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Victor Orena
Vittorio "Little Vic" Orena (born August 4, 1934) is a New York City mobster who became the acting boss of the Colombo crime family. A challenge by Orena to boss Carmine Persico triggered one of the bloodiest Mafia wars of the late 20th century, and the last major mob war in New York to date. Early life Born in New York City, Victor Orena's father died when he was a child. Orena spent time in a reform school and eventually dropped out of high school. According to his son, Orena entered the mob life because the wiseguys he knew had risen from humble beginnings and had become big figures in his neighborhood. In the early 1970s, Carmine Persico, the boss of the Colombo crime family, allegedly had a few people "made" into his organization, even though the "books" had officially been closed since 1958, barring any new inductions. One of these men was Orena, who rose through the ranks and operated in Brooklyn, Long Island, and New Jersey primarily in labor racketeering. Orena was a w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Crime Boss
A crime boss, also known as a crime lord, Don, gang lord, gang boss, mob boss, kingpin, godfather, crime mentor or criminal mastermind, is a person in charge of a criminal organization. Description A crime boss typically has absolute or nearly absolute control over the other members of the organization and is often greatly feared or respected for their cunning, strategy, and/or ruthlessness and willingness to take lives to exert their influence and profits from the criminal endeavors in which the organization engages.Manning, George A. ''Financial Investigation and Forensic Accounting.'' Boca Raton, Fla.: CRC Press, 2005. Some groups may only have as little as two ranks (a crime boss and their soldiers). Other groups have a more complex, structured organization with many ranks, and structure may vary with cultural background. Organized crime enterprises originating in Sicily differ in structure from those in mainland Italy. American groups may be structured differently from ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Loansharking
A loan shark is a person who offers loans at extremely high interest rates, has strict terms of collection upon failure, and generally operates outside the law. Description Because loan sharks operate mostly illegally, they cannot reasonably expect to be able to use the legal system to collect such debts, they often resort to enforcing repayment by terms of blackmail and threats of violence. Historically, many moneylenders skirted between legal and criminal activity. In the recent western world, loan sharks have been a prominent feature of the criminal underworld. Loan sharking is not to be confused with predatory lending with extremely high interest rates such as payday or title loans, which is sometimes considered to be "loan sharking" (or, at least, unfavorably compared to loan sharking by critics) regardless of whether it is legal. A key difference between "traditional" loan sharking and predatory lending is that lenders alleged to be engaged in the latter practice are exp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grand Jury
A grand jury is a jury—a group of citizens—empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a person to testify. A grand jury is separate from the courts, which do not preside over its functioning. Originating in England during the Middle Ages, grand juries are only retained in two countries, the United States and Liberia. Other common law jurisdictions formerly employed them, and most others now employ a different procedure that does not involve a jury: a preliminary hearing. Grand juries perform both accusatory and investigatory functions. The investigatory functions of grand juries include obtaining and reviewing documents and other evidence, and hearing sworn testimonies of witnesses who appear before it; the accusatory function determines whether there is probable cause to believe that one or more persons committed a particula ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
District Attorney
In the United States, a district attorney (DA), county attorney, state's attorney, prosecuting attorney, commonwealth's attorney, or state attorney is the chief prosecutor and/or chief law enforcement officer representing a U.S. state in a local government area, typically a county or a group of counties. The exact name and scope of the office varies by state. Alternative titles for the office include county attorney, solicitor, or county prosecutor. The prosecution is the legal party responsible for presenting the case against an individual suspected of breaking the law, initiating and directing further criminal investigations, guiding and recommending the sentencing of offenders, and are the only attorneys allowed to participate in grand jury proceedings. The prosecutors decide what criminal charges to bring, and when and where a person will answer to those charges. In carrying out their duties, prosecutors have the authority to investigate persons, grant immunity to witnes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Cutolo
William Cutolo (June 6, 1949 – May 26, 1999), also known as "Billy Fingers" and "Wild Bill", was a Brooklyn mobster in the Colombo crime family who rose to the position of under boss and was heavily involved in labor racketeering. Cutolo played a key role in the 1991 to 1993 Colombo war. Biography William Cutolo, christened Guglielmo Cutolo, was born in Potenza in Basilicata, Italy. William Sr. was the brother of Gertrude, Barbara, and Geraldine Cutolo. William Cutolo had three daughters and a son named William Jr. to previous wife Margurite Butera. In 1990, Cutolo had his third daughter, Dana, with his wife Bette Anne Fox, from Brooklyn. William Jr. followed his father into illegal gambling and loansharking and was eventually convicted of extortion and racketeering. Cutolo was also involved with several charities. He was a fundraising chairman and board member for the National Leukemia Research Association in Garden City, New York. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Genovese Crime Family
The Genovese crime family, () also sometimes referred to as the Westside, is an Italian-American Mafia crime family and one of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City and New Jersey as part of the American Mafia. They have generally maintained a varying degree of influence over many of the smaller mob families outside New York, including ties with the Philadelphia, Patriarca, and Buffalo crime families. The current "family" was founded by Charles "Lucky" Luciano and was known as the Luciano crime family from 1931 to 1957, when it was renamed after boss Vito Genovese. Originally in control of the waterfront on the West Side of Manhattan as well as the docks and the Fulton Fish Market on the East River waterfront, the family was run for years by "The Oddfather", Vincent "The Chin" Gigante, who feigned insanity by shuffling unshaven through New York's Greenwich Village wearing a tattered bath robe and muttering to himself incoherently to avo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Consigliere
Consigliere ( , ; plural ) is a position within the leadership structure of the Sicilian, Calabrian, and Italian-American Mafia. The word was popularized in English by the novel ''The Godfather'' (1969) and its film adaptation. In the novel, a consigliere is an advisor or counselor to the boss, with the additional responsibility of representing the boss in important meetings both within the boss's crime family and with other crime families. The consigliere is a close, trusted friend and confidant, the mob's version of an elder statesman. They are an advisor to the boss in a Mafia crime family, and sometimes is their "right-hand man". By the very nature of the job, a consigliere is one of the few in the family who can argue with the boss, and is often tasked with challenging the boss when needed, to ensure subsequent plans are foolproof. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Commission (Mafia)
The Commission is the governing body of the Italian-American Mafia, formed in 1931 by Charles "Lucky" Luciano following the Castellammarese War. Capeci, Jerry. ''The complete idiot's guide to the Mafia'"The Mafia's Commission" (pp. 31–46)/ref> The Commission replaced the title of '' capo di tutti i capi'' ("boss of all bosses"), held by Salvatore Maranzano before his murder, with a ruling committee that consists of the bosses of the Five Families of New York City, as well as the bosses of the Chicago Outfit and, at various times, the leaders of smaller families, such as Buffalo, Philadelphia, Detroit, and others. The purpose of the Commission was to oversee all Mafia activities in the United States and serve to mediate conflicts among families. Throughout the history of the Commission, the body has been involved in several incidents including the Apalachin meeting in 1957, a plot to kill several members of the Commission in 1963, and the Mafia Commission Trial in 1985. Histo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Joe Bonanno
Joseph Charles Bonanno (born Giuseppe Carlo Bonanno; ; January 18, 1905 – May 11, 2002), sometimes referred to as Joe Bananas, was an Italian-American crime boss of the Bonanno crime family, which he ran from 1931 to 1968. Bonanno was born in Castellammare del Golfo, Sicily, where his father was also involved in organized crime. At the age of three, Bonanno immigrated to New York City with his family, for about 10 years before he moved back to Italy. He later slipped back into the United States in 1924, by stowing away on a Cuban fishing boat bound for Tampa, Florida. After the Castellammarese War, Salvatore Maranzano was murdered in 1931, and Bonanno took control of most of the crime family, and at age 26, Bonanno became one of the youngest-ever bosses of a crime family. In 1963, Bonanno made plans with Joseph Magliocco to assassinate several rivals on the Mafia Commission. When Magliocco gave the contract to one of his top hit men, Joseph Colombo, he revealed the plot to it ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Horse Murders
The show jumping horse killings scandal refers to cases of insurance fraud in the United States in which expensive horses, many of them show jumpers, were insured against death, accident, or disease, and then killed to collect the insurance money. It is not known how many horses were killed in this manner between the mid-1970s and the mid-1990s, when a Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) investigation brought the horse killings to light, but the number is thought to be well over 50, and may have been as high as 100. In addition, in 1977, the heiress Helen Brach disappeared and was presumed by law enforcement agents to have been murdered by the perpetrators of these crimes, because she threatened to report their criminal activity to authorities; continuing investigations into Brach's death began to uncover the insurance fraud in the 1990s. The scandal has been called "one of the biggest, most gruesome stories in sports" as well as "the biggest scandal in the history of equestria ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Seattle Slew
Seattle Slew (February 15, 1974 – May 7, 2002) was a champion American Thoroughbred horse racing, racehorse who became the tenth winner of the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing (United States), American Triple Crown (1977). He is one of only two horses to have won the Triple Crown while being undefeated in any previous race; the second was Justify (horse), Justify who won the Triple Crown in 2018 and is descended from Seattle Slew. Seattle Slew was the 1977 American Horse of the Year, Horse of the Year and a champion at ages two, three, and four. In the Blood-Horse magazine List of the Top 100 U.S. Racehorses of the 20th Century, ''Blood-Horse'' magazine List of the Top 100 U.S. Racehorses of the 20th Century Seattle Slew was ranked ninth. Joe Hirsch of the ''Daily Racing Form'' wrote of Seattle Slew's three-year-old campaign: "Every time he ran he was an odds-on favorite, and the response to his presence on the racetrack, either for a morning workout or a major race, was ele ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carmine Sessa
Carmine Sessa, alias Carmine Marletta (born 1951) is an Italian-American mobster and former consigliere of the Brooklyn-based Colombo crime family and played a key role in the family from 1991 to 1993. He later became a government witness. Biography Murders After becoming a government witness, Sessa admitted to personally murdering four people. In September 1984, Sessa murdered Mary Bari, a former girlfriend of then Colombo consigliere Alphonse Persico. When Persico went into hiding to avoid an indictment, the family decided to kill Bari out of concern that she knew Persico's location. Bari was lured into Sessa's social club Occasions on the pretext of a job interview. When Bari arrived, Sessa shot her three times in the head. In May 1988, Sessa murdered Anthony Bolino. Suspecting Bolino of robbing his dealers, Sessa shot him one time in the head on a street corner in Bayside. In November 1988, Sessa murdered Vincent Angellino, a top capo in the Colombo family. Angellino was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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