Leonardo Coppola

[B.]

Leonardo Coppola seems to be known only because of his murder alongside Carmine Galante, but I came across something interesting about him. He had an apartment in Chester, PA and had been working in a pizzeria in the Chester area before he was murdered. It doesn't clarify how recent before the murder he had worked in the pizzeria, but it sounds like he still had the apartment in Chester at the time of his death. He is also described in the report as a "part-time" chaffeur and bodyguard for Galante. Do they mean part-time because he lived part of the time in PA?

Coppola has been described as a "zip" and was involved in a dispute with Bonanno soldier Giuseppe Turano, apparently one of the reasons for the lunch at Turanos's restaurant. Turano was from Castellammare Del Golfo and supposedly a cousin of Galante. Not sure where Coppola was from, but there was another Coppola in the CDG family around the same period and all of the other Sicilians at the Joe and Mary's lunch were from Castellammare Del Golfo, so seems possible Leonardo was from there as well. Some books and articles describe him as a Bonanno member and even a captain but I've never seen an actual LE or member source confirm this. Given that he was close to Galante and everyone else at the meeting was a Bonanno member, it seems possible he was a member but who knows.

One of the big stories surrounding Sicilian mafia members/associates in America during the 1970s and early 1980s was that they were running pizzerias all around the country used for employing illegal immigrants from Sicily and as fronts for international drug trafficking, i.e. the "Pizza Connection". The Philadelphia area, including further upstate in PA and South Jersey, was a big spot for this, so seems possible that Coppola was working at a pizzeria in this network. He has been said in some articles/books to have been involved in heroin like the other "zips" but like with his membership I've never seen a clear source confirming these activities.

This info also stands out because the Bonannos aren't known for having many connections to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, or South Jersey. Soldier Vito Badamo Sr. had a home in the Hazleton area and the Badamos coincidentally look to be from CDG originally. The Saputo Cheese Company of Montreal, which was once co-owned by Joe Bonanno and was/is connected to the Montreal Bonanno decina as recently as the 2000s, distributed cheese to pizzerias in PA including the Chester area. The Coppola connection suggests that the Bonannos may have had their own direct connection to the area through the "Pizza Connection". Another would be Benny Zito, who did business in PA in the "Pizza Connection" directly with Sal Catalano and Giuseppe Ganci but whose affiliation doesn't appear to have been with the Bonannos like Coppola.

[Cheech]

I must have missed this. Love when the Barbarian has a lengthy post. Pizza Conmection still interests me and I don’t know much about it even after reading the books.

[Hailbritain]

I must have missed this. Love when the Barbarian has a lengthy post. Pizza Conmection still interests me and I don’t know much about it even after reading the books.

I know what you mean cheech , last days of the Sicilians was just confusing

[Cheech]

I must have missed this. Love when the Barbarian has a lengthy post. Pizza Conmection still interests me and I don’t know much about it even after reading the books.

I know what you mean cheech , last days of the Sicilians was just confusing

Ya I got turned around.

[JeremyTheJew]

cabrini is mr pizza connection.

id say best book involving this subject would be Octopus

itd be nice for a john gambino book.... Octopus is the only book iv ever seen him even in.

also id like to know more about Francesco Palmeri job in pizza case. he was the only Decavalcante involved.

[B.]

I expect the only way we'll ever hear more about Leonardo Coppola is if LCNBios finds something, but last time I talked to him even he didn't have much on Coppola outside of what's publicly available.

There was also a Salvatore Coppola involved in mafia-connected pizzerias further out in York County PA during the same period Leonardo Coppola was working in a Chester-area pizzeria but no clue if there is a connection and Coppola is a common name.

[JeremyTheJew]

cabrini is mr pizza connection.

id say best book involving this subject would be Octopus

itd be nice for a john gambino book.... Octopus is the only book iv ever seen him even in.

also id like to know more about Francesco Palmeri job in pizza case. he was the only Decavalcante involved.

btw i meant Frank Polizzi

[B.]

Polizzi was from San Giuseppe Iato which is where Giuseppe Ganci was from. Ganci was one of the main players in the case and he was close to Polizzi, among other connections I'm sure.

[JOJO]

I must have missed this. Love when the Barbarian has a lengthy post. Pizza Conmection still interests me and I don’t know much about it even after reading the books.

great point, me too

I can't find a good delineation of the "pizza connection" that's organized and clear

[richard_belding]

According to Coppola's landlady, he lived in Chester from 1973 to 1977. She claims he took frequent long trips, which he said were business jaunts to Brooklyn or Baltimore. So unless she cant account for those few years, it seems he wasn't still living there at the time of the murder.

-According to his Immigration and Naturalization papers Coppola entered the US in 1969 on a transit visa, indicating he was just flying through and would only be in the country a few hours. But he simply dropped from sight. It was not until 1974 that his presence here was brought to INS attention. He was nearly deported, but the proceedings were notoriously slow.

-Despite his lack of citizenship or any legal papers, Coppola had obtained a Pennsylvania driver's license and got insurance on his car from a Ridley Park (PA) agency.

-Also according to the landlady, Coppola made many long distance phone calls, including one to Roma Food Service of South Plainfield NJ. The firm supplied pizzerias and was controlled by Galante associates and competed with a similar firm owned by the Gambino family.

[Super]

If he was a capo who was in his crew?

[B.]

According to Coppola's landlady, he lived in Chester from 1973 to 1977. She claims he took frequent long trips, which he said were business jaunts to Brooklyn or Baltimore. So unless she cant account for those few years, it seems he wasn't still living there at the time of the murder.

-According to his Immigration and Naturalization papers Coppola entered the US in 1969 on a transit visa, indicating he was just flying through and would only be in the country a few hours. But he simply dropped from sight. It was not until 1974 that his presence here was brought to INS attention. He was nearly deported, but the proceedings were notoriously slow.

-Despite his lack of citizenship or any legal papers, Coppola had obtained a Pennsylvania driver's license and got insurance on his car from a Ridley Park (PA) agency.

-Also according to the landlady, Coppola made many long distance phone calls, including one to Roma Food Service of South Plainfield NJ. The firm supplied pizzerias and was controlled by Galante associates and competed with a similar firm owned by the Gambino family.

Great info. Where did the landlady information come from out of curiosity?

The transit visa bit would fit with the MO of a number of illegal immigrants from Sicily during this period, along with the employment at a pizzeria and connections to PA and NJ. The biggest mystery to me is what Coppola's close connection to Galante was. Did the immigration and naturalization mention if he was from Castellammare or give any specifics? Names of relatives?

Roma Foods was actually a Colombo-associated company. Sal Profaci worked for them. There was speculation that Roma owner Luigi Piancone was himself a Colombo soldier though I haven't seen it confirmed. Piancone was from Bari, so non-Sicilian, but Roma is like Saputo Cheese in that they at least had mafia connections all around them even if they weren't direct participants in mafia activities.

[richard_belding]

-Also according to the landlady, Coppola made many long distance phone calls, including one to Roma Food Service of South Plainfield NJ. The firm supplied pizzerias and was controlled by Galante associates and competed with a similar firm owned by the Gambino family.

Roma Foods was actually a Colombo-associated company. Sal Profaci worked for them. There was speculation that Roma owner Luigi Piancone was himself a Colombo soldier though I haven't seen it confirmed. Piancone was from Bari, so non-Sicilian, but Roma is like Saputo Cheese in that they at least had mafia connections all around them even if they weren't direct participants in mafia activities.

Just a little more interesting info on Roma Foods and the Piancones:

-They were from Bari, like you mentioned, Louis had married (& later divorced) an American tourist overseas; his brother Michael, an illegal with fake cheese maker credentials, had slipped into the US in 1963. Early partners in the pizza business, they had branched out in different directions by the end of the decade.

- Michael Piancone owned a four-state chain of Piancone Pizza Palaces, sold franchises for others, and hired more illegal Sicillian aliens than anybody in the state of New Jersey. Several of his pizza parlors were notorious heroin bases. The biggest heroin seizure in record up to 1971 was made that year in one of his NJ Pizza Palaces: eighty six kilos, shipped from Palermo by Gaetano Badalamenti. The biggest heroin merchant in NY was arrested in another Piancone Pizza Palace two years later: Fillippo Casamento of Eagle Cheese, rounded up in the international drug bust that pinched Tommasso Buscetta in Brazil.

- many other Sicilian traffickers held the franchise the Piancone Pizza Palace’s: two of Badalamenti’s nephews and others who moved heroin with the Cherry Hill Gambino’s were known partners.

- as far as Roma Foods itself which was founded by brother Louis, it was also the sole East Coast distributor for Joe Bonnano’s Grande Cheese Company which gave him a corner on supplies for the entire industry. This meant every cheese, dairy, and meat companies were in favor of the Bonnano & Gambino families. Sal Profaci’s role later gave the Colombo’s a foot inside as well.

- Piancone Pizza Palaces set up the Caribbean Managment Corporation in 1972, which was stationed in the Grand Cayman Islands- which is known as among the largest money-laundering centers in the world.

[baldo]

Great info thanks! What is the status of Roma foods today?

[SILENT PARTNERZ]

Great info thanks! What is the status of Roma foods today?

Most NY/NJ style pizzerias use their products.
Here in the ATL, I go to a place that uses them.
Sbarro uses them. I see there cups and trucks
regularly. When you look them up on Wikipedia,
this is what comes up. They are now owned by a huge
conglomerate that did $17.45 billion in 2017. So it looks
like the mob guys who had a piece of it cashed out in
2015 (?).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Performance_Food_Group