Buffalo Family Lineage

[SonnyBlackstein]

Thx Pogo and JAnthony.

[JCB1977]

Cleveland had 4 Capos for only a handful of old and largely inactive Soldiers.


Pogo

Who are you referring to?

[JCB1977]

Apparently the FBI made a chart back in 2006 showing it had twenty something members: http://niagarafallsreporter.com/Stories ... udson.html

Some people are claiming it's still active, but I am not so sure. I don't know enough to rule it out completely, so if I were to make a chart I wouldn't go past 2006: http://www.topix.com/forum/city/buffalo ... 6MO0CJ4S3I

23 members to be exact in 2006 - a boss, underboss, consigliere, 4 captains, and 16 soldiers. I've referred people to that article many times when the subject of Buffalo comes up. And, if course, several members have died over the past decade. Anything can be put in chart form but I don't think the feds have considered it a viable family in years. You have to go back 20 years to find the last significant case when LIUNA Local 210 was taken over.

4 captains for 16 soldiers? And you believe the Feds had that right? James Comey has destroyed any credibility the Feds have in regards to information, I'd hope you could buy that. You're a smart guy, these FBI announcements are horseshit.

Are you serious? Because of Comey during the election that means we should throw out the window everything the FBI says about the mob even though they are, hands down, the best and most consistent source we have?

And why is what they said about Buffalo so hard to believe? Considering its in the northeast, 23 living members in 2006 is not unrealistic. Though I don't equate those members having ranks and being put on a chart to a functioning, viable family. In other words, I don't think the family intended to be so top heavy but it just ended up that way as attrition set in, guys died off, and the organization became too defunct to warrant a shuffling people around.

While the FBI may be our source to measure accuracy, most of their inside Intel comes from pathological liars. If you are saying that the members in 2006 were Capo's in rank and name only, I could buy that. If you're telling me that 4 Capos were running a tiny crew of 4 guys and were out on the street collecting tributes as if it were 1960 I don't buy it.

Personally, I don't believe Buffalo was viable in the early 2000's, just remnants of earners more or less.

[JCB1977]

And yes, Comey was a bitch and did what he was told. Just as agents are bitches that manufacture evidence and Intel because they had a direct order...no matter what, convict. Dirty politics trickle down from the AG to street level agents. Do I believe all agents are dirty? Of course not. But agents in major cities making a name for themselves are absolutely concerned about conviction, certainly ly not upholding the constitution. It's all about them.

[JAnthony]

Sorry about that,Don't know if there were any links to Mob families or members but thought the article/indictment was interesting,it was also posted on another site.
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Buffalo Jury Convicts Operating Engineers Boss; Acquits Four Others
Posted on April 11, 2014 by Carl Horowitz


operating-engineerWhen it comes to union violence, International Union of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 17, based near Buffalo, N.Y., has to rank as among its most obnoxious practitioners. The evidence of crime proved convincing enough for a federal jury last month to convict former local president and business manager Mark Kirsch on various racketeering-related charges. Yet the same jury in the eight-week trial also acquitted four other defendants. Prosecutors alleged that all five union members were involved in repeated acts of vandalism of nonunion construction sites and terror against nonunion contractors and workers. The case had sprung open in 2008 with the indictment of a dozen persons, several of whom eventually pled guilty. While union leaders and their lawyers are cheering the outcome, it is highly unlikely the local can resume its mobster style of enforcement.
Union Corruption Update first reported on this case six years ago. During predawn hours of April 8, 2008, federal and state law enforcement agents arrested a dozen Local 17 members, among them Mark Kirsch. The raid was the culmination of a five-year joint federal, state and local investigation into a series of reported assaults, threats and property destruction at construction sites in Western New York State that began in 1997. All defendants named in the 62-page, eight-count indictment initially denied the charges. Prosecutors had alleged that the 75 listed criminal acts, far from being unconnected, were part of a criminal enterprise intended to persuade area contractors to use Operating Engineers Local 17 labor. Projects ranged from small-scale demolitions to the renovations of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute and Ralph Wilson Stadium.

The union drove a rough bargain. If it got wind that a given construction project was using nonunion equipment operators, it responded with intimidation that would have done the Mafia proud. Among incidents cited in the indictment:

Carl Larson, an organizer for Local 17, on February 5, 2003 tried to force an Orchard Park, N.Y. contractor and project owner to sign a collective bargaining agreement with the union. Several weeks earlier, in December 2002, the project owner had been stabbed in the neck by another union member, Michael Caggiano, and had his tires slashed. The owner asked Larson in the February encounter: “What are the positives [to signing with the union]? You guys slash my tires, stab me in the neck, and try to beat me up in a bar. What are the positives to signing? There are only negatives.” Larson’s response: “The positives are that the negatives you are complaining about would go away.”

Michael Eddy took part in a campaign of violence and intimidation against a Latham, N.Y.-based contractor who at the time was removing soil contaminated with coal tar from underneath a school in downtown Buffalo during the summer of 2005. Eddy was part of a group of members of Local 17 who had vandalized a pickup truck driven by the contractor project manager and then, after the manager had entered the work site and gotten out of his truck, “belly bumped” him. During this campaign a Local 17 organizer had gotten hold of the project manager’s address and sent an anonymous threatening letter to his wife.

George DeWald was part of a campaign to force a Frankford, N.Y. contractor, the low bidder on a project to expand a landfill in Chaffee, N.Y., to sign a collective bargaining agreement. On the night of May 7 or 8, 2002, DeWald and several other members went to the landfill and inserted sand into the engines and hydraulic lines of nine separate pieces of heavy machinery. This caused significant delays in project completion time and over $240,000 in equipment damage.

Larson, Eddy and DeWald each pleaded guilty on or just before December 27, 2013 and agreed to testify in the trial of seven remaining defendants. By the time the trial rolled around, a grand jury already had handed down two superseding indictments.

That the court trials had been delayed for so long is a tribute to the resourcefulness of the legal team representing the Lake View (Erie County), N.Y.-based Operating Engineers Local 17. One union attorney, Catherine Creighton, is a lead partner at Creighton, Johnsen & Giroux, the Buffalo law firm where current National Labor Relations Board Chairman Mark Gaston Pearce practiced prior to becoming a board member; months prior to his March 2010 recess appointment to the NLRB, Pearce acknowledged during a Senate confirmation hearing that the local had been one of his clients. In the case at hand, defense attorneys from the start have been pouring on the populist puffery. At President Mark Kirsch’s well-attended bail hearing in April 2008, one of his defense lawyers, Rodney Personius, declared: “I’ve never seen such tremendous family support. He (Kirsch) feels that all the activities that he engaged in were proper union activities.” And union attorney Richard Furlong stated: “If these defendants truly get a jury of their peers – including working people, including those who have lost a job or who have no health insurance – they will all be acquitted. In fact, the jury will pin medals on them.”

But the prosecution also had fire in their eyes. They had persuaded a grand jury to deliver two superseding indictments – the second one against 10 persons. And the feds had every reason to believe they would win, especially given that their star witness was union organizer James Minter III. One of three defendants accused of running (as opposed to simply taking part in) the racket, Minter already had pleaded guilty. He was the guy who wrote that menacing letter to a contractor’s wife. Five IUOE Local 17 members – President Mark Kirsch, business agents Gerald Bove and Thomas Freedenburg, and members Michael Caggiano and Kenneth Edbauer – went on trial starting this January. Caggiano already had pleaded guilty to a state misdemeanor (not a felony) charge in his stabbing of a contractor. During his testimony, Minter told the jury in the Buffalo courtroom about his decade-long involvement in criminal activity. In his words, the strategy was: “Try to delay work as much as possible. Try to slow down the trucks.” Under questioning by U.S. Attorney Anthony Bruce, Minter spoke of his handing out “stars” (sharp metal objects) designed to flatten truck tires at a picket line; pouring sand into the machinery at another site; and writing a menacing letter to a contractor’s wife. The purpose of such acts, Minter emphasized, was to intimidate contractors into hiring members of Operating Engineers Local 17.

More than anyone else, Mark Kirsch was the key to the case. If he could be shown to have orchestrated the campaign, prosecutors believed, the four other defendants would roll as well. Taking the witness stand in late February, he denied that he was part of a criminal conspiracy. Instead, he claimed to have been aware of only five instances of vandalism, and when notified, ordered disciplinary action against the perpetrators in each case. Under friendly examination by defense lawyer Rodney Personius, he denied that any contractors or fellow union leaders had complained about vandalism. And while he personally approved of the acts of violence and vandalism (itself a red flag), he denied that he took part in them. His account sounded convincing, but it flatly contradicted sworn statements by dozens of union members, nonunion employees and contractors.

In all, about 80 witnesses testified. When the trial was over, it was hard to doubt that Local 17 operated as a criminal enterprise. On March 7, the jury reported its verdict: Mark Kirsch was guilty of racketeering conspiracy, extortion conspiracy, and attempted extortion. Yet the jury also declared the other four defendants not guilty. Defense lawyers were over the moon. “Their (the jury’s) overall verdict demonstrates they were not enamored with the government’s case,” said Rodney Personius. And Michael O’Rourke, who represented Michael Caggiano, the guy who stabbed a contractor, exulted: “Mr. Caggiano is absolutely elated. He’s had this matter hanging over his head since the indictment. From my perspective, he never should have been part of this case.” U.S. Attorney Anthony Bruce, understandably, was more circumspect. “The verdict was a mixed verdict,” he said. “We accept what the jury did, and justice was done.”

Yet the big picture suggests the outcome was a good deal more favorable to the prosecution – and public accountability. Of the ten defendants named in the second superseding indictment of January 10, 2012, five already had pleaded guilty. The ringleader, Mark Kirsch, is almost certainly headed for federal prison. And the four who got to walk aren’t likely to play any future role in union affairs. The federal government will be watching them like a hawk. Who wouldn’t watch them? The whole crew was scary. Even some of the feds admitted as much. “The union members who pleaded guilty in this case made honest working people go to work in fear of being stabbed or assaulted, even more so than I do as a law enforcement officer,” said Brian Boetig, FBI Special Agent-in-Charge in Buffalo. The smart money says the old regime is gone. Like two other fallen Western New York State union behemoths, Laborers Local 91 (Niagara Falls) and Laborers Local 210 (Buffalo), Operating Engineers Local 17 is about to understand the meaning of the word “limits.” Nonunion contractors in the Buffalo area, not to mention their work forces, can breathe easier.

The case may be over, but there is a key piece of unfinished long-term business: eliminating a loophole in the Hobbs Act, an anti-racketeering law passed by Congress in 1946 designed to discourage extortion or robbery in the course of interstate commerce. The loophole is more than 40 years old. The Supreme Court, in United States v. Enmons (1973), ruled by 5-4 that under certain circumstances a union could be exempt from Hobbs Act statutes if it could demonstrate its intent to pursue “legitimate” objectives. While the High Court did not exempt unions outright, it did raise the bar to achieve a conviction. In the process, it implied that when it comes to unions, the ends may justify the means. More than a dozen states since have created a similar exception. Federal prosecutors in the Local 17 case relied upon the Hobbs Act (and by extension, its original basis, the Anti-Racketeering Act of 1934) to show that IUOE Local 17 operated as a criminal enterprise. Over the years, certain members of Congress, especially Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, and Reps. Joe Wilson, R-S.C. and John Kline, R-Minn., have tried to repeal the Enmons exception. Each time, the proposed legislation went nowhere. Now would be a good time to revive it.

[Wiseguy]

While the FBI may be our source to measure accuracy, most of their inside Intel comes from pathological liars. If you are saying that the members in 2006 were Capo's in rank and name only, I could buy that. If you're telling me that 4 Capos were running a tiny crew of 4 guys and were out on the street collecting tributes as if it were 1960 I don't buy it.

Personally, I don't believe Buffalo was viable in the early 2000's, just remnants of earners more or less.

Have you forgotten who you're talking to, JCB? I'm the guy who's had debate after endless debate with more people than I can remember over the years about there really being no viable families outside of the 5 in NY, as well as New Jersey, New England, Philadelphia, and Chicago. I don't even count Detroit though it's forgivable if others do since there are conflicting sources. So, needless to say, I'm the last guy who's claiming Buffalo is still a viable family. In name only is precisely what I think the case was and the FBI wasn't saying anything different. You won't find any fed source listing Buffalo as one of the remaining families for close to 20 years now. Now why you have such a low opinion of the Bureau as a whole, I don't know.

[Wiseguy]

Like the Laborers Local 91 case before it, the Operating Engineers case above had no discernible links to the mob. Laborers Local 210 in 1996 was the last one and it was declared to be free of Mob influence in 2006. And we're now a decade past that.

That said, the Operating Engineers have been one of the most corrupt unions over the past decade or so and several IUOE locals in the greater NY metropolitan area have been involved in mob cases in recent years.

[Pogo The Clown]

Cleveland had 4 Capos for only a handful of old and largely inactive Soldiers.

Who are you referring to?

Tony Liberatore, Tommy Sinito, John Calandra and Joseph Gallo. They were Capos in the early 80s when the family had been reduced to about a dozen and half mostly old and inactive members.


Pogo

[JAnthony]

Thanks @wiseguy, I didn't see any mob influence there in the case but I didn't get a chance to look into the backgrounds of the indicted names in the case . I guess 9 times out of 10 the Fed's investigation would have uncovered that.

[JCB1977]

Cleveland had 4 Capos for only a handful of old and largely inactive Soldiers.

Who are you referring to?

Tony Liberatore, Tommy Sinito, John Calandra and Joseph Gallo. They were Capos in the early 80s when the family had been reduced to about a dozen and half mostly old and inactive members.


Pogo

Gallo was a Capo but was locked up by 1983 having received a life without parole plus an additional 100 years. Calandra to my knowledge was a made guy that was a yes man to Jack White, never a Capo. Lib was definitely a Capo at one time but wasn't on the scene for 9 years through the 1980's into the early 1990's. He and Peanuts Tronolone were the highest ranking members on the street in 1992 but all the rest of the fellas were locked up . Joe Loose and RJ Papalardo were some of the last guys made into the family in the early 1980's to replenish some of the ranks. But I guess if it was Capo in name/rank only and not actively on the street collecting tribute, I could go along with that.

[JCB1977]

While the FBI may be our source to measure accuracy, most of their inside Intel comes from pathological liars. If you are saying that the members in 2006 were Capo's in rank and name only, I could buy that. If you're telling me that 4 Capos were running a tiny crew of 4 guys and were out on the street collecting tributes as if it were 1960 I don't buy it.

Personally, I don't believe Buffalo was viable in the early 2000's, just remnants of earners more or less.

Have you forgotten who you're talking to, JCB? I'm the guy who's had debate after endless debate with more people than I can remember over the years about there really being no viable families outside of the 5 in NY, as well as New Jersey, New England, Philadelphia, and Chicago. I don't even count Detroit though it's forgivable if others do since there are conflicting sources. So, needless to say, I'm the last guy who's claiming Buffalo is still a viable family. In name only is precisely what I think the case was and the FBI wasn't saying anything different. You won't find any fed source listing Buffalo as one of the remaining families for close to 20 years now. Now why you have such a low opinion of the Bureau as a whole, I don't know.

No I haven't forgotten who I'm talking to Wiseguy, that's why I was getting clarification. My opinion of the bureau is due to the many things. How the FBI pursued Jim Traficant and convicted him on the word of a known liar, how they wrongfully and knowingly got information on Peter Limone and company and sent them to prison for 33 years, how they were in bed with Bulger and crew, how William Roemer exaggerates and wrote books, how their chief agent Comey was clearly instructed not to pursue a high level government operative to name a few. Again, not all agents are crooked and I know that. But the Feds get such a hard on for headlines that they exaggerate the crimes to make their agency look good in the court of public opinion. My parents neighbor and my neighbor growing up was a SA in the Cleveland office and eventually their chief spokesperson and I knew him to be very honest and still has integrity. But I also know that Congressman Jim Traficant went on record to report that SA Stanley Peterson was on the payroll of Youngstown mobster Joey Naples. Wiretapped conversations put Naples and Peterson in the same room and at the same places. Ironically, that's when the FBI stepped up the pursuit of Traficant witht he IRS. Just when the conversations between them would start up, they would walk into the body shop where the machinery and noises would wipe out any clarity on wiretaps. It's only natural to question the integrity of the agency with so many high profile mishaps and lies.

[Antiliar]

JCB1977, I think you make valid points. Although FBI reports are the best we've got, we should always be skeptical. Question everything. What I usually find fault with in reports like these is not from FBI corruption, but from laziness and poor historical research. They fail to ask the right questions and fail to do good follow-up. This leads to sloppy, inaccurate or incomplete reports.

What would I like to see different? I'd like the interviewing agents to be fully prepared with reports and documents with them. I want them to prompt the mobsters they're interviewing. I know they *sometimes* do this, but not every time. Get a complete history. Get second and third-hand information for historical background even if it can't be used in prosecutions.

As an example, let's look at those Justice Dept. charts shown during the McClellan hearings. They were based on info from Ernie "the Hawk" Rupollo, Greg Scarpa, Joe Valachi, and many others. Why didn't anyone ask, "Joe, I see on these charts that they don't show the consigliere. Can you tell us who it was?" Valachi: "Mike Miranda." Q: "Ok, now who was the consigliere before Miranda, and who was the consigliere before him?" Valachi: "It was X, I forgot who was before X." Q: "Ok, thanks. I have a list of names, maybe one of them was before X. If they sound familiar, please tell us about them, what position they held and when." Or maybe, "Joe, when you were first brought into the Luciano Family in 1931, who were the to people and the lieutenants? Who were in the different crews at that time? After you tell us that information, I have some names I can read off to you and maybe you confirm what rank they held. Dominick Didato, known as 'Terry Burns.' Next, X...etc." Imagine how much better info we'd have today if agents and investigators really did some serious historical digging. It's the failure to do that digging, even today, that leads to these incomplete reports, in my opinion.

[Wiseguy]

The problem is - and I'm not saying JCB is doing this - that we've always had people in these forums (fortunately far less than in the past) who will use any misstep by the feds, even if it's totally unrelated, as an excuse to ignore them completely. Obviously the ones who did this the most were the self-proclaimed insiders who's info usually conflicted with the feds and they needed a way to justify telling everyone to believe them and not the FBI. Nevermind the fact that time proved the feds to be incomparably more knowledgeable and accurate than any of these insiders. That's why my alarm goes up any time someone wants to criticize the FBI as a whole or has the knee-jerk reaction that they must be lying.

In the case with Buffalo, they simply took what they had as far as the latest intelligence and put it in a chart. But it had been years since you saw any law enforcement official list Buffalo among remaining families.

[willychichi]

I would add that back then in the 20's and 30's and even leading up to the 70's, especially with the FBI, the feds had no formal training and were learning as they went along how to investigate, gather information, intetview and prosecute OC members. No excuse after that period for the sloppy work just my 2cents.

[JAnthony]

Is Ronnie Carrabbia still alive ? I know he was released from that long bid not too long ago.I think his sons and him are heavily involved in Amusement vending machines and I know they were opening up loads of wholesale fireworks stores all over the U.S. , I think it's called SkyKing or something like that.Also, Isn't Tony Lib' s son a Major union boss ? Does he STILL run that union local ?