B. wrote: ↑Thu Sep 15, 2022 8:49 am
Looking at what Cavita posted, some names I wasn't familiar with + what I could find of their heritage:
Galveston
Vincenzo Bellomo - Corleone?
Anthony Cesari - Lucca, Tuscany
Constantine Demetrisene? - Hard to read his name, closest matches I can find are Greek
Joe Massa - Caccamo, Palermo
Joe Messina - 1900-1988, born in Lousiana, father might be "Guy" (Gaetano?)
August Simoncini - ?
Also Alfonso Attardi is listed in Houston. Gambino member who was first made in Sciacca.
Biagio Angelica on the list from Houston was ID'd by Chicago informant Teddy DeRose as a Genovese member based in TX. DeRose visited him and knew him well.
I didn't see your post before but looking at it now has me interested. The fact Rockford had connections to the Dallas family is clear through Civella marrying a Rockford woman, but I also noticed something else. There was a highly respected guy in Rockford named Joseph "Jo-Jo" Saporito who owned Jo-Jo-'s Tap for many years. Saporito was born in Rockford in 1918 but his parents Leoluca Saporito and Lucia Bruscato were both born in Corleone, Sicily. FBI files kind of hint around that possibly Saporito traveled to Florida to inform boss Joe Zammuto about the arrest of capo Charles VInce in 1971 so maybe he was a messenger of sorts? His son Lou Saporito was also a member of the Latin Counts street gang and I wonder if Saporito was related to the Luke Saporito of the Houston LCN group.
Leoluca (Louis) Saporito of Rockford was born Nov 11, 1893 in Corleone and married Leolucchina Bruscato in 1917 in Illinois. His marriage record says his father's name was Joseph (Giuseppe) and his mother's name was Anna Sporacio.
Luke Saporito's parents were Bernardo Saporito and Maria Cortimiglia. His parents were Antonio (or Antonino) Saporito and Francesca Papania. Bernardo did have an older brother named Leoluca born in 1868 (Bernardo was born in 1880), but there was a second brother named Leoluca born in 1891 who died as an infant, which suggests that the Leoluca born in 1868 was probably dead by 1891. So there's no close connection but it's possible that they were distantly related.
Sullycantwell wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:42 pm
Sorry for the spam, this just sent me on a rabbit hole, but it appears Luke Cortemeglia is a member.
Great find. Who was the informant?
Luke Cortemeglia was born in Tx in 1915 to Giovanni Cortimiglia and Lucille Depuma. Giovanni was born 1881 in Corleone, to Calogero Cortimiglia (his mother was a Pomilla, a surname that connects to the mafia in Chicago) and Francesca Piranio; the family arrived in NOLA in 1890 and then settled in Tx. The family had members living in Bryan, Houston, and Dallas. Giovanni’s brother, Arcangelo “Frank” Cortimiglia, was also married to a Catino (they lived in Houston).
Lucille was born in Bryan in 1884, underscoring how old the Corelonese colony in Brazos County was, to Emanuele Di Puma and Angela Lo Cascio of Corleone. She married Giovanni Cortimiglia in Brazos County in 1901.
I’d suspect that some members of this family could’ve been early Tx mafia members.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
Sullycantwell wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:42 pm
Sorry for the spam, this just sent me on a rabbit hole, but it appears Luke Cortemeglia is a member.
Great find. Who was the informant?
Luke Cortemeglia was born in Tx in 1915 to Giovanni Cortimiglia and Lucille Depuma. Giovanni was born 1881 in Corleone, to Calogero Cortimiglia (his mother was a Pomilla, a surname that connects to the mafia in Chicago) and Francesca Piranio; the family arrived in NOLA in 1890 and then settled in Tx. The family had members living in Bryan, Houston, and Dallas. Giovanni’s brother, Arcangelo “Frank” Cortimiglia, was also married to a Catino (they lived in Houston).
Lucille was born in Bryan in 1884, underscoring how old the Corelonese colony in Brazos County was, to Emanuele Di Puma and Angela Lo Cascio of Corleone. She married Giovanni Cortimiglia in Brazos County in 1901.
I’d suspect that some members of this family could’ve been early Tx mafia members.
Sullycantwell wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:42 pm
Sorry for the spam, this just sent me on a rabbit hole, but it appears Luke Cortemeglia is a member.
Great find. Who was the informant?
Luke Cortemeglia was born in Tx in 1915 to Giovanni Cortimiglia and Lucille Depuma. Giovanni was born 1881 in Corleone, to Calogero Cortimiglia (his mother was a Pomilla, a surname that connects to the mafia in Chicago) and Francesca Piranio; the family arrived in NOLA in 1890 and then settled in Tx. The family had members living in Bryan, Houston, and Dallas. Giovanni’s brother, Arcangelo “Frank” Cortimiglia, was also married to a Catino (they lived in Houston).
Lucille was born in Bryan in 1884, underscoring how old the Corelonese colony in Brazos County was, to Emanuele Di Puma and Angela Lo Cascio of Corleone. She married Giovanni Cortimiglia in Brazos County in 1901.
I’d suspect that some members of this family could’ve been early Tx mafia members.
Sullycantwell wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:42 pm
Sorry for the spam, this just sent me on a rabbit hole, but it appears Luke Cortemeglia is a member.
Great find. Who was the informant?
Luke Cortemeglia was born in Tx in 1915 to Giovanni Cortimiglia and Lucille Depuma. Giovanni was born 1881 in Corleone, to Calogero Cortimiglia (his mother was a Pomilla, a surname that connects to the mafia in Chicago) and Francesca Piranio; the family arrived in NOLA in 1890 and then settled in Tx. The family had members living in Bryan, Houston, and Dallas. Giovanni’s brother, Arcangelo “Frank” Cortimiglia, was also married to a Catino (they lived in Houston).
Lucille was born in Bryan in 1884, underscoring how old the Corelonese colony in Brazos County was, to Emanuele Di Puma and Angela Lo Cascio of Corleone. She married Giovanni Cortimiglia in Brazos County in 1901.
I’d suspect that some members of this family could’ve been early Tx mafia members.
Interesting. Mezzojuso (which is on the other side of the Ficuzza forest from Corleone).was connected to both the Morello (the LaGattutas) and Chicago (which had an early Corleonese component) Families.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
Sullycantwell wrote: ↑Wed Jan 11, 2023 5:42 pm
Sorry for the spam, this just sent me on a rabbit hole, but it appears Luke Cortemeglia is a member.
Great find. Who was the informant?
Luke Cortemeglia was born in Tx in 1915 to Giovanni Cortimiglia and Lucille Depuma. Giovanni was born 1881 in Corleone, to Calogero Cortimiglia (his mother was a Pomilla, a surname that connects to the mafia in Chicago) and Francesca Piranio; the family arrived in NOLA in 1890 and then settled in Tx. The family had members living in Bryan, Houston, and Dallas. Giovanni’s brother, Arcangelo “Frank” Cortimiglia, was also married to a Catino (they lived in Houston).
Lucille was born in Bryan in 1884, underscoring how old the Corelonese colony in Brazos County was, to Emanuele Di Puma and Angela Lo Cascio of Corleone. She married Giovanni Cortimiglia in Brazos County in 1901.
I’d suspect that some members of this family could’ve been early Tx mafia members.
I believe the Pomilla surname is also found in the Lucchese Family.
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 4:37 pm
The LoMontes from Villafrati were top Morello leaders and it directly neighbors Mezzojuso, just 5.5 miles apart. Guessing LaMonte is the same surname.
Also Rick is correct -- Tom Gagliano's bro-in-law was Lucchese member Nunzio Pomilla.
Thanks for confirming both points.
We’ve seen already that towns like Villafrati, Baucina, Mezzojuso, Cefalà Diana, etc seem to have fallen into the Corleone mafia hinterland and thus were part of their networks in the US.
We’ve also now seen the Catino and Pomilla surnames pop up as connected to the Corelonese mafia network in several US Families. We should make a PowerPoint of all this stuff and send it to Barney Bellomo for his birthday.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
Yeah, we see those towns together in multiple locations yet we don't see much Bisacquino and Palazzo Adriano with them. There's a tendency to link Roccamena to the Bonanno network because of Schiro but it's an anomaly -- not enough examples to say definitively but looks to me like Roccamena fell in with the Corleone network. Stefano Badami's wife was from there, same with the Campisis in Dallas. Rockford also had Roccamena connections from what Cavita has said and Corleone shows up there too. One of the lynched New Orleans guys was from Roccamena and we know that Family had well-connected Corleonesi at one point.
Barney's Birthday PowerPoint. Could be a children's book.
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 5:12 pm
Yeah, we see those towns together in multiple locations yet we don't see much Bisacquino and Palazzo Adriano with them. There's a tendency to link Roccamena to the Bonanno network because of Schiro but it's an anomaly -- not enough examples to say definitively but looks to me like Roccamena fell in with the Corleone network. Stefano Badami's wife was from there, same with the Campisis in Dallas. Rockford also had Roccamena connections from what Cavita has said and Corleone shows up there too. One of the lynched New Orleans guys was from Roccamena and we know that Family had well-connected Corleonesi at one point.
Yeah, there are local dynamics which aren’t always immediately legible to us, and not all of the current dynamics of local/regional interaction in the mafia necessarily map exactly on to how these things were played out in the late 19th century.
B. wrote:
Barney's Birthday PowerPoint. Could be a children's book.
Ficuzza = The Enchanted Forest.
"Hey, hey, hey — this is America, baby! Survival of the fittest.”
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 5:12 pm
Yeah, we see those towns together in multiple locations yet we don't see much Bisacquino and Palazzo Adriano with them. There's a tendency to link Roccamena to the Bonanno network because of Schiro but it's an anomaly -- not enough examples to say definitively but looks to me like Roccamena fell in with the Corleone network. Stefano Badami's wife was from there, same with the Campisis in Dallas. Rockford also had Roccamena connections from what Cavita has said and Corleone shows up there too. One of the lynched New Orleans guys was from Roccamena and we know that Family had well-connected Corleonesi at one point.
Yeah, there are local dynamics which aren’t always immediately legible to us, and not all of the current dynamics of local/regional interaction in the mafia necessarily map exactly on to how these things were played out in the late 19th century.
B. wrote:
Barney's Birthday PowerPoint. Could be a children's book.
Ficuzza = The Enchanted Forest.
Which of the New Orleans guys that was lynched was from Roccamena? I know a lot of Roccamelese from the New Orleans area settled in Rockford.
It was Antonino Grimando, who also used the surname Marchese/Marchesi. Was 48 when he was killed in 1891 and came to the US around 1889. Father Giuseppe and had a son named Gaspare.
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 6:33 pm
It was Antonino Grimando, who also used the surname Marchese/Marchesi. Was 48 when he was killed in 1891 and came to the US around 1889. Father Giuseppe and had a son named Gaspare.
Interesting. I never heard the name Grimando in Roccamena but the name Marchese is prevalent.
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 6:33 pm
It was Antonino Grimando, who also used the surname Marchese/Marchesi. Was 48 when he was killed in 1891 and came to the US around 1889. Father Giuseppe and had a son named Gaspare.
Interesting. I never heard the name Grimando in Roccamena but the name Marchese is prevalent.
B. wrote: ↑Thu Jan 12, 2023 6:33 pm
It was Antonino Grimando, who also used the surname Marchese/Marchesi. Was 48 when he was killed in 1891 and came to the US around 1889. Father Giuseppe and had a son named Gaspare.
Interesting. I never heard the name Grimando in Roccamena but the name Marchese is prevalent.
It's possible that authorities reversed the names. Worth looking into.
Edit: According to government docs he was Antonino Grimando according to his passport, 48 (c1843), born in Roccamena to Joseph (Giuseppe). Naturalized as Antonino Marchesi. Has one son named Gaspare, 14. A widower.
Last edited by Antiliar on Thu Jan 12, 2023 6:55 pm, edited 1 time in total.
