THE BLACK HAND FORUM

Here is what we know:

- Mancuso was the second highest ranking member on the street behind Basciano after the family's meltdown in the mid-2000s.
- When Basciano went away and much of his contact with the outside world was severed, Mancuso becoming the highest ranking member.
- Basciano and Mancuso were at odds with one another, but much of Basciano's support base went away when his crew had its own meltdown and Basciano was sent to supermax.
- Mancuso crew member Sal Montagna becomes acting boss when Mancuso goes away and runs the family for several years until he is deported. It's not clear if he was getting directives from Mancuso, but it's possible. No reported incidents of anyone challenging this arrangement.
- In 2009 a Mancuso crew member Seccafico is murdered due to disrespect he had shown toward his superiors.
- We've just learned that the same year Montagna was deported and Seccafico killed, Mancuso's young nephew Aiello is inducted and is used to communicate directives from Mancuso, who unlike Basciano can still communicate from prison.
- In the meantime, the family is run by a variety of admin members and ruling panels from different areas.
- John Palazzolo is named as the street boss and a Mancuso loyalist. (side note, but is he actually a "Bronx guy"? I've been familiar with him for years before this and I don't recall him ever being associated with the Bronx... maybe someone knows better than I do)
- Recently we've also learned that Mancuso's "nephew" (might not be officially related) Salerno has been made and has been used to communicate messages from Mancuso.
- John Cammarano is now the acting boss and is making his presence known within the family.

My take:
There is said to be some amount of tension between different factions in the family, especially when Palazzolo was helping run things. But tension is normal for these organizations and its members are competitive by nature. If you look at the history of every family, especially in NY, you will see few periods if any where there wasn't somebody who was unhappy with the boss or trying to gain more power. Very rarely is every single crew going to be 100% loyal to the boss. Seems like Mancuso has people who are loyal to him and they have at least been able to maintain the status quo for him since he went to prison (even if he wasn't the official boss then). Maybe things are changing and Cammarano will push to officially take over. Asaro was recorded referring to DiFiore as the "new boss", but all other info has had him as the acting boss until he got arrested. We're still debating who the official boss was for the Genovese family in the 1970s and 80s and up until a decade ago many of us believed Carmine Galante had been the official boss in the 1970s. Let's wait and see what else comes out.

If people are disputing official sources as a rule then sure.

It just ruffles yours feathers when, on a forum, a guy goes "my contention is ABC because of XYZ" and a response is a name call.

If you weren't referring to Tommy's post then I apologize.

And to reiterate, I'm not taking a Mancuso position. I believe the jury is in, and he's official, for the record.

When I say sickness I'm talking about this strange tendency we've seen by more than a few posters over the years to always approach everything the feds or Capeci (our best sources) say with immediate scepticism. If you need an example of what I'm talking about, read the majority of Dan's posts. He does it all the time. It's like they automatically go into it looking to pick it apart and deduce on their own what's really going on. Now, this may make some sense if it was more questionable sources that have a spotty track record. But not proven ones and certainly not the feds. Ironically, these people are often the first to believe the forum insiders. Now, if this only happened once in a blue moon and for a good reason, that's one thing. But I'm talking about doing it on an ongoing basis. I don't know if it's ego driven or what but it's that mentality I mentioned before will some see the mob as some kind of computer game where they can build their own Mafia family.

Anyway, as Chucky said, all the info so far says Mancuso is official boss. But some have steadily refused to believe it. And it started with other people on the forum saying there's no real Bonanno presence left in the Bronx so there's no way a guy from that part of the family could be boss. Well, that's some great XYZ reasoning right there but, as I and others have pointed out, the feds and Capeci have a much better tack record than the forum insiders or ones that try to figure stuff out on their own.

SonnyBlackstein wrote:I think the term 'sickness' is a little overrated Mr Wiseguy.

These things aren't set in stone. There's no official press release.
And as the idea is be be secretive and deceptive, in certain cases there can be cause for speculation.
Crea v Amuso etc.

Now in this case (Bonanno's), personally I think now the evidence is overwhelming that Mancuso is official, but Tommy has presented his rationale to dispute this. Whilst I don't agree with his perspective I understand his argument and calling it a 'sickness' I think is overkill which stifles meaningful dialogue.

If someone says 'I know Mancuso's not boss'. And doesn't offer any basis for this, then sure, fuck 'em. But for someone to say 'In my opinion Mancuso is not official because of X,Y,Z..." to be called 'sick' is unfair.

Tommy presented his argument with evidence and logic.

Agree with him or don't. Leave it at that

I usually don't debate NY shit, but ever since Montreal turned into the wild west I've kept an eye on the Bonannos, and I'm not trying to say I'm expert or in the know in anyway.

The feds, Capeci, the NY Post, and Aiello himself have identified Mancuso as the boss, I think that's pretty overwhelming. And to Tommy's point about Palazzolo and Aiello being off the street hurting him...that suggests that Mancuso only has a handful of guys who are aligned to him when there hasn't been any evidence showing that outside of a "hunch".

In the Asaro detention memo it was mentioned by Vincent Asaro that he and Tommy DiFiore were discussing taking down a bunch of capos, and I think the Cammarano christmas party all but confirms this did happen. Now, are we suppose to believe that Mancuso had no say in this or that none of these new capos are aligned with him? I think that's a broad leap to make.

All we know is that there is a faction backing Cammarano to be the boss, we don't know if it's a majority of the family or not, just that there is one.

I think the term 'sickness' is a little overrated Mr Wiseguy.

These things aren't set in stone. There's no official press release.
And as the idea is be be secretive and deceptive, in certain cases there can be cause for speculation.
Crea v Amuso etc.

Now in this case (Bonanno's), personally I think now the evidence is overwhelming that Mancuso is official, but Tommy has presented his rationale to dispute this. Whilst I don't agree with his perspective I understand his argument and calling it a 'sickness' I think is overkill which stifles meaningful dialogue.

If someone says 'I know Mancuso's not boss'. And doesn't offer any basis for this, then sure, fuck 'em. But for someone to say 'In my opinion Mancuso is not official because of X,Y,Z..." to be called 'sick' is unfair.

Tommy presented his argument with evidence and logic.

Agree with him or don't. Leave it at that

Chucky wrote:Also, maybe this article will put the Mancuso shit to bed.

You'd think so but no. If we've seen one thing over and over again on these forums over the years, it's that you could have the feds and mob experts all saying the same thing. But there will always be those who either A) choose to believe some guy on the board who says something different, or B) figure they can deduct what's really going on from behind their computer. It's almost a sickness.

With Mancuso's 'street boss' Palazzolo and his cousin Aiello off the streets its interesting. Capeci reported last year that Cammarano was making a play to take over the family with the support of his father in law Vito Grimaldi. Then we found out a few months ago Vito & his son Joseph are capo's after Cammarano said to be official underboss and acting boss. Then the big meeting and a bunch of new captains, surveillance etc.

Cammarano looks like the boss to me, weather official or not. When is Mancuso home? Really interesting following the going's on in the Bonanno family lately.

TommyGambino wrote:

Cheech wrote:anyone wanna take a guess who the guy mancuso didn't want at his daughters house anymore from Brooklyn that had something to do with mob wives?

Old TG pimping Mancuso's daughters

Duh. I Should have thought the ovvious

B. wrote:

SonnyBlackstein wrote:Interesting how it lists Muscarella and Gioeli as soldiers.

Though with Capeci's terminology, who the fuck knows.

Is there a picture of Crea Jnr out there?

Seems most likely that Gioeli is a soldier at this point.

As for Muscarella, I don't think he was ever ID'd as an official captain despite being one of the top guys in that family, so with a lot of other powerful guys from that area back on the street he could be a soldier but I wouldn't bank on it either way. The Genovese family is way outside of my comfort zone when it comes to this stuff.

In the 2001 case where he was indicted with the Chin, Muscarella was said to be the acting boss. I couldn't find it but if memory serves he was indicted as the former acting boss in the 2003/2004 Operating Engineers case. Often in mob indictments they will list all the ranks a guy has been. Below are a few articles where Muscarella was identified as a captain.

http://m.nydailynews.com/archives/news/ ... e-1.664055
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/the-mo ... rs-6398946
http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/trends/co ... side/9265/

Cheech wrote:anyone wanna take a guess who the guy mancuso didn't want at his daughters house anymore from Brooklyn that had something to do with mob wives?

Old TG pimping Mancuso's daughters

anyone wanna take a guess who the guy mancuso didn't want at his daughters house anymore from Brooklyn that had something to do with mob wives?

B. wrote:Since the indictment I have been questioning the assumption that Aiello was an acting capo for Santora. I don't believe he was, as he is a known Bronx guy which is not an area Santora has been involved in. It also wouldn't make sense for Santora to have two acting capos especially when he himself was on the street. Given that Aiello is a relative of Mancuso, we can assume that he was acting for a Bronx crew with ties to either the old DeFilippo crew or the Basciano crew. John Spirito Jr. was also named by Capeci as an acting capo at one point, so not sure how it's all set up or how many crews are still operating in the area.

Anyway, this was a good Gangland in my opinion. It told us how Mancuso was communicating with the streets and gave more background on Aiello's involvement with the family. If he got made in 2009, that tells us that Mancuso may have been trying to build his powerbase in the family.

Agree. I think the "background" info, drawing timelines, and crew affiliations is always important.

Thanks for the article, Dellacroce.

And so are you Gov

Giacomo_Vacari wrote:Zocolilo was asked to identify ten made men he met. He was not asked about their ranks during that line of questioning.
Still think Capeci writes his own articles?

He used to teach a class and his students would write his articles. He would serve as the editor.

Fact is: Capeci rode the Gotti wave into the OC Expert Chair. Along the way he developed sources on both sides of the law. He's the previous generation of Scott Burnstein in that retrospect. Scott was schooled by Anastasia and agree with him or not, Scott is published.

Zocolilo was asked to identify ten made men he met. He was not asked about their ranks during that line of questioning.
Still think Capeci writes his own articles?