"Patsy" (Donnie Brasco)

[B.]

One of the Colombo associates with Jilly Greca was a Patsy who got out of prison with someone named Frankie and they caused a dispute with Pistone. In his book, Pistone says he "belted" Patsy a few times during his fight with them. Pistone says Patsy later turned informant and entered the witness protection program; this would have been sometime before 1988 when the book was published.

In a recent interview, though, Pistone says he never hit Patsy because Patsy was a made guy. He repeatedly refers to Patsy as a made member in this re-telling. It is an odd detail to misremember, especially given he published a different version. It's also an odd detail to deliberately lie about. He still says he hit Frankie during the fight in this version, so it's not that he's trying to distance himself from the violence. The only motivation I can imagine would be to add random mob protocol into the story -- Pistone first brings it up to explain the rule about not hitting a made member.

If Patsy was a made guy, we should be able to figure out who he was given how much info is available on the Colombos during that time (~1977). Similarly, if Patsy became a cooperating witness and entered WITSEC in the 1980s, his name should also be known even if he was an associate. I lean toward the book version, as it was put to print, the event was still more recent, and the impression he gives in the book is that Jilly (who was initially an associate when he met him) is the only made guy with that Colombo crew.

I'm curious about the other Greca associates like Frankie and Guido. Were they ever identified?

--

Has Pistone changed any other stories over the years? I know he claimed he had the contract to murder Bruno Indelicato and was willing to carry it out if he had to, not sure what else. That's something he omitted from the original story, though, not something he outright changed.

One thing, too, is Pistone claimed to have been proposed for membership in the recent interview and Massino confirmed this in his testimony. Massino said "Brasco" would have been inducted if the books hadn't been closed at the time that Napolitano proposed him, so that is true.

[Angelo Santino]

Sonny Black was capo wanting consigliere in Donnie Brasco whereas he was Acting Boss in Unfinished Business.

The biggest change between 1980's Pistone and 2000's Pistone is the tone. The books don't read like the same author. I consider his 2000 work ("Had Lefty sent to me do it, fuck it I would have did the hit. Fuhgedaboutit") to be an an antithesis of his 1980's self: "I was an FBI agent assigned to do a job and I never forgot that, my being Italian had nothing to do with my decisions."

But let's be honest, he's cashing in, as evidenced by him coming out a day before the finale of S3 to answer "Who gets whacked" in the last episode despite having a 500K contract on his head. He's not the only one, Franzese's shit keeps snowballing too. In his first book he's an acting captain conflicted with his life and finding god. In his recent shit he was being groomed to be Persico Jr's Underboss.

I remember he's on TV giving a tour of the old neighborhood when we hear off camera: "Fuckin' rat!" and Pistone laughs and says: "See, they don't like me around here." That shit was staged.

And if that don't suit your fancy we have Jack Garcia walking into a store and taking a rubber band off of a stalk of lettuce to use as a money clip and says: "This is how the wiseguyssss do it." Would have been funny had an employee came over and said "put that back and please leave the store." Instead that clip probably inspired a bunch of assholes to imitate that, so if you went to the store and the rubberbands were missing around that time, you can probably thank Jack for that. You'll never convince me otherwise that when offered the undercover assignment that Garcia didnt jumped 10 feet into the air and see the future career on tv, fear never was a factor ever.

[SonnyBlackstein]

I'm curious about the other Greca associates like Frankie and Guido. Were they ever identified?

Ditto on Guido. Love to know who that guy was.

[Eld]

'Patsy' was most likley Pasquale Senatore a Colombo associate who flipped. Intresting that Pistone has changed his story but I don't think Senatore was ever made.

Patsy and Jilly Greca were suspected of being involved with Mickey Paradiso in the 1978 murder of Frank Morici. It's a possibility that 'Frankie' was Frank Morici, but the age dosen't fit. Pistone describes him as being in his late 30's and Morici was 31 in january of 1978.

As a twist of fate, in his youth Patsy and his twin brother Joe were part of a Brooklyn gang (Joe was describe as the leader) that rivaled the gang that Carmine Persico and Anthony Scarpati belonged to. Scarpati was convicted of stabbing one of the Senatores fellow gang members to death.

[AlexfromSouth]

'Patsy' was most likley Pasquale Senatore a Colombo associate who flipped. Intresting that Pistone has changed his story but I don't think Senatore was ever made.

Patsy and Jilly Greca were suspected of being involved with Mickey Paradiso in the 1978 murder of Frank Morici. It's a possibility that 'Frankie' was Frank Morici, but the age dosen't fit. Pistone describes him as being in his late 30's and Morici was 31 in january of 1978.

As a twist of fate, in his youth Patsy and his twin brother Joe were part of a Brooklyn gang (Joe was describe as the leader) that rivaled the gang that Carmine Persico and Anthony Scarpati belonged to. Scarpati was convicted of stabbing one of the Senatores fellow gang members to death.

That' very Interesting about the Senatore's. Found them living at 597 President st in 1940. That's betwen 4th and 5th avenues. The Persico fam lived on Carroll st, which is a block away.
Where did you find that thing about the Senatore brothers being in a teen age gang?

[tmarotta]

I wonder if Senatore is related to the guy Frank Gangi killed on orders from Thomas Pitera. I think that guy was Joseph "Joe Dish" Senatore.

[SonnyBlackstein]

Great info gents

Anything on Guido?

[B.]

'Patsy' was most likley Pasquale Senatore a Colombo associate who flipped. Intresting that Pistone has changed his story but I don't think Senatore was ever made.

Patsy and Jilly Greca were suspected of being involved with Mickey Paradiso in the 1978 murder of Frank Morici. It's a possibility that 'Frankie' was Frank Morici, but the age dosen't fit. Pistone describes him as being in his late 30's and Morici was 31 in january of 1978.

As a twist of fate, in his youth Patsy and his twin brother Joe were part of a Brooklyn gang (Joe was describe as the leader) that rivaled the gang that Carmine Persico and Anthony Scarpati belonged to. Scarpati was convicted of stabbing one of the Senatores fellow gang members to death.

Awesome job -- thank you. Senatore would most likely be him and given the extensive cooperation of other Colombo members plus Senatore flipping himself, we can be certain he wasn't a made member during this period. Your description of Senatore fits closely with Pistone's original description of him. Of all details to change, it's bizarre Pistone decided to start calling Senatore a made member decades later.

Sonny Black was capo wanting consigliere in Donnie Brasco whereas he was Acting Boss in Unfinished Business.

The biggest change between 1980's Pistone and 2000's Pistone is the tone. The books don't read like the same author. I consider his 2000 work ("Had Lefty sent to me do it, fuck it I would have did the hit. Fuhgedaboutit") to be an an antithesis of his 1980's self: "I was an FBI agent assigned to do a job and I never forgot that, my being Italian had nothing to do with my decisions."

But let's be honest, he's cashing in, as evidenced by him coming out a day before the finale of S3 to answer "Who gets whacked" in the last episode despite having a 500K contract on his head. He's not the only one, Franzese's shit keeps snowballing too. In his first book he's an acting captain conflicted with his life and finding god. In his recent shit he was being groomed to be Persico Jr's Underboss.

I remember he's on TV giving a tour of the old neighborhood when we hear off camera: "Fuckin' rat!" and Pistone laughs and says: "See, they don't like me around here." That shit was staged.

And if that don't suit your fancy we have Jack Garcia walking into a store and taking a rubber band off of a stalk of lettuce to use as a money clip and says: "This is how the wiseguyssss do it." Would have been funny had an employee came over and said "put that back and please leave the store." Instead that clip probably inspired a bunch of assholes to imitate that, so if you went to the store and the rubberbands were missing around that time, you can probably thank Jack for that. You'll never convince me otherwise that when offered the undercover assignment that Garcia didnt jumped 10 feet into the air and see the future career on tv, fear never was a factor ever.

I don't blame Pistone for cashing in, though it's unfortunate he is tweaking his stories. Part of his shtick now seems to be going through the "rules of the mafia" as if he were a former wiseguy. I think he changed the story about Patsy Senatore's membership because it makes Pistone sound more hip to protocol, i.e. not raising his hands to a made member.

The interview Gravano did when he got out of prison reiterated a lot of what was published in his book, but I appreciated that the stories hadn't changed. His daughter has been exploiting his name for years and he damaged his own reputation with that Arizona drug case, so if anyone wanted to start making up stories to cash in, you'd think it would be him, but he seems to have stuck with his story. If he starts going off about some bullshit I'll eat my words, but when I saw him talk I was impressed he didn't pull a Natale, or even a Pistone. I feel like we could create a scale for measuring someone's credibility using some of these guys as examples.

Hilarious about Garcia. I got his book from the dollar bin at one point and skimmed it for info on the Gambino family but couldn't deal with the tone beyond that.

[Brian the brain]

Pistone is a douchebag. He acts like his life is still in danger but nobody gives a fuck about him anymore. Donnie Brasco was a good movie but very loosely based on truth.

[AlexfromSouth]

'Patsy' was most likley Pasquale Senatore a Colombo associate who flipped. Intresting that Pistone has changed his story but I don't think Senatore was ever made.

Patsy and Jilly Greca were suspected of being involved with Mickey Paradiso in the 1978 murder of Frank Morici. It's a possibility that 'Frankie' was Frank Morici, but the age dosen't fit. Pistone describes him as being in his late 30's and Morici was 31 in january of 1978.

As a twist of fate, in his youth Patsy and his twin brother Joe were part of a Brooklyn gang (Joe was describe as the leader) that rivaled the gang that Carmine Persico and Anthony Scarpati belonged to. Scarpati was convicted of stabbing one of the Senatores fellow gang members to death.

That' very Interesting about the Senatore's. Found them living at 597 President st in 1940. That's betwen 4th and 5th avenues. The Persico fam lived on Carroll st, which is a block away.
Where did you find that thing about the Senatore brothers being in a teen age gang?

No they were in the same gang, South Brooklyn boys. The other gang was the Red hook tigers

[Hired_Goonz]

One aspect where I don't know if Pistone's story changed so much as "evolved" was in that Unfinished Business book he claimed that he had met Massino, something he never claimed in Donnie Brasco. Massino denied ever meeting him.

[bert]

Sonny Black was capo wanting consigliere in Donnie Brasco whereas he was Acting Boss in Unfinished Business.

The biggest change between 1980's Pistone and 2000's Pistone is the tone. The books don't read like the same author. I consider his 2000 work ("Had Lefty sent to me do it, fuck it I would have did the hit. Fuhgedaboutit") to be an an antithesis of his 1980's self: "I was an FBI agent assigned to do a job and I never forgot that, my being Italian had nothing to do with my decisions."

But let's be honest, he's cashing in, as evidenced by him coming out a day before the finale of S3 to answer "Who gets whacked" in the last episode despite having a 500K contract on his head. He's not the only one, Franzese's shit keeps snowballing too. In his first book he's an acting captain conflicted with his life and finding god. In his recent shit he was being groomed to be Persico Jr's Underboss.

I remember he's on TV giving a tour of the old neighborhood when we hear off camera: "Fuckin' rat!" and Pistone laughs and says: "See, they don't like me around here." That shit was staged.

And if that don't suit your fancy we have Jack Garcia walking into a store and taking a rubber band off of a stalk of lettuce to use as a money clip and says: "This is how the wiseguyssss do it." Would have been funny had an employee came over and said "put that back and please leave the store." Instead that clip probably inspired a bunch of assholes to imitate that, so if you went to the store and the rubberbands were missing around that time, you can probably thank Jack for that. You'll never convince me otherwise that when offered the undercover assignment that Garcia didnt jumped 10 feet into the air and see the future career on tv, fear never was a factor ever.

You nailed it. I love the Garcia and the rubber band part. He did a lot of interviews to try to go one up on Pistone where he made other claims about how wise guys did things. How wise guys drank, ate, talked, and so on.

[Philly d]

Pistone is a douchebag. He acts like his life is still in danger but nobody gives a fuck about him anymore. Donnie Brasco was a good movie but very loosely based on truth.

totally agree

[JeremyTheJew]

The Garcia story I wish read like Donnie Brasco.
The book almost seems like a bad double agent movie doing all these cases..
I'm wondering why there's not as much about Jack Falcone as there is Brasco.
And also, I'm interested in the Genovese agent that we heard about a little bit ago??

[IrishDave]

The Garcia story I wish read like Donnie Brasco.
The book almost seems like a bad double agent movie doing all these cases..
I'm wondering why there's not as much about Jack Falcone as there is Brasco.
And also, I'm interested in the Genovese agent that we heard about a little bit ago??

In my opinion it's because Brasco was the first and the mafia was the mafia. When Garcia comes along, Gotti was in jail. On the outside it looked more like a watered down version of the mafia.