved in killing her husband in Chicago. He was locked up in Boron Federal Penitentiary and he was released to get the murderers on tape. Jimmy Caci knew this and so did the others. John Branco used to collect money for Herbie Blitzstein's shylock business and he also tried his hand at extortion.  He tried to extort the owners of escort businesses in Las Vegas.  One night he confronted an escort operator and a fight broke out and one of his wannabees pulled a pistol.  John was arrested and his bail set but he had no way of making bail and Herbie told him to sit it out.  John flipped and began working with the FBI.  He soon began giving information on Charlie who was in Las Vegas to pursue criminal opportunities.  They soon revealed that Charlie was an FBI Agent and they started working together.

The Las Vegas FBI planned on taking down Fat Herbie in the case, and they had a bug in his house. Meanwhile John Branco and Fat Tony were going around telling people that Fat Herbie was a rat.  They wanted him hurt because they owed him money and they wanted what he had.  I have written before that Herbie was known to carry large sums of cash and he had a large shylock business.  The LA guys Steve Cino, Jimmy Caci, Carmen Milano and Bobby Milano all liked Herbe but they would still take a cut of his business.  The only LA guy who did not like Herbie was Louie Caruso, a Capo under Pete Milano.  Louie did not like Herbie because Herbie had him moved out of a booth at a stripclub in Las Vegas.  Louie is a short man who pumps himself up like a mini bodybuilder but he is no tough guy. He brought some bikers to a family sitdown in Los Angeles in a breach of the rules. Later he would be beaten up by some bikers.  

Jimmy Caci and I were making our rounds in LA one day when we had to go meet a friend named Abe at Starbucks across from the Beverly Connection. Abe brought a friend named Eddie to the meeting. Ori Spado ended up at the meeting, which I did not like.  Eddie had these really good Visa travelers checks that could even be run through a machine and they would come up real. He gave us four as a sample, Ori tried to take them but I got them.  A week later, Ori got Jimmy arrested and Jimmy was locked up.  Jimmy told me to take them to Las Vegas.  Rocky Zangari and John Demattia (members of another crew of the LA Family) heard about it from their guys in Vegas and decided to get in on it and shook down Abe. They started to bring them to Las Vegas.  We had a huge sitdown in Culver City where guys came from Las Vegas and Palm Springs. Jimmy's lawyer went to see him and brought back word that we were to drop it and let Rocky deal with it because it was a waste.

So Louie Caruso and Rocky Zangari dealt with John Branco and Charlie.  Louie Caruso really did want to make John Branco into the family.  I met him with Jimmy and Ori in Palm Springs at Club 340 one afternoon. I was there with my girlfriend and Louie brought his girlfriend so they hung out while we had our talk.  Louie brought up John Branco and how he wanted to to bring him into the family. Jimmy flipped out because Louie brought it up in front of me and that he would even consider it.  Jimmy told him John Branco was a rat and had worn a wire.  Louie was shocked and embarrassed but like a lot of Mob guys he liked easy cash and he got it from John Branco and the FBI.  I took a picture of Ori at that meeting and it is all over the web check it out.

A few weeks later I met Steve Cino in Las Vegas at Marie Calendars and we spoke about Herbie and Louie Caruso.  The real wiseguys did not want Herbie killed it was the wannabee guys but a mob killing makes the news.  Never mind that no made guy took part or was convicted for the murder.  Yet writers keep writing about the Mafia killing Herbie.

Frank Cullota

“I liked Jewelry stores because they had a lot of cash.”  - Frank Cullota

Frank was the Leader of the notorious Hole in the Wall Gang, a very success crew that pulled scores in Las Vegas when the Chicago Outfit reigned supreme in Sin City.

Frank Cullota

Frank was born June 20, 1938 in Chicago.  He met the man who would become his best friend in his criminal career when he was 13 years old.  That man was Tony Spilatro.  Tony would work his way up from a street thug to the Outfit’s man in Las Vegas.  

I was speaking to Frank on the phone the other day and I asked him a few questions.

First, I wanted to know about Herbie Blitzstein.  I liked Herbie, I always felt he was a good guy who just did what he knew.  A lot of people refer to him as an enforcer but I never got that vibe when I was around him. The FBI was running Operation Button Down and Operation Thin Crust in 1995 in Las Vegas.  The LA Family was once more trying to regroup and Las Vegas was one of the places they were working on.  

Fat Steve Cino lived there along with a host of associates, so LA Capo Jimmy Caci and I would drive out there frequently.  Jimmy was out on an appeal bond for a Telemarketing deal gone bad, so we were trying to get things moving.  Jimmy and his brother Bobby Milano liked Herbie and so did Steve Cino.  

Jimmy would get picked up by LAPD because he was around an FBI informant named Ori Spado in Beverly Hills.  Ori had gone out on a collection in the Valley and Jimmy was in his car.  Ori went into this business and he started running his mouth selling wolf tickets, the guy had enough of Ori’s crap and he decked Ori with a tape dispenser.  Ori was on the ground and the guy had a pistol out when Jimmy came into the office and stopped the guy.  The guy knew Jimmy from the track so he chilled and he explained his situation.  The guy had a business that went bankrupt everything was in bankruptcy so he had nothing.  Jimmy helped Ori to the car where he dressed Ori down for acting so foolish.  Ori never told Jimmy what he was doing there or Jimmy would not have even gone with him.  

A week later I went to dinner with Jimmy and Ori at Frankie’s after dinner Jimmy went to Ori's apartment.  While there, Ori had to get something from his car.  The next thing Jimmy knew there was a knock at Ori's door.  Ori ran to open it, and it was the LAPD OC Squad.  

Ori lived in a secured building.  

Thanks to Ori,  Jimmy was away on January 6, 1996 when some wannabee low class robbers broke into Herbie’s condo and murdered him.

This was not a Mafia crime in anyway shape or form.  The only guys I heard that wanted him dead were the two FBI informants John Bronco and Fat Tony. They both owed Herbie money.  The FBI used it in a RICO case against Steve Cino and Bobby Panera but it was a joke.

Speaking to Frank about Herbie helped me learn some more about Herbie.

Herbie was a bookmaker in Chicago and he made juice loans but he was not a tough guy.  He was in too big to go on scores but he always had money on him.  He would carry 20k in his pockets because the IRS would take anything of value from him.  He owed them for unpaid taxes.  Frank was asked by his boss in Chicago to move out to Las Vegas to help Tony out in the 70's when he got out of prison. It was not an order just a nudge to go out to Las Vegas.  

Tony opened up a jewelry store in Las Vegas called Gold Rush Ltd where they bought and sold Jewelry.  Tony told Frank that he was bringing out the Jew to help, that is what they called Herbie.  Herbie mostly worked in the back room removing jewels from settings and melting down the gold.  He bought hot merchandise.

Frank told me that Herbie was never a hard guy he just looked it.  

I asked Frank who he admired most in his criminal life and he came back with two answers.  One guy he liked was Sam Giancana who was tough and smart.  Sam used to tell him that he was too quick with his fists because Frank was young and angry.  He told him that it would get him in trouble someday.  The other guy is a criminal legend. Tony Accardo, Joe Batters the man who was in the Outfit since Al Capone and never spent a night in jail.  He would see Tony at the Golden Bear Pancake house and after the first time Tony saw him there he would say hello. Nobody got close to Tony but he knew who everyone was everywhere he went. If Tony would have been legit he would be a Billionaire today.

I cannot do justice to Frank’s story on this blog, you can read all about his life in his book Cullotta: The Life of a Chicago Criminal, Las Vegas Mobster, and Government Witness. Frank has a lot to say and anyone who wants to gain a better understanding about the Life should attend Mob-Con Sept. 7 and 8 in Las Vegas at the Palace Station.  You can meet Frank and ask him any questions about the life.  Others I have featured on previous blog posts will be there also:

Andrew DiDonato

Andrew Didanato, Frank Calabrese, Tony Montana, Tim Redsull as well as Law enforcement speakers and authors.

Hear from Andrew about life in a crew where one wrong step could mean death and that went for the boss's son John Gotti Jr.

Frank Calabrese

Speak to Frank Calabrese about growing up in a Mafia house hold and then running his father street rackets.  

For more information check out the convention’s website:

http://mob-con.net/