Can someone please clarify wot the deal was with this . Were they made into the bonnanos or made in Italy ? Was nicolo and his associates made in Italy and under the flag of the bonnanos ?? Wot abot the violi and the cotroni's ? Was Vito rizzuto a bonnano soldier ? It's all confusing to me .

i do not claim to have definite, 100% correct answers, but this is my picture of the story:

- rizzutos were made in america in the bonanno family, under which boss, i do not know
- it's unpossible to me made in 2 families
- cotroni/violi possibly had their own kind of "family" until they became affiliated with and later more or less absorbed by the rizzutos e.g. bonannos (due to the galante connection in the 50's for example)
- Vito rizzuto a bonnano soldier -> yes. there are enough evidence in surveillance pictures of him with joe massino around the time of the 3-capo murders. After the falling out caused by the murder of gerlando "george from canada" sciascia he became somewhat independent, what was possible because the many legal troubles the bonanno family had in this timeframe

Cheers Micky , that's kind of wot I thought , it's a mystery . I figured vito was a bonnano soldier , wot about his father ? Plus if rizzuto was a bonnano soldier and he was making guys what family was he making them into ?? Surely he wouldn't have the authority to make them in the bonnanos ? Wot about rocco sollecito and Francesco arcadi ?

Vito proposed guys to the leadership of the Bonanno's I'd imagine.

Yeah , it's really a tangled web , hard to figure out who was with who

Vito was made in Canada, into the Sicilian mafia, not the american. They were technically under a Bonanno flag, but loyalties were always with Cattolica Eraclea.
He was never going to take orders from what he and his family (the Rizzuto family blood and mafia) considered a group of thugs and glorified rats, which is how they looked upon the American mafia.

Even in the 70's/80's?

Especially after he was passed over for UB, he started to work more and more independently from Cotroni and Violi, doing things on his own, not asking for permission, etc.

Thanks Carmela much appreciated

Were there any hits that could potentially be linked to reprisals for Sciscia getting whacked? I've always wondered about that.

Now everyone sees why I laugh when people think he was kicking up to Massino and was still kicking up until the day he died to NYC.

george s. was huge as the in between.

Anyone that says that Rizzuto was taking orders from Massino is delusional.

I agree! I think all they did was let the Bonanno's use their pipeline to smuggle drugs and that was it. They did just enough to make the Bonanno's think they would do anything for them and kept it that way until George was killed. Just my opinion though.

Cotroni was inducted into the Bonanno family by Galante in de mid 1950s and after Galante's departure became the Bonanno family's capodecina in Montreal. The Cotronis were very close with the Bonannos and very loyal as well. Nick Rizzuto was a mafioso for over a decade in Sicily before moving to Canada, so I'm inclined to think he was already made before being absorbed into the Montreal crew. Otherwise he would have been made into the Bonanno family by Cotroni. I think that his son Vito was made into the Bonanno family. In 1981 Vito was summoned by Sciascia and Massino to participate in the murder of the three capos. Perhaps he was made after making his bones, but it was said that he was already put in charge by his father when the latter was organizing the drug trade in Venezuela, so he could have already been made by the late 1970s.

After Cotroni's death in 1984 Montreal gradually became more independent from New York. This was mainly because Sciascia, as the Montreal crew's representative in New York, gave the Rizzutos a free hand. It is even debatable whether Sciascia was really the caporegime or Nick Rizzuto. Both came from the same village of Cattolica Eraclea. Anyway, the direct link between Montreal and New York broke with Sciascia's murder. I personally don't believe Montreal ever declared itself independent, but the Rizzutos were from that point on firmly in charge of Montreal until Vito was incarcerated.

Does this mean he participated in the 3 captains murder for charity?

Back in the 1970s or 1980s (the time Vito Rizzuto was made) they didn't look at the Bonanno family like that. This came later on after Sciascia was killed followed by Massino and his buddies becoming government witnesses. Back in the 1970s the Bonanno family was still a force to be reckoned with and at the very centre of the heroin trade, being closely affiliated with the Sicilians such as the [BadWord] and Caruana families and Nick Rizzuto as well.

I didn't mean to imply the Bonannos weren't a force to be reckoned with, but Rizzuto's never saw them as their authority fully or where they pledged their allegiance. Rizzuto stood close to his blood family and insulated himself with them, and that included his familial ties to C-C's.

I agree with you on that, which is also why I'm skeptical whether Nick Rizzuto was made into the Bonanno family as he was very close to the Sicilians. Perhaps that could be a reason why he wasn't named the new capo after Cotroni passed away and it became Sciascia instead. It would also explain why he refused to take orders from Montagna.

Did Massino say Montreal still paid tribute after he clipped Sciasca?

There are so many conflicting theories about 1) the true nature of the relationship between the Bonanno Family and the Montreal Mafia (past and present), and 2) the made status of particular Montreal Mafia members (past and present), that I have to remind myself every once in a while to re-examine what is "known" about this relationship and what is "known" about the crime-family affiliation of some Montreal Mafia members. (I also have to remind myself to calm down about trying to find definitive answers to a lot of these types of questions.)

In this thread I'm not going to go through all the "evidence" for and against, as doing so would take forever. Because I'm feeling lazy, I'll provide for now just this one link:

The Sixth Family: Bonannos and Montreal; Vito a Bonanno Soldier?

Always remember that law-enforcement intelligence, organized-crime-commission reports, informants' testimony, and forum posters' posts are not above being wrong. Canadian organized-crime reporters and authors have certainly changed their views dramatically over the years about particular Italian crime groups and Italian organized-crime figures in Canada.

Some of you who have read Lee Lamothe and Antonio Nicaso's book about the Caruana-Cun[t]reras, Bloodlines: the rise and fall of the mafia's royal family, know that the authors identified Nick Rizzuto Sr. as someone who was affiliated with the Caruana-Cun[t]rera mafia family back in Agrigento and someone who continued this affiliation after he moved to Canada.

On the other hand, those of you who have read Mafia inc. will recall a paragraph in the book about the infamous Sicilian turncoat Tomasso Buscetta allegedly asking Nick Rizzuto Sr. about the latter's affiliation. Apparently, based on Nick Sr.'s answer, Buscetta concluded the Rizzutos were under the Bonanno flag.

Naturally, all of us have our prejudices regarding the reliability of what informants and turncoats tell law enforcement; of what testimony witnesses give in court. Some may dismiss what Sal Vitale had to say about the meeting with Vito Rizzuto in Montreal in 2001 because of a lack of confidence in how truthful Vitale was about such a meeting and about the relationship between the Bonannos and Montreal. Personally, while I don't believe what Sal Vitale has said about Gerlando Sciascia's role in the killing of Joe Lo Presti, I do tend to believe that Vitale and Anthony Urso met with Vito to ask Vito, in a roundabout way, to go from being the acting Bonanno captain in Montreal to the official Montreal-based Bonanno captain--regardless of the fact that Massino, Vitale, Urso, Frank Lino, et al. did not seem to have a very good handle on what the Montreal "crew" was all about, how many members this crew had, and so on.

I think I remember reading that Vito was made in the Bonanno family following the 3 captains hit. After Sciascia was murdered he was invited to NYC by Massino to be bumped up to captain of the montreal "crew".

Obviously Vito never took him up on that.

In any case I think the reality here is that the Rizzutos had familial ties to the Agrigento clans and traditional ties to the Bonannos. It seems that they only paid lip-service to those traditional ties, but it would have been the official "running story" I'm sure, that, on the books, they are a crew of the Bonannos. It could be the Buscetta simply didn't know any more than that.

This is the best way it can be put. And like I did say, they were under the Bonanno flag, of course, but their loyalties were not with them.

And as antimafia knows, as we go way back..I've not read any of those books so whatever knowledge I have is from my own little head, which makes me ignorant to a lot of specific names, and dates. But what I know, I know.

I would bet galante made Vito the second the books where open in 75 76. Nick had galantes ear. He oked the hit on violi a rusty capo. I don't think galante was allowed to go back to Montreal but that was his crown jewel his her I on pipeline the reason he died. What was he boss from 74 to 79 that when he made all the bononnos Massimo lino spero all them zips. So he diffintly made all the guys under nick rizzuto. I wonder if Massimo inducted nick Jr or OKed it.

pmac, Nick Jr was made? I always got the impression he wasn't.

Its know nick sr got permission from galante to take out violin gets his kid made by him. Why would nick sr go to another family all his guys were them her I on pizza case guys. Vito was still very young when galante took over in 75. But I'm guessing well George from Canada was capo early 90tys Vito probably asked him to ask massino to put him on a list pass it around and make induct him up there. Maybe sent spero up to do the meeting. Make sense.

I was reading some guys testimony. Felix from the genovese he was inducted in a house in Springfield mass in 82. That's 3 plus house from NYC so I think his capo did the ceremony with the blessings of NYC chin. But maybe fat tony was up here back then he commuted a lot to Boston/new england.

I'm really interested in one part of the cicale book who Vito was still in contact with in the bonano family after Georges death. There was way to much money to be made to caught off all dealings with the 5 families. And a lot of guys still have blood relatives up there.

I think there's more chance of the Gambino's working with Montreal then the Bonanno's today.

I don't doubt Vito was still in contact with Massino and co after they killed George but I bet there was tension, obviously after Massino flipped all ties were severed. Even though Capeci seems to think Montreal and the Sicilians in Ny were pushing for Vinny Asaro to be boss a few years back..I call bullshit.

There have been some Gambino's up there recently (last year or two) meeting with guys from Montreal. The Caruana-Cun trera ties to, and in, Montreal are still tight with the Gambino's.