Buffalo/Ontario Mob Acitivity

[NickleCity]

and blowing it out of proportion - while ignoring what law enforcement has said.

And one more quick observation: I'm not ignoring LE. I recognize that they are imperfect and have their own presupposition/biases which can affect their work and the stated outcomes to some extent or another. An extreme example: Bongiovanni himself.

[Wiseguy]

Time will prove I am right.

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[B.]

Nickle -- I appreciate the research you've done into Buffalo and I often find that you're a few steps ahead of me as I look into names and places, past and present. You are obviously of the opinion that there is an active Buffalo family of some kind, which there are conflicting sources on to say the least, and you conduct yourself reasonably and logically regardless of the different conclusions or non-conclusions various people and sources have come to. Please continue to do exactly what you've been doing, as it has produced a lot of great discussion and shown if nothing else certain relationships have persisted in Buffalo / NF no matter what the big picture is.

[TommyGambino]

What B said, keep up the good work

[B.]

More on Sam Bongiovanni:

- Business agent for Local 210 in the 1940s.
- Married to a DiCarlo.

So if Sam Bongiovanni is an ancestor of Gerard and Joseph, he was right in the middle of things during his era. Business agent is one of the most influential labor positions, this during a time when the local mafia dominated the local. Certainly could be a candidate for one of the 125 members at Buffalo's peak, most of whom went unidentified by the FBI.

Good info and nice connection! Thanks B.

An elderly relative of Gerard and Carlo Bongiovanni named Salvatore "Sam" Bongiovanni moved from Buffalo to Las Vegas as well, where he died in 1999. Not sure how he connects to the 210 business agent, or if it could be the same guy even, but the name is there.

[antimafia]

I think he’s an Italian biker type

His Facebook friends include Frank "Cisco" Lenti (longtime Woodbridge biker who's a convicted murderer), Vivian Risi (real-estate superwoman who is Cosimo Commisso's wife), and a couple of Commissos who are related to the murdered Cosimo Ernesto Commisso.

Yep, frank lenti likes his pics on Facebook lol. I winder if this was business or a more personal beef that caused this.

‘Tony Scratch,’ killed in daylight shooting near Sherway Gardens, was longtime organized crime figure, sources say
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2019/1 ... s-say.html

Man slain near Sherway Gardens was 'Mob enforcer': Sources

https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/ ... etobicoke/

[antimafia]

^^^^
Victim of Toronto daylight mall shooting was a veteran mobster linked to one of Canada's most powerful Mafia clans

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/an ... -shooting/

[antimafia]

^^^^
From the Toronto Police Service Homicide webpage:

http://www.torontopolice.on.ca/homicide/case/61/2019#

[TommyNoto]

I have no idea and could care less but I would agree with you those families are done. Just a guess , same as you

I can only go by what the Feds say in the indictment , members / associates in Western District of NY. If this was the only incident of Buffalo activity then I would agree with you but as NC and B have shown this is one of many busts involving direct relatives of old Buffalo mobsters. Putting 1000 kilos into streets of Western NY, gambling records, guns, explosives, DEA agents, wiretaps, an undercover LE poster here.

As B said to treat paying a DEA with mob ties agent $250k plus all the recent Buffalo drug busts, all relatives of buffalo members as nothing is just ignoring evidence from legit LE agencies. It does seem though that the Feds are into them now and as Kennedy said this investigation isn’t done. Things are getting interesting that’s for sure

but it doesn’t matter what the Feds say at this point , you chose your team so let’s just agree to disagree and move on with our lives .

Reading your posts, it's apparent that you really haven't looked at these cases in depth. You've just glanced over them and then ran with it.

You can look at all the Buffalo cases before the 2017 drug bust (an anomaly) and after. What they show is the same small, disjointed residual activity from remnants of a family that we've seen in other cities.

And my god, if you really believe the Buffalo mob is moving thousands of kilos into Western New York, there really is nothing left to say to you.

Speaking of few coincidences and social circles. The day before the Bongiovanni story broke a local funeral director named Charles Durante was found collapsed in the middle of an Amherst road outside the funeral home. LE tabled the death "suspicious." When you check Durante's facebook friends they
are numerous surnames associated with the Buffalo crime family. I know this is a leap in logic. I'm just saying this is something to keep an eye on and look into. And let me preempt Pogo and Wiseguy... My proverbial tin-foil hat is on.

https://buffalonews.com/2019/11/04/amhe ... d-in-road/

You're a nice guy, NickleCity, but this is honestly how I picture you.

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I have no idea their strength ( and neither do you ) but I tend to agree with you that they are fairly smaller crew however I am keeping an open mind with this new info about Major DEA corruption plus now an FBI corruption probe into Buffalo. I would not be shocked if Buffalo govt agents on the mob payroll resulted in Buffalo becoming a larger drug wholesaler in more recent times ( possibly/ likely in partnership with Canada and Bonnanos ) due to this long term Govt protection. I find Porkys visit to Buffalo to speak with Buffalo mobsters significant as well as the allegation of Genovese family ok the UB ( I would need more evidence of the Genovese part tho to consider that fact ). If anyone has more info on this please share .

I have no idea the structure or who is actually running the show ( RCMP referencing Todaro family is very interesting ) but based on the uptick of all these major drug/ gun busts that I’m about 99% certain there is IOC activity in Buffalo. I do think Violi was largely speaking the truth on those tapes (he probably exacerbated the 30 made men statement but again who knows.)

Please don’t belittle me about my knowledge and that is my issue with you , talking down to people on a subject area you have very little knowledge about yourself. My job does involve legal defense vs DOJ criminal actions and who largely does the investigative work that leads to allegations made in the indictment, it’s very hard for me to believe that the FBI wasnt the driving agency ( plus DEA ) in declaring the defendant worked with IOC IN Western NY. This indictment brought me to the 99% confidence level about active IOC activity in Buffalo. Especially FBI SAI at the PC ( if their was material disagreement with DOJ indictment language he likely would not of been there to address any investigation questions ).

RCMP, wiretaps , drug/ gun busts, corrupt govt agent (s) on
Mob payroll, undercover agents/ CIs, visits from NY mob admin rep(s) and now finally the DOJ indictment ( includes their investigative agencies FBI/ DEA) stating IOC IN Western NY is the icing on the cake for me and probably most unbiased observers.

[NickleCity]

Man slain near Sherway Gardens was 'Mob enforcer': Sources

https://torontosun.com/news/local-news/ ... etobicoke/

From the article: “Tony was well-known in TOC (Traditional Organized Crime) as Scratch,” the source said. “He is/was an enforcer for Joe Violi and linked directly to the Calabrian Commisso family.”

Does this mean he was an enforcer for the Luppino family (Joe Violi) and part of the Commisso family? Does Buffalo fit into this equation because of the Violi/Luppino connection?

Also, on February 21, 2016 Bongiovanni attended a party in Toronto with Coconspirator 2 and with “friends and associates involved with possession, use, and distribution of cocaine.” The Commisso’s are in Toronto and some are related to the Luppinos according to the Luppino family tree.

Luppino Family Tree with Todaro Connection.jpg

[NickleCity]

^^^^^^

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[B.]

Excellent find, re: Bongiovanni. That he endorsed drug activity and socialized with drug traffickers on both sides of the border opens up some possibilities. Hopefully some names surface.

About the Commissions and Luppinos, re: "Scratch":

- If Joe Violi had business partnerships with the Commissos, an associate could be on record with one or the other but serve as enforcer for those joint businesses and be "linked" to both. This has commonly happened even in NYC and it doesn't mean the associate belongs to both groups, but is rather looking after the interests of joint operations his superior has with another group. But, as I often say, Canadian LE has what appears to be a 1950s FBN analysis of affiliation, i.e. groups/"families" are publicly described according to their associations and operations and not their formal affiliation.

- The Commissos are an 'ndrangheta-linked group, like the Luppinos, but we know that the Luppinos going back to the patriarch Giacomo are Buffalo members and Giacomo appears to have also been an 'ndranghetesi. Sicilian Cosa Nostra membership requires a transfer to join another Cosa Nostra group in the US because they are the same paret organization, but it appears that 'ndrangheta/Camorra members can be made into Cosa Nostra without a transfer and have something resembling dual membership, as they are not recognized as "the same thing."

- If not "dual membership", could it be, too, that some of the Commissos are members of the Buffalo-Ontario group, while others have membership only in the 'ndrangheta? This appears to be the case with some of the Sicilian clans in Montreal and NYC, where certain relatives had membership in the local group and others retained membership with their Sicilian family (Caruana-Cuntrera and Gambino brothers being examples).

- The indication of kinship between the Luppinos and Commissos could tell us a lot about shared affiliation, or at least cooperation. Kinship is one of the greatest indicators of shared mafia affiliation past, present, and dare I say future. And of course, kinship doesn't stop kin from killing kin.

[FriendofHenry]

Maybe a little chuckle along the way?

The Buffalo Bills are playing the Cleveland Browns in Cleveland this Sunday. Cleveland Sports Talk is telling Browns Season Ticket holders not to sell their tickets to Bills fans and let the "Buffalo Mafia" to over-take the Stadium

[Wiseguy]

I have no idea their strength ( and neither do you ) but I tend to agree with you that they are fairly smaller crew however I am keeping an open mind with this new info about Major DEA corruption plus now an FBI corruption probe into Buffalo. I would not be shocked if Buffalo govt agents on the mob payroll resulted in Buffalo becoming a larger drug wholesaler in more recent times ( possibly/ likely in partnership with Canada and Bonnanos ) due to this long term Govt protection. I find Porkys visit to Buffalo to speak with Buffalo mobsters significant as well as the allegation of Genovese family ok the UB ( I would need more evidence of the Genovese part tho to consider that fact ). If anyone has more info on this please share .

I have no idea the structure or who is actually running the show ( RCMP referencing Todaro family is very interesting ) but based on the uptick of all these major drug/ gun busts that I’m about 99% certain there is IOC activity in Buffalo. I do think Violi was largely speaking the truth on those tapes (he probably exacerbated the 30 made men statement but again who knows.)

Please don’t belittle me about my knowledge and that is my issue with you , talking down to people on a subject area you have very little knowledge about yourself. My job does involve legal defense vs DOJ criminal actions and who largely does the investigative work that leads to allegations made in the indictment, it’s very hard for me to believe that the FBI wasnt the driving agency ( plus DEA ) in declaring the defendant worked with IOC IN Western NY. This indictment brought me to the 99% confidence level about active IOC activity in Buffalo. Especially FBI SAI at the PC ( if their was material disagreement with DOJ indictment language he likely would not of been there to address any investigation questions ).

RCMP, wiretaps , drug/ gun busts, corrupt govt agent (s) on
Mob payroll, undercover agents/ CIs, visits from NY mob admin rep(s) and now finally the DOJ indictment ( includes their investigative agencies FBI/ DEA) stating IOC IN Western NY is the icing on the cake for me and probably most unbiased observers.

That's just it, you are biased. You'd have to be, or just breathtakingly ignorant, to believe what's left of the Buffalo mob has become a major wholesaler of drugs in western New York. Read any recent DEA National Drug Threat Assessment or HITDA report. The remnants of the Buffalo mob are barely a blip on the radar when it comes to drug trafficking. And anything else really.

Look at your above post to see how much you embellish things. One former DEA agent charged you refer to as "major DEA corruption." And, while we don't even know who he was taking bribes from, you're happy to assume to was the Buffalo mob. You hear some vague reference about the FBI investigating corruption and your imagination starts running wild. You talk about "all these major gun and drug busts." There's been one bust involving Buffalo that could be called significant and it was an anomaly. In fact that drug bust, which wasn't that big, has really been the only significant case involving Buffalo in over 20 years. And it was guys in Canada.

Active IOC members doesn't equate to a formally, structured family. There were technically active IOC members in the 2010 Kansas City gambling bust but that doesn't mean there's a family left there. I've got a newsflash for you. The significant IOC activity not in Buffalo. It's in Canada, some of which naturally crosses the border into upper New York state. But that doesn't stop some of you guys from taking liberties in tying it to Buffalo, if even by the loosest of connections.

[SonnyBlackstein]

I do love the ‘loosest of connections’. The self admitted underboss of the, self admitted Buffalo family (all on tape? If I recall correctly?), is a at best a ‘loose’ connection?
What’s a firm connection?

You make a good argument WG. But it carries better weight when you use evidence to depose contentions. Not mud.
Serves you better.