General Chicago Outfit Info Dumping Ground

[PolackTony]

Maybe this was talked about before but there were some Italian gangs that were not as notorious as the c-notes and 12th st players but we’re still a force in the 80s and 90s. I was looking at the CCC gang book from 1995 and they have the Italian Playboys listed as being active in:

Addison, Bloomingdale, Des Plaines, Elk Grove Village, Franklin Park, Itasca, Lombard, River Grove, and Roselle.

They were the biggest of the non alliance gang and were active in the most cities. There colors were red, green and white and initials were IPB. They were obviously a big deal in the 80s and 90s, mostly in the western suburbs and the Dunning and Montclair area of Chicago. In the early 2000s they started to disperse. I remember when I was a teenager hearing about them getting shot up by some MLDs in the 90s in Addison. Does anyone know of any Outfit guys that were a IPB? I met some that had family in the Outfit but they were not.

Another mostly Italian gang was called the Boys in the Hood Gang. They were mostly active in Elmwood Park. Their colors were gray and black or light blue. Initials were BH and they were supposedly apart of the peoples alliance. They were mostly into burglaries from what I remember.

Just wondering if anyone remembers these gangs and have any info. They kind died out in the early 2000s

Aside from hearing the names, I don’t know much about these organizations as they didn’t have a big footprint in the city itself. The gangs that I know of that had territory up in Montclair/Dunning were the Gaylords and C-Notes. I do recall hearing about the Italian Playboys back in the early 90s when I used to go to the Brickyard but I never encountered any of them. My impression was that they were more like what we called a “party crew”, many of which basically just became gangs, but as I said, I never had any real knowledge of them.

For older Italian street gangs, the Park Boys in Cicero and the Taylor Dukes on Taylor St were said to have ties to the Outfit back in the 60s/70s. The Taylor Jousters started out as an Italian gang also (they had a large and very rough section in Wicker Park that was mixed white up through the 80s). In Little Sicily there were the Italian Sharks who were said to have been a very fierce club but who of course died out when the Italians fled that area in the 60s. On Grand Ave you had the Baby Gents, who occupied that part of the Patch between the Gaylords to the east and the C-Notes to the west. There were a number of old Italian gangs or “Social Athletic Clubs” all around Bridgeport, Taylor, Little Sicily, and Humboldt Park way back in the day but none of them outlived the Italian demographic outflux from the inner-city.

[PolackTony]

An early Outfit informant who placed a lot of members in the wrong crews called the crew capos "capitanos." I wonder if this term was actually used and if so, how common was it?

https://archive.org/details/sambattagli ... =Fillichio

https://archive.org/details/1196496-0-9 ... =Fillichio

Yeah, I really wonder who this guy was as he makes some pretty big errors. He has Babe Tuffanelli as a Taylor St guy, which is so off as to be hilarious.

This CI is the only source I’ve seen who ever used “capitano”. My take is that it was just an Italianized rendering of captain that he probably overheard used as a casual reference to capo.

[B.]

In the first use of it in the report it says "capitanos" is phonetic, so they may have been making the closest approximation of what they heard.

Calling Capone the padrone makes me wonder if they used that at all for boss in "the Family" or if it was just how he was seen socially. Not far off from Joe Bonanno's Family calling him father / padre which he said was the same as boss to them.

[PolackTony]

In the first use of it in the report it says "capitanos" is phonetic, so they may have been making the closest approximation of what they heard.

Calling Capone the padrone makes me wonder if they used that at all for boss in "the Family" or if it was just how he was seen socially. Not far off from Joe Bonanno's Family calling him father / padre which he said was the same as boss to them.

I suspect that “padrone” could’ve been another causal usage, literally referring to Capone as the “boss”. But then, we really don’t know if they typically called the boss rappresentante, or a local term as with the Bonannos.

One thing that might speak to it having been more formalized and potentially not limited to Chicago is this account from a NY CI who refers to the Padrone and Padronesuita (I.e, Sottopadrone):

[PolackTony]

Also, with respect to "capitano", here's Joe Falcone talking to Magaddino:

[B.]

Falcone also called himself the "capino" (little boss).

[Antiliar]

Just an observation: "clique" was a euphemism primarily used in the Midwest:

Chicago:
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... e_fusco%22
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... rch=clique

Detroit:
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... rch=clique

Kansas City, where it was used a lot:
https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... rch=clique

[Antiliar]

I think 8534-C/8534-TE is Red Wemette. He wrote in his book that his handler was SA John Osborne.

CG 8534-C contacts SA John Osborne: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... ch=8534-TE

In 1974, CG 8534-C told SA Osborne that Anthony Spilotro fixes races for the Outfit, and also utilizes others such as ex-cop Miles Cooperman: https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... ch=8534-TE

In 1979, CG 8534-TE advised that Frank Schweihs told him that Aiuppa isn't happy with how Tony Spilotro handled Las Vegas and he called him back to Chicago to take over Turk Torello's territory, who recently died. The Chicago leaders wanted Spilotro back in Chicago to watch him and to have him replaced in Las Vegas. It's implied that Spilotro wanted to "hit" and FBI agent - something the Outfit would never authorize. Spilotro is not high up in the Outfit and is expendable. https://www.maryferrell.org/showDoc.htm ... D%20outfit

[Snakes]

Red ever say when he started informing?

[Antiliar]

Red ever say when he started informing?

August 1971

[PolackTony]

Great info. Definitely seems to fit Red.

[Ed]

Nice find. I've often wondered if the informer knows his own symbol code. (Probably not.)

[PolackTony]

- I've read about a lot of Families and very little phases me, but the Chicago group comes across more ominous and genuinely terrifying than any other. It's like they had a bunch of Greg Scarpas who never ratted. The way Nick Calabrese described his induction, you get the feeling those same guys in the room wouldn't hesitate to kill him right then and there for wincing when they pinched his finger . Just look at the Spilotro brothers murder -- they lured them there on formal grounds and the new generation of leaders wanted to fucking be there to participate in the horrific and primal "unmaking" of Spilotro. Then they killed the guy who disposed of the bodies when they got found. Frank Calabrese told his brother he was sad he wasn't included in the murders. It's like the Spilotro murder was a sacred ritual unto itself that tells us more about the organization's psychology than an actual making ceremony.

Spilotro trying to say a prayer too -- it's like he knew he was dealing with Satan in the flesh. This group didn't become that way overnight.

Funny that you said this, as Frank Sr claimed that during the ceremony they let the paper burn down to the skin of the initiate's palm. No tossing it back and forth in the hands and then dropping it to the floor. Apparently small detail, but for me highly evocative of the ethos of the family. The ceremony wasn't simply a purely symbolic act of rebirth, but also a very real, flesh and blood test of the initiate as rite of passage. Presumably, they weren't going to be sponsoring guys who were going to flinch, but letting the card burn down to your skin while watching your reaction instills in the initiate in a visceral way what is now expected of him and what will happen if he fails. Another seemingly minor idiosyncrasy to note is that neither Frank nor Nick Calabrese mentioned anything about them "locking in" or joining hands during the ceremony. Indeed, each initiate was inducted individually. This wasn't done for secrecy or operational security purposes, as the initiates were all present together in the waiting room. But rather than inducting them in a group, they are instead brought in by Al Tornabene one-by-one before the rappresentante and capos of the family to face them as a lone individual. I see it as a "born alone, die alone" message, as the initiate is tested and inducted before the body of men who will be the ones to order his execution if he errs. Nick C later stated that he thought over the years of what would've happened to him if he had turned down LaPietra's "offer" when notified that they were being sponsored for membership, for good reason I think. Not like these guys were going to be like "Hey, you've been selected to be part of a tiny number of men to offer your blood to our ominous Brotherhood, to belong to us until death. Oh, you don't wanna do it? No prob, we wish you all the best in your future endeavors". They would've dropped them right there in Angelo's basement.

Frank to Frank Jr:

“Holy pictures. And they look at you to see if you’d budge, while the pictures are burning. And they, and they wait till they’re getting down to the skin” [...] “They’re watching you.”

[...]

“I didn’t want it. I would be strapped down and if I wanted to do something else, I couldn’t” [...] "You know what I regret more than anything? Burning the holy pictures in my hand. It bothers me.”

I see the 1983 ceremony as metaphor and metonym of the family itself, a window into its dark soul. This was an organization born and nourished through a century of blood and fire; as B. states, it didn't get this way overnight. Totally unsurprising that when we finally got a look at how Chicago brought in new "friends", it comes across as the most sinister and ominous induction ceremony that I'm aware of. Another hint of the seriousness of Chicago's making ceremony is the claim that Cerone was made in 1935 in a church in River Forest. Presumably, in 1935, they could've elected to hold his initiation at any number of other locations, so if it did happen this way there must've been a reason.

As a final observation on how seriously Chicago took these things, Nick C testified that he had no idea what would happen at the ceremony after LaPietra notified him that he was to be made. This was an associate who had been raised in an old Outfit neighborhood, who had reached the level of trust and respect where he was being sponsored for membership, and had apparently never heard anything about what that actually entailed. All the more reason to approach older accounts regarding Chicago's ceremony (or lack thereof) with healthy skepticism. For example, while we know that DeRose stated that the initiation involved a banquet behind closed doors where the initiate was administered an oath, we can't simply take that at face value as evidence that this was all that occurred during this function. This is just what DeRose was either aware of or willing to share with his handler. That DeRose even knew that much about it is, I think, remarkable enough, and I don't think it's incidental that people thought he was Italian.

(from a comment on Nick C's testimony thread: viewtopic.php?p=218814#p218814)

One thing that seems consistent between the 1956 and 1983 ceremonies is Chicago preferred having a captain serve as sponsor. A lot more of a member's identity revolved around his captain and the crew he was made into even though there were exceptions. In NYC you don't see as much of that, where captains can sponsor guys but it's not the norm and it's not uncommon at all for him to be moved around sometimes immediately. Chicago really wanted captains to take responsibility for the members under them.

It's like the Spilotro murder was a sacred ritual unto itself that tells us more about the organization's psychology than an actual making ceremony.

This is something I've been mulling over in the context of Accardo and Giancana's relationship.

While not apparently his sponsor, it may very well have been the case that Giancana was a soldier direct with Accardo during the latter's tenure as rappresentante. As such, Accardo may have had a very personal sense of responsibility towards Mooney given their long personal association; the fact that they were both paesani with roots in Castelvetrano I would imagine also formed part of the context for their relationship (whether this mattered at all in organizational terms, no way these two weren't well-aware of it). All of this makes the possibility (and I do think it is fully possible) that Accardo was the one that actually shot Giancana all the more ominous. Although Chicago killed many, many people, and not infrequently in spectacular and gruesome fashion, I still find the Spilotro and Giancana murders among the most disturbing. As B. observed, with the Spilotros it took the form of a malevolent ritual, while with Giancana it wasn't some guy shot in the street or found in an alley as "trunk music". It may very well have been Mooney being killed by his old boss, friend, and paesan' in his own home, two old cumpari with salsiccie and beans sizzling on a skillet in the background.

[Coloboy]

Whoa…never heard that theory before. Obviously it seems unlikely, by that stage accardo was a guy who was looking to minimize all risk and stay out of prison until he died. But hey, crazier things have happened in the world. I’m not discounting it.

[Coloboy]

I one thing I’ve wondered about Accardo is how he stayed connected when he was residing primarily in California in later years. Given the prevalence of wiretaps during this period in the 70s and 80s, I can’t imagine he was very comfortable discussing outfit business on the phone. I wonder if somebody was dispatched regularly out there to meet with him.