Featured Blog Posts (262)

By Seth Ferranti

To many in his hometown of Washington, D.C., during his 1980s reign as the city’s biggest cocaine and crack dealer, Rayful Edmond was public enemy number one. At the height of Dodge City’s brutal crack epidemic in 1987, this 22-year-old man was responsible for distributing 60 percent of the cocaine that flooded the city’s…

By David Amoruso

Authorities and the media alike tend to focus on the bosses and captains of mob families, and deservingly so. But it isn’t until we take a look at the young up-and-coming mobsters that we get a sense of what’s in store for the future of La Cosa Nostra in the United States.

Take 36-year-old Giuseppe Destefano (photo above). He…

By David Amoruso

The times they keep a-changin’. Over a decade ago, Casablanca restaurant in Maspeth, Queens, was the home base of Joseph Massino, boss of the Bonanno family, one of New York’s five Mafia families. At that time he wielded tremendous power as he was the only boss not behind…

By David Amoruso

When it comes to the mob in America everybody knows about the five families in New York or Al Capone in Chicago. But what about a smaller city? Like Tampa, Florida. A city that has a long and colorful history of violence filled with gangsters from Italy, Spain, Cuba, and the U.S. itself. A brand-new magazine and tour shine a…

By Peter Lance

John Marzulli, who covers organized crime for the N.Y. Daily News today broke a story on the new memoir by John A. “Junior” Gotti to be released this week. As Marzulli reports, the book had been under wraps for months. It will be…

By David Amoruso

It was undoubtedly the biggest crime news of 2014, the capture of Sinaloa cartel boss Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman on February 22 at his condominium in Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico. But in a new…

By David Amoruso

It was to be the a huge blow against Mexican drug cartels. “These cartels will be destroyed,” Attorney General Eric Holder said. Led by the ATF, Operation Fast and Furious was to cripple the cartels’ ability to traffic and use American guns. But things turned out very differently and people continue to die from ATF-facilitated…

By David Amoruso

Antonio Madafferi, an honest and successful businessman or senior leader of the ‘Ndrangheta crime clan in Melbourne, Australia? It depends on who you ask, but police are quite certain that Madafferi runs one of the country’s most powerful criminal organizations, one that moves record-breaking amounts of drugs and has connections…

By David Amoruso

Police in Italy and the United States have busted up an international extortion racket run by the Calabrian ‘Ndrangheta and the Gambino crime family in New York. Eight people in both countries were arrested today, including Francesco Palmeri, who, authorities claim, is a high-ranking member of the Gambino family.

As…

By David Amoruso

Would you tell a vicious mobster to his face that his wife looks like a moose? Seriously. Would you have the balls to do that? Forget about balls for a second, would you be crazy enough to do that? You, probably not. But comedian Don Rickles built his entire act around it. Nicknamed the King of Zing, Rickles pokes fun at everyone. Blacks,…

By David Amoruso

Mobster Tonino Callocchia was shot to death yesterday as he dined at a restaurant in Riviere-des-Prairies, Montreal. He was 53. His murder is the latest to rock the Canadian city as two mafia factions are fighting a vicious war for control of the rackets.

The longtime mobster was enjoying a meal at Bistro XO+ (photo above)…

By David Amoruso

It’s a bad time to be a secretive criminal organization. Today, Italian authorities released video of a ‘Ndrangheta elite swearing-in ceremony after concluding a two year investigation resulting in the arrest of forty suspected members of the criminal brotherhood from Calabria.  

“It's the first time that the swearing in, with the…

By David Amoruso

The life of an outlaw is not for the faint hearted but outlaw bikers are turning up the action to levels more appropriate for a Hollywood movie than real life. A video released yesterday shows how a large group of bikers is involved in a wild shooting in broad daylight at a villa in a busy residential area.

The shooting happened…

By Ron Chepesiuk

Santo Trafficante, Sr., the powerful Trafficante crime family’s patriarch, was born on May 28, 1886, in Alexandria Della Rocca, Sicily. At age 16, he boarded the S.S. Lombardia and set sail for American in search of a better life. Two years later, Santo, Sr. followed like thousands of other Italian immigrants, settling near downtown…

By David Amoruso

So much for working in the shadows. Italian authorities have released video images (below) of a vicious attack in broad daylight on a shopkeeper by Mafiosi of the Palermo Noce clan. The shopkeeper, Antonio Vizzi, had refused to pay 3,000 euros in “pizzo,” protection money, to the local Mafia family and was beaten as a…

By Clarence Walker

Who rules the cocaine trade? Will Colombian cartels  remain a  major force in the illegal drug trade in South America and Central America--the primary producing countries of cocaine? Or has other foreigners monopolized the Colombian drug trade to limit the Colombians ability to control the European and Central America illegal drug…

By David Amoruso

The ceremony in which the Mafia initiates new members is considered a sacred event by wannabe and seasoned mobsters alike. Pricking blood from the finger, burning the picture of a saint, swearing allegiance, and becoming part of a brotherhood dating back a century. So you can imagine their anger when they heard the FBI had…

By David Amoruso

Gambino crime family associate Gennaro “Jerry” Bruno (above) was hit with racketeering charges yesterday. Authorities say Bruno was involved in the 2002 murder of a rival, narcotics trafficking, extortion, and obstruction of justice. The mobster was arrested in Las Vegas, Nevada, by FBI agents, and faces a long hard time behind…

By David Amoruso

Eleven members and associates of the Genovese crime family were charged with racketeering charges for allegedly reaping millions of dollars in criminal profits in New Jersey through loansharking, unlicensed check cashing, gambling and money laundering, including laundering of proceeds from narcotics trafficking. Using…

By David Amoruso

Gulf Cartel leader Juan Francisco Saenz-Tamez was arrested on October 9, 2014, while shopping in Edinburg, Texas, authorities announced yesterday, when Saenz-Tamez made an appearance in a Texas court on drug trafficking charges. His ascend to the top is further proof that the Gulf Cartel is in a steady decline after the…