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Speaker 5: Love to Canadian, You are now listening to True Murder,
Speaker 5: The most Shocking Killers in True crime History and the
Speaker 5: authors that have written about them. Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The
Speaker 5: Nightstalker BTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the
Speaker 5: most shocking and infamous killers in true crime history. True
Speaker 5: Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zupansky.
Speaker 6: Good evening, This is your host Dan Zupanski for the
Speaker 6: program True Murder, The most shocking Killers in true crime
Speaker 6: History and the authors that have written about them. A
Speaker 6: vain man of good looks but no family tied to
Speaker 6: the mob, Vincent Vinni Gorgious Basciano worked his way up
Speaker 6: to acting boss of the Banano crime family, becoming its
Speaker 6: leader when official boss Joseph Massino went to prison in
Speaker 6: two thousand and three. When the mafia was crawling with
Speaker 6: secret operatives and informants. Caving to government pressure to flip,
Speaker 6: Basciano steadfastly obeyed the code of La casinostra. I got
Speaker 6: faith in one guy, he said during a secretly taped meeting.
Speaker 6: That man was Messino, head of the Banano Borgada. But
Speaker 6: for all his loyalty, Basciano was still a hot headed,
Speaker 6: cold blooded killer, which ultimately led to his arrest and downfall. Then,
Speaker 6: in a remarkable betrayal that rocked the Five families to
Speaker 6: their foundations, Messino secretly cooperated with the FBI, the first
Speaker 6: head boss ever to roll over. As a result, Basciano
Speaker 6: faced the death penalty, but a federal jury, disturbed by
Speaker 6: the prosecution's use of deadly criminal informants, reached a surprising verdict. Here,
Speaker 6: from veteran crime author Anthony M. Di Stefano comes the
Speaker 6: riveting story of the last true believer in the mobs
Speaker 6: cult of Brotherhood and his betrayal at the hands of
Speaker 6: the only man he ever trusted. The book that we're
Speaker 6: featuring this evening is Vinnie Gorgeous, The Ugliest Ugly Rise
Speaker 6: and Fall of a New York Mobster, with my special
Speaker 6: guest journalist and author, Anthony M. Di Stefano. Welcome back
Speaker 6: to the program. Anthony di Stefano.
Speaker 2: Thank you, and you can call me Tony.
Speaker 6: Okay, Tony, thank you very much. Thank you for coming
Speaker 6: back on This is another great book, this one you've
Speaker 6: vot done yourself. Let's get right to this now. I
Speaker 6: love the way you set up this book and you
Speaker 6: drew us in and like I was saying to you
Speaker 6: in earlier in the just before we went on the air,
Speaker 6: the very soprano ish in terms of you grabbed the
Speaker 6: reader and bring them right into something that we see
Speaker 6: only in the movies. So let's talk about first the
Speaker 6: the sort of colorful character of Randy Randolph Puzzolo and
Speaker 6: just how you start in the book. Let's talk about
Speaker 6: this guy's sort of erratic character and who he is
Speaker 6: and his role in the mafia. Tell us about this
Speaker 6: Randolph Puzzolo and how you start in your in your book,
Speaker 6: Vinnie Gorgeous.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I opened. I opened the book with the scene
Speaker 2: where Pizzolo was killed, because it really allowed us entree
Speaker 2: into the wider story. Pisolo was one of these tragic
Speaker 2: characters who had aspirations to join the mob and wanted
Speaker 2: to be a maid member and you know, did his
Speaker 2: h did his work and had his loyalties, but he
Speaker 2: had a lot of problems, and some of the problems
Speaker 2: was his sort of poor impulse control. He did things
Speaker 2: that embarrassed people and showed that he was somewhat hot tempered.
Speaker 2: He also had the misfortune of doing some poor construction
Speaker 2: work at a time when it was very important that
Speaker 2: he do well in his jobs, his straight jobs, as
Speaker 2: it were, and that seemed to antagonize people around him,
Speaker 2: including Bassiano, who really used him on a number of projects.
Speaker 2: But really it was a confluence of things. His pouring
Speaker 2: pulse control, his embarrassed, embarrassing episodes where he was doing
Speaker 2: things with guns and bars and stuff and shooting up
Speaker 2: places really started to within on people, and ultimately, you know,
Speaker 2: his number came up, and he was and he knew
Speaker 2: something was going on. He knew he didn't have long
Speaker 2: untill live. In fact, the night he was killed, he
Speaker 2: was supposed to meet an insurance agents and take out
Speaker 2: an insurance policy on his life. And he went to
Speaker 2: this location in green Point, which is a sort of
Speaker 2: deserted industrial place in Brooklyn between Brooklyn and Queens right
Speaker 2: on the Cusp, and it's a gritty industrial area. And
Speaker 2: he drove there and he was meeting a couple of
Speaker 2: characters he was expected to meet. He was going to
Speaker 2: meet them, and he thought it was just going to
Speaker 2: be a short meeting and then he was going to
Speaker 2: go do his life insurance policy and then have drinks
Speaker 2: with another friend of his. Well, it didn't happen. He
Speaker 2: was gunned down on the street, and people coming to
Speaker 2: work the next morning at about six point thirty or
Speaker 2: so found his body on the street. And that was
Speaker 2: the murder of Randy Pizzolo, and that was really the
Speaker 2: nub of the case against Bassiano. The solving of that
Speaker 2: murder and the gathering of evidence was the thing that
Speaker 2: sort of put the Feds finally onto Vinnie Bassiano. It was,
Speaker 2: you know, it was just a cool, bloody shooting and
Speaker 2: it was done, as we found out through the evidence
Speaker 2: in the case, by his friend Ace, a guy by
Speaker 2: the name of al who is the triggerman. And that's
Speaker 2: what loyalty is in the mob. That's what happens.
Speaker 6: Now. Dude, what I really liked is you painted you
Speaker 6: talk about these guys. It's not like these guys are
Speaker 6: shy about doing murders, but it is not something that
Speaker 6: it can just happen. And you explain how if somebody
Speaker 6: were to kill someone without this being cleared by the boss,
Speaker 6: that might get you killed itself. The thing that you
Speaker 6: talked about this Pizzolo being especially well somebody wanted to
Speaker 6: kill him, was especially a couple of the things that
Speaker 6: he did do. He was again harassing an agent in
Speaker 6: a restaurant again, and you explained in the book that's
Speaker 6: because the mafia would really like people to take to
Speaker 6: leave people alone that are just doing their job. So
Speaker 6: that's the way they see it. And the other thing
Speaker 6: was he had said to someone else, I guess in
Speaker 6: one of the families, that they better not be a
Speaker 6: rat or try to be a rat. So these are
Speaker 6: kind of things that are major offenses, aren't they. And
Speaker 6: so he didn't get killed for nothing, right.
Speaker 2: Well, he was you know, he kept screwing up in
Speaker 2: small and big ways, and you know, in sort of
Speaker 2: embarrassing people and insulting people. And after a while that's
Speaker 2: starting to wear thin. And then he was told what
Speaker 2: really sort of I think ice the case against him,
Speaker 2: but that he was told, you know, to leave New York,
Speaker 2: go down to Florida and you know, take care of
Speaker 2: some projects in Florida. And he didn't want to go.
Speaker 2: You know, he had his family here, he had his
Speaker 2: daughter here, he had you know, other interest here, and
Speaker 2: he didn't want to go. He wasn't going to go,
Speaker 2: he said, I'm not going. So that sort of put
Speaker 2: him on the radar. And when you when you sort
Speaker 2: of diss the leadership and you don't go or get
Speaker 2: chased as it were, when you're supposed to, that's gonna
Speaker 2: things are going to happen. And that's what happened.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And he knew, especially when that occurrence, that thing
Speaker 6: happened in terms of asked, asked to be going to Florida,
Speaker 6: he knew what that meant, right and him, he knew.
Speaker 2: What you got to get out of here. Yeah, you
Speaker 2: got to get out here otherwise you're going to have trouble.
Speaker 2: And he didn't go, and he got in a lot
Speaker 2: of trouble fatally.
Speaker 6: Now you talk, you talk about as Anthony ale and
Speaker 6: who killed Pizzolo when they find evidence shows later that
Speaker 6: but he's a soldier with Vincent bi Biano.
Speaker 2: Uh, and so tell us that the pronunciation of the
Speaker 2: best thing screwed me up too. His family had a
Speaker 2: different pronunciation even for me or Basciano. They they put
Speaker 2: the kind of accent on the on the middle syllables.
Speaker 2: But uh, you know, we'll call him Vinnie gorgeous simplifies it. Uh,
Speaker 2: but he he I think your question was, uh, what
Speaker 2: Ace's connection was to Bashano and he was under h
Speaker 2: under Vinnie's asia as it were he was part of
Speaker 2: his his crew of people.
Speaker 3: Uh.
Speaker 2: He was a very loyal dog as they call him,
Speaker 2: and Vashiano called him my look of Brasa looka Brasi rather,
Speaker 2: who is a character from the Godfather film who was
Speaker 2: the sort of loyal supplicant who would do anything. And
Speaker 2: that's what that was Iola's reputation. He would do anything.
Speaker 6: Include it's great you showed the photo of the guy.
Speaker 6: I guess it's a mugshot, no doubt. It doesn't look
Speaker 6: like a high school graduation.
Speaker 2: Most of them are mugshots.
Speaker 6: He looks very intense, looks very believable. He's capable of
Speaker 6: something serious.
Speaker 2: We'll say, yeah, he has that look right, the sort
Speaker 2: of head sort of merges with the neck, and he's
Speaker 2: got these eyes that it looks straight and very cold,
Speaker 2: jet black eyes. And you know they kind of say,
Speaker 2: you know, you don't want to mess with him.
Speaker 6: No, no, he looks like a serious guy. Now, tell
Speaker 6: us about give us the background on Vinnie gorgeous, because
Speaker 6: it's it's sort of a well, it is a very
Speaker 6: very interesting story his rise. But just give us the
Speaker 6: background and who he was at a younger age and
Speaker 6: how he grew up. Tell us a little bit about
Speaker 6: Vinnie Gorgeous. How he Vinnie was.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Vinnie was a guy. You know. I grew up
Speaker 2: in Westchester County, which is just north of New York City.
Speaker 2: He didn't grow up in the Bronx, as it turns out,
Speaker 2: they call him Vinnie from the Bronx. He you know,
Speaker 2: came from a average sort of Italian American family. His
Speaker 2: father was a stonecutter, sort of a craftsman as it were.
Speaker 2: His mother was a house a housewife, and Vinnie, you
Speaker 2: know it was a knock around kid. He didn't really
Speaker 2: finish high school when he was supposed to. Instead, he
Speaker 2: was kind of like a as it was portrayed to me,
Speaker 2: a Robin and type character, where he'd you know, stick
Speaker 2: up for kids in the neighborhood who you know, were
Speaker 2: being put upon. And he did that for one person
Speaker 2: who happened to be the relative of Dominic Trinchera. Now
Speaker 2: Dominic Trinchera may not mean much to people now in
Speaker 2: the Van Schema things, but he was a pretty powerful
Speaker 2: captain in the Bonano crime family. When Hinterrera Schinchera Trinchera
Speaker 2: let me there we go pronunciations again, found out that
Speaker 2: Vinnie helped his I guess it was his nephew. He
Speaker 2: took a liking to him, and the Vinnie sort of
Speaker 2: was around and Vinnie was became a Dominick's driver, and
Speaker 2: that was Vinnie's entree to this world, which at the
Speaker 2: time was a pretty powerful organized crime world. Crinchera was involved,
Speaker 2: as they tell us, the FETs tell us, a lot
Speaker 2: of narcotics dealings, and he had a you know, ties
Speaker 2: to the Montreal faction of the family. And there's this
Speaker 2: very interesting photo that was taken of a wedding at
Speaker 2: a swank hotel in Manhattan in which all the Banana
Speaker 2: mobsters and all the Canadian mobsters were together and Trinchera
Speaker 2: is there at the table and who is behind Trinchera
Speaker 2: but Vinnie Basciano as a young sort of starry eyed kid,
Speaker 2: no tie. He wasn't dressed for a wedding, you know,
Speaker 2: he just had a a sport jacket on and had
Speaker 2: an open, open college shirt. And the FBI was looking
Speaker 2: at that picture when they finally got and they said, yeah,
Speaker 2: who is this guy. He's a young kid, and he
Speaker 2: came in a way that would have normally showed disrespect
Speaker 2: at this wedding, coming dressed down as you were, and
Speaker 2: they found out ultimately that he was Domini's Trinchera's driver
Speaker 2: and that's was Vinnie's entree to the world. And by
Speaker 2: you know, small steps, you know, he became an associate,
Speaker 2: he got involved in gambling, and in fact, he remained
Speaker 2: involved with gambling for most of his life and you know,
Speaker 2: then became initiated to the family about nineteen ninety one
Speaker 2: ninety two, and then you know, made his rise pretty
Speaker 2: quickly after that because it showed, he showed that he
Speaker 2: could be relied upon to you know, earn money, certainly
Speaker 2: through gambling. And there was always the claim that he
Speaker 2: wasn't the drug dealing. You know, he beat a very
Speaker 2: big heroin case. So he made his way, he made
Speaker 2: his bones, as it were, you know, through the gambling operations.
Speaker 2: He had a reputation for being involved in homicides, and
Speaker 2: you know, he sort of solidified his credentials as it were,
Speaker 2: what was.
Speaker 6: His legitimate what was his legitimate business face though?
Speaker 2: What was he what legitimate Yeah, Legitimately he was involved
Speaker 2: in a number of things. He had a video store,
Speaker 2: he had a sandwich store, sort of a deli, He
Speaker 2: had construction business businesses, and he had a beauty salon
Speaker 2: which was called Hello Gorgeous, which I learned was taken
Speaker 2: from a line taken from the movie Married Married to
Speaker 2: the Mob, and he got the moniker off of that,
Speaker 2: and also because of his good looks as Vinnie Gorgeous.
Speaker 2: So that's how it stuck. But he had a lot
Speaker 2: of legitimate enterprises, and he was pretty much involved in
Speaker 2: legitimate businesses up until the very time he got arrested
Speaker 2: in two thousand and four.
Speaker 6: Now you say this, he slowly rose in the Banano
Speaker 6: family in small increments and doing certain things, and obviously
Speaker 6: gained the grace of people in power. Tell us some
Speaker 6: of the things that he would would be required to do.
Speaker 6: We're talking about a guy that ends up, you know,
Speaker 6: having a violent streak in him. So is there any
Speaker 6: hint of anything like that? He said when he was
Speaker 6: young and he was sticking up for kids in the neighborhood.
Speaker 6: But were there any violent streaks around that time? It
Speaker 6: also impressed or worried is.
Speaker 2: Well ultimate leader? I think he you know, he had
Speaker 2: the reputation of being involved in a homicide of some
Speaker 2: unknown person who was in a gambling dispute, and they're
Speaker 2: never able to develop.
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Speaker 2: Name on it. But supposedly he was involved in a
Speaker 2: murder that took place in a social club. It was
Speaker 2: never proven in a court of law, but that kind
Speaker 2: of made bosses like Messino, Joe Messino a little, well
Speaker 2: not a little, but a leary of him because he
Speaker 2: had a reputation for, you know, being having a hot
Speaker 2: streak and sort of doing things sort of without the
Speaker 2: clearance of sanction. And then ultimately, when you know, we
Speaker 2: got into the situation where before Pisolo, there was another
Speaker 2: murder that took place, which he ultimately got convicted for
Speaker 2: in federal court, this guy from Frank and sen Toro,
Speaker 2: which Messino had not cleared, nobody had cleared, and which
Speaker 2: normally would have gotten Vinnie in a lot of trouble,
Speaker 2: but Messino sort of just maybe gave him a tongue
Speaker 2: lashing and that was the end of it. But Messino
Speaker 2: was leery of him, so they tell us, but kept
Speaker 2: him around. Nonetheless, you know, he didn't kick him out
Speaker 2: of the family. I think Messina saw a lot of
Speaker 2: use that could be gotten from somebody like Vinnie. He
Speaker 2: had his gamily enterprises, he had his you know, it's
Speaker 2: legitimate businesses, and he had a certain sort of charisma
Speaker 2: on the street, partly because I think his good looks,
Speaker 2: but also because he was very self self assured and
Speaker 2: very assertive, so he would you know, he was a
Speaker 2: guy who could take command, and in a family for
Speaker 2: a boss who need somebody to take command, that's not
Speaker 2: a bad thing.
Speaker 6: Yeah, he was well liked by people. Was gonna put
Speaker 6: that into a question that he was He obviously had
Speaker 6: this charisma, but he also had to dodge all the
Speaker 6: bullets that could come his way, so he had to
Speaker 6: have that natural leadership and charisma and and really just
Speaker 6: get along with people. Basically, what I found interesting too,
Speaker 6: is how you portray this guy having again I don't
Speaker 6: know normal, I don't know what normal is, but as
Speaker 6: normal a life as say, of a businessman with a
Speaker 6: with a wife that was quite attractive and outgoing, and
Speaker 6: so they they partied and associated with people. Tell us
Speaker 6: a little bit about that he was it seemed to
Speaker 6: have almost a normal life.
Speaker 2: So he did. In some ways, he was like Messino
Speaker 2: because Messino had a normal life. Messino had a lot
Speaker 2: of legitimate businesses. He had had a wife and a family,
Speaker 2: two three daughters, and you know, and you know who
Speaker 2: grew up you know, in a in a nice family setting,
Speaker 2: you know, church going family, and Basciano's family. You know,
Speaker 2: he had four kids, four boys, and he had a wife,
Speaker 2: a tractive wife, and she was working as well, and
Speaker 2: she worked in some of his businesses or had her
Speaker 2: own businesses as well, and they did very well for themselves.
Speaker 2: They moved up to Scarsdale at some point, which is
Speaker 2: a very sort of nice community to reside, and most
Speaker 2: people aspire to that. And he did well, he did well,
Speaker 2: and in some ways, you know, Messino did very well.
Speaker 2: He didn't do as well as Messino. Materially, Messino hoarded
Speaker 2: lots and lots of money. I mean, he had millions
Speaker 2: upon millions of dollars in cash. But Bashiana did very
Speaker 2: well for himself. And you know, he had a normal
Speaker 2: family setting, as it were, although you know, he did
Speaker 2: have a girlfriend, and with that girlfriend he had a
Speaker 2: he had another son, and that sort of created some
Speaker 2: interesting issues when he got arrested and had to go
Speaker 2: to trial.
Speaker 6: Yeah, now, tell us about this Florida aparted me the
Speaker 6: Blue Thunder, and tell us how some people, well Basiano
Speaker 6: avoided being prosecutor or pardon me, convicted, but some other
Speaker 6: people weren't so lucky. So tell us about this initiative
Speaker 6: by the authorities. The Blue Thunder heroine. Tell us about
Speaker 6: that story.
Speaker 2: The Blue Thunder case was Vinnie's really first major serious case. Now,
Speaker 2: we had an earlier attensive murder case involving a guy
Speaker 2: in a booky operation, but that case was either so
Speaker 2: mishandled or the evidence was so problematic that they pled
Speaker 2: it down to a gun case and Vinnie had to
Speaker 2: go away for about a year in jail. But the
Speaker 2: Blue Thunder case was a heroin case. Blue Thunder was
Speaker 2: a brand of heroin that was in the city streets
Speaker 2: in the late nineteen eighties early nineteen nineties, and the
Speaker 2: Feds ultimately made an indictment. They indicted Vinnie most about
Speaker 2: the characters running a very large accusing him pretty a
Speaker 2: large heroin trafficking ring. Vinnie went to trial, as did
Speaker 2: about the probably about nine others. Vinnie had a very
Speaker 2: good lawyer. He had Ben Brafman as a lawyer's well
Speaker 2: known in the criminal justice field. Here he represented Tom
Speaker 2: and E. Strauss Khan later on. He had a very
Speaker 2: strong lawyer, and the case against Vinnie really was problematic,
Speaker 2: and Brafman did a very good job. I thought of
Speaker 2: exploiting those weaknesses and arguing to the jury the look,
Speaker 2: they made a mistake with Vinnie. Yes, he's a gambler.
Speaker 2: We have tapes saying Vinnie's a gambler, but we don't
Speaker 2: have any tapes putting him in the middle of heroin
Speaker 2: ring or heroin operations. Vinnie got off. Number of others
Speaker 2: weren't so lucky, and they got convicted, and they got
Speaker 2: long sentences, and some of them died in jail. But
Speaker 2: he got off, and you know, it should have been
Speaker 2: his wake up call In fact, Rathman told him said, look, Vinnie,
Speaker 2: you know, Vinnie, you don't know what just happened when
Speaker 2: you just got to quit it here. This doesn't happen
Speaker 2: every day. You know, nine out of ten people in
Speaker 2: federal court are going to get convicted. Vinnie avoided that.
Speaker 2: He got acquitted. So Brafman says, look, just forget about
Speaker 2: this life. Go away, tell your businesses and do something
Speaker 2: else and forget about Vinnie gorgeous and Basiano, you know,
Speaker 2: gave him a knowing smile and said, okay, you know
Speaker 2: you basically saying to himself, look, I know how to
Speaker 2: live my life. You know how to do your business.
Speaker 2: You know, I'll do my thing my way. And that
Speaker 2: was that was that, and that led onto his next
Speaker 2: phase of the life, which was, you know, dodging one bullet.
Speaker 2: He sort of is going to get ensnared and some
Speaker 2: other stuff, which is what happened.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 6: Tell us that this is a good lesson for the
Speaker 6: FBI and authorities themselves because they do a wire tap
Speaker 6: and you say, the evidence is I don't know if
Speaker 6: it's weak, but it wasn't that strong. And then he
Speaker 6: had a really strong lawyer, which can be expected when
Speaker 6: a guy has money and he's fighting for his life,
Speaker 6: you know, so they knew that wire tap probably wasn't
Speaker 6: the best thing. But anyway, how does the FBI now
Speaker 6: or the authorities basically try to gain information on Vinnie Gorgeous?
Speaker 2: Well, ultimately what happened after the Blue thundercase. You know,
Speaker 2: Vinnie goes about his life, he's doing this thing with
Speaker 2: the crime family, but he's really not on the radar
Speaker 2: on a big way. Messino is ultimately the guy in
Speaker 2: about early two thousand who came, you know, came into
Speaker 2: the radar the FBI sites. So they went after Messino,
Speaker 2: and the FBI did and in this offensive, and the
Speaker 2: the Bronx wing of the family, which was really Vinnie's wing,
Speaker 2: wasn't getting that much attention in terms of prosecution. Ultimately
Speaker 2: they got they got Messino, they got him arrested, and
Speaker 2: they at that point, Messino, knowing he was going to
Speaker 2: be arrested, turned to guys like Basciano to sort of
Speaker 2: help out and running the family. So that Vinnie's you know,
Speaker 2: stock as it were, in his power and his ability
Speaker 2: to do things. So Vinnie now was more of a
Speaker 2: name and he had more recognition, and the FBI started
Speaker 2: to put together resources to go after the Bronx, the
Speaker 2: Bronx wing of the Bonano family, focusing on Vinnie and
Speaker 2: some others, Patty his captain. And when Messino got convicted,
Speaker 2: and this is the fan of story, Messino, within minutes
Speaker 2: of this conviction decided he was going to cooperate with
Speaker 2: the THEI And this was a song and dance that
Speaker 2: went on with the FBI in this. For a while,
Speaker 2: they weren't sure about Joe, they didn't know what he had.
Speaker 2: He gave him a couple of things he pointed out
Speaker 2: where some bodies were literally buried, and a lot in Queens.
Speaker 2: But ultimately it was when both Vinnie and Joe were
Speaker 2: in the federal lockup together that things started to happen.
Speaker 2: Joe learns in a meeting, because these guys are all
Speaker 2: allowed to meet when they have the same you know,
Speaker 2: in the same criminal case and a co defendant meeting,
Speaker 2: Joe learns that Pizzolo, who we talked about earlier, it
Speaker 2: was dead and Joe hadn't sanctioned it, and Vinnie sort
Speaker 2: of indicates that, you know, something happened, and ultimately Joe
Speaker 2: and Vinnie have more conversations and this is where the
Speaker 2: record gets a little strange. There was no tape recordings
Speaker 2: of these early conversations, but Messino swears that Basiana told
Speaker 2: him about the Bizola homicide, the reasons for it, and
Speaker 2: also about the idea of going after a federal prosecutor
Speaker 2: who they wanted to harm. There was no tape of
Speaker 2: those conversations. So Messino goes back to the FBI and
Speaker 2: tells them about these interchange exchanges. They then wire up
Speaker 2: Joe Messino, you know, the first time a mob boss's
Speaker 2: official boss has ever been wired up, and that's in
Speaker 2: chapter two of the book. They send Messino to meet
Speaker 2: Basciano in the recreation area of the jail, and Messino
Speaker 2: makes these tapes, and if you listen to the tapes,
Speaker 2: there really works of art. Messino's basically a neophyte sort
Speaker 2: of spy at this point, but he's doing a pretty
Speaker 2: good job. He sort of led Bachiano down the garden
Speaker 2: path and tells gets Vinni to admit that I had
Speaker 2: a conversation about taking out a prosecutor, but Basciano doesn't
Speaker 2: admit to really wanting to do that. He said, let's
Speaker 2: all forget about it. Forget about it's kind of like
Speaker 2: a arf hand thing. But Bashiano does indicate in those
Speaker 2: conversations that he did order the hit against Pozzolo, but
Speaker 2: then he did he pulled it back, you know, and
Speaker 2: canceled it, but he knew about it that he didn't
Speaker 2: know about. He gives these equivocal indications that he was
Speaker 2: involved in the Pizzolo hit. So the sense take that.
Speaker 2: The FBI takes that and they said, well, you know,
Speaker 2: we have enough maybe to build a case, and they
Speaker 2: started building a case and that's when the dominoes start
Speaker 2: to fall after that, friend Lesson, go ahead.
Speaker 6: Sorry, let's just go back just a little bit, because
Speaker 6: the amazing thing that we that you write about is Messino.
Speaker 6: And you know they talk about the Omaradi and America America.
Speaker 2: By the Italian words.
Speaker 6: You know, we should have a gift shot after this,
Speaker 6: he gets shot, after this, I should I should get
Speaker 6: beaten up. Okay, So anyway, he talks about he's up
Speaker 6: for murder, and so he's up for seven murders. So
Speaker 6: how many people turned state evidence against him?
Speaker 2: It was amazing against Meine Evans. Yeah, against Messina, he
Speaker 2: had six major cooperators, including his brother in law sal vitally.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it was amazed.
Speaker 2: Pretty heavy. That's a pretty heavy load of witnesses against you,
Speaker 2: and Joe knew at that point that he had long
Speaker 2: road against them and defending that case. That was a
Speaker 2: major captains and major people in his family gave evidence consistently,
Speaker 2: by the way.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so he he was done and then again amazing,
Speaker 6: almost very movie esque as well. So right after that,
Speaker 6: it's he's right in the judges chambers going listen, can
Speaker 6: we make it?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's amazing. I mean, Joe had to figure it
Speaker 2: out this a long time before he got victed. This
Speaker 2: case is going south on me. I've got to do something.
Speaker 2: What's my card? When one card? When one card? Is
Speaker 2: really to cooperate At that point, Joe didn't really have
Speaker 2: that much to give them, and the FBI was skeptical
Speaker 2: of it, you know, but they talk with him for
Speaker 2: a period of months and finally the thing happened with
Speaker 2: Basiana and we was able to take these conversations.
Speaker 6: Now, from that they have that little bit of evidence,
Speaker 6: but of course they want to make an ironclad case here.
Speaker 6: So I found it very interesting that you write, and
Speaker 6: of course you have this incredible access. Again, what we
Speaker 6: spoke about in the introduction is very interesting an agent
Speaker 6: named James di Stefano, And I asked you any relation,
Speaker 6: no relation whatsoever. Now it happens to be the guy
Speaker 6: that was wiring Messino up. But we're talking about some information.
Speaker 6: How are they now going to try to approach trying
Speaker 6: to get an ironclad charge, prosecution and conviction on Basiano?
Speaker 6: How are they going to go about this this time?
Speaker 2: Well, what they did was they used the evidence that
Speaker 2: Messino had given them, the taped evidence, and they charged.
Speaker 2: Uh uh as I recalled Basciano and dominic Sicli in
Speaker 2: this situation, and so Calli, once he got arrested, ultimately
Speaker 2: decided to cooperate against Bosiano. So he gave a great
Speaker 2: deal of evidence against Bosiano.
Speaker 6: Tell us that audience doesn't know who that is, and
Speaker 6: so tell us who Cicali is, and then his relation
Speaker 6: to Basiano.
Speaker 2: Dominicicli was Basciano's right hand man, the sort of younger
Speaker 2: brother type person, as it were, a handsome guy, strapping
Speaker 2: Italian man, uh, you know, sort of crude, unpolished, but
Speaker 2: he had a lot of his own charisma and Vinnie
Speaker 2: I think saw him as like a son, a son figure.
Speaker 2: And he was a guy who became uh in ambered
Speaker 2: with Bassiano and others in the family and became took
Speaker 2: you know, it was under Basiana's wing, and ultimately became
Speaker 2: a soldier and then became an acting captain in the
Speaker 2: crime family. And he did a lot of stuff with Vinnie.
Speaker 2: They did the uh, you know, gambling things. And as
Speaker 2: it turned out, and as we heard in court, it
Speaker 2: was so Calli who orchestrated the details of the Pizzolo murder.
Speaker 2: And he said he swears that this was on Basiano
Speaker 2: say so in order. The evidence gets a little strange
Speaker 2: here because Cali admits.
Speaker 6: Lucky Land casino, asking people, what's the weirdest place you've
Speaker 6: gotten lucky?
Speaker 4: Lucky in line at the Delhi I guess ah, in
Speaker 4: my dentist's office more than once. Actually do I have
Speaker 4: to say?
Speaker 1: Yes? You do?
Speaker 4: In the car for my kid's PTA meeting? Really yes,
Speaker 4: excuse me? What's the weirdest place you've gotten lucky? I
Speaker 4: never win in tell?
Speaker 5: Well, there you have it.
Speaker 4: You could get lucky anywhere playing at lucky landsloughts dot
Speaker 4: com play for free right now? Are you feeling lucky?
Speaker 5: No, We're not necessary for eighteen plus turns conditions plus eygains.
Speaker 2: That when Vinnie got arrested, that he himself canceled the
Speaker 2: hit against Pizzolo, but then a new acting boss in
Speaker 2: the family, guy by the name of Michael Mancuso, supposedly
Speaker 2: put it back on. So you have this sort of
Speaker 2: interesting break in the in the way this case goes.
Speaker 2: But ultimately, you know, the jury listened to Sakali and
Speaker 2: they they believed them on this. They believed that it
Speaker 2: was enough for Vinnie to get the snowball rolling down
Speaker 2: the hill, as it were, that he then bore responsibility
Speaker 2: for Pizzolo's homicide in late two thousand and four. That's
Speaker 2: what happened on that and Cali gave it a lot
Speaker 2: of evidence, firsthand evidence. Messino broadly gave the indication that
Speaker 2: it was Basciano who indicated himself that he knew what
Speaker 2: was going on with the Pisola homicide. So you got
Speaker 2: these two major chunks of evidence against Vinnie, and then
Speaker 2: you have these other witnesses filling in uh some of
Speaker 2: the details, but largely that was Sicli, fortified by Messino.
Speaker 2: Messino and flat flat out testified that Vinnie told him
Speaker 2: that he ordered Pizzolo killed, So you know, you get
Speaker 2: that kind of evidence and it's really hard to beat
Speaker 2: and that was a long struggle for Vinnie and it
Speaker 2: was ultimately it was an exercise and futility.
Speaker 6: Now you single out some fine agents here that's done
Speaker 6: some hard work that had been on a Banano crime
Speaker 6: family kind of business for many years, interrediting the DA.
Speaker 6: But tell us some of the characters that were involved
Speaker 6: with some of the people behind the scenes that we're
Speaker 6: trying to get this prosecution in these charges before a court.
Speaker 2: Well, the two agents who did the initial heavy lifting
Speaker 2: on Messino were Jess Select and Kim McCaffrey. They were
Speaker 2: part of this Bonano team led by Jack Stubing, sort
Speaker 2: of supervisory agent. Selette McCaffrey were young agents right out
Speaker 2: of the academy, but they are accountants, so they followed
Speaker 2: the money trail which ultimately got Messino implicated a lot
Speaker 2: of bad stuff. Select, an agent to Stefano, were the
Speaker 2: ones who wired up Messino. The interesting thing is that
Speaker 2: Messino really likes Selet because it was Select who arrested
Speaker 2: and they treated him, you know, courteously, when dignity and
Speaker 2: that that little bonding you know played out later on
Speaker 2: because it was select who Messino approached initially to see
Speaker 2: the judge or ultimately think the marshals how to how
Speaker 2: to take Messino inside. Uh. You then had Mike Breslin,
Speaker 2: who was now a supervisory agent I think in Philadelphia,
Speaker 2: who put together the case against Bosiano and his sort
Speaker 2: of wing of the family. And so you had, you know,
Speaker 2: a lot of things going on. You had a lot
Speaker 2: of moving parts here. But basically, you know, you have
Speaker 2: about a cadre of a good three or four agents
Speaker 2: who were able to do the heavy lifting and get
Speaker 2: this case going. And it really is a testament to
Speaker 2: the way the FBI builds these historical mob cases. You know,
Speaker 2: they go back, they built a historical case against Messino.
Speaker 2: Once Messina got ensnared, they were building a historical case
Speaker 2: against Bossing and the Bronx wing of the family. And
Speaker 2: once they start focusing on that, well, you know what happens.
Speaker 2: You know, everything starts to form the place because a
Speaker 2: lot of the guys who get arrested just don't want
Speaker 2: to do the time in jail, They don't want to
Speaker 2: keep with the old loyalties, and they turn state's evidence,
Speaker 2: and that's what happened here. You know, Everybodysino engendered no loyalty.
Speaker 2: Baciano in the end didn't engender any loyalty among his underlings,
Speaker 2: and that's what happened. Everybody sort of folded. But Basciano
Speaker 2: is the true believer. He's not doing any any cooperation
Speaker 2: and in fact, I don't know what they're cooperating. Get
Speaker 2: about if he wanted to, Yeah, yeah, this is the
Speaker 2: last Yeah.
Speaker 6: Now, the thing is that you you really described that
Speaker 6: domino effect too. Once they have one someone is snared,
Speaker 6: then they look for the other person and then give
Speaker 6: him an offer he can't refuse since he's looking at
Speaker 6: the rest of his life in prison. Like you say,
Speaker 6: I don't know how much honor would really. I mean,
Speaker 6: there was cracks a long time before, Like you point
Speaker 6: out that initially there was always this connection right back
Speaker 6: to Sicilian neighborhood or village in Italy, so that they
Speaker 6: could go back and but that had been not been
Speaker 6: the case in mafia in America for many years anyway,
Speaker 6: hadn't it.
Speaker 2: Well, that's what happened was that, you know, certainly in
Speaker 2: the early days of the Banana Crime fan with Joe Bernano,
Speaker 2: he had a lot of extended relations with you know,
Speaker 2: cousins or uncles and people who were close from the
Speaker 2: old country. Gradually that wore out, and what you had
Speaker 2: the bosses who were leading sort of combinations of people
Speaker 2: who were in it for the money, you know, and
Speaker 2: there's not really there's not really much loyalty. The all
Speaker 2: loyalty is really not there. You know, it's really a
Speaker 2: money making proposition. And you know, a lot of people,
Speaker 2: they're Americanized middle class. You know, a lot of them
Speaker 2: are old, and they want to spend whatever time they
Speaker 2: have left outside of prison, so they're going to cooperate.
Speaker 2: The best job, somebody once said to me and some
Speaker 2: of these neighborhoods now, is to become a federal witness.
Speaker 2: You know, LA mafia doesn't give you a retirement plan.
Speaker 2: The best retirement plan is to be a confidential informant
Speaker 2: where maybe you know, like Mesino, you'll be able to
Speaker 2: live some of your time remaining time out of jail.
Speaker 2: You might get social Security, you might get you know,
Speaker 2: a stipend. Casino did very well out of all this,
Speaker 2: I got to tell you, be credited with twelve homicides.
Speaker 2: He spent about ten eleven years in jail and he's
Speaker 2: going to be out in about sixty days or so.
Speaker 2: So and he keeps us some assets, He keeps pension,
Speaker 2: an annuity, and he keeps a social security So Joe's
Speaker 2: Wherever's Joe going to live? And it's not going to
Speaker 2: be back in the old neighborhood, And I don't think
Speaker 2: it's going to be with his family anywhere near him.
Speaker 2: He's going to be comfortable and he's going to be
Speaker 2: able to you know how much of a time he
Speaker 2: has left, and he is not well physically, hasn't been
Speaker 2: for a while. You know, he'll live as a free man.
Speaker 2: Now what's that freedom going to be worth? That's for
Speaker 2: him to decide, But clearly he was He comes out
Speaker 2: of this probably the best of everybody. That's my view.
Speaker 6: Now with Basciano, he's he's looking at you know, this
Speaker 6: very very serious charges that you talk about in the book.
Speaker 6: How he he goes back to Brathman and asks him
Speaker 6: if he could represent him, And what's the answer and
Speaker 6: why does Brafman say no?
Speaker 2: And which told me that yeah, he wasn't going to
Speaker 2: represent He wanted to get away from these mob type clients.
Speaker 2: And he said you know, he just didn't want to
Speaker 2: have it anymore. And he told them, look, I'm doing
Speaker 2: I have a big white collar practice, and I really
Speaker 2: don't want to represent people in this life. I can't
Speaker 2: help you. And ultimately, I mean it wasn't a total severance.
Speaker 2: I think for a short period of time a colleague
Speaker 2: of Brathman's represented Basciano at his arrangement on the big
Speaker 2: federal case. But ultimately, you know, he severed the tides.
Speaker 2: He just had other fish to fry. You know, he
Speaker 2: had Dominique Strauss Khan, he had a lot of white
Speaker 2: collarge cases. You know, Ben has done very well in
Speaker 2: this life after these early successes with mobsters. So he
Speaker 2: told them, you know, we're out of here. You know,
Speaker 2: it's maybe somewhat cold, but you make a decision. You
Speaker 2: don't want to get too close to some of these
Speaker 2: guys Brafman, Tolman, and you know there are lawyers who
Speaker 2: got ensnared by being too close to some of these clients. Uh,
Speaker 2: part credit, you know, Brafman did very well.
Speaker 6: Now you talk about another person, I believe Tommy Lee
Speaker 6: that's maybe not the epitome of the ethical lawyer that
Speaker 6: Brafman at least would like to be.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Tommy Lee, you know he was. Yeah, he was
Speaker 2: a lawyer out of the Bronx who was worked with
Speaker 2: Vinnie and represented some of his people in gambling cases
Speaker 2: when they got arrested. And it seemed that, you know,
Speaker 2: from what we saw and later in the cases, that
Speaker 2: Tommy you know, was really kind of enamored with these
Speaker 2: guys and for a while he was carrying messages back
Speaker 2: and forth between Messino and the outside world. Well that's
Speaker 2: a no. No, I was a lawyer because I put
Speaker 2: you right in the middle of things. Tommy Lee got arrested,
Speaker 2: he pled out pretty quickly, and he turned state's evidence.
Speaker 2: You know, he was not an Italian guy, a member
Speaker 2: of the mob. But you know, he had a lot
Speaker 2: to lose, and he lost his law practice at least,
Speaker 2: you know, that's the way it is right now. And
Speaker 2: he you know, he had to move away, he had
Speaker 2: to move away, but he gave states evidence. He gave
Speaker 2: evidence against Vinnie and some others, and you know, it
Speaker 2: was another sort of nail and Vinnie's coffin, as it were,
Speaker 2: to have Tommy Lee turn on him as well. What
Speaker 2: he supposed to do that?
Speaker 6: Yeah, how did they proceed a trial to I mean,
Speaker 6: we're looking at a death penalty case. We're capital case here,
Speaker 6: So tell us what his lawyers did do or how
Speaker 6: they tried to attempt to defend him.
Speaker 2: Well, what they're trying to do. Look, you had these
Speaker 2: tapes Messino made, Messino recordings. They are what they are.
Speaker 2: I mean, they're not you know, they're not abridged where
Speaker 2: they're not doctored. You know, the jury hears them. So
Speaker 2: what the defense tried to do was say, look, Vinnie's
Speaker 2: saying what he's saying, but he's really lying to Joe
Speaker 2: and trying to take the weight to keep Joe away
Speaker 2: from Dominic Sicali from thinking Dominic Sicali operated on his own.
Speaker 2: Vinnie was taking the heat and trying to say that
Speaker 2: he organized the you know, the murder of Pasolo as
Speaker 2: a way of defending he was spinning a yarn in
Speaker 2: other words, with Messino. That was the way the defense
Speaker 2: tried to spin the tapes. And I gotta tell you
Speaker 2: it's hard. It's like you're trying to say, well, he
Speaker 2: said what he said, but what he said was was
Speaker 2: a fairy tale, And if you listen to those tapes,
Speaker 2: that's not what's going to come out of it. You know,
Speaker 2: you're not gonna prevail with that, and ultimately, you know,
Speaker 2: Vinnie got convicted. Now, we figured that Vinnie was going
Speaker 2: to get convicted in that case anyway, The real battle
Speaker 2: was going to be over the death penalty because he
Speaker 2: was charged in a death penalty count with Pasolo's murder
Speaker 2: and that's you know, that would have been the first
Speaker 2: execution of a main New York City mobster since the
Speaker 2: nineteen four I think when Lewis Lepkei was executed. So
Speaker 2: that was the real struggle for Vinny, the death penalty
Speaker 2: phase of this case. And that's where the defense really,
Speaker 2: I thought, you know, was able to turn the tide
Speaker 2: at least get Vinnie something life in prison ain't much,
Speaker 2: but it's something other than the death penalty.
Speaker 6: Now, what was the strategy in terms of the death
Speaker 6: penalty of We alluded to it in the introduction, but
Speaker 6: what really way can you defend and say that there
Speaker 6: are some mitigating factors who then discount the death penalty.
Speaker 2: There's basically three prongs to that. One is that Vinnie,
Speaker 2: as wild and crazy as the government painted him, would
Speaker 2: be well under the government's control with a life sentence
Speaker 2: in the supermac's prison out and say Colorado. That's one argument.
Speaker 2: The other argument is that has redeeming qualities as a
Speaker 2: human being, as a father, as somebody who has done
Speaker 2: a lot of charity for people who he knew. The
Speaker 2: other is that, look, okay, Vinnie's convicted of the Bisolo murder.
Speaker 2: He's convicted earlier. Not in this case. It was the
Speaker 2: Centauro murder, and the prosecution claims he may or may
Speaker 2: not have been involved in other planned homicides or you know,
Speaker 2: alleged homicides, attempted homicides. But John Messino, the boss of
Speaker 2: the family, killed twelve people, Dominisicali, was involved in the
Speaker 2: Pizzolo homicide and the Centauro homicide. You have all these
Speaker 2: other characters who have cooperated or aren't being given the
Speaker 2: death penalty. It was just coupled as Vinni well more so,
Speaker 2: you know, isn't really equitable to do that. And those
Speaker 2: three pretty strong arguments marshaled by the defense, I thought
Speaker 2: in this case, and ultimately I think the fact that
Speaker 2: Messino had such a bloody record himself made it to
Speaker 2: the jury impossible moral calculation to make for the deat
Speaker 2: penalty and they voted to give any not death but
Speaker 2: life in prison, and that's how that case ended. Ravini
Speaker 2: gets another life sentence and he's out in supermax in Colorado,
Speaker 2: and you know, from what I hear, he's doing reasonably well,
Speaker 2: liking the food, liking the facility more than the other
Speaker 2: places he's been in, and he's got a life to
Speaker 2: think about. In jail, he's appealing and you know, we'll
Speaker 2: see where that goes. But for the moment, that's where
Speaker 2: he's at.
Speaker 6: What's the relationship with him? And is it Angela Angelero?
Speaker 2: Yeah, she was. She was there now and again in
Speaker 2: the trial. Uh, they're no longer married, but she does
Speaker 2: keep in touch with them, and she is supportive in
Speaker 2: the sense that you know, she keeps in contact. You know,
Speaker 2: they have four kids together, so they have to there's
Speaker 2: something that that binds them. And you know, it's an
Speaker 2: interesting turn of events because you know, it's a very
Speaker 2: public betrayal on his part of her by you know,
Speaker 2: this this other girlfriend and the child. Because it became
Speaker 2: very public, and normally it doesn't, you know, become that,
Speaker 2: but this became very public. It became very scene and
Speaker 2: very tawdry and the tabloids had a field day with it.
Speaker 2: And she's a very private woman, but you know, and
Speaker 2: she sort of rolled with the punch. Uh. You know,
Speaker 2: there's one thing I must tell you. When Messino, what
Speaker 2: it became known that Messina was a witness, they took me,
Speaker 2: you know, out of the jail where Basciano was for
Speaker 2: obvious reasons. Yeah, and they took him to a secure facility.
Speaker 2: And I'm told that Messino while he was in the
Speaker 2: jail had a pillow because he's a big guy and
Speaker 2: he had problems sleeping, so they game a pillow. And
Speaker 2: when Messino left, the pillow was offered to Bosiano. Basianos said,
Speaker 2: There's no way I'm gonna rest my head on that pillow.
Speaker 2: This is what I'm told. Wow, amazing.
Speaker 6: Now, what was what was his demeanor and behavior like
Speaker 6: Vinnie at at trial?
Speaker 2: Well, I mean he was, you know, he he I
Speaker 2: think he was getting frustrated with the court. He thought
Speaker 2: the judge was against him. Uh, you know, he sparred
Speaker 2: with his defense attorneys over tactics. He's smart with all
Speaker 2: his attorneys over tactics. And you know, I think because
Speaker 2: he wasn't solitary for so long, it's somehow affected his
Speaker 2: emotional makeup. I mean, he seemed to be on top
Speaker 2: of things. I mean, he kept incredibly with it. Physically
Speaker 2: he looked fine. But I think, you know, there was
Speaker 2: an element of paranoia that crept in when you're in
Speaker 2: isolation for so long. But I mean he you know,
Speaker 2: he'd have an occasional outburst with a judge, but generally
Speaker 2: it went fine. You know, it wasn't really that many
Speaker 2: sharp issues.
Speaker 6: What was his reaction to people like Messino and other
Speaker 6: people testifying against him? Did he have What was his
Speaker 6: reaction visibly?
Speaker 2: None? Wow, you know, he'd sort of shake his head
Speaker 2: now and then you know, he didn't blurt out like
Speaker 2: a bulger. Supposedly he is blurting out in the Boston case.
Speaker 2: That really didn't happen. It really wasn't a factor. He
Speaker 2: kept as cool as it were for the most part.
Speaker 2: I don't think he looked directly at each other.
Speaker 6: Yeah, incredible. So has anyone interviewed Bastiano since the verdict
Speaker 6: at all?
Speaker 2: Now? I tried, I you know, I I Alfred I
Speaker 2: wanted to interview him for the book. But you know,
Speaker 2: he in a nice way declined and somebody told me that,
Speaker 2: you know, it just wouldn't look good on his MOB resume,
Speaker 2: So you know, we took that for what it was worth.
Speaker 2: I interviewed his wife in two thousand and six. She
Speaker 2: gave me a nice long interview, but this time around,
Speaker 2: and she wanted to keep her on counsel and she
Speaker 2: would want to comment for the book. But I got
Speaker 2: to tell you, there's a lot of stuff I was
Speaker 2: able to derive that showed me what his thinking was
Speaker 2: about a lot of things, and for example, good inside
Speaker 2: well like his feeling about the meetings with Messino and jail.
Speaker 2: You know, there's a different spin that comes to that.
Speaker 2: It was apparently it was a Messino supposedly raised the
Speaker 2: issue of the prosecutor Vinny chimed in in a way
Speaker 2: that was from what I've read, it was more in
Speaker 2: jest than anything, just blowing off steam. There's that kind
Speaker 2: of thing, you know. And apparently from what I'm hearing,
Speaker 2: he wasn't that nift with Pizzola, with Pazzolo's work as
Speaker 2: a contractor, which is one of the theories of the
Speaker 2: government's fun So you know.
Speaker 6: What I found interesting too, is we didn't talk about
Speaker 6: was again Tarta tartaglionis Big Louis. Yeahs whe everybody thinks
Speaker 6: he is a snitch, so they're they're talking like they
Speaker 6: think he's wired. Anyway, tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 2: Well, Vinny thought, I'm talking Big Louis came back to
Speaker 2: New York after being in Florida. He said, he was thinking, well, look,
Speaker 2: Big louis on probation and he's coming back to New
Speaker 2: York to talk to us. Wise, guys, he's not supposed
Speaker 2: to do that. You know, it didn't sit right. Why
Speaker 2: is he doing that? Why is he coming back? Vinnie,
Speaker 2: from what I understand, thought that there's a chance that
Speaker 2: Tartaglione was an informant. But you know, he talked with
Speaker 2: them in the beginning, and gradually he sort of the
Speaker 2: backpedal and really started to keep Tartaglion on the arm's length. Ultimately,
Speaker 2: what sort of sensed it was when Tartaglione offered Vinnie
Speaker 2: some hot Kruger rands that had been stolen, that came
Speaker 2: out of the blue, and Vinnie said that later we
Speaker 2: learned that. Vinnie said, you know that that indicates that
Speaker 2: he's Big louis an informant, And sure, enough. Big Louis
Speaker 2: was an informant, and about two days later the arrest
Speaker 2: came down. Not a Bessiana, but some other people were
Speaker 2: at that meeting. Pasiana had good instincts. You know, these
Speaker 2: guys are not supposed to be fraternizing with other mobsters
Speaker 2: when they're on prohibition. So Big Louis coming back to
Speaker 2: New York to fratenize what's the bassiano or red flag?
Speaker 6: Yeah, they're really tiptoeing in that conversation with them, too,
Speaker 6: weren't they.
Speaker 2: Yeah, they really were. The first conversation they weren't so much.
Speaker 2: The second conversation with Vinie was kind of shaky. Uh
Speaker 2: with this he was really backpedaling and tiptoeing around their
Speaker 2: different things. And it was then that they told Big Louis, look, Louis,
Speaker 2: go back to Florida. You know. They didn't say I
Speaker 2: think you're a snitch. It's just go back. If we
Speaker 2: need you, we'll call you. And Big Louis and.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and that effectively stopped that investigation in its tracks
Speaker 6: because of that incident itself, but it stop.
Speaker 2: Big Louis use as an informant. But it didn't matter
Speaker 2: at that point. They had enough. So within two days
Speaker 2: they were indicting some of the other people in that meeting,
Speaker 2: and Big Louis turned out to me actually a pretty
Speaker 2: good witness in Messino's case and not so bad in
Speaker 2: Bassiano's case.
Speaker 6: The Vitally was the guy that was the big guy
Speaker 6: in messino case though it really had the biggest mouth
Speaker 6: out of the deal, wasn't he.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was. He was the Viattally knew a lot
Speaker 2: about Joe, grew up with him, married his sister. Joe
Speaker 2: married his sister. Oh yeah, so their brother in law's
Speaker 2: and you know, Vitally knew about some of the murders
Speaker 2: that Joe had planned. He knew about Joe's gambling, he
Speaker 2: knew about Joe's loan shocking operations. So what do you got.
Speaker 2: You know, You've got somebody was your closest confidant testifying
Speaker 2: against you. And Vittally's evidence was like the keystone to
Speaker 2: the case. The other informants, the other captains who testified,
Speaker 2: provided information about different segments of the case, but it
Speaker 2: was Vitally who sort of was the overarching centerpiece that
Speaker 2: kept everything together in cohesive. So that was a big
Speaker 2: blow to Joe and Battalion is now he's in the
Speaker 2: witness protection program too, he's out of prison.
Speaker 6: Oh interesting now if you know these numbers, but it
Speaker 6: is a staggering amount of numbers and success by the
Speaker 6: FDI and authorities in general. The Banano family, new York
Speaker 6: City's biggest crime family. How many people went down. I'm
Speaker 6: not to say break it up into captains and soldiers,
Speaker 6: but what kind of numbers are we talking about in
Speaker 6: terms of Oh, you're.
Speaker 2: Probably talking and easily anywhere between seventy five two hundred
Speaker 2: members and associates, including the boss, also very varied acting bosses.
Speaker 2: That's a pretty good estimate. The Genevie's family, it's had
Speaker 2: some you know, problems, but they're relatively cohesive. The Gambino family,
Speaker 2: you know, as you well know from the troubles of Godi.
Speaker 2: You know, I've had their problems, but they're kind of
Speaker 2: like reconstituting. And the other families a little caseys, the
Speaker 2: Colombo's and the Bananas are really sort of, you know,
Speaker 2: trying to pick up the pieces and I don't probably
Speaker 2: I don't think very well. Yeah, it's just their it'll happen,
Speaker 2: It'll take years, but it's not going to be like
Speaker 2: it was yeah.
Speaker 6: And the thing is what I found very interesting too
Speaker 6: is how everybody, not everyone, but there were a lot
Speaker 6: of guys. I guess the time has passed, or they
Speaker 6: feel free, or they you know, they're vain enough, they
Speaker 6: want to they want to be in a book. So
Speaker 6: there's a heck of a lot of guys come went
Speaker 6: forward that want to talk and write books and be interviewed.
Speaker 6: It's it's kind of interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, the the hardcore guys like Basciano, I
Speaker 2: don't you know, I don't think they're going to do that.
Speaker 2: Joe Messina, who knows. I mean, I'll wait for Joe
Speaker 2: Messina to come knocking on my door, maybe to write
Speaker 2: the definitive story to fill in the blanks. But I'm
Speaker 2: not going to wait too long. You know.
Speaker 6: It's just no, no, no.
Speaker 2: I think I think he'll just want to sort of
Speaker 2: fade away. He doesn't need the money, you know, Joe
Speaker 2: doesn't need to mark it himself anymore. Some of the
Speaker 2: other guys, I don't know, you know you're going to
Speaker 2: see I think low level people, you know, might but hey,
Speaker 2: you don't know, you know, right, everybody's doing stuff about
Speaker 2: the mob. If you're not in the Mob. People are
Speaker 2: writing about the Mob.
Speaker 6: You say, Messino did so so well compared to everyone else.
Speaker 6: Did you surprised that a guy like that or were
Speaker 6: you not surprised at a guy like that without all
Speaker 6: his abilities to come out so sweet out of where
Speaker 6: everybody else didn't well.
Speaker 2: I was surprised that he amassed as much wealth as
Speaker 2: he did. He was shoveling in money from all sorts
Speaker 2: of places, and he had He was taking money from
Speaker 2: guys he didn't even know the last names were their
Speaker 2: first names for that matter. But he amassed you know,
Speaker 2: he gave the government ten million dollars in cash and
Speaker 2: goal bars, you know, so he had a store in
Speaker 2: his house. You know, it's an incredible I would be
Speaker 2: deadly afraid that the player was going to burn down.
Speaker 2: I never leave the house. But Joe had all this
Speaker 2: dash and this was an incredible amount of money. He
Speaker 2: also had real estate which he was able to keep
Speaker 2: some of, and he had business interests, and he had
Speaker 2: a lot going for him. I was surprised at the
Speaker 2: volume of the assets he had, because none of the
Speaker 2: other bosses that we've seen are compiled anywhere near this
Speaker 2: in terms of just cold hard cash.
Speaker 6: Now you say ten million, is that ten million? Was
Speaker 6: the find that the government said, you've got to give
Speaker 6: us ten million or we're going to take it.
Speaker 2: Was what they forfeited after he got convicted. What they
Speaker 2: estimated is illegal take gains were ten million dollars and
Speaker 2: he got real or written a check for that. But
Speaker 2: they went they had this proceeding where they where they
Speaker 2: seized the assets.
Speaker 6: But that is that is before he walked in and
Speaker 6: said listen, let's make a deal so they.
Speaker 2: Could Yeah, it was Yeah, what happened was, you know,
Speaker 2: as I recall, maybe a little shaky on the timing
Speaker 2: of this, Joe got convicted. No, no, I think what
Speaker 2: happened was a Joe got convicted and walked into the
Speaker 2: judge and ever recall right, if they had a proceeding
Speaker 2: on forfeiture that afternoon, and the forfeiture came down, so
Speaker 2: you know they had a ten million dollar judgment against them.
Speaker 6: Well, you know, he had a pretty good law He
Speaker 6: had a pretty good lawyer if he could because really
Speaker 6: what was with stopping them from taking much more?
Speaker 2: Though, Well, he got a shadow council and that was
Speaker 2: this well known former prosecutor Ed McDonald in New York,
Speaker 2: who actually prosecuted Joe back in the nineteen eighties on
Speaker 2: some other racketeering case he had. But the quarter pointed
Speaker 2: McDonald's shadow council, meaning a secret counsel. Messino's regular council
Speaker 2: didn't know about it. And it was the shadow council
Speaker 2: that represented Joe in his negotiations with the government to
Speaker 2: become a cooperator. And McDonald struck a pretty good deal. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, he protected Joe's interest and he there was
Speaker 2: money he had to give up, and then there was uh,
Speaker 2: you know, money that Joe wanted to keep assets they
Speaker 2: wanted to keep. You want to keep his mother's house,
Speaker 2: He wanted to keep his wife's house. He wanted to
Speaker 2: keep something for his wife and family so they could
Speaker 2: survive on some sort of income stream. So McDonald did
Speaker 2: a pretty good job, I thought of protecting those interests. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Joe had a pretty good lawyer and the shadow lawyer,
Speaker 2: as we call it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I find it. I found it very interesting because
Speaker 6: I had not really heard of anybody that survived keeping
Speaker 6: as much money as he did and also his freedom
Speaker 6: and twelve murders, so he did wonderful really.
Speaker 2: So yeah, well, Joe, like I said, Joe's the one
Speaker 2: that sort of comes out ahead if you want to
Speaker 2: call it that, on this whole sort of situation.
Speaker 6: And Baciano has his uh in prison, his ethics.
Speaker 2: He got his ethics, so to speak. Right, Yeah, the mom.
Speaker 6: No one else did, he had no one else did. Yeah,
Speaker 6: that's incredible. Yeah, Tony, this is another great book with
Speaker 6: Vinny gorgeous, The Rise in Ugly Fall of the Ugly
Speaker 6: Rise and Fall of a New York Mobster. I well,
Speaker 6: thank you very much. How can people get ahold of you?
Speaker 6: If they have any questions or they'd like to just
Speaker 6: Facebook you?
Speaker 1: Or I have?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I have, I have. I'm on Facebook. Uh is
Speaker 2: Tony di Stefano or Anthony MD Stefano either one. I'm
Speaker 2: also I also have a website, Uh, Tony d'stefano dot com. Uh.
Speaker 2: And those are the best ways to reach me, uh,
Speaker 2: you know, through emails, through my website or through Facebook.
Speaker 2: You know, I'm happy to you know, field questions or
Speaker 2: you know, you know, the help when I can. I
Speaker 2: couldn't tell you. A lot readers do get in touch
Speaker 2: with me for a variety of reasons. You know, they
Speaker 2: either want to know certain things or they want a
Speaker 2: new other sources of information? Uh and where can I
Speaker 2: you know, you help people. I have some secret sources,
Speaker 2: but those stay confidential. That's what you all try to do.
Speaker 5: Well.
Speaker 6: Yes, again, I want to thank you very much for
Speaker 6: coming on and talking about your newest release, Vinnie gorgeous,
Speaker 6: and thank you very much, Tony, and have yourself a
Speaker 6: great eating.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, and thank you very much for
Speaker 2: having me and I hope you can do it again.
Speaker 6: Okay, thank you, have a good night.
Speaker 2: Good night,