The Gangster Report -

Bracing For Impact: Ex-Trafficante Mafia Figure ‘Big John’ Jammed Up In Healthcare Scam Out Of West Palm Beach

Scott Burnstein

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October 15, 2021

Bracing For Impact: Ex-Trafficante Mafia Figure ‘Big John’ Jammed Up In Healthcare Scam Out Of West Palm Beach

October 15, 2021 — Former Florida mob soldier John (Big John) Mamone was indicted last week in West Palm Beach on charges of Medicare fraud.

Mamone, 70, pleaded not guilty to stealing almost $4,000,000 bucks in phony healthcare claims for knee, ankle, shoulder and wrist braces and was released on a half-million dollar bond to await trial. He was a member of the Trafficante crime family’s South Florida satellite crew in the last vestiges of existence for both the crew and the crime family as a whole. These days, Big John lives in Delray Beach.

The Trafficante clan was based out of the Tampa-St. Petersburg area for years, but has since gone dormant. Two decades ago, Mamone left his life in the mafia behind and entered the Witness Protection Program after taking a federal racketeering pinch.

Before being inducted into the Trafficante organization in the mid-1990s, Mamone was an associate of New York’s Genovese crime family. As part of his cooperation deal, Mamone helped prosecutors convict Genovese soldier Paul (Doc) Gaccione in a homicide case from 1992: the murder of mob associate Angelo Sangiuolo in which Gaccione admitted to Mamone his role as getaway driver in the hit.

Gaccione and Mamone were partners in running construction rackets for Genovese capo Angelo (The Horn) Prisco in the late 1980s and early 90s. Sangiuolo was Prisco’s first cousin and was caught stealing from a Genovese gambling business. Prior to hooking up with the Prisco crew, Mamone reported to one of the Genovese’s New Jersey capos, John (The Count) DiGilio, who was murdered in 1988 for unstable behavior.

Gaccione got “made” in the months following the Sangiuolo murder. Mamone, realizing he wasn’t being inducted into the Genovese borgata any time soon and the constant heat Prisco was garnering was bad for him personally, relocated to South Florida.

Working for the Trafficante family’s Miami crew headed by Steve (Uncle Stevie) Raffa, Mamone headquartered his operations out of Gold Coast Check Cashing in Margate. According to FBI records from that era, Big John oversaw Raffa’s day-to-day loan sharking and gambling rackets. The entire South Florida regime was dismantled by an October 2000 bust. Raffa committed suicide weeks later that November.

Unresolved Trouble In The Six: The Toronto Unsolved Mob Murder Timeline (1967-2018)

Scott Burnstein

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October 11, 2021

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Unresolved Trouble In The Six: The Toronto Unsolved Mob Murder Timeline (1967-2018)

Unsolved Gangland Homicides From The 6:

The Toronto Mob Murder Hit List (1967-2018)

Salvatore (Sammy Bottles) Triumbari — Mafia soldier shot dead in the driveway of his northside Toronto home in the early morning hours of January 6, 1967. Triumbari was murdered because he attacked and disfigured a Siderno clan elder statesman and failed to successfully plead his case at a Sitdown held at his home 72 hours before he was killed.

Fillippe (Phil the Shoe) Vendemini — Mafia soldier gunned down on June 6, 1969 for his connection to Sammy Bottles. Vendemini was Triumbari’s right hand man and believed to have taken part in the unsanctioned attack that got Sammy Bottles bumped off two years prior.

Kenny Worth — Teenage thief slain i

n Grundy Park on June 24, 1975.

Joey Sarraino — Local gambler and mob associate found dead on the side of the road near a gas station off Royal York Road on September 19, 1975.

Salvatore Palmeriti — Young Sicilian mafioso visiting Canada on vacation is executed on June 6, 1976 and left in an abandoned building on Bayview Avenue. He had last been seen playing pool at Regina Billards.

Ian (The Iceman) Rosenberg & Joan Lipson — Jewish Mafia associate and notorious hit man and his girlfriend are killed in their home on April 12, 1977.

Antonio (Tony Meat Pie) Carnovale — The well known narcotics trafficker is shot gunned to death on the couch of his girlfriend’s Keele Street apartment on the afternoon of January 11, 1980. Carnovale was under indictment at the time of his murder.

Paul (The Fox) Volpe — Mob chief is found in the trunk of his BMW at Pearson International Airport on November 13, 1983. Volpe had been shot and strangled to death.

Vincenzo (Vinnie Chubs) Cherubino — The Italian immigrant and mob enforcer is shot in the back of the head and dumped on Rosemount Avenue on December 2, 1983 in broad daylight. Cherubino was feuding with Toronto mob don Mike (The Baker) Racco.

Antonio (Tony Naps) Cotroneo — Mob associate and drug trafficker is stabbed to death in his Lawrence Ave. apartment on the night of September 4, 1986.

Giovanni Costa — Mob associate killed by a pair of shotgun blasts to his face and neck as he sat behind the wheel of his car in Thornhill on June 25, 1991. Giovanni was the fourth Costa brother to be slain on a feud with the city’s Commisso clan tied to the N’Drangheta.

Francesco (Frankie Rustic) Loiero — Mafia associate and bakery owner who was killed in a Vaughan produce market parking lot on the night of January 7, 1996. In the weeks preceding the hit, Loiero was seeking permission to murder another local mob figure for scamming one of his family members out of $25,000.

Giuseppe (Joe Congo) Conguista — Mob soldier murdered leaving the MS Social Club in North York just after midnight on September 4, 1996.

Giovanni Derango — Twenty-two-year-old mob associate is last seen alive leaving Caffe Lamezia and less than a hour later was found suffering from fatal gun-shot wounds outside the Phil White Arena on Arlington Avenue on November 19, 1996.

Frank Roberts — The famous inventor is shot to death on August 13, 1998 behind the wheel of his Mercedes in the parking lot of his Toronto factory and lab.

Domenic (Mico) Napoli & Antonio (Tony O) Oppedisano — The two mafia soldiers disappeared on March 15, 2000 after a falling out with Montreal’s Rizzuto crime family over gambling territory in Ontario.

Patricia Real — The girlfriend of prominent Toronto mobster Guy Panepinto is shot to death execution-style in her apartment on June 17, 2000. Her husband, who was considered a suspect in the case, committed suicide in subsequent months.

Gaetano (Guy) Panepinto — The Rizzuto crime family skipper and funeral casket peddled is murdered behind the wheel of his Cadillac in a drive-by shooting on October 3, 2000.

Giuseppe (Little Joe) Racco — The Siderno clan Mafia soldier is killed in front of his Commisso Bros. & Racco bakery on November 22, 2000

Frank (Frankie Pizzaz) Pizzimenti — The Siderno clan soldier is killed behind the wheel of his Alfa Romeo in front of the Commisso Bros. & Racco Bakery on February 2, 2002. Pizzmienti co-owned the bakery with Racco.

Juan (Joe Bravo) Fernandez – The deported Toronto mob crew boss is killed in Sicily on May 8, 2013.

Salvatore (Young Gun Sam) Calautti & James (Jimmy the Ear) Tusek — Mafia hit man and his bodyguard are gunned down in their BMW outside a bachelor party held at the Terrace Banquet Hall on July 12, 2013. Calautti was suspected of being the trigger man in a number of the early murders in the Great Canadian Mob War, including the sniper slaying of Rizzuto clan patriarch Nicolo (Uncle Nock) Rizzuto.

Vito Girdona — Suspected mob grunt is shot dead in his home on Christmas Day, December 25, 2013.

Carmine (The Animal) Verduci — The Siderno clan mafia chief is killed outside the Regina Sports Caffe in Woodbridge on April 24, 2014. Verduci was butting heads with the Rizzutos group in Montreal and Verduci’s murder is chalked up to being one of the fatalities of the Great Canadian Mob War.

Mila Barbieri — Girlfriend of a Toronto wiseguy is collateral damage in the war, caught in the crossfire in a hit attempt on her boyfriend on March 14, 2017.

Daniele (Dark Danny) Ranieri — The on-the-run Toronto mob crew boss is found murdered in Mexico on February 3, 2018.

Scarred For Death: Mexican Mafia Snitch Takes His Own Life Instead Of Reporting Back To Prison

Scott Burnstein

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October 11, 2021

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Scarred For Death: Mexican Mafia Snitch Takes His Own Life Instead Of Reporting Back To Prison

October 11, 2021 — “La Eme” turncoat Oscar (The Scar) Moriel committed suicide by shooting himsekf in the head last month in Huntington Beach, California. The Scar was the star witness in the 2017 Operation Black Flag trial, a sweeping federal indictment that targeted the upper echelon of the Mexican Mafia — known on the street and behind bars as “La Eme” —, including then-La Eme boss Peter (The Fury) Ojeda.

The 40-year old Moriel was scheduled to be sentenced two weeks from now to 28 months in prison for an arrest in August 2020 for being a felon in possession of a gun and ammunition. Moriel served 15 years in prison and admitted to participating in a half-dozen Mexican Mafia-related slayings. He flipped in 2009, four years into what would have been a 25-year sentence for attempted murder. As a result of his deal, Moriel helped law enforcement quell rising tensions in La Eme related to a war raging between Ojeda and his one-time protege Armando (Little Mondo) Moreno.

Operation Black Flag finally landed in 2011. Moriel was released in 2020. Police in California caught him with a gun less than six months later.

Hailing from the Santa Ana wing of the Mexican Mafia known as the Delhi Crew, Moriel was the star witness against Ojeda at his trial. Ojeda came from Orange County, California and for years was La Eme’s most powerful shot caller. He was convicted in the case and died of a heart attack in 2018 at age 76, only months after the guilty verdict came in.

The Big Tuna Theory: Was O.J. Murder Case Actually A Mafia Hit?

Scott Burnstein

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October 9, 2021

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The Big Tuna Theory: Was O.J. Murder Case Actually A Mafia Hit?

October 9, 2021 — The Nicole Brown Simpson-Ron Goldman double murder might have been a mob-related drug hit according to a movie script that has floated around Hollywood circles in recent years. Reputed Miami-by-way-of-NYC/Jersey Mafia associate Charles (Charlie Tuna) Ehrlich is the main character in the script, titled Juiced about his time operating in the east coast underworld, his 1980s drug bust out of Atlanta and his friendship with NFL Hall of Famer O.J. Simpson.

Not to mention, delivering bombshell never-before-revealed details in the Case of the Century.

According to the script, Simpson — and possibly Ehrlich — went over to his ex-wife’s Beverly Hills residence that fateful night on June 12, 1994 to collect a cocaine debt from Brown Simpson and her best friend. Ehrlich was dispatched by New Jersey mob soldier Joey Ippolito to Los Angeles that summer to square up drug tabs with Ippolito’s Hollywood clientele.

Ippolito was a “made” man in the DeCalvacante crime family, which served as the basis of the fictional Garden State Soprano’s mob clan. Because he was Jewish, Ehrlich, 67, can’t be inducted into the Italian mafia, but was considered a mafia affiliate by the FBI at the time of the Brown Simpson-Goldman slayings. Ehrlich’s father worked for legendary Jewish mob boss Meyer Lansky and Charlie tuna grew up in the middle of a burgeoning Big Apple mob scene of the 1970s and early 80s.

Miami New Times Magazine broke the story of the script about Ehrlich’s life written by Erik Laibe and the potential mob angle in the O.J. Murder case on the cover of its September issue. In 1995, Simpson was famously found not guilty of butchering his ex-wife and Goldman, a friend and waiter returning a pair of glasses left behind at their family dinner earlier that evening. He was ruled liable for the pair’s killings in a civil case two years later. As an athlete, Simpson is one of the best running backs in the history of pro football

Ehrlich is a repeat convicted felon and for the last three decades has been behind the scenes at Miami’s swanky Dean’s Gold strip club on Biscayne Boulevard. He was arrested in 2007 with Simpson in Las Vegas for robbing a group of sports memorabilia collectors at gunpoint of pieces Simpson believed were rightfully his.

Ehrlich denies any involvement in the Brown Simpson-Goldman heinously iconic double-murder case and says he has an issue with Laibe taking creative liberties with his life story. He pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges in the Vegas memorabilia heist and received probation. Simpson did almost 10.

In the manuscript for a tacky and controversial book penned by Simpson himself called If I Did It that earned a multi-million dollar advance payday but never saw the light of day due to PR blowback, Simpson cited a man named “Charlie” as his accomplice that night. Ippolitto was nailed in 1993 by the feds in Operation Lasima (standing for “LA Sicilian Mafia”). Simpson’s mob ties date back to his early playing days in Buffalo where he used to hobnob with members and drug-dealing associates of Western New York’s Magaddino crime family.

The feds had investigated O.J. previously for allegations that he was running a bookmaking business for athletes and actors in L.A. alongside his attorney, Robert Kardashian, the father of the Kardashian sisters of reality-television show and social media superstardom. The DEA looked into claims he was moving cocaine to his Buffalo Bills teammates in the 1970s and linked to an Ecstasy ring in South Florida in the early 2000s. No charges were ever filed in either investigation.

Ippolito’s driver and bodyguard when he would come to stay on the West Coast in the 1980s and 90s was Al (A.C.) Cowlings, O/J/’s childhood best friend and college and pro teammate, according to LAPD Major Crimes Unit files. Cowlings was driving O.J. in Simpson’s white-colored Ford Bronco during the infamous slow-speed chase, as the “Juice” had to be talked off the ledge by LASPD detectives via cell phone and convinced against committing suicide on national television from the backseat of the vehicle.

Simpson met Ippolito from Cowlings. Charlie Tuna was introduced to Simpson by Ippolito, who owned the trendy Malibu restaurant Cenn’Tanni and kept company with a fast, flashbulb-friendly social circle. In 1997, Ippolito began cooperating with the federal government. His brother Sammy Ippolito survived a brutal murder attempt that holiday season in a ploy to get Joey to break off communications with the Feds.

The 74-year old Simpson was paroled from a Nevada state prison in October 2017. Today, he lives in Las Vegas.

Clash Of The Biker Titans: Conan The Barbarian Forced Tyrone The Terrible From Boss’ Seat Of Pagan’s MC In Late ‘17

Scott Burnstein

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October 7, 2021

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Clash Of The Biker Titans: Conan The Barbarian Forced Tyrone The Terrible From Boss’ Seat Of Pagan’s MC In Late ‘17

October 7, 2021 — Keith (Conan the Barbarian) pushed Michael (Tyrone the Terrible) Trone out of power in the Pagan’s Motorcycle Club kingdom four years ago this month to take control of the club in a bloodless coup, per ATF records related to Richter’s reign. The 62-year old Richter was busted with a gun last winter and will be spending at least the next 2-to-3 years as a guest of the U.S. government in a federal correctional facility.

Trone, 65, is from Newport, Pennsylvania (near Harrisburg) and rose to the club’s No. 1 spot in the early 2010s after being an enforcer for the club’s top brass in the 2000s. During Trone’s ascent, Richter was behind bars serving federal prison time for extorting and trying to kill a New York strip club owner. Richter headquarters out of the club’s Long Island chapter.

According to DEA informant documents, Richter forced Trone to step down as boss in the days surrounding Halloween 2017 and launched his “Blue Wave” mandate, an expansion campaign of the Pagan’s brand and criminal activity into Upstate New York, North Jersey, New England and parts of the Southwest and Pacific Northwest.

In an official ceremony in the weeks that followed, Richter was voted in as the Pagan’s new national president, per the documents. The club has opened more than a dozen new chapters across the country in the last three years.

Trone was Sergeant at Arms for portions of former Pagan’s National President David (Black Bart) Barbeito’s tenure. Barbeito lives in Maryland, where the club was founded.

In June 2003, Trone accompanied Barbeito to confront a faction of rebel Pagan’s in West Virginia and helped Barbeito strip the leaders of the St. Albans chapter of their colors and cuts. The altercation resulted in Trone to pleading no contest to kidnapping charges. He received a suspended sentence of five years in state court as punishment. Black Bart was indicted for racketeering in 2009 and dethroned by his subsequent prison stint.

Dennis (Rooster) Katona of Westmoreland County, Pennsylvania, who had succeeded Trone as Sergeant at Arms, then became boss for two years until he was nailed in 2011 on drug and weapons charges.

For a period of time prior to Trone taking the reins of the club, James (Jersey Jim) Coles landed in the boss’ seat. However, Coles knew his time as National President was on an interim basis and Trone had the power in the Pagan’s by 2013.

Under Barbeito, Coles and Trone, the club kept a relatively low profile. When Richter assumed the mantle, that all changed.

“Conan is a rah-rah guy, he’s like a football coach or a general at war rallying his troops, he had his vision of taking the Pagans to a whole other level of prestige and reach and he went out and did it,” said one former Pagan’s member. “He knew that meant jumping square on the Feds radar. That goes with the territory.”

Before Richter pleaded guilty to being a felony in possession of a weapon and reported to prison back in the summer, — he still awaits sentencing –, he tapped Virginia Pagan’s leader Robert (Big Bob) Francis as his successor. Francis’ plan of attack either towards continuing the Blue Wave movement or keeping it dormant until Richter returns to the streets, remains unknown at this moment.

Richter’s aggressive approach as boss ruffled feathers in the Pagan’s rank and file and with a number of “OGs” in the club, including Rooster Katona. Upon Richter taking power, Katona, who long represented the club’s Pittsburgh chapter in multiple administrations, broke off and started his own club, called the Sutars Soldiers. Another group of ex-Pagan’s in the Philadelphia area left the club and founded, the Jackals.