Good discussion of the Accardo comment. We've probably talked about it before, but I have the same reading. The distancing and dismissive language: "they" and "the Jew". He wasn't "Meyer", though presumably Accardo had known and met him as an individual. He was a token, "the Jew".B. wrote: ↑Mon Dec 11, 2023 10:38 pm Though his tirade was antisemitic, it's clear in the transcript that Fischetti was also upset about the protocol violation of Coppola wanting to use his associate as a middleman when handling an issue with a fellow made member. That Eder was Jewish really brought the rage out of Fischetti but some of Fischetti's statements indicate that organizational protocol was at play too.
Good point about the Accardo quote. I always read it as dismissive or disparaging as well. I actually had an unfinished post about that quote that I might as well include here:
Unfortunately, we haven't seen this comment in its original context, unlike the Fischetti thing. And the Fischetti/Cerone bug is very interesting, on several counts. As you note, the issue at hand isn't really Rocky Fish's own personal bigotry, but rather, how this intersected with protocol issues. Fischetti probably wasn't any more or less anti-semitic than other guys of his generation; the "Christ killer" stuff was boilerplate/standard for Italians and other Catholics back in the day. Rocky's issue was that he felt that Coppola was giving his Jewish associates too much power in Miami and privileging them at the sake of fellow members.
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The Fischetti transcript is worth going into in some detail, as it provides one of the few glimpses we get into some of these things from Chicago's perspective. It also sheds some light on Rocky Fish himself, who, despite his well-known name is someone that we have little personal insight into.
The conversation was between Rocky Fish and Jack Cerone and was recorded in 1962 by an FBI bug in Miami. An UNSUB named "Joe" is noted as present, but at least in the transcript we have, he doesn't speak (probably Joe Fischetti, but could just as well be any number of other Joes). A TV is playing loudly in the background, rendering some parts of the conversation unintelligible.
Fischetti launches into an account of a beef that he had with Mike Coppola ~1959, revolving around concerns that Coppola was cheating Rocky's brother Joe Fischetti out of income owed to him from the Fontainebleau Hotel in Miami Beach, and that, specifically Coppola had put his associate Max "Maxie Raymond" Eder in charge of gambling proceeds from the hotel.
- FISCHETTI: "My kid brother, JOEY, he was supposed to get a piece of the card room, he was bringing in all these acts [...] the setup was made so they got a piece of him out of the salary he gets at the door [...] when they had FRANK SINATRA, DEAN MARTIN, he got them in [...]"
- The Fontainebleau Hotel was opened in 1954 by Jewish-NYC hotelier and developer Ben Novack on the site of the former estate of tire magnate Harvey Firestone, and controlled by Genovese members Jimmy Alo and Mike Coppola. Joe Fischetti was very close to Sinatra and was asked by the Genovese guys to get Sinatra and other acts to perform at the Hotel when it opened. In return, Joey Fish was supposed to get a cut from "the door" of the take from the card room that guys with Eder were operating in the hotel.
- Rocky notes that Joey Fish upheld his end of the bargain and the hotel quickly became a major success. But apparently, Joey Fish thought that he was getting cheated by Coppola and his guys, and complained to Phil Alderisio, who told him to talk to his brother Rocky about it.
- FISCHETTI: "I know MIKEY, I know him for years, from the old school, in New York, he carries a lot of weight...I know I ain't going to get the best of the deal by buttin head and head [...] because it would be his word or my word [...] and he's going to say - 'We ain't making any money ROCK, don't you believe me?'... and if a guy throws it up to you, you gotta take his word for it"
- Giancana talks to his fellow Commission members and sets up a meeting at the Eden Roc Hotel in Miami Beach.
- The meeting is attended by Rocky and Joey Fish, Giancana, Coppola, Jerry Catena, Tommy Lucchese, Carlo Gambino, and Accardo.
- Catena recounts that Coppola indeed asked Joey Fish to get Sinatra and other acts to perform at the Fontainebleau to ensure that the venture would be a success and notes also that Joey Fish upheld his end of the deal.
- Coppola tries to talk and Rocky interjects "but you guys are muscling him out of a salary, whoever heard of that?"
- Giancana asks Rocky "What do you want to do?", to which Rocky replies "I want to do this -- JOEY's got the door by himself, and he's got to deal directly with the boss"
- Rocky then tells Cerone that "MIKEY COPPOLA had a guy in between him [...] when JOEY had to do something he had to see MAXIE RAYMOND because MAXIE RAYMOND used to say 'I'm Mikey Coppola'".
- Rocky notes that in order to get paid or deal with any issues, Joey had to go to Eder instead of dealing directly with Coppola, with Eder entrusted to divide the proceeds from the door/card room and give Joey his cut.
- FISCHETTI: "I says MAXIE RAYMOND got to be out of the picture, what are we getting to be, the same like in Vegas where we're going to have these Christ killers over there to tell us what to do? I says what the hell, we might as well fold up [.] I says MIKEY [...] I don't want this beef, he's one of us, one of our brothers, I said I want it off those Christ killers [.]"
- While Rocky and elder brother Charlie Fischetti were confirmed as Chicago members, some questions have remained (at least for me) as to whether it could be confirmed that Joe Fischetti was in fact made. The bolded part would confirm it for me.
- Coppola than replies "[G]ive me till tomorrow morning [...]"
- To which Rocky says that Giancana replied "[W]hat's to think about? You say you can't handle it, then you can't handle it [...] I know how to handle those (obscene) Jews [...] I'll put them up against a stake and fry em [...] you're important, you can't run Jews..."
- Coppola then replied, "MOONEY give me till tomorrow morning, what the hell..."
- At this point a "TODDO (ph) broke in and he says 'all right, please give him till tomorrow morning'[.]"
- Fischetti hadn't noted anyone named Salvatore present at the meeting. Maybe Todo Del Duca was there? We know that Del Duca had ties to Chicago, and died in Miami in 1960, so this seems plausible.
- FISCHETTI: "[W]e're in the back and we're drinking, [...] JOEY comes back, he says 'Jesus Christ, what do you think happened to me, MIKEY COPPOLA is outside here, he's got MAXIE RAYMOND with him [.]
- FISCHETTI: "[T]hey called me over because when JERRY LEWIS was making a picture there, JERRY LEWIS had JOEY on the payroll [...] They found out about it, they want a piece of what he got. So I says to JOEY, well, I'll go talk to them. This is two o'clock in the morning [...] I says, what's wrong MIKEY? He says, 'well, MAXIE RAYMOND was telling me that JOEY got five thousand dollars from a picture. I says, that's right. And then he said 'well, he didn't tell MAXIE RAYMOND'. I said he didn't tell MAXIE RAYMOND, huh, then I hit him --- poom --- and I kicked him in the (obscene) and MIKEY COPPOLA says, 'what are you doing, blowing your stack?" I says, I'm blowing my top, but these Christ killers, I got to talk to a Christ killer? I says, I got respect for you, MIKEY, but not for this guy, then boom, I hit him again and he's moaning and running away. Now, he don't know that MOE is still here, he thinks MOE has left [...]
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Hard to tell if Rocky was saying that he hit Coppola or Eder, though the way it reads, it does sound like the former. To underscore how serious this was, Fischetti is telling Chicago captain Cerone that he assaulted either a (highly feared) Genovese captain or a top associate direct with this captain, because he blew his stack at Coppola putting the Jewish Eder before fellow members of the mafia organization. And the Giancana comment about "how to handle those [fuckin] Jews" speaks for itself.
Again, there is no reason at all to think that Chicago's attitudes about these things fundamentally changed when Aiuppa or Carlisi took power.
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The account also provided good evidence that Rocky Fischetti was a capodecina, at least as of 1959. He was able to call for a sit down with Coppola, a Genovese capodecina, attended by Chicago's rappresentante and consigliere along with the acting boss of the Genovese Family and the bosses of the Gambino and Lucchese Families (along with, probably, Genovese capodecina Generoso Del Duca). Further, he invokes his kid brother Joey's membership and would seem to have been representing Joey at the sit-down, so Joey Fischetti was probably assigned to Rocky.
In July of 1965, a still unknown Chicago CI (the one who referred to 'the outfit" as having been called "amafa" (phonetic) and capidecine as "capitanos" (phonetic)) in Teets Battaglia's file claimed that Chicago member Rocco "Bobby Dore" Salvatore was assigned to a "new guy" who had been "recently appointed because the former lieutenant died of a heart attack some months ago". Rocky Fischetti, of course, died of a heart attack in 1964 while visiting relatives on Long Island.
As a reminder, Milwaukee member CI Augie Maniaci also told us that when Milwaukee had its leadership crisis ~1952, the conflict was mediated by a Choicago panel including Accardo (who was then the rappresentante), Giancana (presumably the Underboss), and Rocky Fischetti.
Now, we generally believe that Rocco Salvatore was assigned to Battaglia ut we also believe that Battaglia was already a captain before Rocky Fish's death in 1964. Either: a) Battaglia wasn't promoted to captain until 1964; b) Rocco Salvatore was actually assigned to someone else and not Battaglia; C) after Fischetti's death his crew was split between other captains, or d) the CI was wrong about Salvatore having reported to Fischetti. Option "b" seems the least likely, as we know that at least by 1966 Salvatore was described as the driver and "close confidant" of Battaglia.
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Some other interesting points from the Fischetti/Cerone transcript.
Fischetti was discussing old events with Cerone, unrelated to the Coppola beef.
- FISCHETTI: Trenton, New Jersey [...] LITLE AUGIE was alive, they were scared of me and another young kid...TONY GOEBELS....because they hear that only the youngsters were doing all the work, the oldtimers now and we were the only young kids out, so now there was STRONGY and HOWIE and CAPUCHI [ph) this is when it first started, all the trouble"
- "Strongy" was, of course, Frank Ferraro. "Capuchi" was probably Tony Capezio. Offhand, not sure who "Howie" could have been.
- CERONE: "LITTLE AUGIE would have been a big man, only thing was he was too ignorant, he didn't know enough."
- FISCHETTI: "He used to make them by the thousands overnight...overnight, that's the trouble in New York, too many factions." (emphasis in original)
- Cerone and Fischetti clearly discussing Genovese captain Anthony "Little Augie Pisano" Carfagno, who took over the former Yale decina in Brooklyn. Capone and the Fischettis were presumably associates of the Yale decina originally, and it's possible that Capone took over this decina when he became a Masseria captain, with Carfagno either taking part of the crew or taking it over after Capone was made boss of the Chicago Family.
- Fischetti also noting that NYC made too many guys, which caused problems, a point that NYC-area leaders like Angelo DeCarlo and Joe Colombo also made about their own Families vis-a-vis Chicago.
- CERONE: "In Chicago, I was around 13 years before...look how long you were around me..."
- FISCHETTI: "You should have come to me..."
- CERONE: "ROCKY, I didn't know who you were connected with..." (inaudible)
- Cerone apparently noting that he was an associate for 13 years before he was made (much like Nick Calabrese decades later). Rocky seems to have been telling him that if Cerone had been with him, he would've been made earlier.
