General Chicago Outfit Info Dumping Ground

[NickyEyes1]

Bridgeport Italians are very insular. They often don't even get along with other Italians from different parts of the city. For some reason I always get a Brooklyn vibe when I'm in Bridgeport

[PolackTony]

Bridgeport Italians are very insular. They often don't even get along with other Italians from different parts of the city. For some reason I always get a Brooklyn vibe when I'm in Bridgeport

100%. Very clannish and suspicious of outsiders. When I’m in Armour Square, on the side streets in particular, I often get this like gut feeling that I’m being watched. Sort of creepy and tense feeling. Funny that you bring up the Brooklyn comparison in that, like Bensonhurst, Armour Square/Bridgeport has had a big influx of Chinese.

Even compared to other Chicago Italian “old neighborhoods”, the Chinatown/Armour Square community was rooted in densely interwoven familial networks of people from a handful of towns in Sicily and Calabria. I believe that this has always given it a particularly insular and old school character. One can go there still today and see people with the Sicilian Trinacria flag flying from their stoops. The Near Southside also has a *very* old and continuous history and presence of mafia activity. Even going back long before men like Tony D’Andrea, Mike Merlo, and Colosimo lived there. The earliest likely mafia-related murder that I have been able to document in Chicago occurred on the Near Southside in the 1870s (involving notorious mafioso Gaetano Russo). So this area you can think of really as the historic heart of the Chicago mafia.

[Ivan]

The Near Southside also has a *very* old and continuous history and presence of mafia activity. Even going back long before men like Tony D’Andrea, Mike Merlo, and Colosimo lived there. The earliest likely mafia-related murder that I have been able to document in Chicago occurred on the Near Southside in the 1870s (involving notorious mafioso Gaetano Russo). So this area you can think of really as the historic heart of the Chicago mafia.

Damn that guy really got around, didn't he?

Cool shit, I didn't know it was that old. Thought it got going in Chicago no earlier than like 1890.

[Aunt+Baby]

So as far as present day Chinatown is concerned:

The three elder Carusos
Terry Scalise
Nick Ferriola
Caruso III
Bill Pacella
George Bonomo

Who else?

[Patrickgold]

So as far as present day Chinatown is concerned:

The three elder Carusos
Terry Scalise
Nick Ferriola
Caruso III
Bill Pacella
George Bonomo

Who else?

Michael Talarico but from my understanding is that he is retired and transferred all of his bookmaking business to Terry Scalise.

[Aunt+Baby]

So as far as present day Chinatown is concerned:

The three elder Carusos
Terry Scalise
Nick Ferriola
Caruso III
Bill Pacella
George Bonomo

Who else?

Michael Talarico but from my understanding is that he is retired and transferred all of his bookmaking business to Terry Scalise.

Wasn’t he hitched to schwheis’s kid?

[Tonyd621]

He testified, Talarico, right?

[Snakes]

He testified, Talarico, right?

Yes, in Family Secrets, but he didn't reveal anything particularly damning about any of the defendants, if I recall -- just general sportsbook stuff. He did relate the story about Nick and the puppy's head, though. I think he later also did an interview for the Sun-Times.

And yes, he was married to Nora Schweihs but they are divorced.

[NorthBuffalo]

Donald “Captain D” DiFazio also testified at Family Secrets.

[Coloboy]

As always, I’m sure there are some names not on the public radar that are connected to that group. Some people with local knowledge here as well as Scott B have claimed that Frankie jr has a group of guys around him that he grew up with.

[Coloboy]

I can tell you personally that around the time of the Sflarski video poker bust, the Caruso’s were very much active and involved in the rackets. I won’t get into detail, but I’ve seen literal backpacks full of cash in their residences. They were making a shit load of money, and probably still are.

Aunt baby is correct that they enjoy a high-level of insulation and connection in the areas where they operate. They are extremely well connected politically even to this day. The real, true outfit guys have operating through multiple screens down to a T. As everyone knows, there have been plenty of smaller, outfit “adjacent “busts in the past decade, but they are never tied to the person actually in charge of it. Unless you are Sarno, and you are doing dumb shit like blowing up businesses.

Sarno also admonished Szaflarski on the phone for mentioning Toots by name.

That was David Kantowski (brother in law of Volpendesto and crooked real estate agent) who was admonished on the phone - Szaflarksi was painted as the guy collecting the money from the machines, but I never could figure out if Szaflarksi was the guy 'using' Sarno's crew to take out his competitor (using Sarno as muscle) or whether Sarno 'used' Szaflarski as their 'front man' to own the machines since most of them were ex-felons.

Saflarski is a goof and front guy, nothing more. The issues arose when he married into their family. That’s when things got weird, after the bust

Do you know them or something?

I knew the Safarski family, and through that connection met the LaMantias and Carusos. Was exposed to that whole Bridgeport Italian thing. And yes, Toots dressed like a cowboy frequently.

[PolackTony]

The Near Southside also has a *very* old and continuous history and presence of mafia activity. Even going back long before men like Tony D’Andrea, Mike Merlo, and Colosimo lived there. The earliest likely mafia-related murder that I have been able to document in Chicago occurred on the Near Southside in the 1870s (involving notorious mafioso Gaetano Russo). So this area you can think of really as the historic heart of the Chicago mafia.

Damn that guy really got around, didn't he?

Cool shit, I didn't know it was that old. Thought it got going in Chicago no earlier than like 1890.

We don’t know for sure if a Family was already opened in Chicago by the 1870s. But Sicilians, Palermitani, had already been arriving in small numbers since the 1850s, and by the 1870s there were also signs of likely mafia activity in STL. Gaetano Russo was in both cities, unsurprisingly, as well as NOLA, NYC, and Boston (IIRC off the top of my head). In Chicago, he was alleged to have been running a counterfeiting operation on the Near Southside. He was accused of having shot one of his partners to death, believing the latter to have been talking to the police, and then fled Chicago with the law on his heels. I’ve posted before about this story in more detail.

In the 1880s, there was another likely mafia murder on the Near Westside, involving a network of guys from Termini Imerese and Trabia. They killed a guy, stuffed him in a trunk, and shipped the body by train to Pittsburgh, where someone reported the trunk sitting on the station platform. Presumably, someone in Pitt (another main nodal point along with Chicago for compaesani from that part of Palermo province) was supposed to have picked the body up, suggesting that Pitt’s mafia was already present but this time also.

[Patrickgold]

He testified, Talarico, right?

Yes, in Family Secrets, but he didn't reveal anything particularly damning about any of the defendants, if I recall -- just general sportsbook stuff. He did relate the story about Nick and the puppy's head, though. I think he later also did an interview for the Sun-Times.

And yes, he was married to Nora Schweihs but they are divorced.

I remember that there was talk that he was the acting boss of Chinatown after Jimmy LaPietra died. He was only in his early 30s at the time. Correct me if I’m wrong but I think that was proven to be false. I doubt he is made considering his testimony at family secrets. He is related to Lapietras which gave him some status. Being married to Nora Schweihs also helped but she turned out to be an embarrassment. Drug addict, stripper at Crazy Horse and finally the mob wives show.

[Snakes]

He testified, Talarico, right?

Yes, in Family Secrets, but he didn't reveal anything particularly damning about any of the defendants, if I recall -- just general sportsbook stuff. He did relate the story about Nick and the puppy's head, though. I think he later also did an interview for the Sun-Times.

And yes, he was married to Nora Schweihs but they are divorced.

I remember that there was talk that he was the acting boss of Chinatown after Jimmy LaPietra died. He was only in his early 30s at the time. Correct me if I’m wrong but I think that was proven to be false. I doubt he is made considering his testimony at family secrets. He is related to Lapietras which gave him some status. Being married to Nora Schweihs also helped but she turned out to be an embarrassment. Drug addict, stripper at Crazy Horse and finally the mob wives show.

I think it was an early theory in the papers that he was helping run Chinatown after Jimmy died, but yeah, I don't think that ended up being the case.

[PolackTony]

He testified, Talarico, right?

Yes, in Family Secrets, but he didn't reveal anything particularly damning about any of the defendants, if I recall -- just general sportsbook stuff. He did relate the story about Nick and the puppy's head, though. I think he later also did an interview for the Sun-Times.

And yes, he was married to Nora Schweihs but they are divorced.

I remember that there was talk that he was the acting boss of Chinatown after Jimmy LaPietra died. He was only in his early 30s at the time. Correct me if I’m wrong but I think that was proven to be false. I doubt he is made considering his testimony at family secrets. He is related to Lapietras which gave him some status. Being married to Nora Schweihs also helped but she turned out to be an embarrassment. Drug addict, stripper at Crazy Horse and finally the mob wives show.

I think it was an early theory in the papers that he was helping run Chinatown after Jimmy died, but yeah, I don't think that ended up being the case.

Not sure who was the origin for this idea that Talarico was a big shot. The only coverage that I’m aware that he had in the 90s by the local press was for running the Sinatra Bar at 31st and Wells (next to the old Punchinello’s restaurant).

And yeah, he corroborated Nicky C’s story about cutting the puppy’s head off under cross examination in FS. He also testified that he himself had once been ordered by his uncle Angelo to place a dead rat in front of a guy’s office. Apart from being given rights by his uncle to a gambling operation which he kicked up to Angelo, he further testified that he had been assigned to work with the Calabrese brothers’ juice loan operation and handed out juice loans on their behalf. He was given immunity from prosecution for his cooperation, so while his personal testimony wasn’t particularly damning against Frank Sr in that he didn’t discuss any murders, he did serve to buttress the G’s overall case about Frank’s activities and membership in the LaPietra crew.

Safe to assume that he was not a member at that time and even if he has remained in the loop in terms of criminal operations, I can’t imagine that he got his button since.