 Welcome back to the original gangsters podcast. I'm Jimmy Buccellato here in the studio and via Zoom is my colleague and co-conspirator Scott Bernstein. Hey now, sorry guys Apologies to the audience. I couldn't be with Jimmy in the same spot because of some of Benny you can hit the hit the siren. I was I was with Fox News all day who are in Detroit Shooting a new Jimmy Hoffa documentary. So I've been with them the last two days and I couldn't make it to the To our OG ground zero over at the Benny's house. So the command center command center So I just want to thank everyone for for watching and listening. Please subscribe to our YouTube channel Please subscribe to our podcast and spread the word on social media. We really appreciate that. That's really important We're on Twitter Facebook Instagram. So we always appreciate your support We're super excited for this episode episode. We have our one of our returning champions, I would say Michael Francies the legendary Michael Francies is with us again. He's been on our show before and Welcome Michael. Good to be back guys. Thanks. Thanks for having me. Yeah, I'm like, I can't tell you how Grateful we are you were you know, you were one of our first guests in the infancy of this and just having you appear is is just tremendous, you know, a tremendous co-signing for our for our, you know, our bonafides and we we pay homage to people like you and your father who Were the real OGs. I appreciate that guys, but am I pleasure you guys? We appreciate that we Michael was one of our first big guests back in the day He was on not long ago to talk about his appearance in Detroit So if people audience members want to dig into the archives, you can listen to some of our earlier episodes with Michael and I was fortunate enough to meet Michael when he was in Detroit He appeared at Andeanos and he was talking about his new book Mafia democracy but also talking about his life and it's just a real Fun evening to go see Michael during one of these speaking events. So before we get into, you know Some of the other stuff we're gonna talk about with you. I believe you have an event coming up in, you know, Ohio that's similar to your Detroit appearance. Do you want to Talk to us about that for a moment, Michael? Yeah, it's on June 24th, and it's gonna be in Lorraine, Ohio, which as I understand is about 20 25 miles outside of Cleveland, I believe And it's gonna be a great event, you know, it's a nice theater from what I understand it's it's got a lot of Lineage a lot of heritage about it. So I'm excited to be there And tickets are selling well from what I'm told And we're gonna have a great night, you know, we talk I tell them a little bit about my life I educate them a little bit about, you know, what my former life was really all about telling what I'm doing today We do a Q&A and that's always the best part get a lot of Jimmy Hoffa questions Especially when I'm in and around the Detroit area But, you know, we have a great time and we sign some books. We do a VIP meet and greet afterwards And everybody seems to enjoy themselves. I've been doing this quite some time and I enjoy it I love interacting with people and it's just going to be a great night Yeah, it was a lot of fun at the appearance in Detroit. So I recommend people take advantage of this and Michael's a true gentleman too. Like when he's signing the books, you could tell that If he could you'd say you'd sit there all night with everyone I mean, you could tell that you were really genuine about it I've talked to, you know, you know, Chris and some of your people and they're like They're the ones that put the parameters on your appearances because otherwise you'll you'll stay there as long as it takes To talk with your fans and I just thought that was really cool. You weren't like rock star about it at all You were really down earth and just a nice guide. You could tell everyone was enjoying themselves Well, thank you, you know, and I've been doing this a long time and I had an experience once in Chicago I spoke at a it was actually a church event And I was big church the the congregation was about 25,000 people And after I spoke the the line to sign books Was about five hours long and people were actually waiting And everybody had left and I told my crew I said listen If these people can wait online for five hours, then we're going to stay here and sign the books And that was early on in my my speaking career and and I just learned if people want to wait I think we owe it to them to be courteous because they mean well and they get excited about it I've been doing that, you know for my whole speaking career, which is almost a little over 20 years now. So And yeah, I enjoy it people, you know, they mean well and they get excited and You know, it means a lot to them. So Why not? Yeah, that's awesome. I appreciate that and and and I hope people take advantage of this and visit the Go see you in Cleveland. Um, so speaking of Cleveland Just wondering what like in terms of what you're going to talk about I know you're going to talk about your life But when you're at an event you also try to give it some local flavor and and talk about some of your knowledge and experiences and interactions with That local familia And so can you give us a little preview of maybe some of the things that You find interesting about cleveland or some of the interactions that you had with the cleveland family during your time in in the in the life Yeah, well, you know, cleveland is one of those cities that you know, it's not really talked about when you think of You know, cause in austria in this country, obviously you think of new york You think of chicago right away sometimes kansas city tampa, maybe new orleans uh, detroit And cleveland comes to mind, but it's not really spoken about that much and it's got a great history. I think Well, depends how you look at it. I mean, it's got a good history in my former life of of some pretty substantial people being involved Al Capone used to visit there quite a bit So i'm going to talk a little bit about the history and the lore I met a few guys from cleveland When I would visit my dad, he was in prison in leavenworth and a few of the more prominent guys won't get into it now I met in a visiting room got a little friendly with them actually visited cleveland And met with one of them at one point in time So we're going to be talking about that and little italy I mean, i've never been to little italy there But you know, I put out that video and it was so nice a number of people from some of the restaurants in town Contacted me and wanted to host me for dinner and really, you know offered to uh, you know to Have me come and just you know open their doors to me. So there Uh, you know, I think there's a museum there that people Reached out to us also. So i'm looking forward to spending an extra day there going down to literally italy meeting some people And you know just enjoying the the culture and the scene as it is today michael, um I don't want you to give away too much of what you're going to talk about in june But you were you were a young up-and-comer in the 70s when The cleveland family started to implode um I believe the the the war there between the italians and the irish Which is just really fascinating. It's like something out of a movie script I mean that's the kind of stuff that was happened during prohibition. It really didn't other than This one situation in cleveland. You really didn't have irish and italian Squaring off against each other, but in cleveland you did in in from about 1976 to 78 You had an all-out war And some of those guys were actually taking counsel In new york city not with the columbos, but I believe with Some of the genovese And some of the gambinos, but were you aware? I mean you you remember in the 70s hearing that in cleveland They're blowing people up in cars and the irish are trying to take over for the italians. Oh, yeah I mean it was there was so many car bombings back then and like I said Uh during that time my dad was in leavenworth from 70 to 75. I thought you were talking about later on You're talking about back in the 70s. I'm talking back in the 70s and then from 75 to 80 was in atlanta But a couple of guys from cleveland were in there and we were talking about it in the visiting room So, yeah, I was well aware of it and it's true. I mean, you know normally You know at least you go back to the days of prohibition when everybody was warring with everybody But uh after lucky, you know put the commission together. You didn't see much of that. You didn't see families Warring among themselves, you know that that doesn't happen whenever there's a war in our life It's always a civil war and it's always over leadership. You know normally a power struggle But back then it was out of the ordinary that the irish really uh, you know, they they went to battle A lot of guys got killed and we know some of the big stories there some of the guys and again I won't mention their names now. I'm gonna save it But that was uh, I was a unique situation. Yes, it did bleed into new york Because you got to understand the real seat of power for close and oyster in this country really was in new york I mean, we had five members on the commission Genevieve's family very powerful back then and uh, I remember fat Tony was uh Was pretty much the acting boss him and chin And uh, they called the shots or they they had a lot of influence throughout the entire country And they did intercede uh in cleveland at that time Well, I think they're in just a little tidbit. I don't know if people know this But you had both sides of that war doing business in new york with the five families because danny green who was the leader of the of the insurgency that was the boss of The loosely coined irish mafia or the they called themselves the Celtic club or Celtic club but danny green was in some Uh, wholesale Meet and deals with paul castellano who was the boss of the gambitos at that time and So it wasn't just jimmy liquevoli And his guys going to new york to take counsel. You also had the other side danny greens going to meet with castellano um, and I think if if green hadn't have been murdered in 78 In cleveland via car bomb. I think there was some talks that castellano was going to draw him to new york And they were just going to kill him in new york Yeah, I mean he was definitely going to go one way the other He was renegade and you know listen bottom line is um You know, we stick together when it comes to that, you know, even if we're Not too pleased with the family that might be involved in the war. We're going to stick together We stick with our own at that point Uh, you know, we got involved in new york with the westies Uh, big irish group, but we worked with them. They worked with us and uh, I was pretty close with one or two of them there One's doing life in prison right now, but um, yeah, I mean danny green. He stepped over the line. No doubt Yeah, I was going to ask you about that michael. I mean, I still want to talk about cleveland But just speaking of irish gangsters in general, obviously you're known for you had some lucrative Partnerships with with russian, uh mobsters, but I was going to ask you about the the irish in new york during you know during your heyday um, did you know guys like jimmy burk or uh, obviously henry hill you're in the movie michael's in the movie good fellas, so Famous for people that don't know Famous scene where they're introducing all of the members of the crew when they go to the bamboo lounge And they say this is mikey francisi Yeah, classic scene. So did you you mentioned the westies? Did you interact with some of the other irish guys like jimmy burk or henry hill? Well, I knew jimmy and henry both very well henry I got to know During that whole boston College scam when he was working there. He he uh, he gave me some information. I made a couple of bets made a few bucks with him So I knew him quite well. He was uh You know, Henry was always in trouble Honestly, he never looked as good as he did in good fellas. I can tell you that And I was uh, I was very close with poli vario. He was out on long island And I can tell you so many incidents that occurred with henry hill But jimmy, I knew fairly well as a matter of fact, uh, he did me a real solid When I finally went to prison Uh, when they were transporting me back to california, they brought me um into lewisburg penitentiary And they had opened up the basement at that time because the basement was condemned But they opened it up because they had an overflow of inmates and they had to put them somewhere So, you know the feds they don't care. It's condemned. They put you in there And uh, the night I got there, uh, one of the co's called me. He says I need you to go into the bathroom And I said what for he said just go in the bathroom So I go in the bathroom and I go by the uh the window and you know, just like in the movies A pillowcase comes down on on a string or a rope And uh, I open it up and there's cigarettes and coffee and everything that you need in there, you know And there would a big note on there that said love jimmy anything you need let us know They were all upstairs, you know, so many of us were there So, uh, it was funny because uh, they had two phones only two phones and the phones were active every other day They'd be shut off one day on the next and for me when I was in prison All I cared about was staying in touch with my family my wife and my kids So I said man, there's 250 guys down here with two phones every other day. We're not going to get any time So I went over there was a a gang in there that kind of controlled everything And I went over to and I said who's your leader over here? So he said he pointed him out I said bring him in the bathroom. I want to talk to him. So he comes in I opened up the pillowcase because I didn't smoke and I didn't eat any of that stuff I said here you go. I said I got cigarettes. I got smokes anything that you want I said you got just let me know. I said but that one phone belongs to me And he said you got a deal and that was it. So jimmy kept sending me stuff I was in there for about four months before they took me out But at least I had to use to a phone all day every other day. So it was great Those little things those little things mean what in there trust me Yeah, I can I can imagine. Um um I just wanted to ask you something else about the the westies and see what you think because I I know you like to Talk about the culture of the life not not just you know the the crimes and the rackets but the culture and uh One thing I read about the westies was that when they were working so closely with the italians like yourself and others That um, I think it was jimmy coon and scott could correct me or not, but jimmy coon and He he got to the point where he was so close with the italians That he started wearing silk suits and pinky rings and hanging out in brooklyn And my understanding is that some of the rank and file westies some of the old school irish guys hoods In hell's kitchen started to resent that that jimmy coon and Started to forget that he was irish. Uh, you have any thoughts? I always think that's kind of an amusing a story I don't know if it's true, but I wonder if you have any thoughts on that michael Well the fellow that I mentioned, you know early on I said I knew one of them It was jimmy coon and I knew him quite well And uh real guy good guy tough guy, no doubt about it. And yeah, he was close to us. I mean there's no question about it Uh, yeah, there was some friction, you know, he had some resentment and uh with mickey featherstone and they had their They're falling out, but um You know, uh, they were a good crew. I can tell you that and we use them for various things Uh, you know Different things that we had to get done. So, uh, but yeah, you know Listen, the street life is is crazy. You know, there's a lot of treachery in that life a lot of jealousy and envy Uh, you can't avoid it. Uh, no matter who you are if you're doing well in that life You always got to watch yourself. You got to be very smart and intuitive, you know, know your surroundings Know who you got to deal with know who's looking at you. It's uh, The tough life in that regard, but you can navigate it. I did I love quoting, uh, my one of my mentors, uh, george anesthesia. I think he was so Succinct with this little blurb of his where he said, you know, in in the world of the mafia You don't have to worry about the double cross. You got to worry about the triple cross and the quadruple cross So, you know, who your enemies are and who your allies are can oftentimes, you know, blur Yeah, well, you know, you got to be aware. You got to, you know In a case like mine I mean, I became a major target of law enforcement from day one because my dad was so high profile And uh, you know, I had 18 arrests that seven indictments two federal racketeering cases I was constantly under investigation at one point in time They had a 14 agency task force that had banned together that would meet in a courthouse in long island in union dale Twice a month and their whole objective was to put me in jail forever So you got that to deal with and then you got, you know, the guys on the street, you know I was one of the younger guys And you know, I was doing pretty well. I was making a lot of money. I had my own plane. I had a helicopter I had a lot of guys. I had the russians involved with me And the old time is resent that, you know, they really do so you had to be you had to know how to use diplomacy you had to Learn how not to rub people the wrong way and you had to keep your ego in check Extremely important because that's what gets you in trouble in that life in a big way You got to keep it in check You know, just to say something. Yeah, I was just going to say one thing, uh, Michael, you mentioned during, uh, your talk in detroit and I don't want to Uh, spoil too much for the the audience in cleveland But you mentioned that that was a specially important lesson you learned, uh Before you went to prison that your father was the one who reminded you that that that he's told you was inevitable You're going to go to the joint at some point. It's just a just a matter of time in our life You know that that that's going to happen and that you need to uh to keep your ego in check when you're in prison If you could uh talk about that a little bit Well, my father told me he said my three words are going to save you a lot of headache and aggravation in prison He said please thank you and excuse me And he said, you know, you're bunking to say somebody excuse me You want to cut it? Somebody on the line, please do you mind if I get in there? You know, I got a friend there And then of course, thank you somebody's polite to you or gives you something. Thank you and the reason for that Is because so many guys in prison that never got any respect on the street They want respect in there because they want to show off to their you know friends that they're somebody And so for the littlest nonsense, you know, I've seen so many things happen in there because people have an arrogant attitude Listen, john gotty got beat up in there. You know, uh Carmine persico, you know had his issues in there They don't care who you are when guys are doing life in prison. What do they got to lose? You know, they don't care. So you gotta you got to be mindful of that I never had a problem never had an issue at any time in prison And for that reason, you know, you're just uh The only time I had a problem about be honest with was with my own guys Did I tell you a quick story? Uh, I can say pete malano, you know pete, you know, his father came out the boss of la that eventually or that whose Father was the conciliary of cleveland. Yeah, exactly Well, I got along with pete. He was doing time in terminal island where I was and he was kind of I don't know if you're gonna really call him the boss of la because they didn't really have a But you know, he was he was a lead guy So him and uh, you know, sam shuantino a really nice guy Uh, you know out of new orleans or had good contacts in new orleans And it was about maybe six seven eight guys in there, right? And you know, I used to when I got out on the yard because they tried to lock me down a bunch of times when I was Out on the yard. I used to play softball. I used to walk the track I wanted to make my time go and a lot of the black guys, you know They would play ball and I'd hang with them and you know, we'd have a good time So one day pete calls me And he says mike, I want to see he sent somebody down so I go see him And I said pete, what's up? He's mike. How come, you know, you don't hang with us. He said, you know, you're always courteous You say hello, and we don't hang out with us. We always see on the yard You're playing ball. You know, you hang out with some of the black guys. You said why? I said pete very simple. I says first of all, I do my own time I said second of all, you guys hang out tell war stories and play cars. I have no interest in that I said, that's not how I do my time And he says, well, you know, you're hanging around with these kind of guys. I said pete, let me remind you of something I'm in jail because my Italian friend that became an informant and informed against me So don't talk to me about other guys um, and when we settled it was nice after that, you know, and uh Uh, but I you know, I let him know that he was a nice guy But it was different than uh, you know guys that I was used to back in new york, but uh But you know, we got along I don't want you to think we didn't but you know, things happen in there And you got to just you know, you got to state your case and and speak up for yourself in a nice way Lightly, there was no reason to be disrespectful. I don't disrespect anybody You know, unless uh, they give me a reason to other than that, you know with me you got respect until you until you don't Went when you were you were making a lot of moves out in california before you got locked up Yeah Did you have to go kind of check in with melano and jimmy? Gotcha and all those guys You know, we had a rule in new york whenever you went to a city Like chicago, I had business there. I had to go in and I put it on record with my boss And then I had to go and seek out the the boss, you know a message was sent I went to see him and basically told him what I wanted to do and got his blessing or whatever, you know Um, uh, but when we went to la, hey do whatever you want. Don't worry about it Wow, yeah that that and my understanding is that a lot of new york guys were active out there from the different families It was kind of virgin territory, you know, it was funny because uh, I loved it out here You know, I'm out here now. I'm in orange county, but I love it out here And it was like, you know, just a whole different environment I was in the film business I had a lot of things going and the guys in new york would say mike. How is california? I would say terrible The words thing I don't want anybody to follow me out there. So I said, uh, that's a bad place You don't want to come out here But uh, truthfully it was especially back then it was really really beautiful It's nice now, but it was beautiful back then Can I can I segue back to cleveland because I want to ask mike You know kind of monday morning quarterbacking or doing a kind of a 40 year later autopsy of the situation I find it interesting when you're when you're studying cleveland Yeah, you I mean we already just we just talked about in the last five minutes I mean people you had a lot of guys that weren't necessarily or that were kind of moving in and out of cleveland coming from other cities Tony malano who was the conciliary of cleveland sent his two boys carmen and Pete out to la the guys that eventually took over the crime family when all this Tension erupted in the mid to late 70s were actually detroiters That had come to cleveland 20 years before that or 30 years before that But danie green and and the uh, and the Celtic club or the irish mob there They were working in tandem with the italians Throughout the 60s and first part of the 70s And then john scalish who was the longtime boss of cleveland Passes somewhat suddenly. He was having a surgery on his heart and there was some Debate or controversy about who he actually had named as his successor And eventually became jack white or james liquivoli blacky Was a guy that again traced his roots back to detroit. So us me and me and jimmy have done a lot of research on on his family But there's a lot of belief that scalish actually didn't want jimmy liquivoli that he probably wanted angelo lennardo but the the jewish de facto conciliary macy rockman Was the one who was john scalish's brother-in-law and had the one that had relayed the message to To the rest of the family about who scalish had named his replacement Some people think rockman lied and said it was jimmy liquivoli when in fact it was lennardo, but What happened? There's no debate about jimmy liquivoli was a lot of things um He wasn't really boss material and when he took over He had a very difficult time navigating his new position And then all of a sudden danie green and the guys in his camp who had been working very closely with the scalish group Um, and I think they had been dealing with scalish is under boss frankie broncato but as soon as james liquivoli takes over his under boss leo lips mosheri they Cannot get along with danie green and everything falls apart really quickly Do you do you I don't know how much you know about the history, but do you look at that and is like well if a guy jimmy liquivoli not only wasn't someone who seems to be a Or seemed to have been equipped to be a boss from everybody that i've spoken to and everything that i've read jimmy liquivoli didn't want to be a boss so i mean do you look at that situation and think well maybe if The power transition would have been different Then you wouldn't have had all of all of the um dust ups which really I mean, I know it was 40 years ago, but the cleveland family never really recovered I think from from my research. I think there's still something there. I don't think it's defunct, but it's To say it's a shadow of its former self would be an offensive to shadows Uh, so do you look at that situation and think well they just miscalculated on who they put in the boss's seat? Well listen, you know first of all the you know all over the country It's a shadow of what it used to be you know the golden the golden years of our life were from the 50s right through the mid 80s and then when the Rico statue came in everybody went crazy. That was the end of the life as we knew it um But listen, you know leadership is everything The wrong guy is in the place. I mean look John Gotti He was the wrong guy for that position Not because he he wasn't capable because of the way he conducted himself. You can't you can't be that much in the public eye It just can't be you don't only hurt yourself, but you bring people down with you He didn't do it intentionally. You know, he wasn't looking to hurt but you know, that's why guys like carlo gambino and and uh, you know Frank Costello they tried to be as low-key as they possibly could and as a result, you know, they had some longevity in that life, but you know, listen You know, I don't know the intricacies about it, but leadership is everything in that life. It's everything And it's leadership is everything everywhere. Let's face it. You know, you can be a boss It doesn't automatically mean you're a good leader Right with that position, but that doesn't mean you're gonna You know, you're qualified to deal with the family. It's it's it's very hard. It's a lot of work And a lot of knowledge to run a family trust me You got all different crazy guys out there doing different things that you have to reign in And look, I knew it just from I wasn't a boss, but I had my crew And I knew, you know, just the 15 18 guys I had around me. It was a lot of work I would never want to be the boss never number one. You got so much exposure And number two, it's a it's a real hard job Yeah, okay, you make money, but there's other ways, you know So, I mean, I would have to say there was probably a durable leadership Maybe things could have been avoided, but you know, who am I to talk after the fact? You know, it's I don't want to be a Monday morning quarterback because I'm not that familiar, but You know, like every other city Cleveland had its problems. Chicago had its problems. New York, obviously Everywhere you go. We just we devastated in many ways Just timing who lasted the longest To your point about how Rico changed everything again, it's tight right back into Cleveland Depending on what you consider acting boss or real boss James the Cavoli was the first official boss To be convicted under Rico. I know they got Fungi Thierry of the of the Genovese But I think there were some questions about whether Fungi was the actual boss or was he a front boss, but Jack White aka James Lickavoli was convicted Under the Rico Act and it was really the opening of the both Thierry and Lickavoli were the first two mob bosses to be Uh tried under Are indicted under the racketeering influence and corruption act and from that point on You know all bets are off Yeah, well, it was devastating You know people say Gotti ruined the life Gotti didn't help in many ways, but You know it was Rico. Trust me when I tell you that Rico created more informants That you can imagine and at the end of the day it's informants that pull you down So, um, it was devastating still is Who was who was the uh, the the saying uh, the famous saying that uh with Rico they can indict a ham sandwich Who said that I can't remember it was somebody in the life I can't remember It was actually a lawyer. I don't remember who's wrote phone or whatever, but yeah, they said a grand jury can indict Joey the town lombardo from chicago was caught on a wire being like, you know You can in you can indict a cheeseburger Under the racketeering act and get a conviction and then I think what Yeah, it was a ham sandwich. It's not the racketeering act, you know the uh, it's it's the grand jury. I don't know I I would be I would ask anybody To name one situation where a prosecutor brought a case to a grand jury and they didn't hand down an indictment Doesn't happen. They do whatever the prosecutor wants You know, it's it's supposed to be a good system, but it's not Because you don't have a lawyer in there. You can't defend yourself If you go in there and speak on your own behalf, you're actually putting yourself in trouble Um, it's it's it's not a good system. It's really not Um, and again, I would ask if there's any lawyers listening or anybody out there Give me one situation where a prosecutor brought a case to a grand jury and the grand jury failed to bring An indictment look we just had it with trump at new york the biggest nonsense ridiculous case you could imagine um, but of course they they hand down an indictment it just It's it's crazy. It's it's a silly system, but it is what it is And if you're if you're the federal government and you're bringing a racketeering case You have a 99 percent chance of conviction. I mean, it's uh, the the deck is stacked heavily against Whoever the defendant is and i'm i'm not passing judgment on it I'm just saying that robber blakley wrote this law back in the early 70s It took the government a good decade plus to understand How to use it and now, you know 40 years later 35 years later They're now taking this the same approach to Busting the mob and they're going after, you know politicians. I mean in detroit We had kwami. Kilpatrick go down on a riko case. He got the largest sentence ever Handed down and in a political riko. He ended up getting pardoned by trump when trump walk got out of office I have my issues with that but that will be that can be said for another day But kwami. Kilpatrick raped and pillaged our city and probably killed two prostitutes strippers In the process of doing that or people Loyal to him did so And he got a 30-year sentence and ended up only doing about seven years But that's neither here nor there but uh, it happened in chicago With two different governors george ryan and roba goyvich. It happened in providence with buddy cianci So the government has has taken this riko law to that initially was made to go after the mob and now is is going after You know other targets using it So it's a very very Lethal weapon. It's not now. They've been doing that since the beginning Right people don't understand. Whatever you weaponize the government at some point in time. It's going to turn against you also You know, they weaponize the government to now to go after their political enemies. They'll they'll use riko But even before that, you know, there's a civil riko stature. They were going to have to guys on wall street You know to take your money. I mean it's Every time you give the government an inch They want to take a yard and they'll never give it back never and that's what people don't understand You know, that's why you know, we're in such a A dangerous time In society right now because the government is weaponizing the department of justice and law enforcement agencies To go after their political enemies and you can't do that That's not what this country is built upon. You don't you know, the people in power are not supposed to weaponize You know the the administration to go after their enemies And that's what's happening and listen, you know Whether trump trump is going to be okay, whether it becomes president or not He's got plenty of money. He's going to defend this case. It's going to be all right, you know But what they did to him was horrible Let's face it. I mean they've been after that guy since 2016 because they don't like him because he's not You know, one of the boys he doesn't care about them. He didn't need him. He had his own money And I believe the guy really wanted to do good for america. So what did they do? They come after him I don't think anybody's been into mom guys haven't been as investigated as much as he has But I gotta tell you I I agree with you with what you're talking about specifically with this case out of manhattan I don't disagree with you. But what I will tell you Putting my I have a law degree putting my lawyer hat on Donald trump has quite a bit of exposure And major issues coming down the line that have nothing to do With this manhattan case because I I I predict he's going to be indicted another two or three times before the end of the year And those cases could be a lot stronger than what you have in manhattan If if he violated the law and they had the evidence he's like anybody else you go after him and you do what you gotta do Uh, but until or unless that happens Uh, he's an innocent guy at this point. I don't know what he's done You know people are saying well, he got away with so much in the past Well, what does that have to do with anything? You know what I mean? You don't prosecute people today for what they got away with in the past that you couldn't prosecute for Uh, you know at that time That's not what the system is about, you know, I had arguments with people about oj simpson and that whole case And people said well, everybody knows oj killed, you know, his wife and that and that young man and I said Yeah, I believe that too. I lived there. My kids used to dance with his his kids I mean, we knew the story and I believe that, you know, he was guilty But the government didn't prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt And if the government doesn't prove their case beyond a reasonable doubt then a jury should acquit them And that's the safeguard in our system. That's it Well, it was a brilliant defense by johnny cock. That was one of the greatest defense attorney jobs ever Yeah, I don't want to get into the intricacies of the case, but whatever They didn't prove their case and if you don't prove the case the defendant's supposed to go free Our system is built upon that principle You know, the government has enough weapons. They have enough, you know weapons in their arsenal to go after somebody legitimately And you know, we used to tell guys on the street fbi agents listen You got a job to do You do your job. You're on one side. We're on the other just don't frame us You get us you get us we got it and there was no hard feelings We understood that but don't frame us If you can't get us with all the weapons that you have in your arsenal and everything you got and shame on you You know the flip side of that Is i've had people jopa stone donnie brass goes a good friend. I like him a lot only met him once on the street Thank god for that because I may not be here. He was with his record Yes But you know guys, uh, michael, how can you be friends with that guy? He put so many guys away I said, well, that was his job I said you're mad because he did his job better than we did ours That was his job. He wasn't in formant He didn't flip that was his job. That's what he took an oath to do So he did it better than we did. What are you mad at? You know, and that's what I believe and i'll stick to that principle You know the mic's point about sorry jimmy, let me just make one point to mic's point about how The the rico act has been this isn't a brand new Approach about going after politicians, you know, the cnc case was in the late 90s So you're right It's been you know 25 years of this and that was the first time that they really Nailed a uh a political leader, but they've taken that as as kind of entree now to To do what they've been doing now for the last 25 years, but to your point. Yeah And I know just as many Retired FBI agents and retired DE agents that I know Retired wise guys and I'll tell you there's really at the end of the day There ain't that much difference between the two the two groups of people Well, I was gonna Mention something michael. I think a friend of yours we we interviewed george christy former hell's angels Member one time and he was mentioned that he was friendly with you I think you guys did serve some time together and uh George is a great guy too and he he said To your point about civil liberties. He said look, I'm not saying I'm a saint If you can if you could catch me and if you could get me on what I did Then I'll do my I'll take my medicine, but don't manufacture evidence. Don't frame me Because that's not how the system is going to work and I always thought that that was a fair A way of of framing it. Yeah, and bring it back I went to jail for a crime that I was guilty of I pled guilty. I did my time no hard feelings The juliani case when he indicted me I had as much reason being on that case as you did and nothing to do with it as a result I was acquitted But it cost me a couple of million bucks to defend myself and almost two years out of my life You know being on trial the trial lasted several months and then defending I mean preparing for the trial before that So, I mean they get you one way or the other, but at least I had my freedom, but You know, um, I want I'm not saying he Framed me But the evidence was was nonsense. I shouldn't have been in that case and you know as a result the jury sold through it We got acquitted, but You know, I feel guilty you're guilty. You know you do your time I was just going to ask because I know we're we're getting close on time here I wanted to ask you Michael back to about the culture is um, you know, you mentioned you worked with some russian guys You worked with some irish guys You were in new york, that's the the sort of nexus of of the life, but obviously there's guys in other families. You talked about la cleveland What was your sense when you would meet a friend? from Detroit cleveland another familiar um Did you view them as equals because I I know you've had some interactions with sammy the bull And and scott had a conversation with sammy the bull and and grovano is not here to defend himself but but but sammy Was pretty condescending about non new york families The first thing I or one of the first thing I said to him was like, did you know any guys from detroit? He says Detroit michigan. Is that even in the united states of america? Yeah, so he was so I was running michael Well, how did you when you would meet it when you were in the life and you met a guy from another Family from another part of the country. How did how did you did you view them? It's like this is a michi. No, street. This is this is our friend doesn't matter And made guy is a made guy regardless of where he came from and you know, I wasn't being condescending Pete malano. He was a made guy respected that Uh, but you also speak your peace when you have to speak up, you know I mean he was the one that approached me but no, I mean look I met a lot of guys in prison too from all over the country and As far as I was concerned, you're a made guy. You're a made guy. You you you earn that respect By getting your button. So, you know, say look sammy is sammy. He's a character in that regard You know, he and I get along fine now. We had our uh, uh, a little skirmishes, but it didn't go anywhere, but You know, if that's his attitude, what could I say? But you know sammy sammy At least now I didn't know him well on the street at all But at least now he's come down to earth quite a bit Maybe when he's off camera, you know, he's got a great family I love his son as a matter of fact, I was going to take his son away if I said, hey, you report to me now You don't report to your dad anymore He was he was happy to do that, but I'm only kidding. But yeah, you know, look no guys are made guy regardless. Look I I One of my cellmates was rosario gambino was a filly guy And he was related to carlo and you know, we we spent uh, quite some time together And you know gave him all the respect that uh, that he Earned, you know, and he felt the same with me. So I don't differentiate because of a city or a family or anything. No, look, obviously from new york They look up to you as well. You guys are from new york You just you just got that feeling that they were looking at you that way. So um But no, I if sammy said that I disagree Mike I mean you michael you you have a situation in new york at least we're talking about the heyday You're talking about families that had, you know, some of them had a thousand guys in it 800 guys A big family outside of new york if they got 100 guys, it's a big family so Well, I mean look We had during my time in that life. We had 750 made guys That comprised all five families The biggest families, you know, the gambino and the jenobis family each had about 250 Uh, 200 250 and you know bananos and ours. We were smaller. We had 115 guys Now we had a lot of associates, right? But you know, nobody had you know, a thousand guys I mean, I guess I was talking about the all the made guys in new york city Yeah, you know, again 750 but It didn't matter, you know, I mean look our values. That's my boss. How come You know, they got double the amount of guys we do and he said well, we go for quality not quantity Well, michael, uh before we wrap up, uh, you want to uh Mention to our audience how they can find out more about your your channel and your books and your website and and uh Different different ways to interact with you. Yeah one thing I want to mention You know, I've recently created a platform It's called mob ties vip.com mob ties vip.com And uh, we have a platform there where we're really trying to do a lot of good for people We're creating a lot of content. We're having a lot of zoom calls. We're putting Meet and greet events together and as a little secret surprise, I can let you guys in on it Mike Tyson will be joining me shortly on that platform. We're going to be working together Mike is in a position now Um where he really wants to give back. He really really does is very sincere about it very genuine Wants to use, you know, the benefit of his experiences throughout his life to help people and we're joining together in that regard And we're going to be announcing that soon Um, but anybody that's interested look, you know Men men got to be men today. I can tell you that we're helping a lot of guys Anybody that's interested mob ties vip.com go in take a look no obligation, of course, but We provide a lot of good resources for people a lot of good men have jumped on board this Uh chas parmentaries with me a guy by the name of tommy metola used to run Sony records mariah kelly tommy metola as please google him This guy's the biggest power players in the music industry. Yeah big deal He's a he's a he's almost in some ways bigger than the other guys you met Well, yeah, and uh, you know, they all want to do the same thing. So we're we're really trying to help people And uh, so far the reaction has been tremendous And we're building and it's growing and uh, we want to become the biggest platform in the world That's known to be giving back and helping people. We have the charity that's involved with us. So Again mob ties vip.com My book mafia democracy you can go on amazon. It's out there. You want a signed copy from me? You can go on anyone in my wet my social media sites. I think the book is available Um, and really that's it everything else is good We got a tv series in development based upon my life that I think they'll be in making an announcement the next several months Um, everything else is good. I'm looking forward to being in lorraine And uh, I'm meeting a lot of people from cleveland. I love the city. I've been there many times Looking forward to little italy and maybe you guys will hook up again and uh, you know, we'll shoot the breeze some more It's yeah. Yeah next time you're in detroit. Michael. Yeah, well, uh, and i'm always in touch with your camp So, uh, I would look forward to that would be fun even cleveland. I mean, depending on what i'm doing that week I mean, it's really I I had uh Hit the siren benny my My netflix documentary white boy, uh was produced out of cleveland So I spent and then the white boy rick film that I worked on was also shot in cleveland So I got a a nice dose of that city from around 2017 to 2020 and I really fell in love with it Yeah, and it's only about We I can get to cleveland from detroit in two and a half hours. So We I could potentially come out and see you I just want to ask one more thing not really relating to the life or anything But one of the things I fell in love with uh with mike's content I want to see if you're still doing it so you can promote it Uh is you was your movie reviews? Yeah, are you are you still dabbling in that? We're still doing them. Yeah, I got I got a couple online now We we ran out of you know movies for a while So, uh, but we're starting to replenish. We got more in the bank now. We're gonna be doing that I thought it was so great I mean for to have someone like mike be able to mike will be able to take you through the movies that he was Analyzing and giving you this is what you know, this is the the real this is the the fictional and then help you kind of Melved those two worlds as a viewer to kind of understand What's what was fiction and what was nonfiction? I love I loved everyone I've watched. Well, I'm glad you enjoyed it. Thank you Listen, I appreciate it. I am coming to detroit. I think we're doing uh I destroyed area two more wine tastings there at a couple of restaurants. I forget the name of the restaurants Sometime in may I believe so It happens. We'll let you know and I'm sure about it. He'll he'll reach out to you Yeah, please and we'll promote it on our social media. Uh, please check out michael's content on youtube. Please read his books Please check out his website. He's the best. He's a superstar Michael we really appreciate your time and uh, please uh, subscribe to our video channel original gangsters podcast Thank you again, michael. Good luck with everything. Have fun in cleveland guys. I appreciate it. Thanks very much and until the next time Take care. God bless. Michael. Take care everyone