Beliefs with no evidence

[B.]

There is a social club in South Philly called Palizzi Social club, there is a video on YT about it, that originally opened in 1918 for italians from a certain town (Vasto in/near Abbruzzo). After seeing this, I thought it could possibly be one of the early "different" Families that Harry Riccobene talked about.

Good info. Philly had one of the largest Abruzzesi populations which is why we see so many of them in that Family.

They definitely wouldn't have had their own Family early on, though. Celeste Morello thought the early Families were divided between the Belmontesi, Caccamesi, Castrogiovannesi, and the Campobellesi, all Western Sicilians, and I suspect that's fairly accurate. Less confident about the guys from Campobello di Mazzara as there were fewer (known) members from there than the other three towns but who knows.

Very possible there were early Abruzzesi in Philly affiliated with the Camorra though by the 1920s when Philly had one Family we have guys like Marco Reginelli named by Rocco Scafidi as a member, who was given the names of 1920s members from his brother. If any guys from Abruzzo were made before that it would have been with one of the Sicilian groups, not a separate Abruzzese Family.

Thanks for that clarification, B.
What are your thoughts on the Harry Riccobene statement about there being different Families in Philly before it being the one we know of???

I fully believe it and have written a lot about it on here. It makes sense given Families were originally an outgrowth of their original Sicilian hometown Families, so much like New York City you would see multiple Families divided by hometown. There is evidence this existed elsewhere too.

Here is what Riccobene actually said:

- They "headed small families from their particular town or region. Western Sicily had their tradition and eastern Sicily had their own. It was very provincial."

- The first boss, he said, was in the late-1800s and there were others after him. He couldn't remember their names.

- After the war, Avena opened Mafia membership to Sicilians "from different parts of Sicily" instead of only the boss's village. Though immigrants from Italy (i.e. non-Sicilians) were eligible under new mob rules, none were chosen.

- He seems to suggest non-Sicilians weren't made until later. This conflicts with other sources who said a number of the prominent non-Sicilians were made by the 1920s, but Riccobene was a made member back then so his word has weight though sometimes he is off on timelines.

- This also makes three separate interviews spanning decades where Riccobene mentions there being more small Families, and as he says in this interview they were based along compaesani lines.

This fits with what I recently posted about former San Cataldo underboss and pentito Leonardo Messina testifying he was told the American Families formed as decine of their original Sicilian Families so it makes sense they'd be divided by hometown compaesani or a similar arrangement.

[PolackTony]

We’ve talked before about Riccobene’s comment regarding “Eastern Sicilians” having had their “own tradition” in the Philly region. Riccobene was himself, of course, Ennese (from the actual comune of Castrogiovanni, only renamed Enna in 1926 under Mussolini with the formation of the new Enna province). So I’ve wondered if he meant his own paesani by “Eastern Sicilians” (relative to the Palermitani, Agrigentini, and Trapanesi), or if he was instead referring to those from Messina. Messinesi were by far the largest Sicilian contingent in Philadelphia proper, outnumbering the Western Sicilians. If he meant the latter, he may well have been referring to Camorristi (for any readers confused by that statement, Messina was a well-documented hotbed of the old Camorra in Sicily and remained a center of ‘Ndrangheta activity through the 20th century [‘Ndrangheta itself being a Calabrian variant/outgrowth of the old Camorra]). Not sure if Riccobene otherwise glossed what he meant by “Eastern Sicilians” or if he included his own people as such or not (we may have discussed this a couple of years ago but if so I don’t recall).

Regarding the Palizzi Club and the large South Philly Abruzzesi community. The (speculative) guess that there were Abruzzesi Camorristi active in Philly back in the day is something that I would posit as a belief without evidence. It is, however, an educated guess. We know that Abruzzesi as a group were not strangers to the old Camorra tradition, as Abruzzesi Camorristi were in fact documented in late 19th century Italy. It’s thus a real possibility that there were some Abruzzesi among the large number of migrants who arrived in Philly who had connections already to this phenomenon from back home (particularly if any of these men had previously been incarcerated in Italy). There were also notorious Abruzzesi gangsters and bootleggers in South Philly, such as Domenico DiGuglielmo, aka “Thomas Williams”, great uncle of Phil Leonetti (the Leonetti side was Campanian and I believe that they were themselves connected to a network of Camorristi active in both Philly and Amsterdam, NY). The DiGugliemo/Williams family were from Chieti province (the same province as the Vastesi who founded the Palizzi Club and the home province of a bunch of important later Philly families as well, such as the Ciancaglinis). That South Philly was otherwise a node in the national Camorra networks of the early 20th Century US is supported by the fact that a number of the men affiliated with the “Navy St Gang” group of Camorristi in Brooklyn had close ties to partners in Philly.

So while we don’t have direct documentation of Abruzzesi Camorristi, per se, active in Philly, there are several lines of suggestive evidence pointing to that possibility and I would be personally surprised if it were not the case that some of them were in fact involved in the old Camorra.

[B.]

Yeah, Castrogiovanni/Enna is almost dead center on the the island so like you said it's hard to say if Riccobene meant actual Eastern Sicilians (i.e. Messina and Catania) or if he was referring to the Castrogiovannesi as "eastern" in relation to the guys further west. However, I've never seen anything from Riccobene to indicate he saw his father, grandfather (he made reference once to his grandfather being a member back in Castrogiovanni), etc. as part of a different "tradition" from their peers. We also don't know exactly what he meant by tradition -- we can assume it meant something organizational but it's also a passing remark and could refer to any number of things.

He would have known guys like Avena, Dovi Bruno, and Restuccia were Messinese and that Salvatore Testa was from Catania province, so given those guys were well-established in the local mafia by the 1920s he very well could be referring to guys like them. Avena as we know does appear to have been connected to Camorristi. While the Testas fell in with the "Sicilian faction" later alongside the western Sicilians, they apparently lived in Pittsburgh for a time and little is known about Salvatore Testa.

That Riccobene believed Avena (boss by 1927 at the earliest, 1931 at the latest) was the one who opened the Family up to members from other villages apart from the boss's hometown is a weird remark as the Family by all accounts already seems to have been merged under Sabella in the 1920s and therefore the Family included all kinds of different compaesani by the time Avena took over. Avena taking over itself would seem to be proof that the Family wasn't limited to a single group of Sicilians in the immediate years before that. As I already mentioned it's strange too Riccobene thought they begin allowing non-Sicilians at that point yet didn't make any as we have reason to believe several prominent Calabrians and even an Abruzzese were members by then, the Scafidis thinking so at least. Rocco was told that by his brother Sam Scafidi who was made around 1930. "After the war" would seem to refer to the Castellammarese War which is very late for Philly to make these changes but he also believed the war started in 1927 so his timeline is off a bit.

He may have been mistaken about some of the finer details and the overall timeline but there's no doubt to me the basic information is true and supported by other circumstantial evidence, it's just a matter of when and exactly how it played out.

[InCamelot]

A serious discussion based on a lot of beliefs with no evidence here:

https://www.patreon.com/posts/how-80s-m ... =web_share

"Castellammarese War was Moustache Petes vs young turks"
"Lucky beat them all"
etc

[PolackTony]

Yeah, Castrogiovanni/Enna is almost dead center on the the island so like you said it's hard to say if Riccobene meant actual Eastern Sicilians (i.e. Messina and Catania) or if he was referring to the Castrogiovannesi as "eastern" in relation to the guys further west. However, I've never seen anything from Riccobene to indicate he saw his father, grandfather (he made reference once to his grandfather being a member back in Castrogiovanni), etc. as part of a different "tradition" from their peers. We also don't know exactly what he meant by tradition -- we can assume it meant something organizational but it's also a passing remark and could refer to any number of things.

He would have known guys like Avena, Dovi Bruno, and Restuccia were Messinese and that Salvatore Testa was from Catania province, so given those guys were well-established in the local mafia by the 1920s he very well could be referring to guys like them. Avena as we know does appear to have been connected to Camorristi. While the Testas fell in with the "Sicilian faction" later alongside the western Sicilians, they apparently lived in Pittsburgh for a time and little is known about Salvatore Testa.

That Riccobene believed Avena (boss by 1927 at the earliest, 1931 at the latest) was the one who opened the Family up to members from other villages apart from the boss's hometown is a weird remark as the Family by all accounts already seems to have been merged under Sabella in the 1920s and therefore the Family included all kinds of different compaesani by the time Avena took over. Avena taking over itself would seem to be proof that the Family wasn't limited to a single group of Sicilians in the immediate years before that. As I already mentioned it's strange too Riccobene thought they begin allowing non-Sicilians at that point yet didn't make any as we have reason to believe several prominent Calabrians and even an Abruzzese were members by then, the Scafidis thinking so at least. Rocco was told that by his brother Sam Scafidi who was made around 1930. "After the war" would seem to refer to the Castellammarese War which is very late for Philly to make these changes but he also believed the war started in 1927 so his timeline is off a bit.

He may have been mistaken about some of the finer details and the overall timeline but there's no doubt to me the basic information is true and supported by other circumstantial evidence, it's just a matter of when and exactly how it played out.

My suspicion is that while Riccobene's chronology was fuzzy (a very common issue with later sources attempting to piece together events from decades past), he was gesturing at something important around Avena, who may well have opened the doors for the full-on incorporation/absorption of (actual) Eastern Sicilians and Mainland meridionali in the Philly mafia, even if Riccobene was a bit off on the actual timeline (we know comparatively more, obviously, about how this process unfolded in places like NYC, Chicago, and Pittsburgh, but it certainly happened in Philly as well). While we will never know exactly what Riccobene meant by his vague comment regarding "Eastern Sicilians" having their own, separate "tradition", given the huge Messinese community in Philly, I would bet good money that he was pointing in that direction (given that the mafia in Caltanissetta, the original province to which Castrogiovanni belonged, was fully a part of the general Western Sicilian Cosa Nostra phenomenon and nothing else in Riccobene's account points to him having depicted his own family and paesani as forming a separate "tradition" from the Palermitani, etc.).

You brought up Salvatore Testa, and it's worth noting here that he was from Calatabiano, on the borderlands of Messina and Catania provinces; in modern times, Italian LE has characterized this area (Calatabiano/Naxos/Taormina) as a "crossroads" for Cosa Nostra and the 'ndrangheta (incidentally, Italian authorities just executed a major "blitz" on mafiosi in this area a couple of days ago). My belief is that this bears echoes of deeper historical processes in that part of Sicily, which has been a crossroads in this way since probably the early 20th century.

While nowhere near as numerous as the Messinesi, there were many Catanesi in Philly. Into the 20th Century, accounts described Catania City as, practically, overrun by "Camorristi" (as with Messina), who instilled terror in the population and extracted extortion revenues from multiple areas of economic activity (very similar to old accounts from Napoli in this). This was the Catania from whence arrived those who came to the US in the decades around and after 1900. As with the Messinesi, these were people for whom the old Camorra would have been a fact of life, and we can presume that, as with the mafia, some number of affiliates of these Societies arrived among their paesani in the US and began setting up networks to extort and take advantage of them. As with the Abruzzesi, we don't have a direct, explicit account of Eastern Sicilians operating Camorra societies (as such), but I would be surprised if some of this *were not happening* and if such things were not relevant to the ways that some of these people became incorporated in the LCN network. We do have that account from Antonio Musolino (brother of the infamous Giuseppe Musolino), which noted that the Calabrian Camorra (aka, "Mano Nera") Society (headed by Francesco Filasto, partner of Chicago's Giacomo Colosimo) in NYC in the early 20th Century included both Calabrians along with a number of "Sicilians". Musolino did not note where in Sicily these men were from, but we can presume that they may well have hailed from NYC/Brooklyn's also-sizeable Messinese and Catanese communities, and that such dynamics would certainly not have been restricted to NYC.

[B.]

His recollection that Philly opened itself to inducting non-Sicilians but initially chose not to induct anyone could indicate they were responding to national changes. It seems unlikely that Philly on its own sought to amend the rules to allow non-Sicilians yet had no candidates -- more likely they were aware of other Families doing this around the country and a national rule change was put forth (we know Pittsburgh inducting Camorristi required national intervention), with Philly accepting the rule change but simply choosing not to induct non-Sicilians at that point. We know it was a short time before they were overrun with mainlanders, though, so any reluctance to make them was temporary. Whereas some Families around the country remained purely or almost purely Sicilian, those cities didn't have the overpowering Southern Italian mainland population that Philly had.

This brings to mind the FBI informant I've mentioned who said that initially the American mafia only inducted Sicilian-born members, then allowed American-born Sicilians, followed by Calabrians, Neapolitans, and eventually all Italians. Riccobene's recollection shows a similar pattern where initially Families could only have compaesani as members, then they allowed Sicilians from other regions, followed by non-Sicilians. In both cases the umbrella of acceptable members widens from a very specific type of Sicilian, to a wider range of Sicilians, and then non-Sicilians. In Philly I wouldn't be surprised if it was the same as the other FBI informant said where the initial mainlanders were from specific parts of Southern Italy (Calabria, Campania, possibly Abruzzo) before widening to include all Italians.

I'm also curious if the original Philly Families were truly restricted to literal compaesani from the same village like Riccobene said or if they were a little more broad than that. Like if an early member was from Misilmeri is he going to be told he can't join the local Belmontese Family? Seems unlikely and that the rule was a little more flexible than Riccobene made it sound even though the basic nucleus of these Families was compaesani based. The Belmontesi, Caccamesi, and Castrogiovannesi look to have had enough of a presence to easily form their own strict compaesani-based Families but given the elements from Campobello di Mazzara and Castellammarese were smaller, did those Trapanese mafiosi have their own group? We'll never find an answer but that's kind of what I'm getting at.

The timeline also brings to mind the murder of Giorgio Catania (Caccamo) in 1928. Riccobene identified him as a former boss which indicates Catania had likely been boss of the local Caccamese Family but was he a boss until his murder, which marked the merging of the Caccamese with the other group(s)? We know prominent Caccamese were also killed in Chicago Heights and Pittsburgh during the later half of the 1920s which I've mentioned before but I'm curious if Catania's murder had any formal significance at the time or if he was simply a former boss of one of the pre-Sabella Philly Families at the time given Riccobene seemed to remember these changes taking place closer to Avena's time as boss (again, 1927 being the earliest he's been identified as boss although others place it around 1931).

[OmarSantista]

I've got one, Carlo Tresca. I'm not big on politics but reading through Anthony DeStefano's book The Deadly Don I thought adding this here would be ideal. Quoting the Deadly Don, "the author of Carlo Trescas 2010 book, Nunzio Pernicone describes facts & scenarios that work against the idea that Genovese took $500,000 to have Tresca killed". As an outsider looking in I never questioned Carlo's murderer until reading this bit. Much like many other results of conclusions in this subject I think theres a little bit of both sides of the story mixed in this one.

Summary of Pernicone's Declarations - Mussolini had too much on his plate in 1942 to worry about a NY reporter. In 1940 Tresca did allude to dirty laundry in Genovese's closet referring to narcotics, pernicone goes on to mention that Tresca never did write about drugs specifically. Tresca then goes on to rhetorically ask why Vito would kill Tresca 3 years later for something written in 1940. (Obviously Pernicone didn't understand cosa nostra's having of a long memory whether this was done by Vito's hand or not, understandably so). Pernicone's examination decades later brought him to the idea that the instigator was most likely Frank "Don Ciccio" Garafalo whom Tresca blurted insults at as well as Garofalo's pro-fascist friends at an Italian war bond dinner in 1942 at the Manhattan Club. Years later a biographical summary of Garofalo known as "Garofolo" said that he was "believed to have ordered the murder of Carlo Tresca in 1943." The shooter is said to have been Carmine Galante.

Not sure if this part was supposed to be apart of Pernicone's opposition but the book states that "traction for the story that Genovese was involved stemmed from a story that appeared in the Brooklyn Eagle Newspaper that reported how Ernest Rupolo one of the killers of Boccia alleged that the mob boss arranged the Tresca hit, again with no substantiation"

It's possible it was a Genovese hit, it's possible it was a Bonanno hit, it's possible Tresca was a rock in the shoe of Mussolini (who had a reciprocal relationship with Vito during Vito's time in Italy), as well as Frank Garofalo and friends, causing those 2 families to collaborate in 1943, I lean toward the latter but idk, that's what I've got.

[scagghiuni]

I actually have a good one.

I think the real wealth in the Sicilian Mafia might be concentrated in a few powerful surnames.

I don't think they HOLD a lot of ACTUAL liquidity.

I think they control and or co-op businessmen who operate within territory they reside in. But I don't know if they possess billions, or rather.... this wealth is not distributed in a homogeneous way amongst the families.

almost half of the assets seized in Italy belong to Cosa Nostra, but there are important families like the Inzerillos from whom nothing has ever been seized, however at present it seems that they have been seized in a homogenous way

[Hired_Goonz]

These ones might be foregone conclusions to most but-

Guys like Kevin Weeks, Johnny Martorano, maybe even guys like Jimmy Mantville and Paul Moore were completely aware of Whitey giving info to the FBI. They have admitted to knowing about Whitey's relationship with Connolly, I believe they just assumed that when the indictments came they would all be shielded.

Joe Mac definitely killed Jimmy Simms. Simms had been saying Mac was unstable b/c of his drinking and did not want to do anymore work with him. They had some sort of falling out and Mac killed him. However, I believe Joe was sober when he killed Simms because Simms body was never found.

Yea reading between the lines of Martorano's book it's so obvious that he knew what the deal was. Flemmi gets bail after being on the lam for blowing up a lawyer where his codefendant got 30 years and he pretends that he thought Stevie just got "lucky"? Think about the horse racing case for a second. Martorano claims that he believed that Connolly as a corrupt agent on their payroll kept Bulger and Flemmi out of the case - how the FUCK would he be able to swing that with his superiors unless those 2 guys were informants? It's ridiculous. Then Johnny himself goes on the run for like 18 years to avoid this chickenshit case? Johnny never noticed that Whitey and Stevie never did any time in 30 years despite being so active? The Boston Globe outs Bulger as an informant and Martorano seriously is convinced that it's nothing but a smear job on Whitey's brother? Gimme a break.

Johnny knew exactly why he and his partners had lived such a charmed criminal life and when the time came he made a sweetheart deal. Can't knock the hustle, but it's insulting to our intelligence to pretend that he didn't find out until 96 or whatever it was when it came out in court.

Did Howie Winter know about Bulger and Flemmi's relationship with the Feds? As he went down on the race fixing case. Also Howie worked with Buddy McLean who was a federal informant during the gang war against the McLaughlin's. I wonder if Howie knew then about Stevie's thing with the Feds such as Paul Rico from Buddy.

He would have had to realize they were doing more than just bribing an agent to not get charged in that case so yea he must have known by then at the latest. Even the whole thing with Winter is crazy how it worked out because all these guys he did murders with were informants but he doesn't end up getting charged with any of them. Look at this Patrick Nee character, he gets out from under this long sentence and also never gets charged for murders he committed with informants. Everything and everyone in Boston in this era should be considered to be some kind of informant unless proven otherwise lol.

[B.]

One more....

Benny Squint being the boss was the worst kept secret in the mafia. Everyone knew.

We don't have a lot of Genovese member sources from that era but Barone, Russo, and Cafaro all said Lombardo was the actual boss. They were all soldiers (though Russo and Cafaro were very close to the admin) so it doesn't seem to have been a total mystery. That said, outside of the Genovese Family it does seem contemporary FBI sources thought it was Tieri which was seemingly the point of the whole set-up.

I'll throw one into the mix....

I think Torreta has had......some kinda colony in New York since Francesco Gambino.

That's not a belief without evidence. There's been a colony of Torrettesi in NYC continuously for many decades now. Plenty of evidence for that.

[CabriniGreen]

One more....

Benny Squint being the boss was the worst kept secret in the mafia. Everyone knew.

We don't have a lot of Genovese member sources from that era but Barone, Russo, and Cafaro all said Lombardo was the actual boss. They were all soldiers (though Russo and Cafaro were very close to the admin) so it doesn't seem to have been a total mystery. That said, outside of the Genovese Family it does seem contemporary FBI sources thought it was Tieri which was seemingly the point of the whole set-up.

I'll throw one into the mix....

I think Torreta has had......some kinda colony in New York since Francesco Gambino.

That's not a belief without evidence. There's been a colony of Torrettesi in NYC continuously for many decades now. Plenty of evidence for that.

I don't know what Torretesi are. Are these members of the Torreta mafia family? You killing me if you mean just regular people from Torreta.

[B.]

One more....

Benny Squint being the boss was the worst kept secret in the mafia. Everyone knew.

We don't have a lot of Genovese member sources from that era but Barone, Russo, and Cafaro all said Lombardo was the actual boss. They were all soldiers (though Russo and Cafaro were very close to the admin) so it doesn't seem to have been a total mystery. That said, outside of the Genovese Family it does seem contemporary FBI sources thought it was Tieri which was seemingly the point of the whole set-up.

I'll throw one into the mix....

I think Torreta has had......some kinda colony in New York since Francesco Gambino.

That's not a belief without evidence. There's been a colony of Torrettesi in NYC continuously for many decades now. Plenty of evidence for that.

I don't know what Torretesi are. Are these members of the Torreta mafia family? You killing me if you mean just regular people from Torreta.

Torrettesi refers to people from the village of Torretta and it includes both mafiosi from there (who belong to different Families, including Torretta, Gambinos, Luccheses, and maybe even Bonannos) and regular people. There have been Torrettesi in NYC continuously for decades and that includes mafiosi and civilians.

As far as the word Torrettese goes it's like like saying someone is a Chicagoan. In a mafia context, it refers to mafiosi from Torretta.

[CabriniGreen]

One more....

Benny Squint being the boss was the worst kept secret in the mafia. Everyone knew.

We don't have a lot of Genovese member sources from that era but Barone, Russo, and Cafaro all said Lombardo was the actual boss. They were all soldiers (though Russo and Cafaro were very close to the admin) so it doesn't seem to have been a total mystery. That said, outside of the Genovese Family it does seem contemporary FBI sources thought it was Tieri which was seemingly the point of the whole set-up.

I'll throw one into the mix....

I think Torreta has had......some kinda colony in New York since Francesco Gambino.

That's not a belief without evidence. There's been a colony of Torrettesi in NYC continuously for many decades now. Plenty of evidence for that.

I don't know what Torretesi are. Are these members of the Torreta mafia family? You killing me if you mean just regular people from Torreta.

Torrettesi refers to people from the village of Torretta and it includes both mafiosi from there (who belong to different Families, including Torretta, Gambinos, Luccheses, and maybe even Bonannos) and regular people. There have been Torrettesi in NYC continuously for decades and that includes mafiosi and civilians.

As far as the word Torrettese goes it's like like saying someone is a Chicagoan. In a mafia context, it refers to mafiosi from Torretta.

See the part that I don't get is why include REGULAR people? Or conflate the two. Are you referring to a Geographic location, or the ACTUAL FAMILY. To me its a little like referring to the geographic area of Brooklyn, or the Lower East Side like a family. Like... Brooklynite isn't a mafia term. Imagine using it like it's a mafia reference.

The FBI chart that gets made for the purpose of identifying Sicilian MAFIA members present in NY is NOT going to include a bunch of regular people.

I don't get why you do that....

I remember someone asked.... " How many guys in the Gambino Sicilian faction..." ;The answer was something like 8. What if we include the entire extended community of residents with ancestry from the Passo Di Rigano area? THEN how many was it? I think the number of Torreta guys arrested connected to Francesco Gambino was over 30. If Passo Di Rigano, had what we refer to as a powerful faction in NY with 8 members, what the hell was Ciccio Gambinos crew? A whole FAMILY? I mean.....how big was it if they had that many guys in NY?

Think about it like this.......

Ernie Grillo pops up in Sicily again. This time he's with SEVERAL Americans. They've been there all year and haven't left, holding clandestine meetings and shit. They are up to no good. An Italian investigator ask...."What family is THIS one with?" . Imagine the reply being something like..." He's part of a network of Brooklynites".... It's like no bro. He's a Gambino.
He's a Luchesse. And their relatives in Brooklyn arnt going to be identified as being part of the family.

Or maybe I'm over thinking it?.....I dunno... I gave you my criteria for this stuff in a pm awhile back.....

That boss from Borgetto who got indicted for extortion? Of the regular people? Is he setting up a criminal extention of HIS parent borgata? Is he the Borgetto component of an integrated Sicilian mafia faction that has members spread out amongst the families, but still answerable to Sicily like we saw with someone like Riccardo Cefalu? Did he abdicate and join an American Family? Is he a rouge doing his own thing like that Palmeri guy?

The regular people never even enter my thought process....

[CabriniGreen]

I actually have a good one.

I think the real wealth in the Sicilian Mafia might be concentrated in a few powerful surnames.

I don't think they HOLD a lot of ACTUAL liquidity.

I think they control and or co-op businessmen who operate within territory they reside in. But I don't know if they possess billions, or rather.... this wealth is not distributed in a homogeneous way amongst the families.

That's interesting. Any particular reason for the theory? Specifically the wealth being concentrated in a few families.

I'll have to corral some articles and excerpts to lay it all out. But it's the contemporary stuff happening with Palermo mostly.

Especially this recent big bust. They continuously speak on how the Palermo people were regulated to the local wholesale narcotics market in Sicily. That no one in Palermo could source large amounts of cocaine.

Simultaneously we have the Lombard mafia system being led by none other than one of the 70s Heroin baron like families, the Fidanzati. Reportedly sourcing a TON of coke a month for the Lombard region. And he's supposed to be under Ruttesana...no? Isnt that in Palermo?

That's one little thing..... There's a lot more to it than that though....

[motorfab]

I actually have a good one.

I think the real wealth in the Sicilian Mafia might be concentrated in a few powerful surnames.

I don't think they HOLD a lot of ACTUAL liquidity.

I think they control and or co-op businessmen who operate within territory they reside in. But I don't know if they possess billions, or rather.... this wealth is not distributed in a homogeneous way amongst the families.

That's interesting. Any particular reason for the theory? Specifically the wealth being concentrated in a few families.

I'll have to corral some articles and excerpts to lay it all out. But it's the contemporary stuff happening with Palermo mostly.

Especially this recent big bust. They continuously speak on how the Palermo people were regulated to the local wholesale narcotics market in Sicily. That no one in Palermo could source large amounts of cocaine.

Simultaneously we have the Lombard mafia system being led by none other than one of the 70s Heroin baron like families, the Fidanzati. Reportedly sourcing a TON of coke a month for the Lombard region. And he's supposed to be under Ruttesana...no? Isnt that in Palermo?

That's one little thing..... There's a lot more to it than that though....

Yes Resuttana is a district in Palermo. Gaetano Fidanzati was from Aranella, part of the Resuttana mandamento

Regarding Lombardia I think the 'ndrangheta is much bigger than Cosa Nostra there, especially when it comes to cocaine. You have the Barbaro/Sergi/Trimboli/Musitano/Papalia clan(s) from Plati, which is very big and influential in that area