Carmine Galante was a mobster who frightened even the Mafia men. Even if he seemed old he was deadly. He had worked the mean streets for decades. At the age of sixty his career seemed finished. But from his prison cell he masterminded an astonishing comeback, and flooded New York’s streets with heroin. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e7: Carmine Galante
One of the most notorious Mob crimes ever ... One of the city’s biggest mobsters, Carmine Galante, was having lunch. And it was here that he was interrupted. ibid.
Carmine Galante’s career was built on heroin. ibid.
Bonanno had brought with him his trusted underboss Carmine Galante. ibid.
This complex international journey from Turkey to north America through France became known as the French Connection. ibid.
The FBI arrested him in 1961 on a charge of narcotics trafficking ... He got twenty years in prison. ibid.
He wanted to take on the biggest family in New York – the Gambinos. ibid.
In the ghettos of New York heroin was now the drug of choice. ibid.
As Gambino’s restaurants burned, new pizza parlours open by Galante were opened up in their place. ibid.
The Mafia’s interest in drugs has waned ... The French Connection has been replaced by new smuggling routes. ibid.
August 14th 1981 New York City: Dominick Sonny Black Napolitano, a captain in the Bonanno crime family, walks into the Motion Lounge bar in Brooklyn. He hands the barman his keys to his apartment, a large bundle of cash and diamond-encrusted rings from his fingers. He tells the barman he is going to a meeting and doesn’t know if he’s coming back. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e8: Donnie Brasco: Undercover in the Mob
He had brought a spy, Donnie Brasco, into the inner sanctum of the Mafia. He was really Special Agent Joe Pistone. Thanks to Pistone’s six years undercover over 200 mobsters would be convicted. And one of the biggest Mafia families brought down. ibid.
In 1976 New York was facing a wave of truck hijackings. ibid.
Jewel Thief: in 1976 he left FBI headquarters with a new ID – Donnie Brasco. ibid.
Zips were enormous drug importers; they used a series of pizza restaurants to distribute the drugs. ibid.
The Bonanno family was right in the middle of a civil war. ibid.
Sonny Black had taken part in the murder of the boss of his own family Carmine Galante. ibid.
Sonny’s body was found dumped in a New York river. ibid.
Agent Joe Pistone lives under a pseudonym. ibid.
In 1979 the FBI launched a vast electronic surveillance operation of one criminal in particular: Allen Dorfman. Allen Dorfman wasn’t a Mafioso, he wasn’t even Italian, he was Jewish, and his weapon was not a gun but a pen. Dorfman’s crime was to raid a billion-dollar pension fund for his bosses. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e9: Allen Dorfman
An ambitious Teamsters’ official, Jimmy Hoffa wanted to become president. Red Dorfman agreed to help. ibid.
Government agencies discovered Allen Dorfman had made $3 million from Teamsters’ insurance policies. ibid.
And what did the gangstas do with all these millions? They built casino hotels in the Nevada desert – Las Vegas. ibid.
Hoffa and Dorfman approved sixty loans totalling a mammoth $91 million. ibid.
Hoffa was gone ... this was a great opportunity ... Access to the pension fund was just too important to the Mob. ibid.
Joey the Clown Lombardo was a serious gangsta ... Lombardo oversaw the Las Vegas casinos. ibid.
Joey Lombardo was a Mob enforcer and would stop at nothing to back up their money man Allen Dorfman. ibid.
Suddenly, the man who’d loyally bankrolled the Mob for years seemed a dangerous liability. Mob bosses decided to put out a contract on Allen Dorfman. ibid.
Allen Dorfman’s death was a watershed for both the Mafia and US law enforcement. ibid.
Without Dorfman, the Mafia’s money supply was suddenly cut off; this crippled the Mob and they never recovered. ibid.
Joe Valachi: hit-man for the Mob. The first man to break omerta – the Mafia’s code of silence. Valachi was the first to give the world the phrase ‘La Cosa Nostra’. Valachi was the first to reveal the names of the bosses and their soldiers; he explained the Mafia’s structure, their rituals and secrets. Valachi was the first to expose their bloody history of killings and executions and knew where the bodies were. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e10: Joe Valachi
Kennedy had huge concerns about Valachi’s credibility. ibid.
According to the Justice Department he had at least 33 murders under his belt. And was also now singing for his life. How could anyone be sure Valachi was telling the truth? ibid.
One of the Mafia’s most bloody murderers: Roy DeMeo. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e11: Roy DeMeo
Gaggi was a Mafia captain in the infamous Gambino crime family of New York. ibid.
DeMeo expanded his loan-shark book. ibid.
The DeMeo Crew: each member had their own area of expertise. ibid.
Paul Castellano came calling for his hitmen services. ibid.
Murder For Hire – what became known as the Murder Machine. ibid.
Despite killing nearly a hundred people Roy DeMeo could do bigger and bigger deals. ibid.
What started as a large-scale car crime case was turning into something even bigger. ibid.
As the trial date approached, Roy DeMeo went missing ... Found dead in the trunk of his Cadillac. ibid.
Paul Castellano was the man with the motive. ibid.
He [Castellano] was cut down by unknown gunmen. ibid.
The law enforcement machine must take its share of the blame. ibid.
Los Angeles 20th June 1947: The murder of Bugsy Siegel was never solved. But the one name always associated with Siegel’s death is the one name he would have least expected, that of his best friend Meyer Lansky. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e12: Meyer Lansky
Meyer Lansky was one of the most mysterious of all Mob figures ... Mob mastermind or victim of his own legend? ibid.
With Lansky at his side, Luciano was soon shooting his way to the top of the New York underworld. ibid.
Lansky was soon running casinos. ibid.
The Mob’s war-time collaboration was hushed up. ibid.
Cuba in the 1950s was Las Vegas by the sea. ibid.
Lansky helped turn Havana into America’s playground. ibid.
The Riviera: the largest single investment Lansky ever made. ibid.
Lansky now moved permanently to Miami: he was almost sixty and in poor health. ibid.
Lansky was facing charges of tax evasion. ibid.
Lansky died in his bed of cancer. ibid.
Mayer Lansky never was the all-powerful godfather some believed. ibid.
In New York five Mafia families dominated great swathes of economic activity – from construction to the waterfront to the garment industry, as well as raking in vast profits from more traditional criminal activities. Mafia’s Greatest Hits s1e13: Downfall
The garbage industry was run by the Lucchese Family, an outfit originally set up in the 1930s and headed by an old-style Mafia Don – called Tony Corallo. ibid.
Anthony Salerno – head of the powerful Genovese family. ibid.
For the first time on tape agents began to hear references to what Mafioso called the Commission. ibid.
RICO made membership of the Mafia a crime in itself. ibid.
On December 16th 1985 Paul Castellano, head of the Gambino family, arrived at a stake house in mid-Manhattan ... The hit was ordered by a rival within the same family. ibid.
The Mafia is now a shadow of its former self. ibid.
We were able to establish with hard evidence that the organised crime families did in fact have these hidden interests in casinos in Las Vegas. That they were receiving skim money. Lee Flosi, FBI special agent