Boss Earnings

[JCB1977]

Not sure where you are getting millions from. His own testimony says he was only getting 500 bucks to 2 grand a month from his top Capos. When he flipped he only had something like 10 million in cash and assets and that was after being boss for 13 years, UnderBoss for the 8 years before that and a top Capo for the 5 years before that. So it's clear he was not pulling in millions a year.


Pogo

That’s crazy. Lenny Strollo in Youngstown, OH had $6 million in real estate assets alone with another $12 million in cash that was recovered by the Feds and he was just a Capo. They let him keep all of it after he agreed to testify. Mike Genovese, boss of Pittsburgh, made a $25 million deposit into Swiss Banks in 1992 through money launderer Vic Calautti. Smaller family bosses had a much bigger piece of the pie than NY bosses not having to share territory.

HOLY FUCKIN SHIT! 25 million in 1992 dollars? I had no idea that even the boss of a small family would have dough like that. I wonder what a guy like Buffalino was worth then?

I find it completely baffling that they would let this Strollo keep his entire bankroll like that. I think Massino got to keep a couple properties but they made him hand over all the cash and gold bars. They must have really wanted Strollo"s testimony if they would give him a sweetheart deal like that. Christ, is that the best deal that a rat ever got? I don't know how much time he got or how many murders he copped to, but letting him just keep 12 mill cash plus all his real estate is huge. Did Sammy Bull get to keep any dough as a part of his generous deal? I'm sure Sammy made a lot more than what Massino is claiming here, just based on all that money from the 80s construction boom alone not to mention all his other illicit revenue streams.

Think about it....As far as Pittsburgh is concerned, they controlled all of Western Pennsylvania, Northeast Ohio, the entire panhandle of West Virginia and parts of Western NY. That is a huge geographic territory with NO COMPETITION. Point is, they didn't have to compete with other families. It's like they said in the movie Donnie Brasco, 5000 wiseguys chasing the same nickel in NYC. Pittsburgh had the unions, gambling, casinos, extortion, loansharking and by the mid 1980's after the old man John LaRocca and Gabriel Mannarino died, Genovese aggressively pursued narcotics trafficking. The Pittsburgh connection from Goodfellas was Paul Mazzei and Chucky Porter and they were moving a ton of blow in conjunction with Ramon Sosa, a Cuban National in Miami, FL. Plus, Mike Genovese laundered tens of millions over the years into commercial real estate in the Pittsburgh area through two crooked democratic ward bosses. His son just recently sold about $8 million in commercial real estate that his father purchased and put into a private trust. The real estate was not in the best section of town but a developer bought it to turn into apartments and condos.

The New York metro area has 5 families because it can support that many. Past or present, there is more money there than anywhere else. Most other cities were cow towns comparably.

Of course you will turn this into an argument. No surprise. Yes, NY could support 5 families. But smaller city bosses made just as much if not more. Same rackets, unions, etc. But show some numbers.

[JCB1977]

@Wiseguy

Big fish in smaller ponds did financially just as well. I made an example of how smaller families were dealing with staggering amounts of cash. You are typically fixated on big cities. Plus, bosses of smaller cities didn't have to cut up the cash with as many people. Less money to go around meant bigger cuts for the bosses and Capos.

[Wiseguy]

@Wiseguy

Big fish in smaller ponds did financially just as well. I made an example of how smaller families were dealing with staggering amounts of cash. You are typically fixated on big cities. Plus, bosses of smaller cities didn't have to cut up the cash with as many people. Less money to go around meant bigger cuts for the bosses and Capos.

You can't make blanket statements like "smaller bosses made just as much if not more." You have to look at each boss individually. And good luck coming up with legit, verifiable figures. You also have to take the era into account when making comparisons.

[scagghiuni]

That said, I'm kind of skeptical of some of the figures given even for the big drug guys, like the $30 billion net worth you hear attributed to Pablo Escobar.

A better example - with real figures - would be when the Rodriguez Orejuela brothers of the Cali cartel were prosecuted by the U.S., who estimated their worth at about $2 billion.

escobar and el chapo were probably worth 2 billions, drug money estimates are highly inflated by media, a street pusher earns very little, the wholesale suppliers earn more but less than one could think

2 billion is already an enormous amount. Why people always feel the need to exaggerate everything beats me.

it is not so difficult to understand that if a kilo of cocaine costs 30,000 euros on the wholesale market, the entire world production is not worth more than 30 billions

[FriendofHenry]

No evidence of Strollo being tied to any drugs, that was Naples' thing.

Yeah I've never heard anything about Strollo being into drugs at all. He would have admitted it too as he admitted to everything.

Though for whatever it's worth, towards the end from what I understand much (most?) of his gambling customers were black drug dealers because they were the only ones living in the core city of Youngstown who had any money.

IMO staying away from drugs was the only honorable thing Lenny did. After the mills closed there was a void in the gambling customer base especially at The All American Club. It was considered the highest volume casino out side of Atlantic City and Vegas. The club was run by Bernie the Jew and he went out and recruited the black drug dealers as customers. Free high line liquor, food and whores available for these high dollar customers. Barbooth was the high rollers game of choice and the table had electric magnets and the house hardly ever lost only when they didn't use their loaded dice. Yes, Bernie and Lenny grew up together and Lenny hired Bernie to wack Ernie Biondillo. Then Lenny ratted Bernie out and got his freedom, keep all his cash, and real. Henry always said that Bernie was doing life on the installment plan and this was it

[SonnyBlackstein]

That is not accurate. It has been documented that Vincent Gigante did not take tribute from every Capo in his family. As an example Arilotta just talked about how the Springfield Crew did not send tribute to NY. We also have other informant terimony that for years the Montreal Crew did pay any tribute either. So that is at least two families were we have confirmation that not every Captain was required to pay tribute.
If we want to outside NY we have the example of Harry Riccobene not being required to pay tribute to Angelo Bruno except for a Christmas tribute.

I was waiting for someone to raise the Genovese example . I’m highly suspicious of this claim, would like to know the source and suspect there is misinterpretation involved. That there may have been the odd Capo whom, for whatever reason, did not pay monthly or regular tribute I can understand, but that I would suggest would be an exception, and an uncommon one which I think has been overblown.

Look at this logically, what is the primary function of a mafia family? To quote Tony Soprano “This is a business” and the structure of a family is such that it’s a pyramid. It would be as nonsensical for Capo’s not to kick up as standard practice as soldiers not kicking up. It’s antithetical to the principle and structure of the model itself.

Of course there are exceptions but the mafia is a business, these are greedy fucks, the structure of the model contradicts this as common practice, Massino is a liar (refer his Sonny Black was making a move for boss garbage) and Massino has huge motivation (he understates his income, the less can be seized in forfeiture) to lie.

So, I think Massino = Bull. Shit.

[Confederate]

Al Capone was the most wealthy and the whole gross income for his entire organization in his biggest year was $105 million, meaning that ne netted about $5 million in 1927 dollars before taxes.

$5 million in 1927 dollars is roughly $100 million in today's money, just for comparison.

I think Meyer Lansky might have been telling the truth - or close to it - when he said "I wish I had a million" when someone asked him if he had $300 million.

I actually used the inflation calculator and $5 million in 1927 would be about $72.5 million in 2020. Not bad.

Dollar numbers about gangsters are some of the biggest gross exaggerations I have ever seen & have no "business" sense to them. lol
Capone, for example, had cost of goods, payroll, payoffs to Police, losses from the Feds raiding him sometimes, percentages to partners etc.
Even after that, the guy was extremely successful & lucky not to have been killed.

Cool, thanks for that. Completely forgot about the inflation calculator.

You're right about gangster earnings. The moderately successful ones get to be upper-middle class; the absolute most successful get to be low-level millionaires. Being a gangster isn't about getting rich; it's about getting to live a comfortable middle-class lifestyle without having to do a 9 to 5 job. Very few people realize this and think "getting rich" is what being a gangster is all about. You can get low-level rich being a gangster, but that's not the main point.

I think the situation in Canada is quite different since drugs is their bread and butter. Only the gangsters who are major drug dealers make tens of millions if not more. The Rizzuto family may be worth as much as 100 million.

Then you’re forgetting about Moe Dalitz from the Mayfield Road Mob in Cleveland, he was worth over $300 million when he died after planting his flag in Vegas. He was arguably the wealthiest gangster of all time with no narcotics trafficking

Moe Dalitz was a very powerful successful gangster. Everybody agrees. However, that being said, there is no verifiable accurate information out there that he "personally" was worth that kind of money. He had "many" partners. When these guys die, the other partners take their share. That's why their wives end up with very little. Sounds like a huge gross exaggeration same as Meyer Lansky, Al Capone, etc. etc. It's all unverifiable with many unanswered questions. No doubt that those guys were all very rich & powerful. Not saying otherwise. Just that the figures thrown around about them become bigger & bigger as time goes by with the legend.

[JCB1977]

@Wiseguy

Big fish in smaller ponds did financially just as well. I made an example of how smaller families were dealing with staggering amounts of cash. You are typically fixated on big cities. Plus, bosses of smaller cities didn't have to cut up the cash with as many people. Less money to go around meant bigger cuts for the bosses and Capos.

You can't make blanket statements like "smaller bosses made just as much if not more." You have to look at each boss individually. And good luck coming up with legit, verifiable figures. You also have to take the era into account when making comparisons.

I'll re-phrase- "Some" smaller crime family bosses made just as much. Gravano stated in his interview with Diane Sawyer that Gotti was making roughly anywhere between $5-$20 million per year and that Gravano was making a couple million per year. The Gambinos had 21 Captains according to Sammy in his interview, which was quite a few people to cut up the money with. In 1990, when the FBI raided an illegal casino in Youngstown, OH called the All American Club, the FBI said it was the largest casino operation outside AC and Vegas. It provided $20 million per year to Pittsburgh. Mike Genovese had roughly 4 Captains in 1990. The money from the casino operation that was operating for more than two decades without interruption generated a ton of cash let alone narcotics, other gambling, unions, loansharking etc. We're not talking about huge differences in annual revenue from this very small sample. Al Polizzi from Cleveland built a $100 million dollar fortune running Cleveland in the 1940's and 1950's before retiring down to Miami and starting a construction company. My point is just because somebody comes from a bigger city doesn't necessarily make them more wealthy. Add in the cost of living alone in NYC or Fairfield County, CT and these guys are strangled financially just on housing, taxes and goods and services alone. We have limited info to go by but with the limited info, a decent comparison can be made. If Gotti was pulling down $15 million per year in NYC and Mike Genovese was generating $8 million a year but living in Pittsburgh, it's not that far off Wiseguy due to the low cost of living in Western PA. Plus, Mike was aggressively pursuing heavy narcotics which generated an obscene amount of money. NY was easily generating more revenue annually in a bigger city but the way the money was distributed to so many more members essentially makes the net worth added with the cost of living very close.

[JCB1977]

Is there any info that shows what Tony Accardo was making in Chicago at his height? I'd have to assume he was doing as well as anybody. Nick Civella? Frank Balistrieri?

[JCB1977]

No evidence of Strollo being tied to any drugs, that was Naples' thing.

Yeah I've never heard anything about Strollo being into drugs at all. He would have admitted it too as he admitted to everything.

Though for whatever it's worth, towards the end from what I understand much (most?) of his gambling customers were black drug dealers because they were the only ones living in the core city of Youngstown who had any money.

I can assure you that Strollo didn't give up "everything." Informants never do. The FBI takes the lead and shows the informant their targets and the CI tells them what they need to know to solidify a conviction. Lenny was in the life from the time he was 19 working on slot machines for Jimmy Prato. If he told the FBI everything, there would have been much more info on dead bodies over the 4 decades Strollo spent in the rackets. He was there in the 60's and 70's when bodies were dropping regularly. The FBI wanted to nail the politicians, judges and prosecutors who were on the take. Strollo provided that and then some. He admitted to making the call to set up Charlie Carabbia. He gave the Feds what they needed to keep his $15-$20 million so he could do his time on an Air Force base with 24/7 protection so he could get out and live his days.

[JCB1977]

Back to the topic, Joey Massino under reported the lion's share. He lied...which is what he was highly skilled in.

[gohnjotti]

That is not accurate. It has been documented that Vincent Gigante did not take tribute from every Capo in his family. As an example Arilotta just talked about how the Springfield Crew did not send tribute to NY. We also have other informant terimony that for years the Montreal Crew did pay any tribute either. So that is at least two families were we have confirmation that not every Captain was required to pay tribute.
If we want to outside NY we have the example of Harry Riccobene not being required to pay tribute to Angelo Bruno except for a Christmas tribute.

I was waiting for someone to raise the Genovese example . I’m highly suspicious of this claim, would like to know the source and suspect there is misinterpretation involved. That there may have been the odd Capo whom, for whatever reason, did not pay monthly or regular tribute I can understand, but that I would suggest would be an exception, and an uncommon one which I think has been overblown.

Look at this logically, what is the primary function of a mafia family? To quote Tony Soprano “This is a business” and the structure of a family is such that it’s a pyramid. It would be as nonsensical for Capo’s not to kick up as standard practice as soldiers not kicking up. It’s antithetical to the principle and structure of the model itself.

Of course there are exceptions but the mafia is a business, these are greedy fucks, the structure of the model contradicts this as common practice, Massino is a liar (refer his Sonny Black was making a move for boss garbage) and Massino has huge motivation (he understates his income, the less can be seized in forfeiture) to lie.

So, I think Massino = Bull. Shit.

I’d add that Allie Persico collected little-to-no tribute from his men when he was on the street. Thats what Joe Campanella testified at Allie Persico’s trial, and I tend to believe that because there is no incentive for Campanella to say he didn’t give Allie tribute if he actually did.

Neither Dino Calabro, Dino Saracino nor Joe Competiello testified that Allie Persico’s successor Tommy Gioeli took regular tribute from his capos, until his incarceration and the legal fund set up afterwards.

There’s nothing to indicate that Gioeli’s successor Ralph DeLeo was given anything as tribute either IIRC, although his mob connections gave him the keys to a lot of new business deals.

And, lastly, Liz Geddes admitted at Andy Russo’s 2011 detention memo that she had no indication whatsoever that Russo had benefited financially from his status as acting boss, as he only helped make money for the family of his cousin, official boss Carmine Persico. Which is believable, considering Russo works pretty tirelessly for the Persicos without ever really raising a peep.

In fact, the main way that the Colombo admin are able to make money, from what I can gather, is through the rigid loansharking structure that many crews display - i.e., William Cutolo loaning hundreds of thousands of dollars at 1 point a week to his crew, and his crew pushing the money further onto the street at 2-5% a week.
That seems to be what William Cutolo’s entire crew was doing, and it was mirrored across the Colombo family in Greg Scarpa’s crew, Joey Amato’s crew, and so on. Every week on Wednesdays, Cutolo’s crew would come to his social club to pay him his “tribute.” This is a line you’ll see repeated on anything you read about Wild Bill. But, according to court testimony, these payments were almost exclusively loansharking vig payments, as opposed to actual tribute payments (although Cutolo did make his crew pay social club dues to keep the building open). This continued right through Cutolo’s tenure as underboss and, after his murder, the system continued under acting boss Allie Persico and acting underboss Jackie DeRoss.

Another way admin members make money is by engaging in sitdowns. It seems that if two associates are beefing and they bring in a made member for a sit down, chances are, both the associates will wind up having to pay the made guy for some reason. That’s the nature of sitdowns, since the whole concept of them is that a made guy makes the rules and the associates have to abide by them. Ben Castellazzo is the king of this. He didn’t get the nickname “the Claw” for nothing. Most of the charges against him in the 2011 indictment revolved around him finding his way into associates’ beefs and getting his “claws” into them. Acting captain Big Anthony Russo was tape-recorded saying “He (Castellazzo) don’t give a fuck. He likes the drama” in reference to an upcoming sitdown with members from another crime family. The Razzle Dazzle rackets are a great example. Colombo associate Angelo Spata was beefing with the brother of a Genovese soldier over placement of rigged Razzle Dazzle carnival games at the Figli Di Santa Rosalia. At a sit-down between them at a Coney Island bar, Castellazzo divvied up territory between Spata and the Genovese associate (a Castellazzo crew member was actually a partner in the Genovese associate’s operations, which is probably why Castellazzo came to such a compromise) and then took a healthy payment for himself, to the tune of a few grand (Can’t recall the exact figure offhand).

There are far more examples of admin members using sit-downs to their monetary advantage. There was a three-way sitdown between the Colombos, Gambinos and Bonannos in the late ‘90s over which family Chris Paciello belonged to, with each family (according to Michael DiLeonardo), outright lying about their claim to Paciello. According to DiLeonardo, Paciello had no say. He didn’t pipe up to say that Anthony Graziano, or Cutolo, or the Gambino (can’t remember the Gambino’s identity offhand) were lying, because Paciello knew that it wasn’t up to him.

Fast-forward to the 2000s period. You know how I said Tommy Gioeli probably didn’t take regular tribute from his captains? (Going off the testimony of his three closest crew members). That isn’t to say Gioeli wasn’t profiting off his position as acting boss. In fact, he received thousands of dollars from associates whom he had represented at sit-downs, including Roger Califano’s enormous bookmaking operation. He gave Gioeli $5000-$10000 a year as tribute, but only after Gioeli successfully represented him at a sitdown earlier in the decade. The sitdown created a basis for the tribute payments. Even though Gioeli technically doesn’t need a reason to ask for tribute, for some reason he only does so on a case-by-case basis. This, I contend, was probably a better method of leadership. For one thing, nobody can say Gioeli was poor. He lived a humble, yet luxurious, lifestyle up there in Farmingdale. And secondly, his handling of tribute payments ensured a lot more loyalty towards him. Roger Califano himself was caught on tape praising Gioeli as a fair boss who “never asked for nothing” from his underlings. Califano, by his own admission, didn’t consider those Christmastime payments that he gave as “tribute.” They were the payments for something Gioeli represented them for earlier in the decade. It was only until Gioeli was arrested and Ben Castellazzo began asking for those payments to resume that Califano raised a beef.

Every boss has a different way of approaching things. For the Colombos, there are indeed still family-wide tribute models, but not for the acting boss specifically. As I mentioned earlier, there was a legal slush fund established by Tommy Gioeli after his imprisonment, in which every crew member paid a little bit every month (in soldier Robert Pate’s case, he sent $600 a month). There was also some sort of fund for the imprisoned Persicos, or possibly other imprisoned Colombo members too. That would mean the Colombos have a similar “legal fund” model as the Genoveses, although I imagine it’s on a much smaller scale. That money, according to Angelo Spata’s 2011 case, was collected around Christmastime and went right down to the associates, even the brokester ones like Fat Larry Sessa.

[Pogo The Clown]

Thanks for the Colombo examples Gohn.


We also have Genovese informant Anthony Arilotta saying the Springfield Crew didn't pay tribute to NY. You have the Boss of the Bonannos testifying in court that he didn't take tribute from some of his captain. This is backed up by other member informants like Vitale and Cicale who said that for years the Montreal Crew didn't pay tribute. You have member informants in Philly who said the Riccobene Crew only paid tribute at Christmas.


That is 4 major families where we have verified documentation of the Boss selectively collecting tribute from his crews.


Pogo

[Bklyn21]

The posting of Massino's testimony got me thinking how little modern Bosses are actually pulling in.


From the tidbits posted by B.

Massino received around $150,000 - 160,000 in Christmas tribute from the family. As mentioned earlier, he said members were supposed to pay $1000 in Christmas tribute if they were able, so the total is consistent with his estimate that the Bonanno family had 150 - 160 members under him.

- He says only some captains paid monthly tribute to him, including Coppa ($2000), Cantarella ($1200), Urso ($500-600), and $500 a week from DeFilippo from a bookmaking business split with Vitale. This shows that the "kicking up" process wasn't as strict as people believe and in some cases involved the boss being a partner in an operation, not necessarily vertical tribute. There were other operations Massino inherited when he became boss of the family, including JFK airport activities and an electrician who paid $4000 a year to prevent union intervention. Anthony Mannone handled this for Massino and they split the money.

Add up all his tribute and he is not even close to pulling in a million a year. Probably not even half a million some years. I'm sure he could have gotten a little more by pressing some Capos but it is still crap considering he was the Boss of the number 3 or 2 family in the country. These low earnings are confirmed by Joe Defede who testified he only made 1.2 million during his time (1994-1998) as Acting Boss of the Lucchese family. Really this is peanuts even adjusted for inflation. Bosses today definitely don't have that Don Corleone money.


Pogo

I personally think some of the Kicking up info and estimates are pure BS ! Even though they are outted and cannot lie to the Feds I think they don't give them official and accurate records because then they'd have to give up more money and assets to the Feds . I was also told this years ago by people on both sides of the fence, Ex: Law enforcement and Mob guys . They said that's pure Bullshit and that Bosses, Members , Associates lie to preserve some of they're earnings and savings etc etc..

[Bklyn21]

While everyone in the Mob clearly aren't equal , There are plenty of guys making way more money than the figures or pple say . Bosses of the families especially the Big 2 Westside and Gambino are making millions a year in kick up cash from those underneath them and thats not including they're own operations and side deals etc etc. I'd bet it all that Barney is easily pulling in 30 Mil. Annually and possibly earning 200--300 Mil. Plus annually with everything