Motorfab's Blog: Une Histoire de Crime Organisé

[Antiliar]

New article dedicated to the membership of the New Orleans Crime Family during the 1960s.

The idea came to me to write an article on this subject following conversations that Angelo, Antiliar, B., and I had several years ago about Greg Scarpa who claimed that Colombo had told him that there were only 5 members in the New Orleans Crime Family (here viewtopic.php?f=29&t=6536 and here viewtopic.php?t=9441).

Not sure that I solved anything, but I tried to demonstrate that for me Scarpa greatly exaggerated.

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... de-la.html

Loved reading this! Great coverage of New Orleans.

[motorfab]

New article dedicated to the membership of the New Orleans Crime Family during the 1960s.

The idea came to me to write an article on this subject following conversations that Angelo, Antiliar, B., and I had several years ago about Greg Scarpa who claimed that Colombo had told him that there were only 5 members in the New Orleans Crime Family (here viewtopic.php?f=29&t=6536 and here viewtopic.php?t=9441).

Not sure that I solved anything, but I tried to demonstrate that for me Scarpa greatly exaggerated.

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... de-la.html

Loved reading this! Great coverage of New Orleans.

Great if you enjoyed it, not an easy topic but fascinating to dig all this ...

Enjoy your new year's eve mate

[motorfab]

New article on the blog dedicated to Giuseppe Mammone, a member of the Calabrian mafia active in Buffalo then in Sydney

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... ffalo.html

[AustraliaSteve]

Yeah, this is a perfect read on Joe Mammone’s life and times. Linked to it in a blog post, like I mentioned Fab

[antimafia]

New article on the blog dedicated to Giuseppe Mammone, a member of the Calabrian mafia active in Buffalo then in Sydney

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... ffalo.html

Just prior to seeing your forum post, over on X I reposted your posts about your newest blog article.

Adrian Humphreys describes Antonio Papalia, father of Johnny Pops in Hamilton, Ontario, as a member of the picciotteria — see Humphreys’s biography of John Papalia. Humphreys doesn’t provide a source, though — he might have reused a description he found elsewhere.

[motorfab]

Yeah, this is a perfect read on Joe Mammone’s life and times. Linked to it in a blog post, like I mentioned Fab

Thanks again Steve, much appreciated !

New article on the blog dedicated to Giuseppe Mammone, a member of the Calabrian mafia active in Buffalo then in Sydney

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... ffalo.html

Just prior to seeing your forum post, over on X I reposted your posts about your newest blog article.

Adrian Humphreys describes Antonio Papalia, father of Johnny Pops in Hamilton, Ontario, as a member of the picciotteria — see Humphreys’s biography of John Papalia. Humphreys doesn’t provide a source, though — he might have reused a description he found elsewhere.

Thanks antimafia!

I unfortunately haven't read The Enforcer, but yes I had heard that Antonio Papalia was sometimes described as a member of the Picciotteria. It seems quite complicated to confirm or not, but he was in any case well connected with Rocco Perri and the Bordonaro & Silvestro families, so why not.

For what it's worth, a few years ago I saw a series of documentaries on the mafia in Canada (I think the name in English was "Crime Stories"), and one of the episodes was about John Papalia. Anyway, in it they said that unlike Antonio, John had been made a "man of honor". I mention these docs because they were relatively well documented (which is quite rare) and people like Humphrey, Nicaso or Edwards were among the speakers.

While we're on the subject of the Papalia family, has it ever been confirmed that the Papalias of Delianuova/Hamilton are relatives of the Papalias of Plati? Even though the two cities are relatively close (39 kilometers/24 miles), I've never seen anything substantial to confirm this.

[motorfab]

New article, dedicated to organized crime in the city of Grenoble. The article is mainly focused on the Corsican mob boss Mathieu Mattei, the Italo-Grenoblois gang and the establishment of Cosa Nostra in the French capital of the Alps https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... italo.html

Jean-Pierre Maldera, brother of Robert, the former boss of the Italo-Grenoblois gang mentioned in my article, was murdered this morning at 10:30 a.m. on a highway near Grenoble.

https://www.francebleu.fr/infos/faits-d ... 41-9757046

This is objectively one of the most wild mob hits I've seen and it's a miracle that only Maldera was hit.

[motorfab]

New article dedicated to the two drug cases dating of 1963 and 1986 involving the Piazza family of Misilmeri/Marseille and George Adragna of Pittsburgh/San Jose

https://unehistoiredecrimeorganise.blog ... peres.html

[B.]

Another good one that especially fits your unique area of interest.

I would have assumed George Adragna was completely uninvolved in criminal activity in his later years but here he and his wife were involved in international drug networks.

[motorfab]

Yes, I knew Adragna's name because I'm very interested in California (mainly Los Angeles, less about the other two northern families) and I occasionally read stuff about Pittsburgh, but it was a big surprise to discover his name along with Piazza and the other Marseille mobsters. Especially since I thought I knew his two cases very well, but it's always nice to learn something new (especially when you were initialy looking for something else unrelated to this).

Like you, I thought he was inactive during the 1970s and 80s, like most of the other guys in San Jose.

I have a contact in Marseille who was in prison at the same time as most of the individuals mentioned in the article and who already knew some of them beforehand.

He gave me some additional information:

He confirmed that Mario Piazza and Aldo Di Pisa had cousins ​​in the Mafia in Italy. My contact, although friends with them, wasn't a guy of the same criminal stature as them, so it was pointless for me to ask him if they themselves were members of the mafia. The opinion of Judge Falcone and the investigators is more than enough for me.

This may be less exciting for you to know, but he also told me that Joseph Ansellem later cooperated with justice and that his sentence (9 years) was reduced. No good for him if his sentence was shortened, but also his life, since he was shot shortly after his release from prison...