THE BLACK HAND FORUM

Felice "Phil" LaMela dead at 91 (pretty sure this is him?)

https://www.didonatofuneralservice.com/obituaries/Felice-Phil-LaMela?obId=41932620

Small correction from an earlier post, but it was Ribera boss Simone Capizzi's son Paolo who was a Sicilian operating alongside the DeCavalcantes in the US. There was also an older Paolo Capizzi who is identified in some places as Ribera boss who Gennaro Sortino was loyal to. In 2008 Francesco Capizzi was also identified as Ribera boss.

[quote=Harrism post_id=291816 time=1744125948 user_id=8402]
Great thread.

Did the Decavalcantes participate in the Castelamarese war? Do we have any indications for them participating? And is it known which faction in the castelamarese war they supported or where part of? They appareantly had a faction in NY close to the people from Sciacca.
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No references to them having any involvement in the war or events before or after. Given Pasquale LoLordo was aligned with Capone, the DeCavalcantes were repped by the Genovese on the Commission afterward, and the Sciacchitani were allegedly pro-Masseria I'd suspect they were Masseria allies.

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Other random notes:

- Emanuele Riggi (John's father) was another president of the orphanage committee at one time.

- On September 3, 1987, 55-year-old Ribera-born contractor Vincenzo Sorce was found shot to death beneath the Goethals Bridge near the outskirts of Elizabeth around twenty minutes after being seen leaving the Ribera Club. Sorce had been playing cards at the club with friends before his murder. Though up to ten witnesses saw him leave the club there was little to no cooperation and police sent flyers to 3000 residents of the Peterstown community written in both English and Italian asking witnesses to come forward and offered a $2000 reward for assistance. Sorce was shot three times in the head from behind and his killing was described by authorities as "gangland style" and "not spontaneous", Sorce's death occurring a relatively short time after the FBI raided the Local 394 hall and other DeCavalcante-linked properties.

In 1960, Elizabeth physician Dr. Anthony Ruvolo, 37, was arrested and sent to a mental hospital for the shotgun murder of his partner Dr. Annunciato LaFace, 34, in what was allegedly a dispute over their practice. Dr. Ruvolo "ambushed" both Dr. LaFace and Dr. Frank Merlo, 50, in the parking lot of St. Elizabeth Hospital. Ruvolo's wife was on vacation to Ribera, Sicily, at the time of the murder. The murder seems to be personal but funny you have doctors with links to Ribera whacking each other in Elizabeth.

- John Riggi was believed to have had influence over the Police Athletic League and was a member of the Board of Adjustment and the Elizabeth Human Relations Commission.

- In May or 1964, the Catena bug picked up Gene Catena meeting with Sam DeCavalcante and Catena asked DeCavalcante how many capodecinas he had, guessing Sam had three. Sam told him he had no capodecinas at the time and around 31 or 32 soldiers. Sam said most of them were old and not making much money but the ones who are making money give him a third.

Great thread.

Did the Decavalcantes participate in the Castelamarese war? Do we have any indications for them participating? And is it known which faction in the castelamarese war they supported or where part of? They appareantly had a faction in NY close to the people from Sciacca.

Thanks Stroccos.

[quote=B. post_id=291726 time=1743959738 user_id=127]
- In 1961 a teenaged Charles Stango and Frank Nigro along with a couple of friends were detained by police for disorderly conduct while driving around Watchung, a small town a ways outside of Elizabeth, claiming to be looking for a "haunted castle", a reference to Moldenke's Castle. The building was a mansion originally owned by a doctor and designed to look like the creator's family castle back in Denmark though it burned down in 1969. Giovanni Rocco recorded Stango calling Nigro "Goombah Frank" and saying they "made their bones" together, this episode of teenage mischief showing the two did go back to their teens together, close to fifty-years or more at that point. Their families also came from the same part of Avellino province, Stango's family originally from Vallata and neighboring Flumeri while Nigro's family looks to be from Vallata as well.

- Stango pleaded guilty in 1986 to cocaine distribution charges from the late 1970s along with Jerry Gallicchio of Newark and Fred Batissa of Elizabeth. By the time he pled guilty Stango was already serving prison time for the Mann murder. Gallicchio was also a suspect in the murder of NJ Colombo member Nello Cammarata and the Gallicchios were yet another family in this circle who may have come from Vallata. Older Gallicchios had numerous other connections to important NJ mafiosi and events, including a couple of them being on scene for the Vincenzo Troia murder in 1935.

- Stango had also been charged in 1979 with attempting to defraud a Newark bank and Philadelphia insurance firm in 1979 along with Batissa (from the cocaine case) and John Garofalo. Even earlier, in 1972, Stango and Batissa had been arrested in Florida and charges with possessing counterfeit money and marijuana. Stango was listed as a resident of California at the time showing his presence in Las Vegas in the mid-2010s was not his first time on the West Coast, Stango also boasting to Rocco he had ties to Los Angeles.

- Member Gaetano Alessi was a major commercial and residential builder in Bayonne and Jersey City during the 1980s and 90s. In 1994 he was arrested in a water theft scam through his ownership of the historic Pride Bake Shop in Bayonne. He was accused of bypassing water meters to steal water services from the city. Alessi was a native of San Giovanni Gemini, Agrigento, and a member of the Ribera Club, Alessi showing up in the well-known Riggi-era group photo of Ribera Club members. Alessi is the only DeCavalcante I've found from San Giovanni and seemingly always lived in Bayonne after coming to the US so it's not clear exactly how he was recruited but his hometown being in Agrigento may have played a role, especially if there was any Sicilian mafia connection back there. Son Vincent became a DeCavalcante associate and major construction contractor himself, being very close to members of the Gambino Family.
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stango was living in Fresno in the mid 70s , , he was busted out there for trying to shake someone down I forget the particulars.

- In 1961 a teenaged Charles Stango and Frank Nigro along with a couple of friends were detained by police for disorderly conduct while driving around Watchung, a small town a ways outside of Elizabeth, claiming to be looking for a "haunted castle", a reference to Moldenke's Castle. The building was a mansion originally owned by a doctor and designed to look like the creator's family castle back in Denmark though it burned down in 1969. Giovanni Rocco recorded Stango calling Nigro "Goombah Frank" and saying they "made their bones" together, this episode of teenage mischief showing the two did go back to their teens together, close to fifty-years or more at that point. Their families also came from the same part of Avellino province, Stango's family originally from Vallata and neighboring Flumeri while Nigro's family looks to be from Vallata as well.

- Stango pleaded guilty in 1986 to cocaine distribution charges from the late 1970s along with Jerry Gallicchio of Newark and Fred Batissa of Elizabeth. By the time he pled guilty Stango was already serving prison time for the Mann murder. Gallicchio was also a suspect in the murder of NJ Colombo member Nello Cammarata and the Gallicchios were yet another family in this circle who may have come from Vallata. Older Gallicchios had numerous other connections to important NJ mafiosi and events, including a couple of them being on scene for the Vincenzo Troia murder in 1935.

- Stango had also been charged in 1979 with attempting to defraud a Newark bank and Philadelphia insurance firm in 1979 along with Batissa (from the cocaine case) and John Garofalo. Even earlier, in 1972, Stango and Batissa had been arrested in Florida and charges with possessing counterfeit money and marijuana. Stango was listed as a resident of California at the time showing his presence in Las Vegas in the mid-2010s was not his first time on the West Coast, Stango also boasting to Rocco he had ties to Los Angeles.

- Member Gaetano Alessi was a major commercial and residential builder in Bayonne and Jersey City during the 1980s and 90s. In 1994 he was arrested in a water theft scam through his ownership of the historic Pride Bake Shop in Bayonne. He was accused of bypassing water meters to steal water services from the city. Alessi was a native of San Giovanni Gemini, Agrigento, and a member of the Ribera Club, Alessi showing up in the well-known Riggi-era group photo of Ribera Club members. Alessi is the only DeCavalcante I've found from San Giovanni and seemingly always lived in Bayonne after coming to the US so it's not clear exactly how he was recruited but his hometown being in Agrigento may have played a role, especially if there was any Sicilian mafia connection back there. Son Vincent became a DeCavalcante associate and major construction contractor himself, being very close to members of the Gambino Family.

Yeah, Tommaso Bacino was the same one who told the FBI he was distantly related to Phil. The FBI also included a Joe Bacino (b. 1893) as an LCN figure and described him as a cousin of Phil on their "Dead List". When I looked into Joe five or six years ago I don't think I definitively identified him but found one from Burgio who may have fit. Maybe you narrowed it down, hard to remember.

Another associate in that case was Joseph Grisafi from Sambuca (same hometown as Bacino in-laws the Maggios) and one of Phil Bacino's grandchildren married a Grisafi. I remember you doing a dive into him and it looked like the granddaughter's in-laws were descended from Joseph. Mentioning it here for anyone else who is curious about his circle of neighboring paesani / relatives who worked alongside him in the US, this clearly an extensive mafia network from Agrigento that extended from New York and New Jersey to Connecticut and into the Midwest.

I forgot or didn't know Triolo was from Johnston City but fits the presence of Miceli and the Canzoneris in the Burgitano / Palazzese colony.

[quote=B. post_id=291693 time=1743881632 user_id=127]
- Since we were talking about confusion over the Triolos, Phil Bacino's mother's family, one of Phil Bacino's associates in Calumet City was an Andrew Triolo. I assume this was a relative but I already made some incorrect assumptions about the Triolo-Giacobbe relation. Bacino did associate with some distant relatives named Bacino (one of them told the FBI he was a distant relative in this case, not sure what the research shows) in the area who were around the Chicago Family who we've discussed previously.
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Yup, Andrea Triolo was one of the guys arrested along with Phil Bacino in 1940 as part of a huge, multistate bootlegging ring (presumably under Bacino’s control, this ring had a bunch of stills and distribution arms in IL, IN, MI, and OH). He was born in downstate Johnston City, IL, in 1907 and seems to have been brought back to Sicily as a kid, as he returned to the US bound for Chicago in 1926. I don’t know for a fact but suspect that his family was from Burgio, as other Triolos in Williamson County — where of course there was a colony of Burgitani with close ties to Chicago — were from Burgio and also relocated to Chicago from the 1920s on (decline of coal mining in Southern IL). As you might, recall, Tommaso Bacino of Burgio/Chicago, who we can presume was a paternal relative of Phil, also had close ties to the old Agrigentino colony in Williamson County. I’d very much bet that Andrea Triolo was Burgitano (he died in 1981 in IN; I’m not sure that he was ever publicly identified as being involved in criminal activities subsequent to the big 1940 case).

Yeah those are the most logical conclusions.

Carmelo Giacobbe I should point out was also the oldest potential member I've found. A couple others I'll get into were a few years younger and are equally solid candidates but Giacobbe is the eldest one who can be reasonably speculated about.

[quote=B. post_id=291643 time=1743800098 user_id=127]
Ok. Also strange she consistently used her mother's surname of Triolo rather than her birth name, the wife apparently using a selection of given names and surnames. Maybe SHE was the mafioso, haha.
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I suspect that Corinda was an illegitimate birth, hence her using her mother’s maiden name. I’ve seen cases like this before, where the father’s name was just used for the birth record but then the mother’s name is of course used subsequently. I don’t have her mother, Giuseppa Triolo’s death record, so I also wonder if her mother may later have married a guy named Montalbano. Speculative, but could well account for these discrepancies. I also wonder whether Palma may have been her middle name, or if it was her baptismal name (these don’t always correspond to one’s legal given name), as Palma was not an uncommon female name in Ribera.

Thanks man. Please feel free to contribute / correct anything.

- Something I forgot to mention is that Mariano Coniglio was also president of the Ribera Club at one time, as was Vincenzo Carlino's son Emanuele. For some reason the Ribera Club temporarily closed down between 1932 - 1935, not sure why given the Sicilian colony was in full swing by the 1920s (hence the formation of the club in 1923) and continuing to grow. Other presidents of note over the years were Pietro Guarraci (possibly acting boss Frank Guarraci's father) and John Riggi. The founding president circa 1923 was Paolo Sgro (b. early 1880s) who previously lived in Lower Manhattan between 1904-1913 and was a relative of the Truncales, Phil Amari's mother's maiden name. Joe Colletti and Giuseppe Merlo (possibly Joe Merlo Jr.'s father based on the period) once served as trustees in the 1970s while Pietro Guarraci was president and Sam DeCavalcante was the club's general director at the time.

- Since we were talking about confusion over the Triolos, Phil Bacino's mother's family, one of Phil Bacino's associates in Calumet City was an Andrew Triolo. I assume this was a relative but I already made some incorrect assumptions about the Triolo-Giacobbe relation. Bacino did associate with some distant relatives named Bacino (one of them told the FBI he was a distant relative in this case, not sure what the research shows) in the area who were around the Chicago Family who we've discussed previously.

Amazing thread. Just fantastic!

[b]Calogero Coniglio (1894-1983), Domenico Renda (1893-1964), Vincenzo Carlino (1884-1976)[/b]

- Calogero "Charles" Coniglio, Domenico Renda, and Vincenzo Carlino sat on the 1947 Ribera Club orphanage committee and of the 15 total committee members, these three are the only ones who are not confirmed mafiosi. The other 12 committee members were DeCavalcante boss Phil Amari, future capodecina Giacomo Colletti, member Salvatore Caterinicchio, future underboss Frank Majuri, member and possible capodecina Lorenzo Giacobbe, member Pietro Galletta, future capodecina Joseph LoLordo, Chicago member Phil Bacino, Chicago capodecina Jim DeGeorge, and suspected Chicago member Nicola Diana. That these three obscure names sat on the committee alongside 12 influential mafia members, many of them leaders, does not confirm they were mafiosi but adds a great deal of suspicion.

- All three were born in Ribera, Coniglio being among the early wave of Riberese Peterstown residents, arriving to Elizabeth in 1906 around the same period the Merlo brothers settled there; Coniglio already had relatives living in Elizabeth. He worked as a barber while his brothers worked as hod carriers, the trade of DeCavalcante-controlled Local 394. In 1915, Coniglio was living in the same building as Sheriff James LaCorte and his son, future mayor Nicholas LaCorte, James noted earlier for his ties to numerous Riberese DeCavalcante-connected names and unsurprisingly Coniglio himself is one of the figures whose naturalization was witnessed by the elder LaCorte.

- Coniglio was additionally listed among fifteen names who founded the Ribera Club in 1923, other notable founders including Phil Amari and the Merlo brothers, Michele and Giuseppe. He was a nearby neighbor of future capodecina Joe Sferra by 1950, the two having served on the Ribera Club orphanage committee three years previous.

- Domenico Renda worked for Standard Oil, at least a few DeCavalcante members or their older relatives, including the Riggis, working for Standard Oil early on. Renda was another relatively early settler in Elizabeth, arriving there straight from Ribera in 1912 and like Calogero Coniglio he shared a close relation to the Firetto surname. Renda too used Sheriff James LaCorte as a naturalization witness. In 1930 he lived on John Street just a short distance from Giovanni Riggi, father of Emanuele and grandfather of John, and a just a bit further down John Street was Emanuele Riggi and young John. In the 1940s Renda and his family were living in the same building as future capodecina Giacomo Colletti.

- Domenico Renda may have been related to fellow 1947 orphanage committee member Frank Majuri through marriage. Frank Majuri's daughter Marie appears to have married the Ribera-born Saverio Renda, son of Michele, whose mother was a Paola Amari. Domenico Renda also had a son named Saverio several years older than this Saverio, an indication he may have been a cousin. Marie's son is Frank Renda, believed to be a current DeCavalcante member under his uncle Charlie Majuri. The Renda-Majuri wedding is also apparently where Phil Bacino's son met his wife in what became another DeCavalcante-coordinated wedding. Saverio Renda died young in 1989 and Marie Majuri later remarried DeCavalcante member Nick LaMela, this second marriage to a made member possibly an indication her first marriage had mafia connections as well which would be logical given who her male relatives were.

- The third unknown 1947 orphanage committee member Vincenzo Carlino was a one-time employee of Standard Oil like Renda and Carlino was also one of the fifteen named founders of the Ribera Club in 1923 along with Calogero Coniglio, Phil Amari, and the Merlos. The eldest of these three men, Carlino may have also been the last to arrive in America, citing a 1921 arrival through Philadelphia on his naturalization although there was a Vincenzo Carlino of the same age from Ribera who arrived to NYC in 1905 -- either way he was living in Ribera before he arrived for permanent residence in 1921. The arrival manifest for the 1921 trip shows that the Carlinos were heading to Elizabeth and accompanied by a fellow Riberese traveler named Firetto, a recurring name connected to Coniglio, Renda, and Carlino, and that Carlino's brother Giuseppe was already living in Elizabeth. By 1930 he lived in DeCavalcante ground zero, living on John Street a few doors down from possible Family leader Michele Merlo and five doors down in the opposite direction from Phil Amari. Vincenzo's brother Giuseppe Carlino's own home was directly next door to Amari.

- Even during the Delmore era the Ribera Club orphanage committee was comprised almost entirely of Family leaders plus future Ribera Family leader Gennaro Sortino and high-level associates like Mike Kleinberg and Jake Miceli as well as the mysterious John Parlapiano. The original 1947 committee was dominated by an even more overwhelming number of mafiosi so either Coniglio, Renda, and Carlino were the only three non-members on the 15 man committee or they too were Family members/associates. The Family had between 30 to 40 members in the 1960s with roughly 27 or 28 identified, leaving a number of slots that logically should have included at least a few elderly Riberesi who were holdovers from an earlier era and completely off the radar.

- While certain direct relatives of DeCavalcante members are strong candidates for these unknown slots as well, these three names are equally if not stronger candidates given two of them not only helped found the Ribera Club but all three sat on the 1947 orphanage committee. The Ribera Club itself was controlled by the DeCavalcante Family and carried Family leaders and other members as officers but Ribera Club posts also included many "civilians" from within the broader Sicilian/Italian community and the Ribera Club's administration pales in comparison to the sheer concentration of mafiosi we see on the club's orphanage committee in 1947 under Amari and later under Delmore. That twelve of the fifteen 1947 committee members were mafiosi makes it probable that at least one of these three was a member and if they weren't members they were nonetheless regarded as respected peers.

- Former proposed member and CW Frank Scarabino stated that the Ribera Club's orphanage activities in the 1990s were carried out in collaboration with members of the Ribera Family, who also traveled to America to attend orphanage events hosted by the Ribera Club, the DeCavalcante tapes further confirming that these benefit dinners were a Family-controlled affair in the 1960s. This is despite the fact that during Scarabino's era these links had been fully exposed for decades and even during Sam DeCavalcante's early years as boss the Ribera Club and its corrupt orphanage philanthropy were becoming known. In 1947 it appears the then-unknown Family was even less apologetic in inserting itself into orphanage activities based on the sheer number of DeCavalcante and Chicago members on the committee.

- Renda died in 1964 but the other two lived into the mid-1970s and early 1980s, their advanced age already taking them off the radar of the FBI and contemporary sources and the unassuming nature of Riberese mafiosi in Elizabeth making it more difficult to confirm/deny their membership.

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[b]Mariano Coniglio (1895-1991)[/b]

- Along with members Emanuele Riggi and Jake Colletti, a Mariano Coniglio was one of the men who posted bond for Salvatore Caterinicchio when he was held as a material witness in the 1948 John DiBiasio murder so it is a surname that connects to top DeCavalcante figures more than once. Mariano, who used the name "Michael", was from Ribera like the aforementioned Calogero Coniglio (relation unconfirmed; both related to Venzianos) and arrived to NYC in 1909 then settled in Elizabeth. He was another one-time Standard Oil employee, also living two doors down from Frank Majuri's Riberese father-in-law Emanuele Caruano circa 1950. A decade earlier he'd been Salvatore Caterinicchio's next door neighbor which may explain why he was one of the men who posted his bond.

- Another name who posted Caterinicchio's bond was a "Joseph DeStephens". I'm not sure who "DeStephens" is as I couldn't find a record for him but there was a Joseph DeStefano (b. 1903) living in Peterstown circa 1940 although I haven't found many leads beyond that and it's a fairly generic name. There was a Joseph DiStefano buried in Linden in 1942 which would rule him out as "Joseph DeStephens" but I couldn't find a DOB, neither could I find a DOD for the 1940 Peterstown resident. There was also a younger Joseph DeStefano (b. 1915) living in Peterstown whose father Alfonso DeStefano/DiStefano came from Girgenti (Agrigento; possibly Ribera) and reportedly lived in Elizabeth since at least 1908 based on the locations given for his children's birth on his naturalization paperwork. It's anyone's guess who "DeStephens" actually is although the latter is a good candidate based on his confirmed heritage and that he's confirmed to have been alive in 1948.

- I don't consider Mariano Congilio a particularly strong candidate for membership (nor "DeStephens" for that matter) compared to the three unknown 1947 orphanage names but his surname together with posting bond for a top DeCavalcante in tandem with two other top DeCavalcantes puts him in the conversation. Living next door to Caterinicchio adds a more practical angle to the relationship and it's not uncommon to see neighbors post bond for one another. He's worth of including in the discussion particularly in light of the info on his paesan and possible relative Calogero Coniglio.

Ok awesome, that helps a ton with the wife confusion even though it brings up other questions.

Phil Bacino lists Carmelo as his uncle and Carmelo on one record stated Palma Triolo was his wife, the Triolo name seemingly being the source of Phil's stated nephew relation to Carmelo so I assumed it was cut and dry (even though I should know better at this point). Whatever the nature of the connection is, it doesn't seem coincidental that Phil's mother was a Triolo, Carmelo's mother-in-law was a Triolo, and Phil listed Carmelo as his "uncle" indicating they were at least part of an extended clan although it does seem "uncle" was used loosely here and it's not a given that they were related in a meaningful sense. These types of coincidences do of course happen with this stuff, though, and sometimes there is a connection through an entirely different branch of relation.

It does look like the "wives" were all the same woman Corinda Triolo Parinisi, which at least reaffirms a possible Triolo connection to Phil, but then the confusion is why they used Palma Triolo, Phil's mother's name, which is neither Corinda's first name nor her own maiden name and why she was listed as Palma Montalbano on earlier records given that wasn't her first nor maiden name nor her mother's maiden name. He could have falsified his wife's name for shady reasons as you said although I'm not sure how effective this would be given his own identity is pretty clearly and consistently stated and he was the presumed mafioso, not his wife. He also uses his brother Lorenzo's true identity as his arrival contact more than once and Lorenzo was a confirmed mafioso so there was no attempt to hide who he or his brother were.

It's possible the "Palma Triolo" departure contact was mistranscribed as his wife which is known to happen on these records but it's part of a larger clusterfuck of discrepancies related to records of his wife and we can see she used Palma earlier when the Montalbano surname was given which shows it wasn't a one-off. If his departure contact was actually Phil's mother Palma Triolo and it was mistranscribed as "wife" (i.e. maybe he told them it was his a relative of his wife and it got truncated to "wife") it would be interesting in its own right that Phil's mother was his departure contact then two years later he was Phil's arrival contact however I don't think that's the case since we have an instance of her using the name Palma earlier. Also strange she consistently used her mother's surname of Triolo rather than her birth name, the wife apparently using a selection of given names and surnames. Maybe SHE was the mafioso, haha.

If the relation is more distant than I assumed it adds further weight to a possible mafia relationship between him and Bacino, these people all no doubt being ingrained in the Cosa Nostra subculture in Ribera.

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I've never come across any Santinis or Maniglias in these circles in either Ribera or America. Those are good leads, though, and as is typical whenever we find new names I will probably start coming across Santinis and Maniglias left and right now.