 Welcome back to the original gangsters podcast. I'm Jimmy Buccellato. We're recording a remote episode one of these quick hitters and usually Bernie goes solo with these but once in a while I'm happy to jump in and break things down with my esteemed colleague Scott Bernstein in the house. So I just want to remind everyone please if you like the show please subscribe to our YouTube channel. Please subscribe to our audio podcast. We're on Spotify. We're on iTunes Google podcast and just make it I've made this appeal before but if you're familiar if you like our video content just recall that we have other audio episodes you can check out and if you primarily listen to us on audio remember we also have some video exclusive so I encourage audience members to be open-minded and check out both formats we have a pretty cool topic for today involving some heavy hitters some bosses in the five families Messino and also the boss of the west side and Scott has been doing some data mining and was looking at some core filings and found some interesting tidbits in there that we're going to talk about for a few minutes so Scott you want to go to set up what you were finding yeah so this involves Joe Messino, Vinnie Gorgias-Basiano and Barney Belomo. I don't know up until recently if we've been able to draw any connections or lines between Joe Messino who was the most powerful biggest New York mafia don of the 90s and early 2000s to Barney Belomo who in 2023 is I don't want to say without question but for for most peoples you know bottom line I would say that Barney Belomo is the most powerful modern day mafia don in America and New York and let's start with some information that came out last week via gangland news and we always give props and shout out to to Jerry Capace over at gangland news he started this whole game that we play so always got to give him give him his props he wrote a column or part of his column was about Vinnie Bassiano the former acting boss of the Bananos who was underneath Joe Messino and had a pretty tumultuous short-lived tenure as as boss of the family in 0405 he's now doing multiple life sentences for a pair of murders as well as some murder plots against prosecutors and judges but there was appeal that's now being heard by US district court it's been a six-year waiting period to get in front of the judge now they're getting in front of the judge and Bassiano is appealing his murder sent a murder conviction in the Randy Pazolo hit from 2004 under the theory that he was in trap because Joe Messino at that time had flipped was working for the government nobody knew it was wired up and Bassiano's council is saying that it was entrapment and that it was ineffective council for not bringing up this entrapment issue before that when Messino was asking Bassiano to explain what happened in the Pazolo hit Bassiano had no other option but to respond because he was being ordered to respond by he's appearing the mafia and if he didn't respond he could be murdered within that reporting Jerry made a reference to a piece of a court transcript that came up in Vinnie Bassiano's trial back in 07 with Messino on the witness stand again this has been there in the transcript for for let's say 15 years but this little anecdote I don't think it ever made it to the light of day until last week and Jerry says there was a conversation or I should say points out in the transcript that Messino testifies to a conversation that he had with the Genovese crime family that they had come to him when he was locked up and asked him if they wanted them the Genovese to murder Vinnie Bassiano and we'll get into why in a second Jerry didn't put in there who the people within the Genovese had approached Messino so myself I saw some people online did it as well went back into the court transcript from Messino's testimony and it's clear from this testimony that it was Barney Belomo who approached him in around 2005 in the Metropolitan Detention Center uh and we're going to read the the direct uh quotes but you know for all intents and purposes and to break it down into a small bite sized uh uh situation he he says you know your boy Vinnie is acting crazy out on the streets he's walking around the Bronx like he's John Gotti and that's upsetting a lot of people uh Messino says no don't touch him but it's interesting to see that you have this meeting of a Don that was on his way out and a Don that was ascending you know into the stratosphere in Belomo and they had this conversation back in 2005 yeah um I want to read some some things from the transcript here so at the beginning and I just want to clarify because you've studied this documentation more than I have at the beginning he says I could have killed him they wanted me to kill him but I gave him a pass the west side comes to me when I was on the floor they said he need help we'll get rid of him I said let him go let him do what he's doing so in that context Messino's talking about Bassiano he's saying I'll give him a pass leave him alone and then it says um well let's just tell people what the issue was the issue was that Bassiano was acting autonomously um and breaching a lot of protocol uh first when it came to appointing himself acting boss Messino never officially assigned him the role of acting boss Bassiano assigned himself and then retroactively got permission from Messino and then within that time period which was about a eight month nine month time period Bassiano orders the murder of Randy Pizzolo who was a former member of his inner circle I think he drove drove for Bassiano for a while and was a real cowboy uh it seemed like Vinny's ascension in the Bananos went to Randy Pizzolo's head as Vinny got more powerful Randy's behavior got more outlandish he was proposed to be made but never made it to a making ceremony because of upsetting too many people he upset the Gambino's he upset the Genovese and eventually he upset Vinny himself by botching a home remodel job and he was killed in November of 04 about two weeks after Vinny Bassiano is arrested um fast forward into 05 I believe is when these conversations or this conversation was being had by uh Belomo to Messino in lock up being like Vinny is um being insubordinate I guess in some of his actions and that will kill him for you yeah um so I would I would also add from this documentation so when so they ask him who were you talking with specifically and as you point out he says he says Barney and this is a quote listen the word is in the street nobody's happy with Vinny Bassiano the way he's acting and then this is for Messino quote Barney comes to me and says quote he's causing a lot of waves in the Bronx he thinks he's John Gotti and then he says if you need help again makes this offer like we can we can we can take care of this according to Messino and in terms of your point about um causing a lot of waves and walking around the Bronx and this is from also from I'm getting this right from our friend Tony DeStefano's book on Vinny Gorgeous well he's been on our show before not on video I don't think but we have an audio episode with him that Messino claims that Bassiano wanted permission to kill a number of people including DeFilippo a high-ranking member of the including Patty from the Bronx who was his capo but also the parents of witnesses uh in this trial um and uh civilians civilians and the prosecutor and that was the that was the biggest the biggest one that ended up getting him uh getting him jammed up so um apparently this wasn't sitting well with all these different things wasn't sitting well with with people on the west side and they approached Messino I think there should be a um just to fill in a little bit more background and I want to throw this out to Jimmy um so you had a situation where in the lead-up to Bassiano being imprisoned less than a year I believe before this conversation happens between Belomo and Messino there's an issue between Bassiano's son Vinny Jr and quiet Dom Cirillo's son Nikki and quiet Dom Cirillo uh was an acting boss was a conciliary of the Genovese very close to the chin um and apparently in late April or early May of 04 Nikki Cirillo physically attacks Vinny Bassiano Jr um on May 10th which was Mother's Day of that year Nikki Cirillo disappeared and has never been heard from since Randy Pozzolo one of the final nails in his coffin was Pozzolo was going around town bragging that he had killed Cirillo to defend the Bassiano's honor so but there's a lot of confusion of what happened there because when Bassiano is asked about Nikki Cirillo from Messino in these recorded conversations Bassiano says it came from his own dad right Bassiano says that was Dom killing his own son not I don't know if that's true Bassiano was just was ordering a lot of murders and taking part in a bunch of murders that he wasn't getting sanctioned yeah now the Frank Santoro murder which he he had even if he gets the Pozzolo murder tossed or or or acquitted on it in a retrial if it ever gets to that point he still has to deal with the Frank Santoro murder uh back in 01 where he killed a guy that had been threatening his son Vinnie Jr that was a murder that was done without any permission and he was just a soldier at that point he wasn't a cop yet and then Pozzolo murder he does without checking with Messino which is one of the reasons Messino was talking or ostensibly one of the reasons Messino wanted to talk to him about it when when they were locked up and I think the famous line that came from that was that uh you know we needed to send a message Randy was acting um subversive uh and we needed to send a message to the street this was Vinnie trying to like establish his his aura as a boss and that you know even my even guys in my inner circle are going to be killed if they don't tow the line yeah I mean that that's the one guy that there seems to have been a consensus on like killing like the Pozzolo but um back to um Cirillo uh for what it's worth I hate to even say this I've heard I know it sounds like obnoxious but talking to people off the record people on the street find that difficult to believe that he had something to do with the disappearance of his own son that's right that's right and so that um and and so that if you analyze that take it for what it's worth but I can't really say more but I just think it just I just I think it gives some context and some color to 2005 Barney sidling up to Messino and being like listen you know you need to be aware that your boy is ruffling a lot of feathers meaning Vinnie Bassiano that he whether or not he eventually got it cleared that he had appointed himself boss we know from the Gotti situation with Castellano the west side doesn't take kindly to people just doing stuff without permission or without the proper sanctioning they're very buttoned up they're very buttoned up organization that's that's one of the reasons why they're usually the the most powerful family they're probably buttoned up well organized and the analogy to Gotti probably wasn't what I'm saying was probably part of that analogy with Belomo being like we don't need another yeah you know a replay of someone like a Gotti who was doing all these things um that that you're uh uh making waves causing heat and and Bassiano seemed to love the heat like Gotti loved the heat yeah there's a there's a there's an irony here this is just my own conjecture so again take it for what it's worth the irony is I suspect right now the west side may prefer Bassiano back the try for stand compared to what what's going on right now with the Bananos like so things change right and Bassiano's tied into that same group that or was tied in to that same group that that's leading uh the banana organization now the Bronx crew the powers in the Bronx now with Mikey Mancuso um and Johnny Joe these were guys that were at one point then these guys he put Mancuso into power when he left and went to prison and eventually had a falling out with Mancuso tried to kill me or try to put a contract out on Mancuso's head was trying to put a contract out on on Patty from the Bronx's head these are all guys that were in his camp that kind of so it's not shocking that that Belomo would approach Masino it's just interesting to find that out now almost 20 years later and it's interesting that Jerry either didn't want to go dive into the uh transcript or he didn't want to put Barney on blast but he had a whole paragraph about the Genovese approaching Masino but didn't say that it came from Barney it seems like that would be you know the meat and potatoes of that news at least in I guess the way I would cover it and by the way just if people if you if you never look at the document they actually they actually don't say Belomo but Scott and I are almost certain that it's a it's a spelling error on the part of this denographer um well they say Barello I think right Barney Borello who was Barney Borello which it's it's unimaginable to me that Masino wouldn't know who wouldn't know who Barney was so I would bet anything that that wasn't just an error on the part of this denographer um but let me ask you you're you're put on your uh law degree hat Scott before we wrap up um in my opinion this is a very legitimate case Boschiano is making about entrapment I I absolutely think he's onto something here I think that was dirty pool to use a cliche that the feds did with Masino wiring Masino up and then him giving Boschiano orders basically that Boschiano has no no choice but uh and then and then you're going to indict Boschiano for following orders that seems dirty pool to me um so I would ask you two questions a what do you think you think you agree with me on that but then also let's say he wins that doesn't he have so many other chargers that it's not like he would be released anytime soon even if he were to win that appeal right what do you think about those two points so first I I I agree with you I think they're at least at least in terms of the eye test and the fact that I have a um a law degree hit the slider and Benny um there seems to be some legal merit to that uh and the fact that the judges is going to consider it now um I think speaks to that to your other point he's got the Frank Santoro murder which he was convicted of he's got these murder conspiracies attempted murder conspiracies that he was convicted of but so so yes it even if he gets a new trial with the with the uh the wire uh of him talking to Masino tossed Masino can't testify to that that conversation and let's say in a in a perfect world for for Vinny Gordus he's acquitted of the Pozzolo murder I think his theory I mean there'd be a lot of red tape to have to cut through to eventually see freedom but at that point there's a potential light because you can as crazy as it sounds with deals and time serves and stuff you know Michael Mancuso who we're talking about Mikey knows he caught two the Randy Pozzolo murder yeah the twelve years for the Pozzolo murder um but it didn't send him away for the rest of his life so I'm thinking to myself if he can get the Pozzolo murder tossed he could somehow go to a get a reset or attempt to get a resentencing from the judge on the Santoro murder and possibly get an out date where he's done 30 years um and and there's an opportunity for him to hit a halfway house and then uh he's only 63 I think he's probably in his mind thinking if by my early 70s I can I can get out I can live my last 15 years yeah free who knows there's been there's crazier things have happened I mean I was in the mob I always point to Joe Legambi in Philadelphia I mean there should have never been a Joe Legambi uh uh mafia godfather era you know he was he was dead to rights in prison doing doing a life sentence and then uh case gets uh tossed and and he's out on the streets and he becomes boss so yeah the star is aligned right so yeah the especially the assassination conspiracy with the prosecutor is the one that I always think he's gonna have the hardest time with because the feds especially do not take that lightly that that alone they would try to try to get you a life sentence yep and that's why he was in uh super max for a while I don't know he's still in super max I don't think he's out by now out of the super max but uh and last thing I'll say you know we've said it before here I mean nothing seems to phase been e-gorgeous I mean John Gotti at the you watch the uh those those tape recording those surveillance videos of him in prison uh between 90 92 and 02 when he died he seemed just really pissed off and he's unrecognizable toward the end he was you wouldn't even know it was John Gotti all the pictures that are filtering out of Vinny he's smiling near the ear his hair he's got a he's got his tan he's he's sitting posing with I mentioned it on a quick hitter that we just did about the appeal that he one of the video or one of the those pictures that recently came out on on social media is him with a bunch of Mexican mafia guys yeah with like five or six Mexican mafia guys so he doesn't he seems like he can go with the flow uh and doesn't he seems to be doing the time instead of the time doing him yeah yeah yeah he seems yeah he still he still looks like um you know pretty pretty healthy guy so we'll see what happens well thanks for joining me Jimmy um another one of these quick hitters in the books we'll keep you updated on what's going on with Vinny's appeal um check out gangsta report with some you know deep dives into to Vinny's case I did a deep dive into the pozzolo hit I also uh did a story about um how Dom Ciacali who was Vinny's right-hand man and along with Messino the star witness at Vinny's trial how Ciacali met Bonanno and he was actually introduced by one of the characters in Goodfellas or I said one of the actors in Goodfellas who played one of the characters in the famous bamboo lounge scene when he's introducing all the members of the vario crew uh Pete the killer who says I took care of that thing for you that's his uncle right isn't that Ciacali you know Pete the killer was a real lukezi mob guy his uncle was a guy named Pete the neck Ciacali who played Pete the killer in Goodfellas and Pete the neck was the one who introduced Ciacali to Vinny Gorgeous at a Christmas 1999 lunch meeting in Manhattan with Bruno Indelicato who was his entry point into Vinny so check that out I'm going to do something else on the Patty from Patty from the Bronx murder conspiracy that will be out in the next couple days that I got from the court filings and and then obviously what's going on the west side we're always uh keeping tabs on that because they are uh they're they're they're the front page mob family they're they're the mob family that everybody wants to know about because they're doing things at a level that nobody else does it does it at they're they're elite so yeah the uh yeah I think you said how he met Bonanno but you met Basiano yeah sorry Basiano right how I'm apologize how Ciacali met Basiano eventually became Basiano's best friend right hand man um but didn't know him until the late 1999 intro through his uncle Pete the neck who played Pete the killer in Goodfellas yeah a lot of it's been uh again shout out to our friend Tony DeStephan a lot of that is um not only check out gangsta report but um yeah in that book Tony's book is great book great book all right well thanks jimmy for Ben behind the glass scott burnstein og pod out