John DiFronzo was a CI?

[Antiliar]

This has been brought up before, but Red Wemette just recently posted that he has an FBI doc that notes DiFronzo is a CI. Don't have any more details than that.

post the document or dont post this thread

Are you running this group for Soliai now?

[Frank]

This has been brought up before, but Red Wemette just recently posted that he has an FBI doc that notes DiFronzo is a CI. Don't have any more details than that.

post the document or dont post this thread

Are you running this group for Soliai now?

Hes Pete DiFronzo

[Frank]

Would the Frank Calabrese recording about DiFronzo planning the Spillotro hits be considered hearsay?? And is that inadmissable in court??

[Frank]

DiFronzo did get convicted in the Rincon case. I thought the high level informant went back as far as close to 10 years before the Rinco case

[Pete]

This has been brought up before, but Red Wemette just recently posted that he has an FBI doc that notes DiFronzo is a CI. Don't have any more details than that.

post the document or dont post this thread

Are you running this group for Soliai now?

He’s a stunad of the first magnitude. its best to pay him as little attention as possible

[Frank]

I'm not saying he was but, considering DiFronzo's uninterrupted 20+ year run (mostly as the identified boss) from the mid-1990s until his death, nobody should be surprised if it was proven he was a CI.

Yes, thats my opinion too. Recently finding out that Frank Calabrese said Di Fronzo planed the Spillotro murders made me wonder that again, how he wasnt charged in Family Secrets case. Maybe they just didn't have a good case against him or maybe he started to cooperate or was a CI for a long time. Just the whole DiFronzo years have many points that could indicate he was a CI. When he died I made a point of maybe he wasn't CI and how he handled himself, could possibly have been because he was suspicious of CI and had an idea that it was somebody from the other crews.

[Pete]

I'm not saying he was but, considering DiFronzo's uninterrupted 20+ year run (mostly as the identified boss) from the mid-1990s until his death, nobody should be surprised if it was proven he was a CI.

That’s not really accurate though because he stepped down in the mid 90’s which was confirmed by magnafichi as well as frank calabrese sr on his prison tapes. Whether he was or wasn’t I don’t care I’m just saying he stepped down after he got out for the rincon thing

[Frank]

If Wemette is lying, why. And why DiFronzo. I would take it that Wemette is of the opinion that DiFronzo was a CI.I wonder who else Outfit related also thinks that. With Frank jr out in the open, doing tours, who knows, anything is possible

[Angelo Santino]

At the risk of sounding rude, dismissive or out of my league, let me try and word this carefully.

I'm becoming very leary of these so-called ex-Chicago operatives and the things they say. I don't know this Red guy, I never heard of him before this thread so I'm not directly discussing this individual. But alot of the things Frank Culotta says on youtube raises my red flags tremendously. That's not to say it's all bullshit but some of the specifics are. I think all these guys wanted to be members, they go online they see whats written, if they can get away with saying they're members of it, why not? It's what they always wanted and it adds validity to their claims. And since Chicago is supposed to be so damn different we afford these guys more leeway than we would if someone made these claims in any other Family in the country.

If Culotta is to be believed, he was secretly made by Spilotro and he has a video where he lays out the Chicago Outfit structure worse than BB's best attempt- it was this guy, and this guy was under this guy and this guy was under that guy. Which goes back to the operational vs organizational discussion in another thread but I won't re-litigate it here.

1 A Did Spilotro, a Soldier in the Joe Lomardo Crew, have the authority to do that? We all argue Chicago is different but it ain't that different. Even if he was a Crew Boss dash semi-capo it doesn't provide the authority to make members on a whim. When I say "made" I'm referring to the position of a Formal Member Of the Mafia, which means he has to be recognized by other Families as a Formal Member. Any argument made that what he actually meant to say was that he was a "made" a "crew member" but not a Mafia Member is null because that's not what he said, he claimed he was made a formal member, he wants people to believe this and this has only surfaced recently. You're made or you're not. It's black and white. Had he flipped as a made member, the FBI would have made reference to it. I don't believe in "confessions," it either took Franzese 20 years to remember that he was being groomed for Underboss or he's only recently made it up. Always question stuff like this.
1 B What purpose does it serve to have a button and no one knows? The mafia is a word of mouth organization one of the biggest universal traits for any member entering is an introduction to other members within the organization. The alternative is for Spilotro to die and no one believes Frank. (It happened when Giancana died and no one knew Fratianno was a member, but that's different. Fratianno transferred in and stayed on the west coast, whereas Culotta was from Chicago and chances are still had contacts and visits there.)

Let's contrast this with an actual confirmed Made Member Calabrese and what he said:
1 He laid out the hierarchy, #1 and 2, capo, soldier. Clear as day
2 He was able to place people in positions, not rattle off four tiers of 4 names underneath each other.
3 He differentiated between made and associate, recalling how one Outfit associate was chastised in jail for "having these New York guys think (he's) a made guy." If Chicago's membership was such a grey area for its own members then Calabrese wouldn't have given a shit.
4 Simple.

I mean no disrespect, I'm not trying to be Johnny-Come-Lately to this subject. I'm just sharing my honest feelings on the subject.

----------

Back to Red, what I said above doesn't apply completely to this. Just to say, its not the first time there appears to have been such extraordinary circumstances with these ex-guys. Someone made an interesting point- A boss is a CI and the FBI is going to share that info with an associate? To me that is an outlandish allegation. Has there ever been an instance where other members like Scarpa or Previte (who were senior/ranking members) were provided a list of other informants.

These guys are part of the story, they were around the players and the things they say deserve to be reviewed, scrutinized in a non-bias and fair way.

Antiliar, thank you for posting this. It makes for quite an interesting discussion.

[Frank]

I'm not saying he was but, considering DiFronzo's uninterrupted 20+ year run (mostly as the identified boss) from the mid-1990s until his death, nobody should be surprised if it was proven he was a CI.

That’s not really accurate though because he stepped down in the mid 90’s which was confirmed by magnafichi as well as frank calabrese sr on his prison tapes. Whether he was or wasn’t I don’t care I’m just saying he stepped down after he got out for the rincon thing

But did he step down or did he step down like Accardo and Ricca, which was basically not stepping down. Im not saying you are wrong or right. That is the question that really has never been answered completely that I know of. What did Magnifichi say?

[Pete]

I'm not saying he was but, considering DiFronzo's uninterrupted 20+ year run (mostly as the identified boss) from the mid-1990s until his death, nobody should be surprised if it was proven he was a CI.

That’s not really accurate though because he stepped down in the mid 90’s which was confirmed by magnafichi as well as frank calabrese sr on his prison tapes. Whether he was or wasn’t I don’t care I’m just saying he stepped down after he got out for the rincon thing

But did he step down or did he step down like Accardo and Ricca, which was basically not stepping down. Im not saying you are wrong or right. That is the question that really has never been answered completely that I know of. What did Magnifichi say?

Magnafichi said he deactivated the Elmwood
Park crew in the mid 90’s and stopped associating with anyone besides a few people like his brother Pete, brother joe, Marco, Joey A. That he tried to make everyone go legitimate and didn’t have illegal dealings. Also the story was since his son John jr died he wanted to raise his grandson John iii and never go back to prison so he could do that. And people like the calabrese lay out the hierarchy very simply, it was difronzo, monteleone from mid 90’s till he died in 01, then tornabene ran it until marcello got out. No mention from people that were members on the street that difronzo was the secret boss. Take it for what you want but I tend to go with the guys who are on the inside. Difronzo being boss for 25 years I file under the same category as ferriola being boss. Incorrect le info later proven wrong

[funkster]

That he saw it in 2002 is highly improbable. If someone said they saw it after he died it would be more believable. If the feds let a civilian see a document with a CI’s real name on it who was still alive he would be fired and possibly brought up on charges. That is highly confidential information which would put someone’s life at risk

Improbable and unlikely don't tell us whether or not it actually happened. I know a couple guys who worked with the feds and were allowed to get copies of some otherwise confidential docs. I can't explain why this happened, only that it happened. My guess is that every now and then some rules are bent or they make exceptions. If I can, I'll see if I can follow up with him and see if he can recall the circumstances.

Were the guys low level cooperating associates who obtained that information about the boss of an entire LCN group?

[Antiliar]

The 1999 conversation between Frank Sr and Jr is a bit confusing. In one part Sr said that Johnny was "running the show," and in another part he stepped down from Elmwood Park and Joey (Andriacchi) is running it. He also said, "Johnny is out of it, he wants no pinch. He don't want more time." So it seems at that time EP wasn't totally deactivated. Was DiFronzo in a Paul Ricca role while Monteleone, Tornabene, Marcello and Sarno played the Giancana role? If DiFronzo had insulated himself it's hard to say if lower level soldiers like the Calabreses would have known about it. Mike Magnafichi, for his part, wasn't sure if DiFronzo was the top guy up to his death, but he leaned in that direction.

In 2011 the Chicago Sun-Times reported that an informant said that Mike Sarno was kicking up money to John DiFronzo, which tells me, if true, that he wasn't totally out of the picture. Maybe he was one of the informants who helped get Sarno out of the way.

Of course this is all speculation and we'll probably never get confirmation during our lifetimes.

[Frank]

I'm not saying he was but, considering DiFronzo's uninterrupted 20+ year run (mostly as the identified boss) from the mid-1990s until his death, nobody should be surprised if it was proven he was a CI.

That’s not really accurate though because he stepped down in the mid 90’s which was confirmed by magnafichi as well as frank calabrese sr on his prison tapes. Whether he was or wasn’t I don’t care I’m just saying he stepped down after he got out for the rincon thing

But did he step down or did he step down like Accardo and Ricca, which was basically not stepping down. Im not saying you are wrong or right. That is the question that really has never been answered completely that I know of. What did Magnifichi say?

Magnafichi said he deactivated the Elmwood
Park crew in the mid 90’s and stopped associating with anyone besides a few people like his brother Pete, brother joe, Marco, Joey A. That he tried to make everyone go legitimate and didn’t have illegal dealings. Also the story was since his son John jr died he wanted to raise his grandson John iii and never go back to prison so he could do that. And people like the calabrese lay out the hierarchy very simply, it was difronzo, monteleone from mid 90’s till he died in 01, then tornabene ran it until marcello got out. No mention from people that were members on the street that difronzo was the secret boss. Take it for what you want but I tend to go with the guys who are on the inside. Difronzo being boss for 25 years I file under the same category as ferriola being boss. Incorrect le info later proven wrong

Ok it was Mags that said DiFronzo deactivated Elmwood Park. Also it is possible that DiFronzo wasn't the Top Boss, also called The Man. Or that the position was no longer being used. Or that Aiuppa or someone else was The Man. But you mention the Calabrese bros as giving us a clear picture of the hierarchy?, but I don't see it as clear. First Nick says Monteleone was after Carlisi. Then Frank says Andriacchi was boss in and around the same Monteleone time period. But Frank also says Monteleone was boss. Villain says possibly they were co bosses. Or I thought maybe one was #1 and the other#2. What about Sarno kicking up to DiFronzo.

[Frank]

The 1999 conversation between Frank Sr and Jr is a bit confusing. In one part Sr said that Johnny was "running the show," and in another part he stepped down from Elmwood Park and Joey (Andriacchi) is running it. He also said, "Johnny is out of it, he wants no pinch. He don't want more time." So it seems at that time EP wasn't totally deactivated. Was DiFronzo in a Paul Ricca role while Monteleone, Tornabene, Marcello and Sarno played the Giancana role? If DiFronzo had insulated himself it's hard to say if lower level soldiers like the Calabreses would have known about it. Mike Magnafichi, for his part, wasn't sure if DiFronzo was the top guy up to his death, but he leaned in that direction.

In 2011 the Chicago Sun-Times reported that an informant said that Mike Sarno was kicking up money to John DiFronzo, which tells me, if true, that he wasn't totally out of the picture. Maybe he was one of the informants who helped get Sarno out of the way.

Of course this is all speculation and we'll probably never get confirmation during our lifetimes.

Wow that would be something if he was taking. Sarnos money and then helped put him away for 25 years. Lol