THE BLACK HAND FORUM

Vito Rizzuto's sudden death was indeed quite shocking. How could I forget. The moment I saw the thread I immediately thought that they got him afterall, but then I learned it was from 'natural causes', which was equally shocking.

These shocking news stories and revelations followed by endless threads is what makes these forums so great.

Vito rizzutos death and subsequent murder purge wen he was released

Galante not really being the Bonanno boss and Frank Nitti not really being the Chicago boss, the 40 Mafia murders after Maranzano being killed hoax, and I could go on. I learn stuff that changes what we think we knew almost weekly.

Castellano's hit

The family secrets case and all the murders by the Calabrese bros. I had been following the outfit for several years and that really changed a lot of what I thought was fact. It is interesting to see how the info has changed over the years. After reading blood and honor and Frank Friels book I thought I knew all there was to know about Scarfo and Philly. How wrong I was. The one book that really never got shot down by new info for me at least is the last mafioso. It seems to me that much of what Jimmy Fratiano said is still pretty spot on almost 40 years later

I have to agree with what nearly everyone else has posted: Montreal in the years up to and just after 2012. The bombings and murders and then BAM Vito's son, Nick and Montagna. It felt like the proverbial soap opera. My experience was much like Chucky mentioned; just kicking it with my family on like my 9th beer and suddenly goddamn, hitting F5 every 30 seconds.

Hairy Knuckles made a really good point in his post, about how what what seems to be all but established FACT can become just wrong and incorrect with time. It's something I'm seeing constantly with the Calabrians in Australia; just when you think you've got this place or era figured out, another confidential report is made public, you stumble across dusty files 50, 60, 70 or nearly 80 years old, another guy dies and makes a deathbed confession, another case pops up which you're able to link back and changes your perspective. It's almost always in flux. You think you've got it down, and then there's a whole other line of inquiry to chase up. THAT's been my biggest surprise, learningjust how far back and wide things have gone.

Lenny Strollo having a prosecutor shot was a biggie. Kind of hard to believe that sort of thing would happen in Ohio in 1996.

1 sal montenga hit
2 joe ligambi and co beating all they're charges after sitting so long.
3. Gotti jr beating all his charges 4 times
4 gotti jr proffer coming to light from Jon alite of all people
5 nicodemo poorly planned hit
6 massino flipping
7 the bbc making a better mob doc then America has in recent years
8 sonny franzese being indicted at his old age and him still being alive
9 the use of mobsters and social media
10 the legacy of Joey merlino


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Definitely an important angle. The families basically controlled crime in the country and in order to maintain control they had to take over the heroin trade as well, because they were in a position to do so after the French Connection was dismantled.

An angle I don't hear about often is also the power, not just the profits, that goes along with large-scale drug trafficking. By letting other groups/criminals handle more of that action they are giving them a lot more influence on the underworld as a whole. Those profits have to go somewhere and a lot of the time they are invested in other criminal operations or used to gain influence.

B. wrote:

brianwellbrock wrote: As far as new discovery, on my own resesrch which is very little would be discovering Scarfo wasnt "banished" to AC by Bruno.

Look at the "drug" rule... there have absolutely been rules against dealing drugs, but it seems to mean different things. In some cases (i.e. Gambino family), this seems to mean that there are certain crews who were allowed to traffick heroin because they had the trust of the bosses (Conte crew), whereas other crews were not given that freedom because they didn't have the same trust (Bergin crew).

And there was also a difference between dealing drugs on the street, which was forbidden, and actual importation/distribution/wholesale, for which certain crews were designated because the profits were too big to ignore.

Not particulary shocking, but I was a bit surprised when I learned that Vincent Gigante was the boss of the Genovese Family. This was bsck in the mid 1980s and I had just weeks pror read about the Frank Costello hit. In the article it said that the gunman allegedly had been Gigante, described in the article as a simple thug back then. I got what some might say an "aha experience" and it intrigued me to learn more.

Something that is constantly changing are the facts. Something you knew, or what you think you knew, is always getting rebuked, of course, that´s a good thing. But I can´t tell how many times I´ve been shaking my head in disbelief thinking the new facts must be wrong but realize soon that they are not. It happens all the tme. Any mob book written 15, 20 years ago and considered an excellent one back then, can easily actually be riddled with factual errors found today when reading through them again. Knowledge of the Mafia, its history etc is constantly growing. Conservative mob followers/onlookers/researchers (whatever) who don´t accept new facts and who are only relying on info that came out let´s say in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s must be having a hard time today with all the new info that has come out recently.

Gravano flipping, the shooting on the freeway in broad daylight in Philly. The Herbert Blitzstein hit in Las Vegas, Joe Massino flipping, Nick Rizzuto hit in Montreal. There are more, but the two shocking moments for me were Herbert Blitzstein hit and Carman Milano flipping then changing his mind.

I was very surprised when Nick Rizzuto got killed. I didn't expect him to die a violent death at his age, I thought he was almost done by natural age.

As far as history goes, when I read about how wacky things used to be in Youngstown, I was pretty blown away (no bombing pun intended).

Imagine living thru those days like I did. Then going thru the aftermath that followed.
Finally ending with the then Boss ratting out his lifelong friend that he hired to kill one of his own ;-(