Organization & Operation revisited

[B.]

Some of the basic organizational functions of these roles. Probably forgetting some.

Consiglio / Council / Chair / Board
- Seats belong to made members ranging from admin to soldier.
- Apparently voted in by the membership.
- Conducts underworld trials involving made members.
- Votes on said trials, internal policy, and other matters relevant to the org.
- Can approve transfers (Gentile in San Fran) and holds banquet afterward.
- Likely involved in approving / conducting inductions.
- Presides over boss elections and can remove a boss from power.
- Chairman can consult directly with the Commission about an issue with the boss.
- Discusses and decides on murders.
- Mediates Family disputes.

Boss / Rappresentante
- Must be a made member, can be elected by the entire membership or captains.
- Can be voted out of office by the membership.
- Must be introduced as a boss by a third party who has already been introduced to him as such.
- Represents the Family in high-level politics with other Families.
- Influences all facets of the organization.
- Either sits on the Commission or answers to an avugad on the Commission.
- Carries out many of the duties of the consiglio, especially in Families that didn't have one.
- Sponsors new members and approves lists of proposed members in other Families.
- Often presides over inductions.
- Can promote/demote underboss, captains, and in some cases consigliere.
- Can have soldiers or a decina direct w/ him.
- Sits on the consiglio.
- Can't be killed without Commission approval (during that era).

Underboss / Sottocapo
- Appointed by the boss, must be a made member.
- Must be introduced as an underboss by a third party who has already been introduced to him as such.
- Represents the boss on the street.
- Sometimes a loyalist of boss, other times head of a separate faction.
- Directs many of the Family operations.
- Can represent his boss at Commission meetings if needed.
- Sometimes responsible for "enforcement".
- Sponsors new members and approves lists of proposed members in other Families.
- Sometimes serves as acting boss.
- Often presides over inductions.
- Can have soldiers or a decina direct w/ him.
- Sits on the consiglio.
- Can't be killed without Commission approval (during that era).

Consigliere
- Elected by the membership in many cases, must be a made member.
- Can apparently be voted out by the membership / captains (Gotti / Gallo wiretap).
- Must be introduced as a consigliere by a third party who has already been introduced to him as such.
- Represents the full membership, advises everyone from the boss down to the soldiers.
- Represents the Family in high-level sitdowns and deals with other Families.
- Sometimes a loyalist of boss, other times head of separate faction.
- Carries out many of the duties of the consiglio, especially in Families that didn't have one.
- Can attend Commission meetings as a Family representative.
- Looks after the Family treasury.
- Often the final word in internal beefs between members.
- Sometimes has specific ceremonial duties at inductions and elections.
- Sponsors new members and approves lists of proposed members in other Families.
- Often presides over the Family consiglio as chairman / secretary.
- Traditionally served as acting boss.
- Can have soldiers or a decina direct w/ him.
- Sits on the consiglio.
- Can't be killed without Commission approval (during that era).

Captain / Capodecina
- Appointed by the boss, must be a made member.
- Must be introduced as a captain by a third party who has already been introduced to him as such.
- Can be assigned a wide range of members or none.
- Can represent the Family in sitdowns with other Families' captains.
- Solves lower-level problems involving members and associates.
- When the entire membership can't attend, casts vote(s) on behalf of his members at boss elections.
- Two captains together can preside over inductions in the absence of the admin.
- Sometimes serves as acting admin member or part of a ruling panel.
- Sponsors new members and approves lists of proposed members in other Families.
- Directs all operations within his decina.
- Can sit on the consiglio.
- Can't be killed without the admin's (Commission?) approval.

Soldier / Soldato
- Must be a made member.
- Must be introduced as a member by a third party who has already been introduced to both members.
- Can have any number of associates "on record" with him.
- Represents the Family in lower-level interactions with other Families.
- Can sit down with soldiers of other crews and Families to settle problems.
- Directs his associates' operations.
- Sponsors new members.
- Can transfer to another Family w/ approval of both Families' leadership.
- Can serve as acting captain or in rare cases acting admin.
- Can sit on the consiglio in select cases.
- Can't be killed without the admin's approval.
- Must check in with his captain in regular intervals.
- Must notify superior and receive approval before traveling.

Associate
- Can be anyone of any ethnicity -- if Italian, can be proposed for membership.
- Range of operational power is extremely wide, can be an operational leader or a gofer and everything between.
- Can be on record with a member of any rank, from admin to soldier.
- Can meet with a member of any rank so long as the ranking member approves.
- If highly respected and well-positioned, can be consulted in important matters and be seen as an extension of high-ranking members.
- Depending on who he is, can't be killed without the approval of the org, while others are more disposable.
- Can be "released" to another member or Family so long as his superiors in the organization approve.
- Can attend sitdowns / meetings when invited.
- If low-level, can be used as muscle or a grunt who is ordered to carry out tasks for the org.
- Attends social events with members, even events with a thinly-veiled organizational purpose (celebrating inductions, elections, Family Christmas parties, etc.)

[chin_gigante]

[Associates are not allowed into an Organizational Family meeting.

Besides making guys, can you give me few examples regarding organizational family meeting?

Promotions would be one. When a new captain is promoted, he has to be introduced to inducted members of his crew, which would onl. Gravano talks about when John Gambino was promoted:

"We spoke to John Gambino first on the side. We promoted him to the position of capo decine..We told him that this was official from our representante, that he was now capo decine, and he was going to take over this decine that was left abandoned by Paul Castellano..We went inside a bigger room [and] excused everybody who wasn't a friend of ours. I believe John told some of the people, his brother and them, to be excused, they left."- Quote from LCNBios, full info here: https://lcnbios.blogspot.com/2018/11/ga ... 1980s.html

Since this related to the actual organization, a new captain meeting his crew, all non members had to leave the room so the introductions could take place. This would be the same for a new underboss, consigliere, or boss.

I would add to that as well captains' meetings and decina meetings. I believe it was Gravano who described going around all of the crews shortly into Gotti's time as boss to discuss organisational news. They would tie-in, recite an oath, then get into organisational business (i.e, who's in positions running the family).

Tie-ins are a very useful way to differentiate organisational meetings from operational meetings. The formality of declaring the business of the family open. No associate could be present for such a meeting. While there will almost certainly be operational matters discussed (particularly at captains' meetings), the venue for that conversation is the network provided by the innermost echelon of the organisation. And the confines of the discussion are marked by organisational protocol and requirements.

There are also many instances of members attending sitdowns purely for organisational purposes. Member A has to discuss an operational matter with Member B, but they have not been introduced as friends yet. Member C attends the meeting to formally introduce Member A and Member B. Once that organisational requirement has been fulfilled, and the confines of the discussion met, Member C can leave - he has nothing else to add to the matter.

[chin_gigante]

Also important to acknowledge where the idiosyncracies and differences between families comes from. There's no written mafia constitution. No boss can pull up a citation that the family has to fill vacant captain or administration positions, there's no script to follow for induction ceremonies. The idiosyncracies emerge naturally because these rules are reliant on the interpretation and the memory of those members. A good example of that is Cleveland in the 1970s. Because the books had been closed for so long, Jimmy Fratianno ended up getting pulled in to help them conduct a ceremony.

[thekiduknow]

Tie-ins are a very useful way to differentiate organisational meetings from operational meetings. The formality of declaring the business of the family open. No associate could be present for such a meeting. While there will almost certainly be operational matters discussed (particularly at captains' meetings), the venue for that conversation is the network provided by the innermost echelon of the organisation. And the confines of the discussion are marked by organisational protocol and requirements.

Great point, a tie-in is a ceremonial thing which only members of the borgata are able to take part in. If LCN was just operations based, they wouldn't feel the need to do that, but there's examples well into the 21st century of them doing a tie-in as a ritual.

[thekiduknow]

Some of the basic organizational functions of these roles. Probably forgetting some.

Great breakdown B., really helpful seeing the differences and overlap between the different ranks.

[antimafia]

Watching some podcasts today and I feel this needs to be revisited. I love Scott but we do have very different perspectives on this stuff.

Angelo, if you don't mind me asking and if you don't mind answering: Why does this need to be revisited?

Is there a trend, line of thinking, or interpretive dance either outside or inside of TBHF that is troubling?

[B.]

Also important to acknowledge where the idiosyncracies and differences between families comes from. There's no written mafia constitution. No boss can pull up a citation that the family has to fill vacant captain or administration positions, there's no script to follow for induction ceremonies. The idiosyncracies emerge naturally because these rules are reliant on the interpretation and the memory of those members. A good example of that is Cleveland in the 1970s. Because the books had been closed for so long, Jimmy Fratianno ended up getting pulled in to help them conduct a ceremony.

Same thing happened in the Vicari Family in Sicily. The same elderly member presided over their ceremonies and when he died nobody knew what needed to be said.

The rules and protocol get violated (willfully or not) and there are many exceptions to the rules but the distinctions are still clear to those who need to understand them.

[B.]

We could do SAT questions.

If Joe Capodecina runs the garbage industry for his Family but he dies and John Associate takes over Joe's role in the industry, what rank is John?

A - Capodecina
B - Soldier
C - Boss
D - Still an associate.

The book Takedown helped me understand that back in the day. I was initially confused about the plan for captain Jimmy Brown to pass on his role to Joe Francolino, a soldier from another crew, but it became clear the Family didn't equate "garbage czar" with capodecina. If we didn't know those organizational details we might assume Francolino was going to replace Brown as captain and these kinds of assumptions are easy to make when looking at historic FBI reports.

[Angelo Santino]

Watching some podcasts today and I feel this needs to be revisited. I love Scott but we do have very different perspectives on this stuff.

Angelo, if you don't mind me asking and if you don't mind answering: Why does this need to be revisited?

Is there a trend, line of thinking, or interpretive dance either outside or inside of TBHF that is troubling?

I revisited it because I feel it's still widely misunderstood. We as researchers or knowledge seekers need to understand the difference between org and op the same way someone studying the human body needs to understand the difference between anatomy and physiology. The bones and the muscles cannot be separated without prohibiting the human structure and movement but they need to be studied separately.

I was watching Scott Burnstein's podcast and he throws out terms "like a solder" or "like a capo" or "probably made" and "Detroit and Chicago are different and aren't beholden to New York." I would argue that New York is the outlier and not the norm, that both Chicago and Detroit are more traditional entities than what is seen in New York- smaller membership, incredibly secretive (to the point where for the longest time we most had operational aspects to draw upon.)

I've had these discussions with him and he said something like "aren't we just splitting hairs?" I'd argue not at all. Besase of Toledo was a soldier in the Licavoli crew, period. Calling him a "crew boss" is an outsider description for audiences to get it in their head that he wasn't a grunt soldier. Calling him a "capo" is wrong because he didn't hold that rank. If he were called into Detroit for a Family meeting, he would go and be recognized as a soldier. Paul Schiro was never the capo of Arizona for Chicago. Operationally he may have been the first among equals, a crew leader, but never a formal capo. We don't, or we should not, give them ranks based upon what we as outsiders perceive. It is their organization. if we don't understand it or it don't make sense, that's on us, not them.

It's one of our disagreements but it's cordial, the respect is there between us. I know why he does this- to articulate it to an audience that Besase as a member wasn't a grunt, but I'm more conservative about it and if it were me, I'd focus on driving home that soldiers are not composed of just men in leather jackets committing street crime to generate income "for the family" rather than go with public perception and bestow ranks so that the public better understands their role or importance. But it's not me and Scott can do as he pleases. And besides, while I have FBI docs and wiretaps that confirm Besase wasn't a captain but a Licavoli decina soldier, I could call Scott up right now who could be driving somewhere and he'd rattle off Besase's entire biographical background, which I'm not knowledgeable on. You tell me what is more insightful/interesting? I'd argue that listening to Scott delivering biographical info is, hands down, more enlightening than me being gung ho on the man's formal position within the mafia.

We come at this from very different angles.

--

Additionally, I watch series like Tulsa King to get a feel on how the mafia is perceived by pop culture and I'd argue it fails to appreciate the mafia as a secret society. Stallone gets out of prison, is met by his crime family with open animosity, the boss tells him that his son is "his (the boss') underboss." The Underboss son then tells Stallone that so and so is "his (the underboss') capo" who he ends up punching in the room in front of everyone including the boss. They then tell Stallone he's to go to Tulsa to organize the rackets and send back 5 grand a month. Joe Bonanno would call that depiction of the mafia disgusting. It reflects the viewpoint of the mafia that it's purely an operational criminal conspiracy which fails to explain why it has existed and thrived in the US since the 1850's. The crime is there, it cannot be disconnected. But there is another world to it that isn't readily visible to outsiders.

Drawing back to what B., Griffin and Chin described, there is a process and form of introduction. Stallone wouldn't be told by the boss that his underboss is now his son. He would be formally introduced to "our" underboss even though he knew the son before prison. Same goes for the captain.

And don't get me started on Boardwalk Empire!

I'm not being petty, I'm not trashing these series. I turn off my "mafia cap" and enjoy them. I find them useful because I think they are a good examples for what outsiders perceive and by addressing these nuances or at least pointing them out can lead to a deeper understanding.

Why it matters? Because in almost every depiction, "soldiers" are grunts. People know the Sopranos is fiction, but they also hear how "realistic" it is and the takeaway is that soldiers are Chris Moltisantis-esque. It influences peoples' thinking, which is why every member who doesn't act/dress like low level street guys must be "like a capo" when that's not the case at all.

[B.]

The forum is one of the few places where this stuff is understood well.

It's especially a problem with historic stuff, as most of the media and LE coverage was based on outside speculation and they didnt understand what was going on apart from illegal operations. Sometimes the most notorious racketeer was the Family boss but other times it was someone we'd never guess without our few inside sources. All you can do is make educated guesses when there aren't sources to break it down but some historians have a tendency to put more stock in operations than they should.

You see it in coverage of places like Colorado a lot. Little was known about the Family's activities except the Smaldones who had big operations in Denver and it's common to read about the "Smaldone Crime Family" as if they were bosses of their own group. They did eventually take over the real Family but it was way late when it was on its way out and during the era in question they were soldiers/associates.

[Angelo Santino]

Here's a good example made by yours truly of Org vs Op before I formulated this methodology.

1 Organizational: Members have a red background. I included Rockman at the top but didn't give him a red background. Had I created this after I formed the org/op methodology I would have put Rockman in the associate section within the "with Licavoli direct." But aside from that, members are at the top and associates at the bottom.


2 Operational: As we see, the boss wasn't linked only to the under and the under to the captains and the captains to the soldiers. Instead we see a web of connections relating to different things.


Both charts display the same info, just presented differently. And I'd reckon that each Family at any time or era, would warrant two charts displaying the organization and the operation.

[Villain]

Morning gents.

Some of the basic organizational functions of these roles. Probably forgetting some.

Consiglio / Council / Chair / Board
- Seats belong to made members ranging from admin to soldier.
- Apparently voted in by the membership.
- Discusses and decides on murders.
- Mediates Family disputes.

Associate
- Can be anyone of any ethnicity -- if Italian, can be proposed for membership.
- Range of operational power is extremely wide, can be an operational leader or a gofer and everything between.
- Can be on record with a member of any rank, from admin to soldier.
- Can meet with a member of any rank so long as the ranking member approves.
- If highly respected and well-positioned, can be consulted in important matters and be seen as an extension of high-ranking members.
- Depending on who he is, can't be killed without the approval of the org, while others are more disposable.
- Can be "released" to another member or Family so long as his superiors in the organization approve.
- Can attend sitdowns / meetings when invited.
- If low-level, can be used as muscle or a grunt who is ordered to carry out tasks for the org.
- Attends social events with members, even events with a thinly-veiled organizational purpose (celebrating inductions, elections, Family Christmas parties, etc.)

B I respect your research since you also helped me a lot in ubderstanding the Chicago family and other families too, but I disagree regarding your two upper statements or maybe i should say that I want to add some vital information, especially regarding Chicago.

Regarding the consiglio or the board of directors...previously I showed one file in which we can see Humphreys being present with the top leaders on a meeting in chosing on who was going to lead the CN organization, and a DECISION was made for Giancana to become to boss.

But you said that Pierce's info is "very general and doesn't elaborate beyond that. You've drafted a scenario where Humphreys attended an official Consiglio meeting and formally voted on the new boss. Does that come from somewhere?" (Lets see the file again)



Now, we have another "general" info regarding similar or same same situation when Battaglia was still being a candidate for Giancanas replacement and it seems that Ricca and Accardo wanted for Cerone to become the new boss, but they also wanted the support from the so-called Humphreys group, which means they needed their vote on the round table.



So the most interesting statement is "the Humphreys group" and "support", which means Humphreys again represented the interests of some group of Outfit people who in turn had their own man on the round table. This means that the Humphreys group was still involved in high level decisions, especially in chosing the new CN boss and this a second file from a different year (ten years later) and confirms the same situation. I believe Humphreys and Giancana went with Battaglia.

Again, ill show you another already posted file from my non-Italian thread which for the third time, confirms that the non-Italians still had a official seat on the Outfits consiglio in 1967 (by this time Humphreys was dead) and this time Alex was the one who represented the interests of that same group of people, occasionally obviously because he wasnt Italian. (Humphreys group remember?)



So yeah, Chicago was a little bit different. Dont remember who it was but i think back in the days someone posted info that even members from other families thought the same thing.

-‐---------------------------

Btw, do you have any file with at least few made guys using the terms operational vs organizational? Or is it just an educated guess?

[Villain]

structure consisting of Top Boss, Senior Advisor, Boss, Underboss,

I think this info comes from a made member and this how the orders went down, something which corresponds with half of your "funny" statement. There was a governing board (top boss, boss, advisor and underboss (sometimes known as relay man) )and below them was the board of directors which also included a non-Ital.

Alex represented the south sidegroup, first ward and loop, Prio represented the north side group while Alderisio represented the west.



And yeah, Chicago was a little bit different, as I already said in my upper or last post to B. Im not saying they werent CN family and that they didnt operate under southern Italian rules, but still as you can see there was something different.

‐-------------

In my upper post I already asked B, but ill ask you too...do you have any file with at least few made guys using the terms operational vs organizational? Or is it just an educated guess?

[chin_gigante]

I don't think Angelo or anybody else has ever claimed that organisational vs operational is a term used by wiseguys themselves. It's more of an academic term for us to use to get a clearer picture as outsiders. Insiders wouldn't need to use it because they'd already get it.

[Villain]

It's more of an academic term for us to use to get a clearer picture as outsiders.

Thats what I wanted to hear. Same situation is with me, meaning im also making "academic" guesses BUT often followed by evidences (files with statements made by members etc.)

If everyone around here starts making ONLY "academic" guesses (without any files or any type of evidence made by a member) then we better start talking about the Godfather movie only lol