John Gambino
Encyclopedia
Gambino crime family
The Gambino crime family is one of the "Five Families" that dominates organized crime activities in New York City, United States, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the Mafia . The group is named after Carlo Gambino, boss of the family at the time of the McClellan hearings in 1963...
in 1975 and a capodecina
Capodecina
A capodecina is the head of a decina, a branch within a Mafia family. In the larger families, a capodecina is selected by the head of the family and coordinates units of about ten people....
or captain, and head of the crime family's Sicilian faction, appointed by family boss John Gotti
John Gotti
John Joseph Gotti, Jr was an American mobster who became the Boss of the Gambino crime family in New York City. Gotti grew up in poverty. He and his brothers turned to a life of crime at an early age...
in 1986, according to Mafia turncoat Sammy Gravano
Sammy Gravano
Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano is a former underboss of the Gambino crime family. He is known as the man who helped bring down John Gotti, the family's boss, by agreeing to become a Federal Bureau of Investigation informant and turn state's evidence.Originally a mobster for the Colombo crime...
.
Transatlantic Mafia clan
Together with his younger brothers RosarioRosario Gambino
Rosario "Sal" Gambino is an Italian mobster in the Gambino crime family. He became nationally known when he and his brothers set up a multimillion dollar heroin cartel during the 1970s and 1980s...
and Joseph Gambino he formed a faction in the crime family known as the Cherry Hill
Cherry Hill, New Jersey
Cherry Hill is a township in Camden County, New Jersey, in the United States. As of the 2010 United States Census, the township had a population of 71,045, representing an increase of 1,080 from the 69,965 residents enumerated during the 2000 Census...
Gambinos for their country seat in the New Jersey
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...
town of that name. Although they were distant cousins of family boss Carlo Gambino
Carlo Gambino
"Don" Carlo Gambino, was a Sicilian mafioso who became Boss of the Gambino crime family, that still bears his name today. After the 1957 Apalachin Convention he unexpectedly seized control of the Commission of the American Mafia. Gambino was known for being low-key and secretive...
, they did not owe him allegiance. They were Sicilian Mafiosi, made men from Palermo, whose father had brought the family to New York in 1964. The Gambino brothers ran the Cafe Valentino on 18th Avenue in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn
Brooklyn
Brooklyn is the most populous of New York City's five boroughs, with nearly 2.6 million residents, and the second-largest in area. Since 1896, Brooklyn has had the same boundaries as Kings County, which is now the most populous county in New York State and the second-most densely populated...
(later renamed as Cafe Giardino).
The Gambinos hailed from the Passo di Rigano neighbourhood in Palermo, just as the Inzerillo clan, headed by Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo was an Italian criminal, a member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Totuccio . He rose to be a powerful boss of Palermo's Passo di Rigano family...
. Together the Inzerillo-Gambino Mafia clan formed a transatlantic Mafia family, based in Palermo and New York. The Inzerillo clan had been on the verge of total extermination by Totò Riina and the Corleonesi
Corleonesi
The Corleonesi is the name given to a faction within the Sicilian Mafia that dominated Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and the 1990s. It was called the Corleonesi because its most important leaders came from the town of Corleone, first Luciano Leggio and later Totò Riina, Bernardo Provenzano and Leoluca...
during the Second Mafia War
Second Mafia War
The Second Mafia War was a conflict within the Sicilian Mafia, mostly taking place in the early 1980s. As with any criminal organization, the history of the Sicilian Mafia is replete with conflicts and power struggles, and the violence that results from them, but these are generally localised and...
in Sicily when in 1981 the family boss Salvatore Inzerillo was killed. With the intervention of the Gambinos a deal was worked out that allowed the surviving Inzerillos to take refuge in the US, with the agreement that none of them, or their offspring, could ever return to Sicily. Many went to the New York area and joined forces with the Gambino family. They were dubbed "gli scappati" (the escapees).
Heroin trafficking
Despite a ban on drug dealing, the Gambinos were heavily involved in international heroin trafficking out of Bensonhurst. John Gambino was the converging point in the United States for a consortium of heroin traffickers of the Sicilian MafiaMafia
The Mafia is a criminal syndicate that emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in Sicily, Italy. It is a loose association of criminal groups that share a common organizational structure and code of conduct, and whose common enterprise is protection racketeering...
, composed of the Inzerillo family and Stefano Bontade
Stefano Bontade
Stefano Bontade was a powerful member of the Sicilian Mafia. Some sources spell his surname Bontate. He was the capomafia of the Santa Maria di Gesù Family in Palermo...
, and the final destination for its shipments of heroin that was refined in laboratories on Sicily from Turkish morphine
Morphine
Morphine is a potent opiate analgesic medication and is considered to be the prototypical opioid. It was first isolated in 1804 by Friedrich Sertürner, first distributed by same in 1817, and first commercially sold by Merck in 1827, which at the time was a single small chemists' shop. It was more...
base. His relative Salvatore Inzerillo was the Gambino brothers’ principal interlocutor, the central personage in Sicily, with myriads interests and heavy capital investments.
Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone was an Sicilian/Italian prosecuting magistrate born in Palermo, Sicily. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Mafia in Sicily...
, the investigating magistrate who was assigned the investigation into heroin trafficking case in 1980, estimated that by the late 1970s the Inzerillo-Gambino-Spatola network was smuggling US$600 million worth of heroin into the US each year.
Money laundering
Gambino had close relationship with the Italian banker Michele SindonaMichele Sindona
Michele Sindona was an Italian banker and convicted felon. Known in banking circles as "The Shark", Sindona was a member of Propaganda Due , a secret lodge of Italian Freemasonry, and had clear connections to the Mafia...
. They dined often and openly at the luxurious Hotel Pierre on Fifth Avenue or the Gambino’s Café Valentino. Gambino was a frequent guest at New York dinner parties in Sindona’s honour. When Sindona got in trouble and was indicted for the bankruptcy of the Franklin National Bank
Franklin National Bank
Franklin National Bank, based in Franklin Square in Long Island, New York was once the United States' 20th largest bank. On October 8, 1974, it collapsed in obscure circumstances, involving Michele Sindona, renowned Mafia-banker and member of the irregular freemasonic lodge, Propaganda Due...
, John Gambino procured a false passport and helped to stage a bogus kidnap in August 1979, to conceal a mysterious 11-week trip to Sicily before his scheduled fraud trial.
However, Sindona also had put the Mafia’s heroin money at risk, due to his financial malpractice. The real purpose of the kidnapping was to issue sparsely disguised blackmail notes to Sindona’s past political allies – among them Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
– to engineer the rescue of his banks and recuperate Cosa Nostra’s money. Gambino accompanied Sindona’s attempt to recover the money, but the plans failed and Sindona was arrested, leading to the indictment of the Inzerillo-Spatola-Gambino network. It remains unclear if any of the Mafia money Sindona had lost was recovered.
Indicted in 1980 in relation with the heroin trafficking network, he was convicted to six-and-a-half years jail sentence for heroin trafficking in Palermo (the sentence in absentia
In absentia
In absentia is Latin for "in the absence". In legal use, it usually means a trial at which the defendant is not physically present. The phrase is not ordinarily a mere observation, but suggests recognition of violation to a defendant's right to be present in court proceedings in a criminal trial.In...
was confirmed by Italy’s Supreme Court in 1985). However, Gambino remained free because the US did not agree with Italian requests for extradition
Extradition
Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...
. John and Joe Gambino were acquitted in a 1984 New Jersey drug case in which their brother, Rosario, was convicted and sentenced to 45 years in prison.
Operation Iron Tower
On December 1, 1988, Italian and US law enforcement cracked down on the Gambino-Inzerillo network again with Operation Iron Tower. Italian and federal prosecutors charged some 200 defendants for drug trafficking in Italy and the US. Among the arrestees was Joe Gambino, the owner of Cafe Giardino. A crowd of about 100 had gathered at the cafe to hear a newly arrived Italian singer. Federal agents moved in as the entertainment ended with one agent coming to the mike and saying, in effect, "This is your last dance." Some of the partygoers thought it was a joke and laughed, a few tried to run but were caught. John Gambino was not charged – the FBI could not gather enough evidence against him – but was described in the court affidavit as the current leader of the "Brooklyn-based Sicilian faction of the Gambino family."The brothers were released after initial indictments in 1988 and 1989. John Gambino was arrested on January 4, 1990. He later was charged in a superseding indictment with narcotics and racketeering violations. On January 5, 1990, he was released on a US$2 million personal recognizance bond signed by his wife Vittoria Gambino and his son Tommy Gambino.
Due to testimonies of Mafia turncoats such as Sammy Gravano
Sammy Gravano
Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano is a former underboss of the Gambino crime family. He is known as the man who helped bring down John Gotti, the family's boss, by agreeing to become a Federal Bureau of Investigation informant and turn state's evidence.Originally a mobster for the Colombo crime...
of the New York Gambino crime family and Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who became a pentito in 1989. His nickname was Mozzarella. He is considered to be one of the most reliable government witnesses against the Mafia...
, an Italian pentito
Pentito
Pentito designates people in Italy who, formerly part of criminal or terrorist organizations, following their arrests decide to "repent" and collaborate with the judicial system to help investigations...
who had become a government witness, Joe and John Gambino and six other defendants – including Francesco Inzerillo – were indicted on charges that they smuggled and distributed drugs, operated a number of organized-crime enterprises and took part in the 1988 murder of Francesco Oliveri. However, the brothers failed to appear at their arraignment
Arraignment
Arraignment is a formal reading of a criminal complaint in the presence of the defendant to inform the defendant of the charges against him or her. In response to arraignment, the accused is expected to enter a plea...
on September 1, 1992, at the Federal District Court in Manhattan, forfeiting US$5 million bail. Electronic monitoring bracelets intended to keep track of them had been removed with the approval of the Government in July that year.
Arrest and trial
On September 17, 1992, they were arrested in a secluded motel suite in Fort Lauderdale, South Florida, where they were said to have associates who would help them flee to VenezuelaVenezuela
Venezuela , officially called the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela , is a tropical country on the northern coast of South America. It borders Colombia to the west, Guyana to the east, and Brazil to the south...
, where they owned an interest in a ranch. They were returned to Manhattan for trial.
In February 1993, the trial against John and Joe Gambino, and their associates Lorenzo Mannino and Matteo Romano, started. The prosecution portrayed them as the main distributors of heroin smuggled from Italy and South America to Miami and New York by the Sicilian Mafia. The defence said that the central drug and murder charges in the case were based on the uncorroborated testimony of Marino Mannoia and Gravano, depicted by the defense as killers and liars. The trial ended in a mistrial in June 1993 when a jury was unable to reach a verdict.
Marino Mannoia was admitted into the Witness Protection Program in the United States (Italy had no such programme at the time). He testified he had met with John Gambino personally, who had inspected the quality of the heroin Marino Mannoia was refining in Palermo. His testimony finally induced the Gambinos to plead guilty to drug trafficking in an arrangement with prosecution.
Guilty plea
After their Florida arrest, John and Joe Gambino agreed to return to Manhattan to face Federal narcotics trafficking, murder and racketeering charges, including jury tamperingJury tampering
Jury tampering is the crime of unduly attempting to influence the composition and/or decisions of a jury during the course of a trial.The means by which this crime could be perpetrated can include attempting to discredit potential jurors to ensure they will not be selected for duty. Once selected,...
, illegal gambling and loan sharking. After prosecutors recommended 15-year sentences without parole, the men agreed to plead guilty to the racketeering charges stemming from activity that took place from 1975 to 1992.
The pentito Gaspare Mutolo
Gaspare Mutolo
Gaspare Mutolo is a Sicilian mafioso, also known as "Asparino". In 1992 he became a pentito . He was the first mafioso who spoke about the connections between Cosa Nostra and Italian politicians...
revealed that he organised a 400-kilogram shipment of heroin to the US in 1981. The Cuntrera-Caruana Mafia clan received half of the load, while John Gambino took care of the other 200 kilograms. The shipments were financed by consortium
Consortium
A consortium is an association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments with the objective of participating in a common activity or pooling their resources for achieving a common goal....
of Sicilian Mafia clans, who had organized a pool to provide the money to buy the merchandise from Thai suppliers.
Release
In prison Gambino survived a stroke, heart attacks, and open-heart surgery. Sitting in a wheelchair, he was released in October 2005, but was later arrested to face an extradition request by Italy. He was released on bail. In September 2006, he was freed when a federal judge overruled a decision that would have extradited him to Italy to face drug charges. The judge ruled that Gambino already served a 15-year sentence in the US for drug trafficking and murder and can't be tried again for the same charges in Italy.According to court papers filed in Brooklyn Federal Court
United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York
The United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York is the federal district court whose jurisdiction comprises the entirety of Long Island and Staten Island...
, John Gambino is one of a three-man panel that runs the Gambino family, jointly with Daniel Marino and Bartolomeo "Bobby" Vernace after Operation Old Bridge
Operation Old Bridge
Operation Old Bridge is the code name for the February 7, 2008 arrests in Italy and the United States that targeted the Gambino crime family. Among the indicted were the reputed acting bosses Jackie D'Amico, Nicholas Corozzo and Consigliere Joseph Corozzo of the Gambino crime family...
in February 2008 decapitated the leadership. They oversee a slimmed-down criminal gang of 200 made men and 300 associates active in drug trafficking, extortion and loansharking, according to the FBI. His nephew Frank Cali
Frank Cali
Francesco Paolo Augusto Calì , known as "Frank" or "Franky Boy", is a reputed acting captain in the Staten Island faction of the Gambino crime family. Law enforcement considers Cali to be the Gambino "ambassador to Sicilian mobsters" and have linked him to the Inzerillo Mafia family from Palermo...
is a rising star in the Gambino family.