Daniel Renaud's 2018 book on Vito Rizzuto

[Snakes]

From what I've seen, most mob drug busts are for weed or pills. Most of the coke and junk seems to be moved by the other OC groups.

[B.]

Questions/htoughts:
1. Why did Joe Massino want Sal Vitale killed? Why was Sal in Joe's bad graces?
3. Why did the NY Bonnano's order Guiseppe Lo Presti killed? No reason given.

If I remember right LoPresti was killed for killing a guy without permission. There may have been others reasons on top of that.


Vitale first fell out of Massinos graces because he didn't like how Vitale handled things while he (Massino) was in prison. Vitale was holding Gotti style public meetings with the Capos which brought a lot of heat on the family and led to some indictments. When Massino got out he named Vitale UnderBoss but stripped him of most of the power and responsibilities that come with it (Capos couldn't meet with him, a ruling panel handled the duties of UnderBoss, etc). So he was UnderBosst in name only for the most part. I don't recall the exact reason he wanted him killed but I seem to recall it coming about after Vitale indictments and fears that he may flip.


Pogo

Vitale was also involved with ordering / setting up the murder of Nicky Marangello's son-in-law Robert Perrino without Massino's approval, which disturbed Massino. Coincidentally this was the murder where Vitale asked George Sciascia to bring Montreal shooters but Sciascia instead offered Baldo Amato, which violated protocol as Amato was in a different decina. They did end up using Amato, though, which shows the influence Sciascia had.

The excerpt posted earlier about the NY Bonannos ordering LoPresti's murder and it potentially bothering Rizzuto goes against Vitale's information, assuming the translation is correct. LoPresti's murder was ordered by Sciascia seemingly without receiving permission from the administration. Vitale claimed that Sciascia approached Vitale and Anthony Spero and asked permission to kill LoPresti, but after talking with Spero afterwards, Vitale and Spero concluded that LoPresti had already been murdered and Sciascia was simply following protocol after the fact. Sciascia was banned from Canada by this time, so it shows that he had life or death influence over made members in Canada from the US and we can assume that the LoPresti murder was carried out with the Rizzutos' knowledge/consent. To say that this was when the "cracks" started to develop between Montreal and NYC has zero basis.

Massino said that Sciascia was killed for the murder of a Bonanno Montreal member's son without permission. It has been deduced that this was likely Frank Cotroni's son, though apparently there is information that the Cotroni son was killed by local bikers / gangs in an unrelated dispute, though we do know that the Montreal decina is close to and has apparently contracted with local groups. I am not quick to dismiss Massino's claim because it shows that he was well-aware of Cotroni's murder. The most questionable aspect is why he apparently told Vitale a different reason for the murder, but remember that Massino/Vitale made additional lies to everyone else. Given that there were several layers of lies behind the Sciascia murder, it seems possible Massino also lied to Vitale about his own reasoning given that he didn't trust Vitale by all accounts at this time. I don't see what Massino's incentive would be to lie to the FBI about his reason for the Sciascia murder as his claim does match up with a murder in Montreal and he took full responsibility for order the murder. As is common with just about every mob murder, it's entirely possible there were multiple motivations for the murder.

Alfonso Gagliano was from Siculiana and his membership in the Bonanno family is a possible indication that Agostino Cuntrera, also of Siculiana, was likely made with the Bonannos as well since it hasn't been confirmed.

"For their part, RCMP investigators warn their American counterparts that the boss of the Montreal Mafia is independent and autonomous, that he is much more powerful than he thinks, that he has interests and tentacles everywhere. the world and that his clan is even bigger and better structured than the families of New York."

Sounds like a fanboy speaking instead of a police agent. How would the RCMP, who may be miles behind in knowledge of the mob compared to the FBI, know anything about the size and strenght of the New York families to compare them with the Rizzuto clan. Sounds like a very biased statement. However, we now have to give some credit back to Humphreys and Lamothe, who apparantly weren't the ones who came up with these claims - they were simply repeating the opinion of RCMP investigators.

Another interesting revelation by Renaud (thanks again to Cabrini for sharing it) is the 1991 meeting between the Bonanno delegation and the "20 members" of the Montreal crew to inform them of Massino's appointment as boss. This means that during Vitale's visit after the Sciascia murder Massino should've been familiar with all the members in the Montreal crew, but Vitale wasn't. Perhaps this could be another indication of Vitale being kept out of the loop and make his statements about Montreal more questionable. 

Yeah, we know how competitive and ego-driven LE can be in the US, so I imagine it is similar in Canada. Seems possible that by admitting the Montreal group is a "wing" of an NY family, some members of Canadian LE may feel they are playing second string to US LE. There are some very questionable statements in the Sixth Family, like one I've pointed out before about Vito Rizzuto commanding hundreds of men of honor worldwide. Can't even begin to guess what the source may be for that statement.

B.
I was surprised you never read that about Sciascia and Catalano. It's why I was so baffled it was such a fierce argument on here. I'm like, " Am I the ONLY one on here that's read this shit?"... and then to be called " confused", that shit was too much...

A few things......

It's a little incredible to me you would categorize it as " Gossip", like it's made up, the FIRST page of the book states that they were doing what they wanted.

Anti just defended a bunch of authors, who some on the board basically accused of perpetuating falsehoods, or making up shit, for their own benefit.... it's not gossip, people are just drawing conclusions based on what's in front of their face.....

The info about Sciascia and Catalano being Sicilian members who transferred doesn't' change anything I've said in the past, it's just interesting info if it's true. Members transferring from Sicilian families to US families was the norm 100 years ago and became rare after the 1930s, but continued to happen in rare cases. Catalano was described as "street boss" of the zips by Lefty Ruggiero in Donnie Brasco and George Sciascia seems to have held a similar amount of influence, so it makes sense on some level that both of them may have originally been Sicilian mafia members.

"Gossip" doesn't necessarily mean something is made up, only that it isn't substantiated. We have no information that supports the idea that the Bonanno decina ever officially or even unofficially separated from the Bonanno family. Take a look at the image I posted from a 1960s document where it is mentioned that even then the Montreal decina wasn't interested in getting tangled in NYC affairs and was allowed to administer their own group while remaining a Bonanno decina. All substantial information points to the Montreal crew handling their own affairs from the 1960s through Sciascia's 1999 murder. It seems like the main involvement the Bonanno NYC leadership has had with Montreal is to send emissaries to announce new bosses -- this happened in the mid-1960s, the early-mid 1970s, and then in 1991. That's only what we know of, though -- with so few sources, it's entirely possible there was more contact than we know about, and that includes the post-1999 period.

[CabriniGreen]

Fair enough, I can agree with all that....

What next, more Chapters? I'll finish skimming through 3, and 4. There might be subtleties I've missed you guys can spot...

[Lupara]

Fair enough, I can agree with all that....

What next, more Chapters? I'll finish skimming through 3, and 4. There might be subtleties I've missed you guys can spot...

As much as I would like you to do so I'd be careful with the copying the whole book here though as you may get into trouble for that. But please continue to share interesting tidbits about Vito's relationship with the Bonannos and the mob war of 2010-13.

[CabriniGreen]

Good advice, I wont post anymore whole chapters. I'll try to keep the excerpts to info we haven't heard, and anything interesting or Insightful....

[Lupara]

Good advice, I wont post anymore whole chapters. I'll try to keep the excerpts to info we haven't heard, and anything interesting or Insightful....

Please do! [emoji2]

[Wiseguy]

From what I've seen, most mob drug busts are for weed or pills. Most of the coke and junk seems to be moved by the other OC groups.

The 2009 DEA report, which actually did include the LCN, said it traffics in marijuana and ecstasy and, to a lesser extent, cocaine and heroin. But looking at the cases one by one over the last 20 years, we see a lot involving cocaine.

[TommyNoto]

Any idea who the Gambino was who met with Vito in person to warn him about the problems he could have in New York?

I'm thinking it could've been Frank Cali. In addition, I think Frank Cali was likely one of the New York emissaries during the Toronto meeting with Vito Rizzuto in 2012.

That makes sense , wasn’t it around that time that guys in Italy were caught on a wiretap saying FC was a very competent, senior & influential NY mafioso?



It’s pretty impressive how we are still basically flying in the dark with NY involvement in a very public mafia war tied to large scale drug trafficking.



Like a previous poster stated  that NY distribution was vital to the network and was a great point to make connecting those dots & which seems so obvious now after the fact.



It’s still very confusing but we have several cases and bits of information that Canadian / Italian mafioso are either trying to set up or are currently running a possible large scale narcotics ring. Now is this is a network moving 100+ kilos a year or a 1000+ kilo?  Have Dom and Barney each designated a very competent member / crew to wholesale in the powder, do they work together or do they just get a regular payment like the old Pizza Connection days, or has the West side shunned all direct drug involvement as a security risk but will help with ancillary services ( financing , money laundering , investing etc )

I think people were saying that about him around 2003, which is when Vito Rizzuto was alerted by Massino that Vitale was a CW. I wonder why Massino sent a Gambino member instead of one of his own guys. Perhaps he didn't trust anyone in his own family anymore. 


Not sure whether large scale drug trafficking was a factor in the Montreal mob war but who knows. It seemed more of a territorial matter with removing the Rizzutos from power first and foremost and restoring ties to the Bonannos.


With most drugs coming from the south and the Five Families refraining from selling large scale heroin like they used to back in the days Montreal is not that important to them anymore. This may very well have contributed to the Rizzutos becoming more autonomous in the 90s, after the dismantling of the Pizza Connection and the Bonannos focusing on other rackets and being less concerned with Montreal. 

I don’t know a ton about Montreal or the war so I really don’t know if it was over drugs and didn’t intend to make that connection as I wouldn’t know.

I was more thinking out loud that it seems NY was to some level involved in the Montreal wars as they likely have a big say on NY distribution as someone posted in this thread.

To what level was NY involvement and how much powder are these guys moving in NY are the big question marks to me ?

It seems we have had some hints with some recent cases ( that Tough Tony link was interesting and could be a shocker or nothing ) and it’s seems the warring factions are large traffickers.

Did this all work out with NY being a major drug distribution hub for these Canadian and Italian drug traffickers ? Or is NY largely staying out of the drug game and partnering on the investment / laundering side ? Or Both or neither ? Lol . Lots of holes in this story to investigate as if they did get back (larger quantities ) into the drug business, which bosses / families made that happen as this is all pretty recent.

On one hand, we see enough drug trafficking charges in mob busts to show it's still a major racket for them.
On the other hand, generally speaking the mob has been marginalized in the drug trade for years, even in New York. You don't see the LCN holding a prominent position, if mentioned at all, in most DEA threat assessment or HIDTA reports.

However, what has always been most beneficial to the mob is it's diversification rather than its position in the drug trade. In other words, being diversified benefits the NY families more than if they were #1 in


I agree and interesting times IMO as now we have well resourced Calabrians that have access to large amounts of South American drugs, an outpost in Canada with a likely far less secured border than Mexico to smuggle into NYC / Western NY.

The ingredients are there to set up a pretty sizeable drug operation ( coke n dope as they already have/ had large marajiana / pill rackets ).

I wonder how they play it as it must be tempting to turn that faucet on

[TommyNoto]

* Double post

I agree and interesting times IMO as now we have well resourced Calabrians that have access to large amounts of South American drugs, an outpost in Canada with a likely far less secured border than Mexico to smuggle into NYC / Western NY.

The ingredients are there to set up a pretty sizeable drug operation ( coke n dope as they already have/ had large marajiana / pill rackets ).

I wonder how they play it as it must be tempting to turn that faucet on

[B.]

The simple answer is no, but in the bigger picture there is a more complicated answer...

Sciascia was based in the Bronx but he was captain of the Montreal crew and seemingly a very small number of NYC/NJ members/associates. He appears to have taken over directly from Vic Cotroni, so regardless of where Sciascia was living, he was the official successor of the Montreal crew.

The Bronx crew that Montagna joined after Sciascia's death was the Pat DeFilippo crew, which is what you might call the "main" Bronx crew. It looks like Emanuel Guaragna (coincidentally of Cattolica Eraclea heritage) was the acting captain when DeFilippo first went to prison, then Michael Mancuso, followed by Sal Montagna when Mancuso joined the administration. It's not clear when DeFilippo was demoted or stepped down in the years to come, so no idea if Mancuso or Montagna ever became official captains.

This "main" Bronx crew had been through a few different captains and had been split up and put back together a couple of times in the 1970s/80s, but in the late 1970s it was run by DeFilippo's father Vito who had been a Bonanno emissary to Canada in the 1950s/60s after Carmine Galante, who is credited with originally going to Montreal and organizing the decina for the Bonanno family, and Galante lived in Montreal for a number of years beginning in the early 1950s before he was deported. Personally I don't think we have enough info to know whether the Bonannos were officially in Canada before Galante moved there -- early Bonanno boss Maranzano's family fled to Montreal at one point before returning to NYC, so there is reason to believe there was some connection.

Technically the Sciascia/Montreal and DeFilippo/Bronx crews were both originally part of the Carmine Galante decina along with at least two other future crews in the 1950s, then in the early 1960s Montreal was given its own captain in Vic Cotroni and some other NYC/NJ crews split off from the Galante crew as the decade went on. Vito DeFilippo was a captain for a short period in the 1960s then was demoted and fled to the west coast when Joe Bonanno was deposed. However it should be noted that the Montreal crew was loyal to Joe Bonanno until almost the end and during the Bonanno war Vito DeFilippo and his son Pat visited Montreal with Bill Bonanno and supposedly attended Vito Rizzuto's wedding before they were arrested. The Montreal crew was represented in NYC for a time by Bonanno's brother-in-law captain Frank LaBruzzo. So this group doesn't appear to have simply gone the way the wind blows and they weren't alone in that, as a number of the crews that split off from Galante remained loyal to Bonanno.

Then there is the Nicolo Alfano crew, which had a presence in the Bronx area, included members from Agrigento (including Cattolica Eraclea),and had ties to Montreal and Toronto as well, with JD once sharing that the elder murdered Vito Rizzuto was associated with Alfano early on. Alfano was a longtime captain and already an old timer by the 1950s who would come to be related by marriage to the Arcuris, mentioned throughout this thread. So that adds another element to this that I can't even begin to crack.

So long story short... the Sciascia/Montreal crew and the DeFilippo/Bronx crew were originally part of the Carmine Galante crew, and Galante was the first known "gear" of Montreal, to use your word. And even though the Cotroni/Sciascia crew would split off, the future DeFilippo crew would also have strong historic ties to Montreal.

Montagna himself lived in Long Island, had a business in Bushwick (Brooklyn) and hung out in the cafes and clubs in the Middle Village/Ridgewood area where many of the Bonanno Sicilian element spent their time. His reporting to Sciascia makes sense given their mutual ties to Montreal and Sicily, but it's interesting he was transferred to DeFilippo in the Bronx to "keep an eye on him" and not a Brooklyn or Queens crew.

Another coincidental connection in all of this I meant to mention...

When the DeFilippos were busted in Montreal in 1966, Patty DeFilippo had a scrap of paper with Dominick Trinchera's phone number on it. Given that he wasn't yet banned from Canada, I have to assume Gerlando Sciascia was at Vito Rizzuto's wedding, which the DeFilippos attended. Interesting to think that Sciascia may have met his future murderer DeFilippo at this wedding, meanwhile DeFilippo was carrying around Trinchera's phone number and it would be Sciascia and Rizzuto who would kill Trinchera. And of course Sciascia had a scrap of paper in his pocket at the time of his murder referencing Patty DeFilippo, who by then had taken over Trinchera's old crew. It's like a snake swallowing its own tale.

I'm also surprised more hasn't been made of the parallels between Sal Montagna and Carmine Galante... in each case you have a guy born in North America to Castellammarese parents who hung out in Middle Village / Bushwick with Baldo Amato, who went to Montreal as a high-ranking representative of the Bonanno family to take over the local rackets. Galante had a reputation for violence while Montagna quickly established a reputation for violence once he got there. If you read it in a fictional book, you'd tell the author to come up with something more original.

[antimafia]

^^^^
Sciascia did attend Vito Rizzuto’s wedding reception in Toronto; in fact, the very first photo in Renaud’s new book shows, from left to right, Sciascia; the bride; Rizzuto; and a woman whose face has been blurred out. The unidentified woman could be Sciascia’s second wife, Mary Elizabeth MacFadyen, whom he married on April 28, 1963 in White Plains, NY; however, the woman pictured has black/dark hair, as well as somewhat chubby arms—she doesn’t strike me as Sciascia’s Scottish-born wife.

[antimafia]

Alfonso Gagliano was from Siculiana and his membership in the Bonanno family is a possible indication that Agostino Cuntrera, also of Siculiana, was likely made with the Bonannos as well since it hasn't been confirmed.

felice (our fellow TBHF poster) once suggested on the Real Deal forum that Cuntrera is the only Caruana-Cuntrera male relative who, by virtue of membership in the Montreal Mafia, was made in another mafia family as opposed to being made in the Caruana-Cuntrera Sicilian Cosa Nostra family. This might be true; it might not. As Antonio Nicaso often says in his talks and presentations, the Caruana-Cuntrera crime family is unique among Sicilian Cosa Nostra families because it is a blood family. Giovanni Falcone himself famously said, in Italian, that every male Caruana or Cuntrera in the clan was a made member of the family. (Are there other Sicilian CN blood families?)

Recall that early on in Nicaso and Lamothe’s 2002 Bloodlines book, Agostino Cuntrera is described in a sidebar on p. 2 as follows:

Agostino “Dino” Cuntrera (b. 1944) is a resident of Montreal, Quebec. He is variously described as the number-one member of the Caruana-Cuntrera in Montreal, or as the number-two man in the city, operating under Mafia godfather Nicolò Rizzuto.

In Renaud’s 2016 book, Cellule 8002 vs mafia, Cuntrera is identifed by Renaud as a made man in the Caruana-Cuntrera clan (p. 235) (I added the copy "[Paolo]" below for clarification):

À la suite de la disparition de [Paolo] Renda, Agostino Cuntrera, homme d’honneur et membre de la famille sicilienne des Caruana-Cuntrera –- une alliée indéfectible des Rizzuto –-, devient le nouveau chef du clan, mais pas nécessairement parce qu’il en a envie.

Incidentally, in the same book, Renaud lists Cuntrera as a (brief) leader of the Montreal Mafia, holding the "title" (my quotation marks) for June 2010. (insert following p. 36)

[antimafia]

^^^^
Sciascia did attend Vito Rizzuto’s wedding reception in Toronto; in fact, the very first photo in Renaud’s new book shows, from left to right, Sciascia; the bride; Rizzuto; and a woman whose face has been blurred out. The unidentified woman could be Sciascia’s second wife, Mary Elizabeth MacFadyen, whom he married on April 28, 1963 in White Plains, NY; however, the woman pictured has black/dark hair, as well as somewhat chubby arms—she doesn’t strike me as Sciascia’s Scottish-born wife.

Link below is to Mary MacFadyen Sciascia’s current Facebook profile photo:

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1140117446161614

She is pictured with her two grandsons, Gerlando on the left (Joseph Mark Sciascia’s son) and Luciano (Donna Santavicca’s son). One of the commenters is Elena Veltri, who is the widow of Agostino Cuntrera.

[scagghiuni]

She is pictured with her two grandsons, Gerlando on the left (Joseph Mark Sciascia’s son) and Luciano (Donna Santavicca’s son). One of the commenters is Elena Veltri, who is the widow of Agostino Cuntrera.

is francesco veltri (killed in 2001) related to her?

[antimafia]

She is pictured with her two grandsons, Gerlando on the left (Joseph Mark Sciascia’s son) and Luciano (Donna Santavicca’s son). One of the commenters is Elena Veltri, who is the widow of Agostino Cuntrera.

is francesco veltri (killed in 2001) related to her?

Francesco is Elena's brother; that is, Francesco was Agostino Cuntrera's brother-in-law. See, for example, the article originally dated August 18, 2001 to which I've linked below.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/na ... le4151840/

Veltri is also identified as Cuntrera's brother-in-law in Mafia inc.