Wow Rudy Giuliani is saying Chin was not the Boss or Under boss with Fat Tony and all kinds of other things

[Mikeymike12]

Wow is Rudy Giuliani losing his mind or something??Did you see the PBD pod cast with Sammy the Bull episode 89? Patrick played his interview with Rudy (it’s around the 140 mark) for Sammy , wow the things that Rudy G was saying. That’s like the first time anyone has said anything bad about the Chin. He was saying all kinds of things like he wasnt in any leadership position, they were all lying to him, he was disliked, he wasn’t smart etc etc. lol . Craziest thing is Rudy Giuliani is saying all this with a straight face

[eboli]

Rudy lost his mind a long time ago. I mean, he's doing cameo videos for $325 a pop these days, alongside reality show contestants, social media influencers, and travel bloggers.

Chin wasn't that smart, but he learned from his mistakes. He had a loyal following, and his subordinates feared him. When they indicted Fat Tony as the Genovese boss in The Commission case, the prosecution and the FBI knew perfectly well he was only acting for Chin.

[Wiseguy]

Chin wasn't that smart,

Huh? That conflicts with virtually everything ever said about him, on both sides of the law.

[Dr031718]

Not surprising. He built his reputation on the Commission case. Even though most people know Fat Tony was a front boss Rudy isn’t going to say we got 4 bosses and another high ranking member. Doesn’t sound as good

[eboli]

Chin wasn't that smart,

Huh? That conflicts with virtually everything ever said about him, on both sides of the law.

My favorite piece is how Leonetti described him.

Within our family, we viewed the Chin as a very, very smart man, a very secretive man, very cunning, and very ruthless. He was old-school Cosa Nostra—stay low-key, follow the rules and make money. He wasn’t flashy. I mean, Christ, he spent his whole day in a bathrobe. He wasn’t trying to be a celebrity. He was a gangster and he knew this thing, La Cosa Nostra, this thing, better than anyone in the country.

During the first half of his criminal career, he was a bit of a brute. He was flashy and reckless. Pretty much a total contradiction to his later years. After his bribery case in Old Tappan, he learned the crazy act and stuck to it. Having better mentors helped him learn how to run the family effectively and evade law enforcement scrutiny. Don't get me wrong, he wasn't an idiot, but he wasn't the criminal mastermind some members of law enforcement propped him up to be.

Talking in more scientific terms: before he went 'crazy,' he was tested in prison and scored double digits on the IQ test. Then he started malingering tests and dropped twenty points in thirty years. The inventor of the PDRT, the neuropsychological evaluation test used to detect the validity of suboptimal efforts, thought that Gigante was treading the IQ cutoff point even after he was deemed competent to stand trial.

[PolackTony]

My own admittedly non-expert opinion is that Gigante's success can probably be credited less to his own exceptional abilities than to the practices and networks of his family. So less an instance of a particularly "smart guy" than one of a somewhat average guy who benefitted from being able to draw on the resources of a "smart organization" (as eboli already noted in relation to the quality of Gigante's mentorship).

Talking in more scientific terms: before he went 'crazy,' he was tested in prison and scored double digits on the IQ test. Then he started malingering tests and dropped twenty points in thirty years. The inventor of the PDRT, the neuropsychological evaluation test used to detect the validity of suboptimal efforts, thought that Gigante was treading the IQ cutoff point even after he was deemed competent to stand trial.

A "double-digit" IQ could be 99, of course. Given that the IQ distribution is scaled to a mean of 100 and standard deviation, anything from 85 to 99 would fall in the range of the ~68% of the population who score within 1 SD of the mean; essentially, "normal" or average, even if lower than the mean. Do you recall what his score was when initially tested in prison?

IQ measures an underlying latent statistical construct ("G") that more or less corresponds to processing speed and ability to engage in abstract reasoning. IQ performance is of course heavily (though not completely) influenced by various early life experiences and education level. Given the deprived upbringing, subliterate/pre-modern culture of many 1st generation immigrants who were Southern contadini, and low levels of educational attainment, many if not most of the successful mobsters of the past probably scored low or very low on cognitive tests. Giancana, IIRC, scored like 65 when he was in prison, which is more than 2 SDs below the mean and essentially cognitively disabled. While probably not given to or capable of much abstraction and reflective thought, these guys often had tremendous "cunning" and an almost instinctual feel for operating successfully within the dynamics of criminal rackets, the streets, and mafia politics. I'd venture that Bonnano was probably among the more "high IQ" bosses, given his family background and education, and look where all his machinations led him in the end.

[eboli]

My own admittedly non-expert opinion is that Gigante's success can probably be credited less to his own exceptional abilities than to the practices and networks of his family. So less an instance of a particularly "smart guy" than one of a somewhat average guy who benefitted from being able to draw on the resources of a "smart organization" (as eboli already noted in relation to the quality of Gigante's mentorship).

Talking in more scientific terms: before he went 'crazy,' he was tested in prison and scored double digits on the IQ test. Then he started malingering tests and dropped twenty points in thirty years. The inventor of the PDRT, the neuropsychological evaluation test used to detect the validity of suboptimal efforts, thought that Gigante was treading the IQ cutoff point even after he was deemed competent to stand trial.

A "double-digit" IQ could be 99, of course. Given that the IQ distribution is scaled to a mean of 100 and standard deviation, anything from 85 to 99 would fall in the range of the ~68% of the population who score within 1 SD of the mean; essentially, "normal" or average, even if lower than the mean. Do you recall what his score was when initially tested in prison?

IQ measures an underlying latent statistical construct ("G") that more or less corresponds to processing speed and ability to engage in abstract reasoning. IQ performance is of course heavily (though not completely) influenced by various early life experiences and education level. Given the deprived upbringing, subliterate/pre-modern culture of many 1st generation immigrants who were Southern contadini, and low levels of educational attainment, many if not most of the successful mobsters of the past probably scored low or very low on cognitive tests. Giancana, IIRC, scored like 65 when he was in prison, which is more than 2 SDs below the mean and essentially cognitively disabled. While probably not given to or capable of much abstraction and reflective thought, these guys often had tremendous "cunning" and an almost instinctual feel for operating successfully within the dynamics of criminal rackets, the streets, and mafia politics. I'd venture that Bonnano was probably among the more "high IQ" bosses, given his family background and education, and look where all his machinations led him in the end.

Yeah, I agree. Gigante got his start in organized crime thanks to his family's connections. I think that he knew how to adapt, and once his direct superiors weren't borderline psychopaths, he learned how to be a better criminal. If he got inducted into the Colombo family, I expect that our view of him would've been drastically different. After all, the feds and court officials considered Carmine Persico very intelligent too, and he spent most of his adult life in prison.

The results from Gigante's earliest IQ tests were in the ballpark of the USA average, which is 98. I've seen them reported as low as 80-something and as high as 105. Many experts dismiss the validity of these early tests. It wasn't uncommon for mobsters to score below average. If I remember correctly, Carmine Galante had a similar IQ score and was still labeled mentally underdeveloped after further evaluation. By the way: A few days ago I was looking for something and stumbled upon Al Capone's IQ, measured at 95 - similar to Galante and Gigante.

[Wiseguy]

I don't know how much an IQ score translates to what we're talking about here. In any event, while I agree that he was rough around the edges early on, and he certainly benefited from the organization he led, by all accounts he was one of the main reasons for that organization continuing it's stability when he became the boss. And again, it wasn't just law enforcement saying it. It was his fellow mafiosi too.

[eboli]

This thread made me remember a funny letter sent to Giuliani's office in 1985. The sender was IDd as an associate of Gigante.

chin-letter-1.jpg

[PolackTony]

This thread made me remember a funny letter sent to Giuliani's office in 1985. The sender was IDd as an associate of Gigante.


chin-letter-1.jpg

TAX DEVASION

[PolackTony]

Yeah, I agree. Gigante got his start in organized crime thanks to his family's connections. I think that he knew how to adapt, and once his direct superiors weren't borderline psychopaths, he learned how to be a better criminal. If he got inducted into the Colombo family, I expect that our view of him would've been drastically different. After all, the feds and court officials considered Carmine Persico very intelligent too, and he spent most of his adult life in prison.

Bingo. The exact counterfactual scenario that I had in mind is what would’ve become of Gigante if he had been made into the Colombos instead.

[Wiseguy]

Again, while there may have been an advantage being made into the Genovese family as opposed to the Colombos, you can't take away Gigante's part in that. Persico couldn't stay out of prison. Gigante lasted through the 1980s and most of the 1990s on the street as a boss in New York while everyone else was going down. And as much as the guy who wrote the letter above didn't like it, it was due to his crazy act. Furthermore, Persico's leadership, or perhaps lack of it, led to a full blown mutiny where most of his own crime family was aligned against him. Law enforcement grudgingly credited Gigante with the ability to select loyal captains who helped him keep the family stable while the other families were suffering from defectors, infighting, and their hierarchies fracturing.

[mpl0215]

Chin was definitely a sharp guy….I also feel like he has two major blunders under his belt that get overlooked, with the Frank C hit and the windows case with the informant that he was warned about by seemingly everyone


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[MichaelGiovanni]

Chin was definitely a sharp guy….I also feel like he has two major blunders under his belt that get overlooked, with the Frank C hit and the windows case with the informant that he was warned about by seemingly everyone


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Seemingly everyone? Name 3 people.

[Tonyd621]

This thread made me remember a funny letter sent to Giuliani's office in 1985. The sender was IDd as an associate of Gigante.


chin-letter-1.jpg

Do you know who penned that letter?