Giovanni "John" Gambino (; August 22, 1940 – November 16, 2017) was an Italian-born American mobster. Born in
Palermo
Palermo ( , ; scn, Palermu , locally also or ) is a city in southern Italy, the capital (political), capital of both the autonomous area, autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan ...
,
Sicily
(man) it, Siciliana (woman)
, population_note =
, population_blank1_title =
, population_blank1 =
, demographics_type1 = Ethnicity
, demographics1_footnotes =
, demographi ...
, he became a
made member
In the American and Sicilian Mafia, a made man is a fully initiated member of the Mafia. To become "made", an associate first must be Italian or of Italian descent and sponsored by another made man. An inductee will be required to take the oat ...
of the
Gambino crime family
The Gambino crime family (pronounced ) is an Italian-American Mafia crime family and one of the "Five Families" that dominate organized crime activities in New York City, United States, within the nationwide criminal phenomenon known as the Ame ...
in 1975 and a
capodecina
A (literally 'head of ten',Schneider, ''Reversible Destiny'', p. 83 also called caporegime in the American Mafia) is the head of a , a branch within a Sicilian Mafia family. In the larger families, a is selected by the head of the family and coo ...
or captain, and head of the crime family's Sicilian faction, appointed by family boss
John Gotti
John Joseph Gotti Jr.Capeci, Mustain (1996), pp. 25–26 (, ; October 27, 1940 – June 10, 2002) was an American gangster and boss of the Gambino crime family in New York City. He ordered and helped to orchestrate the murder of Gambino boss ...
in 1986, according to
Mafia
"Mafia" is an informal term that is used to describe criminal organizations that bear a strong similarity to the original “Mafia”, the Sicilian Mafia and Italian Mafia. The central activity of such an organization would be the arbitration of d ...
turncoat
Sammy Gravano
Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano (born March 12, 1945) is an American former mobster who became underboss of the Gambino crime family. Gravano played a major role in prosecuting John Gotti, the crime family's boss, by agreeing to testify as a ...
.
[Rackets Trial for Gambino Brothers Opens]
The New York Times, February 2, 1993
The New York Times, April 15, 1993
Transatlantic Mafia clan
Together with his younger brothers
Rosario (Sal) and Giuseppe (Joseph) he formed a faction in the crime family known as the
Cherry Hill Gambinos for their base of operation in the
New Jersey
New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...
town of that name. Although they were distant cousins of family boss
Carlo Gambino
Carlo Gambino (; August 24, 1902 – October 15, 1976) was an Italian-American crime boss of the Gambino crime family. After the Apalachin Meeting in 1957, and the imprisonment of Vito Genovese in 1959, Gambino took over the Commission o ...
, they did not owe him allegiance. They were Sicilian Mafiosi, men from Palermo, whose father had brought the family to
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
in 1964. The Gambino brothers ran the Cafe Valentino on 18th Avenue in
Bensonhurst
Bensonhurst is a residential neighborhood in the southwestern section of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The neighborhood is bordered on the northwest by 14th Avenue, on the northeast by 60th Street, on the southeast by Avenue P and 22nd ...
,
Brooklyn
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
(later renamed as Cafe Giardino).
[Sterling, ''Octopus'', p. 107]
The Gambinos hailed from the Passo di Rigano neighbourhood in Palermo, just as the Inzerillo clan, headed by
Salvatore Inzerillo
Salvatore Inzerillo (; 20 August 1944 – 11 May 1981) was an Italian member of the Sicilian Mafia, also known as Totuccio (a diminutive for Salvatore). He rose to be a powerful boss of Palermo's Passo di Rigano family. A prolific heroin trafficke ...
. 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
Salvatore Riina (; 16 November 1930 – 17 November 2017), called (, Totò being the diminutive of Salvatore), was an Italian mobster and chief of the Sicilian Mafia, known for a ruthless murder campaign that reached a peak in the early 1990s ...
and the Corleonesi
The Corleonesi Mafia clan was a faction within the Corleone family of the Sicilian Mafia, formed in the 1970s. Notable leaders included Luciano Leggio, Salvatore Riina, Bernardo Provenzano, and Leoluca Bagarella.
Corleonesi affiliates were n ...
during the Second Mafia War
The Second Mafia War was a period of conflict involving the Sicilian Mafia, mostly taking place from the late 1970s to the early 1990s and involved thousands of homicides. Sometimes referred to as The Great Mafia War or the ''Mattanza'' (Italian ...
in Sicily when in 1981 the family boss Salvatore Inzerillo was killed. With the intervention of the Gambino crime family in New York, 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.[Changes in Mafia Leadership Reveal New Links to US-Based La Cosa Nostra]
DNI Open Source Center, November 19, 2007 Many went to the New York area and joined forces with the Gambino family. They were dubbed "gli scappati" (the escapees).
Time Magazine, November 5, 2007
Heroin trafficking
Despite a ban on drug dealing, the Gambino's were heavily involved in international heroin trafficking out of Bensonhurst.[Davis, ''Mafia Dynasty'', p. 219] John Gambino was the converging point in the United States for a consortium of heroin
Heroin, also known as diacetylmorphine and diamorphine among other names, is a potent opioid mainly used as a recreational drug for its euphoric effects. Medical grade diamorphine is used as a pure hydrochloride salt. Various white and brow ...
traffickers of the Sicilian Mafia
The Sicilian Mafia, also simply known as the Mafia and frequently referred to as Cosa nostra (, ; "our thing") by its members, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type organized crime syndicate and criminal society originating in the region of Sicily a ...
, composed of the Inzerillo family and Stefano Bontade
Stefano Bontade (23 April 1939 – 23 April 1981) was a powerful member of the Sicilian Mafia. His actual surname was Bontate. He was the boss of the Santa Maria di Gesù Family in Palermo. He was also known as the ''Principe di Villagrazia'' (Prin ...
, and the final destination for its shipments of heroin that was refined in laboratories in Sicily from Turkish morphine
Morphine is a strong opiate that is found naturally in opium, a dark brown resin in poppies (''Papaver somniferum''). It is mainly used as a analgesic, pain medication, and is also commonly used recreational drug, recreationally, or to make ...
base. His relative Salvatore Inzerillo was the Gambino brothers’ principal interlocutor, the central personage in Sicily, with myriads interests and heavy capital investments.[Sterling, ''Octopus'', pp. 199-200]
Giovanni Falcone
Giovanni Falcone (; 18 May 1939 – 23 May 1992) was an Italian judge and prosecuting magistrate. From his office in the Palace of Justice in Palermo, Sicily, he spent most of his professional life trying to overthrow the power of the Sicilian ...
, 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.[Shawcross & Young, ''Men Of Honour'', pp. 77-78]
Money laundering
Gambino had close relationship with the Italian banker Michele Sindona
Michele Sindona (; 8 May 1920 – 22 March 1986) was an Italian banker and convicted felon. Known in banking circles as "The Shark", Sindona was a member of Propaganda Due (#0501), a secret lodge of Italian Freemasonry, and had clear connectio ...
. 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, based in Franklin Square on 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 t ...
, 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.[Sterling, ''Octopus'', pp. 190-202]
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 ( , ; 14 January 1919 – 6 May 2013) was an Italian politician and statesman who served as the 41st prime minister of Italy in seven governments (1972–1973, 1976–1979, and 1989–1992) and leader of the Christian Democra ...
– to engineer the rescue of his banks and recuperate Cosa Nostra
The Sicilian Mafia, also simply known as the Mafia and frequently referred to as Cosa nostra (, ; "our thing") by its members, is an Italian Mafia-terrorist-type organized crime syndicate and criminal society originating in the region of Sicily a ...
’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 and sentenced to six-and-a-half years jail sentence for heroin trafficking in Palermo (the sentence '']in absentia
is Latin for absence. , a legal term, is Latin for "in the absence" or "while absent".
may also refer to:
* Award in absentia
* Declared death in absentia, or simply, death in absentia, legally declared death without a body
* Election in absen ...
'' 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 is an action wherein one jurisdiction delivers a person accused or convicted of committing a crime in another jurisdiction, over to the other's law enforcement. It is a cooperative law enforcement procedure between the two jurisdict ...
.[Sterling, ''Octopus'', pp. 304-07] 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.[Dozens Are Seized in New U.S.-Italian Drug Sweep]
The New York Times, December 2, 1988
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 indicted some 200 defendants in Italy and the US on drug trafficking charges. 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, while a few tried to run but were caught. John Gambino wasn't charged – the FBI couldn't 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.]
The New York Times, September 4, 1992 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.[United States of America v. John Gambino]
United States Court of Appeals, Second Circuit. - 17 F.3d 572, February 24, 1994
Due to testimonies of Mafia turncoats such as Sammy Gravano
Salvatore "Sammy the Bull" Gravano (born March 12, 1945) is an American former mobster who became underboss of the Gambino crime family. Gravano played a major role in prosecuting John Gotti, the crime family's boss, by agreeing to testify as a ...
of the New York Gambino crime family and Francesco Marino Mannoia
Francesco Marino Mannoia (born 5 March 1951) is a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who became a pentito (government witness) in 1989. His nickname was ''Mozzarella''. He is considered to be one of the most reliable government witnesses against ...
, an Italian pentito
''Pentito'' (; lit. "repentant"; plural: ''pentiti'') is used colloquially to designate collaborators of justice in Italian criminal procedure terminology who were formerly part of criminal organizations and decided to collaborate with a public ...
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 is a formal reading of a criminal charging document in the presence of the defendant, to inform them of the charges against them. In response to arraignment, the accused is expected to enter a plea. Acceptable pleas vary among jurisd ...
on September 1, 1992, at the Federal District Court in Manhattan, forfeiting US$5 million bail.[Gambinos Miss Court Date, Forfeiting $5 Million]
The New York Times, September 3, 1992 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
A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...
, South Florida
South Florida is the southernmost region of the U.S. state of Florida. It is one of Florida's three most commonly referred to directional regions; the other two are Central Florida and North Florida. South Florida is the southernmost part of th ...
, where they were said to have associates who would help them flee to Venezuela
Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...
, where they owned an interest in a ranch. They were returned to Manhattan for trial.[2 Gambinos Are Seized In Florida]
The New York Times, September 22, 1992
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
South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the southe ...
to Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a East Coast of the United States, coastal metropolis and the County seat, county seat of Miami-Dade County, Florida, Miami-Dade C ...
and New York by the Sicilian Mafia, while the defense countered that the central drug and murder charges in the case were based on the uncorroborated testimony of Marino Mannoia and Gravano, whom the defense depicted as "killers and liars". The trial ended in mistrial in June 1993 when a jury was unable to reach a verdict on charges of racketeering, drug trafficking and murder.[
Marino Mannoia was admitted into the ]Witness Protection Program
Witness protection is security provided to a threatened person providing testimonial evidence to the justice system, including defendants and other clients, before, during, and after a trial, usually by police. While a witness may only require p ...
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.[Stille, ''Excellent Cadavers'', p. 304]
Guilty plea
In June 1994, 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.[3 Mob Figures Draw 15-Year Terms in Drug Case]
The New York Times, June 15, 1994
The New York Times, January 7, 1994
The pentito Gaspare Mutolo Gaspare Mutolo (Palermo, February 5, 1940) is a Sicilian mafioso, also known as "Asparino".[Cuntrera-Caruana Mafia clan
The Cuntrera-Caruana Mafia clan () was a Mafia clan of the Cosa Nostra and held a key position in the illicit drug trade and money laundering for Cosa Nostra in the 1980s and 1990s. The Italian press baptized the clan as "The Rothschilds of the ...]
received half of the load, while John Gambino took possession of the other 200 kilograms. The shipments were financed by a consortium
A consortium (plural: consortia) is an association of two or more individuals, companies, organizations or governments (or any combination of these entities) with the objective of participating in a common activity or pooling their resources for ...
of Sicilian Mafia clans, who had organized a pool to provide the money to buy the merchandise from Thai
Thai or THAI may refer to:
* Of or from Thailand, a country in Southeast Asia
** Thai people, the dominant ethnic group of Thailand
** Thai language, a Tai-Kadai language spoken mainly in and around Thailand
*** Thai script
*** Thai (Unicode block ...
suppliers.[The Rothschilds of the Mafia on Aruba]
by Tom Blickman, Transnational Organized Crime, Vol. 3, No. 2, Summer 1997.
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.[Prison term ended, a member of crime family faces new charges]
The Boston Globe, October 15, 2005 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 had already served a 15-year sentence in the US for drug trafficking and murder and could not be tried again for the same charges in Italy.[Reputed mobster freed from prison]
The Boston Globe, September 12, 2006
According to court papers filed in Brooklyn Federal Court, John Gambino was one of a three-man panel that ran the Gambino family, jointly with Daniel Marino Daniel Marino (born October 7, 1940) is an Italian American mobster and member of the Gambino crime family. He was identified as a member of the family's leadership panel, alongside John Gambino and Bartolomeo Vernace, in 2009.
On June 23, 1963 ...
and Bartolomeo ''"Bobby"'' Vernace after 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 Joseph Corozzo. ...
in February 2008 decapitated the leadership. They oversaw a slimmed-down criminal gang of 200 made men active in drug trafficking, extortion and loansharking, according to the FBI
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and its principal Federal law enforcement in the United States, federal law enforcement age ...
. He was a high-ranking member of the family along with his wife's nephew Frank Cali
Francesco Paolo Augusto "Frank" Cali (, ; March 26, 1965 – March 13, 2019), also known as "Franky Boy", was an American mobster and the eventual acting boss of the Gambino crime family. Law enforcement considered Cali to have been the Gambino ...
.[It's A Mob Family Circus]
, The New York Post, March 8, 2009 On November 16, 2017, Gambino died of natural causes in New York.
References
* Davis, John H. (1993). ''Mafia Dynasty. The Rise and Fall of the Gambino Crime Family'', New York: Harper Collins,
*Shawcross, Tim & Martin Young (1987). ''Men Of Honour: The Confessions Of Tommaso Buscetta'', Glasgow: Collins
* Sterling, Claire (1990), ''Octopus. How the long reach of the Sicilian Mafia controls the global narcotics trade'', New York: Simon & Schuster,
* Stille, Alexander (1995). ''Excellent Cadavers. The Mafia and the Death of the First Italian Republic'', New York: Vintage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gambino, John
1940 births
2017 deaths
Gambino crime family
American gangsters of Sicilian descent
Inzerillo-Gambino Mafia clan
Sicilian Mafiosi
Italian drug traffickers
Gangsters from Palermo
American people convicted of drug offenses
Italian people convicted of drug offenses