George Martorano’s New Cafe
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NJShore4Life
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crazyjoegallo
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
“I’m not saying I was innocent,” said Martorano, the son of the late mobster Raymond “Long John” Martorano. “For three years, I was a weed dealer. But I was never a part of Cosa Nostra. It was my father who was in with those guys. Not me. I was never a ‘made’ man.”NJShore4Life wrote: ↑Fri May 03, 2019 2:00 am https://www.philly.com/business/marijua ... 90216.html
https://gangsterreport.com/the-cowboy-c ... er-murder/
Former Philadelphia mafia figure George (Cowboy) Martorano remains a prime suspect in the 1981 gangland slaying of Greek mobster Steve Bouras and his girlfriend, a murder allegedly ordered by then City of Brotherly Love don Nicodemo (Little Nicky) Scarfo and arranged by Cowboy Martorano’s hoodlum father, according to sources in Pennsylvania law enforcement.
According to FBI records related to the double homicide investigation and sources with intimate knowledge of Philly mob politics of the day, Scarfo assigned the responsibility of coordinating the Bouras hit to Long John Martorano, a Bouras associate, and Long John tasked his son, fledgling drug kingpin and aspiring “made man” Cowboy Martorano, and his bodyguard, Frank (The Suit of Armor) Vadino, with carrying the contract out.
Handsome, ambitious and articulate, Cowboy Martorano was busted in 1982 and subsequently pled guilty to running a 75-million dollar-a-year marijuana, meth, heroin and cocaine ring. Sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in the fall of 1983.
Good for Martorano that changed life but for sure if he wouldn't caught in 1983 he would be made.
Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
"for sure" is exaggerated.
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NJShore4Life
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
I wonder if he holds any grudges or vendettas against Ligambi for ordering his Father’s death. He doesn’t seem to but who knows deep down. South Philly is a small, extremely insular community they are definitely going to run into each other eventually....
Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
I think George knows as well as anybody that his old man was a divisive guy. I always wondered if Joe Crutch wanted to see Long John get popped, he was one of the top guys around the time Long John was clipped and you got to think he held a grudge against him.NJShore4Life wrote: ↑Fri May 03, 2019 1:31 pm I wonder if he holds any grudges or vendettas against Ligambi for ordering his Father’s death. He doesn’t seem to but who knows deep down. South Philly is a small, extremely insular community they are definitely going to run into each other eventually....
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Ivan
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
According to Tommy DelGiorno, Vadino was the guy who actually killed Bouras, while Cowboy Martorano was the guy who yelled "Don't nobody move!" and fired his gun at the ceiling.
My problem is I hate everybody.
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NJShore4Life
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
I was just thinking that the other day too, Joe Crutch was #3 guy at the time and had everyone hanging out at his Coffee Shop at 10th and Moore when Long John was hit. Joe Crutch could have held a huge grudge againstLong John for murdering his Aunt , a woman and asked Ligambi to sanction it ....Chucky wrote: ↑Fri May 03, 2019 2:06 pmI think George knows as well as anybody that his old man was a divisive guy. I always wondered if Joe Crutch wanted to see Long John get popped, he was one of the top guys around the time Long John was clipped and you got to think he held a grudge against him.NJShore4Life wrote: ↑Fri May 03, 2019 1:31 pm I wonder if he holds any grudges or vendettas against Ligambi for ordering his Father’s death. He doesn’t seem to but who knows deep down. South Philly is a small, extremely insular community they are definitely going to run into each other eventually....
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Ivan
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
Here's the article for anyone who can't get past the paywall.
This Philly hustler, once called a ‘drug kingpin’ and spent 30 years in prison, now owns a CBD cafe
Sentenced to life without parole in 1984, Martorano spent more than three decades in a series of “supermax” facilities after pleading guilty to running what prosecutors said was a $75 million-a-year narcotics ring.
The only thing he runs now is a cozy coffee shop, the Hip Hemp Cafe in South Philadelphia, where he serves CBD-infused hot drinks, lollipops, and muffins.
Once described by the FBI as a drug kingpin, Martorano has an empire that is small, but he plans to grow it into a chain of 12 shops down the East Coast from Staten Island to Fort Lauderdale. He currently employs five millennials -- none with an Italian last name, he quipped -- within the 600-square-foot retail space just off South Street. The building, on the 600 block of South Seventh Street, is owned by his sister and brother-in-law, records show.
“I’ve turned my nightmare into something more profound,” said Martorano, 69. “Now look at me. And look at what I’ve done.”
When he was set free, there were only two places in South Philly he said hadn’t changed in the years since he was locked up: His mother’s house on Fitzwater Street, where he lives and takes care of her, and his favorite restaurant, the Saloon, where he’s a regular.
Martorano looks nothing like the Philly street hustler he once was. He exudes warm confidence and a sense of refined style more akin to a tanned and fit Hollywood character actor. He doesn’t deny his past.
“I’m not saying I was innocent,” said Martorano, the son of the late mobster Raymond “Long John” Martorano. “For three years, I was a weed dealer. But I was never a part of Cosa Nostra. It was my father who was in with those guys. Not me. I was never a ‘made’ man.”
As a convicted felon, Martorano is prohibited from selling medical marijuana in Pennsylvania. But that doesn’t prevent him from vending dozens of products infused with a legal cannabis derivative called CBD, or cannabidiol.
“I use it myself. I believe in it,” said Martorano, who prefers to smoke hemp flower high in CBD. “I take it for relaxation. I do so many things now I need to relax.”
A glass display case highlights pre-rolled joints packed with industrial hemp, CBD vape cartridges, CBD creams, and CBD-infused hot sauce. A tall plexiglass canister was filled with smokable hemp flowers that could be easily confused with psychoactive THC-rich marijuana buds.
The Hip Hemp Cafe’s manager, Chris Mendenhall, said that if Pennsylvania ever legalizes marijuana for adult recreational use, the store will be well-poised to serve that market. “I’d have to bail out if that happened,” said Martorano. “But my job is to market this place.”
One of the two smartphones he carries chirped as he recounted his life behind bars. Martorano winced as he pulled the device out of his sport coat pocket and muted the ringer.
“I hadn’t held a cell phone until Oct. 5, 2015, when I was released to my sister in St. Pete,” he said. “Now I’m sentenced to this friggin’ thing. I don’t know what’s worse, life without parole or this ... cell phone.”
“I know while he was in prison he made the best of his time. He wrote books. He taught classes,” said Bill Sweeney, the retired FBI agent who led the investigation that found Martorano guilty of dealing tons of marijuana and tens of thousands of Quaaludes. The agent also videotaped Martorano conspiring in a hotel room to distribute mass quantities of heroin with the Black Mafia in North Philadelphia.
Martorano insists he was only “a weed guy.” He claims the sentencing judge gave the unprecedented term to force him to flip on his father and other mob bosses. He said the feds arrested him at a North Miami hotel and charged him with shipping a literal truckload of cannabis to Philadelphia. “It was only 2,600 pounds of weed, and I wasn’t even there,” he protested.
“It was much more than marijuana,” said Pichini, now legal counsel at Deloitte. "And the evidence supported it. We never had a case with the evidence as strong as that one. We had hours and hours of tape.”
Driven by five-years in solitary confinement, Martorano became a prolific writer. “Every time there was a mob hit in Philadelphia, they threw me in the hole,” he said. During Martorano’s first years inside, during the mid-'80s, gangsters were gunned down routinely on city streets. With so much time on his hands, Martorano penned the first of his hard-boiled novels. He didn’t stop until he had completed 31. Among the titles: Pain Grows a Platinum Rose, Lion Love Last, and The Honey Keeper.
But in prison, his love of storytelling blossomed into a full-time job. He taught creative writing to inmates. Without chalk and a blackboard, he improvised, using a blue bar of soap to write on a prison wall in a room called “the pit,” he said. He discovered a talent for lecturing and created a life-skills class.
“I basically gave birth to a revived federal reentry program, though I never took credit. You always give the credit to the warden," he said with a broad smile. “Only a fool upstages the warden.”
“It was a lifestyle change course," Martorano said. “Teach 'em how to be on time. How to be respectful. How to take care of themselves. I taught them how to talk. I told them to get into sales when they got out. I showed them the way up and out. Gave them hope.”
He was the coordinator of his prison’s suicide prevention program, he said, and was even elected as the first Caucasian to the board of the Coleman Federal Penitentiary’s branch of NAACP. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons said it could not comment on inmate activities.
George Anastasia, retired mob writer for the Inquirer, said Martorano was one of the few figures associated with local organized crime to successfully overcome his past.
“He survived and was able to come back on the other side of this,” said Anastasia. “Georgie’s sane, lucid and productive. It goes to his character that he was able to do all that.”
“Those were the deciding factors that led to my release,” Martorano said. “The staff also wanted me to get out. I can’t thank them enough.”
After he was set free, Martorano was celebrated as a marijuana folk hero. He embarked on a speaking tour. He recorded a well-received TEDx presentation at the University of Pennsylvania on how he became a writer. It has been viewed nearly 400,000 times.
“It’s not about me," he said. "This is all about helping other people. If anything, I want to be known as the Kingpin of Hope. Remember that title: George Martorano, the Kingpin of Hope. That’s who I am now.”
This Philly hustler, once called a ‘drug kingpin’ and spent 30 years in prison, now owns a CBD cafe
Sentenced to life without parole in 1984, Martorano spent more than three decades in a series of “supermax” facilities after pleading guilty to running what prosecutors said was a $75 million-a-year narcotics ring.
The only thing he runs now is a cozy coffee shop, the Hip Hemp Cafe in South Philadelphia, where he serves CBD-infused hot drinks, lollipops, and muffins.
Once described by the FBI as a drug kingpin, Martorano has an empire that is small, but he plans to grow it into a chain of 12 shops down the East Coast from Staten Island to Fort Lauderdale. He currently employs five millennials -- none with an Italian last name, he quipped -- within the 600-square-foot retail space just off South Street. The building, on the 600 block of South Seventh Street, is owned by his sister and brother-in-law, records show.
“I’ve turned my nightmare into something more profound,” said Martorano, 69. “Now look at me. And look at what I’ve done.”
When he was set free, there were only two places in South Philly he said hadn’t changed in the years since he was locked up: His mother’s house on Fitzwater Street, where he lives and takes care of her, and his favorite restaurant, the Saloon, where he’s a regular.
Martorano looks nothing like the Philly street hustler he once was. He exudes warm confidence and a sense of refined style more akin to a tanned and fit Hollywood character actor. He doesn’t deny his past.
“I’m not saying I was innocent,” said Martorano, the son of the late mobster Raymond “Long John” Martorano. “For three years, I was a weed dealer. But I was never a part of Cosa Nostra. It was my father who was in with those guys. Not me. I was never a ‘made’ man.”
As a convicted felon, Martorano is prohibited from selling medical marijuana in Pennsylvania. But that doesn’t prevent him from vending dozens of products infused with a legal cannabis derivative called CBD, or cannabidiol.
“I use it myself. I believe in it,” said Martorano, who prefers to smoke hemp flower high in CBD. “I take it for relaxation. I do so many things now I need to relax.”
A glass display case highlights pre-rolled joints packed with industrial hemp, CBD vape cartridges, CBD creams, and CBD-infused hot sauce. A tall plexiglass canister was filled with smokable hemp flowers that could be easily confused with psychoactive THC-rich marijuana buds.
The Hip Hemp Cafe’s manager, Chris Mendenhall, said that if Pennsylvania ever legalizes marijuana for adult recreational use, the store will be well-poised to serve that market. “I’d have to bail out if that happened,” said Martorano. “But my job is to market this place.”
One of the two smartphones he carries chirped as he recounted his life behind bars. Martorano winced as he pulled the device out of his sport coat pocket and muted the ringer.
“I hadn’t held a cell phone until Oct. 5, 2015, when I was released to my sister in St. Pete,” he said. “Now I’m sentenced to this friggin’ thing. I don’t know what’s worse, life without parole or this ... cell phone.”
“I know while he was in prison he made the best of his time. He wrote books. He taught classes,” said Bill Sweeney, the retired FBI agent who led the investigation that found Martorano guilty of dealing tons of marijuana and tens of thousands of Quaaludes. The agent also videotaped Martorano conspiring in a hotel room to distribute mass quantities of heroin with the Black Mafia in North Philadelphia.
Martorano insists he was only “a weed guy.” He claims the sentencing judge gave the unprecedented term to force him to flip on his father and other mob bosses. He said the feds arrested him at a North Miami hotel and charged him with shipping a literal truckload of cannabis to Philadelphia. “It was only 2,600 pounds of weed, and I wasn’t even there,” he protested.
“It was much more than marijuana,” said Pichini, now legal counsel at Deloitte. "And the evidence supported it. We never had a case with the evidence as strong as that one. We had hours and hours of tape.”
Driven by five-years in solitary confinement, Martorano became a prolific writer. “Every time there was a mob hit in Philadelphia, they threw me in the hole,” he said. During Martorano’s first years inside, during the mid-'80s, gangsters were gunned down routinely on city streets. With so much time on his hands, Martorano penned the first of his hard-boiled novels. He didn’t stop until he had completed 31. Among the titles: Pain Grows a Platinum Rose, Lion Love Last, and The Honey Keeper.
But in prison, his love of storytelling blossomed into a full-time job. He taught creative writing to inmates. Without chalk and a blackboard, he improvised, using a blue bar of soap to write on a prison wall in a room called “the pit,” he said. He discovered a talent for lecturing and created a life-skills class.
“I basically gave birth to a revived federal reentry program, though I never took credit. You always give the credit to the warden," he said with a broad smile. “Only a fool upstages the warden.”
“It was a lifestyle change course," Martorano said. “Teach 'em how to be on time. How to be respectful. How to take care of themselves. I taught them how to talk. I told them to get into sales when they got out. I showed them the way up and out. Gave them hope.”
He was the coordinator of his prison’s suicide prevention program, he said, and was even elected as the first Caucasian to the board of the Coleman Federal Penitentiary’s branch of NAACP. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons said it could not comment on inmate activities.
George Anastasia, retired mob writer for the Inquirer, said Martorano was one of the few figures associated with local organized crime to successfully overcome his past.
“He survived and was able to come back on the other side of this,” said Anastasia. “Georgie’s sane, lucid and productive. It goes to his character that he was able to do all that.”
“Those were the deciding factors that led to my release,” Martorano said. “The staff also wanted me to get out. I can’t thank them enough.”
After he was set free, Martorano was celebrated as a marijuana folk hero. He embarked on a speaking tour. He recorded a well-received TEDx presentation at the University of Pennsylvania on how he became a writer. It has been viewed nearly 400,000 times.
“It’s not about me," he said. "This is all about helping other people. If anything, I want to be known as the Kingpin of Hope. Remember that title: George Martorano, the Kingpin of Hope. That’s who I am now.”
My problem is I hate everybody.
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Fughedaboutit
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
Not really, the people they were making at the time, who his father was...not that far fetched or exaggerated.
"I wanna hear some noise." "Tell Salvie to clean the boat, the whole boat top to bottom" -Nicodemo "Nicky" Scarfo Sr"
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crazyjoegallo
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
Not really. In the the 1980s and especially with Scarfo you must "make your bones" to be made.
I think also that Martorano know that his father was a true gangster and was killed because wanted more after made long time in jail. If George is smart would stay away from the mobsters and run his cafè.
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SonnyBlackstein
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Re: George Martorano’s New Cafe
He plead guilty and got life. For a non violent offence. What the fuck were they going to give him if he went to trial? The death penalty 
.
He got fucked.
.He got fucked.
Don't give me your f***ing Manson lamps.