 Welcome to the original gangsters podcast. I'm your host Scott Bernstein along with my co-host my partner in crime the doctor Jimmy Bucci Lotto Hi everyone We are doing a zoom episode this week. We are very excited for our featured guest we are going to delve into a Subject a pocket of American organized crime that we really haven't Addressed yet in our several years of doing this show. We're going to talk about the Pittsburgh Mafia the Leroka crime family that Was written about by our guest Paul Hodes a former FBI analyst who worked in the Bureau for almost two decades and Came out in the last couple weeks with a great piece of literature to add to the the canon of You know very compelling organized crime reads It's called Steel City Mafia Blood betrayal in Pittsburgh's last Don Paul. Thank you for joining us Thanks Scott and Jimmy. It's great to be here. I actually love your show. I'm a fan, so Well, we we appreciate you and your work and I was so excited when you reached out to me I think about a year ago to talk about what you had in the hopper and No, no disrespect no disrespect to the era of Pittsburgh organized crime where things were nice and stable and functional In the mid 20th century where you know the golden era but your book really focuses more on that last vestige of power and prestige that the Pittsburgh group had Mike Genevieve who was the godfather who was John Leroka the family namesakes protege and Mike Genevieve led a you know about a 20 year 10 year in the Pittsburgh mob and it you know as opposed to you know Automobile going from zero to a hundred his automobile and from a hundred to zero About a number of reasons for that that you get into And it's not just Pittsburgh. You really dive into a lot of Pennsylvania organized crime outside of the Pittsburgh proper, but all families are all factions that reported To Pittsburgh so you're talking about other other cities like Youngstown Altoona Some other you know strongholds Yeah in the area so Paul. Thanks a lot for joining us and just maybe Jump in right away and just tell us kind of what your inspiration for writing this book was sure sure So my inspiration was I grew up in a place called Johnstown, Pennsylvania and I Live there until basically like I was 21 years old and moved away around like the early early 2000s to New York City and it was It was a really cool place honestly a lot of different ethnicities a lot of Immigrant families that had come in you know in the like the 1920s And it had a small organized crime presence That I was only marginally aware of when I was like a kid a teenager reading about some of this stuff as the court cases came up and it was really those articles like in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette and and other papers that got me into this topic and then you know things like the Sopranos came out and I became a quick fan of that in my young young years and It just stuck in my brain the whole time and then I wrote a military history book a few years back and on another topic I'm a fan of and When I was thinking about my next topic. I was like, this is a no-brainer. It's gonna be the Pittsburgh Mafia No one's written about it yet. It's actually a very exciting story and It's it's worth telling and it's it's also amazing because I don't think a lot of people who live in that area Really understand how much was going on They've kind of just there's like kind of a collective memory loss on that Obviously the people who are directly around it still think about it and talk about it online, especially but but the general population I'm trying to Get get them back into and say hey, there's this really cool story that happened right your backyard not that long ago You know just the longest short of it and you know throw it to Jimmy if he has any questions to start But when Jimmy and I were talking off air You know just to condense it Into kind of like a bite-sized Knowledge base and then we'll unpack from there It seemed like Mike today's took over the family and again the family was pretty robust at that point in the early to mid-80s and Again from it from a Kind of a neophyte when it comes to Pittsburgh. I wouldn't consider myself a Pittsburgh mafia expert I definitely just like a lot of these subjects. I probably know more than the average human being but I wouldn't consider myself an expert, but I think there there were two pretty big decisions That led to the downfall of that crime family and one was to dive headfirst into the drug game a lot of families were were kind of dancing around it and Neglecting to fully embrace it and Pittsburgh was one of the first families to kind of throw out that That that That belief that there was a die or a deal or die order Some families kind of had it, but it was more um more like, you know You know more more more more talk than actual action And then the second one would be the fact that Mike Genovese didn't really just didn't want to make a lot of people and Really became a ghost. He was a mob boss in name, but would really not have all we would have would never Do a lot of hands-on stuff had a lot of buffers and then didn't want to replenish The the um the rank and file Yeah, yeah, and uh, they they had kind of that replenishment problem with la rocka, too. Um, he Uh hadn't made uh people in a while and that was one of the reasons why Mike Genovese, uh did uh When he when he first started he made Uh five guys um in the first few years after he became the godfather um But and for Pittsburgh, that's a lot like that's like uh a quarter of the family basically, you know I estimate that there are around 20 members in the 80s um and uh You know for for a small family like that that was a big deal But you're right like after the 1990 trial, which we can get more into if you want it that scared him, uh I think and in the opinion of the of especially the the main case agent that I've been talking to who's obviously now retired Uh, but the FBI agent he thought that Mike Genovese was basically after 1990 like I'm only going to do business through intermediaries for sure. He already had that tendency um, you know, uh me and you had talked about uh his meeting with uh Nikki scarfo in 1986 they had a a beef over uh a bookmaker that was outside of pittsburgh who was uh scarfo's uh Brother-in-law and basically uh uh pittsburgh was trying to tax him and uh He finally reached out to scarfo for help because pittsburgh was kept up in the percentage every time he said You know hold off hold off and it eventually got to 50 percent and so scarfo showed up for a meeting and Mike genovese actually didn't go and meet him. He sent chucky porter Who very soon would be made and be an underboss, but at the time he was an associate so um and uh one of the things that uh that I found uh After after the book came out was a little bit more of a detailed report on that meeting um, and uh, it It doesn't seem like nicky made his displeasure known at them at the meeting But he basically just told them like just go tell mike what was said at the meeting in the morning and they did um, the fbi followed mike the next morning or fall chucky porter the next morning um, his trusted associate at that time and uh They met at a hardware store parking lot and I'm sure that's what they were talking about. They didn't record the meeting but uh But yeah, so he was extremely secretive like I'd say probably one of the most secretive bosses I've ever come across and like mafia stories, uh for sure um You know possibly to the point where it it could hurt, you know, his control of things to a certain point Especially later in the 90s um And then the other thing you mentioned. Oh, sorry Go ahead Yeah, I'm sorry just to pick up on that plan. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I just I don't want to lose my uh, his question here That's so that's that is very Striking to me that in in the 80s genovese would not meet with scarful personally because The 80s it's not now we're basically a lot of these dons are this is this seems like the norm These days where people like Barney in new york I mean the guys in his own family don't even know who he is never even see the guy, right? Maybe once a year they see the guy and it and you know, that's the norm these Days, maybe not like a guy like Tanaro or skinny joey guys. We're very public But a lot of these guys they're they're out of sight But the 1980s To not show up to a meeting with another boss, especially someone as temperamental As nicky nicky scarfo is really remarkable to me. I mean scott. Your philly is one of your areas of expertise I mean, I can't imagine scarfo. I mean that was he and I well, I heard that Probably didn't want to kill him over that. Well, I heard that story firsthand, you know, because I wrote mafia prince hit the siren benny And um, you know, that's philly and that's autobiography siren again Uh, but I remember having that conversation with phil Probably the first day or two that I was interviewing him and I didn't know anything about This particular circumstance, but I remember asking him What what type of relationship or communication were you and your uncle having with the pittsburgh guys? And this was the first story that he he told me and yeah, um Right off the bat when phil started recounting the story He said that his uncle was was offended Not that not only might get a vase didn't come meet him, but he sent like uh, paul Reference he didn't send a maid guy. Yeah, chucky porter would eventually become a maid guy eventually became the underboss and in a lot of ways Paul referenced the 1990 trial and chucky gets nailed with with drugs and flips And that really is is kind of the beginning of the end for pittsburgh, but um, I don't I could be wrong, but my memory is telling me that That phil told me at the time that they didn't even know who chucky porter was So yeah, he was sending a guy that they had done business with in the past that had represented genovese or laroka To them in the past, but they were sending a guy that they didn't even know Yeah, there were two other guys Yeah There are two other guys at the meeting that were made To like sort of assist him, but chucky porter was really the lead negotiator Right, um, but uh, it was lou vault who was an old a real old timer Um, he I think he was in the 70s at that point at least And then joceca who was also very old and who was actually related to al the arco from the lukezi family Yeah, um And uh, and and they lou vault actually approached scarfo Uh after the meeting and told him Straight up that mike wasn't going to come because there was a law enforcement presence Uh in the area, which was correct and leonette leonetti actually spotted them and he said Hey chucky is are those who those guys behind you sitting at the bar? They look like they're cops and he was like, oh, yeah, those guys are those guys are law enforcement um, so and and mike genovese from what all i've seen he He would have been completely anathema to having his picture taken With someone who was as high profile as nicky scarfo. It would have been like his worst nightmare Very few photos of him There really are it's hard to find anything of him from when he was actually the boss, right? um, like I a lot of the pictures that I have as you saw in the book they're kind of when he was younger um, there is one from 1984 that's a surveillance shot of him coming out of the holiday house Which was their headquarters at the time Um, and you can kind of see that he's actually, you know, the he was when he was almost a boss Uh, but other than that man, there's there's really not a lot at all What let me ask you both. I mean What would be the I mean you talked to phil about this god or paul from your research I mean was that was was some of the reaction not only to be put off But like who the fuck are these guys like I mean should we even take them seriously? I mean would that have been is that too extreme reaction especially for a guy like scarfo? Scarfo was offended that um That the boss of pittsburgh had the audacity to try to tax his his brother-in-law um, yeah, so It was a situation where um It was already getting off on a bad foot from before they even came to pittsburgh to me Yeah, so I mean paul. I mean, do you think you're either one of you guys from your research? I mean um, did the genovese have the sense of What a deadly individual he was he was dealing with. Um, I mean, I you know, I just wonder like We know that scarfo's reputation Right. I mean we know it now, but in real time did he have a sense of he's it seems like a very flippant decision to me I mean paul, can you I think to his ever seen where of who he was dealing with? I think he was well aware. Um, there were There are rumors I've heard from some people that I didn't put in the book because I never had corroboration but that That basically that the family was meeting with other lower members lower level members of philly and other places Uh, not necessarily mike genovese meeting with them, but other people too Um, so they had context with them in that way. I think you know, what's kind of can't confirm that um, and then You also have uh Uh, the papers. I mean like scarfo was already famous by the time this meeting occurred So all he had to do was just read about him. He was all all over the place for uh, you know some of the Some of the wild murders that had already happened and I think he'd already been on trial in new jersey for that one Yeah, this was the end of the scarfo. This was the scarfo's last year 86 into 87 he was off the streets by spring of 87 so, um And I Go ahead jimmy Yeah, I was just gonna say, um, sorry to belay this point, but it's just so striking to me I mean he ordered he can whack people in philly for a lot less Of an infraction than this. I mean, is it imaginables? Either one of you guys that scarfo would have gone after someone in another Or is that even too too too much of a leap for a guy like him? I don't think he would have put a hit on him, but I definitely think when for the for the last let's say year of scarfo's Rain if he was meeting with any guys in new york or meeting with any other family members he would he would you know This merch the way mike Genovese runs his family in the in the kind of proper protocol proper etiquette that he didn't feel like Uh, he received Yeah, and uh And and to answer the second part of your question and I never saw anything about Him possibly talking about him, but I could definitely see that uh with other bosses. Um Uh, so for for mike genovese. I think it was just It was just secrecy purposes like I have an fbi file that says that he would get enraged uh when Family business would be in the paper um, like he would just stop talking to people for a few days and and like Just basically like Be alone uh for a while. Um, he really did not like it at all. I mean it was very isolated. I mean yeah yeah, and and In the end it worked out for him, but uh, I'm sure it made business very hard to do like he was able to make aggressive moves I mean the joseph nestico Tax issue came up because he was he expanded the tax on bookmakers in the in the in the pittsburgh Mafia's territory Nestico was was um scarfose brother-in-law. Scarfose brother-in-law. Yes. Yes, and uh And so that that was caused by his new policy where he thought la rocko was to basically too nice to everyone and he said You know, everybody's gonna start Paying what they owe finally. Um, and and and that's it which was something that philly was doing at the same time too And uh an la as well actually, uh, peter malano was trying to do that too So yeah, I want I want to point out that's a great way to segue. So for for jimmy's knowledge, um Who I don't think has read the book yet, but um, I'm gonna get him a copy of it cool, and um It's my fault that he he hasn't read it beforehand because I was supposed to get him a copy and and uh We just haven't met up, but um one of To me the best parts of this book is learning that the situation with Scarfo and and jenna vase wasn't an outlier Um, there was another scenario that I didn't know about. I don't know if anybody knew about until this book Where in the winner of 1995 which is nine years after the the meeting with with scarfo and leonetti um peter malano who at that time was the boss of the los angeles crime family uh came to town and jenna vase didn't meet with him he sent Two guys two of his lieutenants to meet with him and this was uh revolving around Pittsburgh Requesting permission from malano to come into town and along with the chicago mafia have a piece of a Indian reservation for shake down and gambling purposes the whole thing blew up pretty quickly, but uh There you have photos in here of of the meeting where pete malano came, um To to pennsylvania, uh, or were they in ohio? They were in ohio. Actually, uh, they were in ohio, but that they were meeting He he came to their neck of the woods to have that meeting Yeah, and and he came for other reasons too. I think he stayed for more than a few days. Uh so peter malano traveled to the cleveland area In order to it was visit blood relatives is what it said, uh, yeah, because he has his family Uh, his his father was the conciliary of cleveland for like 30 40 years Yeah, and it so he had deep ties and uh Reestablished contact with like the remnants of the cleveland family at that time And then also to meet with pittsburgh about, uh So they were investing in a casino that the The ring cone band of lewisano indians, uh were, uh opening um A casino that had actually um been part of a takeover scheme in the late 80s by the chicago mafia family And then they went looking for investors again and the pittsburgh family came in um, so they didn't really have good luck with that, but, uh Uh sandiego is where that casino is located in the same region. I think it's like 40 miles away. Um And it's you know, kind of in the kind of in the desert desert area Um, you know, nothing could be farther from pittsburgh, you know without leaving the united states really Um, but it was a good way to launder money um And to obviously make legit income too on top of it um, and they you know, they had card games and uh One-armed bandits and I think I think there was a big bingo hall involved bingo hall. Yeah. Yeah, there was uh The real moneymaker was the machines the game the machines, but um, you know, unfortunately for them those those didn't last too long. Um, the The government, you know figured that out and took the machines out and basically what was left was, uh The card games and the in the bingo Which wasn't as lucrative The pittsburgh guy that was running point was Henry zebo Zatola, right? Yes. Yeah, he was the point man and at that time in the 90s I would call him basically the street boss of the pittsburgh family Mike genovese throughout his whole reign always had somebody who was kind of point on the street um, so uh at that time it was zoltula and uh And he was he was a really smart guy, um, and he was actually in in the meeting with malano Along with lennie strollo from youngstown um, and then uh youngstown area um, and then uh, you had john butzano jr. Who was the son of one of the early prohibition bosses um, and and like like scott said, uh, genovese didn't go to that meeting. Um, obviously it was surveilled again. Um, I think uh, probably a little more low-key than that first one was So would we say that genovese is Even though he's violating protocol and I and I find that like kind of interesting especially by 1980 standards Could we say that maybe genovese was actually the smartest guy in the room here because they actually were under surveillance in all these cases And he died Yeah, even if he's offending people, maybe he was maybe he was ahead of the curve He died a free man and died a very wealthy man Yeah, exactly like and and you know, nobody really knows how much money had, um, his Last wife in an article claimed that they didn't really have much at all. But You know, he could have I heard that he invested it and I don't believe that's For my for my research and I've talked to a lot of the top detroit guys um, and I didn't realize The the deep ties between loraca genovese and zirilli and toko until I interviewed Tony Zirilli, um If you're gonna trust what I was hearing Uh, he he it might not have all been on paper, uh, just to see in front of you But but he he he had quite a large investment portfolio kind of like jack toko did and I know that um At least again, what I was told is that he he had access to a lot of money Um by the time that uh the the 90s and 2000s had hit Yeah, I don't doubt it, but I'm just telling you what the family said, but I I don't doubt it like there are uh There's rumen all over the place about investment investing in real estate in pittsburgh and uh overseas bank accounts and Um, you know hiding hiding money around, you know, just in in different places Um, which wouldn't surprise me at all and and and just to get back to jimmy's point too like He really was the smartest guy in the room. I mean, uh, he Managed to whether uh, well the 80s and the 90s, which were probably the toughest decades for the mafia ever um and uh Without going to prison and really he only spent You know besides, you know, like maybe like a day stittin jail when he was young or something like that for, you know Small time crimes back when he was just an associate or even before then um He really only spent like six months in jail in the mid 70s when he wouldn't testify before a grand jury that granted him immunity Um, and that was kind of just a you know, it was a tactic to push him to get testify basically, which didn't work Uh, but at that time and I say this in the book. He promised Uh, his associate said that he promised himself that he would never go to prison again So he did make that come true Oh, can I ask you about um, the uh, maybe it's not fair if if you if you didn't interview him like his social psychology, but um It sounds like he didn't want to make Many more members eventually because for you wanted to be insulated it with like that's a reoccurring theme this episode um So do you think he viewed it more as like this is just a criminal organization that he happens to be running and not as concerned with like the legacy of like You know, this is our thing. This is cozenostra. Like this this has to continue on and sustain This is bigger than us. It sounds like he just viewed it as like hey if this thing runs, of course Then you know, whatever at least I stayed out of jail So I don't know for sure like he said we did we nobody's ever interviewed him and he never would have talked anyway, but the uh, uh the sense I get from putting everything together and seeing everything is that He he had to have given up on it because otherwise he would have made some people You know, I there there's some uh, you know Some people who say like well, maybe there just weren't no recruits. I don't think that's true. I think there were associates who wanted to be made Um, there were a ton of people that probably deserve to be made Who had done, uh, you know made a lot of money um, potentially, uh, you know committed murders and things like that Uh, so there was certainly A group of people that could have replenished the family I think he made the conscious decision not to replenish it And I was told by um, you know, once again, my best source who is the the case agent for The pittsburgh family for from like the late 70s until the early 2000s that that he believes that once uh, the trial happened the 1990 trial that took down his underboss and other top people and the uh That when that making ceremony was caught on tape in 1989 in boston Uh, the the patraka family maybe not boston itself, but that that family it was medford, but out right outside of boston. Okay um, so after that happened that that also freaked him out and and He was like, uh, you know like we got we got to stay away from that kind of thing um, and you know it it seemed like at that time and in that year for pittsburgh and for other mom families like the world was falling apart And uh, and I think he entrenched even more after that and decided in essence like This thing is gonna die Well, let's let's talk about that case because I think you can kind of draw a through line between one of the reasons the family fell apart and As I mentioned at the beginning of the episode this decision to kind of go all in On the on the burgeoning drug market of the late 70s 80s And I also want to connect it to a piece of Of pop culture that people probably would recognize if you're if your fans of the movie goodfellas um At the end of that movie there's a constant reference to Our coke connection in pittsburgh Yeah, and that was that was real the henry hill and the lukezi crime family were hooked up um with the the pittsburgh mafia in doing their coke deals guys that Just like you saw in the movie henry hill met in prison um And these were guys that reported to tell me if i'm wrong chuckie porter Yes, yes Who chuckie porter was and how he Be kind of or not kind of became Uh genovases not only his underboss, but the guy that was running all the drugs Yep, and so, uh chuckie porter is definitely one of the most interesting characters in the pittsburgh family and to me in the mafia generally, uh, because he's kind of uh He's kind of uh like an an oddity in in many ways. So he's His name is porter. Obviously, which is uh like an irish english name. Um, he claimed that he was Part irish and part italian. He claimed he was more italian like 75 italian um, that's according to him I dug into him a bit. Um, you know like on ancestry and whatnot. Um And I can only really confirm like 50 percent um on his mother's side For the book's purposes, I put in what he said, which was 75 Um, so he was at least 50 possibly 75 italian But he had that non-italian last name um, he uh started out Uh, kind of as a leg breaker Bodyguard for the manorino group in new kensington, pennsylvania Which was a branch of the pittsburgh family Um led by gabriel kelly manorino who was a legendary figure Um who died in 1980? Um, he was the underboss for a long time um, and he had a lot of power and a lot of uh A lot of influence. So there was a good friend to have for chucky porter um manorino trusted him quite a bit um, there was a a dispute um within the family uh that resulted in The murder of basically one of their hit men leg breakers Who happened to be a friend of the manorino group? And uh chucky allegedly it was never proven in court. Uh Took vengeance on the person who killed him. Um, that got him further Uh Further up the ranks in the family, you know more respect Um, he ran gambling clubs. Uh, he did all the the standard things loan sharking. Um Uh and But the thing that made him a little different than a lot of the made guys is that he did direct deal in drugs for a long time Um, and he had associates underneath him too Uh that were doing the same thing and you know, he was taking a cut of it Uh before he was underboss and and while he was too um And some people say that the reason that they got into drugs is that Uh, is that maybe the gambling business was a little down because you know, that that area went through sort of like an economic decline in the 70s and 80s Uh, and maybe maybe not as many blue collar workers were gambling. Um Uh I I tend to think that it was just, you know, they was there was a coke craze in the 80s And and there was more money to be made so they and I think it Again, tell me if i'm wrong. I think it hit Pittsburgh particularly hard um It hit it hit every major city hard, but I just recall And and this is purely anecdotal, but um, I know that the major league baseball had a huge Coke scandal that a lot of it was based out of pennsylvania um The philadelphia and pittsburgh. I know that that locker room in the And again, this is more probably more of a statement on what was going on in professional sports But I know in the locker room of the stealers when they were at the end of their run with terry bradshaw Winning those super bowls and then the the pirates in that 1979. Uh, we are family group A lot of cocaine a lot of cocaine Um, a lot. Yeah, I I heard that Yeah in various forms of Trouble but because of of cocaine. Yeah, that's that sports connection. I'd uh heard about that too I didn't get to put put anything about that in the book, but uh But yeah, it was definitely it was definitely part of the pittsburgh party culture too. Just like it was in a lot of other places. Definitely. Um, so porter Porter went all in on that. Um Him and a few other guys, um prominently among them Eugene nick the blade jizwale and uh Joey rosa who was a third generation Mafia associate His grandfather was made his father was made He never got to become made because of what happened. Uh, in the late 80s, right? What's that? Wasn't he killed? No, he wasn't killed. He was he actually just he became a government witness. Um, okay. Who am I thinking of? Who was the hitman? Uh, that was involved in the youngstown pittsburgh or sorry the the pittsburgh cleveland war out of youngstown Ah Yeah, little joey naples. Okay. I'm sorry. I was confused. Yeah Yeah, he he was a force unto himself um So so chuckie porter, um, everybody knew what he was doing um, and laraca allegedly didn't really want to get into drugs neither did manorino Um, but they let him earn they let him do what he wanted Um, laraca still started bringing around despite the fact that i'm sure that they had to have known that he was Involved in the drug trade. There's no way he couldn't um And uh, he started appearing at laraca's alginy car wash, which was his headquarters in pittsburgh Um and having lunch with the boss and showing up in suits, you know, suddenly he became respectable in the late 70s He started just showing up there um and clearly laraca liked him um and uh When laraca died when mike jenovies took over He relied on him very heavily Um to be kind of his, you know under boss, but also the street boss, you know, the person who's actually Resolving some of those lower level disputes and uh And chuckie was still in the drug trade and mike was accepting that money Um, there are people who are in the know and I believe what they're saying that said that mike was saying You know, I can't believe that chuckie was dealing, uh after after he was arrested like um You know, I'm against drugs. I'm against all that. Um, I I think that For him not to know he was a very smart person in my opinion For him not to know that is ridiculous. I think that he was probably just saying that. Um, That's just my opinion, but But that's what I think, um I'm the same here in detroit with jack toko And not to always make it a detroit thing, but you know jack was taking a lot of drug money Um from from multiple people including, you know, his top advisor jimmy quasarano And you know, he would tell everyone that uh, he was against drugs and that he didn't want anybody in the family dealing drugs But it was all it was all lip service. None of it was It was all like, you know in theory, but not in practice. Yep. Yeah and And that's the thing too. Like I mentioned nick the belages walle. He was close to the hierarchy too He was close to real rock and jenovies Had had worked for them in the past um, and he was super obvious about it. I mean, you know, like He was the drug drug dealer par excellence in that area and uh, and as you mentioned, he's He's under porter But he's also the pittsburgh connection really, um, his underling associate is paul matzeh and uh, and or matzai Some of these names i'm unsure of the exact pronunciation, but he Uh was uh, henry hill's direct connect this paul matzeh guy Um, so that's where he was getting his drugs from but paul matzai was getting it from jizwale Who was getting it from florida and then, you know, you trace it back and it goes to columbia Yep, um, so also Uh, the guy that hooked up henry hill With uh, the point shaving scheme With boston college. Yes paul paul knew Uh, a couple guys that knew a player on that team Um, and and they they made a lot of money. I think in the 78 season Yeah, 77 78 season shaving points. Yeah, and I I think the player was actually from western pa if i'm right He was he was a pittsburgh guy rick. I think it was rick kuhn Yeah, yeah, that's a name. Um, and and those those guys, uh You know and I think jizwale even commented on it at one point like I saw an article where you know He was like They shouldn't have made a movie about that rat henry hill. They should have made a movie about a real gangster like me Um, but he was really super flamboyant. Um, he had uh his Like monogram like his initials on his underwear and his shirts and pants and all this stuff flashy cars, uh penthouse apartment um He he had a Rolls Royce that the government didn't confiscate and his sister kept it form So so there's a pretty cool picture of him with a sitting in front of a 1980s Rolls Royce down in florida after he got out Yep um, and uh, you know he Uh, they had a mole in the fbi office actually a clerk secretary who was on the fbi's organized crime squad there um, and she was giving them A bunch of very important documents about porter and et cetera and all all all the people who were involved in that drug enterprise So just while he was actually tipped off uh Before the indictments came down he ran to jamaica And he was able to hide for a year, but eventually the us marshals caught up with them um and uh part of it was they they uh, they knew that he couldn't stay away from betting and drug dealing and so um, he was doing both down there um, uh, and and the The locals arrested him and handed him over And that was the end of the Pittsburgh connection I have a question that just the elephant in the room here is the theoretical criminologist. Um It's just chucky porter. I mean if his dad's not italian, he shouldn't even have been made I mean that just that that's just a that's an axiom of cosinostra that just I mean And I know they talk about the risottos maybe made a guy who wasn't italian Well, they I don't know. I mean you can I guess any family can say whatever they want and make someone But they will not be recognized by another cosinostra family And um, it's just it's just I mean That's astounding to me. I mean, he should not have been made if his ital if his dad wasn't italian And and you're exactly correct with how the rules are like, you know in a perfect situation But for pittsburgh and this was al the arco said this Um, he said that's just how they did things down there basically That if they found somebody who was talented, they would either treat him like they were made You know, even though they were an associate or In chucky porter's case, he actually got made and then became part of the administration and he you know was supposedly uh the uh The liaison to other families too. So he was meeting with other people um and uh And it's like you said I don't know if they were happy about it in sometimes, but it's who they had to deal with But there's guys in detroit Who who are who are not italian who for all intent and purpose were treated like made guys But being treated like a made guy and being a made guy are two different or two different things So you get blinded by the envelopes You know as long as the envelopes fat They're not going to see You're you're a your true ethnic bloodline. They're going to see what they want to see And I know the first thing that comes in my mind. I know there's a lot of to be Is there anything sacred anymore? I mean, I know like I said one thing that I immediately gravitate to when we talk about this conversation and I've heard both sides of the fence on this But you know sunny campos um over in Um with the yamino crime family And I got people that are swearing to me. He's Puerto Rican I have other people telling me he's italian nonetheless. He's been a huge earner Um over the years and as a capo now and I would guess I think he's in prison. He's gonna come out in a couple years. I would guess that he's On crack to become a future member of the administration. He's not that old. He's in his 50s but You know whether or not he's Puerto Rican or half Puerto Rican or half italian Sunny sunny campos, you know the envelopes Did the speaking for him just like I think in this case with well 30 years earlier with chuckie porter. Yeah, and uh Uh, there's one other example. I can think of and since it's your area of expertise scott. I um, uh, john veezy Yeah, v nobody really know. I mean, I think veezy was italian um Had italian blood in him, but he definitely was a Was a a mutt and a wild card and not someone that would have ever gotten their button Under any normal circumstances, you know, if we're just going to brainstorm. I know Two guys that became bosses that weren't full blooded italians jimmy marcello In chicago, uh, is either a half or a quarter irish Frank solemmie who became the boss of the patriarchas in new england was half irish um But gaudy jr. Wasn't full italian right but in all those cases to jimmy's point In all those cases their dads were Yeah, yeah um, so I I think uh I want to just ask you about nick the blade. I mean me and jimmy New or me and jimmy are the show itself is is friendly with seph ferrante who's who's one of our guys and um seph when he was locked up was very close to nick the blade and I remember um Learning about nick the blade from seph on the phone And nick the blade sitting next his leg next to seph And you know trying to tell me that hey you remember the the um The the good fellas pittsburgh connection. Well, that was me and I had never heard of him before Um, because I wasn't a pittsburgh expert Yeah, I found out that because at first I remember seph telling me this and I was like jiz walley I was like that sounds like an indian name And I thought seph was being fed a line of bullshit Yeah, yeah, my due diligence and nick the blade was a was a force to be reckoned with Yeah, he got out. He was free for about two years And then died a strange death uh in the last decade He like choked to death Yeah, it was it was 2016 and I don't think it was choked. I actually think it was his heart gave out He was drinking wine at something that was called the pastimes bar It was an orman beach florida And uh, and like I guess he used to do that all the time like I was his hangout And he was drinking and uh, he just fell over and like died and had a heart attack basically Like in the middle of a restaurant. Yeah Yeah and like It was kind of appropriate like that was That was where like I think it is younger days, especially like where you could find them was clubs and bars Let's let's jump back and and um Talk about youngstown for for a little bit and then we'll end with uh The current state or the post genovace years, but uh with youngstown it's always been a Absolutely riveting uh fascinating Mob landscape, uh, you know for me to study and um, it's close. It's relatively close to michigan where we are here and It's this kind of no man's well not no man's land, but it's kind of this Very working class town and it's not just the town. It's the county. It's the mahogany valley um, and it was at one point in time was very lucrative organized crime territory and it was always shared by pittsburgh and cleveland and you had two sets of Or two different wars basically one in the sixties and then one in the 70s and 80s um How much did did that story within a story uh play a role in your research? Uh a big role because the youngstown crew as I call them and there sometimes there are multiple crews there like you mentioned um They were super important. Um youngstown itself was uh Had to be one of the most mobbed up places in america uh from the you know From the early days of of the of the mob world to the 19 late 1990s Um, and you know when you think about that, you know, it's it's a place where you know You're talking about tens of thousands of people living in the city You know, maybe at a tight, you know a hundred thousand or so but like it For a place that's that small to have so many You know there's always a small amount of maid guys in town like not not that many you could count on one hand but the amount of associates and and people who really Probably would have been made if they were like in the new york area or something like that like, you know Being made in pittsburgh and in cleveland too was kind of like a gift that was very rarely given uh one that war i mean at the end of the The end of the run of the youngstown mafia, which pretty much ended 20 years ago It was the pittsburgh guys that were the last ones standing cleveland. Yes had been kind of wiped off the map in the early 80s and Uh pittsburgh controlled that area into about 2000. Yep. Yep. And then in the 60s, it was a bunch of car bombs like over 80 car bombings Many that were like message jobs not nobody died but some that people did including innocence Yeah, well cattle act charlie. That was what kind of started the whole thing Yeah, and his kid got killed it's like 10 year old 12 year old kid Yeah, one was killed in that car bombing and his other kid was injured right and uh You know horrible stuff and then when you get to the late 70s early 80s and that that second war um between cleveland and pittsburgh the 1960s one was a little more muddled i'll say like there were some independent operators in there Possibly even some other families like buffalo involved back in people um And then you have the 70s and 80s one it's it's much more uh concrete who's going up against each other Um, and they've stopped using car bombs on a regular basis. Um, and you know, you've got People shooting each other in the street You know and the body count eventually got up to nine ten people one of the hits probably was just an inside job for Uh for uh the uh pittsburgh family. Um, just whacking a guy who was Skimming a little too much off the top but The other people including a A civilian who was killed the father of one of the hitmen um You know when you're talking about that amount of bodies and two small families like that You know if i'm not mistaken that was the same body count that you had in the colombo family war It's so it's pretty crazy. Um And cleveland could ill afford it because they they had had a war with danny green who was an irish gangster in the mid 70s So they and that's what really started the war is that uh the danny green war weakened cleveland Pittsburgh saw an opportunity and said all right, we're gonna We're gonna start moving in on some of these rackets in youngstown mahogany valley And and they did um and cleveland fought back pretty hard a lot of pittsburgh guys died. Um But in the end pittsburgh did did win. Um, you know, they they were in control of all the politicians there In control of all the gambling and to give you just a taste of what Kind of money was coming out of there casino, which at the time was the largest the legal casino um that law enforcement had you know been able to discover Uh, and it was making reportedly 20 million a year um in a small place like that so that's That's like a ton of money for there. So um, and you know the people who came out on top were uh jimmy prado who was kind of uh The leader um, I I hesitate to call him people call him a capo sometimes. I don't think he officially was he was a made guy um, and then uh his two protégés who became made right at the end of his life lenny strollo and uh little joey naples as you mentioned before And then those two once jimmy prado dies Those two kind of have a power struggle Yeah, so they didn't really like each other. Um, uh Little joey naples was very infamous around the area lenny strollo kind of stayed in the shadows um and uh, there was definitely some animosity lenny got pinched from the all-american casino bust he went to jail for a little less than a year and a half and uh That was around 1990 um, and then in he was very worried uh Reportedly that uh naples was going to take over his rackets and you know kind of muscle in on on what he had left And uh and lo and behold in august of 1991 naples is inspecting this new house. He's having built and uh a sniper from a cornfield Uses what what they what they think was a rifle and uh shoots him dead And uh, really it's the only killing of a made guy in recent pittsburgh history You know, you have to go way back to the to the old days to get another made guy who is murdered a lot a lot of associates were killed But made guys very rare for that to happen And this is the subject of endless debate in youngstown. There's a Lenny knew about it or did somebody do it on Lenny's behalf without Lenny knowing about it I've I've been I've been inundated with both sides of it over the years. Yes and and there's there's more than a few theories um and and like There's a youngstown mob facebook page that has really helped me out. I've been talking to a lot of people on there some of whom were former mafia associates And it's endlessly debated on that page and like you've got uh You've got people who think that Lenny did it and that's the easiest answer You've got people that think that there was this independent operator who i'm not going to name because he's still alive um who was trying to impress him and and shot him um, and then there's another theory that the pittsburgh hierarchy was thought he was too flashy and um, and that there was some kind of uh involvement of drug enterprise and that after the 1990 trial, you know They were thought he was a risk um, and honestly, there's not a lot of evidence for any of those theories It's not enough to that's why nobody's been indicted for it because it's just not It's there's there's no there there right now whoever did it did it very well this is really striking uh historically too because um, shame us self promotion, but by the time our audience sees this video or listens to it They will have already had access to our episode of michael francis from last week and he mentioned that most Mafia wars are internal Like the last time there was a big mafia war between families you have to go back to the 1930s and 1920s when that would happen Like usually big wars are internal so to have two Families, uh, you know in different states go to war. It's it's really fascinating I mean that just is not the norm at all. So it's so intriguing and so interesting And it was a very odd war. I mean it was very they kept it localized like during the whole conflict that guys were would come like uh kelly manorina who i mentioned who was the underboss And uh angelo lanardo who was the underboss for cleveland and then the acting boss once jack lookovoli went away uh They met with each other and with lorakatu and uh And they were talking to each other about you know like Like basically like some of the problems that they were having with the cleveland leadership the local cleven leadership in youngstown And trying to hash things out and you know trying to get permission to kill this person and that person And it it's almost it's just a very odd thing each of their proxies are fighting it out And but yet they're still meeting at restaurants or or at somebody's house and talking to each other It's just they didn't let it get out of control, which is kind of amazing to draw another through line uh lenni stroller who i i got to know quite a bit about because When he eventually flipped Um, I think it was 98 Yes, he gave a lot of information on detroit. Um, and and a lot of my uh fbi files that i've gotten that come from the early 2000s a lot of that information is coming from stroller so I actually know more about this little pocket of of the pittsburgh lakosenostro than i do the the entire um Orbit but with lenni stroller he It's this through line. I find as i'm it's crystallizing in my head he Was involved in the hit that ended that Last war where pittsburgh is able to defeat cleveland And it's and I think part of what you were just talking about these meetings between the bosses of both families and being upset with What was going on there ended ends up with one of the carabia brothers Uh disappears I believe with charlie crab. Yes Charlie the crab ronnie the crab and orally the crab uh the carabia brothers who were the cleveland uh crew bosses Uh for what was going on in youngstown and lenni stroller Was able to make his bones By according to fbi records and I believe that I believe lenni's own lenni's own debriefing Yeah, yes, I think he admitted to it. He lured um Charlie the crab to his murder in 1980. He made the phone call and told charlie the crab. He had to be somewhere Uh, nobody ever saw charlie the crab again Yeah, and then you go, you know 10 15 years later and it's lenni stroller's Just off the reservation behavior that was so Counter-intuitive you want to talk about the opposite of mike genovese is lenni stroller jimmy, you know you have A guy that's not even a boss, you know, he's a I guess you could say he was a captain, but I don't know if Be accurate like like the the power he had was a of a captain, but not officially and not only is he depending on who you talk to not only is he Turning on his own guys He's trying to hit prosecutors and sheriffs And you know it was just totally out of hand uh, so it was like He's part of what ends the This this kind of these back-to-back wars that gives the whole territory to pittsburgh within a decade from that Or in about a decade from that he takes over the whole territory and then a decade after that It all blows up because he was a lunatic Yeah, and then one other thing I wanted to throw out there and then just have you guys You know mash it up Is that part of his Blueprint for controlling that area in the 90s was again drugs and But more so going into black neighborhoods and recruiting african-american lieutenants of his and one guy that he had with him for a while this jeff riddle um He thought he was going around telling everyone that he was going to become the first african-american ever made into the mafia That let me throw low and mike genovese were gonna make it Why not why not if chucky porter can be the item on the boss and irish guy can be the under boss. Why not? Yeah, and uh I have like there's conflicting sources on jeff riddle So like some say that he was joking when he said that and others say no, he was dead serious And so like I tend to believe the dead serious side um And and I and I think that part of that is because he he actually Stuck to america, you know when the trial happened and his boss was testifying against them um and uh And I think that you know He's he just he did so much for them that he probably expected to get some kind of reward for that you know uh being involved in enforcing for them And uh making a lot of money from gambling etc for them Um and also uh what you were talking about yeah, like even though stroller wasn't necessarily directly involved in Dealing drugs a lot of his associates were And you know, they purposely You know what I talked about with that erosion of the blue collar gambling base like the blue collar guys who used to work at the steel mills that shut down Um, they replaced that with so there was a guy who's Whose name was bernie the jewel or who is actually stroller's real lieutenant. Um And then kind of alt jewelers man on the street was jeff riddle uh he was kind of Bernie alt jewelers was the connection to uh the the black criminals and and the drug dealers who were in youngstown Who were the only people in town that had money anymore? So they were trying to lure them into these games of chance and it worked like they All the drug dealers were gambling at the pits work mafia's uh gambling places and uh betting with them So so they were making money off of it um, and then And then they started to get involved in this uh fixing cases for the same customers these gambling customers who are also drug dealers Um, you know, so they're paying off prosecutors pretty exorbitant amounts Uh while also taking a cut for themselves. So if you get in trouble as a drug dealer And you have this connection to the local mob Uh, you can say hey, can you help me fix this case? You give them, you know a set man of a money of money um It at least in the tens of thousands of dollars, but a hundred thousand dollars on some of these cases and uh You know the mob guys whack it up amongst each other and then part of it goes to the prosecutor um, and people are getting away with all these different crimes because uh, Lenny stroller was helping them fix cases Um, and uh, they really did own that valley the mahogany valley. They really did own it until stroller flipped um, and the reason the federal government did that is because uh, you know, you think like why would you make Why would you take testimony from the guy who is actually running all this? um Is they are able to get convictions on like 70 public officials because of him So they were able to basically just in one fail swoop just destroyed all And youngstown was eliminated. I'm not saying there's no gambling there at all even right now, but The big the big players were all finished. I think one of the most True statements ever set on a wire And I'm guessing paul you've heard this. I don't know if jimmy has but um At the end of all of that drama When lennie stroller had testified against any uh, everybody And had gone into witness protection And bernie altru shuler Or excuse me bernie alt shuler and jeff riddle And uh, who were his number one jewish lieutenant and number one african american lieutenant Kept their mouth shut didn't make any deals went to prison And adhered to an omerita that they had never taken And there was a guy on a wire that was heard this is this is what it's come to in the year 2000 that the mob coppo flips And the jew and the black keep their mouth shut Yeah, yeah, I remember that. Yeah, it wasn't as poetic as that. Yeah, it was not poetic as that But I think it was incredibly um It was an enlightening statement and I thought I think it was very Uh hit the nail on the head for what the mob had become in the the early part of the 21st century Where you had the government make a deal with the mob boss to take down The underlings that weren't italian and and those those not italian underlings Kept their mouth shut and did their time Yeah, and and even jeff riddle said the same thing actually like during his statement Like, you know, you have a final statement for your sentencing or or whatever it was or uh, Maybe it was before he was convicted. I can't remember exactly but he basically said like You know, what kind of joke is this like basically we're not even italian, you know Like how how how can how can we be convicted of this basically? Um, you're the big fish in the big italian mob boss, but neither of us are italian. Yep Let me Or go ahead finish. Yeah, I was End with this and then throw it to jimmy You look at those three those three main characters in that drama I Jeff riddle dies in prison Bernie alt shuler dies in prison Lenny strodo died a free man last year or the year before it was 2021. Yeah Like the summer Yeah, he and he stuck around ohio like he's dating young son He was yeah, he was staying uh spending his days at a tailor like a mens clothier and Be in the in the back of the store telling war stories. Yeah, he definitely wasn't hiding Sorry jimmy go ahead Yeah, I was just gonna say I well, I have a question for paul, but just a comment that I I have an issue You know, it's a criminal justice system. It reminds me of a parallel with miscino Yeah, when you give a deal with the boss to go after the lower ranking guys I just seems asked backwards to me. It's I don't know I don't agree. I don't agree. Yeah Something doesn't sit right with me not to say that those two guys were good guys and they and they didn't deserve to go to prison for what they did but Just there's something out of whack with with the top guy Cooperates and the other guys go to prison for them. They did try to kill a prosecutor, but I should say that what they actually successfully shot him. He just they didn't hit they didn't hit him in a vital organ so he lived but uh but the That what you're saying I understand like the only thing that I'll say that's different between strodo and miscino is For strodo. They had that like That desire to take down all these public officials who were helping them out who otherwise they probably couldn't have gotten um for miscino And I don't know how many convictions they've gotten from his testimony itself, but but he he I I don't I don't know if You know one of the head on the wall convictions afterwards They wanted the head on the wall They wanted to say we flipped the most powerful godfather in new york Who they got in terms of convictions from that? I think that was secondary. I mean, I guess viny basciano But yeah, he wore a wire on yeah, yeah um, but Go ahead jimmy. Yeah, go ahead finish. Sorry. It's got to finish up because I wanted to ask another thing about jenny So so finish go ahead. I was just going to say that um, I think with strodo another a luring factor for the government In in in making that deal with strodo as a compared to miscino Strodo could give them information on more than one family strodo gave them information on detroit cleveland chicago um and and other groups in addition to the um The corruption in the uh in the government and I suppose you could say the same thing about miscino to I'm sure you knew but I don't know how much more I I don't know if you could I'm not saying that he wasn't having or that he didn't have contact with with um families outside of new york, but I don't know how much. I mean, I think you could have told you about the leaders of the other five families Yeah, that's what I was going to say. It'd be the other it'd be the other five family the other four families They miscino would have intel on i'm assuming Yeah But um, I wanted to ask paul About mike genovese is he is he you I mean, I don't know. I haven't read your book yet. I'm going to get it I look forward to reading it. Um And um, is mike genovese related to veto genovese. I mean I have to ask excuse my excuse my ignorance uh, so uh I have talked to People who have researched his genealogy and now I did a little bit too um And he is from the same area just outside naples. It's called rucha rhinola um but There's no obvious connection From what I've been told and uh, uh, this is uh, someone that someone I mentioned uh, me and scott no part jimmy jimmy b Told me this um, but it's not until like possibly like way back in 1800. So like if they are related it's very distant um, there are some articles that say they're brothers and that's Mistaking there's actually veto had a mike genovese as his brother who was you know in the new york genovese family um and uh So the answer the short answer is no I think but like I think there might be some distant distant family I think regardless Of the the validity. I think it definitely helped them. I mean people You know heard that mike genovese was an up-and-comer in pittsburgh back in the day and they I'm I'm I'm almost certain They assumed oh, he's got to be related to veto. So he's got to have some bona fides. Yeah, they're probably not going to To mess with them And there's a little bit extra there to be like uh, oh don't don't touch that guy And so just to finish up here You know mike genovese died. I think in 06 yeah 2006 um There really Wasn't much of an organization left. I know there was a couple guys that were stragglers Sonny, uh, seeing sudy died in the last year. He was kind of the last made guy in pittsburgh How do you write the obit for this family so the obit is So, you know, you know the title of my book is the end of the subtitles pittsburgh's last on pittsburgh's last on for me is mike genovese because he Uh commanded and you know more than a few made guys had a lot of associates went through all that drama that we were just talking about um And I I think you know he obviously deserves that title is elected by the capos um after his death Um, there were only a very few made guys left and even those guys that were left didn't have long to live um except for sonny chi and chi and shuddy like you said um and he Did and this is why I don't discount Families even even even if they only have one made guy like he was definitely He was he was doing things. Um, you know, there's hints here and there that you can pick out It you know, there's there are definitely still associates Doing gambling possibly, you know possibly giving him a cut of that um, and there were there's this fbi document that was just floating around the internet um from 2017 somebody foy at it and uh, it was Basically details these two associates trying to get this city work contract scam going and in code they refer to somebody named doc um and uh fbi doc mentions at the at the bottom of the paragraph that uh, they believe that doc refers to uh, you know Sonny chi chi and shuddy and that he's the head of the lcn in pittsburgh And so that's a pretty late reference to be called the head Now the reason I don't call him the last on even if he was recognized as that by the associates is because he was the only made guy so So he was kind of a family of one so uh, so there was stuff going on still and and and that uh, some of the people in youngstown that i've been talking to uh said that uh Sonny still had a lot of respect in youngstown like among the remaining associates there too uh, but But I don't I don't think it was anything like it was before um, you know, there there's There are families that are on life support and I would definitely designate pittsburgh as that um post 2006 Why don't you think sonny decided to do what mike genovese didn't do? and you know, he was Whatever however you want to categorize him. I mean he had In theory, he would have had the opportunity to try to get that family Back up and running make some new guys restructure it But he seemed to take the same approach as some of these other old timers is You know as long as I stay out of prison and as long as I make money I don't need to to rock the boat Yeah, I mean that's the only thing I can figure is that he didn't want to rock the boat still I mean that he was a good student of Mike genovese and uh, you know the one of the other last members john butzano jr um, who may have been the interim boss in between, uh genovese and uh, gene cutty and um And so We talked about it. Sorry and interrupt you go ahead paul um No, I'm just saying like I think these guys all had that same mindset That's the only thing I can that's the only thing I can imagine, you know, I know a lot of people online Um, like to talk about how well, we don't know what if they made secret members and they're they're still there I suppose there's like a 1 chance of that but like I I would think that we would There would be something coming out of it, right? Like like if you're active, you're gonna be committing crimes and you're gonna sometimes you're gonna get caught And I I just want to mention as we're closing closing up here that Sonny was not a guy that was like, uh um Because of attrition He was the last man standing. I mean, yes Because of attrition. He was the last man standing But I want to be very clear to people that sonny was not a, uh Sonny was a guy that had a lot of respect as as paul mentioned and the respect dated all the way back Uh 50 60 years, um, you know, he was Well liked by john larocca and mike genovese and and I know me and paul were talking a couple months ago. I had I found a newspaper reference I I couldn't Refind it but I had one time I had found a newspaper reference in new york um, I believe from a court case in the early 70s That reference an fbi report that said sonny had driven The pittsburgh leaders to a commission meeting So, I mean this this was back in the 60s when he would have been a guy probably in his 30s or 20s So this was a guy that did have The bona fides that you would have needed to Resurrect a crime family kind of, you know, if you want to make a comparison of what's going on in buffalo right now um, but for whatever reason You know, big joe tedaro had that inclination according to the fbi if you believe them And and sonny for whatever reason did it and I think to maybe to jimmy's point and throw it over to jimmy You know joe tedaro has a family legacy To be concerned about, you know, the his family dates back In in the buffalo crime family decades and decades sonny doesn't have that kind of that that bloodline um urgency or or uh, maybe um Um Jimmy how would you how would you phrase that? Well, like the kinship like the well just that it's more of a family business for the tedaro's And for sonny it was an organization that he was a part of like in detroit. You know, it's there It's like if you have a restaurant that's been around for a hundred years. It's you're a restaurant You didn't just work there your name was yeah, yeah, it's a tradition you know that It's just kind of interesting. I think the sociology and psychology of um The the leadership and some of these families that are dying out or are just actually defunct um What what they see Their role and their legacy in terms of continuing that tradition that they view themselves as just gangsters as part of an And they happen to be heading up a criminal enterprise and stay out of prison If that means we don't bring any new people into it because we want to minimize our our You know exposure then so be it or do do they see it as something like Uh, you know, my my dad was a mafioso my grandfather's a mafioso my uncles my cousins And this is this is a tradition that we have some kind of obligation to to continue on now You know, I think there's going to be some people out there would say oh you're being naive all these guys are just gangsters They don't give a shit. I think that's probably true for for a lot of them It's not most of them, but I suspect that for some of them Uh, some of them do think about Especially these families that this has been part of their tradition for multiple generations That some of them might think about it as more than just a criminal enterprise Yeah, and I think the Pittsburgh guys did But I think that like and this is once again, just my opinion a lot a lot of this sort of more recent stuff is that way because um law enforcement wasn't chasing them as heavily during this time period because They weren't, you know, they were small and they were not the biggest crime threat in Pittsburgh. That's for sure um You know after the 90s it they were uh, they were less than viable, uh, but the uh The I think that they they made that decision This is my theory. They made that decision and they decided to let it die out But while they were alive, they were still True to it, you know, they were they were doing business even if on a much lower level than they were in the 80s and 90s and uh, and and still Still controlling things and the associates, you know, there's they're presumably still paying up even until the end Uh, you know just out of respect. I mean, are they really afraid of uh of a man in his 80s? you know, I doubt it but they They still have that respect. They still have that uh that tradition So in that way, I think they still They still adhere to it, but it just The continuing survival of the organization Just wasn't was not priority anymore. Um, I think they realized, um Something that the other families will eventually realize which is that You know, this thing is gonna die out Unless you get new blood, you know, unless you Make it into an organization that maybe is made up of, you know, actual Italians or Sicilians like it originally was, you know, back in the day It's it's interesting to compare and contrast the two different parts of Pennsylvania Um, and I I know that Pittsburgh and Philadelphia If you don't know you think oh, they're both in Pennsylvania, but they they're very far apart And growing up in Philadelphia is a lot different than growing up in in Pittsburgh But you have one side of the state Where it's 2023 and the Philadelphia crime family is In some ways thriving. I mean at least numbers wise, they have more numbers on the street now than they've had since the 80s I think there's something like 45 made guys right now that we know of And I'm hearing that they've been making ceremony. There could be over well over, you know, uh 50 guys maybe 60 guys and in um, Philadelphia in the 2020s, but you know Pittsburgh is is No longer. So it's it's it's interesting to look at that you know from uh From a uh, uh, from like a 30,000 foot view of the state of Pennsylvania and then you know the scranton wilkes bar Uh, buffalino family is You know is is gone too Yeah, and they were dead I'd say Like what was that by the by the late 90s early 2000s Is well like, you know, basically billy de ilio was running around Being a mafia diplomat for a long time And uh, and he was a Yeah, he's got a book coming out and he did an interview for a um a fox special that i'm a part of um So it should be interesting. I don't know. I'm not supposed to say that I laugh about I laugh about scranton because I I keep on going back to uh, uh, philly attardo That's a glorified crew Glorified crew Even at his peak I thought it was wasn't it karmine potasi that said the glorified crew comment Yeah, he said karmine used to always say Oh This was great. Well, we went well. This is maybe our longest episode. We've ever done with a guest You can tell how enthralled jimmy and I were Good. Yeah I can't wait to read your book. I i'm i'm really this i mean I i'm and admit i'm ignorant. I didn't realize like pittsburgh was had this much this much going on It's really intriguing to me. I can't wait to dig into the book So, uh, i'm gonna show it on the screen right now um Go get it This is a great read. I read it in the weekend. Um, I am Thoroughly impressed by the photos I'm just amazing never before seen Surveillance photos of all the guys that are mentioned in this book um Just a great compliment or our companion to the to the text which is which is uh outstanding well researched very thorough Uh, you know, you know, no stone no stone is left unturned And like like we said at the beginning when we started talking about you writing this there's there isn't really a You know a book of record to to be able to go to and say, okay This is this is the bible when it comes to pittsburgh. Let's say 1965 to 2005 But now we got it paul. You did an amazing job. Thank you so much Thank you guys so much. It was it was great to be on here. I I loved it Where can guy where can people pick it up? Is there anything else you want to promote? so You can go to your favorite online retailers. It's it's all there if you live in uh, the the western pa ohio Like sort of uh, west virginia area The publisher is going to stock stores in that area. So, uh, my relatives have been sending me photos of it in bookstores So that's that's encouraging But uh, the arcadia publishing website amazon barnes and noble that's it's there Great. Well, thank you paul. Uh, we definitely want to have you back on With any new projects you got or just to come and chop up mafia history you're you're incredibly well versed and um, oh, we could have you back on just to talk about your Your work as a for 18 years as an analyst at the fbi office Um Go ahead paul. It was very interesting guys. Thank you so much We owe we owe people like you with that and uh We'll be back next week breaking down more American mafia canadian mafia drug dealers bikers We we uh, we touch on it all here at the original gangsters podcast. Uh, we love bringing you this content. So please like Uh, subscribe share Um, we're only growing and and and we're only gonna keep growing and and paul. Thank you so much We will see you next week for jimmy buchelado scott bernstein og podcast out